There is a widespread agreement that Nietzsche has developed a kind of position or doctrine called ‘perspectivism’. Scholars go on and develop metaphysical, semantic, epistemic, and psychobiological interpretations of the supposed Nietzschean perspectivism or even ‘perspectivisms’. They engage in debates about whether this perspectivism is relativistic, realistic, or anti-realistic and what the tenets of perspectivism are. In this paper, I suggest putting an end to this practice. I examine Nietzsche’s explicit mentions of the term ‘perspectivism’, the problems associated with the (...) misunderstanding of this term as a label, attempts to reconstruct perspectivism based on explicit mentions of ‘perspective’ and related vocabulary, and doctrinal assumptions scholars try to connect with this terminology. (shrink)

Despite its potential implications for the objectivity of scientific knowledge, the claim that “scientific instruments are perspectival” has received little critical attention. I show that this claim is best understood as highlighting the dependence of instruments on different perspectives. When closely analyzed, instead of constituting a novel epistemic challenge, this dependence can be exploited to mount novel strategies for resolving two old epistemic problems: conceptual relativism and theory-ladeness. The novel content of this article consists in articulating and developing these strategies (...) by introducing two fine-grained notions of perspectives as the key units of analysis: “broad perspectives” and “narrow perspectives.”. (shrink)

This article offers formal and doctrinal reasons that prove the existence of the "Harvard Philosophical School" as a real historico-philosophical phenomenon. The author includes Willard Van Orman Quine, Nelson Goodman, and Hilary Putnam in this school. The aim of this article is to compare the conceptualism, relativism and anti-realism of Quine, Goodman and Pantem, on the basis of pragmatic tendencies in their philosophical studies. All these philosophers were professors at Harvard University; in addition, Quine was a teacher of Goodman and (...) Putnam, Goodman was a teacher of Putnam. Quine, Goodman, and Putnam, each in his own specific pragmatic way, stood on the positions of relativism, anti-realism, conceptualism, and tried to separate themselves from “cultural relativism”. Common touchstone concepts and tendencies in particular in their philosophical investigations are: conceptual scheme, indeterminacy of translation, internal criteria, ontological relativity and others. The obvious analogy between Quine's standards of similarity, Goodman's standards of correctness, and standards for Putnam's conceptual schemes. The role played in their doctrines by the ideas of William James, who also taught at Harvard, at least hypothetically allows us to expand the boundaries of this school. (shrink)

In the recent debate about the semantics of perspectival expressions, disagreement has played a crucial role. In a nutshell, what I call “the challenge from disagreement” is the objection that certain views on the market cannot account for the intuition of disagreement present in ordinary exchanges involving perspectival expressions like “Licorice is tasty./no, it’s not.” Various contextualist answers to this challenge have been proposed, and this has led to a proliferation of notions of disagreement. It is now accepted in the (...) debate that there are many notions of disagreement and that the search for a common, basic notion is misguided. In this paper I attempt to find such a basic notion underneath this diversity. The main aim of the paper is to motivate, forge and defend a notion of “minimal disagreement” that has beneficial effects for the debate over the semantics of perspectival expressions. (shrink)

Building on a model of the biological, socio-psychological, and structural drivers of luxury consumption, this article explores when and why luxury consumers consider ethics in their luxury consumption practices, to identify differences in their ethical and ethical luxury consumption. The variables proposed to explain these differences derive from biological, socio-psychological, and structural drivers, namely, consumers’ (1) age, (2) ethicality, (3) human values, (4) motivations, and (5) assumptive world. A cluster analysis of a sample of 706 U.S. adult luxury consumers reveals (...) five segments of luxury consumers, each reflecting a specific persona, that engage in both ethical and ethical luxury consumption to varying extents. The five segments differ in the extent to which they exhibit features related to four discriminant functions (immorality, ego-orientation, and strain; altruistic-orientation; conservation, in control, and positivity; and youth and luxury savvy), which vary across the biological, socio-psychological, and structural drivers. The findings thus indicate which segments of luxury consumers are most relevant for luxury firms pursuing a long-term sustainability agenda and suggest practical actions to reach those goals. (shrink)

