GOTTLOB FREGE

1848-1925

I. Vida y obras

German mathematician, logician, and Philosopher of language

1873: PhD in Mathematics from the University of Gottingen

Über eine geometrische Darstellung der imaginären Gebilde in der Ebene (“On a Geometrical
Representation of Imaginary Forms in the Plane”)

1874: Habilitation in Mathematics from the University of Jena

Rechnungsmethoden, die sich auf eine Erweiterung des Grössenbegriffes gründen (“Methods
of Calculation Based on an Extension of the Concept of Quantity”)

SOBRE LA UNIVERSIDAD ALEMANA

where he taught for 43 years until his retirement in 1917 after which he continued to write on
issues in philosophical logic and the philosophy of mathematics until his death in 1925

Teaching

Immediately after submitting this thesis, the good offices of Abbe led Frege to become a
Privatdozent (Lecturer) at the University of Jena. Library records from the University of Jena
establish that, over the next 5 years, Frege checked out texts in mechanics, analysis,
geometry, Abelian functions, and elliptical functions (Kreiser 1984, 21).

This course of Frege’s reading and lectures during the period of 1874–1879 dovetailed quite
naturally with the interests he displayed in his Habilitationsschrift. The ‘extension of the
concept of quantity’ referred to in the title concerns the fact that our understanding of
quantities (e.g., lengths, surfaces, etc.) has to be extended in the context of complex numbers.

GEOMETRÍA Y ARITMÉTICA

There is accordingly a noteworthy difference between geometry and arithmetic in the way in
which their fundamental principles are grounded. The elements of all geometrical
constructions are intuitions, and geometry refers to intuition as the source of its axioms.
Since the object of arithmetic does not have an intuitive character, its fundamental
propositions cannot stem from intuition… (Frege 1874, translation in McGuinness (ed.)
1984, 56).

his seminal achievements in these areas initially elicited little interest from his contemporaries
in mathematics. Bertrand Russell, Edmund Husserl, Rudolf Carnap, and Ludwig Wittgenstein.

PURPOSE:

Frege’s main goal in philosophy was to ground the certainty and objectivity of mathematics
in the fundamental laws of logic, and to distinguish both logic and mathematics from
empirical science in general, and from the psychology of human reasoning in particular.

His pursuit of this goal can be divided into four interrelated stages:

1. The first was his development of a new system of symbolic logic, vastly extending
the power of previous systems, and capable of formalizing the notion of proof in
mathematics. This stage culminated in his publication of the Begriffsschrift (Concept
Script) in 1879.

Begriffsschrift, eine der arithmetischen nachgebildete Formelsprache des reinen Denkens

(Concept Notation: A formula language of pure thought, modelled upon that of arithmetic).

Although the Begriffsschrift constituted a major advance in logic, it was neither widely
understood nor well-received.

2. Frege presented the second stage of his project in remarkably accessible, and largely
informal, terms in Die Grundlagen der Arithmetik (The Foundations of Arithmetic),
published in 1884. Die Grundlagen der Arithmetic: eine logisch mathematische
Untersuchung über den Begriff der Zahl.
The second stage was the articulation of a systematic philosophy of mathematics,
emphasizing:
(i) the objective nature of mathematical truths,
(ii) the grounds for certain, a priori knowledge of them,
(iii) the definition of number,
(iv) a strategy for deriving the axioms of arithmetic from the laws of logic
plus analytical definitions of basic arithmetical concepts, and
(v) the prospect of extending the strategy to higher mathematics through
the definition and analysis of real, and complex, numbers

In addition to being among the greatest treatises in the philosophy of

mathematics ever written, this work is one of the best examples of the clarity,
precision, and illuminating insight to which work in the analytic tradition has
come to aspire

3. ground-breaking articles, starting in the early 1890s and continuing at irregular

intervals throughout the rest of his life:
(i) “Funktion und Begriff” (“Function and Concept”) in 1891,
(ii) “Über Begriff und Gegenstand” (“On Concept and Object”) in 1892,
(iii) “Über Sinn und Bedeutung” (“On Sense and Reference”) in 1892,
(iv) and “Der Gedanke” (“Thought”) in 1918.
In addition to elucidating the fundamental semantic ideas needed to understand and
 precisely characterize the language of logic and mathematics, this series of articles
contains important insights about how to extend those ideas to natural languages like
English and German, thereby providing the basis for the systematic study of
language, thought, and meaning.

