Product Description

If a man supports Arsenal one day and Spurs the next then he is fickle but not necessarily illogical. From this starting point, and assuming no previous knowledge of logic, Wilfrid Hodges takes the reader through the whole gamut of logical expressions in a simple and lively way. Readers who are more mathematically adventurous will find optional sections introducing rather more challenging material. 'A lively and stimulating book' Philosophy

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #32731 in Books
• Published on: 2001-11-29
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 304 pages

Review
'A lively and stimulating book' Philosophy

About the Author
Wilfrid Hodges is a Professor of Mathematics at Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London. He has held visiting appointments in the US.

Customer Reviews

The Logical Choice
Logic can be a funny and confusing subject, but this is the introduction I used for the first year of my degree course. There are different Logic systems out there, and if you're being taught you'll have to consult your syllabus - obviously this is only any good if doing Hodges' Logic, not, for example, Newton-Smith's.

I found this a good clear introduction for someone with no background in philosophy. Obviously not the most advanced text, but a simple introduction for beginners with definitions and plenty of question sets for you to try (answers in the back).

An excellent introduction
Wilfrid Hodges' book is a comprehensive introduction to its subject, it's attractive presentation making the complexities and abstract qualities of his themes far more accessible. The book conveys something of the history of the subject through references to key names (e.g. Carnap and Russell) and suggests the relevance of logical thought to everyday activities. An excellent introduction to the Philosophy of Logic which invites the reader though clear explanations, rather than leaving them at a distance through what might otherwise be the daunting, mathematical-style appearance of numbers and symbols.

An excellent introduction to formal logic.
Presuming no prior knowledge neither of philosophy nor logic, Hodges' book is an excellent, non technical, introduction to the subject. Although some sections of the book are mathematical, these are clearly indicated by the author and may be skipped if the reader wishes, without detriment to the rest of the book. This book presents the classical system of formal logic, introducing the reader to both propositonal and first order predicate calculi. Unlike most introductory texts, this book uses the semantic tree tableau method of deduction which some students find easier to understand than N.D.. Although I find this method a little cumbersome, it has the advantage of translating truth tables to deduction. Hodges the reader through some elementary meta-theory up to the interpolation theorem. The book concludes with a brief outline of some non-clasical logics such as modle logic and tense logic. I would recommend this book to anybody.