Your complimentary articles

You’ve read all of your complimentary articles for this month. To have complete access to the thousands of philosophy articles on this site, please

If you are a subscriber please sign in to your account.

To buy or renew a subscription please visit the Shop.

If you are a print subscriber you can contact us to create an online account.

Articles

Ships on a Collision Course

Roger Caldwell revisits reality (and postmodernism, too!).

In my article ‘How to Get Real’ (Philosophy Now, Issue 42) I argued that postmodernism does nothing to improve our understanding of science proper, of the social sciences, or, indeed, of everyday life, but rather serves only to obfuscate. Jason Wasserman argues in Issue 48 that I, along with critical realists in general, have ‘missed the point’ and offers a rapprochement (of sorts). He claims that postmodernism and critical realism both have useful things to say, and can be seen as complementary, as ‘ships that pass in the night’ rather than ships on a collision course.

How, though, to effect this rapprochement? The answer, for Wasserman, is simple. Reality presents itself to us under two forms, that of meaning and value on the one hand, and that of function on the other.

…