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Gnosis

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Abstract

The transition from form to meaning is not neatly layered: there is no point where form ends and content sets in. Rather, there is an almost continuous process that converts form into meaning. That process cannot always take a straight line. Very often we hit barriers in our mind, due to the inability to understand the exact content of the sentence just heard. The standard division between formula and interpretation (or value) should therefore be given up when talking about the process of understanding. Interestingly, when we do this it turns out that there are ‘easy’ formulae, those we can understand without further help, and ‘difficult’ ones, which we cannot.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Fakultät Linguistik und Literaturwissenschaft, Universität Bielefeld, Postfach 10 01 31, 33501, Bielefeld, Germany

    Marcus Kracht

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  1. Marcus Kracht
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Correspondence to Marcus Kracht.

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I have benefitted greatly from discussions with Albert Visser and Kees Vermeulen during his stay in Utrecht in 1992–1993 and with Christa Hauenschild, David Pearce, Carla Umbach, Gerd Wagner, Frank Wolter and Heinrich Wansing in the Gruppe Logik, Wissenstheorie und Information. Later stages of this manuscript have benefitted from the thoughtful comments from a reviewer for the JPL, and from discussions with Hans-Martin Gärtner, András Kornai, Udo Klein and Christian Wurm.

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Kracht, M. Gnosis. J Philos Logic 40, 397–420 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10992-010-9156-0

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