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no tes that subj ectivism and relativism " have a sel f-ev ident air if no t exam–
in ed too closely, which may account fo r their grea ter populari ty o utside
philosophy than inside it."
Although relativism is very ancient it can be interes ting and useful to
locate the causes of its repea ted re-emergences. N agel quo tes Hilary Putnam's
remark about " the appeal which all incoherent ideas seem to have," but makes
no attempt to explain either their o rigins o r their appeal . If we look around,
though, we can sometimes locate the (re-)emergence of relativism in the
teachings of individual philosophers-Protagoras, for exampl e, o r Nietzsche,
or, in O xfo rd,
J.
L.
Mackie, author of
III IJCllfill<(? R((?/lf alld Wrollg
R elativi sm
speaks of hidden agendas, so Freud too has had a finger in thi s pie. R oger
Kimball , in
Tel1ured Radicals,
argues that the populari ty in Ameri ca of global
relativism can be traced to the arrival in 1947 of Paul de Man, a N azi collab–
o rator with plenty to hide. The notion that objective knowl edge is impossible
everywhere (and especially in ethi cs) was consciously or unconsciously adopt–
ed by de Man as a smokescreen for hi s early life as an anti- Semite, a
smo kescreen enthusias tically taken up by his supporters in the
U.
S. and
France. The smokescreen worked, and works, hke a charm.
Tracing the o ri gin o f ideas, be they coherent o r in coherent, is a task for
hi stori ans of philosophy, and , as I've already sa id , it is bo th useful and inter–
es ting. But it is not the same thin g as examining th e validi ty o r otherwi se
of arguments and no t th e same thin g as showin g dut a theo ry is true (or
false) . To confuse or meld th ose two different enterpri ses is part and parcel
of relativism itself.
Contemporary global skepti cism consists of claims that hi story, biolo–
gy, o r psychology can explain away, i. e., replace, th e concepts of reason ,
truth , and validi ty. N agel's first maj o r contenti o n is that th ose claims them–
selves rely on the concepts th ey pretend to abo li sh , and are th erefo re
self- refutin g. His second contenti o n is that what he calls " first o rder argu–
ments" in logic, sc ience, and ethi cs can refute th e meta-language
explanati o ns o f rela tivism , w hi ch thus turn o ut to be refuted tw ice over. As
fa r as I know thi s second contentio n is new.
Rel ativi sts rely on all - purpose cOl1lments abo ut reason in general and
reply to criti cism by repea tin g th e ir comments.
In di scussion th e obj ec ti vist finds th at hi s oppo nent will either refu se
to acce pt the concept o f refutati o n , o r, if a foll owe r o f Jacqu es D errida,
will claim that self- refut ati o n merely shows language to be res ting on
qui cksan d .
N agel deals with the impasse by moving from generali ty to parti cular–
ity. It is legitimate to trea t th e rel ativist's all- purpose CO lTlments as
compri sing a coll ecti o n of asserti o ns abo ut th e supposed o ri gins of every
different domain of reason: logic, science, ethi cs, hi story, etc. T he obj ectivi st
