A Splitting Set Theorem for Epistemic Specifications

Over the past decade a considerable amount of research has been done to expand logic programming languages to handle incomplete information. One such language is the language of epistemic specifications. As is usual with logic programming languages, the problem of answering queries is intractable in the general case. For extended disjunctive logic programs, an idea that has proven useful in simplifying the investigation of answer sets is the use of splitting sets. In this paper we will present an extended definition of splitting sets that will be applicable to epistemic specifications. Furthermore, an extension of the splitting set theorem will be presented. Also, a characterization of stratified epistemic specifications will be given in terms of splitting sets. This characterization leads us to an algorithmic method of computing world views of a subclass of epistemic logic programs.