A Minimalist Theory of Truth

This article, after briefly discussing Alfred Tarski's influential theory of truth, turns to a more recent theory of truth, a deflationary, or minimalist, theory. One of the chief elements of a deflationary, or minimalist, theory of truth is that it replaces the question of what truth is with the question of what “true” does. After setting out the central features of the minimalist theory of truth, the article explains the motivation for opting for such a position. In addition, it provides some reasons for thinking that such a theory of truth is “minimal” or “deflationary” in the way that contemporary truth theorists have claimed it to be.     

Beyond Truth and Falsehood: The Real Value of Knowing That p

Current epistemological dogma has it that the twin goalsof believing truths and avoiding errors exhaust our cognitive aspirations.On such a view, (call it the TG view) the only evaluationsthat count as genuinely epistemological are those that evaluatesomething (a belief, believer, set of beliefs, a cognitivetrait or process, etc.) in terms of its connection to thesetwo goods. In particular, this view implies that all theepistemic value of knowledge must be derived from thevalue of the two goals cited in TG. I argue thatthis implication is false, and thus that the TG view must be abandoned. I propose a candidate to replacethe TG view that makes better sense of the value ofknowledge.     

A Recommendation for Correspondence Theory of Truth

The purpose of this paper is to show that the correspondence theory as a truth-maker theory has certain advantages over some of the other theories of truth. The cost of this advantage is postulating extra entities—facts. However, the benefits outweigh the costs; facts facilitate our understanding of the nature of truth made by the world. Facts are required for understanding this world; therefore, one cannot claim that a separate cost is incurred for explaining truth. It is further argued that because of specific reasons the correspondence theory can be treated even better than the truth-maker theory and so the recommendation for correspondence as the most efficient theory of truth.

     

A Coherence Theory of Truth in Ethics

Quine argues, in “On the Nature of Moral Values” that a coherence theory of truth is the “lot of ethics”. In this paper, I do a bit of work from within Quinean theory. Specifically, I explore precisely what a coherence theory of truth in ethics might look like and what it might imply for the study of normative value theory generally. The first section of the paper is dedicated to the exposition of a formally correct coherence truth predicate, the possibility of which has been the subject of some skepticism. In the final two sections of the paper, I claim that a coherence theory in ethics does not reduce the practice of moral inquiry to absurdity, in practice as well as in principle.     

阿赖耶识的真妄及其在修行中的应用

本文对印度佛教经论及中国汉藏佛学诸宗关于第八阿赖耶识性质的说法作了梳理,说明地论师、摄论师、天台宗、慈恩宗、真言宗及藏传宁玛派、觉朗派等,对阿赖耶识的性质,凡有妄、真、真妄和合三种看法,各有其经典依据,其中以真妄和合说较为合理,并对阿赖耶识在修行、开悟中的应用进行了论述,认为见到阿赖耶识与否并不能作为见道、开悟的标准.     

An Identity Theory of Truth

Book Information An Identity Theory of Truth. By Dodd Julian. Macmillan. Basingstoke. 2000. Pp. ix + 199. Hardback, £42.50.     

论戴维森的真之理论

毫无疑问,真之理论在戴维森的哲学理论中扮演着核心地位,如果不理解他的真之理论也就无法理解他的整个哲学思想。虽然在他的哲学生涯中,戴维森对真的理解并非完全保持一致,甚至在某些地方曾出现过重大转变,但这并不妨碍他的真之理论形成一个整体。因为戴维森在很多关键地方,对真的理解保持着不变。戴维森对真的理解可以从两个方面进行阐述。从否定方面看,戴维森认为真是不可被定义的,因为它是一个最简单的概念;其次,真之紧缩论对真的解释是不能成立的,因为它并不能把握真的实质。从积极方面看,戴维森肯定了真与人之间的紧密关系,并认为人是真的前提;同时,他又强调了真与信念、愿望以及意义之间的联系,认为对这些概念的解释必须以真为基础。     

论前期维特根斯坦的逻辑真理观

维特根斯坦在其早期代表作《逻辑哲学论》中深入探讨了逻辑真理的理解问题.然而当今学界流行的看法是,维特根斯坦有着最狭隘的逻辑真理观逻辑真理即重言式.本文试图澄明维氏使用重言式概念的原初含义,并从其以逻辑为基础的世界观、真值函项理论及优范式理论等角度分别加以阐述,说明维氏所理解的逻辑真理乃穷尽可能的必然,而对逻辑真理的这种理解同样可推广到谓词逻辑,并指出用穷尽可能来定义逻辑必然并不会导致恶性循环.     

