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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/5117-h.zip b/5117-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f68bced --- /dev/null +++ b/5117-h.zip diff --git a/5117-h/5117-h.htm b/5117-h/5117-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a906811 --- /dev/null +++ b/5117-h/5117-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,6526 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="us-ascii"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + The Meaning of Truth, by William James + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 10%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + .side { float: right; font-size: 75%; width: 25%; padding-left: 0.8em; + border-left: dashed thin; margin-left: 0.8em; text-align: left; + text-indent: 0; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; + font-weight: bold; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: solid 1px;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Meaning of Truth, by William James + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Meaning of Truth + +Author: William James + + +Release Date: February, 2004 [EBook #5117] +This file was first posted on May 1, 2002 +Last Updated: July 4, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MEANING OF TRUTH *** + + + + +Text file produced by Steve Harris, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + +HTML file produced by David Widger + + + + +</pre> + + <div style="height: 8em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + THE MEANING OF TRUTH + </h1> + <h3> + A SEQUEL TO 'PRAGMATISM' + </h3> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + By William James + </h2> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_PREF" id="link2H_PREF"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + PREFACE + </h2> + <p> + THE pivotal part of my book named Pragmatism is its account of the + relation called 'truth' which may obtain between an idea (opinion, belief, + statement, or what not) and its object. 'Truth,' I there say, 'is a + property of certain of our ideas. It means their agreement, as falsity + means their disagreement, with reality. Pragmatists and intellectualists + both accept this definition as a matter of course. + </p> + <p> + 'Where our ideas [do] not copy definitely their object, what does + agreement with that object mean? ... Pragmatism asks its usual question. + "Grant an idea or belief to be true," it says, "what concrete difference + will its being true make in any one's actual life? What experiences [may] + be different from those which would obtain if the belief were false? How + will the truth be realized? What, in short, is the truth's cash-value in + experiential terms?" The moment pragmatism asks this question, it sees the + answer: TRUE IDEAS ARE THOSE THAT WE CAN ASSIMILATE, VALIDATE, + CORROBORATE, AND VERIFY. FALSE IDEAS ARE THOSE THAT WE CANNOT. That is the + practical difference it makes to us to have true ideas; that therefore is + the meaning of truth, for it is all that truth is known as. + </p> + <p> + 'The truth of an idea is not a stagnant property inherent in it. Truth + HAPPENS to an idea. It BECOMES true, is MADE true by events. Its verity IS + in fact an event, a process, the process namely of its verifying itself, + its veriFICATION. Its validity is the process of its validATION. + [Footnote: But 'VERIFIABILITY,' I add, 'is as good as verification. For + one truth-process completed, there are a million in our lives that + function in [the] state of nascency. They lead us towards direct + verification; lead us into the surroundings of the object they envisage; + and then, if everything, runs on harmoniously, we are so sure that + verification is possible that we omit it, and are usually justified by all + that happens.'] + </p> + <p> + 'To agree in the widest sense with a reality can only mean to be guided + either straight up to it or into its surroundings, or to be put into such + working touch with it as to handle either it or something connected with + it better than if we disagreed. Better either intellectually or + practically .... Any idea that helps us to deal, whether practically or + intellectually, with either the reality or its belongings, that doesn't + entangle our progress in frustrations, that FITS, in fact, and adapts our + life to the reality's whole setting, will agree sufficiently to meet the + requirement. It will be true of that reality. + </p> + <p> + 'THE TRUE, to put it very briefly, IS ONLY THE EXPEDIENT IN THE WAY OF OUR + THINKING, JUST AS THE RIGHT IS ONLY THE EXPEDIENT IN THE WAY OF OUR + BEHAVING. Expedient in almost any fashion, and expedient in the long run + and on the whole, of course; for what meets expediently all the experience + in sight won't necessarily meet all farther experiences equally + satisfactorily. Experience, as we know, has ways of BOILING OVER, and + making us correct our present formulas.' + </p> + <p> + This account of truth, following upon the similar ones given by Messrs. + Dewey and Schiller, has occasioned the liveliest discussion. Few critics + have defended it, most of them have scouted it. It seems evident that the + subject is a hard one to understand, under its apparent simplicity; and + evident also, I think, that the definitive settlement of it will mark a + turning-point in the history of epistemology, and consequently in that of + general philosophy. In order to make my own thought more accessible to + those who hereafter may have to study the question, I have collected in + the volume that follows all the work of my pen that bears directly on the + truth-question. My first statement was in 1884, in the article that begins + the present volume. The other papers follow in the order of their + publication. Two or three appear now for the first time. + </p> + <p> + One of the accusations which I oftenest have had to meet is that of making + the truth of our religious beliefs consist in their 'feeling good' to us, + and in nothing else. I regret to have given some excuse for this charge, + by the unguarded language in which, in the book Pragmatism, I spoke of the + truth of the belief of certain philosophers in the absolute. Explaining + why I do not believe in the absolute myself (p. 78), yet finding that it + may secure 'moral holidays' to those who need them, and is true in so far + forth (if to gain moral holidays be a good), [Footnote: Op. cit., p. 75.] + I offered this as a conciliatory olive-branch to my enemies. But they, as + is only too common with such offerings, trampled the gift under foot and + turned and rent the giver. I had counted too much on their good will—oh + for the rarity of Christian charity under the sun! Oh for the rarity of + ordinary secular intelligence also! I had supposed it to be matter of + common observation that, of two competing views of the universe which in + all other respects are equal, but of which the first denies some vital + human need while the second satisfies it, the second will be favored by + sane men for the simple reason that it makes the world seem more rational. + To choose the first view under such circumstances would be an ascetic act, + an act of philosophic self-denial of which no normal human being would be + guilty. Using the pragmatic test of the meaning of concepts, I had shown + the concept of the absolute to MEAN nothing but the holiday giver, the + banisher of cosmic fear. One's objective deliverance, when one says 'the + absolute exists,' amounted, on my showing, just to this, that 'some + justification of a feeling of security in presence of the universe,' + exists, and that systematically to refuse to cultivate a feeling of + security would be to do violence to a tendency in one's emotional life + which might well be respected as prophetic. + </p> + <p> + Apparently my absolutist critics fail to see the workings of their own + minds in any such picture, so all that I can do is to apologize, and take + my offering back. The absolute is true in NO way then, and least of all, + by the verdict of the critics, in the way which I assigned! + </p> + <p> + My treatment of 'God,' 'freedom,' and 'design' was similar. Reducing, by + the pragmatic test, the meaning of each of these concepts to its positive + experienceable operation, I showed them all to mean the same thing, viz., + the presence of 'promise' in the world. 'God or no God?' means 'promise or + no promise?' It seems to me that the alternative is objective enough, + being a question as to whether the cosmos has one character or another, + even though our own provisional answer be made on subjective grounds. + Nevertheless christian and non-christian critics alike accuse me of + summoning people to say 'God exists,' EVEN WHEN HE DOESN'T EXIST, because + forsooth in my philosophy the 'truth' of the saying doesn't really mean + that he exists in any shape whatever, but only that to say so feels good. + </p> + <p> + Most of the pragmatist and anti-pragmatist warfare is over what the word + 'truth' shall be held to signify, and not over any of the facts embodied + in truth-situations; for both pragmatists and anti-pragmatists believe in + existent objects, just as they believe in our ideas of them. The + difference is that when the pragmatists speak of truth, they mean + exclusively some thing about the ideas, namely their workableness; whereas + when anti-pragmatists speak of truth they seem most often to mean + something about the objects. Since the pragmatist, if he agrees that an + idea is 'really' true, also agrees to whatever it says about its object; + and since most anti-pragmatists have already come round to agreeing that, + if the object exists, the idea that it does so is workable; there would + seem so little left to fight about that I might well be asked why instead + of reprinting my share in so much verbal wrangling, I do not show my sense + of 'values' by burning it all up. + </p> + <p> + I understand the question and I will give my answer. I am interested in + another doctrine in philosophy to which I give the name of radical + empiricism, and it seems to me that the establishment of the pragmatist + theory of truth is a step of first-rate importance in making radical + empiricism prevail. Radical empiricism consists first of a postulate, next + of a statement of fact, and finally of a generalized conclusion. + </p> + <p> + The postulate is that the only things that shall be debatable among + philosophers shall be things definable in terms drawn from experience. + [Things of an unexperienceable nature may exist ad libitum, but they form + no part of the material for philosophic debate.] + </p> + <p> + The statement of fact is that the relations between things, conjunctive as + well as disjunctive, are just as much matters of direct particular + experience, neither more so nor less so, than the things themselves. + </p> + <p> + The generalized conclusion is that therefore the parts of experience hold + together from next to next by relations that are themselves parts of + experience. The directly apprehended universe needs, in short, no + extraneous trans-empirical connective support, but possesses in its own + right a concatenated or continuous structure. + </p> + <p> + The great obstacle to radical empiricism in the contemporary mind is the + rooted rationalist belief that experience as immediately given is all + disjunction and no conjunction, and that to make one world out of this + separateness, a higher unifying agency must be there. In the prevalent + idealism this agency is represented as the absolute all-witness which + 'relates' things together by throwing 'categories' over them like a net. + The most peculiar and unique, perhaps, of all these categories is supposed + to be the truth-relation, which connects parts of reality in pairs, making + of one of them a knower, and of the other a thing known, yet which is + itself contentless experientially, neither describable, explicable, nor + reduceable to lower terms, and denotable only by uttering the name + 'truth.' + </p> + <p> + The pragmatist view, on the contrary, of the truth-relation is that it has + a definite content, and that everything in it is experienceable. Its whole + nature can be told in positive terms. The 'workableness' which ideas must + have, in order to be true, means particular workings, physical or + intellectual, actual or possible, which they may set up from next to next + inside of concrete experience. Were this pragmatic contention admitted, + one great point in the victory of radical empiricism would also be scored, + for the relation between an object and the idea that truly knows it, is + held by rationalists to be nothing of this describable sort, but to stand + outside of all possible temporal experience; and on the relation, so + interpreted, rationalism is wonted to make its last most obdurate rally. + </p> + <p> + Now the anti-pragmatist contentions which I try to meet in this volume can + be so easily used by rationalists as weapons of resistance, not only to + pragmatism but to radical empiricism also (for if the truth-relation were + transcendent, others might be so too), that I feel strongly the + strategical importance of having them definitely met and got out of the + way. What our critics most persistently keep saying is that though + workings go with truth, yet they do not constitute it. It is numerically + additional to them, prior to them, explanatory OF them, and in no wise to + be explained BY them, we are incessantly told. The first point for our + enemies to establish, therefore, is that SOMETHING numerically additional + and prior to the workings is involved in the truth of an idea. Since the + OBJECT is additional, and usually prior, most rationalists plead IT, and + boldly accuse us of denying it. This leaves on the bystanders the + impression—since we cannot reasonably deny the existence of the + object—that our account of truth breaks down, and that our critics + have driven us from the field. Altho in various places in this volume I + try to refute the slanderous charge that we deny real existence, I will + say here again, for the sake of emphasis, that the existence of the + object, whenever the idea asserts it 'truly,' is the only reason, in + innumerable cases, why the idea does work successfully, if it work at all; + and that it seems an abuse of language, to say the least, to transfer the + word 'truth' from the idea to the object's existence, when the falsehood + of ideas that won't work is explained by that existence as well as the + truth of those that will. + </p> + <p> + I find this abuse prevailing among my most accomplished adversaries. But + once establish the proper verbal custom, let the word 'truth' represent a + property of the idea, cease to make it something mysteriously connected + with the object known, and the path opens fair and wide, as I believe, to + the discussion of radical empiricism on its merits. The truth of an idea + will then mean only its workings, or that in it which by ordinary + psychological laws sets up those workings; it will mean neither the idea's + object, nor anything 'saltatory' inside the idea, that terms drawn from + experience cannot describe. + </p> + <p> + One word more, ere I end this preface. A distinction is sometimes made + between Dewey, Schiller and myself, as if I, in supposing the object's + existence, made a concession to popular prejudice which they, as more + radical pragmatists, refuse to make. As I myself understand these authors, + we all three absolutely agree in admitting the transcendency of the object + (provided it be an experienceable object) to the subject, in the + truth-relation. Dewey in particular has insisted almost ad nauseam that + the whole meaning of our cognitive states and processes lies in the way + they intervene in the control and revaluation of independent existences or + facts. His account of knowledge is not only absurd, but meaningless, + unless independent existences be there of which our ideas take account, + and for the transformation of which they work. But because he and Schiller + refuse to discuss objects and relations 'transcendent' in the sense of + being ALTOGETHER TRANS-EXPERIENTIAL, their critics pounce on sentences in + their writings to that effect to show that they deny the existence WITHIN + THE REALM OF EXPERIENCE of objects external to the ideas that declare + their presence there. [Footnote: It gives me pleasure to welcome Professor + Carveth Read into the pragmatistic church, so far as his epistemology + goes. See his vigorous book, The Metaphysics of Nature, 2d Edition, + Appendix A. (London, Black, 1908.) The work What is Reality? by Francis + Howe Johnson (Boston, 1891), of which I make the acquaintance only while + correcting these proofs, contains some striking anticipations of the later + pragmatist view. The Psychology of Thinking, by Irving E. Miller (New + York, Macmillan Co., 1909), which has just appeared, is one of the most + convincing pragmatist document yet published, tho it does not use the word + 'pragmatism' at all. While I am making references, I cannot refrain from + inserting one to the extraordinarily acute article by H. V. Knox in the + Quarterly Review for April, 1909.] + </p> + <p> + It seems incredible that educated and apparently sincere critics should so + fail to catch their adversary's point of view. + </p> + <p> + What misleads so many of them is possibly also the fact that the universes + of discourse of Schiller, Dewey, and myself are panoramas of different + extent, and that what the one postulates explicitly the other + provisionally leaves only in a state of implication, while the reader + thereupon considers it to be denied. Schiller's universe is the smallest, + being essentially a psychological one. He starts with but one sort of + thing, truth-claims, but is led ultimately to the independent objective + facts which they assert, inasmuch as the most successfully validated of + all claims is that such facts are there. My universe is more essentially + epistemological. I start with two things, the objective facts and the + claims, and indicate which claims, the facts being there, will work + successfully as the latter's substitutes and which will not. I call the + former claims true. Dewey's panorama, if I understand this colleague, is + the widest of the three, but I refrain from giving my own account of its + complexity. Suffice it that he holds as firmly as I do to objects + independent of our judgments. If I am wrong in saying this, he must + correct me. I decline in this matter to be corrected at second hand. + </p> + <p> + I have not pretended in the following pages to consider all the critics of + my account of truth, such as Messrs. Taylor, Lovejoy, Gardiner, Bakewell, + Creighton, Hibben, Parodi, Salter, Carus, Lalande, Mentre, McTaggart, G. + E. Moore, Ladd and others, especially not Professor Schinz, who has + published under the title of Anti-pragmatisme an amusing sociological + romance. Some of these critics seem to me to labor under an inability + almost pathetic, to understand the thesis which they seek to refute. I + imagine that most of their difficulties have been answered by anticipation + elsewhere in this volume, and I am sure that my readers will thank me for + not adding more repetition to the fearful amount that is already there. + </p> + <p> + 95 IRVING ST., CAMBRIDGE (MASS.), August, 1909. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + <b>CONTENTS</b> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_PREF"> PREFACE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_TOC"> DETAILED CONTENTS </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> <b>THE MEANING OF TRUTH</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> I </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> II </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> III </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> IV </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> V </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> VI </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0009"> VII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0010"> VIII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0011"> IX </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0012"> X </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0013"> XI </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0014"> XII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0015"> XIII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0016"> XIV </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0017"> XV </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_TOC" id="link2H_TOC"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <div class="middle"> + <p> + <b>CONTENTS</b> + </p> + I THE FUNCTION OF COGNITION <br /> II THE TIGERS IN INDIA <br /> III + HUMANISM AND TRUTH <br /> IV THE RELATION BETWEEN KNOWER AND KNOWN <br /> V + THE ESSENCE OF HUMANISM <br /> VI A WORD MORE ABOUT TRUTH <br /> VII + PROFESSOR PRATT ON TRUTH <br /> VIII THE PRAGMATIST ACCOUNT OF TRUTH AND + ITS MIS-UNDERSTANDERS <br /> IX THE MEANING OF THE WORD TRUTH <br /> X THE + EXISTENCE OF JULIUS CAESAR <br /> XI THE ABSOLUTE AND THE STRENUOUS LIFE + <br /> XII PROFESSOR HEBERT ON PRAGMATISM <br /> XIII ABSTRACTIONISM AND + 'RELATIVISMUS' <br /> XIV TWO ENGLISH CRITICS <br /> XV A DIALOGUE <br /> + </div> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + THE MEANING OF TRUTH + </h1> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + I + </h2> + <p> + THE FUNCTION OF COGNITION [Footnote: Read before the Aristotelian Society, + December 1, 1884, and first published in Mind, vol. x (1885).—This, + and the following articles have received a very slight verbal revision, + consisting mostly in the omission of redundancy.] + </p> + <p> + The following inquiry is (to use a distinction familiar to readers of Mr. + Shadworth Hodgson) not an inquiry into the 'how it comes,' but into the + 'what it is' of cognition. What we call acts of cognition are evidently + realized through what we call brains and their events, whether there be + 'souls' dynamically connected with the brains or not. But with neither + brains nor souls has this essay any business to transact. In it we shall + simply assume that cognition IS produced, somehow, and limit ourselves to + asking what elements it contains, what factors it implies. + </p> + <p> + Cognition is a function of consciousness. The first factor it implies is + therefore a state of consciousness wherein the cognition shall take place. + Having elsewhere used the word 'feeling' to designate generically all + states of consciousness considered subjectively, or without respect to + their possible function, I shall then say that, whatever elements an act + of cognition may imply besides, it at least implies the existence of a + FEELING. [If the reader share the current antipathy to the word 'feeling,' + he may substitute for it, wherever I use it, the word 'idea,' taken in the + old broad Lockian sense, or he may use the clumsy phrase 'state of + consciousness,' or finally he may say 'thought' instead.] + </p> + <p> + Now it is to be observed that the common consent of mankind has agreed + that some feelings are cognitive and some are simple facts having a + subjective, or, what one might almost call a physical, existence, but no + such self-transcendent function as would be implied in their being pieces + of knowledge. Our task is again limited here. We are not to ask, 'How is + self-transcendence possible?' We are only to ask, 'How comes it that + common sense has assigned a number of cases in which it is assumed not + only to be possible but actual? And what are the marks used by common + sense to distinguish those cases from the rest?' In short, our inquiry is + a chapter in descriptive psychology,—hardly anything more. + </p> + <p> + Condillac embarked on a quest similar to this by his famous hypothesis of + a statue to which various feelings were successively imparted. Its first + feeling was supposed to be one of fragrance. But to avoid all possible + complication with the question of genesis, let us not attribute even to a + statue the possession of our imaginary feeling. Let us rather suppose it + attached to no matter, nor localized at any point in space, but left + swinging IN VACUO, as it were, by the direct creative FIAT of a god. And + let us also, to escape entanglement with difficulties about the physical + or psychical nature of its 'object' not call it a feeling of fragrance or + of any other determinate sort, but limit ourselves to assuming that it is + a feeling of Q. What is true of it under this abstract name will be no + less true of it in any more particular shape (such as fragrance, pain, + hardness) which the reader may suppose. + </p> + <p> + Now, if this feeling of Q be the only creation of the god, it will of + course form the entire universe. And if, to escape the cavils of that + large class of persons who believe that SEMPER IDEM SENTIRE AC NON SENTIRE + are the same, [Footnote:1 'The Relativity of Knowledge,' held in this + sense, is, it may be observed in passing, one of the oddest of philosophic + superstitions. Whatever facts may be cited in its favor are due to the + properties of nerve-tissue, which may be exhausted by too prolonged an + excitement. Patients with neuralgias that last unremittingly for days can, + however, assure us that the limits of this nerve-law are pretty widely + drawn. But if we physically could get a feeling that should last eternally + unchanged, what atom of logical or psychological argument is there to + prove that it would not be felt as long as it lasted, and felt for just + what it is, all that time? The reason for the opposite prejudice seems to + be our reluctance to think that so stupid a thing as such a feeling would + necessarily be, should be allowed to fill eternity with its presence. An + interminable acquaintance, leading to no knowledge-about,—such would + be its condition.] we allow the feeling to be of as short a duration as + they like, that universe will only need to last an infinitesimal part of a + second. The feeling in question will thus be reduced to its fighting + weight, and all that befalls it in the way of a cognitive function must be + held to befall in the brief instant of its quickly snuffed-out life,—a + life, it will also be noticed, that has no other moment of consciousness + either preceding or following it. + </p> + <p> + Well now, can our little feeling, thus left alone in the universe,—for + the god and we psychological critics may be supposed left out of the + account,—can the feeling, I say, be said to have any sort of a + cognitive function? For it to KNOW, there must be something to be known. + What is there, on the present supposition? One may reply, 'the feeling's + content q.' But does it not seem more proper to call this the feeling's + QUALITY than its content? Does not the word 'content' suggest that the + feeling has already dirempted itself as an act from its content as an + object? And would it be quite safe to assume so promptly that the quality + q of a feeling is one and the same thing with a feeling of the quality q? + The quality q, so far, is an entirely subjective fact which the feeling + carries so to speak endogenously, or in its pocket. If any one pleases to + dignify so simple a fact as this by the name of knowledge, of course + nothing can prevent him. But let us keep closer to the path of common + usage, and reserve the name knowledge for the cognition of 'realities,' + meaning by realities things that exist independently of the feeling + through which their cognition occurs. If the content of the feeling occur + nowhere in the universe outside of the feeling itself, and perish with the + feeling, common usage refuses to call it a reality, and brands it as a + subjective feature of the feeling's constitution, or at the most as the + feeling's DREAM. + </p> + <p> + For the feeling to be cognitive in the specific sense, then, it must be + self-transcendent; and we must prevail upon the god to CREATE A REALITY + OUTSIDE OF IT to correspond to its intrinsic quality Q. Thus only can it + be redeemed from the condition of being a solipsism. If now the new + created reality RESEMBLE the feeling's quality Q I say that the feeling + may be held by us TO BE COGNIZANT OF THAT REALITY. + </p> + <p> + This first instalment of my thesis is sure to be attacked. But one word + before defending it 'Reality' has become our warrant for calling a feeling + cognitive; but what becomes our warrant for calling anything reality? The + only reply is—the faith of the present critic or inquirer. At every + moment of his life he finds himself subject to a belief in SOME realities, + even though his realities of this year should prove to be his illusions of + the next. Whenever he finds that the feeling he is studying contemplates + what he himself regards as a reality, he must of course admit the feeling + itself to be truly cognitive. We are ourselves the critics here; and we + shall find our burden much lightened by being allowed to take reality in + this relative and provisional way. Every science must make some + assumptions. Erkenntnisstheoretiker are but fallible mortals. When they + study the function of cognition, they do it by means of the same function + in themselves. And knowing that the fountain cannot go higher than its + source, we should promptly confess that our results in this field are + affected by our own liability to err. THE MOST WE CAN CLAIM IS, THAT WHAT + WE SAY ABOUT COGNITION MAY BE COUNTED AS TRUE AS WHAT WE SAY ABOUT + ANYTHING ELSE. If our hearers agree with us about what are to be held + 'realities,' they will perhaps also agree to the reality of our doctrine + of the way in which they are known. We cannot ask for more. + </p> + <p> + Our terminology shall follow the spirit of these remarks. We will deny the + function of knowledge to any feeling whose quality or content we do not + ourselves believe to exist outside of that feeling as well as in it. We + may call such a feeling a dream if we like; we shall have to see later + whether we can call it a fiction or an error. + </p> + <p> + To revert now to our thesis. Some persons will immediately cry out, 'How + CAN a reality resemble a feeling?' Here we find how wise we were to name + the quality of the feeling by an algebraic letter Q. We flank the whole + difficulty of resemblance between an inner state and an outward reality, + by leaving it free to any one to postulate as the reality whatever sort of + thing he thinks CAN resemble a feeling,—if not an outward thing, + then another feeling like the first one,—the mere feeling Q in the + critic's mind for example. Evading thus this objection, we turn to another + which is sure to be urged. + </p> + <p> + It will come from those philosophers to whom 'thought,' in the sense of a + knowledge of relations, is the all in all of mental life; and who hold a + merely feeling consciousness to be no better—one would sometimes say + from their utterances, a good deal worse—than no consciousness at + all. Such phrases as these, for example, are common to-day in the mouths + of those who claim to walk in the footprints of Kant and Hegel rather than + in the ancestral English paths: 'A perception detached from all others, + "left out of the heap we call a mind," being out of all relation, has no + qualities—is simply nothing. We can no more consider it than we can + see vacancy.' 'It is simply in itself fleeting, momentary, unnameable + (because while we name it it has become another), and for the very same + reason unknowable, the very negation of knowability.' 'Exclude from what + we have considered real all qualities constituted by relation, we find + that none are left.' + </p> + <p> + Altho such citations as these from the writings of Professor Green might + be multiplied almost indefinitely, they would hardly repay the pains of + collection, so egregiously false is the doctrine they teach. Our little + supposed feeling, whatever it may be, from the cognitive point of view, + whether a bit of knowledge or a dream, is certainly no psychical zero. It + is a most positively and definitely qualified inner fact, with a + complexion all its own. Of course there are many mental facts which it is + NOT. It knows Q, if Q be a reality, with a very minimum of knowledge. It + neither dates nor locates it. It neither classes nor names it. And it + neither knows itself as a feeling, nor contrasts itself with other + feelings, nor estimates its own duration or intensity. It is, in short, if + there is no more of it than this, a most dumb and helpless and useless + kind of thing. + </p> + <p> + But if we must describe it by so many negations, and if it can say nothing + ABOUT itself or ABOUT anything else, by what right do we deny that it is a + psychical zero? And may not the 'relationists' be right after all? + </p> + <p> + In the innocent looking word 'about' lies the solution of this riddle; and + a simple enough solution it is when frankly looked at. A quotation from a + too seldom quoted book, the Exploratio Philosophica of John Grote (London, + 1865), p. 60, will form the best introduction to it. + </p> + <p> + 'Our knowledge,' writes Grote, 'may be contemplated in either of two ways, + or, to use other words, we may speak in a double manner of the "object" of + knowledge. That is, we may either use language thus: we KNOW a thing, a + man, etc.; or we may use it thus: we know such and such things ABOUT the + thing, the man, etc. Language in general, following its true logical + instinct, distinguishes between these two applications of the notion of + knowledge, the one being yvwvai, noscere, kennen, connaitre, the other + being eidevai, scire, wissen, savoir. In the origin, the former may be + considered more what I have called phenomenal—it is the notion of + knowledge as ACQUAINTANCE or familiarity with what is known; which notion + is perhaps more akin to the phenomenal bodily communication, and is less + purely intellectual than the other; it is the kind of knowledge which we + have of a thing by the presentation to the senses or the representation of + it in picture or type, a Vorstellung. The other, which is what we express + in judgments or propositions, what is embodied in Begriffe or concepts + without any necessary imaginative representation, is in its origin the + more intellectual notion of knowledge. There is no reason, however, why we + should not express our knowledge, whatever its kind, in either manner, + provided only we do not confusedly express it, in the same proposition or + piece of reasoning, in both.' + </p> + <p> + Now obviously if our supposed feeling of Q is (if knowledge at all) only + knowledge of the mere acquaintance-type, it is milking a he-goat, as the + ancients would have said, to try to extract from it any deliverance ABOUT + anything under the sun, even about itself. And it is as unjust, after our + failure, to turn upon it and call it a psychical nothing, as it would be, + after our fruitless attack upon the billy-goat, to proclaim the + non-lactiferous character of the whole goat-tribe. But the entire industry + of the Hegelian school in trying to shove simple sensation out of the pale + of philosophic recognition is founded on this false issue. It is always + the 'speechlessness' of sensation, its inability to make any + 'statement,'[Footnote: See, for example, Green's Introduction to Hume's + Treatise of Human Nature, p. 36.] that is held to make the very notion of + it meaningless, and to justify the student of knowledge in scouting it out + of existence. 'Significance,' in the sense of standing as the sign of + other mental states, is taken to be the sole function of what mental + states we have; and from the perception that our little primitive + sensation has as yet no significance in this literal sense, it is an easy + step to call it first meaningless, next senseless, then vacuous, and + finally to brand it as absurd and inadmissible. But in this universal + liquidation, this everlasting slip, slip, slip, of direct acquaintance + into knowledge-ABOUT, until at last nothing is left about which the + knowledge can be supposed to obtain, does not all 'significance' depart + from the situation? And when our knowledge about things has reached its + never so complicated perfection, must there not needs abide alongside of + it and inextricably mixed in with it some acquaintance with WHAT things + all this knowledge is about? + </p> + <p> + Now, our supposed little feeling gives a WHAT; and if other feelings + should succeed which remember the first, its WHAT may stand as subject or + predicate of some piece of knowledge-about, of some judgment, perceiving + relations between it and other WHATS which the other feelings may know. + The hitherto dumb Q will then receive a name and be no longer speechless. + But every name, as students of logic know, has its 'denotation'; and the + denotation always means some reality or content, relationless as extra or + with its internal relations unanalyzed, like the Q which our primitive + sensation is supposed to know. No relation-expressing proposition is + possible except on the basis of a preliminary acquaintance with such + 'facts,' with such contents, as this. Let the Q be fragrance, let it be + toothache, or let it be a more complex kind of feeling, like that of the + full-moon swimming in her blue abyss, it must first come in that simple + shape, and be held fast in that first intention, before any knowledge + ABOUT it can be attained. The knowledge ABOUT it is IT with a context + added. Undo IT, and what is added cannot be CONtext. [Footnote: If A + enters and B exclaims, 'Didn't you see my brother on the stairs?' we all + hold that A may answer, 'I saw him, but didn't know he was your brother'; + ignorance of brotherhood not abolishing power to see. But those who, on + account of the unrelatedness of the first facts with which we become + acquainted, deny them to be 'known' to us, ought in consistency to + maintain that if A did not perceive the relationship of the man on the + stairs to B, it was impossible he should have noticed him at all.] + </p> + <p> + Let us say no more then about this objection, but enlarge our thesis, + thus: If there be in the universe a Q other than the Q in the feeling, the + latter may have acquaintance with an entity ejective to itself; an + acquaintance moreover, which, as mere acquaintance, it would be hard to + imagine susceptible either of improvement or increase, being in its way + complete; and which would oblige us (so long as we refuse not to call + acquaintance knowledge) to say not only that the feeling is cognitive, but + that all qualities of feeling, SO LONG AS THERE IS ANYTHING OUTSIDE OF + THEM WHICH THEY RESEMBLE, are feelings OF qualities of existence, and + perceptions of outward fact. + </p> + <p> + The point of this vindication of the cognitive function of the first + feeling lies, it will be noticed, in the discovery that q does exist + elsewhere than in it. In case this discovery were not made, we could not + be sure the feeling was cognitive; and in case there were nothing outside + to be discovered, we should have to call the feeling a dream. But the + feeling itself cannot make the discovery. Its own q is the only q it + grasps; and its own nature is not a particle altered by having the + self-transcendent function of cognition either added to it or taken away. + The function is accidental; synthetic, not analytic; and falls outside and + not inside its being. [Footnote: It seems odd to call so important a + function accidental, but I do not see how we can mend the matter. Just as, + if we start with the reality and ask how it may come to be known, we can + only reply by invoking a feeling which shall RECONSTRUCT it in its own + more private fashion; so, if we start with the feeling and ask how it may + come to know, we can only reply by invoking a reality which shall + RECONSTRUCT it in its own more public fashion. In either case, however, + the datum we start with remains just what it was. One may easily get lost + in verbal mysteries about the difference between quality of feeling and + feeling of quality, between receiving and reconstructing the knowledge of + a reality. But at the end we must confess that the notion of real + cognition involves an unmediated dualism of the knower and the known. See + Bowne's Metaphysics, New York, 1882, pp. 403-412, and various passages in + Lotze, e.g., Logic, Sec. 308. ['Unmediated' is a bad word to have used.—1909.]] + </p> + <p> + A feeling feels as a gun shoots. If there be nothing to be felt or hit, + they discharge themselves ins blaue hinein. If, however, something starts + up opposite them, they no longer simply shoot or feel, they hit and know. + </p> + <p> + But with this arises a worse objection than any yet made. We the critics + look on and see a real q and a feeling of q; and because the two resemble + each other, we say the one knows the other. But what right have we to say + this until we know that the feeling of q means to stand for or represent + just that SAME other q? Suppose, instead of one q, a number of real q's in + the field. If the gun shoots and hits, we can easily see which one of them + it hits. But how can we distinguish which one the feeling knows? It knows + the one it stands for. But which one DOES it stand for? It declares no + intention in this respect. It merely resembles; it resembles all + indifferently; and resembling, per se, is not necessarily representing or + standing-for at all. Eggs resemble each other, but do not on that account + represent, stand for, or know each other. And if you say this is because + neither of them is a FEELING, then imagine the world to consist of nothing + but toothaches, which ARE feelings, feelings resembling each other + exactly,—would they know each other the better for all that? + </p> + <p> + The case of q being a bare quality like that of toothache-pain is quite + different from that of its being a concrete individual thing. There is + practically no test for deciding whether the feeling of a bare quality + means to represent it or not. It can DO nothing to the quality beyond + resembling it, simply because an abstract quality is a thing to which + nothing can be done. Being without context or environment or principium + individuationis, a quiddity with no haecceity, a platonic idea, even + duplicate editions of such a quality (were they possible), would be + indiscernible, and no sign could be given, no result altered, whether the + feeling I meant to stand for this edition or for that, or whether it + simply resembled the quality without meaning to stand for it at all. + </p> + <p> + If now we grant a genuine pluralism of editions to the quality q, by + assigning to each a CONTEXT which shall distinguish it from its mates, we + may proceed to explain which edition of it the feeling knows, by extending + our principle of resemblance to the context too, and saying the feeling + knows the particular q whose context it most exactly duplicates. But here + again the theoretic doubt recurs: duplication and coincidence, are they + knowledge? The gun shows which q it points to and hits, by BREAKING it. + Until the feeling can show us which q it points to and knows, by some + equally flagrant token, why are we not free to deny that it either points + to or knows any one of the REAL q's at all, and to affirm that the word + 'resemblance' exhaustively describes its relation to the reality? + </p> + <p> + Well, as a matter of fact, every actual feeling DOES show us, quite as + flagrantly as the gun, which q it points to; and practically in concrete + cases the matter is decided by an element we have hitherto left out. Let + us pass from abstractions to possible instances, and ask our obliging deus + ex machina to frame for us a richer world. Let him send me, for example, a + dream of the death of a certain man, and let him simultaneously cause the + man to die. How would our practical instinct spontaneously decide whether + this were a case of cognition of the reality, or only a sort of marvellous + coincidence of a resembling reality with my dream? Just such puzzling + cases as this are what the 'society for psychical research' is busily + collecting and trying to interpret in the most reasonable way. + </p> + <p> + If my dream were the only one of the kind I ever had in my life, if the + context of the death in the dream differed in many particulars from the + real death's context, and if my dream led me to no action about the death, + unquestionably we should all call it a strange coincidence, and naught + besides. But if the death in the dream had a long context, agreeing point + for point with every feature that attended the real death; if I were + constantly having such dreams, all equally perfect, and if on awaking I + had a habit of ACTING immediately as if they were true and so getting 'the + start' of my more tardily instructed neighbors,—we should in all + probability have to admit that I had some mysterious kind of clairvoyant + power, that my dreams in an inscrutable way meant just those realities + they figured, and that the word 'coincidence' failed to touch the root of + the matter. And whatever doubts any one preserved would completely vanish, + if it should appear that from the midst of my dream I had the power of + INTERFERING with the course of the reality, and making the events in it + turn this way or that, according as I dreamed they should. Then at least + it would be certain that my waking critics and my dreaming self were + dealing with the SAME. + </p> + <p> + And thus do men invariably decide such a question. THE FALLING OF THE + DREAM'S PRACTICAL CONSEQUENCES into the real world, and the EXTENT of the + resemblance between the two worlds are the criteria they instinctively + use. [Footnote: The thoroughgoing objector might, it is true, still return + to the charge, and, granting a dream which should completely mirror the + real universe, and all the actions dreamed in which should be instantly + matched by duplicate actions in this universe, still insist that this is + nothing more than harmony, and that it is as far as ever from being made + clear whether the dream-world refers to that other world, all of whose + details it so closely copies. This objection leads deep into metaphysics. + I do not impugn its importance, and justice obliges me to say that but for + the teachings of my colleague, Dr. Josiah Royce, I should neither have + grasped its full force nor made my own practical and psychological point + of view as clear to myself as it is. On this occasion I prefer to stick + steadfastly to that point of view; but I hope that Dr. Royce's more + fundamental criticism of the function of cognition may ere long see the + light. [I referred in this note to Royce's religious aspect of philosophy, + then about to be published. This powerful book maintained that the notion + of REFERRING involved that of an inclusive mind that shall own both the + real q and the mental q, and use the latter expressly as a representative + symbol of the former. At the time I could not refute this + transcendentalist opinion. Later, largely through the influence of + Professor D. S. Miller (see his essay 'The meaning of truth and error,' in + the Philosophical Review for 1893, vol. 2 p. 403) I came to see that any + definitely experienceable workings would serve as intermediaries quite as + well as the absolute mind's intentions would.]] All feeling is for the + sake of action, all feeling results in action,—to-day no argument is + needed to prove these truths. But by a most singular disposition of nature + which we may conceive to have been different, MY FEELINGS ACT UPON THE + REALITIES WITHIN MY CRITIC'S WORLD. Unless, then, my critic can prove that + my feeling does not 'point to' those realities which it acts upon, how can + he continue to doubt that he and I are alike cognizant of one and the same + real world? If the action is performed in one world, that must be the + world the feeling intends; if in another world, THAT is the world the + feeling has in mind. If your feeling bear no fruits in my world, I call it + utterly detached from my world; I call it a solipsism, and call its world + a dream-world. If your toothache do not prompt you to ACT as if I had a + toothache, nor even as if I had a separate existence; if you neither say + to me, 'I know now how you must suffer!' nor tell me of a remedy, I deny + that your feeling, however it may resemble mine, is really cognizant of + mine. It gives no SIGN of being cognizant, and such a sign is absolutely + necessary to my admission that it is. + </p> + <p> + Before I can think you to mean my world, you must affect my world; before + I can think you to mean much of it, you must affect much of it; and before + I can be sure you mean it AS I DO, you must affect it JUST AS I SHOULD if + I were in your place. Then I, your critic, will gladly believe that we are + thinking, not only of the same reality, but that we are thinking it ALIKE, + and thinking of much of its extent. + </p> + <p> + Without the practical effects of our neighbor's feelings on our own world, + we should never suspect the existence of our neighbor's feelings at all, + and of course should never find ourselves playing the critic as we do in + this article. The constitution of nature is very peculiar. In the world of + each of us are certain objects called human bodies, which move about and + act on all the other objects there, and the occasions of their action are + in the main what the occasions of our action would be, were they our + bodies. They use words and gestures, which, if we used them, would have + thoughts behind them,—no mere thoughts uberhaupt, however, but + strictly determinate thoughts. I think you have the notion of fire in + general, because I see you act towards this fire in my room just as I act + towards it,—poke it and present your person towards it, and so + forth. But that binds me to believe that if you feel 'fire' at all, THIS + is the fire you feel. As a matter of fact, whenever we constitute + ourselves into psychological critics, it is not by dint of discovering + which reality a feeling 'resembles' that we find out which reality it + means. We become first aware of which one it means, and then we suppose + that to be the one it resembles. We see each other looking at the same + objects, pointing to them and turning them over in various ways, and + thereupon we hope and trust that all of our several feelings resemble the + reality and each other. But this is a thing of which we are never + theoretically sure. Still, it would practically be a case of grubelsucht, + if a ruffian were assaulting and drubbing my body, to spend much time in + subtle speculation either as to whether his vision of my body resembled + mine, or as to whether the body he really MEANT to insult were not some + body in his mind's eye, altogether other from my own. The practical point + of view brushes such metaphysical cobwebs away. If what he have in mind be + not MY body, why call we it a body at all? His mind is inferred by me as a + term, to whose existence we trace the things that happen. The inference is + quite void if the term, once inferred, be separated from its connection + with the body that made me infer it, and connected with another that is + not mine at all. No matter for the metaphysical puzzle of how our two + minds, the ruffian's and mine, can mean the same body. Men who see each + other's bodies sharing the same space, treading the same earth, splashing + the same water, making the same air resonant, and pursuing the same game + and eating out of the same dish, will never practically believe in a + pluralism of solipsistic worlds. + </p> + <p> + Where, however, the actions of one mind seem to take no effect in the + world of the other, the case is different. This is what happens in poetry + and fiction. Every one knows Ivanhoe, for example; but so long as we stick + to the story pure and simple without regard to the facts of its + production, few would hesitate to admit that there are as many different + Ivanhoes as there are different minds cognizant of the story. [Footnote: + That is, there is no REAL 'Ivanhoe,' not even the one in Sir Walter + Scott's mind as he was writing the story. That one is only the FIRST one + of the Ivanhoe-solipsisms. It is quite true we can make it the real + Ivanhoe if we like, and then say that the other Ivanhoes know it or do not + know it, according as they refer to and resemble it or no. This is done by + bringing in Sir Walter Scott himself as the author of the real Ivanhoe, + and so making a complex object of both. This object, however, is not a + story pure and simple. It has dynamic relations with the world common to + the experience of all the readers. Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe got itself + printed in volumes which we all can handle, and to any one of which we can + refer to see which of our versions be the true one, i.e., the original one + of Scott himself. We can see the manuscript; in short we can get back to + the Ivanhoe in Scott's mind by many an avenue and channel of this real + world of our experience,—a thing we can by no means do with either + the Ivanhoe or the Rebecca, either the Templar or the Isaac of York, of + the story taken simply as such, and detached from the conditions of its + production. Everywhere, then, we have the same test: can we pass + continuously from two objects in two minds to a third object which seems + to be in BOTH minds, because each mind feels every modification imprinted + on it by the other? If so, the first two objects named are derivatives, to + say the least, from the same third object, and may be held, if they + resemble each other, to refer to one and the same reality.] The fact that + all these Ivanhoes RESEMBLE each other does not prove the contrary. But if + an alteration invented by one man in his version were to reverberate + immediately through all the other versions, and produce changes therein, + we should then easily agree that all these thinkers were thinking the SAME + Ivanhoe, and that, fiction or no fiction, it formed a little world common + to them all. + </p> + <p> + Having reached this point, we may take up our thesis and improve it again. + Still calling the reality by the name of q and letting the critic's + feeling vouch for it, we can say that any other feeling will be held + cognizant of q, provided it both resemble q, and refer to q, as shown by + its either modifying q directly, or modifying some other reality, p or r, + which the critic knows to be continuous with q. Or more shortly, thus: THE + FEELING OF q KNOWS WHATEVER REALITY IT RESEMBLES, AND EITHER DIRECTLY OR + INDIRECTLY OPERATES ON. If it resemble without operating, it is a dream; + if it operate without resembling, it is an error. [Footnote: Among such + errors are those cases in which our feeling operates on a reality which it + does partially resemble, and yet does not intend: as for instance, when I + take up your umbrella, meaning to take my own. I cannot be said here + either to know your umbrella, or my own, which latter my feeling more + completely resembles. I am mistaking them both, misrepresenting their + context, etc. + </p> + <p> + We have spoken in the text as if the critic were necessarily one mind, and + the feeling criticised another. But the criticised feeling and its critic + may be earlier and later feelings of the same mind, and here it might seem + that we could dispense with the notion of operating, to prove that critic + and criticised are referring to and meaning to represent the SAME. We + think we see our past feelings directly, and know what they refer to + without appeal. At the worst, we can always fix the intention of our + present feeling and MAKE it refer to the same reality to which any one of + our past feelings may have referred. So we need no 'operating' here, to + make sure that the feeling and its critic mean the same real q. Well, all + the better if this is so! We have covered the more complex and difficult + case in our text, and we may let this easier one go. The main thing at + present is to stick to practical psychology, and ignore metaphysical + difficulties. + </p> + <p> + One more remark. Our formula contains, it will be observed, nothing to + correspond to the great principle of cognition laid down by Professor + Ferrier in his Institutes of Metaphysic and apparently adopted by all the + followers of Fichte, the principle, namely, that for knowledge to be + constituted there must be knowledge of the knowing mind along with + whatever else is known: not q, as we have supposed, but q PLUS MYSELF, + must be the least I can know. It is certain that the common sense of + mankind never dreams of using any such principle when it tries to + discriminate between conscious states that are knowledge and conscious + states that are not. So that Ferrier's principle, if it have any relevancy + at all, must have relevancy to the metaphysical possibility of + consciousness at large, and not to the practically recognized constitution + of cognitive consciousness. We may therefore pass it by without further + notice here.] It is to be feared that the reader may consider this formula + rather insignificant and obvious, and hardly worth the labor of so many + pages, especially when he considers that the only cases to which it + applies are percepts, and that the whole field of symbolic or conceptual + thinking seems to elude its grasp. Where the reality is either a material + thing or act, or a state of the critic's consciousness, I may both mirror + it in my mind and operate upon it—in the latter case indirectly, of + course—as soon as I perceive it. But there are many cognitions, + universally allowed to be such, which neither mirror nor operate on their + realities. + </p> + <p> + In the whole field of symbolic thought we are universally held both to + intend, to speak of, and to reach conclusions about—to know in short—particular + realities, without having in our subjective consciousness any mind-stuff + that resembles them even in a remote degree. We are instructed about them + by language which awakens no consciousness beyond its sound; and we know + WHICH realities they are by the faintest and most fragmentary glimpse of + some remote context they may have and by no direct imagination of + themselves. As minds may differ here, let me speak in the first person. I + am sure that my own current thinking has WORDS for its almost exclusive + subjective material, words which are made intelligible by being referred + to some reality that lies beyond the horizon of direct consciousness, and + of which I am only aware as of a terminal MORE existing in a certain + direction, to which the words might lead but do not lead yet. The SUBJECT, + or TOPIC, of the words is usually something towards which I mentally seem + to pitch them in a backward way, almost as I might jerk my thumb over my + shoulder to point at something, without looking round, if I were only + entirely sure that it was there. The UPSHOT, or CONCLUSION, of the words + is something towards which I seem to incline my head forwards, as if + giving assent to its existence, tho all my mind's eye catches sight of may + be some tatter of an image connected with it, which tatter, however, if + only endued with the feeling of familiarity and reality, makes me feel + that the whole to which it belongs is rational and real, and fit to be let + pass. + </p> + <p> + Here then is cognitive consciousness on a large scale, and yet what it + knows, it hardly resembles in the least degree. The formula last laid down + for our thesis must therefore be made more complete. We may now express it + thus: A PERCEPT KNOWS WHATEVER REALITY IT DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY OPERATES + ON AND RESEMBLES; ACONCEPTUAL FEELING, OR THOUGHT KNOWS A REALITY, + WHENEVER IT ACTUALLY OR POTENTIALLY TERMINATES IN A PERCEPT THAT OPERATES + ON, OR RESEMBLES THAT REALITY, OR IS OTHERWISE CONNECTED WITH IT OR WITH + ITS CONTEXT. The latter percept may be either sensation or sensorial idea; + and when I say the thought must TERMINATE in such a percept, I mean that + it must ultimately be capable of leading up thereto,—by the way of + practical [missing section] is an incomplete 'thought about' that reality, + that reality is its 'topic,' etc. experience, if the terminal feeling be a + sensation; by the way of logical or habitual suggestion, if it be only an + image in the mind. + </p> + <p> + Let an illustration make this plainer. I open the first book I take up, + and read the first sentence that meets my eye: 'Newton saw the handiwork + of God in the heavens as plainly as Paley in the animal kingdom.' I + immediately look back and try to analyze the subjective state in which I + rapidly apprehended this sentence as I read it. In the first place there + was an obvious feeling that the sentence was intelligible and rational and + related to the world of realities. There was also a sense of agreement or + harmony between 'Newton,' 'Paley,' and 'God.' There was no apparent image + connected with the words 'heavens,' or 'handiwork,' or 'God'; they were + words merely. With 'animal kingdom' I think there was the faintest + consciousness (it may possibly have been an image of the steps) of the + Museum of Zoology in the town of Cambridge where I write. With 'Paley' + there was an equally faint consciousness of a small dark leather book; and + with 'Newton' a pretty distinct vision of the right-hand lower corner of + curling periwig. This is all the mind-stuff I can discover in my first + consciousness of the meaning of this sentence, and I am afraid that even + not all of this would have been present had I come upon the sentence in a + genuine reading of the book, and not picked it out for an experiment. And + yet my consciousness was truly cognitive. The sentence is 'about + realities' which my psychological critic—for we must not forget him—acknowledges + to be such, even as he acknowledges my distinct feeling that they ARE + realities, and my acquiescence in the general rightness of what I read of + them, to be true knowledge on my part. + </p> + <p> + Now what justifies my critic in being as lenient as this? This singularly + inadequate consciousness of mine, made up of symbols that neither resemble + nor affect the realities they stand for,—how can he be sure it is + cognizant of the very realities he has himself in mind? + </p> + <p> + He is sure because in countless like cases he has seen such inadequate and + symbolic thoughts, by developing themselves, terminate in percepts that + practically modified and presumably resembled his own. By 'developing' + themselves is meant obeying their tendencies, following up the suggestions + nascently present in them, working in the direction in which they seem to + point, clearing up the penumbra, making distinct the halo, unravelling the + fringe, which is part of their composition, and in the midst of which + their more substantive kernel of subjective content seems consciously to + lie. Thus I may develop my thought in the Paley direction by procuring the + brown leather volume and bringing the passages about the animal kingdom + before the critic's eyes. I may satisfy him that the words mean for me + just what they mean for him, by showing him IN CONCRETO the very animals + and their arrangements, of which the pages treat. I may get Newton's works + and portraits; or if I follow the line of suggestion of the wig, I may + smother my critic in seventeenth-century matters pertaining to Newton's + environment, to show that the word 'Newton' has the same LOCUS and + relations in both our minds. Finally I may, by act and word, persuade him + that what I mean by God and the heavens and the analogy of the handiworks, + is just what he means also. + </p> + <p> + My demonstration in the last resort is to his SENSES. My thought makes me + act on his senses much as he might himself act on them, were he pursuing + the consequences of a perception of his own. Practically then MY thought + terminates in HIS realities. He willingly supposes it, therefore, to be OF + them, and inwardly to RESEMBLE what his own thought would be, were it of + the same symbolic sort as mine. And the pivot and fulcrum and support of + his mental persuasion, is the sensible operation which my thought leads + me, or may lead, to effect—the bringing of Paley's book, of Newton's + portrait, etc., before his very eyes. + </p> + <p> + In the last analysis, then, we believe that we all know and think about + and talk about the same world, because WE BELIEVE OUR PERCEPTS ARE + POSSESSED BY US IN COMMON. And we believe this because the percepts of + each one of us seem to be changed in consequence of changes in the + percepts of someone else. What I am for you is in the first instance a + percept of your own. Unexpectedly, however, I open and show you a book, + uttering certain sounds the while. These acts are also your percepts, but + they so resemble acts of yours with feelings prompting them, that you + cannot doubt I have the feelings too, or that the book is one book felt in + both our worlds. That it is felt in the same way, that my feelings of it + resemble yours, is something of which we never can be sure, but which we + assume as the simplest hypothesis that meets the case. As a matter of + fact, we never ARE sure of it, and, as ERKENNTNISSTHEORETIKER, we can only + say that of feelings that should NOT resemble each other, both could not + know the same thing at the same time in the same way. [Footnote: Though + both might terminate in the same thing and be incomplete thoughts 'about' + it.] If each holds to its own percept as the reality, it is bound to say + of the other percept, that, though it may INTEND that reality, and prove + this by working change upon it, yet, if it do not resemble it, it is all + false and wrong. [Footnote: The difference between Idealism and Realism is + immaterial here. What is said in the text is consistent with either + theory. A law by which my percept shall change yours directly is no more + mysterious than a law by which it shall first change a physical reality, + and then the reality change yours. In either case you and I seem knit into + a continuous world, and not to form a pair of solipsisms.] + </p> + <p> + If this be so of percepts, how much more so of higher modes of thought! + Even in the sphere of sensation individuals are probably different enough. + Comparative study of the simplest conceptual elements seems to show a + wider divergence still. And when it comes to general theories and + emotional attitudes towards life, it is indeed time to say with Thackeray, + 'My friend, two different universes walk about under your hat and under + mine.' + </p> + <p> + What can save us at all and prevent us from flying asunder into a chaos of + mutually repellent solipsisms? Through what can our several minds commune? + Through nothing but the mutual resemblance of those of our perceptual + feelings which have this power of modifying one another, WHICH ARE MERE + DUMB KNOWLEDGES-OF-ACQUAINTANCE, and which must also resemble their + realities or not know them aright at all. In such pieces of + knowledge-of-acquaintance all our knowledge-about must end, and carry a + sense of this possible termination as part of its content. These percepts, + these termini, these sensible things, these mere matters-of-acquaintance, + are the only realities we ever directly know, and the whole history of our + thought is the history of our substitution of one of them for another, and + the reduction of the substitute to the status of a conceptual sign. + Contemned though they be by some thinkers, these sensations are the + mother-earth, the anchorage, the stable rock, the first and last limits, + the terminus a quo and the terminus ad quem of the mind. To find such + sensational termini should be our aim with all our higher thought. They + end discussion; they destroy the false conceit of knowledge; and without + them we are all at sea with each other's meaning. If two men act alike on + a percept, they believe themselves to feel alike about it; if not, they + may suspect they know it in differing ways. We can never be sure we + understand each other till we are able to bring the matter to this test. + [Footnote: 'There is no distinction of meaning so fine as to consist in + anything but a possible difference of practice.... It appears, then, that + the rule for attaining the [highest] grade of clearness of apprehension is + as follows: Consider what effects, which might conceivably have practical + bearings, we conceive the object of our conception to have. Then, our + conception of these effects is the whole of our conception of the object.' + Charles S. Peirce: 'How to make our Ideas clear,' in Popular Science + Monthly, New York, January, 1878, p. 293.] This is why metaphysical + discussions are so much like fighting with the air; they have no practical + issue of a sensational kind. 'Scientific' theories, on the other hand, + always terminate in definite percepts. You can deduce a possible sensation + from your theory and, taking me into your laboratory, prove that your + theory is true of my world by giving me the sensation then and there. + Beautiful is the flight of conceptual reason through the upper air of + truth. No wonder philosophers are dazzled by it still, and no wonder they + look with some disdain at the low earth of feeling from which the goddess + launched herself aloft. But woe to her if she return not home to its + acquaintance; Nirgends haften dann die unsicheren Sohlen—every crazy + wind will take her, and, like a fire-balloon at night, she will go out + among the stars. + </p> + <p> + NOTE.—The reader will easily see how much of the account of the + truth-function developed later in Pragmatism was already explicit in this + earlier article, and how much came to be defined later. In this earlier + article we find distinctly asserted:— + </p> + <p> + 1. The reality, external to the true idea; + </p> + <p> + 2. The critic, reader, or epistemologist, with his own belief, as warrant + for this reality's existence; + </p> + <p> + 3. The experienceable environment, as the vehicle or medium connecting + knower with known, and yielding the cognitive RELATION; + </p> + <p> + 4. The notion of POINTING, through this medium, to the reality, as one + condition of our being said to know it; + </p> + <p> + 5. That of RESEMBLING it, and eventually AFFECTING it, as determining the + pointing to IT and not to something else. + </p> + <p> + 6. The elimination of the 'epistemological gulf,' so that the whole + truth-relation falls inside of the continuities of concrete experience, + and is constituted of particular processes, varying with every object and + subject, and susceptible of being described in detail. + </p> + <p> + The defects in this earlier account are:— + </p> + <p> + 1. The possibly undue prominence given to resembling, which altho a + fundamental function in knowing truly, is so often dispensed with; + </p> + <p> + 2. The undue emphasis laid upon operating on the object itself, which in + many cases is indeed decisive of that being what we refer to, but which is + often lacking, or replaced by operations on other things related to the + object. + </p> + <p> + 3. The imperfect development of the generalized notion of the WORKABILITY + of the feeling or idea as equivalent to that SATISFACTORY ADAPTATION to + the particular reality, which constitutes the truth of the idea. It is + this more generalized notion, as covering all such specifications as + pointing, fitting, operating or resembling, that distinguishes the + developed view of Dewey, Schiller, and myself. + </p> + <p> + 4. The treatment, [earlier], of percepts as the only realm of reality. I + now treat concepts as a co-ordinate realm. + </p> + <p> + The next paper represents a somewhat broader grasp of the topic on the + writer's part. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + II + </h2> + <p> + THE TIGERS IN INDIA [Footnote: Extracts from a presidential address before + the American Psychological Association, published in the Psychological + Review, vol. ii, p. 105 (1895).] + </p> + <p> + THERE are two ways of knowing things, knowing them immediately or + intuitively, and knowing them conceptually or representatively. Altho such + things as the white paper before our eyes can be known intuitively, most + of the things we know, the tigers now in India, for example, or the + scholastic system of philosophy, are known only representatively or + symbolically. + </p> + <p> + Suppose, to fix our ideas, that we take first a case of conceptual + knowledge; and let it be our knowledge of the tigers in India, as we sit + here. Exactly what do we MEAN by saying that we here know the tigers? What + is the precise fact that the cognition so confidently claimed is KNOWN-AS, + to use Shadworth Hodgson's inelegant but valuable form of words? + </p> + <p> + Most men would answer that what we mean by knowing the tigers is having + them, however absent in body, become in some way present to our thought; + or that our knowledge of them is known as presence of our thought to them. + A great mystery is usually made of this peculiar presence in absence; and + the scholastic philosophy, which is only common sense grown pedantic, + would explain it as a peculiar kind of existence, called INTENTIONAL + EXISTENCE of the tigers in our mind. At the very least, people would say + that what we mean by knowing the tigers is mentally POINTING towards them + as we sit here. + </p> + <p> + But now what do we mean by POINTING, in such a case as this? What is the + pointing known-as, here? + </p> + <p> + To this question I shall have to give a very prosaic answer—one that + traverses the pre-possessions not only of common sense and scholasticism, + but also those of nearly all the epistemological writers whom I have ever + read. The answer, made brief, is this: The pointing of our thought to the + tigers is known simply and solely as a procession of mental associates and + motor consequences that follow on the thought, and that would lead + harmoniously, if followed out, into some ideal or real context, or even + into the immediate presence, of the tigers. It is known as our rejection + of a jaguar, if that beast were shown us as a tiger; as our assent to a + genuine tiger if so shown. It is known as our ability to utter all sorts + of propositions which don't contradict other propositions that are true of + the real tigers. It is even known, if we take the tigers very seriously, + as actions of ours which may terminate in directly intuited tigers, as + they would if we took a voyage to India for the purpose of tiger-hunting + and brought back a lot of skins of the striped rascals which we had laid + low. In all this there is no self-transcendency in our mental images TAKEN + BY THEMSELVES. They are one phenomenal fact; the tigers are another; and + their pointing to the tigers is a perfectly commonplace intra-experiential + relation, IF YOU ONCE GRANT A CONNECTING WORLD TO BE THERE. In short, the + ideas and the tigers are in themselves as loose and separate, to use + Hume's language, as any two things can be; and pointing means here an + operation as external and adventitious as any that nature + yields.[Footnote: A stone in one field may 'fit,' we say, a hole in + another field. But the relation of 'fitting,' so long as no one carries + the stone to the hole and drops it in, is only one name for the fact that + such an act MAY happen. Similarly with the knowing of the tigers here and + now. It is only an anticipatory name for a further associative and + terminative process that MAY occur.] + </p> + <p> + I hope you may agree with me now that in representative knowledge there is + no special inner mystery, but only an outer chain of physical or mental + intermediaries connecting thought and thing. TO KNOW AN OBJECT IS HERE TO + LEAD TO IT THROUGH A CONTEXT WHICH THE WORLD SUPPLIES. All this was most + instructively set forth by our colleague D. S. Miller at our meeting in + New York last Christmas, and for re-confirming my sometime wavering + opinion, I owe him this acknowledgment. [Footnote: See Dr. Miller's + articles on Truth and Error, and on Content and Function, in the + Philosophical Review, July, 1893, and Nov., 1895.] + </p> + <p> + Let us next pass on to the case of immediate or intuitive acquaintance + with an object, and let the object be the white paper before our eyes. The + thought-stuff and the thing-stuff are here indistinguishably the same in + nature, as we saw a moment since, and there is no context of + intermediaries or associates to stand between and separate the thought and + thing. There is no 'presence in absence' here, and no 'pointing,' but + rather an allround embracing of the paper by the thought; and it is clear + that the knowing cannot now be explained exactly as it was when the tigers + were its object. Dotted all through our experience are states of immediate + acquaintance just like this. Somewhere our belief always does rest on + ultimate data like the whiteness, smoothness, or squareness of this paper. + Whether such qualities be truly ultimate aspects of being, or only + provisional suppositions of ours, held-to till we get better informed, is + quite immaterial for our present inquiry. So long as it is believed in, we + see our object face to face. What now do we mean by 'knowing' such a sort + of object as this? For this is also the way in which we should know the + tiger if our conceptual idea of him were to terminate by having led us to + his lair? + </p> + <p> + This address must not become too long, so I must give my answer in the + fewest words. And let me first say this: So far as the white paper or + other ultimate datum of our experience is considered to enter also into + some one else's experience, and we, in knowing it, are held to know it + there as well as here; so far, again, as it is considered to be a mere + mask for hidden molecules that other now impossible experiences of our own + might some day lay bare to view; so far it is a case of tigers in India + again—the things known being absent experiences, the knowing can + only consist in passing smoothly towards them through the intermediary + context that the world supplies. But if our own private vision of the + paper be considered in abstraction from every other event, as if it + constituted by itself the universe (and it might perfectly well do so, for + aught we can understand to the contrary), then the paper seen and the + seeing of it are only two names for one indivisible fact which, properly + named, is THE DATUM, THE PHENOMENON, OR THE EXPERIENCE. The paper is in + the mind and the mind is around the paper, because paper and mind are only + two names that are given later to the one experience, when, taken in a + larger world of which it forms a part, its connections are traced in + different directions. [Footnote: What is meant by this is that 'the + experience' can be referred to either of two great associative systems, + that of the experiencer's mental history, or that of the experienced facts + of the world. Of both of these systems it forms part, and may be regarded, + indeed, as one of their points of intersection. One might let a vertical + line stand for the mental history; but the same object, O, appears also in + the mental history of different persons, represented by the other vertical + lines. It thus ceases to be the private property of one experience, and + becomes, so to speak, a shared or public thing. We can track its outer + history in this way, and represent it by the horizontal line. (It is also + known representatively at other points of the vertical lines, or + intuitively there again, so that the line of its outer history would have + to be looped and wandering, but I make it straight for simplicity's + sake.)] In any case, however, it is the same stuff figures in all the sets + of lines. + </p> + <p> + TO KNOW IMMEDIATELY, THEN, OR INTUITIVELY, IS FOR MENTAL CONTENT AND + OBJECT TO BE IDENTICAL. This is a very different definition from that + which we gave of representative knowledge; but neither definition involves + those mysterious notions of self-transcendency and presence in absence + which are such essential parts of the ideas of knowledge, both of + philosophers and of common men. [Footnote: The reader will observe that + the text is written from the point of view of NAIF realism or common + sense, and avoids raising the idealistic controversy.] + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + III + </h2> + <p> + HUMANISM AND TRUTH [Footnote: Reprinted, with slight verbal revision, from + Mind, vol. xiii, N. S., p. 457 (October, 1904). A couple of interpolations + from another article in Mind, 'Humanism and truth once more,' in vol. xiv, + have been made.] + </p> + <p> + RECEIVING from the Editor of Mind an advance proof of Mr. Bradley's + article on 'Truth and Practice,' I understand this as a hint to me to join + in the controversy over 'Pragmatism' which seems to have seriously begun. + As my name has been coupled with the movement, I deem it wise to take the + hint, the more so as in some quarters greater credit has been given me + than I deserve, and probably undeserved discredit in other quarters falls + also to my lot. + </p> + <p> + First, as to the word 'pragmatism.' I myself have only used the term to + indicate a method of carrying on abstract discussion. The serious meaning + of a concept, says Mr. Peirce, lies in the concrete difference to some one + which its being true will make. Strive to bring all debated conceptions to + that' pragmatic' test, and you will escape vain wrangling: if it can make + no practical difference which of two statements be true, then they are + really one statement in two verbal forms; if it can make no practical + difference whether a given statement be true or false, then the statement + has no real meaning. In neither case is there anything fit to quarrel + about: we may save our breath, and pass to more important things. + </p> + <p> + All that the pragmatic method implies, then, is that truths should HAVE + practical [Footnote: 'Practical' in the sense of PARTICULAR, of course, + not in the sense that the consequences may not be MENTAL as well as + physical.] consequences. In England the word has been used more broadly + still, to cover the notion that the truth of any statement CONSISTS in the + consequences, and particularly in their being good consequences. Here we + get beyond affairs of method altogether; and since my pragmatism and this + wider pragmatism are so different, and both are important enough to have + different names, I think that Mr. Schiller's proposal to call the wider + pragmatism by the name of 'humanism' is excellent and ought to be adopted. + The narrower pragmatism may still be spoken of as the 'pragmatic method.' + </p> + <p> + I have read in the past six months many hostile reviews of Schiller's and + Dewey's publications; but with the exception of Mr. Bradley's elaborate + indictment, they are out of reach where I write, and I have largely + forgotten them. I think that a free discussion of the subject on my part + would in any case be more useful than a polemic attempt at rebutting these + criticisms in detail. Mr. Bradley in particular can be taken care of by + Mr. Schiller. He repeatedly confesses himself unable to comprehend + Schiller's views, he evidently has not sought to do so sympathetically, + and I deeply regret to say that his laborious article throws, for my mind, + absolutely no useful light upon the subject. It seems to me on the whole + an IGNORATIO ELENCHI, and I feel free to disregard it altogether. + </p> + <p> + The subject is unquestionably difficult. Messrs. Dewey's and Schiller's + thought is eminently an induction, a generalization working itself free + from all sorts of entangling particulars. If true, it involves much + restatement of traditional notions. This is a kind of intellectual product + that never attains a classic form of expression when first promulgated. + The critic ought therefore not to be too sharp and logic-chopping in his + dealings with it, but should weigh it as a whole, and especially weigh it + against its possible alternatives. One should also try to apply it first + to one instance, and then to another to see how it will work. It seems to + me that it is emphatically not a case for instant execution, by conviction + of intrinsic absurdity or of self-contradiction, or by caricature of what + it would look like if reduced to skeleton shape. Humanism is in fact much + more like one of those secular changes that come upon public opinion + overnight, as it were, borne upon tides 'too deep for sound or foam,' that + survive all the crudities and extravagances of their advocates, that you + can pin to no one absolutely essential statement, nor kill by any one + decisive stab. + </p> + <p> + Such have been the changes from aristocracy to democracy, from classic to + romantic taste, from theistic to pantheistic feeling, from static to + evolutionary ways of understanding life—changes of which we all have + been spectators. Scholasticism still opposes to such changes the method of + confutation by single decisive reasons, showing that the new view involves + self-contradiction, or traverses some fundamental principle. This is like + stopping a river by planting a stick in the middle of its bed. Round your + obstacle flows the water and 'gets there all the same.' In reading some of + our opponents, I am not a little reminded of those catholic writers who + refute darwinism by telling us that higher species cannot come from lower + because minus nequit gignere plus, or that the notion of transformation is + absurd, for it implies that species tend to their own destruction, and + that would violate the principle that every reality tends to persevere in + its own shape. The point of view is too myopic, too tight and close to + take in the inductive argument. Wide generalizations in science always + meet with these summary refutations in their early days; but they outlive + them, and the refutations then sound oddly antiquated and scholastic. I + cannot help suspecting that the humanistic theory is going through this + kind of would-be refutation at present. + </p> + <p> + The one condition of understanding humanism is to become inductive-minded + oneself, to drop rigorous definitions, and follow lines of least, + resistance 'on the whole.' 'In other words,' an opponent might say, + 'resolve your intellect into a kind of slush.' 'Even so,' I make reply,—'if + you will consent to use no politer word.' For humanism, conceiving the + more 'true' as the more 'satisfactory' (Dewey's term), has sincerely to + renounce rectilinear arguments and ancient ideals of rigor and finality. + It is in just this temper of renunciation, so different from that of + pyrrhonistic scepticism, that the spirit of humanism essentially consists. + Satisfactoriness has to be measured by a multitude of standards, of which + some, for aught we know, may fail in any given case; and what is more + satisfactory than any alternative in sight, may to the end be a sum of + PLUSES and MINUSES, concerning which we can only trust that by ulterior + corrections and improvements a maximum of the one and a minimum of the + other may some day be approached. It means a real change of heart, a break + with absolutistic hopes, when one takes up this inductive view of the + conditions of belief. + </p> + <p> + As I understand the pragmatist way of seeing things, it owes its being to + the break-down which the last fifty years have brought about in the older + notions of scientific truth. 'God geometrizes,' it used to be said; and it + was believed that Euclid's elements literally reproduced his geometrizing. + There is an eternal and unchangeable 'reason'; and its voice was supposed + to reverberate in Barbara and Celarent. So also of the 'laws of nature,' + physical and chemical, so of natural history classifications—all + were supposed to be exact and exclusive duplicates of pre-human archetypes + buried in the structure of things, to which the spark of divinity hidden + in our intellect enables us to penetrate. The anatomy of the world is + logical, and its logic is that of a university professor, it was thought. + Up to about 1850 almost every one believed that sciences expressed truths + that were exact copies of a definite code of non-human realities. But the + enormously rapid multiplication of theories in these latter days has + well-nigh upset the notion of any one of them being a more literally + objective kind of thing than another. There are so many geometries, so + many logics, so many physical and chemical hypotheses, so many + classifications, each one of them good for so much and yet not good for + everything, that the notion that even the truest formula may be a human + device and not a literal transcript has dawned upon us. We hear scientific + laws now treated as so much 'conceptual shorthand,' true so far as they + are useful but no farther. Our mind has become tolerant of symbol instead + of reproduction, of approximation instead of exactness, of plasticity + instead of rigor. 'Energetics,' measuring the bare face of sensible + phenomena so as to describe in a single formula all their changes of + 'level,' is the last word of this scientific humanism, which indeed leaves + queries enough outstanding as to the reason for so curious a congruence + between the world and the mind, but which at any rate makes our whole + notion of scientific truth more flexible and genial than it used to be. + </p> + <p> + It is to be doubted whether any theorizer to-day, either in mathematics, + logic, physics or biology, conceives himself to be literally re-editing + processes of nature or thoughts of God. The main forms of our thinking, + the separation of subjects from predicates, the negative, hypothetic and + disjunctive judgments, are purely human habits. The ether, as Lord + Salisbury said, is only a noun for the verb to undulate; and many of our + theological ideas are admitted, even by those who call them 'true,' to be + humanistic in like degree. + </p> + <p> + I fancy that these changes in the current notions of truth are what + originally gave the impulse to Messrs. Dewey's and Schiller's views. The + suspicion is in the air nowadays that the superiority of one of our + formulas to another may not consist so much in its literal 'objectivity,' + as in subjective qualities like its usefulness, its 'elegance' or its + congruity with our residual beliefs. Yielding to these suspicions, and + generalizing, we fall into something like the humanistic state of mind. + Truth we conceive to mean everywhere, not duplication, but addition; not + the constructing of inner copies of already complete realities, but rather + the collaborating with realities so as to bring about a clearer result. + Obviously this state of mind is at first full of vagueness and ambiguity. + 'Collaborating' is a vague term; it must at any rate cover conceptions and + logical arrangements. 'Clearer' is vaguer still. Truth must bring clear + thoughts, as well as clear the way to action. 'Reality' is the vaguest + term of all. The only way to test such a programme at all is to apply it + to the various types of truth, in the hope of reaching an account that + shall be more precise. Any hypothesis that forces such a review upon one + has one great merit, even if in the end it prove invalid: it gets us + better acquainted with the total subject. To give the theory plenty of + 'rope' and see if it hangs itself eventually is better tactics than to + choke it off at the outset by abstract accusations of self-contradiction. + I think therefore that a decided effort at sympathetic mental play with + humanism is the provisional attitude to be recommended to the reader. + </p> + <p> + When I find myself playing sympathetically with humanism, something like + what follows is what I end by conceiving it to mean. + </p> + <p> + Experience is a process that continually gives us new material to digest. + We handle this intellectually by the mass of beliefs of which we find + ourselves already possessed, assimilating, rejecting, or rearranging in + different degrees. Some of the apperceiving ideas are recent acquisitions + of our own, but most of them are common-sense traditions of the race. + There is probably not a common-sense tradition, of all those which we now + live by, that was not in the first instance a genuine discovery, an + inductive generalization like those more recent ones of the atom, of + inertia, of energy, of reflex action, or of fitness to survive The notions + of one Time and of one Space as single continuous receptacles; the + distinction between thoughts and things, matter and mind between permanent + subjects and changing attributes; the conception of classes with sub + classes within them; the separation of fortuitous from regularly caused + connections; surely all these were once definite conquests made at + historic dates by our ancestors in their attempt to get the chaos of their + crude individual experiences into a more shareable and manageable shape. + They proved of such sovereign use as denkmittel that they are now a part + of the very structure of our mind. We cannot play fast and loose with + them. No experience can upset them. On the contrary, they apperceive every + experience and assign it to its place. + </p> + <p> + To what effect? That we may the better foresee the course of our + experiences, communicate with one another, and steer our lives by rule. + Also that we may have a cleaner, clearer, more inclusive mental view. + </p> + <p> + The greatest common-sense achievement, after the discovery of one Time and + one Space, is probably the concept of permanently existing things. When a + rattle first drops out of the hand of a baby, he does not look to see + where it has gone. Non-perception he accepts as annihilation until he + finds a better belief. That our perceptions mean BEINGS, rattles that are + there whether we hold them in our hands or not, becomes an interpretation + so luminous of what happens to us that, once employed, it never gets + forgotten. It applies with equal felicity to things and persons, to the + objective and to the ejective realm. However a Berkeley, a Mill, or a + Cornelius may CRITICISE it, it WORKS; and in practical life we never think + of 'going back' upon it, or reading our incoming experiences in any other + terms. We may, indeed, speculatively imagine a state of 'pure' experience + before the hypothesis of permanent objects behind its flux had been + framed; and we can play with the idea that some primeval genius might have + struck into a different hypothesis. But we cannot positively imagine today + what the different hypothesis could have been, for the category of + trans-perceptual reality is now one of the foundations of our life. Our + thoughts must still employ it if they are to possess reasonableness and + truth. + </p> + <p> + This notion of a FIRST in the shape of a most chaotic pure experience + which sets us questions, of a SECOND in the way of fundamental categories, + long ago wrought into the structure of our consciousness and practically + irreversible, which define the general frame within which answers must + fall, and of a THIRD which gives the detail of the answers in the shapes + most congruous with all our present needs, is, as I take it, the essence + of the humanistic conception. It represents experience in its pristine + purity to be now so enveloped in predicates historically worked out that + we can think of it as little more than an OTHER, of a THAT, which the + mind, in Mr. Bradley's phrase, 'encounters,' and to whose stimulating + presence we respond by ways of thinking which we call 'true' in proportion + as they facilitate our mental or physical activities and bring us outer + power and inner peace. But whether the Other, the universal THAT, has + itself any definite inner structure, or whether, if it have any, the + structure resembles any of our predicated WHATS, this is a question which + humanism leaves untouched. For us, at any rate, it insists, reality is an + accumulation of our own intellectual inventions, and the struggle for + 'truth' in our progressive dealings with it is always a struggle to work + in new nouns and adjectives while altering as little as possible the old. + </p> + <p> + It is hard to see why either Mr. Bradley's own logic or his metaphysics + should oblige him to quarrel with this conception. He might consistently + adopt it verbatim et literatim, if he would, and simply throw his peculiar + absolute round it, following in this the good example of Professor Royce. + Bergson in France, and his disciples, Wilbois the physicist and Leroy, are + thoroughgoing humanists in the sense defined. Professor Milhaud also + appears to be one; and the great Poincare misses it by only the breadth of + a hair. In Germany the name of Simmel offers itself as that of a humanist + of the most radical sort. Mach and his school, and Hertz and Ostwald must + be classed as humanists. The view is in the atmosphere and must be + patiently discussed. + </p> + <p> + The best way to discuss it would be to see what the alternative might be. + What is it indeed? Its critics make no explicit statement, Professor Royce + being the only one so far who has formulated anything definite. The first + service of humanism to philosophy accordingly seems to be that it will + probably oblige those who dislike it to search their own hearts and heads. + It will force analysis to the front and make it the order of the day. At + present the lazy tradition that truth is adaequatio intellectus et rei + seems all there is to contradict it with. Mr. Bradley's only suggestion is + that true thought 'must correspond to a determinate being which it cannot + be said to make,' and obviously that sheds no new light. What is the + meaning of the word to 'correspond'? Where is the 'being'? What sort of + things are 'determinations,' and what is meant in this particular case by + 'not to make'? + </p> + <p> + Humanism proceeds immediately to refine upon the looseness of these + epithets. We correspond in SOME way with anything with which we enter into + any relations at all. If it be a thing, we may produce an exact copy of + it, or we may simply feel it as an existent in a certain place. If it be a + demand, we may obey it without knowing anything more about it than its + push. If it be a proposition, we may agree by not contradicting it, by + letting it pass. If it be a relation between things, we may act on the + first thing so as to bring ourselves out where the second will be. If it + be something inaccessible, we may substitute a hypothetical object for it, + which, having the same consequences, will cipher out for us real results. + In a general way we may simply ADD OUR THOUGHT TO IT; and if it SUFFERS + THE ADDITION, and the whole situation harmoniously prolongs and enriches + itself, the thought will pass for true. + </p> + <p> + As for the whereabouts of the beings thus corresponded to, although they + may be outside of the present thought as well as in it, humanism sees no + ground for saying they are outside of finite experience itself. + Pragmatically, their reality means that we submit to them, take account of + them, whether we like to or not, but this we must perpetually do with + experiences other than our own. The whole system of what the present + experience must correspond to 'adequately' may be continuous with the + present experience itself. Reality, so taken as experience other than the + present, might be either the legacy of past experience or the content of + experience to come. Its determinations for US are in any case the + adjectives which our acts of judging fit to it, and those are essentially + humanistic things. + </p> + <p> + To say that our thought does not 'make' this reality means pragmatically + that if our own particular thought were annihilated the reality would + still be there in some shape, though possibly it might be a shape that + would lack something that our thought supplies. That reality is + 'independent' means that there is something in every experience that + escapes our arbitrary control. If it be a sensible experience it coerces + our attention; if a sequence, we cannot invert it; if we compare two terms + we can come to only one result. There is a push, an urgency, within our + very experience, against which we are on the whole powerless, and which + drives us in a direction that is the destiny of our belief. That this + drift of experience itself is in the last resort due to something + independent of all possible experience may or may not be true. There may + or may not be an extra-experiential 'ding an sich' that keeps the ball + rolling, or an 'absolute' that lies eternally behind all the successive + determinations which human thought has made. But within our experience + ITSELF, at any rate, humanism says, some determinations show themselves as + being independent of others; some questions, if we ever ask them, can only + be answered in one way; some beings, if we ever suppose them, must be + supposed to have existed previously to the supposing; some relations, if + they exist ever, must exist as long as their terms exist. + </p> + <p> + Truth thus means, according to humanism, the relation of less fixed parts + of experience (predicates) to other relatively more fixed parts + (subjects); and we are not required to seek it in a relation of experience + as such to anything beyond itself. We can stay at home, for our behavior + as exponents is hemmed in on every side. The forces both of advance and of + resistance are exerted by our own objects, and the notion of truth as + something opposed to waywardness or license inevitably grows up + SOLIPSISTICALLY inside of every human life. + </p> + <p> + So obvious is all this that a common charge against the humanistic authors + 'makes me tired.' 'How can a deweyite discriminate sincerity from bluff?' + was a question asked at a philosophic meeting where I reported on Dewey's + Studies. 'How can the mere [Footnote: I know of no 'mere' pragmatist, if + MERENESS here means, as it seems to, the denial of all concreteness to the + pragmatist's THOUGHT.] pragmatist feel any duty to think truly?' is the + objection urged by Professor Royce. Mr. Bradley in turn says that if a + humanist understands his own doctrine, 'he must hold any idea, however + mad, to be the truth, if any one will have it so.' And Professor Taylor + describes pragmatism as believing anything one pleases and calling it + truth. + </p> + <p> + Such a shallow sense of the conditions under which men's thinking actually + goes on seems to me most surprising. These critics appear to suppose that, + if left to itself, the rudderless raft of our experience must be ready to + drift anywhere or nowhere. Even THO there were compasses on board, they + seem to say, there would be no pole for them to point to. There must be + absolute sailing-directions, they insist, decreed from outside, and an + independent chart of the voyage added to the 'mere' voyage itself, if we + are ever to make a port. But is it not obvious that even THO there be such + absolute sailing-directions in the shape of pre-human standards of truth + that we OUGHT to follow, the only guarantee that we shall in fact follow + them must lie in our human equipment. The 'ought' would be a brutum fulmen + unless there were a felt grain inside of our experience that conspired. As + a matter of fact the DEVOUTEST believers in absolute standards must admit + that men fail to obey them. Waywardness is here, in spite of the eternal + prohibitions, and the existence of any amount of reality ante rem is no + warrant against unlimited error in rebus being incurred. The only REAL + guarantee we have against licentious thinking is the CIRCUMPRESSURE of + experience itself, which gets us sick of concrete errors, whether there be + a trans-empirical reality or not. How does the partisan of absolute + reality know what this orders him to think? He cannot get direct sight of + the absolute; and he has no means of guessing what it wants of him except + by following the humanistic clues. The only truth that he himself will + ever practically ACCEPT will be that to which his finite experiences lead + him of themselves. The state of mind which shudders at the idea of a lot + of experiences left to themselves, and that augurs protection from the + sheer name of an absolute, as if, however inoperative, that might still + stand for a sort of ghostly security, is like the mood of those good + people who, whenever they hear of a social tendency that is damnable, + begin to redden and to puff, and say 'Parliament or Congress ought to make + a law against it,' as if an impotent decree would give relief. + </p> + <p> + All the SANCTIONS of a law of truth lie in the very texture of experience. + Absolute or no absolute, the concrete truth FOR US will always be that way + of thinking in which our various experiences most profitably combine. + </p> + <p> + And yet, the opponent obstinately urges, your humanist will always have a + greater liberty to play fast and loose with truth than will your believer + in an independent realm of reality that makes the standard rigid. If by + this latter believer he means a man who pretends to know the standard and + who fulminates it, the humanist will doubtless prove more flexible; but no + more flexible than the absolutist himself if the latter follows (as + fortunately our present-day absolutists do follow) empirical methods of + inquiry in concrete affairs. To consider hypotheses is surely always + better than to DOGMATISE ins blaue hinein. + </p> + <p> + Nevertheless this probable flexibility of temper in him has been used to + convict the humanist of sin. Believing as he does, that truth lies in + rebus, and is at every moment our own line of most propitious reaction, he + stands forever debarred, as I have heard a learned colleague say, from + trying to convert opponents, for does not their view, being THEIR most + propitious momentary reaction, already fill the bill? Only the believer in + the ante-rem brand of truth can on this theory seek to make converts + without self-stultification. But can there be self-stultification in + urging any account whatever of truth? Can the definition ever contradict + the deed? 'Truth is what I feel like saying'—suppose that to be the + definition. 'Well, I feel like saying that, and I want you to feel like + saying it, and shall continue to say it until I get you to agree.' Where + is there any contradiction? Whatever truth may be said to be, that is the + kind of truth which the saying can be held to carry. The TEMPER which a + saying may comport is an extra-logical matter. It may indeed be hotter in + some individual absolutist than in a humanist, but it need not be so in + another. And the humanist, for his part, is perfectly consistent in + compassing sea and land to make one proselyte, if his nature be + enthusiastic enough. + </p> + <p> + 'But how can you be enthusiastic over any view of things which you know to + have been partly made by yourself, and which is liable to alter during the + next minute? How is any heroic devotion to the ideal of truth possible + under such paltry conditions?' + </p> + <p> + This is just another of those objections by which the anti-humanists show + their own comparatively slack hold on the realities of the situation. If + they would only follow the pragmatic method and ask: 'What is truth + KNOWN-AS? What does its existence stand for in the way of concrete goods?'—they + would see that the name of it is the inbegriff of almost everything that + is valuable in our lives. The true is the opposite of whatever is + instable, of whatever is practically disappointing, of whatever is + useless, of whatever is lying and unreliable, of whatever is unverifiable + and unsupported, of whatever is inconsistent and contradictory, of + whatever is artificial and eccentric, of whatever is unreal in the sense + of being of no practical account. Here are pragmatic reasons with a + vengeance why we should turn to truth—truth saves us from a world of + that complexion. What wonder that its very name awakens loyal feeling! In + particular what wonder that all little provisional fool's paradises of + belief should appear contemptible in comparison with its bare pursuit! + When absolutists reject humanism because they feel it to be untrue, that + means that the whole habit of their mental needs is wedded already to a + different view of reality, in comparison with which the humanistic world + seems but the whim of a few irresponsible youths. Their own subjective + apperceiving mass is what speaks here in the name of the eternal natures + and bids them reject our humanism—as they apprehend it. Just so with + us humanists, when we condemn all noble, clean-cut, fixed, eternal, + rational, temple-like systems of philosophy. These contradict the DRAMATIC + TEMPERAMENT of nature, as our dealings with nature and our habits of + thinking have so far brought us to conceive it. They seem oddly personal + and artificial, even when not bureaucratic and professional in an absurd + degree. We turn from them to the great unpent and unstayed wilderness of + truth as we feel it to be constituted, with as good a conscience as + rationalists are moved by when they turn from our wilderness into their + neater and cleaner intellectual abodes. [Footnote: I cannot forbear + quoting as an illustration of the contrast between humanist and + rationalist tempers of mind, in a sphere remote from philosophy, these + remarks on the Dreyfus 'affaire,' written by one who assuredly had never + heard of humanism or pragmatism. 'Autant que la Revolution, "l'Affaire" + est desormais une de nos "origines." Si elle n'a pas fait ouvrir le + gouffre, c'est elle du moins qui a rendu patent et visible le long travail + souterrain qui, silencieusement, avait prepare la separation entre nos + deux camps d'aujourd'hui, pour ecarter enfin, d'un coup soudain, la France + des traditionalistes (poseurs de principes, chercheurs d'unite, + constructeurs de systemes a priori) el la France eprise du fait positif et + de libre examen;—la France revolutionnaire et romantique si l'on + veut, celle qui met tres haut l'individu, qui ne veut pas qu'un juste + perisse, fut-ce pour sauver la nation, et qui cherche la verite dans + toutes ses parties aussi bien que dans une vue d'ensemble ... Duclaux ne + pouvait pas concevoir qu'on preferat quelque chose a la verite. Mais il + voyait autour de lui de fort honnetes gens qui, mettant en balance la vie + d'un homme et la raison d'Etat, lui avouaient de quel poids leger ils + jugeaient une simple existence individuelle, pour innocente qu'elle fut. + C'etaient des classiques, des gens a qui l'ensemble seul importe.' La Vie + de Emile Duclaux, par Mme. Em. D., Laval, 1906, pp. 243, 247-248.] + </p> + <p> + This is surely enough to show that the humanist does not ignore the + character of objectivity and independence in truth. Let me turn next to + what his opponents mean when they say that to be true, our thoughts must + 'correspond.' + </p> + <p> + The vulgar notion of correspondence here is that the thoughts must COPY + the reality—cognitio fit per assimiliationem cogniti et + cognoscentis; and philosophy, without having ever fairly sat down to the + question, seems to have instinctively accepted this idea: propositions are + held true if they copy the eternal thought; terms are held true if they + copy extra-mental realities. Implicitly, I think that the copy-theory has + animated most of the criticisms that have been made on humanism. + </p> + <p> + A priori, however, it is not self-evident that the sole business of our + mind with realities should be to copy them. Let my reader suppose himself + to constitute for a time all the reality there is in the universe, and + then to receive the announcement that another being is to be created who + shall know him truly. How will he represent the knowing in advance? What + will he hope it to be? I doubt extremely whether it could ever occur to + him to fancy it as a mere copying. Of what use to him would an imperfect + second edition of himself in the new comer's interior be? It would seem + pure waste of a propitious opportunity. The demand would more probably be + for something absolutely new. The reader would conceive the knowing + humanistically, 'the new comer,' he would say, 'must TAKE ACCOUNT OF MY + PRESENCE BY REACTING ON IT IN SUCH A WAY THAT GOOD WOULD ACCRUE TO US + BOTH. If copying be requisite to that end, let there be copying; otherwise + not.' The essence in any case would not be the copying, but the enrichment + of the previous world. + </p> + <p> + I read the other day, in a book of Professor Eucken's, a phrase, 'Die + erhohung des vorgefundenen daseins,' which seems to be pertinent here. Why + may not thought's mission be to increase and elevate, rather than simply + to imitate and reduplicate, existence? No one who has read Lotze can fail + to remember his striking comment on the ordinary view of the secondary + qualities of matter, which brands them as 'illusory' because they copy + nothing in the thing. The notion of a world complete in itself, to which + thought comes as a passive mirror, adding nothing to fact, Lotze says is + irrational. Rather is thought itself a most momentous part of fact, and + the whole mission of the pre-existing and insufficient world of matter may + simply be to provoke thought to produce its far more precious supplement. + </p> + <p> + 'Knowing,' in short, may, for aught we can see beforehand to the contrary, + be ONLY ONE WAY OF GETTING INTO FRUITFUL RELATIONS WITH REALITY whether + copying be one of the relations or not. + </p> + <p> + It is easy to see from what special type of knowing the copy-theory arose. + In our dealings with natural phenomena the great point is to be able to + foretell. Foretelling, according to such a writer as Spencer, is the whole + meaning of intelligence. When Spencer's 'law of intelligence' says that + inner and outer relations must 'correspond,' it means that the + distribution of terms in our inner time-scheme and space-scheme must be an + exact copy of the distribution in real time and space of the real terms. + In strict theory the mental terms themselves need not answer to the real + terms in the sense of severally copying them, symbolic mental terms being + enough, if only the real dates and places be copied. But in our ordinary + life the mental terms are images and the real ones are sensations, and the + images so often copy the sensations, that we easily take copying of terms + as well as of relations to be the natural significance of knowing. + Meanwhile much, even of this common descriptive truth, is couched in + verbal symbols. If our symbols FIT the world, in the sense of determining + our expectations rightly, they may even be the better for not copying its + terms. + </p> + <p> + It seems obvious that the pragmatic account of all this routine of + phenomenal knowledge is accurate. Truth here is a relation, not of our + ideas to non-human realities, but of conceptual parts of our experience to + sensational parts. Those thoughts are true which guide us to BENEFICIAL + INTERACTION with sensible particulars as they occur, whether they copy + these in advance or not. + </p> + <p> + From the frequency of copying in the knowledge of phenomenal fact, copying + has been supposed to be the essence of truth in matters rational also. + Geometry and logic, it has been supposed, must copy archetypal thoughts in + the Creator. But in these abstract spheres there is no need of assuming + archetypes. The mind is free to carve so many figures out of space, to + make so many numerical collections, to frame so many classes and series, + and it can analyze and compare so endlessly, that the very superabundance + of the resulting ideas makes us doubt the 'objective' pre-existence of + their models. It would be plainly wrong to suppose a God whose thought + consecrated rectangular but not polar co-ordinates, or Jevons's notation + but not Boole's. Yet if, on the other hand, we assume God to have thought + in advance of every POSSIBLE flight of human fancy in these directions, + his mind becomes too much like a Hindoo idol with three heads, eight arms + and six breasts, too much made up of superfoetation and redundancy for us + to wish to copy it, and the whole notion of copying tends to evaporate + from these sciences. Their objects can be better interpreted as being + created step by step by men, as fast as they successively conceive them. + </p> + <p> + If now it be asked how, if triangles, squares, square roots, genera, and + the like, are but improvised human 'artefacts,' their properties and + relations can be so promptly known to be 'eternal,' the humanistic answer + is easy. If triangles and genera are of our own production we can keep + them invariant. We can make them 'timeless' by expressly decreeing that on + THE THINGS WE MEAN time shall exert no altering effect, that they are + intentionally and it may be fictitiously abstracted from every corrupting + real associate and condition. But relations between invariant objects will + themselves be invariant. Such relations cannot be happenings, for by + hypothesis nothing shall happen to the objects. I have tried to show in + the last chapter of my Principles of Psychology [Footnote: Vol. ii, pp. + 641 ff.] that they can only be relations of comparison. No one so far + seems to have noticed my suggestion, and I am too ignorant of the + development of mathematics to feel very confident of my own view. But if + it were correct it would solve the difficulty perfectly. Relations of + comparison are matters of direct inspection. As soon as mental objects are + mentally compared, they are perceived to be either like or unlike. But + once the same, always the same, once different, always different, under + these timeless conditions. Which is as much as to say that truths + concerning these man-made objects are necessary and eternal. We can change + our conclusions only by changing our data first. + </p> + <p> + The whole fabric of the a priori sciences can thus be treated as a + man-made product. As Locke long ago pointed out, these sciences have no + immediate connection with fact. Only IF a fact can be humanized by being + identified with any of these ideal objects, is what was true of the + objects now true also of the facts. The truth itself meanwhile was + originally a copy of nothing; it was only a relation directly perceived to + obtain between two artificial mental things. [Footnote: Mental things + which are realities of course within the mental world.] + </p> + <p> + We may now glance at some special types of knowing, so as to see better + whether the humanistic account fits. On the mathematical and logical types + we need not enlarge further, nor need we return at much length to the case + of our descriptive knowledge of the course of nature. So far as this + involves anticipation, tho that MAY mean copying, it need, as we saw, mean + little more than 'getting ready' in advance. But with many distant and + future objects, our practical relations are to the last degree potential + and remote. In no sense can we now get ready for the arrest of the earth's + revolution by the tidal brake, for instance; and with the past, tho we + suppose ourselves to know it truly, we have no practical relations at all. + It is obvious that, altho interests strictly practical have been the + original starting-point of our search for true phenomenal descriptions, + yet an intrinsic interest in the bare describing function has grown up. We + wish accounts that shall be true, whether they bring collateral profit or + not. The primitive function has developed its demand for mere exercise. + This theoretic curiosity seems to be the characteristically human + differentia, and humanism recognizes its enormous scope. A true idea now + means not only one that prepares us for an actual perception. It means + also one that might prepare us for a merely possible perception, or one + that, if spoken, would suggest possible perceptions to others, or suggest + actual perceptions which the speaker cannot share. The ensemble of + perceptions thus thought of as either actual or possible form a system + which it is obviously advantageous to us to get into a stable and + consistent shape; and here it is that the common-sense notion of permanent + beings finds triumphant use. Beings acting outside of the thinker explain, + not only his actual perceptions, past and future, but his possible + perceptions and those of every one else. Accordingly they gratify our + theoretic need in a supremely beautiful way. We pass from our immediate + actual through them into the foreign and the potential, and back again + into the future actual, accounting for innumerable particulars by a single + cause. As in those circular panoramas, where a real foreground of dirt, + grass, bushes, rocks and a broken-down cannon is enveloped by a canvas + picture of sky and earth and of a raging battle, continuing the foreground + so cunningly that the spectator can detect no joint; so these conceptual + objects, added to our present perceptual reality, fuse with it into the + whole universe of our belief. In spite of all berkeleyan criticism, we do + not doubt that they are really there. Tho our discovery of any one of them + may only date from now, we unhesitatingly say that it not only IS, but WAS + there, if, by so saying, the past appears connected more consistently with + what we feel the present to be. This is historic truth. Moses wrote the + Pentateuch, we think, because if he didn't, all our religious habits will + have to be undone. Julius Caesar was real, or we can never listen to + history again. Trilobites were once alive, or all our thought about the + strata is at sea. Radium, discovered only yesterday, must always have + existed, or its analogy with other natural elements, which are permanent, + fails. In all this, it is but one portion of our beliefs reacting on + another so as to yield the most satisfactory total state of mind. That + state of mind, we say, sees truth, and the content of its deliverances we + believe. + </p> + <p> + Of course, if you take the satisfactoriness concretely, as something felt + by you now, and if, by truth, you mean truth taken abstractly and verified + in the long run, you cannot make them equate, for it is notorious that the + temporarily satisfactory is often false. Yet at each and every concrete + moment, truth for each man is what that man 'troweth' at that moment with + the maximum of satisfaction to himself; and similarly, abstract truth, + truth verified by the long run, and abstract satisfactoriness, long-run + satisfactoriness, coincide. If, in short, we compare concrete with + concrete and abstract with abstract, the true and the satisfactory do mean + the same thing. I suspect that a certain muddling of matters hereabouts is + what makes the general philosophic public so impervious to humanism's + claims. + </p> + <p> + The fundamental fact about our experience is that it is a process of + change. For the 'trower' at any moment, truth, like the visible area round + a man walking in a fog, or like what George Eliot calls 'the wall of dark + seen by small fishes' eyes that pierce a span in the wide Ocean,' is an + objective field which the next moment enlarges and of which it is the + critic, and which then either suffers alteration or is continued + unchanged. The critic sees both the first trower's truth and his own + truth, compares them with each other, and verifies or confutes. HIS field + of view is the reality independent of that earlier trower's thinking with + which that thinking ought to correspond. But the critic is himself only a + trower; and if the whole process of experience should terminate at that + instant, there would be no otherwise known independent reality with which + HIS thought might be compared. + </p> + <p> + The immediate in experience is always provisionally in this situation. The + humanism, for instance, which I see and try so hard to defend, is the + completest truth attained from my point of view up to date. But, owing to + the fact that all experience is a process, no point of view can ever be + THE last one. Every one is insufficient and off its balance, and + responsible to later points of view than itself. You, occupying some of + these later points in your own person, and believing in the reality of + others, will not agree that my point of view sees truth positive, truth + timeless, truth that counts, unless they verify and confirm what it sees. + </p> + <p> + You generalize this by saying that any opinion, however satisfactory, can + count positively and absolutely as true only so far as it agrees with a + standard beyond itself; and if you then forget that this standard + perpetually grows up endogenously inside the web of the experiences, you + may carelessly go on to say that what distributively holds of each + experience, holds also collectively of all experience, and that experience + as such and in its totality owes whatever truth it may be possessed-of to + its correspondence with absolute realities outside of its own being. This + evidently is the popular and traditional position. From the fact that + finite experiences must draw support from one another, philosophers pass + to the notion that experience uberhaupt must need an absolute support. The + denial of such a notion by humanism lies probably at the root of most of + the dislike which it incurs. + </p> + <p> + But is this not the globe, the elephant and the tortoise over again? Must + not something end by supporting itself? Humanism is willing to let finite + experience be self-supporting. Somewhere being must immediately breast + nonentity. Why may not the advancing front of experience, carrying its + immanent satisfactions and dissatisfactions, cut against the black inane + as the luminous orb of the moon cuts the caerulean abyss? Why should + anywhere the world be absolutely fixed and finished? And if reality + genuinely grows, why may it not grow in these very determinations which + here and now are made? + </p> + <p> + In point of fact it actually seems to grow by our mental determinations, + be these never so 'true.' Take the 'great bear' or 'dipper' constellation + in the heavens. We call it by that name, we count the stars and call them + seven, we say they were seven before they were counted, and we say that + whether any one had ever noted the fact or not, the dim resemblance to a + long-tailed (or long-necked?) animal was always truly there. But what do + we mean by this projection into past eternity of recent human ways of + thinking? Did an 'absolute' thinker actually do the counting, tell off the + stars upon his standing number-tally, and make the bear-comparison, silly + as the latter is? Were they explicitly seven, explicitly bear-like, before + the human witness came? Surely nothing in the truth of the attributions + drives us to think this. They were only implicitly or virtually what we + call them, and we human witnesses first explicated them and made them + 'real.' A fact virtually pre-exists when every condition of its + realization save one is already there. In this case the condition lacking + is the act of the counting and comparing mind. But the stars (once the + mind considers them) themselves dictate the result. The counting in no + wise modifies their previous nature, and, they being what and where they + are, the count cannot fall out differently. It could then ALWAYS be made. + NEVER could the number seven be questioned, IF THE QUESTION ONCE WERE + RAISED. + </p> + <p> + We have here a quasi-paradox. Undeniably something comes by the counting + that was not there before. And yet that something was ALWAYS TRUE. In one + sense you create it, and in another sense you FIND it. You have to treat + your count as being true beforehand, the moment you come to treat the + matter at all. + </p> + <p> + Our stellar attributes must always be called true, then; yet none the less + are they genuine additions made by our intellect to the world of fact. Not + additions of consciousness only, but additions of 'content.' They copy + nothing that pre-existed, yet they agree with what pre-existed, fit it, + amplify it, relate and connect it with a 'wain,' a number-tally, or what + not, and build it out. It seems to me that humanism is the only theory + that builds this case out in the good direction, and this case stands for + innumerable other kinds of case. In all such eases, odd as it may sound, + our judgment may actually be said to retroact and to enrich the past. + </p> + <p> + Our judgments at any rate change the character of FUTURE reality by the + acts to which they lead. Where these acts are acts expressive of trust,—trust, + e.g., that a man is honest, that our health is good enough, or that we can + make a successful effort,—which acts may be a needed antecedent of + the trusted things becoming true. Professor Taylor says [Footnote: In an + article criticising Pragmatism (as he conceives it) in the McGill + University Quarterly published at Montreal, for May, 1904.] that our trust + is at any rate UNTRUE WHEN IT IS MADE, i. e; before the action; and I seem + to remember that he disposes of anything like a faith in the general + excellence of the universe (making the faithful person's part in it at any + rate more excellent) as a 'lie in the soul.' But the pathos of this + expression should not blind us to the complication of the facts. I doubt + whether Professor Taylor would himself be in favor of practically handling + trusters of these kinds as liars. Future and present really mix in such + emergencies, and one can always escape lies in them by using hypothetic + forms. But Mr. Taylor's attitude suggests such absurd possibilities of + practice that it seems to me to illustrate beautifully how + self-stultifying the conception of a truth that shall merely register a + standing fixture may become. Theoretic truth, truth of passive copying, + sought in the sole interests of copying as such, not because copying is + GOOD FOR SOMETHING, but because copying ought schlechthin to be, seems, if + you look at it coldly, to be an almost preposterous ideal. Why should the + universe, existing in itself, also exist in copies? How CAN it be copied + in the solidity of its objective fulness? And even if it could, what would + the motive be? 