Truth and Language-World Connections Dorothy Grover The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 87, No. 12. (Dec., 1990), pp. 671-687. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-362X%28199012%2987%3A12%3C671%3ATALC%3E2.0.CO%3B2-A The Journal of Philosophy is currently published by Journal of Philosophy, Inc..
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THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY VOLUME LXXXVII, NO. 1 2 , DECEMBER
1990
TRUTH AND LANGUAGE-WORLD CONNECTIONS* hilosophers have notoriously had little success in their search for a satisfactory, substantive correspondence theory of truth.' According to the early Bertrand Russell, true beliefs correspond to facts: the fact that snow is white makes the belief that snow is white true. The difficulties such fact theories face are wellknown. For example, none of the explanations of falsehood is close to being satisfactory. One suggestion is that beliefs are false because there are no facts to which they correspond. This kind of theory easily degenerates into the existence theory (A. N. Prior's terminology, op. cit.) of truth. In the Theaetetus, Plato wrestles with the dilemma posed by the existence theory: if sentences are false when there is nothing to which they correspond, then false sentences would appear to be about nothing. Part of the solution to the difficulty, offered in the Sophist, is to recognize that sentences have both subjects and predicates; for then a sentence can be about something
* I thank Michael Devitt, Anil Gupta, and Jerry Kapus for their comments on earlier drafts. I am afraid I have probably not adequately addressed all of Devitt's doubts. Thanks also to the philosophers at Victoria University/Wellington, for their helpful comments. See, for example, A. N. Prior's survey of the correspondence theory in "Correspondence Theory of Truth," in Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Paul Edwards, ed. (New York: Macmillan, 1967). By a substantive correspondence theory of truth I mean a theory that construes truth as a substantive relational property connecting language o r thought with an extralinguistic reality. I include the correspondence theories of Russell, and I shall include Hartry Field's. Some philosophers (e.g., Prior) follow Alfred Tarski in claiming that a formally correct definition that has as consequences, so-called T-sentences, like 'Snow is white' is true iff snow is white. captures all there is to capture in correspondence theories of truth. O n this view, nothing further needs to be said about truth "relating" language to the world. Theories like this, and others, have been called deflationary. It is expected that deflationists assume truth does not have a causal explanatory role. 0022-362X/90/8712/671-687
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(Theaetetus), and yet false (Theaetetus flies). This does not leave us within reach of a theory of truth and falsity, however. Alternative proposals for falsehood have encountered other difficulties. Russell2 suggests that false beliefs (false sentences, or false propositions) might correspond to objective falsehoods; or, alternatively, that belief is a relation between the believer and an indefinite number of objects. Then later Russells proposes that a true sentence corresponds in one way to a fact and a false sentence corresponds in a different way to the same fact. What are facts, and what are objective falsehoods? What kinds of language-world connections are there that might provide the assumed correspondence? The picture theory of the Tractatus might be viewed as offering a natural explanation of correspondence-for one is supposed just to see what a picture pictures. But it is pretty obvious we do not just see what a picture pictures, for different people with different backgrounds see many different thing^.^ Furthermore, how can a mere configuration of natural linguistic objects (or names) be propositional? To the extent that a picture theory more satisfactorily addresses this question, the picture analogy seems undermined. Relations (of implication, for example) that obtain between sentences do not obtain between pictures. If we loosen up on the picture analogy, what explanation do we have of the connections between language and reality? Faced with problems such as these, many philosophers have abandoned the idea that the correspondence-to-facts framework will lead to an acceptable theory of truth (or meaning). Indeed, alternatives to a substantive correspondence truth theory have been offered. There is Alfred Tarski's theory, according to which truth definitions that are formally correct and materially adequate capture all that is to be captured in the notion of "correspondence"; there are the disquotational t h e ~ r i e sand , ~ the prosentential theory of truth.6 "On the Nature of Truth and Falsehood" (first published in 1910), in Philosophical Essays (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1966). "The Philosophy of Logical Atomism," reprinted in The Philosophy ofLogica1 Atomism, David Pears, ed. (LaSalle: Open Court, 1985). See Nelson Goodman, "The Way the World is," in Problems and Projects (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1972). Another problem: it has been claimed that pictures picture what they picture in virtue of certain conventions. Can an account be given of the conventions governing verbal "pictures" without assuming language already understood? See W. V. Quine, The Philosophy of Logic (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: PrenticeHall, 1970), pp. 10-13; Steven Leeds, "Theories of Reference and Truth," Erkenntnis, XIII (1978): 111-1 29; Paul Horwich, "Three Forms of Realism," Synthese, LI (1982): 181-201; and Scott Soames "What is a Theory of Truth?" this JOURNAL, LXXXI, 8 (August 1984): 41 1-429. 'See Grover, Joe Camp, and Nuel Belnap, "A Prosentential Theory of Truth,"
