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Logical Reasoning A First Course Rob P. Nederpelt
Digital Instant Download
Author(s): Rob P. Nederpelt, Fairouz D. Kamareddine
ISBN(s): 9780954300678, 095430067X
Edition: Revised Edition, 2007
File Details: PDF, 80.72 MB
Year: 2004
Language: english
 Logical Reasoning
A First Course
Revised Edition

Rob Nederpelt
Technische Universiteit , Eindhoven, The Netherlands

Fairouz Kamareddine
Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, Scotland
Volume 1
Programming Languages and Semantics
Maribel Fernandez
Volume 2
An Introduction to Lambda Calculus for Computer Scientists
Chris Hankin
Volume 3
Logical Reasoning: A First Course
Rob Nederpelt and Fairouz Kamareddine
Volume 4
The Haskell Road to Logic, Maths and Programming
Kees Doets and Jan van Eijck
Volume 5
Bridges from Classical to Nonmonotonic Reasoning
David Makinson
Volume 6
Automata and Dictionaries
Denis Maurel and Franz Guenthner
Volume 7
Learn Prolog Now!
Patrick Blackburn, Johan Bos and Kristina Striegnitz
Volum 8 A Meeting of the Minds: Proceedings of the Workshop on Logic ,
Rationality and Interaction, Beijing, 2007
Johan van Benthem, Shier Ju and Frank Veltman, eds.
Texts in Computing Series Editor
lan Mackie ian.mackie@kcl .ac.uk
 ~

© Individual author and College Publications, 2004.

Revised edition, 2007.
All rights reserved.

ISBN 0-9543006-7 -X
College Publications
Scientific Director: Dov Gabbay
Managing Director: Jane Spurr
Department of Computer Science
King's College London
Strand, London WC2R 2LS, UK

Original cover design by Richard Fraser.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system
or transmitted, in any form , or by any means, electronic, mechanical , photocopying, recording or
otherwise, without prior permission , in writing, from the publisher.
Contents

I Logical Calculations 1

1 What is 'logic'? 3
1.1 Aristotle and his 'Organon' 3
1.2 Formal logic . 5
1.3 Exercises ...... 6

2 Abstract propositions 7
2.1 Propositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2.2 Abstract propositions and connectives 9
2.3 Recursive definitions of propositions 10
2.4 The structure of abstract propositions 12
2.5 Dropping parentheses 13
2.6 Exercises • • • • • 0 15

3 Truth tables 17
3.1 The conjunction P 1\ Q . 17
3.2 The disjunction P V Q 18
3.3 The negation ,p . . . . 20
3.4 The implication P =? Q 21
3.5 The hi-implication P {=} Q
,
22
3.6 Other notations . 24
3.7 Exercises ...... . . . 25

4 The Boolean behaviour of propositions 27

4.1 Truth-functions . . . . . . . . .. 27
4.2 Classes of equivalent propositions 30
4.3 Equivalency of propositions .. 32
4.4 Tautologies and contradictions 33
4.5 Exercises • 0 • • • • • • • • • • 36
vi CONTENTS

5 Standard equivalences 39
5.1 Commutativity, associativity . . . . . . 39
5.2 Intermezzo: =} and {=} as meta-symbols 41
5.3 Idempotence, double negation . 43
5.4 Rules with True and False 44
5.5 Distributivity, De Morgan 46
5.6 Rules with =} 47
5. 7 Rules with {=} 48
5.8 Exercises .. 49

6 Working with equivalent propositions 51

. properties
6.1 Bas1c . of =val . . . .
51
6.2 Substitution, Leibniz . . . . . 53
6.3 Calculations with equivalence 55
6.4 Equivalence in mathematics 57
6.5 Exercises . . . . . . . . . . 59

7 Strengthening and weakening of propositions 61

7.1 Stronger and weaker . . 61
7.2 Standard weakenings . . . . . 63
73
. B as1c ~
. o f r--
. properties 64
7.4 Calculations with weakening . 66
7.5 Exercises . . . . . . . . . 68

8 Predicates and quantifiers 71

8.1 Sorts of variables 71
8.2 Predicates . .. .. . . . . 72
8.3 Quantifiers . . . . . . . . 75
8.4 Quantifying many-place predicates 77
8.5 The structure of quantified formulas 79
8.6 Exercises . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

9 Standard equivalences with quantifiers 85

9.1 Equivalence of predicates . . . . 85
9.2 The renaming of bound variables 86
9.3 Domain splitting . . . . . . . 88
9.4 One- or zero-element domains 89
9.5 Domain weakening . . . . . . 91
9.6 De Morgan for \/ and 3 . . . . 92
9. 7 Substitution and Leibniz for quantifications 94
9.8 Other equivalences with \/ and 3 . . . . . . 95
coNTENTS vii

9.9 Tautologies and contradictions with quantifiers 98

9.10 Exercises .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . 101

10 Other binders of variables 103

10.1 Predicates versus abstract function values . 103
10.2 The set binder . . 104
10.3 The sum binder . . 107
10.4 The symbol # . 108
10.5 Scopes of binders . 109
10.6 Exercises . . . . . 110

II Logical Derivations 111

11 Reasoning 113
11.1 The strength and weakness of calculations . 113
11.2 'Calculating' against 'reasoning' . . 116
11.3 An example from mathematics . 117
11.4 Inference . . . . . . . . . 120
11.5 Hypotheses .. .. . . . 124
11.6 The use of hypotheses . 126
11. 7 Exercises . . . . . . . . 127

12 Reasoning with 1\ and =? 129

12.1 'Flags' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
12.2 Introduction and elimination rules . . . . . 130
12.3 The construction of an abstract reasoning . 136
12.4 The setting up of a reasoning . 142
12.5 Exercises . . . . . . . . . . . 144

13 The structure of the context 147

13.1 Validity . . .. . . 147
13.2 Nested contexts .
."" . 149
13.3 Other notations . . 150
13.4 Exercises . 153

14 Reasoning with other connectives 155

14.1 Reasoning with -, . . . . 155
14.2 Reasoning with False . . . . . 161
14.3 Reasoning with -,-, . .. . . . . 163
14.4 Reasoning ' by contradiction ' . . 164
14.5 Reasoning with V . . . . . . . . 166
Vlll CONTENTS

14.6 Case distinction . . . 172

14.7 Reasoning with {:} . 174
14.8 Exercises . . . . . . 175

15 Reasoning with quantifiers 177

15.1 Reasoning with V . . 177
15.2 Reasoning with 3 .
15.3 Alternatives for 3 .
15.4 Exercises • 0 •• 0
.
.
.
184
187
196 I
Iii

~
III Applications 199
16 Sets 201
16.1 Set construction . 201
16.2 Universal set and subset . 203
16.3 Equality of sets . . . . . 205
16.4 Intersection and union . 209
16.5 Complement . . . 211
16.6 Difference .. . . 213
16.7 The empty set . 218
16.8 Powerset . . . . . 222
16.9 Cartesian product . 225
16.10 Exercises . . . . . . "''• . 228

17 Relations 231
17.1 Relations between sets . 231
17.2 Relations on a set . . . . 234
17.3 Special relations on a set . . 235
17.4 Equivalence relations . . 238
17.5 Equivalence classes . . 242
17.6 Composing relations . 246
17.7 Equality of relations . 248
17.8 Exercises ...... . 249

18 Mappings 253
18.1 Mappings from one set to another . 253
18.2 The characteristics of a mapping . 257
18.3 Image and source . . . 258
18.4 Special mappings . . . 264
18.5 The inverse function . 272
18.6 Composite mappings . 274
CONTENTS ix

180 7 Equality of mappings 0 0 277

1808 Exercises 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 278

19 Numbers and structures 281

1901 Sorts of numbers 0 0 0 0 281
1902 The structure of the natural numbers 0 0 282
1903 Inductive proofs 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 285
19.4 Inductive definition of sets of numbers 0 291
1905 Strong induction 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 294
1906 Inductive definition of sets of formulas 0 299
1907 Structural induction . 302
1908 Cardinality 0 0 0 304
1909 Denumerability 0 306
19o10Uncountability 0 310
19 011 Exercises 0 315

20 Ordered sets 321

20 01 Quasi-ordering 0 321
2002 Orderings 0 0 0 0 323
20 03 Linear orderings 0 327
20.4 Lexicographic orderings 0 329
2005 Hasse diagrams 0 0 0 0 0 0 332
2006 Extreme elements 0 0 0 0 0 335
2007 Upper and lower bounds 0 338
2008 Well-ordering and well-foundedness 0 0 341
20 09 Exercises 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 344
To the reader

This book introduces you to logical reasoning and its applications. Logic and
logical reasoning have many roles in mathematics and computer science. In
particular, logic can be considered as a foundational science for mathematics
and computer science, but also, logic is a powerful application tool in these
areas. Interest in logic dates centuries back, yet logic has never lost its
influence and charm. In the twentieth century, research took new directions
and logic was used to settle questions related to what can be computed
and what cannot , to what machines can do , and to how efficiently these
machines can do things.
Today, modern logic is considered the basis for establishing correctness
of theories in mathematics, including (mathematical) proofs. Logic is also
an outstanding scientific tool for the development of correct computer pro-
grams.
The book describes the necessary elementary steps in logical reasoning.
The book is self-contained and presupposes no earlier knowledge from you
and only elementary competence in mathematics. The book can also be
followed when you do not specialize in mathematics, but for example in
computer science, while still allowing you to deepen your skills further when
you are a student of mathematics. Anything that is introduced, is explained
in detail. At the end of the book, you will have developed found
·; ,
ational skills
that will enable you to tackle more advanced books on logic and reasoning.
A list of further reading is given at the end of the book which enables you
to learn more about the topics you have selected as your favorites while
reading this book.
The book is divided into three parts. The first gives a general introduction
to logic and the methodology of logical calculations. The logical connectives
and quantifiers are introduced in detail one after another together with their
properties. The truth tables for connectives and the laws of calculation for
connectives and quantifiers are given together with a number of standard
equ ivalences. You can think of a step of a logical calculation to be merely a
xii TO THE READER

rewriting of the logical formula at hand with an equivalent logical formula,

using the given standard equivalences.
The second part starts by discussing advantagBs and disadvantages of log-
ical calculations and presents another method for making logical derivations,
t he so-called reasoning. A reasoning allows a concl usion of an inference to
be derived from everything t hat is available (instead of just from t he for-
mula at hand). And so, the second part gives the laws of reasoning for all
the logical connectives and quantifiers studied in the first part. A partic-
ular style, the so-called flag-notation (or Fitch-style), is used in this book
to express this kind of reasoning. Proofs in t his style are clearly structured
and one is aware at any moment of every formula and fact t hat is available.
The third part deals with applications .of logic in different areas, in par-
ticular: sets, relations, mappings, numbers and structures, and ordered sets.
In this part, you can see the power of logical proofs 'at work' . In order to
establish the desired properties you can now use calculations, reasonings or
an intelligent mixture of both styles. The different proof techniques known
under the name 'induction' are also developed in this part . Throughout,
methods and concepts are illustrated with ample examples and t here are
further exercises which will help sharpen your skills.
After reading this book you know how logic helps you to set up a n indis-
putably correct reasoning and you have seen many applications of how this
can be done. We wish you good luck and much pleasure in the exploration
of the stimulating field of science known as 'logic'.
A word from the authors

The book is, as t he tit le explains, an int roduction t o logic, sets and t he
necessary backgrounds needed in this field for any degree in Mathematics
and / or Computer Science. We introduce the students t o these field from
a very int roductory point of view and we expect t hat, by studying t his
book, the student can develop t he necessary techniques needed to work
with abstract struct ures and correct proofs.
The approach of t he book is to be as informal with the reader as possible,
creating a relationship between t he reader and t he aut hors. Abstract mate-
rial is explained in a friend ly tone without sacrificing the precision needed
to mast er this subject .
In every university, the subject of logics a nd set s is taught as a compulsory
course t o undergraduat es. Most existing books are either too introductory
or cover only one of the topics of the book in det ails. Our book goes in
depth into logic and naive set theory, with ample examples and techniques.
None of t he books currently available for t eaching logics and sets to under-
graduates covers proofs and derivations in such det ails as we do.
This book can be used as a t extbook for an int roductory course at both
t he undergraduate and graduate level. The book will serve as a basis for a
leisurely two-terms course or can be used in an intensive one-term course.
The material of t his book has been used by dr R.P. Ne~e rp e lt as an un-
dergraduate course at Eindhoven University of Technology since 1987 unt il
today and was modified following the students experience with it. Students
following the course are freshmen in the University and they follow the
course in t he first t hree mont hs of t heir first year. There has also been a
long experience in t eaching t he material of t his book to first year classes
of Computer Science at Glasgow University (1 987- 1997), by Professor F .D.
Kamareddine. She current ly uses this material for teaching courses on logic
and formal specifications at Heriot-Watt University whose size varies be-
tween 15 and 65 students.
Both aut hors have taught this subject to large classes, up to 180 students.
xiv A WORD FROM THE AUTHORS

They concluded that this course material is suited for the modern classes
and addresses modern developments.
As special features of the book we mention the following :
• The first way of proving propositions as presented in this book, is the
method using so-called calculations. These calc ulations were coined
by the computer scientist Dijkstra and his group at Eindhoven and
are strongly associated to basic notions in computer science such as
invariants, pre- and post-conditions and to Hoare logic. In this book
we develop an easy method to work with these calculations in a trans-
parent manner, using a format which also provides arguments for the
correctness of the calculation. The method is based on a well-chosen
set of standard equivalences.
• The second method of proving, being a form of what is known as nat-
ural deduction, uses the fl ag notation for proofs. The mathematician
de Bruijn and his Automath group at Eindhoven have exploited it
several decades ago in the first theorem prover which checks books of
mathematics. With such a notation, it is clear which hypotheses are
valid, where they are valid and when they are retracted. This avoids
the possibility of using a hypothesis when it is not valid. These flags
are used in developing and presenting derivations which give proofs
for propositions.
• We believe that both methods of proofs need to be taught and this is
what we do in this book. In addition, we compare and combine these
two methods and present them coherently.
This book contains all the above items in one single manuscript. It
addresses the needs of modern day computer science and mathematics
students.
The book includes many examples, questions, problems and the like. The
concepts are first taught by examples, then by generalizations and then the
student learning is tested by many exercises. All along, the student is asked
to reflect and think about why a certain concept is introduced and why a
certain definition is used .
The purpose of this book is to encourage the student to be inventive and
to develop an abstract mind. So, the student needs to attempt the exercises
without help. If the chapters are studied, then the exercises will be easy to
solve.
We expect the book to be used mainly for undergraduate teaching as we
have used it ourselves. We also expect however that the book be used at
M .,ctar 1"""1" fm Pxamole: (a) in conversion courses for students converting
A WORD FROM THE AUTHORS XV

to computer science and who hence need to learn the material a nd (b) for
IT degrees. In addition, we expect our book to be a valuable reference for
all teachers and researchers in computer science including those working in
industry and who understand the value of form al methods.

