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Short Answer

There is no material-constitution model of truth because the material constitution is an ontological consideration, whereas truth the concern of epistemology. Is it viable for material constitution to inform a theory on belief, knowledge, and truth? I don't see why not, particularly because ontology and epistemology are tightly bound, but there is no mention of such a theory in several sources such as EOP, SEP, and IEP If there had been one, it might have come from the Berlin and Vienna circles whose members were driven to show that our material reality translated directly into abstract truths without the intervention of much if any metaphysics.

Long Answer

After long consideration, let's start with a quotation from IEP: truth:

Propositions are abstract entities; they do not exist in space and time. They are sometimes said to be “timeless”, “eternal”, or “omnitemporal” entities. Terminology aside, the essential point is that propositions are not concrete (or material) objects.

Ah, so the primary constraint in the minds of many philosophers is mind-body dualism which seems to stick to thought like white on rice. SpeakpigeonClosely related to Speakpigeon's claims, for instance, argues in the same vein asare those of George Berkeley that from (from WP: subjective idealism):

"only minds and mental contents exist. It entails and is generally identified or associated with immaterialism, the doctrine that material things do not exist. Subjective idealism rejects dualism, neutral monism, and materialism; indeed, it is the contrary of eliminative materialism, the doctrine that all or some classes of mental phenomena (such as emotions, beliefs, or desires) do not exist, but are sheer illusions.

You, on the other hand, seem to seek some permutational intuition of conflating the material with the abstract in some regard possibly because you are a critic of some version of dualism such as that of Descartes. If you expect a materially constitutive theory of truth, such a theory would have to relate how mereological concerns inform epistemic methods granting beliefs the imprimatur of truth.

Let's go back to the Aristotelian Four Causes. Certainly, material cause undergirds the notion of material constitution long before mereology as a word was coined and seems to underscore the idea that physical entities are defined in some manner by their attributes. But nowhere in the consideration of material constitution (at least in our SEP article) in the general definition or description of the relation, does the notion of truth or methods raise its head SEP: material constitution :

what is this relation of material constitution? Some insist that constitution is identity, on the grounds that distinct material objects cannot occupy the same place at the same time. Others argue that constitution is not identity, since the statue and the lump differ in important respects. Still others take cases like this to motivate revisionary views about the nature of persistence, parthood, modality, identity, or existence.

And how modality (necessity and contingency of truth) relates to truth is a consideration seemingly taken to the extreme by logical positivism which sought to eliminate metaphysics and skip right to a material for the basis of truth. And by their own admission, the program failed spectacularly. So, is there a material-constitution theory of truth? Not called as such, but perhaps to be found in some form among the works of logical positivism.

Short Answer

There is no material-constitution model of truth because the material constitution is an ontological consideration, whereas truth the concern of epistemology. Is it viable for material constitution to inform a theory on belief, knowledge, and truth? I don't see why not, particularly because ontology and epistemology are tightly bound, but there is no mention of such a theory in several sources such as EOP, SEP, and IEP If there had been one, it might have come from the Berlin and Vienna circles whose members were driven to show that our material reality translated directly into abstract truths without the intervention of much if any metaphysics.

Long Answer

After long consideration, let's start with a quotation from IEP: truth:

Propositions are abstract entities; they do not exist in space and time. They are sometimes said to be “timeless”, “eternal”, or “omnitemporal” entities. Terminology aside, the essential point is that propositions are not concrete (or material) objects.

Ah, so the primary constraint in the minds of many philosophers is mind-body dualism which seems to stick to thought like white on rice. Speakpigeon, for instance, argues in the same vein as George Berkeley that from WP: subjective idealism:

"only minds and mental contents exist. It entails and is generally identified or associated with immaterialism, the doctrine that material things do not exist. Subjective idealism rejects dualism, neutral monism, and materialism; indeed, it is the contrary of eliminative materialism, the doctrine that all or some classes of mental phenomena (such as emotions, beliefs, or desires) do not exist, but are sheer illusions.

You, on the other hand, seem to seek some permutational intuition of conflating the material with the abstract in some regard possibly because you are a critic of some version of dualism such as that of Descartes. If you expect a materially constitutive theory of truth, such a theory would have to relate how mereological concerns inform epistemic methods granting beliefs the imprimatur of truth.

Let's go back to the Aristotelian Four Causes. Certainly, material cause undergirds the notion of material constitution long before mereology as a word was coined and seems to underscore the idea that physical entities are defined in some manner by their attributes. But nowhere in the consideration of material constitution (at least in our SEP article) in the general definition or description of the relation, does the notion of truth or methods raise its head SEP: material constitution :

what is this relation of material constitution? Some insist that constitution is identity, on the grounds that distinct material objects cannot occupy the same place at the same time. Others argue that constitution is not identity, since the statue and the lump differ in important respects. Still others take cases like this to motivate revisionary views about the nature of persistence, parthood, modality, identity, or existence.

And how modality (necessity and contingency of truth) relates to truth is a consideration seemingly taken to the extreme by logical positivism which sought to eliminate metaphysics and skip right to a material for the basis of truth. And by their own admission, the program failed spectacularly. So, is there a material-constitution theory of truth? Not called as such, but perhaps to be found in some form among the works of logical positivism.