4. Grundgesetze der Arithmetik (Basic Laws of Arithmetic), volumes 1 and 2, published

in 1893 and 1903 respectively.
In these volumes, Frege meticulously and systematically endeavors to derive
arithmetic from logic together with definitions of arithmetical concepts in purely
logical terms. Although, as we shall see, his attempt was not entirely successful, the
project has proven to be extraordinarily fruitful.

1902), as he was preparing the proofs of the second volume of the Grundgesetze, he received
a letter from Bertrand Russell, informing him that one could derive a contradiction in the
system he had developed in the first volume. Russell’s letter frames the paradox first in terms
of the predicate P = ‘being a predicate which cannot be predicated of itself’, and then in terms
of the class of all those classes that are not members of themselves. Frege, in the Appendix to
the second volume, rephrased the paradox in terms of his own system.

Unfortunately, his last years saw him become more than just politically conservative and
right-wing – his diary for a brief period in 1924 show sympathies for fascism and anti-
Semitism.

II. Filosofía
1. Philosophy of Logic and Mathematics

Frege provided a foundations for the modern discipline of logic by developing a more
perspicuous method of formally representing the logic of thoughts and inferences.

(a) a system allowing one to study inferences formally,

(b) an analysis of complex sentences and quantifier phrases that showed an underlying unity
to certain classes of inferences,

(c) an analysis of proof and definition,

(d) a theory of extensions which, though seriously flawed, offered an intriguing picture of the
foundations of mathematics,

(e) an analysis of statements about number (i.e., of answers to the question ‘How many?’),

(f) definitions and proofs of some of the basic axioms of number theory from a limited set of
logically primitive concepts and axioms, and

(g) a conception of logic as a discipline which has some compelling features. We discuss
these developments in the following subsections.
Predicate Calculus

Leibniz’s ideas for a universal formal language and a rational calculus

Frege developed a formal notation for regimenting thought and reasoning

Begriffsschrift (1879)

Grundgesetze der Arithmetik (1893/1903)

Frege’s two systems are best characterized as term logics, since all of the complete
expressions are denoting terms. Frege analyzed ordinary predication in these systems, and so
they can also be conceived as predicate calculi. A predicate calculus is a formal system (a
formal language and a method of proof) in which one can represent valid inferences among
predications, i.e., among statements in which properties are predicated of objects.

The Basis of Frege’s Term Logic

In Frege’s term logic, all of the terms and well-formed formulas are denoting expressions.

These include: (a) simple names of objects, like ‘2’ and ‘π’, (b) complex terms which denote
objects, like ‘22’ and ‘3+1’, and (c) sentences (which are also complex terms).

The complex terms in (b) and (c) are formed with the help of ‘incomplete expressions’ which
signify functions, such as the unary squaring function ‘()2’ and the binary addition function
‘()+()’. In these functional expressions, ‘()’ is used as a placeholder for what Frege called the
arguments of the function

Thus, a mathematical expression such as ‘22’ denotes the result of applying the function ()2 to
the number 2 as argument, namely, the number 4. Similarly, the expression ‘7+1’ denotes the
result of applying the binary function +((),()) to the numbers 7 and 1 as arguments, in that
order.

