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Contemporary philosophical realism is the belief that some aspect of our reality is ontologically independent of our conceptual schemes, perceptions, linguistic practices, beliefs, etc. Realism may be spoken of with respect to other minds, the past, the future, universals, mathematical entities (such as natural numbers), moral categories, the material world, and thought. Realism can also be promoted in an unqualified sense, in which case it asserts the mind-independent existence of a visible world, as opposed to skepticism and solipsism. Philosophers who profess realism state that truth consists in the mind's correspondence to reality.〔The statement ''veritas est adaequatio rei et intellectus'' ("truth is the equation of thought and thing") was ascribed by Thomas Aquinas to a 10th-century Jewish philosopher, Isaac Israëli. ((Summa ), (I ), (Q.16 ), (A.2 ))〕 Realists tend to believe that whatever we believe now is only an approximation of reality and that every new observation brings us closer to understanding reality.〔Blackburn p. 188〕 In its Kantian sense, ''realism'' is contrasted with ''idealism''. In a contemporary sense, ''realism'' is contrasted with ''anti-realism'', primarily in the philosophy of science. ==History== The oldest use of the term "realism" appears in medieval scholastic interpretations and adaptations of Greek philosophy. Here, however, it is a Platonic realism developed out of debates over the problem of universals. Universals are terms or properties that can be applied to many things, such as "red", "beauty", "five", or "dog". Realism in this context, contrasted with conceptualism and nominalism, holds that such universals really exist, independently and somehow prior to the world. Moderate Realism holds that they exist, but only insofar as they are instantiated in specific things; they do not exist ''separately'' from the specific thing. Conceptualism holds that they exist, but only in the mind, while nominalism holds that universals do not "exist" at all but are no more than words (flatus vocis) that describe specific objects. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Philosophical realism」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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