Women in Logic Online – Talk with Francesca Poggiolesi
Explanatory Proofs: From Logic to Mathematics
| DATE: | Friday, January 24, 2025 |
| TIME: | 17:00 |
| VENUE: | Online via Zoom (link for registration below) |
ABSTRACT
Since the time of Aristotle, a distinction has been recognized between proofs that merely establish the truth of a theorem and those that provide an explanation by revealing the reasons why the theorem is true. While the former have been rigorously formalized in the ground-breaking work of Gentzen, the latter—despite being explored by eminent thinkers such as Leibniz and Bolzano—have not been subjected to systematic analysis. Recently, however, explanatory proofs have garnered increasing attention in philosophical discourse. The central question driving this debate is: _What makes a proof explanatory?_ Specifically, what features endow certain proofs with their explanatory power? In this talk, we aim to address this question through a logical formalization that leverages two pivotal tools of proof theory: the formalism known as _deep sequents_ and a systematic method for transforming _axioms into rules_. The results presented are partly based on a joint work with E. Pimentel (UCL, London).
On January 24, 2025, Francesca Poggiolesi will hold the third talk in the seminar series “Women in Logic Online”!
Click here to register for this talk via zoom.
SHORT BIO:
Francesca Poggiolesi is a CNRS Directrice de Recherche (Full Professor), co-leading the logic and philosophy of mathematics group of the IHPST, Paris. Broadly speaking, her research interest covers both foundational philosophical issues, as well as more technical logical problems: the common core of these different perspectives is represented by the employment of a similar methodology rooted in proof-theoretic tools. In the last years she has been focusing on the notion of explanation that she has been analyzing in different areas ranging from mathematics to explainable AI. Her research has been awarded by the French National Agency of Research with the four-years grant “Bolzano’s Insights.” She is the author of the book “Gentzen Calculi for Modal Propositional Logic,” and one of the editors in chief of the Journal of Philosophical Logic.
Women in Logic https://womeninlogic.org/
