Reviews for Principles of Knowledge Representation

The average rating for Principles of Knowledge Representation based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2015-01-16 00:00:00 Douglas Starbird This book is intended to be a general outline, an introduction, in fact a coursebook (for undergraduate students) in Comparative Political Theory. It is didactic and informative in many respects in terms of the different of thought it covers (Islamic, Indian and East Asian). In the beginning of each part it gives necessary background information in terms of historical contexts and how each chapter fits in them. I have two main criticisms regarding the book: First, except the introduction and transitory/contextual parts, all of the chapters are taken from other, and more importantly older, sources. The book was published in 2010 but there are chapters who were originally written in the 80s or 90s. So, many of the chapters are out of date in terms of their approach and contain already familiar subjects or ideas. As a student of Islamism/Islamic political thought, this is especially the case for me in the concerning part. I can say that I did not learn anything new. Perhaps it is similar in the case of other parts but I learnt great deal in reading them since I am not familiar with subject matters. Second, the organization or the structure of the book is problematic for me. It wouldn't be "comparative" political theory when different articles/chapters regarding different traditions are juxtaposed. I found Fred Dallmayr's approach to Comparative Political Theory problematic for he reduces the discipline to an effort to "learning from other cultures", a vision that apparently doesn't have problems with studies that has rudimentary comparisons of their individual "cases" with the Western political thought. What Dallmayr argues in the opening chapter (Beyond Monologue, originally published in 2004) must call for a totally new approach/perspective into studying political theory. The subsequent chapter, with a very few exceptions, do not fulfill the promises of Comparative Political Theory that Dallmayr enunciates in that chapter.

Review # 2 was written on 2012-10-01 00:00:00 Dave Thorpe Again, no one has given this a rating, so I feel a certain obligation to provide one. Providing some of the foundations of Thrift's "non-representational theory," this book is particularly good at connecting space to postmodernist social theory, Bourdieu and Giddens especially. If you have any interest in geographies that transcend the world of represented space and move into the stranger, murkier waters of "lived space," then this book is for you.