Skip to main content
Log in

Anti-Realist Semantics

  • Published:
Erkenntnis Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

I argue that the implementation of theDummettian program of an ``anti-realist'' semanticsrequires quite different conceptions of the technicalmeaning-theoretic terms used than those presupposed byDummett. Starting from obvious incoherences in anattempt to conceive truth conditions as assertibilityconditions, I argue that for anti-realist purposesnon-epistemic semantic notions are more usefully kept apart from epistemic ones rather than beingreduced to them. Embedding an anti-realist theory ofmeaning in Martin-Löf's Intuitionistic Type Theory(ITT) takes care, however, of many notorious problemsthat have arisen in trying to specify suitableintuitionistic notions of semantic value,truth-conditions, and validity, taking into accountthe so-called ``defeasibility of evidence'' forassertions in empirical discourses.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

REFERENCES

  • van Benthem, J.: 1996, Exploring Logical Dynamics, CSLI Publications, Stanford.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brouwer, L. E. J.: 1981, in D. van Dalen (ed.), Brouwer's Cambridge Lectures on Intuitionism, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dummett, M.: 1959, ‘Truth’, in M. Dummett (1978), pp. 1-24.

  • Dummett, M.: 1978, Truth and other Enigmas, Duckworth, London.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dummett, M.: 19812, Frege: Philosophy of Language, Duckworth, London.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dummett, M.: 1983, ‘Language and Truth’, in M. Dummett (1993), pp. 117ff.

  • Dummett, M.: 1985, ‘Truth and Meaning’, in M. Dummett (1993), pp. 147ff.

  • Dummett, M.: 1990, ‘The Source of the Concept of Truth’, in M. Dummett (1993), pp. 188-201.

  • Dummett, M.: 1990a, ‘Wittgenstein on Necessity: Some Reflections’, in M. Dummett (ed.) (1993), pp. 446f.

  • Dummett, M.: 1991, The Logical Basis of Metaphysics, Duckworth, London.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dummett, M.: 1993, The Seas of Language, Clarendon, Oxford.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dummett, M.: 1994, ‘Replies to Critics’, in B. McGuiness and G. Oliveri (eds) (1994), pp. 257-370.

  • Edwards, J.: 1996, ‘Anti-Realist Truth and Concepts of Superassertibility’, Synthese 109, 103-120.

    Google Scholar 

  • Guttenplan, S.: 1986, ‘Meaning and Metaphysics’, in Ch. Travis (ed.), Meaning and Interpretation, Blackwell, Oxford, pp. 177-200.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kleene, S.: 1952, Introduction to Metamathematics, North-Holland, Amsterdam.

    Google Scholar 

  • Landman, F.: 1986, Towards a Theory of Information. The Status of Partial Objects in Semantics, Groningen-Amsterdam Studies in Semantics Series No. 6, Foris, Dordrecht.

    Google Scholar 

  • Martin-Löf, P.: 1984, Intuitionistic Type Theory. Bibliopolis, Naples.

    Google Scholar 

  • Martin-Löf, P.: 1987, ‘Truth of a Proposition, Evidence of a Judgement, Validity of Proof’, Synthese 73, 407-420.

    Google Scholar 

  • Martin-Löf, P.: 1995, ‘Verificationism Then and Now’, in W. DePauli-Scimanovich et al. (eds), The Foundational Debate: Complexity and Constructivity in Mathematics and Physics, Kluwer, Dordrecht, pp. 187-196.

    Google Scholar 

  • Martin-Löf, P.: 1983, On the Meanings of the Logical Constants and the Justifcations of the Logical Laws. Lectures, held at the meeting ‘Teoria della Dimostrazione e Filosofia della Logica’, Siena (1983). Also in (and quoted from) the Nordic Journal of Philosophical Logic, Vol. 1, No. 1 (1996), pp. 11-60.

    Google Scholar 

  • Martin-Löf, P.: 1996, ‘Analytic and Synthetic Judgements in Type Theory’, in P. Parrini (ed.), Kant and Contemporary Epistemology, Kluwer, Dordrecht, pp. 87-100.

    Google Scholar 

  • McGuiness, B. and G. Oliveri (eds): 1994, The Philosophy of Michael Dummett, Dordrecht.

  • Merin, A.: 1997, If All Our Arguments had to be Conclusive, There Would be Few of Them. Working papers of the SFB 340, Report No. 101.

  • Moschovakis, Y.: 1991, ‘Sense and Reference as Algorithm and Value’, in J. Oikkonen and J. Väänänen (eds), Logic Colloquium '90, Lecture Notes in Logic, Vol. 2, Springer, Berlin, pp. 210-249.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rabinowicz, W.: 1985, ‘Intuitionistic Truth’, J. Philosophical Logic 14, 191-228.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rabinowicz, W. and K. Segerberg: 1994, ‘Actual Truth, Possible Knowledge’, Topoi 13, 101-115.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ranta, A.: 1994, Type-Theoretical Grammar, Oxford Science Publications, Clarendon, Oxford.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schiffer, S.: 1987, Remnants of Meaning, The MIT Press, Cambridge MA.

    Google Scholar 

  • van Stigt, W.: 1990, Brouwer's Intuitionism, North-Holland, Amsterdam.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shapiro, S. (ed.): 1985, Intensional Mathematics, North-Holland, Amsterdam.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sundholm, G.: 1986, ‘Proof Theory and Meaning’, in D. Gabbay and F. Guenthner (eds), Handbook of Philosophical Logic, Vol. III, Chap. III(8), Reidel, Dordrecht, pp. 478 ff.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sundholm, G.: 1994, ‘Vestiges of Realism’, in B. McGuiness and G. Oliveri (1994), pp. 137ff.

  • Sundholm, G. (1994a), ‘Existence, Proof and Truth-Making: A Perspective on the Intuitonistic Conception of Truth’, Topoi 13, 117-126.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sundholm, G.: 1997, ‘Implicit Epistemic Aspects of Constructive Logic’, J. Logic, Language, and Information 6, 191-212.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sundholm, G.: 1999, ‘Proofs as Acts and Proofs as Objects’, to appear in a special volume of Theoria devoted to the works of Dag Prawitz.

  • van Dalen, D.: 1984, ‘Intuitionistic Logic’, in F. Guenthner and D. Gabbay (eds), Handbook of Philosophical Logic, Vol. II.

  • Wright, C.: 1993, Realism, Meaning, and Truth, 2nd ed., Blackwell, Oxford.

    Google Scholar 

  • Williamson, T.: 1990, ‘On Intuitionistic Modal Epistemic Logic’, J Philosophical Logic 21, 63-89.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Hinzen, W. Anti-Realist Semantics. Erkenntnis 52, 281–311 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1005619924431

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1005619924431

Keywords

Navigation