Syllabus

Class Meetings. M W F 12:30-1:20 pm in Humanities Center, Room 315

Office Hours. M Tu W Th F 1:30-2:20 pm

or by appointment

Office. Humanities Center, Room 113

Telephone. 280-1219

Email. kgraham@creighton.edu

For at least four hundred years, Western philosophers have dreamt of helping logic to attain the same level of precision and clarity that mathematics has. This dream has been most fully realized in the truth-functional logic developed by the German mathematician Gottlob Frege (1848-1925) and the British philosopher Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) and refined by philosophers and mathematicians throughout the twentieth century. The fundamental assumptions of truth-functional logic are (1) that logically complex sentences can be broken down into compounds of logically simple sentences and logical connectives (such as "and," "or," "if...then...," and "...if and only if...") and (2) that the truth (or falsehood) of a logically complex sentence is a function of the truth (or falsehood) of the logically simple sentences that make it up and the meaning of the logical connectives that hold those simple sentences together. In this way, logically complex sentences are understood as truth-functions of their logically simple components, similarly to the way that complex mathematical expressions are understood as quantitative functions of their mathematically simple components (i.e., constants and variables).

One of the chief aims of this course is to improve your reasoning ability by teaching you to use the state-of-the-art tools of modern symbolic logic to analyze arguments. You will learn how to translate sentences from a natural language (in this case, English) into the language of symbolic logic, how to test arguments stated in symbolic logic for validity using truth-functional semantics, and how to demonstrate the validity of an argument stated in symbolic logic by constructing a proof. Our study will progress through three levels of analysis, each more powerful and detailed than the last: sentential logic, monadic predicate logic, and first-order predicate logic with identity. Acquiring these skills will both improve your general reasoning ability and enable you to read with confidence the logic employed in works of contemporary analytic philosophy.

In addition, this course aims to help you acquire a critical understanding of and appreciation for the philosophical project of analyzing human reasoning purely truth-functionally. This project has provided powerful analytic tools that are useful to philosophers in every field of the discipline. This project also has several significant limitations, some of which have been discovered by philosophical logicians themselves. We will discuss both the power and the limitations of the project as we study symbolic logic together.

Graeme Forbes, Modern Logic: A Text in Elementary Symbolic Logic (New York: Oxford UP, 1994).

1. Four examinations, worth 15% each (60%):
• Exam on Forbes, Chapters 1-3, to be administered in class on Mon., Sept. 20, 2004
• Exam on Forbes, Chapter 4, to be administered in class on Fri., Oct. 15, 2004
• Exam on Forbes, Chapters 5-6, to be administered in class on Mon., Nov. 22, 2004
• Final Exam on Forbes, Chapter 7, to be administered on Wed., Dec. 15, 2004, 1:00-2:40 pm
2. Ten or more quizzes to be administered in class on dates that will not be announced in advance (30%)
3. Participation in class discussions (10%)

Examinations. You will write four examinations covering the material we will study in Forbes, Modern Logic. Each of the examinations will consist of: (1) several logic problems that will test your understanding of the skills and techniques covered in class, worth approximately 80% of the exam grade; and (2) one short answer question related to some of the material in logical theory and the philosophy of logic covered in class, worth approximately 20% of the exam grade. Details about the content and format of each exam will be spelled out in an exam review handout that will be distributed in class prior to the date of the exam in question.

Quizzes. You will write ten or more quizzes covering the material we will study in Forbes, Modern Logic, on dates that will not be announced in advance. Each quiz will consist of one logic problem that will test your understanding of skills and techniques previously covered in class. The average of your grades on all the quizzes will be worth 30% of your final grade for the course. With respect to my policy on missed quizzes, see "Petitions to Make Up Exams and Quizzes" under "Academic Policies," p. 3.

Class participation. During each class meeting, I will invite students to take turns suggesting what steps to take toward solving logic problems that we are examining as a class. Active participation in helping the class solve such problems plays an integral role in your development of an understanding of the skills and techniques that you must master to succeed in this course. Regular attendance of class meetings is necessary for the achievement of this goal, but it is not sufficient. Consequently, regular attendance of class meetings is necessary to receive a passing grade for this component of your grade for the course, but regular attendance is insufficient to receive a grade higher than C for this component of your course grade. Regular, active, thoughtful participation in class discussions will be rewarded with a grade of B or better for this component of your grade for the course.

Academic Honesty. If you present the work of another person as if it were your own, then you are guilty of academic dishonesty. Academic dishonesty is a serious offense that has consequences that will remain with you throughout your academic career and potentially beyond. If I determine that you have committed an act of academic dishonesty in this course, then I will normally assign you a grade of zero on the assignment in question. I reserve the right, however, to assign a more severe penalty, such as a grade of F for the course, or even to petition the Dean to apply an extraordinary penalty, such as expulsion from the College, in the event that you commit a particularly serious act of academic dishonesty.

