Research On C.I.Lewis's Epistemology Of Conceptional Pragmatism

The subject of this dissertation is C.I.Lewis's epistemology.The core of Lewis's epistemology is "conceptional pragmatism".Based on this concept of Lewis's,this dissertation tries to show the outstanding contributions Lewis has made between traditional and modern philosophies by revealing the deep meaning of this concept and by digging out the deep insights into the experience,knowledge and linguistic problems in Lewis's theory of pragmatism.And based on this,a systematic evaluation of both the effect and deficiency of Lewis's epistemology is made.The dissertation is divided into three parts:introduction,body and evaluation.In the part of introduction,such questions like background and significance of the selected title,research status and review of literatures,research methods and structure of the dissertation are introduced firstly.According to the internal logic structure of conceptional meaning in Lewis's theory,a comprehensive illustration from four aspects,namely the origin of thought,concept vs.empirical reality,concept vs.knowledge,concept vs.priori provisions,is made in the body part of the dissertation.Exploring the origin of thought of conceptional pragmatism constitutes the first part of the dissertation.In this chapter,a rounded analysis of the background of the origin of thought is made at first.From the view of background,Lewis's theory of conception results from the collision between the traditional epistemology and modern analytical philosophy.His theoretical construction is to find a fusion point between the two.Secondly,through analyzing the origin of thought of Lewis's thought of pragmatism,this dissertation explores how he finds out a reasonable basis for the fusion of the traditional and modern philosophies.Such a basis serves both as a traditional reference and as the modern criticism.Finally,both the criticism of traditional philosophy and the overall reform strategy in Lewis's theory are introduced.Concept vs.empirical reality is mainly elaborated in Chapter 2.It is from this chapter that the curtain of Lewis's theory of "conceptional pragmatism" officially rises.Firstly,starting from Lewis's analysis of the root cause of predicament on traditional empiricism,this chapter explores the wrong understanding on empiricism's theory of given and points out the incomprehensibility of experience given itself and puts forward the importance of mind to the interpretation of experience.Secondly,by refuting the two main stream thoughts that challenge the mind interpretation,the relationship among mind interpretation,the independence of the experience given and knowledge composition is clarified.Finally,by exploring the basis of the traditional concept,the universality of building such mind interpretation,namely,social practice,is pointed out.Regarded as the soul of Lewis's "conceptional pragmatism",concept vs.knowledge and concept vs.priori provisions constitute the core of the dissertation.The two parts are mainly elaborated in Chapter 3 and Chapter 4.In Chapter 3,Lewis's definition of knowledge is explained firstly.Secondly,the important role which concept plays in the system of knowledge is deeply discussed.It can be divided into three aspects,and the first part is the basic function and the meaning which concept should have in the system of knowledge.In this respect,according to Lewis,the meaning of the concept comes neither from a metaphysical abstraction nor from empirical intuition,but more from hidden practical purpose and has function as classification and prediction in social practice.The second part is to explore the belief as how concept constitutes knowledge.In this respect,Lewis puts forward two types of conceptional judgment,namely,terminating judgment and non-terminating judgment.It shows the basis that experience given can become knowledge belief as well as the relationship between linguistic meaning and behavior.The third part is the justification and verification of concepts in the knowledge belief.According to Lewis,the validity of knowledge belief would take effect in the whole correlation,but the correlation is not such a coherence theory as justification or verification can take place within the system.Lewis thinks that the belief of conceptional meaning is still consistent with the social practical behavior.Finally,issues like concept and reality in knowledge are explored.The reality Lewis understands here is neither the absolute idea as advocated by Plato nor the empiricism's subjective sensory representation but a mode similar to Kantian objects of conceptional interpretation.The objects of conceptional interpretation are based on men's rational legislation.However,this legislation is the limitation of experience by the mysterious "Transcendental Ego",but men's norms of common reality in social practice.It reflects the common social achievement.In Chapter 4,based on Lewis's discussion of conceptional priori,the dissertation mainly explores issues related to priori concept and knowledge validity.The former question discusses that knowledge does not have the universal validity of priori concept.In other words,traditional Nativism and Kantian a priori proposition do not have the universal necessity.The conceptional apriority only means the legislation of categories in certain conditions.Such legislation is the provision of empirical facts.It is still possible knowledge in predicting experience and will develop along with the possibility of further refutation.The latter question discusses that the validity of knowledge would not become the critical object of Hume's empiricism.The validity of knowledge is judgment built under some preconditions.These preconditions are all verified facts and they constitute the proofs of validity of knowledge.Under unchanged preconditions,the validity of the judgments is true forever.The last part of the dissertation is both a general evaluation of Lewis's theory and a summary of the dissertation.Firstly,the overall contribution of Lewis's theory is summarized and key figures influenced by his theory are analyzed.Secondly,through the critique of Lewis's theory by relevant critics,the deficiency of his theory is pointed out.Finally,a coordinate is established for the status of Lewis's theory and his theoretical reference to the contemporary is also analyzed.