Avicenna recognizes and attempts to deal with the close...

Avicenna recognizes and attempts to deal with the close nexus between language and thought: Were it possible for logic to be learned through pure cogitation, so that meanings alone would be observed in it, then this would suffice. And if it were possible for the disputant to disclose what is in his soul through some other device, then he would dispense entirely with its expression.

But since it is necessary to employ expressions, and especially as it is not possible for the reasoning faculty to arrange meanings without imagining the expressions corresponding to them (reasoning being rather a dialogue with oneself by means of imagined expressions), it follows that expressions have various modes (ahwâl) on account of which the modes of the meanings corresponding to them in the soul vary so as to acquire qualifications ( ahkâm ) which would not have existed without the expressions.

It is for this reason that the art of logic must be concerned in part with investigating the modes of expressions… But there is no value in the doctrine of those who say that the subject matter of logic is to investigate expressions in so far as they indicate meanings…but rather the matter should be understood in the way we described. Ibn Sina criticized attempts to introduce linguistic concerns into the subject matter of logic.

In al-Madkhal, Ibn Sina labels as 'stupid' those who say that 'the subject matter of logic is speculation concerning expressions in so far as they signify meanings (ma'ani)'. However, Ibn Sina does not deny that the logician is sometimes or even often required to consider linguistic matters; his objection is to the inclusion of language as an essential constituent of the subject matter of logic.

The logician is only incidentally concerned with language because of the constraints of human thought and the practical exigencies of learning and communication. 'if logic could be learned through pure thought so that meanings alone could be attended to in it, then it would dispense entirely with expressions'; but since this is not in fact possible, 'the art of logic is compelled to have some of its parts come to consider the states of expressions' (al-Madhkal, in Anawati et al. 1952: 22-3).

For Ibn Sina, then, logic is a purely rational art whose purpose is entirely captured by its goal of leading the mind from the known to the unknown; only accidentally and secondarily can it be considered a linguistic art.