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Single Idea 1483

[filed under theme 13. Knowledge Criteria / E. Relativism / 1. Relativism ]

Full Idea

In the very same bath some treat the water as too hot, others as too cold.

Gist of Idea

Bath water is too hot for some, too cold for others

Source

report of Epicurus (fragments/reports [c.289 BCE]) by Plutarch - 74: Reply to Colotes 1109b

Book Ref

Plutarch: 'Moralia - vol 14', ed/tr. Einarson,B. /De Lacy P.H. [Harvard Loeb 1967], p.201


The 31 ideas with the same theme [knowledge varies according to points of view]:

If God had not created honey, men would say figs are sweeter [Xenophanes]
Donkeys prefer chaff to gold [Heraclitus]
Sea water is life-giving for fish, but not for people [Heraclitus]
A dog seems handsome to another a dog, and even a pig to another pig [Epicharmus]
There is no more purely metaphysical doctrine than Protagorean relativism [Benardete,JA on Protagoras]
Man is the measure of all things - of things that are, and of things that are not [Protagoras]
Animals vary in their feelings and judgements (Mode 1) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius]
Perception varies with madness or disease (Mode 4) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius]
Perception of things depends on their size or quantity (Mode 8) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius]
Perception of objects depends on surrounding conditions (Mode 6) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius]
Perception is affected by expectations (Mode 9) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius]
Perception varies with viewing distance and angle (Mode 7) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius]
Perception and judgement depend on comparison (Mode 10) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius]
Individuals vary in responses and feelings (Mode 2) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius]
Objects vary according to which sense perceives them (Mode 3) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius]
Judgements vary according to local culture and law (Mode 5) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius]
If two people disagree over taste, who is right? [Epicurus, by Plutarch]
Bath water is too hot for some, too cold for others [Epicurus, by Plutarch]
When entering a dark room it is colourless, but colour gradually appears [Epicurus]
Everything is perceived in relation to another thing (Mode 13) [Agrippa, by Diog. Laertius]
How can we judge between our impressions and those of other animals, when we ourselves are involved? [Sext.Empiricus]
For Kant, experience is relative to a scheme, but there are no further possible schemes [Kant, by Fogelin]
We now have innumerable perspectives to draw on [Nietzsche]
Each of our personal drives has its own perspective [Nietzsche]
We assume causes, geometry, motion, bodies etc to live, but they haven't been proved [Nietzsche]
There is only 'perspective' seeing and knowing, and so the best objectivity is multiple points of view [Nietzsche]
The extreme view is there are only perspectives, no true beliefs, because there is no true world [Nietzsche]
Saying games of truth were merely power relations would be a horrible exaggeration [Foucault]
Foucault challenges knowledge in psychology and sociology, not in the basic sciences [Foucault, by Gutting]
Ontological relativists are anti-realists, who deny that our theories carve nature at the joints [O'Grady]
Radical perspectivism replaces Kant's necessary scheme with many different schemes [Fogelin]