Interjection of the Week: "Wolog!!"

JONES in post, this blog:

"[M]inimalisms are not always bad, we have to be selective in our disposal of minimalisms, otherwise we lose useful things like set theory, possibly even the whole of science, since science looks for simplest theories and is therefore in that sense inherently minimalistic."

Hear, hear. In fact in the CarnapGrice pdf ((c) Jones & Speranza) we are discussing 'without loss of generality', which is a genial thing pronounced by mathematicians. Recall that Grice loved a mathematician. Not really sure who, but apparently Hardy. In "Aspects of Reason" he refers to a mathematician who always had one proof one step short, if not mistaken. "Yet, we could see what he was getting at".

In mathematics, wolog, stands for 'without loss of generality', as Jones notes. So, how can one really try a minimalist, i.e. 'general' framework, unless allowing for this 'loss of generality' NOT to be taken seriously.

So, if a mechanist, say, is deemed 'a minimalist' by his enemies, he can always claim, "Wolog!!", implicating thereby: "I MAY be a minimalist in my account of all possible explanations as purely mechanist; but that is because I'm after a general picture -- a TOE -- and surely you are going to allow me to have that."

--- The details of 'Wolog' are not easy, but worth disecting when it comes to each minimalism.

Consider "Positivism", as the 'minimalist' framework that elludes (intentionally or not) issues or questions of 'value'. "Surely by keeping values out of the 'picture' of the Tractatus -- the 'general' picture --", one can almost hear Witters say --, "I'm furthering a minimalist general philosophical claim worth furthering." And right he is.

On the other hand, there's something blurred about 'a general picture'. How can a picture be 'general'? Pictures are either blurred or onfocus. Or not?