The Logic Book

No party can govern effectively without majority support.
When there is only one political party, dissenting views are neither
presented nor contested.
When there are two or more viable parties, dissenting views are
presented and contested.
Only the two party system is compatible both with effective
governance and with the presenting and contesting of dissenting
views.
Section 1.4E
1.a. False. Many valid arguments have one or more false premise. Here
is an example with two false premises:
All Doberman pinschers are friendly creatures.
All friendly creatures are dogs.
All Doberman pinschers are dogs.
c. True. By definition, a sound argument is a valid argument with true
premises.
e. False. A valid argument all of whose premises are true cannot have
a false conclusion. But if a valid argument has at least one false premises, it
may well have a false conclusion. Here is an example:
Reptiles are mammals.
If reptiles are mammals, then reptiles are warm blooded.
Reptiles are warm blooded.
SOLUTIONS TO SELECTED EXERCISES ON PP. 1012, 1617
g. False. An argument may have true premises and a true conclusion

and not be valid. Here is an example:
Chicago is in Illinois.
Madrid is in Spain.
i. False. A sound argument is, by definition, a valid argument with true
premises. And every valid argument with true premises has a true conclusion.
Section 1.5E
1.a. This passage is best construed as a deductive argument with some
unexpressed or assumed premises. These premises include: Mike is skiing
somewhere other than the office. No one can be in Spokane, or Olympia, or
Seattle and in the office in question. With these premises added, the argument
is deductively valid. Without them, it is deductively invalid.
c. As noted in the answers to exercises 1.3.2E, the passage in question
expresses no plausible argument. Construed as a deductive argument it is
deductively invalid (no matter which claim is taken as the conclusion). Construed as an inductive argument it is inductively weak, again no matter which
claim is taken as the conclusion.
e. Same answer as c. above.
g. This passage can be construed as an argument (see answers to
1.3.2.E). So construed it is deductively invalid but inductively plausible.
i. This passage can be construed as a deductive argument with suppressed or assumed premises. The missing premises can be expressed as: All
systems are not so compatible.

