Abstract not found

We consider a new extension of the Skolem class for first-order logic and prove its decidability by resolution techniques. We then extend this class including the built-in equational theory of exclusive or. Again, we prove the decidability of the class by resolution techniques.

Until recently, First-Order Temporal Logic (FOTL) has been only partially understood. While it is well known that the full logic has no finite axiomatisation, a more detailed analysis of fragments of the logic was not previously available. However, a breakthrough by Hodkinson et al., identifying a finitely axiomatisable fragment, termed the monodic fragment, has led to improved understanding of FOTL. Yet, in order to utilise these theoretical advances, it is important to have appropriate proof techniques for this monodic fragment. In this paper, we modify and extend the clausal temporal resolution technique, originally developed for propositional temporal logics, to enable its use in such monodic fragments. We develop a specific normal form for monodic formulae in FOTL, and provide a complete resolution calculus for formulae in this form. Not only is this clausal resolution technique useful as a practical proof technique for certain monodic classes, but the use of this approach provides us with increased understanding of the monodic fragment. In particular, we here show how several features of monodic FOTL can be established as corollaries of the completeness result for the clausal temporal resolution method. These include definitions of new decidable monodic classes, simplification of existing monodic classes by reductions, and completeness of clausal temporal resolution in the case of

We consider instantiation-based theorem proving whereby instances of clauses are generated by certain inferences, and where inconsistency is detected by propositional tests. We give a model construction proof of completeness by which restrictive inference systems as well as admissible simplification techniques can be justified. Another contribution of the paper are novel inference systems that allow one to also employ decision procedures for first-order fragments more complex than propositional logic. The decision procedure provides for an approximative consistency test, and the instance generation inference system is a means of successively refining the approximation.

Abstract. Resolution-based calculi are among the most widely used calculi for theorem proving in first-order logic. Numerous refinements of resolution are nowadays available, such as e.g. basic superposition, a calculus highly optimized for theorem proving with equality. However, even such an advanced calculus does not restrict inferences enough to obtain decision procedures for complex logics, such as SHIQ. In this paper, we present a new decomposition inference rule, which can be combined with any resolution-based calculus compatible with the standard notion of redundancy. We combine decomposition with basic superposition to obtain three new decision procedures: (i) for the description logic SHIQ, (ii) for the description logic ALCHIQb, and (iii) for answering conjunctive queries over SHIQ knowledge bases. The first two procedures are worst-case optimal and, based on the vast experience in building efficient theorem provers, we expect them to be suitable for practical usage. 1

Abstract not found

We present a novel reasoning calculus for the description logic SHOIQ + —a knowledge representation formalism with applications in areas such as the Semantic Web. Unnecessary nondeterminism and the construction of large models are two primary sources of inefficiency in the tableau-based reasoning calculi used in state-of-the-art reasoners. In order to reduce nondeterminism, we base our calculus on hypertableau and hyperresolution calculi, which we extend with a blocking condition to ensure termination. In order to reduce the size of the constructed models, we introduce anywhere pairwise blocking. We also present an improved nominal introduction rule that ensures termination in the presence of nominals, inverse roles, and number restrictions—a combination of DL constructs that has proven notoriously difficult to handle. Our implementation shows significant performance improvements over state-of-the-art reasoners on several well-known ontologies.

Abstract. This paper investigates the use of hyperresolution as a decision procedure and model builder for guarded formulae. In general hyperresolution is not a decision procedure for the entire guarded fragment. However we show that there are natural fragments which can be decided by hyperresolution. In particular, we prove decidability of hyperresolution with or without splitting for the fragment GF1 − and point out several ways of extending this fragment without loosing decidability. As hyperresolution is closely related to various tableaux methods the present work is also relevant for tableaux methods. We compare our approach to hypertableaux, and mention the relationship to other clausal classes which are decidable by hyperresolution. 1

First-order temporal logic is a concise and powerful notation, with many potential applications in both Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence. While the full logic is highly complex, recent work on monodic first-order temporal logics has identified important enumerable and even decidable fragments. In this paper, we develop a clausal resolution method for the monodic fragment of first-order temporal logic over expanding domains. We first define a normal form for monodic formulae and show how arbitrary monodic formulae can be translated into the normal form, while preserving satisfiability. We then introduce novel resolution calculi that can be applied to formulae in this normal form and state correctness and completeness results for the method. We illustrate the method on a comprehensive example. The method is based on classical first-order resolution and can, thus, be efficiently implemented.

In this paper we define a new clausal class, called BU, which can be decided by hyperresolution with splitting. We also consider the model generation problem for BU and show that hyperresolution plus splitting can also be used as a Herbrand model generation procedure for BU and, furthermore, that the addition of a local minimality test allows us to generate only minimal Herbrand models for clause sets in BU. In addition, we investigate the relationship of BU to other solvable classes.