Constructivism and truth plurality
Various people (e.g. Rawls, Scanlon, Richard Chappell) endorse a view something like the following: Truth in non-empirical matters is defined as the result of a priori inquiry. We aren't discovering independent a priori truth; we're creating it by looking at what the rules for a priori inquiry allow.
But it seems to me that there's a problem with this view, appealing as it is. What guarantee do we have that the rules for a priori inquiry are determinate enough that we will be left with only one possible conclusion?
No-one is entirely clear on what the rules for a priori inquiry are - the only requirement for reasoning might be consistency, or some fairly weak definition of coherence, or some fairly stringent definition of coherence. Unless we know in advance that the a priori requirements on reasoning are towards the more stringent end of this scale, we can't know that only one result of a priori inquiry is possible. And if there's more than one acceptable result of a priori inquiry, then, on this view, there's more than one truth. Would such a view be tenable?
(In contast, views which claim that we're discovering independent truth can merely claim that indeterminate rules for reasoning would leave us ignorant as to what the (singular) correct answer is)
ha, I'm in good company
ha, I'm in good company there!
Anyway, in case of ideal pluralism (i.e. pluralism persisting through to the end of all possible inquiry), it seems plausible to me that there really wouldn't be any fact of the matter. What is it that we remain ignorant of, after all?
I see the appeal of what
I see the appeal of what you're saying, but I also find this hard to accept.
Let's take an example. On this view, it's possibly true both that we ought to always maximise the good, and also that we sometimes ought to act so as to fail to maximise the good. Though these two statements are incompatible, if the requirements on reasoning are not stringent enough, it might be the case that we can't reject either. And if that's true, then holding this view commits you to claiming that both views are simultaneously true*.
Some forms of pluralism seem acceptable, but pluralism that might leave a very long list of incompatible truths seems to be, at the very least, bizarre, at least in my eyes.
Al
* Not to be confused with claiming that either action is permissible.
It may make more sense to
It may make more sense to understand truth as what ideal reflection requires us to accept, not merely what we can't reject. Truth is what we have at 'the end of inquiry', as the pragmatists would say. In case of pluralism, our inquiry ends indeterminately between each option. We are not led to both at once.
Ah yes, it seems that there
Ah yes, it seems that there are two possible views here:
1) Truth is what rational inquiry fails to reject.
2) Truth is what rational inquiry requires us to accept.
Agreed, the second view avoids the criticism that it may leave more than one truth. However, it's susceptible to the reverse criticism, which is to say that it may leave no truth.
If rational inquiry does not require us to accept "Consequentialism is true", nor requires us to accept "Consequentialism is false", nor "Consequentialism is neither true nor false", then on view (2), none of these statements is true. Do you find this tenable? Doesn't it seem more plausible to suppose that consequentialism must be true, false, or neither, regardless of what reason tells us about these alternatives?
Al
Wouldn't we just come to the
Wouldn't we just come to the conclusion that it is indeterminate whether consequentialism is true?
Put another way, since we would be required to accept (2) on ideal rational inquiry, and we would (ex hypothesi) find that we are not required to find the question of consequentialism conclusively settled either way, it seems like we might then be able to infer that it is neither true nor false, right?
Perhaps that is the
Perhaps that is the conclusion that we'd reach. Though, at least prima facie, it seems like an odd conclusion to me. More so if this theory of truth leaves many (or most) questions indeterminate in this sense.
But perhaps this is an idiosyncrasy of my intuitions, and as you rightly point out, the theory certainly isn't self-defeating on this count.
Al
As long as you like, though
Why should it seem odd that we ought to always maximise the good and that we sometimes ought to act so as to fail to maximise the good? Presumably because we think that there is some fact of the matter here. But then therefore we are presumably thinking that this is an empirical matter.