Meaning and nature of Logic

Meaning and nature of Logic

• The term logic comes from the Greek word
“logos”.
• partial translation are - sentence, discuss,
reason, rule, ratio, account, (especially the
account of the meaning of an expression),
rational principle and definition.
• logic deals with the laws of thought, the rules
of right reasoning, the principles of valid
argumentation, and truths based solely on the
meanings of the terms they contain
• Logical study exposes us to rules that will
enable us to test whether any particular
piece of reasoning is coherent and
consistent (logical)
• Therefore, logical type of reasoning is
distinguishable by the fact that it produces
reasons or evidence for establishing
conclusions
• Logic allows us to infer a certain
conclusion, which if they are true, provides
evidence for the truth of the conclusion.
 What then is logic?
• Logic is concerned with answering such
question as what is correct reasoning?
• The study of the principles for appraising
arguments as correct or incorrect .
• It is the study of the norms or laws of correct
reasoning.
• Logic is the study of truth based completely on
the meaning of the term they contain.
• E.g “if sight is perception, then objects of sight
are objects of perception”. (Aristotle)
• Its truth can be grasped without holding any
opinion as to what in fact is the relationship
of sight to perception.
• What is needed is merely an understanding
of what is meant by such terms as “If … Then
… And”.
• The logical truth of Aristotle’s example of
proposition is reflected by the fact that the
object of sight are the objects of perception
can validly be inferred that sight is
perception.
 Characteristics of Logical Thinking
• Logic or critical thinking gives due
consideration to the evidence, the
context of judgment and the relevant
criteria for making the judgment well.
• Logic must employ the applicable
methods or techniques for forming
the judgment, and the applicable
constructs for understanding the
problem and the question at hand.
• Logic must employ broad intellectual
criteria such as clarity, credibility, accuracy,
precision, relevance, depth, breadth,
significance and fairness.
• Logical or critical thinking must have an
attitude of being disposed to consider in a
thoughtful way the problems and subjects
that come within the range of one’s
experiences.
• All logical thinking should be sequential in
nature. They should allow for thinking in a
certain order to have an objective view of
the issue in question.
 Logic and Argument
• Logic is said to be a form of argument, which
shows sequence in the order of expression of
statements.
• So what is argument?.
• There is a distinction between “argument” in the
ordinary sense and “argument” in the technical
sense.
• Ordinarily, the word argument refers to a quarrel
or disagreement, but argument in the technical
sense is “one or more propositions, called a
premise or premises, which are offered as
evidence for another proposition, called a
conclusion”.
• Meanwhile, a proposition is a statement which
can be evaluated as true or false.
Let us consider the following and see which of
them form a proposition that can be evaluated
as true or false:
• 1. Students are rioters.
• 2. What a Speech!
• 3. It is sunning.
• 4. Dolapo is a lawyer.
• 5. Christians are saints.
• 6. Are police friendly?
• 7. Go to the mountain.
The sentences above comprise commands,
exclamations, and questions while some are
statements.
The primary interest, however, is in
statements or propositions, which are
capable of being true or false.
• For example, the group of statements below
constitute an argument:
• All men are mortal.
• Plato is a man.
• Therefore, Plato is a mortal.
• The above is an argument. The first two
statements, which provide support for the last
one, are known as premises, while the last one,
which is supported by the first two statements, is
called the conclusion
• Arguments, particularly deductive arguments,
are either valid or invalid.
• An argument is valid if it would be
unreasonable to believe its premises and not
believe its conclusion.
• On the other hand, it is invalid if it is possible
to accept the premises and reject the
conclusion.
• Therefore, an argument is sound when it is
valid and all of its premises are true.
• Let us consider the following arguments in
order to ascertain when an argument is valid,
invalid, sound, and unsound.
• i. All men are mortal.
• Plato is a man.
• Therefore, Plato is mortal.
• 2. All Spiders are eight legged creatures.
• All eight legged creatures have wings.
• Therefore, all spiders have wings.
• In the first example, the argument is valid and
the premises are true. Therefore, it is a sound
argument.
• In the second example, however, although the
argument is valid, the premises are false. So, it
is an unsound argument.
• It is important to note that the validity or
invalidity of arguments is determined by their
formal structure, that is, the relationship
between premises and conclusion, not the truth
or falsity of the premises and conclusion.
 Deductive Arguments
• Deductive arguments involve reasoning that
attempts to establish conclusive inferences.
• To say that an inference is “conclusive” means
that if the reasons given are true, then it will be
impossible for the inference based upon these
reasons to be false.
• Also, a deductive argument is an inference in
which the conclusion flows from the premises.
• Furthermore, in a deductive argument, the
premises provide sufficient or conclusive
ground for the conclusion.
• A deductive argument can be valid or invalid.
• Equally, it should be noted that,
deductive arguments are concerned
with the conditions under which
particular propositions are inferable
from universal premises.
• In other words, in deductive
reasoning, inferences are, in many
cases, made from general
statements to particular statements.
 Examples of these are:
• 1) All unmarried men are bachelors.
• Okoro is unmarried.
• Therefore, Okoro is a bachelor.

