relativisme

Relativisme appeared in French philosophical writing in the mid-nineteenth century, from Latin relativus (having reference or relation to), from relatus, past participle of referre (to carry back, to refer). The concept, again, is far older than the word. Protagoras of Abdera, around 450 BCE, declared 'man is the measure of all things' — truth is relative to the individual perceiver. Plato spent considerable energy attacking this position in the Theaetetus.

Cultural relativism became a formal anthropological position in the early twentieth century. Franz Boas, working at Columbia University from the 1890s, argued that cultures should be understood on their own terms, not ranked against a Western standard. His students — Margaret Mead, Ruth Benedict, Melville Herskovits — developed this into a methodological principle. Cultural relativism was a tool for understanding, not a philosophical claim that all cultures are equally good. The distinction was often lost.

Moral relativism — the claim that there are no universal moral truths, only local ones — became a political flashpoint in the late twentieth century. Critics, especially from the political and religious right, accused academia and progressivism of moral relativism. The accusation was usually imprecise. Most people who were called moral relativists were actually moral pluralists — they believed in moral truth but thought it was more complex than a single tradition claimed.

Einstein's theory of relativity, published in 1905 and 1915, was misappropriated by cultural commentators who confused physical relativity (measurements depend on the observer's frame of reference) with philosophical relativism (truth depends on perspective). Einstein himself objected. His theory was about invariance — the speed of light is the same for all observers. He wanted to call it Invariantentheorie. The word 'relativity' won, and the confusion has been permanent.