Relativism and Post-Truth in Contemporary Society

Mikael Stenmark is Professor in Philosophy of Religion at the University of Uppsala, Sweden. In his research he has explored different conceptions of God, human nature and of the natural world. He has previously co-edited The Customization of Science : The Impact of Religious and Political Wordviews on Contemporary Science (2014, Palgrave Macmillan) with Adam Briggle and Ulf Zackariasson.
Steve Fuller is the Auguste Comte Chair in Social Epistemology in the Department of Sociology at the University of Warwick, UK. His research interests include the emergence of intellectual property in the information society, the interdisciplinary challenges in the natural and social sciences, the political and epistemological consequences of the new biology, science and religion, the future of humanity.

Ulf Zackariasson is Associate Professor in Philospohy of Religion at the University of Uppsala, Sweden. His research interests include American pragmatism (both classical pragmatism and neopragmatism) and the possibilities it offers approaching philosophical problems that are brought about by the human phenomenon of religion, such as questions about the role of religion in the public sphere, religious experience and moral criticism of religion.

This book approaches post-truth and relativism in a multidisciplinary fashion. Researchers from astrophysics, philosophy, psychology, media studies, religious studies, anthropology, social epistemology and sociology discuss and analyse the impact of relativism and post-truth both within the academy and in society at large. The motivation for this multidisciplinary approach is that relativism and post-truth are multifaceted phenomena with complex histories that have played out differently in different areas of society and different academic disciplines. There is hence a multitude of ways in which to use and understand the concepts and the phenomena to which they refer, and a multitude of critiques and defenses as well. No single volume can capture the ongoing discussions in different areas in all their complexity, but the different chapters of the book can function as exemplifications of the ramifications these phenomena have had.

Posits that the impact of relativism extends far beyond the direct influence of relativism itself

1. Introduction: Engaging relativism and post-truth; Ulf Zackariasson.- Part I: The Promise of Relativism.- 2.Relativism versus Absolutism: The Sense of Relativism that Leibniz and Hegel Grasped but Plato didn't; Steve Fuller.- 3.Postmodern Relativism as Enlightened Pluralism;Raphael Sassower.- Part II: Post-truth as Social Condition and Truth-game.- 4.Post-Truth, Social Media, and the "Real" as Phantasm; Michael Sawyer.- 5.A Theory of Evolution of Religious Knowledge in a Post-Revolutionary Iran: And a New Frontier for Sociology of Knowledge; Morteza Hashemi and Amir R. Bagherpour.- Part III: Relativism and the Academy.- 6.On Extrapolation in Trans-cultural Dialogues: The Example of the Use of Einstein´s Theories of Relativity in the Discourse of Relativism; Bengt Gustafsson.- 7. Mental Health Diagnosis - is it relative oruniversal in relation to culture?; Valerie DeMarinis.- 8.Critique of Human Rights Universalism; Elena Namli.- Part IV: The Threat of Relativism.- 9.Scientism and Utopia: New Atheism as a Fundamentalist Reaction to Relativism; Steven LeDrew.- 10. The Barbarian in Rome and the Cultural Relativism Debate; Mattias Gardell.- 11. Relativism as a Challenge to Religion: Christianity, Truth and the "Dictatorship of Relativism"; Mikael Stenmark.