That is not a doctrine of relativity. That is a doctrine of awareness. There is no relativity involved.
Mark On Oct 7, 2012, at 1:52 AM, MarshaV <[email protected]> wrote: > > Philosophy > 21, Fall, 2004 > > Reconstruction of an Argument for Protagorean Relativity > > Protagoras of Abdera is famous for advocating a doctrine of relativity, > according to which each individual person is a “measure” of truth and > reality. One statement of the doctrine can be found in Plato’s Theaetetus: > “Not that any one ever made another think truly, who previously thought > falsely. For no one can think what is not, or think anything different from > that which he feels; and this is always true” (167b). Aristotle tells us that > “he said that man is the measure of all things, meaning simply that that > which seems to each man also assuredly is” (Metaphysics, 1062b 13). > > The basis for this doctrine is found by Plato and Aristotle in the fact that > people disagree about many things, such as whether an object is beautiful or > whether a breeze is cold. Plato at least seems to have been willing to admit > that the feeling of cold is relative. Even if it is, the relativity of some > terms is not an adequate basis for a fully general claim about relativity. It > may be, to use one of Aristotle’s examples, that an object appears to one > person as a man, to another as a ship, and to yet another as a wall > (Metaphysics, 1007b 20). Do we want to say that the object is both a man, a > ship, and a wall? > > We can find an argument for the general thesis of relativity in Sextus > Empiricus. “He asserts that all sense-impressions and opinions are true and > that truth is a relative thing inasmuch as everything that has appeared to > someone or has been opined by someone is at once real in relation to him” > (Against the Logicians I. 61). Let us try to make this argument more exact, > using the case of opinion. We will restrict ourselves to opinions about > really existing objects. > > 1. For all x and persons y, if y has the opinion that x is O, then x’s being > O is real for y. 2. For any x and person y, if x’s being O is real for y, > then O is true of x for y. > 3. So, for all x and persons y, if y has the opinion that x is O, then O is > true of x for y. 4. For all x and persons y, if O is true of x for y, then O > is true of x. > 5. So, for all x and persons y, if y has the opinion that x is O, then O is > true of x. > > The key premises in this argument are 2 and 4. We can take 2 to be a way of > understanding the expression “true for.” Premise 4 makes the crucial claim > that truth for any one person is the truth pure and simple. > > Most opponents of relativism, such as Aristotle, would concentrate their > criticism on premise 4. They might be inclined to allow that there is a > harmless notion of being true for a person, so long as it is understood > merely as an expression of the fact that the content of the person’s opinion > in some way is “real” in the mind of that person, as premise 2 puts it. What > they object to is the view that “truth” taken in this way should be > understood to be truth in an unqualified way. > > According to the opponents of relativism, “truth” understood in an > unqualified way indicates a relation of “correspondence” between the > “reality” in S’s mind of x’s being O and a reality that is independent of > what is going on in S’s mind. > > A relativist could deny that there is any such thing as mind-independent > reality, which would make a correspondence account of truth impossible. > Protagoras himself seems not to have taken this line. Instead, he emphasized > that individual human beings are the “measure” of reality. Modern relativists > argue that any description we make of reality is the result of the way we > have (in Protagorean terms) “measured” it. We cannot get outside ourselves to > evaluate the success of our “measuring” of reality, and the only alternative > is to hold that our own individual “measuring” is the standard of truth. > > The fact that all opinions must be called “true” does not mean that any > opinion is just as good as any other. As presented by Plato, Protagoras > allowed that the opinions of a “healthy” soul are better, though not “truer,” > than the opinions of an “unhealthy” soul (Theaetetus 167b). Perhaps we should > say that the healthy soul is better at “measuring” what is and what is not. > > > http://hume.ucdavis.edu/mattey/phi021/ProgatgorasRelativism.pdf > > > Moq_Discuss mailing list > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org > Archives: > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ > http://moq.org/md/archives.html Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
