This is a textbook for a "logic literacy" course, suitable for beginning graduate or advanced undergraduate courses. The goal is to introduce students to the logic they need to know in order to understand contemporary philosophy. It emphasizes breadth rather than depth. For example, it discusses modal logic and counterfactuals, but does not prove the central metalogical results for predicate logic, such as completeness and undecidability. (It does, however, discuss enough metalogic for students to understand what metalogic is all about. For example, it goes through completeness proofs in nonmodal and modal propositional logic.) Published by Oxford University Press, 2010.
If we want to think that the need for nonclassical logic arises not simply from semantic paradox (including metaphysically semantic paradoxFootnote 33), but also from considerations about vagueness, the open future, set theory, or whatever else, (1**) could be expanded to accommodate this. The question remains whether the restriction in (1**) can be motivated. A quick response that is not without force is that the avoidance of triviality is as good a motivation as one could wish for, and given that classical responses to semantic paradoxes are unpersuasive, this excellent motivation combines with our desire for a nonclassical solution to force revision of (1). However, there is a more exacting sense to the initial question: what we want is not simply a reason for replacing (1) with (1**); we undoubtedly have that. Instead it would be good to have a compelling metaphysical picture on which this revision appears natural, rather than as simply theoretical back-pedalling in the face of paradox. Is there such a picture to be had?
Theodore Sider Logic For Philosophy Pdf Download
The problem is this, that the operative picture of truth, combined with the classical nature of metaphysical truth-conditions, enforces classical behaviour of negation in the language for which metaphysical truth-conditions are being supplied. Now, the master thesis behind the application of metaphysical semantics in the philosophy of logic was that logical vocabulary in a nonfundamental language might not carve at the joints. Leaving aside the case of quantifiers, the non joint-carving nature of which in natural language is surely de fide for the metaphysical semanticist, the case for this is persuasive especially in the case of negation.Footnote 38 In any case, given that debates between classical and nonclassical logicians are usually best viewed as concerning the logic of negation, it is fatal to any metaphysical semantics which hopes to reconcile fundamental classicality and nonfundamental nonclassicality to impose a condition which enforces a uniform treatment of negation between the fundamental and nonfundamental levels.
The Logic Manual is the ideal introduction to logic for beginning philosophy students. It offers a concise but complete introductory course, giving a firm grounding in the logic that is needed to study contemporary philosophy. Exercises, examples, and sample examination papers are provided on an accompanying website.
Logic for Philosophy is an introduction to logic for students of contemporary philosophy. It is suitable both for advanced undergraduates and for beginning graduate students in philosophy. It is very user-friendly for students without much background in mathematics. It gives you the logic you need to do philosophy.
An earlier post collected links to various guides for students about how to write a philosophy paper, but there are a variety of other materials out there, including reading guides, tips on logic and argumentation, lessons on specific topics, subject summaries, instructional videos, thought experiments, and more. Such information could be useful to students and to other instructors, but it can be hard to find, so I thought it would be worthwhile to create a space to post links to these materials. 2ff7e9595c
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