Two Neglected Arguments for a Pragmatist Metaphysics: Peirce and James on Individuals and Generals

Journal title RIVISTA DI STORIA DELLA FILOSOFIA
Author/s Michela Bella, Maria Regina Brioschi
Publishing Year 2022 Issue 2022/3
Language English Pages 25 P. 511-535 File size 233 KB
DOI 10.3280/SF2022-003010
DOI is like a bar code for intellectual property: to have more infomation click here

Below, you can see the article first page

If you want to buy this article in PDF format, you can do it, following the instructions to buy download credits

Article preview

FrancoAngeli is member of Publishers International Linking Association, Inc (PILA), a not-for-profit association which run the CrossRef service enabling links to and from online scholarly content.

This article proposes an integrative reading of Peirce’s and James’s philosophies, which aims to figure out the main features of a shared pragmatist metaphysics. Two methodologies are adopted to reach this goal: a historical scrutiny of sources (letters, works, manuscripts), prevalent in the first part, and a theoretical investigation of Peirce’s and James’s philosophies, in the second and third parts. The first part analyzes Peirce’s and James’s proximity, which lies in their common understanding of pragmatism as an anti-dogmatic method in philosophy, and their alleged main difference, which is represented by the issue of nominalism/anti-nominalism, and pivots around the concepts of individuals and generals. The article challenges the mainstream interpretation that sees Peirce as a champion of generality and continuity, whereas James is known for being an ardent defender of individuality. The arguments supporting such an unconventional interpretation are offered in the second part, which explores Peirce’s view of individuality in logic, and the third one, dedicated to James’s view of continuity in psychology. As a conclusion, Peirce and James’s shared pragmatic metaphysics turns out to be centered on the dynamical bonding between individuals and generals.

Keywords: Charles S. Peirce, William James, metaphysics, logic, psychology, individuality, continuity.

