51 research outputs found
Changing a semantics: opportunism or courage?
The generalized models for higher-order logics introduced by Leon Henkin, and
their multiple offspring over the years, have become a standard tool in many
areas of logic. Even so, discussion has persisted about their technical status,
and perhaps even their conceptual legitimacy. This paper gives a systematic
view of generalized model techniques, discusses what they mean in mathematical
and philosophical terms, and presents a few technical themes and results about
their role in algebraic representation, calibrating provability, lowering
complexity, understanding fixed-point logics, and achieving set-theoretic
absoluteness. We also show how thinking about Henkin's approach to semantics of
logical systems in this generality can yield new results, dispelling the
impression of adhocness. This paper is dedicated to Leon Henkin, a deep
logician who has changed the way we all work, while also being an always open,
modest, and encouraging colleague and friend.Comment: 27 pages. To appear in: The life and work of Leon Henkin: Essays on
his contributions (Studies in Universal Logic) eds: Manzano, M., Sain, I. and
Alonso, E., 201
On the uniform one-dimensional fragment
The uniform one-dimensional fragment of first-order logic, U1, is a recently
introduced formalism that extends two-variable logic in a natural way to
contexts with relations of all arities. We survey properties of U1 and
investigate its relationship to description logics designed to accommodate
higher arity relations, with particular attention given to DLR_reg. We also
define a description logic version of a variant of U1 and prove a range of new
results concerning the expressivity of U1 and related logics
One-dimensional fragment of first-order logic
We introduce a novel decidable fragment of first-order logic. The fragment is
one-dimensional in the sense that quantification is limited to applications of
blocks of existential (universal) quantifiers such that at most one variable
remains free in the quantified formula. The fragment is closed under Boolean
operations, but additional restrictions (called uniformity conditions) apply to
combinations of atomic formulae with two or more variables. We argue that the
notions of one-dimensionality and uniformity together offer a novel perspective
on the robust decidability of modal logics. We also establish that minor
modifications to the restrictions of the syntax of the one-dimensional fragment
lead to undecidable formalisms. Namely, the two-dimensional and non-uniform
one-dimensional fragments are shown undecidable. Finally, we prove that with
regard to expressivity, the one-dimensional fragment is incomparable with both
the guarded negation fragment and two-variable logic with counting. Our proof
of the decidability of the one-dimensional fragment is based on a technique
involving a direct reduction to the monadic class of first-order logic. The
novel technique is itself of an independent mathematical interest
Computational Aspects of Dependence Logic
In this thesis (modal) dependence logic is investigated. It was introduced in
2007 by Jouko V\"a\"aan\"anen as an extension of first-order (resp. modal)
logic by the dependence operator =(). For first-order (resp. propositional)
variables x_1,...,x_n, =(x_1,...,x_n) intuitively states that the value of x_n
is determined by those of x_1,...,x_n-1.
We consider fragments of modal dependence logic obtained by restricting the
set of allowed modal and propositional connectives. We classify these fragments
with respect to the complexity of their satisfiability and model-checking
problems. For satisfiability we obtain complexity degrees from P over NP,
Sigma_P^2 and PSPACE up to NEXP, while for model-checking we only classify the
fragments with respect to their tractability, i.e. we either show
NP-completeness or containment in P.
We then study the extension of modal dependence logic by intuitionistic
implication. For this extension we again classify the complexity of the
model-checking problem for its fragments. Here we obtain complexity degrees
from P over NP and coNP up to PSPACE.
Finally, we analyze first-order dependence logic, independence-friendly logic
and their two-variable fragments. We prove that satisfiability for two-variable
dependence logic is NEXP-complete, whereas for two-variable
independence-friendly logic it is undecidable; and use this to prove that the
latter is also more expressive than the former.Comment: PhD thesis; 138 pages (110 main matter
A Simple Logic of Functional Dependence
This paper presents a simple decidable logic of functional dependence LFD,
based on an extension of classical propositional logic with dependence atoms
plus dependence quantifiers treated as modalities, within the setting of
generalized assignment semantics for first order logic. The expressive
strength, complete proof calculus and meta-properties of LFD are explored.
