[Math] Condition of possibility = Co-Implication

lo.logicmathematical-philosophysoft-question

Sorry, but I do not know another place to post this question.

Condition of possibility is an important philosophical concept. Naively, this concept could be formally defined this way:

$q$ is a condition of possibility of
$p$ iff $\neg q$ implies $\neg
> p$

the latter being equivalent with $p$ implies $q$. When we write $\hookrightarrow$ for is a condition of possibility of and $\rightarrow$ for implies we get

$q \hookrightarrow p$ iff $p
> \rightarrow q$.

So, condition of possibility is something like co-implication.

My question is: While in category theory many concepts and co-concepts are treated as strongly related (= inter-definable) but each in its own right, and while in logic many concepts are treated as strongly related (= inter-definable) but each in its own right:

Why wasn't the – philosophically important – concept of condition
of possibility
found worthy of being
named and treated in its own right in (formal) logic?

Best Answer

As the other responders noted, you first need to find a formal setting in which what you call "co-implication" is operationally distinguished from ordinary implication. Emil Jeřábek mentioned non-commutative logic, but I think he might have been too quick to dismiss its relevance here. In particular the "right implication" of non-commutative logic (distinguished from "left implication") seems to me to be what you are looking for.

Have a look at the "Lambek calculus" (introduced by Lambek in his 1958 article, The mathematics of sentence structure), and then more generally "categorial type logics". Lambek's original motivation was syntax of natural language, but eventually (following a 1983 essay by van Benthem) this idea became part of a general approach to relating natural language syntax and semantics.

Related Question