Combining Texts

Ideas for 'On the Question of Absolute Undecidability', 'Ruling Passions' and 'Set Theory and related topics (2nd ed)'

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3 ideas

4. Formal Logic / F. Set Theory ST / 1. Set Theory
Mathematical set theory has many plausible stopping points, such as finitism, and predicativism [Koellner]
     Full Idea: There are many coherent stopping points in the hierarchy of increasingly strong mathematical systems, starting with strict finitism, and moving up through predicativism to the higher reaches of set theory.
     From: Peter Koellner (On the Question of Absolute Undecidability [2006], Intro)
'Reflection principles' say the whole truth about sets can't be captured [Koellner]
     Full Idea: Roughly speaking, 'reflection principles' assert that anything true in V [the set hierarchy] falls short of characterising V in that it is true within some earlier level.
     From: Peter Koellner (On the Question of Absolute Undecidability [2006], 2.1)
4. Formal Logic / F. Set Theory ST / 3. Types of Set / e. Equivalence classes
Equivalence relations are reflexive, symmetric and transitive, and classify similar objects [Lipschutz]
     Full Idea: A relation R on a non-empty set S is an equivalence relation if it is reflexive (for each member a, aRa), symmetric (if aRb, then bRa), and transitive (aRb and bRc, so aRc). It tries to classify objects that are in some way 'alike'.
     From: Seymour Lipschutz (Set Theory and related topics (2nd ed) [1998], 3.9)
     A reaction: So this is an attempt to formalise the common sense notion of seeing that two things have something in common. Presumably a 'way' of being alike is going to be a property or a part