MA Thesis Defense: Mitch Kaufman

Direct versus Indirect Correspondence: Dissolving the Distinction
Mitch Kaufman**

Monday February 27th 2017 @ 10:00am in MHB–915

Abstract: Assertions are sentences uttered with illocutionary force and governed by alethic norms. For austere realists like Terence Horgan, the alethic norms governing those assertions constituted by terms that denote or designate entities not included in the correct ontology are so-called ‘indirect correspondence standards’. In this thesis, I argue that, within the ontological framework of blobjectivism, there is a state of affairs consisting of the blobject instantiating a property for every true assertion governed by indirect correspondence standards. Indirect correspondence standards for truth thus accord with Bertrand Russell’s well-known formulation of the correspondence theory of truth. Any true assertion governed by indirect correspondence standards is true in virtue of its being paraphrasable by a true assertion which is governed by direct correspondence standards.

Oral defenses are open to the public. For a draft copy of the thesis, please contact Mitch <kaufman.mitch@gmail.com> directly.

** nb: Mitch will be conducting his defense via Skype from the UK.