Metaphysical realism is the view that most of the objects that populate the world exist independently of our thought and have their natures independently of how, if at all, we conceive of them. It is committed, in my opinion, to a robust form of essentialism. Many modern forms of anti-realism have their roots in a form of conceptualism, according to which all truths about essence knowable by us are ultimately grounded in our concepts, rather than in things (...) 'in themselves'. My aim is to show that conceptualist anti-realism is an incoherent doctrine and how we can support metaphysical realism and robust essentialism, while still properly acknowledging the cognitive role of concepts in mediating our grasp of the nature of mind-independent reality.RésuméLe réalisme métaphysique est la conception suivant laquelle la plupart des objets qui peuplent le monde existent indépendamment de notre pensée et possèdent une nature indépendante de la manière dont nous pouvons éventuellement la concevoir. A mon sens cette position engage à admettre une forme robuste d'essentialisme. Beaucoup des formes modernes de l'anti-réalisme tirent leurs origines d'une forme de conceptualisme, suivant laquelle toutes les vérités que nous puissions connaître au sujet des essences sont en dernière analyse fondées sur nos concepts, plutôt que dans les choses « en elles-mêmes ». Mon but est de montrer que l'anti-réalisme conceptualiste est une doctrine incohérente, et comment nous pouvons soutenir le réalisme métaphysique et l'essentialisme robuste, tout en reconnaissant clairement le rôle cognitif des concepts en tant qu'intermédiaires dans notre appréhension de la nature de la réalité indépendante de l'esprit. (shrink)

Minimally, metaphysical realists hold that there exist some mind-independent entities. Metaphysical realists also hold that we can speak meaningfully or truthfully about mind-independent entities. Those who reject metaphysical realism deny one or more of these commitments. This Element aims to introduce the reader to the core commitments of metaphysical realism and to illustrate how these commitments have changed over time by surveying some of the main families of views that realism has been contrasted (...) with: such as scepticism, idealism, and anti-realism. (shrink)

Putnam rejects "metaphysical realism," which takes "the world" to be a single complex thing, a connected causal or explanatory order into which all facts fit. he argues that such metaphysical realism is responsible for views he finds implausible; in particular, it can lead to moral relativism when one tries to locate the place of value in the world of fact. i agree that metaphysical realism will lead a thoughtful philosopher to moral relativism, but find (...) neither of these views implausible. in particular, putnam's main argument against metaphysical realism seems fallacious and his suggested alternative, to think of truth as the idea limit of rational inquiry, is clearly incorrect. (shrink)

Lenman's ‘argument from cluelessness’ against consequentialism is that a significant percentage of the consequences of our actions are wholly unknowable, so that when it comes to assessing the moral quality of our actions, we are without a clue. I distinguish the argument from cluelessness from traditional epistemic objections to consequentialism. The argument from cluelessness should be no more problematic for consequentialism than the argument from epistemological scepticism should be for metaphysical realism. This puts those who would reject consequentialism (...) on the ground of cluelessness in an awkward philosophical position. (shrink)

The metaphysical realist asserts, while the metaphysical antirealist denies, that there are individuals that exist independently of the existence and workings of any mind or minds. I begin by distinguishing the thesis of metaphysical realism from other theses that are also called ' realism '. Of particular interest in this discussion is the relation between metaphysical realism and views such as moral realism and scientific realism. ; Metaphysical realism is (...) commonly thought to be the default position in the debate since it is prima facie supported by our commonsense intuitions concerning the nature of reality. I develop several arguments to show that, when we examine our intuitions in detail, metaphysical realism is not the entirely commonsensical view that it at first appears. I argue that if metaphysical realism is true, it is difficult to see how semantic and epistemic access to the mind-independent world is possible and that, even if we do have such access, it will be difficult to rule out very bizarre ontologies. While none of these arguments constitute a decisive objection to metaphysical realism, they do suggest that the metaphysical realist should say something in defense of his view. ;I then examine Peter van Inwagen's attempted defense of metaphysical realism. This defense takes the form of a series of arguments designed to show that metaphysical antirealism is incoherent because incompatible with the existence of objective truth. I argue that his criticisms do not constitute an adequate defense of metaphysical realism because certain forms of antirealism, if otherwise philosophically viable, plausibly escape. ;This leads to a discussion of the extent to which an antirealist metaphysic can be considered a viable philosophical view. In this context, I examine the views of Hilary Putnam and Paul Grice. While the versions of metaphysical antirealism presented face serious difficulties of their own, I argue that it is a matter of philosophical judgment which view, metaphysical realism or metaphysical antirealism, has the more severe problems. (shrink)

