The Platonism of Pavel Tichy

This article addresses the Platonism of the Czech philosopher and logician Pavel Tichy. This is not an easy task as Tichy's texts are first and foremost detailed analyses of concrete logical problems. The article therefore draws in part on the texts of Tichy's followers, especially those of P. Materna, M. Duzi. and J. Raclaysky. The author compares Tichy's version of Platonism with the ancient version of Platonism and then with Aristotle's critique of Platonism. Reference is made to Aristotle's (probable) work Peri Ideon, in which arguments defending Platonism are invariably presented prior to Aristotle's critique of them. At the beginning of every chapter there is thus always to be found an argument from Peri Ideon defending Platonism and then the Aristotelian critique of that argument. The arguments in question are the Argument of Scientific Knowledge, the Argument of the One in Multiplicity, and the Argument of the Object of Thinking. Analogies between ancient arguments and Tichy's defence of Platonism allow the author to apply Aristotle's critique to Tichy's view:file kernel of Aristotle's critique which, in the author's opinion, is also relevant to Tichy's conception, consists in the fact that the arguments presented, though they correctly point to there being something common to a plurality of things, do not justify one to postulate a concrete conception (in this case a Platonic one) of universals.