Truth: A Guide for the Perplexed: A Guide for the Perplexed

Editorial Reviews. About the Author. Simon Blackburn is Edna S. Koury Distinguished Truth: A Guide for the Perplexed: A Guide for the Perplexed - Kindle edition by Simon Blackburn. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC.
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Blackburn's title is misleading. Rather than being any kind of a "guide for the perplexed," he has authored a case for his particular school of thought. And it's a serviceable one one. He's at his best when he's looking at Nietzsche, both applauding his efforts, and noting his flaws. Where he's at his weakest is when he goes up against "relativism," a straw man he erects, and then attempts to light aflame.

This straw man is, in Blackburn's mind, in cahoots with such rogues as William James and Ri Blackburn's title is misleading. This straw man is, in Blackburn's mind, in cahoots with such rogues as William James and Richard Rorty.

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He doesn't specify any straight-up relativists, though, but instead darkly suggests that there are lots of "postmodernist" "academics" who engage in this witchcraft. His lack of specificity comes from the fact that the relativism he attacks is taken up by virtually no one. His arguments for a metaphysics closer to classical realism are intelligent and deserve to be taken seriously, but he fails to provide suitable rebuttals to his opponents' challenges.

Jun 14, Arturo Javier rated it really liked it Shelves: Mar 25, Stewart rated it it was ok. An easy-to-read philosophical book on "truth" I will admit is not the easiest thing to write, and Simon Blackburn fails to achieve it with "Truth: The one exception is a chapter called "Nietzsche: The Arch Debunker," in which that German philosopher's hammer-like prose spurs Blackburn to better clarity.

The best book on small-t truth is still Sissela Bok's "Lying: Moral Choice in An easy-to-read philosophical book on "truth" I will admit is not the easiest thing to write, and Simon Blackburn fails to achieve it with "Truth: Moral Choice in Public and Private Life. A History of Falsehood" by Jeremy Campbell. Aug 21, Prithvi Shams rated it liked it. The author ends with a positive note that regardless of all the uncertainty that surrounds the notion of truth, we may not need an absolute authority to settle all issues after all, since we have managed to be confident in our intellectual endeavors and yet, still be aware that the future may uproot the notions we hold dear.

This is by far, our most valuable asset. Jul 13, Grasped in Thought rated it really liked it. A fantastic tour through the philosophical problems related to the concept of "truth". The only thing that stopped me from giving this book 5 stars is Blackburn's writing style. He tends to jump around a lot, and has trouble with maintaining a linear narrative.

Otherwise, a worthwhile and fun read. Jul 15, Morris Yen rated it really liked it. For me, the book gets more difficult to understand in later chapters. Might have to re-read. Dec 24, Steven Williams rated it liked it. The truth about truth is that is very hard to pin down. So, just like so many other books on truth, it failed to bring the truth down to earth.

It just kind of floats around from cloud to cloud. It could be concluded that truth has different applications in different situations. This is actually not so out there as it might appear. There are lots of areas, especially in philosophy, that are really talking about different concepts, or aspects of concepts, that use a single word, or cluster of wor The truth about truth is that is very hard to pin down.

There are lots of areas, especially in philosophy, that are really talking about different concepts, or aspects of concepts, that use a single word, or cluster of words to communicate them. I found the book to be slightly meandering. Granted that Blackburn might have meant the book to take on this movement. However, he does cover a lot of ground in a fairly short book. He looks at truth from lots of different positions. These include realist, pragmatist, relativist, idealist, coherentist, foundationalist, eliminatavist, phenomenalist, quietist, and finally minimalist.

It appears that he prefers the minimalist position. A minimalist holds that the truth of something is just what makes that something hold. It is the case that my cat is asleep if he is asleep, so the statement holds. If it is not the case that my cat is asleep, than the statement does not hold. There is nothing more to consider. Either my cat is asleep or not. There is no extra component to consider.

While the minimalist position is certainly attractive, I am not to sure that this gives truth all that is implied in this concept. I still need evidence that my cat is asleep or not to assess whether that statement holds. Of course these different postions on truth do not have to be mutually opposed to each other. There can be a certain blending, and Blackburn certainly points this out. This might bring the issue more into focus or make it even more blurry.

The book certainly held my interest, but could have been better structured.


