Pragmatism

As a philosophical movement, pragmatism was first introduced through the works of Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914), and then further developed by [Page 672]William James (1842–1910) and John Dewey (1859–1952). William James was the first to use the term pragmatism in print; however, he credited Peirce with formulating the concept in the early 1870s. The central notion of pragmatism focuses on the nature of truth. In it simplest explanation, pragmatism holds that truth is found in “what works,” and that truth is relative to the current situation. However simple these statements may be, they created some of the most heated and widespread debate concerning the value and “truth” of pragmatism as a philosophy. Its earliest critics, emanating from the European continent, saw pragmatism as a quaint American philosophy of little value. Later it was viewed by many quantitative and qualitative researchers as an attack on epistemology. What made pragmatism a lighting rod for criticism was, first, its softening of the nature of truth, which made the empirical sciences less certain of their moorings; and, second, its subtle shift toward a separation of truth and reality, or, more accurately, a separation of epistemology and ontology. As James was quick to point out, pragmatists speak of how truth is not ready made and therefore uncertain or relative. Adding to that was the ontological bridge contained within the philosophy of pragmatism that held that we and reality “make” truth.

Pragmatism is derived from the Greek word pragma, meaning action. Interestingly this is the same root from which words like practice and practical are created. Pragmatism is often seen as the practical philosophy in which truth is not seen as an absolute but a moveable and usable construct for understanding the nature of reality. Therefore, a chasm formed between empirical scientists, and the methods, truths, and philosophies they held as certain, and the pragmatist who maintained a blatant disregard for the certainty of empirically revealed truths. Pragmatists selected their truths by their functionality. If a truth or theory could be easily seen as practical, the pragmatist was an early adopter; if not, it simply became unusable. Thus the pragmatist was often seen as having an ability to put theory into practice.

In the end, as was William James's complaint, the pragmatist is simply unable to make truth a representation of reality, which was what the empiricist desired. Reality, according to the pragmatist, is to be revealed and experienced. Truths, portable or otherwise, were relative or practical only as long as they provided a tool for that reveal. Truths were easily seen as mutable and relative to an interpretive dialog. This was of great concern to the epistemologist and to the empirical sciences. Pragmatism when treated as an epistemological construct fails at every measure because it violates too many empirical conventions. For that reason it is quite easy to attack pragmatism. However, when pragmatism is treated as an ontological construct it is exceptionally informative and nearly impossible to attack using any epistemological razor.