Course description
This course explores some recent developments in the field of logic.
First, and more specifically, the course is an introduction to the
growing field of inquisitive logic. Classically, logic is concerned with
relations between sentences of a particular kind, namely, statements.
Inquisitive logic broadens this classical view of logic by bringing
questions into the picture. We will see that questions, while
traditionally neglected, actually have an important role to play in
logic: they can participate in entailment relations and manipulated in
inferences, they can be combined by connectives and quantifiers, and
they give rise to an elegant mathematical theory.
Second, and more broadly, the course explores the information-based
perspective on logic. While this perspective is crucial to inquisitive
logic, it plays an equally important role in other recent developments,
such as dependence logic and accounts of the logic of epistemic vocabulary.
Time and place
Time: Friday 14-16 (class) and Wednesday 11-12 (exercises)
Start: Friday 24.04.2020
Place: classes will, at least initially, take place in the form of Zoom meetings.
Further details will be provided soon to all registered participants.
Prerequisites
Propositional and predicate logic.
Basic Material
Assessment
In principle, the assessment is based on a final exam. Should the university stay closed until the end of the semester, this might have to change.
Course program (preliminary)
Part I: inquisitive logic
24.04. Introduction and foundations.
Material: Intro slides. Pages 1–7 of the dissertation (excluding 1.1.4)
Exercise sheet 1
08.05. Generalizing logical consequence.
Material: remainder of Ch. 1 (section 1.6 is optional)
Exercise sheet 2
22.05. Inquisitive propositional logic.
Material: Slides. Ch. 2.1 and 2.2 (pp. 45-54)
Exercise sheet 3
Exercise sheet 4
Solution to Ex 1 of sheet 4
05.06. Inquisitive propositional logic.
Material: Slides. Ch. 2.3-2.5 (pp. 44-68)
Exercise sheet 5
10.06. Reasoning with questions.
Material: Ch. 3.1, 3.2 and 3.4
Solution to Ex 2 of sheet 5
12.06. Completeness theorem for InqB.
Material: Ch. 3.3.
Exercise sheet 6
19.06. Inquisitive predicate logic.
Material: Ch. 4.1 (pp. 95-102)
Exercise sheet 7
26.06. Inquisitive predicate logic.
Material: Ch. 4.2-4.4 (optional: 4.5)
Exercise sheet 8
Solutions to exercise sheet 8
03.07. Inquisitive predicate logic, modal logic recap.
Material: Slides, Ch. 4.6
Optional advanced readings: Grilletti2019, Grilletti&Ciardelli2020
Exercise sheet 9
10.07. Inquisitive modal logic.
Material: Slides, Ch. 6.1-6.4.3 (pp. 199-217)
Optional: Ch. 6.4.4, 6.5, Ch. 7
Exercise sheet 10
Part 2: informational consequence beyond question
17.07. Dependence logic
Material: pp. 9-20 of Pietro Galliani’s dissertation
No new exercises. In the next session week we’ll correct the last exercise from the previous sheet, and then discuss any questions you have.
24.07. Dependence logic and inquisitive logic
Material: Ch. 5.3.2-5.3.5 + 5.5