Relativism is a family of
philosophical
Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...
views which deny claims to
objectivity within a particular domain and assert that valuations in that domain are relative to the perspective of an observer or the context in which they are assessed. There are many different forms of relativism, with a great deal of variation in scope and differing degrees of controversy among them. ''
Moral relativism
Moral relativism or ethical relativism (often reformulated as relativist ethics or relativist morality) is used to describe several philosophical positions concerned with the differences in moral judgments across different peoples and cultures. ...
'' encompasses the differences in moral judgments among people and cultures.
''
Epistemic relativism'' holds that there are no absolute principles regarding normative
belief
A belief is an attitude that something is the case, or that some proposition is true. In epistemology, philosophers use the term "belief" to refer to attitudes about the world which can be either true or false. To believe something is to take i ...
,
justification, or
rationality
Rationality is the quality of being guided by or based on reasons. In this regard, a person acts rationally if they have a good reason for what they do or a belief is rational if it is based on strong evidence. This quality can apply to an abil ...
, and that there are only relative ones.
''
Alethic relativism'' (also factual relativism) is the doctrine that there are no
absolute truths, i.e., that truth is always relative to some particular frame of reference, such as a language or a culture (
cultural relativism
Cultural relativism is the idea that a person's beliefs and practices should be understood based on that person's own culture. Proponents of cultural relativism also tend to argue that the norms and values of one culture should not be evaluated ...
). Some forms of relativism also bear a resemblance to
philosophical skepticism
Philosophical skepticism ( UK spelling: scepticism; from Greek σκέψις ''skepsis'', "inquiry") is a family of philosophical views that question the possibility of knowledge. It differs from other forms of skepticism in that it even reject ...
. ''Descriptive relativism'' seeks to describe the differences among cultures and people without evaluation, while normative relativism evaluates the morality or truthfulness of views within a given framework.
Forms of relativism
Anthropological versus philosophical relativism
Anthropological relativism
Cultural relativism is the idea that a person's beliefs and practices should be understood based on that person's own culture. Proponents of cultural relativism also tend to argue that the norms and values of one culture should not be evaluated ...
refers to a
methodological
In its most common sense, methodology is the study of research methods. However, the term can also refer to the methods themselves or to the philosophical discussion of associated background assumptions. A method is a structured procedure for bri ...
stance, in which the researcher suspends (or brackets) his or her own cultural prejudice while trying to understand beliefs or behaviors in their contexts. This has become known as
methodological relativism
Cultural relativism is the idea that a person's beliefs and practices should be understood based on that person's own culture. Proponents of cultural relativism also tend to argue that the norms and values of one culture should not be evaluated ...
, and concerns itself specifically with avoiding
ethnocentrism
Ethnocentrism in social science and anthropology—as well as in colloquial English discourse—means to apply one's own culture or ethnicity as a frame of reference to judge other cultures, practices, behaviors, beliefs, and people, instead of ...
or the application of one's own cultural standards to the assessment of other cultures. This is also the basis of the so-called "
emic
In anthropology, folkloristics, and the social and behavioral sciences, emic () and etic () refer to two kinds of field research done and viewpoints obtained.
The "emic" approach is an insider's perspective, which looks at the beliefs, values, ...
" and "
etic" distinction, in which:
* An ''emic'' or ''insider'' account of behavior is a description of a society in terms that are meaningful to the participant or actor's own culture; an emic account is therefore culture-specific, and typically refers to what is considered "
common sense
''Common Sense'' is a 47-page pamphlet written by Thomas Paine in 1775–1776 advocating independence from Great Britain to people in the Thirteen Colonies. Writing in clear and persuasive prose, Paine collected various moral and political argu ...
" within the culture under observation.
* An ''etic'' or outsider account is a description of a society by an observer, in terms that can be applied to other cultures; that is, an etic account is culturally neutral, and typically refers to the conceptual framework of the social scientist. (This is complicated when it is scientific research itself that is under study, or when there is theoretical or terminological disagreement within the social sciences.)
Philosophical relativism, in contrast, asserts that the truth of a proposition depends on the metaphysical, or theoretical frame, or the instrumental method, or the context in which the proposition is expressed, or on the person, groups, or culture who interpret the proposition.
Methodological relativism and philosophical relativism can exist independently from one another, but most anthropologists base their methodological relativism on that of the philosophical variety.
Descriptive versus normative relativism
The concept of relativism also has importance both for
philosophers
A philosopher is a person who practices or investigates philosophy. The term ''philosopher'' comes from the grc, φιλόσοφος, , translit=philosophos, meaning 'lover of wisdom'. The coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek th ...
and for
anthropologists
An anthropologist is a person engaged in the practice of anthropology. Anthropology is the study of aspects of humans within past and present societies. Social anthropology, cultural anthropology and philosophical anthropology study the norms and v ...
in another way. In general, anthropologists engage in descriptive relativism ("how things are" or "how things seem"), whereas philosophers engage in
normative
Normative generally means relating to an evaluative standard. Normativity is the phenomenon in human societies of designating some actions or outcomes as good, desirable, or permissible, and others as bad, undesirable, or impermissible. A norm in ...
relativism ("how things ought to be"), although there is some overlap (for example, descriptive relativism can pertain to concepts, normative relativism to truth).
Descriptive relativism assumes that certain cultural groups have different modes of thought, standards of reasoning, and so forth, and it is the anthropologist's task to describe, but not to evaluate the validity of these principles and practices of a cultural group. It is possible for an anthropologist in his or her fieldwork to be a descriptive relativist about some things that typically concern the philosopher (e.g., ethical principles) but not about others (e.g., logical principles). However, the descriptive relativist's empirical claims about epistemic principles, moral ideals and the like are often countered by anthropological arguments that such things are universal, and much of the recent literature on these matters is explicitly concerned with the extent of, and evidence for, cultural or moral or linguistic or human universals.
The fact that the various species of descriptive relativism are empirical claims may tempt the philosopher to conclude that they are of little philosophical interest, but there are several reasons why this isn't so. First, some philosophers, notably Kant, argue that certain sorts of cognitive differences between human beings (or even all rational beings) are impossible, so such differences could never be found to obtain in fact, an argument that places a priori limits on what empirical inquiry could discover and on what versions of descriptive relativism could be true. Second, claims about actual differences between groups play a central role in some arguments for normative relativism (for example, arguments for normative ethical relativism often begin with claims that different groups in fact have different moral codes or ideals). Finally, the anthropologist's descriptive account of relativism helps to separate the fixed aspects of human nature from those that can vary, and so a descriptive claim that some important aspect of experience or thought does (or does not) vary across groups of human beings tells us something important about human nature and the human condition.
Normative relativism concerns normative or
evaluative claims that modes of thought, standards of reasoning, or the like are only right or wrong relative to a framework. ‘Normative’ is meant in a general sense, applying to a wide range of views; in the case of beliefs, for example, normative correctness equals truth. This does not mean, of course, that framework-relative correctness or truth is always clear, the first challenge being to explain what it amounts to in any given case (e.g., with respect to concepts, truth, epistemic norms). Normative relativism (say, in regard to normative ethical relativism) therefore implies that things (say, ethical claims) are not simply true in themselves, but only have
truth value
In logic and mathematics, a truth value, sometimes called a logical value, is a value indicating the relation of a proposition to truth, which in classical logic has only two possible values (''true'' or '' false'').
Computing
In some progr ...
s relative to broader frameworks (say, moral codes). (Many normative ethical relativist arguments run from premises about ethics to conclusions that assert the relativity of truth values, bypassing general claims about the nature of truth, but it is often more illuminating to consider the type of relativism under question directly.)
Legal relativism
In English
common law
In law, common law (also known as judicial precedent, judge-made law, or case law) is the body of law created by judges and similar quasi-judicial tribunals by virtue of being stated in written opinions."The common law is not a brooding omnipresen ...
