Download or read book A Natural History of Pragmatism written by Joan Richardson and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2006-12-21 with total page 14 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Joan Richardson provides a fascinating and compelling account of the emergence of the quintessential American philosophy: pragmatism. She demonstrates pragmatism's engagement with various branches of the natural sciences and traces the development of Jamesian pragmatism from the late nineteenth century through modernism, following its pointings into the present. Richardson combines strands from America's religious experience with scientific information to offer interpretations that break new ground in literary and cultural history. This book exemplifies the value of interdisciplinary approaches to producing literary criticism. In a series of highly original readings of Edwards, Emerson, William and Henry James, Stevens, and Stein, A Natural History of Pragmatism tracks the interplay of religious motive, scientific speculation, and literature in shaping an American aesthetic. Wide-ranging and bold, this groundbreaking book will be essential reading for all students and scholars of American literature.

Download or read book Pragmatism as a Principle and Method of Right Thinking written by Charles Sanders Peirce and published by SUNY Press. This book was released on 1997-01-01 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a study edition of Charles Sanders Peirce's manuscripts for lectures on pragmatism given in spring 1903 at Harvard University. Excerpts from these writings have been published elsewhere but in abbreviated form. Turrisi has edited the manuscripts for publication and has written a series of notes that illuminate the historical, scientific, and philosophical contexts of Peirce's references in the lectures. She has also written a Preface that describes the manner in which the lectures came to be given, including an account of Peirce's life and career pertinent to understanding the philosopher himself. Turrisi's introduction interprets Peirce's brand of pragmatism within his system of logic and philosophy of science as well as within general philosophical principles.

Download or read book Pragmatism s Evolution written by Trevor Pearce and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2020-10-20 with total page 380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “An important contribution . . . invaluable to anyone interested in the history of pragmatism and the influence of biology and evolution on pragmatic thinkers.” —Richard J. Bernstein, The New School for Social Research, author of The Pragmatic Turn In Pragmatism’s Evolution, Trevor Pearce demonstrates that the philosophical tradition of pragmatism owes an enormous debt to specific biological debates in the late 1800s, especially those concerning the role of the environment in development and evolution. Many are familiar with John Dewey’s 1909 assertion that evolutionary ideas overturned two thousand years of philosophy—but what exactly happened in the fifty years prior to Dewey’s claim? What form did evolutionary ideas take? When and how were they received by American philosophers? Although the various thinkers associated with pragmatism—from Charles Sanders Peirce to Jane Addams and beyond—were towering figures in American intellectual life, few realize the full extent of their engagement with the life sciences. In his analysis, Pearce focuses on a series of debates in biology from 1860 to 1910—from the instincts of honeybees to the inheritance of acquired characteristics—in which the pragmatists were active participants. If we want to understand the pragmatists and their influence, Pearce argues, we need to understand the relationship between pragmatism and biology. “Pragmatism’s Evolution is about the role of evolution, as a theory, in American pragmatism, as well as the early evolution of pragmatism itself.” —Isis “Superb.” —Metascience “[An] important book.” —Acta Biotheoretica “A significant and edifying work.” —Choice “Pearce has done something remarkable and all too rare: written a book at the intersection of philosophy, science, and history that is equally excellent in all three respects.” —International Journal of Philosophical Studies

Download or read book A Natural History of Pragmatism written by Joan Richardson and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2006-12-21 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Joan Richardson provides a fascinating and compelling account of the emergence of the quintessential American philosophy: pragmatism. She demonstrates pragmatism's engagement with various branches of the natural sciences and traces the development of Jamesian pragmatism from the late nineteenth century through modernism, following its pointings into the present. Richardson combines strands from America's religious experience with scientific information to offer interpretations that break new ground in literary and cultural history. This book exemplifies the value of interdisciplinary approaches to producing literary criticism. In a series of highly original readings of Edwards, Emerson, William and Henry James, Stevens, and Stein, A Natural History of Pragmatism tracks the interplay of religious motive, scientific speculation, and literature in shaping an American aesthetic. Wide-ranging and bold, this groundbreaking book will be essential reading for all students and scholars of American literature.

