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Chapter 2:
Reply to Usual Objections to Platonism

2.1 - Causal Knowledge for Legitimate Epistemology?
2.2 - Semantic Fictionalism
2.3 - Non-Twilight Zone View of Formal Knowledge:  Platonist Epistemological Theories
    2.3.1 - The Mind's Eye
    2.3.2 - Realistic Rationalism
    2.3.3 - Husserlian Epistemology of Mathematics
2.4 - Scientific Evidence for Mathematical Intuition
2.5 - Platonism and the Fallibility of Knowledge
2.6 - Where and Why Do Mistakes Occur?

There are many philosophers who reject mathematical platonism on a basis very similar to that expressed by Michael Dummett:

If mathematics is not about some particular realm of empirical reality, what, then is it about? Some have wished to maintain that it is indeed a science like any other, or rather, differing from others only in that its subject-matter is super-empirical realm of abstract entities, to which we have access by means of an intellectual faculty of intuition analogous to those sensory faculties by means of which we are aware of physical realm. Whereas the empiricist view tied mathematics too closely to certain of its applications, this view generally labeled “platonists,” separates it too widely from them: it leaves unintelligible how the denizens of this atemporal, supra-sensible realm could have any connection with, or bearing upon, conditions in the temporal, sensible realm that we inhabit.

    Like the empiricist view, the platonist one fails to do justice to the role of proof in mathematics. For presumably, the supra-sensible realm is as much God's creation as is the sensible one; if so, conditions in it must be as contingent as in the latter.59

    In other words, here we find three objections to platonism in general. The first one is of epistemological nature, if abstract objects cannot be perceived or have any causal relationship with us, how do we know them? The second has to do with the question about which intellectual, mental or psychological ability do we use to know them. Finally, are these abstract objects contingent (God's creations)?

    This chapter will address these usual objections to platonism. It will not be an exhaustive refutation of every argument against platonism presented in philosophy. However, it will provide enough answers to cover the necessary bases to explore the extent of the relationship between formal and natural sciences, and see if a posteriori matters-of-fact can revise logic and mathematics.

    Before we begin, we must point out that Benacerraf (1983) challenged philosophers of mathematics in general to formulate a philosophical doctrine of mathematics that fulfills the following requirements:
  1. First, any proposed good philosophy of mathematics should reach the objectivity and high level of consistency of mathematics, thus providing an adequate account of mathematical truth. This has been accomplished by platonism.60

  2. Second, it should provide an adequate epistemology of mathematics, which supposedly platonism is not able to offer.61
We will certainly address the problem presented in the second requirement that, according to Benacerraf, platonism is not able to satisfy.

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2.1 — Causal Knowledge for Legitimate Epistemology?

    Platonism as such is not positing objects “floating in the middle of the air”, or “creatures of God”, or anything similar. We are talking about an abstract reality that is absolutely necessary, and is the formal condition of possibility of any object or any state-of-affairs whatsoever. Therefore, we are referring to an ideal realm autonomous from human psychology and the physical world, and in the specific case of pure logical and mathematical truths, completely independent. We have to add, as Husserl pointed out, that we are not talking about numbers or other ideal objects and concepts as forming part of the real (reell) world, which would lead to a “metaphysical hypostatization”.62

    This abstract nature of logical and mathematical entities makes it impossible to establish a causal relation between such ideal realm on the one hand, and the psychological acts and physical world on the other. This goes against certain philosophers' doctrines that ask for causality as a condition for all acceptable epistemology. The requirement of causality for an adequate epistemology of mathematics does not seem convincing for many reasons. First, it is not self-evident. Our view of mathematical epistemology is non-causal, the abstract entities themselves do not cause our knowing them, and yet, our cognitive processes are perfectly natural. Whichever causal mechanisms our brain or mind uses to constitute objectualities and essences do not depend causally on numbers or ideal entities themselves.

    Second, in natural science, the criterion of causality is not applied to all cases. For example, in quantum physics we cannot establish certain causal relations among subatomic particles, and yet we have legitimate scientific knowledge about them. The following example shows one case:

EPR Machine
Illustration 1

    Illustration 1 shows an EPR Machine.63  Let us suppose we have a positronium64 that annihilates and two photons are released in opposite directions. According to experiments carried out by scientists, one photon will spin in one direction and the other will spin in the opposite direction. Apparently, there are no exceptions to this phenomenon. We could conjecture why this happens, but it seems we cannot formulate a theory that can causally link both spins. We could say that this happens because one photon seems to affect the other. Since photons travel at the speed of light, the effect of one on the other should be faster than the speed of light, which goes against special relativity's assertion that nothing can travel faster than this speed. We could perhaps think that what affects their spin is at the very source of the photons at the moment of annihilation, but quantum physics states that if such a thing were true, the outcome would be completely different. Therefore, we can know non-causally the spin of one photon by knowing the spin of the other one. The causal requirement for legitimate knowledge is refuted.65

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2.2 — Semantic Fictionalism

    Some philosophers of science like Mario Bunge are not completely satisfied with platonist proposals, not even Popper's semi-platonism. Bunge chooses fictionalism with respect to propositions, logic, and mathematics as an alternative. He says that there are no “propositions-in-themselves” as Bernard Bolzano, Gottlob Frege, Edmund Husserl and others seem to believe, and says that we have to make believe that they exist. He says that unlike Mickey Mouse or Superman,66 we can establish formal and semantic exactness using these fictitious notions.67

    Since his conception of meanings and propositions is fictionalist, the truth value for these propositions is linked to human psychology and to scientists' and mathematicians' “conventional knowledge”. He gives the following examples to show that not all propositions are true or false, and that there are other propositions with no truth value: the trivial propositions “the trillionth decimal character of π is 7”, “in the center of the Earth there is a piece of iron”, and the non-trivial proposition “The value of function f, representative of a P property for an individual x, is y” where f is an attribute of the figure in a scientific theory. Bunge says that in these and other cases a proposition lacks truth value, not because one has not been assigned to it, but because it is impossible to decide if it is true or false.68

    In light of platonism, Bunge's real problem is that he supposes that a proposition is true or false only when we know such truth value on the basis of facts. For platonists, it would be as absurd as claiming that the proposition “the Sun is in the center of the Solar System” was not true one time because human beings did not know it. The proposition just expressed has always been (and is) objectively true, even when throughout the centuries humanity believed the false proposition “the Earth is the center of the universe”. That humanity did believe that “the Earth is the center of the universe” is true did not make such a proposition true. Bunge confuses holding a proposition as true with it being true.

