08-d davidson- the method of truth in metaphysics

8/3/2019 08-D Davidson- The Method of Truth in Metaphysics

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200 Language and Reality

reason is that w e dam age the intelligibility of 'our readings or'theutterances of others w hen our m eQ lod of reading puts others intow hat w e take to be broad error. We can m ake set~se of differences allright, but only against a ba ckground of sha red belief. W hat is shareddoes not in general call for com ment; it is too dull. trite, or, fam iliarto stand notice. But without a vast common ground, there is noplace for disputants to have their quarrel. O f course, w e can no m oreagree than disagree w ith som eone else w ithout m uch m utuality; butp erh ap s th is is o bv io us .

B eliefsare identified and describe d only w ilhina .de nse pa tte rn ofbeliefs. I can believe a cloud is passiltg before the' sun, but onlybecause I believe there is a sun. that clouds are made of watervapour, that water can exist in liquid or gaseous form; and so on,w ithout end. N o particular list of further beliefs is required to givesubstanct; to m y belief that a cloud is passing before the sun; butsom e appropriate set of related beliefs m ust be there. If I supposethat you believe a cloud is passing before the sun. J suppose you have

the right sort of pattern of beliefs to support that one belief. andthese be lie fs I assum e you to have m llst. to do their supportitlg w ork,be e nough like m y beliefs to justify the de sc ription of your be lie f as abelief that a cloud is passing tJefore the sun. If I am right ina ttributing.the be lie f to you, the n you m ust have a'pattern of be lie fsmuch like mine. No wonder, then. I can interpret your wordscorrectly only by interpreting so as to put us largely in agreem ent.

It may. seem that the argument so far shows only that goodinterpreta~iotl breeds concurrence, w hile leaving quite open thequestion whether. what is agreed upon is true. And certainlyagreem ent, no m atter how widcspread. does not guarantee truth.This observation m isses the point of the argum ent, how ever. Thebasic claim is that m uch com munity of belief is needed to provide abasis for com munication or understanding; the extende<,J claimshould then be that objective error can occur only in a setting oflargely true belief. A greem ent does not m ake for truth, but m uch ofwhat is agreed m ust be true if some of what is agreed is false.'_ J~s t as too much a tt ribu ted error r isks depriving the subject 0[11 ;: ;

.subject m atter, so too.m uch actual em :> r,robs a person of things to

go wrong about. W hen we want to interpret, we work on one or :another assumption about the general pattern of agreem ent. Wesuppose that much of what we take to be common is true, but wecannot, of course, assum e w e know w here the truth lies. We cannot

T he M eth od o f Tru th i;, M eta ph ysics.

201:< -

interpret on the basis of know n truths, not because we know nobut becaus~ w e do not 'alw ays know which they are. We do not nto be om niscient to interpret, but there is nothing absurd in the iof an om niscient interpreter; he attributes beliefs to others,interprets their speech on the basis of his ow n beliefs, just as theof us do. Since he does this as the rest of us do, he perforce findm uch agreem ent as is needed to m ake sense of his attributions

interpretations; and in this case, of course, what is agreed ishypothesis true. nut now it is plain why massive error aboutw orld is sim ply unintelligible, for to suppose it intelligible issuppose there could be an interpreter (the om niscient o~e) wcorre ctly interpre ted som eone else as being m assively m ista ken,this w e have show n to be im possible.

II

Successful com munication proves the existence of a shared,largely true, view or the world. But what led liS to demandcom moll view was the recognition that sentences held true-thlinguistic represcntatives of belief-determ ine the m eanings ofwords they contain. Thus the common view shapes the sharlangu age. T his is w hy it is pla usible to hold tha t by studying the mgeneral aspects of language w e w ill be studying the m ost geneaspects of reality. It remains to say how these aspects mayiden tif ied and descr ibed .

Language is an instrument of communication because ofsem antic dim ension, the potentiality for truth or falsehood ofsentences, or better, of its utterances and inscriptions. The studyw ha t sente nces a re true is in genera l tQ e w ork of the various sc iencbut the study of truth conditions is the province of sem antics. Ww e m ust attend to in language, if w e w ant to bring into relief genefeatures of the w orld, is..w hat it is in general for a sentence inlanguage to be true. The suggestion is that if th~ truth conditionssentences are placed in the context of a com prehensive theory,lillg uistic stru ctu re th at e me rg es w ill re fle ct la rg e fe atu re s o f re al

The aim is a theory of truth for a reasonably powerful ansignificant part of a natural language . T he scope of the theory-howmuch of the language is captured by the theory, and hoconvincingly-will be one factor on which the .interestof any



l~ J. tf'"g lla g~ \ fllld R ea litY Inietaphysical results depends. T he theory m ust show us how w e can,.~i~w encl~ of a potentinlinfinity of sentences as cbm posed from a'fin ite sto ck o f sem an tically sig nifican t ato ms' (ro ug hly, w ord s) b y'trteans of a fhlite num ber of applications of a finite num ber of rulesofcoinposition. It must then give the truth cOl\ditions 'of each's'tn ten ce (relativ e to th e c ircu mstan ce s o f its u tteran ce) o n the b asis'of its composition. The theory may thus be said to explain the

'donditions of truth of an utterance of a sentence on the basis of the~:bles of the w ords in the sentence.;

