Although we grant the truth or falsity of propositions about past and present events, propositions
about the future seem problematic. If a proposition about tomorrow is true or false today, then the future
event it describes will happen or not happen necessarily; but if such a proposition is neither true nor false,
then there is no future at all. Aristotle’s solution was to maintain that the disjunction is necessarily true
today even though neither of its disjuncts is. Thus, it is necessary that either tomorrow’s event will occur
or it will not, but it is neither necessary that it will occur nor necessary that it will not occur.
A categorical statement expresses how two sets of things relate to each other. For example, the
statement “All ravens are black birds” tell us that every member of the set ravens is also a member of the
and Predicate Term
The subject term and the predicate term stand for the two sets whose logical relation is
characterized by the statement.
something different from the things’ supposed results of necessity because these things are so.”
observations.
A categorical syllogism consists of three parts: the major premise, the minor premise and the conclusion.
The 19th century was a period when change — progressive change, in particular — was
becoming an important expectation. Perhaps surprisingly to the minds of people of the late 20th century,
The Term Paper on Personal Statement 36
Many graduate school programs, scholarship and internship applications request candidates to write a personal essay. Specific questions may be provided for you to answer, or in some cases you will have the freedom to write about the topic of your choice. The personal essay serves as a writing sample and a chance to present yourself as an individual. It should be something that only you could have ...
this was a rather new development in cultural expectation.
If we take the beginning of the 19th century as a kind of benchmark, we can say that the broad
view of the natural world was largely influenced by a couple of Greek philosophersThe Greek
philosophers were Plato and Aristotle.
To Aristotle we can attribute the basis for an idea often called “The Great Chain of Being.” Other
kind of classification, or taxonomy. Aristotle was attempting to make sense of the relationships among
living things.
His idea was that all species could be placed in order, from the “lowest” to the “highest,” with
worms on the bottom and you-know-who on the top. In Aristotle’s view, the universe was ultimately
perfect, and that meant that the Great Chain was also perfect. That meant that there were no empty links
in the chain, and no link was represented by more than one species.
This basic concept highly influenced the thinking of centuries of Western civilization. In fact,
some say it still holds a powerful influence over our thinking today. One of the great cultural changes
over that century was the movement away from this restriction in thinking toward a more dynamic view
of the natural world.
