(Note: I made this presentation on Objectivity in conjunction with a Philosophy Club meeting at MSU on January 25, 1996. Dick Liebendorfer of the department also presented a paper on the issue. The subsequent discussion was quite lively.-RY)
Copyright 1996 by Ron Yezzi. Material may be downloaded for personal, non-commercial use.
Objectivity is an intertwined metaphysical and epistemological issue. I want to argue, in contrast with the traditional view in western philosophy, for an epistemological interpretation of objectivity. This epistemological interpration (1) stands by itself as an adequate meaning of objectivity, (2) generates a type of objective metaphysics, and (3) establishes an objective framework for value statements.
The traditional view of objectivity is what I shall refer to as metaphysical objectivity: The objective is what exists independently of what we (human beings) think. My view is what I shall refer to as epistemological objectivity: The objective is what we know as we overcome the limits of our own (human) subjectivity.
Metaphysical objectivity is based upon an affinity claim or assumption regarding thought and reality, namely, that our thought can achieve reproducible identity with what exists independent of our thought. Thus what we know is identical with what exists-a position of metaphysical realism. At first glance, the affinity claim or assumption may seem silly. Why should what we think reproduce what exists independently of thought rather than produce a filtered version or a created fantasy? What saved the affinity claim from silliness historically, in my judgment, was the theological underpinnings of western thought primarily and a non-theological naturalism secondarily.
Any theology, whether dogmatic or rational, that established existence of a superior being (God) who intelligibly created, managed, or understood the world likewise established a link between knowledge and existence that justified metaphysical objectivity. God knows the world as it really is. And we-given God's benevolence, revealed promises, or gift of reason as well as our likeness with God-can also know the world as it really is, even if we know far less than God. This point of view is clearly evident in philosophical thought based upon Christian theology. But it is also evident in the thought of Plato, Aristotle, Epicureans, the Stoics, and Spinoza.
Secondarily, non-theological naturalistic tendencies-based upon unrecognized vestigial remains of theological thinking or overconfidence about reason also led to metaphysical objectivity. There is a side of the thought of Plato, Aristotle, Epicureans, the Stoics, and Spinoza that supports this point of view. (There is also a latent, or perhaps a dimly articulated, epistemological objectivity that is present in their thought, but not in a way that challenges metaphysical objectivity seriously.)
Finality and absoluteness usually are characteristics of metaphysical objectivity-since one cannot claim to know reality as it is in itself and also grant that it may be otherwise. So finality and absolutenss become measurement standards for progress with respect to metaphysical objectivity.
I see Hume and Kant as transitional figures in the development of epistemological objectivity, although each is still strongly influenced by metaphysical objectivity--Hume in the sense that he uses an epistemologically objective method but still views himself as a skeptic because he cannot describe ultimate reality and Kant in the sense that he retains the standards of finality and absoluteness as measures of progress within a system of epistemological objectivity.
The weakening of the theological underpinnings of western thought due to expansion in secular philosophies since the eighteenth century and the lessened confidence in reason's capacity to reproduce reality due to the scientific revolutions of the twentieth century (particularly relativity and quantum mechanics) have, in turn, undermined claims for metaphysical objectivity.
Epistemological objectivity is based upon distinguishing subjective and objective ways of knowing and providing techniques for decreasing subjectivity. In contrast with metaphysical objectivity, its standard of progress is measured by how far we have moved from more limited ways of past knowing rather than claiming any final or absolute description of an objective reality.
As some sources or techniques of subjective thinking, we might list
Subjective Intuition
Acts of commitment (including faith)
Rugged individualism
Snap judgments
Immediate feelings
Provincialism
Naivete
Inner-directed self-assertion
Immediate experience
Egocentrism
Prejudice
Fanaticism
I am not suggesting that these sources or techniques always result in errors. I only want to point out that they are subjective and that we have methods of moving toward objectivity with respect to them.