Many prominent arguments for epistemic relativism take their departure from the observation that a certain kind of epistemic symmetry is present in particular empirical cases. In this paper, we seek to attain further clarity about the kind of symmetry at issue, and the sort of relativism to which such symmetry can reasonably be taken to give rise. The need for such an investigation is made apparent, we believe, by the fact that prominent anti-relativist arguments such as that advanced by Boghossian (...) in his influential book Fear of Knowledge (2006) yield distorted pictures of the matter. Following Boghossian, we present our argument through a detailed consideration of the dispute between Bellarmine and Galileo concerning heliocentrism. Contrary to what Boghossian claims, the relevant sort of symmetry does not concern a difference in fundamental epistemic principles between Bellarmine and Galileo, but rather a much more localized difference in procedures for adjudication between shared principles in the novel epistemic circumstances generated by Galileo's telescopic observations. Bellarmine and Galileo advance fundamentally different procedures of adjudication that are nevertheless equally rational. The upshot is not so much the denial that there are absolute epistemic facts as such, as Boghossian thinks, but rather the denial that there is an absolute fact of the matter as to which was the most rational way to proceed: Bellarmine's or Galileo's. What this gives us, is the denial that there is a certain kind of absolute epistemic fact. (shrink)

This paper develops a view on which: (a) all fundamental facts are absolute, (b) some facts do not supervene on the fundamental facts, and (c) only relative facts fail to supervene on the fundamental facts.

Reasonable certainty in science and philosophy: It is argued that, as forms of knowledge, neither science is so safe nor philosophy is as arbitrary as often claimed. Mathematics and experimental science are founded on postulates that must be accepted axiomatically and cannot be justified with the rigor that is eventually expected from both disciplines. That acceptance entails the conscious or unconscious adoption of specific philosophical choices. The same can be said of other statements which enjoy so wide a consensus that (...) their philosophical character is eclipsed. The ontological status of specific instances of such widely accepted assertions is discussed. It is concluded that, in the adventure of life, the elusive myth of sure knowledge must be replaced by the tangible prose of reasonable certainty. It is proposed that the necessary and successful vital bet on reasonable certainties, that already enjoy a wide consensus, may be extended to other philosophical spheres which so far have been perceived by some as the domain of the arbitrary. (shrink)

The main goal of my text is to generalize Alexy's explicative argument against human rights skeptics in order to minimize the overall room for their escape. This argument tries to show that any attempt to intersubjectively justify the nonexistence of human rights as moral rights necessarily commits the so‐called performative self‐contradiction. Alexy worries that the effect of his argument can be weakened by a group reduction of discourse. But I will argue that this worry is overstated because the price of (...) such a reduction is much higher than Alexy estimates. I will then turn to the issue of moral relativism. I will try to show that the explicative argument, if suitably generalized, can cope even with human rights skeptics who think in terms of moral relativism. (shrink)

As Einstein’s successor in Prague and the author of a biography on Einstein, the physicist and philosopher Philipp Frank made relativity a central aspect of his thoughts on morality. He published his views on this topic mainly in the year 1950 in a small book entitled Relativity—A Richer Truth. As far as morality as a part of social and political life is concerned, Frank’s primary interest is to show that as in science, relativity in morality does not preclude objectivity. The (...) paper deals with the question of which conceptions of relativity and relativism Frank refers to in the context of modern science and examines the implications for objectivity and absolute values in morality. (shrink)

In a recent article in this journal, Stump argues that pragmatism distances itself from absolutism due to its assent to fallibilism while it rejects relativism at the same time because of its insistence on experience. Therefore, pragmatism can provide a third position between relativism and absolutism. I argue in this note that his argument is profoundly inadequate for both claims. Fallibilism is compatible with both relativism and absolutism, and accordingly cannot be considered as the middle ground. Furthermore, the experience itself (...) and the way it is inferred from is the subject of the relativists’ debates, not a response. (shrink)

Whereas there is much discussion about Thomas Kuhn’s notion of methodological incommensurability and many have seen his ideas as an attempt to allow for rational disagreement in science, so far no serious analysis of how exactly Kuhn aims to account for rational disagreement has been proposed. This paper provides the first in-depth analysis of Kuhn’s account of rational disagreement in science—an account that can be seen as the most prominent attempt to allow for rational disagreement in science. Three things will (...) be shown: First, we find not one, but two accounts of rational disagreements in science in Kuhn’s writings: one stemming from methodological incommensurability and one stemming from Kuhn-underdetermination, which are not only fundamentally different—the first purports to explain how disagreeing scientists can nevertheless be rational, while the second attempts to show how rational scientists can nevertheless disagree—but appear to be incompatible with each other. Second, I will assess both accounts. Kuhn’s account from methodological incommensurability is not convincing since it cannot explain rational disagreement in science. Whereas, on the other hand, Kuhn’s account from Kuhn-underdetermination allows for rational disagreement, his argument why we should accept it is not convincing. Third, I present a tentative sketch of an alternative to Kuhn’s account that emphasizes the fallibility of epistemic justification in order to show that Kuhn’s argument founders. In sum, the paper shows that focusing not on the muchly debated consequences of methodological incommensurability, but on Kuhn’s treatment of rational disagreement gives new insight into the adequate interpretation of his thought as well as the cogency of his ideas. (shrink)

