Are you a platonist or a nominalist? Explain why.
Platonism is codeword for postmodernism.
>>8079702
the exact opposite. Undergraduates trike again !
>>8079702
How's that?
>This is called deflationary nominalism. Another popular form of nominalism is fictionalism, which evaluates P(a) in "as if" fashion of fictional narratives, similar to "Pegasus is a flying horse" being true-according-to-Greek-mythology despite the non-existence of Pegasus or flying horses.
I'm an intuitionist.
t. L.E.J.B.
>>8079708
So, are mathematical systems true according to the human race or do they have an existence of their own?
>>8079693
>nominalist
>limiting to two choices.
Plato was a metaphysicalist, shadow starer, religious commie.
Socratic Purist, Epistemologist, Empiricist, Cynic, Stoic and part time space case.
Both Plato and the Sophists were wrong. Plato thinks that, since givens can't be proven, they must be in a place where they can't be sensed, but since they make their presence known by their effect, then they must be real.
The Sophist (what we know of them) believed that the mind determines what we see, and that the universe is therefore up to what our desires are which determine what we can see.
Both are wrong. The world is; we make a picture of it in our mind, but the process that makes up that narrative has things it adds and things it filters which makes us think things are real that aren't, and ignore things that are that don't fit. The only way to resolve these perspective and objective conflicts, and the non-existence of the tools we use to make up the story - purpose, cause and effect, and statistical inference - is to make the narrative the thing that is not real, and the world unknowable. Once you can do that, you can find things useful to be believed, and pretend that the narrative is the world, until that narrative no longer fits, and a better one comes along.
That is called Pragmatism.
>>8079852
The reason people get so confused is that they don't understand the narrative process. The meta-narrative has a model where the brain is a sense organ that can sense itself, then sense itself sensing itself. This creates iterative loops where our definitions are circular in that they reinforce themselves. Since the narrative can be updated by the senses AND updated by the narrative itself, this creates a non-linear iteration that cannot be reversed.
The only thing that can be done to correct iterations that lead to conclusions that are false is to make a paradigm shift, which is a reordering of the iteration of iterations under a new intent. The narrative then can adopt new objects, new perspective, new filters, and create new objects that are made in the narrative to represent things that don't exist in the world.
The narrative itself does not exist in the world. This is the hardest concept, because you can't not have a narrative. The narrative is all we have, even simple senses are created from comparisons from one moment to the next, all ties together into pathways that are reinforced with use.
So pragmatists simply find it useful to be believed that that narrative has no existence in the sense that it has energy or mass, and that configuration is just an output of the brain with no existence of its own.
>>8079864
Virtually all question of philosophy are the mistake of using the narrative process on itself. So even though purpose does not exist, we ask if the world has a purpose. And even though cause and effect don't exist, we ask if the world is determined or if it has free will. And even though the objects and perspective we make up that can't possible be corroborated are taken as real, we equivocate existence and ask where they are, creating whole other universes where decisions lead to anything else.
The world is indistinguishable from a narrative of randomness unless there is a narrative with an intent.
All of pragmatism is a narrative, and it is the only philosophy that recognizes this paradox. But then all narratives are paradox in one of its forms. This is true of all iterative processes; the output is defined by the input that defines the output. The limitation is in the narrative, not the world. There is no paradox in the world.
But then again, the world is. It has no reason to be anything else, and has no reason to corroborate its own existence. That is our job.
>>8079693
>>8079719
Mathematics exists on its own and true in every sense. For example, mathematics in any fictional universe can have its unique physics but mathematics must be as our universe's.
>>8079924
>true in every sense
nice spook
>>8079889
>plug a chicken
took me way too long to realize the author misspelled "pluck".
>>8079889
>Plato was discoursing on his theory of ideas and, pointing to the cups on the table before him, said while there are many cups in the world, there is only one ‘idea’ of a cup, and this cupness precedes the existence of all particular cups.
>“I can see the cup on the table,” interrupted Diogenes, “but I can’t see the ‘cupness’.”