Various language extensions are presented as well, up to undecidable
modal-style logics for independence and dynamic logics of changing dependence
models. Finally, more concrete settings for dependence are discussed:
continuous dependence in topological models, linear dependence in vector
spaces, and temporal dependence in dynamical systems and games.Comment: 56 pages. Journal of Philosophical Logic (2021
On the uniform one-dimensional fragment over ordered models
The uniform one-dimensional fragment U1 is a recently introduced extension of the two-variable fragment FO2. The logic U1 enables the use of relation symbols of all arities and thereby extends the scope of applications of FO2. In this thesis we show that the satisfiability and finite satisfiability problems of U1 over linearly ordered models are NExpTime-complete. The corresponding problems for FO2 are likewise NExpTime-complete, so the transition from FO2 to U1 in the ordered realm causes no increase in complexity. To contrast our results, we also establish that U1 with an unrestricted use of two built-in linear orders is undecidable
Complexity and Expressivity of Uniform One-Dimensional Fragment with Equality
Uniform one-dimensional fragment UF is a formalism obtained from first-order logic by limiting quantification to applications of blocks of existential (universal) quantifiers such that at most one variable remains free in the quantified formula. The fragment is closed under Boolean operations, but additional restrictions (called uniformity conditions) apply to combinations of atomic formulas with two or more variables. The fragment can be seen as a canonical generalization of two-variable logic, defined in order to be able to deal with relations of arbitrary arities. The fragment was introduced recently, and it was shown that the satisfiability problem of the equality-free fragment of UF is decidable. In this article we establish that the satisfiability and finite satisfiability problems of UF are NEXPTIME-complete. We also show that the corresponding problems for the extension of UF with counting quantifiers are undecidable. In addition to decidability questions, we compare the expressivities of UF and two-variable logic with counting quantifiers FOC^2. We show that while the logics are incomparable in general, UF is strictly contained in FOC^2 when attention is restricted to vocabularies with the arity bound two
Decidable fragments of first-order logic and of first-order linear arithmetic with uninterpreted predicates
First-order logic is one of the most prominent formalisms in computer science and mathematics. Since there is no algorithm capable of solving its satisfiability problem, first-order logic is said to be undecidable. The classical decision problem is the quest for a delineation between the decidable and the undecidable parts. The results presented in this thesis shed more light on the boundary and open new perspectives on the landscape of known decidable fragments. In the first part we focus on the new concept of separateness of variables and explore its applicability to the classical decision problem and beyond. Two disjoint sets of first-order variables are separated in a given formula if none of its atoms contains variables from both sets. This notion facilitates the definition of decidable extensions of many well-known decidable first-order fragments. We demonstrate this for several prefix fragments, several guarded fragments, the two-variable fragment, and for the fluted fragment. Although the extensions exhibit the same expressive power as the respective originals, certain logical properties can be expressed much more succinctly. In two cases the succinctness gap cannot be bounded using elementary functions. This fact already hints at computationally hard satisfiability problems. Indeed, we derive non-elementary lower bounds for the separated fragment, an extension of the Bernays-Schönfinkel-Ramsey fragment (E*A*-prefix sentences). On the semantic level, separateness of quantified