Arguing with the devil: Teaching in controversial domains

Abstract

There are certain problems inherent in teaching in controversial domains. In this paper, we present a prototype of an intelligent tutoring system called OLIA which addresses some of these problems. We focus here on OLIA’s Devil’s advocate strategy which is a method for teaching through a debate between the user and the system. This paper takes advantage of existing work using a meta-level argumentation framework for knowledge representation in controversial domains. In this framework statements are linked by primitive relations such as disagreement, equivalence and justification, and higher order meta-level ones such as counter-arguments and corroborations. We investigate the use of this framework as the basis for the OLIA system.