Assertion, negation and contradiction : a conjunction of literature, psychoanalysis and philosophy in modern thought

Simms, Karl Nigel (1988) Assertion, negation and contradiction : a conjunction of literature, psychoanalysis and philosophy in modern thought. University of Southampton, Doctoral Thesis.

Abstract

The first chapter considers the early twentieth century theories of meaning of Frege, Russell, Husserl and Wittgenstein. It argues that Frege's philosophy, particularly in the distinction between Sinn (sense) and Bedeutung (meaning or reference) is flawed by contradiction, and that the greater sophistication afforded by Husserl's phenomenology (in his Logical Investigations) accounts for various categories of meaning which other theories must condemn as `nonsense'. Chapter 2 discusses Husserl's distinction between `expression' (Ausdruck) and `indication' (Anzeichen). It considers the discrepancy between his contention that meaning is essentially expressive, in that it is capable of functioning in the absence of an object, and his belief that meaning requires indicativity as a guarantee of such an expressive function. This leads to a discussion of the semantic function of the word `I', which is shown to coincide with its meaning, rather than be, as Husserl thought, a product of that meaning. This special status in meaning which the word `I' has is taken up in Chapter 3 from a psychoanalytic perspective. It is shown that the contradiction which `devastated' Frege is positively endorsed by Lacan as a description of the structure of the subject which `I' reveals. Lacan's topologies are considered, concluding that there is an irreducible undecidability between his notions of `reality' and `the real'. The fourth chapter examines the concept of negation (die Verneinung) in Frege's later philosophy, and argues that Jespersen's linguistics accounts for nuances of meaning which logic must exclude. It is argued that Freudian negation (die Verneinung) is open to a charge of reductiveness, and that Lacan, whilst overcoming this in situating truth in what he calls `the Other' (l'Autre), does so by promoting a specifically analytic conception of truth. In conclusion it is suggested that analytic philosophy and psychoanalysis depend upon an implicit (sometimes explicit) faith in truth-in-language: that language itself is always true, even if what it says is false. (DX84032)

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