Nietzsche thought it would take superhuman strength for someone self-consciously to give himself his own truth. Only a strong god—an Übermensch—can mint truths rather than discern and obey them. This is certainly not what Popper wants. His goal is modesty, not self-assertion. He therefore hedges, writing about “meaning” instead of “truth.” In this he is characteristic of the postwar era, which is deflationary when it comes to truth, not relativistic in a thoroughgoing way. Value-free facts alone constitute the domain of truth in Popper’s universe. Whatever we make of them amounts to “meaning.”
...more
