1 Sets, Relations, and Arguments

1.1 SETS

Set theory is employed in many disciplines. As such, some acquaintance with the most basic notions of set theory will be useful not only
in logic, but also in other areas that rely on formal methods. Set theory
is a vast area of mathematical research and of signicant philosophical
interest. For the purposes of this book, the reader only needs to know
a fragment of the fundamentals of set theory.1
A set is a collection ofobjects. These objects may be concrete objects
such as persons and planets or non-concrete objects such as numbers
or other sets. The objects in the collection are elements of that set.
Sets are identical and only they have the same elements. Therefore, the set of all animals with kidneys and the set of all animals with
a heart are identical, because exactly those animals that have kidneys
also have a heart and vice versa.2 In contrast, the property of having
a heart is usually distinguished from the property of having kidneys,
although both properties apply to the same objects.
That a is an element of the set S can be expressed symbolically by
writing a e S. a is an element of 8, one also says that a is in S or that
S contains a.
1There are various mathematical introductions to set theory such as Devlin (1993),
Moschovakis (1994), or the more elementary Halmos (1960). In contrast to rigorous
expositions of set theory, I will not proceed axiomatically here.

2 I have added this footnote because there are regularly protests with respect to this example, which is due to Quine (1951). For this example only complete and healthy animals
are being considered. Even with this restriction the example is not uncontroversial for
certain species.

1 Sets, Relations, and Arguments

There is exactly one set that contains no elements, namely, the empty
set . Obviously, there is only one empty set, because all sets containing
no elements contain the same elements, namely none.
There are various ways to denote sets.
One can write down names of the elements, or other designations of
the elements, and enclose this list in curly brackets.
The set {London, Munich}, for instance, has exactly two cities as its
elements. The set {Munich, London} has the same elements. Therefore,
the sets are identical, that is:

{London, Munich} : {Munich, London}

Thus, if a set is specied by including names for the elements in curly
brackets, the order of the names between the brackets does not matter.
The set {the capital of England, Munich} is again the same set because the capital ofEngland is just another way of designating London.
{London, Munich, the capital of England} is still the same set: adding
another name for London, namely, the capital of England, does not
add a further element to {London, Munich}.
This method of designating sets has its limitations: sometimes one
lacks names for the elements. The method will also fail for sets with
innitely many or even just impractically many elements.
Above I have designated a set by the phrase the set of all animals
with a heart. One can also use the following semiformal expression to
designate this set:

{x : x is an animal with a heart}

This is read as the set of all animals with a heart. Similarly, {x : x is
a natural number bigger than 3} is the set of natural numbers bigger
than 3, and {x : x is blue all over or x is red all over} is the set of all
objects that are blue all over and all objects that are red all over.3
3 The assumption that any description of this kind actually describes a set is problematic.
The so-called Russell paradox imposes some limitations on what sets one can postulate.
See Exercise 7.4.

1.2 Binary Relations

1.2 BINARY RELATIONS

The expression is a tiger applies to some objects, but not to others.

There is a set of all objects to which it applies, namely the set {x :
x is a tiger} containing all tigers and no other objects. The expression
is a bigger city than, in contrast, does not apply to single objects; rather
it relates two objects. It applies to London and Munich (in this order),
for instance, because London is a bigger city than Munich. One can also
say that the expression is a bigger city than applies to pairs of objects.
The set of all pairs to which the expression 1's a bigger city than applies
is called the binary relation of being a bigger city than or simply the
relation of being a bigger city than.4 This relation contains all pairs with
objects d and e such that d is a bigger city than e.5
These pairs cannot be understood simply as the sets {d, e}, such
that d is a bigger city than e, because elements of a set are not ordered
by the set: as pointed out above, the set {London, Munich} is the same
set as {Munich, London}. So a set with two elements does not have a
rst or second element. Since London is bigger than Munich, but not
Vice versa, only the pair with London as rst component and Munich
as second component should be in the relation of being a bigger city
than, but not the pair with Munich as rst component and London as
second component.
Therefore, so-called ordered pairs are used in set theory. They are
different from sets with two elements. Ordered pairs, in contrast to sets
with two elements, have a rst and a second component (and no fur4 By the qualication binary one distinguishes relations applying to pairs from relations
applying to triples and strings of more objects. I will return to non-binary relations in
Section 1.4.
5 Often philosophers do not identify relations with sets of pairs. On their terminology re
lations need to be distinguished from sets of ordered pairs in the same way properties
need to be distinguished from sets (see footnote 2). In set theory, however, it is com
mon to refer to sets of ordered pairs as binary relations and I shall follow this usage
here.

