Talk:Truth

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GA review

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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This review is transcluded from Talk:Truth/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Nominator: Phlsph7 (talk · contribs) 18:21, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

Reviewer: ScrubbedFalcon (talk · contribs) 08:33, 1 June 2026 (UTC)

I will be reviewing this article over the coming days as part of the June backlog drive. Note that I'm a new reviewer so I'll be waiting on an experienced reviewer to check my work.

Hello ScrubbedFalcon, welcome to GA reviewing and thanks for tackling this article! Phlsph7 (talk) 09:00, 1 June 2026 (UTC)

Hi ScrubbedFalcon and Phlsph7. I'll be the experienced reviewer to oversight the review process. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask. :) Alexeyevitch^(talk) 10:41, 1 June 2026 (UTC)~

Hey ScrubbedFalcon, just checking whether you have the time for some initial comments. Phlsph7 (talk) 08:24, 8 June 2026 (UTC)

Hi! My apologies for being absent (offline life things happened). I have the first bit of the review, but its mostly about the paragraphing. I need to get to my university library to check some of the references still. I'll put my long comment about the paragraphing below for you to consider, I should have time to finish the review in the coning days. In solidarity, ScrubbedFalcon (talk) 15:31, 13 June 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for the input, my responses are below. Some of the sources are available online, but not all. Let me know if you have problems accessing a source. I can't quote lengthy passages spanning several pages of text here, but I should be able to provide shorter quotes to cover at least the main points.

Hey ScrubbedFalcon, just following up to see if you have more comments. Phlsph7 (talk) 16:49, 20 June 2026 (UTC)

Hey ScrubbedFalcon, it has been one month now since the review started. How should we proceed? Phlsph7 (talk) 07:25, 1 July 2026 (UTC)

Since this review didn't get particularly far and ScrubbedFalcon has not edited in several weeks, I am going to go ahead and fail this review (while resetting the clock on the talk page so that it doesn't get sent to the bottom of the queue). -- Reconrabbit (talk) 15:02, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

1. Is it well written?

   A. The prose is clear, concise and understandable to an appropriately broad audience, and the spelling and grammar are correct:

   • There are places where I think the paragraphing makes the content less comprehensible for non experts. Some examples:

   1. The first paragraph of § Definitions covers both a high level definition of truth as used in philosophy and provides (a slightly buried) definition of it as an adjective. In reading the whole section, I would suggest that reorganizing the same information (along with some of what is written in para. 2 on falsity) would make the entire section more readable

      I moved the part on falsity to first paragraph. Phlsph7 (talk) 17:56, 13 June 2026 (UTC)

   2. The second paragraph of § Deflationary does an admirable job of summarizing 5 major areas in one or two sentences each; however, for a non expert it would be difficult to extract useful information from the paragraph and its examples since they have less prior knowledge to hold onto. A fix for this could be as simple as adding guiding words to a few sentences to denote different theories. For example:

      Different deflationary theories propose distinct accounts of the linguistic function of truth-related terms. For example, the redundancy theory asserts that the predicate "is true" is superfluous and does not contribute to meaning. According to this view, the sentences 'Snow is white.' and '"Snow is white" is true.' have the same meaning. Another view, Disquotationalism, holds that the predicate "is true" acts as a linguistic device to remove quotation marks and make generalizations. Meanwhile, the performative theory (...)

      
      Or another solution could be adding a sort of comparison table for the different views. I wouldn't suggest breaking up the paragraph since its a BCA article and one or two sentence paragraphs are generally inadvisable, but I would suggest helping the reader along a bit more.

      I tried a different approach by adding a short list to the beginning of the paragraph to familiarize the reader with terms. Have a look if this addresses your concern. If not, we can try your suggestion. Phlsph7 (talk) 17:56, 13 June 2026 (UTC)

   3. The first paragraph of § Types covers, by my count, two and a half large topics in one block (the a priori/a posteriori distinction, the analytic/synthetic distinction, and the large sub-area of tautology). This followed by the short paragraph on necessity (which lacks context) which would throw me off as a naïve reader. I like the paragraph on mathematics and historicism more, but here too I would have trouble with the transition between them if I didn't make the connection myself that both are related to connection between truth and the philosophy of (social) science. In some ways the section reads as a bulleted list that happens to be presented in paragraph form, I would suggest that some editing and transitional prose might aid readers with less background or prior knowledge (or break it up into a bulleted list? it might not be stylistically ideal, but it might be clearer?). On a personal note, I appreciate the you've kept the old example of "all bachelors are unmarried" and I wonder if there's space for Cohen's example that "all bachelors are tetchy and demanding" (on page 17 of If you're an egalitarian, how come you're so rich?) which is, of course, funnier in context and probably not a fit for this article.

