Truth – A Problem for Materialism?

Great Debates
1

Truth is a subject that has been discussed for thousands of years; and, likewise, the debates on a definition for truth tend to be controversial and endless. A particular quotation comes to mind: “What is truth? Said jesting Pilot, but would not stay for an answer” ~Bacon, * Essays 1: Of Truth*. Nevertheless, I’m going to go by the most common definition: the relation of a proposition to reality. Propositions are to be preferred since other things such as sentence tokens and sentence-types all encounter difficulties. Now, a proposition, p, is said to be “true”, when it corresponds to reality, to a fact, f. If it does not correspond, then we shall call it “false”. The argument that follows is somewhat inspired by Russell; an extract from his Problems of Philosophy:

What Russell is proposing here is nothing out of the ordinary, matter cannot have “beliefs” nor can it make “propositions”. Sure, we can say that a computer delivers out information, but these are not the computer making presuppositions, it is our individual interpretation of the characters that a computer brings out that determines any truth-value. Truth is also not “in language”.

Now, it is also true that propositions are abstract entities – they do not exist in space-time. A problem, perhaps, for Nominalists, but this is by far the best-backed up theory of truth and the dominant one in Philosophy.

Another thing to note is that truth and falsehood are contingent upon propositions/beliefs. Were there no propositions and beliefs, then there would be no truth – there is not “truth” in a place of, as Russell puts it, “mere matter”. However, it should be noted that the truth—the actual reality—is something completely separated and external to the proposition. We cannot examine a proposition to find out whether it is true – we, rather, look to the external.

Now, these are a few recent thoughts, and I haven’t yet dedicated enough time to think fully about them yet, but it would be nice to get some other opinions on the issue. The problem should be that (i) materialism proposes that thought and everything is reducible to matter, (ii) propositions are abstract entities, as well as (ii) materialism would lead to a contradiction. Materialism would lead to a contradiction because, by denying truth, they are asserting it. The supposition, “there is no truth” is one of the clearest paradoxes out there. Thoughts on this would be greatly appreciated. :slight_smile:

2

That’s a very interesting question.

First off, a nitpick. When you say that “We cannot examine a proposition to find out whether it is true – we, rather, look to the external”, I assume that you mean this is the case for those propositions which are not a priori true. That is, the proposition “A equals A” isn’t something that we need empirical evidence to prove. (I don’t think this matters to the overall topic, it just stuck out at me and I’m feeling nitpicky today. :smiley: )

Anyway, I don’t think truth is a problem for materialism because I believe Russell was incorrect about matter being able to have beliefs.

(1) I’m made of matter.
(2) I have beliefs.
I can see no contradiction between 1 and 2. If there is one, it would need to be demonstrated. Now, 1 or 2 (or both) may very well be false, but that would at worst mean that materialism is false - not that it’s contradictory.

Unless it can be shown that there is a contradiction inherent in the idea that (certain formations of) matter can hold beliefs, then truth is no problem for the materialist.

That’s my 2 cents, anyway. I hope to hear other Dopers’ thoughts on the subject.

3

I agree entirely. If the source of the OP’s quotation is accurate, Russell was having some kind of a brief mental breakdown – a brainfart – when he wrote it. It doesn’t make the tiniest bit of sense. Russell was a thoroughgoing materialist and, had he been thinking clearly at that moment, would never have written anything so absurd.

Belief is just another physical property of matter, albeit matter that has self-organized in such a way as to be self-aware and capable of sufficiently complex language.

4

Your definition of truth is as an abstract thought, one which stems from belief. That is if fact f is true, then it follows that idea p is true, and so on and so forth?

For materialists perhaps this lessens the value of truth? This object has these properties, size, colour and belief - therefore the ability to hold a truth is no more or less important than the other material properties of an object.

We seem to reach a paradox here though, in that the factual properties, which can be measured, are also defined by the creation of propositions, the labels we produce and the language used to describe the physical properties of an object, the ability to describe, comes from the same place as the ability to believe.

The measuring of physical property, and faith, are born of the same mind.

The supposition that destroys the value of truth, that it’s another property of matter, also destroys the value of the physical properties of matter.

5

Nonsense. It’s well-written, thoughtful, and erudite nonsense, but it’s nonsense nonetheless.