1 Sets, Relations, and Arguments

ther components). The ordered pair (London, Munich) has London as

its rst component and Munich as its second. (Munich, London) is a
different ordered pair, because the two ordered pairs differ in both their
rst and second components.6 More formally, an ordered pair (d, e) is
identical with (f, g) if and only if d = f and e : g. 'Ihe ordered pair
(the largest city in Bavaria, the largest city in the UK) is the same ordered pair as (Munich, London), because they coincide in their rst
and in their second component. An ordered pair can have the same
object as rst and second component: (London, London), for instance,
has London as its rst and second component. (Munich, London) and
(London, London) are two different ordered pairs, because they differ
in their rst components. For the sake of brevity, I will often drop the
qualication ordered from ordered pair.
DEFINITION 1.1. A set is a binary relation
ordered pairs.

and only

it contains only

According to the denition, a set is a binary relation if it does not

contain anything that is not an ordered pair. Since the empty set @ does
not contain anything, it does not contain anything that is not an ordered pair. Therefore, the empty set is a binary relation.
In the following I shall occasionally drop the qualication binary
and write relation for binary relation, when it is clear that I am dealing
with binary relations.
The binary relation of being a bigger city than, that is, the relation
that is satised by objects d and e if and only if d is a bigger city than e
is the following set:

{(London, Munich), ( London, Oxford), (Munich, Oxford),

(Paris, Munich), . . . }
In the following denition I will classify binary relations. Later, I
6 Using a nice trick, one can dispense with ordered pairs by dening the ordered pair
(d, e) as {{d}, {d, e} The trick will not be used here.

1.2 Binary Relations

shall illustrate the denitions by examples. Here, and in the following,

I shall use iff as an abbreviation for if and only if.
DEFINITION 1.2. A binary relation R is
(1') reexive on a set S for all elements d of S the pair (d, d) is an
element ofR;
(ii) symmetric on a set S for all elements d, e of S: (d, e) ER then
(e, d ) R;
(iii) asymmetric on a set S for no elements d, e of S: (d, e) e R and
(e, d) e R;
(iv) antisymmetric on a set S for no two distinct (that is, dierent)
elements d, e of S: (d, e)R and (e, d)eR;
(V) transitive on a set S for all elements d, e, f ofS: (d, e) e R and
(ef)R, then also (d,f)eR.
So, for instance, a binary relation is symmetric on S if and only if,
considering only ordered pairs with components in S, if a pair is in the
relation also the pair with its components reversed is in the relation.
Often the relativization to a set is not needed. A binary relation
is symmetric (without relativization, or simpliciter) if and only if it is
symmetric on all sets.
DEFINITION 1.3. A binary relation R is
(i)
(ii)
(iii)
(iv)

symmetric it is symmetric on all sets;

asymmetric it is asymmetric on all sets;
antisymmetric it is antisymmetric on all sets;
transitive it is transitive on all sets.

30, for instance, a binary relation is symmetric if and only if for any
ordered pair in the relation the pair with the components reversed is
also in the relation.
Therefore a binary relation R is
(i) symmetric iff for all d, e: if (d, e) e R then (e, d) E R;
(ii) asymmetric iff for no d, e: (cl, e) ER and (e, d) ER;
(iii) antisymmetric iff for no two distinct d, e: (d, e) 6 R and (e, d ) e R;

10

1 Sets, Relations, und Arguments

(iv) transitive iff for all d, e,f: if (d, e) e R and (e, f ) E R, then also
(d, ) E R.
As long as they are not too complicated, relations and their properties such as reexivity and symmetry can be visualized by diagrams.
For every component of an ordered pair in the relation, one writes exactly one name (or other designation) in the diagram. The ordered pairs
in the relation are then represented by arrows. For instance, the relation

{( France, Italy), (Italy, Austria), (France, France),

(Italy, Italy), (Austria, Austria)}
has the following diagram:

France

Austria

\/
Italy

U
The arrow from France to Italy corresponds to the pair (France,
Italy), and the arrow from Italy to Austria corresponds to the pair
(Italy, Austria). The three loops in the diagram correspond to the three
pairs (France, France), (Italy, Italy), (Austria, Austria).
Since France, Italy, and Austria all have such a loop attached to
them, the relation is reexive on the set {France, Italy, Austria}. The
relation is not reexive on larger sets. For instance, it is not reexive on
the set {France, Italy, Austria, Spain}, because the pair (Spain, Spain)
is not in the relation.
The relation is not transitive. For transitivity it is required that if
there is an arrow from a point d to a point e and one from e to f in the
diagram, then there must be a short cut, that is, a (direct) arrow from d
to f. In the diagram above there is an arrow from France to Italy and
an arrow from Italy to Austria, but there is no arrow from France

1.2 Binary Relations

11

to Austria. Hence the relation is not transitive. If the additional pair

(Fran-ce, Austria) were added to the relation, then a transitive relation
would be obtained.
The relation is transitive on the set {France, Italy} because if Aus
tria is dropped from the diagram there is no missing short cut. It is also
transitive on {Italy, Austria} and {France, Austria}, but it is not transi
tive on any set containing all three countries France, Italy, and Austria.
If a relation is symmetric, then there are no one-way arrows. That
is, if there is an arrow from d to e, then there must be an arrow back
to d from e. The relation above is not symmetric. For instance, the pair
(France, Italy) is in the relation, but not the pair (Italy, France). That is,
in the diagram there is an arrow from France to Italy but no arrow
back from Italy to France.
The relation is also not asymmetric. If a relation is asymmetric and
(d, e) is in the relation, then (e, d) cannot be in the relation. The pair
(France, France) is in the relation, but the pair with its elements reversed, that is, (France, France) (which happens to be the same ordered
pair again), is in the relation as well, thereby violating the condition for
asymmetry.
In the diagram of an asymmetric relation there are only one-way
arrows: there is never an arrow from an object d to an object e and
then an arrow back from e to d. This implies that in the diagram of an
asymmetric relation there cannot be any loops, because if there is an
arrow from d to d, there is also, trivially, an arrow back from d to d:
the very same arrow.
The relation in the diagram on page 10 is antisymmetric: in an an
tisymmetric relation there must not be two different objects with arrows in both directions between them. Thus, antisymmetry is the same
as asymmetry except that in an antisymmetric relation elements may
have loops attached to them. In the above diagram there are objects
with loops, but no two different objects with arrows in both directions
between them. Therefore, the relation is antisymmetric.
I turn to another example. Consider the relation with the following
diagram:

12

1 Sets, Relations, and Arguments

Mars
\\Pluto

Venus

Mercury

This relation is reexive on the set {Mars, Pluto, Venus, Mercury}; it

is also symmetric. It fails to be transitive since direct arrows are missing, for instance, from Mars to Venus. The relation is not asymmetric
or antisymmetric since there are arrows going back and forth between
names in the diagram, for instance between Mars and Mercury.
The relation z has some peculiar properties: its diagram is empty.
It is reexive on the empty set z, but on no other set. It is symmetric,
as there is no arrow for which there is not any arrow in the opposite
direction. But it is also asymmetric and antisymmetric because there
is no arrow for which there is an arrow in the opposite direction. is
also transitive.
The relation with the diagram below is not reexive on the set with
the two elements Ponte Vecchio and Eiffel Tower, because there is no
loop attached to Eiffel Tower.
Eiffel Tower

'_$

Ponte Vecchio

The relation is symmetric, but not asymmetric or antisymmetric. It is

also not transitive: there is an arrow from Eiel Tower to Ponte Vecchio and an arrow back from Ponte Vecchio to Eiffel Tower, but there
is no short cut from Eiffel Tower directly to Eiffel Tower, that is, there
is no loop attached to Eiffel Tower.
Now I turn to a relation that cannot easily be described by a diagram or by listing the pairs in the relation, namely to the relation that
obtains between persons d and e if and only if d is at least as tall as
e, that is, the relation that contains exactly those pairs (d, e) such that
d is at least as tall as e. This relation is reexive on the set of all persons
because every person is at least as tall as themselves. The relation is not
symmetric: I am taller than my brother, so I am at least as tall as he