Download or read book Pragmatism Pluralism and the Nature of Philosophy written by Scott F. Aikin and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-10-30 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For the past fifteen years, Aikin and Talisse have been working collaboratively on a new vision of American pragmatism, one which sees pragmatism as a living and developing philosophical idiom that originates in the work of the "classical" pragmatisms of Charles Peirce, William James, and John Dewey, uninterruptedly develops through the later 20th Century pragmatists (C. I. Lewis, Wilfrid Sellars, Nelson Goodman, W. V. O. Quine), and continues through the present day. According to Aikin and Talisse, pragmatism is fundamentally a metaphilosophical proposal – a methodological suggestion for carrying inquiry forward amidst ongoing deep disagreement over the aims, limitations, and possibilities of philosophy. This conception of pragmatism not only runs contrary to the dominant self-understanding among cotemporary philosophers who identify with the classical pragmatists, it also holds important implications for pragmatist philosophy. In particular, Aikin and Talisse show that their version of pragmatism involves distinctive claims about epistemic justification, moral disagreement, democratic citizenship, and the conduct of inquiry. The chapters combine detailed engagements with the history and development of pragmatism with original argumentation aimed at a philosophical audience beyond pragmatism.

Download or read book Pragmatism and American Experience written by Joan Richardson and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2014-06-09 with total page 293 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Pragmatism and American Experience provides a lucid and elegant introduction to America's defining philosophy. Joan Richardson charts the nineteenth-century origins of pragmatist thought and its development through the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, focusing on the major first- and second-generation figures and how their contributions continue to influence philosophical discourse today. At the same time, Richardson casts pragmatism as the method it was designed to be: a way of making ideas clear, examining beliefs, and breaking old habits and reinforcing new and useful ones in the interest of maintaining healthy communities through ongoing conversation. Through this practice we come to perceive, as William James did, that thinking is as natural as breathing, and that the essential work of pragmatism is to open channels essential to all experience.

Download or read book Preludes to Pragmatism written by Philip Kitcher and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2012-11-01 with total page 459 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In these essays, distinguished philosopher Philip Kitcher argues for a reconstruction of philosophy along the lines of classical Pragmatism

Download or read book Pragmatism written by Hilary Putnam and published by Wiley-Blackwell. This book was released on 1995-02-17 with total page 120 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hilary Putnam has been at the center of contemporary debates about the nature of the mind and of its access to the world, about language and its relation to reality, and many other metaphysical and epistemological issues. In this book he turns to pragmatism - and confronts the teachings of James, Peirce, Dewey, and Wittgenstein - not solely out of an interest in theoretical questions, but above all to respond to the questions of whether it is possible to find an alternative to corrosive moral skepticism, on the one hand, and to moral authoritarianism on the other.

Download or read book Cognitive Pragmatism written by Nicholas Rescher and published by University of Pittsburgh Pre. This book was released on 2017-03-13 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Cognitive Pragmatism, Nicholas Rescher tackles the major questions of philosophical inquiry, pondering the nature of truth and existence. In the authoritative voice and calculated manner that we've come to expect from this distinguished philosopher, Rescher argues that the development of knowledge is a practice, pursued by humans because we have a need for its products. This pragmatic approach satisfies our innate urge as humans to make sense of our surroundings.Taking his discussion down to the level of particular details, and addressing such topics as inductive validation, hypostatization fallacies, and counterfactual reasoning, Rescher abandons abstract generalities in favor of concrete specifics. For example, philosophers usually insist that to reason logically from a counterfactual, we must imagine a possible world in which the statement is fact. But Rescher argues that there's no need to attempt to accept the facts of a world outside our cognition in order to reason from them. He shows us how we can use our own natural system of prioritizing, our own understanding of the fundamental, to resolve the inconsistencies in such statements as, "If the Eiffel Tower were in Manhattan, then it would be in New York State." In using dozens of real-world examples such as these, and in arguing in his characteristically succinct style, Rescher casts light on a wide variety of concrete issues in the classical theory of knowledge, and reassures us along the way that the inherent limitations on our knowledge are no cause for distress. In pragmatic theory and inquiry, we must accept that the best we can do is good enough, because we only have a certain (albeit large) set of tools and conceptualizations available to us.A unique synthesis, this endeavor into pragmatic epistemology will be of interest to scholars and students of philosophy and cognitive science.

