Early Ideas Behind Logic Programming
Historical Perspectives
Logic programming is an approach to computer science in which the first order predicate logic is used as a high level programming language. The use of symbolic logic as a programming language has a history of not more than thirty years, but the study of the symbolic logic goes back to the work of Aristotle in the fourth century B. C. First Order Predicate Logic is a branch of symbolic logic that has evolved largely in the twentieth century.
The history of logic programming started with symbolic logic, and then First Order Predicate Logic emerged from symbolic logic to form the base for Logic Programming. The history of logic programming can be classified into three eras. The first era was the era of the pioneers in founding a symbolic language. The real development of the symbolic logic occurred in the second era, where the third era is the era of transition from symbolic logic to logic programming.
In each of the three eras many people contributed to the journey of developing Logic Programming, but we are going to mention only those who had deep influence on this development.
Early Ideas of Symbolic Logic
What is now known as traditional logic began at the time of Aristotle over 22 centuries ago. Aristotle work was assembled by his students after his death in 322 B. C. Aristotle attempted to codify the knowledge into scientific system. His work is best understood as a theoretical study of successful reasoning techniques. Syllogism was Aristotle major reasoning technique to reach a rational conclusion. The syllogism is a set of rules governing what conclusion can be reached from a set of statements written in four statement forms.
Based on the syllogism, students of Aristotle were able to isolate principles of deductive inference on a restricted form of statements called propositions. A proposition is any statement that can be assigned a truth value. Aristotle approach to logic became sacred, especially in the Middle Ages that no one even considered trying to improve until the seventeenth century.
In unpublished writings, Leibniz (1646-1716) expressed his doubt about the perfection of Aristotelian logic. Leibniz found certain points where the syllogism seemed to be wrong or incomplete. Leibniz wrote about a new, universal language of mathematical logic to replace the syllogism. He anticipated that such a language would be able to solve philosophical problems in a mechanical way, and thereby bring peace to the world.
There are other contrasting aspects of the stories that call for attention. Most significantly Benito Cereno – ultimately – portrays slaves as evil and Babo as the mind behind the cunning plan that deceives Captain Delano. The reason for this one-sided representation is naturally the fact that we experience the story from Delano’s point of view. In the beginning, we perceive Babo as the typical docile, helpful, and faithful servant so often portrayed in other slave characters such as Stowe’s Uncle Tom and Jim in Twain’s Huckleberry Finn. Babo is more than just a slave; he is a “faithful fellow”, “a friend that cannot be called slave” . And despite all the underlying hints of a slave insurrection, Delano does not grasp their meaning. Examples are the slaves’ treatment of the Spanish sailors and the hatchet polishers , but in Delano’s narrow-minded world, only the white man is capable of conceiving plans of ‘evil’. And when he – and the reader too – finally sees “the mask torn away, flourishing hatchets and knives, in ferocious piratical revolt”, he is embarrassed and “with infinite pity he [withdraws] his hold from Don Benito” . From this moment on, Babo is a malign devil and Melville removes speech from Babo’s mouth. This strengthen our opinion of Babo as ‘evil’ even more, for how can we sympathise with him without hearing his version of the story? Apparently, Melville proposes no other alternative for the reader than to sympathise with the white slave owner Don Benito, whom Babo so ingeniously deceives.
Aristotle is undoubtedly a great philosopher whose contributions in many fields, including rhetoric, constitute a foundation of our modern education and research. However, many scholars suggested that his theory was an evolution of a preliminary sophistic rhetoric that developed through the years by a group of travelling teachers who formed this art and played a major role in reinforcing democracy in Greece.
The subject-matter that I would like to discuss today is a sample of how these commentators can still contribute to understand Aristotle. I would like to warn, however, that the theme of the indefinite terms is especially illustrative of what I indicate, for the modern comments on this topic have been made without a profounder consideration of the ancient teaching. In my opinion, however, a more reliable and complete explanation about this difficult subject is to be found in the analysis of the ancient view.
Divorce has become an unquestionable remedy for the miserably married. Currently, the United States has the highest divorce rate in the world. Every year in the US approximately one million children experience divorce which, is about one in every three children (Amato 21). The effects of divorce can be tremendously painful for both children and adults. Children of divorce are more likely to suffer from behavioral, social, academic, and psychological problems than children raised in two-parent families.
After his death, Aristotle's words were perpetuated at the Perpatetic school by his loyal followers. Unfortunatley many of his ideas disappeared in Western philosophy between 500 and 1000 A.D., but were preserved by Arabic and Syrian scholars which reintroduced Aristotle to the Western world between. Since this time, his ideas have been extremely influential in Western rhetoric analysis.
