26 ideas
| 10676 | The Axiom of Choice is a non-logical principle of set-theory [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: The Axiom of Choice seems better treated as a non-logical principle of set-theory. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 4 n8) | |
| A reaction: This reinforces the idea that set theory is not part of logic (and so pure logicism had better not depend on set theory). |
| 10686 | The Axiom of Choice guarantees a one-one correspondence from sets to ordinals [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: We cannot explicitly define one-one correspondence from the sets to the ordinals (because there is no explicit well-ordering of R). Nevertheless, the Axiom of Choice guarantees that a one-one correspondence does exist, even if we cannot define it. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 10) |
| 10687 | Maybe we reduce sets to ordinals, rather than the other way round [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: We might reduce sets to ordinal numbers, thereby reversing the standard set-theoretical reduction of ordinals to sets. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 10) | |
| A reaction: He has demonstrated that there are as many ordinals as there are sets. |
| 10677 | Extensional mereology needs two definitions and two axioms [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: Extensional mereology defs: 'distinct' things have no parts in common; a 'fusion' has some things all of which are parts, with no further parts. Axioms: (transitivity) a part of a part is part of the whole; (sums) any things have a unique fusion. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 5) |
| 10671 | Plural definite descriptions pick out the largest class of things that fit the description [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: If we extend the power of language with plural definite descriptions, these would pick out the largest class of things that fit the description. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 3) |
| 10666 | Plural reference will refer to complex facts without postulating complex things [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: It may be that plural reference gives atomism the resources to state complex facts without needing to refer to complex things. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 1) | |
| A reaction: This seems the most interesting metaphysical implication of the possibility of plural quantification. |
| 10669 | Plural reference is just an abbreviation when properties are distributive, but not otherwise [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: If all properties are distributive, plural reference is just a handy abbreviation to avoid repetition (as in 'A and B are hungry', to avoid 'A is hungry and B is hungry'), but not all properties are distributive (as in 'some people surround a table'). | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 2) | |
| A reaction: The characteristic examples to support plural quantification involve collective activity and relations, which might be weeded out of our basic ontology, thus leaving singular quantification as sufficient. |
| 10675 | A plural comprehension principle says there are some things one of which meets some condition [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: Singular comprehension principles have a bad reputation, but the plural comprehension principle says that given a condition on individuals, there are some things such that something is one of them iff it meets the condition. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 4) |
| 10673 | Plural language can discuss without inconsistency things that are not members of themselves [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: In a plural language we can discuss without fear of inconsistency the things that are not members of themselves. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 4) | |
| A reaction: [see Hossack for details] |
| 10680 | The theory of the transfinite needs the ordinal numbers [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: The theory of the transfinite needs the ordinal numbers. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 8) |
| 10684 | I take the real numbers to be just lengths [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: I take the real numbers to be just lengths. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 9) | |
| A reaction: I love it. Real numbers are beginning to get on my nerves. They turn up to the party with no invitation and improperly dressed, and then refuse to give their names when challenged. |
| 10674 | A plural language gives a single comprehensive induction axiom for arithmetic [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: A language with plurals is better for arithmetic. Instead of a first-order fragment expressible by an induction schema, we have the complete truth with a plural induction axiom, beginning 'If there are some numbers...'. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 4) |
| 10681 | In arithmetic singularists need sets as the instantiator of numeric properties [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: In arithmetic singularists need sets as the instantiator of numeric properties. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 8) |
| 10685 | Set theory is the science of infinity [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: Set theory is the science of infinity. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 10) |
| 10668 | We are committed to a 'group' of children, if they are sitting in a circle [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: By Quine's test of ontological commitment, if some children are sitting in a circle, no individual child can sit in a circle, so a singular paraphrase will have us committed to a 'group' of children. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 2) | |
| A reaction: Nice of why Quine is committed to the existence of sets. Hossack offers plural quantification as a way of avoiding commitment to sets. But is 'sitting in a circle' a real property (in the Shoemaker sense)? I can sit in a circle without realising it. |
