CONSISTENCY OF CIRCUIT EVALUATION, EXTENDED RESOLUTION AND TOTAL NP SEARCH PROBLEMS

We consider sets ${\it\Gamma}(n,s,k)$ of narrow clauses expressing that no definition of a size $s$ circ...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: JAN KRAJÍČEK
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Cambridge University Press 2016-01-01
Series:Forum of Mathematics, Sigma
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S205050941600013X/type/journal_article
Description
Summary:We consider sets ${\it\Gamma}(n,s,k)$ of narrow clauses expressing that no definition of a size $s$ circuit with $n$ inputs is refutable in resolution R in $k$ steps. We show that every CNF with a short refutation in extended R, ER, can be easily reduced to an instance of ${\it\Gamma}(0,s,k)$ (with $s,k$ depending on the size of the ER-refutation) and, in particular, that ${\it\Gamma}(0,s,k)$ when interpreted as a relativized NP search problem is complete among all such problems provably total in bounded arithmetic theory $V_{1}^{1}$ . We use the ideas of implicit proofs from Krajíček [J. Symbolic Logic, 69 (2) (2004), 387–397; J. Symbolic Logic, 70 (2) (2005), 619–630] to define from ${\it\Gamma}(0,s,k)$ a nonrelativized NP search problem $i{\it\Gamma}$ and we show that it is complete among all such problems provably total in bounded arithmetic theory $V_{2}^{1}$ . The reductions are definable in theory $S_{2}^{1}$ . We indicate how similar results can be proved for some other propositional proof systems and bounded arithmetic theories and how the construction can be used to define specific random unsatisfiable formulas, and we formulate two open problems about them.
ISSN:2050-5094