HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: schweizer@tik.ethz.ch (schweizer)
Subject: Minimisation of boolean functions
Keywords: Quine McCluskey, Prolog
Organization: ETH Zurich, Switzerland
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 14:35:29 GMT

I'm looking for an available implementation of Quine/McCluskey's minimization
algorithm for boolean functions written in AAIS Prolog on a Macintosh Computer.
Every pointer to such a program source would be greatly appretiated.
Thank you!  
Newsgroups: sci.logic
From: boshuck@triples.math.mcgill.ca (William Boshuck)
Subject: Re: Equivalence of Strong completeness and categoricity
Organization: Dept Of Mathematics and Statistics
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 92 02:50:48 GMT

In article <1992Jul22.205827.16651@cenatls.cena.dgac.fr> alliot@cenatls.cena.dgac.fr (Jean-Marc Alliot) writes:
>
>Consistency: A system is consistent if, for any wff F, we
>can not have at the same time (F is a theorem) and (not F is a
>theorem). 
>
>Categoricity: a system is categoric if, for any wff F, we have either
>(F is theorem) or (not F is a theorem).
>
>Strong completeness: a system based on a set S of axioms is strongly
>complete if for any wff F, we have either (F is a theorem) or (F added
>to S is an inconsistent system).
>
>
>Now the questions:
>
>1) It seems quite clear that in any system which is a superset of
>propositional calculus Categoricity and Strong completeness are
>equivalent. However a short and clear demonstration would be very much
>welcome.
>
>2) Does the property hold in the general case (I especially think of
>intuitionist logic) ?
>

The proof which answers question 1) depends on something
called the deduction theorem which, in turn gives an answer to
the second question. The deduction theorem says that for a
theory T and formulas F,G, that the following inferences (both
top to bottom and bottom to top) are valid

                T,F |- G
              ------------
              T |- F ==> G   .	

(I am using |- to denote provability in whatever logic is
under consideration) In some treatments of logic, this is
virtually the definition of implication (perhaps rightly so).
In particular, this rule is valid in intuitionistic, and modal
logics (at least in the more common ones like S4).

If T is a theory in a logic which admits the above rule for
implication then we can say the following. First, categoricity
implies strong completeness: Suppose T is categorical. If T |-
F then that's it. Otherwise, T |- ~F in which case T,F |- F &
~F so T adjoin F is an inconsistent theory. Now, strong
completeness implies categoricity: Again, if F is a theorem
then you're done.  Otherwise, T adjoin F is an inconsistent
theory; that is, T,F |- (false). By the above rule we get
T |- F ==> (false), that is, T |- ~F. 

I hope this has been helpful.

WHB


Xref: sparky sci.logic:1246 comp.theory:1697 sci.math.symbolic:2097 comp.ai:2904 aus.ai:98 comp.lang.functional:968
From: mahler@latcs1.lat.oz.au (Daniel Mahler)
Newsgroups: sci.logic,comp.theory,sci.math.symbolic,comp.ai,aus.ai,comp.lang.functional
Subject: Wanted Knuth-Bendix algorithm and/or other programs for word problems
Date: 28 Jul 92 09:11:42 GMT
Organization: Comp Sci, La Trobe Uni, Australia
Originator: mahler@ipc2.lat.oz.au

The subject really says it all.
I would like to obtain programs for Knuth-Bendix,
theory unification/resolution, paramodualtion etc.

	Thanks
		Daniel
From: ard@cs.bham.ac.uk (Antoni Diller)
Newsgroups: sci.logic
Subject: Re: Kleene 3-valued logic
Date: 24 Jul 92 14:03:15 GMT
Distribution: sci.logic
Organization: School of Computer Science, University of Birmingham, UK

In article <FABIO.92Jul18144835@mars.inagaki.nuie.nagoya-u.ac.jp> fabio@inagaki.nuie.nagoya-u.ac.jp (Fabio Casablanca) writes:
>
>I am interested in model theory connected to Kleene 3-valued logic.
>
>I am also interested to applications of this logic to logic programming 
>and computer science.
>
>Any pointer will be greatly appreciated.
>
>fabio
>--
>Fabio CASABLANCA
>    Inagaki Laboratory-Information Engineering Dept.-Nagoya University
>    E-MAIL:fabio@mars.inagaki.nuie.nagoya-u.ac.jp
>    FAX NUMBER:(052)782-8260
>  
>        

Cliff Jones in his book `Systematic Software Development Using VDM' uses
Kleene's logic in program verification; there are references in that book
to various articles he and his students have written exploring this
logic, which he calls LCF (I think, but I may be wrong).

