The 2022 Lindström Lectures were delivered in June 2022 by Sara Negri, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Genoa. The Public Lindström Lecture took place on Monday, 20 June 2022 at the Faculty of Humanities of Gothenburg University and online.
The Lindström Lectures is an annual lecture series organised by the Department of Philosophy, Linguistics and Theory of Science at the University of Gothenburg to celebrate the achievements of Pelle Lindström, former professor of logic at the department. For more information, including other talks in this lecture series, visit the
Lindström Lectures homepage.
Talk details
Speaker: Sara Negri (University of Genoa)
Title: Syntax and semantics in synergy
Abstract
Syntax and semantics, often considered as conflicting aspects of logic, have turned out to be intertwined in a methodology for generating complete proof systems for wide families of non-classical logics. In this formal semantics, models can be considered as purely mathematical objects with no ontological assumptions upon them. More specifically, by the “labelled formalism”, which now is a well-developed methodology, the semantics is turned into an essential component in the syntax of logical calculi. Thus enriched, the calculi not only constitute a tool for the automatisation of reasoning, but can also be used at the meta-level to establish general structural properties of logical systems and direct proofs of completeness up to decidability in the terminating case. The calculi, on the other hand, can be used to find simplified models through conservativity results. The method will be illustrated with gradually generalised semantics, including topological ones such as neighbourhood semantics.
The lecture was held on Monday, 20 June 2022 at the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Gothenburg and online.