Syntax

An atomic term is an upper case Latin letter, I and S excepted, followed by a numerical superscript called its degree, or by concatenated lower case variables, collectively known as an argument list. The degree of a term conveys the same information as the number of variables following a predicate letter. An atomic term of degree 0 denotes a Boolean variable or a truth value. The degree of I is invariably 2 and so is not indicated.

The "combinatory" (the word is Quine's) predicate functors, all monadic and peculiar to PFL, are Inv, inv, ∃, +, and p. A term is either an atomic term, or constructed by the following recursive rule. If τ is a term, then Invτ, invτ, ∃τ, +τ, and pτ are terms. A functor with a superscript n, n a natural number > 1, denotes n consecutive applications (iterations) of that functor.

A formula is either a term or defined by the recursive rule: if α and β are formulas, then αβ and ~(α) are likewise formulas. Hence "~" is another monadic functor, and concatenation is the sole dyadic predicate functor. Quine called these functors "alethic." The natural interpretation of "~" is negation; that of concatenation is any connective that, when combined with negation, forms a functionally complete set of connectives. Quine's preferred functionally complete set was conjunction and negation. Thus concatenated terms are taken as conjoined. The notation + is Bacon's (1985); all other notation is Quine's (1976; 1982). The alethic part of PFL is identical to the Boolean term schemata of Quine (1982).

As is well known, the two alethic functors could be replaced by a single dyadic functor with the following syntax and semantics: if α and β are formulas, then (αβ) is a formula whose semantics are "not (α and/or β)" (see NAND and NOR).

Axioms and semantics

Quine set out neither axiomatization nor proof procedure for PFL. The following axiomatization of PFL, one of two proposed in Kuhn (1983), is concise and easy to describe, but makes extensive use of free variables and so does not do full justice to the spirit of PFL. Kuhn gives another axiomatization dispensing with free variables, but that is harder to describe and that makes extensive use of defined functors. Kuhn proved both of his PFL axiomatizations sound and complete.

This section is built around the primitive predicate functors and a few defined ones. The alethic functors can be axiomatized by any set of axioms for sentential logic whose primitives are negation and one of ∧ or ∨. Equivalently, all tautologies of sentential logic can be taken as axioms.

Quine's (1982) semantics for each predicate functor are stated below in terms of abstraction (set builder notation), followed by either the relevant axiom from Kuhn (1983), or a definition from Quine (1976). The notation ${\displaystyle \{x_{1}\cdots x_{n}:Fx_{1}\cdots x_{n}\}}$ denotes the set of n-tuples satisfying the atomic formula ${\displaystyle Fx_{1}\cdots x_{n}.}$

• Identity, I, is defined as:

${\displaystyle IFx_{1}x_{2}\cdots x_{n}\leftrightarrow (Fx_{1}x_{1}\cdots x_{n}\leftrightarrow Fx_{2}x_{2}\cdots x_{n}){\text{.}}}$

Identity is reflexive (Ixx), symmetric (Ixy→Iyx), transitive ((Ixy∧Iyz) → Ixz), and obeys the substitution property:

${\displaystyle (Fx_{1}\cdots x_{n}\land Ix_{1}y)\rightarrow Fyx_{2}\cdots x_{n}.}$

• Padding, +, adds a variable to the left of any argument list.

${\displaystyle \ +F^{n}\ {\overset {\underset {\mathrm {def} }{}}{=}}\ \{x_{0}x_{1}\cdots x_{n}:F^{n}x_{1}\cdots x_{n}\}.}$

${\displaystyle +Fx_{1}\cdots x_{n}\leftrightarrow Fx_{2}\cdots x_{n}.}$

• Cropping, ∃, erases the leftmost variable in any argument list.

${\displaystyle \exists F^{n}\ {\overset {\underset {\mathrm {def} }{}}{=}}\ \{x_{2}\cdots x_{n}:\exists x_{1}F^{n}x_{1}\cdots x_{n}\}.}$

${\displaystyle Fx_{1}\cdots x_{n}\rightarrow \exists Fx_{2}\cdots x_{n}.}$

Cropping enables two useful defined functors:

• Reflection, S:

${\displaystyle SF^{n}\ {\overset {\underset {\mathrm {def} }{}}{=}}\ \{x_{2}\cdots x_{n}:F^{n}x_{2}x_{2}\cdots x_{n}\}.}$

${\displaystyle SF^{n}\leftrightarrow \exists IF^{n}.}$

S generalizes the notion of reflexivity to all terms of any finite degree greater than 2. N.B: S should not be confused with the primitive combinator S of combinatory logic.

