The theory ACUI of an associative, commutative, and idempotent binary function symbol + with unit 0 was one of the first equational theories for which the complexity of testing solvability of unification problems was investigated in detail. In this paper, we investigate two extensions of ACUI. On one hand, we consider approximate ACUI-unification, where we use appropriate measures to express how close a substitution is to being a unifier. On the other hand, we extend ACUI-unification to ACUIG-unification, that is, unification in equational theories that are obtained from ACUI by adding a finite set G of ground identities. Finally, we combine the two extensions, that is, consider approximate ACUI-unification. For all cases we are able to determine the exact worst-case complexity of the unification problem.

Harvey Friedman’s gap condition on embeddings of finite labelled trees plays an important role in combinatorics (proof of the graph minor theorem) and mathematical logic (strong independence results). In the present paper we show that the gap condition can be reconstructed from a small number of well-motivated building blocks: It arises via iterated applications of a uniform Kruskal theorem.

We prove that the semantics of intuitionistic linear logic in vector spaces which uses cofree coalgebras is also a model of differential linear logic, and that the Cartesian closed category of cofree coalgebras is a model of the simply typed differential λ-calculus.

This paper explores versions of the Yoneda Lemma in settings founded upon FM sets. In particular, we explore the lemma for three base categories: the category of nominal sets and equivariant functions; the category of nominal sets and all finitely supported functions, introduced in this paper; and the category of FM sets and finitely supported functions. We make this exploration in ordinary, enriched and internal settings. We also show that the finite support of Yoneda natural transformations is a theorem for free.

Differential categories axiomatize the basics of differentiation and provide categorical models of differential linear logic. A differential category is said to have antiderivatives if a natural transformation , which all differential categories have, is a natural isomorphism. Differential categories with antiderivatives come equipped with a canonical integration operator such that generalizations of the Fundamental Theorems of Calculus hold. In this paper, we show that Blute, Ehrhard, and Tasson's differential category of convenient vector spaces has antiderivatives. To help prove this result, we show that a differential linear category – which is a differential category with a monoidal coalgebra modality – has antiderivatives if and only if one can integrate over the monoidal unit and such that the Fundamental Theorems of Calculus hold. We also show that generalizations of the relational model (which are biproduct completions of complete semirings) are also differential linear categories with antiderivatives.

We consider the well-known Coordinated Attack Problem, where two generals have to decide on a common attack, when their messengers can be captured by the enemy. Informally, this problem represents the difficulties to agree in the presence of communication faults. We consider here only omission faults (loss of message), but contrary to previous studies, we do not to restrict the way messages can be lost, i.e., we make no specific assumption, we use no specific failure metric. In the large subclass of message adversaries where the double simultaneous omission can never happen, we characterize which ones are obstructions for the Coordinated Attack Problem. We give two proofs of this result. One is combinatorial and uses the classical bivalency technique for the necessary condition. The second is topological and uses simplicial complexes to prove the necessary condition. We also present two different Consensus algorithms that are combinatorial (resp. topological) in essence. Finally, we analyze the two proofs and illustrate the relationship between the combinatorial approach and the topological approach in the very general case of message adversaries. We show that the topological characterization gives a clearer explanation of why some message adversaries are obstructions or not. This result is a convincing illustration of the power of topological tools for distributed computability.

We give a definition of Q-net, a generalization of Petri nets based on a Lawvere theory Q, for which many existing variants of Petri nets are a special case. This definition is functorial with respect to change in Lawvere theory, and we exploit this to explore the relationships between different kinds of Q-nets. To justify our definition of Q-net, we construct a family of adjunctions for each Lawvere theory explicating the way in which Q-nets present free models of Q in Cat. This gives a functorial description of the operational semantics for an arbitrary category of Q-nets. We show how this can be used to construct the semantics for Petri nets, pre-nets, integer nets, and elementary net systems.

The homotopical Squier’s theorem relates rewriting properties of a presentation of a monoid with homotopical invariants of this monoid. This theorem has since been extended by Guiraud and Malbos, yielding a so-called polygraphic resolution of a monoid starting from a presentation with suitable rewriting properties. In this article, we argue that cubical categories are a more natural setting in which to express and possibly extend Guiraud and Malbos construction. As a proof-of-concept, we give a new proof of Squier’s homotopical theorem using cubical categories.

The reachability semantics for Petri nets can be studied using open Petri nets. For us, an “open” Petri net is one with certain places designated as inputs and outputs via a cospan of sets. We can compose open Petri nets by gluing the outputs of one to the inputs of another. Open Petri nets can be treated as morphisms of a category Open(Petri), which becomes symmetric monoidal under disjoint union. However, since the composite of open Petri nets is defined only up to isomorphism, it is better to treat them as morphisms of a symmetric monoidal double category ${\mathbb O}$ pen(Petri). We describe two forms of semantics for open Petri nets using symmetric monoidal double functors out of ${\mathbb O}$ pen(Petri). The first, an operational semantics, gives for each open Petri net a category whose morphisms are the processes that this net can carry out. This is done in a compositional way, so that these categories can be computed on smaller subnets and then glued together. The second, a reachability semantics, simply says which markings of the outputs can be reached from a given marking of the inputs.

Recurrence can be used as a function definition schema for any nontrivial free algebra, yielding the same computational complexity in all cases. We show that primitive-recursive computing is in fact independent of free algebras altogether, and can be characterized by a generic programming principle, namely the control of iteration by the depletion of finite components of the underlying structure.

