First-Order Modal Logic Seminar
Online once a month
A platform for the exchange of recent work in the area of first-order modal logic
Next talk
Speaker: Colin Zwanziger (Institute of Philosophy, Czech Academy of Sciences)
Date and time: 6 May 2024, 4:30 pm (UTC+2, Vienna)
3 Myths about Predicate Modal Logic
Predicate modal logic has been controversial at least since the criticisms of Quine. While predicate modal logic is now accepted, questions remain about its formulation, which has been hampered by several myths. Among these are:
1. In the context of a modal operator, substitution of equals for equals fails.
2. In the context of a modal operator, ordinary quantifier rules such as existential generalization fail.
3. De re is the result of a modal operator occurring inside the scope of a quantifier or lambda.
Applying lessons from modal type theory (Bierman and de Paiva 2000, Pfenning and Davies 2001, etc.), I argue for a countervailing principle:
A. In the context of a modal operator, all free variables will receive de re interpretation, and should be marked as such.
Where this is implemented (e.g. Zwanziger 2017), the rules for equality and quantifiers finally become unproblematic (as demanded by Quine), and de re is more evidently decoupled from scope-taking operators. Further refinements are needed, but should avoid Myths 1-3 by adhering to Principle A, roughly speaking.
Schedule
Talks are held on Zoom on the first (occasionally the second) Monday of the month at 4:30-6:00 pm CET (and CEST when Central Europe observes daylight savings time). A session consists of a 60-minute talk plus 30 minutes of questions and discussion afterwards.
Topics of the seminar
We aim for the talks to cover a wide variety of topics including, but not limited to, recent and ongoing work in:
Proof theory and semantics
General methods and techniques
First-order modal logics for epistemic logic, deontic logic, temporal logic, or others
Applications of first-order modal logic in Computer Science, Linguistics, Mathematics and Philosophy
Goals
The main goal of this seminar is to connect researchers in the area and encourage new collaborations. As speakers share their recent work and discoveries, we hope the main challenges of the field can be identified together as a collective community. Ideally, the seminar will also offer valuable insights to up-and-coming researchers and spark new research initiatives.
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