This book is addressed to all those - logicians, computer scientists, mathe- maticians, philosophers of science as well as the students in all these disci- plines - who may be interested in the development and current status of one of the major themes of mathematical logic in the twentieth century, namely the classical decision problem known also as Hilbert's Entscheidungsproblem. The text provides a comprehensive modern treatment of the subject, includ- ing complexity theoretic analysis. We have made an effort to combine the features of a research monograph and a textbook. Only the basic...

The annual conference of the European Association for Computer Science Logic (EACSL), CSL 2009, was held in Coimbra (Portugal), September 7 11, 2009. The conference series started as a programme of International Workshops on Computer Science Logic, and then at its sixth meeting became the Annual C- ference of the EACSL. This conference was the 23rd meeting and 18th EACSL conference; it was organized at the Department of Mathematics, Faculty of S- ence and Technology, University of Coimbra. In response to the call for papers, a total of 122 abstracts were submitted to CSL 2009of which 89...

Finite model theory, as understoodhere, is an areaof mathematicallogic that has developed in close connection with applications to computer science, in particular the theory of computational complexity and database theory. One of the fundamental insights of mathematical logic is that our understanding of mathematical phenomena is enriched by elevating the languages we use to describe mathematical structures to objects of explicit study. If mathematics is the science of patterns, then the media through which we discern patterns, as well as the structures in which we discern them, command our...