Numerical computation is traditionally performed using floating-point arithmetic and truncated forms of infinite series, a methodology which allows for efficient computation at the cost of some accuracy. For most applications, these errors are entirely acceptable and the numerical results are considered trustworthy, but for some operations, we may want to have guarantees that the numerical results are correct, or explicit bounds on the errors. To obtain rigorous calculations, floating-point arithmetic is usually replaced by interval arithmetic and truncation errors are explicitly contained in the result. We may then ask the question of which mathematical operations can be implemented in a way in which the exact result can be approximated to arbitrary known accuracy by a numerical algorithm. This is the subject of computable analysis and forms a theoretical underpinning of rigorous numerical computation. The aim of this article is to provide a straightforward introduction to this subject that is powerful enough to answer questions arising in dynamic system theory.

A desired closure property in Bayesian probability is that an updated posterior distribution be in the same class of distributions – say Gaussians – as the prior distribution. When the updating takes place via a statistical model, one calls the class of prior distributions the ‘conjugate priors’ of the model. This paper gives (1) an abstract formulation of this notion of conjugate prior, using channels, in a graphical language, (2) a simple abstract proof that such conjugate priors yield Bayesian inversions and (3) an extension to multiple updates. The theory is illustrated with several standard examples.

We consider anti-unification for simply typed lambda terms in theories defined by associativity, commutativity, identity (unit element) axioms and their combinations and develop a sound and complete algorithm which takes two lambda terms and computes their equational generalizations in the form of higher-order patterns. The problem is finitary: the minimal complete set of such generalizations contains finitely many elements. We define the notion of optimal solution and investigate special restrictions of the problem for which the optimal solution can be computed in linear or polynomial time.

We consider the problem of the unification modulo an equational theory associativity and commutativity (ACh), which consists of a function symbol h that is homomorphic over an associative–commutative operator +. Since the unification modulo ACh theory is undecidable, we define a variant of the problem called bounded ACh unification. In this bounded version of ACh unification, we essentially bound the number of times h can be applied to a term recursively and only allow solutions that satisfy this bound. There is no bound on the number of occurrences of h in a term, and the + symbol can be applied an unlimited number of times. We give inference rules for solving the bounded version of the problem and prove that the rules are sound, complete, and terminating. We have implemented the algorithm in Maude and give experimental results. We argue that this algorithm is useful in cryptographic protocol analysis.

This paper surveys a new perspective on tree automata and Monadic second-order logic (MSO) on infinite trees. We show that the operations on tree automata used in the translations of MSO-formulae to automata underlying Rabin’s Tree Theorem (the decidability of MSO) correspond to the connectives of Intuitionistic Multiplicative Exponential Linear Logic (IMELL). Namely, we equip a variant of usual alternating tree automata (that we call uniform tree automata) with a fibered monoidal-closed structure which in particular handles a linear complementation of alternating automata. Moreover, this monoidal structure is actually Cartesian on non-deterministic automata, and an adaptation of a usual construction for the simulation of alternating automata by non-deterministic ones satisfies the deduction rules of the !(–) exponential modality of IMELL. (But this operation is unfortunately not a functor because it does not preserve composition.) Our model of IMLL consists in categories of games which are based on usual categories of two-player linear sequential games called simple games, and which generalize usual acceptance games of tree automata. This model provides a realizability semantics, along the lines of Curry–Howard proofs-as-programs correspondence, of a linear constructive deduction system for tree automata. This realizability semantics, which can be summarized with the slogan “automata as objects, strategies as morphisms,” satisfies an expected property of witness extraction from proofs of existential statements. Moreover, it makes it possible to combine realizers produced as interpretations of proofs with strategies witnessing (non-)emptiness of tree automata.

We study decision procedures for two knowledge problems critical to the verification of security protocols, namely the intruder deduction and the static equivalence problems. These problems can be related to particular forms of context matching and context unification. Both problems are defined with respect to an equational theory and are known to be decidable when the equational theory is given by a subterm convergent term rewrite system (TRS). In this work, we extend this to consider a subterm convergent TRS defined modulo an equational theory, like Commutativity. We present two pairs of solutions for these important problems. The first solves the deduction and static equivalence problems in rewrite systems modulo shallow theories such as Commutativity. The second provides a general procedure that solves the deduction and static equivalence problems in subterm convergent systems modulo syntactic permutative theories, provided a finite measure is ensured. Several examples of such theories are also given.

We consider matching, rewriting, critical pairs and the Knuth–Bendix confluence test on rewrite rules in a nominal setting extended by atom-variables. We utilize atom-variables instead of atoms to formulate and rewrite rules on constrained expressions, which is an improvement of expressiveness over previous approaches. Nominal unification and nominal matching are correspondingly extended. Rewriting is performed using nominal matching, and computing critical pairs is done using nominal unification. We determine the complexity of several problems in a quantified freshness logic. In particular we show that nominal matching is $$\prod _2^p$$ -complete. We prove that the adapted Knuth–Bendix confluence test is applicable to a nominal rewrite system with atom-variables, and thus that there is a decidable test whether confluence of the ground instance of the abstract rewrite system holds. We apply the nominal Knuth–Bendix confluence criterion to the theory of monads and compute a convergent nominal rewrite system modulo alpha-equivalence.