An Objectivist Rejoinder to Relativism about Truth

In this paper I consider whether the phenomenon of faultless disagreement really does provide evidence for relativism about truth. Though many have taken it to do so, I argue that relativism about truth cannot do justice to the phenomenon because it fails to give an adequate account of disagreement. Objectivism has little problem in accounting for disagreement and, appropriately construed, can allow for faultlessness in disagreements. The paper thus divides into two: first a critique of relativism and then an elaboration and defence of objectivism. In the first part I concentrate on what is perhaps the most nuanced, developed and sustained defence of relativism about truth in the literature, namely, that found in John MacFarlane’s work.