Hi DMB,
Steve said to dmb:
I wasn't saying that a moral claim is no different from a statement of
mathematical fact. What I was suggesting is that there is no
difference in what we mean by the word 'true' in the sentences "it is
true that slavery is wrong" and "it is true that 2+2=4." Obviously,
the sentences are very different, but I think 'true' is used in the
same way in both. Do you agree or do you think that there is a
difference in usage of 'true' in these two sentences?
dmb says:
Yea, I definitely think there is a huge difference in the usage of
"true" in those two sentences for the reason already stated. One is a
moral claim about human suffering and the other is true by virtue of
mathematical definitions.
Steve:
What I've been trying to distinguish and what I think you continue to
conflate here are 'truth' and 'justification.' Your objection here is
that these two statements are justified in very different ways, but
that is a completely separate issue from what we mean by truth. In
other words, though we would justify these statements differently, we
can still simply say that both sentences are true.
This is an important issue for pragmatists to sort out because James
and Dewey often seemed to be conflating justification with truth and
why many modern philosophers of a pragmatic bent refuse to
self-identify as pragmatists.
Steve said:
When pragmatists of Rorty's brand decline to propose a theory of truth
and justification, it is because they doubt that there is anything to
know about truth or justification once we've learned how to use these
words and once we've learned how these words function in language.
What I was trying to establish in my numbered sentences is a consensus
about how these words are used since the tradition of pragmatism
suggests to me that if we want to answer the question "what does this
mean?" we might consider asking the question "how is this used?"
instead.
dmb says:
Hmmm. I don't get that either. Isn't it true that words mean what they
mean precisely because of the way they're used? To my mind, that just
what "meaning" means. I mean, asking what it means and asking how its
used is the same question so I don't understand what it means to
replace one with the other.
Steve:
Well then, good. I'm glad we agree that there is no pragmatic
difference. Neither one of us is concerned with finding the essence of
Truth or Reason and the like.
Steve said:
The distinction between belief, justification, and truth is usually
considered in discussion of knowledge. There may be other ways of
talking about knowledge but I think knowledge is generally taken in
philosophy class to be "justified true belief," where each of these
three terms is important. For more info, see: http://
plato.stanford.edu/entries/knowledge-analysis/#JTB
dmb says:
Oh dear. I honestly had no idea we were talking about Plato. No wonder
I'm confused.
Steve:
We are talking about knowledge and trying to understand what knowledge
means in relation to belief, justification, and truth.
Steve said:
As an example to distinguish justification from belief and to answer
your question 'How can Bob be "justified" in believing what is "not
true"?' consider this situation: Bob is a member of a jury where the
defense attorney did a horrible job. Bob may be justified in believing
that the defendant is guilty when in fact the defendant is innocent.
We are always in such a position as Bob where we don't know what we
don't know, so we CAN be justified in believing things that are
actually false.
dmb says:
Well, if the defense attorney did a horrible job then I really think
it would be wrong to say Bob's false beliefs are not at all
"justified". We can sympathize with Bob and we can understand the
reason he came to believe what isn't true but "justified" is not the
right word for that. In fact, convicting an innocent man is pretty
much the definition of the opposite term. That would be unjust and
would be considered an injustice.
Steve:
You are taking the "bad defense attorney" thing too literally and
conflating legal justice (which is usually thought of as Justice, as
one of those essences like Truth and The American Way) with being
justified in a belief. If it is confusing for you, try substituting
"warrant" for "justification."
The point of the trial analogy is that we are always in the epistemic
situation of such a juror who can only make a decision based on the
arguments and evidence that are available to him. Justification of
belief happens within a social context while truth swings freely of
justification. Knowledge is relative not because truth is relative but
because justification is relative. And even justification is not so
subjective as to be relative to the whim of a person but is relative to
the epistemic situation. The epistemic situation includes the
assertion, the person, and the context. These three must be related in
the required way for it to be true that Bob is justified in believing
that the defendant is innocent. Recall that pragmatists don't think we
will find much fruit in pursuing a theory about what this way must be
like, but note that there is nothing merely subjective about this
situation as I described it. Though some of the facts involved concern
the human subject Bob himself, like the facts about the assertion and
the context, they are facts nonetheless.
Best,
Steve
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