What is situational realism?

Answer 1

Philosophy: In summary, situational realism is a school of thought that derived from the empirical philosophy of John Anderson, Challis Professor of Psychology at the University of Sydney (See Hibberd, 2009/2011 for further details). It is also colloquially known as Andersonian realism, Australian Realism, as well as Sydney realism. Situational realism states that there is a direct relation between a subject and an object term in a cognitive relation (Michell, 1988/2011). Situational realism sets itself aside by its "ontological egalitarianism" (Mackary & Petocz, 2011) to which it states that there is only a single way of being, i.e. one spatial-temporal universe that everything exists within. Moreover, situational realism also states that reality has to thought in terms of relations, namely comprising of the subject and object term. All situations comprises of at least two terms but there can be more than just the subject and object term, i.e. complex. It follows that situations exhaust reality (Hibberd, 2009/2011) and that cognition cannot be reduced to just one term or the relation. For example, Adam is taller than James. Being taller is a relation and it is difficult without reference to James to know that Adam is taller. It is from the larger, more complex relation involving Adam, James and the relation of being taller that we understand what the statement of Adam is taller than James means.

References

Hibberd, F. J. (2009/2011). John Anderson's development of (situational) realism and its bearing on psychology today. In N. Mackay & A. Petocz (Eds.), Realism and psychology: Collected essays (pp. 119-158). Leiden: Brill.

Mackay, N. & Petocz, A. (2011). Realism and the state of theory in psychology today. In N. Mackay & A. Petocz (Eds.), Realism and psychology: Collected essays (pp. 119-158). Leiden: Brill.