Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Mathematics without Numbers', 'Has Philosophy Lost Contact with People?' and 'Semantics for Natural Languages'

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7 ideas

1. Philosophy / A. Wisdom / 3. Wisdom Deflated
Inspiration and social improvement need wisdom, but not professional philosophy [Quine]
1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 6. Hopes for Philosophy
For a good theory of the world, we must focus on our flabby foundational vocabulary [Quine]
6. Mathematics / B. Foundations for Mathematics / 7. Mathematical Structuralism / c. Nominalist structuralism
Modal structuralism says mathematics studies possible structures, which may or may not be actualised [Hellman, by Friend]
Statements of pure mathematics are elliptical for a sort of modal conditional [Hellman, by Chihara]
Modal structuralism can only judge possibility by 'possible' models [Shapiro on Hellman]
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 4. Meaning as Truth-Conditions
Davidson rejected ordinary meaning, and just used truth and reference instead [Davidson, by Soames]
Davidson aimed to show that language is structured by first-order logic [Davidson, by Smart]