"There are dinosaurs" would be false before the advent of humanity because there would be no verification procedures or justifications. — fdrake

There'd be no one to say anything of "there are dinosaurs", so I don't think it would be false. It just wouldn't be labelled either way.

To say "the cat is on the mat" is true IFF the cat is on the mat makes 'true' something which acts like a property of propositions. But if you want it to have an opposite, then it acts like a set, the membership of which is according to some 'family resemblance' type of criteria, much like Wittgenstein's 'game', or at least, that's how I understand it at the moment.

So to answer the "what are games?" we answer the question which activities are 'games'? You have to defer to convention "cards is usually called a game, football is... Carpentry isn't...". You could try to summarise a few common features, and that would be very useful (despite the inevitable loss of accuracy).

I see it exactly the same answering the question "what is truth". There's no better answer than to list all of the propositions which are considered members of the set 'truth'. Like with 'games' though, we can provide a useful (if slightly less accurate) summary. "Propositions which, when treated as though they were the case, work as expected" would be one such non-exhaustive, but pragmatic summary.

What I can't get to is some definition of truth which holds outside of convention. It's just a word after all, no magic force.

So when we say "the earth is flat" was not true, even for the people 1000years ago, we're saying that their category {true propositions} did not contain "the earth is flat". But it almost certainly did.

If we we take the opposite view, that their category {true propositions} did contain "the earth is flat", but they were wrong to put it there, then we're saying that language comes before the people using it. That it's not the case that a culture evolves some use of a word, but rather the categories are all pre-ordained somehow, and there's a right and wrong about what goes in them.

This is why Ramsey ends up analysing beliefs, not truths. 'True' can only (like any other word) be understood in terms of what people do with it, which a) requires people, and b) requires beliefs about the objects/actions being referred to by it.

Having said all that, I will re-read Tarski, as advised and try to take on board what you've said whilst doing so. Maybe I can get a better perspective on this.

There'd be no one to say anything of "there are dinosaurs", so I don't think it would be false. It just wouldn't be labelled either way. — Isaac

I am pretty sure it would be false if the logic has excluded middle.

(There is someone that believes that P) necessitates (P is true)
is equivalent to
(P is true) entails (There is someone that believes that P)
is equivalent to
(not (There is someone that believes that P)) entails (not (P is true))
When there is no one that believes that P, the last implication allows us to derive (not (P is true)).
Then with excluded middle for all P (P or not P) you get:
P is false.
So "there are dinosaurs" would be false. It'd also be false that "There was plantlife prior to the advent of people capable of belief" until people capable of belief came about, despite everything indicating otherwise.

I am pretty sure it would be false if the logic has excluded middle. — fdrake

Yeah, I trust your logic. I obviously can't accept the excluded middle though, following any language-based analysis of 'true' and 'false'. Not(true) is just not(true), false is something else.

"Mozart is a better composer than Beethoven" us not(true), but it's not(false) either.

So "there are dinosaurs" at the beginning of the earth would be like "Mozart is a better composer than Beethoven", neither true nor false (at the time) because they'd be no language community (at that time) using the terms 'true' and 'false' from which to derive their meaning.

The rate at which truth can be injected is too harsh and can lead to this confusion"There are dinosaurs' - is true. It's true. Truth of the matter suggests.

"It's true" can be used in any statement.

Yes, it's true there were dinosaurs, but that's only I because you're highlighting it's truth value.

Play with it a bit, and you may find that T-sentences exactly capture what you are saying here. — Banno

I'm not getting anything out of the Tarski I'm reading, I'm afraid. All I'm coming across is that chasm between formal languages that Tarski was talking about and the semantically closed natural languages. He even says that

"A thorough analysis of the meaning current in everyday life of the term ‘true’ is not intended here"

And he seems, if anything, to agree with my analysis of the natural language meaning of 'true' being something of an incompletely definable set {things which are true}

"We should reconcile ourselves with the fact that we are confronted, not with one concept, but with several different concepts which are denoted by one word"

Is there something else you think I'd benefit from reading to better understand how you're crossing that chasm? More Davidson perhaps (I ask, teeth clenched!)?

"We should reconcile ourselves with the fact that we are confronted, not with one concept, but with several different concepts which are denoted by one word" — Isaac

Indeed. My only reply here thus far, prior to this one, began exactly on that focus...

Substitution practices clarify the differences. It's good for determining which is more primary/foundational; which is existentially dependent upon which.

Truth(as reality or correspondence to what's happened/happening) is not existentially dependent upon language. All conceptions of "truth" are.

Tarski focuses upon "is true" or as it's sometimes described "truth as a predicate". The problem with Tarski is that "is true" is not equivalent to truth. It(Convention T) is a perfect semantic rendering of "is true" though.

I am not here to educate people. — A Seagull
Probably just as well. — Banno

Lol

The first thing people need to learn before they can get educated is that there is something they need, or at least want, to learn.

PS Does it not bother you at all that you don't (or at least seem not to) know what assumptions your philosophy is based on?

What you have shown here is that sometimes folk use "that's true" for "I agree with you".

