UQ Philosophy Seminar: next talk by Alexander Paseau (Friday 3 March, Zoom)

[Guillermo Badia]

The Philosophy Seminar of the University of Queensland is pleased to
have a  Zoom  talk by Prof Alexander Paseau  (Oxford) on 3 March at
17:30 PM (Brisbane local time). Everyone is welcome to join! If you’re
interested, please contact Dr Guillermo Badia (g.badia at uq.edu.au) for
the Zoom link. The details of the talk can be found below.

Title: Why Infinitary Logic is Genuinely Logical

Abstract:  Just as one can distinguish pure geometry (roughly the
study of what follows from some geometric axioms) from applied
geometry (the geometry of our physical world or worlds like it), one
can distinguish pure logic (the mathematical study of any logic) from
applied logic (the study of what really follows from what). My talk
will be an exercise in applied logic. A tenet of contemporary thought
is that applied logic is finitary: any logically valid argument must
be capturable in a finitary logic, e.g. first-order logic. Infinitary
logics are a relatively minor area of mathematical study but are not
generally regarded as correct, i.e. as genuinely logical in the
applied logician’s sense. Against this, I shall give some reasons for
thinking that infinitary logic is genuinely logical. The talk will
overlap with Part II of my book One True Logic, co-authored with Owen
Griffiths (Oxford UP 2022).