Some of the more objective methods derived from our successful past experience include
Expanding the breadth of experience
Dialectical Method
Techniques of logic
Attention to facts
Scientific method
Intersubjective agreement
(These methods may overlap.) I am not saying that these methods are foolproof; but they are methods of overcoming subjectivity.
Another way of moving from subjectivity to objectivity occurs when we consider error-correction procedures.
For example, one troubling aspect of moral relativism is the absence of any method for correcting errors that is more than a personal or cultural opinion. The need for correcting errors arises from the facts that (1) we cannot avoid making assessments of reality-that is, judgments about the adequacy of our awareness of the way things are and (2) we are fallible-that is, susceptible to making errors with respect to our awareness of the way things are.
Any proposed claim must stand the test of one's awareness of the way things are; any accepted claim becomes part of one's awareness of the way things are; and one's awareness of the way things are is tested continually by reason and experience. Suppose, for example, you propose for my acceptance the claim that human beings by nature act selfishly. Before I accept the claim, I am going to weigh it against what I already accept about human beings, that is, against my present awareness of the way things are. Before accepting, I may also want to expand my awareness of the way things are by doing some research, perhaps by devising some experiments or examining what others say. Suppose for the sake of the example, then, that I accept the claim. That human beings by nature act selfishly now becomes part of my awareness of the way things are. The process does not end there however. My accepted claim is always subject to further tests-that is, to reexamination of the reasons for my accepting the claim, to new observations of others' actions, to new accounts or reports about human motivation, and to my own further, direct experiences. A similar process occurs for any other claim-such as, "You ought to look out for No. 1" or even "No one knows what the good life is."
I take it to be a universal experience of human beings (part of my experience of the way things are and, I expect, part of yours too) that no one always acts infallibly in this process-that is, no one always finds that all of their initially accepted claims are forever entirely adequate. In other words, everyone at some time or other recognizes mistakes9 that lead to rejection or modification of claims previously accepted. Moreover, going through rejections or modifications is an important element in most people's lives.
A cultural moral relativist may insist that any error-correction procedures are culturally based. Such insistence needs to take into consideration the discussion of sociocentrism in the section on “grounds for objectivity” that follows below.
Recognizing the need for error-correction is significant. We can evaluate different modes of knowing the good life by examining their error correction procedures. Furthermore, since these procedures correct errors in personal or cultural opinions, we can formulate this rule: The less adequate the error-correction procedures, the greater the moral relativity; the more adequate the error-correction procedures, the less the moral relativity.
We might consider, for example, some modes of knowing the good life: Openness to Life Experience, Faith, The Sales Mode, The Legal System Mode, Cooperative Consciousness-Raising, and The Rational-Empirical Mode to test their error-correction procedures.
Epistemological objectivity generates a type of metaphysical realism that ranges in a continuum from Commonly Certified Realism with respect to ordinary objects of experience to Pragmatic Realism with respect to more sophisticated, theoretical objects. Remember that we need not make claims here to absolute certainty. We only need to show that statements about, for example, everyday objects can satisfy criteria of objectivity. I do not need to establish metaphysical objectivity to assert that we are located in a room right now; nor do I have to worry about whether the present environment is more accurately described in terms of quarks. When it comes to sophisticated theoretical objects, like quarks, then I would argue for a Pragmatic Realism. (Note that it is Pragmatic Realism, not Pragmatism.) That is, there are pragmatically sound reasons for making claims about the existence of quarks.
(Note: What follows has specific reference to moral issues because it is taken from From my Philosophical Problems: The Good Life)
Although I have made reference to objective claims, I need to clarify more the applied meaning of objectivity: Claims are objective if the evidence is such that reasonable persons should agree about their truth or falsity.
