Yes, “No connexion under this number.” sounds sensible.
On Fri, Oct 14, 2016 at 11:49 AM, <epostboxx@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
Deutsche Telekom operators (and their counterparts at Telekom’s rival
firms) neatly sidestep the whole issue with their German equivalent of "You
have dialed a non-existent number”. In such cases, one hears nothing about
whether the number itself exists or not, but rather:
“Kein Anschluss unter dieser Nummer” or “Keine Verbindung unter dieser
Nummer” — literally “No connexion under this number.”
They (rightly, I would argue) assume that the issue of greatest interest
to the caller is the possibility of establishing a telephone connexion to
some third party using the number dialled.
Determining the ontological status of the number itself is left as an
exercise in which they indulge over an after-work Pilsner, or on
philosophical and mathematical internet discussion lists.
Chris Bruce,
stalling for time while he
brushes up on his Frege, in
Kiel, Germany
On 13 Oct 2016, at 15:12, Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:announcement is surely false. If I have dialed a number, I must have
Okay, this is probably trivial and/or pedantic, but the above
imagined it first. If I can imagine it, then it is NOT non-existent. A
number which can be conceptualized but does not 'really' exist seems to be
an impossibility. In other words, once a number is conceptualized, it
exists necessarily.
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Or no ?
Perhaps the resident Fregeans will have some comment on this.
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