    For a platonist, it is possible for a proposition to have a truth value, even if we do not know it, or if we do not know the proposition itself. Let us take the example of “the trillionth decimal character of π is 7”. This proposition will depend ontologically on the number π itself. According to platonists, there is a trillionth decimal character, but we do not know which one it is. Knowing and being are two very different things. Unfortunately, Bunge's own conception of numbers as being only products of human imagination leads him to confuse knowledge of the number with its being, and he imagines that this is enough to refute platonism. Epistemological limitation is not the same as lack of truth value of a proposition.

    With respect to “the value of function f, representative of a P property for an individual x, is y”, this itself is a function, not a proposition. Its truth value will depend on the values to be assigned to, P, x, and y. Once the assignment is made, then a proposition is expressed. At least in logic we have made a very clear difference between a propositional function such as “F(x)” where x is a variable, from singular logical statements such as “F(a)” (where a is a constant), or as propositions where a quantifier is prefixed such as:

((∀x)(F(x)→G(x))∧(∀x)(G(x)→H(x)))→(∀x)(F(x)→H(x))

As Bunge clearly stated, truth value can only be applied to propositions. If this is correct, they are not applied to functions.

    Bunge develops an epistemological doctrine about propositions which does not let us talk about all propositions as being true or false. His proposal overcomes some difficulties with Quine's statements about the problem of identity of meanings.69  For him, it is possible to say that there are propositions, just like mathematics can state that there are numbers, but without stating that there are “propositions-in-themselves” or “numbers-in-themselves”.

    In light of this epistemological doctrine, he establishes the unequivocal ontological existence of physical organisms capable of thinking and forming judgments. Possibly there are no identical judgments, nor an identical process in two or more brains, or even in the same brain. However, there are similar judgments. If that similarity is pointed out enough, then we can conclude that two brains are thinking the same proposition. This leads him to think that concepts, propositions, and numbers lack autonomous existence. At most, we can define their existence psychologically: “x exists conceptually if there is at least one brain that thinks x”.70

    Apparently, Bunge is not aware that platonists already have replied to such statements. For example, in The Foundations of Arithmetic, Gottlob Frege addressed precisely this kind of psychological view of propositions and numbers. Such view states that there are no identical propositions or notions, since they are subject to psychological change, and subjective notions cannot be shared. Let us suppose, for the sake of the argument, that mathematical objects are figments of our brains' neurons and nothing else beyond that. If there is no abstract ideal realm, nor a cultural realm that is essentially abstract, it is difficult to account for our agreement about propositions and mathematical entities.71 Throughout history and in every society, humans have represented numbers in very different ways (think about Greek numbers, Roman numbers, Hebrew numbers, Arabic numbers, and so on), and yet, they all have the same meaning, and refer to exactly the same objects without there being any difference between the properties of the Arabic “1”, the Hebrew “א” or the Roman “I”. We can all agree that the number five is a prime number, the result of adding 2 and 3, the result of adding 1 and 4, the number whose square is 25, and whose cube is 125, and so on.72 Bunge does not solve the problem of defining numbers as subjective representations. Each representation of the number one (as similar as it can be to other number ones in other people's brains) will always be different with different subjective characteristics. So we cannot talk about the number one. Instead we would be talking about 1, 1', 1'', 1''', and so on.73 It would be a miracle if rational beings can understand one proposition independently of non-shared mental representations.

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2.3 — Non-Twilight Zone View of Formal Knowledge: Platonist Epistemological Theories

    Platonist epistemology is often accused of being mysterious and mystical. As Katz (1998) has pointed out, the fact that something is mysterious does not make it illegitimate. Philosophy is replete with mysteries, and it thrives in solving those mysteries rationally.74 It has been accused of mysticism, because it would require a kind of an extra-eye to “see” those mysterious entities floating in the air waiting for someone to grasp them and know them. Mysticism proposes that we can obtain knowledge beyond our cognitive faculties.75 In this section, we will see that this is not so. First, we will see three platonist theories regarding formal knowledge, choose one of them, and then look at empirical evidence for this in animals and humans.

2.3.1 — The Mind's Eye

    Several platonist philosophers of mathematics like James Robert Brown posit the existence of “the mind's eye” which, in many ways, is analogous to the physical eye. We must understand the term “mind's eye” only as a metaphor to describe that aspect of the mind that lets us access the mathematical realm.76

    For example, says Brown, we ordinarily perceive a cup of coffee on the table, and we are compelled to believe in the actual existence of the cup. In the same way, we are compelled to believe in the actual existence of mathematical objects and truths, such as the necessity of the proposition “2 + 2 = 4” and the contingency of the judgment “the bishops move diagonally”.77

    An objection may be raised that we know more or less the physical processes by which our physical eyes perceive objects. On the other hand, the way this mind's eye perceives needs to be explained.78 Brown argues against this objection saying that this mystery of the “mechanics” of the mind's eye does not undermine this platonist claim that we perceive abstract mathematical objects. It is a fact. As we have seen, the criterion of causation has been refuted, so opponents cannot use it against platonism.79

    Finally, Brown argues in favor of the concept of the mind's eye by recognizing the fallibility of formal a priori knowledge. As Descartes argued very well, perceptions can deceive us. What we perceive does not necessarily correspond to the actual facts. What seems to be a lake from afar may be, in reality, a hallucination, an illusion, or a mirage. The same thing happens to the mind's eye. When we formulate a mathematical conjecture that is not self-evident, we may be subject to error. He calls this philosophical standpoint “fallibilist platonism”.80

    The epistemological proposal of the mind's eye has one advantage, and it is precisely fallibilist platonism. As I will show later in this chapter, a priori knowledge can be fallible.

    However, the “mind's eye” doctrine has several serious disadvantages. All that this doctrine says is that we perceive abstract objects, but it does not begin to explain how we perceive them. Also, it seems that the analogy with the physical eye is flawed. In the realm of all possible worlds, we can see as possible that the world as we experience and perceive it is an illusion, and that our compelling belief about the existence of a cup that we perceive may not be true. But in the case of formal knowledge there seems to be no possible scenario where the principle of no-contradiction is false, or that the square root of two is not an irrational number. In this case, a priori knowledge seems to be far more compelling than an a posteriori knowledge of the existence of a cup based on physical perception.

    We also need to recognize another aspect where the analogy with the physical eye fails. Let us assume, for the sake of the argument, that it is still a mystery today how our brain works regarding the way physical perception operates. We can still argue that despite this mystery, something seems to be given to us. Even if the world were an illusion, it would still be reasonable to suppose its existence. So, even if we don't know how the brain works, we know that there must be a natural mechanism for perception. The problem with abstract mathematical objects is that they are not perceived sensibly, which leads to several hypotheses that would seem prima facie viable regarding our mathematical knowledge: numbers are conventions, or fictions, or arise from sensible experience, and so on. These explanations do seem plausible in relation to natural processes, and the hypothesis of the “eye” that “grasps” abstract mathematical objects is not itself powerful enough to be an explanation.

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2.3.2 — Realistic Rationalism

    Jerrold Katz is one of the most recent philosophers of mathematics who tried to meet Benacerraf's challenge, and had tried to account for a platonist epistemology of mathematics without the need to establish a certain kind of supernatural faculty that grasps abstract entities. He calls his philosophical position “realistic rationalism”. “Realism” in this context means that mathematical truths refer to abstract objects: entities no located in space and time.81 “Rationalism” means that reason alone is the source of all formal a priori knowledge.82 Therefore, his epistemological theory can be rightfully called “rationalist epistemology”.83

    Katz establishes several conditions of an adequate rationalist epistemology:
  1. There should be no causal relationship between the knower and the abstract objects to be known.84

  2. The truth of a mathematical proposition depends exclusively on the nature of the proposition itself. For example, the truth of propositions about physical objects depends on the facts of the physical world. The knowledge of mathematical truths depends ultimately on their a priori nature and their epistemological foundation in reason.85

  3. That the truths discovered through reason should be justified according to the objects they talk about, mathematical entities and their properties.86
    Contrary to the objects of the external world, whose nature is contingent, all abstract mathematical entities have necessary properties. The fact that the square root of two is an irrational number, and that two is the only even prime number are examples of this. Both statements about number two are examples of apodeictic conclusions at which we arrive using Reductio ad Absurdum.87

    Realistic rationalism recognizes the existence of a kind of mathematical intuition which is necessary to find these mathematical truths. This is not a mystical intuition, but rather one that can be explained naturally. He uses this example:

It is also crucial to the notion of intuition in our sense that intuitions are apprehensions of structure that can reveal the limits of possibility with respect to the abstract objects having the structure. Intuitions are of structure, and the structure cannot be certain ways. [ . . .] Consider the pigeon-hole principle. Even mathematically naive people immediately see that if m things are put into n pigeon-holes, then, when m is greater than n, some hole must contain more than one thing. We can eliminate prior acquaintance with the proof of the pigeon-hole principle, instantaneous discovery of the proof, lucky guesses, and so on as “impossibilities.” The only remaining explanation for the immediate knowledge of the principle is intuition.88

    In this way, Katz refutes antirealists who accuse realists of not providing an alternative to this mathematical intuition that they reject as mystical.

    It seems by the context of this epistemological doctrine that this notion of “mathematical entities” is conceptualized as structures, not as objects in the fregean sense.89 For this reason, we find Katz as closer to Nicolas Bourbaki and Edmund Husserl than to Frege.

    Katz also tells us that he favors a kind of fallibilist platonism, because mathematical intuition itself is also subject to error. The revision of logic and mathematics is the result of our cognitive limitations of mathematics, which are eventually superseded through reason and careful analysis.90

    Katz concludes his presentation of his rationalist epistemology, showing that there is no begging a question within reason. For him, to beg the question within rationalist epistemology would be like falling into a kind of Cartesian skepticism, which questions even the most elementary mathematical principles. If this is the game empiricists wish to play against realism, then we should also remember that they can fall into a humean skepticism if we ask on what logical basis can we say that we have one single pencil in our hand if all the flow of experience never remains the same, and that the fact that we perceive the pencil does not mean necessarily that it exists or that the pencil is the source of our sensations. Therefore, if the empiricist is willing to accept within reason (without falling into radical skepticism) that what we have in our hand has the traits of a pencil, and that such phenomenon can mean that the pencil does indeed exist, the empiricist must grant that through Reductio ad Absurdum we should show the mathematical truth that, for example, the number 2 is the only even prime number.91

    Also, he pointed out that not holding up some basic logical principles that are necessary for any rational reasoning would lead immediately into paradoxes, such as the paradox of revisability. The paradox goes like this:

Since the constitutive principles are premises of every argument for belief revision, it is impossible for an argument for belief revision to revise any of them because revising any one of them saws off the limb on which the argument rests. Any argument for changing the truth value of one of the constitutive principles must make a conclusion that contradicts the premise of the argument, and hence must be an unsound argument for revising the constitutive principle.92

    The principle of no-contradiction is an example. If all logic were revisable, the principle of no-contradictions should also be revisable. If it is revisable, it is because certain “events” seem to contradict the principle of no-contradiction. Since the principle of no-contradiction should be supposed as a premise necessary to find a contradiction, then the reason to question this principle is also questioned, and there would be no base at all for the revision. Therefore, we reach the conclusion that the principle of no-contradiction is revisable and it is not revisable.93  He states that realistic rationalism meets Benacerraf's challenge, because it explains how we can grasp mathematical entities and truths non-causally.94

    Katz's advantage over the mind's eye proposal is significant. He shows the mechanisms through which we can achieve a logical or mathematical truth without going into metaphors like the “mind's eye”. He also embraces “fallibilist platonism” and gives us a glimpse of how we are able to grasp truths about mathematical entities.

