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2 ideas
18281 | In mathematics everything is algorithm and nothing is meaning [Wittgenstein] |
Full Idea: In mathematics everything is algorithm and nothing is meaning; even when it doesn't look like that because we seem to be using words to talk about mathematical things. | |
From: Ludwig Wittgenstein (Philosophical Grammar [1932], p.468), quoted by J. Alberto Coffa - The Semantic Tradition from Kant to Carnap 13 'Constr' | |
A reaction: I would have thought that an algorithm needs some raw material to work with. This leads to the idea that meaning arises from rules of usage. |
18392 | Classes have cardinalities, so their members must all be treated as units [Armstrong] |
Full Idea: Classes, because they have a particular cardinality, are essentially a certain number of ones, things that, within the particular class, are each taken as a unit. | |
From: David M. Armstrong (Truth and Truthmakers [2004], 09.1) | |
A reaction: [Singletons are exceptions] So units are basic to set theory, which is the foundations of technical analytic philosophy (as well as, for many, of mathematics). If you can't treat something as a unit, it won't go into set theory. Vagueness... |