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The seventh excerpt is a late reflection on the reception of pragmatism. With a sense of exasperation that is almost palpable, this comment tries to justify the maxim of pragmatism and to reconstruct its misreadings by pinpointing a number of false impressions that the intervening years have piled on it, and it attempts once more to correct the deleterious effects of these mistakes. Recalling the very conception and birth of pragmatism, it reviews its initial promise and its intended lot in the light of its subsequent vicissitudes and its apparent fate. Adopting the style of a ''post mortem'' analysis, it presents a veritable autopsy of the ways that the main truth of pragmatism, for all its practicality, can be murdered by a host of misdissecting disciplinarians, by its most devoted followers. This doleful but dutiful undertaking is presented next.
The seventh excerpt is a late reflection on the reception of pragmatism.
With a sense of exasperation that is almost palpable, this comment tries
to justify the maxim of pragmatism and to reconstruct its misreadings by
pinpointing a number of false impressions that the intervening years have
piled on it, and it attempts once more to correct the deleterious effects
of these mistakes. Recalling the very conception and birth of pragmatism,
it reviews its initial promise and its intended lot in the light of its
subsequent vicissitudes and its apparent fate. Adopting the style of
a "post mortem" analysis, it presents a veritable autopsy of the ways
that the main truth of pragmatism, for all its practicality, can be
murdered by a host of misdissecting disciplinarians, by its most
devoted followers. This doleful but dutiful undertaking is
presented next.
| This employment five times over of derivates of 'concipere' must then have
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|
|(Peirce, CP 5.402 note 3, 1906).
<p>This employment five times over of derivates of ''concipere'' must then have had a purpose. In point of fact it had two. One was to show that I was speaking of meaning in no other sense than that of intellectual purport. The other was to avoid all danger of being understood as attempting to explain a concept by percepts, images, schemata, or by anything but concepts. I did not, therefore, mean to say that acts, which are more strictly singular than anything, could constitute the purport, or adequate proper interpretation, of any symbol. I compared action to the finale of the symphony of thought, belief being a demicadence. Nobody conceives that the few bars at the end of a musical movement are the purpose of the movement. They may be called its upshot.</p>
|-
| align="right" | (Peirce, CP 5.402 note 3, 1906).
|}
There are notes of emotion ranging from apology to pique to be detected
There are notes of emotion ranging from apology to pique to be detected in this eulogy of pragmatism, and all the manner of a pensive elegy that affects the tone of its contemplation. It recounts the various ways that the good of the best among our maxims is "oft interrèd with their bones", how the aim of the pragmatic maxim to clarify thought gets clouded over with the dust of recalcitrant prepossessions, drowned in the drift of antediluvian predilections, lost in the clamor of prevailing trends and the shuffle of assorted novelties, and even buried with the fractious contentions that it can tend on occasion to inspire. It details the evils that are apt to be done in the name of this précis of pragmatism if ever it is construed beyond its ambition, and sought to be elevated from a working POV to the imperial status of a Weltanshauung.
in this eulogy of pragmatism, and all the manner of a pensive elegy that
affects the tone of its contemplation. It recounts the various ways that
the good of the best among our maxims is "oft interrèd with their bones",
how the aim of the pragmatic maxim to clarify thought gets clouded over
with the dust of recalcitrant prepossessions, drowned in the drift of
antediluvian predilections, lost in the clamor of prevailing trends
and the shuffle of assorted novelties, and even buried with the
fractious contentions that it can tend on occasion to inspire.
It details the evils that are apt to be done in the name of
this précis of pragmatism if ever it is construed beyond
its ambition, and sought to be elevated from a working
POV to the imperial status of a Weltanshauung.
The next three elaborations of this POV are bound to sound mysterious
The next three elaborations of this POV are bound to sound mysterious at this point, but they are necessary to the integrity of the whole work. In any case, it is a good thing to assemble all these pieces in one place, for future reference if nothing else.
at this point, but they are necessary to the integrity of the whole work.
In any case, it is a good thing to assemble all these pieces in one place,
for future reference if nothing else.
| When we come to study the great principle of continuity
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|(Peirce, CP 5.402 note 2, 1893).
<p>When we come to study the great principle of continuity and see how all is fluid and every point directly partakes the being of every other, it will appear that individualism and falsity are one and the same. Meantime, we know that man is not whole as long as he is single, that he is essentially a possible member of society. Especially, one man's experience is nothing, if it stands alone. If he sees what others cannot, we call it hallucination. It is not "my" experience, but "our" experience that has to be thought of; and this "us" has indefinite possibilities.</p>
|-
| align="right" | (Peirce, CP 5.402 note 2, 1893).
|}
| Nevertheless, the maxim has approved itself to the writer, after
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|
<p>Nevertheless, the maxim has approved itself to the writer, after many years of trial, as of great utility in leading to a relatively high grade of clearness of thought. He would venture to suggest that it should always be put into practice with conscientious thoroughness, but that, when that has been done, and not before, a still higher grade of clearness of thought can be attained by remembering that the only ultimate good which the practical facts to which it directs attention can subserve is to further the development of concrete reasonableness; so that the meaning of the concept does not lie in any individual reactions at all, but in the manner in which those reactions contribute to that development. …</p>
<p>Almost everybody will now agree that the ultimate good lies in the evolutionary process in some way. If so, it is not in individual reactions in their segregation, but in something general or continuous. Synechism is founded on the notion that the coalescence, the becoming continuous, the becoming governed by laws, the becoming instinct with general ideas, are but phases of one and the same process of the growth of reasonableness.</p>
|-
| align="right" | (Peirce, CP 5.3, 1902).
|}
| is applied to dabbing paint upon canvas, and saying that that art-life consists
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| in dabbing paint, or that its ultimate aim is dabbing paint. Pragmaticism makes
| thinking to consist in the living inferential metaboly of symbols whose purport
| lies in conditional general resolutions to act.
|
|
|(Peirce, CP 5.402 note 3, 1906).
<p>No doubt, Pragmaticism makes thought ultimately apply to action exclusively — to conceived action. But between admitting that and either saying that it makes thought, in the sense of the purport of symbols, to consist in acts, or saying that the true ultimate purpose of thinking is action, there is much the same difference as there is between saying that the artist-painter's living art is applied to dabbing paint upon canvas, and saying that that art-life consists in dabbing paint, or that its ultimate aim is dabbing paint. Pragmaticism makes thinking to consist in the living inferential metaboly of symbols whose purport lies in conditional general resolutions to act.</p>
|-
| align="right" | (Peirce, CP 5.402 note 3, 1906).
|}
<pre>
The final excerpt touches on a what can appear as a quibbling triviality
The final excerpt touches on a what can appear as a quibbling triviality
or a significant problem, depending on one's POV. It mostly arises when
or a significant problem, depending on one's POV. It mostly arises when
