Subject: Re: advice on modal logic

From: Horacio Arlo-Costa <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 29 Aug 1999 16:43:18 -0400 (EDT)

Dear Steve:

Modal logic:

>>1. What books and papers do you consider "standard" or "classic"?

>>2. What books and papers do you consider especially good?

>>3.  What recent work do you consider particularly interesting or >>promising?

Items 2 and 3 require a long answer, which I can eventually provide verbally.

As to 1.  Well, Scott's `Advice in modal logic' is a classic piece that
you probably know.

Books.  This branches into books and textbooks. Recent and interesting
books probably goes together with items 2 and 3, so I will skip this in
this quick response.

Some ideas about textbooks.  Perhaps three recent textbooks can be
mentioned.  One not so recent: Chellas' book, and the new edition of E.
Hughes and M. J. Creswell's book dealing with first order modal logic as
well as the recent book by Melvin Fitting and Richard L. Mendelsohn
(First-Order Modal Logic).  The last one seems the best under both a
philosophical and logical point of view -- although several branches of
modal logic (like epistemic logic) are neglected.

Let me know if you need more specific references.

Best,

--H.