Our background
Dr Rob Nederpelt is a senior lecturer in applied logic at t he Technische
Universiteit in Eindhoven, The Netherlands. He was one of the members of
the Automath project at this university. The influence of the 'mathematical
language' Automath, designed by N. G. de Bruijn, on theorem proving
and automating mathematics is widely acknowledged. Rob Nederpelt has
published over 40 art icles and a number of books.
Professor Fairouz Kamareddine is a professor of computer science at
Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland. Since 1980, she has been
involved in teaching many subjects in Computer Science and mathematics.
Fairouz Kamareddine has published over 60 articles and several books.

Addresses of the authors

Dr R.P. Nederpelt, Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, Dept of Math-
ematics and Computer Science, P.O. Box 513, 5600 MB Eindhoven, The
Netherlands
e-mail: r.p.nederpelt@tue. nl
Professor F.D. Kamareddine, Heriot-Watt University, School of Math-
ematical and Computer Science, Mountbatten Building, Riccarton, Edin-
burgh EH14 4ASQ, Scotland
e-mail: fairouz@macs. hw. ac. uk
xvi A WORD FROM THE AUTHORS

Revised edition

This edition differs in several places from the first edition of 2004, albeit
that the changes are relatively small.
As regards the contents , the changes concentrate on the following items:
• A new Section 4.3 , 'Equivalency of propositions ', has been added.
• In Section 16.9, we added a rule for Equality of pairs.
• In Chapter 20, the lexicographic orderings have been removed from
Section 20.3 and inserted into a new Section 20.4, with a slight extension of
the subject.
• Throughout the whole Chapter 20, "the distinction between reflexive
and irreflexive orderings has been implemented in a more consistent manner.
This has led to a number of changes in the text.
• Slight changes in formulation and paragraph order have been carried
out throughout the book. We also seized the opportunity to eliminate a
number of typo's and small errors.
As to the lay-out of the text in this book, good use has been made of
a new and improved tool for the rendering of flag derivations ('flagderiv') .
One of the many useful options in that package concerns the breaking of
derivations over pages, which enabled us to remove unnecessary white in
many places.

Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful to all users who informed them about mist a kes,
typo 's and possible improvements. Their information has been used in the
preparation of this revision.
In particular, we thank Bas Luttik and other members of the staff of the
Computer Science Group of the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven.
Special thanks to Paul van Tilburg and his former co-students, who pre-
pared the versatile fiagderiv package for flag derivations, based on the first
version of Jan Zwanenburg and Erik Poll.
And as a final remark: without the help of the editors of King's College
London (including our contact person J ane Spurr), this book wouldn't have
got the nice appearance that it has now.
Thank you all!
 Part I

Logical Calculations
Chapter 1

•
What IS 'logic'?

It stands to reason

1.1 Aristotle and his 'Organon'

Logic is an old science. Already around 350 B.C., the Greek Aristotle wrote
six collections on reasoning which together became known as the Organon 1 .
The meaning of 'Organon' is approximately 'instrument'. In his Organon,
Aristotle gave a list of fixed irrefutable rules which make it possible to derive
correct conclusions. These rules give a kind of instrument that helps set up
good reasoning.
In those old days, reasoning was - like it is today - of great importance.
He who can reason, is in a state of carrying through convincing arguments
with which he can achieve what he desires. Moreover, with a reasoning-
instrument, one is capable of getting oneself rid of false reasoning, and of
winning arguments against opponents.
As an example of a general rule, we give the rule of Aristotle which later,
in the Middle Ages, became known as 'Barbara' (the three a's in Barbara
refer to the three words 'all' in the rule) :

All K's are L's

All L's are M's
All K's are M's

You should read this as follows:

1 See The Cambridge Companion to Aristotle, a book edited by Jonath a n Barnes and

published by Cambridge University Press in 1995.

4 CHAPTER 1. WHAT IS 'LOGIC'?

From 'all K's are L's'

and 'all L's are M's'
we can conclude that: 'all K's are M's'.
This is elegant indeed. The rule can for example be applied as follows:
From ( 1) All Scottish are British;
and (2) All British are European;
we can derive (3) All Scottish are European.
This rule only has a say over the validity of the conclusion: from (1) and
(2) conclude (3) . Whether (1) and (2) themselves hold, is not a priority
for the rule. In the above example, (1) and (2) are correct: Scottish are
British, and British are European. But, in the following example, both (4)
and (5) are incorrect. Nevertheless, on the basis of the rule 'Barbara', the
conclusion (6) is still correct: Suppose that (4) and (5) were really true,
then indeed (6) follows!
From (4) All tigers are vegetarians;
and (5) All vegetarians are sea animals;
we derive (6) All tigers are sea animals.
Now we must be careful with these general rules like Barbara: it is nec-
essary that they always hold, no matter what you have instead of the K's,
L's and M's.
Look at the following 'rule':
All K's are L's
There are L's that are M's
There are K's that are M's
This rule might look alright at first sight, but it actually isn't. Look at
the following instantiation of the rule, which gives a counterexample against
its own correctness:
From (7) All Scottish are British;
and (8) There are British which are Welsh;
we deriv e (9) There are Scottish which are Welsh.
This is obviously an incorrect conclusion, because (7) and (8) are correct,
but (9) is not. Hence, it is not correct 'From (7) and (8), to conclude (9)',
because in that case, (9) would have to hold! Therefore, the 'rule' (with the
K's, L's and M's) is not correct in general.

Remark 1.1.1 The word 'logic' comes from Greek. It is the first part from
the Greek expression 'logike techne ', which means: reasoning techniques,
1.2. FORMAL LOGIC 5

the technique {knowledge) of reasoning. The word 'logike' is the adjective

which comes from the Greek word 'logos', which can either mean 'word',
'understanding ' or 'reason'.

1. 2 Formal logic
Logic deals with general reasoning laws , which you can trust. Logical laws
are given in the form of formulas with 'parameters' . When in one such
law, you replace the parameters with something concrete, you get a good
trustworthy reasoning. Look at the law 'Barbara' of Aristotle, given on
page 3 where the parameters K, Land M appear. When you t ake 'Scottish'
instead of K's, 'British' instead of L's and 'European' instead of M's, the
formula is correct. But the formula remains correct when you replace all
occurrences of K, L and M by something else (see the previous section).
Aristotle gave in total19 rules, the so-called syllogism, of which 'Barbara'
is one. Until the Middle Ages , the logic of Aristotle was leading. Only after
then, did the basis of logic change. This was necessary because other condi-
tions began to be imposed in mathematics (an important application area
of logic). In his book, 2 the English mathematician George Boole (1815 -
1864) wrote logic in a way which became known as the two-valued or Boolean
logic. Later, the German Mathematician Gerhard Gentzen (1909 - 1945)
went a step further. He invented 3 a logical system which was connected,
as closely as possible, to the method of reasoning used in mathematics. He
called his logic 'natural deduction' and intended to use it to deduce (derive
conclusions) in a natural way (exactly like man is used to).
Computer science imposes different conditions than mathematics. In
the area of logic, computer science imposes perhaps more conditions than
mathematics. A computer must be told precisely what it should do, up to
the smallest details, otherwise it will not work well. If a mathematician
goes quickly or lightly over some details, his fellow mathematician will still
understand him. However, a computer scientist cannot P.frmit himself to
go lightly over some details. If a program is false or has some holes, it will
not work (' error'!). Or, even worse: it does work, but will not deliver what
is expected. One hopes that one discovers the mistake in time, otherwise
disasters might happen.
In this book, we will not discuss Aristotle any further. His logic, al-
though ground breaking, will no longer be needed because it does not go
2
George Boole: Th e Mathematical Analysis of Logic, being an Essay towards a Cal-
culus of Deductive Reasoning. Cambridge University Press, 1847.
3 Gerhard Gentzen: Untersuchungen ii.ber das logische Schliessen. Mathematisches
Zeitschrift, 1935.
6 CHAPTER 1. WHAT IS 'LOGIC'?

far. Boolean logic on the other hand, will be discussed further (see Chap-
ter 3), and so will natural deduction (Chapter 11 onwards). Both logical
systems have had many applications, not only in mathematics, but also in
computer science:
• Modern logic is used in mathematics in areas that include set theory,
functional analysis, algebra and discrete mathematics.
• Modern logic is important in computer science especially in areas like
programming, database theory, computer architecture and verifica-
tion.
Nowadays, one prefers to use the ten~ 'formal logic' instead of 'modern
logic', in order to express that the general science of reasoning is written as
precisely as possible. This is done with logical formulas, and hence the use
of 'formal'.
Remark 1.2.1 Judges, politicians, philosophers, and also 'ordinary' people
like you and I, use natural language when reasoning. Formal logic attempts
to separate the logical laws from ordinary (spoken and written) language.
This is needed, because language is often too 'rich' in meaning and hence
not precise enough to avoid writing the logical laws in a manner that can
be subject to double interpretations. In the following chapter, we will con-
tinuously make the association with language, in order to explain where the
logical formulas come from. However, when it is a question of precision of
reasoning, logic will dissociate itself /rom language and will often take its
own separate way. This is necessary in order to preserve the consistency,
which is the guarantee that as long as we keep faithful to the rules, we can
never derive an incorrect conclusion. Via this process of doing our best to
avoid ambiguity and double interpretations, both mathematics and computer
science can be made 'trustworthy'. This leads to quality and good products.

1. 3 Exercises
1.1 Check in each of the following cases whether the given rule is correct.
If it is, give arguments to show this. If it is not, give a counterexample.
There are K's which are also M's
(a) All K's are L's
There are L's which are M's
No one K is an M
(b) All K's are L's
No one L is an M
Chapter 2

Abstract propositions

True to the facts

2.1 Propositions
Modern, formal logic has as a basic concept the so-called proposition. This
is a purely technical term, and you must not think of the ordinary English
word 'proposition' ('proposal'), but instead, think of something like a special
kind of a (linguistic) 'sentence'.
What is a proposition? It is a grammatically correct sentence which (at
this moment, at this place, etc.) is either true or false . Here are some
examples of propositions:
(1) It is raining.
(2) There are birds which cannot fly.
(3) 2 + 2 = 5.
(4) 7r is bigger than three.
(5) p2+q2=r2.
Proposition (3) is completely written in the 'language of mathematics'
(and is false in our world) . In proposition (4), ordinary language is mixed
with the mathematical symbol 7r. Sentences in the language of mathematics
(like (3)), or sentences which are mixed with the language of mathematics
(like (4) ), are allowed as propositions.
Note that proposition (5) is grammatically correct, not because of English
grammar, but because of the grammar of mathematical formulas. Moreover,
8 CHAPTER 2. ABSTRACT PROPOSITIONS

this sentence is only in principle true or false: it depends on what p, q and

r are. Only when we know the context (hence as soon as we have enough
information about p, q and r), can we say: true or false. A proposition
can hence have symbols which are meaningless in the proposition, but are
(perhaps) specified in the context.
Here are some examples of sentences that are not propositions, and rea-
sons as to why they are not:
(6) Is it raining? (This is a question, which on its own cannot be true or
false: there does not exist something like a 'true question' or a 'false
question'.)
(7) Make sure to get away! (An order.)
(8) x := x + 1. (This is a command in a programming language, and also
a kind of order.)
(9) All these awaiting jobs! (This is not a sentence, but a cry of despair.)
(10) Queen Netherlands Juliana of the was. (This is not a grammatically
correct sentence.)
We have now seen examples of simple sentences which are propositions
and of sentences which are not. Things become interesting when we try to
form new propositions from old ones. This happens frequently in ordinary
language.
(ll) It is raining and it is windy. (This proposition can be built from
the propositions 'It is raining' and 'It is windy', via the use of the
connecting word 'and' which joins them together.)
(12) It is not freezing. (Built from 'It is freezing' with the negation, 'not'.)
(13) If it is raining, (then) I will stay home. (A proposition built from 'It
is raining' and 'I will stay home', with the use of 'if ... then'.)
(14) x < -1 =? x 2 + x > 0. (Built from the proposition x < -1 and
x 2 + x > 0 with the help of the implication sign =? . This sign (or
symbol) =? is used in logic for expressing 'if ... then'.)
(15) The sun is shining, but I am cold. (Built by the use of the connecting
word 'but' which combines the two propositions 'The sun is shining'
and 'I am cold' .)
Propositions which are not built from other propositions (like examples
(1) to (5)) are usually called simple propositions. Those built from other
propositions (like examples (ll) to (15)), are called complex propositio"ns.
 ABSTRACT PROPOSITIONS AND CONNECTIVES 9

2.· 2 Abstract propositions and connectives

Logic deals with patterns of correct reasoning. This means that propGsi-
tions as such are not that important. What matters is the way in which
ropositions are combined and what follows from them.
p For example, let us look at the following proposition:

If it is raining and windy , then I will not come.

This fits the pattern:

(a and b) implies not-e,
with a, band e as abstractions respectively from 'It is raining', 'It is windy'
and 'I will come'. (The word 'implies' is an alternative for 'if ... then'.)
Also the proposition

If it holds that x ~ -1 and that x ::; 0, then x 2 +x is not positive

fits the same pattern: take x ~ -1 for a, x ::; 0 for b and 'x 2 + x is positive'
for c.
Logic is primarily the study of abstract patterns rather than the 'real'
concrete propositions. This is to clarify what the essence is. We do not lose
anything via the use of abstract patterns because, once we know how the
reasoning laws work for abstract propositions, we can apply them without
any difficulties to concrete propositions by replacing the occurrences of the
proposition variables a, b etc., by the concrete propositions.
By abstracting over propositions, one goes even further. Patterns like the
above mentioned '(a and b) implies not-e' still contain words from natural
language ('and', 'implies', 'not'). In order to avoid in logic the double
meanings that usually occur in natural language, we replace these words by
symbols, the so-called connectives.
In logic, one usually limits the number of connectives e'o the following:

1\ This is the symbol for the word 'and'.