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Those seeking a substantive truth theory-usually because they think truth has a causal explanatory role-think, however, that none of these "deflationary" alternatives provides adequate explanations of truth as a needed language-world relational property. Hartry Field7 is one such philosopher. Convinced that truth has an explanatory role, Field offers a suggestion as to the form a substantive correspondence theory might take. His suggestion is that something along the lines of the causal-historical theories of reference should be employed to provide an account of truth as a substantive relational property connecting language with the world. Because we need a better understanding of the possible points of contact between truth and language-world connections, it will be useful to examine this provocative suggestion of Field's. Field's paper is important because of the deep issues it raises; for that reason, it has also been controver~ial.~ Despite this attention by philosophers expressing widely divergent views, an interesting feature of Field's suggestion seems to have gone unnoticed: it does not accomplish what I believe Field (and, I presume, many readers) thought it would accomplish-it does not lead us to a theory in which truth would have a distinctive substantive role in connecting language to the world. My main goal is to highlight, in section IV, this curious feature of a correspondence theory of truth that incorporates as its substantive language-world connections the language-world connections of the causal-historical theory of reference. As a step toward this end, I first outline, in section I, Field's assessment of Tarski's truth definition. In section 11, taking up Field's suggestions, I sketch a few of the details of how the causal-historical theory of reference connections might be incorporated in a Tarskian theory of truth. In Section 111, I -
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Philosophical Studies, XXVII (1975):72-124; m y "Inheritors and Paradox," this JOURNAL,L XXIV, 10 (October 1977):590-604; my "Truth: Do W e Need It?" Philosophzcal Studies, XL (1981):69-103; and my " O n T w o Deflationary Theories o f Truth," in T r u t h and Consequences, M. Dunn and A. Gupta, eds. (Boston:Kluwer, forthcoming); R. Brandom, "Reference Explained Away," this JOURNAL, LXXXI, 9 (September 1984): 469-492; and K . Wilson, " S o m e Reflections o n the Prosententia! Theory o f Truth," in T r u t h and Consequences. "Tarski's Theory o f Truth," this JOURNAL, LXIX, 13 ( J u l y 13, 1972): 347-375. For example, Devitt [Designation (New Y o r k : Columbia, 1981), and Realism and T r u t h (Princeton:University Press, 1984)l and Michael Friedman ["Truth and Confirmation," this JOURNAL, I.XXVI, 7 ( J u l y 1979): 361-3821 have endorsed Field's claim that something like causal-historical explanations o f reference may constitute a crucial element o f a theory o f truth; whereas Donald Davidson ["Reality without Reference," Dialectics, xxx~(1977):247-258, Hilary Putnam [Reason, T r u t h and History (New Y o r k : Cambridge, 1981), ch. 21, J o h n McDo~vell["Physicalism and Primitive Denotation: Field o n Tarski," Erkenntnis, X I I I ( 1 9 7 8 ) : 131-1521, Leeds (op. cit.), Robert Stalnaker [Inquiry (Cambridge: MIT, 1984), ch. 21, and Soames (op. cit.) have raised some doubts. I
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briefly reflect on a criticism of Field's program which is pertinent to the issue I pursue. Then in Section IV, after defining falsity, I show that true sentences are not uniquely connected to the world on Field's proposal. In the remainder of the paper, I argue that language-world connections. like those of the causal-historical theory of reference, fail to provide truth itself with the explanatory role Field speculates truth has. I conclude with the suggestion that it seems we can, and perhaps should, treat the issues of language-world connections, and truth and falsity, separately. I. FIELD'S PROGRAM
In his 1972 paper criticizing Tarski's truth definition, Field proposed that Tarski's theory needs to be supplemented because truth has an explanatory role. For according to Field, Tarski's definition does not accomplish the goal Tarski set himself-a definition that would satisfy the demands of a physicalist who believes in the unity of science. He says, further, that Tarski's definition is only language-specific. Field argues that, if Tarski's definition of truth were modified so that truth for arbitrary languages would be defined, then 'denotes' and 'applies' would appear in Tarski's base clauses; so truth is, in effect, explained by Tarski only with the help of other semantic terms. Field proposes eliminating these terms in a way that would satisfy physicalists. Thus, the recursive clauses of Tarski's truth definition provide (only) the first important step of Field's definition. For Field's Tarskian base clauses for primitive terms and atomic sentences contain the semantic terms 'denotes' and 'applies'. Field suggests that the causal-historical theory of reference (or something similar) be used to explain 'denotes' and 'applies'. Let us take a close look at the suggestion that the causal-historical theory of reference might yield the kind of truth theory Field seeks. First, 'true' would be eliminated in favor of 'denotes' and 'applies'; then 'denotes' and 'applies', in their turn, are to be eliminated with the help of recent causal-historical theories of reference. This discussion will move more smoothly if I assume, as Field would need to, that causal-historical theories provide an analysis of reference that would satisfy physicalists. And, despite my preference for another theory of truth, I shall also for the moment follow Field in assuming that truth is a relational property, and in particular, a property of sentence tokens. 11. FIELD'S TRUTH DEFINITION
As a first step toward a truth definition which will be applicable to all languages, and from which all semantic terms can eventually be elim-
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inated, Field offers the following base clauses for selected primitive terms and atomic sentences. (I ignore his function symbols. As Tarski's recursive clauses are not in dispute, I ignore those also.) I follow Field in using '. . . is true on s' for a gven sequence s, rather than 's satisfies . . .'. For a given sequence s, A. (i) the kth variable denotes the kth member of s; (ii) the kth constant denotes what it denotes. B. For a given predicate ' F ' and term e, 'Fe' is true if and only if (i) there is a (unique?) object x that 'e' denotes; and (ii) ' F ' applies to x.