The question as to whether Ian Hacking’s project of scientific styles of thinking entails epistemic relativism has received considerable attention. However, scholars have never discussed it vis-à-vis Wittgenstein. This is unfortunate: not only is Wittgenstein the philosopher who, together with Foucault, has influenced Hacking the most, but he has also faced the same accusation of ‘relativism’. I shall explore the conceptual similarities and differences between Hacking’s notion of style of thinking and Wittgenstein’s conception of form of life. It is a (...) fact that whether or not the latter entails epistemic relativism is still a controversial question. From my comparative analysis, it will emerge that there are stronger reasons to conclude that Hacking’s notion of style leads to epistemic relativism than there are to reach the same conclusion in the case of Wittgenstein’s conception of form of life. This point will be at odds with the anti-relativistic stance that Hacking has taken in his more recent writings. (shrink)

Addiction is a common condition affecting millions of people worldwide of which only a small proportion receives treatment. The development and use of healthcare services is influenced by how addiction is understood (e.g., a condition to treat, a shameful condition to stigmatize), notably with respect to how volition is impacted (e.g., addiction as a choice or a disease beyond one’s control). Through semi-structured qualitative interviews, we explore the implicit views and understandings of addiction and volition across three stakeholder groups: people (...) with lived experience of addiction, clinicians with experience treating addiction, and members of the public without lived experience of addiction. We notably examine whether three paradigms, i.e., three philosophical sets of understandings about the nature of reality and knowledge (realism, relativism, pragmatism) reflect how stakeholders envision addiction and volition in the context of addiction. The use of these paradigms allows for the characterization of different stances on addiction and volition and an assessment of the coherence of beliefs about these matters. Our findings demonstrate that few participants relied on a single epistemic paradigm when describing their views. Furthermore, there were notable differences in understandings of volition between the clinician group, who were more oriented toward pragmatism, and people with lived experience of addiction, who were less oriented toward realism. Despite its limitations, our study suggests that a greater appreciation for the complexity of views held by different stakeholders about addiction and volition could help critically assess the search for coherence expressed in academic and policy debates. (shrink)

This paper explores the application of hinge epistemology to deep disagreement. Hinge epistemology holds that there is a class of commitments—hinge commitments—which play a fundamental role in the structure of belief and rational evaluation: they are the most basic general ‘presuppositions’ of our world views which make it possible for us to evaluate certain beliefs or doubts as rational. Deep disagreements seem to crucially involve disagreements over such fundamental commitments. In this paper, I consider pessimism about deep disagreement, the thesis (...) that such disagreements are rationally irresolvable, and ask whether the Wittgensteinian account of deep disagreement—according to which such disagreements are disagreements over hinge commitments—provides adequate support for pessimism. I argue that the answer to this question depends on what hinge commitments are and what our epistemic relation to them is supposed to be. I argue for two core claims. First, that non-epistemic theories of hinge commitments provide adequate support for pessimism. Nevertheless, such theories have highly implausible consequences in the context of deep disagreement. Secondly, at least one epistemic theory of hinge commitments, the entitlement theory, permits optimism about such disagreements. As such, while hinge epistemology is mainly pessimistic about deep disagreement, it doesn’t have to be. (shrink)

This paper explores the application of hinge epistemology to deep disagreement. Hinge epistemology holds that there is a class of commitments—hinge commitments—which play a fundamental role in the structure of belief and rational evaluation: they are the most basic general ‘presuppositions’ of our world views which make it possible for us to evaluate certain beliefs or doubts as rational. Deep disagreements seem to crucially involve disagreements over such fundamental commitments. In this paper, I consider pessimism about deep disagreement, the thesis (...) that such disagreements are rationally irresolvable, and ask whether the Wittgensteinian account of deep disagreement—according to which such disagreements are disagreements over hinge commitments—provides adequate support for pessimism. I argue that the answer to this question depends on what hinge commitments are and what our epistemic relation to them is supposed to be. I argue for two core claims. First, that non-epistemic theories of hinge commitments provide adequate support for pessimism. Nevertheless, such theories have highly implausible consequences in the context of deep disagreement. Secondly, at least one epistemic theory of hinge commitments, the entitlement theory, permits optimism about such disagreements. As such, while hinge epistemology is mainly pessimistic about deep disagreement, it doesn’t have to be. (shrink)

