Peircean Pragmatism Research Articles

Rossi-Landi e il pragmatismo

As already emerges in his 1961 book, Significato, comunicazione e parlare comune, Rossi-Landi reflects on sign and language relatedly to the American tradition in pragmatism from Peirce to Morris (he published a monograph on Morris in 1953). He also recovers the contribution made by Giovanni Vailati, who was among the first in Italy to recognize the importance of Peirce’s pragmatism. Through Peircean pragmatism, Rossi-Landi oriented his work from the very beginning in the direction of a semiotics of interpretation in contrast to a semiotics – or better semiology in this case – of the code, of decodification. His “philosophical methodics” continues to be characterized in terms of “pragmatism,” from his works of the late 1960s and early 1970s (Linguaggio come lavoro e come mercato, 1968, and Semiotica e ideologia, 1972), to his last book Metodica filosofica e scienza dei segni (1985, the year of his death), in which recovering Wittgenstein he reconsiders the question of the “traps of language” in the Marxian terms of “linguistic alienation.”

Comparing abduction and retroduction in Peircean pragmatism and critical realism

ABSTRACT Abduction as a method for sociological explanation is increasingly gaining interest, but questions remain as to what exactly it is and how it differs from other methods of inquiry. This paper compares abduction as conceived in Peircean pragmatism with the critical realist concept of retroduction. I argue that abduction in the Peircean sense and retroduction in the critical realist sense refer to different, but complementary, modes of inference. Abductive conclusions provide the starting point for retroductive inferences; the latter inform the tenability of the former. Together, abduction and retroduction contribute to theoretical explanation.

World oriented self-formation as sublimation: or why postphenomenology needs Peircean pragmatism

A pós-fenomenologia é um enfoque na filosofia da tecnologia que investiga como as tecnologias influenciam e moldam o mundo e o ego. Embora a pós-fenomenologia tenha expressado desde o início a ambição de oferecer uma estrutura não-essencialista e não-fundacionista, o desenvolvimento estrutural desse aspecto está virtualmente ausente. O pragmatismo peirciano, como será proposto, pode fornecer essa estrutura, bem como os blocos de construção para o desenvolvimento da visão da autoformação em termos de sublimação. Essa visão tenta reconhecer que nosso ambiente, que é cada vez mais um ambiente tecnológico e sujeito à mudança radical, molda consideravelmente quem nós somos e influencia quem deveremos ser. E, ao mesmo tempo, resiste à ideia de que o ego não é mais do que um joguete de influências e forças contingentes.

A Different Legal Conservatism

In Conservatism and Pragmatism, Seth Vannatta posits and explores several major conceptual and practical affinities between classical (especially Peircean) pragmatism and conservatism. Characterizing both as essentially methods rather than ideologies, he argues that the two ought to be understood as mutually supportive and corrective, and that they conjointly supply an especially robust set of intellectual resources relevant to contemporary moral, political, and legal concerns. This essay critically examines Vannatta’s marriage of conservatism and pragmatism in the realm of legal theory. It argues that while Vannatta’s work provides a rigorous pragmatist alternative to the familiar legal formalism adopted by many American conservatives, its foundations may be narrower than Vannatta appreciates and the resulting theory may have little necessary connection to the dispositional, methodological conservatism upon which it is purportedly based.

Narrative Inquiry and New Materialism: Stories as (Not Necessarily Benign) Agents

Agential realism—the idea that it makes sense to view the world as being composed of various forms of protean nonhuman agency—has been a topic of discussion for many social science scholars in recent years. This increase of interest in agent ontologies can be attributed to the new feminist materialist movement in the philosophy of science literature. However, agent ontologies also are found in Indigenous studies literature and in Peircean pragmatism. These latter sources are also a part of the current methodological conversation about nonhuman agency. This article explores the connections between agential realist philosophy and social science research that employs narrative forms of analysis and representation. The goal is to assist narrative researchers in avoiding oversimplification by tracing out different strands in these literatures and mapping out points of connection and disconnection in detail. Intersections that hold the promise of complementary development are highlighted.

Democratic epistemology and democratic morality: the appeal and challenges of Peircean pragmatism

Does the wide distribution of political power in democracies, relative to other modes of government, result in better decisions? Specifically, do we have any reason to believe that they are better qualitatively – more reasoned, better supported by the available evidence, more deserving of support – than those which have been made by other means? In order to answer this question, we examine the recent effort by Talisse and Misak to show that democracy is epistemically justified. Highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of their arguments, we conclude that the differences between an epistemic conception of democracy and an epistemic justification of democracy are fundamental to determining the relative attractions of different arguments for democracy, and their implications for actual forms of government.

