The evidence for relativism |
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Authors: | Max Kölbel |
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Institution: | (1) Department of Philosophy, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK |
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Abstract: | The aim of this paper is to examine the kind of evidence that might be adduced in support of relativist semantics of a kind
that have recently been proposed for predicates of personal taste, for epistemic modals, for knowledge attributions and for
other cases. I shall concentrate on the case of taste predicates, but what I have to say is easily transposed to the other
cases just mentioned. I shall begin by considering in general the question of what kind of evidence can be offered in favour
of some semantic theory or framework of semantic theorizing. In other words, I shall begin with the difficult question of
the empirical significance of semantic theorizing. In Sect. 2, I outline a relativist semantic theory, and in Sect. 3, I review
four types of evidence that might be offered in favour of a relativistic framework. I show that the evidence is not conclusive
because a sophisticated form of contextualism (or indexical relativism) can stand up to the evidence. However, the evidence
can be taken to support the view that either relativism or the sophisticated form of contextualism is correct. |
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Keywords: | Relativism Contextualism Indexicality Context of use Circumstance of evaluation Taste predicates Knowledge attributions Epistemic modals Future contingents David Lewis David Kaplan |
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