Carl Scandelius
Harvard University
The “phenomenon of conceptual relativity,”^(1) as Putnam names it, calls into question the feasibility of external realism. But full relativism does not seem an attractive theory to embrace either, given its seemingly self-refuting nature—the conceptual relativist seems to require scheme independent truth even to articulate their own ideas. Is there a middle-ground?
In this paper I shall show that we are indeed able to depart from Putnam’s lead and assert a degree of standardisation on the conceptual schemes we accept. In so doing, we can constrain relativism to something which allows us to enjoy the benefits and appeals of both extremes: the pragmatic, mind-independent representations of truth enjoyed by realists (which will be established as correspondence truth—itself appealing on account of the ‘correspondence intuition’) and avoidance of self-refuting nature of full relativism, but also the ability to deflate certain metaphysical discussions as a problem of language and objecthood (and thus explain the phenomena to which Putnam refers). Thus, I must: (I) account for the multiplicity and variability amongst conceptual schemes as shown by the conceptual relativist; (II) establish what kind of rules of standardisation can be imposed, and how this can be inferred from the mind-independent world beyond conceptual schemes; (II) further explain how this standardisation permits mind-independent correspondence truth to arise; justify the very nature of this paper in discussing conceptual schemes and the mind-independent world, and show that this does not descend into nonsense, as Carnap would have it, but is meaningful on account of the nature of language within conceptual schemes which meet these certain standards (these shall be referred to as ‘accurate’).
^(1) Putnam, Hilary (1987). The Many Faces of Realism. Open Court, 29.
Chair: Szymon Sapalski
Time: September 6th, 14:00-14:30
Location: SR 1.006
SOPhiA 2026 