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In this book I have attempted to provide a qualified defence of Michael Dummett's "tolerant reductionist' account of abstract entities. Once we accept Dummett's thesis that the problem of abstract objects should be decided by considerations derived from the theory of meaning — in particular through an examination of the extent to which it is legitimate to attribute a reference to abstract singular terms — it becomes apparent, or at least so I have argued, that an intermediate position between platonism and nominalism is more plausible than its rivals. The problem with platonism is that it renders our epistemic access to abstract entities inscrutable insofar as it relies on a mysterious and superfluous notion of mind and language independence. Extreme nominalism, by contrast — in denying that it is legitimate to ascribe a reference to abstract singular terms at all — contradicts our capacity to form true sentences containing reference to abstract entities, while more sophisticated variants overlook the role played by our linguistic practice in the constitution of "thin' objects of reference.

DOI: 10.1057/9780230378438_9

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