Negation as failureNegation as failure (NAF, for short) is a non-monotonic inference rule in logic programming, used to derive (i.e. that is assumed not to hold) from failure to derive . Note that can be different from the statement of the logical negation of , depending on the completeness of the inference algorithm and thus also on the formal logic system. Negation as failure has been an important feature of logic programming since the earliest days of both Planner and Prolog. In Prolog, it is usually implemented using Prolog's extralogical constructs.
Closed-world assumptionThe closed-world assumption (CWA), in a formal system of logic used for knowledge representation, is the presumption that a statement that is true is also known to be true. Therefore, conversely, what is not currently known to be true, is false. The same name also refers to a logical formalization of this assumption by Raymond Reiter. The opposite of the closed-world assumption is the open-world assumption (OWA), stating that lack of knowledge does not imply falsity. Decisions on CWA vs.
Autoepistemic logicThe autoepistemic logic is a formal logic for the representation and reasoning of knowledge about knowledge. While propositional logic can only express facts, autoepistemic logic can express knowledge and lack of knowledge about facts. The stable model semantics, which is used to give a semantics to logic programming with negation as failure, can be seen as a simplified form of autoepistemic logic. The syntax of autoepistemic logic extends that of propositional logic by a modal operator indicating knowledge: if is a formula, indicates that is known.
Default logicDefault logic is a non-monotonic logic proposed by Raymond Reiter to formalize reasoning with default assumptions. Default logic can express facts like “by default, something is true”; by contrast, standard logic can only express that something is true or that something is false. This is a problem because reasoning often involves facts that are true in the majority of cases but not always. A classical example is: “birds typically fly”.
Non-monotonic logicA non-monotonic logic is a formal logic whose conclusion relation is not monotonic. In other words, non-monotonic logics are devised to capture and represent defeasible inferences (cf. defeasible reasoning), i.e., a kind of inference in which reasoners draw tentative conclusions, enabling reasoners to retract their conclusion(s) based on further evidence. Most studied formal logics have a monotonic entailment relation, meaning that adding a formula to a theory never produces a pruning of its set of conclusions.
PrologProlog is a logic programming language associated with artificial intelligence and computational linguistics. Prolog has its roots in first-order logic, a formal logic, and unlike many other programming languages, Prolog is intended primarily as a declarative programming language: the program logic is expressed in terms of relations, represented as facts and rules. A computation is initiated by running a query over these relations.
Logic programmingLogic programming is a programming paradigm which is largely based on formal logic. Any program written in a logic programming language is a set of sentences in logical form, expressing facts and rules about some problem domain. Major logic programming language families include Prolog, answer set programming (ASP) and Datalog. In all of these languages, rules are written in the form of clauses: H :- B1, ..., Bn. and are read declaratively as logical implications: H if B1 and ... and Bn. H is called the head of the rule and B1, .