Logical Modalities from Aristotle to Carnap: The Story of Necessity - Softcover

Cresswell, Max

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1107434904 ISBN 13: 9781107434905

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 2019

Synopsis

Interest in the metaphysics and logic of possible worlds goes back at least as far as Aristotle, but few books address the history of these important concepts. This volume offers new essays on the theories about the logical modalities (necessity and possibility) held by leading philosophers from Aristotle in ancient Greece to Rudolf Carnap in the twentieth century. The story begins with an illuminating discussion of Aristotle's views on the connection between logic and metaphysics, continues through the Stoic and mediaeval (including Arabic) traditions, and then moves to the early modern period with particular attention to Locke and Leibniz. The views of Kant, Peirce, C. I. Lewis and Carnap complete the volume. Many of the essays illuminate the connection between the historical figures studied, and recent or current work in the philosophy of modality. The result is a rich and wide-ranging picture of the history of the logical modalities.

About this title

About the Authors

Max Cresswell taught philosophy at Victoria University of Wellington from 1963 to 1999, and has taught there again part-time since 2009. He has published over 150 articles and eleven books, including three widely used texts on modal logic with G. E. Hughes, and most recently, with Adriane Rini, The World-Time Parallel (Cambridge, 2012).

Edwin Mares is Professor of Philosophy at Victoria University of Wellington. His publications include Relevant Logic: A Philosophical Interpretation (Cambridge, 2004), A Priori (2011), and, with Stuart Brock, Realism and Anti-Realism (2007).

Adriane Rini is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Massey University, New Zealand. She is the author of Aristotle's Modal Proofs (2011) and, with Max Cresswell, The World-Time Parallel (Cambridge, 2012).

Edition details

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 2019
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1107434904
• ISBN 13: 9781107434905
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 366