The Logic of Concept Expansion

Description

The operation of developing a concept is a common procedure in mathematics and in natural science, but has traditionally seemed much less possible to philosophers and, especially, logicians. Meir Buzaglo's innovative study proposes a way of expanding logic to include the stretching of concepts, while modifying the principles which block this possibility. He offers stimulating discussions of the idea of conceptual expansion as a normative process, and of the relation of conceptual expansion to truth, meaning, reference, ontology and paradox, and analyzes the views of Kant, Wittgenstein, Godel, and others, paying especially close attention to Frege. His book will be of interest to a wide range of readers, from philosophers (of logic, mathematics, language, and science) to logicians, mathematicians, linguists, and cognitive scientists.

Meir Buzaglo is Lecturer at the Department of Philosophy in the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

'The book provides interesting philosophical, mainly historical, views on the dynamics of conceptual changes which fall under the considered domain of concept expansion.' Zentralblatt fur Mathematik und ihre Grenzgebiete Mathematics Abstracts