Patent ID: 7447670

Claim:
A method for determining valuation-based system characteristics of a physical system represented as a set of basic probability assignments (BPAs), the method comprising acts, performed on a data processing system, of: receiving a sequence of normalized basic probability assignments (BPAs) designated m i , for index i=1, . . . , n; having intermediate combined, unnormalized BPAs designated m′ (n) ; determining a valuation-based system characteristic selected from a group consisting of a local cumulative normalization factor, a local incremental normalization factor, a local cumulative conflict measure, a local incremental conflict measure, a global cumulative normalization factor, a Type I global incremental normalization factor, a Type II global incremental normalization factor, a global cumulative conflict measure, a Type I global incremental conflict measure, and a Type II global incremental conflict measure determined from: k 12 =k /( k 1 k 2 ), where k 1 is a normalization factor for a first BPA m 1 , k 2 is a normalization factor for a second BPA m 2 , k is an overall normalization factor, and k 12 represents an incremental normalization factor; outputting the valuation-based system characteristic; whereby the valuation-based system characteristic provides information for evaluating the physical system.