笔记：IEP“Pluralist Theories of Truth”词条

1. A Brief History of Truth Pluralism

William James: there are many different ways that beliefs can be useful.

Michael Dummett

Alan White’s ‘dual-aspect’ theory of truth: appraisal-aspect + descriptive aspect

Crispin Wright

Michael P. Lynch

2. Truth Pluralism Preliminaries

The basic idea: the analysis of truth may require different treatment for different kinds of subject matter

A full account of the nature of truth, on the pluralist view, will need to look at truth in a specific domain, as opposed to (or as well as) what constitutes truth per se.

These distinctions are between the truth predicate, the truth concept, and the truth property. The truth predicate, typically taking the form ‘is true’ is the linguistic entity appended to certain sentences, as in “‘snow is white” is true’. One who competently uses the words 'true' and 'truth' can be said to possess the concept of truth, and an analysis of the concept of truth will aim to uncover what those conditions of competent use consist in. The property of truth is what is ascribed by the truth predicate.

Most of the investigations into the nature of truth concern the essence of the truth property. However in the story of truth pluralism, the concept of truth has an important role to play.

3. Motivations for Truth Pluralism

Correspondence theories of truth carries with it significant metaphysical commitments.

Two constraints on all truth pluralist theories. They must:

(1) Adequately explain how truth is to be analysed differently in different domains of discourse, and

(2) Ensure that truth is held to be robust enough to avoid the criticisms of deflationism.

4. Forms of Truth Pluralism

a. Simple Alethic Pluralism

Simple Alethic Pluralism (SAP): there are different concepts of truth in different domains of discourse.

i. The Problem of Mixed Inferences (Form 1)

(1) This cat is wet

(2) This cat is funny

Therefore, this cat is wet and funny

(1*) ‘This cat is wet’ is truem

(2*) ‘This cat is funny’ is truec

Therefore, ‘this cat is wet and funny’ is true?

ii. The Problem of Mixed Compounds (Form 1)

Now consider compound claims, like conjunctions or disjunctions.

iii. Norm of Inquiry

One of the main motivations for moving beyond deflationism is to accommodate the thought that truth constitutes a norm of inquiry.

However, Lynch (2006) argues that we need to read this constraint as the need for truth to constitute a single general norm of inquiry. All SAP would give us is lots of different norms (truth-in-ethics, truth-in-mathematics, and so forth) which would provide different norms for different domains of discourse, as opposed to a single general norm that all assertions (regardless of domain) aim at.

iv. Generalizations

‘Everything Socrates said is true.’

b. The One Concept Many Properties View (OCMP)

The second option (Crispin Wright 1992, 2001, 2003): one concept of truth, different truth properties.

the content of the concept of truth: a list of ‘platitudes’ about truth, for example:

Transparency. That to assert a proposition is to present it as true and, more generally, that any attitude to a proposition is an attitude to its truth – that to believe, doubt, or fear, for example, that p is to believe, doubt, or fear that p is true.

(E). <p> is true iff p. (Note: ‘<p>’ here and below stands for ‘the proposition that p’, following Horwich’s (1998) notation.)

Embedding. A proposition’s aptitude for truth is preserved under a variety of operations - in particular, truth-apt propositions have negations, conjunctions, disjunctions, and so forth, which are likewise truth-apt.

Straight-talking. A true proposition ‘tells it like it is’, in some way.

Contrast. A proposition may be true but not justified, or justified but not true.

Stability. If a proposition is ever true, then it always is, so that whatever may, at any particular time, be truly asserted may - perhaps by appropriate transformations of mood, or tense - be truly asserted at any time.

Absoluteness. Truth is absolute - there is, strictly, no such thing as a proposition’s being more or less true; propositions are completely true if true at all.

i. The Problem of Mixed Inferences (Form 2)

how to explain preservation of truth across mixed inferences when there is no single truth property.

ii. The Problem of Mixed Compounds (Form 2)

How to explain in what way the conjunction is true, and this can kick in just as well at the level of properties.

iii. Norm of Inquiry

Again, there is no general property possessed by all truths, but, if truth is to be considered a general norm of inquiry, then there needs to be a general truth property capable of grounding this norm.

iv. Generalizations

But, again, one may think that the problem kicks in at the level of properties.

c. Second-Order Functionalism (SOF)

Lynch (2001a, 2004, 2006) proposes to think of truth as a functional concept. belief. Lynch’s platitudes are:

The proposition that p is true if and only if p.

