display all the ideas for this combination of texts
2 ideas
18957 | Nominalism only makes sense if it is materialist [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Nominalists must at heart be materialists, or so it seems to me: otherwise their scruples are unintelligible. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Philosophy of Logic [1971], Ch.5) | |
A reaction: This is modern nominalism - the rejection of abstract objects. I largely plead guilty to both charges. |
9006 | Commitment to universals is as arbitrary or pragmatic as the adoption of a new system of bookkeeping [Quine] |
Full Idea: One's hypothesis as to there being universals is at bottom just as arbitrary or pragmatic a matter as one's adoption of a new brand of set theory or even a new system of bookkeeping. | |
From: Willard Quine (Carnap and Logical Truth [1954], x) | |
A reaction: This spells out clearly the strongly pragmatist vein in Quine's thinking. |