Gates Accept Concurrent Behavior

We represent concurrent processes as Boolean propositions or gates, cast in the role of acceptors of concurrent behavior. This properly extends other mainstream representations of concurrent behavior such as event structures, yet is defined more simply. It admits an intrinsic notion of duality that permits processes to be viewed as either schedules or automata. Its algebraic structure is essentially that of linear logic, with its morphisms being consequence-preserving renamings of propositions, and with its operations forming the core of a natural concurrent programming language. 1 Introduction We understand sequential behavior very well today, namely in terms of acceptance of such behavior by sequential automata, e.g. a pushdown automaton accepting an English sentence. We propose to understand concurrent behavior via acceptance by concurrent automata of a particularly simple kind, namely Boolean gates as devices implementing Boolean propositions. Since the notion of a general Boolean..