Talk:Gottlob Frege

One Pupil of Note??
What about Gershom Scholem?

Logicist about arithmetic not geometry
I changed "Frege was the first major proponent of logicism- the view that mathematics is reducible to logic.". This can be misleading because Frege only held the logicist view with respect to arithmetic and analysis. He believed that geometry is synthetic a priori and hence not a part of logic.


 * Also, though a lot will depend on how one understands "logicism", Dedekind was an earlier proponent of the view.

boole?
How is the work of Gottlob Frege related to that of George Boole? --Hirzel 03:06 15 Jun 2003 (UTC)

You could say that Frege's work was later, was research rather than exposition, was deeper as an enquiry into language. In fact there is no serious intellectual connection, though obviously there might be some comparison in the use of algbra-style notations. User:Charles Matthews

As I know, Boole mostly worked on the theory of classes in logic, Frege was involved rather in the theories of first-order and second-order languages. It's a more general theory, because class theory is a logical theory, the theories of logical languages are metalogical theories (in a particular, relative meaning of metalogics). These statements are a bit inexact, but I can't explain it detail, cause English is not my original language, however it is true the relation between Boole and Frege is a quite neglected area in the Frege-research. I have no sources about it and I think even if some exists so they are unpopular (f.e. not foundable in internet or in public libraries). Gubbubu 20:37, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Frege wrote two papers comparing his Begriffschrift with Boole's work. They are located in the Posthumous writings.

Jamie Tappenden has written a paper on fruitful concepts in Frege that contains a discussion of Frege's critique of Boole's logical calculus.

Comments, questions and quibbles 25-aug-2004
...such as the use of quantification...


 * Common logician's error here: in normal english phrases like "two horses", two is a quantifier: no need for variables, bound or otherwise, to have quantification. Frege's contribution was the way he expressed quantification by means of variables; he did not invent quantification itself.

Frege was the first to devise an axiomatization of propositional logic and of predicate logic.


 * Frege did not create a separate theory of propositional logic, as the above suggests, and actually it is an achievement of Frege's to combine propositional connectives and quantifiers in one calculus.


 * In fact, the formalisation of predicate logic took almost another 60 years to complete, with the publication of Hilbert and Ackermann's book in 1928.

Ludwig Wittgenstein and Edmund Husserl were among the other philosophical notables strongly influenced by Frege.


 * With Wittgenstein this is undeniable (although I think the sentence goes better elsewhere), but just how important an influence was Frege on Husserl. Husserl first agrees with Frege's objections, and then goes on to change his mind about it.  That Husserl had an important correspondence is clear, but strong influence I think is going too far.

Nice article, though: I was surprised by how many things I learned reading it. Charles Stewart 22:30, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Failure of logicist programme
The article says:


 * Frege was the first major proponent of logicism -- the view that mathematics is reducible to logic. ... Russell discovered the paradox which bears his name, and that the axioms of the Grundgesetze led to this contradiction; he wrote to Frege, who acknowledged the contradiction in an appendix to volume two of the Grundgesetze, noting what he perceived to be the faulty axiom. Frege never did manage to amend his axioms to his satisfaction, however; and after Frege's death, Kurt Gödel's incompleteness theorems showed that Frege's logicist program was impossible.

This strongly suggests that logicism was a failure. But I don't think that is correct; it seems to me that Frege's program was a success. Mathematicians still view set theory and logic, as set forth by Frege, to be the proper foundations for mathematics. It's only in recent years that an alternative, in the form of category theory, has appeared.
 * Mathematicians do not view logicist set theory as a proper foundation for mathematics. Logicist set theory, at least as I see it, was fairly definitively refuted by the Russell paradox.  We do not consider sets to be a logical notion, identified with definable properties of which they are extensions, but as a mathematical notion--collections of objects, and at the same time objects themselves. --Trovatore 06:55, 27 July 2005 (UTC)


 * I think I probably misunderstood what "logicist" means. Thanks for correcting me.  I will do more research and try to corectly understand the situation. -- Dominus 01:32, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

The Russell paradox was satisfactorily resolved by Russell and Whitehead's theory of types and later by Zermelo's work on the axiom of foundation. It is not a serious hindrance today.
 * You can't get rid of a paradox by adding an axiom. What Zermelo did was to provide a formal point of reference for the notion of sets as collections of objects rather than as extensions of properties (this was made more explicit by von Neumann, I think).  That's the polar opposite of logicism. --Trovatore 06:55, 27 July 2005 (UTC)


 * I didn't say it was resolved by the axiom; I said it was resolved by Zermelo's work. -- Dominus 18:52, 21 September 2005 (UTC)
 * Point taken. It addresses only the smallest part of my remarks, though. --Trovatore 18:55, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

The remark about Gödel's incompleteness theorems is a non-sequitur. The incompleteness theorems show that there can be no formal axiomatization of all of mathematics. This no more invalidates the logicist programme than it invalidates the idea of doing mathematics at all. Mathematics can be founded on logic, and frequently is; the fact that the Gödel theorems say that there will be true theorems that are not provable does not negate the usefulness or soundness of the foundation.

For these reasons, I have rewritten this paragraph of the article and removed the reference to Gödel entirely. -- Dominus 14:31, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)

More biography needed
I think that since this is an article about Frege, it is stongly lacking in biographical information about the man.

If you speak Hungarian, see the Hungarian article. Terrible news I haven't got enough time to translate it, but maybe you can ask other hungarians. Gubbubu 10:08, 17 October 2005 (UTC)
 * According to a book review in the NYT (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/27/books/review/Holt-t.html?pagewanted=2&nl=books&emc=booksupdateema3), he became an anti-Semite later in life. Kdammers (talk) 06:21, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Query
The article says he is " widely considered the greatest logician since Aristotle."I think many would say Russell or even Godel was greater. Could we not say one of the greatest to ensure NPOV? I think there would be unanimity on that assessment.Logic2go
 * Russell or Godel probably weren't "greater" logicians than Frege and Frege wasn't "greater" then them (imnsho). They were all great logicians, but as a matter of fact Frege was the first. Yes, he was one of the greatest logicians since Aristotle. The difference between Frege and Russel, Gödel etc. is mainly that Frege was unknown for a long time, untill Russell (re)discovered lot of his achievements. Frege was born too early. Russell done a lot to put Frege on the well-known logicians's map. So I think you're right in this question: "one of" is more candid. Gubbubu 10:54, 20 October 2005 (UTC)
 * I'd guess you won't find many logicians today who don't think that Frege was a greater figure than Russell. Figures from the algebraic logic tradition (Pierce, Boole, Schröder) would be better bets, Tarski has his admirers, but the claim still holds: Frege is widely considered the greatest logician since Aristotle, even if not universally.  It might be a good idea to get some sources for this claim, though. --- Charles Stewart 12:29, 20 October 2005 (UTC)
 * There were other great logicians (like Hegel or Kant, contributors in philosophical logic). Gubbubu 16:27, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

I think I could make a cogent and even persuasive case that russell was the superior logicianN especially given recent studies of Russel's papers at Macmasters. Certainly he was more influential. But my point is that arguing this borders on original research and a POV. I think qualifiers such as " widely considered the greatest" or equivalent superlatives are inherntly problematical. I can't imagine that anyone could disagree that he was "one of the greatest." Logic2go
 * Part of the issue is how the word "logician" is being used. For overall accomplishment in fields called "logic", including "mathematical logic", I think Gödel has it all over Frege. But if mathematical logic is not considered part of logic proper, then Frege's claim looks a lot better. In any case I think Logic2go's point is well taken. --Trovatore 18:57, 20 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Mathematical logic is a field of mathematics, and wasn't there until the 1930s. Gödel was a virtuoso, while Frege was a pioneer who kick-started logic as a research area after a break of, ooo, 2000 years since the Stoics. Mathematicians are always going to think more of Gödel. Charles Matthews 15:41, 21 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Read this . American philosophy education will never be the same.--CSTAR 05:33, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

