On Hell and Forgiveness

[polymath257]

No. Counting external things is describing an external reality. That is using a *mathematical model*, albeit a very simple one. And such a model may or may not be appropriate for any given physical situation. Whether it is or not is a matter of observation and testing.

Please define 'a number as a description' in a way that does not depend on the subject. You make the claim that the number 4 is objective: that it doesn't depend on context or the person using it. I have pointed out a few ways in which it *does* depend on context or the person using it.

Again, you seem to be confusing language with the external reality of things.   If there are 4 trees, then there is four tree's.   Whether you or anyone else knows it, and if you incorrectly count 5 tree's.   Even in your argument here, you appeal to an objective reality outside of the subject.  I would agree, that there is a subjective component to our observations, and our understanding.   But that relates to an external objective reality.   As you keep appealing to yourself.   I don't disagree, that we can be incorrect, or that we may call it different things (due to the conventions of language).  These things do not make something ontologically subjective.

Suppose I have four plants and you consider one to be a tree and I consider that one to be a bush. You would say there are four trees and I would say there are three. And we could both be correct. The method of counting is the mathematical model: how to apply the abstract language to a particular real world situation. The reality didn't change: it was only our interpretation that differs.