A New Logical Characterisation of Stable Models and Answer Sets

This paper relates inference in extended logic programming with nonclassical, nonmonotonic logics. We define a nonmonotonic logic, called equilibrium logic, based on the least constructive extension, N2, of the intermediate logic of “here-and-there”. We show that on logic programs equilibrium logic coincides with the inference operation associated with the stable model and answer set semantics of Gelfond and Lifschitz. We thereby obtain a very simple characterisation of answer set semantics as a form of minimal model reasoning in N2, while equilibrium logic itself provides a natural generalisation of this semantics to arbitrary theories. We discuss briefly some consequences and applications of this result.