Logic: The Structure of Reason

As a tool for characterizing rational thought, logic cuts across many philosophical disciplines and lies at the core of mathematics and computer science. Drawing on Aristotle’s Organon, Russell’s Principia Mathematica, and other central works, this program tracks the evolution of logic, beginning with the basic syllogism. A sampling of subsequent topics includes propositional and predicate logic, Bayesian theory, Boolean logic, Frege’s use of variables and quantifiers, Gödel’s work with meta-mathematics, the Vienna Circle’s logical positivism, and the Turing machine. Commentary by Hilary Putnam, of Harvard University; NYU’s Kit Fine; and Colin McGinn, of Rutgers University, is featured.

#Philosophy

[sudarshanbadoni]

Thanks. Never thought that philosophy has such mathematical abstract equations and plain analysis of simple statements. Thanks again.

[richardjosephson]

Best overview of a complex history of logic I have seen. Thoroughly enjoyed and enriched and grateful.

[yYprtyboXx]

I love the dungeon synth gangsta music that switches on after some grand citations read on top of philosopher's portrait zooming in and rotating :)

[progyandas]

This is an extremely well timed lecture as I had just finished watching Errol Morris’s ‘Fog of War’ where McNamara talks about how he used the lessons he learnt from his classes on Logic at Harvard in the war but still lost a lot of battles in Vietnam because of ‘pervasive uncertainty’ . Personally I think the post-Aristotelian dive that logic undertook into language and to some extent semantics has taken the tradition too far adrift from applications to philosophical problems .

[HughChing]

There are three stages in the development of fuzzy logic: (Stage-1) Lukasiewicz–Tarski logic of 1920s for mathematicians, (Stage-2) Lotfi A. Zadeh fuzzy logic for engineers, and (Stage-3) Hugh Ching extension of concept of range of value of Zadeh to that of range of tolerance of Zadeh and Ching. Zadeh jumped directly to fuzzy logic from science, whose essence is precision. Ching took the long way and filled in the gap in knowledge progress from science to social science to life science to robotics to self-creation, and finally guided by Zadeh to fuzzy logic. Science is obsessed with precision, and social and life sciences are clearly fuzzy. The overall effect of fuzzy logic is to reveal the true nature of reality. Fuzzy logic deals with sacrificing precision and relaxing rigor to change the range of tolerance to cover the range of possibilities in an uncertain future to determine the range of solutions or survival. Survival depends on the range of possibilities of creations staying within the range of tolerance for permanent survival in an uncertain future. The best example is DNA. In summary, the conjunction of the range of tolerance T and the range of possibilities P is the range of survival S or S is the conjunction of T and P or S=T ^ P.

[demitriemanuel]

Wonderful video, however I wonder why Wittgenstein wasn’t mentioned.

[richardmead]

Aristotle's "simple system" is the basis of computer science, today. The "true/false" rule. Yes/no, off/on, is binary code (reasoning).

[daleputnam]

I am very grateful to share a last name with Hilary. Go Putnams!

[sjuvanet]

as a philosophy major currently studying logic... Etc.

[AAZed]

Francis Bacon was not the first philosopher of modern science. It is widely recognized it was the Iraqi polymath Ibn Al-Haytham as the first scientist and physicist. He developed optics and provided the first accurate description of human vision refuting Aristotle. He predicted the camera and in fact camera is an Arabic word meaning dark room or space which what’s inside the eye. Look him up if you doubt.

[darrellee]

Ever noticed that the classic syllogism starts with an inductive statement?

[arlieferguson]

Love the extremely old stuffy Aristotle voice

[alwaysgreatusa]

Yes, Sir Bacon, but how does one know something is a fact ? It seems straight-forward, and so the question absurd. But let us not forget that we consider Descartes to be the 'Father of Modern Philosophy' primarily because he believed that nothing could be taken for granted -- or as being so obvious that it did not require some kind of proof. He only came to accept his own existence as a fact after finding, by means of a rational analysis, that he could not logically refute it. Of course, we might think to ask ourselves, what 'facts' did his 'rational analysis' take for granted ?

[It_Matters_Not]

Hey Philosophy Overdose, thanks for the documentary and for clearing up the my confusion with the example syllogism! Deleted my original comment to spare myself permanent embarrassment on the internet.

[RejunPaudel]

Why are not they talking about Nyaya Theory? One of the most relied system on Eastern Philosophy.

[havenbastion]

Science is rigor (or the body of knowledge thereby acquired). Logic is rigorously relationships which always replicate.

[alwaysgreatusa]

Evidence of the sense, Sir Bacon ? Yes, but what is it evidence of ? We walk from the shadows into the sunlight, and we say feel the warmth of the sun upon our skin... But is the warmth in the sunlight, or in our skin, or in our minds ? Where exactly is this warmth ? Where exactly is the light ? Is it really in the sun ? Or, is it really in ourselves -- in our perception of the sun ?

[Molecular-Brainwaves-Translate]

39:40 sort of rubs me the wrong way. Not because I disagree with the guy, but because of how things have played out the previous years in academia. There is a sense something was lost in philosophy when people began to treat it (to my understanding) as a language unto itself. In other words, that the "traditional" Aristotelian way of logic, while insufficient, was more practical, and evolution of logic into something "semantic" rendered logic impotent. (I think deductive logic can easily be said to be the more masculine compared to inductive logic, since the big man Aristotle himself favored deductive logic. That's not logic, that's talk about gender! But I digress). While perhaps using an Aristotelian (you mean totalitarian? no, impossible! just kidding) way of logic could be of benefit, we shouldn't assume it is a direct antithesis to "deviant" or "modal" logic (I would argue "deviant" and "modal" also means "post-modern", which is akin to the word "liberal" and is said with the same amount of disgust by critics of academia) for the simple reason that Socrates (the big man himself!) was not an antithesis to Aristotle when he said, "I know that I know nothing", which isn't a whole lot different from what is said at 40:50 .

[eternaldoorman]

24:18 This is a _very_ interesting way of putting the liar paradox. I've never heard that before.

[JonSebastianF]

7:25 *RIP, Hilary Putnam* ...judging from the colours, it doesn't look like he went to Heaven 😅