The Diversity Of Pragmatism And Its Origin

At present,pragmatism is faced with a dilemma of genealogy description.On the one hand,there exists great difficulties in the identification of the pragmatists,except for a few pragmatists who have been recognized,there are still a lot of pragmatic philosophers whose pragmatist's identity can not be determined.On the other hand,during the whole development process of pragmatism,there is a great deal of controversy in the representatives of each stage and the division of different stages.We can neither clearly point out that there are how many stages of development of pragmatism,nor can we judge the different pragmatists separately belong to which stage of development.Actually,the occurrence of the dilemma of the genealogy of pragmatism lies in the ambiguous understanding of pragmatism.Specifically speaking,different pragmatists have different views on the meaning of pragmatism,which sometimes can be completely hostile views.Thus,people's recognitions on the pragmatism show diversified phenomena,which is the direct cause of the dilemma of the genealogy of pragmatism.According to the pragmatism theories of several representative figures in the classical pragmatism and post-classical pragmatism,the diversification of pragmatism can be roughly divided into the following categories: the pragmatism represented by Peirce as the methodological tool,the pragmatism represented by James as the theory of truth,the pragmatism in the context of realism represented by Putnam,Rorty's radical theory of post-philosophical culture,Bernstein's theory of pragmatism as the “narrative conflict” and West's prophetic pragmatism.Their understandings of pragmatism to some extent reflect the different qualities of pragmatism,but what's more important is that why pragmatism has such a diverse understanding when compared with other philosophical schools.The origin of the diversity of pragmatism needs to be traced back to its own uniqueness.The uniqueness of pragmatism mainly lies in two aspects.Firstly,the special production and development process of pragmatism.Pragmatism is not extended from the development sequence of philosophy itself,but produced in the way of thinking of native America,so it is not so clear as the other schools of philosophy in the domain of topic and methodology.And in the primary period of pragmatism,the views of several main representatives including Peirce,James and Dewey are quite different from each other,which has planted seeds for the diversity of pragmatism.Then in the post-classical period,the integration of pragmatism and analytical philosophy has further aggravated the difference and diversity.Secondly,the pragmatism theory has its own characteristics.Pragmatism is a kind of anti-system philosophy,which opposes the closed system and the compulsory formalization,but this does not mean that pragmatism is just an occasional gathering of a series of views.It is a philosophy with its own unique temperament,for it is against the dependence of traditional philosophy on the absolute certainty,and introduces the factor of "action" upon the problem of knowledge,as well as establishes a kind of procedural,non–spectator theory of knowledge.Meanwhile,pragmatism holds its promise of "reality" in the ontological sense.Different from traditional theory of realism,pragmatism holds that "reality" is not a fixed base,but the performance of our full expectations for the reality and future,our beliefs of existence of truth in the real life without constancy,instead of immersion into complete relativism,with pessimistic thoughts that only dialogues are left.In addition,pragmatism also represents a kind of democratic,harmonious and open philosophy.The pursuit of democracy makes pragmatism a realistic philosophy concerning ethics and politics,whose inclusiveness makes it possible to reconcile "language" and "experience",and find a way out of the confrontation of empiricism and rationalism.At last,the open pragmatism respects difference and diversity,and faces to the future,which enables it to have a steady stream of vitality,and become popular in more and more areas.