ITA P12 Task2

Summary of Controlled English (v0.4)

1 Introduction
Controlled English (CE) is a type of Controlled Natural Language (CNL), designed to
be readable by a native English speaker whilst representing information in a
structured and unambiguous form. It is structured by following a simple but fully
defined syntax, which may be parsed by a computer system. It is unambiguous by
using only words that are defined by the analyst as part of a conceptual model. CE
therefore serves as a language that is simultaneously understandable by human and
computer system, thus facilitating the communication between them.
The CNL used in ITA project 12 is based upon a draft proposal for Controlled English
[CE], defined by John Sowa as a human-friendly version of Common Logic [CL].
During the use of CE in project12, and in several transitions projects, some additions
and modifications were made, to the extent that we now use a different dialect,
herein called ITA Controlled English. All references below in this document are
references to ITA CE.
Experience in using ITA CE within the Project 12 planning work and on several
transition projects suggests that CE is of significant benefit, in the following ways:

it permits the use of a single language that is used by both human and
machine, encouraging the development of novel hybrid ways of reasoning
it facilitates the development and understanding of logical conceptual models
containing both structures and logical relationships
it facilitates the viewing, construction and understanding of rationale

This document describes the current syntax of CE, provides an informal introduction
to its use, and offers an initial mapping between the syntax and predicate logic, thus
providing an initial semantics for the CE sentences.
Some of the content of this document has come from work undertaken during the UK
Pathfinder II transition contract project.

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2 ITA Controlled English

This section defines the syntax of ITA Controlled English, as of 28th April 2010, by
specifying the grammar using the following conventions:

a literal, standing for itself is enclosed in quotes: the

a nonterminal, standing for further structure, is any word not enclosed in
quotes: Paragraph
a space, specifying the concatenation of terms: the NounP Name
alternatives are specified by a bar, enclosed in parentheses: ( true | false )
optional structures are contained in parentheses followed by a ?: ( on
DateTime )?
repeated structures, where zero or more repeats are acceptable, are contained
in parentheses followed by a *: ( and BracketDS )*

For each structure the linguistic purpose is stated, providing an informal specification
of why the structure is used. In addition each subsection is introduced with some
examples of the relevant structures, providing an overview of the meaning of the
structures.
It should be noted that the use of CE in the ITA project is ongoing research, and the
specification has gaps, overlaps and inconsistencies of style in certain areas.
Furthermore some of the constructs are experimental placeholders and have not been
integrated to the inferencing component, and are not therefore yet useful. These
experimental features are noted where appropriate. It is anticipated that further use of
CE in ITA projects will lead to future enhancements, modifications and
simplifications.

2.1 Lexical categories

A number of syntactic items are defined as primitives, without further syntactic
structure. The mechanism by which the words are added to the lexicon are not here
defined, it is possible that they are defined as a fixed list (as in the ITA) or from the
set of conceptualise statements (see below).
Category
Noun
FunctionalNoun
VerbSing
Adjective
Variable

Name
Op
DateTime

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Linguistic Purpose
To name the type of an object, as defined in the lexicon of the
ontology
To name a has-as property, as defined in the lexicon of the
ontology
To name a relationship between two objects, as defined in the
lexicon of the ontology
To name a property, as defined in the lexicon of the ontology
To refer to an object that is not specifically named but is at
some stage associated with the variable. A variable must
comprise only uppercase alphacharacters or numeric
characters
To name an instance of an object
To reference an infix mathematical operator: +, - , *, /
To name a date/time

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QUOTE
CV

A quoted string, indicating unstructured text, e.g. I told you

so
A certainty value

All of these categories are in the form of a string of characters. QUOTE and Variable
have further restrictions as noted in the table. If this sequence is to contain characters
other than alphanumerics, then they should be contained with single quotes, eg The
Commander. Uppercase and lowercase may be used, and the items are case sensitive.

2.2 Phrase Structure Rules (in EBNF)

The following sections describe the different type of the CE sentences. However
every CE sentence must end in a full stop:
CESENTENCE .