We cannot associate "objectivity" with what is entirely independent of human thought, because we cannot know anything entirely independent of human thought. Hence objectivity represents a certain kind of limit in human thinking; and when individual persons reach that limit, they know something objectively. Ideally, the limit represents what human beings ultimately can agree upon once they overcome their idiosyncratic personal and cultural differences and utilize their faculties for understanding fully. Practically, the limit represents something less than the ideal-namely, what human beings can agree upon once they make a committed, reasoned effort to overcome their idiosyncratic personal and cultural differences and to utilize their faculties for understanding fully. So long as we do not demand absolute certainty, this practical interpretation of a limit is workable.
Instead of demanding objectivity in the ideal, ultimate sense, we fare better by asking, "How is one statement (point of view) more or less objective than another?" We then can examine evidence to decide rationally when one statement is more limited personally or culturally than another. I think that we frequently can make these decisions with some degree of probability. So we can distinguish a snap decision based upon extremely limited personal experience from a considered decision based upon a much greater breadth of experience. For example, persons often express personal opinions about complex national issues such as crime or health care that are little more than frustrating outbursts of the moment from an especially narrow point of view. We usually can identify these opinions as being less objective than careful analyses of many factors involved in the issues.
We make progress through a process of extending the limits of our capacity for objectivity rather than simply being objective by and of itself. Thus we become more objective as we overcome personal and cultural limitations.
In some sense, we are all egocentric-since we cannot go outside ourselves in experiencing, thinking, judging, and doing. After all, my experiencing is my experiencing, my thinking is my thinking, my judging is my judging, and my doing is my doing. This fact easily suggests the conclusion that all my interests are merely personal. So I am always pursuing my self-interest; I am always asserting what I want to think and do; I am always withdrawn within myself. Moreover, since all of us exist within our own egocentric worlds, our values reflect our personal interests rather than some objective state of affairs-so that a personal moral relativity seems to make sense. There seem to be no moral truths, just personal opinions. This egocentric train of thought is pervasive enough in the twentieth century to support a great deal of moral relativism.
A basic flaw however exists in the train: It presumes that I am unrelated to anything outside myself just because I experience, think, judge, and do everything through myself. This presumption is questionable. I can be influenced by external forces-namely, society and nature-even though they produce effects only by working through my being. Furthermore, ample evidence shows the high probability of these external influences. Our language, our attitudes, our interests, our skills are all strongly dependent on social, or communal, interaction. Human beings do not start out fending for themselves and creating merely personal selves; rather they develop their own selves in interaction with a social environment that includes other people and cultural conditions. Our experiencing, thinking, judging, and doing are also all subject to limitations set by external nature (regardless how unsure we are about the fit between our conceptionalizations of nature and nature itself).9 Nearly all we envision as a possibility or try to do must stand the test of an external nature beyond our selves that we do not control fully; and what our selves thereafter become is influenced by the result of those tests. For example, although I may place great value on leaping up to the moon right now, what is external does not support my effort. We have good reason to recognize further that these external influences, social or natural, reach into the deepest recesses of the self. Thus the private, self-directing individual concerned with advancing personal interests that is the focus of egocentrism is a myth.
Recognition of the myth does not strip us of our uniqueness as individual human beings, since no self is identical with any other self and our existence is not a state of conformity with everyone else. We also retain a sense of self and the pursuit of self-interest. Recognition of the myth only tempers our egocentrism-allowing us to turn away from selfishness and personal moral relativity.
Claims about personal moral relativity lose much of their force once we grant the effects of society and external nature on the self. At the very least, we see that the moral relativity is social rather than personal in fundamental ways: that is, our morality is relative to the kinds of social interaction in our development.10 Going a step further, we see that the tests of external nature can present objective standards that will confirm, modify, or falsify many personal opinions.]
Let me now present a parallel discussion of our tendency to socialize all our thought.
Claims about social moral relativity based upon the social nature of human existence lose much of their force in the same way as claims about personal moral relativity do. If we use the term "sociocentrism" as the social counterpart of egocentrism, we get arguments that parallel arguments about egocentrism.
