A formula finder for the automatic synthesis of translation algorithms

A system of procedures and computer programs is proposed for the semi-automatic synthesis of Russian-English translation algorithms. For the purposes of automatic formula finding, a large corpus of Russian scientific and technical text may be processed by an automatic Russian-English dictionary, the resulting word-by-word translation postedited according to a systematic procedure, and the final translation transcribed back onto magnetic tape for input to a computer. The operation of the proposed system is based on the automatic comparison of magnetic tapes containing the original automatic dictionary outputs with ones containing the parallel post-edited texts. It is expected that, when given proper clues, the formula finder will be capable of synthesizing algorithms that can be used to convert one text into the other. The clues corresponding to a desired algorithm consist mainly of a list of logical variables that might in some combination govern the application of a specified post-editing transformation. Whenever a product of the transformation is found in the post-edited text, the formula finder examines the truth value configuration of the given variables in the automatic dictionary output. After examining all instances of the transformation, the formula finder ascertains whether the given variables can be combined into a logical formula that implies the given transformation. The formula finder compounds the given variables into a valid and optimal translation algorithm if it is at all possible to do so.