    However, there is an aspect of Katz's epistemological doctrine that is not completely satisfied. For example, he implicitly recognizes that we are able to perceive some mathematical structures in a given experience. In fact, much later in his book, as we shall see more thoroughly with Husserl, he says that we are able to see these structures along with sensible objects. We are able to recognize these abstract objects once we “purify” them from the sensible components.95  However, he does not talk much about the way different kinds of mathematical objects can be found in experience, he just assumes that they are there and that we can perceive them rationally. More to the point, his notion of mathematical intuition is not very clear, since he seems to confuse the “perception” of structures with the intuition that lets us find their necessary properties or relationships. As we shall see, his portrayal of mathematical intuition with the pigeon-hole example would seem a confusion of categorial intuition and eidetic intuition in husserlian terms.

    Finally, Katz lacks a theory explaining how from these elementary structures we are able to reach the level of mathematical complexity we know today (various theories of numbers such as complex numbers, category theory, universal algebra, general topology, among others)

    I do not wish to finish this section without making a comment on a significant point made by Katz regarding the revisability paradox. As we shall see, this paradox is a very important stumbling block to Quine's assertion that in principle all logical truths can be revised.

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2.3.3 – Husserlian Epistemology of Mathematics

    To address Husserl's epistemological proposal, we have to realize that it is a result of his epistemological interest in mathematical knowledge. After his antipsychological turn, in a section called “Sensibility and Understanding”, in the sixth investigation of his philosophical work, Logical Investigations, he explained in full detail his phenomenological approach to mathematics and addresses the problem of mathematical knowledge. To understand this, we must look at the way judgments or propositions are fulfilled by states-of-affairs.

    According to phenomenology, intentionality is an essential property or consciousness, and it consists in directing ourselves to objects. An intentional act is an act of thinking, a cogito in the cartesian sense. Every cogito has a cogitatum, every act of thinking has an object that is being thought of.96

    As we have seen in Chapter 1, Husserl says that an objectual act, which is also an intentional act, constitutes an objectuality, a state-of-affairs. As we have seen, a state-of-affairs is composed of sensible objects interconnected by categorial forms. For him, objectualities can be correlated with judgments that are fulfilled in them (true judgments or propositions). If we say that “Mary is taller than John”, such a proposition is fulfilled precisely on the objects Mary and John, and the way they are related by categorial forms. If we say, “John is shorter than Mary”, this judgment refers to another state-of-affairs, another objectuality. The situation-of-affairs (Sachlage), the sensible objects that serve as a passive basis for both states-of-affairs, remains the same. If we have sensible objects a and b, the propositions “a < b” and “b > a” would both refer to two different states-of-affairs, but they are based on the same situation-of-affairs.97

    This is the way propositions about the temporal world are fulfilled. Our words can refer to sensible objects: “house”, “book”, “bike”, “Aristotle”, and many other concepts. However, we cannot disregard formal words, which are words with no sensible correlates, like “is”, “the”, “three”, “below”, “over”, “under”, “then”, “and”, or “first”. These refer to categorial forms.98  Given that they have no sensible correlates, how do we know about them?

    An intentional analysis can reveal how states-of-affairs are constituted. The origin of all our knowledge begins with two sorts of intuitions: sensible intuition and categorial intuition. Sensible intuition is what lets us grasp sensible objects directly. We can identify two kinds of sensible intuition: sensible perception and sensible imagination. The latter lets us constitute sensible objects in our fantasy or imagination, while the former lets us grasp sensible objects that are present “in-the-flesh” so-to-speak. Through sensible perception, sensible objects are given immediately in a low-level objectual act. They appear as “external” objects before us.99

    On the other hand, categorial intuition lets us constitute categorial forms on the basis of sensible objects. In this sense, they are higher-level formal concepts that relate low-level sensible objects.100 However, these categorial forms are not given in the same manner than sensible objects, because they require the intervention of understanding through categorial acts. In the act of constituting a state-of-affairs through a categorial act, objects are given in a specific manner. We can either talk about a set of pencils, or about five pencils or the total of pencils, and other kinds of states-of-affairs based on one situation-of-affairs.

    In all of these cases, we treat sensible objects as a unity of experience. This lets us use these states-of-affairs as basis for other categorial or objectual acts, there can still be higher objectual levels.101 This can be clearly seen in the case of sets. He gives us the following example:

In the domain of receptivity there is already an act of plural contemplation in the act of collectively taking things together; it is not the mere apprehension of one object after the other but retaining-in-grasp of the one in the apprehension of the next, and so forth [. . .]. But this unity of taking-together, of collection, does not yet have one object: the pair, the collection, more generally, the set of the two objects. It is limited consciousness, we are turned toward one object in particular, then toward another in particular, and nothing beyond this. We can then, while we hold on the apprehension, again, carry out a new act of taking together [of, let us say] the inkwell and a noise that we have just heard, or we retain the first two objects in apprehension and look at a third object as separate from others. The connection of the first two is not loosened thereby. It is another thing to the combination or to take a new object into consideration in addition to the two objects already in special combination. And then we have a unity of apprehension in the form of {{A,B},C}: likewise {{A,B},{C,D}}, etc. It is necessary to say again here that each apprehension of a complex form has as objects A B C . . . and not, for example {A,B} as one object, and so on.102

    In other words, the example of sets shows us that there can be a hierarchy of objectualities. If we wish to find the sensible subtracts of all of these objectual acts, we can trace them down to the sensible components.103

    Of course, in states-of-affairs we find sensible components and formal components, and we are able to distinguish matter and form. They are essentially the result of mixed categorial acts where we constitute a state-of-affairs which include empirical content and formal content. As we have seen, every categorial form given in categorial intuition rests on sensible intuition.104

    This has to be distinguished from pure categorial acts where pure categorial concepts are constituted without any sort of sensible components. We know they are constituted, because all of the mathesis universalis is empty of all sensible content.105 How can it be constituted?

