more from Alfred Tarski

Single Idea 19134

[catalogued under 3. Truth / F. Semantic Truth / 2. Semantic Truth]

Full Idea

Tarski defined various predicates of the form 's is true in L', each applicable to a single language, but he failed to define a predicate of the form 's is true in L' for variable 'L'.

Gist of Idea

Tarski defined truth for particular languages, but didn't define it across languages

Source

comment on Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Donald Davidson - Truth and Predication 1

Book Reference

Davidson,Donald: 'Truth and Predication' [Belknap Harvard 2005], p.15


A Reaction

You might say that no one defines 'tree' to be just 'in English', but we might define 'multiplies' to be in Peano Arithmetic. This indicates the limited and formal nature of what Tarski was trying to achieve.