, two (perhaps three) separate standards of proof are recognized:
* proof based on the
balance of probabilities
In a legal dispute, one party has the burden of proof to show that they are correct, while the other party had no such burden and is presumed to be correct. The burden of proof requires a party to produce evidence to establish the truth of facts ...
is the lesser standard used in
civil litigation
Civil law is a major branch of the law.Glanville Williams. ''Learning the Law''. Eleventh Edition. Stevens. 1982. p. 2. In common law legal systems such as England and Wales and the law of the United States, United States, the term refers to non ...
, which cases mostly concern money or some other penalty, that, if further and better evidence should emerge, is reasonably reversible.
* proof
beyond reasonable doubt
Beyond a reasonable doubt is a legal standard of proof required to validate a criminal conviction in most adversarial legal systems. It is a higher standard of proof than the balance of probabilities standard commonly used in civil cases, becau ...
is used in
criminal law
Criminal law is the body of law that relates to crime. It prescribes conduct perceived as threatening, harmful, or otherwise endangering to the property, health, safety, and moral welfare of people inclusive of one's self. Most criminal law i ...
cases where an accused right to
personal freedom
Civil liberties are guarantees and freedoms that governments commit not to abridge, either by constitution, legislation, or judicial interpretation, without due process. Though the scope of the term differs between countries, civil liberties may ...
or
survival
Survival, or the act of surviving, is the propensity of something to continue existing, particularly when this is done despite conditions that might kill or destroy it. The concept can be applied to humans and other living things (or, hypotheti ...
is in question, because such
punishment
Punishment, commonly, is the imposition of an undesirable or unpleasant outcome upon a group or individual, meted out by an authority—in contexts ranging from child discipline to criminal law—as a response and deterrent to a particular acti ...
is not reasonably reversible
* Absolute truth is so complex as to be only capable of being fully understood by the
omniscient
Omniscience () is the capacity to know everything. In Hinduism, Sikhism and the Abrahamic religions, this is an attribute of God. In Jainism, omniscience is an attribute that any individual can eventually attain. In Buddhism, there are diffe ...
established during the
Tudor period
The Tudor period occurred between 1485 and 1603 in History of England, England and Wales and includes the Elizabethan period during the reign of Elizabeth I until 1603. The Tudor period coincides with the dynasty of the House of Tudor in Englan ...
as the one true
God
In monotheism, monotheistic thought, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator deity, creator, and principal object of Faith#Religious views, faith.Richard Swinburne, Swinburne, R.G. "God" in Ted Honderich, Honderich, Ted. (ed)''The Ox ...
Related and contrasting positions
Relationism is the theory that there are only relations between individual entities, and no intrinsic
properties. Despite the similarity in name, it is held by some to be a position distinct from relativism—for instance, because "statements about relational properties
..assert an absolute truth about things in the world".
On the other hand, others wish to equate relativism, relationism and even
relativity, which is a precise theory of relationships between physical objects: Nevertheless, "This confluence of relativity theory with relativism became a strong contributing factor in the increasing prominence of relativism".
Whereas previous investigations of science only sought sociological or psychological explanations of failed scientific theories or pathological science, the '
strong programme
The strong programme or strong sociology is a variety of the sociology of scientific knowledge (SSK) particularly associated with David Bloor, Barry Barnes, Harry Collins, Donald A. MacKenzie, and John Henry. The strong programme's influence on ...
' is more relativistic, assessing scientific truth and falsehood equally in a historic and cultural context.
Criticisms
A common argument against relativism suggests that it inherently
refutes itself: the statement "all is relative" classes either as a relative statement or as an absolute one. If it is relative, then this statement does not rule out absolutes. If the statement is
absolute Absolute may refer to:
Companies
* Absolute Entertainment, a video game publisher
* Absolute Radio, (formerly Virgin Radio), independent national radio station in the UK
* Absolute Software Corporation, specializes in security and data risk manage ...
, on the other hand, then it provides an example of an absolute statement, proving that not all truths are relative. However, this argument against relativism only applies to relativism that positions truth as relative–i.e. epistemological/truth-value relativism. More specifically, it is only extreme forms of epistemological relativism that can come in for this criticism as there are many epistemological relativists who posit that some aspects of what is regarded as factually "true" are not universal, yet still accept that other universal truths exist (e.g.
gas laws
The gas laws were developed at the end of the 18th century, when scientists began to realize that relationships between pressure, volume and temperature of a sample of gas could be obtained which would hold to approximation for all gases.
Boyle ...
or moral laws).
Another argument against relativism posits a
Natural Law
Natural law ( la, ius naturale, ''lex naturalis'') is a system of law based on a close observation of human nature, and based on values intrinsic to human nature that can be deduced and applied independently of positive law (the express enacte ...
. Simply put, the physical universe works under basic principles: the "Laws of Nature". Some contend that a natural Moral Law may also exist, for example as argued by,
Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant (, , ; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German philosopher and one of the central Enlightenment thinkers. Born in Königsberg, Kant's comprehensive and systematic works in epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and ...
in ''
Critique of Practical Reason
The ''Critique of Practical Reason'' (german: Kritik der praktischen Vernunft) is the second of Immanuel Kant's three critiques, published in 1788. It follows on from Kant's first critique, the '' Critique of Pure Reason'' and deals with his mo ...
'',
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins (born 26 March 1941) is a British evolutionary biologist and author. He is an emeritus fellow of New College, Oxford and was Professor for Public Understanding of Science in the University of Oxford from 1995 to 2008. An ath ...
in ''
The God Delusion
''The God Delusion'' is a 2006 book by British evolutionary biologist, ethologist Richard Dawkins, a professorial fellow at New College, Oxford and, at the time of publication, the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science ...
'' (2006) and addressed by
C. S. Lewis
Clive Staples Lewis (29 November 1898 – 22 November 1963) was a British writer and Anglican lay theologian. He held academic positions in English literature at both Oxford University (Magdalen College, 1925–1954) and Cambridge Univers ...
in ''
Mere Christianity
''Mere Christianity'' is a Christian apologetical book by the British author C. S. Lewis. It was adapted from a series of BBC radio talks made between 1941 and 1944, originally published as three separate volumes: ''Broadcast Talks'' (1942), ' ...
'' (1952). Dawkins said "I think we face an equal but much more sinister challenge from the right, in the shape of cultural relativism - the view that scientific truth is only one kind of truth and it is not to be especially privileged".
Philosopher
Hilary Putnam
Hilary Whitehall Putnam (; July 31, 1926 – March 13, 2016) was an American philosopher, mathematician, and computer scientist, and a major figure in analytic philosophy in the second half of the 20th century. He made significant contributions ...
, among others, states that some forms of relativism make it impossible to believe one is in error. If there is no truth beyond an individual's
belief
A belief is an attitude that something is the case, or that some proposition is true. In epistemology, philosophers use the term "belief" to refer to attitudes about the world which can be either true or false. To believe something is to take i ...
that something is true, then an individual cannot hold their own beliefs to be false or mistaken. A related criticism is that relativizing truth to individuals destroys the distinction between truth and belief.
Views
Philosophical
Ancient
=Ancient India
=
Ancient Indian philosophers
Mahavira
Mahavira (Sanskrit: महावीर) also known as Vardhaman, was the 24th ''tirthankara'' (supreme preacher) of Jainism. He was the spiritual successor of the 23rd ''tirthankara'' Parshvanatha. Mahavira was born in the early part of the 6t ...
(c. 599 – c. 527 BC) and
Nagarjuna
Nāgārjuna . 150 – c. 250 CE (disputed)was an Indian Mahāyāna Buddhist thinker, scholar-saint and philosopher. He is widely considered one of the most important Buddhist philosophers.Garfield, Jay L. (1995), ''The Fundamental Wisdom of ...
(c. 150 – c. 250 BC) made contributions to the development of relativist philosophy.
=Sophism
=
Sophists
A sophist ( el, σοφιστής, sophistes) was a teacher in ancient Greece in the fifth and fourth centuries BC. Sophists specialized in one or more subject areas, such as philosophy, rhetoric, music, athletics, and mathematics. They taught ' ...
are considered the founding fathers of relativism in
Western philosophy
Western philosophy encompasses the philosophical thought and work of the Western world. Historically, the term refers to the philosophical thinking of Western culture, beginning with the ancient Greek philosophy of the pre-Socratics. The word ' ...
