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Single Idea 13819

[filed under theme 4. Formal Logic / A. Syllogistic Logic / 2. Syllogistic Logic ]

Full Idea

Aristotle's system accepted as correct some laws which nowadays we reject, for example |= (Some Fs are G) or (some Fs are not G). He failed to take into account the possibility of there being no Fs at all.

Gist of Idea

Aristotle's said some Fs are G or some Fs are not G, forgetting that there might be no Fs

Source

comment on Aristotle (Prior Analytics [c.328 BCE]) by David Bostock - Intermediate Logic 8.4

Book Ref

Bostock,David: 'Intermediate Logic' [OUP 1997], p.353

Related Idea

Idea 14453 The Darapti syllogism is fallacious: All M is S, all M is P, so some S is P' - but if there is no M? [Russell]


The 14 ideas with the same theme [general ideas about formal arguments in syllogism form]:

Aristotle's said some Fs are G or some Fs are not G, forgetting that there might be no Fs [Bostock on Aristotle]
Stoics like syllogisms, for showing what is demonstrative, which corrects opinions [Stoic school, by Diog. Laertius]
Syllogisms are verbal fencing, not discovery [Locke]
Many people can reason well, yet can't make a syllogism [Locke]
Frege thought traditional categories had psychological and linguistic impurities [Frege, by Rumfitt]
The Darapti syllogism is fallacious: All M is S, all M is P, so some S is P' - but if there is no M? [Russell]
The mortality of Socrates is more certain from induction than it is from deduction [Russell]
The universal syllogism is now expressed as the transitivity of subclasses [Putnam]
The Square of Opposition has two contradictory pairs, one contrary pair, and one sub-contrary pair [Harré]
Venn Diagrams map three predicates into eight compartments, then look for the conclusion [Bostock]
An 'enthymeme' is an argument with an indispensable unstated assumption [Yablo]
'No councillors are bankers' and 'All bankers are athletes' implies 'Some athletes are not councillors' [Devlin]
'Equivocation' is when terms do not mean the same thing in premises and conclusion [Beall/Restall]
Syllogistic can't handle sentences with singular terms, or relational terms, or compound sentences [Engelbretsen/Sayward]