Syntactic and Semantic Connections between Logic Programming and Argumentation Systems

Abstract

Logic programming was one of the first formalisms to incorporate non-monotonic reasoning and, as such, is the origin of many semantics for this type of reasoning. Many of the core argumentation systems, including Abstract Argumentation, Assumption-Based Argumentation and Abstract Dialec- tical Frameworks even find their historical roots in the logic programming literature, borrowing terminology, procedures, notation and semantics from this niche. In this article, we provide an overview of the connections between logic programming and a series of argumentation systems, focusing on the semantic perspective to find their relative expressive power. The systems we examine in detail include the ones we already mentioned, as well as Argumentation Frameworks with Sets of Attacking Arguments. In each case, we consider translations and find whether they preserve the semantics of their respective source and target formalism, under some of the most common semantics. For some of the cases where equivalence does not hold, we consider how to restore it. Apart from that, we also offer an overview of how some of these argumentation systems can be implemented using Answer-Set Programming and their specialized solvers.