These clauses provide only a first step toward a definition; for 'denotes' and 'applies' have yet to be eliminated. Beyond directing us to Kripke's causal-historical account of reference, Field does not give us details as to how the elimination is to be achieved.%lso, note that the above definition yields a truth definition for sentence types rather than tokens. As I mentioned above, Field intends a definition for sentence tokens, in part because he says he wants to provide a definition that will cope with ambiguity. I shall usually ignore this detail. According to causal-historical theories of reference, tokens of singular terms are causally10connected to objects, and tokens of predicates like count nouns, natural-kind terms, etc., are causally connected to the members of sets of objects. Unfortunately, these details do not suggest unique ways of eliminating 'denotes' from Field's base clauses, even in outline. So I shall provide only schematic elimination clauses. For a given sequence s, 'denotes' can be eliminated from the A-clauses and B(i) by means of D. A token x denotes y iff x is appropriately causally connected toy.
The situation for predicates [which is what we must look to in unpacking 'applies' in B(ii)] is more complicated." Whereas for a singular-term token only one extralinguistic object is usually as"This is not surprising, for Saul Kripke's "Naming and Necessity" [in Semantics ofNatural Language, D. Davidson & G . Harman, eds. (Boston: Reidel, 1972), pp. 253-3551 had not at that time appeared in print. l o I shall often speak of 'causal connections' rather than the longer 'causal-historical connections'. Field refers us to Kripke, op. cit. It happens that all of Kripke's examples involving 'water', 'gold', etc., have these terms occurring in subject place. I d o not know whether this is deliberate. I shall follow Field in assuming Kripke intended his account of reference to apply also when such terms occur in predicate position.
"
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sumed involved, for a predicate "baptisms" typically involve a set of sample objects, a subset of which are paradigmatic samples of the predicate's extension. Bits of junk are likely to be included along with the paradigmatic samples in the initial baptismal sets. In the case of 'water' and 'gold', for example, the samples may include dirty or salty water, and fool's gold. "Experts" in the society shoulder the responsibility of doing some sorting out here, for facts about the world determine extension; and the experts are supposed to know about the world. They must sort out which or what among baptismal samples are paradigmatic to a determination of extension, as well as the complete extension of the predicate. I cannot offer ways of handling (B) [or (A)] which will do justice to the details of causal-historical theories of reference. Appropriate eliminations must presumably rely, however, on something like the following elimination schema, for a given sequence s, AP. A token ' F ' applies to x iff (a) there is a (possibly empty) paradigmatic set of objects f' included in a baptismal set of sample objects; and the members off' are appropriately causally connected to the token 'F';" and (b) there is a (possibly empty) set f-the extension of the token of 'F'-such that the members off are similar in appropriate respects to the members off '.
Tarski allows primitive predicates with empty extensions. As Field does not comment on this point, I assume he also allows empty extensions for predicates. I do not know how he would do this. Nevertheless, I have allowed that the set of paradigmatic samples,f', included in the baptismal set, could be empty; and I have allowed that the extension of the token of 'F' could be empty. [Perhaps definite descriptions are used to pick out the members of the initialf' when f (and f ' ) are empty; and sometimes nothing satisfies the definite description. O r perhaps f' could be empty in another way: if causal connections are involved, the baptismal set will have to be nonempty; however, f'would be empty if the baptismal set contained no objects that can be counted as paradigmatic.] AP(a) and (b) do not alone suffice to eliminate 'applies', of course. They ensure only that the terms in a token of Fe have extensions. Given the syntactic structure of Fx, I complete AP with (c) x is a member off.
