Pragmatism and Idealism.

Abstract

Foundations of in American Thought series offers two sets of volumes containing the most significant defenses and critiques of pragmatism written before World War I: the Early Defenders of Pragmatism and Early Critics of Pragmatism. This, the first collection, Early Defenders, provides key texts for understanding the context of pragmatism's years of greatest vitality. Each author was either a pragmatist of stature in their own right, or a formidable philosophical critic from a rival school of thought. They all participated in the heated controversies over pragmatism during its first decade, and drew onthis experience to sum up their views in their books reprinted in these sets. The early critics represent the broad spectrum of philosophical activity at the start of the 20th century. James B. Pratt was educated at Harvard; initially attracted to James's pragmatism, he soon became a member of the Realist movement. Paul Carus, the editor of Monist, and Albert Schinz, a scholar of language and literature, deplored pragmatism's relativism. William Caldwell was a product of the Cornell school of idealism. John T. Driscoll appealled to Thomistic scholasticism for his critique of pragmatism. The central texts of the movement can be found in this set, along with a representative selection of the secondary texts, reviews and responses they elicited. Each volume features a newly-commissioned introduction by a scholar of American pragmatism.