Deductive reasoning Deductive reasoning Deductive reasoning, also deductive logic, logical deduction is the process of reasoning from one or more statements (premises) to reach a logically certain conclusion. Deductive reasoning goes in the same direction as that of the conditionals, and links premises with conclusions. If all premises are true, the terms are clear, and the rules of deductive logic are followed, then the conclusion reached is necessarily true. Deductive reasoning (""top-down logic"") contrasts with inductive reasoning (""bottom-up logic"") in the following way; in deductive reasoning, a conclusion is reached reductively by applying general rules which hold over the entirety of a
Logical atomism then in Britain and exemplified in works of F. H. Bradley and J. M. E. McTaggart. Logical atomism is partly understood as a developed alternative to logical holism, or the "monistic logic" of Idealists, on which logical analysis is a kind of falsification. The theory holds that the world consists of ultimate logical "facts" (or "atoms") that cannot be broken down any further. Having originally propounded this stance in his "Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus", Wittgenstein rejected it in his later "Philosophical Investigations" (§§46–49, §81, §91). The term "logical atomism," partly because it was first introduced in a French paper that remained untranslated