In mathematics and computer science, the Entscheidungsproblem is a challenge posed by David Hilbert and Wilhelm Ackermann in 1928. The problem asks for an algorithm that considers, as input, a statement and answers "yes" or "no" according to whether the statement is universally valid, i.e., valid in every structure satisfying the axioms.
First-order logic—also known as predicate logic, quantificational logic, and first-order predicate calculus—is a collection of formal systems used in mathematics, philosophy, linguistics, and computer science. First-order logic uses quantified variables over non-logical objects, and allows the use of sentences that contain variables, so that rather than propositions such as "Socrates is a man", one can have expressions in the form "there exists x such that x is Socrates and x is a man", where "there exists" is a quantifier, while x is a variable. This distinguishes it from propositional logic, which does not use quantifiers or relations; in this sense, propositional logic is the foundation of first-order logic.
Mathematical logic is the study of formal logic within mathematics. Major subareas include model theory, proof theory, set theory, and recursion theory. Research in mathematical logic commonly addresses the mathematical properties of formal systems of logic such as their expressive or deductive power. However, it can also include uses of logic to characterize correct mathematical reasoning or to establish foundations of mathematics.
In mathematical logic, model theory is the study of the relationship between formal theories, and their models. The aspects investigated include the number and size of models of a theory, the relationship of different models to each other, and their interaction with the formal language itself. In particular, model theorists also investigate the sets that can be defined in a model of a theory, and the relationship of such definable sets to each other. As a separate discipline, model theory goes back to Alfred Tarski, who first used the term "Theory of Models" in publication in 1954. Since the 1970s, the subject has been shaped decisively by Saharon Shelah's stability theory.
Gödel's incompleteness theorems are two theorems of mathematical logic that are concerned with the limits of provability in formal axiomatic theories. These results, published by Kurt Gödel in 1931, are important both in mathematical logic and in the philosophy of mathematics. The theorems are widely, but not universally, interpreted as showing that Hilbert's program to find a complete and consistent set of axioms for all mathematics is impossible.
Alfred Tarski was a Polish-American logician and mathematician. A prolific author best known for his work on model theory, metamathematics, and algebraic logic, he also contributed to abstract algebra, topology, geometry, measure theory, mathematical logic, set theory, and analytic philosophy.
In logic, a true/false decision problem is decidable if there exists an effective method for deriving the correct answer. Zeroth-order logic is decidable, whereas first-order and higher-order logic are not. Logical systems are decidable if membership in their set of logically valid formulas can be effectively determined. A theory in a fixed logical system is decidable if there is an effective method for determining whether arbitrary formulas are included in the theory. Many important problems are undecidable, that is, it has been proven that no effective method for determining membership can exist for them.
In mathematics, a real closed field is a field F that has the same first-order properties as the field of real numbers. Some examples are the field of real numbers, the field of real algebraic numbers, and the field of hyperreal numbers.
In mathematics, a nonelementary antiderivative of a given elementary function is an antiderivative that is, itself, not an elementary function. A theorem by Liouville in 1835 provided the first proof that nonelementary antiderivatives exist. This theorem also provides a basis for the Risch algorithm for determining which elementary functions have elementary antiderivatives.
Quantifier elimination is a concept of simplification used in mathematical logic, model theory, and theoretical computer science. Informally, a quantified statement " such that " can be viewed as a question "When is there an such that ?", and the statement without quantifiers can be viewed as the answer to that question.
In mathematics, Robinson arithmetic is a finitely axiomatized fragment of first-order Peano arithmetic (PA), first set out by R. M. Robinson in 1950. It is usually denoted Q. Q is almost PA without the axiom schema of mathematical induction. Q is weaker than PA but it has the same language, and both theories are incomplete. Q is important and interesting because it is a finitely axiomatized fragment of PA that is recursively incompletable and essentially undecidable.
In computer science and mathematical logic, satisfiability modulo theories (SMT) is the problem of determining whether a mathematical formula is satisfiable. It generalizes the Boolean satisfiability problem (SAT) to more complex formulas involving real numbers, integers, and/or various data structures such as lists, arrays, bit vectors, and strings. The name is derived from the fact that these expressions are interpreted within ("modulo") a certain formal theory in first-order logic with equality. SMT solvers are tools which aim to solve the SMT problem for a practical subset of inputs. SMT solvers such as Z3 and cvc5 have been used as a building block for a wide range of applications across computer science, including in automated theorem proving, program analysis, program verification, and software testing.
In mathematics, Richardson's theorem establishes the undecidability of the equality of real numbers defined by expressions involving integers, π, and exponential and sine functions. It was proved in 1968 by mathematician and computer scientist Daniel Richardson of the University of Bath.
A timeline of mathematical logic; see also history of logic.
In mathematics, the Tarski–Seidenberg theorem states that a set in (n + 1)-dimensional space defined by polynomial equations and inequalities can be projected down onto n-dimensional space, and the resulting set is still definable in terms of polynomial identities and inequalities. The theorem—also known as the Tarski–Seidenberg projection property—is named after Alfred Tarski and Abraham Seidenberg. It implies that quantifier elimination is possible over the reals, that is that every formula constructed from polynomial equations and inequalities by logical connectives ∨ (or), ∧ (and), ¬ (not) and quantifiers ∀ (for all), ∃ (exists) is equivalent to a similar formula without quantifiers. An important consequence is the decidability of the theory of real-closed fields.
In mathematical logic, a formula is satisfiable if it is true under some assignment of values to its variables. For example, the formula is satisfiable because it is true when and , while the formula is not satisfiable over the integers. The dual concept to satisfiability is validity; a formula is valid if every assignment of values to its variables makes the formula true. For example, is valid over the integers, but is not.
In proof theory, a branch of mathematical logic, elementary function arithmetic (EFA), also called elementary arithmetic and exponential function arithmetic, is the system of arithmetic with the usual elementary properties of 0, 1, +, ×, xy, together with induction for formulas with bounded quantifiers.
In mathematical logic, computational complexity theory, and computer science, the existential theory of the reals is the set of all true sentences of the form
