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Full Idea
I suggest we give up on the account of ontological claims in terms of existential quantification. The commitment to the integers is not an existential but a universal commitment, to each of the integers, not to some integer or other.
Gist of Idea
Ontological claims are often universal, and not a matter of existential quantification
Source
Kit Fine (The Question of Ontology [2009], p.167)
Book Ref
'Metametaphysics', ed/tr. Chalmers/Manley/Wasserman [OUP 2009], p.167
A Reaction
In classical logic it is only the existential quantifier which requires the domain to be populated, so Fine is more or less giving up on classical logic as a tool for doing ontology (apparently?).
| 12211 | It is plausible that x^2 = -1 had no solutions before complex numbers were 'introduced' [Fine,K] |
| 12209 | The indispensability argument shows that nature is non-numerical, not the denial of numbers [Fine,K] |
| 12212 | Just as we introduced complex numbers, so we introduced sums and temporal parts [Fine,K] |
| 12214 | 'Exists' is a predicate, not a quantifier; 'electrons exist' is like 'electrons spin' [Fine,K] |
| 12213 | Ontological claims are often universal, and not a matter of existential quantification [Fine,K] |
| 12215 | The existence of numbers is not a matter of identities, but of constituents of the world [Fine,K] |
| 12216 | Real objects are those which figure in the facts that constitute reality [Fine,K] |
| 12218 | Being real and being fundamental are separate; Thales's water might be real and divisible [Fine,K] |
| 12217 | For ontology we need, not internal or external views, but a view from outside reality [Fine,K] |