Gravity = Truth: The Structural Necessity of Honesty in CAT'S Theory

Logics in Artificial Intelligence, 2010

This paper aims at providing a formal account of lying – a dishonest attitude of human beings. We first formulate lying under propositional modal logic and present basic properties for it. We then investigate why one engages in lying and how one reasons about lying. We distinguish between offensive and defensive lies, or deductive and abductive lies, based on intention behind the act. We also study two weak forms of dishonesty, bullshit and deception, and provide their logical features in contrast to lying. We finally argue dishonesty postulates that agents should try to satisfy for both moral and self-interested reasons.

History and Philosophy of Logic, 2007

This paper uses the resources of illocutionary logic to provide a new understanding of the Liar Paradox. In the system of illocutionary logic of the paper, denials are irreducible counterparts of assertions; denial does not in every case amount to the same as the assertion of the negation of the statement that is denied. Both a Liar statement, (a) Statement (a) is not true, and the statement which it negates can correctly be denied; neither can correctly be asserted. A Liar statement, more precisely, an attempted Liar statement, fails to fulfill conditions essential to statements, but no linguistic rules are violated by the attempt. Ordinary language, our ordinary practice of using language, is not inconsistent or incoherent because of the Liar. We are committed to deny Liars, but not to accept or assert them. This understanding of the Liar Paradox and its sources cannot be fully accommodated in a conventional logical system, which fails to mark the distinction between sentences/statements and illocutionary acts of accepting, rejecting, and supposing statements.

2025

This paper provides a formal ontological and epistemological defense of CAT'S Theory-defined as Reality = Pattern × Intent × Presence-as the only viable foundational model that coherently integrates structure, function, and observation across all domains: physics, language, computation, ethics, biology, and consciousness. Unlike compartmentalized scientific or philosophical paradigms, CAT'S Theory is multiplicative and collapse-sensitive; any absence of Pattern, Intent, or Presence results in incoherence or nonexistence. This framework is demonstrably applicable to quantum physics, linguistics, morality, AI architecture, and theology, offering a unifying formula for reality's operation and emergence. The formula is validated both deductively and inductively through structural resonance, logical necessity, and universal recursion.

In this paper I investigate the claim that truth is a relational property. What does this claim really mean? What is its import?-Is it a basic feature of the concept of truth; or a distinctive feature of the correspondence theory of truth; or even both? After introducing some general ideas about truth, I begin by highlighting an ambiguity in current uses of the term 'relational property' in the truth debate, and show that we need to distinguish two separate ideas: that truth is a relational property, and that truth is an extrinsic property. I go on to examine what both of these ideas are in more detail, and consider what would need to hold for truth to be in either of these categories. I then discern where all the main competitors in the truth debate stand on these issues. In doing so we learn more about these views and what they entail, and build a general picture of what stances different theories of truth take on whether truth is extrinsic or relational. Moreover, in doing this we will be able to answer one of the questions with which we began: whether truth's being extrinsic or relational is something that, if accepted, lends support to the correspondence theory of truth. We will see that this is not so, and discern some interesting variations between various theories of truth on the issues of whether truth is extrinsic or relational. Following this we will be in a better position to judge whether the notions of extrinsicality or relationality are basic features of the concept of truth. In the final part of the paper I argue that, even if we are not in a position to conclude that they are basic features, they are features that any prospective theory of truth needs to take seriously.

2013

In trying to understand secrets and lies we define the truth as embed-ded in a surjective mapping of secrets onto lies. For every secret there is at least one lie. Individuals are badged into types: there is a set of individual's type = {H, L ,T}: honest type (H), liar type (L) and truth telling type (T). Secrets and lies are signalled by an individual's type. Truth is embedded in a topological neighbourhood of secrets and lies, signals and type. So the task at hand is to explain the truth by arguing that a no-truth equilibrium exists and honesty may not be the best policy. Paradoxically, Mr L, by not keeping to type and Mr T by telling a 'white lie' are engaged in telling the truth by telling a lie in the neighbourhood of no-truth.