Short Answer

There is no material-constitution model of truth because the material constitution is an ontological consideration, whereas truth the concern of epistemology. Is it viable for material constitution to inform a theory on belief, knowledge, and truth? I don't see why not, particularly because ontology and epistemology are tightly bound, but there is no mention of such a theory in several sources such as EOP, SEP, and IEP If there had been one, it might have come from the Berlin and Vienna circles whose members were driven to show that our material reality translated directly into abstract truths without the intervention of much if any metaphysics.

Long Answer

After long consideration, let's start with a quotation from IEP: truth:

Propositions are abstract entities; they do not exist in space and time. They are sometimes said to be “timeless”, “eternal”, or “omnitemporal” entities. Terminology aside, the essential point is that propositions are not concrete (or material) objects.

Ah, so the primary constraint in the minds of many philosophers is mind-body dualism which seems to stick to thought like white on rice. Closely related to Speakpigeon's claims, for instance, are those of George Berkeley that (from WP: subjective idealism):

"only minds and mental contents exist. It entails and is generally identified or associated with immaterialism, the doctrine that material things do not exist. Subjective idealism rejects dualism, neutral monism, and materialism; indeed, it is the contrary of eliminative materialism, the doctrine that all or some classes of mental phenomena (such as emotions, beliefs, or desires) do not exist, but are sheer illusions.

You, on the other hand, seem to seek some permutational intuition of conflating the material with the abstract in some regard possibly because you are a critic of some version of dualism such as that of Descartes. If you expect a materially constitutive theory of truth, such a theory would have to relate how mereological concerns inform epistemic methods granting beliefs the imprimatur of truth.

Let's go back to the Aristotelian Four Causes. Certainly, material cause undergirds the notion of material constitution long before mereology as a word was coined and seems to underscore the idea that physical entities are defined in some manner by their attributes. But nowhere in the consideration of material constitution (at least in our SEP article) in the general definition or description of the relation, does the notion of truth or methods raise its head SEP: material constitution :

what is this relation of material constitution? Some insist that constitution is identity, on the grounds that distinct material objects cannot occupy the same place at the same time. Others argue that constitution is not identity, since the statue and the lump differ in important respects. Still others take cases like this to motivate revisionary views about the nature of persistence, parthood, modality, identity, or existence.

And how modality (necessity and contingency of truth) relates to truth is a consideration seemingly taken to the extreme by logical positivism which sought to eliminate metaphysics and skip right to a material for the basis of truth. And by their own admission, the program failed spectacularly. So, is there a material-constitution theory of truth? Not called as such, but perhaps to be found in some form among the works of logical positivism.

Source Link
J D
  • 35.5k
  • 4
  • 30
  • 125

Short Answer

There is no material-constitution model of truth because the material constitution is an ontological consideration, whereas truth the concern of epistemology. Is it viable for material constitution to inform a theory on belief, knowledge, and truth? I don't see why not, particularly because ontology and epistemology are tightly bound, but there is no mention of such a theory in several sources such as EOP, SEP, and IEP If there had been one, it might have come from the Berlin and Vienna circles whose members were driven to show that our material reality translated directly into abstract truths without the intervention of much if any metaphysics.

Long Answer

After long consideration, let's start with a quotation from IEP: truth:

Propositions are abstract entities; they do not exist in space and time. They are sometimes said to be “timeless”, “eternal”, or “omnitemporal” entities. Terminology aside, the essential point is that propositions are not concrete (or material) objects.

Ah, so the primary constraint in the minds of many philosophers is mind-body dualism which seems to stick to thought like white on rice. Speakpigeon, for instance, argues in the same vein as George Berkeley that from WP: subjective idealism:

"only minds and mental contents exist. It entails and is generally identified or associated with immaterialism, the doctrine that material things do not exist. Subjective idealism rejects dualism, neutral monism, and materialism; indeed, it is the contrary of eliminative materialism, the doctrine that all or some classes of mental phenomena (such as emotions, beliefs, or desires) do not exist, but are sheer illusions.

You, on the other hand, seem to seek some permutational intuition of conflating the material with the abstract in some regard possibly because you are a critic of some version of dualism such as that of Descartes. If you expect a materially constitutive theory of truth, such a theory would have to relate how mereological concerns inform epistemic methods granting beliefs the imprimatur of truth.

Let's go back to the Aristotelian Four Causes. Certainly, material cause undergirds the notion of material constitution long before mereology as a word was coined and seems to underscore the idea that physical entities are defined in some manner by their attributes. But nowhere in the consideration of material constitution (at least in our SEP article) in the general definition or description of the relation, does the notion of truth or methods raise its head SEP: material constitution :

what is this relation of material constitution? Some insist that constitution is identity, on the grounds that distinct material objects cannot occupy the same place at the same time. Others argue that constitution is not identity, since the statue and the lump differ in important respects. Still others take cases like this to motivate revisionary views about the nature of persistence, parthood, modality, identity, or existence.

And how modality (necessity and contingency of truth) relates to truth is a consideration seemingly taken to the extreme by logical positivism which sought to eliminate metaphysics and skip right to a material for the basis of truth. And by their own admission, the program failed spectacularly. So, is there a material-constitution theory of truth? Not called as such, but perhaps to be found in some form among the works of logical positivism.