Most students who commit acts of academic dishonesty do so not out of malice, but because they feel overwhelmed by the difficulty of the course material, circumstances that make it difficult to prepare as well as they would like for an exam, or the like. If you feel prone to such feelings, please come to see me at the earliest opportunity. Many students find symbolic logic difficult, and it tends to be difficult in ways that other subjects in philosophy are not. Often individual tutoring will accomplish what large group instruction cannot. Please seek my help before you feel that cheating on a quiz or exam is the only way out.

Petitions to Make Up Exams and Quizzes. If you miss an exam due to reasons beyond your control, then you can arrange to take a make-up exam by contacting me as soon as possible, and no more than 24 hours after the scheduled time of the exam. In order to obtain permission to take a make-up exam, you need to provide documentary proof of the circumstances that prevented you from writing the exam at the scheduled time within 5 business days of the scheduled time. If you fail to contact me within 24 hours or to provide evidence that circumstances beyond your control prevented you from taking the exam within 5 business days, then you will receive a grade of zero for the exam.

I will not announce in advance the dates on which quizzes will be administered in class. I do this both in order to determine how well you understand the material we are studying without cramming for the quiz beforehand and in order to motivate you to attend class meetings regularly. In order to achieve the second goal, I do not permit students who are absent from class without excuse to make up missed quizzes. If you miss a class meeting without excuse and you miss a quiz as a result, then you will receive a grade of zero for that quiz. If, on the other hand, reasons beyond your control prevent you from attending a class meeting and you miss a quiz as a result, then you can arrange to take a make-up quiz by contacting me as soon as possible, and no more than 24 hours after the scheduled time of the quiz. In order to obtain permission to take a make-up quiz, you need to provide documentary proof of the circumstances that prevented you from writing the quiz at the scheduled time within 5 business days of the scheduled time. If you fail to contact me within 24 hours or to provide evidence of what prevented you from taking the quiz within 5 business days, then you will receive a grade of zero for that quiz.

Requests to Take Examinations Early. University policy forbids instructors to cancel the last class before a University recess, such as Fall Break or Thanksgiving Break (Creighton University Bulletin: Undergraduate Issue, 2004-2005, p. 85). The second and third exams in this course are scheduled for Friday, October 15, 2004 and Monday, November 22, 2004 partly to ensure that you will attend the last class meetings before Fall Break and Thanksgiving Break, respectively. In addition, permitting students to write an exam at various different times requires me to create different but equivalent versions of the exam for each administration of the exam, which is both difficult and time-consuming. For these reasons, no student will be permitted to write an exam early. The sole exception to this policy is for students whose participation in university-sponsored activities, such as varsity athletics or debate, requires their absence from campus at the time of the exam. In such cases, requests for an alternate exam time must be accompanied by a letter from the appropriate University office.

The final exam for this course will take place on Wednesday, December 15, 2004, 1:00-2:40 pm. Experience suggests that some students may wish to take the final exam at an earlier time for the sake of convenience. However, university policy forbids instructors to administer final examinations at any time other than the time scheduled by the University Registrar (http://www.creighton.edu/Registrar/finlexa4.html). In addition, permitting students to write the final exam at various times during the final exam week requires me to create different but equivalent versions of the exam for each administration of the exam, which is both difficult and time-consuming. For these reasons, no student will be permitted to write the final exam early. The sole exception to this policy is for students whose participation in university-sponsored activities, such as varsity athletics or debate, requires their absence from campus at the time of the exam. In such cases, requests for an alternate exam time must be accompanied by a letter from the appropriate University office.

Final Examinations for Graduating Seniors. University policy permits instructors to release graduating seniors who have an overall grade of B or better in a course from the obligation of taking the final exam in the course (Creighton University Bulletin: Undergraduate Issue, 2004-2005, p. 87). In accordance with this policy, if (1) you are a senior, (2) you expect to receive your degree (not just to walk through the commencement ceremony with your graduating class) on December 18, 2004, (3) you inform me in writing by Monday, December 6, 2004 that you meet conditions (1) and (2), and (4) you have achieved an overall grade of B or better in this course once I have evaluated all of your work apart from the final exam, then I will give you the option to accept your current grade in the course as it stands on December 10, 2004 as your final grade in the course without taking the final exam. If the option of not taking the final exam is available to you, then I will inform you of this option at our last regular class meeting on December 10, 2004. If I do not inform you in writing by December 10, 2004 that this option is available to you, then you are responsible to take the final exam at the regularly scheduled time. Failure to do so will result in your receiving a grade of zero for the final exam and a grade of X for the course.