Skolem Function

Consider a formula in prenex normal form,

If  is the existential quantifier () and , ...,  are all the universal quantifier variables such that , , then introduce the new function symbol  and term . (If , then  is a constant.) This function is called Skolem function (or Herbrand function).

Now replace all occurrences of  by this term and remove . When all existential quantifiers are removed, convert  into conjunctive normal form. This process, which usually termed skolemization, results in a formula in Skolemized form. The resulting formula is unsatisfiable iff the source formula is unsatisfiable. Note that if the source formula is satisfiable, it is not necessarily equivalent to the resulting formula.

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REFERENCES

Chang, C.-L. and Lee, R. C.-T. Symbolic Logic and Mechanical Theorem Proving. New York: Academic Press, 1997.Kleene, S. C. Mathematical Logic. New York: Dover, 2002.

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