Professor Patricia Blanchette, “Models and Consistency in Geometry and Logic”

Patricia Blanchette is an Associate Professor at the University of Notre Dame.

Abstract: In what sense does a model really show the “consistency,” in any intuitive sense, of the things modeled?  This talk investigates this question by looking at some of the issues raised in a debate over consistency-proofs in geometry at the beginning of the 20^th century.  Authors discussed include Frege, Hilbert, Veblen, and others.