Moral Relativism & Epistemic Relativism

@fresco,

...the problem is not about "rules" having an Anthropological account, the problem is you making the case that it is exclusively so...which of course you can´t !

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@fresco,

Do you also consider the explanations of natural science to be anthropocentric, fresco?

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@fresco,

Everything is anthropocentric. But also, in a sense that I cannot discuss, everything is God-centric. We can say simultaneously that Man and Ultimate Reality are the co-measures of all things.

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@JLNobody,

I hope the above does not turn everyone off. It was irrelevant to the discussion. Apologies.

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@wandeljw,

Quote:

Do you also consider the explanations of natural science to be anthropocentric, fresco?

Of course ! "Explanation" is inevitably about the human pre-occupation with prediction and control, and JLN expands this issue by noting the classificatory generalizations we call "things"which constitute the nominal level of measurement.

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@Fil Albuquerque,

Quote:

..the problem is not about "rules" having an Anthropological account, the problem is you making the case that it is exclusively so...which of course you can´t !

Rules are about "ordering" and "regularities". What other than a life-form to which we attribute features such as "memory" and "prediction" and "classification" can seek out and utilize such regularities.

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@fresco,

...and what does that has anything to do with what has been said ? Furthermore the definition of life is itself a tricky business...not to mention that one thing is to invent and come up with regularity´s and rules and quite another to derive them from nature...

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@fresco,

fresco wrote:

Quote:
Do you also consider the explanations of natural science to be anthropocentric, fresco?

Of course ! "Explanation" is inevitably about the human pre-occupation with prediction and control, and JLN expands this issue by noting the classificatory generalizations we call "things"which constitute the nominal level of measurement.

Can the explanations of natural science be value-neutral (free from cultural values)?

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@wandeljw,

Depends what you mean by "culture". In terms of national or regional norms...yes (with the notable exceptions of fundamentalist dogmatic interference and the infamous Nazi pre-occupation with "Aryan science"). With respect to "paradigms"...no, because of the financial vested interests in funding research and creating social infrastructures to channel and sanction that research.

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@fresco,

I guess I meant "culture" in the way a social anthropologist may use that term. It could also refer to the culture of specific financial interests or other special interest groups.

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@wandeljw,

I have difficulty thinking of any notions or actions that are culture free. We are cultural animals, living in a kind of symbolic linguistic soup our entire lives.

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@Eorl,

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"Rape is wrong" is very subjective and definition dependent. For example, the idea that's it possible to rape one's spouse is quite a new concept, and certainly not a worldwide one. Also, various versions of rape depend on age of consent, which ranges between the Vatican (age 12) and Tunisia (age 20).

So what? Moral rightness and wrongness doesn't depend on when, it has to do with justification.

It may also be descriptively true that rape is not a moral wrong universally, but descriptive truths are not the point at issue. The point at issue is the justification for normative judgements.

Rape being wrong may certainly turn on consent, but age of consent isn't what we rely on to characterize rape. The fact that rape sexually violates a person's physical integrity is what constitues rape.

In any event, you're still missing the point at issue: is epistemic relativism and similar moral relativisms based on the assumption that acceptance alone dictates the rationality of a standard a justified assumption?

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@JLNobody,

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Tell me if my spin on "naive realism" is itself excessively naive. When I see that the grass in my backyard is "green" I am talking about properties of grass, optics, my nervous system and much more, all of which create the experience we call the color green. A different kind of animal with a different kind of nervous system will have a different experience. As such, all my visual experience is the result of a complex set of processes. It is complex not simple. Naive realism is the doctrine of the epistemologically unwashed; it assumes that what one sees is simply and directly what is--naively not complexly.

You're assuming that our experiences and animals experiences are somehow fundamentally different that there cannot be any truths about the way the world is. Based on biology animals and humans might percieve things somewhat differently, but the fact that our experiences also reflect the world in similar respects, that they reflect aspects of which the way the world is a truth about the way things are. Any cognitive notion of truth depends on this, and it is no coincidence that the majority of epistemologists out there are not relativists.

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On the other hand, I accept the zen perspective that what is complexly generated by the world of properties is ultimately/primitively/ and prereflectively simple just as it is. I hope you can see that this is paradoxical rather than contradictory.

Sorry, I do not understand this, nor how this "complexity" relates to epistemic relativism.

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@bigstew,

Honk!

BTW, I have little interest in the formal discipline of epistemology. In fact I take a pluralistic stance toward the notion of Truth, I'm open to a multiplicity of possibilities. I think Natural and Physical Science, Philosophy, Mathematics, Logic, Art, Literature, Mythology, qualitative forms of Social Science, everyday efforts at understanding practical concerns, certain forms of religion, etc. are valid contenders for different kinds of "truth."

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@JLNobody,

If you have "little interest" regarding knowledge then don't make assertions about it. You're copping out yet at the same time you think you have something to say about it. That just displays a lack of integrity and rationale.

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@bigstew,

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is a truth about the way things are

No..that's"naive realism".
Truth is is about what we agree about "things" and "events". It changes with zeitgeist. (Check out Evans-Pritchard on the Azande attitude to Western court systems).

Quote:

the majority of epistemologists out there are not relativist

Name one !

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@fresco,

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Truth is is about what we agree about "things" and "events". It changes with zeitgeist.

Evidentialism and reliablism (to name two epistemic theories) are not about matters of agreement. They have to do with justified true belief. The basic methodology of science does not generate facts based on "agreement". Claims are tested against, and only after considerable testing (and retesting to avoid error) are true facts generated. That is not a matter of agreement.

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@bigstew,

You've not spotted that "justified" is a matter of paradigmatic coherence.
Check out a Richard Rorty interview on "truth" via Utube. The word "truth" adds nothing to agreed justification methods.

I'm still waiting for you to name an absolutist epistemologist !

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@bigstew,

That Rorty reference
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzynRPP9XkY

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@fresco,

I guess there are no successful absolute epistemologists. Would Berkeley be its most famous failure--that the absolute proof of the objective sound of a falling tree lies in God's hearing?

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Moral Relativism & Epistemic Relativism

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