Instrumental Theory

"On Instruments" is one of Aristotle's important works. This book is a compilation of Aristotle's expositions on syllogism and other logical reasoning. It focuses on syllogism, deduction, reductio ad absurdum and other thinking and reasoning methods. It lays the foundation for formal logic and has a profound impact on this subject. The book contains six parts: "Explanation" discusses the composition, nature, classification and true-false relationship of propositions; "Categories" discusses ten basic categories that are often used in propositions; "Pre-analysis" explains how to correctly draw conclusions through major and minor premises, that is, syllogism; "Post-analysis" discusses definitions, proofs, and deductions. It clarifies four types of reasoning such as deduction and induction; "Thesis" studies the famous four-predicate theory, discusses the ways and methods of reasonable argumentation, and how to defeat opponents in debates; "Argument of Fallacies" is a logical theory about fallacies, reveals and analyzes various types of fallacies and sophistry, and proposes specific methods to refute fallacies.