First-Order Modular Logic Programs and their Conservative Extensions

TL;DR

This paper introduces first-order modular logic programs and conservative extensions, providing a framework to understand and relate complex logic programs and justify common rewriting techniques.

Contribution

It presents the novel concept of first-order modular logic programs and conservative extensions, linking modularity with traditional answer set programs.

Findings

Introduces first-order modular logic programs.

Defines conservative extensions for these programs.

Shows how conservative extensions justify projection rewriting.

Abstract

Modular logic programs provide a way of viewing logic programs as consisting of many independent, meaningful modules. This paper introduces first-order modular logic programs, which can capture the meaning of many answer set programs. We also introduce conservative extensions of such programs. This concept helps to identify strong relationships between modular programs as well as between traditional programs. We show how the notion of a conservative extension can be used to justify the common projection rewriting. This note is under consideration for publication in Theory and Practice of Logic Programming.