Document Type : Scientific Review
Author
Assistant Professor of Philosophy, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran.
Abstract
In his famous 1985 article “What the Tortoise Said to Achilles”, Lewis Carroll offers a regress that suggests that we could never reach the conclusion of a deductive argument. Here, by reviewing Corine Besson`s article, we discuss a solution for his puzzle by suggesting that we should consider logical principles as dispositions that guide us in our mental movements; logical principles, in this way, are not some sort of beliefs that represents facts. In articulating this solution, Besson uses a theory in the philosophy of ethics that considers moral judgments as non-cognitive mental states. In logical non-cognitivism, logic is a handbook for deducing. Also, according to logical internalism, non-propositional rules of logic are enough to entail the conclusion and there is no need to add other premises to the argument. Logical expressivism is an approach in the epistemology of logic that regards logic as a self-sufficient knowledge and as a prerequisite for any rational activity.
Keywords: Lewis Carroll, cognitive states, logical non-cognitivism, logical internalism, logical expressivism. Corine Besson.
Keywords
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