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Articles

The World as it is in Itself Revisited

Michael Philips thinks that intelligent aliens could help us sort out the problem of what we can know, by providing a useful new point of view.

Metaphysical realists are people who believe that the world exists independently of us and is what it is however we happen to experience it or to theorize about it. Epistemic optimists believe that our theories are, in principle, capable of accurately describing the world. Both views are now under attack from several armies of critics. The common theme of these critiques is that our theories about the world bear the marks of their origins. They are human artifacts created by beings who are constructed in a certain way, and who are operating within a certain historical setting.

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