Note that I could just as easily have used ' x is F' in place of ' x is a member off '. Either would give the right extension for 'true', pro'?
I assume the causal connection is not with the set f ', hut with its me~nhers.
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viding the other clauses do their job. For we usually explain set membership to those new to set theory by means of more commonplace predicates, e.g., we explain 'Adam is a member of the set of fathers' by means of 'Adam is a father'.''' This concludes my schematic development of Field's proposal for a causal-historical truth definition. 111. CRITICISM O F FIELD'S PROPOSAL
Field's proposal for a substantive correspondence theory seems, in some respects, an advance on earlier proposals for a substantive theory. For Field does not assume that there is a correspondence without making some attempt at identifying the "correspondence"; and, following Tarski, he does not appear to assume connections with facts. Despite these positive features, there have been criticisms of Field's proposal, as I mentioned above. Pertinent to the point I want to make is an issue that relates to a criticism John McDowell raises. McDowell questions Field's location of language-world connections at the level of primitive reference. Field says that language-world connections at the level of sentences are to be explained or derived from language-world connections at the level of the primitive terms of the language-via Tarski's recursive clauses. The language-world connections at the level of primitive terms on which I am focusing are those of causal-historical theories of reference. Let us consider, then, the task of drawing on the details of causal-historical theory of reference as we try to fill in the gaps in the schematic elimination clauses D and AP for 'denotes' and 'applies'. We have been told that referential chains are determined by complex social linguistic factors. Saul Kripke and Hilary PutnamI4 give us some of these details. For example, scientific experts have a role in the determination of reference, etc. Charles Chastain15 provides other kinds of details; for example, he illustrates some of the ways in which proper names can be introduced into a discourse: D14. A man named Fred Schultz runs a liquor store around the corner from here. He was held up yesterday, and . . . D15. A man known to the underworld as Joe the Snake was found dead in a vacant lot this morning. Police spokesmen stated . . . l 3 Given our lack of understanding of the set-theoretic paradoxes, it is doubtful we should view 'x is a member off' as contributing to a better explanation than ' x is an F' would. l 4 "The Meaning of 'Meaning'," in Language, Mind, and Knowledge, K . Gunderson, ed. (Minneapolis: Minnesota UP, 1975), pp. 131-193. I' "Reference and Context," in L a n g u a g e , M i n d , and Knowledge, pp.
194-269.
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D17. A certain bookie I know whom I'll just call "Harry" told me that
. . . D18. Stella Houston (a fictitious name) underwent a sex-change operation six months ago. "She" told this reporter that . . . (ibid., pp. 2 16-7).
Of these Chastain says: Sometimes it appears that a proper name is introduced de nouo into a context, in such a way that it is not referentially linked to another occurrence of the same name in another context. This is indicated explicitly in D l 7 by the phrase 'whom I'll just call "Harry" '; the pseudonym is introduced simply in order to have a name i n that context for the person whom the speaker is referring to by another singular term ('a certain bookie I know'), and previous occurrences of the name in other contexts are irrelevant. . . . Sometimes the situation is just the opposite: the first occurrence of the name in the context harks back to previous occurrences in other contexts, as in . . . D14, D l 5 . . . (ibid.).
The causal-historical explanation of reference portrays a situation where complex human linguistic behavior is causally or historically linked to extralinguistic reality. Our D and AP clauses must take account of the fact, for example, that both the immediate discourse, and earlier discourses-as well as the expertise, intentions, and theories of speakers of the language-have a role in determining reference. In particular, our elimination clauses must take account of the fact that initial baptisms typically involve sentences, not just terms. Putnam and Kripke illustrate this aspect of their theories with examples like 'This (liquid) is water', 'Gold is the substance instantiated by the items over there, or at any rate, by almost all of them'. Whole sentences (not just terms) also typically appear at later stages of referential chains, as in D l 4 and D15, for example. These excerpts serve to illustrate partially the criticism that the causal-historical theory of reference does not provide Field with what his program would need. For the causal-historical theory does not have language-world connections occurring first at the level of primitive terms, and then only derivatively at the level of sentences -as Field's project seems to assume. Field needs to do some sorting out here.I6 The point I want to draw attention to in all of this is that causal-historical theories do not assume true sentences have a unique role in
l6 Devitt thinks there are optional strategies here; e.g., along the lines suggested in Designation, pp. 113-124; and in Realism and Truth, ch. 10.
