Combining Philosophers

Ideas for Lynch,MP/Glasgow,JM, Antony Eagle and Edmund Husserl

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3 ideas

18. Thought / D. Concepts / 4. Structure of Concepts / b. Analysis of concepts
We clarify concepts (e.g. numbers) by determining their psychological origin [Husserl, by Velarde-Mayol]
     Full Idea: Husserl said that the clarification of any concept is made by determining its psychological origin. He is concerned with the psychological origins of the operation of calculating cardinal numbers.
     From: report of Edmund Husserl (Philosophy of Arithmetic [1894]) by Victor Velarde-Mayol - On Husserl 2.2
     A reaction: This may not be the same as the 'psychologism' that Frege so despised, because Husserl is offering a clarification, rather than the intrinsic nature of number concepts. It is not a theory of the origin of numbers.
18. Thought / E. Abstraction / 8. Abstractionism Critique
Psychologism blunders in focusing on concept-formation instead of delineating the concepts [Dummett on Husserl]
     Full Idea: Husserl substitutes his account of the process of concept-formation for a delineation of the concept. It is above all in making this substitution that psychologism is objectionable (and Frege opposed it so vehemently).
     From: comment on Edmund Husserl (Philosophy of Arithmetic [1894]) by Michael Dummett - Frege philosophy of mathematics Ch.2
     A reaction: While this is a powerful point which is a modern orthodoxy, it hardly excludes a study of concept-formation from being of great interest for other reasons. It may not appeal to logicians, but it is crucial part of the metaphysics of nature.
Husserl wanted to keep a shadowy remnant of abstracted objects, to correlate them [Dummett on Husserl]
     Full Idea: Husserl saw that abstracted units, though featureless, must in some way retain their distinctness, some shadowy remnant of their objects. So he wanted to correlate like-numbered sets, not just register their identity, but then abstractionism fails.
     From: comment on Edmund Husserl (Philosophy of Arithmetic [1894]) by Michael Dummett - Frege philosophy of mathematics Ch.12
     A reaction: Abstractionism is held to be between the devil and the deep blue sea, of depending on units which are identifiable, when they are defined as devoid of all individuality. We seem forced to say that the only distinction between them is countability.