Common Logic and Language

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering the concepts, figures, historical texts, and linguistic dynamics discussed in the chapter on Common Logic and Language.

Augustus De Morgan's view on logic and expression

The observation that logic tends to correct inaccuracy of thought and inaccuracy of expression, noting that people who think logically can express themselves illogically and cause hearers or readers to believe they thought wrongly.

Dialectic (Renaissance Logic)

The branch of discourse concerned with statements aimed at achieving valid inferences about reality, widely considered the domain of scholarly and scientific discourse and traditionally symbolized by a closed fist.

Rhetoric

The method of discourse intended to communicate ideas between the learned and the populace, historically symbolized by an open hand representing open discourse.

Sir Francis Bacon

Renaissance author and the 'father of deductive reasoning' who contrasted logic and rhetoric as the closed fist versus the open palm, asserting that logic handles reason exact and in truth, while rhetoric handles it as planted in popular opinions and manners.

The Lawiers Logike

A 1588 book by Abraham Fraunce that attempted to bring English law and logic together, seeking to apply the scholastic, aristocratic image of philosophy to the law.

Syntagma Logicum, or The Divine Logike

A 1620 work published by Thomas Granger designed to provide preachers with a logical system fruitful for theology.

The Port Royal Logic

A widely popular 1662 text (originally titled 'La Logique, ou L\'Art de Penser') written by Antoine Arnauld and Pierre Nicole, illustrating the application of logic to theological, civil, and ordinary discourse, semantics, and mental operations.

Semantics

The branch of modern linguistics that deals with the meaning of words, phrases, and sentences.

Hyponymy

The semantic relationship of asymmetric, hierarchical class inclusion between linguistic labels, in which a specific term (a hyponym or subname, such as 'daisy') is included within a broader category (such as 'flower').

Class Inclusion

A hierarchical, taxonomic relation expressed in categorical statements such as Aristotle's 'Every A is B,' indicating that one class is included within another rather than asserting identity, spatial relation, or temporal relation.

Natural Logic (Pragmatic Reasoning)

The intuitive way humans reason during everyday conversation, relying on natural language conventions, context, known facts, and practical considerations rather than formal laws of logic.

Gricean Maxims

A set of conversational rules formulated in 1967 by H. Paul Grice that participants implicitly follow, instructing speakers to be informative, truthful, relevant, clear, brief, and orderly.

Cooperation Principle

The overarching conversational principle requiring the speaker to be as informative, truthful, relevant, concise, clear, and orderly as possible, while the listener interprets speech under the assumption that these standards are being upheld.

Enthymeme

A syllogism described by Arnauld and Nicole as perfect in the mind but imperfect in expression, in which one proposition is suppressed because it is deemed obvious enough to be supplied by the listener's intelligence.

Formal Logic

A reasoning system requiring the thinker to compartmentalize information, exclude outside knowledge, and accept only the minimal commitments strictly entailed by the premises.

Alternative Conditionals

Additional conditional statements offering multiple independent antecedents for a consequent, shown in psychological studies to help reasoners block the invited fallacious inference of denying the antecedent.

Additional Conditionals

Supplementary background conditions that can disrupt valid deductive inferences (like modus ponens) because reasoners intuitively presume all stated requirements must be met before drawing a conclusion.

Martin Braine

New York University psycholinguistics professor who studied 'natural logic' and explained everyday logical errors as an intrusion of practical reasoning habits and natural language connectives into formal reasoning tasks.

Heuristic Reasoning

Informal, intuitive problem-solving procedures that describe how human minds naturally work, which Martin Gardner distinguished from formal logic.

Keith Devlin's perspective on human reasoning

The view that human logical thought and language involve commonsense knowledge and more than mechanistic rule application, separating human comprehension from computer processing.

Mary Henle's premise on logic

The observation that logical reasoning is fundamental to human interaction, arguing that if individuals could not arrive at common conclusions from shared premises, they could not understand one another, make decisions, or work together.