Cut-free formulations for a quantified logic of here and there

A predicate extension SQHT⁼ of the logic of here-and-there was introduced by V. Lifschitz, D. Pearce, and A. Valverde to characterize strong equivalence of logic programs with variables and equality with respect to stable models. The semantics for this logic is determined by intuitionistic Kripke models with two worlds (here and there) with constant individual domain and decidable equality. Our sequent formulation has special rules for implication and for pushing negation inside formulas. The soundness proof allows us to establish that SQHT⁼ is a conservative extension of the logic of weak excluded middle with respect to sequents without positive occurrences of implication. The completeness proof uses a non-closed branch of a proof search tree. The interplay between rules for pushing negation inside and truth in the “there” (non-root) world of the resulting Kripke model can be of independent interest. We prove that existence is definable in terms of remaining connectives.     

On the equivalence between logic programming semantics and argumentation semantics

In the current paper, we re-examine the connection between formal argumentation and logic programming from the perspective of semantics. We observe that one particular translation from logic programs to instantiated argumentation (the one described by Wu, Caminada and Gabbay) is able to serve as a basis for describing various equivalences between logic programming semantics and argumentation semantics. In particular, we are able to show equivalence between regular semantics for logic programming and preferred semantics for formal argumentation. We also show that there exist logic programming semantics (L-stable semantics) that cannot be captured by any abstract argumentation semantics.     

The distribution semantics for normal programs with function symbols

The distribution semantics integrates logic programming and probability theory using a possible worlds approach. Its intuitiveness and simplicity have made it the most widely used semantics for probabilistic logic programming, with successful applications in many domains. When the program has function symbols, the semantics was defined for special cases: either the program has to be definite or the queries must have a finite number of finite explanations. In this paper we show that it is possible to define the semantics for all programs. We also show that this definition coincides with that of Sato and Kameya on positive programs. Moreover, we highlight possible approaches for inference, both exact and approximate.     

Imperative programs as proofs via game semantics

Game semantics extends the Curry–Howard isomorphism to a three-way correspondence: proofs, programs, strategies. But the universe of strategies goes beyond intuitionistic logics and lambda calculus, to capture stateful programs. In this paper we describe a logical counterpart to this extension, in which proofs denote such strategies. The system is expressive: it contains all of the connectives of Intuitionistic Linear Logic, and first-order quantification. Use of Laird?s sequoid operator allows proofs with imperative behaviour to be expressed. Thus, we can embed first-order Intuitionistic Linear Logic into this system, Polarized Linear Logic, and an imperative total programming language.     

Full abstraction for Reduced ML

We present the first effectively presentable fully abstract model for Stark?s Reduced ML, a call-by-value higher-order programming language featuring integer-valued references. The model is constructed using techniques of nominal game semantics. Its distinctive feature is the presence of carefully restricted information about the store in plays, combined with conditions concerning the participants? ability to distinguish reference names. We show how it leads to an explicit characterization of program equivalence.     

Possibilistic nested logic programs and strong equivalence

In this paper, the class of possibilistic nested logic programs is introduced. These possibilistic logic programs allow us to use nested expressions in the bodies and heads of their rules. By considering a possibilistic nested logic program as a possibilistic theory, a construction of a possibilistic logic programing semantics based on answer sets for nested logic programs and the proof theory of possibilistic logic is defined. In order to define a general method for computing the possibilistic answer sets of a possibilistic nested program, the idea of equivalence between possibilistic nested programs is explored. By considering properties of equivalence between possibilistic programs, a process of transforming a possibilistic nested logic program into a possibilistic disjunctive logic program is defined. Given that our approach is an extension of answer set programming, we also explore the concept of strong equivalence between possibilistic nested logic programs. To this end, we introduce the concept of poss SE-models. Therefore, we show that two possibilistic nested logic programs are strong equivalents whenever they have the same poss SE-models.The expressiveness of the possibilistic nested logic programs is illustrated by a scenario from the medical domain. In particular, we exemplify how possibilistic nested logic programs are expressive enough for capturing medical guidelines which are pervaded by vagueness and qualitative information.     

