Slides

Lecture 1, Monday 7 January.
(Introduction; Propositions)

Lecture 2, Monday 7 January.
(Predicates; Quantifiers; Sets)

Here are some online resources for playing with truth-tables: ttable, a handy perl script for making truth tables. An online truth table generator is here (from a logic course online at the University of Kentucky). Some online exercises. More online exercises and solutions.

Lecture 1 [ps] [pdf]

Lecture 2 [ps] [pdf]

Lectures 1 and 2 [video]

Thanks to sri, who got all the exercises online (because of the way phpBB works you might have to log in, then go back to this page and click on the link again).

Exercises (do them now, online, on the message board) [click here]

Thanks to John Irvine, who discovered how hard it is to stand up in front of forty people and make some kind of sense. He didn't run away and he didn't wet himself.

Lecture 1, redigested by John Irvine [pdf]

Lecture 2, redigested by John Irvine [pdf]

Lecture 3, Tuesday 8 January.
(More on sets: subset, cardinality, types)

I'm happy, and sad. Students were asking questions — that's good. I asked some fairly demanding questions of my own during the lecture, and the students kept their cool and, for the most part, answered them.

I did ask somebody whether two was equal to two, and they couldn't tell me. That's less good. Some of you believe that letting me vibrate your eardrums constitutes ‘study’. Have you done exercises up to 3.1? No? Why not? You're going to do them eventually (or fail the course). They're right here. Do them now or suffer. Do them online and I will provide support.

Lecture 3 [ps] [pdf]

Lecture 3 [video]

Lecture 4, Thursday 10 January.
(Schema, specifications)

I completed Lecture 4 and got some way into Lecture 5. Something rather unexpected happened about half-way through.

Many of you have bought the latest edition of Currie's book The Essence of Z. It was drawn to my attention pages 36 and 37 are missing from this edition. If you find the leaf with page 35 on it, and turn it over, then you see page 38 on the other side. It's surprisingly creepy.

As part of my continuing commitment to facilitating student learning, here is the missing pair of pages, photographed from my own, older edition of the same book.

Lecture 4 [ps] [pdf]

Lecture 4 [video]

Lecture 5, Thursday 17 January.
(Combining schema, initial state, preconditions, totality)

Lecture 5 [ps] [pdf]

Lecture 5 [video]

Lecture 6, Monday 21 January.
(Totalising schema of more than one variable, preconditions again, methodology for developing Z schema)

Lecture 6 [ps] [pdf]

Class test 1, Tuesday 22 January, discussed Thursday 25 January.

Most of the students failed the test outright, scoring only a smattering of marks. Only half the students turned up for the discussion afterwards.

This course requires study. The class test is representative, except I didn't use some of the harder Z concepts (which I will introduce next week). This is necessary preparation both for the second half of the course, and for getting marks in all future assessments.

I have updated and improved the pdf of the class test. You can find it here. I need everybody to re-do the class test on the message board by Sunday lunchtime.

Lecture 7, Monday 28 January.
(Relations)

Lecture 7 [ps] [pdf]

Lecture 7 [video]

Lecture 8, Tuesday 29 January.
(Telephone directory case study; Sequences)

Lecture 8 [ps] [pdf]

Lecture 8 [video]

Class Discussions, Thursday 31 January, Monday 4 February, Tuesday 5 February (pancake day).

I gave out Quality Street on Thursday and Monday. It was Jaffa Cakes on Tuesday — just for pancake day. Maybe I have another two boxes of delicious, succulent Jaffa Cakes sitting in my office for Thursday ... maybe I don't. I suppose a lot depends on my self-control. Turn up and find out.

I've just gone through case studies: a supermarket with two queues and a crush area (sequences); a module allocation system (relations); a petrol station (sequences and relations!!!); prime numbers (big, hairy, complicated predicates); and the President of Iran (moderately hairy predicates, with sequences). At least one of these is liable to appear nearly verbatim as an exam question.

I think that some of you are getting the hang of this. Best of all, some of you are working outside of class. Bless you. I also think that some of you aren't. Students that don't study. Whatever will they think of next?

Videos? No, not for these classes. All the action was one-on-one with individual students. Pester your colleagues to post answers on the message board.

What? I should post answers on the message board? No, I shouldn't. I should have three contact hours with you a week, write an exam, and assess it. All further TLC is an optional bonus dispensed at my expert and gracious discretion. Typing up the answers I give you is a learning experience which is its own reward and which will raise marks in all future assessments. You hear me? Its own reward! Yes! All future assessments!

Pancake recipe (gluten free) — or: how to impress a girl.

Sift together the following ingredients: 1 cup rice flour, 1/2 cup cornflower, 1 teaspoon dark brown sugar, 2 teaspoons honey, 1 teaspoon baking powder, and a generous pinch of salt. (If you don't have problems with wheat, you can use 1 1/2 cups plain flower. For a nuttier taste substitute some of the rice flower for barley flour, rye flour, or quinoa flour.)

Mix together the following ingredients: 1 cup milk, two eggs, and two tablespoons of melted butter (or melted olive oil spread).

Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix until a smooth batter is formed. It should have the runniness and consistency of something fairly runny and consistent — fine-tune with milk (wetter) or flour (drier).

Ladle the mix into a frying pan and fry on low heat, turning when one side looks lightly brown or omelette-like. When turning, it helps to have two spatulas; don't use metal implements on a non-stick frying pan, unless you really wanted a non-non-stick frying pan. These quantities should make about three moist steaming six-inch pancakes.

Serve immediately with maple syrup, yoghurt and red berries, peanut butter, cheese, or anything else that takes your fancy. If you are male and are cooking for a female, look sensitive and intelligent.

Problem sets

F22HO2 Forum

FAQ

Q. How do I print out the slides.

A. Thanks to John for this screenshot. The menu on your computer may differ, just look for ‘pages per sheet’. You may get the best results printing in landscape mode.

Q. Why no printed slides?

A. Use the book. If I print the slides my students may use them instead of the better presentation in the book.

Q. Is logical disjunction P ∨ Q ‘exclusive or’ — P or Q but not both?

No, it's ‘inclusive or’. P ∨ Q has truth-value T when at least one of P and Q has truth-value T.