Antoni Diller
From: morgun@csr.UVic.CA (Mehmet Orgun)
Newsgroups: sci.logic
Subject: Re: Kleene 3-valued logic
Date: 24 Jul 92 16:38:28 GMT
Distribution: sci.logic
Organization: University of Victoria

ard@cs.bham.ac.uk (Antoni Diller) writes:

>In article <FABIO.92Jul18144835@mars.inagaki.nuie.nagoya-u.ac.jp> fabio@inagaki.nuie.nagoya-u.ac.jp (Fabio Casablanca) writes:
>>
>>I am interested in model theory connected to Kleene 3-valued logic.
>>
>>I am also interested to applications of this logic to logic programming 
>>and computer science.
>>
>>Any pointer will be greatly appreciated.
>>
>>fabio
>>--
>>Fabio CASABLANCA
>>    Inagaki Laboratory-Information Engineering Dept.-Nagoya University
>>    E-MAIL:fabio@mars.inagaki.nuie.nagoya-u.ac.jp
>>    FAX NUMBER:(052)782-8260
>>  
>>        

>Cliff Jones in his book `Systematic Software Development Using VDM' uses
>Kleene's logic in program verification; there are references in that book
>to various articles he and his students have written exploring this
>logic, which he calls LCF (I think, but I may be wrong).

>Antoni Diller

See the following reference for an application of Kripke-Kleene
3-valued logic to logic programming:

Melvin Fitting, A Kripke-Kleene semantics for logic programs,
J of Logic Programming, 2(1985) 295-312.

Mehmet.
Xref: sparky sci.logic:1237 sci.math.symbolic:2067
From: amonge@cs.ucsd.edu (Alvaro Monge)
Newsgroups: sci.logic,sci.math.symbolic
Subject: Manipulating logical expressions...
Date: 25 Jul 92 00:01:57 GMT
Followup-To: sci.logic
Distribution: usa
Organization: CSE Dept., U.C. San Diego


I am in need of source code (preferably C++) which
manipulates logical expressions involving variables
and literal constants.

An important operation of such a program is:
   Standardizing apart of names:
     i.e.
	Given 2 expressions.  Want them to each have different
	variable names.  That is do the necessary alfa conversions
	on the expression(s) to make sure that they do not share
	any variable names.

Thanks,
Al Monge
amonge@cs.ucsd.edu


Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
From: vincent@reg.triumf.ca (pete)
Subject: Re: propaganda and the new physics
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    
Organization: dept. of theophysics and cosmogyny
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1992 20:48:00 GMT

In article <1992Jul28.065104.7626@crash.cts.com>, snodgras@crash.cts.com 
(John Snodgrass) writes...
> 
>      I agree. But let's look at the human motive too, so often ignored
>in these discussions. Scientists are people who want power. They want
>the average person to look upon them as specially gifted, as penetrating
>the deepest mysteries of life. And that view should be accurate, but
>IMO it is not today. It's become a sham, and it's getting worse. Like
>a developing priesthood, they're slinking toward the God-thing. They want
>it, and they think they can get it. Those of us who are pro-science don't
>want to see it become dominated by these types.
> 

Well this is really too much. Now I think I can see the source of John's
bile. Reading spurious motive into a whole field of human endeavour,
reflects rather on the realm of motive available to the beholder.
    Let me just say that for myself and most of those I know in the
basic research fields of the hard sciences, the motive has nothing
to do with public adulation, or manipulation of the world, or monetary
gain. There are far better avenues for each of these motives. No, the
basic drive is simply to know more about what's going on, for its own
sake. Period. A basic human drive which surfaces in some of us much
stronger than most, having no doubt had an evolutionary advantage.
But it is ultimately as visceral a need as sex or food, and like them,
it may have a rational purpose, but that is not how it appears to
the psyche. Rather, it is there, primal, raw, and unexamined.


===========================================================================
A cynic's world is comprised                          Pete Vincent
of fools and other cynics
From: jeff@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: How can people write like that?
Date: 31 Jul 92 16:11:06 GMT
Organization: AIAI, University of Edinburgh, Scotland

In article <BrFMv6.9Jp@unx.sas.com> sasghm@theseus.unx.sas.com (Gary Merrill) writes:
>Some philosophy is more difficult that other philosophy.  Some philosphers
>are much more difficult to read than others (sometimes just because of
>their writing styles).  A lot of stuff presupposes that you are familiar
>with other writings.  If you were ignorant of contemporary physics but
>wanted to learn, you wouldn't do so by starting on the most advanced text
>you could find in general relativity and stellar cosmology.  But many people
>try a comparable approach with philosphy.