      I split the first paragraph in two and added some transitions. I also found a way to include the example you mentioned. Phlsph7 (talk) 17:56, 13 June 2026 (UTC)

   4. The section § Modern and contemporary could benefit from some more prose on how the various thinkers are related to one another and major areas of thought. (I realize that the MOS says to link things in the article once, but I wonder if this isn't a place to relink to other articles for the sake of the reader)

      I added a few relations between thinkers. Some were already contained in the text through introductory phrases like "Inspired by Hegel, F. H. Bradley (1846–1924) agreed that truth" and "Responding to Russell, Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951) defined truth". Generally speaking, the difficulty is that the relations are not always straightforward and giving a more detailed explanation would significantly increase the length of the section, which is already relatively long. I think those details are better left to child articles. Phlsph7 (talk) 17:56, 13 June 2026 (UTC)

   B. It complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation:

2. Is it verifiable with no original research, as shown by a source spot-check?

   A. It contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline:

   B. Reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose):

   C. It contains no original research:

   D. It contains no copyright violations nor plagiarism:

3. Is it broad in its coverage?

   A. It addresses the main aspects of the topic:

   B. It stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style):

4. Is it neutral?

   It represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each:

5. Is it stable?

   It does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute:

6. Is it illustrated, if possible, by images?

   A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content:

   B. Images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:

7. Overall:

   Pass or Fail:

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

GA review

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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This review is transcluded from Talk:Truth/GA2. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Nominator: Phlsph7 (talk · contribs) 18:21, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

Reviewer: ErnestKrause (talk · contribs) 13:07, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Starting review for nomination which may take a few days. To get things started:

Hello ErnestKrause and thanks for reviewing this nomination. The previous review was abandoned last month, so let's hope it goes better this time. Phlsph7 (talk) 07:51, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

(1) Basic concepts section mostly appears to be Alternative concepts concerning the main topic for Truth. "Truthbearers" and "Truthmakers" does not appear to be mainstream. These should appear lower down in the TOC.

Truthbearers and truthmakers are basic concepts standardly discussed in reliable sources on truth. These concepts are not alternatives to truth but preliminary notions used in later discussions. They are often mentioned in introduction sections, such as the introduction sections of Burgess 2011 and Beall & Middleton 2024, and the first chapter of Engel 2002. It's also not uncommon for sources to have separate sections on those concepts, such as the sections "Truthmakers" and "Truth-bearers" of Glanzberg 2025 and the section "What Sorts of Things are True (or False)?" of Dowden & Swartz. Phlsph7 (talk) 07:51, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

I'm really not seeing this degree of 'standardness' which you are associating here. The authors you are citiing as authorities have under 50 hits on the daily page counts for their pages. This seems to verge on being almost negligible by comparison to Plato, Socrates, Heidegger (1000 hits per day), or Wittgenstein (1500 hits per day). I'm going to suggest switching the section on 'History' to take the place of this section, and then move it down in the TOC where the History article currently resides. Its really not possible to compare Armstrong (your photo of him) as an authority over Plato or Socrates. Its not even a comparison which would pass the giggle test. Wikipedia uses a principle of applying best arguments and strongest sources (RS) in constructing articles; Armstrong appears to be marginal in the extreme compared to Plato and Socrates as authorities here. Bring Plato and Socrates to the top of the article, and move Truthbearers to the bottom of the TOC as a correction to this. ErnestKrause (talk) 23:28, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

I think there is a basic misunderstanding about how to write this type of article. You suggest that we should look at how some old primary sources treat the subject. If that was the right approach, I agree that changes would be needed. However, this suggestion collides with WP:PRIMARY: Do not base an entire article on primary sources, and be cautious about basing large passages on them. Many of your comments below hinge on this point, so I directed them here. (You also suggest that weight should be based Wikipedia page views, which violates WP:PROPORTION.) The standard approach is too look at contemporary high-quality secondary and tertiary overview sources, which integrate the ideas from those and other primary sources into a larger picture. The five sources cited above are high-quality overview sources and are ideal for deciding weight. Another example would be the The Oxford Handbook Of Truth, which also has separate chapters dedictated to truthbearers and truthmakers. Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

(2) The next section following appears more traditional and understandable for coherence theories and coorrespondence theories. Is there a single book you can name on Coherence theory of truth which mentions "Truthbearer" with any type of centrality?

