|
|
|
|
|
|
by two_handfuls
754 days ago
|
|
|
> The English language seems to lack a way to encode unambiguously the "A => B" It doesn’t: “If A then B” encodes it unambiguously. It’s just that as you said, many people don’t think hard about the difference between this and similar-but-different concepts like “B only if A”. It’s not the language itself, it’s the way people use the language and think about what it says (or in this case, don’t). |
|
|
No, actually it doesn't
> Some authors have argued that participants do not read "if... then..." as the material conditional, since the natural language conditional is not the material conditional.
> It’s just that as you said, many people don’t think hard about the difference between this and similar-but-different concepts like “B only if A”.
While a nice simplistic answer it's likely not what's going on here. There is more here than "People just aren't good at thinking".
If your statement were true, then you'd be forced to say that the following statement is also obviously true:
"If the Nazis won World War II, then everybody would be happy"
The fact that you can rightfully say that sentence is false, means that your comment above about implication and "if" statements is wrong.[1] Language is more complex then you're giving it credit.
[1] - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradoxes_of_material_implic...