FALL COURSE

ANALYTICS Fall 2025

Logic, Reason and Knowledge

Time: TUESDAYS 11AM

Instructor:James Lyons-Weiler, PhD

Place: ONLINE ZOOM

Office:ONLINE

Office Hours: Via EMAIL AND AFTER CLASS

CAUSALITY Coffee Hour: Thursday 11AM ET

Phone: 412-728-8743

e-mail: jameslyonsweiler@ipak-edu.org

Course Goals

1.To review how different cultures and schools of thought view logic, reason and causality.

2.To investigate ways of knowing used and abused in various domains in which conclusions are a currency.

3.To help you empower yourself to know and view valid inferences about reality and draw your own conclusions.

Course Description

Logic is the study of inference. It offers ways of analyzing the structure of inferences and has evolved over eon. The specific linguistic and mathematical tools for representing arguments in symbolic form have evolved over time. In the end, causality is often at stake, and the ability to carry the day often involves misleading and misdirection. Students will master methods that demarcate valid and invalid reasoning. In this course we will study formal and symbolic logic to discover how to identify a valid argument, classify and understand valid inferences such as analogy, invalidation, proof by contradiction, truth tables, and many other tools of the trade. We will examine evidences of causality and their relative strengths and weaknesses. Students will understand and be able to identify logical fallacies. In the final weeks, we will examine causal network theory and visit a theory of causal or liability attenuation and visit assessment of causality in complex, nonlinear dynamic systems.

Texts and Readings

Patrick Hurley, A Concise Introduction to Logic

Stanislaw

The logic of causal propositions (researchgate.net)

The Logic of Causal Propositions on JSTOR

Self-Assessment

PROJECTS (50%)

IN-CLASS PARTICIPATION (25%)

Comprehensive final exam (25%)

1. COURSE OVERVIEW. A HISTORY OF LOGIC AND REASON.
2. INTRODUCTION TO FORMAL LOGIC1
3. INTRODUCTION TO FORMAL LOGIC2
4. INTERMEDIATE LOGIC 1
5. INTERMEDIATE LOGIC 2
6. ADVANCED LOGIC 2
7. ADVANCED LOGIC 2
8. ARGUMENT
9. ARGUMENT BY ANALOGY
10. INVALIDATION
11. PROOF BY CONTRADICTION
12. CREATING AND USING TRUTH TABLES
13. DIRECT VS. INDIRECT CAUSALITY
14. MULTIFACTORIAL CAUSALITY
15. EVIDENCES OF CAUSAL IMPLICATION
16. CAUSAL NETWORKS1
17. CAUSAL NETWORKS2
18. CAUSAL ATTENUATION THEORY
19. CAUSALITY IN CHAOS - NONLINEAR COMPLEX SYSTEMS
20. CAUSALIITY IN THE QUANTUM REALM
21. REVIEW OF LOGICAL FALLACIES AND HOW TO SPOT THEM
22. PARADOXES AND KNOWLEDGE