Concept tag
#deontic-logic
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If I must file the return, must I file it or shred it? Ross’s paradox for a tax preparer
A client's son, who is studying philosophy, told me about something called Ross's paradox. As he explained it: in the standard logic of obligation, if you ought to do A, then it follows that you ought to do "A or B", for…
Started by Harpreet Kaur Grewal3 replies -
Our safety manual tells us what to do after we’ve broken a safety rule. Is that a paradox?
Working the cranes, I read our safety manual more carefully than most. Rule 1: never enter the exclusion zone under a suspended load. Rule 2: if you find yourself in the exclusion zone, do not move; radio the operator and wait for…
Started by Hugo Marchetti4 replies -
Norms are neither true nor false, so there is no logic of obligation, only a logic about obligations
This puzzle has bothered me since I read Kelsen as a law student in Lahore. Logic, as usually understood, is about relations between things that can be true or false: if the premises are true, the conclusion must be. But norms ("you…
Started by Hamza Qureshi4 replies -
The five rulings, from obligatory to forbidden: why the middle categories are not just extra boxes
Standard deontic logic has three basic statuses: obligatory, forbidden, and permitted. Anything neither obligatory nor forbidden is simply permitted, and that's the end of it. Islamic jurisprudence has five rulings (al-aḥkām al-khamsa). An act is obligatory (wājib), recommended (mandūb), permissible (mubāḥ), disliked…
Started by Khalid Mahmood Awan5 replies -
Chisholm’s contrary-to-duty paradox: why exactly do four sensible sentences become inconsistent?
I work for a tenants' organisation in Johannesburg, so most of my working life is spent on what is owed when someone has already failed to do what they should: the landlord who evicted unlawfully, the municipality that didn't provide alternative accommodation.…
Started by Thandeka Mokoena3 replies