Ontology and the Logistic Analysis of Language: An Enquiry Into the Contemporary Views on Universals

ISBN-13: 9789027700285 / Angielski / Twarda / 1974 / 211 str.

Guido Kung; Guido K]ng; Guido Ka1/4ng

Opis

It is the aim of the present study to introduce the reader to the ways of thinking of those contemporary philosophers who apply the tools of symbolic logic to classical philosophical problems. Unlike the "conti- nental" reader for whom this work was originally written, the English- speaking reader will be more familiar with most of the philosophers dis- cussed in this book, and he will in general not be tempted to dismiss them indiscriminately as "positivists" and "nominalists." But the English version of this study may help to redress the balance in another respect. In view of the present emphasis on ordinary language and the wide- spread tendency to leave the mathematical logicians alone with their technicalities, it seems not without merit to revive the interest in formal ontology and the construction of formal systems. A closer look at the historical account which will be given here, may convince the reader that there are several points in the historical develop- ment whose consequences have not yet been fully assessed: I mention, e. g., the shift from the traditional three-level semantics of sense and deno- tation to the contemporary two-level semantics of representation; the relation of extensional structure and intensional content in the extensional systems of Wittgenstein and Carnap; the confusing changes in labelling the different kinds of analytic and apriori true sentences; etc. Among the philosophically interesting tools of symbolic logic Lesniewski's calculus of names deserves special attention.

Spis treści

0. Introduction.- 0.1 The linguistic and logical interests of contemporary philosophy.- 0.2 Natural and logistic languages.- 0.3 The concern of the present study.- 0.31 Speculative grammar.- 0.32 Logistic languages and ontology.- 0.4 Plan of the book.- Appendix I/Brief historical survey of logistic philosophy.- Appendix II/The different traditions of contemporary semiotics.- One / The logistic analysis of language and the relation of representation.- 1. A Philosophical Revolution.- 1.1 The birth of contemporary analytic philosophy.- 1.2 Russell’s analysis of relational facts.- 2. From the Theory of Knowledge to the Logical Analysis of Language.- 2.1 The logicist definition of number.- 2.2 Logical constructions in place of epistemological inferences of existence.- 2.3 Philosophy as logical analysis of language.- 3. From the Psychological Concept to the Graphical Sign.- 3.1 The elimination of psychologism and Frege’s semantics.- 3.2 Russell’s theory of descriptions.- 3.3 Tarski’S Definition of the Concept of Truth.- 4. The Relation of Representation.- 4.1 The sharing of structure and form.- 4.2 The question of the content.- Two / The relation of representation of predicate signs and contemporary views on universals.- 5. Bertrand Russell.- 5.1 Universals as logical atoms.- 5.2 Qualia as individuals.- 5.3 Antinomies in the theory of classes.- 5.4 The hierarchy of types.- 6. Ludwig Wittgenstein.- 6.1 The ideal language without predicate signs.- 6.2 The interpretation of predicate signs of non-ideal languages.- 6.3 Some consequences of Wittgenstein’s conception.- 7. Rudolf Carnap.- 7.1 “Well-founded” relations.- 7.2 Synonymity.- 7.21 Kinds of a priori statements.- 7.22 Synonymity in logical syntax and semantics.- 7.3 Conventionalism and positivism.- 8. Stanislaw Le?niewski.- 8.1 The contradictory nature of so-called “general objects”.- 8.2 Mereology.- 8.3 OntologyL.- 8.31 The distributive conception of totalities.- 8.32 Shared, unshared and fictitious names.- 8.33 Functors and existential import.- 8.34 Quantifiers without existential import.- 8.4 Lesniewski’S nominalism.- 9. W. V. Quine and N. Goodman.- 9.1 Quine’s criterion.- 9.11 To be is to be the value of a variable.- 9.12 Different kinds of variables.- 9.13 On the precise formulation of Quine’s criterion.- 9.2 Ontologically different universes of discourse.- 9.21 Individuals and classes.- 9.22 Classes and intensions.- 9.3 A new way of judging ontological points of view.- 9.31 Intensionalism and extensionalism.- 9.32 Platonism and nominalism.- 9.321 Degrees of platonism.- 9.322 Systems and experience.- 9.323 Nominalistic reformulations.- 9.4 The syncategorematic functioning of predicate signs.- 9.41 Quine’s views.- 9.42 Goodman’s views.- 10. The Interpretations of Predicate Signs.- 10.1 Predicate signs as genuine names.- 10.2 Syncategorematic predicate signs.- 10.21 The equality interpretation.- 10.22 Equalities as a foundation for abstraction.- 10.23 The similarity interpretation.- 10.3 The strictly reistic interpretation.- 11. Conclusion.- 11.1 The value of exact formulation.- 11.2 The intensional background of formal structures and the incompleteness of all formalizations.- 11.3 Logical analysis and formal ontology.- Index of Names.- Index of Subjects.