Mathematical Truth, Ontology, and Structures: The Point of View of Category Theory

Nicolas Fillion The University of Western Ontario May 5, 2009

Abstract This paper will examine a structuralist philosophy of mathematics based on possibilities opened by category theory. Specically, by sketching general philosophical projects meant to provide foundations for mathematics in a global philosophical context, the paper will clarify the justicatory status of the argument pros and contra this view.

Contents
1 Nature of a Philosophy of Mathematics 2 Truth, Knowledge, and Ontology 2.1 The Traditional Conception . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2 Structuralism: Moving Away from Substantivalism . . . . . . . . 3 The Open Mathematical Universe and Its Ennemies 2 5 5 8 11

This paper will discuss some philosophies of mathematics bearing the name structuralism from the point of view of the problem of mathematical truth. I assume that the problem of mathematical truth can rightly be regarded as the central problem for philosophies of mathematics. Indeed, it seems to be a categorical imperative, for any philosophy of mathematics, to account for the fact that, in some sense, mathematical statements are true. Otherwise, mathematics would lack the objective character that it is almost universally acknowledged to have, and would then have to be ranked on a par with strictly creative artistic disciplines. Many of the ideas explored in this paper are borrowed from the works of Marquis, Landry, and Awodey. In fact, this paper is meant to provide further justication for their views or at least for a common core of philosophical views they share. Their arguments rely on many deep and fascinating conceptual

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distinctions, some of which will be presented here. Nonetheless, some deep objections have been put forward by philosophers such as Hellman and Shapiro. The contribution of this paper is in attempting to counter those objections at the outset by determining which questions the proponents of this view may legitimately be required to answer, and which one may be dismissed. Claims about legitimacy of questions are very delicate, since there is a constant threat of merely be begging the question; for this reason, a huge conceptual preliminary work is required. A sketch of it will be presented here.1 To do so legitimately, it will be important to take a step back and look at what a philosophy of mathematics is supposed to do. To this eect, a general characterization of what a global philosophy of mathematics is will be presented. Building on this characterization, I will discuss various structuralist philosophies of mathematics from the point of view of the problem of mathematical truth which, I suggest, is a natural anchor. Using this strategy, I will suggest that not only have I made it clear that philosophies of mathematics along the line of Marquis, Landry, and Awodey are to be preferred, but also I will suggest that I have explained why some other approaches are essentially misguided. The motivation for undertaking this examination is that, from there on, we will perhaps be justied in discarding some philosophers annoying insistence on telling them what ontological foundations mathematics has.

Nature of a Philosophy of Mathematics

Philosophy of mathematics involves two intertwined and complementary tasks, which are nonetheless distinct. On the one hand, philosophy of mathematics consists in producing global views about the nature of mathematics, hereafter referred to as (global) philosophies of mathematics. This sort of project is very accurately described by Shapiro (2005b, 5-6): For any eld of study X, the main purposes of the philosophy of X are to interpret X and to illuminate the place of X in the overall intellectual enterprise. The philosopher of mathematics immediately encounters sweeping issues, typically concerning all of mathematics. Most of these questions come from general philosophy: matters of ontology, epistemology, and logic. [. . . ] Some problems and issues on the agenda of contemporary philosophy have remarkably clean formulations when applied to mathematics. Examples include matters of ontology, logic, objectivity, knowledge, and mind. At this level, we have general, all-encompassing philosophies of mathematics, often driven by interests lying outside of the eld of mathematics. Typically, global philosophies of mathematics have a programmatic role, and may be seen as research programmes.
1 I am aware that many of the arguments presented here are very close to hand-waving, but it is why I call it a sketch.

