MATH 311W Wksht 2

• If/then (aka conditional statement, aka implication) An if/then statement in-

volving 2 statements A and B is a new statement (written A ⇒ B or “ if A, then B)
that is either true or false. Think of this as a trigger, if A is true then B must also be
true. Therefore, the only way A ⇒ B can be false is if A is true but B is false. [That
is A is true, but fails to trigger B being true as well]. The statement A is called the
hypothesis and B is called the conclusion.
Which of the following conditional statements are false/true?
“If 2 + 2 = 9 then 4 × 5 = 6.”
“If 2 is prime then 4 is prime”
“If 4 is prime then 2 is prime”
“If 4 is even then 8 is even”
“If pigs can fly then the moon is made of cheese.”
NOTE: If/then statements do not need to have a causal relationship to be true.
”If 7 is odd then white is a color.” is a true statement. Even though white being a
color is not caused by 7 being odd.

• Converse The converse of an implication is the implication with the hypothesis and
conclusion switched.
The converse of “If it is raining then it is cloudy.” is “If it is cloudy then it is raining.”
[One of these is false and the other is true]
What is the converse of:
C: “If a number is divisible by 4 then it is even.”
Is the original statement true? is its converse?
WARNING: In light of the above example, a statement and its converse are not nec-
essarily equivalent!!

• Theorem 3.
A ⇒ B is equivalent to (∼ A) ∨ B

A B ∼ A A ⇒ B (∼ A) ∨ B
T T F T T
T F F F F
F T T T T
F F T T T

Let’s see this with an English example:

“If it is raining then it is cloudy” is equivalent to
“It is not raining or it is cloudy.”
 “If 7 is odd, then white is a color”
NOTE: All “if/then” statements can be converted to equivalent statements involving
“or”!

• Contrapositive. The contrapositive of the conditional statement A ⇒ B is the (con-

ditional) statement ∼ B ⇒∼ A.
Theorem 4 The contrapositive of a conditional statement is equivalent to the original
statement.
Proof 1:

A B ∼ A ∼ B (∼ B) ⇒ (∼ A) A ⇒ B
T T F F T T
T F F T F F
F T T F T T
F F T T T T

Proof 2: We have built up enough ’algebra’ to prove this as follows:

From Theorem 3, for any statements X and Y, we know that X ⇒ Y and (∼ X) ∨ Y
are equivalent.
So by using this theorem twice, we see that A ⇒ B is equivalent to (∼ A) ∨ B, and
that (∼ B) ⇒ (∼ A) is equivalent to ∼ (∼ B) ∨ (∼ A) which is B ∨ (∼ A) which is
clearly equivalent to (∼ A) ∨ B. ¤
Let’s see this equivalence with an English example:
“If it is raining then it is cloudy” is equivalent to its contrapositive:
“If it is not cloudy, then it is not raining.”
NOTE: If one shows the contrapositive of an “if/then” statement is true, then the
original “if/then” statement is true.

• Negation of a conditional. Theorem 5 ∼ (A ⇒ B) is equivalent to A ∧ (∼ B)

(You will prove this in the HW).
Example: negate each the following statements and simplify each to an ’and’ statement.
(a) If it rains then it pours.
(b) If it is rainy then it is cloudy.
(c) If 2 is odd then 5 is even.
(d) If x ¿ 2 then x is positive.

• Proofs of “if/then” statements. In mathematics, we often need to prove that

A ⇒ B is a true statement. Recall that if/then statements are like triggers, that only
go off if A is true. So to prove that A ⇒ B is true, one approach is to directly show
that whenever A is true, this forces B to be true. Then we have proven that A ⇒ B is
 a true statement. The actual argument that shows that B is forced to be true is called
a direct proof.
Theorem A: If a is even and b is even, then a + b is an even number.
Note: We need a careful definition of even.
Before that, we need to define the integers Z
Z=

Definition A number is even if ..

The Direct Proof of the Theorem A:

• Proofs by Contradiction. By Theorem 5, if you can manage to prove that A∧(∼ B)

is a FALSE statement then A ⇒ B is true (and vice versa). When one does this, they
say that they are proving A ⇒ B by contradiction.
Theorem B: If a is even and b is odd, then a + b is an odd number.
We can actually use Theorem A to prove this.
Proof of Theorem B (by contradiction):

• Proofs by Contrapositive. By Theorem 4, if one proves (∼ B) ⇒ (∼ A) is true,

then they have proven that A ⇒ B is true. Such a proof is called a proof by contra-
position.
HW # 2 (read N&B: pg 9-13,19-24, look at exercises 11-24 on pg 30)
1. Are the following conditional statements true or false?
(a) If x2 < 0 then y = 17.
(b) If 4 is even, then 27 is positive.
(c) If 4 is even, then 27 is negative.
2. Negate each of the following if/then statements and express them using ’and’:
(a) If Tom ate his broccoli then he will have dessert.
(b) If x is even, then x2 is even.
(c) If x is a whole number, then x is 20.
3. For any statement A, is A ⇒ A a true statement always? Explain. What is its
converse? What is its contrapositive?
4. Provide two proofs of Theorem 5, one using truth tables and one using ’algebra’ as
in the proof of Theorem 4.