Abstract
The fallacy used to declare the League of Nations inadmissible under the pretense that it is incompatible with the concept of the state can be analysed as the joint work of three nominal definitions. If instead of states we would take individuals, this method would produce the strange result that an institution to protect individuals is proscribed by law. It is shown that the fallacy is present in the writing of several eminent legal scholars. A similar fallacy sometimes also appears in a theoretical field such as arithmetic, where it has been used by some philosophers such as Leibniz and mathematicians such as Grassmann, Peano and Poincaré to prove that arithmetic theorems are analytically true.
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Notes
- 1.
- 2.
Zitelmann (1914, 477).
- 3.
Heilborn (1912, 21).
- 4.
The two following quotations are from Heilborn (1912, 35).
- 5.
The three following quotations are taken from Schoen (1915, 290).
- 6.
See Kaufmann (1911, 146).
- 7.
Nelson refers to World War I (1914–1917).
- 8.
The proof that follows is to be found in Leibniz (1704, Book I, Chap. VII, §10). Nelson’s critique probably stems from Frege (1884, Chap. I, §6). It is a bit curious that Nelson does not mention Frege’s name, either here or in the other passages of his works in which he reproduces his refutation, although he was demonstrably aware of Frege’s paternity. It is in fact all the more curious given that Frege’s treatment of the question is far more sophisticated than Nelson’s. In particular, Frege also has ‘2 + 2 = 2 + (1 + 1)’ and the general form of the associative law ‘a + (b + c) = (a + b) + c’.
- 9.
- 10.
Nelson’s argument is a bit opaque. The translation above was suggested by one of the two anonymous referees appointed by Springer. With much appreciation I put it here instead of my original one.
References
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Grassmann, Hermann. 1861. Lehrbuch der Arithmetik für höhere Lehranstalten [Handbook of arithmetic for institutions of higher education]. Berlin: Enslin.
Heilborn, Paul. 1912. Grundbegriffe des Völkerrechts [Fundamental concepts of international law]. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer.
Kaufmann, Erich. 1911. Das Wesen des Völkerrechts und die clausula rebus sic stantibus: rechtsphilosophische Studie zum Rechts-, Staats- und Vertragsbegriff [The essence of international law and the clausula rebus sic stantibus: A philosophical study of the concepts of law, state, and contract]. Tübingen: Mohr.
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Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm. 1704. Nouveaux essais sur l’entendement humain. Manuscript published posthumously. [English translation: New essays on human understanding. Cambridge: University Press (1996)].
Peano, Giuseppe. 1889. Arithmetices principia nova methodo exposita. Torino: Bocca. [English translation: The Principles of Arithmetic, Presented by a New Method, in Jean van Heijenoort, From Frege to Gödel: A source book in mathematical logic, 1879–1931, 85–97. Cambridge (MA): Harvard University Press (1967)].
Poincaré, Henri. 1902. La science et l’hypothèse. Paris: Flammarion. [English translation: The foundations of science: science and hypothesis, the value of science, science and method, 27–197. New York: The Science Press (1929)].
Schoen, Paul. 1915. Zur Lehre von den Grundlagen des Völkerrechts [Contribution to the theory of the foundations of international law]. Archiv für Rechts- und Wirtschaftsphilosophie 8: 287–321.
Zitelmann, Ernst. 1914. Haben wir noch ein Völkerrecht? [Do we still have an international law?]. Preussische Jahrbücher 158: 472–495.
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Nelson, L. (2016). Lecture XVII. In: A Theory of Philosophical Fallacies. Argumentation Library, vol 26. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-20783-4_18
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