Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Mahaprajnaparamitashastra', 'Plural Quantification Exposed' and 'Letters to Varignon'

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7 ideas

4. Formal Logic / F. Set Theory ST / 4. Axioms for Sets / n. Axiom of Comprehension
A comprehension axiom is 'predicative' if the formula has no bound second-order variables [Linnebo]
     Full Idea: If φ contains no bound second-order variables, the corresponding comprehension axiom is said to be 'predicative'; otherwise it is 'impredicative'.
     From: Øystein Linnebo (Plural Quantification Exposed [2003], §1)
     A reaction: ['Predicative' roughly means that a new predicate is created, and 'impredicative' means that it just uses existing predicates]
5. Theory of Logic / A. Overview of Logic / 4. Pure Logic
A 'pure logic' must be ontologically innocent, universal, and without presuppositions [Linnebo]
     Full Idea: I offer these three claims as a partial analysis of 'pure logic': ontological innocence (no new entities are introduced), universal applicability (to any realm of discourse), and cognitive primacy (no extra-logical ideas are presupposed).
     From: Øystein Linnebo (Plural Quantification Exposed [2003], §1)
5. Theory of Logic / G. Quantification / 6. Plural Quantification
Plural quantification depends too heavily on combinatorial and set-theoretic considerations [Linnebo]
     Full Idea: If my arguments are correct, the theory of plural quantification has no right to the title 'logic'. ...The impredicative plural comprehension axioms depend too heavily on combinatorial and set-theoretic considerations.
     From: Øystein Linnebo (Plural Quantification Exposed [2003], §4)
Can second-order logic be ontologically first-order, with all the benefits of second-order? [Linnebo]
     Full Idea: According to its supporters, second-order logic allow us to pay the ontological price of a mere first-order theory and get the corresponding monadic second-order theory for free.
     From: Øystein Linnebo (Plural Quantification Exposed [2003], §0)
9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 1. Physical Objects
The modern concept of an object is rooted in quantificational logic [Linnebo]
     Full Idea: Our modern general concept of an object is given content only in connection with modern quantificational logic.
     From: Øystein Linnebo (Plural Quantification Exposed [2003], §2)
     A reaction: [He mentions Frege, Carnap, Quine and Dummett] This is the first thing to tell beginners in modern analytical metaphysics. The word 'object' is very confusing. I think I prefer 'entity'.
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 3. Virtues / a. Virtues
The six perfections are giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom [Nagarjuna]
     Full Idea: The six perfections are of giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom.
     From: Nagarjuna (Mahaprajnaparamitashastra [c.120], 88)
     A reaction: What is 'morality', if giving is not part of it? I like patience and vigour being two of the virtues, which immediately implies an Aristotelian mean (which is always what is 'appropriate').
27. Natural Reality / G. Biology / 3. Evolution
Men are related to animals, which are related to plants, then to fossils, and then to the apparently inert [Leibniz]
     Full Idea: Men are related to animals, these to plants, and the latter directly to fossils which will be linked in their turn to bodies which the senses and the imagination represent to us as perfectly dead and formless.
     From: Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Varignon [1702], 1702)
     A reaction: Leibniz would be a bit surprised to find the way in which this has turned out to be largely true, since he is basing it on his picture of a hierarchy of monads. Nevertheless, the idea that we are all related wasn't invented in 1859.