In this paper we aim to show an intrinsic contradiction of contemporary Metaphysical Realism by focusing on the relation between the subject and the object. Metaphysical Realism considers facts and objects as being empirical, and therefore they are considered in relation to the subject, while at the same time facts are assumed to belong to an autonomous and independent reality. However, if a real object is considered to be independent from the subject, once it enters in (...) a relation with the latter, a real object must undergo an intrinsic transformation. However, since an object cannot avoid this transformation then recovering the real or “absolute” object from the perceived object is not possible. In this way, the inherent contradiction of the “absolute” as being determined, i.e., defined by virtue of a limit, is revealed. (shrink)

I propose a metaphysical position I call 'limited metaphysical realism', and I link it to a position in the philosophy of language I call 'psychologistic semantics'. Limited metaphysical realism asserts that there is a mind-independent, discourse-independent world, but posits a sparse ontology. Psychologistic semantics construes truth not as direct word/world correspondence, and not as warranted assertibility (or Putnam's "ideal" warranted assertibility), but rather as 'correct assertibility'. I argue that virtues of this package deal over each (...) of the two broad positions that have recently dominated metaphysics and philosophy of language--positions I call package deal metaphysical realism, and package deal anti-realism. (shrink)

In this paper I present a transcendental argument based on the findings of cognitive psychology and neurophysiology which invites two conclusions: First and foremost, that a pre-condition of visual perception itself is precisely what the Aristotelian and other commonsense realists maintain, namely, the independent existence of a featured, or pre-packaged world; second, this finding, combined with other reflections, suggests that, contra McDowell and other neo-Kantians, human beings have access to things as they are in the world via non-projective perception. These (...) two conclusions taken together form the basis of Aristotelian metaphysical realism and a refutation of the neo-Kantian two-factor approach to perception. (shrink)

The realism debate concerns the relationship of our beliefs, thoughts and language to the world or universe, and hence involves a number of fundamental questions ranging from metaphysics through epistemology to semantics and philosophy of language. While a few philosophers take it as an inevitable feature of the debate and try to advance it by coping simultaneously with all those questions, a number of others insists that the approach of this kind leads merely to confusions and misunderstandings. They usually (...) suggest that the metaphysical or ontological aspects of it should be kept separate from such epistemological and semantic issues as the possibility of absolute knowledge, the correspondence theory of truth, or the truth-conditional theory of meaning. In other words, there is such a thing as pure or simple metaphysical realism that may be endorsed and defended, or undermined and rejected. The aim of the paper is to raise some doubts about that metaphilosophical strategy, and to argue that the comprehensive approach to the realism debate, in which the metaphysical issues are combined with - at least - some epistemological matters, is not so much caused by confusions and misunderstandings, but forced, as it were, by its subject matter and the philosophical nature of the debate. (shrink)

Could an "ideal theory" be false? metaphysical realism requires an affirmative answer. The question has usually been discussed in terms of physical theory. I argue that if we shift ground to historical narrative, We can be virtually certain that some "ideal stories" not only "can" be false, But "will" be false. If this argument is correct, Metaphysical realism is almost certainly true.

There is a dogma about metaphysical realism that is well nigh universal: "If one is a metaphysical realist about the external world, then one ought to be a semantic realist about external- world statements". I argue that this dogma should be rejected. It is possible for a metaphysical realist to be a "semantic dualist", holding that some middle- sized object statements receive a realist interpretation, but that most such statements require an antirealist interpretation. To show that (...) a semantically dual language is at least possible, I describe a possible world whose inhabitants speak a version of English that is syntactically dual. Further I argue that English in the "actual world" is itself semantically dual. (shrink)

