These essays have been written to honor W. W. Bledsoe, a scientist who has contributed to such diverse fields as mathematics, systems analysis, pattern recognition, biology, artificial intelligence, and automated reasoning. The first essay provides a sketch of his life, emphasizing his scientific contributions. The diversity of the fields to which Bledsoe has contributed is reflected in the range of the other essays, which are original scientific contributions by some of his many friends and colleagues. Bledsoe is a founding father of the field of automated reasoning, and a majority of the essays are on that topic. These essays are collected together here not only to acknowledge Bledsoe's manifold and substantial scientific contributions but also to express our appreciation for the great care and energy that he has devoted to nurturing many of the scientists working in those scientific fields he has helped found. Robert S. Boyer Austin February, 1991 ix Acknow ledgements Thanks to Larry Wos, editor of the Journal of Automated Reasoning, and Derek Middleton and Martin Scrivener, Kluwer Academic editors, for sup­ porting the idea of initiating this collection of essays. Thanks to A. Michael Ballantyne and Michael Spivak, for help with lffi.TWC, especially in identifying many formatting problems and providing fixes.