Syllogistic Reasoning

Syllogistic reasoning is a type of logical thinking that uses deductive reasoning to arrive at a conclusion based on two premises (statements) assumed to be true.

It was first formally studied by Aristotle.

The basic structure looks like this:

• Major Premise: A general statement or universal truth.
• Minor Premise: A more specific statement related to the major premise.
• Conclusion: A logical result based on the two premises.

Here’s a classic example:

• All humans are mortal.
• Socrates is a human.
• Therefore, Socrates is mortal.

Electricians have a slightly different type of logic that applies when a ditch is required for routing an underground cable:

• Major Premise: Someone needs to dig a ditch.
• Minor Premise: Digging a ditch sucks.
• Conclusion: I just pulled a brain muscle; therefore, I can’t dig the ditch.

—Mitchell Hegman