V The symbol for the word 'or'.

Represents the word 'not'.

=? For 'if ... then ' or 'implies'.

<=? For 'if and only if'.

10 CHAPTER 2. ABSTRACT PROPOSITIONS

(In Chapter 3 we will come back to these connectives and will explain
in detail what they represent. The {=>, for example, which we have only
vaguely described with 'if and only if', will be defined more precisely.)
We can now describe, with the help of these connectives, the above-
mentioned pattern '(a and b) implies not-e' in a fully abstract form, without
words from natural language:

(a 1\ b) ==> •c

Remark 2.2.1 Although logic only uses a limited number of connectives,

this appears to be enough for many applications. Especially when it concerns
reasoning, we mostly have enough with the above five symbols. Moreover,
some of the nuances that exist in natural language, disappear when formal-
izing towards an abstract proposition. For example, the proposition 'the sun
is shining, but I am cold' has the abstract logical form 'd 1\ e' (where d
stands for 'The sun is shining' and e for 'I am cold'). The word 'but' is
replaced by 1\ ('and'), which is a sort of weakening: the surprising aspect of
'but ' (like: ' You didn't expect that I can be cold despite the sun shining, did
you?') disappears.

2.3 Recursive definitions of propositions

We will clarify what we precisely under-stand by 'abstract propositions'. We
will assume that we have at our disposal an infinite collection of proposition
variables, such as a, b and c. We start by giving the following definition:

Definition 2.3.1 (Abstract proposition)

Basis: Proposition variables (like a, b and c) are themselves abstract propo-
sitions.
Step (case 1): If P is an abstract proposition, then so is (-.P).
Step (case 2): If P and Q are abstract propositions, then so are (P 1\ Q) ,
(P v Q), (P ==> Q) and (P {=> Q).

Remark 2.3.2 This is what we call a recursive definition. These defini-

tions are also called inductive definitions . It consists of a basis, which spec-
ifies what the simplest abstract propositions are, and a step which is divided
here in two cases. Through the steps, more complex abstract propositions
can be formed from less complex ones.

As an example, let us see how the abstract proposition ((a 1\ b) ==> (•c))
r.l'l.n he 'built' or 'constructed' according to the definition: ·
2.3. RECURSIVE DEFINITIONS OF PROPOSITIONS 11

(basis) a, b and c are proposition variables, hence following the defi-

nition, they are also abstract propositions.
(step) Because a and b are abstract propositions, then so is (a 1\ b)
(see case 2).

(step) Because cis an abstract proposition, then so is (•c) (see case 1).
(step) Because (a 1\ b) is an abstract proposition and also (•c) is an
abstract proposition, then so is ((a 1\ b)=} (•c)) (see case 2).

All the abstract propositions that we reach during the construction, are
called sub-formulas of the formula that we have finally built. The sub-
formulas of ((a 1\ b) '*(•c)) are hence: a , b, c, (a 1\ b) , (•c) and also
'* (
((a 1\ b) •c)) itself.
In this definition, you may question the number of parentheses and may
rightly believe that they are used excessively. We will in Section 2.5 see how
we can reduce the number of parentheses without affecting the intended
meaning of the formula.

Remark 2.3.3 The word 'recursive' literally means 'running back'. What
runs back in a recursive definition? We are actually going forward in the
building of our abstract propositions: from a and b to a 1\ b, from c to
•c, etc. This word 'recursive' does not really refer to the building of the
propositions, but rather to breaking them down into smaller pieces. This
process of breaking down into smaller pieces is needed when we come across
a ready-made formula which we want to check whether it is an abstract
proposition.

Example 2.3.4 Lookatthefollowingformula: ((•(al\b)) <=? ((•a)V(•b))).

Is this an abstract proposition? We see that it has the form (P <=? Q), with
(•( al\b)) for P and ( (•a) V (·b)) for Q. According to case 2, of the definition,
the formula is a 'good' abstract proposition, provided that P and Q are too.
Hence we must check whether (•(a 1\ b)) and ((•a) V (•b)) are abstract
propositions.
The first is of the form (·R) with (a 1\b) as R. This is 'good' according to
case 1 of the definition, again provided that (al\b) is an abstract proposition.
However, this is the case (again case 2) when a and bare. And this is indeed
the case due to (basis). As for the second formula, ((•a) V (•b)), we can
follow the same parsing process.
Finally we decide that the formula ( ( •( a 1\ b)) <=? ( ( •a) V (·b))) is an
abstract proposition because we could break it down into smaller abstract
12 CHAPTER 2. ABSTRACT PROPOSITIONS

propositions, until we reach the bottom (the level of (basis) , the proposition
variables). This breaks the recursion (the running back via the definition).

2.4 The structure of abstract propositions

We have seen (Definition 2.3.1) how abstract propositions can be both con-
structed and broken down. We can also give these formulas graphically in
the form of a so-called tree. In Figure 2.1, we give the tree of ( (al\b) =? (--.c)).

a b c

Figure 2.1: The tree of ((a 1\ b)=;. (-.c))

Such a tree has nodes (the black buttons), branches (the connecting lines)
and labels (the symbols at the nodes, like b, --. and =? ) . The nodes at the
end of the tree (in this case: the nodes with labels a, b and c) are called
leaves. At the node at the top of the tree, the so-called root, there is a label
which is called the main symbol of th"'e formula, in this case =?.
Characteristic for a tree is that it has a root, that all nodes are connected
to each other and that there are no loops. (A loop occurs, for example, when
there is a branch between the nodes labeled b and c. In such a loop you
can go continuously round.) As can be seen, trees in the above graphical
figure, are drawn upside down. The root is in the air, the leaves grow on
the ground. You can draw the horizontal mirror image of such trees, and
then you get 'normal' trees.
Note that the tree of an abstract proposition does not need any paren-
theses in order to clarify the structure of the formula:
(1) In order to see how the tree is built, we begin at the bottom, with the
leaves, and then we follow the branches to the top.

(2) In order to see how the tree can be decomposed or broken down, we
begin from the top, at the root , and we follow the branches to the
bottom in order to find the different parts.
In the tree one can also see what the subformulas are: (a 1\ b) can be
found as a sub-tree of the whole tree. Namely as the tree of Figure 2.2. ·
2.5. DROPPING PARENTHESES 13

A
a b
Figure 2.2: The tree of (a 1\ b)

This holds for every node in the tree: the tree below a node represents a
sub-formula.

2.5 Dropping parentheses

An inductive definition has in general more parentheses than is needed.
In order to economize on parentheses, one usually uses a precedence or a
priority scheme for the connectives. So, in logic, the following priority
scheme for the connectives is used (the horizontal lines separate here the
different priority levels):

1\ v
:=}

{=}
This means that: -,has a higher priority than 1\ or V, which in turn have
a higher priority than :=;., which again in turn has a higher priority than{=}.
The following three examples illustrate what this priority scheme offers:
(i) In •a 1\ b, the symbol -, has higher priority than 1\, and hence one
must read this formula as (•a) 1\ b and not as •( a 1\ b).
(ii) In a V b {=} b V a the symbol V has higher priority than {=}, and hence
it represents (a V b){=} (b V a) and not for example (a V (b {=}b)) V a.
(iii) As to a 1\ b V c, there is a problem: 1\ and V have $e same priority
in the above mentioned priority scheme, hence it is not clear whether
one means with this formula (a 1\ b) V cor a 1\ (b V c) . We will come
back to this point below.
Remark 2.5.1 Priority schemes can also be used for non-logical symbols.
So in arithmetic, the following scheme is used:
T
X

+
14 CHAPTER 2. ABSTRACT PROPOSITIONS

It should be noted that not everyone uses the same priority scheme.
Sometimes, in logic, 1\ has higher priority than V and in arithmetic x may
be stronger than : .
In the case where priorities do not give a definite answer (as in example
(iii)) , one usually applies the left-associativity rule: 'left is applied first ', or:
first come, first serve. Then we read a 1\ b V c as (a 1\ b) V c. Be careful
however. Sometimes we also see the right-associativity rule: right is applied
first. That this can make a lot of difference can be seen in the formula al\bVc:
right-associativity represents it as a 1\ (b V c), which is very different from
(a 1\ b) V c (as we will see in Section 3.2). See also the following example:

(l) With the left-associativity rule, 9 '-- 5 + 3 must be read as (9 - 5) + 3,

and hence results in 7.

(r) With the right-associativity rule, one gets a different formula, namely
9- (5 + 3), which results in 1.

The priority scheme for connectives and the associativity rules enable
one to economize on parentheses. In addition, it is common to leave out the
outside parentheses.
Summary: You can cut down the number of parentheses by
(1) applying a priority scheme,

(2) using the left- (or right-)associativity rule and

(3) removing the outside parentheses.

Convention 2.5.2 In the rest of this book we will use the priority scheme
from the beginning of this section. Also, we will remove the outside paren-
theses. However, we will neither use the left- nor the right-associativity rule.
Instead, we will when necessary, keep the extra parentheses needed to avoid
ambiguity. Hence, in the formula a 1\ b V c, we add parentheses to describe
what we mean exactly. This could be either (a 1\ b) V c or a 1\ ( b V c).

Example 2.5.3 By applying (1} and (3) given above, we can write the
abstract proposition ( (a 1\ b) "* (
•c)) completely without parentheses, as
follows: a 1\ b "*
•C. Note that for readability, it is sometimes useful to keep
some parentheses; hence for this example, we may write (a 1\ b) •c. "*
Remark 2.5.4 Parentheses remain however necessary, for distinguishing
for instance between the formula s •(a 1\ b) and •a 1\ b. For example, replace
a bu 'It is raining' and b by 'It is cold', then the first formula says: 'It is not
2.6. EXERCISES 15

the case that it is both mining and cold' and the second (which is actually
(-.a ) 1\ b): 'It is not mining and it is cold'. (In the first case, it can very
well not be cold, and perhaps it can also be mining.)

2.6 Exercises
2.1 Check in each of the following cases whether the given expressions are
propositions or not. If yes, say whether this proposition is simple or
complex. If no, give reasons why not.

(a) It is freezing and yet it is not cold, because it is not windy.

(b) if x < 0 then x := x + 1 else x := x - 1.
(c) The queen of Great Britain lives in Liverpool.
(d) Either x < 0, or x = 0 andy< 0.
(e) How is this.
(f) Romeo and Juliet.
(g) Elephants don't exist.
(h) If x = 0, then x.

2.2 For each of the following concrete propositions, write an abstract

proposition which corresponds to it:

(a) I love you and will always be true to you.

(b) If it is raining, then I will stay home and will open a bottle of
wine.
(c) x::; 1 or x > 2.
(d) I will go to play tennis, if you bring balls with you.
(e) I will go to the movies, unless something happens.
(f) x 2 > 4 if, and only if, x > 2 or x < -2. "

2.3 Give the following propositions in words again, with 'it is raining' for
a, 'it is windy' for band 'I am wet' for c.

(a) a 1\ -.b
(b) • (a 1\ b)
(c) (a => c) 1\ (b => • a)
(d) C V •C
(e) c{=}a
16 CHAPTER 2. ABSTRACT PROPOSITIONS

2.4 Show how the following abstract propositions are built according to
Definition 2.3.1.

(a) (a===> (b ===>a))

(b) ( (--,(a ===> b)) <::> (a A (--,b)))
(c) ( ( __, (--,a)) ===> ( (--,a) A b))
(d) (a=> ((bAa)Vc)).

2.5 Show that:

(a) In every abstract proposition in which the symbol '•' does not
appear, the number of proposition variables is one more than the
number of connectives.
(b) In every abstract proposition where no parentheses are dropped
out, the number of parentheses is equal to twice the number of
connectives.

2.6 (a) Draw the trees of the abstract propositions of Exercise 2.4.
(b) For each of the abstract propositions of Exercise 2.4, give the
main symbol.

2.7 Give all the sub-formulas of th~ abstract proposition

((a A (•b)) ===>((-,c)=> d)) .

2.8 Drop as many parentheses as possible from the abstract propositions

given in Exercise 2.4. Use the left-associativity rule.
Chapter 3

'fruth tables

The truth and nothing but the truth

3.1 The conjunction P /\ Q

The simplest logical connective is/\, the symbolic reproduction of the word
'and'. It leads to little confusion. Assume that P and Q are abstract
propositions. The meaning of P 1\ Q is: 'P and Q are true', hence, if we
want to know if P 1\ Q holds, we need to know
(1) whether Pis true, and
(2) whether Q is true,
and only when this is the case for both, we can say that P 1\ Q is true.
We can express this in one standard truth-table for 1\, which specifies how
the truth or falsity of P 1\ Q follows from the truth or falsity of P and that
of Q. We use the symbol 0 for 'false' and 1 for 'true'. These symbols 0
and 1 are called in logic the Boolean values or truth-values. There are four
possible cases, depending on the values of P and Q fromJ;he list of values
0 and 1:

p Q PI\Q
0 0 0
0 1 0
1 0 0
1 1 1

It is obvious that P 1\ Q is true only, when P is true and Q is true: we

only get 1 as value for P 1\ Q in the last row of the table.
18 CHAPTER 3. TRUTH TABLES

Note that such a truth-table follows the inductive construction of an

a bstract proposition. We begin first with the truth-values of P and Q,
based on which we decide the truth-value of the proposition P 1\ Q which is
.)
built out of P and Q. (Compare with case (2) of Defin ition 2.3 .1.)

Remark 3.1.1 An abstract proposition of the form P 1\ Q is called a con-

junction. The Latin prefix con m eans 'together ' or 'both ' and junction m eans
'connection'. One calls (a=} b) 1\c the co njunction of a=} band c. With the
symbol /\ you can think of two legs with strong standing f ee t on the ground:
To stand strong on one's feet, one n eeds to stand on both feet , hence both
on the left foot and on the right foot .