. Elements of relativism emerged among the
Sophist
A sophist ( el, σοφιστής, sophistes) was a teacher in ancient Greece in the fifth and fourth centuries BC. Sophists specialized in one or more subject areas, such as philosophy, rhetoric, music, athletics, and mathematics. They taught ' ...
s in the 5th century
BC. Notably, it was
Protagoras
Protagoras (; el, Πρωταγόρας; )Guthrie, p. 262–263. was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher and rhetorical theorist. He is numbered as one of the sophists by Plato. In his dialogue '' Protagoras'', Plato credits him with inventing the r ...
who coined the phrase, "Man is the measure of all things: of things which are, that they are, and of things which are not, that they are not." The thinking of the Sophists is mainly known through their opponent,
Plato
Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...
. In a paraphrase from Plato's dialogue ''
Theaetetus'', Protagoras said: "What is true for you is true for you, and what is true for me is true for me."
[
]
=Pyrrhonism
=
Pyrrhonist
Pyrrho of Elis (; grc, Πύρρων ὁ Ἠλεῖος, Pyrrhо̄n ho Ēleios; ), born in Elis, Greece, was a Greek philosopher of Classical antiquity, credited as being the first Greek skeptic philosopher and founder of Pyrrhonism.
Life
...
philosophy views relativity as a reason for
philosophical skepticism
Philosophical skepticism ( UK spelling: scepticism; from Greek σκέψις ''skepsis'', "inquiry") is a family of philosophical views that question the possibility of knowledge. It differs from other forms of skepticism in that it even reject ...
, as it is one of the reasons that
truth cannot be grasped. All
perception
Perception () is the organization, identification, and interpretation of sensory information in order to represent and understand the presented information or environment. All perception involves signals that go through the nervous system ...
is relative to a perceiver, and perception differs according to position. Hence, no particular perception can be judged as representing the truth about what is perceived. Arguments from relativity form the basis of
trope
Trope or tropes may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
* Trope (cinema), a cinematic convention for conveying a concept
* Trope (literature), a figure of speech or common literary device
* Trope (music), any of a variety of different things ...
8 of the
ten modes of
Aenesidemus
Aenesidemus ( grc, Αἰνησίδημος or Αἰνεσίδημος) was a Greek Pyrrhonist philosopher, born in Knossos on the island of Crete. He lived in the 1st century BC, taught in Alexandria and flourished shortly after the life of Cic ...
and trope 3 of the
five modes of
Agrippa Agrippa may refer to:
People Antiquity
* Agrippa (mythology), semi-mythological king of Alba Longa
* Agrippa (astronomer), Greek astronomer from the late 1st century
* Agrippa the Skeptic, Skeptic philosopher at the end of the 1st century
* Agri ...
.
Modern
=Bernard Crick
=
Bernard Crick
Sir Bernard Rowland Crick (16 December 1929 – 19 December 2008) was a British political theorist and democratic socialist whose views can be summarised as "politics is ethics done in public". He sought to arrive at a "politics of action", as ...
, a British political scientist and advocate of relativism, suggested in ''In Defence of Politics'' (1962) that moral conflict between people is inevitable. He thought that only
ethics
Ethics or moral philosophy is a branch of philosophy that "involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong behavior".''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' The field of ethics, along with aesthetics, concerns m ...
can resolve such conflict, and when that occurs in public it results in
politics
Politics (from , ) is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status. The branch of social science that studies ...
. Accordingly, Crick saw the process of
dispute resolution,
harms reduction
Harm reduction, or harm minimization, refers to a range of public health policies designed to lessen the negative social and/or physical consequences associated with various human behaviors, both legal and illegal. Harm reduction is used to de ...
,
mediation
Mediation is a structured, interactive process where an impartial third party neutral assists disputing parties in resolving conflict through the use of specialized communication and negotiation techniques. All participants in mediation are ...
or
peacemaking
Peacemaking is practical conflict transformation focused upon establishing equitable power relationships robust enough to forestall future conflict, often including the establishment of means of agreeing on ethical decisions within a community, ...
as central to all of moral philosophy. He became an important influence on
feminists
Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male poi ...
and later on the
Greens.
=Paul Feyerabend
=
Philosopher of science
Paul Feyerabend
Paul Karl Feyerabend (; January 13, 1924 – February 11, 1994) was an Austrian-born philosopher of science best known for his work as a professor of philosophy at the University of California, Berkeley, where he worked for three decades (1958 ...
is often considered to be a relativist, although he denied being one.
Feyerabend argued that modern science suffers from being methodologically monistic (the belief that only a single methodology can produce
scientific progress
Progress is the movement towards a refined, improved, or otherwise desired state. In the context of progressivism, it refers to the proposition that advancements in technology, science, and social organization have resulted, and by extension wi ...
). Feyerabend summarises his case in ''
Against Method
''Against Method: Outline of an Anarchistic Theory of Knowledge'' is a 1975 book by Austrian-born philosopher of science Paul Feyerabend. The author argues that science should become an anarchic enterprise, not a nomic (customary) one; in the cont ...
'' with the phrase "anything goes".
:In an aphorism
eyerabendoften repeated, "potentially every culture is all cultures". This is intended to convey that world views are not hermetically closed, since their leading concepts have an "ambiguity" - better, an open-endedness - which enables people from other cultures to engage with them.
..It follows that relativism, understood as the doctrine that truth is relative to closed systems, can get no purchase.
..For Feyerabend, both hermetic relativism and its absolutist rival
ealismserve, in their different ways, to "devalue human existence". The former encourages that unsavoury brand of political correctness which takes the refusal to criticise "other cultures" to the extreme of condoning murderous dictatorship and barbaric practices. The latter, especially in its favoured contemporary form of "scientific realism", with the excessive prestige it affords to the abstractions of "the monster 'science'", is in bed with a politics which likewise disdains variety, richness and everyday individuality - a politics which likewise "hides" its norms behind allegedly neutral facts, "blunts choices and imposes laws".
=Thomas Kuhn
=
Thomas Kuhn
Thomas Samuel Kuhn (; July 18, 1922 – June 17, 1996) was an American philosopher of science whose 1962 book ''The Structure of Scientific Revolutions'' was influential in both academic and popular circles, introducing the term '' paradigm ...
's philosophy of science, as expressed in ''
The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
''The Structure of Scientific Revolutions'' (1962; second edition 1970; third edition 1996; fourth edition 2012) is a book about the history of science by philosopher Thomas S. Kuhn. Its publication was a landmark event in the history, philosophy ...
'', is often interpreted as relativistic. He claimed that, as well as progressing steadily and incrementally ("
normal science Normal(s) or The Normal(s) may refer to:
Film and television
* ''Normal'' (2003 film), starring Jessica Lange and Tom Wilkinson
* ''Normal'' (2007 film), starring Carrie-Anne Moss, Kevin Zegers, Callum Keith Rennie, and Andrew Airlie
* ''Norma ...
"), science undergoes periodic revolutions or "
paradigm shift
A paradigm shift, a concept brought into the common lexicon by the American physicist and philosopher Thomas Kuhn, is a fundamental change in the basic concepts and experimental practices of a scientific discipline. Even though Kuhn restricted t ...
s", leaving scientists working in different paradigms with difficulty in even communicating. Thus the truth of a claim, or the existence of a posited entity, is relative to the paradigm employed. However, it isn't necessary for him to embrace relativism because every paradigm presupposes the prior, building upon itself through history and so on. This leads to there being a fundamental, incremental, and referential structure of development which is not relative but again, fundamental.
:From these remarks, one thing is however certain: Kuhn is not saying that incommensurable theories cannot be compared - what they can’t be is compared in terms of a system of common measure. He very plainly says that they can be compared, and he reiterates this repeatedly in later work, in a (mostly in vain) effort to avert the crude and sometimes catastrophic misinterpretations he suffered from mainstream philosophers and post-modern relativists alike.
