Logic Programming Languages

Logic Programming languages fall under the declarative programming paradigm and are designed with one of two approaches. The mathematical logic approach or the procedural approach.

The Mathematical Logic approach takes a hypothesis (the problem) and checks to see if it valid with an existing theory. This can be checked using an automated proof system.

The Procedural approach allows for imperative ideas (plans) to be invoked, usually by a system of pattern-matching between clauses.

There is an ongoing argument about which is the preferred approach to logic programming. Whilst First-Order Logic is provably sufficient for all computation, concerns arise involving indeterminacy when attempting concurrent programming. This is due to message passing systems used for concurrent logic programming. Procedural programming does not suffer from this problem and is therefore preferred by some computer scientists

External Link: Programming Languages Timeline