3.2 The disjunction P V Q

With the logical connective V, the symbolic reproduction of 'or ', t here is
ambiguity. Roughly speaking, there are two forms of 'or':

• the inclusive 'or '. You say: 'I feel hungry. I'll fetch a roll or a sand-
wich '. This can mean that you come back with a roll and a sandwich ,
without you uttering a false statement . So the word 'or ' means here:
the one or the other or both . The both-option is 'open ' (inclusive). In
order to precisely express the inclusive character of 'or ', a combination
of 'and/or' is used in language (especially the official language): 'The
information meeting is for the' benefit of travelers to France and /or
Italy' .

• the exclusive 'or'. On lottery tickets one finds: 'Congratulations. You

have won a TV or 500 pounds' . In this case you have a right for
one of the two, but not to both. You should therefore understand
here: one or the other (and not both) . The both-option is 'closed '
(exclusive). Also here, language provides possibilities for avoiding
ambiguity. When we mean the exclusive 'or', we use., 'either ... or .. .
(but not both) ' : 'You have won either a tv or 500,"pounds (but not
both) '.

In nat ural language, it usually depends on circumstances or on the reason-

ing, which of the two 'or's is meant . Such imprecisions cannot be tolerated
nor permitted in logic.
Hence the following convention. In logic the symbol V is used for the
inclusive or (i.e. with an open possibility for ' both ' ). Hence P V Q means:
P is true or Q is true or both are true.
The standard truth-table fo r V is now straightforward :
3.2. THE DISJUNCTION P v Q 19

p Q PvQ
0 0 0
0 1 1
1 0 1
1 1 1

Here one can see t hat P V Q is only false , when both P and Q are false.
As soon as (at least) one of t he two is true, P V Q becomes true too .
In this book we don't use any separate standard symbol for exclusive 'or '.
Those who want to express in logic 'either P or Q (but not both) ', can
for example use: (P V Q) 1\ •( P 1\ Q) (i .e. : P or Q, but not: P and Q) . A
shorter way is: • (P <=> Q) , but in order to show t hat this expresses 'the
same' formula, we must wait till Section 3.5.

Remark 3 .2.1 An abstract proposition of the form P V Q is called a d is-

junction. The Latin prefix dis means 'away from each other' or 'separated '.
And in P V Q there is indeed often a separation of ways, a choice. With the
symbol V you can think of two arms which in hesitation shoot in the air: 'I
don 't know, should I now go left or right (or in both directions at the same
.
tzme ... )'.

Wit h truth-tables, we can a lso calculate the truth-values of complex ab-

stract propositions. As an example, we give the t ruth-tables of (a 1\ b) V c
andofa /\(b Vc):

a b c al\ b (al\b)Vc a b c b Vc a 1\ (b v c)
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0
0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0
0 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 1 0
1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0
1 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1
1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 1
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

In these tables, it is clear that (a /\ b) Vc and a l\ (b vc ) 'calculate' different

t hings. The first three columns in both tables (the 'input '-possibilities for
a, band c) are t he same. But t he ' results', which appear in the last column ,
are different . The last column of the left table differs in two places from
t he last column of the right table. For example, when the values of a and b
20 CHAPTER 3. TRUTH TABLES

are both 0 and that of cis 1, then the value of proposition (a 1\ b) V cis 1,
whereas the value of a 1\ (b V c) is 0. We say that (a 1\ b) V c and a 1\ (b V c)
are not equivalent.
Note how during the calculations in the truth-tables, the structure of the
formula is followed precisely (compare Section 2.4)!

3.3 The negation -,p

The negation 'not' is expressed with the sign '· It has in principle a simple
meaning: the negation of 'true' is 'false', and the negation of 'false' is 'true'.
In other words: 1 becomes 0 and 0 beeomes 1. Hence the standard truth-
table for .., is:

This truth-table is shorter than that of P 1\ Q resp. P V Q. The reason is

that 1\ and V have two arguments, P and Q, for which four Boolean truth
combinations become possible: (0,0), (0,1), (1,0) or (1,1). Whereas.., has
only one argument, P, with two Boolean choices: 0 of 1.

Remark 3.3.1 In ordinary language, negation is less clear, because there

usually are more choices than simply yes or no. When it is not cold, it
does not necessarily mean that it is warm: it can be 'in between'. This has
consequences for the double negation in ordinary language: 'It is not that
I do not believe in this' does not in general mean: 'I (do) believe in it', but
more likely: 'I believe in it a little bit'.
In standard logic (see also Section 5.4) there is no ambiguity concerning
this point: with 'not-not' we are simply back where we started, as is seen in
the following truth-table:

p ..,p ..,..,p
0 1 0
1 0 1

This implies that: when P has the truth-value 0, then also ..,..,p has the
truth-value 0; and when P has the truth-value 1, then also ..,..,p has the
truth-value 1. Therefore P and ..,..,p have the same truth-values or are
ormi"" Jpnt, Whatever P iS.
3.4. THE IMPLICATION P =::> Q 21

3.4 The implication P ==? Q

The connective =::> is called arrow or implication arrow and it is the formal
symbol for if ... then. Hence P =::> Q expresses: 'If P, then Q'. One can
also say: 'P implies Q' or 'From P follows Q' . In logic we simply say: ' P
arrow Q'.
It is not immediately obvious how t he truth-value of P =::> Q can be
calculated from the truth-values of P and Q. This is especially t he case if
p is false. Example: is the proposition (2 > 3) =::> (2 > 3) true or false?
And what about (2 > 3) =::> (4 > 3)?
To get a feel for how things work , we will study the following proposition,
where n and i are natural numbers:

If n > 3, then n + i > 3.

We have absolutely no difficult ies in declaring that this proposition is
true, independently of what n and i are. Hence the truth-value of the
whole proposition is 1, independently of what the t ruth-values of its sub-
propositions n > 3 and n + i > 3 are.
We will look now at three cases: (1) n = 2, i = 0, (2) n = 2, i = 2 and
(3) n = 4, i = 0. In these cases, three different combinations of n > 3 and
n + i > 3 take place:

n>3 n+i > 3 If n > 3, t hen n + i > 3.

n = 2,i = 0 0 0
n = 2,i = 2 0 1 always 1
n = 4,i = 0 1 1

Hence, it makes sense that in logic, the truth-value of P =::> Q is calculated

as follows:
p Q P==?Q
0 0 1
0 1 1
1 1 1

We still have one case left, namely when Pis true (1) and Q is false (0).
(This case does not occur in the example above.) Take the example: 'If 4
is bigger than 3, then 2 + 2 is equal to 5'. Now, there is no possibility for
ambiguity. In this case, P =::> Q says that from something true, something
false must follow, and this can never be the case. So, in this case, the
truth-value of P =::> Q is equal to 0.
22 CHAPTER 3. TRUTH TABLES

When we summarize the above, we reach the following standard truth-

table for =:>:
p Q P =:> Q
0 0 1
0 1 1
1 0 0
1 1 1

Hence an implication P => Q is always true, except when P is true but

Q is false.
In ordinary language, 'if ...then' has 1;1 double meaning. Imagine that you
say: 'If it is raining, then I will not come'. Often this also means: 'But if it
is not raining, then I will come'. It is true that you have not uttered this
last sentence, however, a little common sense can lead to the conclusion of
this last sentence.
In logic this is not the case: 'If it is raining => I will not come' simply
means what it says; what happens if it is not raining is not discussed at all.
Furthermore, in ordinary language, there often is a consequential relation
in an implication. For example: 'If I drink a lot tonight, then I will be ill
tomorrow '. This being ill tomorrow is a direct consequence of over-drinking.
In logic, such a consequential relation is not necessary. For this reason ,
some implications may look strange on first sight: 'If penguins can fly, then
two plus two equals five ' . This is a true implication (because penguins don't
fly) , which can be seen by looking at the truth-table.
Finally, one last remark about 'if ... then'. In ordinary language, 'if' has
a double role: It can mean 'in case' and hence leads to an implication, but
it can also mean 'when'. For example: 'If the sun is shining, I feel happy'.
This means: ' When the sun is shining, I feel happy'. And hence, this is not
an implication in the true sense.
The difference between 'if= in case' and 'if= when' is rather subtle. We
will not go further into such details.

Remark 3.4.1 The word 'implication' comes from the Latin 'implicere',
which is 'to fold in'. The proposition 'P implies Q ' means hence something
like 'By P , we fold in Q ', i. e. 'if P holds, then automatically Q holds too '.

3.5 The hi-implication P {::} Q

The connective <* will also be called double arrow . You can treat it as the
combination of an implication arrow from left to right and an implication
3.5. THE BI-IMPLICATION P <=> Q 23

arrow from right to left. Hence, P <=> Q can be described as: 'If P then Q,
and if Q then P'. Written as an abstract proposition: (P => Q) 1\ (Q => P).
This allows us to calculate the truth-table for <=>:

p Q P=>Q Q=>P (P=>Q)/\(Q=>P)

0 0 1 1 1
0 1 1 0 0
1 0 0 1 0
1 1 1 1 1

So now, we can distill the following standard truth-table for<=>:

p Q P <=> Q
0 0 1
0 1 0
1 0 0
1 1 1

Hence P <=> Q is only true when P and Q have the same truth-value
(both 0, or both 1) .
The abstract proposition P <=> Q is pronounced as follows: 'P if and only
if Q'. This is a combination of 'P if Q' and 'P only if Q' . With the first, 'P
if Q', we have no difficulties. It is the usual 'if Q then P' (be careful about
the exchange of the order of P and Q). Formally: 'P if Q ' is expressed as
P {= Q, another way of writing Q => P.
But now the part 'P only if Q' is more difficult. It costs some headaches
before understanding what one means here, namely: 'if P then Q', or, in
formula-form: P => Q.
We illustrate the latter one with an example. Look at: 'x > 5 only if
x > 4' . We can read this as: 'xis greater than 5 (only) if also x is greater
than 4' or as: 'For x > 5, it is needed that x > 4'. This is a.true proposition,
which expresses the same thing as x > 5 => x > 4.
Therefore, we repeat the general conclusion: 'P only if Q' is the same as
P => Q.
Hence 'P if and only if Q' is the combination of Q => P and P => Q,
which we have expressed above with P <=> Q .
As a shorthand notation for 'P if and only if Q' one uses: 'P iff Q'.

Remark 3.5.1 The connective<=> is called the hi-implication symbol, with

the Greek prefix 'bi' which means 'doub lP. '. TndP. P.ri. li.kP. 1nP .~Mn nhn"P ~----'>
24 CHAPTER 3. TRUTH TABLES

expresses a mutual implication, one from left to right and one from right to
left.
In this respect, one also speaks of equivalence, which is 'having the same
value' (P <--=} Q is true when P and Q always have the same value, both 0
or both 1). (See also the end of Section 3.2 and Chapter 5).

3.6 Other notations

There are alternative notations in use for the various connectives. In this
section we describe some of these alternative notations. We use the same
order in which the connectives in this book have been listed so far: /\, V, ---, ,
=? and <--=}.

For 1\, especially in t he field of electro-technology, one also uses the mul-
tiplication sign'·', for V the plus sign'+'. This is because t he truth-values
of P 1\ Q and P V Q can be calculated from those of P and Q via the
multiplication respectively the addition of the values 0 and 1.
For example: When P has value 0 and Q has value 1, then P 1\ Q has
the value 0.1 = 0 and P V Q has the value 0 + 1 = 1. We should hence use
the convention that 1 + 1 = 1, see the table below.
Another possibility to calcu late the value of P 1\ Q resp. P V Q, is to take
the minimum resp. the maximum of the values of P and Q. (We denote the
minimum of x andy by x 1 y, the maximum by xi y.)
We summarize this in the following tables:
p Q PI\Q P·Q P!Q PvQ P+Q PjQ
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 1 0 0 0 1 1 1
1 0 0 0 0 1 1 1
1 1 1 1 1 1 1+1=1 1

One can take the truth-value of -, p to be one minus the value of P:

p -,p 1- p
0 1 1
1 0 0

Remark 3.6. 1 Abstract propositions with only 1\, V and/or ---, have a math-
ematical structure which is called a Boolean algebra. The calculations that
belong to such an algebra are better executed with '1\ ' written as '. ' and
'V' written as '+ ', in the same way we demons trated above. (In so-called
Boolean rings, however, it is customary to use P + Q not for P V Q {the
inclusive or), but for (PV Q) 1\ ---, ( P 1\ Q) (the exclusive or; see Section 3.2).)
 3. 7. EXERCISES 25

The truth-value of P =} Q can be calculated by taking the sum of 1 - P

and Q. In order to calculate the value of P ¢:> Q, one needs a more complex
operation, which we don't give here.
The following alternative notations are also in use for •, =} and ¢:> :

• '"" P or P for • P ,
• P --> Q or P ::::> Q for P =} Q,
• P ...... Q or P = Q for P ¢:> Q.

3. 7 Exercises
v 3.1 Give the truth-tables of the abstract propositions of Exercise 2.4 .

./ 3.2 For which values of a, b and c one gets 0 in the truth-table of

(a 1\ (b =} c))=} ((b =} a) 1\ c)?

Chapter 4

The Boolean behaviour of

propositions

Truth is s t ranger than fict i on

4.1 Trut h-functions

We have seen that for each abstract proposition, we can make a truth-
table. Such a truth-table shows how different truth-values of the proposition
variables lead to the truth-value of the whole proposition. The number of
lines in such a truth-table depends on the number of proposition variables:
(1) For an abstract proposition with one proposition variable, one needs
two lines (one for 0 and one for 1). For example:

a •a a=? •a
0 1 1
1 0 0

(2) For an a bstract proposition with two proposition variables, one needs
four lines. For example:

a b •a •aVb
0 0 1 1
0 1 1 1
1 0 0 0
1 1 0 1
 ~1
28 CHAPTER 4. THE BOOLEAN BEHAVIOUR OF PROPOSITIONS J
(3) For an abstract proposition with three proposition variables, one needs
eight lines. See the two tables at the end of Section 3.2.