Wow. What do you suppose is the liklihood that Cheney even knows who Frege is? Or for that matter what the Evening Star is?Logic2go
 * I think we're more or less on the same page here. E.g. a lot of Gödel's greatness comes from his work in set theory. Is set theory part of logic? Frege thought so, which in large part explains why Frege wasn't a great set theorist. In fact, the extent to which set theory is not simply logic became much clearer as a result specifically of Gödel's work.
 * But whether set theory is logic or not, the fact remains that it's called logic, and therefore discussions of who is the "greatest logician" are bound to be confusing. --FregeTrovatore 17:00, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Cruising for a debate on that one(lol)! But that's the point, we have well-formed opinions on logic that a high school student looking to the encyclopedia for biographical info does not, and we shouldn't taint his understanding with our POV. We can do that in other venues. On that we can agree!Logic2go
 * Agreed. In logic(s), I think of Frege,Russell, and Godel as the Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle of the matter in terms of greatness and importance.:)Logic2go
 * It is irrelevant now, but I don't agree. Russell wasn't greater logician then Frege, his only one important and dateless - but disputed - achievement is type theory. Frege was 100× greater then him, I think :-)). And Russell was publicated explicit silly "achievements", e.g. his description theory is totally psychotic ... Gubbubu 18:41, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Kudos
Nice page, the picture is nice. And what references! I wish I could find more of this qualtiy of work on wikipedia. wvbaileyWvbailey 01:37, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

Frege's Metaphysics
Frege had such a horror of subjectivity in mathematics that it led him to make metaphysical statements about the ontological objectivity of mathematical concepts. He forgot or concealed the fact that concepts are mental products. In order for a concept to exist as it is, there must be a human nervous system and brain to think the concept. Frege's hatred of psychologism resulted in his conviction that there are mathematical concepts without thinking subjects.Lestrade 21:19, 21 February 2006 (UTC)Lestrade


 * Frege did not forget or conceal the possibility that concepts are mental products; he explicitly considered and rejected this claim, and would outright disagree with your claim that human existence is necessary for concept existence (though, of course, it is necessary to refer to or talk about the concepts). Indeed, it might be (though I need to check Frege's works more closely) that Frege's hatred of psychologism was motivated by his conviction on the objectivity of concepts - it was a cause, rather than a consequence.


 * Wikipedia-wise, then, putting either of our views into the article would represent our own opinions and violate NPOV. I'll look for references in Frege's own writings and reliable secondary sources. --Joth (talk) 11:18, 31 May 2009 (UTC)


 * As stated above, that's already NPOV and speculation. That concepts are mental products is an assumption. Plato, for instance, would disagree on that.--188.101.112.162 (talk) 14:37, 18 March 2014 (UTC)

You might look at Frege's article "The Thought" (Mind, New Series, Vol. 65, No. 259 (Jul., 1956), pp. 289-311) for a rundown on his views of psychologism. --138.251.242.34 (talk) 14:38, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Err emm
I guess this isn't proper to mention, but isn't Frege partly known for his later years as a far right associate to Bruno Bauch who hated liberals, Catholics, and the French? Also as an Anti-Semite who wanted Jewish people to have their rights curtailed or even be expelled.. Granted scandal maybe shouldn't be added if it's not needed, but I thought this was a well-known aspect of his history as I read it in a print encyclopedia that was over 30 years old.--T. Anthony 13:53, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
 * It is true that Frege was something of an anti-Semite in his later years, and diaries have been published in which he expounds his views on the subject. But, so far as I know, Frege never expressed these views in public forums or played any particular role in the rise of the Nazi party. That Frege was something of a xenophobe thus does not seem particularly relevant.
 * Well, relevant to what, exactly? Not to his work in logic, maybe, but this is a biography; if it's a significant aspect of Frege the man, and can be documented, then I'd include it. Bios shouldn't be limited to flattering material. On the other hand I'd be against spending lots of text on it, given that it doesn't bear much on Frege's impact on history. --Trovatore 02:11, 5 August 2006 (UTC)


 * I'd say that this fact was relevant to mention; as Trovatore mentions, this is a biographical page rather than a philosophical page. Probably best to limit it only to a sentence, however. I'm also not sure whether the diaries in which he mentions such views have ever been published - Dummett refers to them in his Introduction, and says that (at the time he was writing, at least) they had been explicitly left out of Frege's published diaries. --Joth (talk) 11:20, 31 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I just edited the section, changing "he later became known as an antisemite" to "he is known to have held antisemitic views", since there is no evidence that he was widely known during his time as an antisemite, nor is there evidence that these views developed only his later life. Furthermore, from what I've seen, it is doubtful as to how important these beliefs were to him, so I changed 'antisemite' to the less judgemental 'held antisemitical views'. --Joth (talk) 11:45, 31 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Beyond his antisemetic leanings, Frege also held some notably racist views. See the second sentence of his Grundlagen for a minor example that comes to mind (http://www.naturalthinker.net/trl/texts/Frege,Gottlob/Frege,%20Gottlob%20-%20The%20Foundations%20of%20Arithmetic%20%281953%29%202Ed_%207.0-2.5%20LotB.pdf, pg 24). There are better ways to substantiate his racism than that, I'm sure - just logging it here in case somebody thinks it should be integrated into the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.150.49.173 (talk) 19:49, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Currently Frege's protoaryan views are only discussed in the context of his diary. If they have been expressed elsewhere, particularly his major publications, then our page should certainly make a note of that, so feel free to add it.  Tkuvho (talk) 13:06, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Begriffsschrift notation and Peirce
Charles Saunders Peirce used a notation for implication that reminds me of the two-dimensional notation used by Frege in the Begriffsschrift. Is anything known about a possible influence of Peirce on Frege's notation? Leibniz 21:54, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

"Sinn and Bedeutung"
I have to say I find the section header "Sinn and Bedeutung" to be a bit jarring, switching as it does from German to English to German in the space of three words. How about changing it to "Sense and denotation" (note capitalization), if we mean the Fregean concepts, or "Sinn und Bedeutung", if we mean the paper by that title? (By the way, I've always heard "denotation" rather than "reference"). --Trovatore 05:28, 15 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Denotation, reference, sense, signification, these have all been used. The real problem is that Ebglish does not have two, subtly different, words for sense. for example, in good Italian translations, this is rendered "senso e significato" (which are really synonymous just like the German sinn and bedeutung). Frege's beuteuting is neither denotation (denotazione) nor reference (riferimento) but a technical distinction which he introduced between synonynous terms to sever his purpose and not to be confused with denotation or references. Sense and signification is the best version, I think. --Francesco Franco aka Lacatosias 12:26, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Number?
It would be nice to get a summary of Frege's definition of a number and the Julius Caesar problem. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 75.160.146.253 (talk) 20:13, 14 April 2007 (UTC).

Version 0.7
This article has now been reviewed by the review team and will be on this DVD release. The "pass" template was added by mistake in place of the nomination template, but now it has officially passed. Walkerma 02:30, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

delete the tendentious political section?
Frege died in 1925. The Nazis came to power in 1933. Whatever is written in the article on this subject is highly misleading. Tkuvho (talk) 15:43, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
 * It was certainly possible to be a Nazi before the Nazis came to power. A bio gives the good and the bad; I don't see any need to give Frege a pass on this, if, indeed, it was a significant aspect of his thought, and if that fact can be solidly sourced.
 * I do think that we need to examine the sources for a political agenda; if the author was making a political argument, rather than simply chronicling, then it's more important to say something like Hersh argues... or Hicks says... rather than simply stating the conclusion. I'm speaking hypothetically as I haven't examined the sources.
 * It's also true that the Nazi Party changed quite a bit in the time between 1925 and WWII. While few of us today would ever want to defend any of its incarnations, it is perhaps not quite fair to accuse a 1925 Nazi of complicity in the gas chambers.  Or maybe it is fair; I haven't thought about it or researched it much.  But in any case the point is not obvious, and the wording should be chosen carefully to avoid conflating distinct eras on the timeline.
 * But carefully choosing the wording is poles apart from deleting it. I doubt we can avoid treating the subject, given its appearance in the sources. --Trovatore (talk) 19:21, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Hersh's text is emotional, whereas Hicks merely adds Frege to his long list as an afterthought. I tried to tone down our page here in such a way as not to indict Frege more than our page on Ludwig Bieberbach. Tkuvho (talk) 09:34, 27 April 2010 (UTC)


