@kennethamy,
kennethamy;68634 wrote:There are two negations of, the present king of France is bald, depending on whether the negation has wide scope, or narrow scope Thus:
It is not the case that the present king of France is bald; and, The present king of France is not bald.
The latter sentence is false, since there is no present king of France. And, of course, the former sentence is true, for the same reason. What is the contradiction?
Take the sentence: "It is not the case that the present king of France is bald". By using the definite article before "present king", it implies that there is such a king of France, and then states that it is not the case that he is bald. But the implied assertion is false; there is no such person. So the sentence as a whole is
not true, since one of its assertions is false.
On the other hand, it seems that if "The present king of France is bald" is false, then "It is not the case that the present king of France is bald" must, as its negation, be
true. Hence the paradox.
The only way of resolving this difficulty would be to regard "The present king of France is bald" as meaningless, not false. Then "It is not the case that...." could also be regarded as meaningless.