Logical Forms, Part II - Logic, Language, and Knowledge

COLEÇÃO CLE, 2001

The main question treated in this book is the relation between statements (sentences, propositions) and reality. The book is the first volume of a larger work about the fundamental (ontological, epistemological, linguistic) character of logic. My viewpoint is a realistic and metaphysical view of logic and truth influenced to a very large extent by works of Plato, Aristotle, Frege, Russell, Gödel, and Hardy, among others. Hence the title "Logical Forms", inspired by Plato. I list below the titles of the chapters in lieu of an abstract. Introduction. Logic, ontology, and epistemology. 1. Truth, description, and identification. 2. The True and the False. 3. Use, mention, and Russell's theory of descriptions. 4. Arguments for Frege's thesis. 5. Objections to facts. 6. Truth, denotation, and interpretations. 7. Tarski's semantic conception of truth. 8. The True and the False revisited: Frege's logic. 9.Structuring reality: properties, sets, and states of affairs. 10. Identity and extensionality. 11. Senses. 12. Truth and correspondence. A translation to Spanish--Formas Lógicas I--was published by Eudeba in 2015 and I added some information and a link to Eudeba in TRANSLATIONS. A translation to Portuguese--Lógica, ontologia e epistemologia --of the Introduction was published in 2006 and I added the pdf in TRANSLATIONS.

The expressions 'form', 'structure', 'schema', 'shape', 'pattern', 'figure', 'mold', and related locutions are used in logic both as technical terms and in metaphors. This paper juxtaposes, distinguishes, and analyses uses of these expressions by logicians. No such project has been attempted previously. After establishing general terminology, we present a variant of traditional usage of the expression 'logical form' followed by a discussion of the usage found in the two-volume Chateaubriand book Logical Forms (2001 and 2005)—the most comprehensive work on the subject ever written and in many ways the focus of this paper. Resumo: As expressões 'forma', 'estrutura', 'esquema', 'formato', 'modelo', 'figura', 'molde', e termos relacionados são usados em lógica tanto como termos técnicos quanto como em metáforas. O presente artigo justapõe, diferencia e analisa o uso de...

Philosophical Studies, 1975

The last half dozen years have witnessed growing talk about a new synthesis. Linguists and logicians, it is said, are finding common ground in the investigation of the logical form of sentences in natural language. Adverbs, mass terms, proper names, action sentences, belief sentenes, quantitiers, comparatives and more have all come in for scrutiny. Early results have been intriguing. Even more enticing though are the claims that out of the synthesis will come illumination of our tacit metaphysical or ontological assumptions, and perhaps even the solution of major philosophical problems.

This essay is a critical review of Western Logic designed to analyze this central science from a philosophical view. It examines logic's historical evolution, its traditional divisions and its principles. Since logic was introduced in the early days of the development of western philosophy, then it is appropriate to apply the clear thinking reputation of philosophy to this central pillar of Western Philosophy. My motivation is to construct my challenge to traditional western thinking, derived from 'The Old Greeks'; it is particularly critical because logic was developed from the beginning as a method for winning arguments; this was motivated by the men who were the original creators of logic. They were often the well-educated ('clever') brothers of the warriors who ran the warlike Greek city states; all of these men were convinced of the warrior values of competition and winning. Argument was simply a verbal analogue of a combat dual between two warriors but with less lethal

Oxford University Press, 2023

This book takes an idea first explored by medieval logicians 800 years ago and revisits it armed with the tools of contemporary linguistics, logic, and computer science. The idea - the Holy Grail of the medieval logicians - was the thought that all of logic could be reduced to two very simple rules that are sensitive to logical polarity (for example, the presence and absence of negations). Ludlow and %Zivanović pursue this idea and show how it has profound consequences for our understanding of the nature of human inferential capacities. They also show its consequences for some of the deepest issues in contemporary linguistics, including the nature of quantification, puzzles about discourse anaphora and pragmatics, and even insights into the source of aboutness in natural language. The key to their enterprise is a formal relation they call "p-scope" - a polarity-sensitive relation that controls the operations that can be carried out in their Dynamic Deductive System. They show that with p-scope in play, deductions can be carried out using sublogical operations like those they call COPY and PRUNE - operations that are simple syntactic operations on sentences. They prove that the resulting deductive system is complete and sound. The result is a beautiful formal tapestry in which p-scope unlocks important properties of natural language, including the property of "restrictedness," which they prove to be equivalent to the semantic notion of conservativity. More than that, they show that restrictedness is also a key to understanding quantification and discourse anaphora, and many other linguistic phenomena.

