5 ideas
10845 | To be true a sentence must express a proposition, and not be ambiguous or vague or just expressive [Lewis] |
Full Idea: Sentences or assertions can be derivately called true, if they succeed in expressing determinate propositions. A sentence can be ambiguous or vague or paradoxical or ungrounded or not declarative or a mere expression of feeling. | |
From: David Lewis (Forget the 'correspondence theory of truth' [2001], p.276) | |
A reaction: Lewis has, of course, a peculiar notion of what a proposition is - it's a set of possible worlds. I, with my more psychological approach, take a proposition to be a particular sort of brain event. |
10847 | Truthmakers are about existential grounding, not about truth [Lewis] |
Full Idea: Instances of the truthmaker principle are equivalent to biconditionals not about truth but about the existential grounding of all manner of other things; the flying pigs, or what-have-you. | |
From: David Lewis (Forget the 'correspondence theory of truth' [2001]) | |
A reaction: The question then is what the difference is between 'existential grounding' and 'truth'. There wouldn't seem to be any difference at all if the proposition in question was a simple existential claim. |
10846 | Truthmaker is correspondence, but without the requirement to be one-to-one [Lewis] |
Full Idea: The truthmaker principle seems to be a version of the correspondence theory of truth, but differs mostly in denying that the correspondence of truths to facts must be one-to-one. | |
From: David Lewis (Forget the 'correspondence theory of truth' [2001], p.277) | |
A reaction: In other words, several different sentences might have exactly the same truthmaker. |
3115 | Are meaning and expressed concept the same thing? [Burge, by Segal] |
Full Idea: It is Burge's view that what a word means should be distinguished from the concept it expresses. | |
From: report of Tyler Burge (Frege on Extensions from Concepts [1984]) by Gabriel M.A. Segal - A Slim Book about Narrow Content 3.2 | |
A reaction: Presumably the immediate meaning (e.g. of 'arthritis') is socially determined, while the concept is fixed by history? Or what? |
468 | Musical performance can reveal a range of virtues [Damon of Ath.] |
Full Idea: In singing and playing the lyre, a boy will be likely to reveal not only courage and moderation, but also justice. | |
From: Damon (fragments/reports [c.460 BCE], B4), quoted by (who?) - where? |