Talk:Pragmatism

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Additional clarification?[edit]

The request for for clarification of the term "representative accuracy" seems unwarranted in context, as it clearly means the correctness of a belief, for example, as opposed to its usefulness. What may be needed is the citation of some secondary source as the basis of this general definition. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rmrwiki (talk • contribs) 04:49, 27 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Instrumentalism in the 21st century.[edit]

GUIDANCE REQUEST: I propose updating the article on Instrumentalism to explain how John Dewey and Karl Popper have been reinterpreted, making instrumentalism an active part of the philosophy of science project relevant to inductive reasoning, technology, and pragmatism. Please evaluate my proposal at talk: Instrumentalism, entries 20 and 21.TBR-qed (talk) 19:50, 6 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A List of Pragmatists[edit]

Hu Shi is hardly a "fringe figure." One of the major advocates for the "baihua" (vernacular Chinese) movement, a chancellor at Peking University, a Director of Academia Sinica, and a Chinese ambassador to the US, he ranks among the most important Chinese intellectuals of the 20th century. Calling him a "fringe figure" is Euro-centric, to say the least. Isn't this kind of evaluation too subjective anyway? --Majining (talk) 03:58, 16 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Punctation (clarity)[edit]

The following sentence from Summary seems tangled: 

It equates any conception of an object to a conception of that object's effects to 
a general extent of the effects' conceivable implications for informed practice.

As an interpretation/reworking/extension of the maxim (no citation given), I am guessing this is what it means: 

It equates any conception of an object to the general extent of the conceivable 
implications for informed practice of that object's effects.

I have changed it accordingly. If I've misunderstood would someone please rewrite the original to clarify what it means to say. LookingGlass (talk) 13:15, 25 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Unbalanced and misleading[edit]

I began trying to clarify the text in the section I have tagged, but I have run out of time and am not an expert. I suspect the tenets described are approximately correct, but from the citations given they give a false impression of what the philosophers concerned wrote and the significance of this. The tagging was prompted by the claims made in the second paragraph of the second sub-section. Judging from the citation provided, Peirce's arguments as described here are not a true reflection of what he wrote. The article claims he argues agains intuition but this is from a quite particular definition of what intuition is. Pierce acknowledges this from the outset and it central to explain this somehow as the idea that pragmatists (Peircean) hold that meta- conceptions of "semiotic" processes have no validity goes entirely against the work of modern semioticians (Peircean) such as Hoffmeyer, Kull, et al. Peirce's article goes on to use and argument of Kant, something the article claims was a specific target the pragmatists set themselves in distinction to, and he then uses inference (ditto) with respect to this and to the young children's development it refers to in order to "prove" his point. I accept this only indicates the problems rather than details them precisely but it suffices imo to describe the lack of neutrality the section represents as it stands. An overhaul of the "tenets" described in this section is needed to clarify what they might be and especially how they have evolved to Peirce and into their current form(s), as, as with any "school", pragmatism is simply a category, which for convenience has been applied to elements of a wide field, rather than something to which those identified with it have necessarily subscribed to in anything but outline. There are therefore undoubtedly many variants, of significance, between the tenets of its individual members. The article as it stands however gives the impression that this is not the case and that the summaries provided e.g of the work of Peirce ,are those of the field as a whole, as well as that they are accurate and neutral summaries of what Peirce wrote. Neither seem to me to be the case at present. LookingGlass (talk) 14:30, 25 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

As a summary of the above, it seems to me that the preceding sections are clear and robust and that subsequent sections should accord with it and likewise be built on these qualities.LookingGlass (talk) 15:20, 25 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Consolidation[edit]

I've moved some passages around to put like with like and begin removing duplications. The introduction seems to now have the key information that previously was dispersed across the first three sections. I've moved the "positions characteristic of" list into the Core tenets section as they seem to belong there, and I've edited the intro and origins sections, however that leaves the Summary to be tidied up to remove its duplications. These are all cosmetic changes affecting readability etc, not changes to the content as such.

It seems to me the next step is to "merge" the two sections:- Origins, and Summary as the Summary in part details the origins of pragmatism and the Origins in part summarizes it.

