Robotics Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 1.
The Stanhope Demonstrator as it appeared in
Mind
, a philosophical journal,
in April 1879
limited form of syllogistic logic
3
as it had been handed down by Aristotle
2,000 years earlier.
Stanhope's Demonstrator could solve numerical syllogisms in the fol-
lowing way. Let us consider the syllogism
Eight of my ten cats are male
Four of my ten cats are black
Therefore at least two of my male cats are black
3
A syllogism is the basic form of a logical argument. It consists of two statements (called premises
in logic parlance), for example, “All cats are furry” and “Tom is a cat”, and one conclusion, for
example, “Tom is furry”. In each of these statements there are two
terms
. In “All cats are furry”, the
terms are “cats” and “furry”, and in “Tom is a cat” the terms are “Tom” and “cat”.
