Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Precis of 'Limits of Abstraction'', 'Pragmatism and Objective Truth' and 'Can there be Vague Objects?'

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14 ideas

2. Reason / D. Definition / 2. Aims of Definition
Definitions concern how we should speak, not how things are [Fine,K]
3. Truth / E. Pragmatic Truth / 1. Pragmatic Truth
Does the pragmatic theory of meaning support objective truth, or make it impossible? [Macbeth]
6. Mathematics / B. Foundations for Mathematics / 5. Definitions of Number / b. Greek arithmetic
Greek mathematics is wholly sensory, where ours is wholly inferential [Macbeth]
6. Mathematics / B. Foundations for Mathematics / 5. Definitions of Number / d. Hume's Principle
If Hume's Principle can define numbers, we needn't worry about its truth [Fine,K]
Hume's Principle is either adequate for number but fails to define properly, or vice versa [Fine,K]
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 10. Vagueness / b. Vagueness of reality
Evans argues (falsely!) that a contradiction follows from treating objects as vague [Evans, by Lowe]
Is it coherent that reality is vague, identities can be vague, and objects can have fuzzy boundaries? [Evans]
Evans assumes there can be vague identity statements, and that his proof cannot be right [Evans, by Lewis]
There clearly are vague identity statements, and Evans's argument has a false conclusion [Evans, by Lewis]
9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 3. Unity Problems / e. Vague objects
If a=b is indeterminate, then a=/=b, and so there cannot be indeterminate identity [Evans, by Thomasson]
9. Objects / F. Identity among Objects / 6. Identity between Objects
There can't be vague identity; a and b must differ, since a, unlike b, is only vaguely the same as b [Evans, by PG]
14. Science / B. Scientific Theories / 1. Scientific Theory
Seeing reality mathematically makes it an object of thought, not of experience [Macbeth]
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 1. Concepts / a. Nature of concepts
For pragmatists a concept means its consequences [Macbeth]
18. Thought / E. Abstraction / 7. Abstracta by Equivalence
An abstraction principle should not 'inflate', producing more abstractions than objects [Fine,K]