Pragmatism and Pluralism

Cheryl Misak Pragmatism and Pluralism 1. Talisse and Aikin argue that pragmatists who take themselves to be pluralists are making a serious mistake. The pluralism in question here is 'deep' pluralism: the view that the persistence of disagreement or conflict is not due to a mistake on someone's part or to human frailty, but is due to the world. I think that Tallise and Aikin are on to something important here. Those pragmatists who take themselves to be pluralists (James, Dewey, Rorty, for instance)1 do indeed turn their backs on something essential to pragmatism. I shall, that is, agree with Talisse and Aiken that pragmatism and a principled, across-the-board pluralism are in tension. Pragmatists cannot be pluralists who enthusiastically hold that the world makes pluralism inevitable. They ought to follow the founder of the doctrine — CS. Peirce — in being unenrhusiastic about pluralism. Nonetheless — and here I part company with Talisse and Aikin — pragmatists also ought to follow Peirce in reconciling themselves to the possibility of pluralism's holding here and there. We shall see that, despite this reluctant attitude towards pluralism, the pragmatist can and must celebrate and encourage the diversity of views. 2. The lever on which the pragmatist's position on pluralism turns is the concept of truth. It is unsurprising that James, Dewey, and Rorty take themselves to be pluralists, as they are constantiy tempted by the view that there is no truth — only different, equally warranted, accounts of what is the case. Peirce was much more of an objectivist about truth and so it is also unsurprising that he is less keen on pluralism. Peirce argued that a true belief is one which would be indefeasible or one which would stand up to the rigors of inquiry (CP 5.569, 6.485). A true belief is one which is "unassailable by doubt"; it is a belief which would meet every demand we were to place on it (CP 5.416). On this view, truth is a stable property — a belief is either true (indefeasible) or not. And truth is not a matter for some particular community — if a belief is indefeasible, it would stand up to whatever could be thrown at it, by any community of inquirers. 3. Talisse and Aikin distinguish between meaning pragmatism and inquiry pragmatism. Meaning pragmatism, they say, is roughly: the meaning of a concept lies in its practical consequences. Conflict or disagreement is to be dissolved, not resolved, as it is often a problem about clarifying meaning. Inquiry pragmatism, Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society Winter, 2005, Vol. XLI, No. 1 130 Cheryl Misak they say, is roughly: what drives conflict is that we haven't experimented enough to resolve the matter. Resolution, not dissolution, is what we must try to do with conflict. They say that Peirce, along with being a meaning pragmatist, "is an inquiry pragmatist par excellence": he argues that when we are agitated by doubt or conflict, we try to settle belief and get to the truth. The distinction between the two kinds of pragmatism strikes me as being not terribly apt, as meaning pragmatism directly gives rise to inquiry pragmatism. Peirce asks how we determine the meaning of the concept of truth. His "meaning pragmatism" has it that we must see what its implications are for practice. The practice relevant to truth is the practice of inquiry, for truth is what we think we are after when we inquire. So "meaning pragmatism" advises us to look to the practice of inquiry if we want to get a fix on the meaning of truth. Peirce's examination of the practice of inquiry leads him to the view of truth on which truth is indefeasible belief. When we inquire — when we search for truth — what we do is try to resolve doubt or conflict. Were we to really and permanently resolve doubt or conflict, we would reach the truth. Meaning pragmatism and inquiry pragmatism are thus inextricably bound together. Talisse and Aiken put forward a number of linked arguments about how both meaning pragmatism and inquiry pragmatism are incompatible with deep pluralism. Given that I don't take the distinction between meaning and...