Williams, NW orcid.org/0000-0003-3478-1864 (2018) Kidnapping an ugly child: is William James a pragmaticist? British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 26 (1). pp. 154-175. ISSN 0960-8788
Abstract
Since the term ‘pragmatism’ was first coined, there have been debates about who is or is not a ‘real’ pragmatist, and what that might mean. The division most often drawn in contemporary pragmatist scholarship is between William James and Charles Peirce. Peirce is said to present a version of pragmatism which is scientific, logical and objective about truth, whereas James presents a version which is nominalistic, subjectivistic and leads to relativism. The first person to set out this division was in fact Peirce himself, when he distinguished his own ‘pragmaticism’ from the broad pragmatism of James and others. Peirce sets out six criteria which defines ‘pragmaticism’: the pragmatic maxim; a number of ‘preliminary propositions’; prope-positivism; metaphysical inquiry; critical common-sensism; and scholastic realism. This paper sets out to argue that in fact James meets each of these criteria, and should be seen as a ‘pragmaticist’ by Peirce’s own lights.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2017 BSHP. This is an author produced version of a paper published in British Journal for the History of Philosophy. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. |
Keywords: | William James, Charles S. Peirce, nominalism, scholastic realism, pragmatism |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures (Leeds) > Inter-Disciplinary Ethics Applied (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 21 Jun 2018 15:19 |
Last Modified: | 04 Mar 2019 01:40 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Taylor and Francis |
Identification Number: | 10.1080/09608788.2017.1358140 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:125877 |