'Even the hairs of your head are numbered.' Doubtless they + are, virtually; but why, as an absolute proposition, OUGHT the number to + become copied and known? Surely knowing is only one way of interacting + with reality and adding to its effect. + </p> + <p> + The opponent here will ask: 'Has not the knowing of truth any substantive + value on its own account, apart from the collateral advantages it may + bring? And if you allow theoretic satisfactions to exist at all, do they + not crowd the collateral satisfactions out of house and home, and must not + pragmatism go into bankruptcy, if she admits them at all?' The destructive + force of such talk disappears as soon as we use words concretely instead + of abstractly, and ask, in our quality of good pragmatists, just what the + famous theoretic needs are known as and in what the intellectual + satisfactions consist. + </p> + <p> + Are they not all mere matters of CONSISTENCY—and emphatically NOT of + consistency between an absolute reality and the mind's copies of it, but + of actually felt consistency among judgments, objects, and habits of + reacting, in the mind's own experienceable world? And are not both our + need of such consistency and our pleasure in it conceivable as outcomes of + the natural fact that we are beings that do develop mental HABITS—habit + itself proving adaptively beneficial in an environment where the same + objects, or the same kinds of objects, recur and follow 'law'? If this + were so, what would have come first would have been the collateral profits + of habit as such, and the theoretic life would have grown up in aid of + these. In point of fact, this seems to have been the probable case. At + life's origin, any present perception may have been 'true'—if such a + word could then be applicable. Later, when reactions became organized, the + reactions became 'true' whenever expectation was fulfilled by them. + Otherwise they were 'false' or 'mistaken' reactions. But the same class of + objects needs the same kind of reaction, so the impulse to react + consistently must gradually have been established, and a disappointment + felt whenever the results frustrated expectation. Here is a perfectly + plausible germ for all our higher consistencies. Nowadays, if an object + claims from us a reaction of the kind habitually accorded only to the + opposite class of objects, our mental machinery refuses to run smoothly. + The situation is intellectually unsatisfactory. + </p> + <p> + Theoretic truth thus falls WITHIN the mind, being the accord of some of + its processes and objects with other processes and objects—'accord' + consisting here in well-definable relations. So long as the satisfaction + of feeling such an accord is denied us, whatever collateral profits may + seem to inure from what we believe in are but as dust in the balance—provided + always that we are highly organized intellectually, which the majority of + us are not. The amount of accord which satisfies most men and women is + merely the absence of violent clash between their usual thoughts and + statements and the limited sphere of sense-perceptions in which their + lives are cast. The theoretic truth that most of us think we 'ought' to + attain to is thus the possession of a set of predicates that do not + explicitly contradict their subjects. We preserve it as often as not by + leaving other predicates and subjects out. + </p> + <p> + In some men theory is a passion, just as music is in others. The form of + inner consistency is pursued far beyond the line at which collateral + profits stop. Such men systematize and classify and schematize and make + synoptical tables and invent ideal objects for the pure love of unifying. + Too often the results, glowing with 'truth' for the inventors, seem + pathetically personal and artificial to bystanders. Which is as much as to + say that the purely theoretic criterion of truth can leave us in the lurch + as easily as any other criterion, and that the absolutists, for all their + pretensions, are 'in the same boat' concretely with those whom they + attack. + </p> + <p> + I am well aware that this paper has been rambling in the extreme. But the + whole subject is inductive, and sharp logic is hardly yet in order. My + great trammel has been the non-existence of any definitely stated + alternative on my opponents' part. It may conduce to clearness if I + recapitulate, in closing, what I conceive the main points of humanism to + be. They are these:— + </p> + <p> + 1. An experience, perceptual or conceptual, must conform to reality in + order to be true. + </p> + <p> + 2. By 'reality' humanism means nothing more than the other conceptual or + perceptual experiences with which a given present experience may find + itself in point of fact mixed up. [Footnote: This is meant merely to + exclude reality of an 'unknowable' sort, of which no account in either + perceptual or conceptual terms can be given. It includes of course any + amount if empirical reality independent of the knower. Pragmatism, is thus + 'epistemologically' realistic in its account.] + </p> + <p> + 3. By 'conforming,' humanism means taking account-of in such a way as to + gain any intellectually and practically satisfactory result. + </p> + <p> + 4. To 'take account-of' and to be 'satisfactory' are terms that admit of + no definition, so many are the ways in which these requirements can + practically be worked out. + </p> + <p> + 5. Vaguely and in general, we take account of a reality by preserving it + in as unmodified a form as possible. But, to be then satisfactory, it must + not contradict other realities outside of it which claim also to be + preserved. That we must preserve all the experience we can and minimize + contradiction in what we preserve, is about all that can be said in + advance. + </p> + <p> + 6. The truth which the conforming experience embodies may be a positive + addition to the previous reality, and later judgments may have to conform + to it. Yet, virtually at least, it may have been true previously. + Pragmatically, virtual and actual truth mean the same thing: the + possibility of only one answer, when once the question is raised. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + IV + </h2> + <h3> + THE RELATION BETWEEN KNOWER AND KNOWN + </h3> + <p> + [Footnote: Extract from an article entitled 'A World of Pure Experience,' + in the Journal of Philosophy, etc., September 29,1904.] + </p> + <p> + Throughout the history of philosophy the subject and its object have been + treated as absolutely discontinuous entities; and thereupon the presence + of the latter to the former, or the 'apprehension' by the former of the + latter, has assumed a paradoxical character which all sorts of theories + had to be invented to overcome. Representative theories put a mental + 'representation,' 'image,' or 'content' into the gap, as a sort of + intermediary. Commonsense theories left the gap untouched, declaring our + mind able to clear it by a self-transcending leap. Transcendentalist + theories left it impossible to traverse by finite knowers, and brought an + absolute in to perform the saltatory act. All the while, in the very bosom + of the finite experience, every conjunction required to make the relation + intelligible is given in full. Either the knower and the known are: + </p> + <p> + (1) the self-same piece of experience taken twice over in different + contexts; or they are + </p> + <p> + (2) two pieces of ACTUAL experience belonging to the same subject, with + definite tracts of conjunctive transitional experience between them; or + </p> + <p> + (3) the known is a POSSIBLE experience either of that subject or another, + to which the said conjunctive transitions WOULD lead, if sufficiently + prolonged. + </p> + <p> + To discuss all the ways in which one experience may function as the knower + of another, would be incompatible with the limits of this essay. I have + treated of type 1, the kind of knowledge called perception, in an article + in the Journal of Philosophy, for September 1, 1904, called 'Does + consciousness exist?' This is the type of case in which the mind enjoys + direct 'acquaintance' with a present object. In the other types the mind + has 'knowledge-about' an object not immediately there. Type 3 can always + formally and hypothetically be reduced to type 2, so that a brief + description of that type will now put the present reader sufficiently at + my point of view, and make him see what the actual meanings of the + mysterious cognitive relation may be. + </p> + <p> + Suppose me to be sitting here in my library at Cambridge, at ten minutes' + walk from 'Memorial Hall,' and to be thinking truly of the latter object. + My mind may have before it only the name, or it may have a clear image, or + it may have a very dim image of the hall, but such an intrinsic difference + in the image makes no difference in its cognitive function. Certain + extrinsic phenomena, special experiences of conjunction, are what impart + to the image, be it what it may, its knowing office. + </p> + <p> + For instance, if you ask me what hall I mean by my image, and I can tell + you nothing; or if I fail to point or lead you towards the Harvard Delta; + or if, being led by you, I am uncertain whether the Hall I see be what I + had in mind or not; you would rightly deny that I had 'meant' that + particular hall at all, even tho my mental image might to some degree have + resembled it. The resemblance would count in that case as coincidental + merely, for all sorts of things of a kind resemble one another in this + world without being held for that reason to take cognizance of one + another. + </p> + <p> + On the other hand, if I can lead you to the hall, and tell you of its + history and present uses; if in its presence I feel my idea, however + imperfect it may have been, to have led hither and to be now TERMINATED; + if the associates of the image and of the felt hall run parallel, so that + each term of the one context corresponds serially, as I walk, with an + answering term of the other; why then my soul was prophetic, and my idea + must be, and by common consent would be, called cognizant of reality. That + percept was what I MEANT, for into it my idea has passed by conjunctive + experiences of sameness and fulfilled intention. Nowhere is there jar, but + every later moment continues and corroborates an earlier one. + </p> + <p> + In this continuing and corroborating, taken in no transcendental sense, + but denoting definitely felt transitions, LIES ALL THAT THE KNOWING OF A + PERCEPT BY AN IDEA CAN POSSIBLY CONTAIN OR SIGNIFY. Wherever such + transitions are felt, the first experience KNOWS the last one. Where they + do not, or where even as possibles they can not, intervene, there can be + no pretence of knowing. In this latter case the extremes will be + connected, if connected at all, by inferior relations—bare likeness + or succession, or by 'withness' alone. Knowledge of sensible realities + thus comes to life inside the tissue of experience. It is MADE; and made + by relations that unroll themselves in time. Whenever certain + intermediaries are given, such that, as they develop towards their + terminus, there is experience from point to point of one direction + followed, and finally of one process fulfilled, the result is that THEIR + STARTING-POINT THEREBY BECOMES A KNOWER AND THEIR TERMINUS AN OBJECT MEANT + OR KNOWN. That is all that knowing (in the simple case considered) can be + known-as, that is the whole of its nature, put into experiential terms. + Whenever such is the sequence of our experiences we may freely say that we + had the terminal object 'in mind' from the outset, even altho AT the + outset nothing was there in us but a flat piece of substantive experience + like any other, with no self-transcendency about it, and no mystery save + the mystery of coming into existence and of being gradually followed by + other pieces of substantive experience, with conjunctively transitional + experiences between. That is what we MEAN here by the object's being 'in + mind.' Of any deeper more real way of its being in mind we have no + positive conception, and we have no right to discredit our actual + experience by talking of such a way at all. + </p> + <p> + I know that many a reader will rebel at this. 'Mere intermediaries,' he + will say, 'even tho they be feelings of continuously growing fulfilment, + only SEPARATE the knower from the known, whereas what we have in knowledge + is a kind of immediate touch of the one by the other, an "apprehension" in + the etymological sense of the word, a leaping of the chasm as by + lightning, an act by which two terms are smitten into one over the head of + their distinctness. All these dead intermediaries of yours are out of each + other, and outside of their termini still.' + </p> + <p> + But do not such dialectic difficulties remind us of the dog dropping his + bone and snapping at its image in the water? If we knew any more real kind + of union aliunde, we might be entitled to brand all our empirical unions + as a sham. But unions by continuous transition are the only ones we know + of, whether in this matter of a knowledge-about that terminates in an + acquaintance, whether in personal identity, in logical prediction through + the copula 'is,' or elsewhere. If anywhere there were more absolute + unions, they could only reveal themselves to us by just such conjunctive + results. These are what the unions are worth, these are all that we can + ever practically mean by union, by continuity. Is it not time to repeat + what Lotze said of substances, that to act like one is to be one? Should + we not say here that to be experienced as continuous is to be really + continuous, in a world where experience and reality come to the same + thing? In a picture gallery a painted hook will serve to hang a painted + chain by, a painted cable will hold a painted ship. In a world where both + the terms and their distinctions are affairs of experience, conjunctions + that are experienced must be at least as real as anything else. They will + be 'absolutely' real conjunctions, if we have no transphenomenal absolute + ready, to derealize the whole experienced world by, at a stroke. + </p> + <p> + So much for the essentials of the cognitive relation where the knowledge + is conceptual in type, or forms knowledge 'about' an object. It consists + in intermediary experiences (possible, if not actual) of continuously + developing progress, and, finally, of fulfilment, when the sensible + percept which is the object is reached. The percept here not only VERIFIES + the concept, proves its function of knowing that percept to be true, but + the percept's existence as the terminus of the chain of intermediaries + CREATES the function. Whatever terminates that chain was, because it now + proves itself to be, what the concept 'had in mind.' + </p> + <p> + The towering importance for human life of this kind of knowing lies in the + tact that an experience that knows another can figure as its + REPRESENTATIVE, not in any quasi-miraculous 'epistemological' sense, but + in the definite, practical sense of being its substitute in various + operations, sometimes physical and sometimes mental, which lead us to its + associates and results. By experimenting on our ideas of reality, we may + save ourselves the trouble of experimenting on the real experiences which + they severally mean. The ideas form related systems, corresponding point + for point to the systems which the realities form; and by letting an ideal + term call up its associates systematically, we may be led to a terminus + which the corresponding real term would have led to in case we had + operated on the real world. And this brings us to the general question of + substitution. + </p> + <p> + What, exactly, in a system of experiences, does the 'substitution' of one + of them for another mean? + </p> + <p> + According to my view, experience as a whole is a process in time, whereby + innumerable particular terms lapse and are superseded by others that + follow upon them by transitions which, whether disjunctive or conjunctive + in content, are themselves experiences, and must in general be accounted + at least as real as the terms which they relate. What the nature of the + event called 'superseding' signifies, depends altogether on the kind of + transition that obtains. Some experiences simply abolish their + predecessors without continuing them in any way. Others are felt to + increase or to enlarge their meaning, to carry out their purpose, or to + bring us nearer to their goal. They 'represent' them, and may fulfil their + function better than they fulfilled it themselves. But to 'fulfil a + function' in a world of pure experience can be conceived and defined in + only one possible way. In such a world transitions and arrivals (or + terminations) are the only events that happen, tho they happen by so many + sorts of path. The only function that one experience can perform is to + lead into another experience; and the only fulfilment we can speak of is + the reaching of a certain experienced end. When one experience leads to + (or can lead to) the same end as another, they agree in function. But the + whole system of experiences as they are immediately given presents itself + as a quasi-chaos through which one can pass out of an initial term in many + directions and yet end in the same terminus, moving from next to next by a + great many possible paths. + </p> + <p> + Either one of these paths might be a functional substitute for another, + and to follow one rather than another might on occasion be an advantageous + thing to do. As a matter of fact, and in a general way, the paths that run + through conceptual experiences, that is, through 'thoughts' or 'ideas' + that 'know' the things in which they terminate, are highly advantageous + paths to follow. Not only do they yield inconceivably rapid transitions; + but, owing to the 'universal' character [Footnote: Of which all that need + be said in this essay is that it also an be conceived as functional, and + defined in terms of transitions, or of the possibility of such.] which + they frequently possess, and to their capacity for association with one + another in great systems, they outstrip the tardy consecutions of the + things themselves, and sweep us on towards our ultimate termini in a far + more labor-saving way than the following of trains of sensible perception + ever could. Wonderful are the new cuts and the short-circuits the + thought-paths make. Most thought-paths, it is true, are substitutes for + nothing actual; they end outside the real world altogether, in wayward + fancies, utopias, fictions or mistakes. But where they do re-enter reality + and terminate therein, we substitute them always; and with these + substitutes we pass the greater number of our hours. [Footnote: This is + why I called our experiences, taken all together, a quasi-chaos. There is + vastly more discontinuity in the sum total of experiences than we commonly + suppose. The objective nucleus of every man's experience, his own body, + is, it is true, a continuous percept; and equally continuous as a percept + (though we may be inattentive to it) is the material environment of that + body, changing by gradual transition when the body moves. But the distant + parts of the physical world are at all times absent from us, and form + conceptual objects merely, into the perceptual reality of which our life + inserts itself at points discrete and relatively rare. Round their several + objective nuclei, partly shared and common partly discrete of the real + physical world, innumerable thinkers, pursuing their several lines of + physically true cogitation, trace paths that intersect one another only at + discontinuous perceptual points, and the rest of the time are quite + incongruent; and around all the nuclei of shared 'reality' floats the vast + cloud of experiences that are wholly subjective, that are + non-substitutional, that find not even an eventual ending for themselves + in the perceptual world—the mere day-dreams and joys and sufferings + and wishes of the individual minds. These exist WITH one another, indeed, + and with the objective nuclei, but out of them it is probable that to all + eternity no inter-related system of any kind will ever be made.] + </p> + <p> + Whosoever feels his experience to be something substitutional even while + he has it, may be said to have an experience that reaches beyond itself. + From inside of its own entity it says 'more,' and postulates reality + existing elsewhere. For the transcendentalist, who holds knowing to + consist in a salto motale across an 'epistemological chasm,' such an idea + presents no difficulty; but it seems at first sight as if it might be + inconsistent with an empiricism like our own. Have we not explained that + conceptual knowledge is made such wholly by the existence of things that + fall outside of the knowing experience itself—by intermediary + experiences and by a terminus that fulfils? + </p> + <p> + Can the knowledge be there before these elements that constitute its being + have come? And, if knowledge be not there, how can objective reference + occur? + </p> + <p> + The key to this difficulty lies in the distinction between knowing as + verified and completed, and the same knowing as in transit and on its way. + To recur to the Memorial Hall example lately used, it is only when our + idea of the Hall has actually terminated in the percept that we know 'for + certain' that from the beginning it was truly cognitive of THAT. Until + established by the end of the process, its quality of knowing that, or + indeed of knowing anything, could still be doubted; and yet the knowing + really was there, as the result now shows. We were VIRTUAL knowers of the + Hall long before we were certified to have been its actual knowers, by the + percept's retroactive validating power. Just so we are 'mortal' all the + time, by reason of the virtuality of the inevitable event which will make + us so when it shall have come. + </p> + <p> + Now the immensely greater part of all our knowing never gets beyond this + virtual stage. It never is completed or nailed down. I speak not merely of + our ideas of imperceptibles like ether-waves or dissociated 'ions,' or of + 'ejects' like the contents of our neighbors' minds; I speak also of ideas + which we might verify if we would take the trouble, but which we hold for + true altho unterminated perceptually, because nothing says 'no' to us, and + there is no contradicting truth in sight. TO CONTINUE THINKING + UNCHALLENGED IS, NINETY-NINE TIMES OUT OF A HUNDRED, OUR PRACTICAL + SUBSTITUTE FOR KNOWING IN THE COMPLETED SENSE. As each experience runs by + cognitive transition into the next one, and we nowhere feel a collision + with what we elsewhere count as truth or fact, we commit ourselves to the + current as if the port were sure. We live, as it, were, upon the front + edge of an advancing wave-crest, and our sense of a determinate direction + in falling forward is all we cover of the future of our path. It is as if + a differential quotient should be conscious and treat itself as an + adequate substitute for a traced-out curve. Our experience, inter alia, is + of variations of rate and of direction, and lives in these transitions + more than in the journey's end. The experiences of tendency are sufficient + to act upon—what more could we have DONE at those moments even if + the later verification comes complete? + </p> + <p> + This is what, as a radical empiricist, I say to the charge that the + objective reference which is so flagrant a character of our experiences + involves a chasm and a mortal leap. A positively conjunctive transition + involves neither chasm nor leap. Being the very original of what we mean + by continuity, it makes a continuum wherever it appears. Objective + reference is an incident of the fact that so much of our experience comes + as an insufficient and consists of process and transition. Our fields of + experience have no more definite boundaries than have our fields of view. + Both are fringed forever by a MORE that continuously develops, and that + continuously supersedes them as life proceeds. The relations, generally + speaking, are as real here as the terms are, and the only complaint of the + transcendentalist's with which I could at all sympathize would be his + charge that, by first making knowledge to consist in external relations as + I have done, and by then confessing that nine-tenths of the time these are + not actually but only virtually there, I have knocked the solid bottom out + of the whole business, and palmed off a substitute of knowledge for the + genuine thing. Only the admission, such a critic might say, that our ideas + are self-transcendent and 'true' already; in advance of the experiences + that are to terminate them, can bring solidity back to knowledge in a + world like this, in which transitions and terminations are only by + exception fulfilled. + </p> + <p> + This seems to me an excellent place for applying the pragmatic method. + What would the self-transcendency affirmed to exist in advance of all + experiential mediation or termination, be KNOWN-AS? What would it + practically result in for US, were it true? + </p> + <p> + It could only result in our orientation, in the turning of our + expectations and practical tendencies into the right path; and the right + path here, so long as we and the object are not yet face to face (or can + never get face to face, as in the case of ejects), would be the path that + led us into the object's nearest neighborhood. Where direct acquaintance + is lacking, 'knowledge about' is the next best thing, and an acquaintance + with what actually lies about the 'object, and is most closely related to + it, puts such knowledge within our grasp. Ether-waves and your anger, for + example, are things in which my thoughts will never PERCTEPTUALLY + terminate, but my concepts of them lead me to their very brink, to the + chromatic fringes and to the hurtful words and deeds which are their + really next effects. + </p> + <p> + Even if our ideas did in themselves possess the postulated + self-transcendency, it would still remain true that their putting us into + possession of such effects WOULD BE THE SOLE CASH-VALUE OF THE + SELF-TRANSCENDENCY FOR US. And this cash-value, it is needless to say, is + verbatim et liberatim what our empiricist account pays in. On pragmatist + principles therefore, a dispute over self-transcendency is a pure + logomachy. Call our concepts of ejective things self-transcendent or the + reverse, it makes no difference, so long as we don't differ about the + nature of that exalted virtue's fruits—fruits for us, of course, + humanistic fruits. + </p> + <p> + The transcendentalist believes his ideas to be self-transcendent only + because he finds that in fact they do bear fruits. Why need he quarrel + with an account of knowledge that insists on naming this effect? Why not + treat the working of the idea from next to next as the essence of its + self-transcendency? Why insist that knowing is a static relation out of + time when it practically seems so much a function of our active life? For + a thing to be valid, says Lotze, is the same as to make itself valid. When + the whole universe seems only to be making itself valid and to be still + incomplete (else why its ceaseless changing?) why, of all things, should + knowing be exempt? Why should it not be making itself valid like + everything else? That some parts of it may be already valid or verified + beyond dispute; the empirical philosopher, of course, like any one else, + may always hope. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + V + </h2> + <h3> + THE ESSENCE OF HUMANISM + </h3> + <p> + [Footnote: Reprinted from the Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and + Scientific Methods, vol. ii. No. 5, March 2, 1905.] + </p> + <p> + Humanism is a ferment that has 'come to stay.' It is not a single + hypothesis or theorem, and it dwells on no new facts. It is rather a slow + shifting in the philosophic perspective, making things appear as from a + new centre of interest or point of sight. Some writers are strongly + conscious of the shifting, others half unconscious, even though their own + vision may have undergone much change. The result is no small confusion in + debate, the half-conscious humanists often taking part against the radical + ones, as if they wished to count upon the other side. [Footnote: Professor + Baldwin, for example. His address 'Selective Thinking' (Psychological + Review, January, 1898, reprinted in his volume, 'Development and + Evolution') seems to me an unusually well written pragmatic manifesto. + Nevertheless in 'The Limits of Pragmatism' (ibid; January, 1904), he (much + less clearly) joins in the attack.] + </p> + <p> + If humanism really be the name for such a shifting of perspective, it is + obvious that the whole scene of the philosophic stage will change in some + degree if humanism prevails. The emphasis of things, their foreground and + background distribution, their sizes and values, will not keep just the + same. [Footnote: The ethical changes, it seems to me, are beautifully made + evident in Professor Dewey's series of articles, which will never get the + attention they deserve till they are printed in a book. I mean: 'The + Significance of Emotions,' Psychological Review, vol. ii, 13; 'The Reflex + Arc Concept in Psychology,' ibid; iii, 357; 'Psychology and Social + Practice,' ibid., vii, 105; 'Interpretation of Savage Mind,' ibid; ix, + 2l7; 'Green's Theory of the Moral Motive,' Philosophical Review, vol. i, + 593; 'Self-realization as the Moral Ideal,' ibid; ii, 652; 'The Psychology + of Effort,' ibid; vi, 43; 'The Evolutionary Method as Applied to + Morality,' ibid; xi, 107,353; 'Evolution and Ethics,' Monist, vol. viii, + 321; to mention only a few.] If such pervasive consequences be involved in + humanism, it is clear that no pains which philosophers may take, first in + defining it, and then in furthering, checking, or steering its progress, + will be thrown away. + </p> + <p> + It suffers badly at present from incomplete definition. Its most + systematic advocates, Schiller and Dewey, have published fragmentary + programmes only; and its bearing on many vital philosophic problems has + not been traced except by adversaries who, scenting heresies in advance, + have showered blows on doctrines—subjectivism and scepticism, for + example—that no good humanist finds it necessary to entertain. By + their still greater reticences, the anti-humanists have, in turn, + perplexed the humanists. Much of the controversy has involved the word + 'truth.' It is always good in debate to know your adversary's point of + view authentically. But the critics of humanism never define exactly what + the word 'truth' signifies when they use it themselves. The humanists have + to guess at their view; and the result has doubtless been much beating of + the air. Add to all this, great individual differences in both camps, and + it becomes clear that nothing is so urgently needed, at the stage which + things have reached at present, as a sharper definition by each side of + its central point of view. + </p> + <p> + Whoever will contribute any touch of sharpness will help us to make sure + of what's what and who is who. Any one can contribute such a definition, + and, without it, no one knows exactly where he stands. If I offer my own + provisional definition of humanism now and here, others may improve it, + some adversary may be led to define his own creed more sharply by the + contrast, and a certain quickening of the crystallization of general + opinion may result. + </p> + <p> + The essential service of humanism, as I conceive the situation, is to have + seen that THO ONE PART OF OUR EXPERIENCE MAY LEAN UPON ANOTHER PART TO + MAKE IT WHAT IT IS IN ANY ONE OF SEVERAL ASPECTS IN WHICH IT MAY BE + CONSIDERED, EXPERIENCE AS A WHOLE IS SELF-CONTAINING AND LEANS ON NOTHING. + Since this formula also expresses the main contention of transcendental + idealism, it needs abundant explication to make it unambiguous. It seems, + at first sight, to confine itself to denying theism and pantheism. But, in + fact, it need not deny either; everything would depend on the exegesis; + and if the formula ever became canonical, it would certainly develop both + right-wing and left-wing interpreters. I myself read humanism theistically + and pluralistically. If there be a God, he is no absolute all-experiencer, + but simply the experiencer of widest actual conscious span. Read thus, + humanism is for me a religion susceptible of reasoned defence, tho I am + well aware how many minds there are to whom it can appeal religiously only + when it has been monistically translated. Ethically the pluralistic form + of it takes for me a stronger hold on reality than any other philosophy I + know of—it being essentially a SOCIAL philosophy, a philosophy of + 'CO,' in which conjunctions do the work. But my primary reason for + advocating it is its matchless intellectual economy. It gets rid, not only + of the standing 'problems' that monism engenders ('problem of evil,' + 'problem of freedom,' and the like), but of other metaphysical mysteries + and paradoxes as well. + </p> + <p> + It gets rid, for example, of the whole agnostic controversy, by refusing + to entertain the hypothesis of trans-empirical reality at all. It gets rid + of any need for an absolute of the bradleyan type (avowedly sterile for + intellectual purposes) by insisting that the conjunctive relations found + within experience are faultlessly real. It gets rid of the need of an + absolute of the roycean type (similarly sterile) by its pragmatic + treatment of the problem of knowledge. As the views of knowledge, reality + and truth imputed to humanism have been those so far most fiercely + attacked, it is in regard to these ideas that a sharpening of focus seems + most urgently required. I proceed therefore to bring the views which I + impute to humanism in these respects into focus as briefly as I can. + </p> + <h3> + II + </h3> + <p> + If the central humanistic thesis, printed above in italics, be accepted, + it will follow that, if there be any such thing at all as knowing, the + knower and the object known must both be portions of experience. One part + of experience must, therefore, either + </p> + <p> + (1) Know another part of experience—in other words, parts must, as + Professor Woodbridge says, [Footnote: In Science, November 4, 1904, p. + 599.] represent ONE ANOTHER instead of representing realities outside of + 'consciousness'—this case is that of conceptual knowledge; or else + </p> + <p> + (2) They must simply exist as so many ultimate THATS or facts of being, in + the first instance; and then, as a secondary complication, and without + doubling up its entitative singleness, any one and the same THAT in + experience must figure alternately as a thing known and as a knowledge of + the thing, by reason of two divergent kinds of context into which, in the + general course of experience, it gets woven. [Footnote: This statement is + probably excessively obscure to any one who has not read my two articles + 'Does Consciousness Exist?' and 'A World of Pure Experience' in the + Journal of Philosophy, vol. i, 1904.] + </p> + <p> + This second case is that of sense-perception. There is a stage of thought + that goes beyond common sense, and of it I shall say more presently; but + the common-sense stage is a perfectly definite halting-place of thought, + primarily for purposes of action; and, so long as we remain on the + common-sense stage of thought, object and subject FUSE in the fact of + 'presentation' or sense-perception-the pen and hand which I now SEE + writing, for example, ARE the physical realities which those words + designate. In this case there is no self-transcendency implied in the + knowing. Humanism, here, is only a more comminuted IDENTITATSPHILOSOPHIE. + </p> + <p> + In case (1), on the contrary, the representative experience DOES TRANSCEND + ITSELF in knowing the other experience that is its object. No one can talk + of the knowledge of the one by the other without seeing them as + numerically distinct entities, of which the one lies beyond the other and + away from it, along some direction and with some interval, that can be + definitely named. But, if the talker be a humanist, he must also see this + distance-interval concretely and pragmatically, and confess it to consist + of other intervening experiences—of possible ones, at all events, if + not of actual. To call my present idea of my dog, for example, cognitive + of the real dog means that, as the actual tissue of experience is + constituted, the idea is capable of leading into a chain of other + experiences on my part that go from next to next and terminate at last in + vivid sense-perceptions of a jumping, barking, hairy body. Those ARE the + real dog, the dog's full presence, for my common sense. If the supposed + talker is a profound philosopher, altho they may not BE the real dog for + him, they MEAN the real dog, are practical substitutes for the real dog, + as the representation was a practical substitute for them, that real dog + being a lot of atoms, say, or of mind-stuff, that lie WHERE the + sense-perceptions lie in his experience as well as in my own. + </p> + <h3> + III + </h3> + <p> + The philosopher here stands for the stage of thought that goes beyond the + stage of common sense; and the difference is simply that he 'interpolates' + and 'extrapolates,' where common sense does not. For common sense, two men + see the same identical real dog. Philosophy, noting actual differences in + their perceptions points out the duality of these latter, and interpolates + something between them as a more real terminus—first, organs, + viscera, etc.; next, cells; then, ultimate atoms; lastly, mind-stuff + perhaps. The original sense-termini of the two men, instead of coalescing + with each other and with the real dog-object, as at first supposed, are + thus held by philosophers to be separated by invisible realities with + which, at most, they are conterminous. + </p> + <p> + Abolish, now, one of the percipients, and the interpolation changes into + 'extrapolation.' The sense-terminus of the remaining percipient is + regarded by the philosopher as not quite reaching reality. He has only + carried the procession of experiences, the philosopher thinks, to a + definite, because practical, halting-place somewhere on the way towards an + absolute truth that lies beyond. + </p> + <p> + The humanist sees all the time, however, that there is no absolute + transcendency even about the more absolute realities thus conjectured or + believed in. The viscera and cells are only possible percepts following + upon that of the outer body. The atoms again, tho we may never attain to + human means of perceiving them, are still defined perceptually. The + mind-stuff itself is conceived as a kind of experience; and it is possible + to frame the hypothesis (such hypotheses can by no logic be excluded from + philosophy) of two knowers of a piece of mind-stuff and the mind-stuff + itself becoming 'confluent' at the moment at which our imperfect knowing + might pass into knowing of a completed type. Even so do you and I + habitually conceive our two perceptions and the real dog as confluent, tho + only provisionally, and for the common-sense stage of thought. If my pen + be inwardly made of mind-stuff, there is no confluence NOW between that + mind-stuff and my visual perception of the pen. But conceivably there + might come to be such confluence; for, in the case of my HAND, the visual + sensations and the inward feelings of the hand, its mind-stuff, so to + speak, are even now as confluent as any two things can be. + </p> + <p> + There is, thus, no breach in humanistic epistemology. Whether knowledge be + taken as ideally perfected, or only as true enough to pass muster for + practice, it is hung on one continuous scheme. Reality, howsoever remote, + is always defined as a terminus within the general possibilities of + experience; and what knows it is defined as an experience THAT + 'REPRESENTS' IT, IN THE SENSE OF BEING SUBSTITUTABLE FOR IT IN OUR + THINKING because it leads to the same associates, OR IN THE SENSE OF + 'POINTING TO IT THROUGH A CHAIN OF OTHER EXPERIENCES THAT EITHER INTERVENE + OR MAY INTERVENE. + </p> + <p> + Absolute reality here bears the same relation to sensation as sensation + bears to conception or imagination. Both are provisional or final termini, + sensation being only the terminus at which the practical man habitually + stops, while the philosopher projects a 'beyond,' in the shape of more + absolute reality. These termini, for the practical and the philosophical + stages of thought respectively, are self-supporting. They are not 'true' + of anything else, they simply ARE, are REAL. They 'lean on nothing,' as my + italicized formula said. Rather does the whole fabric of experience lean + on them, just as the whole fabric of the solar system, including many + relative positions, leans, for its absolute position in space, on any one + of its constituent stars. Here, again, one gets a new + IDENTITATSPHILOSOPHIE in pluralistic form. + </p> + <h3> + IV + </h3> + <p> + If I have succeeded in making this at all clear (tho I fear that brevity + and abstractness between them may have made me fail), the reader will see + that the 'truth' of our mental operations must always be an + intra-experiential affair. A conception is reckoned true by common sense + when it can be made to lead to a sensation. The sensation, which for + common sense is not so much 'true' as 'real,' is held to be PROVISIONALLY + true by the philosopher just in so far as it COVERS (abuts at, or occupies + the place of) a still more absolutely real experience, in the possibility + of which, to some remoter experient, the philosopher finds reason to + believe. + </p> + <p> + Meanwhile what actually DOES count for true to any individual trower, + whether he be philosopher or common man, is always a result of his + APPERCEPTIONS. If a novel experience, conceptual or sensible, contradict + too emphatically our pre-existent system of beliefs, in ninety-nine cases + out of a hundred it is treated as false. Only when the older and the newer + experiences are congruous enough to mutually apperceive and modify each + other, does what we treat as an advance in truth result. In no case, + however, need truth consist in a relation between our experiences and + something archetypal or trans-experiential. Should we ever reach + absolutely terminal experiences, experiences in which we all agreed, which + were superseded by no revised continuations, these would not be TRUE, they + would be REAL, they would simply BE, and be indeed the angles, corners, + and linchpins of all reality, on which the truth of everything else would + be stayed. Only such OTHER things as led to these by satisfactory + conjunctions would be 'true.' Satisfactory connection of some sort with + such termini is all that the word 'truth' means. On the common-stage of + thought sense-presentations serve as such termini. Our ideas and concepts + and scientific theories pass for true only so far as they harmoniously + lead back to the world of sense. + </p> + <p> + I hope that many humanists will endorse this attempt of mine to trace the + more essential features of that way of viewing things. I feel almost + certain that Messrs. Dewey and Schiller will do so. If the attackers will + also take some slight account of it, it may be that discussion will be a + little less wide of the mark than it has hitherto been. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VI + </h2> + <h3> + A WORD MORE ABOUT TRUTH + </h3> + <p> + [Footnote: Reprint from the Journal of Philosophy, July 18,1907.] + </p> + <p> + My failure in making converts to my conception of truth seems, if I may + judge by what I hear in conversation, almost complete. An ordinary + philosopher would feel disheartened, and a common choleric sinner would + curse God and die, after such a reception. But instead of taking counsel + of despair, I make bold to vary my statements, in the faint hope that + repeated droppings may wear upon the stone, and that my formulas may seem + less obscure if surrounded by something more of a 'mass' whereby to + apperceive them. + </p> + <p> + For fear of compromising other pragmatists, whoe'er they be, I will speak + of the conception which I am trying to make intelligible, as my own + conception. I first published it in the year 1885, in the first article + reprinted in the present book. Essential theses of this article were + independently supported in 1893 and 1895 by Professor D. S. Miller + [Footnote: Philosophical Review, vol. ii, p. 408, and Psychological + Review, vol. ii, p. 533.] and were repeated by me in a presidential + address on 'The knowing of things together' [Footnote: The relevant parts + of which are printed above, p. 43.] in 1895. Professor Strong, in an + article in the Journal of Philosophy, etc., [Footnote: Vol. i, p. 253.] + entitled 'A naturalistic theory of the reference of thought to reality,' + called our account 'the James-Miller theory of cognition,' and, as I + understood him, gave it his adhesion. Yet, such is the difficulty of + writing clearly in these penetralia of philosophy, that each of these + revered colleagues informs me privately that the account of truth I now + give—which to me is but that earlier statement more completely set + forth—is to him inadequate, and seems to leave the gist of real + cognition out. If such near friends disagree, what can I hope from remoter + ones, and what from unfriendly critics? + </p> + <p> + Yet I feel so sure that the fault must lie in my lame forms of statement + and not in my doctrine, that I am fain to try once more to express myself. + </p> + <p> + Are there not some general distinctions which it may help us to agree + about in advance? Professor Strong distinguishes between what he calls + 'saltatory' and what he calls 'ambulatory' relations. 'Difference,' for + example, is saltatory, jumping as it were immediately from one term to + another, but 'distance' in time or space is made out of intervening parts + of experience through which we ambulate in succession. Years ago, when T. + H. Green's ideas were most influential, I was much troubled by his + criticisms of english sensationalism. One of his disciples in particular + would always say to me, 'Yes! TERMS may indeed be possibly sensational in + origin; but RELATIONS, what are they but pure acts of the intellect coming + upon the sensations from above, and of a higher nature?' I well remember + the sudden relief it gave me to perceive one day that SPACE-relations at + any rate were homogeneous with the terms between which they mediated. The + terms were spaces, and the relations were other intervening spaces. + [Footnote: See my Principles of Psychology, vol. ii, pp. 148-153.] For the + Greenites space-relations had been saltatory, for me they became + thenceforward ambulatory. + </p> + <p> + Now the most general way of contrasting my view of knowledge with the + popular view (which is also the view of most epistemologists) is to call + my view ambulatory, and the other view saltatory; and the most general way + of characterizing the two views is by saying that my view describes + knowing as it exists concretely, while the other view only describes its + results abstractly taken. + </p> + <p> + I fear that most of my recalcitrant readers fail to recognize that what is + ambulatory in the concrete may be taken so abstractly as to appear + saltatory. Distance, for example, is made abstract by emptying out + whatever is particular in the concrete intervals—it is reduced thus + to a sole 'difference,' a difference of 'place,' which is a logical or + saltatory distinction, a so-called 'pure relation.' + </p> + <p> + The same is true of the relation called 'knowing,' which may connect an + idea with a reality. My own account of this relation is ambulatory through + and through. I say that we know an object by means of an idea, whenever we + ambulate towards the object under the impulse which the idea communicates. + If we believe in so-called 'sensible' realities, the idea may not only + send us towards its object, but may put the latter into our very hand, + make it our immediate sensation. But, if, as most reflective people opine, + sensible realities are not 'real' realities, but only their appearances, + our idea brings us at least so far, puts us in touch with reality's most + authentic appearances and substitutes. In any case our idea brings us into + the object's neighborhood, practical or ideal, gets us into commerce with + it, helps us towards its closer acquaintance, enables us to foresee it, + class it, compare it, deduce it,—in short, to deal with it as we + could not were the idea not in our possession. + </p> + <p> + The idea is thus, when functionally considered, an instrument for enabling + us the better to HAVE TO DO with the object and to act about it. But it + and the object are both of them bits of the general sheet and tissue of + reality at large; and when we say that the idea leads us towards the + object, that only means that it carries us forward through intervening + tracts of that reality into the object's closer neighborhood, into the + midst of its associates at least, be these its physical neighbors, or be + they its logical congeners only. Thus carried into closer quarters, we are + in an improved situation as regards acquaintance and conduct; and we say + that through the idea we now KNOW the object better or more truly. + </p> + <p> + My thesis is that the knowing here is MADE by the ambulation through the + intervening experiences. If the idea led us nowhere, or FROM that object + instead of towards it, could we talk at all of its having any cognitive + quality? Surely not, for it is only when taken in conjunction with the + intermediate experiences that it gets related to THAT PARTICULAR OBJECT + rather than to any other part of nature. Those intermediaries determine + what particular knowing function it exerts. The terminus they guide us to + tells us what object it 'means,' the results they enrich us with 'verify' + or 'refute' it. Intervening experiences are thus as indispensable + foundations for a concrete relation of cognition as intervening space is + for a relation of distance. Cognition, whenever we take it concretely, + means determinate 'ambulation,' through intermediaries, from a terminus a + quo to, or towards, a terminus ad quem. As the intermediaries are other + than the termini, and connected with them by the usual associative bonds + (be these 'external' or be they logical, i.e., classificatory, in + character), there would appear to be nothing especially unique about the + processes of knowing. They fall wholly within experience; and we need use, + in describing them, no other categories than those which we employ in + describing other natural processes. + </p> + <p> + But there exist no processes which we cannot also consider abstractly, + eviscerating them down to their essential skeletons or outlines; and when + we have treated the processes of knowing thus, we are easily led to regard + them as something altogether unparalleled in nature. For we first empty + idea, object and intermediaries of all their particularities, in order to + retain only a general scheme, and then we consider the latter only in its + function of giving a result, and not in its character of being a process. + In this treatment the intermediaries shrivel into the form of a mere space + of separation, while the idea and object retain only the logical + distinctness of being the end-terms that are separated. In other words, + the intermediaries which in their concrete particularity form a bridge, + evaporate ideally into an empty interval to cross, and then, the relation + of the end-terms having become saltatory, the whole hocus-pocus of + Erkenntnistheorie begins, and goes on unrestrained by further concrete + considerations. The idea, in 'meaning' an object separated by an + 'epistemological chasm' from itself, now executes what Professor Ladd + calls a 'salto mortale'; in knowing the object's nature, it now + 'transcends' its own. The object in turn becomes 'present' where it is + really absent, etc.; until a scheme remains upon our hands, the sublime + paradoxes of which some of us think that nothing short of an 'absolute' + can explain. + </p> + <p> + The relation between idea and object, thus made abstract and saltatory, is + thenceforward opposed, as being more essential and previous, to its own + ambulatory self, and the more concrete description is branded as either + false or insufficient. The bridge of intermediaries, actual or possible, + which in every real case is what carries and defines the knowing, gets + treated as an episodic complication which need not even potentially be + there. I believe that this vulgar fallacy of opposing abstractions to the + concretes from which they are abstracted, is the main reason why my + account of knowing is deemed so unsatisfactory, and I will therefore say a + word more on that general point. + </p> + <p> + Any vehicle of conjunction, if all its particularities are abstracted from + it, will leave us with nothing on our hands but the original disjunction + which it bridged over. But to escape treating the resultant + self-contradiction as an achievement of dialectical profundity, all we + need is to restore some part, no matter how small, of what we have taken + away. In the case of the epistemological chasm the first reasonable step + is to remember that the chasm was filled with SOME empirical material, + whether ideational or sensational, which performed SOME bridging function + and saved us from the mortal leap. Restoring thus the indispensable + modicum of reality to the matter of our discussion, we find our abstract + treatment genuinely useful. We escape entanglement with special cases + without at the same time falling into gratuitous paradoxes. We can now + describe the general features of cognition, tell what on the whole it DOES + FOR US, in a universal way. + </p> + <p> + We must remember that this whole inquiry into knowing grows up on a + reflective level. In any real moment of knowing, what we are thinking of + is our object, not the way in which we ourselves are momentarily knowing + it. We at this moment, as it happens, have knowing itself for our object; + but I think that the reader will agree that his present knowing of that + object is included only abstractly, and by anticipation, in the results he + may reach. What he concretely has before his mind, as he reasons, is some + supposed objective instance of knowing, as he conceives it to go on in + some other person, or recalls it from his own past. As such, he, the + critic, sees it to contain both an idea and an object, and processes by + which the knower is guided from the one towards the other. He sees that + the idea is remote from the object, and that, whether through + intermediaries or not, it genuinely HAS TO DO with it. He sees that it + thus works beyond its immediate being, and lays hold of a remote reality; + it jumps across, transcends itself. It does all this by extraneous aid, to + be sure, but when the aid has come, it HAS done it and the result is + secure. Why not talk of results by themselves, then, without considering + means? Why not treat the idea as simply grasping or intuiting the reality, + of its having the faculty anyhow, of shooting over nature behind the + scenes and knowing things immediately and directly? Why need we always lug + in the bridging?—it only retards our discourse to do so. + </p> + <p> + Such abstract talk about cognition's results is surely convenient; and it + is surely as legitimate as it is convenient, SO LONG AS WE DO NOT FORGET + OR POSITIVELY DENY, WHAT IT IGNORES. We may on occasion say that our idea + meant ALWAYS that particular object, that it led us there because it was + OF it intrinsically and essentially. We may insist that its verification + follows upon that original cognitive virtue in it—and all the rest—and + we shall do no harm so long as we know that these are only short cuts in + our thinking. They are positively true accounts of fact AS FAR AS THEY GO, + only they leave vast tracts of fact out of the account, tracts of tact + that have to be reinstated to make the accounts literally true of any real + case. But if, not merely passively ignoring the intermediaries, you + actively deny them [Footnote: This is the fallacy which I have called + 'vicious intellectualism' in my book A Pluralistic Universe, Longmans, + Green & Co., 1909.] to be even potential requisites for the results + you are so struck by, your epistemology goes to irremediable smash. You + are as far off the track as an historian would be, if, lost in admiration + of Napoleon's personal power, he were to ignore his marshals and his + armies, and were to accuse you of error in describing his conquests as + effected by their means. Of such abstractness and one-sidedness I accuse + most of the critics of my own account. + </p> + <p> + In the second lecture of the book Pragmatism, I used the illustration of a + squirrel scrambling round a tree-trunk to keep out of sight of a pursuing + man: both go round the tree, but does the man go round the squirrel? It + all depends, I said, on what you mean by going round.' In one sense of the + word the man 'goes round,' in another sense he does not. I settled the + dispute by pragmatically distinguishing the senses. But I told how some + disputants had called my distinction a shuffling evasion and taken their + stand on what they called 'plain honest English going-round.' + </p> + <p> + In such a simple case few people would object to letting the term in + dispute be translated into its concreter equivalents. But in the case of a + complex function like our knowing they act differently. I give full + concrete particular value for the ideas of knowing in every case I can + think of, yet my critics insist that 'plain honest English knowing' is + left out of my account. They write as if the minus were on my side and the + plus on theirs. + </p> + <p> + The essence of the matter for me is that altho knowing can be both + abstractly and concretely described, and altho the abstract descriptions + are often useful enough, yet they are all sucked up and absorbed without + residuum into the concreter ones, and contain nothing of any essentially + other or higher nature, which the concrete descriptions can be justly + accused of leaving behind. Knowing is just a natural process like any + other. There is no ambulatory process whatsoever, the results of which we + may not describe, if we prefer to, in saltatory terms, or represent in + static formulation. Suppose, e.g., that we say a man is 'prudent.' + Concretely, that means that he takes out insurance, hedges in betting, + looks before he leaps. Do such acts CONSTITUTE the prudence? ARE they the + man qua prudent? + </p> + <p> + Or is the prudence something by itself and independent of them? As a + constant habit in him, a permanent tone of character, it is convenient to + call him prudent in abstraction from any one of his acts, prudent in + general and without specification, and to say the acts follow from the + pre-existing prudence. There are peculiarities in his psycho-physical + system that make him act prudently; and there are tendencies to + association in our thoughts that prompt some of them to make for truth and + others for error. But would the man be prudent in the absence of each and + all of the acts? Or would the thoughts be true if they had no associative + or impulsive tendencies? Surely we have no right to oppose static essences + in this way to the moving processes in which they live embedded. + </p> + <p> + My bedroom is above my library. Does the 'aboveness' here mean aught that + is different from the concrete spaces which have to be moved-through in + getting from the one to the other? It means, you may say, a pure + topographic relation, a sort of architect's plan among the eternal + essences. But that is not the full aboveness, it is only an abbreviated + substitute that on occasion may lead my mind towards truer, i.e., fuller, + dealings with the real aboveness. It is not an aboveness ante rem, it is a + post rem extract from the aboveness in rebus. We may indeed talk, for + certain conveniences, as if the abstract scheme preceded, we may say 'I + must go up stairs because of the essential aboveness,' just as we may say + that the man 'does prudent acts because of his ingrained prudence,' or + that our ideas 'lead us truly because of their intrinsic truth.' But this + should not debar us on other occasions from using completer forms of + description. A concrete matter of fact always remains identical under any + form of description, as when we say of a line, now that it runs from left + to right, and now that it runs from right to left. These are but names of + one and the same fact, one more expedient to use at one time, one at + another. The full facts of cognition, whatever be the way in which we talk + about them, even when we talk most abstractly, stand inalterably given in + the actualities and possibilities of the experience-continuum. [Footnote + 1: The ultimate object or terminus of a cognitive process may in certain + instances lie beyond the direct experience of the particular cognizer, but + it, of course, must exist as part of the total universe of experience + whose constitution, with cognition in it, the critic is discussing.] But + my critics treat my own more concrete talk as if IT were the kind that + sinned by its inadequacy, and as if the full continuum left something out. + </p> + <p> + A favorite way of opposing the more abstract to the more concrete account + is to accuse those who favor the latter of 'confounding psychology with + logic.' Our critics say that when we are asked what truth MEANS, we reply + by telling only how it is ARRIVED-AT. But since a meaning is a logical + relation, static, independent of time, how can it possibly be identified, + they say, with any concrete man's experience, perishing as this does at + the instant of its production? This, indeed, sounds profound, but I + challenge the profundity. I defy any one to show any difference between + logic and psychology here. The logical relation stands to the + psychological relation between idea and object only as saltatory + abstractness stands to ambulatory concreteness. Both relations need a + psychological vehicle; and the 'logical' one is simply the 'psychological' + one disemboweled of its fulness, and reduced to a bare abstractional + scheme. + </p> + <p> + A while ago a prisoner, on being released, tried to assassinate the judge + who had sentenced him. He had apparently succeeded in conceiving the judge + timelessly, had reduced him to a bare logical meaning, that of being his + 'enemy and persecutor,' by stripping off all the concrete conditions (as + jury's verdict, official obligation, absence of personal spite, possibly + sympathy) that gave its full psychological character to the sentence as a + particular man's act in time. Truly the sentence WAS inimical to the + culprit; but which idea of it is the truer one, that bare logical + definition of it, or its full psychological specification? The + anti-pragmatists ought in consistency to stand up for the criminal's view + of the case, treat the judge as the latter's logical enemy, and bar out + the other conditions as so much inessential psychological stuff. + </p> + <h3> + II + </h3> + <p> + A still further obstacle, I suspect, stands in the way of my account's + acceptance. Like Dewey and like Schiller, I have had to say that the truth + of an idea is determined by its satisfactoriness. But satisfactoriness is + a subjective term, just as idea is; and truth is generally regarded as + 'objective.' Readers who admit that satisfactoriness is our only MARK of + truth, the only sign that we possess the precious article, will still say + that the objective relation between idea and object which the word 'truth' + points to is left out of my account altogether. I fear also that the + association of my poor name with the 'will to believe' (which 'will,' it + seems to me, ought to play no part in this discussion) works against my + credit in some quarters. I fornicate with that unclean thing, my + adversaries may think, whereas your genuine truth-lover must discourse in + huxleyan heroics, and feel as if truth, to be real truth, ought to bring + eventual messages of death to all our satisfactions. Such divergences + certainly prove the complexity of the area of our discussion; but to my + mind they also are based on misunderstandings, which (tho with but little + hope of success) I will try to diminish by a further word of explanation. + </p> + <p> + First, then, I will ask my objectors to define exactly what SORT of thing + it is they have in mind when they speak of a truth that shall be absolute, + complete and objective; and then I will defy them to show me any + conceivable standing-room for such a kind of truth outside the terms of my + own description. It will fall, as I contend, entirely within the field of + my analysis. + </p> + <p> + To begin with, it must obtain between an idea and a reality that is the + idea's object; and, as a predicate, it must apply to the idea and not to + the object, for objective realities are not TRUE, at least not in the + universe of discourse to which we are now confining ourselves, for there + they are taken as simply BEING, while the ideas are true OF them. But we + can suppose a series of ideas to be successively more and more true of the + same object, and can ask what is the extreme approach to being absolutely + true that the last idea might attain to. + </p> + <p> + The maximal conceivable truth in an idea would seem to be that it should + lead to an actual merging of ourselves with the object, to an utter mutual + confluence and identification. On the common-sense level of belief this is + what is supposed really to take place in sense-perception. My idea of this + pen verifies itself through my percept; and my percept is held to BE the + pen for the time being—percepts and physical realities being treated + by common sense as identical. But the physiology of the senses has + criticised common sense out of court, and the pen 'in itself' is now + believed to lie beyond my momentary percept. Yet the notion once + suggested, of what a completely consummated acquaintance with a reality + might be like, remains over for our speculative purposes. TOTAL CONFLUX OF + THE MIND WITH THE REALITY would be the absolute limit of truth, there + could be no better or more satisfying knowledge than that. + </p> + <p> + Such total conflux, it is needless to say, is ALREADY EXPLICITLY PROVIDED + FOR, AS A POSSIBILITY, IN MY ACCOUNT OF THE MATTER. If an idea should ever + lead us not only TOWARDS, or UP TO, or AGAINST, a reality, but so close + that we and the reality should MELT TOGETHER, it would be made absolutely + true, according to me, by that performance. + </p> + <p> + In point of fact philosophers doubt that this ever occurs. What happens, + they think, is only that we get nearer and nearer to realities, we + approximate more and more to the all-satisfying limit; and the definition + of actually, as distinguished from imaginably, complete and objective + truth, can then only be that it belongs to the idea that will lead us as + CLOSE UP AGAINST THE OBJECT as in the nature of our experience is + possible, literally NEXT to it, for instance. + </p> + <p> + Suppose, now, there were an idea that did this for a certain objective + reality. Suppose that no further approach were possible, that nothing lay + between, that the next step would carry us right INTO the reality; then + that result, being the next thing to conflux, would make the idea true in + the maximal degree that might be supposed practically attainable in the + world which we inhabit. + </p> + <p> + Well, I need hardly explain that THAT DEGREE OF TRUTH IS ALSO PROVIDED FOR + IN MY ACCOUNT OF THE MATTER. And if satisfactions are the marks of truth's + presence, we may add that any less true substitute for such a true idea + would prove less satisfactory. Following its lead, we should probably find + out that we did not quite touch the terminus. We should desiderate a + closer approach, and not rest till we had found it. + </p> + <p> + I am, of course, postulating here a standing reality independent of the + idea that knows it. I am also postulating that satisfactions grow pari + passu with our approximation to such reality. [Footnote 1: Say, if you + prefer to, that DISsatisfactions decrease pari passu with such + approximation. The approximation may be of any kind assignable—approximation + in time or in space, or approximation in kind, which in common speech + means 'copying.'] If my critics challenge this latter assumption, I retort + upon them with the former. Our whole notion of a standing reality grows up + in the form of an ideal limit to the series of successive termini to which + our thoughts have led us and still are leading us. Each terminus proves + provisional by leaving us unsatisfied. The truer idea is the one that + pushes farther; so we are ever beckoned on by the ideal notion of an + ultimate completely satisfactory terminus. I, for one, obey and accept + that notion. I can conceive no other objective CONTENT to the notion of + ideally perfect truth than that of penetration into such a terminus, nor + can I conceive that the notion would ever have grown up, or that true + ideas would ever have been sorted out from false or idle ones, save for + the greater sum of satisfactions, intellectual or practical, which the + truer ones brought with them. Can we imagine a man absolutely satisfied + with an idea and with all its relations to his other ideas and to his + sensible experiences, who should yet not take its content as a true + account of reality? The matter of the true is thus absolutely identical + with the matter of the satisfactory. You may put either word first in your + ways of talking; but leave out that whole notion of SATISFACTORY WORKING + or LEADING (which is the essence of my pragmatistic account) and call + truth a static logical relation, independent even of POSSIBLE leadings or + satisfactions, and it seems to me you cut all ground from under you. + </p> + <p> + I fear that I am still very obscure. But I respectfully implore those who + reject my doctrine because they can make nothing of my stumbling language, + to tell us in their own name—und zwar very concretely and + articulately!—just how the real, genuine and absolutely 'objective' + truth which they believe in so profoundly, is constituted and established. + They mustn't point to the 'reality' itself, for truth is only our + subjective relation to realities. What is the nominal essence of this + relation, its logical definition, whether or not it be 'objectively' + attainable by mortals? + </p> + <p> + Whatever they may say it is, I have the firmest faith that my account will + prove to have allowed for it and included it by anticipation, as one + possible case in the total mixture of cases. There is, in short, no ROOM + for any grade or sort of truth outside of the framework of the pragmatic + system, outside of that jungle of empirical workings and leadings, and + their nearer or ulterior terminations, of which I seem to have written so + unskilfully. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VII + </h2> + <h3> + PROFESSOR PRATT ON TRUTH + </h3> + <h3> + I + </h3> + <p> + [Footnote: Reprinted from the Journal of Philosophy, etc., August 15, 1907 + (vol. iv, p. 464).] + </p> + <p> + Professor J. B. Pratt's paper in the Journal of Philosophy for June 6, + 1907, is so brilliantly written that its misconception of the pragmatist + position seems doubly to call for a reply. + </p> + <p> + He asserts that, for a pragmatist, truth cannot be a relation between an + idea and a reality outside and transcendent of the idea, but must lie + 'altogether within experience,' where it will need 'no reference to + anything else to justify it'—no reference to the object, apparently. + The pragmatist must 'reduce everything to psychology,' aye, and to the + psychology of the immediate moment. He is consequently debarred from + saying that an idea that eventually gets psychologically verified WAS + already true before the process of verifying was complete; and he is + equally debarred from treating an idea as true provisionally so long as he + only believes that he CAN verify it whenever he will. + </p> + <p> + Whether such a pragmatist as this exists, I know not, never having myself + met with the beast. We can define terms as we like; and if that be my + friend Pratt's definition of a pragmatist, I can only concur with his + anti-pragmatism. But, in setting up the weird type, he quotes words from + me; so, in order to escape being classed by some reader along with so + asinine a being, I will reassert my own view of truth once more. + </p> + <p> + Truth is essentially a relation between two things, an idea, on the one + hand, and a reality outside of the idea, on the other. This relation, like + all relations, has its fundamentum, namely, the matrix of experiential + circumstance, psychological as well as physical, in which the correlated + terms are found embedded. In the case of the relation between 'heir' and + 'legacy' the fundamentum is a world in which there was a testator, and in + which there is now a will and an executor; in the case of that between + idea and object, it is a world with circumstances of a sort to make a + satisfactory verification process, lying around and between the two terms. + But just as a man may be called an heir and treated as one before the + executor has divided the estate, so an idea may practically be credited + with truth before the verification process has been exhaustively carried + out—the existence of the mass of verifying circumstance is enough. + Where potentiality counts for actuality in so many other cases, one does + not see why it may not so count here. We call a man benevolent not only + for his kind acts paid in, but for his readiness to perform others; we + treat an idea as 'luminous' not only for the light it has shed, but for + that we expect it will shed on dark problems. Why should we not equally + trust the truth of our ideas? We live on credits everywhere; and we use + our ideas far oftener for calling up things connected with their immediate + objects, than for calling up those objects themselves. Ninety-nine times + out of a hundred the only use we should make of the object itself, if we + were led up to it by our idea, would be to pass on to those connected + things by its means. So we continually curtail verification-processes, + letting our belief that they are possible suffice. + </p> + <p> + What CONSTITUTES THE RELATION known as truth, I now say, is just the + EXISTENCE IN THE EMPIRICAL WORLD OF THIS FUNDAMENTUM OF CIRCUMSTANCE + SURROUNDING OBJECT AND IDEA and ready to be either short-circuited or + traversed at full length. So long as it exists, and a satisfactory passage + through it between the object and the idea is possible, that idea will + both BE true, and will HAVE BEEN true of that object, whether fully + developed verification has taken place or not. The nature and place and + affinities of the object of course play as vital a part in making the + particular passage possible as do the nature and associative tendencies of + the idea; so that the notion that truth could fall altogether inside of + the thinker's private experience and be something purely psychological, is + absurd. It is BETWEEN the idea and the object that the truth-relation is + to be sought and it involves both terms. + </p> + <p> + But the 'intellectualistic' position, if I understand Mr. Pratt rightly, + is that, altho we can use this fundamentum, this mass of go-between + experience, for TESTING truth, yet the truth-relation in itself remains as + something apart. It means, in Mr. Pratt's words, merely 'THIS SIMPLE THING + THAT THE OBJECT OF WHICH ONE IS THINKING IS AS ONE THINKS IT.' + </p> + <p> + It seems to me that the word 'as,' which qualifies the relation here, and + bears the whole 'epistemological' burden, is anything but simple. What it + most immediately suggests is that the idea should be LIKE the object; but + most of our ideas, being abstract concepts, bear almost no resemblance to + their objects. The 'as' must therefore, I should say, be usually + interpreted functionally, as meaning that the idea shall lead us into the + same quarters of experience AS the object would. Experience leads ever on + and on, and objects and our ideas of objects may both lead to the same + goals. The ideas being in that case shorter cuts, we SUBSTITUTE them more + and more for their objects; and we habitually waive direct verification of + each one of them, as their train passes through our mind, because if an + idea leads AS the object would lead, we can say, in Mr. Pratt's words, + that in so far forth the object is AS we think it, and that the idea, + verified thus in so far forth, is true enough. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Pratt will undoubtedly accept most of these facts, but he will deny + that they spell pragmatism. Of course, definitions are free to every one; + but I have myself never meant by the pragmatic view of truth anything + different from what I now describe; and inasmuch as my use of the term + came earlier than my friend's, I think it ought to have the right of way. + But I suspect that Professor Pratt's contention is not solely as to what + one must think in order to be called a pragmatist. I am cure that he + believes that the truth-relation has something MORE in it than the + fundamentum which I assign can account for. Useful to test truth by, the + matrix of circumstance, he thinks, cannot found the truth-relation in se, + for that is trans-empirical and 'saltatory.' + </p> + <p> + Well, take an object and an idea, and assume that the latter is true of + the former—as eternally and absolutely true as you like. Let the + object be as much 'as' the idea thinks it, as it is possible for one thing + to be 'as' another. I now formally ask of Professor Pratt to tell what + this 'as'-ness in itself CONSISTS in—for it seems to me that it + ought to consist in something assignable and describable, and not remain a + pure mystery, and I promise that if he can assign any determination of it + whatever which I cannot successfully refer to some specification of what + in this article I have called the empirical fundamentum, I will confess my + stupidity cheerfully, and will agree never to publish a line upon this + subject of truth again. + </p> + <h3> + II + </h3> + <p> + Professor Pratt has returned to the charge in a whole book, [Footnote 1: + J. B. Pratt: What is Pragmatism. New York, The Macmillan Company, 1909.—The + comments I have printed were written in March, 1909, after some of the + articles printed later in the present volume.] which for its clearness and + good temper deserves to supersede all the rest of the anti-pragmatistic + literature. I wish it might do so; for its author admits all MY essential + contentions, simply distinguishing my account of truth as 'modified' + pragmatism from Schiller's and Dewey's, which he calls pragmatism of the + 'radical' sort. As I myself understand Dewey and Schiller, our views + absolutely agree, in spite of our different modes of statement; but I have + enough trouble of my own in life without having to defend my friends, so I + abandon them provisionally to the tender mercy of Professor Pratt's + interpretations, utterly erroneous tho I deem these to be. My reply as + regards myself can be very short, for I prefer to consider only + essentials, and Dr. Pratt's whole book hardly takes the matter farther + than the article to which I retort in Part I of the present paper. + </p> + <p> + He repeats the 'as'-formula, as if it were something that I, along with + other pragmatists, had denied, [Footnote: Op. cit., pp. 77-80.] whereas I + have only asked those who insist so on its importance to do something more + than merely utter it—to explicate it, for example, and tell us what + its so great importance consists in. I myself agree most cordially that + for an idea to be true the object must be 'as' the idea declares it, but I + explicate the 'as'-ness as meaning the idea's verifiability. + </p> + <p> + Now since Dr. Pratt denies none of these verifying 'workings' for which I + have pleaded, but only insists on their inability to serve as the + fundamentum of the truth-relation, it seems that there is really nothing + in the line of FACT about which we differ, and that the issue between us + is solely as to how far the notion of workableness or verifiability is an + essential part of the notion of 'trueness'—'trueness' being Dr. + Pratt's present name for the character of as-ness in the true idea. I + maintain that there is no meaning left in this notion of as-ness or + trueness if no reference to the possibility of concrete working on the + part of the idea is made. + </p> + <p> + Take an example where there can be no possible working. Suppose I have an + idea to which I give utterance by the vocable 'skrkl,' claiming at the + same time that it is true. Who now can say that it is FALSE, for why may + there not be somewhere in the unplumbed depths of the cosmos some object + with which 'skrkl' can agree and have trueness in Dr. Pratt's sense? On + the other hand who can say that it is TRUE, for who can lay his hand on + that object and show that it and nothing else is what I MEAN by my word? + But yet again, who can gainsay any one who shall call my word utterly + IRRELATIVE to other reality, and treat it as a bare fact in my mind, + devoid of any cognitive function whatever. One of these three alternatives + must surely be predicated of it. For it not to be irrelevant (or + not-cognitive in nature), an object of some kind must be provided which it + may refer to. Supposing that object provided, whether 'skrkl' is true or + false of it, depends, according to Professor Pratt, on no intermediating + condition whatever. The trueness or the falsity is even now immediately, + absolutely, and positively there. + </p> + <p> + I, on the other hand, demand a cosmic environment of some kind to + establish which of them is there rather than utter irrelevancy. [Footnote: + Dr. Pratt, singularly enough, disposes of this primal postulate of all + pragmatic epistemology, by saying that the pragmatist 'unconsciously + surrenders his whole case by smuggling in the idea of a conditioning + environment which determines whether or not the experience can work, and + which cannot itself be identified with the experience or any part of it' + (pp. 167-168). The 'experience' means here of course the idea, or belief; + and the expression 'smuggling in' is to the last degree diverting. If any + epistemologist could dispense with a conditioning environment, it would + seem to be the antipragmatist, with his immediate saltatory trueness, + independent of work done. The mediating pathway which the environment + supplies is the very essence of the pragmatist's explanation.] I then say, + first, that unless some sort of a natural path exists between the 'skrkl' + and THAT object, distinguishable among the innumerable pathways that run + among all the realities of the universe, linking them promiscuously with + one another, there is nothing there to constitute even the POSSIBILITY OF + ITS REFERRING to that object rather than to any other. + </p> + <p> + I say furthermore that unless it have some TENDENCY TO FOLLOW UP THAT + PATH, there is nothing to constitute its INTENTION to refer to the object + in question. + </p> + <p> + Finally, I say that unless the path be strown with possibilities of + frustration or encouragement, and offer some sort of terminal satisfaction + or contradiction, there is nothing to constitute its agreement or + disagreement with that object, or to constitute the as-ness (or + 'not-as-ness') in which the trueness (or falseness) is said to consist. + </p> + <p> + I think that Dr. Pratt ought to do something more than repeat the name + 'trueness,' in answer to my pathetic question whether that there be not + some CONSTITUTION to a relation as important as this. The pathway, the + tendency, the corroborating or contradicting progress, need not in every + case be experienced in full, but I don't see, if the universe doesn't + contain them among its possibilities of furniture, what LOGICAL MATERIAL + FOR DEFINING the trueness of my idea is left. But if it do contain them, + they and they only are the logical material required. + </p> + <p> + I am perplexed by the superior importance which Dr. Pratt attributes to + abstract trueness over concrete verifiability in an idea, and I wish that + he might be moved to explain. It is prior to verification, to be sure, but + so is the verifiability for which I contend prior, just as a man's + 'mortality' (which is nothing but the possibility of his death) is prior + to his death, but it can hardly be that this abstract priority of all + possibility to its correlative fact is what so obstinate a quarrel is + about. I think it probable that Dr. Pratt is vaguely thinking of something + concreter than this. The trueness of an idea must mean SOMETHING DEFINITE + IN IT THAT DETERMINES ITS TENDENCY TO WORK, and indeed towards this object + rather than towards that. Undoubtedly there is something of this sort in + the idea, just as there is something in man that accounts for his tendency + towards death, and in bread that accounts for its tendency to nourish. + What that something is in the case of truth psychology tells us: the idea + has associates peculiar to itself, motor as well as ideational; it tends + by its place and nature to call these into being, one after another; and + the appearance of them in succession is what we mean by the 'workings' of + the idea. According to what they are, does the trueness or falseness which + the idea harbored come to light. These tendencies have still earlier + conditions which, in a general way, biology, psychology and biography can + trace. This whole chain of natural causal conditions produces a resultant + state of things in which new relations, not simply causal, can now be + found, or into which they can now be introduced,—the relations + namely which we epistemologists study, relations of adaptation, of + substitutability, of instrumentality, of reference and of truth. + </p> + <p> + The prior causal conditions, altho there could be no knowing of any kind, + true or false, without them, are but preliminary to the question of what + makes the ideas true or false when once their tendencies have been obeyed. + The tendencies must exist in some shape anyhow, but their fruits are + truth, falsity, or irrelevancy, according to what they concretely turn out + to be. They are not 'saltatory' at any rate, for they evoke their + consequences contiguously, from next to next only; and not until the final + result of the whole associative sequence, actual or potential, is in our + mental sight, can we feel sure what its epistemological significance, if + it have any, may be. True knowing is, in fine, not substantially, in + itself, or 'as such,' inside of the idea from the first, any more than + mortality AS SUCH is inside of the man, or nourishment AS SUCH inside of + the bread. Something else is there first, that practically MAKES FOR + knowing, dying or nourishing, as the case may be. That something is the + 'nature' namely of the first term, be it idea, man, or bread, that + operates to start the causal chain of processes which, when completed, is + the complex fact to which we give whatever functional name best fits the + case. Another nature, another chain of cognitive workings; and then either + another object known or the same object known differently, will ensue. + </p> + <p> + Dr. Pratt perplexes me again by seeming to charge Dewey and Schiller + [Footnote: Page 200] (I am not sure that he charges me) with an account of + truth which would allow the object believed in not to exist, even if the + belief in it were true. 'Since the truth of an idea,' he writes, 'means + merely the fact that the idea works, that fact is all that you mean when + you say the idea is true' (p. 206). 'WHEN YOU SAY THE IDEA IS TRUE'—does + that mean true for YOU, the critic, or true for the believer whom you are + describing? The critic's trouble over this seems to come from his taking + the word 'true' irrelatively, whereas the pragmatist always means 'true + for him who experiences the workings.' 'But is the object REALLY true or + not?'—the critic then seems to ask,—as if the pragmatist were + bound to throw in a whole ontology on top of his epistemology and tell us + what realities indubitably exist. 'One world at a time,' would seem to be + the right reply here. + </p> + <p> + One other trouble of Dr. Pratt's must be noticed. It concerns the + 'transcendence' of the object. When our ideas have worked so as to bring + us flat up against the object, NEXT to it, 'is our relation to it then + ambulatory or saltatory?' Dr. Pratt asks. If YOUR headache be my object, + 'MY experiences break off where yours begin,' Dr. Pratt writes, and 'this + fact is of great importance, for it bars out the sense of transition and + fulfilment which forms so important an element in the pragmatist + description of knowledge—the sense of fulfilment due to a continuous + passage from the original idea to the known object. If this comes at all + when I know your headache, it comes not with the object, but quite on my + side of the "epistemological gulf." The gulf is still there to be + transcended.' (p. 158). + </p> + <p> + Some day of course, or even now somewhere in the larger life of the + universe, different men's headaches may become confluent or be + 'co-conscious.' Here and now, however, headaches do transcend each other + and, when not felt, can be known only conceptually. My idea is that you + really have a headache; it works well with what I see of your expression, + and with what I hear you say; but it doesn't put me in possession of the + headache itself. I am still at one remove, and the headache 'transcends' + me, even tho it be in nowise transcendent of human experience generally. + Bit the 'gulf' here is that which the pragmatist epistemology itself fixes + in the very first words it uses, by saying there must be an object and an + idea. The idea however doesn't immediately leap the gulf, it only works + from next to next so as to bridge it, fully or approximately. If it + bridges it, in the pragmatist's vision of his hypothetical universe, it + can be called a 'true' idea. If it only MIGHT bridge it, but doesn't, or + if it throws a bridge distinctly AT it, it still has, in the onlooking + pragmatist's eyes, what Professor Pratt calls 'trueness.' But to ask the + pragmatist thereupon whether, when it thus fails to coalesce bodily with + the object, it is REALLY true or has REAL trueness,—in other words + whether the headache he supposes, and supposes the thinker he supposes, to + believe in, be a real headache or not,—is to step from his + hypothetical universe of discourse into the altogether different world of + natural fact. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0010" id="link2H_4_0010"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VIII + </h2> + <p> + THE PRAGMATIST ACCOUNT OF TRUTH AND ITS MISUNDERSTANDERS [Footnote: + Reprint from the Philosophical Review, January, 1908 (vol. xvii, p. 1).] + </p> + <p> + The account of truth given in my volume entitled Pragmatism, continues to + meet with such persistent misunderstanding that I am tempted to make a + final brief reply. My ideas may well deserve refutation, but they can get + none till they are conceived of in their proper shape. The fantastic + character of the current misconceptions shows how unfamiliar is the + concrete point of view which pragmatism assumes. Persons who are familiar + with a conception move about so easily in it that they understand each + other at a hint, and can converse without anxiously attending to their P's + and Q's. I have to admit, in view of the results, that we have assumed too + ready an intelligence, and consequently in many places used a language too + slipshod. We should never have spoken elliptically. The critics have + boggled at every word they could boggle at, and refused to take the spirit + rather than the letter of our discourse. This seems to show a genuine + unfamiliarity in the whole point of view. It also shows, I think, that the + second stage of opposition, which has already begun to express itself in + the stock phrase that 'what is new is not true, and what is true not new,' + in pragmatism, is insincere. If we said nothing in any degree new, why was + our meaning so desperately hard to catch? The blame cannot be laid wholly + upon our obscurity of speech, for in other subjects we have attained to + making ourselves understood. But recriminations are tasteless; and, as far + as I personally am concerned, I am sure that some of the misconception I + complain of is due to my doctrine of truth being surrounded in that volume + of popular lectures by a lot of other opinions not necessarily implicated + with it, so that a reader may very naturally have grown confused. For this + I am to blame,—likewise for omitting certain explicit cautions, + which the pages that follow will now in part supply. + </p> + <h3> + FIRST MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM IS ONLY A RE-EDITING OF POSITIVISM. + </h3> + <p> + This seems the commonest mistake. Scepticism, positivism, and agnosticism + agree with ordinary dogmatic rationalism in presupposing that everybody + knows what the word 'truth' means, without further explanation. But the + former doctrines then either suggest or declare that real truth, absolute + truth, is inaccessible to us, and that we must fain put up with relative + or phenomenal truth as its next best substitute. By scepticism this is + treated as an unsatisfactory state of affairs, while positivism and + agnosticism are cheerful about it, call real truth sour grapes, and + consider phenomenal truth quite sufficient for all our 'practical' + purposes. + </p> + <p> + In point of fact, nothing could be farther from all this than what + pragmatism has to say of truth. Its thesis is an altogether previous one. + It leaves off where these other theories begin, having contented itself + with the word truth's DEFINITION. 'No matter whether any mind extant in + the universe possess truth or not,' it asks, 'what does the notion of + truth signify IDEALLY?' 'What kind of things would true judgments be IN + CASE they existed?' The answer which pragmatism offers is intended to + cover the most complete truth that can be conceived of, 'absolute' truth + if you like, as well as truth of the most relative and imperfect + description. This question of what truth would be like if it did exist, + belongs obviously to a purely speculative field of inquiry. It is not a + theory about any sort of reality, or about what kind of knowledge is + actually possible; it abstracts from particular terms altogether, and + defines the nature of a possible relation between two of them. + </p> + <p> + As Kant's question about synthetic judgments had escaped previous + philosophers, so the pragmatist question is not only so subtile as to have + escaped attention hitherto, but even so subtile, it would seem, that when + openly broached now, dogmatists and sceptics alike fail to apprehend it, + and deem the pragmatist to be treating of something wholly different. He + insists, they say (I quote an actual critic), 'that the greater problems + are insoluble by human intelligence, that our need of knowing truly is + artificial and illusory, and that our reason, incapable of reaching the + foundations of reality, must turn itself exclusively towards ACTION.' + There could not be a worse misapprehension. + </p> + <h3> + SECOND MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM IS PRIMARILY AN APPEAL TO ACTION. + </h3> + <p> + The name 'pragmatism,' with its suggestions of action, has been an + unfortunate choice, I have to admit, and has played into the hands of this + mistake. But no word could protect the doctrine from critics so blind to + the nature of the inquiry that, when Dr. Schiller speaks of ideas + 'working' well, the only thing they think of is their immediate workings + in the physical environment, their enabling us to make money, or gain some + similar 'practical' advantage. Ideas do work thus, of course, immediately + or remotely; but they work indefinitely inside of the mental world also. + Not crediting us with this rudimentary insight, our critics treat our view + as offering itself exclusively to engineers, doctors, financiers, and men + of action generally, who need some sort of a rough and ready + weltanschauung, but have no time or wit to study genuine philosophy. It is + usually described as a characteristically American movement, a sort of + bobtailed scheme of thought, excellently fitted for the man on the street, + who naturally hates theory and wants cash returns immediately. + </p> + <p> + It is quite true that, when the refined theoretic question that pragmatism + begins with is once answered, secondary corollaries of a practical sort + follow. Investigation shows that, in the function called truth, previous + realities are not the only independent variables. To a certain extent our + ideas, being realities, are also independent variables, and, just as they + follow other reality and fit it, so, in a measure, does other reality + follow and fit them. When they add themselves to being, they partly + redetermine the existent, so that reality as a whole appears incompletely + definable unless ideas also are kept account of. This pragmatist doctrine, + exhibiting our ideas as complemental factors of reality, throws open + (since our ideas are instigators of our action) a wide window upon human + action, as well as a wide license to originality in thought. But few + things could be sillier than to ignore the prior epistemological edifice + in which the window is built, or to talk as if pragmatism began and ended + at the window. This, nevertheless, is what our critics do almost without + exception. They ignore our primary step and its motive, and make the + relation to action, which is our secondary achievement, primary. + </p> + <p> + THIRD MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISTS CUT THEMSELVES OFF FROM THE RIGHT TO + BELIEVE IN EJECTIVE REALITIES. + </p> + <p> + They do so, according to the critics, by making the truth of our beliefs + consist in their verifiability, and their verifiability in the way in + which they do work for us. Professor Stout, in his otherwise admirable and + hopeful review of Schiller in Mind for October, 1897, considers that this + ought to lead Schiller (could he sincerely realize the effects of his own + doctrine) to the absurd consequence of being unable to believe genuinely + in another man's headache, even were the headache there. He can only + 'postulate' it for the sake of the working value of the postulate to + himself. The postulate guides certain of his acts and leads to + advantageous consequences; but the moment he understands fully that the + postulate is true ONLY (!) in this sense, it ceases (or should cease) to + be true for him that the other man really HAS a headache. All that makes + the postulate most precious then evaporates: his interest in his + fellow-man 'becomes a veiled form of self-interest, and his world grows + cold, dull, and heartless.' + </p> + <p> + Such an objection makes a curious muddle of the pragmatist's universe of + discourse. Within that universe the pragmatist finds some one with a + headache or other feeling, and some one else who postulates that feeling. + Asking on what condition the postulate is 'true' the pragmatist replies + that, for the postulator at any rate, it is true just in proportion as to + believe in it works in him the fuller sum of satisfactions. What is it + that is satisfactory here? Surely to BELIEVE in the postulated object, + namely, in the really existing feeling of the other man. But how + (especially if the postulator were himself a thoroughgoing pragmatist) + could it ever be satisfactory to him NOT to believe in that feeling, so + long as, in Professor Stout's words, disbelief 'made the world seem to him + cold, dull, and heartless'? Disbelief would seem, on pragmatist + principles, quite out of the question under such conditions, unless the + heartlessness of the world were made probable already on other grounds. + And since the belief in the headache, true for the subject assumed in the + pragmatist's universe of discourse, is also true for the pragmatist who + for his epitemologizing purposes has assumed that entire universe, why is + it not true in that universe absolutely? The headache believed in is a + reality there, and no extant mind disbelieves it, neither the critic's + mind nor his subject's! Have our opponents any better brand of truth in + this real universe of ours that they can show us? [Footnote: I see here a + chance to forestall a criticism which some one may make on Lecture III of + my Pragmatism, where, on pp. 96-100, I said that 'God' and 'Matter' might + be regarded as synonymous terms, so long as no differing future + consequences were deducible from the two conceptions. The passage was + transcribed from my address at the California Philosophical Union, + reprinted in the Journal of Philosophy, vol. i, p. 673. I had no sooner + given the address than I perceived a flaw in that part of it; but I have + left the passage unaltered ever since, because the flaw did not spoil its + illustrative value. The flaw was evident when, as a case analogous to that + of a godless universe, I thought of what I called an 'automatic + sweetheart,' meaning a soulless body which should be absolutely + indistinguishable from a spiritually animated maiden, laughing, talking, + blushing, nursing us, and performing all feminine offices as tactfully and + sweetly as if a soul were in her. Would any one regard her as a full + equivalent? Certainly not, and why? Because, framed as we are, our egoism + craves above all things inward sympathy and recognition, love and + admiration. The outward treatment is valued mainly as an expression, as a + manifestation of the accompanying consciousness believed in. + Pragmatically, then, belief in the automatic sweetheart would not work, + and is point of fact no one treats it as a serious hypothesis. The godless + universe would be exactly similar. Even if matter could do every outward + thing that God does, the idea of it would not work as satisfactorily, + because the chief call for a God on modern men's part is for a being who + will inwardly recognize them and judge them sympathetically. Matter + disappoints this craving of our ego, so God remains for most men the truer + hypothesis, and indeed remains so for definite pragmatic reasons.] + </p> + <p> + So much for the third misunderstanding, which is but one specification of + the following still wider one. + </p> + <p> + FOURTH MISUNDERSTANDING: NO PRAGMATIST CAN BE A REALIST IN HIS + EPISTEMOLOGY. + </p> + <p> + This is supposed to follow from his statement that the truth of our + beliefs consists in general in their giving satisfaction. Of course + satisfaction per se is a subjective condition; so the conclusion is drawn + that truth falls wholly inside of the subject, who then may manufacture it + at his pleasure. True beliefs become thus wayward affections, severed from + all responsibility to other parts of experience. + </p> + <p> + It is difficult to excuse such a parody of the pragmatist's opinion, + ignoring as it does every element but one of his universe of discourse. + The terms of which that universe consists positively forbid any + non-realistic interpretation of the function of knowledge defined there. + The pragmatizing epistemologist posits there a reality and a mind with + ideas. What, now, he asks, can make those ideas true of that reality? + Ordinary epistemology contents itself with the vague statement that the + ideas must 'correspond' or 'agree'; the pragmatist insists on being more + concrete, and asks what such 'agreement' may mean in detail. He finds + first that the ideas must point to or lead towards THAT reality and no + other, and then that the pointings and leadings must yield satisfaction as + their result. So far the pragmatist is hardly less abstract than the + ordinary slouchy epistemologist; but as he defines himself farther, he + grows more concrete. The entire quarrel of the intellectualist with him is + over his concreteness, intellectualism contending that the vaguer and more + abstract account is here the more profound. The concrete pointing and + leading are conceived by the pragmatist to be the work of other portions + of the same universe to which the reality and the mind belong, + intermediary verifying bits of experience with which the mind at one end, + and the reality at the other, are joined. The 'satisfaction,' in turn, is + no abstract satisfaction ueberhaupt, felt by an unspecified being, but is + assumed to consist of such satisfactions (in the plural) as concretely + existing men actually do find in their beliefs. As we humans are + constituted in point of fact, we find that to believe in other men's + minds, in independent physical realities, in past events, in eternal + logical relations, is satisfactory. We find hope satisfactory. We often + find it satisfactory to cease to doubt. Above all we find CONSISTENCY + satisfactory, consistency between the present idea and the entire rest of + our mental equipment, including the whole order of our sensations, and + that of our intuitions of likeness and difference, and our whole stock of + previously acquired truths. + </p> + <p> + The pragmatist, being himself a man, and imagining in general no contrary + lines of truer belief than ours about the 'reality' which he has laid at + the base of his epistemological discussion, is willing to treat our + satisfactions as possibly really true guides to it, not as guides true + solely for US. It would seem here to be the duty of his critics to show + with some explicitness why, being our subjective feelings, these + satisfactions can not yield 'objective' truth. The beliefs which they + accompany 'posit' the assumed reality, 'correspond' and 'agree' with it, + and 'fit' it in perfectly definite and assignable ways, through the + sequent trains of thought and action which form their verification, so + merely to insist on using these words abstractly instead of concretely is + no way of driving the pragmatist from the field,—his more concrete + account virtually includes his critic's. If our critics have any definite + idea of a truth more objectively grounded than the kind we propose, why do + they not show it more articulately? As they stand, they remind one of + Hegel's man who wanted 'fruit,' but rejected cherries, pears, and grapes, + because they were not fruit in the abstract. We offer them the full + quart-pot, and they cry for the empty quart-capacity. + </p> + <p> + But here I think I hear some critic retort as follows: 'If satisfactions + are all that is needed to make truth, how about the notorious fact that + errors are so often satisfactory? And how about the equally notorious fact + that certain true beliefs may cause the bitterest dissatisfaction? Isn't + it clear that not the satisfaction which it gives, but the relation of the + belief TO THE REALITY is all that makes it true? Suppose there were no + such reality, and that the satisfactions yet remained: would they not then + effectively work falsehood? Can they consequently be treated distinctively + as the truth-builders? It is the INHERENT RELATION TO REALITY of a belief + that gives us that specific TRUTH-satisfaction, compared with which all + other satisfactions are the hollowest humbug. The satisfaction of KNOWING + TRULY is thus the only one which the pragmatist ought to have considered. + As a PSYCHOLOGICAL SENTIMENT, the anti-pragmatist gladly concedes it to + him, but then only as a concomitant of truth, not as a constituent. What + CONSTITUTES truth is not the sentiment, but the purely logical or + objective function of rightly cognizing the reality, and the pragmatist's + failure to reduce this function to lower values is patent.' + </p> + <p> + Such anti-pragmatism as this seems to me a tissue of confusion. To begin + with, when the pragmatist says 'indispensable,' it confounds this with + 'sufficient.' The pragmatist calls satisfactions indispensable for + truth-building, but I have everywhere called them insufficient unless + reality be also incidentally led to. If the reality assumed were cancelled + from the pragmatist's universe of discourse, he would straightway give the + name of falsehoods to the beliefs remaining, in spite of all their + satisfactoriness. For him, as for his critic, there can be no truth if + there is nothing to be true about. Ideas are so much flat psychological + surface unless some mirrored matter gives them cognitive lustre. This is + why as a pragmatist I have so carefully posited 'reality' AB INITIO, and + why, throughout my whole discussion, I remain an epistemological realist. + [Footnote: I need hardly remind the reader that both sense-percepts and + percepts of ideal relation (comparisons, etc.) should be classed among the + realities. The bulk of our mental 'stock' consists of truths concerning + these terms.] + </p> + <p> + The anti-pragmatist is guilty of the further confusion of imagining that, + in undertaking to give him an account of what truth formally means, we are + assuming at the same time to provide a warrant for it, trying to define + the occasions when he can be sure of materially possessing it. Our making + it hinge on a reality so 'independent' that when it comes, truth comes, + and when it goes, truth goes with it, disappoints this naive expectation, + so he deems our description unsatisfactory. I suspect that under this + confusion lies the still deeper one of not discriminating sufficiently + between the two notions, truth and reality. Realities are not TRUE, they + ARE; and beliefs are true OF them. But I suspect that in the + anti-pragmatist mind the two notions sometimes swap their attributes. The + reality itself, I fear, is treated as if 'true' and conversely. Whoso + tells us of the one, it is then supposed, must also be telling us of the + other; and a true idea must in a manner BE, or at least YIELD without + extraneous aid, the reality it cognitively is possessed of. + </p> + <p> + To this absolute-idealistic demand pragmatism simply opposes its non + possumus. If there is to be truth, it says, both realities and beliefs + about them must conspire to make it; but whether there ever is such a + thing, or how anyone can be sure that his own beliefs possess it, it never + pretends to determine. That truth-satisfaction par excellence which may + tinge a belief unsatisfactory in other ways, it easily explains as the + feeling of consistency with the stock of previous truths, or supposed + truths, of which one's whole past experience may have left one in + possession. + </p> + <p> + But are not all pragmatists sure that their own belief is right? their + enemies will ask at this point; and this leads me to the + </p> + <p> + FIFTH MISUNDERSTANDING: WHAT PRAGMATISTS SAY IS INCONSISTENT WITH THEIR + SAYING SO. + </p> + <p> + A correspondent puts this objection as follows: 'When you say to your + audience, "pragmatism is the truth concerning truth," the first truth is + different from the second. About the first you and they are not to be at + odds; you are not giving them liberty to take or leave it according as it + works satisfactorily or not for their private uses. Yet the second truth, + which ought to describe and include the first, affirms this liberty. Thus + the INTENT of your utterance seems to contradict the CONTENT of it.' + </p> + <p> + General scepticism has always received this same classic refutation. 'You + have to dogmatize,' the rationalists say to the sceptics,' whenever you + express the sceptical position; so your lives keep contradicting your + thesis.' One would suppose that the impotence of so hoary an argument to + abate in the slightest degree the amount of general scepticism in the + world might have led some rationalists themselves to doubt whether these + instantaneous logical refutations are such fatal ways, after all, of + killing off live mental attitudes. General scepticism is the live mental + attitude of refusing to conclude. It is a permanent torpor of the will, + renewing itself in detail towards each successive thesis that offers, and + you can no more kill it off by logic than you can kill off obstinacy or + practical joking. This is why it is so irritating. Your consistent sceptic + never puts his scepticism into a formal proposition,—he simply + chooses it as a habit. He provokingly hangs back when he might so easily + join us in saying yes, but he is not illogical or stupid,—on the + contrary, he often impresses us by his intellectual superiority. This is + the REAL scepticism that rationalists have to meet, and their logic does + not even touch it. + </p> + <p> + No more can logic kill the pragmatist's behavior: his act of utterance, so + far from contradicting, accurately exemplifies the matter which he utters. + What is the matter which he utters? In part, it is this, that truth, + concretely considered, is an attribute of our beliefs, and that these are + attitudes that follow satisfactions. The ideas around which the + satisfactions cluster are primarily only hypotheses that challenge or + summon a belief to come and take its stand upon them. The pragmatist's + idea of truth is just such a challenge. He finds it ultra-satisfactory to + accept it, and takes his own stand accordingly. But, being gregarious as + they are, men seek to spread their beliefs, to awaken imitation, to infect + others. Why should not YOU also find the same belief satisfactory? thinks + the pragmatist, and forthwith endeavors to convert you. You and he will + then believe similarly; you will hold up your subject-end of a truth, + which will be a truth objective and irreversible if the reality holds up + the object-end by being itself present simultaneously. What there is of + self-contradiction in all this I confess I cannot discover. The + pragmatist's conduct in his own case seems to me on the contrary admirably + to illustrate his universal formula; and of all epistemologists, he is + perhaps the only one who is irreproachably self-consistent. + </p> + <p> + SIXTH MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM EXPLAINS NOT WHAT TRUTH IS, BUT ONLY + HOW IT IS ARRIVED AT. + </p> + <p> + In point of fact it tells us both, tells us what it is incidentally to + telling us how it is arrived at,—for what IS arrived at except just + what the truth is? If I tell you how to get to the railroad station, don't + I implicitly introduce you to the WHAT, to the being and nature of that + edifice? It is quite true that the abstract WORD 'how' hasn't the same + meaning as the abstract WORD 'what,' but in this universe of concrete + facts you cannot keep hows and whats asunder. The reasons why I find it + satisfactory to believe that any idea is true, the HOW of my arriving at + that belief, may be among the very reasons why the idea IS true in + reality. If not, I summon the anti-pragmatist to explain the impossibility + articulately. + </p> + <p> + His trouble seems to me mainly to arise from his fixed inability to + understand how a concrete statement can possibly mean as much, or be as + valuable, as an abstract one. I said above that the main quarrel between + us and our critics was that of concreteness VERSUS abstractness. This is + the place to develop that point farther. + </p> + <p> + In the present question, the links of experience sequent upon an idea, + which mediate between it and a reality, form and for the pragmatist indeed + ARE, the CONCRETE relation of truth that may obtain between the idea and + that reality. They, he says, are all that we mean when we speak of the + idea 'pointing' to the reality, 'fitting' it, 'corresponding' with it, or + 'agreeing' with it,—they or other similar mediating trains of + verification. Such mediating events make the idea 'true.' The idea itself, + if it exists at all, is also a concrete event: so pragmatism insists that + truth in the singular is only a collective name for truths in the plural, + these consisting always of series of definite events; and that what + intellectualism calls the truth, the inherent truth, of any one such + series is only the abstract name for its truthfulness in act, for the fact + that the ideas there do lead to the supposed reality in a way that we + consider satisfactory. + </p> + <p> + The pragmatist himself has no objection to abstractions. Elliptically, and + 'for short,' he relies on them as much as any one, ending upon innumerable + occasions that their comparative emptiness makes of them useful + substitutes for the overfulness of the facts he meets, with. But he never + ascribes to them a higher grade of reality. The full reality of a truth + for him is always some process of verification, in which the abstract + property of connecting ideas with objects truly is workingly embodied. + Meanwhile it is endlessly serviceable to be able to talk of properties + abstractly and apart from their working, to find them the same in + innumerable cases, to take them 'out of time,' and to treat of their + relations to other similar abstractions. We thus form whole universes of + platonic ideas ante rem, universes in posse, tho none of them exists + effectively except in rebus. Countless relations obtain there which nobody + experiences as obtaining,—as, in the eternal universe of musical + relations, for example, the notes of Aennchen von Tharau were a lovely + melody long ere mortal ears ever heard them. Even so the music of the + future sleeps now, to be awakened hereafter. Or, if we take the world of + geometrical relations, the thousandth decimal of 'pi' sleeps there, tho no + one may ever try to compute it. Or, if we take the universe of 'fitting,' + countless coats 'fit' backs, and countless boots 'fit' feet, on which they + are not practically FITTED; countless stones 'fit' gaps in walls into + which no one seeks to fit them actually. In the same way countless + opinions 'fit' realities, and countless truths are valid, tho no thinker + ever thinks them. + </p> + <p> + For the anti-pragmatist these prior timeless relations are the + presupposition of the concrete ones, and possess the profounder dignity + and value. The actual workings of our ideas in verification-processes are + as naught in comparison with the 'obtainings' of this discarnate truth + within them. + </p> + <p> + For the pragmatist, on the contrary,—all discarnate truth is static, + impotent, and relatively spectral, full truth being the truth that + energizes and does battle. Can any one suppose that the sleeping quality + of truth would ever have been abstracted or have received a name, if + truths had remained forever in that storage-vault of essential timeless + 'agreements' and had never been embodied in any panting struggle of men's + live ideas for verification? Surely no more than the abstract property of + 'fitting' would have received a name, if in our world there had been no + backs or feet or gaps in walls to be actually fitted. EXISTENTIAL truth is + incidental to the actual competition of opinions. ESSENTIAL truth, the + truth of the intellectualists, the truth with no one thinking it, is like + the coat that fits tho no one has ever tried it on, like the music that no + ear has listened to. It is less real, not more real, than the verified + article; and to attribute a superior degree of glory to it seems little + more than a piece of perverse abstraction-worship. As well might a pencil + insist that the outline is the essential thing in all pictorial + representation, and chide the paint-brush and the camera for omitting it, + forgetting that THEIR pictures not only contain the whole outline, but a + hundred other things in addition. Pragmatist truth contains the whole of + intellectualist truth and a hundred other things in addition. + Intellectualist truth is then only pragmatist truth in posse. That on + innumerable occasions men do substitute truth in posse or verifiability, + for verification or truth in act, is a fact to which no one attributes + more importance than the pragmatist: he emphasizes the practical utility + of such a habit. But he does not on that account consider truth in posse,—truth + not alive enough ever to have been asserted or questioned or contradicted, + to be the metaphysically prior thing, to which truths in act are tributary + and subsidiary. When intellectualists do this, pragmatism charges them + with inverting the real relation. Truth in posse MEANS only truths in act; + and he insists that these latter take precedence in the order of logic as + well as in that of being. + </p> + <h3> + SEVENTH MINUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM IGNORES THE THEORETICAL INTEREST. + </h3> + <p> + This would seem to be an absolutely wanton slander, were not a certain + excuse to be found in the linguistic affinities of the word 'pragmatism,' + and in certain offhand habits of speech of ours which assumed too great a + generosity on our reader's part. When we spoke of the meaning of ideas + consisting "in their 'practical' consequences", or of the 'practical' + differences which our beliefs make to us; when we said that the truth of a + belief consists in its 'working' value, etc.; our language evidently was + too careless, for by 'practical' we were almost unanimously held to mean + OPPOSED to theoretical or genuinely cognitive, and the consequence was + punctually drawn that a truth in our eyes could have no relation to any + independent reality, or to any other truth, or to anything whatever but + the acts which we might ground on it or the satisfactions they might + bring. The mere existence of the idea, all by itself, if only its results + were satisfactory, would give full truth to it, it was charged, in our + absurd pragmatist epistemology. The solemn attribution of this rubbish to + us was also encouraged by two other circumstances. First, ideas ARE + practically useful in the narrow sense, false ideas sometimes, but most + often ideas which we can verify by the sum total of all their leadings, + and the reality of whose objects may thus be considered established beyond + doubt. That these ideas should be true in advance of and apart from their + utility, that, in other words, their objects should be really there, is + the very condition of their having that kind of utility,—the objects + they connect us with are so important that the ideas which serve as the + objects' substitutes grow important also. This manner of their practical + working was the first thing that made truths good in the eyes of primitive + men; and buried among all the other good workings by which true beliefs + are characterized, this kind of subsequential utility remains. + </p> + <p> + The second misleading circumstance was the emphasis laid by Schiller and + Dewey on the fact that, unless a truth be relevant to the mind's momentary + predicament, unless it be germane to the 'practical' situation,—meaning + by this the quite particular perplexity,—it is no good to urge it. + It doesn't meet our interests any better than a falsehood would under the + same circumstances. But why our predicaments and perplexities might not be + theoretical here as well as narrowly practical, I wish that our critics + would explain. They simply assume that no pragmatist CAN admit a genuinely + theoretic interest. Having used the phrase 'cash-value' of an idea, I am + implored by one correspondent to alter it, 'for every one thinks you mean + only pecuniary profit and loss.' Having said that the true is 'the + expedient in our thinking,' I am rebuked in this wise by another learned + correspondent: + </p> + <p> + 'The word expedient has no other meaning than that of self-interest. The + pursuit of this has ended by landing a number of officers of national + banks in penitentiaries. A philosophy that leads to such results must be + unsound.' + </p> + <p> + But the word 'practical' is so habitually loosely used that more + indulgence might have been expected. When one says that a sick man has now + practically recovered, or that an enterprise has practically failed, one + usually means I just the opposite of practically in the literal sense. One + means that, altho untrue in strict practice, what one says is true in + theory, true virtually, certain to be true. Again, by the practical one + often means the distinctively concrete, the individual, particular, and + effective, as opposed to the abstract, general, and inert. To speak for + myself, whenever I have emphasized the practical nature of truth, this is + mainly what has been in my mind. 