From the lead paragraph of Kirkham 1998: [Coherence theories] make truth a matter of a truth bearer’s relations to other truth bearers Phlsph7 (talk) 07:51, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

See answer to (3) below. One source is not enough to defend Armstrong against Plato and Socrates as authorities on this subject. ErnestKrause (talk) 23:28, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

See my response at the first (1). Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

(3) Similarly, is there a single book you can nome on the Correspondence theory of truth with mentions "Truthmaker" with any type of centrality? Both of these terms seems somewhat subordinate or alternative conceptions rather than warranting the title of Basic concepts.

David 2025 has a separate main section called "Truthbearers, Truthmakers, Truth". Phlsph7 (talk) 07:51, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Book length studies is what I'm looking for and not finding. Only book length studies and you'll need more than 1-2 if you wish to prevail over Artistotle, Socrates and Plato when comparing them Kirkham, David and Armstrong. ErnestKrause (talk) 23:28, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

See my response at the first (1). Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

(4) More basic would seem to be issues of dealing with reality and representation-of-reality as contrasting ideas. Reality has large ontology cross readings as found in Heidegger and others. Representation-of-reality are more theory of language and semantically oriented; what are the limits of the linguistic representation of reality? Why does Wittgenstein for example mention that what cannot be represented must be consigned to silence?

It's controversial whether there is a fundamental contrast between reality and representation-of-reality, such as Kant's distinctions between things-in-themselves and appearances, and this is not directly an account of truth. Heidegger's theory of truth as unconcealment and Wittgenstein's idea about the limits of language (which is about meaning rather than truth) are equally controversial. I don't think that starting the article by presenting controversial views is a good idea, see WP:UNDUE. As far as I'm aware, none of the sources I mentioned so far start by discussing Heidegger and Wittgenstein. Phlsph7 (talk) 07:51, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

It would be much preferable I think to rely on Kant, Heidegger and Wittgenstein than to rely on Armstrong, Kirkham and David as seem to be wanting to defend. On the basis of Wikipedia daily page count statistics as providing some measure of relative importance, then the latter just do not stand up to any one of the three of Kant, H. and W. ErnestKrause (talk) 23:28, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

See my response at the first (1). Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

(5) Top of TOC I think needs to be much closer to Coherece and Correspondence theories of Truth. I'm not really following which sources you are using to justify placing them below in the TOC in deference to something like Truthbearers and Truthmakers. It seems reversed in importance.

As I said above, it works better for the purpose of an introduction to present basic concepts before theories that rely on these concepts. This is also how reliable sources cited above proceed. Generally speaking, there are different ways of organizing the topics into a section structure, and relative importance is not the only relevant factor. Phlsph7 (talk) 07:51, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

If you move the History section up to the top of the TOC, and move the other section to the bottom of the TOC. RS are very emphatic in quantity and vast numbers to recognize Aristotle, Plato and Socrates as authorities here over and against Armstrong. Its beyond merely an order of magnitude in the number of scholars supporting the Greeks over Armstrong. ErnestKrause (talk) 23:28, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

See my response at the first (1). Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

Full review is in process and may take a few days. ErnestKrause (talk) 13:07, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Start review comments:

(1) Definition section examines the English roots of the word Truth, however, this seem to verge on the arbitrary. Why are the English roots of Truth as an English word be more significant than looks at Alethea in Greek, or Pravda in Russian, or verite in French, etc. The other should be added.

The article is called truth, which is why the etymology of the term truth gets a brief discussion in two short sentences. This is standard for this type of article. The term aletheia is discussed in the section "Ancient and medieval" because it is relevant to ancient Greek philosophy. Adding a list of translations of the term into many other languages and discussing the etymology of each one is not standard. Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

(2) The position that discussion of Truthbearers is more important to the article than discussing Greek philosophy of Alethia seem odd here as a starting point in the article. I'm just not seeing how you can avoid Aristotle, Socrates and Plato at the top of the article. The true, the good, and the beautiful are still repeated over and over as providing a useful and repeated standard to define philosophical inquiry even in the 20th and 21 centuries.