LookingGlass (talk) 20:14, 25 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Done! It only needed for the summary to be slotted into the right place. Again, I've made no changes to the content. LookingGlass (talk) 20:23, 25 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

On mirroring reality[edit]

I am no expert in pragmatism, and in fact I am quite ignorant of it. However, I have just read some of Haack's commentary of Rorty (an article in the New Criterion on what she calls "vulgar rortyism" and the famous essay "We Pragmatists...", in which she compares Rorty and Peirce), and I came out with the impression that Peirce values truth and sees truth as correspondence with reality. Check out one of the passages of her fictional dialogue, composed of passages from mr. Peirce's book: «C. S. Peirce: You certainly opine that there is such a thing as Truth. Otherwise, reasoning and thought would be without a purpose. What do you mean by there being such a thing as Truth? You mean that something is SO (...) whether you, or I, or anybody thinks it is so or not. (...) The essence of the opinion is that there is something that is SO, no matter if there be an overwhelming vote against it (2.135). Every man is fully satisfied that there is such a thing as truth, or he would not ask any question. That truth consists in a conformity to something independent of his thinking it to be so, or of any man's opinion on that subject (5.211). Truth [is] overwhelmingly forced upon the mind in experience as the effect of an independent reality (5.564). The essence of truth lies in its resistance to being ignored (2.139).» — And later on Peirce talks about opinion "coinciding" with fact and he states explicitly that "Truth is conformity of a representation to its object."

From her article on the New Criterion, I wouldn't be surprised if mr. Dewey had a similar opinion to that of mr. Peirce. So it seems the introductory passages of this article are misleading, because it states pragmatists reject the correspondence criterion of truth. And worse: it provides as reference one of James's book detailing the "Will to Believe" doctrine of truth, which Haack states (in the New Criterion) Dewey and Peirce abhor, as well as others (IIRC). I am not sure what Putnam says in his books on pragmatisms (such as "Representation and Reality"), but I've seen him being described as not quite a relativist, and given that he respects reason so highly, I wouldn't be surprised if he disagreed with mr. James on what truth is. Perhaps this Wiki article's approach was influenced too much by a Jamesian or a Rortyian brand of pragmatism? Anyway, this is something future editors, with more competence than myself, should check out. Thanks for reading! 189.61.236.160 (talk) 19:18, 17 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

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Effects on urbanism section[edit]

I have removed this section in its entirety. It cites Peirce's "How to Make Our Ideas Clear" as a source on a topic Peirce never discusses in the piece. It misattributes to Rorty a quote from Davidson's "The Myth of the Subjective" that isn't even on point anyway, and then veers off into OR. This is followed by a paragraph having nothing to do with any putative effects of pragmatism on urbanism. -- Rrburke (talk) 14:25, 13 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Holmes, Breyer and legal pragmatism[edit]

Oliver Wendell Holmes should probably be readded to the list of "old" pragmatists. Holmes was among the first "generation" of prominent pragmatist figures, and he was so regarded at the time. Jurisprudence aside, he met with James, Peirce etc. in the Metaphysical Club in Cambridge and wrote plenty on, for example, Plato and the Transcendentalists, which in my view places him pretty firmly within the philosophical tradition of pragmatism proper. Haack's own class on pragmatism at UMiami includes readings from Holmes as well; this can be verified on her syllabus for the course which can be found online for public view. The existing Wiki articles on Holmes, James, and the Metaphysical Club agree, just to name a few; it is rather jarring in particular to read on Holmes' article that his works influenced "schools of pragmatism, critical legal studies, and law and economics," then click the link to "pragmatism" and find no mention of him whatsoever, not even in a list of notable and relevant figures.

I can understand Breyer's removal on the grounds that this article is supposed to focus on the philosophical tradition as such, but one can (and many do) draw a pretty clear line from the judicial "version" of pragmatism through Rorty's political theory and all the way back to the Cambridge discussions between James, Peirce, Holmes and so on. I think this is, correctly, reflected in the contemporary literature. To give a few examples, Menand's "reader" on pragmatism fairly includes excerpts from Holmes, most notably from the Common Law, and Sunstein's writings on Breyer's jurisprudence cite James, Peirce and Posner extensively. I can provide sources for these and more if needed.

I think the best course of action is to add Holmes to the list of "classical pragmatists" and place Breyer in the list of pragmatists "in the extended sense," alongside West etc.

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