 * In 1933 very many not very radical Germans were willing to support A.H. and the new nsdap-government; but if Frege died in 1925, he was a very early Nazi-sympathiser, when some, but not that many Germans were (and most of those probably in Bayern). and the NSDAP was a much more openly "revolutionary" party in 1923 than in 1933.--Radh (talk) 18:39, 17 July 2010 (UTC)


 * This section is out of proportion to anything. Frege was an introverted academic.  It doesn't really matter what his political views were.  I don't think it would be reasonable to say that someone voting for Bush in 2000 was voting to invade Iraq, and in the same manner, a person supporting the Nazis in 1925 was not supporting gas chambers or WWII.  Frege was an anti-semite?  So what.  He was a German in the 1920's.  That is almost sufficient to establish he was an anti-semite.  The non-anti-semites were the exceptions.  Suppose he'd only supported the DNVP.  Would we bother to note it in more than a sentence?  This whole section can be cut down to two sentences at most.  Who cares what this Hersch guy has to say.  Ekwos (talk) 05:56, 21 October 2010 (UTC)
 * The remarks about Dummett's reaction are relevant and should be restored in my opinion. Tkuvho (talk) 20:22, 23 October 2010 (UTC)
 * It might be interesting in Dummett's article...as it is information about Dummett. Ekwos (talk) 17:12, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think so. It exemplifies the reaction of western intellectuals to a tremendous moral failure of a brilliant logician.  Tkuvho (talk) 17:51, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
 * "Tremendous moral failing?" No, Frege was a man of his time and place.  This is comparable to taking a white American in the 40's and pointing out that they were racist against black Americans.  Well of course they were, so what?  A jew-hating German in the 1920's?  *Yawn*.  Ekwos (talk) 18:17, 24 October 2010 (UTC)


 * If this were just an article about Frege's mathematics, then his support for NSDAP should not be mentioned. But it is an article about the whole person, so the size of the section on that fact should be proportionate to the importance which he attributed to politics in his own life. JRSpriggs (talk) 05:05, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I disagree, an article should address things in as much as they are noteworthy. Not in as much as the individual thought they were important in their own life.  If it weren't for the mathematics we wouldn't bother to have an article to begin with.  Ekwos (talk) 22:52, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * @Ekwos. As far as I know, the KKK has not mass murdered or advocated the mass murder of Negroes or Jews. Nowhere under slavery were Negroes treated the way Jews and Slavs were in Nazigermany. And not all antisemitic Germans, contrary to common belief in the States, not all Germans were antisemites...in ny case they were not all against Jews the way the Nazis were. The Nsdap came to power because of the stupidity of the rightwing establishment and it got most of its popular vote, because of the terrible economic policies of the Brüning government. Obama's may be bad, think n-times as bad. A jewish professor of economics had to publish his work c.1932 with a nsdap-publisher, because nobody else would touch it - he was a Keynesian./ It can be no fun to have to admit that one's hero was a true Nazi, but why be fierce only in cases like Paul De Man, Ezra Pound or Martin Heidegger and have nothing but lame excusses for Frege, who was no idiot and knew what he was doing./ But his political views are not his important legacy. --Radh (talk) 06:39, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * We are talking about the early 1920's here. You cannot hold a person guilty in supporting a party in the 1920's for what it did in the 1940's.  And that is what the section is aiming to do.  The most you can hold Frege to is what the Nazi platform contained in the early 1920's.  Anything further is dishonest.  In fact, if anything, the section should be made clear as to what the Nazis advocated at that time, because otherwise it looks like Frege is supporting WWII and gas chambers.  It is also worth bearing in mind that the Hitler he admired was Time's "Man of the Year" in 1938.  Ekwos (talk) 22:51, 25 October 2010 (UTC)

Let's see if we can work out a consensus: (a) there is no need to get fierce, that would be unencyclopedic; (b) at a biographic page, there is no need to incriminate entire populations; (c) moral failings of distinguished intellectuals are significant and worthy of inclusion if reflected in the literature. Agreed? Tkuvho (talk) 14:52, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm perfectly willing to include fair criticisms of the man. But the fact is, we can't accuse people who supported Bush in 2000 of supporting the invasion of Iraq, and we can't accuse a man who supported the Nazis in the 1920's of supporting gas chambers.  A fair treatment of what being a conservative German at the time was about is reasonable.  An attempt to make him sound like some sort of ideological Nazi bitter-ender of 1945 is not.  Ekwos (talk) 22:57, 25 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Regarding the early attitude of Nazis towards Jews, see National Socialist Program, especially points: 4, 5, 8 and 24. Originally the Nazis merely wanted to deny citizenship to Jews and expel recent immigrants. The decision to try to exterminate the Jews was only made after World War II began on the basis of the Nazis' belief that the Jews were responsible for inciting the allies to declare war on Germany. Thus we should not attribute (without a specific reliable source) any intention to Frege of exterminating the Jews. JRSpriggs (talk) 23:31, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Reproduced below is the material deleted in a recent edit. Once we are satisfied that it contains no accusations of mass genocide against Frege, we can reinstate it in the article.  Tkuvho (talk) 05:40, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

Frege was a sympathizer of the National Socialist (Nazi) party in its early stages, a known anti-Semite, and later in life named Adolf Hitler as one of his heroes. As Reuben Hersh states in What Is Mathematics, Really? (Oxford University Press, 1997), p. 241:

"Frege actually died a Nazi. Sluga reports: 'Frege confided in his diary in 1924 that he had once thought of himself as a liberal and was an admirer of Bismarck, but his heroes now were General Ludendorff and Adolf Hitler. This was after the two had tried to topple the elected democratic government in a coup in November 1923. In his diary Frege also used all his analytic skills to devise plans for expelling the Jews from Germany and for suppressing the Social Democrats.' Michael Dummett tells of his shock to discover, while reading Frege's diary, that his hero was an outspoken anti-Semite (1973)."

I removed the quote for stylistic and content reasons. There isn't a need for a huge quote, it is unnecessary and looks ugly. In fact, if you look closely, the quote largely is itself a quote from yet another person...Sluga...you could already improve things by quoting Sluga directly. Anyway, what, of a factual nature, does the quote really contain that isn't in the section as it is now? Fold the relevant bits into a proper paragraph if you want, and drop the useless bit about Dummett, and put in a citation. The man is known for his work in mathematics and logic and not as a politician. There is no need for this section to be big. There is a tendency on Wikipedia to use huge quotes more out of laziness than need. Ekwos (talk) 16:45, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