Download or read book Stoic Pragmatism written by John Lachs and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2012-05-09 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: John Lachs, one of American philosophy's most distinguished interpreters, turns to William James, Josiah Royce, Charles S. Peirce, John Dewey, and George Santayana to elaborate stoic pragmatism, or a way to live life within reasonable limits. Stoic pragmatism makes sense of our moral obligations in a world driven by perfectionist human ambition and unreachable standards of achievement. Lachs proposes a corrective to pragmatist amelioration and stoic acquiescence by being satisfied with what is good enough. This personal, yet modest, philosophy offers penetrating insights into the American way of life and our human character.

Download or read book The Promise of Pragmatism written by John Patrick Diggins and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1995-05-15 with total page 534 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For much of our century, pragmatism has enjoyed a charmed life, holding the dominant point of view in American politics, law, education, and social thought in general. After suffering a brief eclipse in the post-World War II period, pragmatism has enjoyed a revival, especially in literary theory and such areas as poststructuralism and deconstruction. In this sweeping critique of pragmatism and neopragmatism, one of our leading intellectual historians traces the attempts of thinkers from William James to Richard Rorty to find a response to the crisis of modernism. John Patrick Diggins analyzes the limitations of pragmatism from a historical perspective and dares to ask whether America's one original contribution to the world of philosophy has actually fulfilled its promise. In the late nineteenth century, intellectuals felt themselves in the grips of a spiritual crisis. This confrontation with the "acids of modernity" eroded older faiths and led to a sense that life would continue in the awareness, of absences: knowledge without truth, power without authority, society without spirit, self without identity, politics without virtue, existence without purpose, history without meaning. In Europe, Friedrich Nietzsche and Max Weber faced a world in which God was "dead" and society was succumbing to structures of power and domination. In America, Henry Adams resigned from Harvard when he realized there were no truths to be taught and when he could only conclude: "Experience ceases to educate." To the American philosophers of pragmatism, it was experience that provided the basis on which new methods of knowing could replace older ideas of truth. Diggins examines how, in different ways, William James, Charles Peirce, John Dewey, George H. Mead, and Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., demonstrated that modernism posed no obstacle in fields such as science, education, religion, law, politics, and diplomacy. Diggins also examines the work of the neopragmatists Jurgen Habermas and Richard Rorty and their attempt to resolve the crisis of postmodernism. Using one author to interrogate another, Diggins brilliantly allows the ideas to speak to our conditions as well as theirs. Did the older philosophers succeed in fulfilling the promises of pragmatism? Can the neopragmatists write their way out of what they have thought themselves into? And does America need philosophers to tell us that we do not need foundational truths when the Founders already told us that the Constitution would be a "machine" that would depend more upon the "counterpoise" of power than on the claims of knowledge? Diggins addresses these and other essential questions in this magisterial account of twentieth-century intellectual life. It should be read by everyone concerned about the roots of postmodernism (and its links to pragmatism) and about the forms of thought and action available for confronting a world after postmodernism.

Download or read book Philosophical Essays in Pragmatic Naturalism written by Paul Kurtz and published by . This book was released on 1990 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kurtz (philosophy, SUNY at Buffalo; editor, Free inquiry; and president, Prometheus Books) collects his essays, articles, and contributions to books written over the past thirty-five years. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Download or read book Pragmatism Ascendent written by Joseph Margolis and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 2012-10-17 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Pragmatism Ascendent is the last of four volumes on the contribution of pragmatism to American philosophy and Western philosophy as a whole. It covers the period of American philosophy's greatest influence worldwide, from the second half of the 20th century through the beginning of the 21st. The book provides an account of the way pragmatism reinterprets the revolutionary contributions of Kant and Hegel, the significance of pragmatism's original vision, and the expansion of classic pragmatism to incorporate the strongest themes of Hegelian and Darwinian sources. In the process, it addresses many topics either scanted or not addressed at all in most overviews of the pragmatism's relevance today. Noting the conceptual stalemate, confusion, and inertia of much of current Western philosophy, Margolis advances a new line of inquiry. He considers a fresh conception of the human agent as a hybrid artifact of enlanguaged culture, the decline of all forms of cognitive privilege, the pragmatist sense of the practical adequacy of philosophical solutions, and the possibilities for a recuperative convergence of the best resources of Western philosophy's most viable movements.