2.2.1 Propositions and Meta Statements

Propositions define facts that have the potential to be true, for example the person
Fred has the person Joe as brother. These may be statements of entity existence (and
type):
there is a person named Fred.
or of possession:
the person Fred has the person Joe as brother.
there is a person named Fred that has the person Joe as brother.
(In most cases there is no distinction between these two sentences, the only case
where there is a difference is when this proposition occurs on the conclusion of a
logical rule, see below. However the structure the person Fred on its own is not
permissible.)
These possessions may be other entities, such as Fred above, or constants:
the person Fred has 24 as age.
Propositions may be defined in the form of relations:
the person Fred is married to the person Jane.
the agent Commander executes the plan order1.
Here the relation may be defined as a transitive verb (executes) or a more general
relation (is married to).
Meta statements specify information about propositions, such as their truth status:
it is false that the person Fred is married to the person Jane.
or that they are assumptions:

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it is assumed by the agent A that the person Fred is married to the person Jane.
or that they have a source:
the user U1 states that the person Fred is married to the person Jane.
after reading the document d1 the user U1 states that the person Fred is
married to the person Jane.
or that there is uncertainty associated with the proposition:
it is true to degree A2 that the person Fred is married to the person Jane.
These meta statements may be concatenated:
the user states that it is true to degree A2 that the person Fred is married to the
person Jane.
it is assumed by the agent A that it is false that the person Fred is married to
the person Jane.
A concept of a general proposition is also defined as being either structured (i.e. the
examples above) or unstructured (i.e. a double quoted string). This concept allows a
meta statement about an unstructured proposition:
it is true that I told you so.
as well as the use of unstructured propositions in rationale, as noted below. However
it should be noted that, currently, the generalised proposition may only be used in
certain places; it is intended that this limitation will be addressed in the future.
Structure
Paragraph ->
( in ReferentialNP , )?
Declarative1 |
Query
Sentence ->
Declarative
Declarative -> Source states (on DateTime)?
that Declarative |
SimpleDS ( [ Name ] )? |
CausalDS ( [ Name ] )? |
IfDS |
AndOrDS |
IffDS
SimpleDS ->

( on DateTime )? (at Location )?

SimpleDS |
there is ExistentialNP |
NounN VerbP |

Linguistic Purpose
To specify a proposition optionally in a
context (defined by the
ReferentialNP);
to specify a query
To specify a single proposition.
To specify a single proposition as:
something stated by a source
(optionally at a time); a simple
statement (optionally annotated with a
name); a causal statement (optionally
annotated); a conditional statement; a
Boolean expression of statements
linked by And/or; a new
conceptualisation statement
To specify a single proposition as: a
simple statement (optionally with a
date and time and location); a
statement that an entity exists; a

There is a capability for CE to allow a list of Declaratives separated by semi-colon, However this has
been removed due to efficiency reasons. It may be possible in the future to revise the parser code to reintroduce this facility.

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NounP ->
SimpleNP ->

it is (true | false | unknown ) that

GeneralProposition |
it is possible that SimpleDS |
it is assumed by NounP that
GeneralProposition |
it can be assumed that SimpleDS |
it is decided by NounP that
SimpleDS |
it is asserted ( by NounP)?
that SimpleDS |
NounP Belief SimpleDS |
that SimpleDS is currently not
based on assumptions
that SimpleDS is currently
supported by AssumptionList
it is (true | false | unknown ) to
degree CV that
GeneralProposition |
that SimpleDS is currently
(true | false | unknown)
(to degree CV)?
ExistentialNP |
ReferentialNP
( SimpleNP ) |
ExistentialNP |
ReferentialNP

ExistentialNP ->
(a | an) Description
Description ->
Noun |
Noun NameDecl? RelativeClause?
NameDecl ->
named Name |
Variable |
known as Name
RelativeClause ->
that VerbP
described as QUOTE
ReferentialNP ->
the Noun ( Name | Variable) |
Variable |
the type Noun |
the Noun known as Name

VerbP ->

SimpleVP ( and SimpleVP )*

SimpleVP ->

( has | does not have ) SimpleNP

as FunctionalNoun |
has Word as FunctionalNoun |
has SimpleNP |
= MathExpr |
is PredComp |
VerbSing VerbComp |