The topic of the article is "Truth", not "History of the philosophy of truth". See also my response at the first (1). Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

(3) There needs to be something like a section about the true, the good and the beautiful to guide the understand of Truth as a relative term in contemporary philosophy. Each one of the terms defines its of field of philosophy as found in metamathematics, ethics and aesthetics. Truth as a comparative philosophical terms needs to be put into perspective.

These relations are discussed in the paragraph starting with "Evaluative truths are about what". However, the triade of truth, good, and beauty does not get much attention in overview sources on truth and is often not mentioned at all. For example, The Oxford Handbook Of Truth has no separate chapter on this and, as far as I can tell, neither "Glanzberg 2025" nor "Dowden & Swartz" even mention it. I appreciate that you are trying to think out of the box, but adding a separate section would violate WP:PROPORTION. Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

(4) Regarding the perspective viewpoint of what Truth is in its many applications, then it would also be of some usefullness to discuss how its context changes within the respective realms of objective knowledge, intersubjective knowledge and subjective knowledge. The associated meaning of Truth for each of these varies substantially based on context of inquiry.

This is discussed in the paragraphs on absolutism and relativism and on realism and anti-realism. Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

(5) Individual sections of type of Truth dealing with Coherence, Correspondence, etc, looks rather useful. More later.

Thanks. Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

(6) Truthbearers is just not standing up in this context. I'm fairly close to recommending either removal from the article or at the very least rescoping it to the very bottom of the TOC. Aristotle, Plato and Socrates seem the best place to start with their views of alethia, etc.

See my response at the first (1). Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

(7) Reality and representation-of-reality should not be discounted in importance. Ontology is often used as a philosophical measure of defining what Truth is or is not. See Husserl on phenomenology regarding this, and how he passes it on to Heidegger who presses Husserl further on this in Being and Time. These are not unrelated issues. For representation-of-reality see Auerbach and his book on Mimesis as to this question; there is large difference between discussing things as they are in reality (one theory of truth) and discussing opinions about what representing those things can accomplish (another theory of truth).

The relation between reality and representations is discussed in various places. For example, it plays a key role in the section "Correspondence". It is also addressed in other sections, such "Definition" and "Basic concepts". Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

(8) Separating meaning from the discussion of truth is not so easy, and it should be given more attention. When presenting a meaning for something, then the first question of come back is whether or not the meaning represents truth or if it fails at this. Meaning, verification, and definitions are all parts of this nexus of inquiries which should not be discounted in this article.

They are not discounted. For example, there is a separate paragraph on verificationism. Similarly, the problem of meaning is addressed in various places, including the sections "Basic concepts", "Theories", and "Types". Phlsph7 (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

More later. ErnestKrause (talk) 23:28, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Second opinion

After looking at the Encyclopedia of Philosophy in 8 volumes from Macmillan then there is not one single mention of the term Truthbearer in the entire set of volumes. That does not look good; especially since you are requiring it and want it as a section of top importance to the article at the top of the TOC. Even if you are placing exceptional weight on the 2004 Armstrong book on Truthbearers from Camb Univ Press then that still looks too thin to be useful. I'm seeing nothing revolutionary in the Armstrong book to suggest the full displacement of Kant, or Plato, or Socrates, or Heidegger, etc. I'll list this for a second opinion and another editor can take over with the evaluations. ErnestKrause (talk) 18:30, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

It seems you didn't look very hard. The entry Truth of the Macmillan Encyclopedia of Philosophy already has the term in its second sentence: Theories of truth investigate truth as a property of one’s thoughts and speech. We attribute truth and falsity to a wide variety of so-called truth-bearers. Phlsph7 (talk) 20:25, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

I've looked through the entire index there and there is no article with that title as a recognized subject on its own. Its up to a second opinion editor to look at it. ErnestKrause (talk) 21:54, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

If I understand you correctly, you do not intend to continue the review, meaning that you are not primarily looking for a second opinion but for another editor to write their own review. While I'm open to someone else continuing this review for you, the more straight-forward approach would be to vacate this review (like what was done with the previous review, which was vacated due to inactivity). This way, the nomination would go back to the GA nominations list where reviewers can pick it up again, in case that's fine with you. Phlsph7 (talk) 09:01, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

@ErnestKrause: Does that work for you? Phlsph7 (talk) 08:50, 29 July 2026 (UTC)

