A Defence of Information Closure

2019 ◽  
pp. 149-161
Author(s):  
Luciano Floridi

In this chapter, the principle of information closure (PIC) is defined and defended against a sceptical objection similar to the one discussed by Dretske in relation to the principle of epistemic closure. If successful, given that PIC is equivalent to the axiom of distribution and that the latter is one of the conditions that discriminate between normal and non-normal modal logics, one potentially good reason to look for a formalization of the logic of ‘S is informed that p’ among the non-normal modal logics, which reject the axiom, is also removed. This is not to argue that the logic of ‘S is informed that p’ should be a normal modal logic, but that it could still be, insofar as the objection that it could not be, based on the sceptical objection against PIC, has been removed. In other words, this chapter argues that the sceptical objection against PIC fails, so such an objection provides no ground to abandon the normal modal logic B (also known as KTB) as a formalization of ‘S is informed that p’, which remains plausible insofar as this specific obstacle is concerned.

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 416-435 ◽  
Author(s):  
SERGEI P. ODINTSOV ◽  
STANISLAV O. SPERANSKI

AbstractWe shall be concerned with the modal logic BK—which is based on the Belnap–Dunn four-valued matrix, and can be viewed as being obtained from the least normal modal logic K by adding ‘strong negation’. Though all four values ‘truth’, ‘falsity’, ‘neither’ and ‘both’ are employed in its Kripke semantics, only the first two are expressible as terms. We show that expanding the original language of BK to include constants for ‘neither’ or/and ‘both’ leads to quite unexpected results. To be more precise, adding one of these constants has the effect of eliminating the respective value at the level of BK-extensions. In particular, if one adds both of these, then the corresponding lattice of extensions turns out to be isomorphic to that of ordinary normal modal logics.


1999 ◽  
Vol 64 (1) ◽  
pp. 99-138 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcus Kracht ◽  
Frank Wolter

AbstractThis paper shows that non-normal modal logics can be simulated by certain polymodal normal logics and that polymodal normal logics can be simulated by monomodal (normal) logics. Many properties of logics are shown to be reflected and preserved by such simulations. As a consequence many old and new results in modal logic can be derived in a straightforward way, sheding new light on the power of normal monomodal logic.


2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 436-469 ◽  
Author(s):  
GURAM BEZHANISHVILI ◽  
NICK BEZHANISHVILI ◽  
JULIA ILIN

AbstractStable logics are modal logics characterized by a class of frames closed under relation preserving images. These logics admit all filtrations. Since many basic modal systems such as K4 and S4 are not stable, we introduce the more general concept of an M-stable logic, where M is an arbitrary normal modal logic that admits some filtration. Of course, M can be chosen to be K4 or S4. We give several characterizations of M-stable logics. We prove that there are continuum many S4-stable logics and continuum many K4-stable logics between K4 and S4. We axiomatize K4-stable and S4-stable logics by means of stable formulas and discuss the connection between S4-stable logics and stable superintuitionistic logics. We conclude the article with many examples (and nonexamples) of stable, K4-stable, and S4-stable logics and provide their axiomatization in terms of stable rules and formulas.


Author(s):  
Vladimir O. Lobovikov

The paper aims at coping with the difficult problem of rationally uniting astonishingly huge amount of qualitatively different modal logics. For realizing this aim artificial languages of symbolic logic and the axiomatic methodology are used. Therefore, the method of constructing and studying formal logic inferences within the axiom system under investigation is exploited systematically. Inventing and elaborating a hitherto not-considered axiomatic system of epistemology uniting normal and not-normal modal logics is the new nontrivial scientific result of this work. History of philosophy and systematical philosophy, formal ethics and formal aesthetics, philosophical epistemology and analytical theology, philosophy of law and philosophy of science are among the important fields of application of the nontrivial abstract-theoretic principles demonstrated in this paper. Using the above-indicated machinery the author has arrived to the following main conclusion: the famous philosophical principles of utilitarianism, hedonism, optimism, pragmatism, fideism, falsifiability, verifiability, “Hume’s Guillotine”, “naturalistic fallacies” et al have not absolutely indefinite (unlimited) but quite definite (limited) sphere of relevant applicability; the precise formal definition of the border-line of mentioned sphere of relevance is the axiomatic one submitted and discussed in the paper. This general conclusion is instantiated in the text by several particular conclusions concerning explication and clarification of specific philosophical ideas and principles, for example, the one of kalokagathia. The author concludes that constructing and investigating the axiomatic systems of universal philosophical epistemology is indispensable for adequate representing human knowledge in artificial intellectual systems, for instance, in autonomous AI‑robots


2018 ◽  
Vol 27 (5) ◽  
pp. 639-658 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philippe Balbiani

Abstract The problem of unification in a normal modal logic $L$ can be defined as follows: given a formula $\varphi$, determine whether there exists a substitution $\sigma$ such that $\sigma (\varphi )$ is in $L$. In this paper, we prove that for several non-symmetric non-transitive modal logics, there exists unifiable formulas that possess no minimal complete set of unifiers.