I happen to think that a lot of analytic (roughly, Anglo-American)
philosophy is fairly readable, though it probably helps to have some
knowledge of maths or logic.  "Continental" philosophy is a different
story, and I think it would be hard to make any sense of it without
reading some good background material first.

Some philosophers or books I think are fairly readable:

  Kripke, _Naming and Necessity_
    (The Nixon and Godel examples are fun, if nothing else.)
  Dennett
  Fodor
  Putnam

My nomination for the most difficult to read contemporary analytic
philosopher: David Wiggins.  

-- jd
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
From: snodgras@crash.cts.com (John Snodgrass)
Subject: Re: How can people write like that?
Organization: Crash TimeSharing, El Cajon, CA
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 19:15:41 GMT

In <1992Jul18.183735.24522@uwm.edu> hiho@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Mark Peterson) writes:

>From article <1992Jul17.210643.2509@crash.cts.com>, by snodgras@crash.cts.com (John Snodgrass):
>> In <1992Jul14.161117.16461@access.usask.ca> choy@skorpio.usask.ca writes:
>> 
>>>I've read some works by philosophers and I just can't get over how
>>>hard they are to read. 

>To Mr. Choy:

>Well, sure, a lot of the time.  I have the same problem trying to
>follow my own father's description of DNA splicing.  ;-)  

>But... to John:

>>       Don't believe what you don't understand. Maybe you'll be wrong, and
>> miss out on something, but at least you'll never give credit where it isn't
>> due. This is how philosophers, scientific and otherwise, play on the
>> ignorant. They accept the assignment of authority for knowledge they never
>> demonstrate they have. Dogmas become established, gain power, and proceed
>> to suppress all other views, putting the lid on human discovery. It is my
>> own belief that all truth is intuitive, that the human mind -- to the extent
>> that it can apprehend something -- can understand how it works.

>Zowie.  You know, it's always been completely intuitive to me that the
>sun goes around the earth.  Just use your eyes.  Anybody could tell
>you that....  But now, tell me, why wouldn't you believe them?


>Yust tinking out loud...


      It is not intuitive that the sun goes around the Earth, which is
part of the reason what is really going on was discovered. The geocentric
universe didn't make sense when you worked it out in more detail, especially
the motions of the planets. Once the real situation was discovered, it was
_more_ intuitive than what was previously thought.

      Anything which involves motion of objects in 3-D space is intuitive,
because it can be imagined in terms of the way we process data normally.
This does not mean the image or structure imagined is correct, it just means
its accessible to human mental processes. All engineering, all computerized
manipulation of information, all spacial chemical models, all physical
interactions which can be represented in 3-space (+ time) are intuitive.

      What is not intuitive is symbolic manipulation which is not tied to
description of 3-D external reality (again over time). Curvature of space
or frame-of-reference alterations of length or time are not intuitive. They
cannot be imagined -- and no one says they can be imagined. When symbologies
take on a life of their own (usually to someone's profit) then and only then
do you get non-intuitive science.

      For instance, DNA splicing may be complex, but it is just as intuitive,
conceptually, as film editing.

      SnOdGrAsS

>hiho
>-- 
>mark ce peterson   | uw-washington county  | hiho@csd4.csd.uwm.edu 
>dept of philosophy | west bend, wi.  53095 | (414) 335-5200        

>     The shorter the tether, the sooner the goat starves.
From: dwilson@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (dwilson)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Structure of Possible Perception
Date: 24 Jul 92 03:25:51 GMT
Reply-To: dwilson@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (dwilson)
Distribution: usa
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX
Originator: dwilson@sneezy.cc.utexas.edu


In article <RV.92Jul23001550@cslab8a.cs.brown.edu> rv@cs.brown.edu (rodrigo vanegas) writes:
>
>Much of Kant's theory rests on the notion that there is a class of
>truths which are both "a priori" and "synthetic".  Are these truths
>"necessary" or "contingent"?
>

      
Necessary. They include our ideas about space, time and causality, and
so are synthetic (ie, having to do with the world) rather than analytic
tautologies ("All bachelors are unmarried", that sort of shit), but
they have the same epistemological stature as analytic statements 
because they can never be contradicted by experience.  Just as you will
never meet an unmarried bachelor, you will never observe an uncaused
event, an object that does not have spatial coordinates or an event
not in time.  According to Kant.  
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
From: rv@cs.brown.edu (rodrigo vanegas)
Subject: Kant and the synthetic a priori
Organization: Dept. of Computer Science, Brown University
Distribution: sci
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 1992 05:15:50 GMT

Just a quickie question for which i'd like a quickie straightforward
answer.