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Global philosophies of mathematics are very involved philosophically due to their highly speculative nature.2 From the global perspective, the task does not consist in attempting to interpret specic mathematical or logical results, but in identifying features common to the whole of mathematics, i.e., invariant features. Famous global philosophies of mathematics are Platonism, Kantism, Logicism, Naturalism (in many senses), Nominalism, Intuitionism, Fictionalism, Structuralism, Formalism, etc. To be sure, those philosophies have the weakness of their strength, which is the inattention to specic mathematical and logical details. On the other hand, philosophy of mathematics deals with local matters. The point here is to examine technical results in mathematics and logic, to interpret specic theorems, to put forward doubts concerning global philosophies by nding the devil in the details, etc. It is easy to see that this task is complementary to the global one, but that they are still very dierent. This paper will deal with global philosophies of mathematics. So, our reference to category theory as a support of certain structuralist views will not be to specic results. The argument developed here will be about what a global philosophy of mathematics should be like. Now, let us take another step back and consider how global philosophies of mathematics are articulated. Typically, philosophies of mathematics try to specify what the objects of mathematics are, what the basic concepts and axioms of mathematics are, what the correct inference to be made on this basis are, what the sense and reference of fundamental terms is, what the ontology of mathematics is, how mathematics is practiced, how mathematical knowledge is acquired, what epistemological status mathematical theories have, etc. Following Marquis (1995), we can see those concerns as corresponding to six dierent senses of the phrase being a foundation of relevant to mathematics. To begin with, P is a foundation for Q has a logical sense. In this case, we take P to be an (axiomatized) theory for Q expressed in a completely specied formal language. This theory consists in a class of axioms (or axiom schemata) together with a specied underlying logic captured by rules of inferences. P makes explicit the deductive structure of Q and, as such, it can be seen as a systematic reconstruction of Q. The key concepts involved in a logical foundation are denability and provability in P, as well as satisfaction of P by Q. Note that, if Q is meant to be a signicantly large part of mathematics, it will not in general be a set and, as such, the model theory will have to be very general.3 Closely related to the logical sense of foundation is the semantical sense of P is a foundation for Q. The relation between those two senses of foundations is one of duality: Thus, at rst sight, it seems that the relation of semantical foundations is the converse of the relation of logical foundations: SemFound(P, Q) = LogFound(P, Q)op .
live in the kingdom of isms. Marquis (1995) and Hatcher (1982) mentions, they are many serious diculty with this characterization. Given our purpose, we judge it to be unnecessary to go in the details.
3 As 2 They

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This should not be surprising, for, since Tarski, a semantics, that is a theory of reference and truth, is based on a satisfaction relation. However, as in the case of the relation of logical foundations, as soon as we try to be more exact, the situation becomes more delicate. (Marquis, 1995, 429-30) The complications relative to semantical foundations are just the dual complications that we face with respect to logical foundations. However, if logical foundations are mostly insensitive to strictly linguistic issues, semantical foundations will naturally be very sensitive to them. This is why semantics is the natural bridge between logical foundations and other types of foundation. Thirdly, P is a foundation for Q has a ontological sense. In this case, the relevant questions are typically taken to be concerned with what the entities of Q are made of, and what kind of existence of they possess. It is a common practice in philosophy to connect ontological foundations to semantical and epistemological issues in a way that will be explained in the second section of this paper. The epistemological sense of P is a foundation for Q consists in linking a certain body of knowledge P to Q. P is a body of knowledge specically selected for possessing certain epistemological properties, such as analyticity, certainty, objectivity, self-evidence, etc. The nature of the link is meant to explain that, given P possesses a certain epistemological property, Q also does. Three prototypical examples of such a link are reducing Q to P, demonstrating that Q is a conservative extension of P, and embedding Q in P. Often confused with the epistemological sense of foundation is the cognitive sense of P is a foundation for Q. Cognitive foundations are usually developed along three lines: (1) a strong cognitive interpretation, stating that one cannot know or understand Q without possessing P (here, P is a mental faculties and Q is a mathematical system); (2) a weak cognitive interpretation, which may includes pedagogical and heuristic foundation; (3) a transcendental interpretation. Finally, there is a methodological sense of P is a foundation for Q, which investigates the principles and methods applied in a mathematical eld in a way that guarantees that certain methods are legitimately dealt with. As emphasized by Marquis (1995, 431), the logical foundations are in a sense constructed from the methodological foundations. The methodological foundations appear during the construction of a eld, whereas the logical foundations constitute a reconstruction of the given eld from a specic standpoint. This importance of this point will be seen in the last section. Now, let us come back to our characterization of global philosophies of mathematics. On the basis of those six foundational relations, it becomes possible to characterize a philosophy of mathematics as follows: A philosophy of mathematics is an ordering of the above relations. Thus, within a philosophy of mathematics, some of these relations lose their foundational status, since they are presumably shown to follow from one or a few others, and some are ignored altogether.