You are entitled to a second opinion here. Let's wait a week or two. ErnestKrause (talk) 10:04, 29 July 2026 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I agree with @Phlsph7's response in (1) above. The theories of truth provided by the canonical figures you mention each have a large enough literature to support their own articles. An article on a such a general topic as truth should be grounded in recent, high-quality overview sources on the topic, not authors' prominence in the history of philosophy writ-large. Patrick 🐈‍⬛ (talk) 12:38, 4 August 2026 (UTC)

Hi Patrick Welsh, thanks a lot for looking into the issue! Phlsph7 (talk) 17:25, 4 August 2026 (UTC)

@Reconrabbit: Thanks for vacating the last review of this article, which had become inactive. Unfortunately, the current review may also need to be vacated since the reviewer does not intend to continue the review. Per their request, the nomination was left open for several weeks since they wanted to get a 2nd opinion. A 2nd opinion was given but they haven't responded to it and they had already declared before that they do not wish to continue the review. It might be best to vacate the review so the nomination can go back to the GA nominations list where reviewers can pick it up again. Thanks for looking into it. Phlsph7 (talk) 09:44, 12 August 2026 (UTC)

That does appear to be the case. With a topic as broad as this, it will be difficult to get a conclusive review. I will tick up the counter. -- Reconrabbit (talk) 12:39, 12 August 2026 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

GA review

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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This review is transcluded from Talk:Truth/GA3. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Nominator: Phlsph7 (talk · contribs) 18:21, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

Reviewer: Generalissima (talk · contribs) 13:44, 12 August 2026 (UTC)

My gosh, Phlsph, you have bad luck on getting effective GAN reviewers. I'll give this a look-over and give you a conclusive answer at the very least! Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 13:44, 12 August 2026 (UTC)

Hi Generalissima and thanks for picking up another nomination with a troubled review history! Although getting effective reviews for this type of article can be challenging, it's usually not as problematic as it has been recently. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:15, 13 August 2026 (UTC)

Prose review

• While I think the use of truthbearer as a term is well-supported, it feels a little ambiguous in the lede as a non-specialist. I initially read it as meaning an individual who bears truth, so it might be worth saying entities such as sentences, propositions, or beliefs that describe things as they are

  Implemented. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:15, 13 August 2026 (UTC)

• Are there not significant discussion of truth in the Chinese philosophical tradition (outside of Buddhism)?

  I don't think so, at least not to the extent found in the other early traditions mentioned. This point is covered in the last sentence of the first paragraph of the history section. For example, from Fraser 2024: The central questions for early Chinese thinkers are not What is the truth, and how do we know it? but What is the dao (way), and how do we follow it?

• Might be worth linking inquiry in the lede and definition section?

  Added. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:15, 13 August 2026 (UTC)

• Definition section very solid and well-written.
• Truthbearer section pretty good. Seems like there could be a potential to diagram a truthful sentence, a truthful proposition, and a truthful belief about the same scenario? This would be only important at an FAC level though.

  Good idea, I gave it a try. However, visually distinguishing sentences from propositions is challenging. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:15, 13 August 2026 (UTC)

  That looks good to me! Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 15:36, 13 August 2026 (UTC)

• Truthmakers and truth conditions section seems fine.

Shall continue tomorrow Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 15:20, 12 August 2026 (UTC)

• Others section seems fine.
• You do a great job of explaining what the theories of truth are. I can't really nitpick much at all there.
• Might be good to say when Tarski developed his semantic theory.

  Added. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:08, 14 August 2026 (UTC)

• Second example statement for synthetic statements is a bit weird - it uses a fairly obscure word (tetchy) and it's slightly confusing to use what would be a falsifiable generalization there.

  This example is taken from Cohen 2009. I changed replaced tetchy with irritable to make it more accessible. The question here is not whether the sentence is true but whether its truth value depends on what the world is like. As an alternative, we could use something like "Water boils at 100 °C at sea level." Phlsph7 (talk) 10:08, 14 August 2026 (UTC)

• Are tautologies and logical truths the same concept? If so, why link to separate articles?

  Strictly speaking, tautologies are a subclass of logical truths for which the discussed condition holds. To avoid possible confusion, I removed the term tautologies since it is already implicitly included. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:08, 14 August 2026 (UTC)

• We'd need a comma after "transcendent, divine reality", no?

  Added. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:08, 14 August 2026 (UTC)

• Oh i missed this before, but you should link "empirical" somewhere on the first use in the lead and the body.

