Steps Towards an Ecology of Experience: Empiricism, Pragmatism and George Eliot’s The Spanish Gypsy

2018 ◽  
pp. 107-138
Author(s):  
Philipp Erchinger
Keyword(s):  
John Dewey ◽  
William James ◽  
Practical Wisdom ◽  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
Main Argument ◽  
American Pragmatism ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future ◽  
Ecological View ◽  
Spanish Gypsy

Chapter 4 makes the case that the work of Eliot and Lewes exemplifies a pragmatist understanding of knowledge that is centred on the idea of “experience as experiment” (Jay) or “experience as a craft” (Sennett). Distinguishing between two main senses of ‘experience’, practical wisdom and intense awareness, the chapter traces the manifold implications of that term through G.H. Lewes’s five volume fragment Problems of Life and Mind, Samuel Butler’s Life and Habit and George Eliot’s The Spanish Gypsy. Moreover, close readings of these texts are interwoven with references to the philosophical tradition of American Pragmatism, as represented by the work of William James and John Dewey. Briefly, my main argument is that these Pragmatist writers shared with their Victorian predecessors an ecological view of experience as an incipient pattern, an advancing middle between the past and the future as well as inside and outside, or subject and object, that essentially lacks anything like a firm ground.

scholarly journals Other Stories: Experimental Forms of Contemporary Historying at the Crossroads Between Facts and Fictions

2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-15
Author(s):  
Małgorzata Sugiera
Keyword(s):  
New Wave ◽  
Main Argument ◽  
Historical Discourse ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
The Past ◽  
Academic History ◽  
The Future ◽  
Rhetorical Dimension ◽  
Hayden White ◽  
Experimental History

Summary The process of questioning the authority of academic history—in the form in which it emerged at the turn of the 19th century—began in the 1970s, when Hayden White pointed out the rhetorical dimension of historical discourse. His British colleague Alun Munslow went a step further and argued that the ontological statuses of the past and history are so different that historical discourse cannot by any means be treated as representation of the past. As we have no access to that which happened, both historians and artists can only present the past in accordance with their views and opinions, the available rhetorical conventions, and means of expression. The article revisits two examples of experimental history which Munslow mentioned in his The Future of History (2010): Robert A. Rosenstone’s Mirror in the Shrine (1988) and Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht’s In 1926 (1997). It allows reassessing their literary strategies in the context of a new wave of works written by historians and novelists who go beyond the fictional/factual dichotomy. The article focuses on Polish counterfactual writers of the last two decades, such as Wojciech Orliński, Jacek Dukaj, and Aleksander Głowacki. Their novels corroborate the main argument of the article about a turn which has been taking place in recent experimental historying: the loss of previous interest in formal innovations influenced by modernist avant-garde fiction. Instead, it concentrates on demonstrating the contingency of history to strategically extend the unknowability of the future or the past(s) and, as a result, change historying into speculative thinking.

Mead, George Herbert (1863–1931)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hans Joas
Keyword(s):  
Social Psychology ◽  
John Dewey ◽  
William James ◽  
The Self ◽  
George Herbert ◽  
Human Communication ◽  
George Herbert Mead ◽  
American Pragmatism ◽  
Charles Peirce ◽  
Infantile Development

Together with Charles Peirce, William James and John Dewey, George Herbert Mead is considered one of the classic representatives of American pragmatism. He is most famous for his ideas about the specificities of human communication and sociality and about the genesis of the ‘self’ in infantile development. By developing these ideas, Mead became one of the founders of social psychology and – mostly via his influence on the school of symbolic interactionism – one of the most influential figures in contemporary sociology. Compared to that enormous influence, other parts of his philosophical work are relatively neglected.

scholarly journals Sekularingseringstesen i religionssociologien

1999 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lene Kühle
Keyword(s):  
Social Reality ◽  
Sociology Of Religion ◽  
Main Argument ◽  
New Paradigm ◽  
Sociological Study ◽  
Political Sphere ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Dominant Paradigm

