Proofs as Schemas and Their Heuristic Use

✍ Scribed by Matthias Fuchs

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 2000
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 400 KB
• Volume: 30
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0747-7171
• DOI: 10.1006/jsco.1999.0349

✦ Synopsis

Automated theorem proving essentially amounts to solving search problems. Despite significant progress in recent years theorem provers still have many shortcomings. The use of machine-learning techniques such as schemas is acknowledged as promising, but difficult to apply in the area of theorem proving. We propose a simple form of schemas, and to make use of a schema heuristically by integrating it with a search-guiding heuristic. Experiments have demonstrated that the approach allows a theorem prover to find proofs significantly faster and to prove hard problems that were out of reach before.