For Ortega y Gasset, each perspective reveals a real angle of the world. It is not relativism: it is recognizing that the truth is broader than any isolated view.
The central idea
Perspectivism states that there is no absolute point of view, from nowhere. Each observer sees from a position, and that position reveals a true aspect of reality. The complete truth is the sum of perspectives, not their abolition.
It's not relativism
Saying that we see it from one angle is not saying that anything goes. The facts exist: the handle of the cup is on one side. What varies is the angle of the observer. The position organizes and hierarchizes reality, but does not invent it out of nothing.
The lion scene
Ortega reads Don Quixote with this key. When the hero challenges a lion that merely yawns, from a zoological point of view there was no combat; from an existential point of view, there was real courage. Two true perspectives of the same fact.
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What is perspectivism?
It is Ortega y Gasset's thesis that all truth is seen from a perspective, and that the sum of the angles makes up the real. Each point of view reveals something true.
Is perspectivism the same as relativism?
No. Relativism says that everything is worth equally; perspectivism states that there are facts, but that we perceive them from different positions, each revealing a real aspect.
Who created perspectivism?
The expression is linked to José Ortega y Gasset, who developed it in works such as Quixote's Meditations (1914), although the idea has antecedents in Leibniz and Nietzsche.
Continue: I am me and my circumstance · Don Quixote, Part 2: summary and analysis
Source class (YouTube): Dom Quixote, Parte Dois (NousCast)