Finite Satisfiability of the Two-Variable Guarded Fragment with Transitive Guards and Related Variants
We consider extensions of the two-variable guarded fragment, GF2, where distinguished binary predicates that occur only in guards are required to be interpreted in a special way (as transitive relations, equivalence relations, pre-orders or partial orders). We prove that the only fragment that retains the finite (exponential) model property is GF2 with equivalence guards without equality. For remaining fragments we show that the size of a minimal finite model is at most doubly exponential. To obtain the result we invent a strategy of building finite models that are formed from a number of multidimensional grids placed over a cylindrical surface. The construction yields a 2NExpTime-upper bou…
Equivalence closure in the two-variable guarded fragment
We consider the satisfiability and finite satisfiability problems for the extension of the two-variable guarded fragment in which an equivalence closure operator can be applied to two distinguished binary predicates. We show that the satisfiability and finite satisfiability problems for this logic are 2-ExpTime-complete. This contrasts with an earlier result that the corresponding problems for the full two-variable logic with equivalence closures of two binary predicates are 2-NExpTime-complete.
Two-Variable First-Order Logic with Equivalence Closure
We consider the satisfiability and finite satisfiability problems for extensions of the two-variable fragment of first-order logic in which an equivalence closure operator can be applied to a fixed number of binary predicates. We show that the satisfiability problem for two-variable, first-order logic with equivalence closure applied to two binary predicates is in 2-NExpTime, and we obtain a matching lower bound by showing that the satisfiability problem for two-variable first-order logic in the presence of two equivalence relations is 2-NExpTime-hard. The logics in question lack the finite model property; however, we show that the same complexity bounds hold for the corresponding finite sa…
On Finite Satisfiability of the Guarded Fragment with Equivalence or Transitive Guards
The guarded fragment of first-order logic, GF, enjoys the finite model property, so the satisfiability and the finite satisfiability problems coincide. We are concerned with two extensions of the two-variable guarded fragment that do not possess the finite model property, namely, GF2 with equivalence and GF2 with transitive guards. We prove that in both cases every finitely satisfiable formula has a model of at most double exponential size w.r.t. its length. To obtain the result we invent a strategy of building finite models that are formed from a number of multidimensional grids placed over a cylindrical surface. The construction yields a 2NEXPTIME-upper bound on the complexity of the fini…
Two-variable logics with counting and semantic constraints
In this article we discuss fragments and extensions of two-variable logics motivated by practical applications. We outline the decidability frontier, describing some of the techniques developed for deciding satisfiability and finite satisfiability, as well as characterizing their complexity.
On Finite Satisfiability of Two-Variable First-Order Logic with Equivalence Relations
We show that every finitely satisfiable two-variable first-order formula with two equivalence relations has a model of size at most triply exponential with respect to its length. Thus the finite satisfiability problem for two-variable logic over the class of structures with two equivalence relations is decidable in nondeterministic triply exponential time. We also show that replacing one of the equivalence relations in the considered class of structures by a relation which is only required to be transitive leads to undecidability. This sharpens the earlier result that two-variable logic is undecidable over the class of structures with two transitive relations.