Considering the relationship between the truth and what is useful in life is an interesting enquiry and important for my overall project. However, it appears that the attempt to equate use with the measure of truth has a damning problem to it which is worth addressing from the outset. Basically, this is that measuring truth by what is useful begs the question and this is the only important point that needs to be conveyed by the end of this discussion. This could be labelled “The Problem of Pragmatism” because Pragmatism is the recognised school of thought within philosophy that forwards the idea that use is the measure of Truth.
To be clear, I will not explore much detail about Pragmatism as a school within philosophy; that is, I will not address its various thinkers and the nuanced differences in their approaches. Not that this is unimportant, but that such a consideration is largely irrelevant to the overall project. What is important is the problem, and in so far as Pragmatism regards use as the measure of Truth, it is The Problem of Pragmatism.
And so, to explain what the problem is, let’s begin by giving an outline of the Pragmatist position. To measure truth by its usefulness means to judge a given claim to be true or false depending upon whether it ultimately serves the goals of a given individual or wider society. For example, let’s say that a Captain and his crew are trying to navigate the oceans. A claim such as “The North Star never moves” would be regarded as true, not because it is a statement about universal facts about geometry or astronomy, but because regarding the claim as true makes navigation easier than would regarding the claim to be false. This is why one definition of Pragmatic Truth is “that which is good to steer by”. And in the case of navigating a ship, this could be literal.
Now, at first glance this position is insane. Yet, there is some sense behind it. At fist glance we may well point out that the claim that “The North Star never moves” is not true because it is useful, but because it is relating to a fact about the world: it is simply a fact that The North Star is a celestial object, out there in the world, that does not change position. That this fact can help with navigation might be handy, but it’s besides the point of whether it is true or not.
Yet, consider where we are in philosophy for just a second. The truth about the North Star might be a fact at first glance, but philosophers tend to ask questions; questions such as “How does one define ‘North’ and ‘Star’?”, “We say that the star is fixed and does not move, but what is this in relation to?” and “How can we even trust our senses to tell us that we really are seeing a star at all? What if it is all in our heads?”. Now, image that the Captain has an entire crew of philosophers debating over these questions, using all of their time to create complex theories of epistemology and linguistics, trying to pin down the truth that The North star never moves… all the while, the food supply is waning and the weather is changing… if the Captain is a Pragmatist, he can cut through all of the questions with a single claim: “It’s true that The North star never moves because its useful. Now, shut up and let’s get going.”
And so, this is the potential use of Pragmatism: philosophy often falls into a quagmire that Pragmatism offers an escape from by bringing our standards of truth down to real-world application. And this applies to many areas: we can regard the claim that “bacteria exists” as true because it helps us to make medicine, and we can regard the claim that “water is poison” as false because doing so keep us from dying of thirst.
Whatever a given truth (or falsehood) may be, it is in relation to the goals of a given person or people in their time and context. Under this model, despite the universalist claims of – say – Christianity, the truth or falsehood of it would be completely irrelevant to a tribe on the other side of the world who had never heard of it. The rationale for this is simple: if use is the measure of truth, a society’s conception of truth cannot go beyond the given goals and concerns that it has. Therefore, all systems of truth are relative to their time and context.
At this juncture, then, we have an outline of Pragmatism; of what it means to have use as the measure of truth. Now we may consider some of the problems with it, including the greatest problem of all. The problems are as follows (although, this list is not exhaustive):
Problem 1: The Laws of Thought never change.
Problem 2: Pragmatism is Evil.
Problem 3: Pragmatism begs the question and is ultimately circular.
Let’s begin with the first problem. As I mentioned, Pragmatism regards truth as relative to time and context because these determine the given goals and aims of a people and therefore shape what they are going to regard as “useful” or not. If use is the measure of truth and the definition of “use” changes with time and context, it follows that truth as-such cannot be constant or universal. However, my challenge to this position is an appeal to Aristotle’s “Laws of Thought” which is, essentially, an appeal to the basic laws of logic and reason because these never change. The rationale behind this is that we need the laws of thought to think coherently about anything. Suppose we claim that “use is the measure of truth and use is not the measure of truth at all.” This would defy the laws of logic and such a claim becomes meaningless because its truth-value collapses. Therefore, by forgoing the laws of thought the coherence of truth-claims in general fall apart and all of our claims become meaningless. Not only does this appear to demonstrate that Pragmatism requires the laws of thought, but it is also the case that the idea that truth is relative to time and context must be at least partially wrong because the laws of thought are universal and there has never been a time in which they do not apply; there has never been a time in which 2+2 does not equal 4, even if we use different words to make this claim.
The Laws of Thought are an important topic and much more about what they mean in relation to our aims will be made in due course. For now, hopefully an overview has been provided of how they pose a challenge to basic Pragmatism.
That brings us to the second problem: that Pragmatism is Evil. To call it “Evil” might be a bit of rhetorical flourish, but it does appear that Pragmatism is doomed to have a very shadowy relationship with morality.
Why is this?