Person A "The cat is on the roof"- Person B goes out to check.
Person B "That's true" — Isaac

is the same as

Person A "The cat is on the roof"- Person B goes out to check.
Person B "The cat is on the roof"

or,

Person A "The cat is on the roof"- Person B goes out to check.
Person B '"The cat is on the roof" is true'

"The cat is on the roof" is true IFF the cat is on the roof.

So when we're evaluating facts about the past, we evaluate P at time T.

Kind of like the way statements about possible worlds are evaluated "at" a world, not as if P was spoken in that world. Right?

Kind of like you can evaluate the fork being on the left for the person sitting opposite you, despite it being on your right.

The earth's being flat was not true-for-them. They believed it was flat, but they were wrong. It was not flat.

The magic travelling vantage point, exactly.

But there is a view that says a statement has to be verifiable in order to be truth apt. I can't remember how it worked, though.

Do you?

The Vienna circle? Thought we moved past that.

The Vienna circle? Thought we moved past that. — Banno

Maybe it's the remnants of it. But it's the reason some people claim string theory doesn't qualify as science: because it can't presently be verified. I'll see if I can find it.

It's a debate between realists and anti-realists. Dummett:

1. The meaning of a sentence consists in its truth conditions. To understand a sentence is to know the conditions in which it is true; such knowledge explains understanding.

2. The notion of truth required by realism is one that may apply to sentences independently of our ability to recognize it as applying.

3. If truth is understood in the manner required by realism, it will be impossible to explain what it means for a speaker to know the truth conditions of unverifiable sentences.

4. Because of this, the realist theory of meaning fails.

5. Since (1) is correct, the verification-transcendent conception of truth required by realism must be rejected in favor of a verificationist conception.

2. The notion of truth required by realism is one that may apply to sentences independently of our ability to recognize it as applying. — frank

How's that? What's this bit mean? Can you fill it out?

I think it means a realist holds that P can be true even if we cant know it's true.

But what does P even mean if we dont know its truth conditions?

And if we can't understand P, what does it mean to say P is true?

But the complaint about string theory isnt from Dummett. It's this.

so, put the cup in the cupboard. We can’t see it, we can’t verify that it is true that the cup is in the cupboard.

But I say that it can still be true that the cup is in the cupboard, and further that it will be true that the cup is in the cupboard if the truth condition that the cup is in the cupboard holds.

And finally, this level of analysis is just weird.

the wiki article leaves much to be desired.

put the cup in the cupboard. We can’t see it, we can’t verify that it is true that the cup is in the cupboard. — Banno

It's verifiable in principle. Just open the door.

You didn't believe that meaning is truth conditions anyway, did you? You're more meaning-is-use.

the wiki article leaves much to be desired. — Banno

It's handy tho.

so what would be an example
That was not verifiable in principle?

That there is a planet in some inaccessible part of space.

I'll read more Dummett tomorrow to understand what's at stake.

so that’s a planet we would see if we went there. Same as a cup we would see if we opened the cupboard.

So long as justification and verification are fallible, and there are truths prior to the advent of humanity, justification and verification are logically independent (in the sense of not formally entailing anything about) of statement truth value. — fdrake

If truth is a property of statements, and there were no statements prior to the advent of humanity, how could there have been truths prior to the advent of humanity?

But it's the reason some people claim string theory doesn't qualify as science: because it can't presently be verified. — frank

I thinks it's rejected because it is thought that it cannot be verified (or falsified) in principle,as opposed to merely "presently".

put the cup in the cupboard. We can’t see it, we can’t verify that it is true that the cup is in the cupboard. — Banno
It's verifiable in principle. Just open the door.

You didn't believe that meaning is truth conditions anyway, did you? You're more meaning-is-use. — frank

A believes that there is a cup in the cupboard. He/she opens the door and realises that he/she was mistaken.

What is so hard about that? Why complicate things by bringing in all this talk about 'truth'?

What you have shown here is that sometimes folk use "that's true" for "I agree with you". — Banno

And sometimes for "that has been checked by methods we both approve of", and sometimes for "I really, really believe that", and sometimes for "I really, really want you to believe that"...But never, in my experience, for "that is what people in the future will come to think when science has advanced sufficiently far". As I said

You trying to claim that what is 'true' (even for the people at the time) is what we currently think is the case is just not how 'true' is used. If you're not defining 'true' by how it is used, then I'm not interested in going any further because I don't hold with trying to define what things should mean, only what they do mean. — Isaac

sometimes folk use "that's true" for "I agree with you".
— Banno

...But never, in my experience, for "that is what people in the future will come to think when science has advanced sufficiently far". — Isaac

Isn't that exactly how you use it when you speculate (with or without committing) as to the relative merits of competing (and perhaps currently unfalsifiable) theories?

If you're not defining 'true' by how it is used, then I'm not interested in going any further because I don't hold with trying to define what things should mean, only what they do mean. — Isaac

Perhaps Banno and Davidson are saying that any term (including 'true' and 'mean') means only what it should mean, and/or what it will eventually mean (when science has advanced sufficiently far)?

Ok, I don't fancy the odds that Banno will agree to that. But I'm always surprised when anyone takes "what they do mean" to be a matter of fact. So I hope someone would question that.