logic and life

In light of logic and the scriptures, I recall Dr. Carter (BYU logic professor) saying that The Book of Mormon authors used a different logic system than what we studied in class. Sam or Brian, do you recall something like this? I haven't heard or read anything else on this. However, I have spent some time diverting myself during a boring Sunday school lesson by translating the prophetic logic arguments into truth-functional or quantificational logic symbolic form. Then, I would either play with the proof or make truth-table to test its validity.

I agree with Brian. Set-theory, to me also, is the closest we have to how people reason. A few months ago, I read an article in some cognitive science periodical about natural set-theory. The author argued that while the ZF-Set-theory is great for mathematics, set-theory needed some modifications to better approximate how people reason. He proceeded to propose some new rules and definitions (but I can't remember them all, I'll have to go find that article).

While in formal logic we have a clear distinction between validity and soundness, I don't believe most people realize the difference between the structure of the argument (validity) and the argument's relation to reality (soundness). In normal language, people also see different logic connectors different. How many people see a disjunction as having the possibility of both disjuncts being true? Most people, I believe see is it as one or the other, but not both. Conditionals can throw people through similar loops. So often, people don't know what to do if the antecedent is false and the consequent is true; if a person does have a reply, then there is a good chance that the person will say the truth-value is false. Were the statement to be a bicondition, this would be right. Perhaps, people see exclusive-disjunctions and bi-conditionals rather than inclusive-disjunctions and conditionals.

Within all of this, I think another interesting question comes out: While Socrates saw a careful evaluation of life (through a logical dialectic) as fundamental to living well, and Plato asserted a logical ascension is necessary to reach the good, what is the purpose of logic in an everyday person's life? (Please note, I am a fan of looking for fallacies (ask Lindsay).) Outside of mathematical and philosophical discussion, does formal/symbollic logic have a role? Are we better knowing probabilities, heuristics, and inductive logic in these situations?