NP-Completeness

Abstract

Why study problems in NP? Papadimitriou and Steiglitz, page 351: “The recognition versions of all reasonable combinatorial optimization problems are in NP , . . . (because) . . . combinatorial optimization problems aim for the optimal design of objects. It is reasonable to expect that, once found, the optimal solution can be written down concisely, and thus serve as a certificate for the recognition version.”