Frege has become known mainly through the interpretation of his work given by Church and Carnap, and he is mainly interpreted as the father of modern philosophy of language. This seminar focuses on other aspects of Frege’s philosophy, while criticising the Frege reception just mentioned. On the one hand, Frege will be read from a historical perspective, dealing with such questions as: What was Kant’s infuence on Frege’s writings? On the other hand, the focus will be on Frege’s relevance for modern philosophy of logic, as Frege’s aim was to give a content-logic, not a meta-mathematical system.
Modern readers of Frege, such as Tyler Burge in his Truth, Thought and Reason (Oxford 2005) show the relevance of Frege’s rationalism for modern philosophy of logic and epistemology. Frege’s theories can be read in opposition to the positivist and empirist tradition that holds that pure mathematics and logic are only vacuously true and that all knowledge must be guided and justified by perceptual-causal relations to its subject-matter.
Onderwijsvorm
Seminar
Toetsing
Active student participation – preparation, presentation, term paper
Literatuur
*Gottlob Frege, Die Grundlagen der Arithmetik; Funktion, Begriff, Bedeutung. Fünf logische Studien, Hrsg. G. Patzig. *Gottlob Frege, Logische Untersuchungen, Hrsg. G. Patzig. *A selection from Frege’s Begriffsschrift, Grundgezetze der Arithmetik, Nachgelassene Schriften and Frege’s Briefwechsel. *Secondary literature: Warren Goldfarb, Thomas Ricketts, Tyler Burge, Gottfried Gabriel, Hans Sluga, Wolfgang Künne, a.o.
Toegangseisen
First-year BA courses in Logic (Logica I-II), second-year BA course in Logic or Philosophy of Language, third-year BA course in Logic or Philosophy of Language.
Rooster
see Timetable MPhil in Philosophy: Rationality 2008-2009
Aanmelden
Please register for this course with the student administration: y.van.eijk@phil.leidenuniv.nl
Informatie
dr. M.S. van der Schaar ( m.van.der.schaar@phil.leidenuniv.nl)