On graph reasoning

Abstract

In this paper, we study the (positive) graph relational calculus. The basis for this calculus was introduced by Curtis and Lowe in 1996 and some variants, motivated by their applications to semantics of programs and foundations of mathematics, appear scattered in the literature. No proper treatment of these ideas as a logical system seems to have been presented. Here, we give a formal presentation of the system, with precise formulation of syntax, semantics, and derivation rules. We show that the set of rules is sound and complete for the valid inclusions, and prove a finite model result as well as decidability. We also prove that the graph relational language has the same expressive power as a first-order positive fragment (both languages define the same binary relations), so our calculus may be regarded as a notational variant of the positive existential first-order logic of binary relations. The graph calculus, however, has a playful aspect, with rules easy to grasp and use. This opens a wide range of applications which we illustrate by applying our calculus to the positive relational calculus (whose set of valid inclusions is not finitely axiomatizable), obtaining an algorithm for deciding the valid inclusions and equalities of the latter.