Michael Dummett tells of his shock to discover, while reading Frege's diary, that his hero was an outspoken anti-Semite
[Added July 29, 2020.] No need to invoke "hearsay" (to quote the editor below), here's the direct source: "There is some irony for me in the fact that the man about whose philosophical views I have devoted, over years, a great deal of time to thinking, was, at least at the end of his life, a virulent racist, specifically an anti-semite. This fact is revealed by a fragment of a diary which survives among Frege's Nachlass, but which was not published with the rest by Professor Hans Hermes in Freges nachgelasseme Schriften. The diary shows Frege to have been a man of extreme right-wing political opinions, bitterly opposed to the parliamentary system, democrats, liberals, Catholics, the French and, above all, Jews, who he thought ought to be deprived of political rights and preferably, expelled from Germany. When I first reread that diary, many years ago, I was deeply shocked, because I had revered Frege as an absolutely rational man, if, perhaps, not a very likeable one. I regret that the editors of Frege's Nachlass chose to suppress that particular item. From it I learned something about human beings which I should be sorry not to know; perhaps something about Europe, also." (Dummett, Frege: Philosophy of Language, p. xii.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 104.57.188.56 (talk) 04:46, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Michael Dummett's sentiment is reflected in secondary sources and in my opinion deserves to be included here. Among the German mathematicians during this period, he is just about the only one to have expressed such sentiments. One will certainly find nothing of the sort in David Hilbert, for example. Tkuvho (talk) 17:04, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
 * @Frege probably did not suspect Nazi mass murder and did not advocate it in the quote we had. This quote is fine as it is and should not be censored. It's style or its content are not that ugly.--Radh (talk) 17:15, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
 * As it stands the quote is by Hersch, and itself is mostly a quote of Sluga, and reports Dummett as hearsay. If you want to find an actual quote to the effect by Dummett himself, then we might have something to discuss.  As it is, it might be reasonable to cut out the middle man, get rid of Hersch and look at Sluga directly.  It is still hearsay as far as Dummett is concerned.  But I ask again, how does Dummett's "shock" tell us anything about Frege?  It only tells us something about Dummett.  Ekwos (talk) 19:14, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
 * You're right, true sources should be used and have been read - as far as I can see Frege was an antisemite and wrote that Hitler was right in certain points, but it seems to be way over the top to call Hitler old Frege's hero.
 * Gottfried Gabriel, Wolfganz Kienzler (editors, introduction): Gottlob Freges politisches Tagebuch. In: DZfPh [Deutsche Zeitschrift für Philosophie], Vol. 42, 1994, p. 1057-1098. [The introduction seems to be on pp. 1057-66.]
 * I have only be able so far to read a bit of: Wolfgang Kienzler: Frege und Deutschland. In: Klaus-Michael Kodalle (ed.): Angst vor der Moderne, p. 135-156..
 * Christian Tilitzki, Die deutsche Universitätsphilosophie... also is anti-alarmist.
 * It seems Heinrich Scholz, who had read Frege's letters and other unpublished material, on April 21, 1936 called Frege in a private letter stramm rechts (very right-wing) but added: he was no Nazi--Radh (talk) 19:33, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * At wiki we present material that has been influential. One gauge of influence is whether the material is reflected in secondary sources.  The fact that Dummett's sentiment is reflected in secondary sources is therefore significant, and indeed more relevant than the primary source itself, which would not be WP:notable without such follow-up. Tkuvho (talk) 19:37, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
 * The impression I get is that were Frege alive today and an American he'd probably hang around on Free Republic, support the Tea Party, and gripe about Mexican illegal immigrants. Whatever your politics, the words "Nazi" and "tremendous moral failing" seem a bit much in describing such folks.  Certainly the Nazi platform in the 20's was something along those lines (in a German social context).  This is certainly far right, but it isn't WWII and gas chambers (which seems to be what some people are dying to imply)  Ekwos (talk) 20:30, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I must apologize to user:Ekwos; he was absolutely right in critizising the wording of the pragraph and the source. The old Frege was very anti-sozialist, very much against the common vote (regardless of income) for all. He also was anti -Jewish, but still added that some Jews were allright. Like Ekwos had said, this was pretty standard stuff at the time.
 * Frege was NO fan of Hitler, although he said that he had some correct ideas about this and that, not about eliminating the Jews (as far as I can see on the web).
 * Dummett seems to be correct about all this, but the other "source" given seems to be pretty fantastic.--Radh (talk) 12:02, 27 October 2010 (UTC)
 * It also looks like that citation to stephenhicks.org actually goes back to Hersch's "What is Mathematics, Really?" as a footnote within that site. At the very least that should be changed.  In addition Hersch's book is a popular book about Mathematics and the philosophy of Mathematics so it is questionable how much time he really put into a remark that looks like little more than an odd aside in his book.  I haven't looked into Sluga, but that looks like a reasonable source, and is probably really where stephenhicks.org and Hersch go back to anyway.  Ideally any reference to stephenhicks.org or Hersch should be replaced with a better source.  Hersch doesn't appear to be anything like a Frege scholar and seems to overplay the Nazi-card.  Ekwos (talk) 20:49, 27 October 2010 (UTC)
 * The 1924 diary has been translated in English, it is in one of the philosophical journals (Inquiry 39, 1996, p. 303-342).--Radh (talk) 21:46, 27 October 2010 (UTC)

Frege's admiration for Hitler
The French wiki reports the following source noting Frege's admiration for Hitler: Roger Schmit, Recension du livre de Lothar Kreiser, Gottlob Frege : Leben-Werk-Zeit, Hamburg, 2001, Archives de philosophie, 2001, 4, 64. Tkuvho (talk) 21:04, 27 October 2010 (UTC)
 * If I am reading that right it is referring to an article by Roger Schmit which is in fact a review of a book by Lothar Kreiser. I presume anything Schmit asserts about Frege in the context is taken from Kreiser.  From the look of it, even though the review is in French, the book being reviewed is in German.  It would be preferable to take the quote from Kreiser directly if you want to go that route.  I checked Amazon, and there doesn't appear to be a translation of Kreiser into English.  It is looking to me like Kenny, Sluga, and Dummett are good English sources to look through.  I checked the German article to see if Kreiser was quoted, and, unsurprisingly, Hitler isn't mentioned.  Ditto for the Dutch article.  I'm not saying it isn't true, only that I can't find the Kreiser quote.  Ekwos (talk) 01:20, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
 * The biography by Kreiser is on google books. It has been very well received as far as I can see. Hitler is mentioned on pages 14 (on all Freges: Carl-Heinrich von Stülpnagel mentioned in connection to Hitler), not mentioned at all (only in the index): pages 597-8, 600, which debate Frege's political beliefs after 1918: de:Heinrich Scholz knew about them early on, etc.; in his cure, at the Kaltwasseranstalt Frege reads a Ludendorff article, and agrees that marxism (SPD!) be eradicated and should not be allowed to take part in the political life in Germany (Deutschlands Erneuerung, No. 4, 1924); All parlamentarism in fact is non-German. 598, 600, 623 not shown by google books; Hitler mentioned, it seems, by Frege, in connection with the Hitler-trial (re: 1923 Sturm auf die Feldherrenhalle by Hitler and Ludendorff). Kreiser says, Frege did NOT put too much hope on Hitler, he seems to have been all for the aims of the Putsch, but highly critical of the actual 1923 debacle.--Radh (talk) 07:29, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
 * In short, Frege is an admirer of Ludendorff, reads his article, and agrees with it; agrees with the aims of Hitler's putsch, but not with the method of execution. An introverted academic, in short.  Tkuvho (talk) 08:45, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
 * The Putsch was a dismal failure and the pie-in-the-sky dilettantes in this case were Hitler and Ludendorff. Google only offers glimpses for Frege's remarks on the Hitler-Ludendorff Putsch, but he was critical of its execution.--Radh (talk) 09:49, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
 * It is sounding like he hated the new government and admired anybody with the guts to try to overthrow it. His admiration for Hitler being admiration for someone who also hated the government and was willing to take action in that direction.  Admittedly that last bit is my OR, but it is looking more reasonable to not call him a Nazi and that his admiration of Hitler was limited and may not have included agreeing with all of Hitler's positions.  Ekwos (talk) 17:17, 28 October 2010 (UTC)

Is Hersh a reliable source?
In response to the comment above, "Hersch's book is a popular book about Mathematics and the philosophy of Mathematics so it is questionable how much time he really put into a remark that looks like little more than an odd aside in his book", note that Reuben Hersh is an influential philosopher of mathematics. It is not the job of a wikieditor to second-guess reliable secondary sources. Tkuvho (talk) 05:25, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, somebody like Dummett certainly is a reliable person, but is Hersch (with regard to this ideological/political point only)? The diaries of Frege have been published and translated. Somebody should to be able to check the reliability of our sources against them (I can't at the moment, no useful library around).--Radh (talk) 07:34, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
 * As Hicks, re: Frege, only refers to Hicks, this reference, a blog!, certainly by an intelligent guy and packed with interesting stuff (pure POV) about Naziism, should be scrapped. And could anybody actually cite the Hersh stuff, at least in Europe there is no useful google preview for this book.--Radh (talk) 12:14, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I did not notice Hicks was a blog, we can't use it especially if it is controversial. I would like to mention that the kind of work you mentioned above of checking primary sources is certainly very interesting research and I would like to see the outcome, but wiki relies on secondary, not primary sources.  An editor who feels he can delete the Hersh quote because the editor feels Hersh is not being objective, does not understand the rules at wiki.  Obviously, if the secondary source says something completely unreasonable, common sense should prevail.  But as you already indicated in the section above, we are talking about making fine distinctions of judgment.  I don't believe there is a consensus on this talkpage that Frege was not an admirer of AH.  Tkuvho (talk) 15:04, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Like I said above, most of the quote by Hersh here is a quote of Sluga. Hersh quotes Sluga, and it appears based on that quote of Sluga, arrives at the conclusion "Frege died a Nazi".  He then proceeds to report hearsay by Dummett (maybe it is sourced in Hersh and not here).  This technically makes Hersh a tertiary source, and Wikipedia relies on secondary sources as you said.  The secondary source in this case is Sluga, which you may track down and include if you like.  Most of the quote is already there in Hersh it just needs to be referenced to Sluga correctly.  Extracting the Sluga quote from Hersh gives:


 * 'Frege confided in his diary in 1924 that he had once thought of himself as a liberal and was an admirer of Bismarck, but his heroes now were General Ludendorff and Adolf Hitler. This was after the two had tried to topple the elected democratic government in a coup in November 1923. In his diary Frege also used all his analytic skills to devise plans for expelling the Jews from Germany and for suppressing the Social Democrats.'


