Concept and object
Encyclopedia
In the philosophy of language
, the distinction between concept and object is attributable to the German philosopher Gottlob Frege
.
According to Frege, any sentence that expresses a singular thought consists of an expression (a proper name or a general term plus the definite article) that signifies an Object together with a predicate (the copula "is", plus a general term accompanied by the indefinite article or an adjective) that signifies (bedeutet) a Concept. Thus "Socrates is a philosopher" consists of "Socrates", which signifies the Object Socrates, and "is a philosopher", which signifies the Concept of being a philosopher.
This was a considerable departure from the traditional term logic
, in which every proposition (i.e. sentence) consisted of two general terms joined by the copula "is".
The distinction was of fundamental importance to the development of logic and mathematics. Frege's distinction helped to clarify the notions of a set
, of the membership relation between element and set, and of empty
and infinite sets. However, Frege's conception of a class (in his terminology an extension of a concept) differs from the current iterative conception of a set.
Frege's distinction leads to the famous difficulty or "awkwardness of language" that some expressions which purport to signify a concept - Frege's example is "the concept horse" - is grammatically an expression that by his criterion signifies an Object. Thus "the concept horse is not a concept, whereas the city of Berlin is a city".
Anthony Kenny
sought to justify the distinction, other philosophers such as Hartley Slater and Crispin Wright
have argued that the distinguished category of entity cannot be associated with predication in the way that individual objects are associated with the use of singular term
s.
Philosophy of language
Philosophy of language is the reasoned inquiry into the nature, origins, and usage of language. As a topic, the philosophy of language for analytic philosophers is concerned with four central problems: the nature of meaning, language use, language cognition, and the relationship between language...
, the distinction between concept and object is attributable to the German philosopher Gottlob Frege
Gottlob Frege
Friedrich Ludwig Gottlob Frege was a German mathematician, logician and philosopher. He is considered to be one of the founders of modern logic, and made major contributions to the foundations of mathematics. He is generally considered to be the father of analytic philosophy, for his writings on...
.
According to Frege, any sentence that expresses a singular thought consists of an expression (a proper name or a general term plus the definite article) that signifies an Object together with a predicate (the copula "is", plus a general term accompanied by the indefinite article or an adjective) that signifies (bedeutet) a Concept. Thus "Socrates is a philosopher" consists of "Socrates", which signifies the Object Socrates, and "is a philosopher", which signifies the Concept of being a philosopher.
This was a considerable departure from the traditional term logic
Term logic
In philosophy, term logic, also known as traditional logic or aristotelian logic, is a loose name for the way of doing logic that began with Aristotle and that was dominant until the advent of modern predicate logic in the late nineteenth century...
, in which every proposition (i.e. sentence) consisted of two general terms joined by the copula "is".
The distinction was of fundamental importance to the development of logic and mathematics. Frege's distinction helped to clarify the notions of a set
Set theory
Set theory is the branch of mathematics that studies sets, which are collections of objects. Although any type of object can be collected into a set, set theory is applied most often to objects that are relevant to mathematics...
, of the membership relation between element and set, and of empty
Empty set
In mathematics, and more specifically set theory, the empty set is the unique set having no elements; its size or cardinality is zero. Some axiomatic set theories assure that the empty set exists by including an axiom of empty set; in other theories, its existence can be deduced...
and infinite sets. However, Frege's conception of a class (in his terminology an extension of a concept) differs from the current iterative conception of a set.
Frege's distinction leads to the famous difficulty or "awkwardness of language" that some expressions which purport to signify a concept - Frege's example is "the concept horse" - is grammatically an expression that by his criterion signifies an Object. Thus "the concept horse is not a concept, whereas the city of Berlin is a city".
Anthony Kenny
Anthony Kenny
Sir Anthony John Patrick Kenny FBA is an English philosopher whose interests lie in the philosophy of mind, ancient and scholastic philosophy, the philosophy of Wittgenstein and the philosophy of religion...
sought to justify the distinction, other philosophers such as Hartley Slater and Crispin Wright
Crispin Wright
Crispin Wright is a British philosopher, who has written on neo-Fregean philosophy of mathematics, Wittgenstein's later philosophy, and on issues related to truth, realism, cognitivism, skepticism, knowledge, and objectivity....
have argued that the distinguished category of entity cannot be associated with predication in the way that individual objects are associated with the use of singular term
Singular term
There is no really adequate definition of singular term. Here are some definitions proposed by different writers:# A term that tells us which individual is being talked about....
s.