A Systems Theory of Organizational Information

Standing on both the Peircean pragmatism semiotics and the Churchmanian systems thinking, this paper is an empirically grounded conceptualization of the phenomena of organizational information in terms of the nature and the formulation process of information in organizations. Four organizational cases in consulting industries were conducted for field data to firmly ground the resultant emergent theory. Two research findings were gained: organizational information as system, and organizational information formulation as habit production. By the author's systems based conception, organizational information would present itself as a unity that comprises nonexclusive six aspects: structure, function, process, context, time and epistemology. From the relational perspective, organizational information would better manifest itself as a dynamically triadic process in the form of the Peircean semiosis that comprises three states of mind (i.e. surprise, doubt, and belief) and three relations, or human activities (i.e. experience, abduction, and inquiry). Further, the findings also suggest paradigmatic distinction among three common information categories (i.e. data, knowledge, information), where ‘data' was found to be monadic, ‘knowledge' dyadic, and ‘information' triadic. The author's grounded systems model of organizational information introduces a sketch of a semiotics based framework for both information and organization domains, which offers that information and organization constitute each other. The author also posits that the grounded systems model of organizational information would imply an information paradigm for, and hence, a theory native to the information systems (IS) and knowledge management (KM) field.

Harald R. Wohlrapp: The Concept of Argument: A Philosophical Foundation. Logic, Argumentation and Reasoning 4

In this work, the fruit of some 30 years of research in the Hamburg argumentation group, the author proposes a new philosophical foundation for the study of argumentation. His theory can be briefly characterized as ‘‘pragmatic-dialectical’’, since it is shaped by a Peircean pragmatism and a quasi-Hegelian dialectic. It is both more pragmatic and more dialectical than the Amsterdam pragma-dialectical theory of argumentation. Readers are likely to find the book difficult to follow, because of its many new concepts and new definitions of old concepts. The present reviewer found it useful to write a close summary of the entire book, amounting to 84 single-spaced pages, and to have the author check it for accuracy. The summary is available from the present reviewer on request. It hardly needs to be said that, despite its difficulty, the book deserves to be read carefully by anyone with a serious research interest in argumentation. It is not every day that a new philosophical basis for the study of argumentation is proposed. The present review has been written with the main goal of helping the prospective reader to understand and appreciate the book more easily while working through it.

Bohr’s Philosophy in the Light of Peircean Pragmatism

Adopting Murdoch’s pragmatist reading of Bohr’s theory of meaning with regard to Bohr’s notion of complementarity, in this paper I try to see Bohr’s post-Como and, in particular, post-EPR philosophy of quantum mechanics in the light of Peircean pragmatism with the hope that such a construal can shed more light to Bohr’s philosophy. I supplement Murdoch’s position on Bohr’s pragmatism by showing that in addition to his complementarity, Bohr’s correspondence principle, instrumentalism and realism can be read on the basis of Peirce’s pragmatic maxim and his notion of indeterminism has commonalities with Peirce’s tychism. Also, Bohr’s practice of applying the correspondence principle can be interpreted in the light of Peirce’s fallibilism. However, when it comes to Bohr’s understanding of the symbolic character of quantum mechanics, Bohr’s philosophy deviates from Peircean pragmatism. Bohr’s philosophy distinguishes between the symbolic language of quantum formalism, which counts as a tool practically useful for prediction, and observation sentences which are visualizable in space and time and refer to the so-called individual phenomena. Such an epistemologically significant distinction is not recognized by Peircean pragmatism.

Escolhas, dogmatismos e apostas – justificando o realismo de Peirce

O eixo conceitual deste artigo constitui-se em uma reflexão sobre o realismo de Charles Peirce, buscando mostrá-lo como a base da qual se derivam muitas outras de suas doutrinas filosóficas. Na primeira parte do artigo, são analisados os problemas colocados pelo clássico ensaio peirciano Questões referentes a certas faculdades reivindicadas pelo homem, propondo extrair das consequências dessa análise as diretrizes de um realismo que gradualmente se torna mais radical na obra madura de Peirce. Tais consequências serão consolidadas em sua fenomenologia, uma ciência que fundamentará a semiótica e uma concepção de simetria relacionada às categorias do autor. Essa simetria associada à sua epistemologia e ontologia será, a propósito, onipresente em todo o sistema filosófico peirciano. Na segunda parte do artigo, são discutidos os conceitos de mediação e representação, também sob um viés realista, concluindo que esses conceitos não podem ser coerentemente relacionados nas filosofias nominalistas. Nessas filosofias, encontram-se frequentemente consequências de alguma forma comprometidas com posturas dogmáticas e não dialógicas, se confrontadas com uma análise do significado tal como proposto pelo pragmatismo clássico peirciano.