 * Of course this is I don't know how few entries in a diary. For all I know Hitler was his hero for all of a week.  Ekwos (talk) 17:08, 28 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Frege is not the main point of the book, and the remark is offered as an interesting factoid, not as a major item contributing to his point. As for Hicks.  Like I said before Hicks uses Hersh as his source.  So keeping Hicks in effect references Hersh twice.  Thus I removed it again.  Ekwos (talk) 17:03, 28 October 2010 (UTC)

Google books link
As the pages available at the google book link don't include the actual page being referred to in the reference, I've removed it from the reference. The point of a reference is to confirm that the passage isn't made up, and the google book fails to do this. Ekwos (talk) 23:12, 28 October 2010 (UTC)

Dummett
Radh: your comment about Dummett is interesting. In what sense exactly is he a follower of Frege? I always associated Dummett with an extreme form of intuitionism. Unlike Errett Bishop, he rejects the completed infinity, even of the integers. In this sense, he is more of a direct descendant of Brouwer rather than Frege. Has the logicist school had a strong influence on Dummett? Tkuvho (talk) 09:40, 31 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I was only thinking of philosophy. Maybe follower is too strong a word, but D. stresses the role of Frege more than any other and published a lot about him. D. writes somewhere that he was very engaged in the fight against racism against Westafricans in Britain in the 1960s, so it is even more understandable that he did not take Frege's remarks lightly.--Radh (talk) 08:14, 2 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Checking the Dummett page I see that I was being a bit slow; he seems to be one of the main authorities on Frege, apart from the issue of being a follower or not. It would be good to amplify the information found there.  What exactly did Dummett get from Frege, and how does it fit with his anti-realist profile?  Tkuvho (talk) 13:01, 2 November 2010 (UTC)
 * That also belongs in the Dummett article. It is interesting when I want to know about Dummett to know what he got from Frege.  It makes no sense, when I want to know about Frege, that Dummett got some things from him.  However, perhaps we can put this and the Dummett quote in the Dummett article and add some link here saying people interested in Frege might be interested in Dummett?  This is all starting to sound like people want to add Dummett info to the Frege article because they don't think anyone will ever bother to go to the Dummett article, so adding it there is like dropping it into a black hole.  Ekwos (talk) 05:39, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Relevance
A user provided a link to the page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Relevance_of_content which I have examined and found nothing that would suggest that including Dummett's reaction to Frege's views should not be included in this page. Dummett being a foremost Frege scholar, his reaction to Frege's views is eminently relevant. The fact that Dummett's reaction is reflected in tertiary literature makes it WP:notable. Therefore I am in favor of restoring it. Tkuvho (talk) 17:38, 3 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Well I read the exact same thing, and I found the contrary. I believe it is up to you to make an actual case for relevance and notability.  I say Dummett's opinion is outside of the scope of this article.
 * In fact, I would argue that opinions should generally be left out. Take Shakespeare.  If we said that the opinion of anyone who could get a book published about Shakespeare in the last 400 years could be legitimately added, well I imagine the Shakespeare article could be easily expanded to the size of a large novel.  Of course we have to draw the line somewhere, and not every attested opinion in a published book should be allowed to be added.
 * So simply being published isn't enough. If that were all that were required, well, why not append Dummett's entire book to the article?  I imagine you think there are items in Dummett's published book that shouldn't be added to the article.  Why not?  Ekwos (talk) 20:26, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Diary
I've removed this:

The 1924 diary has been published. .

This is not the right way to do this. It would be better to put a direct reference to the published diary in the primary sources section. I'm trying to figure out whether the given reference is the publication of the diary, or excerpts from the diary published elsewhere. If anyone knows the answer, chime in. Ekwos (talk) 21:10, 3 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Okay, as near as I can tell the article is the publication of the diary, so I've added that to primary references. Ekwos (talk) 21:23, 3 November 2010 (UTC)
 * I take that back it looks like Menzler-Trott is the publication of the diary. Ekwos (talk) 21:31, 3 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Anyway, I'm seeing what look like two redactions of the diary: Menzler-Trott, and Gabriel.  Are they the same?  Different?  If they're the same, we can whittle things down to the one that appears to have been a book.  Ekwos (talk) 21:35, 3 November 2010 (UTC)


 * I am not certain about this either, but the article in the DZfPh (once the East-German journal of philosophy) is everywhere cited as being the first publication of the diary. And it also has been translated.--Radh (talk) 07:36, 8 November 2010 (UTC)


 * My only concern is that I don't know if they are in fact both complete versions of the diary from that period, or if some selection was made, and if selection was made, if different selections were made. However, regarding making the point of Frege's views for the present article, probably either does the same job.  Should we cut the references down to just the one that has been translated?  Ekwos (talk) 22:36, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, this would be the most practical solution. --Radh (talk) 07:06, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Okay, I've removed Menzler-Trott. Ekwos (talk) 21:38, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