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causal-historical chains-false sentences, as well as true sentences, appear in the chains. This observation raises an initial question concerning Field's program. Correspondence theorists usually assume that the languageworld connections of true sentences should be different from the language-world connections of false sentences. Since true sentences do not appear to have a unique role in causal-historical theories of reference, one wonders whether a truth theory of the kind Field proposes will yield different language-world connections for true and false sentences. This is the issue I am chasing. IV FALSEHOOD
Field's definition yields extensions for only 'true' and, by implication, 'not true'. 'False' is left to us. A question arises when we think about how we should handle the existential quantifiers in the above clauses. Both Field's A-clauses and his overall discussion suggest that he follows Tarski in assuming that the languages under consideration contain only denoting singular terms. As this is the simplest assumption to accommodate, I shall proceed on that assumption in defining falsity. So the base clauses, 4(i) and A(ii), will be the same for falsity as for truth. It remains to define 'A token of F e is false'. For this, I shall construct C-clauses, following as closely as possible the above Bclauses. C-clause can be the same as B-clause up to the end of (i), since we continue with the assumption that singular terms denote. As I am defining falsity and not 'not true', I cannot simply add 'F does not apply to x', since I assume Field would hold that all predicates appearing in the primitive sentences of his languages have extensions-though possibly empty. For this reason, C(ii) will be more complex than B(ii). The following should suffice. For a given sequence s, C. A token of 'Fe' is false on s if and only if (i) There is a (unique?) object x that the token 'e' denotes; and (ii) (a) The given token of ' F ' has a (possibly empty) extension; and (b) ' F ' does not apply to x.
D and AP, above, can be used to eliminate 'denotes' and 'applies'. That leaves 'has an extension', which for a given predicate is assumed to be causal-historically determined. Note that AP(a) and (b) contain all we need for an elimination clause. Rewritten, in the form of a (schematic) definition we get for a given s, E. A token of ' F ' has an extension iff (i) There is a (possibly empty) paradigmatic set of objects f ' i~zcluded
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in a baptismal set of sample objects; and the members o f f ' are appropriately causally connected to the token of F, and (ii) There is a (possibly empty) set f such that the members off are similar in appropriate respects (as identified by the experts) to the members off '.
Providing the details could be filled out, this would yield a definition of falsity from which all semantic terms would be eliminated. In general, 'F' does not apply to x if any of AP(a), (b), or (c) were denied. On the assumption that 'F' has an extension [i.e., C(ii) (a) obtains], however, ' F e ' will be false only if x is not a member off. In summary, we have: 'Fe' is true, on s, just in case, e is appropriately causally connected to x (its denotation); 'F' is appropriately causally connected to certain members (the objects in f') o f f ('F's extension); and x is a member off; 'Fe' is false, on s , just in case, e is appropriately causally connected to x (its denotation); 'F' is appropriately causally connected to certain members (the objects in f') o f f ('F's extension); and x is not a member off.
With the base clauses of the definition set out in this fairly tidy way, we can see immediately where the causal-historical theory establishes substantive causal-historical connections between sentences and the world. The connections are between some of the parts of a sentence and extralinguistic objects. We also see that, since a sentence contains the same words whether or not it is true or false, these causalhistorical connections are the same for a sentence whether or not it is true or false. It is only in the final clauses of the definitions for " 'Fe' is true" and " 'Fe' is false" that there is a difference. In the case where 'Fe' is true, it is required that x (the object which is causally connected to e) belong to f (the causally determined extension of 'F'); in the case where 'Fe' is false, it is required that x not belong to f . This is a difference that has nothing to do with the causal historical language-world relations, however.I7 It concerns only extralinguistic reality-if one is a realist. Indeed, this difference between true and false sentences is one that deflationists recognize. Consider Tarski's requirement of material adequacy, according to which a theory of truth should have among its theorems T-sentences like " 'Snow is white' is true if and only if s n o is ~~ ~ white." 1'
Field's use of 'applies' makes it easy for us to overlook this point
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And so my point can nowr be made: The causal-historical connections between language and the worldwhich have been incorporated in this proposed definition of truth-are the same for a sentence whether o r not the sentence is true o r false."
This feature of Field's language-world connections is perhaps not surprising, when one considers that the language-world connections Field utilizes come from causal-historical theories of reference. According to these theories, the same kind of story is to be told about 'this ring' and 'gold', for example, whether or not tokens of these terms appear in declaratives like 'This ring is gold' and 'This ring is riot gold', or in questions like 'Where is the gold ring?' and 'Whose is this ring?', or in commands like 'Give me that ring!'. No presently proposed theory (to my knowledge) suggests that different kinds of causal-historical referential connections obtain depending on whether a term occurs in a question, a command, or a declarativeor in a true declarative or a false declarative. It is true that Field is cautious in suggesting that the causal-historical theory of reference provides correspondence theorists with exactly what is needed. [Kripke] has suggested a kind of factor involved in denotation that gives new hope to explaini~lgthe connection between language and the things it is about. It seems to me that the possibility of some such theory of denotation (to b e deliberately very vague) is essential t o the joint acceptability of physicalism and the semantic term 'denotes' . . . (op. cit., p. 367).
