Paper: The Logic of Intersection Subtyping (at LICS 2026)

Authors: Olivier Laurent

Open access: https://doi.org/10.4230/LIPIcs.LICS.2026.62

Abstract

The subtyping relation of programming languages can be analysed as an entailment relation by means of proof theory. We are interested in two main families of systems: intersection types and polymorphic subtyping. They share the fact that implication has some distributivity property: over intersection in the first case and over universal quantification in the second one. We introduce a restriction of the second-order (full) Lambek calculus which is stable under cut-elimination and conservatively extends these two subtyping relations. This new system IS is an intuitionistic non-commutative linear sequent calculus which provides a natural logical setting for the study of subtyping relations. We recover sequent calculi from the literature (as well as new variants) as restrictions of IS (thanks to the proof-theoretical analysis of the system: admissible rules, invertibility, focusing, etc.), so that IS appears as a unifying logic for subtyping. We also develop translations relating IS with relevant logic, the (unconstrained) Lambek calculus or cyclic linear logic.

BibTeX

  @InProceedings{Laurent-TheLogicofIntersect,
    author = 	 {Olivier Laurent},
    title = 	 {The Logic of Intersection Subtyping},
    booktitle =  {Proceedings of the Forty-First Annual Symposium on Logic in Computer Science (LICS 2026)},
    year =	 {2026},
    month =	 {July}, 
    pages =      {62:1--62:26},
    location =   {Lisbon, Portugal}, 
    publisher =	 {Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik},
    doi =        {10.4230/LIPIcs.LICS.2026.62}
  }