Putnam; Fact/Value Dichotomy and Fact Constructivism

Ebadi, Ahmad; Emdadi Masouleh, Mohammad

doi:10.22054/wph.2021.53089.1867

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

¹ Associate Professor of Islamic Philosophy and Theology, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran

² Ph.D. Student of Contemporary Philosophy, Imam Khomeini International University (IKIU), Qazvin, Iran

https://doi.org/10.22054/wph.2021.53089.1867

Abstract

Hillary Putnam is one of the contemporary philosophers who study the fact/value dichotomy. In his thoughts, these two concepts are interpretation and even conceptually not separate, a notion named instructive pragmatism. He accuses the advocates of this dichotomy and believes that when they say morality is separate from fact, they base their trust on the supposition that they realize fact in its exact sense. He sets three reasons that lead to resorting to this dichotomy of reality/value and by rejecting all, paves the way for his criticism of this dichotomy. The drawbacks recognized by him in this context, consist of 1. conversion of a non-destructive distinction into a destructive metaphysical dichotomy, 2. The impact of science from the values in generating science, 3. existence of consensus regarding ethical issues similar to that of other domains, 4. inaccuracy in the analysis of moral judgment into the two perspective and descriptive components, 5. wrong moral thick concepts, a reason in the interpretation of facts and values. Next to accepting his thoughts, and strong points in rejecting fact/value dichotomy, we believe when he defends the character of constructive facts, the following deficiencies become evident in his views: 1. inaccuracy in changing facts due to the conceptual schema, 2. the problem of backward causation, 3. lack of conceptual competence, 4. problem of incoherence and 5. use mention fallacy. The objective of this paper is to analyze and assess the strong and weak points of Putman’s views on fact/value dichotomy.

Keywords

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Wisdom And Philosophy

Putnam; Fact/Value Dichotomy and Fact Constructivism

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Volume 17, Issue 68
January 2022
Pages 123-153

Putnam; Fact/Value Dichotomy and Fact Constructivism

References

References

Volume 17, Issue 68January 2022Pages 123-153

Volume 17, Issue 68
January 2022
Pages 123-153