30 ideas
20768 | Like spiderswebs, dialectical arguments are clever but useless [Ariston, by Diog. Laertius] |
9921 | 'True' is only occasionally useful, as in 'everything Fermat believed was true' [Burgess/Rosen] |
9924 | Modal logic gives an account of metalogical possibility, not metaphysical possibility [Burgess/Rosen] |
10301 | The axiom of choice is controversial, but it could be replaced [Shapiro] |
9933 | The paradoxes are only a problem for Frege; Cantor didn't assume every condition determines a set [Burgess/Rosen] |
9928 | Mereology implies that acceptance of entities entails acceptance of conglomerates [Burgess/Rosen] |
10588 | First-order logic is Complete, and Compact, with the Löwenheim-Skolem Theorems [Shapiro] |
10298 | Some say that second-order logic is mathematics, not logic [Shapiro] |
10299 | If the aim of logic is to codify inferences, second-order logic is useless [Shapiro] |
10300 | Logical consequence can be defined in terms of the logical terminology [Shapiro] |
9926 | A relation is either a set of sets of sets, or a set of sets [Burgess/Rosen] |
10290 | Second-order variables also range over properties, sets, relations or functions [Shapiro] |
10297 | The Löwenheim-Skolem theorem seems to be a defect of first-order logic [Shapiro] |
10590 | Up Löwenheim-Skolem: if natural numbers satisfy wffs, then an infinite domain satisfies them [Shapiro] |
10292 | Downward Löwenheim-Skolem: if there's an infinite model, there is a countable model [Shapiro] |
10296 | The Löwenheim-Skolem Theorems fail for second-order languages with standard semantics [Shapiro] |
9932 | The paradoxes no longer seem crucial in critiques of set theory [Burgess/Rosen] |
9923 | We should talk about possible existence, rather than actual existence, of numbers [Burgess/Rosen] |
10294 | Second-order logic has the expressive power for mathematics, but an unworkable model theory [Shapiro] |
9925 | Structuralism and nominalism are normally rivals, but might work together [Burgess/Rosen] |
9934 | Number words became nouns around the time of Plato [Burgess/Rosen] |
9918 | Abstract/concrete is a distinction of kind, not degree [Burgess/Rosen] |
9929 | Much of what science says about concrete entities is 'abstraction-laden' [Burgess/Rosen] |
9927 | Mathematics has ascended to higher and higher levels of abstraction [Burgess/Rosen] |
9930 | Abstraction is on a scale, of sets, to attributes, to type-formulas, to token-formulas [Burgess/Rosen] |
10591 | Logicians use 'property' and 'set' interchangeably, with little hanging on it [Shapiro] |
9919 | The old debate classified representations as abstract, not entities [Burgess/Rosen] |
3049 | The chief good is indifference to what lies midway between virtue and vice [Ariston, by Diog. Laertius] |
3549 | Ariston says rules are useless for the virtuous and the non-virtuous [Ariston, by Annas] |
9922 | If space is really just a force-field, then it is a physical entity [Burgess/Rosen] |