Abstract

The publication of this book constitutes a real service to students of logic and of the foundations and philosophy of mathematics. Here, "under one roof," are translations of seventeen of the most important papers on logic and metalogic by Ajdukiewicz, Chwistek, Jaskowski, Jordan, Lesniewski, Lukasiewicz, S upecki, Sobocinski, and Wajsberg. All but two of them appear in English for the first time. Notably absent are papers by Alfred Tarski, but this omission is fully justified in view of the publisher's well-known companion volume devoted exclusively to this most important logician. Within the contents of this volume, the major topics covered are various systems of sentential logic ; philosophically-motivated foundational studies ; miscellaneous papers on logical syntax, intuitionism and metalogic; and historical studies of the development of Polish logic. One cautionary note: the protothetic notation of Lesniewski is extremely difficult to read. Before undertaking that author's articles, the reader will do well to turn to the explanatory footnotes in the subsequent articles by Sobocinski. The book has a bibliography, but no index. In general, this is a worthwhile and long overdue book.—H. P. K.