Reason monolithism: A Darwinian dilemma for “relaxed” realism

Mähringer, Gloria (2023): Reason monolithism: A Darwinian dilemma for “relaxed” realism. In: Theoria, Vol. 89, No. 6: pp. 840-855

Abstract

Street formulated a Darwinian Dilemma for realist theories of value. Much criticism of her formulation of the dilemma targets the second horn, posed by the scientifically implausible assumption of a tracking relation between our attitudes and evaluative truth. This paper shows how a recent wave of metaethical realism, most prominently defended by Scanlon, succeeds without a tracking relation and thus avoids the Darwinian Dilemma in Street's formulation. However, Scanlon's approach, which builds on the concept of a reason relation and defends a metaphysically pluralist, domain-specific conception of truth, runs into another version of the Darwinian Dilemma. The problem is not that Scanlon's realism assumes a tracking relation but that it assumes what I call reason monolithism – the idea that there is one possible expression of the faculty of reason and that this cognitive faculty could not be otherwise, which is scientifically implausible on similar grounds.

• Item Type: Journal article
• Faculties: Philosophy, Philosophy of Science and Religious Science
• Subjects: 100 Philosophy and Psychology > 100 Philosophy
• ISSN: 0040-5825
• Language: English