In Chapter One it is argued that three famous epistemologies, labeled foundationalism, radical skepticism and mitigated skepticism, all presuppose metaphysical realism, or the ontological division between mind and world . Then it is argued that each of these three epistemologies is false and that metaphysical realism cannot be made comprehensible apart from one or the other of them. If this is true then it follows that truth cannot be a matter of correspondence between sentences, statements, propositions, (...) judgments, etc. and some absolutely independent reality. This, however, leaves the author with the task in Chapter Two of developing the basics of a new epistemology--one that does not presuppose metaphysical realism, yet which allows for the possibility of a genuine truth and knowledge that are in a particular way dependent on conceptualization. The phrase "genuine truth and knowledge" is crucial because part of the task is to present a view that does not reduce truth and knowledge to mere belief by relativizing them to conceptual schemes. In Chapter Three it is argued that a unique form of metaphysical realism, which I call the objectification of ideas, is present in the philosophies of Descartes, Hume and Kant, simultaneously creating for them a need to account both for the external world and personal identity, and making them impotent to do so. (shrink)

Le réalisme métaphysique est la conception suivant laquelle la plupart des objets qui peuplent le monde existent indépendamment de notre pensée et possèdent une nature indépendante de la manière dont nous pouvons éventuellement la concevoir. A mon sens cette position engage à admettre une forme robuste d'essentialisme. Beaucoup des formes modernes de l'anti-réalisme tirent leurs origines d'une forme de conceptualisme, suivant laquelle toutes les vérités que nous puissions connaître au sujet des essences sont en dernière analyse fondées sur nos concepts, (...) plutôt que dans les choses « en elles-mêmes ». Mon but est de montrer que l'anti-réalisme conceptualiste est une doctrine incohérente, et comment nous pouvons soutenir le réalisme métaphysique et l'essentialisme robuste, tout en reconnaissant clairement le rôle cognitif des concepts en tant qu'intermédiaires dans notre appréhension de la nature de la réalité indépendante de l'esprit. (shrink)

Le réalisme métaphysique est la conception suivant laquelle la plupart des objets qui peuplent le monde existent indépendamment de notre pensée et possèdent une nature indépendante de la manière dont nous pouvons éventuellement la concevoir. A mon sens cette position engage à admettre une forme robuste d'essentialisme. Beaucoup des formes modernes de l'anti-réalisme tirent leurs origines d'une forme de conceptualisme, suivant laquelle toutes les vérités que nous puissions connaître au sujet des essences sont en dernière analyse fondées sur nos concepts, (...) plutôt que dans les choses « en elles-mêmes ». Mon but est de montrer que l'anti-réalisme conceptualiste est une doctrine incohérente, et comment nous pouvons soutenir le réalisme métaphysique et l'essentialisme robuste, tout en reconnaissant clairement le rôle cognitif des concepts en tant qu'intermédiaires dans notre appréhension de la nature de la réalité indépendante de l'esprit. (shrink)

Hilary Putnam's argument against metaphysical realism (commonly referred to as the "model theoretic argument") has now enjoyed two decades of discussion.(1) The text is rich and contains variously construable arguments against variously construed philosophical positions. David Lewis isolated one argument and called it "Putnam's Paradox".(2) That argument is clear and concise; so is the paradoxical conclusion it purports to demonstrate; and so is Lewis' paradox-avoiding solution. His solution involves a position I call "anti-nominalism": not only are classes real, (...) but they are divided into arbitrary and 'natural' classes. The natural classes 'carve nature at the joints', being (as other philosophers might say) the extensions of 'real' properties, universals, or Forms.(3) Thus the argument was turned, in effect, into support for a metaphysical realism stronger than Putnam envisaged. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: I II.

Karol Wojtyła found phenomenology very helpful for the analysis of concrete human experience and for overcoming the ethical formalism ofKant. Phenomenology, he believed, could also enrich classical Thomism by exploring the lived experience of freedom, interiority, and self-governance. But phenomenology, in his opinion, needed to be supplemented by metaphysics in order to ground experiences such as the sense of duty in the real order. He criticized much modern philosophy for abandoning metaphysics and thus neglecting the sapiential dimension. Since his career (...) as a professor was very short, he did not have time to complete his project of a personalist Thomism in which phenomenology and metaphysics would be harmoniously combined. (shrink)

