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Philosophia Mathematica Advance Access originally published online on March 2, 2009
Philosophia Mathematica 2009 17(2):220-247; doi:10.1093/philmat/nkp004
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© The Author [2009]. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Book Review

WILLIAM TAIT. The Provenance of Pure Reason. Essays on the Philosophy of Mathematics and on its History

Charles Parsons*

* Department of Philosophy, Emerson Hall, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, U.S.A. parsons2@fas.harvard.edu

WILLIAM TAIT. The Provenance of Pure Reason. Essays on the Philosophy of Mathematics and on its History. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005. ISBN 0-19-514192-X. Pp. vii + 332.{dagger}

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.


   1. Introduction
 
William Tait's standing in the philosophy of mathematics hardly needs to be argued for; for this reason the appearance of this collection is especially welcome. As noted in his Preface, the essays in this book ‘span the years 1981–2002’. The years given are evidently those of publication. One essay (no. 6) was not previously published in its present form, but it is a reworking of papers published during that period. The Introduction, one appendix, and some notes are new. Many of the essays will be familiar to the readers of this journal; indeed two (nos 4 and 12) first appeared here.

It should be no surprise to those who know Tait's work that this is a very rich collection, with contributions on a wide variety of issues, both systematic and historical. That poses a problem for a reviewer, because a serious discussion of even all the major issues would be . . . [Full Text of this Article]


   2. The Axiomatic Conception
 

   3. Realism
 

   4. Finitism
 

   5. Tait on Others
 

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