Klaus Oehler
The relevance of ancient semiotics
Wolfgang Detel
Signs in Parmenides
Hermann Weidemann
The beginning of a semantic theory in Aristotle
Klaus Oehler
The beginning of a logic of relations and the end of signs in Aristotle
Wolfgang Künne
Megarian problems of Frege's semantics.
Presupposition and vague predicates
Signs in Parmenides
Wolfgang Detel, University of Hamburg
Summary. Before Parmenides, the Greeks understood as sign ("sema") primarily
a
military signal, road sign, omen, asterisk, or memorial. After Parmenides,
supporting evidence and premisses in incomplete arguments were also called
signs ("semeion"). This development, which took place between 600 and 300
B.C.,
may have been influenced by the way Parmenides applied the term sign in his
didactic poem. For him a sign ("semeion") is a feature of a concept, i. e.
a
second-order predicate.
The beginning of a semantic theory in Aristotle
Hermann Weidemann, University of Münster
Summary. In chapter 1 of "Peri hermeneias" Aristotle treats the expressions
of
spoken language as symbols of affections in the soul which in turn are
likenesses of things. This paper attempts to show that such a view may be
considered the rudiment of a semantic theory that accounts for the conditions
under which communication by means of the conventional signs of language is
possible.
The beginning of a logic of relations and the end of
signs in Aristotle
Klaus Oehler, University of Hamburg
Summary. In Aristotle we find formulations of rules that belong to the logic of
relations. These rules are not theorems of the two-place predicate calculus.
They involve the use of language and the application of relations. Aristotle's
treatment of relatives can be interpreted as the beginning of a logic of
relations, because this rudimentary analysis, as well as the theory of
inference from signs, anticipates the logical and semiotic thinking of
later centuries. Aristotle's contribution to the logic of relations is all the
more remarkable in view of the fact that it was not until the 19th century that
an explicit logic of relations was expressed in the form of a comprehensive
theory.
Megarian problems of Frege's semantics
Presupposition and vague predicates
Wolfgang Künne, University of Hamburg
Summary. This article analyzes two Megarian arguments: the Horned Man and the
Heap (or the Bald Man). I first present the most significant ancient versions
of these paradoxes. I then treat both arguments as attacks on the principle
that every statement is either true or false: Statements with unfulfilled
presuppositions seem to be, and statements with vague predicates are,
counterinstances to this principle. In the light of the Megarian arguments I
finally discuss a fundamental assumption of Frege's semantics: the assumption
that the reference (Bedeutung) of a whole sentence is functionally dependent on
the reference of its parts. It is shown that no truth-functional logic can
provide an adequate basis for the semantics of natural languages.