From Lucid to TransLucid: Iteration, Dataflow, Intensional and Cartesian Programming

We present the development of the Lucid language from the Original Lucid of the mid-1970s to the TransLucid of today. Each successive version of the language has been a generalisation of previous languages, but with a further understanding of the problems at hand. The Original Lucid (1976), originally designed for purposes of formal verification, was used to formalise the iteration in while-loop programs. The pLucid language (1982) was used to describe dataflow networks. Indexical Lucid (1987) was introduced for intensional programming, in which the semantics of a variable was understood as a function from a universe of possible worlds to ordinary values. With TransLucid, and the use of contexts as firstclass values, programming can be understood in a Cartesian framework.      

A Routley–Meyer Semantics for Gödel 3-Valued Logic and Its Paraconsistent Counterpart

Routley–Meyer semantics (RM-semantics) is defined for Gödel 3-valued logic G3 and some logics related to it among which a paraconsistent one differing only from G3 in the interpretation of negation is to be remarked. The logics are defined in the Hilbert-style way and also by means of proof-theoretical and semantical consequence relations. The RM-semantics is defined upon the models for Routley and Meyer’s basic positive logic B₊, the weakest positive RM-semantics. In this way, it is to be expected that the models defined can be adapted to other related many-valued logics.     

Program equilibrium—a program reasoning approach

The concept of program equilibrium, introduced by Howard (Theory and Decision 24(3):203–213, 1988) and further formalised by Tennenholtz (Game Econ Behav 49:363–373, 2004), represents one of the most ingenious and potentially far-reaching applications of ideas from computer science in game theory to date. The basic idea is that a player in a game selects a strategy by entering a program, whose behaviour may be conditioned on the programs submitted by other players. Thus, for example, in the prisoner’s dilemma, a player can enter a program that says “If his program is the same as mine, then I cooperate, otherwise I defect”. It can easily be shown that if such programs are permitted, then rational cooperation is possible even in the one-shot prisoner’s dilemma. In the original proposal of Tennenholtz, comparison between programs was limited to syntactic comparison of program texts. While this approach has some considerable advantages (not the least being computational and semantic simplicity), it also has some important limitations. In this paper, we investigate an approach to program equilibrium in which richer conditions are allowed, based on model checking—one of the most successful approaches to reasoning about programs. We introduce a decision-tree model of strategies, which may be conditioned on strategies of others. We then formulate and investigate a notion of “outcome” for our setting, and investigate the complexity of reasoning about outcomes. We focus on coherent outcomes: outcomes in which every decision by every player is justified by the conditions in his program. We identify a condition under which there exist a unique coherent outcome. We also compare our notion of (coherent) outcome with that of (supported) semantics known from logic programming. We illustrate our approach with many examples.     

On elementary logics for quantitative dependencies

We define and study logics in the framework of probabilistic team semantics and over metafinite structures. Our work is paralleled by the recent development of novel axiomatizable and tractable logics in team semantics that are closed under the Boolean negation. Our logics employ new probabilistic atoms that resemble so-called extended atoms from the team semantics literature. We also define counterparts of our logics over metafinite structures and show that all of our logics can be translated into functional fixed point logic implying a polynomial time upper bound for data complexity with respect to BSS-computations.     

Separation logic and logics with team semantics

Separation logic is a successful logical system for formal reasoning about programs that mutate their data structures. Team semantics, on the other side, is the basis of modern logics of dependence and independence. Separation logic and team semantics have been introduced with quite different motivations, and are investigated by research communities with rather different backgrounds and objectives. Nevertheless, there are obvious similarities between these formalisms. Both separation logic and logics with team semantics involve the manipulation of second-order objects, such as heaps and teams, by first-order syntax without reference to second-order variables. Moreover, these semantical objects are closely related; it is for instance obvious that a heap can be seen as a team, and the separating conjunction of separation logic is (essentially) the same as the team-semantical disjunction. Based on such similarities, the possible connections between separation logic and team semantics have been raised as a question at several occasions, and lead to informal discussions between these research communities. The objective of this paper is to make this connection precise, and to study its potential but also its obstacles and limitations.     

