1. How many things are there?

2017 ◽  
pp. 6-23
Author(s):  
Michael Beaney
Keyword(s):  
Analytic Philosophy ◽  
Gottlob Frege ◽  
Relevant Concept ◽  
Central Concern ◽  
Nature Of Mathematics

‘How many things are there?’ introduces Gottlob Frege (1848–1925), one of the main founders of analytic philosophy whose central concern was with the nature of mathematics, and arithmetic in particular. It considers the question ‘How many things are there?’, concluding a simple answer is not permitted without specifying the relevant concept(s) by means of which to think of the things. If how to answer a given question is not immediately obvious, then we need to identify its possible meanings. Perhaps we will find the intended or relevant meaning by understanding the context; if not, then we may need to imagine possible contexts in which the question has an answer.

Meaning in Gender Theory: Clarifying a Basic Problem from a Linguistic-Philosophical Perspective

Hypatia ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 48-68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eva Waniek
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Language ◽  
Basic Problem ◽  
Analytic Philosophy ◽  
Linguistic Meaning ◽  
Gottlob Frege ◽  
Gender Theory ◽  
Philosophical Perspective ◽  
Gender Research ◽  
Ferdinand De Saussure ◽  
Anglo American

The author investigates the notion of linguistic meaning in gender research. She approaches this basic problem by drawing upon two very different conceptions of language and meaning: (1) that of the logician Gottlob Frege and (2) that of the linguist Ferdinand de Saussure. Motivated by the controversial response the Anglo-American sex/gender debate received within the German context, the author focuses on the connection between this epistemological controversy among feminists and two discursive traditions of linguistic meaning (analytic philosophy and poststructuralism), to show how philosophy of language can contribute to current feminist debates.

Necessity Lost

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sanford Shieh
Keyword(s):  
Analytic Philosophy ◽  
Logical Positivism ◽  
Bertrand Russell ◽  
Gottlob Frege ◽  
Deductive Argument ◽  
Analytic Tradition

A long tradition, going back to Aristotle, conceives of logic in terms of necessity and possibility: a deductive argument is correct if the truth of its conclusion follows necessarily from the truth of its premises or, put differently, if it is not possible for the conclusion to be false when the premises are true. A relatively unknown feature of the analytic tradition in philosophy is that, at its very inception, this venerable conception of the relation between logic and modality was put into question. The founders of analytic philosophy, Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell, held that there are no genuine distinctions among the necessary, the possible and the actual. In this first of a two-volume book, I investigate the grounds and consequences of this anti-modal position. The grounds lie in doctrines on truth, thought, and knowledge, as well as on the relation between mind and reality, that are central to the philosophies of Frege and Russell, and are of enduring philosophical interest. The main consequence is that logic is fundamental, and, to be coherent, modal concepts would be reconstructed in logical terms. This rejection of modality in early analytic philosophy remains of contemporary significance. The coherence of modal concepts is rarely questioned nowadays, because it is assumed that suspicion of modality derives from logical positivism, which has not survived philosophical scrutiny. The anti-modal arguments of Frege and Russell, however, have nothing to do with positivism, and remain a challenge to the contemporary acceptance of modal notions.

Introduction

Husserl ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
John J. Drummond ◽  
Otfried Höffe
Keyword(s):  
Edmund Husserl ◽  
Transcendental Phenomenology ◽  
Continental Philosophy ◽  
Analytic Philosophy ◽  
First Century ◽  
Viable Alternative ◽  
Central Concern ◽  
Philosophical Movement ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
The Many

Edmund Husserl, generally regarded as the founding figure of the philosophical movement of phenomenology—or, more precisely, transcendental phenomenology—exerted an enormous influence on the course of twentieth-and twenty-first-century philosophy. This influence was both positive and negative. The subsequent developments of, for example, existentialism, hermeneutics, and deconstruction were defined in part by how they both assimilated and departed from Husserlian views. The course of what has come to be called “continental philosophy” cannot be described without reference to this assimilation and departure and, among the many successor approaches, phenomenology remains a viable alternative. In addition, problems addressed by Husserl—most notably, intentionality, consciousness, the emotions, and ethics—are of central concern in so-called analytic philosophy. So, Husserl’s views remain central to many contemporary philosophical discussions....

The Analytic Revolution

2016 ◽  
Vol 78 ◽  
pp. 227-249 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Beaney
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Analytic Philosophy ◽  
Logical Analysis ◽  
Bertrand Russell ◽  
Gottlob Frege ◽  
Foundations Of Mathematics ◽  
Logical Theory

AbstractAnalytic philosophy, as we recognize it today, has its origins in the work of Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell around the turn of the twentieth century. Both were trained as mathematicians and became interested in the foundations of mathematics. In seeking to demonstrate that arithmetic could be derived from logic, they revolutionized logical theory and in the process developed powerful new forms of logical analysis, which they employed in seeking to resolve certain traditional philosophical problems. There were important differences in their approaches, however, and these approaches are still pursued, adapted, and debated today. In this paper I shall elucidate the origins of analytic philosophy in the work of Frege and Russell and explain the revolutionary significance of their methods of logical analysis.

“ALWAYS MIXED TOGETHER”: NOTATION, LANGUAGE, AND THE PEDAGOGY OF FREGE'S BEGRIFFSSCHRIFT

2018 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 1099-1131
Author(s):  
DAVID E. DUNNING
Keyword(s):  
Mathematical Logic ◽  
Analytic Philosophy ◽  
Spoken Language ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Gottlob Frege ◽  
Visual Understanding ◽  
The University

Gottlob Frege is considered a founder of analytic philosophy and mathematical logic, but the traditions that claim Frege as a forebear never embraced his Begriffsschrift, or “conceptual notation”—the invention he considered his most important accomplishment. Frege believed that his notation rendered logic visually observable. Rejecting the linearity of written language, he claimed Begriffsschrift exhibited a structure endogenous to logic itself. But Frege struggled to convince others to use his notation, as his frustrated pedagogical efforts at the University of Jena illustrate. Teaching Begriffsschrift meant using words to explain it; rather than replacing spoken language, notation became its obverse in a bifurcated style of argument that separated deduction from commentary. Both registers of this discourse, however, remained within Frege's monologue, imposing a consequential passivity on his students. In keeping with Frege's visual understanding of notation, they learned by silently observing it, though never in isolation: notation and language were always mixed together.

