Method of Analytic Tableaux - First-order Logic Tableau

First-order Logic Tableau

Tableaux are extended to first order predicate logic by two rules for dealing with universal and existential quantifiers, respectively. Two different sets of rules can be used; both employ a form of Skolemization for handing existential quantifiers, but differ on the handling of universal quantifiers.

The set of formulae to check for validity is here supposed to contain no free variables; this is not a limitation as free variables are implicitly universally quantified, so universal quantifiers over these variables can be added, resulting in a formula with no free variables.