The existential assumptions of traditional logic

History and Philosophy of Logic 17 (1 & 2):141-154 (1996)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

There have been and continue to be disagreements about how to consider the traditional square of opposition and the traditional inferences of obversion, conversion, contraposition and inversion from the perspective of contemporary quantificational logic. Philosophers have made many different attempts to save traditional inferences that are invalid when they involve empty classes. I survey some of these attempts and argue that the only satisfactory way of saving all the traditional inferences is to make the existential assumption that both the subject and predicate classes and their complement classes are non-empty for all the propositions we admit. I briefly indicate the room for continued controversy over how properly to interpret Aristotle's statements regarding these inferences, but find some plausibility in the views of Manley Thompson and A.N.Prior that Aristotle had in mind a particular arrangement of existential import unfamiliar to most contemporary logicians.

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,616

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

The existential assumptions of traditional logic.Dwayne Hudson Mulder - 1996 - History and Philosophy of Logic 17 (1-2):141-154.
Existential Assumptions for Aristotelian Logic.Phillip H. Wiebe - 1991 - Journal of Philosophical Research 16:321-328.
Existential Assumptions for Aristotelian Logic.Phillip H. Wiebe - 1991 - Journal of Philosophical Research 16:321-328.
Kant on Existential Import.Alberto Vanzo - 2014 - Kantian Review 19 (2):207-232.
The traditional square of opposition.Terence Parsons - 2008 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
On the logic of general conditionals.R. N. McLaughlin - 1973 - Philosophical Quarterly 23 (91):133-143.
Negation and Quantification in Aristotle.Michael V. Wedin - 1990 - History and Philosophy of Logic 11 (2):131-150.
The structure of Aristotelian logic.James Wilkinson Miller - 1938 - London,: K. Paul, Trench, Trubner & co..
Head or tail? de morgan on the bounds of traditional logic.Víctor Sánchez Valencia - 1997 - History and Philosophy of Logic 18 (3):123-138.
Head or tail? de morgan on the bounds of traditional logic.Víctor Sánchez Valencia - 1997 - History and Philosophy of Logic 18 (3):123-138.

Analytics

Added to PP
2017-02-19

Downloads
20 (#656,247)

6 months
1 (#1,040,386)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Citations of this work

Trespassers and Existential Import.Kai-Yee Wong & Chi-Ho Hung - 2019 - Thought: A Journal of Philosophy 8 (1):57-62.

Add more citations

References found in this work

On referring.Peter F. Strawson - 1950 - Mind 59 (235):320-344.
The Development of Logic.William Kneale & Martha Kneale - 1962 - Studia Logica 15:308-310.
Introduction to Logical Theory.P. F. Strawson - 1954 - Philosophy 29 (108):78-80.
Symbolic Logic.C. I. Lewis & C. H. Langford - 1932 - Erkenntnis 4 (1):65-66.
Introduction to Logic.Irving M. Copi - 1954 - Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale 59 (3):344-345.

View all 24 references / Add more references