You are merely stating your own personal beliefs, your own personal value judgments, which are themselves purely materialistic. You are not presenting scientific evidence and you’re not expressing a rational argument. You’re just stating your personal opinion that materialism in some magical, spurious way lessens the “value” of truth; a “value” that you yourself assigned quite arbitrarily. Those opinions and beliefs and value judgments arise from nothing more than material entities and the interactions of material entities, just like mine. They are not in themselves “true”.

You are making arbitrary, essentially religious pronouncements about the value of truth. Truth is only valuable as truth. It does not possess some implicit value other than itself. It possess no mystical, transcendent value. It’s value cannot be compared to other values and it cannot be made greater or lesser in value. It is no more and no less than what it is. It has no moral or ethical value unto itself.

6

I wasn’t trying to assign a value to truth, I was trying to deny any value of truth. I think…let me try again and see what happens, bear with me please, I’m rather new at this.

I agree with this

What I was trying to do is get here from the OP, and also say that the material properties also have no other value than what they are, that any we give them are created by thought.

The OP defines truth as the validity of a proposition
BlackKnight is of matter and has beliefs (whether these can be measured or not is another question)
The ability to believe (perhaps express belief would be more correct), or to create and measure propositions can be either true or false for a specific piece of matter (**BlackKnight can hold beliefs, my teapot cannot)
We can measure the ability to express belief.
We can measure material properties (BlackKnight is X cm tall, the teapot is Y cm tall)

The proposition that an object is x tall can be either true or false.
This judgement is measured by thought.
If you propose that propositions cannot exist in space time (per the OP) that the value of the proposition is something created by thought, surely the physical properties of matter are the same as this, also created by thought and only existing in thought.?

Does that make any more sense? If not forgive me, I’m thinking this through as I type it, and I’m glad you challenged my previous post

7

I think that was a poorly constructed sentence on my part; allow me to delineate further. What I mean to say is that the truth or the falsity of a belief/proposition depends upon something that lies beyond—outside—the belief/proposition itself. If I were to believe that what is called is generally called “soccer” in America is called “football” in England, and I believe truly, this is not down to any “intrinsic quality” (Russell) of my belief; not a quality to be discovered merely by examining the belief. But rather, it is because an actual fact, that exists, that “soccer” is called “football” in England.

I disagree; something cannot be “proved” by empirical evidence; certainly not to the conclusion where we have an absolute such as “A is A”. Inductive reasoning is key to empirical evidence. Inductive reasoning, as you know, makes the far milder claim than a deductive [axiomatic] argument. The outcome of an inductive argument can only be shown to be probable; never logically necessary or certain. And hence, that is the reason for “A is A” being an axiom – the identity axiom (A=A). While, the definition of “=” is “A=A” itself. Still, it remains an axiom of logic; perhaps the most important and practical one.

I presume you mean, in your first premise, that you are made of “only” matter; that you are not a gestalt. If so, this argument is, with all due respect, poor reasoning. It begs the question. I have shown why there might be a contradiction, and you’re saying that “not so, I’m made of complete matter” – something that appears to be contradictory. To attack it you will not be able to make an argument like that. Matter cannot have beliefs, that should be evident. Neither can truth be in matter – truth are contingent upon propositions, and they are abstract entities.

I think you have dear Russell here completely understood; for one, BlackKnight’s argument certainly doesn’t hold. However, as you know, Russell was never a materialist – he propounded what was called “logical atomism”; which, is considered to be neutral monist. Russell was old, and evidently, became one of the few Philosophers to change their mind on some major issues. However, his theory of truth and falsehood (which obviously is not original to Russell), was something that carried through to his deathbed. I’d be interested in seeing sources that suggest to the contrary.

Don’t be mislead by Russell’s article – the proper, formal view is that truth comes from propositions. And, beliefs are not contingent upon language, anyhow. They are not sentence-tokens; that produces a superfluity of problems. You’d also probably have a problem with some theories in psychology; interestingly, do you think that thought is contingent upon language? That is, that thought is slave to language. Hopefully, at least, not to the extent of peripheralism. :smiley:

Dear Gartog,
With all due respect, I found your response interesting but a little cryptic. However, my definition of truth is something that stems from a proposition, not necessarily a belief. Truth, for the materialist (from this argument), will have to mean nothing. It would show their whole line of thinking to be contradictory; we can never reasonably reach the conclusion that “there is no truth”. In a purely material world, there is no truth.

