Method of Logical Reasoning for Paper 1 Unit VI (Logical Reasoning) as Per New 2023 Syllabus

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Logical Reasoning

  • Logical reasoning (or just “logic” for short) is one of the fundamental skills of effective thinking. It works by raising questions like:

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  • If this is true, what else must be true?
  • If this is true, what else is probably true?
  • If this isn՚t true, what else can՚t be true?
  • These are all inferences: they՚re connections between a given sentence (the “premise” ) and some other sentence (the “conclusion” ) .Inferences are the basic building blocks of logical reasoning, and there are strict rules governing what counts as a valid inference and what doesn՚t — it՚s a lot like math, but applied to sentences rather than numbers.
    Illustration: Logical Reasoning
  • Example:
  • If there is someone at the door, the dog will bark.
  • Assuming this sentence holds true, there are some other sentences that must also be true.
  • If the dog didn՚t bark, there is no one at the door.
  • Just because the dog barked doesn՚t mean there՚s someone at the door.
  • There are also a few sentences that are probably true, such as:
  • The dog can sense (hear or smell) when someone is at the door.
  • The dog belongs to the people who live in the house where the door is located.
  • A logical reasoning test is a type of aptitude test that is widely used by corporate employers to help assess candidates during their recruitment process. Logical reasoning aptitude tests are designed to measure your ability to draw logical conclusions based on statements or arguments, and to identify the strengths and weaknesses of those arguments.
  • These tests are designed to assess your logical reasoning ability using the information provided. A logical reasoning test is a fundamental part of any assessment. Below follows an overview of the most commonly used logical reasoning tests:

Importance of Logical Reasoning

  • Logic is a universal part of the human experience — agriculture would be impossible without inductive reasoning about weather and sunlight, and construction would be impossible without mathematics and deductive reasoning about what makes a structure sturdy.
  • Formalized logic has appeared in several places with more or less similar results. The Greek philosopher Aristotle is credited with being the first to develop a formal system of logical reasoning, but there were already people in India and China working on formal logic long before Aristotle was born. The Indian, Chinese, and Greek systems were all remarkably similar in their rules, which suggests that there may have been some mutual influence despite the distance. Traders and travelling scholars may have brought ideas about logical reasoning with them all over the world, allowing for rapid development of new ideas.
  • Logic may seem like a stuffy, abstract discipline used only by philosophers and lawyers, but it has had a profound influence on the history of science and technology as well. Alan Turing, the inventor of the modern computer, was a logician rather than a tinkerer or engineer, and his famous “Turing Machine” was a product of his rigorous training in formal logical reasoning.

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Formal and Informal Logic Reasoning

  • Next to these 3 types of logical reasoning it is also possible to make a difference between formal reasoning and informal reasoning. Formal reasoning is a type of logical reasoning based on valid premises and therefore valid conclusions, thus it is a form of deductive reasoning. It provides no new information, but only rearranges known information to a new conclusion.
  • Next to formal reasoning we also have informal reasoning. This form of logical reasoning possesses all the elements of formal reasoning, like the deduction part, however it also includes probabilities and truths about premises and conclusions. It can be said that informal reasoning is related to abductive reasoning, one of the other three types of logical reasoning explained above
  • Combining these two forms of logical reasoning together with the three different types results in the following distinguish in logical reasoning:
    • Deductive
    • Formal deductive reasoning
    • Informal deductive reasoning
    • Inductive
    • Formal inductive reasoning
    • Informal inductive reasoning
    • Abductive
    • Formal abductive reasoning
    • Informal abductive reasoning

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