A popular accusation against moral relativism is that it goes too far in its vindication of tolerance. The idea behind accusations like this can be summarized in the slogan, frequently attributed to relativism, that “anything goes”. The aim of this paper is to defend moral relativism from the accusation that it is an “anything goes” view; from the accusation that it forces us to suspend our judgment in cases in which we do not think we should even be allowed to. (...) In the end, relativism is not an “anything goes” view because it is not a view about what goes, but about the way things go—about what goes on when we say that something is morally right or wrong. There is indeed a view, sometimes called “relativism”, that forces us to suspend our judgment about practices that do not allow for such comfort, but it is not so much moral relativism as moral contextualism. Apparently, though, the most salient alternative to “anything goes” views such as contextualism is not moral relativism. It is moral objectivism, according to which there is a fact of the matter about moral issues. However, I show that moral objectivism too ends up being an “anything goes” view unless the objectivist takes herself to be endowed with “God’s point of view”, which I prove troublesome. (shrink)

This article discusses explanations behind theory choice, that is, ultimately, what leads people to accept a certain claim as valid. There has been a recent debate as to how closure was achieved in the continental-drift discussion. The controversy had found its usual explanation under rationalist terms: Wegener’s 1912 continental-drift theory was accepted 50 years later only after the plate tectonic theory had provided more evidence or a more in-depth problem-solving capacity. Nevertheless, a re-examination of the controversy under constructivist terms argued (...) that closure was achieved by a change in the style of thought. This analysis prompted some authors to react calling to a ‘defence of rationalism’ and insisting on explaining that the continental-drift theory was only accepted because of epistemic reasons. As the debate impacts on the way to explain scientific controversies, in this article I analyze rationalist and constructivist approaches with respect to ways to explain the social acceptance or rejection of a theory. The analytical perspectives will be contextualized within a broader theoretical discussion in philosophy and social sciences about the role of different factors that condition knowledge, which will also include an empirical approximation in the analysis of GMO and continental-drift controversies. Ultimately, the debate with rationalism is situated in a broader context about the ways of explaining the social acceptance of a theory, arguing that the problem with the rationalism that confuses a purely logical explanation with a sociological one is that it tends to judge rather than understand. (shrink)

Ethics is a philosophical branch of inquiry that reasons between what is right and wrong. The moral philosophy of Socrates, Aristotle, and Plato from ancient Greek became the basis of most of the western ethics. These days, ethics can be divided based on its inquiries for example, normative, descriptive, metaethics, and applied ethics or based on its theories like utilitarianism, emotivism, and universal ethics. In context with applied ethics that examines issues involving emerging technologies, this study will look into the (...) ethics of Malaysian stem cell technology based on written literature. It was mainly to identify Malaysian literature on stem cell ethics through conventional search since the mainstream international database indicated an obvious shortage. The critical review of this literature will facilitate in the understanding of unique position of Malaysia towards stem cell and its ethics in reference to the limited number. Despite the limitation, this can be a preliminary study urging for more inquiries and exploration to fulfil the multiple perspectives in ethics such as the diversity of Malaysian ethics, the impact of ethics in stem cell regulation in Malaysia, and if western contemporary ethics influences Malaysian ethics particularly involving stem cell technology. (shrink)

Among Wittgenstein’s thought experiments, the wood-sellers is one of the most controversial. According to an absolutist interpretation, they are meant to show that we cannot transcend our concepts,...

There are similarities between Bernard Williams and Cora Diamond as moral philosophers: both their moral philosophies are marked by an engagement with the question of what it is like to be a human being, and both are engaged with experience more than theory. Still, such similarities rest on very different philosophical grounds. In this article, I consider whether a Nietzschean (Williams) and a Wittgensteinian (Diamond) could ever converge on a characterization of the ‘moral point of view’ as this involves views (...) on life, thought, and language. I argue that divergences between Williams and Diamond persist, a very important one concerning relativism: whereas Diamond adumbrates a Wittgensteinian way out of relativism, it remains a last word for Williams. (shrink)

Political leaders, philosophers, sociologists, historians, political scientists, law scholars and economists approach terrorism in diverse ways, especially its definition. Politicians assign the meaning to the term terrorism that best suits them. Political scientists analyze the actions of those in the geopolitical framework. Moral philosophers look at terrorism from the viewpoint of fairness. Historians make a comparative assessment of the phenomenon through its evolution over time, and scholars of law simply dissect counterterrorism measures and assess their consistency with customs and current (...) legislation. Sociologists stress the importance of culture, social relationships and social interactions. Eventually, politicians and lawmakers are not immune to the influence of the common ethics and morals of their own societies and the uses and habits of their own cultures, including religious aspects. Morals and ethics relate to “right” and “wrong” conduct; the first provides guiding principles, and the latter refers to rules provided by an external source, e.g., codes of conduct in workplaces or principles in religions. While morals are concerned with principles of right and wrong, ethics are related to right and wrong conduct of an individual in a particular situation. Ethics, morals and religion are intertwined in the antithetical principles “good and evil.” This work aims to scrutinize the crucial concept of just and unjust war, and just and unjust combatants, and to elaborate on some critical moral and ethical elements within the modern understanding of the interplay between terrorism, counterterrorism, fundamental human rights, and international humanitarian law. Through the examination of all pertinent theoretical positions the paper seeks to shed light on the limits of the use of force and the justification of the violation of fundamental rights in the War on Terror. (shrink)

