Truth and Relation

This book explores two fundamental concepts in philosophy: truth and relation. These concepts indicate the unconditioned condition and the empirical-formal universe that truth unilaterally conditions, respectively. Indeed, truth conditions the empirical-formal universe without being conditioned by it. It is argued that the reduction of truth to various theories explaining its empirical use has led to the unconditioned nature of truth itself being lost. But if truth is not grasped for its absolute value, it is reduced to relation. The book aims to show that the concept of relation – if understood as a static construct of two terms and a nexus – is a contradictory construct, since it reconciles the irreconcilable: dependence and independences of the related terms. Thus, only insofar as truth is absolute is it authentic truth, because it does not depend on anything else, but is autonomous and self-sufficient. Indeed, if truth were not absolute, it would be determined and, as such, would be defined by a limit that would place it in relation to something other than itself, i.e. non-truth. But this is contradictory as it would make truth reliant on what is not truth. Instead, no determination can ground itself: the circle of referring that requires the determination to refer beyond itself cannot be the ground, because it configures nothing other than an infinite regress. In conclusion, the book shows that truth has to be understood not only as the end of a quest, but also as its condition, since it is only in virtue of absolute truth that the inadequacy and therefore the unintelligibility of all that is finite or relative are recognised. Truth and Relation is essential reading for all scholars, researchers and advanced students of philosophy and, in particular, of metaphysics and epistemology.