But Kuhn rejected the accusation of being a relativist later in his postscript:
:scientific development is ... a unidirectional and irreversible process. Later scientific theories are better than earlier ones for solving puzzles ... That is not a relativist's position, and it displays the sense in which I am a convinced believer in scientific progress.
Some have argued that one can also read Kuhn's work as essentially positivist in its ontology: the revolutions he posits are epistemological, lurching toward a presumably 'better' understanding of an objective reality through the lens presented by the new paradigm. However, a number of passages in ''Structure'' do indeed appear to be distinctly relativist, and to directly challenge the notion of an objective reality and the ability of science to progress towards an ever-greater grasp of it, particularly through the process of paradigm change.
:In the sciences there need not be progress of another sort. We may, to be more precise, have to relinquish the notion, explicit or implicit, that changes of paradigm carry scientists and those who learn from them closer and closer to the truth.
:We are all deeply accustomed to seeing science as the one enterprise that draws constantly nearer to some goal set by nature in advance. But need there be any such goal? Can we not account for both science’s existence and its success in terms of evolution from the community’s state of knowledge at any given time? Does it really help to imagine that there is some one full, objective, true account of nature and that the proper measure of scientific achievement is the extent to which it brings us closer to that ultimate goal?
=George Lakoff and Mark Johnson
=
George Lakoff
George Philip Lakoff (; born May 24, 1941) is an American cognitive linguistics, cognitive linguist and philosopher, best known for his thesis that people's lives are significantly influenced by the conceptual metaphors they use to explain comple ...
and
Mark Johnson define relativism in ''
Metaphors We Live By
''Metaphors We Live By'' is a book by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson published in 1980. The book suggests metaphor is a tool that enables people to use what they know about their direct physical and social experiences to understand more abstract ...
'' as the rejection of both
subjectivism
Subjectivism is the doctrine that "our own mental activity is the only unquestionable fact of our experience", instead of shared or communal, and that there is no external or objective truth.
The success of this position is historically attribute ...
and
metaphysical objectivism
Philosophical realism is usually not treated as a position of its own but as a stance towards other subject matters. Realism about a certain kind of thing (like Mathematical realism, numbers or Moral realism, morality) is the thesis that this kin ...
in order to focus on the relationship between them, i.e. the
metaphor
A metaphor is a figure of speech that, for rhetorical effect, directly refers to one thing by mentioning another. It may provide (or obscure) clarity or identify hidden similarities between two different ideas. Metaphors are often compared wit ...
by which we relate our current experience to our previous experience. In particular, Lakoff and Johnson characterize "objectivism" as a "
straw man
A straw man (sometimes written as strawman) is a form of argument and an informal fallacy of having the impression of refuting an argument, whereas the real subject of the argument was not addressed or refuted, but instead replaced with a false ...
", and, to a lesser degree, criticize the views of
Karl Popper
Sir Karl Raimund Popper (28 July 1902 – 17 September 1994) was an Austrian-British philosopher, academic and social commentator. One of the 20th century's most influential philosophers of science, Popper is known for his rejection of the cl ...
,
Kant
Immanuel Kant (, , ; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German Philosophy, philosopher and one of the central Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment thinkers. Born in Königsberg, Kant's comprehensive and systematic works in epistemolo ...
and
Aristotle
Aristotle (; grc-gre, Ἀριστοτέλης ''Aristotélēs'', ; 384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Peripatetic school of phil ...
.
= Robert Nozick
=
In his book ''
Invariances
''Invariances'' is a 2001 book by American philosopher Robert Nozick, his last book before his death in 2002.
Introduction
In the introduction, Nozick assumes "orthodox quantum mechanics" and draws inferences from it about indeterminism and nonl ...
'',
Robert Nozick
Robert Nozick (; November 16, 1938 – January 23, 2002) was an American philosopher. He held the Joseph Pellegrino University Professorship at Harvard University, expresses a complex set of theories about the absolute and the relative. He thinks the absolute/relative distinction should be recast in terms of an invariant/variant distinction, where there are many things a proposition can be invariant with regard to or vary with. He thinks it is coherent for truth to be relative, and speculates that it might vary with time. He thinks necessity is an unobtainable notion, but can be approximated by robust invariance across a variety of conditions—although we can never identify a proposition that is invariant with regard to everything. Finally, he is not particularly warm to one of the most famous forms of relativism,
moral relativism
Moral relativism or ethical relativism (often reformulated as relativist ethics or relativist morality) is used to describe several philosophical positions concerned with the differences in moral judgments across different peoples and cultures. ...
, preferring an evolutionary account.
=Joseph Margolis
=
Joseph Margolis
Joseph Zalman Margolis (May 16, 1924 – June 8, 2021) was an American philosopher. A radical historicist, he authored many books critical of the central assumptions of Western philosophy, and elaborated a robust form of relativism.
His philosop ...
advocates a view he calls "robust relativism" and defends it in his books ''Historied Thought, Constructed World'', Chapter 4 (California, 1995) and ''The Truth about Relativism'' (Blackwell, 1991). He opens his account by stating that our logics should depend on what we take to be the nature of the sphere to which we wish to apply our logics. Holding that there can be no distinctions which are not "privileged" between the
alethic, the
ontic
In ontology, ontic (from the Greek , genitive : "of that which is") is physical, real, or factual existence.
In more nuance, it means that which concerns particular, individuated beings rather than their modes of being; the present, actual thing i ...
, and the
epistemic
Epistemology (; ), or the theory of knowledge, is the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. Epistemology is considered a major subfield of philosophy, along with other major subfields such as ethics, logic, and metaphysics.
Episte ...
, he maintains that a
many-valued logic
Many-valued logic (also multi- or multiple-valued logic) refers to a propositional calculus in which there are more than two truth values. Traditionally, in Aristotle's logical calculus, there were only two possible values (i.e., "true" and "false" ...
just might be the most apt for
aesthetics
Aesthetics, or esthetics, is a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of beauty and taste, as well as the philosophy of art (its own area of philosophy that comes out of aesthetics). It examines aesthetic values, often expressed thr ...
or
history
History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the History of writing#Inventions of writing, invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbr ...
since, because in these practices, we are loath to hold to simple
binary logic; and he also holds that many-valued logic is relativistic. (This is perhaps an unusual definition of "relativistic". Compare with his comments on "relationism".) To say that "True" and "False" are mutually exclusive and exhaustive judgements on ''
Hamlet
''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts ...
'', for instance, really does seem absurd. A many-valued logicwith her values "apt", "reasonable", "likely", and so onseems intuitively more applicable to interpreting ''Hamlet''. Where apparent contradictions arise between such interpretations, we might call the interpretations "incongruent", rather than dubbing either of them "false", because using many-valued logic implies that a measured value is a mixture of two extreme possibilities. Using the subset of many-valued logic,
fuzzy logic
Fuzzy logic is a form of many-valued logic in which the truth value of variables may be any real number between 0 and 1. It is employed to handle the concept of partial truth, where the truth value may range between completely true and completely ...
, it can be said that various interpretations can be represented by membership in more than one possible truth set simultaneously. Fuzzy logic is therefore probably the best mathematical structure for understanding "robust relativism" and has been interpreted by
Bart Kosko
Bart Andrew Kosko (born February 7, 1960) is a writer and professor of electrical engineering and law at the University of Southern California (USC). He is a researcher and popularizer of fuzzy logic, neural networks, and noise, and author of s ...
as philosophically being related to Zen Buddhism.
It was
Aristotle
Aristotle (; grc-gre, Ἀριστοτέλης ''Aristotélēs'', ; 384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Peripatetic school of phil ...
who held that relativism implies that we should, sticking with appearances only, end up contradicting ourselves somewhere if we could apply all attributes to all ''ousiai'' (
being
In metaphysics, ontology is the philosophical study of being, as well as related concepts such as existence, becoming, and reality.