I applaud Maria Baghramian and Annalisa Coliva (henceforth B&C) for writing this book. Like Baghramian’s earlier book of the same title (Baghramian 2004), i.

In his 2014 article “Motivations for Relativism as a Solution to Disagreements”, Steven Hales argues that relativism is a plausible disagreement resolution strategy for epistemically irresolvable disagreements. I argue that his relativistic strategy is not adequate for disagreements of this kind, because it demands an impossible doxastic state for disputants to resolve the disagreement. Contrarily, Fogelin’s :1–8, 1985) theory of deep disagreement does not run into the same problems. Deep disagreements, according to Fogelin, cannot be resolved through argumentation because the (...) conditions for argumentation are lacking in such contexts. I advance the view that deep disagreements arise due to differences in disputants’ mutually supporting interrelated beliefs. This view avoids the hurdles caused by the tiered structure of support found at the heart of Hales’s view on disagreement: the assumption that belief and perspective can be separated, and that disagreement is located. (shrink)

The article offers formal and doctrinal reasons that prove the existence of the “Harvard Philosophical School” as a real historico-philosophical phenomenon. The author includes Willard Van Orman Quine, Nelson Goodman, and Hilary Putnam in this school. The aim of this article is to compare the conceptualism, relativism and anti-realism of Quine, Goodman and Pantem, on the basis of pragmatic tendencies in their philosophical studies. Formal reasons: all these philosophers were professors at Harvard University; in addition, Quine was a teacher of (...) Goodman and Putnam, Goodman was a teacher of Putnam. Doctrinal reasons: Quine, Goodman, and Putnam, each in his own specific pragmatic way, stood on the positions of relativism, anti-realism, conceptualism, and tried to separate themselves from “cultural relativism”; common touchstone concepts and tendencies in particular in their philosophical investigations are: conceptual scheme, indeterminacy of translation, internal criteria, ontological relativity and others; the obvious analogy between Quine's standards of similarity, Goodman's standards of correctness, and standards for Putnam's conceptual schemes. Thus, we have strong reasons to consider Quine, Goodman and Putnam as representatives of a common philosophical school. The role played in their doctrines by the ideas of William James, who also taught at Harvard, at least hypothetically allows us to expand the boundaries of this school. (shrink)

In this article, the epistemological interpretation of the relationship between concepts of relativism, beliefs, and probability ensures a defense of two theses, namely, (i) epistemic relativism refers to attitudes that depend on the repetition and anchoring of probabilistic beliefs, and (ii) Popper’s propensity interpretation of probability discloses the connections between relativity, probability, and collective subjectivity. The propensity interpretation brings a framework for describing the role of collective subjectivity in epistemic systems. This approach, as an acceptable epistemological stance, is related to (...) the variability of anchored collective beliefs. The repetition and anchoring of subjective probabilistic beliefs becomes a relative reference frame for evaluating the elements of knowledge. With this in mind, each particular way of considering probability indicates a manner of distinguishing epistemic systems. In epistemic systems, the statements are collective points of view expressed in the form ‘p is justified when belief in p is probably reliable.’ The statements can be accurate in a particular epistemic system but inaccurate in other systems. As a result, by avoiding the ‘all statements must be true or false’ requirement, each proponent of a certain epistemic system can build a probabilistic picture of the world. In this picture, not every statement needs to be ‘true’ when and if the statement expresses a collective point of view that has a propensity to be reliable and justified. (shrink)

The kind of epistemic relativism usually refuted by its critics is less frequently observable in ethnographic research practices than the critics assume. Instead, methodological conceptual relativism can be recognized in several cases. This has significant practical implications, since the kind of epistemic relativism described by its critics, if rigorously followed, could lead to ethnographers conflating ways of argumentation accepted by their informants, with ways of argumentation accepted in academia, whereas methodological conceptual relativism does not have such consequences.

