The fourth dimension

90 THE FOURTH DIMENSION

us into the complexities incident on its application in classificatory science, let us follow Mrs, Alicia Boole Stott in her representation of the syllogism by its means. She will be interested to find that the curious gap she detected has a significance.

A syllogism consists of two statements, the major and the minor premiss, with the conclusion that can be drawn from them. Thus, to take an instance, fig. 49. It is evident, from looking at the successive figures that, if we know that the region m lies altogether within the region P, and also know that the region s lies altogether within the region M, we can conclude that the region § lies

altogether within the region Pp. mM is P, major premiss; $§ is M, minor premiss; s P is P, conclusion. Given the first two data we must conclude that s lies in p, The conclusion s is P involves two terms, s and

P, which are respectively called the subject () and the predicate, the letters s and Pp

being chosen with reference to the parts

the notions they designate play in the

conclusion.. s is the subject of the conclusion, P is the predicate of the conclusion.

P The major premiss we take to be, that which does not involve s, and here we always write it first.

There are several varieties of statement possessing different degrees of universality and manners of assertiveness. These different forms of statement are called the moods.

We will take the major premiss as one variable, as a thing capable of different modifications of the same kind, the minor premiss as another, and the different moods we will consider as defining the variations which these variables undergo,

Fig. 49.