  1. - Anderson 2008: Douglas R. Anderson, Peirce and Pragmatism: American Connections, in Cheryl Misak (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of American Philosophy (pp. 38–59), Oxford University Press, Oxford 2008.
  2. - Atkin 2005: Albert Atkin, Peirce on the Index and Indexical Reference, «Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society», 41 (2005) , 1, pp. 161-88.
  3. - Atkins 2015: Richard K. Atkins, Peirce’s “Paradoxical Irradiations” and James’s The Will to Believe, «Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society», 51 (2015), 2. pp. 173-200.
  4. - Atkins 2018: Richard K. Atkins, Charles S. Peirce’s Phenomenology: Analysis and Consciousness, New York, Oxford University Press 2018.
  5. - Bella 2019a: Michela Bella, Ontology After Philosophical Psychology. The Continuity of Consciousness in William James’s Philosophy of Mind, Lexington, Lanham 2019.
  6. - Bella 2019b: Michela Bella, Novelty and Causality in William James’s Pluralistic Universe. From Psychology to Metaphysics, «European Journal of Pragmatism and American Philosophy», XI (2019), 2, pp. 1-24.
  7. - Bellucci 2014: Francesco Bellucci, Logic, considered as Semeiotic. «Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society», 50, (2014), 4, pp. 523-547.
  8. - Bellucci 2019: Francesco Bellucci, Peirce on Assertion and Other Speech Acts, «Semiotica», 228 (2019), pp. 29-54.
  9. - Boncompagni 2016: Anna Boncompagni, Wittgenstein and Pragmatism: On Certainty in the Light of Peirce and James, Palgrave Macmillan, London 2016.
  10. - Bordogna 2008: Francesca Bordogna, William James at the Boundaries, University of Chicago Press, Chicago/London 2008.
  11. - Brady 2000: Geraldine Brady, From Peirce to Skolem. A Neglected Chapter in the History of Logic, North-Holland/Elsevier, Amsterdam 2000.
  12. - Brioschi 2019: Maria Regina Brioschi, Does Continuity allow for Emergence? An Emergentist Reading of Peirce’s Evolutionary Thought, «European Journal of Pragmatism and American Philosophy», XI (2019), 2, pp. 1-24.
  13. - Brioschi 2020: Maria Regina Brioschi, Creativity between Experience and Cosmos. C.S. Peirce and A.N. Whitehead on Novelty, Verlag Karl Alber, Freiburg/München 2020.
  14. - Calcaterra 2011: Rosa M. Calcaterra, Varieties of Synechism: Peirce and James on Mind-World Continuity, «The Journal of Speculative Philosophy», 24 (2011), 5, pp. 412-424.
  15. - Calcaterra 2017: Rosa M. Calcaterra, William James’s Naturalism Within the Common Project of Pragmatist Philosophy, «Rivista di Storia della Filosofia», (2017), 3, pp. 475-492.
  16. - Colapietro 1989: Vincent M. Colapietro, Peirce’s Approach to the Self, State University of New York Press, Albany 1989.
  17. - De Tienne 2004: André De Tienne, Is Phaneroscopy as a Pre-Semiotic Science Possible?, «Semiotiche», 2 (2004), pp. 15-30.
  18. - DiLeo 1991: Jeffrey R. DiLeo, Peirce’s Hecceitism, «Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society», 27, (1991), 1, pp. 79-109.
  19. - Duvernoy 2015: Russell Duvernoy, ‘Concepts’ and Continuity: Onto-Epistemology in William James, «Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society», 51, (2015), 4, pp. 508-530.
  20. - Evans 2017: David H. Evans (ed.), Understanding James, Understanding Modernism, Bloomsbury Academic, New York-London 2017.
  21. - Fabbrichesi 1986: Rossella Fabbrichesi, Sulle tracce del segno. Semiotica, faneroscopia e cosmologia nel pensiero di Charles S. Peirce, La Nuova Italia, Firenze 1986.
  22. - Fabbrichesi 2020: Rossella Fabbrichesi, Pensare in continuità, in Guido Baggio et al. (a cura di), Esperienza, contingenza, valori. Saggi in onore di Rosa Calcaterra, Quodlibet Studio, Macerata 2021, pp. 73-77.
  23. - Ferrari 2015: Massimo Ferrari, William James navigava con Otto Neurath? «Rivista di filosofia», CVI, (2015), 2, pp. 235-265.
  24. - Fisch 1986: Max Fisch, Peirce, Semeiotic, and Pragmatism, ed. by K.L. Ketner, C.J.W. Kloesel, Indiana University Press, Bloomington 1986.
  25. - Gale 1999: Richard M. Gale, The Divided Self of William James, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, MA 1999.
  26. - Gavin 1992: William Gavin, William James and the Reinstatement of the Vague, Temple University Press, Philadelphia 1992.
  27. - Girel 2021: Mathias Girel, L’esprit en acte. Psychologie, mythologies et pratique chez les pragmatists, Vrin, Paris 2021.
  28. - Haack 1977: Susan Haack, Pragmatism and Ontology: Peirce and James, «Revue Internationale de Philosophie», 31 (1977), pp. 377-400.
  29. - Hilpinen 1992: Risto Hilpinen, On Peirce’s Philosophical Logic: Propositions and Their Objects, «Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society», 28, (1992), 3, pp. 467-488.
  30. - Hookway 1997: Christopher Hookway, Logical Principles and Philosophical Attitudes: Peirce’s Response to James’s Pragmatism, in Ruth A. Putnam (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to William James, Cambridge University Press, New York 1997.
  31. - Houser 2011: Nathan Houser, Peirce’s post-Jamesian Pragmatism, «European Journal of Pragmatism and American Philosophy», III (2011), 1, pp. 1-23.
  32. - James 1898: William James, Philosophical Conceptions and Practical Results, «University of California Chronicle», Berkeley, California, 1(4), pp. 287-310.
  33. - Klein 2007: Alexander Klein, The Rise of Empiricism, PhD Dissertation, Indiana University, Bloomington 2007.