In general: a complete truth-table for an abstract proposition with k

proposition variables needs 2k lines for 0 and 1. This means that the number
of lines is exponential in the number of proposition variables.
To each truth-table, one can associate a function, which expresses how the
final result depends on the choice at the beginning. The above example (2)
gives the following function:

(~,~)
l
r-4 1
(0,1)r-41
(1,0)r-40
(1, 1) r-4 1.
Such a function is called a truth-function or a Boolean function, because
the values (right of r-4) can only be 0 or 1. The domain is in this case
the four-elements set {(0, 0), (0, 1), (1, 0), (1, 1)}, which is the set of all pairs
(a, b) where a E {0, 1} and bE {0, 1}.
The set of all pairs (a, b) with a E A and bE B, is called the Cartesian
product Ax B. In our case we have A= B = {0, 1}. Hence we can write
{0, 1} x {0, 1} instead of {(0,0), (0, 1), (1,0), (1, 1)}.

Remark 4.1.1 The Cartesian product is called after the French philoso-
pher Rene Descartes {1596 - 1650}, whose name is written in Latin as:
Cartesius. He wrote a famous book1 in which he explained what the 'scien-
tific method' is and why it is important. The character of the book is mainly
philosophical, but in an appendix, he applies his own ideas to develop a rel-
evant new area for that time: the analytical method, which is the theory of
algebraic similarities and their relation with geometry.

Let us call the above function f. Then for example, it holds that f(O, 1) =
1. From this, we see that the choice a = 0 and b = 1 leads to the value 1
for the whole proposition •a V b.
If we do the same for the abstract proposition (al\b)Vc (see Section 3.2),
then we get as domain for (a, b, c) a set of eight elements:
{(0, 0, 0)) (0, 0, 1), (0, 1) 0), (0, 1) 1)) (1) 0, 0)) (1) 0, 1), (1) 1) 0)) (1) 1) 1)}.
(We can also see this as a collection of all the sequences of Os and 1s, with
length 3. Such a sequence of length 3 is also called a triple. In general: the
1
R. Cartesius: Discours de la methode pour bien conduire sa roison et chercher la
verite dans les sciences, Leiden, 1637. .
4.1. TRUTH-FUNCTIONS 29

collection of all triples (a, b, c) with a E A , b E B and c E C, is called the

Cartesian product Ax B x C . Above, we have dealt with the special case
that A= B = C = {0, 1}. Hence, the above set of eight elements can be
denoted in a compact manner by {0, 1} x {0, 1} x {0, 1}.)
It can happen that different abstract propositions lead to the same Boo-
lean function. For example:

• The abstract propositions • a and a => •a have the same Boolean

function, namely:

See the above example (1).

• Also the abstract propositions a and ••a have the same Boolean
function:

~~0
{ 1~ 1

(See Section 3.3.)

• Naturally, the same holds for b and ••b:

~~0
{ 1~ 1

But be careful: this Boolean function ranges over the proposition vari-
able b and is therefore different from the previous one, which ranged
over a.

• The abstract propositions a => b and •a V b lead to the same Boolean

function. See the truth-table for => in Section 3.4 and the above
example (2), which we could summarize as follows:

a b a=>b •aVb a b I
!
0 0 1 1 (0, 0) ~ 1
0
1
1
1
0
1
1
0
1
1
0
1
(0,1)
(1 , 0)
(1,1)
~
~
~
1
0
1.
I
30 CHAPTER 4. THE BOOLEAN BEHAVIOUR OF PROPOSITIONS

It is not difficult to see that this table implies that any abst ract propo-
sition of the f orm P =;. Q is equivalent to one of the form -. P V Q .
Take for example P = c V d and Q = -.-.e. Then P =;. Q is equal to
(cVd) =;. -.-.e and -. PvQ is equal to -.(cV d)V -.-.e. If we now choose
values for c, d and e, then P gets a value (0 or 1) and so does Q. But
the value of P =;. Q is then equal to that of ...., p V Q, exactly like that
of a =;. b is equal to that of -.a V b for given values of a and b. Hence,
(c V d) =;. -.-.e (of the form P =;. Q) has - for every triple of values of
c, d and e - the same value as -.(c V d) V -.-.e (of the form ....,p V Q) .

4. 2 Classes of equivale·n t propositions

In the previous section, we saw t hat, given a truth-table of an abstract
proposition, one can build a corresponding trut h-function. Different ab-
stract propositions can however give t he same truth-function.
We will now turn this around . Suppose we have a truth-function. Which
propositions will then represent the truth-table to which t his t ruth-funct ion
applies?

For example, take t he truth-function f of t he previous section:

(~,~) ~ 1
! (0 , 1) ~ 1
(1,0)
(1,1)~1.
~ 0

We saw already t hat the abstract propositions a =;. b and -.a V b corre-
spond to this truth function. Are there any more? The answer is: yes, even
infinitely many. For example: b V •a (which is not surprising) , but also
-.b =;.-.a. We can still go further: -.a V (a =;. b) , (a<* b) V b, etc. (Can you
give a few more?)
The set of all abstract propositions wit h the above truth-function f is
called the class of abstract propositions wit h t his truth-function. We say
t hat all proposit ions in such a class are equivalent (i.e.: lead to the same -
Latin: aequus - column of values, namely the column that you find behind
t he ~'s in t he description of the truth-function).

Every truth-function can be related as above to a class of propositions.

This class is never empty, and contains an infinite number of propositions.
Let us look at another example, of a truth function that we call g, apd
which ranges over propositions with proposition variables b and c:
 . . CLASSES OF EQUIVALENT PROPOSITIONS 31
42

be

!
(0, 0) I-> 1
(0, 1) I-> 0
(1,0) I-> 1
(1, 1) I-> 0.

Also this function corresponds to a class of propositions, all being equiv-

alent by definition. We give some examples: (b V • b) 1\ • c, • (b 1\ • c) =>
(.-,b 1\ -..,c). If you don't believe it, then fo llow the above process to check it
for yourself.
There is an interesting abstract proposition in this class, namely •c. That
is, there is one in which the proposition variable b does not occur! Still, this
proposition satisfies the above scheme, as can easily be checked:

b c •C
0 0 1
0 1 0
1 0 1
1 1 0

So also • c corresponds to truth function g! Of course, •c fits also in a

simpler scheme, namely:

~.!!!~~.1 In this section we always began with the truth-function and

afterwards we looked for 'suitable' abstract propositions which fit this truth-
function . ~
Those who do not want to search wildly like above, can instead look for
such suitable propositions in a canonical (or standard) way. We give here
the canonical propositions that can be found from f and g. Detect, with
the use of these examples, the standard recipe for finding such propositions.
Check also that both examples 'make sense'.
For f: ( ( • a 1\ · b) V ( • a 1\ b)) V (a 1\ b).
For g: (·b 1\ •c) V (b 1\ • c).
You see that this principle works (except when the result is always 0, see
for this case Section 4.4), but the drawback is that you get fairly complex
ormulas.
32 CHAPTER 4. THE BOOLEAN BEHAVIOUR OF PROPOSITIONS

4.3 Equivalency of propositions

We called abstract propositions which lead to the same Boolean function,
equivalent (Section 4.2). We can also describe this notion of 'equivalence'
directly, by means of truth tables only (and not truth-functions). Suppose
P and Q are abstract propositions . How can we decide whether P and Q
are equivalent or not? The new procedu re is as follows:
(1) Firstly, determine the set of all proposition variables occurring in P
or Q (or in both). Assume there are n different ones, say a 1 up to an.
(2) Secondly, start a truth table, with all of these n variables on top of
then leftmost columns (the columns between the 'double bars') . This table
obviously has 2n lines.
(3) Thirdly, det ermine in this truth table what the truth values are for
the abstract proposition P , and also for Q.
(4) Finally, compare the two obtained columns, belonging to P and Q
respectively. If these columns are equal - so P has a 0 wherever Q has one,
and similarly for the ones - then P and Q are equivalent. If, however , the
columns are different {even if this is the case in only one position!), then
they are not equivalent.

From this procedural description it is clear, that a =} b is equivalent

to --.a V b (see the last table of Section 4.1) . Moreover, (a 1\ b) V c is not
equivalent to a 1\ (b V c) (see the final tables in section 3.2).
Another consequence of this pro~edure is, that a 1\ b is equivalent to b 1\ a,
but not equivalent to bl\c. The latter observation needs some consideration,
so think this over carefully!

So now we have two ways to determine equivalency of two proposition P

and Q:
(i) Find out whether P and Q correspond to the same truth-function.
(ii) Apply the procedure given above, on the basis of a truth table.
Of course, these two methods have much in common; both focus on the
columns of truth values which belong to the propositions.
Equivalence is important when you are not interested in the abstract
propositions themselves, but in their behavior as Boolean functions , i.e.
when you are only interested in how the truth/falsity of the whole propo-
sition depends on the truth/falsity of its proposition variables - which is
expressed in the column of truth values belonging to the proposition. This
is frequently the case in science, particularly in mathematics and computer
science: it does not matter much what the proposition looks like; important
is what its Boolean behavior is.
 TAUTOLOGIES AND CONTRADICTIONS 33

This means for example that , in practice, a proposition having the form
:::? Q can be exchanged with the equivalent proposition , p V Q, and
·ce versa. This exchange of one proposition by an eq uivalent one, is called
~vi
calculating with propositions. We return to t his point in detail in Chapter 6.

4.4 Tautologies and contradictions

For a given domain, for example {(0,0),(0,1) ,(1, 0),(1 , 1)} (which is also
written as {0, 1} x {0, 1} , see Section 4.1), there are two truth-functions
which have a special place: the function whose value is always 0 and the
function whose value is always 1 . We consider first the latter function : the
function which always gives function-value 1.
For (a,b) E {0,1} x {0,1} , t his function is as follows:

(~,~)

l
r-> 1
(0 , 1) r-> 1
(1 , 0) r-> 1
(1, 1)r-> l.
Such a function exists in every domain , for example , if c E {0, 1} :

{ ~ r-> 1
1 r-> 1.

All abstract propositions that have a truth-function which always returns

1, are called tautologies. These are abstract propositions which are always
true, no matter which proposition variables we use.
When working with logical formulas, it is useful to have a special abstract
proposition without any proposition variables and which always returns the
value 1. We call this proposit ion True . The proposition True is hence a
tau to logy (always true). •

Here are some examples of abstract proposit ions which a re tautologies:

(0) With 0 proposit ion variables, we only have True .

( 1) As tautologies with one proposition variable we take:

b V · b ('to be or not to be' ), a => a, a <=? a, c <=? ••c.

(2) Of t he tautologies with two proposition variables we give:

a=> (b =>a) and (a=> b) <=? (•b => •a)
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Schopenhauer's fundamental misunderstanding of the will (just as
though passion, instinct, and desire were the essential factors of
will) is typical: the depreciation of the will to the extent of mistaking
it altogether. Likewise the hatred of willing: the attempt at seeing
something superior—yea, even superiority itself, and that which
really matters, in non-willing, in the "subject-being without aim or
intention." Great symptom of fatigue or of the weakness of will: for
this, in reality, is what treats the passions as master, and directs
them as to the way and to the measure....

85.
The undignified attempt has been made to regard Wagner and
Schopenhauer as types of the mentally unsound: an infinitely more
essential understanding of the matter would have been gained if the
exact decadent type which each of them represents had been
scientifically and accurately defined.

86.
In my opinion, Henrik Ibsen has become very German. With all his
robust idealism and "Will to Truth," he never dared to ring himself
free from moral-illusionism which says "freedom," and will not admit,
even to itself, what freedom is: the second stage in the
metamorphosis of the "Will to Power" in him who lacks it. In the first
stage, one demands justice at the hands of those who have power.
In the second, one speaks of "freedom," that is to say, one wishes to
"shake oneself free" from those who have power. In the third stage,
one speaks of "equal rights"—that is to say, so long as one is not a
predominant personality one wishes to prevent one's competitors
from growing in power.

87.
The Decline of Protestantism: theoretically and historically
understood as a half-measure. Undeniable predominance of
Catholicism to-day: Protestant feeling is so dead that the strongest
anti-Protestant movements (Wagner's Parsifal, for instance) are no
longer regarded as such. The whole of the more elevated
intellectuality in France is Catholic in instinct; Bismarck recognised
that there was no longer any such thing as Protestantism.

88.
Protestantism, that spiritually unclean and tiresome form of
decadence, in which Christianity has known how to survive in the
mediocre North, is something incomplete and complexly valuable for
knowledge, in so far as it was able to bring experiences of different
kinds and origins into the same heads.

89.
What has the German spirit not made out of Christianity! And, to
refer to Protestantism again, how much beer is there not still in
Protestant Christianity! Can a crasser, more indolent, and more
lounging form of Christian belief be imagined, than that of the
average German Protestant?... It is indeed a very humble
Christianity. I call it the Homœopathy of Christianity! I am reminded
that, to-day, there also exists a less humble sort of Protestantism; it
is taught by royal chaplains and anti-Semitic speculators: but nobody
has ever maintained that any "spirit" "hovers" over these waters. It
is merely a less respectable form of Christian faith, not by any
means a more comprehensible one.

90.
Progress.—Let us be on our guard lest we deceive ourselves! Time
flies forward apace,—we would fain believe that everything flies
forward with it,—that evolution is an advancing development.... That
is the appearance of things which deceives the most circumspect.
But the nineteenth century shows no advance whatever on the
sixteenth: and the German spirit of 1888 is an example of a
backward movement when compared with that of 1788.... Mankind
does not advance, it does not even exist. The aspect of the whole is
much more like that of a huge experimenting workshop where some
things in all ages succeed, while an incalculable number of things
fail; where all order, logic, co-ordination, and responsibility is lacking.
How dare we blink the fact that the rise of Christianity is a decadent
movement?—that the German Reformation was a recrudescence of
Christian barbarism?—that the Revolution destroyed the instinct for
an organisation of society on a large scale?... Man is not an example
of progress as compared with animals: the tender son of culture is
an abortion compared with the Arab or the Corsican; the Chinaman
is a more successful type—that is to say, richer in sustaining power
than the European.

(b) The Last Centuries.