Environmental thinkers often suppose that the natural world (or some parts of it, at least) exists in its own right, independent of human concerns. The arguments developed in this paper suggest that it is possible to do justice to this thought without endorsing some form of metaphysical realism. Thus the early sections look to Merleau-Ponty's Phenomenology of Perception to develop an anti-realist account of the independent reality of the natural world, one, it is argued, that has certain advantages (...) over the accounts proffered by 'environmental realists'. The concluding sections draw upon certain of Merleau-Ponty's later works to defend a rather bolder claim: that the conceptions of realism endorsed by environmental thinkers are not just ill equipped but, in fact, unable to acknowledge what may be provisionally referred to as the more-than-human dimension of reality. (shrink)

Hilary Putnam's famous model-theoretic arguments have the virtue of presenting metaphysical realists with a clear challenge. On pain of embracing either an implausible antifallibilism or the radical indeterminacy of reference, metaphysical realists must appeal to metalinguistic levels of interpretation richer than our own in order to fix meaning. And sense must be made of this appeal. In this paper I begin the task of developing a version of metaphysical realism that takes up this challenge.

Like frege, I claim that any singular term (a name, A definite description, Or an indexical) has a sense, And it refers to what satisfies that sense. Unlike frege, I say that this referent is the real world entity that satisfies the said sense in some belief world, Usually, The utterer's. Reference is a function from senses to transworld heirlines. Thus, My token of 'plato' may have a different sense than your token of 'plato', Yet both may refer to plato. (...) My token of 'the f' may have the same sense as your token of 'the f', Yet they may have different referents. My semantics constitutes, I believe, A new argument for the tenability of metaphysical realism. (shrink)

It is the evening of January 11, 1951. A. J. Ayer retires to a Parisian bar for a post-lecture drink, where he is joined by Georges Batailles, Maurice MerleauPonty, and the physicist Georges Ambrosino. They argue until 3 a.m. The point at issue: Was there a sun before human beings existed? Ayer says "yes," the other three say "no."1Now imagine that a fifth person joins the debate—a Mādhyamika. She argues that because nothing exists independently of conceptual imputation, since, as she (...) puts it, everything is prajñaptisat, neither the sun nor anything else could exist "in itself" or "from its own side"—apart, that is, from the conceptualizing activities of beings like us.Ayer is unimpressed. He stubs out his... (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the implications of semantic externalism (SE) are even more far-reaching than has heretofore been acknowledged. If SE is true, then it is possible that a thinker's mental reality has joints that cannot in principle be discerned by the thinker herself.

While there is an absence of treatises devoted to the question of ens ut primum cognitum, there is no shortage of brief and implicit treatments; indeed, nearly every Thomist of the past seven centuries seems to have at least something to say about the notion that being is the first of our intellectual conceptions. Most recent Thomist thinkers—including Gilson—assume this ens to be nothing other than the ens reale of things entitatively considered, operating as they do out of a framework (...) within which realism and idealism are presumed to be exhaustive and mutually exclusive attempts to answer the question of human knowledge. It is the intent of this essay to examine how Gilson arrives at his position, which he calls “metaphysical realism,” and to point to some of the difficulties it entails. (shrink)

How are we to understand religion? It is undeniable that religion, and religious motivations, have played a very large role in shaping world events. As such, the question of how to understand religion has become increasingly urgent. At one extreme are those who adopt a comprehensive scientific naturalism. They approach religious beliefs and practices in such a way as to reduce them to nonreligious social or psychological factors; for them religion is part of an ideology or an infantile wish projection (...) that must be outgrown. At the other extreme are many of the religious believers themselves, who take their own religion as absolute truth and take themselves to be in a privileged epistemic position to apprehend it. Both extremes are dangerous: the first because it fails to take both religion and the religious drive seriously, and so ignores an integral facet of human life; the second because it is exemplary of the dangers of religion itself, which can take absolutist and Manichean forms. When religion does take such a form, it degenerates into idolatry, for it mistakes what must always remain a finite and conditioned apprehension of the transcendent for the transcendent ground itself. Often coupled with such a mistake comes a failure to recognize the validity of other perspectives, as well as a violent exclusion of everything that is other or unfamiliar. (shrink)

