Synthesising interprocedural bit-precise termination proofs

Proving program termination is key to guaranteeing absence of undesirable behaviour, such as hanging programs and even security vulnerabilities such as denial-of-service attacks. To make termination checks scale to large systems, interprocedural termination analysis seems essential, which is a largely unexplored area of research in termination analysis, where most effort has focussed on difficult single-procedure problems. We present a modular termination analysis for C programs using template-based interprocedural summarisation. Our analysis combines a context-sensitive, over-approximating forward analysis with the inference of under-approximating preconditions for termination. Bit-precise termination arguments are synthesised over lexicographic linear ranking function templates. Our experimental results show that our tool 2LS outperforms state-of-the-art alternatives, and demonstrate the clear advantage of interprocedural reasoning over monolithic analysis in terms of efficiency, while retaining comparable precision

An Objection to Naturalism and Atheism from Logic

I proffer a success argument for classical logical consequence. I articulate in what sense that notion of consequence should be regarded as the privileged notion for metaphysical inquiry aimed at uncovering the fundamental nature of the world. Classical logic breeds necessitism. I use necessitism to produce problems for both ontological naturalism and atheism

McFIL: Model Counting Functionality-Inherent Leakage

Protecting the confidentiality of private data and using it for useful collaboration have long been at odds. Modern cryptography is bridging this gap through rapid growth in secure protocols such as multi-party computation, fully-homomorphic encryption, and zero-knowledge proofs. However, even with provable indistinguishability or zero-knowledgeness, confidentiality loss from leakage inherent to the functionality may partially or even completely compromise secret values without ever falsifying proofs of security. In this work, we describe McFIL, an algorithmic approach and accompanying software implementation which automatically quantifies intrinsic leakage for a given functionality. Extending and generalizing the Chosen-Ciphertext attack framework of Beck et al. with a practical heuristic, our approach not only quantifies but maximizes functionality-inherent leakage using Maximum Model Counting within a SAT solver. As a result, McFIL automatically derives approximately-optimal adversary inputs that, when used in secure protocols, maximize information leakage of private values.Comment: To appear in USENIX Security 202

From Biological to Synthetic Neurorobotics Approaches to Understanding the Structure Essential to Consciousness (Part 3)

This third paper locates the synthetic neurorobotics research reviewed in the second paper in terms of themes introduced in the first paper. It begins with biological non-reductionism as understood by Searle. It emphasizes the role of synthetic neurorobotics studies in accessing the dynamic structure essential to consciousness with a focus on system criticality and self, develops a distinction between simulated and formal consciousness based on this emphasis, reviews Tani and colleagues' work in light of this distinction, and ends by forecasting the increasing importance of synthetic neurorobotics studies for cognitive science and philosophy of mind going forward, finally in regards to most- and myth-consciousness