صدق

by Alexis G. Burgess, فرشته نباتی (Translator)

This is a concise, advanced introduction to current philosophical debates about truth. A blend of philosophical and technical material, the book is organized around, but not limited to, the tendency known as deflationism, according to which there is not much to say about the nature of truth. In clear language, Burgess and Burgess cover a wide range of issues, including the nature of truth, the status of truth-value gaps, the relationship between truth and meaning, relativism and pluralism about truth, and semantic paradoxes from Alfred Tarski to Saul Kripke and beyond. Following a brief introduction that reviews the most influential traditional and contemporary theories of truth, short chapters cover Tarski, deflationism, indeterminacy, realism, antirealism, Kripke, and the possible insolubility of semantic paradoxes. The book provides a rich picture of contemporary philosophical theorizing about truth, one that will be essential reading for philosophy students as well as philosophers specializing in other areas.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction

237 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2011

Reviews

[Liedzeit Liedzeit · Rating 3 out of 5]

The authors (Alexis and John Burgess) give a clear account on recent developments in the quest for a philosophical theory of truth. Well, they start with Tarski who is only compared to Aristotle a recent thinker. (And I quite liked the chapter on him. I always had the suspicion that maybe he did have something useful to say although it always seemed trivial to me.)

To the classical theories that could be summarised as correspondence, coherence and pragmatist theories there are modern versions and as a newcomer the deflationists theory. Which goes back to Ramsey and basically states that there is no difference between x and it is true that x.

I must say that I could not quite follow the chapter on Kripke. But I made a mental note to myself that I will read his paper on truth directly.

[Pedro Forquesato · Rating 2 out of 5]

Não me sinto confortável avaliando livros de áreas que não sou conhecedor, mas este é afinal um livro supostamente introdutório. E ele não é difícil, mas em muitos momentos é bastante confuso. Não acabei a leitura entendendo Tarski melhor do que quando iniciei (eu já conhecia sua teoria relativamente bem), e o mesmo vale para Kripke (que eu conhecia muito menos).

Mas admito que entendo agora melhor o debate sobre verdade na filosofia e sua relação com o problema semântico e dos paradoxos. Então valeu a pena a leitura, mas não sei se recomendaria para alguém interessado em verdade. Mesmo porque o próprio livro me fez perder quase todo o meu interesse pelo tema, que me parece agora de importância um tanto trivial. (Principalmente se você concordar com o deflacionismo: os próprios autores reconhecem que se os deflacionistas eventualmente vencerem o debate sobre verdade, seria uma vitória de Pirro, pois eles teriam a teoria correta sobre um conceito que eles próprios mostram ser completamente vácuo.)

[Swami Narasimhananda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Truth and its various connotations have always intrigued us. Professors of philosophy, the authors have done a succinct and critical analysis of some theories of truth: deflationism, indeterminacy, insolubility, realism, and antirealism. They also deal with the concepts of Alfred Tarski and Saul Kripke and their grey areas. Throughout the volume, one can see the mathematical precision of the reasoning of the concepts presented here that could be a model for all endeavours of research into complex areas of philosophy. This book could be an inspiration for further work on truth.

[Vasile Rotaru · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a terrific book about the philosophical and logical notion of truth. It provides a brief yet rigorous overview of some of the most important theories about this issue in contemporary analytic philosophy. At some places, it gets so difficult it hurts. I will have to reread it after getting more comfortable with this type of philosophy.