Combining Texts

Ideas for 'Through the Looking Glass', 'Introduction to the Philosophy of Mathematics' and 'The Development of Logic'

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3 ideas

4. Formal Logic / E. Nonclassical Logics / 2. Intuitionist Logic
Rejecting double negation elimination undermines reductio proofs [Colyvan]
     Full Idea: The intuitionist rejection of double negation elimination undermines the important reductio ad absurdum proof in classical mathematics.
     From: Mark Colyvan (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mathematics [2012], 1.1.3)
Showing a disproof is impossible is not a proof, so don't eliminate double negation [Colyvan]
     Full Idea: In intuitionist logic double negation elimination fails. After all, proving that there is no proof that there can't be a proof of S is not the same thing as having a proof of S.
     From: Mark Colyvan (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mathematics [2012], 1.1.3)
     A reaction: I do like people like Colyvan who explain things clearly. All of this difficult stuff is understandable, if only someone makes the effort to explain it properly.
4. Formal Logic / F. Set Theory ST / 4. Axioms for Sets / f. Axiom of Infinity V
The axiom of infinity is not a truth of logic, and its adoption is an abandonment of logicism [Kneale,W and M]
     Full Idea: There is something profoundly unsatisfactory about the axiom of infinity. It cannot be described as a truth of logic in any reasonable use of that phrase, and so the introduction of it as a primitive proposition amounts to the abandonment of logicism.
     From: W Kneale / M Kneale (The Development of Logic [1962], XI.2)
     A reaction: It seems that the axiom is essentially empirical, and it certainly makes an existential claim which seems to me (intuitively) to have nothing to do with logic at all.