Peking University, Oct. 14, 2012: Invited by the Department of Philosophy at Peking University (PKU) as distinguished guest on its 100th anniversary, Professor Saul Kripke visited the University from August 30 to September 9.
Respectively on August 31 and September 5, Professor Kripke delivered two speeches at Yingjie Overseas Exchange Center. Firstly focusing on “Vacuous Names and Fictional Entities”, Professor Kripke talked about the significations of vacuous names, together with whether and how Fictional Entities exist, which based on his masterpiece Naming and Necessity. In his second speech, Kripke explored the significance of “I” and gave relevant metaphysical reflections.
Prof. Kripke
From September 2 to 3, the international discussion “Kripke, logic and philosophy” was held at Tan Siu Lin Center for International Studies. About 60 attendees from the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan and China shared their opinions. Kripke himself also made a themed speech named A Road to Godel.
Background Info:
Saul Kripke is recognized as one of the greatest logicians and philosophers in the late 20th century. According to the result of a poll held among western colleagues, Professor Kripke is the seventh greatest philosopher in the past 200 years, first among those alive.
Kripke has been quite influential in a number of fields related to logic, philosophy of language and metaphysics. He has highly initiative contributions in modal logic and historical referential theories. In 2001, he was awarded Schock Prize, the “Nobel Prize” in logic and philosophy, by The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.
Professor Kripke has taught in Harvard University, Columbia University, Cornell University and Rockefeller University, and was emeritus from Princeton University in 1999. Now he teaches as distinguished professor of philosophy at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.
Written by: Liu Yineng
Edited by: Arthars
Source: PKU News (Chinese)