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statement that an entity does

something; that a statement is true
false or unknown; that a statement is
possible (this is experimental and not
integrated to the inference engine);
that a statement is assumed by an
agent; that a statement may be
assumed; that an agent has made a
decision; that a statement has been
asserted (optionally by an agent)
statement of belief by an agent
(experimental); that the proposition is
supported by a set of assumptions;
that a proposition does not require
assumptions for its support; that a
proposition is true or false or unknown
to a certain degree; that a proposition
has (under the current set of
assumptions and inferences) a truth
value to a certain degree
The denotation of an object either by a
description or by a specific reference
The reference to an object, but with an
arbitrary number of nested brackets in
order to assist disambiguation of
syntax (such as and/or)
Referencing an entity via its
description without referring to it by
name
A description of an entity by type of
name or by related information
A identification an entity; a variable
that is used in a rule to refer to the
identity; a name by which the entity is
known, but not uniquely identified
A description of further information
about an entity; an unstructured
description of the entity that allows
structured and unstructured
information to be mixed.
A denotation of a specific entity or
entity representing a class, via a name
or a variable bound to the name or via
a variable bound to the entity itself; or
via a name that is commonly used, but
that does not unambiguously identify
the entity, in effect this is an
unidentified individual
A conjunction of verb phrases,
separated by and
A single verb phrase indicating a
relationship to an entity, either as a
named property, or an unnamed
property or being mathematically
equal to a mathematical expression or
a predication or a verb relationship; or
an unstructured description of a verb

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is described as doing QUOTE |
is described as having QUOTE
PredComp ->

SimpleNP |
Adjective

VerbComp ->

SimpleNP

MathExpr ->

SimpleNP Op SimpleNP

Belief ->

knows that |
does not know that |
believes that |
does not believe that |
is told by NounP that
is not told by NounP that
Source -> NounP |
( after reading Document )? NounP

Document -> the document Name |

the section Name
of the document Name |
the sentence Name of
the section Name
of the document Name |
the sentence Name
of the document Name
Location -> NounP
AssumptionList -> the assumption by NounP that
SimpleDS
( and the assumption by NounP
that SimpleDS )*
GeneralProposition -> (SimpleDS | QUOTE)

phrase or a property phrase. Note that

these latter two are experimental and
have not been full integrated into the
inference engine.
A specification of something which
may be predicated of the entity. Note
that the adjective is experimental and
is not integrated to the inference
engine
The entity that is the range of the verb
relation (in the context of the
SimpleVP expression) whose range is
the contextual noun
A definition of a binary mathematical
expression on objects
Different types of belief. Thee are
experimental and are not fully
integrated into the inference engine.

The agent entity (NounP) that is the

source of a statement, optionally
preceded by a textual reference that
caused the agent to make the
statement
A textual reference is either a
document or a section in a document
or a sentence in a section or a
sentence in a document.

A location in space
A list of propositions each of which is
assumed by an entity
A general definition of a proposition as
either structured (SimpleDS) or
unstructured (QUOTE).

2.2.2 Logical Rules

A logical rule is a relation between a set of premise propositions, and a conclusion
proposition:
if
( the person X has the person Y as brother ) and
( the person Z has the person X as father )
then
( the person Z has the person Y as uncle )
.
Note:

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the brackets must be present around each proposition

there must be a space surrounding the brackets
only a single proposition may be contained in the conclusion
in the context of a logical rule, the names (X, Y Z) are treated as variables
to specify a constant the expression the constant XXX must be used
(without the double quotes); to specify a variable that is to be matched to a
value that is untyped (e.g. a string) then the expression the value V must be
used (without the double quotes)

There is a difference in the conclusion between the person X and there a

person named X that . The former asserts the proposition about the entity X,
whereas the latter asserts the existence of the entity X. Special processing is used to
handle the matching of this new entity to any existing entities that might be the same,
as discussed in the logical section below.
Structure
IfDS -> if Declarative then BracketDS
BracketDS ->

( ( SimpleDS | IfDS | AndOrDS ) )

AndOrDS ->

BracketDS ( and BracketDS )*

Linguistic Purpose
A logical inference (rule) between a
premise and a conclusion
The addition of brackets in order to
disambiguate structures such as
and/or
A Boolean expression (using and) of
simple propositions

2.2.3 Rationale
Rationale is the set of reasoning steps, where each step is defined as a because
relation between multiple premises and a single conclusion. These are general
propositions so may be structure or unstructured, or any combination of these:
the person Fred has the person John as uncle
because
the person James has the person John as brother and
the person Fred has the person James as father.
the person Fred has the person John as uncle
because
John told me so.
the plan has failed
because
there was a misunderstanding.
Note that unlike the logical rules, there are no brackets on the premises.
Structure
CausalDS ->

