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Arthur Schopenhauer on Naturalness in Logic

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Language, Logic, and Mathematics in Schopenhauer

Part of the book series: Studies in Universal Logic ((SUL))

Abstract

The question of naturalness in logic is widely discussed in today’s research literature. On the one hand, naturalness in the systems of natural deduction is intensively discussed on the basis of Aristotelian syllogistics. On the other hand, research on “natural logic” is concerned with the implicitly existing logical laws of natural language, and is therefore also interested in the naturalness of syllogistics. In both research areas, the question arises what naturalness exactly means, in logic as well as in language. We show, however, that this question is not entirely new: In his Berlin Lectures of the 1820s, Arthur Schopenhauer already discussed in depths what is natural and unnatural in logic. In particular, he anticipates two criteria for the naturalness of deduction that meet current trends in research: (1) Naturalness is what corresponds to the actual practice of argumentation in everyday language or scientific proof; (2) Naturalness of deduction is particularly evident in the form of Euler-type diagrams.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Jason Costanzo and Jørgen Fischer Nilsson for helpful comments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. FernUniversität in Hagen, Hagen, Germany

    Hubert Martin Schüler

  2. Institute for Philosophy, University of Hagen, Hagen, Germany

    Jens Lemanski

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  1. Hubert Martin Schüler
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  2. Jens Lemanski
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Correspondence to Jens Lemanski .

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  1. Institute for Philosophy, University of Hagen, Hagen, Germany

    Jens Lemanski

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Schüler, H.M., Lemanski, J. (2020). Arthur Schopenhauer on Naturalness in Logic. In: Lemanski, J. (eds) Language, Logic, and Mathematics in Schopenhauer. Studies in Universal Logic. Birkhäuser, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33090-3_10

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