Secularization has been á major issue in sociological debates on religion. Recent developments in theory as well as in social reality seems to indicate that the future for the seularization thesis will not be as glorious as the past. The main argument in this article is that the secularization thesis, which can more properly be understood as a paradigm in the Kuhnian sense, is no longer a very useful frame for the sociological study of religion. This argument is supported by three examples from the contemporay political sphere, where the description in terms of "secularization" seems to lead to ambiguous conclusions. The article gives a brief presentation of two candidates for a new paradigm and discusses the requirements that the new paradigm is expected to meet. Whether any of these paradigms or perhaps a completely different one is going to assume the position as the dominant paradigm in the sociology of religion is still to be seen.

To Bear the Past as a Living Wound: William James and the Philosophy of History

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 325-342
Author(s):  
Bonnie Sheehey
Keyword(s):  
William James ◽  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
Historical Change ◽  
Alternative Account ◽  
Future Possibility ◽  
The Past ◽  
Historical Progress ◽  
The Future ◽  
Forward Looking

Abstract Philosophers generally recognize pragmatism as a philosophy of progress. For many commentators, pragmatism is linked to a notion of historical progress through its embrace of meliorism – a forward-looking philosophy that places hope in the future possibility of improvement. This paper calls pragmatism’s progressivism into question by outlining an alternative account of meliorism in the work of William James. Drawing on his ethical writings from the 1870s and 1880s, I argue that James’s concept of hope does not imply an embrace of historical progress, but remains detached from such a notion precisely insofar as it relies on a non-progressive temporality that encourages a rethinking of historical change. This form of hope is significant, I suggest, for the work of conceptualizing a non-progressive pragmatist approach to history and historiography.

scholarly journals THE DIFFERENT THEORIES OF TRUTH THREE BROTHERS (CHARLES SANDERS PEIRCE, WILLIAM JAMES AND JOHN DEWEY)

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Novia S. Silalahi ◽  
Avivah A. Putri ◽  
Indah K. Sianturi ◽  
Aprillia Chasanah
Keyword(s):  
John Dewey ◽  
Qualitative Methodology ◽  
William James ◽  
Charles Sanders Peirce ◽  
Theories Of Truth ◽  
Research Article ◽  
The Future

The theory of truth is that truth statements consist of practical consequences, especially in agreement with subsequent experience. The purpose of this study is to discuss the different theories of truth proposed by Charles Sanders Peirce, William James and John Dewey. This study uses a qualitative methodology that uses the analysis of this research article to reveal the basic theories and differences from each expert as they are known as pragmatic researchers with their theories of truth. This paper is intended to explore and provide different pragmatic theories of the three truths by Charles Sanders Peirce, William James and John Dewey. This reward research to see that results from differences in the theory of truth by Charles Sanders Peirce, William James and John Dewey which results in that Peirce is often associated with the idea that true beliefs are those who will stand the test in the future; James with the idea that true trust is reliable and also beneficial; while Dewey with that idea claims of ownership are verified (or "valuation"). Therefore, expecting further research is to find the effects of different theories of truth from the three experts in various contexts.

scholarly journals Adding Interest to Educational Practices. Propositions for a Post-Critical Pedagogy

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (9) ◽  
Author(s):  
Hans Schildermans
Keyword(s):  
Critical Pedagogy ◽  
William James ◽  
Theory Development ◽  
Alfred North Whitehead ◽  
Educational Practices ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future ◽  
Isabelle Stengers ◽  
Opening Up ◽  
Educational Thinking

