Rudolf Carnap Studies In Semantics

"This book is valuable as expounding in full a theory of meaning that has its roots in the work of Frege and has been of the widest influence. . . . The chief virtue of the book is its systematic character. From Frege to Quine most philosophical logicians have restricted themselves by piecemeal and local assaults on the problems involved. The book is marked by a genial tolerance. Carnap sees himself as proposing conventions rather than asserting truths. However he provides plenty of matter for argument."—Anthony Quinton, Hibbert Journal

Volume 7 of the Collected Works of Rudolf Carnap presents Studies in Semantics, which comprises three interlocking books: Introduction to Semantics (1942), Formalization of Logic (1942), and Meaning and Necessity (1947). Along with textual notes, the editors' introduction places Carnap's whole semantic project in its various contexts.

This is IV volume of eight in a series on Philosophy of the Mind and Language. For nearly a century mathematicians and logicians have been striving hard to make logic an exact science. But a book on logic must contain, in addition to the formulae, an expository context which, with the assistance of the words of ordinary language, explains the formulae and the relations between them; and this context often leaves much to be desired in the matter of clarity and exactitude. Originally published in 1937, the purpose of the present work is to give a systematic exposition of such a method, namely, of the method of " logical syntax".

Clear, comprehensive, and rigorous treatment develops the subject from elementary concepts to the construction and analysis of relatively complex logical languages. Hundreds of problems, examples, and exercises. 1958 edition.

'My endeavour in these pages is to explain the main features of the method of philosophizing which we, the Vienna Circle, use, and by using try to develop further. It is the method of the logical analysis of science, or more precisely, of the syntactical analysis of scientific language.... The purpose of the book -- as of the lectures -- is to give a first impression of our method and of the direction of our questions and investigations to those who are not yet acquainted with them.' -- From the Preface.

This volume contains Carnap's Studies in Semantics, a series of three interlocking books: Introduction to Semantics (1942), Formalization of Logic (1942), and Meaning and Necessity (1947). They were extremely influential in their time, especially the third, and shaped the direction of analytic philosophy during the 1950s and 1960s. They constitute the background to a number of celebrated controversies of that period, especially those between Carnap and Quine. Most of the philosophical debates today in philosophical logic and the philosophy of language ultimately had their origins here. This new edition situates these works in their context, both within Carnap's philosophical development and within the philosophical debates they responded to and influenced. The editors' introduction explains how Carnap arrived at the project of semantics in the 1930s and how it developed into these three successive publications, how the three books fit together, and how the project developed and changed in the course of the 1940s. It also describes the reception of the books as they appeared, as well as Carnap's response. The editorial and textual notes give variant readings, Carnap's own marginal notes on these texts in his personal copies, and elucidatory commentary where Carnap's terminology or notation are no longer familiar. This will be an indispensable volume for anyone interested in the origins and preoccupations of present-day analytic philosophy, especially philosophical logic and philosophy of language.

Stimulating, thought-provoking text by one of the 20th century's most creative philosophers makes accessible such topics as probability, measurement and quantitative language, causality and determinism, theoretical laws and concepts, more.