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Ideas for 'To be is to be the value of a variable..', 'Philosophical Logic' and 'Does Ontology Rest on a Mistake?'

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7 ideas

4. Formal Logic / D. Modal Logic ML / 6. Temporal Logic
With four tense operators, all complex tenses reduce to fourteen basic cases [Burgess]
     Full Idea: Fand P as 'will' and 'was', G as 'always going to be', H as 'always has been', all tenses reduce to 14 cases: the past series, each implying the next, FH,H,PH,HP,P,GP, and the future series PG,G,FG,GF,F,HF, plus GH=HG implying all, FP=PF which all imply.
     From: John P. Burgess (Philosophical Logic [2009], 2.8)
     A reaction: I have tried to translate the fourteen into English, but am not quite confident enough to publish them here. I leave it as an exercise for the reader.
4. Formal Logic / D. Modal Logic ML / 7. Barcan Formula
The temporal Barcan formulas fix what exists, which seems absurd [Burgess]
     Full Idea: In temporal logic, if the converse Barcan formula holds then nothing goes out of existence, and the direct Barcan formula holds if nothing ever comes into existence. These results highlight the intuitive absurdity of the Barcan formulas.
     From: John P. Burgess (Philosophical Logic [2009], 2.9)
     A reaction: This is my reaction to the modal cases as well - the absurdity of thinking that no actually nonexistent thing might possibly have existed, or that the actual existents might not have existed. Williamson seems to be the biggest friend of the formulas.
4. Formal Logic / E. Nonclassical Logics / 2. Intuitionist Logic
Is classical logic a part of intuitionist logic, or vice versa? [Burgess]
     Full Idea: From one point of view intuitionistic logic is a part of classical logic, missing one axiom, from another classical logic is a part of intuitionistic logic, missing two connectives, intuitionistic v and →
     From: John P. Burgess (Philosophical Logic [2009], 6.4)
It is still unsettled whether standard intuitionist logic is complete [Burgess]
     Full Idea: The question of the completeness of the full intuitionistic logic for its intended interpretation is not yet fully resolved.
     From: John P. Burgess (Philosophical Logic [2009], 6.9)
4. Formal Logic / E. Nonclassical Logics / 5. Relevant Logic
Relevance logic's → is perhaps expressible by 'if A, then B, for that reason' [Burgess]
     Full Idea: The relevantist logician's → is perhaps expressible by 'if A, then B, for that reason'.
     From: John P. Burgess (Philosophical Logic [2009], 5.8)
4. Formal Logic / F. Set Theory ST / 5. Conceptions of Set / a. Sets as existing
The use of plurals doesn't commit us to sets; there do not exist individuals and collections [Boolos]
     Full Idea: We should abandon the idea that the use of plural forms commits us to the existence of sets/classes… Entities are not to be multiplied beyond necessity. There are not two sorts of things in the world, individuals and collections.
     From: George Boolos (To be is to be the value of a variable.. [1984]), quoted by Henry Laycock - Object
     A reaction: The problem of quantifying over sets is notoriously difficult. Try http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/object/index.html.
4. Formal Logic / F. Set Theory ST / 8. Critique of Set Theory
Does a bowl of Cheerios contain all its sets and subsets? [Boolos]
     Full Idea: Is there, in addition to the 200 Cheerios in a bowl, also a set of them all? And what about the vast number of subsets of Cheerios? It is haywire to think that when you have some Cheerios you are eating a set. What you are doing is: eating the Cheerios.
     From: George Boolos (To be is to be the value of a variable.. [1984], p.72)
     A reaction: In my case Boolos is preaching to the converted. I am particularly bewildered by someone (i.e. Quine) who believes that innumerable sets exist while 'having a taste for desert landscapes' in their ontology.