Niemann, Hans-Joachim, In Pursuit of Relativism. Nicholas Rescher's Method of Double Writing, Quarterly Journal of Ideology 21 (3&4) Dec 1998 (published Dec. 1999); p.63-95.
Summary. The relativistic believe, that there can be no tolerance if we continue to make a difference between right and wrong has become an influential ideology. So there is a great interest to reveal the objectivity of Western science as being a mere illusion. The idea behind is well expressed by Paul Feyerabend: "If not even the natural sciences are a realm of reason ..., how are we to demand, that the quite less strict disciplines like history, politics, poetics, or dramaturgy should be subjected to rigid rules?" This paper is going to criticize the methods of a new version of this "scientific relativism" established by Nicholas Rescher. Rescher is skillfully doing what I call double writing: the scientifically trained reader identifies a harmless but quite superfluous trivial relativism, meanwhile those who are not used to philosophical quibbling are made to believe to have got a lot of arguments in favor of a revolutionary scientific relativism, which would mean a breakdown of objectivity and therefore a catastrophe in science.