Formal language

About: Formal language is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 5763 publications have been published within this topic receiving 154114 citations.

Specification of Timed EFSM Fault Models in SDL

Abstract: In this paper, we apply our timing fault modeling strategy to writing formal specifications for communication protocols. Using the formal language of Specification and Description Language (SDL), we specify the Controller process of rail-road crossing system, a popular benchmark for real-time systems. Our extended finite state machine (EFSM) model has the capability of representing a class of timing faults, which otherwise may not be detected in an IUT. Hit-or-Jumpalgorithm is applied to the SDL specification based on our EFSM model to generate a test sequence that can detect these timing faults. This application of fault modeling into SDL specification ensures the synchronization among the timing constraints of different processes, and enables generation of portable test sequences since they can be easily represented in other formal notations such as TTCN or MSC.

Inter-GPS: Interpretable Geometry Problem Solving with Formal Language and Symbolic Reasoning

Abstract: Geometry problem solving has attracted much attention in the NLP community recently. The task is challenging as it requires abstract problem understanding and symbolic reasoning with axiomatic knowledge. However, current datasets are either small in scale or not publicly available. Thus, we construct a new large-scale benchmark, Geometry3K, consisting of 3,002 geometry problems with dense annotation in formal language. We further propose a novel geometry solving approach with formal language and symbolic reasoning, called Interpretable Geometry Problem Solver (Inter-GPS). Inter-GPS first parses the problem text and diagram into formal language automatically via rule-based text parsing and neural object detecting, respectively. Unlike implicit learning in existing methods, Inter-GPS incorporates theorem knowledge as conditional rules and performs symbolic reasoning step by step. Also, a theorem predictor is designed to infer the theorem application sequence fed to the symbolic solver for the more efficient and reasonable searching path. Extensive experiments on the Geometry3K and GEOS datasets demonstrate that Inter-GPS achieves significant improvements over existing methods. The project with code and data is available at https://lupantech.github.io/inter-gps.

DNA evolutionary linguistics and RNA structure modeling: a computational approach

Abstract: The authors are concerned with analysing formal linguistic properties of DNA sequences in which a number of the language theoretic analysis on DNA sequences are established by means of computational methods. First, employing a formal language theoretic framework, the authors consider a kind of evolutionary problem of DNA sequences, asking (1) how DNA sequences were initially created and then evolved (grew up) to be a language of certain complexity, and (2) what primitive constructs were minimally required for the process of evolution. In terms of formal linguistic concepts, the authors present several results that provide their views on these questions at a conceptual level. Based on the formal analysis on these biological questions, the authors then choose a certain type of tree generating grammars called tree adjunct grammars (TAG) to attach the problem of modeling the secondary structure of RNA sequences. By proposing an extended model of TAGs, the authors demonstrate the usefulness of the grammars for modeling some typical RNA secondary structures including "pseudoknots", which suggests that TAG families as RNA grammars have a great potential for RNA secondary structure prediction. >

A Combined Approach to the Dynamics of Theories

Abstract: Phrases like “Formal Approach” or even “Systematic Approach” are nowadays generally considered synonyms for linguistic or semantic analyses referring to a text within a formal language. I share, at least to a certain degree, the view of J. C. C. McKinsey and P. Suppes that this attitude was “responsible for the lack of substantial progress in the philosophy of science”.1 Indeed, this kind of self-restriction forced philosophers to limit themselves to fictitious examples formalisable in primitive first order languages and to leave examples taken from real science to the historians.

A resolution of the regionalization problem and its implications for political geography and social justice

Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that the set theoretic foundations of the usual formal representations of "region" and "boundary" do not lead to an adequate (or interesting) characterization of the nature of areal units and that by changing the underlying set theory (and formal language) it is possible to obtain richer descriptive and prescriptive models. In particular, it is argued that a shift from classical Boolean set theory to Zadeh's theory of fuzzy sets provides the basis for a subjective characterization of "region" in terms of a graded participation function. The argument is then extended to demonstrate that this alternative characterization of "region" leads directly to a form of weighted voting and that it therefore has important implications for the theory of political geography and social justice.