  34. - Klein 2013: Alexander Klein, Who is in the Community of Inquiry?, «Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society», 49, (2013), 3, pp. 413-423.
  35. - Kuklick 2017: Bruce Kuklick, Who Owns Pragmatism?, «Modern Intellectual History», 14, (2017), 2, pp. 565-583.
  36. - Lamberth 1999: David C. Lamberth, William James and the Metaphysics of Experience, Cambridge University Press, New York 1999.
  37. - Lane 2018: Robert Lane, Peirce on Realism and Idealism, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2018.
  38. - Lanfredini 2017: Roberta Lanfredini, Anti-Psychologism and Neutrality: The Radical Empiricism of Husserl and James, «European Journal of Pragmatism and American Philosophy», 9, (2017), 1, pp. 1-13.
  39. - Levine 2018: Steven Levine, James and Phenomenology, in Alexander Klein (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of William James, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2018.
  40. - Maddalena 2017: Giovanni Maddalena, Scientific and not Scientistic: the Rich Realism of Pragmatism, «Rivista di Storia della Filosofia», (2017), 3, pp. 401-414.
  41. - Maddalena 2021: Giovanni Maddalena, Filosofia del gesto, Carocci, Roma 2021.
  42. - Madden & Madden 1978: Marian C. Madden, Edward H. Madden, William James and the Problem of Relations, «Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society», 14, (1978), 4, pp. 227-246.
  43. - Martin 1976: Richard M. Martin, On Individuality and Quantification in Peirce’s Published Logic Papers, 1867-1885, «Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society», 12, 3 (1976), pp. 231-245.
  44. - Mayorga 2007: Rosa M. Mayorga, From Realism to “Realiticism”: The Metaphysics of Charles Sanders Peirce, Lexington, Lanham 2007.
  45. - McDermott 1976: John McDermott, Introduction to William James, Essays in Radical Empiricism (pp. xi-xlviii), Harvard University Press, Cambridge/London 1976.
  46. - Misak 2013: Cheryl Misak, The American Pragmatists, Oxford: Oxford University Press 2013.
  47. - Nöth 2002: Winfried Nöth, Charles Sanders Peirce, Pathfinder in Linguistics, «Interdisciplinary Journal for Germanic Linguistic and Semiotic Analysis», 7 (2002), 1, pp. 1-14.
  48. - Oleksy 2015: Mateusz W. Oleksy, Realism and Individualism: Charles S. Peirce and the Threat of Modern Nominalism, John Benjamins Pub. Co, Amsterdam/Philadelphia 2015.
  49. - Pawelski 2007: James O. Pawelsky, The Dynamic Individualism of William James, State University of New York Press, Albany 2007.
  50. - Pearce 2020: Trevor Pearce, Pragmatism’s Evolution: Organism and Environment in American Philosophy, University of Chicago Press, Chicago 2020.
  51. - Perry 1912: Ralph B. Perry (ed.), Introduction to William James, Essays in Radical Empiricism, Longmans, Green, and Co., New York 1912.
  52. - Poggi 2020: Stefano Poggi, Metempsicosi positivistiche? Charles Sanders Peirce e William James, «Rivista di Filosofia», CXI, (2020), 3, pp. 491-511.
  53. - Pihlström 2009: Sami Pihlström, Pragmatist Metaphysics: An Essay on the Ethical Grounds of Ontology, Bloomsbury, London 2009.
  54. - Putnam 2017: Hilary Putnam and Ruth Anna Putnam, Pragmatism as a Way of Life. The Lasting Legacy of William James and John Dewey, ed. by David Macarthur, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (MA) 2017.
  55. - Ransdell 1989: Joseph Ransdell, Peirce est-il un phénoménologue?, «Ètudes Phénoménologiques», 9-10 (1989), pp. 51-75.
  56. - Riley 1974: Gresham Riley, Peirce’s Theory of Individuals, «Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society», 10, (1974), 3, pp. 135-165.
  57. - Rosenthal 2005: Sandra Rosenthal, The Ontological Grounding of Diversity: A Pragmatic Overview, «The Journal of Speculative Philosophy», New Series, 19, 2 (2005), pp. 107-119.
  58. - Seigfried 1973: Charlene H. Seigfried, The Status of Relations in William James. Dissertation, Chicago: Loyola University, 1973.
  59. - Seigfried 1990: Charlene H. Seigfried, William James’s Radical Reconstruction of Philosophy, State University of New York Press, New York 1990.
  60. - Stjernfelt 2019: Frederik Stjernfelt, Co-localization as the Syntax of Multimodal Propositions, in Tony Jappy (ed.), The Bloomsbury Companion to Contemporary Peircean Semiotics (pp. 419-458), Bloomsbury Academic, London 2019.
  61. - Stjernfelt 2014: Frederik Stjernfelt, Natural Propositions: The Actuality of Peirce’s Doctrine of Dicisigns, Docent Press, Boston 2014.
  62. - Thibaud 1997: Pierre Thibaud, Between Saying and Doing: Peirce’s Propositional Space, «Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society», 332, (1997), 2, pp. 270-327.
  63. - Tiercelin 1991: Claudine Tiercelin, Peirce’s Semiotic Version of the Semantic Tradition in Formal Logic, in Neil Cooper et al. (eds.), New Inquiries into Meaning and Truth (pp. 187-213), St. Martin Press, New York 1991.
  64. - Williams 2018: Neil Williams, Kidnapping an ugly child: is William James a pragmaticist?, «British Journal for the History of Philosophy», 26, (2018), 1, pp. 154-75.

  • Il pragmatismo: una filosofia in circolo Michela Bella, in European Journal of Pragmatism and American Philosophy /2024
    DOI: 10.4000/12yvn

Michela Bella, Maria Regina Brioschi, Two Neglected Arguments for a Pragmatist Metaphysics: Peirce and James on Individuals and Generals in "RIVISTA DI STORIA DELLA FILOSOFIA" 3/2022, pp 511-535, DOI: 10.3280/SF2022-003010