“Sherlock Holmes is a bachelor” implies that Sherlock Holmes exists. But when you say that you’re simply taking part in a fictitious story. It’s story telling and everyone knows you’re not trying to describe the universe. If the fiction of Arthur Conan Doyle turned out to be a good theory of something—say it was an accurate description of events that really took place in the late 19th century—and accurately predicted lots of historic discoveries and Sherlock Holmes and the traits attributed to him were essential for that theory, then we would sat Sherlock Holmes existed.
A lot of lifting seems to be being done by the “scientific” in “scientific theory”.
I am rightly shifting the criteria of “what exists” to people who actually seem to know what they’re doing.
“Sherlock Holmes is a bachelor” implies that Sherlock Holmes exists
That is not uncontentious.
But when you say that you’re simply taking part in a fictitious story.
In which case SH is not implied to exist. But I knew that it is a fictitious story. The point was that
“the number the 3 is prime” doens’t imply that 3 exists, since properties can be correctly or incorrectly
ascribe to fictive entities. There is no obvious implication from a statement being true to a statement
involving entities that actually exist. Mathematical formalism and fictivism hold 3 to be no more existent than
SH, and are not obviously false.
I am rightly shifting the criteria of “what exists” to people who actually seem to know what they’re doing.
You are not, because you are ignoring them when they say centres don’t exist. You are trying to read ontology from formalism, without taking into account the interpretation of the formalism, the semantics.
”
You are not, because you are ignoring them when they say centres don’t exist.
I don’t agree that I am.
In which case SH is not implied to exist. But I knew that it is a fictitious story. The point was that “the number the 3 is prime” doens’t imply that 3 exists, since properties can be correctly or incorrectly ascribe to fictive entities. There is no obvious implication from a statement being true to a statement involving entities that actually exist. Mathematical formalism and fictivism hold 3 to be no more existent than SH, and are not obviously false.
I don’t understand what you’re trying to accomplish with this line of reasoning. Obviously, “truths” about fictitious stories do not imply the existence of the entities they quantify over. A fiction is a sort of mutually agreed upon lie. (I don’t agree, btw, that a statement about Sherlock Holmes is true in the same way that “There are white Swans” is true). But it is none the less the case that the assertion “Sherlock Holmes is a bachelor” implies the existence of Sherlock Holmes. It just so happens that everyone plays along with the story. But unlike the stories of Sherlock Holmes I really do believe in quantum mechanics and so take the theory’s word for it that the entities it implies exist actually do exist.
I’m obviously aware there are alternatives to Platonism and that there is plenty of debate. I presumably have reasons for rejecting the alternatives. But instead of actually asserting a positive case for any alternative you seem to just be picking at things and disagreeing with me without explaining why (plus a decent amount of misunderstanding the position). If you’d like to continue this discussion please do that instead of just complaining about my position. It’s unpleasant and not productive.
So do I. But I take “the entities it implies” to mean “the entities that you are supposed to believe in according to
the informal interpretation of the formalism”, not “the entities quantified over”.
“Maddy’s first objection to the indispensability argument is that the actual attitudes of working scientists towards the components of well-confirmed theories vary from belief, through tolerance, to outright rejection (Maddy 1992, p. 280). The point is that naturalism counsels us to respect the methods of working scientists, and yet holism is apparently telling us that working scientists ought not have such differential support to the entities in their theories. Maddy suggests that we should side with naturalism and not holism here. Thus we should endorse the attitudes of working scientists who apparently do not believe in all the entities posited by our best theories. We should thus reject P1.”
“Sherlock Holmes is a bachelor” implies that Sherlock Holmes exists. But when you say that you’re simply taking part in a fictitious story. It’s story telling and everyone knows you’re not trying to describe the universe. If the fiction of Arthur Conan Doyle turned out to be a good theory of something—say it was an accurate description of events that really took place in the late 19th century—and accurately predicted lots of historic discoveries and Sherlock Holmes and the traits attributed to him were essential for that theory, then we would sat Sherlock Holmes existed.
I am rightly shifting the criteria of “what exists” to people who actually seem to know what they’re doing.
That is not uncontentious.
In which case SH is not implied to exist. But I knew that it is a fictitious story. The point was that “the number the 3 is prime” doens’t imply that 3 exists, since properties can be correctly or incorrectly ascribe to fictive entities. There is no obvious implication from a statement being true to a statement involving entities that actually exist. Mathematical formalism and fictivism hold 3 to be no more existent than SH, and are not obviously false.
You are not, because you are ignoring them when they say centres don’t exist. You are trying to read ontology from formalism, without taking into account the interpretation of the formalism, the semantics. ”
I don’t agree that I am.
I don’t understand what you’re trying to accomplish with this line of reasoning. Obviously, “truths” about fictitious stories do not imply the existence of the entities they quantify over. A fiction is a sort of mutually agreed upon lie. (I don’t agree, btw, that a statement about Sherlock Holmes is true in the same way that “There are white Swans” is true). But it is none the less the case that the assertion “Sherlock Holmes is a bachelor” implies the existence of Sherlock Holmes. It just so happens that everyone plays along with the story. But unlike the stories of Sherlock Holmes I really do believe in quantum mechanics and so take the theory’s word for it that the entities it implies exist actually do exist.
I’m obviously aware there are alternatives to Platonism and that there is plenty of debate. I presumably have reasons for rejecting the alternatives. But instead of actually asserting a positive case for any alternative you seem to just be picking at things and disagreeing with me without explaining why (plus a decent amount of misunderstanding the position). If you’d like to continue this discussion please do that instead of just complaining about my position. It’s unpleasant and not productive.
“Maddy’s first objection to the indispensability argument is that the actual attitudes of working scientists towards the components of well-confirmed theories vary from belief, through tolerance, to outright rejection (Maddy 1992, p. 280). The point is that naturalism counsels us to respect the methods of working scientists, and yet holism is apparently telling us that working scientists ought not have such differential support to the entities in their theories. Maddy suggests that we should side with naturalism and not holism here. Thus we should endorse the attitudes of working scientists who apparently do not believe in all the entities posited by our best theories. We should thus reject P1.”
SEP