Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Premise/archive1

• Scope: a non-specialist pass on prose, structure and internal consistency, plus a limited check of the citation apparatus. This reads as a strong article.

• "False premises offer no support": the definition section says false premises offer no support. Later on, the article explains that a valid argument can have false premises, because validity is about what would follow if the premises were true. The two passages seem to use "support" in different ways. Could the earlier sentence say which sense it means?

  I assume that you are talking about the subsection "Deductive reasoning". I added a footnote there to explain that validity alone does not offer support. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:27, 26 July 2026 (UTC) reply

• Something similar happens in "Premise adequacy and relevance": Their aim is usually to preserve truth or transfer justification from accepted statements to the claim being argued for. Preserving truth is normally something an inference does, rather than something the premises aim at. The lead carries the same wording, so both may want a look.

  Good point. I think the original formulation a while back was "The aim", referring to the whole process rather than the premises in particular. I changed it back. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:27, 26 July 2026 (UTC) reply

• Euclid: the body and the caption both say Euclid showed how five fundamental premises can serve as the basis of Euclidean geometry. Book I of the Elements actually starts with twenty-three definitions, five postulates and five common notions, and the common notions count as axioms too. Do Priest, Novaes and Rosenberg mean the five postulates in particular? If they do, would calling them the postulates match the sources better?

  Rosenberg 2011 calls them "postulates or axioms". I changed the text to reflect this terminology. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:27, 26 July 2026 (UTC) reply

• Captions that repeat the text: two captions say the same thing as the sentence beside them. In "In various fields", the caption is the body sentence with "For example" taken off: Euclid showed how five fundamental premises can serve as the basis of Euclidean geometry. In "Others", the caption Aristotle developed syllogistic logic and distinguished between major and minor premises sits right above Syllogistic logic, first formulated by Aristotle, distinguishes between major and minor premises. Reading the same sentence twice running is a little odd. Could those captions say something the body does not?

  I reformulated them to avoid the repetition without presenting entirely new information not found in the body. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:27, 26 July 2026 (UTC) reply

• "Others" heading: this subsection covers axioms, intermediate premises, affirmative and negative premises, universal and existential propositions, simple and compound premises, descriptive and normative premises, and major and minor premises. That is a lot for one heading called "Others". Could it get a more descriptive name, or be split in two?

  I made an extra subsection for axioms and intermediate premises. Generally speaking, they are grouped together because these categories do not get as much attention as the others and because the explanations are relatively short. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:27, 26 July 2026 (UTC) reply

• Lead links: the lead says Premises are true or false statements, with "true" linked to Truth and "false statements" to false statement. The body instead talks about false premises, and says each premise has a truth value. Would statements with a truth value be more accurate, and match the body better?

  I think it could also work and would be more concise than the current formulation. However, truth value is a technical term, while the current formulation is more accessible, which matters more for the lead section than for explanation in the body. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:27, 26 July 2026 (UTC) reply

• Two source titles cut short: Magnus and Button is listed as forall x: Calgary: An Introduction to Formal, but the book's own title page reads "forall x: Calgary. An Introduction to Formal Logic". Sen is listed as An Introduction to Critical Thinking:, ending on a colon.

  Fixed. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:27, 26 July 2026 (UTC) reply

• Cook page: the bibliography entry for Cook pins page=227, but the work is cited at pp. 21, 227 and 251. The pinned page probably wants removing so the short footnotes carry the page each time.

  Removed. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:27, 26 July 2026 (UTC) reply

• Allen editors: the third editor field reads editor-last3=Galles with editor-first3=Eduardo Ortiz and Carlos Delfino, which looks like two editors run together.

  Changed. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:27, 26 July 2026 (UTC) reply

• Date format: the Mackie entry uses 2021年04月15日 and 2026年05月21日 while the rest of the bibliography is day-month-year (MOS:DATEUNIFY).

  Fixed. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:27, 26 July 2026 (UTC) reply

thats all I have. It's a good read. Metalicat (talk) 20:41, 25 July 2026 (UTC) reply

Hi Metalicat and thanks for all the helpful comments! Phlsph7 (talk) 10:27, 26 July 2026 (UTC) reply

No worries. It's all implemented, so happy to support a very well written article. Metalicat (talk) 12:56, 26 July 2026 (UTC) reply

@Metalicat Hi there, I hope you’re okay and happy reviewing; I wanted to let you know that the bolded support above coupled with this one is duplicating, haha, maybe use italics for the one above or just quotes would work fine. Vanderwaalforces (talk) 04:45, 28 July 2026 (UTC) reply

@Vanderwaalforces: Whoops! Thanks for the heads up. It's rectified now. Metalicat (talk) 15:09, 28 July 2026 (UTC) reply

The footnote about validity not by itself offering support has me worry if the use of justify in the lead will have readers confuse logic with epistemology, and inference with justification. Might one use "imply" or some such logical notion? If one meant to include epistemology, so as to include a premise of non deductive reasoning, could one still make sure to distinguish them, say by the disjunction? "Premises depending on context serve either to logically imply or epistemically justify" or something more artfully expressed. Cake (talk) 22:55, 28 July 2026 (UTC) reply

Hi MisterCake and thanks for the input! The point you mention is in part addressed in the third lead paragraph. I changed the term to "defend" to avoid taking sides. Phlsph7 (talk) 08:57, 29 July 2026 (UTC) reply

I like the switch to defend. "Substantiate" or something might be even better, as 'defend' might lead one to think about a 2-player dispute rather than a 1-player proof. I think I have the same worry about the third lead paragraph suddenly talking about epistemology. I would again try something like "to preserve truth and infer conclusions, they may also serve to justify..." Cake (talk) 15:50, 29 July 2026 (UTC) reply

substantiate also works for me, so I changed it. The topic is relevant to many fields, including epistemology, so I don't think that this is a problem. For example, Blair 2012 says the epistemic ... status of the premises .. will transfer to the conclusion. Phlsph7 (talk) 08:30, 30 July 2026 (UTC) reply