91.
Gloominess and pessimistic influence necessarily follow in the wake
of enlightenment. Towards 1770 a falling-off in cheerfulness was
already noticeable; women, with that very feminine instinct which
always defends virtue, believed that immorality was the cause of it.
Galiani hit the bull's eye: he quotes Voltaire's verse:
"Un monstre gai vaut mieux
Qu'un sentimental ennuyeux."
If now I maintain that I am ahead, by a century or two of
enlightenment, of Voltaire and Galiani—who was much more
profound, how deeply must I have sunk into gloominess! This is also
true, and betimes I somewhat reluctantly manifested some caution
in regard to the German and Christian narrowness and inconsistency
of Schopenhauerian or, worse still, Leopardian Pessimism, and
sought the most characteristic form (Asia). But, in order to endure
that extreme Pessimism (which here and there peeps out of my Birth
of Tragedy), to live alone "without God or morality," I was compelled
to invent a counter-prop for myself. Perhaps I know best why man is
the only animal that laughs: he alone surfers so excruciatingly that
he was compelled to invent laughter. The unhappiest and most
melancholy animal is, as might have been expected, the most
cheerful.

92.
In regard to German culture, I have always had a feeling as of
decline. The fact that I learned to know a declining form of culture
has often made me unfair towards the whole phenomenon of
European culture. The Germans always follow at some distance
behind: they always go to the root of things, for instance:—
Dependance upon foreigners; Kant—Rousseau, the sensualists,
Hume, Swedenborg.
Schopenhauer—the Indians and Romanticism, Voltaire.
Wagner—the French cult of the ugly and of grand opera, Paris, and
the flight into primitive barbarism (the marriage of brother and
sister).
The law of the laggard (the provinces go to Paris, Germany goes to
France).
How is it that precisely Germans discovered the Greek (the more an
instinct is developed, the more it is tempted to run for once into its
opposite).
Music is the last breath of every culture.

93.
Renaissance and Reformation.—What does the Renaissance prove?
That the reign of the "individual" can be only a short one. The
output is too great; there is not even the possibility of husbanding or
of capitalising forces, and exhaustion sets in step by step. These are
times when everything is squandered, when even the strength itself
with which one collects, capitalises, and heaps riches upon riches, is
squandered. Even the opponents of such movements are driven to
preposterous extremes in the dissipation of their strength: and they
too are very soon exhausted, used up, and completely sapped.
In the Reformation we are face to face with a wild and plebeian
counterpart of the Italian Renaissance, generated by similar
impulses, except that the former, in the backward and still vulgar
North, had to assume a religious form—there the concept of a
higher life had not yet been divorced from that of a religious one.
Even the Reformation was a movement for individual liberty; "every
one his own priest" is really no more than a formula for libertinage.
As a matter of fact, the words "Evangelical freedom" would have
sufficed—and all instincts which had reasons for remaining
concealed broke out like wild hounds, the most brutal needs
suddenly acquired the courage to show themselves, everything
seemed justified ... men refused to specify the kind of freedom they
had aimed at, they preferred to shut their eyes. But the fact that
their eyes were closed and that their lips were moistened with
gushing orations, did not prevent their hands from being ready to
snatch at whatever there was to snatch at, that the belly became
the god of the "free gospel," and that all lusts of revenge and of
hatred were indulged with insatiable fury.
This lasted for a while: then exhaustion supervened, just as it had
done in Southern Europe; and again here, it was a low form of
exhaustion, a sort of general ruere in servitium.... Then the
disreputable century of Germany dawned.

94.
Chivalry—the position won by power: its gradual break-up (and
partial transference to broader and more bourgeois spheres). In the
case of Larochefoucauld we find a knowledge of the actual impulses
of a noble temperament—together with the gloomy Christian
estimate of these impulses.
The protraction of Christianity through the French Revolution. The
seducer is Rousseau; he once again liberates woman, who
thenceforward is always represented as ever more interesting—
suffering. Then come the slaves and Mrs. Beecher-Stowe. Then the
poor and the workmen. Then the vicious and the sick—all this is
drawn into the foreground (even for the purpose of disposing people
in favour of the genius, it has been customary for five hundred years
to press him forward as the great sufferer!). Then comes the cursing
of all voluptuousness (Baudelaire and Schopenhauer), the most
decided conviction that the lust of power is the greatest vice;
absolute certainty that morality and disinterestedness are identical
things; that the "happiness of all" is a goal worth striving after (i.e.,
Christ's Kingdom of Heaven). We are on the best road to it: the
Kingdom of Heaven of the poor in spirit has begun.—Intermediate
stages: the bourgeois (as a result of the nouveau riche) and the
workman (as a result of the machine).
Greek and French culture of the time of Louis XIV. compared. A
decided belief in oneself. A leisure-class which makes things hard for
itself and exercises a great deal of self-control. The power of form,
the will to form oneself. "Happiness" acknowledged as a purpose.
Much strength and energy behind all formality of manners. Pleasure
at the sight of a life that is seemingly so easy. The Greeks seemed
like children to the French.

95.
The Three Centuries.
Their different kinds of sensitiveness may perhaps be best expressed
as follows:—
Aristocracy: Descartes, the reign of reason, evidence showing the
sovereignty of the will.
Feminism: Rousseau, the reign of feeling, evidence showing the
sovereignty of the senses; all lies.
Animalism: Schopenhauer, the reign of passion, evidence showing
the sovereignty of animality, more honest, but gloomy.
The seventeenth century is aristocratic, all for order, haughty
towards everything animal, severe in regard to the heart, "austere,"
and even free from sentiment, "non-German," averse to all that is
burlesque and natural, generalising and maintaining an attitude of
sovereignty towards the past for it believes in itself. At bottom it
partakes very much of the beast of prey, and practises asceticism in
order to remain master. It is the century of strength of will, as also
that of strong passion.
The eighteenth century is dominated by woman, it is gushing,
spiritual, and flat; but with intellect at the service of aspirations and
of the heart, it is a libertine in the pleasures of intellect, undermining
all authorities; emotionally intoxicated, cheerful, clear, humane, and
sociable, false to itself and at bottom very rascally....
The nineteenth century is more animal, more subterranean, hateful,
realistic, plebeian, and on that very account "better," "more honest,"
more submissive to "reality" of what kind soever, and truer; but
weak of will, sad, obscurely exacting and fatalistic. It has no feeling
of timidity or reverence, either in the presence of "reason" or the
"heart"; thoroughly convinced of the dominion of the desires
(Schopenhauer said "Will," but nothing is more characteristic of his
philosophy than that it entirely lacks all actual willing). Even morality
is reduced to an instinct ("Pity").
Auguste Comte is the continuation of the eighteenth century (the
dominion of the heart over the head, sensuality in the theory of
knowledge, altruistic exaltation).
The fact that science has become as sovereign as it is to-day, proves
how the nineteenth century has emancipated itself from the
dominion of ideals. A certain absence of "needs" and wishes makes
our scientific curiosity and rigour possible—this is our kind of virtue.
Romanticism is the counterstroke of the eighteenth century; a sort
of accumulated longing for its grand style of exaltation (as a matter
of fact, largely mingled with mummery and self-deception: the desire
was to represent strong nature and strong passion).
The nineteenth century instinctively goes in search of theories by
means of which it may feel its fatalistic, submission to the empire of
facts justified. Hegel's success against sentimentality and romantic
idealism was already a sign of its fatalistic trend of thought, in its
belief that superior reason belongs to the triumphant side, and in its
justification of the actual "state" (in the place of "humanity," etc.).—
Schopenhauer: we are something foolish, and at the best self-
suppressive. The success of determinism, the genealogical derivation
of obligations which were formerly held to be absolute, the teaching
of environment and adaptation, the reduction of will to a process of
reflex movement, the denial of the will as a "working cause"; finally
—a real process of re-christening: so little will is observed that the
word itself becomes available for another purpose. Further theories:
the teaching of objectivity, "will-less" contemplation, as the only road
to truth, as also to beauty (also the belief in "genius," in order to
have the right to be submissive); mechanism, the determinable
rigidity of the mechanical process; so-called "Naturalism," the
elimination of the choosing, directing, interpreting subject, on
principle.
Kant, with his "practical reason," with his moral fanaticism, is quite
eighteenth century style; still completely outside the historical
movement, without any notion whatsoever of the reality of his time,
for instance, revolution; he is not affected by Greek philosophy; he is
a phantasist of the notion of duty, a sensualist with a hidden leaning
to dogmatic pampering.
The return to Kant in our century means a return to the eighteenth
century, people desire to create themselves a right to the old ideas
and to the old exaltation—hence a theory of knowledge which
"describes limits," that is to say, which admits of the option of fixing
a Beyond to the domain of reason.
Hegel's way of thinking is not so very far removed from that of
Goethe: see the latter on the subject of Spinoza, for instance. The
will to deify the All and Life, in order to find both peace and
happiness in contemplating them: Hegel looks for reason
everywhere—in the presence of reason man may be submissive and
resigned. In Goethe we find a kind of fatalism which is almost joyous
and confiding, which neither revolts nor weakens, which strives to
make a totality out of itself, in the belief that only in totality does
everything seem good and justified, and find itself resolved.

96.
The period of rationalism—followed by a period of sentimentality. To
what extent does Schopenhauer come under "sentimentality"?
(Hegel under intellectuality?)

97.
The seventeenth century suffers from humanity as from a host of
contradictions ("l'amas de contradictions" that we are); it
endeavours to discover man, to co-ordinate him, to excavate him:
whereas the eighteenth century tries to forget what is known of
man's nature, in order to adapt him to its Utopia. "Superficial, soft,
humane"—gushes over "humanity."
The seventeenth century tries to banish all traces of the individual in
order that the artist's work may resemble life as much as possible.
The eighteenth century strives to create interest in the author by
means of the work. The seventeenth century seeks art in art, a piece
of culture; the eighteenth uses art in its propaganda for political and
social reforms.
"Utopia," the "ideal man," the deification of Nature, the vanity of
making one's own personality the centre of interest, subordination to
the propaganda of social ideas, charlatanism—all this we derive from
the eighteenth century.
The style of the seventeenth century: propre exact et libre.
The strong individual who is self-sufficient, or who appeals ardently
to God—and that obtrusiveness and indiscretion of modern authors
—these things are opposites. "Showing-oneself-off"—what a contrast
to the Scholars of Port-Royal!
Alfieri had a sense for the grand style.
The hate of the burlesque (that which lacks dignity), the lack of a
sense of Nature belongs to the seventeenth century.

98.
Against Rousseau.—Alas! man is no longer sufficiently evil;
Rousseau's opponents, who say that "man is a beast of prey," are
unfortunately wrong. Not the corruption of man, but the softening
and moralising of him is the curse. In the sphere which Rousseau
attacked most violently, the relatively strongest and most successful
type of man was still to be found (the type which still possessed the
great passions intact: Will to Power, Will to Pleasure, the Will and
Ability to Command). The man of the eighteenth century must be
compared with the man of the Renaissance (also with the man of
the seventeenth century in France) if the matter is to be understood
at all: Rousseau is a symptom of self-contempt and of inflamed
vanity—both signs that the dominating will is lacking: he moralises
and seeks the cause of his own misery after the style of a revengeful
man in the ruling classes.

99.
Voltaire—Rousseau.—A state of nature is terrible; man is a beast of
prey: our civilisation is an extraordinary triumph over this beast of
prey in nature—this was Voltaires conclusion. He was conscious of
the mildness, the refinements, the intellectual joys of the civilised
state; he despised obtuseness, even in the form of virtue, and the
lack of delicacy even in ascetics and monks.
The moral depravity of man seemed to pre-occupy Rousseau; the
words "unjust," "cruel," are the best possible for the purpose of
exciting the instincts of the oppressed, who otherwise find
themselves under the ban of the vetitum and of disgrace; so that
their conscience is opposed to their indulging any insurrectional
desires. These emancipators seek one thing above all: to give their
party the great accents and attitudes of higher Nature.

100.
Rousseau; the rule founded on sentiment; Nature as the source of
justice; man perfects himself in proportion as he approaches Nature
(according to Voltaire, in proportion as he leaves Nature behind).
The very same periods seem to the one to demonstrate the progress
of humanity and, to the other, the increase of injustice and
inequality.
Voltaire, who still understood umanità in the sense of the
Renaissance, as also virtù (as "higher culture"), fights for the cause
of the "honnêtes gens" "la bonne compagnie" taste, science, arts,
and even for the cause of progress and civilisation.
The flare-up occurred towards 1760: On the one hand the citizen of
Geneva, on the other le seigneur de Ferney. It is only from that
moment and henceforward that Voltaire was the man of his age, the
philosopher, the representative of Toleration and of Disbelief
(theretofore he had been merely un bel esprit). His envy and hatred
of Rousseau's success forced him upwards.
"Pour 'la canaille' un dieu rémunérateur et vengeur"—Voltaire.
The criticism of both standpoints in regard to the value of
civilisation. To Voltaire nothing seems finer than the social invention:
there is no higher goal than to uphold and perfect it. L'honnêteté
consists precisely in respecting social usage; virtue in a certain
obedience towards various necessary "prejudices" which favour the
maintenance of society. Missionary of Culture, aristocrat,
representative of the triumphant and ruling classes and their values.
But Rousseau remained a plebeian, even as hommes de lettres, this
was preposterous; his shameless contempt for everything that was
not himself.
The morbid feature in Rousseau is the one which happens to have
been most admired and imitated. (Lord Byron resembled him
somewhat, he too screwed himself up to sublime attitudes and to
revengeful rage—a sign of vulgarity; later on, when Venice restored
his equilibrium, he understood what alleviates most and does the
most good ... l'insouciance.)
In spite of his antecedents, Rousseau is proud of himself; but he is
incensed if he is reminded of his origin....
In Rousseau there was undoubtedly some brain trouble; in Voltaire—
rare health and lightsomeness. The revengefulness of the sick; his
periods of insanity as also those of his contempt of man, and of his
mistrust.
Rousseau's defence of Providence (against Voltaire's Pessimism): he
had need of God in order to be able to curse society and civilisation;
everything must be good per se, because God had created it; man
alone has corrupted man. The "good man" as a man of Nature was
pure fantasy; but with the dogma of God's authorship he became
something probable and even not devoid of foundation.
Romanticism à la Rousseau: passion ("the sovereign right of
passion"); "naturalness"; the fascination of madness (foolishness
reckoned as greatness); the senseless vanity of the weak; the
revengefulness of the masses elevated to the position of justice ("in
politics, for one hundred years, the leader has always been this
invalid").

