ABSTRACT
In the rhetoric of philosophers the English-speaking world, the term "relativism" is often used as a term of opprobrium, something to be said of a philosophical position that falls short or afoul of a much lauded ideal of 'objectivity' that is supposed to follow upon a robust metaphysical realism. Richard Rorty responded to this rhetoric by urging that analytic philosophers should simply set aside the realist ideal of objectivity and embrace relativism. The aim of this chapter is to show that one can better understand the moral sources of resistance to relativism on both sides of Rorty's analytic-continental divide if one formulates it as the chapter proposes to do, as a challenge to the universality of truth. Rorty admired Davidson's argument very much and pronounced it the transcendental argument to end all transcendental arguments. The chapter also includes that relativism actually presupposes this universal conception of the person, because relativism involves adopting a stance that only a person can adopt.