Axioms ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 128
Author(s):  
Lorenz Demey

Aristotelian diagrams, such as the square of opposition, are well-known in the context of normal modal logics (i.e., systems of modal logic which can be given a relational semantics in terms of Kripke models). This paper studies Aristotelian diagrams for non-normal systems of modal logic (based on neighborhood semantics, a topologically inspired generalization of relational semantics). In particular, we investigate the phenomenon of logic-sensitivity of Aristotelian diagrams. We distinguish between four different types of logic-sensitivity, viz. with respect to (i) Aristotelian families, (ii) logical equivalence of formulas, (iii) contingency of formulas, and (iv) Boolean subfamilies of a given Aristotelian family. We provide concrete examples of Aristotelian diagrams that illustrate these four types of logic-sensitivity in the realm of normal modal logic. Next, we discuss more subtle examples of Aristotelian diagrams, which are not sensitive with respect to normal modal logics, but which nevertheless turn out to be highly logic-sensitive once we turn to non-normal systems of modal logic.


1983 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 941-964 ◽  
Author(s):  
W.J. Blok ◽  
P. Köhler

A well-known result, going back to the twenties, states that, under some reasonable assumptions, any logic can be characterized as the set of formulas satisfied by a matrix 〈, F〉, where is an algebra of the appropriate type, and F a subset of the domain of , called the set of designated elements. In particular, every quasi-classical modal logic—a set of modal formulas, containing the smallest classical modal logic E, which is closed under the inference rules of substitution and modus ponens—is characterized by such a matrix, where now is a modal algebra, and F is a filter of . If the modal logic is in fact normal, then we can do away with the filter; we can study normal modal logics in the setting of varieties of modal algebras. This point of view was adopted already quite explicitly in McKinsey and Tarski [8]. The observation that the lattice of normal modal logics is dually isomorphic to the lattice of subvarieties of a variety of modal algebras paved the road for an algebraic study of normal modal logics. The algebraic approach made available some general results from Universal Algebra, notably those obtained by Jónsson [6], and thereby was able to contribute new insights in the realm of normal modal logics [2], [3], [4], [10].The requirement that a modal logic be normal is rather a severe one, however, and many of the systems which have been considered in the literature do not meet it. For instance, of the five celebrated modal systems, S1–S5, introduced by Lewis, S4 and S5 are the only normal ones, while only SI fails to be quasi-classical. The purpose of this paper is to generalize the algebraic approach so as to be applicable not just to normal modal logics, but to quasi-classical modal logics in general.


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (63) ◽  
pp. 419-430
Author(s):  
Luigi Pavone

This paper is in the scope of the philosophy of modal logic; more precisely, it concerns the semantics of modal logic, when the modal elements are interpreted as logical modalities. Most authors have thought that the logic for logical modality—that is, the one to be used to formalize the notion of logical truth (and other related notions)—is to be found among logical systems in which modalities are allowed to be iterated. This has raised the problem of the adequacy, to that formalization purpose, of some modal schemes, such as S4 and S5 . It has been argued that the acceptance of S5 leads to non-normal modal systems, in which the uniform substitution rule fails. The thesis supported in this paper is that such a failure is rather to be attributed to what will be called “Condition of internalization.” If this is correct, there seems to be no normal modal logic system capable of formalizing logical modality, even when S5 is rejected in favor of a weaker system such as S4, as recently proposed by McKeon.


10.29007/jsb9 ◽  
2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tobias Gleißner ◽  
Alexander Steen ◽  
Christoph Benzmüller

We present a procedure for algorithmically embedding problems formulated in higher- order modal logic into classical higher-order logic. The procedure was implemented as a stand-alone tool and can be used as a preprocessor for turning TPTP THF-compliant the- orem provers into provers for various modal logics. The choice of the concrete modal logic is thereby specified within the problem as a meta-logical statement. This specification for- mat as well as the underlying semantics parameters are discussed, and the implementation and the operation of the tool are outlined.By combining our tool with one or more THF-compliant theorem provers we accomplish the most widely applicable modal logic theorem prover available to date, i.e. no other available prover covers more variants of propositional and quantified modal logics. Despite this generality, our approach remains competitive, at least for quantified modal logics, as our experiments demonstrate.


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