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True by Default

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 August 2021

AARON M. GRIFFITH
AARON M. GRIFFITH*
Affiliation:
THE COLLEGE OF WILLIAM & MARY amgriffith@wm.edu
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Abstract

This paper defends a new version of truthmaker non-maximalism. The central feature of the view is the notion of a default truth-value. I offer a novel explanation for default truth-values and use it to motivate a general approach to the relation between truth-value and ontology, which I call truth-value-maker theory. According to this view, some propositions are false unless made true, whereas others are true unless made false. A consequence of the theory is that negative existential truths need no truthmakers and that positive existential falsehoods need no falsemakers.

Keywords

truthmakingtruthfalsitydefault truth-valuepropositions
Type
Article
Information
Journal of the American Philosophical Association , Volume 8 , Issue 1 , Spring 2022 , pp. 92 - 109
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the American Philosophical Association

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Footnotes

For comments on and discussion about this paper, I am indebted to Noël Saenz, Rohan Sud, Kevin Richardson, Kian Mintz-Woo, Liz Jackson, Andrew Moon, Jonah Goldwater, Chad Vance, Philip Swenson, Elanor Taylor, Jim Hutchinson, Daniel Rubio, Alex Skiles, and the audience at the 2019 Eastern APA meeting in Philadelphia, PA.

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