Charles Brown wrote: > by Devine, James > > Charles writes: > >>The funny thing is dialectics is logic. So, it is a way of talking about > things. Formal logic is a linguistic project.
To which Ravi responds:
i am not sure who wrote what, but addressing the above: i would submit that formal logic is a mathematical project, not a linguistic one (even wittgenstein might agree). fwiw, i agree with most of the rest of charles' summation of logic.
For an in-depth defense and exploration of the idea that logic is grounded in mathematics rather than vice-versa, see G. Spencer-Brown's classic LAWS OF FORM. His argument rebuts the notion that formal logic is "a linguistic project": Spencer-Brown's argument is that, given any consistent distinction (and thus any specific linguistic structure), and two rules, (essentially): 1) "a double affirmative is equivalent to an affirmative ( Is is = is)" and 2) "a double negative is equivalent to an affirmative ( Not not = is)", then certain results unavoidably follow, *whatever* the distinction or linguistic structure you begin with.
Gil