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(Marquis, 1995, 431)4 From the point of view of the problem of mathematical truth as traditionally conceived, philosophies of mathematics are articulated around only four senses of being a foundation of. So, in the next section, I will present the traditional treatment of the problem of mathematical truth and sketch how it orders foundational relations. On this basis, I will approach the debate between dierent kinds of structuralism, and nally return to a category-theoretically inspired conception of structuralism.

Truth, Knowledge, and Ontology

It is now time to give a formulation of the problem of mathematical truth. Curry has done it in those words: The central problem in the philosophy of mathematics is the denition of mathematical truth. If mathematics is to be a science, then it must consist of propositions concerning a subject matter, which propositions are true in so far as they correspond with the facts. We are concerned with the nature of this subject matter and these facts. (Curry, 1951, 3) If no account of mathematical truth is provided, then it will appear that mathematics is purely aesthetic. The reason for which this problem is central to logical and semantical foundations is rather obvious, namely considerations of satisfaction. One of the point of interest is to understand how it also relates (or not) to epistemological and ontological foundations.5

2.1

The Traditional Conception

In this section, I will discuss a traditional approach to the problem of mathematical truth by characterizing the relation between logical, semantical, ontological, and epistemological foundations underlying it. This view was rst articulated systematically by Aristotle in the Analytics. It has found many very inuential appropriations by various mathematicians, most prominently by Euclid in the Elements. We nd variations of this theme through the whole history of philosophy of mathematics. More recently, the father of modern logic, Frege, also adopted this conception of mathematical knowledge and truth. It must thus be no surprise that it is still very inuential.
4 Marquis (1995, 421-2) also rightly claims that [. . . ] some of the arguments given either in favor or against category theory are based on dierent conceptions of what should be included in, or what should be meant by, the foundations of mathematics. It is hoped that this will allow us to see precisely where the dierent parties disagree and, from there, orient the debate appropriately. From the point of view adopted in this paper, it is hoped that it will allow us to identify the source of illegitimate questions. 5 Again, I ignore the methodological and cognitive aspects for the sake of characterizing the traditional approach.

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To begin with, let us say a few things about Aristotles conception of sciences. For Aristotle, logic is not a science, since it has no genus. That logic has no genus follows from three fundamental features of Aristotelian deductive logic (Corcoran, 2008). Firstly, deduction is cognitively neutral, i.e., we use the same process of deduction whether we know that the premises are true, false, or whether we ignore which one is the case. Secondly, deduction is topic neutral, i.e., the same process of deduction is used for any genus. Thirdly, deduction is content independent, i.e., it is not necessary to know anything to be true about the genus to deduce. Aristotles conception of logic involves no ontological commitment. The function of logic is strictly epistemological, in that it provides knowledge of the validity of arguments, but not of the truth of premises or conclusions. On the other hand, demonstrations have to provide knowledge of the truth of conclusions. A demonstration is a deduction with premises known to be true.6 As a result, the conclusions will also be known to be true. Consequently, the function of demonstrative logic is both epistemological and semantical, in that it provides knowledge of the truth of conclusions. If we consider a certain specic science, this task is neither cognitively neutral, topic neutral, nor content independent. This is why, for Aristotle, demonstrative logic is the theory of science. Those considerations constitute the background of the connection to ontological foundations. The important point, in the case of mathematics, is that a demonstration requires to rstly accept rst principles (primitives), which are truth about the genus of mathematics. Without rst principles known to be true, there is no demonstrative mathematical knowledge. Since those rst principles are assertions in the sense required by the Aristotelian conception of truth by correspondence, there must be a corresponding fact of the mathematical subject matter. Those mathematical facts serve as truth-makers. The bridge from this semantical consideration to an ontological one is made via an argument of regress ad innitum. The claim argued for is that, if no truth-makers have ontological import, then there is no objective knowledge of the genus of a science (a fortiori of mathematics). Take an arbitrary mathematical statement that happens to be semantically true (except rst principles). Is it assertoric, i.e., is it ontologically true? We can answer yes if it can be demonstrated from rst principles. There must be rst principles ontologically true, for otherwise the objective truth of no mathematical proposition whatsoever would be obtained. So, there are immediately knowable, apodictic rst principles forcing an ontological commitment. There is a distinction between the Aristotelian and the Fregean approaches in that the formers logic is a formal epistemology, whereas the latter is a formal ontology (Corcoran & Scanlan, 1982). However, their conception of mathematical truth and knowledge are very similar. Freges view of science is in many respects closer to the traditional conception of science than to a more modern (say, twentieth-century) conception. Science has an epistemic role to fulll to
6 Note that this requirement is signicantly stronger than the claim that a demonstration is a deduction with true premises, since it involves a bridge between semantical and epistemological considerations.

