719 research outputs found
Logics for the Relational Syllogistic
The Aristotelian syllogistic cannot account for the validity of many
inferences involving relational facts. In this paper, we investigate the
prospects for providing a relational syllogistic. We identify several fragments
based on (a) whether negation is permitted on all nouns, including those in the
subject of a sentence; and (b) whether the subject noun phrase may contain a
relative clause. The logics we present are extensions of the classical
syllogistic, and we pay special attention to the question of whether reductio
ad absurdum is needed. Thus our main goal is to derive results on the existence
(or non-existence) of syllogistic proof systems for relational fragments. We
also determine the computational complexity of all our fragments
A system of relational syllogistic incorporating full Boolean reasoning
We present a system of relational syllogistic, based on classical
propositional logic, having primitives of the following form:
Some A are R-related to some B;
Some A are R-related to all B;
All A are R-related to some B;
All A are R-related to all B.
Such primitives formalize sentences from natural language like `All students
read some textbooks'. Here A and B denote arbitrary sets (of objects), and R
denotes an arbitrary binary relation between objects. The language of the logic
contains only variables denoting sets, determining the class of set terms, and
variables denoting binary relations between objects, determining the class of
relational terms. Both classes of terms are closed under the standard Boolean
operations. The set of relational terms is also closed under taking the
converse of a relation. The results of the paper are the completeness theorem
with respect to the intended semantics and the computational complexity of the
satisfiability problem.Comment: Available at
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10849-012-9165-
Approximate reasoning with fuzzy-syllogistic systems
The well known Aristotelian syllogistic system consists of 256 moods. We have found earlier that 136 moods are distinct in terms of equal truth ratios that range in τ=[0,1]. The truth ratio of a particular mood is calculated by relating the number of true and false syllogistic cases the mood matches. A mood with truth ratio is a fuzzy-syllogistic mood. The introduction of (n-1) fuzzy existential quantifiers extends the system to fuzzy-syllogistic systems nS, 1<n, of which every fuzzy-syllogistic mood can be interpreted as a vague inference with a generic truth ratio that is determined by its syllogistic structure. We experimentally introduce the logic of a fuzzy-syllogistic ontology reasoner that is based on the fuzzy-syllogistic systems nS. We further introduce a new concept, the relative truth ratio rτ=[0,1] that is calculated based on the cardinalities of the syllogistic cases
How to Deduce the Other 91 Valid Aristotelian Modal Syllogisms from the Syllogism IAI-3
This paper firstly formalizes Aristotelian modal syllogisms by taking advantage of the trisection structure of (modal) categorical propositions. And then making full use of the truth value definition of (modal) categorical propositions, the transformable relations between an Aristotelian quantifier and its three negative quantifiers, the reasoning rules of classical propositional logic, and the symmetry of the two Aristotelian quantifiers (i.e. some and no), this paper shows that at least 91 valid Aristotelian modal syllogisms can be deduced from IAI-3 on the basis of possible world semantics and set theory. The reason why these valid Aristotelian modal syllogisms can be reduced is that any Aristotelian quantifier can be defined by the other three Aristotelian quantifiers, and the necessary modality ( ) and possible modality ( ) can also be defined mutually. This research method is universal. This innovative study not only provides a unified mathematical research paradigm for the study of generalized modal syllogistic and other kinds of syllogistic, but also makes contributions to knowledge representation and knowledge reasoning in computer science
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