Axiom Schema of Specification - in Quine's New Foundations

In Quine's New Foundations

In the New Foundations approach to set theory pioneered by W.V.O. Quine, the axiom of comprehension for a given predicate takes the unrestricted form, but the predicates that may be used in the schema are themselves restricted. The predicate (C is not in C) is forbidden, because the same symbol C appears on both sides of the membership symbol (and so at different "relative types"); thus, Russell's paradox is avoided. However, by taking P(C) to be (C = C), which is allowed, we can form a set of all sets. For details, see stratification.

Read more about this topic:  Axiom Schema Of Specification

Famous quotes containing the words quine and/or foundations:

    The three main medieval points of view regarding universals are designated by historians as realism, conceptualism, and nominalism. Essentially these same three doctrines reappear in twentieth-century surveys of the philosophy of mathematics under the new names logicism, intuitionism, and formalism.
    —Willard Van Orman Quine (b. 1908)

    I am present at the sowing of the seed of the world. With a geometry of sunbeams, the soul lays the foundations of nature.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)