Title: Logical Inferentialism: Anti-realism and the Foundations of Formal Logic

Speaker: Alexander V. Gheorghiu (University of Southampton and University College London)

Time: Mar. 31st (Tuesday), 15:10 - 18:00

Location: Room 314, Teaching Building No.2 (北京大学第二教学楼314)

Abstract:

This talk develops a form of logical inferentialism and explores its consequences for anti-realism and the foundations of formal logic. The model-theoretic tradition following Tarski understands logical consequence in terms of truth in all models, but the later Wittgenstein and Michael Dummett argued that a theory of meaning must instead explain what speakers can recognise and manifest in practice. I argue that this challenge points toward an alternative perspective in which consequence, rather than truth, is conceptually primary. Building on base-extension semantics, I show how a mathematically precise framework can be developed that connects inferential role with formal semantic structure and supports a proof-theoretic conception of meaning. The aim is not to reject model-theoretic semantics, but to reinterpret it within a broader anti-realist account of logic grounded in the role expressions play in reasoning.