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Is there a book out there that discusses the construction of logic and set theory from the ground up?

Many of the logic books that I've found suffers from one main problem: it doesn't define things in the right order. For example:

1- propositions are statements which can either be true or false

2- predicates are ... (has references to propositions)

3- quantifier are ... (has references to predicates and propositions)

4- an axiom system contains a finite number of ... countable set of ... etc.

So the problem becomes: what does 'finite' mean? what is a 'number'? what is a 'countable'? have you even defined what a 'set' is?

In other words, it goes from step 1, step 2, step 3, refers to step 513, step 4, step 5, ...

I am aware of these concepts beforehand, but it would be nice to know the proper sequence of definitions (instead of defining something in terms of other things that have yet to be defined).

japseow
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  • An exposition having a step by step construction and logical building up concepts and that covers most parts of what you have asked, is the book named "The Topology Problem Solver" by Emil G. Milewski.

    Here is the link

    There might certainly be many other such expositions, but this came to my mind first.

    – spkakkar Mar 18 '18 at 07:57
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    Of possible interest is my answer to the Mathematics Stack Exchange question Foundation of Formal Logic. – Dave L. Renfro Mar 18 '18 at 11:13
  • Do you really believe there is something like 'the proper sequence of definitions'? In fact, that there can even be something like a 'step 1'? – Bram28 Mar 18 '18 at 13:43
  • Well, people don't use hilbert spaces to define sets. I believe that choosing the undefined terms we put in play is a topic we could afford to be iffy at. But, actual definitions should leave no room for hand wavy-ness. – japseow Mar 18 '18 at 14:15
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    You might think of such statements as informal commentary to aid in getting "the big picture." Like comments in computer programming source code. You can say, for example, that ZFC has "countably many" axioms in a presentation of the axioms, but you don't use this notion when formally proving theorems in ZFC. – Dan Christensen Mar 18 '18 at 14:47
  • I think informal comments do put things in proper context. Much like in programming, "the goal" or "what the author is going for" is often not immediately apparent when reading just the definitions. These are very important, but precise definitions are important as well. – japseow Mar 18 '18 at 15:37
  • Also, thanks very much for all the book references. I couldnt comment on them at the moment as I have yet to go through them. – japseow Mar 18 '18 at 18:10
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    @MauroALLEGRANZA could you please post an answer with the Tourlakis sources so that I could accept it. I found a copy and It's definitely what I'm looking for. Thanks! – japseow Apr 04 '18 at 04:11

1 Answers1

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You can see:

  • Are there any answer keys? I'm getting stuck on some questions, but the book just keeps on going on to new topics. – japseow May 26 '18 at 17:43