>"That's because you have the eyes to see the cup," said Plato, "but", tapping his head with his forefinger, "you don't have the intellect with which to comprehend ‘cupness’.”
>Diogenes walked up to the table, examined a cup and, looking inside, asked, "Is it empty?"
>Plato nodded.
>“Where is the ‘emptiness’ which precedes this empty cup?” asked Diogenes.
>Plato allowed himself a few moments to collect his thoughts, but Diogenes reached over and, tapping Plato's head with his finger, said “I think you will find here is the ‘emptiness’.”
>>8079924
Triangles and unicorns are the same thing, except triangles are easier to to study and more applicable than unicorns.
The construct of triangles yield new properties of this construct, while unicorn properties have to be bullshitted, but if somehow the definition of a unicorn would reveal its biology it would be easy to apply to mammalian biology.
>unicorn
>horse with a horn
this yields no information, to know more about it you have to know more about horses.
>triangle
>3 straight lines that meet at 3 different point
this yields, that all the angles add up to 180 degrees, a^2+b^2=c^2, etc.
since a lot of triangle like objects exists in our world the study of triangles is very useful.
keep in mind that such platonic things as numbers and triangles don't exists in "reality"
>>8080056
>3 straight lines that meet at 3 different point
this yields no information, to know more about it you have to know more about straightness, lines, meeting, quantities, and points.
Also, you definition of a unicorn is deliberately vague.
>>8080066
>to know more about it you have to know more about straightness, lines, meeting, quantities, and points.
Hilbert pls
but do you get the idea that this simple definition leads to new results? Axiomatic mathematics.
I'm pretty sure my definition of a unicorn is spot on, as is my definition of a triangle.
the difference is that I don't know how a unicorn digests food by my definition, but by using logic on the triangle's definition I can better define it.
another point is that I have to study the real thing(horses) to know about unicorns, but studying triangles can be done with only the definition that exists. And it was easier for the ancients to contemplate math than it was for them to contemplate biology.
It is kind of ridiculous to assume anything is pan-universal, such as our logic which is the basis of math. I think there are some theories out there about universes where our logic does not apply.
>>8080095
>but by using logic on the triangle's definition I can better define it.
By using logic and several other definitions, sure.
>Axiomatic mathematics.
But muh Gödel's incompleteness theorems!
>the ancients
I don't follow.
I'm willing to have the conversation with you, but where are you trying to go with it?
>>8079693
The need to constantly categorize everything, including ourselves, is one of the reasons Western civilizations are so easily manipulated.
It's also the reason hipsters exist - they try to redefine themselves externally through pop-culture, just as you are doing now (albeit in a very different cultural niche).
>>8079693
Formalist here. Thinking math has any inherent existence outside of math itself is hilariously deluded.
>>8079702
MATHEMATICS FOR THE MATHEMATICIANS, PSYCHOLOGY FOR THE PSYCHOLOGISTS, PHILOSOPHY FOR EVERYBODY! Everybody says there is a SUBJECTIVITY problem. Everybody says that this SUBJECTIVITY problem will be solved when postmodernists pour into EVERY subfield of philosophy and ONLY philosophy.
Metaphysics and ethics are just as legitimate as number theory or microbiology, but nobody says number theory or microbiology will solve the SUBJECTIVITY problem by bringing in hundreds of postmodernists to "validate" them.
What if I said there was a SUBJECTIVITY problem and this SUBJECTIVITY problem would only be solved by bringing hundreds of philosophers into EVERY comparative literature department and ONLY comparative literature departments? How long would it take anyone to realize I’m not talking about a SUBJECTIVITY problem. I am talking about the Final solution to the PHILOSOPHY problem?
But if I tell that obvious truth about the ongoing program of paradigm shift in my field, pseudointellectuals and respectable scientists all agree that I am a nihilistwhowantstoacceptsixmillionperspectives.
They say they are Platonist. What they are is postmodernist. Platonism is a code word for Postmodernism.
>>8080395
I can't believe I laughed so much at that pic.
>>8081103
Ayyyyyyyyyy lmao
>>8080051
#REKT
>>8080051
Sick burn, diogenital
