Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'works', 'Dthat' and 'The Psychophysical Nexus'

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4 ideas

5. Theory of Logic / D. Assumptions for Logic / 2. Excluded Middle

15941	For intuitionists excluded middle is an outdated historical convention [Brouwer]
	Full Idea: From the intuitionist standpoint the dogma of the universal validity of the principle of excluded third in mathematics can only be considered as a phenomenon of history of civilization, like the rationality of pi or rotation of the sky about the earth.
	From: Luitzen E.J. Brouwer (works [1930]), quoted by Shaughan Lavine - Understanding the Infinite VI.2
	A reaction: [Brouwer 1952:510-11]

6. Mathematics / A. Nature of Mathematics / 3. Nature of Numbers / h. Reals from Cauchy

18247	Brouwer saw reals as potential, not actual, and produced by a rule, or a choice [Brouwer, by Shapiro]
	Full Idea: In his early writing, Brouwer took a real number to be a Cauchy sequence determined by a rule. Later he augmented rule-governed sequences with free-choice sequences, but even then the attitude is that Cauchy sequences are potential, not actual infinities.
	From: report of Luitzen E.J. Brouwer (works [1930]) by Stewart Shapiro - Philosophy of Mathematics 6.6
	A reaction: This is the 'constructivist' view of numbers, as espoused by intuitionists like Brouwer.

7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 5. Supervenience / c. Significance of supervenience

4242	Pure supervenience explains nothing, and is a sign of something fundamental we don't know [Nagel]
	Full Idea: Pure, unexplained supervenience is never a solution to a problem but a sign that there is something fundamental we don't know.
	From: Thomas Nagel (The Psychophysical Nexus [2000], §III)
	A reaction: This seems right. It is not a theory or an explanation, merely the observation of a correlation which will require explanation. Why are they correlated?

19. Language / B. Reference / 3. Direct Reference / b. Causal reference

14080	Are causal descriptions part of the causal theory of reference, or are they just metasemantic? [Kaplan, by Schaffer,J]
	Full Idea: Kaplan notes that the causal theory of reference can be understood in two quite different ways, as part of the semantics (involving descriptions of causal processes), or as metasemantics, explaining why a term has the referent it does.
	From: report of David Kaplan (Dthat [1970]) by Jonathan Schaffer - Deflationary Metaontology of Thomasson 1
	A reaction: [Kaplan 'Afterthought' 1989] The theory tends to be labelled as 'direct' rather than as 'causal' these days, but causal chains are still at the heart of the story (even if more diffused socially). Nice question. Kaplan takes the meta- version as orthodox.