Much here is owed to Frege. Frcge saw the importnnce of giving

\an ~ccount.of how the truth of a sentence depends on the sem antic

'features of Its parts, and he suggested how such an account could begiven for hnpressive stretches of natural language. H is m ethod w asone now fam iliar: he introduced a standardized'''nohition whose'sy nta x d ire ctly re fle cte d th e in te nd ed in te rp re ta tio n, a nd th en u rg e~tha t the n ew n otatio n, as in terp reted , h ad th e sam e ex pre ssiv e p ow e~as important parts of natuml language. Or rather, not quite the

sam e expressive pow er, since F rege believed natural language w as'defective in som e respects, and he regarded his new language as animprovemen l .,

j F re ge w as'c on ce rn ed w ith th e se ma ntic s tru ctu re o f s en te nc es , a ndwith semantic relatiolls between sentences, in so far as thesegenerated entailm ents. But he cannot be said to have conceived the

"Wea of a comprehensive formal theory of truth for a language as awhole. One consequence was a lack of interest in the semanticparadoxes. Another was an apparent willi'ngness to accept anin fin ity o f in ea nin gs (se ns es ) a nd re fe re nts fo r e ve ry d en otin g p hra se

iti the l anguage.\ -Because Fr~e took the applkation of function to argum ent to be

the sole mode of semantic combination, he was bound to treafsentences as a kind of n~m e-the nam e of a truth value. Seen sim plyas an artful dodge on the w ay to characterizing the truth conditionsof sentences, this device of Frege's is unexceptionable. But sincesentences do. not operate in language the way names do, Frege'~a pp ro ac h u nd erm in es < ;:o nfid en ce th at th e o nto lo gy h ~ n ee ds to w ork.h .is se ma ntic s h as a ny 'd ire ct c on ne ctio n w ith th e o nto lo gy im plic it in

natural language. It is not clear, then, what one qll1 learn aboutrne tap hysics frolll F re ge's,m etho d. (I ce rtain ly d o Ito t'm ean b y this',that w e can't learn about m etaphysics from F rege's'\vork; but to seehow, arguments d iffe rent ' f rom mine must be marsha lled .)

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11/(!M ethod. of Truth ill M etl!physics 203

,,' ". .Q uil~ ep rp v~ ~ed an esse ntial in grediellt fo r th e pro jec t a( qa nd,

.s!10wing how a holis~ic approach to the problem of understanding

i lang~ age sllpplies the needed em pirical foundation. If m etaphysic~

"co nclu sio ns are to b e d ra wn fro m a th eo ry o f tru th i!lth e w ay thjI;'

':p ro po ~e , th e' a pp ro a~ h to la ng ua ge J nu st b e h olistit:\

Ql.linehimself:1 does not see holism as hav, ingsuch!direct metaph) 's ical s ignif ica.

!10».'c;ver,and f9r a !lum ber of reasons. First, Q uine has not m ade th

/ 'Jheorr ~ ftrutl) central eithcr as a key to the ontology of a languagor as a test of logical form. Second, like Frege, he viewssatisfactori.ly regim ented language as an im provem ent on natumlanguage. rather than as part of a theory about it. In one im portan

~ ,~ .r~spect, Qu in~ ' s ee ln~ ev~n. ~pgo bey~nd Frege, for w here Fregethinks his notation m akcs for bctter languagc, Q uine thinks it al

,nakes for better science. (\s a consequcnce, Quine ties his m et:p hysic~ to h is can onical n otatio n rath er th an to na tu ra llan gu ag c;1,d 'p'~is it, 'T he quest ,of a sim plest, clcarest overall pattern

'.. cunonical noia"tion is not to be distinguished from. a quest

u ltilp atc cut~ ~ories, a !im nin g o f 'hc m 9st g cn eraltraits o f reality.T hc form al languflges tow ards w hich I gravitate-first-ordcr

languages w ith sta"ndard logic-are those preferr~ d by Q uine. B'I" o ur reason s fo r th is ch oice d iv erg e som ew hat. S uc h lan gua ge s p lea

Qu ine, b ecause their l og ic is s imp le , and the scie ilt if ic all y, r espectabparts of natural language can be translateu into them ; a'nd w ith thI agree: Bu't since I al~l not iiltcrested in improving on natura

'Iangll~ige, but in understanding it, I view "form al languagesca no nical n otatio ns as d ev ice s fo r ex plo rin g th e stru cturc o f n atu rlanguage. W e know how to give a theory of truth for the formalanguage; so if wc also knew how to transform the sentences ofnatural language systcm atically into sentences of the form al laguag~, we w ou,ld have a theory of trutli for the natural language,F ro m th is p oin t o fv ie :w, s ta nd ard fo rm al la ng ua ge s a re in te rm ed ia tdevices to assist us in treating natural languages as m ore com pleformal languages .

Tarsk i's w ork o n tru th d efin itio ns fo r fo rm alized lan gu ag es servas)nspiration for the kind of theory of truth that is wanted fonatur~llanguages. 2 T he m eth od w ork s b y en um eratin g th e sem an tic

: . properties of the items, in' a filiite vocabulary, and on this basirec ursiv ely ch aracterizes tru th fo r each o f th e in fin ity o f sen ten ces,_. .. .

I W . V. Quinc. w o , . d ,;; ' ,(1O b ;C C I, 1 (, 1.2 i\. T ursk i. 'T hc C on cep l 0 ': T ru th in F orm uliz ed la ng ua ges '.

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204 lAn guag ea lld Rea lity .

