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Formal Logic question
Posted: Sat Mar 28, 2015 12:19 am
by tequilawine
IF you are not T, then you are not V.
Diagram: NOT T---> NOT V
The book also said V---> T.
I don't know how can it get V--->T. You are V doesn't mean you are T. am I wrong?
Thank you
Re: Formal Logic question
Posted: Sat Mar 28, 2015 12:28 am
by The Abyss
V -> T is the contrapositive of /T -> /V. Flip and negate. They are logically equivalent.
Re: Formal Logic question
Posted: Sat Mar 28, 2015 12:28 am
by lollsat
Hey buddy! It is V---> T because that's the contrapositive to NOT T---> NOT V. If you don't know what "contrapositive" is don't worry! I was there a few months ago when I was beginning my prep. There's an article on TLS that really helped me out that explains conditional logic fundamentals. Here it is:
http://www.top-law-schools.com/conditio ... oning.html Someone will post here giving you a great explanation, still, I HIGHLY recommend going through that article as it thoroughly explains the basics. Good luck!
Re: Formal Logic question
Posted: Sat Mar 28, 2015 12:30 am
by js1663
OK so we had -T ----> -V right?
That means if we don't have T, we most certainly don't have V - basically we need T to have V - so if we have V, then we must have T
It follows the method used to gain a contrapositive -
If you have -T ----> - V
Switch places so it becomes -V ---->-T and then reverse signs (negative becomes positive, positive becomes negative and vice versa -
So it becomes V ----> T
__________________
Think of it in simpler terms:
If it's not round it's not a circle
So you'd have:
- (round) ---> - (circle)
Though irrelevant to LG (doesn't need to make sense if they give you a rule) but it makes sense since circles are round, so if it's not round how could it be a circle.
If you follow the contrapositive method, you'd get
circle ---> round
The rule gave us that if it's not round it can't be a circle. If it can't be a circle unless it's round, then we know that if it is a circle, then it must be round, otherwise it'd violate the original rule. Same idea with the original example of TV
Re: Formal Logic question
Posted: Sat Mar 28, 2015 12:35 am
by tequilawine
thanks for your guys help
Re: Formal Logic question
Posted: Sat Mar 28, 2015 12:41 am
by RZ5646
tequilawine wrote:IF you are not T, then you are not V.
Diagram: NOT T---> NOT V
The book also said V---> T.
I don't know how can it get V--->T. You are V doesn't mean you are T. am I wrong?
Thank you
The other responses explained it but they didn't prove it, so I'll give it a shot with a reductio ad absurdum:
Say you're V. Then let's assume that you're ~T (not T). But then by your first conditional you must be ~V, and we just said that you're V. You have V and ~V at the same time, which is a contradiction. Thus the assumption that you are are ~T must be false, and its opposite must be true: you are T. Thus, if you are V, you are T, and V --> T.
In general, any conditional p --> q can be flipped into ~q --> ~p. The flipped version is called the contrapositive, and it works both ways: ( p --> q ) <--> ( ~q --> ~p ).