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Pragmatism is a philosophical tradition that began in the United States around 1870. Pragmatism rejects the idea that the function of thought is to describe, represent, or mirror reality. Instead, pragmatists consider thought an instrument or tool for prediction, problem solving and action. Pragmatists contend that most philosophical topics—such as the nature of knowledge, language, concepts, meaning, belief, and science—are all best viewed in terms of their practical uses and successes. A few of the various but interrelated positions often characteristic of philosophers working from a pragmatist approach include: *Epistemology (justification): a coherentist theory of justification that rejects the claim that all knowledge and justified belief rest ultimately on a foundation of noninferential knowledge or justified belief. Coherentists hold that justification is solely a function of some relationship between beliefs, none of which are privileged beliefs in the way maintained by foundationalist theories of justification. *Epistemology (truth): a deflationary or pragmatist theory of truth; the former is the epistemological claim that assertions that predicate truth of a statement do not attribute a property called truth to such a statement while the latter is the epistemological claim that assertions that predicate truth of a statement attribute the property of useful-to-believe to such a statement. *Metaphysics: a pluralist view that there is more than one sound way to conceptualize the world and its content. *Philosophy of science: an instrumentalist and scientific anti-realist view that a scientific concept or theory should be evaluated by how effectively it explains and predicts phenomena, as opposed to how accurately it describes objective reality. *Philosophy of language: an anti-representationalist view that rejects analyzing the semantic meaning of propositions, mental states, and statements in terms of a correspondence or representational relationship and instead analyzes semantic meaning in terms of notions like dispositions to action, inferential relationships, and/or functional roles (e.g. behaviorism and inferentialism). Not to be confused with pragmatics, a sub-field of linguistics with no relation to philosophical pragmatism. *Additionally, forms of empiricism, fallibilism, verificationism, and a Quinean naturalist metaphilosophy are all commonly elements of pragmatist philosophies. Many pragmatists are epistemological relativists and see this to be an important facet of their pragmatism (e.g. Richard Rorty), but this is controversial and other pragmatists argue such relativism to be seriously misguided (e.g. Hilary Putnam, Susan Haack). Charles Sanders Peirce (and his pragmatic maxim) deserves much of the credit for pragmatism, along with later twentieth century contributors, William James and John Dewey.〔Biesta, G.J.J. & Burbules, N. (2003). ''Pragmatism and educational research''. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield.〕 Pragmatism enjoyed renewed attention after W. V. O. Quine and Wilfrid Sellars used a revised pragmatism to criticize logical positivism in the 1960s. Inspired by the work of Quine and Sellars, a brand of pragmatism known sometimes as neopragmatism gained influence through Richard Rorty, the most influential of the late twentieth century pragmatists along with Hilary Putnam and Robert Brandom. Contemporary pragmatism may be broadly divided into a strict analytic tradition and a "neo-classical" pragmatism (such as Susan Haack) that adheres to the work of Peirce, James, and Dewey. The word ''pragmatism'' derives from Greek πρᾶγμα (''pragma''), "a thing, a fact", which comes from πράσσω (''prassō''), "to pass over, to practise, to achieve".〔(πράσσω ), Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, ''A Greek-English Lexicon'', on Perseus〕 The word "Pragmatism" as a piece of technical terminology in philosophy refers to a specific set of associated philosophical views originating in the late twentieth-century. However, the phrase is often confused with "pragmatism" in the context of politics (which refers to politics or diplomacy based primarily on practical considerations, rather than ideological notions) and with a non- technical use of "pragmatism" in ordinary contexts referring to dealing with matters in one's life realistically and in a way that is based on practical rather than abstract considerations. ==Origins== Pragmatism as a philosophical movement began in the United States in the 1870s. Its direction was determined by The Metaphysical Club members Charles Sanders Peirce, William James, and Chauncey Wright, as well as John Dewey and George Herbert Mead. The first use in print of the name ''pragmatism'' was in 1898 by James, who credited Peirce with coining the term during the early 1870s.〔James, William (1898), "Philosophical Conceptions and Practical Results", delivered before the Philosophical Union of the University of California at Berkeley, August 26, 1898, and first printed in the ''University Chronicle'' 1, September 1898, pp. 287–310. ''Internet Archive'' (Eprint ). On (p. 290 ): James credited Peirce again in 1906 lectures published in 1907 as ''Pragmatism: A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking'', see Lecture 2, fourth paragraph.〕 James regarded Peirce's 1877–8 "Illustrations of the Logic of Science" series (including "The Fixation of Belief", 1877 and especially "How to Make Our Ideas Clear", 1878) as the foundation of pragmatism .〔See James (1897), ''Will to Believe'' (which James dedicated to Peirce), see p. 124 and footnote via ''Google Books'' (Eprint ): See also James's 1907 ''Pragmatism: A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking'', Lecture 2, fourth paragraph.〕〔In addition to James's lectures and publications on pragmatist ideas (''Will to Believe'' 1897, etc.) wherein he credited Peirce, James also arranged for two paid series of lectures by Peirce, including the 1903 Harvard lectures on pragmatism. See pp. 261–4, 290–2, & 324 in Brent, Joseph (1998), ''Charles Sanders Peirce: A Life'', 2nd edition.〕 Peirce in turn wrote in 1906〔Peirce, C. S., "The Founding of Pragmatism", manuscript written 1906, published in ''The Hound & Horn: A Harvard Miscellany'' v. II, n. 3, April–June 1929, pp. 282–5, see 283–4, reprinted 1934 as "Historical Affinities and Genesis" in ''Collected Papers'' v. 5, paragraphs 11–13, see 12.〕 that Nicholas St. John Green had been instrumental by emphasizing the importance of applying Alexander Bain's definition of belief, which was "that upon which a man is prepared to act." Peirce wrote that "from this definition, pragmatism is scarce more than a corollary; so that I am disposed to think of him as the grandfather of pragmatism." John Shook has said, "Chauncey Wright also deserves considerable credit, for as both Peirce and James recall, it was Wright who demanded a phenomenalist and fallibilist empiricism as an alternative to rationalistic speculation."〔Shook, John (undated), "The Metaphysical Club", the ''Pragmatism Cybrary''. (Eprint ).〕 Inspiration for the various pragmatists included: *Francis Bacon who coined the saying ''ラテン語:ipsa scientia potestas est'' ("knowledge itself is power") *David Hume for his naturalistic account of knowledge and action *Thomas Reid, for his direct realism *Immanuel Kant, for his idealism and from whom Peirce derives the name "pragmatism" *G. W. F. Hegel who introduced temporality into philosophy (Pinkard in Misak 2007) *J. S. Mill for his nominalism and empiricism *George Berkeley for his project to eliminate all unclear concepts from philosophy (Peirce 8:33) *Henri Bergson who influenced William James to renounce intellectualism and logical methods 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Pragmatism」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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