ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an argument for a realist theory of objectivity. It is a rejection of both “value free” approaches to knowledge and epistemological relativism. Instead, it is argued that objective decisions about what and how to research are inevitably grounded in particular times and places, thus objectivity is “situated”. Objectivity is itself a value, but it is a value that can transcend particular contexts and help us get nearer to the truth of the matter. However, for there to be objective knowledge of the world, there must be objects in it that exist apart from our views or theories about them. Objective investigation produces objects of knowledge that reside in, what Popper, called “the third world of knowledge”.
