Handsome Proof-nets: R&B-Graphs, Perfect Matchings and Series-parallel Graphs

The main interest of this paper is to provide proof-nets, a proof syntax which identify proofs with the same meaning, with a standard graph-theoretical description. More precisely, we give two such descriptions which both view proof-nets as graphs endowed with a perfect matching, and in both cases the graphs corresponding to proofs are recognized by a simple correctnes- s criterion (with and without the so-called mix rule). The first description may be viewed as a graph-theoretical reformulation of usual proof-nets; nevertheless it allows us to recover various results on proof-nets as the corollaries of a single graph theoretical result. The second description, inspired from the first one, is more innovative: a proof-structure simply consists in the set of its axioms - the perfect matching - plus one single series-parallel graph (a.k.a cograph) which encodes the whole syntactical forest of the sequent. Unlike other approaches, every such graph, with out any further specification, corresponds to a proof structure, and this description identify proof structures which only differ up to the commutativity or associativity of the connectives, or because final disjunctions have been performed or not. Thus these proof-nets are even closer to the proofs themselves than usual proof-nets

A System of Interaction and Structure

This paper introduces a logical system, called BV, which extends multiplicative linear logic by a non-commutative self-dual logical operator. This extension is particularly challenging for the sequent calculus, and so far it is not achieved therein. It becomes very natural in a new formalism, called the calculus of structures, which is the main contribution of this work. Structures are formulae submitted to certain equational laws typical of sequents. The calculus of structures is obtained by generalising the sequent calculus in such a way that a new top-down symmetry of derivations is observed, and it employs inference rules that rewrite inside structures at any depth. These properties, in addition to allow the design of BV, yield a modular proof of cut elimination.Comment: This is the authoritative version of the article, with readable pictures, in colour, also available at . (The published version contains errors introduced by the editorial processing.) Web site for Deep Inference and the Calculus of Structures at <http://alessio.guglielmi.name/res/cos

No proof nets for MLL with units:Proof equivalence in MLL is PSPACE-complete

[Analysis of algorithms and problem complexity]: Nonnumerical algorithms and problems—Complexity of proof procedures Keywords linear logic, proof equivalence, proof nets, constraint logic, PSPACE-completeness MLL proof equivalence is the problem of deciding whether two proofs in multiplicative linear logic are related by a series of inference permutations. It is also known as the word problem for ∗-autonomous categories. Previous work has shown the problem to be equivalent to a rewiring problem on proof nets, which are not canonical for full MLL due to the presence of the two units. Drawing from recent work on reconfiguration problems, in this paper it is shown that MLL proof equivalence is PSPACE-complete, using a reduction from Nondeterministic Constraint Logic. An important consequence of the result is that the existence of a satisfactory notion of proof nets for MLL with units is ruled out (under current complexity assumptions). 1

Proof nets for additive linear logic with units

Abstract—Additive linear logic, the fragment of linear logic concerning linear implication between strictly additive formu-lae, coincides with sum-product logic, the internal language of categories with free finite products and coproducts. Deciding equality of its proof terms, as imposed by the categorical laws, is complicated by the presence of the units (the initial and terminal objects of the category) and the fact that in a free setting products and coproducts do not distribute. The best known desicion algorithm, due to Cockett and Santocanale (CSL 2009), is highly involved, requiring an intricate case analysis on the syntax of terms. This paper provides canonical, graphical representations of the categorical morphisms, yielding a novel solution to this decision problem. Starting with (a modification of) existing proof nets, due to Hughes and Van Glabbeek, for additive linear logic without units, canonical forms are obtained by graph rewriting. The rewriting algorithm is remarkably simple. As a decision procedure for term equality it matches the known complexity of the problem. A main technical contribution of the paper is the substantial correctness proof of the algorithm. I

The Logic of Categorial Grammars: Lecture Notes

These lecture notes present categorial grammars as deductive systems, and include detailed proofs of their main properties. The first chapter deals with Ajdukiewicz and Bar-Hillel categorial grammars (AB grammars), their relation to context-free grammars and their learning algorithms. The second chapter is devoted to the Lambek calculus as a deductive system; the weak equivalence with context free grammars is proved; we also define the mapping from a syntactic analysis to a higher-order logical formula, which describes the semantics of the parsed sentence. The third and last chapter is about proof-nets as parse structures for Lambek grammars; we show the linguistic relevance of these graphs in particular through the study of a performance question. Although definitions, theorems and proofs have been reformulated for pedagogical reasons, these notes contain no personnal result but in the proofnet chapter

Graphical representation of canonical proof: two case studies

An interesting problem in proof theory is to find representations of proof that do not distinguish between proofs that are ‘morally’ the same. For many logics, the presentation of proofs in a traditional formalism, such as Gentzen’s sequent calculus, introduces artificial syntactic structure called ‘bureaucracy’; e.g., an arbitrary ordering of freely permutable inferences. A proof system that is free of bureaucracy is called canonical for a logic. In this dissertation two canonical proof systems are presented, for two logics: a notion of proof nets for additive linear logic with units, and ‘classical proof forests’, a graphical formalism for first-order classical logic. Additive linear logic (or sum–product logic) is the fragment of linear logic consisting of linear implication between formulae constructed only from atomic formulae and the additive connectives and units. Up to an equational theory over proofs, the logic describes categories in which finite products and coproducts occur freely. A notion of proof nets for additive linear logic is presented, providing canonical graphical representations of the categorical morphisms and constituting a tractable decision procedure for this equational theory. From existing proof nets for additive linear logic without units by Hughes and Van Glabbeek (modified to include the units naively), canonical proof nets are obtained by a simple graph rewriting algorithm called saturation. Main technical contributions are the substantial correctness proof of the saturation algorithm, and a correctness criterion for saturated nets. Classical proof forests are a canonical, graphical proof formalism for first-order classical logic. Related to Herbrand’s Theorem and backtracking games in the style of Coquand, the forests assign witnessing information to quantifiers in a structurally minimal way, reducing a first-order sentence to a decidable propositional one. A similar formalism ‘expansion tree proofs’ was presented by Miller, but not given a method of composition. The present treatment adds a notion of cut, and investigates the possibility of composing forests via cut-elimination. Cut-reduction steps take the form of a rewrite relation that arises from the structure of the forests in a natural way. Yet reductions are intricate, and initially not well-behaved: from perfectly ordinary cuts, reduction may reach unnaturally configured cuts that may not be reduced. Cutelimination is shown using a modified version of the rewrite relation, inspired by the game-theoretic interpretation of the forests, for which weak normalisation is shown, and strong normalisation is conjectured. In addition, by a more intricate argument, weak normalisation is also shown for the original reduction relation

From Proof Nets to the Free *-Autonomous Category

In the first part of this paper we present a theory of proof nets for full multiplicative linear logic, including the two units. It naturally extends the well-known theory of unit-free multiplicative proof nets. A linking is no longer a set of axiom links but a tree in which the axiom links are subtrees. These trees will be identified according to an equivalence relation based on a simple form of graph rewriting. We show the standard results of sequentialization and strong normalization of cut elimination. In the second part of the paper we show that the identifications enforced on proofs are such that the class of two-conclusion proof nets defines the free *-autonomous category.Comment: LaTeX, 44 pages, final version for LMCS; v2: updated bibliograph