Dear All

I've now posted two new articles on the Philosophy site at BellaOnline.com.

The Valid Argument Form - If P then Q. P therefore Q.
The use of propositional variables in analysing arguments is nowhere near as difficult or as boring as it sounds. Philosophy really is fun, you know. And I can prove it.
http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art34137.asp

The Invalid Argument Form - if P then Q. Q therefore P.
Consider the following argument: If Socrates is a man then Socrates is mortal. Socrates is mortal therefore Socrates is a man. Why is this argument invalid and are all arguments of this form also invalid?
http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art15022.asp

Over the next few months I plan to write a number of articles on the subject of Formal Logic and show that what might seem quite a scary topic can in fact be very accessible. And fun.

I'm also planning a series of articles on "Meditations on First Philosophy" by the French philosopher Rene Descartes who is generally considered to be the father of modern western philosophy. "Meditations" was one of the first Philosophy books I studied myself as an undergraduate and it serves as an excellent introduction to philosophical enquiry. More on that later.

To participate in free, fun online discussions, or to post questions (or answers) relating to the logic articles you can visit the Philosophy community forum located at:
http://forums.bellaonline.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=postlist&Board=143

You can also contact me directly via the Comments box on my bio page at http://www.bellaonline.com/about/philosophy or by email in response to this newsletter.

And I'll leave you with two philosophy related questions:
For what statement is Rene Descartes most famous?
And which English Rock band had some fun paraphrasing it slightly at the beginning of one of their songs?


Chik J Duncan, Philosophy Editor
http://philosophy.bellaonline.com

One of hundreds of sites at BellaOnline.com