Introduction to Prolog
RESHMA R
ASSISTANT
PROFESSOR
CSE, KAHE
A Little History
Prolog was invented by Alain Colmerauer, a
professor of computer science at the
university of Aix-Marseille in France, in
1972
The first application of Prolog was in natural
language processing
Prolog stands for programming in logic
(PROgrammation en LOgique)
Its theoretical underpinning are due to
Donald Loveland of Duke university through
Robert Kowalski (formerly) of the university
of Edinburgh
Logic Programming
Prolog is the only successful example of the
family of logic programming languages
A Prolog program is a theory written in a
subset of first-order logic, called Horn
clause logic
Prolog is declarative. A Prolog programmer
concentrates on what the program needs to
do, not on how to do it
The other major language for Artificial
Intelligence programming is LISP, which is a
functional (or applicative) language
Defining Relations by Facts
parent( tom,bob).
parent is the name of a relation
A relation of arity n is a function from n-tuples
(elements of a Cartesian product) to {true, false}.
(It can also be considered a subset of the n-tuples.)
parent( pam, bob). parent( tom,bob).
parent( tom,liz). parent( bob, ann). parent(
bob,pat). parent( pat,jim).
A relation is a collection of facts
Queries
?-parent( bob,pat).
yes
A query and its answer, which is correct for
the relation defined in the previous slide:
this query succeeds
?-parent( liz,pat).
no
A query and its answer, which is correct for
the relation defined in the previous slide:
this query fails
More Queries
cf. pr1_1.pl
?-parent( tom,ben). /* who is Ben? */
?-parent( X,liz).
?-parent( bob,X). /* Bob’s children */
?-parent( X,Y). /* The relation, fact by fact */
Composite Queries
Grandparents:
?-parent( Y,jim), parent( X,Y).
the comma stands for “and”
?-parent( X,Y), parent(Y,jim).
order should not matter, and it does not!
Grandchildren:
?-parent( tom,X), parent( X,Y).
Common parent, i.e. (half-)sibling:
?-parent( X,ann), parent( X,pat).
Facts and Queries
Relations and queries about them
Facts are a kind of clause
Prolog programs consist of a list of clauses
The arguments of relations are atoms or
variables (a kind of term)
Queries consist of one or more goals
Satisfiable goals succeed; unsatisfiable
goals fail
Defining Relations by Rules
The offspring relation:
For all X and Y,
Y is an offspring of X if
X is a parent of Y
This relation is defined by a rule,
corresponding to the Prolog clause
offspring( Y,X) :- parent( X,Y).
Alternative reading:
For all X and Y,
if X is a parent of Y,
then Y is an offspring of X
Rules
Rules are clauses. Facts are clauses
A rule has a condition and a conclusion
The conclusion of a Prolog rule is its head
The condition of a Prolog rule is its body
If the condition of a rule is true, then it
follows that its conclusion is true also
How Prolog Rules are Used
Prolog rules may be used to define
relations
The offspring relation is defined by the rule
offspring( Y,X) :- parent( X,Y):
if (X,Y) is in the parent relation, then (Y,X) is
in the offspring relation
When a goal of the form offspring( Y,X) is
set up, the goal succeeds if parent( X,Y)
succeeds
Procedurally, when a goal matches the
head of a rule, Prolog sets up its body as a
new goal
?-offspring(liz,tom).
No fact matches this query
The head of the clause
offspring( Y,X) :- parent( X,Y) does
Y is replaced with liz, X is replaced with tom
The instantiated body parent( tom,liz) is set
up as a new goal
?-parent( tom,liz) succeeds
offspring( liz,tom) therefore succeeds too
More Family Relations
female and male are defined extensionally,
i.e., by facts; mother and grandparent are
defined intensionally, I.e., by rules
female(pam). … male(jim).
mother( X,Y) :- parent( X,Y), female( X).
grandparent( X,Z) :- parent( X,Y),
parent( Y,Z).
sister(X,Y) :- parent(Z,X), parent(Z,Y), female( X).
Try:
?-sister(X,pat).
X = ann;
X = pat /* Surprise! */
(Half-)sisters have a common parent and are
different people, so the correct rule is:
sister(X,Y) :- parent(Z,X), parent(Z,Y), female( X),
different(X,Y).
(or:sister(X,Y) :- parent(Z,X), parent(Z,Y), parent(W,X),
parent(W,Y), female(X), different(Z,W), different(X,Y).)
Clauses and Instantiation
Facts are clauses without body
Rules are clauses with both heads and non-
empty bodies
Queries are clauses that only have a body
(!)
When variables are substituted by
constants, we say that they are
instantiated.
Universal Quantification
Variables are universally quantified, but
beware of variables that only appear in the
body, as in haschild( X) :- parent( X,Y)., which
is best read as:
for all X,
X has a child if
there exists some Y such that X is a parent of Y
(I.e.: for all X and Y, if X is a parent of Y, then X has a
child)
Predecessor (Ancestor)
predecessor( X,Z) :- parent( X,Z).
predecessor( X,Z) :- parent( X,Y),
parent(Y,Z).
predecessor( X,Z) :- parent( X,Y1),
parent( Y1,Y2,),
parent( Y2,Z).
etc.
When do we stop?
The length of chain of people between the
predecessor and the successor should not
arbitrarily bounded.
A Recursive Rule
For all X and Z,
X is a predecessor of Z if
there is a Y such that
(1) X is a parent of Y and
(2) Y is a predecessor of Z.
predecessor( X,Z) :-
parent( X,Y),
predecessor( Y,Z).
Comments
/* This is a comment */
% This comment goes to the end of the line
SWI Prolog warns us when the clauses
defining a relation are not contiguous.
Prolog Proves Theorems
Prolog accepts facts and rules as a set of
axioms, and the user’s query as a
conjectured theorem. Prolog then tries to
prove the theorem, i.e., to show that it can
be logically derived from the axioms
Prolog builds the proof “backwards”: it does
not start with facts and apply rules to
derive other facts, but it starts with the
goals in the user’s query and replaces them
with new goals, until new goals happen to
be facts
Declarative and Procedural
Meaning of Prolog Programs
The declarative meaning is concerned with the
relations defined by the program: what the program
states and logically entails
The procedural meaning is concerned with how the
output of the program is obtained, i.e., how the
relations are actually evaluated by the Prolog
system
It is best to concentrate on the declarative meaning
when writing Prolog programs
Unfortunately, sometimes the programmer must
also consider procedural aspect (for reasons of
efficiency or even correctness)
