Each course meeting is envisaged as consisting of a lecture followed by questions and general discussion.

Some recent commentators have given accounts of twentieth-century analytic philosophy and its history that gives relatively little weight to the role played by modern logic. These seminars will, to the contrary, emphasize that role, although not to the exclusion of other factors. Among the (interlocking) themes which will be discussed (time permitting) are:

• Logicism, the reduction of arithmetic to logic; this idea was advanced by Frege and by Russell and plays a fundamental role in the early history of twentieth-century analytic philosophy. In particular, the central idea of philosophical (logical) analysis is greatly influenced by logicism, although that idea later develops in other ways.

• The idea of a Logically Perfect Language, a framework for all thought and knowledge. This idea is perhaps implicit in the work of Frege and becomes explicit in Russell (and in Wittgenstein?s early work). In the form that it takes, it is unthinkable without modern logic. It is closely related to:

• The idea of nonsense, meaninglessness, especially as applied to philosophical claims and questions. This idea is often associated with verificationism or some forms of empiricism. We will emphasize a logical idea of meaninglessness, which, again, is implicit in the work of Frege and Russell, and becomes explicit in the early work of Wittgenstein.

• The differences, as well as the similarities, between the Germanophone (Fregean) and the Anglophone (Russellian) origins of analytic philosophy, and the lasting significance of the differences. Of particular importance here is the picture that Russell has of knowledge, especially empirical knowledge, and his use of logical techniques to support and extend that picture.

• The idea of logic as constitutive of knowledge, as it appears Carnap?s Der Logischer Aufbau der Welt (at least on some interpretations of that work).

• The relativisation of logic (the Principle of Tolerance), as it appears in Carnap?s Logische Syntax der Sprache and subsequent works. This idea was fundamental to Carnap?s mature work and, in particular, to his rejection of (other forms of) philosophy.

• Quine's rejection of the two ideas listed immediately above, and the pragmatic role that logic plays in his philosophy (and in the revival of metaphysics that was perhaps made possible by his work?although certainly not endorsed by him).

Reading list

Here's a link to Professor Hylton's page at UIC:
http://www.uic.edu/depts/phil/bios/hylton.htm