    To reach the level of pure categorial forms, an act of categorial abstraction is needed. With this act of understanding, we purge a state-of-affairs of all of its sensible contents, and stay with the categorial forms. In this process, all sensible concepts are substituted with indeterminates (variables), and the only thing that matters in mathematics and logic is the essential relationship between these categorial forms.106  In the case of mathematics we explore the necessary or essential relationship between formal-ontological categories: unity, plurality, relation, cardinal numbers, ordinal numbers, part and whole, and so on. What lets us constitute these essences (necessities or possibilities) is what Husserl called “general intuition”, “essential intuition” or “eidetic intuition”. Through eidetic intuition, essences are constituted, and we are able to discover the necessary relationships between concepts, be them material or formal.107

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    Also, Husserl explains that to understand logic, we must understand that the acts by which we constitute a state-of-affairs, while we are able to formulate judgments or propositions through meaning acts. The most basic of these meaning acts is expressed by the concept of “being”. Once we constitute a state-of- affairs, through meaning acts we establish that such a state-of-affairs is the case. If we find Mary taller than John as a state-of-affairs, through a meaning act we can express that “Mary is taller than John”. “Is”, in this case, is a meaning category constituted by a meaning act. Through more meaning acts we can formulate judgments such as: “Mary is taller than John and John is shorter than Mary” where we establish a conjunction among elementary propositions. We can abstract a pure logical truth once the material concepts in propositions are substituted by indeterminates or variables (categorial abstraction). We can obtain from such abstraction true subject-predicate forms, disjunction, conjunction, and so forth: “A is B”, “A and B”, “A or B”, and so on.108

    Since every objectual act can have a meaning act as correlate, and given the fact that there are unlimited ways to form complex propositions about objectualities, we can also form a hierarchy of meanings which can be traced down and be founded on sensible components, and their complication also has to follow laws, namely, the “laws to avoid non-sense”, which are the laws of pure universal grammar. The essential relationship between meaning categories and between any sort of propositions can be discovered through categorial abstraction, as we explained above. Analytic laws are discovered when these judgments, purified of all material concepts, follow the laws to avoid non-sense, and the laws to avoid counter-sense in order to preserve truth.109

    For Husserl, we are able to reach the mathesis universalis from these pure categorial acts. From a transcendental standpoint we can distinguish between what he called “formal logic” and “transcendental logic”. For Husserl, the world is already given in a determined and determinable way to transcendental consciousness. It is to this experience that we must turn to, so we can understand the relationship between the subjective forms of reasoning (transcendental logic) and the objective logic (formal logic) in its supreme form as mathesis universalis. As we will show, he argued that transcendental logic turns to objective formal logic, while formal logic needs transcendental logic to be constituted.110

    As we have seen in Chapter 1, logic consists in three different strata. From a transcendental point of view, each one of these strata is further removed from psychology until it constitutes formal logic. The first stratum on the side of logic is the morphology of meanings or the universal pure grammar, which follows the laws to prevent non-sense. On the side of mathematics we find the morphology of intuitions or morphology of formal-ontological categories.111

    Logic's second stratum builds on the first one, and deals with forms of deductions and demonstrations, and its laws, called by Husserl “laws to prevent counter-sense”. This stratum is still syntactic. However, he makes a distinction between the “logic of consequence” and the “logic of truth”. The latter includes the concept of truth among other related concepts. In other words, there must be a difference between syntax and semantics. On the side of mathematics we also find a second stratum that deals with theories based on formal-ontological categories completely purified from any empirical content, such as set theory, theory of plurality, theory of numbers (arithmetic), and so on. It simply consists in theories of possible objects and states-of-affairs based formal-ontological categories, in other words, based on mathematics' first stratum.112

    Finally there is the third stratum, where logic becomes a theory of deductive systems or a theory of all possible forms of theories. On the side of mathematics, its supreme form is a theory of manifolds. Both of these correlated strata become a mathesis universalis where we only reason completely on a level of pure forms, and purified from all empirical content, whose truth cannot be reduced to psychological activities. This mathesis universalis, from an epistemological standpoint, is the a priori basis of any and every science in the broadest sense.113

    Here we illustrate a summary of Husserl's doctrine regarding these three strata of formal logic and how we reach this mathesis universalis.

Logical-Mathematical Strata
Illustration 2

    The advantage of Husserl's epistemology over the other two are great. First, it can tell us how from our experience of states-of-affairs we are able to abstract mathematical objects, or formal-ontological categories. We constitute them through objectual acts, purify them from all empirical content, and then reach the theory of manifolds in the husserlian sense. It does not state just that there is a “mind's eye”, but Husserl explains that due to the fact that we constitute states-of-affairs through mixed categorial acts, we can perceive sensibly the objects, but we can also perceive the formal relationship between them. Katz is close to this notion when he talks about mathematical relationships that need to be purified of all empirical concepts or objects.

    However, there is a difference between what Katz calls “mathematical intuition” and what Husserl conceives as mathematical intuition. For Katz, mathematical intuition is closer to a mix of categorial intuition and eidetic intuition, with which we are able to “perceive” the necessary and possible relationships among formal structures. On the other hand, for Husserl, mathematical intuition is a pure categorial act: categorial intuition and categorial abstraction. That is, we constitute a state-of-affairs and then, through an act of formalization, we obtain the mathematical objects themselves purified from all empirical content. Once these formal-ontological categories are constituted in their pure form, we develop theories based on them and on the way they are essentially related to each other. Furthermore, in a metamathematical level, we are able to posit new mathematical entities (negative roots, fractions, and more) and formulate axioms based on them, or alter axioms in order to explore mathematical consistency (as when the so-called “axiom of the parallels” was not used and mathematicians could discover consistent non-euclidean spaces). Such activity can be carried on as long as logical consistency is preserved.

    Hence, we have reached with Husserl a satisfactory platonist epistemology of mathematics.

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2.4 — Scientific Evidence for Mathematical Intuition

    The evidence for mathematical intuition, meaning categorial intuition and categorial abstraction, is evident everywhere in the world, in every civilization. It is not a mystical intuition, but the result of acts carried out by our mind in order to constitute objects and states-of-affairs. George Ifrah shows how categorial intuition manifests in animals:

Some animal species possess some kind of notion of number. At a rudimentary level, they can distinguish concrete quantities (an ability that must be differentiated from the ability to count numbers in abstract). For what of a better term we will call animals' basic number-recognition the sense of number. [. . .]

    Domesticated animals (for instance, dogs, cats, monkeys, elephants) notice straight away if one item is missing from a small set of familiar objects. In some species, mothers show by their behaviour that they know if they are missing one or more than one of their litter. A sense of number is marginally present in such reactions. The animal possesses a natural disposition to recognise that a small set seen for a second time has undergone a numerical change.