Tru th is re ac he d fro m th e b asis b y th e in terv ~n tion o f'a su btle a nd.;

p ow e rf ul' c on ce pt ( sa tis fa ctio n) w h ic h r ela te s b oth se nte nc es a nd ,, \

non-sentential expressions to objects in the' w orld. A n im portant'

feature of Tarski's approach is that a characterization of a truthpredicate 'x is true in L' is accepted, only if it entails, for eachse nten ce o fthe la ng ua ge L , a th eo re m of th e fo rm'x is true in L if

and onlY-if. . .' w ith'x ' re pla ce d b y a d es c~ ip tio n o Cth e se nte n~and the dots replaced by a translation of the sentence into thela ng ua ge o f th e th eo ry. '

It is evid ent that th ese th eorem s, w hich w e'm ay call T ~sen tences,req uire a predicate th at ho ld s of ju st th e tru e senten ces o f L . I t is alsoplain , from the fact that the tru th co nd itio ns for a sen ten ce tr~ u1 slate'

th at se nte nc e (i.e ., w ha t a pp ea rs to th e rig ht o f the 'if an d on ly if' ina T-s en te nc e tr an sla te s th e s en te nc e d esc rib ed o n th e le ft) , th at th etheory show s how to characterize truth for any given sentencew ithout' appeal to conceptual resources not available 'in' that. If

sentence'. .'T he se 'r em ar ks a re ' O I lly ro ug hly c or re ct. A th eo ry 'o f tr uth f or a

natural 'language m ust relativize the truth of a ~ent~nce to thecircumstances of, utterance, and w hen this is done the truthconditions given by, a' T-sentence w ill no longer tran~late thed es cr ib ed s en te nc e, n or w ill it b e p os sib le to a vo id u sin g c on ce pts'that are, perhaps, sem antical, in giving the truth conditions ofs en te nc es w ith in de xic al e le me nts. M o re in jp or ta nt, th e n otio n o f'tr an sla tio n, w hic h c an b e m a de p re cis e f o~ a rtif ic ia l la ng ua ge s o nw hic h in te rpre ta .tion s are im po se d by fia t, h as n o pre cise o r e ve n,c lear app lica tion to natural l anguages .

.

F or th ese , a nd o th er re as on s, it is im p or ta nt to str es s th at a th eo ryof truth for a natural language (as I c~ :>I1ceivet) d iffe rs ~ id ely inb oth a im a nd in te re st f ro m Tar sk i's tr uth d efin itio ns . S ha rp ne ss o fapplication is lost, and w ith it, m ost of w hat concerns m athem a~t idans ,and log ic ians : consequences for consi stency, for, example.Tarski cou ld take t rans la tion as syn tact ical ly speci fi ed ,and go on tod efine tru th. B ut in app licatio n toan atu ral lang uag e it m akes m or~s en se to a ss um e a p ar tia l u nd er sta nd in g o f tru th , a nd u se th e th eo ry

to 'throw tight on m eaning; interpretation, and translation.3S atisfa ctio n o f Tarsk i's C on v~ ntio n T rem ain s a d esid er~ tu m o f athe ory, bu t is n o lo ng er a vaila ble a s a form al te st.

3 S ee E ss ay s and 1 0

to~.

The M ethod of Truth ill M etaphysics 205

, W h~t ,a theory ,of truth does for a natural.,langu~ge',~s reveastructure. In, treating each s,entence as com posed in accq~ ntable~ays ~"H

of;~ .f in it,e number J )f tr uth -r elevant words ,. it a rticula t~ sthis structure. W hen w e study term s and sentences directly" not ath e ligh t 'o f a co mprehen siv e t~ leo ry, w e m ust b ring m 'etap hy sics tlanguage; w e assign roles to w ords and sentences in accord w ith thcategories we independently posit on epistem ological or metaph ysical gro un ds. O peratin g in this w ay, p hilo so ph ers p on der su cqu estio ns as w hether th ere m ust be entities, perh ap s ~ niversals, thco rrespo nd to p red icates, o r n on -ex isten t en tities to ~ orre~ pon d

, n on -d en otin g n am e s o r d es cr ip tio ns ; o r th ey a rg ue th at s en te ncd o, o r d o n ot, c orre sp ond to fac ts o r pro po sitio ns.

A different light is shed on these matters w hen w e look forcom prehensive theory of truth, for such a theory m akes its owunavoidable demands.

II I

..Now let us consider some applications. W e noticed that th,requirem ent that the truth conditions of a sentence be given usinonly the conceptual resources of that sentence is not entirely clewhere it seem s that it can be m et, nor everywhere applicable. Thc ases that invite excep tion a re sen tences that invo lve demons tr ativeand here the cure of the difficulty is relatively sim ple.4 T hese cas

.aside, the req uirem ent, fo r all its ob scu rity, has, I thin k, im po rtanimplications:

Suppose we were to admit a rule like this as part of a theorytruth: 'A sentence consisting of a singular term followed by a onplace predicate is true if and only if the object nam ed by the singulterm belongs to the class determ ined by the predicate.'s This ruo ffe nd s th e s :e qu irem en t, fo r if th e ru le w ere ad mitte d, th e T -s en te nfor ~ Socrates is w ise' w ould be' "Socrates is w ise" is true if and onif the_ ob ject n am ed b y "S ocrates" belo ng s to the class determ inedth e p red icate "is w ise",' and here the'statem ent o f tru th co nd itio

involves tw o sem antic concepts (nam ing and determ ining a clanot plausibly am ong the conceptual resources of 'Socrates is w i

It w o uld b e e as y to g et fro m th e ten den tio us T-s en te nc ej4 S e e S . W e in s te in .'Tru th a ndD e m o n s t r a t i v e s ' ,5 C om pare R . C arn ap .M ea nin g a nd N ecessity , S .

