Carol Rovane is Professor of Philosophy at Columbia University.
This is an excellent readable and informative book discussing a
particularly interesting kind of "relativism." Perhaps the most
important contribution of the book (but by far from the only one)
is its careful explication of the relevant sort of relativism as an
instance of what Carol Rovane calls "multimundialism," the thesis
that one person might reject another's beliefs without supposing
that the other beliefs fail to be true. Along the way there is much
useful discussion of potentially relevant ideas in the history of
philosophy through such twentieth-century figures as Rudolf Carnap,
W.V. Quine, Thomas Kuhn, Paul Feyerabend, Richard Rorty, and Donald
Davidson. This is the best discussion of relativism that I know
of.
*Gilbert Harman, Princeton University*
In recent years, the issue of relativism has been hotly discussed
by the philosophical community, and a number of good books have
been dedicated to the issue. However, to my knowledge no thorough
general and methodical analysis has been offered of what the
content of this doctrine exactly is. Carol Rovane's The Metaphysics
and Ethics of Relativism finally fills this relevant gap in the
philosophical literature. This is a thoughtful, original, and very
deep book. In the next decades it will very probably represent a
milestone in the debate on relativism.
*Mario De Caro, Università Roma Tre and Tufts University*
Rovane breaks new ground in an otherwise-tired debate between
‘relativists,’ ‘objectivists,’ and ‘absolutists.’ One of the book’s
signal achievements lies in clarifying the nature of relativism,
whether in its metaphysical or ethical guise. People (especially,
but not only) from different cultures inhabit different ‘worlds.’
The author calls this ‘multimundialism,’ and it leads to one of her
principal substantive theses: a person/people can reject the
beliefs of another/others without claiming that the rejected
beliefs are false. Ethics, thus, is more than a matter of taste and
sentiment. Furthermore, people occupying different ‘worlds’ can
rightly reject others’ claims and stay committed to their own
without judging those of others to be false. Along the way, Rovane
engages with leading contemporary philosophers, including G.
Harman, D. Davidson, R. Rorty, and J. Raz…Rovane’s book deserves a
careful reading; it is thoughtful, thorough, substantive, clear,
and challenging.
*Choice*
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