Aristotle’s treatment of mixed, first-figure, problematic-assertoric syllogisms has generated a good deal of controversy among modern commentators.I argue that W.D.Ross’s criticism of A.Becker’s cr...

There are a number of fragments attributed to Theophrastus, as well as titles in Diogenes Laertius' catalogue of his writings , of which it is uncertain whether they should be placed among his logical or rhetorical works. In this note I want to give my reasons for excluding one of them from my forthcoming edition of his logical fragments. It is not my intention here to discuss all the questions it raises; I hope to come back to them in a (...) later volume of my commentary. (shrink)

The only passage from Aristotle's works that seemsto discuss the paradox of the liar is within chapter 25 of Sophistici Elenchi (180a34–b7). This passage raises several questions: Is it really about the paradox of the liar? If it is, is it addressing a strong version of the paradox or some weak strain of it? If it is addressing a strong version of the paradox, what solution does it propose? The conciseness of the passage does not enable one to answer these (...) questions beyond doubt, and commentators have offered very different replies. However, a reasonable case can be made for claiming, first, that the passage in question is about the paradox of the liar, second, that it addresses a strong version of the paradox, and, third, that it attempts to solve it by assuming that someone uttering 'I am speaking falsely' (or whatever sentence-type the paradox turns on) is neither speaking truly nor speaking falsely absolutely. (shrink)