'Pragmata' are things in their plurality; + and in that early California address, when I described pragmatism as + holding that the meaning of any proposition can always be brought down to + some particular consequence in our future practical experience, whether + passive or active, expressly added these qualifying words: the point lying + rather in the fact that the experience must be particular than in the fact + that it must be active,—by 'active' meaning here 'practical' in the + narrow literal sense. [Footnote: The ambiguity of the word 'practical' + comes out well in these words of a recent would-be reporter of our views: + 'Pragmatism is an Anglo-Saxon reaction against the intellectualism and + rationalism of the Latin mind.... Man, each individual man is the measure + of things. He is able to conceive one but relative truths, that is to say, + illusions. What these illusions are worth is revealed to him, not by + general theory, but by individual practice. Pragmatism, which consists in + experiencing these illusions of the mind and obeying them by acting them + out, is a PHILOSOPHY WITHOUT WORDS, a philosophy of GESTURES AND OF ACTS, + which abandons what is general and olds only to what is particular.' + (Bourdeau, in Journal des. debats, October 89, 1907.)] But particular + consequences can perfectly well be of a theoretic nature. Every remote + fact which we infer from an idea is a particular theoretic consequence + which our mind practically works towards. The loss of every old opinion of + ours which we see that we shall have to give up if a new opinion be true, + is a particular theoretic as well as a particular practical consequence. + After man's interest in breathing freely, the greatest of all his + interests (because it never fluctuates or remits, as most of his physical + interests do), is his interest in consistency, in feeling that what he now + thinks goes with what he thinks on other occasions. We tirelessly compare + truth with truth for this sole purpose. Is the present candidate for + belief perhaps contradicted by principle number one? Is it compatible with + fact number two? and so forth. The particular operations here are the + purely logical ones of analysis, deduction, comparison, etc.; and altho + general terms may be used ad libitum, the satisfactory practical working + of the candidate—idea consists in the consciousness yielded by each + successive theoretic consequence in particular. It is therefore simply + idiotic to repeat that pragmatism takes no account of purely theoretic + interests. All it insists on is that verity in act means VERIFICATIONS, + and that these are always particulars. Even in exclusively theoretic + matters, it insists that vagueness and generality serve to verify nothing. + </p> + <h3> + EIGHTH MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM IS SHUT UP TO SOLIPSISM. + </h3> + <p> + I have already said something about this misconception under the third and + fourth heads, above, but a little more may be helpful. The objection is + apt to clothe itself in words like these: 'You make truth to consist in + every value except the cognitive value proper; you always leave your + knower at many removes (or, at the uttermost, at one remove) from his real + object; the best you do is to let his ideas carry him towards it; it + remains forever outside of him,' etc. + </p> + <p> + I think that the leaven working here is the rooted intellectualist + persuasion that, to know a reality, an idea must in some inscrutable + fashion possess or be it. [Footnote: Sensations may, indeed, possess their + objects or coalesce with them, as common sense supposes that they do; and + intuited differences between concepts may coalesce with the 'eternal' + objective differences; but to simplify our discussion. here we can afford + to abstract from these very special cases of knowing.] For pragmatism this + kind of coalescence is inessential. As a rule our cognitions are only + processes of mind off their balance and in motion towards real termini; + and the reality of the termini, believed in by the states of mind in + question, can be guaranteed only by some wider knower [Footnote: The + transcendental idealist thinks that, in some inexplicable way, the finite + states of mind are identical with the transfinite all-knower which he + finds himself obliged to postulate in order to supply a fundamentum far + the relation of knowing, as he apprehends it. Pragmatists can leave the + question of identity open; but they cannot do without the wider knower any + more than they can do without the reality, if they want to prove a case of + knowing. They themselves play the part of the absolute knower for the + universe of discourse which serves them as material for epistemologizing. + They warrant the reality there, and the subject's true knowledge, there, + of it. But whether what they themselves say about that whole universe is + objectively true, i.e., whether the pragmatic theory of truth is true + really, they cannot warrant,—they can only believe it To their + hearers they can only propose it, as I propose it to my readers, as + something to be verified ambulando, or by the way is which its + consequences may confirm it]. But if there is no reason extant in the + universe why they should be doubted, the beliefs are true in the only + sense in which anything can be true anyhow: they are practically and + concretely true, namely. True in the mystical mongrel sense of an + Identitatsphilosophie they need not be; nor is there any intelligible + reason why they ever need be true otherwise than verifiably and + practically. It is reality's part to possess its own existence; it is + thought's part to get into 'touch' with it by innumerable paths of + verification. + </p> + <p> + I fear that the 'humanistic' developments of pragmatism may cause a + certain difficulty here. We get at one truth only through the rest of + truth; and the reality, everlastingly postulated as that which all our + truth must keep in touch with, may never be given to us save in the form + of truth other than that which we are now testing. But since Dr. Schiller + has shown that all our truths, even the most elemental, are affected by + race-inheritance with a human coefficient, reality per se thus may appear + only as a sort of limit; it may be held to shrivel to the mere PLACE for + an object, and what is known may be held to be only matter of our psyche + that we fill the place with. It must be confessed that pragmatism, worked + in this humanistic way, is COMPATIBLE with solipsism. It joins friendly + hands with the agnostic part of kantism, with contemporary agnosticism, + and with idealism generally. But worked thus, it is a metaphysical theory + about the matter of reality, and flies far beyond pragmatism's own modest + analysis of the nature of the knowing function, which analysis may just as + harmoniously be combined with less humanistic accounts of reality. One of + pragmatism's merits is that it is so purely epistemological. It must + assume realities; but it prejudges nothing as to their constitution, and + the most diverse metaphysics can use it as their foundation. It certainly + has no special affinity with solipsism. + </p> + <p> + As I look back over what I have written, much of it gives me a queer + impression, as if the obvious were set forth so condescendingly that + readers might well laugh at my pomposity. It may be, however, that + concreteness as radical as ours is not so obvious. The whole originality + of pragmatism, the whole point in it, is its use of the concrete way of + seeing. It begins with concreteness, and returns and ends with it. Dr. + Schiller, with his two 'practical' aspects of truth, (1) relevancy to + situation, and (2) subsequential utility, is only filling the cup of + concreteness to the brim for us. Once seize that cup, and you cannot + misunderstand pragmatism. It seems as if the power of imagining the world + concretely MIGHT have been common enough to let our readers apprehend us + better, as if they might have read between our lines, and, in spite of all + our infelicities of expression, guessed a little more correctly what our + thought was. But alas! this was not on fate's programme, so we can only + think, with the German ditty:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Es waer' zu schoen gewesen, Es hat nicht sollen sein." +</pre> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0011" id="link2H_4_0011"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + IX + </h2> + <p> + THE MEANING OF THE WORD TRUTH [Footnote: Remarks at the meeting of the + American Philosophical Association, Cornell University, December, 1907.] + </p> + <p> + My account of truth is realistic, and follows the epistemological dualism + of common sense. Suppose I say to you 'The thing exists'—is that + true or not? How can you tell? Not till my statement has developed its + meaning farther is it determined as being true, false, or irrelevant to + reality altogether. But if now you ask 'what thing?' and I reply 'a desk'; + if you ask 'where?' and I point to a place; if you ask 'does it exist + materially, or only in imagination?' and I say 'materially'; if moreover I + say 'I mean that desk' and then grasp and shake a desk which you see just + as I have described it, you are willing to call my statement true. But you + and I are commutable here; we can exchange places; and, as you go bail for + my desk, so I can go bail for yours. + </p> + <p> + This notion of a reality independent of either of us, taken from ordinary + social experience, lies at the base of the pragmatist definition of truth. + With some such reality any statement, in order to be counted true, must + agree. Pragmatism defines 'agreeing' to mean certain ways of 'working,' be + they actual or potential. Thus, for my statement 'the desk exists' to be + true of a desk recognized as real by you, it must be able to lead me to + shake your desk, to explain myself by words that suggest that desk to your + mind, to make a drawing that is like the desk you see, etc. Only in such + ways as this is there sense in saying it agrees with THAT reality, only + thus does it gain for me the satisfaction of hearing you corroborate me. + Reference then to something determinate, and some sort of adaptation to it + worthy of the name of agreement, are thus constituent elements in the + definition of any statement of mine as 'true'. + </p> + <p> + You cannot get at either the reference or the adaptation without using the + notion of the workings. THAT the thing is, WHAT it is, and WHICH it is (of + all the possible things with that what) are points determinable only by + the pragmatic method. The 'which' means a possibility of pointing, or of + otherwise singling out the special object; the 'what' means choice on our + part of an essential aspect to conceive it by (and this is always relative + to what Dewey calls our own 'situation'); and the 'that' means our + assumption of the attitude of belief, the reality-recognizing attitude. + Surely for understanding what the word 'true' means as applied to a + statement, the mention of such workings is indispensable. Surely if we + leave them out the subject and the object of the cognitive relation + float-in the same universe, 'tis true—but vaguely and ignorantly and + without mutual contact or mediation. + </p> + <p> + Our critics nevertheless call the workings inessential. No functional + possibilities 'make' our beliefs true, they say; they are true inherently, + true positively, born 'true' as the Count of Chambord was born + 'Henri-Cinq.' Pragmatism insists, on the contrary, that statements and + beliefs are thus inertly and statically true only by courtesy: they + practically pass for true; but you CANNOT DEFINE WHAT YOU MEAN by calling + them true without referring to their functional possibilities. These give + its whole LOGICAL CONTENT to that relation to reality on a belief's part + to which the name 'truth' is applied, a relation which otherwise remains + one of mere coexistence or bare withness. + </p> + <p> + The foregoing statements reproduce the essential content of the lecture on + Truth in my book PRAGMATISM. Schiller's doctrine of 'humanism,' Dewey's + 'Studies in logical theory,' and my own 'radical empiricism,' all involve + this general notion of truth as 'working,' either actual or conceivable. + But they envelop it as only one detail in the midst of much wider theories + that aim eventually at determining the notion of what 'reality' at large + is in its ultimate nature and constitution. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0012" id="link2H_4_0012"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + X + </h2> + <p> + THE EXISTENCE OF JULIUS CAESAR [Footnote: Originally printed under the + title of 'Truth versus Truthfulness,' in the Journal of Philosophy.] + </p> + <p> + My account of truth is purely logical and relates to its definition only. + I contend that you cannot tell what the WORD 'true' MEANS, as applied to a + statement, without invoking the CONCEPT OF THE STATEMENTS WORKINGS. + </p> + <p> + Assume, to fix our ideas, a universe composed of two things only: imperial + Caesar dead and turned to clay, and me, saying 'Caesar really existed.' + Most persons would naively deem truth to be thereby uttered, and say that + by a sort of actio in distans my statement had taken direct hold of the + other fact. + </p> + <p> + But have my words so certainly denoted THAT Caesar?—or so certainly + connoted HIS individual attributes? To fill out the complete measure of + what the epithet 'true' may ideally mean, my thought ought to bear a fully + determinate and unambiguous 'one-to-one-relation' to its own particular + object. In the ultrasimple universe imagined the reference is uncertified. + Were there two Caesars we shouldn't know which was meant. The conditions + of truth thus seem incomplete in this universe of discourse so that it + must be enlarged. + </p> + <p> + Transcendentalists enlarge it by invoking an absolute mind which, as it + owns all the facts, can sovereignly correlate them. If it intends that my + statement SHALL refer to that identical Caesar, and that the attributes I + have in mind SHALL mean his attributes, that intention suffices to make + the statement true. + </p> + <p> + I, in turn, enlarge the universe by admitting finite intermediaries + between the two original facts. Caesar HAD, and my statement HAS, effects; + and if these effects in any way run together, a concrete medium and bottom + is provided for the determinate cognitive relation, which, as a pure ACTIO + IN DISTANS, seemed to float too vaguely and unintelligibly. + </p> + <p> + The real Caesar, for example, wrote a manuscript of which I see a real + reprint, and say 'the Caesar I mean is the author of THAT.' The workings + of my thought thus determine both its denotative and its connotative + significance more fully. It now defines itself as neither irrelevant to + the real Caesar, nor false in what it suggests of him. The absolute mind, + seeing me thus working towards Caesar through the cosmic intermediaries, + might well say: 'Such workings only specify in detail what I meant myself + by the statement being true. I decree the cognitive relation between the + two original facts to mean that just that kind of concrete chain of + intermediaries exists or can exist.' + </p> + <p> + But the chain involves facts prior to the statement the logical conditions + of whose truth we are defining, and facts subsequent to it; and this + circumstance, coupled with the vulgar employment of the terms truth and + fact as synonyms, has laid my account open to misapprehension. 'How,' it + is confusedly asked, 'can Caesar's existence, a truth already 2000 years + old, depend for its truth on anything about to happen now? How can my + acknowledgment of it be made true by the acknowledgment's own effects? The + effects may indeed confirm my belief, but the belief was made true already + by the fact that Caesar really did exist.' + </p> + <p> + Well, be it so, for if there were no Caesar, there could, of course, be no + positive truth about him—but then distinguish between 'true' as + being positively and completely so established, and 'true' as being so + only 'practically,' elliptically, and by courtesy, in the sense of not + being positively irrelevant or UNtrue. Remember also that Caesar's having + existed in fact may make a present statement false or irrelevant as well + as it may make it true, and that in neither case does it itself have to + alter. It being given, whether truth, untruth, or irrelevancy shall be + also given depends on something coming from the statement itself. What + pragmatism contends for is that you cannot adequately DEFINE the something + if you leave the notion of the statement's functional workings out of your + account. Truth meaning agreement with reality, the mode of the agreeing is + a practical problem which the subjective term of the relation alone can + solve. + </p> + <p> + NOTE. This paper was originally followed by a couple of paragraphs meant + to conciliate the intellectualist opposition. Since you love the word + 'true' so, and since you despise so the concrete working of our ideas, I + said, keep the word 'truth' for the saltatory and incomprehensible + relation you care so much for, and I will say of thoughts that know their + objects in an intelligible sense that they are 'truthful.' + </p> + <p> + Like most offerings, this one has been spurned, so I revoke it, repenting + of my generosity. Professor Pratt, in his recent book, calls any objective + state of FACTS 'a truth,' and uses the word 'trueness' in the sense of + 'truth' as proposed by me. Mr. Hawtrey (see below, page 281) uses + 'correctness' in the same sense. Apart from the general evil of ambiguous + vocabularies, we may really forsake all hope, if the term 'truth' is + officially to lose its status as a property of our beliefs and opinions, + and become recognized as a technical synonym for 'fact.' + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0013" id="link2H_4_0013"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XI + </h2> + <p> + THE ABSOLUTE AND THE STRENUOUS LIFE [Footnote: Reprinted from the Journal + of Philosophy, etc., 1906.] + </p> + <p> + Professor W. A. Brown, in the Journal for August 15, approves my + pragmatism for allowing that a belief in the absolute may give holidays to + the spirit, but takes me to task for the narrowness of this concession, + and shows by striking examples how great a power the same belief may have + in letting loose the strenuous life. + </p> + <p> + I have no criticism whatever to make upon his excellent article, but let + me explain why 'moral holidays' were the only gift of the absolute which I + picked out for emphasis. I was primarily concerned in my lectures with + contrasting the belief that the world is still in process of making with + the belief that there is an 'eternal' edition of it ready-made and + complete. The former, or 'pluralistic' belief, was the one that my + pragmatism favored. Both beliefs confirm our strenuous moods. Pluralism + actually demands them, since it makes the world's salvation depend upon + the energizing of its several parts, among which we are. Monism permits + them, for however furious they may be, we can always justify ourselves in + advance for indulging them by the thought that they WILL HAVE BEEN + expressions of the absolute's perfect life. By escaping from your finite + perceptions to the conception of the eternal whole, you can hallow any + tendency whatever. Tho the absolute DICTATES nothing, it will SANCTION + anything and everything after the fact, for whatever is once there will + have to be regarded as an integral member of the universe's perfection. + Quietism and frenzy thus alike receive the absolute's permit to exist. + Those of us who are naturally inert may abide in our resigned passivity; + those whose energy is excessive may grow more reckless still. History + shows how easily both quietists and fanatics have drawn inspiration from + the absolutistic scheme. It suits sick souls and strenuous ones equally + well. + </p> + <p> + One cannot say thus of pluralism. Its world is always vulnerable, for some + part may go astray; and having no 'eternal' edition of it to draw comfort + from, its partisans must always feel to some degree insecure. If, as + pluralists, we grant ourselves moral holidays, they can only be + provisional breathing-spells, intended to refresh us for the morrow's + fight. This forms one permanent inferiority of pluralism from the + pragmatic point of view. It has no saving message for incurably sick + souls. Absolutism, among its other messages, has that message, and is the + only scheme that has it necessarily. That constitutes its chief + superiority and is the source of its religious power. That is why, + desiring to do it full justice, I valued its aptitude for moral-holiday + giving so highly. Its claims in that way are unique, whereas its + affinities with strenuousness are less emphatic than those of the + pluralistic scheme. + </p> + <p> + In the last lecture of my book I candidly admitted this inferiority of + pluralism. It lacks the wide indifference that absolutism shows. It is + bound to disappoint many sick souls whom absolutism can console. It seems + therefore poor tactics for absolutists to make little of this advantage. + The needs of sick souls are surely the most urgent; and believers in the + absolute should rather hold it to be great merit in their philosophy that + it can meet them so well. + </p> + <p> + The pragmatism or pluralism which I defend has to fall back on a certain + ultimate hardihood, a certain willingness to live without assurances or + guarantees. To minds thus willing to live on possibilities that are not + certainties, quietistic religion, sure of salvation ANY HOW, has a slight + flavor of fatty degeneration about it which has caused it to be looked + askance on, even in the church. Which side is right here, who can say? + Within religion, emotion is apt to be tyrannical; but philosophy must + favor the emotion that allies itself best with the whole body and drift of + all the truths in sight. I conceive this to be the more strenuous type of + emotion; but I have to admit that its inability to let loose quietistic + raptures is a serious deficiency in the pluralistic philosophy which I + profess. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0014" id="link2H_4_0014"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XII + </h2> + <p> + PROFESSOR HEBERT ON PRAGMATISM [Footnote: Reprint from the Journal of + Philosophy for December 3, 1908 (vol. v, p. 689), of a review of Le + Pragmatisme et ses Diverses Formes Anglo-Americaines, by Marcel Hebert. + (Paris: Librairie critique Emile Nourry. 1908. Pp. 105.)] + </p> + <p> + Professor Marcel Hebert is a singularly erudite and liberal thinker (a + seceder, I believe, from the Catholic priesthood) and an uncommonly direct + and clear writer. His book Le Divin is one of the ablest reviews of the + general subject of religious philosophy which recent years have produced; + and in the small volume the title of which is copied above he has, + perhaps, taken more pains not to do injustice to pragmatism than any of + its numerous critics. Yet the usual fatal misapprehension of its purposes + vitiates his exposition and his critique. His pamphlet seems to me to form + a worthy hook, as it were, on which to hang one more attempt to tell the + reader what the pragmatist account of truth really means. + </p> + <p> + M. Hebert takes it to mean what most people take it to mean, the doctrine, + namely, that whatever proves subjectively expedient in the way of our + thinking is 'true' in the absolute and unrestricted sense of the word, + whether it corresponds to any objective state of things outside of our + thought or not. Assuming this to be the pragmatist thesis, M. Hebert + opposes it at length. Thought that proves itself to be thus expedient may, + indeed, have every OTHER kind of value for the thinker, he says, but + cognitive value, representative value, VALEUR DE CONNAISSANCE PROPREMENT + DITE, it has not; and when it does have a high degree of general utility + value, this is in every case derived from its previous value in the way of + correctly representing independent objects that have an important + influence on our lives. Only by thus representing things truly do we reap + the useful fruits. But the fruits follow on the truth, they do not + constitute it; so M. Hebert accuses pragmatism of telling us everything + about truth except what it essentially is. He admits, indeed, that the + world is so framed that when men have true ideas of realities, + consequential utilities ensue in abundance; and no one of our critics, I + think, has shown as concrete a sense of the variety of these utilities as + he has; but he reiterates that, whereas such utilities are secondary, we + insist on treating them as primary, and that the connaissance objective + from which they draw all their being is something which we neglect, + exclude, and destroy. The utilitarian value and the strictly cognitive + value of our ideas may perfectly well harmonize, he says—and in the + main he allows that they do harmonize—but they are not logically + identical for that. He admits that subjective interests, desires, impulses + may even have the active 'primacy' in our intellectual life. Cognition + awakens only at their spur, and follows their cues and aims; yet, when it + IS awakened, it is objective cognition proper and not merely another name + for the impulsive tendencies themselves in the state of satisfaction. The + owner of a picture ascribed to Corot gets uneasy when its authenticity is + doubted. He looks up its origin and is reassured. But his uneasiness does + not make the proposition false, any more than his relief makes the + proposition true, that the actual Corot was the painter. Pragmatism, + which, according to M. Hebert, claims that our sentiments MAKE truth and + falsehood, would oblige us to conclude that our minds exert no genuinely + cognitive function whatever. + </p> + <p> + This subjectivist interpretation of our position seems to follow from my + having happened to write (without supposing it necessary to explain that I + was treating of cognition solely on its subjective side) that in the long + run the true is the expedient in the way of our thinking, much as the good + is the expedient in the way of our behavior! Having previously written + that truth means 'agreement with reality,' and insisted that the chief + part of the expediency of any one opinion is its agreement with the rest + of acknowledged truth, I apprehended no exclusively subjectivistic reading + of my meaning. My mind was so filled with the notion of objective + reference that I never dreamed that my hearers would let go of it; and the + very last accusation I expected was that in speaking of ideas and their + satisfactions, I was denying realities outside. My only wonder now is that + critics should have found so silly a personage as I must have seemed in + their eyes, worthy of explicit refutation. + </p> + <p> + The object, for me, is just as much one part of reality as the idea is + another part. The truth of the idea is one relation of it to the reality, + just as its date and its place are other relations. All three relations + CONSIST of intervening parts of the universe which can in every particular + case be assigned and catalogued, and which differ in every instance of + truth, just as they differ with every date and place. + </p> + <p> + The pragmatist thesis, as Dr. Schiller and I hold it,—I prefer to + let Professor Dewey speak for himself,—is that the relation called + 'truth' is thus concretely DEFINABLE. Ours is the only articulate attempt + in the field to say positively what truth actually CONSISTS OF. Our + denouncers have literally nothing to oppose to it as an alternative. For + them, when an idea is true, it IS true, and there the matter terminates; + the word 'true' being indefinable. The relation of the true idea to its + object, being, as they think, unique, it can be expressed in terms of + nothing else, and needs only to be named for any one to recognize and + understand it. Moreover it is invariable and universal, the same in every + single instance of truth, however diverse the ideas, the realities, and + the other relations between them may be. + </p> + <p> + Our pragmatist view, on the contrary, is that the truth-relation is a + definitely experienceable relation, and therefore describable as well as + namable; that it is not unique in kind, and neither invariable nor + universal. The relation to its object that makes an idea true in any given + instance, is, we say, embodied in intermediate details of reality which + lead towards the object, which vary in every instance, and which in every + instance can be concretely traced. The chain of workings which an opinion + sets up IS the opinion's truth, falsehood, or irrelevancy, as the case may + be. Every idea that a man has works some consequences in him, in the shape + either of bodily actions or of other ideas. Through these consequences the + man's relations to surrounding realities are modified. He is carried + nearer to some of them and farther from others, and gets now the feeling + that the idea has worked satisfactorily, now that it has not. The idea has + put him into touch with something that fulfils its intent, or it has not. + </p> + <p> + This something is the MAN'S OBJECT, primarily. Since the only realities we + can talk about are such OBJECTS-BELIEVED-IN, the pragmatist, whenever he + says 'reality,' means in the first instance what may count for the man + himself as a reality, what he believes at the moment to be such. Sometimes + the reality is a concrete sensible presence. The idea, for example, may be + that a certain door opens into a room where a glass of beer may be bought. + If opening the door leads to the actual sight and taste of the beer, the + man calls the idea true. Or his idea may be that of an abstract relation, + say of that between the sides and the hypothenuse of a triangle, such a + relation being, of course, a reality quite as much as a glass of beer is. + If the thought of such a relation leads him to draw auxiliary lines and to + compare the figures they make, he may at last, perceiving one equality + after another, SEE the relation thought of, by a vision quite as + particular and direct as was the taste of the beer. If he does so, he + calls THAT idea, also, true. His idea has, in each case, brought him into + closer touch with a reality felt at the moment to verify just that idea. + Each reality verifies and validates its own idea exclusively; and in each + case the verification consists in the satisfactorily-ending consequences, + mental or physical, which the idea was able to set up. These 'workings' + differ in every single instance, they never transcend experience, they + consist of particulars, mental or sensible, and they admit of concrete + description in every individual case. Pragmatists are unable to see what + you can possibly MEAN by calling an idea true, unless you mean that + between it as a terminus a quo in some one's mind and some particular + reality as a terminus ad quem, such concrete workings do or may intervene. + Their direction constitutes the idea's reference to that reality, their + satisfactoriness constitutes its adaptation thereto, and the two things + together constitute the 'truth' of the idea for its possessor. Without + such intermediating portions of concretely real experience the pragmatist + sees no materials out of which the adaptive relation called truth can be + built up. + </p> + <p> + The anti-pragmatist view is that the workings are but evidences of the + truth's previous inherent presence in the idea, and that you can wipe the + very possibility of them out of existence and still leave the truth of the + idea as solid as ever. But surely this is not a counter-theory of truth to + ours. It is the renunciation of all articulate theory. It is but a claim + to the right to call certain ideas true anyhow; and this is what I meant + above by saying that the anti-pragmatists offer us no real alternative, + and that our account is literally the only positive theory extant. What + meaning, indeed, can an idea's truth have save its power of adapting us + either mentally or physically to a reality? + </p> + <p> + How comes it, then, that our critics so uniformly accuse us of + subjectivism, of denying the reality's existence? It comes, I think, from + the necessary predominance of subjective language in our analysis. However + independent and elective realities may be, we can talk about them, in + framing our accounts of truth, only as so many objects believed-in. But + the process of experience leads men so continually to supersede their + older objects by newer ones which they find it more satisfactory to + believe in, that the notion of an ABSOLUTE reality inevitably arises as a + grenzbegriff, equivalent to that of an object that shall never be + superseded, and belief in which shall be endgueltig. Cognitively we thus + live under a sort of rule of three: as our private concepts represent the + sense-objects to which they lead us, these being public realities + independent of the individual, so these sense-realities may, in turn, + represent realities of a hypersensible order, electrons, mind-stuff. God, + or what not, existing independently of all human thinkers. The notion of + such final realities, knowledge of which would be absolute truth, is an + outgrowth of our cognitive experience from which neither pragmatists nor + anti-pragmatists escape. They form an inevitable regulative postulate in + every one's thinking. Our notion of them is the most abundantly suggested + and satisfied of all our beliefs, the last to suffer doubt. The difference + is that our critics use this belief as their sole paradigm, and treat any + one who talks of human realities as if he thought the notion of reality + 'in itself' illegitimate. Meanwhile, reality-in-itself, so far as by them + TALKED OF, is only a human object; they postulate it just as we postulate + it; and if we are subjectivists they are so no less. Realities in + themselves can be there FOR any one, whether pragmatist or + anti-pragmatist, only by being believed; they are believed only by their + notions appearing true; and their notions appear true only because they + work satisfactorily. Satisfactorily, moreover, for the particular + thinker's purpose. There is no idea which is THE true idea, of anything. + Whose is THE true idea of the absolute? Or to take M. Hebert's example, + what is THE true idea of a picture which you possess? It is the idea that + most satisfactorily meets your present interest. The interest may be in + the picture's place, its age, its 'tone,' its subject, its dimensions, its + authorship, its price, its merit, or what not. If its authorship by Corot + have been doubted, what will satisfy the interest aroused in you at that + moment will be to have your claim to own a Corot confirmed; but, if you + have a normal human mind, merely calling it a Corot will not satisfy other + demands of your mind at the same time. For THEM to be satisfied, what you + learn of the picture must make smooth connection with what you know of the + rest of the system of reality in which the actual Corot played his part. + M. Hebert accuses us of holding that the proprietary satisfactions of + themselves suffice to make the belief true, and that, so far as we are + concerned, no actual Corot need ever have existed. Why we should be thus + cut off from the more general and intellectual satisfactions, I know not; + but whatever the satisfactions may be, intellectual or proprietary, they + belong to the subjective side of the truth-relation. They found our + beliefs; our beliefs are in realities; if no realities are there, the + beliefs are false but if realities are there, how they can even be KNOWN + without first being BELIEVED; or how BELIEVED except by our first having + ideas of them that work satisfactorily, pragmatists find it impossible to + imagine. They also find it impossible to imagine what makes the + anti-pragmatists' dogmatic 'ipse dixit' assurance of reality more credible + than the pragmatists conviction based on concrete verifications. M. Hebert + will probably agree to this, when put in this way, so I do not see our + inferiority to him in the matter of connaissance proprement dite. + </p> + <p> + Some readers will say that, altho I may possibly believe in realities + beyond our ideas Dr. Schiller, at any rate, does not. This is a great + misunderstanding, for Schiller's doctrine and mine are identical, only our + exposition follow different directions. He starts from the subjective pole + of the chain, the individual with his beliefs, as the more concrete and + immediately given phenomenon. 'An individual claims his belief to be + true,' Schiller says, 'but what does he mean by true? and how does he + establish the claim?' With these questions we embark on a psychological + inquiry. To be true, it appears, means, FOR THAT INDIVIDUAL, to work + satisfactorily for him; and the working and the satisfaction, since they + vary from case to case, admit of no universal description. What works is + true and represents a reality, for the individual for whom it works. If he + is infallible, the reality is 'really' there; if mistaken it is not there, + or not there as he thinks it. We all believe, when our ideas work + satisfactorily; but we don't yet know who of us is infallible; so that the + problem of truth and that of error are EBENBURTIG and arise out of the + same situations. Schiller, remaining with the fallible individual, and + treating only of reality-for-him, seems to many of his readers to ignore + reality-in-itself altogether. But that is because he seeks only to tell us + how truths are attained, not what the content of those truths, when + attained, shall be. It may be that the truest of all beliefs shall be that + in transsubjective realities. It certainly SEEMS the truest for no rival + belief is as voluminously satisfactory, and it is probably Dr. Schiller's + own belief; but he is not required, for his immediate purpose, to profess + it. Still less is he obliged to assume it in advance as the basis of his + discussion. + </p> + <p> + I, however, warned by the ways of critics, adopt different tactics. I + start from the object-pole of the idea-reality chain and follow it in the + opposite direction from Schiller's. Anticipating the results of the + general truth-processes of mankind, I begin with the abstract notion of an + objective reality. I postulate it, and ask on my own account, I VOUCHING + FOR THIS REALITY, what would make any one else's idea of it true for me as + well as for him. But I find no different answer from that which Schiller + gives. If the other man's idea leads him, not only to believe that the + reality is there, but to use it as the reality's temporary substitute, by + letting it evoke adaptive thoughts and acts similar to those which the + reality itself would provoke, then it is true in the only intelligible + sense, true through its particular consequences, and true for me as well + as for the man. + </p> + <p> + My account is more of a logical definition; Schiller's is more of a + psychological description. Both treat an absolutely identical matter of + experience, only they traverse it in opposite ways. + </p> + <p> + Possibly these explanations may satisfy M. Hebert, whose little book, + apart from the false accusation of subjectivism, gives a fairly + instructive account of the pragmatist epistemology. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0015" id="link2H_4_0015"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XIII + </h2> + <h3> + ABSTRACTIONISM AND 'RELATIVISMUS' + </h3> + <p> + Abstract concepts, such as elasticity, voluminousness, disconnectedness, + are salient aspects of our concrete experiences which we find it useful to + single out. Useful, because we are then reminded of other things that + offer those same aspects; and, if the aspects carry consequences in those + other things, we can return to our first things, expecting those same + consequences to accrue. + </p> + <p> + To be helped to anticipate consequences is always a gain, and such being + the help that abstract concepts give us, it is obvious that their use is + fulfilled only when we get back again into concrete particulars by their + means, bearing the consequences in our minds, and enriching our notion of + the original objects therewithal. + </p> + <p> + Without abstract concepts to handle our perceptual particulars by, we are + like men hopping on one foot. Using concepts along with the particulars, + we become bipedal. We throw our concept forward, get a foothold on the + consequence, hitch our line to this, and draw our percept up, travelling + thus with a hop, skip and jump over the surface of life at a vastly + rapider rate than if we merely waded through the thickness of the + particulars as accident rained them down upon our heads. Animals have to + do this, but men raise their heads higher and breathe freely in the upper + conceptual air. + </p> + <p> + The enormous esteem professed by all philosophers for the conceptual form + of consciousness is easy to understand. From Plato's time downwards it has + been held to be our sole avenue to essential truth. Concepts are + universal, changeless, pure; their relations are eternal; they are + spiritual, while the concrete particulars which they enable us to handle + are corrupted by the flesh. They are precious in themselves, then, apart + from their original use, and confer new dignity upon our life. + </p> + <p> + One can find no fault with this way of feeling about concepts so long as + their original function does not get swallowed up in the admiration and + lost. That function is of course to enlarge mentally our momentary + experiences by ADDING to them the consequences conceived; but + unfortunately, that function is not only too often forgotten by + philosophers in their reasonings, but is often converted into its exact + opposite, and made a means of diminishing the original experience by + DENYING (implicitly or explicitly) all its features save the one specially + abstracted to conceive it by. + </p> + <p> + This itself is a highly abstract way of stating my complaint, and it needs + to be redeemed from obscurity by showing instances of what is meant. Some + beliefs very dear to my own heart have been conceived in this viciously + abstract way by critics. One is the 'will to believe,' so called; another + is the indeterminism of certain futures; a third is the notion that truth + may vary with the standpoint of the man who holds it. I believe that the + perverse abuse of the abstracting function has led critics to employ false + arguments against these doctrines, and often has led their readers to + false conclusions. I should like to try to save the situation, if + possible, by a few counter-critical remarks. + </p> + <p> + Let me give the name of 'vicious abstractionism' to a way of using + concepts which may be thus described: We conceive a concrete situation by + singling out some salient or important feature in it, and classing it + under that; then, instead of adding to its previous characters all the + positive consequences which the new way of conceiving it may bring, we + proceed to use our concept privatively; reducing the originally rich + phenomenon to the naked suggestions of that name abstractly taken, + treating it as a case of 'nothing but' that concept, and acting as if all + the other characters from out of which the concept is abstracted were + expunged. [Footnote: Let not the reader confound the fallacy here + described with legitimately negative inferences such as those drawn in the + mood 'celarent' of the logic-books.] Abstraction, functioning in this way, + becomes a means of arrest far more than a means of advance in thought. It + mutilates things; it creates difficulties and finds impossibilities; and + more than half the trouble that metaphysicians and logicians give + themselves over the paradoxes and dialectic puzzles of the universe may, I + am convinced, be traced to this relatively simple source. THE VICIOUSLY + PRIVATIVE EMPLOYMENT OF ABSTRACT CHARACTERS AND CLASS NAMES is, I am + persuaded, one of the great original sins of the rationalistic mind. + </p> + <p> + To proceed immediately to concrete examples, cast a glance at the belief + in 'free will,' demolished with such specious persuasiveness recently by + the skilful hand of Professor Fullerton. [Footnote: Popular Science + Monthly, N. Y., vols. lviii and lix.] When a common man says that his will + is free, what does he mean? He means that there are situations of + bifurcation inside of his life in which two futures seem to him equally + possible, for both have their roots equally planted in his present and his + past. Either, if realized, will grow out of his previous motives, + character and circumstances, and will continue uninterruptedly the + pulsations of his personal life. But sometimes both at once are + incompatible with physical nature, and then it seems to the naive observer + as if he made a choice between them NOW, and that the question of which + future is to be, instead of having been decided at the foundation of the + world, were decided afresh at every passing moment in I which fact seems + livingly to grow, and possibility seems, in turning itself towards one + act, to exclude all others. + </p> + <p> + He who takes things at their face-value here may indeed be deceived. He + may far too often mistake his private ignorance of what is predetermined + for a real indetermination of what is to be. Yet, however imaginary it may + be, his picture of the situation offers no appearance of breach between + the past and future. A train is the same train, its passengers are the + same passengers, its momentum is the same momentum, no matter which way + the switch which fixes its direction is placed. For the indeterminist + there is at all times enough past for all the different futures in sight, + and more besides, to find their reasons in it, and whichever future comes + will slide out of that past as easily as the train slides by the switch. + The world, in short, is just as CONTINUOUS WITH ITSELF for the believers + in free will as for the rigorous determinists, only the latter are unable + to believe in points of bifurcation as spots of really indifferent + equilibrium or as containing shunts which there—and there only, NOT + BEFORE—direct existing motions without altering their amount. + </p> + <p> + Were there such spots of indifference, the rigorous determinists think, + the future and the past would be separated absolutely, for, ABSTRACTLY + TAKEN, THE WORD 'INDIFFERENT' SUGGESTS DISCONNECTION SOLELY. Whatever is + indifferent is in so far forth unrelated and detached. Take the term thus + strictly, and you see, they tell us, that if any spot of indifference is + found upon the broad highway between the past and the future, then no + connection of any sort whatever, no continuous momentum, no identical + passenger, no common aim or agent, can be found on both sides of the shunt + or switch which there is moved. The place is an impassable chasm. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Fullerton writes—the italics are mine—as follows:— + </p> + <p> + 'In so far as my action is free, what I have been, what I am, what I have + always done or striven to do, what I most earnestly wish or resolve to do + at the present moment—these things can have NO MORE TO DO WITH ITS + FUTURE REALIZATION THAN IF THEY HAD NO EXISTENCE.... The possibility is a + hideous one; and surely even the most ardent free-willist will, when he + contemplates it frankly, excuse me for hoping that if I am free I am at + least not very free, and that I may reasonably expect to find SOME degree + of consistency in my life and actions. ... Suppose that I have given a + dollar to a blind beggar. Can I, if it is really an act of free-will, be + properly said to have given the money? Was it given because I was a man of + tender heart, etc., etc.? ... What has all this to do with acts of + free-will? If they are free, they must not be conditioned by antecedent + circumstances of any sort, by the misery of the beggar, by the pity in the + heart of the passer-by. They must be causeless, not determined. They must + drop from a clear sky out of the void, for just in so far as they can be + accounted for, they are not free.' [Footnote: Loc. cit., vol. lviii, pp. + 189, 188.] + </p> + <p> + Heaven forbid that I should get entangled here in a controversy about the + rights and wrongs of the free-will question at large, for I am only trying + to illustrate vicious abstractionism by the conduct of some of the + doctrine's assailants. The moments of bifurcation, as the indeterminist + seems to himself to experience them, are moments both of re-direction and + of continuation. But because in the 'either—or' of the re-direction + we hesitate, the determinist abstracts this little element of + discontinuity from the superabundant continuities of the experience, and + cancels in its behalf all the connective characters with which the latter + is filled. Choice, for him, means henceforward DISconnection pure and + simple, something undetermined in advance IN ANY RESPECT WHATEVER, and a + life of choices must be a raving chaos, at no two moments of which could + we be treated as one and the same man. If Nero were 'free' at. the moment + of ordering his mother's murder, Mr. McTaggart [Footnote: Some Dogmas of + Religion, p. 179.] assures us that no one would have the right at any + other moment to call him a bad man, for he would then be an absolutely + other Nero. + </p> + <p> + A polemic author ought not merely to destroy his victim. He ought to try a + bit to make him feel his error—perhaps not enough to convert him, + but enough to give him a bad conscience and to weaken the energy of his + defence. These violent caricatures of men's beliefs arouse only contempt + for the incapacity of their authors to see the situations out of which the + problems grow. To treat the negative character of one abstracted element + as annulling all the positive features with which it coexists, is no way + to change any actual indeterminist's way of looking on the matter, tho it + may make the gallery applaud. + </p> + <p> + Turn now to some criticisms of the 'will to believe,' as another example + of the vicious way in which abstraction is currently employed. The right + to believe in things for the truth of which complete objective proof is + yet lacking is defended by those who apprehend certain human situations in + their concreteness. In those situations the mind has alternatives before + it so vast that the full evidence for either branch is missing, and yet so + significant that simply to wait for proof, and to doubt while waiting, + might often in practical respects be the same thing as weighing down the + negative side. Is life worth while at all? Is there any general meaning in + all this cosmic weather? Is anything being permanently bought by all this + suffering? Is there perhaps a transmundane experience in Being, something + corresponding to a 'fourth dimension,' which, if we had access to it, + might patch up some of this world's zerrissenheit and make things look + more rational than they at first appear? Is there a superhuman + consciousness of which our minds are parts, and from which inspiration and + help may come? Such are the questions in which the right to take sides + practically for yes or no is affirmed by some of us, while others hold + that this is methodologically inadmissible, and summon us to die + professing ignorance and proclaiming the duty of every one to refuse to + believe. + </p> + <p> + I say nothing of the personal inconsistency of some of these critics, + whose printed works furnish exquisite illustrations of the will to + believe, in spite of their denunciations of it as a phrase and as a + recommended thing. Mr. McTaggart, whom I will once more take as an + example, is sure that 'reality is rational and righteous' and 'destined + sub specie temporis to become perfectly good'; and his calling this belief + a result of necessary logic has surely never deceived any reader as to its + real genesis in the gifted author's mind. Mankind is made on too uniform a + pattern for any of us to escape successfully from acts of faith. We have a + lively vision of what a certain view of the universe would mean for us. We + kindle or we shudder at the thought, and our feeling runs through our + whole logical nature and animates its workings. It CAN'T be that, we feel; + it MUST be this. It must be what it OUGHT to be, and OUGHT to be this; and + then we seek for every reason, good or bad, to make this which so deeply + ought to be, seem objectively the probable thing. We show the arguments + against it to be insufficient, so that it MAY be true; we represent its + appeal to be to our whole nature's loyalty and not to any emaciated + faculty of syllogistic proof. We reinforce it by remembering the + enlargement of our world by music, by thinking of the promises of sunsets + and the impulses from vernal woods. And the essence of the whole + experience, when the individual swept through it says finally 'I believe,' + is the intense concreteness of his vision, the individuality of the + hypothesis before him, and the complexity of the various concrete motives + and perceptions that issue in his final state. + </p> + <p> + But see now how the abstractionist treats this rich and intricate vision + that a certain state of things must be true. He accuses the believer of + reasoning by the following syllogism:— + </p> + <p> + All good desires must be fulfilled; The desire to believe this proposition + is a good desire; + </p> + <p> + Ergo, this proposition must be believed. + </p> + <p> + He substitutes this abstraction for the concrete state of mind of the + believer, pins the naked absurdity of it upon him, and easily proves that + any one who defends him must be the greatest fool on earth. As if any real + believer ever thought in this preposterous way, or as if any defender of + the legitimacy of men's concrete ways of concluding ever used the abstract + and general premise, 'All desires must be fulfilled'! Nevertheless, Mr. + McTaggart solemnly and laboriously refutes the syllogism in sections 47 to + 57 of the above-cited book. He shows that there is no fixed link in the + dictionary between the abstract concepts 'desire,' 'goodness' and + 'reality'; and he ignores all the links which in the single concrete case + the believer feels and perceives to be there! He adds:— + </p> + <p> + 'When the reality of a thing is uncertain, the argument encourages us to + suppose that our approval of a thing can determine its reality. And when + this unhallowed link has once been established, retribution overtakes us. + For when the reality of the thing is independently certain, we [then] have + to admit that the reality of the thing should determine our approval of + that thing. I find it difficult to imagine a more degraded position.' + </p> + <p> + One here feels tempted to quote ironically Hegel's famous equation of the + real with the rational to his english disciple, who ends his chapter with + the heroic words:— + </p> + <p> + 'For those who do not pray, there remains the resolve that, so far as + their strength may permit, neither the pains of death nor the pains of + life shall drive them to any comfort in that which they hold to be false, + or drive them from any comfort [discomfort?] in that which they hold to be + true.' + </p> + <p> + How can so ingenious-minded a writer fail to see how far over the heads of + the enemy all his arrows pass? When Mr. McTaggart himself believes that + the universe is run by the dialectic energy of the absolute idea, his + insistent desire to have a world of that sort is felt by him to be no + chance example of desire in general, but an altogether peculiar + insight-giving passion to which, in this if in no other instance, he would + be stupid not to yield. He obeys its concrete singularity, not the bare + abstract feature in it of being a 'desire.' His situation is as particular + as that of an actress who resolves that it is best for her to marry and + leave the stage, of a priest who becomes secular, of a politician who + abandons public life. What sensible man would seek to refute the concrete + decisions of such persons by tracing them to abstract premises, such as + that 'all actresses must marry,' 'all clergymen must be laymen,' 'all + politicians should resign their posts'? Yet this type of refutation, + absolutely unavailing though it be for purposes of conversion, is spread + by Mr. McTaggart through many pages of his book. For the aboundingness of + our real reasons he substitutes one narrow point. For men's real + probabilities he gives a skeletonized abstraction which no man was ever + tempted to believe. + </p> + <p> + The abstraction in my next example is less simple, but is quite as flimsy + as a weapon of attack. Empiricists think that truth in general is + distilled from single men's beliefs; and the so-called pragmatists 'go + them one better' by trying to define what it consists in when it comes. It + consists, I have elsewhere said, in such a working on the part of the + beliefs as may bring the man into satisfactory relations with objects to + which these latter point. The working is of course a concrete working in + the actual experience of human beings, among their ideas, feelings, + perceptions, beliefs and acts, as well as among the physical things of + their environment, and the relations must be understood as being possible + as well as actual. In the chapter on truth of my book Pragmatism I have + taken pains to defend energetically this view. Strange indeed have been + the misconceptions of it by its enemies, and many have these latter been. + Among the most formidable-sounding onslaughts on the attempt to introduce + some concreteness into our notion of what the truth of an idea may mean, + is one that has been raised in many quarters to the effect that to make + truth grow in any way out of human opinion is but to reproduce that + protagorean doctrine that the individual man is 'the measure of all + things,' which Plato in his immortal dialogue, the Thaeatetus, is + unanimously said to have laid away so comfortably in its grave two + thousand years ago. The two cleverest brandishers of this objection to + make truth concrete, Professors Rickert and Munsterberg, write in German, + [Footnote: Munsterberg's book has just appeared in an English version: The + Eternal Values, Boston, 1909.] and 'relativismus' is the name they give to + the heresy which they endeavor to uproot. + </p> + <p> + The first step in their campaign against 'relativismus' is entirely in the + air. They accuse relativists—and we pragmatists are typical + relativists—of being debarred by their self-adopted principles, not + only from the privilege which rationalist philosophers enjoy, of believing + that these principles of their own are truth impersonal and absolute, but + even of framing the abstract notion of such a truth, in the pragmatic + sense, of an ideal opinion in which all men might agree, and which no man + should ever wish to change. Both charges fall wide of their mark. I + myself, as a pragmatist, believe in my own account of truth as firmly as + any rationalist can possibly believe in his. And I believe in it for the + very reason that I have the idea of truth which my learned adversaries + contend that no pragmatist can frame. I expect, namely, that the more + fully men discuss and test my account, the more they will agree that it + fits, and the less will they desire a change. I may of course be premature + in this confidence, and the glory of being truth final and absolute may + fall upon some later revision and correction of my scheme, which later + will then be judged untrue in just the measure in which it departs from + that finally satisfactory formulation. To admit, as we pragmatists do, + that we are liable to correction (even tho we may not expect it) involves + the use on our part of an ideal standard. Rationalists themselves are, as + individuals, sometimes sceptical enough to admit the abstract possibility + of their own present opinions being corrigible and revisable to some + degree, so the fact that the mere NOTION of an absolute standard should + seem to them so important a thing to claim for themselves and to deny to + us is not easy to explain. If, along with the notion of the standard, they + could also claim its exclusive warrant for their own fulminations now, it + would be important to them indeed. But absolutists like Rickert freely + admit the sterility of the notion, even in their own hands. Truth is what + we OUGHT to believe, they say, even tho no man ever did or shall believe + it, and even tho we have no way of getting at it save by the usual + empirical processes of testing our opinions by one another and by facts. + Pragmatically, then, this part of the dispute is idle. No relativist who + ever actually walked the earth [Footnote: Of course the bugaboo creature + called 'the sceptic' in the logic-books, who dogmatically makes the + statement that no statement, not even the one he now makes, is true, is a + mere mechanical toy—target for the rationalist shooting-gallery—hit + him and he turns a summersault—yet he is the only sort of relativist + whom my colleagues appear able to imagine to exist.] has denied the + regulative character in his own thinking of the notion of absolute truth. + What is challenged by relativists is the pretence on any one's part to + have found for certain at any given moment what the shape of that truth + is. Since the better absolutists agree in this, admitting that the + proposition 'There is absolute truth' is the only absolute truth of which + we can be sure, [Footnote: Compare Bickert's Gegenstand der Erkentniss, + pp. 187, 138. Munsterberg's version of this first truth is that 'Es gibt + eine Welt,'—see his Philosophie der Werte, pp. 38 and 74 And, after + all, both these philosophers confess in the end that the primal truth of + which they consider our supposed denial so irrational is not properly an + insight at all, but a dogma adopted by the will which any one who turns + his back on duty may disregard! But if it all reverts to 'the will to + believe,' pragmatists have that privilege as well as their critics.] + further debate is practically unimportant, so we may pass to their next + charge. + </p> + <p> + It is in this charge that the vicious abstractionism becomes most + apparent. The antipragmatist, in postulating absolute truth, refuses to + give any account of what the words may mean. For him they form a + self-explanatory term. The pragmatist, on the contrary, articulately + defines their meaning. Truth absolute, he says, means an ideal set of + formulations towards which all opinions may in the long run of experience + be expected to converge. In this definition of absolute truth he not only + postulates that there is a tendency to such convergence of opinions, to + such ultimate consensus, but he postulates the other factors of his + definition equally, borrowing them by anticipation from the true + conclusions expected to be reached. He postulates the existence of + opinions, he postulates the experience that will sift them, and the + consistency which that experience will show. He justifies himself in these + assumptions by saying that they are not postulates in the strict sense but + simple inductions from the past extended to the future by analogy; and he + insists that human opinion has already reached a pretty stable equilibrium + regarding them, and that if its future development fails to alter them, + the definition itself, with all its terms included, will be part of the + very absolute truth which it defines. The hypothesis will, in short, have + worked successfully all round the circle and proved self-corroborative, + and the circle will be closed. + </p> + <p> + The anti-pragmatist, however, immediately falls foul of the word 'opinion' + here, abstracts it from the universe of life, and uses it as a bare + dictionary-substantive, to deny the rest of the assumptions which it + coexists withal. The dictionary says that an opinion is 'what some one + thinks or believes.' This definition leaves every one's opinion free to be + autogenous, or unrelated either to what any one else may think or to what + the truth may be. + </p> + <p> + Therefore, continue our abstractionists, we must conceive it as + essentially thus unrelated, so that even were a billion men to sport the + same opinion, and only one man to differ, we could admit no collateral + circumstances which might presumptively make it more probable that he, not + they, should be wrong. Truth, they say, follows not the counting of noses, + nor is it only another name for a majority vote. It is a relation that + antedates experience, between our opinions and an independent something + which the pragmatist account ignores, a relation which, tho the opinions + of individuals should to all eternity deny it, would still remain to + qualify them as false. To talk of opinions without referring to this + independent something, the anti-pragmatist assures us, is to play Hamlet + with Hamlet's part left out. + </p> + <p> + But when the pragmatist speaks of opinions, does he mean any such + insulated and unmotived abstractions as are here supposed? Of course not, + he means men's opinions in the flesh, as they have really formed + themselves, opinions surrounded by their causes and the influences they + obey and exert, and along with the whole environment of social + communication of which they are a part and out of which they take their + rise. Moreover the 'experience' which the pragmatic definition postulates + is the independent something which the anti-pragmatist accuses him of + ignoring. Already have men grown unanimous in the opinion that such + experience is of an independent reality, the existence of which all + opinions must acknowledge, in order to be true. Already do they agree that + in the long run it is useless to resist experience's pressure; that the + more of it a man has, the better position he stands in, in respect of + truth; that some men, having had more experience, are therefore better + authorities than others; that some are also wiser by nature and better + able to interpret the experience they have had; that it is one part of + such wisdom to compare notes, discuss, and follow the opinion of our + betters; and that the more systematically and thoroughly such comparison + and weighing of opinions is pursued, the truer the opinions that survive + are likely to be. When the pragmatist talks of opinions, it is opinions as + they thus concretely and livingly and interactingly and correlatively + exist that he has in mind; and when the anti-pragmatist tries to floor him + because the word 'opinion' can also be taken abstractly and as if it had + no environment, he simply ignores the soil out of which the whole + discussion grows. His weapons cut the air and strike no blow. No one gets + wounded in the war against caricatures of belief and skeletons of opinion + of which the German onslaughts upon 'relativismus' consists. Refuse to use + the word 'opinion' abstractly, keep it in its real environment, and the + withers of pragmatism remain unwrung. That men do exist who are + 'opinionated,' in the sense that their opinions are self-willed, is + unfortunately a fact that must be admitted, no matter what one's notion of + truth in general may be. But that this fact should make it impossible for + truth to form itself authentically out of the life of opinion is what no + critic has yet proved. Truth may well consist of certain opinions, and + does indeed consist of nothing but opinions, tho not every opinion need be + true. No pragmatist needs to dogmatize about the consensus of opinion in + the future being right—he need only postulate that it will probably + contain more of truth than any one's opinion now. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0016" id="link2H_4_0016"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XIV + </h2> + <h3> + TWO ENGLISH CRITICS + </h3> + <p> + Mr. Bertrand Russell's article entitled 'Transatlantic Truth,' [Footnote: + In the Albany Review for January, 1908.] has all the clearness, dialectic + subtlety, and wit which one expects from his pen, but it entirely fails to + hit the right point of view for apprehending our position. When, for + instance, we say that a true proposition is one the consequences of + believing which are good, he assumes us to mean that any one who believes + a proposition to be true must first have made out clearly that its + consequences be good, and that his belief must primarily be in that fact,—an + obvious absurdity, for that fact is the deliverance of a new proposition, + quite different from the first one and is, moreover, a fact usually very + hard to verify, it being 'far easier,' as Mr. Russell justly says, 'to + settle the plain question of fact: "Have popes always been infallible?"' + than to settle the question whether the effects of thinking them + infallible are on the whole good.' + </p> + <p> + We affirm nothing as silly as Mr. Russell supposes. Good consequences are + not proposed by us merely as a sure sign, mark, or criterion, by which + truth's presence is habitually ascertained, tho they may indeed serve on + occasion as such a sign; they are proposed rather as the lurking motive + inside of every truth-claim, whether the 'trower' be conscious of such + motive, or whether he obey it blindly. They are proposed as the causa + existendi of our beliefs, not as their logical cue or premise, and still + less as their objective deliverance or content. They assign the only + intelligible practical meaning to that difference in our beliefs which our + habit of calling them true or false comports. + </p> + <p> + No truth-claimer except the pragmatist himself need ever be aware of the + part played in his own mind by consequences, and he himself is aware of it + only abstractly and in general, and may at any moment be quite oblivious + of it with respect to his own beliefs. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Russell next joins the army of those who inform their readers that + according to the pragmatist definition of the word 'truth' the belief that + A exists may be 'true' even when A does not exist. This is the usual + slander repeated to satiety by our critics. They forget that in any + concrete account of what is denoted by 'truth' in human life, the word can + only be used relatively to some particular trower. Thus, I may hold it + true that Shakespeare wrote the plays that bear his name, and may express + my opinion to a critic. If the critic be both a pragmatist and a baconian, + he will in his capacity of pragmatist see plain that the workings of my + opinion, I being who I am, make it perfectly true for me, while in his + capacity of baconian he still believes that Shakespeare never wrote the + plays in question. But most anti-pragmatist critics take the wont 'truth' + as something absolute, and easily play on their reader's readiness to + treat his OWE truths as the absolute ones. If the reader whom they address + believes that A does not exist, while we pragmatists show that those for + whom tho belief that it exists works satisfactorily will always call it + true, he easily sneers at the naivete of our contention, for is not then + the belief in question 'true,' tho what it declares as fact has, as the + reader so well knows, no existence? Mr. Russell speaks of our statement as + an 'attempt to get rid of fact' and naturally enough considers it 'a + failure' (p. 410). 'The old notion of truth reappears,' he adds—that + notion being, of course, that when a belief is true, its object does + exist. + </p> + <p> + It is, of course, BOUND to exist, on sound pragmatic principles. Concepts + signify consequences. How is the world made different for me by my + conceiving an opinion of mine under the concept 'true'? First, an object + must be findable there (or sure signs of such an object must be found) + which shall agree with the opinion. Second, such an opinion must not be + contradicted by anything else I am aware of. But in spite of the obvious + pragmatist requirement that when I have said truly that something exists, + it SHALL exist, the slander which Mr. Russell repeats has gained the + widest currency. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Russell himself is far too witty and athletic a ratiocinator simply to + repeat the slander dogmatically. Being nothing if not mathematical and + logical, he must prove the accusation secundum artem, and convict us not + so much of error as of absurdity. I have sincerely tried to follow the + windings of his mind in this procedure, but for the life of me I can only + see in it another example of what I have called (above, p. 249) vicious + abstractionism. The abstract world of mathematics and pure logic is so + native to Mr. Russell that he thinks that we describers of the functions + of concrete fact must also mean fixed mathematical terms and functions. A + mathematical term, as a, b, c, x, y, sin., log., is self-sufficient, and + terms of this sort, once equated, can be substituted for one another in + endless series without error. Mr. Russell, and also Mr. Hawtrey, of whom I + shall speak presently, seem to think that in our mouth also such terms as + 'meaning,' 'truth,' 'belief,' 'object,' 'definition,' are self-sufficients + with no context of varying relation that might be further asked about. + What a word means is expressed by its definition, isn't it? The definition + claims to be exact and adequate, doesn't it? Then it can be substituted + for the word—since the two are identical—can't it? Then two + words with the same definition can be substituted for one another, n'est—ce + pas? Likewise two definitions of the same word, nicht wahr, etc., etc., + till it will be indeed strange if you can't convict some one of + self-contradiction and absurdity. + </p> + <p> + The particular application of this rigoristic treatment to my own little + account of truth as working seems to be something like what follows. I say + 'working' is what the 'truth' of our ideas means, and call it a + definition. But since meanings and things meant, definitions and things + defined, are equivalent and interchangeable, and nothing extraneous to its + definition can be meant when a term is used, it follows that who so calls + an idea true, and means by that word that it works, cannot mean anything + else, can believe nothing but that it does work, and in particular can + neither imply nor allow anything about its object or deliverance. + 'According to the pragmatists,' Mr. Russell writes, 'to say "it is true + that other people exist" means "it is useful to believe that other people + exist." But if so, then these two phrases are merely different words for + the same proposition; therefore when I believe the one, I believe the + other' (p. 400). [Logic, I may say in passing, would seem to require Mr. + Russell to believe them both at once, but he ignores this consequence, and + considers that other people exist' and 'it is useful to believe that they + do EVEN IF THEY DON'T,' must be identical and therefore substitutable + propositions in the pragmatist mouth.] + </p> + <p> + But may not real terms, I now ask, have accidents not expressed in their + definitions? and when a real value is finally substituted for the result + of an algebraic series of substituted definitions, do not all these + accidents creep back? Beliefs have their objective 'content' or + 'deliverance' as well as their truth, and truth has its implications as + well as its workings. If any one believe that other men exist, it is both + a content of his belief and an implication of its truth, that they should + exist in fact. Mr. Russell's logic would seem to exclude, 'by definition,' + all such accidents as contents, implications, and associates, and would + represent us as translating all belief into a sort of belief in pragmatism + itself—of all things! If I say that a speech is eloquent, and + explain 'eloquent' as meaning the power to work in certain ways upon the + audience; or if I say a book is original, and define 'original' to mean + differing from other books, Russell's logic, if I follow it at all, would + seem to doom me to agreeing that the speech is about eloquence, and the + book about other books. When I call a belief true, and define its truth to + mean its workings, I certainly do not mean that the belief is a belief + ABOUT the workings. It is a belief about the object, and I who talk about + the workings am a different subject, with a different universe of + discourse, from that of the believer of whose concrete thinking I profess + to give an account. + </p> + <p> + The social proposition 'other men exist' and the pragmatist proposition + 'it is expedient to believe that other men exist' come from different + universes of discourse. One can believe the second without being logically + compelled to believe the first; one can believe the first without having + ever heard of the second; or one can believe them both. The first + expresses the object of a belief, the second tells of one condition of the + belief's power to maintain itself. There is no identity of any kind, save + the term 'other men' which they contain in common, in the two + propositions; and to treat them as mutually substitutable, or to insist + that we shall do so, is to give up dealing with realities altogether. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Ralph Hawtrey, who seems also to serve under the banner of + abstractionist logic, convicts us pragmatists of absurdity by arguments + similar to Mr. Russell's. [Footnote: See The New Quarterly, for March, + 1908.] + </p> + <p> + As a favor to us and for the sake of the argument, he abandons the word + 'true' to our fury, allowing it to mean nothing but the fact that certain + beliefs are expedient; and he uses the word 'correctness' (as Mr. Pratt + uses the word 'trueness') to designate a fact, not about the belief, but + about the belief's object, namely that it is as the belief declares it. + 'When therefore,' he writes, 'I say it is correct to say that Caesar is + dead, I mean "Caesar is dead." This must be regarded as the definition of + correctness.' And Mr. Hawtrey then goes on to demolish me by the conflict + of the definitions. What is 'true' for the pragmatist cannot be what is + 'correct,' he says, 'for the definitions are not logically + interchangeable; or if we interchange them, we reach the tautology: + </p> + <p> + "Caesar is dead" means "it is expedient to believe that Caesar is dead." + But what is it expedient to believe? Why, "that Caesar is dead." A + precious definition indeed of 'Caesar is dead.' + </p> + <p> + Mr. Hawtrey's conclusion would seem to be that the pragmatic definition of + the truth of a belief in no way implies—what?—that the + believer shall believe in his own belief's deliverance?—or that the + pragmatist who is talking about him shall believe in that deliverance? The + two cases are quite different. For the believer, Caesar must of course + really exist; for the pragmatist critic he need not, for the pragmatic + deliverance belongs, as I have just said, to another universe of discourse + altogether. When one argues by substituting definition for definition, one + needs to stay in the same universe. + </p> + <p> + The great shifting of universes in this discussion occurs when we carry + the word 'truth' from the subjective into the objective realm, applying it + sometimes to a property of opinions, sometimes to the facts which the + opinions assert. A number of writers, as Mr. Russell himself, Mr. G. E. + Moore, and others, favor the unlucky word 'proposition,' which seems + expressly invented to foster this confusion, for they speak of truth as a + property of 'propositions.' But in naming propositions it is almost + impossible not to use the word 'that.' + </p> + <p> + THAT Caesar is dead, THAT virtue is its own reward, are propositions. + </p> + <p> + I do not say that for certain logical purposes it may not be useful to + treat propositions as absolute entities, with truth or falsehood inside of + them respectively, or to make of a complex like 'that—Caesar—is—dead' + a single term and call it a 'truth.' But the 'that' here has the extremely + convenient ambiguity for those who wish to make trouble for us + pragmatists, that sometimes it means the FACT that, and sometimes the + BELIEF that, Caesar is no longer living. When I then call the belief true, + I am told that the truth means the fact; when I claim the fact also, I am + told that my definition has excluded the fact, being a definition only of + a certain peculiarity in the belief—so that in the end I have no + truth to talk about left in my possession. + </p> + <p> + The only remedy for this intolerable ambiguity is, it seems to me, to + stick to terms consistently. 'Reality,' 'idea' or 'belief,' and the 'truth + of the idea or belief,' which are the terms I have consistently held to, + seem to be free from all objection. + </p> + <p> + Whoever takes terms abstracted from all their natural settings, identifies + them with definitions, and treats the latter more algebraico, not only + risks mixing universes, but risks fallacies which the man in the street + easily detects. To prove 'by definition' that the statement 'Caesar + exists' is identical with a statement about 'expediency' because the one + statement is 'true' and the other is about 'true statements,' is like + proving that an omnibus is a boat because both are vehicles. A horse may + be defined as a beast that walks on the nails of his middle digits. + Whenever we see a horse we see such a beast, just as whenever we believe a + 'truth' we believe something expedient. Messrs. Russell and Hawtrey, if + they followed their antipragmatist logic, would have to say here that we + see THAT IT IS such a beast, a fact which notoriously no one sees who is + not a comparative anatomist. + </p> + <p> + It almost reconciles one to being no logician that one thereby escapes so + much abstractionism. Abstractionism of the worst sort dogs Mr. Russell in + his own trials to tell positively what the word 'truth' means. In the + third of his articles on Meinong, in Mind, vol. xiii, p. 509 (1904), he + attempts this feat by limiting the discussion to three terms only, a + proposition, its content, and an object, abstracting from the whole + context of associated realities in which such terms are found in every + case of actual knowing. He puts the terms, thus taken in a vacuum, and + made into bare logical entities, through every possible permutation and + combination, tortures them on the rack until nothing is left of them, and + after all this logical gymnastic, comes out with the following portentous + conclusion as what he believes to be the correct view: that there is no + problem at all in truth and falsehood, that some propositions are true and + some false, just as some roses are red and some white, that belief is a + certain attitude towards propositions, which is called knowledge when they + are true, error when they are false'—and he seems to think that when + once this insight is reached the question may be considered closed + forever! + </p> + <p> + In spite of my admiration of Mr. Russell's analytic powers, I wish, after + reading such an article, that pragmatism, even had it no other function, + might result in making him and other similarly gifted men ashamed of + having used such powers in such abstraction from reality. Pragmatism saves + us at any rate from such diseased abstractionism as those pages show. + </p> + <p> + P. S. Since the foregoing rejoinder was written an article on Pragmatism + which I believe to be by Mr. Russell has appeared in the Edinburgh Review + for April, 1909. As far as his discussion of the truth-problem goes, altho + he has evidently taken great pains to be fair, it seems to me that he has + in no essential respect improved upon his former arguments. I will + therefore add nothing further, but simply refer readers who may be curious + to pp. 272-280 of the said article. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0017" id="link2H_4_0017"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + XV + </h2> + <h3> + A DIALOGUE + </h3> + <p> + After correcting the proofs of all that precedes I imagine a residual + state of mind on the part of my reader which may still keep him + unconvinced, and which it may be my duty to try at least to dispel. I can + perhaps be briefer if I put what I have to say in dialogue form. Let then + the anti-pragmatist begin:— + </p> + <p> + Anti-Pragmatist:—You say that the truth of an idea is constituted by + its workings. Now suppose a certain state of facts, facts for example of + antediluvian planetary history, concerning which the question may be + asked: + </p> + <p> + 'Shall the truth about them ever be known?' And suppose (leaving the + hypothesis of an omniscient absolute out of the account) that we assume + that the truth is never to be known. I ask you now, brother pragmatist, + whether according to you there can be said to be any truth at all about + such a state of facts. Is there a truth, or is there not a truth, in cases + where at any rate it never comes to be known? + </p> + <p> + Pragmatist:—Why do you ask me such a question? + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—Because I think it puts you in a bad dilemma. + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—How so? + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—Why, because if on the one hand you elect to say that + there is a truth, you thereby surrender your whole pragmatist theory. + According to that theory, truth requires ideas and workings to constitute + it; but in the present instance there is supposed to be no knower, and + consequently neither ideas nor workings can exist. What then remains for + you to make your truth of? + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—Do you wish, like so many of my enemies, to force me to make + the truth out of the reality itself? I cannot: the truth is something + known, thought or said about the reality, and consequently numerically + additional to it. But probably your intent is something different; so + before I say which horn of your dilemma I choose, I ask you to let me hear + what the other horn may be. + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—The other horn is this, that if you elect to say that + there is no truth under the conditions assumed, because there are no ideas + or workings, then you fly in the face of common sense. Doesn't common + sense believe that every state of facts must in the nature of things be + truly statable in some kind of a proposition, even tho in point of fact + the proposition should never be propounded by a living soul? + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—Unquestionably common sense believes this, and so do I. There + have been innumerable events in the history of our planet of which nobody + ever has been or ever will be able to give an account, yet of which it can + already be said abstractly that only one sort of possible account can ever + be true. The truth about any such event is thus already generically + predetermined by the event's nature; and one may accordingly say with a + perfectly good conscience that it virtually pre-exists. Common sense is + thus right in its instinctive contention. + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—Is this then the horn of the dilemma which you stand + for? Do you say that there is a truth even in cases where it shall never + be known? + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—Indeed I do, provided you let me hold consistently to my own + conception of truth, and do not ask me to abandon it for something which I + find impossible to comprehend.—You also believe, do you not, that + there is a truth, even in cases where it never shall be known? + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—I do indeed believe so. + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—Pray then inform me in what, according to you, this truth + regarding the unknown consists. + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—Consists?—pray what do you mean by 'consists'? It + consists in nothing but itself, or more properly speaking it has neither + consistence nor existence, it obtains, it holds. + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—Well, what relation does it bear to the reality of which it + holds? + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:-How do you mean, 'what relation'? It holds of it, of course; + it knows it, it represents it. + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—Who knows it? What represents it? + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—The truth does; the truth knows it; or rather not + exactly that, but any one knows it who possesses the truth. Any true idea + of the reality represents the truth concerning it. + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—But I thought that we had agreed that no knower of it, nor + any idea representing it was to be supposed. + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—Sure enough! + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—Then I beg you again to tell me in what this truth consists, + all by itself, this tertium quid intermediate between the facts per se, on + the one hand, and all knowledge of them, actual or potential, on the + other. What is the shape of it in this third estate? Of what stuff, + mental, physical, or 'epistemological,' is it built? What metaphysical + region of reality does it inhabit? + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—What absurd questions! Isn't it enough to say that it is + true that the facts are so-and-so, and false that they are otherwise? + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—'It' is true that the facts are so-and-so—I won't yield + to the temptation of asking you what is true; but I do ask you whether + your phrase that 'it is true that' the facts are so-and-so really means + anything really additional to the bare being so-and-so of the facts + themselves. + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—It seems to mean more than the bare being of the facts. + It is a sort of mental equivalent for them, their epistemological + function, their value in noetic terms. Prag.:—A sort of spiritual + double or ghost of them, apparently! If so, may I ask you where this truth + is found. + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—Where? where? There is no 'where'—it simply + obtains, absolutely obtains. + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—Not in any one's mind? + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—No, for we agreed that no actual knower of the truth + should be assumed. + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—No actual knower, I agree. But are you sure that no notion of + a potential or ideal knower has anything to do with forming this strangely + elusive idea of the truth of the facts in your mind? + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—Of course if there be a truth concerning the facts, that + truth is what the ideal knower would know. To that extent you can't keep + the notion of it and the notion of him separate. But it is not him first + and then it; it is it first and then him, in my opinion. + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—But you still leave me terribly puzzled as to the status of + this so-called truth, hanging as it does between earth and heaven, between + reality and knowledge, grounded in the reality, yet numerically additional + to it, and at the same time antecedent to any knower's opinion and + entirely independent thereof. Is it as independent of the knower as you + suppose? It looks to me terribly dubious, as if it might be only another + name for a potential as distinguished from an actual knowledge of the + reality. Isn't your truth, after all, simply what any successful knower + would have to know in case he existed? And in a universe where no knowers + were even conceivable would any truth about the facts there as something + numerically distinguishable from the facts themselves, find a place to + exist in? To me such truth would not only be non-existent, it would be + unimaginable, inconceivable. + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—But I thought you said a while ago that there is a truth + of past events, even tho no one shall ever know it. + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—Yes, but you must remember that I also stipulated for + permission to define the word in my own fashion. The truth of an event, + past, present, or future, is for me only another name for the fact that if + the event ever does get known, the nature of the knowledge is already to + some degree predetermined. The truth which precedes actual knowledge of a + fact means only what any possible knower of the fact will eventually find + himself necessitated to believe about it. He must believe something that + will bring him into satisfactory relations with it, that will prove a + decent mental substitute for it. What this something may be is of course + partly fixed already by the nature of the fact and by the sphere of its + associations. This seems to me all that you can clearly mean when you say + that truth pre-exists to knowledge. It is knowledge anticipated, knowledge + in the form of possibility merely. + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—But what does the knowledge know when it comes? Doesn't + it know the truth? And, if so, mustn't the truth be distinct from either + the fact or the knowledge? + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—It seems to me that what the knowledge knows is the fact + itself, the event, or whatever the reality may be. Where you see three + distinct entities in the field, the reality, the knowing, and the truth, I + see only two. Moreover, I can see what each of my two entities is + known-as, but when I ask myself what your third entity, the truth, is + known-as, I can find nothing distinct from the reality on the one hand, + and the ways in which it may be known on the other. Are you not probably + misled by common language, which has found it convenient to introduce a + hybrid name, meaning sometimes a kind of knowing and sometimes a reality + known, to apply to either of these things interchangeably? And has + philosophy anything to gain by perpetuating and consecrating the + ambiguity? If you call the object of knowledge 'reality,' and call the + manner of its being cognized 'truth,' cognized moreover on particular + occasions, and variously, by particular human beings who have their + various businesses with it, and if you hold consistently to this + nomenclature, it seems to me that you escape all sorts of trouble. + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—Do you mean that you think you escape from my dilemma? + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—Assuredly I escape; for if truth and knowledge are terms + correlative and interdependent, as I maintain they are, then wherever + knowledge is conceivable truth is conceivable, wherever knowledge is + possible truth is possible, wherever knowledge is actual truth is actual. + Therefore when you point your first horn at me, I think of truth actual, + and say it doesn't exist. It doesn't; for by hypothesis there is no + knower, no ideas, no workings. I agree, however, that truth possible or + virtual might exist, for a knower might possibly be brought to birth; and + truth conceivable certainly exists, for, abstractly taken, there is + nothing in the nature of antediluvian events that should make the + application of knowledge to them inconceivable. Therefore when you try to + impale me on your second horn, I think of the truth in question as a mere + abstract possibility, so I say it does exist, and side with common sense. + </p> + <p> + Do not these distinctions rightly relieve me from embarrassment? And don't + you think it might help you to make them yourself? + </p> + <p> + Anti-Prag.:—Never!—so avaunt with your abominable + hair-splitting and sophistry! Truth is truth; and never will I degrade it + by identifying it with low pragmatic particulars in the way you propose. + </p> + <p> + Prag.:—Well, my dear antagonist, I hardly hoped to convert an + eminent intellectualist and logician like you; so enjoy, as long as you + live, your own ineffable conception. Perhaps the rising generation will + grow up more accustomed than you are to that concrete and empirical + interpretation of terms in which the pragmatic method consists. Perhaps + they may then wonder how so harmless and natural an account of truth as + mine could have found such difficulty in entering the minds of men far + more intelligent than I can ever hope to become, but wedded by education + and tradition to the abstractionist manner of thought. + </p> + <div style="height: 6em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Meaning of Truth, by William James + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MEANING OF TRUTH *** + +***** This file should be named 5117-h.htm or 5117-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/5/1/1/5117/ + + +Text file produced by Steve Harris, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + +HTML file produced by David Widger + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Meaning of Truth + +Author: William James + + +Release Date: February, 2004 [EBook #5117] +This file was first posted on May 1, 2002 +Last Updated: July 4, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MEANING OF TRUTH *** + + + + +Produced by Steve Harris, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + + + + + + + +THE MEANING OF TRUTH + +A SEQUEL TO 'PRAGMATISM' + +By William James + + + + + +PREFACE + +THE pivotal part of my book named Pragmatism is its account of the +relation called 'truth' which may obtain between an idea (opinion, +belief, statement, or what not) and its object. 'Truth,' I there say, +'is a property of certain of our ideas. It means their agreement, +as falsity means their disagreement, with reality. Pragmatists and +intellectualists both accept this definition as a matter of course. + +'Where our ideas [do] not copy definitely their object, what does +agreement with that object mean? ... Pragmatism asks its usual question. +"Grant an idea or belief to be true," it says, "what concrete difference +will its being true make in any one's actual life? What experiences +[may] be different from those which would obtain if the belief were +false? How will the truth be realized? What, in short, is the truth's +cash-value in experiential terms?" The moment pragmatism asks this +question, it sees the answer: TRUE IDEAS ARE THOSE THAT WE CAN +ASSIMILATE, VALIDATE, CORROBORATE, AND VERIFY. FALSE IDEAS ARE THOSE +THAT WE CANNOT. That is the practical difference it makes to us to have +true ideas; that therefore is the meaning of truth, for it is all that +truth is known as. + +'The truth of an idea is not a stagnant property inherent in it. Truth +HAPPENS to an idea. It BECOMES true, is MADE true by events. Its verity +IS in fact an event, a process, the process namely of its verifying +itself, its veriFICATION. Its validity is the process of its validATION. +[Footnote: But 'VERIFIABILITY,' I add, 'is as good as verification. +For one truth-process completed, there are a million in our lives +that function in [the] state of nascency. They lead us towards direct +verification; lead us into the surroundings of the object they envisage; +and then, if everything, runs on harmoniously, we are so sure that +verification is possible that we omit it, and are usually justified by +all that happens.'] + +'To agree in the widest sense with a reality can only mean to be guided +either straight up to it or into its surroundings, or to be put into +such working touch with it as to handle either it or something connected +with it better than if we disagreed. Better either intellectually or +practically .... Any idea that helps us to deal, whether practically or +intellectually, with either the reality or its belongings, that doesn't +entangle our progress in frustrations, that FITS, in fact, and adapts +our life to the reality's whole setting, will agree sufficiently to meet +the requirement. It will be true of that reality. + +'THE TRUE, to put it very briefly, IS ONLY THE EXPEDIENT IN THE WAY OF +OUR THINKING, JUST AS THE RIGHT IS ONLY THE EXPEDIENT IN THE WAY OF OUR +BEHAVING. Expedient in almost any fashion, and expedient in the long +run and on the whole, of course; for what meets expediently all the +experience in sight won't necessarily meet all farther experiences +equally satisfactorily. Experience, as we know, has ways of BOILING +OVER, and making us correct our present formulas.' + +This account of truth, following upon the similar ones given by Messrs. +Dewey and Schiller, has occasioned the liveliest discussion. Few critics +have defended it, most of them have scouted it. It seems evident that +the subject is a hard one to understand, under its apparent simplicity; +and evident also, I think, that the definitive settlement of it will +mark a turning-point in the history of epistemology, and consequently +in that of general philosophy. In order to make my own thought more +accessible to those who hereafter may have to study the question, I have +collected in the volume that follows all the work of my pen that bears +directly on the truth-question. My first statement was in 1884, in the +article that begins the present volume. The other papers follow in the +order of their publication. Two or three appear now for the first time. + +One of the accusations which I oftenest have had to meet is that of +making the truth of our religious beliefs consist in their 'feeling +good' to us, and in nothing else. I regret to have given some excuse for +this charge, by the unguarded language in which, in the book Pragmatism, +I spoke of the truth of the belief of certain philosophers in the +absolute. Explaining why I do not believe in the absolute myself (p. +78), yet finding that it may secure 'moral holidays' to those who need +them, and is true in so far forth (if to gain moral holidays be a +good), [Footnote: Op. cit., p. 75.] I offered this as a conciliatory +olive-branch to my enemies. But they, as is only too common with such +offerings, trampled the gift under foot and turned and rent the giver. I +had counted too much on their good will--oh for the rarity of +Christian charity under the sun! Oh for the rarity of ordinary secular +intelligence also! I had supposed it to be matter of common observation +that, of two competing views of the universe which in all other respects +are equal, but of which the first denies some vital human need while +the second satisfies it, the second will be favored by sane men for the +simple reason that it makes the world seem more rational. To choose the +first view under such circumstances would be an ascetic act, an act of +philosophic self-denial of which no normal human being would be guilty. +Using the pragmatic test of the meaning of concepts, I had shown the +concept of the absolute to MEAN nothing but the holiday giver, the +banisher of cosmic fear. One's objective deliverance, when one says +'the absolute exists,' amounted, on my showing, just to this, that 'some +justification of a feeling of security in presence of the universe,' +exists, and that systematically to refuse to cultivate a feeling of +security would be to do violence to a tendency in one's emotional life +which might well be respected as prophetic. + +Apparently my absolutist critics fail to see the workings of their own +minds in any such picture, so all that I can do is to apologize, and +take my offering back. The absolute is true in NO way then, and least of +all, by the verdict of the critics, in the way which I assigned! + +My treatment of 'God,' 'freedom,' and 'design' was similar. Reducing, +by the pragmatic test, the meaning of each of these concepts to its +positive experienceable operation, I showed them all to mean the same +thing, viz., the presence of 'promise' in the world. 'God or no God?' +means 'promise or no promise?' It seems to me that the alternative is +objective enough, being a question as to whether the cosmos has one +character or another, even though our own provisional answer be made +on subjective grounds. Nevertheless christian and non-christian critics +alike accuse me of summoning people to say 'God exists,' EVEN WHEN HE +DOESN'T EXIST, because forsooth in my philosophy the 'truth' of the +saying doesn't really mean that he exists in any shape whatever, but +only that to say so feels good. + +Most of the pragmatist and anti-pragmatist warfare is over what the word +'truth' shall be held to signify, and not over any of the facts embodied +in truth-situations; for both pragmatists and anti-pragmatists believe +in existent objects, just as they believe in our ideas of them. The +difference is that when the pragmatists speak of truth, they mean +exclusively some thing about the ideas, namely their workableness; +whereas when anti-pragmatists speak of truth they seem most often to +mean something about the objects. Since the pragmatist, if he agrees +that an idea is 'really' true, also agrees to whatever it says about +its object; and since most anti-pragmatists have already come round +to agreeing that, if the object exists, the idea that it does so is +workable; there would seem so little left to fight about that I might +well be asked why instead of reprinting my share in so much verbal +wrangling, I do not show my sense of 'values' by burning it all up. + +I understand the question and I will give my answer. I am interested +in another doctrine in philosophy to which I give the name of radical +empiricism, and it seems to me that the establishment of the pragmatist +theory of truth is a step of first-rate importance in making radical +empiricism prevail. Radical empiricism consists first of a postulate, +next of a statement of fact, and finally of a generalized conclusion. + +The postulate is that the only things that shall be debatable among +philosophers shall be things definable in terms drawn from experience. +[Things of an unexperienceable nature may exist ad libitum, but they +form no part of the material for philosophic debate.] + +The statement of fact is that the relations between things, conjunctive +as well as disjunctive, are just as much matters of direct particular +experience, neither more so nor less so, than the things themselves. + +The generalized conclusion is that therefore the parts of experience +hold together from next to next by relations that are themselves parts +of experience. The directly apprehended universe needs, in short, no +extraneous trans-empirical connective support, but possesses in its own +right a concatenated or continuous structure. + +The great obstacle to radical empiricism in the contemporary mind is the +rooted rationalist belief that experience as immediately given is all +disjunction and no conjunction, and that to make one world out of this +separateness, a higher unifying agency must be there. In the prevalent +idealism this agency is represented as the absolute all-witness which +'relates' things together by throwing 'categories' over them like a +net. The most peculiar and unique, perhaps, of all these categories is +supposed to be the truth-relation, which connects parts of reality in +pairs, making of one of them a knower, and of the other a thing known, +yet which is itself contentless experientially, neither describable, +explicable, nor reduceable to lower terms, and denotable only by +uttering the name 'truth.' + +The pragmatist view, on the contrary, of the truth-relation is that it +has a definite content, and that everything in it is experienceable. +Its whole nature can be told in positive terms. The 'workableness' +which ideas must have, in order to be true, means particular workings, +physical or intellectual, actual or possible, which they may set up +from next to next inside of concrete experience. Were this pragmatic +contention admitted, one great point in the victory of radical +empiricism would also be scored, for the relation between an object and +the idea that truly knows it, is held by rationalists to be nothing of +this describable sort, but to stand outside of all possible temporal +experience; and on the relation, so interpreted, rationalism is wonted +to make its last most obdurate rally. + +Now the anti-pragmatist contentions which I try to meet in this volume +can be so easily used by rationalists as weapons of resistance, not only +to pragmatism but to radical empiricism also (for if the truth-relation +were transcendent, others might be so too), that I feel strongly the +strategical importance of having them definitely met and got out of +the way. What our critics most persistently keep saying is that though +workings go with truth, yet they do not constitute it. It is numerically +additional to them, prior to them, explanatory OF them, and in no wise +to be explained BY them, we are incessantly told. The first point for +our enemies to establish, therefore, is that SOMETHING numerically +additional and prior to the workings is involved in the truth of +an idea. Since the OBJECT is additional, and usually prior, most +rationalists plead IT, and boldly accuse us of denying it. This leaves +on the bystanders the impression--since we cannot reasonably deny the +existence of the object--that our account of truth breaks down, and that +our critics have driven us from the field. Altho in various places in +this volume I try to refute the slanderous charge that we deny real +existence, I will say here again, for the sake of emphasis, that the +existence of the object, whenever the idea asserts it 'truly,' is the +only reason, in innumerable cases, why the idea does work successfully, +if it work at all; and that it seems an abuse of language, to say +the least, to transfer the word 'truth' from the idea to the object's +existence, when the falsehood of ideas that won't work is explained by +that existence as well as the truth of those that will. + +I find this abuse prevailing among my most accomplished adversaries. But +once establish the proper verbal custom, let the word 'truth' represent +a property of the idea, cease to make it something mysteriously +connected with the object known, and the path opens fair and wide, as +I believe, to the discussion of radical empiricism on its merits. The +truth of an idea will then mean only its workings, or that in it which +by ordinary psychological laws sets up those workings; it will mean +neither the idea's object, nor anything 'saltatory' inside the idea, +that terms drawn from experience cannot describe. + +One word more, ere I end this preface. A distinction is sometimes made +between Dewey, Schiller and myself, as if I, in supposing the object's +existence, made a concession to popular prejudice which they, as more +radical pragmatists, refuse to make. As I myself understand these +authors, we all three absolutely agree in admitting the transcendency of +the object (provided it be an experienceable object) to the subject, in +the truth-relation. Dewey in particular has insisted almost ad nauseam +that the whole meaning of our cognitive states and processes lies in +the way they intervene in the control and revaluation of independent +existences or facts. His account of knowledge is not only absurd, but +meaningless, unless independent existences be there of which our ideas +take account, and for the transformation of which they work. But because +he and Schiller refuse to discuss objects and relations 'transcendent' +in the sense of being ALTOGETHER TRANS-EXPERIENTIAL, their critics +pounce on sentences in their writings to that effect to show that they +deny the existence WITHIN THE REALM OF EXPERIENCE of objects external +to the ideas that declare their presence there. [Footnote: It gives me +pleasure to welcome Professor Carveth Read into the pragmatistic church, +so far as his epistemology goes. See his vigorous book, The Metaphysics +of Nature, 2d Edition, Appendix A. (London, Black, 1908.) The work What +is Reality? by Francis Howe Johnson (Boston, 1891), of which I make the +acquaintance only while correcting these proofs, contains some striking +anticipations of the later pragmatist view. The Psychology of Thinking, +by Irving E. Miller (New York, Macmillan Co., 1909), which has just +appeared, is one of the most convincing pragmatist document yet +published, tho it does not use the word 'pragmatism' at all. While I +am making references, I cannot refrain from inserting one to the +extraordinarily acute article by H. V. Knox in the Quarterly Review for +April, 1909.] + +It seems incredible that educated and apparently sincere critics should +so fail to catch their adversary's point of view. + +What misleads so many of them is possibly also the fact that the +universes of discourse of Schiller, Dewey, and myself are panoramas of +different extent, and that what the one postulates explicitly the other +provisionally leaves only in a state of implication, while the reader +thereupon considers it to be denied. Schiller's universe is the +smallest, being essentially a psychological one. He starts with but one +sort of thing, truth-claims, but is led ultimately to the independent +objective facts which they assert, inasmuch as the most successfully +validated of all claims is that such facts are there. My universe is +more essentially epistemological. I start with two things, the objective +facts and the claims, and indicate which claims, the facts being there, +will work successfully as the latter's substitutes and which will not. +I call the former claims true. Dewey's panorama, if I understand this +colleague, is the widest of the three, but I refrain from giving my own +account of its complexity. Suffice it that he holds as firmly as I do to +objects independent of our judgments. If I am wrong in saying this, +he must correct me. I decline in this matter to be corrected at second +hand. + +I have not pretended in the following pages to consider all the critics +of my account of truth, such as Messrs. Taylor, Lovejoy, Gardiner, +Bakewell, Creighton, Hibben, Parodi, Salter, Carus, Lalande, Mentre, +McTaggart, G. E. Moore, Ladd and others, especially not Professor +Schinz, who has published under the title of Anti-pragmatisme an amusing +sociological romance. Some of these critics seem to me to labor under an +inability almost pathetic, to understand the thesis which they seek to +refute. I imagine that most of their difficulties have been answered +by anticipation elsewhere in this volume, and I am sure that my readers +will thank me for not adding more repetition to the fearful amount that +is already there. + +95 IRVING ST., CAMBRIDGE (MASS.), August, 1909. + + + + + + + +CONTENTS + +I THE FUNCTION OF COGNITION + +II THE TIGERS IN INDIA + +III HUMANISM AND TRUTH + +IV THE RELATION BETWEEN KNOWER AND KNOWN + +V THE ESSENCE OF HUMANISM + +VI A WORD MORE ABOUT TRUTH + +VII PROFESSOR PRATT ON TRUTH + +VIII THE PRAGMATIST ACCOUNT OF TRUTH AND ITS MIS-UNDERSTANDERS + +IX THE MEANING OF THE WORD TRUTH + +X THE EXISTENCE OF JULIUS CAESAR + +XI THE ABSOLUTE AND THE STRENUOUS LIFE + +XII PROFESSOR HEBERT ON PRAGMATISM + +XIII ABSTRACTIONISM AND 'RELATIVISMUS' + +XIV TWO ENGLISH CRITICS + +XV A DIALOGUE + + + + + + + +THE MEANING OF TRUTH + + + +I + +THE FUNCTION OF COGNITION [Footnote: Read before the Aristotelian +Society, December 1, 1884, and first published in Mind, vol. x +(1885).--This, and the following articles have received a very slight +verbal revision, consisting mostly in the omission of redundancy.] + +The following inquiry is (to use a distinction familiar to readers of +Mr. Shadworth Hodgson) not an inquiry into the 'how it comes,' but +into the 'what it is' of cognition. What we call acts of cognition are +evidently realized through what we call brains and their events, whether +there be 'souls' dynamically connected with the brains or not. But with +neither brains nor souls has this essay any business to transact. In it +we shall simply assume that cognition IS produced, somehow, and limit +ourselves to asking what elements it contains, what factors it implies. + +Cognition is a function of consciousness. The first factor it implies +is therefore a state of consciousness wherein the cognition shall take +place. Having elsewhere used the word 'feeling' to designate generically +all states of consciousness considered subjectively, or without respect +to their possible function, I shall then say that, whatever elements an +act of cognition may imply besides, it at least implies the existence +of a FEELING. [If the reader share the current antipathy to the word +'feeling,' he may substitute for it, wherever I use it, the word 'idea,' +taken in the old broad Lockian sense, or he may use the clumsy phrase +'state of consciousness,' or finally he may say 'thought' instead.] + +Now it is to be observed that the common consent of mankind has agreed +that some feelings are cognitive and some are simple facts having a +subjective, or, what one might almost call a physical, existence, but +no such self-transcendent function as would be implied in their being +pieces of knowledge. Our task is again limited here. We are not to ask, +'How is self-transcendence possible?' We are only to ask, 'How comes it +that common sense has assigned a number of cases in which it is assumed +not only to be possible but actual? And what are the marks used by +common sense to distinguish those cases from the rest?' In short, our +inquiry is a chapter in descriptive psychology,--hardly anything more. + +Condillac embarked on a quest similar to this by his famous hypothesis +of a statue to which various feelings were successively imparted. Its +first feeling was supposed to be one of fragrance. But to avoid all +possible complication with the question of genesis, let us not attribute +even to a statue the possession of our imaginary feeling. Let us rather +suppose it attached to no matter, nor localized at any point in space, +but left swinging IN VACUO, as it were, by the direct creative FIAT of a +god. And let us also, to escape entanglement with difficulties about the +physical or psychical nature of its 'object' not call it a feeling +of fragrance or of any other determinate sort, but limit ourselves +to assuming that it is a feeling of Q. What is true of it under this +abstract name will be no less true of it in any more particular shape +(such as fragrance, pain, hardness) which the reader may suppose. + +Now, if this feeling of Q be the only creation of the god, it will of +course form the entire universe. And if, to escape the cavils of that +large class of persons who believe that SEMPER IDEM SENTIRE AC NON +SENTIRE are the same, [Footnote:1 'The Relativity of Knowledge,' held +in this sense, is, it may be observed in passing, one of the oddest of +philosophic superstitions. Whatever facts may be cited in its favor are +due to the properties of nerve-tissue, which may be exhausted by +too prolonged an excitement. Patients with neuralgias that last +unremittingly for days can, however, assure us that the limits of this +nerve-law are pretty widely drawn. But if we physically could get a +feeling that should last eternally unchanged, what atom of logical or +psychological argument is there to prove that it would not be felt as +long as it lasted, and felt for just what it is, all that time? The +reason for the opposite prejudice seems to be our reluctance to think +that so stupid a thing as such a feeling would necessarily be, should +be allowed to fill eternity with its presence. An interminable +acquaintance, leading to no knowledge-about,--such would be its +condition.] we allow the feeling to be of as short a duration as they +like, that universe will only need to last an infinitesimal part of a +second. The feeling in question will thus be reduced to its fighting +weight, and all that befalls it in the way of a cognitive function +must be held to befall in the brief instant of its quickly snuffed-out +life,--a life, it will also be noticed, that has no other moment of +consciousness either preceding or following it. + +Well now, can our little feeling, thus left alone in the universe,--for +the god and we psychological critics may be supposed left out of +the account,--can the feeling, I say, be said to have any sort of a +cognitive function? For it to KNOW, there must be something to be known. +What is there, on the present supposition? One may reply, 'the feeling's +content q.' But does it not seem more proper to call this the feeling's +QUALITY than its content? Does not the word 'content' suggest that the +feeling has already dirempted itself as an act from its content as +an object? And would it be quite safe to assume so promptly that the +quality q of a feeling is one and the same thing with a feeling of the +quality q? The quality q, so far, is an entirely subjective fact which +the feeling carries so to speak endogenously, or in its pocket. If +any one pleases to dignify so simple a fact as this by the name of +knowledge, of course nothing can prevent him. But let us keep closer +to the path of common usage, and reserve the name knowledge for the +cognition of 'realities,' meaning by realities things that exist +independently of the feeling through which their cognition occurs. If +the content of the feeling occur nowhere in the universe outside of the +feeling itself, and perish with the feeling, common usage refuses +to call it a reality, and brands it as a subjective feature of the +feeling's constitution, or at the most as the feeling's DREAM. + +For the feeling to be cognitive in the specific sense, then, it must be +self-transcendent; and we must prevail upon the god to CREATE A REALITY +OUTSIDE OF IT to correspond to its intrinsic quality Q. Thus only can +it be redeemed from the condition of being a solipsism. If now the new +created reality RESEMBLE the feeling's quality Q I say that the feeling +may be held by us TO BE COGNIZANT OF THAT REALITY. + +This first instalment of my thesis is sure to be attacked. But one +word before defending it 'Reality' has become our warrant for calling +a feeling cognitive; but what becomes our warrant for calling anything +reality? The only reply is--the faith of the present critic or inquirer. +At every moment of his life he finds himself subject to a belief in SOME +realities, even though his realities of this year should prove to be his +illusions of the next. Whenever he finds that the feeling he is studying +contemplates what he himself regards as a reality, he must of course +admit the feeling itself to be truly cognitive. We are ourselves the +critics here; and we shall find our burden much lightened by being +allowed to take reality in this relative and provisional way. Every +science must make some assumptions. Erkenntnisstheoretiker are but +fallible mortals. When they study the function of cognition, they do +it by means of the same function in themselves. And knowing that the +fountain cannot go higher than its source, we should promptly confess +that our results in this field are affected by our own liability to +err. THE MOST WE CAN CLAIM IS, THAT WHAT WE SAY ABOUT COGNITION MAY BE +COUNTED AS TRUE AS WHAT WE SAY ABOUT ANYTHING ELSE. If our hearers agree +with us about what are to be held 'realities,' they will perhaps also +agree to the reality of our doctrine of the way in which they are known. +We cannot ask for more. + +Our terminology shall follow the spirit of these remarks. We will deny +the function of knowledge to any feeling whose quality or content we do +not ourselves believe to exist outside of that feeling as well as in +it. We may call such a feeling a dream if we like; we shall have to see +later whether we can call it a fiction or an error. + +To revert now to our thesis. Some persons will immediately cry out, 'How +CAN a reality resemble a feeling?' Here we find how wise we were to name +the quality of the feeling by an algebraic letter Q. We flank the whole +difficulty of resemblance between an inner state and an outward reality, +by leaving it free to any one to postulate as the reality whatever sort +of thing he thinks CAN resemble a feeling,--if not an outward thing, +then another feeling like the first one,--the mere feeling Q in the +critic's mind for example. Evading thus this objection, we turn to +another which is sure to be urged. + +It will come from those philosophers to whom 'thought,' in the sense of +a knowledge of relations, is the all in all of mental life; and who hold +a merely feeling consciousness to be no better--one would sometimes say +from their utterances, a good deal worse--than no consciousness at all. +Such phrases as these, for example, are common to-day in the mouths of +those who claim to walk in the footprints of Kant and Hegel rather than +in the ancestral English paths: 'A perception detached from all others, +"left out of the heap we call a mind," being out of all relation, has no +qualities--is simply nothing. We can no more consider it than we can +see vacancy.' 'It is simply in itself fleeting, momentary, unnameable +(because while we name it it has become another), and for the very same +reason unknowable, the very negation of knowability.' 'Exclude from what +we have considered real all qualities constituted by relation, we find +that none are left.' + +Altho such citations as these from the writings of Professor Green might +be multiplied almost indefinitely, they would hardly repay the pains of +collection, so egregiously false is the doctrine they teach. Our little +supposed feeling, whatever it may be, from the cognitive point of view, +whether a bit of knowledge or a dream, is certainly no psychical zero. +It is a most positively and definitely qualified inner fact, with a +complexion all its own. Of course there are many mental facts which it +is NOT. It knows Q, if Q be a reality, with a very minimum of knowledge. +It neither dates nor locates it. It neither classes nor names it. And +it neither knows itself as a feeling, nor contrasts itself with other +feelings, nor estimates its own duration or intensity. It is, in short, +if there is no more of it than this, a most dumb and helpless and +useless kind of thing. + +But if we must describe it by so many negations, and if it can say +nothing ABOUT itself or ABOUT anything else, by what right do we deny +that it is a psychical zero? And may not the 'relationists' be right +after all? + +In the innocent looking word 'about' lies the solution of this riddle; +and a simple enough solution it is when frankly looked at. A quotation +from a too seldom quoted book, the Exploratio Philosophica of John Grote +(London, 1865), p. 60, will form the best introduction to it. + +'Our knowledge,' writes Grote, 'may be contemplated in either of two +ways, or, to use other words, we may speak in a double manner of the +"object" of knowledge. That is, we may either use language thus: we +KNOW a thing, a man, etc.; or we may use it thus: we know such and such +things ABOUT the thing, the man, etc. Language in general, following its +true logical instinct, distinguishes between these two applications +of the notion of knowledge, the one being yvwvai, noscere, kennen, +connaitre, the other being eidevai, scire, wissen, savoir. In +the origin, the former may be considered more what I have called +phenomenal--it is the notion of knowledge as ACQUAINTANCE or familiarity +with what is known; which notion is perhaps more akin to the phenomenal +bodily communication, and is less purely intellectual than the other; it +is the kind of knowledge which we have of a thing by the presentation +to the senses or the representation of it in picture or type, a +Vorstellung. The other, which is what we express in judgments or +propositions, what is embodied in Begriffe or concepts without any +necessary imaginative representation, is in its origin the more +intellectual notion of knowledge. There is no reason, however, why we +should not express our knowledge, whatever its kind, in either manner, +provided only we do not confusedly express it, in the same proposition +or piece of reasoning, in both.' + +Now obviously if our supposed feeling of Q is (if knowledge at all) only +knowledge of the mere acquaintance-type, it is milking a he-goat, as +the ancients would have said, to try to extract from it any deliverance +ABOUT anything under the sun, even about itself. And it is as unjust, +after our failure, to turn upon it and call it a psychical nothing, as +it would be, after our fruitless attack upon the billy-goat, to proclaim +the non-lactiferous character of the whole goat-tribe. But the entire +industry of the Hegelian school in trying to shove simple sensation out +of the pale of philosophic recognition is founded on this false issue. +It is always the 'speechlessness' of sensation, its inability to make +any 'statement,'[Footnote: See, for example, Green's Introduction to +Hume's Treatise of Human Nature, p. 36.] that is held to make the very +notion of it meaningless, and to justify the student of knowledge in +scouting it out of existence. 