Information and Knowledge - A Constructive Type-theoretical Approach

This research is the result of a fruitful connection and provides a sign- cant link between two topics of a logical and philosophical enquiry. It tries to provide a solution to the problem of analyticity: with this expression I understand, on the one hand, the essential nature of analytic truths and, on the other, the related explanation of the analytic nature of logical inference. The connection between these two sides of what will be referred to as the Analyticity Principle, can be brie?y explained as follows: by analytic truth one understands in general a sentence whose content is logically true; by logically true one understands moreover truth independent from matters of fact or empirical data, a truth which is therefore established by logical criteria only. On this basis, it follows that a logical inference represents a purely analytic process, in opposition to its property of being able to produce knowledge, a situation which is exempli?ed by the con?icting - tions of validity and utility. The question-begging topic of this research is therefore that of analyticity, the inspiring problem for which a solution is formulated in the present book. If analyticity represents the starting point of this research, the other part of its content is the result of a far more complex question; to represent the notion of Information in the context of logical calculi.