Dr. Wesley Wrigley

This course is available on the MSc in Economics and Philosophy, MSc in Philosophy of Science and MSc in Philosophy of the Social Sciences. This course is available as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit.

Students taking this course should already have taken a year-long introductory course in logic in a Philosophy Department, or a mathematical course that covers the basics of logic. If in doubt whether you satisfy this prerequisite, consult the Teacher Responsible.

The course begins with taking a look at the big picture: the main problems and milestones of modern logic. Then, after a quick review of classical propositional and first-order predicate logic, the course delves into the central meta-theorems about classical logic (such as the soundness and completeness theorems). This will lead the way to an outline of the famous limitative results that have philosophical ramifications: Godel's  incompleteness theorems and Tarski's undefinability theorem. The course also covers extensions of and alternatives to classical logic, namely modal logics,  logics of counterfactual conditionals and intuitionistic logic.

15 hours of lectures and 15 hours of seminars in the WT.

10 x 1.5 hours of lectures and 10 x 1.5 hours of seminars in the Winter Term. 

Students are required to submit solutions to two problem-sets, and write one essay on a topic selected from a list or proposed by the student and approved by the instructor in the Winter Term.

• Sider, Theodore: Logic for Philosophy (Oxford University Press, 2010).
• Cameron, Peter J. 1999. Sets, Logic and Categories. Springer undergraduate mathematics series. London, Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer.
• Curry, H.B. 1963. Foundations of Mathematical Logic. New York: McGraw-Hill.
• P. Smith. Godel without (too many) tears. 2016. available online.

Specific sections of these texts that are relevant to weekly topics will be indicated in the detailed course description and in the Moodle page of the course.

Exam (100%, duration: 2 hours).

The exam questions are chosen from a list of questions that are made available at the beginning of the academic year ("seen exam").