Lexicon · Mathematical and computational foundations
Reasoning
Fully specified name: Reasoning (concept)
Deriving conclusions from premises under stated rules.
- Scope note
- A valid inference can depend on an incorrect premise.
- Synonyms
- None recorded as true synonyms in this context.
- Monograph
- Description logics (planned; brief only)
- External mappings
- None recorded. In W0 no mapping to SNOMED CT® or any external authority is asserted for this entry. A future mapping record will carry source system, identifier, version, relation type, evidence, author, confidence where meaningful, and review state.
- Formal status
- Editorial entry only. It is not part of any released ontology and a prose edit here changes no formal definition.
Draft. This entry is an unreviewed draft. Its sources have not been checked by a named person and no domain reviewer has approved it. Treat every claim as provisional.
Notes
Reasoning, in the sense used here, is the mechanical derivation of conclusions from stated premises under stated rules. A description-logic reasoner takes an ontology's axioms and computes the class hierarchy, checks for contradictions, and determines which individuals belong to which classes. The output is valid relative to the inputs: if the axioms are right, the conclusions are right.
The scope note is the caution. Validity is not truth. If an ontology states that every agent of a certain class localizes to bone, and a particular agent is asserted to be in that class, the reasoner will conclude that it localizes to bone, and it will be wrong if either premise is wrong. The reasoner cannot tell. For a physician this is the difference between a logical consequence and a clinical finding; for a scientist it is the difference between a model's output and a measurement. The entries on Evidence and Uncertainty cover what a premise needs before it deserves to be a premise.
The word also has broader uses. Clinical reasoning is the physician's interpretive judgment; statistical reasoning draws conclusions under uncertainty rather than under logical rules; and "reasoning" in a language model is a description of behavior, not a guarantee of valid inference. The monograph on Description logics works a small example showing an inference, a non-inference, and the axioms that distinguish them.