Karol Wojtyła (Pope John Paul II) found phenomenology very helpful for the analysis of concrete human experience and for overcoming the ethical formalism ofKant. Phenomenology, he believed, could also enrich classical Thomism by exploring the lived experience of freedom, interiority, and self-governance. But phenomenology, in his opinion, needed to be supplemented by metaphysics in order to ground experiences such as the sense of duty in the real order. He criticized much modern philosophy for abandoning metaphysics and thus neglecting the sapiential (...) dimension. Since his career as a professor was very short, he did not have time to complete his project of a personalist Thomism in which phenomenology and metaphysics would be harmoniously combined. (shrink)

A significant ontological commitment is required to sustain metaphysical realism—the view that there is a single, objective way the world is—in order to defend it from common sense objections. This involves presupposing the existence of properties (or tropes, or universals) and relations between them which define the objective structure of the world. This paper explores the grounds for accepting this ontological assumption and examines a sceptical argument which questions whether, having assumed the world is objectively divided into fundamental (...) properties, we could ever know which properties these are. It then assesses the responses available to the metaphysical realist, arguing that the sceptical difficulty cannot merely be dismissed by means of another assumption in the manner of radical scepticism, as David Lewis suggests, but that the sceptic's argument might be defused by the non-question-begging success of some form of strong scientific realism which links the predicates of our scientific theories directly to the fundamental properties the world contains. It remains unclear however whether this widely accepted metaphysical theory can find principled philosophical support. (shrink)

The amount of realist positions put forward by philosophers of religion and theologians is impressive. one can certainly doubt whether there is a need for yet another alternative. However, most realist positions employed in studies on religion fall prey to Hilary Putnam’s criticism against metaphysical realism. This gives rise to a dilemma that I aim at solving by introducing yet another realist position, namely non-metaphysical realism.

This essay defends a view which is near enough to Putnam's characterization of metaphysical realism for it to be called by the same name. Indeterminacy of reference is conceded, in the sense that there may be multiple reference relations, but it is denied that this implied belief in unknowable noumena. It is enough for metaphysical realism as conceived here, that there be at least one reference relation. The essay also argues against defining truth epistemically. Even a (...) Peircean ideal theory might be false, in a contextual sense of might' stronger than that of the logically possible. (shrink)

In this essay, I consider whether the alleged demise of metaphysical realism does actually provide a better way for defending the cognitive status of ethical judgments. I argue that the rejection of a realist ontology and epistemology does not help to establish the claim that ethical knowledge is possible. More specifically, I argue that Hilary Putnam's argument does not succeed in making a case for ethical knowledge. In fact, his account of the procedures by which our valuations are (...) warranted—the criteria of idealized inquiry—ultimately begs the question in a number of crucial ways. Moreover, it prejudices the moral and political discussion in certain ideological respects. Finally, though Putnam has apparently modified to some extent his approach to the issue of realism in recent years, I will point out that these modifications are not fundamental and do not help to advance the case for ethical knowledge. I note also that Martha C. Nussbaum's appeal to Putnam’s argument actually works against her attempt to make a case for an Aristotelian conception of human flourishing. Ultimately, I conclude that metaphysical realism is vital for ethical knowledge. (shrink)

Is conceptual relativity a genuine phenomenon? If so, how is it properly understood? And if it does occur, does it undermine metaphysical realism? These are the questions we propose to address. We will argue that conceptual relativity is indeed a genuine phenomenon, albeit an extremely puzzling one. We will offer an account of it. And we will argue that it is entirely compatible with metaphysical realism. Metaphysical realism is the view that there is a (...) world of objects and properties that is independent of our thought and discourse (including our schemes of concepts) about such a world. Hilary Putnam, a former proponent of metaphysical realism, later gave it up largely because of the alleged phenomenon that he himself has given the label ‘conceptual relativity’. One of the key ideas of conceptual relativity is that certain concepts—including such fundamental concepts as object, entity, and existence—have a multiplicity of different and incompatible uses (Putnam 1987, p. 19; 1988, pp. 110 14). According to Putnam, once we recognize the phenomenon of conceptual relativity we must reject metaphysical realism: The suggestion . . . is that what is (by commonsense standards) the same situation can be described in many different ways, depending on how we use the words. The situation does not itself legislate how words like “object,” “entity,” and “exist” must be used. What is wrong with the notion of objects existing “independently” of conceptual schemes is that there are no standards for the use of even the logical notions apart from conceptual choices.” (Putnam 1988, p. 114) Putnam’s intriguing reasoning in this passage is difficult to evaluate directly, because conceptual [1] relativity is philosophically perplexing and in general is not well understood. In this paper we propose a construal of conceptual relativity that clarifies it considerably and explains how it is possible despite its initial air of paradox. We then draw upon this construal to explain why, contrary to Putnam and others, conceptual relativity does not conflict with metaphysical realism, but in fact comports well with it.. (shrink)

