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(2019) Synthese 196 (4).

A general argument against structured propositions

Peter Pagin

pp. 1501-1528

The standard argument against ordered tuples as propositions is that it is arbitrary what truth-conditions they should have. In this paper we generalize that argument. Firstly, we require that propositions have truth-conditions intrinsically. Secondly, we require strongly equivalent truth-conditions to be identical. Thirdly, we provide a formal framework, taken from Graph Theory, to characterize structure and structured objects in general. The argument in a nutshell is this: structured objects are too fine-grained to be identical to truth-conditions. Without identity, there is no privileged mapping from structured objects to truth-conditions, and hence structured objects do not have truth-conditions intrinsically. Therefore, propositions are not structured objects.

Publication details

DOI: 10.1007/s11229-016-1244-4

Full citation:

Pagin, P. (2019). A general argument against structured propositions. Synthese 196 (4), pp. 1501-1528.

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