Applications of Logics

Bismillah.

The logic we are considering here is just formal, symbolic or mathematical logic, and our purpose is to separate out the use of logic from study of or research in logic (though research into something other than logic would count).

A majority of people who take an interest in logic prefer to study logic, to advocate the use of logic, or even to build tools to support the use of logic, rather than to actually use logic. It is also not uncommon to find great aspirations, but little substance, even among great philosophers such as Descartes, Leibniz and Hobbes.  

Many different aspects of software engineering, from database management, through programming language design to artificial intelligence have benefitted from the discoveries of modern logic. 

Mathematics, always a deductive science, was the target application for the modern revolution in logic. Its has been transformed by modern logic, and can expect more revolution to come. 

Digital hardware is called "logic", its built up from electronic devices selected to behave like boolean operations, and it is the most pervasive and simple application of logic. 

Many philosophers have sought to emulate the deductive rigour of mathematics, but none have succeeded. Though Russell and the logical positivists hoped modern logic would make this possible, success remains illusory. 

Probably the most successful application has been in the development of relational databases. Logic here plays a role in the theory behind the databases, and may permit certain aspects of the operation of the daTabase to be viewed as analagous to automatic theorem proving. 

Logic is also used in different ways to build logic databases, usually intended to deliver an element of artificial intelligence. 

Logic Programming Similar techniques are applicable more generally, without the emphasis on database management, under the rubrick "logic programming".

The marriage of logic programming with linear programming techniques has enabled rapid and efficient solutions to many difficult scheduling type problems.