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Metaphysical and epistemological commitments unavoidably determine the course of research in the field of logic as well as its theoretical interpretation. What we take the objects (subjects) of logical investigation to be determines our views on how they are to be known, and our view of the possible types of knowledge in turn places restrictions or what kinds of things those objects could be. No doubt it is true that logical studies can be pursued to great lengths without indulging in general declarations about the nature of reality or of human knowledge. But to say this is very far from admitting the possibility of "logic without ontology". The thoughtful beginning student in logic quickly wants to know what it is he or she is really studying and what, precisely, it has to do with the real (or other) worlds. The slightest philosophical stimulation (of which logic classes are often deplorablyfree) will lead him or her, further,to ask about the evidence supporting the various sorts of claims made as the course progresses, and about the methodology of logic from a scientific point of view. Rarely is any answer givento such questions, much less a reasonable and well elaborated one.

DOI: 10.1007/978-94-011-2580-2_15

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