Restoring quote by Frege scholar Dummett
At least two editors in this space support such a move. Frege's antisemitism is nothing to "yawn" about, and comparisons to "Shakespeare" are specious. Tkuvho (talk) 02:31, 8 November 2010 (UTC)
 * The antisemitism is already in the article. The Dummett bit adds nothing but someone's opinion.  In addition "ugly" is POV and would seem to demonstrate you have an agenda beyond a simple setting out of facts.  In fact, the discussion thread you started at the anti-semitism page also seems to indicate an agenda (and no one there seemed to buy into it either).  You seem to want to tell people what they should think of Frege, rather than let them reach their own conclusion based on the facts.  The argument was simply that no article here can include everything slightly related to its topic simply because it is in print.  There is always some judicious selection.  Just because it is published doesn't mean it is automatically fit for inclusion.  You have yet to make an argument for inclusion that goes beyond your interpretation of wikipedia guidelines.  Based entirely on the content of the passage, why do you think it merits inclusion in the Frege article rather than the Dummett article?  Ekwos (talk) 20:10, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
 * The quote by eminent Frege scholar has been there for a year and does not merit deletion. You are the only one on this page arguing in favor of deletion.  Is your opinion that the quote is only "slightly related to the topic"? Tkuvho (talk) 17:41, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
 * We replaced the Hersh quotes with better quotes from Sluga and Dummett. The Dummett quote which expresses nothing more than his own feelings, strictly speaking, is now a new addition now that we've gotten the meat on the page through more direct sources than Hersh.  Again, do you have any good reason for including it other than not wanting a reader to be able to make up their own mind based on the facts?  The article presently says that Frege was anti-semitic.  The Dummett quote contributes nothing.
 * Given that the article already says that Frege was anti-semitic, the only thing the Dummett quote allows you to do is smuggle in a condemnation of anti-semitism (which is what you are really working at, this isn't about Frege per se). The fact is Frege was anti-semitic, the article says so, and the reader can decide whether that is a good or bad thing without an editor smuggling in a statement that says anti-semitism is bad.
 * In fact, one can argue that the Dummett quote shows how irrelevant Frege's personal views are to his philosophy (the thing that makes him notable). His philosophy is so technical and divorced from every-day situations that you could study him in depth for years and never know he had certain thoughts (such as hating Jews).  It just can never come up in such a rarified analysis.
 * I'll also note that when you went to the anti-semitism page hoping to get people to come here and back you up, that the people responding there didn't think you had a point either.
 * Also, "eminent" is POV. Ekwos (talk) 21:34, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Your deletes at Gottlob Frege are disruptive as they represent nobody's views but your own. I firmly request that you restore the material you deleted.    Tkuvho (talk) 05:27, 11 November 2010 (UTC)
 * On the contrary your repeated inclusion of the material is disruptive and represents nobody's views but your own (as the exchange on the anti-semitism page indicates). I firmly request that you stop putting the material in.  In fact I haven't seen anyone else supporting your viewpoint, whereas I have seen people supporting mine.  You are free to elevate this to some sort of higher level mediation if you so desire.  Alternatively you could try explaining what you think the article presently lacks and how the inclusion of the quote remedies that lack.  I've tried to explain why I don't think it contributes anything to the article.  You haven't made any effort to explain why you think it does.  Ekwos (talk) 17:48, 11 November 2010 (UTC)
 * User Radh similarly supports the inclusion of the properly sourced sentence on eminent Frege scholar Dummett. Your remarks about "rarified analysis" are irrelevant.  Tkuvho (talk) 18:29, 11 November 2010 (UTC)
 * I guess you are right about that, I'd been of the impression the support extended to the existing Dummett quote. I still support the inclusion of the quote in the Dummett article.  And I'm willing to compromise with an appropriate link to that article from here.  It is off topic here.  Like I said, you are welcome to elevate this to higher mediation.  You clearly aren't going to give me an explanation of what it contributes beyond something about what the rules allow.  So unless you plan to explain what you feel it adds to this article and why it isn't off topic, we have nothing more to talk about.  Ekwos (talk) 21:10, 11 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks for recognizing a majority support for inclusion of the quote in this page (and not just at Dummett's). I think that should be the determining factor, particularly in combination with the fact that the material has been here for a year.  I would be glad to provide explanations but I think first the material should be restored.  I am willing to hear out your arguments for deleting it then.  Obviously if you convince the other editors, it can be deleted.  Tkuvho (talk) 09:20, 12 November 2010 (UTC)
 * I've given my arguments repeatedly. I've asked for your arguments repeatedly.  At this point, I'm willing to listen to arguments, but I don't care about a majority of 2 out of 3 people.  In statistics we call that "not a significant sample size".  I think I've given a good reason for non-inclusion.  In fact, you could have stated your reasoning right there.  Instead, once again, you've pushed for inclusion based on some technicality rather than an explanation of what you think it contributes to the article.  You see, the thing is, right now, I think the fact that you appear to be totally unable to come up with a good reason for including the quote in the article, is itself an argument that there isn't a good reason to include it at all.  Ekwos (talk) 18:08, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

Dummett Quote Compromise
Okay, how about this for a compromise on the Dummett quote. I say we contextualize it. We lead in to the political section (which perhaps should be renamed the "diary" section) with something like the following:

Frege's published philosophical writings were of a very technical nature and divorced from practical issues, so much so that Frege scholar Dummett when reading his diaries could be "shocked... blah blah blah."

? Ekwos (talk) 05:03, 13 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Your proposal of compromise is helpful, but I don't see what we gain by adding the material on "technical nature", and the claim of "divorced" may be WP:OR. At any rate, this addition merely lengthens the sentence.  We can let the reader decide for himself why it was exactly that Dummett was shocked.  Change of title is fine.  How about "His diary and politics"? Tkuvho (talk) 03:56, 14 November 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm waiting for your proposed compromise. I'm not going along with what you've been proposing thus far.  And I'm still waiting for you to explain what your position contributes to the article.  At least what I proposed makes the quote something about Frege rather than something about Dummett.  Anyway, don't bother posting unless you have something positive to contribute, either in the form of a compromise or explanation.  Or just alert the higher ups to settle things.  Ekwos (talk) 18:18, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

Request for comment
Following some detailed discussions on the talkpage, I added a properly sourced sentence here. This was reverted by user Ekwos here. I pointed out at the talkpage that Ekwos is in a minority of 1 here. Ekwos himself acknowledged the point here. Based on the mutually agreed-upon facts concerning his isolated position, I urged him to restore the material he deleted here. However, Ekwos refused to cooperate by saying I've given my arguments repeatedly. Note that the material deleted by Ekwos had been on the page for a year. Numerous editors worked on the page since, without deleting it. I assume that users Radh, Trovatore, and JRSpriggs do not object to the inclusion of the sourced sentence. Can Ekwos impose his minority opinion by unilaterally deleting material he disapproves of? Tkuvho (talk) 13:54, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * I had been following the discussion without much opinion. I agree that the Dummett quotation is well-sourced.  I also agree that Frege's antisemitism is a suitable topic for the article and should be included.  What I do not understand why the Dummett quotation is sufficiently interesting or relevant to the issue.  It seems to me that it primarily concerns Dummett, and that it does not actually tell us anything about Frege, the subject of the article.   I have reviewed the prior discussion and I am still in the dark as to why you think that Dummett's reaction to his dicovery of Frege's antisemitism is relevant here.  Can you elaborate on this? —Mark Dominus (talk) 15:11, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * (1) Dummett is an eminent (perhaps the pre-eminent) Frege scholar, and his reaction is reflected in secondary sources, hence notable; (2) one can speculate as to why those secondary authors reflected Dummett's remarks. Such speculations are not for inclusion in the article (due to OR), but at any rate scientists may believe themselves to be above common prejudices of the masses, due to their greater commitment to Logic with a capital L; hence Logician Frege's position is notable.  Tkuvho (talk) 15:29, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * None of that addresses my question. Why is Dummett's personal reaction relevant here?  I think it would be a fine addition to the Dummett article, but I do not see the relevance to Frege himself; it does not seem to me to add in any way to the reader's understanding of Frege. —Mark Dominus (talk) 15:39, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Dummett's reaction represents the reaction of a number of western intellectuals provoked by Frege's position. What they are puzzled by is Frege's ability to combine the talent of a first-rate logician on the one hand, and the position in question, on the other.  The fact that Frege inspired such a legacy is as significant as it is disturbing.  Tkuvho (talk) 15:43, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Okay. I am unpersuaded, and I still don't understand why neither of you is willing to let it go.  One the one hand, it seems of marginal relevance.  On the other hand, it seems like a harmless trivium.  I wish you luck in resolving your dispute.  —Mark Dominus (talk) 15:50, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Inspite of having been told otherwise by Radh, Ekwos is convinced that Frege's position is identical to that of all Germans in the Weimar Republic, and is therefore not notable and causes him to yawn. Note that Germany had a Jewish Foreign minister at the time.  Tkuvho (talk) 15:59, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * I never said "all Germans" I said it was unremarkable. Frege is a typical conservative German of the time, and is probably comparable to a racist white American today.  Sure America has a black president, but white anti-black racism is sufficiently common as to be unremarkable.  Dummett's shock is that of a person seeing a hero not live up to the fantasy image they've built of their hero in their head.  It isn't the shock of finding the one anti-semite in all of 19th century Germany.  The shock all stems from Dummett building an unrealistic image of the guy.  Ekwos (talk) 18:30, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually my position is that Dummett being shocked is as much a fact about Frege as the fact that "the sky is blue" (also interesting) is a fact about Frege. Tkuvho, however is on a crusade against anti-semitism, and feels that the article needs something POV that tells the reader that Frege needs to be condemned for being one.  Apparently merely stating that Frege is an anti-semite based on the contents of the 1924 diary and letting the reader be the judge isn't enough.  Tkuvho also appears unwilling or unable to articulate a reason for inclusion besides that the rules let him.  He cannot explain what it adds to the article that isn't already there.  All it does is beat the anti-semitism horse (already represented by two quotes) to death.  You could study Frege all your life and never know he had ideas that went beyond the ivory tower, and the anti-semitism aspect is already represented in the article out of proportion to his work.  Ekwos (talk) 18:03, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * I would lean towards inclusion of a short sentence about Dummett's reaction to Frege's (later) proto-fascist politics. Dummett's reaction is interesting and notable because Dummett has spent decades and written at least three notable books championing Frege; there is at least one (snide) remark by Hintikka about the "Frege industry" (perhaps naming Dummett) somewhere.
 * The second reason that Dummett's reaction is notable is that he has long been a public intellectual, an apparently leading critic of Thatcher's university policies and of racism in the UK. Because of his public status (partly due to Tarot eccentricities), Dummett's response has interest for many intellectuals, now and for the next few decades. In a hundred years, it may not make sense to maintain Dummett's response in this article. However, this is not a life-and-death issue. Thanks, Kiefer.Wolfowitz (talk) 20:14, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm seeing two for and two against of the interested parties. Hardly a "consensus".  If other users want to chime in here and push it one way or the other that'd be fine.  I say leave it open a while longer and see if anyone wants to chime in.  Anyway, if you are going to include it, cite it directly to Dummett, and don't use Hersh.  I think the actual Dummett source is given in one of the above threads.  Also if you look up Wikipedia's own article on Consensus_decision-making, "consensus" isn't the same thing as the majority gets its way.  It also involves mitigating the concerns of the minority.  Ekwos (talk) 00:42, 21 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Hi Ekwos! As I wrote, this is not a life-and-death issue, which seems to be your judgement also, I'm glad to note. I welcome your suggestion that we wait a few days for additional voices. I agree that it's better to cite Dummett directly, although I suppose the other editor wanted a secondary source (rather than original research): Maybe a footnote after Dummett's name (with the primary source) and then a footnote at the end of the sentence to Hersch would be safest? Best regards, Kiefer.Wolfowitz (talk) 03:19, 21 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Ekwos wrote above: "I'm seeing two for and two against of the interested parties". Who do you have in mind as the party supporting the deletion of the material citing Dummett? Tkuvho (talk) 14:59, 22 November 2010 (UTC)
 * I've already proposed a compromise. I'm still waiting for you to propose anything, or even explain what you feel it contributes.  All I've gotten from you is "I'm going to have my way, I'm not going to explain myself, and I'm not going to compromise over anything."  On top of that I've seen you deliberately misrepresent my position at every turn.  Ekwos (talk) 03:30, 24 November 2010 (UTC)
 * If the Dummett quote can be rejected as a primary source, well then the quote isn't about Frege is it? I mean a primary source about Frege would be Frege.  If it is a primary source, then the only thing it can be a primary source about is Dummett.  If the Dummett remark is in fact about Frege, then it is already a secondary source, and we can use it directly.  The Hersh book is a popular book about mathematics.  I can't imagine how such a work is an improvement over a work directly about Frege.  I gave a context in which the Dummett quote could be used directly about Frege without the absurd need for an intervening source earlier.  Tkuvho rejected all this, as near as I can tell, because it makes things no longer about a direct condemnation of anti-semitism.  Ekwos (talk) 03:37, 24 November 2010 (UTC)


