Criticism of Benacerraf's criticism of modern eleatics

Leon, Antonio (2008) Criticism of Benacerraf's criticism of modern eleatics.

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Abstract

I analyze here Benacerraf's criticism of Thomson arguments on the impossibility of w-supertasks. Although Benacerraf's criticism is well founded, his analysis of Thomson's lamp is incomplete. In fact, it is possible to consider a new line of argument, which Benacerraf only incidentally considered, based on the functioning laws of the lamp. This argument leads to a contradictory result that compromises the formal consistency of the w-ordering involved in all w-supertasks.

Keywords:Supertask, Thomson lamp, w-order, axiom of infinity
Subjects:General Issues: Thought Experiments
Specific Sciences: Mathematics
ID Code:3995
Deposited By:Leon, Antonio
Deposited On:19 April 2008