History of Science and Technology Colloquium

Relativism, the view that all knowledge is relative to some percipient subject and that there is no universal, objective truth, is a product of knowledge. Historically, it was probably the result of a generalisation of some observations made by Greek mariners and merchants: laws and customs in distant (and not so distant) countries were different, sometimes opposite, from those of the Greeks. Knowledge of different customs brought about a challenge to knowledge itself. Some daring thinkers argued that there was thus an obvious contrast between what is valid by nature, always and everywhere, and what is valid by custom or law, and is therefore situated in a specific time and place. From a notion about knowledge, relativism quickly and naturally expanded into a full-fledge theory about everything: moral values, education and civilization, political arrangements, the existence of the gods.

Nowadays, it is especially moral and cultural relativism that hold the sway, because of the strong immigration fluxes and the exposure to different cultures not mediated by that typical attitude of Western superiority that was still dominant until a few decades ago. The problem of relativism, when applied to practical matters, is still more interesting and commands our attention for its consequences. Is there any standard, beside our preferences, likes and dislikes, by which we may evaluate competing claims about entities of the utmost importance (values, political arrangements, religion, scientific theories about man and the universe)?

In my paper I will examine historically the origins of relativism and the first consistent relativist thinker, Protagoras, in order to show how his theory about knowledge contains an explicit non-relativist part when it comes to value-judgements. I then move on to maintain that relativism, although an attractive theory for its deconstructionist slant, it is untenable as a general outlook on reality.