'Significance,' in the sense of standing +as the sign of other mental states, is taken to be the sole function +of what mental states we have; and from the perception that our little +primitive sensation has as yet no significance in this literal sense, +it is an easy step to call it first meaningless, next senseless, then +vacuous, and finally to brand it as absurd and inadmissible. But in +this universal liquidation, this everlasting slip, slip, slip, of direct +acquaintance into knowledge-ABOUT, until at last nothing is left +about which the knowledge can be supposed to obtain, does not all +'significance' depart from the situation? And when our knowledge about +things has reached its never so complicated perfection, must there +not needs abide alongside of it and inextricably mixed in with it some +acquaintance with WHAT things all this knowledge is about? + +Now, our supposed little feeling gives a WHAT; and if other feelings +should succeed which remember the first, its WHAT may stand as subject +or predicate of some piece of knowledge-about, of some judgment, +perceiving relations between it and other WHATS which the other feelings +may know. The hitherto dumb Q will then receive a name and be no +longer speechless. But every name, as students of logic know, has its +'denotation'; and the denotation always means some reality or content, +relationless as extra or with its internal relations unanalyzed, +like the Q which our primitive sensation is supposed to know. No +relation-expressing proposition is possible except on the basis of a +preliminary acquaintance with such 'facts,' with such contents, as this. +Let the Q be fragrance, let it be toothache, or let it be a more complex +kind of feeling, like that of the full-moon swimming in her blue abyss, +it must first come in that simple shape, and be held fast in that first +intention, before any knowledge ABOUT it can be attained. The knowledge +ABOUT it is IT with a context added. Undo IT, and what is added cannot +be CONtext. [Footnote: If A enters and B exclaims, 'Didn't you see my +brother on the stairs?' we all hold that A may answer, 'I saw him, +but didn't know he was your brother'; ignorance of brotherhood not +abolishing power to see. But those who, on account of the unrelatedness +of the first facts with which we become acquainted, deny them to be +'known' to us, ought in consistency to maintain that if A did not +perceive the relationship of the man on the stairs to B, it was +impossible he should have noticed him at all.] + +Let us say no more then about this objection, but enlarge our thesis, +thus: If there be in the universe a Q other than the Q in the feeling, +the latter may have acquaintance with an entity ejective to itself; an +acquaintance moreover, which, as mere acquaintance, it would be hard to +imagine susceptible either of improvement or increase, being in its way +complete; and which would oblige us (so long as we refuse not to call +acquaintance knowledge) to say not only that the feeling is cognitive, +but that all qualities of feeling, SO LONG AS THERE IS ANYTHING OUTSIDE +OF THEM WHICH THEY RESEMBLE, are feelings OF qualities of existence, and +perceptions of outward fact. + +The point of this vindication of the cognitive function of the first +feeling lies, it will be noticed, in the discovery that q does exist +elsewhere than in it. In case this discovery were not made, we could +not be sure the feeling was cognitive; and in case there were nothing +outside to be discovered, we should have to call the feeling a dream. +But the feeling itself cannot make the discovery. Its own q is the only +q it grasps; and its own nature is not a particle altered by having +the self-transcendent function of cognition either added to it or taken +away. The function is accidental; synthetic, not analytic; and falls +outside and not inside its being. [Footnote: It seems odd to call so +important a function accidental, but I do not see how we can mend the +matter. Just as, if we start with the reality and ask how it may come +to be known, we can only reply by invoking a feeling which shall +RECONSTRUCT it in its own more private fashion; so, if we start with the +feeling and ask how it may come to know, we can only reply by invoking +a reality which shall RECONSTRUCT it in its own more public fashion. In +either case, however, the datum we start with remains just what it was. +One may easily get lost in verbal mysteries about the difference +between quality of feeling and feeling of quality, between receiving +and reconstructing the knowledge of a reality. But at the end we must +confess that the notion of real cognition involves an unmediated dualism +of the knower and the known. See Bowne's Metaphysics, New York, 1882, +pp. 403-412, and various passages in Lotze, e.g., Logic, Sec. 308. +['Unmediated' is a bad word to have used.--1909.]] + +A feeling feels as a gun shoots. If there be nothing to be felt or +hit, they discharge themselves ins blaue hinein. If, however, something +starts up opposite them, they no longer simply shoot or feel, they hit +and know. + +But with this arises a worse objection than any yet made. We the +critics look on and see a real q and a feeling of q; and because the two +resemble each other, we say the one knows the other. But what right have +we to say this until we know that the feeling of q means to stand for or +represent just that SAME other q? Suppose, instead of one q, a number +of real q's in the field. If the gun shoots and hits, we can easily +see which one of them it hits. But how can we distinguish which one the +feeling knows? It knows the one it stands for. But which one DOES +it stand for? It declares no intention in this respect. It merely +resembles; it resembles all indifferently; and resembling, per se, is +not necessarily representing or standing-for at all. Eggs resemble each +other, but do not on that account represent, stand for, or know each +other. And if you say this is because neither of them is a FEELING, +then imagine the world to consist of nothing but toothaches, which ARE +feelings, feelings resembling each other exactly,--would they know each +other the better for all that? + +The case of q being a bare quality like that of toothache-pain is quite +different from that of its being a concrete individual thing. There is +practically no test for deciding whether the feeling of a bare quality +means to represent it or not. It can DO nothing to the quality beyond +resembling it, simply because an abstract quality is a thing to which +nothing can be done. Being without context or environment or principium +individuationis, a quiddity with no haecceity, a platonic idea, even +duplicate editions of such a quality (were they possible), would be +indiscernible, and no sign could be given, no result altered, whether +the feeling I meant to stand for this edition or for that, or whether it +simply resembled the quality without meaning to stand for it at all. + +If now we grant a genuine pluralism of editions to the quality q, by +assigning to each a CONTEXT which shall distinguish it from its mates, +we may proceed to explain which edition of it the feeling knows, by +extending our principle of resemblance to the context too, and saying +the feeling knows the particular q whose context it most exactly +duplicates. But here again the theoretic doubt recurs: duplication and +coincidence, are they knowledge? The gun shows which q it points to and +hits, by BREAKING it. Until the feeling can show us which q it points to +and knows, by some equally flagrant token, why are we not free to deny +that it either points to or knows any one of the REAL q's at all, and to +affirm that the word 'resemblance' exhaustively describes its relation +to the reality? + +Well, as a matter of fact, every actual feeling DOES show us, quite as +flagrantly as the gun, which q it points to; and practically in concrete +cases the matter is decided by an element we have hitherto left out. Let +us pass from abstractions to possible instances, and ask our obliging +deus ex machina to frame for us a richer world. Let him send me, +for example, a dream of the death of a certain man, and let him +simultaneously cause the man to die. How would our practical instinct +spontaneously decide whether this were a case of cognition of the +reality, or only a sort of marvellous coincidence of a resembling +reality with my dream? Just such puzzling cases as this are what the +'society for psychical research' is busily collecting and trying to +interpret in the most reasonable way. + +If my dream were the only one of the kind I ever had in my life, if the +context of the death in the dream differed in many particulars from +the real death's context, and if my dream led me to no action about the +death, unquestionably we should all call it a strange coincidence, +and naught besides. But if the death in the dream had a long context, +agreeing point for point with every feature that attended the real +death; if I were constantly having such dreams, all equally perfect, and +if on awaking I had a habit of ACTING immediately as if they were true +and so getting 'the start' of my more tardily instructed neighbors,--we +should in all probability have to admit that I had some mysterious kind +of clairvoyant power, that my dreams in an inscrutable way meant just +those realities they figured, and that the word 'coincidence' failed +to touch the root of the matter. And whatever doubts any one preserved +would completely vanish, if it should appear that from the midst of my +dream I had the power of INTERFERING with the course of the reality, and +making the events in it turn this way or that, according as I dreamed +they should. Then at least it would be certain that my waking critics +and my dreaming self were dealing with the SAME. + +And thus do men invariably decide such a question. THE FALLING OF THE +DREAM'S PRACTICAL CONSEQUENCES into the real world, and the EXTENT +of the resemblance between the two worlds are the criteria they +instinctively use. [Footnote: The thoroughgoing objector might, it is +true, still return to the charge, and, granting a dream which should +completely mirror the real universe, and all the actions dreamed in +which should be instantly matched by duplicate actions in this universe, +still insist that this is nothing more than harmony, and that it is as +far as ever from being made clear whether the dream-world refers to that +other world, all of whose details it so closely copies. This objection +leads deep into metaphysics. I do not impugn its importance, and justice +obliges me to say that but for the teachings of my colleague, Dr. Josiah +Royce, I should neither have grasped its full force nor made my own +practical and psychological point of view as clear to myself as it is. +On this occasion I prefer to stick steadfastly to that point of view; +but I hope that Dr. Royce's more fundamental criticism of the function +of cognition may ere long see the light. [I referred in this note to +Royce's religious aspect of philosophy, then about to be published. This +powerful book maintained that the notion of REFERRING involved that of +an inclusive mind that shall own both the real q and the mental q, and +use the latter expressly as a representative symbol of the former. +At the time I could not refute this transcendentalist opinion. Later, +largely through the influence of Professor D. S. Miller (see his essay +'The meaning of truth and error,' in the Philosophical Review for 1893, +vol. 2 p. 403) I came to see that any definitely experienceable workings +would serve as intermediaries quite as well as the absolute mind's +intentions would.]] All feeling is for the sake of action, all feeling +results in action,--to-day no argument is needed to prove these truths. +But by a most singular disposition of nature which we may conceive +to have been different, MY FEELINGS ACT UPON THE REALITIES WITHIN MY +CRITIC'S WORLD. Unless, then, my critic can prove that my feeling does +not 'point to' those realities which it acts upon, how can he continue +to doubt that he and I are alike cognizant of one and the same real +world? If the action is performed in one world, that must be the world +the feeling intends; if in another world, THAT is the world the feeling +has in mind. If your feeling bear no fruits in my world, I call it +utterly detached from my world; I call it a solipsism, and call its +world a dream-world. If your toothache do not prompt you to ACT as if +I had a toothache, nor even as if I had a separate existence; if you +neither say to me, 'I know now how you must suffer!' nor tell me of +a remedy, I deny that your feeling, however it may resemble mine, is +really cognizant of mine. It gives no SIGN of being cognizant, and such +a sign is absolutely necessary to my admission that it is. + +Before I can think you to mean my world, you must affect my world; +before I can think you to mean much of it, you must affect much of it; +and before I can be sure you mean it AS I DO, you must affect it JUST +AS I SHOULD if I were in your place. Then I, your critic, will gladly +believe that we are thinking, not only of the same reality, but that we +are thinking it ALIKE, and thinking of much of its extent. + +Without the practical effects of our neighbor's feelings on our own +world, we should never suspect the existence of our neighbor's feelings +at all, and of course should never find ourselves playing the critic as +we do in this article. The constitution of nature is very peculiar. In +the world of each of us are certain objects called human bodies, which +move about and act on all the other objects there, and the occasions of +their action are in the main what the occasions of our action would be, +were they our bodies. They use words and gestures, which, if we used +them, would have thoughts behind them,--no mere thoughts uberhaupt, +however, but strictly determinate thoughts. I think you have the notion +of fire in general, because I see you act towards this fire in my room +just as I act towards it,--poke it and present your person towards it, +and so forth. But that binds me to believe that if you feel 'fire' +at all, THIS is the fire you feel. As a matter of fact, whenever we +constitute ourselves into psychological critics, it is not by dint of +discovering which reality a feeling 'resembles' that we find out which +reality it means. We become first aware of which one it means, and then +we suppose that to be the one it resembles. We see each other looking +at the same objects, pointing to them and turning them over in various +ways, and thereupon we hope and trust that all of our several feelings +resemble the reality and each other. But this is a thing of which we +are never theoretically sure. Still, it would practically be a case of +grubelsucht, if a ruffian were assaulting and drubbing my body, to spend +much time in subtle speculation either as to whether his vision of my +body resembled mine, or as to whether the body he really MEANT to insult +were not some body in his mind's eye, altogether other from my own. The +practical point of view brushes such metaphysical cobwebs away. If what +he have in mind be not MY body, why call we it a body at all? His mind +is inferred by me as a term, to whose existence we trace the things +that happen. The inference is quite void if the term, once inferred, be +separated from its connection with the body that made me infer it, +and connected with another that is not mine at all. No matter for the +metaphysical puzzle of how our two minds, the ruffian's and mine, can +mean the same body. Men who see each other's bodies sharing the same +space, treading the same earth, splashing the same water, making the +same air resonant, and pursuing the same game and eating out of the +same dish, will never practically believe in a pluralism of solipsistic +worlds. + +Where, however, the actions of one mind seem to take no effect in the +world of the other, the case is different. This is what happens in +poetry and fiction. Every one knows Ivanhoe, for example; but so long as +we stick to the story pure and simple without regard to the facts of its +production, few would hesitate to admit that there are as many different +Ivanhoes as there are different minds cognizant of the story. [Footnote: +That is, there is no REAL 'Ivanhoe,' not even the one in Sir Walter +Scott's mind as he was writing the story. That one is only the FIRST +one of the Ivanhoe-solipsisms. It is quite true we can make it the real +Ivanhoe if we like, and then say that the other Ivanhoes know it or do +not know it, according as they refer to and resemble it or no. This is +done by bringing in Sir Walter Scott himself as the author of the real +Ivanhoe, and so making a complex object of both. This object, however, +is not a story pure and simple. It has dynamic relations with the world +common to the experience of all the readers. Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe +got itself printed in volumes which we all can handle, and to any one of +which we can refer to see which of our versions be the true one, i.e., +the original one of Scott himself. We can see the manuscript; in short +we can get back to the Ivanhoe in Scott's mind by many an avenue and +channel of this real world of our experience,--a thing we can by no +means do with either the Ivanhoe or the Rebecca, either the Templar or +the Isaac of York, of the story taken simply as such, and detached from +the conditions of its production. Everywhere, then, we have the same +test: can we pass continuously from two objects in two minds to a third +object which seems to be in BOTH minds, because each mind feels every +modification imprinted on it by the other? If so, the first two objects +named are derivatives, to say the least, from the same third object, and +may be held, if they resemble each other, to refer to one and the same +reality.] The fact that all these Ivanhoes RESEMBLE each other does +not prove the contrary. But if an alteration invented by one man in his +version were to reverberate immediately through all the other versions, +and produce changes therein, we should then easily agree that all +these thinkers were thinking the SAME Ivanhoe, and that, fiction or no +fiction, it formed a little world common to them all. + +Having reached this point, we may take up our thesis and improve it +again. Still calling the reality by the name of q and letting the +critic's feeling vouch for it, we can say that any other feeling will +be held cognizant of q, provided it both resemble q, and refer to q, +as shown by its either modifying q directly, or modifying some other +reality, p or r, which the critic knows to be continuous with q. Or more +shortly, thus: THE FEELING OF q KNOWS WHATEVER REALITY IT RESEMBLES, +AND EITHER DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY OPERATES ON. If it resemble without +operating, it is a dream; if it operate without resembling, it is an +error. [Footnote: Among such errors are those cases in which our feeling +operates on a reality which it does partially resemble, and yet does not +intend: as for instance, when I take up your umbrella, meaning to take +my own. I cannot be said here either to know your umbrella, or my own, +which latter my feeling more completely resembles. I am mistaking them +both, misrepresenting their context, etc. + +We have spoken in the text as if the critic were necessarily one mind, +and the feeling criticised another. But the criticised feeling and its +critic may be earlier and later feelings of the same mind, and here it +might seem that we could dispense with the notion of operating, to prove +that critic and criticised are referring to and meaning to represent +the SAME. We think we see our past feelings directly, and know what they +refer to without appeal. At the worst, we can always fix the intention +of our present feeling and MAKE it refer to the same reality to +which any one of our past feelings may have referred. So we need no +'operating' here, to make sure that the feeling and its critic mean the +same real q. Well, all the better if this is so! We have covered the +more complex and difficult case in our text, and we may let this easier +one go. The main thing at present is to stick to practical psychology, +and ignore metaphysical difficulties. + +One more remark. Our formula contains, it will be observed, nothing to +correspond to the great principle of cognition laid down by Professor +Ferrier in his Institutes of Metaphysic and apparently adopted by all +the followers of Fichte, the principle, namely, that for knowledge to +be constituted there must be knowledge of the knowing mind along with +whatever else is known: not q, as we have supposed, but q PLUS MYSELF, +must be the least I can know. It is certain that the common sense +of mankind never dreams of using any such principle when it tries to +discriminate between conscious states that are knowledge and conscious +states that are not. So that Ferrier's principle, if it have any +relevancy at all, must have relevancy to the metaphysical possibility +of consciousness at large, and not to the practically recognized +constitution of cognitive consciousness. We may therefore pass it by +without further notice here.] It is to be feared that the reader may +consider this formula rather insignificant and obvious, and hardly worth +the labor of so many pages, especially when he considers that the only +cases to which it applies are percepts, and that the whole field of +symbolic or conceptual thinking seems to elude its grasp. Where the +reality is either a material thing or act, or a state of the critic's +consciousness, I may both mirror it in my mind and operate upon it--in +the latter case indirectly, of course--as soon as I perceive it. But +there are many cognitions, universally allowed to be such, which neither +mirror nor operate on their realities. + +In the whole field of symbolic thought we are universally held both +to intend, to speak of, and to reach conclusions about--to know +in short--particular realities, without having in our subjective +consciousness any mind-stuff that resembles them even in a remote +degree. We are instructed about them by language which awakens no +consciousness beyond its sound; and we know WHICH realities they are by +the faintest and most fragmentary glimpse of some remote context they +may have and by no direct imagination of themselves. As minds may differ +here, let me speak in the first person. I am sure that my own current +thinking has WORDS for its almost exclusive subjective material, words +which are made intelligible by being referred to some reality that lies +beyond the horizon of direct consciousness, and of which I am only aware +as of a terminal MORE existing in a certain direction, to which the +words might lead but do not lead yet. The SUBJECT, or TOPIC, of the +words is usually something towards which I mentally seem to pitch them +in a backward way, almost as I might jerk my thumb over my shoulder to +point at something, without looking round, if I were only entirely sure +that it was there. The UPSHOT, or CONCLUSION, of the words is something +towards which I seem to incline my head forwards, as if giving assent to +its existence, tho all my mind's eye catches sight of may be some tatter +of an image connected with it, which tatter, however, if only endued +with the feeling of familiarity and reality, makes me feel that the +whole to which it belongs is rational and real, and fit to be let pass. + +Here then is cognitive consciousness on a large scale, and yet what +it knows, it hardly resembles in the least degree. The formula last laid +down for our thesis must therefore be made more complete. We may +now express it thus: A PERCEPT KNOWS WHATEVER REALITY IT DIRECTLY OR +INDIRECTLY OPERATES ON AND RESEMBLES; ACONCEPTUAL FEELING, OR THOUGHT +KNOWS A REALITY, WHENEVER IT ACTUALLY OR POTENTIALLY TERMINATES IN A +PERCEPT THAT OPERATES ON, OR RESEMBLES THAT REALITY, OR IS OTHERWISE +CONNECTED WITH IT OR WITH ITS CONTEXT. The latter percept may be either +sensation or sensorial idea; and when I say the thought must TERMINATE +in such a percept, I mean that it must ultimately be capable of leading +up thereto,--by the way of practical [missing section] is an incomplete +'thought about' that reality, that reality is its 'topic,' etc. +experience, if the terminal feeling be a sensation; by the way of +logical or habitual suggestion, if it be only an image in the mind. + +Let an illustration make this plainer. I open the first book I take up, +and read the first sentence that meets my eye: 'Newton saw the handiwork +of God in the heavens as plainly as Paley in the animal kingdom.' I +immediately look back and try to analyze the subjective state in which I +rapidly apprehended this sentence as I read it. In the first place there +was an obvious feeling that the sentence was intelligible and rational +and related to the world of realities. There was also a sense of +agreement or harmony between 'Newton,' 'Paley,' and 'God.' There was no +apparent image connected with the words 'heavens,' or 'handiwork,' or +'God'; they were words merely. With 'animal kingdom' I think there was +the faintest consciousness (it may possibly have been an image of the +steps) of the Museum of Zoology in the town of Cambridge where I write. +With 'Paley' there was an equally faint consciousness of a small +dark leather book; and with 'Newton' a pretty distinct vision of the +right-hand lower corner of curling periwig. This is all the mind-stuff I +can discover in my first consciousness of the meaning of this sentence, +and I am afraid that even not all of this would have been present had I +come upon the sentence in a genuine reading of the book, and not picked +it out for an experiment. And yet my consciousness was truly cognitive. +The sentence is 'about realities' which my psychological critic--for we +must not forget him--acknowledges to be such, even as he acknowledges +my distinct feeling that they ARE realities, and my acquiescence in the +general rightness of what I read of them, to be true knowledge on my +part. + +Now what justifies my critic in being as lenient as this? This +singularly inadequate consciousness of mine, made up of symbols that +neither resemble nor affect the realities they stand for,--how can he be +sure it is cognizant of the very realities he has himself in mind? + +He is sure because in countless like cases he has seen such inadequate +and symbolic thoughts, by developing themselves, terminate in percepts +that practically modified and presumably resembled his own. By +'developing' themselves is meant obeying their tendencies, following up +the suggestions nascently present in them, working in the direction in +which they seem to point, clearing up the penumbra, making distinct the +halo, unravelling the fringe, which is part of their composition, and in +the midst of which their more substantive kernel of subjective content +seems consciously to lie. Thus I may develop my thought in the Paley +direction by procuring the brown leather volume and bringing the +passages about the animal kingdom before the critic's eyes. I may +satisfy him that the words mean for me just what they mean for him, +by showing him IN CONCRETO the very animals and their arrangements, of +which the pages treat. I may get Newton's works and portraits; or if +I follow the line of suggestion of the wig, I may smother my critic in +seventeenth-century matters pertaining to Newton's environment, to show +that the word 'Newton' has the same LOCUS and relations in both our +minds. Finally I may, by act and word, persuade him that what I mean by +God and the heavens and the analogy of the handiworks, is just what he +means also. + +My demonstration in the last resort is to his SENSES. My thought makes +me act on his senses much as he might himself act on them, were he +pursuing the consequences of a perception of his own. Practically +then MY thought terminates in HIS realities. He willingly supposes it, +therefore, to be OF them, and inwardly to RESEMBLE what his own thought +would be, were it of the same symbolic sort as mine. And the pivot and +fulcrum and support of his mental persuasion, is the sensible operation +which my thought leads me, or may lead, to effect--the bringing of +Paley's book, of Newton's portrait, etc., before his very eyes. + +In the last analysis, then, we believe that we all know and think about +and talk about the same world, because WE BELIEVE OUR PERCEPTS ARE +POSSESSED BY US IN COMMON. And we believe this because the percepts +of each one of us seem to be changed in consequence of changes in the +percepts of someone else. What I am for you is in the first instance a +percept of your own. Unexpectedly, however, I open and show you a book, +uttering certain sounds the while. These acts are also your percepts, +but they so resemble acts of yours with feelings prompting them, that +you cannot doubt I have the feelings too, or that the book is one +book felt in both our worlds. That it is felt in the same way, that my +feelings of it resemble yours, is something of which we never can be +sure, but which we assume as the simplest hypothesis that meets +the case. As a matter of fact, we never ARE sure of it, and, as +ERKENNTNISSTHEORETIKER, we can only say that of feelings that should NOT +resemble each other, both could not know the same thing at the same +time in the same way. [Footnote: Though both might terminate in the same +thing and be incomplete thoughts 'about' it.] If each holds to its own +percept as the reality, it is bound to say of the other percept, that, +though it may INTEND that reality, and prove this by working change upon +it, yet, if it do not resemble it, it is all false and wrong. [Footnote: +The difference between Idealism and Realism is immaterial here. What +is said in the text is consistent with either theory. A law by which my +percept shall change yours directly is no more mysterious than a law +by which it shall first change a physical reality, and then the reality +change yours. In either case you and I seem knit into a continuous +world, and not to form a pair of solipsisms.] + +If this be so of percepts, how much more so of higher modes of thought! +Even in the sphere of sensation individuals are probably different +enough. Comparative study of the simplest conceptual elements seems to +show a wider divergence still. And when it comes to general theories +and emotional attitudes towards life, it is indeed time to say with +Thackeray, 'My friend, two different universes walk about under your hat +and under mine.' + +What can save us at all and prevent us from flying asunder into a chaos +of mutually repellent solipsisms? Through what can our several minds +commune? Through nothing but the mutual resemblance of those of our +perceptual feelings which have this power of modifying one another, +WHICH ARE MERE DUMB KNOWLEDGES-OF-ACQUAINTANCE, and which must also +resemble their realities or not know them aright at all. In such pieces +of knowledge-of-acquaintance all our knowledge-about must end, and +carry a sense of this possible termination as part of its content. +These percepts, these termini, these sensible things, these mere +matters-of-acquaintance, are the only realities we ever directly know, +and the whole history of our thought is the history of our substitution +of one of them for another, and the reduction of the substitute to the +status of a conceptual sign. Contemned though they be by some thinkers, +these sensations are the mother-earth, the anchorage, the stable rock, +the first and last limits, the terminus a quo and the terminus ad quem +of the mind. To find such sensational termini should be our aim with all +our higher thought. They end discussion; they destroy the false conceit +of knowledge; and without them we are all at sea with each other's +meaning. If two men act alike on a percept, they believe themselves to +feel alike about it; if not, they may suspect they know it in differing +ways. We can never be sure we understand each other till we are able to +bring the matter to this test. [Footnote: 'There is no distinction of +meaning so fine as to consist in anything but a possible difference of +practice.... It appears, then, that the rule for attaining the [highest] +grade of clearness of apprehension is as follows: Consider what effects, +which might conceivably have practical bearings, we conceive the object +of our conception to have. Then, our conception of these effects is the +whole of our conception of the object.' Charles S. Peirce: 'How to make +our Ideas clear,' in Popular Science Monthly, New York, January, 1878, +p. 293.] This is why metaphysical discussions are so much like fighting +with the air; they have no practical issue of a sensational kind. +'Scientific' theories, on the other hand, always terminate in definite +percepts. You can deduce a possible sensation from your theory and, +taking me into your laboratory, prove that your theory is true of my +world by giving me the sensation then and there. Beautiful is the +flight of conceptual reason through the upper air of truth. No wonder +philosophers are dazzled by it still, and no wonder they look with some +disdain at the low earth of feeling from which the goddess launched +herself aloft. But woe to her if she return not home to its +acquaintance; Nirgends haften dann die unsicheren Sohlen--every crazy +wind will take her, and, like a fire-balloon at night, she will go out +among the stars. + +NOTE.--The reader will easily see how much of the account of the +truth-function developed later in Pragmatism was already explicit in +this earlier article, and how much came to be defined later. In this +earlier article we find distinctly asserted:-- + +1. The reality, external to the true idea; + +2. The critic, reader, or epistemologist, with his own belief, as +warrant for this reality's existence; + +3. The experienceable environment, as the vehicle or medium connecting +knower with known, and yielding the cognitive RELATION; + +4. The notion of POINTING, through this medium, to the reality, as one +condition of our being said to know it; + +5. That of RESEMBLING it, and eventually AFFECTING it, as determining +the pointing to IT and not to something else. + +6. The elimination of the 'epistemological gulf,' so that the whole +truth-relation falls inside of the continuities of concrete experience, +and is constituted of particular processes, varying with every object +and subject, and susceptible of being described in detail. + +The defects in this earlier account are:-- + +1. The possibly undue prominence given to resembling, which altho a +fundamental function in knowing truly, is so often dispensed with; + +2. The undue emphasis laid upon operating on the object itself, which in +many cases is indeed decisive of that being what we refer to, but which +is often lacking, or replaced by operations on other things related to +the object. + +3. The imperfect development of the generalized notion of the +WORKABILITY of the feeling or idea as equivalent to that SATISFACTORY +ADAPTATION to the particular reality, which constitutes the truth of +the idea. It is this more generalized notion, as covering all such +specifications as pointing, fitting, operating or resembling, that +distinguishes the developed view of Dewey, Schiller, and myself. + +4. The treatment, [earlier], of percepts as the only realm of reality. I +now treat concepts as a co-ordinate realm. + +The next paper represents a somewhat broader grasp of the topic on the +writer's part. + + + +II + +THE TIGERS IN INDIA [Footnote: Extracts from a presidential address +before the American Psychological Association, published in the +Psychological Review, vol. ii, p. 105 (1895).] + +THERE are two ways of knowing things, knowing them immediately or +intuitively, and knowing them conceptually or representatively. Altho +such things as the white paper before our eyes can be known intuitively, +most of the things we know, the tigers now in India, for example, or +the scholastic system of philosophy, are known only representatively or +symbolically. + +Suppose, to fix our ideas, that we take first a case of conceptual +knowledge; and let it be our knowledge of the tigers in India, as we sit +here. Exactly what do we MEAN by saying that we here know the tigers? +What is the precise fact that the cognition so confidently claimed is +KNOWN-AS, to use Shadworth Hodgson's inelegant but valuable form of +words? + +Most men would answer that what we mean by knowing the tigers is having +them, however absent in body, become in some way present to our thought; +or that our knowledge of them is known as presence of our thought to +them. A great mystery is usually made of this peculiar presence in +absence; and the scholastic philosophy, which is only common sense +grown pedantic, would explain it as a peculiar kind of existence, called +INTENTIONAL EXISTENCE of the tigers in our mind. At the very least, +people would say that what we mean by knowing the tigers is mentally +POINTING towards them as we sit here. + +But now what do we mean by POINTING, in such a case as this? What is the +pointing known-as, here? + +To this question I shall have to give a very prosaic answer--one +that traverses the pre-possessions not only of common sense and +scholasticism, but also those of nearly all the epistemological writers +whom I have ever read. The answer, made brief, is this: The pointing of +our thought to the tigers is known simply and solely as a procession of +mental associates and motor consequences that follow on the thought, and +that would lead harmoniously, if followed out, into some ideal or real +context, or even into the immediate presence, of the tigers. It is known +as our rejection of a jaguar, if that beast were shown us as a tiger; as +our assent to a genuine tiger if so shown. It is known as our ability +to utter all sorts of propositions which don't contradict other +propositions that are true of the real tigers. It is even known, if we +take the tigers very seriously, as actions of ours which may terminate +in directly intuited tigers, as they would if we took a voyage to India +for the purpose of tiger-hunting and brought back a lot of skins of +the striped rascals which we had laid low. In all this there is no +self-transcendency in our mental images TAKEN BY THEMSELVES. They are +one phenomenal fact; the tigers are another; and their pointing to the +tigers is a perfectly commonplace intra-experiential relation, IF YOU +ONCE GRANT A CONNECTING WORLD TO BE THERE. In short, the ideas and the +tigers are in themselves as loose and separate, to use Hume's language, +as any two things can be; and pointing means here an operation as +external and adventitious as any that nature yields.[Footnote: A +stone in one field may 'fit,' we say, a hole in another field. But the +relation of 'fitting,' so long as no one carries the stone to the hole +and drops it in, is only one name for the fact that such an act MAY +happen. Similarly with the knowing of the tigers here and now. It is +only an anticipatory name for a further associative and terminative +process that MAY occur.] + +I hope you may agree with me now that in representative knowledge there +is no special inner mystery, but only an outer chain of physical or +mental intermediaries connecting thought and thing. TO KNOW AN OBJECT IS +HERE TO LEAD TO IT THROUGH A CONTEXT WHICH THE WORLD SUPPLIES. All this +was most instructively set forth by our colleague D. S. Miller at our +meeting in New York last Christmas, and for re-confirming my sometime +wavering opinion, I owe him this acknowledgment. [Footnote: See Dr. +Miller's articles on Truth and Error, and on Content and Function, in +the Philosophical Review, July, 1893, and Nov., 1895.] + +Let us next pass on to the case of immediate or intuitive acquaintance +with an object, and let the object be the white paper before our eyes. +The thought-stuff and the thing-stuff are here indistinguishably the +same in nature, as we saw a moment since, and there is no context of +intermediaries or associates to stand between and separate the thought +and thing. There is no 'presence in absence' here, and no 'pointing,' +but rather an allround embracing of the paper by the thought; and it is +clear that the knowing cannot now be explained exactly as it was when +the tigers were its object. Dotted all through our experience are states +of immediate acquaintance just like this. Somewhere our belief always +does rest on ultimate data like the whiteness, smoothness, or squareness +of this paper. Whether such qualities be truly ultimate aspects of +being, or only provisional suppositions of ours, held-to till we get +better informed, is quite immaterial for our present inquiry. So long as +it is believed in, we see our object face to face. What now do we mean +by 'knowing' such a sort of object as this? For this is also the way +in which we should know the tiger if our conceptual idea of him were to +terminate by having led us to his lair? + +This address must not become too long, so I must give my answer in the +fewest words. And let me first say this: So far as the white paper or +other ultimate datum of our experience is considered to enter also into +some one else's experience, and we, in knowing it, are held to know it +there as well as here; so far, again, as it is considered to be a mere +mask for hidden molecules that other now impossible experiences of our +own might some day lay bare to view; so far it is a case of tigers in +India again--the things known being absent experiences, the knowing can +only consist in passing smoothly towards them through the intermediary +context that the world supplies. But if our own private vision of the +paper be considered in abstraction from every other event, as if it +constituted by itself the universe (and it might perfectly well do so, +for aught we can understand to the contrary), then the paper seen and +the seeing of it are only two names for one indivisible fact which, +properly named, is THE DATUM, THE PHENOMENON, OR THE EXPERIENCE. The +paper is in the mind and the mind is around the paper, because paper +and mind are only two names that are given later to the one experience, +when, taken in a larger world of which it forms a part, its connections +are traced in different directions. [Footnote: What is meant by this is +that 'the experience' can be referred to either of two great associative +systems, that of the experiencer's mental history, or that of the +experienced facts of the world. Of both of these systems it forms part, +and may be regarded, indeed, as one of their points of intersection. +One might let a vertical line stand for the mental history; but the +same object, O, appears also in the mental history of different persons, +represented by the other vertical lines. It thus ceases to be the +private property of one experience, and becomes, so to speak, a shared +or public thing. We can track its outer history in this way, and +represent it by the horizontal line. (It is also known representatively +at other points of the vertical lines, or intuitively there again, +so that the line of its outer history would have to be looped and +wandering, but I make it straight for simplicity's sake.)] In any case, +however, it is the same stuff figures in all the sets of lines. + +TO KNOW IMMEDIATELY, THEN, OR INTUITIVELY, IS FOR MENTAL CONTENT AND +OBJECT TO BE IDENTICAL. This is a very different definition from that +which we gave of representative knowledge; but neither definition +involves those mysterious notions of self-transcendency and presence in +absence which are such essential parts of the ideas of knowledge, both +of philosophers and of common men. [Footnote: The reader will observe +that the text is written from the point of view of NAIF realism or +common sense, and avoids raising the idealistic controversy.] + + + +III + +HUMANISM AND TRUTH [Footnote: Reprinted, with slight verbal revision, +from Mind, vol. xiii, N. S., p. 457 (October, 1904). A couple of +interpolations from another article in Mind, 'Humanism and truth once +more,' in vol. xiv, have been made.] + +RECEIVING from the Editor of Mind an advance proof of Mr. Bradley's +article on 'Truth and Practice,' I understand this as a hint to me to +join in the controversy over 'Pragmatism' which seems to have seriously +begun. As my name has been coupled with the movement, I deem it wise to +take the hint, the more so as in some quarters greater credit has been +given me than I deserve, and probably undeserved discredit in other +quarters falls also to my lot. + +First, as to the word 'pragmatism.' I myself have only used the term +to indicate a method of carrying on abstract discussion. The serious +meaning of a concept, says Mr. Peirce, lies in the concrete difference +to some one which its being true will make. Strive to bring all +debated conceptions to that' pragmatic' test, and you will escape +vain wrangling: if it can make no practical difference which of two +statements be true, then they are really one statement in two verbal +forms; if it can make no practical difference whether a given statement +be true or false, then the statement has no real meaning. In neither +case is there anything fit to quarrel about: we may save our breath, and +pass to more important things. + +All that the pragmatic method implies, then, is that truths should HAVE +practical [Footnote: 'Practical' in the sense of PARTICULAR, of course, +not in the sense that the consequences may not be MENTAL as well as +physical.] consequences. In England the word has been used more broadly +still, to cover the notion that the truth of any statement CONSISTS in +the consequences, and particularly in their being good consequences. +Here we get beyond affairs of method altogether; and since my pragmatism +and this wider pragmatism are so different, and both are important +enough to have different names, I think that Mr. Schiller's proposal +to call the wider pragmatism by the name of 'humanism' is excellent and +ought to be adopted. The narrower pragmatism may still be spoken of as +the 'pragmatic method.' + +I have read in the past six months many hostile reviews of Schiller's +and Dewey's publications; but with the exception of Mr. Bradley's +elaborate indictment, they are out of reach where I write, and I have +largely forgotten them. I think that a free discussion of the subject +on my part would in any case be more useful than a polemic attempt at +rebutting these criticisms in detail. Mr. Bradley in particular can be +taken care of by Mr. Schiller. He repeatedly confesses himself unable +to comprehend Schiller's views, he evidently has not sought to do so +sympathetically, and I deeply regret to say that his laborious article +throws, for my mind, absolutely no useful light upon the subject. +It seems to me on the whole an IGNORATIO ELENCHI, and I feel free to +disregard it altogether. + +The subject is unquestionably difficult. Messrs. Dewey's and Schiller's +thought is eminently an induction, a generalization working itself free +from all sorts of entangling particulars. If true, it involves much +restatement of traditional notions. This is a kind of intellectual +product that never attains a classic form of expression when first +promulgated. The critic ought therefore not to be too sharp and +logic-chopping in his dealings with it, but should weigh it as a whole, +and especially weigh it against its possible alternatives. One should +also try to apply it first to one instance, and then to another to see +how it will work. It seems to me that it is emphatically not a case +for instant execution, by conviction of intrinsic absurdity or of +self-contradiction, or by caricature of what it would look like if +reduced to skeleton shape. Humanism is in fact much more like one of +those secular changes that come upon public opinion overnight, as it +were, borne upon tides 'too deep for sound or foam,' that survive all +the crudities and extravagances of their advocates, that you can pin +to no one absolutely essential statement, nor kill by any one decisive +stab. + +Such have been the changes from aristocracy to democracy, from classic +to romantic taste, from theistic to pantheistic feeling, from static to +evolutionary ways of understanding life--changes of which we all have +been spectators. Scholasticism still opposes to such changes the method +of confutation by single decisive reasons, showing that the new view +involves self-contradiction, or traverses some fundamental principle. +This is like stopping a river by planting a stick in the middle of its +bed. Round your obstacle flows the water and 'gets there all the same.' +In reading some of our opponents, I am not a little reminded of those +catholic writers who refute darwinism by telling us that higher species +cannot come from lower because minus nequit gignere plus, or that the +notion of transformation is absurd, for it implies that species tend to +their own destruction, and that would violate the principle that every +reality tends to persevere in its own shape. The point of view is too +myopic, too tight and close to take in the inductive argument. Wide +generalizations in science always meet with these summary refutations in +their early days; but they outlive them, and the refutations then sound +oddly antiquated and scholastic. I cannot help suspecting that the +humanistic theory is going through this kind of would-be refutation at +present. + +The one condition of understanding humanism is to become +inductive-minded oneself, to drop rigorous definitions, and follow lines +of least, resistance 'on the whole.' 'In other words,' an opponent might +say, 'resolve your intellect into a kind of slush.' 'Even so,' I make +reply,--'if you will consent to use no politer word.' For humanism, +conceiving the more 'true' as the more 'satisfactory' (Dewey's term), +has sincerely to renounce rectilinear arguments and ancient ideals +of rigor and finality. It is in just this temper of renunciation, so +different from that of pyrrhonistic scepticism, that the spirit of +humanism essentially consists. Satisfactoriness has to be measured by +a multitude of standards, of which some, for aught we know, may fail in +any given case; and what is more satisfactory than any alternative in +sight, may to the end be a sum of PLUSES and MINUSES, concerning which +we can only trust that by ulterior corrections and improvements +a maximum of the one and a minimum of the other may some day be +approached. It means a real change of heart, a break with absolutistic +hopes, when one takes up this inductive view of the conditions of +belief. + +As I understand the pragmatist way of seeing things, it owes its being +to the break-down which the last fifty years have brought about in the +older notions of scientific truth. 'God geometrizes,' it used to be +said; and it was believed that Euclid's elements literally reproduced +his geometrizing. There is an eternal and unchangeable 'reason'; and its +voice was supposed to reverberate in Barbara and Celarent. So also +of the 'laws of nature,' physical and chemical, so of natural history +classifications--all were supposed to be exact and exclusive duplicates +of pre-human archetypes buried in the structure of things, to which the +spark of divinity hidden in our intellect enables us to penetrate. The +anatomy of the world is logical, and its logic is that of a university +professor, it was thought. Up to about 1850 almost every one believed +that sciences expressed truths that were exact copies of a definite +code of non-human realities. But the enormously rapid multiplication of +theories in these latter days has well-nigh upset the notion of any one +of them being a more literally objective kind of thing than another. +There are so many geometries, so many logics, so many physical and +chemical hypotheses, so many classifications, each one of them good for +so much and yet not good for everything, that the notion that even the +truest formula may be a human device and not a literal transcript +has dawned upon us. We hear scientific laws now treated as so much +'conceptual shorthand,' true so far as they are useful but no farther. +Our mind has become tolerant of symbol instead of reproduction, of +approximation instead of exactness, of plasticity instead of rigor. +'Energetics,' measuring the bare face of sensible phenomena so as to +describe in a single formula all their changes of 'level,' is the last +word of this scientific humanism, which indeed leaves queries enough +outstanding as to the reason for so curious a congruence between the +world and the mind, but which at any rate makes our whole notion of +scientific truth more flexible and genial than it used to be. + +It is to be doubted whether any theorizer to-day, either in mathematics, +logic, physics or biology, conceives himself to be literally re-editing +processes of nature or thoughts of God. The main forms of our thinking, +the separation of subjects from predicates, the negative, hypothetic +and disjunctive judgments, are purely human habits. The ether, as Lord +Salisbury said, is only a noun for the verb to undulate; and many of our +theological ideas are admitted, even by those who call them 'true,' to +be humanistic in like degree. + +I fancy that these changes in the current notions of truth are what +originally gave the impulse to Messrs. Dewey's and Schiller's views. +The suspicion is in the air nowadays that the superiority of one of +our formulas to another may not consist so much in its literal +'objectivity,' as in subjective qualities like its usefulness, its +'elegance' or its congruity with our residual beliefs. Yielding to these +suspicions, and generalizing, we fall into something like the humanistic +state of mind. Truth we conceive to mean everywhere, not duplication, +but addition; not the constructing of inner copies of already complete +realities, but rather the collaborating with realities so as to bring +about a clearer result. Obviously this state of mind is at first full of +vagueness and ambiguity. 'Collaborating' is a vague term; it must at +any rate cover conceptions and logical arrangements. 'Clearer' is vaguer +still. Truth must bring clear thoughts, as well as clear the way to +action. 'Reality' is the vaguest term of all. The only way to test such +a programme at all is to apply it to the various types of truth, in the +hope of reaching an account that shall be more precise. Any hypothesis +that forces such a review upon one has one great merit, even if in +the end it prove invalid: it gets us better acquainted with the total +subject. To give the theory plenty of 'rope' and see if it hangs itself +eventually is better tactics than to choke it off at the outset by +abstract accusations of self-contradiction. I think therefore that +a decided effort at sympathetic mental play with humanism is the +provisional attitude to be recommended to the reader. + +When I find myself playing sympathetically with humanism, something like +what follows is what I end by conceiving it to mean. + +Experience is a process that continually gives us new material to +digest. We handle this intellectually by the mass of beliefs of which +we find ourselves already possessed, assimilating, rejecting, or +rearranging in different degrees. Some of the apperceiving ideas are +recent acquisitions of our own, but most of them are common-sense +traditions of the race. There is probably not a common-sense tradition, +of all those which we now live by, that was not in the first instance +a genuine discovery, an inductive generalization like those more recent +ones of the atom, of inertia, of energy, of reflex action, or of fitness +to survive The notions of one Time and of one Space as single continuous +receptacles; the distinction between thoughts and things, matter and +mind between permanent subjects and changing attributes; the conception +of classes with sub classes within them; the separation of fortuitous +from regularly caused connections; surely all these were once definite +conquests made at historic dates by our ancestors in their attempt +to get the chaos of their crude individual experiences into a more +shareable and manageable shape. They proved of such sovereign use as +denkmittel that they are now a part of the very structure of our mind. +We cannot play fast and loose with them. No experience can upset them. +On the contrary, they apperceive every experience and assign it to its +place. + +To what effect? That we may the better foresee the course of our +experiences, communicate with one another, and steer our lives by rule. +Also that we may have a cleaner, clearer, more inclusive mental view. + +The greatest common-sense achievement, after the discovery of one Time +and one Space, is probably the concept of permanently existing things. +When a rattle first drops out of the hand of a baby, he does not look to +see where it has gone. Non-perception he accepts as annihilation until +he finds a better belief. That our perceptions mean BEINGS, rattles +that are there whether we hold them in our hands or not, becomes an +interpretation so luminous of what happens to us that, once employed, +it never gets forgotten. It applies with equal felicity to things and +persons, to the objective and to the ejective realm. However a Berkeley, +a Mill, or a Cornelius may CRITICISE it, it WORKS; and in practical +life we never think of 'going back' upon it, or reading our incoming +experiences in any other terms. We may, indeed, speculatively imagine +a state of 'pure' experience before the hypothesis of permanent objects +behind its flux had been framed; and we can play with the idea that some +primeval genius might have struck into a different hypothesis. But we +cannot positively imagine today what the different hypothesis could have +been, for the category of trans-perceptual reality is now one of the +foundations of our life. Our thoughts must still employ it if they are +to possess reasonableness and truth. + +This notion of a FIRST in the shape of a most chaotic pure experience +which sets us questions, of a SECOND in the way of fundamental +categories, long ago wrought into the structure of our consciousness and +practically irreversible, which define the general frame within which +answers must fall, and of a THIRD which gives the detail of the answers +in the shapes most congruous with all our present needs, is, as I take +it, the essence of the humanistic conception. It represents experience +in its pristine purity to be now so enveloped in predicates historically +worked out that we can think of it as little more than an OTHER, of +a THAT, which the mind, in Mr. Bradley's phrase, 'encounters,' and to +whose stimulating presence we respond by ways of thinking which we +call 'true' in proportion as they facilitate our mental or physical +activities and bring us outer power and inner peace. But whether the +Other, the universal THAT, has itself any definite inner structure, or +whether, if it have any, the structure resembles any of our predicated +WHATS, this is a question which humanism leaves untouched. For us, at +any rate, it insists, reality is an accumulation of our own intellectual +inventions, and the struggle for 'truth' in our progressive dealings +with it is always a struggle to work in new nouns and adjectives while +altering as little as possible the old. + +It is hard to see why either Mr. Bradley's own logic or his +metaphysics should oblige him to quarrel with this conception. He might +consistently adopt it verbatim et literatim, if he would, and simply +throw his peculiar absolute round it, following in this the good example +of Professor Royce. Bergson in France, and his disciples, Wilbois the +physicist and Leroy, are thoroughgoing humanists in the sense defined. +Professor Milhaud also appears to be one; and the great Poincare misses +it by only the breadth of a hair. In Germany the name of Simmel offers +itself as that of a humanist of the most radical sort. Mach and his +school, and Hertz and Ostwald must be classed as humanists. The view is +in the atmosphere and must be patiently discussed. + +The best way to discuss it would be to see what the alternative +might be. What is it indeed? Its critics make no explicit statement, +Professor Royce being the only one so far who has formulated anything +definite. The first service of humanism to philosophy accordingly seems +to be that it will probably oblige those who dislike it to search their +own hearts and heads. It will force analysis to the front and make +it the order of the day. At present the lazy tradition that truth is +adaequatio intellectus et rei seems all there is to contradict it with. +Mr. Bradley's only suggestion is that true thought 'must correspond to +a determinate being which it cannot be said to make,' and obviously that +sheds no new light. What is the meaning of the word to 'correspond'? +Where is the 'being'? What sort of things are 'determinations,' and what +is meant in this particular case by 'not to make'? + +Humanism proceeds immediately to refine upon the looseness of these +epithets. We correspond in SOME way with anything with which we enter +into any relations at all. If it be a thing, we may produce an exact +copy of it, or we may simply feel it as an existent in a certain place. +If it be a demand, we may obey it without knowing anything more about it +than its push. If it be a proposition, we may agree by not contradicting +it, by letting it pass. If it be a relation between things, we may act +on the first thing so as to bring ourselves out where the second will +be. If it be something inaccessible, we may substitute a hypothetical +object for it, which, having the same consequences, will cipher out for +us real results. In a general way we may simply ADD OUR THOUGHT TO IT; +and if it SUFFERS THE ADDITION, and the whole situation harmoniously +prolongs and enriches itself, the thought will pass for true. + +As for the whereabouts of the beings thus corresponded to, although they +may be outside of the present thought as well as in it, humanism sees +no ground for saying they are outside of finite experience itself. +Pragmatically, their reality means that we submit to them, take account +of them, whether we like to or not, but this we must perpetually do with +experiences other than our own. The whole system of what the present +experience must correspond to 'adequately' may be continuous with the +present experience itself. Reality, so taken as experience other than +the present, might be either the legacy of past experience or the +content of experience to come. Its determinations for US are in any +case the adjectives which our acts of judging fit to it, and those are +essentially humanistic things. + +To say that our thought does not 'make' this reality means pragmatically +that if our own particular thought were annihilated the reality would +still be there in some shape, though possibly it might be a shape +that would lack something that our thought supplies. That reality is +'independent' means that there is something in every experience that +escapes our arbitrary control. If it be a sensible experience it coerces +our attention; if a sequence, we cannot invert it; if we compare two +terms we can come to only one result. There is a push, an urgency, +within our very experience, against which we are on the whole powerless, +and which drives us in a direction that is the destiny of our belief. +That this drift of experience itself is in the last resort due to +something independent of all possible experience may or may not be true. +There may or may not be an extra-experiential 'ding an sich' that keeps +the ball rolling, or an 'absolute' that lies eternally behind all the +successive determinations which human thought has made. But within our +experience ITSELF, at any rate, humanism says, some determinations show +themselves as being independent of others; some questions, if we ever +ask them, can only be answered in one way; some beings, if we ever +suppose them, must be supposed to have existed previously to the +supposing; some relations, if they exist ever, must exist as long as +their terms exist. + +Truth thus means, according to humanism, the relation of less fixed +parts of experience (predicates) to other relatively more fixed +parts (subjects); and we are not required to seek it in a relation of +experience as such to anything beyond itself. We can stay at home, for +our behavior as exponents is hemmed in on every side. The forces both of +advance and of resistance are exerted by our own objects, and the notion +of truth as something opposed to waywardness or license inevitably grows +up SOLIPSISTICALLY inside of every human life. + +So obvious is all this that a common charge against the humanistic +authors 'makes me tired.' 'How can a deweyite discriminate sincerity +from bluff?' was a question asked at a philosophic meeting where I +reported on Dewey's Studies. 'How can the mere [Footnote: I know of no +'mere' pragmatist, if MERENESS here means, as it seems to, the denial of +all concreteness to the pragmatist's THOUGHT.] pragmatist feel any duty +to think truly?' is the objection urged by Professor Royce. Mr. Bradley +in turn says that if a humanist understands his own doctrine, 'he must +hold any idea, however mad, to be the truth, if any one will have it +so.' And Professor Taylor describes pragmatism as believing anything one +pleases and calling it truth. + +Such a shallow sense of the conditions under which men's thinking +actually goes on seems to me most surprising. These critics appear to +suppose that, if left to itself, the rudderless raft of our experience +must be ready to drift anywhere or nowhere. Even THO there were +compasses on board, they seem to say, there would be no pole for them +to point to. There must be absolute sailing-directions, they insist, +decreed from outside, and an independent chart of the voyage added to +the 'mere' voyage itself, if we are ever to make a port. But is it not +obvious that even THO there be such absolute sailing-directions in the +shape of pre-human standards of truth that we OUGHT to follow, the +only guarantee that we shall in fact follow them must lie in our human +equipment. The 'ought' would be a brutum fulmen unless there were a felt +grain inside of our experience that conspired. As a matter of fact the +DEVOUTEST believers in absolute standards must admit that men fail to +obey them. Waywardness is here, in spite of the eternal prohibitions, +and the existence of any amount of reality ante rem is no warrant +against unlimited error in rebus being incurred. The only REAL guarantee +we have against licentious thinking is the CIRCUMPRESSURE of experience +itself, which gets us sick of concrete errors, whether there be a +trans-empirical reality or not. How does the partisan of absolute +reality know what this orders him to think? He cannot get direct sight +of the absolute; and he has no means of guessing what it wants of him +except by following the humanistic clues. The only truth that he +himself will ever practically ACCEPT will be that to which his finite +experiences lead him of themselves. The state of mind which shudders +at the idea of a lot of experiences left to themselves, and that +augurs protection from the sheer name of an absolute, as if, however +inoperative, that might still stand for a sort of ghostly security, is +like the mood of those good people who, whenever they hear of a +social tendency that is damnable, begin to redden and to puff, and +say 'Parliament or Congress ought to make a law against it,' as if an +impotent decree would give relief. + +All the SANCTIONS of a law of truth lie in the very texture of +experience. Absolute or no absolute, the concrete truth FOR US will +always be that way of thinking in which our various experiences most +profitably combine. + +And yet, the opponent obstinately urges, your humanist will always +have a greater liberty to play fast and loose with truth than will your +believer in an independent realm of reality that makes the standard +rigid. If by this latter believer he means a man who pretends to know +the standard and who fulminates it, the humanist will doubtless prove +more flexible; but no more flexible than the absolutist himself if the +latter follows (as fortunately our present-day absolutists do follow) +empirical methods of inquiry in concrete affairs. To consider hypotheses +is surely always better than to DOGMATISE ins blaue hinein. + +Nevertheless this probable flexibility of temper in him has been used +to convict the humanist of sin. Believing as he does, that truth lies in +rebus, and is at every moment our own line of most propitious reaction, +he stands forever debarred, as I have heard a learned colleague say, +from trying to convert opponents, for does not their view, being THEIR +most propitious momentary reaction, already fill the bill? Only the +believer in the ante-rem brand of truth can on this theory seek to +make converts without self-stultification. But can there be +self-stultification in urging any account whatever of truth? Can +the definition ever contradict the deed? 'Truth is what I feel like +saying'--suppose that to be the definition. 'Well, I feel like saying +that, and I want you to feel like saying it, and shall continue to say +it until I get you to agree.' Where is there any contradiction? Whatever +truth may be said to be, that is the kind of truth which the saying +can be held to carry. The TEMPER which a saying may comport is an +extra-logical matter. It may indeed be hotter in some individual +absolutist than in a humanist, but it need not be so in another. And the +humanist, for his part, is perfectly consistent in compassing sea and +land to make one proselyte, if his nature be enthusiastic enough. + +'But how can you be enthusiastic over any view of things which you +know to have been partly made by yourself, and which is liable to alter +during the next minute? How is any heroic devotion to the ideal of truth +possible under such paltry conditions?' + +This is just another of those objections by which the anti-humanists +show their own comparatively slack hold on the realities of the +situation. If they would only follow the pragmatic method and ask: +'What is truth KNOWN-AS? What does its existence stand for in the way of +concrete goods?'--they would see that the name of it is the inbegriff +of almost everything that is valuable in our lives. The true is +the opposite of whatever is instable, of whatever is practically +disappointing, of whatever is useless, of whatever is lying and +unreliable, of whatever is unverifiable and unsupported, of whatever is +inconsistent and contradictory, of whatever is artificial and eccentric, +of whatever is unreal in the sense of being of no practical account. +Here are pragmatic reasons with a vengeance why we should turn to +truth--truth saves us from a world of that complexion. What wonder that +its very name awakens loyal feeling! In particular what wonder that all +little provisional fool's paradises of belief should appear contemptible +in comparison with its bare pursuit! When absolutists reject humanism +because they feel it to be untrue, that means that the whole habit of +their mental needs is wedded already to a different view of reality, in +comparison with which the humanistic world seems but the whim of a few +irresponsible youths. Their own subjective apperceiving mass is what +speaks here in the name of the eternal natures and bids them reject +our humanism--as they apprehend it. Just so with us humanists, when +we condemn all noble, clean-cut, fixed, eternal, rational, temple-like +systems of philosophy. These contradict the DRAMATIC TEMPERAMENT of +nature, as our dealings with nature and our habits of thinking have so +far brought us to conceive it. They seem oddly personal and artificial, +even when not bureaucratic and professional in an absurd degree. We turn +from them to the great unpent and unstayed wilderness of truth as we +feel it to be constituted, with as good a conscience as rationalists +are moved by when they turn from our wilderness into their neater and +cleaner intellectual abodes. [Footnote: I cannot forbear quoting as an +illustration of the contrast between humanist and rationalist tempers of +mind, in a sphere remote from philosophy, these remarks on the Dreyfus +'affaire,' written by one who assuredly had never heard of humanism or +pragmatism. 'Autant que la Revolution, "l'Affaire" est desormais une de +nos "origines." Si elle n'a pas fait ouvrir le gouffre, c'est elle du +moins qui a rendu patent et visible le long travail souterrain qui, +silencieusement, avait prepare la separation entre nos deux camps +d'aujourd'hui, pour ecarter enfin, d'un coup soudain, la France +des traditionalistes (poseurs de principes, chercheurs d'unite, +constructeurs de systemes a priori) el la France eprise du fait positif +et de libre examen;--la France revolutionnaire et romantique si l'on +veut, celle qui met tres haut l'individu, qui ne veut pas qu'un juste +perisse, fut-ce pour sauver la nation, et qui cherche la verite dans +toutes ses parties aussi bien que dans une vue d'ensemble ... Duclaux ne +pouvait pas concevoir qu'on preferat quelque chose a la verite. Mais il +voyait autour de lui de fort honnetes gens qui, mettant en balance la +vie d'un homme et la raison d'Etat, lui avouaient de quel poids leger +ils jugeaient une simple existence individuelle, pour innocente qu'elle +fut. C'etaient des classiques, des gens a qui l'ensemble seul importe.' +La Vie de Emile Duclaux, par Mme. Em. D., Laval, 1906, pp. 243, +247-248.] + +This is surely enough to show that the humanist does not ignore the +character of objectivity and independence in truth. Let me turn next to +what his opponents mean when they say that to be true, our thoughts must +'correspond.' + +The vulgar notion of correspondence here is that the thoughts must COPY +the reality--cognitio fit per assimiliationem cogniti et cognoscentis; +and philosophy, without having ever fairly sat down to the question, +seems to have instinctively accepted this idea: propositions are held +true if they copy the eternal thought; terms are held true if they copy +extra-mental realities. Implicitly, I think that the copy-theory has +animated most of the criticisms that have been made on humanism. + +A priori, however, it is not self-evident that the sole business of +our mind with realities should be to copy them. Let my reader suppose +himself to constitute for a time all the reality there is in the +universe, and then to receive the announcement that another being is to +be created who shall know him truly. How will he represent the knowing +in advance? What will he hope it to be? I doubt extremely whether it +could ever occur to him to fancy it as a mere copying. Of what use to +him would an imperfect second edition of himself in the new comer's +interior be? It would seem pure waste of a propitious opportunity. The +demand would more probably be for something absolutely new. The reader +would conceive the knowing humanistically, 'the new comer,' he would +say, 'must TAKE ACCOUNT OF MY PRESENCE BY REACTING ON IT IN SUCH A WAY +THAT GOOD WOULD ACCRUE TO US BOTH. If copying be requisite to that end, +let there be copying; otherwise not.' The essence in any case would not +be the copying, but the enrichment of the previous world. + +I read the other day, in a book of Professor Eucken's, a phrase, 'Die +erhohung des vorgefundenen daseins,' which seems to be pertinent here. +Why may not thought's mission be to increase and elevate, rather than +simply to imitate and reduplicate, existence? No one who has read Lotze +can fail to remember his striking comment on the ordinary view of the +secondary qualities of matter, which brands them as 'illusory' because +they copy nothing in the thing. The notion of a world complete in +itself, to which thought comes as a passive mirror, adding nothing +to fact, Lotze says is irrational. Rather is thought itself a most +momentous part of fact, and the whole mission of the pre-existing and +insufficient world of matter may simply be to provoke thought to produce +its far more precious supplement. + +'Knowing,' in short, may, for aught we can see beforehand to the +contrary, be ONLY ONE WAY OF GETTING INTO FRUITFUL RELATIONS WITH +REALITY whether copying be one of the relations or not. + +It is easy to see from what special type of knowing the copy-theory +arose. In our dealings with natural phenomena the great point is to be +able to foretell. Foretelling, according to such a writer as Spencer, is +the whole meaning of intelligence. When Spencer's 'law of intelligence' +says that inner and outer relations must 'correspond,' it means that the +distribution of terms in our inner time-scheme and space-scheme must +be an exact copy of the distribution in real time and space of the real +terms. In strict theory the mental terms themselves need not answer to +the real terms in the sense of severally copying them, symbolic mental +terms being enough, if only the real dates and places be copied. But +in our ordinary life the mental terms are images and the real ones are +sensations, and the images so often copy the sensations, that we +easily take copying of terms as well as of relations to be the natural +significance of knowing. Meanwhile much, even of this common descriptive +truth, is couched in verbal symbols. If our symbols FIT the world, in +the sense of determining our expectations rightly, they may even be the +better for not copying its terms. + +It seems obvious that the pragmatic account of all this routine of +phenomenal knowledge is accurate. Truth here is a relation, not of our +ideas to non-human realities, but of conceptual parts of our experience +to sensational parts. Those thoughts are true which guide us to +BENEFICIAL INTERACTION with sensible particulars as they occur, whether +they copy these in advance or not. + +From the frequency of copying in the knowledge of phenomenal fact, +copying has been supposed to be the essence of truth in matters rational +also. Geometry and logic, it has been supposed, must copy archetypal +thoughts in the Creator. But in these abstract spheres there is no need +of assuming archetypes. The mind is free to carve so many figures out of +space, to make so many numerical collections, to frame so many classes +and series, and it can analyze and compare so endlessly, that the very +superabundance of the resulting ideas makes us doubt the 'objective' +pre-existence of their models. It would be plainly wrong to suppose a +God whose thought consecrated rectangular but not polar co-ordinates, or +Jevons's notation but not Boole's. Yet if, on the other hand, we assume +God to have thought in advance of every POSSIBLE flight of human fancy +in these directions, his mind becomes too much like a Hindoo idol +with three heads, eight arms and six breasts, too much made up of +superfoetation and redundancy for us to wish to copy it, and the whole +notion of copying tends to evaporate from these sciences. Their objects +can be better interpreted as being created step by step by men, as fast +as they successively conceive them. + +If now it be asked how, if triangles, squares, square roots, genera, +and the like, are but improvised human 'artefacts,' their properties +and relations can be so promptly known to be 'eternal,' the humanistic +answer is easy. If triangles and genera are of our own production we can +keep them invariant. We can make them 'timeless' by expressly decreeing +that on THE THINGS WE MEAN time shall exert no altering effect, that +they are intentionally and it may be fictitiously abstracted from every +corrupting real associate and condition. But relations between +invariant objects will themselves be invariant. Such relations cannot +be happenings, for by hypothesis nothing shall happen to the objects. +I have tried to show in the last chapter of my Principles of Psychology +[Footnote: Vol. ii, pp. 641 ff.] that they can only be relations of +comparison. No one so far seems to have noticed my suggestion, and I am +too ignorant of the development of mathematics to feel very confident +of my own view. But if it were correct it would solve the difficulty +perfectly. Relations of comparison are matters of direct inspection. As +soon as mental objects are mentally compared, they are perceived to +be either like or unlike. But once the same, always the same, once +different, always different, under these timeless conditions. Which +is as much as to say that truths concerning these man-made objects are +necessary and eternal. We can change our conclusions only by changing +our data first. + +The whole fabric of the a priori sciences can thus be treated as a +man-made product. As Locke long ago pointed out, these sciences have no +immediate connection with fact. Only IF a fact can be humanized by being +identified with any of these ideal objects, is what was true of the +objects now true also of the facts. The truth itself meanwhile was +originally a copy of nothing; it was only a relation directly perceived +to obtain between two artificial mental things. [Footnote: Mental things +which are realities of course within the mental world.] + +We may now glance at some special types of knowing, so as to see better +whether the humanistic account fits. On the mathematical and logical +types we need not enlarge further, nor need we return at much length to +the case of our descriptive knowledge of the course of nature. So far +as this involves anticipation, tho that MAY mean copying, it need, as +we saw, mean little more than 'getting ready' in advance. But with many +distant and future objects, our practical relations are to the last +degree potential and remote. In no sense can we now get ready for the +arrest of the earth's revolution by the tidal brake, for instance; and +with the past, tho we suppose ourselves to know it truly, we have no +practical relations at all. It is obvious that, altho interests strictly +practical have been the original starting-point of our search for +true phenomenal descriptions, yet an intrinsic interest in the bare +describing function has grown up. We wish accounts that shall be true, +whether they bring collateral profit or not. The primitive function has +developed its demand for mere exercise. This theoretic curiosity seems +to be the characteristically human differentia, and humanism recognizes +its enormous scope. A true idea now means not only one that prepares us +for an actual perception. It means also one that might prepare us for +a merely possible perception, or one that, if spoken, would suggest +possible perceptions to others, or suggest actual perceptions which the +speaker cannot share. The ensemble of perceptions thus thought of +as either actual or possible form a system which it is obviously +advantageous to us to get into a stable and consistent shape; and here +it is that the common-sense notion of permanent beings finds triumphant +use. Beings acting outside of the thinker explain, not only his actual +perceptions, past and future, but his possible perceptions and those +of every one else. Accordingly they gratify our theoretic need in a +supremely beautiful way. We pass from our immediate actual through +them into the foreign and the potential, and back again into the future +actual, accounting for innumerable particulars by a single cause. As +in those circular panoramas, where a real foreground of dirt, grass, +bushes, rocks and a broken-down cannon is enveloped by a canvas picture +of sky and earth and of a raging battle, continuing the foreground so +cunningly that the spectator can detect no joint; so these conceptual +objects, added to our present perceptual reality, fuse with it into the +whole universe of our belief. In spite of all berkeleyan criticism, we +do not doubt that they are really there. Tho our discovery of any one of +them may only date from now, we unhesitatingly say that it not only +IS, but WAS there, if, by so saying, the past appears connected more +consistently with what we feel the present to be. This is historic +truth. Moses wrote the Pentateuch, we think, because if he didn't, all +our religious habits will have to be undone. Julius Caesar was real, or +we can never listen to history again. Trilobites were once alive, or +all our thought about the strata is at sea. Radium, discovered only +yesterday, must always have existed, or its analogy with other natural +elements, which are permanent, fails. In all this, it is but one portion +of our beliefs reacting on another so as to yield the most satisfactory +total state of mind. That state of mind, we say, sees truth, and the +content of its deliverances we believe. + +Of course, if you take the satisfactoriness concretely, as something +felt by you now, and if, by truth, you mean truth taken abstractly +and verified in the long run, you cannot make them equate, for it is +notorious that the temporarily satisfactory is often false. Yet at each +and every concrete moment, truth for each man is what that man 'troweth' +at that moment with the maximum of satisfaction to himself; and +similarly, abstract truth, truth verified by the long run, and abstract +satisfactoriness, long-run satisfactoriness, coincide. If, in short, we +compare concrete with concrete and abstract with abstract, the true +and the satisfactory do mean the same thing. I suspect that a certain +muddling of matters hereabouts is what makes the general philosophic +public so impervious to humanism's claims. + +The fundamental fact about our experience is that it is a process of +change. For the 'trower' at any moment, truth, like the visible area +round a man walking in a fog, or like what George Eliot calls 'the +wall of dark seen by small fishes' eyes that pierce a span in the wide +Ocean,' is an objective field which the next moment enlarges and of +which it is the critic, and which then either suffers alteration or is +continued unchanged. The critic sees both the first trower's truth and +his own truth, compares them with each other, and verifies or confutes. +HIS field of view is the reality independent of that earlier trower's +thinking with which that thinking ought to correspond. But the critic +is himself only a trower; and if the whole process of experience should +terminate at that instant, there would be no otherwise known independent +reality with which HIS thought might be compared. + +The immediate in experience is always provisionally in this situation. +The humanism, for instance, which I see and try so hard to defend, is +the completest truth attained from my point of view up to date. But, +owing to the fact that all experience is a process, no point of view can +ever be THE last one. Every one is insufficient and off its balance, and +responsible to later points of view than itself. You, occupying some of +these later points in your own person, and believing in the reality of +others, will not agree that my point of view sees truth positive, truth +timeless, truth that counts, unless they verify and confirm what it +sees. + +You generalize this by saying that any opinion, however satisfactory, +can count positively and absolutely as true only so far as it agrees +with a standard beyond itself; and if you then forget that this standard +perpetually grows up endogenously inside the web of the experiences, +you may carelessly go on to say that what distributively holds of +each experience, holds also collectively of all experience, and that +experience as such and in its totality owes whatever truth it may be +possessed-of to its correspondence with absolute realities outside of +its own being. This evidently is the popular and traditional position. +From the fact that finite experiences must draw support from one +another, philosophers pass to the notion that experience uberhaupt must +need an absolute support. The denial of such a notion by humanism lies +probably at the root of most of the dislike which it incurs. + +But is this not the globe, the elephant and the tortoise over again? +Must not something end by supporting itself? Humanism is willing to let +finite experience be self-supporting. Somewhere being must immediately +breast nonentity. Why may not the advancing front of experience, +carrying its immanent satisfactions and dissatisfactions, cut against +the black inane as the luminous orb of the moon cuts the caerulean +abyss? Why should anywhere the world be absolutely fixed and finished? +And if reality genuinely grows, why may it not grow in these very +determinations which here and now are made? + +In point of fact it actually seems to grow by our mental determinations, +be these never so 'true.' Take the 'great bear' or 'dipper' +constellation in the heavens. We call it by that name, we count the +stars and call them seven, we say they were seven before they were +counted, and we say that whether any one had ever noted the fact or not, +the dim resemblance to a long-tailed (or long-necked?) animal was always +truly there. But what do we mean by this projection into past eternity +of recent human ways of thinking? Did an 'absolute' thinker actually +do the counting, tell off the stars upon his standing number-tally, and +make the bear-comparison, silly as the latter is? Were they explicitly +seven, explicitly bear-like, before the human witness came? Surely +nothing in the truth of the attributions drives us to think this. +They were only implicitly or virtually what we call them, and we human +witnesses first explicated them and made them 'real.' A fact virtually +pre-exists when every condition of its realization save one is already +there. In this case the condition lacking is the act of the counting and +comparing mind. But the stars (once the mind considers them) themselves +dictate the result. The counting in no wise modifies their previous +nature, and, they being what and where they are, the count cannot fall +out differently. It could then ALWAYS be made. NEVER could the number +seven be questioned, IF THE QUESTION ONCE WERE RAISED. + +We have here a quasi-paradox. Undeniably something comes by the counting +that was not there before. And yet that something was ALWAYS TRUE. In +one sense you create it, and in another sense you FIND it. You have to +treat your count as being true beforehand, the moment you come to treat +the matter at all. + +Our stellar attributes must always be called true, then; yet none the +less are they genuine additions made by our intellect to the world of +fact. Not additions of consciousness only, but additions of 'content.' +They copy nothing that pre-existed, yet they agree with what +pre-existed, fit it, amplify it, relate and connect it with a 'wain,' +a number-tally, or what not, and build it out. It seems to me that +humanism is the only theory that builds this case out in the good +direction, and this case stands for innumerable other kinds of case. In +all such eases, odd as it may sound, our judgment may actually be said +to retroact and to enrich the past. + +Our judgments at any rate change the character of FUTURE reality by +the acts to which they lead. Where these acts are acts expressive of +trust,--trust, e.g., that a man is honest, that our health is good +enough, or that we can make a successful effort,--which acts may be a +needed antecedent of the trusted things becoming true. Professor Taylor +says [Footnote: In an article criticising Pragmatism (as he conceives +it) in the McGill University Quarterly published at Montreal, for May, +1904.] that our trust is at any rate UNTRUE WHEN IT IS MADE, i. e; +before the action; and I seem to remember that he disposes of anything +like a faith in the general excellence of the universe (making the +faithful person's part in it at any rate more excellent) as a 'lie in +the soul.' But the pathos of this expression should not blind us to +the complication of the facts. I doubt whether Professor Taylor would +himself be in favor of practically handling trusters of these kinds as +liars. Future and present really mix in such emergencies, and one can +always escape lies in them by using hypothetic forms. But Mr. Taylor's +attitude suggests such absurd possibilities of practice that it seems +to me to illustrate beautifully how self-stultifying the conception of +a truth that shall merely register a standing fixture may become. +Theoretic truth, truth of passive copying, sought in the sole interests +of copying as such, not because copying is GOOD FOR SOMETHING, but +because copying ought schlechthin to be, seems, if you look at it +coldly, to be an almost preposterous ideal. Why should the universe, +existing in itself, also exist in copies? How CAN it be copied in the +solidity of its objective fulness? And even if it could, what would the +motive be? 'Even the hairs of your head are numbered.' Doubtless they +are, virtually; but why, as an absolute proposition, OUGHT the number to +become copied and known? Surely knowing is only one way of interacting +with reality and adding to its effect. + +The opponent here will ask: 'Has not the knowing of truth any +substantive value on its own account, apart from the collateral +advantages it may bring? And if you allow theoretic satisfactions to +exist at all, do they not crowd the collateral satisfactions out of +house and home, and must not pragmatism go into bankruptcy, if she +admits them at all?' The destructive force of such talk disappears as +soon as we use words concretely instead of abstractly, and ask, in our +quality of good pragmatists, just what the famous theoretic needs are +known as and in what the intellectual satisfactions consist. + +Are they not all mere matters of CONSISTENCY--and emphatically NOT of +consistency between an absolute reality and the mind's copies of it, +but of actually felt consistency among judgments, objects, and habits of +reacting, in the mind's own experienceable world? And are not both our +need of such consistency and our pleasure in it conceivable as +outcomes of the natural fact that we are beings that do develop mental +HABITS--habit itself proving adaptively beneficial in an environment +where the same objects, or the same kinds of objects, recur and follow +'law'? If this were so, what would have come first would have been the +collateral profits of habit as such, and the theoretic life would have +grown up in aid of these. In point of fact, this seems to have been the +probable case. At life's origin, any present perception may have been +'true'--if such a word could then be applicable. Later, when reactions +became organized, the reactions became 'true' whenever expectation was +fulfilled by them. Otherwise they were 'false' or 'mistaken' reactions. +But the same class of objects needs the same kind of reaction, so the +impulse to react consistently must gradually have been established, and +a disappointment felt whenever the results frustrated expectation. +Here is a perfectly plausible germ for all our higher consistencies. +Nowadays, if an object claims from us a reaction of the kind habitually +accorded only to the opposite class of objects, our mental machinery +refuses to run smoothly. The situation is intellectually unsatisfactory. + +Theoretic truth thus falls WITHIN the mind, being the accord of some +of its processes and objects with other processes and objects--'accord' +consisting here in well-definable relations. So long as the satisfaction +of feeling such an accord is denied us, whatever collateral profits +may seem to inure from what we believe in are but as dust in the +balance--provided always that we are highly organized intellectually, +which the majority of us are not. The amount of accord which satisfies +most men and women is merely the absence of violent clash between +their usual thoughts and statements and the limited sphere of +sense-perceptions in which their lives are cast. The theoretic truth +that most of us think we 'ought' to attain to is thus the possession of +a set of predicates that do not explicitly contradict their subjects. +We preserve it as often as not by leaving other predicates and subjects +out. + +In some men theory is a passion, just as music is in others. The form +of inner consistency is pursued far beyond the line at which collateral +profits stop. Such men systematize and classify and schematize and +make synoptical tables and invent ideal objects for the pure love of +unifying. Too often the results, glowing with 'truth' for the inventors, +seem pathetically personal and artificial to bystanders. Which is as +much as to say that the purely theoretic criterion of truth can leave us +in the lurch as easily as any other criterion, and that the absolutists, +for all their pretensions, are 'in the same boat' concretely with those +whom they attack. + +I am well aware that this paper has been rambling in the extreme. But +the whole subject is inductive, and sharp logic is hardly yet in order. +My great trammel has been the non-existence of any definitely stated +alternative on my opponents' part. It may conduce to clearness if I +recapitulate, in closing, what I conceive the main points of humanism to +be. They are these:-- + +1. An experience, perceptual or conceptual, must conform to reality in +order to be true. + +2. By 'reality' humanism means nothing more than the other conceptual +or perceptual experiences with which a given present experience may find +itself in point of fact mixed up. [Footnote: This is meant merely to +exclude reality of an 'unknowable' sort, of which no account in either +perceptual or conceptual terms can be given. It includes of course any +amount if empirical reality independent of the knower. Pragmatism, is +thus 'epistemologically' realistic in its account.] + +3. By 'conforming,' humanism means taking account-of in such a way as to +gain any intellectually and practically satisfactory result. + +4. To 'take account-of' and to be 'satisfactory' are terms that admit +of no definition, so many are the ways in which these requirements can +practically be worked out. + +5. Vaguely and in general, we take account of a reality by preserving +it in as unmodified a form as possible. But, to be then satisfactory, it +must not contradict other realities outside of it which claim also to be +preserved. That we must preserve all the experience we can and minimize +contradiction in what we preserve, is about all that can be said in +advance. + +6. The truth which the conforming experience embodies may be a positive +addition to the previous reality, and later judgments may have +to conform to it. Yet, virtually at least, it may have been true +previously. Pragmatically, virtual and actual truth mean the same thing: +the possibility of only one answer, when once the question is raised. + + + +IV + +THE RELATION BETWEEN KNOWER AND KNOWN + +[Footnote: Extract from an article entitled 'A World of Pure +Experience,' in the Journal of Philosophy, etc., September 29,1904.] + +Throughout the history of philosophy the subject and its object +have been treated as absolutely discontinuous entities; and thereupon +the presence of the latter to the former, or the 'apprehension' by the +former of the latter, has assumed a paradoxical character which all +sorts of theories had to be invented to overcome. Representative +theories put a mental 'representation,' 'image,' or 'content' into +the gap, as a sort of intermediary. Commonsense theories left the gap +untouched, declaring our mind able to clear it by a self-transcending +leap. Transcendentalist theories left it impossible to traverse by +finite knowers, and brought an absolute in to perform the saltatory +act. All the while, in the very bosom of the finite experience, every +conjunction required to make the relation intelligible is given in full. +Either the knower and the known are: + +(1) the self-same piece of experience taken twice over in different +contexts; or they are + +(2) two pieces of ACTUAL experience belonging to the same subject, with +definite tracts of conjunctive transitional experience between them; or + +(3) the known is a POSSIBLE experience either of that subject or +another, to which the said conjunctive transitions WOULD lead, if +sufficiently prolonged. + +To discuss all the ways in which one experience may function as the +knower of another, would be incompatible with the limits of this essay. +I have treated of type 1, the kind of knowledge called perception, in +an article in the Journal of Philosophy, for September 1, 1904, called +'Does consciousness exist?' This is the type of case in which the mind +enjoys direct 'acquaintance' with a present object. In the other types +the mind has 'knowledge-about' an object not immediately there. Type 3 +can always formally and hypothetically be reduced to type 2, so that +a brief description of that type will now put the present reader +sufficiently at my point of view, and make him see what the actual +meanings of the mysterious cognitive relation may be. + +Suppose me to be sitting here in my library at Cambridge, at ten +minutes' walk from 'Memorial Hall,' and to be thinking truly of the +latter object. My mind may have before it only the name, or it may have +a clear image, or it may have a very dim image of the hall, but such an +intrinsic difference in the image makes no difference in its cognitive +function. Certain extrinsic phenomena, special experiences of +conjunction, are what impart to the image, be it what it may, its +knowing office. + +For instance, if you ask me what hall I mean by my image, and I can +tell you nothing; or if I fail to point or lead you towards the Harvard +Delta; or if, being led by you, I am uncertain whether the Hall I see +be what I had in mind or not; you would rightly deny that I had 'meant' +that particular hall at all, even tho my mental image might to some +degree have resembled it. The resemblance would count in that case as +coincidental merely, for all sorts of things of a kind resemble one +another in this world without being held for that reason to take +cognizance of one another. + +On the other hand, if I can lead you to the hall, and tell you of its +history and present uses; if in its presence I feel my idea, however +imperfect it may have been, to have led hither and to be now TERMINATED; +if the associates of the image and of the felt hall run parallel, so +that each term of the one context corresponds serially, as I walk, with +an answering term of the other; why then my soul was prophetic, and +my idea must be, and by common consent would be, called cognizant of +reality. That percept was what I MEANT, for into it my idea has passed +by conjunctive experiences of sameness and fulfilled intention. Nowhere +is there jar, but every later moment continues and corroborates an +earlier one. + +In this continuing and corroborating, taken in no transcendental sense, +but denoting definitely felt transitions, LIES ALL THAT THE KNOWING OF +A PERCEPT BY AN IDEA CAN POSSIBLY CONTAIN OR SIGNIFY. Wherever such +transitions are felt, the first experience KNOWS the last one. Where +they do not, or where even as possibles they can not, intervene, there +can be no pretence of knowing. In this latter case the extremes will be +connected, if connected at all, by inferior relations--bare likeness or +succession, or by 'withness' alone. Knowledge of sensible realities thus +comes to life inside the tissue of experience. It is MADE; and made +by relations that unroll themselves in time. Whenever certain +intermediaries are given, such that, as they develop towards their +terminus, there is experience from point to point of one direction +followed, and finally of one process fulfilled, the result is that THEIR +STARTING-POINT THEREBY BECOMES A KNOWER AND THEIR TERMINUS AN OBJECT +MEANT OR KNOWN. That is all that knowing (in the simple case considered) +can be known-as, that is the whole of its nature, put into experiential +terms. Whenever such is the sequence of our experiences we may freely +say that we had the terminal object 'in mind' from the outset, even +altho AT the outset nothing was there in us but a flat piece of +substantive experience like any other, with no self-transcendency about +it, and no mystery save the mystery of coming into existence and of +being gradually followed by other pieces of substantive experience, with +conjunctively transitional experiences between. That is what we MEAN +here by the object's being 'in mind.' Of any deeper more real way of its +being in mind we have no positive conception, and we have no right to +discredit our actual experience by talking of such a way at all. + +I know that many a reader will rebel at this. 'Mere intermediaries,' he +will say, 'even tho they be feelings of continuously growing fulfilment, +only SEPARATE the knower from the known, whereas what we have in +knowledge is a kind of immediate touch of the one by the other, an +"apprehension" in the etymological sense of the word, a leaping of the +chasm as by lightning, an act by which two terms are smitten into one +over the head of their distinctness. All these dead intermediaries of +yours are out of each other, and outside of their termini still.' + +But do not such dialectic difficulties remind us of the dog dropping his +bone and snapping at its image in the water? If we knew any more real +kind of union aliunde, we might be entitled to brand all our empirical +unions as a sham. But unions by continuous transition are the only ones +we know of, whether in this matter of a knowledge-about that terminates +in an acquaintance, whether in personal identity, in logical prediction +through the copula 'is,' or elsewhere. If anywhere there were more +absolute unions, they could only reveal themselves to us by just such +conjunctive results. These are what the unions are worth, these are all +that we can ever practically mean by union, by continuity. Is it not +time to repeat what Lotze said of substances, that to act like one is to +be one? Should we not say here that to be experienced as continuous is +to be really continuous, in a world where experience and reality come to +the same thing? In a picture gallery a painted hook will serve to hang +a painted chain by, a painted cable will hold a painted ship. In a world +where both the terms and their distinctions are affairs of experience, +conjunctions that are experienced must be at least as real as anything +else. They will be 'absolutely' real conjunctions, if we have no +transphenomenal absolute ready, to derealize the whole experienced world +by, at a stroke. + +So much for the essentials of the cognitive relation where the knowledge +is conceptual in type, or forms knowledge 'about' an object. It consists +in intermediary experiences (possible, if not actual) of continuously +developing progress, and, finally, of fulfilment, when the sensible +percept which is the object is reached. The percept here not only +VERIFIES the concept, proves its function of knowing that percept to +be true, but the percept's existence as the terminus of the chain of +intermediaries CREATES the function. Whatever terminates that chain was, +because it now proves itself to be, what the concept 'had in mind.' + +The towering importance for human life of this kind of knowing lies +in the tact that an experience that knows another can figure as its +REPRESENTATIVE, not in any quasi-miraculous 'epistemological' sense, +but in the definite, practical sense of being its substitute in various +operations, sometimes physical and sometimes mental, which lead us to +its associates and results. By experimenting on our ideas of reality, we +may save ourselves the trouble of experimenting on the real experiences +which they severally mean. The ideas form related systems, corresponding +point for point to the systems which the realities form; and by letting +an ideal term call up its associates systematically, we may be led to a +terminus which the corresponding real term would have led to in case +we had operated on the real world. And this brings us to the general +question of substitution. + +What, exactly, in a system of experiences, does the 'substitution' of +one of them for another mean? + +According to my view, experience as a whole is a process in time, +whereby innumerable particular terms lapse and are superseded by others +that follow upon them by transitions which, whether disjunctive or +conjunctive in content, are themselves experiences, and must in general +be accounted at least as real as the terms which they relate. What the +nature of the event called 'superseding' signifies, depends altogether +on the kind of transition that obtains. Some experiences simply abolish +their predecessors without continuing them in any way. Others are felt +to increase or to enlarge their meaning, to carry out their purpose, or +to bring us nearer to their goal. They 'represent' them, and may fulfil +their function better than they fulfilled it themselves. But to 'fulfil +a function' in a world of pure experience can be conceived and defined +in only one possible way. In such a world transitions and arrivals (or +terminations) are the only events that happen, tho they happen by so +many sorts of path. The only function that one experience can perform is +to lead into another experience; and the only fulfilment we can speak of +is the reaching of a certain experienced end. When one experience leads +to (or can lead to) the same end as another, they agree in function. But +the whole system of experiences as they are immediately given presents +itself as a quasi-chaos through which one can pass out of an initial +term in many directions and yet end in the same terminus, moving from +next to next by a great many possible paths. + +Either one of these paths might be a functional substitute for +another, and to follow one rather than another might on occasion be an +advantageous thing to do. As a matter of fact, and in a general way, +the paths that run through conceptual experiences, that is, through +'thoughts' or 'ideas' that 'know' the things in which they terminate, +are highly advantageous paths to follow. Not only do they yield +inconceivably rapid transitions; but, owing to the 'universal' character +[Footnote: Of which all that need be said in this essay is that it also +an be conceived as functional, and defined in terms of transitions, or +of the possibility of such.] which they frequently possess, and to +their capacity for association with one another in great systems, they +outstrip the tardy consecutions of the things themselves, and sweep us +on towards our ultimate termini in a far more labor-saving way than the +following of trains of sensible perception ever could. Wonderful are +the new cuts and the short-circuits the thought-paths make. Most +thought-paths, it is true, are substitutes for nothing actual; they end +outside the real world altogether, in wayward fancies, utopias, fictions +or mistakes. But where they do re-enter reality and terminate therein, +we substitute them always; and with these substitutes we pass the +greater number of our hours. [Footnote: This is why I called our +experiences, taken all together, a quasi-chaos. There is vastly more +discontinuity in the sum total of experiences than we commonly suppose. +The objective nucleus of every man's experience, his own body, is, it is +true, a continuous percept; and equally continuous as a percept (though +we may be inattentive to it) is the material environment of that body, +changing by gradual transition when the body moves. But the distant +parts of the physical world are at all times absent from us, and form +conceptual objects merely, into the perceptual reality of which our +life inserts itself at points discrete and relatively rare. Round their +several objective nuclei, partly shared and common partly discrete of +the real physical world, innumerable thinkers, pursuing their several +lines of physically true cogitation, trace paths that intersect one +another only at discontinuous perceptual points, and the rest of +the time are quite incongruent; and around all the nuclei of shared +'reality' floats the vast cloud of experiences that are wholly +subjective, that are non-substitutional, that find not even an eventual +ending for themselves in the perceptual world--the mere day-dreams and +joys and sufferings and wishes of the individual minds. These exist WITH +one another, indeed, and with the objective nuclei, but out of them it +is probable that to all eternity no inter-related system of any kind +will ever be made.] + +Whosoever feels his experience to be something substitutional even while +he has it, may be said to have an experience that reaches beyond itself. +From inside of its own entity it says 'more,' and postulates reality +existing elsewhere. For the transcendentalist, who holds knowing to +consist in a salto motale across an 'epistemological chasm,' such an +idea presents no difficulty; but it seems at first sight as if it might +be inconsistent with an empiricism like our own. Have we not explained +that conceptual knowledge is made such wholly by the existence of things +that fall outside of the knowing experience itself--by intermediary +experiences and by a terminus that fulfils? + +Can the knowledge be there before these elements that constitute its +being have come? And, if knowledge be not there, how can objective +reference occur? + +The key to this difficulty lies in the distinction between knowing as +verified and completed, and the same knowing as in transit and on its +way. To recur to the Memorial Hall example lately used, it is only when +our idea of the Hall has actually terminated in the percept that we know +'for certain' that from the beginning it was truly cognitive of THAT. +Until established by the end of the process, its quality of knowing +that, or indeed of knowing anything, could still be doubted; and yet +the knowing really was there, as the result now shows. We were VIRTUAL +knowers of the Hall long before we were certified to have been its +actual knowers, by the percept's retroactive validating power. Just +so we are 'mortal' all the time, by reason of the virtuality of the +inevitable event which will make us so when it shall have come. + +Now the immensely greater part of all our knowing never gets beyond this +virtual stage. It never is completed or nailed down. I speak not merely +of our ideas of imperceptibles like ether-waves or dissociated 'ions,' +or of 'ejects' like the contents of our neighbors' minds; I speak also +of ideas which we might verify if we would take the trouble, but which +we hold for true altho unterminated perceptually, because nothing says +'no' to us, and there is no contradicting truth in sight. TO CONTINUE +THINKING UNCHALLENGED IS, NINETY-NINE TIMES OUT OF A HUNDRED, OUR +PRACTICAL SUBSTITUTE FOR KNOWING IN THE COMPLETED SENSE. As each +experience runs by cognitive transition into the next one, and we +nowhere feel a collision with what we elsewhere count as truth or fact, +we commit ourselves to the current as if the port were sure. We live, as +it, were, upon the front edge of an advancing wave-crest, and our sense +of a determinate direction in falling forward is all we cover of the +future of our path. It is as if a differential quotient should be +conscious and treat itself as an adequate substitute for a traced-out +curve. Our experience, inter alia, is of variations of rate and of +direction, and lives in these transitions more than in the journey's +end. The experiences of tendency are sufficient to act upon--what more +could we have DONE at those moments even if the later verification comes +complete? + +This is what, as a radical empiricist, I say to the charge that the +objective reference which is so flagrant a character of our experiences +involves a chasm and a mortal leap. A positively conjunctive transition +involves neither chasm nor leap. Being the very original of what we +mean by continuity, it makes a continuum wherever it appears. Objective +reference is an incident of the fact that so much of our experience +comes as an insufficient and consists of process and transition. Our +fields of experience have no more definite boundaries than have our +fields of view. Both are fringed forever by a MORE that continuously +develops, and that continuously supersedes them as life proceeds. The +relations, generally speaking, are as real here as the terms are, and +the only complaint of the transcendentalist's with which I could at +all sympathize would be his charge that, by first making knowledge to +consist in external relations as I have done, and by then confessing +that nine-tenths of the time these are not actually but only virtually +there, I have knocked the solid bottom out of the whole business, and +palmed off a substitute of knowledge for the genuine thing. Only the +admission, such a critic might say, that our ideas are self-transcendent +and 'true' already; in advance of the experiences that are to terminate +them, can bring solidity back to knowledge in a world like this, in +which transitions and terminations are only by exception fulfilled. + +This seems to me an excellent place for applying the pragmatic method. +What would the self-transcendency affirmed to exist in advance of +all experiential mediation or termination, be KNOWN-AS? What would it +practically result in for US, were it true? + +It could only result in our orientation, in the turning of our +expectations and practical tendencies into the right path; and the right +path here, so long as we and the object are not yet face to face (or +can never get face to face, as in the case of ejects), would be the +path that led us into the object's nearest neighborhood. Where direct +acquaintance is lacking, 'knowledge about' is the next best thing, and +an acquaintance with what actually lies about the 'object, and is most +closely related to it, puts such knowledge within our grasp. Ether-waves +and your anger, for example, are things in which my thoughts will never +PERCTEPTUALLY terminate, but my concepts of them lead me to their very +brink, to the chromatic fringes and to the hurtful words and deeds which +are their really next effects. + +Even if our ideas did in themselves possess the postulated +self-transcendency, it would still remain true that their putting us +into possession of such effects WOULD BE THE SOLE CASH-VALUE OF THE +SELF-TRANSCENDENCY FOR US. And this cash-value, it is needless to +say, is verbatim et liberatim what our empiricist account pays in. On +pragmatist principles therefore, a dispute over self-transcendency is a +pure logomachy. Call our concepts of ejective things self-transcendent +or the reverse, it makes no difference, so long as we don't differ about +the nature of that exalted virtue's fruits--fruits for us, of course, +humanistic fruits. + +The transcendentalist believes his ideas to be self-transcendent only +because he finds that in fact they do bear fruits. Why need he quarrel +with an account of knowledge that insists on naming this effect? Why not +treat the working of the idea from next to next as the essence of its +self-transcendency? Why insist that knowing is a static relation out of +time when it practically seems so much a function of our active life? +For a thing to be valid, says Lotze, is the same as to make itself +valid. When the whole universe seems only to be making itself valid and +to be still incomplete (else why its ceaseless changing?) why, of all +things, should knowing be exempt? Why should it not be making itself +valid like everything else? That some parts of it may be already valid +or verified beyond dispute; the empirical philosopher, of course, like +any one else, may always hope. + + + +V + +THE ESSENCE OF HUMANISM + +[Footnote: Reprinted from the Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and +Scientific Methods, vol. ii. No. 5, March 2, 1905.] + +Humanism is a ferment that has 'come to stay.' It is not a single +hypothesis or theorem, and it dwells on no new facts. It is rather a +slow shifting in the philosophic perspective, making things appear +as from a new centre of interest or point of sight. Some writers are +strongly conscious of the shifting, others half unconscious, even though +their own vision may have undergone much change. The result is no small +confusion in debate, the half-conscious humanists often taking part +against the radical ones, as if they wished to count upon the other +side. [Footnote: Professor Baldwin, for example. His address 'Selective +Thinking' (Psychological Review, January, 1898, reprinted in his volume, +'Development and Evolution') seems to me an unusually well written +pragmatic manifesto. Nevertheless in 'The Limits of Pragmatism' (ibid; +January, 1904), he (much less clearly) joins in the attack.] + +If humanism really be the name for such a shifting of perspective, it +is obvious that the whole scene of the philosophic stage will change +in some degree if humanism prevails. The emphasis of things, their +foreground and background distribution, their sizes and values, will not +keep just the same. [Footnote: The ethical changes, it seems to me, are +beautifully made evident in Professor Dewey's series of articles, which +will never get the attention they deserve till they are printed in a +book. I mean: 'The Significance of Emotions,' Psychological Review, +vol. ii, 13; 'The Reflex Arc Concept in Psychology,' ibid; iii, 357; +'Psychology and Social Practice,' ibid., vii, 105; 'Interpretation +of Savage Mind,' ibid; ix, 2l7; 'Green's Theory of the Moral Motive,' +Philosophical Review, vol. i, 593; 'Self-realization as the Moral +Ideal,' ibid; ii, 652; 'The Psychology of Effort,' ibid; vi, 43; +'The Evolutionary Method as Applied to Morality,' ibid; xi, 107,353; +'Evolution and Ethics,' Monist, vol. viii, 321; to mention only a few.] +If such pervasive consequences be involved in humanism, it is clear that +no pains which philosophers may take, first in defining it, and then in +furthering, checking, or steering its progress, will be thrown away. + +It suffers badly at present from incomplete definition. Its most +systematic advocates, Schiller and Dewey, have published fragmentary +programmes only; and its bearing on many vital philosophic problems has +not been traced except by adversaries who, scenting heresies in advance, +have showered blows on doctrines--subjectivism and scepticism, for +example--that no good humanist finds it necessary to entertain. By their +still greater reticences, the anti-humanists have, in turn, perplexed +the humanists. Much of the controversy has involved the word 'truth.' +It is always good in debate to know your adversary's point of view +authentically. But the critics of humanism never define exactly what the +word 'truth' signifies when they use it themselves. The humanists have +to guess at their view; and the result has doubtless been much beating +of the air. Add to all this, great individual differences in both camps, +and it becomes clear that nothing is so urgently needed, at the stage +which things have reached at present, as a sharper definition by each +side of its central point of view. + +Whoever will contribute any touch of sharpness will help us to make sure +of what's what and who is who. Any one can contribute such a definition, +and, without it, no one knows exactly where he stands. If I offer my own +provisional definition of humanism now and here, others may improve it, +some adversary may be led to define his own creed more sharply by the +contrast, and a certain quickening of the crystallization of general +opinion may result. + +The essential service of humanism, as I conceive the situation, is to +have seen that THO ONE PART OF OUR EXPERIENCE MAY LEAN UPON ANOTHER PART +TO MAKE IT WHAT IT IS IN ANY ONE OF SEVERAL ASPECTS IN WHICH IT MAY +BE CONSIDERED, EXPERIENCE AS A WHOLE IS SELF-CONTAINING AND LEANS +ON NOTHING. Since this formula also expresses the main contention +of transcendental idealism, it needs abundant explication to make it +unambiguous. It seems, at first sight, to confine itself to denying +theism and pantheism. But, in fact, it need not deny either; everything +would depend on the exegesis; and if the formula ever became canonical, +it would certainly develop both right-wing and left-wing interpreters. +I myself read humanism theistically and pluralistically. If there be a +God, he is no absolute all-experiencer, but simply the experiencer of +widest actual conscious span. Read thus, humanism is for me a religion +susceptible of reasoned defence, tho I am well aware how many minds +there are to whom it can appeal religiously only when it has been +monistically translated. Ethically the pluralistic form of it takes for +me a stronger hold on reality than any other philosophy I know of--it +being essentially a SOCIAL philosophy, a philosophy of 'CO,' in which +conjunctions do the work. But my primary reason for advocating it is its +matchless intellectual economy. It gets rid, not only of the standing +'problems' that monism engenders ('problem of evil,' 'problem of +freedom,' and the like), but of other metaphysical mysteries and +paradoxes as well. + +It gets rid, for example, of the whole agnostic controversy, by refusing +to entertain the hypothesis of trans-empirical reality at all. It gets +rid of any need for an absolute of the bradleyan type (avowedly sterile +for intellectual purposes) by insisting that the conjunctive relations +found within experience are faultlessly real. It gets rid of the need +of an absolute of the roycean type (similarly sterile) by its pragmatic +treatment of the problem of knowledge. As the views of knowledge, +reality and truth imputed to humanism have been those so far most +fiercely attacked, it is in regard to these ideas that a sharpening of +focus seems most urgently required. I proceed therefore to bring the +views which I impute to humanism in these respects into focus as briefly +as I can. + +II + +If the central humanistic thesis, printed above in italics, be accepted, +it will follow that, if there be any such thing at all as knowing, the +knower and the object known must both be portions of experience. One +part of experience must, therefore, either + +(1) Know another part of experience--in other words, parts must, as +Professor Woodbridge says, [Footnote: In Science, November 4, 1904, p. +599.] represent ONE ANOTHER instead of representing realities outside of +'consciousness'--this case is that of conceptual knowledge; or else + +(2) They must simply exist as so many ultimate THATS or facts of being, +in the first instance; and then, as a secondary complication, and +without doubling up its entitative singleness, any one and the same +THAT in experience must figure alternately as a thing known and as a +knowledge of the thing, by reason of two divergent kinds of context into +which, in the general course of experience, it gets woven. [Footnote: +This statement is probably excessively obscure to any one who has not +read my two articles 'Does Consciousness Exist?' and 'A World of Pure +Experience' in the Journal of Philosophy, vol. i, 1904.] + +This second case is that of sense-perception. There is a stage of +thought that goes beyond common sense, and of it I shall say more +presently; but the common-sense stage is a perfectly definite +halting-place of thought, primarily for purposes of action; and, so long +as we remain on the common-sense stage of thought, object and subject +FUSE in the fact of 'presentation' or sense-perception-the pen and hand +which I now SEE writing, for example, ARE the physical realities which +those words designate. In this case there is no self-transcendency +implied in the knowing. Humanism, here, is only a more comminuted +IDENTITATSPHILOSOPHIE. + +In case (1), on the contrary, the representative experience DOES +TRANSCEND ITSELF in knowing the other experience that is its object. +No one can talk of the knowledge of the one by the other without seeing +them as numerically distinct entities, of which the one lies beyond the +other and away from it, along some direction and with some interval, +that can be definitely named. But, if the talker be a humanist, he +must also see this distance-interval concretely and pragmatically, and +confess it to consist of other intervening experiences--of possible +ones, at all events, if not of actual. To call my present idea of my +dog, for example, cognitive of the real dog means that, as the actual +tissue of experience is constituted, the idea is capable of leading into +a chain of other experiences on my part that go from next to next and +terminate at last in vivid sense-perceptions of a jumping, barking, +hairy body. Those ARE the real dog, the dog's full presence, for my +common sense. If the supposed talker is a profound philosopher, altho +they may not BE the real dog for him, they MEAN the real dog, are +practical substitutes for the real dog, as the representation was a +practical substitute for them, that real dog being a lot of atoms, +say, or of mind-stuff, that lie WHERE the sense-perceptions lie in his +experience as well as in my own. + +III + +The philosopher here stands for the stage of thought that goes beyond +the stage of common sense; and the difference is simply that he +'interpolates' and 'extrapolates,' where common sense does not. For +common sense, two men see the same identical real dog. Philosophy, +noting actual differences in their perceptions points out the duality +of these latter, and interpolates something between them as a more real +terminus--first, organs, viscera, etc.; next, cells; then, ultimate +atoms; lastly, mind-stuff perhaps. The original sense-termini of the two +men, instead of coalescing with each other and with the real dog-object, +as at first supposed, are thus held by philosophers to be separated by +invisible realities with which, at most, they are conterminous. + +Abolish, now, one of the percipients, and the interpolation changes +into 'extrapolation.' The sense-terminus of the remaining percipient is +regarded by the philosopher as not quite reaching reality. He has only +carried the procession of experiences, the philosopher thinks, to a +definite, because practical, halting-place somewhere on the way towards +an absolute truth that lies beyond. + +The humanist sees all the time, however, that there is no absolute +transcendency even about the more absolute realities thus conjectured or +believed in. The viscera and cells are only possible percepts following +upon that of the outer body. The atoms again, tho we may never attain +to human means of perceiving them, are still defined perceptually. +The mind-stuff itself is conceived as a kind of experience; and it is +possible to frame the hypothesis (such hypotheses can by no logic be +excluded from philosophy) of two knowers of a piece of mind-stuff and +the mind-stuff itself becoming 'confluent' at the moment at which our +imperfect knowing might pass into knowing of a completed type. Even so +do you and I habitually conceive our two perceptions and the real dog +as confluent, tho only provisionally, and for the common-sense stage +of thought. If my pen be inwardly made of mind-stuff, there is no +confluence NOW between that mind-stuff and my visual perception of the +pen. But conceivably there might come to be such confluence; for, in +the case of my HAND, the visual sensations and the inward feelings of +the hand, its mind-stuff, so to speak, are even now as confluent as any +two things can be. + +There is, thus, no breach in humanistic epistemology. Whether knowledge +be taken as ideally perfected, or only as true enough to pass muster +for practice, it is hung on one continuous scheme. Reality, howsoever +remote, is always defined as a terminus within the general possibilities +of experience; and what knows it is defined as an experience THAT +'REPRESENTS' IT, IN THE SENSE OF BEING SUBSTITUTABLE FOR IT IN OUR +THINKING because it leads to the same associates, OR IN THE SENSE +OF 'POINTING TO IT THROUGH A CHAIN OF OTHER EXPERIENCES THAT EITHER +INTERVENE OR MAY INTERVENE. + +Absolute reality here bears the same relation to sensation as sensation +bears to conception or imagination. Both are provisional or final +termini, sensation being only the terminus at which the practical man +habitually stops, while the philosopher projects a 'beyond,' in the +shape of more absolute reality. These termini, for the practical and the +philosophical stages of thought respectively, are self-supporting. They +are not 'true' of anything else, they simply ARE, are REAL. They 'lean +on nothing,' as my italicized formula said. Rather does the whole +fabric of experience lean on them, just as the whole fabric of the +solar system, including many relative positions, leans, for its absolute +position in space, on any one of its constituent stars. Here, again, one +gets a new IDENTITATSPHILOSOPHIE in pluralistic form. + +IV + +If I have succeeded in making this at all clear (tho I fear that brevity +and abstractness between them may have made me fail), the reader +will see that the 'truth' of our mental operations must always be an +intra-experiential affair. A conception is reckoned true by common sense +when it can be made to lead to a sensation. The sensation, which +for common sense is not so much 'true' as 'real,' is held to be +PROVISIONALLY true by the philosopher just in so far as it COVERS (abuts +at, or occupies the place of) a still more absolutely real experience, +in the possibility of which, to some remoter experient, the philosopher +finds reason to believe. + +Meanwhile what actually DOES count for true to any individual trower, +whether he be philosopher or common man, is always a result of his +APPERCEPTIONS. If a novel experience, conceptual or sensible, contradict +too emphatically our pre-existent system of beliefs, in ninety-nine +cases out of a hundred it is treated as false. Only when the older and +the newer experiences are congruous enough to mutually apperceive and +modify each other, does what we treat as an advance in truth result. +In no case, however, need truth consist in a relation between our +experiences and something archetypal or trans-experiential. Should we +ever reach absolutely terminal experiences, experiences in which we all +agreed, which were superseded by no revised continuations, these would +not be TRUE, they would be REAL, they would simply BE, and be indeed +the angles, corners, and linchpins of all reality, on which the truth of +everything else would be stayed. Only such OTHER things as led to these +by satisfactory conjunctions would be 'true.' Satisfactory connection of +some sort with such termini is all that the word 'truth' means. On the +common-stage of thought sense-presentations serve as such termini. Our +ideas and concepts and scientific theories pass for true only so far as +they harmoniously lead back to the world of sense. + +I hope that many humanists will endorse this attempt of mine to trace +the more essential features of that way of viewing things. I feel almost +certain that Messrs. Dewey and Schiller will do so. If the attackers +will also take some slight account of it, it may be that discussion will +be a little less wide of the mark than it has hitherto been. + + + +VI + +A WORD MORE ABOUT TRUTH + +[Footnote: Reprint from the Journal of Philosophy, July 18,1907.] + +My failure in making converts to my conception of truth seems, if I +may judge by what I hear in conversation, almost complete. An ordinary +philosopher would feel disheartened, and a common choleric sinner would +curse God and die, after such a reception. But instead of taking counsel +of despair, I make bold to vary my statements, in the faint hope that +repeated droppings may wear upon the stone, and that my formulas may +seem less obscure if surrounded by something more of a 'mass' whereby to +apperceive them. + +For fear of compromising other pragmatists, whoe'er they be, I will +speak of the conception which I am trying to make intelligible, as my +own conception. I first published it in the year 1885, in the first +article reprinted in the present book. Essential theses of this article +were independently supported in 1893 and 1895 by Professor D. S. Miller +[Footnote: Philosophical Review, vol. ii, p. 408, and Psychological +Review, vol. ii, p. 533.] and were repeated by me in a presidential +address on 'The knowing of things together' [Footnote: The relevant +parts of which are printed above, p. 43.] in 1895. Professor Strong, +in an article in the Journal of Philosophy, etc., [Footnote: Vol. i, +p. 253.] entitled 'A naturalistic theory of the reference of thought +to reality,' called our account 'the James-Miller theory of cognition,' +and, as I understood him, gave it his adhesion. Yet, such is the +difficulty of writing clearly in these penetralia of philosophy, that +each of these revered colleagues informs me privately that the account +of truth I now give--which to me is but that earlier statement more +completely set forth--is to him inadequate, and seems to leave the gist +of real cognition out. If such near friends disagree, what can I hope +from remoter ones, and what from unfriendly critics? + +Yet I feel so sure that the fault must lie in my lame forms of statement +and not in my doctrine, that I am fain to try once more to express +myself. + +Are there not some general distinctions which it may help us to agree +about in advance? Professor Strong distinguishes between what he calls +'saltatory' and what he calls 'ambulatory' relations. 