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Essay / Frege's Interpretation of Language - 1430
Logic generally arises from argumentation, involving the study of reason and the forms it can take when presented as an argument. To determine the logical value of an argument, one must effectively evaluate the relationships between the objects and concepts put forward in a thought. However, thoughts themselves are inaccessible to anyone except the self because they only exist in consciousness. To express such thought, one must use the tool of language, putting thoughts and ideas into words so that they can be shared with a community. However, language can never summarize the entire idea; information and its clarity are often lost in translation. In order to pursue the objective of logic and evaluate a set of reasonings, one must first analyze and master the language in which the argument is presented. Gottlob Frege, one of the founders of modern logic, recognized the need to correctly analyze language into ideas and devised a methodology, published in On Sense and Meaning, for analyzing words, expressions, and sentences. Frege breaks down his analysis into constituent elements. parts of a sentence, to finally form the whole. The first part concerns individual words, to which he attributes three attributes: idea, sense and signification. Idea is the most abstract of the three qualities, signifying the mental image associated with the word in question. It is composed of all memories and experiences with such an object and is therefore specific to the individual; we can never be sure that two people have the same idea. Although similarities between ideas can be extracted through expression, absolute congruence can never be established. The idea is an element of consciousness and therefore...... middle of paper ......se. However, this obvious connection does not apply to the meaning of the sentences, which is defined as true or false, assuming it exists. According to Frege, the sentences "Barack Obama is the president of the United States" and "Man set foot on the Moon" are both true and have the same meaning. However, if we ask a layman if these phrases “mean” the same thing, the intuitive and automatic answer is no. The familiar concept of meaning as it relates to sentences corresponds to Frege's idea of meaning. It seems that Frege's definitions are exactly the opposite of what is usually assumed, leading to unnecessary confusion. However, this is only a statement about the aesthetic qualities of his theory, and does not necessarily affect its pragmatic value. Frege's interpretation of language is certainly revolutionary, but it is not without its flaws..