The Naive Physics Perplex
Ernest Davis · 1997
The \\Naive Physics Manifesto " of Pat Hayes (1978) proposes a large-scale project of developing a formal theory encompassing the entire knowledge of physics of naive reasoners, expressed in a declarative symbolic form. The theory is organized in clusters of closely interconnected concepts and axioms. More recent work in the representation of commonsense physical knowledge has followed a somewhat di erent methodology. The goal has been to develop a competence theory powerful enough to justify commonsense physical inferences, and the research is organized in microworlds, each microworld covering a small range of physical phenomena. In this paper we compare the advantages and disadvantages of the two approaches. Three Scenarios Consider the following scenario: Common sense is a wild thing, savage, and beyond rules.