You wrote:
> This is called Platonism, and it is with that term
> that Bertrand Russell labelled himself as a
> mathematician. But of course laws, equations,
> theorems, etc. exist only in human brains.
> There is no e = mc(2) "out there" in the world,
> though matter moves in ways that can be described
> (for human understanding) by that equation. Ted is
> simply reintroducing the ancient quarrel over
> universals first theorized by Plato and Aristotle.
This is part of what I wanted to suggest with my questions (as well as that ugly sentence), but I wouldn't to go as far as saying they exist only in brains. To explain and expand on that statement: as a materialist, I think (ha!) everything that's ascribed to "mind" can be reduced to brain processes, but it's clear we don't have those descriptions yet, so mind is still a convenient term for the ensemble of brain processes we don't have good accounts of. However, because there are brain processes that are only provoked by interactions with others (nervous system development is impeded if a child isn't touched, successful language acquisition requires stimulation before a certain age, et cetera), it's likely that that many of the processes that fall into the category of mind must also require social stimulus -- and if this is so, this is the cause of much of the confusion about the "ideal" and "eternal" nature of universals.
I was recently going through Kripke's _Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language_, which amounts to a long gloss on Wittenstein's statement "Hence it is not possible to obey a rule 'privately': otherwise thinking one was obeying a rule would be the same thing as obeying it," which is also a pertinent criticism of "ideal, eternal" universals.
What made me throw the book across the room, though, was Kripke's claim that Wittgenstein's posing the problem and his resolution thereof was completely original:
<quote mongering> "As long as we regard him as following a rule 'privately', so that we pay attention to _his_ justification conditions alone, all we can say is that he is licensed to follow the rule as it strikes him. This is why Wittgenstein says, "To think one is obeying a rule is not to obey a rule. Hence it is not possible to obey a rule 'privately'; otherwise thinking one was obeying a rule would be the same thing as obeying it." (sec. 202, _Philosophical Investigations_)
"The situation is very different if we widen our gaze from consideration of the rule follower alone and allow ourselves to consider him as interacting with a wider community. Others will then have justification conditions for attributing correct or incorrect rule following to the subject, and these will _not_ be simply that that the subject's own authority is unconditionally to be accepted. Consider the example of a small child learning addition. It is obvious that his teacher will not accept just any response the from the child. On the contrary, the child must fulfill various conditions if the teacher is to ascribe to him mastery of the concept of addition." [p.89] </quote mongering>
If we skip back to p.87 in Kripke, he notes, again with justification from Wittgenstein, that an individual solving an addition problem doesn't do so by referring to the rules of addition but where one acts "unhestitatingly but _blindly_." So it takes Krikpe almost a hundred pages of stultifying prose that constantly appeal to Wittgenstein's cryptic utterances to make the same points made in less than four quite lucid and readable pages in Nietzsche's _Gay Science_, section 354, "On the 'genius of the species'". So at that point I gave up on Mr. Kripke and decided to take my arguments against Platonism from more congenial folks who won't waste my time or try my patience. -- Curtiss
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