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2 ideas
12217 | For ontology we need, not internal or external views, but a view from outside reality [Fine,K] |
Full Idea: We need to straddle both of Carnap's internal and external views. It is only by standing outside of reality that we are able to occupy a standpoint from which the constitution of reality can be adequately described. | |
From: Kit Fine (The Question of Ontology [2009], p.174) | |
A reaction: See Idea 4840! I thoroughly approve of this idea, which almost amounts to a Credo for the modern metaphysician. Since we can think outside our room, or our country, or our era, or our solar system, I think we can do what Fine is demanding. |
12213 | Ontological claims are often universal, and not a matter of existential quantification [Fine,K] |
Full Idea: I suggest we give up on the account of ontological claims in terms of existential quantification. The commitment to the integers is not an existential but a universal commitment, to each of the integers, not to some integer or other. | |
From: Kit Fine (The Question of Ontology [2009], p.167) | |
A reaction: In classical logic it is only the existential quantifier which requires the domain to be populated, so Fine is more or less giving up on classical logic as a tool for doing ontology (apparently?). |