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8631 | Cantor says that maths originates only by abstraction from objects [Cantor, by Frege] |
Full Idea: Cantor calls mathematics an empirical science in so far as it begins with consideration of things in the external world; on his view, number originates only by abstraction from objects. | |
From: report of George Cantor (works [1880]) by Gottlob Frege - Grundlagen der Arithmetik (Foundations) §21 | |
A reaction: Frege utterly opposed this view, and he seems to have won the day, but I am rather thrilled to find the great Cantor endorsing my own intuitions on the subject. The difficulty is to explain 'abstraction'. |