more on this theme     |     more from this thinker


Single Idea 18953

[filed under theme 4. Formal Logic / A. Syllogistic Logic / 1. Aristotelian Logic ]

Full Idea

In modern notation we can consider potential logical principles that Aristotle never considered because of his general practice of looking at inferences each of whose premises involved exactly two class-names.

Gist of Idea

Modern notation frees us from Aristotle's restriction of only using two class-names in premises

Source

Hilary Putnam (Philosophy of Logic [1971], Ch.3)

Book Ref

Putnam,Hilary: 'Philosophy of Logic' [Routledge 1972], p.26


A Reaction

Presumably you can build up complex inferences from a pair of terms, just as you do with pairs in set theory.


The 14 ideas from 'Philosophy of Logic'

The universal syllogism is now expressed as the transitivity of subclasses [Putnam]
For scientific purposes there is a precise concept of 'true-in-L', using set theory [Putnam]
Physics is full of non-physical entities, such as space-vectors [Putnam]
Having a valid form doesn't ensure truth, as it may be meaningless [Putnam]
'⊃' ('if...then') is used with the definition 'Px ⊃ Qx' is short for '¬(Px & ¬Qx)' [Putnam]
Modern notation frees us from Aristotle's restriction of only using two class-names in premises [Putnam]
Before the late 19th century logic was trivialised by not dealing with relations [Putnam]
Asserting first-order validity implicitly involves second-order reference to classes [Putnam]
Nominalism only makes sense if it is materialist [Putnam]
In type theory, 'x ∈ y' is well defined only if x and y are of the appropriate type [Putnam]
Sets larger than the continuum should be studied in an 'if-then' spirit [Putnam]
Most predictions are uninteresting, and are only sought in order to confirm a theory [Putnam]
Unfashionably, I think logic has an empirical foundation [Putnam]
We can identify functions with certain sets - or identify sets with certain functions [Putnam]