Much of Kant's theory rests on the notion that there is a class of
truths which are both "a priori" and "synthetic".  Are these truths
"necessary" or "contingent"?

i'll assume that because this is talk.philosophy.tech i don't have to
define these rather standard terms.

that's it!

rodrigo_vanegas@brown.edu
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
From: jdymond@tartarus.uwa.edu.au (Jason Dymond)
Subject: Ontology of the Internet
Organization: University of Western Australia
Date: Sat, 25 Jul 1992 06:49:39 GMT

I am currently working on the ontology of the net in the philosophy
dept.here.

I am interested in hearing from other net users as to exactly where they
conceive of the interchange of communication on the net as taking
place. By this I don't mean the physical location of files etc., but the
notional location in terms of the "space" being accessed on the virtual
network.

I would like to correspond by e-mail with anyone who has any thoughts on
this.

Thanx in advance.

Jason.
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
From: snodgras@crash.cts.com (John Snodgrass)
Subject: Re: A Brief History of Tripe
Organization: Crash TimeSharing, El Cajon, CA
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 19:41:43 GMT

In <1992Jul18.233946.13851@msuinfo.cl.msu.edu> burtt@crs.cl.msu.edu (Brian Burtt) writes:


>    In each of their times, Newton and Hawking were/are brilliant 
>mathematical physicists.  You call Hawking 'pathetic' because of his
>disabilities.  I think he is a hero, having overcome the problems

      Hawking is what he is, as we all are. Everyone is crippled in some
way, if you choose to look at it like that. My bone to pick with Hawking,
and with the ideas he is a proponent of, is not because he's 'a cripple',
though as I said, I feel his particular disability is too rich a metaphor
with what is wrong with the new physics to pass up. That's all. I think the
whole subjectivist movement is the disolution of science into pathos.

>that would cause most people to give up on life, and accomplishing
>more than most able-bodied people.  I only hope that, being an able
>bodied person myself, I can accomplish as a physicist a small fraction
>of what Hawking (or Newton) has done.  Granted, neither Newton nor

      Sometimes people accomplish things by doing them wrong, because in
that way they establish the non-viability of certain approaches. IMO this is
what Hawking (and others) has accomplished. Ultimately I think science does
come down to trial and error, that there is no escaping this. But when
something doesn't pan out, there comes a time to say 'enough is enough'!
This may not be easy, since tens of thousands of people may have based
entire careers on the current paradigm: they're hardly going to take an
even-handed 'scientific' approach to the problem. They have kids to feed.
This is where you're still a little starry-eyed, I fear.

>Hawking are the most pleasant of personalities--most geniuses aren't.
>Let's join together in the common cause:  working to understand this
>glorious and complex word and universe we live in.


      Philosophies and cosmologies compete just like industries. In an age
of information, territory has become conceptual. The sooner you realize this,
the further you will get in science; it's not a harmonius situation --
you're going to have to fight to get your ideas accepted.

>-- Brian Burtt
>Undergraduate astrophysics major-- Michigan State University
>  


      SnOdGrAsS
From: jeff@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: Re: Free Will?
Date: 30 Jul 92 17:16:47 GMT
Organization: AIAI, University of Edinburgh, Scotland

In article <14900002@hpspdla.spd.HP.COM> ric@hpspdla.spd.HP.COM (Ric Peregrino) writes:
>Regarding free will I wrote:
>
>>>In essence, does free will preclude a deterministic physics?
>
>to which Jeff Dalton responds:
>
>>There are a number of "compatiblist" arguments in philosophy that say
>>no....  Of course, not
>>all philosophers think these arguments are correct, and there is some
>>dispute about just what "determinism" means.
>
>I think the language is very clear, but let me make some simple definitions.

You don't have to believe me, but so far as I can tell there really is
some dispute about what "determinism" means.  Moreover, the compatiblist
arguments apply to fairly strong versions of determinism.  I suspect
that some would apply even to your version (which is not to say they're
right).