First-order theories for pure Prolog programs with negation

The standard theory of logic programming is not applicable to Prolog programs even not to pure code. Modifying the theory to take account of reality more is the motivation of this article. For this purpose we introduce the -completion and the inductive extension of a logic program. Both are first-order theories in a language with operators for success, failure and termination of goals. The -completion of a logic program is a sound and complete axiomatization of the Prolog depth-first search under certain natural conditions; the inductive extension of the -completion is a suitable theory for proving termination and equivalence of pure Prolog programs with negation.Sponsored by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Germany     

A Sahlqvist theorem for distributive modal logic

In this paper we consider distributive modal logic, a setting in which we may add modalities, such as classical types of modalities as well as weak forms of negation, to the fragment of classical propositional logic given by conjunction, disjunction, true, and false. For these logics we define both algebraic semantics, in the form of distributive modal algebras, and relational semantics, in the form of ordered Kripke structures. The main contributions of this paper lie in extending the notion of Sahlqvist axioms to our generalized setting and proving both a correspondence and a canonicity result for distributive modal logics axiomatized by Sahlqvist axioms. Our proof of the correspondence result relies on a reduction to the classical case, but our canonicity proof departs from the traditional style and uses the newly extended algebraic theory of canonical extensions.     

Iterated team semantics for a hierarchy of informational types

In this paper, we introduce and study a framework that is inspired by the team semantics for propositional dependence logic but deviates from it in several respects. Most importantly, instead of the two semantic layers used in dependence logic – possible worlds and teams – a whole hierarchy of contexts is introduced and different types of formulas are evaluated at different levels of this hierarchy. This leads to a rich stratification of informational types. In this framework, the dependence operator of dependence logic can be defined by the standard propositional connectives (negation, conjunction, disjunction and implication). We explore the formal aspects of this approach and apply it to a number of puzzling phenomena related to modalities and conditionals.     

Soft Constraint Logic Programming and Generalized Shortest Path Problems

In this paper we study the relationship between Constraint Programming (CP) and Shortest Path (SP) problems. In particular, we show that classical, multicriteria, partially ordered, and modality-based SP problems can be naturally modeled and solved within the Soft Constraint Logic Programming (SCLP) framework, where logic programming is coupled with soft constraints. In this way we provide this large class of SP problems with a high-level and declarative linguistic support whose semantics takes care of both finding the cost of the shortest path(s) and also of actually finding the path(s). On the other hand, some efficient algorithms for certain classes of SP problems can be exploited to provide some classes of SCLP programs with an efficient way to compute their semantics.     

Intuitionistic completeness of first-order logic

We constructively prove completeness for intuitionistic first-order logic, iFOL, showing that a formula is provable in iFOL if and only if it is uniformly valid in intuitionistic evidence semantics as defined in intuitionistic type theory extended with an intersection operator.     

Efficient Intensional Implementation for Lazy Functional Languages

The intensional transformation is a technique that can be used in order to eliminate higher-order functions from a functional program by introducing appropriate context-manipulation operators. The transformation can be applied to a significant class of higher-order programs and results in equivalent zero-order intensional programs that can be executed in a simple demand-driven way. Despite its simplicity, the transformation has never been seriously evaluated with respect to its efficiency and potential. Certain simple implementations of the technique have been performed, but questions regarding the merits of the method have remained inconclusive. In this paper we demonstrate that the transformation can be efficiently implemented by using what we call lazy activation records, namely activation records in which some entries are filled on-demand. An evaluation of our implementation demonstrates that the technique outperforms some of the most well-known functional programming systems, for the class of programs that can be transformed. This work has been partially supported by the University of Athens under the project “Kapodistrias” (grant no. 70/4/5827).