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My reccomendation is that, while the book is accessable from a novice's point of view, it is not a very good general introduction to truth. Still there is good deal that makes it worthwhile to read. Jan 17, Gregg Sapp rated it liked it. For a philosopher to describe an intellectual conflict as a "war" seems like a strained metaphor. Surely, few of us in our mundane worlds perceive what amounts to a rarefied dispute over metaphysical principles to be even remotely analogous to strife and carnage.

Simon Blackburn obviously does not claim anybody ever died in the "Truth Wars" between absolutists and relativists. Still, even using bellicose imagery seems to insist upon a relevance that regular folks like me just don't get. Once you For a philosopher to describe an intellectual conflict as a "war" seems like a strained metaphor. Once you give up the concept of "logos," what's left for an absolutist to believe in? Still, the idea that the absolute truths of physics and that it is smart to come in from the rain are hard to argue with.

But, to me, relativism is a much more flexible concept. How else are you going to reconcile any interpretive assertions of truth.

Post-truth: a guide for the perplexed.

Logically, doesn't it make sense to say that if truth is relative just some of the time, then relativism is true all the time? I'm no philosopher, so I have no quibble with Blackburn, who is fair-minded in arbitrating points of view from Socrates to Nietzsche. While we might argue about what such things as "truth," "reason," and "justice," mean, those words must still and always be part of our working vocabulary. Jan 14, Aaron Terrazas rated it liked it.

At times enlightening although at other times dense and academic. More of a philosophy course text than a book for general consumption guidance would have been helpful in navigating the evolution. But perhaps we have learned to do without that, just as we learn to retain our hard-won confidences At times enlightening although at other times dense and academic. An important and interesting topic, but the author merely surveys the issues as they appear in philosophical history without digging in or committing to a position himself.

The result is the reader gains immediacy, but no basis for resolution of what their own views might be. A little more commitment and focus would have been helpful.

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However, as a well-written survey, it's short and well worth the effort of the reader interested in approaches to truth. One person found this helpful. The book was a bit confusing but overall great! Simon Blackburn provides interesting insights into the philosophical problem of truth. While many would like the issue of truth to be an easily resolved question via some simplisitic answer, Blackburn points that while a parsimonious answer might be advantageous as in the case of minimalism or deflationism or even quietism, the issue of truth still continues to persist.

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One person found this helpful 2 people found this helpful. With the issue of truth, it is all too easy to allow our sympathies towards one side or the other on the nature of truth to ignore the real argument on the other side of the issue. Simon Blackburn does an excellent job digging deep into the position of relativism as well as the usual complaints from "foundationalist" philosophers against relativism. If you are interested in seeing what both sides have to offer intellectually, this is an exceptional guide.

Exactly what I wanted. I buy books for instructors who forgot to order on time or ones that are out of print. The theistic or religious view Blackburn interacts with seems to be unrepresentative of theistic philosophers. It seems to be the defeat of a straw-man which is unrepresentative of the actual substance that you often find in theistic philosophers. I would encourage the inquisitive reader to investigate stronger theistic positions such as you will find among the philosopher Dr.


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William Lane Craig, Dr. Alvin Plantinga, and Dr. As a theist myself, I found myself ashamed of the position Blackburn was arguing against and so I quite understand why he would find it inadequate. However, I don't think it is representative of the theistic position. If you are interested in delving deeply into the philosophical complexities of the concept of truth, you may well benefit from this book.

If you are merely a thoughtful person interested in knowing when you can tell if something is indeed true, I'd advise looking elsewhere. This is an interesting effort to make a general statement of Blackburn's views on epistemology. Blackburn is appropriately skeptical of anti-realism but very cautious about historic realist positions that require strong metaphysical claims. He adopts a position of 'minimalism' which denies strong metaphysical claims but argues that statements carry with them their own criteria of truth.

Minimalism turns out to be a surprisingly strong position as the statements that carry their own truth criteria include all of the natural sciences and indeed almost all of routine life. Though this position originates with work of the great logician Frege, it seems almost too good to be true and in Blackburn's relatively simple presentation, a bit of a linguistic trick. Blackburn is better, I think, in his criticism of anti-realist positions.

He does a good job of showing the internal contradictions of many attacks on realism. Richard Rorty, in particular, comes in for some pretty stringent though polite criticism for attempting to escape some of the logical extensions of his anti-realism by opening a backdoor to what are, de facto, forms of realism. This book has a decent though hardly outstanding bibliography. See all 20 reviews. Most recent customer reviews. Published 11 months ago.

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Truth: A Guide

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