Single Idea 8182

[catalogued under 19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 5. Meaning as Verification]

Full Idea

There is a possible route to realism, which has been called 'ideal verificationism', if we base our grasping the understanding and truth of a range of sentences on the procedure that would be available to an imagined being with superhuman powers.

Gist of Idea

Verificationism could be realist, if we imagined the verification by a superhuman power

Source

Michael Dummett (Thought and Reality [1997], 5)

Book Reference

Dummett,Michael: 'Thought and Reality (Gifford Lectures)' [OUP 2006], p.70


A Reaction

This is actually a slippery slope for verificationists, as soon as they allow that verification could be done by other people. A verifier might turn up who had telepathy, or x-ray vision, or could see quarks...