PHILOSOPHY
A Text with Readings
ELEVENTH EDITION
MANUEL VELASQUEZ
CHAPTER SIX: TRUTH
PHILOSOPHY
• Knowledge is at least warranted, true
belief, but Gettier examples show that
something more is required for genuine
knowledge.
CHAPTER SIX: TRUTH
PHILOSOPHY
• Warrantability is another name for
"justification" or "evidence".
CHAPTER SIX: TRUTH
PHILOSOPHY
• Warrantability depends on whether the
statement to be analyzed is logical,
semantic, or empirical.
CHAPTER SIX: TRUTH
PHILOSOPHY
• The three traditional theories of truth are
the correspondence, coherence, and
pragmatic theories.
CHAPTER SIX: TRUTH
PHILOSOPHY
• The correspondence theory of truth claims
that the truth of a statement depends on
its relation to the world of facts. A
statement is true if and only if it
corresponds to the facts. Objection: If we
know only our sensory experiences, how
can we ever get outside them to verify
what reality actually is? What does
correspondence mean? Precisely what is
a fact?
CHAPTER SIX: TRUTH
PHILOSOPHY
• The coherence theory of truth claims that the
truth of a statement depends on its relation to
other statements. A statement is true if and only
if it coheres or fits in with that system of
statements that we already accept. Objection:
Coherence is no guarantee of truth. If the first
statements are false, they can produce a
coherent system of consistent error. There is
much disagreement even among idealists over
first judgments.
CHAPTER SIX: TRUTH
PHILOSOPHY
• The pragmatic theory claims that truth depends
on what works. A statement is true if and only if
it effectively solves a practical problem and
thereby experientially satisfies us. The
pragmatist sees the human as needing to use
the practical consequences of beliefs to
determine their truth and validity. Objection:
There's no necessary connection between truth
and workability. Truth is rendered a
psychological, not an epistemological, concern,
and it can become relative.
CHAPTER SIX: TRUTH
PHILOSOPHY
• There are three views of truth in science:
the instrumentalist, realist, and conceptual
relativist views. The instrumentalist view is
similar to the pragmatic theory, the realist
view to the correspondence theory, and
the conceptual relativist view to the
coherence theory.
CHAPTER SIX: TRUTH
PHILOSOPHY
• Truth is important for hermeneutics, which studies the
interpretation of people's words and actions. For
Aquinas, scripture has many true symbolic
interpretations. For Schleiermacher and Dilthey, the only
true interpretation is the one intended by the historical
author. Wittgenstein abandoned his early ideal of a clear
language of facts and proposed that the meaning of
words depends on how they are used, so words can
have many true interpretations. For Gadamer, an
interpretation emerges from uniting our cultural
"prejudices" with what the text was trying to say in its
own culture, so there are many true interpretations of a
text.
CHAPTER SIX: TRUTH