浅析罗素的摹状词理论——从一个真命题谈起

那个会腾云驾雾的会腾云驾雾吗?对于这个问题,从常识出发的人们会很自信地回答：当然能。也就是说,命题“那个会腾云驾雾的会腾云驾雾”是真的。而罗素的回答却恰恰相反,在他看来这个命题是假的。在回答之先,罗素首先分析指出这个命题面临     

关于“现在”算子冗余性的一个注记

关于“现在”算子的技术分析始于坎普(H.Kamp)。他在研究“现在”算子的冗余性问题时,通过引入■-tense的概念,把真值联结词和时态算子作为一种情形进行处理,造成了证明的晦涩。本文利用伯吉斯(J.Burgess)证明“现在”算子的冗余性思路,重新对“现在”算子在时态命题逻辑中的冗余性定理进行证明,补充了简化公式存在性这一关键步骤的证明,并利用证明中的处理方式,来分析自然语言中的时态语句。     

金岳霖“穷尽可能”的“必然”观——与维特根斯坦“重言式”的比较

《论道》是金岳霖的主要著作之一,集中体现了西方现代逻辑与中国哲学相结合这一特点。很多人觉得《论道》不容易读懂,原因在于里面包含很多逻辑的背景知识。在《论道》一书的"序"中,金岳霖这样写道:"近来经奥人维特根斯坦与英人袁梦西分析才知道逻辑命题都是穷尽可能的必然命题。"[1]这里     

批判与新构：利科自身性主体的“下降”诠释逻辑

面对西方近现代的主体瓦解危机,利科坚持主体存在论,秉持批判与新构的态度对各流派进行调和,通过自身性主体、诠释、语言、反思、迂回、他者和中介等核心概念,走上了蕴含认识论和方法论的“下降”之路的主体求索,完成了对主体哲学的三重超越,其内在的思想逻辑在于：首先对传统和现代的主体概念进行批判,重新构思出自身性主体的在世存在;接着从反思的原则、形式和内容等层面进行革新,视主体形成于与他者的在世交互活动中,须对蕴含在世生存经验的语言进行意义诠释才能通达主体的反思与认识;最后,利科构建了承载意义的语言中介来承担具体且迂回的主体反思任务,逐步抵达主体存在之本体的初衷。这在断裂的存在论、认识论和方法论诠释学间架起沟通的桥梁,开启了诠释学的第三次转向,使得动荡的主体哲学有了坚实的此在生活世界之根,并为始源性的存在论问题提供了新思路。     

为一个教条辩护

在这篇论文中,格菜斯和斯特劳森试图为分析—综合区分辩护,他们认为奎因对该区分提出的批评不能为他对区分的拒绝提供辩护。两位作者的理由是:第一,分析—综合区分的存在有一个支持性的普遍前提,这个前提以分析性词组的日常用法和哲学用法为基础;第二,虽然分析性词组中的概念没有得到有效的形式定义,但通过对概念的语用分析,我们可以提出有效的非形式定义,而且任何定义都应当以语用实践为依据;第三,接受整体论与接受分析—综合区分是一致的,两者之间不存在矛盾。     

平等的正义性及其形式原则考论

正义在逻辑上是比平等更底层、更基础的概念,可以为平等理论提供逻辑基础,平等的论证是一种正义性论证。支撑平等的正义的形式原则相同的人相同对待,不同的人不同对待,恰恰是从平等的描述性概念即人们的相同性到平等的规范性概念即平等要求的逻辑过渡。     

医生特殊干涉权的法律分析

医生特殊干涉权对于正确处理医患关系、保护医患双方的合法权益具有重要意义，分析了医生特殊干涉权的依据、概念，指出了医生特殊干涉权具有时间性、职业性、后续代位性、目的性的特点，分析了其适用原则，并对其抗辩理由进行了分析讨论。     

医生特殊干涉权的法律分析

医生特殊干涉权对于正确处理医患关系、保护医患双方的合法权益具有重要意义,分析了医生特殊干涉权的依据、概念,指出了医生特殊干涉权具有时间性、职业性、后续代位性、目的性的特点,分析了其适用原则,并对其抗辩理由进行了分析讨论.     

