scientific article; zbMATH DE number 1324396

Authors

Publication date 16 August 1999

Published in Perspektiven der Analytischen Philosophie (Search for Journal in Brave)

Philosophy of mathematics (00A30) Proceedings of conferences of miscellaneous specific interest (00B25) Proceedings, conferences, collections, etc. pertaining to history and biography (01-06) History of mathematics in the 19th century (01A55) History of mathematics in the 20th century (01A60) History of mathematical logic and foundations (03-03) Proceedings, conferences, collections, etc. pertaining to mathematical logic and foundations (03-06) Philosophical and critical aspects of logic and foundations (03A05) Foundations of classical theories (including reverse mathematics) (03B30)

Review text

Most of the papers published in this collection were presented at the conference ``Foundational problems in Frege and in modern logic in Munich in July 1991. The principal purpose of this collection is ``to display both the breadth and the significance of current Frege research (p.\ vii) not only concerning the development of modern logic and the foundations of analytical philosophy, but also \textit{Gottlob Frege}'s legacy, i.e., ``the set of questions yet to be answered (ibid.). One can justly say that the editor reached this aim. The volume contains a comprehensive introduction by the editor \textit{Matthias Schirn} entitled ``Frege on the foundations of arithmetic and geometry and 16 further contributions organized in three parts: ``Logic and Philosophy of mathematics, ``Epistemology, and ``Philosophy of Language. In the introduction (pp. 1-42), the editor gives an overview on some selected topics in Frege's philosophy of mathematics, especially in number theory and analysis relevant for the current discussion. Furthermore, special attention is paid to Frege's opinion of the a priori character of Euclidean geometry. In ``On positing mathematical objects (pp.\ 45-69) \textit{Michael D. Resnik} reviews Frege's criticism of creative definitions and the mental creation of mathematical objects, turning then ``to the idea of recognizing preexisting mathematical objects through acts of postulation (p.\ 45), thereby arguing for a realist mathematical structuralism (cf. Zbl 0905.03004) combined with a postulational epistemology. \textit{W. W. Tait} contributes a paper ``Frege versus Cantor and Dedekind: On the concept of number (pp.\ 70-113). He argues that one of the most important problems connected with the concept of number, the classification of the infinite, initiated by \textit{Bernard Bolzano} and \textit{Georg Cantor}, was seriously misunderstood by Frege (p.\ 71). Tait aims at showing that ``Frege's discussions of other writers are often characterized less by clarity than by misinterpretation and lack of charity, and, on many matters, both of criticism of other scholars and of substance, his analysis is defective (p.\ 72). \textit{Matthias Schirn}, in ``On Frege's introduction of cardinal numbers as logical objects (pp.\ 114-173), discusses the question ``How do we conceive numbers qua abstract objects? He gives a comprehensive account of Frege's number theoretic version of ontological platonism, discussing among other topics Frege's context principle (words have meaning only in the context of a sentence), and his conception of logical truth. \textit{Bob Hale} and \textit{Crispin Wright} deal with ``Nominalism and the contingency of abstract objects (pp.\ 174-199), arguing against \textit{Hartry Field}'s version of nominalism as exposed in his ``Realism, mathematics and modality [Blackwell, New York etc. (1989)]. \textit{Richard G. Heck}'s topic is ``Definition by induction in Frege's \textit{Grundgesetze der Arithmetik} (pp. 200-233). He especially discusses Frege's proof of theorem 263 of ``Grundgesetze der Arithmetik which yields a characterization of objects whose number is ``endlos, endless. According to Heck the stardard evaluation of the ``Grundgesetze should be changed regarding the significance of theorem 263. Frege had shown that his axioms for arithmetic ``determine a class of structures isomorphic to the natural numbers, and even more, ``that all structures satisfying these axioms are isomorphic (p.\ 228). \textit{George Boolos} asks ``Whence the contradiction? (pp.\ 234-252). He discusses recent explanations of the reasons for the contradiction in Frege's system of the ``Grundgesetze. He especially criticizes \textit{Michael Dummett}'s diagnosis in ``Frege: Philosophy of mathematics [Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA (1991)] that the contradiction is due to an insufficient introduction of second order quantifiers. Boolos still supports the idea of a failure of Basic Law V. \textit{Michael Dummett}, in his ``Reply to Boolos (pp.\ 253-260), defends his interpretation, claiming that ``Frege does not appear to have been conscious of the distinction between the two ways of understanding quantification, i.e., first and second order quantification (p.\ 254). ``On the structure of Frege's system of logic is the topic of \textit{Christian Thiel}'s contribution (pp.\ 261-279). He considers recent positions concerning some problems of the system of the ``Grundgesetze, such as the reasons for its inconsistency, the interpretation of the horizontal, and the role of impredicativity. In the center of Thiel's paper stands an elucidation of the construction and the import of theorem \(\chi\) in Frege's ``Nachwort to volume II of the ``Grundgesetze with the help of which Frege wanted to abolish the extension of the concept in the traditional sense in order to avoid the inconsistency. In ``The horizontal (pp.\ 280-300) \textit{Peter Simons} contributes to our understanding of the development of Frege's thought by examining the transition of the Content Stroke in ``Begriffsschrift to the Horizontal in ``Grundgesetze. In ``Frege and natural deduction (pp.\ 301-304), \textit{Franz von Kutschera} argues that in the first volume of ``Grundgesetze Frege ``used a system closely related to the calculus of sequents that Gentzen developed for formalizing natural deduction (p.\ 301). \textit{Eva Picardi} discusses ``Frege's anti-psychologism (pp.\ 307-329) giving an overview on 19th century psychologism and Frege's position towards it. She especially doubts the opinion that Frege's anti-psychologism is based on a Kantian transcendentalism. \textit{Gottfried Gabriel} uncovers ``Frege's `epistemology in disguise' (pp.\ 330-346) showing that Frege had an immediate interest in logic and epistemology whereas his interest in the philosophy of language was only mediate (p.\ 332). Special attention is paid to the distinction between proof and justification. \textit{Tyler Burge} discusses ``Frege on knowing the Third Realm (pp.\ 347-368), defending the interpretation of Frege being a Platonist against idealistic assumptions. He is concerned with Frege's ``Third Realm consisting of non-spatial, non-temporal, causally inert objects, ontologically independent from any persons thinking them or thinking about them (p.\ 348). The author addresses the problem ``of understanding how reason alone could justify one in believing that a thought is true, when the thought has a subject matter that is independent of any one's thinking \dots (p.\ 349). In ``Fregean theories of truth and meaning (pp.\ 371-409), \textit{Terence Parsons} defends his view that Frege's semantics provides an appropriate framework for the study of natural languages. The author starts with the semantics of sense and reference, focusing especially on the notion of indirect (shifted) reference. He then discusses the principle of extensionality, the notions of truth and meaning, finally presenting Frege's linguistic hierarchies. \textit{Richard L. Mendelsohn} deals with ``Frege's treatment of indirect reference (pp.\ 410-437) as occurring in that-clauses. The volume is closed by \textit{Bob Hale}'s paper ``Singular terms (1) (pp.\ 439-457) concerned with the problem of formulating acceptable criteria for singular termhood.

Recommendations

Cited in

(41)

This page was built for publication:

Report a bug (only for logged in users!)Click here to report a bug for this page (MaRDI item Q4255490)