Combining Philosophers

Ideas for Anaxarchus, Richard Wollheim and John Heil

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3 ideas

3. Truth / B. Truthmakers / 1. For Truthmakers
Philosophers of the past took the truthmaking idea for granted [Heil]
     Full Idea: For millenia, philosophers operated with an implicit conception of truthmaking, a conception that remained unarticulated only because it was part of the very fabric of philosophy.
     From: John Heil (The Universe as We Find It [2012], 07.2)
     A reaction: Presumably it is an advance that we have brought it out into the open, and subjected it to critical study. Does Heil want us to return to it being unquestioned? I like truthmaking, but that can't be right.
3. Truth / B. Truthmakers / 3. Truthmaker Maximalism
Not all truths need truthmakers - mathematics and logic seem to be just true [Heil]
     Full Idea: I do not subscribe to the thesis that every truth requires a truthmaker. Mathematical truths and truths of logic are compatible with any way the universe could be.
     From: John Heil (The Universe as We Find It [2012], 01.5)
     A reaction: He makes that sound like a knock-down argument, but I'm not convinced. I see logic and mathematics as growing out of nature, though that is a very unfashionable view. I'm almost ashamed of it. But I'm not giving it up. See Carrie Jenkins.
3. Truth / B. Truthmakers / 4. Truthmaker Necessitarianism
The view that truth making is entailment is misguided and misleading [Heil]
     Full Idea: I argue that the widely held view that truth making is to be understood as entailment is misguided in principle and potentially misleading.
     From: John Heil (From an Ontological Point of View [2003], Intro)
     A reaction: If reality was just one particle, what would entail the truths about it? Suppose something appears to be self-evident true about reality, but no one can think of any entailments to derive it? Do we assume a priori that they are possible?