Anyone who thinks, for example, of “realism,” “sur-realism,” and the like in matters of art, or of the vulgar and journalistic vagueness in the use of the adjective “realistic,” may be prepared for the discovery that in philosophy also the term “realist” is either uncomfortably fluid or else acquires technical senses that are rather easily blurred. Our lexicographers tell us that, in its most general sense, “realism” indicates fidelity to what is real, particularly in the representation of (usually sordid) matters of fact, and that in philosophy it is an antithetic term, asserting the contrary either of