'Difference,' for +example, is saltatory, jumping as it were immediately from one term +to another, but 'distance' in time or space is made out of intervening +parts of experience through which we ambulate in succession. Years ago, +when T. H. Green's ideas were most influential, I was much troubled +by his criticisms of english sensationalism. One of his disciples in +particular would always say to me, 'Yes! TERMS may indeed be possibly +sensational in origin; but RELATIONS, what are they but pure acts of +the intellect coming upon the sensations from above, and of a higher +nature?' I well remember the sudden relief it gave me to perceive one +day that SPACE-relations at any rate were homogeneous with the terms +between which they mediated. The terms were spaces, and the relations +were other intervening spaces. [Footnote: See my Principles of +Psychology, vol. ii, pp. 148-153.] For the Greenites space-relations had +been saltatory, for me they became thenceforward ambulatory. + +Now the most general way of contrasting my view of knowledge with the +popular view (which is also the view of most epistemologists) is to call +my view ambulatory, and the other view saltatory; and the most general +way of characterizing the two views is by saying that my view describes +knowing as it exists concretely, while the other view only describes its +results abstractly taken. + +I fear that most of my recalcitrant readers fail to recognize that what +is ambulatory in the concrete may be taken so abstractly as to appear +saltatory. Distance, for example, is made abstract by emptying out +whatever is particular in the concrete intervals--it is reduced thus +to a sole 'difference,' a difference of 'place,' which is a logical or +saltatory distinction, a so-called 'pure relation.' + +The same is true of the relation called 'knowing,' which may connect +an idea with a reality. My own account of this relation is ambulatory +through and through. I say that we know an object by means of an idea, +whenever we ambulate towards the object under the impulse which the idea +communicates. If we believe in so-called 'sensible' realities, the idea +may not only send us towards its object, but may put the latter into our +very hand, make it our immediate sensation. But, if, as most reflective +people opine, sensible realities are not 'real' realities, but only +their appearances, our idea brings us at least so far, puts us in touch +with reality's most authentic appearances and substitutes. In any case +our idea brings us into the object's neighborhood, practical or ideal, +gets us into commerce with it, helps us towards its closer acquaintance, +enables us to foresee it, class it, compare it, deduce it,--in short, to +deal with it as we could not were the idea not in our possession. + +The idea is thus, when functionally considered, an instrument for +enabling us the better to HAVE TO DO with the object and to act about +it. But it and the object are both of them bits of the general sheet +and tissue of reality at large; and when we say that the idea leads us +towards the object, that only means that it carries us forward +through intervening tracts of that reality into the object's closer +neighborhood, into the midst of its associates at least, be these its +physical neighbors, or be they its logical congeners only. Thus carried +into closer quarters, we are in an improved situation as regards +acquaintance and conduct; and we say that through the idea we now KNOW +the object better or more truly. + +My thesis is that the knowing here is MADE by the ambulation through the +intervening experiences. If the idea led us nowhere, or FROM that object +instead of towards it, could we talk at all of its having any cognitive +quality? Surely not, for it is only when taken in conjunction with the +intermediate experiences that it gets related to THAT PARTICULAR OBJECT +rather than to any other part of nature. Those intermediaries determine +what particular knowing function it exerts. The terminus they guide +us to tells us what object it 'means,' the results they enrich us +with 'verify' or 'refute' it. Intervening experiences are thus as +indispensable foundations for a concrete relation of cognition as +intervening space is for a relation of distance. Cognition, whenever +we take it concretely, means determinate 'ambulation,' through +intermediaries, from a terminus a quo to, or towards, a terminus ad +quem. As the intermediaries are other than the termini, and connected +with them by the usual associative bonds (be these 'external' or be they +logical, i.e., classificatory, in character), there would appear to +be nothing especially unique about the processes of knowing. They fall +wholly within experience; and we need use, in describing them, no +other categories than those which we employ in describing other natural +processes. + +But there exist no processes which we cannot also consider abstractly, +eviscerating them down to their essential skeletons or outlines; and +when we have treated the processes of knowing thus, we are easily led to +regard them as something altogether unparalleled in nature. For we first +empty idea, object and intermediaries of all their particularities, in +order to retain only a general scheme, and then we consider the latter +only in its function of giving a result, and not in its character of +being a process. In this treatment the intermediaries shrivel into the +form of a mere space of separation, while the idea and object retain +only the logical distinctness of being the end-terms that are separated. +In other words, the intermediaries which in their concrete particularity +form a bridge, evaporate ideally into an empty interval to cross, and +then, the relation of the end-terms having become saltatory, the whole +hocus-pocus of Erkenntnistheorie begins, and goes on unrestrained +by further concrete considerations. The idea, in 'meaning' an object +separated by an 'epistemological chasm' from itself, now executes what +Professor Ladd calls a 'salto mortale'; in knowing the object's nature, +it now 'transcends' its own. The object in turn becomes 'present' where +it is really absent, etc.; until a scheme remains upon our hands, the +sublime paradoxes of which some of us think that nothing short of an +'absolute' can explain. + +The relation between idea and object, thus made abstract and saltatory, +is thenceforward opposed, as being more essential and previous, to its +own ambulatory self, and the more concrete description is branded as +either false or insufficient. The bridge of intermediaries, actual +or possible, which in every real case is what carries and defines the +knowing, gets treated as an episodic complication which need not even +potentially be there. I believe that this vulgar fallacy of opposing +abstractions to the concretes from which they are abstracted, is the +main reason why my account of knowing is deemed so unsatisfactory, and I +will therefore say a word more on that general point. + +Any vehicle of conjunction, if all its particularities are abstracted +from it, will leave us with nothing on our hands but the original +disjunction which it bridged over. But to escape treating the resultant +self-contradiction as an achievement of dialectical profundity, all we +need is to restore some part, no matter how small, of what we have taken +away. In the case of the epistemological chasm the first reasonable step +is to remember that the chasm was filled with SOME empirical material, +whether ideational or sensational, which performed SOME bridging +function and saved us from the mortal leap. Restoring thus the +indispensable modicum of reality to the matter of our discussion, we +find our abstract treatment genuinely useful. We escape entanglement +with special cases without at the same time falling into gratuitous +paradoxes. We can now describe the general features of cognition, tell +what on the whole it DOES FOR US, in a universal way. + +We must remember that this whole inquiry into knowing grows up on a +reflective level. In any real moment of knowing, what we are thinking of +is our object, not the way in which we ourselves are momentarily knowing +it. We at this moment, as it happens, have knowing itself for our +object; but I think that the reader will agree that his present knowing +of that object is included only abstractly, and by anticipation, in +the results he may reach. What he concretely has before his mind, as he +reasons, is some supposed objective instance of knowing, as he conceives +it to go on in some other person, or recalls it from his own past. As +such, he, the critic, sees it to contain both an idea and an object, and +processes by which the knower is guided from the one towards the other. +He sees that the idea is remote from the object, and that, whether +through intermediaries or not, it genuinely HAS TO DO with it. He sees +that it thus works beyond its immediate being, and lays hold of a +remote reality; it jumps across, transcends itself. It does all this by +extraneous aid, to be sure, but when the aid has come, it HAS done it +and the result is secure. Why not talk of results by themselves, then, +without considering means? Why not treat the idea as simply grasping +or intuiting the reality, of its having the faculty anyhow, of shooting +over nature behind the scenes and knowing things immediately and +directly? Why need we always lug in the bridging?--it only retards our +discourse to do so. + +Such abstract talk about cognition's results is surely convenient; and +it is surely as legitimate as it is convenient, SO LONG AS WE DO NOT +FORGET OR POSITIVELY DENY, WHAT IT IGNORES. We may on occasion say +that our idea meant ALWAYS that particular object, that it led us there +because it was OF it intrinsically and essentially. We may insist that +its verification follows upon that original cognitive virtue in it--and +all the rest--and we shall do no harm so long as we know that these are +only short cuts in our thinking. They are positively true accounts of +fact AS FAR AS THEY GO, only they leave vast tracts of fact out of the +account, tracts of tact that have to be reinstated to make the accounts +literally true of any real case. But if, not merely passively ignoring +the intermediaries, you actively deny them [Footnote: This is the +fallacy which I have called 'vicious intellectualism' in my book A +Pluralistic Universe, Longmans, Green & Co., 1909.] to be even potential +requisites for the results you are so struck by, your epistemology goes +to irremediable smash. You are as far off the track as an historian +would be, if, lost in admiration of Napoleon's personal power, he were +to ignore his marshals and his armies, and were to accuse you of +error in describing his conquests as effected by their means. Of such +abstractness and one-sidedness I accuse most of the critics of my own +account. + +In the second lecture of the book Pragmatism, I used the illustration +of a squirrel scrambling round a tree-trunk to keep out of sight of +a pursuing man: both go round the tree, but does the man go round the +squirrel? It all depends, I said, on what you mean by going round.' In +one sense of the word the man 'goes round,' in another sense he does +not. I settled the dispute by pragmatically distinguishing the senses. +But I told how some disputants had called my distinction a shuffling +evasion and taken their stand on what they called 'plain honest English +going-round.' + +In such a simple case few people would object to letting the term in +dispute be translated into its concreter equivalents. But in the case +of a complex function like our knowing they act differently. I give full +concrete particular value for the ideas of knowing in every case I can +think of, yet my critics insist that 'plain honest English knowing' is +left out of my account. They write as if the minus were on my side and +the plus on theirs. + +The essence of the matter for me is that altho knowing can be both +abstractly and concretely described, and altho the abstract descriptions +are often useful enough, yet they are all sucked up and absorbed without +residuum into the concreter ones, and contain nothing of any essentially +other or higher nature, which the concrete descriptions can be justly +accused of leaving behind. Knowing is just a natural process like any +other. There is no ambulatory process whatsoever, the results of which +we may not describe, if we prefer to, in saltatory terms, or represent +in static formulation. Suppose, e.g., that we say a man is 'prudent.' +Concretely, that means that he takes out insurance, hedges in betting, +looks before he leaps. Do such acts CONSTITUTE the prudence? ARE they +the man qua prudent? + +Or is the prudence something by itself and independent of them? As a +constant habit in him, a permanent tone of character, it is convenient +to call him prudent in abstraction from any one of his acts, prudent in +general and without specification, and to say the acts follow from the +pre-existing prudence. There are peculiarities in his psycho-physical +system that make him act prudently; and there are tendencies to +association in our thoughts that prompt some of them to make for truth +and others for error. But would the man be prudent in the absence of +each and all of the acts? Or would the thoughts be true if they had no +associative or impulsive tendencies? Surely we have no right to oppose +static essences in this way to the moving processes in which they live +embedded. + +My bedroom is above my library. Does the 'aboveness' here mean +aught that is different from the concrete spaces which have to be +moved-through in getting from the one to the other? It means, you may +say, a pure topographic relation, a sort of architect's plan among the +eternal essences. But that is not the full aboveness, it is only an +abbreviated substitute that on occasion may lead my mind towards truer, +i.e., fuller, dealings with the real aboveness. It is not an aboveness +ante rem, it is a post rem extract from the aboveness in rebus. We +may indeed talk, for certain conveniences, as if the abstract scheme +preceded, we may say 'I must go up stairs because of the essential +aboveness,' just as we may say that the man 'does prudent acts because +of his ingrained prudence,' or that our ideas 'lead us truly because of +their intrinsic truth.' But this should not debar us on other occasions +from using completer forms of description. A concrete matter of fact +always remains identical under any form of description, as when we say +of a line, now that it runs from left to right, and now that it runs +from right to left. These are but names of one and the same fact, one +more expedient to use at one time, one at another. The full facts of +cognition, whatever be the way in which we talk about them, even when +we talk most abstractly, stand inalterably given in the actualities and +possibilities of the experience-continuum. [Footnote 1: The ultimate +object or terminus of a cognitive process may in certain instances lie +beyond the direct experience of the particular cognizer, but it, of +course, must exist as part of the total universe of experience whose +constitution, with cognition in it, the critic is discussing.] But my +critics treat my own more concrete talk as if IT were the kind that +sinned by its inadequacy, and as if the full continuum left something +out. + +A favorite way of opposing the more abstract to the more concrete +account is to accuse those who favor the latter of 'confounding +psychology with logic.' Our critics say that when we are asked what +truth MEANS, we reply by telling only how it is ARRIVED-AT. But since a +meaning is a logical relation, static, independent of time, how can it +possibly be identified, they say, with any concrete man's experience, +perishing as this does at the instant of its production? This, indeed, +sounds profound, but I challenge the profundity. I defy any one to show +any difference between logic and psychology here. The logical relation +stands to the psychological relation between idea and object only as +saltatory abstractness stands to ambulatory concreteness. Both relations +need a psychological vehicle; and the 'logical' one is simply the +'psychological' one disemboweled of its fulness, and reduced to a bare +abstractional scheme. + +A while ago a prisoner, on being released, tried to assassinate the +judge who had sentenced him. He had apparently succeeded in conceiving +the judge timelessly, had reduced him to a bare logical meaning, that +of being his 'enemy and persecutor,' by stripping off all the concrete +conditions (as jury's verdict, official obligation, absence of personal +spite, possibly sympathy) that gave its full psychological character to +the sentence as a particular man's act in time. Truly the sentence WAS +inimical to the culprit; but which idea of it is the truer one, that +bare logical definition of it, or its full psychological specification? +The anti-pragmatists ought in consistency to stand up for the criminal's +view of the case, treat the judge as the latter's logical enemy, and bar +out the other conditions as so much inessential psychological stuff. + +II + +A still further obstacle, I suspect, stands in the way of my account's +acceptance. Like Dewey and like Schiller, I have had to say that +the truth of an idea is determined by its satisfactoriness. But +satisfactoriness is a subjective term, just as idea is; and truth +is generally regarded as 'objective.' Readers who admit that +satisfactoriness is our only MARK of truth, the only sign that we +possess the precious article, will still say that the objective relation +between idea and object which the word 'truth' points to is left out of +my account altogether. I fear also that the association of my poor name +with the 'will to believe' (which 'will,' it seems to me, ought to play +no part in this discussion) works against my credit in some quarters. +I fornicate with that unclean thing, my adversaries may think, whereas +your genuine truth-lover must discourse in huxleyan heroics, and feel as +if truth, to be real truth, ought to bring eventual messages of death to +all our satisfactions. Such divergences certainly prove the complexity +of the area of our discussion; but to my mind they also are based on +misunderstandings, which (tho with but little hope of success) I will +try to diminish by a further word of explanation. + +First, then, I will ask my objectors to define exactly what SORT of +thing it is they have in mind when they speak of a truth that shall be +absolute, complete and objective; and then I will defy them to show me +any conceivable standing-room for such a kind of truth outside the terms +of my own description. It will fall, as I contend, entirely within the +field of my analysis. + +To begin with, it must obtain between an idea and a reality that is the +idea's object; and, as a predicate, it must apply to the idea and not +to the object, for objective realities are not TRUE, at least not in the +universe of discourse to which we are now confining ourselves, for there +they are taken as simply BEING, while the ideas are true OF them. But we +can suppose a series of ideas to be successively more and more true +of the same object, and can ask what is the extreme approach to being +absolutely true that the last idea might attain to. + +The maximal conceivable truth in an idea would seem to be that it should +lead to an actual merging of ourselves with the object, to an utter +mutual confluence and identification. On the common-sense level +of belief this is what is supposed really to take place in +sense-perception. My idea of this pen verifies itself through +my percept; and my percept is held to BE the pen for the time +being--percepts and physical realities being treated by common sense as +identical. But the physiology of the senses has criticised common sense +out of court, and the pen 'in itself' is now believed to lie beyond my +momentary percept. Yet the notion once suggested, of what a completely +consummated acquaintance with a reality might be like, remains over for +our speculative purposes. TOTAL CONFLUX OF THE MIND WITH THE REALITY +would be the absolute limit of truth, there could be no better or more +satisfying knowledge than that. + +Such total conflux, it is needless to say, is ALREADY EXPLICITLY +PROVIDED FOR, AS A POSSIBILITY, IN MY ACCOUNT OF THE MATTER. If an idea +should ever lead us not only TOWARDS, or UP TO, or AGAINST, a reality, +but so close that we and the reality should MELT TOGETHER, it would be +made absolutely true, according to me, by that performance. + +In point of fact philosophers doubt that this ever occurs. What happens, +they think, is only that we get nearer and nearer to realities, +we approximate more and more to the all-satisfying limit; and the +definition of actually, as distinguished from imaginably, complete and +objective truth, can then only be that it belongs to the idea that +will lead us as CLOSE UP AGAINST THE OBJECT as in the nature of our +experience is possible, literally NEXT to it, for instance. + +Suppose, now, there were an idea that did this for a certain objective +reality. Suppose that no further approach were possible, that nothing +lay between, that the next step would carry us right INTO the reality; +then that result, being the next thing to conflux, would make the idea +true in the maximal degree that might be supposed practically attainable +in the world which we inhabit. + +Well, I need hardly explain that THAT DEGREE OF TRUTH IS ALSO PROVIDED +FOR IN MY ACCOUNT OF THE MATTER. And if satisfactions are the marks of +truth's presence, we may add that any less true substitute for such a +true idea would prove less satisfactory. Following its lead, we should +probably find out that we did not quite touch the terminus. We should +desiderate a closer approach, and not rest till we had found it. + +I am, of course, postulating here a standing reality independent of the +idea that knows it. I am also postulating that satisfactions grow pari +passu with our approximation to such reality. [Footnote 1: Say, if +you prefer to, that DISsatisfactions decrease pari passu with +such approximation. The approximation may be of any kind +assignable--approximation in time or in space, or approximation in kind, +which in common speech means 'copying.'] If my critics challenge this +latter assumption, I retort upon them with the former. Our whole notion +of a standing reality grows up in the form of an ideal limit to the +series of successive termini to which our thoughts have led us and +still are leading us. Each terminus proves provisional by leaving us +unsatisfied. The truer idea is the one that pushes farther; so we +are ever beckoned on by the ideal notion of an ultimate completely +satisfactory terminus. I, for one, obey and accept that notion. I can +conceive no other objective CONTENT to the notion of ideally perfect +truth than that of penetration into such a terminus, nor can I conceive +that the notion would ever have grown up, or that true ideas would ever +have been sorted out from false or idle ones, save for the greater +sum of satisfactions, intellectual or practical, which the truer ones +brought with them. Can we imagine a man absolutely satisfied with an +idea and with all its relations to his other ideas and to his sensible +experiences, who should yet not take its content as a true account of +reality? The matter of the true is thus absolutely identical with the +matter of the satisfactory. You may put either word first in your ways +of talking; but leave out that whole notion of SATISFACTORY WORKING or +LEADING (which is the essence of my pragmatistic account) and call truth +a static logical relation, independent even of POSSIBLE leadings or +satisfactions, and it seems to me you cut all ground from under you. + +I fear that I am still very obscure. But I respectfully implore those +who reject my doctrine because they can make nothing of my stumbling +language, to tell us in their own name--und zwar very concretely and +articulately!--just how the real, genuine and absolutely 'objective' +truth which they believe in so profoundly, is constituted and +established. They mustn't point to the 'reality' itself, for truth is +only our subjective relation to realities. What is the nominal +essence of this relation, its logical definition, whether or not it be +'objectively' attainable by mortals? + +Whatever they may say it is, I have the firmest faith that my account +will prove to have allowed for it and included it by anticipation, as +one possible case in the total mixture of cases. There is, in short, +no ROOM for any grade or sort of truth outside of the framework of +the pragmatic system, outside of that jungle of empirical workings and +leadings, and their nearer or ulterior terminations, of which I seem to +have written so unskilfully. + + + +VII + +PROFESSOR PRATT ON TRUTH + +I + +[Footnote: Reprinted from the Journal of Philosophy, etc., August 15, +1907 (vol. iv, p. 464).] + +Professor J. B. Pratt's paper in the Journal of Philosophy for June 6, +1907, is so brilliantly written that its misconception of the pragmatist +position seems doubly to call for a reply. + +He asserts that, for a pragmatist, truth cannot be a relation between +an idea and a reality outside and transcendent of the idea, but must +lie 'altogether within experience,' where it will need 'no reference to +anything else to justify it'--no reference to the object, apparently. +The pragmatist must 'reduce everything to psychology,' aye, and to the +psychology of the immediate moment. He is consequently debarred from +saying that an idea that eventually gets psychologically verified WAS +already true before the process of verifying was complete; and he is +equally debarred from treating an idea as true provisionally so long as +he only believes that he CAN verify it whenever he will. + +Whether such a pragmatist as this exists, I know not, never having +myself met with the beast. We can define terms as we like; and if that +be my friend Pratt's definition of a pragmatist, I can only concur with +his anti-pragmatism. But, in setting up the weird type, he quotes words +from me; so, in order to escape being classed by some reader along with +so asinine a being, I will reassert my own view of truth once more. + +Truth is essentially a relation between two things, an idea, on the one +hand, and a reality outside of the idea, on the other. This relation, +like all relations, has its fundamentum, namely, the matrix of +experiential circumstance, psychological as well as physical, in which +the correlated terms are found embedded. In the case of the relation +between 'heir' and 'legacy' the fundamentum is a world in which there +was a testator, and in which there is now a will and an executor; in the +case of that between idea and object, it is a world with circumstances +of a sort to make a satisfactory verification process, lying around +and between the two terms. But just as a man may be called an heir and +treated as one before the executor has divided the estate, so an idea +may practically be credited with truth before the verification process +has been exhaustively carried out--the existence of the mass of +verifying circumstance is enough. Where potentiality counts for +actuality in so many other cases, one does not see why it may not so +count here. We call a man benevolent not only for his kind acts paid in, +but for his readiness to perform others; we treat an idea as 'luminous' +not only for the light it has shed, but for that we expect it will +shed on dark problems. Why should we not equally trust the truth of our +ideas? We live on credits everywhere; and we use our ideas far oftener +for calling up things connected with their immediate objects, than for +calling up those objects themselves. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred +the only use we should make of the object itself, if we were led up to +it by our idea, would be to pass on to those connected things by its +means. So we continually curtail verification-processes, letting our +belief that they are possible suffice. + +What CONSTITUTES THE RELATION known as truth, I now say, is just the +EXISTENCE IN THE EMPIRICAL WORLD OF THIS FUNDAMENTUM OF CIRCUMSTANCE +SURROUNDING OBJECT AND IDEA and ready to be either short-circuited +or traversed at full length. So long as it exists, and a satisfactory +passage through it between the object and the idea is possible, that +idea will both BE true, and will HAVE BEEN true of that object, whether +fully developed verification has taken place or not. The nature and +place and affinities of the object of course play as vital a part in +making the particular passage possible as do the nature and associative +tendencies of the idea; so that the notion that truth could fall +altogether inside of the thinker's private experience and be something +purely psychological, is absurd. It is BETWEEN the idea and the object +that the truth-relation is to be sought and it involves both terms. + +But the 'intellectualistic' position, if I understand Mr. Pratt rightly, +is that, altho we can use this fundamentum, this mass of go-between +experience, for TESTING truth, yet the truth-relation in itself remains +as something apart. It means, in Mr. Pratt's words, merely 'THIS SIMPLE +THING THAT THE OBJECT OF WHICH ONE IS THINKING IS AS ONE THINKS IT.' + +It seems to me that the word 'as,' which qualifies the relation here, +and bears the whole 'epistemological' burden, is anything but simple. +What it most immediately suggests is that the idea should be LIKE the +object; but most of our ideas, being abstract concepts, bear almost no +resemblance to their objects. The 'as' must therefore, I should say, be +usually interpreted functionally, as meaning that the idea shall lead +us into the same quarters of experience AS the object would. Experience +leads ever on and on, and objects and our ideas of objects may both +lead to the same goals. The ideas being in that case shorter cuts, we +SUBSTITUTE them more and more for their objects; and we habitually waive +direct verification of each one of them, as their train passes through +our mind, because if an idea leads AS the object would lead, we can say, +in Mr. Pratt's words, that in so far forth the object is AS we think it, +and that the idea, verified thus in so far forth, is true enough. + +Mr. Pratt will undoubtedly accept most of these facts, but he will deny +that they spell pragmatism. Of course, definitions are free to every +one; but I have myself never meant by the pragmatic view of truth +anything different from what I now describe; and inasmuch as my use of +the term came earlier than my friend's, I think it ought to have the +right of way. But I suspect that Professor Pratt's contention is not +solely as to what one must think in order to be called a pragmatist. I +am cure that he believes that the truth-relation has something MORE in +it than the fundamentum which I assign can account for. Useful to +test truth by, the matrix of circumstance, he thinks, cannot found the +truth-relation in se, for that is trans-empirical and 'saltatory.' + +Well, take an object and an idea, and assume that the latter is true of +the former--as eternally and absolutely true as you like. Let the object +be as much 'as' the idea thinks it, as it is possible for one thing to +be 'as' another. I now formally ask of Professor Pratt to tell what this +'as'-ness in itself CONSISTS in--for it seems to me that it ought to +consist in something assignable and describable, and not remain a pure +mystery, and I promise that if he can assign any determination of it +whatever which I cannot successfully refer to some specification of what +in this article I have called the empirical fundamentum, I will confess +my stupidity cheerfully, and will agree never to publish a line upon +this subject of truth again. + + +II + +Professor Pratt has returned to the charge in a whole book, [Footnote +1: J. B. Pratt: What is Pragmatism. New York, The Macmillan Company, +1909.--The comments I have printed were written in March, 1909, after +some of the articles printed later in the present volume.] which for +its clearness and good temper deserves to supersede all the rest of +the anti-pragmatistic literature. I wish it might do so; for its author +admits all MY essential contentions, simply distinguishing my account +of truth as 'modified' pragmatism from Schiller's and Dewey's, which he +calls pragmatism of the 'radical' sort. As I myself understand Dewey and +Schiller, our views absolutely agree, in spite of our different modes of +statement; but I have enough trouble of my own in life without having to +defend my friends, so I abandon them provisionally to the tender mercy +of Professor Pratt's interpretations, utterly erroneous tho I deem these +to be. My reply as regards myself can be very short, for I prefer to +consider only essentials, and Dr. Pratt's whole book hardly takes the +matter farther than the article to which I retort in Part I of the +present paper. + +He repeats the 'as'-formula, as if it were something that I, along with +other pragmatists, had denied, [Footnote: Op. cit., pp. 77-80.] whereas +I have only asked those who insist so on its importance to do something +more than merely utter it--to explicate it, for example, and tell us +what its so great importance consists in. I myself agree most cordially +that for an idea to be true the object must be 'as' the idea declares +it, but I explicate the 'as'-ness as meaning the idea's verifiability. + +Now since Dr. Pratt denies none of these verifying 'workings' for which +I have pleaded, but only insists on their inability to serve as the +fundamentum of the truth-relation, it seems that there is really nothing +in the line of FACT about which we differ, and that the issue between us +is solely as to how far the notion of workableness or verifiability +is an essential part of the notion of 'trueness'--'trueness' being Dr. +Pratt's present name for the character of as-ness in the true idea. +I maintain that there is no meaning left in this notion of as-ness or +trueness if no reference to the possibility of concrete working on the +part of the idea is made. + +Take an example where there can be no possible working. Suppose I have +an idea to which I give utterance by the vocable 'skrkl,' claiming at +the same time that it is true. Who now can say that it is FALSE, for why +may there not be somewhere in the unplumbed depths of the cosmos some +object with which 'skrkl' can agree and have trueness in Dr. Pratt's +sense? On the other hand who can say that it is TRUE, for who can lay +his hand on that object and show that it and nothing else is what I MEAN +by my word? But yet again, who can gainsay any one who shall call my +word utterly IRRELATIVE to other reality, and treat it as a bare fact in +my mind, devoid of any cognitive function whatever. One of these +three alternatives must surely be predicated of it. For it not to be +irrelevant (or not-cognitive in nature), an object of some kind must be +provided which it may refer to. Supposing that object provided, whether +'skrkl' is true or false of it, depends, according to Professor Pratt, +on no intermediating condition whatever. The trueness or the falsity is +even now immediately, absolutely, and positively there. + +I, on the other hand, demand a cosmic environment of some kind to +establish which of them is there rather than utter irrelevancy. +[Footnote: Dr. Pratt, singularly enough, disposes of this primal +postulate of all pragmatic epistemology, by saying that the pragmatist +'unconsciously surrenders his whole case by smuggling in the idea of a +conditioning environment which determines whether or not the experience +can work, and which cannot itself be identified with the experience or +any part of it' (pp. 167-168). The 'experience' means here of course the +idea, or belief; and the expression 'smuggling in' is to the last degree +diverting. If any epistemologist could dispense with a conditioning +environment, it would seem to be the antipragmatist, with his immediate +saltatory trueness, independent of work done. The mediating pathway +which the environment supplies is the very essence of the pragmatist's +explanation.] I then say, first, that unless some sort of a natural path +exists between the 'skrkl' and THAT object, distinguishable among the +innumerable pathways that run among all the realities of the universe, +linking them promiscuously with one another, there is nothing there to +constitute even the POSSIBILITY OF ITS REFERRING to that object rather +than to any other. + +I say furthermore that unless it have some TENDENCY TO FOLLOW UP THAT +PATH, there is nothing to constitute its INTENTION to refer to the +object in question. + +Finally, I say that unless the path be strown with possibilities +of frustration or encouragement, and offer some sort of terminal +satisfaction or contradiction, there is nothing to constitute its +agreement or disagreement with that object, or to constitute the as-ness +(or 'not-as-ness') in which the trueness (or falseness) is said to +consist. + +I think that Dr. Pratt ought to do something more than repeat the name +'trueness,' in answer to my pathetic question whether that there be not +some CONSTITUTION to a relation as important as this. The pathway, the +tendency, the corroborating or contradicting progress, need not in every +case be experienced in full, but I don't see, if the universe doesn't +contain them among its possibilities of furniture, what LOGICAL MATERIAL +FOR DEFINING the trueness of my idea is left. But if it do contain them, +they and they only are the logical material required. + +I am perplexed by the superior importance which Dr. Pratt attributes +to abstract trueness over concrete verifiability in an idea, and I wish +that he might be moved to explain. It is prior to verification, to be +sure, but so is the verifiability for which I contend prior, just as a +man's 'mortality' (which is nothing but the possibility of his death) is +prior to his death, but it can hardly be that this abstract priority of +all possibility to its correlative fact is what so obstinate a quarrel +is about. I think it probable that Dr. Pratt is vaguely thinking +of something concreter than this. The trueness of an idea must mean +SOMETHING DEFINITE IN IT THAT DETERMINES ITS TENDENCY TO WORK, and +indeed towards this object rather than towards that. Undoubtedly there +is something of this sort in the idea, just as there is something in man +that accounts for his tendency towards death, and in bread that accounts +for its tendency to nourish. What that something is in the case of truth +psychology tells us: the idea has associates peculiar to itself, motor +as well as ideational; it tends by its place and nature to call these +into being, one after another; and the appearance of them in succession +is what we mean by the 'workings' of the idea. According to what they +are, does the trueness or falseness which the idea harbored come to +light. These tendencies have still earlier conditions which, in a +general way, biology, psychology and biography can trace. This whole +chain of natural causal conditions produces a resultant state of things +in which new relations, not simply causal, can now be found, or into +which they can now be introduced,--the relations namely which we +epistemologists study, relations of adaptation, of substitutability, of +instrumentality, of reference and of truth. + +The prior causal conditions, altho there could be no knowing of any +kind, true or false, without them, are but preliminary to the question +of what makes the ideas true or false when once their tendencies have +been obeyed. The tendencies must exist in some shape anyhow, but their +fruits are truth, falsity, or irrelevancy, according to what they +concretely turn out to be. They are not 'saltatory' at any rate, for +they evoke their consequences contiguously, from next to next only; and +not until the final result of the whole associative sequence, actual +or potential, is in our mental sight, can we feel sure what its +epistemological significance, if it have any, may be. True knowing is, +in fine, not substantially, in itself, or 'as such,' inside of the idea +from the first, any more than mortality AS SUCH is inside of the man, or +nourishment AS SUCH inside of the bread. Something else is there first, +that practically MAKES FOR knowing, dying or nourishing, as the case may +be. That something is the 'nature' namely of the first term, be it idea, +man, or bread, that operates to start the causal chain of processes +which, when completed, is the complex fact to which we give whatever +functional name best fits the case. Another nature, another chain of +cognitive workings; and then either another object known or the same +object known differently, will ensue. + +Dr. Pratt perplexes me again by seeming to charge Dewey and Schiller +[Footnote: Page 200] (I am not sure that he charges me) with an account +of truth which would allow the object believed in not to exist, even +if the belief in it were true. 'Since the truth of an idea,' he writes, +'means merely the fact that the idea works, that fact is all that you +mean when you say the idea is true' (p. 206). 'WHEN YOU SAY THE IDEA IS +TRUE'--does that mean true for YOU, the critic, or true for the believer +whom you are describing? The critic's trouble over this seems to come +from his taking the word 'true' irrelatively, whereas the pragmatist +always means 'true for him who experiences the workings.' 'But is the +object REALLY true or not?'--the critic then seems to ask,--as if +the pragmatist were bound to throw in a whole ontology on top of his +epistemology and tell us what realities indubitably exist. 'One world at +a time,' would seem to be the right reply here. + +One other trouble of Dr. Pratt's must be noticed. It concerns the +'transcendence' of the object. When our ideas have worked so as to bring +us flat up against the object, NEXT to it, 'is our relation to it then +ambulatory or saltatory?' Dr. Pratt asks. If YOUR headache be my object, +'MY experiences break off where yours begin,' Dr. Pratt writes, +and 'this fact is of great importance, for it bars out the sense of +transition and fulfilment which forms so important an element in the +pragmatist description of knowledge--the sense of fulfilment due to a +continuous passage from the original idea to the known object. If this +comes at all when I know your headache, it comes not with the object, +but quite on my side of the "epistemological gulf." The gulf is still +there to be transcended.' (p. 158). + +Some day of course, or even now somewhere in the larger life of +the universe, different men's headaches may become confluent or be +'co-conscious.' Here and now, however, headaches do transcend each other +and, when not felt, can be known only conceptually. My idea is that +you really have a headache; it works well with what I see of your +expression, and with what I hear you say; but it doesn't put me in +possession of the headache itself. I am still at one remove, and the +headache 'transcends' me, even tho it be in nowise transcendent of human +experience generally. Bit the 'gulf' here is that which the pragmatist +epistemology itself fixes in the very first words it uses, by +saying there must be an object and an idea. The idea however doesn't +immediately leap the gulf, it only works from next to next so as to +bridge it, fully or approximately. If it bridges it, in the pragmatist's +vision of his hypothetical universe, it can be called a 'true' idea. +If it only MIGHT bridge it, but doesn't, or if it throws a bridge +distinctly AT it, it still has, in the onlooking pragmatist's eyes, what +Professor Pratt calls 'trueness.' But to ask the pragmatist thereupon +whether, when it thus fails to coalesce bodily with the object, it is +REALLY true or has REAL trueness,--in other words whether the headache +he supposes, and supposes the thinker he supposes, to believe in, be +a real headache or not,--is to step from his hypothetical universe of +discourse into the altogether different world of natural fact. + + + +VIII + +THE PRAGMATIST ACCOUNT OF TRUTH AND ITS MISUNDERSTANDERS [Footnote: +Reprint from the Philosophical Review, January, 1908 (vol. xvii, p. 1).] + +The account of truth given in my volume entitled Pragmatism, +continues to meet with such persistent misunderstanding that I +am tempted to make a final brief reply. My ideas may well deserve +refutation, but they can get none till they are conceived of in their +proper shape. The fantastic character of the current misconceptions +shows how unfamiliar is the concrete point of view which pragmatism +assumes. Persons who are familiar with a conception move about so +easily in it that they understand each other at a hint, and can converse +without anxiously attending to their P's and Q's. I have to admit, in +view of the results, that we have assumed too ready an intelligence, +and consequently in many places used a language too slipshod. We should +never have spoken elliptically. The critics have boggled at every word +they could boggle at, and refused to take the spirit rather than the +letter of our discourse. This seems to show a genuine unfamiliarity in +the whole point of view. It also shows, I think, that the second stage +of opposition, which has already begun to express itself in the stock +phrase that 'what is new is not true, and what is true not new,' in +pragmatism, is insincere. If we said nothing in any degree new, why +was our meaning so desperately hard to catch? The blame cannot be laid +wholly upon our obscurity of speech, for in other subjects we have +attained to making ourselves understood. But recriminations are +tasteless; and, as far as I personally am concerned, I am sure that some +of the misconception I complain of is due to my doctrine of truth being +surrounded in that volume of popular lectures by a lot of other opinions +not necessarily implicated with it, so that a reader may very naturally +have grown confused. For this I am to blame,--likewise for omitting +certain explicit cautions, which the pages that follow will now in part +supply. + +FIRST MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM IS ONLY A RE-EDITING OF POSITIVISM. + +This seems the commonest mistake. Scepticism, positivism, and +agnosticism agree with ordinary dogmatic rationalism in presupposing +that everybody knows what the word 'truth' means, without further +explanation. But the former doctrines then either suggest or declare +that real truth, absolute truth, is inaccessible to us, and that we +must fain put up with relative or phenomenal truth as its next best +substitute. By scepticism this is treated as an unsatisfactory state of +affairs, while positivism and agnosticism are cheerful about it, call +real truth sour grapes, and consider phenomenal truth quite sufficient +for all our 'practical' purposes. + +In point of fact, nothing could be farther from all this than what +pragmatism has to say of truth. Its thesis is an altogether previous +one. It leaves off where these other theories begin, having contented +itself with the word truth's DEFINITION. 'No matter whether any mind +extant in the universe possess truth or not,' it asks, 'what does +the notion of truth signify IDEALLY?' 'What kind of things would true +judgments be IN CASE they existed?' The answer which pragmatism offers +is intended to cover the most complete truth that can be conceived of, +'absolute' truth if you like, as well as truth of the most relative and +imperfect description. This question of what truth would be like if it +did exist, belongs obviously to a purely speculative field of inquiry. +It is not a theory about any sort of reality, or about what kind of +knowledge is actually possible; it abstracts from particular terms +altogether, and defines the nature of a possible relation between two of +them. + +As Kant's question about synthetic judgments had escaped previous +philosophers, so the pragmatist question is not only so subtile as to +have escaped attention hitherto, but even so subtile, it would seem, +that when openly broached now, dogmatists and sceptics alike fail to +apprehend it, and deem the pragmatist to be treating of something wholly +different. He insists, they say (I quote an actual critic), 'that the +greater problems are insoluble by human intelligence, that our need of +knowing truly is artificial and illusory, and that our reason, incapable +of reaching the foundations of reality, must turn itself exclusively +towards ACTION.' There could not be a worse misapprehension. + +SECOND MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM IS PRIMARILY AN APPEAL TO ACTION. + +The name 'pragmatism,' with its suggestions of action, has been an +unfortunate choice, I have to admit, and has played into the hands of +this mistake. But no word could protect the doctrine from critics so +blind to the nature of the inquiry that, when Dr. Schiller speaks of +ideas 'working' well, the only thing they think of is their immediate +workings in the physical environment, their enabling us to make money, +or gain some similar 'practical' advantage. Ideas do work thus, of +course, immediately or remotely; but they work indefinitely inside of +the mental world also. Not crediting us with this rudimentary insight, +our critics treat our view as offering itself exclusively to engineers, +doctors, financiers, and men of action generally, who need some sort +of a rough and ready weltanschauung, but have no time or wit to study +genuine philosophy. It is usually described as a characteristically +American movement, a sort of bobtailed scheme of thought, excellently +fitted for the man on the street, who naturally hates theory and wants +cash returns immediately. + +It is quite true that, when the refined theoretic question that +pragmatism begins with is once answered, secondary corollaries of a +practical sort follow. Investigation shows that, in the function called +truth, previous realities are not the only independent variables. To +a certain extent our ideas, being realities, are also independent +variables, and, just as they follow other reality and fit it, so, in +a measure, does other reality follow and fit them. When they add +themselves to being, they partly redetermine the existent, so that +reality as a whole appears incompletely definable unless ideas also +are kept account of. This pragmatist doctrine, exhibiting our ideas +as complemental factors of reality, throws open (since our ideas are +instigators of our action) a wide window upon human action, as well as a +wide license to originality in thought. But few things could be sillier +than to ignore the prior epistemological edifice in which the window is +built, or to talk as if pragmatism began and ended at the window. This, +nevertheless, is what our critics do almost without exception. They +ignore our primary step and its motive, and make the relation to action, +which is our secondary achievement, primary. + +THIRD MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISTS CUT THEMSELVES OFF FROM THE RIGHT TO +BELIEVE IN EJECTIVE REALITIES. + +They do so, according to the critics, by making the truth of our beliefs +consist in their verifiability, and their verifiability in the way in +which they do work for us. Professor Stout, in his otherwise admirable +and hopeful review of Schiller in Mind for October, 1897, considers that +this ought to lead Schiller (could he sincerely realize the effects of +his own doctrine) to the absurd consequence of being unable to believe +genuinely in another man's headache, even were the headache there. +He can only 'postulate' it for the sake of the working value of the +postulate to himself. The postulate guides certain of his acts and leads +to advantageous consequences; but the moment he understands fully that +the postulate is true ONLY (!) in this sense, it ceases (or should +cease) to be true for him that the other man really HAS a headache. All +that makes the postulate most precious then evaporates: his interest in +his fellow-man 'becomes a veiled form of self-interest, and his world +grows cold, dull, and heartless.' + +Such an objection makes a curious muddle of the pragmatist's universe +of discourse. Within that universe the pragmatist finds some one with +a headache or other feeling, and some one else who postulates that +feeling. Asking on what condition the postulate is 'true' the pragmatist +replies that, for the postulator at any rate, it is true just +in proportion as to believe in it works in him the fuller sum of +satisfactions. What is it that is satisfactory here? Surely to BELIEVE +in the postulated object, namely, in the really existing feeling of +the other man. But how (especially if the postulator were himself a +thoroughgoing pragmatist) could it ever be satisfactory to him NOT +to believe in that feeling, so long as, in Professor Stout's words, +disbelief 'made the world seem to him cold, dull, and heartless'? +Disbelief would seem, on pragmatist principles, quite out of the +question under such conditions, unless the heartlessness of the world +were made probable already on other grounds. And since the belief in the +headache, true for the subject assumed in the pragmatist's universe of +discourse, is also true for the pragmatist who for his epitemologizing +purposes has assumed that entire universe, why is it not true in that +universe absolutely? The headache believed in is a reality there, and no +extant mind disbelieves it, neither the critic's mind nor his subject's! +Have our opponents any better brand of truth in this real universe of +ours that they can show us? [Footnote: I see here a chance to forestall +a criticism which some one may make on Lecture III of my Pragmatism, +where, on pp. 96-100, I said that 'God' and 'Matter' might be regarded +as synonymous terms, so long as no differing future consequences were +deducible from the two conceptions. The passage was transcribed from my +address at the California Philosophical Union, reprinted in the Journal +of Philosophy, vol. i, p. 673. I had no sooner given the address than +I perceived a flaw in that part of it; but I have left the passage +unaltered ever since, because the flaw did not spoil its illustrative +value. The flaw was evident when, as a case analogous to that of a +godless universe, I thought of what I called an 'automatic sweetheart,' +meaning a soulless body which should be absolutely indistinguishable +from a spiritually animated maiden, laughing, talking, blushing, nursing +us, and performing all feminine offices as tactfully and sweetly as if +a soul were in her. Would any one regard her as a full equivalent? +Certainly not, and why? Because, framed as we are, our egoism craves +above all things inward sympathy and recognition, love and admiration. +The outward treatment is valued mainly as an expression, as a +manifestation of the accompanying consciousness believed in. +Pragmatically, then, belief in the automatic sweetheart would not work, +and is point of fact no one treats it as a serious hypothesis. The +godless universe would be exactly similar. Even if matter could do +every outward thing that God does, the idea of it would not work as +satisfactorily, because the chief call for a God on modern men's part +is for a being who will inwardly recognize them and judge them +sympathetically. Matter disappoints this craving of our ego, so God +remains for most men the truer hypothesis, and indeed remains so for +definite pragmatic reasons.] + +So much for the third misunderstanding, which is but one specification +of the following still wider one. + +FOURTH MISUNDERSTANDING: NO PRAGMATIST CAN BE A REALIST IN HIS +EPISTEMOLOGY. + +This is supposed to follow from his statement that the truth of our +beliefs consists in general in their giving satisfaction. Of course +satisfaction per se is a subjective condition; so the conclusion is +drawn that truth falls wholly inside of the subject, who then may +manufacture it at his pleasure. True beliefs become thus wayward +affections, severed from all responsibility to other parts of +experience. + +It is difficult to excuse such a parody of the pragmatist's opinion, +ignoring as it does every element but one of his universe of discourse. +The terms of which that universe consists positively forbid any +non-realistic interpretation of the function of knowledge defined there. +The pragmatizing epistemologist posits there a reality and a mind with +ideas. What, now, he asks, can make those ideas true of that reality? +Ordinary epistemology contents itself with the vague statement that the +ideas must 'correspond' or 'agree'; the pragmatist insists on being more +concrete, and asks what such 'agreement' may mean in detail. He finds +first that the ideas must point to or lead towards THAT reality and no +other, and then that the pointings and leadings must yield satisfaction +as their result. So far the pragmatist is hardly less abstract than the +ordinary slouchy epistemologist; but as he defines himself farther, he +grows more concrete. The entire quarrel of the intellectualist with him +is over his concreteness, intellectualism contending that the vaguer and +more abstract account is here the more profound. The concrete pointing +and leading are conceived by the pragmatist to be the work of other +portions of the same universe to which the reality and the mind belong, +intermediary verifying bits of experience with which the mind at one +end, and the reality at the other, are joined. The 'satisfaction,' in +turn, is no abstract satisfaction ueberhaupt, felt by an unspecified +being, but is assumed to consist of such satisfactions (in the plural) +as concretely existing men actually do find in their beliefs. As we +humans are constituted in point of fact, we find that to believe in +other men's minds, in independent physical realities, in past events, in +eternal logical relations, is satisfactory. We find hope satisfactory. +We often find it satisfactory to cease to doubt. Above all we find +CONSISTENCY satisfactory, consistency between the present idea and the +entire rest of our mental equipment, including the whole order of our +sensations, and that of our intuitions of likeness and difference, and +our whole stock of previously acquired truths. + +The pragmatist, being himself a man, and imagining in general no +contrary lines of truer belief than ours about the 'reality' which he +has laid at the base of his epistemological discussion, is willing to +treat our satisfactions as possibly really true guides to it, not as +guides true solely for US. It would seem here to be the duty of his +critics to show with some explicitness why, being our subjective +feelings, these satisfactions can not yield 'objective' truth. The +beliefs which they accompany 'posit' the assumed reality, 'correspond' +and 'agree' with it, and 'fit' it in perfectly definite and assignable +ways, through the sequent trains of thought and action which form +their verification, so merely to insist on using these words abstractly +instead of concretely is no way of driving the pragmatist from the +field,--his more concrete account virtually includes his critic's. If +our critics have any definite idea of a truth more objectively grounded +than the kind we propose, why do they not show it more articulately? +As they stand, they remind one of Hegel's man who wanted 'fruit,' but +rejected cherries, pears, and grapes, because they were not fruit in the +abstract. We offer them the full quart-pot, and they cry for the empty +quart-capacity. + +But here I think I hear some critic retort as follows: 'If satisfactions +are all that is needed to make truth, how about the notorious fact that +errors are so often satisfactory? And how about the equally notorious +fact that certain true beliefs may cause the bitterest dissatisfaction? +Isn't it clear that not the satisfaction which it gives, but the +relation of the belief TO THE REALITY is all that makes it true? Suppose +there were no such reality, and that the satisfactions yet remained: +would they not then effectively work falsehood? Can they consequently be +treated distinctively as the truth-builders? It is the INHERENT RELATION +TO REALITY of a belief that gives us that specific TRUTH-satisfaction, +compared with which all other satisfactions are the hollowest humbug. +The satisfaction of KNOWING TRULY is thus the only one which the +pragmatist ought to have considered. As a PSYCHOLOGICAL SENTIMENT, +the anti-pragmatist gladly concedes it to him, but then only as a +concomitant of truth, not as a constituent. What CONSTITUTES truth +is not the sentiment, but the purely logical or objective function of +rightly cognizing the reality, and the pragmatist's failure to reduce +this function to lower values is patent.' + +Such anti-pragmatism as this seems to me a tissue of confusion. To begin +with, when the pragmatist says 'indispensable,' it confounds this with +'sufficient.' The pragmatist calls satisfactions indispensable for +truth-building, but I have everywhere called them insufficient unless +reality be also incidentally led to. If the reality assumed were +cancelled from the pragmatist's universe of discourse, he would +straightway give the name of falsehoods to the beliefs remaining, in +spite of all their satisfactoriness. For him, as for his critic, there +can be no truth if there is nothing to be true about. Ideas are so +much flat psychological surface unless some mirrored matter gives +them cognitive lustre. This is why as a pragmatist I have so carefully +posited 'reality' AB INITIO, and why, throughout my whole discussion, I +remain an epistemological realist. [Footnote: I need hardly remind +the reader that both sense-percepts and percepts of ideal relation +(comparisons, etc.) should be classed among the realities. The bulk of +our mental 'stock' consists of truths concerning these terms.] + +The anti-pragmatist is guilty of the further confusion of imagining +that, in undertaking to give him an account of what truth formally +means, we are assuming at the same time to provide a warrant for +it, trying to define the occasions when he can be sure of materially +possessing it. Our making it hinge on a reality so 'independent' that +when it comes, truth comes, and when it goes, truth goes with it, +disappoints this naive expectation, so he deems our description +unsatisfactory. I suspect that under this confusion lies the still +deeper one of not discriminating sufficiently between the two notions, +truth and reality. Realities are not TRUE, they ARE; and beliefs are +true OF them. But I suspect that in the anti-pragmatist mind the two +notions sometimes swap their attributes. The reality itself, I fear, is +treated as if 'true' and conversely. Whoso tells us of the one, it is +then supposed, must also be telling us of the other; and a true idea +must in a manner BE, or at least YIELD without extraneous aid, the +reality it cognitively is possessed of. + +To this absolute-idealistic demand pragmatism simply opposes its non +possumus. If there is to be truth, it says, both realities and beliefs +about them must conspire to make it; but whether there ever is such a +thing, or how anyone can be sure that his own beliefs possess it, it +never pretends to determine. That truth-satisfaction par excellence +which may tinge a belief unsatisfactory in other ways, it easily +explains as the feeling of consistency with the stock of previous +truths, or supposed truths, of which one's whole past experience may +have left one in possession. + +But are not all pragmatists sure that their own belief is right? their +enemies will ask at this point; and this leads me to the + +FIFTH MISUNDERSTANDING: WHAT PRAGMATISTS SAY IS INCONSISTENT WITH THEIR +SAYING SO. + +A correspondent puts this objection as follows: 'When you say to your +audience, "pragmatism is the truth concerning truth," the first truth is +different from the second. About the first you and they are not to be at +odds; you are not giving them liberty to take or leave it according as +it works satisfactorily or not for their private uses. Yet the second +truth, which ought to describe and include the first, affirms this +liberty. Thus the INTENT of your utterance seems to contradict the +CONTENT of it.' + +General scepticism has always received this same classic refutation. +'You have to dogmatize,' the rationalists say to the sceptics,' whenever +you express the sceptical position; so your lives keep contradicting +your thesis.' One would suppose that the impotence of so hoary an +argument to abate in the slightest degree the amount of general +scepticism in the world might have led some rationalists themselves to +doubt whether these instantaneous logical refutations are such +fatal ways, after all, of killing off live mental attitudes. General +scepticism is the live mental attitude of refusing to conclude. It is +a permanent torpor of the will, renewing itself in detail towards each +successive thesis that offers, and you can no more kill it off by logic +than you can kill off obstinacy or practical joking. This is why it is +so irritating. Your consistent sceptic never puts his scepticism into +a formal proposition,--he simply chooses it as a habit. He provokingly +hangs back when he might so easily join us in saying yes, but he is +not illogical or stupid,--on the contrary, he often impresses us by his +intellectual superiority. This is the REAL scepticism that rationalists +have to meet, and their logic does not even touch it. + +No more can logic kill the pragmatist's behavior: his act of utterance, +so far from contradicting, accurately exemplifies the matter which he +utters. What is the matter which he utters? In part, it is this, that +truth, concretely considered, is an attribute of our beliefs, and that +these are attitudes that follow satisfactions. The ideas around which +the satisfactions cluster are primarily only hypotheses that +challenge or summon a belief to come and take its stand upon them. +The pragmatist's idea of truth is just such a challenge. He finds it +ultra-satisfactory to accept it, and takes his own stand accordingly. +But, being gregarious as they are, men seek to spread their beliefs, +to awaken imitation, to infect others. Why should not YOU also find the +same belief satisfactory? thinks the pragmatist, and forthwith endeavors +to convert you. You and he will then believe similarly; you will hold +up your subject-end of a truth, which will be a truth objective and +irreversible if the reality holds up the object-end by being itself +present simultaneously. What there is of self-contradiction in all this +I confess I cannot discover. The pragmatist's conduct in his own case +seems to me on the contrary admirably to illustrate his universal +formula; and of all epistemologists, he is perhaps the only one who is +irreproachably self-consistent. + +SIXTH MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM EXPLAINS NOT WHAT TRUTH IS, BUT ONLY +HOW IT IS ARRIVED AT. + +In point of fact it tells us both, tells us what it is incidentally to +telling us how it is arrived at,--for what IS arrived at except just +what the truth is? If I tell you how to get to the railroad station, +don't I implicitly introduce you to the WHAT, to the being and nature of +that edifice? It is quite true that the abstract WORD 'how' hasn't +the same meaning as the abstract WORD 'what,' but in this universe of +concrete facts you cannot keep hows and whats asunder. The reasons why +I find it satisfactory to believe that any idea is true, the HOW of my +arriving at that belief, may be among the very reasons why the idea IS +true in reality. If not, I summon the anti-pragmatist to explain the +impossibility articulately. + +His trouble seems to me mainly to arise from his fixed inability to +understand how a concrete statement can possibly mean as much, or be as +valuable, as an abstract one. I said above that the main quarrel between +us and our critics was that of concreteness VERSUS abstractness. This is +the place to develop that point farther. + +In the present question, the links of experience sequent upon an idea, +which mediate between it and a reality, form and for the pragmatist +indeed ARE, the CONCRETE relation of truth that may obtain between the +idea and that reality. They, he says, are all that we mean when we speak +of the idea 'pointing' to the reality, 'fitting' it, 'corresponding' +with it, or 'agreeing' with it,--they or other similar mediating trains +of verification. Such mediating events make the idea 'true.' The idea +itself, if it exists at all, is also a concrete event: so pragmatism +insists that truth in the singular is only a collective name for truths +in the plural, these consisting always of series of definite events; and +that what intellectualism calls the truth, the inherent truth, of any +one such series is only the abstract name for its truthfulness in act, +for the fact that the ideas there do lead to the supposed reality in a +way that we consider satisfactory. + +The pragmatist himself has no objection to abstractions. Elliptically, +and 'for short,' he relies on them as much as any one, ending upon +innumerable occasions that their comparative emptiness makes of them +useful substitutes for the overfulness of the facts he meets, with. But +he never ascribes to them a higher grade of reality. The full reality +of a truth for him is always some process of verification, in which the +abstract property of connecting ideas with objects truly is workingly +embodied. Meanwhile it is endlessly serviceable to be able to talk of +properties abstractly and apart from their working, to find them the +same in innumerable cases, to take them 'out of time,' and to treat +of their relations to other similar abstractions. We thus form whole +universes of platonic ideas ante rem, universes in posse, tho none of +them exists effectively except in rebus. Countless relations obtain +there which nobody experiences as obtaining,--as, in the eternal +universe of musical relations, for example, the notes of Aennchen von +Tharau were a lovely melody long ere mortal ears ever heard them. Even +so the music of the future sleeps now, to be awakened hereafter. Or, if +we take the world of geometrical relations, the thousandth decimal of +'pi' sleeps there, tho no one may ever try to compute it. Or, if we take +the universe of 'fitting,' countless coats 'fit' backs, and countless +boots 'fit' feet, on which they are not practically FITTED; countless +stones 'fit' gaps in walls into which no one seeks to fit them actually. +In the same way countless opinions 'fit' realities, and countless truths +are valid, tho no thinker ever thinks them. + +For the anti-pragmatist these prior timeless relations are the +presupposition of the concrete ones, and possess the profounder dignity +and value. The actual workings of our ideas in verification-processes +are as naught in comparison with the 'obtainings' of this discarnate +truth within them. + +For the pragmatist, on the contrary,--all discarnate truth is static, +impotent, and relatively spectral, full truth being the truth that +energizes and does battle. Can any one suppose that the sleeping quality +of truth would ever have been abstracted or have received a name, if +truths had remained forever in that storage-vault of essential timeless +'agreements' and had never been embodied in any panting struggle of +men's live ideas for verification? Surely no more than the abstract +property of 'fitting' would have received a name, if in our world +there had been no backs or feet or gaps in walls to be actually fitted. +EXISTENTIAL truth is incidental to the actual competition of opinions. +ESSENTIAL truth, the truth of the intellectualists, the truth with no +one thinking it, is like the coat that fits tho no one has ever tried +it on, like the music that no ear has listened to. It is less real, not +more real, than the verified article; and to attribute a superior +degree of glory to it seems little more than a piece of perverse +abstraction-worship. As well might a pencil insist that the outline +is the essential thing in all pictorial representation, and chide +the paint-brush and the camera for omitting it, forgetting that THEIR +pictures not only contain the whole outline, but a hundred other things +in addition. Pragmatist truth contains the whole of intellectualist +truth and a hundred other things in addition. Intellectualist truth is +then only pragmatist truth in posse. That on innumerable occasions men +do substitute truth in posse or verifiability, for verification or truth +in act, is a fact to which no one attributes more importance than the +pragmatist: he emphasizes the practical utility of such a habit. But +he does not on that account consider truth in posse,--truth not alive +enough ever to have been asserted or questioned or contradicted, to be +the metaphysically prior thing, to which truths in act are tributary and +subsidiary. When intellectualists do this, pragmatism charges them with +inverting the real relation. Truth in posse MEANS only truths in act; +and he insists that these latter take precedence in the order of logic +as well as in that of being. + +SEVENTH MINUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM IGNORES THE THEORETICAL INTEREST. + +This would seem to be an absolutely wanton slander, were not a +certain excuse to be found in the linguistic affinities of the word +'pragmatism,' and in certain offhand habits of speech of ours which +assumed too great a generosity on our reader's part. When we spoke of +the meaning of ideas consisting "in their 'practical' consequences", +or of the 'practical' differences which our beliefs make to us; when we +said that the truth of a belief consists in its 'working' value, etc.; +our language evidently was too careless, for by 'practical' we were +almost unanimously held to mean OPPOSED to theoretical or genuinely +cognitive, and the consequence was punctually drawn that a truth in our +eyes could have no relation to any independent reality, or to any other +truth, or to anything whatever but the acts which we might ground on it +or the satisfactions they might bring. The mere existence of the idea, +all by itself, if only its results were satisfactory, would give full +truth to it, it was charged, in our absurd pragmatist epistemology. +The solemn attribution of this rubbish to us was also encouraged by two +other circumstances. First, ideas ARE practically useful in the narrow +sense, false ideas sometimes, but most often ideas which we can verify +by the sum total of all their leadings, and the reality of whose objects +may thus be considered established beyond doubt. That these ideas should +be true in advance of and apart from their utility, that, in other +words, their objects should be really there, is the very condition of +their having that kind of utility,--the objects they connect us with are +so important that the ideas which serve as the objects' substitutes grow +important also. This manner of their practical working was the first +thing that made truths good in the eyes of primitive men; and +buried among all the other good workings by which true beliefs are +characterized, this kind of subsequential utility remains. + +The second misleading circumstance was the emphasis laid by Schiller +and Dewey on the fact that, unless a truth be relevant to the mind's +momentary predicament, unless it be germane to the 'practical' +situation,--meaning by this the quite particular perplexity,--it is +no good to urge it. It doesn't meet our interests any better than a +falsehood would under the same circumstances. But why our predicaments +and perplexities might not be theoretical here as well as narrowly +practical, I wish that our critics would explain. They simply assume +that no pragmatist CAN admit a genuinely theoretic interest. Having used +the phrase 'cash-value' of an idea, I am implored by one correspondent +to alter it, 'for every one thinks you mean only pecuniary profit and +loss.' Having said that the true is 'the expedient in our thinking,' I +am rebuked in this wise by another learned correspondent: + +'The word expedient has no other meaning than that of self-interest. The +pursuit of this has ended by landing a number of officers of national +banks in penitentiaries. A philosophy that leads to such results must be +unsound.' + +But the word 'practical' is so habitually loosely used that more +indulgence might have been expected. When one says that a sick man has +now practically recovered, or that an enterprise has practically failed, +one usually means I just the opposite of practically in the literal +sense. One means that, altho untrue in strict practice, what one says +is true in theory, true virtually, certain to be true. Again, by the +practical one often means the distinctively concrete, the individual, +particular, and effective, as opposed to the abstract, general, and +inert. To speak for myself, whenever I have emphasized the practical +nature of truth, this is mainly what has been in my mind. 'Pragmata' are +things in their plurality; and in that early California address, when I +described pragmatism as holding that the meaning of any proposition +can always be brought down to some particular consequence in our future +practical experience, whether passive or active, expressly added these +qualifying words: the point lying rather in the fact that the experience +must be particular than in the fact that it must be active,--by 'active' +meaning here 'practical' in the narrow literal sense. [Footnote: The +ambiguity of the word 'practical' comes out well in these words of a +recent would-be reporter of our views: 'Pragmatism is an Anglo-Saxon +reaction against the intellectualism and rationalism of the Latin +mind.... Man, each individual man is the measure of things. He is able +to conceive one but relative truths, that is to say, illusions. What +these illusions are worth is revealed to him, not by general theory, but +by individual practice. Pragmatism, which consists in experiencing +these illusions of the mind and obeying them by acting them out, is a +PHILOSOPHY WITHOUT WORDS, a philosophy of GESTURES AND OF ACTS, +which abandons what is general and olds only to what is particular.' +(Bourdeau, in Journal des. debats, October 89, 1907.)] But particular +consequences can perfectly well be of a theoretic nature. Every remote +fact which we infer from an idea is a particular theoretic consequence +which our mind practically works towards. The loss of every old opinion +of ours which we see that we shall have to give up if a new opinion +be true, is a particular theoretic as well as a particular practical +consequence. After man's interest in breathing freely, the greatest of +all his interests (because it never fluctuates or remits, as most of his +physical interests do), is his interest in consistency, in feeling +that what he now thinks goes with what he thinks on other occasions. +We tirelessly compare truth with truth for this sole purpose. Is the +present candidate for belief perhaps contradicted by principle number +one? Is it compatible with fact number two? and so forth. The particular +operations here are the purely logical ones of analysis, deduction, +comparison, etc.; and altho general terms may be used ad libitum, the +satisfactory practical working of the candidate--idea consists in +the consciousness yielded by each successive theoretic consequence in +particular. It is therefore simply idiotic to repeat that pragmatism +takes no account of purely theoretic interests. All it insists on +is that verity in act means VERIFICATIONS, and that these are always +particulars. Even in exclusively theoretic matters, it insists that +vagueness and generality serve to verify nothing. + +EIGHTH MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM IS SHUT UP TO SOLIPSISM. + +I have already said something about this misconception under the third +and fourth heads, above, but a little more may be helpful. The objection +is apt to clothe itself in words like these: 'You make truth to consist +in every value except the cognitive value proper; you always leave your +knower at many removes (or, at the uttermost, at one remove) from his +real object; the best you do is to let his ideas carry him towards it; +it remains forever outside of him,' etc. + +I think that the leaven working here is the rooted intellectualist +persuasion that, to know a reality, an idea must in some inscrutable +fashion possess or be it. [Footnote: Sensations may, indeed, possess +their objects or coalesce with them, as common sense supposes that they +do; and intuited differences between concepts may coalesce with the +'eternal' objective differences; but to simplify our discussion. here +we can afford to abstract from these very special cases of knowing.] +For pragmatism this kind of coalescence is inessential. As a rule our +cognitions are only processes of mind off their balance and in motion +towards real termini; and the reality of the termini, believed in by the +states of mind in question, can be guaranteed only by some wider knower +[Footnote: The transcendental idealist thinks that, in some inexplicable +way, the finite states of mind are identical with the transfinite +all-knower which he finds himself obliged to postulate in order to +supply a fundamentum far the relation of knowing, as he apprehends it. +Pragmatists can leave the question of identity open; but they cannot do +without the wider knower any more than they can do without the reality, +if they want to prove a case of knowing. They themselves play the part +of the absolute knower for the universe of discourse which serves them +as material for epistemologizing. They warrant the reality there, +and the subject's true knowledge, there, of it. But whether what they +themselves say about that whole universe is objectively true, i.e., +whether the pragmatic theory of truth is true really, they cannot +warrant,--they can only believe it To their hearers they can only +propose it, as I propose it to my readers, as something to be verified +ambulando, or by the way is which its consequences may confirm it]. But +if there is no reason extant in the universe why they should be doubted, +the beliefs are true in the only sense in which anything can be true +anyhow: they are practically and concretely true, namely. True in the +mystical mongrel sense of an Identitatsphilosophie they need not be; nor +is there any intelligible reason why they ever need be true otherwise +than verifiably and practically. It is reality's part to possess its +own existence; it is thought's part to get into 'touch' with it by +innumerable paths of verification. + +I fear that the 'humanistic' developments of pragmatism may cause a +certain difficulty here. We get at one truth only through the rest of +truth; and the reality, everlastingly postulated as that which all our +truth must keep in touch with, may never be given to us save in the +form of truth other than that which we are now testing. But since Dr. +Schiller has shown that all our truths, even the most elemental, are +affected by race-inheritance with a human coefficient, reality per se +thus may appear only as a sort of limit; it may be held to shrivel to +the mere PLACE for an object, and what is known may be held to be only +matter of our psyche that we fill the place with. It must be confessed +that pragmatism, worked in this humanistic way, is COMPATIBLE with +solipsism. It joins friendly hands with the agnostic part of kantism, +with contemporary agnosticism, and with idealism generally. But worked +thus, it is a metaphysical theory about the matter of reality, and flies +far beyond pragmatism's own modest analysis of the nature of the knowing +function, which analysis may just as harmoniously be combined with less +humanistic accounts of reality. One of pragmatism's merits is that it +is so purely epistemological. It must assume realities; but it prejudges +nothing as to their constitution, and the most diverse metaphysics can +use it as their foundation. It certainly has no special affinity with +solipsism. + +As I look back over what I have written, much of it gives me a queer +impression, as if the obvious were set forth so condescendingly that +readers might well laugh at my pomposity. It may be, however, that +concreteness as radical as ours is not so obvious. The whole originality +of pragmatism, the whole point in it, is its use of the concrete way of +seeing. It begins with concreteness, and returns and ends with it. Dr. +Schiller, with his two 'practical' aspects of truth, (1) relevancy to +situation, and (2) subsequential utility, is only filling the cup of +concreteness to the brim for us. Once seize that cup, and you cannot +misunderstand pragmatism. It seems as if the power of imagining the +world concretely MIGHT have been common enough to let our readers +apprehend us better, as if they might have read between our lines, and, +in spite of all our infelicities of expression, guessed a little +more correctly what our thought was. But alas! this was not on fate's +programme, so we can only think, with the German ditty:-- + + "Es waer' zu schoen gewesen, Es hat nicht sollen sein." + + + +IX + +THE MEANING OF THE WORD TRUTH [Footnote: Remarks at the meeting of the +American Philosophical Association, Cornell University, December, 1907.] + +My account of truth is realistic, and follows the epistemological +dualism of common sense. Suppose I say to you 'The thing exists'--is +that true or not? How can you tell? Not till my statement has developed +its meaning farther is it determined as being true, false, or irrelevant +to reality altogether. But if now you ask 'what thing?' and I reply 'a +desk'; if you ask 'where?' and I point to a place; if you ask 'does it +exist materially, or only in imagination?' and I say 'materially'; if +moreover I say 'I mean that desk' and then grasp and shake a desk +which you see just as I have described it, you are willing to call +my statement true. But you and I are commutable here; we can exchange +places; and, as you go bail for my desk, so I can go bail for yours. + +This notion of a reality independent of either of us, taken from +ordinary social experience, lies at the base of the pragmatist +definition of truth. With some such reality any statement, in order +to be counted true, must agree. Pragmatism defines 'agreeing' to mean +certain ways of 'working,' be they actual or potential. Thus, for my +statement 'the desk exists' to be true of a desk recognized as real by +you, it must be able to lead me to shake your desk, to explain myself +by words that suggest that desk to your mind, to make a drawing that is +like the desk you see, etc. Only in such ways as this is there sense in +saying it agrees with THAT reality, only thus does it gain for me the +satisfaction of hearing you corroborate me. Reference then to something +determinate, and some sort of adaptation to it worthy of the name +of agreement, are thus constituent elements in the definition of any +statement of mine as 'true'. + +You cannot get at either the reference or the adaptation without using +the notion of the workings. THAT the thing is, WHAT it is, and WHICH it +is (of all the possible things with that what) are points determinable +only by the pragmatic method. The 'which' means a possibility of +pointing, or of otherwise singling out the special object; the 'what' +means choice on our part of an essential aspect to conceive it by (and +this is always relative to what Dewey calls our own 'situation'); +and the 'that' means our assumption of the attitude of belief, the +reality-recognizing attitude. Surely for understanding what the word +'true' means as applied to a statement, the mention of such workings is +indispensable. Surely if we leave them out the subject and the object +of the cognitive relation float-in the same universe, 'tis true--but +vaguely and ignorantly and without mutual contact or mediation. + +Our critics nevertheless call the workings inessential. No functional +possibilities 'make' our beliefs true, they say; they are true +inherently, true positively, born 'true' as the Count of Chambord was +born 'Henri-Cinq.' Pragmatism insists, on the contrary, that statements +and beliefs are thus inertly and statically true only by courtesy: +they practically pass for true; but you CANNOT DEFINE WHAT YOU MEAN by +calling them true without referring to their functional possibilities. +These give its whole LOGICAL CONTENT to that relation to reality on a +belief's part to which the name 'truth' is applied, a relation which +otherwise remains one of mere coexistence or bare withness. + + + +The foregoing statements reproduce the essential content of the lecture +on Truth in my book PRAGMATISM. Schiller's doctrine of 'humanism,' +Dewey's 'Studies in logical theory,' and my own 'radical empiricism,' +all involve this general notion of truth as 'working,' either actual or +conceivable. But they envelop it as only one detail in the midst of much +wider theories that aim eventually at determining the notion of what +'reality' at large is in its ultimate nature and constitution. + + + +X + +THE EXISTENCE OF JULIUS CAESAR [Footnote: Originally printed under the +title of 'Truth versus Truthfulness,' in the Journal of Philosophy.] + +My account of truth is purely logical and relates to its definition +only. I contend that you cannot tell what the WORD 'true' MEANS, as +applied to a statement, without invoking the CONCEPT OF THE STATEMENTS +WORKINGS. + +Assume, to fix our ideas, a universe composed of two things only: +imperial Caesar dead and turned to clay, and me, saying 'Caesar really +existed.' Most persons would naively deem truth to be thereby uttered, +and say that by a sort of actio in distans my statement had taken direct +hold of the other fact. + +But have my words so certainly denoted THAT Caesar?--or so certainly +connoted HIS individual attributes? To fill out the complete measure +of what the epithet 'true' may ideally mean, my thought ought to bear +a fully determinate and unambiguous 'one-to-one-relation' to its own +particular object. In the ultrasimple universe imagined the reference is +uncertified. Were there two Caesars we shouldn't know which was meant. +The conditions of truth thus seem incomplete in this universe of +discourse so that it must be enlarged. + +Transcendentalists enlarge it by invoking an absolute mind which, +as it owns all the facts, can sovereignly correlate them. If it intends +that my statement SHALL refer to that identical Caesar, and that the +attributes I have in mind SHALL mean his attributes, that intention +suffices to make the statement true. + +I, in turn, enlarge the universe by admitting finite intermediaries +between the two original facts. Caesar HAD, and my statement HAS, +effects; and if these effects in any way run together, a concrete medium +and bottom is provided for the determinate cognitive relation, which, as +a pure ACTIO IN DISTANS, seemed to float too vaguely and unintelligibly. + +The real Caesar, for example, wrote a manuscript of which I see a +real reprint, and say 'the Caesar I mean is the author of THAT.' The +workings of my thought thus determine both its denotative and its +connotative significance more fully. It now defines itself as neither +irrelevant to the real Caesar, nor false in what it suggests of him. The +absolute mind, seeing me thus working towards Caesar through the cosmic +intermediaries, might well say: 'Such workings only specify in detail +what I meant myself by the statement being true. I decree the cognitive +relation between the two original facts to mean that just that kind of +concrete chain of intermediaries exists or can exist.' + +But the chain involves facts prior to the statement the logical +conditions of whose truth we are defining, and facts subsequent to it; +and this circumstance, coupled with the vulgar employment of the terms +truth and fact as synonyms, has laid my account open to misapprehension. +'How,' it is confusedly asked, 'can Caesar's existence, a truth already +2000 years old, depend for its truth on anything about to happen now? +How can my acknowledgment of it be made true by the acknowledgment's own +effects? The effects may indeed confirm my belief, but the belief was +made true already by the fact that Caesar really did exist.' + +Well, be it so, for if there were no Caesar, there could, of course, +be no positive truth about him--but then distinguish between 'true' as +being positively and completely so established, and 'true' as being so +only 'practically,' elliptically, and by courtesy, in the sense of +not being positively irrelevant or UNtrue. Remember also that Caesar's +having existed in fact may make a present statement false or irrelevant +as well as it may make it true, and that in neither case does it itself +have to alter. It being given, whether truth, untruth, or irrelevancy +shall be also given depends on something coming from the statement +itself. What pragmatism contends for is that you cannot adequately +DEFINE the something if you leave the notion of the statement's +functional workings out of your account. Truth meaning agreement with +reality, the mode of the agreeing is a practical problem which the +subjective term of the relation alone can solve. + +NOTE. This paper was originally followed by a couple of paragraphs meant +to conciliate the intellectualist opposition. Since you love the word +'true' so, and since you despise so the concrete working of our ideas, +I said, keep the word 'truth' for the saltatory and incomprehensible +relation you care so much for, and I will say of thoughts that know +their objects in an intelligible sense that they are 'truthful.' + +Like most offerings, this one has been spurned, so I revoke it, +repenting of my generosity. Professor Pratt, in his recent book, calls +any objective state of FACTS 'a truth,' and uses the word 'trueness' +in the sense of 'truth' as proposed by me. Mr. Hawtrey (see below, page +281) uses 'correctness' in the same sense. Apart from the general evil +of ambiguous vocabularies, we may really forsake all hope, if the term +'truth' is officially to lose its status as a property of our beliefs +and opinions, and become recognized as a technical synonym for 'fact.' + + + +XI + +THE ABSOLUTE AND THE STRENUOUS LIFE [Footnote: Reprinted from the +Journal of Philosophy, etc., 1906.] + +Professor W. A. Brown, in the Journal for August 15, approves my +pragmatism for allowing that a belief in the absolute may give +holidays to the spirit, but takes me to task for the narrowness of this +concession, and shows by striking examples how great a power the same +belief may have in letting loose the strenuous life. + +I have no criticism whatever to make upon his excellent article, but let +me explain why 'moral holidays' were the only gift of the absolute which +I picked out for emphasis. I was primarily concerned in my lectures with +contrasting the belief that the world is still in process of making +with the belief that there is an 'eternal' edition of it ready-made +and complete. The former, or 'pluralistic' belief, was the one that my +pragmatism favored. Both beliefs confirm our strenuous moods. Pluralism +actually demands them, since it makes the world's salvation depend upon +the energizing of its several parts, among which we are. Monism permits +them, for however furious they may be, we can always justify ourselves +in advance for indulging them by the thought that they WILL HAVE BEEN +expressions of the absolute's perfect life. By escaping from your finite +perceptions to the conception of the eternal whole, you can hallow any +tendency whatever. Tho the absolute DICTATES nothing, it will SANCTION +anything and everything after the fact, for whatever is once there will +have to be regarded as an integral member of the universe's perfection. +Quietism and frenzy thus alike receive the absolute's permit to exist. +Those of us who are naturally inert may abide in our resigned passivity; +those whose energy is excessive may grow more reckless still. History +shows how easily both quietists and fanatics have drawn inspiration from +the absolutistic scheme. It suits sick souls and strenuous ones equally +well. + +One cannot say thus of pluralism. Its world is always vulnerable, for +some part may go astray; and having no 'eternal' edition of it to draw +comfort from, its partisans must always feel to some degree insecure. +If, as pluralists, we grant ourselves moral holidays, they can only be +provisional breathing-spells, intended to refresh us for the morrow's +fight. This forms one permanent inferiority of pluralism from the +pragmatic point of view. It has no saving message for incurably sick +souls. Absolutism, among its other messages, has that message, and is +the only scheme that has it necessarily. That constitutes its chief +superiority and is the source of its religious power. That is why, +desiring to do it full justice, I valued its aptitude for moral-holiday +giving so highly. Its claims in that way are unique, whereas its +affinities with strenuousness are less emphatic than those of the +pluralistic scheme. + +In the last lecture of my book I candidly admitted this inferiority of +pluralism. It lacks the wide indifference that absolutism shows. It +is bound to disappoint many sick souls whom absolutism can console. +It seems therefore poor tactics for absolutists to make little of this +advantage. The needs of sick souls are surely the most urgent; and +believers in the absolute should rather hold it to be great merit in +their philosophy that it can meet them so well. + +The pragmatism or pluralism which I defend has to fall back on a certain +ultimate hardihood, a certain willingness to live without assurances or +guarantees. To minds thus willing to live on possibilities that are +not certainties, quietistic religion, sure of salvation ANY HOW, has a +slight flavor of fatty degeneration about it which has caused it to be +looked askance on, even in the church. Which side is right here, who can +say? Within religion, emotion is apt to be tyrannical; but philosophy +must favor the emotion that allies itself best with the whole body +and drift of all the truths in sight. I conceive this to be the more +strenuous type of emotion; but I have to admit that its inability to +let loose quietistic raptures is a serious deficiency in the pluralistic +philosophy which I profess. + + + +XII + +PROFESSOR HEBERT ON PRAGMATISM [Footnote: Reprint from the Journal of +Philosophy for December 3, 1908 (vol. v, p. 689), of a review of Le +Pragmatisme et ses Diverses Formes Anglo-Americaines, by Marcel Hebert. +(Paris: Librairie critique Emile Nourry. 1908. Pp. 105.)] + +Professor Marcel Hebert is a singularly erudite and liberal thinker +(a seceder, I believe, from the Catholic priesthood) and an uncommonly +direct and clear writer. His book Le Divin is one of the ablest reviews +of the general subject of religious philosophy which recent years have +produced; and in the small volume the title of which is copied above he +has, perhaps, taken more pains not to do injustice to pragmatism than +any of its numerous critics. Yet the usual fatal misapprehension of its +purposes vitiates his exposition and his critique. His pamphlet seems to +me to form a worthy hook, as it were, on which to hang one more attempt +to tell the reader what the pragmatist account of truth really means. + +M. Hebert takes it to mean what most people take it to mean, the +doctrine, namely, that whatever proves subjectively expedient in the way +of our thinking is 'true' in the absolute and unrestricted sense of the +word, whether it corresponds to any objective state of things outside of +our thought or not. Assuming this to be the pragmatist thesis, M. Hebert +opposes it at length. Thought that proves itself to be thus expedient +may, indeed, have every OTHER kind of value for the thinker, he says, +but cognitive value, representative value, VALEUR DE CONNAISSANCE +PROPREMENT DITE, it has not; and when it does have a high degree of +general utility value, this is in every case derived from its previous +value in the way of correctly representing independent objects that have +an important influence on our lives. Only by thus representing things +truly do we reap the useful fruits. But the fruits follow on the truth, +they do not constitute it; so M. Hebert accuses pragmatism of telling us +everything about truth except what it essentially is. He admits, indeed, +that the world is so framed that when men have true ideas of realities, +consequential utilities ensue in abundance; and no one of our critics, +I think, has shown as concrete a sense of the variety of these utilities +as he has; but he reiterates that, whereas such utilities are secondary, +we insist on treating them as primary, and that the connaissance +objective from which they draw all their being is something which we +neglect, exclude, and destroy. The utilitarian value and the strictly +cognitive value of our ideas may perfectly well harmonize, he says--and +in the main he allows that they do harmonize--but they are not logically +identical for that. He admits that subjective interests, desires, +impulses may even have the active 'primacy' in our intellectual life. +Cognition awakens only at their spur, and follows their cues and aims; +yet, when it IS awakened, it is objective cognition proper and not +merely another name for the impulsive tendencies themselves in the state +of satisfaction. The owner of a picture ascribed to Corot gets uneasy +when its authenticity is doubted. He looks up its origin and is +reassured. But his uneasiness does not make the proposition false, any +more than his relief makes the proposition true, that the actual Corot +was the painter. Pragmatism, which, according to M. Hebert, claims that +our sentiments MAKE truth and falsehood, would oblige us to conclude +that our minds exert no genuinely cognitive function whatever. + +This subjectivist interpretation of our position seems to follow from my +having happened to write (without supposing it necessary to explain that +I was treating of cognition solely on its subjective side) that in the +long run the true is the expedient in the way of our thinking, much as +the good is the expedient in the way of our behavior! Having previously +written that truth means 'agreement with reality,' and insisted that the +chief part of the expediency of any one opinion is its agreement +with the rest of acknowledged truth, I apprehended no exclusively +subjectivistic reading of my meaning. My mind was so filled with the +notion of objective reference that I never dreamed that my hearers +would let go of it; and the very last accusation I expected was that +in speaking of ideas and their satisfactions, I was denying realities +outside. My only wonder now is that critics should have found so silly +a personage as I must have seemed in their eyes, worthy of explicit +refutation. + +The object, for me, is just as much one part of reality as the idea +is another part. The truth of the idea is one relation of it to the +reality, just as its date and its place are other relations. All three +relations CONSIST of intervening parts of the universe which can in +every particular case be assigned and catalogued, and which differ in +every instance of truth, just as they differ with every date and place. + +The pragmatist thesis, as Dr. Schiller and I hold it,--I prefer to let +Professor Dewey speak for himself,--is that the relation called 'truth' +is thus concretely DEFINABLE. Ours is the only articulate attempt in the +field to say positively what truth actually CONSISTS OF. Our denouncers +have literally nothing to oppose to it as an alternative. For them, when +an idea is true, it IS true, and there the matter terminates; the word +'true' being indefinable. The relation of the true idea to its object, +being, as they think, unique, it can be expressed in terms of nothing +else, and needs only to be named for any one to recognize and understand +it. Moreover it is invariable and universal, the same in every single +instance of truth, however diverse the ideas, the realities, and the +other relations between them may be. + +Our pragmatist view, on the contrary, is that the truth-relation is a +definitely experienceable relation, and therefore describable as well +as namable; that it is not unique in kind, and neither invariable nor +universal. The relation to its object that makes an idea true in any +given instance, is, we say, embodied in intermediate details of reality +which lead towards the object, which vary in every instance, and which +in every instance can be concretely traced. The chain of workings which +an opinion sets up IS the opinion's truth, falsehood, or irrelevancy, +as the case may be. Every idea that a man has works some consequences +in him, in the shape either of bodily actions or of other ideas. Through +these consequences the man's relations to surrounding realities are +modified. He is carried nearer to some of them and farther from others, +and gets now the feeling that the idea has worked satisfactorily, now +that it has not. The idea has put him into touch with something that +fulfils its intent, or it has not. + +This something is the MAN'S OBJECT, primarily. Since the only realities +we can talk about are such OBJECTS-BELIEVED-IN, the pragmatist, whenever +he says 'reality,' means in the first instance what may count for the +man himself as a reality, what he believes at the moment to be such. +Sometimes the reality is a concrete sensible presence. The idea, for +example, may be that a certain door opens into a room where a glass of +beer may be bought. If opening the door leads to the actual sight and +taste of the beer, the man calls the idea true. Or his idea may be +that of an abstract relation, say of that between the sides and the +hypothenuse of a triangle, such a relation being, of course, a reality +quite as much as a glass of beer is. If the thought of such a relation +leads him to draw auxiliary lines and to compare the figures they make, +he may at last, perceiving one equality after another, SEE the relation +thought of, by a vision quite as particular and direct as was the taste +of the beer. If he does so, he calls THAT idea, also, true. His idea +has, in each case, brought him into closer touch with a reality felt at +the moment to verify just that idea. Each reality verifies and validates +its own idea exclusively; and in each case the verification consists in +the satisfactorily-ending consequences, mental or physical, which +the idea was able to set up. These 'workings' differ in every single +instance, they never transcend experience, they consist of particulars, +mental or sensible, and they admit of concrete description in every +individual case. Pragmatists are unable to see what you can possibly +MEAN by calling an idea true, unless you mean that between it as a +terminus a quo in some one's mind and some particular reality as a +terminus ad quem, such concrete workings do or may intervene. Their +direction constitutes the idea's reference to that reality, their +satisfactoriness constitutes its adaptation thereto, and the two things +together constitute the 'truth' of the idea for its possessor. +Without such intermediating portions of concretely real experience the +pragmatist sees no materials out of which the adaptive relation called +truth can be built up. + +The anti-pragmatist view is that the workings are but evidences of the +truth's previous inherent presence in the idea, and that you can wipe +the very possibility of them out of existence and still leave the truth +of the idea as solid as ever. But surely this is not a counter-theory +of truth to ours. It is the renunciation of all articulate theory. It is +but a claim to the right to call certain ideas true anyhow; and this is +what I meant above by saying that the anti-pragmatists offer us no real +alternative, and that our account is literally the only positive theory +extant. What meaning, indeed, can an idea's truth have save its power of +adapting us either mentally or physically to a reality? + +How comes it, then, that our critics so uniformly accuse us of +subjectivism, of denying the reality's existence? It comes, I think, +from the necessary predominance of subjective language in our analysis. +However independent and elective realities may be, we can talk about +them, in framing our accounts of truth, only as so many objects +believed-in. But the process of experience leads men so continually +to supersede their older objects by newer ones which they find it more +satisfactory to believe in, that the notion of an ABSOLUTE reality +inevitably arises as a grenzbegriff, equivalent to that of an object +that shall never be superseded, and belief in which shall be endgueltig. +Cognitively we thus live under a sort of rule of three: as our private +concepts represent the sense-objects to which they lead us, these being +public realities independent of the individual, so these sense-realities +may, in turn, represent realities of a hypersensible order, electrons, +mind-stuff. God, or what not, existing independently of all human +thinkers. The notion of such final realities, knowledge of which would +be absolute truth, is an outgrowth of our cognitive experience from +which neither pragmatists nor anti-pragmatists escape. They form an +inevitable regulative postulate in every one's thinking. Our notion of +them is the most abundantly suggested and satisfied of all our beliefs, +the last to suffer doubt. The difference is that our critics use this +belief as their sole paradigm, and treat any one who talks of +human realities as if he thought the notion of reality 'in itself' +illegitimate. Meanwhile, reality-in-itself, so far as by them TALKED OF, +is only a human object; they postulate it just as we postulate it; and +if we are subjectivists they are so no less. Realities in themselves +can be there FOR any one, whether pragmatist or anti-pragmatist, only by +being believed; they are believed only by their notions appearing true; +and their notions appear true only because they work satisfactorily. +Satisfactorily, moreover, for the particular thinker's purpose. There is +no idea which is THE true idea, of anything. Whose is THE true idea of +the absolute? Or to take M. Hebert's example, what is THE true idea of a +picture which you possess? It is the idea that most satisfactorily meets +your present interest. The interest may be in the picture's place, its +age, its 'tone,' its subject, its dimensions, its authorship, its price, +its merit, or what not. If its authorship by Corot have been doubted, +what will satisfy the interest aroused in you at that moment will be +to have your claim to own a Corot confirmed; but, if you have a normal +human mind, merely calling it a Corot will not satisfy other demands of +your mind at the same time. For THEM to be satisfied, what you learn of +the picture must make smooth connection with what you know of the rest +of the system of reality in which the actual Corot played his part. +M. Hebert accuses us of holding that the proprietary satisfactions of +themselves suffice to make the belief true, and that, so far as we are +concerned, no actual Corot need ever have existed. Why we should be thus +cut off from the more general and intellectual satisfactions, I know +not; but whatever the satisfactions may be, intellectual or proprietary, +they belong to the subjective side of the truth-relation. They found our +beliefs; our beliefs are in realities; if no realities are there, the +beliefs are false but if realities are there, how they can even be KNOWN +without first being BELIEVED; or how BELIEVED except by our first having +ideas of them that work satisfactorily, pragmatists find it impossible +to imagine. They also find it impossible to imagine what makes the +anti-pragmatists' dogmatic 'ipse dixit' assurance of reality +more credible than the pragmatists conviction based on concrete +verifications. M. Hebert will probably agree to this, when put in +this way, so I do not see our inferiority to him in the matter of +connaissance proprement dite. + +Some readers will say that, altho I may possibly believe in realities +beyond our ideas Dr. Schiller, at any rate, does not. This is a great +misunderstanding, for Schiller's doctrine and mine are identical, +only our exposition follow different directions. He starts from the +subjective pole of the chain, the individual with his beliefs, as the +more concrete and immediately given phenomenon. 