Focusing on the interplay between mathematical logic and everyday language, this book explores puzzles and paradoxes to introduce informal reasoning. It serves as a transition from puzzle-solving to formal studies in symbolic logic, covering topics from propositional to first-order logic. The author emphasizes the significance of these concepts in philosophy, mathematics, and computer science. Additionally, readers are taken on a captivating journey through the intriguing concept of infinity, which has long fascinated thinkers throughout history.
Although solving Sudoku puzzles does not directly involve arithmetic, Sudoku
is all about mathematics. This book will give readers a deeper understanding
of the inner workings of Sudoku and how it connects to the larger world of
mathematics.
This "best of" hardcover collection of works by Raymond Smullyan features excerpts from his published writings, including logic puzzles, explorations of mathematical logic and paradoxes, retrograde analysis chess problems, jokes and anecdotes, and meditations on the philosophy of religion. Jason Rosenhouse, the editor of Four Lives , has provided an Introduction, in addition to compiling numerous tributes from former students, friends, and others saluting this celebrated professor, author, and logic scholar hailed by Martin Gardner as "the most entertaining logician and set theorist who ever lived."
Here -- from philosopher/logician/puzzlemaker Raymond Smullyan -- are fifty elegant, witty, and altogether unique "chess mysteries." In each problem the solver has to deduce certain events in a game's past. For On what square was the White queen captured? or, Is the White queen promoted or original?Since these problems involve the same sort of logical reasoning that lies at the core of the Sherlock Holmes stories, Raymond Smullyan has aptly set each one within its own Holmes-Watson dialogue. In each case Holmes, by his remarkable powers of deduction, is able to demonstrate to his awed admirers precisely what must have happened, move by move, at the "scene of the crime" -- the chess table. For what the missing piece is; what square it should be on; whether or not either side can castle.In the second half, through a series of progressively more difficult (self-contained) chess problems, Holmes, with the reader's help, solves a mystery and a double murder -- perpetrated, of course, by Moriarty. And at the end of the book are ten bonus problems from Moriarty himself (four of them composed before the age of nine!).Chess Mysteries of Sherlock Holmes is Smullyan's challenging and witty romp through the royal game.
In this entertaining and challenging collection of logic puzzles, Raymond
Smullyan-author of Forever Undecided-continues to delight and astonish us with
his gift for making available, in the thoroughly pleasurable form of puzzles,
some of the most important mathematical thinking of our time. schovat popis
Characters from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass populate these 88 intriguing puzzles. Mathematician Raymond Smullyan re-creates the spirit of Lewis Carroll's writings in puzzles involving word play, logic and metalogic, and philosophical paradoxes. Challenges range from easy to difficult and include solutions, plus 60 charming illustrations. "An ingenious book." — Boston Globe.
A lucid, elegant, and complete survey of set theory, this three-part treatment explores axiomatic set theory, the consistency of the continuum hypothesis, and forcing and independence results. 1996 edition.
"Games for Your Mind explores the history and future of logic puzzles while enabling you to test your skill against a variety of puzzles yourself."--Amazon.com
“The most entertaining logician and set theorist who ever lived” (Martin Gardner) gives us an encore to The Lady or the Tiger?-a fiendishly clever, utterly captivating new collection of 225 brainteasers, puzzles, and paradoxes.
Honorable knights, lying knaves, and other fanciful characters populate this unusual survey of the principles underlying the works of Georg Cantor. Created by a renowned mathematician, these engaging puzzles apply logical precepts to issues of infinity, probability, time, and change. They require a strong mathematics background and feature complete solutions.
