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Full Idea
Modest ontologies are Nominalism (Goodman), admitting only concrete individuals; and Extensionalism (Quine/Davidson) which admits individuals and sets; but Intensionalists (Frege/Carnap/Church/Marcus/Kripke) may have propositions, properties, concepts.
Gist of Idea
Just individuals in Nominalism; add sets for Extensionalism; add properties, concepts etc for Intensionalism
Source
Alex Orenstein (W.V. Quine [2002], Ch.3)
Book Ref
Orenstein,Alex: 'W.V. Quine' [Princeton 2002], p.44
A Reaction
I don't like sets, because of Idea 7035. Even the ontology of individuals could collapse dramatically (see the ideas of Merricks, e.g. 6124). The intensional items may be real enough, but needn't have a place at the ontological high table.
Related Ideas
Idea 7035 God does not create the world, and then add the classes [Heil]
Idea 6124 I say that most of the objects of folk ontology do not exist [Merricks]
| 8452 | Traditionally, universal sentences had existential import, but were later treated as conditional claims [Orenstein] |
| 8454 | The whole numbers are 'natural'; 'rational' numbers include fractions; the 'reals' include root-2 etc. [Orenstein] |
| 8457 | The Principle of Conservatism says we should violate the minimum number of background beliefs [Orenstein] |
| 8458 | Just individuals in Nominalism; add sets for Extensionalism; add properties, concepts etc for Intensionalism [Orenstein] |
| 8471 | Three ways for 'Socrates is human' to be true are nominalist, platonist, or Montague's way [Orenstein] |
| 8465 | Mereology has been exploited by some nominalists to achieve the effects of set theory [Orenstein] |
| 8474 | Unlike elementary logic, set theory is not complete [Orenstein] |
| 8472 | Sentential logic is consistent (no contradictions) and complete (entirely provable) [Orenstein] |
| 8476 | Axiomatization simply picks from among the true sentences a few to play a special role [Orenstein] |
| 8473 | The logicists held that is-a-member-of is a logical constant, making set theory part of logic [Orenstein] |
| 8475 | The substitution view of quantification says a sentence is true when there is a substitution instance [Orenstein] |
| 8477 | People presume meanings exist because they confuse meaning and reference [Orenstein] |
| 8484 | If two people believe the same proposition, this implies the existence of propositions [Orenstein] |
| 8480 | S4: 'poss that poss that p' implies 'poss that p'; S5: 'poss that nec that p' implies 'nec that p' [Orenstein] |