---
title: "Formal Theories of Action (Preliminary Report)"
authors:
  - "Vladimir Lifschitz"
doi: ""
url: "https://ijcai.org/proceedings/1987/199"
pdf: "https://ijcai.org/proceedings/1987/0199.pdf"
venue: "Proceedings of the Tenth International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence"
year: 1987
pages: "966-971"
track: "Reasoning"
keywords:
---

# Formal Theories of Action (Preliminary Report)

Vladimir Lifschitz

*Proceedings of the Tenth International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence*, pages 966-971.

## Abstract

We apply circumscription to formalizing reasoninabout the effects of actions in the framework of the situation calculus. The axiomatic description of causal connections between actions and changes allows us to solve the qualification problem and the frame problem using only simple forms of circumscription. The method is applied to the Hanks-McDermott shooting problem and to a blocks world in which blocks can be moved and painted.