• 2) All students are matriculated.

• Bongo is a student.
• Therefore, Bongo matriculated.
• However, care must be taken on this point;
the essence of deduction is not the
derivation of particular conclusions from
universal propositions, but the derivation of
conclusions, which are necessarily
involved in the premises.
 Inductive Arguments
• A non-deductive inference in which the conclusion
expresses an empirical conjecture that goes
beyond what the premises claim.
• The premises of an inductive argument provide
good (but not conclusive) grounds for accepting
the conclusion.
• Thus, it is possible for all the premises of a good
inductive argument to be true and the conclusion
false.
• The point here is that, in this type of reasoning, the
conclusion includes information not necessarily
implied by the premises.
• Thus, the premises only render the conclusion
• It must be noted that, inductive arguments are not
appraised as valid or invalid, sound or unsound.
• The appraisal of an inductive argument is based on
the degree of probability, which the premises
provide for the conclusion.
• Inductive argument deals with those inferences,
which enable us to derive a universal conclusion
from particular premise or premises.
• Inductive reasoning is based on sense experience
of particular instances and since one has not yet
exhausted all the instances of such elements that
exist, it becomes a problem for one to make a
universal claim about the things he has not yet
experienced”.
• For this reason, the conclusion of an inductive
argument is most of the time probable.
 Let us consider these examples:
• David, a Political Science student, is brilliant.
• Mayowa, a Political Science student, is
brilliant.
• Jason, a Political Science student, is brilliant.
• Flourish a Political Science student, is brilliant.
• Therefore, it probably follows that all Political
Science students are brilliant.
 example
• Aluminum, a metallic object, melts when exposed
to heat.
• Silver, a metallic object, melts when exposed to
heat.
• Copper, a metallic object, melts when exposed to
heat.
• Therefore, probably all metallic objects melt when
exposed to heat.
• One important characteristic of inductive
arguments is that our confidence in the truth of
their conclusions can be increased or decreased
by adding other premises.
• In other words, the more the number of instances,
which provide the evidence, the higher the degree
of probability of an inductive argument.
 Symbolic Logic
• In symbolic logic, the subject logic becomes
more of a science than art.
• The reason for this claim is that logic is
concerned with developing our thinking system
or faculty.
• In this sense, symbolic logic is concerned with
the development of techniques that will enable
us to determine the validity of deductive
arguments without the ambiguities of natural
language.
• Symbolic logic, is therefore, concerned
with syntax rather than with semantics.
It studies, not sentences but, sentential
forms or proposition forms.
• Symbolic logic is seen as part of formal
logic in which special symbols are
introduced to represent propositions and
their connectives, or predicates and their
quantifiers.
• The use of symbols allows for precision,
economy and transparency (Bello, 1999).