Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 4.3bsd-beta 6/6/85; site l5.uucp Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!harvard!seismo!lll-crg!well!l5!laura From: laura@l5.uucp (Laura Creighton) Newsgroups: net.philosophy Subject: Re: Consistency Again Message-ID: <244@l5.uucp> Date: Tue, 5-Nov-85 13:22:54 EST Article-I.D.: l5.244 Posted: Tue Nov 5 13:22:54 1985 Date-Received: Fri, 8-Nov-85 05:55:01 EST References: <2479@sjuvax.UUCP> Reply-To: laura@l5.UUCP (Laura Creighton) Distribution: net Organization: Nebula Consultants in San Francisco Lines: 89 Todd understand me very well. I have never been described as a coherentist theorest before, but the shoe seems to fit. There are a few things that I would like to elucidate a bit more... >I think it is fair to describe Laura's position as a "coherence >theory of truth." For a coherentist theorist, truth is only definable >within sets of statements, I take it. Pretty well. Of course, the process of dividing things into statements is to some extent a-priori, and so the statements that result are to some extent artificial. Truth is only definable within beliefs, which are commonly expressed as statements (statements of beliefs). >Individual statements would lack truth values. I am not sure that this is strictly so. It is impossible to determine the truth of a statement independent of other beliefs, but it is easy to determine that the statement ``Laura is 7 feet tall'' is false. At that point, I would say that it is quite correct to assign a truth value of false to that statement. Note that it is impossible to arrive at this statement without some beliefs in the accuracy of your ability to measure. There are certain statements which cannot be assigned a truth value, of course. Consider the pair: The following sentence is true. The preceeding senetence is false. To consider them individually would be a mistake. To consider them in reference to each other yeilds ambiguity. You cannot assign truth values to either of them. >A false statement, on this view, would be one that >would make a contradiction derivable from the set, that would not have >been derivable had that statement not been added. This is dead-on. >For purposes of analysis, regard someone's belief system as the set of >propositions to which that person would assent. When contradictions >become apparent, a rational individual rejects the smallest possible >number of propositions required to remove the inconsistency. This >ranking process is necessary to keep the coherence theory from >licensing the rejection of tremendous portions of the belief system >for the sake of isolated incongruities. Nothing said so far requires >that truth be defined as a relation between statements and >mind-independent reality. I think that I am defining truth as a relationship which beliefs have taken as a whole. Statements of belief which are called ``true'' are ways of expressing memebers of the set of beliefs which have the truth relationship. Also, the ranking of true beliefs in a rational person is more complicated than what you have outlined. At some point it would be simpler to reject the evidence of your own eyes and remove the smallest number of propositions that keeps you inconsistent with other people. A rational person does this sometimes, but often should tenatiously hang onto their beliefs because it is the other people who are mistaken. Observational errors are common. Somebody may have a set of beliefs that are consistent with what they believe they observed but not consistent with what happened because they made an observational error. For this reason, most rational people have a ``bullshit index'' that they apply to all new evidence -- how likely is it that this new bit of information is bogus? >But I am not clear about what Laura means by "facts", since these, on >the face of it, appear to be observer-independent Truths. If that is >the case, then the inconsistency is reintroduced after all. No, a fact is a presumed-true. it is a statement that I believe is true. (Once I disbelieve it, it is no longer a fact). I think that I use ``fact'' where you would use ``true statement'' or ``true proposition''. A new fact is a belief that you have to integrate into your set of beliefs. This will often entail rejecting things which yesterday you would have called facts, and today which you would call ``mistaken beliefs''. -- Help beautify the world. I am writing a book called *How To Write Portable C Programs*. Send me anything that you would like to find in such a book when it appears in your bookstores. Get your name mentioned in the credits. Laura Creighton sun!l5!laura (that is ell-five, not fifteen) l5!laura@lll-crg.arpa