1.2 Binary Relations

13

is, but he is not at least as tall as I am. Thus the pair (Volker Halbach,
Volker Halbachs brother) is an element of the relation, while (Volker
Halbachs brother, Volker Halbach) is not an element of the relation.
The relation is transitive: if d is at least as tall as e and e is at least as tall
as f, then surely d is at least as tall as f.
The relation of loving contains exactly those ordered pairs (d, e)
such that d loves e. This relation is presumably not reexive on the
set of all persons: some people do not love themselves. Much grief is
caused by the fact that this relation is not symmetric, and the fortunate
cases of mutual love show that the relation is also not asymmetric or
antisymmetric. It clearly fails to be transitive: there are many cases in
which d loves e and e loves f, but in many cases d does not love his or
her rival f.
The relation of not having the same hair colour is the set containing exactly those pairs (d, e) such that d does not have the same hair
colour as 6. This relation is surely not reexive on the set of all persons,
but it is symmetric: if ds hair colour is different from es hair colour,
then surely es hair colour is different from ds hair colour. The relation
fails to be transitive: my hair colour is different from my brothers hair
colour and his hair colour is different from mine. If the relation were
transitive, then I would have a hair colour that differs from my own
hair colour. More formally, the pairs (Volker Halbach, Volker Halbachs
brother) and (Volker Halbachs brother, Volker Halbach) are in the relation, while (Volker Halbach, Volker Halbach) is not. This example illustrates again that in the denition of transitivity it is not presupposed
that d must be different from f.
The relation of being born on the same day is reexive, symmetric,
and transitive on the set of all persons. Persons stand in the relation of
being born on the same day if and only if they are born on the same
day, that is, if they are equal or equivalent with respect to their birthday. Hence the relation expresses some kind of equivalence and such

relations are known as equivalence relations.

14

1 Sets, Relations, and Arguments

DEFINITION 1.4. A binary relation R is an equivalence relation on S i

R is reflexive on S, symmetric on S and transitive on S.
As before, the restriction on S eXpresses that only elements of S
are taken into account.
I will now turn to another very important kind of relation. It is so
important that it deserves a section of its own.
1.3 FUNCTIONS

DEFINITION 1.5. A binary relation R is a function ifor all d, e, f: fi

(d,e)eR and (d,f)eR then e=f.
Thus a relation is a function if for every d there is at most one e
such that (d, e) is in the relation.
In the diagram of a function there is at most one arrow leaving from
any point in the diagram. In order to illustrate this, I will consider the
function with the following four ordered pairs as its elements:

(France, Paris)
(Italy, Rome)
(England, London)
(the United Kingdom, London)
The function has the following diagram:
France -> Paris

Italy > Rome

England > London

the United Kingdom

1.3 Functions

15

In this diagram, there are arrows from France, Italy, England, and
the United Kingdom. The set containing France, Italy, England, and
the United Kingdom is called the domain of the function. The names
of the three cities receive arrows; the set of these three cities is called
the range of the function.
DEFINITION 1.6.
(i) 771e domain of a function R is the set { d: there is an e such that
(d, e) e R
(ii) The range of afunction R is the set {e: there is a d such that (d, e) e
R
(iii) R is afunction into the set S and only all elements ofthe range
of thefunction are in S.
The elements of the domain serve as inputs or arguments of the
function; the elements of the range are outputs or Values.
In the above example the set containing France, Italy, England, and
the United Kingdom is the domain of the function, While the set with
Paris, Rome, and London as its elements is the range. According to (iii)
of the above denition, the function is a function into the set of all
European cities, for instance.

DEFINITION 1.7. fI d is in the domain of a function R one writes R(d)

for the unique object e such that (d, e) is in R.
The relation containing all pairs (d , e) such that d has e as a biological mother is a function: if d has e as biological mother and d has f as
biological mother, then e and f must be identical. Its domain is the set
of all people and animals, its range the set of all female animals with
offspring.
In contrast, the relation containing all pairs (d, e) such that d is the
biological mother of e is not a function: my brother and I have the same
biological mother, yet we are not identical.