The aim of this paper is to outline a way of theory development in educational thinking that stays true to the insights and commitments of post-critical pedagogy, while at the same time drawing out a slightly different pattern. The paper suggests five different propositions that reformulate the Manifesto for a Post-Critical Pedagogy in a speculative-pragmatic mode, informed by the philosophies of Alfred North Whitehead, William James, and Isabelle Stengers. Central to this way of doing theory is that it is situated by actual educational practices and that theory development itself is conceived as a way of taking care of our abstractions through the formation of concepts. What is at stake in this mode of doing theory is adding interest to educational practices, making them come to matter in a particular way. In doing so, post-critical pedagogy offers a way of analyzing educational practices of the present and the past, while opening up possibilities for designing educational practices for the future, without defining what the future might look like.

scholarly journals Pragmaticist explorations: C.S. Peirce, the logic of inquiry and international relations

2013 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruben Zaiotti
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
John Dewey ◽  
William James ◽  
Charles Sanders Peirce ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
First Order ◽  
Logic Of Inquiry

<p>The philosophical tradition of Pragmatism has recently entered the fray of international relations (IR) debates. Pragmatism has so far been mainly employed in meta-theoretical discussions over the foundations of the discipline, and to address normative and methodological questions characterizing this field of studies. The main sources of inspiration in these discussions have been classic pragmatist writers such as John Dewey and William James. The work of one of the major figures of this tradition, Charles Sanders Peirce, has been by and large neglected in the literature. The claim advanced in this paper is that the application of some of the American philosopher’s key insights, especially those regarding the logic of inquiry, to first order issues in world politics can enrich the current ‘pragmatist turn’ in IR and contribute to the expansion of the theoretical horizons of the discipline.</p>

Emerson, Ralph Waldo (1803–82)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Russell B. Goodman
Keyword(s):  
John Dewey ◽  
Ralph Waldo Emerson ◽  
William James ◽  
Social Progress ◽  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
The Core ◽  
The World ◽  
American Tradition ◽  
Anglo American

The American philosopher and poet Ralph Waldo Emerson developed a philosophy of flux or transitions in which the active human self plays a central role. At the core of his thought was a hierarchy of value or existence, and an unlimited aspiration for personal and social progress. ‘Man is the dwarf of himself’, he wrote in his first book Nature (1836). Emerson presented a dire portrait of humankind’s condition: ‘Men in the world of today are bugs or spawn, and are called "the mass" and "the herd"’. We are governed by moods which ‘do not believe in one another’, by necessities real or only imagined, but also, Emerson held, by opportunities for ‘untaught sallies of the spirit’ – those few real moments of life which may nevertheless alter the whole. Emerson’s lectures drew large audiences throughout America and in England, and his works were widely read in his own time. He influenced the German philosophical tradition through Nietzsche – whose The Gay Science carries an epigraph from ‘History’ – and the Anglo-American tradition via William James and John Dewey. Emerson’s major works are essays, each with its own structure, but his sentences and paragraphs often stand on their own as expressions of his thought.

Scientific Time and Temporal Experience: Pragmatism's Contribution to the Search for a Synthesis

KronoScope ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 167-183 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra Rosenthal
Keyword(s):  
John Dewey ◽  
Physical Science ◽  
William James ◽  
Philosophical Problem ◽  
Philosophical Issue ◽  
Temporal Experience ◽  
American Pragmatism ◽  
Philosophical Movement ◽  
Charles Peirce ◽  
The Universe

AbstractThe problem of the relation between lived temporal experience and scientific time is an ongoing philosophical issue which has led to numerous and well entrenched radical solutions that in one way or another sever human temporal experience from the time of the universe. This presentation will offer a bird's eye view of the roots of the philosophical problem both historically and as it manifests itself today in major positions or movements that contour the contemporary philosophical landscape. It will then sketch the path to a possible solution from the perspective of classical American pragmatism, the philosophical movement encompassing the writings of Charles Peirce, William James, John Dewey, C.I. Lewis, and G.H. Mead. For pragmatism the roots of the problem are ultimately located in the understanding of time as discrete and confusions among the mathematical time of physical science, the time of the universe, and lived temporal experience.

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