Logic, Mathematics and Consistency in Literature: Searching for Don Quixote’s Place

Abstract

In this paper we show how uncertainty can be drastically reduced along our linguistic discourse. In particular, after discussing if the analysis of consistency in literature is a legitimate scientific question, from the linguistic analysis of the master piece of Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616), “Don Quixote of La Mancha”, we will propose a procedure to check to what extent the linguistic information provided by the author about the walking speed of Don Quixote within La Mancha is consistent. Such a consistency should allow the existence of a region that meets the author’s linguistic description of those trips that involve the place that Cervantes decided not to reveal from the beginning of his book, with the famous sentence “In a village of La Mancha, the name of which I have no desire to call to mind…” Taking into account the distances of those trips involving the unknown village and another well located place, and their estimated walking times obtained from a careful reading of such a novel, we will show that those stories seem to be consistent with a more or less constant walking march per day, still assuring the existence of a region within La Mancha that could be reached during the prescribed time for those trips involving the hidden village.