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Hume's and much 20th-century moral philosophy contrasted moral with factual judgments and led people to conclude that the former, unlike the latter, are subjective in the sense of not being rationally supportable. Putnam...believes that the contrast is ill conceived and that the conclusion is both unwarranted and false. He acknowledges the usefulness of the fact/ value distinction but denies that anything metaphysical follows from it...Putnam covers such matters as imperative logic, economics vis-a-vis ethics, and preference theory and such thinkers as V. Walsh, L. Robbins, and R. M. Hare. A fine philosophical workout. -- Robert Hoffman Library Journal 20021201
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Although it is on occasion important and useful to distinguish between factual claims and value judgments, the distinction becomes, Hilary Putnam argues, positively harmful when identified with a dichotomy between the objective and the purely "subjective." Lively, concise, and wise, his book prepares the way for a renewed mutual fruition of philosophy and the social sciences.
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29 of 30 people found the following review helpful
Possibly Putnam's most important book?
30 Sep 2003
Format:Hardcover
The fact/value dichotomy remains a standing dogma of contemporary empiricism. One sees it assumed without question in numerous works intended both for students and professional philosophers. (It is taken for granted, for instance, in Peter Singer's recent A Darwinian Left.) Yet Putnam shows that the original dichotomy, usually attributed to David Hume, was based (1) on a metaphysics of fact that nobody has seriously entertained since the early days of Logical Positivism, and (2) on an argument formally identical to Hume's argument against causality, the latter being an argument virtually nobody now accepts as cogent. Putnam argues that we must now accept the embeddedness of values virtually all theoretical and even factual statements. This does not, however, drop us into a morass of post-modern relativism, but allows us to think more clearly about the value-assumptions we make in all forms of discourse.
27 of 29 people found the following review helpful
The Entanglement of the Fact/Value Distinction
21 Jan 2004
Format:Hardcover
If there is one point that sticks out in my mind after reading Hilary Putnam's "Collapse of the Fact/Value Dichotomy," it is his suggestion that there is an "entanglement" of facts and values, which effectually preserves a distinction between the two without positing a metaphysically dichotomous relationship vis-a-vis facts and values. According to Putnam, logic itself presupposes certain values (e.g., coherence, validity, soundness) and so does science with its talk of "elegant" or "parsimonious" theories. Values permeate all aspects of academic study and human life. No human being reasons on "facts" without simultaneously having axiological concerns. Putnam demonstrates this point analytically, though most of the book is fairly accessible to continental philosophers and even those who are philosophically challenged (n.b., the two aforementioned classes of persons are not to be confused with one another or epistemically conflated). The only portion of the book that I found somewhat challenging was his discussion of economics and Amartya Sen. That chapter notwithstanding, I find myself forced to accept Putnam's pragmatist mantra with some reservations: "knowledge of facts presupposes knowledge of values."
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful
A biased opinion
11 Sep 2007
Format:Paperback
As a former student of Hilary's, I can't claim my review is free of bias. Nonetheless, in my view the simple insight that the fact/value distinction can be--has been--turned into a dangerous dichotomy is priceless.
Of course, there are many other things to like about this book. For one, I've gone back to Sen and to Walsh. For another, it's clarified (for me) many problems (or puzzles) in philosophy and economics.
Of course, there are many other things to like about this book. For one, I've gone back to Sen and to Walsh. For another, it's clarified (for me) many problems (or puzzles) in philosophy and economics.
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