Definition:Logical Connective

Definition
A logical connective is an object which either modifies a statement, or connects existing statements into a larger, more complicated statement.

Other terms for logical connective which may be encountered are:


 * Connective;
 * Propositional connective;
 * Sentential connective;
 * Logical constant;
 * Sentence-forming operator;
 * Boolean operator (in the context of mathematical logic);
 * Conjunction (as used in natural language - mathematics has a more specialised use for the term conjunction, however.

A connective can be considered as being an operator.

In propositional logic, the only types of connective you are likely to encounter are unary connectives, which take one statement as an operand, and binary connectives, which take two.

Some treatments do not consider unary connectives to be logical connectives as such, because they do not actually "connect" anything, but this is a trivial point which can serve only to confuse.

Also see

 * Operation