Frege and Early Wittgenstein on Logic and Language

Abstract

Abstract According to Frege, logic is a science and its laws are truths like any others. According to Wittgenstein, the laws of logic contrast with truths in being sinnlos, without sense. The Wittgensteinian conception is generally regarded as a much‐needed corrective to Frege's view, but, as I show, this assessment rests on a misunderstanding of Frege's (mature) distinction between the Sinn and the Bedeutung of an expression. Frege's mature conception of a logical language is not a confused precursor of Wittgenstein's Tractatus conception, but instead a rigorous, and deeply illuminating, alternative to that later view.