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No Syllogisms for the Numerical Syllogistic

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Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNPSE,volume 5533))

Abstract

The numerical syllogistic is the extension of the traditional syllogistic with numerical quantifiers of the forms at least C and at most C. It is known that, for the traditional syllogistic, a finite collection of rules, similar in spirit to the classical syllogisms, constitutes a sound and complete proof-system. The question arises as to whether such a proof system exists for the numerical syllogistic. This paper answers that question in the negative: no finite collection of syllogism-like rules, broadly conceived, is sound and complete for the numerical syllogistic.

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Pratt-Hartmann, I. (2009). No Syllogisms for the Numerical Syllogistic. In: Grumberg, O., Kaminski, M., Katz, S., Wintner, S. (eds) Languages: From Formal to Natural. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 5533. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-01748-3_13

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-01748-3_13

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-01747-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-01748-3

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