Read complete books and articles on: Pragmatism

Pragmatism - prăgˈmətĭzəm, method of philosophy in which the truth of a proposition is measured by its correspondence with experimental results and by its practical outcome. Thought is considered as simply an instrument for supporting the life aims of the human organism and has no real metaphysical significance. Pragmatism stands opposed to doctrines that hold that truth can be reached through deductive reasoning from a priori grounds and insists on the need for inductive investigation and constant empirical verification of hypotheses. There is constant protest against speculation concerning questions that have no application and no verifiable answers. Pragmatism holds that truth is modified as discoveries are made and is relative to the time and place and purpose of inquiry. In its ethical aspect pragmatism holds that knowledge that contributes to human values is real and that values play as essential a role in the choice of means employed in order to attain an end as they do in the choice of the end itself.

The philosophy was given its name by C. S. Peirce (c.1872), who developed the principles of pragmatic theory as formal doctrine. He was followed by William James, who held that in vital matters of faith the criterion for acceptance was the will to believe, and who was the key figure in promoting the widespread influence of pragmatism during the 1890s and early 1900s. John Dewey in his works developed the instrumentalist aspects of the doctrine. In Europe, F. C. S. Schiller (1864–1937) and others took up the theory. The succeeding generation of pragmatists included C. I. Lewis (1883–1964), whose conceptual pragmatism involves the application of Kantian principles to the investigation of empirical reality. W. V. O. Quine has upheld the validity of some a priori knowledge, pointing out that mathematics greatly facilitates scientific research. Richard Rorty has argued that theories are ultimately justified by their instrumentality, or the extent to which they enable people to attain their aims. Pragmatism dominated American philosophy from the 1890s to the 1930s and has reemerged as a significant element in contemporary thought.

See W. James, Pragmatism and Other Essays (ed. by R. B. Perry, 1965); A. J. Ayer, The Origins of Pragmatism (1968); H. S. Thayer, Meaning and Action: A Critical History of Pragmatism (1968, repr. 1981); C. Morris, The Pragmatic Movement in American Philosophy (1970); R. Rorty, Consequences of Pragmatism (1982); D. S. Clarke, Rational Acceptance and Purpose: An Outline of a Pragmatist Epistemology (1989); L. Menand, Pragmatism: A Reader (1997) and The Metaphysical Club (2001); M. Dickstein, ed., The Revival of Pragmatism (1999).

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15 of the Best Books and Articles on: Pragmatism

as selected by Questia librarians

1.

Pragmatism: From Peirce to Davidson » Read Now
by John P. Murphy. 152 pgs.

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2.

Pragmatism: From Progressivism to Postmodernism » Read Now
by Robert Hollinger, David Depew. 348 pgs.

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American pragmatism can be best understood against the background of 20th-century American culture and politics. The essays in this volume, by philosophers, cultural critics, and historians, explore the development of pragmatism in this context. The emphasis in this volume is on the interrelations...
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American pragmatism can be best understood against the background of 20th-century American culture and politics. The essays in this volume, by philosophers, cultural critics, and historians, explore the development of pragmatism in this context. The emphasis in this volume is on the interrelations between the philosophical or foundational issues raised by pragmatism as a philosophical movement, and the cultural, political, and educational programs that have been associated with pragmatism from James, Dewey, and Mead to Rorty and Cornel West. The book is divided into three parts, reflecting the periods of Progressivism, Positivism, and Postmodernism. The contributors explore the ways in which pragmatist writings have been appropriated or misappropriated in the literature and practice of Progressive reformers, positivist academics, end-of-ideology liberals, and postmodernists.
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3.

Purpose and Thought: The Meaning of Pragmatism » Read Now
by John E. Smith. 244 pgs.

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4.

Pragmatism and the American Mind: Essays and Reviews in Philosophy and Intellectual History » Read Now
by Morton White. 265 pgs.

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5.

The Revival of Pragmatism: New Essays on Social Thought, Law, and Culture » Read Now
by Morris Dickstein. 464 pgs.

