xvi
Preface
least in part, and is, we believe, unique in its content and coverage and fills a
significant gap in the literature on theoretical computer science.
The book is mainly aimed at advanced undergraduate students, graduate students, and researchers interested in the interface between mathematics and computer science. It presents material from the early days of logic
programming through to topics which are of current importance. It should
be of special interest to those engaged in the foundations of logic programming, theoretical aspects of knowledge representation and reasoning, artificial intelligence, the integration of logic-based systems with other models of
computation, logic in computer science, semantics of computation, and related topics. The book should also prove to be of interest to those engaged
in domain theory and in applications of general topology to computer science. Indeed, it carries out for logic programming semantics, in a general
model-building sense, something akin to what the well-known treatments of
Abramsky and Jung [Abramsky and Jung, 1994] and Stoltenberg-Hansen et
al. [Stoltenberg-Hansen et al., 1994] set out to do for the semantics of conventional programming languages.
We have inevitably built up a considerable debt of gratitude to a number of colleagues, collaborators, post-doctoral researchers, and post-graduate
students during the course of conducting the research presented here. It is
therefore a pleasure to record our thanks for insights, comments, and valuable discussions to all of them. They include Sebastian Bader, Federico Banti,
Howard Blair, Eleanor Clifford, Artur S. d’Avila Garcez, Ben Goertzel, Barbara Hammer, Roland Heinze, Steffen H¨ olldobler, Achim Jung, Matthias
Knorr, Ekaterina Komendantskaya, Vladimir Komendantsky, Ralph Kopperman, Markus Kr¨ otzsch, Kai-Uwe K¨ uhnberger, Luis Lamb, M´ aire Lane,
Jens Lehmann, Tobias Matzner, Turlough Neary, John Power, Sibylla PrießCrampe, Paulo Ribenboim, Bill Rounds, Sibylle Schwarz, Pawe� l Waszkiewicz,
Matthias Wendt, Andreas Witzel, Damien Woods, and Guo-Qiang Zhang. In
particular, we are grateful to Sebastian Bader for his contribution to Chapter 7, and indeed this chapter was written jointly with him.
Our acknowledgments and thanks are also due to a number of institutions
and individuals for hosting us on a number of research projects and visits and
to various funding agencies for making the latter possible.
In particular, Pascal Hitzler acknowledges the support of Science Foundation Ireland; the Boole Centre for Research at University College Cork;
University College Cork itself; the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst
(DAAD); and Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio. While conducting the research which led to the contents of this book, P. Hitzler changed
affiliation several times, and he is grateful to University College Cork Ireland; the International Center on Computational Logic at Technical University Dresden; Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio; the Institute
for Applied Informatics and Formal Description Methods (AIFB) at the University of Karlsruhe; and the Kno.e.sis Center at Wright State University,
Dayton, Ohio for providing excellent working environments.
Preface
least in part, and is, we believe, unique in its content and coverage and fills a
significant gap in the literature on theoretical computer science.
The book is mainly aimed at advanced undergraduate students, graduate students, and researchers interested in the interface between mathematics and computer science. It presents material from the early days of logic
programming through to topics which are of current importance. It should
be of special interest to those engaged in the foundations of logic programming, theoretical aspects of knowledge representation and reasoning, artificial intelligence, the integration of logic-based systems with other models of
computation, logic in computer science, semantics of computation, and related topics. The book should also prove to be of interest to those engaged
in domain theory and in applications of general topology to computer science. Indeed, it carries out for logic programming semantics, in a general
model-building sense, something akin to what the well-known treatments of
Abramsky and Jung [Abramsky and Jung, 1994] and Stoltenberg-Hansen et
al. [Stoltenberg-Hansen et al., 1994] set out to do for the semantics of conventional programming languages.
We have inevitably built up a considerable debt of gratitude to a number of colleagues, collaborators, post-doctoral researchers, and post-graduate
students during the course of conducting the research presented here. It is
therefore a pleasure to record our thanks for insights, comments, and valuable discussions to all of them. They include Sebastian Bader, Federico Banti,
Howard Blair, Eleanor Clifford, Artur S. d’Avila Garcez, Ben Goertzel, Barbara Hammer, Roland Heinze, Steffen H¨ olldobler, Achim Jung, Matthias
Knorr, Ekaterina Komendantskaya, Vladimir Komendantsky, Ralph Kopperman, Markus Kr¨ otzsch, Kai-Uwe K¨ uhnberger, Luis Lamb, M´ aire Lane,
Jens Lehmann, Tobias Matzner, Turlough Neary, John Power, Sibylla PrießCrampe, Paulo Ribenboim, Bill Rounds, Sibylle Schwarz, Pawe� l Waszkiewicz,
Matthias Wendt, Andreas Witzel, Damien Woods, and Guo-Qiang Zhang. In
particular, we are grateful to Sebastian Bader for his contribution to Chapter 7, and indeed this chapter was written jointly with him.
Our acknowledgments and thanks are also due to a number of institutions
and individuals for hosting us on a number of research projects and visits and
to various funding agencies for making the latter possible.
In particular, Pascal Hitzler acknowledges the support of Science Foundation Ireland; the Boole Centre for Research at University College Cork;
University College Cork itself; the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst
(DAAD); and Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio. While conducting the research which led to the contents of this book, P. Hitzler changed
affiliation several times, and he is grateful to University College Cork Ireland; the International Center on Computational Logic at Technical University Dresden; Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio; the Institute
for Applied Informatics and Formal Description Methods (AIFB) at the University of Karlsruhe; and the Kno.e.sis Center at Wright State University,
Dayton, Ohio for providing excellent working environments.