Equivalence of syllogisms (Q558433): Difference between revisions

Having introduced the 256 standard syllogisms, the author enlarges the definition of a syllogism by including 4 nonstandard figures and 4 nonstandard statement types, resulting in a space of \(8^4\) = 4096 syllogistic forms. This is convenient for theoretical purposes because this space is closed under obversion at each vertex, conversion at each side, and indirect reduction at each base vertex. So, the extended space of 4096 syllogisms is acted upon naturally by a group \(G\) of transformations that come from the classical transformations used to generate all valid syllogisms from Barbara. The author studies the structure of \(G\) as an abstract group. An \textit{orbit} of \(G\) is a set of the form \(\{g \alpha : g \in G\}\) for some syllogism \(\alpha\). Two syllogisms are in the same orbit of \(G\) if some element of \(G\) transforms the one into the other. If two syllogisms are in the same orbit of \(G\), then we can transform one into the other by a sequence of conversions, obversions, and indirect reductions. The author studies the following two questions: 1. If two standard syllogisms are in the same orbit of \(G\), can we transform one into the other by a sequence of conversions, obversions and indirect reductions without leaving the subspace of standard syllogisms? 2. If two syllogisms are equivalent, are they in the same orbit of \(G\)? The author computes the number of orbits of \(G\) of each size and suggests antilogisms as a more efficient way to analyze equivalence of syllogisms, where an antilogism is just like a syllogism except that an antilogism says \( \neg (p \wedge q \wedge r)\) rather than \( (p \wedge q) \rightarrow \neg r\).