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206 L allgua ge alld R ea lity ,'-. ;

m en tioned to th~ lion -com m ittal and ad missible' "S ocrates is w ise":is true if and only if S ocrates is w ise',if the ,thcory also con t,j\in cd as,postulates s ta tements that the .object named by 'Socrates' i sSocrate(I

, , a nd th atx belongs to the class determined by the prcdicate 'i§wise' i r; :and only ifx is w ise . I f en ou gh :> uch P ostu illtes a re a va ilab lC 'to c arefo r all proper nam es and prim itiv e pred icates, th~ results are cIear..",rFirst, T-'sentences free from unwanted sem antic term s w ould be~a va ilab le f or a ll th e se nte nc es in vo lv ed ; an d th e e xtra sem an ti~ te rm giw Ol,ild b e unnecessary. For there would have to be a postulate foreach nam e and prcdicate, and this therc could be only if tlie list ofn am es an d p rim itiv e p re dic ate s w er e f iliite . B ut if th e list w ere fin ite ,there would be only a finite num ber of sentences consisting of aJU line aitd a one-place p redicatc, and no th ing w ould stan d h fthe w ayo f g iv in g th e tru th c on ditio ns fo r a ll su ch se nte nc es str aig ht o ff -th eT ~se nten ce s th em selv es c ou ld ser ve a s th e a xio ms .'

The exam ple illustrates how kecping the vocabulary finite m ayallow the elim ination of scm antic concepts; it alsp show s how thedem and for a satisfactory theory has ontologie;,1 consequences,H ere, the call for entities to correspond to p'redieates disappears

,when the theory is m ade to produce T-sentences without excess'sem antic baggage. Indeed in the case at Ii~nd th'e theory floes notn eed to p ut ex pression s and objects in to ex plicit corrcspon dence at'all, and so n o onto logy is invo lved ; b ut this is b ecau se th e & ,upplyo fsentences w hose truth conditions arc to be given is finite.

N oU hat an infinity of sentences nccessarily dem ands ontology.G iv en th e [ln ite su pp ly o f se nten ce s " Yitlr ~ ~ tstru ctu red p r.e die atesth at w e h av e b een im ag in in g, it is e asy 'to g O,.o n to in fin ity,byadding

Ol\e or m ore iterable devices for constructing sentences fromsen te nc es,lik e n eg atio n, co nju nc tio n, o r alte rn atio n. If o nto lo gy w a~';no t req uired to giv e the truth co ndition s fo r th e sim plest sentences,~

th es e d ev ic es w ill n ot c all f or m o re . ,

In general, how ever, sem antically relev,!lI1t s tructure is apt tod eln an d, o nto lo gy. C on sid er, fo r ex am p,le , th e v iew th at q uo ta tio nsar~ to be treated as semantic atom s, on a par with proper nam es inlacking significant structure. Tarski says of this w ay of viewing"quotation that it 'seem s to be the m ost natural one and com pletely inaccordance w ith the custom ary w ay of using quotation m arks'.6 H eg iv e$ :'tnn odel arg um ent to sho wt h~ L< w ~~ :a t.~ 9n m ar ks c an no t b e

~ A . Tauki, 'T he Concept or Truth, in rornm lized L unguages'. tC,O .Tor m ore onq uotatio n see E ssay 6 .

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111 eM eth od o f Trllthil},M etaphysics 207

treated as an o rdin ary fun ction al exp ression siqce a quo tation dnot.nante an entity that is a function of anything nam ed by w hatquo tation m arks enclo se. A bout this Tarski is certain ly rig ht, b utm o,~al of .the lesson ~aD l~ot b~that q~~t~J.~?nsare like pr~perI\am es-not, anyw ay, If a Tarskl-style theory:of truth can be gifo r a lan ~u ag ec on ta in in g q u( )ta tio n. F or cI eili- ly t he re a re in fin itmany quota tions.

O ne idea for 'a possible solution can be extracted from Q uinrem ark that quotations m ay be replaced by spelling (m uch the sais s aid by Tarsk i). Sp elling d ocs have structu re. It is a w ay of givinsem antically articulate description of an expression by the usef in it e n u'm b er o f e xp re ss io ns : t he c on ca te na ti on s ig n; w it h a ss oc iap ,a re nt he se s, a nd ( pr op er ) n am e s o f th e l et .t er s. F ol lo w in g t hi s l in eshould think of a quotation like,' "cat'" as having a ,form mclearly given by'''c''''''a''''''t''', o r, b ette r s till, b y '« see "e h) "tee '.T his idea w orks, at least up to a point. B ut note the consequens;We no longer view the quotation' "cat'" as unstructured; rather

are treatiJlg it as an ab breviation of a sort fo r a com plex descriptioN o.t, how ever, as 'an arbitrary abbreviation to be specified forcase at hand, but as aslyle of abbreviation th at can b e expandedm ech anically into a description th at sho ws structure m ore plainIndeed, talk of abbreviation is m isleading; w e m ay as w ell sayth eo ry 'tr ea ts q uo ta tio ns a s c om plex d esc rip tio ns.

