Introduction
The word “truth” is applied to different things. A proposition is said to be true, but a coin is also said to be “true gold” and a person is said to “be true”. Before asking what truth is, it is therefore advisable to know what is being talked about. This article sets out the main historical answers and the distinctions that prevent them from being confused.
1. The classical formulation of correspondence
The foundational formulation of truth as correspondence is found in Aristotle:
«τὸ μὲν γὰρ λέγειν τὸ ὂν μὴ εἶναι ἢ τὸ μὴ ὂν εἶναι ψεῦδος, τὸ δὲ τὸ ὂν εἶναι καὶ τὸ μὴ ὂν μὴ εἶναι ἀληθές» (Metaphysics Γ.7, 1011b26–27).
“To say of what is that it is not, or of what is not that it is, is false; and to say of what is that it is, and of what is not that it is not, is true.”
Two features of this formula matter for everything that follows. The first is that truth and falsehood reside in saying (λέγειν), that is, in the statement, not in things themselves. The second is that the measure of that truth is being: a statement is true because the thing is as the statement says, and not the other way around.
Aristotle also locates formal truth in the composition and division of judgment (De anima —“On the Soul”—, III.6): only when the intellect unites or separates concepts in accordance with what things are is there properly truth or falsehood.
2. The tradition of adequation
Scholasticism condensed that intuition into the formula of adequation: truth is the conformity of the intellect with the thing. The attribution must be made precise, because the formula is often circulated inaccurately.
The expression “veritas est adaequatio rei et intellectus” (“truth is the adequation of the thing and the intellect”) is not Saint Thomas Aquinas’s invention; he quotes it from Isaac Israeli, a tenth-century Jewish philosopher. In the body of his doctrine he prefers the term conformitas (“conformity”). Saint Anselm of Canterbury offered another variant: “veritas est rectitudo sola mente perceptibilis” (“truth is rectitude perceptible only by the mind”, De veritate —“On Truth”—, 12).
Saint Thomas systematizes the question in the Summa theologiae I, q. 16, through three theses:
- Truth resides primarily in the intellect and secondarily in things (I q.16 a.1), because “just as the good names that to which appetite tends, so the true names that to which the intellect tends” (sicut bonum nominat id in quod tendit appetitus, ita verum nominat id in quod tendit intellectus).
- Truth resides properly in judgment (I q.16 a.2), that is, in composing and dividing, not in mere apprehension.
- God is the first truth (I q.16 a.5): in God being and understanding are identical, so that “not only is truth in him, but he himself is the supreme and first truth” (ipse sit ipsa summa et prima veritas).
The distinction between truth of the intellect (the human intellect conforms to the thing) and truth of things (natural things conform to the divine intellect that creates them) is the key to the system, because it marks two directions of adequation, of which only the second refers to God.
3. Three senses that must not be confused
The tradition distinguishes three senses of “truth”, which answer different questions:
| Sense | Question | Locus |
|---|---|---|
| Ontological | is a thing “true” (authentic)? | in things, with respect to their exemplar |
| Logical | is a statement true or false? | in propositions |
| Epistemological | is a knowledge true? | in the judging mind |
Reducing “truth” to a single sense — usually the logical one — is the source of numerous confusions. The classical tradition worked with all three at once, and the ontological one ultimately refers to a creative understanding — that is, to things insofar as they conform to the divine intellect that creates them.
4. Modern conceptions
Since modernity, correspondence has ceased to be the only available theory. Coherentism (Bradley, Blanshard) makes a statement true if it is coherent with the total system of beliefs, replacing correspondence with the external by internal coherence. Pragmatism (Peirce, James, Dewey) identifies truth with what “works” or with what would stabilize at the end of ideal inquiry. Deflationism (Ramsey, Quine, Horwich) holds that “true” does not name a substantive property, so that “p is true” is equivalent to “p”. Finally, Tarski’s semantic theory (1944) formally rehabilitates correspondence in formal languages — “‘snow is white’ is true if and only if snow is white” — without committing to an ontology of facts.
These theories are not mere variants of one another: they dispute the very question of where truth resides and of what measures it.
5. The necessary distinctions
Before taking sides, it is advisable to separate six theses that do not imply one another: (1) “truth exists”; (2) “we can know the truth”; (3) “we can know all truth”; (4) “our formulation of truth can be imperfect”; (5) “something is true because we believe it”; (6) “something is true independently of whether we believe it”.
The position underlying the Aristotelian-Thomistic tradition affirms 1, 2, 4 and 6, and denies 3 and 5. Two confusions are especially serious. Denying 3 (we do not know everything) does not imply denying 2 (we know something) or 1 (truth exists). And affirming 4 (the fallibility of our formulations) does not imply 5 (relativism); on the contrary, fallibilism presupposes 6, because error can only be spoken of with respect to something independent of the subject. Thesis 5 is the breaking point: if something were true only because we believe it, the possibility of a trans-personal error would disappear, and with it, that of all seeking.
6. Objections to correspondence
Correspondence is not without difficulties, which should be recorded.
The relation of “corresponding” is in the first place opaque: it is not clear what it exactly means for a judgment to conform to a thing. Second, the problem of facts arises: if truth is correspondence with a fact, the question of what a fact is arises; Strawson pointed out that “facts are what true statements state”, which makes the definition circular. Third, there is the problem of access: to verify correspondence one would have to compare the judgment with the thing independently of the judgment, but all one has are judgments. Fourth, the slingshot argument (attributed to Frege) holds that, if every true statement corresponds simply to “the fact that p”, all true statements would correspond to the same fact, trivializing correspondence. Finally, the semantic paradoxes — such as the liar — force, as Tarski showed, a hierarchy of languages.
These objections do not refute correspondence, but they force it to be made precise: what a fact is, what adequation is, and how to distinguish being true from knowing that one is true. The way in which reality presents itself to knowledge — and the plurality of approaches that the real admits — is addressed in Reality, disciplines, and the unity of knowledge.
Conclusion
It can be safely asserted that correspondence is the classical matrix of truth (Aristotle), that scholasticism systematized it as adequation (Saint Thomas, with the noted attributional precisions), and that rival modern theories exist. It should not be asserted that correspondence is undisputed, nor that the adequation formula is Saint Thomas’s invention. The analysis of the six theses shows that the core of the problem consists in distinguishing the existence and knowability of truth from its total possession and from its dependence on the subject.
References
Primary sources
- Aristotle, Metaphysica Γ.7 (Bekker ed.), 1011b25–27; De anima III.6.
- Saint Anselm of Canterbury, De veritate 12.
- Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I q.16; Quaestiones disputatae de veritate q.1 (Leonine ed.).
- Tarski, A., “The Semantic Conception of Truth” (1944).
Secondary sources
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: “Truth”, “Correspondence Theory of Truth”, “Coherence Theory of Truth”, “Deflationary Theory of Truth”.