GeneralProposition
because
GeneralProposition
( and GeneralProposition )*

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Linguistic Purpose
Specifying a causal dependency
between a premise (after the
because) and a conclusion (before
the because)

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2.2.4 Conceptualise Statements

The conceptual model, or ontology, may be defined in CE as conceptualise
statements. These define new types, properties and relations, in terms of the linguistic
terms and phrases that are to be used in CE. Note that the basic syntax is unchanged
by these definitions. Mechanisms for changing the CE syntax by the user are given in
the section on CE extensions.
A new conceptual type, for example a teacher may be defined as a subtype of
person:
conceptualise
a ~ teacher ~ F that is a person.
This permits the construction of new valid CE sentences such as:
there is a teacher named MrChips .
Further properties, together with the type of the property, may be defined:
conceptualise
a ~ teacher ~ T that
has the person P as ~ manager ~ and
has the value V as ~ language ~
.
Now we can write:
the teacher MrChips has Chinese as language and has the person DrBoss as
manager.
Other relations may be defined:
conceptualise
the teacher T ~ teaches ~ the person P
.
allowing the sentence:
the teacher MrChips teaches the person John.
Note that:
the tildes (~) must have a space on either side
the property definition starts with a whereas the relation starts with the
in the property definition there must be a variable (such as T) after the tilde
for the type name. The intention is that the exact same syntax is used for the
conceptualise and the actual CE sentence, except that the conceptualise has
the extra tildes around the new words being defined.
If a type is referred to (rather than being defined) in the definition then that
type must already have been defined in a previous conceptualise.

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There are no implied inferences about properties and relations, other than the
transitivity of class membership. This means that a property or relation defined on a
superclass is available for use in CE sentences about entities of a subclass. We take
the view that the meaning of a concept is defined by the explicit logical rules that
refer to it on its premises and conclusions.
For example, it is possible to define a relation in different ways, for example we could
have defined:
conceptualise
the teacher T ~ can speak ~ the language L.
(assuming we have already defined the concept of language) allowing a sentence like:
the teacher MrChips can speak the language Chinese.
However there is no implicit logic to state that this is equivalent to
the teacher MrChips has Chinese as language.
Such equivalences, and indeed any logical relations, must be defined by explicit
logical rules.
Structure
IffDS ->

conceptualise ( a | an ) Description |
conceptualise NounP VerbP

Linguistic Purpose
The specification of a new concept or
relation

2.2.5 Queries
A query specifies a request to determine the truth of a proposition or set of
propositions. This is experimental and has not been integrated to the inference engine.
Structure
Query ->

Linguistic Purpose
Specifying a query, by asking if a
proposition is true

is it true that AndOrDS

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3 Extensions
We believe that CE is useful in expressing basic statements, as described above.
However it is clear that the language can be stilted, and we have proposed a
mechanism to allow a user to extend the syntax (rather than just the vocabulary). This
is described in more detail in [XCE], and some basic information is given here for
completeness.
For example, in order to say that two people attend a meeting, instead of saying in
basic CE:
( the person P attends the meeting M ) and
( the person Q attends the meeting M )
it becomes possible to say:
the person P attends the meeting M with the person Q
Such a structure could be used on the premise or conclusion of a logical rule.
In order to extend the syntax of CE in this way, an experimental linguistic
transformation language has been defined. In this example the transform would be:
under ~~andorDS
~~simpleNP 1 attends ~~simpleNP 2 with ~~simpleNP 3
==>
( ~~simpleNP 1 attends ~~simpleNP 2 ) and ( ~~simpleNP 3 attends
~~simpleNP 2 )
:: a meeting
.
The meaning of this language is further discussed in [XCE]. It should be noted that
because the syntactic transformation is between an extended CE sentence and a basic
CE sentence, the semantics of the extended CE sentence may, in theory, be derived
from the concatenation of the transform from extended to basic CE, then from basic
CE to Common Logic. However this does require a formalisation of the semantics of
the linguistic transformation language, which to date has not been undertaken.
Such extensions can be added to certain places within the parse tree (e.g. andOrDS in
the example above), to extend the syntax of these structures. The current syntax
structures where extensions may be added are:

Paragraph
SimpleDS
RelativeClause
Declarative
AndOrDS

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4 Controlled English Document

It is also of benefit to group the individual CE sentences defined above into a higherlevel document structure, providing meta-data such as title, sections, annotated
notes for individual sentences and names for logical rules. The description of such
Controlled English Documents is provided in [CED], and brief information is given
here for completeness.
The syntax for a Controlled English Document is:
Structure
CED -> Title? ( Section | Note | Author | Date |
CESentence )*

Linguistic Purpose
A CED has an optional title, followed
by a (possibly empty) sequence of
items, each being a section, an author
specification, a date specification, a
note or a CE sentence. The syntax
does not prescribe a particular order
of these items. However if a note is
provided, it will be taken as referring to
the immediate preceding item.