Ontology addresses questions like how entities are grouped into categories and which of these entities exis ...
s). Aristotle, however, made non-contradiction dependent upon his
essentialism
Essentialism is the view that objects have a set of attributes that are necessary to their identity. In early Western thought, Plato's idealism held that all things have such an "essence"—an "idea" or "form". In ''Categories'', Aristotle sim ...
. If his essentialism is false, then so too is his ground for disallowing relativism. (Subsequent philosophers have found other reasons for supporting the principle of non-contradiction.)
Beginning with
Protagoras
Protagoras (; el, Πρωταγόρας; )Guthrie, p. 262–263. was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher and rhetorical theorist. He is numbered as one of the sophists by Plato. In his dialogue '' Protagoras'', Plato credits him with inventing the r ...
and invoking
Charles Sanders Peirce
Charles Sanders Peirce ( ; September 10, 1839 – April 19, 1914) was an American philosopher, logician, mathematician and scientist who is sometimes known as "the father of pragmatism".
Educated as a chemist and employed as a scientist for t ...
, Margolis shows that the historic struggle to discredit relativism is an attempt to impose an unexamined belief in the world's essentially rigid rule-like nature. Plato and Aristotle merely attacked "relationalism"the doctrine of true for l or true for k, and the like, where l and k are different speakers or different worldsor something similar (most philosophers would call this position "relativism"). For Margolis, "true" means true; that is, the alethic use of "true" remains untouched. However, in real world contexts, and context is ubiquitous in the real world, we must apply truth values. Here, in epistemic terms, we might ''tout court'' retire "true" as an evaluation and keep "false". The rest of our value-judgements could be graded from "extremely plausible" down to "false". Judgements which on a bivalent logic would be incompatible or contradictory are further seen as "incongruent", although one may well have more weight than the other. In short, relativistic logic is not, or need not be, the bugbear it is often presented to be. It may simply be the best type of logic to apply to certain very uncertain spheres of real experiences in the world (although some sort of logic needs to be applied in order to make that judgement). Those who swear by
bivalent logic
In logic, the semantic principle (or law) of bivalence states that every declarative sentence expressing a proposition (of a theory under inspection) has exactly one truth value, either true or false. A logic satisfying this principle is calle ...
might simply be the ultimate keepers of the great fear of the flux.
=Richard Rorty
=
Philosopher
Richard Rorty
Richard McKay Rorty (October 4, 1931 – June 8, 2007) was an American philosopher. Educated at the University of Chicago and Yale University, he had strong interests and training in both the history of philosophy and in contemporary analytic phi ...
has a somewhat
paradox
A paradox is a logically self-contradictory statement or a statement that runs contrary to one's expectation. It is a statement that, despite apparently valid reasoning from true premises, leads to a seemingly self-contradictory or a logically u ...
ical role in the debate over relativism: he is criticized for his relativistic views by many commentators, but has always denied that relativism applies to much anybody, being nothing more than a Platonic scarecrow. Rorty claims, rather, that he is a
pragmatist, and that to construe pragmatism as relativism is to
beg the question
In classical rhetoric and logic, begging the question or assuming the conclusion (Latin: ') is an informal fallacy that occurs when an argument's premises assume the truth of the conclusion, instead of supporting it.
For example:
* "Green is t ...
.
:'"Relativism" is the traditional epithet applied to pragmatism by realists'
:'"Relativism" is the view that every belief on a certain topic, or perhaps about any topic, is as good as every other. No one holds this view. Except for the occasional cooperative freshman, one cannot find anybody who says that two incompatible opinions on an important topic are equally good. The philosophers who get called 'relativists' are those who say that the grounds for choosing between such opinions are less algorithmic than had been thought.'
:'In short, my strategy for escaping the self-referential difficulties into which "the Relativist" keeps getting himself is to move everything over from epistemology and metaphysics into cultural politics, from claims to knowledge and appeals to self-evidence to suggestions about what we should try.'
Rorty takes a
deflationary
In economics, deflation is a decrease in the general price level of goods and services. Deflation occurs when the inflation rate falls below 0% (a negative inflation rate). Inflation reduces the value of currency over time, but sudden deflation ...
attitude to
truth
Truth is the property of being in accord with fact or reality.Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionarytruth 2005 In everyday language, truth is typically ascribed to things that aim to represent reality or otherwise correspond to it, such as beliefs ...
, believing there is nothing of interest to be said about truth in general, including the contention that it is generally subjective. He also argues that the notion of
warrant or justification can do most of the work traditionally assigned to the concept of truth, and that justification ''is'' relative; justification is justification to an audience, for Rorty.
In ''
Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity
''Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity'' is a 1989 book by the American philosopher Richard Rorty, based on two sets of lectures he gave at University College, London, and at Trinity College, Cambridge. In contrast to his earlier work, ''Philosoph ...
'' he argues that the debate between so-called relativists and so-called objectivists is beside the point because they don't have enough premises in common for either side to prove anything to the other.
= Nalin de Silva
=
In his book ''Mage Lokaya'' (My World), 1986,
Nalin de Silva
Thakurartha Devadithya Guardiyawasam Lindamulage Nalin Kumara de Silva ( Sinhala: නලින් ද සිල්වා; born 20 October 1944) is a Sri Lankan philosopher and a political analyst. He is the current Sri Lankan ambassador in Mya ...
criticized the basis of the established western system of knowledge, and its propagation, which he refers as "domination throughout the world".He explained in this book that mind independent reality is impossible and knowledge is not found but constructed. Further he has introduced and developed the concept of "Constructive Relativism" as the basis on which knowledge is constructed relative to the sense organs, culture and the mind completely based on
Avidya.
Postmodernism
The term "relativism" often comes up in debates over
postmodernism
Postmodernism is an intellectual stance or Rhetorical modes, mode of discourseNuyen, A.T., 1992. The Role of Rhetorical Devices in Postmodernist Discourse. Philosophy & Rhetoric, pp.183–194. characterized by philosophical skepticism, skepticis ...
,
poststructuralism
Post-structuralism is a term for philosophical and literary forms of theory that both build upon and reject ideas established by structuralism, the intellectual project that preceded it. Though post-structuralists all present different critiques ...
and
phenomenology
Phenomenology may refer to:
Art
* Phenomenology (architecture), based on the experience of building materials and their sensory properties
Philosophy
* Phenomenology (philosophy), a branch of philosophy which studies subjective experiences and a ...
. Critics of these perspectives often identify advocates with the label "relativism". For example, the
Sapir–Whorf hypothesis
The hypothesis of linguistic relativity, also known as the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis , the Whorf hypothesis, or Whorfianism, is a principle suggesting that the structure of a language affects its speakers' worldview or cognition, and thus people' ...
is often considered a relativist view because it posits that linguistic categories and structures shape the way people view the world.
Stanley Fish
Stanley Eugene Fish (born April 19, 1938) is an American literary theorist, legal scholar, author and public intellectual. He is currently the Floersheimer Distinguished Visiting Professor of Law at Yeshiva University's Benjamin N. Cardozo Scho ...
has defended postmodernism and relativism.
These perspectives do not strictly count as relativist in the philosophical sense, because they express agnosticism on the nature of reality and make
epistemological
Epistemology (; ), or the theory of knowledge, is the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. Epistemology is considered a major subfield of philosophy, along with other major subfields such as ethics, logic, and metaphysics.
Episte ...
rather than
ontological
In metaphysics, ontology is the philosophical study of being, as well as related concepts such as existence, becoming, and reality.
Ontology addresses questions like how entities are grouped into categories and which of these entities exis ...
claims. Nevertheless, the term is useful to differentiate them from
realists who believe that the purpose of philosophy, science, or literary critique is to locate externally true meanings. Important philosophers and theorists such as
Michel Foucault
Paul-Michel Foucault (, ; ; 15 October 192625 June 1984) was a French philosopher, historian of ideas, writer, political activist, and literary critic. Foucault's theories primarily address the relationship between power and knowledge, and how ...
