Gottlob Frege

"Frege" redirects here. For other people with the surname, see Frege (surname).
Not to be confused with Gottlob Frick.

Gottlob Frege
Frege in c. 1879
Born8 November 1848
Wismar, Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, German Confederation
Died26 July 1925(1925-07-26) (aged 76)
Bad Kleinen, Free State of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, German Reich
EducationUniversity of Göttingen (PhD, 1873)
University of Jena (Dr. phil. hab., 1874)
Notable workBegriffsschrift (1879)
The Foundations of Arithmetic (1884)
Basic Laws of Arithmetic (1893–1903)
Era19th-century philosophy
20th-century philosophy
RegionWestern philosophy
SchoolAnalytic philosophy
Linguistic turn
Logical objectivism
Modern Platonism[1]
Logicism
Transcendental idealism[2][3] (before 1891)
Metaphysical realism[3] (after 1891)
Foundationalism[4]
Indirect realism[5]
Redundancy theory of truth[6]
InstitutionsUniversity of Jena
Theses
Doctoral advisorErnst Christian Julius Schering (PhD thesis advisor)
Other academic advisorsRudolf Friedrich Alfred Clebsch
Notable studentsRudolf Carnap
Main interests
Philosophy of mathematics, mathematical logic, philosophy of language
Notable ideas
 

Friedrich Ludwig Gottlob Frege (/ˈfreɪɡə/;[7] German: [ˈɡɔtloːp ˈfreːɡə]; 8 November 1848 – 26 July 1925) was a German philosopher, logician, and mathematician. He was a mathematics professor at the University of Jena, and is understood by many to be the father of analytic philosophy, concentrating on the philosophy of language, logic, and mathematics. Though he was largely ignored during his lifetime, Giuseppe Peano (1858–1932), Bertrand Russell (1872–1970), and, to some extent, Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951) introduced his work to later generations of philosophers. Frege is widely considered to be the greatest logician since Aristotle, and one of the most profound philosophers of mathematics ever.[8]

His contributions include the development of modern logic in the Begriffsschrift and work in the foundations of mathematics. His book the Foundations of Arithmetic is the seminal text of the logicist project, and is cited by Michael Dummett as where to pinpoint the linguistic turn. His philosophical papers "On Sense and Reference" and "The Thought" are also widely cited. The former argues for two different types of meaning and descriptivism. In Foundations and "The Thought", Frege argues for Platonism against psychologism or formalism, concerning numbers and propositions respectively.

  1. ^ Balaguer, Mark (25 July 2016). Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Platonism in Metaphysics. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University – via Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
  2. ^ Hans Sluga, "Frege's alleged realism," Inquiry 20 (1–4):227–242 (1977).
  3. ^ a b Michael Resnik, II. Frege as Idealist and then Realist," Inquiry 22 (1–4):350–357 (1979).
  4. ^ Tom Rockmore, On Foundationalism: A Strategy for Metaphysical Realism, Rowman & Littlefield, 2004, p. 111.
  5. ^ Frege criticized direct realism in his "Über Sinn und Bedeutung" (see Samuel Lebens, Bertrand Russell and the Nature of Propositions: A History and Defence of the Multiple Relation Theory of Judgement, Routledge, 2017, p. 34).
  6. ^ Truth – Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy; The Deflationary Theory of Truth (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy).
  7. ^ "Frege". Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary.
  8. ^ Wehmeier, Kai F. (2006). "Frege, Gottlob". In Borchert, Donald M. (ed.). Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Vol. 3 (2 ed.). Macmillan Reference USA. ISBN 0-02-866072-2.