Even the sentences of Frege’s mature logical system are (complex) denoting terms; they are
terms that denote truth-values. Frege distinguished two truth-values, The True and The
False, which he took to be objects. The basic sentences of Frege’s system are constructed
using the expression ‘()=()’, which signifies a binary function that maps a pair of objects x
and y to The True if x is identical to y and maps x and y to The False otherwise. A sentence
such as ‘22=4’ therefore denotes the truth-value The True, while the sentence ‘22=6’ denotes
The False.

f(x)=y’,

Similarly, f(x,y)=z is an identity statement involving a binary function of two variables

If we replace a complete name appearing in a sentence by a placeholder, the result is an

incomplete expression that signifies a special kind of function which Frege called a concept.
Concepts are functions which map every argument to one of the truth-values. Thus, ‘()>2’
denotes the concept being greater than 2, which maps every object greater than 2 to The True
and maps every other object to The False. Similarly, ‘()2=4’ denotes the concept that which
when squared is identical to 4. Frege would say that any object that a concept maps to The
True falls under the concept. Thus, the number 2 falls under the concept that which when
squared is identical to 4. In what follows, we use lower-case expressions like f() to talk
generally about functions, and upper-case expressions like F() to talk more specifically about
those functions which are concepts.

Frege supposed that a mathematical claim such as ‘2 is prime’ should be formally represented
as ‘P(2)’. The verb phrase ‘is prime’ is thereby analyzed as denoting the concept P() which
maps primes to The True and everything else to The False. Thus, a simple predication like ‘2
is prime’ becomes analyzed in Frege’s system as a special case of functional application.

Predicate Calculus

representation of non-mathematical thoughts and predications.

Frege analyzed a non-mathematical predicate like ‘is happy’ as signifying a function of one
variable which maps its arguments to a truth-value. Thus, ‘is happy’ denotes a concept which
can be represented in the formal system as ‘H()’.

The sentence ‘John is happy’, represented as ‘H(j)’, is thereby analyzed as: the object
denoted by ‘John’ falls under the concept signified by ‘() is happy’. Thus, a simple
predication is analyzed in terms of falling under a concept, which in turn, is analyzed in
terms of functions which map their arguments to truth values.

Complex Statements and Generality

So far, we have been discussing Frege’s analysis of ‘atomic’ statements. To complete the
basic logical representation of thoughts, Frege added notation for representing more complex
statements (such as negated and conditional statements) and statements of generality (those
involving the expressions ‘every’ and ‘some’).
PROOF

Frege’s system (i.e., his term logic/predicate calculus) consisted of a language and an
apparatus for proving statements. The latter consisted of a set of logical axioms
(statements considered to be truths of logic) and a set of rules of inference that lay out the
conditions under which certain statements of the language may be correctly inferred
from others. Frege made a point of showing how every step in a proof of a proposition was
justified either in terms of one of the axioms or in terms of one of the rules of inference or
justified by a theorem or derived rule that had already been proved.

Thus, as part of his formal system, Frege developed a strict understanding of a ‘proof’. In
essence, he defined a proof to be any finite sequence of statements such that each
statement in the sequence either is an axiom or follows from previous members by a
valid rule of inference. Thus, a proof of a theorem of logic, say φ, is therefore any finite
sequence of statements (with φ the final statement in the sequence) such that each member of
the sequence: (a) is one of the logical axioms of the formal system, or (b) follows from
previous members of the sequence by a rule of inference. These are essentially the
definitions that logicians still use today.

Frege’s Conception of Logic

Frege thought that he had shown that arithmetic is reducible to the truths of logic

Whereas Frege thought that the truths of arithmetic are derivable from analytic truths of logic,
Kant thought arithmetic principles are synthetic, in which case they wouldn’t be derivable
from analytic truths. Their different conceptions of logic helps to explain why these two
philosophers came to such different conclusions.

