We describe a novel logic, called HiLog, and show that it provides a more suitable basis for logic programming than does traditional predicate logic. HiLog has a higher-order syntax and allows arbitrary terms to appear in places where predicates, functions and atomic formulas occur in predicate calculus. But its semantics is first-order and admits a sound and complete proof procedure. Applications of HiLog are discussed, including DCG grammars, higher-order and modular logic programming, and deductive databases.

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Unification problems are identified with conjunctions of equations between simply typed λ-terms where free variables in the equations can be universally or existentially quantified. Two schemes for simplifying quantifier alternation, called Skolemization and raising (a dual of Skolemization), are presented. In this setting where variables of functional type can be quantified and not all types contain closed terms, the naive generalization of firstorder Skolemization has several technical problems that are addressed. The method of searching for pre-unifiers described by Huet is easily extended to the mixed prefix setting, although solving flexible-flexible unification problems is undecidable since types may be empty. Unification problems may have numerous incomparable unifiers. Occasionally, unifiers share common factors and several of these are presented. Various optimizations on the general unification search problem are as discussed. 1.

The unification problem and several variants are presented. Various algorithms and data structures are discussed. Research on unification arising in several areas of computer science is surveyed, these areas include theorem proving, logic programming, and natural language processing. Sections of the paper include examples that highlight particular uses

This report provides a detailed description of the TPTP Problem Library for automated theorem proving systems. The library is available via Internet, and forms a common basis for development of and experimentation with automated theorem provers. This report provides: ffl the motivations for building the library; ffl a discussion of the inadequacies of previous problem collections, and how these have been resolved in the TPTP; ffl a description of the library structure, including overview information; ffl descriptions of supplementary utility programs; ffl guidelines for obtaining and using the library; Contents 1 Introduction 2 1.1 Previous Problem Collections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 1.2 What is Required? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 2 Inside the TPTP 6 2.1 The TPTP Domain Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...

Escher is a general-purpose, declarative programming language that integrates the best features of both functional and logic programming languages. It has types and modules, higher-order and meta-programming facilities, concurrency, and declarative input/output. The main design aim is to combine in a practical and comprehensive way the best ideas of existing functional and logic languages, such as Haskell and Godel. In fact, Escher uses the Haskell syntax and is most straightforwardly understood as an extension of Haskell. Consequently, this paper discusses Escher from this perspective. It provides an introduction to the Escher language, concentrating largely on the issue of programming style and the Escher programming idioms not provided by Haskell. Also the extra mechanisms needed to support these idioms are discussed.

Expansion trees are defined as generalizations of Herbrand instances for formulas in a nonextensional form of higher-order logic based on Church’s simple theory of types. Such expansion trees can be defined with or without the use of skolem functions. These trees store substitution terms and either critical variables or skolem terms used to instantiate quantifiers in the original formula and those resulting from instantiations. An expansion tree is called an expansion tree proof (ET-proof) if it encodes a tautology, and, in the form not using skolem functions, an “imbedding ” relation among the critical variables be acyclic. The relative completeness result for expansion tree proofs not using skolem functions, i.e. if A is provable in higher-order logic then A has such an expansion tree proof, is based on Andrews ’ formulation of Takahashi’s proof of the cut-elimination theorem for higher-order logic. If the occurrences of skolem functions in instantiation terms are restricted appropriately, the use of skolem functions in place of critical variables is equivalent to the requirement that the imbedding relation is acyclic. This fact not only resolves the open question of what

Type classes and overloading are shown to be independent concepts that can both be added to simple higher-order logics in the tradition of Church and Gordon, without demanding more logical expressiveness. In particular, model-theoretic issues are not affected. Our metalogical results may serve as a foundation of systems like Isabelle/Pure that offer the user Haskell-style order-sorted polymorphism as an extended syntactic feature. The latter can be used to describe simple abstract theories with a single carrier type and a fixed signature of operations.

The semantics of typed lambda calculus is usually described using Henkin models, consisting of functions over some collection of sets, or concrete cartesian closed categories, which are essentially equivalent. We describe a more general class of Kripke-style models. In categorical terms, our Kripke lambda models are cartesian closed subcategories of the presheaves over a poset. To those familiar with Kripke models of modal or intuitionistic logics, Kripke lambda models are likely to seem adequately \semantic." However, when viewed as cartesian closed categories, they do not have the property variously referred to as concreteness, well-pointed-ness, or having enough points. While the traditional lambda calculus proof system is not complete for Henkin models that may have empty types, we prove strong completeness for Kripke models. In fact, every set of equations that is closed under implication is the theory of a single Kripke model. We also develop some properties of logical relations ...

We present a simple type-checker for a language with dependent types and let expressions, with a simple proof of correctness. Introduction Type Theory provides an interesting approach to the problem of (interactive) proof-checking. Instead of introducing, like in LCF [10], an abstract data type of theorems, it uses the proofs-as-programs analogy and reduces the problem of proof checking to the problem of type-checking in a programming language with dependent types [5]. This approach presents several advantages, well described in [11,5], among those being the possibility of independent proof verification and of a uniform treatment for naming constants and theorems. It is crucial however for this approach to proof-checking to have a simple and reliable type-checking algorithm. Since the core part of such languages, like the ones described in [5,7], seems very simple, there may be some hope for such a short and simple type-checker for dependent types. Indeed, de Bruijn sketches such an al...