Pragmatic Genuine Philosophy
Pragmatism is a philosophy that emphasizes experience and context. It may not have an enlightened ethical framework or foundational principles. This could lead to the loss of idealistic goals and transformative change.
Contrary to deflationary theories, pragmatic theories do not reject the notion that statements are correlated to actual events. They merely explain the role truth plays in the practical world.
Definition
The word pragmatic is used to describe things or people that are practical, logical and sensible. It is often used to distinguish between idealistic which is an idea or a person that is based upon ideals or principles of high quality. When making a decision, the pragmatic person is aware of the world and the conditions. They focus on what is achievable and realistically feasible instead of trying to find the ideal course of action.
Pragmatism is a new philosophical movement that emphasizes the importance of practical consequences in determining the meaning, truth, or value. It is a third option to the dominant analytic and continental tradition of philosophy. It was founded by Charles Sanders Peirce and William James with Josiah Royce as its founding fathers, pragmatism developed into two competing streams that tended towards relativism, and the other toward the idea of realism.
The nature of truth is a major issue in pragmatism. While a majority of pragmatists agree that truth is a crucial concept, they are not sure how to define it and how it is used in the real world. One approach, influenced by Peirce and James, is focused on the ways in which people tackle problems and make assertions and prioritizes the speech-act and justification tasks of language-users in determining whether something is true. Another approach that is inspired by Rorty and his followers, focuses on the relatively mundane functions of truth--the way it serves to generalize, admonish and avert danger. It is also less concerned with a full-fledged theory of truth.
The first flaw with this neo-pragmatic view of truth is that it stray with relativism, as the notion of "truth" has such a long and extensive history that it is unlikely that it can be reduced to the nebulous uses to which pragmatists assign it. Second, pragmatism appears to deny the existence of truth in its metaphysical aspect. This is reflected by the fact that pragmatists, like Brandom, who owes much to Peirce and James but are uninformed about metaphysics. Dewey has only made one reference to truth in his extensive writings.
Purpose
The aim of pragmatism is to offer an alternative to analytic and Continental traditions of philosophy. Charles Sanders Peirce, William James and their Harvard colleague Josiah Royce (1860-1916) were the first to introduce it's first generation. These pragmatists from the classical period focused on the theory of inquiry as well as the nature of truth. Their influence was felt through several influential American thinkers, including John Dewey (1859-1952), who applied these theories to education and other dimensions of social improvement, and Jane Addams (1860-1935) who established social work.
In recent years an emerging generation has given pragmatism a wider debate platform. Although they differ from traditional pragmatists, a lot of the neo-pragmatists claim to be part of the same tradition. Robert Brandom is their main figure. He focuses his research on semantics and philosophy of language, but draws from the philosophy of Peirce, James, and others.
The neopragmatists have a different conception of what it takes for an idea to be true. The classical pragmatists focused on a concept called 'truth-functionality,' which states that an idea is genuinely true if it is useful in practice. pragmatic kr -pragmatists instead concentrate on the concept of 'ideal warranted assertion,' which says that an idea is true if the claim made about it is justified in a certain way to a specific audience.
This idea has its challenges. It is often criticized for being used to support illogical and silly concepts. The gremlin theory is a prime example: It's a useful idea that works in practice but is probably unfounded and nonsense. This is not a major issue, but it does highlight one of the main weaknesses of pragmatism: it can be used as a justification for just about everything.
Significance
When making decisions, pragmatic means taking into consideration the world as it is and its conditions. It can also be used to refer to a philosophical perspective that emphasizes the practical consequences in determining the meaning values, truth or. William James (1842-1910) first employed the term pragmatism describe this view in a lecture at the University of California, Berkeley. James claimed he invented the term along with his mentor and friend Charles Sanders Peirce, but the pragmatist viewpoint soon gained its own name.
The pragmatists resisted the sharp dichotomies of analytic philosophy such as value and fact as well as experience and thought, mind and body, synthetic and analytic and the list goes on. They also rejected the notion that truth was something fixed or objective, and instead treated it as a continuously evolving socially-determined notion.
James utilized these themes to investigate the truth of religion. John Dewey (1859-1952) was a major influence on a second generation of pragmatists who applied this method to politics, education and other aspects of social improvement.
In recent years, the Neopragmatists have tried to put the pragmatism in a larger Western philosophical framework. They have identified the affinities between Peirce’s views and those of Kant and other idealists of the 19th century, and the emerging theory of evolution. They also sought to understand the role of truth in an original epistemology a priori and to develop a metaphilosophy that is pragmatic that includes views on the meaning of language, as well as the nature and origin of knowledge.
However the fact that pragmatism is still evolving and the a posteriori approach that it came up with is an important departure from conventional methods. The people who defend it have had to face a myriad of arguments that are as old as the theory itself, yet have gained more attention in recent years. One of them is the notion that pragmatism is ineffective when applied to moral questions and that its assertion of "what works" is nothing more than relativism with an unpolished appearance.
Methods
For Peirce the pragmatic explanation of truth was an essential element of his epistemological plan. He saw it as an opportunity to discredit false metaphysical ideas such as the Catholic understanding of transubstantiation, and Cartesian certainty searching strategies in epistemology.
For many modern pragmatists, the Pragmatic Maxim is all that one can reasonably expect from an understanding of truth. They generally avoid deflationist theories of truth which require verification to be valid. Instead they advocate a different method which they call "pragmatic explication". This is the process of explaining how the concept is used in the real world and identifying conditions that must be met in order to recognize it as true.
It is important to remember that this approach may still be viewed as a type of relativism, and indeed is often criticised for doing so. But it is more moderate than the deflationist alternatives, and thus is a great way to get around some of the issues with relativism theories of truth.
In the wake of this, a number of liberatory philosophical projects like those that are linked to eco-philosophy and feminism, Native American philosophy, and Latin American philosophy, look for guidance in the pragmatist traditions. Quine for instance, is an analytical philosopher who has taken on the pragmatist tradition in a way Dewey could not.
It is important to acknowledge that pragmatism is a rich concept in the past, has some serious flaws. Particularly, pragmatic approach does not provide a meaningful test of truth, and it is not applicable to moral questions.
Quine, Wilfrid Solars and other pragmatists have also critiqued the philosophy. Richard Rorty and Robert Brandom are among the philosophers who have revived it from obscureness. These philosophers, despite not being classical pragmatists are influenced by the philosophy and work of Peirce James and Wittgenstein. The works of these philosophers are well worth reading by anyone who is interested in this philosophical movement.