The vagueness makes it hard to tell, however, what 'some such theory' includes. If Field includes theories that are motivated by issues that we traditionally associate with "meaning," then we should be aware that the same substantive language-world relations might emerge for a sentence, whether it is true or false. Consider for a moment, and more generally, some of the factors that can influence the selection of language-world connections in a theory that seeks a replacement for, or an account of, denotation. If we suppose that there are certain language-world connections that determine (or partly determine) the significance of a word in a sen-
'' Like the early theorists, Field begins with an idea that sounds appealilrg i n tially-when one thinks only about truth. As so011 as one tries to complete the theory with an account of falsity, however, the theory appears to raise more (important) questions than it answers.
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tence, these language-world connections must presumably be the same whenever the significance of the word remains the same. Given, further, that the contribution the component words make to a sentence is usually more or less fixed, we assume that a sentence has roughly the same meaning, whether it is true or false.'"I ignore the interesting complications that indexicals and vagueness introduce.) Accordingly, we can expect that the kinds of language-world connections to which Field directs us might be the same, whether the sentences in question are true or false.20 There are a number of reasons for thinking Field may have hoped for different language-world connections for true and false sentences, however. One reason is that he believes truth has an explanatory role. I discuss this issue in the next section. There is also the following. . . . Part of the explanation of the truth of 'Schnee ist weiss u n d Gras ist grun', presumably, would be that snow is white and grass is green. But this would only be part of the explanation, for still missing is the connection between snow being white and grass being green o n the one hand, and the German utterance being true o n the other hand (op. cit. pp. 359-360).
In this passage, Field tells us what he is looking for by way of substantive language-world connections. Part of the requirement is captured in AP(c)-the deflationary Tarski part. Beyond that, he seeks a connection between the sentence and 'snow being white and grass being green'. Field's way of stating this requirement unfortunately brings to mind the problems the earlier fact theories encountered. For consider the sentence, 'The cat is on the mat', when the cat is up the tree. Is the sentence connected to the cats not being on the mat (a negative fact), or the dogs being on the mat, or the cats being up the tree?*' What we do know is that 'The cat is on the mat', if false, cannot be connected to the cats being on the mat, because
' w e make this assumption when we judge that sentences of the form ' S 8c not S' are contradictory. I have shown, in sect. 111, that true sentences do not have a special role in the version of the causal-historical theory of reference I considered. From this, I cannot conclude there is no theory of denotation according to which some true sentences (and no false sentences) are uniquely connected to the world. For what it is worth, however, I am almost certain there are no interesting causal connections that obtain between all and only true-sentence tokens and extralinguistic reality. 2 1 These questions are taken from Peter Strawson, "Truth," Proceedings o f t h e Aristotelian Society, Supp. Vol. x x ~ v(1950): 129-156.
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there is no such thing-the language-world connections must presumably be different for true and false sentences, if we approach language-world connections from this direction. I believe, however, that Field's talk of 'snow being white', etc., is only a manner of speaking that we should not take seriously. Let us back off a bit. The crucial test for Field's theory will come in those places where he claims truth has an explanatory role. Does Field need a theory of truth according to which there are different languageworld connections for true sentences and false sentences? V. A CAUSAL EXPLANATORY ROLE F O R T R U T H
A reason Field gives for advocating a substantive correspondence theory of truth is that he thinks truth has a causal explanatory role, otherwise he seems to think a disquotational theory of truth would do. His most recent defense of these claims appears in "The Deflationary Conception of Truth."" In that paper, Field speculates that certain kinds of systematic reliability, T-reliability, can only be explained with a "full-blooded" correspondence theory. The task is . . . the matter of explaining T-reliability (as opposed to using T-reliability in explanations). If, under a given interpretation J, an agent's states are highly T-reliable and converse T-reliable-i.e. for certain sorts of p, when the agent has a belief whose truth-conditions under J are that p, then generally p; and conversely when p then the agent has a belief whose truth-conditions under J are that p-then this fact is a striking regularity that calls for some sort of explanation. Just what the explanation will be like will of course vary greatly from case to case, depending on the interpretation J and the nature of the class of p for which the agent is T-reliable (and converse T-reliable) under J. Suppose we have a successful social activist, whose success is explained in part by her extensive knowledge of social movements of the past. The interpretation useful in explaining her success will make her T-reliable (and converse T-reliable) about such events as the Kronstadt rebellion; and we will need an explanation of the striking correlation between her belief-states and the events involving the Kronstadt sailors. It seems likely the explanation would have to involve something like causal networks of information . . . A familiar proposal for giving a correspondence theory of truth (perhaps most explicit in Field, 1972) is to explain the truth conditions of sentences in terms of reference or reference-like relations for the basic parts of the sentence, and then to give explanations of the reference-like relations for the parts; and it is often assumed that something like causal
22 I n Fact, Science, and Morality: Essays on A. J. Ayer's Language, Truth, and Logic, G . MacDonald & C. Wright eds. (New York: Blackwell, 1986), pp. 55-1 17.
