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Ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Is There a Marxist Doctrine?' and 'New Essays on Human Understanding'

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2 ideas

3. Truth / A. Truth Problems / 3. Value of Truth
Most people won't question an idea's truth if they depend on it [Weil]
     Full Idea: The majority of human beings do not question the truth of an idea without which they would literally be unable to live.
     From: Simone Weil (Is There a Marxist Doctrine? [1943], p.163)
     A reaction: I assume that this inability grows stronger with age, as the dependence on the idea runs deeper. Hence for most people the beliefs which sustain them have a higher value than truth. Obviously we should all make love of truth our guiding idea!
3. Truth / C. Correspondence Truth / 1. Correspondence Truth
Truth is correspondence between mental propositions and what they are about [Leibniz]
     Full Idea: Let us be content with looking for truth in the correspondence between the propositions which are in the mind and the things which they are about.
     From: Gottfried Leibniz (New Essays on Human Understanding [1704], 4.05)
     A reaction: In an age when the nature of truth was hardly debated, and theories such as coherence and pragmatism, never mind semantic accounts, were unthought of, it is interesting to see that correspondence seems obvious to Leibniz. Correct!