神经约束求解需融合符号计算才能保证正确性。
Position: Certified Correctness in Neural Constraint Reasoning Requires Symbolic Integration

- 用符号方法验证神经模型输出,确保硬约束不被违反。
- 在数独任务中,神经纯学习方法无法保证正确性。
- 适合关注可靠性与可证明正确性的系统设计者。
神经约束求解器在分布内任务上表现优异,但在分布外仍会出现严重约束违反,即使模型信心很高。本文主张,当存在硬约束且验证成本较低时,神经约束推理应优先采用符号集成而非纯学习。以数独(NP完全问题)为典型测试场景,因其解的验证只需多项式时间 $O(n^{2})$,而求解可能需指数级搜索,凸显了验证易、求解难的显著差异。通过综述从确定性算法、元启发式优化、学习型方法到语言引导推理的各类方法,我们发现仅依赖神经网络的方法缺乏实例级认证能力,无法提供可证明的正确性。而符号与神经符号方法则能实现此目标。因此,我们倡导双向集成:神经方法学习启发式并把感知转化为符号,符号方法验证神经输出以保障可靠性。为此,提出多智能体认证推理框架,实现在计算效率与可证明正确性间的平衡。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
Neural solvers for constraint satisfaction problems have achieved remarkable in-distribution accuracy, yet they suffer from a fundamental limitation persistent constraint violations occur under distribution shifts even when the model reports high confidence. This position paper argues that when hard constraints exist and the cost of verification is relatively low, neural constraint reasoning must prioritize symbolic integration over pure learning. We justify our focus on Sudoku as a representative NP-complete testbed because it exhibits a sharp asymmetry between easy verification and hard solving: checking a candidate solution requires only polynomial time $O(n^{2})$, while finding a solution may require exponential search. Through a comprehensive survey of solving methods spanning deterministic algorithms, metaheuristic optimization, learning-based approaches, and language-conditioned reasoning, we demonstrate that neural-only methods without instance-level certification fail to achieve the provable correctness that symbolic and neuro-symbolic approaches provide. We advocate for a bidirectional integration in which neural methods enhance symbolic solvers by learning heuristics and converting percepts into symbols, while symbolic methods verify neural outputs to ensure their reliability. To operationalize this position, we propose a multi-agent certified reasoning framework that demonstrates how this integration can achieve both computational efficiency and provable correctness.
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