Accuracy in Aristotle’s philosophy of logic

It is not an exaggeration to say that #aristotle (384-322 BC) made modern civilisation possible. He invented formal #logic at a time where most of humanity could neither read nor write. If it wasn’t for Aristotle’s contribution to #philosophy , we wouldn’t enjoy such a high standard of living nowadays. In his book “Prior Analytics,” Aristotle outlined the method for drawing correct conclusions; his method is called syllogism or syllogistic reasoning. A syllogism is a sequence of thoughts, ideas or statements that lead to an inescapable conclusion. Human intelligence can employ #syllogisms (animals cannot, even the most intelligent) and, through programming, computers imitate what humans do naturally. Syllogisms typically consist of three elements. In Aristotle’s works, the first element is called “major premise” because it is making a wide statement. For instance, “cats are carnivorous.” The second element is called “minor premise” because it’s making a narrower statement. For example, “my pet is a cat.” I draw your attention to the fact that major and minor premises must share a common feature that enables a conclusion. In our example, the conclusion is “my pet is carnivorous.” I can imitate Aristotle’s style and place the word “therefore” at the beginning: “Therefore, my pet is carnivorous.” When a syllogism is based on permanent characteristics, it’s called “categorical syllogism.” For instance, the major premise “all horses have four legs” and the minor premise “my pet is a horse,” lead to the categorical outcome “my pet has four legs.” Syllogisms can also employ hypothetical premises. Let’s use the example, “when the weather is cold, there are fewer people on the beach” as a major premise. The minor premise “today is a cold day,” leads to the outcome “today, there are fewer people on the beach.” Modern philosophers have criticised Aristotelian syllogisms because of their #rigidity , but that’s precisely their key strength. Here is the link to the original article: https://johnvespasian.com/accuracy-in-aristotles-philosophy-of-logic/