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Ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'works' and 'Identity and Existence in Logic'

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2 ideas

7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 2. Types of Existence
Do mathematicians use 'existence' differently when they say some entity exists? [Anderson,CA]
     Full Idea: A cursory examination shows that mathematicians have no aversion to saying that this-or-that mathematical entity exists. But is this a different sense of 'existence'?
     From: C. Anthony Anderson (Identity and Existence in Logic [2014], 2.6)
     A reaction: For those of us like me and my pal Quine who say that 'exist' is univocal (i.e. only one meaning), this is a nice challenge. Quine solves it by saying maths concerns sets of objects. I, who don't like sets, am puzzled (so I turn to fictionalism...).
7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 5. Reason for Existence
Nothing could come out of nothing, and existence could never completely cease [Empedocles]
     Full Idea: From what in no wise exists, it is impossible for anything to come into being; for Being to perish completely is incapable of fulfilment and unthinkable.
     From: Empedocles (fragments/reports [c.453 BCE], B012), quoted by Anon (Lyc) - On Melissus 975b1-4