The Liar

An Essay on Truth and Circularity

Jon Barwise and John Etchemendy

This monograph purports to provide a solution to semantical paradoxes like the Liar. The authors base this solution on J. L. Austin's idea of ...

The Liar

An Essay on Truth and Circularity

Jon Barwise and John Etchemendy

Description

This monograph purports to provide a solution to semantical paradoxes like the Liar. The authors base this solution on J. L. Austin's idea of truth, which is fundamental to situation semantics. They compare two models of language, propositions and truth, one based on Russell and the other on Austin, as they bear on the Liar Paradox. In Russell's view, a sentence expresses a proposition, which is true or not. According to Austin, however, there is always a contextual parameter - the situation the sentence is about - that comes between the sentence and proposition. The Austinian perspective proves to have fruitful applications to the analysis of semantic paradox. The authors show that, on this account, the liar is a genuine diagonal argument. This argument can be shown to have profound consequences for our understanding of some of the most basic semantical mechanisms at work in our language.

Jon Barwise is, with John Perry, a co-founder of the Centre for the Study of Language and Information at Stanford.

The Liar

An Essay on Truth and Circularity

Jon Barwise and John Etchemendy

Author Information

Jon Barwise, Professor of Philosophy, Stanford University, California, USA, and John Etchemendy, Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Stanford University, California, USA

The Liar

An Essay on Truth and Circularity

Jon Barwise and John Etchemendy

Reviews and Awards

'a book well worth reading for anyone with an interest in puzzles such as The Liar Paradox.' The Guardian -

'Some interesting work of the Stanford based logicians John Barwise and John Etchemendy has thrown considerable light on to this vexing problem. And one of the most interesting aspects of the whole affair is that their work depends upon developments in computer science.' The Guardian. 'In their book, the two logicians put forward a theory of language that includes explicitly some of the "contextual parameters" so far left out of logic, but now shown to be crucial to understanding paradoxes.' The Times -

'This is a splendid book. Jon Barwise and John Etchemendy have striking new ideas and material. These they have thought through deftly and masterfully ... a book to seize the philosophical imagination.' W.D. Hart, University College, London. Mind -