Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Epistemic and Metaphysical Possibility', 'Review of Chihara 'Struct. Accnt of Maths'' and 'Russell's Ontological Development'

expand these ideas     |    start again     |     specify just one area for these texts


10 ideas

2. Reason / D. Definition / 12. Paraphrase
Russell offered a paraphrase of definite description, to avoid the commitment to objects [Quine]
6. Mathematics / B. Foundations for Mathematics / 6. Mathematics as Set Theory / a. Mathematics is set theory
Set theory is the standard background for modern mathematics [Burgess]
6. Mathematics / B. Foundations for Mathematics / 7. Mathematical Structuralism / a. Structuralism
Structuralists take the name 'R' of the reals to be a variable ranging over structures, not a structure [Burgess]
There is no one relation for the real number 2, as relations differ in different models [Burgess]
6. Mathematics / B. Foundations for Mathematics / 7. Mathematical Structuralism / e. Structuralism critique
If set theory is used to define 'structure', we can't define set theory structurally [Burgess]
Abstract algebra concerns relations between models, not common features of all the models [Burgess]
How can mathematical relations be either internal, or external, or intrinsic? [Burgess]
10. Modality / A. Necessity / 6. Logical Necessity
Logical necessity is epistemic necessity, which is the old notion of a priori [Edgington, by McFetridge]
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 7. Meaning Holism / a. Sentence meaning
Taking sentences as the unit of meaning makes useful paraphrasing possible [Quine]
Knowing a word is knowing the meanings of sentences which contain it [Quine]