6408
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Russell needed three extra axioms to reduce maths to logic: infinity, choice and reducibility [Grayling]
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Full Idea:
In order to deduce the theorems of mathematics from purely logical axioms, Russell had to add three new axioms to those of standards logic, which were: the axiom of infinity, the axiom of choice, and the axiom of reducibility.
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From:
A.C. Grayling (Russell [1996], Ch.2)
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A reaction:
The third one was adopted to avoid his 'barber' paradox, but many thinkers do not accept it. The interesting question is why anyone would 'accept' or 'reject' an axiom.
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5845
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Niceratus learnt the whole of Homer by heart, as a guide to goodness [Xenophon]
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Full Idea:
Niceratus said that his father, because he was concerned to make him a good man, made him learn the whole works of Homer, and he could still repeat by heart the entire 'Iliad' and 'Odyssey'.
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From:
Xenophon (Symposium [c.391 BCE], 3.5)
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A reaction:
This clearly shows the status which Homer had in the teaching of morality in the time of Socrates, and it is precisely this acceptance of authority which he was challenging, in his attempts to analyse the true basis of virtue
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