History of logic

The history of logic deals with the study of the development of the science of valid <a href="/facts/Inference/RBbe95bP">inference</a> (<a href="/facts/Logic/8JnpJLtt">logic</a>). Formal logics developed in ancient times in <a href="/facts/Indian_logic/VPHHNtEU">India</a>, <a href="/facts/Logic_in_China/DAqHIoRB">China</a>, and <a href="/facts/Greek_philosophy/LWEkp8JX">Greece</a>. Greek methods, particularly <a href="/facts/Aristotelian_logic/Ke2jxPC0">Aristotelian logic</a> (or term logic) as found in the <a href="/facts/Organon/tvVdUNNL">Organon</a>, found wide application and acceptance in Western science and mathematics for millennia. The <a href="/facts/Stoicism/hQu81X5x">Stoics</a>, especially <a href="/facts/Chrysippus/y92CPwt2">Chrysippus</a>, began the development of <a href="/facts/Predicate_logic/lcISqWIg">predicate logic</a>.
<a href="/facts/Christian_philosophy/Tbbcl5yv">Christian</a> and <a href="/facts/Logic_in_Islamic_philosophy/2U6nFD87">Islamic</a> philosophers such as <a href="/facts/Boethius/9k2rqLps">Boethius</a> (died 524), <a href="/facts/Avicenna/EYKG4Vez">Avicenna</a> (died 1037), <a href="/facts/Thomas_Aquinas/h2vN2VkX">Thomas Aquinas</a> (died 1274) and <a href="/facts/William_of_Ockham/swyfVda2">William of Ockham</a> (died 1347) further developed Aristotle's logic in the <a href="/facts/Medieval_philosophy/f1PmX7FB">Middle Ages</a>, reaching a high point in the mid-fourteenth century, with <a href="/facts/Jean_Buridan/6aC3Jcaz">Jean Buridan</a>. The period between the fourteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth century saw largely decline and neglect, and at least one historian of logic regards this time as barren. <a href="/facts/Empirical_methods/A6cy8Rcy">Empirical methods</a> ruled the day, as evidenced by Sir <a href="/facts/Francis_Bacon/qMJoNMRB">Francis Bacon</a>'s <a href="/facts/Novum_Organon/EfxQ8zCG">Novum Organon</a> of 1620.
Logic revived in the mid-nineteenth century, at the beginning of a revolutionary period when the subject developed into a rigorous and formal discipline which took as its exemplar the exact method of <a href="/facts/Mathematical_proof/7ECDrU80">proof</a> used in <a href="/facts/Mathematics/pxTouaz4">mathematics</a>, a hearkening back to the Greek tradition. The development of the modern "symbolic" or "mathematical" logic during this period by the likes of <a href="/facts/George_Boole/fWJT2rek">Boole</a>, <a href="/facts/Gottlob_Frege/FXyStVYj">Frege</a>, <a href="/facts/Bertrand_Russell/SRpwNX2U">Russell</a>, and <a href="/facts/Giuseppe_Peano/VT2Wsmu7">Peano</a> is the most significant in the two-thousand-year history of logic, and is arguably one of the most important and remarkable events in human <a href="/facts/Intellectual_history/363gKSRc">intellectual history</a>.
Progress in <a href="/facts/Mathematical_logic/SaI7Y3wN">mathematical logic</a> in the first few decades of the twentieth century, particularly arising from the work of <a href="/facts/Kurt_G%25C3%25B6del/P14DqKqK">Gödel</a> and <a href="/facts/Alfred_Tarski/7h6NySAj">Tarski</a>, had a significant impact on <a href="/facts/Analytic_philosophy/ALSWKaQa">analytic philosophy</a> and <a href="/facts/Philosophical_logic/Ld8lnKDA">philosophical logic</a>, particularly from the 1950s onwards, in subjects such as <a href="/facts/Modal_logic/I7uXvYYT">modal logic</a>, <a href="/facts/Temporal_logic/vANP39lc">temporal logic</a>, <a href="/facts/Deontic_logic/3qHUf4cs">deontic logic</a>, and <a href="/facts/Relevance_logic/rVQufU1b">relevance logic</a>.

History of logic open-in-new

History of logic