Greetings all, This coming Monday 31 March current projects resumes after the easter break. 1.00-2.30 in the philosophy common room. This week we have yours truly, on "Mathematical Contingentism"
Platonists and nominalists disagree about whether mathematical objects exist. But they almost uniformly agree about one thing: whatever the status of the existence of mathematical objects, that status is modally necessary. Two notable dissenters from this orthodoxy are Hartry Field, who defends contingent nominalism, and Mark Colyvan, who defends contingent Platonism. The source of their dissent is their view that the indispensability argument provides our justification for believing in the existence, or not, of mathematical objects. This paper considers first, whether commitment to the indispensability argument gives one grounds to be a contingentist about mathematical objects, and second, whether mathematical contingentism is, independently, a viable metaphysical view. Dr. Kristie Miller Australian Research Council Post-doctoral Fellow School of Philosophical and Historical Inquiry and The Centre for Time The University of Sydney Sydney, Australia Room 411, A18 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Ph: (work) 02 9036 9663 Ph: (mobile) 0432 275 286 http://homepage.mac.com/centre.for.time/KristieMiller/Kristie/Home%20Page.html _______________________________________________ SydPhil mailing list [email protected] List Info: http://lists.arts.usyd.edu.au/mailman/listinfo/sydphil NEW LIST ARCHIVE: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/
