more from this thinker     |     more from this text


Single Idea 19388

[filed under theme 3. Truth / A. Truth Problems / 5. Truth Bearers ]

Full Idea

B: I concede that truth and falsity both pertain to thoughts and not to things. A: But this contradicts your previous opinion that a proposition remains true even when you are not thinking about it.

Gist of Idea

True and false seem to pertain to thoughts, yet unthought propositions seem to be true or false

Source

Gottfried Leibniz (Dialogue on Things and Words [1677], p.7)

Book Ref

Leibniz,Gottfried: 'Leibniz Selections', ed/tr. Wiener,Philip P. [Scribners 1951], p.7


A Reaction

I don't trigger the truth of a proposition by thinking about it - I see that it is true. But I dislike the idea that reality is full of propositions, which seems to be mad metaphysics. So I deny unthought propositions are true, because there aren't any.

Related Idea

Idea 19389 Truth is a characteristic of possible thoughts [Leibniz]


The 25 ideas with the same theme [sorts of items capable of truth and falsehood]:

The truth bearers are said to be the signified, or the signifier, or the meaning of the signifier [Stoic school, by Sext.Empiricus]
It is only when we say a proposition that we speak truly or falsely [Sext.Empiricus]
It is propositions which are true or false, though it is sometimes said of ideas [Locke]
If they refer to real substances, 'man' is a true idea and 'centaur' a false one [Locke]
Truth only belongs to mental or verbal propositions [Locke]
Truth is a characteristic of possible thoughts [Leibniz]
True and false seem to pertain to thoughts, yet unthought propositions seem to be true or false [Leibniz]
In Hegel's logic it is concepts (rather than judgements or propositions) which are true or false [Hegel, by Scruton]
Frege was strongly in favour of taking truth to attach to propositions [Frege, by Dummett]
Truth belongs to beliefs, not to propositions and sentences [Russell]
In its primary and formal sense, 'true' applies to propositions, not beliefs [Russell]
What is true or false is not mental, and is best called 'propositions' [Russell]
Truth and falsehood are properties of beliefs and statements [Russell]
Truth is irrelevant if no statements are involved [Goodman]
Must sentences make statements to qualify for truth? [O'Connor]
Davidson takes truth to attach to individual sentences [Davidson, by Dummett]
Logicians take sentences to be truth-bearers for rigour, rather than for philosophical reasons [Cartwright,R]
Are the truth-bearers sentences, utterances, ideas, beliefs, judgements, propositions or statements? [Cartwright,R]
To be true a sentence must express a proposition, and not be ambiguous or vague or just expressive [Lewis]
Psychology has to include the idea that mental processes are typically truth-preserving [Fodor]
There are at least fourteen candidates for truth-bearers [Kirkham]
A statement S is 'partly true' if it has some wholly true parts [Yablo]
Truth and falsity apply to suppositions as well as to assertions [Williamson]
Are truth-bearers propositions, or ideas/beliefs, or sentences/utterances? [Engel]
Propositions have sentence-like structures, so it matters little which bears the truth [Horsten]