Undecidability of dyadic first-order logic in Coq

The work

AuthorsJohannes Hostert; Andrej Dudenhefner; Dominik Kirst
Editors
Typeinproceedings
Year2022
Citekeyhostert2022undecidability

Where it appeared

Published in13th International Conference on Interactive Theorem Proving (ITP 2022)
PublisherSchloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik
SeriesLeibniz International Proceedings in Informatics
Number in series237
Volume237
Pages19:1--19:19

Abstract

We develop and mechanize compact proofs of the undecidability of various problems for dyadic first-order logic over a small logical fragment. In this fragment, formulas are restricted to only a single binary relation, and a minimal set of logical connectives. We show that validity, satisfiability, and provability, along with finite satisfiability and finite validity are undecidable, by directly reducing from a suitable binary variant of Diophantine constraints satisfiability. Our results improve upon existing work in two ways: First, the reductions are direct and significantly more compact than existing ones. Secondly, the undecidability of the small logic fragment of dyadic first-order logic was not mechanized before. We contribute our mechanization to the Coq Library of Undecidability Proofs, utilizing its synthetic approach to computability theory.

How it got here

How it got hereagent via bibtex
Added2026-08-05 00:00 UTC
Approved bya person 2026-08-17 14:03 UTC

Cite it as

@inproceedings{hostert2022undecidability,
  title        = {Undecidability of dyadic first-order logic in Coq},
  author       = {Johannes Hostert and Andrej Dudenhefner and Dominik Kirst},
  year         = {2022},
  booktitle    = {13th International Conference on Interactive Theorem Proving (ITP 2022)},
  publisher    = {Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik},
  series       = {Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics},
  volume       = {237},
  pages        = {19:1--19:19},
  doi          = {10.4230/lipics.itp.2022.19},
}

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