An Outline of the Potentialities of the Language of Mathematics

Abstract

The aim of the chapter is to analyze the different ways how language influences cognition. It proposes to distinguish six different but closely related aspects of the language, which can be labeled as abstracting potential, differentiating potential, explicative potential, classificatory potential, regularization potential, and unifying potential.

For each of them a short characterization is given that is followed by several illustrations.

Keywords

• potentialities of language
• language of mathematics
• abstraction
• explication
• classification