With political growth and democracy, a new legal system was introduced in Athens. To quell the requisite knowledge in this era a group called sophists of lecturers, writers, and teachers came into being in the 5th and 4th centuries BCE, most of whom traveled about Greece giving instruction in a wide range of subjects in return for fees. Most of the major Sophists were not Athenians, but they made Athens the center of their activities, although traveling continuously. The importance of Athens was doubtless due in part to the greater freedom of speech prevailing there. Headed by Protagoras, the Sophists taught men how to speak and what arguments to use in public debate.
The stance that became widespread among these advocates of rational judgment was called relativism. They insisted that there is more than one side to the argument and there is no absolute truth – similar to Xenophanes’ teachings about truth and belied – and the only truth known to humans is subjective and relative to our circumstances: summed up by Protagoras in his saying ‘man is the measure of all things. However, this stance, like any other philosophical stance, gave rise to more questions and issues that were embedded in its use. For example, in moral philosophy, one could consider relativism as concluding that there are no moral absolutes in the world and that every action could be justified. But could it really?