动词体的球态语义学

本文介绍由塔斯基的立体几何导出的球态语义学,并将其应用于自然语言中的动词体现象。球态语义学特别适合应用于英语的进行体。这种方法有以下优点（i）它扩展了区间式语义,并同时避免了其缺陷,（ii）它解决了未完成体难题,（iii）它的解决方法无需诉诸最终结果策略。逻辑方法一般被认为难于处理自然语言的动词体问题。基于点的时间结构以及建立在该结构之上的经典普莱尔时态逻辑（[18]）太弱了。而基于区间的时态语义则缺乏足够的表达力,并且难以解释进行体（[4,8]）.本文给出一种新的基于球上整体－部分关系概念的模型和时态语义。这种球态语义学建基于塔斯基1927年引入的立体几何之上。与基于点和基于区间的语义不同,在球态语义学中很多动词体区分都由统一的逻辑方法刻画。在一个由封闭球构成的论域中,可达关系由相切性概念给出。相应地,我们可定义外切、内切、外径、内径以及同心等基本概念。与区间式语义不同,球是论域的初始概念,球态语义学不是在时间段而是在球中对事件赋值。因此,仅将时间区间作为初始概念而不承认其端点初性性的问题不复存在。英语中的进行体由球上的连续行动来刻画。行动是非终止的,只要球没有由外切相离。相应地,外切相离刻车动作完成。我们区分在均匀球和非均匀球中发生事件的整体-部分关系。非持续动作视为直径为零的同心球。球态语义学根据动作或执行完成的时刻来定义时间概念,其中不需要时间端点的概念。在保持与基于区间的时间模型类似的基础上,球态语义学暗示了一种关于可能世界的定性概念,并且它有利于解决时间的循环概念问题。     

论逻辑后承概念

塔尔斯基在其1933年的论文中基于自己开创的语义学定义了形式化语言中真这个概念。然后,他在发表于1936年的本文中,在真这个概念的定义的基础上,第一次为后承概念提出了一个实质恰当的定义,即“句子X从类K的句子逻辑地得出当且仅当K这个类的每个模型也是句子X的模型”,使得逻辑后承这个现代逻辑核心概念的定义成为标准定义。但是,这个定义也遗留了一个更为根本的问题,即逻辑词项和非逻辑词项的划分标准问题,后者将由塔尔斯基本人在1966年给出了一个划分标准,从而开辟了一个方兴未衰的逻辑哲学研究方向。     

Necessity and Language: In Defence of Conventionalism

Kalhat has forcefully criticised Wittgenstein's linguistic or conventionalist account of logical necessity, drawing partly on Waismann and Quine. I defend conventionalism against the charge that it cannot do justice to the truth of necessary propositions, renders them unacceptably arbitrary or reduces them to metalingustic statements. At the same time, I try to reconcile Wittgenstein's claim that necessary propositions are constitutive of meaning with the logical positivists’ claim that they are true by virtue of meaning. Explaining necessary propositions by reference to linguistic conventions does not reduce modal to non‐modal notions, but it avoids metaphysical accounts, which are incapable of explaining how we can have a priori knowledge of necessity.     

Quine: Elliott SoberQuine's Two Dogmas

In 'Two Dogmas of Empiricism', Quine attacks the analytic/synthetic distinction and defends a doctrine that I call epistemological holism. Now, almost fifty years after the article's appearance, what are we to make of these ideas? I suggest that the philosophical naturalism that Quine did so much to promote should lead us to reject Quine's brief against the analytic/synthetic distinction; I also argue that Quine misunderstood Carnap's views on analyticity. As for epistemological holism, I claim that this thesis does not follow from the logical point that Duhem and Quine made about the role of auxiliary assumptions in hypothesis testing, and that the thesis should be rejected.     

