The Laissez Faire Electronic Times

Recently in an online forum, a group of us discussed the problem of relativism in modern philosophy. At the time, I offered to put together some thoughts on the subject. Here they are.

RELATIVISM

Relativism is a common philosophy (set of ideas) that either states or implies that reality is unknowable and/or unstable. The proponents of these ideas say things like:

The more subtle forms of this include mis-stated half-truths such as:

WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT

All of the statements in quotes above are incorrect. I'll explain why as we go on, but let me back up for a moment and explain one basic concept: The trick of doing philosophy well is to go slowly, and analyze the words people use very precisely. (The tool you really need when discussing philosophy is a dictionary.) This is important because most people's thinking consists of remembering slogans. In other words, when a specific subject is brought up to them, they recall a set of slogans or phrases. They are in the habit of using such slogans as a shortcut, rather than spending the time and energy to think in raw facts and concepts. (Is it good for people to do this? No, generally it is not; but that is not our issue right now.)

Because most thinking consists of recalling short statements, the accuracy of these phrases is critically important. A wrong slogan is father to a host of incorrect choices.

Painstakingly analyzing the correct use of words is not something most of us do on a continual basis. In daily life, it is much more effective to interpret what it is that the other party means, and disregard slight inaccuracies in their words. Going slowly and using precision would require you to waste large amounts of time, energy, and good will. But when discussing philosophy–or when analyzing our own inner thoughts–it is critical.

Relativism is built on catchy little slogans, such as those shown above. Even when seemingly learned people promote relativism, they use slogans such as:

Einstein proved that certain things, in certain circumstances, are relative — not that everything is relative at all times.

Quantum mechanics concerns very specific aspects of the world inside of atoms.

Heisenberg showed that certain drastically small things are uncertain in some ways.

THE ROOTS

Now, briefly, on to the roots of relativism. It actually began with Galileo. (Though it was certainly not Galileo's fault.) As it was being proved that the earth actually moved around the sun, and not vice-versa, the counter-argument went like this: "You can see the sun coming up in the east every morning, and going down in the west — obviously it moves. In addition, if we were moving, would we not fly off of the earth? Take a stone, and place a grain of sand on it, then toss it into the air; does not the sand fly off? Your eyes are not lying to you, it is the sun that moves, not the earth."

So, as the realization that Galileo was right spread slowly though Europe, the message people came away with was that you cannot trust your senses. (This is obviously a generalization, but I think a fair one. This was studied in considerable depth by Hannah Arendt, whose work I am borrowing from here.)

The truth of the matter was that our senses work just fine, but there are sometimes issues of perspective that must be combined with them to secure an accurate conclusion. In other words, our sensory perceptions must be combined with reason in order to reach correct conclusions.

Galileo (and Copernicus before him) used their senses and observed inconsistencies with the traditional conclusion that the sun moved. They observed facts that didn't fit that hypothesis. So, they observed more, reached possible conclusions, tested them, and finally came up with a solid answer. In no way, and at no time, did they prove that senses were invalid. What they did prove was that our senses are in some ways limited, and that they must be used with reason.

From this history, I think you can see the roots of relativism's error. For example, people often say things like "that's his reality, not yours." This implies that reality is fluid, being dependent on the observer for its form. And that is absolutely untrue. Reality is what it is, and it is perceptions that are fluid. When someone says "that's his reality", what they mean is "that's his perception, which he is mistaking for reality." Or, stated more briefly, "that's what he thinks reality is."

So, perceptions are sometimes mistaken or misinterpreted, and the popular thing to do is to blame reality, rather than blaming perception or perspective. The popular thing, however, is wrong.

Now, before I go on to absolutes, let me explain the errant statements I began with:

ABSOLUTES

If I drop an anvil on your foot, that foot will be damaged. If I poke you in the eye with a stick, your eye will be damaged. If I throw a rock into the air, it will fall back to earth. And, as we all know, I could go on with this list indefinitely.

Your life is full of absolutes from the day you are born till the day you die. Our world is built upon them. If reality were not stable and knowable we couldn't button our shirts, much less drive a car or build an airplane. Actually, one of the first lessons we learn as infants is cause-and-effect. Almost everything you do is based upon cause-and-effect. You are hungry, and food satisfies you; you are cold, and clothing warms you; you need sex, and it satisfies you. And on and on and on.

The laws of mechanics are absolutes, as are the laws of biology, chemistry, aeronautics, hydraulics, and so on. If these were not absolute, we could not live as we do. Period.

There is one slight modification to this, however. All of the above are absolute in what we call 'normal' circumstances. That is, at our usual temperatures, speeds, pressures, and so on. If taken to radical extremes, some of these things may change. This is where quantum mechanics and relativity come into play. At these extremes of small and large, it seems that our normal absolutes morph. (I say "it seems", because we haven't yet proved exactly what is going on. It could be another problem with limited perceptions, or it could be the 'normal' laws of physics morphing.)

But regardless of what happens at the fringe extremes, our common absolutes are certain in their place. We can predict with exact precision where and when the next eclipse will occur, how much electricity will flow through a given circuit, and how a certain toxin affects an organism.

If reality really did change according to our perceptions, I could merely wish for a pile of hundred dollar notes to appear on my desk, and they would. I could merely wish for any woman to fall madly in love with me, and she would. I could wish for the attack of September 11 not to have occurred, and it would not have. Obviously this is a ridiculous idea.

Can what we think affect reality? (a la Napoleon Hill and applied faith.) Not directly. Altering our thinking affects our impact on the real world in many ways, but does not affect the nature of reality. We can affect results, but not reality itself.

I think this covers the subject fairly well. There are, however side-issues to this, such as the questions of absolute values. I do not want to get overly-broad in covering such things in this article. It is better, in my judgment, to stick to one subject at a time, and address other subjects separately. Otherwise, the waters get muddied, and not much can be clearly seen.

from The Laissez Faire Electronic Times , Vol 1, No 1, February 18, 2002