A New Addition to the Suggested Reads Page
Being Logical: A Guide to Good Thinking
by D.Q. McInerny
I have yet to finish this one, but it is interesting and readable and does not resort to the pages of problems and strings of symbols that are typical of textbooks.] I took 2 courses in logic in college, Introductory Logic and Symbolic Logic, around 2006-2007. It is not an exaggeration to say that they changed my life and helped me resolve some thorny problems. The stuff we covered in Introductory could, I believe, easily and profitably be taught in middle school around the same time as algebra is introduced. It seems to me that logic is more broadly applicable to thinking through everyday problems and reaching a sound understanding of facts than is arithmetic. Yet, our educational system relegates it to the departments of Philosophy or Computer Science at the university level rather than alongside the 5 paragraph essay and x + y = 11.
From the publisher's blurb:
Elegant, pithy, and precise, Being Logical breaks logic down to its essentials through clear analysis, accessible examples, and focused insights. D. Q. McInerney covers the sources of illogical thinking, from naïve optimism to narrow-mindedness, before dissecting the various tactics—red herrings, diversions, and simplistic reasoning—the illogical use in place of effective reasoning.
An indispensable guide to using logic to advantage in everyday life, this is a concise, crisply readable book. Written explicitly for the layperson, McInerny's Being Logical promises to take its place beside Strunk and White's The Elements of Style as a classic of lucid, invaluable advice.
Praise for Being Logical
“Highly readable . . . D. Q. McInerny offers an introduction to symbolic logic in plain English, so you can finally be clear on what is deductive reasoning and what is inductive. And you'll see how deductive arguments are constructed.”
— Detroit Free Press
Cooper Dozier, 11/20/2022
