Objectivity

Barbara Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk, University of Applied Sciences in Konin, Poland
barbara.lewandowska-tomaszczyk@konin.edu.pl

Barbora Baďurová, Matej Bel University in Banská Bystrica, Slovakia
barbora.badurova@umb.sk

Objectivity is the quality of being based on facts and unbiased by personal feelings or interpretations. In philosophy, objectivity is an opinion or methodology that assumes that reality exists outside of the human mind, so that people can separate their own ideas and opinions from the observations they make (knowledge).

From a philosophical perspective, the classical correspondence theory states that truth is based on facts—it corresponds to them. Objectivity, then, stems from this factual correspondence. It is often contrasted with subjectivity and is commonly associated with mind-independence and realism. For instance, Thomas Nagel describes objectivity as a ‘view from nowhere’. In logical positivism, Moritz Schlick defined (scientific) knowledge as propositions that can be verified.

As outlined above, assertions (broadly understood as opinions) are objective and represent true beliefs if they correspond to facts. For example, the statement ‘I live in Slovakia’ is a verifiable claim—its truth depends on my actual place of residence. However, if I say, ‘Slovakia is the most beautiful place on Earth’, verifying this claim would require universal, measurable criteria for beauty, which may not exist. Similarly, if I state, ‘I think Slovakia is the most beautiful place’, verification would depend on whether I am sincere and not misinterpreting my own preferences. Likewise, ‘I like Slovakia’ expresses a subjective preference, which could be verified by assessing whether I am accurately describing my mental state. Moral claims, such as ‘The government of Slovakia is not good’, present a different challenge. They could, in principle, be evaluated using objective moral criteria, though the existence of such criteria remains debated in metaethics. Alternative theories of truth, such as coherence theory, propose that truth depends on a belief’s coherence within a system, offering another perspective on objectivity.

Keywords: belief, subjectivity, truth

Related Entries: Belief, Fact, Subjectivity, Truth, View

References:
Baďurová, B. (2016). Environmental values as a problem. In Environmental ethics in V4 countries. Belianum.
Nagel, T. (1986). The view from nowhere. Oxford University Press.
Schlick, M. (1974). General theory of knowledge (H. Feigl, Trans.). Springer. (Original work published 1925).