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3 ideas
10744 | Nominalism can reject abstractions, or universals, or sets [Oliver] |
Full Idea: We can say that 'Harvard-nominalism' is the thesis that there are no abstract objects, 'Oz-nominalism' that there are no universals, and Goodman's nominalism rejects entities, such as sets, which fail to obey a certain principle of composition. | |
From: Alex Oliver (The Metaphysics of Properties [1996], §15 n46) | |
A reaction: Personally I'm a Goodman-Harvard-Oz nominalist. What are you rebelling against? What have you got? We've been mesmerized by the workings of our own minds, which are trying to grapple with a purely physical world. |
14596 | Call 'nominalism' the denial of numbers, properties, relations and sets [Dorr] |
Full Idea: Just as there are no numbers or properties, there are no relations (like 'being heavier than' or 'betweenness'), or sets. I will provisionally use 'nominalism' for the conjunction of these four claims. | |
From: Cian Dorr (There Are No Abstract Objects [2008], 1) | |
A reaction: If you are going to be a nominalist, do it properly! My starting point in metaphysics is strong sympathy with this view. Right now [Tues 22nd Nov 2011, 10:57 am GMT] I think it is correct. |
14597 | Natural Class Nominalism says there are primitive classes of things resembling in one respect [Dorr] |
Full Idea: Natural Class Nominalists take as primitive the notion of a 'natural' class - a class of things that all resemble one another in some one respect and resemble nothing else in that respect. | |
From: Cian Dorr (There Are No Abstract Objects [2008], 4) | |
A reaction: Dorr rejects this view because he doesn't believe in 'classes'. How committed to classes do you have to be before you are permitted to talk about them? All vocabulary (such as 'resemble') seems metaphysically tainted in this area. |