Truth Matters: Realism, Anti-realism and Response-dependence - Hardcover

Norris, Christopher

9780748615995: Truth Matters: Realism, Anti-realism and Response-dependence

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0748615997 ISBN 13: 9780748615995

Publisher: Edinburgh University Press, 2002

Truth Matters is the first full-length introduction to response-dependence, a topic that has become a main focus of interest for philosophers across a wide range of disciplines and subject areas. The response-dependence claim, in brief, is to provide a 'third way' between the realist (or objectivist) conception of truth as always potentially transcending the limits of human ascertainment and the anti-realist (or verificationist) case that truth cannot possibly transcend those limits since then we could never acquire or manifest a knowledge of it. While setting out the issues clearly and concisely, Norris also provides some relevant background history to this current debate, including discussion of its sources and analogues in Plato, Locke, Kant and Wittgenstein. His book offers invaluable guidance for student readers in search of a reliable introductory survey of the field. Among those with a more specialist interest it may sometimes provoke disagreement, as when Norris argues that the response-dependence approach often goes along with a disguised anti-realist bias and hence fails to make good on its 'third-way' promise.However, its combination of wide-ranging coverage with clarity of focus and depth of philosophical treatment will be welcomed. Key Features: *Clear, accessible account of some complex philosophical issues; *First book-length study of the response-dependence debate; *Informative discussion of its pre-history in philosophers from Plato to Hume, Locke and Kant; *Aimed at readers seeking a reliable, well-informed introductory account while relevant to those with a more specialist knowledge of the topic.

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About the Author:

Christopher Norris is Distinguished Research Professor in Philosophy at the University of Cardiff, Wales. He is the author of many widely-acclaimed books on various aspects of philosophy and critical theory, among them (most recently) Quantum Theory and the Flight from Realism and Minding the Gap: Epistemology and Philosophy of Science in the Two Traditions.

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