Platon Poretsky worked as an astronomer and observer first at Kharkov Observatory and then at Kazan University. He became interested in logic through Vasiliev just before he retired in 1889 through ill health.
Poretsky worked on mathematical logic for the rest of his life, extending and augmenting results of Boole, Jevons and Schröder. He applied his logic calculus to the theory of probability.
Recently further material on Poretsky had come to light and this is described in [3]. V A Bazhanov, the author states in his summary:-
In February 1992, T Ivanovic, working with the author in the archives at Kazan University, discovered new material relating to the life and work of the logician P S Poretsky (1846-1907). These include: various documents related to Poretsky's lectures on mathematical logic for mathematics department students at Kazan University which were intended to be given for three semesters in the autumn of 1887 and all of 1888 but were delivered only during the 1888 Spring semester, a complete mathematical logic program compiled by Poretsky, materials related to Poretsky's father and family, Poretsky's Magister's (master's) dissertation and the decision of the physics-mathematics faculty council to award him the doctorate in astronomy rather than the Magister, a complete list of the sources he used (including Boole, Jevons, Schröder, and Peano), biographical data and materials regarding his illness and subsequent dismissal from Kazan University.
Article by: J J O'Connor and E F Robertson
February 1997