Dummett's Backward Road to Frege and to Intuitionism - Tripod

acquired by abstraction. Late in life, he indicates that we use abstraction to teach and learn our first
“kindergarten numbers” in ordinary language (1979h: 276; see 1979a: 280); perhaps he thinks such
teaching is a type of explication (1979j: 271). Perhaps the best view is that from 1884 on, he thinks that
not every concept can be acquired by abstraction, but that some must be. This is parallel to Dummett’s
distinction between primary and secondary objects. See my (2003: 240–42). Frege says that even the
existence of a proposition that can be proved by pure logic “is surely compatible with the fact that it
could nevertheless not have come to consciousness in a human mind without any activity of the
senses[,] since without sensory experience no mental development is possible in the beings known to
us,” Begriffsschrift, 5, 5 n.1.
15. One might object that modes in general are ontologically dependent, and that thus perhaps modes of
presentation contained by incomplete senses are incomplete too. If so, the chief difference between
such senses and the modes of presentation they contain is simply that the former have a linguistic role
and the latter are their cognitive components. But surely the modes of presentation contained by
complete senses are just as dependent, yet are complete. Thus I see no need for incomplete senses to
contain incomplete modes of presentation.
16. My interpretation is in my (2003: 275–77).
17. The conclusion is clear enough to show that Russell interprets Frege the same way I do. For Russell
is criticizing Frege precisely for not holding that every denoting phrase denotes a denotation (reference)
as opposed to a meaning (sense). That is, Russell is agreeing with me that Frege holds that some
denoting phrases denote meanings (senses) as opposed to denotations (references).
18. Dummett is well aware that difference in reference implies difference in sense.
19. Dummett is right that references are singled out only via senses; Frege expressly says so (1979c:
124). But I criticize Frege in the following limited sense. If dogs can single out the Moon without the
use of imperceptible concepts in Grundlagen, § 31, then dogs can single out the Moon without the use
74