SUO: RE: Re: Policy On Substitutions
Dear Jon,
I share your concern about the nature of variables, but fail to see from
what you right below how they can be eliminated. Please could you explain
with a non-abstract example?
Regards
Matthew
============================================
Matthew West
Operations & Asset Management
Shell Services International
H3229, Shell Centre, London, SE1 7NA, UK.
Tel: +44 207 934 4490 Fax: 7929
Mobile: +44 7796 336538
E-mail: Matthew.R.West@is.shell.com
http://www.shellservices.com/
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> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jon Awbrey [mailto:jawbrey@oakland.edu]
> Sent: 11 February 2001 17:12
> To: Stand Up Ontology
> Subject: SUO: Re: Policy On Substitutions
>
>
>
> Robert Meersman wrote:
> >
> > ### happy birthday Jon Andre! Am VERY curious about
> > the semi-ontological effects of the mimosas ... :-)
> >
> > --Robert Meersman
>
> ¤~~~~~~~~~¤~~~~~~~~~¤~~~~~~~~~¤~~~~~~~~~¤~~~~~~~~~¤
>
> ¤
> º
> .°
> \_/
> |
> -^-
>
> Robert,
>
> Let's see if we can cure you of that 'very' curiosity!
>
> Once upon a time, a very long time ago, back when
> I was deep in the muddle of my very first, and my
> most extenuous "crisis of foundations" (COF, COF),
> I was very sorely afflicted, among the variety of
> other affectations that flesh and grass are heirs
> to, with an anxious "ontological insecurity" (OI),
> focussed on the "ontological status of variables",
> the eventual resolution of which difficulty, over
> too long a time to believe for the obviousness of
> its ultimate form, was simply to banish variables
> altogether from the realm of our finely canonical
> & our most finally, commonly, sans-critical koine.
>
> Henceforward, and for the rest of time, let us then say
> that there are actually no "open sentences" at all, not
> in our most wholy sanctioned languages, but that such a
> common nickname or vulgar form of words as "Bla, bla X"
> is really just a general name, a pleonastic periphrasis,
> or perhaps just a colloquial circumlocution for a whole
> collection of signs or sentences of a similar configure,
> except with the "X" respliced by a fully concrete piece
> of a fixed signal, or a fitful token of a sentence part.
>
> It needs to be noted that the specification of this
> collection of signs
> in no way relies on the particular artifices or the
> specialized devices
> of anybody's rude mechanics for performing substitutions, but
> since the
> collection of signs is conceived to exist, in some sense of
> "existence",
> prior to its secular and timely indications by the likes of
> me and thee,
> well, then we note, ours is not to question why, ours is but
> to specify.
> The point is that any way of specifying the desired
> collection of signs
> is equally as good as any other, to any of which
> indiscernible outcomes,
> assuming that they do indeed meet any one of many reasonably
> equivalent
> specifications, one might affix any convenient nickname for
> the species.
>
> So, for example, the so-called "open expression" of the form "x + x",
> where the values that one associates with the variable token "x" are
> the elements of the non-negative numbers N = {0, 1, 2, ...}, is just
> a nickname for the set of constant expressions that begins like this:
>
> "0 + 0", "1 + 1", "2 + 2", ...
>
> And it is species of perfectly constant signs like this
> that are the actual subjects of our generic discussions
> in this regard, thereby removing every last trace of my
> onetime "ontological insecurity" (OI) about "variables".
>
> And that, my friends, is something to celebrate!
> So leave me to my illusions, at least for a day!
>
> Cheers,
>
> Jon
>
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