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Full Idea
Classes or series of particulars, collected together on account of some property which makes it convenient to be able to speak of them as wholes, are what I call logical constructions or symbolic fictions.
Gist of Idea
Classes, grouped by a convenient property, are logical constructions
Source
Bertrand Russell (The Ultimate Constituents of Matter [1915], p.125)
Book Ref
Russell,Bertrand: 'Mysticism and Logic' [Unwin 1989], p.125
A Reaction
When does a construction become 'logical' instead of arbitrary? What is it about a property that makes it 'convenient'? At this point Russell seems to have built his ontology on classes, and the edifice was crumbling, thanks to Wittgenstein.
| 7545 | Visible things are physical and external, but only exist when viewed [Russell] |
| 7546 | A man is a succession of momentary men, bound by continuity and causation [Russell] |
| 7547 | Matter requires a division into time-corpuscles as well as space-corpuscles [Russell] |
| 7548 | Classes, grouped by a convenient property, are logical constructions [Russell] |
| 7549 | If my body literally lost its mind, the object seen when I see a flash would still exist [Russell] |
| 7550 | We could probably, in principle, infer minds from brains, and brains from minds [Russell] |
| 7551 | Matter is a logical construction [Russell] |
| 7552 | Six dimensions are needed for a particular, three within its own space, and three to locate that space [Russell] |
| 7553 | Sense-data are purely physical [Russell] |