26 January 2006
On Pragmatism
I read this
to approach Peirce and as an overview of pragmatism in general. The book seems to meet these goals. I do not yet know enough to form an opinion on the author’s stance, but he seemed to be more favorable to Peirce and Haack and against Rorty. Being dependent on the opinion of your peers or culture to determine how to act is bleak indeed. If truth is ethnocentric, then how does societal change happen?
The author writes well and conversationally. The claims attributed to Peirce seem incontestable; it is only as other writers work them over in later chapters that they become objectionable. Immediately James seems to stretch the ‘pragmatic maxim’ further than it can bear by introducing nominalism. Peirce’s pragmatic maxim is:
Consider what effects, that might conceivably have practical bearings, we conceive the object of our conception to have. Then, our conception of these effects is the whole of our conception of the object.
James and Peirce differ in what they had in mind with these ‘effects’. “James… is more explicit than Peirce… The effects are the sensations we are to expect and the reactions we must prepare. Here, too, there is a crucial difference between Peirce and James. Whereas Peirce aims to relate the meaning of an idea with the habits to which the idea gives rise (which are generals, not particulars), James relates the meaning of an idea strictly to particulars; i. e., sensations and reactions… Peirce rejects nominalism, which is the view that only particulars are real, in favor of realism, which is the view that some generals are real also.”
The idea that nothing can result from our ‘particulars’ doesn’t seem to work, but I guess I still need to read more. The rest of the chapters fall into line with distinction built upon distinction and philosophers surveyed put their own ideas on display. Dewey still seems daffy, and the source of much ill in education today. Eugenics rears its ugly head in Schiller, and some Italian intellectual bomb-throwers are detailed. Haack seems interesting, while Rorty terribly misguided. If he is right than there is no reason to study philosophy or anything else. Cornelis De Waal also has a book in the same series On Peirce that I should probably seek out.
I have a few other short books and one long tome I am midway through before I plan to start some serious Peirce. Daniel Dennett’s latest leaps to the front of the line once it appears in February.
to approach Peirce and as an overview of pragmatism in general. The book seems to meet these goals. I do not yet know enough to form an opinion on the author’s stance, but he seemed to be more favorable to Peirce and Haack and against Rorty. Being dependent on the opinion of your peers or culture to determine how to act is bleak indeed. If truth is ethnocentric, then how does societal change happen?The author writes well and conversationally. The claims attributed to Peirce seem incontestable; it is only as other writers work them over in later chapters that they become objectionable. Immediately James seems to stretch the ‘pragmatic maxim’ further than it can bear by introducing nominalism. Peirce’s pragmatic maxim is:
Consider what effects, that might conceivably have practical bearings, we conceive the object of our conception to have. Then, our conception of these effects is the whole of our conception of the object.
James and Peirce differ in what they had in mind with these ‘effects’. “James… is more explicit than Peirce… The effects are the sensations we are to expect and the reactions we must prepare. Here, too, there is a crucial difference between Peirce and James. Whereas Peirce aims to relate the meaning of an idea with the habits to which the idea gives rise (which are generals, not particulars), James relates the meaning of an idea strictly to particulars; i. e., sensations and reactions… Peirce rejects nominalism, which is the view that only particulars are real, in favor of realism, which is the view that some generals are real also.”
The idea that nothing can result from our ‘particulars’ doesn’t seem to work, but I guess I still need to read more. The rest of the chapters fall into line with distinction built upon distinction and philosophers surveyed put their own ideas on display. Dewey still seems daffy, and the source of much ill in education today. Eugenics rears its ugly head in Schiller, and some Italian intellectual bomb-throwers are detailed. Haack seems interesting, while Rorty terribly misguided. If he is right than there is no reason to study philosophy or anything else. Cornelis De Waal also has a book in the same series On Peirce
that I should probably seek out.I have a few other short books and one long tome I am midway through before I plan to start some serious Peirce. Daniel Dennett’s latest leaps to the front of the line once it appears in February.
