18253
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I wish to go straight from cardinals to reals (as ratios), leaving out the rationals [Frege]
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Full Idea:
You need a double transition, from cardinal numbes (Anzahlen) to the rational numbers, and from the latter to the real numbers generally. I wish to go straight from the cardinal numbers to the real numbers as ratios of quantities.
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From:
Gottlob Frege (Letters to Russell [1902], 1903.05.21), quoted by Michael Dummett - Frege philosophy of mathematics 21 'Frege's'
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A reaction:
Note that Frege's real numbers are not quantities, but ratios of quantities. In this way the same real number can refer to lengths, masses, intensities etc.
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18269
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Logical objects are extensions of concepts, or ranges of values of functions [Frege]
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Full Idea:
How are we to conceive of logical objects? My only answer is, we conceive of them as extensions of concepts or, more generally, as ranges of values of functions ...what other way is there?
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From:
Gottlob Frege (Letters to Russell [1902], 1902.07.28), quoted by J. Alberto Coffa - The Semantic Tradition from Kant to Carnap 7 epigr
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A reaction:
This is the clearest statement I have found of what Frege means by an 'object'. But an extension is a collection of things, so an object is a group treated as a unity, which is generally how we understand a 'set'. Hence Quine's ontology.
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20166
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A man is a responsible agent to the extent he has an intention, and knows what he is doing [Hampshire]
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Full Idea:
A man becomes more and more a free and responsible agent the more he at all times knows what he is doing, in every sense of this phrase, and the more he acts with a definite and clearly formed intention.
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From:
Stuart Hampshire (Thought and Responsibility [1960], p.178), quoted by John Kekes - The Human Condition 07.1
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A reaction:
Kekes quote this (along with Frankfurt, Hart etc) as the 'received view' of responsibility, which he attacks.
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