Professor G. F. STOUT, WITH THE CO-OPERATION OF DR. E. CAIRD, PROFESSOR WARD, PROFESSOR NEW SERIES. VOL. XIV.-1905. WILLIAMS AND NORGATE, 14 HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN, LONDON, 1905. MIND A QUARTERLY REVIEW OF PSYCHOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY I.—‘ABSOLUTE' AND 'RELATIVE' TRUTH. BY HAROLD H. JOACHIM. § 1. THE view, which I wish to attack, may be put roughly as follows: Every judgment is either true or false, and what is true is true always and absolutely and completely. What is true is eo ipso "absolutely" true. Relative truth is a contradiction in terms, and “absolute" is an otiose addition to "truth". There may be truth about the Relative— all truth, indeed, is about Relations-but the truth about the Relative is itself absolute, i.e. true neither more nor less. A "partial truth" is a judgment which contains complete and absolute truth, but which, as compared with another judgment, covers with its truth part only of the subject-matter of the latter. The same "partial truth," looked at from the point of view of the larger judgment and wrongly taken as equivalent to it, is an "error" Hence a "partial truth" is the same thing as a true, but indeterminate, judgment. The determinate judgment is the whole truth about a matter where the indeterminate judgment affirms only part of the truth. But the part affirmed is true absolutely and completely, and remains true to all eternity: it is the whole truth about part of the matter. It is added to, increased, supplemented by the determination: but in the supplementation it is not annulled, nor even altered. Its truth remains, and remains quá truth precisely what it was. Three types of judgment may be taken in illustration. (1) "The interior angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles," "2 + 2 = 4". “2 Such judgments remain true, and But true without alteration of their truth, however much may be added to them by the development of geometrical and arithmetical knowledge. (2) "This tree is green," "the roof of my house is wet". Such judgments are true under the relations and at the time involved in their affirmation. And their truth remains unalterable, provided you are careful to remember what is affirmed in them: i.e. what "their truth" is. No doubt the content of these judgments, as they are expressed, is indeterminate. Their content is fixed and defined by a complex of relations: but though the judgments thus imply this complex, they do not (perhaps could not) fully express it. The truth expressed in them is vague and slight and capable of infinite further determination. any further determination-even e.g. that which Omniscience would give to them-would supplement, but would not alter, the truth which they contain for you and me when we make them. If we say, e.g., "This tree is green, "this for our knowledge (for discursive thinking) is indeterminable. But if Omniscience were to determine "this," what is true for us of "this tree" (as fixed for us now by perception) would remain true of "this tree as fixed by the infinity of relations forming the content of that Omniscience: though no doubt more would be true for that Absolute Knowledge of this tree than merely what is now true for us. Again, "this tree" persists through a period of time and changes its properties. In the winter "this tree" is brown, in the night it is black, and always (while it exists) it is much besides ". But still " "green" This tree is green" and the fact that it is much more besides, and that its greenness changes and vanishes, does not annul nor alter the fact that it is green here and now, viz. under the conditions in which the judgment claims truth. Nor, lastly, is the truth of the judgment rendered relative" by the fact that green" is relative to the normal human vision. For that too is implied in the content of the judgment as affirmed and as claiming truth. We mean to predicate of "this tree" a quality, which to the present normal human vision appears as "green" and this fact the fact affirmed in our judgment-will hold and hold unaltered, even though the appearance would be different to the colour-blind, or to the eye of a fly, or to the normal human vision as it may be two thousand years hence. (3) Lastly, certain negative judgments afford a good illustration of the view which we are to attack. For if it is true that "I did not play golf yesterday," can the truth of that judgment be altered or in any sense vanish even for infinite knowledge? And if it is true now that "the walls of this CONTENTS OF VOLUME XIV. PAGE DOAN, F. C.-Phenomenalism in Ethics 221 GIBSON, W. R. BOYCE.-Predetermination and Personal Endeavour HÖFFDING, H.-Őn Analogy and its Philosophical Importance LEUBA, J. H.-On the Psychology of a Group of Christian Mystics MELLONE, S. H.—I's Humanism a Philosophical Advance ? SMITH, NORMAN.-The Naturalism of Hume (I.) SCHILLER, F. C. S.--Empiricism and the Absolute (II.) STRONG, C. A.-Has Mr. Moore Refuted Idealism? MACCOLL, H.-The Existential Import of Propositions RUSSELL, B.-The Existential Import of Propositions SCHILLER, F. C. S.-The Definition of Pragmatism' and' Humanism BAIN, A.-Autobiography (W. L. Mackenzie) 398 235 82 85 |