XPost: sci.logic
On 5/04/2016 12:38, David Elkins wrote:
A person can stand in the way of my being able to see a coffee cup, but they cannot stand in the way of me seeing zero.
Can you see zero coffee cups?
And if by "see" you mean something like "perceive visually" rather than something metaphorical (like "I see your point"), then you cannot in
fact see zero. Visual perception applies to the physical world and its
mental reflections (such as dreams, hallucinations, and vivid
imaginings); zero and all other mathematical items are entirely abstract
and non-physical. The numeral "0, the expression "4-3-1", and the
english word "zero" are all *representations* of the abstract
mathematical zero, not it itself.
(There are those who think that zero and the other mathematical items do
have a concrete non-physical existence in some ideal realm. This view
is called "mathematical realism" or "Platonism". I am not of that view.)
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