Mathematical Thought and Its Objects
Author | : Charles Parsons |
Publisher | : |
Total Pages | : 378 |
Release | : 2008 |
ISBN-10 | : 1107172705 |
ISBN-13 | : 9781107172708 |
Rating | : 4/5 (708 Downloads) |
Download or read book Mathematical Thought and Its Objects written by Charles Parsons and published by . This book was released on 2008 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Charles Parsons examines the notion of object, with the aim to navigate between nominalism, denying that distinctively mathematical objects exist, and forms of Platonism that postulate a transcendent realm of such objects. He introduces the central mathematical notion of structure and defends a version of the structuralist view of mathematical objects, according to which their existence is relative to a structure and they have no more of a 'nature' than that confers on them. Parsons also analyzes the concept of intuition and presents a conception of it distantly inspired by that of Kant, which describes a basic kind of access to abstract objects and an element of a first conception of the infinite.