    Some birds have shown that they can be trained to recognise more precise quantities. Goldfinches, when trained to choose between two different piles of seed, usually manage to distinguish successfully between three and one, three and two, four and two, four and three, and six and three.

    Even more striking is the untutored ability of nightingales, magpies, and crows to distinguish between concrete sets ranging from one to three or four.

    [. . .]

    What we see in domesticated animals is the rudimentary perception of equivalence and non-equivalence between sets, but only in respect of numerically small sets. In goldfinches, there is something more than just a perception of equivalence — there seems to be a sense of “more than” and “less then”. Once trained, these birds seem to have a perception or intensity, halfway, between a perception of quantity (which requires an ability to numerate beyond a certain point) and a perception of quality. However, it only works for goldfinches when the “moreness” or “lessness” is quite large; the bird will almost always confuse five and four, seven and five, eight and six, ten and six. In other words, goldfinches can recognise differences of intensity if they are large enough, but not otherwise.

    Crows have rather greater abilities: they can recognise equivalence and non-equivalence, they have considerable powers of memory, and they can perceive the relative magnitudes of two sets of the same kind separated in time and space. Obviously, crows do not count in the sense that we do, since in the absence of any generalising or abstracting capacity they cannot conceive any “absolute quantity”. But they do manage to distinguish concrete quantities. They do therefore seem to have a basic number sense.114

    From a husserlian standpoint, the term “number sense” is equivocal, since we can see categorial objectualities that are not necessarily numerical. There are different categorial forms being considered, like “more than”, “less than”, and “sets”.. We should remember that no categorial form is reducible to the other, and the notion of sets is not reducible to the notion of number, and vice-versa.115  This “number sense” only describes the ability animals have of conceiving objects as groups (sets). The data provided by Ifrah only makes sense if we take into consideration that animals perceive categorially because these categorial forms are founded on the sensible objects in the states-of-affairs constituted by their mind.

    However, we must recognize that depending on the animals' mental faculties, its perception is limited by its ability to grasp certain quantities of objects. This is not different with humans. Ifrah carries out an experiment which I essentially reproduce in Illustration 3. Try to know how many objects there are in each frame in Illustration 3 without counting them, just by glancing at them.

Experiment with Number of Objects
Illustration 3

    The reader may have noticed that he or she can grasp the number of objects just by glancing at one, two, three or four elements in a frame. But if there are five or more objects it is almost impossible to know right away the right amount without mentally grouping or counting them. Since animals do not know how to count, they have a very limited capacity for numbering. This not only applies to animals, but in some human civilizations around the world, some people are not able to count beyond three or four. For example,the Murray islanders use numbers “one”, “two”, “three”, or , “four” but above that they call “a crowd of . . .”. The same thing happens with Torres Straits islanders, among other isolated civilizations.116

    Even babies have this mental ability of constituting states-of-affairs through mixed categorial acts. For instance, Karen Wynn has experimented with five-month-old babies and found that they can perform elementary forms of mental arithmetic. Steven Pinker describes this process:

In Wynn's experiment, the babies were shown a rubber Mickey Mouse doll on a stage until their little eyes wandered. Then a screen came up, and a prancing hand visibly reached out from behind a curtain and placed a second Mickey Mouse behind the screen. When some screen was removed, if there were two Mickey Mouses visible (something the babies had never actually seen), the babies looked for only a few moments. But if there was only one doll, the babies were captivated—even though this was exactly the scene that had bored them before the screen was put into place. Wynn also tested a second group of babies, and this time, after the screen came up to obscure a pair of dolls, a hand visibly reached behind the screen and removed one of them. If the screen fell to reveal a single Mickey, the babies looked briefly; if it revealed the old scene with two, the babies had more trouble tearing themselves away. The babies must have been keeping track of how many dolls were behind the screen, updating their counts as dolls were added or subtracted. If the number inexplicably departed from what they expected, they scrutinized the scene, as if searching for some explanation.117

    Even a similar methodology to this one has shown that five-days-old babies are “sensitive to numbers”.118  Husserl would say “Of course, they are sensitive to numbers! Their consciousness is constituting states-of-affairs, because that is what is originally given. They can see the sensible objects, and simultaneously the categorial forms founded on them.”

    In our case, we have reached a level of categorial abstraction, which makes us separate sensible experience from formal judgments constituted by formal categories. We do not need to perceive 99,999+1 sensible objects (which would be impossible in light of our recent experiment) to know that it must equal 100,000. Here we see our eidetic intuition in action when we recognize the necessary relationship between three different numbers (99,999 + 1 = 100,000). In fact, we are able to see that we can even conceive all kinds of mathematical entities, many of them not grasped on sensible basis like irrational numbers, imaginary numbers (negative roots), among others. These are constituted in light of mathematics’ third stratum, where the mathematician is free to posit any mathematical objects whatsoever, formulate axioms, and explore them as long as consistency is preserved.

    Hence, categorial intuition, categorial abstraction, and eidetic intuition are perfectly natural activities of the mind.

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2.5 — Platonism and the Fallibility of Knowledge

    One of the least understood aspects of platonism is that of the fallibility of mathematical knowledge. For many antiplatonists, the infallibility of truths and all the logical and objectual relationships of abstract entities of all kinds implies necessarily infallibility of logical and mathematical knowledge. Also they make the mistake of equating a priori knowledge with the infallibility of a priori knowledge. This constitutes a non sequitur, it somehow implies that for an infallible mathematical or logical proposition to exist, it follows that our knowledge about it has to be infallible. It would be like saying that Uranus never existed for millenia because humans never knew it. If we take it to the extreme suggested by antiplatonists, Uranus still would not exist because our knowledge of it is limited and not infallible.

    In fact, for platonists, logic and mathematics are science in the original sense of the word “episteme” in Greek. They provide formal knowledge. The way we grasp it is completely different from that of natural science. For example, in the case of natural science it is not enough to formulate consistent theories, we need to find the empirical correlates that might indicate that our theories are indeed correct. But logic and mathematics do not proceed in such a way. Let us see two very simple, but clear, examples, one of logic and one of mathematics.

Theorem. Modus Ponens preserves truth; so if α and α→β are true in an interpretation I, then β has to be true in I.

Proof. Let us suppose that α and α→β are true in I, but that β is false in I. If α is true and β false in I, then that would mean that α→β should be false according to the definition of implication. This, however, would contradict the theorem's position that α→β is true. Therefore β should be true in I.

Notice that in the case of logic we do not have to appeal to experience in any way, its truth relies solely in its own definitions, rules, and axioms.

    Let us see now an example in mathematics:

Theorem. There is no rational number c which satisfies c2=2, so √2 is an irrational number.

Proof. An irrational number is that which cannot be expressed as a fraction (a ratio). Suppose that there is a fraction p/q reduced to its lowest terms, in such a way that

2_irrational_num_proof

p2=2q2

This means that regardless of q's numerical value, p has to be an even number. Therefore, the value of p is 2a. If we substitute p for 2a then we will obtain the following equation:

(2a)2=2q2

Therefore:

2q2=4a2

q2=2a2

This means that q is an even number. If p is even and q is even, then that means that they can both be divisible by two, so the fraction p/q is not reduced to the lowest terms. This would contradict the hypothesis of the theorem that states that the fraction is reduced to the lowest terms. Hence, there is no rational number c which satisfies c2=2.

    We can see here that there is no appeal at all to sensible experience in order to prove that √2 is an irrational number.

    For platonists, both of these theorems are true and have always been timelessly true. What we have done is not an “invention” or “construction” of the truth of the theorems but a discovery of their absolute truth. The very notion of discovery implies these truths have existed, but were not previously known, and they constitute mathematical knowledge. If platonists argue the discovery of such objects, then the antiplatonists' view that platonism posits infallible knowledge is invalid.

    By the way, given that logic and mathematics as analytic disciplines carry out their proofs in a completely different way than natural-scientific theories as a body of synthetic judgments, we can see a qualitative difference between analytic and synthetic propositions. If this is the case, Quine is wrong in denying the analytic/synthetic dichotomy on the basis that there is no qualitative difference between both kinds of statements. There is a difference in kind, and not merely in degree of abstraction.

    Now, we have to confront a usual objection against platonists concerning mathematical knowledge: the difficulty of proving certain theorems because their proof is too long and sometimes some important factors are missing. Philip Kitcher, for instance, presents this argument:

We suppose, with the apriorist, that when we follow a proof we begin by undergoing a process which is an a priori warrant belief in an axiom. The process serves as a warrant for the belief so long as it is present to mind. As we proceed with the proof, there comes a stage when we can no longer keep the process and the subsequent reasoning present to mind: we cannot attend to everything at once. In continuing beyond this stage, we no longer believe the axiom on the basis of the original warrant, but rather because we recall having apprehended its truth in the approximate way. However, this new process of recollection although it normally warrants belief in the axiom, does not provide an a priori warrant for the belief. So, when we follow long proofs we lose our a priori warrants for their beginnings.119

    But this argument does not refute the fact that logic and mathematics considered in themselves are a priori, nor does it refute the statement that we have some a priori knowledge. All this argument shows is that our knowledge and psychological processes are limited and that we are not fully able to grasp the truth of certain logical or mathematical propositions. But through a revision of the deductive process using mathematical truths known by all mathematicians, the flaws of such a “long proof” can be shown, then see what went wrong, and, sometimes, how to make it right. Sometimes there is no proof because the mathematical conjecture is wrong, but we do not know yet that it is wrong. James R. Brown shows an example of Euler's conjecture, which is a generalization of Fermat's Last Theorem. It states the following:

[. . .] if n ≥ 3, then fewer than n nth powers cannot sum to an nth power. As a special case, this means that there are no solutions {w,x,y,z} to equation w4+x4+y4=z4. The conjecture was well tested by examples, and for about two centuries was widely believed as [Fermat's Last Theorem]. However, counter-examples have been found recently, for example, 2,682,4404 + 15,365,6394 + 18,796,7604 = 20,615,6734.120

So, Euler's conjecture was always false, even when everyone thought it was true. The point platonists wish to make is not that our knowledge of the logical-mathematical realm is infallible, but that sometimes many of these a priori truths can be discovered either by proving a certain conjecture or providing its refutation. But our beliefs in them being true or false have nothing to do with their objective truth value.

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2.6 — Where and Why Do Mistakes Occur?

Most of the mistakes made in mathematics are due to three main reasons:121
  1. We could formulate false mathematical conjectures, but not know that they are actually false. This is the case of Euler's generalization of Fermat's Last Theorem which we have shown above, or David Hilbert's (and Husserl's) belief in the completeness of mathematics. In both cases, it was the apodeictic certainty of mathematics that led to the discovery of these conjectures' falsity. These refutations do not mean that mathematics is doomed to be uncertain as fallible inventions of humans, nor does it mean that because this sole aspect has a similarity in conjecturing and refuting like in science, it belongs to natural science.122 It is an exaggerated claim to say that because some of these conjectures were false there are “disasters” in mathematics.123 On the contrary, due to the refutation of these conjectures we have more certain knowledge of mathematics: our knowledge about Euler's conjecture is now more certain than before we knew it was false.

  2. The use of wrong and naïve concepts is also a source of mathematical mistakes. For example, some of the ancient Greeks associated numbers with geometrical objects, and adhered to these concepts the notion of perfection (circles, squares, or equilateral triangles as perfect shapes). Of course, the number 3 cannot be identified with the equilateral triangle, nor is 4 identified to the square, etc. Nor are these numbers expressing perfection of any kind. Also, the misconception of numbers as distances prevented many philosophers in history to adopt negative numbers and negative roots, and regarded them as contradictory to certain axioms of mathematics. Simultaneously, this conception of numbers prevented many ancient mathematicians from developing a theory of complex numbers.

