Re: BHA: truth

[Carrol Cox <cbcox@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Ruth Groth writes:

 I mean, if "It is true that the
> cat (my cat, actually) is black" is equivalent in meaning to "There exists a
> (smart, wonderful) creature who really is a cat and who really is black,"
> then what have we gained, or lost, by holding that you can say something is
> true about the world without actually using the word "true"?  I just don't
> get it.

I'm way over my head technically on this maillist, but once in a while I
see a possibility for a small entry. How would one or more of the theories
of truth discussed here handle the following two sentences?

(1) A single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a
wife.

(2) It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in
possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.

The page on which the second sentence appears immediately implies that the
reader who has accepted *either* sentence is a fool, while the reader who
has denied the truth of both sentences is the reader the text desires.

The entire work which the second sentence begins affirms that in at least
one case, a rich man who does not affirm in action the truth of sentence
(1) would be unable to truthfully affirm, "I am I."

Carrol Cox



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