Title -> Title: SingleText ( Version: SingleText )?

The title is defined by a single line of

text. There is an optional version, also
defined by a single line of text.
A section has an id (a string eg 1.1)
and a piece of text defining its name

Section -> Section ID : SingleText

Author -> Author: SingleText

An author specification is a piece of

text defining the author name

Date -> Date: SingleText

A date specification is a piece of text

defining the date. No specific format is
prescribed.

Note -> Note: Text

A note is an annotation, written as a

piece of multiline text. This will be
taken to relate to the immediately
preceding item.
A CE sentence is as defined above
A single text line is a series of
characters terminated by a new line
A piece of text is a set of lines
terminated by a blank line

CESentence -> Paragraph

SingleText -> line of characters
Text ->

( line-of-characters )* blank-line

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5 Logical Mapping
A key aspect of the use of Controlled English is that it is intended to be the human
face of the logical specification of the ontology and instances of the ontology. To that
end it is necessary to map the syntax of the CE onto the syntax of predicate logic, in
order that the semantics of the CE sentences be established, and grounded in logic.
This section starts to define this mapping, using the CLIF syntax of Common Logic
[CL] as the gold standard syntax for predicate logic. Further work is needed to
complete this mapping into the remoter areas of the CE syntax and intended
semantics, such as assumptions, states of belief and default negation.
No attempt is made to provide a direct model-theoretic semantics of CE sentences.
However, by mapping the syntax of CE to the syntax of predicate logic (specifically
Common Logic CLIF syntax), there is implied a model theoretic semantics of CE
sentences derived from the concatenation of the mapping from CE to Common Logic
and from Common Logic to model-theoretic semantics.

5.1 Individuals
It is presumed that the universe of discourse contains a set of individuals, each having
a unique identifier. It is also presumed that these identifiers are those specified in (or
can be mapped onto) the Name component of an entity description in a CE sentence.
For example in the person Fred, it is presumed that Fred is a unique identifier of an
individual, such that any reference to Fred refers to the same individual. This is the
case even if the type is different, thus the teacher Fred or the teacher named Fred
will also refer to the same entity.
Note that the known as KName structure does not make the presumption that all
references to the same KName refer to the same individual.
It is possible that the system using the CE in the context of an application may further
map the CE names onto other naming systems, such as URIs. For example, in the ITA
CPM visualiser:
individual names, such as Fred, are mapped onto a URI, prepended with a
domain-specific string, such as
http://project12.usukita.org/ontologies/cpm/instance/test.owl#

5.2 Predicate Names

It is also presumed that there is a set of logical predicates defined for the universe of
discourse, where each predicate is a set of N-tuples, according to the normal logical
semantics, and each predicate has a name in the universe of discourse. In contrast, in
CE sentences there are syntactic structures specifying CE properties (has as
PROPERTY ) or CE relations ( the X RELATION the X ), and the names of the
PROPERTY and RELATION must be mapped onto Common Logic predicate names.
(The full syntax of CE must also be mapped onto a complete Common Logic
statement, and this is covered below; here we are only concerned with names).

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The mapping of names may be done in different ways. If conceptualise statements are
used, then the mapping must occur automatically, via the CE parser, and since there is
no specific way in CE to define the real name of the logical predicate, or even a
contextual namespace, this information being defined out of band for each
application. One application-specific way to construct such predicate names is:
define a domain specific URI prefix, such as http://myproject/ontology1#
take the CE words in the conceptualise statement between the tildes and
concatenate them, separated by underlines
Construct the name from the URI prefix and the concatenated CE words
An alternative possibility is to predefine a mapping lexicon where each CE name is
mapped to a URI.
Whichever way is used, the key point is that this is a domain-specific mechanism,
outside the model theoretic semantics. The following sections presume some form of
domain-specific mapping between CE names and individuals in the universe of
discourse.

