Ibn Sīnā on analysis: 1. proof search. or: abstract state machines as a tool for history of logic

  • Authors:

  • Wilfrid Hodges

  • Affiliations:

  • Herons Brook, Sticklepath, England

  • Venue:
  • Fields of logic and computation
  • Year:
  • 2010

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Abstract

The 11th century Arabic-Persian logician Ibn Sīnā (Avicenna) in Sect. 9.6 of his book Qiyās gives what appears to be a proof search algorithm for syllogisms. We confirm that it is indeed a proof search algorithm, by extracting all the essential ingredients of an Abstract State Machine from Ibn Sīnā's text. The paper also contains a translation of the passage from Ibn Sīnā's Arabic, and some notes on the text and translation.