Quine

For this session, we will answer the title’s question with the short and sweet: John P. Burgess’s Why I Am Not a Nominalist, a broad overview against various forms of nominalism.

Burgess responds to nominalist attempts to dispense with abstract objects in mathematical and scientific discourse, challenging both instrumentalist and reconstructionist forms of nominalism, among other; arguing that they fail to provide a viable alternative to the standard use of mathematics in science. He maintans that nominalism, rather than Platonism, bears the real “burden of proof”. His critique adresses Goodman, Quine, and Field, among others.

Tibo will give a short presentation supporting the (in)famous Quine thesis that SOL is in reality ST, followed by a debate. The rules will be uploaded in due time.

Slides used during the presentation are available here (link now unfortunately broken).

Suggested Bibliography (They are freely accessible from your UvA student account)

• Quine W.V.O., Philosophy of Logic (2nd Edition), Chapter 5: ‘The Scope of Logic’, Harvard University Press, 1986. [PDF accessible from the UvA Library]