Introduction

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Oskari Kuusela
Keyword(s):  
Mathematical Logic ◽  
Ludwig Wittgenstein ◽  
Analytic Philosophy ◽  
Gottlob Frege ◽  
Rudolf Carnap ◽  
Peter Strawson ◽  
The Future ◽  
History Of ◽  
Further Development ◽  
Philosophical Progress

Gottlob Frege and Bertand Russell are widely regarded as the founders of analytic philosophy. A longer list also includes G. E. Moore and Ludwig Wittgenstein. This is not because analytic philosophers subscribe to Frege’s and Russell’s views about particular philosophical matters. It is hard to think of examples of such agreed-upon views. Rather, Frege’s and Russell’s role as founders is due, before all, to certain methodological ideas which they introduced. Especially important in this regard is the idea that philosophical progress could be achieved by means of the methods of symbolic or mathematical logic to whose development both contributed in important ways. This book, in essence, is an examination of Frege’s and Russell’s methodological and logical ideas and their further development and transformation by certain other philosophers, especially Ludwig Wittgenstein, but also Rudolf Carnap and Peter Strawson. It is in this sense a book on methodology in analytic philosophy. And although the book assumes the form of the examination of the history of analytic philosophy, especially the work of Wittgenstein, it is just as much—or more—about the future of analytic philosophy. The underlying question that motivates this book is what analytic philosophy could be or become, and whether it is possible for it to redeem its original promise of progress. For it seems fair to say that progress has been less impressive than Russell promised and more controversial than he may have expected (see ...

The Ship of Logic on the High Seas of Discourse

2019 ◽  
pp. 53-104
Author(s):  
Ken Hirschkop
Keyword(s):  
Public Sphere ◽  
Ludwig Wittgenstein ◽  
Analytic Philosophy ◽  
Bertrand Russell ◽  
Gottlob Frege ◽  
Linguistic Turn ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Public Sphere ◽  
Linguistic Philosophy ◽  
High Seas

Chapter 3 looks at the linguistic turn in analytic philosophy as it emerges from Gottlob Frege, gains momentum in Bertrand Russell, and finds elaboration in the early and middle work of Ludwig Wittgenstein. The characteristic move of linguistic philosophy will be the clarification of presumably ‘muddled’ ordinary statements: the bringing to the surface a lucidity that is lurking within language, needing only to be coaxed out. The author shows how in the works of Frege, Russell, and early Wittgenstein, the drive to clarity entails a stripping away of every intersubjective, rhetorical element in discourse. He then argues that a language clarified by professional philosophers is a substitute for the objectivity of the public sphere. The chapter concludes by showing how intersubjectivity returns first as irony in Wittgenstein’s Tractatus and then as the belief that language always ‘works’: that it fails only when external circumstances disturb its inner workings.

Introduction

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Sanford Shieh
Keyword(s):  
Ludwig Wittgenstein ◽  
Analytic Philosophy ◽  
Bertrand Russell ◽  
Gottlob Frege ◽  
Philosophy Of Logic ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Philosophical Issue

This chapter presents the principal philosophical issue of the book: is the nature of logic specified by the concepts of necessity and possibility? According to Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell, the answer is no, because these concepts of modality are empty: there are no genuine distinctions among the necessary, the possible and the actual. The upshot for Frege and Russell is that logic is fundamental, and modality is to be reconstructed from logical notions. This chapter continues with a brief outline of Volume II of this work: how C. I. Lewis and Ludwig Wittgenstein argued against the anti-modal stance of Frege and Russell. I conclude with a note on the significance of this aspect of early analytic philosophy for contemporary philosophy of logic and modality.

scholarly journals Analytic Philosophy: A Very Short introduction

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Beaney
Keyword(s):  
Critical Thinking ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Ludwig Wittgenstein ◽  
Analytic Philosophy ◽  
Bertrand Russell ◽  
Gottlob Frege ◽  
Short Introduction ◽  
Philosophical Questions

Analytic Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction introduces some of the key ideas of the founders of analytic philosophy—Gottlob Frege, Bertrand Russell, G. E. Moore, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Susan Stebbing around the turn of the 20th century—by exploring certain fundamental philosophical questions and showing how those ideas can be used in offering answers. Considering the work of Susan Stebbing, it also explores the application of analytic philosophy to critical thinking, and emphasizes the conceptual creativity that lies at the heart of fruitful analysis. Throughout, this VSI illustrates why clarity of thinking, precision of expression, and rigour of argumentation are rightly seen as virtues of analytic philosophy.

Derrida and Frege

Paragraph ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 184-195
Author(s):  
Marian Hobson
Keyword(s):  
Gottlob Frege

Derrida, for reasons which he never made clear publicly, published his mémoire for the diplôme d'études supérieures only in 1990, some thirty-five years after it had been written. Had it been published much earlier, some of the dispiritingly ill-informed remarks about his work might have been avoided. The mémoire, entitled The Problem of Genesis in Husserl's Philosophy, reveals that he is, when required, perfectly able to write a standard thesis in straightforward French. And that, in particular, he is aware of the work of the great logician Gottlob Frege in its relation to Husserl.

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