Logic, Inductive and Deductive

In the Athenian game of argument, one player could ask only yes-or-no questions—and lead the other into refuting himself. William Minto traces logic to this contest, where Aristotle’s syllogism gave disputants a way to make their opponent’s own admissions do the work.

Writing in the nineteenth century, Minto looks back to ancient Athens to find the practical purpose behind a subject that has grown into a tangle of theories and technical distinctions. Aristotle, he argues, devised logic not as an abstract monument but as a tool for joining propositions and testing arguments. Minto follows that history while asking what logic can still do for us: help us reason clearly, recognize contradiction, and resist error. If logic began as a game of intellectual thrust and parry, what can recovering its original rules teach us about thinking well?

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