1. la intuicion

2. Philosophy of language

While pursuing his investigations into mathematics and logic (and quite possibly, in order to
ground those investigations), Frege was led to develop a philosophy of language. His
philosophy of language has had just as much, if not more, impact than his contributions to
logic and mathematics. Frege’s seminal paper in this field ‘Über Sinn und Bedeutung’ (‘On
Sense and Reference’, 1892a) is now a classic. In this paper, Frege considered two puzzles
about language and noticed, in each case, that one cannot account for the meaningfulness or
logical behavior of certain sentences simply on the basis of the denotations of the terms
(names and descriptions) in the sentence. One puzzle concerned identity statements and the
other concerned sentences with subordinate clauses such as propositional attitude reports.
To solve these puzzles, Frege suggested that the terms of a language have both a sense and a
denotation, i.e., that at least two semantic relations are required to explain the
significance or meaning of the terms of a language. This idea has inspired research in the
field for over a century and we discuss it in what follows.

Frege’s Puzzle About Identity Statements

Here are some examples of identity statements:

117+136=253

The morning star is identical to the evening star.

Mark Twain is Samuel Clemens.

Bill is Debbie’s father.

Frege believed that these statements all have the form ‘a=b

’, where ‘a’ and ‘b’ are either names or descriptions that denote individuals. He naturally
assumed that a sentence of the form ‘a=b’ is true if and only if the object a just is (identical to)
the object b. For example, the sentence ‘117+136=253’ is true if and only if the number
117+136 just is the number 253

. And the statement ‘Mark Twain is Samuel Clemens’ is true if and only if the person Mark
Twain just is the person Samuel Clemens.

But Frege noticed (1892a) that this account of truth can’t be all there is to the meaning of
identity statements. The statement ‘a=a

’ has a cognitive significance (or meaning) that must be different from the cognitive
significance of ‘a=b’. We can learn that ‘Mark Twain = Mark Twain’ is true simply by
inspecting it; but we can’t learn the truth of ‘Mark Twain = Samuel Clemens’ simply by
inspecting it — you have to examine the world to see whether the two persons are the same.
Similarly, whereas you can learn that ‘117+136=117+136’ and ‘the morning star is identical
to the morning star’ are true simply by inspection, you can’t learn the truth of ‘117+136=253’
and ‘the morning star is identical to the evening star’ simply by inspection. In the latter cases,
you have to do some arithmetical work or astronomical investigation to learn the truth of these
identity claims. Now the problem becomes clear: the meaning of ‘a=a’ clearly differs from the
meaning of ‘a=b’, but given the account of the truth described in the previous paragraph,
these two identity statements appear to have the same meaning whenever they are true! For
example, ‘Mark Twain = Mark Twain’ is true just in case: the person Mark Twain is identical
with the person Mark Twain. And ‘Mark Twain = Samuel Clemens’ is true just in case: the
person Mark Twain is identical with the person Samuel Clemens. But given that Mark Twain
just is Samuel Clemens, these two cases are the same case, and that doesn’t explain the
difference in meaning between the two identity sentences. And something similar applies to
all the other examples of identity statements having the forms ‘a=a’ and ‘a=b

’.

So the puzzle Frege discovered is: how do we account for the difference in cognitive
significance between ‘a=b

’ and ‘a=a’ when they are true?

Propositional Attitude Reports

A propositional attitude is a psychological relation between a person and a proposition. Belief,

desire, intention, discovery, knowledge, etc., are all psychological relationships between
persons, on the one hand, and propositions, on the other. When we report the propositional
attitudes of others, these reports all have a similar logical form:

X believes that p

x desires that p

x intends that p

x discovered that p

x knows that p

o see the problem posed by the analysis of propositional attitude reports, consider what
appears to be a simple principle of reasoning, namely, the Principle of Identity Substitution
(this is not to be confused with the Rule of Substitution discussed earlier). If a name, say n,
appears in a true sentence S, and the identity sentence n=m is true, then the Principle of
Identity Substitution tells us that the substitution of the name m for the name n in S does not
affect the truth of S. For example, let S be the true sentence ‘Mark Twain was an author’, let n
be the name ‘Mark Twain’, and let m

be the name ‘Samuel Clemens’. Then since the identity sentence ‘Mark Twain = Samuel
Clemens’ is true, we can substitute ‘Samuel Clemens’ for ‘Mark Twain’ without affecting the
truth of the sentence. And indeed, the resulting sentence ‘Samuel Clemens was an author’ is
true. In other words, the following argument is valid:

Mark Twain was an author.