>A deterministic physics is one in which the outcome of an event can be known
>before the event.

I don't think this is what's usually meant by deterministic, unless
"can be known" is taken in an ideal sense (ie, ignoring processing
time and access to information).  What's usually meant is more or
less "given a state of the universe, only one sequence of later
states is possible".  Now this certainly sounds incompatible with
free will, but there are arguments to the contrary.

>Free will is the ability of a being to choose their
>actions whithin the realm of possibility (ie. I can't choose to fly to
>Mars today, but I can choose to post this note). Clearly a deterministic
>physics thus defined precludes free will, and vice versa.

I don't agree that it's clear, but you should look at the compatiblist
arguments yourself and see what you think.

>>>What about a QM type of solution where a probability of a human's
>>>choice is all that could be calculated? Even still, if told the 
>>>probabilities, Adam could always choose the lowest probability just
>>>to spite God.
>
>>He could, but it's unlikely that he'd do it very often (assuming, as
>>we do, that God is right about the probabilities).
>
>But he could do it always if he had free will.

This depends on what we mean by saying God is right about the
probabilities.  If the guy really is going to choose some
"low-probability" option, why wouldn't God know this and take
it into account?

>I think this transfer of information will perturb his state
>and alter the coeffecients A and B. Thus if I can know what a human
>is going to do, then I can't tell him, otherwise it alters the outcome.

I agree.  But God presumably takes this into account.

It depends on just what sort of knowledge we're allowing God to have.

-- jd
From: burt@aupair.cs.athabascau.ca (Burt Voorhees)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: Kant and the synthetic a priori
Date: 23 Jul 92 16:18:41 GMT
Distribution: sci

rv@cs.brown.edu (rodrigo vanegas) writes:

>Just a quickie question for which i'd like a quickie straightforward
>answer.

>Much of Kant's theory rests on the notion that there is a class of
>truths which are both "a priori" and "synthetic".  Are these truths
>"necessary" or "contingent"?

>i'll assume that because this is talk.philosophy.tech i don't have to
>define these rather standard terms.

>that's it!

>rodrigo_vanegas@brown.edu

  First we need to assume that there is at least one synthetic a priori
truth since if none exist it doesn't make much sense to ask of them
whether they are necessary or contingent (What is not cannot be thought -
Parmenides).
  For a Platonist there are lots of synthetic a priori truths, and they
are all necessary, as required for any a priori truth.  On the other hand,
one could look into what kind of truth one was talking about.  Is it the
real and absolute truth, or merely some little relative truth which
depends on choice of axioms?  Kant thought that the theorems of Euclidian
geometry were synthetic a priori, but we now know that they are true only
in the sense that if we assume Euclid's five axioms then the theorems
follow, and Euclid's axioms are not necessary.
  On the other hand, Kant was interested in the conditions which are
necessary for having experience.  Bracketing the thought that it might
be better to phrase this question as that of the conditions which are
necessary for there to exist an experiencer, uit seems to me that this
might be the area where one would look for some necessary synthetic a
priori truths.
bhv
From: luden@lehigh.edu (Dean E. Nelson)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: Structure of Possible Perception
Date: 24 Jul 92 15:26:23 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: Lehigh University Computing Center

In article <76488@ut-emx.uucp> dwilson@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (dwilson) writes:
>From: dwilson@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (dwilson)
>Subject: Structure of Possible Perception
>Date: 24 Jul 92 03:25:51 GMT


>In article <RV.92Jul23001550@cslab8a.cs.brown.edu> rv@cs.brown.edu (rodrigo vanegas) writes:
>>
>>Much of Kant's theory rests on the notion that there is a class of
>>truths which are both "a priori" and "synthetic".  Are these truths
>>"necessary" or "contingent"?
>>

>      
>Necessary. They include our ideas about space, time and causality, and
>so are synthetic (ie, having to do with the world) rather than analytic
>tautologies ("All bachelors are unmarried", that sort of shit), but
>they have the same epistemological stature as analytic statements 
>because they can never be contradicted by experience.  Just as you will
>never meet an unmarried bachelor, you will never observe an uncaused
>event, an object that does not have spatial coordinates or an event
>not in time.  According to Kant.  

Perhaps we should ask Rodrigo if he meant epistemological necessity or
logical necessity.  

Dean Nelson den0@lehigh.edu