Colin Allen

Michael Hand

Logic Primer presents a rigorous introduction to natural deduction systems of sentential and first-order logic. Logic Primer presents a rigorous introduction to natural deduction systems of sentential and first-order logic. The text is designed to foster the student-instructor relationship. The key concepts are laid out in concise definitions and comments, with the expectation that the instructor will elaborate upon them. New to the second edition is the addition of material on the logic of identity in chapters 3 and 4. An innovative interactive Web site, consisting of a "Logic Daemon" and a "Quizmaster," encourages students to formulate their own proofs and links them to appropriate explanations in the book.

Logic Primer, second edition

The new edition of a comprehensive and rigorous but concise introduction to symbolic logic. Logic Primer offers a comprehensive and rigorous introduction to symbolic logic, providing concise definitions of key concepts, illustrative examples, and exercises. After presenting the definitions of validity and soundness, the book goes on to introduce a formal language, proof theory, and formal semantics for sentential logic (chapters 1–3) and for first-order predicate logic (chapters 4–6) with identity (chapter 7). For this third edition, the material has been reorganized from four chapters into seven, increasing the modularity of the text and enabling teachers to choose alternative paths through the book. New exercises have been added, and all exercises are now arranged to support students moving from easier to harder problems. Its spare and elegant treatment makes Logic Primer unique among textbooks. It presents the material with minimal chattiness, allowing students to proceed more directly from topic to topic and leaving instructors free to cover the subject matter in the way that best suits their students. The book includes more than thirty exercise sets, with answers to many of them provided in an appendix. The book’s website allows students to enter and check proofs, truth tables, and other exercises interactively.

Logic Primer, third edition

Children must be taught morality. They must be taught to recognise the authority of moral standards and to understand what makes them authoritative. But there’s a problem: the content and justification of morality are matters of reasonable disagreement among reasonable people. This makes it hard to see how educators can secure children’s commitment to moral standards without indoctrinating them. In A Theory of Moral Education, Michael Hand tackles this problem head on. He sets out to show that moral education can and should be fully rational. It is true that many moral standards and justificatory theories are controversial, and educators have an obligation to teach these nondirectively, with the aim of enabling children to form their own considered views. But reasonable moral disagreement does not go all the way down: some basic moral standards are robustly justified, and these should be taught directively, with the aim of bringing children to recognise and understand their authority. This is an original and important contribution to the philosophy of moral education, which lays a new theoretical foundation for the urgent practical task of teaching right from wrong.

A Theory of Moral Education

Is Religious Education Possible?: A Philosophical Investigation tackles a well-established problem in the philosophy of education. The problem is the threat posed to the logical possibility of non-confessional religious education by the claim that religion constitutes an autonomous language-game or form of knowledge. Defenders of this claim argue that religion cannot be understood from the outside: it is impossible to impart religious understanding unless one is also prepared to impart religious belief. Michael Hand argues for two central points: first, that non-confessional religious education would indeed be impossible if it were true that religion constitutes a distinct form of knowledge; and, second, that religion does not in fact constitute a distinct form of knowledge.

Michael Hand

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