In pursuit of resistance: pragmatic recommendations for doing science within one’s means

Charles Peirce, the founder of pragmatism and himself a working scientist, was concerned to formulate elements of his pragmatism so as to be of practical benefit to philosophers and scientists alike. This discussion investigates the practical recommendations of Peircean pragmatism, especially as it relates to questions of how we should conduct scientific inquiry. Peirce’s model of inquiry is supposed to demarcate appropriate from specious methods of inquiry. While, as Cheryl Misak points out, Peirce’s explicit account fails, the account can nevertheless be rescued by elements of his own system. Specifically the account provided in this paper draws from Peirce’s corollary to his “first rule of reason,” that one should not block the road to inquiry. Following this corollary, under the guidance of Peirce’s view of reality and the role it plays in inquiry, leads us to conclude that the optimal way to conduct inquiry is to follow the path of greatest resistance. We cannot, however, as Peirce recognized, pursue our researches optimally, since we are limited in time, energy, and other resources. Making the best use of those resources requires a measure of economy. To this end, Peirce developed specific recommendations about the economy of research. The focus here is on his recommendation regarding hypothesis testing, which is that we “begin with that positive prediction . . . which seems least likely to be verified.” According to this suggestion, to test any given hypothesis we should begin by assessing the probability of each of its predictions, given a suitable, contrary hypothesis. Once we note which are the least likely of the predictions, we use other economic factors to determine which tests to perform. The fortified Peircean account developed here maintains that inquiry should be conducted so as to leave open the path to future inquiry. This means taking a particular attitude toward our set of beliefs—being prepared to recognize their limitations and keeping the field of belief susceptible to doubt. In accepting that inquiry is best that serves to maximize resistance, we require of ourselves a constant striving, believing just what we believe, but never resting content with it. This is the attitude of the consummate scientist, accepting the best of the theories available, but never dogmatically, and always on alert for opportunities to recognize the shortcomings of those views and awake to the possibility that other, better theories are on the horizon.

Beyond the Interaction Paradigm? Radical Constructivism, Universal Pragmatics, and Peircean Pragmatism

In this article, the author examines Colin Grant's recent criticism of the so-called “interaction paradigm” and Jürgen Habermas's universal pragmatics. Grant's approach, which is presented as an open challenge to communication theories grounded in philosophical conceptions of communality and dialogue, can be construed as an exemplar of a radical constructivist approach to vital questions of contingency and incommensurability in communication studies. In response, the author outlines a classical pragmatist approach to the problem areas identified by Grant, with the aim of outlining how a pragmatist outlook can offer promising theoretical alternatives to universal pragmatics and radical constructivism. It is argued that moderate Peircean pragmatism, appropriately interpreted, can provide a philosophical platform capable of addressing issues of contingency, uncertainty, and autonomy in communication theory without succumbing to incommensurabilism, traditional objectivism, or nominalistic individualism.

Introduction to knowability and beyond

Beyond the limits of human knowledge lies nothing at all—no understandable proposition whose truth may outrun our idealized epistemic capacities. So says the semantic anti-realist, who advocates an epistemic theory of truth—one for which, as a matter of metaphysical necessity, anything true is knowable in principle. The interesting idealization remains elusive but is meant to lie somewhere between the triviality of equating truth with God’s knowledge (uninformative realism) and the naivety of equating it with what humans actually know (naive idealism). The former offers no explanatory gain, and the latter fails to appreciate the objectivity and discoverability of truth. The middle way aims for something like this: barring vagueness and ambiguity, we could in principle know the truth value of any fully understood proposition, given only finite improvements to our epistemic capacities, resources or environment. Call this “moderate anti-realism”. Many forms of non-realism are in the neighborhood of the thesis, including some versions of ethical expressivism, Michael Dummett’s mathematical intuitionism, Putnamian internal realism, Peircean pragmatism, logical positivism, Kantian transcendental realism, and Berkeleyian idealism. One great problem for our understanding of the middle way is the knowability paradox—also known as “Fitch’s paradox” because Frederic Fitch first published the result in 1963, and the “Church–Fitch paradox” because Church was the anonymous referee who conveyed it to Fitch in 1945.1 It consists of a proof that appears

Experience, Purpose, and the Value of Vagueness: On C. S. Peirce's Contribution to the Philosophy of Communication

Recent decades have witnessed a growth of interest in the contribution of pragmatism to the study of communication. Yet, it is striking that C. S. Peirce, the founder of pragmatism and the father of one of the major strands of modern semiotics, is often ignored by communication scholars sympathetic to pragmatism. In this article, I explore some of the reasons for this neglect, and put forward the case for a recovery of some of the philosophical tools that Peircean pragmatism can provide for communication theory.