Since the early 20th century, two new disciplines emerged in the tradition of analytic philosophy: meta-ethics and political epistemology. Nevertheless, debates on such questions go back to the ancient Greeks and, in particular, to the debates between Plato and Protagoras. This article elucidates the controversy between Plato and the influential sophist Protagoras from the perspective of contemporary meta-ethics and political epistemology. It argues that the main motivation of Plato’s philosophical endeavors is to overcome Protagoras’s skeptical claims that no moral facts (...) and no moral knowledge applicable to political issues exist. The paper defends the thesis that there exists a deep disagreement between Protagoras and Plato on the existence of moral facts and moral knowledge. A deep disagreement is a disagreement that cannot be resolved through the use of reasons and arguments. Applying the foundationalist approach Robert J. Fogelin proposes in his seminal paper “The Logic of Deep Disagreements”, this article argues that the deep disagreement between Protagoras and Plato exists because their political thought is based on “underlying principles” that clash. While Plato’s political philosophy rests on his religious and theological convictions, the political thought of Protagoras is based on his skepticism, relativism, and agnosticism. (shrink)

In their book Relativism, Maria Baghramian and Annalisa Coliva (B&C; 2020) offer a panoramic view of various forms of relativism and their history. They mak.

In the pair of articles of which this is the first, I shall present a set of problems and philosophical proposals that have in recent years been associated with the term “relativism”. All these problems and proposals concern the question of how we should represent thought and speech about certain topics. The main issue here is whether we should model such mental states or linguistic acts as involving representational contents that are absolutely correct or incorrect, or whether, alternatively, their correctness (...) should be thought of as varying with some (more or less surprising) factor. In this, first, article, I shall discuss the general issue of relativism about representational content. I shall claim that there are legitimate ways of attributing contents that are absolute truth-bearers, and there are also equally legitimate ways of attributing relativistic representational contents. In the companion piece “Relativism 2: Semantic Content”, I look in more detail at the more specific question whether semantic contents (i.e. the contents assigned to linguistic utterances in the semantics of natural language) should be construed in an absolutist or a relativist way. (shrink)

Relativism is often motivated in terms of certain types of disagreement. In this paper, we survey the philosophical debates over two such types: faultless disagreement in the case of gustatory conflict, and fundamental disagreement in the case of epistemic conflict. Each of the two discussions makes use of a implicit conception of judgement: brute judgement in the case of faultless disagreement, and rule-governed judgement in the case of fundamental disagreement. We show that the prevalent accounts work with unreasonably high levels (...) of idealization. We defend two claims. First, philosophical discussions of disagreement need to be de-idealized. Second, once a less idealized account of disagreement is available, both our conception of judgement and our understanding of relativism need to be revised. Our example is a case study in the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge: Steven Shapin and Simon Schaffer’s classic Leviathan and the Air-Pump. This case study gives a less idealized account of disagreement that conceptualizes judgements as situated. We argue that this conception can and should be applied to cases of gustatory and epistemic disagreement. The payoff will be a reformulation of relativism in terms of rationally resolvable yet contingent disagreements. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis article asks whether the philosophy of Paul K. Feyerabend can be reasonably classified as postmodernist, a label applied to him by friends and foes alike. After describing some superficial similarities between the style and content of both Feyerabend’s and postmodernist writings, I offer three more robust characterisations of postmodernism in terms of relativism, ‘incredulity to metanarratives’, and ‘depthlessness’. It emerges that none of these characterisations offers a strong justification for classifying Feyerabend as ‘postmodern’ in any significant sense. Indeed, what (...) does emerge is that Feyerabend’s work was fundamentally informed by a humanitarian vision of the value of science that is, in fact, strikingly modern. (shrink)

The topic of epistemic normativity has come to the fore of recent work in epistemology, and so naturally, theories of knowledge, truth and justification have been increasingly held accountable to preserving normative epistemological platitudes. Central to discussions of epistemic normativity are questions about epistemic agency and epistemic value. Here, our aim is to take up some of these issues as they come to bear on the rather unconventional brand of epistemology that was defended by Richard Rorty. Our purpose is to (...) explore whether Rorty’s epistemology—or perhaps his replacement for epistemology—can preserve these normative platitudes about epistemic agency, responsibility, achievement, and the value of knowledge. Our conclusion is a negative one: that Rorty’s commitments leave him firmly at odds with some of the most plausible assumptions about epistemic agency and epistemic value. (shrink)

Whether truth is absolute or relative has been a widely discussed topic for over two thousand years in epistemology and the philosophy of science. However, this issue has not yet been discussed systematically with respect to linguistics. The present paper attempts to make the first step toward filling this gap. It raises the following question in Sect. 1: What kind of relationship is there between the pluralism of inquiry, the relativistic and the absolutistic approach to truth, and the tolerance of (...) views differing from one’s own in the practice of linguistic research? After Sect. 2 has clarified what is meant by ‘relativism’, ‘absolutism’, ‘pluralism’ and ‘tolerance’, Sects. 3–5 describe, analyse, and systematize the ways in which relativistic and absolutistic views are manifested in linguistic theorizing. Finally, Sect. 6 summarizes the findings and gives a sophisticated answer to the main question of the paper. (shrink)

