We know that lots of things are correct. (Helping people in need is correct. Moving the bishop diagonally when playing chess is correct. Adding 7 to 5 to make 12 is correct.) But where does this correctness come from? I argue that correctness is best seen as something we humans created in the process of forming our societies. This, admittedly, is speculative; but aside of this, there are facts that are more than speculations. In particular, I argue that our correctness (...) is based on normative attitudes, though these often determine only the criteria of correctness, letting the criteria to then determine what is correct independently of our will. Thus it holds both that correctness is wholly our creation and that it is independent of us in the sense that things may be correct even if we do not know that they are (or, indeed, think them incorrect). (shrink)

Overview of Wilfrid Sellars's philosophy.