AUTHOR=Kramer Peter 

TITLE=Iconic logic: the visual art of drawing the right conclusion

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Psychology

VOLUME=15

YEAR=2024

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1368989

DOI=10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1368989

ISSN=1664-1078

ABSTRACT=<p>Most people, evidence suggests, have a hard time thinking straight. <italic>Symbolic logic</italic> is a tool that can help remedy this problem. Unfortunately, it is highly abstract and uses symbols whose meanings rely on unintuitive arbitrary conventions. Without sacrificing rigor, <italic>iconic logic</italic> is more concrete and uses icons that resemble what they stand for and whose meanings are thus easier to picture, process, and remember. Here I review and critique iconic <italic>existential graphs</italic> and <italic>concept diagrams</italic>—the former link iconic logic to iconic mathematics; the latter expand popular Euler or Venn diagrams and have, to some degree, been empirically investigated for user-friendliness. I lay out how expertise in perception, cognition, and genetics can inform and improve such empirical research to help make iconic logic more ergonomic. After all, logic is a tool, and tools should not only suit their use but also their user.</p>