In some sense, we are all sociocentric-since we cannot go outside our social interactions in experiencing, thinking, judging, and doing. After all, our experiencing is social experiencing, our thinking is social thinking, our judging is social judging, and our doing is social doing. This fact easily suggests the conclusion that all our interests are social. Since all of us exist within sociocentric worlds, our values reflect our social interests rather than some objective state of affairs-so that a social moral relativity seems to make sense. There seem to be no moral truths, just socialized opinions. This sociocentric train of thought is pervasive enough in the twentieth century to support a great deal of moral relativism.
A basic flaw however exists in the train: It presumes that we are unrelated to anything outside our social interactions just because we experience, think, judge, and do everything through social interactions. This presumption is questionable. I can be influenced by external nature-even though it produces effects only by working through my socialized being. Our experiencing, thinking, judging, and doing are all subject to limitations set by external nature (regardless how unsure we are about the fit between our conceptionalizations of nature and nature itself). Whatever we envision as a possibility or try to do based upon our social interactions must stand the test of an external nature; and what we thereafter do or become is influenced by the result of those tests.
Thus external nature existing beyond our cultural outlook at any given time provides ways of taking us beyond our current cultural limitations. Our encounters with external nature are a frequent source of cultural change. For example, the Copernican view of the world with the earth traveling around the sun as well as the theory of evolution were developed in human thought with the help of interaction with external physical nature; and these scientific doctrines have changed cultural attitudes with respect to the structure of the universe, the place of human beings in the universe, the process of change in nature, and explanation of why things are as they are. Likewise, the automobile, the television set, and the computer cannot exist without the potential for their development in external nature; and these technological objects have changed cultural attitudes with respect to transportation, social status, communication, gathering of information, and education. Interaction with external nature in the form of other cultures alters our cultural attitudes about human nature and knowledge.
Due to the lessening of both egocentrism and sociocentrism that has occurred, and that continues to occur, we have reason to be optimistic about ever-increasing grounds for objectivity.
In my judgment, there are no spontaneous, wholly free choices that create moral values. Rather our moral values are embedded in a set of fact-like claims.
Consider, for example, a person's opposition to abortion. What may appear at first as simply a personal opinion shows, on further examination, a series of fact-like claims that are essentially connected with a person's moral stance on abortion. Let me list a number of possibilities that different persons may hold:
An immortal soul exists from the moment of conception.
Unborn babies have feelings and experience pain during an abortion.
Unborn babies are human beings just like every other human being.
Unborn babies are persons and are thus protected under the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution.
Pro-choice persons are pro-abortion.
Abortion is murder.
Abortion is disgusting.
Pictures of dismembered body parts from abortions demonstrate that abortion is a cruel attack on human beings.
Men force women to get abortions because they do not want to pay child support.
Abortion is a genocidal plot against African-Americans.
Women who have abortions later experience deep psychological trauma and regret.
Abortion is dangerous to physical health.
Abortion is an easy way out for people seeking instant self-gratification.
Abortion is a civil rights issue just like slavery.
Most abortions are done for convenience.
Computer disks are made from the brains of aborted fetuses.
Persons who have or support abortions see the unborn baby as just body tissue like a wart.
There is no need for abortion when people are on waiting-lists to adopt a baby.
Legalized abortion is the mark of a degenerate society.
Abortion shows a lack of love for children.
The number of annual abortions in the U.S. shows that this country is participating in a holocaust greater what occurred in Nazi Germany.
If we examine these claims, taking into account the sources or techniques of subjective thinking and the objective methods previously listed, we should be able to sort our various claims as being more, or less, subjective. We also should be able to establish some probabilities among the claims with respect to truth or falsity. I am not saying that these tasks are easy. In using this example, I am only asserting that the framework of epistemological objectivity described earlier gives us ways of introducing greater objectivity into our consideration of moral stances that otherwise appear to be simply personal opinions not subject to objective analysis.
Last updated 2/25/96