One particular topic in the literature on Frege’s conception of sense relates to two apparently contradictory theses held by Frege: the isomorphism of thought and language on one hand and the expressibility of a thought by different sentences on the other. I will divide the paper into five sections. In (1) I introduce the problem of the tension in Frege’s thought. In (2) I discuss the main attempts to resolve the conflict between Frege’s two contradictory claims, showing what is wrong (...) with some of them. In (3), I analyze where, in Frege’s writings and discussions on sense identity, one can find grounds for two different conceptions of sense. In (4) I show how the two contradictory theses held by Frege are connected with different concerns, compelling Frege to a constant oscillation in terminology. In (5) I summarize two further reasons that prevented Frege from making the distinction between two conceptions of sense clear: (i) the antipsychologism problem and (ii) the overlap of traditions in German literature contemporary to Frege about the concept of value. I conclude with a hint for a reconstruction of the Fregean notion of ‘thought’ which resolves the contradiction between his two theses. (shrink)

Michael Dummett has long argued that Frege is committed to recognizing a distinction between two sorts of analysis of propositional contents: 'analysis', which reveals the entities that one must grasp in order to apprehend a given propositional content; and 'decomposition', which is used in recognizing the validity of certain inferences. Whereas any propositional content admits of a unique ultimate 'analysis' into simple constituents, it also admits of distinct 'decompositions', no one of which is ultimately privileged over the others. I argue (...) that although Russell accepts this distinction between analysis and decomposition, Frege does not. In particular, I consider claims which Dummett makes regarding how 'analysis' and 'decomposition' are related to two different models Frege at least suggests in discussing the composition of thoughts, the part/whole model and the function/argument model; and I argue that in each case, while Russell accepts views which Dummett attributes to Frege, Frege does not. (shrink)

The paper challenges a widely held interpretation of Frege's conception of logic on which the constituent clauses of basic law V have the same sense. I argue against this interpretation by first carefully looking at the development of Frege's thoughts in Grundlagen with respect to the status of abstraction principles. In doing so, I put forth a new interpretation of Grundlagen §64 and Frege's idea of ‘recarving of content’. I then argue that there is strong evidence in Grundgesetze that Frege (...) did not hold the relevant sense-identity claim regarding basic law V. (shrink)

Two claims the present author has made about Frege's philosophy are defended against Michael Dummett's criticisms (The Interpretation of Frege's Philosophy and ?Objectivity and Reality in Lotze and Frege?, this journal, 1982). The claim that Frege was concerned primarily with epistemological problems rather than with the theory of meaning, and the claim (this journal, 1978) that the ascription of Wirklichkeit to Thoughts is evidence of Frege's realism, are clarified and defended. Dummett's own characterization of Frege's realism is considered and rejected.

The paper discusses the emergence of Frege's puzzle and the introduction of the celebrated distinction between sense and reference in the context of Frege's logicist project. The main aim of the paper is to show that not logicism per se is mainly responsible for this introduction, but Frege's constant struggle against formalism. Thus, the paper enlarges the historical context, and provides a reconstruction of Frege's philosophical development from this broader perspective.

The aim of this article is to examine Frege’s view of the context principle in his mature philosophical doctrine. Here, the author argues that the context principle is embodied in the contextual explanation of value-ranges presented in Basic Laws of Arithmetic. The contextual explanation of value-ranges plays essentially the same role as the context principle in The Foundations of Arithmetic. It is supposed to show how a reference to natural numbers is possible. Moreover, the author argues against the view that (...) the context principle should be separated from the recarving thesis. This aspect of Frege’s view leads the author to the rejection of the purely referential view of the context principle, which is fairly widely accepted in the current literature. (shrink)

Gottlob Frege famously rejects the methodology for consistency and independence proofs offered by David Hilbert in the latter's Foundations of Geometry. The present essay defends against recent criticism the view that this rejection turns on Frege's understanding of logical entailment, on which the entailment relation is sensitive to the contents of non-logical terminology. The goals are (a) to clarify further Frege's understanding of logic and of the role of conceptual analysis in logical investigation, and (b) to point out the extent (...) to which his understanding of logic differs importantly from that of the model-theoretic tradition that grows out of Hilbert's work. (shrink)