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LogFound

SemFound

EpistFound

OntFound

Figure 1: Traditional Foundations Based on Ontology produce objective knowledge and it may be presumed to fulll it in actuality. Given this epistemic function, it is necessary for scientic discourses to have a uniquely determined content being in correspondence7 to the realm it refers to: A science is a system of truths. A thought, once grasped, keeps us pressing us for an answer to the question whether it is true. We declare our recognition of the truth of a thought, or as we may also say, our recognition of a truth, by uttering a sentence with assertoric force. (Frege, 1899-1906, 168) For Frege, the task of science is to grasp objective contents (thoughts), to discover truths (i.e., to judge of the truth of these thoughts), to systematize them, and nally to express these true thoughts in assertions. Note that the epistemological position Frege takes forces him to maintain that the semantics of mathematics commits one to an ontology: Just as the geographer does not create a sea when he draws boundary lines and says: the part of the oceans surface bounded by these lines I am going to call the Yellow Sea, so too the mathematician cannot really create anything by his dening. (Frege, 1893, 11) For Frege, this amounts to give a certain degree of existence to the truth-makers of mathematical statements. There is a common theme in the way the traditional conception orders the foundational relations, with respect to the problem of mathematical truth.8 Logical foundations are discussed for the sake of semantical elucidation. The semantical foundations are coupled with epistemological foundations requiring objectivity, and this coupling is taken to be possible only by making both of them rely on a solid, unshakable ontological ground (see gure 1). Notice the absence of cognitive and methodological foundations. Notice, also, that the
7 Strictly speaking, Frege does not endorse the correspondence view of truth. But the point is mostly immaterial here. 8 A similar theme is discussed by Wilson (2006), under the name classical gluing. It would be worth exploring the analogy in more details, but it lies outside of the scope of this paper.

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ontological ground is unshakable; as a result, mathematics can only grow by expanding on its basis, not by radical conceptual transformation. At the end of this paper, I will suggest that it is important to avoid such consequences and that, consequently, the objectivity of semantical foundations required by epistemological foundations should come, not from ontological foundations, but from weak cognitive foundations and from methodological foundations.