American Philosophical Quarterly, 2016

In this paper, we offer a brief, critical survey of contemporary work on truth. We begin by reflecting on the distinction between substantivist and deflationary truth theories. We then turn to three new kinds of truth theory-Kevin Scharp's replacement theory, John MacFarlane's relativism, and the alethic pluralism pioneered by Michael Lynch and Crispin Wright. We argue that despite their considerable differences, these theories exhibit a common 'pluralizing tendency' with respect to truth. In the final section, we look at the underinvestigated interface between metaphysical and formal truth theories, pointing to several promising questions that arise here. 2.2 Traditional theories: new developments Perhaps the oldest kind of truth theory, dating at least to Aquinas if not to Plato and Heraclitus, is the correspondence theory. The basic idea behind any correspondence theory of truth is that truths correspond to reality and non-truths fail to correspond to reality. Correspondence theories have long been a favorite target of philosophers who are skeptical of one or another form of realism, objectivism, or representationalism. Yet they continue to generate much favorable attention and have received highly inventive articulations by Terence Cuneo [38]; George Englebretsen [54]; Terence Horgan (and colleagues) [13], [73]; Patricia Marino [101]; Vann McGee [97], [98]; Andrew Newman [109]; Joshua Rasmussen [123]; Gila Sher [135], [136]; and Gerald Vision [144]. 3 Pragmatist theories of truth originate with the American pragmatists C.S. Peirce, William James, and John Dewey. In more recent years, Cheryl Misak [104], [105] has offered a sustained defense of a Peircean conception of truth. As a neo-pragmatist, Misak urges that we divert the bulk of our attention away from metaphysical questions about truth's nature. Our primary task is rather to trace the rich connections between our concept of truth and certain other concepts, especially those of verification and practical success. 4 Misak does devote space to an account (an 'elucidation,' rather than a 'definition') of truth's essence. Yet according to Misak, the bulk of an account of truth should focus on the concept of truth, not on the essence of truth. 5 Identity theories of truth are commonly classified as substantivist truth theories, the most extensive recent defense of an identity theory coming from Julian Dodd [44]. 6 The basic thesis of an identity theory is that truths are numerically identical to facts, which sounds at first pass like a constructive proposal as to truth's nature. Yet in connection with Dodd's identity theory, first appearances are deceptive. Dodd takes his agenda as an identity theorist to be primarily critical rather than constructive. The raison d'être [44, p. 120] of his 'modest identity theory' is to diagnose a fatal flaw in correspondence theories. According to Dodd, the most defensible theory of facts and propositions takes both to be structured and to be composed of Fregean senses. It follows that contra the correspondence theorist, facts are not entities of a different kind to which true propositions correspond. Rather, says the modest identity theorist, facts just are true propositions. This result, inasmuch as it undermines correspondence theories, is for Dodd meant to bolster the case for deflationism, which he takes to be the view that [44, pp.

Topoi: The Formation of the Moral Point of View - The legacy of Bernard Williams 20 years after his passing (ed. Falcato & Cadilha), 2023

In chapter four of Truth and Truthfulness Bernard Williams presents an account of assertion that relies heavily on the 'psychological' notions of belief and intention. In chapter five his definition of lying similarly relies on such notions. For Williams, insofar as there are norms governing assertion as such or norms broken by lying as such, these norms relate to saying what you think to be true, as distinct from saying what is true. I argue that this 'psychologized' account of assertion (and lying) is for various reasons mistaken. A consequence of Williams's approach is that 'Shall I tell the truth here?' is presented as a much more open question for an agent than it possibly can be. Only by adverting to the language-game presupposed by that question's having any sense at all can we arrive at a fair picture of when and how the answer 'No' might be reasonable.

The Journal of Value Inquiry, 2003

It is proposed that "This sentence is not true" may be true under some interpretations and false under others. The revenge challenge given by "This sentence is false in at least one interpretation" is handled through the observation that a sentence is arguable true under all interpretations if and only if it is provable. This makes the revenge challenge equivalent to the one given by "This sentence is not provable." Apart from arguing a link with Gödel's first incompleteness theorem we also argue that the way a Liar sentence may be true under one interpretation and false under another is related to the way a "many-valued function" in mathematics may have more than one value. We set up a mathematical framework where sentences may be given many different interpretations. Examples are also given of how Liar sentences may be given many interpretations in practice depending on the intentions of speakers and how they are understood, and our approach to dealing with Liar sentences is compared to those of others.