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Although long considered the most distinctive American contribution to philosophy, pragmatism-with its problem-solving emphasis and its contingent view of truth-lost popularity in mid-century after the advent of World War II, the horror of the Holocaust, and the dawning of the Cold War. Since the...
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Although long considered the most distinctive American contribution to philosophy, pragmatism-with its problem-solving emphasis and its contingent view of truth-lost popularity in mid-century after the advent of World War II, the horror of the Holocaust, and the dawning of the Cold War. Since the 1960s, however, pragmatism in many guises has again gained prominence, finding congenial places to flourish within growing intellectual movements. This volume of new essays brings together leading philosophers, historians, legal scholars, social thinkers, and literary critics to examine the far-reaching effects of this revival.As the twenty-five intellectuals who take part in this discussion show, pragmatism has become a complex terrain on which a rich variety of contemporary debates have been played out. Contributors such as Richard Rorty, Stanley Cavell, Nancy Fraser, Robert Westbrook, Hilary Putnam, and Morris Dickstein trace pragmatism's cultural and intellectual evolution, consider its connection to democracy, and discuss its complex relationship to the work of Emerson, Nietzsche, and Wittgenstein. They show the influence of pragmatism on black intellectuals such as W. E. B. Du Bois, explore its view of poetic language, and debate its effects on social science, history, and jurisprudence. Also including essays by critics of the revival such as Alan Wolfe and John Patrick Diggins, the volume concludes with a response to the whole collection from Stanley Fish.Including an extensive bibliography, this interdisciplinary work provides an in-depth and broadly gauged introduction to pragmatism, one that will be crucial for understanding the shape of the transformations taking place in the American social and philosophical scene at the end of the twentieth century.Contributors: Richard Bernstein, David Bromwich, Ray Carney, Stanley Cavell, Morris Dickstein, John Patrick Diggins, Stanley Fish, Nancy Fraser, Thomas C. Grey, Giles Gunn, Hans Joas, James T. Kloppenberg, David Luban, Louis Menand, Sidney Morgenbesser, Richard Poirier, Richard A. Posner, Ross Posnock, Hilary Putnam, Ruth Anna Putnam, Richard Rorty, Michel Rosenfeld, Richard H. Weisberg, Robert B. Westbrook, Alan Wolfe
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6.

Pragmatism in Law and Society » Read Now
by Michael Brint, William Weaver. 417 pgs.

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7.

Reinventing Pragmatism: American Philosophy at the End of the Twentieth Century » Read Now
by Joseph Margolis. 179 pgs.

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Margolis considers the revival of American pragmatism as both a surprise and a turn of great importance. The discussion between Putnam and Rorty in the 1970s obliged American philosophers to reconsider the direction of philosophy in terms of competing accounts of realism and naturalism.
8.

Progress and Pragmatism: James, Dewey, Beard, and the American Idea of Progress » Read Now
by David W. Marcell. 404 pgs.

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9.

American Pragmatists: Selected Writings » Read Now
by Milton R. Konvitz, Gail Kennedy. 416 pgs.

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10.

Chance, Love, and Logic: Philosophical Essays » Read Now
by Charles Sanders Peirce. 322 pgs.

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Two of the most important and influential works by Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914) here in one volume. The first marks the beginning of pragmatism. The second presents Peirce's innovative essays on scientific metaphysics. (Peirce was) "one of the most original thinkers and system builders of any...
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Two of the most important and influential works by Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914) here in one volume. The first marks the beginning of pragmatism. The second presents Peirce's innovative essays on scientific metaphysics. (Peirce was) "one of the most original thinkers and system builders of any time, and certainly the greatest philosopher the United States has ever seen".--Joseph Brent, biographer.
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11.

Pragmatism and the Tragic Sense of Life » Read Now
by Sidney Hook. 224 pgs.

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12.

Pragmatism: A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking » Read Now
by William James. 279 pgs.

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13.

The Pragmatic Philosophy of William James » Read Now
by Ellen Kappy Suckiel. 190 pgs.

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14.

Hilary Putnam: Pragmatism and Realism » Read Now
by James Conant, Urszula M. Eglen. 243 pgs.

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One of the most influential contemporary philosophers, Hilary Putnam's involvement in philosophy spans philosophy of mind, philosophy of language, ontology and epistemology and logic. This collection discusses the realist and pragmatist debate.
15.

Radical Pragmatism: An Alternative » Read Now
by Robert J. Roth. 168 pgs.

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Robert Roth, among the first few Catholics to write favorably, even if critically, about American pragmatism, presents here a creative piece of comparative philosophy in which he achieves a long-term goal of attempting a reconciliation between pragmatism and a classical spiritual and religious...
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Robert Roth, among the first few Catholics to write favorably, even if critically, about American pragmatism, presents here a creative piece of comparative philosophy in which he achieves a long-term goal of attempting a reconciliation between pragmatism and a classical spiritual and religious perspective. The title, Radical Pragmatism, is an adaptation of William James's "radical empiricism". James had argued that the classical empiricists, Locke and Hume, did not go far enough in their account of experience. They missed some of its most important aspects, namely, connections and relations, and as a result they were left with discrete sense data and sense objects.
In a similar vein, Roth maintains that the pragmatists themselves have not been radical enough in developing the full implications of their own tradition. In chapters on Peirce, James, and Dewey, Roth makes the Fast full-scale attempt to show that the pragmatic notion of experience can be extended to include a classical spiritual andreligious perspective in a theory of knowledge, morality, God, religion, and person.
Radical Pragmatism also discuses the thought of the Jesuit priest and anthropologist, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, showing how Teilhard from an evolutionary standpoint addressed the problem, long considered by the pragmatists, of bringing religion and science into harmony. Teilhard's thesis, as espoused by Roth, is that one can be deeply religious in a traditional sense and still take seriously the importance of science and life in the world; thus giving rise to a more fully developed person.
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