,
Max Stirner
Johann Kaspar Schmidt (25 October 1806 – 26 June 1856), known professionally as Max Stirner, was a German post-Hegelian philosopher, dealing mainly with the Hegelian notion of social alienation and self-consciousness. Stirner is often seen a ...
, political movements such as
post-anarchism
Contemporary anarchism within the history of anarchism is the period of the anarchist movement continuing from the end of World War II and into the present. Since the last third of the 20th century, anarchists have been involved in anti-globalisat ...
or
post-Marxism
Post-Marxism is a trend in political philosophy and social theory which deconstructs Karl Marx's writings and Marxism itself, bypassing orthodox Marxism. The term "post-Marxism" first appeared in Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe's theoretica ...
can also be considered as relativist in this sense - though a better term might be
social constructivist
Social constructivism is a sociological theory of knowledge according to which human development is socially situated and knowledge is constructed through interaction with others.
Like social constructionism, social constructivism states th ...
.
The spread and popularity of this kind of "soft" relativism varies between academic disciplines. It has wide support in
anthropology
Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including past human species. Social anthropology studies patterns of behavi ...
and has a majority following in cultural studies. It also has advocates in political theory and political science, sociology, and
continental philosophy
Continental philosophy is a term used to describe some philosophers and philosophical traditions that do not fall under the umbrella of analytic philosophy. However, there is no academic consensus on the definition of continental philosophy. Pri ...
(as distinct from Anglo-American analytical philosophy). It has inspired empirical studies of the social construction of meaning such as those associated with labelling theory, which defenders can point to as evidence of the validity of their theories (albeit risking accusations of
performative contradiction A performative contradiction (german: performativer Widerspruch) arises when the propositional content of a statement contradicts the presuppositions of asserting it. An example of a performative contradiction is the statement "I am dead" because th ...
in the process). Advocates of this kind of relativism often also claim that recent developments in the natural sciences, such as Heisenberg's
uncertainty principle
In quantum mechanics, the uncertainty principle (also known as Heisenberg's uncertainty principle) is any of a variety of mathematical inequalities asserting a fundamental limit to the accuracy with which the values for certain pairs of physic ...
,
quantum mechanics
Quantum mechanics is a fundamental theory in physics that provides a description of the physical properties of nature at the scale of atoms and subatomic particles. It is the foundation of all quantum physics including quantum chemistry, ...
,
chaos theory
Chaos theory is an interdisciplinary area of scientific study and branch of mathematics focused on underlying patterns and deterministic laws of dynamical systems that are highly sensitive to initial conditions, and were once thought to have co ...
and
complexity theory show that science is now becoming relativistic. However, many scientists who use these methods continue to identify as realist or
post-positivist
Postpositivism or postempiricism is a metatheoretical stance that critiques and amends positivism and has impacted theories and practices across philosophy, social sciences, and various models of scientific inquiry. While positivists emphas ...
, and some sharply criticize the association.
Religious
Jainism
Mahavira
Mahavira (Sanskrit: महावीर) also known as Vardhaman, was the 24th ''tirthankara'' (supreme preacher) of Jainism. He was the spiritual successor of the 23rd ''tirthankara'' Parshvanatha. Mahavira was born in the early part of the 6t ...
(599-527 BC), the 24th
Tirthankara
In Jainism, a ''Tirthankara'' (Sanskrit: '; English: literally a 'ford-maker') is a saviour and spiritual teacher of the ''dharma'' (righteous path). The word ''tirthankara'' signifies the founder of a '' tirtha'', which is a fordable passag ...
of
Jainism
Jainism ( ), also known as Jain Dharma, is an Indian religions, Indian religion. Jainism traces its spiritual ideas and history through the succession of twenty-four tirthankaras (supreme preachers of ''Dharma''), with the first in the current ...
, developed a philosophy known as
Anekantavada
( hi, अनेकान्तवाद, "many-sidedness") is the Jain doctrine about metaphysical truths that emerged in ancient India. It states that the ultimate truth and reality is complex and has multiple aspects.
According to Jainism, ...
. John Koller describes ''anekāntavāda'' as "epistemological respect for view of others" about the nature of existence, whether it is "inherently enduring or constantly changing", but "not relativism; it does not mean conceding that all arguments and all views are equal".
Hinduism
Hindu religion
Hinduism () is an Indian religion or ''dharma'', a religious and universal order or way of life by which followers abide. As a religion, it is the world's third-largest, with over 1.2–1.35 billion followers, or 15–16% of the global pop ...
has no theological difficulties in accepting degrees of truth in other religions. A
Rig Vedic
The ''Rigveda'' or ''Rig Veda'' ( ', from ' "praise" and ' "knowledge") is an ancient Indian collection of Vedic Sanskrit hymns (''sūktas''). It is one of the four sacred canonical Hindu texts (''śruti'') known as the Vedas. Only one S ...
hymn states that "Truth is One, though the sages tell it variously." (Ékam sat vipra bahudā vadanti)
Buddhism
Madhyamaka Buddhism, which forms the basis for many
Mahayana
''Mahāyāna'' (; "Great Vehicle") is a term for a broad group of Buddhist traditions, texts, philosophies, and practices. Mahāyāna Buddhism developed in India (c. 1st century BCE onwards) and is considered one of the three main existing bra ...
Buddhist schools and which was founded by
Nāgārjuna
Nāgārjuna . 150 – c. 250 CE (disputed)was an Indian Mahāyāna Buddhist thinker, scholar-saint and philosopher. He is widely considered one of the most important Buddhist philosophers.Garfield, Jay L. (1995), ''The Fundamental Wisdom of ...
. Nāgārjuna taught the idea of relativity. In the Ratnāvalī, he gives the example that shortness exists only in relation to the idea of length. The determination of a thing or object is only possible in relation to other things or objects, especially by way of contrast. He held that the relationship between the ideas of "short" and "long" is not due to intrinsic nature (
svabhāva). This idea is also found in the Pali Nikāyas and Chinese Āgamas, in which the idea of relativity is expressed similarly: "That which is the element of light ... is seen to exist on account of
n relation todarkness; that which is the element of good is seen to exist on account of bad; that which is the element of space is seen to exist on account of form."
Madhyamaka Buddhism discerns two levels of truth: relative and ultimate. The
two truths doctrine
The Buddhist doctrine of the two truths (Sanskrit: ''dvasatya,'' ) differentiates between two levels of ''satya'' (Sanskrit; Pali: ''sacca''; word meaning "truth" or "reality") in the teaching of the Śākyamuni Buddha: the "conventional" or "pr ...
states that there are ''Relative'' or conventional, common-sense truth, which describes our daily experience of a concrete world, and ''Ultimate'' truth, which describes the ultimate reality as ''
sunyata'', empty of concrete and inherent characteristics. Conventional truth may be understood, in contrast, as "obscurative truth" or "that which obscures the true nature". It is constituted by the appearances of mistaken awareness. Conventional truth would be the appearance that includes a duality of apprehender and apprehended, and objects perceived within that. Ultimate truth is the phenomenal world free from the duality of apprehender and apprehended.
[Levinson, Jules (August 2006) ]
Lotsawa Times Volume II
'
Sikhism
In
Sikhism
Sikhism (), also known as Sikhi ( pa, ਸਿੱਖੀ ', , from pa, ਸਿੱਖ, lit=disciple', 'seeker', or 'learner, translit=Sikh, label=none),''Sikhism'' (commonly known as ''Sikhī'') originated from the word ''Sikh'', which comes fro ...
the
Gurus
Guru ( sa, गुरु, IAST: ''guru;'' Pali'': garu'') is a Sanskrit term for a "mentor, guide, expert, or master" of certain knowledge or field. In pan- Indian traditions, a guru is more than a teacher: traditionally, the guru is a reverenti ...
