Combining Texts

Ideas for 'works', 'Logic in Mathematics' and 'The Human Animal'

unexpand these ideas     |    start again     |     choose another area for these texts

display all the ideas for this combination of texts

---

3 ideas

9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 3. Unity Problems / e. Vague objects

9388	Every concept must have a sharp boundary; we cannot allow an indeterminate third case [Frege]
	Full Idea: Of any concept, we must require that it have a sharp boundary. Of any object it must hold either that it falls under the concept or it does not. We may not allow a third case in which it is somehow indeterminate whether an object falls under a concept.
	From: Gottlob Frege (Logic in Mathematics [1914], p.229), quoted by Ian Rumfitt - The Logic of Boundaryless Concepts p.1 n1
	A reaction: This is the voice of the classical logician, which has echoed by Russell. I'm with them, I think, in the sense that logic can only work with precise concepts. The jury is still out. Maybe we can 'precisify', without achieving total precision.

9. Objects / C. Structure of Objects / 2. Hylomorphism / a. Hylomorphism

13276	The unmoved mover and the soul show Aristotelian form as the ultimate mereological atom [Aristotle, by Koslicki]
	Full Idea: Aristotle's discussion of the unmoved mover and of the soul confirms the suspicion that form, when it is not thought of as the object represented in a definition, plays the role of the ultimate mereological atom within his system.
	From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 6.6
	A reaction: Aristotle is concerned with which things are 'divisible', and he cites these two examples as indivisible, but they may be too unusual to offer an actual theory of how Aristotle builds up wholes from atoms. He denies atoms in matter.

9. Objects / C. Structure of Objects / 2. Hylomorphism / d. Form as unifier

13277	The 'form' is the recipe for building wholes of a particular kind [Aristotle, by Koslicki]
	Full Idea: Thus in Aristotle we may think of an object's formal components as a sort of recipe for how to build wholes of that particular kind.
	From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 7.2.5
	A reaction: In the elusive business of pinning down what Aristotle means by the crucial idea of 'form', this analogy strikes me as being quite illuminating. It would fit DNA in living things, and the design of an artifact.