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networks of information of the sort just alluded to will play a role in the theories of reference for the parts. Abstracting from the details of the proposal, it seems that a central feature of the proposal is to build into the theoretical explication of correspondence truthjust the sort of thing that is needed to explain the striking T-reliability and converse T-reliability that agents have (about some matters), under the interpretations that we find useful in explaining their success. . . . And perhaps it is not surprising that the explanation of such a systematic T-reliability would have to involve the systematic elements required of an explication of the notion of truth conditions (ibid.,p. 104).
Let us suppose Field is right when he suggests that causal connections will be a "central feature" of explanations of T-reliability. Has Field built into his "theoretical explication of correspondence truth just the sort of thing that is needed to explain . . . T-reliability"? I assume one thing we should require of a good explanation of T-reliability is that it provide an explanation of why some people are T-reliable and why others are not T-reliable. So it would seem to follow that, if certain kinds of causal connections between language or an observer and the world are what is needed to explain T-reliability, then the causal connections that obtain when a person is T-reliable will not obtain when a person is not T-reliable. Otherwise, the presence of the causal connections will contribute little (if anything) to an explanation of the differences between being T-reliable and failing to be T-reliable. If we continue assuming the causal-historical connections of current theories of reference, then the utterances of articulate coherent speakers will tend to be appropriately causally connected to the objects about which they talk. Articulate coherent speakers can have false beliefs, however, and so fail to be T-reliable. Indeed, the presence of referential causal-historical connections-though they may have a role in explaining articulateness-seem to have little to do with a person's T-reliability or lack of T-reliability. For reasons such as these, I conclude that the language-world connections Field suggests we consider incorporating in his truth theory are unlikely to help us distinguish between those articulate persons who are T-reliable and those articulate persons who are not T-reliable.2" A good explanation of T-reliability, along the lines Field seeks, would seem to call for different language-world connections for true
23 Friedman, op. cit., argues that a truth theory like Field's is needed to justify scientific methods of confirmation. I believe that such a truth theory is ill-suited to that task also.
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and false beliefs.24As Field's proposal for a theory of truth does not provide the kind of truth property he needs, we face a problem. What can be salvaged? We have considered the possibility of incorporating in a theory of truth the language-world connections of reference. If truth is to have a causal explanatory role, however, then it seems there must be different causal connections with the world for true and false sentences. And this, we have seen, seems to make the causal connections of reference unsuitable for the task. If truth has an explanatory role we need to look somewhere else for the required language-world connections. What are our options if truth does not have an explanatory role? While I am inclined to drop the idea of incorporating languageworld in our analysis of truth, many philosophers find the spirit of Field's project appealing." Would there be any harm in incorporating something like the language-world connections of reference in an account of truth? One such approach might proceed as follows. We are free to stipulate how we will use 'true', 'false', 'truth', and 'falsity'; and so, as it pleases us, it seems we could use these terms to designate an identifiable set of causal relations. The causal-historical connections of theories of reference seem relevant to an explanation of linguistic activity. They seem pertinent, for example, to an explanation of meaning, or to an explanation of the fact that a given sequence of sounds is a token of a sentence in a given language. Incorporation of referential connections in an analysis of truth would then seem an option, since harmless. In the particular case we are considering, if referential causal-historical connections have an explanatory role (in explaining meaning, perhaps) then truth would also-though admittedly this would not give truth and falsity explanatory roles of their own.
24 I suspect connections like those often associated with justified belief are more likely to be relevant. 2 5 I believe a reason the incorporation of language-world connections is initially
attractive-whether o r not one has a view o n explanatory role-is that this move addresses a problem for truth created by correspondence theorists. Their move to a n~etalinguistictruth predicate, as in " 'Snow is white' is true," leads one to ask how it is that the sequence of marks on paper which constitute the inscription 'Snow is white' come to be used to say what we say when using it. If we think, instead, of 'true' as functioning at the level of the object language-as 'she' and 'he' do-this question does not arise in connection with truth and falsity. Of course, it does arise when we start thinking about language, no matter what theory of the truth predicate we adopt.