2.2

Structuralism: Moving Away from Substantivalism

The scheme of argument presented above has often been used to support strong ontological claims about the existence of mathematical objects. This view can accurately be called entity realism. However, the commitment to a realm of mathematical entities has appeared inappropriate to many philosophers of mathematics. It has seemed inappropriate for two dierent kinds of reasons: rstly, because it seems unreasonable to say that mathematics is about objects, and secondly, because it may seem that one must be more parsimonious concerning the ontology of a discipline such as mathematics. Let us consider the rst reason, that it seems unreasonable to say that mathematics is about objects. This worry is found, to take a classical example, in Benacerrafs claim that numbers cannot be objects, since arithmetic is concerned with systems that share a common structure, and not with any particular ontology of objects. So, one must think of numbers in terms of shared structures. Category theory also suggests that the really important aspect of mathematics is not the objects that could be taken to constitute structures, but the structures themselves. There are many excellent detailed expositions of this point,9 and so I will not elaborate on this point. Whether one endorses a structuralist view as a foundation for mathematics, it must be conceded that talks of structure are everywhere in mathematics. Mac Lane (1996, 176) describes the situation as follow: This notion of structure is clearly an outgrowth of the widespread use of the axiomatic method in mathematics. This method was initially deployed primarily to give a rigorous description (called an axiomatization) of some unique mathematical object. [. . . ] These axioms were categorical, in the sense that they had, up to isomorphism, only one model [. . . ]. Then one may say that these axioms describe the structure of the system [. . . ]. In mathematical logic, the notion has a broader acceptation. For instance, Johnstone (1987) describes any set equipped with relations and functions corresponding to the operations and predicates of a language L an L -structure. Under such a reading, there is not very much in mathematics that cannot be considered to be a structure. To adopt a terminology that corresponds closely to the one in the literature discussed here, we will take the denition given by Mac Lane (1996, 174):
9 Awodey (E.g., 1996, 2004); Bell (E.g., 1986, 2001); Hatcher (E.g., 1982); Landry & Marquis (E.g., 2005); Mac Lane (E.g., 1986); Marquis (E.g., 2006, 2007, 2009).

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[. . . ] a structure is essentially a list of mathematical operations and relations and their required properties, commonly given as axioms, and often so formulated as to be properties shared by a number of possibly quite dierent mathematical objects. So, from this point of view, a structure is whatever system of operations and relations that satises a specied list of axioms (or axiom schemata). The study of structure is not the study of relata, but the study of relations per se. Consequently, an ontological analysis of things simply called mathematical objects is likely to miss the real point of mathematical existence. (Mac Lane, 1996, 182) The second reason (or perhaps should we say motivation) underlying structuralist philosophies of mathematics is to relax the ontological commitment to something that would be more readily acceptable. From the point of view adopted here, structuralism is a philosophical strategy consisting in trying to provide a satisfying answer to the problem of mathematical truth without committing to entity realism. Various kinds of structuralism will thus be various claims as to the degree to which one should make ontological commitment, and to what ontological kinds one should legitimately commit. There are two basic stances that one can take with respect to ontology in mathematics: substantivalism and formalism (Curry, 1977). To put it simply, substantivalism is the claim that, in one way or another, one will still have to commit to some sort of ontology of structure; for proponents of subtantivalist views, this is unavoidable. Formalists, on the other hand, prefer to stay away from such ontological commitment and, accordingly, they try to solve the problem of mathematical truth without any appeal to ontological foundations. I will call the structuralist views relying on a formalist stance schematism, in reference to Hilberts famous view that it is surely obvious that every theory is only a scaolding or schema of concepts together with their necessary relations to one another, and that the basic elements can be thought of in any way one likes [. . . ]. Any theory can always be applied to innitely many systems of basic elements. One only need to apply a reversible one-one transformation and lay it down that the axioms shall be correspondingly the same for the transformed things. [. . . ] But the circumstance I mentioned can never be a defect in a theory (it is a tremendous advantage), and it is in any case unavoidable. (emphasis of mine, Hilbert, 1899, 40) If we look at the philosophical details, the story is more complex. If pressed to say what exactly the structures are, the structuralist will have two basic options: (1) the structure belongs to all particular systems that satisfy the axioms; (2) the structure is just the properties and relations required by the theory, and not something that belongs to particular systems. In the rst case, we will say that the subject matter of mathematics is systems that have structures,10 ,
10 I

will not elaborate on this view. The reason is that I mainly want to examine views di-

