Proposition (mathematics) in the context of "¬"

In logic, negation, also called the logical not or logical complement, is an operation that takes a proposition ${\displaystyle P}$ to another proposition "not ${\displaystyle P}$", written ${\displaystyle \neg P}$, ${\displaystyle {\mathord {\sim }}P}$, ${\displaystyle P^{\prime }}$ or ${\displaystyle {\overline {P}}}$. It is interpreted intuitively as being true when ${\displaystyle P}$ is false, and false when ${\displaystyle P}$ is true. For example, if ${\displaystyle P}$ is "The dog runs", then "not ${\displaystyle P}$" is "The dog does not run". An operand of a negation is called a negand or negatum.

Negation is a unary logical connective. It may furthermore be applied not only to propositions, but also to notions, truth values, or semantic values more generally. In classical logic, negation is normally identified with the truth function that takes truth to falsity (and vice versa). In intuitionistic logic, according to the Brouwer–Heyting–Kolmogorov interpretation, the negation of a proposition ${\displaystyle P}$ is the proposition whose proofs are the refutations of ${\displaystyle P}$.

In mathematical logic, a sentence (or closed formula) of a predicate logic is a Boolean-valued well-formed formula with no free variables. A sentence can be viewed as expressing a proposition, something that must be true or false. The restriction of having no free variables is needed to make sure that sentences can have concrete, fixed truth values: as the free variables of a (general) formula can range over several values, the truth value of such a formula may vary.

Sentences without any logical connectives or quantifiers in them are known as atomic sentences; by analogy to atomic formula. Sentences are then built up out of atomic sentences by applying connectives and quantifiers.