Quickly recapping the discussion so far, we started with a data structure called an idea‑form flag and adopted it as a building block for constructing a species of graph-theoretic data structures called painted and rooted cacti. We showed how to code the abstract forms of cacti into character strings called cactus expressions and how to parse the character strings into pointer structures in computer memory.
At this point we had to choose between two expository strategies.
A full account of Theme One’s operation would describe its use of cactus graphs in three distinct ways, called lexical, literal, and logical applications. The more logical order would approach the lexical and literal tasks first. That is because the program’s formal language learner must first acquire the vocabulary its propositional calculator interprets as logical variables. The sequential learner operates at two levels, taking in sequences of characters it treats as strings or words plus sequences of words it treats as strands or sentences.
Finding ourselves more strongly attracted to the logical substance, however, we leave the matter of grammar to another time and turn to Theme One’s use of cactus graphs in its reasoning module to represent logical propositions on the order of Peirce’s alpha graphs and Spencer Brown’s calculus of indications.
Resources
- Theme One Program • Overview
- Theme One Program • Exposition
- Theme One Program • User Guide
- Survey of Theme One Program
cc: FB | Theme One Program • Laws of Form • Mathstodon • Academia.edu
cc: Conceptual Graphs • Cybernetics • Structural Modeling • Systems Science