- published: 22 Nov 2013
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Logic (from the Greek λογική logikē) is the philosophical study of valid reasoning. Logic is used in most intellectual activities, but is studied primarily in the disciplines of philosophy, mathematics, semantics, and computer science. It examines general forms that arguments may take, which forms are valid, and which are fallacies. In philosophy, the study of logic is applied in most major areas: metaphysics, ontology, epistemology, and ethics. In mathematics, it is the study of valid inferences within some formal language. Logic is also studied in argumentation theory.
Logic was studied in several ancient civilizations, including India,China, and Greece. In the West, logic was established as a formal discipline by Aristotle, who gave it a fundamental place in philosophy. The study of logic was part of the classical trivium, which also included grammar and rhetoric.
Logic is often divided into three parts, inductive reasoning, abductive reasoning, and deductive reasoning.
The concept of logical form is central to logic, it being held that the validity of an argument is determined by its logical form, not by its content. Traditional Aristotelian syllogistic logic and modern symbolic logic are examples of formal logics.