  Done. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:08, 14 August 2026 (UTC)

• The dinosaur example for truth simpliciter is probably a bad one to use, considering that in scientific parlance, they have survived

  I changed it to "tyrannosaurs". Phlsph7 (talk) 10:08, 14 August 2026 (UTC)

• Not finding anything to nitpick in the "in various fields" section
• There's many many birth and death range statements in the history section, to the point where it becomes a little distracting. Obviously having a chronology is helpful, but perhaps you could group people by shared century or time period to avoid this? The MOS cautions that Beyond the first paragraph of the lead section, birth and death details should only be included after a name if there is special contextual relevance.

  I think reviewer opinions are divided on this issue. I usually add parenthesis with birth and death ranges only to history sections since chronology matters there (i.e., special contextual relevance), limited to the first mention of each person. It's usually less intrusive than repeatedly providing temporal information in separate phrases. Phlsph7 (talk) 12:22, 14 August 2026 (UTC)

Will try and do source review tomorrow! Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 15:36, 13 August 2026 (UTC)

Forgot to say, but all the images are appropriate and correctly licensed. Alt-text is great. An image for the lede would be nice, but I imagine it'd be very hard to come up with anything that encompasses the concept, so I understand if not. Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 15:38, 13 August 2026 (UTC)

This is one of those articles where representative images of the topic at large are difficult to come by. I'll keep it in mind in case I come up with something. Phlsph7 (talk) 12:22, 14 August 2026 (UTC)

• Apologies for the delay, had some random stuff pop up. I haven't forgotten about this though, and I'll get to the spot check over the next day or two. Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 14:52, 16 August 2026 (UTC)

  Thanks for the heads-up. The nomination started over 6 months ago, so a day or two more or less is not an issue. Phlsph7 (talk) 18:44, 16 August 2026 (UTC)

Source review

Sources use consistent SFN formatting. Earwig returns no concerning results, only some terminology crossover from the Stanford Plato entry on truth.

A FAC-level concern, but i'm sure this is headed here; the The Oxford Companion to Philosophy has a DOI on Oxford Reference, so that should be included. Ditto with Pradhan 2019, The Oxford Handbook of Truth, Niiniluoto 1987, and seemingly all the other sources published by Oxford, Cambridge, Sage, Springer, or Wiley. These are generally more useful than Google Book links (esp. since they are accessible on the Wikipedia Library), so they should be included to make accessing the source easier.

I added several DOIs. However, for books it's often a hit-or-miss: some have DOIs, others don't. I usually give the DOI for journal articles, where it is almost always available, while I stick to ISBNs for books. Phlsph7 (talk) 10:38, 19 August 2026 (UTC)

Additionally, you got a scant few authors names wikilinked, but there are many more with articles (for instance, the first name in the bibliography, Evandro Agazzi. This should be consistent one way or another.

Some journal sources have ISSNs, but many don't.

Three also have an HDL.

For the sake of consistency, I removed the author links, ISSNs, and HDLs. Phlsph7 (talk) 12:22, 19 August 2026 (UTC)

This table lists 16 random passages from throughout the article (9.9% of 161 total passages). These passages contain 16 inline citations (9.9% of 161 in the article). Reference numbers refer to this revision. Generated with the Veracity user script. Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 06:57, 19 August 2026 (UTC)

