This talk will be offered in a hybrid format. Join us on site or online! (Venue and Zoom link below)
Can we make true affirmative claims about things that don’t exist? When we say “roses are flowers” in winter, or define “idealized gases are infinitely compressible” (which is actually impossible), what makes these statements meaningful or true? Many medieval logicians writing in Latin struggled with such problems, particularly with empty terms – i.e., terms that do not refer to anything in the world.
Historical presuppositions, linguistic features, and ontological commitments contributed to this struggle, but they also provided the background against which some late medieval logicians developed creative solutions.
Within this complex interplay of presuppositions, language, and ontology, fourteenth-century thinkers such as John Buridan and Marsilius of Inghen devised strikingly original semantic strategies.
Birgit Kellner will respond to the paper in a comparative context of Buddhist philosophy.