• Cartesian product, ${\displaystyle \times }$;

${\displaystyle F^{m}\times G^{n}\leftrightarrow F^{m}\exists ^{m}G^{n}.}$

Here only, Quine adopted an infix notation, because this infix notation for Cartesian product is very well established in mathematics. Cartesian product allows restating conjunction as follows:

${\displaystyle F^{m}x_{1}\cdots x_{m}G^{n}x_{1}\cdots x_{n}\leftrightarrow (F^{m}\times G^{n})x_{1}\cdots x_{m}x_{1}\cdots x_{n}.}$

Reorder the concatenated argument list so as to shift a pair of duplicate variables to the far left, then invoke S to eliminate the duplication. Repeating this as many times as required results in an argument list of length max(m,n).

The next three functors enable reordering argument lists at will.

• Major inversion, Inv, rotates the variables in an argument list to the right, so that the last variable becomes the first.

${\displaystyle \operatorname {Inv} F^{n}\ {\overset {\underset {\mathrm {def} }{}}{=}}\ \{x_{1}\cdots x_{n}:F^{n}x_{n}x_{1}\cdots x_{n-1}\}.}$

${\displaystyle \operatorname {Inv} Fx_{1}\cdots x_{n}\leftrightarrow Fx_{n}x_{1}\cdots x_{n-1}.}$

• Minor inversion, inv, swaps the first two variables in an argument list.

${\displaystyle \operatorname {inv} F^{n}\ {\overset {\underset {\mathrm {def} }{}}{=}}\ \{x_{1}\cdots x_{n}:F^{n}x_{2}x_{1}\cdots x_{n}\}.}$

${\displaystyle \operatorname {inv} Fx_{1}\cdots x_{n}\leftrightarrow Fx_{2}x_{1}\cdots x_{n}.}$

• Permutation, p, rotates the second through last variables in an argument list to the left, so that the second variable becomes the last.

${\displaystyle \ pF^{n}\ {\overset {\underset {\mathrm {def} }{}}{=}}\ \{x_{1}\cdots x_{n}:F^{n}x_{1}x_{3}\cdots x_{n}x_{2}\}.}$

${\displaystyle pFx_{1}\cdots x_{n}\leftrightarrow \operatorname {Inv} \operatorname {inv} Fx_{1}x_{3}\cdots x_{n}x_{2}.}$

Given an argument list consisting of n variables, p implicitly treats the last n−1 variables like a bicycle chain, with each variable constituting a link in the chain. One application of p advances the chain by one link. k consecutive applications of p to Fⁿ moves the k+1 variable to the second argument position in F.

When n=2, Inv and inv merely interchange x₁ and x₂. When n=1, they have no effect. Hence p has no effect when n < 3.

Kuhn (1983) takes Major inversion and Minor inversion as primitive. The notation p in Kuhn corresponds to inv; he has no analog to Permutation and hence has no axioms for it. If, following Quine (1976), p is taken as primitive, Inv and inv can be defined as nontrivial combinations of +, ∃, and iterated p.

The following table summarizes how the functors affect the degrees of their arguments.

Expression	Degree
${\displaystyle p;\operatorname {Inv}$ ;\operatorname {inv} ;\ \lnot ;\ I}	no change
${\displaystyle +F^{n-1};\ \exists F^{n+1};\ SF^{n+1}}$	n
${\displaystyle \alpha ^{m}\beta ^{n};\ F^{m}\times G^{n}}$	max(m, n)

Rules

All instances of a predicate letter may be replaced by another predicate letter of the same degree, without affecting validity. The rules are:

• Modus ponens;
• Let α and β be PFL formulas in which ${\displaystyle x_{1}}$ does not appear. Then if ${\displaystyle (\alpha \land Fx_{1}...x_{n})\rightarrow \beta }$ is a PFL theorem, then ${\displaystyle (\alpha \land \exists Fx_{2}...x_{n})\rightarrow \beta }$ is likewise a PFL theorem.

Some useful results

Instead of axiomatizing PFL, Quine (1976) proposed the following conjectures as candidate axioms.

${\displaystyle \exists I}$

n−1 consecutive iterations of p restores the status quo ante:

${\displaystyle F^{n}\leftrightarrow p^{n-1}F^{n}}$

+ and ∃ annihilate each other:

${\displaystyle {\begin{cases}F^{n}\rightarrow +\exists F^{n}\\F^{n}\leftrightarrow \exists +F^{n}\end{cases}}}$

Negation distributes over +, ∃, and p:

${\displaystyle {\begin{cases}+\lnot F^{n}\leftrightarrow \lnot +F^{n}\\\lnot \exists F^{n}\rightarrow \exists \lnot F^{n}\\p\lnot F^{n}\leftrightarrow \lnot pF^{n}\end{cases}}}$

+ and p distributes over conjunction:

${\displaystyle {\begin{cases}+(F^{n}G^{m})\leftrightarrow (+F^{n}+G^{m})\\p(F^{n}G^{m})\leftrightarrow (pF^{n}pG^{m})\end{cases}}}$

Identity has the interesting implication:

${\displaystyle IF^{n}\rightarrow p^{n-2}\exists p+F^{n}}$

Quine also conjectured the rule: If α is a PFL theorem, then so are pα, +α, and ${\displaystyle \lnot \exists \lnot \alpha }$.