Browsing by Subject "Truth"
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Item A search for truth: a study of non-conscious states in the novels of Charles Dickens(Texas Tech University, 1966-08) Schoner, Alta A. C.NOT AVAILABLEItem Building nothing out of something(2011-05) Wright, Briggs Marvin; Sainsbury, R. M. (Richard Mark); Koons, Robert C.; Pautz, Adam; Tye, Michael; Varzi, Achille; Zimmerman, DeanThe notion of absence is pervasive throughout and central to human language and thought. Such thought and talk is often taken quite seriously. Much has been done to motivate treating absences as genuine entities, things as real as the tables and chairs we encounter in everyday life. Unfortunately, not nearly as much attention has been paid to the question of what kinds of things absences could be if indeed there were such things. In this dissertation, I take up the metaphysical question involving the nature of absences, and I also carefully consider the ontological question of whether any kind of case can be made for reifying absences. Along the way, I develop a novel metaphysical account of absences, and examine various considerations from the realms of causation, perception, and truthmaking that putatively support treating absences as bona fide entities.Item Coherentism as a model for aesthetic evaluation(Texas Tech University, 1993-05) Kairies, Joy E.When evaluating artworks, people commonly assert that certain artworks are good or bad, powerful or impassive, original or trite. We frequently ascribe properties and qualities to artworks such as graceful, balanced, serene, dynamic, vivid, and tragic as though those properties truly exist within the artwork and can be easily identified by any rational and observant individual. We often deliberate about the value of artworks as though there really was a correct answer. Nevertheless, it is widely believed that aesthetic judgments cannot be justified. Because past theories that purported to establish aesthetic evaluation as an objective discipline have generally been unsuccessful, people have assumed that such judgments are merely expressions of our individual tastes or attitudes. Aesthetic evaluations are thought to be similar to moral judgments in this respect. Many argue that moral claims cannot be proven to be objectively true or false. They are simply expressions of our personal attitudes, interests or prejudices.Item Is, was, will, might(2012-05) Baia, Alex; Dever, Josh; Sainsbury, R. M. (Richard Mark); Koons, Robert; Sosa, David; Tooley, MichaelMy guiding question is this: how does what is metaphysically differ from what was, will be, or might have been? The first half of the dissertation concerns ontology: are the apparent disputes over the existence of merely past, merely future, and merely possible entities genuine and nontrivial disputes? After demarcating the various positions one might take in these disputes, I argue that the disputes are, in fact, genuine. I then offer—in the second half of the dissertation—a limited defense of presentism, the view that only present things exist. In particular, I defend presentism against one of the most significant classes of objections to it—the class of objections claiming that it cannot account for a variety of past-oriented truths. In giving this defense, I draw on insights from the dispute between modal actualists—those who hold that everything is actual— and their rivals.Item Scripting the Persians : Herodotus' use of the Persian 'trivium' (truth telling, archery, and horsemanship) in the Histories(2011-08) Oughton, Charles Westfall; Perlman, Paula Jean; Gates-Foster, JenniferThis paper examines the relationship between Herodotus’ ethnographic account of the Persians and his narrative of their actions in the Histories. The first chapter analyzes the placement of this ethnography within the historian’s description of the fall of Croesus and the rise of Cyrus and then examines the language that Herodotus uses to describe the Persian customs. The second chapter focuses more narrowly on the elements of the Persian trivium (truth telling, archery, and horsemanship) and analyzes the way in which the historian incorporates these themes into his narrative. Finally, the third chapter of the report examines how Herodotus integrates all three elements of the trivium into an extended logos, that of the revolt of the Persian nobles against the usurper Magi and the subsequent ascension of Darius. This analysis thereby demonstrates that the multifaceted relationship between the historian’s Persian ethnography and his narrative connects the Persians’ successes with their adherence to their customs.Item The nameless place(Texas Tech University, 1991-01) Hart, David C.This research began with identifying an area of interest which had room for exploration and was relevant to arriving at an architectural thesis. My initial interest was that of creating a studio or a retreat for a genius; a genius being a person such as Mozart, Goethe, Aristotle, Einstein, or Michelangelo. The research vvas looking for what could be said about the impact of a place on the life of the genius; asking what is the role of place? What I found was that the place, the physical environment, was not of significance. In this process of fínding out that the genius is actually divorced from the physical, other characteristics of significance were encountered which lead to an understanding that the genius exist in the world in a different sense -in a spiritual sense. At this point I lost my preoccupation with a retreat for the genius and began exploring the characteristics of the genius to where that would lead. To further understand the state of the genius, the spiritual state, I looked at the state of the non-genius, or the nonspiritual state.Item Truth empiricism(2014-05) Anderson, Derek E.; Juhl, CoryNaturalistic philosophers aim to understand the world on the basis of science. A naturalist takes empirical evidence to be the ultimate arbiter of our beliefs. As naturalists, our investigations of the nature of truth itself should respect this empiricist methodology. In this essay, I argue that the existence and character of truth are open empirical questions, to be answered by scientific inquiry. I then argue against an a priori proof of the existence of truth.