The functions truth serves

pp. 45-61

in: Richard J. Campbell, The concept of truth, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2011

Abstract

From time to time, protests were voiced that the concept of truth is "richer" than what minimalist and redundancy theories could deliver. These dissenters insisted that truth is a substantial concept; those theories fail to do it justice. As we have seen, there are grounds for complaint. Nevertheless, the protests were largely ineffectual. The reason they did not prevail, I suggest, was because the dissenters were not radical enough; they too were operating within the confines of the linguistic conception, which does not have enough resources to supply a truly substantial theory of truth. So, if a substantial conception of truth is to be worked out, it will have to break out of that restriction.