Cultural Relativity and the Logic of Philosophy

Abstract

This paper is an attempt to elicit some features of one of those areas of investigation which may be designated by the term ‘philosophical logic.’ However, before the topic is more carefully delimited, perhaps it would be illuminating to indicate briefly the wider contexts which are being eliminated as matters of concern. ‘Philosophical logic’ suggests at least three different sorts of inquiry, each of which has been a matter of concern for philosophers. One may take the term to designate a certain kind of logic, the philosophical variety, to be distinguished from other varieties, such as the common-sensical or the mathematical. This may be roughly synonymous with ‘metaphysics’ or ‘ontology.’ One may interpret the term as demarcating a certain collection of problems arising in logic which may or ought to be the objects of philosophical scrutiny. Used in this way, the term is synonymous with ‘the philosophy of logic,’ the critical appraisal of the presuppositions and procedures of logic. This would be the same sort of discipline as the philosophy of science, the philosophy of art, or the philosophy of religion.