Gottlob Frege

ne of the founders of modern symbolic logic, and also of analytic

philosophy, Gottlob Frege (1848-1925) began as a mathematician.
He came to believe that mathematics grows out of logic, and

sought to devise the symbolic language with which this could be

shown.

Frege was born in Wismar, a Hanseatic seaport in Germany east

of Hamburg, the son of creative schoolmasters. His interest in the

logic of language was first stimulated by his father’s textbook

designed to teach German teenagers the deep structure of their lan-

guage. Frege studied mathematics and physics at the University of

Jena, becoming a close friend of his teachers there. The great center for

the study of mathematics in those days was the University of

Géttingen, where Frege continued his studies, obtaining his doctorate

in geometry in 1873.