Syntax, Truth, and the Fate of Sentences

Dados Bibliográficos

ID10690750
AutoresJohn Collins (0000-0002-3180-4357, University of East Anglia, autor correspondente)
Ano2023
Volume74
Fascículo1
Páginas125-144
Data de publicação2023-12-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoThe Philosophical Quarterly (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0031-8094 • E-ISSN: 1467-9213
EditoraOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/pq/pqac068
OpenAlexW4309223197
IdiomaEN
Referências citadas30

Truth appears to be a predicate of sentence-like structures. This raises the question of what a sentence is (or what it is to be sentence-like) such that it is truth-apt. A natural move is to treat sentences and truth-aptness as somehow conceptually or metaphysical coeval—made for each other. This resolution conflicts, however, with now standard approaches in syntactic theory that treat sentences as mere epiphenomena. Siding with the developments in syntax, the paper argues that truth-aptness properly belongs, not to sentences, but to clauses as structures that can be selected by verbs that specify truth-apt states. It is further argued that this arrangement is perfectly consistent with truth-conditional semantics

Epistemology · Linguistics · Logical truth · Metaphysics · Natural language processing · Predicate (mathematical logic) · Programming language · Resolution (logic) · Semantics (computer science) · Sentence · Syntax · Truth condition · Truth value · Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science · Historical Linguistics and Language Studies · Linguistics and Discourse Analysis · Philosophy · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation