Logic
While the material conditional operator used in logic (i.e.) is sometimes read aloud in the form of a conditional sentence (i.e. "if p, then q"), the intuitive interpretation of conditional statements in natural language does not always correspond to the definition of this mathematical relation. Modelling the meaning of real conditional statements requires the definition of an indicative conditional, and contrary-to-fact statements require a counterfactual conditional operator, formalized in modal logic.
Read more about this topic: Conditional Sentence
Famous quotes containing the word logic:
“We want in every man a long logic; we cannot pardon the absence of it, but it must not be spoken. Logic is the procession or proportionate unfolding of the intuition; but its virtue is as silent method; the moment it would appear as propositions and have a separate value, it is worthless.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“There is no morality by instinct.... There is no social salvation—in the end—without taking thought; without mastery of logic and application of logic to human experience.”
—Katharine Fullerton Gerould (1879–1944)
“The American Constitution, one of the few modern political documents drawn up by men who were forced by the sternest circumstances to think out what they really had to face instead of chopping logic in a university classroom.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)