Download or read book Pragmatism and Other Writings written by William James and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2000-04-01 with total page 404 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The writings of William James represent one of America's most original contributions to the history of ideas. Ranging from philosophy and psychology to religion and politics, James composed the most engaging formulation of American pragmatism. 'Pragmatism' grew out of a set of lectures and the full text is included here along with 'The Meaning of Truth', 'Psychology', 'The Will to Believe', and 'Talks to Teachers on Psychology'.

Download or read book Essays in Pragmatism written by William James and published by Read Books Ltd. This book was released on 2013-03-05 with total page 181 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This antiquarian volume contains Henry James's seminal philosophical treatise, 'Essays in Pragmatism'. The ideas outlined within this text underpin James's work, and are key to understanding the mind of this most important of philosophical thinkers. The volume will be of considerable use to the student of philosophy and those with a keen interest James's work, and it is a veritable must-have for collectors of important philosophical writings. The chapters of this book include: 'The Sentiment of Rationality', 'The Dilemma of Determinism', 'The Moral Philosopher and the Moral Life', 'The Will to Believe', 'Conclusions on Varieties of Religious Experience', 'What Pragmatism Means', 'Pragmatism's Conception of Truth', and more. William James (1842 – 1910) was an American philosopher, psychologist, and trained physician. He is hailed as one of the most influential philosophers the United States has ever produced. We are republishing this book now complete with a specially commissioned biography of the author.

Download or read book A Philosophy of Culture written by Morton White and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2009-02-09 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book, one of America's leading philosophers offers a sweeping reconsideration of the philosophy of culture in the twentieth century. Morton White argues that the discipline is much more important than is often recognized, and that his version of holistic pragmatism can accommodate its breadth. Going beyond Quine's dictum that philosophy of science is philosophy enough, White suggests that it should contain the word "culture" in place of "science." He defends the holistic view that scientific belief is tested by experience but that such testing is rightly applied to systems or conjunctions of beliefs, not isolated beliefs. He adds, however, that we test ethical systems by appealing to feelings of moral obligation as well as to sensory experiences. In the course of his lucidly written analysis, White treats central issues in the philosophy of science, of religion, of art, of history, of law, of politics, and of morality. While doing so he examines the views of Quine, Tarski, Goodman, and Rawls, and shows how they are related to the approaches of Peirce, James, Duhem, Russell, Dewey, Carnap, and the later Wittgenstein. He also discusses the ideas of the legal philosophers Holmes and Hart from a holistic standpoint. White demonstrates how his version of pragmatism bridges the traditional gulf between analytic and synthetic truth as well as that between moral and scientific belief. Indeed, the high point of the book is a brilliant presentation of his view of ethics, based on the idea that our scientific theories face the tribunal of observation whereas our ethical views face the joint tribunal of observation and moral feeling. Scholars and students of the history of ideas and of philosophy will welcome A Philosophy of Culture as the highly finished product of more than sixty years of philosophical reflection by an important thinker.

Download or read book The Agrarian Roots of Pragmatism written by Paul B. Thompson and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Critically analyzes and revitalizes agrarian philosophy by tracing its evolution. Today, most historians, philosophers, political theorists, and scholars of rural America take a dim view of the agrarian ideal that farmers and farming occupy a special moral and political status in society. Agrarian rhetoric is generally seen as special pleading on the part of farmers seeking protection from labor reform and environmental regulation while continuing to receive direct payments and subsidies from the public till. Agrarianism should not be viewed as a set of immutable claims about farming and political order, but as a tradition of moral and political philosophy that has evolved and deepened over the centuries. Agrarian naturalism--the belief that culture and conduct are conditioned by nature because they are of a piece with nature--becomes pragmatic naturalism, giving way to a new set of puzzles about how we are to understand the rural landscape and our responsibilities for its use. The agrarian idea that personality and sociability are integrated with the material transformation of the landscape can serve as the basis for a new, pragmatically grounded ethic of natural resources and rural development. The essays in this volume critically analyze and revitalize agrarian philosophy by tracing its evolution in the classical American philosophy of key figures such as Franklin, Jefferson, Emerson, Thoreau, Dewey, and Royce. Three chapters address the belief that farming peoples develop moral virtue and a taste for democracy as it evolved in the American context, and four examine how a reconstitution of agrarian themes might invigorate our nation's thinking on environment, food, and rural development policy. The Agrarian Roots of Pragmatism will be of broad interest to scholars of American philosophy, rural history, history of ideas, geography, and agricultural or natural resource policy.