Irvin, Andrew. "Bertand Russell." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. N.p., 18 Oct 2013. Web. 22 Mar 2014. .
Aristotle’s strong belief in logic led his argument in the principle of reasoning and the theory of knowledge. Aristotle believed that humans were born with a blank slate, having minds with no knowledge about anything. He was certain that knowledge is a process that it is acquired over an extended period of time and is not something that humans are born with or can achieve instantaneously. He viewed the human body as a knowledge-seeking tool purposefully made to aid in learning. Aristotle was the forefather in naturalist philosophy; he believed that knowledge was acquired through observation and interaction. He believed in acquiring knowledge through our senses, which is called perception. After perception, one must then be able to retain that knowledge through memory. One must experience those perceptions for oneself in conjunction with memory, the result of which is knowledge. To Aristotle, knowledge was having the ability to understand the essence and universal form of things. Aristotle wanted a way to protect against critics doubt...
Aristotle’s works were modern for the time. He had distinguished dolphins and whales from fish, created a classification system quite similar to the one in place today, and formed many astronomical ideas, which were not far from the truth. It should also be noted that in medieval times, he gained a great many followers after some of his preserved works were found, and the disciples of the late philosopher generally believed his works as absolute truth.
Many of Aristotle’s teachings have shown remarkable insight into the human mind, especially considering the time in which he lived. Just as some of his teachings on physics were held as true for nearly 2000 years, many of his teachings on the human mind were well ahead of his time. His method of study and experimentation, followed by logical deduction are the basis for all sciences now, something which was completely new when he wrote of this approach.
...senses are all we got. While Aristotle falls into the absolute trap by arguing that his method is the only way to acquire knowledge, I do not fall into this trap because I argue if there was knowledge attainable to us at this time, then it appears Aristotle’s method for acquiring knowledge is most valid, despite it still having some problems particularly concerning first principles. The reason I think Aristotle’s is the most valid is because of his use of the senses. Aristotle does not come up with some distinct reality when trying to explain the world, rather he observes it through his senses and goes from there when trying to determining the cause of something. This falls in nicely with prryhonist skepticism who still adhere to the senses. I do not have to take Aristotle’s argument as some absolute truth, but rather as a guide for making decisions in my own life.
Aristotle made contributions to logic, physics, biology, medicine, and agriculture. He redesigned most, if not all, areas of knowledge he studied. Later in life he became the “Father of logic” and was the first to develop a formalized way of reasoning. Aristotle was a greek philosopher who founded formal logic, pioneered zoology, founded his own school, and classified the various branches of philosophy.
Somebody who studies mathematical logic and gives his or her own concepts about it is called a logician. Some well known logicians include Boole and Frege. They were trying to give a definite form to what formal deduction really was. Aristotle had already done such a thing but he had done it with language, Boole wanted to do it with only Symbols. Frege came up with “Predicate Calculus”.
In the area of mathematics, it has been stated that Aristotle “is the real father of logic” (Thompson, 1975, p. 7) and although it may be a minor exaggeration, it is not far off the truth. Aristotle’s ideas on philosophy and logic were great advancers in Western culture, and are still being discussed and taught today. The ancient Greeks focused their mathematics on many areas, but one main question continuously asked by the Greeks was “what are good arguments?” (Marke & Mycielski, 2001, pg. 449). This question brought about the study of logic. Aristotle’s philosophy on the importance of logic was unique for his time as he believed that logic had to be considered in all disciplines, and that the aim of logic was to provide a system that allowed one to “investigate, classify, and evaluate good and bad forms of reasoning” (Groarke). Aristotle studied and contributed to various disciplines including philosophy, science, and astronomy, but his greatest influence was in the study of mathematical logic and more specifically, the introduction of syllogism. As Ulrich (1953) states, “any discussion of syllogism necessarily involves logic as it is the field that the syllogism plays a very important role” (p. 311). Aristotle’s ideas surrounding logic and syllogism are still being used in mathematics today, and over the course of history they have influenced many mathematicians’ areas of study.
Thousands of years ago calculations were done using people’s fingers and pebbles that were found just lying around. Technology has transformed so much that today the most complicated computations are done within seconds. Human dependency on computers is increasing everyday. Just think how hard it would be to live a week without a computer. We owe the advancements of computers and other such electronic devices to the intelligence of men of the past.
It was pure joy to learn how the Boolean logic makes computers work. In my undergraduate study I had taken up courses on Software Engineering, Computer Networks, Data Structures, JAVA, Operating Systems, Computer Graphics, Design and Analysis of Algorithms, Database Management, Web Technology and Mobile Application Development. Practical application aspects were introduced to me through laboratories correspond...