In An Autobiography, R.G. Collingwood offers a strikingly compact reductio ad absurdum of John Cook Wilson's metaphysical realism. Cook Wilson formulates the thesis as the inefficacy of epistemic states to determine the properties of objects of knowledge. He explains realism, according to Collingwood, as the view that 'knowing makes no difference to what is known'. Collingwood objects that any such formulation is 'meaningless'. The problem is that by implication the metaphysical realist is supposed to know that (...) Cook Wilson's principle is true, which requires the realist per impossibile to know what something is like even when its properties are unknown. (shrink)

The cognitive problem, which is a main modern theme, arises early in the Greektra- dition. Parmenides, who formulates one ofthe first identifiably "modern" approaches to epistemology, points toward identity as the only acceptable cognitive standard. The paper, which leaves epistemic skepticism for another occasion, reviews versions of metaphysicalrealism identified with Plato in ancient philosophy and Descartes in the modern tradition in suggesting that for different reasons both fail. The paper reviews German idealist versions of epistemic constructivism formulated by Kant, Fichte (...) and Hegel. The criticalphilosophy provides a widely known, complex a priori account of cognitive constructivism.This account is amplified, corrected, and reformulated in different ways by such post-Kantian German idealists as Fichte and Hegel. A key element concerns the restatement ofthe abstract Kantian view ofthe subject as finite human being by Fichte and Hegel.Early in the Greektradition,in equatingthinking and being, Parmenides pointstothree approaches to knowledge as epistemic skepticism, metaphysicalrealism or epistemic constructivism. If epistemic skepticism is unacceptable and, metaphysical realism is implausible,then epistemic constructivism appearsto bethe most promising approach to cognition. (shrink)

This paper presents an argument for metaphysical realism, understood as the claim that the world has structure that would exist even if our cognitive activities never did. The argument is based on the existence of a structured world at a time when it was still possible that we would never evolve. But the interpretation of its premises introduces subtleties: whether, for example, these premises are to be understood as assertions about the world or about our evidence, internally or (...) externally, via assertibility conditions or truth conditions – and what sorts of beings are included in the `we' upon whose cognitions the antirealist supposes the structure of the world to depend. I argue that antirealism can provide no defensible, fully articulated interpretation of the premises that either shows them not to be true or defeats the reasoning. (shrink)

The paper explores the relationship between skepticism on the one hand and the metaphysical realist and the internal realist conceptions of truth on the other. After a brief description of the metaphysical realist and the internal realist positions, it is argued that the former but not the latter is committed to an important sort of skepticism, namely, that we might be wrong about practically everything at the same time. First an abstract argument is presented to this effect, then (...) the issue is further clarified through an analysis of Hilary Putnam's anti‐skeptical argument about brains in a vat. The analysis shows that the argument can be rejected only from the metaphysical realist standpoint. Since the argument is conclusive from the internal realist point of view, internal realism, in contrast with metaphysical realism, is safe from skepticism. (shrink)

This article examines the relationship between totalitarianism and the metaphysical illusions on which it rests. Phenomenological investigation is claimed to loosen the grip of totalitarian ideology by exposing its origins in the “resurrective” illusions that seek to overcome the impact of collective trauma. Phenomenology is thus shown to have emancipatory power.

This work defends a modest version of metaphysical realism. The commitments of the view are spelled out and the strongest argument for it is presented. It is suggested that failure to find this argument persuasive frequently arises from either a failure to distinguish between trivial and nontrivial dependence of minds on minds or a tendency to equivocate between metaphysical and theoretical timelines. The notion of mind-dependence is then explored in more detail. It is argued that, while the (...) metaphysical realist has recourse to a sufficiently rich notion of mind-dependence, the notion of mind-dependence required by a rejection of metaphysical realism is far from clear. This further strengthens the case for metaphysical realism. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: The Existential Component of Realism Realism in its Regulative/Pragmatic Aspect The Role of Presumption The Role of Retrovalidation Retrospect.