Nekonečno a kontinuum v pojetí Petra Vopěnky

One of the key themes of Petr Vopěnka was his understanding of mathematical infinity. He put forward many objections to Cantor’s established set theory. He worked out a new, alternative, theory in which he surprisingly interpreted infinity as a means of mathematising indeterminacy. He interpreted the continuum in a similar way. He drew on phenomenology, on Husserl’s motto “Return to things themselves”, and he employed a range of phenomenological concepts. At the same time, however, he did not give up the claim to mathematical precision in his theory. This claim brings with it certain pitfalls which centre on mathematical idealisation and its relation to the natural real world.