A nother consequence is that in giving structure to quotationshave had to recognize in quotations repeatable and independe'w ord s': n am es .o f tile in div id ua l le tter s, an d th e co nc ate na tio n sThese 'w ords' are, of course, finite in num ber-that w as required

but they also reveal an ontological fact not apparent whquotations w ere'view ed as unstructured Itam es, a com mitm entletters. We get a m anageable theory w hen w e explain m oleculesm ade from atom s of a finite num ber of kinds; but w e also get atom

!\. m ore stirring exam ple of how postulating needed structurelanguage can bring ontology in its wake is provided by Fregsemantics for the oblique contexts created by sentences abopropositional attitudes. In Frege's view , a sentence like 'Danb elieves that th ere is a lio n in the den' is do minated b y th e tw oj> la

, p re <H ca te 'b elie ve s' w h os e f irs t p la ce is f ille d b y th e sin gu la r t'D aiiieJ' ,and whose second place is filled by a singular term thnam es"a 'propositio n or 'sense', Taking this line no t only req uiresto treat sentences as singular term s, but to find entities for them

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208 ia"guage ~"d Reality

-name. And more is, to com~. For clearly an infinite nuniber ofsentences m ay occupy the spot after 'D aniel b~liev~s that. . ,,' So ifw e are to prov id e a tru th d efin itio n, w e )l1u st d isco ver sem an tic' "

structu~e in these sin~ular term s: it !pust be show n how they can betre ate d a s d esc rip tio ns o f p ro po sitio ns, To a vO id th e a bsu rd Hie s th at

~,..

w ,ould ensue if the singular term s in a sent~nc~ had tlleli- usuat'iI.. ,

,re,rer~nce, Frege takes them as referring in~ iead to 'intensional'.j,

e nti t~ ,e s. A na lo go ~s c ha ng es m u st c om e o ve r tq ,e .s em a nt ic f ea .t ur es o r',p red lcat~ s, q uan tifiers, a nd sen ten tial con nectives. S o far, a th eoryQf truth of the sort we have been looking 'for can handle thesituation, but only by treating each word of the language as';am biguous, having one in~erpretation in ordinary contexts andanother after 'believes that' and sim ilar verbs. W hat is to the eye onew ord m ust, from the vantage point of this theory, be treated as tw o.~rege appreciated this, and held the ambi& uity against naturallanguage; C hurch, in the artificial languages of 'A F orm ulation ofthe Logic of Sense and Denotation', elim inated the am biguity byin tr od uc in g ,d is tin ct e xp re ss io ns , d if fe rin g i n s ub sc ri ~t.7

F rege sug gested that w ith each ad ditio n of a verb of p rop osition afattitu de before a referrillg ex pressio n that ex pressio n com es to refer,to an entity of a higher semaatical level. Thus every word andsentence is infinitely m any-w ays am biguqus; on C hurch's theoryt he re , w il l b e a n i nf in it e b as ic v oc ab ul ar y. I n n ei ~h er c as e i s i t 'p os si bl e,to provi~e a theory of truth of the kind we want.

Frege w as clear on the need, if w e are to hav~ a system atic theory:to view the truth value of each sentence as a function of the sem antic

ro les ofits parts o r asp ects, far clearer th an an yp ne w ho w ent befo re,an d clearer than m ost w ho follow ed. W ha t F reg e d id no t app reciate,as this last exam ple brings out, w as the additional restraints, i'i,'-particular to a finite vocabulary, that now from the demand for aco mp rehen siv e th eo ry o f truth . F rege b ro ug ht, sem an tics to a po int'w he re th e d em an d w as in te llig ib le a nd e ve n, p erh ap s, s atis fia ble ; b utit d id no t o ccu r to h im to form ulate th e d em an d, '

Let us take a closer look at the bootstrap operation that enables,1,1Sto ,bring latent structure to light by characterizing a truth',predicate. E arly steps m ay be illustrated by a~ sim ple a sentence as

,'Jack and Jill went up the hill'-under what conditions is thissen ten ce tru e? T he challen ge lies in th e p resen ce in th e sen tence o f an

7 A ,. C hu rch, 'A F orm ulation of th e L ogic of S ense and D enotation',

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The M ethod of Truthill M etaphysics 209

iterativ e d evice-co njun ctio n.\C lea rly w e can g o o n ad din g ph raseslike 'and M ary' after the w ord 'Jill'ad l ib itum. So any statem ent oftruth 'coiuiitions for this sentence m ust bear in m ind the infinity osentences,' generated by the same device, that lie waiting for

. treatm en t. W hat is called for is a recu rsiv e clau se in th e truth theq rythat can be called into play ,as often as ~eeded. The trick, as we alknow, is to define truth for a basic, and finite, stock of simplest

-sentences; such as' Jack w ent up the hill' and 'Jill w ent up the hilt'and then m ake the truth conditions of ~Jack and Jill w ent up the hildepcnd on the truth conditions, of the .tw o sim ple scntences. So wget:

'Jack and Jill went up the hilt' is true if and only if Jack went upthe hill an~ Jill went up the h~11.