Reference #	Letter	Source	Archive	Status	Notes
Truth contrasts with falsehood or falsity, which encompasses misrepresentations that do not meet this standard and fail to align with reality. The negation of a true statement is a falsehood.
3		Beall & Middleton 2024, pp. 6–7			Yup, this neatly reflects the statement.
Different philosophical approaches to truthlikeness have been proposed. Some look at logical consequences, arguing that a theory's degree of truthlikeness depends on the number of its true and false consequences. Others focus on resemblance, comparing how similar the theory's description is to the actual world.
23		Niiniluoto 1987, pp. [xi–x, 1–2] Oddie & Cevolani 2022, Lead section, § 1. The Logical Problem, § 3…			This actually cover the whole paragraph, but it checks out with Niinluoto (who describes truthlikeness before giving some complex semiotic equations that are beyond my pay grade). Oddie & Cevolani give an overview of the different theories of truthlikeness
but the precise relation between the two is disputed. Various suggestions have been made regarding the nature of truthbearers, like seeing them as propositions, sentences, or beliefs. The classical view analyzes their relation to reality in terms of objects and properties. It assumes that truthbearers have a subject-predicate structure, in which the subject refers to an entity and the predicate denotes a property. According to this view, a statement corresponds to reality if it refers to an entity that carries the denoted property. Fact-based theories, by contrast, hold that a statement expresses a fact, and it is true if the fact obtains.
32		David 2025, § 1. History of the Correspondence Theory David 2018, pp. 238–245			David 2025 seems to cover all this, and I assume David 2018 is just more of the same.
One criticism acknowledges that coherence is relevant for testing or verifying what is true but contends that coherence theory confuses criteria of verification with truth itself. Another objection argues that there can be competing coherent sets of beliefs where one set contradicts the other, meaning that coherence alone cannot determine which set is correct. For example, a fictional story does not become true just because it is coherent.
37	c	Grøn 2003, p. 902 Simmons 2006, pp. 536 Engel 2002, pp. 26–27			Simmons checks out, as does Grøn, which contains each of these criticisms. Can't access Engel but I assume that it is just more of the same.-G
Absolutism asserts that truth is the same for everyone, meaning that what is true does not depend on individual standpoints, opinions, or contexts. It contrasts with relativism, which maintains that the same statement can be true in one perspective or context and false in another.
54		Blackburn 2005, pp. xiii–xvii Cappelen & Huvenes 2018, pp. 521			Looks good to me. Cappeln & Huevenes checks out, as does Blackburn (that book has a fascinating introduction)
The liar paradox involves a proposition with an inconsistent truth assignment: if the proposition is true, it follows that it is false, and if it is false, it follows that it is true.
63		Deutsch 2022, pp. 533–534 Beall, Glanzberg & Ripley 2025, Lead section			Both of these describe the liar paradox.
A related distinction is between synthetic and analytic truths, based on the source of the truth. A sentence is synthetic if its truth depends on what the world is like, such as "Mount Everest is the highest mountain on Earth" or "all bachelors are irritable and demanding". A sentence is analytic if its truth depends only on the meanings of its terms, as in "all bachelors are unmarried".
73		books.google.com			All four of these check out. Conveniently, Russell's checks out within the freely-available summary.
The concept of religious truth encompasses core teachings and doctrines within religious traditions, addressing not only how things are but also how people relate to the world. They typically concern the meaning of life, the nature of ultimate reality and the divine, and the values and practices that should guide human conduct. Some traditions distinguish between absolute and relative truth, with absolute truth pointing to a transcendent, divine reality, while relative truth refers to conventional or context-dependent teachings for everyday life. Religious truths are often grounded in faith, drawing rationalist and scientific criticisms for lacking substantial empirical evidence.
80		Streng 2005, pp. 9368–9370 Grøn 2003, pp. 903–904			Grøn and Streng both check out. Streng includes a lot of coverage of how religions gather truth from (oft-critcizied) means such as internal insight and claimed spiritual connections, which I think is worth mentioning to expand on how religions connect truth and faith.
Truth tables, another tool in logic, express how the truth values of compound propositions depend on those of their constituent propositions.
93		Marcus 2005, p. 928			Formal logic is really beyond me, but this seems to check out.
Truth plays a central role in law as a guiding norm to which legal processes and decisions should align. Because of difficulties in reconstructing what happened, this field relies on various standards of proof and evidentiary rules to ascertain pertinent facts. Consequently, truth by itself can be insufficient if it cannot be proven in court, contrasting factual truth with legal truth.
108		books.google.com			These both give a good summary of legal truth which matches with the text.
Buddhism, originating roughly in the 6th century BCE,
116		books.google.com			This is a very strange source for this, since it is a children's book. Most historians also date it to the latter half of the 5th century BCE at this point (many of the other dates for the religions are especially incorrect here, 2000 BCE for Judaism, phew) may I suggest the Stanford Encyclopedia entry on the Buddha instead?
The topic of truth received less attention in ancient Chinese thought, where the focus was more on right conduct and practical consequences than on abstract semantic properties of statements.
120		Fraser 2020, pp. 113–117 Fraser 2024, § 3. The Search for Objective Standards, § 4. Epistemology			Checks out well.
Immanuel Kant understood judgments as the main truthbearers, arguing that a judgment is true if it agrees with its object. In his transcendental idealism, objects are not entirely independent of observers since the mind actively structures experience following inbuilt forms and categories. This raises the question of the extent to which truth is objective or subjective.
136		Tolley 2018, pp. 93–98 O'Farrell 2003, § Modern Development			This checks out - though as with Tufari 2003, I'm very skeptical that we should be citing this via Encyclopedia.com. Shouldn't we just cite the New Catholic Encyclopedia directly? This just feels like a cumbersome and potentially misleading way to share the source (especially cause it collects so many other articles with identical titles). Also, the 2nd edition of the NCE (important to specify) seems to have been published in 2002 -G
Inspired by Hegel, F. H. Bradley (1846–1924) agreed that truth ultimately resides in the whole or the absolute. He held that truth comes in degrees based on the extent to which an entity aligns with the whole. His views are often interpreted as a form of coherence theory or identity theory.
139		Baldwin 2018, pp. 125–128 Candlish & Damnjanovic 2007, pp. 233–237			Summarizes Bradley and his relationship to Hegel.
Truth-conditional semantics define sentence meaning through truth conditions: to understand a sentence is to grasp the circumstances in which it is true, with truth conditions as the necessary and sufficient conditions of its truth.
15		books.google.com			Glanzberg and Shaw check out, can't get my hands on Kearns.
Epistemology differs in this respect from anthropology and sociology, which tend to characterize knowledge as ideas and practices that are shared and reproduced in societies, irrespective of their truth values.
94		onlinelibrary.wiley.com			Checks out, though see my previous notes on Tufari.