The proposition that p is false if and only if it is not the case that p.

Propositions are the bearers of truth and falsity.

Every proposition has a negation.

A proposition can be justified but not true, and true but not justified. (Lynch 2001a: 730)

The truth property is to be thought of as a second-order functional role property, not as a realizer property. There is a single second-order role property, and a plurality of realizer properties across discourses, and the truth property is to be identified with the former. (So, one truth concept, one truth property.)

Problem 1 (concerns the ‘robustness’ of second-order properties): One might think that the robust properties here are the first-order properties, like correspondence and coherence, as opposed to the property of having one of those properties, which seems to be a thinner, less complex property.

Problem 2: whether the second-order truth property will satisfy the truth platitudes.

d. Manifestation Functionalism

Lynch 2009 revision of his earlier proposal: the central role afforded to the list of platitudes about truth, holding that the concept of truth is captured by the following (slightly different) list:

Objectivity: The belief that p is true if, and only if, with respect to the belief that p, things are as they are believed to be.

Warrant Independence: Some beliefs can be true but not warranted and some can be warranted without being true.

Norm of Belief: It is prima facie correct to believe that p if and only if the proposition that p is true.

End of Inquiry: Other things being equal, true beliefs are a worthy goal of inquiry. (Lynch 2009: 8-12)

MF does not want to identify truth with these properties, rather that truth is manifested in these properties:

MF thus requires that the truth features - as expressed in the characterisation of the truth property - are a subset of the features of the particular domain-specific properties.

The metaphysics of manifestation: are similar to the metaphysics of the determinate/determinable relation. A classic example of this relation is the relation between being coloured and being red.

Objection (Wright 2012): if Lynch’s view in general is correct, then surely one of the essential features of truth is that truth is manifested in, for example, correspondence and superassertibility. However, now it looks difficult for those properties to manifest truth, for it cannot be that correspondence and superassertibility are themselves manifested in correspondence and superassertibility. But, if this cannot be the case, then they cannot manifest truth, for they do not possess one of the essential features of truth.

e. Disjunctivism and Simple Determination Pluralism

The ‘disjunctivist’ proposal: to take the basic structure of OCMP, and add an additional property that will serve as a general truth property. This property will be a disjunctive property which contains each of the domain-specific truth properties as disjuncts.

The second emerging view is offered by Edwards (2011a, 2012b), which draws upon Dummett’s (1978) analogy between truth and winning. Just as winning is the aim of playing a game, truth is the aim of assertion and belief. It is evident that what it takes to win differs from game to game, but there is good reason to think that winning qua property has a significant degree of constancy. The thought is that the property of being a winner is a property that one can get in a variety of different ways, and that the rules of each game establish a property the possession of which determines the possession of the property of being a winner.

(Bdx) In domain of discourse x: <p> is true (has the property of truth) iff <p> has property F.

There will be an order of determination on the biconditionals which reflects the explanatory primacy of the right-to-left direction. That is, in the material world domain, for example, it is because <p> corresponds to the facts that <p> is true, and not because <p> is true that <p> corresponds to the facts. It is in virtue of the order of determination on these biconditionals that we can say that the properties in question determine truth in their respective domains.（对比：truthmaker theory）

5. General Issues

These are some of the main formulations of truth pluralism that are currently available. Evidently, the intricacies of each view are more complex than I have been able to outline here, and the reader is directed to the relevant references for more on the structure and motivations for each view. I hope, though, that it is clear that the term ‘truth pluralism’ covers a variety of different proposals which, although they share a certain general approach to truth, differ on the details.

Each proposal, then, faces specific challenges of its own, but there are also some concerns about the general project which all pluralists will need to address. I will close by briefly noting three such concerns.

a. The Problem of Domain Individuation

略。

b. The Demandingness Objection

A truth pluralist is committed to defending the use of a particular theory of truth in each domain.

c. Problems with Platitudes

Different formulations favour slightly different platitudes, there is room for scepticism.

d. The Deflationary Challenge

why bring in all of these complications when we can get by with far less?