Single Idea 8998

[catalogued under 5. Theory of Logic / C. Ontology of Logic / 4. Logic by Convention]

Full Idea

If logic and mathematics being true by convention says the primitives can be conventionally described, that works for anything, and is empty; if the conventions are only for those fields, that's uninteresting; if a general practice, that is false.

Gist of Idea

Claims that logic and mathematics are conventional are either empty, uninteresting, or false

Source

Willard Quine (Truth by Convention [1935], p.102)

Book Reference

Quine,Willard: 'Ways of Paradox and other essays' [Harvard 1976], p.102


A Reaction

This is Quine's famous denial of the traditional platonist view, and the new Wittgensteinian conventional view, preparing the ground for a more naturalistic and empirical view. I feel more sympathy with Quine than with the other two.