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Single Idea 19467

[filed under theme 19. Language / D. Propositions / 2. Abstract Propositions / a. Propositions as sense ]

Full Idea

I call a 'thought' something for which the question of truth can arise at all. ...So I can say: thoughts are senses of sentences, without wishing to assert that the sense of every sentence is a thought.

Gist of Idea

A 'thought' is something for which the question of truth can arise; thoughts are senses of sentences

Source

Gottlob Frege (The Thought: a Logical Enquiry [1918], p.327-8 (61))

Book Ref

Frege,Gottlob: 'The Frege Reader', ed/tr. Beaney,Michael [Blackwell 1997], p.328


A Reaction

This builds on his distinction between sense and reference. The reference of every truth sentence is just 'the true', and the sense is the proposition. The concept of a proposition seems indispensable to logic, I would say.


The 13 ideas from 'The Thought: a Logical Enquiry'

There exists a realm, beyond objects and ideas, of non-spatio-temporal thoughts [Frege, by Weiner]
Thoughts have their own realm of reality - 'sense' (as opposed to the realm of 'reference') [Frege, by Dummett]
A thought is distinguished from other things by a capacity to be true or false [Frege, by Dummett]
Thoughts about myself are understood one way to me, and another when communicated [Frege]
Late Frege saw his non-actual objective objects as exclusively thoughts and senses [Frege, by Dummett]
The word 'true' seems to be unique and indefinable [Frege]
There cannot be complete correspondence, because ideas and reality are quite different [Frege]
A 'thought' is something for which the question of truth can arise; thoughts are senses of sentences [Frege]
The property of truth in 'It is true that I smell violets' adds nothing to 'I smell violets' [Frege]
We grasp thoughts (thinking), decide they are true (judgement), and manifest the judgement (assertion) [Frege]
Thoughts in the 'third realm' cannot be sensed, and do not need an owner to exist [Frege]
A fact is a thought that is true [Frege]
A sentence is only a thought if it is complete, and has a time-specification [Frege]