Wang Lu: The logic of resigning the old and welcoming the new

【Scholar Profile】Wang Lu, Distinguished Chief Professor of school of philosophy of Zhengzhou University, professor of department of philosophy of school of humanities of Tsinghua University, doctoral supervisor. Enjoy the special government allowance of the State Council. He was the vice president and secretary general of the Chinese Logic Society, and the director of the Modern Logic Professional Committee of the Chinese Logic Society. His major works include Aristotle's Theory of Logic, Research on Frege's Thought, The Concept of Logic, "Yes" and "Truth"—The Cornerstone of Metaphysics, Foundations of Logic, Logic and Philosophy, And Lonely Truth, etc.; his main translations include Selected Works of Frege Philosophy, Fundamentals of Arithmetic, The Origin of Analytic Philosophy, and The Pursuit of Truth.

Domestic philosophers often criticize logic for its limitations, only studying form, not studying content, and not solving the fundamental problems of philosophy, especially the major social problems of reality. But they generally acknowledge that logic is important. Critics of logic are mostly related to their own research: they do not understand logic, they have no personal feelings about the importance of logic, but they still write books and lectures, and even become famous. They probably admit that logic is important out of a common-sense understanding that man is a rational animal, and it is wrong and impossible not to talk about logic. If it weren't for this, the importance of logic would not have been said. Therefore, not understanding logic does not prevent people from saying that logic is important, nor does it prevent people from criticizing logic as having limitations.

Importance is a value judgment that is always a bit vague. We can ask in another way: Is logic necessary for philosophy? I believe that what is necessary must be important, and what is important is not necessarily necessary. In this way, the importance can be discussed more clearly.

Aristotle believed that philosophical research should be cultivated with logic; Kant said that metaphysical research should start from logic and mathematics; Hegel sought initial concepts from logic and constructed his entire philosophical system; Husserl directly named the founding work of his philosophical system "logical research"; Russell bluntly said that logic is the essence of philosophy. All of this can be summed up in one sentence: logic is indispensable for the study of philosophy, and therefore very important. Such a philosophy can be called ontology or epistemology, phenomenology or analytic philosophy, or, first philosophy or metaphysics. According to Aristotle, this is the study of "being itself", and in my words, it is about knowledge itself. Such studies are a priori. Logic is the study of cognition, but it is also a priori, and it is precisely in the two points of cognition and transcendence that logic and philosophy are connected: naturally allied and inseparable. So I have always advocated that being should be translated as "is" rather than "being", that it should be understood in the sense of lexical, that this logically related nature and meaning should be highlighted, and that this understanding and understanding should be carried through.

Many philosophers seem to be dissatisfied with such philosophy, criticizing it for being difficult and useless, believing that philosophy should solve practical problems, and preferring to concretize philosophical research in the form of adding words. Hegel proposed "natural philosophy", "historical philosophy", and "philosophy of law", which are obviously fundamentally different from his logic and metaphysics. Today there are more such philosophies, however, "adding words" seems to have become an ability to make the philosophy of adding words emerge in an endless stream, such as engineering philosophy, leisure philosophy, children's philosophy, and so on. It seems to me that the words "engineering", "leisure", etc., make it clear that they are related to experience, which is fundamentally different from the philosophy associated with logic.

Ontology, epistemology, and analytic philosophy are different forms of metaphysics at different times. Logic is necessary for philosophy, or metaphysics.

The importance of logic is dealt with from a philosophical point of view, with the help of the concept of necessity. Logic is an independent discipline, so it is also possible to put aside necessity and talk about importance directly from the point of view of logic. This will show that there can be different levels of understanding of the importance of logic.

First, logic is the most basic ability to think about activities. People don't have to study logic specifically, they have this ability, and people use this ability to explain, explain, argue, and predict. Therefore, logical importance can be a common-sense understanding.

Second, logic is a discipline. Through learning, it can become a concept of people, form a knowledge structure of people, and play a subtle role in work and study. Therefore, logical importance can be an understanding in the sense of a discipline.

Again, logic is a theory. Through learning, it can be mastered and applied to specific specialties, such as philosophy. Therefore, logical importance can be an understanding in a methodological sense.

Finally, logic is a profession. It has its own research object, forms its own theoretical approach, and forms a distinction from other disciplines. Therefore, logical importance can be an understanding in a professional sense.

Therefore, the same talk about the importance of logic, the knowledge and understanding of logic, the knowledge and grasp of logic theory may be completely different: the importance of logic can be a theoretical understanding, or it can be just a nice statement, becoming an exaggeration. In fact, like the philosophy of adding words, the logic of adding words has always existed, such as transcendental logic, dialectical logic, speculative logic, inductive logic and so on. In the discussion of the logic of adding words, it can be clearly seen that people want to develop logic, and it is also possible to vaguely feel a kind of pressure that logic has formed on people, especially after the emergence of modern logic, this pressure has become more and more obvious: logic has become a specialized thing, and man is a rational animal, and he cannot but talk about logic. Therefore, there are always people who want to talk about logic by adding words, so as to avoid the logic that does not add words.

I hope that philosophers will not be stressed about logic, and that they will not be anxious if they do not understand logic. The simplest way is to study, through which you will gain an understanding of logic, and then understand the necessity of logic for philosophy, so as to truly recognize the importance of logic. It should be noted that the mastery of the theories and methods of logic, though not necessary, is not without benefits for the study of the philosophy of addition, but is not only beneficial but necessary for the study of philosophy or metaphysics.

Editor: Liu Yan