The Old, the New and Its Absorption. Commentary on Susan Haack's "Pragmatism, Old and New"

Abstract

In these pages I take up the discussion on Haack's "Pragmatism, Old and New" (Diánoia 47) which Ramón del Castillo has initiated in the present issue of this journal. Part 1 deals with topics such as authenticity and seriousness as opposed to the anti-intellectual character Haack attaches to neopragmatism. Part 2 resorts to some arguments due to James and Dewey which speak for the continuity between old and new pragmatism, and it has recourse to an argument due to Hookway which yields a more complex picture of Peirce's philosophy than the one which Haack suggested in "Pragmatism, Old and New". From this standpoint some consequences of Dewey and Peirce's pragmatism momentous for social philosophy are compared. Part 3 seeks to attenuate some of Haack's judgments on Quine's philosophy, as well as trying to regain Rorty's moderate composure, a philosophical outlook more atuned to a Deweyan theory of inquiry-a theory which, according to Haack, Rorty has given up once for all.