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An introduction to mental language in late medieval philosophy

Magali Roques , Jenny Pelletier

pp. 1-25

The introduction to this volume is divided into two parts. The first part includes an overview of the state of the art on mental language as a key topic and tool in the philosophical analyses of the fourteenth century. We describe the current state of scholarship in five main areas: (1) the mental language hypothesis in general and in the work of William of Ockham in particular; (2) the comparison of Ockham to John Buridan (1295/1300–1358/61), another leading figure in the first half of fourteenth century, on mental language and related semantic issues; (3) situating Ockham within a broader context by examining themes in mental language in other philosophers both preceding and following him; (4) developments in Ockham's semantics and its connection to concept formation and cognitive psychology; (5) the relationship, if any, between mental language and nominalism. The second part of the introduction briefly describes the chapters of the present volume and explains their organization.

Publication details

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-66634-1_1

Full citation:

Roques, M. , Pelletier, J. (2017)., An introduction to mental language in late medieval philosophy, in J. Pelletier & M. Roques (eds.), The language of thought in late medieval philosophy, Dordrecht, Springer, pp. 1-25.

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