Arda Denkel

{{Short description|Turkish philosopher}}

{{Infobox philosopher

|region = Western philosophy

|era = Contemporary philosophy

|image =

|caption =

|name = Arda Denkel

|birth_date = 6 July 1949

|birth_place = Ankara

|death_date = 21 May 2000

|death_place = Istanbul, Turkey

|school_tradition = Analytic

|main_interests = Philosophy of language, ontology, epistemology, philosophy of mind, history of philosophy

}}

Arda Denkel (6 July 1949 – 21 May 2000) was a Turkish philosopher.{{Cite web |title=People {{!}} Boğaziçi University Department of Philosophy |url=https://phil.boun.edu.tr/people/arda-denkelns/Arda-Denkel-2105454665/ |access-date=2022-10-06 |website=phil.boun.edu.tr}}{{cite journal |last=Armstrong |first=D. M. |year=1991 |title=Arda Denkel's Resemblance Nominalism |journal=The Philosophical Quarterly |volume=41 |issue=165 |pages=478–482 |doi=10.2307/2220081}} He graduated from Lycée Saint-Benoît d'Istanbul in 1968 and began his undergraduate studies at the Department of City and Regional Planning at Middle East Technical University.{{Cite web |last=Beyter |first=Yazar Taner |date=2023-11-13 |title=Bizim Değerli Hocamız Arda Denkel: Ayşegül Denkel ile Röportaj – Taner Beyter {{!}} Öncül Analitik Felsefe |url=https://onculanalitikfelsefe.com/bizim-degerli-hocamiz-arda-denkel-aysegul-denkel-ile-roportaj-taner-beyter/ |access-date=2024-12-27 |language=tr}} During his undergraduate education, he attended classes taught by philosophers including Teo Grünberg, Hüseyin Batuhan, and Cemal Yıldırım. He graduated in 1972 and began his doctoral studies in the philosophy of language under the supervision of Peter Strawson at the University of Oxford. He received his Ph.D. in 1977 with a thesis titled 'Communication and Meaning which he later developed into a more expansive study with his book The Natural Background of Meaning in 1999.{{Cite journal |last=Adıgüzel |first=Eylül |last2=Karakoç |first2=İrem Sena |last3=Bayrak |first3=Hasan Alparslan |last4=Canbol |first4=Selman Harun |last5=Tosun |first5=Muhammed Ali |date=2020 |title=Türkiye’de analitik felsefenin öncülerinden biri: Arda Denkel |url=https://repository.bilkent.edu.tr/items/f13e9526-e1c8-4ffd-b739-e71e3a88c715 |journal=Bilkent University |language=Turkish}}

Upon his return to Turkey he became an important promoter of analytical philosophy in Turkey, a country traditionally almost entirely cultivated within a continental atmosphere, and became a faculty member in the philosophy department at the Boğaziçi University in Istanbul for the rest of his life.{{Cite web |title=Arda Denkel {{!}} Boğaziçi University Department of Philosophy |url=https://phil.boun.edu.tr/people/arda-denkel |access-date=2022-10-06 |website=phil.boun.edu.tr}}

He was twice a visiting professor at the University of Wisconsin between 1985 and 1989, and served as a member of the steering committee of the European Society for Analytic Philosophy (ESAP) between 1996 and 1999.

He also authored several other books and articles in both Turkish and English, including his Object and Property in 1996.{{cite journal |last=Fantl |first=Jeremy |year=1997 |title=Arda Denkel, "Object and Property." |journal=Philosophy in Review |volume=17 |issue=3 |pages=162–164 |url=https://journals.uvic.ca/index.php/pir/article/view/7989}} He died in 2000 after a prolonged fight with a brain tumour.