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($isa %GiordanoBrunoStory %HistoricalEvent)
($isa %GiordanoBrunoStory %IdeaSystemCreationEvent)
($isa %GiordanoBrunoStory %Execution)
(%circa %GiordanoBrunoStory (%DateRangeFn
(%CenturyFn 16) (%CenturyFn 17)))
($eventOccursAt %GiordanoBrunoStory $ContinentOfEurope)
($performedBy %GiordanoBrunoStory %GiordanoBruno)
($outputsCreated %GiordanoBrunoStory %GiordanoBrunosIdeas)
($isa %GiordanoBrunosIdeas $PropositionalInformationThing)
($isa %GiordanoBrunosIdeas $SomethingExisting)
(%conflictingMOs %GiordanoBrunosIdeas %MedievalChristianity)
($isa %GiordanoBrunosIdeas %IdeaSystem)
($performedByPart %GiordanoBrunoStory
%TheRomanCatholicReligiousOrg)
($objectActedOn %GiordanoBrunoStory %GiordanoBruno)
Figure 3.
Formal representation of the Giordano Bruno story.
The formal representation of historical events is manipulated by processes
(described below) which select events for inclusion in a story, produced biased
spins of events, link spins together into narratives, and generate narrative text.
Te rmi na l Time
organizes ideological bias with goal trees, adapted from the
ideological reasoning program Politics (Carbonell 1979). These goal trees rep-
resent the rhetorical goals of an ideological story-teller. For example, the Hard-
core Anti-religious Rationalist has as one of its top level goals
show that religion
leads to evil
. Two subgoals are
show that religion causes war
and
show that re-
ligion causes oppression
. Audience interaction defines and modifies the current
active goal tree, possibility adding, deleting, or changing goals. Two different
ideological positions can be mixed by combining goals from two goal trees.
For example, the audience's answers to the first set of questions may select the
Hard-core Anti-religious Rationalist goal tree. Answers to the second set of
questions may determine that racial equality (exaggerated as a homogenized
“Bennetton commercial” multiculturalism) is a sub-theme. The goal tree is
modified to include the Corporate Multiculturalist goals in addition to Hard-
core Anti-religious Rationalist goals, thus producing a hybridized ideological
narrative. Some responses to questions (particularly questions in the third and
last set) modify the tree more subtly, adding and removing individual goals
in the tree.
These goal trees scan through the knowledge base to select and produced
biased spins of events for use in a story. The “spun” events are put into a con-
ceptual container called the storyboard. Rhetorical devices then connect the
