BMWk Revisited - Generalization and Formalization of an Algorithm for Detecting Recursive Relations in Term Sequences

As several works in Machine Learning (particularly in Inductive Logic Programming) have focused on building recursive definitions from examples, this paper presents a formalization and a generalization of the BMWk methodology, which stems from program synthesis from examples, ten years ago. The framework of the proposed formalization is term rewriting. It allows to state some theoretical results on the qualities and limitations of the method. This work is supported by the Esprit project BRA ILP n° 6020 and the french MRT through PRC-IA