On the Quinean-analyticity of mathematical propositions

This paper investigates the relation between Carnap and Quine??s views on analyticity on the one hand, and their views on philosophical analysis or explication on the other. I argue that the stance each takes on what constitutes a successful explication largely dictates the view they take on analyticity. I show that although acknowledged by neither party (in fact Quine frequently expressed his agreement with Carnap on this subject) their views on explication are substantially different. I argue that this difference not only explains their differences on the question of analyticity, but points to a Quinean way to answer a challenge that Quine posed to Carnap. The answer to this challenge leads to a Quinean view of analyticity such that arithmetical truths are analytic, according to Quine??s own remarks, and set theory is at least defensibly analytic.     

Revisiting Quine on Truth by Convention

In “Truth by Convention” W.V. Quine gave an influential argument against logical conventionalism. Even today his argument is often taken to decisively refute logical conventionalism. Here I break Quine’s arguments into two—(i) the super-task argument and (ii) the regress argument—and argue that while these arguments together refute implausible explicit versions of conventionalism, they cannot be successfully mounted against a more plausible implicit version of conventionalism. Unlike some of his modern followers, Quine himself recognized this, but argued that implicit conventionalism was explanatorily idle. Against this I show that pace Quine’s claim that implicit conventionalism has no content beyond the claim that logic is firmly accepted, implicit rules of inference can be used to distinguish the firmly accepted from the conventional. As part of my case, I argue that positing syntactic rules of inference as part of our linguistic competence follows from the same methodology that leads contemporary linguists and cognitive scientists to posit rules of phonology, morphology, and grammar. The upshot of my discussion is a diagnosis of the fallacy in Quine’s master critique of logical conventionalism and a re-opening of possibilities for an attractive conventionalist theory of logic.     

Does the Quine/duhem Thesis Prevent Us from Defining Analyticity?

Quine claims that holism (i.e., the Quine-Duhem thesis) prevents us from defining synonymy and analyticity (section 2). In Word and Object, he dismisses a notion of synonymy which works well even if holism is true. The notion goes back to a proposal from Grice and Strawson and runs thus: R and S are synonymous iff for all sentences T we have that the logical conjunction of R and T is stimulus-synonymous to that of S and T. Whereas Grice and Strawson did not attempt to defend this definition, I try to show that it indeed gives us a satisfactory account of synonymy. Contrary to Quine, the notion is tighter than stimulus-synonymy – particularly when applied to sentences with less than critical semantic mass (section 3). Now according to Quine, analyticity could be defined in terms of synonymy, if synonymy were to make sense: A sentence is analytic iff synonymous to self-conditionals. This leads us to the following notion of analyticity: S is analytic iff, for all sentences T, the logical conjunction of S and T is stimulus-synonymous to T; an analytic sentence does not change the semantic mass of any theory to which it may be conjoined (section 4). This notion is tighter than Quine's stimulus-analyticity; unlike stimulus-analyticity, it does not apply to those sentences from the very center of our theories which can be assented to come what may, even though they are not synthetic in the intuitive sense (section 5).     

Showing,Analysis and the Truth-Functionality of Logical Necessity in Wittgenstein's Tractatus

This paper aims to explain how the Tractatus attempts to unifylogic by deriving the truth-functionality of logical necessityfrom the thesis that a proposition shows its sense. I first interpret the Tractarian notion of showing as the displaying ofwhat is intrinsic to an expression (or a symbol). Then I argue that, according to theTractatus, the thesis that a proposition shows its sense implies the determinacy of sense, the possibility of the complete elimination of non-primitive symbols, the analyticity thesis and the strong analyticity thesis. The picture theory emerges as what provides the only acceptable account of an elementary proposition, subject to the constraint that a proposition must show its sense. The picture theory and the analyticity thesis then entail the contingency thesis (that an elementary proposition is contingent) and the independence thesis (that elementary propositions are mutually logically independent) which, together with the strong analyticity thesis, imply that all logical propositions are tautologies.     

Two Dogmas'–All Bark and No Bite? Carnap and Quine on Analyticity1

Recently O'Grady aigued that Quine's “Two Dogmas” misses its mark when Carnap's use of the analyticity distinction is understood in the light of his deflationism. While in substantial agreement with the stress on Camap's deflationism, I argue that O'Grady is not sufficiently sensitive to the difference between using the analyticity distinction to support deflationism, and taking a deflationary attitude towards the distinction itself; the latter being much more controversial. Being sensitive to this difference, and viewing Quine as having reason to insist on a non‐arbitrary analyticity distinction, we see that “Two Dogmas” makes direct contact with Carnap's deflationism. We must look beyond “Two Dogmas” to Quine's other critiques of analyticity to understand why the arbitrariness of the distinction threatens to undermine or overextend Carnap's deflationism, collapsing it into a view much like Quine's. Quine is then seen to achieve many of Carnap's ends, with the important exception of deflationism.     

