Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Letters to a German Princess', 'The Evolution of Physics' and 'Whitehead and the Rise of Modern Logic'

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4 ideas

5. Theory of Logic / A. Overview of Logic / 7. Second-Order Logic

13639	Quine says higher-order items are intensional, and lack a clearly defined identity relation [Quine, by Shapiro]
	Full Idea: Quine (in 1941) attacked 'Principia Mathematica' because the items in the range of higher-order variables (attributes etc) are intensional and thus do not have a clearly defined identity relation.
	From: report of Willard Quine (Whitehead and the Rise of Modern Logic [1941]) by Stewart Shapiro - Foundations without Foundationalism 1.3

6. Mathematics / C. Sources of Mathematics / 6. Logicism / b. Type theory

21557	Russell confused use and mention, and reduced classes to properties, not to language [Quine, by Lackey]
	Full Idea: Quine (1941) said that Russell had confused use and mention, and thus thought he had reduced classes to linguistic entities, while in fact he reduced them only to Platonic properties.
	From: report of Willard Quine (Whitehead and the Rise of Modern Logic [1941]) by Douglas Lackey - Intros to Russell's 'Essays in Analysis' p.133
	A reaction: This is cited as the 'orthodox critical interpretation' of Russell and Whitehead. Confusion of use and mention was a favourite charge of Quine's.

26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 1. Laws of Nature

5467	Euler said nature is instrinsically passive, and minds cause change [Euler, by Ellis]
	Full Idea: Euler thought the powers necessary for the maintenance of the changing universe would turn out to be just the passive ones of inertia and impenetrability. There are no active powers, he urged, other than those of God and living beings.
	From: report of Leonhard Euler (Letters to a German Princess [1765]) by Brian Ellis - The Philosophy of Nature: new essentialism Ch.4
	A reaction: Very significant, I think, for revealing the religious framework behind early theories of natural laws. If there is nothing external to impose powers and movements on nature, the source must be sought within - hence essentialism.

27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 2. Electrodynamics / b. Fields

18202	The concept of a field gradually replaced the substances in explaining relations between charges [Einstein/Infeld]
	Full Idea: In the beginning the field concept was no more than a means of facilitating the understanding of phenomena. ...In the new field language it is the field and not the charges themselves which is essential. The substance was overshadowed by the field.
	From: Einstein,A/Infeld,L (The Evolution of Physics [1938], p.151), quoted by Penelope Maddy - Naturalism in Mathematics II.4
	A reaction: This is very important for philosophical metaphysicians, especially those like me who want to explain the universe by the nature of the stuff that composes it. The 'stuff' had better not be simplistic individual 'substances'.