Propositonal Logic

Less ontological commitment. Weak epistemological commitment.

Syntax

Sentences are formed using logical connectives such as not, and.

• Atomic sentence: a single proposition (e.g., $P$).
• Literal: an atomic sentence or its negation.
• Complex sentence: built from simpler ones with connectives.

Semantics

Defines the truth of sentences under a model (assignment of true/false values).

Example: $m1 = \set{P = \text{true}, Q = \text{true}, R = \text{false}}$

Conjunctive Normal Form

Aka. CNF. A standard way of writing logical formulas so that they can be easily processed by reasoning algorithms like resolution.

A formula is in CNF iff:

• it’s a conjunction ($\land$) and
• each clause inside the conjunction is a disjunction ($\lor$) of literals

Steps

• Eliminate biconditionals ($\iff$)
  Replace: $(A \iff B) \to (A \implies B) \land (B \implies A)$

• Eliminate implications ($\implies$)
  Replace: $(A \implies B) \to \lnot A \lor B$

• Move lnot inwards using De Morgan’s laws

  • $\lnot(A \land B) \to (\lnot A \lor \lnot B)$
  • $\lnot(A \lor B) \to (\lnot A \land \lnot B)$
  • $\lnot(\lnot A) \to A$

• Apply distributive law to get a conjunction of disjunctions
  $(A \lor (B \land C)) \to (A \lor B) \land (A \lor C)$

• Simplify
  Remove duplicate literals or clauses if possible.