Contingudes

Contingudes are a class of abstract entities used in certain formal theories to model contingent relations between propositions and events. A contingude represents a unit of potential truth that may become actual under specific conditions but does not by itself determine the outcome. In a formal system, contingudes are elements of a domain C equipped with a condition function cond and an outcome function out. A contingude c is specified by a pair (φ, ψ) where φ is a condition formula drawn from a language L, and ψ is a proposition that may hold if φ and other dependencies are satisfied. The collection of contingudes supports composition: two contingudes can be combined to form a composite contingent relation, and a negation operator that yields a contingude for the contingent negation of ψ under φ. The ordering by entailment defines a partial order: c1 ≤ c2 if whenever ψ1 holds under φ1, ψ2 holds under φ2 in all relevant models.

Examples: A contingude might represent "rain tomorrow" with condition "humid front over the region" leading to outcome "rain occurs with probability p". Another example is "stock price rise" contingent on "positive earnings report".

Relation: Contingudes relate to modal logic and possible-world semantics as a way to encode contingent truth across worlds, while differing from events by focusing on potential truth rather than occurrence alone.

Applications: used in thought experiments, probabilistic databases, and scenario planning; they are primarily a theoretical tool rather than an established standard.

See also: contingency, modal logic, possible worlds, probabilistic reasoning.