'An individual claims +his belief to be true,' Schiller says, 'but what does he mean by true? +and how does he establish the claim?' With these questions we embark +on a psychological inquiry. To be true, it appears, means, FOR THAT +INDIVIDUAL, to work satisfactorily for him; and the working and the +satisfaction, since they vary from case to case, admit of no universal +description. What works is true and represents a reality, for the +individual for whom it works. If he is infallible, the reality is +'really' there; if mistaken it is not there, or not there as he thinks +it. We all believe, when our ideas work satisfactorily; but we don't yet +know who of us is infallible; so that the problem of truth and that of +error are EBENBURTIG and arise out of the same situations. Schiller, +remaining with the fallible individual, and treating only +of reality-for-him, seems to many of his readers to ignore +reality-in-itself altogether. But that is because he seeks only to tell +us how truths are attained, not what the content of those truths, when +attained, shall be. It may be that the truest of all beliefs shall be +that in transsubjective realities. It certainly SEEMS the truest for +no rival belief is as voluminously satisfactory, and it is probably +Dr. Schiller's own belief; but he is not required, for his immediate +purpose, to profess it. Still less is he obliged to assume it in advance +as the basis of his discussion. + +I, however, warned by the ways of critics, adopt different tactics. I +start from the object-pole of the idea-reality chain and follow it in +the opposite direction from Schiller's. Anticipating the results of the +general truth-processes of mankind, I begin with the abstract notion +of an objective reality. I postulate it, and ask on my own account, I +VOUCHING FOR THIS REALITY, what would make any one else's idea of it +true for me as well as for him. But I find no different answer from that +which Schiller gives. If the other man's idea leads him, not only +to believe that the reality is there, but to use it as the reality's +temporary substitute, by letting it evoke adaptive thoughts and acts +similar to those which the reality itself would provoke, then it is +true in the only intelligible sense, true through its particular +consequences, and true for me as well as for the man. + +My account is more of a logical definition; Schiller's is more of a +psychological description. Both treat an absolutely identical matter of +experience, only they traverse it in opposite ways. + +Possibly these explanations may satisfy M. Hebert, whose little +book, apart from the false accusation of subjectivism, gives a fairly +instructive account of the pragmatist epistemology. + + + + + +XIII + +ABSTRACTIONISM AND 'RELATIVISMUS' + +Abstract concepts, such as elasticity, voluminousness, disconnectedness, +are salient aspects of our concrete experiences which we find it useful +to single out. Useful, because we are then reminded of other things +that offer those same aspects; and, if the aspects carry consequences in +those other things, we can return to our first things, expecting those +same consequences to accrue. + +To be helped to anticipate consequences is always a gain, and such being +the help that abstract concepts give us, it is obvious that their use is +fulfilled only when we get back again into concrete particulars by their +means, bearing the consequences in our minds, and enriching our notion +of the original objects therewithal. + +Without abstract concepts to handle our perceptual particulars by, +we are like men hopping on one foot. Using concepts along with the +particulars, we become bipedal. We throw our concept forward, get +a foothold on the consequence, hitch our line to this, and draw our +percept up, travelling thus with a hop, skip and jump over the surface +of life at a vastly rapider rate than if we merely waded through the +thickness of the particulars as accident rained them down upon our +heads. Animals have to do this, but men raise their heads higher and +breathe freely in the upper conceptual air. + +The enormous esteem professed by all philosophers for the +conceptual form of consciousness is easy to understand. From Plato's +time downwards it has been held to be our sole avenue to essential +truth. Concepts are universal, changeless, pure; their relations are +eternal; they are spiritual, while the concrete particulars which they +enable us to handle are corrupted by the flesh. They are precious in +themselves, then, apart from their original use, and confer new dignity +upon our life. + +One can find no fault with this way of feeling about concepts so long as +their original function does not get swallowed up in the admiration +and lost. That function is of course to enlarge mentally our momentary +experiences by ADDING to them the consequences conceived; but +unfortunately, that function is not only too often forgotten by +philosophers in their reasonings, but is often converted into its exact +opposite, and made a means of diminishing the original experience +by DENYING (implicitly or explicitly) all its features save the one +specially abstracted to conceive it by. + +This itself is a highly abstract way of stating my complaint, and it +needs to be redeemed from obscurity by showing instances of what is +meant. Some beliefs very dear to my own heart have been conceived in +this viciously abstract way by critics. One is the 'will to believe,' so +called; another is the indeterminism of certain futures; a third is the +notion that truth may vary with the standpoint of the man who holds it. +I believe that the perverse abuse of the abstracting function has led +critics to employ false arguments against these doctrines, and often has +led their readers to false conclusions. I should like to try to save the +situation, if possible, by a few counter-critical remarks. + +Let me give the name of 'vicious abstractionism' to a way of using +concepts which may be thus described: We conceive a concrete situation +by singling out some salient or important feature in it, and classing it +under that; then, instead of adding to its previous characters all the +positive consequences which the new way of conceiving it may bring, we +proceed to use our concept privatively; reducing the originally rich +phenomenon to the naked suggestions of that name abstractly taken, +treating it as a case of 'nothing but' that concept, and acting as if +all the other characters from out of which the concept is abstracted +were expunged. [Footnote: Let not the reader confound the fallacy here +described with legitimately negative inferences such as those drawn in +the mood 'celarent' of the logic-books.] Abstraction, functioning in +this way, becomes a means of arrest far more than a means of advance +in thought. It mutilates things; it creates difficulties and finds +impossibilities; and more than half the trouble that metaphysicians and +logicians give themselves over the paradoxes and dialectic puzzles of +the universe may, I am convinced, be traced to this relatively simple +source. THE VICIOUSLY PRIVATIVE EMPLOYMENT OF ABSTRACT CHARACTERS AND +CLASS NAMES is, I am persuaded, one of the great original sins of the +rationalistic mind. + +To proceed immediately to concrete examples, cast a glance at the belief +in 'free will,' demolished with such specious persuasiveness recently +by the skilful hand of Professor Fullerton. [Footnote: Popular Science +Monthly, N. Y., vols. lviii and lix.] When a common man says that his +will is free, what does he mean? He means that there are situations of +bifurcation inside of his life in which two futures seem to him equally +possible, for both have their roots equally planted in his present and +his past. Either, if realized, will grow out of his previous motives, +character and circumstances, and will continue uninterruptedly the +pulsations of his personal life. But sometimes both at once are +incompatible with physical nature, and then it seems to the naive +observer as if he made a choice between them NOW, and that the question +of which future is to be, instead of having been decided at the +foundation of the world, were decided afresh at every passing moment in +I which fact seems livingly to grow, and possibility seems, in turning +itself towards one act, to exclude all others. + +He who takes things at their face-value here may indeed be deceived. He +may far too often mistake his private ignorance of what is predetermined +for a real indetermination of what is to be. Yet, however imaginary +it may be, his picture of the situation offers no appearance of breach +between the past and future. A train is the same train, its passengers +are the same passengers, its momentum is the same momentum, no matter +which way the switch which fixes its direction is placed. For the +indeterminist there is at all times enough past for all the different +futures in sight, and more besides, to find their reasons in it, and +whichever future comes will slide out of that past as easily as the +train slides by the switch. The world, in short, is just as CONTINUOUS +WITH ITSELF for the believers in free will as for the rigorous +determinists, only the latter are unable to believe in points of +bifurcation as spots of really indifferent equilibrium or as containing +shunts which there--and there only, NOT BEFORE--direct existing motions +without altering their amount. + +Were there such spots of indifference, the rigorous determinists think, +the future and the past would be separated absolutely, for, ABSTRACTLY +TAKEN, THE WORD 'INDIFFERENT' SUGGESTS DISCONNECTION SOLELY. Whatever +is indifferent is in so far forth unrelated and detached. Take the +term thus strictly, and you see, they tell us, that if any spot of +indifference is found upon the broad highway between the past and the +future, then no connection of any sort whatever, no continuous momentum, +no identical passenger, no common aim or agent, can be found on both +sides of the shunt or switch which there is moved. The place is an +impassable chasm. + +Mr. Fullerton writes--the italics are mine--as follows:-- + +'In so far as my action is free, what I have been, what I am, what I +have always done or striven to do, what I most earnestly wish or resolve +to do at the present moment--these things can have NO MORE TO DO WITH +ITS FUTURE REALIZATION THAN IF THEY HAD NO EXISTENCE.... The possibility +is a hideous one; and surely even the most ardent free-willist will, +when he contemplates it frankly, excuse me for hoping that if I am free +I am at least not very free, and that I may reasonably expect to find +SOME degree of consistency in my life and actions. ... Suppose that I +have given a dollar to a blind beggar. Can I, if it is really an act +of free-will, be properly said to have given the money? Was it given +because I was a man of tender heart, etc., etc.? ... What has all +this to do with acts of free-will? If they are free, they must not be +conditioned by antecedent circumstances of any sort, by the misery of +the beggar, by the pity in the heart of the passer-by. They must be +causeless, not determined. They must drop from a clear sky out of the +void, for just in so far as they can be accounted for, they are not +free.' [Footnote: Loc. cit., vol. lviii, pp. 189, 188.] + +Heaven forbid that I should get entangled here in a controversy about +the rights and wrongs of the free-will question at large, for I am only +trying to illustrate vicious abstractionism by the conduct of some +of the doctrine's assailants. The moments of bifurcation, as the +indeterminist seems to himself to experience them, are moments both of +re-direction and of continuation. But because in the 'either--or' of the +re-direction we hesitate, the determinist abstracts this little element +of discontinuity from the superabundant continuities of the experience, +and cancels in its behalf all the connective characters with which the +latter is filled. Choice, for him, means henceforward DISconnection pure +and simple, something undetermined in advance IN ANY RESPECT WHATEVER, +and a life of choices must be a raving chaos, at no two moments of which +could we be treated as one and the same man. If Nero were 'free' at. the +moment of ordering his mother's murder, Mr. McTaggart [Footnote: Some +Dogmas of Religion, p. 179.] assures us that no one would have the +right at any other moment to call him a bad man, for he would then be an +absolutely other Nero. + +A polemic author ought not merely to destroy his victim. He ought to try +a bit to make him feel his error--perhaps not enough to convert him, +but enough to give him a bad conscience and to weaken the energy of his +defence. These violent caricatures of men's beliefs arouse only contempt +for the incapacity of their authors to see the situations out of which +the problems grow. To treat the negative character of one abstracted +element as annulling all the positive features with which it coexists, +is no way to change any actual indeterminist's way of looking on the +matter, tho it may make the gallery applaud. + +Turn now to some criticisms of the 'will to believe,' as another example +of the vicious way in which abstraction is currently employed. The right +to believe in things for the truth of which complete objective proof is +yet lacking is defended by those who apprehend certain human situations +in their concreteness. In those situations the mind has alternatives +before it so vast that the full evidence for either branch is missing, +and yet so significant that simply to wait for proof, and to doubt while +waiting, might often in practical respects be the same thing as weighing +down the negative side. Is life worth while at all? Is there any general +meaning in all this cosmic weather? Is anything being permanently bought +by all this suffering? Is there perhaps a transmundane experience in +Being, something corresponding to a 'fourth dimension,' which, if we had +access to it, might patch up some of this world's zerrissenheit and +make things look more rational than they at first appear? Is there a +superhuman consciousness of which our minds are parts, and from which +inspiration and help may come? Such are the questions in which the right +to take sides practically for yes or no is affirmed by some of us, while +others hold that this is methodologically inadmissible, and summon us to +die professing ignorance and proclaiming the duty of every one to refuse +to believe. + +I say nothing of the personal inconsistency of some of these critics, +whose printed works furnish exquisite illustrations of the will to +believe, in spite of their denunciations of it as a phrase and as a +recommended thing. Mr. McTaggart, whom I will once more take as an +example, is sure that 'reality is rational and righteous' and 'destined +sub specie temporis to become perfectly good'; and his calling this +belief a result of necessary logic has surely never deceived any reader +as to its real genesis in the gifted author's mind. Mankind is made on +too uniform a pattern for any of us to escape successfully from acts of +faith. We have a lively vision of what a certain view of the universe +would mean for us. We kindle or we shudder at the thought, and our +feeling runs through our whole logical nature and animates its workings. +It CAN'T be that, we feel; it MUST be this. It must be what it OUGHT +to be, and OUGHT to be this; and then we seek for every reason, good +or bad, to make this which so deeply ought to be, seem objectively the +probable thing. We show the arguments against it to be insufficient, so +that it MAY be true; we represent its appeal to be to our whole nature's +loyalty and not to any emaciated faculty of syllogistic proof. We +reinforce it by remembering the enlargement of our world by music, by +thinking of the promises of sunsets and the impulses from vernal woods. +And the essence of the whole experience, when the individual swept +through it says finally 'I believe,' is the intense concreteness of +his vision, the individuality of the hypothesis before him, and the +complexity of the various concrete motives and perceptions that issue in +his final state. + +But see now how the abstractionist treats this rich and intricate vision +that a certain state of things must be true. He accuses the believer of +reasoning by the following syllogism:-- + +All good desires must be fulfilled; The desire to believe this +proposition is a good desire; + +Ergo, this proposition must be believed. + +He substitutes this abstraction for the concrete state of mind of the +believer, pins the naked absurdity of it upon him, and easily proves +that any one who defends him must be the greatest fool on earth. As if +any real believer ever thought in this preposterous way, or as if any +defender of the legitimacy of men's concrete ways of concluding ever +used the abstract and general premise, 'All desires must be fulfilled'! +Nevertheless, Mr. McTaggart solemnly and laboriously refutes the +syllogism in sections 47 to 57 of the above-cited book. He shows that +there is no fixed link in the dictionary between the abstract concepts +'desire,' 'goodness' and 'reality'; and he ignores all the links which +in the single concrete case the believer feels and perceives to be +there! He adds:-- + +'When the reality of a thing is uncertain, the argument encourages us to +suppose that our approval of a thing can determine its reality. And when +this unhallowed link has once been established, retribution overtakes +us. For when the reality of the thing is independently certain, we +[then] have to admit that the reality of the thing should determine our +approval of that thing. I find it difficult to imagine a more degraded +position.' + +One here feels tempted to quote ironically Hegel's famous equation of +the real with the rational to his english disciple, who ends his chapter +with the heroic words:-- + +'For those who do not pray, there remains the resolve that, so far as +their strength may permit, neither the pains of death nor the pains +of life shall drive them to any comfort in that which they hold to be +false, or drive them from any comfort [discomfort?] in that which they +hold to be true.' + +How can so ingenious-minded a writer fail to see how far over the heads +of the enemy all his arrows pass? When Mr. McTaggart himself believes +that the universe is run by the dialectic energy of the absolute idea, +his insistent desire to have a world of that sort is felt by him to +be no chance example of desire in general, but an altogether peculiar +insight-giving passion to which, in this if in no other instance, he +would be stupid not to yield. He obeys its concrete singularity, not +the bare abstract feature in it of being a 'desire.' His situation is as +particular as that of an actress who resolves that it is best for her +to marry and leave the stage, of a priest who becomes secular, of a +politician who abandons public life. What sensible man would seek +to refute the concrete decisions of such persons by tracing them +to abstract premises, such as that 'all actresses must marry,' 'all +clergymen must be laymen,' 'all politicians should resign their posts'? +Yet this type of refutation, absolutely unavailing though it be for +purposes of conversion, is spread by Mr. McTaggart through many pages of +his book. For the aboundingness of our real reasons he substitutes +one narrow point. For men's real probabilities he gives a skeletonized +abstraction which no man was ever tempted to believe. + +The abstraction in my next example is less simple, but is quite as +flimsy as a weapon of attack. Empiricists think that truth in general is +distilled from single men's beliefs; and the so-called pragmatists 'go +them one better' by trying to define what it consists in when it comes. +It consists, I have elsewhere said, in such a working on the part of the +beliefs as may bring the man into satisfactory relations with objects to +which these latter point. The working is of course a concrete working +in the actual experience of human beings, among their ideas, feelings, +perceptions, beliefs and acts, as well as among the physical things +of their environment, and the relations must be understood as being +possible as well as actual. In the chapter on truth of my book +Pragmatism I have taken pains to defend energetically this view. Strange +indeed have been the misconceptions of it by its enemies, and many have +these latter been. Among the most formidable-sounding onslaughts on the +attempt to introduce some concreteness into our notion of what the truth +of an idea may mean, is one that has been raised in many quarters to the +effect that to make truth grow in any way out of human opinion is but +to reproduce that protagorean doctrine that the individual man is +'the measure of all things,' which Plato in his immortal dialogue, the +Thaeatetus, is unanimously said to have laid away so comfortably in +its grave two thousand years ago. The two cleverest brandishers of this +objection to make truth concrete, Professors Rickert and Munsterberg, +write in German, [Footnote: Munsterberg's book has just appeared in an +English version: The Eternal Values, Boston, 1909.] and 'relativismus' +is the name they give to the heresy which they endeavor to uproot. + +The first step in their campaign against 'relativismus' is entirely +in the air. They accuse relativists--and we pragmatists are typical +relativists--of being debarred by their self-adopted principles, +not only from the privilege which rationalist philosophers enjoy, of +believing that these principles of their own are truth impersonal and +absolute, but even of framing the abstract notion of such a truth, in +the pragmatic sense, of an ideal opinion in which all men might agree, +and which no man should ever wish to change. Both charges fall wide +of their mark. I myself, as a pragmatist, believe in my own account of +truth as firmly as any rationalist can possibly believe in his. And I +believe in it for the very reason that I have the idea of truth which +my learned adversaries contend that no pragmatist can frame. I expect, +namely, that the more fully men discuss and test my account, the more +they will agree that it fits, and the less will they desire a change. +I may of course be premature in this confidence, and the glory of +being truth final and absolute may fall upon some later revision and +correction of my scheme, which later will then be judged untrue in +just the measure in which it departs from that finally satisfactory +formulation. To admit, as we pragmatists do, that we are liable to +correction (even tho we may not expect it) involves the use on our +part of an ideal standard. Rationalists themselves are, as individuals, +sometimes sceptical enough to admit the abstract possibility of their +own present opinions being corrigible and revisable to some degree, so +the fact that the mere NOTION of an absolute standard should seem to +them so important a thing to claim for themselves and to deny to us is +not easy to explain. If, along with the notion of the standard, they +could also claim its exclusive warrant for their own fulminations now, +it would be important to them indeed. But absolutists like Rickert +freely admit the sterility of the notion, even in their own hands. Truth +is what we OUGHT to believe, they say, even tho no man ever did or shall +believe it, and even tho we have no way of getting at it save by the +usual empirical processes of testing our opinions by one another and +by facts. Pragmatically, then, this part of the dispute is idle. No +relativist who ever actually walked the earth [Footnote: Of course +the bugaboo creature called 'the sceptic' in the logic-books, who +dogmatically makes the statement that no statement, not even the one he +now makes, is true, is a mere mechanical toy--target for the rationalist +shooting-gallery--hit him and he turns a summersault--yet he is the only +sort of relativist whom my colleagues appear able to imagine to exist.] +has denied the regulative character in his own thinking of the notion of +absolute truth. What is challenged by relativists is the pretence on any +one's part to have found for certain at any given moment what the shape +of that truth is. Since the better absolutists agree in this, admitting +that the proposition 'There is absolute truth' is the only absolute +truth of which we can be sure, [Footnote: Compare Bickert's Gegenstand +der Erkentniss, pp. 187, 138. Munsterberg's version of this first truth +is that 'Es gibt eine Welt,'--see his Philosophie der Werte, pp. 38 and +74 And, after all, both these philosophers confess in the end that the +primal truth of which they consider our supposed denial so irrational +is not properly an insight at all, but a dogma adopted by the will which +any one who turns his back on duty may disregard! But if it all reverts +to 'the will to believe,' pragmatists have that privilege as well as +their critics.] further debate is practically unimportant, so we may +pass to their next charge. + +It is in this charge that the vicious abstractionism becomes most +apparent. The antipragmatist, in postulating absolute truth, refuses +to give any account of what the words may mean. For him they form a +self-explanatory term. The pragmatist, on the contrary, articulately +defines their meaning. Truth absolute, he says, means an ideal set +of formulations towards which all opinions may in the long run of +experience be expected to converge. In this definition of absolute truth +he not only postulates that there is a tendency to such convergence +of opinions, to such ultimate consensus, but he postulates the other +factors of his definition equally, borrowing them by anticipation from +the true conclusions expected to be reached. He postulates the existence +of opinions, he postulates the experience that will sift them, and the +consistency which that experience will show. He justifies himself in +these assumptions by saying that they are not postulates in the strict +sense but simple inductions from the past extended to the future by +analogy; and he insists that human opinion has already reached a pretty +stable equilibrium regarding them, and that if its future development +fails to alter them, the definition itself, with all its terms included, +will be part of the very absolute truth which it defines. The hypothesis +will, in short, have worked successfully all round the circle and proved +self-corroborative, and the circle will be closed. + +The anti-pragmatist, however, immediately falls foul of the word +'opinion' here, abstracts it from the universe of life, and uses it as +a bare dictionary-substantive, to deny the rest of the assumptions which +it coexists withal. The dictionary says that an opinion is 'what some +one thinks or believes.' This definition leaves every one's opinion free +to be autogenous, or unrelated either to what any one else may think or +to what the truth may be. + +Therefore, continue our abstractionists, we must conceive it as +essentially thus unrelated, so that even were a billion men to sport the +same opinion, and only one man to differ, we could admit no collateral +circumstances which might presumptively make it more probable that he, +not they, should be wrong. Truth, they say, follows not the counting of +noses, nor is it only another name for a majority vote. It is a relation +that antedates experience, between our opinions and an independent +something which the pragmatist account ignores, a relation which, tho +the opinions of individuals should to all eternity deny it, would still +remain to qualify them as false. To talk of opinions without referring +to this independent something, the anti-pragmatist assures us, is to +play Hamlet with Hamlet's part left out. + +But when the pragmatist speaks of opinions, does he mean any such +insulated and unmotived abstractions as are here supposed? Of course +not, he means men's opinions in the flesh, as they have really formed +themselves, opinions surrounded by their causes and the influences +they obey and exert, and along with the whole environment of social +communication of which they are a part and out of which they take +their rise. Moreover the 'experience' which the pragmatic definition +postulates is the independent something which the anti-pragmatist +accuses him of ignoring. Already have men grown unanimous in the opinion +that such experience is of an independent reality, the existence of +which all opinions must acknowledge, in order to be true. Already do +they agree that in the long run it is useless to resist experience's +pressure; that the more of it a man has, the better position he stands +in, in respect of truth; that some men, having had more experience, are +therefore better authorities than others; that some are also wiser by +nature and better able to interpret the experience they have had; that +it is one part of such wisdom to compare notes, discuss, and follow the +opinion of our betters; and that the more systematically and thoroughly +such comparison and weighing of opinions is pursued, the truer the +opinions that survive are likely to be. When the pragmatist talks +of opinions, it is opinions as they thus concretely and livingly and +interactingly and correlatively exist that he has in mind; and when the +anti-pragmatist tries to floor him because the word 'opinion' can also +be taken abstractly and as if it had no environment, he simply ignores +the soil out of which the whole discussion grows. His weapons cut +the air and strike no blow. No one gets wounded in the war against +caricatures of belief and skeletons of opinion of which the German +onslaughts upon 'relativismus' consists. Refuse to use the word +'opinion' abstractly, keep it in its real environment, and the withers +of pragmatism remain unwrung. That men do exist who are 'opinionated,' +in the sense that their opinions are self-willed, is unfortunately a +fact that must be admitted, no matter what one's notion of truth in +general may be. But that this fact should make it impossible for truth +to form itself authentically out of the life of opinion is what no +critic has yet proved. Truth may well consist of certain opinions, and +does indeed consist of nothing but opinions, tho not every opinion need +be true. No pragmatist needs to dogmatize about the consensus of opinion +in the future being right--he need only postulate that it will probably +contain more of truth than any one's opinion now. + + + +XIV + +TWO ENGLISH CRITICS + +Mr. Bertrand Russell's article entitled 'Transatlantic Truth,' +[Footnote: In the Albany Review for January, 1908.] has all the +clearness, dialectic subtlety, and wit which one expects from his pen, +but it entirely fails to hit the right point of view for apprehending +our position. When, for instance, we say that a true proposition is one +the consequences of believing which are good, he assumes us to mean that +any one who believes a proposition to be true must first have made +out clearly that its consequences be good, and that his belief must +primarily be in that fact,--an obvious absurdity, for that fact is the +deliverance of a new proposition, quite different from the first one and +is, moreover, a fact usually very hard to verify, it being 'far easier,' +as Mr. Russell justly says, 'to settle the plain question of fact: "Have +popes always been infallible?"' than to settle the question whether the +effects of thinking them infallible are on the whole good.' + +We affirm nothing as silly as Mr. Russell supposes. Good consequences +are not proposed by us merely as a sure sign, mark, or criterion, by +which truth's presence is habitually ascertained, tho they may indeed +serve on occasion as such a sign; they are proposed rather as the +lurking motive inside of every truth-claim, whether the 'trower' be +conscious of such motive, or whether he obey it blindly. They are +proposed as the causa existendi of our beliefs, not as their logical cue +or premise, and still less as their objective deliverance or content. +They assign the only intelligible practical meaning to that difference +in our beliefs which our habit of calling them true or false comports. + +No truth-claimer except the pragmatist himself need ever be aware of the +part played in his own mind by consequences, and he himself is aware +of it only abstractly and in general, and may at any moment be quite +oblivious of it with respect to his own beliefs. + +Mr. Russell next joins the army of those who inform their readers that +according to the pragmatist definition of the word 'truth' the belief +that A exists may be 'true' even when A does not exist. This is the +usual slander repeated to satiety by our critics. They forget that in +any concrete account of what is denoted by 'truth' in human life, the +word can only be used relatively to some particular trower. Thus, I may +hold it true that Shakespeare wrote the plays that bear his name, and +may express my opinion to a critic. If the critic be both a pragmatist +and a baconian, he will in his capacity of pragmatist see plain that the +workings of my opinion, I being who I am, make it perfectly true for +me, while in his capacity of baconian he still believes that Shakespeare +never wrote the plays in question. But most anti-pragmatist critics +take the wont 'truth' as something absolute, and easily play on their +reader's readiness to treat his OWE truths as the absolute ones. If +the reader whom they address believes that A does not exist, while we +pragmatists show that those for whom tho belief that it exists works +satisfactorily will always call it true, he easily sneers at the naivete +of our contention, for is not then the belief in question 'true,' tho +what it declares as fact has, as the reader so well knows, no existence? +Mr. Russell speaks of our statement as an 'attempt to get rid of fact' +and naturally enough considers it 'a failure' (p. 410). 'The old notion +of truth reappears,' he adds--that notion being, of course, that when a +belief is true, its object does exist. + +It is, of course, BOUND to exist, on sound pragmatic principles. +Concepts signify consequences. How is the world made different for me +by my conceiving an opinion of mine under the concept 'true'? First, an +object must be findable there (or sure signs of such an object must be +found) which shall agree with the opinion. Second, such an opinion must +not be contradicted by anything else I am aware of. But in spite of +the obvious pragmatist requirement that when I have said truly that +something exists, it SHALL exist, the slander which Mr. Russell repeats +has gained the widest currency. + +Mr. Russell himself is far too witty and athletic a ratiocinator simply +to repeat the slander dogmatically. Being nothing if not mathematical +and logical, he must prove the accusation secundum artem, and convict us +not so much of error as of absurdity. I have sincerely tried to follow +the windings of his mind in this procedure, but for the life of me I +can only see in it another example of what I have called (above, p. 249) +vicious abstractionism. The abstract world of mathematics and pure logic +is so native to Mr. Russell that he thinks that we describers of the +functions of concrete fact must also mean fixed mathematical terms +and functions. A mathematical term, as a, b, c, x, y, sin., log., +is self-sufficient, and terms of this sort, once equated, can be +substituted for one another in endless series without error. Mr. +Russell, and also Mr. Hawtrey, of whom I shall speak presently, seem to +think that in our mouth also such terms as 'meaning,' 'truth,' 'belief,' +'object,' 'definition,' are self-sufficients with no context of varying +relation that might be further asked about. What a word means is +expressed by its definition, isn't it? The definition claims to be exact +and adequate, doesn't it? Then it can be substituted for the word--since +the two are identical--can't it? Then two words with the same definition +can be substituted for one another, n'est--ce pas? Likewise two +definitions of the same word, nicht wahr, etc., etc., till it will be +indeed strange if you can't convict some one of self-contradiction and +absurdity. + +The particular application of this rigoristic treatment to my own little +account of truth as working seems to be something like what follows. +I say 'working' is what the 'truth' of our ideas means, and call it a +definition. But since meanings and things meant, definitions and things +defined, are equivalent and interchangeable, and nothing extraneous to +its definition can be meant when a term is used, it follows that who so +calls an idea true, and means by that word that it works, cannot +mean anything else, can believe nothing but that it does work, and in +particular can neither imply nor allow anything about its object or +deliverance. 'According to the pragmatists,' Mr. Russell writes, 'to say +"it is true that other people exist" means "it is useful to believe +that other people exist." But if so, then these two phrases are merely +different words for the same proposition; therefore when I believe the +one, I believe the other' (p. 400). [Logic, I may say in passing, would +seem to require Mr. Russell to believe them both at once, but he ignores +this consequence, and considers that other people exist' and 'it is +useful to believe that they do EVEN IF THEY DON'T,' must be identical +and therefore substitutable propositions in the pragmatist mouth.] + +But may not real terms, I now ask, have accidents not expressed in their +definitions? and when a real value is finally substituted for the result +of an algebraic series of substituted definitions, do not all these +accidents creep back? Beliefs have their objective 'content' or +'deliverance' as well as their truth, and truth has its implications +as well as its workings. If any one believe that other men exist, it is +both a content of his belief and an implication of its truth, that they +should exist in fact. Mr. Russell's logic would seem to exclude, +'by definition,' all such accidents as contents, implications, and +associates, and would represent us as translating all belief into a sort +of belief in pragmatism itself--of all things! If I say that a speech is +eloquent, and explain 'eloquent' as meaning the power to work in certain +ways upon the audience; or if I say a book is original, and define +'original' to mean differing from other books, Russell's logic, if I +follow it at all, would seem to doom me to agreeing that the speech is +about eloquence, and the book about other books. When I call a belief +true, and define its truth to mean its workings, I certainly do not mean +that the belief is a belief ABOUT the workings. It is a belief about the +object, and I who talk about the workings am a different subject, with +a different universe of discourse, from that of the believer of whose +concrete thinking I profess to give an account. + +The social proposition 'other men exist' and the pragmatist proposition +'it is expedient to believe that other men exist' come from different +universes of discourse. One can believe the second without being +logically compelled to believe the first; one can believe the first +without having ever heard of the second; or one can believe them both. +The first expresses the object of a belief, the second tells of one +condition of the belief's power to maintain itself. There is no identity +of any kind, save the term 'other men' which they contain in common, in +the two propositions; and to treat them as mutually substitutable, or +to insist that we shall do so, is to give up dealing with realities +altogether. + +Mr. Ralph Hawtrey, who seems also to serve under the banner of +abstractionist logic, convicts us pragmatists of absurdity by arguments +similar to Mr. Russell's. [Footnote: See The New Quarterly, for March, +1908.] + +As a favor to us and for the sake of the argument, he abandons the +word 'true' to our fury, allowing it to mean nothing but the fact that +certain beliefs are expedient; and he uses the word 'correctness' (as +Mr. Pratt uses the word 'trueness') to designate a fact, not about the +belief, but about the belief's object, namely that it is as the belief +declares it. 'When therefore,' he writes, 'I say it is correct to say +that Caesar is dead, I mean "Caesar is dead." This must be regarded as +the definition of correctness.' And Mr. Hawtrey then goes on to demolish +me by the conflict of the definitions. What is 'true' for the pragmatist +cannot be what is 'correct,' he says, 'for the definitions are not +logically interchangeable; or if we interchange them, we reach the +tautology: + +"Caesar is dead" means "it is expedient to believe that Caesar is dead." +But what is it expedient to believe? Why, "that Caesar is dead." A +precious definition indeed of 'Caesar is dead.' + +Mr. Hawtrey's conclusion would seem to be that the pragmatic definition +of the truth of a belief in no way implies--what?--that the believer +shall believe in his own belief's deliverance?--or that the pragmatist +who is talking about him shall believe in that deliverance? The two +cases are quite different. For the believer, Caesar must of course +really exist; for the pragmatist critic he need not, for the pragmatic +deliverance belongs, as I have just said, to another universe of +discourse altogether. When one argues by substituting definition for +definition, one needs to stay in the same universe. + +The great shifting of universes in this discussion occurs when we carry +the word 'truth' from the subjective into the objective realm, applying +it sometimes to a property of opinions, sometimes to the facts which the +opinions assert. A number of writers, as Mr. Russell himself, Mr. G. +E. Moore, and others, favor the unlucky word 'proposition,' which seems +expressly invented to foster this confusion, for they speak of truth as +a property of 'propositions.' But in naming propositions it is almost +impossible not to use the word 'that.' + +THAT Caesar is dead, THAT virtue is its own reward, are propositions. + +I do not say that for certain logical purposes it may not be useful to +treat propositions as absolute entities, with truth or falsehood +inside of them respectively, or to make of a complex like +'that--Caesar--is--dead' a single term and call it a 'truth.' But the +'that' here has the extremely convenient ambiguity for those who wish to +make trouble for us pragmatists, that sometimes it means the FACT that, +and sometimes the BELIEF that, Caesar is no longer living. When I then +call the belief true, I am told that the truth means the fact; when I +claim the fact also, I am told that my definition has excluded the fact, +being a definition only of a certain peculiarity in the belief--so that +in the end I have no truth to talk about left in my possession. + +The only remedy for this intolerable ambiguity is, it seems to me, to +stick to terms consistently. 'Reality,' 'idea' or 'belief,' and the +'truth of the idea or belief,' which are the terms I have consistently +held to, seem to be free from all objection. + +Whoever takes terms abstracted from all their natural settings, +identifies them with definitions, and treats the latter more algebraico, +not only risks mixing universes, but risks fallacies which the man in +the street easily detects. To prove 'by definition' that the statement +'Caesar exists' is identical with a statement about 'expediency' because +the one statement is 'true' and the other is about 'true statements,' +is like proving that an omnibus is a boat because both are vehicles. A +horse may be defined as a beast that walks on the nails of his middle +digits. Whenever we see a horse we see such a beast, just as whenever +we believe a 'truth' we believe something expedient. Messrs. Russell and +Hawtrey, if they followed their antipragmatist logic, would have to say +here that we see THAT IT IS such a beast, a fact which notoriously no +one sees who is not a comparative anatomist. + +It almost reconciles one to being no logician that one thereby escapes +so much abstractionism. Abstractionism of the worst sort dogs Mr. +Russell in his own trials to tell positively what the word 'truth' +means. In the third of his articles on Meinong, in Mind, vol. xiii, p. +509 (1904), he attempts this feat by limiting the discussion to three +terms only, a proposition, its content, and an object, abstracting from +the whole context of associated realities in which such terms are found +in every case of actual knowing. He puts the terms, thus taken in a +vacuum, and made into bare logical entities, through every possible +permutation and combination, tortures them on the rack until nothing is +left of them, and after all this logical gymnastic, comes out with the +following portentous conclusion as what he believes to be the correct +view: that there is no problem at all in truth and falsehood, that some +propositions are true and some false, just as some roses are red and +some white, that belief is a certain attitude towards propositions, +which is called knowledge when they are true, error when they are +false'--and he seems to think that when once this insight is reached the +question may be considered closed forever! + +In spite of my admiration of Mr. Russell's analytic powers, I wish, +after reading such an article, that pragmatism, even had it no other +function, might result in making him and other similarly gifted men +ashamed of having used such powers in such abstraction from reality. +Pragmatism saves us at any rate from such diseased abstractionism as +those pages show. + +P. S. Since the foregoing rejoinder was written an article on Pragmatism +which I believe to be by Mr. Russell has appeared in the Edinburgh +Review for April, 1909. As far as his discussion of the truth-problem +goes, altho he has evidently taken great pains to be fair, it seems +to me that he has in no essential respect improved upon his former +arguments. I will therefore add nothing further, but simply refer +readers who may be curious to pp. 272-280 of the said article. + + + +XV + +A DIALOGUE + +After correcting the proofs of all that precedes I imagine a residual +state of mind on the part of my reader which may still keep him +unconvinced, and which it may be my duty to try at least to dispel. I +can perhaps be briefer if I put what I have to say in dialogue form. Let +then the anti-pragmatist begin:-- + +Anti-Pragmatist:--You say that the truth of an idea is constituted by +its workings. Now suppose a certain state of facts, facts for example +of antediluvian planetary history, concerning which the question may be +asked: + +'Shall the truth about them ever be known?' And suppose (leaving the +hypothesis of an omniscient absolute out of the account) that we assume +that the truth is never to be known. I ask you now, brother pragmatist, +whether according to you there can be said to be any truth at all about +such a state of facts. Is there a truth, or is there not a truth, in +cases where at any rate it never comes to be known? + +Pragmatist:--Why do you ask me such a question? + +Anti-Prag.:--Because I think it puts you in a bad dilemma. + +Prag.:--How so? + +Anti-Prag.:--Why, because if on the one hand you elect to say that +there is a truth, you thereby surrender your whole pragmatist theory. +According to that theory, truth requires ideas and workings to +constitute it; but in the present instance there is supposed to be no +knower, and consequently neither ideas nor workings can exist. What then +remains for you to make your truth of? + +Prag.:--Do you wish, like so many of my enemies, to force me to make the +truth out of the reality itself? I cannot: the truth is something +known, thought or said about the reality, and consequently numerically +additional to it. But probably your intent is something different; so +before I say which horn of your dilemma I choose, I ask you to let me +hear what the other horn may be. + +Anti-Prag.:--The other horn is this, that if you elect to say that there +is no truth under the conditions assumed, because there are no ideas or +workings, then you fly in the face of common sense. Doesn't common sense +believe that every state of facts must in the nature of things be truly +statable in some kind of a proposition, even tho in point of fact the +proposition should never be propounded by a living soul? + +Prag.:--Unquestionably common sense believes this, and so do I. There +have been innumerable events in the history of our planet of which +nobody ever has been or ever will be able to give an account, yet of +which it can already be said abstractly that only one sort of possible +account can ever be true. The truth about any such event is thus already +generically predetermined by the event's nature; and one may accordingly +say with a perfectly good conscience that it virtually pre-exists. +Common sense is thus right in its instinctive contention. + +Anti-Prag.:--Is this then the horn of the dilemma which you stand for? +Do you say that there is a truth even in cases where it shall never be +known? + +Prag.:--Indeed I do, provided you let me hold consistently to my own +conception of truth, and do not ask me to abandon it for something which +I find impossible to comprehend.--You also believe, do you not, that +there is a truth, even in cases where it never shall be known? + +Anti-Prag.:--I do indeed believe so. + +Prag.:--Pray then inform me in what, according to you, this truth +regarding the unknown consists. + +Anti-Prag.:--Consists?--pray what do you mean by 'consists'? It +consists in nothing but itself, or more properly speaking it has neither +consistence nor existence, it obtains, it holds. + +Prag.:--Well, what relation does it bear to the reality of which it +holds? + +Anti-Prag.:-How do you mean, 'what relation'? It holds of it, of course; +it knows it, it represents it. + +Prag.:--Who knows it? What represents it? + +Anti-Prag.:--The truth does; the truth knows it; or rather not exactly +that, but any one knows it who possesses the truth. Any true idea of the +reality represents the truth concerning it. + +Prag.:--But I thought that we had agreed that no knower of it, nor any +idea representing it was to be supposed. + +Anti-Prag.:--Sure enough! + +Prag.:--Then I beg you again to tell me in what this truth consists, all +by itself, this tertium quid intermediate between the facts per se, on +the one hand, and all knowledge of them, actual or potential, on the +other. What is the shape of it in this third estate? Of what stuff, +mental, physical, or 'epistemological,' is it built? What metaphysical +region of reality does it inhabit? + +Anti-Prag.:--What absurd questions! Isn't it enough to say that it is +true that the facts are so-and-so, and false that they are otherwise? + +Prag.:--'It' is true that the facts are so-and-so--I won't yield to the +temptation of asking you what is true; but I do ask you whether your +phrase that 'it is true that' the facts are so-and-so really means +anything really additional to the bare being so-and-so of the facts +themselves. + +Anti-Prag.:--It seems to mean more than the bare being of the facts. It +is a sort of mental equivalent for them, their epistemological function, +their value in noetic terms. Prag.:--A sort of spiritual double or ghost +of them, apparently! If so, may I ask you where this truth is found. + +Anti-Prag.:--Where? where? There is no 'where'--it simply obtains, +absolutely obtains. + +Prag.:--Not in any one's mind? + +Anti-Prag.:--No, for we agreed that no actual knower of the truth should +be assumed. + +Prag.:--No actual knower, I agree. But are you sure that no notion of a +potential or ideal knower has anything to do with forming this strangely +elusive idea of the truth of the facts in your mind? + +Anti-Prag.:--Of course if there be a truth concerning the facts, that +truth is what the ideal knower would know. To that extent you can't keep +the notion of it and the notion of him separate. But it is not him first +and then it; it is it first and then him, in my opinion. + +Prag.:--But you still leave me terribly puzzled as to the status of this +so-called truth, hanging as it does between earth and heaven, between +reality and knowledge, grounded in the reality, yet numerically +additional to it, and at the same time antecedent to any knower's +opinion and entirely independent thereof. Is it as independent of the +knower as you suppose? It looks to me terribly dubious, as if it might +be only another name for a potential as distinguished from an actual +knowledge of the reality. Isn't your truth, after all, simply what +any successful knower would have to know in case he existed? And in a +universe where no knowers were even conceivable would any truth about +the facts there as something numerically distinguishable from the facts +themselves, find a place to exist in? To me such truth would not only be +non-existent, it would be unimaginable, inconceivable. + +Anti-Prag.:--But I thought you said a while ago that there is a truth of +past events, even tho no one shall ever know it. + +Prag.:--Yes, but you must remember that I also stipulated for permission +to define the word in my own fashion. The truth of an event, past, +present, or future, is for me only another name for the fact that if +the event ever does get known, the nature of the knowledge is already to +some degree predetermined. The truth which precedes actual knowledge of +a fact means only what any possible knower of the fact will eventually +find himself necessitated to believe about it. He must believe something +that will bring him into satisfactory relations with it, that will prove +a decent mental substitute for it. What this something may be is of +course partly fixed already by the nature of the fact and by the sphere +of its associations. This seems to me all that you can clearly mean when +you say that truth pre-exists to knowledge. It is knowledge anticipated, +knowledge in the form of possibility merely. + +Anti-Prag.:--But what does the knowledge know when it comes? Doesn't it +know the truth? And, if so, mustn't the truth be distinct from either +the fact or the knowledge? + +Prag.:--It seems to me that what the knowledge knows is the fact itself, +the event, or whatever the reality may be. Where you see three distinct +entities in the field, the reality, the knowing, and the truth, I see +only two. Moreover, I can see what each of my two entities is known-as, +but when I ask myself what your third entity, the truth, is known-as, I +can find nothing distinct from the reality on the one hand, and the ways +in which it may be known on the other. Are you not probably misled by +common language, which has found it convenient to introduce a hybrid +name, meaning sometimes a kind of knowing and sometimes a reality known, +to apply to either of these things interchangeably? And has philosophy +anything to gain by perpetuating and consecrating the ambiguity? If you +call the object of knowledge 'reality,' and call the manner of its +being cognized 'truth,' cognized moreover on particular occasions, and +variously, by particular human beings who have their various businesses +with it, and if you hold consistently to this nomenclature, it seems to +me that you escape all sorts of trouble. + +Anti-Prag.:--Do you mean that you think you escape from my dilemma? + +Prag.:--Assuredly I escape; for if truth and knowledge are terms +correlative and interdependent, as I maintain they are, then wherever +knowledge is conceivable truth is conceivable, wherever knowledge +is possible truth is possible, wherever knowledge is actual truth is +actual. Therefore when you point your first horn at me, I think of truth +actual, and say it doesn't exist. It doesn't; for by hypothesis there is +no knower, no ideas, no workings. I agree, however, that truth possible +or virtual might exist, for a knower might possibly be brought to birth; +and truth conceivable certainly exists, for, abstractly taken, there +is nothing in the nature of antediluvian events that should make the +application of knowledge to them inconceivable. Therefore when you try +to impale me on your second horn, I think of the truth in question as a +mere abstract possibility, so I say it does exist, and side with common +sense. + +Do not these distinctions rightly relieve me from embarrassment? And +don't you think it might help you to make them yourself? + +Anti-Prag.:--Never!--so avaunt with your abominable hair-splitting and +sophistry! Truth is truth; and never will I degrade it by identifying it +with low pragmatic particulars in the way you propose. + +Prag.:--Well, my dear antagonist, I hardly hoped to convert an eminent +intellectualist and logician like you; so enjoy, as long as you live, +your own ineffable conception. Perhaps the rising generation will +grow up more accustomed than you are to that concrete and empirical +interpretation of terms in which the pragmatic method consists. Perhaps +they may then wonder how so harmless and natural an account of truth as +mine could have found such difficulty in entering the minds of men far +more intelligent than I can ever hope to become, but wedded by education +and tradition to the abstractionist manner of thought. + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Meaning of Truth, by William James + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MEANING OF TRUTH *** + +***** This file should be named 5117.txt or 5117.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/5/1/1/5117/ + +Produced by Steve Harris, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: The Meaning of Truth + +Author: William James + +Release Date: February, 2004 [EBook #5117] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on May 1, 2002] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MEANING OF TRUTH *** + + + + +Produced by Steve Harris, Charles Franks +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + + + +THE MEANING OF TRUTH + +A SEQUEL TO 'PRAGMATISM' + +BY + +WILLIAM JAMES + + + + + + +PREFACE + +THE pivotal part of my book named Pragmatism is its account of the +relation called 'truth' which may obtain between an idea +(opinion, belief, statement, or what not) and its object. 'Truth,' I +there say, 'is a property of certain of our ideas. It means their +agreement, as falsity means their disagreement, with +reality. Pragmatists and intellectualists both accept this +definition as a matter of course. + +'Where our ideas [do] not copy definitely their object, what does +agreement with that object mean? ... Pragmatism asks its +usual question. "Grant an idea or belief to be true," it says, "what +concrete difference will its being true make in any one's actual +life? What experiences [may] be different from those which would +obtain if the belief were false? How will the truth be realized? +What, in short, is the truth's cash-value in experiential +terms?" The moment pragmatism asks this question, it sees the +answer: TRUE IDEAS ARE THOSE THAT WE CAN ASSIMILATE, VALIDATE, +CORROBORATE, AND VERIFY. FALSE IDEAS ARE THOSE THAT WE CANNOT. That +is the practical difference it makes to us to have true ideas; that +therefore is the meaning of truth, for it is all that truth is known +as. + +'The truth of an idea is not a stagnant property inherent in it. +Truth HAPPENS to an idea. It BECOMES true, is MADE true by events. +Its verity IS in fact an event, a process, the process namely of its +verifying itself, its veriFICATION. Its validity is the process of +its validATION. [Footnote: But 'VERIFIABILITY,' I add, 'is as good +as verification. For one truth-process completed, there are a +million in our lives that function in [the] state of nascency. They +lead us towards direct verification; lead us into the surroundings +of the object they envisage; and then, if everything, runs on +harmoniously, we are so sure that verification is possible that we +omit it, and are usually justified by all that happens.'] + +'To agree in the widest sense with a reality can only mean to be +guided either straight up to it or into its surroundings, or to be +put into such working touch with it as to handle either it or +something connected with it better than if we disagreed. Better +either intellectually or practically .... Any idea that helps us +to deal, whether practically or intellectually, with either the +reality or its belongings, that doesn't entangle our progress in +frustrations, that FITS, in fact, and adapts our life to the +reality's whole setting, will agree sufficiently to meet +the requirement. It will be true of that reality. + +'THE TRUE, to put it very briefly, IS ONLY THE EXPEDIENT IN THE WAY +OF OUR THINKING, JUST AS THE RIGHT IS ONLY THE EXPEDIENT IN THE WAY +OF OUR BEHAVING. Expedient in almost any fashion, and expedient in +the long run and on the whole, of course; for what meets expediently +all the experience in sight won't necessarily meet all farther +experiences equally satisfactorily. Experience, as we know, has ways +of BOILING OVER, and making us correct our present formulas.' + +This account of truth, following upon the similar ones given by +Messrs. Dewey and Schiller, has occasioned the liveliest +discussion. Few critics have defended it, most of them have scouted +it. It seems evident that the subject is a hard one to understand, +under its apparent simplicity; and evident also, I think, that +the definitive settlement of it will mark a turning-point in the +history of epistemology, and consequently in that of general +philosophy. In order to make my own thought more accessible to those +who hereafter may have to study the question, I have collected in +the volume that follows all the work of my pen that bears directly +on the truth-question. My first statement was in 1884, in the +article that begins the present volume. The other papers follow in +the order of their publication. Two or three appear now for the +first time. + +One of the accusations which I oftenest have had to meet is that of +making the truth of our religious beliefs consist in their 'feeling +good' to us, and in nothing else. I regret to have given some excuse +for this charge, by the unguarded language in which, in the book +Pragmatism, I spoke of the truth of the belief of certain +philosophers in the absolute. Explaining why I do not believe in the +absolute myself (p. 78), yet finding that it may secure 'moral +holidays' to those who need them, and is true in so far forth (if to +gain moral holidays be a good), [Footnote: Op. cit., p. 75.] I +offered this as a conciliatory olive-branch to my enemies. But they, +as is only too common with such offerings, trampled the gift under +foot and turned and rent the giver. I had counted too much on their +good will--oh for the rarity of Christian charity under the sun! Oh +for the rarity of ordinary secular intelligence also! I had supposed +it to be matter of common observation that, of two competing views +of the universe which in all other respects are equal, but of which +the first denies some vital human need while the second satisfies +it, the second will be favored by sane men for the simple reason +that it makes the world seem more rational. To choose the first view +under such circumstances would be an ascetic act, an act of +philosophic self-denial of which no normal human being would be +guilty. Using the pragmatic test of the meaning of concepts, I had +shown the concept of the absolute to MEAN nothing but the +holiday giver, the banisher of cosmic fear. One's objective +deliverance, when one says 'the absolute exists,' amounted, on my +showing, just to this, that 'some justification of a feeling +of security in presence of the universe,' exists, and that +systematically to refuse to cultivate a feeling of security would be +to do violence to a tendency in one's emotional life which +might well be respected as prophetic. + +Apparently my absolutist critics fail to see the workings of their +own minds in any such picture, so all that I can do is to apologize, +and take my offering back. The absolute is true in NO way then, and +least of all, by the verdict of the critics, in the way which I +assigned! + +My treatment of 'God,' 'freedom,' and 'design' was similar. +Reducing, by the pragmatic test, the meaning of each of these +concepts to its positive experienceable operation, I showed them all +to mean the same thing, viz., the presence of 'promise' in the +world. 'God or no God?' means 'promise or no promise?' It seems to +me that the alternative is objective enough, being a question as to +whether the cosmos has one character or another, even though our own +provisional answer be made on subjective grounds. Nevertheless +christian and non-christian critics alike accuse me of summoning +people to say 'God exists,' EVEN WHEN HE DOESN'T EXIST, because +forsooth in my philosophy the 'truth' of the saying doesn't +really mean that he exists in any shape whatever, but only that to +say so feels good. + +Most of the pragmatist and anti-pragmatist warfare is over what the +word 'truth' shall be held to signify, and not over any of the +facts embodied in truth-situations; for both pragmatists and anti- +pragmatists believe in existent objects, just as they believe in our +ideas of them. The difference is that when the pragmatists speak of +truth, they mean exclusively some thing about the ideas, namely +their workableness; whereas when anti-pragmatists speak of truth +they seem most often to mean something about the objects. Since the +pragmatist, if he agrees that an idea is 'really' true, also +agrees to whatever it says about its object; and since most anti- +pragmatists have already come round to agreeing that, if the object +exists, the idea that it does so is workable; there would seem so +little left to fight about that I might well be asked why instead of +reprinting my share in so much verbal wrangling, I do not show my +sense of 'values' by burning it all up. + +I understand the question and I will give my answer. I am interested +in another doctrine in philosophy to which I give the name of +radical empiricism, and it seems to me that the establishment of the +pragmatist theory of truth is a step of first-rate importance in +making radical empiricism prevail. Radical empiricism consists first +of a postulate, next of a statement of fact, and finally of a +generalized conclusion. + +The postulate is that the only things that shall be debatable among +philosophers shall be things definable in terms drawn from +experience. [Things of an unexperienceable nature may exist ad +libitum, but they form no part of the material for philosophic +debate.] + +The statement of fact is that the relations between things, +conjunctive as well as disjunctive, are just as much matters of +direct particular experience, neither more so nor less so, than the +things themselves. + +The generalized conclusion is that therefore the parts of experience +hold together from next to next by relations that are themselves +parts of experience. The directly apprehended universe needs, in +short, no extraneous trans-empirical connective support, but +possesses in its own right a concatenated or continuous structure. + +The great obstacle to radical empiricism in the contemporary mind is +the rooted rationalist belief that experience as immediately given +is all disjunction and no conjunction, and that to make one world +out of this separateness, a higher unifying agency must be there. +In the prevalent idealism this agency is represented as the absolute +all-witness which 'relates' things together by throwing +'categories' over them like a net. The most peculiar and unique, +perhaps, of all these categories is supposed to be the truth- +relation, which connects parts of reality in pairs, making of one of +them a knower, and of the other a thing known, yet which is itself +contentless experientially, neither describable, explicable, nor +reduceable to lower terms, and denotable only by uttering the name +'truth.' + +The pragmatist view, on the contrary, of the truth-relation is that +it has a definite content, and that everything in it is +experienceable. Its whole nature can be told in positive terms. The +'workableness' which ideas must have, in order to be true, means +particular workings, physical or intellectual, actual or +possible, which they may set up from next to next inside of concrete +experience. Were this pragmatic contention admitted, one great point +in the victory of radical empiricism would also be scored, for the +relation between an object and the idea that truly knows it, is held +by rationalists to be nothing of this describable sort, but to stand +outside of all possible temporal experience; and on the relation, +so interpreted, rationalism is wonted to make its last most obdurate +rally. + +Now the anti-pragmatist contentions which I try to meet in this +volume can be so easily used by rationalists as weapons of +resistance, not only to pragmatism but to radical empiricism also +(for if the truth-relation were transcendent, others might be so +too), that I feel strongly the strategical importance of having +them definitely met and got out of the way. What our critics most +persistently keep saying is that though workings go with truth, yet +they do not constitute it. It is numerically additional to them, +prior to them, explanatory OF them, and in no wise to be explained +BY them, we are incessantly told. The first point for our enemies to +establish, therefore, is that SOMETHING numerically additional and +prior to the workings is involved in the truth of an idea. Since the +OBJECT is additional, and usually prior, most rationalists plead IT, +and boldly accuse us of denying it. This leaves on the bystanders +the impression--since we cannot reasonably deny the existence of the +object--that our account of truth breaks down, and that our critics +have driven us from the field. Altho in various places in this +volume I try to refute the slanderous charge that we deny real +existence, I will say here again, for the sake of emphasis, that +the existence of the object, whenever the idea asserts it 'truly,' +is the only reason, in innumerable cases, why the idea does work +successfully, if it work at all; and that it seems an abuse +of language, to say the least, to transfer the word 'truth' from the +idea to the object's existence, when the falsehood of ideas that +won't work is explained by that existence as well as the truth of +those that will. + +I find this abuse prevailing among my most accomplished adversaries. +But once establish the proper verbal custom, let the word +'truth' represent a property of the idea, cease to make it something +mysteriously connected with the object known, and the path opens +fair and wide, as I believe, to the discussion of radical empiricism +on its merits. The truth of an idea will then mean only its +workings, or that in it which by ordinary psychological laws sets up +those workings; it will mean neither the idea's object, nor anything +'saltatory' inside the idea, that terms drawn from experience cannot +describe. + +One word more, ere I end this preface. A distinction is sometimes +made between Dewey, Schiller and myself, as if I, in supposing +the object's existence, made a concession to popular prejudice which +they, as more radical pragmatists, refuse to make. As I myself +understand these authors, we all three absolutely agree in admitting +the transcendency of the object (provided it be an experienceable +object) to the subject, in the truth-relation. Dewey in +particular has insisted almost ad nauseam that the whole meaning of +our cognitive states and processes lies in the way they intervene in +the control and revaluation of independent existences or facts. His +account of knowledge is not only absurd, but meaningless, unless +independent existences be there of which our ideas take account, and +for the transformation of which they work. But because he and +Schiller refuse to discuss objects and relations 'transcendent' in +the sense of being ALTOGETHER TRANS-EXPERIENTIAL, their critics +pounce on sentences in their writings to that effect to show that +they deny the existence WITHIN THE REALM OF EXPERIENCE of objects +external to the ideas that declare their presence there. [Footnote: +It gives me pleasure to welcome Professor Carveth Read into the +pragmatistic church, so far as his epistemology goes. See his +vigorous book, The Metaphysics of Nature, 2d Edition, Appendix A. +(London, Black, 1908.) The work What is Reality? by Francis Howe +Johnson (Boston, 1891), of which I make the acquaintance only while +correcting these proofs, contains some striking anticipations of the +later pragmatist view. The Psychology of Thinking, by Irving +E. Miller (New York, Macmillan Co., 1909), which has just +appeared, is one of the most convincing pragmatist document yet +published, tho it does not use the word 'pragmatism' at all. While I +am making references, I cannot refrain from inserting one to the +extraordinarily acute article by H. V. Knox. in the Quarterly Review +for April, 1909.] + +It seems incredible that educated and apparently sincere +critics should so fail to catch their adversary's point of view. + +What misleads so many of them is possibly also the fact that the +universes of discourse of Schiller, Dewey, and myself are panoramas +of different extent, and that what the one postulates explicitly the +other provisionally leaves only in a state of implication, while the +reader thereupon considers it to be denied. Schiller's universe is +the smallest, being essentially a psychological one. He starts with +but one sort of thing, truth-claims, but is led ultimately to the +independent objective facts which they assert, inasmuch as the most +successfully validated of all claims is that such facts are +there. My universe is more essentially epistemological. I start with +two things, the objective facts and the claims, and indicate which +claims, the facts being there, will work successfully as +the latter's substitutes and which will not. I call the former +claims true. Dewey's panorama, if I understand this colleague, is +the widest of the three, but I refrain from giving my own account of +its complexity. Suffice it that he holds as firmly as I do to +objects independent of our judgments. If I am wrong in saying this, +he must correct me. I decline in this matter to be corrected at +second hand. + +I have not pretended in the following pages to consider all the +critics of my account of truth, such as Messrs. Taylor, Lovejoy, +Gardiner, Bakewell, Creighton, Hibben, Parodi, Salter, Carus, +Lalande, Mentre, McTaggart, G. E. Moore, Ladd and others, +especially not Professor Schinz, who has published under the title +of Anti-pragmatisme an amusing sociological romance. Some of these +critics seem to me to labor under an inability almost pathetic, to +understand the thesis which they seek to refute. I imagine that most +of their difficulties have been answered by anticipation elsewhere +in this volume, and I am sure that my readers will thank me for not +adding more repetition to the fearful amount that is already there. + +95 IRVING ST., CAMBRIDGE (MASS.), August, 1909. + + + + + + + +CONTENTS + +I THE FUNCTION OF COGNITION + +II THE TIGERS IN INDIA + +III HUMANISM AND TRUTH + +IV THE RELATION BETWEEN KNOWER AND KNOWN + +V THE ESSENCE OF HUMANISM + +VI A WORD MORE ABOUT TRUTH + +VII PROFESSOR PRATT ON TRUTH + +VIII THE PRAGMATIST ACCOUNT OF TRUTH AND ITS MIS-UNDERSTANDERS + +IX THE MEANING OF THE WORD TRUTH + +X THE EXISTENCE OF JULIUS CAESAR + +XI THE ABSOLUTE AND THE STRENUOUS LIFE + +XII PROFESSOR HEBERT ON PRAGMATISM + +XIII ABSTRACTIONISM AND 'RELATIVISMUS' + +XIV TWO ENGLISH CRITICS + +XV A DIALOGUE + + + + + + + +THE MEANING OF TRUTH + + + +I + +THE FUNCTION OF COGNITION +[Footnote: Read before the Aristotelian Society, December 1, +1884, and first published in Mind, vol. x (1885).--This, and +the following articles have received a very slight verbal +revision, consisting mostly in the omission of redundancy.] + +The following inquiry is (to use a distinction familiar +to readers of Mr. Shadworth Hodgson) not an inquiry into +the 'how it comes,' but into the 'what it is' of +cognition. What we call acts of cognition are evidently +realized through what we call brains and their events, +whether there be 'souls' dynamically connected with the +brains or not. But with neither brains nor souls has this +essay any business to transact. In it we shall simply +assume that cognition IS produced, somehow, and limit +ourselves to asking what elements it contains, what +factors it implies. + +Cognition is a function of consciousness. The first factor it +implies is therefore a state of consciousness wherein the cognition +shall take place. Having elsewhere used the word 'feeling' to +designate generically all states of consciousness considered +subjectively, or without respect to their possible function, I shall +then say that, whatever elements an act of cognition may imply +besides, it at least implies the existence of a FEELING. [If the +reader share the current antipathy to the word 'feeling,' he may +substitute for it, wherever I use it, the word 'idea,' taken in the +old broad Lockian sense, or he may use the clumsy phrase 'state of +consciousness,' or finally he may say 'thought' instead.] + +Now it is to be observed that the common consent of mankind has +agreed that some feelings are cognitive and some are simple +facts having a subjective, or, what one might almost call a +physical, existence, but no such self-transcendent function as +would be implied in their being pieces of knowledge. Our task +is again limited here. We are not to ask, 'How is self-transcendence +possible?' We are only to ask, 'How comes it that common sense +has assigned a number of cases in which it is assumed not only to be +possible but actual? And what are the marks used by common sense +to distinguish those cases from the rest?' In short, our inquiry is +a chapter in descriptive psychology,--hardly anything more. + +Condillac embarked on a quest similar to this by his famous +hypothesis of a statue to which various feelings were successively +imparted. Its first feeling was supposed to be one of fragrance. But +to avoid all possible complication with the question of genesis, let +us not attribute even to a statue the possession of our imaginary +feeling. Let us rather suppose it attached to no matter, nor +localized at any point in space, but left swinging IN VACUO, as +it were, by the direct creative FIAT of a god. And let us also, to +escape entanglement with difficulties about the physical or +psychical nature of its 'object' not call it a feeling of +fragrance or of any other determinate sort, but limit ourselves to +assuming that it is a feeling of Q. What is true of it under this +abstract name will be no less true of it in any more particular +shape (such as fragrance, pain, hardness) which the reader may +suppose. + +Now, if this feeling of Q be the only creation of the god, it will +of course form the entire universe. And if, to escape the cavils of +that large class of persons who believe that SEMPER IDEM SENTIRE AC +NON SENTIRE are the same, [Footnote:1 'The Relativity of Knowledge,' +held in this sense, is, it may be observed in passing, one of the +oddest of philosophic superstitions. Whatever facts may be cited in +its favor are due to the properties of nerve-tissue, which may be +exhausted by too prolonged an excitement. Patients with neuralgias +that last unremittingly for days can, however, assure us that +the limits of this nerve-law are pretty widely drawn. But if +we physically could get a feeling that should last +eternally unchanged, what atom of logical or psychological argument +is there to prove that it would not be felt as long as it +lasted, and felt for just what it is, all that time? The reason for +the opposite prejudice seems to be our reluctance to think that +so stupid a thing as such a feeling would necessarily be, should be +allowed to fill eternity with its presence. An +interminable acquaintance, leading to no knowledge-about,--such +would be its condition.] we allow the feeling to be of as short a +duration as they like, that universe will only need to last an +infinitesimal part of a second. The feeling in question will thus be +reduced to its fighting weight, and all that befalls it in the way +of a cognitive function must be held to befall in the brief +instant of its quickly snuffed-out life,--a life, it will also be +noticed, that has no other moment of consciousness either preceding +or following it. + +Well now, can our little feeling, thus left alone in the universe,-- +for the god and we psychological critics may be supposed left out of +the account,--can the feeling, I say, be said to have any sort of a +cognitive function? For it to KNOW, there must be something to be +known. What is there, on the present supposition? One may reply, +'the feeling's content q.' But does it not seem more proper to call +this the feeling's QUALITY than its content? Does not the +word 'content' suggest that the feeling has already dirempted itself +as an act from its content as an object? And would it be quite safe +to assume so promptly that the quality q of a feeling is one and the +same thing with a feeling of the quality q? The quality q, so far, +is an entirely subjective fact which the feeling carries so to speak +endogenously, or in its pocket. If any one pleases to dignify so +simple a fact as this by the name of knowledge, of course +nothing can prevent him. But let us keep closer to the path of +common usage, and reserve the name knowledge for the cognition of +'realities,' meaning by realities things that exist independently of +the feeling through which their cognition occurs. If the content of +the feeling occur nowhere in the universe outside of the feeling +itself, and perish with the feeling, common usage refuses to call it +a reality, and brands it as a subjective feature of the +feeling's constitution, or at the most as the feeling's DREAM. + +For the feeling to be cognitive in the specific sense, then, it must +be self-transcendent; and we must prevail upon the god to CREATE A +REALITY OUTSIDE OF IT to correspond to its intrinsic quality Q. Thus +only can it be redeemed from the condition of being a solipsism. If +now the new created reality RESEMBLE the feeling's quality Q I say +that the feeling may be held by us TO BE COGNIZANT OF THAT REALITY. + +This first instalment of my thesis is sure to be attacked. But one +word before defending it 'Reality' has become our warrant for +calling a feeling cognitive; but what becomes our warrant for +calling anything reality? The only reply is--the faith of the +present critic or inquirer. At every moment of his life he +finds himself subject to a belief in SOME realities, even though his +realities of this year should prove to be his illusions of the next. +Whenever he finds that the feeling he is studying contemplates what +he himself regards as a reality, he must of course admit the feeling +itself to be truly cognitive. We are ourselves the critics here; and +we shall find our burden much lightened by being allowed to take +reality in this relative and provisional way. Every science must +make some assumptions. Erkenntnisstheoretiker are but fallible +mortals. When they study the function of cognition, they do it by +means of the same function in themselves. And knowing that the +fountain cannot go higher than its source, we should promptly +confess that our results in this field are affected by our own +liability to err. THE MOST WE CAN CLAIM IS, THAT WHAT WE SAY ABOUT +COGNITION MAY BE COUNTED AS TRUE AS WHAT WE SAY ABOUT ANYTHING ELSE. +If our hearers agree with us about what are to be held 'realities,' +they will perhaps also agree to the reality of our doctrine of the +way in which they are known. We cannot ask for more. + +Our terminology shall follow the spirit of these remarks. We will +deny the function of knowledge to any feeling whose quality or +content we do not ourselves believe to exist outside of that feeling +as well as in it. We may call such a feeling a dream if we like; we +shall have to see later whether we can call it a fiction or an +error. + +To revert now to our thesis. Some persons will immediately cry out, +'How CAN a reality resemble a feeling?' Here we find how wise we +were to name the quality of the feeling by an algebraic letter Q. We +flank the whole difficulty of resemblance between an inner state +and an outward reality, by leaving it free to any one to postulate +as the reality whatever sort of thing he thinks CAN resemble a +feeling,--if not an outward thing, then another feeling like +the first one,--the mere feeling Q in the critic's mind for example. +Evading thus this objection, we turn to another which is sure to +be urged. + +It will come from those philosophers to whom 'thought,' in the sense +of a knowledge of relations, is the all in all of mental life; and +who hold a merely feeling consciousness to be no better--one would +sometimes say from their utterances, a good deal worse--than no +consciousness at all. Such phrases as these, for example, are common +to-day in the mouths of those who claim to walk in the footprints +of Kant and Hegel rather than in the ancestral English paths: 'A +perception detached from all others, "left out of the heap we call a +mind," being out of all relation, has no qualities--is simply +nothing. We can no more consider it than we can see vacancy.' 'It is +simply in itself fleeting, momentary, unnameable (because while we +name it it has become another), and for the very same reason +unknowable, the very negation of knowability.' 'Exclude from what we +have considered real all qualities constituted by relation, we find +that none are left.' + +Altho such citations as these from the writings of Professor Green +might be multiplied almost indefinitely, they would hardly repay +the pains of collection, so egregiously false is the doctrine they +teach. Our little supposed feeling, whatever it may be, from the +cognitive point of view, whether a bit of knowledge or a dream, is +certainly no psychical zero. It is a most positively and definitely +qualified inner fact, with a complexion all its own. Of course there +are many mental facts which it is NOT. It knows Q, if Q be a +reality, with a very minimum of knowledge. It neither dates nor +locates it. It neither classes nor names it. And it neither knows +itself as a feeling, nor contrasts itself with other feelings, nor +estimates its own duration or intensity. It is, in short, if there +is no more of it than this, a most dumb and helpless and useless +kind of thing. + +But if we must describe it by so many negations, and if it can say +nothing ABOUT itself or ABOUT anything else, by what right do we +deny that it is a psychical zero? And may not the 'relationists' be +right after all? + +In the innocent looking word 'about' lies the solution of this +riddle; and a simple enough solution it is when frankly looked at. A +quotation from a too seldom quoted book, the Exploratio Philosophica +of John Grote (London, 1865), p. 60, will form the best +introduction to it. + +'Our knowledge,' writes Grote, 'may be contemplated in either of two +ways, or, to use other words, we may speak in a double manner of +the "object" of knowledge. That is, we may either use language thus: +we KNOW a thing, a man, etc.; or we may use it thus: we know such +and such things ABOUT the thing, the man, etc. Language in general, +following its true logical instinct, distinguishes between these two +applications of the notion of knowledge, the one being yvwvai, +noscere, kennen, connaitre, the other being eidevai, scire, wissen, +savoir. In the origin, the former may be considered more what I have +called phenomenal--it is the notion of knowledge as ACQUAINTANCE or +familiarity with what is known; which notion is perhaps more akin to +the phenomenal bodily communication, and is less purely +intellectual than the other; it is the kind of knowledge which we +have of a thing by the presentation to the senses or the +representation of it in picture or type, a Vorstellung. The +other, which is what we express in judgments or propositions, what +is embodied in Begriffe or concepts without any necessary +imaginative representation, is in its origin the more +intellectual notion of knowledge. There is no reason, however, why +we should not express our knowledge, whatever its kind, in +either manner, provided only we do not confusedly express it, in the +same proposition or piece of reasoning, in both.' + +Now obviously if our supposed feeling of Q is (if knowledge at all) +only knowledge of the mere acquaintance-type, it is milking a he- + goat, as the ancients would have said, to try to extract from it +any deliverance ABOUT anything under the sun, even about itself. And +it is as unjust, after our failure, to turn upon it and call it a +psychical nothing, as it would be, after our fruitless attack upon +the billy-goat, to proclaim the non-lactiferous character of +the whole goat-tribe. But the entire industry of the Hegelian school +in trying to shove simple sensation out of the pale of philosophic +recognition is founded on this false issue. It is always the +'speechlessness' of sensation, its inability to make any +'statement,'[Footnote: See, for example, Green's Introduction to +Hume's Treatise of Human Nature, p. 36.] that is held to make the +very notion of it meaningless, and to justify the student of +knowledge in scouting it out of existence. 'Significance,' in the +sense of standing as the sign of other mental states, is taken to be +the sole function of what mental states we have; and from the +perception that our little primitive sensation has as yet no +significance in this literal sense, it is an easy step to call it +first meaningless, next senseless, then vacuous, and finally to +brand it as absurd and inadmissible. But in this universal +liquidation, this everlasting slip, slip, slip, of +direct acquaintance into knowledge-ABOUT, until at last nothing is +left about which the knowledge can be supposed to obtain, does not +all 'significance' depart from the situation? And when our knowledge +about things has reached its never so complicated perfection, must +there not needs abide alongside of it and inextricably mixed in with +it some acquaintance with WHAT things all this knowledge is about? + +Now, our supposed little feeling gives a WHAT; and if other feelings +should succeed which remember the first, its WHAT may stand as +subject or predicate of some piece of knowledge-about, of some +judgment, perceiving relations between it and other WHATS which +the other feelings may know. The hitherto dumb Q will then receive a +name and be no longer speechless. But every name, as students +of logic know, has its 'denotation'; and the denotation always means +some reality or content, relationless as extra or with its +internal relations unanalyzed, like the Q which our +primitive sensation is supposed to know. No relation- +expressing proposition is possible except on the basis of a +preliminary acquaintance with such 'facts,' with such contents, as +this. Let the Q be fragrance, let it be toothache, or let it be a +more complex kind of feeling, like that of the full-moon swimming in +her blue abyss, it must first come in that simple shape, and be held +fast in that first intention, before any knowledge ABOUT it can be +attained. The knowledge ABOUT it is IT with a context added. Undo +IT, and what is added cannot be CONtext. [Footnote: If A enters and +B exclaims, 'Didn't you see my brother on the stairs?' we all hold +that A may answer, 'I saw him, but didn't know he was your brother'; +ignorance of brotherhood not abolishing power to see. But those who, +on account of the unrelatedness of the first facts with which we +become acquainted, deny them to be 'known' to us, ought in +consistency to maintain that if A did not perceive the relationship +of the man on the stairs to B, it was impossible he should +have noticed him at all.] + +Let us say no more then about this objection, but enlarge our +thesis, thus: If there be in the universe a Q other than the Q in +the feeling, the latter may have acquaintance with an entity +ejective to itself; an acquaintance moreover, which, as mere +acquaintance, it would be hard to imagine susceptible either of +improvement or increase, being in its way complete; and which would +oblige us (so long as we refuse not to call acquaintance +knowledge) to say not only that the feeling is cognitive, but that +all qualities of feeling, SO LONG AS THERE IS ANYTHING OUTSIDE OF +THEM WHICH THEY RESEMBLE, are feelings OF qualities of existence, +and perceptions of outward fact. + +The point of this vindication of the cognitive function of the first +feeling lies, it will be noticed, in the discovery that q does exist +elsewhere than in it. In case this discovery were not made, we could +not be sure the feeling was cognitive; and in case there were +nothing outside to be discovered, we should have to call the feeling +a dream. But the feeling itself cannot make the discovery. Its own q +is the only q it grasps; and its own nature is not a particle +altered by having the self-transcendent function of cognition either +added to it or taken away. The function is accidental; synthetic, +not analytic; and falls outside and not inside its being. [Footnote: +It seems odd to call so important a function accidental, but I do +not see how we can mend the matter. Just as, if we start with the +reality and ask how it may come to be known, we can only reply by +invoking a feeling which shall RECONSTRUCT it in its own more +private fashion; so, if we start with the feeling and ask how it may +come to know, we can only reply by invoking a reality which shall +RECONSTRUCT it in its own more public fashion. In either case, +however, the datum we start with remains just what it was. One may +easily get lost in verbal mysteries about the difference between +quality of feeling and feeling of quality, between receiving and +reconstructing the knowledge of a reality. But at the end we must +confess that the notion of real cognition involves an +unmediated dualism of the knower and the known. See Bowne's +Metaphysics, New York, 1882, pp. 403-412, and various passages in +Lotze, e.g., Logic, Sec. 308. ['Unmediated' is a bad word to +have used.--1909.]] + +A feeling feels as a gun shoots. If there be nothing to be felt or +hit, they discharge themselves ins blaue hinein. If, however, +something starts up opposite them, they no longer simply shoot or +feel, they hit and know. + +But with this arises a worse objection than any yet made. We the +critics look on and see a real q and a feeling of q; and because the +two resemble each other, we say the one knows the other. But what +right have we to say this until we know that the feeling of q means +to stand for or represent just that SAME other q? Suppose, instead +of one q, a number of real q's in the field. If the gun shoots and +hits, we can easily see which one of them it hits. But how can we +distinguish which one the feeling knows? It knows the one it stands +for. But which one DOES it stand for? It declares no intention in +this respect. It merely resembles; it resembles all indifferently; +and resembling, per se, is not necessarily representing or standing- +for at all. Eggs resemble each other, but do not on that account +represent, stand for, or know each other. And if you say this +is because neither of them is a FEELING, then imagine the world to +consist of nothing but toothaches, which ARE feelings, feelings +resembling each other exactly,--would they know each other the +better for all that? + +The case of q being a bare quality like that of toothache-pain is +quite different from that of its being a concrete individual thing. +There is practically no test for deciding whether the feeling of a +bare quality means to represent it or not. It can DO nothing to the +quality beyond resembling it, simply because an abstract quality is +a thing to which nothing can be done. Being without context or +environment or principium individuationis, a quiddity with +no haecceity, a platonic idea, even duplicate editions of such a +quality (were they possible), would be indiscernible, and no sign +could be given, no result altered, whether the feeling I meant to +stand for this edition or for that, or whether it simply resembled +the quality without meaning to stand for it at all. + +If now we grant a genuine pluralism of editions to the quality q, by +assigning to each a CONTEXT which shall distinguish it from its +mates, we may proceed to explain which edition of it the feeling +knows, by extending our principle of resemblance to the context too, +and saying the feeling knows the particular q whose context it most +exactly duplicates. But here again the theoretic doubt recurs: +duplication and coincidence, are they knowledge? The gun shows which +q it points to and hits, by BREAKING it. Until the feeling can show +us which q it points to and knows, by some equally flagrant token, +why are we not free to deny that it either points to or knows any +one of the REAL q's at all, and to affirm that the +word 'resemblance' exhaustively describes its relation to the +reality? + +Well, as a matter of fact, every actual feeling DOES show us, quite +as flagrantly as the gun, which q it points to; and practically in +concrete cases the matter is decided by an element we have hitherto +left out. Let us pass from abstractions to possible instances, and +ask our obliging deus ex machina to frame for us a richer world. Let +him send me, for example, a dream of the death of a certain man, and +let him simultaneously cause the man to die. How would our practical +instinct spontaneously decide whether this were a case of cognition +of the reality, or only a sort of marvellous coincidence of a +resembling reality with my dream? Just such puzzling cases as this +are what the 'society for psychical research' is busily +collecting and trying to interpret in the most reasonable way. + +If my dream were the only one of the kind I ever had in my life, if +the context of the death in the dream differed in many particulars +from the real death's context, and if my dream led me to no action +about the death, unquestionably we should all call it a strange +coincidence, and naught besides. But if the death in the dream had a +long context, agreeing point for point with every feature that +attended the real death; if I were constantly having such +dreams, all equally perfect, and if on awaking I had a habit of +ACTING immediately as if they were true and so getting 'the start' +of my more tardily instructed neighbors,--we should in all +probability have to admit that I had some mysterious kind of +clairvoyant power, that my dreams in an inscrutable way meant just +those realities they figured, and that the word 'coincidence' failed +to touch the root of the matter. And whatever doubts any one +preserved would completely vanish, if it should appear that from the +midst of my dream I had the power of INTERFERING with the course of +the reality, and making the events in it turn this way or that, +according as I dreamed they should. Then at least it would be +certain that my waking critics and my dreaming self were dealing +with the SAME. + +And thus do men invariably decide such a question. THE FALLING OF +THE DREAM'S PRACTICAL CONSEQUENCES into the real world, and the +EXTENT of the resemblance between the two worlds are the criteria +they instinctively use. [Footnote: The thoroughgoing objector might, +it is true, still return to the charge, and, granting a dream which +should completely mirror the real universe, and all the actions +dreamed in which should be instantly matched by duplicate actions in +this universe, still insist that this is nothing more than harmony, +and that it is as far as ever from being made clear whether +the dream-world refers to that other world, all of whose details it +so closely copies. This objection leads deep into metaphysics. I do +not impugn its importance, and justice obliges me to say that but +for the teachings of my colleague, Dr. Josiah Royce, I should +neither have grasped its full force nor made my own practical and +psychological point of view as clear to myself as it is. On this +occasion I prefer to stick steadfastly to that point of view; but I +hope that Dr. Royce's more fundamental criticism of the function of +cognition may ere long see the light. [I referred in this note to +Royce's religious aspect of philosophy, then about to be published. +This powerful book maintained that the notion of REFERRING involved +that of an inclusive mind that shall own both the real q and the +mental q, and use the latter expressly as a representative symbol of +the former. At the time I could not refute this transcendentalist +opinion. Later, largely through the influence of Professor D. S. +Miller (see his essay 'The meaning of truth and error,' in the +Philosophical Review for 1893, vol. 2 p. 403) I came to see that any +definitely experienceable workings would serve as +intermediaries quite as well as the absolute mind's +intentions would.]] All feeling is for the sake of action, all +feeling results in action,--to-day no argument is needed to prove +these truths. But by a most singular disposition of nature which we +may conceive to have been different, MY FEELINGS ACT UPON THE +REALITIES WITHIN MY CRITIC'S WORLD. Unless, then, my critic can +prove that my feeling does not 'point to' those realities which it +acts upon, how can he continue to doubt that he and I are alike +cognizant of one and the same real world? If the action is performed +in one world, that must be the world the feeling intends; if in +another world, THAT is the world the feeling has in mind. If your +feeling bear no fruits in my world, I call it utterly detached from +my world; I call it a solipsism, and call its world a dream-world. +If your toothache do not prompt you to ACT as if I had a toothache, +nor even as if I had a separate existence; if you neither say to me, +'I know now how you must suffer!' nor tell me of a remedy, I deny +that your feeling, however it may resemble mine, is really cognizant +of mine. It gives no SIGN of being cognizant, and such a sign is +absolutely necessary to my admission that it is. + +Before I can think you to mean my world, you must affect my world; +before I can think you to mean much of it, you must affect much of +it; and before I can be sure you mean it AS I DO, you must affect it +JUST AS I SHOULD if I were in your place. Then I, your critic, will +gladly believe that we are thinking, not only of the same reality, +but that we are thinking it ALIKE, and thinking of much of its +extent. + +Without the practical effects of our neighbor's feelings on our own +world, we should never suspect the existence of our +neighbor's feelings at all, and of course should never +find ourselves playing the critic as we do in this article. The +constitution of nature is very peculiar. In the world of each of us +are certain objects called human bodies, which move about and act on +all the other objects there, and the occasions of their action are +in the main what the occasions of our action would be, were they our +bodies. They use words and gestures, which, if we used them, would +have thoughts behind them,--no mere thoughts uberhaupt, however, but +strictly determinate thoughts. I think you have the notion of +fire in general, because I see you act towards this fire in my room +just as I act towards it,--poke it and present your person towards +it, and so forth. But that binds me to believe that if you feel +'fire' at all, THIS is the fire you feel. As a matter of fact, +whenever we constitute ourselves into psychological critics, it is +not by dint of discovering which reality a feeling 'resembles' that +we find out which reality it means. We become first aware of which +one it means, and then we suppose that to be the one it resembles. +We see each other looking at the same objects, pointing to them and +turning them over in various ways, and thereupon we hope and trust +that all of our several feelings resemble the reality and each +other. But this is a thing of which we are never theoretically sure. +Still, it would practically be a case of grubelsucht, if a ruffian +were assaulting and drubbing my body, to spend much time in subtle +speculation either as to whether his vision of my body resembled +mine, or as to whether the body he really MEANT to insult were not +some body in his mind's eye, altogether other from my own. The +practical point of view brushes such metaphysical cobwebs away. If +what he have in mind be not MY body, why call we it a body at all? +His mind is inferred by me as a term, to whose existence we trace +the things that happen. The inference is quite void if the term, +once inferred, be separated from its connection with the body +that made me infer it, and connected with another that is not mine +at all. No matter for the metaphysical puzzle of how our two minds, +the ruffian's and mine, can mean the same body. Men who see each +other's bodies sharing the same space, treading the same earth, +splashing the same water, making the same air resonant, and pursuing +the same game and eating out of the same dish, will never +practically believe in a pluralism of solipsistic worlds. + +Where, however, the actions of one mind seem to take no effect in +the world of the other, the case is different. This is what happens +in poetry and fiction. Every one knows Ivanhoe, for example; but so +long as we stick to the story pure and simple without regard to +the facts of its production, few would hesitate to admit that there +are as many different Ivanhoes as there are different minds +cognizant of the story. [Footnote: That is, there is no REAL +'Ivanhoe,' not even the one in Sir Walter Scott's mind as he was +writing the story. That one is only the FIRST one of the Ivanhoe- +solipsisms. It is quite true we can make it the real Ivanhoe if we +like, and then say that the other Ivanhoes know it or do not know +it, according as they refer to and resemble it or no. This is done +by bringing in Sir Walter Scott himself as the author of the real +Ivanhoe, and so making a complex object of both. This object, +however, is not a story pure and simple. It has dynamic +relations with the world common to the experience of all the +readers. Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe got itself printed in volumes +which we all can handle, and to any one of which we can refer to +see which of our versions be the true one, i.e., the original one +of Scott himself. We can see the manuscript; in short we can +get back to the Ivanhoe in Scott's mind by many an avenue +and channel of this real world of our experience,--a thing we can by +no means do with either the Ivanhoe or the Rebecca, either the +Templar or the Isaac of York, of the story taken simply as such, and +detached from the conditions of its production. Everywhere, then, we +have the same test: can we pass continuously from two objects in two +minds to a third object which seems to be in BOTH minds, because +each mind feels every modification imprinted on it by the other? If +so, the first two objects named are derivatives, to say the least, +from the same third object, and may be held, if they resemble each +other, to refer to one and the same reality.] The fact that all +these Ivanhoes RESEMBLE each other does not prove the contrary. But +if an alteration invented by one man in his version were to +reverberate immediately through all the other versions, and +produce changes therein, we should then easily agree that all these +thinkers were thinking the SAME Ivanhoe, and that, fiction or no +fiction, it formed a little world common to them all. + +Having reached this point, we may take up our thesis and improve it +again. Still calling the reality by the name of q and letting +the critic's feeling vouch for it, we can say that any other feeling +will be held cognizant of q, provided it both resemble q, and refer +to q, as shown by its either modifying q directly, or modifying some +other reality, p or r, which the critic knows to be continuous with +q. Or more shortly, thus: THE FEELING OF q KNOWS WHATEVER REALITY IT +RESEMBLES, AND EITHER DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY OPERATES ON. If it +resemble without operating, it is a dream; if it operate without +resembling, it is an error. [Footnote: Among such errors are those +cases in which our feeling operates on a reality which it does +partially resemble, and yet does not intend: as for instance, when +I take up your umbrella, meaning to take my own. I cannot be said +here either to know your umbrella, or my own, which latter my +feeling more completely resembles. I am mistaking them both, +misrepresenting their context, etc. + +We have spoken in the text as if the critic were necessarily one +mind, and the feeling criticised another. But the criticised feeling +and its critic may be earlier and later feelings of the same mind, +and here it might seem that we could dispense with the notion of +operating, to prove that critic and criticised are referring to and +meaning to represent the SAME. We think we see our past feelings +directly, and know what they refer to without appeal. At the worst, +we can always fix the intention of our present feeling and MAKE it +refer to the same reality to which any one of our past feelings may +have referred. So we need no 'operating' here, to make sure that the +feeling and its critic mean the same real q. Well, all the better if +this is so! We have covered the more complex and difficult case in +our text, and we may let this easier one go. The main thing +at present is to stick to practical psychology, and ignore +metaphysical difficulties. + +One more remark. Our formula contains, it will be observed, nothing +to correspond to the great principle of cognition laid down by +Professor Ferrier in his Institutes of Metaphysic and apparently +adopted by all the followers of Fichte, the principle, namely, that +for knowledge to be constituted there must be knowledge of the +knowing mind along with whatever else is known: not q, as we have +supposed, but q PLUS MYSELF, must be the least I can know. It is +certain that the common sense of mankind never dreams of using any +such principle when it tries to discriminate between conscious +states that are knowledge and conscious states that are not. So +that Ferrier's principle, if it have any relevancy at all, must +have relevancy to the metaphysical possibility of consciousness +at large, and not to the practically recognized constitution +of cognitive consciousness. We may therefore pass it by +without further notice here.] It is to be feared that the reader may +consider this formula rather insignificant and obvious, and hardly +worth the labor of so many pages, especially when he considers that +the only cases to which it applies are percepts, and that the whole +field of symbolic or conceptual thinking seems to elude its grasp. +Where the reality is either a material thing or act, or a state of +the critic's consciousness, I may both mirror it in my mind and +operate upon it--in the latter case indirectly, of course--as +soon as I perceive it. But there are many cognitions, universally +allowed to be such, which neither mirror nor operate on their +realities. + +In the whole field of symbolic thought we are universally held both +to intend, to speak of, and to reach conclusions about--to know in +short--particular realities, without having in our subjective +consciousness any mind-stuff that resembles them even in a remote +degree. We are instructed about them by language which awakens no +consciousness beyond its sound; and we know WHICH realities they +are by the faintest and most fragmentary glimpse of some remote +context they may have and by no direct imagination of themselves. As +minds may differ here, let me speak in the first person. I am sure +that my own current thinking has WORDS for its almost exclusive +subjective material, words which are made intelligible by being +referred to some reality that lies beyond the horizon of direct +consciousness, and of which I am only aware as of a terminal +MORE existing in a certain direction, to which the words might lead +but do not lead yet. The SUBJECT, or TOPIC, of the words is +usually something towards which I mentally seem to pitch them in a +backward way, almost as I might jerk my thumb over my shoulder to +point at something, without looking round, if I were only entirely +sure that it was there. The UPSHOT, or CONCLUSION, of the words is +something towards which I seem to incline my head forwards, as if +giving assent to its existence, tho all my mind's eye catches sight +of may be some tatter of an image connected with it, which tatter, +however, if only endued with the feeling of familiarity and reality, +makes me feel that the whole to which it belongs is rational and +real, and fit to be let pass. + + Here then is cognitive consciousness on a large scale, and yet what +it knows, it hardly resembles in the least degree. The formula last +laid down for our thesis must therefore be made more complete. We +may now express it thus: A PERCEPT KNOWS WHATEVER REALITY IT +DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY OPERATES ON AND RESEMBLES; ACONCEPTUAL +FEELING, OR THOUGHT KNOWS A REALITY, WHENEVER IT ACTUALLY OR +POTENTIALLY TERMINATES IN A PERCEPT THAT OPERATES ON, OR RESEMBLES +THAT REALITY, OR IS OTHERWISE CONNECTED WITH IT OR WITH ITS CONTEXT. +The latter percept may be either sensation or sensorial idea; and +when I say the thought must TERMINATE in such a percept, I mean that +it must ultimately be capable of leading up thereto,--by the way of +practical + + Is an incomplete 'thought about' that reality, that reality is its +'topic,' etc. experience, if the terminal feeling be a sensation; by +the way of logical or habitual suggestion, if it be only an image in +the mind. + +Let an illustration make this plainer. I open the first book I take +up, and read the first sentence that meets my eye: 'Newton saw +the handiwork of God in the heavens as plainly as Paley in the +animal kingdom.' I immediately look back and try to analyze the +subjective state in which I rapidly apprehended this sentence as I +read it. In the first place there was an obvious feeling that the +sentence was intelligible and rational and related to the world of +realities. There was also a sense of agreement or harmony between +'Newton,' 'Paley,' and 'God.' There was no apparent image connected +with the words 'heavens,' or 'handiwork,' or 'God'; they were +words merely. With 'animal kingdom' I think there was the faintest +consciousness (it may possibly have been an image of the steps) of +the Museum of Zoology in the town of Cambridge where I write. With +'Paley' there was an equally faint consciousness of a small +dark leather book; and with 'Newton' a pretty distinct vision of the +right-hand lower corner of curling periwig. This is all the mind- +stuff I can discover in my first consciousness of the meaning of +this sentence, and I am afraid that even not all of this would have +been present had I come upon the sentence in a genuine reading of +the book, and not picked it out for an experiment. And yet my +consciousness was truly cognitive. The sentence is 'about realities' +which my psychological critic--for we must not forget him-- +acknowledges to be such, even as he acknowledges my distinct feeling +that they ARE realities, and my acquiescence in the general +rightness of what I read of them, to be true knowledge on my part. + +Now what justifies my critic in being as lenient as this? This +singularly inadequate consciousness of mine, made up of symbols +that neither resemble nor affect the realities they stand for,--how +can he be sure it is cognizant of the very realities he has himself +in mind? + +He is sure because in countless like cases he has seen such +inadequate and symbolic thoughts, by developing themselves, +terminate in percepts that practically modified and presumably +resembled his own. By 'developing' themselves is meant obeying their +tendencies, following up the suggestions nascently present in them, +working in the direction in which they seem to point, clearing up +the penumbra, making distinct the halo, unravelling the +fringe, which is part of their composition, and in the midst of +which their more substantive kernel of subjective content seems +consciously to lie. Thus I may develop my thought in the +Paley direction by procuring the brown leather volume and bringing +the passages about the animal kingdom before the critic's eyes. I +may satisfy him that the words mean for me just what they mean for +him, by showing him IN CONCRETO the very animals and their +arrangements, of which the pages treat. I may get Newton's works and +portraits; or if I follow the line of suggestion of the wig, I may +smother my critic in seventeenth-century matters pertaining to +Newton's environment, to show that the word 'Newton' has the same +LOCUS and relations in both our minds. Finally I may, by act and +word, persuade him that what I mean by God and the heavens and +the analogy of the handiworks, is just what he means also. + +My demonstration in the last resort is to his SENSES. My thought +makes me act on his senses much as he might himself act on +them, were he pursuing the consequences of a perception of his own. +Practically then MY thought terminates in HIS realities. He +willingly supposes it, therefore, to be OF them, and inwardly to +RESEMBLE what his own thought would be, were it of the same symbolic +sort as mine. And the pivot and fulcrum and support of his +mental persuasion, is the sensible operation which my thought leads +me, or may lead, to effect--the bringing of Paley's book, of +Newton's portrait, etc., before his very eyes. + +In the last analysis, then, we believe that we all know and think +about and talk about the same world, because WE BELIEVE OUR +PERCEPTS ARE POSSESSED BY US IN COMMON. And we believe this because +the percepts of each one of us seem to be changed in consequence of +changes in the percepts of someone else. What I am for you is in the +first instance a percept of your own. Unexpectedly, however, I open +and show you a book, uttering certain sounds the while. These acts +are also your percepts, but they so resemble acts of yours with +feelings prompting them, that you cannot doubt I have the +feelings too, or that the book is one book felt in both our worlds. +That it is felt in the same way, that my feelings of it resemble +yours, is something of which we never can be sure, but which we +assume as the simplest hypothesis that meets the case. As a matter +of fact, we never ARE sure of it, and, as ERKENNTNISSTHEORETIKER, we +can only say that of feelings that should NOT resemble each other, +both could not know the same thing at the same time in the same way. +[Footnote: Though both might terminate in the same thing and be +incomplete thoughts 'about' it.] If each holds to its own percept +as the reality, it is bound to say of the other percept, that, +though it may INTEND that reality, and prove this by working change +upon it, yet, if it do not resemble it, it is all false and wrong. +[Footnote: The difference between Idealism and Realism is +immaterial here. What is said in the text is consistent with +either theory. A law by which my percept shall change yours +directly is no more mysterious than a law by which it shall +first change a physical reality, and then the reality change +yours. In either case you and I seem knit into a continuous +world, and not to form a pair of solipsisms.] + +If this be so of percepts, how much more so of higher modes of +thought! Even in the sphere of sensation individuals are +probably different enough. Comparative study of the simplest +conceptual elements seems to show a wider divergence still. And when +it comes to general theories and emotional attitudes towards life, +it is indeed time to say with Thackeray, 'My friend, two different +universes walk about under your hat and under mine.' + +What can save us at all and prevent us from flying asunder into a +chaos of mutually repellent solipsisms? Through what can our +several minds commune? Through nothing but the mutual resemblance of +those of our perceptual feelings which have this power of modifying +one another, WHICH ARE MERE DUMB KNOWLEDGES-OF-ACQUAINTANCE, and +which must also resemble their realities or not know them aright at +all. In such pieces of knowledge-of-acquaintance all our knowledge- +about must end, and carry a sense of this possible termination as +part of its content. These percepts, these termini, these sensible +things, these mere matters-of-acquaintance, are the only +realities we ever directly know, and the whole history of our +thought is the history of our substitution of one of them for +another, and the reduction of the substitute to the status of a +conceptual sign. Contemned though they be by some thinkers, these +sensations are the mother-earth, the anchorage, the stable rock, +the first and last limits, the terminus a quo and the terminus ad +quem of the mind. to find such sensational termini should be our aim +with all our higher thought. They end discussion; they destroy the +false conceit of knowledge; and without them we are all at sea with +each other's meaning. If two men act alike on a percept, they +believe themselves to feel alike about it; if not, they may suspect +they know it in differing ways. We can never be sure we understand +each other till we are able to bring the matter to this test. +[Footnote: 'There is no distinction of meaning so fine as to +consist in anything but a possible difference of practice.... It +appears, then, that the rule for attaining the [highest] grade +of clearness of apprehension is as follows: Consider what +effects, which might conceivably have practical bearings, we +conceive the object of our conception to have. Then, our +conception of these effects is the whole of our conception of the +object.' Charles S. Peirce: 'How to make our Ideas clear,' in +Popular Science Monthly, New York, January, 1878, p. 293.] This is +why metaphysical discussions are so much like fighting with the air; +they have no practical issue of a sensational kind. 'Scientific' +theories, on the other hand, always terminate in definite +percepts. You can deduce a possible sensation from your theory and, +taking me into your laboratory, prove that your theory is true of my +world by giving me the sensation then and there. Beautiful is the +flight of conceptual reason through the upper air of truth. +No wonder philosophers are dazzled by it still, and no wonder they +look with some disdain at the low earth of feeling from which the +goddess launched herself aloft. But woe to her if she return not +home to its acquaintance; Nirgends haften dann die unsicheren +Sohlen--every crazy wind will take her, and, like a fire-balloon at +night, she will go out among the stars. + +NOTE.--The reader will easily see how much of the account of the +truth-function developed later in Pragmatism was already explicit in +this earlier article, and how much came to be defined later. In this +earlier article we find distinctly asserted:-- + +1. The reality, external to the true idea; + +2. The critic, reader, or epistemologist, with his own belief, as +warrant for this reality's existence; + +3. The experienceable environment, as the vehicle or +medium connecting knower with known, and yielding the +cognitive RELATION; + +4. The notion of POINTING, through this medium, to the reality, as +one condition of our being said to know it; + +5. That of RESEMBLING it, and eventually AFFECTING it, as +determining the pointing to IT and not to something else. + +6. The elimination of the 'epistemological gulf,' so that the whole +truth-relation falls inside of the continuities of +concrete experience, and is constituted of particular processes, +varying with every object and subject, and susceptible of being +described in detail. + +The defects in this earlier account are:-- + +1. The possibly undue prominence given to resembling, which altho a +fundamental function in knowing truly, is so often dispensed with; + +2. The undue emphasis laid upon operating on the object itself, +which in many cases is indeed decisive of that being what we refer +to, but which is often lacking, or replaced by operations on other +things related to the object. + +3. The imperfect development of the generalized notion of the +WORKABILITY of the feeling or idea as equivalent to +that SATISFACTORY ADAPTATION to the particular reality, +which constitutes the truth of the idea. It is this more generalized +notion, as covering all such specifications as pointing, fitting, +operating or resembling, that distinguishes the developed view +of Dewey, Schiller, and myself. + +4. The treatment, [earlier], of percepts as the only realm of +reality. I now treat concepts as a co-ordinate realm. + +The next paper represents a somewhat broader grasp of the topic on +the writer's part. + + + +II + +THE TIGERS IN INDIA [Footnote: Extracts from a presidential address +before the American Psychological Association, published in the +Psychological Review, vol. ii, p. 105 (1895).] + +THERE are two ways of knowing things, knowing them immediately or +intuitively, and knowing them conceptually or +representatively. Altho such things as the white paper before our +eyes can be known intuitively, most of the things we know, the +tigers now in India, for example, or the scholastic system of +philosophy, are known only representatively or symbolically. + +Suppose, to fix our ideas, that we take first a case of conceptual +knowledge; and let it be our knowledge of the tigers in India, as we +sit here. Exactly what do we MEAN by saying that we here know the +tigers? What is the precise fact that the cognition so +confidently claimed is KNOWN-AS, to use Shadworth +Hodgson's inelegant but valuable form of words? + +Most men would answer that what we mean by knowing the tigers is +having them, however absent in body, become in some way present to +our thought; or that our knowledge of them is known as presence of +our thought to them. A great mystery is usually made of +this peculiar presence in absence; and the scholastic philosophy, +which is only common sense grown pedantic, would explain it as a +peculiar kind of existence, called INTENTIONAL EXISTENCE of the +tigers in our mind. At the very least, people would say that what we +mean by knowing the tigers is mentally POINTING towards them as we +sit here. + +But now what do we mean by POINTING, in such a case as this? What is +the pointing known-as, here? + +To this question I shall have to give a very prosaic answer--one +that traverses the pre-possessions not only of common sense +and scholasticism, but also those of nearly all the epistemological +writers whom I have ever read. The answer, made brief, is this: +The pointing of our thought to the tigers is known simply and solely +as a procession of mental associates and motor consequences that +follow on the thought, and that would lead harmoniously, if followed +out, into some ideal or real context, or even into the immediate +presence, of the tigers. It is known as our rejection of a jaguar, +if that beast were shown us as a tiger; as our assent to a genuine +tiger if so shown. It is known as our ability to utter all sorts of +propositions which don't contradict other propositions that are true +of the real tigers. It is even known, if we take the tigers very +seriously, as actions of ours which may terminate in directly +intuited tigers, as they would if we took a voyage to India for the +purpose of tiger-hunting and brought back a lot of skins of the +striped rascals which we had laid low. In all this there is no self- +transcendency in our mental images TAKEN BY THEMSELVES. They are one +phenomenal fact; the tigers are another; and their pointing to the +tigers is a perfectly commonplace intra-experiential relation, IF +YOU ONCE GRANT A CONNECTING WORLD TO BE THERE. In short, the ideas +and the tigers are in themselves as loose and separate, to +use Hume's language, as any two things can be; and pointing means +here an operation as external and adventitious as any that +nature yields.[Footnote: A stone in one field may 'fit,' we say, a +hole in another field. But the relation of 'fitting,' so long as no +one carries the stone to the hole and drops it in, is only one name +for the fact that such an act MAY happen. Similarly with the +knowing of the tigers here and now. It is only an anticipatory +name for a further associative and terminative process that +MAY occur.] + +I hope you may agree with me now that in representative knowledge +there is no special inner mystery, but only an outer chain +of physical or mental intermediaries connecting thought and thing. +TO KNOW AN OBJECT IS HERE TO LEAD TO IT THROUGH A CONTEXT WHICH THE +WORLD SUPPLIES. All this was most instructively set forth by our +colleague D. S. Miller at our meeting in New York last Christmas, +and for re-confirming my sometime wavering opinion, I owe him this +acknowledgment. [Footnote: See Dr. Miller's articles on Truth and +Error, and on Content and Function, in the Philosophical Review, +July, 1893, and Nov., 1895.] + +Let us next pass on to the case of immediate or intuitive +acquaintance with an object, and let the object be the white paper +before our eyes. The thought-stuff and the thing-stuff are here +indistinguishably the same in nature, as we saw a moment since, and +there is no context of intermediaries or associates to stand between +and separate the thought and thing. There is no 'presence in +absence' here, and no 'pointing,' but rather an allround +embracing of the paper by the thought; and it is clear that the +knowing cannot now be explained exactly as it was when the tigers +were its object. Dotted all through our experience are states +of immediate acquaintance just like this. Somewhere our belief +always does rest on ultimate data like the whiteness, smoothness, or +squareness of this paper. Whether such qualities be truly ultimate +aspects of being, or only provisional suppositions of ours, held-to +till we get better informed, is quite immaterial for our present +inquiry. So long as it is believed in, we see our object face to +face. What now do we mean by 'knowing' such a sort of object +as this? For this is also the way in which we should know the tiger +if our conceptual idea of him were to terminate by having led us +to his lair? + +This address must not become too long, so I must give my answer in +the fewest words. And let me first say this: So far as the white +paper or other ultimate datum of our experience is considered to +enter also into some one else's experience, and we, in knowing it, +are held to know it there as well as here; so far, again, as it is +considered to be a mere mask for hidden molecules that other now +impossible experiences of our own might some day lay bare to view; +so far it is a case of tigers in India again--the things known +being absent experiences, the knowing can only consist in +passing smoothly towards them through the intermediary context that +the world supplies. But if our own private vision of the paper be +considered in abstraction from every other event, as if it +constituted by itself the universe (and it might perfectly well do +so, for aught we can understand to the contrary), then the +paper seen and the seeing of it are only two names for one +indivisible fact which, properly named, is THE DATUM, THE +PHENOMENON, OR THE EXPERIENCE. The paper is in the mind and the +mind is around the paper, because paper and mind are only two names +that are given later to the one experience, when, taken in a larger +world of which it forms a part, its connections are traced in +different directions. [Footnote: What is meant by this is that 'the +experience' can be referred to either of two great associative +systems, that of the experiencer's mental history, or that of the +experienced facts of the world. Of both of these systems it forms +part, and may be regarded, indeed, as one of their points of +intersection. One might let a vertical line stand for the mental +history; but the same object, O, appears also in the mental history +of different persons, represented by the other vertical lines. It +thus ceases to be the private property of one experience, and +becomes, so to speak, a shared or public thing. We can track its +outer history in this way, and represent it by the horizontal line. +(It is also known representatively at other points of the +vertical lines, or intuitively there again, so that the line of its +outer history would have to be looped and wandering, but I make it +straight for simplicity's sake.)] In any case, however, it is the +same stuff figures in all the sets of lines. + +TO KNOW IMMEDIATELY, THEN, OR INTUITIVELY, IS FOR MENTAL CONTENT AND +OBJECT TO BE IDENTICAL. This is a very different definition from +that which we gave of representative knowledge; but neither +definition involves those mysterious notions of self-transcendency +and presence in absence which are such essential parts of the +ideas of knowledge, both of philosophers and of common men. +[Footnote: The reader will observe that the text is written from the +point of view of NAIF realism or common sense, and avoids raising +the idealistic controversy.] + + + +III + +HUMANISM AND TRUTH [Footnote: Reprinted, with slight +verbal revision, from Mind, vol. xiii, N. S., p. 457 (October, +1904). A couple of interpolations from another article in Mind, +'Humanism and truth once more,' in vol. xiv, have been made.] + +RECEIVING from the Editor of Mind an advance proof of Mr. Bradley's +article on 'Truth and Practice,' I understand this as a hint to me +to join in the controversy over 'Pragmatism' which seems to have +seriously begun. As my name has been coupled with the movement, I +deem it wise to take the hint, the more so as in some quarters +greater credit has been given me than I deserve, and +probably undeserved discredit in other quarters falls also to my +lot. + +First, as to the word 'pragmatism.' I myself have only used the term +to indicate a method of carrying on abstract discussion. The serious +meaning of a concept, says Mr. Peirce, lies in the concrete +difference to some one which its being true will make. Strive to +bring all debated conceptions to that' pragmatic' test, and you will +escape vain wrangling: if it can make no practical difference which +of two statements be true, then they are really one statement in two +verbal forms; if it can make no practical difference whether a given +statement be true or false, then the statement has no real meaning. +In neither case is there anything fit to quarrel about: we may +save our breath, and pass to more important things. + +All that the pragmatic method implies, then, is that truths should +HAVE practical [Footnote: 'Practical' in the sense of PARTICULAR, of +course, not in the sense that the consequences may not be MENTAL as +well as physical.] consequences. In England the word has been used +more broadly still, to cover the notion that the truth of any +statement CONSISTS in the consequences, and particularly in their +being good consequences. Here we get beyond affairs of method +altogether; and since my pragmatism and this wider pragmatism are +so different, and both are important enough to have different names, +I think that Mr. Schiller's proposal to call the wider pragmatism by +the name of 'humanism' is excellent and ought to be adopted. The +narrower pragmatism may still be spoken of as the +'pragmatic method.' + +I have read in the past six months many hostile reviews of +Schiller's and Dewey's publications; but with the exception of Mr. +Bradley's elaborate indictment, they are out of reach where I write, +and I have largely forgotten them. I think that a free discussion of +the subject on my part would in any case be more useful than a +polemic attempt at rebutting these criticisms in detail. Mr. Bradley +in particular can be taken care of by Mr. Schiller. He repeatedly +confesses himself unable to comprehend Schiller's views, he +evidently has not sought to do so sympathetically, and I +deeply regret to say that his laborious article throws, for my mind, +absolutely no useful light upon the subject. It seems to me on the +whole an IGNORATIO ELENCHI, and I feel free to disregard +it altogether. + +The subject is unquestionably difficult. Messrs. Dewey's and +Schiller's thought is eminently an induction, a generalization +working itself free from all sorts of entangling particulars. If +true, it involves much restatement of traditional notions. This is a +kind of intellectual product that never attains a classic form of +expression when first promulgated. The critic ought therefore not to +be too sharp and logic-chopping in his dealings with it, but should +weigh it as a whole, and especially weigh it against its possible +alternatives. One should also try to apply it first to one instance, +and then to another to see how it will work. It seems to me that it +is emphatically not a case for instant execution, by conviction of +intrinsic absurdity or of self-contradiction, or by caricature of +what it would look like if reduced to skeleton shape. Humanism is in +fact much more like one of those secular changes that come upon +public opinion overnight, as it were, borne upon tides 'too deep for +sound or foam,' that survive all the crudities and extravagances of +their advocates, that you can pin to no one absolutely essential +statement, nor kill by any one decisive stab. + +Such have been the changes from aristocracy to democracy, from +classic to romantic taste, from theistic to pantheistic feeling, +from static to evolutionary ways of understanding life--changes of +which we all have been spectators. Scholasticism still opposes to +such changes the method of confutation by single decisive +reasons, showing that the new view involves self-contradiction, or +traverses some fundamental principle. This is like stopping a river +by planting a stick in the middle of its bed. Round your obstacle +flows the water and 'gets there all the same.' In reading some of +our opponents, I am not a little reminded of those catholic writers +who refute darwinism by telling us that higher species cannot come +from lower because minus nequit gignere plus, or that the notion of +transformation is absurd, for it implies that species tend to their +own destruction, and that would violate the principle that +every reality tends to persevere in its own shape. The point of view +is too myopic, too tight and close to take in the inductive +argument. Wide generalizations in science always meet with these +summary refutations in their early days; but they outlive them, and +the refutations then sound oddly antiquated and scholastic. I +cannot help suspecting that the humanistic theory is going through +this kind of would-be refutation at present. + +The one condition of understanding humanism is to become inductive- +minded oneself, to drop rigorous definitions, and follow lines +of least, resistance 'on the whole.' 