Re: Mentalism and Calculus
Posted by
Robert Holmes on
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/Mentalism-and-Calculus-tp526405p475588.html
Nick - the snippet below illustrates the key problem with invoking category errors. I think giving the infinitesimal point speed and direction makes sense and you do not. You see a category error and I do not. So how do we adjudicate? We can't: there's no objective methodology for saying if a category error exists. (BTW, appeals to 'common sense' have as much objectivity as Ryle's invocation of absurdity: not much).
So if there's no remotely objective way of even saying whether we have a category error, then it seems pointless to try and analyse calculus in terms of its category errors. Why use a tool when all the evidence suggests that the tool is broken?
Robert
On Wed, Jul 9, 2008 at 4:07 PM, Nicholas Thompson <
[hidden email]> wrote:
<snip>
If one defines a point as having no extension in space and time, one CANNOT in common sense give it speed and direction in the next sentence
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
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