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perspectivist

perspectivist

9.9
A person who believes truth depends on their point of view
  • noun
  • /pərˈspɛktɪvɪst/
  • Formal
translation icon : perspectivista
  • The perspectivist argues that our understanding of truth varies based on individual experiences.

Examples

  • As a perspectivist, she believes that different cultures offer unique insights into universal truths.

  • But modern science is not perspectivist: some truth claims have the weight of scientific evidence behind them, and some do not.

    Academic text (2006)
  • Nor does he accept a perspectivist response, which would understand different traditions of rationality as providing different perspectives on the one truth.

    Academic text (2010)
  • The so-called perspectivist school of optics was in part based at the University of Padua.

    Academic text (2007)
  • We might regard such self-reflexive writing of history as perspectivist or anamorphic since the position of the storyteller is necessarily figured into the account.

    Academic text (1994)
  • Here we have the perspectivist critique made famous by Nietzsche's postmodern successors.

    Academic text (2000)
  • Just as the perspectivist outlook comes from conditioning, so the cubist point of view can become ingrained and can lie beneath the surface of another perspective.

    Academic text (1999)
  • The second part of the story reverses these tendencies; as the narrator enters school and a structured family, the cubist vision is replaced by a perspectivist point of view.

    Academic text (1999)
  • Schacht's Making Sense of Nietzsche (1994) offers an appropriate correction to the perspectivist readings put forward by such scholars as Nehamas (see chs. 3-5 and 10).

    Academic text (2000)
  • By contrast, the moment in which the adolescent Patrik approaches Fedja's house is dominated by perspectivist observation (Proza 301; Short Stories 186).

    Academic text (1999)

Synonyms

relativist
vsperspectivist
4 8.0

A person who thinks that truth and moral rules depend on the situation or viewpoint

sees truth as tied to a specific viewpoint rather than to general context
subjectivist
vsperspectivist
  • Specialized
1 9.9

A person who believes truth and values depend on personal experience or perception

views truth as based on differing viewpoints rather than on individual experience

How Relativist

relativist
4 8.0
perspectivist
  • Formal
9.9
Objectivist
  • Jargon
1 9.1
absolutist
3 8.1

Surface Forms

perspectivist singular

Morphology

perspectivist = perspective (semi-transparent) = perspective + ist

Agentive formation from 'perspective' + '-ist' is clear, but the specific philosophical meaning ('one who holds perspectivism') is specialized and not fully derivable by average learners.

Etymology

Perspectivist combines perspective ('viewpoint') with the ending -ist ('a person who believes or practices something'). So a perspectivist is someone who thinks truth or knowledge depends on each person's point of view.