Philosophy Talk: Trump and Truth
The Department of Philosophy is hosting a Philosophy Talk, open to all, called "Trump and Truth" by Dr. Daniel Harris.
Donald Trump is surely a post-truth President. However, rather than abandoning truth altogether, Trumps seeks to alter our sense of which sources of knowledge are to be trusted and so of what passes for true. To call mainstream media 鈥渇ake news鈥�, for instance, is to rely on the possibility of real, true news. Trump does not malign truth so much as our usual practices of building consensus around what counts as true.
Post-truth is often connected to, even blamed on, postmodernism. Postmodernists say there is no objective truth and what passes for true is largely a function of social and historical contingencies. Critics often take postmodern philosophers to be advocating for this view of truth, whereas in reality they are describing what they see when they study the intersection of truth and power. Postmodern philosophers have understood themselves as responding to a crisis of truth rather than creating one.
In this talk, Dr. Harris explores these themes by touching on philosophers including Nietzsche, Sartre, Foucault and Arendt, trying to bring their insights to bear on the present political moment in the US.
