First-Order Modal Logic: 277 (Synthese Library) - Hardcover

Fitting, M.; Mendelsohn, Richard L.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 079235334X ISBN 13: 9780792353348

Publisher: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1998

Synopsis

This is a thorough treatment of first-order modal logic. The book covers such issues as quantification, equality (including a treatment of Frege's morning star/evening star puzzle), the notion of existence, non-rigid constants and function symbols, predicate abstraction, the distinction between nonexistence and nondesignation, and definite descriptions, borrowing from both Fregean and Russellian paradigms.

About this title

Review

"This Text is an excellent and most useful volume. It is pitched correctly: the exercises are just right... It sets a high standard for anything following. It is to be highly recommended."
(Bulletin of Symbolic Logic, 8:3)

Synopsis

Fitting and Mendelsohn present a thorough treatment of first-order modal logic, together with some propositional background. They adopt throughout a threefold approach. Semantically, they use possible world models; the formal proof machinery is tableaus; and full philosophical discussions are provided of the way that technical developments bear on well-known philosophical problems.This book covers quantification itself, including the difference between actualist and possibilist quantifiers; equality, leading to a treatment of Frege's morning star/evening star puzzle; the notion of existence and the logical problems surrounding it; non-rigid constants and function symbols; predicate abstraction, which abstracts a predicate from a formula, in effect providing a scoping function for constants and function symbols, leading to a clarification of ambiguous readings at the heart of several philosophical problems; the distinction between nonexistence and nondesignation; and definite descriptions, borrowing from both Fregean and Russellian paradigms.

Edition details

• Publisher: Kluwer Academic Publishers
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 079235334X
• ISBN 13: 9780792353348
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 292