I added the additional information on religious truths, I replaced the source on Buddhism with a better one, and I mentioned the edition of the New Catholic Encyclopedia. The websites https://openlibrary.org/books/OL8146126M/New_Catholic_Encyclopedia and https://www.biblio.com/9780787640057 say that it is from 2003. Currently, we cite the articles from the book and give additional links to Encyclopedia.com, where the texts of those two articles are available in full. I'm also not happy about the fact that those links collect articles from several works. It is kind of a tradeoff: it helps with accessibility since clicking a link to verify the information is much easier than going to a library. We could remove the links, but I think the added accessibility makes the links overall an improvement. Phlsph7 (talk) 09:58, 19 August 2026 (UTC)

You work fast! Everything looks pretty much good to go now. Thinking about how to resolve the issue - maybe we could cite it as book but use the chapter-url= parameter to link to Encyclopedia.com, instead of just url=? That way, a reader wouldn't be under the impression its a link to the entire work. Anyhow, this isn't a GA criteria concern, so I think we're golden here. Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 08:07, 20 August 2026 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. Track your hook after promotion. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Beta Beta Beta (talk) 18:45, 21 August 2026 (UTC)

(

• Comment or view
• Article history

)

• ... that philosophers discuss whether truth is correspondence between statements and facts, coherence among beliefs, or something else?

• Source: Burgess, Alexis G.; Burgess, John P. (2011). Truth. Princeton University Press. pp. 3–4. ISBN 978-0-691-16367-3.; Dowden, Bradley; Swartz, Norman. "Truth". Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Lead section, § 3. Correspondence Theory, § 5. Coherence Theories.

• • Reviewed: Template:Did you know nominations/Henry van Velthuysen

Improved to Good Article status by Phlsph7 (talk). Number of QPQs required: 1. Nominator has 40 past nominations.

Phlsph7 (talk) 13:16, 20 August 2026 (UTC).

• Hook is intriguing and sourced, article looks in great shape. Dylan620 (he/they/she • talk • edits) 18:19, 20 August 2026 (UTC)

Peer review

Truth

I've listed this article for peer review to prepare it for a featured article candidacy. I would be interested to learn what changes are required to fulfill the featured article criteria, but I'm also open to more casual improvement ideas.

Thanks, Phlsph7 (talk) 16:48, 28 August 2026 (UTC)

Comments by Shocksingularity

• The explanations of the theories in the second paragraph of the lead could for the most part be a little simpler/written in a more understandable style. Some of the language is a bit technical.
• The images of David Malet Armstrong and Alfred Tarski are not really that helpful to the encyclopedic content of the article, so I'd remove them.

Overall, I think it looks good and could probably pass FA as-is, as long as you take into account any feedback from FA reviewers. Shocksingularity (talk) 02:10, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

Hi Shocksingularity and thanks for the comments! I rewrote the 2nd lead paragraph. It's a technical subject so it could be still somewhat challenging but I hope it's better now. I moved Armstrong's image to the history section, where he is discussed. I kept Tarski's image in the subsection "Semantic" since Tarski is explicitly mentioned there as the founder of the semantic theory and because the history section already has too many images to fit in Tarski's image as well. Phlsph7 (talk) 09:57, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

The second lead paragraph looks a lot better now! Shocksingularity (talk) 18:32, 30 August 2026 (UTC)