Diagrams, Information and the Visual

Claude Imbert
ENS, Paris

I first recall Frege’s endeavour, including its graphic details and his daring use of new dimensions. It soon became a stumbling block, and a matter of discussion with psychologists, anthropologists, logicians and philosophers. The problem remained on the agenda during half a century, till a mathematical logic got its explicit transformation laws and  (by the way) its options.  In the same time, Frege’s diagrammatic syntax suggested a rough draft for an electronic net.

So, Frege’s case is now part of a visual challenge to which epistemology has been confronted along XXth century. The use of diagrams  – in the context of visual art and visual anthropology – elicited a specific attention to the cognitive aspects of any visual syntax.

Image source: Hu Zhiheng /CAFA ART INFO