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Re: [ontolog-forum] IKL mailing list for discussions?

To: "[ontolog-forum] " <ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
From: Christopher Menzel <cmenzel@xxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 3 Jun 2009 20:48:20 -0500
Message-id: <07C552BF-BD99-4E70-AB4B-D401AD86FA5B@xxxxxxxx>
On Jun 3, 2009, at 5:02 PM, Jawit Kien wrote:
> [Chris Menzel wrote:]    (01)

>> Richard H. McCullough wrote:
>>> I put IKL in the class of languages like Prolog.
>
>> Well, you shouldn't.  More evidence of the striking gaps in your  
>> knowledge of fundamental issues.
>
> I'm not trying to be a simpleton, but Prolog as a language, does  
> represent a particular method of verifying logical statements,  
> independent of any implementation of Prolog. As I recall, it is a  
> recursive unification reasoner.    (02)

Well, that better describes a Prolog interpreter than Prolog itself,  
but it illustrates the point.  The syntax of Prolog is indeed based  
upon a subset of first-order logic.  But Prolog -- PROgramming in  
LOGic -- is a fully fledged, Turing complete programming language.   
IKL is not a programming language; the idea, in particular, of an IKL  
interpreter makes no sense.    (03)

I suppose in a very abstract way IKL is "like" Prolog -- Prolog is a  
formal language that can be given a mathematical (denotational)  
semantics and which is capable of expressing declarative information.   
But the differences between Prolog and IKL (or basic first-order  
logic, for that matter) are profound.  Lumping the two together  
without understanding their differences is exactly the sort of thing  
that gives rise to confusion and category mistakes (like "IKL  
interpreter").    (04)

Chris Menzel    (05)


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