as a consequence' of a theory of truth. O n the left, a sentence of thv ern ac~ la r, its structu re transpare nt o r n ot, is d escrib ed; o n th e righof the 'if and only if' a sentence of that sam e vernacular, but a parof the vernacular chosen for its ability to m ake explicit, throughrepeated applications of the sam e sim ple devices, the underlyil)sem antic 'structure. If ~thepry' of truth yields such a purifiedsentence for every sentence in the language, the portion of the totalan gu ag e used on th e righ t m ay b e con sid ered a can on ical n otationIndeed, w ith sym bols substituted for som e w ords, and groupinm ade plain by parentheses or som e equivalent device, the part of tlanguage used in stating truth conditions for all sentences mabecom e indistinguishable from w hat is often called a form alizediu lificiallan guag e. It w ould b e a m istake , h ow ever, to sup po se thit is essential to find such a canonical subdivision of the ,languagS in~ e 'and ' m ay b e w riU en betw een senten ces in E nglish , w e tak e teasy route of transform ing 'Jack and Jill w ent up the hill' into 'Jacwent up the hill and Jill went up the hill' and then giving the trutconditions of the latter in accord w ith a rule that says a conjunctioof sentences is true if and only if each conjunct is: B ut suppose 'annever sto'od betw een sentences; its role as sentential connectivw ould still be recognized by a rule saying that a sentence com posof a conjunctive subject ('Jack and Jill') and a predicate ('wentthe hill') is true if 'and only if the sentence composed of the ficonjoined subject and the predicate, and the sentence com posedthe'second conjoined subject and the predicate, are true. T he rurequired is less perspicuous, and needs to be supplem ented w

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21 0 L an gu ag e a nd R ea lity

others, to do the work of the simple original rule. But the pointrem ains: canonical notation is a convenience we can get alongwithout if need be. It is good, but not necessary, to bring logicalform to the surface.

Sim ilarly, it w ould greatly ease the treatm ent of negation if w e-'could plausibly transform all sentences containing negation intosentences, recognizably the same in truth value, in which the

ne ga tin g p hrase alw ays g ove rns a sen te nc e (as w ith , 'it is n ot th e ca sethat'). But if this were not possible, negation would still be asen tential co nne ctiv e if the truth co nditio n o f a sen tcn cc lik e 'C oal isnot w hite' w ere given by adverting to the truth condition of 'C oal iswhite'. ('Coal is not w hite' is true if and only if 'C oal is white' is nottrue.)

The issue of ontology is forced into the open only where thethe ory fin ds qu an tification al stru cture , an d that is w here the the oryb es t a cc ou nts fo r th e p atte rn o f tru th d ep en de nc ie s b y s yste ma tic allyrelatin g ex pre ssion s to o bje cts. It is strikin g h ow firm ly the de man d

for theory puts to rest one ancient source of aporia: the"questionh ow to d em on strate th e asy mm etry, if an y, of sub ject and p red icate.A s long as our attention is focused on single, sim ple sentences, w em ay w onder w hy an explanation of truth should involve predicates1 n o nto lo gy an y less tha n sing ular te rm s. T he class o f w ise o bjects (o rthe p ro perty o f w isdo m) o ffe rs itself a s w hat m ig ht co rresp on d to thepredicate 'w ise' in 'Socrates is w ise' in m uch the sam e w ay Socratescorresponds to 'S ocrates'. A s pointed out above, no finite num ber ofsuch sentences requires a theory of truth to bring ontology into thep ictu re. W hen w e get to "m ix ed qu an tifica tio n an d p red icates o f an y

d egree o f co mp le xity, ho wev er, th e p icture ch an ges. With c om plexq ua ntif ic atio na l s tru ctu re , th e th eo ry w ill m atc h u p e xp re ss io ns w ithobjects. But there is no need, as long as the underlying logic isassum ed to be first order, to introduce entities to correspond topredicates. Rccognition of this fact w ill not, of course, settle thequ estio n w hethe r th ere a re su ch th ing s as u niv ersals o r c lasses. B ut itdoes dem onstrate that there is a difference betw een singular termand predicate; for large stretches of language, anyw ay, variables,quantifiers, a!1d singular term s m ust be construed as referential infun ction ; no t so fo r p red icates.

It is not alw ays evident w hat thequantificational structure of asentence in natural language is; w hat appear to be singular term ssom etim es m elt into som ething less ontic in im plication w hen their

,"."

T he M etllO d of T ru th in M eta ph ysics 21 1

lo gic al r ela tio ns w ith o th er se nte nc es a re stu die d, w hile th e re qu irm ents of theory m ay suggest that a sentence plays a role which cabe explained only by treating it as having a quantificationals tru ctu re n ot a pp ar en t o n th e s urf ac e. H ere is a fa milia r illu stra tio n

W hat is the ontology of a sentence like:

'Jack fell dow n before Jack broke his crow n'?

Jack and his crow n seem to be the only candidates for entities thm ust ex ist if this se nten ce is to be tru e. A nd if, in p la ce o f 'b efo re', whad 'and', this answer might satisfy us for the reason alreadexplored: namely, that we can state, in away that will work fendless sim ilar cases, the truth conditions of the w hole sentenc'Jack fell d ow nalld Jack broke his crown' on the basis just of thetruth of the com ponent sentences, and w e can hope to give the truconditions for the com ponents w ithout m ore ontology than Jaand his crown. But 'Jack fell down before Jack broke his crowdo es n ot y ield to th is treatm en t, b ecau se 'b efo re' can no t b e v ie we da truth-functional sem antic connective: to see this, reflect that fthe sentcnce to be true, both com ponent sentences m ust be true, bth is is n ot s uffic ie nt fo r its tru th , s in ce in te rc ha ng in g th e c om p on enw ill m ak e it false.

Frege show ed us how to cope with the case: we can form ulate ttruth conditions for the sentence 'Jack fell dow n before Jack brohis crow n' as follow s: it is true if and only if there exists a tim et an dthcre exists a tim et' such that Jack fell down att, Jack broke hiscro wn a tt', an d t i s before t'. S o apparently w e are com mitted to theexistence of times if we accept any such sentence as true. Ath in kin g o f the h olistic ch aracter o f a tru th d efin ition , th e d isco veo f h id den in tolo gy in sen ten ces co ntain in g 'b efo re ' m ust c arry oveto other sentences: thus, 'Jack fell dow n' is true if and only if theex ists a tim et such that Jack fell down att.