Manuscrito, 2007

In this critical study I try to highlight some of the most important issues discussed in Chateaubriand’s excellent book. In particular, I discuss in some detail Chateaubriand’s criticism of one of the icons of analytic philosophy, namely, Quine, as well as some of his own valuable contributions to philosophy in this book – for example, his refutation of the various forms of the slingshot argument and his characterization of logical truth.

La lógica experimenta actualmente un crecimiento vertiginoso. Acompañada de un impulso inter y transdisciplinario, se despliega como un saber que transforma la naturaleza de las nociones de epistemolog&iacure;a y semántica. Es hora de que los filósofos se confronten a los problemas y a las nuevas preguntas esbozadas por estos avances. En verdad es manifiesto que hay ya algunos emprendimientos importantes en ese sentido. Emprendimientos que contribuyen en la exploración de nuevas direcciones del rol de la lógica como organon. El objetivo principal de nuestra colección es precisamente promover la publicación y traducción de obras en lengua castellana sobre lógica, filosofía de la lógica, filosofía de la ciencia, epistemología y semántica de la lenguas naturales. Esperamos que un tal foro de publicación fomentará la consolidación de vínculos ya existentes entre las disciplinas mencionadas y la construcción de nuevos lazos inter-y transdisciplinarios. Logic is nowadays growing at a breathtaking pace with a trans-and interdisciplinary élan which is transforming the very nature of the notion of epistemology and semantics. The time is ripe for philosophers to take up the challenges resulting from this impulse and indeed there are clear signals that many philosophers have already responded by taking upon themselves the task of reinstating logic in a new version of its old role of organon.The aim of this series is to promote the publication in Spanish of worksin logic, philosophy of logic, philosophy of science, epistemology and semantic for natural languag. This publication forum should foster the consolidation of existing links between those disciplines and the building of new inter and transdisplinary ones. The Volume La lógica como herramienta de la razón has been published by the UK publisher College Publications. Their Spanish language series Cuadernos de Logica, Epistemologia y Lenguaje, distinguishes itself by promoting and supporting researche in the field of Logic, where logic takes anew the role of an Organon, prescribed in Antiquity by Aristotle. Nowadays; this role of logic is deployed in its inter-and transdisciplianry character. Two other salient characteristics of this collection that I would like to point out, is as, already mentioned, that it publishes original work in Spanish and the second is copyright policy of all CP titles that allows authors to retain full rights for their own work. Prof. Atocha Aliseda (Universidad Autonoma de Mexico) We congratulate, moreover (the Spanish-speaking scientific community) should congratulate ourselves for the launching of a collection that promotes the publication in Spanish of work in this field, " Prof Arancha San Ginés (Universidad de Granada) Extracted from the Radio interview with Atocha Aliseda (Universidad Autonoma de Mexico), on the occassion of the publication in 2014 of her book La lógica como herramienta de la razón. Directores de la Serie: Shahid Rahman (Université de Lille3-STL:UMR 8163-CNRS) Juan Redmond (Universidad de Valparaíso, STL-UMR8163 Lille3) Editor Asistente: Rodrigo López Orellana (Universidad de Valparaíso/Universidad de Salamanca)

Ratio 23.2 (2010) 184-198

I have written a number of articles recently that have a rather remarkable character. They all point out trivial grammatical facts that, at great cost, have not been respected in twentieth century Logic. A major continuous strand in my previous work, with this same character, I will first summarise, to locate the kind of fact that is involved. But then I shall present an overview of the more recent, and more varied points I have made, which demonstrate the far larger extent of basic grammar that has been overlooked or suppressed. I end with some remarks about how this phenomenon can have arisen – principally through logicians not being attentive enough to their own language, and occupying themselves, instead, with often quite imaginary languages.

Essay on the Principles of Logic: A Defense of Logical Monism, 2023

Michael Wolff's new preface to my translation of his Essay on the Principles of Logic: A Defense of Logical Monism.