This article considers historical facts and investigates the particular relationship between a factual and a valuative dimension within them. The operation is an autopsy of a particular historical fact, which works as an example. On this basis, the article will elucidate the similarities and the differences between historical facts and natural facts, with an emphasis on the observation that the former are more subject to the influence of interpretation than the latter. This feature of historical facts explains why social and (...) political struggles for recognition arise with respect to historical events. (shrink)

ABSTRACTIt is well acknowledged that the categorization of people with specific political, social and economic characteristics as ‘migrants’ – migrantization – is facilitated by mainstream, positivist versions of science and is associated with the production and/or reproduction of power relations. To date, this important critique has been advanced by academics influenced by interpretivism/poststructuralism who tend to relativize the discussion, and who are unable to provide a space for quantitative research. The main objective of this paper is to offer an alternative (...) approach to avoiding positivism and relativism in ‘migration studies’, based on critical realism, which I term ‘migrantization research’. Critical realist migrantization research is multi-methodological and provides an interdisciplinary framework for conducting mixed-method social research on ‘migration’. It aims to discover, uncover or indicate how various causal powers – of structural, discursive/cultural and agential character – interact and produce certain outcomes. It presupposes that both measurable and non-measurable dimensions of the social world are relevant. (shrink)

To liberate African philosophy from the remnants of the colonial style of thought, Kwesi Wiredu promotes the idea of the conceptual decolonization of African philosophy. He argues that, to accomplish this project, African philosophers must theorize in African vernaculars. This article attempts to show that the project of the conceptual decolonization of African philosophy by recourse to theorizing in African vernaculars is challenging. It examines a particular strategy that Wiredu deploys in “Conceptual Decolonization as an Imperative in Contemporary African Philosophy,” (...) in which he hopes to demonstrate that the Akan conception of mind is superior to the Cartesian conception of mind. It demonstrates that Wiredu’s attempt to show the superiority of the Akan conception of mind is unsuccessful and that his project of conceptual decolonization fails. Nevertheless, it concludes that Wiredu’s conceptual decolonization project still shows promise even in light of our criticisms. (shrink)

Davidson has famously argued that conceptual relativism, which, for him, is based on the content-scheme dualism, or the “third dogma” of empiricism, is either unintelligible or philosophically uninteresting and has accused Quine of holding onto such a dogma. For Davidson, there can be found no intelligible ground for the claim that there may exist untranslatable languages: all languages, if they are languages, are in principle inter-translatable and uttered sentences, if identifiable as utterances, are interpretable. Davidson has also endorsed the Quinean (...) indeterminacy-underdetermination distinction. The early Quine, as well as the later Quine, believe that the indeterminacy of translation casts serious doubt on the existence of facts of the matter about correct translation between languages. In this paper, I will argue that Quine cannot be the target of Davidson’s argument against conceptual relativism, and that Davidson’s argument is in conflict, among others, with his endorsement of the Quinean indeterminacy-underdetermination distinction. I will show how this conflict results in a radical departure from Quine with respect to the matter of factualism about fine-grained meanings. (shrink)

What does it take for Islam and science to engage in a genuine conversation with each other? This essay is an attempt to answer this question by clarifying the conditions which make having such a conversation possible and plausible. I will first distinguish between three notions of conversation: the trivial conversation (which requires sharing a common language and the meaning of its ordinary expressions), superficial conversation (in which although the language is shared, the communicators fail to share the meaning of (...) their theoretical terms), and genuine conversation (which implies sharing the language and the meaning of ordinary as well as theoretical terms). I will then argue that our real concern with regard to the exchange between Islam and science is to be to specify the conditions under which their proponents can engage in a genuine conversation with each other and that such a conversation to take place essentially requires sharing a common ontology. Following Quine, I will argue that Muslims, like the followers of any religion, would have no other choice but to work from within science. Doing so, however, would not prevent Muslims from having a genuine conversation with the proponents of other worldviews because when the shared ontology fails to offer any potentially testable answer to our remaining questions about the world, the Islamic viewpoint can appear as a genuine alternative among other underdetermined ones, deciding between which would be a matter of pragmatic criteria. (shrink)

