Truth vanishes again: deflationism, assertion, and 'presenting as true'

Abstract

In this talk, I'll aim to defend deflationism about the concept of truth from a prominent objection. The objection, due to Dorit Bar-On and Keith Simmons, is that deflationists cannot account for the fact that asserting a proposition involves presenting the proposition as being true. In responding to this objection, I will focus on the influential minimalist account of the concept of truth that has been developed by Paul Horwich. I will motivate an account of ‘presenting as true’ that has been recently proposed by Neri Marsili and then explain why it is fully compatible with minimalism.