8

There are things which are true because we define them to be so - mathematics is the best example. How does that fit in?

9

Yes. Let me rephrase proposition (1) as “I am composed entirely of matter”.

It does no such thing, because it’s not in itself an argument - I’m merely pointing out two propositions and saying that I see no contradiction between them. What I’m saying is that the burden of proof is upon you to show that there is a contradiction between them. It seems to me that it is you who is begging the question, by assuming that no possible arrangement of matter can hold beliefs.

What is the apparant contradiction in the idea that I am composed entirely of matter?

That’s not evident at all.

They may be abstract entities that are properties of matter, in the way that velocity is. That is, truth may be contingent upon propositions which are contingent upon matter. This may not be true, or it may be true, but I don’t see how it’s contradictory.

10

If 1 were true and 2 were not, then we have a situation described in the OP and it does not mean that materialism is false. I fail to see any burden of proof.

There are a few things about your example that I would like to point out. I think you are ignoring the processes of consciousness.

While I don’t see any need to come up with some abstraction outside of matter to explain consciousness, that doesn’t make up for the fact that consciousness is not completely understood. When you mention “I” you have opened up an incredible can of worms.

I believe Russell (this is a guess here) was taking a computational approach to consciousness. The experience of a belief or self is not necessary for a proposition. Hence, your suppositions are not necessary.

You are proposing some material object, “I”, which somehow exhibits a certain trait (a belief). I think you must first define what “I” is and demonstrate it’s necessity for a proposition. Just as we don’t have to have a creator of the universe, we don’t need a creator of propositions to create logical conclusions about them.

I see nothing abstract about velocity. It’s easily measurable.

I must admit I’m having a hard time seeing propositions themselves (such as “a=a”) as a property of matter. But if they are, then it would seem that is all that they are. Calling them true or false would just be window dressing. Contradictory and logically consistent ideas would become indistinguishable absent any reference to physical objects.

11

Ah, where to start? Full disclosure, I suppose. I’m currently working on my second bottle of Arrogant Bastard Ale and have also tucked away a bottle of Victory Hop Devil in addition. I stand by what I am about to post in this thread, but I claim the right of “I was completely sozzled” as my defense of any content lacking in clarity.

Now, to business.

Firstly, I think Russell was absolutely right - if sentience does not exist, then truth does not exist. Witness the myriad forms of life on earth before the rise of humanity (and also alongside it). Dinosaurs could not and did not create the concept of ‘truth’, even though they had physical structres scientifically identifiable as brains. Neither have any other currently living species apart from humans. Truth is an entirely human creation - a concept defined as ‘that which corresponds completely to material reality’. It is the structure of our brains that not only allows us to perceive reality - as any other living being on this earth can do - but also to endeavor to make sense of it beyond the simple needs of finding food, seeking mates, and escaping predators for as long as we can. No other creature on this earth is capable of a false analysis of their physical surroundings, therefore humans alone are capable of grasping ‘the truth’.

Having said that, I completely disagree with ex animo’s assertion

This is not the fundamental proposition of materialism. The fundamental proposition is “The physical world is the source and foundation of all the concepts we humans invent”. Thought is the result of a peculiar organization of matter - the human brain. Morality is the result of observing the consequences of our actions, not only on fellow human beings but our physical environment as a whole. Materialism bases its conclusions about truth not only on the observation of physical reality - which is empricism at its best - but the analysis thereof. Truth is not a problem for materialism, because materialism seeks acces to the truth not only by observing the world but also attempting to understand the relationship between the things it observes.

12

“Materialism” is actually a rather old-fashioned term these days. Clearly more exists than simple “material”: energy, fundamental forces, spacetime etc.

A more accurate term is Physicalism. When we say that “only the physical exists” we contend that everything (including thoughts, concepts, abstractions and the like) supervenes on the physical.

The question here is “How can truth, or a proposition itself, be said to be physical in nature?”

As I replied to erislover in a thread a while back where he asked What is Math?

So the physical form of “propositions” are strings of linguistic sounds, each of which represent memories we all have since we all neurally “encode” the same universe, which themselves represent a description of the universe.

The universe is so. It is how it is, not some other way. That statement itself holds the consequence that “characteristics”, brain patterns which correspond to how the universe is rather than how it is not, exist. The physical form of “truth” is ultimately a neural encoding of the universe the way it is, rather than the way it is not.