16

1 Sets, Relations, and Arguments

1.4 NON-BINARY RELATIONS

The relations I have considered so far are binary; they contain only or.
dered pairs. Expressions such as d loves e express binary relations;
the expression d loves e expresses the relation that contains exactly
those ordered pairs (d, e) such that d loves e. In contrast, the expression
d prefers e over f expresses a ternary (3-place) relation rather than a
binary one. In order to deal with ternary relations, ordered triples (or
triples for short) are used. Triples are very much like ordered pairs.
A triple (d, e, f) is identical with a triple (g, h, i) and onyl fi they
agree in therst, second, and third component, respectively, that is, and
onlyfid = g, e = h, andf = i.7
Ternary relations are sets containing only triples.
Besides ordered pairs and triples there are also quadruples and so
on. This can be generalized to even higher arities n: an n-tuple
<d1>d2> - - o > dn)

has n components.
An n-tuple (d1,d2,. . . ,dn) and an n-tuple (61,62,. . . en) are identical if and only if d1 = el and d2 = ez and so on up to dn = en. Now
n-tuples allow one to deal with n-place relations:
An n-place relation is a set containing only n-tuples. An n -place rela-

tion is called a relation ofarity n.

For instance, there is the relation that contains exactly those 5tuples
(d, e, f, g, h) such that d killed 6 with f in g with the help of h. This is
a 5ary relation, which, for instance, contains among others the 5-tuple
(Brutus, Caesar, Brutus knife, Rome, Cassius).
I also allow l-tuples as a special case. I stipulate that (d ) is simply
d itself. Thus a 1-place or unary relation is just some set.
7 As has been remarked in footnote 6 above, one can dene ordered pairs as certain sets.
Similarly one can dene the triple ( d, e, f) using ordered pairs as d, e), f So in the
end only sets are needed.

1.5 Arguments, Validity, and Contradictions

17

1.5 ARGUMENTS, VALIDITY, AND CONTRADICTIONS

In logic usually sentences are taken as the objects that can be true or
false. Of course not every sentence of English can be true or false: a
command or a question is neither true nor false.
Sentences that are true or false are called declarative sentences. In
what follows I willfocus exclusively on declarative sentences. I will often
drop the restriction declarative, because I will be concerned exclusively
with declarative sentences.
Whether a sentence is true or not may depend on who is uttering
the sentence, who is addressed, where it is said, and various other fac
tors. The sentence I am Volker Halbach is true when I say it, but the
same sentence is false when uttered by you, the reader. It is raining
might be true in Oxford but false in Los Angeles at the same time. So
the truth of the sentence depends partly on the context, that is, on the
speaker, the place, the addressee, and so on. Dealing with contexts is
tricky and logicians have developed theories about how the context re
lates to the truth of a sentence. I will try to use examples where the
context of utterance does not really matter, but for some examples the
context will matter. Even in those cases, what I am going to say will be
correct as long as the context does not shift during the discussion of an
example. This will guarantee that a true sentence cannot become false
from one line to the other.
We often draw conclusions from certain sentences, and a sentence
is often said to follow from or to be a consequence of certain sentences.
Words like therefore, so, or hence, or phrases such as it follows that
often mark a sentence that is supposed to follow from one or more sen
tences. The sentences from which one concludes a sentence are called
premisses, the sentence which is claimed to be supported by the premisses is called conclusion. Together premisses and conclusion form
an argument.

DEFINITION 1.8. An argument consists of a set of declarative sentences

(the premisses) and a declarative sentence (the conclusion) marked as the
concluded sentence.

1 Sets, Relations, and Arguments

18

There is no restriction on how the conclusion is marked as such. EXpressions like therefore or so may be used for marking the conclusion,
Ott'en the conclusion is found at the end of an argument. The conclu.
sion. however, may also be stated at the beginning of an argument and
the premisses, preceded by phrases such as this follows from or for,
follow the conclusion.
In an argument there is always exactly one conclusion, but there
may be arbitrarily man'y premisses; there may be even only one premiss
or no premiss at all.
The following is an' argument with the single premiss Zeno is a
tortoise and the conclusion Zeno is toothless.
Zeno is a tortoise. Therefore Zeno is toothless.