5.3 Further conventions

In the sections below some additional conventions will be followed:
The domain-specific mapping of a CE name or relation or property to a
Common Logic name, as described above, will be stated generally as XXX*.
For example, if the CE sentence is the TYPE Name then the equivalent
Common Logic predicate will be stated as TYPE* and the equivalent
Common Logic individual will be stated as Name*
CourierfontisusedforCommonLogic

5.4 Types
The fragments of CE the TYPE Name or the TYPE named Name specify that the
individual whose name is Name is of the type specified. Treating a type as a unary
logic predicate, this may be stated in Common Logic as:
(TYPE*Name*)
For example:
the person Fred
maps to:
(ex:Personex:Fred)
where ex:Person is the domain specific mapping of person, and ex:Fred is the
domain specific mapping of Fred.

5.5 Supertype inference

The notion of supertype in ITA CE has some predefined semantics:

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if an entity E is a member of a type T, and T is conceptualised as a subtype of

type SuperT, then entity E is a member of SuperT

5.6 Existence of an entity

The notion of the existence of an entity is given a particular syntax in CE:
there is a TYPE named NAME
The meaning of this sentence depends upon the context in which it is used. In the
majority of cases it has the same semantics as:
the TYPE NAME
that is to say, they state the type of the entity, and therefore contribute a Common
Logic fragment:
(TYPE*NAME*)
However, when the there is syntax is used as the conclusion of a logical relation,
then it posits the existence of a new entity that may not have been known about
before.
For example, the following (slightly unlikely) logical rule states that if there is a
person, then there is a mother of that person:
if ( there is a person named P ) then
( there is a person P1 that has female as gender
and has the person P as child ) .
The meaning of this logical rule is perhaps different to a normal predicate logic rule,
(with an existential quantifier on the conclusion) as it given an operational meaning
by virtue of the way it is implemented in the ITA inference engine. If this rule fires the
inference engine will assert the existence of a new entity, with an unknown ID, and
with the attributes (female gender and the specific person matched to P as child).
Further operational semantics has been given by the implementation, to avoid the
duplication of new entities that are actually the same. In the CE conceptualise it is
possible to add an identifier attribute that specifies a unique index:
conceptualise
a ~ person ~ that has
the sequence of ( the value ~ gender ~ , the value ~ child ~ ) as identifier
This indicates that the combination of gender and child uniquely identifies the entity,
so that if a new entity is posited with values for those attributes, then a search will be
made to determine if an already existing entity with the same values is present; if so
that entity is used instead.
This operational semantics is different to the logical semantics of the normal exists
operator, since in predicate logic it is presumed that all entities are already in
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existence in the universe of discourse, and the meaning of exists is that there is at
least one entity with the relevant properties in the universe of discourse, not that a
new entity is to be created. The operational semantics is more to do with the state of
knowledge about the universe of discourse (that the system knows of the existence of
an entity), which suggests that it should be modelled in terms of a meta-model of
belief. As such this relates to the model of assumptions, knowledge and belief, that is
yet to be formalised in this paper.

5.7 The properties of an entity

That an entity has a property is stated in CE as:
the TYPE NAME has the TYPE1 NAME1 as PROPERTY.
This may be stated in Common Logic as:
(and
(TYPE*NAME*)
(TYPE1*NAME1*)
(PROPERTY*NAME*NAME1*))
For example:
the plan P has the agent A as executor.
is mapped onto
(and
(pla:Planex:P)
(log:Agentex:A)
(pla:planExecutorex:Pex:A))
The value of a property may be a basic data type such as a constant (e.g. 1234).
These are just modelled as entities in the universe of discourse and no special
treatment is required. Specifically there is currently no concept of the universe of
discourse containing sets of entities being of a certain basic data type.