 * It appears that we are finally converging. Thank you for your helpful edits.  It can be a pleasure working with you.  Tkuvho (talk) 03:20, 25 November 2010 (UTC)
 * In so far as we are interested in Frege's political views or his diary contents then the primary piece of information is that (apparently) the latter showed that the former included anti-semitic views.  The  fact that Dummett was shocked to discover it is of secondary interest, surely.Philogo (talk) 16:57, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

Reception by later philosophers and logicians
It might be useful to include more of the history of others' appreciation of Frege, Such intellectual historiography is common in other articles. (In such a section, discussions of the anti-semitism and reaction of Frege would be more natural.) Sincerely, Kiefer.Wolfowitz (talk) 20:27, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * from ignorance (initial)
 * to over-zealous promotion (Russell & Dummett & Per Martin-Löf, slighting Charles Sanders Peirce and Ernst Schröder)
 * to contemporary balance (Jaakko Hintikka), imho.


 * Sounds like a great idea. The starting point of course is Peano's "discovery" of Frege.  There is an illuminating piece on this by Gillies in Revolutions in mathematics.  Go ahead and give it a try!  Tkuvho (talk) 22:41, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Hi, folks. I'm no expert on the subject, but Hilary Putnam wrote about the issue of priority versus actual influence (Frege and Peirce). Putnam, Hilary (1982), "Peirce the Logician", Historia Mathematica 9, 290–301. Reprinted, pp. 252–60 in Putnam (1990), Realism with a Human Face, Harvard. Excerpt with article's last five pages: Eprint. See Charles Sanders Peirce for a summary (in that section's third paragraph). Also, Irving Anellis wrote about Russell on Peirce: Anellis, Irving H. (1995), "Peirce Rustled, Russell Pierced: How Charles Peirce and Bertrand Russell Viewed Each Other's Work in Logic, and an Assessment of Russell's Accuracy and Role in the Historiography of Logic", Modern Logic 5, 270–328. Arisbe Eprint. The Tetrast (talk) 19:09, 21 November 2010 (UTC).
 * Continuing my stalking of The Tetrast (among others) (*LOL* as the kids say) and my monitoring of this page, I would second the recommendation of the article by Anellis, which is a very detailed study indeed; if my memory is correct, Anellis may have started with Frege in earlier articles, and has moved to Peirce's role in mathematical logic, lately. Also, Putnam is always interesting; Putnam contributes another discussion in his long foreword to Logic and the Nature of Things, Peirce's (1898??) lectures at Harvard. Cheers, Kiefer.Wolfowitz (talk) 21:16, 21 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Stalking, yikes! Don't get worried folks, Tkuvho invited me to comment here, and Kiefer was already here. Kiefer, I didn't quite get the sturm und drang at your link till I read it carefully, now that's really yikes! Anyway, thanks for the laudation there, and your edits at the articles I work on have rocked. Anyway, I have Reasoning and the Logic of Things but haven't read Putnam's intro yet. Not that I'm about to write anything in this Frege wiki - I (and others) know my limits. The Tetrast (talk) 19:09, 22 November 2010 (UTC).
 * I've found that there is some attempt in the scientific articles to try to tone the influence part down to people the subject had direct contact with (otherwise there might be no end to influence). Frege's review of Husserl's early book on arithmetic (?) accusing him of psychologism might be of interest in that regard.  Obviously Frege and Russell had more direct contact.  There might have been some contact with Carnap if I'm not confusing things.  Peirce and Schroeder might be interesting if we keep in mind that the largest part of Frege's contribution to logic is the formalization that came with the Begriffschrift (although this is obscured by the fact that we basically now use a formalization based on Hilbert and Russell's simplifications).  I don't think Peirce and Schroeder had done much in the direction of a formalized symbolic system.  Ekwos (talk) 03:45, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Frege encouraging to Wittgenstein
This new comment is interesting but as yet unsourced. Do you have a source for this? Tkuvho (talk) 13:28, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Frege appears mostly to have encouraged Wittgenstein to leave for England :) Tkuvho (talk) 14:26, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't believe it is even clear that Frege knew Wittgenstein was of Jewish descent. 24.21.175.70 (talk) 06:48, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Misleading quote in 1927 diary section
The Sluga quote (about Frege being an admirer of Ludendorf and Hitler) is criticized by Mendelsohn in his translation of Frege's diaries (published 1996 in Inquiry). He writes that "(...)the very recent (1993) work of Hans Sluga, and his brief description of the diary is quite misleading." And he further elaborats on the comment in the footnotes. It might be relevant, since the entire section is rather thin on information and presents the quote uncritically. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.163.36.197 (talk) 18:12, 9 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Some details would be appreciated. Certainly if Mendelsohn's work is reliable, his critique of Sluga should be mentioned.  Which Mendelsohn is this?  Tkuvho (talk) 18:30, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

Should redirect for "Drittes Reich" and "Third Realm" be to Abstract object (per Frege), or to Nazi Germany (per Hitler)?
Should redirect for "Drittes Reich" and "Third Realm" be to Abstract object (per Frege), or to Nazi Germany (per Hitler)?