A biologist will probably accept that the conclusion follows from the
premiss Zeno is a tortoise, as he will know that tortoises do not have
teeth. That the conclusion follows from the premiss depends on a certain biological fact. This assumption can be made explicit by adding
the premiss that tortoises are toothless. This will make the argument
convincing not only to biologists but also to people with no biological
knowledge at all. The biologist, ifprompted for a more explicit version
of the argument, would probably restate the argument with the additional premiss on which he may have implicity relied all along:
Zeno is a tortoise. All tortoises are toothless. Therefore Zeno
is toothless.

After adding this premiss, no special knowledge of the subject matter

is required to see that the conclusion follows from the premisses. The
conclusion follows from the two premisses purely formally or logically:
the conclusion is a consequence of the premisses independently of any
subject-specic assumptions. It does not matter who Zeno is, what tortoises are, what being toothless is, or which objects there are.
In this argument the conclusion follows from the premisses independently of what the premisses and conclusion are about. WhateW?r

1.5 Arguments, Validity, and Contradictions

19

they are taken to be about, in whatever way the subject-specic terms

are (re-)interpreted, the conclusion will be true if the premisses are. Arguments of this kind are called logically valid or formally valid. Thus
in a logically valid argument the conclusion follows from the premisses
independently of the subject matter.
CHARACTERIZATION 1.9 (LOGICAL VALIDITY). An argument is logically
valid and only there is no interpretation under which the premisses
are all true and the conclusion isfalse.8
In particular, if all terms are interpreted in the standard way, then,
according to Characterization 1.9, the conclusion is true if the premisses are true. Thus the conclusion of a logically valid argument is true
if the premisses are true.
The notion of an interpretation employed in Characterization 1.9
needs some clarication: An interpretation will assign meanings to the
subject-specic terms such as Zeno, tortoise, and iridium. It will also
determine which objects the argument is taken to be about. The logical
terms, that is, the subject-independent terms such as all, are not subject
to any (re-)interpretation. These logical terms belong to the form of the
argument and they are not affected by interpretations.
In later chapters I shall provide an exact denition of interpretations or structures, as I shall call them in the case of formal languages.
These formal accounts of logical validity can also be seen as attempts
to elucidate the notion of logical validity in natural languages such as
English at least for those parts of English that can be translated into the

formal languages.
According to the characterization of logical validity, the meanings
of the subject-specic terms do not matter for the logical validity of the
argument. Thus, one can replace these terms by other terms and thereby
obtain a logically valid argument again. The following argument has

8 A precise and informative denition of the logical validity of a argument is not so easy
to give. Sainsbury (2001, chapter 1) provides a critical introductory discussion.

20

1 Sets, Relations, and Arguments

been obtained from the argument about Zeno by such a substitution of

non-logical, that is, subject-specic terms:
Iridium is a metal. All metals are chemical elements. Therefore iridium is a chemical element.

Both the argument about Zeno and the argument about iridium have
the same pattern; they share the same form. The conclusion follows
from the premisses solely in virtue of the form of the argument. This is
the reason for calling such arguments formally valid.
The notion of logical or formal validity is occasionally contrasted
with other, less strict notions of validity, under which more arguments
come out as valid. Some arguments in which the truth ofthe premisses
does guarantee the truth of the conclusion are not formally valid. Here
is an example:
Hagen is a bachelor. Therefore Hagen is not married.
In this argument the conclusion is bound to be true if the premiss is
true, but it is not logically or formally valid, that is, valid in Virtue of
its form. Hagen is not married follows from Hagen is a bachelor in
virtue of the meaning of the word bachelor, which is subject-specic.
Also, arguments in which the premisses do not guarantee the truth
of the conclusion are often called valid. Here is an example:
All emeralds observed so far have been green. Therefore
all emeralds are green.
The premiss may support the conclusion in some sense, but it does not
guarantee the truth of the conclusion. Such arguments as the argument
above are said to be inductively valid. In logically valid arguments, in
contrast, the truth ofthe premisses guarantees the truth ofthe conclusion.
Logically valid arguments are also called deductzvely valid.
In this book I will focus on logical validity and not consider other
less stringent kinds of validity. Therefore, I shall often drop the specication logical or formal: validity will always be understood as logical
validity.

