Preproceedings 2006 - Austrian Ludwig Wittgenstein Society

Do We Really Need Relativism About Truth?
Julien Murzi, University of Rome “La Sapienza”, Italy and
University of Saint Andrews, UK
1. MacFarlane on Relative Truth
Philosophy is confronted with relativism at least since
Protagoras’ most famous dictum: man is measure of
everything. Contemporary relativists typically do not deny
that, within certain areas of discourse, truth can be
objective. Rather, they wonder whether in all discourses
truth should be objective. Their answer is: “No”. The paper
focuses on John MacFarlane’s and Max Kölbel’s recent
relativistic frameworks and argues that they run into
serious objections.
According to MacFarlane, truth is to be conceived
as relative at least within the three following discourses:
future contingents, epistemic modalities and knowledge
attributions. Consider future contingents (MacFarlane
2003). My friend Joe utters at time t0:
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(1) There will be a sea battle tomorrow.
Unless we are determinist, as uttered at time t0, (1)
is arguably neither true nor false. Call this the
indeterminacy intuition. Now assume that (1)’s truthconditions
are satisfied at a time t1 > t0: in fact, a sea battle
occurs at the time predicted by Joe. Hence, it seems, Joe’s
utterance was already true at t0. Call this the determinacy
intuition. Of course, according to standard semantics, the
two intuitions should be mutually exclusive. For the very
same (proposition expressed by the very same) utterance
cannot have different truth-values. However, MacFarlane
suggests, both intuitions are correct, and should therefore
be respected. Standard semantics, it follows, is to be given
up: truth is to be thought as relative both to a context of
utterance and a context of assessment.
Consider now epistemic modalities (MacFarlane
2005c). Joe asks Luca if their common friend Carlotta is in
town. Luca knows that Carlotta is usually in town on
Fridays, but hasn’t seen Carlotta since Wednesday. So, he
answers quite confidently:
(2) Yes, she might be in town.
Then comes Holly, who informs Joe and Luca that
Carlotta just took a flight for Toronto: her mother is not
doing very well. So, the example goes, Luca says:
(3) Oh, I was wrong: she can’t be in town.
At time t0, Luca’s utterance is clearly true: Carlotta
could be in town, as far as Luca knows. Moreover, since
Carlotta usually is in town on Fridays, Luca is perfectly
justified in asserting (2). Nevertheless, it seems, (2) turns
out to be false as assessed from t1 – once Holly has
informed Joe and Luca about Carlotta’s departure. Again,
MacFarlane suggests, truth is to be conceived as relative
not only to a context of utterance, but also to a context of
assessment.
Finally, consider the following classical contextualist
example (MacFarlane 2005b). Joe is working in his office.
He parked his car in the driveway, and therefore knows
that his car is parked in the driveway. So the following
holds:
(4) Joe knows that the car is in the driveway.
Call this context 1. Now consider whether – while
he’s working in his office – Joe knows that his car has not
been stolen. Of course not: someone might have stolen
the car. Call this context 2. Does Joe still know – in context
2 – that his car is in the driveway? If knowledge is closed
under logical implication, the answer is negative. For, since
knowledge that the car is in the garage implies knowledge
that the car has not been stolen, and since Joe does not
know that the car has not been stolen, it follows by modus
tollens that Joe does not know that the car was in the
driveway. So apparently we have further evidence for
relative truth: (4) is true as assessed from context 1, but
false as assessed from context 2.
We are now in position to frame MacFarlane’s
conception of relative truth:
(RTF) ∀p(p’s truth is relative ↔ (it is possible that there
be two context of assessment CA1 and CA2, such that an
utterance of p is true as assessed from CA1 and not true
as assessed from CA2) 1 ,
where p ranges over propositional entities of some
sort. If correct at all, MacFarlane’s analysis of future
contingents, epistemic modalities and knowledge
attributions offers some evidence for the right hand-side of
(RTF). Since truth is relative, according to MacFarlane, if
and only if (RTF) is satisfied by at least one proposition,
relativism seems to follow: truth is to be thought as relative
rather than absolute, and so much the worst for classical
semantics. So far, so good?
2. Relative truth, Belief and Assertion
MacFarlane’s relativistic framework face at least two
different kinds of objections. Let us start with the first.
According to Gareth Evans (1985), relativistic conceptions
of truth are at odds with the highly intuitive (and widely
shared) thesis that
(TAA) Truth is the aim of assertion.
For how could we aim at truth if truth-values depend
on a parameter – the context of assessment – that is
clearly independent from the speaker’s context?
MacFarlane’s reply is straightforward: (TAA) is not the real
norm of assertion. Rather, MacFarlane suggests, truth is
what we are committed to when we make our assertions.
More precisely, speakers are committed to: (a) withdraw
the assertion when it is shown to be false; (b) justify it
when challenged; (c) accept responsibility for what is said.
Since this latter norm is not incompatible with (RTF),
Evans’ objection, according to MacFarlane, does not even
apply to it.
Here is a potential concern. MacFarlane subscribes
to the standard account of belief, according to which
beliefs aim at truth in the very strong sense that no
propositional attitude that does not aim at truth can count
as a belief (cf. MacFarlane 2005a). The troubles begin as
soon as we realize that, according to (RTF), beliefs cannot
aim at truth as relative anymore than assertion can. But
1 Cf. Kölbel (2002), p. 102.