 * (See also the 독일의-Wikipedia's Drittes Reich (Frege) -
 * ''"In dem Aufsatz Der Gedanke des deutschen Philosophen und Mathematikers Gottlob Frege (1918) bezeichnet der Ausdruck Drittes Reich einen Bereich der Realität, in dem die nach seiner Auffassung objektiven Gedanken angesiedelt sind:
 * ''Die Gedanken sind weder Dinge der Außenwelt noch Vorstellungen. Ein drittes Reich muß anerkannt werden. Was zu diesem gehört, stimmt mit den Vorstellungen darin überein, daß es nicht mit den Sinnen wahrgenommen werden kann, mit den Dingen aber darin, daß es keines Trägers bedarf, zu dessen Bewußtseinsinhalte es gehört. So ist z. B. der Gedanke, den wir im pythagoreischen Lehrsatz aussprachen, zeitlos wahr, unabhängig davon, ob irgendjemand ihn für wahr hält. Er bedarf keines Trägers. Er ist wahr nicht erst, seitdem er entdeckt worden ist, wie ein Planet, schon bevor jemand ihn gesehen hat, mit andern Planeten in Wechselwirkung gewesen ist.[1]
 * Mit dem Argument, dass es andernfalls keine Intersubjektivität geben könne, postuliert Frege neben dem Reich der subjektiven Vorstellungen und dem der "objektiv-wirklichen" physischen Gegenstände noch ein "drittes Reich": das der "objektiv-nichtwirklichen" Gedanken. Sie werden vom Bewusstsein erfasst, aber nicht hervorgebracht."


 * I don't speak German, but "Third Realm" and "Drittes Reich" both redirect to Nazi Germany.
 * There is often a problem when Kant, Frege, Wittgenstein, etc., are translated by lighter weight thinkers (i.e., by anyone).
 * Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP) is WP:RS.
 * According to reliable secondary source Gideon Rosen in the "Abstract Objects" article at SEP, "Frege concludes that numbers are neither external ‘concrete’ things nor mental entities of any sort. ... He says that they (thoughts - by which Gideon Rosen means the senses of declarative sentences, apparently with Rosen using Frege's highly technical meaning of "sense") belong to a ‘third realm’ distinct both from the sensible external world and from the internal world of consciousness... As this new ‘realism’ was absorbed into English speaking philosophy, the traditional term ‘abstract’ was enlisted to apply to the denizens of this ‘third realm’."
 * Note: Rosen does not provide citations in support of this particular SEP:OR "encyclopedia" article statement, re what he calls "absorption" and "enlistment", likely because of a lack of historical scholarly works to rely on re the etymology of "abstract object". But we at Wikipedia have higher standards than SEP when it comes to OR.

I propose a disabiguation page. But having inadvertently stepped from writing WP:BLPs into trying to edit the Alternative medicine article, I assume per User:IRWolfie's comments at alt med, that it is best to first propose things in a small way at talk pages, before editing on any articles involving religion, racist groups, evolution, alt meds, and articles about topics involving groups of irrational people that are still in existence.

Discussion is here ParkSehJik (talk) 02:35, 26 November 2012 (UTC)


 * As per User:Trovatore's comments, "third realm" is merely an incorrect translation of the German. Third Reich is the correct translation.  I have seen some modern philosophers discussing the idea of "third realm" in Frege's sense, so redirect to Frege is reasonable since the term has some currency.  Tkuvho (talk) 16:09, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

I am copying your comment to the section here as a multipage WP:RTP consolidation of discussion. ParkSehJik (talk) 16:15

ARISTOTLE INCOMPATIBLE WITH EUCLID?
The following statement appears in the "Work as a logician" section:"It is frequently noted that Aristotle's logic is unable to represent even the most elementary inferences in Euclid's geometry..." No citation is given. This statement does not take into account the contrary opinion expressed by John Stuart Mill in his article "Is the syllogism a petitio principii?",viz. "The whole of euclid, for example, might be thrown without difficulty into a series of syllogisms, regular in mood and figure." (Readings on Logic", Copi & Gould, 1964, p.100, citing Mill's "A System of Logic", 1874, pp.126-157.Bobblond (talk) 03:14, 10 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Unless Mill actually went and did it, I'd go with the consensus of modern logicians that it can't be done. 71.59.210.202 (talk) 23:40, 3 October 2013 (UTC)

1924 Diary
This article makes a bit much of a diary written by a man in his 70's in the last couple years of his life. It appears the article is trying to use these very late views to color the man's entire life. It is entirely possible that Frege was losing some of his mental faculties by the time the diary was written. Indeed, the diary section indicates that Frege was much more liberal when he was younger. Coloring Frege's life by his diary is a bit like summing up your grandfather's life by what he was saying in the last couple years of his life when he started spending all his time watching Fox News. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.246.211.17 (talk) 20:34, 30 July 2014 (UTC)

Grundlagen article link?
Hi,

I see that "Grundlagen ..." has its own article, at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Foundations_of_Arithmetic , but I couldn't see any link to it where it is mentioned in this article. There is a link way down at "Important Works", which I first thought was a link to the text/book/work itself. Perhaps give it the more prominent place, too?

T88.89.219.147 (talk) 04:33, 24 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Done did it. T 88.89.219.147 (talk) 18:23, 27 April 2016 (UTC)

Ueber
Older texts in German use "Ueber" instead of "Über." The practice apparently started dying out in the 1890s. So the correct titles of Frege's works are as follows: Ueber eine geometrische Darstellung der imaginären Gebilde in der Ebene, "Über Sinn und Bedeutung" (H. Hermes et al., Nachgelassene Schriften und Wissenschaftlicher Briefwechsel / Wissenschaftlicher Briefwechsel: Zweiter Band der "Nachgelassenen Schriften und Wissenschaftlicher Briefwechsel", Meiner Verlag, 2013, p. xii: SB), "Ueber Begriff und Gegenstand" (H. Hermes et al. 2013, p. xii: BuG), and "Über die Grundlagen der Geometrie" (H. Hermes et al. 2013, p. xii: GLG). --Omnipaedista (talk) 00:05, 25 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Older texts use Ueber in Latin script, because umlauts were uncommon in Latin-script-based typestting, but in the then more common Fraktur script, umlauts were used. &mdash; Charles Stewart (talk) 14:48, 26 May 2016 (UTC)

Mother of Polish descent
Freges Mother's parents were Johann Heinrich Siegfried Bialloblotzky and Auguste Amalia Maria Ballhorn. So even if her father was polish, which is unlikely in view of his name Johann Heinrich Siegfried, Freges mother would be half polish, half german. Thats why it is probably wrong to claim she was exclusively of Polish origin — Preceding unsigned comment added by Malzkorn (talk • contribs) 17:19, 23 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Please see WP:V and WP:NOR. --Omnipaedista (talk) 12:37, 1 January 2017 (UTC)

"Major figure in mathematics"
Is he? He's certainly one for philosophy. Cake (talk) 20:05, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
 * He was a contributor to the philosophy of mathematics and influenced Bertrand Russell there. This is I know considered separate from mathematics. (It's not the same as mathematics, but "separate from" is a bit much, actually :) - still, not your words, possibly-misremebered someone or other or other else's... ) ELSchissel (talk) 23:57, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

Family
According to German Wikipedia (de:Christian Gottlob Frege) his great-grandfather (C.G. Frege) was a well-known banker (the article lists the genealogy, and mentions that Virginia Livia Gebhardt (Livia Frege) married one of CG Frege's grandchildren, which makes sense of a coincidence...) — Preceding unsigned comment added by ELSchissel (talk • contribs) 23:54, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

Language in bibliography
Hi, in the "Important works" section, the works on Logic etc. are presented with the original German titles + EN translation; the works on Philosophy etc. with EN titles and then DE original titles; and finally the works on Geometry etc. again with the original German titles with EN translations. Is there a "method to this madness"? T 84.208.65.62 (talk) 00:50, 4 July 2022 (UTC)

Source for the claim that he is considered the greatest logician since Aristotle
There does not seem to a consensus of sources that support this claim. Many other sources consider Russell, Godel, etc. to be more influential. Partofthemachine (talk) 05:55, 11 February 2023 (UTC)

Philosophy of language in the twentieth century
Philosophy of language in the twentieth century 23.88.217.103 (talk) 15:57, 7 October 2023 (UTC)