Whitehead and Russell on points

Abstract

This paper considers the attempts put forward by A.N.Whitehead and by Bertrand Russell to 'construct' points (and temporal instants) from what they regard as the more basic concept of extended 'regions'. It is shown howwhat they each say themselves will not do, and howit should be filled out and amended so that the 'construction' may be regarded as successful. Finally there is a brief discussion of whether this 'construction' is worth pursuing, or whether it is better-as in today's mathematics-to prefer a 'construction' that goes the other way round, i.e., to view a region as a set of points. © The Author [2009]. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org.