Semantic Singularities

Paradoxes of Reference, Predication, and Truth
Erscheinungsjahr 2018
ISBN: 978-0-19-879154-6
Verlag: Oxford University Press

Buch, Englisch, 260 Seiten, Print PDF, Format (B × H): 164 mm x 241 mm, Gewicht: 562 g

This book aims to provide a solution to the semantic paradoxes. It argues for a unified solution to the paradoxes generated by our concepts of denotation, predicate extension, and truth. The solution makes two main claims. The first is that our semantic expressions 'denotes', 'extension' and 'true' are context-sensitive. The second, inspired by a brief, tantalizing remark of Gödel's, is that these expressions are significant everywhere except for certain singularities, in analogy with division by zero. A formal theory of singularities is presented and applied to a wide variety of versions of the definability paradoxes, Russell's paradox, and the Liar paradox. Keith Simmons argues that the singularity theory satisfies the following desiderata: it recognizes that the proper setting of the semantic paradoxes is natural language, not regimented formal languages; it minimizes any revision to our semantic concepts; it respects as far as possible Tarski's intuition that natural languages are universal; it responds adequately to the threat of revenge paradoxes; and it preserves classical logic and semantics. Simmons draws out the consequences of the singularity theory for deflationary views of our semantic concepts, and concludes that if we accept the singularity theory, we must reject deflationism.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Simmons, Keith

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Philosophie Philosophische Logik, Argumentationstheorie
• Geisteswissenschaften Sprachwissenschaft Semantik & Pragmatik
• Geisteswissenschaften Sprachwissenschaft Sprachwissenschaften Sprachphilosophie
• Geisteswissenschaften Philosophie Sprachphilosophie

Inhaltsverzeichnis

- 1: Semantic Paradox

- 2: Paradox and Context

- 3: Singularities

- 4: Identifying Singularities

- 5: Paradoxes of Definability, Russell's Paradox, the Liar

- 6: A General Theory of Singularities

- 7: The Theory at Work

- 8: Revenge, I

- 9: Revenge, II

- 10: Consequences for Deflationism

Über Autor(innen)

Keith Simmons is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Connecticut, Storrs, having previously been at the University of North Carolina from 1987 to 2014. He is author of Universality and the Liar (Cambridge 1993), and co-editor with Simon Blackburn of the volume on Truth in the series Oxford Readings in Philosophy (1999). Has written numerous articles in the philosophy and history of logic, philosophy of language, and Kant's ethics.