9224
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Proceduralism offers a version of logicism with no axioms, or objects, or ontological commitment [Fine,K]
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Full Idea:
My Proceduralism offers axiom-free foundations for mathematics. Axioms give way to the stipulation of procedures. We obtain a form of logicism, but with a procedural twist, and with a logic which is ontologically neutral, and no assumption of objects.
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From:
Kit Fine (Our Knowledge of Mathematical Objects [2005], 1)
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A reaction:
[See Ideas 9222 and 9223 for his Proceduralism] Sounds like philosophical heaven. We get to take charge of mathematics, without the embarrassment of declaring ourselves to be platonists. Someone, not me, should evaluate this.
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9223
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My Proceduralism has one simple rule, and four complex rules [Fine,K]
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Full Idea:
My Proceduralism has one simple rule (introduce an object), and four complex rules: Composition (combining two procedures), Conditionality (if A, do B), Universality (do a procedure for every x), and Iteration (rule to keep doing B).
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From:
Kit Fine (Our Knowledge of Mathematical Objects [2005], 1)
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A reaction:
It sounds like a highly artificial and private game which Fine has invented, but he claims that this is the sort of thing that practising mathematicians have always done.
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11214
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We learn 'not' along with affirmation, by learning to either affirm or deny a sentence [Rumfitt]
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Full Idea:
The standard view is that affirming not-A is more complex than affirming the atomic sentence A itself, with the latter determining its sense. But we could learn 'not' directly, by learning at once how to either affirm A or reject A.
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From:
Ian Rumfitt ("Yes" and "No" [2000], IV)
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A reaction:
[compressed] This seems fairly anti-Fregean in spirit, because it looks at the psychology of how we learn 'not' as a way of clarifying what we mean by it, rather than just looking at its logical behaviour (and thus giving it a secondary role).
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16709
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Some people return to scholastic mysterious qualities, disguising them as 'forces' [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
It pleases others to return to occult qualities or scholastic faculties, but since these crude philosophers and physicians see that those terms are in bad repute they change their name, calling them 'forces'.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (Against Barbaric physics [1716], A&G:313), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 19.7
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A reaction:
Deceptive, because Leibniz embraced forces in his revised Aristotelian essentialism. Leibniz placed forces within essences, and he is worried about forces as separate entities, unsupported by any substance.
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