variables may lead to weaker dependences than we encounter in general. We investigate this property in the context of model-checking games. The focus of the second part of the thesis is on linear arithmetic with uninterpreted predicates. Two novel decidable fragments are presented, both based on the Bernays-Schönfinkel-Ramsey fragment. On the negative side, we identify several small fragments of the language for which satisfiability is undecidable.Untersuchungen der Logik erster Stufe blicken auf eine lange Tradition zurück. Es ist allgemein bekannt, dass das zugehörige Erfüllbarkeitsproblem im Allgemeinen nicht algorithmisch gelöst werden kann - man spricht daher von einer unentscheidbaren Logik. Diese Beobachtung wirft ein Schlaglicht auf die prinzipiellen Grenzen der Fähigkeiten von Computern im Allgemeinen aber auch des automatischen Schließens im Besonderen. Das Hilbertsche Entscheidungsproblem wird heute als die Erforschung der Grenze zwischen entscheidbaren und unentscheidbaren Teilen der Logik erster Stufe verstanden, wobei die untersuchten Fragmente der Logik mithilfe klar zu erfassender und berechenbarer syntaktischer Eigenschaften beschrieben werden. Viele Forscher haben bereits zu dieser Untersuchung beigetragen und zahlreiche entscheidbare und unentscheidbare Fragmente entdeckt und erforscht. Die vorliegende Dissertation setzt diese Tradition mit einer Reihe vornehmlich positiver Resultate fort und eröffnet neue Blickwinkel auf eine Reihe von Fragmenten, die im Laufe der letzten einhundert Jahre untersucht wurden. Im ersten Teil der Arbeit steht das syntaktische Konzept der Separiertheit von Variablen im Mittelpunkt, und dessen Anwendbarkeit auf das Entscheidungsproblem und darüber hinaus wird erforscht. Zwei Mengen von Individuenvariablen gelten bezüglich einer gegebenen Formel als separiert, falls in jedem Atom der Formel die Variablen aus höchstens einer der beiden Mengen vorkommen. Mithilfe dieses leicht verständlichen Begriffs lassen sich viele wohlbekannte entscheidbare Fragmente der Logik erster Stufe zu größeren Klassen von Formeln erweitern, die dennoch entscheidbar sind. Dieser Ansatz wird für neun Fragmente im Detail dargelegt, darunter mehrere Präfix-Fragmente, das Zwei-Variablen-Fragment und sogenannte "guarded" und " uted" Fragmente. Dabei stellt sich heraus, dass alle erweiterten Fragmente ebenfalls das monadische Fragment erster Stufe ohne Gleichheit enthalten. Obwohl die erweiterte Syntax in den betrachteten Fällen nicht mit einer erhöhten Ausdrucksstärke einhergeht, können bestimmte Zusammenhänge mithilfe der erweiterten Syntax deutlich kürzer formuliert werden. Zumindest in zwei Fällen ist diese Diskrepanz nicht durch eine elementare Funktion zu beschränken. Dies liefert einen ersten Hinweis darauf, dass die algorithmische Lösung des Erfüllbarkeitsproblems für die erweiterten Fragmente mit sehr hohem Rechenaufwand verbunden ist. Tatsächlich wird eine nicht-elementare untere Schranke für den entsprechenden Zeitbedarf beim sogenannten separierten Fragment, einer Erweiterung des bekannten Bernays-Schönfinkel-Ramsey-Fragments, abgeleitet. Darüber hinaus wird der Ein uss der Separiertheit von Individuenvariablen auf der semantischen Ebene untersucht, wo Abhängigkeiten zwischen quantifizierten Variablen durch deren Separiertheit stark abgeschwächt werden können. Für die genauere formale Betrachtung solcher als schwach bezeichneten Abhängigkeiten wird auf sogenannte Hintikka-Spiele zurückgegriffen. Den Schwerpunkt des zweiten Teils der vorliegenden Arbeit bildet das Entscheidungsproblem für die lineare Arithmetik über den rationalen Zahlen in Verbindung mit uninterpretierten Prädikaten. Es werden zwei bislang unbekannte entscheidbare Fragmente dieser Sprache vorgestellt, die beide auf dem Bernays-Schönfinkel-Ramsey-Fragment aufbauen. Ferner werden neue negative Resultate entwickelt und mehrere unentscheidbare Fragmente vorgestellt, die lediglich einen sehr eingeschränkten Teil der Sprache benötigen
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