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Full Idea
If someone says 'the number of Democrats is on the rise', he or she wants to focus on Democrats, not numbers. If the number is 50 million, is 50 million really on the rise?
Gist of Idea
If 'the number of Democrats is on the rise', does that mean that 50 million is on the rise?
Source
Stephen Yablo (Apriority and Existence [2000], §14)
Book Ref
'New Essays on the A Priori', ed/tr. Boghossian,P /Peacocke,C [OUP 2000], p.219
A Reaction
This is a very nice warning from Yablo, against easy platonism, or any sort of platonism at all. We routinely say that numbers are 'increasing', but the real meaning needs entangling. Here it refers to people joining a party.
8858 | Philosophers keep finding unexpected objects, like models, worlds, functions, numbers, events, sets, properties [Yablo] |
8859 | The main modal logics disagree over three key formulae [Yablo] |
8862 | Platonic objects are really created as existential metaphors [Yablo] |
8861 | Hardly a word in the language is devoid of metaphorical potential [Yablo] |
8863 | We must treat numbers as existing in order to express ourselves about the arrangement of planets [Yablo] |
8864 | We quantify over events, worlds, etc. in order to make logical possibilities clearer [Yablo] |
8865 | If 'the number of Democrats is on the rise', does that mean that 50 million is on the rise? [Yablo] |