The Topics of Thought - Leçon 3

"The Topics of Thought" - Prof Franz Berto (Chaire Mercier 2020-2021)

Intentionality is a feature of some mental states: that of being about, that is, directed towards, objects, situations, states of affairs. Propositional or de dicto intentional states are states having propositions as their contents. These are recorded linguistically by verbs taking sentential complements and expressing attitudes towards said contents, such as ‘believes (that)’, ‘knows (that)’, ‘imagines (that)’, ‘supposes (that)’, ‘is informed (that)’. One may use the generic term ‘thought’ as a cover-all for such intentional states.

In these lectures, I will talk about thoughts, so understood, and what they are about: their topics, as I will say. I will present a new framework for the logic of thought – a unified way of replying to the question: given that one thinks (believes, knows, etc.) something, what else must one think (believe, know, etc.), as a matter of logic? Under which logical operations is one’s thought closed?

The foundations of a logic of intentional states must lie in a general theory of propositions. What Qs one must think, as a matter of logical necessity, because one thinks that P, must depend on the contents of P and Q. Two-component semantics is a theory of propositional content, based on the insight that propositions must feature two irreducible components: (1) truth conditions, and (2) topics. Whereas (1) is familiar, (2) will be introduced and explained in some detail.

Two-component semantics is hyperintensional: it individuates contents in a more fine-grained way than standard intensional or possible worlds semantics. But possible worlds semantics has been a 20th Century philosophical success story: it has been used extensively to analyze the aforementioned notions – knowledge, belief, information – and more. These lectures will also discuss, thus, a number of problems for such applications of possible world semantics.

Lien visio-conférence Zoom pour les leçons "The Topics of thought" :  https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85984056806

Leçons suivantes: 

• Leçon le mardi 17/11 de 16 h 15 à 18 h 15 

• Leçon le mercredi 18/11 de 10 h 45 à 12 h 45 

• Leçon le vendredi 20/11 de 16 h 15 à 18 h 15 
   

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