while i mostly agree with neu’s previous post re: relativism and applaud his conclusion wholeheartedly, i would like to claim that, despite neu’s case study and carefully recorded dialogue between the catholic and relativist men-on-the-streets, the types of relativism are not so dichotomously stratified. a lot of the men-on-the-streets out there, and even more-so the women-on-the-streets (women tend to be better at intuition and less rashly extreme) out there, do not have such an ignorant, nihilistic apprehension of what relativism really means. a lot of them know quite consciously what neu has only credited them with knowing subconsciously. no big deal, really, but the people-on-the-streets are a good deal more thoughtful than you give them credit for. they have lives and brains too, and i believe that most of them believe in this, even though the next disheveled hipster you meet in the street might not know that’s the terminology for his beliefs.
and, the song.
I never thought that there could ever be a Whiskey in the Jar techno version that I would actually like.
…weird
Hey dude,
Don't get me wrong. They may not realize what's going on. Many people in fact do, but that "hidden proposition" rarely comes up in a Starbuck's conversation.
Thanks for the thoughts though. As I said, that was a rough draft and I'm still revising.
Cool.
This is the classic Jaffa/Straussian comeback line that I've been learning: "What you say presupposes historicism, relativism, and ultimately can be reduced to nihilism." I've heard that said about a million times since I've been at grad school, to everyone from Thrasymachus to Stephen A. Douglas!