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Can you recommend a textbook on logic?

harrharr
in Research & Reading

I'd like to brush up on some basic thinking skills. Can anyone recommend a textbook on logic, that does not require a STEM background?

It should:

  • be written for undergraduate college students with majors like law, politics, history or philosophy
  • cover all the basics of logic that would be helpful for students who needs to analyze argumentations in complex or ambiguous texts,
  • contain many examples,
  • contain many exercises for self-testing,
  • be written by a reputable author,
  • be supported by reputable references.

Topics should include:

  • deduction and induction
  • truth value
  • propositional logic
  • soundness and validity of arguments
  • correct and erroneous use of syllogisms
  • fallacies like false dichotomy, equivocation or faulty generalization
  • rules and fallacies of definition, stipulative and lexical definition
  • how to deal with vagueness, ambiguity and probability

My favorite bot recommends:

  • Concise Introduction to Logic by Patrick J. Hurley. (goodreads)
  • A Concise Introduction to Logic by Craig DeLancey. (open library)

What are your experiences? What textbooks did you read and find helpful? What textbook would you recommend?

Comments

  • SaschaSascha

    Deductive Reasoning: Einführung in die Logik by Ansgar Beckermann.
    Inductive Reasoning: An Introduction to Probability and Inductive Logic.

    This is the foundational starter kit imho.

    I am a Zettler

  • wjenkins81wjenkins81
    edited 11:56AM

    @harr said:
    My favorite bot recommends:

    • Concise Introduction to Logic by Patrick J. Hurley. (goodreads)
    • A Concise Introduction to Logic by Craig DeLancey. (open library)

    What are your experiences? What textbooks did you read and find helpful? What textbook would you recommend?

    I'd also like to find something good. I just checked Patrick Hurley's Concise Introduction to Logic and it's over 600 pages, so Introduction in the name has some irony. But I notice that a lot in books calling themselves introductory, they are often 500 to 700 pages, and books calling themselves comprehensive or mastering are about 200 to 300 pages. At first I found that annoying, and now I just find it funny.

    I think someone would have to set aside a lot of time for Hurley's book as a special project.

    At 322 pages, the Ian Hacking book that Sascha recommended (Inductive Reasoning: An Introduction to Probability and Inductive Logic) is a good start. There is some maths in it though, but it'll be hard to find a good logic book without any maths.

    I think what you're describing leans more towards rational/critical thinking as opposed to pure logic. So perhaps searching for rational/critical thinking instead might help with your search results.

  • tomptomp

    @wjenkins81 said:

    @harr said:

    I think what you're describing leans more towards rational/critical thinking as opposed to pure logic. So perhaps searching for rational/critical thinking instead might help with your search results.

    I agree. Here's the Merriam-Webster Online's first entry for "logic":

    a(1)
    : a science that deals with the principles and criteria of validity of inference and demonstration
    : the science of the formal principles of reasoning

    I personally don't think those two are quite equivalent, but maybe that's just me.

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