Kant at the Court of King Arthur (Part 1) - Bernard Williams and the Relativism of Historical Distance

On The Very Idea - A Philosophy Podcast

In this first episode of a two part series, I look at an issue that has been hot of late (are there any non-hot issues in the internet age?) – the issue of how we should judge our historical heritage – particularly the prominent figures of history. Winston Churchill, Christopher Columbus and others have had statues removed in public places along with a reassessment of their historical legacy. Its a healthy dialogue to be having even if it is isn't always carried out in a healthy manner. The dialogue lacks any nuanced underlying theoretical ethical structure that can guide conflicting groups to consensus- which is my way of saying that there has been a lot of shouting. So, in this episode, I look at candidates for theoretical guidance on the ethical judgment of historical figures. Ethical theories tend to assess an agent's actions according to universal standards or contextual, local ones which may be fine for justifying giving the stink eye to your neighbor but doesn't really give us an insight about what a moral choice would have looked like for Genghis Khan. But the ever broad eye of Bernard Williams provides us with some tools to tackle the problems associated with ethical assessment of the historical figures and, in this episode, we see what Williams' 'relativism of distance' theory can offer us.