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framework where the level of abstraction is as suitable as in the set theoretic ap-
proach and the degree of mechanization is as high as in the symbolic approach.
The idea is to develop a structure where the domain of the homomorphisms
and also the homomorphisms can be found at the same time, with homomor-
phisms represented by elements of functional type (or something similar), which
would allow working with them at a concrete level, but with the same homomor-
phisms being part of an algebraic structure. Since various algebraic structures
are involved in the problem (at least ( D
,d D )and(ker p, d D )), there is not a
simple algebraic structure containing all the homomorphisms appearing in the
problem. Clearly endomorphisms of ( D
,d D ) form a ring, and also the ones in
(ker p, d D∗ ), as well as the homomorphisms from ( D
,d D∗ )into(ker p, d D∗ )form
an abelian group; the automation of proofs in such a complicated environment
would be hard; some ideas will be proposed in Section 7.
Another possible solution is explained in this section. It involves consider-
ing just one simple algebraic structure where all the homomorphisms can be
embedded, and then develop tools allowing to convert a homomorphism from
this structure into one of the underlying ones. Taking into account that ker p
is a substructure of D
, we will consider as our only structure the ring of en-
domorphisms R =hom( D
). Later we will introduce the tools
allowing to convert homomorphisms from R into homomorphisms, for instance,
of hom(ker p, d D )(ker p, d D ), but just to illustrate the benefits of this approach
we give a brief example here:
,d D
)( D
,d D
Example 1. Proving the fact “assumes d
hom( D
,d D )( D
,d D )and h
hom( D
,d D )”, due to
partiality matters, requires several reasoning steps. When providing homomor-
phisms with an algebraic structure this is a trivial proof, since rings are closed
under their operations.
,d D )( D
,d D )shows p = dh + hd
hom( D
,d D )( D
In order to embed homomorphisms into a ring, it is necessary to choose carefully
the elements and also the operators. Firstly, there can be only one represen-
tant for each homomorphism, and here partiality appears again, since otherwise
both λx. (one G )and λx. (if x
G then one G else arbitrary ) could be iden-
tities in this ring. Secondly, operators must be closed over the structure, and
thus they rely strongly on the chosen representation for homomorphisms. With-
out going in further depth, we decided to consider the carrier of the ring R
formed by the completions λx. (if x
G then fx else one G ), because then the
generic composition operator
can be used in Isabelle (whereas this was not
possible with the extensional functions based on “arbitrary” in Isabelle). At a
second stage, we had to implement the tools allowing to convert an element
of hom( D
,d D ) into one of, for instance, hom(ker p, d D )(ker p, d D )
(under precise conditions). This would allow to implement proofs for facts such
as
,d D )( D
(property (3) in Def. 2, needed for
Lemma 2) in a human readable style such as 4 :
id
p, D, ker p
h, D, D
=
0 ,D, ker p
4 The ··· are just an abbreviation meaning “the previous expression” in sequential
calculations.
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