Abstracts and Key Words

Abstract: Professor Lu Wang takes “following necessarily” as the intrinsic mechanism of logic or the notion of logic, and argues that to know the difference and correspondence between syntax and semantics is a key factor in the foundation of the discipline of logic, but he fails to inquire into how Aristotle can develop such a method by which the notion of “following necessarily” can be explicated in terms of the form of reasoning. In fact, the explicit notion of sentence constitutes a prerequisite for Aristotle’s developing the method of studying the form of reasoning from the angle of the difference and correspondence between syntax and semantics. Research shows that there is no study of the characteristics, components and types of sentence in ancient China, which means the ancient Chinese are unable to develop the explicit notion of sentence, and accordingly, the same method as that by which Aristotle puts forward his theory of syllogism. In this regard, according to professor Lu Wang’s elucidation of the notion of logic or “following necessarily” , there is no logic in ancient China. Compared to the fact emphasized by Lu Wang that the word Shi does not function as the copula in ancient Chinese, the lack of the explicit notion of sentence may better explain why there is no logic in ancient China.

Key words: Aristotle; theory of syllogism; explicit notion of sentence; logic in ancient China; Lu Wang