Now for a m ore disturbing exam ple. C onsider first 'Jack's fcaused the breaking of his crow n.' Here it is natural to take 'Jackfall' and 'the breaking of his crow n' as singular term s descdbinevents, and 'caused' as a tw o-place, or relational, predicate. Bthen, w hat is the sem antic relation betw een such general term s'fall' in 'Jack's fall' or 'the fall of Jack' and such verbs as 'fell''Jack fell'? For that maUer, how does 'Jack's fall caused tbreak in g o f h is cro wn' diffe r, in its truth co nd itio ns, fro m 'Jac k fw hich caused it to be the case that Jack broke his crow n', w here

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f il l h 21 3



212 Language alld R eality

phrase 'which caused it to be the case that' is, on the face of it, asen tent ia l connec tive?

The correct theory of 'caused', as I have argued at more lengthelsew here, is parallel to Frege's theory for 'before'.8 I suggest that'Jack fell down, which caused a breaking of his crown' is true ifa nd o nly if th ere e xis t ev en tse andfsuch thate is a fa ll Ja ck to ok ,f isa breaking his crown suffered, ande caused f A ccording to this

proposal, the predicate 'is a fall', true of events, becom es prim ary,and contexts containing the verb are derived. T hus 'Jack fell' is trueif and only if there is a fall such that Jack took it, 'Jack took a w alk'is true if and only if there is a walk that he took, and so on. On thisanalysis, a noun phrase like 'Jack's fall' becomes a genuinedescription, and w hat it describes is the one fall that Jack took.

, O ne c on side ra tio n tha t m ay h elp re con cile us to a n on to log y ofparticular events is that we m ay then dispense with the abstractontology of tim es w e just now tentatively accepted, for events are asplausibly the relata of the before-relation as times. Anothercon sid eration is th at by reco gn izing ou r com m itm ent to an o ntologyof events we can see our way to a viable sem antics of adverbs andadverbial modification. W ithout events, there is the problem ofe xp la in in g th e lo gic al re la tio ns b etw ee n se nt en ces lik e 'Jo ne s n ic ke dhis check w hile shaving w ith a razor in the bathroom on Saturday',and 'Jones nicked his cheek irt the bathroom ', and 'Jones nicked hischeek'. It seem s that som e iterative device is at w ork; yet w hat, froma sem antic point of view, can the device be? The books on logic donot say: they analyse these sentences to require relations withvarying num bers bf places depending on the num ber of adverbialm odifications, but this leads to the unacceptable conclusion thatthere is an infinite basic vocabulary, and it fails to explain the'ob vio us inferences. D y interpreting th ese senten ces as b eing abou tevents, we can solve the problems. Then we can say that 'Jonesnicked his cheek in the bathroom on Saturday' is true if and only ifthere exists an event that is a nicking of his cheek by Jones,alld that ~'.e ve nt too k pla ce in th e b ath roo m,alld it to ok pla ce o n S atu rd ay.'

The i te ra tive dev ice i s now obvious : i t i s the famil ia r col labora tionof conjunction and quantification that enables us to deal w ith

'S om eo ne f ell d ow n a nd b ro ke h is c ro w n'.This device w orks, but as w e have seen, it takes an ontology to

m a ke it w or k: a n o nto lo gy in clu din g p eo ple f or 'S om e on e f ell d o wn8 See Essay 7 in E ssays on A c/iolls alld EI'fll/s.

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111 eM eth od o f Tru th il l Metaphysics 21 3

an d b ro ke h is crow.n', an on tolo gy o f ev en ts (in ad ditio n) fo r 'Jo nnicked his cheek in the bathroom on Saturday'. It is m ildly ironthat in recent philosophy it has becom e a popular m anceuver toto avoid ontological problems by treating certain phrases aad verb ial. O ne su ch sug gestio n is th at w e can ab jure sense-data ifrender a sentence like 'T he m ountain appears blue to Sm ith' as 'Tm ountain appears bluely to Sm ith'. A nother sim ilar idea is thatcan do without an ontology of intensional objects by thinkingsentences about propositional altitudes as essentially adverbia'G alileo said that the earth m oves' w ould then com e out, 'Galilespoke in a-that-the-earth-m oves-fashion'. There is little chancethink, that such adverbial clauses can be given a systematis em a nt ic al a na ly si s w it ho ut o nt ol og ic al e nt an gl em e nt s.

T here is a further, rather different, w ay in w hich a theory of trulIIay hav e m etaph ysical rep ercussion s. In adju sting to the presenof dem onstratives, and of dem onstrative elem ents like tense, innatural language, a theory of truth m ust treat truth as an attribute

utterances that depends (perhaps am ong other things) on tsentence uttered, the sp eaker, an d the tim e. A ltern ativ ely, it m aypossib le to treat truth as a relation b etw een sp eak ers, sen tences, atim es. Thus an utterance of 'I am five feet tall' is true if spokensom e tim es in the lives of m ost people, and true if spoken at any tiduring a considerable span in the lives of a few. 'Your slipshowing' m ay be true when uttered by a speaker at a tim e whenfaces w est, though it m ight not have been true if he had faced nortand 'Hilary climbed Everest' was for a long time false, and is noforever true. Sentences w ithout dem onstrative elem ents cannotthe w ork of sentences w ith dem onstrative elem ents, but if w e arehave a theory of truth, we m ust be able to state, without the used em on str ativ es, a ru le th at e xp lain s u nd er w ha t c on ditio ns se nte ncw ith d em on str ati ve s a re tr ue . S uc h r ule s w ill g iv e th e tru th c on di tiof sentences like 'H ilary clim bed E verest' only by quantifying ou tterances, speakers, an d tim es, or, perh aps, even ts.

