Negation has occupied a unique place in the history of ideas. Negation as opposed to truth-conditional affirmation has been very much present in Indian and Western thought from very early times. R. S. Bhatnagar of happy memory (1933–2019) in his “Many Splendoured Negation” (Bhatnagar in J Indian Counc Philos Res XXII(3):83–906, 2006) had shown many a facet that could be construed in “negation”. This paper is an attempt to revisit the notion of negation that R. S. Bhatnagar brought to light (...) and to further the germane thought that he had outlined in his concise exposé. Though Bhatnagar had stated that there could be negative and positive functions of negations, a vigilant reading of his article shows that the primary import of Bhatnagar is to examine the positive function of negation. According to R. S. Bhatnagar, even death, which could be the negative in its most feared form, the reality of which, has the positive effect on the soul force in its commitment to live well and die well. R. S. Bhatnagar’s engagement with negation is not complete unless one takes into consideration “negation” as an integral part of philosophizing in India, whether it is the Buddhist tradition or any other tradition. One encounters the philosophical “exercise” on negation enormously in Buddhist thought. The first part of the paper is a brief discussion on the views of Bhatnagar in his essay mentioned with the author’s considerable add-on, while the second part brings home the Buddhist facet and paradigm of negation, the missing link in Bhatnagar. The third part of the paper is an unveilment of the cogitation of R. S. Bhatnagar on “death” in terms of negation. (shrink)

Recently, Irad Kimhi has argued that negation and falsehood can be made intelligible by understanding assertions/judgements as acts of two-way logical capacities. These are capacities that are, at the same time, for (1) positive and negative assertions/judgements and (2) positive and negative facts. Kimhi’s account of negation and falsehood, however, faces severe problems. I argue that these problems can be resolved, and that a new understanding of cases of negation and falsehood can be achieved, by regarding two-way logical capacities for (...) assertion/judgement and facts as established and undergirded by what Ludwig Wittgenstein calls “samples”. The standard metre sample, for instance, establishes and undergirds the capacity for asserting that something, x, is one metre long (meaning: x is like the standard metre in length). At the same time, it establishes and undergirds the capacity for the fact that x is one metre long (when x is like the standard metre in length). As I explain, invoking samples means we cannot say, as Kimhi wants to, what assertion/judgement, negation, and facts, in general, are but can only show what they are, one case at a time. This, however, is a boon not a disadvantage. (shrink)

Praca jest poświęcona negacji dyskursywnej (metajęzykowej). Omawiane są jej funkcje (np. sprostowanie, uwypuklenie, zaskoczenie), rodzaje (np. implikacyjna, językowa, prozodyczna) i własności (np. pozorna sprzeczność, pragmatyczne odkodowanie, przytoczenie, a nie użycie, brak konstrukcji z prefiksem „nie”, brak konstrukcji z zaimkami negatywnymi). Następnie rozpatrzona została możliwość, że negacja dyskursywna jest jedynie szczególnym przypadkiem innych rodzajów negacji, w szczególności negacji kontrastywnej lub illokucyjnej. Dalej postawiono pytanie, czy w przypadku negacji dyskursywnej mamy do czynienia ze zjawiskiem semantycznym czy pragmatycznym, jak również, czy jest możliwe (...) ujęcie negacji dyskursywnej w ramach mechanizmu konwersacyjnego nazywanego „przywołaniem echem”. (shrink)

This paper concerns Bertrand Russell’s changing views on negative judgement. ‘Negative judgement’ is considered in the context of three theories of judgement that Russell put forth at different times: a dual relation theory ; a multiple relation theory ; a psychological theory of judgement. Four issues are singled out for a more detailed discussion: quality dualism versus quality monism, that is, the question whether judgement comes in two kinds, acceptance and rejection, or whether there is only one judgement-quality ; the (...) structure of negative judging; the problem of truth-making for negative facts; the different roles of ‘fact’ in Russell’s theories of truth. What emerges from the discussion is a rough chronology of Russell’s views on negative judgement during the period from 1903 to 1948. (shrink)

The Normative Structure of Responsibility deals with responsibility in legal, moral, and linguistic contexts. The book builds on conceptual analysis and data from everyday language, ethics, and the law in order to defend the thesis that responsibility is fundamentally normative, that is, it cannot be reduced to purely descriptive factors. The book is divided in three parts: the first part draws a conceptual map of various responsibility concepts, conceptions and conditions and their interaction with different kinds of rules; the second (...) part engages with arguments in favour of a descriptive understanding of responsibility based on ethics, neuroscience, and metaphysics and argues against it; the third part investigates the language of responsibility and its use in formal and informal contexts. (shrink)

This thesis aims to throw an illuminating light on the as yet neglected concept of nothing in Kant’s system, a concept which is taken into consideration, by Kant, in accordance with the guiding thread of the categories of the understanding. My main argument is that Kant has a fourfold division of nothing and each has a transcendental function in his system. This function is basically a limiting one; setting up negative determinations without which Kant’s system would have never been constituted (...) as it is now. It is shown in the thesis that the concept of nothing is divided basically into four: first, nothing as ens rationis that limits and thereby protects knowledge, secondly nothing as nihil privativum that defines the boundaries of phenomenal reality, thirdly nothing as ens imaginarium that makes possible the unity of experience and finally, nothing as nihil negativum that draws the lines of logical thinking. All make, in the last resort and by being the concepts of the opposite, experience possible. The thesis consists of four chapters. The first chapter is an exposition of all four divisions of nothing, the second is the display specifically of the concepts of ens rationis and nihil negativum, and the third is of the concepts of ens imaginarium and nihil privativum. The auxiliary argument of the thesis is that while Hegel makes a strong charge of externality against and thereby severely criticizes the Kantian concept of the thing-in-itself, - the concept of which I propose to be contained under the concept of ens rationis- Kant has equally convincing arguments against such a charge. This is the topic of the fourth and final chapter which has an implicit aim of creating the image of a powerful critical Hegel but on the other hand an equally enduring and war-like Kant. Kant is presented as a philosopher who has powerful responses to institute a balance between himself and his opponent. When Kant’s differing concepts of nothing are taken into account, Hegel’s attack of externality, it is maintained, appears not to have taken into account the full measure of the resources of the Kantian position. Even when it is said that the attack is against one specific concept of the thing-in-itself alone, Kant still seems to have enough resources for toleration and defence indeed. (shrink)

This paper offers a new interpretation of John Austin’s views both on assertion and on adverbs, as result of which an expressivist thesis concerning the semantics for action sentences is advanced. First, Austin’s analysis of assertion based on various, specific assertive forces and his remarks on adverbs are systematically connected in order to obtain assertive schemata for action sentences. Finally, those schemata are put to work as the expression of inferential commitments implicit in argumentative practices of different sorts (exculpatory, justificatory (...) and illustrative) in the deployment of which, both logical contrariety and contradiction are exploited. (shrink)