History and Variations
Smullyan in his 1978 book attributes the naming of "The Drinking Principle" to his graduate students. He also discusses variants (obtained by substituting D with other, more dramatic predicates):
- "there is a woman on earth such that if she becomes sterile, the whole human race will die out." Smullyan writes that this formulation emerged from a conversation he had with philosopher John Bacon.
- A "dual" version of the Principle: "there is at least one person such that if anybody drinks, then he does."
As "Smullyan's ‘Drinkers’ principle" or just "Drinkers' principle" it appears in H.P. Barendregt's "The quest for correctness" (1996), accompanied by some machine proofs. Since then it has made regular appearance as an example in publications about automated reasoning; it is sometimes used to contrast the expressiveness of proof assistants.
Read more about this topic: Drinker Paradox
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