A Critique of Pragmatism and Deliberative Democracy

Robert B. Talisse’s A Pragmatist Philosophy of Democracy is a genuine tour de force . His aim is both to defend a particular view of pragmatism originating with the work of Charles Sanders Peirce and, at the same time, argue in favour of a new view of deliberative democracy developed from Talisse’s Peircean pragmatism. The result is a stunning achievement with real persuasive power. In this article, I will focus on one worry, namely, that the picture of democracy on offer is incomplete. While Talisse correctly argues that democracy is about more than elections, democracy is also about more than deliberation between citizens. Talisse’s deliberative democracy is problematic to the degree its view of deliberation fails to account for democracy. If my analysis is correct, then I do not aim to demonstrate that Talisse’s Peircean pragmatism is incorrect, only incomplete . Thus, the hope of this article is to help develop this pragmatism further.

Peircean Polymorphism: Between Realism and Anti-realism

This paper provides a framework, based on Peircean pragmatism and a supplemental metaphysical principle, for reconciling realism and anti-realism. Peircean polymorphism, the resultant position defended in the paper, is a realist position, accepting that there is a world that exists and has characteristics of its own, independently of our experience of it. The position denies, however, what I call the uniqueness assumption about truth—that it is possible for one, unique representational approach to adequately represent reality. While Peirce does not explicitly address the uniqueness assumption, his account is sufficiently ambiguous on this point to have been understood as a uniqueness account. The supplemental metaphysical principle introduced here, that reality is polymorphic, serves to fortify Peirce's pragmatism against uniqueness. Briefly, the paper outlines some implications of accepting the fortified Peircean position, including greater explanatory power and more compelling motivation for continued scientific inquiry.

The New Wave of Pragmatism in Communication Studies

AbstractThis article examines two recent discussions of pragmatism in the field of communication and media studies: Chris Russill’s reconstruction of a pragmatist tradition based on the theories of William James and John Dewey, and Mike Sandbothe’s neopragmatist design for media philosophy. The main contention of the article is that Russill and Sandbothe advocate an unnecessarily narrow conception of pragmatist thought, one that tends to exclude the contribution of Charles S. Peirce, the founder of pragmatism. After the presentation of Russill’s and Sandbothe’s positions, the article attempts to meet their explicit and implicit criticisms of Peircean pragmatism. More specifically, it is shown that Peirce does not advocate “transcendental universalism”. In conclusion, the article argues that his broad conception of experience is preferable to the radical empiricism of James, and that Peircean habit-realism is not only compatible with Dewey’s pragmatism, but may in fact provide the most fertile starting-point for pragmatist communication inquiry.

On Historical Pragmatics and Peircean Pragmatism

Historical pragmatics constitutes both the subject matter and methodology. In this paper, the scientific methodology of historical pragmatics is discussed and related to the opinions shared by some 19th-century linguists and philosophers. In particular, Charles S. Peirce’s (1839–1914) semiotics and pragmatism is related to studies on meaning and its change, and his opinions on hypothesis selection in historical research to historical pragmatics. The conclusion is that historical pragmatics is hermeneutic, but that economic and evolutionary considerations square it from the hermeneutic circle.

From pragmatism to perfectionism

In recent work, Cheryl Misak has developed a novel justification of deliberative democracy rooted in Peircean epistemology. In this article, the author expands Misak's arguments to show that not only does Peircean pragmatism provide a justification for deliberative democracy that is more compelling than the justifications offered by competing liberal and discursivist views, but also fixes a specific conception of deliberative politics that is perfectionist rather than neutralist. The article concludes with a discussion of whether the `epistemic perfectionism' implied by the pragmatist argument could be endorsed by liberal democrats.

The Publicity of Belief, Epistemic Wrongs and Moral Wrongs

It is a commonplace belief that many beliefs, e.g. religious convictions, are a purely private matter, and this is meant in some way to serve as a defense against certain forms of criticism. In this paper it is argued that this thesis is false, and that belief is really often a public matter. This argument, the publicity of belief argument, depends on one of the most compelling and central thesis of Peircean pragmatism. This crucial thesis is that bona fide belief cannot be separated from action. It is then also suggested that we should accept a form of W. K. Clifford’s evidentialism. When these theses are jointly accepted in conjunction with the basic principle of ethics that it is prima facie wrong to act in such a way that may subject others to serious but unnecessary and avoidable harm, it follows that many beliefs are morally wrong.