The theory of truth as that which would be agreed upon in the ideal limit of enquiry. This view was suggested by Peirce in his essay ‘How to Make our Ideas Clear’ (1868). Its principal merit is to connect together the idea of truth as the goal of enquiry with the idea of the virtues (simplicity, comprehensiveness) that belong to an enquiry. However, it needs some view about what makes these features into virtues without presupposing that they act as midwives to the truth. It also faces the problem that there is no prospect of an empirical determination of whether the ideal limit of enquiry has been reached, and whether in the absence of such a criterion the notion of a limit makes good sense.
Philosophy dictionary. Academic. 2011.