TRUTH, PROOF AND LITMUS PAPER

The present paper analyzes the question whether mathematical truth or, in general, truth in formal sciences can be identified with the proofs that would entitle an agent to assert contents belonging to these sciences. A negative answer, resting on the meaning of the notion of truth, is defended. Sentences in which terms such as "true", "truly" or "truth" occur work as complex propositional variables, which we call prosentences. Speech acts in which prosentences occur lack content in isolation; such content they acquire when anaphorically linked to a successful assertive speech act. The paper establishes a distinction between the criteria that entitles to assert a mathematical content and the definition of the notion of truth. Proofs are among the assertion criteria, as Putnam and Maddy assume. The meaning of truth is independent of criteria and is stable in all its uses.