Definition:Exclusive Or

Definition
Exclusive Or is a binary connective which can be written symbolically as $p \oplus q$ whose behaviour is as follows:


 * $p \oplus q$

means:
 * Either $p$ is true or $q$ is true but not both.

There is no standard symbol for this, but the one shown above is commonly seen.

The operation $\oplus$ is called (from the Latin) aut (prounounced out).

This usage of or, that disallows the case where both disjuncts are true, is also called:
 * exclusive disjunction;
 * logical inequality;
 * non-equivalence;
 * symmetric difference.

Boolean Interpretation
From the above, we see that the boolean interpretations for $\mathbf A \oplus \mathbf B$ under the model $\mathcal M$ are:


 * $\left({\mathbf A \oplus \mathbf B}\right)_\mathcal M = \begin{cases}

F & : \mathbf A_\mathcal M = \mathbf B_\mathcal M \\ T & : \text {otherwise} \end{cases}$

Complement
The complement of $\oplus$ is the biconditional operator.

See Non-Equivalence for the proofs of some results relating these operators.

Truth Table
The truth table of $p \oplus q$ and its complement is as follows:

$\begin{array}{|cc||c|c|} \hline p & q & p \oplus q & p \iff q \\ \hline F&F&F&T\\ F&T&T&F\\ T&F&T&F\\ T&T&F&T\\ \hline \end{array}$

Notational Variants
Various symbols are encountered that denote the concept of exclusive or: