Re: what makes it true?



In article <slrndhkgbv.to4.tim-usenet@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Timothy Little <tim-usenet@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:
>mareg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx () wrote:
>> Virtually everybody, irrespective of their philosophical or
>> religious views, believes that Goldbach's conjecture is either true
>> or false, even though it has not yet been proved which, and
>> conceivably never will be.
>
>Virtually everybody, irrespective of their philosophical or religious
>views, believes that the Continuum Hypothesis is either true or false,
>even though it has not yet been proved which, and conceivably never
>will be.

Judging from personal experience, I don't believe that to be true.
My impression is that virtually everybody believes that Goldbach's
conjecture is either true or false, but it is definitely not the case
that virtually everybody believes that the Continuum Hypothesis is
either true or false. Given that neither CH not not CH can be deduced
from the other axioms of set theory, this is not surprising! It is
doubtful whether the notions of "true" and "false" can meaningfully
be attached to the Continuum Hypothesis.

Derek Holt.

.



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