Analytic and synthetic judgements in type theory

Per Martin-Löf

pp. 87-99

in: Paolo Parrini (ed), Kant and contemporary epistemology, Berlin, Springer, 1994

Abstract

When Kant introduced his well-known distinction between analytic and synthetic judgements, he was well aware that it was not something entirely new. In the Prolegomena, he gives an explicit and very detailed reference to Locke, reproaching his dogmatic predecessors Wolff and Baumgarten for having neglected it, and one may take more or less for granted that he knew the Leibnizian distinction between truths of reason and truths of fact, although, strangely enough, he never gives, as far as I know, an explicit reference to it. Also, we know of the Humean distinction between relations of ideas and matters of fact, which is of course even verbally very close to the Leibnizian distinction. Kant's own terminology was that of analytic versus synthetic judgements. After Kant, we also find the distinction treated by Bolzano, for instance, who spoke about conceptual and intuitional propositions, Ger. Begrifjs-and Anschauungssätze, respectively. With Bolzano, the situation is a bit strange in comparison with Kant, because he had not only the distinction between conceptual and intuitional propositions, but he also had the distinction between analytic and synthetic propositions.

Cited authors

Kant Immanuel

Leibniz Gottfried Wilhelm