English

Prove-It: A Proof Assistant for Organizing and Verifying General Mathematical Knowledge

Logic in Computer Science 2020-12-29 v2 Quantum Physics

Abstract

We introduce Prove-It, a Python-based general-purpose interactive theorem-proving assistant designed with the goal of making formal theorem proving as easy and natural as informal theorem proving (with moderate training). Prove-It uses a highly-flexible Jupyter notebook-based user interface that documents interactions and proof steps using LaTeX. We review Prove-It's highly expressive representation of expressions, judgments, theorems, and proofs; demonstrate the system by constructing a traditional proof-by-contradiction that 2Q\sqrt{2}\notin\mathbb{Q}; and discuss how the system avoids inconsistencies such as Russell's and Curry's paradoxes. Extensive documentation is provided in the appendices about core elements of the system. Current development and future work includes promising applications to quantum circuit manipulation and quantum algorithm verification.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2012.10987,
  title  = {Prove-It: A Proof Assistant for Organizing and Verifying General Mathematical Knowledge},
  author = {Wayne M. Witzel and Warren D. Craft and Robert D. Carr and Joaquín E. Madrid Larrañaga},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2012.10987},
  year   = {2020}
}

Comments

Updated the links to our pyproveit.org website. 38 pages, 12 figures

R2 v1 2026-06-23T21:06:39.825Z