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Neuro-psychologist seeking advice on studying logic

Brian Leiter

Longtime reader Kyle Noll, an Associate Professor at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, writes about his interest in online opportunities for learning more about logic:

For background, I majored in philosophy and completed a couple of undergraduate courses in FOL and ZF set theory (by your old colleagues at UT in the early 2000s!). To refresh, I recently completed the online courses offered by BYU covering axiomatic systems, mathematical induction, and Godel’s theorems. I thoroughly enjoyed the format though the topic surveys were a bit brief.

I understand a number of “teach yourself” approaches exist, including the excellent texts from the Open Logic Project (we used forall x in one of the BYU courses). Aside from these, I was curious if your readers could recommend any other structured options for distance education, especially enrollment in online courses and/or auditing possibilities. It is unfortunately not possible to commit to (not to mention unlikely to qualify for) one of the rigorous full-time residential logic master’s programs in the US or Europe at this time.

Comments are open for any advice readers can offer Professor Noll, which I imagine will benefit other readers interested in studying more logic.

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4 responses to “Neuro-psychologist seeking advice on studying logic”

  1. lankos

    It may not be what Professor Noll is looking for — or maybe parts are appropriate — but for others Peter Smith of the University of Cambridge has put together a fantastic free guide to self-study in mathematical logic. It includes brief descriptions of topic areas in rough order of study/difficulty, and the guide plus an appendix and other notes have many dozens of book reviews.
    https://www.logicmatters.net/tyl/

    Reply
  2. Matthew H. Kramer

    The materials by Peter Smith are best if you’re looking for reading. If you’re instead (or additionally) looking for recorded lectures, there is a very good series of lectures by Greg Restall on YouTube that would be suitable for someone with your background in logic :

    https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvROQ_RldgC8KYmkQsF_zKqAXD_Xphr9n

    I don’t know of ongoing courses in which you could enroll remotely.

    Reply
  3. Keith Douglas

    With the proviso that I’m no longer in the field and that it is a book, not a course or self-study materials: a neuropsychologist might find Stenning and Van Lambalgen’s _Human Reasoning and Cognitive Science_ interesting. You’ll want to pick up a text on so-called “default logic” – which I sadly cannot offer a recommendation for – to complement this work, IMO. (When I encountered DL in the MS in logic at CMU it was presented merely on the blackboard – it was a tiny unit in a survey course.) It argues that classical logic is not the *normatively correct* form of reasoning for humans (giving a unique view on the Wason task) and explores this in the context of autism and other matters. My sister is a clinical psychologist (an adjacent field), and she tells me that she’s struggled with these matters in the contexts of (for example) the clinical approaches to delusions.

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  4. Kyle Noll

    Thanks for the helpful comments and to Prof Leiter for posting. I will certainly review these resources and am intrigued by the Stenning and Van Lambalgen book. I have definitely used plenty of card selection tests in my daily work and am interested in related reasoning models. Much appreciated!

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