Mark Twain = Samuel Clemens.

Therefore, Samuel Clemens was an author.

Similarly, the following argument is valid.

Consider the following argument:

John believes that Mark Twain wrote Huckleberry Finn.

Mark Twain = Samuel Clemens.

Therefore, John believes that Samuel Clemens wrote Huckleberry Finn.

The premises of the above argument, therefore, do not logically entail the conclusion. So the
Principle of Identity Substitution appears to break down in the context of propositional
attitude reports.

Theory of Sense and Denotation

to explain these puzzles, Frege suggested (1892a) that in addition to having a denotation,
names and descriptions also express a sense.

he expressions ‘4’ and ‘8/2’ have the same denotation but express different senses, different
ways of conceiving the same number.

The descriptions ‘the morning star’ and ‘the evening star’ denote the same planet, namely
Venus, but express different ways of conceiving of Venus and so have different senses.

The name ‘Pegasus’ and the description ‘the most powerful Greek god’ both have a sense
(and their senses are distinct), but neither has a denotation.

However, even though the names ‘Mark Twain’ and ‘Samuel Clemens’ denote the same
individual, they express different senses.

John loves Mary’

he words ‘John’ and ‘Mary’ in this sentence are names, the expression ‘loves’ signifies a
function, and, moreover, the sentence as a whole is a complex name.

d[j] refers to the denotation of the name ‘John’.

d[m] refers to the denotation of the name ‘Mary’.

d[L] refers to the denotation of the expression ‘loves’.

s[j] refers to the sense of the name ‘John’.

s[m] refers to the sense of the name ‘Mary’.

s[L] refers to the sense of the expression ‘loves’.

We now work toward a theoretical description of the denotation of the sentence as a whole.
On Frege’s view, d[j] and d[m] are the real individuals John and Mary, respectively. d[L] is a
function that maps d[m] (i.e., Mary) to the function ( ) loves Mary. This latter function serves
as the denotation of the predicate ‘loves Mary’ and we can use the notation d[Lm] to refer to
it semantically. Now the function d[Lm] maps d[j] (i.e., John) to the denotation of the
sentence ‘John loves Mary’. Let us refer to the denotation of the sentence as d[jLm]. Frege
identifies the denotation of a sentence as one of the two truth values. Because d[Lm] maps
objects to truth values, it is a concept. Thus, d[jLm] is the truth value The True if John falls
under the concept d[Lm]; otherwise it is the truth value The False. So, on Frege’s view, the
sentence ‘John loves Mary’ names a truth value.[6]

Frege calls the sense of a sentence a thought, and whereas there are only two truth values,
he supposes that there are an infinite number of thoughts.

With this description of language, Frege can give a general account of the difference in the
cognitive significance between identity statements of the form ‘a=a’ and ‘a=b’. The cognitive
significance is not accounted for at the level of denotation. On Frege’s view, the sentences
‘4=8/2’ and ‘4=4’ both denote the same truth value. The function ()=() maps 4 and 8/2 to The
True, i.e., maps 4 and 4 to The True. So d[4=8/2] is identical to d[4=4]; they are both The
True. However, the two sentences in question express different thoughts. That is because s[4]
is different from s[8/2]. So the thought s[4=8/2] is distinct from the thought s[4=4]. Similarly,
‘Mark Twain = Mark Twain’ and ‘Mark Twain = Samuel Clemens’ denote the same truth
value. However, given that s[Mark Twain] is distinct from s[Samuel Clemens], Frege would
claim that the thought s[Mark Twain = Mark Twain] is distinct from the thought s[Mark
Twain = Samuel Clemens].