'In other words,' an opponent +might say, 'resolve your intellect into a kind of slush.' 'Even so,' +I make reply,--'if you will consent to use no politer word.' For +humanism, conceiving the more 'true' as the more 'satisfactory' +(Dewey's term), has sincerely to renounce rectilinear arguments and +ancient ideals of rigor and finality. It is in just this temper of +renunciation, so different from that of pyrrhonistic +scepticism, that the spirit of humanism essentially +consists. Satisfactoriness has to be measured by a multitude of +standards, of which some, for aught we know, may fail in any given +case; and what is more satisfactory than any alternative in sight, +may to the end be a sum of PLUSES and MINUSES, concerning which we +can only trust that by ulterior corrections and improvements a +maximum of the one and a minimum of the other may some day be +approached. It means a real change of heart, a break with +absolutistic hopes, when one takes up this inductive view of the +conditions of belief. + +As I understand the pragmatist way of seeing things, it owes its +being to the break-down which the last fifty years have brought +about in the older notions of scientific truth. 'God geometrizes,' +it used to be said; and it was believed that Euclid's elements +literally reproduced his geometrizing. There is an eternal and +unchangeable 'reason'; and its voice was supposed to reverberate in +Barbara and Celarent. So also of the 'laws of nature,' physical and +chemical, so of natural history classifications--all were supposed +to be exact and exclusive duplicates of pre-human archetypes buried +in the structure of things, to which the spark of divinity hidden in +our intellect enables us to penetrate. The anatomy of the world +is logical, and its logic is that of a university professor, it was +thought. Up to about 1850 almost every one believed that sciences +expressed truths that were exact copies of a definite code of non- +human realities. But the enormously rapid multiplication of +theories in these latter days has well-nigh upset the notion of any +one of them being a more literally objective kind of thing than +another. There are so many geometries, so many logics, so many +physical and chemical hypotheses, so many classifications, each one +of them good for so much and yet not good for everything, that the +notion that even the truest formula may be a human device and not a +literal transcript has dawned upon us. We hear scientific laws now +treated as so much 'conceptual shorthand,' true so far as they are +useful but no farther. Our mind has become tolerant of symbol +instead of reproduction, of approximation instead of exactness, of +plasticity instead of rigor. 'Energetics,' measuring the bare +face of sensible phenomena so as to describe in a single formula all +their changes of 'level,' is the last word of this scientific +humanism, which indeed leaves queries enough outstanding as to the +reason for so curious a congruence between the world and the mind, +but which at any rate makes our whole notion of scientific truth +more flexible and genial than it used to be. + +It is to be doubted whether any theorizer to-day, either in +mathematics, logic, physics or biology, conceives himself to be +literally re-editing processes of nature or thoughts of God. The +main forms of our thinking, the separation of subjects from +predicates, the negative, hypothetic and disjunctive judgments, are +purely human habits. The ether, as Lord Salisbury said, is only a +noun for the verb to undulate; and many of our theological ideas are +admitted, even by those who call them 'true,' to be humanistic in +like degree. + +I fancy that these changes in the current notions of truth are what +originally gave the impulse to Messrs. Dewey's and Schiller's views. +The suspicion is in the air nowadays that the superiority of one of +our formulas to another may not consist so much in its +literal 'objectivity,' as in subjective qualities like +its usefulness, its 'elegance' or its congruity with our residual +beliefs. Yielding to these suspicions, and generalizing, we fall +into something like the humanistic state of mind. Truth we conceive +to mean everywhere, not duplication, but addition; not the +constructing of inner copies of already complete realities, but +rather the collaborating with realities so as to bring about a +clearer result. Obviously this state of mind is at first full of +vagueness and ambiguity. 'Collaborating' is a vague term; it must at +any rate cover conceptions and logical arrangements. 'Clearer' is +vaguer still. Truth must bring clear thoughts, as well as clear +the way to action. 'Reality' is the vaguest term of all. The only +way to test such a programme at all is to apply it to the various +types of truth, in the hope of reaching an account that shall be +more precise. Any hypothesis that forces such a review upon one has +one great merit, even if in the end it prove invalid: it gets +us better acquainted with the total subject. To give the theory +plenty of 'rope' and see if it hangs itself eventually is better +tactics than to choke it off at the outset by abstract +accusations of self-contradiction. I think therefore that a decided +effort at sympathetic mental play with humanism is the provisional +attitude to be recommended to the reader. + +When I find myself playing sympathetically with humanism, something +like what follows is what I end by conceiving it to mean. + +Experience is a process that continually gives us new material to +digest. We handle this intellectually by the mass of beliefs +of which we find ourselves already possessed, assimilating, +rejecting, or rearranging in different degrees. Some of the +apperceiving ideas are recent acquisitions of our own, but most of +them are common-sense traditions of the race. There is probably not +a common-sense tradition, of all those which we now live by, that +was not in the first instance a genuine discovery, an inductive +generalization like those more recent ones of the atom, of inertia, +of energy, of reflex action, or of fitness to survive The notions of +one Time and of one Space as single continuous receptacles; the +distinction between thoughts and things, matter and mind between +permanent subjects and changing attributes; the conception of +classes with sub classes within them; the separation of +fortuitous from regularly caused connections; surely all these were +once definite conquests made at historic dates by our ancestors in +their attempt to get the chaos of their crude individual experiences +into a more shareable and manageable shape. They proved of such +sovereign use as denkmittel that they are now a part of the very +structure of our mind. We cannot play fast and loose with them. No +experience can upset them. On the contrary, they apperceive every +experience and assign it to its place. + +To what effect? That we may the better foresee the course of our +experiences, communicate with one another, and steer our lives by +rule. Also that we may have a cleaner, clearer, more inclusive +mental view. + +The greatest common-sense achievement, after the discovery of one +Time and one Space, is probably the concept of permanently +existing things. When a rattle first drops out of the hand of a +baby, he does not look to see where it has gone. Non-perception he +accepts as annihilation until he finds a better belief. That our +perceptions mean BEINGS, rattles that are there whether we hold them +in our hands or not, becomes an interpretation so luminous of what +happens to us that, once employed, it never gets forgotten. It +applies with equal felicity to things and persons, to the +objective and to the ejective realm. However a Berkeley, a Mill, or +a Cornelius may CRITICISE it, it WORKS; and in practical life we +never think of 'going back' upon it, or reading our +incoming experiences in any other terms. We may, +indeed, speculatively imagine a state of 'pure' experience before +the hypothesis of permanent objects behind its flux had been framed; +and we can play with the idea that some primeval genius might have +struck into a different hypothesis. But we cannot positively +imagine today what the different hypothesis could have been, for the +category of trans-perceptual reality is now one of the foundations +of our life. Our thoughts must still employ it if they are to +possess reasonableness and truth. + +This notion of a FIRST in the shape of a most chaotic pure +experience which sets us questions, of a SECOND in the way of +fundamental categories, long ago wrought into the structure of our +consciousness and practically irreversible, which define the general +frame within which answers must fall, and of a THIRD which gives the +detail of the answers in the shapes most congruous with all our +present needs, is, as I take it, the essence of the +humanistic conception. It represents experience in its +pristine purity to be now so enveloped in predicates historically +worked out that we can think of it as little more than an OTHER, of +a THAT, which the mind, in Mr. Bradley's phrase, 'encounters,' and +to whose stimulating presence we respond by ways of thinking which +we call 'true' in proportion as they facilitate our mental or +physical activities and bring us outer power and inner peace. But +whether the Other, the universal THAT, has itself any definite inner +structure, or whether, if it have any, the structure resembles any +of our predicated WHATS, this is a question which humanism leaves +untouched. For us, at any rate, it insists, reality is an +accumulation of our own intellectual inventions, and the struggle +for 'truth' in our progressive dealings with it is always a struggle +to work in new nouns and adjectives while altering as little as +possible the old. + + It is hard to see why either Mr. Bradley's own logic or his +metaphysics should oblige him to quarrel with this conception. He +might consistently adopt it verbatim et literatim, if he would, and +simply throw his peculiar absolute round it, following in this the +good example of Professor Royce. Bergson in France, and his +disciples, Wilbois the physicist and Leroy, are thoroughgoing +humanists in the sense defined. Professor Milhaud also appears to be +one; and the great Poincare misses it by only the breadth of a hair. +In Germany the name of Simmel offers itself as that of a humanist of +the most radical sort. Mach and his school, and Hertz and Ostwald +must be classed as humanists. The view is in the atmosphere and must +be patiently discussed. + + The best way to discuss it would be to see what the alternative +might be. What is it indeed? Its critics make no explicit +statement, Professor Royce being the only one so far who has +formulated anything definite. The first service of humanism to +philosophy accordingly seems to be that it will probably oblige +those who dislike it to search their own hearts and heads. It will +force analysis to the front and make it the order of the day. At +present the lazy tradition that truth is adaequatio intellectus et +rei seems all there is to contradict it with. Mr. Bradley's only +suggestion is that true thought 'must correspond to a +determinate being which it cannot be said to make,' and obviously +that sheds no new light. What is the meaning of the word to +'correspond'? Where is the 'being'? What sort of things are +'determinations,' and what is meant in this particular case by 'not +to make'? + +Humanism proceeds immediately to refine upon the looseness of these +epithets. We correspond in SOME way with anything with which we +enter into any relations at all. If it be a thing, we may produce an +exact copy of it, or we may simply feel it as an existent in a +certain place. If it be a demand, we may obey it without knowing +anything more about it than its push. If it be a proposition, we may +agree by not contradicting it, by letting it pass. If it be a +relation between things, we may act on the first thing so as to +bring ourselves out where the second will be. If it be +something inaccessible, we may substitute a hypothetical object for +it, which, having the same consequences, will cipher out for us real +results. In a general way we may simply ADD OUR THOUGHT TO IT; and +if it SUFFERS THE ADDITION, and the whole situation harmoniously +prolongs and enriches itself, the thought will pass for true. + +As for the whereabouts of the beings thus corresponded to, although +they may be outside of the present thought as well as in it, +humanism sees no ground for saying they are outside of finite +experience itself. Pragmatically, their reality means that we submit +to them, take account of them, whether we like to or not, but this +we must perpetually do with experiences other than our own. The +whole system of what the present experience must correspond to +'adequately' may be continuous with the present experience itself. +Reality, so taken as experience other than the present, might be +either the legacy of past experience or the content of experience to +come. Its determinations for US are in any case the adjectives which +our acts of judging fit to it, and those are essentially humanistic +things. + +To say that our thought does not 'make' this reality means +pragmatically that if our own particular thought were annihilated +the reality would still be there in some shape, though possibly it +might be a shape that would lack something that our thought +supplies. That reality is 'independent' means that there is +something in every experience that escapes our arbitrary control. If +it be a sensible experience it coerces our attention; if a sequence, +we cannot invert it; if we compare two terms we can come to only one +result. There is a push, an urgency, within our very experience, +against which we are on the whole powerless, and which drives us in +a direction that is the destiny of our belief. That this drift of +experience itself is in the last resort due to something independent +of all possible experience may or may not be true. There may or may +not be an extra-experiential 'ding an sich' that keeps the ball +rolling, or an 'absolute' that lies eternally behind all the +successive determinations which human thought has made. But +within our experience ITSELF, at any rate, humanism says, some +determinations show themselves as being independent of others; some +questions, if we ever ask them, can only be answered in one way; +some beings, if we ever suppose them, must be supposed to have +existed previously to the supposing; some relations, if they exist +ever, must exist as long as their terms exist. + +Truth thus means, according to humanism, the relation of less fixed +parts of experience (predicates) to other relatively more fixed +parts (subjects); and we are not required to seek it in a relation +of experience as such to anything beyond itself. We can stay at +home, for our behavior as exponents is hemmed in on every side. The +forces both of advance and of resistance are exerted by our own +objects, and the notion of truth as something opposed to waywardness +or license inevitably grows up SOLIPSISTICALLY inside of every human +life. + + So obvious is all this that a common charge against the humanistic +authors 'makes me tired.' 'How can a deweyite discriminate sincerity +from bluff?' was a question asked at a philosophic meeting where I +reported on Dewey's Studies. 'How can the mere [Footnote: I know of +no 'mere' pragmatist, if MERENESS here means, as it seems to, the +denial of all concreteness to the pragmatist's THOUGHT.] pragmatist +feel any duty to think truly?' is the objection urged by Professor +Royce. Mr. Bradley in turn says that if a humanist understands his +own doctrine, 'he must hold any idea, however mad, to be the truth, +if any one will have it so.' And Professor Taylor +describes pragmatism as believing anything one pleases and calling +it truth. + +Such a shallow sense of the conditions under which men's thinking +actually goes on seems to me most surprising. These critics appear +to suppose that, if left to itself, the rudderless raft of our +experience must be ready to drift anywhere or nowhere. Even +THO there were compasses on board, they seem to say, there would be +no pole for them to point to. There must be absolute sailing- +directions, they insist, decreed from outside, and an +independent chart of the voyage added to the 'mere' voyage itself, +if we are ever to make a port. But is it not obvious that even +THO there be such absolute sailing-directions in the shape of pre- +human standards of truth that we OUGHT to follow, the only +guarantee that we shall in fact follow them must lie in our human +equipment. The 'ought' would be a brutum fulmen unless there were a +felt grain inside of our experience that conspired. As a matter of +fact the DEVOUTEST believers in absolute standards must admit that +men fail to obey them. Waywardness is here, in spite of the eternal +prohibitions, and the existence of any amount of reality ante rem is +no warrant against unlimited error in rebus being incurred. The only +REAL guarantee we have against licentious thinking is the +CIRCUMPRESSURE of experience itself, which gets us sick of +concrete errors, whether there be a trans-empirical reality or not. +How does the partisan of absolute reality know what this orders him +to think? He cannot get direct sight of the absolute; and he has no +means of guessing what it wants of him except by following the +humanistic clues. The only truth that he himself will ever +practically ACCEPT will be that to which his finite experiences lead +him of themselves. The state of mind which shudders at the idea of a +lot of experiences left to themselves, and that augurs protection +from the sheer name of an absolute, as if, however inoperative, +that might still stand for a sort of ghostly security, is like the +mood of those good people who, whenever they hear of a social +tendency that is damnable, begin to redden and to puff, and say +'Parliament or Congress ought to make a law against it,' as if an +impotent decree would give relief. + +All the SANCTIONS of a law of truth lie in the very texture of +experience. Absolute or no absolute, the concrete truth FOR US will +always be that way of thinking in which our various experiences most +profitably combine. + +And yet, the opponent obstinately urges, your humanist will always +have a greater liberty to play fast and loose with truth than +will your believer in an independent realm of reality that makes the +standard rigid. If by this latter believer he means a man who +pretends to know the standard and who fulminates it, the humanist +will doubtless prove more flexible; but no more flexible than the +absolutist himself if the latter follows (as fortunately +our present-day absolutists do follow) empirical methods of inquiry +in concrete affairs. To consider hypotheses is surely always better +than to DOGMATISE ins blaue hinein. + +Nevertheless this probable flexibility of temper in him has been +used to convict the humanist of sin. Believing as he does, that +truth lies in rebus, and is at every moment our own line of most +propitious reaction, he stands forever debarred, as I have heard a +learned colleague say, from trying to convert opponents, for does +not their view, being THEIR most propitious momentary reaction, +already fill the bill? Only the believer in the ante-rem brand of +truth can on this theory seek to make converts without self- +stultification. But can there be self-stultification in urging any +account whatever of truth? Can the definition ever contradict the +deed? 'Truth is what I feel like saying'--suppose that to be the +definition. 'Well, I feel like saying that, and I want you to feel +like saying it, and shall continue to say it until I get you to +agree.' Where is there any contradiction? Whatever truth may be +said to be, that is the kind of truth which the saying can be held +to carry. The TEMPER which a saying may comport is an extra-logical +matter. It may indeed be hotter in some individual absolutist than +in a humanist, but it need not be so in another. And the humanist, +for his part, is perfectly consistent in compassing sea and land to +make one proselyte, if his nature be enthusiastic enough. + +'But how can you be enthusiastic over any view of things which you +know to have been partly made by yourself, and which is liable to +alter during the next minute? How is any heroic devotion to the +ideal of truth possible under such paltry conditions?' + +This is just another of those objections by which the anti-humanists +show their own comparatively slack hold on the realities of +the situation. If they would only follow the pragmatic method and +ask: 'What is truth KNOWN-AS? What does its existence stand for in +the way of concrete goods?'--they would see that the name of it is +the inbegriff of almost everything that is valuable in our lives. +The true is the opposite of whatever is instable, of whatever is +practically disappointing, of whatever is useless, of whatever is +lying and unreliable, of whatever is unverifiable and +unsupported, of whatever is inconsistent and contradictory, of +whatever is artificial and eccentric, of whatever is unreal in the +sense of being of no practical account. Here are pragmatic reasons +with a vengeance why we should turn to truth--truth saves us from a +world of that complexion. What wonder that its very name awakens +loyal feeling! In particular what wonder that all little provisional +fool's paradises of belief should appear contemptible in comparison +with its bare pursuit! When absolutists reject humanism because they +feel it to be untrue, that means that the whole habit of their +mental needs is wedded already to a different view of reality, in +comparison with which the humanistic world seems but the whim of a +few irresponsible youths. Their own subjective apperceiving mass is +what speaks here in the name of the eternal natures and bids them +reject our humanism--as they apprehend it. Just so with us +humanists, when we condemn all noble, clean-cut, fixed, +eternal, rational, temple-like systems of philosophy. These +contradict the DRAMATIC TEMPERAMENT of nature, as our dealings with +nature and our habits of thinking have so far brought us to conceive +it. They seem oddly personal and artificial, even when not +bureaucratic and professional in an absurd degree. We turn from them +to the great unpent and unstayed wilderness of truth as we feel it +to be constituted, with as good a conscience as rationalists +are moved by when they turn from our wilderness into their neater +and cleaner intellectual abodes. [Footnote: I cannot forbear quoting +as an illustration of the contrast between humanist and rationalist +tempers of mind, in a sphere remote from philosophy, these remarks +on the Dreyfus 'affaire,' written by one who assuredly had +never heard of humanism or pragmatism. 'Autant que la Revolution, +"l'Affaire" est desormais une de nos "origines." Si elle n'a pas +fait ouvrir le gouffre, c'est elle du moins qui a rendu patent et +visible le long travail souterrain qui, silencieusement, +avait prepare la separation entre nos deux camps d'aujourd'hui, pour +ecarter enfin, d'un coup soudain, la France des traditionalistes +(poseurs de principes, chercheurs d'unite, constructeurs de systemes +a priori) el la France eprise du fait positif et de libre examen;-- +la France revolutionnaire et romantique si l'on veut, celle qui met +tres haut l'individu, qui ne veut pas qu'un juste perisse, fut-ce +pour sauver la nation, et qui cherche la verite dans toutes ses +parties aussi bien que dans une vue d'ensemble ... Duclaux ne +pouvait pas concevoir qu'on preferat quelque chose a la verite. +Mais il voyait autour de lui de fort honnetes gens qui, mettant +en balance la vie d'un homme et la raison d'Etat, lui avouaient de +quel poids leger ils jugeaient une simple existence +individuelle, pour innocente qu'elle fut. C'etaient des +classiques, des gens a qui l'ensemble seul importe.' La Vie de +Emile Duclaux, par Mme. Em. D., Laval, 1906, pp. 243, 247-248.] + +This is surely enough to show that the humanist does not ignore the +character of objectivity and independence in truth. Let me turn next +to what his opponents mean when they say that to be true, our +thoughts must 'correspond.' + +The vulgar notion of correspondence here is that the thoughts must +COPY the reality--cognitio fit per assimiliationem cogniti +et cognoscentis; and philosophy, without having ever fairly sat down +to the question, seems to have instinctively accepted this idea: +propositions are held true if they copy the eternal thought; terms +are held true if they copy extra-mental realities. Implicitly, I +think that the copy-theory has animated most of the criticisms +that have been made on humanism. + +A priori, however, it is not self-evident that the sole business of +our mind with realities should be to copy them. Let my reader +suppose himself to constitute for a time all the reality there is in +the universe, and then to receive the announcement that another +being is to be created who shall know him truly. How will he +represent the knowing in advance? What will he hope it to be? I +doubt extremely whether it could ever occur to him to fancy it as a +mere copying. Of what use to him would an imperfect second edition +of himself in the new comer's interior be? It would seem pure waste +of a propitious opportunity. The demand would more probably be for +something absolutely new. The reader would conceive the knowing +humanistically, 'the new comer,' he would say, 'must TAKE ACCOUNT OF +MY PRESENCE BY REACTING ON IT IN SUCH A WAY THAT GOOD WOULD ACCRUE +TO US BOTH. If copying be requisite to that end, let there be +copying; otherwise not.' The essence in any case would not be +the copying, but the enrichment of the previous world. + +I read the other day, in a book of Professor Eucken's, a phrase, +'Die erhohung des vorgefundenen daseins,' which seems to +be pertinent here. Why may not thought's mission be to increase and +elevate, rather than simply to imitate and reduplicate, existence? +No one who has read Lotze can fail to remember his striking comment +on the ordinary view of the secondary qualities of matter, which +brands them as 'illusory' because they copy nothing in the thing. +The notion of a world complete in itself, to which thought comes as +a passive mirror, adding nothing to fact, Lotze says is irrational. +Rather is thought itself a most momentous part of fact, and the +whole mission of the pre-existing and insufficient world of matter +may simply be to provoke thought to produce its far more precious +supplement. + +'Knowing,' in short, may, for aught we can see beforehand to the +contrary, be ONLY ONE WAY OF GETTING INTO FRUITFUL RELATIONS WITH +REALITY whether copying be one of the relations or not. + +It is easy to see from what special type of knowing the copy-theory +arose. In our dealings with natural phenomena the great point is to +be able to foretell. Foretelling, according to such a writer as +Spencer, is the whole meaning of intelligence. When Spencer's 'law +of intelligence' says that inner and outer relations must +'correspond,' it means that the distribution of terms in our inner +time-scheme and space-scheme must be an exact copy of +the distribution in real time and space of the real terms. In strict +theory the mental terms themselves need not answer to the real terms +in the sense of severally copying them, symbolic mental terms being +enough, if only the real dates and places be copied. But in our +ordinary life the mental terms are images and the real ones are +sensations, and the images so often copy the sensations, that we +easily take copying of terms as well as of relations to be the +natural significance of knowing. Meanwhile much, even of this common +descriptive truth, is couched in verbal symbols. If our symbols +FIT the world, in the sense of determining our expectations rightly, +they may even be the better for not copying its terms. + +It seems obvious that the pragmatic account of all this routine of +phenomenal knowledge is accurate. Truth here is a relation, not +of our ideas to non-human realities, but of conceptual parts of our +experience to sensational parts. Those thoughts are true which +guide us to BENEFICIAL INTERACTION with sensible particulars as they +occur, whether they copy these in advance or not. + +From the frequency of copying in the knowledge of phenomenal fact, +copying has been supposed to be the essence of truth in +matters rational also. Geometry and logic, it has been supposed, +must copy archetypal thoughts in the Creator. But in these abstract +spheres there is no need of assuming archetypes. The mind is free to +carve so many figures out of space, to make so many numerical +collections, to frame so many classes and series, and it can analyze +and compare so endlessly, that the very superabundance of the +resulting ideas makes us doubt the 'objective' pre-existence of +their models. It would be plainly wrong to suppose a God whose +thought consecrated rectangular but not polar co-ordinates, or +Jevons's notation but not Boole's. Yet if, on the other hand, we +assume God to have thought in advance of every POSSIBLE flight of +human fancy in these directions, his mind becomes too much like +a Hindoo idol with three heads, eight arms and six breasts, too much +made up of superfoetation and redundancy for us to wish to copy it, +and the whole notion of copying tends to evaporate from these +sciences. Their objects can be better interpreted as being created +step by step by men, as fast as they successively conceive them. + +If now it be asked how, if triangles, squares, square roots, genera, +and the like, are but improvised human 'artefacts,' their +properties and relations can be so promptly known to be 'eternal,' +the humanistic answer is easy. If triangles and genera are of our +own production we can keep them invariant. We can make them +'timeless' by expressly decreeing that on THE THINGS WE MEAN time +shall exert no altering effect, that they are intentionally and it +may be fictitiously abstracted from every corrupting real associate +and condition. But relations between invariant objects will +themselves be invariant. Such relations cannot be happenings, for by +hypothesis nothing shall happen to the objects. I have tried to +show in the last chapter of my Principles of Psychology [Footnote: +Vol. ii, pp. 641 ff.] that they can only be relations of comparison. +No one so far seems to have noticed my suggestion, and I am too +ignorant of the development of mathematics to feel very confident of +my own view. But if it were correct it would solve the difficulty +perfectly. Relations of comparison are matters of direct inspection. +As soon as mental objects are mentally compared, they are perceived +to be either like or unlike. But once the same, always the same, +once different, always different, under these timeless conditions. +Which is as much as to say that truths concerning these man-made +objects are necessary and eternal. We can change our conclusions +only by changing our data first. + +The whole fabric of the a priori sciences can thus be treated as a +man-made product. As Locke long ago pointed out, these sciences have +no immediate connection with fact. Only IF a fact can be humanized +by being identified with any of these ideal objects, is what +was true of the objects now true also of the facts. The truth itself +meanwhile was originally a copy of nothing; it was only a relation +directly perceived to obtain between two artificial mental +things. [Footnote: Mental things which are realities of course +within the mental world.] + +We may now glance at some special types of knowing, so as to see +better whether the humanistic account fits. On the mathematical and +logical types we need not enlarge further, nor need we return at +much length to the case of our descriptive knowledge of the course +of nature. So far as this involves anticipation, tho that MAY mean +copying, it need, as we saw, mean little more than 'getting ready' +in advance. But with many distant and future objects, our practical +relations are to the last degree potential and remote. In no sense +can we now get ready for the arrest of the earth's revolution by the +tidal brake, for instance; and with the past, tho we suppose +ourselves to know it truly, we have no practical relations at all. +It is obvious that, altho interests strictly practical have been the +original starting-point of our search for true +phenomenal descriptions, yet an intrinsic interest in the bare +describing function has grown up. We wish accounts that shall be +true, whether they bring collateral profit or not. The +primitive function has developed its demand for mere exercise. This +theoretic curiosity seems to be the characteristically human +differentia, and humanism recognizes its enormous scope. A true idea +now means not only one that prepares us for an actual perception. It +means also one that might prepare us for a merely possible +perception, or one that, if spoken, would suggest possible +perceptions to others, or suggest actual perceptions which the +speaker cannot share. The ensemble of perceptions thus thought of as +either actual or possible form a system which it is obviously +advantageous to us to get into a stable and consistent shape; and +here it is that the common-sense notion of permanent beings finds +triumphant use. Beings acting outside of the thinker explain, not +only his actual perceptions, past and future, but his possible +perceptions and those of every one else. Accordingly they gratify +our theoretic need in a supremely beautiful way. We pass from our +immediate actual through them into the foreign and the potential, +and back again into the future actual, accounting for innumerable +particulars by a single cause. As in those circular panoramas, where +a real foreground of dirt, grass, bushes, rocks and a broken-down +cannon is enveloped by a canvas picture of sky and earth and of a +raging battle, continuing the foreground so cunningly that the +spectator can detect no joint; so these conceptual objects, added to +our present perceptual reality, fuse with it into the whole +universe of our belief. In spite of all berkeleyan criticism, we do +not doubt that they are really there. Tho our discovery of any one +of them may only date from now, we unhesitatingly say that it not +only IS, but WAS there, if, by so saying, the past appears connected +more consistently with what we feel the present to be. This is +historic truth. Moses wrote the Pentateuch, we think, because if he +didn't, all our religious habits will have to be undone. Julius +Caesar was real, or we can never listen to history again. Trilobites +were once alive, or all our thought about the strata is at +sea. Radium, discovered only yesterday, must always have existed, or +its analogy with other natural elements, which are permanent, fails. +In all this, it is but one portion of our beliefs reacting on +another so as to yield the most satisfactory total state of mind. +That state of mind, we say, sees truth, and the content of its +deliverances we believe. + +Of course, if you take the satisfactoriness concretely, as something +felt by you now, and if, by truth, you mean truth taken +abstractly and verified in the long run, you cannot make them +equate, for it is notorious that the temporarily satisfactory is +often false. Yet at each and every concrete moment, truth for +each man is what that man 'troweth' at that moment with the maximum +of satisfaction to himself; and similarly, abstract truth, truth +verified by the long run, and abstract satisfactoriness, long-run +satisfactoriness, coincide. If, in short, we compare concrete with +concrete and abstract with abstract, the true and the +satisfactory do mean the same thing. I suspect that a certain +muddling of matters hereabouts is what makes the general philosophic +public so impervious to humanism's claims. + +The fundamental fact about our experience is that it is a process of +change. For the 'trower' at any moment, truth, like the visible area +round a man walking in a fog, or like what George Eliot calls 'the +wall of dark seen by small fishes' eyes that pierce a span in the +wide Ocean,' is an objective field which the next moment enlarges +and of which it is the critic, and which then either suffers +alteration or is continued unchanged. The critic sees both the first +trower's truth and his own truth, compares them with each other, and +verifies or confutes. HIS field of view is the reality independent +of that earlier trower's thinking with which that thinking ought to +correspond. But the critic is himself only a trower; and if the +whole process of experience should terminate at that instant, there +would be no otherwise known independent reality with which HIS +thought might be compared. + +The immediate in experience is always provisionally in this +situation. The humanism, for instance, which I see and try so +hard to defend, is the completest truth attained from my point of +view up to date. But, owing to the fact that all experience is a +process, no point of view can ever be THE last one. Every one is +insufficient and off its balance, and responsible to later points of +view than itself. You, occupying some of these later points in your +own person, and believing in the reality of others, will not agree +that my point of view sees truth positive, truth timeless, truth +that counts, unless they verify and confirm what it sees. + +You generalize this by saying that any opinion, however +satisfactory, can count positively and absolutely as true only so +far as it agrees with a standard beyond itself; and if you then +forget that this standard perpetually grows up endogenously inside +the web of the experiences, you may carelessly go on to say that +what distributively holds of each experience, holds also +collectively of all experience, and that experience as such and in +its totality owes whatever truth it may be possessed-of to its +correspondence with absolute realities outside of its own being. +This evidently is the popular and traditional position. From +the fact that finite experiences must draw support from one another, +philosophers pass to the notion that experience uberhaupt must +need an absolute support. The denial of such a notion by humanism +lies probably at the root of most of the dislike which it incurs. + +But is this not the globe, the elephant and the tortoise over again? +Must not something end by supporting itself? Humanism is willing to +let finite experience be self-supporting. Somewhere being must +immediately breast nonentity. Why may not the advancing front of +experience, carrying its immanent satisfactions and +dissatisfactions, cut against the black inane as the luminous orb of +the moon cuts the caerulean abyss? Why should anywhere the world be +absolutely fixed and finished? And if reality genuinely grows, +why may it not grow in these very determinations which here and now +are made? + +In point of fact it actually seems to grow by our mental +determinations, be these never so 'true.' Take the 'great bear' or +'dipper' constellation in the heavens. We call it by that name, we +count the stars and call them seven, we say they were seven before +they were counted, and we say that whether any one had ever noted +the fact or not, the dim resemblance to a long-tailed (or long- +necked?) animal was always truly there. But what do we mean by this +projection into past eternity of recent human ways of thinking? Did +an 'absolute' thinker actually do the counting, tell off the stars +upon his standing number-tally, and make the bear-comparison, silly +as the latter is? Were they explicitly seven, explicitly bear-like, +before the human witness came? Surely nothing in the truth of +the attributions drives us to think this. They were only implicitly +or virtually what we call them, and we human witnesses first +explicated them and made them 'real.' A fact virtually pre-exists +when every condition of its realization save one is already there. +In this case the condition lacking is the act of the counting and +comparing mind. But the stars (once the mind considers them) +themselves dictate the result. The counting in no wise modifies +their previous nature, and, they being what and where they are, the +count cannot fall out differently. It could then ALWAYS be +made. NEVER could the number seven be questioned, IF THE QUESTION +ONCE WERE RAISED. + +We have here a quasi-paradox. Undeniably something comes by the +counting that was not there before. And yet that something was +ALWAYS TRUE. In one sense you create it, and in another sense you +FIND it. You have to treat your count as being true beforehand, the +moment you come to treat the matter at all. + +Our stellar attributes must always be called true, then; yet none +the less are they genuine additions made by our intellect to the +world of fact. Not additions of consciousness only, but additions of +'content.' They copy nothing that pre-existed, yet they agree with +what pre-existed, fit it, amplify it, relate and connect it with a +'wain,' a number-tally, or what not, and build it out. It seems to +me that humanism is the only theory that builds this case out in the +good direction, and this case stands for innumerable other kinds of +case. In all such eases, odd as it may sound, our judgment may +actually be said to retroact and to enrich the past. + +Our judgments at any rate change the character of FUTURE reality by +the acts to which they lead. Where these acts are acts expressive +of trust,--trust, e.g., that a man is honest, that our health is +good enough, or that we can make a successful effort,--which +acts may be a needed antecedent of the trusted things becoming true. +Professor Taylor says [Footnote: In an article criticising +Pragmatism (as he conceives it) in the McGill University +Quarterly published at Montreal, for May, 1904.] that our trust is +at any rate UNTRUE WHEN IT IS MADE, i. e; before the action; and I +seem to remember that he disposes of anything like a faith in the +general excellence of the universe (making the faithful person's +part in it at any rate more excellent) as a 'lie in the soul.' +But the pathos of this expression should not blind us to the +complication of the facts. I doubt whether Professor Taylor would +himself be in favor of practically handling trusters of these kinds +as liars. Future and present really mix in such emergencies, and one +can always escape lies in them by using hypothetic forms. But Mr. +Taylor's attitude suggests such absurd possibilities of practice +that it seems to me to illustrate beautifully how self- +stultifying the conception of a truth that shall merely register a +standing fixture may become. Theoretic truth, truth of passive +copying, sought in the sole interests of copying as such, not +because copying is GOOD FOR SOMETHING, but because copying ought +schlechthin to be, seems, if you look at it coldly, to be an +almost preposterous ideal. Why should the universe, existing in +itself, also exist in copies? How CAN it be copied in the solidity +of its objective fulness? And even if it could, what would +the motive be? 'Even the hairs of your head are numbered.' Doubtless +they are, virtually; but why, as an absolute proposition, OUGHT the +number to become copied and known? Surely knowing is only one way of +interacting with reality and adding to its effect. + +The opponent here will ask: 'Has not the knowing of truth any +substantive value on its own account, apart from the collateral +advantages it may bring? And if you allow theoretic satisfactions to +exist at all, do they not crowd the collateral satisfactions out of +house and home, and must not pragmatism go into bankruptcy, if she +admits them at all?' The destructive force of such talk disappears +as soon as we use words concretely instead of abstractly, and ask, +in our quality of good pragmatists, just what the famous +theoretic needs are known as and in what the +intellectual satisfactions consist. + +Are they not all mere matters of CONSISTENCY--and emphatically NOT +of consistency between an absolute reality and the mind's copies of +it, but of actually felt consistency among judgments, objects, and +habits of reacting, in the mind's own experienceable world? And +are not both our need of such consistency and our pleasure in it +conceivable as outcomes of the natural fact that we are beings that +do develop mental HABITS--habit itself proving adaptively beneficial +in an environment where the same objects, or the same kinds of +objects, recur and follow 'law'? If this were so, what would have +come first would have been the collateral profits of habit as such, +and the theoretic life would have grown up in aid of these. In point +of fact, this seems to have been the probable case. At life's +origin, any present perception may have been 'true'--if such a +word could then be applicable. Later, when reactions became +organized, the reactions became 'true' whenever expectation was +fulfilled by them. Otherwise they were 'false' or 'mistaken' +reactions. But the same class of objects needs the same kind of +reaction, so the impulse to react consistently must gradually have +been established, and a disappointment felt whenever the results +frustrated expectation. Here is a perfectly plausible germ for all +our higher consistencies. Nowadays, if an object claims from us a +reaction of the kind habitually accorded only to the opposite class +of objects, our mental machinery refuses to run smoothly. The +situation is intellectually unsatisfactory. + +Theoretic truth thus falls WITHIN the mind, being the accord of some +of its processes and objects with other processes and objects-- + 'accord' consisting here in well-definable relations. So long as +the satisfaction of feeling such an accord is denied us, whatever +collateral profits may seem to inure from what we believe in are but +as dust in the balance--provided always that we are highly +organized intellectually, which the majority of us are not. The +amount of accord which satisfies most men and women is merely the +absence of violent clash between their usual thoughts and +statements and the limited sphere of sense-perceptions in which +their lives are cast. The theoretic truth that most of us think we +'ought' to attain to is thus the possession of a set of predicates +that do not explicitly contradict their subjects. We preserve it as +often as not by leaving other predicates and subjects out. + +In some men theory is a passion, just as music is in others. The +form of inner consistency is pursued far beyond the line at +which collateral profits stop. Such men systematize and classify and +schematize and make synoptical tables and invent ideal objects for +the pure love of unifying. Too often the results, glowing with +'truth' for the inventors, seem pathetically personal and artificial +to bystanders. Which is as much as to say that the purely theoretic +criterion of truth can leave us in the lurch as easily as any other +criterion, and that the absolutists, for all their pretensions, +are 'in the same boat' concretely with those whom they attack. + +I am well aware that this paper has been rambling in the extreme. +But the whole subject is inductive, and sharp logic is hardly yet in +order. My great trammel has been the non-existence of any +definitely stated alternative on my opponents' part. It may conduce +to clearness if I recapitulate, in closing, what I conceive the main +points of humanism to be. They are these:-- + +1. An experience, perceptual or conceptual, must conform to reality +in order to be true. + +2. By 'reality' humanism means nothing more than the other +conceptual or perceptual experiences with which a given present +experience may find itself in point of fact mixed up. +[Footnote: This is meant merely to exclude reality of an +'unknowable' sort, of which no account in either perceptual +or conceptual terms can be given. It includes of course any +amount if empirical reality independent of the knower. +Pragmatism, is thus 'epistemologically' realistic in its account.] + +3. By 'conforming,' humanism means taking account-of in such a way +as to gain any intellectually and practically satisfactory result. + +4. To 'take account-of' and to be 'satisfactory' are terms that +admit of no definition, so many are the ways in which these +requirements can practically be worked out. + +5. Vaguely and in general, we take account of a reality by +preserving it in as unmodified a form as possible. But, to be then +satisfactory, it must not contradict other realities outside of it +which claim also to be preserved. That we must preserve all the +experience we can and minimize contradiction in what we preserve, is +about all that can be said in advance. + +6. The truth which the conforming experience embodies may be a +positive addition to the previous reality, and later judgments +may have to conform to it. Yet, virtually at least, it may have been +true previously. Pragmatically, virtual and actual truth mean the +same thing: the possibility of only one answer, when once the +question is raised. + + + +IV + +THE RELATION BETWEEN KNOWER AND KNOWN + +[Footnote: Extract from an article entitled 'A World of Pure +Experience,' in the Journal of Philosophy, etc., September 29,1904.] + + Throughout the history of philosophy the subject and its object +have been treated as absolutely discontinuous entities; and +thereupon the presence of the latter to the former, or +the 'apprehension' by the former of the latter, has assumed a +paradoxical character which all sorts of theories had to be invented +to overcome. Representative theories put a mental 'representation,' +'image,' or 'content' into the gap, as a sort of intermediary. +Commonsense theories left the gap untouched, declaring our mind able +to clear it by a self-transcending leap. Transcendentalist theories +left it impossible to traverse by finite knowers, and brought an +absolute in to perform the saltatory act. All the while, in the very +bosom of the finite experience, every conjunction required to make +the relation intelligible is given in full. Either the knower and +the known are: + +(1) the self-same piece of experience taken twice over in different +contexts; or they are + +(2) two pieces of ACTUAL experience belonging to the same subject, +with definite tracts of conjunctive transitional experience +between them; or + +(3) the known is a POSSIBLE experience either of that subject or +another, to which the said conjunctive transitions WOULD lead, +if sufficiently prolonged. + +To discuss all the ways in which one experience may function as the +knower of another, would be incompatible with the limits of +this essay. I have treated of type 1, the kind of knowledge called +perception, in an article in the Journal of Philosophy, for +September 1, 1904, called 'Does consciousness exist?' This is the +type of case in which the mind enjoys direct 'acquaintance' with a +present object. In the other types the mind has 'knowledge-about' +an object not immediately there. Type 3 can always formally and +hypothetically be reduced to type 2, so that a brief description of +that type will now put the present reader sufficiently at my point +of view, and make him see what the actual meanings of the +mysterious cognitive relation may be. + +Suppose me to be sitting here in my library at Cambridge, at ten +minutes' walk from 'Memorial Hall,' and to be thinking truly of +the latter object. My mind may have before it only the name, or it +may have a clear image, or it may have a very dim image of the +hall, but such an intrinsic difference in the image makes no +difference in its cognitive function. Certain extrinsic phenomena, +special experiences of conjunction, are what impart to the image, be +it what it may, its knowing office. + +For instance, if you ask me what hall I mean by my image, and I can +tell you nothing; or if I fail to point or lead you towards the +Harvard Delta; or if, being led by you, I am uncertain whether the +Hall I see be what I had in mind or not; you would rightly deny that +I had 'meant' that particular hall at all, even tho my mental image +might to some degree have resembled it. The resemblance would +count in that case as coincidental merely, for all sorts of things +of a kind resemble one another in this world without being held for +that reason to take cognizance of one another. + +On the other hand, if I can lead you to the hall, and tell you of +its history and present uses; if in its presence I feel my idea, +however imperfect it may have been, to have led hither and to be now +TERMINATED; if the associates of the image and of the felt hall +run parallel, so that each term of the one context corresponds +serially, as I walk, with an answering term of the other; why then +my soul was prophetic, and my idea must be, and by common consent +would be, called cognizant of reality. That percept was what I +MEANT, for into it my idea has passed by conjunctive experiences of +sameness and fulfilled intention. Nowhere is there jar, but every +later moment continues and corroborates an earlier one. + +In this continuing and corroborating, taken in no transcendental +sense, but denoting definitely felt transitions, LIES ALL THAT THE +KNOWING OF A PERCEPT BY AN IDEA CAN POSSIBLY CONTAIN OR SIGNIFY. +Wherever such transitions are felt, the first experience KNOWS the +last one. Where they do not, or where even as possibles they can +not, intervene, there can be no pretence of knowing. In this latter +case the extremes will be connected, if connected at all, by +inferior relations--bare likeness or succession, or by 'withness' +alone. Knowledge of sensible realities thus comes to life inside the +tissue of experience. It is MADE; and made by relations that unroll +themselves in time. Whenever certain intermediaries are given, such +that, as they develop towards their terminus, there is +experience from point to point of one direction followed, and +finally of one process fulfilled, the result is that THEIR STARTING- +POINT THEREBY BECOMES A KNOWER AND THEIR TERMINUS AN OBJECT MEANT +OR KNOWN. That is all that knowing (in the simple case considered) +can be known-as, that is the whole of its nature, put into +experiential terms. Whenever such is the sequence of our experiences +we may freely say that we had the terminal object 'in mind' from the +outset, even altho AT the outset nothing was there in us but a flat +piece of substantive experience like any other, with no self- +transcendency about it, and no mystery save the mystery of coming +into existence and of being gradually followed by other pieces of +substantive experience, with conjunctively transitional +experiences between. That is what we MEAN here by the object's being +'in mind.' Of any deeper more real way of its being in mind we have +no positive conception, and we have no right to discredit our actual +experience by talking of such a way at all. + +I know that many a reader will rebel at this. 'Mere intermediaries,' +he will say, 'even tho they be feelings of continuously +growing fulfilment, only SEPARATE the knower from the known, whereas +what we have in knowledge is a kind of immediate touch of the one +by the other, an "apprehension" in the etymological sense of the +word, a leaping of the chasm as by lightning, an act by which +two terms are smitten into one over the head of their distinctness. +All these dead intermediaries of yours are out of each other, and +outside of their termini still.' + +But do not such dialectic difficulties remind us of the dog dropping +his bone and snapping at its image in the water? If we knew any +more real kind of union aliunde, we might be entitled to brand all +our empirical unions as a sham. But unions by continuous +transition are the only ones we know of, whether in this matter of a +knowledge-about that terminates in an acquaintance, whether in +personal identity, in logical prediction through the copula 'is,' or +elsewhere. If anywhere there were more absolute unions, they could +only reveal themselves to us by just such conjunctive results. These +are what the unions are worth, these are all that we can ever +practically mean by union, by continuity. Is it not time to +repeat what Lotze said of substances, that to act like one is to be +one? Should we not say here that to be experienced as continuous is +to be really continuous, in a world where experience and reality +come to the same thing? In a picture gallery a painted hook will +serve to hang a painted chain by, a painted cable will hold a +painted ship. In a world where both the terms and their distinctions +are affairs of experience, conjunctions that are experienced must be +at least as real as anything else. They will be 'absolutely' real +conjunctions, if we have no transphenomenal absolute ready, +to derealize the whole experienced world by, at a stroke. + +So much for the essentials of the cognitive relation where the +knowledge is conceptual in type, or forms knowledge 'about' an +object. It consists in intermediary experiences (possible, if not +actual) of continuously developing progress, and, finally, of +fulfilment, when the sensible percept which is the object is +reached. The percept here not only VERIFIES the concept, proves its +function of knowing that percept to be true, but the percept's +existence as the terminus of the chain of intermediaries CREATES the +function. Whatever terminates that chain was, because it now proves +itself to be, what the concept 'had in mind.' + +The towering importance for human life of this kind of knowing lies +in the tact that an experience that knows another can figure as its +REPRESENTATIVE, not in any quasi-miraculous 'epistemological' sense, +but in the definite, practical sense of being its substitute in +various operations, sometimes physical and sometimes mental, which +lead us to its associates and results. By experimenting on our +ideas of reality, we may save ourselves the trouble of experimenting +on the real experiences which they severally mean. The ideas form +related systems, corresponding point for point to the systems which +the realities form; and by letting an ideal term call up its +associates systematically, we may be led to a terminus which +the corresponding real term would have led to in case we had +operated on the real world. And this brings us to the general +question of substitution. + +What, exactly, in a system of experiences, does the 'substitution' +of one of them for another mean? + +According to my view, experience as a whole is a process in time, +whereby innumerable particular terms lapse and are superseded +by others that follow upon them by transitions which, whether +disjunctive or conjunctive in content, are themselves experiences, +and must in general be accounted at least as real as the terms which +they relate. What the nature of the event called 'superseding' +signifies, depends altogether on the kind of transition +that obtains. Some experiences simply abolish their predecessors +without continuing them in any way. Others are felt to increase or +to enlarge their meaning, to carry out their purpose, or to bring us +nearer to their goal. They 'represent' them, and may fulfil their +function better than they fulfilled it themselves. But to 'fulfil a +function' in a world of pure experience can be conceived and defined +in only one possible way. In such a world transitions and arrivals +(or terminations) are the only events that happen, tho they happen +by so many sorts of path. The only function that one experience can +perform is to lead into another experience; and the only fulfilment +we can speak of is the reaching of a certain experienced end. When +one experience leads to (or can lead to) the same end as another, +they agree in function. But the whole system of experiences as they +are immediately given presents itself as a quasi-chaos through which +one can pass out of an initial term in many directions and yet +end in the same terminus, moving from next to next by a great many +possible paths. + +Either one of these paths might be a functional substitute for +another, and to follow one rather than another might on occasion be +an advantageous thing to do. As a matter of fact, and in a general +way, the paths that run through conceptual experiences, that +is, through 'thoughts' or 'ideas' that 'know' the things in which +they terminate, are highly advantageous paths to follow. Not only do +they yield inconceivably rapid transitions; but, owing to the +'universal' character [Footnote: Of which all that need be said in +this essay is that it also an be conceived as functional, and +defined in terms of transitions, or of the possibility of such.] +which they frequently possess, and to their capacity for association +with one another in great systems, they outstrip the tardy +consecutions of the things themselves, and sweep us on towards our +ultimate termini in a far more labor-saving way than the following +of trains of sensible perception ever could. Wonderful are the +new cuts and the short-circuits the thought-paths make. Most +thought-paths, it is true, are substitutes for nothing actual; they +end outside the real world altogether, in wayward fancies, +utopias, fictions or mistakes. But where they do re-enter reality +and terminate therein, we substitute them always; and with these +substitutes we pass the greater number of our hours. [Footnote: This +is why I called our experiences, taken all together, a quasi-chaos. +There is vastly more discontinuity in the sum total of experiences +than we commonly suppose. The objective nucleus of every man's +experience, his own body, is, it is true, a continuous percept; and +equally continuous as a percept (though we may be inattentive to it) +is the material environment of that body, changing by gradual +transition when the body moves. But the distant parts of the +physical world are at all times absent from us, and form conceptual +objects merely, into the perceptual reality of which our life +inserts itself at points discrete and relatively rare. Round their +several objective nuclei, partly shared and common partly discrete +of the real physical world, innumerable thinkers, pursuing their +several lines of physically true cogitation, trace paths that +intersect one another only at discontinuous perceptual points, and +the rest of the time are quite incongruent; and around all the +nuclei of shared 'reality' floats the vast cloud of experiences that +are wholly subjective, that are non-substitutional, that find not +even an eventual ending for themselves in the perceptual world--the +mere day-dreams and joys and sufferings and wishes of the individual +minds. These exist WITH one another, indeed, and with the objective +nuclei, but out of them it is probable that to all eternity no +inter-related system of any kind will ever be made.] + +Whosoever feels his experience to be something substitutional even +while he has it, may be said to have an experience that +reaches beyond itself. From inside of its own entity it says 'more,' +and postulates reality existing elsewhere. For the +transcendentalist, who holds knowing to consist in a salto +motale across an 'epistemological chasm,' such an idea presents no +difficulty; but it seems at first sight as if it might be +inconsistent with an empiricism like our own. Have we not explained +that conceptual knowledge is made such wholly by the existence of +things that fall outside of the knowing experience itself--by +intermediary experiences and by a terminus that fulfils? + +Can the knowledge be there before these elements that constitute its +being have come? And, if knowledge be not there, how can +objective reference occur? + +The key to this difficulty lies in the distinction between knowing +as verified and completed, and the same knowing as in transit and on +its way. To recur to the Memorial Hall example lately used, it is +only when our idea of the Hall has actually terminated in +the percept that we know 'for certain' that from the beginning it +was truly cognitive of THAT. Until established by the end of the +process, its quality of knowing that, or indeed of knowing anything, +could still be doubted; and yet the knowing really was there, as the +result now shows. We were VIRTUAL knowers of the Hall long before we +were certified to have been its actual knowers, by the percept's +retroactive validating power. Just so we are 'mortal' all the time, +by reason of the virtuality of the inevitable event which will make +us so when it shall have come. + +Now the immensely greater part of all our knowing never gets beyond +this virtual stage. It never is completed or nailed down. I +speak not merely of our ideas of imperceptibles like ether-waves or +dissociated 'ions,' or of 'ejects' like the contents of our +neighbors' minds; I speak also of ideas which we might verify if +we would take the trouble, but which we hold for true altho +unterminated perceptually, because nothing says 'no' to us, and +there is no contradicting truth in sight. TO CONTINUE +THINKING UNCHALLENGED IS, NINETY-NINE TIMES OUT OF A HUNDRED, OUR +PRACTICAL SUBSTITUTE FOR KNOWING IN THE COMPLETED SENSE. As each +experience runs by cognitive transition into the next one, and +we nowhere feel a collision with what we elsewhere count as truth or +fact, we commit ourselves to the current as if the port were sure. +We live, as it, were, upon the front edge of an advancing wave- +crest, and our sense of a determinate direction in falling forward +is all we cover of the future of our path. It is as if a +differential quotient should be conscious and treat itself as an +adequate substitute for a traced-out curve. Our experience, inter +alia, is of variations of rate and of direction, and lives in these +transitions more than in the journey's end. The experiences of +tendency are sufficient to act upon--what more could we have DONE +at those moments even if the later verification comes complete? + +This is what, as a radical empiricist, I say to the charge that the +objective reference which is so flagrant a character of our +experiences involves a chasm and a mortal leap. A +positively conjunctive transition involves neither chasm nor leap. +Being the very original of what we mean by continuity, it makes a +continuum wherever it appears. Objective reference is an incident of +the fact that so much of our experience comes as an insufficient +and consists of process and transition. Our fields of experience +have no more definite boundaries than have our fields of view. Both +are fringed forever by a MORE that continuously develops, and that +continuously supersedes them as life proceeds. The relations, +generally speaking, are as real here as the terms are, and the only +complaint of the transcendentalist's with which I could at all +sympathize would be his charge that, by first making knowledge to +consist in external relations as I have done, and by then confessing +that nine-tenths of the time these are not actually but only +virtually there, I have knocked the solid bottom out of the whole +business, and palmed off a substitute of knowledge for the genuine +thing. Only the admission, such a critic might say, that our ideas +are self-transcendent and 'true' already; in advance of the +experiences that are to terminate them, can bring solidity back to +knowledge in a world like this, in which transitions and +terminations are only by exception fulfilled. + +This seems to me an excellent place for applying the pragmatic +method. What would the self-transcendency affirmed to exist in +advance of all experiential mediation or termination, be KNOWN-AS? +What would it practically result in for US, were it true? + +It could only result in our orientation, in the turning of our +expectations and practical tendencies into the right path; and the +right path here, so long as we and the object are not yet face to +face (or can never get face to face, as in the case of ejects), +would be the path that led us into the object's +nearest neighborhood. Where direct acquaintance is +lacking, 'knowledge about' is the next best thing, and an +acquaintance with what actually lies about the 'object, and is most +closely related to it, puts such knowledge within our grasp. Ether- +waves and your anger, for example, are things in which my thoughts +will never PERCTEPTUALLY terminate, but my concepts of them lead me +to their very brink, to the chromatic fringes and to the hurtful +words and deeds which are their really next effects. + +Even if our ideas did in themselves possess the postulated self- +transcendency, it would still remain true that their putting us +into possession of such effects WOULD BE THE SOLE CASH-VALUE OF THE +SELF-TRANSCENDENCY FOR US. And this cash-value, it is needless to +say, is verbatim et liberatim what our empiricist account pays in. +On pragmatist principles therefore, a dispute over self- +transcendency is a pure logomachy. Call our concepts of ejective +things self-transcendent or the reverse, it makes no difference, so +long as we don't differ about the nature of that exalted virtue's +fruits--fruits for us, of course, humanistic fruits. + +The transcendentalist believes his ideas to be self-transcendent +only because he finds that in fact they do bear fruits. Why need +he quarrel with an account of knowledge that insists on naming this +effect? Why not treat the working of the idea from next to next +as the essence of its self-transcendency? Why insist that knowing is +a static relation out of time when it practically seems so much +a function of our active life? For a thing to be valid, says Lotze, +is the same as to make itself valid. When the whole universe seems +only to be making itself valid and to be still incomplete (else why +its ceaseless changing?) why, of all things, should knowing be +exempt? Why should it not be making itself valid like everything +else? That some parts of it may be already valid or verified beyond +dispute; the empirical philosopher, of course, like any one else, +may always hope. + + + +V + +THE ESSENCE OF HUMANISM + +[Footnote: Reprinted from the Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and +Scientific Methods, vol. ii. No. 5, March 2, 1905.] + +Humanism is a ferment that has 'come to stay.' It is not a single +hypothesis or theorem, and it dwells on no new facts. It is rather a +slow shifting in the philosophic perspective, making things appear +as from a new centre of interest or point of sight. Some writers are +strongly conscious of the shifting, others half unconscious, even +though their own vision may have undergone much change. The result +is no small confusion in debate, the half-conscious humanists often +taking part against the radical ones, as if they wished to count +upon the other side. [Footnote: Professor Baldwin, for example. His +address 'Selective Thinking' (Psychological Review, January, 1898, +reprinted in his volume, 'Development and Evolution') seems to me an +unusually well written pragmatic manifesto. Nevertheless in 'The +Limits of Pragmatism' (ibid; January, 1904), he (much less clearly) +joins in the attack.] + +If humanism really be the name for such a shifting of perspective, +it is obvious that the whole scene of the philosophic stage +will change in some degree if humanism prevails. The emphasis of +things, their foreground and background distribution, their sizes +and values, will not keep just the same. [Footnote: The +ethical changes, it seems to me, are beautifully made evident in +Professor Dewey's series of articles, which will never get the +attention they deserve till they are printed in a book. I mean: 'The +Significance of Emotions,' Psychological Review, vol. ii, 13; 'The +Reflex Arc Concept in Psychology,' ibid; iii, 357; 'Psychology and +Social Practice,' ibid., vii, 105; 'Interpretation of Savage Mind,' +ibid; ix, 2l7; 'Green's Theory of the Moral Motive,' Philosophical +Review, vol. i, 593; 'Self-realization as the Moral Ideal,' ibid; +ii, 652; 'The Psychology of Effort,' ibid; vi, 43; 'The Evolutionary +Method as Applied to Morality,' ibid; xi, 107,353; 'Evolution and +Ethics,' Monist, vol. viii, 321; to mention only a few.] If such +pervasive consequences be involved in humanism, it is clear that no +pains which philosophers may take, first in defining it, and then in +furthering, checking, or steering its progress, will be thrown away. + +It suffers badly at present from incomplete definition. Its most +systematic advocates, Schiller and Dewey, have published +fragmentary programmes only; and its bearing on many vital +philosophic problems has not been traced except by adversaries who, +scenting heresies in advance, have showered blows on doctrines-- +subjectivism and scepticism, for example--that no good humanist +finds it necessary to entertain. By their still greater reticences, +the anti-humanists have, in turn, perplexed the humanists. Much of +the controversy has involved the word 'truth.' It is always good in +debate to know your adversary's point of view authentically. But the +critics of humanism never define exactly what the word 'truth' +signifies when they use it themselves. The humanists have to guess +at their view; and the result has doubtless been much beating of the +air. Add to all this, great individual differences in both camps, +and it becomes clear that nothing is so urgently needed, at the +stage which things have reached at present, as a sharper +definition by each side of its central point of view. + +Whoever will contribute any touch of sharpness will help us to make +sure of what's what and who is who. Any one can contribute such a +definition, and, without it, no one knows exactly where he stands. +If I offer my own provisional definition of humanism now and here, +others may improve it, some adversary may be led to define his own +creed more sharply by the contrast, and a certain quickening of the +crystallization of general opinion may result. + +The essential service of humanism, as I conceive the situation, is +to have seen that THO ONE PART OF OUR EXPERIENCE MAY LEAN +UPON ANOTHER PART TO MAKE IT WHAT IT IS IN ANY ONE OF SEVERAL +ASPECTS IN WHICH IT MAY BE CONSIDERED, EXPERIENCE AS A WHOLE IS +SELF-CONTAINING AND LEANS ON NOTHING. Since this formula +also expresses the main contention of transcendental idealism, it +needs abundant explication to make it unambiguous. It seems, at +first sight, to confine itself to denying theism and pantheism. But, +in fact, it need not deny either; everything would depend on the +exegesis; and if the formula ever became canonical, it would +certainly develop both right-wing and left-wing interpreters. I +myself read humanism theistically and pluralistically. If there be a +God, he is no absolute all-experiencer, but simply the experiencer +of widest actual conscious span. Read thus, humanism is for me a +religion susceptible of reasoned defence, tho I am well aware how +many minds there are to whom it can appeal religiously only when it +has been monistically translated. Ethically the pluralistic form of +it takes for me a stronger hold on reality than any other philosophy +I know of--it being essentially a SOCIAL philosophy, a philosophy of +'CO,' in which conjunctions do the work. But my primary reason for +advocating it is its matchless intellectual economy. It gets rid, +not only of the standing 'problems' that monism engenders ('problem +of evil,' 'problem of freedom,' and the like), but of other +metaphysical mysteries and paradoxes as well. + +It gets rid, for example, of the whole agnostic controversy, by +refusing to entertain the hypothesis of trans-empirical reality at +all. It gets rid of any need for an absolute of the bradleyan type +(avowedly sterile for intellectual purposes) by insisting that the +conjunctive relations found within experience are faultlessly real. +It gets rid of the need of an absolute of the roycean type +(similarly sterile) by its pragmatic treatment of the problem of +knowledge. As the views of knowledge, reality and truth imputed to +humanism have been those so far most fiercely attacked, it is in +regard to these ideas that a sharpening of focus seems most urgently +required. I proceed therefore to bring the views which I impute to +humanism in these respects into focus as briefly as I can. + + II + +If the central humanistic thesis, printed above in italics, be +accepted, it will follow that, if there be any such thing at all as +knowing, the knower and the object known must both be portions of +experience. One part of experience must, therefore, either + +(1) Know another part of experience--in other words, parts must, as +Professor Woodbridge says, [Footnote: In Science, November 4, +1904, p. 599.] represent ONE ANOTHER instead of representing +realities outside of 'consciousness'--this case is that of +conceptual knowledge; or else + +(2) They must simply exist as so many ultimate THATS or facts of +being, in the first instance; and then, as a secondary +complication, and without doubling up its entitative singleness, any +one and the same THAT in experience must figure alternately as a +thing known and as a knowledge of the thing, by reason of two +divergent kinds of context into which, in the general course of +experience, it gets woven. [Footnote: This statement is +probably excessively obscure to any one who has not read my two +articles 'Does Consciousness Exist?' and 'A World of Pure +Experience' in the Journal of Philosophy, vol. i, 1904.] + +This second case is that of sense-perception. There is a stage of +thought that goes beyond common sense, and of it I shall say +more presently; but the common-sense stage is a perfectly definite +halting-place of thought, primarily for purposes of action; and, so +long as we remain on the common-sense stage of thought, object and +subject FUSE in the fact of 'presentation' or sense-perception- +the pen and hand which I now SEE writing, for example, ARE the +physical realities which those words designate. In this case there +is no self-transcendency implied in the knowing. Humanism, here, is +only a more comminuted IDENTITATSPHILOSOPHIE. + +In case (1), on the contrary, the representative experience DOES +TRANSCEND ITSELF in knowing the other experience that is its object. +No one can talk of the knowledge of the one by the other without +seeing them as numerically distinct entities, of which the one lies +beyond the other and away from it, along some direction and with +some interval, that can be definitely named. But, if the talker be +a humanist, he must also see this distance-interval concretely and +pragmatically, and confess it to consist of other +intervening experiences--of possible ones, at all events, if not of +actual. To call my present idea of my dog, for example, cognitive of +the real dog means that, as the actual tissue of experience is +constituted, the idea is capable of leading into a chain of other +experiences on my part that go from next to next and terminate at +last in vivid sense-perceptions of a jumping, barking, hairy body. +Those ARE the real dog, the dog's full presence, for my common +sense. If the supposed talker is a profound philosopher, altho they +may not BE the real dog for him, they MEAN the real dog, are +practical substitutes for the real dog, as the representation was a +practical substitute for them, that real dog being a lot of atoms, +say, or of mind-stuff, that lie WHERE the sense-perceptions lie in +his experience as well as in my own. + + III + +The philosopher here stands for the stage of thought that goes +beyond the stage of common sense; and the difference is simply +that he 'interpolates' and 'extrapolates,' where common sense does +not. For common sense, two men see the same identical real dog. +Philosophy, noting actual differences in their perceptions points +out the duality of these latter, and interpolates something between +them as a more real terminus--first, organs, viscera, etc.; next, +cells; then, ultimate atoms; lastly, mind-stuff perhaps. The +original sense-termini of the two men, instead of coalescing with +each other and with the real dog-object, as at first supposed, are +thus held by philosophers to be separated by invisible realities +with which, at most, they are conterminous. + +Abolish, now, one of the percipients, and the interpolation changes +into 'extrapolation.' The sense-terminus of the remaining +percipient is regarded by the philosopher as not quite reaching +reality. He has only carried the procession of experiences, the +philosopher thinks, to a definite, because practical, halting- +place somewhere on the way towards an absolute truth that lies +beyond. + +The humanist sees all the time, however, that there is no absolute +transcendency even about the more absolute realities +thus conjectured or believed in. The viscera and cells are only +possible percepts following upon that of the outer body. The atoms +again, tho we may never attain to human means of perceiving them, +are still defined perceptually. The mind-stuff itself is conceived +as a kind of experience; and it is possible to frame the hypothesis +(such hypotheses can by no logic be excluded from philosophy) of two +knowers of a piece of mind-stuff and the mind-stuff itself becoming +'confluent' at the moment at which our imperfect knowing might pass +into knowing of a completed type. Even so do you and I habitually +conceive our two perceptions and the real dog as confluent, tho only +provisionally, and for the common-sense stage of thought. If my pen +be inwardly made of mind-stuff, there is no confluence NOW between +that mind-stuff and my visual perception of the pen. But conceivably +there might come to be such. confluence; for, in the case of my +HAND, the visual sensations and the inward feelings of the hand, its +mind-stuff, so to speak, are even now as confluent as any two things +can be. + +There is, thus, no breach in humanistic epistemology. Whether +knowledge be taken as ideally perfected, or only as true enough to +pass muster for practice, it is hung on one continuous scheme. +Reality, howsoever remote, is always defined as a terminus +within the general possibilities of experience; and what knows it is +defined as an experience THAT 'REPRESENTS' IT, IN THE SENSE OF BEING +SUBSTITUTABLE FOR IT IN OUR THINKING because it leads to the same +associates, OR IN THE SENSE OF 'POINTING TO IT THROUGH A CHAIN OF +OTHER EXPERIENCES THAT EITHER INTERVENE OR MAY INTERVENE. + +Absolute reality here bears the same relation to sensation as +sensation bears to conception or imagination. Both are provisional +or final termini, sensation being only the terminus at which the +practical man habitually stops, while the philosopher projects a +'beyond,' in the shape of more absolute reality. These termini, for +the practical and the philosophical stages of thought respectively, +are self-supporting. They are not 'true' of anything else, +they simply ARE, are REAL. They 'lean on nothing,' as my italicized +formula said. Rather does the whole fabric of experience lean on +them, just as the whole fabric of the solar system, including many +relative positions, leans, for its absolute position in space, on +any one of its constituent stars. Here, again, one gets a new +IDENTITATSPHILOSOPHIE in pluralistic form. + + IV + +If I have succeeded in making this at all clear (tho I fear that +brevity and abstractness between them may have made me fail), the +reader will see that the 'truth' of our mental operations must +always be an intra-experiential affair. A conception is +reckoned true by common sense when it can be made to lead to a +sensation. The sensation, which for common sense is not so much +'true' as 'real,' is held to be PROVISIONALLY true by the +philosopher just in so far as it COVERS (abuts at, or occupies the +place of) a still more absolutely real experience, in the +possibility of which, to some remoter experient, the +philosopher finds reason to believe. + +Meanwhile what actually DOES count for true to any individual +trower, whether he be philosopher or common man, is always a result +of his APPERCEPTIONS. If a novel experience, conceptual or sensible, +contradict too emphatically our pre-existent system of beliefs, +in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred it is treated as false. Only +when the older and the newer experiences are congruous enough to +mutually apperceive and modify each other, does what we treat as an +advance in truth result. In no case, however, need truth consist in +a relation between our experiences and something archetypal or +trans-experiential. Should we ever reach absolutely terminal +experiences, experiences in which we all agreed, which were +superseded by no revised continuations, these would not be TRUE, +they would be REAL, they would simply BE, and be indeed the angles, +corners, and linchpins of all reality, on which the truth of +everything else would be stayed. Only such OTHER things as led to +these by satisfactory conjunctions would be 'true.' +Satisfactory connection of some sort with such termini is all +that the word 'truth' means. On the common-stage of thought sense- +presentations serve as such termini. Our ideas and concepts and +scientific theories pass for true only so far as they harmoniously +lead back to the world of sense. + +I hope that many humanists will endorse this attempt of mine to +trace the more essential features of that way of viewing things. I +feel almost certain that Messrs. Dewey and Schiller will do so. If +the attackers will also take some slight account of it, it may be +that discussion will be a little less wide of the mark than it +has hitherto been. + + + +VI + +A WORD MORE ABOUT TRUTH + +[Footnote: Reprint from the Journal of Philosophy, July 18,1907.] + + My failure in making converts to my conception of truth seems, if I +may judge by what I hear in conversation, almost complete. +An ordinary philosopher would feel disheartened, and a common +choleric sinner would curse God and die, after such a reception. But +instead of taking counsel of despair, I make bold to vary my +statements, in the faint hope that repeated droppings may wear upon +the stone, and that my formulas may seem less obscure if surrounded +by something more of a 'mass' whereby to apperceive them. + +For fear of compromising other pragmatists, whoe'er they be, I will +speak of the conception which I am trying to make intelligible, as +my own conception. I first published it in the year 1885, in the +first article reprinted in the present book. Essential theses of +this article were independently supported in 1893 and 1895 +by Professor D. S. Miller [Footnote: Philosophical Review, vol. ii, +p. 408, and Psychological Review, vol. ii, p. 533.] and were +repeated by me in a presidential address on 'The knowing of things +together' [Footnote: The relevant parts of which are printed above, +p. 43.] in 1895. Professor Strong, in an article in the Journal of +Philosophy, etc., [Footnote: Vol. i, p. 253.] entitled 'A +naturalistic theory of the reference of thought to reality,' called +our account 'the James-Miller theory of cognition,' and, as I +understood him, gave it his adhesion. Yet, such is the difficulty of +writing clearly in these penetralia of philosophy, that each of +these revered colleagues informs me privately that the account of +truth I now give--which to me is but that earlier statement more +completely set forth--is to him inadequate, and seems to leave the +gist of real cognition out. If such near friends disagree, what can +I hope from remoter ones, and what from unfriendly critics? + +Yet I feel so sure that the fault must lie in my lame forms of +statement and not in my doctrine, that I am fain to try once more +to express myself. + +Are there not some general distinctions which it may help us to +agree about in advance? Professor Strong distinguishes between what +he calls 'saltatory' and what he calls 'ambulatory' relations. +'Difference,' for example, is saltatory, jumping as it were +immediately from one term to another, but 'distance' in time or +space is made out of intervening parts of experience through which +we ambulate in succession. Years ago, when T. H. Green's ideas were +most influential, I was much troubled by his criticisms of english +sensationalism. One of his disciples in particular would always say +to me, 'Yes! TERMS may indeed be possibly sensational in origin; but +RELATIONS, what are they but pure acts of the intellect coming upon +the sensations from above, and of a higher nature?' I well remember +the sudden relief it gave me to perceive one day that SPACE- +relations at any rate were homogeneous with the terms between which +they mediated. The terms were spaces, and the relations were other +intervening spaces. [Footnote: See my Principles of Psychology, vol. +ii, pp. 148-153.] For the Greenites space-relations had +been saltatory, for me they became thenceforward ambulatory. + +Now the most general way of contrasting my view of knowledge with +the popular view (which is also the view of most epistemologists) is +to call my view ambulatory, and the other view saltatory; and the +most general way of characterizing the two views is by saying +that my view describes knowing as it exists concretely, while the +other view only describes its results abstractly taken. + +I fear that most of my recalcitrant readers fail to recognize that +what is ambulatory in the concrete may be taken so abstractly as +to appear saltatory. Distance, for example, is made abstract by +emptying out whatever is particular in the concrete intervals--it is +reduced thus to a sole 'difference,' a difference of 'place,' which +is a logical or saltatory distinction, a so-called 'pure relation.' + +The same is true of the relation called 'knowing,' which may connect +an idea with a reality. My own account of this relation is +ambulatory through and through. I say that we know an object by +means of an idea, whenever we ambulate towards the object under the +impulse which the idea communicates. If we believe in so-called +'sensible' realities, the idea may not only send us towards its +object, but may put the latter into our very hand, make it +our immediate sensation. But, if, as most reflective people opine, +sensible realities are not 'real' realities, but only their +appearances, our idea brings us at least so far, puts us in touch +with reality's most authentic appearances and substitutes. In any +case our idea brings us into the object's neighborhood, practical or +ideal, gets us into commerce with it, helps us towards its closer +acquaintance, enables us to foresee it, class it, compare it, deduce +it,--in short, to deal with it as we could not were the idea not in +our possession. + +The idea is thus, when functionally considered, an instrument for +enabling us the better to HAVE TO DO with the object and to act +about it. But it and the object are both of them bits of the general +sheet and tissue of reality at large; and when we say that the idea +leads us towards the object, that only means that it carries us +forward through intervening tracts of that reality into the object's +closer neighborhood, into the midst of its associates at least, be +these its physical neighbors, or be they its logical congeners only. +Thus carried into closer quarters, we are in an improved +situation as regards acquaintance and conduct; and we say that +through the idea we now KNOW the object better or more truly. + +My thesis is that the knowing here is MADE by the ambulation through +the intervening experiences. If the idea led us nowhere, or FROM +that object instead of towards it, could we talk at all of its +having any cognitive quality? Surely not, for it is only when taken +in conjunction with the intermediate experiences that it gets +related to THAT PARTICULAR OBJECT rather than to any other part of +nature. Those intermediaries determine what particular +knowing function it exerts. The terminus they guide us to tells us +what object it 'means,' the results they enrich us with 'verify' or +'refute' it. Intervening experiences are thus as +indispensable foundations for a concrete relation of cognition as +intervening space is for a relation of distance. Cognition, whenever +we take it concretely, means determinate 'ambulation,' through +intermediaries, from a terminus a quo to, or towards, a terminus ad +quem. As the intermediaries are other than the termini, +and connected with them by the usual associative bonds (be these +'external' or be they logical, i.e., classificatory, in character), +there would appear to be nothing especially unique about the +processes of knowing. They fall wholly within experience; and we +need use, in describing them, no other categories than those which +we employ in describing other natural processes. + +But there exist no processes which we cannot also consider +abstractly, eviscerating them down to their essential skeletons or +outlines; and when we have treated the processes of knowing thus, we +are easily led to regard them as something altogether unparalleled +in nature. For we first empty idea, object and intermediaries of all +their particularities, in order to retain only a general scheme, and +then we consider the latter only in its function of giving a result, +and not in its character of being a process. In this treatment the +intermediaries shrivel into the form of a mere space of separation, +while the idea and object retain only the logical distinctness of +being the end-terms that are separated. In other words, +the intermediaries which in their concrete particularity form a +bridge, evaporate ideally into an empty interval to cross, and then, +the relation of the end-terms having become saltatory, the whole +hocus-pocus of Erkenntnistheorie begins, and goes on unrestrained by +further concrete considerations. The idea, in 'meaning' an object +separated by an 'epistemological chasm' from itself, now executes +what Professor Ladd calls a 'salto mortale'; in knowing the object's +nature, it now 'transcends' its own. The object in turn becomes +'present' where it is really absent, etc.; until a scheme remains +upon our hands, the sublime paradoxes of which some of us think that +nothing short of an 'absolute' can explain. + +The relation between idea and object, thus made abstract and +saltatory, is thenceforward opposed, as being more essential and +previous, to its own ambulatory self, and the more +concrete description is branded as either false or insufficient. The +bridge of intermediaries, actual or possible, which in every real +case is what carries and defines the knowing, gets treated as an +episodic complication which need not even potentially be there. I +believe that this vulgar fallacy of opposing abstractions to the +concretes from which they are abstracted, is the main reason why my +account of knowing is deemed so unsatisfactory, and I will +therefore say a word more on that general point. + +Any vehicle of conjunction, if all its particularities are +abstracted from it, will leave us with nothing on our hands but the +original disjunction which it bridged over. But to escape treating +the resultant self-contradiction as an achievement of dialectical +profundity, all we need is to restore some part, no matter +how small, of what we have taken away. In the case of the +epistemological chasm the first reasonable step is to remember that +the chasm was filled with SOME empirical material, +whether ideational or sensational, which performed SOME bridging +function and saved us from the mortal leap. Restoring thus the +indispensable modicum of reality to the matter of our discussion, we +find our abstract treatment genuinely useful. We escape entanglement +with special cases without at the same time falling into gratuitous +paradoxes. We can now describe the general features of cognition, +tell what on the whole it DOES FOR US, in a universal way. + +We must remember that this whole inquiry into knowing grows up on a +reflective level. In any real moment of knowing, what we +are thinking of is our object, not the way in which we ourselves are +momentarily knowing it. We at this moment, as it happens, have +knowing itself for our object; but I think that the reader will +agree that his present knowing of that object is included only +abstractly, and by anticipation, in the results he may reach. What +he concretely has before his mind, as he reasons, is some supposed +objective instance of knowing, as he conceives it to go on in some +other person, or recalls it from his own past. As such, he, the +critic, sees it to contain both an idea and an object, and processes +by which the knower is guided from the one towards the other. He +sees that the idea is remote from the object, and that, whether +through intermediaries or not, it genuinely HAS TO DO with it. +He sees that it thus works beyond its immediate being, and lays hold +of a remote reality; it jumps across, transcends itself. It does all +this by extraneous aid, to be sure, but when the aid has come, it +HAS done it and the result is secure. Why not talk of results by +themselves, then, without considering means? Why not treat the idea +as simply grasping or intuiting the reality, of its having the +faculty anyhow, of shooting over nature behind the scenes +and knowing things immediately and directly? Why need we always lug +in the bridging?--it only retards our discourse to do so. + +Such abstract talk about cognition's results is surely convenient; +and it is surely as legitimate as it is convenient, SO LONG AS WE DO +NOT FORGET OR POSITIVELY DENY, WHAT IT IGNORES. We may on occasion +say that our idea meant ALWAYS that particular object, that it led +us there because it was OF it intrinsically and essentially. We may +insist that its verification follows upon that original +cognitive virtue in it--and all the rest--and we shall do no harm so +long as we know that these are only short cuts in our thinking. They +are positively true accounts of fact AS FAR AS THEY GO, only they +leave vast tracts of fact out of the account, tracts of tact that +have to be reinstated to make the accounts literally true of any +real case. But if, not merely passively ignoring the intermediaries, +you actively deny them [Footnote: This is the fallacy which I have +called 'vicious intellectualism' in my book A Pluralistic Universe, +Longmans, Green & Co., 1909.] to be even potential requisites for +the results you are so struck by, your epistemology goes to +irremediable smash. You are as far off the track as an historian +would be, if, lost in admiration of Napoleon's personal power, he +were to ignore his marshals and his armies, and were to accuse you +of error in describing his conquests as effected by their means. +Of such abstractness and one-sidedness I accuse most of the critics +of my own account. + +In the second lecture of the book Pragmatism, I used the +illustration of a squirrel scrambling round a tree-trunk to keep +out of sight of a pursuing man: both go round the tree, but does the +man go round the squirrel? It all depends, I said, on what you mean +by going round.' In one sense of the word the man 'goes round,' in +another sense he does not. I settled the dispute by +pragmatically distinguishing the senses. But I told how +some disputants had called my distinction a shuffling evasion and +taken their stand on what they called 'plain honest English going- +round.' + +In such a simple case few people would object to letting the term in +dispute be translated into its concreter equivalents. But in +the case of a complex function like our knowing they act +differently. I give full concrete particular value for the ideas of +knowing in every case I can think of, yet my critics insist +that 'plain honest English knowing' is left out of my account. They +write as if the minus were on my side and the plus on theirs. + +The essence of the matter for me is that altho knowing can be both +abstractly and concretely described, and altho the +abstract descriptions are often useful enough, yet they are all +sucked up and absorbed without residuum into the concreter ones, and +contain nothing of any essentially other or higher nature, which the +concrete descriptions can be justly accused of leaving behind. +Knowing is just a natural process like any other. There is no +ambulatory process whatsoever, the results of which we may not +describe, if we prefer to, in saltatory terms, or represent +in static formulation. Suppose, e.g., that we say a man is +'prudent.' Concretely, that means that he takes out insurance, +hedges in betting, looks before he leaps. Do such acts +CONSTITUTE the prudence? ARE they the man qua prudent? + +Or is the prudence something by itself and independent of them? As a +constant habit in him, a permanent tone of character, it +is convenient to call him prudent in abstraction from any one of his +acts, prudent in general and without specification, and to say the +acts follow from the pre-existing prudence. There are peculiarities +in his psycho-physical system that make him act prudently; and there +are tendencies to association in our thoughts that prompt some of +them to make for truth and others for error. But would the man be +prudent in the absence of each and all of the acts? Or would the +thoughts be true if they had no associative or impulsive +tendencies? Surely we have no right to oppose static essences in +this way to the moving processes in which they live embedded. + +My bedroom is above my library. Does the 'aboveness' here mean aught +that is different from the concrete spaces which have to be moved- +through in getting from the one to the other? It means, you may say, +a pure topographic relation, a sort of architect's plan among the +eternal essences. But that is not the full aboveness, it is only an +abbreviated substitute that on occasion may lead my mind towards +truer, i.e., fuller, dealings with the real aboveness. It is not an +aboveness ante rem, it is a post rem extract from the aboveness in +rebus. We may indeed talk, for certain conveniences, as if the +abstract scheme preceded, we may say 'I must go up stairs because of +the essential aboveness,' just as we may say that the man 'does +prudent acts because of his ingrained prudence,' or that our ideas +'lead us truly because of their intrinsic truth.' But this should +not debar us on other occasions from using completer forms of +description. A concrete matter of fact always remains identical +under any form of description, as when we say of a line, now that it +runs from left to right, and now that it runs from right to left. +These are but names of one and the same fact, one more expedient to +use at one time, one at another. The full facts of cognition, +whatever be the way in which we talk about them, even when we talk +most abstractly, stand inalterably given in the actualities and +possibilities of the experience-continuum. [Footnote 1: The ultimate +object or terminus of a cognitive process may in certain instances +lie beyond the direct experience of the particular cognizer, but it, +of course, must exist as part of the total universe of experience +whose constitution, with cognition in it, the critic is discussing.] +But my critics treat my own more concrete talk as if IT were the +kind that sinned by its inadequacy, and as if the full continuum +left something out. + +A favorite way of opposing the more abstract to the more concrete +account is to accuse those who favor the latter of +'confounding psychology with logic.' Our critics say that when we +are asked what truth MEANS, we reply by telling only how it is +ARRIVED-AT. But since a meaning is a logical relation, static, +independent of time, how can it possibly be identified, they say, +with any concrete man's experience, perishing as this does at the +instant of its production? This, indeed, sounds profound, but I +challenge the profundity. I defy any one to show any difference +between logic and psychology here. The logical relation stands to +the psychological relation between idea and object only as saltatory +abstractness stands to ambulatory concreteness. Both relations need +a psychological vehicle; and the 'logical' one is simply the +'psychological' one disemboweled of its fulness, and reduced to a +bare abstractional scheme. + +A while ago a prisoner, on being released, tried to assassinate the +judge who had sentenced him. He had apparently succeeded +in conceiving the judge timelessly, had reduced him to a bare +logical meaning, that of being his 'enemy and persecutor,' by +stripping off all the concrete conditions (as jury's +verdict, official obligation, absence of personal spite, possibly +sympathy) that gave its full psychological character to the sentence +as a particular man's act in time. Truly the sentence WAS inimical +to the culprit; but which idea of it is the truer one, that bare +logical definition of it, or its full psychological specification? +The anti-pragmatists ought in consistency to stand up for the +criminal's view of the case, treat the judge as the latter's logical +enemy, and bar out the other conditions as so much +inessential psychological stuff. + + II + +A still further obstacle, I suspect, stands in the way of my +account's acceptance. Like Dewey and like Schiller, I have had to +say that the truth of an idea is determined by its satisfactoriness. +But satisfactoriness is a subjective term, just as idea is; and +truth is generally regarded as 'objective.' Readers who admit +that satisfactoriness is our only MARK of truth, the only sign that +we possess the precious article, will still say that the objective +relation between idea and object which the word 'truth' points to is +left out of my account altogether. I fear also that the association +of my poor name with the 'will to believe' (which 'will,' it seems +to me, ought to play no part in this discussion) works against my +credit in some quarters. I fornicate with that unclean thing, +my adversaries may think, whereas your genuine truth-lover must +discourse in huxleyan heroics, and feel as if truth, to be real +truth, ought to bring eventual messages of death to all +our satisfactions. Such divergences certainly prove the complexity +of the area of our discussion; but to my mind they also are based +on misunderstandings, which (tho with but little hope of success) I +will try to diminish by a further word of explanation. + +First, then, I will ask my objectors to define exactly what SORT of +thing it is they have in mind when they speak of a truth that shall +be absolute, complete and objective; and then I will defy them to +show me any conceivable standing-room for such a kind of truth +outside the terms of my own description. It will fall, as I contend, +entirely within the field of my analysis. + +To begin with, it must obtain between an idea and a reality that is +the idea's object; and, as a predicate, it must apply to the +idea and not to the object, for objective realities are not TRUE, at +least not in the universe of discourse to which we are now confining +ourselves, for there they are taken as simply BEING, while the ideas +are true OF them. But we can suppose a series of ideas to be +successively more and more true of the same object, and can ask what +is the extreme approach to being absolutely true that the last idea +might attain to. + +The maximal conceivable truth in an idea would seem to be that it +should lead to an actual merging of ourselves with the object, to an +utter mutual confluence and identification. On the common-sense +level of belief this is what is supposed really to take place in +sense-perception. My idea of this pen verifies itself through my +percept; and my percept is held to BE the pen for the time being-- +percepts and physical realities being treated by common sense as +identical. But the physiology of the senses has criticised common +sense out of court, and the pen 'in itself' is now believed to lie +beyond my momentary percept. Yet the notion once suggested, of what +a completely consummated acquaintance with a reality might be like, +remains over for our speculative purposes. TOTAL CONFLUX OF THE MIND +WITH THE REALITY would be the absolute limit of truth, there could +be no better or more satisfying knowledge than that. + +Such total conflux, it is needless to say, is ALREADY EXPLICITLY +PROVIDED FOR, AS A POSSIBILITY, IN MY ACCOUNT OF THE MATTER. If an +idea should ever lead us not only TOWARDS, or UP TO, or AGAINST, a +reality, but so close that we and the reality should MELT TOGETHER, +it would be made absolutely true, according to me, by that +performance. + +In point of fact philosophers doubt that this ever occurs. What +happens, they think, is only that we get nearer and nearer to +realities, we approximate more and more to the all-satisfying limit; +and the definition of actually, as distinguished from +imaginably, complete and objective truth, can then only be that it +belongs to the idea that will lead us as CLOSE UP AGAINST THE OBJECT +as in the nature of our experience is possible, literally NEXT +to it, for instance. + +Suppose, now, there were an idea that did this for a certain +objective reality. Suppose that no further approach were possible, +that nothing lay between, that the next step would carry us right +INTO the reality; then that result, being the next thing to conflux, +would make the idea true in the maximal degree that might be +supposed practically attainable in the world which we inhabit. + +Well, I need hardly explain that THAT DEGREE OF TRUTH IS ALSO +PROVIDED FOR IN MY ACCOUNT OF THE MATTER. And if satisfactions are +the marks of truth's presence, we may add that any less true +substitute for such a true idea would prove less satisfactory. +Following its lead, we should probably find out that we did not +quite touch the terminus. We should desiderate a closer approach, +and not rest till we had found it. + +I am, of course, postulating here a standing reality independent of +the idea that knows it. I am also postulating that satisfactions +grow pari passu with our approximation to such reality. [Footnote 1: +Say, if you prefer to, that DISsatisfactions decrease pari passu +with such approximation. The approximation may be of any kind +assignable--approximation in time or in space, or approximation in +kind, which in common speech means 'copying.'] If my critics +challenge this latter assumption, I retort upon them with the +former. Our whole notion of a standing reality grows up in the form +of an ideal limit to the series of successive termini to which +our thoughts have led us and still are leading us. Each terminus +proves provisional by leaving us unsatisfied. The truer idea is the +one that pushes farther; so we are ever beckoned on by the ideal +notion of an ultimate completely satisfactory terminus. I, for one, +obey and accept that notion. I can conceive no other objective +CONTENT to the notion of ideally perfect truth than that of +penetration into such a terminus, nor can I conceive that the +notion would ever have grown up, or that true ideas would ever have +been sorted out from false or idle ones, save for the greater sum +of satisfactions, intellectual or practical, which the truer ones +brought with them. Can we imagine a man absolutely satisfied with an +idea and with all its relations to his other ideas and to his +sensible experiences, who should yet not take its content as a true +account of reality? The matter of the true is thus +absolutely identical with the matter of the satisfactory. You may +put either word first in your ways of talking; but leave out that +whole notion of SATISFACTORY WORKING or LEADING (which is the +essence of my pragmatistic account) and call truth a static logical +relation, independent even of POSSIBLE leadings or +satisfactions, and it seems to me you cut all ground from under you. + +I fear that I am still very obscure. But I respectfully implore +those who reject my doctrine because they can make nothing of +my stumbling language, to tell us in their own name--und zwar very +concretely and articulately!--just how the real, genuine and +absolutely 'objective' truth which they believe in so profoundly, is +constituted and established. They mustn't point to the 'reality' +itself, for truth is only our subjective relation to realities. What +is the nominal essence of this relation, its logical definition, +whether or not it be 'objectively' attainable by mortals? + +Whatever they may say it is, I have the firmest faith that my +account will prove to have allowed for it and included it by +anticipation, as one possible case in the total mixture of cases. +There is, in short, no ROOM for any grade or sort of truth outside +of the framework of the pragmatic system, outside of that jungle of +empirical workings and leadings, and their nearer or ulterior +terminations, of which I seem to have written so unskilfully. + + + +VII + +PROFESSOR PRATT ON TRUTH + +I + +[Footnote: Reprinted from the Journal of Philosophy, etc., +August 15, 1907 (vol. iv, p. 464).] + +Professor J. B. Pratt's paper in the Journal of Philosophy for June +6, 1907, is so brilliantly written that its misconception of +the pragmatist position seems doubly to call for a reply. + +He asserts that, for a pragmatist, truth cannot be a relation +between an idea and a reality outside and transcendent of the idea, +but must lie 'altogether within experience,' where it will need 'no +reference to anything else to justify it'--no reference to the +object, apparently. The pragmatist must 'reduce everything +to psychology,' aye, and to the psychology of the immediate moment. +He is consequently debarred from saying that an idea that +eventually gets psychologically verified WAS already true before the +process of verifying was complete; and he is equally debarred from +treating an idea as true provisionally so long as he only believes +that he CAN verify it whenever he will. + +Whether such a pragmatist as this exists, I know not, never having +myself met with the beast. We can define terms as we like; and +if that be my friend Pratt's definition of a pragmatist, I can only +concur with his anti-pragmatism. But, in setting up the weird +type, he quotes words from me; so, in order to escape being classed +by some reader along with so asinine a being, I will reassert my own +view of truth once more. + +Truth is essentially a relation between two things, an idea, on the +one hand, and a reality outside of the idea, on the other. This +relation, like all relations, has its fundamentum, namely, the +matrix of experiential circumstance, psychological as well as +physical, in which the correlated terms are found embedded. In +the case of the relation between 'heir' and 'legacy' the fundamentum +is a world in which there was a testator, and in which there is now +a will and an executor; in the case of that between idea and object, +it is a world with circumstances of a sort to make a satisfactory +verification process, lying around and between the two terms. But +just as a man may be called an heir and treated as one before the +executor has divided the estate, so an idea may practically be +credited with truth before the verification process has been +exhaustively carried out--the existence of the mass of +verifying circumstance is enough. Where potentiality counts for +actuality in so many other cases, one does not see why it may not so +count here. We call a man benevolent not only for his kind acts paid +in, but for his readiness to perform others; we treat an idea as +'luminous' not only for the light it has shed, but for that +we expect it will shed on dark problems. Why should we not equally +trust the truth of our ideas? We live on credits everywhere; and +we use our ideas far oftener for calling up things connected with +their immediate objects, than for calling up those objects +themselves. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred the only use +we should make of the object itself, if we were led up to it by our +idea, would be to pass on to those connected things by its means. So +we continually curtail verification-processes, letting our belief +that they are possible suffice. + +What CONSTITUTES THE RELATION known as truth, I now say, is just the +EXISTENCE IN THE EMPIRICAL WORLD OF THIS FUNDAMENTUM OF +CIRCUMSTANCE SURROUNDING OBJECT AND IDEA and ready to be either +short-circuited or traversed at full length. So long as it exists, +and a satisfactory passage through it between the object and +the idea is possible, that idea will both BE true, and will HAVE +BEEN true of that object, whether fully developed verification has +taken place or not. The nature and place and affinities of +the object of course play as vital a part in making the particular +passage possible as do the nature and associative tendencies of the +idea; so that the notion that truth could fall altogether inside of +the thinker's private experience and be something purely +psychological, is absurd. It is BETWEEN the idea and the object that +the truth-relation is to be sought and it involves both terms. + +But the 'intellectualistic' position, if I understand Mr. Pratt +rightly, is that, altho we can use this fundamentum, this mass +of go-between experience, for TESTING truth, yet the truth-relation +in itself remains as something apart. It means, in Mr. Pratt's +words, merely 'THIS SIMPLE THING THAT THE OBJECT OF WHICH ONE IS +THINKING IS AS ONE THINKS IT.' + +It seems to me that the word 'as,' which qualifies the relation +here, and bears the whole 'epistemological' burden, is anything but +simple. What it most immediately suggests is that the idea should be +LIKE the object; but most of our ideas, being abstract concepts, +bear almost no resemblance to their objects. The 'as' must +therefore, I should say, be usually interpreted functionally, as +meaning that the idea shall lead us into the same quarters of +experience AS the object would. Experience leads ever on and on, and +objects and our ideas of objects may both lead to the same goals. +The ideas being in that case shorter cuts, we SUBSTITUTE them more +and more for their objects; and we habitually waive direct +verification of each one of them, as their train passes through our +mind, because if an idea leads AS the object would lead, we can say, +in Mr. Pratt's words, that in so far forth the object is AS we think +it, and that the idea, verified thus in so far forth, is true +enough. + +Mr. Pratt will undoubtedly accept most of these facts, but he will +deny that they spell pragmatism. Of course, definitions are free to +every one; but I have myself never meant by the pragmatic view of +truth anything different from what I now describe; and inasmuch as +my use of the term came earlier than my friend's, I think it ought +to have the right of way. But I suspect that Professor +Pratt's contention is not solely as to what one must think in order +to be called a pragmatist. I am cure that he believes that the +truth-relation has something MORE in it than the fundamentum which I +assign can account for. Useful to test truth by, the matrix of +circumstance, be thinks, cannot found the truth-relation in se, for +that is trans-empirical and 'saltatory.' + +Well, take an object and an idea, and assume that the latter is true +of the former--as eternally and absolutely true as you like. Let the +object be as much 'as' the idea thinks it, as it is possible for one +thing to be 'as' another. I now formally ask of Professor Pratt to +tell what this 'as'-ness in itself CONSISTS in--for it seems to me +that it ought to consist in something assignable and describable, +and not remain a pure mystery, and I promise that if he can assign +any determination of it whatever which I cannot successfully refer +to some specification of what in this article I have called the +empirical fundamentum, I will confess my stupidity cheerfully, and +will agree never to publish a line upon this subject of truth again. + + +II + +Professor Pratt has returned to the charge in a whole book, +[Footnote 1: J. B. Pratt: What is Pragmatism. New York, The +Macmillan Company, 1909.--The comments I have printed were written +in March, 1909, after some of the articles printed later in the +present volume.] which for its clearness and good temper deserves to +supersede all the rest of the anti-pragmatistic literature. I wish +it might do so; for its author admits all MY essential contentions, +simply distinguishing my account of truth as 'modified' +pragmatism from Schiller's and Dewey's, which he calls pragmatism of +the 'radical' sort. As I myself understand Dewey and Schiller, our +views absolutely agree, in spite of our different modes of +statement; but I have enough trouble of my own in life without +having to defend my friends, so I abandon them provisionally to the +tender mercy of Professor Pratt's interpretations, utterly erroneous +tho I deem these to be. My reply as regards myself can be +very short, for I prefer to consider only essentials, and Dr. +Pratt's whole book hardly takes the matter farther than the article +to which I retort in Part I of the present paper. + +He repeats the 'as'-formula, as if it were something that I, along +with other pragmatists, had denied, [Footnote: Op. cit., pp. 77- +80.] whereas I have only asked those who insist so on its importance +to do something more than merely utter it--to explicate it, for +example, and tell us what its so great importance consists in. I +myself agree most cordially that for an idea to be true the object +must be 'as' the idea declares it, but I explicate the 'as'-ness as +meaning the idea's verifiability. + +Now since Dr. Pratt denies none of these verifying 'workings' for +which I have pleaded, but only insists on their inability to serve +as the fundamentum of the truth-relation, it seems that there is +really nothing in the line of FACT about which we differ, and that +the issue between us is solely as to how far the notion of +workableness or verifiability is an essential part of the notion of +'trueness'--'trueness' being Dr. Pratt's present name for the +character of as-ness in the true idea. I maintain that there is no +meaning left in this notion of as-ness or trueness if no reference +to the possibility of concrete working on the part of the idea is +made. + +Take an example where there can be no possible working. Suppose I +have an idea to which I give utterance by the vocable 'skrkl,' +claiming at the same time that it is true. Who now can say +that it is FALSE, for why may there not be somewhere in the +unplumbed depths of the cosmos some object with which 'skrkl' can +agree and have trueness in Dr. Pratt's sense? On the other hand who +can say that it is TRUE, for who can lay his hand on that object and +show that it and nothing else is what I MEAN by my word? But yet +again, who can gainsay any one who shall call my word utterly +IRRELATIVE to other reality, and treat it as a bare fact in my mind, +devoid of any cognitive function whatever. One of these three +alternatives must surely be predicated of it. For it not to be +irrelevant (or not-cognitive in nature), an object of some kind must +be provided which it may refer to. Supposing that object provided, +whether 'skrkl' is true or false of it, depends, according to +Professor Pratt, on no intermediating condition whatever. The +trueness or the falsity is even now immediately, absolutely, and +positively there. + +I, on the other hand, demand a cosmic environment of some kind to +establish which of them is there rather than utter +irrelevancy. [Footnote: Dr. Pratt, singularly enough, disposes of +this primal postulate of all pragmatic epistemology, by saying that +the pragmatist 'unconsciously surrenders his whole case by smuggling +in the idea of a conditioning environment which determines whether +or not the experience can work, and which cannot itself be +identified with the experience or any part of it' (pp. 167-168). The +'experience' means here of course the idea, or belief; and the +expression 'smuggling in' is to the last degree diverting. If any +epistemologist could dispense with a conditioning environment, it +would seem to be the antipragmatist, with his immediate saltatory +trueness, independent of work done. The mediating pathway which the +environment supplies is the very essence of the pragmatist's +explanation.] I then say, first, that unless some sort of a +natural path exists between the 'skrkl' and THAT object, +distinguishable among the innumerable pathways that run among all +the realities of the universe, linking them promiscuously with one +another, there is nothing there to constitute even the POSSIBILITY +OF ITS REFERRING to that object rather than to any other. + +I say furthermore that unless it have some TENDENCY TO FOLLOW UP +THAT PATH, there is nothing to constitute its INTENTION to refer to +the object in question. + +Finally, I say that unless the path be strown with possibilities of +frustration or encouragement, and offer some sort of terminal +satisfaction or contradiction, there is nothing to constitute its +agreement or disagreement with that object, or to constitute the as- +ness (or 'not-as-ness') in which the trueness (or falseness) is +said to consist. + +I think that Dr. Pratt ought to do something more than repeat the +name 'trueness,' in answer to my pathetic question whether +that there be not some CONSTITUTION to a relation as important as +this. The pathway, the tendency, the corroborating or contradicting +progress, need not in every case be experienced in full, but I don't +see, if the universe doesn't contain them among its possibilities of +furniture, what LOGICAL MATERIAL FOR DEFINING the trueness of +my idea is left. But if it do contain them, they and they only are +the logical material required. + +I am perplexed by the superior importance which Dr. Pratt attributes +to abstract trueness over concrete verifiability in an idea, and +I wish that he might be moved to explain. It is prior to +verification, to be sure, but so is the verifiability for which I +contend prior, just as a man's 'mortality' (which is nothing but +the possibility of his death) is prior to his death, but it can +hardly be that this abstract priority of all possibility to its +correlative fact is what so obstinate a quarrel is about. I think it +probable that Dr. Pratt is vaguely thinking of something concreter +than this. The trueness of an idea must mean SOMETHING DEFINITE IN +IT THAT DETERMINES ITS TENDENCY TO WORK, and indeed towards this +object rather than towards that. Undoubtedly there is something of +this sort in the idea, just as there is something in man +that accounts for his tendency towards death, and in bread that +accounts for its tendency to nourish. What that something is in +the case of truth psychology tells us: the idea has associates +peculiar to itself, motor as well as ideational; it tends by its +place and nature to call these into being, one after another; +and the appearance of them in succession is what we mean by the +'workings' of the idea. According to what they are, does the +trueness or falseness which the idea harbored come to light. These +tendencies have still earlier conditions which, in a general way, +biology, psychology and biography can trace. This whole chain of +natural causal conditions produces a resultant state of things in +which new relations, not simply causal, can now be found, or +into which they can now be introduced,--the relations namely which +we epistemologists study, relations of adaptation, of +substitutability, of instrumentality, of reference and of truth. + +The prior causal conditions, altho there could be no knowing of any +kind, true or false, without them, are but preliminary to the +question of what makes the ideas true or false when once their +tendencies have been obeyed. The tendencies must exist in some shape +anyhow, but their fruits are truth, falsity, or +irrelevancy, according to what they concretely turn out to be. They +are not 'saltatory' at any rate, for they evoke their consequences +contiguously, from next to next only; and not until the final result +of the whole associative sequence, actual or potential, is in our +mental sight, can we feel sure what its epistemological +significance, if it have any, may be. True knowing is, in fine, not +substantially, in itself, or 'as such,' inside of the idea from the +first, any more than mortality AS SUCH is inside of the man, +or nourishment AS SUCH inside of the bread. Something else is there +first, that practically MAKES FOR knowing, dying or nourishing, as +the case may be. That something is the 'nature' namely of the first +term, be it idea, man, or bread, that operates to start the causal +chain of processes which, when completed, is the complex fact to +which we give whatever functional name best fits the case. Another +nature, another chain of cognitive workings; and then either another +object known or the same object known differently, will ensue. + +Dr. Pratt perplexes me again by seeming to charge Dewey and Schiller +[Footnote: Page 200] (I am not sure that he charges me) with an +account of truth which would allow the object believed in not +to exist, even if the belief in it were true. 