The Truth in Hybrid Semantics

Hybrid metaethical theories come in many forms, but a particularly natural class of such theories takes their inspiration from terms in natural language which seem to have some conventional semantic meaning over and above their truth-conditions. Theories based on this comparison are naturally paired with naturalist metaethical views in order to make sense of how there is more to moral language and thought than naturalistic thought or talk. This chapter takes up the question of how to think about truth in such a hybrid metaethical theory. A simple model is given for how to distinguish between two different ways a word may contribute something extra to a sentence over and above its truth conditions. The consequences of this distinction for hybrid expressivism are explored.