On Interpretation

De Interpretatione or On Interpretation (Greek: Περὶ Ἑρμηνείας, Peri Hermeneias) is the second text from Aristotle's Organon and is among the earliest surviving philosophical works in the Western tradition to deal with the relationship between language and logic in a comprehensive, explicit, and formal way. The work is usually known by its Latin title. The work begins by analyzing simple categoric propositions, and draws a series of basic conclusions on the routine issues of classifying and defining basic linguistic forms, such as simple terms and propositions, nouns and verbs, negation, the quantity of simple propositions (primitive roots of the quantifiers in modern symbolic logic), investigations on the excluded middle (which to Aristotle is not applicable to future tense propositions—the problem of future contingents), and on modal propositions. The first five chapters deal with the terms that form propositions. Chapters 6 and 7 deal with the relationship between affirmative, negative, universal and particular propositions. These relationships are the basis of the well-known square of opposition. The distinction between universal and particular propositions is the basis of modern quantification theory. The last three chapters deal with modalities. Chapter 9 is famous for the discussion of the sea-battle. (If it is true that there will be a sea-battle tomorrow, then it is true today that there will be a sea-battle. Thus a sea-battle is apparently unavoidable, and thus necessary. Another interpretation would be: that we cannot know that which has not yet come to pass. In other words: if there is a sea battle tomorrow then it is true today that tomorrow there will be a sea battle. So, only if we can know whether or not there will be a sea battle tomorrow then can we know if there will be a sea battle). Chapter 1. Aristotle defines words as symbols of 'affections of the soul' or mental experiences.

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Boethius

Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, commonly known as Boethius (boʊˈiːθiəs; Latin: Boetius; 480–524 AD), was a Roman senator, consul, magister officiorum, historian, and philosopher of the Early Middle Ages. He was a central figure in the translation of the Greek classics into Latin, a precursor to the Scholastic movement, and, along with Cassiodorus, one of the two leading Christian scholars of the 6th century. The local cult of Boethius in the Diocese of Pavia was sanctioned by the Sacred Congregation of Rites in 1883, confirming the diocese's custom of honouring him on the 23 October.

On Interpretation

Term logic

In logic and formal semantics, term logic, also known as traditional logic, syllogistic logic or Aristotelian logic, is a loose name for an approach to formal logic that began with Aristotle and was developed further in ancient history mostly by his followers, the Peripatetics. It was revived after the third century CE by Porphyry's Isagoge. Term logic revived in medieval times, first in Islamic logic by Alpharabius in the tenth century, and later in Christian Europe in the twelfth century with the advent of new logic, remaining dominant until the advent of predicate logic in the late nineteenth century.