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whereas in the second case, we will say that the subject matter of mathematics just is structures. The claim that mathematics is the study of structured systems (as opposed to the study of structures per se) does not involve considering structures as genuine objects. However, given the motivation to stay away from considering terms in axioms as singular terms referring to particular objects one refuses to be assertory with respect to objects , the structuralist is brought to consider structures abstractly. This is the algebraic approach, which does not consider places in the structure as made up of objects, but as the genuine subject matter. Here, the axioms are not true because they adequately capture some particular system. Rather, they are true by denition a key point of this approach. So, schematism accepts the fact that mathematics produces its objects, in some sense. Such an approach is obviously at odds with one that presupposes a preexisting immutable mathematical realm. Now, for many mathematical purposed, particularly metamathematical ones, there is a need for a theory of abstract structures. This theory may be, to take the most common examples, set theory, modal logic, second-order logic, or category theory. Must this theory be considered algebraically (structures being whatever satises this theory of structures), without assertory force, or must it be considered assertory? In other words, can the algebraic perspective be maintained all the way down, or does it stop when we reach metamathematics. If the later option is chosen, then we are adopting an ante rem realism. As Shapiro (2005a, 67) says, The idea is that places in a structure are bona de objects, and we can have quantiers ranging over them. The structure itself is a chunk of reality, and the theory is about it. This background provides us with assertions about the existence of structures, and thus necessitate an ontology of structure. In this case, the improvement over Platonism is of a very limited nature. It will be unacceptable for a schematist, since we still have a background ontology, a reication of structures, or a hypostatization of a theory of relations. This ontological burden to assertorically characterize structures reintroduce traditional universals and Platonic forms. What motivates philosophers such as Shapiro to make such an ontological commitment is that they organize their relational foundations in the same way the traditional conception does. It is taken to be necessary to provide ontological foundations in order to say what a structure is, and when two structures are identical or distinct. Metamathematical claims must not be understood in the algebraic way, but in the assertory one. So, there is a requirement of a mathematical and/or a philosophical theory of structures with an ontological commitment. The point is only that the ontological commitment should be about structures, instead of objects. Nonetheless, there has been a worry about the possibility of genuinely pursuing a structuralist programme. As the structuralist program goes, there is
minishing or eliminating ontological commitments. However, as explained by Shapiro (2005a) this view requires a heavy ontology of structured systems, or otherwise it would be vacuous.

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LogFound

SemFound

EpistFound

LogFound

SemFound

EpistFound

OntFound

OntFound

entities

structures

Figure 2: Resemblance of ante rem structuralism and the traditional conception really no such things as mathematical objects to study. Now, following the works of Bourbaki, set theory has become the canonical backdrop in which most mathematical questions were formulated. So, set theory became the canonical theory of structure, i.e., the theory specifying what structures are made of, what structures can be built, what structures are identical, etc. The point is that, in set theory, there is a study of objects, since a set is uniquely determined by its elements. It thus seems to be impossible to develop a genuinely structuralist programme based on a theory of relations such as set theory. This is where category theory enters the philosophical scene: understood as a top-down approach to mathematics (Awodey, 1996), category theory seems to be a framework fullling the two motivations of structuralist philosophies of mathematics: to talk exclusively about structures, and to avoid ontological commitment to objects. Moreover, as will be explained below, it provides strong support for the schematist approach according to which no ontological commitment whatsoever is necessary (nor desirable).

The Open Mathematical Universe and Its Ennemies

As we have seen, the classical approach maintains that it is necessary to have an ultimate background to provide foundations for mathematics. To put it bluntly, there is no foundations at all if there is not rst an ontological foundation. The top-down approach of category-theoretic inspiration denies this claim: As opposed to this one-universe, global foundational view, the categorical-structural one we advocate is based instead on the idea of specifying, for a given theorem or theory only the required or relevant degree of information or structure, the essential features of a given situation, for the purpose at hand, without assuming some ultimate knowledge, specication, or determination of the objects involved. (Awodey, 2004, 56) This philosophy of mathematics acknowledge the central character of the problem of mathematical truth, and considers the logical, semantical, and epistemological dimensions of the problem to be legitimate. This approach refuses to PHI-9302: Category Theory 11

