Back to Search Start Over

Carnap's Problem, Definability and Compositionality.

Authors :
del Valle-Inclán, Pedro
Source :
Journal of Philosophical Logic. Oct2024, Vol. 53 Issue 5, p1321-1346. 26p.
Publication Year :
2024

Abstract

In his Formalization of Logic (1943) Carnap pointed out that there are non-normal interpretations of classical logic: non-standard interpretations of the connectives and quantifiers that are consistent with the classical consequence relation of a language. Different ways around the problem have been proposed. In a recent paper, Bonnay and Westerståhl argue that the key to a solution is imposing restrictions on the type of interpretation we take into account. More precisely, they claim that if we restrict attention to interpretations that are (a) compositional, (b) non-trivial and (c) in the case of the quantifiers, invariant under permutations of the domain, Carnap's Problem is avoided. This paper has two goals. The first is to show that Bonnay and Westerståhl's solution to Carnap's Problem doesn't work. The second is to argue that something similar to their proposal seems to do the job. The problems with Bonnay and Westerståhl's approach trace back to issues concerning the (un)definability of subsets of the domain of first-order structures, as well as to the compositionality of first-order languages. After expanding on these problems, I'll propose a way to modify Bonnay and Westerståhl's account and solve Carnap's Problem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
00223611
Volume :
53
Issue :
5
Database :
Academic Search Index
Journal :
Journal of Philosophical Logic
Publication Type :
Academic Journal
Accession number :
180106231
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10992-024-09767-2