| Special Workshop Title: | Law, Morality, Politics, Defeasibility |
| Author: | Susan Haack |
| Paper Title: | Truth in the Law |
| Abstract: | (1)
The distinction between truth, i.e., the property of being true, and
truths, i.e., the propositions, etc. that are true. Classification of
theories of truth, commentary on the most plausible. Scare quotes, and
the distinction between truths and "truths," i.e.,
propositions that are taken to be, or pass for, true. The Passes-for
Fallacy, and its role in inducing skepticism about the concept of truth. (2) The
distinction between the factual claims at issue in legal disputes, and
legal claims. Adversarialism; how a trial differs from e.g. historians'
or scientists' or detectives' efforts to ascertain factual truths. Legal
claims as making sense, and hence true or false, only construed as
implicitly referring to some legal system or systems; legal systems as
socially constructed, but also real. Indeterminacies of meaning in legal
claims; truth-value gaps. |
This page was last updated on: 2003-05-04.