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Old Jan 11, 2006, 05:23 PM
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okay well since we are on the topic ;-)

> Truth is something that exists.

that seems to imply that truth is a 'thing' like a house or a bird or a number...

most philosophers... don't see truth as a 'thing' rather they see truth as a value. hence: truth values.

so...

1+1 has the value 2
and a statement / thought (once the meaning has been clarified) has a determinate truth value

(leaving aside the odd statement that might well be neither true nor false such as 'the present king of france is bald)

it might sound a little picky...

but if truth is a thing then all sorts of problems follow:
what sort of thing is it?
would there be truth if there wasn't language / thought?

relativism is a tricky notion...

'strawberry icecream is better than chocolate icecream'
we might consider that the truth or falsity is relative...
which is to say it is a matter of opinion rather than a matter of fact...
but this is a problem of language and we need to translate the language in order to clarify the meaning (and resolve the apparant ambiguity in truth value)
'i prefer strawberry icecream over chocolate icecream'
(where the 'I' refers to me)
that is either true or false. it has a determinate truth value.
when you say it... it is either true or false. it has a determinate truth value. there is no problem here... it is like 'there is a bottle of coke in front of me' might be true when i utter it and false when you utter it. but that doesn't mean that truth is relative... you need to fix the indexical references first (the 'me' and the time that is relevant)

if you say 'no, i meant strawberry icecream is better than chocolate IN GENERAL' then that would translate to 'everyone prefers strawberry icecream to chocolate icecream' and that would be false (because I, for one, prefer chocolate).

if you say 'it is morally wrong to have a slave' then you might want to say that whether that is true or false depends on someones preference. so the statement should be translated to 'i don't think it is right to have a slave'. or maybe the statement should be translated to 'within this particular culture it is considered to be wrong to have a slave'. or you might think that for all people at all times and places slavery is wrong.

that is a matter of controversy...

are there ethical facts that apply to all people of all cultures at all times and all places?

one candidate might be...

'torturing an innocent child for fun is morally wrong'

(of course even if there are universal ethical facts that doesn't say anything at all about whether we can ever come to know them or not. and i can believe in the existence of universal ethical facts without committing myself to the belief that my current ethical beliefs hit upon those universal ethical facts...)