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[GH] [English] [July 7] Formal Logic for Spellcraft
Bella, Theun, Franklin, Basira
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This class sounds COOL. It might disappoint, of course, but it's definitely one of the classes where Bella's glad she's not from such a big enclave that she can't justify doing her own homework. Probably big enclavers can keep some of their homework? They have to learn some things, right? Anyway, this class sounds great. It's a little room, small enough that she feels okay about getting started on checks herself while she doesn't know who's going to be in it to wait for or not.

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Theun is also upbeat - this should be interesting and useful.

He nods to Bella and starts checking the other side of the room.

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"Morning! This one sounds fun."

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"Morning! Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. Interesting, plus I think getting good information handling in spells is theory-heavy."

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"It counts as a math class, which makes three math classes for me, but I'm not even mad."

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"My artifices mostly won't even use math, and I still have two... Not annoyed about this one, though."

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Franklin is in four different math classes and that's awesome. Mathematical Models for Artificing is going to be hard to be better than, but this class might succeed. Also he has terrarium sketches for Bella. He sits next to her and then has a long moment of indecision about whether it would be politer to offer to show her the terrarium sketches now or wait until lunch. Maybe he can just say hello and see how okay she seems with being interrupted. "Hello."

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"Oh, hi Franklin! How's it going?"

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"I have sketches! Would you like to see them?"

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"I would like that! Though maybe at lunch? I think this is gonna be a good class."

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"Can do! I also expect this class to be good. I hope it has artificing implications, but even if it doesn't I will have use for it."

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"I was just saying, I expect implications for things with information-handling, probably that goes in any specialty. You're Boston, right? I don't think I heard your name, mine's Theun."

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"Franklin. Sorry for interrupting. And yes, that sounds very plausible."

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"Eh, no worries, barely an interruption. Nice to meet you."

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"Likewise. Are you an artificer?"

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"Not... really. I have an affinity for books but I'm aiming more toward creative writing and searching the library."

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"Oooh, I'm not surprised you want to learn about information handling."

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"Yeah! I almost got bumped out of this class in homeroom and that would have been the worst. But I got added to this section in the second schedule, so it's all good."

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"I wonder how many sections there are."

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"Two, twelve, fifty, who knows? I didn't hear of it in the big list of classes that exist, but that doesn't mean much."

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"It's probably not fifty. There are only so many blocks in the week. I guess if it were staggeringly common multiple sections could meet simultaneously in different rooms... Oooh." Her book has appeared by her elbow.

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"Yeah, realistically a dozen is probably the top end for... everything but Language Lab, actually."

Does he have a book now? He does! What are the contents of this book?

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The book's table of contents reads:

1. Basics of Propositional Logic
2. Truth Tables
3. Basics of Predicate Logic
4. Rules of Inference
5. Proof Structure
6. Spell Logic
7. Spell Illogic - Cautions and Warnings
8. Case Studies
i. Appendix - Computational Logic
ii. Appendix - Formal Semantics in Natural Language
iii. Appendix - Modal Logic
iv. Further Reading
v. Index


Their classwork for the day is to read through chapter 1 and their homework is to do the odd-numbered problems at the end of the chapter.
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Well, nothing starts with the good stuff, let's see what 'Propositional Logic' is.

"So, we're... defining a vague generalization and stripping the statements out of the statements, to look at fuzzy generalities... I guess that's how math usually works. And the fuzziness usually has a point to it. Eventually."

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All of chapter one appears to be stuff that humans know just from existing in a world, or possibly evolved to be born knowing, but it's nice to see it formalized. He can probably finish the homework during class unless there are quite a lot of odd-numbered problems. Also he should check what subset of the answers are in the back of the book.

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There are a lot of odd numbered problems and the back of the book only has some even numbered ones and not all of those.

Bella skims the problems first, then alternates between reading and doing problems once she has read enough to solve each one.

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Franklin does a similar strategy. When he gets a problem he's not sure about he makes a note of his best guess, then reads the book until he knows whether he was right or wrong and why, then keeps going with the assignment. His handwriting resembles a monospace typewriter font.

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Theun does a lot of scribbling on the paper to mark 'or's and 'and's next to the symbols, and a moderate amount of muttering to himself, mostly to substitute specific statements checking that the answers make sense when they're complicated. This reduces as he goes along and gets used to the patterns.

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Once Bella seems to be done with the assignment or when the lunch bell rings, whichever comes first, Franklin asks, "Would you like to sit together at lunch and look at the sketches?"

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"Sounds good to me, do you want to take the table Suze saves me or should I just sit with Boston?"

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Marcy and Kevin have shop today and are probably going to show up with a bunch of shop people, so it would be convenient for him to sit somewhere else. "I can sit with you and Suze."

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"Cool, it's a plan." She starts reading chapter two in the remaining minutes of class, and when the bell rings she falls in with Franklin.

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They have a boring adventure getting non-toxic food and then he can lay out the sketches! He has a clever design for a block of four bins, arranged in a square and sharing inner walls, each with its own double-layered lid on three sides of rails such that the agglos would have to tear off two rails to access the upper lid and then tear off two more to get out. "The main risk I see is that when they get the first set of rails off the inner lid it will fall down into the tank and land on them. I could try connecting the centers of each pair of lids with a chain or something if you're worried about them getting injured."

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"Hmmm... could there be a post or something in the middle to prop up the lids if they fall?"

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"I could add one but it would have to only be anchored at the bottom end and they might keep knocking it down. I could try making the rails deep enough and to tight enough tolerances that any one edge would be able to hold up the lid."

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"Would it make things easier if you only did that in the starvation condition section? The others are all going to get tidbits and shouldn't be too desperate."

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"The main difficulty is that it needs more glass and more care in sealing, because of the cantilever, but not a great deal more. I can do it for the starvation condition box first and see how my supplies of glass, epoxy, and mana are doing."

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"Okay. I've told Suze I'll trade her for those, but I don't know if she'll have good luck in shop any more than I will."

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"Of course. I could get started after classes end today."

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"Neat. There's no rush, if something comes up, of course, this is strictly extracurricular."