Abstract
In the Prolegomena to his Logische Untersuchungen (LU) Edmund Husserl praised the first two volumes of Bernard Bolzano’s Wissenschaftslehre (WL) as “far surpassing everything else world literature has to offer as systematic exposition of logic”. Eleven years later the key is a bit lower: These volumes, he now says, occupy “the highest rank in the logical world literature of the 19th century”1. To the best of my knowledge, the most extensive and most thorough discussion of a single contention in Bolzano’s philosophy of logic that can be found in any of Husserl’s books and articles published during his lifetime is contained in the last chapter of his LU2. The topic of this discussion is a courageous if not outrageous Bolzanian contention which, at least on the face of it, flatly contradicts what most philosophers since Aristotle took for granted. Questions, Bolzano claims, are a special kind of propositions and hence truth-evaluable. Let me call this Bolzano’s Tenet.
This paper was read at the International Conference on “Les Recherches logiques d’Edmund Husserl 1901–2001: Origines et Postérité de la Phénoménologie”, held in Montréal in May 2001.
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References
LU I, p. 225; letter to Friedjung, Husserliana - Dokumente, Briefwechsel, Dordrecht 1994, vol. 7, p. 97.
In 1920 Husserl emphasized that he had refrained from modifying the text of the 1st edition only because in the meantime his views had changed too drastically (preface to the 2nd edition of LU II/2, p. vii). I shall concentrate exclusively on his 1901 position, more precisely: on those aspects of that position which are relevant for an evaluation of Bolzano’ s thesis about questions. (Page references are always to the 2nd edition.)
Aristotle, De Interpretatione 4, 16 b 33–17 a 7, quoted in part by Bolzano in WL I, p. 87 and vaguely referred to by Husserl in LU II/2, p. 207.
WL I 88, quoted in LU I1/2, p. 207. (All translations from LU and WL are my own.)
Vgl. WL II 194, p. 292. Of course, “Satz” here (as ever so often in WL) is short for “Satz an sich”.
WL II, p. 72–76.
The Stoics called yes/no questions “epwtrµa’ta” and search interrogatives “ttuagata”. In Frege’s paper “Der Gedanke” (at p. 62, original pagination), the former are referred to as “Satzfragen (sentence questions)”, the latter as “Wortfragen (word questions)”. A common pair of labels in German is “Entscheidungsfragen (decision questions)” vs. “Ergänzungsfragen (completion questions)”. Some linguists follow Otto Jespersen (The Philosophy of Grammar,1924) in calling search interrogatives “x-questions”.
“obgleich sie gar nicht die Gestalt haben, welche die Grammatiker sonst eine Frageform nennen” (WL II, p. 72).
“das eigentliche Subject [...] ist der Sprechende” (WL 1, p. 89).
Cp. WL II 72.
WL I, p. 88; Antoine Destutt de Tracy, Eléments d’idéologie,vol.2, Grammaire,Paris 1803, p. 52. In this (non-canonical) form the view is to be found already in Bolzano’s earliest notes on logic : “Etwas aus der Logik” (c. 1812), in : Bernard Bolzano Gesamtausgabe,vol. 2 A 5, 146, and it re-appears in WL III, p. 177.
Lennart Aqvist, A New Approach to the Logical Theory of Interrogatives,Uppsala 1965; Jaako Hintikka, “Questions about Questions”, in: M. Munitz, P. Unger (eds.), Semantics & Philosophy,New York 1974, pp. 104–110; cp. Frege, “Der Gedanke ”,p. 62.
“selbst wenn uns die Wahrheit, nach der wir fragen (wie etwas beim Sokratisiren), recht wohl bekannt ist” (WL II, p. 75).
David Lewis, “General Semantics” (1970), in his Philosophical Papers,vol. 1, Oxford 1983, pp. 222–225.
On the first case: WL I, p. 88, on the second: WL II, pp. 75/76.
I. Cp. also LU I1/2, p. 207.
“Sie sind zwar wahr oder falsch, aber Wahrheit fällt hier mit Wahrhaftigkeit zusammen” (LU IU2, 221). In WL II, p. 292 Bolzano classifies rogations as “perceptual propositions (Wahrnehmungssätze),and by ”perception“ he means here introspection.
“Die Umstände der Äußerung machen es ja ohne weiteres verständlich, daß der Redende selbst es ist, der da fragt. Also liegt die volle Bedeutung des Satzes nicht in dem, was er selbst nach seinem Wortlaute bedeutet, sondern ist durch die Gelegenheit, nämlich durch die Beziehung zur augenblicklich redenden Person bestimmt” (LU II/2, p. 210).
“Das Argument würde doch nicht minder auf Aussagesätze passen; also müßten wir den Ausdruck `S ist P’ als gelegenheitliche Verkürzung für den neuen Ausdruck `ich urteile, daß S P ist’ interpretieren, und so in infinitum” (LU 11/2, p. 211).
This is a counterpart to Lewis’ rebuttal of John Ross’ proposal that declarative sentences abbreviate performatives: It gets truth-conditions wrong (Lewis, 1970, p. 224.)
LU IlI2, p. 218.
Cp. WL II, p. 77 f. on indexical sentences, and my “Propositions in Bolzano and Frege”, in: Bolzano and Analytic Philosophy, Grazer Philos. Studien 53, 1997, p. 227 f. At least the multiplication which is due to the multitude of questioners would be avoided if one were to replace “I want’ rogatives by the impersonal formula `It is desired (es wird verlangt) that a true proposition of type X be indicated’. (Compare Bolzano’s formulation of `problem propositions (Aufgabesätze)’ in WL II, pp. 72 and 68.) But this proposal is implausible. A sincere utterance of the impersonal variant of a canonical rogative can coherently be continued by `As for myself, I do not have the desire that a truth of type X be indicated’. But somebody who sincerely, and in propria persona,utters the corresponding interrogative cannot coherently go on like that.
The weak thesis (B*) applies, mutatis mutandis,to all utterances which have sincerity conditions, hence even to interjections like “ouch”. This generality is intended by Bolzano: see WL I, p. 88.
Frege Der Gedanke’, p. 62; Die Verneinung’, pp. 143–145.
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Künne, W. (2003). Are Questions Propositions?. In: Husserl’s Logical Investigations Reconsidered. Contributions to Phenomenology, vol 48. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-0207-2_6
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