Richard A. Burbank

Three Term Logic: Beyond the Limits of True and False Richard A. Burbank

Mainstream logic is based on assumptions of determination. Truth-values of well-formed logical sentences are determinately true or false - two values that constitute a jointly exhaustive and mutually exclusive pair. However, everyday experiences often result in conclusive statements which are neither true nor false. This book presents an alternative to the two-value thinking that dominates logic today. Starting from indefinite reference, a logic system is developed that explicitly accommodates our experience where meaningful assertions need not be either true or false. The cost of a new approach is increased complexity. To navigate through the complexity, this new logic system carefully steers through quantifiers, negations, and disjunctions often left ambiguous in traditional systems. Having a useful alternative to two term thinking, even at the expense of added complexity, is important for serious inquiries that fail to yield adequate conclusions with a traditional approach.