Combining Philosophers

Ideas for Anaxarchus, Keith Devlin and W.H. Newton-Smith

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2 ideas

13. Knowledge Criteria / E. Relativism / 5. Language Relativism

8088	People still say the Hopi have no time concepts, despite Whorf's later denial [Devlin]
	Full Idea: The Hopi time myth does not appear to have been stopped for a moment by the fact that Whorf himself subsequently wrote that the Hopi language does indeed have words for past, present, and future
	From: Keith Devlin (Goodbye Descartes [1997], Ch. 5)
	A reaction: Arguments for relativism based on the Hopi seem now to be thoroughly discredited. Sensible people never believed them in the first place.

13. Knowledge Criteria / E. Relativism / 6. Relativism Critique

3857	Defeat relativism by emphasising truth and reference, not meaning [Newton-Smith]
	Full Idea: The challenge of incommensurability can be met once it is realised that in comparing theories the notions of truth and reference are more important than that of meaning.
	From: W.H. Newton-Smith (The Rationality of Science [1981], I.6)