In this project, we examined the connections between semantic modelling, possible worlds semantics and the nature of logic and meaning. Questions which the project examined include the following:
- Are proof-theoretic and model-theoretic semantics complementary in giving an account of meaning, or does one have priority over the other?
- What are the formal connections between the notions of logical necessity, metaphysical necessity, analyticity and aprioricity?
- Two-dimensional theories of meaning posit two different dimensions of meaning. What can be learned about the nature of logic from these theories ? For instance, is logic relative to a dimension of meaning?
- To what extent and how is logical consequence normative for reasoning?
- Modal logic standardly deploys a notion of possible world. Is the notion of an impossible world similarly useful?
- What can be learned about the nature of logic from an examination of the history of the notion of logic consequence?
- To solve the semantic paradoxes, Bradwardine proposed that meaning is closed under some notion of consequence. For what notions of consequence, if any, is this true?
Can this phenomenon be modelled? - How do the logics of metaphysical necessity and context-sensitivity interact? Can their interaction shed light into other debates , such as that between the necessitist and the contingentist?
Project leader: Stephen Read
Co-investigators: Derek Ball, Aaron Cotnoir, Ephraim Glick
Research students: Spencer Johnston, Laura Celani, Ryo Ito, Bruno Jacinto, Poppy Mankowitz, Fenner Tanswell, Alexander Yates