Truth Values and Proof Theory

I present an account of truth values for classical logic, intuitionistic logic, and the modal logic S5, in which truth values are not a fundamental category from which the logic is defined, but rather, an idealisation of more fundamental logical features in the proof theory for each system. The result is not a new set of semantic structures, but a new understanding of how the existing semantic structures may be understood in terms of a more fundamental notion of logical consequence.     

赫伯特的真理论

爱德华·赫伯特 (EdwardHerbert 15 83 -164 8) ,亦称彻伯利的赫伯特 ,是英国哲学史上十分独特的人物。虽然他与经验主义者F 培根、霍布斯是同时代人 ,却几乎没有受他们思想的影响 ,走了一条与经验主义完全不同的道路 :他贬低经验 ,强调认识活动中的先天概念以及在此基础上理智能力的作用 ,是英国近代理性主义的开创者。不过 ,他的理性主义与笛卡尔等人的大陆理性主义很不相同。在思想来源上 ,它不像后者那样与以机械论和数学为代表的“科学思维理性”有密切联系 ,而是站在“新科学”的潮流之外 ,从柏拉图主义、斯多亚主义等古代思想中引…     

真之符合论与真之等同论辨析

传统的真之符合论面临一个问题:由谁来判别一个命题是否符合事实?为从上帝之眼回归人类之眼,普特南提出内在实在论,以区别于外在实在论。这里进而提出关于真的内在符合论,以区别于传统的外在符合论;其关键在于把事实看作语言性的,并将语言性事实的观点分为外延等同论和内涵等同论。从主观性和客观性的角度看,内涵等同论和外在符合论处于两个极端,而外延等同论和内在符合论则处于中道,并且是二位一体的。在哲学史上,这两种符合论和两种等同论的要素贯穿于弗雷格、罗素、塔斯基和普特南等人的真理论之中。     

真与意义理论

意义理论是语言哲学的核心内容。意义理论与语言相关,因而与对语言的使用和理解相关,与语言所表达的世界相关。今天,意义理论受到哲学家们的高度重视,有关讨论广泛而深入,观点各异,成果多样。在今天的讨论中,真之极小论、真之紧缩论、真之去引号论、真之代句子理论等一些新的真之理论业已成为重点。但是,真之符合论、真之实用论等传统理论也仍然被涉及,并且由于深入讨论而得到新的认识,尽管许多结论是否定的。在我看来,意义理论的最大特征是与真这个概念密切相关,或者说,真这个概念是意义理论的核心概念。正因为这样。如今的讨论,无论是什么观点,几乎都预设了一个前提:塔尔斯基的语义理论。如果引申开来,甚至可以看到,正是基于真的解释,人们对意义理论形成不同的看法。比如戴维森的意义理论被称为真之理论,即基于T语句提出了一种如何理解语言的真之理论,而达米特则认为这只是对部分语言提出解释,并没有对整个语言的运作提出一种解释。所以,戴维森的解释顸设了对真这个概念的理解,他认为要围绕着真来考虑问题,而达米特虽然承认真这一概念的重要,却认为对真这个概念本身要进行思考,而且要超出这个概念来考虑我们的语言。我翻译过奎因的《真之追求》(三联书店,1999年)、达米特的《分析哲学的起源》(上海译文出版社,2005年),戴维森的《真与谓述》(上海译文出版社,2007年即出),也翻译过一些文章发表在本刊(例如参见《世界哲学》2006年第1期、第2期)。我希望国内读者能够了解和重视这方面的研究情况。编译下面这些内容,也有相同的意思。     

A Framework for Riddles about Truth that do not involve Self-Reference

In this paper, we present a framework in which we analyze three riddles about truth that are all (originally) due to Smullyan. We start with the riddle of the yes-no brothers and then the somewhat more complicated riddle of the da-ja brothers is studied. Finally, we study the Hardest Logic Puzzle Ever (HLPE). We present the respective riddles as sets of sentences of quotational languages, which are interpreted by sentence-structures. Using a revision-process the consistency of these sets is established. In our formal framework we observe some interesting dissimilarities between HLPE’s available solutions that were hidden due to their previous formulation in natural language. Finally, we discuss more recent solutions to HLPE which, by means of self-referential questions, reduce the number of questions that have to be asked in order to solve HLPE. Although the essence of the paper is to introduce a framework that allows us to formalize riddles about truth that do not involve self-reference, we will also shed some formal light on the self-referential solutions to HLPE.