Boole's Principles of Symbolical Reasoning

Abstract

In modern algebra it is well-known that one cannot, in general, apply ordinary equational reasoning when dealing with partial algebras. However Boole did not know this, and he took the opposite to be a fundamental truth, which he called the Principles of Symbolical Reasoning in his 1854 book {\em Laws of Thought}. Although Boole made no mention of it, his Principles were clearly a generalization of the earlier publications on algebra by the Cambridge mathematician Peacock. After a detailed examination of Boole's presentation of his Principles, we give a correct version that is applicable to his algebra of logic for classes.