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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 April 2011
Peirce's discussion of the nature of truth is pertinent to his critique of nominalism for two main reasons. First, he views his treatment of the question of truth as a model of philosophical inquiry. He observes that nominalists do not agree about how truth is to be understood and thinks they lack a clear method for resolving their disagreements. By broaching the question of truth through an investigation of the nature of symbols, he offers a potent illustration of the superiority of his philosophical method over those proffered by nominalists in ‘bring[ing] to an end those prolonged disputes of philosophers which no observations of facts could settle, and yet in which each side claims to prove the other wrong’ (5.6, 1902). Secondly, Peirce's theory of truth challenges the foundations of the nominalist conception of knowledge. Thus, his discussion of truth confirms and extends the epistemological critique of nominalism discussed in the previous two chapters. Here I explain Peirce's view of the debates among nominalists over the nature of truth, the method he brings to bear on them and the significance of the theory he prefers for his case against nominalism.
NOMINALISM AND THE PROBLEM OF TRUTH
Peirce does not think nominalists are committed to any particular theory of truth merely by denying the reality of laws and general kinds.
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