101.
Kant: makes the scepticism of Englishmen, in regard to the theory of
knowledge, possible for Germans.
(1) By enlisting in its cause the interest of the German's religious
and moral needs: just as the new academicians used scepticism for
the same reasons, as a preparation for Platonism (vide Augustine);
just as Pascal even used moral scepticism in order to provoke (to
justify) the need of belief;
(2) By complicating and entangling it with scholastic flourishes in
view of making it more acceptable to the German's scientific taste in
form (for Locke and Hume, alone, were too illuminating, too clear—
that is to say, judged according to the German valuing instinct, "too
superficial").
Kant: a poor psychologist and mediocre judge of human nature,
made hopeless mistakes in regard to great historical values (the
French Revolution); a moral fanatic à la Rousseau; with a
subterranean current of Christian values; a thorough dogmatist, but
bored to extinction by this tendency, to the extent of wishing to
tyrannise over it, but quickly tired, even of 'scepticism; and not yet
affected by any cosmopolitan thought or antique beauty ... a
dawdler and a go-between, not at all original (like Leibnitz,
something between mechanism and spiritualism; like Goethe,
something between the taste of the eighteenth century and that of
the "historical sense" [which is essentially a sense of exoticism]; like
German music, between French and Italian music; like Charles the
Great, who mediated and built bridges between the Roman Empire
and Nationalism—a dawdler par excellence).

102.
In what respect have the Christian centuries with their Pessimism
been stronger centuries than the eighteenth—and how do they
correspond with the tragic age of the Greeks?
The nineteenth century versus the eighteenth. How was it an heir?—
how was it a step backwards from the latter? (more lacking in
"spirit" and in taste)—how did it show an advance on the latter?
(more gloomy, more realistic, stronger).

103.
How can we explain the fact that we feel something in common with
the Campagna romana? And the high mountain chain?
Chateaubriand in a letter to M. de Fontanes in 1803 writes his first
impression of the Campagna romana.
The President de Brosses says of the Campagna romana: "Il fallait
que Romulus fût ivre quand il songea à bâtir une ville dans un
terrain aussi laid."
Even Delacroix would have nothing to do with Rome, it frightened
him. He loved Venice, just as Shakespeare, Byron, and Georges Sand
did. Théophile Gautier's and Richard Wagner's dislike of Rome must
not be forgotten.
Lamartine has the language for Sorrento and Posilippo.
Victor Hugo raves about Spain, "parce que aucune autre nation n'a
moins emprunté à l'antiquité, parce qu'elle n'a subi aucune influence
classique."

104.
The two great attempts that were made to overcome the eighteenth
century:
Napoleon, in that he called man, the soldier, and the great struggle
for power, to life again, and conceived Europe as a political power.
Goethe, in that he imagined a European culture which would consist
of the whole heritage of what humanity had attained to up to his
time.
German culture in this century inspires mistrust—the music of the
period lacks that complete element which liberates and binds as
well, to wit—Goethe.
The pre-eminence of music in the romanticists of 1830 and 1840.
Delacroix. Ingres—a passionate musician (admired Gluck, Haydn,
Beethoven, Mozart), said to his pupils in Rome: "Si je pouvais vous
rendre tous musiciens, vous y gagneriez comme peintres"—likewise
Horace Vernet, who was particularly fond of Don Juan (as
Mendelssohn assures us, 1831); Stendhal, too, who says of himself:
"Combien de lieues ne ferais-je pas à pied, et à combien de jours de
prison ne me soumetterais-je pas pour entendre Don Juan ou le
Matrimonio segreto; et je ne sais pour quelle autre chose je ferais
cet effort." He was then fifty-six years old.
The borrowed forms, for instance: Brahms as a typical "Epigone,"
likewise Mendelssohn's cultured Protestantism (a former "soul" is
turned into poetry posthumously ...)
—the moral and poetical substitutions in Wagner, who used one art
as a stop-gap to make up for what another lacked.
—the "historical sense," inspiration derived from poems, sagas.
—that characteristic transformation of which G. Flaubert is the most
striking example among Frenchmen, and Richard Wagner the most
striking example among Germans, shows how the romantic belief in
love and the future changes into a longing for nonentity in 1830-50.

106.
How is it that German music reaches its culminating point in the age
of German romanticism? How is it that German music lacks Goethe?
On the other hand, how much Schiller, or more exactly, how much
"Thekla"[5] is there not in Beethoven!
Schumann has Eichendorff, Uhland, Heine, Hoffman, Tieck, in him.
Richard Wagner has Freischütz, Hoffmann, Grimm, the romantic
Saga, the mystic Catholicism of instinct, symbolism, "the free-
spiritedness of passion" (Rousseau's intention). The Flying Dutchman
savours of France, where le ténébreux (1830) was the type of the
seducer.
The cult of music, the revolutionary romanticism of form. Wagner
synthesises German and French romanticism.
 [5] Thekla is the sentimental heroine in Schiller's Wallenstein.—
TRANSLATOR'S NOTE.

107.
From the point of view only of his value to Germany and to German
culture, Richard Wagner is still a great problem, perhaps a German
misfortune: in any case, however, a fatality. But what does it matter?
Is he not very much more than a German event? It also seems to
me that to no country on earth is he less related than to Germany;
nothing was prepared there for his advent; his whole type is simply
strange amongst Germans; there he stands in their midst,
wonderful, misunderstood, incomprehensible. But people carefully
avoid acknowledging this: they are too kind, too square-headed—too
German for that. "Credo quia absurdus est": thus did the German
spirit wish it to be, in this case too—hence it is content meanwhile to
believe everything Richard Wagner wanted to have believed about
himself. In all ages the spirit of Germany has been deficient in
subtlety and divining powers concerning psychological matters. Now
that it happens to be under the high pressure of patriotic nonsense
and self-adoration, it is visibly growing thicker and coarser: how
could it therefore be equal to the problem of Wagner!

108.
The Germans are not yet anything, but they are becoming
something; that is why they have not yet any culture;—that is why
they cannot yet have any culture!—They are not yet anything: that
means they are all kinds of things. They are becoming something:
that means that they will one day cease from being all kinds of
things. The latter is at bottom only a wish, scarcely a hope yet.
Fortunately it is a wish with which one can live, a question of will, of
work, of discipline, a question of training, as also of resentment, of
longing, of privation, of discomfort,—yea, even of bitterness,—in
short, we Germans will get something out of ourselves, something
that has not yet been wanted of us—we want something more!
That this "German, as he is not as yet"—has a right to something
better than the present German "culture"; that all who wish to
become something better, must wax angry when they perceive a
sort of contentment, an impudent "setting-oneself-at-ease," or "a
process of self-censing," in this quarter: that is my second principle,
in regard to which my opinions have not yet changed.

(c) Signs of Increasing Strength.

109.
First Principle: everything that characterises modern men savours of
decay: but side by side with the prevailing sickness there are signs
of a strength and powerfulness of soul which are still untried. The
same causes which tend to promote the belittling of men, also force
the stronger and rarer individuals upwards to greatness.

110.
General survey: the ambiguous character of our modern world—
precisely the same symptoms might at the same time be indicative
of either decline or strength. And the signs of strength and of
emancipation dearly bought, might in view of traditional (or
hereditary) appreciations concerned with the feelings, be
misunderstood as indications of weakness. In short, feeling, as a
means of fixing valuations, is not on a level with the times.
Generalised: Every valuation is always backward; it is merely the
expression of the conditions which favoured survival and growth in a
much earlier age: it struggles against new conditions of existence
out of which it did not arise, and which it therefore necessarily
misunderstands: it hinders, and excites suspicion against, all that is
new.

111.
The problem of the nineteenth century.—To discover whether its
strong and weak side belong to each other. Whether they have been
cut from one and the same piece. Whether the variety of its ideals
and their contradictions are conditioned by a higher purpose:
whether they are something higher.—For it might be the prerequisite
of greatness, that growth should take place amid such violent
tension. Dissatisfaction, Nihilism, might be a good sign.

112.
General survey.—As a matter of fact, all abundant growth involves a
concomitant process of crumbling to bits and decay: suffering and
the symptoms of decline belong to ages of enormous progress;
every fruitful and powerful movement of mankind has always
brought about a concurrent Nihilistic movement. Under certain
circumstances, the appearance of the extremest form of Pessimism
and actual Nihilism might be the sign of a process of incisive and
most essential growth, and of mankind's transit into completely new
conditions of existence. This is what I have understood.

113.
A.
Starting out with a thoroughly courageous appreciation of our men
of to-day:—we must not allow ourselves to be deceived by
appearance: this mankind is much less effective, but it gives quite
different pledges of lasting strength, its tempo is slower, but the
rhythm itself is richer. Healthiness is increasing, the real conditions of
a healthy body are on the point of being known, and will gradually
be created, "asceticism" is regarded with irony. The fear of
extremes, a certain confidence in the "right way," no raving: a
periodical self-habituation to narrower values (such as "mother-
land," "science," etc.).
This whole picture, however, would still be ambiguous: it might be a
movement either of increase or decline in Life.
B.
The belief in "progress"—in lower spheres of intelligence, appears as
increasing life: but this is self-deception;

in higher spheres of intelligence it is a sign of declining life.

Description of the symptoms.

The unity of the aspect: uncertainty in regard to the standard of
valuation.
Fear of a general "in vain."
Nihilism.

114.
As a matter of fact, we are no longer so urgently in need of an
antidote against the first Nihilism: Life is no longer so uncertain,
accidental, and senseless in modern Europe. All such tremendous
exaggeration of the value of men, of the value of evil, etc., are not
so necessary now; we can endure a considerable diminution of this
value, we may grant a great deal of nonsense and accident: the
power man has acquired now allows of a lowering of the means of
discipline, of which the strongest was the moral interpretation of the
universe. The hypothesis "God" is much too extreme.

115.
If anything shows that our humanisation is a genuine sign of
progress, it is the fact that we no longer require excessive
contraries, that we no longer require contraries at all....
We may love the senses; for we have spiritualised them in every way
and made them artistic;
We have a right to all things which hitherto have been most
calumniated.

116.
The reversal of the order of rank.—Those pious counterfeiters—the
priests—are becoming Chandala in our midst:—they occupy the
position of the charlatan, of the quack, of the counterfeiter, of the
sorcerer: we regard them as corrupters of the will, as the great
slanderers and vindictive enemies of Life, and as the rebels among
the bungled and the botched. We have made our middle class out of
our servant-caste—the Sudra—that is to say, our people or the body
which wields the political power.
On the other hand, the Chandala of former times is paramount: the
blasphemers, the immoralists, the independents of all kinds, the
artists, the Jews, the minstrels—and, at bottom, all disreputable
classes are in the van.
We have elevated ourselves to honourable thoughts,—even more,
we determine what honour is on earth,—"nobility." ... All of us to-
day are advocates of life.—We Immoralists are to-day the strongest
power: the other great powers are in need of us ... we re-create the
world in our own image.
We have transferred the label "Chandala" to the priests, the
backworldsmen, and to the deformed Christian society which has
become associated with these people, together with creatures of like
origin, the pessimists, Nihilists, romanticists of pity, criminals, and
men of vicious habits—the whole sphere in which the idea of "God"
is that of Saviour....
We are proud of being no longer obliged to be liars, slanderers, and
detractors of Life....
 117.
The advance of the nineteenth century upon the eighteenth (at
bottom we good Europeans are carrying on a war against the
eighteenth century):
(1) "The return to Nature" is getting to be understood, ever more
definitely, in a way which is quite the reverse of that in which
Rousseau used the phrase—away from idylls and operas!
(2) Ever more decided, more anti-idealistic, more objective, more
fearless, more industrious, more temperate, more suspicious of
sudden changes, anti-revolutionary;
(3) The question of bodily health is being pressed ever more
decidedly in front of the health of "the soul": the latter is regarded
as a condition brought about by the former, and bodily health is
believed to be, at least, the prerequisite to spiritual health.

118.
If anything at all has been achieved, it is a more innocent attitude
towards the senses, a happier, more favourable demeanour in regard
to sensuality, resembling rather the position taken up by Goethe; a
prouder feeling has also been developed in knowledge, and the
"reine Thor"[6] meets with little faith.
[6] This is a reference to Wagner's Parsifal. The character as is
well known, is written to represent a son of heart's affliction, and
a child of wisdom—humble, guileless, loving, pure, and a fool.—
TRANSLATOR'S NOTE.

119.
We "objective people."—It is not "pity" that opens up the way for us
to all that is most remote and most strange in life and culture; but
our accessibility and ingenuousness, which precisely does not "pity,"
but rather takes pleasure in hundreds of things which formerly
caused pain (which in former days either outraged or moved us, or
in the presence of which we were either hostile or indifferent). Pain
in all its various phases is now interesting to us: on that account we
are certainly not the more pitiful, even though the sight of pain may
shake us to our foundations and move us to tears: and we are
absolutely not inclined to be more helpful in view thereof.
In this deliberate desire to look on at all pain and error, we have
grown stronger and more powerful than in the eighteenth century; it
is a proof of our increase of strength (we have drawn closer to the
seventeenth and sixteenth centuries). But it is a profound mistake to
regard our "romanticism" as a proof of our "beautified souls." We
want stronger sensations than all coarser ages and classes have
wanted. (This fact must not be confounded with the needs of
neurotics and decadents; in their case, of course, there is a craving
for pepper —even for cruelty.)
We are all seeking conditions which are emancipated from the
bourgeois, and to a greater degree from the priestly, notion of
morality (every book which savours at all of priestdom and theology
gives us the impression of pitiful niaiserie and mental indigence).
"Good company," in fact, finds everything insipid which is not
forbidden and considered compromising in bourgeois circles; and the
case is the same with books, music, politics, and opinions on
women.