Radical Interpretation and Logical Pluralism

I examine Quine’s and Davidson’s arguments to the effect that classical logic is the one and only correct logic. This conclusion is drawn from their views on radical translation and interpretation, respectively. I focus on the latter, but I first address, independently, Quine’s argument to the effect that the ‘deviant’ logician, who departs from classical logic, is merely changing the subject. Regarding logical pluralism, the question is whether there is more than one correct logic. I argue that bivalence may be subject matter dependent, but that distribution and the law of excluded middle can probably not be dropped whilst maintaining the standard meanings of the connectives. In discussing the ramifications of the indeterminacy of interpretation, I ask whether it forces Davidsonian interpreters to adopt Dummett’s epistemic conception of truth vis-à-vis their interpretations. And, if so, does this cohere with their attributing a nonepistemic notion of truth to their interpretees? This would be a form of logical pluralism. In addition, I discuss Davidson’s arguments against conceptual schemes. Schemes incommensurable with our own could be construed as wholesale deviant logics, or so I argue. And, if so, their possibility would yield, in turn, the possibility of a radical logical pluralism. I also address Davidson’s application of Tarski’s definition of truth.

     

From a Phono-Logical Point of View: Neutralizing Quine’s Argument Against Analyticity

Though largely unnoticed, in “Two Dogmas” Quine (1951, Two Dogmas of Empiricism, Philosophical Review 60, 20–43. Reprinted in From a Logical Point of View, 20–46) himself invokes a distinction: a distinction between logical and analytic truths. Unlike analytic statements equating ‘bachelor’ with ‘unmarried man’, strictly logical tautologies relating two word-tokens of the same word-type, e.g., ‘bachelor’ and ‘bachelor’ are true merely in virtue of basic phonological form, putatively an exclusively non-semantic function of perceptual categorization or brute stimulus behavior. Yet natural language phonemic categorization is not entirely free of interpretive semantic considerations. “Phonemic reductionism” in both its linguistic (Bloch 1953, Contrast, Language 29, 59–61) and behavioral (Quine 1990, The Phoneme’s Long Shadow, Emics and Etics: The Insider/Outsider Debate, T. Headland, K. Pike and M. Harris, (eds.), Newbury Park, CA, Sage Publications, 164–167) guise is false. The semantic basis of phonological equivalence, however, has repercussions vis-à-vis Quine’s critique of analyticity. A consistent rejection of meaning-based equivalencies eliminates not only analyticity, but imposes a form of phonological eliminativism too. Phonological eliminativism is the reductio result of applying Quinean meaning skepticism to the phonological typing of natural language. But unlike analyticity, phonology is presumably not subject to philosophical dismissal. The semantic basis of natural language phonology serves to neutralize Quine’s argument against analyticity: without the semantics of meaning, more than just synonymy is lost; basic phonology must also be forfeited. Let’s begin with the fact that even Quine has to admit that it is possible for two tokens of the same orthographic type to be synonymous, for that much is presupposed by his own account of logical truth. Paul Boghossian (1999, 343)     

Opacity and the double life of singular propositions

In this paper I analyze David Kaplan?s essay “Opacity”. In “Opacity” Kaplan attempts to dismiss Quine?s concerns about quantification across intensional (modal and intentional) operators. I argue that Kaplan succeeds in showing that quantification across intensional operators is logically coherent and that quantified modal logic is strictly speaking not committed to essentialism. However, I also argue that this is not in and of itself sufficient to support Kaplan?s more ambitious attempt to move beyond purely logical results and provide unified, uncontroversial interpretations of both “believes” and “necessarily”. In the paper I raise several questions about the subject matter of logic and the role of semantics, with special focus on singular propositions.