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Ideas for 'works', 'Review of Husserl's 'Phil of Arithmetic'' and 'works'

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3 ideas

6. Mathematics / A. Nature of Mathematics / 3. Nature of Numbers / e. Ordinal numbers
Von Neumann defined ordinals as the set of all smaller ordinals [Neumann, by Poundstone]
     Full Idea: At age twenty, Von Neumann devised the formal definition of ordinal numbers that is used today: an ordinal number is the set of all smaller ordinal numbers.
     From: report of John von Neumann (works [1935]) by William Poundstone - Prisoner's Dilemma 02 'Sturm'
     A reaction: I take this to be an example of an impredicative definition (not predicating something new), because it uses 'ordinal number' in the definition of ordinal number. I'm guessing the null set gets us started.
6. Mathematics / A. Nature of Mathematics / 4. Using Numbers / e. Counting by correlation
Counting rests on one-one correspondence, of numerals to objects [Frege]
     Full Idea: Counting rests itself on a one-one correlation, namely of numerals 1 to n and the objects.
     From: Gottlob Frege (Review of Husserl's 'Phil of Arithmetic' [1894]), quoted by Richard G. Heck - Cardinality, Counting and Equinumerosity 3
     A reaction: Parsons observes that counting will establish a one-one correspondence, but that doesn't make it the aim of counting, and so Frege hasn't answered Husserl properly. Which of the two is conceptually prior? How do you decide.
Husserl rests sameness of number on one-one correlation, forgetting the correlation with numbers themselves [Frege]
     Full Idea: When Husserl says that sameness of number can be shown by one-one correlation, he forgets that this counting itself rests on a univocal one-one correlation, namely that between the numerals 1 to n and the objects of the set.
     From: Gottlob Frege (Review of Husserl's 'Phil of Arithmetic' [1894], p.326)
     A reaction: This is the platonist talking. Neo-logicism is attempting to build numbers just from the one-one correlation of objects.