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The universality of polynomial time Turing equivalence
We show that polynomial time Turing equivalence and a large class of other equivalence relations from computational complexity theory are universal countable Borel equivalence relations. We then discuss ultrafilters on the invariant Borel sets of these equivalence relations which are related to Martin's ultrafilter on the Turing degrees
Noncomputable functions in the Blum-Shub-Smale model
Working in the Blum-Shub-Smale model of computation on the real numbers, we
answer several questions of Meer and Ziegler. First, we show that, for each
natural number d, an oracle for the set of algebraic real numbers of degree at
most d is insufficient to allow an oracle BSS-machine to decide membership in
the set of algebraic numbers of degree d + 1. We add a number of further
results on relative computability of these sets and their unions. Then we show
that the halting problem for BSS-computation is not decidable below any
countable oracle set, and give a more specific condition, related to the
cardinalities of the sets, necessary for relative BSS-computability. Most of
our results involve the technique of using as input a tuple of real numbers
which is algebraically independent over both the parameters and the oracle of
the machine
Decreasing Diagrams for Confluence and Commutation
Like termination, confluence is a central property of rewrite systems. Unlike
for termination, however, there exists no known complexity hierarchy for
confluence. In this paper we investigate whether the decreasing diagrams
technique can be used to obtain such a hierarchy. The decreasing diagrams
technique is one of the strongest and most versatile methods for proving
confluence of abstract rewrite systems. It is complete for countable systems,
and it has many well-known confluence criteria as corollaries.
So what makes decreasing diagrams so powerful? In contrast to other
confluence techniques, decreasing diagrams employ a labelling of the steps with
labels from a well-founded order in order to conclude confluence of the
underlying unlabelled relation. Hence it is natural to ask how the size of the
label set influences the strength of the technique. In particular, what class
of abstract rewrite systems can be proven confluent using decreasing diagrams
restricted to 1 label, 2 labels, 3 labels, and so on? Surprisingly, we find
that two labels suffice for proving confluence for every abstract rewrite
system having the cofinality property, thus in particular for every confluent,
countable system.
Secondly, we show that this result stands in sharp contrast to the situation
for commutation of rewrite relations, where the hierarchy does not collapse.
Thirdly, investigating the possibility of a confluence hierarchy, we
determine the first-order (non-)definability of the notion of confluence and
related properties, using techniques from finite model theory. We find that in
particular Hanf's theorem is fruitful for elegant proofs of undefinability of
properties of abstract rewrite systems
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