Abstract
The pragmatists addressed the problem of how to relate truth to beliefs and the use of language. If we apply this to a philosophy of history, it means two things: a theory of truth should explain that historians understand past beliefs and utterances, even when the beliefs and the words used to express those beliefs differ strongly from those of the historian; and it can explain why statements about the past are true or not. The view on truth proposed in this study does both things. It does so in three steps.
First it is argued that without the concept of truth we cannot make sense of understanding. So truth is necessary for understanding. Second, understanding is best described as the sharing of the world. Only against the background of a shared world do differences in beliefs become apparent. Finally, a statement s is held true by p, if what s says would also be said by p, if p were in the position in which s was made.
In the second part of the study it is argued that historians show the past by means of examples in order to express a universal thesis about man and his world. The past itself does not contain examples; only works of history do. Thus, for instance, the historian Corbin shows the growing aversion towards violence and cruelty in 19th century France with a counterexample: the murder in Hautefaye. The murder is a particular event, the historical thesis of a growing aversion towards violence and cruelty a universal thesis. A particular event is what a person (actually) does or lives through. A universal thesis is about the probability or necessity of doing or experiencing something in a certain kind of situation.