5.8 The relations of an entity

That an entity is related to another entity is stated in CE as:
the TYPE1 NAME1 RELATION TYPE2 NAME2.
This may be mapped to:
(and
(TYPE1*NAME1*)
(TYPE2*NAME2*)
(RELATION*NAME1*NAME2*))
For example:

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the task T realises the objective O.
is mapped onto:
(and
(pla:PlanTaskex:T)
(cps:GoalSpecificationex:O))
(pla:realisesex:Tex:O)

5.9 Unstructured propositions

An unstructured proposition is stated in CE as a double quoted string. This is actually
mapped within the CE parser itself into the following structure:
the proposition PName defined by the constant QUOTEDSTRING.
where PName is a unique name defined by the parser for that quoted string.
Thus the mapping rules already stated will handle this case, which will be turned into
the Common Logic:
(and
(log:Propositionex:PNAME)
(log:definedex:PNAMEQUOTEDSTRING)
)

5.10 Logical Rules

A logical relationship is specified by the CE sentence:
if PREMISES then CONCLUSION
This may be mapped to the following Common Logic pattern:
(forall
VARIABLES
(if
PREMISES
CONCLUSION))
where VARIABLES is a list of all the variables in the CE logical rule, PREMISES is a
conjunction of all of the Common Logic statements formed from mapping statements
in the CE PREMISES, and CONCLUSION is the conjunction of all Common Logic
statements formed from mapping the statement in the CE CONCLUSION. Note that
even though there may only be a single CE statement in the conclusion, this may be
mapped into more than one Common Logic statement. Variables in the PREMISES
and CONCLUSIONS are retained across the mapping.
For example:

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if
( the plan P has the agent A as executor ) and
( the plan P contains the task T )
then
( the task T has the agent A as executor ).
is mapped to:
(forall
(APT)
(if
(and
(pla:PlanP)
(log:AgentA)
(pla:planExecutorPA)
(log:containsPT)
(pla:PlanTaskT))
(and
(pla:planTaskAgentTA))))
Note that P is used rather than ex:P, since in a rule, P is a variable not an
individual.

5.11 Rationale
A reasoning step is specified as a CE statement of the form:
CONCLUSION because PREMISES.
This may be mapped into the following Common Logic pattern:
(if
PREMISES
CONCLUSION))
where PREMISES is a conjunction of all of the Common Logic statements formed
from mapping statements in the CE PREMISES, and CONCLUSION is the
conjunction of all Common Logic statements formed from mapping the statement in
the CE CONCLUSION. Note that even though there may only be a single CE
statement in the conclusion, this may be mapped into more than one Common Logic
statement. Note also that there are no variables in a because CE statement, so there
are no variables in the mapped Common Logic statement.
For example:
the task T1 has the agent A1 as executor
because
the plan P1 has the agent A1 as executor and
the plan P1 contains the task T1.
is mapped to:

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(if
(and
(pla:Planex:P1)
(log:Agentex:A1)
(pla:planExecutorex:P1ex:A1)
(log:containsex:P1ex:T1)
(pla:PlanTaskex:T1))
(and
(pla:planTaskAgentex:T1ex:A1))))
Note that ex:P1 is used, because here, in the context of a because sentence, P1 is
the name of an entity, not a variable.

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6 Conclusion
This document has defined various aspects of Controlled English; its syntax, informal
meaning and a semi-formal mapping to predicate logic (specifically via Common
Logic). It is hoped that such a mapping will permit the wider use of Controlled
English within the ITA programme, since experience in project 12 and in transition
projects suggests that there is significant benefit of using CE as the human face of
logic. It is also hoped that the use of CE, together with the use of rationale, are two
key technologies that will support future ITA work in the human graspability of logic,
facilitating shared understanding in collaborative problem solving.
However it is recognised that more work is needed in extending the syntax of CE and
in the mapping of CE to predicate logic, especially in the remoter areas of the CE
syntax and intended semantics, such as assumptions, states of belief and default
negation. Such mapping will also assist the further detailing of the logic proposal
based upon RIF [LogicProposal].

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7 References
[CE]

Common Logic Controlled English, Sowa, J., March 2007,

http://www.jfsowa.com/clce/clce07.htm

[CED] On Structuring CE Documents, Mott, D. January 2010,

https://www.usukitacs.com/?q=node/5425
[XCE] Layered Controlled Natural Languages, D. Mott and J. Hendler, 3rd Annual

Conference of the International Technology Alliance (ACITA), Maryland,

USA, 2009
[CL]

Common Logic - A framework for a family of Logic-Based Languages, ed.

Harry Delugach. ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 32N1377, International Standards
Organization Final Committee Draft, 2005-12-13
http://cl.tamu.edu/docs/cl/32N1377T-FCD24707.pdf

[LogicProposal] The representation of logic in semantic web languages, Mott, D.,

August 2009, https://www.usukitacs.com/?q=node/4986

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