Quantified Sentences

Abstract

The thesis that the logical role and the semantic role require two different notions of logical form has a negative and a positive side. The negative side, as we have seen, is that a deep-rooted presumption turns out to be overly optimistic: there is no unique notion that suits both roles. The positive side is that the distinction between the two notions, once properly spelled out, sheds light on some fundamental issues concerning the relation between logic and language. This chapter illustrates the positive side by showing how the truth-conditional notion and the syntactic notion diverge with respect to the analysis of quantified sentences. As will be suggested, a full understanding of this divergence discloses a new perspective on the issue of quantification, which has always been at the core of any thorough reflection on logical form.