The simple answer is that it is because Pragmatism is, ultimately, morally neutral. It cannot ever say what should or should not be right and wrong, but simply accepts what apparently already is right or wrong. In fact, it might be even worse than that because Pragmatism could posit a standard of right or wrong to fit with a given goal or aim, regardless of that goal’s actual moral content. This is why the label of “Evil” may well be a flourish but is not without justification.
And so, what does this mean in real terms?
Well, suppose that you have a King who is representative of his society’s goals and interests. Let’s suppose that what is “useful” to society is useful for this King, and vis-versa. Now, let’s suppose that this King wants to expand his Kingdom into some nearby territory and purge the resident population: that is his goal. Now, how do we make sense of “right and wrong” in this scenario? Truth is defined by use. Expansion is useful to this King, as is putting an innocent population to the sword. Therefore, the claim that “expansion and purges are wrong” serves no purpose for the King and so must be excluded as a potential truth-claim. In fact, only those claims that serve the King’s goals would have any relevant truth-content at all. Therefore, the claim that “expansion is bad” could be regarded as false and “purges are good” can be regarded as true. Notice that what this does is that it puts the cart before the horse in terms of morality: standards of right and wrong are determined by the goals that the King already has, instead of the goals themselves being determined by what is in fact right or wrong. In this way, then, Pragmatism has no moral content and simply defines morality in terms of whatever goals happen to be aimed at, which begs the question.
Speaking of begging the question, that brings us to the final and most damning criticism of Pragmatism. This is that Pragmatism itself begs the question of how it can be true. This problem shares the same form as the one above, but just as it applies to morality, it applies to the Pragmatic definition of truth itself.
Why is this?
It’s because Pragmatism defines truth in terms of what is useful, but if we ask the question “what is useful?” any answer to the question assumes an answer before it is given. Let’s play this out…
If we return to the ship and its Captain, we consider a scenario in which it is true that The North Star never moves because it serves the purpose of navigation. Therefore, if navigation is the purpose, all truth claims are made in relation to it. However, let’s consider the claim that “Navigation is useless” – what are we to make of this? Well, of course, the claim must be false because it goes against the goal of navigation. Yet, notice what this claim amounts to: if use determines the truth, it cannot be true that navigation is useless because only that which is ultimately useful for navigation can be true. Therefore, navigation cannot be useless because navigation is useful. Therefore, navigation is useful because it must be useful… but, how do we know? After all, truth is determined by use. Therefore, not only must the argument become that navigation is useful because it is useful, but all truth claims are judged against the axiom that navigation is useful. Therefore, all truth claims must take the axiom for granted, and any claims that challenge this axiom must be redundant by the logic of Pragmatism. Thereby, the ultimate support for a given use is that it happens to be the given use. Therefore, Pragmatism must, at base, be circular: it must beg the question. I have used one instance of a goal in this example, but this logic applies to all frameworks in which use is the measure of truth. We could, for example, argue that navigation is in fact useful because it helps us to sail which, in turn, has some use in the wider goal of developing civilisation. But once again, this pushes the question back and we could ask just why developing civilisation is useful and how we would know this to be true. Ultimately, the logic must always be the same and every variation on the Pragmatist answer must be akin to the claim that “this argument is true because it is the kind of argument that must be true.” Therefore, Pragmatism cannot support itself. If we take use as the standard of truth, we have no justification for why a given use should be the standard for truth aside from the claim that it just is.
If we couple this final problem with the second problem of Pragmatism’s moral neutrality, measuring truth with use is, ironically, useless for many philosophical endeavours. As has been mentioned, it cannot provide justification for itself as a system of thought, nor can it answer any moral questions because it can only account for what goals happen to be held at a given time, but cannot explain why a given goal (or framework of goals) should or should not be adopted.
Now, as I began by arguing, the concept that use has a relationship to truth is important to my project and I believe that this relationship functions at a fundamental level. However, these problems that I have unpacked appear to demonstrate that use cannot be the sole measure of truth. What I will eventually argue is that use can be regarded as a measure of truth with at least two qualifications:
1. So long as we consider how logic functions; and
2. If we posit the existence of a goal that does not change.
In summary, then, I have outlined the broad view of Pragmatism as it regards use as the measure of truth. We can recognise that this has some use because it allows for a conception of truth that can lead to action in stead of getting caught in a philosophical quagmire of questions. Moreover, this conception of truth as measured by use becomes relative to one’s goals and, therefore, relative to time and context. In light of all of this, there appear to be at least 3 problems for pragmatism. First of all, the laws of thought do not change and as tools used to determine the truth, this raises the question of whether truth really can be relative to time and context in any meaningful sense. Secondly, there is the problem that Pragmatism lacks any moral content and cannot really produce any moral improvement. Finally, there is the problem that Pragmatism begs the question because, if use is the measure of truth, we become locked into a circular argument whereby whatever is true is true because whatever is useful happens to be useful, and no argument can be to the contrary of this because all truth-claims that do not serve the use become redundant. These problems appear to demonstrate that Pragmatism cannot be a means to seek the truth that stands on its own. However, I do believe that use is an important consideration when seeking the truth and will argue that it can be an important part of the discussion if supported by some further arguments.
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