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Those who endorse deflationists' accounts of the utility of the truth predicate2%ave reasons for not endorsing the above supposedly harmless s~ggestion.'~ I shall explain briefly. According to some who advocate either a disquotational or prosentential theory, 'true' and 'false' are only useful words; since they only provide us with a way of generalizing with respect to sentences, a way of achieving linguistic ascent and descent, etc. That is, truth and falsity, and 'true' and 'false', rather than provide or contain answers to questions regarding such issues as language-world connections, T-reliability, meaning, and realism, provide only the expressibility that we need to say some of the things we want to say, and to ask some of the questions we want to ask about these and other issues. For example, (i) Is there a causal relation that obtains between a sentence and the world when it is true, but does not obtain when it is false? (ii) What justifies us in claiming that statements about theoretical entities are true?
These questions do not need to be interpreted as giving truth a property-ascribing role. On the prosentential theory, (i) and (ii) have instances like (i') Is there a causal relation that holds between 'Reagan cannot remember' and the world, when Reagan cannot remember, which does not hold between the sentence and the world, when Reagan remembers? (ii') What justifies us in claiming that electrons have mass?
If the expressibility offered by 'true' and 'false' can be separated off from these more substantial issues, then there would seem to be advantages in reflecting this fact in our theories. We are not then faced with the difficulty that there seems no clear intuition as to what more there is to truth. And if we separate the issues, we are less likely to confuse them. There is, I believe, another reason for not incorporating the language-world connections of reference in a prosentential analyses of truth." Incorporation of language-world connections would pre-
26 I do not have space to give more details of either the disquotational or prosentential theories. For that, the reader is referred to the references given in footnotes 5 and 6. " Although Field grants that 'true' and 'false' are used in the way disquotationalists have suggested, I do not know whether he would endorse one of the deflationary theories if truth had no explanatory role. 2" continue to assume there are no substantive language-world connections that
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sumably gve 'true' a property-ascribing role. If we accept the prosentential explanation of the expressibility with which 'true' and 'false' provide us, then the cost of adding to this prosentential role, a property-ascribing role, is inconsistency. Construed only as a modified prosentence, 'This is false' lacks content because it is ungrounded; whereas if 'false' has a property-ascribing role in addition to its prosentence-forming role, 'This is false' embodies an inconsi~tenc~.~" I have shown that, in his stimulating papers, Field has presented a confused picture as to the kind of truth theory he thinks we need, since, on the one hand, he has proposed a substantive correspondence truth theory according to which true and false sentences are connected by the same kinds of causal connections to reality. On the other hand, his suggestion that truth has an explanatory role shows we would need different (if any) language-world connections for true and false sentences. The question arises whether we might consider incorporating causal language-world connections of denotation in a truth theory, nevertheless. If 'true' and 'false' provide expressibility of the kind disquotational and prosentential theorists have proposed-and truth itself does not have an explanatory role-I believe there are reasons for not doing so. DOROTHY GROVER
University of Illinois/Chicago
obtain between only true sentences and the world. The whole situation changes if this assumption is false. 29 See my "Inheritors and Paradox" for details. The need for Tarski-style truth models does not thereby vanish, if we adopt the prosentential theory; Tarski-style truth models are needed so that we can track the logic of prosentences, modified prosentences, and ungrounded prosentences.
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[Footnotes] 5
What is a Theory of Truth? Scott Soames The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 81, No. 8. (Aug., 1984), pp. 411-429. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-362X%28198408%2981%3A8%3C411%3AWIATOT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-4 6
Inheritors and Paradox Dorothy Grover The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 74, No. 10, Seventy-Fourth Annual Meeting American Philosophical Association, Eastern Division. (Oct., 1977), pp. 590-604. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-362X%28197710%2974%3A10%3C590%3AIAP%3E2.0.CO%3B2-D 6
Reference Explained Away Robert Brandom The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 81, No. 9. (Sep., 1984), pp. 469-492. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-362X%28198409%2981%3A9%3C469%3AREA%3E2.0.CO%3B2-8 7
Tarski's Theory of Truth Hartry Field The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 69, No. 13. (Jul. 13, 1972), pp. 347-375. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-362X%2819720713%2969%3A13%3C347%3ATTOT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-7
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Truth and Confirmation Michael Friedman The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 76, No. 7. (Jul., 1979), pp. 361-382. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-362X%28197907%2976%3A7%3C361%3ATAC%3E2.0.CO%3B2-J 8
What is a Theory of Truth? Scott Soames The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 81, No. 8. (Aug., 1984), pp. 411-429. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-362X%28198408%2981%3A8%3C411%3AWIATOT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-4 23
Truth and Confirmation Michael Friedman The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 76, No. 7. (Jul., 1979), pp. 361-382. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-362X%28197907%2976%3A7%3C361%3ATAC%3E2.0.CO%3B2-J
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