| 10664 | Complex particulars are either masses, or composites, or sets [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: Complex particulars are of at least three types: masses (which sum, of which we do not ask 'how many?' but 'how much?'); composite individuals (how many?, and summing usually fails); and sets (only divisible one way, unlike composites). | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 1) | |
| A reaction: A composite pile of grains of sand gradually becomes a mass, and drops of water become 'water everywhere'. A set of people divides into individual humans, but redescribe the elements as the union of males and females? |
| 10678 | The relation of composition is indispensable to the part-whole relation for individuals [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: The relation of composition seems to be indispensable in a correct account of the part-whole relation for individuals. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 7) | |
| A reaction: This is the culmination of a critical discussion of mereology and ontological atomism. At first blush it doesn't look as if 'composition' has much chance of being a precise notion, and it will be plagued with vagueness. |
| 10665 | Leibniz's Law argues against atomism - water is wet, unlike water molecules [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: We can employ Leibniz's Law against mereological atomism. Water is wet, but no water molecule is wet. The set of infinite numbers is infinite, but no finite number is infinite. ..But with plural reference the atomist can resist this argument. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 1) | |
| A reaction: The idea of plural reference is to state plural facts without referring to complex things, which is interesting. The general idea is that we have atomism, and then all the relations, unities, identities etc. are in the facts, not in the things. I like it. |
| 10682 | The fusion of five rectangles can decompose into more than five parts that are rectangles [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: The fusion of five rectangles may have a decomposition into more than five parts that are rectangles. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 8) |
| 10663 | A thought can refer to many things, but only predicate a universal and affirm a state of affairs [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: A thought can refer to a particular or a universal or a state of affairs, but it can predicate only a universal and it can affirm only a state of affairs. | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 1) | |
| A reaction: Hossack is summarising Armstrong's view, which he is accepting. To me, 'thought' must allow for animals, unlike language. I think Hossack's picture is much too clear-cut. Do animals grasp universals? Doubtful. Can they predicate? Yes. |
| 23035 | The good life aims at perfections, or absolute laws, or what is absolutely desirable [Green,TH] |
| Full Idea: The differentia of the good life …is controlled by the consciousness of there being some perfection which has to be fulfilled, some law which has to be obeyed, something absolutely desirable whatever the individual may for the time desire. | |
| From: T.H. Green (Prolegomena to Ethics [1882], p.134), quoted by John H. Muirhead - The Service of the State II | |
| A reaction: The 'perfection' suggests Plato, and the 'law' suggests Kant. The idea that something is 'absolutely desirable' is, I suspect, aimed at the utilitarians, who don't care what is desired. I'm no idealist, but have some sympathy with this idea. |
| 23037 | People are improved by egalitarian institutions and habits [Green,TH] |
| Full Idea: Man has bettered himself through institutions and habits which tend to make the welfare of all the welfare of each. | |
| From: T.H. Green (Prolegomena to Ethics [1882], p.180), quoted by John H. Muirhead - The Service of the State II | |
| A reaction: I like this a lot. We underestimate how the best social values are promoted by the existence of enlightened institutions, rather than by preaching and teaching. Schools, law courts and churche embody their values. |
| 23043 | All talk of the progress of a nation must reduce to the progress of its individual members [Green,TH] |
| Full Idea: Our ultimate standard of worth is an ideal of personal worth. All other values are relative to personal values. To speak of any progress of a nation or society or mankind except as relative to some greater worth of persons is to use words without meaning. | |
| From: T.H. Green (Prolegomena to Ethics [1882], p.193), quoted by John H. Muirhead - The Service of the State II | |
| A reaction: Note that, pre-verificationism, a Victorian talks of plausible words actually being meaningless. This is a good statement of the core doctrine of liberalism. |
| 1748 | Archelaus was the first person to say that the universe is boundless [Archelaus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Archelaus was the first person to say that the universe is boundless. | |
| From: report of Archelaus (fragments/reports [c.450 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 02.Ar.3 |
| 10683 | We could ignore space, and just talk of the shape of matter [Hossack] |
| Full Idea: We might dispense with substantival space, and say that if the distribution of matter in space could have been different, that just means the matter of the Universe could have been shaped differently (with geometry as the science of shapes). | |
| From: Keith Hossack (Plurals and Complexes [2000], 9) |
| 5989 | Archelaus said life began in a primeval slime [Archelaus, by Schofield] |
| Full Idea: Archelaus wrote that life on Earth began in a primeval slime. | |
| From: report of Archelaus (fragments/reports [c.450 BCE]) by Malcolm Schofield - Archelaus | |
| A reaction: This sounds like a fairly clearcut assertion of the production of life by evolution. Darwin's contribution was to propose the mechanism for achieving it. We should honour the name of Archelaus for this idea. |