ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an explanation-generation method that addresses this problem in the context of answering questions using an extensive knowledge base. The complex network of relationships in the Botany Knowledge Base provides many possible paths for explanation generation. The fundamental knowledge of each concept in the Botany Knowledge Base is elaborate. For example, the representations of the concept photosynthesis. The definition-generation strategy for the categorical view type is to select knowledge explaining how the concept of interest is a specialization of the reference concept. An important task for Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS) is providing coherent explanations in answer to student's questions. Current ITSs offer a limited solution to the problem of generating explanations because they use restricted forms of domain knowledge. One can expect our research on generating explanations from large-scale knowledge bases to contribute technology for electronic retrieval and manipulation of knowledge. Major advances in computer hardware technology, such as CD-ROMs and videodiscs, permit archiving vast libraries.
