Logic in Mexico

Walter Beller

pp. 1-23

in: Robert S. Cohen (ed), Mexican studies in the history and philosophy of science, Berlin, Springer, 1995

Abstract

The purpose of this work is to show how logic has developed in Mexican society from the middle of the last century until the present day. This process presents two characteristics: (1) works of logic were generally written by authors who, in spite of their national and international prestige, never succeeded in forming a school, but limited themselves to follow the trends outlined by others; and (2) the greater part of the work about logic was written to cover educational needs and, therefore, has been subject to national education policy changes. On the other hand, it should be taken into consideration that the authors we are going to review may be divided into two main groups: those who have used logic from the perspective of some philosophy (i.e. positivism, neo-Kantianism and Marxism) and those who have spread it within the reference framework of formal contemporary logic, whether "mathematical logic" or 'symbolic logic". We are going to find that those writers forming the first group have been, for several reasons, opposed to the introduction of mathematical or symbolic logic.

Cited authors

Kant Immanuel

Marx Karl