If explicit appeal m ust be made to speakers and their circumstances in giving a theory of truth, then on the; a ssum ption thatgeneral featu res of lang uage reflect ob jective featu res o f the w orwe m ust conclude that an intelligible m etaphysics will assigncentral place to the idea of people (= speakers) with a locationpublic space and tim e.

It should be clear that 'the m ethod of truth' in m etaphysics do

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not eliminate recourse to more standard, often essentially non-Hnguistic, arguments or decisions. W hat it is possible to do in atheory of truth, for exam ple, depends to a large extent on the logical

. resources the theory i tsel fdeploys, and the theory cannot dec ide thi sfor us. N or, as w e have seen, does the m ethod suggest w !lattruths,

. b ey on d th ose it c ou nts as lo gic al, w e m ust acc ep t a s a co nd itio n o fm utual understanding. W hat a theory of truth docs is describe thepattern truth m ust m ake am ong the sentences, \vithout telling uswhere the pattern falls. So, for example, I argue that a very largenumber of our ordinary claims about the world cannot be Irueunless there are events. B ut a theory of truth, even if it took the form) propose, w ould not specify w hich events exist, nor even that anydo. However, if I am right about the logical form of sentencesconcerning change, then unless there are events, there are no truesentences of very com mon kinds about change. And if there are notrue sentences about change, there are no true sentences aboutobjects that change. A m etaphysician w ho is w illing to suppose no

sentences like 'Vesuvius erupted in M arch 1944'or 'C aesar crossedthe Rubicon' are true w ill not be forced by a theory of truth to adm itthe existe nce of eve nts or eve n, perh aps, of peuple or m ounta ins. B utif he accepts that m any such sentences are true (w hichever they m aybe ), then it is obvious that he m ust a cce pt th e e xiste nce of pe ople andvolc anoes; and, if I am .righ t, the e xiste nce of eve nts like e ruptio nsand cross ings .

T he m erit of the m ethud of truth is nut that it settles such m attersonce and for all, or even that it settles them without furtherm etaphysical. rellection. B ut the m ethod does serve to sharpen oursense of viable alterilatives, and gives a com prehensive idea of theconsequences of a decision. 'M etaphysics has generality as an ahn;the m ethod of truth expresses that demand by requiring a theorythat touches all the bases. T hus the problem s of m etaphysics, w hileneither solved nor replaced, com e to be seen as the problem s of allgood theory building. We want a theory that is sim ple and clear,w ith a logical apparatus that is understood and justified, and thataccounts for the facts about how our language w orks. W hat thosefacts are may remain somewhat in dispute, as will certainly the

w isdom of various trade-oil's as betw een sim plicity and clarity.These questions will be,. I do not doubt, the old questions ormetaphysics hI new dress. But the new dress is in many ways ana ttr ac ti ve one .

15 llea lity withollt lleferellce .

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It is difficult to see how a theory of m eaning can hope to succeed tdoes not elucidate, and give a central role to, the conceptreference. On the other hand, there are weighty reasonssupposing that reference cannot be explained or analysed in term ore prim itive or behavioural. Let m e describe the dilem ma mfully, and then say how I think a theory of truth in Tarski's style ch elp re so lv e it. .

'Theory of meaning' is not a technical term , but a gesture mdirec tion of a fa mily of problem s (a problem fam ily). C en tral a mothe problem s is the ta sk of e xpla ining lan guage and c om m unica tioby a ppea l to sim ple r, or at a ny rate diffe rent, conc epts. It.is natuto b elie ve th is is p os sib le b ec au se lin gu is tic p he no me na a re p ate ns up erv en ie nt o n n on -lin gu is tic p he no me na .) p ro po se to c all a th eotheory of m eaning for a natural languageL if it is such that (a)know ledge of the the ory suffices for understandin g the utteranc essp ea ke rs o fL a nd (b) the theory can be given em piric al applic atiob y a pp ea l to e vid en ce d esc rib ed w ith ou t u sin g lin gu is tic c on ce pts,a t le as t w ith ou t u sin g lin gu is tic c on ce pts sp ec ific to th e s en te nc esw ords ofL. T he first c ondition indicates the nature of the que stionthe second requires that it not be begged. .

B ya theory of truth, I m ean a theory that satisfies som ething lTarski's C onven tion T: it is a the ory tha t by re cursive ly cha ractering a truth predicate (say 'is true inL' ) enta ils , f ?r ~ach se.n ten~es ofL, a m etalinguistic se ntenc e g ot from th e formS IS tru e IIIL If a ndo nly ifp' when 's' is re pla ce d b y a c an on ic al d esc rip tio n o f a s en te ncof L and 'p ' by a.se ntenc e of the m eta lang uage tha t gives th e..~ uconditions of lJ- le sc ribed sentence . T he theo ry m ust be re Iatlvlto a tim!'

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leake r (a t le ast) to ha ndle inde xic al expression

08-d davidson- the method of truth in metaphysics

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