Editing Relativism (section)

=====Richard Rorty=====
Philosopher [[Richard Rorty]] has a somewhat [[paradox]]ical role in the debate over relativism: he is criticized for his relativistic views by many commentators, but has always denied that relativism applies to much anybody, being nothing more than a Platonic scarecrow. Rorty claims, rather, that he is a [[pragmatism|pragmatist]], and that to construe pragmatism as relativism is to [[beg the question]].

:'"Relativism" is the traditional epithet applied to pragmatism by realists'<ref>Rorty, R. ''Consequences of Pragmatism''</ref>

:'"Relativism" is the view that every belief on a certain topic, or perhaps about any topic, is as good as every other. No one holds this view. Except for the occasional cooperative freshman, one cannot find anybody who says that two incompatible opinions on an important topic are equally good. The philosophers who get called 'relativists' are those who say that the grounds for choosing between such opinions are less algorithmic than had been thought.'<ref>Richard Rorty, ''Pragmatism, Relativism, and Irrationalism''</ref>

:'In short, my strategy for escaping the self-referential difficulties into which "the Relativist" keeps getting himself is to move everything over from epistemology and metaphysics into cultural politics, from claims to knowledge and appeals to self-evidence to suggestions about what we should try.'<ref>Rorty, R. ''Hilary Putnam and the Relativist Menace''</ref>

Rorty takes a [[Deflationary theory of truth|deflationary]] attitude to [[truth]], believing there is nothing of interest to be said about truth in general, including the contention that it is generally subjective. He also argues that the notion of [[Theory of justification|warrant]] or justification can do most of the work traditionally assigned to the concept of truth, and that justification ''is'' relative; justification is justification to an audience, for Rorty.

In ''[[Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity]]'' he argues that the debate between so-called relativists and so-called objectivists is beside the point because they do not have enough premises in common for either side to prove anything to the other.