After Monday's class, a thought occurred to me about coherence theory of truth. Allow me to play it out in a sort of thought experiment.
Let's say I want to make a completely outlandish claim, say, for example, that I can perform magics such as summoning demons from an outer plane of existence. I can build up an entire system of theory around this that would be perfectly coherent, and has no connection to the real world (or perhaps I should say the "apparently real world"). Would this then be truth?
Perhaps I should be more clear. I could certainly create this system and then use it as the basis of, say, a fantasy story (something that is quite common in that genre). However, as this system is only workable on paper, and flies in direct contradiction to the laws and principles governing our plane of existence, it would be truth in the story, but not truth in our plane of existence.
Or would it?
This may be further complicated by possibility. Nothing can exist without the possibility of it existing. The possibility exists that I could summon a demon to do my bidding and enslave the earth, but the method by which I may do this may or may not exist in our plane of being. So is it truth, then, or fabrication?
As a final note, I will likely continue to post on my aesthetics blog as I find interesting news articles related to art (as I have today). If you have an interest, I encourage you to check it out.
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While it may be possible for you to construct an apparent set of truths based on the fundamentals of coherence theory, I feel as though the example falls apart under closer scrutiny.
ReplyDeleteCoherence theory proposes that a claim is true if it works well with previously made claims. Your claim of the power to summon demons may be supplemented and reinforced by other such outlandish claims, in an attempt to pervert the already fundamentally weak aspects of coherence theory. The reason why your example would most likely not qualify as truth is because there are many other claims in our world that would most likely contradict the other claims you might create in order to establish the truth of your demon-summoning powers. It is not enough that your claim works well with your other claims; your claim must also work well with a vast majority of the known claims of others. Only then might your powers be recognized as truth.
And in the event that the coherent-truth theorists can pull that one off, then I humbly apologize for my ignorant insubordination, my liege.