18470
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Maybe truth-making is an unanalysable primitive, but we can specify principles for it [Smith,B]
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Full Idea:
The signs are that truth-making is not analysable in terms of anything more primitive, but we need to be able to say more than just that. So we ought to consider it as specified by principles of truth-making.
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From:
Barry Smith (Truth-maker Realism: response to Gregory [2000], p.20), quoted by Fraser MacBride - Truthmakers 1.5
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A reaction:
This is the axiomatic approach to such problems - treat the target concept as an undefinable, unanalysable primitive, and then give rules for its connections. Maybe all metaphysics should work like that, with a small bunch of primitives.
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10243
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My ontology is quarks etc., classes of such things, classes of such classes etc. [Quine]
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Full Idea:
My tentative ontology continues to consist of quarks and their compounds, also classes of such things, classes of such classes, and so on.
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From:
Willard Quine (Structure and Nature [1992], p.9), quoted by Stewart Shapiro - Philosophy of Mathematics 4.9
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A reaction:
I would call this the Hierarchy of Abstraction (just coined it - what do you think?). Unlike Quine, I don't see why its ontology should include things called 'sets' in addition to the things that make them up.
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