120.
The simplification of man in the nineteenth century (The eighteenth
century was that of elegance, subtlety, and generous feeling).—Not
"return to nature"; for no natural humanity has ever existed yet.
Scholastic, unnatural, and antinatural values are the rule and the
beginning; man only reaches Nature after a long struggle—he never
turns his "back" to her.... To be natural means, to dare to be as
immoral as Nature is.
We are coarser, more direct, richer in irony towards generous
feelings, even when we are beneath them.
Our haute volée, the society consisting of our rich and leisured men,
is more natural: people hunt each other, the love of the sexes is a
kind of sport in which marriage is both a charm and an obstacle;
people entertain each other and live for the sake of pleasure; bodily
advantages stand in the first rank, and curiosity and daring are the
rule.
Our attitude towards knowledge is more natural; we are innocent in
our absolute spiritual debauchery, we hate pathetic and hieratic
manners, we delight in that which is most strictly prohibited, we
should scarcely recognise any interest in knowledge if we were
bored in acquiring it.
Our attitude to morality is also more natural. Principles have become
a laughing-stock; no one dares to speak of his "duty," unless in
irony. But a helpful, benevolent disposition is highly valued. (Morality
is located in instinct and the rest is despised. Besides this there are
few points of honour.)
Our attitude to politics is more natural: we see problems of power, of
the quantum of power, against another quantum. We do not believe
in a right that does not proceed from a power which is able to
uphold it. We regard all rights as conquests.
Our valuation of great men and things is more natural: we regard
passion as a privilege; we can conceive of nothing great which does
not involve a great crime; all greatness is associated in our minds
with a certain standing-beyond-the-pale in morality.
Our attitude to Nature is more natural: we no longer love her for her
"innocence," her "reason," her "beauty," we have made her
beautifully devilish and "foolish." But instead of despising her on that
account, since then we have felt more closely related to her and
more familiar in her presence. She does not aspire to virtue: we
therefore respect her.
Our attitude towards Art is more natural: we do not exact beautiful,
empty lies, etc., from her; brutal positivism reigns supreme, and it
ascertains things with perfect calm.
In short: there are signs showing that the European of the
nineteenth century is less ashamed of his instincts; he has gone a
long way towards acknowledging his unconditional naturalness and
immorality, without bitterness: on the contrary, he is strong enough
to endure this point of view alone.
To some ears this will sound as though corruption had made strides:
and certain it is that man has not drawn nearer to the "Nature"
which Rousseau speaks about, but has gone one step farther in the
civilisation before which Rousseau stood in horror. We have grown
stronger, we have drawn nearer to the seventeenth century, more
particularly to the taste which reigned towards its close (Dancourt,
Le Sage, Renard).

121.
Culture versus Civilisation.—The culminating stages of culture and
civilisation lie apart: one must not be led astray as regards the
fundamental antagonism existing between culture and civilisation.
From the moral standpoint, great periods in the history of culture
have always been periods of corruption; while on the other hand,
those periods in which man was deliberately and compulsorily tamed
("civilisation") have always been periods of intolerance towards the
most intellectual and most audacious natures. Civilisation desires
something different from what culture strives after: their aims may
perhaps be opposed....

122.
What I warn people against: confounding the instincts of decadence
with those of humanity;
Confounding the dissolving means of civilisation and those which
necessarily promote decadence, with culture;
Confounding debauchery, and the principle, "laisser aller," with the
Will to Power (the latter is the exact reverse of the former).
 123.
The unsolved problems which I set anew: the problem of civilisation,
the struggle between Rousseau and Voltaire about the year 1760.
Man becomes deeper, more mistrustful, more "immoral," stronger,
more self-confident—and therefore "more natural"; that is
"progress." In this way, by a process of division of labour, the more
evil strata and the milder and tamer strata of society get separated:
so that the general facts are not visible at first sight.... It is a sign of
strength, and of the self-control and fascination of the strong, that
these stronger strata possess the arts in order to make their greater
powers for evil felt as something "higher" As soon as there is
"progress" there is a transvaluation of the strengthened factors into
the "good."

124.
Man must have the courage of his natural instincts restored to him.
—
The poor opinion he has of himself must be destroyed (not in the
sense of the individual, but in the sense of the natural man ...)—
The contradictions in things must be eradicated, after it has been
well understood that we were responsible for them—
Social idiosyncrasies must be stamped out of existence (guilt,
punishment, justice, honesty, freedom, love, etc. etc.)—
An advance towards "naturalness": in all political questions, even in
the relations between parties, even in merchants', workmen's, or
contractors' parties, only questions of power come into play:— "what
one can do" is the first question, what one ought to do is only a
secondary consideration.

125.
Socialism—or the tyranny of the meanest and the most brainless,—
that is to say, the superficial, the envious, and the mummers,
brought to its zenith,—is, as a matter, of fact, the logical conclusion
of "modern ideas" and their latent anarchy: but in the genial
atmosphere of democratic well-being the capacity for forming
resolutions or even for coming to an end at all, is paralysed. Men
follow—but no longer their reason. That is why socialism is on the
whole a hopelessly bitter affair: and there is nothing more amusing
than to observe the discord between the poisonous and desperate
faces of present-day socialists—and what wretched and nonsensical
feelings does not their style reveal to us!—and the childish lamblike
happiness of their hopes and desires. Nevertheless, in many places
in Europe, there may be violent hand-to-hand struggles and
irruptions on their account: the coming century is likely to be
convulsed in more than one spot, and the Paris Commune, which
finds defenders and advocates even in Germany, will seem to have
been but a slight indigestion compared with what is to come. Be this
as it may, there will always be too many people of property for
socialism ever to signify anything more than an attack of illness: and
these people of property are like one man with one faith, "one must
possess something in order to be some one." This, however, is the
oldest and most wholesome of all instincts; I should add: "one must
desire more than one has in order to become more." For this is the
teaching which life itself preaches to all living things: the morality of
Development. To have and to wish to have more, in a word, Growth
—that is life itself. In the teaching of socialism "a will to the denial of
life" is but poorly concealed: botched men and races they must be
who have devised a teaching of this sort. In fact, I even wish a few
experiments might be made to show that in a socialistic society, life
denies itself, and itself cuts away its own roots. The earth is big
enough and man is still unexhausted enough for a practical lesson of
this sort and demonstratio ad absurdum—even if it were
accomplished only by a vast expenditure of lives—to seem worth
while to me. Still, Socialism, like a restless mole beneath the
foundations of a society wallowing in stupidity, will be able to
achieve something useful and salutary: it delays "Peace on Earth"
and the whole process of character-softening of the democratic
herding animal; it forces the European to have an extra supply of
intellect,—that is to say, craft and caution, and prevents his entirely
abandoning the manly and warlike qualities,—it also saves Europe
awhile from the marasmus femininus which is threatening it.

126.
The most favourable obstacles and remedies of modernity:
(1) Compulsory military service with real wars in which all joking is
laid aside.
(2) National thick-headedness (which simplifies and concentrates).
(3) Improved nutrition (meat).
(4) Increasing cleanliness and wholesomeness in the home.
(5) The predominance of physiology over theology, morality,
economics, and politics.
(6) Military discipline in the exaction and the practice of one's "duty"
(it is no longer customary to praise).

127.
I am delighted at the military development of Europe, also at the
inner anarchical conditions: the period of quietude and "Chinadom"
which Galiani prophesied for this century is now over. Personal and
manly capacity, bodily capacity recovers its value, valuations are
becoming more physical, nutrition consists ever more and more of
flesh. Fine men have once more become possible. Bloodless sneaks
(with mandarins at their head, as Comte imagined them) are now a
matter of the past. The savage in every one of us is acknowledged,
even the wild animal. Precisely on that account, philosophers will
have a better chance. —Kant is a scarecrow!
 128.
I have not yet seen any reasons to feel discouraged. He who
acquires and preserves a strong will, together with a broad mind,
has a more favourable chance now than ever he had. For the
plasticity of man has become exceedingly great in democratic
Europe: men who learn easily, who readily adapt themselves, are the
rule: the gregarious animal of a high order of intelligence is
prepared. He who would command finds those who must obey: I
have Napoleon and Bismarck in mind, for instance. The struggle
against strong and unintelligent wills, which forms the surest
obstacle in one's way, is really insignificant Who would not be able to
knock down these "objective" gentlemen with weak wills, such as
Ranke and Renan!

129.
Spiritual enlightenment is an unfailing means of making men
uncertain, weak of will, and needful of succour and support; in
short, of developing the herding instincts in them. That is why all
great artist-rulers, hitherto (Confucius in China, the Roman Empire,
Napoleon, Popedom—at a time when they had the courage of their
worldliness and frankly pursued power) in whom the ruling instincts,
that had prevailed until their time, culminated, also made use of the
spiritual enlightenment—or at least allowed it to be supreme (after
the style of the Popes of the Renaissance). The self-deception of the
masses on this point, in every democracy for instance, is of the
greatest possible value: all that makes men smaller and more
amenable is pursued under the title "progress."

130.
The highest equity and mildness as a condition of weakness (the
New Testament and the early Christian community—manifesting
itself in the form of utter foolishness in the Englishmen, Darwin and
Wallace). Your equity, ye higher men, drives you to universal
suffrage, etc.; your "humanity" urges you to be milder towards crime
and stupidity. In the end you will thus help stupidity and
harmlessness to conquer.
Outwardly: Ages of terrible wars, insurrections, explosions. Inwardly:
ever more and more weakness among men; events take the form of
excitants. The Parisian as the type of the European extreme.
Consequences: (1) Savages (at first, of course, in conformity with
the culture that has reigned hitherto); (2) Sovereign individuals
(where powerful barbarous masses and emancipation from all that
has been, are crossed). The age of greatest stupidity, brutality, and
wretchedness in the masses, and in the highest individuals.

131.
An incalculable number of higher individuals now perish: but he who
escapes their fate is as strong as the devil. In this respect we are
reminded of the conditions which prevailed in the Renaissance.

132.
How are Good Europeans such as ourselves distinguished from the
patriots? In the first place, we are atheists and immoralists, but we
take care to support the religions and the morality which we
associate with the gregarious instinct: for by means of them, an
order of men is, so to speak, being prepared, which must at some
time or other fall into our hands, which must actually crave for our
hands.
Beyond Good and Evil,—certainly; but we insist upon the
unconditional and strict preservation of herd-morality.
We reserve ourselves the right to several kinds of philosophy which
it is necessary to learn: under certain circumstances, the pessimistic
kind as a hammer; a European Buddhism might perhaps be
indispensable.
We should probably support the development and the maturation of
democratic tendencies; for it conduces to weakness of will: in
"Socialism" we recognise a thorn which prevents smug ease.
Attitude towards the people.. Our prejudices; we pay attention to
the results of cross-breeding.
Detached, well-to-do, strong: irony concerning the "press" and its
culture. Our care: that scientific men should not become journalists.
We mistrust any form of culture that tolerates news-paper reading or
writing.
We make our accidental positions (as Goethe and Stendhal did), our
experiences, a foreground, and we lay stress upon them, so that we
may deceive concerning our backgrounds. We ourselves wait and
avoid putting our heart into them. They serve us as refuges, such as
a wanderer might require and use—but we avoid feeling at home in
them. We are ahead of our fellows in that we have had a disciplina
voluntatis. All strength is directed to the development of the will, an
art which allows us to wear masks, an art of understanding beyond
the passions (also "super-European" thought at times).
This is our preparation before becoming the law-givers of the future
and the lords of the earth; if not we, at least our children. Caution
where marriage is concerned.

133.
The twentieth century.—The Abbé Galiani says somewhere: "La
prévoyance est la cause des guerres actuelles de l'Europe. Si l'on
voulait se donner la peine de ne rien prévoir, tout le monde serait
tranquille, et je ne crois pas qu'on serait plus malheureux parce
qu'on ne ferait pas la guerre." As I in no way share the unwarlike
views of my deceased friend Galiani, I have no fear whatever of
saying something beforehand with the view of conjuring in some
way the cause of wars.
A condition of excessive consciousness, after the worst of
earthquakes: with new questions.

134.
It is the time of the great noon, of the most appalling
enlightenment: my particular kind of Pessimism: the great starting-
point.
(1) Fundamental contradiction between civilisation and the elevation
of man.
(2) Moral valuations regarded as a history of lies and the art of
calumny in the service of the Will to Power (of the will of the herd,
which rises against stronger men).
(3) The conditions which determine every elevation in culture (the
facilitation of a selection being made at the cost of a crowd) are the
conditions of all growth.
(4). The multiformity of the world as a question of strength, which
sees all things in the perspective of their growth. The moral Christian
values to be regarded as the insurrection and mendacity of slaves (in
comparison with the aristocratic values of the ancient world).

SECOND BOOK.

CRITICISM OF THE HIGHEST VALUES THAT

HAVE PREVAILED HITHERTO.

I.
CRITICISM OF RELIGION.
All the beauty and sublimity with which we have invested real and
imagined things, I will show to be the property and product of man,
and this should be his most beautiful apology. Man as a poet, as a
thinker, as a god, as love, as power. Oh, the regal liberality with
which he has lavished gifts upon things in order to impoverish
himself and make himself feel wretched! Hitherto, this has been his
greatest disinterestedness, that he admired and worshipped, and
knew how to conceal from himself that he it was who had created
what he admired.

1. Concerning the Origin of Religions.

135.
The origin of religion.—Just as the illiterate man of to-day believes
that his wrath is the cause of his being angry, that his mind is the
cause of his thinking, that his soul is the cause of his feeling, in
short, just as a mass of psychological entities are still unthinkingly
postulated as causes; so, in a still more primitive age, the same
phenomena were interpreted by man by means of personal entities.
Those conditions of his soul which seemed strange, overwhelming,
and rapturous, he regarded as obsessions and bewitching influences
emanating from the power of some personality. (Thus the Christian,
the most puerile and backward man of this age, traces hope, peace,
and the feeling of deliverance to a psychological inspiration on the
part of God: being by nature a sufferer and a creature in need of
repose, states of happiness, peace, and resignation, perforce seem
strange to him, and seem to need some explanation.) Among
intelligent, strong, and vigorous races, the epileptic is mostly the
cause of a belief in the existence of some foreign power; but all such
examples of apparent subjection—as, for instance, the bearing of
the exalted man, of the poet, of the great criminal, or the passions,
love and revenge—lead to the invention of supernatural powers. A
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