(spiritual teachers) have propagated the message of "many paths" leading to the
one God
Monotheism is the belief that there is only one deity, an all-supreme being that is universally referred to as God. Cross, F.L.; Livingstone, E.A., eds. (1974). "Monotheism". The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (2 ed.). Oxford: Oxford ...
and ultimate
salvation
Salvation (from Latin: ''salvatio'', from ''salva'', 'safe, saved') is the state of being saved or protected from harm or a dire situation. In religion and theology, ''salvation'' generally refers to the deliverance of the soul from sin and its c ...
for all souls who tread on the path of
righteousness
Righteousness is the quality or state of being morally correct and justifiable. It can be considered synonymous with "rightness" or being "upright". It can be found in Indian religions and Abrahamic traditions, among other religions, as a theologi ...
. They have supported the view that proponents of all faiths can, by doing good and virtuous deeds and by remembering the
Lord
Lord is an appellation for a person or deity who has authority, control, or power over others, acting as a master, chief, or ruler. The appellation can also denote certain persons who hold a title of the peerage in the United Kingdom, or ar ...
, certainly achieve salvation. The students of the Sikh faith are told to accept all leading faiths as possible vehicles for attaining spiritual enlightenment provided the faithful study, ponder and practice the teachings of their prophets and leaders. The holy book of the
Sikh
Sikhs ( or ; pa, ਸਿੱਖ, ' ) are people who adhere to Sikhism, Sikhism (Sikhi), a Monotheism, monotheistic religion that originated in the late 15th century in the Punjab region of the Indian subcontinent, based on the revelation of Gu ...
s called the
Sri Guru Granth Sahib
The Guru Granth Sahib ( pa, ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਾਹਿਬ, ) is the central holy religious scripture of Sikhism, regarded by Sikhs as the final, sovereign and eternal Guru following the lineage of the ten human gurus of the rel ...
says: "Do not say that the Vedas, the Bible and the Koran are false. Those who do not contemplate them are false."
Guru Granth Sahib
The Guru Granth Sahib ( pa, ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਾਹਿਬ, ) is the central holy religious scripture of Sikhism, regarded by Sikhs as the final, sovereign and Guru Maneyo Granth, eternal Guru following the lineage of the Sikh gur ...
page 1350; later stating: "The seconds, minutes, and hours, days, weeks and months, and the various seasons originate from the one Sun; O nanak, in just the same way, the many forms originate from the Creator."
Guru Granth Sahib
The Guru Granth Sahib ( pa, ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਾਹਿਬ, ) is the central holy religious scripture of Sikhism, regarded by Sikhs as the final, sovereign and Guru Maneyo Granth, eternal Guru following the lineage of the Sikh gur ...
page 12,13.
Catholicism
The
Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
, especially under
John Paul II
Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his ...
and
Pope Benedict XVI
Pope Benedict XVI ( la, Benedictus XVI; it, Benedetto XVI; german: link=no, Benedikt XVI.; born Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger, , on 16 April 1927) is a retired prelate of the Catholic church who served as the head of the Church and the sovereign ...
, has identified relativism as one of the most significant problems for faith and morals today.
According to the Church and to some theologians, relativism, as a denial of absolute truth, leads to moral license and a denial of the possibility of
sin
In a religious context, sin is a transgression against divine law. Each culture has its own interpretation of what it means to commit a sin. While sins are generally considered actions, any thought, word, or act considered immoral, selfish, s ...
and of
God
In monotheism, monotheistic thought, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator deity, creator, and principal object of Faith#Religious views, faith.Richard Swinburne, Swinburne, R.G. "God" in Ted Honderich, Honderich, Ted. (ed)''The Ox ...
. Whether moral or epistemological, relativism constitutes a denial of the capacity of the human mind and reason to arrive at truth. Truth, according to Catholic theologians and philosophers (following Aristotle) consists of ''adequatio rei et intellectus'', the
correspondence of the mind and reality. Another way of putting it states that the
mind
The mind is the set of faculties responsible for all mental phenomena. Often the term is also identified with the phenomena themselves. These faculties include thought, imagination, memory, will, and sensation. They are responsible for various m ...
has the same form as reality. This means when the form of the computer in front of someone (the type, color, shape, capacity, etc.) is also the form that is in their mind, then what they know is true because their mind corresponds to objective reality.
The denial of an absolute reference, of an ''axis mundi,'' denies God, who equates to Absolute Truth, according to these Christian theologians. They link relativism to
secularism
Secularism is the principle of seeking to conduct human affairs based on Secularity, secular, Naturalism (philosophy), naturalistic considerations.
Secularism is most commonly defined as the Separation of church and state, separation of relig ...
, an obstruction of religion in
human life.
=Leo XIII
=
Pope Leo XIII
Pope Leo XIII ( it, Leone XIII; born Vincenzo Gioacchino Raffaele Luigi Pecci; 2 March 1810 – 20 July 1903) was the head of the Catholic Church from 20 February 1878 to his death in July 1903. Living until the age of 93, he was the second-old ...
(1810–1903) was the first known Pope to use the word relativism in the encyclical ''
Humanum genus
''Humanum genus'' is a papal encyclical promulgated on 20 April 1884 by Pope Leo XIII.
Released in the ascent of the industrial age, Marxism, and the aftermath of the September 20, 1870, Capture of Rome by the Kingdom of Italy military forces ...
'' (1884). Leo XIII condemned
Freemasonry
Freemasonry or Masonry refers to fraternal organisations that trace their origins to the local guilds of stonemasons that, from the end of the 13th century, regulated the qualifications of stonemasons and their interaction with authorities ...
and claimed that its philosophical and political system was largely based on relativism.
=John Paul II
=
John Paul II
Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his ...
in ''
Veritatis Splendor
''Veritatis splendor'' (Latin: ''The Splendor of the Truth'') is an encyclical by Pope John Paul II. It expresses the position of the Catholic Church regarding fundamentals of the Church's role in moral teaching. The encyclical is one of the mos ...
''
:As is immediately evident, the crisis of truth is not unconnected with this development. Once the idea of a universal truth about the good, knowable by human reason, is lost, inevitably the notion of conscience also changes. Conscience is no longer considered in its primordial reality as an act of a person's intelligence, the function of which is to apply the universal knowledge of the good in a specific situation and thus to express a judgment about the right conduct to be chosen here and now. Instead, there is a tendency to grant to the individual conscience the prerogative of independently determining the criteria of good and evil and then acting accordingly. Such an outlook is quite congenial to an individualist ethic, wherein each individual is faced with his own truth, different from the truth of others. Taken to its extreme consequences, this individualism leads to a denial of the very idea of human nature.
In ''
Evangelium Vitae
''Evangelium vitae'' () translated in English to "The Gospel of Life", is a papal encyclical promulgated on 25 March 1995 by Pope John Paul II. It deals with issues pertaining to the sanctity of human life, including murder, abortion, euthanas ...
'' (The Gospel of Life), he says:
:Freedom negates and destroys itself, and becomes a factor leading to the destruction of others, when it no longer recognizes and respects its essential link with the truth. When freedom, out of a desire to emancipate itself from all forms of tradition and authority, shuts out even the most obvious evidence of an objective and universal truth, which is the foundation of personal and social life, then the person ends up by no longer taking as the sole and indisputable point of reference for his own choices the truth about good and evil, but only his subjective and changeable opinion or, indeed, his selfish interest and whim.
=Benedict XVI
=
In April 2005, in his homily during Mass prior to the conclave which would elect him as
Pope
The pope ( la, papa, from el, πάππας, translit=pappas, 'father'), also known as supreme pontiff ( or ), Roman pontiff () or sovereign pontiff, is the bishop of Rome (or historically the patriarch of Rome), head of the worldwide Cathol ...
