A Reply to Krystian Jobczyk

Abstract

This paper is a reply to Krystian Jobczyk’s critical remarks on my treatment of Putnam’s Model-Theoretic Arguments against (metaphysical) realism. I clarify my position by pointing out that Putnam’s statements are ambiguous and allow for vari-ous interpretations. In general, we have no universal criteria for selecting standard models. On the other hand, since models are defined in a suitable metatheory, it is possible to introduce special constraints to define the phrase “to be standard” in con-crete situations. The crucial fact is that models of so-called rich theories (arithmetic of natural numbers and beyond) transcend expressive means of such theories.