1.5 Arguments, Validity, and Contradictions

21

There are good reasons to focus on logically valid arguments. Philos0phers often suppress premisses in arguments because they think that
these premisses are too obvious to state. However, one philosophers obvious premiss can be another philosophers very contentious premiss.
Trying to mak-e an ar'gument logically valid forces one to make all hidden assumptions explicit. This may unearth premisses that are not obvious and uncontroversial at all. Also, there is usually not a unique way to
add premisses to render an argument logically valid, and it may remain
controversial which premisses were implicitly assumed by the original
author, or whether he relied on any implicit premisses at all. At any rate,
if an- argument is formally valid, then the validity does not rely on any
potentially controversial subject-specic assumptions: all the assumptions needed to establish the conclusion will be explicitly laid out for
inspection.
This is not to say that logical validity is always obvious: all required
premisses may have been made explicit, but it might not be obvious
that the conclusion follows from the premisses, that is, one might not
be able to see easily that the argument is logically valid. Characterization 1.9 of logical validity does not demand an obvious connection between the premisses and the conclusion that is easy to grasp. Almost
all of the examples of logically valid arguments considered in this book
are toy examples where it will be fairly obvious that they are logically
valid, but showing that an argument is logically valid can be extremely
difcult. Mathematicians, for instance, are mainly concerned with establishing that certain sentences (theorems) follow from certain premisses (axioms), that is, with showing that certain arguments are logically valid. Of course one can try to break up valid arguments into
chains of short and obvious steps. In Chapter 6 this task is taken up

and a formal notion of proof is developed.

A valid argument need not have a true conclusion. In the following
example the non-logical terms of the logically valid argument about
Zeno (or iridium) have been replaced in such a way as to make the
conclusion false:

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1 Sets, Relations, and Arguments

Water is a metal. All metals are chemical elements. Therefore water is a chemical element.

Although the conclusion Water is a chemical element is false, the argument is logically valid: the conclusion still follows from the premisses.
In a logically valid argument the conclusion may be false as long as at
least one premiss is false. In this case Water is a metal is false. Therefore, one cannot refute the validity of an argument by merely pointing
out a false conclusion. If the conclusion of an argument is false, then either at least one ofthe premisses is false or the argument is not logically
valid (or both).
So far I have used only one argument form (argument pattern) in

my examples. Here is an argument of a different pattern:

Either COz-emissions are being cut or there will be more
oods. It is not the case that (ZOZ-emissions are being cut.
Therefore there will be more oods.

The argument is logically valid according to Characterization 1.9 of logically valid arguments since the validity of the argument does not depend on the subject-specic terms such as COz-emissions and oods.
The validity ofthe argument depends on the logical terms either or
and it is not the case that ....
In the argument about Zeno I could replace various terms, but not
complete sentences. In the present example one can replace entire sentences. In this case the argument will still be valid after replacing the
sentences COz-emissions are being cut and There will be more oods
with some other sentences. The pattern of the valid argument is a pattern of whole sentences. Valid arguments of this kind are said to be
propositionally valid. Thus an argument is propositionally valid if and
only if there is no (re-)interpretation of the sentences in the argument
such that all premisses are true and yet the conclusion is false. These
patterns ofpropositionally valid arguments are studied in sentential or
propositional logic. Propositional validity will be treated in Chapters 2
and 3.

1.5 Arguments, Validity, and Contradictions

23

The argument about Zeno can be adequately analysed in predicate

logic only, and not in propositional logic. Predicate logic is based on
propositional logic; from the technical point of view it is a renement
of propositional logic. Thus I shall start with propositional logic and

then move on to predicate logic.

The notion of logical consistency, or just consistency for short, is
closely related to the notion of validity.
CHARACTERIZATION 1.10 (CONSISTENCY). A set ofsentences is logically
consistent and only there is a least one interpretation under which all
sentences of the set are true.
The negation of a sentence is obtained by writing It is not the case
that in front of the sentence (in English there are various stylistically
more elegant ways to express negation). It is not the case that should
be understood as pertaining to the entire original sentence. A sentence
is false if and only if its negation is true.
For a valid argument there is no interpretation under which the
premisses are all true and the conclusion is false. Thus, for a valid argument there is no interpretation under which the premisses are all true
and the negation of the conclusion is also true. Thus, if an argument is
valid, the set obtained by adding the negation of the conclusion to the
premisses is not consistent (or inconsistent, for short); and if the set