, then
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger
Pope Benedict XVI ( la, Benedictus XVI; it, Benedetto XVI; german: link=no, Benedikt XVI.; born Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger, , on 16 April 1927) is a retired prelate of the Catholic church who served as the head of the Church and the sovereign ...
talked about the world "moving towards a dictatorship of relativism":
:How many winds of doctrine we have known in recent decades, how many ideological currents, how many ways of thinking. The small boat of thought of many Christians has often been tossed about by these waves – thrown from one extreme to the other: from Marxism to liberalism, even to libertinism; from collectivism to radical individualism; from atheism to a vague religious mysticism; from agnosticism to syncretism, and so forth. Every day new sects are created and what
Saint Paul
Paul; grc, Παῦλος, translit=Paulos; cop, ⲡⲁⲩⲗⲟⲥ; hbo, פאולוס השליח (previously called Saul of Tarsus;; ar, بولس الطرسوسي; grc, Σαῦλος Ταρσεύς, Saũlos Tarseús; tr, Tarsuslu Pavlus; ...
says about human trickery comes true, with cunning which tries to draw those into error (cf
Ephesians
The Epistle to the Ephesians is the tenth book of the New Testament. Its authorship has traditionally been attributed to Paul the Apostle but starting in 1792, this has been challenged as Deutero-Pauline, that is, pseudepigrapha written in Pau ...
4, 14). Having a clear Faith, based on the Creed of the Church, is often labeled today as a fundamentalism. Whereas, relativism, which is letting oneself be tossed and "swept along by every wind of teaching", looks like the only attitude acceptable to today's standards. We are moving towards a dictatorship of relativism which does not recognize anything as certain and which has as its highest goal one's own ego and one's own desires. However, we have a different goal: the Son of God, true man. He is the measure of true humanism. Being an "Adult" means having a faith which does not follow the waves of today's fashions or the latest novelties. A faith which is deeply rooted in friendship with
Christ
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other Names and titles of Jesus in the New Testament, names and titles), was ...
is adult and mature. It is this friendship which opens us up to all that is good and gives us the knowledge to judge true from false, and deceit from truth.
On June 6, 2005, Pope Benedict XVI told educators:
:Today, a particularly insidious obstacle to the task of education is the massive presence in our society and culture of that relativism which, recognizing nothing as definitive, leaves as the ultimate criterion only the self with its desires. And under the semblance of freedom it becomes a prison for each one, for it separates people from one another, locking each person into his or her own 'ego'.
Then during the
World Youth Day
World Youth Day (WYD) is an event for young people organized by the Catholic Church that was initiated by Pope John Paul II in 1985, sometimes nicknamed in later years as the "Catholic Woodstock". Its concept has been influenced by the Light-Li ...
in August 2005, he also traced to relativism the problems produced by the communist and sexual revolutions, and provided a counter-counter argument.
:In the last century we experienced revolutions with a common programme–expecting nothing more from God, they assumed total responsibility for the cause of the world in order to change it. And this, as we saw, meant that a human and partial point of view was always taken as an absolute guiding principle. Absolutizing what is not absolute but relative is called totalitarianism. It does not liberate man, but takes away his dignity and enslaves him. It is not ideologies that save the world, but only a return to the living God, our Creator, the Guarantor of our freedom, the Guarantor of what is really good and true.
See also
References
Bibliography
*
Maria Baghramian
Maria Baghramian (born 21 March 1954) is an Irish philosopher who is the Professor of American Philosophy in the School of Philosophy, University College Dublin (UCD). She was elected a member of the Royal Irish Academy (RIA) in 2010 and a mem ...
, ''Relativism,'' London: Routledge, 2004,
* Gad Barzilai, ''Communities and Law: Politics and Cultures of Legal Identities,'' Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2003,
* Andrew Lionel Blais, ''On the Plurality of Actual Worlds,''
University of Massachusetts Press
The University of Massachusetts Press is a university press that is part of the University of Massachusetts Amherst. The press was founded in 1963, publishing scholarly books and non-fiction. The press imprint is overseen by an interdisciplinar ...
, 1997,
* Benjamin Brown, Thoughts and Ways of Thinking: Source Theory and Its Applications. London:
Ubiquity Press
Founded in 2008 by Brian Hole, Ubiquity Press is an academic publisher focusing on open access, peer-reviewed scholarship. Ubiquity Press is a part oUbiquity which also provides full publishing infrastructure and services to university presses, a ...
, 2017
*
*
Ernest Gellner
Ernest André Gellner FRAI (9 December 1925 – 5 November 1995) was a British-Czech philosopher and social anthropologist described by ''The Daily Telegraph'', when he died, as one of the world's most vigorous intellectuals, and by ''The Ind ...
, ''Relativism and the Social Sciences,'' Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985,
*
Rom Harré
Horace Romano "Rom" Harré (; 18 December 1927 – 17 October 2019), was a New Zealand-British philosopher and psychologist.
Biography
Harré was born in Āpiti, in northern Manawatu, near Palmerston North, New Zealand, but held British citi ...
and
Michael Krausz
Michael Krausz (born 1942) is a Swiss-born American philosopher as well as an artist and orchestral conductor. His philosophical works focus on the theory of interpretation, theory of knowledge, philosophy of science, philosophy of history, and p ...
, ''Varieties of Relativism'', Oxford, UK; New York, NY: Blackwell, 1996,
* Knight, Robert H. ''The Age of Consent: the Rise of Relativism and the Corruption of Popular Culture''. Dallas, Tex.: Spence Publishing Co., 1998. xxiv, 253,
p.
*
Michael Krausz
Michael Krausz (born 1942) is a Swiss-born American philosopher as well as an artist and orchestral conductor. His philosophical works focus on the theory of interpretation, theory of knowledge, philosophy of science, philosophy of history, and p ...
, ed., ''Relativism: A Contemporary Anthology'', New York: Columbia University Press, 2010,
*
Martin Hollis,
Steven Lukes
Steven Michael Lukes (born 1941) is a British political and social theorist. Currently he is a professor of politics and sociology at New York University. He was formerly a professor at the University of Siena, the European University Institute ...
, ''Rationality and Relativism,'' Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1982,
*
Joseph Margolis
Joseph Zalman Margolis (May 16, 1924 – June 8, 2021) was an American philosopher. A radical historicist, he authored many books critical of the central assumptions of Western philosophy, and elaborated a robust form of relativism.
His philosop ...
,
Michael Krausz
Michael Krausz (born 1942) is a Swiss-born American philosopher as well as an artist and orchestral conductor. His philosophical works focus on the theory of interpretation, theory of knowledge, philosophy of science, philosophy of history, and p ...
, R. M. Burian, Eds., ''Rationality, Relativism, and the Human Sciences'', Dordrecht: Boston, M. Nijhoff, 1986,
*
Jack W. Meiland,
Michael Krausz
Michael Krausz (born 1942) is a Swiss-born American philosopher as well as an artist and orchestral conductor. His philosophical works focus on the theory of interpretation, theory of knowledge, philosophy of science, philosophy of history, and p ...
, Eds. ''Relativism, Cognitive and Moral,'' Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1982,
* Markus Seidel, ''Epistemic Relativism: A Constructive Critique,'' Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014,
External links
*
* Westacott, E.
Relativism', 2005,
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
The ''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' (''IEP'') is a scholarly online encyclopedia, dealing with philosophy, philosophical topics, and philosophers. The IEP combines open access publication with peer reviewed publication of original pape ...
* Westacott, E.
Cognitive Relativism', 2006,
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
The ''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' (''IEP'') is a scholarly online encyclopedia, dealing with philosophy, philosophical topics, and philosophers. The IEP combines open access publication with peer reviewed publication of original pape ...
Professor Ronald Jones on relativism!-- Broken 2013-07-23 -->
a passage from
Pierre Lecomte du Nouy
Pierre is a masculine given name. It is a French form of the name Peter. Pierre originally meant "rock" or "stone" in French (derived from the Greek word πέτρος (''petros'') meaning "stone, rock", via Latin "petra"). It is a translation ...
's "Human Destiny" (1947)
BBC Radio 4 series "In Our Time", on ''Relativism - the battle against transcendent knowledge'', 19 January 2006''Against Relativism'' by Christopher Noriss
*
Harvey Siegel reviews Paul Boghossian
Paul Artin Boghossian (; born 1957) is an American philosopher. He is Silver Professor of Philosophy at New York University, where he is chair of the department (having also held the position from 1994 to 2004). His research interests include epi ...
's ''Fear of Knowledge''
{{Authority control
Ethical theories
Metatheory
Pyrrhonism