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transfer the philosophical challenges that we nd at these levels to the ontological level. Passing the buck is not admissible. Providing foundations for mathematics in terms of a one-universe immutable theory of relations is only possible and benecial if the traditional conception of mathematical truth and knowledge is accepted. If there is no rigid gluing between semantico-epistemological considerations and ontological ones, then the universe of relations cannot be uniquely xed. As a result, it cannot be presumed that such a universe exists, and it can even less be presumed that such a universe is knowable. As a result, the foundational strategies promoted by the schematist of category-theoretical inspiration will refuse to pursue the quest for an unshakable ground. The big picture is beautifully formulated by Lawvere (1969, 1): Foundations will mean here the study of what is universal in mathematics. Thus Foundations in this sense cannot be identied with any starting-point or justication for mathematics, though partial results in these directions may be among its fruits. But among the other fruits of Foundations so dened would presumably be guidelines for passing from one branch of mathematics to another and for gauging to some extent which directions of research are likely to be relevant. As explained by Lawvere, Bell (1986, 2005), and Mac Lane (1986), there is an imminently dialectical dimension to foundational tasks. Attempts to provide an invariable starting points in terms of an ontology of objects are vain, because the supply of mathematical objects studied in mathematics constantly expands. The point is similar with respect to ontologies of structures. Whereas it had been accepted that the classical world constituted all the structures there were, it is now recognized that they only constitute a minuscule part of the universe of structures. Moreover, the fact that classical principles once considered essential to mathematical structures are merely contingent properties is very signicant. The schematist perspective tries to give an answer to the problem of mathematical truth that will not systematically undermine attempts to solve other philosophical problems concerning mathematics. One of the most fascinating and dicult problems, as explained by Marquis (1998), is the problem of the applicability of mathematics to itself. The conceptual loops involved in this application are literally impossible to understand in a hierarchical ontological framework. Understanding those loops requires one to stay away from quests for unshakable grounds. The universe of mathematics is open, and the enemies of the category-theoretic perspective base their critique on an illegitimate appeal to a total, closed universe. However, the initial worries motivating the appeal to ontological foundations have not been completely addressed yet. One the one hand, there may still be an innite regress that would prevent us from accounting for the objectivity of mathematics. This problem is addressed in two ways. Firstly, the application of mathematics to itself allows one to characterize mathematical invariants (Bell,

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1986). As a result, the only ground there is is provided by invariants. Moreover, some of them serve as x-point, in the sense that some theories are their own semantics (this is the case for category theory, but set theory has been treated in this way too). Secondly, it is addressed by making a signicantly dierent logico-semantical analysis of the meaning of mathematical statements. That brings us to the second problem: how can there be a satisfying account of the meaning of mathematical statements in a formalist framework? Isnt it the case that, for a formalist, mathematical statements are strictly meaningless? The answer to this last question is no, and the explanation for the previous one is complex. It is more complex than the story traditionally given, precisely because it does not oversimplify the problem.11 The formalist attitude of a schematist is to say that axioms determining structures are true by denition. This move solves the problem of mathematical truth in the simplest possible way. It also thereby blocks the path to ontological foundations. Still, there are important foundational resources that can be use to explain the meaning of mathematical statements. The appeal to cognitive considerations, including pedagogical and heuristic ones, and to methodological considerations seems to be obviously appropriate. Explaining the connection, however, will be the topic of another paper.

References
Awodey, S. (1996). Structure in Mathematics and Logic: A Categorical Perspective. Philosophia Mathematica, 4: 20937. (2004). An Answer to Hellmans Question: Does Category Theory Provide a Framework for Mathematical Structuralism?. Philosophia Mathematica, 12: 5464. Bell, J.L. (1986). From Absolute to Local Mathematics. Synthese, 69: 40926. (2001). Observations on Category Theory. Axiomathes, 12. (2005). The Development of Categorical Logic. In: Handbook of Philosophical Logic, vol. 12. Springer. Corcoran, J. (2008). Aristotles Demonstrative Logic. History and Philosophy of Logic, 00: 120. Corcoran, J. & Scanlan, M. (1982). The Contemporary Relevance of Ancient Logical Theory. The Philosophical Quaterly, 32(126): 7686. Curry, H.B. (1951). Outlines of a Formalist Philosophy of Mathematics. Amsterdam: North-Holland.
11 I think that a formalist philosophy is not the the gospel of despair, as suggested by Bell (1986). True, it does not give us any ontological meat to put on the bones, but this may very well be the condition to appreciate the cognitive and methodological meat!

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