[FOM] The influence of Leibniz on Russell

[Joseph Vidal-Rosset]

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Le Wed, 2 May 2007 21:51:18 +0100,
Roger Bishop Jones <rbj at rbjones.com> a écrit :

> Russell studied (and wrote his book on) Leibniz before his work 
> on "The Principles of Mathematics" and "Principia Mathematica".
> 
> Does anyone know whether he was acquainted with Leibniz's ideas 
> about the "Lingua Characteristica" and the "Calculus 
> Ratiocinator" and whether these had any role in motivating his 
> work on the foundations of mathematics?
> 
> I know of only three examples of work in logic which is 
> explicitly based on or inspired by these ideas of Leibniz:
> 
> 1. Frege's citing the lingua characteristica as influencing his
>     work on the Begriffschrift
> 2. the "calculemus" project, which aims to integrate theorem
>     proving and computer algebra software
> 3. Martin Davis's  book "The Universal Computer".
> 
> Does anyone know of any other examples?
> 
> Roger Jones

Ernst Specker told me, in a private conversation in Bern, that
Leibniz had inspired his very famous demonstration about NF which
proves the infinite and disproves the Axiom of Choice. I am not apt
unfortunately to be more precise about the exact link between Leibniz's
work and Specker's proof, but the NF experts on this list will surely
be. I hope so, because it's an interesting topic. 

- -- 
Joseph Vidal-Rosset
Université de Nancy 2
Département de philosophie
Bd Albert 1er
F-54000 Nancy

page web: http://jvrosset.free.fr
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