'Since the truth of an +idea,' he writes, 'means merely the fact that the idea works, that +fact is all that you mean when you say the idea is true' (p. 206). +'WHEN YOU SAY THE IDEA IS TRUE'--does that mean true for YOU, the +critic, or true for the believer whom you are describing? The +critic's trouble over this seems to come from his taking the word +'true' irrelatively, whereas the pragmatist always means 'true for +him who experiences the workings.' 'But is the object REALLY true or +not?'--the critic then seems to ask,--as if the pragmatist +were bound to throw in a whole ontology on top of his epistemology +and tell us what realities indubitably exist. 'One world at a time,' +would seem to be the right reply here. + +One other trouble of Dr. Pratt's must be noticed. It concerns the +'transcendence' of the object. When our ideas have worked so as +to bring us flat up against the object, NEXT to it, 'is our relation +to it then ambulatory or saltatory?' Dr. Pratt asks. If YOUR +headache be my object, 'MY experiences break off where yours begin,' +Dr. Pratt writes, and 'this fact is of great importance, for it bars +out the sense of transition and fulfilment which forms so important +an element in the pragmatist description of knowledge--the sense of +fulfilment due to a continuous passage from the original idea to the +known object. If this comes at all when I know your headache, it +comes not with the object, but quite on my side of +the "epistemological gulf." The gulf is still there to be +transcended.' (p. 158). + +Some day of course, or even now somewhere in the larger life of the +universe, different men's headaches may become confluent or be 'co- +conscious.' Here and now, however, headaches do transcend each other +and, when not felt, can be known only conceptually. My idea is that +you really have a headache; it works well with what I see of your +expression, and with what I hear you say; but it doesn't put me in +possession of the headache itself. I am still at one remove, and the +headache 'transcends' me, even tho it be in nowise transcendent of +human experience generally. Bit the 'gulf' here is that which the +pragmatist epistemology itself fixes in the very first words it +uses, by saying there must be an object and an idea. The idea +however doesn't immediately leap the gulf, it only works from next +to next so as to bridge it, fully or approximately. If it bridges +it, in the pragmatist's vision of his hypothetical universe, it can +be called a 'true' idea. If it only MIGHT bridge it, but doesn't, or +if it throws a bridge distinctly AT it, it still has, in the +onlooking pragmatist's eyes, what Professor Pratt calls +'trueness.' But to ask the pragmatist thereupon whether, when it +thus fails to coalesce bodily with the object, it is REALLY true or +has REAL trueness,--in other words whether the headache he +supposes, and supposes the thinker he supposes, to believe in, be a +real headache or not,--is to step from his hypothetical universe +of discourse into the altogether different world of natural fact. + + + +VIII + +THE PRAGMATIST ACCOUNT OF TRUTH AND ITS MISUNDERSTANDERS +[Footnote: Reprint from the Philosophical Review, January, 1908 +(vol. xvii, p. 1).] + + The account of truth given in my volume entitled Pragmatism, +continues to meet with such persistent misunderstanding that I +am tempted to make a final brief reply. My ideas may well deserve +refutation, but they can get none till they are conceived of in +their proper shape. The fantastic character of the +current misconceptions shows how unfamiliar is the concrete point of +view which pragmatism assumes. Persons who are familiar with a +conception move about so easily in it that they understand each +other at a hint, and can converse without anxiously attending to +their P's and Q's. I have to admit, in view of the results, that we +have assumed too ready an intelligence, and consequently in many +places used a language too slipshod. We should never have spoken +elliptically. The critics have boggled at every word they could +boggle at, and refused to take the spirit rather than the letter of +our discourse. This seems to show a genuine unfamiliarity in the +whole point of view. It also shows, I think, that the second stage +of opposition, which has already begun to express itself in the +stock phrase that 'what is new is not true, and what is true not +new,' in pragmatism, is insincere. If we said nothing in any degree +new, why was our meaning so desperately hard to catch? The +blame cannot be laid wholly upon our obscurity of speech, for in +other subjects we have attained to making ourselves understood. But +recriminations are tasteless; and, as far as I personally am +concerned, I am sure that some of the misconception I complain of is +due to my doctrine of truth being surrounded in that volume +of popular lectures by a lot of other opinions not necessarily +implicated with it, so that a reader may very naturally have grown +confused. For this I am to blame,--likewise for omitting certain +explicit cautions, which the pages that follow will now in part +supply. + +FIRST MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM IS ONLY A RE-EDITING OF +POSITIVISM. + +This seems the commonest mistake. Scepticism, positivism, and +agnosticism agree with ordinary dogmatic rationalism in +presupposing that everybody knows what the word 'truth' means, +without further explanation. But the former doctrines then either +suggest or declare that real truth, absolute truth, is inaccessible +to us, and that we must fain put up with relative or phenomenal +truth as its next best substitute. By scepticism this is treated as +an unsatisfactory state of affairs, while positivism and agnosticism +are cheerful about it, call real truth sour grapes, and consider +phenomenal truth quite sufficient for all our 'practical' purposes. + +In point of fact, nothing could be farther from all this than what +pragmatism has to say of truth. Its thesis is an altogether +previous one. It leaves off where these other theories begin, having +contented itself with the word truth's DEFINITION. 'No matter +whether any mind extant in the universe possess truth or not,' it +asks, 'what does the notion of truth signify IDEALLY?' 'What kind of +things would true judgments be IN CASE they existed?' The answer +which pragmatism offers is intended to cover the most complete truth +that can be conceived of, 'absolute' truth if you like, as well +as truth of the most relative and imperfect description. This +question of what truth would be like if it did exist, belongs +obviously to a purely speculative field of inquiry. It is not a +theory about any sort of reality, or about what kind of knowledge is +actually possible; it abstracts from particular terms altogether, +and defines the nature of a possible relation between two of them. + +As Kant's question about synthetic judgments had escaped previous +philosophers, so the pragmatist question is not only so subtile as +to have escaped attention hitherto, but even so subtile, it would +seem, that when openly broached now, dogmatists and sceptics +alike fail to apprehend it, and deem the pragmatist to be treating +of something wholly different. He insists, they say (I quote an +actual critic), 'that the greater problems are insoluble by human +intelligence, that our need of knowing truly is artificial and +illusory, and that our reason, incapable of reaching the +foundations of reality, must turn itself exclusively +towards ACTION.' There could not be a worse misapprehension. + +SECOND MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM IS PRIMARILY AN APPEAL TO +ACTION. + +The name 'pragmatism,' with its suggestions of action, has been an +unfortunate choice, I have to admit, and has played into the +hands of this mistake. But no word could protect the doctrine from +critics so blind to the nature of the inquiry that, when Dr. +Schiller speaks of ideas 'working' well, the only thing they think +of is their immediate workings in the physical environment, their +enabling us to make money, or gain some similar +'practical' advantage. Ideas do work thus, of course, immediately or +remotely; but they work indefinitely inside of the mental world +also. Not crediting us with this rudimentary insight, our critics +treat our view as offering itself exclusively to engineers, doctors, +financiers, and men of action generally, who need some sort of +a rough and ready weltanschauung, but have no time or wit to study +genuine philosophy. It is usually described as a characteristically +American movement, a sort of bobtailed scheme of thought, +excellently fitted for the man on the street, who naturally hates +theory and wants cash returns immediately. + +It is quite true that, when the refined theoretic question that +pragmatism begins with is once answered, secondary corollaries of a +practical sort follow. Investigation shows that, in the function +called truth, previous realities are not the only independent +variables. To a certain extent our ideas, being realities, are +also independent variables, and, just as they follow other reality +and fit it, so, in a measure, does other reality follow and fit +them. When they add themselves to being, they partly redetermine the +existent, so that reality as a whole appears incompletely definable +unless ideas also are kept account of. This pragmatist +doctrine, exhibiting our ideas as complemental factors of reality, +throws open (since our ideas are instigators of our action) a wide +window upon human action, as well as a wide license to +originality in thought. But few things could be sillier than to +ignore the prior epistemological edifice in which the window is +built, or to talk as if pragmatism began and ended at the +window. This, nevertheless, is what our critics do almost without +exception. They ignore our primary step and its motive, and make the +relation to action, which is our secondary achievement, primary. + +THIRD MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISTS CUT THEMSELVES OFF FROM THE +RIGHT TO BELIEVE IN EJECTIVE REALITIES. + +They do so, according to the critics, by making the truth of our +beliefs consist in their verifiability, and their verifiability in +the way in which they do work for us. Professor Stout, in his +otherwise admirable and hopeful review of Schiller in Mind for +October, 1897, considers that this ought to lead Schiller (could he +sincerely realize the effects of his own doctrine) to the absurd +consequence of being unable to believe genuinely in another +man's headache, even were the headache there. He can only +'postulate' it for the sake of the working value of the postulate to +himself. The postulate guides certain of his acts and leads +to advantageous consequences; but the moment he understands fully +that the postulate is true ONLY (!) in this sense, it ceases (or +should cease) to be true for him that the other man really HAS a +headache. All that makes the postulate most precious then +evaporates: his interest in his fellow-man 'becomes a veiled form +of self-interest, and his world grows cold, dull, and heartless.' + +Such an objection makes a curious muddle of the pragmatist's +universe of discourse. Within that universe the pragmatist finds +some one with a headache or other feeling, and some one else who +postulates that feeling. Asking on what condition the postulate is +'true' the pragmatist replies that, for the postulator at any rate, +it is true just in proportion as to believe in it works in him the +fuller sum of satisfactions. What is it that is satisfactory +here? Surely to BELIEVE in the postulated object, namely, in the +really existing feeling of the other man. But how (especially if the +postulator were himself a thoroughgoing pragmatist) could it ever be +satisfactory to him NOT to believe in that feeling, so long as, in +Professor Stout's words, disbelief 'made the world seem to him cold, +dull, and heartless'? Disbelief would seem, on pragmatist +principles, quite out of the question under such conditions, +unless the heartlessness of the world were made probable already on +other grounds. And since the belief in the headache, true for the +subject assumed in the pragmatist's universe of discourse, is also +true for the pragmatist who for his epitemologizing purposes has +assumed that entire universe, why is it not true in that +universe absolutely? The headache believed in is a reality there, +and no extant mind disbelieves it, neither the critic's mind nor his +subject's! Have our opponents any better brand of truth in this real +universe of ours that they can show us? [Footnote: I see here a +chance to forestall a criticism which some one may make on Lecture +III of my Pragmatism, where, on pp. 96-100, I said that 'God' and +'Matter' might be regarded as synonymous terms, so long as no +differing future consequences were deducible from the two +conceptions. The passage was transcribed from my address at the +California Philosophical Union, reprinted in the Journal of +Philosophy, vol. i, p. 673. I had no sooner given the address than I +perceived a flaw in that part of it; but I have left the passage +unaltered ever since, because the flaw did not spoil its +illustrative value. The flaw was evident when, as a case analogous +to that of a godless universe, I thought of what I called an +'automatic sweetheart,' meaning a soulless body which should be +absolutely indistinguishable from a spiritually animated maiden, +laughing, talking, blushing, nursing us, and performing all feminine +offices as tactfully and sweetly as if a soul were in her. Would +any one regard her as a full equivalent? Certainly not, and +why? Because, framed as we are, our egoism craves above all +things inward sympathy and recognition, love and admiration. +The outward treatment is valued mainly as an expression, as +a manifestation of the accompanying consciousness believed +in. Pragmatically, then, belief in the automatic sweetheart +would not work, and is point of fact no one treats it as a +serious hypothesis. The godless universe would be exactly +similar. Even if matter could do every outward thing that God does, +the idea of it would not work as satisfactorily, because the +chief call for a God on modern men's part is for a being who will +inwardly recognize them and judge them sympathetically. Matter +disappoints this craving of our ego, so God remains for most men the +truer hypothesis, and indeed remains so for definite pragmatic +reasons.] + +So much for the third misunderstanding, which is but one +specification of the following still wider one. + +FOURTH MISUNDERSTANDING: NO PRAGMATIST CAN BE A REALIST IN HIS +EPISTEMOLOGY. + +This is supposed to follow from his statement that the truth of our +beliefs consists in general in their giving satisfaction. Of +course satisfaction per se is a subjective condition; so the +conclusion is drawn that truth falls wholly inside of the subject, +who then may manufacture it at his pleasure. True beliefs become +thus wayward affections, severed from all responsibility to other +parts of experience. + +It is difficult to excuse such a parody of the pragmatist's opinion, +ignoring as it does every element but one of his universe of +discourse. The terms of which that universe consists +positively forbid any non-realistic interpretation of the function +of knowledge defined there. The pragmatizing epistemologist posits +there a reality and a mind with ideas. What, now, he asks, can make +those ideas true of that reality? Ordinary epistemology contents +itself with the vague statement that the ideas must 'correspond' or +'agree'; the pragmatist insists on being more concrete, and asks +what such 'agreement' may mean in detail. He finds first that the +ideas must point to or lead towards THAT reality and no other, and +then that the pointings and leadings must yield satisfaction as +their result. So far the pragmatist is hardly less abstract than the +ordinary slouchy epistemologist; but as he defines himself +farther, he grows more concrete. The entire quarrel of the +intellectualist with him is over his concreteness, intellectualism +contending that the vaguer and more abstract account is here the +more profound. The concrete pointing and leading are conceived by +the pragmatist to be the work of other portions of the same +universe to which the reality and the mind belong, +intermediary verifying bits of experience with which the mind at one +end, and the reality at the other, are joined. The 'satisfaction,' +in turn, is no abstract satisfaction ueberhaupt, felt by an +unspecified being, but is assumed to consist of such satisfactions +(in the plural) as concretely existing men actually do find in +their beliefs. As we humans are constituted in point of fact, we +find that to believe in other men's minds, in independent physical +realities, in past events, in eternal logical relations, +is satisfactory. We find hope satisfactory. We often find it +satisfactory to cease to doubt. Above all we find CONSISTENCY +satisfactory, consistency between the present idea and the entire +rest of our mental equipment, including the whole order of our +sensations, and that of our intuitions of likeness and difference, +and our whole stock of previously acquired truths. + +The pragmatist, being himself a man, and imagining in general no +contrary lines of truer belief than ours about the 'reality' which +he has laid at the base of his epistemological discussion, is +willing to treat our satisfactions as possibly really true guides to +it, not as guides true solely for US. It would seem here to be +the duty of his critics to show with some explicitness why, being +our subjective feelings, these satisfactions can not yield +'objective' truth. The beliefs which they accompany 'posit' +the assumed reality, 'correspond' and 'agree' with it, and 'fit' it +in perfectly definite and assignable ways, through the sequent +trains of thought and action which form their verification, so +merely to insist on using these words abstractly instead of +concretely is no way of driving the pragmatist from the field,-- +his more concrete account virtually includes his critic's. If our +critics have any definite idea of a truth more objectively grounded +than the kind we propose, why do they not show it more articulately? +As they stand, they remind one of Hegel's man who wanted +'fruit,' but rejected cherries, pears, and grapes, because they were +not fruit in the abstract. We offer them the full quart-pot, and +they cry for the empty quart-capacity. + +But here I think I hear some critic retort as follows: 'If +satisfactions are all that is needed to make truth, how about the +notorious fact that errors are so often satisfactory? And how about +the equally notorious fact that certain true beliefs may cause the +bitterest dissatisfaction? Isn't it clear that not the +satisfaction which it gives, but the relation of the belief TO THE +REALITY is all that makes it true? Suppose there were no such +reality, and that the satisfactions yet remained: would they not +then effectively work falsehood? Can they consequently be treated +distinctively as the truth-builders? It is the INHERENT RELATION TO +REALITY of a belief that gives us that specific TRUTH-satisfaction, +compared with which all other satisfactions are the hollowest +humbug. The satisfaction of KNOWING TRULY is thus the only one which +the pragmatist ought to have considered. As a PSYCHOLOGICAL +SENTIMENT, the anti-pragmatist gladly concedes it to him, but then +only as a concomitant of truth, not as a constituent. What +CONSTITUTES truth is not the sentiment, but the purely logical or +objective function of rightly cognizing the reality, and the +pragmatist's failure to reduce this function to lower values is +patent.' + +Such anti-pragmatism as this seems to me a tissue of confusion. To +begin with, when the pragmatist says 'indispensable,' it +confounds this with 'sufficient.' The pragmatist calls satisfactions +indispensable for truth-building, but I have everywhere called them +insufficient unless reality be also incidentally led to. If +the reality assumed were cancelled from the pragmatist's universe of +discourse, he would straightway give the name of falsehoods to the +beliefs remaining, in spite of all their satisfactoriness. For him, +as for his critic, there can be no truth if there is nothing to be +true about. Ideas are so much flat psychological surface unless +some mirrored matter gives them cognitive lustre. This is why as a +pragmatist I have so carefully posited 'reality' AB INITIO, and +why, throughout my whole discussion, I remain an epistemological +realist. [Footnote: I need hardly remind the reader that both sense- +percepts and percepts of ideal relation (comparisons, etc.) should +be classed among the realities. The bulk of our mental +'stock' consists of truths concerning these terms.] + +The anti-pragmatist is guilty of the further confusion of imagining +that, in undertaking to give him an account of what truth +formally means, we are assuming at the same time to provide a +warrant for it, trying to define the occasions when he can be sure +of materially possessing it. Our making it hinge on a reality so +'independent' that when it comes, truth comes, and when it goes, +truth goes with it, disappoints this naive expectation, so he +deems our description unsatisfactory. I suspect that under this +confusion lies the still deeper one of not discriminating +sufficiently between the two notions, truth and reality. Realities +are not TRUE, they ARE; and beliefs are true OF them. But I suspect +that in the anti-pragmatist mind the two notions sometimes swap +their attributes. The reality itself, I fear, is treated as if +'true' and conversely. Whoso tells us of the one, it is then +supposed, must also be telling us of the other; and a true idea must +in a manner BE, or at least YIELD without extraneous aid, the +reality it cognitively is possessed of. + +To this absolute-idealistic demand pragmatism simply opposes its non +possumus. If there is to be truth, it says, both realities and +beliefs about them must conspire to make it; but whether there ever +is such a thing, or how anyone can be sure that his own beliefs +possess it, it never pretends to determine. That truth-satisfaction +par excellence which may tinge a belief unsatisfactory in other +ways, it easily explains as the feeling of consistency with +the stock of previous truths, or supposed truths, of which one's +whole past experience may have left one in possession. + +But are not all pragmatists sure that their own belief is right? +their enemies will ask at this point; and this leads me to the + +FIFTH MISUNDERSTANDING: WHAT PRAGMATISTS SAY IS INCONSISTENT WITH +THEIR SAYING SO. + +A correspondent puts this objection as follows: 'When you say to +your audience, "pragmatism is the truth concerning truth," the +first truth is different from the second. About the first you and +they are not to be at odds; you are not giving them liberty to take +or leave it according as it works satisfactorily or not for their +private uses. Yet the second truth, which ought to describe and +include the first, affirms this liberty. Thus the INTENT of your +utterance seems to contradict the CONTENT of it.' + +General scepticism has always received this same classic refutation. +'You have to dogmatize,' the rationalists say to the sceptics,' +whenever you express the sceptical position; so your lives keep +contradicting your thesis.' One would suppose that the impotence of +so hoary an argument to abate in the slightest degree the amount of +general scepticism in the world might have led some rationalists +themselves to doubt whether these instantaneous logical refutations +are such fatal ways, after all, of killing off live mental +attitudes. General scepticism is the live mental attitude +of refusing to conclude. It is a permanent torpor of the will, +renewing itself in detail towards each successive thesis that +offers, and you can no more kill it off by logic than yon can +kill off obstinacy or practical joking. This is why it is so +irritating. Your consistent sceptic never puts his scepticism into a +formal proposition,--he simply chooses it as a habit. He provokingly +hangs back when he might so easily join us in saying yes, but he is +not illogical or stupid,--on the contrary, he often impresses us by +his intellectual superiority. This is the REAL scepticism that +rationalists have to meet, and their logic does not even touch it. + +No more can logic kill the pragmatist's behavior: his act of +utterance, so far from contradicting, accurately exemplifies the +matter which he utters. What is the matter which he utters? In part, +it is this, that truth, concretely considered, is an attribute of +our beliefs, and that these are attitudes that follow satisfactions. +The ideas around which the satisfactions cluster are primarily only +hypotheses that challenge or summon a belief to come and take its +stand upon them. The pragmatist's idea of truth is just such a +challenge. He finds it ultra-satisfactory to accept it, and takes +his own stand accordingly. But, being gregarious as they are, men +seek to spread their beliefs, to awaken imitation, to infect others. +Why should not YOU also find the same belief satisfactory? thinks +the pragmatist, and forthwith endeavors to convert you. You and he +will then believe similarly; you will hold up your subject-end of a +truth, which will be a truth objective and irreversible if the +reality holds up the object-end by being itself +present simultaneously. What there is of self-contradiction in all +this I confess I cannot discover. The pragmatist's conduct in his +own case seems to me on the contrary admirably to illustrate his +universal formula; and of all epistemologists, he is perhaps the +only one who is irreproachably self-consistent. + +SIXTH MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM EXPLAINS NOT WHAT TRUTH IS, BUT +ONLY HOW IT IS ARRIVED AT. + +In point of fact it tells us both, tells us what it is incidentally +to telling us how it is arrived at,--for what IS arrived at except +just what the truth is? If I tell you how to get to the railroad +station, don't I implicitly introduce you to the WHAT, to the being +and nature of that edifice? It is quite true that the abstract WORD +'how' hasn't the same meaning as the abstract WORD 'what,' but in +this universe of concrete facts you cannot keep hows and +whats asunder. The reasons why I find it satisfactory to believe +that any idea is true, the HOW of my arriving at that belief, may be +among the very reasons why the idea IS true in reality. If not, I +summon the anti-pragmatist to explain the impossibility +articulately. + +His trouble seems to me mainly to arise from his fixed inability to +understand how a concrete statement can possibly mean as much, or be +as valuable, as an abstract one. I said above that the main quarrel +between us and our critics was that of concreteness +VERSUS abstractness. This is the place to develop that point +farther. + +In the present question, the links of experience sequent upon an +idea, which mediate between it and a reality, form and for +the pragmatist indeed ARE, the CONCRETE relation of truth that may +obtain between the idea and that reality. They, he says, are all +that we mean when we speak of the idea 'pointing' to the reality, +'fitting' it, 'corresponding' with it, or 'agreeing' with it,--they +or other similar mediating trains of verification. Such +mediating events make the idea 'true.' The idea itself, if it exists +at all, is also a concrete event: so pragmatism insists that truth +in the singular is only a collective name for truths in the plural, +these consisting always of series of definite events; and that what +intellectualism calls the truth, the inherent truth, of any one such +series is only the abstract name for its truthfulness in act, for +the fact that the ideas there do lead to the supposed reality in a +way that we consider satisfactory. + +The pragmatist himself has no objection to abstractions. +Elliptically, and 'for short,' he relies on them as much as any one, +ending upon innumerable occasions that their comparative emptiness +makes of them useful substitutes for the overfulness of the facts he +meets, with. But he never ascribes to them a higher grade of +reality. The full reality of a truth for him is always some process +of verification, in which the abstract property of connecting ideas +with objects truly is workingly embodied. Meanwhile it is endlessly +serviceable to be able to talk of properties abstractly and apart +from their working, to find them the same in innumerable cases, to +take them 'out of time,' and to treat of their relations to other +similar abstractions. We thus form whole universes of platonic ideas +ante rem, universes in posse, tho none of them exists effectively +except in rebus. Countless relations obtain there which nobody +experiences as obtaining,--as, in the eternal universe of musical +relations, for example, the notes of Aennchen von Tharau were a +lovely melody long ere mortal ears ever heard them. Even so the +music of the future sleeps now, to be awakened hereafter. Or, if we +take the world of geometrical relations, the thousandth decimal of +'pi' sleeps there, tho no one may ever try to compute it. Or, if +we take the universe of 'fitting,' countless coats 'fit' backs, and +countless boots 'fit' feet, on which they are not practically +FITTED; countless stones 'fit' gaps in walls into which no one seeks +to fit them actually. In the same way countless opinions 'fit' +realities, and countless truths are valid, tho no thinker +ever thinks them. + +For the anti-pragmatist these prior timeless relations are the +presupposition of the concrete ones, and possess the profounder +dignity and value. The actual workings of our ideas in verification- +processes are as naught in comparison with the 'obtainings' of +this discarnate truth within them. + +For the pragmatist, on the contrary,--all discarnate truth is +static, impotent, and relatively spectral, full truth being the +truth that energizes and does battle. Can any one suppose that the +sleeping quality of truth would ever have been abstracted or have +received a name, if truths had remained forever in that storage- + vault of essential timeless 'agreements' and had never been +embodied in any panting struggle of men's live ideas for +verification? Surely no more than the abstract property of +'fitting' would have received a name, if in our world there had been +no backs or feet or gaps in walls to be actually fitted. EXISTENTIAL +truth is incidental to the actual competition of opinions. ESSENTIAL +truth, the truth of the intellectualists, the truth with no one +thinking it, is like the coat that fits tho no one has ever tried it +on, like the music that no ear has listened to. It is less real, not +more real, than the verified article; and to attribute a superior +degree of glory to it seems little more than a piece of perverse +abstraction-worship. As well might a pencil insist that the outline +is the essential thing in all pictorial representation, and chide +the paint-brush and the camera for omitting it, forgetting that +THEIR pictures not only contain the whole outline, but a hundred +other things in addition. Pragmatist truth contains the whole of +intellectualist truth and a hundred other things in addition. +Intellectualist truth is then only pragmatist truth in posse. +That on innumerable occasions men do substitute truth in posse or +verifiability, for verification or truth in act, is a fact to which +no one attributes more importance than the pragmatist: he emphasizes +the practical utility of such a habit. But he does not on that +account consider truth in posse,--truth not alive enough ever to +have been asserted or questioned or contradicted, to be the +metaphysically prior thing, to which truths in act are tributary and +subsidiary. When intellectualists do this, pragmatism charges them +with inverting the real relation. Truth in posse MEANS only +truths in act; and he insists that these latter take precedence in +the order of logic as well as in that of being. + +SEVENTH MINUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM IGNORES THE THEORETICAL +INTEREST. + +This would seem to be an absolutely wanton slander, were not a +certain excuse to be found in the linguistic affinities of the word +'pragmatism,' and in certain offhand habits of speech of ours which +assumed too great a generosity on our reader's part. When we +spoke of the meaning of ideas consisting "in their 'practical' +consequences", or of the 'practical' differences which our beliefs +make to us; when we said that the truth of a belief consists in +its 'working' value, etc.; our language evidently was too careless, +for by 'practical' we were almost unanimously held to mean OPPOSED +to theoretical or genuinely cognitive, and the consequence was +punctually drawn that a truth in our eyes could have no relation to +any independent reality, or to any other truth, or to anything +whatever but the acts which we might ground on it or the +satisfactions they might bring. The mere existence of the idea, all +by itself, if only its results were satisfactory, would give full +truth to it, it was charged, in our absurd pragmatist epistemology. +The solemn attribution of this rubbish to us was also encouraged by +two other circumstances. First, ideas ARE practically useful in the +narrow sense, false ideas sometimes, but most often ideas which we +can verify by the sum total of all their leadings, and the reality +of whose objects may thus be considered established beyond +doubt. That these ideas should be true in advance of and apart from +their utility, that, in other words, their objects should be +really there, is the very condition of their having that kind of +utility,--the objects they connect us with are so important that the +ideas which serve as the objects' substitutes grow important +also. This manner of their practical working was the first thing +that made truths good in the eyes of primitive men; and buried among +all the other good workings by which true beliefs are +characterized, this kind of subsequential utility remains. + +The second misleading circumstance was the emphasis laid by Schiller +and Dewey on the fact that, unless a truth be relevant to the mind's +momentary predicament, unless it be germane to the 'practical' +situation,--meaning by this the quite particular perplexity,--it is +no good to urge it. It doesn't meet our interests any better than a +falsehood would under the same circumstances. But why +our predicaments and perplexities might not be theoretical here as +well as narrowly practical, I wish that our critics would explain. +They simply assume that no pragmatist CAN admit a genuinely +theoretic interest. Having used the phrase 'cash-value' of an idea, +I am implored by one correspondent to alter it, 'for every one +thinks you mean only pecuniary profit and loss.' Having said that +the true is 'the expedient in our thinking,' I am rebuked in this +wise by another learned correspondent: + +'The word expedient has no other meaning than that of self-interest. +The pursuit of this has ended by landing a number of officers +of national banks in penitentiaries. A philosophy that leads to such +results must be unsound.' + +But the word 'practical' is so habitually loosely used that more +indulgence might have been expected. When one says that a sick +man has now practically recovered, or that an enterprise has +practically failed, one usually means I just the opposite of +practically in the literal sense. One means that, altho untrue in +strict practice, what one says is true in theory, true virtually, +certain to be true. Again, by the practical one often means the +distinctively concrete, the individual, particular, and +effective, as opposed to the abstract, general, and inert. To speak +for myself, whenever I have emphasized the practical nature of +truth, this is mainly what has been in my mind. 'Pragmata' +are things in their plurality; and in that early California address, +when I described pragmatism as holding that the meaning of any +proposition can always be brought down to some +particular consequence in our future practical experience, whether +passive or active, expressly added these qualifying words: the point +lying rather in the fact that the experience must be particular than +in the fact that it must be active,--by 'active' meaning here +'practical' in the narrow literal sense. [Footnote: The ambiguity of +the word 'practical' comes out well in these words of a recent +would-be reporter of our views: 'Pragmatism is an Anglo-Saxon +reaction against the intellectualism and rationalism of the Latin +mind.... Man, each individual man is the measure of things. He is +able to conceive one but relative truths, that is to say, illusions. +What these illusions are worth is revealed to him, not by general +theory, but by individual practice. Pragmatism, which consists +in experiencing these illusions of the mind and obeying them +by acting them out, is a PHILOSOPHY WITHOUT WORDS, a philosophy of +GESTURES AND OF ACTS, which abandons what is general and olds only +to what is particular.' (Bourdeau, in Journal des. debats, October +89, 1907.)] But particular consequences can perfectly well be of a +theoretic nature. Every remote fact which we infer from an idea is a +particular theoretic consequence which our mind practically works +towards. The loss of every old opinion of ours which we see that we +shall have to give up if a new opinion be true, is a particular +theoretic as well as a particular practical consequence. After man's +interest in breathing freely, the greatest of all his interests +(because it never fluctuates or remits, as most of his +physical interests do), is his interest in consistency, in feeling +that what he now thinks goes with what he thinks on other occasions. +We tirelessly compare truth with truth for this sole purpose. Is the +present candidate for belief perhaps contradicted by principle +number one? Is it compatible with fact number two? and so forth. The +particular operations here are the purely logical ones of analysis, +deduction, comparison, etc.; and altho general terms may be used ad +libitum, the satisfactory practical working of the candidate--idea +consists in the consciousness yielded by each successive theoretic +consequence in particular. It is therefore simply idiotic to repeat +that pragmatism takes no account of purely theoretic interests. All +it insists on is that verity in act means VERIFICATIONS, and that +these are always particulars. Even in exclusively theoretic matters, +it insists that vagueness and generality serve to verify nothing. + +EIGHTH MISUNDERSTANDING: PRAGMATISM IS SHUT UP TO SOLIPSISM. + +I have already said something about this misconception under the +third and fourth heads, above, but a little more may be helpful. The +objection is apt to clothe itself in words like these: 'You make +truth to consist in every value except the cognitive value proper; +you always leave your knower at many removes (or, at the uttermost, +at one remove) from his real object; the best you do is to let his +ideas carry him towards it; it remains forever outside of him,' etc. + +I think that the leaven working here is the rooted intellectualist +persuasion that, to know a reality, an idea must in some +inscrutable fashion possess or be it. [Footnote: Sensations may, +indeed, possess their objects or coalesce with them, as common sense +supposes that they do; and intuited differences between concepts may +coalesce with the 'eternal' objective differences; but to simplify +our discussion. here we can afford to abstract from these very +special cases of knowing.] For pragmatism this kind of coalescence +is inessential. As a rule our cognitions are only processes of mind +off their balance and in motion towards real termini; and the +reality of the termini, believed in by the states of mind in +question, can be guaranteed only by some wider knower [Footnote: The +transcendental idealist thinks that, in some inexplicable way, the +finite states of mind are identical with the transfinite all-knower +which he finds himself obliged to postulate in order to supply a +fundamentum far the relation of knowing, as he apprehends it. +Pragmatists can leave the question of identity open; but they cannot +do without the wider knower any more than they can do without the +reality, if they want to prove a case of knowing. They themselves +play the part of the absolute knower for the universe of discourse +which serves them as material for epistemologizing. They warrant the +reality there, and the subject's true knowledge, there, of it. +But whether what they themselves say about that whole universe is +objectively true, i.e., whether the pragmatic theory of truth is +true really, they cannot warrant,--they can only believe it To their +hearers they can only propose it, as I propose it to my readers, as +something to be verified ambulando, or by the way is which its +consequences may confirm it]. But if there is no reason extant in +the universe why they should be doubted, the beliefs are true in the +only sense in which anything can be true anyhow: they are +practically and concretely true, namely. True in the mystical +mongrel sense of an Identitatsphilosophie they need not be; nor is +there any intelligible reason why they ever need be true otherwise +than verifiably and practically. It is reality's part to possess its +own existence; it is thought's part to get into 'touch' with it by +innumerable paths of verification. + +I fear that the 'humanistic' developments of pragmatism may cause a +certain difficulty here. We get at one truth only through the rest +of truth; and the reality, everlastingly postulated as that which +all our truth must keep in touch with, may never be given to us save +in the form of truth other than that which we are now testing. But +since Dr. Schiller has shown that all our truths, even the most +elemental, are affected by race-inheritance with a +human coefficient, reality per se thus may appear only as a sort of +limit; it may be held to shrivel to the mere PLACE for an object, +and what is known may be held to be only matter of our psyche that +we fill the place with. It must be confessed that pragmatism, worked +in this humanistic way, is COMPATIBLE with solipsism. It joins +friendly hands with the agnostic part of kantism, with +contemporary agnosticism, and with idealism generally. But worked +thus, it is a metaphysical theory about the matter of reality, and +flies far beyond pragmatism's own modest analysis of the nature of +the knowing function, which analysis may just as harmoniously be +combined with less humanistic accounts of reality. One +of pragmatism's merits is that it is so purely epistemological. It +must assume realities; but it prejudges nothing as to their +constitution, and the most diverse metaphysics can use it as +their foundation. It certainly has no special affinity with +solipsism. + +As I look back over what I have written, much of it gives me a queer +impression, as if the obvious were set forth so condescendingly that +readers might well laugh at my pomposity. It may be, however, that +concreteness as radical as ours is not so obvious. The +whole originality of pragmatism, the whole point in it, is its use +of the concrete way of seeing. It begins with concreteness, and +returns and ends with it. Dr. Schiller, with his two +'practical' aspects of truth, (1) relevancy to situation, and (2) +subsequential utility, is only filling the cup of concreteness to +the brim for us. Once seize that cup, and you cannot misunderstand +pragmatism. It seems as if the power of imagining the world +concretely MIGHT have been common enough to let our readers +apprehend us better, as if they might have read between our +lines, and, in spite of all our infelicities of expression, guessed +a little more correctly what our thought was. But alas! this was not +on fate's programme, so we can only think, with the German ditty:-- + + "Es waer' zu schoen gewesen, Es hat nicht sollen sein." + + + +IX + +THE MEANING OF THE WORD TRUTH +[Footnote: Remarks at the meeting of the American Philosophical +Association, Cornell University, December, 1907.] + +My account of truth is realistic, and follows the epistemological +dualism of common sense. Suppose I say to you 'The thing exists'-- +is that true or not? How can you tell? Not till my statement has +developed its meaning farther is it determined as being true, false, +or irrelevant to reality altogether. But if now you ask 'what +thing?' and I reply 'a desk'; if you ask 'where?' and I point to a +place; if you ask 'does it exist materially, or only in +imagination?' and I say 'materially'; if moreover I say 'I mean that +desk' and then grasp and shake a desk which you see just as I have +described it, you are willing to call my statement true. But you and +I are commutable here; we can exchange places; and, as you go bail +for my desk, so I can go bail for yours. + +This notion of a reality independent of either of us, taken from +ordinary social experience, lies at the base of the pragmatist +definition of truth. With some such reality any statement, in order +to be counted true, must agree. Pragmatism defines 'agreeing' to +mean certain ways of 'working,' be they actual or potential. Thus, +for my statement 'the desk exists' to be true of a desk recognized +as real by you, it must be able to lead me to shake your desk, to +explain myself by words that suggest that desk to your mind, to make +a drawing that is like the desk you see, etc. Only in such ways as +this is there sense in saying it agrees with THAT reality, only thus +does it gain for me the satisfaction of hearing you corroborate me. +Reference then to something determinate, and some sort of adaptation +to it worthy of the name of agreement, are thus constituent elements +in the definition of any statement of mine as 'true'. + +You cannot get at either the reference or the adaptation without +using the notion of the workings. THAT the thing is, WHAT it is, +and WHICH it is (of all the possible things with that what) are +points determinable only by the pragmatic method. The 'which' means +a possibility of pointing, or of otherwise singling out the special +object; the 'what' means choice on our part of an essential aspect +to conceive it by (and this is always relative to what Dewey +calls our own 'situation'); and the 'that' means our assumption of +the attitude of belief, the reality-recognizing attitude. Surely +for understanding what the word 'true' means as applied to a +statement, the mention of such workings is indispensable. Surely if +we leave them out the subject and the object of the +cognitive relation float-in the same universe, 'tis true--but +vaguely and ignorantly and without mutual contact or mediation. + +Our critics nevertheless call the workings inessential. No +functional possibilities 'make' our beliefs true, they say; they are +true inherently, true positively, born 'true' as the Count of +Chambord was born 'Henri-Cinq.' Pragmatism insists, on the contrary, +that statements and beliefs are thus inertly and statically true +only by courtesy: they practically pass for true; but you CANNOT +DEFINE WHAT YOU MEAN by calling them true without referring to +their functional possibilities. These give its whole LOGICAL CONTENT +to that relation to reality on a belief's part to which the name +'truth' is applied, a relation which otherwise remains one of mere +coexistence or bare withness. + + + +The foregoing statements reproduce the essential content of the +lecture on Truth in my book PRAGMATISM. Schiller's doctrine of +'humanism,' Dewey's 'Studies in logical theory,' and my own 'radical +empiricism,' all involve this general notion of truth as 'working,' +either actual or conceivable. But they envelop it as only one detail +in the midst of much wider theories that aim eventually at +determining the notion of what 'reality' at large is in its ultimate +nature and constitution. + + + +X + +THE EXISTENCE OF JULIUS CAESAR +[Footnote: Originally printed under the title of 'Truth versus +Truthfulness,' in the Journal of Philosophy.] + + My account of truth is purely logical and relates to its definition +only. I contend that you cannot tell what the WORD 'true' MEANS, +as applied to a statement, without invoking the CONCEPT OF THE +STATEMENTS WORKINGS. + +Assume, to fix our ideas, a universe composed of two things only: +imperial Caesar dead and turned to clay, and me, saying +'Caesar really existed.' Most persons would naively deem truth to be +thereby uttered, and say that by a sort of actio in distans my +statement had taken direct hold of the other fact. + +But have my words so certainly denoted THAT Caesar?--or so certainly +connoted HIS individual attributes? To fill out the complete measure +of what the epithet 'true' may ideally mean, my thought ought to +bear a fully determinate and unambiguous 'one-to-one-relation' to +its own particular object. In the ultrasimple universe imagined the +reference is uncertified. Were there two Caesars we shouldn't know +which was meant. The conditions of truth thus seem incomplete in +this universe of discourse so that it must be enlarged. + + Transcendentalists enlarge it by invoking an absolute mind which, +as it owns all the facts, can sovereignly correlate them. If it +intends that my statement SHALL refer to that identical Caesar, and +that the attributes I have in mind SHALL mean his attributes, that +intention suffices to make the statement true. + + I, in turn, enlarge the universe by admitting finite intermediaries +between the two original facts. Caesar HAD, and my statement HAS, +effects; and if these effects in any way run together, a concrete +medium and bottom is provided for the determinate cognitive +relation, which, as a pure ACTIO IN DISTANS, seemed to float too +vaguely and unintelligibly. + + The real Caesar, for example, wrote a manuscript of which I see a +real reprint, and say 'the Caesar I mean is the author of THAT.' +The workings of my thought thus determine both its denotative and +its connotative significance more fully. It now defines itself as +neither irrelevant to the real Caesar, nor false in what it suggests +of him. The absolute mind, seeing me thus working towards Caesar +through the cosmic intermediaries, might well say: 'Such workings +only specify in detail what I meant myself by the statement being +true. I decree the cognitive relation between the two original facts +to mean that just that kind of concrete chain of intermediaries +exists or can exist.' + +But the chain involves facts prior to the statement the logical +conditions of whose truth we are defining, and facts subsequent to +it; and this circumstance, coupled with the vulgar employment of the +terms truth and fact as synonyms, has laid my account open +to misapprehension. 'How,' it is confusedly asked, 'can Caesar's +existence, a truth already 2000 years old, depend for its truth on +anything about to happen now? How can my acknowledgment of it be +made true by the acknowledgment's own effects? The effects may +indeed confirm my belief, but the belief was made true already by +the fact that Caesar really did exist.' + +Well, be it so, for if there were no Caesar, there could, of course, +be no positive truth about him--but then distinguish between 'true' +as being positively and completely so established, and 'true' as +being so only 'practically,' elliptically, and by courtesy, in +the sense of not being positively irrelevant or UNtrue. Remember +also that Caesar's having existed in fact may make a present +statement false or irrelevant as well as it may make it true, and +that in neither case does it itself have to alter. It being given, +whether truth, untruth, or irrelevancy shall be also given +depends on something coming from the statement itself. What +pragmatism contends for is that you cannot adequately DEFINE the +something if you leave the notion of the statement's functional +workings out of your account. Truth meaning agreement with reality, +the mode of the agreeing is a practical problem which the subjective +term of the relation alone can solve. + +NOTE. This paper was originally followed by a couple of +paragraphs meant to conciliate the intellectualist opposition. +Since you love the word 'true' so, and since you despise so the +concrete working of our ideas, I said, keep the word 'truth' for the +saltatory and incomprehensible relation you care so much for, and I +will say of thoughts that know their objects in an intelligible +sense that they are 'truthful.' + +Like most offerings, this one has been spurned, so I revoke it, +repenting of my generosity. Professor Pratt, in his recent book, +calls any objective state of FACTS 'a truth,' and uses the word +'trueness' in the sense of 'truth' as proposed by me. Mr. Hawtrey +(see below, page 281) uses 'correctness' in the same sense. Apart +from the general evil of ambiguous vocabularies, we may really +forsake all hope, if the term 'truth' is officially to lose its +status as a property of our beliefs and opinions, and become +recognized as a technical synonym for 'fact.' + + + +XI + +THE ABSOLUTE AND THE STRENUOUS LIFE +[Footnote: Reprinted from the Journal of Philosophy, etc., 1906.] + +Professor W. A. Brown, in the Journal for August 15, approves my +pragmatism for allowing that a belief in the absolute may give +holidays to the spirit, but takes me to task for the narrowness of +this concession, and shows by striking examples how great a power +the same belief may have in letting loose the strenuous life. + +I have no criticism whatever to make upon his excellent article, but +let me explain why 'moral holidays' were the only gift of +the absolute which I picked out for emphasis. I was primarily +concerned in my lectures with contrasting the belief that the world +is still in process of making with the belief that there is +an 'eternal' edition of it ready-made and complete. The former, or +'pluralistic' belief, was the one that my pragmatism favored. +Both beliefs confirm our strenuous moods. Pluralism actually demands +them, since it makes the world's salvation depend upon the +energizing of its several parts, among which we are. Monism permits +them, for however furious they may be, we can always justify +ourselves in advance for indulging them by the thought that they +WILL HAVE BEEN expressions of the absolute's perfect life. By +escaping from your finite perceptions to the conception of +the eternal whole, you can hallow any tendency whatever. Tho the +absolute DICTATES nothing, it will SANCTION anything and everything +after the fact, for whatever is once there will have to be regarded +as an integral member of the universe's perfection. Quietism and +frenzy thus alike receive the absolute's permit to exist. Those of +us who are naturally inert may abide in our resigned passivity; +those whose energy is excessive may grow more reckless still. +History shows how easily both quietists and fanatics have drawn +inspiration from the absolutistic scheme. It suits sick souls +and strenuous ones equally well. + +One cannot say thus of pluralism. Its world is always vulnerable, +for some part may go astray; and having no 'eternal' edition of +it to draw comfort from, its partisans must always feel to some +degree insecure. If, as pluralists, we grant ourselves moral +holidays, they can only be provisional breathing-spells, intended to +refresh us for the morrow's fight. This forms one permanent +inferiority of pluralism from the pragmatic point of view. It has no +saving message for incurably sick souls. Absolutism, among its other +messages, has that message, and is the only scheme that has it +necessarily. That constitutes its chief superiority and is the +source of its religious power. That is why, desiring to do it full +justice, I valued its aptitude for moral-holiday giving so highly. +Its claims in that way are unique, whereas its affinities with +strenuousness are less emphatic than those of the pluralistic +scheme. + +In the last lecture of my book I candidly admitted this inferiority +of pluralism. It lacks the wide indifference that absolutism shows. +It is bound to disappoint many sick souls whom absolutism can +console. It seems therefore poor tactics for absolutists to make +little of this advantage. The needs of sick souls are surely the +most urgent; and believers in the absolute should rather hold it to +be great merit in their philosophy that it can meet them so well. + +The pragmatism or pluralism which I defend has to fall back on a +certain ultimate hardihood, a certain willingness to live +without assurances or guarantees. To minds thus willing to live on +possibilities that are not certainties, quietistic religion, sure of +salvation ANY HOW, has a slight flavor of fatty degeneration about +it which has caused it to be looked askance on, even in the church. +Which side is right here, who can say? Within religion, emotion is +apt to be tyrannical; but philosophy must favor the emotion that +allies itself best with the whole body and drift of all the +truths in sight. I conceive this to be the more strenuous type of +emotion; but I have to admit that its inability to let loose +quietistic raptures is a serious deficiency in the pluralistic +philosophy which I profess. + + + +XII + +PROFESSOR HEBERT ON PRAGMATISM +[Footnote: Reprint from the Journal of Philosophy for December 3, +1908 (vol. v, p. 689), of a review of Le Pragmatisme et ses Diverses +Formes Anglo-Americaines, by Marcel Hebert. (Paris: Librairie +critique Emile Nourry. 1908. Pp. 105.)] + +Professor Marcel Hebert is a singularly erudite and liberal thinker +(a seceder, I believe, from the Catholic priesthood) and +an uncommonly direct and clear writer. His book Le Divin is one of +the ablest reviews of the general subject of religious philosophy +which recent years have produced; and in the small volume the title +of which is copied above he has, perhaps, taken more pains not to do +injustice to pragmatism than any of its numerous critics. Yet the +usual fatal misapprehension of its purposes vitiates his exposition +and his critique. His pamphlet seems to me to form a worthy hook, as +it were, on which to hang one more attempt to tell the reader what +the pragmatist account of truth really means. + +M. Hebert takes it to mean what most people take it to mean, the +doctrine, namely, that whatever proves subjectively expedient in +the way of our thinking is 'true' in the absolute and unrestricted +sense of the word, whether it corresponds to any objective state of +things outside of our thought or not. Assuming this to be the +pragmatist thesis, M. Hebert opposes it at length. Thought that +proves itself to be thus expedient may, indeed, have every +OTHER kind of value for the thinker, he says, but cognitive value, +representative value, VALEUR DE CONNAISSANCE PROPREMENT DITE, it has +not; and when it does have a high degree of general utility value, +this is in every case derived from its previous value in the way of +correctly representing independent objects that have an +important influence on our lives. Only by thus representing things +truly do we reap the useful fruits. But the fruits follow on the +truth, they do not constitute it; so M. Hebert accuses pragmatism of +telling us everything about truth except what it essentially is. He +admits, indeed, that the world is so framed that when men have true +ideas of realities, consequential utilities ensue in abundance; and +no one of our critics, I think, has shown as concrete a sense of the +variety of these utilities as he has; but he reiterates that, +whereas such utilities are secondary, we insist on treating them +as primary, and that the connaissance objective from which they draw +all their being is something which we neglect, exclude, and +destroy. The utilitarian value and the strictly cognitive value of +our ideas may perfectly well harmonize, he says--and in the main he +allows that they do harmonize--but they are not logically identical +for that. He admits that subjective interests, desires, impulses may +even have the active 'primacy' in our intellectual life. Cognition +awakens only at their spur, and follows their cues and aims; yet, +when it IS awakened, it is objective cognition proper and not +merely another name for the impulsive tendencies themselves in the +state of satisfaction. The owner of a picture ascribed to Corot +gets uneasy when its authenticity is doubted. He looks up its origin +and is reassured. But his uneasiness does not make the +proposition false, any more than his relief makes the +proposition true, that the actual Corot was the painter. Pragmatism, +which, according to M. Hebert, claims that our sentiments MAKE truth +and falsehood, would oblige us to conclude that our minds exert no +genuinely cognitive function whatever. + +This subjectivist interpretation of our position seems to follow +from my having happened to write (without supposing it necessary +to explain that I was treating of cognition solely on its subjective +side) that in the long run the true is the expedient in the way of +our thinking, much as the good is the expedient in the way of our +behavior! Having previously written that truth means 'agreement with +reality,' and insisted that the chief part of the expediency of any +one opinion is its agreement with the rest of acknowledged truth, I +apprehended no exclusively subjectivistic reading of my meaning. My +mind was so filled with the notion of objective reference that I +never dreamed that my hearers would let go of it; and the very +last accusation I expected was that in speaking of ideas and their +satisfactions, I was denying realities outside. My only wonder now +is that critics should have found so silly a personage as I must +have seemed in their eyes, worthy of explicit refutation. + +The object, for me, is just as much one part of reality as the idea +is another part. The truth of the idea is one relation of it to the +reality, just as its date and its place are other relations. All +three relations CONSIST of intervening parts of the universe which +can in every particular case be assigned and catalogued, and +which differ in every instance of truth, just as they differ with +every date and place. + +The pragmatist thesis, as Dr. Schiller and I hold it,--I prefer to +let Professor Dewey speak for himself,--is that the relation called +'truth' is thus concretely DEFINABLE. Ours is the only articulate +attempt in the field to say positively what truth actually CONSISTS +OF. Our denouncers have literally nothing to oppose to it as an +alternative. For them, when an idea is true, it IS true, and there +the matter terminates; the word 'true' being indefinable. The +relation of the true idea to its object, being, as they think, +unique, it can be expressed in terms of nothing else, and needs only +to be named for any one to recognize and understand it. Moreover it +is invariable and universal, the same in every single instance of +truth, however diverse the ideas, the realities, and the other +relations between them may be. + +Our pragmatist view, on the contrary, is that the truth-relation is +a definitely experienceable relation, and therefore describable as +well as namable; that it is not unique in kind, and neither +invariable nor universal. The relation to its object that makes an +idea true in any given instance, is, we say, embodied in +intermediate details of reality which lead towards the object, which +vary in every instance, and which in every instance can be +concretely traced. The chain of workings which an opinion sets up IS +the opinion's truth, falsehood, or irrelevancy, as the case may +be. Every idea that a man has works some consequences in him, in the +shape either of bodily actions or of other ideas. Through these +consequences the man's relations to surrounding realities are +modified. He is carried nearer to some of them and farther from +others, and gets now the feeling that the idea has +worked satisfactorily, now that it has not. The idea has put him +into touch with something that fulfils its intent, or it has not. + +This something is the MAN'S OBJECT, primarily. Since the only +realities we can talk about are such OBJECTS-BELIEVED-IN, the +pragmatist, whenever he says 'reality,' means in the first instance +what may count for the man himself as a reality, what he believes at +the moment to be such. Sometimes the reality is a concrete sensible +presence. The idea, for example, may be that a certain door opens +into a room where a glass of beer may be bought. If opening the door +leads to the actual sight and taste of the beer, the man calls the +idea true. Or his idea may be that of an abstract relation, say of +that between the sides and the hypothenuse of a triangle, such a +relation being, of course, a reality quite as much as a glass +of beer is. If the thought of such a relation leads him to draw +auxiliary lines and to compare the figures they make, he may at +last, perceiving one equality after another, SEE the +relation thought of, by a vision quite as particular and direct as +was the taste of the beer. If he does so, he calls THAT idea, also, +true. His idea has, in each case, brought him into closer touch with +a reality felt at the moment to verify just that idea. Each reality +verifies and validates its own idea exclusively; and in each case +the verification consists in the satisfactorily-ending consequences, +mental or physical, which the idea was able to set up. These +'workings' differ in every single instance, they never +transcend experience, they consist of particulars, mental or +sensible, and they admit of concrete description in every individual +case. Pragmatists are unable to see what you can possibly MEAN by +calling an idea true, unless you mean that between it as a terminus +a quo in some one's mind and some particular reality as a terminus +ad quem, such concrete workings do or may intervene. Their direction +constitutes the idea's reference to that reality, +their satisfactoriness constitutes its adaptation thereto, and the +two things together constitute the 'truth' of the idea for its +possessor. Without such intermediating portions of concretely real +experience the pragmatist sees no materials out of which the +adaptive relation called truth can be built up. + +The anti-pragmatist view is that the workings are but evidences of +the truth's previous inherent presence in the idea, and that you can +wipe the very possibility of them out of existence and still leave +the truth of the idea as solid as ever. But surely this is not a +counter-theory of truth to ours. It is the renunciation of all +articulate theory. It is but a claim to the right to call certain +ideas true anyhow; and this is what I meant above by saying that +the anti-pragmatists offer us no real alternative, and that our +account is literally the only positive theory extant. What meaning, +indeed, can an idea's truth have save its power of adapting us +either mentally or physically to a reality? + +How comes it, then, that our critics so uniformly accuse us of +subjectivism, of denying the reality's existence? It comes, I think, +from the necessary predominance of subjective language in our +analysis. However independent and elective realities may be, we can +talk about them, in framing our accounts of truth, only as so many +objects believed-in. But the process of experience leads men so +continually to supersede their older objects by newer ones +which they find it more satisfactory to believe in, that the notion +of an ABSOLUTE reality inevitably arises as a grenzbegriff, +equivalent to that of an object that shall never be superseded, +and belief in which shall be endgueltig. Cognitively we thus live +under a sort of rule of three: as our private concepts represent the +sense-objects to which they lead us, these being public realities +independent of the individual, so these sense-realities may, in +turn, represent realities of a hypersensible order, electrons, mind- +stuff. God, or what not, existing independently of all human +thinkers. The notion of such final realities, knowledge of +which would be absolute truth, is an outgrowth of our cognitive +experience from which neither pragmatists nor anti-pragmatists +escape. They form an inevitable regulative postulate in every one's +thinking. Our notion of them is the most abundantly suggested and +satisfied of all our beliefs, the last to suffer doubt. The +difference is that our critics use this belief as their sole +paradigm, and treat any one who talks of human realities as if he +thought the notion of reality 'in itself' illegitimate. Meanwhile, +reality-in-itself, so far as by them TALKED OF, is only a human +object; they postulate it just as we postulate it; and if we are +subjectivists they are so no less. Realities in themselves can be +there FOR any one, whether pragmatist or anti-pragmatist, only by +being believed; they are believed only by their notions appearing +true; and their notions appear true only because they work +satisfactorily. Satisfactorily, moreover, for the +particular thinker's purpose. There is no idea which is THE true +idea, of anything. Whose is THE true idea of the absolute? Or to +take M. Hebert's example, what is THE true idea of a picture which +you possess? It is the idea that most satisfactorily meets your +present interest. The interest may be in the picture's place, +its age, its 'tone,' its subject, its dimensions, its authorship, +its price, its merit, or what not. If its authorship by Corot have +been doubted, what will satisfy the interest aroused in you at that +moment will be to have your claim to own a Corot confirmed; but, if +you have a normal human mind, merely calling it a Corot will +not satisfy other demands of your mind at the same time. For THEM to +be satisfied, what you learn of the picture must make smooth +connection with what you know of the rest of the system of reality +in which the actual Corot played his part. M. Hebert accuses us of +holding that the proprietary satisfactions of themselves suffice to +make the belief true, and that, so far as we are concerned, no +actual Corot need ever have existed. Why we should be thus cut off +from the more general and intellectual satisfactions, I know not; +but whatever the satisfactions may be, intellectual or proprietary, +they belong to the subjective side of the truth-relation. They found +our beliefs; our beliefs are in realities; if no realities are +there, the beliefs are false but if realities are there, how they +can even be KNOWN without first being BELIEVED; or how BELIEVED +except by our first having ideas of them that work satisfactorily, +pragmatists find it impossible to imagine. They also find +it impossible to imagine what makes the anti-pragmatists' dogmatic +'ipse dixit' assurance of reality more credible than the +pragmatists conviction based on concrete verifications. M. Hebert +will probably agree to this, when put in this way, so I do not see +our inferiority to him in the matter of connaissance +proprement dite. + +Some readers will say that, altho I may possibly believe in +realities beyond our ideas Dr. Schiller, at any rate, does not. This +is a great misunderstanding, for Schiller's doctrine and mine are +identical, only our exposition follow different directions. He +starts from the subjective pole of the chain, the individual with +his beliefs, as the more concrete and immediately given phenomenon. +'An individual claims his belief to be true,' Schiller says, +'but what does he mean by true? and how does he establish the +claim?' With these questions we embark on a psychological inquiry. +To be true, it appears, means, FOR THAT INDIVIDUAL, to work +satisfactorily for him; and the working and the satisfaction, since +they vary from case to case, admit of no universal description. What +works is true and represents a reality, for the individual for whom +it works. If he is infallible, the reality is 'really' there; if +mistaken it is not there, or not there as he thinks it. We all +believe, when our ideas work satisfactorily; but we don't yet know +who of us is infallible; so that the problem of truth and that of +error are EBENBURTIG and arise out of the same situations. Schiller, +remaining with the fallible individual, and treating only of +reality-for-him, seems to many of his readers to ignore reality-in- +itself altogether. But that is because he seeks only to tell us how +truths are attained, not what the content of those truths, when +attained, shall be. It may be that the truest of all beliefs shall +be that in transsubjective realities. It certainly SEEMS the +truest for no rival belief is as voluminously satisfactory, and it +is probably Dr. Schiller's own belief; but he is not required, for +his immediate purpose, to profess it. Still less is he obliged to +assume it in advance as the basis of his discussion. + +I, however, warned by the ways of critics, adopt different tactics. +I start from the object-pole of the idea-reality chain and follow +it in the opposite direction from Schiller's. Anticipating the +results of the general truth-processes of mankind, I begin with the +abstract notion of an objective reality. I postulate it, and ask on +my own account, I VOUCHING FOR THIS REALITY, what would make any one +else's idea of it true for me as well as for him. But I find no +different answer from that which Schiller gives. If the other man's +idea leads him, not only to believe that the reality is there, but +to use it as the reality's temporary substitute, by letting it evoke +adaptive thoughts and acts similar to those which the reality itself +would provoke, then it is true in the only intelligible sense, +true through its particular consequences, and true for me as well as +for the man. + +My account is more of a logical definition; Schiller's is more of a +psychological description. Both treat an absolutely identical +matter of experience, only they traverse it in opposite ways. + +Possibly these explanations may satisfy M. Hebert, whose little +book, apart from the false accusation of subjectivism, gives a +fairly instructive account of the pragmatist epistemology. + + + + + +XIII + +ABSTRACTIONISM AND 'RELATIVISMUS' + +Abstract concepts, such as elasticity, voluminousness, +disconnectedness, are salient aspects of our concrete experiences +which we find it useful to single out. Useful, because we are then +reminded of other things that offer those same aspects; and, if the +aspects carry consequences in those other things, we can return to +our first things, expecting those same consequences to accrue. + +To be helped to anticipate consequences is always a gain, and such +being the help that abstract concepts give us, it is obvious that +their use is fulfilled only when we get back again into concrete +particulars by their means, bearing the consequences in our minds, +and enriching our notion of the original objects therewithal. + +Without abstract concepts to handle our perceptual particulars by, +we are like men hopping on one foot. Using concepts along with the +particulars, we become bipedal. We throw our concept forward, get a +foothold on the consequence, hitch our line to this, and draw +our percept up, travelling thus with a hop, skip and jump over the +surface of life at a vastly rapider rate than if we merely waded +through the thickness of the particulars as accident rained +them down upon our heads. Animals have to do this, but men raise +their heads higher and breathe freely in the upper conceptual air. + + The enormous esteem professed by all philosophers for the +conceptual form of consciousness is easy to understand. From Plato's +time downwards it has been held to be our sole avenue to essential +truth. Concepts are universal, changeless, pure; their relations +are eternal; they are spiritual, while the concrete particulars +which they enable us to handle are corrupted by the flesh. They are +precious in themselves, then, apart from their original use, and +confer new dignity upon our life. + +One can find no fault with this way of feeling about concepts so +long as their original function does not get swallowed up in +the admiration and lost. That function is of course to enlarge +mentally our momentary experiences by ADDING to them the +consequences conceived; but unfortunately, that function is not only +too often forgotten by philosophers in their reasonings, but is +often converted into its exact opposite, and made a means of +diminishing the original experience by DENYING (implicitly or +explicitly) all its features save the one specially abstracted to +conceive it by. + +This itself is a highly abstract way of stating my complaint, and it +needs to be redeemed from obscurity by showing instances of what is +meant. Some beliefs very dear to my own heart have been conceived in +this viciously abstract way by critics. One is the 'will +to believe,' so called; another is the indeterminism of certain +futures; a third is the notion that truth may vary with the +standpoint of the man who holds it. I believe that the perverse +abuse of the abstracting function has led critics to employ false +arguments against these doctrines, and often has led their readers +to false conclusions. I should like to try to save the situation, if +possible, by a few counter-critical remarks. + +Let me give the name of 'vicious abstractionism' to a way of using +concepts which may be thus described: We conceive a concrete +situation by singling out some salient or important feature in it, +and classing it under that; then, instead of adding to its previous +characters all the positive consequences which the new way of +conceiving it may bring, we proceed to use our concept privatively; +reducing the originally rich phenomenon to the naked suggestions of +that name abstractly taken, treating it as a case of 'nothing but' +that concept, and acting as if all the other characters from out of +which the concept is abstracted were expunged. [Footnote: Let not +the reader confound the fallacy here described with legitimately +negative inferences such as those drawn in the mood 'celarent' of +the logic-books.] Abstraction, functioning in this way, becomes a +means of arrest far more than a means of advance in thought. It +mutilates things; it creates difficulties and finds impossibilities; +and more than half the trouble that metaphysicians and logicians +give themselves over the paradoxes and dialectic puzzles of the +universe may, I am convinced, be traced to this relatively simple +source. THE VICIOUSLY PRIVATIVE EMPLOYMENT OF ABSTRACT CHARACTERS +AND CLASS NAMES is, I am persuaded, one of the great original sins +of the rationalistic mind. + +To proceed immediately to concrete examples, cast a glance at the +belief in 'free will,' demolished with such specious +persuasiveness recently by the skilful hand of Professor Fullerton. +[Footnote: Popular Science Monthly, N. Y., vols. lviii and lix.] +When a common man says that his will is free, what does he mean? He +means that there are situations of bifurcation inside of his life in +which two futures seem to him equally possible, for both have their +roots equally planted in his present and his past. Either, +if realized, will grow out of his previous motives, character and +circumstances, and will continue uninterruptedly the pulsations of +his personal life. But sometimes both at once are incompatible with +physical nature, and then it seems to the naive observer as if he +made a choice between them NOW, and that the question of which +future is to be, instead of having been decided at the foundation of +the world, were decided afresh at every passing moment in I which +fact seems livingly to grow, and possibility seems, in turning +itself towards one act, to exclude all others. + +He who takes things at their face-value here may indeed be deceived. +He may far too often mistake his private ignorance of what +is predetermined for a real indetermination of what is to be. Yet, +however imaginary it may be, his picture of the situation offers no +appearance of breach between the past and future. A train is the +same train, its passengers are the same passengers, its momentum is +the same momentum, no matter which way the switch which fixes its +direction is placed. For the indeterminist there is at all times +enough past for all the different futures in sight, and +more besides, to find their reasons in it, and whichever future +comes will slide out of that past as easily as the train slides by +the switch. The world, in short, is just as CONTINUOUS WITH +ITSELF for the believers in free will as for the +rigorous determinists, only the latter are unable to believe in +points of bifurcation as spots of really indifferent equilibrium or +as containing shunts which there--and there only, NOT BEFORE-- + direct existing motions without altering their amount. + +Were there such spots of indifference, the rigorous determinists +think, the future and the past would be separated absolutely, +for, ABSTRACTLY TAKEN, THE WORD 'INDIFFERENT' SUGGESTS DISCONNECTION +SOLELY. Whatever is indifferent is in so far forth unrelated and +detached. Take the term thus strictly, and you see, they tell +us, that if any spot of indifference is found upon the broad highway +between the past and the future, then no connection of any sort +whatever, no continuous momentum, no identical passenger, no common +aim or agent, can be found on both sides of the shunt or +switch which there is moved. The place is an impassable chasm. + +Mr. Fullerton writes--the italics are mine--as follows:-- + +'In so far as my action is free, what I have been, what I am, what I +have always done or striven to do, what I most earnestly wish +or resolve to do at the present moment--these things can have NO +MORE TO DO WITH ITS FUTURE REALIZATION THAN IF THEY HAD NO +EXISTENCE.... The possibility is a hideous one; and surely even the +most ardent free-willist will, when he contemplates it frankly, +excuse me for hoping that if I am free I am at least not very +free, and that I may reasonably expect to find SOME degree of +consistency in my life and actions. ... Suppose that I have given a +dollar to a blind beggar. Can I, if it is really an act of free- +will, be properly said to have given the money? Was it given because +I was a man of tender heart, etc., etc.? ... What has all this to do +with acts of free-will? If they are free, they must not be +conditioned by antecedent circumstances of any sort, by the +misery of the beggar, by the pity in the heart of the passer-by. +They must be causeless, not determined. They must drop from a clear +sky out of the void, for just in so far as they can be accounted +for, they are not free.' [Footnote: Loc. cit., vol. lviii, pp. 189, +188.] + +Heaven forbid that I should get entangled here in a controversy +about the rights and wrongs of the free-will question at large, for +I am only trying to illustrate vicious abstractionism by the conduct +of some of the doctrine's assailants. The moments of bifurcation, +as the indeterminist seems to himself to experience them, are +moments both of re-direction and of continuation. But because in +the 'either--or' of the re-direction we hesitate, the determinist +abstracts this little element of discontinuity from the +superabundant continuities of the experience, and cancels in +its behalf all the connective characters with which the latter is +filled. Choice, for him, means henceforward DISconnection pure and +simple, something undetermined in advance IN ANY RESPECT WHATEVER, +and a life of choices must be a raving chaos, at no two moments +of which could we be treated as one and the same man. If Nero were +'free' at. the moment of ordering his mother's murder, Mr. McTaggart +[Footnote: Some Dogmas of Religion, p. 179.] assures us that no one +would have the right at any other moment to call him a bad man, for +he would then be an absolutely other Nero. + +A polemic author ought not merely to destroy his victim. He ought to +try a bit to make him feel his error--perhaps not enough to convert +him, but enough to give him a bad conscience and to weaken the +energy of his defence. These violent caricatures of men's beliefs +arouse only contempt for the incapacity of their authors to see the +situations out of which the problems grow. To treat the negative +character of one abstracted element as annulling all the positive +features with which it coexists, is no way to change any +actual indeterminist's way of looking on the matter, tho it may make +the gallery applaud. + +Turn now to some criticisms of the 'will to believe,' as another +example of the vicious way in which abstraction is currently +employed. The right to believe in things for the truth of which +complete objective proof is yet lacking is defended by those who +apprehend certain human situations in their concreteness. In those +situations the mind has alternatives before it so vast that the full +evidence for either branch is missing, and yet so significant +that simply to wait for proof, and to doubt while waiting, might +often in practical respects be the same thing as weighing down the +negative side. Is life worth while at all? Is there any general +meaning in all this cosmic weather? Is anything being permanently +bought by all this suffering? Is there perhaps a +transmundane experience in Being, something corresponding to a +'fourth dimension,' which, if we had access to it, might patch up +some of this world's zerrissenheit and make things look more +rational than they at first appear? Is there a superhuman +consciousness of which our minds are parts, and from which +inspiration and help may come? Such are the questions in which the +right to take sides practically for yes or no is affirmed by some of +us, while others hold that this is methodologically inadmissible, +and summon us to die professing ignorance and proclaiming the duty +of every one to refuse to believe. + +I say nothing of the personal inconsistency of some of these +critics, whose printed works furnish exquisite illustrations of the +will to believe, in spite of their denunciations of it as a phrase +and as a recommended thing. Mr. McTaggart, whom I will once more +take as an example, is sure that 'reality is rational and righteous' +and 'destined sub specie temporis to become perfectly good'; and his +calling this belief a result of necessary logic has surely never +deceived any reader as to its real genesis in the gifted author's +mind. Mankind is made on too uniform a pattern for any of us to +escape successfully from acts of faith. We have a lively vision of +what a certain view of the universe would mean for us. We kindle +or we shudder at the thought, and our feeling runs through our whole +logical nature and animates its workings. It CAN'T be that, we feel; +it MUST be this. It must be what it OUGHT to be, and OUGHT to be +this; and then we seek for every reason, good or bad, to make this +which so deeply ought to be, seem objectively the probable thing. We +show the arguments against it to be insufficient, so that it MAY be +true; we represent its appeal to be to our whole nature's loyalty +and not to any emaciated faculty of syllogistic proof. We reinforce +it by remembering the enlargement of our world by music, by thinking +of the promises of sunsets and the impulses from vernal woods. And +the essence of the whole experience, when the individual swept +through it says finally 'I believe,' is the intense concreteness of +his vision, the individuality of the hypothesis before him, and +the complexity of the various concrete motives and perceptions that +issue in his final state. + +But see now how the abstractionist treats this rich and intricate +vision that a certain state of things must be true. He accuses +the believer of reasoning by the following syllogism:-- + +All good desires must be fulfilled; The desire to believe this +proposition is a good desire; + +Ergo, this proposition must be believed. + +He substitutes this abstraction for the concrete state of mind of +the believer, pins the naked absurdity of it upon him, and +easily proves that any one who defends him must be the greatest fool +on earth. As if any real believer ever thought in this preposterous +way, or as if any defender of the legitimacy of men's concrete ways +of concluding ever used the abstract and general premise, 'All +desires must be fulfilled'! Nevertheless, Mr. McTaggart solemnly and +laboriously refutes the syllogism in sections 47 to 57 of the above- +cited book. He shows that there is no fixed link in the dictionary +between the abstract concepts 'desire,' 'goodness' and 'reality'; +and he ignores all the links which in the single concrete case the +believer feels and perceives to be there! He adds:-- + +'When the reality of a thing is uncertain, the argument encourages +us to suppose that our approval of a thing can determine its +reality. And when this unhallowed link has once been established, +retribution overtakes us. For when the reality of the thing is +independently certain, we [then] have to admit that the reality of +the thing should determine our approval of that thing. I find it +difficult to imagine a more degraded position.' + +One here feels tempted to quote ironically Hegel's famous equation +of the real with the rational to his english disciple, who ends +his chapter with the heroic words:-- + +'For those who do not pray, there remains the resolve that, so far +as their strength may permit, neither the pains of death nor the +pains of life shall drive them to any comfort in that which they +hold to be false, or drive them from any comfort [discomfort?] in +that which they hold to be true.' + +How can so ingenious-minded a writer fail to see how far over the +heads of the enemy all his arrows pass? When Mr. McTaggart +himself believes that the universe is run by the dialectic energy of +the absolute idea, his insistent desire to have a world of that sort +is felt by him to be no chance example of desire in general, but +an altogether peculiar insight-giving passion to which, in this if +in no other instance, he would be stupid not to yield. He obeys its +concrete singularity, not the bare abstract feature in it of being a +'desire.' His situation is as particular as that of an actress who +resolves that it is best for her to marry and leave the stage, of +a priest who becomes secular, of a politician who abandons public +life. What sensible man would seek to refute the concrete decisions +of such persons by tracing them to abstract premises, such as that +'all actresses must marry,' 'all clergymen must be laymen,' +'all politicians should resign their posts'? Yet this type of +refutation, absolutely unavailing though it be for purposes of +conversion, is spread by Mr. McTaggart through many pages of his +book. For the aboundingness of our real reasons he substitutes one +narrow point. For men's real probabilities he gives a skeletonized +abstraction which no man was ever tempted to believe. + +The abstraction in my next example is less simple, but is quite as +flimsy as a weapon of attack. Empiricists think that truth in +general is distilled from single men's beliefs; and the so-called +pragmatists 'go them one better' by trying to define what it +consists in when it comes. It consists, I have elsewhere said, +in such a working on the part of the beliefs as may bring the man +into satisfactory relations with objects to which these latter +point. The working is of course a concrete working in the actual +experience of human beings, among their ideas, feelings, +perceptions, beliefs and acts, as well as among the physical things +of their environment, and the relations must be understood as being +possible as well as actual. In the chapter on truth of my book +Pragmatism I have taken pains to defend energetically this view. +Strange indeed have been the misconceptions of it by its enemies, +and many have these latter been. Among the most formidable-sounding +onslaughts on the attempt to introduce some concreteness into our +notion of what the truth of an idea may mean, is one that has been +raised in many quarters to the effect that to make truth grow in any +way out of human opinion is but to reproduce that +protagorean doctrine that the individual man is 'the measure of all +things,' which Plato in his immortal dialogue, the Thaeatetus, is +unanimously said to have laid away so comfortably in its grave +two thousand years ago. The two cleverest brandishers of this +objection to make truth concrete, Professors Rickert and +Munsterberg, write in German, [Footnote: Munsterberg's book has just +appeared in an English version: The Eternal Values, Boston, +1909.] and 'relativismus' is the name they give to the heresy which +they endeavor to uproot. + +The first step in their campaign against 'relativismus' is entirely +in the air. They accuse relativists--and we pragmatists are typical +relativists--of being debarred by their self-adopted principles, not +only from the privilege which rationalist philosophers enjoy, of +believing that these principles of their own are truth impersonal +and absolute, but even of framing the abstract notion of such a +truth, in the pragmatic sense, of an ideal opinion in which all men +might agree, and which no man should ever wish to change. Both +charges fall wide of their mark. I myself, as a pragmatist, believe +in my own account of truth as firmly as any rationalist can possibly +believe in his. And I believe in it for the very reason that I have +the idea of truth which my learned adversaries contend that no +pragmatist can frame. I expect, namely, that the more fully +men discuss and test my account, the more they will agree that it +fits, and the less will they desire a change. I may of course be +premature in this confidence, and the glory of being truth final and +absolute may fall upon some later revision and correction of my +scheme, which later will then be judged untrue in just the +measure in which it departs from that finally +satisfactory formulation. To admit, as we pragmatists do, that we +are liable to correction (even tho we may not expect it) involves +the use on our part of an ideal standard. Rationalists +themselves are, as individuals, sometimes sceptical enough to admit +the abstract possibility of their own present opinions being +corrigible and revisable to some degree, so the fact that the mere +NOTION of an absolute standard should seem to them so important a +thing to claim for themselves and to deny to us is not easy +to explain. If, along with the notion of the standard, they could +also claim its exclusive warrant for their own fulminations now, it +would be important to them indeed. But absolutists like Rickert +freely admit the sterility of the notion, even in their own hands. +Truth is what we OUGHT to believe, they say, even tho no man ever +did or shall believe it, and even tho we have no way of getting at +it save by the usual empirical processes of testing our opinions by +one another and by facts. Pragmatically, then, this part of the +dispute is idle. No relativist who ever actually walked the earth +[Footnote: Of course the bugaboo creature called 'the sceptic' in +the logic-books, who dogmatically makes the statement that +no statement, not even the one he now makes, is true, is a +mere mechanical toy--target for the rationalist shooting-gallery-- + hit him and he turns a summersault--yet he is the only sort of +relativist whom my colleagues appear able to imagine to exist.] has +denied the regulative character in his own thinking of the notion of +absolute truth. What is challenged by relativists is the pretence on +any one's part to have found for certain at any given moment what +the shape of that truth is. Since the better absolutists agree in +this, admitting that the proposition 'There is absolute truth' is +the only absolute truth of which we can be sure, [Footnote: +Compare Bickert's Gegenstand der Erkentniss, pp. 187, 138. +Munsterberg's version of this first truth is that 'Es gibt eine +Welt,'--see his Philosophie der Werte, pp. 38 and 74 And, after all, +both these philosophers confess in the end that the primal truth of +which they consider our supposed denial so irrational is not +properly an insight at all, but a dogma adopted by the will which +any one who turns his back on duty may disregard! But if it all +reverts to 'the will to believe,' pragmatists have that privilege as +well as their critics.] further debate is practically unimportant, +so we may pass to their next charge. + +It is in this charge that the vicious abstractionism becomes most +apparent. The antipragmatist, in postulating absolute truth, +refuses to give any account of what the words may mean. For him they +form a self-explanatory term. The pragmatist, on the +contrary, articulately defines their meaning. Truth absolute, he +says, means an ideal set of formulations towards which all opinions +may in the long run of experience be expected to converge. In this +definition of absolute truth he not only postulates that there is a +tendency to such convergence of opinions, to such ultimate +consensus, but he postulates the other factors of his definition +equally, borrowing them by anticipation from the true conclusions +expected to be reached. He postulates the existence of opinions, he +postulates the experience that will sift them, and the consistency +which that experience will show. He justifies himself in these +assumptions by saying that they are not postulates in the strict +sense but simple inductions from the past extended to the future by +analogy; and he insists that human opinion has already reached a +pretty stable equilibrium regarding them, and that if its +future development fails to alter them, the definition itself, with +all its terms included, will be part of the very absolute truth +which it defines. The hypothesis will, in short, have worked +successfully all round the circle and proved self-corroborative, and +the circle will be closed. + +The anti-pragmatist, however, immediately falls foul of the word +'opinion' here, abstracts it from the universe of life, and uses it +as a bare dictionary-substantive, to deny the rest of the +assumptions which it coexists withal. The dictionary says that an +opinion is 'what some one thinks or believes.' This +definition leaves every one's opinion free to be autogenous, or +unrelated either to what any one else may think or to what the truth +may be. + +Therefore, continue our abstractionists, we must conceive it as +essentially thus unrelated, so that even were a billion men to sport +the same opinion, and only one man to differ, we could admit no +collateral circumstances which might presumptively make it more +probable that he, not they, should be wrong. Truth, they say, +follows not the counting of noses, nor is it only another name for a +majority vote. It is a relation that antedates experience, +between our opinions and an independent something which the +pragmatist account ignores, a relation which, tho the opinions of +individuals should to all eternity deny it, would still remain to +qualify them as false. To talk of opinions without referring to this +independent something, the anti-pragmatist assures us, is to play +Hamlet with Hamlet's part left out. + +But when the pragmatist speaks of opinions, does he mean any such +insulated and unmotived abstractions as are here supposed? Of course +not, he means men's opinions in the flesh, as they have really +formed themselves, opinions surrounded by their causes and +the influences they obey and exert, and along with the whole +environment of social communication of which they are a part and out +of which they take their rise. Moreover the 'experience' which the +pragmatic definition postulates is the independent something which +the anti-pragmatist accuses him of ignoring. Already have men grown +unanimous in the opinion that such experience is of an +independent reality, the existence of which all opinions +must acknowledge, in order to be true. Already do they agree that in +the long run it is useless to resist experience's pressure; that the +more of it a man has, the better position he stands in, in respect +of truth; that some men, having had more experience, are therefore +better authorities than others; that some are also wiser by nature +and better able to interpret the experience they have had; that it +is one part of such wisdom to compare notes, discuss, and follow the +opinion of our betters; and that the more systematically and +thoroughly such comparison and weighing of opinions is pursued, the +truer the opinions that survive are likely to be. When the +pragmatist talks of opinions, it is opinions as they thus concretely +and livingly and interactingly and correlatively exist that he has +in mind; and when the anti-pragmatist tries to floor him because the +word 'opinion' can also be taken abstractly and as if it had no +environment, he simply ignores the soil out of which the whole +discussion grows. His weapons cut the air and strike no blow. No +one gets wounded in the war against caricatures of belief and +skeletons of opinion of which the German onslaughts upon +'relativismus' consists. Refuse to use the word 'opinion' +abstractly, keep it in its real environment, and the withers of +pragmatism remain unwrung. That men do exist who are 'opinionated,' +in the sense that their opinions are self-willed, is unfortunately a +fact that must be admitted, no matter what one's notion of truth in +general may be. But that this fact should make it impossible for +truth to form itself authentically out of the life of opinion is +what no critic has yet proved. Truth may well consist of +certain opinions, and does indeed consist of nothing but opinions, +tho not every opinion need be true. No pragmatist needs to dogmatize +about the consensus of opinion in the future being right--he need +only postulate that it will probably contain more of truth than any +one's opinion now. + + + +XIV + +TWO ENGLISH CRITICS + +Mr. Bertrand Russell's article entitled 'Transatlantic Truth,' +[Footnote: In the Albany Review for January, 1908.] has all the +clearness, dialectic subtlety, and wit which one expects from his +pen, but it entirely fails to hit the right point of view for +apprehending our position. When, for instance, we say that a +true proposition is one the consequences of believing which are +good, he assumes us to mean that any one who believes a proposition +to be true must first have made out clearly that its consequences be +good, and that his belief must primarily be in that fact,--an +obvious absurdity, for that fact is the deliverance of a +new proposition, quite different from the first one and is, +moreover, a fact usually very hard to verify, it being 'far easier,' +as Mr. Russell justly says, 'to settle the plain question of fact: +"Have popes always been infallible?"' than to settle the question +whether the effects of thinking them infallible are on the +whole good.' + +We affirm nothing as silly as Mr. Russell supposes. Good +consequences are not proposed by us merely as a sure sign, mark, or +criterion, by which truth's presence is habitually ascertained, tho +they may indeed serve on occasion as such a sign; they are proposed +rather as the lurking motive inside of every truth-claim, whether +the 'trower' be conscious of such motive, or whether he obey it +blindly. They are proposed as the causa existendi of our beliefs, +not as their logical cue or premise, and still less as their +objective deliverance or content. They assign the only intelligible +practical meaning to that difference in our beliefs which our habit +of calling them true or false comports. + +No truth-claimer except the pragmatist himself need ever be aware of +the part played in his own mind by consequences, and he himself is +aware of it only abstractly and in general, and may at any moment be +quite oblivious of it with respect to his own beliefs. + +Mr. Russell next joins the army of those who inform their readers +that according to the pragmatist definition of the word 'truth' +the belief that A exists may be 'true' even when A does not exist. +This is the usual slander repeated to satiety by our critics. They +forget that in any concrete account of what is denoted by 'truth' in +human life, the word can only be used relatively to some +particular trower. Thus, I may hold it true that Shakespeare wrote +the plays that bear his name, and may express my opinion to a +critic. If the critic be both a pragmatist and a baconian, he will +in his capacity of pragmatist see plain that the workings of my +opinion, I being who I am, make it perfectly true for me, while +in his capacity of baconian he still believes that Shakespeare never +wrote the plays in question. But most anti-pragmatist critics take +the wont 'truth' as something absolute, and easily play on their +reader's readiness to treat his OWE truths as the absolute ones. If +the reader whom they address believes that A does not exist, +while we pragmatists show that those for whom tho belief that it +exists works satisfactorily will always call it true, he easily +sneers at the naivete of our contention, for is not then the belief +in question 'true,' tho what it declares as fact has, as the reader +so well knows, no existence? Mr. Russell speaks of our statement as +an 'attempt to get rid of fact' and naturally enough considers it 'a +failure' (p. 410). 'The old notion of truth reappears,' he adds-- +that notion being, of course, that when a belief is true, its +object does exist. + +It is, of course, BOUND to exist, on sound pragmatic principles. +Concepts signify consequences. How is the world made different for +me by my conceiving an opinion of mine under the concept 'true'? +First, an object must be findable there (or sure signs of such an +object must be found) which shall agree with the opinion. Second, +such an opinion must not be contradicted by anything else I am aware +of. But in spite of the obvious pragmatist requirement that when I +have said truly that something exists, it SHALL exist, the +slander which Mr. Russell repeats has gained the widest currency. + +Mr. Russell himself is far too witty and athletic a ratiocinator +simply to repeat the slander dogmatically. Being nothing if +not mathematical and logical, he must prove the accusation secundum +artem, and convict us not so much of error as of absurdity. I +have sincerely tried to follow the windings of his mind in this +procedure, but for the life of me I can only see in it another +example of what I have called (above, p. 249) vicious +abstractionism. The abstract world of mathematics and pure logic is +so native to Mr. Russell that he thinks that we describers of the +functions of concrete fact must also mean fixed mathematical terms +and functions. A mathematical term, as a, b, c, x, y, sin., log., is +self-sufficient, and terms of this sort, once equated, can +be substituted for one another in endless series without error. Mr. +Russell, and also Mr. Hawtrey, of whom I shall speak presently, seem +to think that in our mouth also such terms as 'meaning,' 'truth,' +'belief,' 'object,' 'definition,' are self-sufficients with no +context of varying relation that might be further asked about. What +a word means is expressed by its definition, isn't it? The +definition claims to be exact and adequate, doesn't it? Then it can +be substituted for the word--since the two are identical--can't it? +Then two words with the same definition can be substituted for one +another, n'est--ce pas? Likewise two definitions of the same word, +nicht wahr, etc., etc., till it will be indeed strange if you can't +convict some one of self-contradiction and absurdity. + +The particular application of this rigoristic treatment to my own +little account of truth as working seems to be something like what +follows. I say 'working' is what the 'truth' of our ideas means, and +call it a definition. But since meanings and things meant, +definitions and things defined, are equivalent and +interchangeable, and nothing extraneous to its definition can be +meant when a term is used, it follows that who so calls an idea +true, and means by that word that it works, cannot mean +anything else, can believe nothing but that it does work, and in +particular can neither imply nor allow anything about its object or +deliverance. 'According to the pragmatists,' Mr. Russell writes, 'to +say "it is true that other people exist" means "it is useful to +believe that other people exist." But if so, then these two +phrases are merely different words for the same +proposition; therefore when I believe the one, I believe the other' +(p. 400). [Logic, I may say in passing, would seem to require Mr. +Russell to believe them both at once, but he ignores +this consequence, and considers that other people exist' and 'it is +useful to believe that they do EVEN IF THEY DON'T,' must be +identical and therefore substitutable propositions in the pragmatist +mouth.] + +But may not real terms, I now ask, have accidents not expressed in +their definitions? and when a real value is finally substituted for +the result of an algebraic series of substituted definitions, do not +all these accidents creep back? Beliefs have their objective +'content' or 'deliverance' as well as their truth, and truth has its +implications as well as its workings. If any one believe that other +men exist, it is both a content of his belief and an implication of +its truth, that they should exist in fact. Mr. Russell's logic would +seem to exclude, 'by definition,' all such accidents as contents, +implications, and associates, and would represent us as translating +all belief into a sort of belief in pragmatism itself--of +all things! If I say that a speech is eloquent, and explain +'eloquent' as meaning the power to work in certain ways upon the +audience; or if I say a book is original, and define 'original' to +mean differing from other books, Russell's logic, if I follow it at +all, would seem to doom me to agreeing that the speech is about +eloquence, and the book about other books. When I call a belief +true, and define its truth to mean its workings, I certainly do not +mean that the belief is a belief ABOUT the workings. It is a belief +about the object, and I who talk about the workings am a different +subject, with a different universe of discourse, from that of the +believer of whose concrete thinking I profess to give an account. + +The social proposition 'other men exist' and the pragmatist +proposition 'it is expedient to believe that other men exist' come +from different universes of discourse. One can believe the second +without being logically compelled to believe the first; one can +believe the first without having ever heard of the second; or one +can believe them both. The first expresses the object of a belief, +the second tells of one condition of the belief's power to maintain +itself. There is no identity of any kind, save the term 'other men' +which they contain in common, in the two propositions; and to +treat them as mutually substitutable, or to insist that we shall do +so, is to give up dealing with realities altogether. + +Mr. Ralph Hawtrey, who seems also to serve under the banner of +abstractionist logic, convicts us pragmatists of absurdity by +arguments similar to Mr. Russell's. [Footnote: See The New +Quarterly, for March, 1908.] + +As a favor to us and for the sake of the argument, he abandons the +word 'true' to our fury, allowing it to mean nothing but the +fact that certain beliefs are expedient; and he uses the word +'correctness' (as Mr. Pratt uses the word 'trueness') to designate a +fact, not about the belief, but about the belief's object, +namely that it is as the belief declares it. 'When therefore,' he +writes, 'I say it is correct to say that Caesar is dead, I mean +"Caesar is dead." This must be regarded as the definition of +correctness.' And Mr. Hawtrey then goes on to demolish me by the +conflict of the definitions. What is 'true' for the pragmatist +cannot be what is 'correct,' he says, 'for the definitions are not +logically interchangeable; or if we interchange them, we reach the +tautology: + +"Caesar is dead" means "it is expedient to believe that Caesar is +dead." But what is it expedient to believe? Why, "that Caesar is +dead." A precious definition indeed of 'Caesar is dead.' + +Mr. Hawtrey's conclusion would seem to be that the pragmatic +definition of the truth of a belief in no way implies--what?--that +the believer shall believe in his own belief's deliverance?--or that +the pragmatist who is talking about him shall believe in that +deliverance? The two cases are quite different. For the believer, +Caesar must of course really exist; for the pragmatist critic he +need not, for the pragmatic deliverance belongs, as I have just +said, to another universe of discourse altogether. When one argues +by substituting definition for definition, one needs to stay in the +same universe. + +The great shifting of universes in this discussion occurs when we +carry the word 'truth' from the subjective into the objective +realm, applying it sometimes to a property of opinions, sometimes to +the facts which the opinions assert. A number of writers, as Mr. +Russell himself, Mr. G. E. Moore, and others, favor the unlucky word +'proposition,' which seems expressly invented to foster this +confusion, for they speak of truth as a property of 'propositions.' +But in naming propositions it is almost impossible not to use the +word 'that.' + +THAT Caesar is dead, THAT virtue is its own reward, are +propositions. + +I do not say that for certain logical purposes it may not be useful +to treat propositions as absolute entities, with truth or falsehood +inside of them respectively, or to make of a complex like 'that-- +Caesar--is--dead' a single term and call it a 'truth.' But the +'that' here has the extremely convenient ambiguity for those +who wish to make trouble for us pragmatists, that sometimes it means +the FACT that, and sometimes the BELIEF that, Caesar is no longer +living. When I then call the belief true, I am told that the truth +means the fact; when I claim the fact also, I am told that my +definition has excluded the fact, being a definition only of a +certain peculiarity in the belief--so that in the end I have no +truth to talk about left in my possession. + +The only remedy for this intolerable ambiguity is, it seems to me, +to stick to terms consistently. 'Reality,' 'idea' or 'belief,' and +the 'truth of the idea or belief,' which are the terms I have +consistently held to, seem to be free from all objection. + +Whoever takes terms abstracted from all their natural settings, +identifies them with definitions, and treats the latter more +algebraico, not only risks mixing universes, but risks fallacies +which the man in the street easily detects. To prove 'by definition' +that the statement 'Caesar exists' is identical with a statement +about 'expediency' because the one statement is 'true' and the other +is about 'true statements,' is like proving that an omnibus is +a boat because both are vehicles. A horse may be defined as a beast +that walks on the nails of his middle digits. Whenever we see a +horse we see such a beast, just as whenever we believe a 'truth' we +believe something expedient. Messrs. Russell and Hawtrey, if they +followed their antipragmatist logic, would have to say here that we +see THAT IT IS such a beast, a fact which notoriously no one sees +who is not a comparative anatomist. + +It almost reconciles one to being no logician that one thereby +escapes so much abstractionism. Abstractionism of the worst sort +dogs Mr. Russell in his own trials to tell positively what the word +'truth' means. In the third of his articles on Meinong, in Mind, +vol. xiii, p. 509 (1904), he attempts this feat by limiting the +discussion to three terms only, a proposition, its content, and an +object, abstracting from the whole context of associated +realities in which such terms are found in every case of actual +knowing. He puts the terms, thus taken in a vacuum, and made into +bare logical entities, through every possible permutation +and combination, tortures them on the rack until nothing is left of +them, and after all this logical gymnastic, comes out with the +following portentous conclusion as what he believes to be the +correct view: that there is no problem at all in truth and +falsehood, that some propositions are true and some false, just as +some roses are red and some white, that belief is a certain attitude +towards propositions, which is called knowledge when they are true, +error when they are false'--and he seems to think that when once +this insight is reached the question may be considered closed +forever! + +In spite of my admiration of Mr. Russell's analytic powers, I wish, +after reading such an article, that pragmatism, even had it no +other function, might result in making him and other similarly +gifted men ashamed of having used such powers in such abstraction +from reality. Pragmatism saves us at any rate from such diseased +abstractionism as those pages show. + +P. S. Since the foregoing rejoinder was written an article on +Pragmatism which I believe to be by Mr. Russell has appeared in the +Edinburgh Review for April, 1909. As far as his discussion of the +truth-problem goes, altho he has evidently taken great pains to be +fair, it seems to me that he has in no essential respect improved +upon his former arguments. I will therefore add nothing further, but +simply refer readers who may be curious to pp. 272-280 of the said +article. + + + +XV + +A DIALOGUE + +After correcting the proofs of all that precedes I imagine a +residual state of mind on the part of my reader which may still keep +him unconvinced, and which it may be my duty to try at least to +dispel. I can perhaps be briefer if I put what I have to say in +dialogue form. Let then the anti-pragmatist begin:-- + +Anti-Pragmatist:--You say that the truth of an idea is constituted +by its workings. Now suppose a certain state of facts, facts for +example of antediluvian planetary history, concerning which the +question may be asked: + +'Shall the truth about them ever be known?' And suppose (leaving the +hypothesis of an omniscient absolute out of the account) that we +assume that the truth is never to be known. I ask you now, brother +pragmatist, whether according to you there can be said to be +any truth at all about such a state of facts. Is there a truth, or +is there not a truth, in cases where at any rate it never comes +to be known? + +Pragmatist:--Why do you ask me such a question? + +Anti-Prag.:--Because I think it puts you in a bad dilemma. + +Prag.:--How so? + +Anti-Prag.:--Why, because if on the one hand you elect to say that +there is a truth, you thereby surrender your whole pragmatist +theory. According to that theory, truth requires ideas and workings +to constitute it; but in the present instance there is supposed to +be no knower, and consequently neither ideas nor workings can exist. +What then remains for you to make your truth of? + +Prag.:--Do you wish, like so many of my enemies, to force me to make +the truth out of the reality itself? I cannot: the truth is +something known, thought or said about the reality, and consequently +numerically additional to it. But probably your intent is something +different; so before I say which horn of your dilemma I choose, I +ask you to let me hear what the other horn may be. + +Anti-Prag.:--The other horn is this, that if you elect to say that +there is no truth under the conditions assumed, because there are +no ideas or workings, then you fly in the face of common sense. +Doesn't common sense believe that every state of facts must in +the nature of things be truly statable in some kind of a +proposition, even tho in point of fact the proposition should never +be propounded by a living soul? + +Prag.:--Unquestionably common sense believes this, and so do I. +There have been innumerable events in the history of our planet of +which nobody ever has been or ever will be able to give an account, +yet of which it can already be said abstractly that only one sort of +possible account can ever be true. The truth about any such event is +thus already generically predetermined by the event's nature; and +one may accordingly say with a perfectly good conscience that it +virtually pre-exists. Common sense is thus right in its instinctive +contention. + +Anti-Prag.:--Is this then the horn of the dilemma which you stand +for? Do you say that there is a truth even in cases where it +shall never be known? + +Prag.:--Indeed I do, provided you let me hold consistently to my own +conception of truth, and do not ask me to abandon it for something +which I find impossible to comprehend.--You also believe, do you +not, that there is a truth, even in cases where it never shall +be known? + +Anti-Prag.:--I do indeed believe so. + +Prag.:--Pray then inform me in what, according to you, this truth +regarding the unknown consists. + +Anti-Prag.:--Consists?--pray what do you mean by 'consists'? It +consists in nothing but itself, or more properly speaking it +has neither consistence nor existence, it obtains, it holds. + +Prag.:--Well, what relation does it bear to the reality of which it +holds? + +Anti-Prag.:-How do you mean, 'what relation'? It holds of it, of +course; it knows it, it represents it. + +Prag.:--Who knows it? What represents it? + +Anti-Prag.:--The truth does; the truth knows it; or rather not +exactly that, but any one knows it who possesses the truth. Any true +idea of the reality represents the truth concerning it. + +Prag.:--But I thought that we had agreed that no knower of it, nor +any idea representing it was to be supposed. + +Anti-Prag.:--Sure enough! + +Prag.:--Then I beg you again to tell me in what this truth consists, +all by itself, this tertium quid intermediate between the facts per +se, on the one hand, and all knowledge of them, actual or potential, +on the other. What is the shape of it in this third estate? Of +what stuff, mental, physical, or 'epistemological,' is it built? +What metaphysical region of reality does it inhabit? + +Anti-Prag.:--What absurd questions! Isn't it enough to say that it +is true that the facts are so-and-so, and false that they are +otherwise? + +Prag.:--'It' is true that the facts are so-and-so--I won't yield to +the temptation of asking you what is true; but I do ask you +whether your phrase that 'it is true that' the facts are so-and-so +really means anything really additional to the bare being so-and-so +of the facts themselves. + +Anti-Prag.:--It seems to mean more than the bare being of the facts. +It is a sort of mental equivalent for them, their +epistemological function, their value in noetic terms. Prag.:--A +sort of spiritual double or ghost of them, apparently! If so, may I +ask you where this truth is found. + +Anti-Prag.:--Where? where? There is no 'where'--it simply obtains, +absolutely obtains. + +Prag.:--Not in any one's mind? + +Anti-Prag.:--No, for we agreed that no actual knower of the truth +should be assumed. + +Prag.:--No actual knower, I agree. But are you sure that no notion +of a potential or ideal knower has anything to do with forming this +strangely elusive idea of the truth of the facts in your mind? + +Anti-Prag.:--Of course if there be a truth concerning the facts, +that truth is what the ideal knower would know. To that extent you +can't keep the notion of it and the notion of him separate. But it +is not him first and then it; it is it first and then him, in my +opinion. + +Prag.:--But you still leave me terribly puzzled as to the status of +this so-called truth, hanging as it does between earth and +heaven, between reality and knowledge, grounded in the reality, yet +numerically additional to it, and at the same time antecedent to any +knower's opinion and entirely independent thereof. Is it as +independent of the knower as you suppose? It looks to me terribly +dubious, as if it might be only another name for a potential as +distinguished from an actual knowledge of the reality. Isn't your +truth, after all, simply what any successful knower would have to +know in case he existed? And in a universe where no knowers were +even conceivable would any truth about the facts there as something +numerically distinguishable from the facts themselves, find a place +to exist in? To me such truth would not only be non-existent, it +would be unimaginable, inconceivable. + +Anti-Prag.:--But I thought you said a while ago that there is a +truth of past events, even tho no one shall ever know it. + +Prag.:--Yes, but you must remember that I also stipulated for +permission to define the word in my own fashion. The truth of +an event, past, present, or future, is for me only another name for +the fact that if the event ever does get known, the nature of the +knowledge is already to some degree predetermined. The truth which +precedes actual knowledge of a fact means only what any possible +knower of the fact will eventually find himself necessitated to +believe about it. He must believe something that will bring him into +satisfactory relations with it, that will prove a decent +mental substitute for it. What this something may be is of course +partly fixed already by the nature of the fact and by the sphere of +its associations. This seems to me all that you can clearly mean +when you say that truth pre-exists to knowledge. It is knowledge +anticipated, knowledge in the form of possibility merely. + +Anti-Prag.:--But what does the knowledge know when it comes? Doesn't +it know the truth? And, if so, mustn't the truth be distinct from +either the fact or the knowledge? + +Prag.:--It seems to me that what the knowledge knows is the fact +itself, the event, or whatever the reality may be. Where you +see three distinct entities in the field, the reality, the knowing, +and the truth, I see only two. Moreover, I can see what each of my +two entities is known-as, but when I ask myself what your third +entity, the truth, is known-as, I can find nothing distinct from the +reality on the one hand, and the ways in which it may be known on +the other. Are you not probably misled by common language, which has +found it convenient to introduce a hybrid name, meaning sometimes a +kind of knowing and sometimes a reality known, to apply to either of +these things interchangeably? And has philosophy anything to gain by +perpetuating and consecrating the ambiguity? If you call the object +of knowledge 'reality,' and call the manner of its being cognized +'truth,' cognized moreover on particular occasions, and +variously, by particular human beings who have their various +businesses with it, and if you hold consistently to this +nomenclature, it seems to me that you escape all sorts of trouble. + +Anti-Prag.:--Do you mean that you think you escape from my dilemma? + +Prag.:--Assuredly I escape; for if truth and knowledge are terms +correlative and interdependent, as I maintain they are, +then wherever knowledge is conceivable truth is +conceivable, wherever knowledge is possible truth is possible, +wherever knowledge is actual truth is actual. Therefore when you +point your first horn at me, I think of truth actual, and say it +doesn't exist. It doesn't; for by hypothesis there is no knower, no +ideas, no workings. I agree, however, that truth possible or virtual +might exist, for a knower might possibly be brought to birth; and +truth conceivable certainly exists, for, abstractly taken, there +is nothing in the nature of antediluvian events that should make the +application of knowledge to them inconceivable. Therefore when +you try to impale me on your second horn, I think of the truth in +question as a mere abstract possibility, so I say it does exist, and +side with common sense. + +Do not these distinctions rightly relieve me from embarrassment? And +don't you think it might help you to make them yourself? + +Anti-Prag.:--Never!--so avaunt with your abominable hair-splitting +and sophistry! Truth is truth; and never will I degrade it by +identifying it with low pragmatic particulars in the way you +propose. + +Prag.:--Well, my dear antagonist, I hardly hoped to convert an +eminent intellectualist and logician like you; so enjoy, as long as +you live, your own ineffable conception. Perhaps the rising +generation will grow up more accustomed than you are to that +concrete and empirical interpretation of terms in which the +pragmatic method consists. Perhaps they may then wonder how so +harmless and natural an account of truth as mine could have found +such difficulty in entering the minds of men far more intelligent +than I can ever hope to become, but wedded by education and +tradition to the abstractionist manner of thought. + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Meaning of Truth, by William James + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MEANING OF TRUTH *** + +This file should be named tmnth10.txt or tmnth10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, tmnth11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, tmnth10a.txt + +Produced by Steve Harris, Charles Franks +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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