Dear Professor, My graetest intellectul debt is to Frege,
the German logician, mathematician and phylosopher (of science). For some strange reasons he still has the most 'students' in the USA and is rarely known in Germany. I learned English by myself to be able to read about him because the most publications were in English. Thanks to Frege I am able to analyse any statement made in logical
way. The most 'logical errors' are made because of the deceitful simplicity of the 'subject-predicat' form. Frege was the first to explain 5 different logical contents 'hidden' in the 'S is P' sentence form.
Rik obviously thought that he needs to know first from which country I am to be able to 'çharacterize' me. However he already had a preconception of what a Frenchman, Dutchman, German, etc. 'are'. I as a individual person was actually not relevant. His logical error was to think that 'all Germans are Fx&Gx' is somehow clear and stuffed with 'meaning' as well with 'reference'. This sentence is however the so called 'sentencial function' which means a sentence which contains variables. Variables
are not names but logical places in which one need to put
some name to make a sentence from a sentencial function.
If Rik thinks to know what 'all' refers to then he must be
also able to know what 'some' refers to. Both are quantifiers. If so he can become the reachest American ever in two years time by providing names by :'someone has
stolen my car', 'someone has stolen my x' etc.
You stated that some of us in this discussion use 'sterotypes' but your own 'typical American' is a prototype of a 'sterotype'. You dear Professor also made logical error connected with quantifiers.
Regards,
the German logician, mathematician and phylosopher (of science). For some strange reasons he still has the most 'students' in the USA and is rarely known in Germany. I learned English by myself to be able to read about him because the most publications were in English. Thanks to Frege I am able to analyse any statement made in logical
way. The most 'logical errors' are made because of the deceitful simplicity of the 'subject-predicat' form. Frege was the first to explain 5 different logical contents 'hidden' in the 'S is P' sentence form.
Rik obviously thought that he needs to know first from which country I am to be able to 'çharacterize' me. However he already had a preconception of what a Frenchman, Dutchman, German, etc. 'are'. I as a individual person was actually not relevant. His logical error was to think that 'all Germans are Fx&Gx' is somehow clear and stuffed with 'meaning' as well with 'reference'. This sentence is however the so called 'sentencial function' which means a sentence which contains variables. Variables
are not names but logical places in which one need to put
some name to make a sentence from a sentencial function.
If Rik thinks to know what 'all' refers to then he must be
also able to know what 'some' refers to. Both are quantifiers. If so he can become the reachest American ever in two years time by providing names by :'someone has
stolen my car', 'someone has stolen my x' etc.
You stated that some of us in this discussion use 'sterotypes' but your own 'typical American' is a prototype of a 'sterotype'. You dear Professor also made logical error connected with quantifiers.
Regards,