In what follows I will examine problems surrounding Hilary Putnam's defense of 'internal' realism. I will begin by considering his motivations for rejecting what he calls 'metaphysical realism' and the theory of truth that this leads him to adopt. This theory, idealized rational acceptability, in turn raises doubts that 'internal' realism could be an undesirable form of 'relativism'. Putnam tries to show that his position is distinct from relativism, giving several specific arguments that the latter is inconsistent in various ways in which 'internal' realism is not. These arguments will constitute the main focus of this work. I shall argue that the arguments only succeed against a very narrow and naive class of relativist positions. I will then consider a more careful formulation of a sophisticated relativism offered by Chris Swoyer. From this it will be seen that other relativist doubts can be eliminated and I will then briefly consider what other resources the 'internal' realist position can make use of to deal with some remaining difficulties.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.59524 |
| Date | January 1989 |
| Creators | Parisien, Aurèle |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Arts (Department of Philosophy.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 001067405, proquestno: AAIMM63651, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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