obtained by adding the negation of the conclusion to the premisses is

inconsistent, then there is no interpretation under which all sentences
of that set are true, and, consequently, there is no interpretation under
which all the premisses are true and the conclusion is false. Hence one
can dene validity in terms of consistency: An argument is valid fiand
onyl fi the set obtained by adding the negation of the conclusion to the
premz'sses is inconsistent.
I have not imposed any restrictions on the number of premisses in
an argument. In particular, there may be no premisses at all. Arguments
with no premisses may still be logically valid. The following argument
does not have any premisses but only a conclusion:
All metaphysicians are metaphysicians.

24

1 Sets, Relations, and Arguments

The sentence is true, and it is true for any interpretation of metaphysician, which is the only nonlogical, subjectspecic term in the sen.
tence. Therefore, there is no interpretation under which all premisses
are true (there is none) and the conclusion is false. Therefore, the argument is logically valid. The conclusion Of a logically valid argument
with no premisses is also called logically true or logically valid.
CHARACTERIZATION 1.11 (LOGICAL TRUTH). A sentence is logz'calyl true
fiand only it is true under any interpretation.
There are also sentences that cannot be made true by any interpretation. These sentences are called logically false. They are called logical
contradictions or just contradictions.
CHARACTERIZATION 1.12 (CONTRADICTION). A sentence is a contradiction and only it isfalse under all interpretations.
If a sentence A follows logically from a sentence B and B follows logically from A, that is, if the argument with A as its only premiss and B as
conclusion, and the argument with B as premiss and A as conclusion,
are logically valid, then the sentences A and B are logically equivalent.
According to Characterization 1.9, the argument with A as premiss and
B as conclusion and the argument with B as premiss and A as conclusion are both logically valid if and only if A and B are true under the
same interpretations:
CHARACTERIZATION 1.13 (LOGICAL EQUIVALENCE). Sentences are logically equivalent and only fz they are true under exactly the same interpretations.

1.6 SYNTAX, SEMANTICS, AND PRAGMATICS

In the following chapters I will examine formal languages. These lan

guages are in many respects much less complicated than natural languages such as English or German. They are intended to mirror certain
properties of natural languages. Some philosophers conceive of these
formal languages as models for natural languages.

1.6 Syntax, Semantics, and Pragmatics

25

Usually, in analysing either natural or formal languages one distinguishes three aspects of a language: syntax, semantics, and pragmatics.9 In order to use a language competently, one must master all three
aspects of it.
Syntax is concerned with the expressions of a language bare of their
meanings. In the syntax of a language it is specied what the words or
sentences ofthe language are. In general, the grammar of a language belongs to the syntax of that language, and often syntax is identied with
grammar. In order to use the language competently, one must know the
grammar of the language. In particular, one must know how to form
sentences in the language.
Semantics may be described as the study of the meanings of the
expressions of a language. Clearly, to use a language one must not only
know what the words and the sentences of the language are; one must
also know what they mean.
The expression Im Mondschein hockt auf den Grbern eine wild
gespenstische Gestalt is a well-formed German declarative sentence.
In a syntactic analysis of that sentence one may remark that hockt is
a verb in present tense, and so on. All this is merely syntactic information; it does not tell one anything about the meaning of that sentence. In
order to understand the sentence, one needs information about meaning. For instance, it is a semantic fact of German that im Mondschein
means in the moonlight.
The third component, pragmatics, will not be studied here. Pragmatics is, roughly speaking, the study of language in use. Assume John
calls Mary and asks her whether she wants to come along to the cinema.
She replies, I am ill. Obviously, Iohn should not expect Mary to come
along, but the sentence I am ill does not mean the same thing as I
dont want to come along to the cinema; the former sentence only says
something about Marys health. But uttered by Mary in this particular
situation, the sentence I am ill, spoken by Mary, conveys the informa9 The trichotomy was introduced by Morris (1938).

26

1 Sets, Relations, and Arguments

tion that she will not join ]ohn. Thus, John needs pragmatics in order
to understand that Mary is not going to come along. Pure semantics
would not tell him.

34:
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