From Logic to Composition and Reading

Dennis J. Packard

doi:10.2307/356299

College Composition and Communication Dec 1976

From Logic to Composition and Reading

Dennis J. Packard

Abstract

ONE OF THE NICETIES of being in a philosophy department is the freedom one feels to poke his nose into the disciplines of others, usually under the guise of investigating the philosophical foundations of the Such undertakings, unfortunately, are not always viewed with great enthusiasm by those actually engaged in the discipline. In fact, they are sometimes viewed either dimly, awryly, or not at all. So it is nice if philosophy can provide, at least sometimes, some practical and useful solutions, or at least partial solutions, to the problems it is so famous for revealing. But logic? Could logic be a philosophical tool fit for such a practical task as the teaching of coherence in composition and reading? True, logic has sometimes been considered the discipline that chews up prose and spits out symbols. Still, it must be remembered that the processing that does occur in logic makes language more manageable; that is, it allows us (1) to isolate premises and conclusions of arguments, (2) to determine logical connections and relationships within such statements, and (3) to evaluate arguments for validity. As would be expected, logicians, in order to carry out this processing, have had to develop a number of linguistic and logical tools. Take, fOr example, what logicians call the propositional calculus. It is simply a fragment of natural language that uses what are called connectives-connectives which connect sentences in such a way that the truth or falsity of the whole can be based on that of the parts. For example, when the atomic sentences Horner loves Mrs. Pinchwife and Sparkish is a wit are put together with the connective or (or and, if, only if, if and only if, etc.) the truth or falsity of the resulting compound, or molecular, sentence is based on the truth or falsity of the component sentences. In this case, the molecular sentence Horner loves Mrs. Pinchwife or Sparkish is a wit is false just in case both Horner loves Mrs. Pinchwife and Sparkish is a wit are false. In contrast, the connective since is non-truth functional because the truth of falsity of a sentence like Since Sparkish is a wit, Horner loves Mrs. Pinchwife depends on more than just the truth or falsity of the component sentences. Presumably, it depends on some kind of connection between the states of affairs represented by the component sentences.

Journal: College Composition and Communication
Published: 1976-12-01
DOI: 10.2307/356299
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Open Access: Closed
Topics: teacher development
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From Logic to Composition and Reading

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