  3. Incorrect application of accepted principles can be a source of mistakes. This phenomenon can be shown with a simple example. Let us suppose that x = 1. Let us follow the rules of algebra and multiply both sides of the equation with the same variable x:

x2 – 1 = x – 1

(x – 1) (x + 1) = x – 1

      If we divide both sides by x – 1 the result will be:

x + 1 = 1

x + 1 – 1 = 1 – 1

x = 0

      Therefore, x = 1 means x = 0. This is a mathematical impossibility because x cannot be 1 and 0 simultaneously. Although this demonstration seems to follow correctly all algebraic laws, in reality it does not. If the premise is that x = 1, then x – 1 would be zero, and division by zero is forbidden in algebra. The mistake was to divide both sides of the equation by x – 1.124

    As we have seen, we must be careful not to confuse platonism with certainty of knowledge. Our knowledge of abstract objects is indeed affected by our limits and fallibility, but that does not mean that there is no a priori knowledge of logical and mathematical objects. Mathematical conjectures, to attain absolute certainty, must be proved or refuted in some apodeictic way; if they are not, then they are just that: conjectures.

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Footnotes:


59Dummett, 2002, p. 20. [Return to Text]

60p. 408.  [Return to Text]

61p. 409.  [Return to Text]

62LI. Vol. II. Inv. II. §7. See p. 16 of this book.  [Return to Text]

63“EPR” refers to the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen Paradox (“EPR Paradox” for short). Albert Einstein, Boris Podolsky, and Nathan Rosen tried to refute the claim made by quantum physicists that somehow the observers have influence over quanta. They made their case the following way: suppose there is a positronium and that it releases two photons which travel to two opposite sides of the galaxy. Quantum theory suggests that the photons would literally be anywhere within a probabilistic path. However, there are two detectors on both sides of the galaxy, and despite the fuzzy path of the photons, those two detectors will detect both photons at exactly the right locations. Given that faster-than-light communication among both photons is impossible, the photons would “magically” know where and when each other is being detected to locate each other at exactly the right positions. For them, this shows that the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum phenomena is wrong, since it leaves unexplained how does this happen. In other words, quantum physics as formulated is not complete. The EPR machine operates in a slightly different manner. Based on suggestions by physicist David Bohm, this machine does not measure position but spin, making and EPR-like experiment possible (Popper, 2000, pp. 14-25).  [Return to Text]

64A positronium is an atom consisting of an electron and a positron.  [Return to Text]

65Brown, 1999, pp. 16-17.  [Return to Text]

66Bunge (1997) originally used Minerva and Mafalda, but it is the same idea anyway (p. 65).  [Return to Text]

67Bunge, 1997, p. 65.  [Return to Text]

68Bunge, 1997, p. 72.  [Return to Text]

69Quine, 1953, pp. 20-46.  [Return to Text]

70Bunge, 1997, pp. 75-76.  [Return to Text]

71Bunge's position is paradoxic. On one hand, he accepts the existence of conventions, which do belong to the cultural realm. On the other hand, he says that no cultural abstract products exist beyond the brain. Then conventions cannot exist in any real sense, because they are abstract. The cultural realm is rejected also by Bunge, especially as a form of rejecting Popper's World 3.  [Return to Text]

72FA. pp. 33-38.  [Return to Text]

73FA. pp. 33-38, 47-51.  [Return to Text]

74p. 33.  [Return to Text]

75p. 33.  [Return to Text]

76Brown, 1999, p. 13.  [Return to Text]

77Brown, 1999, pp. 13, 15.  [Return to Text]

78Brown, 1999, p. 15.  [Return to Text]

79Brown, 1999, pp. 15-18.  [Return to Text]

80Brown, 1999, p. 14.  [Return to Text]

81Katz, 1998, p. 1.  [Return to Text]

82Katz, 1998, p. 24.  [Return to Text]

83Katz, 1998, pp. xxxii, 38.  [Return to Text]

84Katz, 1998, pp. 34-35.  [Return to Text]

85Katz, 1998, p. 36.  [Return to Text]

86Katz, 1998, pp. 36-41.  [Return to Text]

87Katz, 1998, pp. 39-40.  [Return to Text]

88Katz, 1998, p. 45.  [Return to Text]

89For Frege, objects are saturated entities, and numbers are seen as logical objects in his philosophy of mathematics (FC. pp. 17-18).  [Return to Text]

90Katz, 1998, pp. 48-51.  [Return to Text]

91Katz, 1998, pp. 51-58.  [Return to Text]

92Katz, 1998, p. 73.  [Return to Text]

93Katz, 1998, pp. 73-74.  [Return to Text]

94Katz, 1998, pp. 26-28, 54, 55.  [Return to Text]

95For instance, “the set of all my children” is an example of “impure sets” (Katz, 1998, p. 133).  [Return to Text]

96I. §28.  [Return to Text]

97LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §48; EJ. §§58-60.  [Return to Text]

98LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §40.  [Return to Text]

99LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §45.  [Return to Text]

100LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §46.  [Return to Text]

101LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §46.  [Return to Text]

102EJ. §61.  [Return to Text]

103LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §60.  [Return to Text]

104LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §60.  [Return to Text]

105LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §60.  [Return to Text]

106LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §60.  [Return to Text]

107LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §§52, 60; I. §§3, 9-10.  [Return to Text]

108LI. Vol. I. §67; LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §§42-44, 55, 61, 63-64.  [Return to Text]

109LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §63.  [Return to Text]

110FTL. §§7, 9; EJ. §§3, 11.  [Return to Text]

111LI. Vol. I. §67; LI. Vol. II. Inv. IV. §§10-14; LI. Vol. II. Inv. VI. §59; FTL. §§12-13.  [Return to Text]

112LI. Vol. I. §68; LI. Vol. II. Inv. IV. §12; FTL. §§14-22.  [Return to Text]

113LI. Vol. I. §§69-70; FTL. §28-36.  [Return to Text]

114Ifrah, 2000, pp. 3-4.  [Return to Text]

115Husserl, 1994/2004, pp. 12-19.  [Return to Text]

116Ifrah, 2000, p. 6.  [Return to Text]

117Pinker, 1994, p. 59. See Wynn, 1992.  [Return to Text]

118Pinker, 1994, p. 59.  [Return to Text]

119Kitcher, 1984, pp. 44-45.  [Return to Text]

120Brown, 1999, p. 166.  [Return to Text]

121Brown, 1999, pp. 18-23.  [Return to Text]

122Kline, 1985, pp. 391-427.  [Return to Text]

123Kline, 1985, pp. 3-7.  [Return to Text]

124Bunch, 1982, p. 13.  [Return to Text]

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