The Other Relativism

Relativism and discussions of the relativity of human judgment have played an important role in philosophy since the 1950s. Such claims are regarded by many as the enemy of realism, the view that human judgments can be valid with respect to their objects as those objects obtain independent of the judgments. Most relativisms assert the relativity of human judgment to some trait of the judge, hence are anthropic. But there is another kind: objective relativism. It was espoused by some of the American pragmatists of the early to mid-twentieth century. Their hope was that objective relativism was compatible with realism while avoiding dualism and idealism. It claimed things themselves are relative. The view eventually disappeared. This article examines this neglected doctrine, not to determine its truth, but its nature. What kind of theory was it, what could it claim to accomplish, and what could it not? Some of its proponents regarded it as a naturalistic metaphysics, but this is problematic. This topic is suggestive for the formulation of a naturalism that rejects physicalism yet is compatible with science and realism.