Section 1.6E
1.a. {Kansas City is in Missouri, St. Paul is in Minnesota, San Francisco
is in California}
c. There is no such set. If all the members of a set are true, then it
is clearly possible for all those members to be true, and the set is therefore
consistent.
2.a. All the members of this set are true (The Dodgers have not been
in Brooklyn for almost half a century. Here, in the Northwest, good vegetables
are hard to find. And today, the day this answer is written, is hotter than yesterday.) Since all the members are true, it is clearly possible for all the members to be true. Therefore, the set is consistent.
c. All three members of this set are true, so the set is consistent.
e. It is possible for all four members of this set to be true. Imagine
yourself driving home on a Monday afternoon with a nearly empty gas tank.
g. The set is inconsistent. If no one who fails Poetry for Scientists
is bright and Tom failed that course, it follows that Tom is not bright. So, for
every member of the set to be true Tom would have to both be bright (as
Tom, Sue, and Robin are all bright alleges), and not be bright. This is not
possible.
i. This set is inconsistent. If Kennedy was the best President we ever
had, it cannot be that Eisenhower was a better President than Kennedy, and
vice-versa. So not all the members of the set can be true.
k. This set is consistent. What is being claimed is that everyone who likes
film classics likes Casablanca, not that everyone who likes Casablanca likes all film
classics. So, it is possible for Sarah to like Casablanca without liking (all) film
classics. Similarly, Sarah can like Casablanca without liking Humphrey Bogart.
3.a. Que ser, ser is a logically true sentence (of Spanish). It means
Whatever will be, will be. This sentence, taken literally, is logically true.
(Were it not, there would have to be something that will be and will not be,
an impossibility.)
c. Eisenhower preceded Kennedy as President is true and is logically
indeterminate. It is true because of facts about the American political system
and how the voters voted in 1956 and 1960, not because of any principles of
logic.
SOLUTIONS TO SELECTED EXERCISES ON PP. 18, 2224
4.a. Logically indeterminate. Passing the bar exam does not involve, as
a matter of logic, having gone to law school. Lincoln passed the bar examination but never went to law school.
c. Logically false. An MD is a Doctor of Medicine, so every MD is a
doctor.
e. Logically true. Whoever Robin is and whatever the class is, she
either will, or will not, make it to the class by starting time.
g. Logically false. If Bob knows everyone in the class, and Robin is in
the class, it follows that he knows Robin, so if the first part of this claim is true,
the last part, which claims Bob doesnt know Robin, must be false.
i. Logically true. Since ocean fish are a kind of fish, it follows from
Sarah likes all kinds of fish that she likes ocean fish.
k. Logically indeterminate. This claim is almost certainly true, given
the very large number of people there are, but it is not a logical truth. If all
but a handful of people were killed, then one of the survivors might love everyone, including him or herself, and not be lacking in discrimination.
5.a. No one will win.
There will be no winner.
c. Not possible. If one sentence is logically true and the other is logically indeterminate, then it is possible for the second sentence to be false and
the former true (the former is always true), and hence the sentences are not
logically equivalent.
e. Any pair of logically true sentences will satisfy this condition, for
example A square has four sides and A mother has a child (living or dead).
Neither sentence can be false, so it is impossible that one is true and the other
false.
6.a. These sentences are not logically equivalent. It can, and does, happen that a person loves someone who does not return that love.
c. These sentences are not logically equivalent. What one claims to be
the case is not always actually the case. Tom may want to impress his new boss,
a gourmet cook, but refuse to indulge when presented with a plate of raw
shark.
e. These sentences are not logically equivalent. If the first is true, then
both Bill and Mary will fail to get into law school. The second sentence makes
a weaker claim, that one or the other will not get into law school. It, unlike
the first sentence, will be true if Mary gets into law school but Bill does not.
g. These sentences are not logically equivalent. If the first is true, then
there are no non-Mariner fans at the rally, but it does not follow that all the
Mariner fans are there. And if the second is true, it does not follow that no
non-Mariner fans are present.
i. These sentences are not logically equivalent. There is often a difference between what is reported and what is the case. If a strike is imminent
but no newscast so reports, the second of the sentences is true but the first
false. So too, newcasts, even taken collectively, often get it wrong, as when all
6 SOLUTIONS TO SELECTED EXERCISES ON PP. 2224
news outlets reported that Dewey won the presidential election in 1948 when
in fact Truman won that election.
k. These sentences are not logically equivalent. If the first is true,
then at least one of the two, Sarah and Anna, will not be elected, and perhaps
neither will be elected. That is, this sentence will be true if neither is elected.
But in that case the second sentence, which claims that one or the other will
be elected, will be false.
m. These sentences are not logically equivalent. The first may well be
true (each of us can probably name at least one person we dislike). Given the
truth of the first sentence, the second sentence may still be false, for we may
each dislike different persons, and there may be no one universally disliked
person.
o. These sentences are not logically equivalent. It is plausible that each
of us does like at least one person, but it does not follow that there is someone we all like.
Section 1.7E
1.a. True. If a member of a set of sentences is logically false, then that
member cannot be true, and hence it cannot be that all the members are true.
So the set is logically inconsistent.
c. True. Sentences that are logically equivalent cannot have different
truth-values. So if all the premises of an argument are true, and one of those
premises is equivalent to the conclusion, then the conclusion must also be
true. Hence, that argument cannot have true premises and a false conclusion.
It is, therefore, deductively valid.
e. True. Whatever will be, will be is logically true. Therefore, any
argument that has it as a conclusion cannot have a false conclusion, and,

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What is the definition of a sound argument according to the text?

No party can govern effectively without majority support.

SOLUTIONS TO SELECTED EXERCISES ON PP. 1012, 1617

g. False. An argument may have true premises and a true conclusion

systems are not so compatible.

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