Logic

Although this is a wonderful reference for 1st order logic and the semantic side of Propositional Logic, there are serious editing problems associated with the early chapters on Propositional Logic. Specifically, Tomassi's examples concerning v elimination are limited. One of his examples is an unorthdox application of v elimination that he not only does not explain, but goes against his own formulation of the rule. (This concerns nested applications of v elimnation and whether or not one can assume both disjuncts immediatly in order to derive the conclusion for one disjunct.) Further editing issues include problems with the "Short-cut" method of solving truth tables, where Tomassi fails to provide a simple formula to determine how many lines will be needed if the conclusion contains conjunctions and/or biconditionals. (3 to the nth power, where n is the number of conjuncts, multiplied by 2 to the nth power, where n is the number of biconditionals; courtesy one of my students.) Tomassi's explanation of the conditions under which the short-cut method can be used is a example of how writing can be led astray by too much exact logical reasoning (the conditions are nearly incomprehensible). He also fails to note the limitations of the short-cut method, and further ways to apply it. Other reviewers have commented on Tomassi's verbosity--this is not only problematic, but confusing to students--as the early chapters lack a good comprehensive structure. Specifically, the author is in need of a good editor to eliminate unneeded information, and to establish a sensical order among some of the sections. I highly suggest using Lemmon's book alongside Tomassi's for the first few chapters (indeed, they are identical in spots), as Lemmon is clearer. Care must also be taken to eliminate Tomassi's verbosity. Finally, it is crucial to exhaust the possibilities of Toamissi's rules in explanation, which Tomassi does not do in the book (he does have exercises that exhaust these possibilities, but provides no explanation.) Overall, I would use the book again for 1st order logic. The chapters on Propositional Logic, I'm not so sure.