display all the ideas for this combination of texts
1 idea
| 16260 | Existence of universals may just be decided by acceptance, or not, of second-order logic [Maudlin] |
| Full Idea: On one line of thought, the question of whether universals exist seems to reduce to the question of the utility, or necessity, of using second-order rather than first-order logic. | |
| From: Tim Maudlin (The Metaphysics within Physics [2007], 3.1) | |
| A reaction: Second-order logic quantifies over properties, where first-order logic just quantifies over objects. This is an extreme example of doing your metaphysics largely through logic. Not my approach. |