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Basic Logic: The Fundamental Principles of Formal Deductive Reasoning: Raymond Mccall

The present work is intended to form the basis of an introductory course of one semester in logic. It does not presuppose in the student any special classical or scientific training, and it regards the course in logic as preparatory to further courses in philosophy. I have striven to make the exposition of elementary principles sufficiently detailed and replete with examples so that the student or other interested person with no previous scientific or logical training will have no great difficulty in mastering them. I have sought, at the same time, to avoid simplifications and schemas which distort the true nature of logic as a science, and to treat as adequately and profoundly of the forms involved in deductive reasoning as the purposes of an elementary course permit. And since the work is intended for students who will go from logic to the study f philosophy, I have not hestated at times to invoke philosophical principles for the purpose of clarifying certain issues which the study of formal logic raises, and the misunderstanding of which can vitiate the approach to the subject. If at times, too, I have ventured into the field of material logic, this was with a view to rounding out a discussion of principles that are basically formal. In those instances, I have endeavored to make clear that the problem in question belongs properly to material or major logic, and that it is being discussed briefly only for the light it casts on a cognate formal principle. If this book is written against anything, it is against the confusion of formal with material logic, and the confusion of logical with mathematical thinking, which are at the root of so much bad doctrine in contemporary books of logic.

To say that the present state of textbooks in the field is confused is an understatement. The author can only hope that in a minor way he has helped to lessen, and not worse confound, this confusion. To those who know something of the history of logical thought since the Middle Ages, the villain of the piece is Christian Wolff (1679- 1754), whose mediocre abilities as a thinker are no gauge of.his influence on nearly all subsequent writers in logic and philosophy.

Wolff was responsible for many errors, but none worse to the logician than his merger and confusion of material and formal logic (which had been clearly distinguished by Aristotle in the Prior Analytics and Posterior Analytics), and his attempt, following Leibniz, to reduce logical genera to mathematical classes. Since Wolff muddied the waters of scientific classification, logic has sought in vain to find its true image in the Wolffian system. And though many modern writers have no consciousness of their debt to Wolff, they are willy. hilly influenced and contaminated by his perversion of the ancient and medieval scheme of the sciences. For the "traditional logic" that many modern thinkers discard is chiefly the tradition of Wolff, and has littie to do with the logical synthesis of Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas.

Moreover, where modern logic is most faithful, however unwittingly, to the tradition of Wolff it has become less and less an explanation of the laws of thought, a true logic, and more and more a set of algebraic combinations in which thinking is "explained away" and a mechanical substitution of symbols takes the place of the play of concepts in judgment and inference. Nor has the influence of the Wolffian tradition left unaffected many authors who would regard themselves as, on the whole, faithful to Aristotle. Thus the majority of contemporary writers on logic in the "Scholastic" tradition do little to mitigate the Wolffian perversion, for they are themselves prey to its confusion of material with formal logic, and to some extent to its mathematicism and its materialization of logical predilection. In this regard, the influence of Wolff extends far beyond the field of logic, for the very design of the philosophical curriculum in most schools where the "Scholastic" philosophy is taght stems directly from Wolff, and nothing like it can be found in Thomas Aquinas or Aristotle. Since, however, our present interest is in tho science of logic, we shall confine our criticisms to that field. If the contemporary proponents of "logical positivism," "logistics," "semanticism," "symbolic logic," and the "logic of scientific method" wish to approach the subject in a manner quite different from the Aristotelian, that is their privilege, and every sincere thinker would wish them well in their efforts. That does not mean that we must subscribe to the total reduction of logic to mathematics or semantics or scientific method, and to the simple dismissal of Aristotelian logic is outmoded and unscientific. If the point of delrture of the modem logician is to be the rejection of the "traditional" approach, let him be sure that he fully understands that tradition. And when he rejects Aristotle, let him be sure that it is an authentic Aristotle, and not an Aristotle of straw who never lived except between the pages of "manuals" in the corrupt and decadent Wolffian tradition.

Few college students, however, will have the inclination or the opportunity to go directly to the works of Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas and their commentators for the fundamentals of logic. Many would be disappointed if they did, for the logical doctrine of these thinkers is scattered through many treatises, and, brilliant and profound though it is, it is often couched in a manner' that is tedious to the modern student who has no special scholarly interest, and for whom logic is only one subject in a large curriculum. Fortunately, there are some modern works which, while faithful to the authentic Aristotelian tradition, are sufficiently relevant and orderly in their presentation of the subject to command the student's interest. Chief among these valuable modern presentations of Aristotelian logic is the Petite Logique of Jacques Maritain, translated into English under the title, "An Introduction to Logic."

My own indebtedness to Maritain's great work should be evident in the analyses on almost every one of the pages which follow. If they, by their very incompleteness, should send the reader to Maritain, they will have served some purpose. If, in certain instances, I have been led to approach problems from a different point of view, that in no way diminishes the extent of my obligation to the writings of the eminent French philosopher. Maritain, in truth, is the kind of thinker who stimulates independent thinking in his readers, and though I have found his book a perfect wellspring of sound logical principle, I have nevertheless deemed a much more elementary approach than his necessary in presenting the fundamentals of formal logic to students in the first two years of college, whose educational background is principally commercial and practical, rather than classical or scientific. If, in this effort of presentation, I have been guilty of any errors or iraprecisions, the responsibility is mine alone. Of the many persons to whom I am indebted for direct or indirect assistance in the preparation of this work, I should mention first. my students. To one of these, Robert C. Chilton, I owe a clearer undestanding of certain aspects of the hypothetical proposition, and to many others the benefit of interest and cooperation in a subject that is often complex and exacting. 1 should also like to thank Prof. J. G. Scully, of St. John's, who, from his long experience as a teacher, has given me several important insights into presentation.

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