First Translation Exercise

Answers (first 10)

 

Translate the following English sentences into Propositional  Logic. Use ">" for the horseshoe and "iff" for the triplebar. 

1. My father taught me to work, but not to love it. (Abraham Lincoln).
 

A: My father taught me to work.
B: My father taught me to love work.

(A & ~B)

2. Kindness is in our power, but fondness is not. (Samuel Johnson)

A: Kindness is in our power
B: Fondness is in our power.

(A & ~B)

3. But if you wisely invest in beauty, it will remain with you all the days of your life. (Frank Lloyd Wright)
 

A: You wisely invest in beauty.
B: Beauty will remain with you all the days of our life.

(A B)

4. It is not poetry, if it make no appeal to our passions or our imagination. (Samuel Taylor Coleridge)

A: It is poetry.
B: It appeals to our passions.
C: It appeals to our imagination.

(~B & ~C) ~A

or translate as:

~(B v C) ~A
 

5. Size is not grandeur, and territory does not make a nation. (Thomas H. Huxley)

A: Size is grandeur
B: Territory makes a nation.

(~A & ~B)

6. If you build a castle in the air, you won't need a mortgage. (Philip Lazarus)

A: You build a castle in the air
B: You need a mortgage.

(A ~B)

7. The mind itself, like other things, must sometimes be unbent or else it will be either weakened or broken. (Philip Sidney)
 

A: The mind must sometimes be unbent.
B: The mind will be weakened.
C: The mind will be broken.


(A v (B v C))

8. If you don't get what you want, it is a sign either that you did not seriously want it, or that you tried to bargain over the price. (R. Kipling)

A: You get what you want.
B: It is a sign that you did seriously want it.
C: It is a sign that you tried to bargain over the price.


(~A (~B v C))

9. The forces of a capitalist society, if left unchecked, tend to make the rich richer and the poor poorer. (J. Nehru)

A: The forces of a capitalist society are checked.
B:
The forces of a capitalist society tend to make the rich richer.
C:
The forces of a capitalist society tend to make the poor poorer.
 

(~A (B & C))

10. Action does not always bring happiness, but there is no happiness without it. ( Benjamin Disraeli)
 

A: Action always brings happiness.
B: There is happiness without action.

(~A & ~B)