How should we look back on the history and the origins of our ethical outlook and our way of life? We know that in the past, strange and appalling ethical views and practices have enjoyed widespread and sincere support. Yet we do not regard our contemporary outlook – to the extent that we do, at the present, have a common outlook – as one option among many. However bemused we may feel in ethical matters, at least on some issues we (...) claim to have reasons that are good . If we do not object to the use of the predicate ‘true’ in ethics, we may say that we are confronted with the truth of an outlook. Or, to echo a provocative expression of David Wiggins, we claim that ‘there is nothing else to think’. (shrink)

Truth-relativism is the claim that the truth of statements is dependent on the context in which they are made. In this article, truth-relativism is considered as a way to explain disagreements. Viewpoint relativism, a recent version of truth-relativism, is introduced as a useful framework to analyse how truth-relativism approaches disagreements. Viewpoint relativism is based on contextual semantics and the logic of viewpoint, which is a two-dimensional modal logic. In viewpoint relativism, the central concept is a point of view in relation (...) to which truth claims are evaluated. Viewpoint relativism is compared to the truth-relativism of Peter Lasersohn and John MacFarlane. Finally, truth-relativism is defended against the critique of Paul Boghossian that it represents untenable ‘replacement relativism’. (shrink)

One of the reasons for relativistic attitudes toward science is the impossibility of justifying scientists’ decisions in the face of alternative theories. According to this paper, an alternative theory can challenge scientific rationality only if the conditions of “methodological shortcomings of scientists” and the “existence of alternative theories” are met at a specific time. A commonly used technique to counter relativism is to try to supplement and equip scientists’ methodologies when confronted with alternative theories. However, this paper focuses on evaluating (...) the possibility of “existence an alternative theory.” To this end, by referring to the different definitions of being alternative, we try to show that only “after the decision” and “the conversion of the scientific community” can a theory be considered justifiably “alternative.” Therefore, the relativistic claim is inconsistent because relativists must first accept the validity of scientists’ decisions to attribute being alternative to a theory. In this work, we provide evidence for our claim using a historical example. We also defend conservatism as a corollary of our discussion. (shrink)

This article seeks to clarify Joseph Raz’s contention that the task of the legal theorist is to explain the nature of law, rather than the concept of law. For Raz, to explain the nature of law is to explain the necessary properties that constitute it, those which if absent law would cease to be what it is. The first issue arises regarding his ambiguous usage of the expression “necessary property”. Concurrently Raz affirms that the legal theorist has the following tasks: (...) (a) explain the essential properties of that which the concept of law refers to, which exists independently from any concept of law; (b) explain the essential properties of law given our concept of law. After trying to dissolve the ambiguity of Raz’s argument, I conclude that based on his methodological commitments the only possible task for a legal philosopher would be conceptual analysis, understood as the task of explaining our concept of law. (shrink)

Business Ethics: A European Review, EarlyView.

The aim of this paper is to begin developing a version of Gualtiero Piccinini’s mechanistic account of computation that does not need to appeal to any notion of proper functions. The motivation for doing so is a general concern about the role played by proper functions in Piccinini’s account, which will be evaluated in the first part of the paper. I will then propose a potential alternative approach, where computing mechanisms are understood in terms of Carl Craver’s perspectival account of (...) mechanistic functions. According to this approach, the mechanistic function of ‘performing a computation’ can only be attributed relative to an explanatory perspective, but such attributions are nonetheless constrained by the underlying physical structure of the system in question, thus avoiding unlimited pancomputationalism. If successful, this approach would carry with it fewer controversial assumptions than Piccinini’s original account, which requires a robust understanding of proper functions. Insofar as there are outstanding concerns about the status of proper functions, this approach would therefore be more generally acceptable. (shrink)

Introduction to the Synthese Special Issue on Disagreement in Science.

A perspectivist theory is usually taken to mean that (1) our knowledge of the world is inevitably shaped by our particular perspectives, (2) any one of these perspectives is as good as any other, and (3) any claims to objective or authoritative knowledge are consequently without ground. Recent scholarship on Nietzsche, however, has challenged the prevalent view that the philosopher holds (2) and (3), arguing instead that his perspectivism aims at attaining a greater level of objectivity. In this essay, I (...) attempt a structurally similar reinterpretation of Zhuangzi’s perspectivism. I argue that while the Chinese thinker sees all knowledge as perspective-dependent, he thinks that some perspectives are broader and more accurate than others. He utilizes shifts in perspective precisely in order to attain these superior perspectives, which constitute what he calls da zhi 大知, or “greater knowledge.” Whereas Nietzsche sees his perspectivism as methodologically continuous with the sciences, Zhuangzi’s “greater knowledge” has the goal of ensuring our survival and well-being in the everyday world. (shrink)