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The Essence Of Humanism
by
Meanwhile what actually does count for true to any individual trower, whether he be philosopher or common man, is always a result of his apperceptions. If a novel experience, conceptual or sensible, contradict too emphatically our pre-existent system of beliefs, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred it is treated as false. Only when the older and the newer experiences are congruous enough to mutually apperceive and modify each other, does what we treat as an advance in truth result. [Having written of this point in an article in reply to Mr. Joseph’s criticism of my humanism, I will say no more about truth here, but refer the reader to that review.[115]] In no case, however, need truth consist in a relation between our experiences and something archetypal or trans-experiential. Should we ever reach absolutely terminal experiences, experiences in which we all agreed, which were superseded by no revised continuations, these would not be true, they would be real, they would simply be, and be indeed the angles, corners, and linchpins of all reality, on which the truth of everything else would be stayed. Only such other things as led to these by satisfactory conjunctions would be ‘true.’ Satisfactory connection of some sort with such termini is all that the word ‘truth’ means. On the common-sense stage of thought sense-presentations serve as such termini. Our ideas and concepts and scientific theories pass for true only so far as they harmoniously lead back to the world of sense.
I hope that many humanists will endorse this attempt of mine to trace the more essential features of that way of viewing things. I feel almost certain that Messrs. Dewey and Schiller will do so. If the attackers will also take some slight account of it, it may be that discussion will be a little less wide of the mark than it has hitherto been.
FOOTNOTES:
[105] [Reprinted from The Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Methods, vol. II, No. 5, March 2, 1905. Also reprinted, with slight changes in The Meaning of Truth, pp. 121-135. The author’s corrections have been adopted for the present text. ED.]
[106] [Written apropos of the appearance of three articles in Mind, N. S., vol. XIV, No. 53, January, 1905: “‘Absolute’ and ‘Relative’ Truth,” H. H. Joachim; “Professor James on ‘Humanism and Truth,'” H. W. B. Joseph; “Applied Axioms,” A. Sidgwick. Of these articles the second and third “continue the humanistic (or pragmatistic) controversy,” the first “deeply connects with it.” ED.]
[107] Professor Baldwin, for example. His address ‘On Selective Thinking’ ( Psychological Review, [vol. V], 1898, reprinted in his volume, Development and Evolution ) seems to me an unusually well-written pragmatic manifesto. Nevertheless in ‘The Limits of Pragmatism’ ( ibid., [vol. XI], 1904), he (much less clearly) joins in the attack.
[108] The ethical changes, it seems to me, are beautifully made evident in Professor Dewey’s series of articles, which will never get the attention they deserve till they are printed in a book. I mean: ‘The Significance of Emotions,’ Psychological Review, vol. II, [1895], p. 13; ‘The Reflex Arc Concept in Psychology,’ ibid., vol. III, [1896], p. 357; ‘Psychology and Social Practice,’ ibid., vol. VII, [1900], p. 105; ‘Interpretation of Savage Mind,’ ibid., vol. IX, [1902], p. 217; ‘Green’s Theory of the Moral Motive,’ Philosophical Review, vol. I, [1892], p. 593; ‘Self-realization as the Moral Ideal,’ ibid., vol. II, [1893], p. 652; ‘The Psychology of Effort,’ ibid., vol. VI, [1897], p. 43; ‘The Evolutionary Method as Applied to Morality,’ ibid., vol. XI, [1902], pp. 107, 353; ‘Evolution and Ethics,’ Monist, vol. VIII, [1898], p. 321; to mention only a few.
[109] [The author employs the term ‘humanism’ either as a synonym for ‘radical empiricism’ (cf. e.g., above, p. 156); or as that general philosophy of life of which ‘radical empiricism’ is the theoretical ground (cf. below, p. 194). For other discussions of ‘humanism,’ cf. below, essay XI, and The Meaning of Truth, essay III. ED.]
[110] [Omitted from reprint in Meaning of Truth. The articles referred to are ‘Does Consciousness Exist?’ and ‘A World of Pure Experience,’ reprinted above.]
[111] In Science, November 4, 1904, p. 599.
[112] This statement is probably excessively obscure to any one who has not read my two articles, ‘Does Consciousness Exist?’ and ‘A World of Pure Experience.’
[113] [Cf. above, p. 134; and below, p. 202.]
[114] [Cf. above, pp. 134, 197.]
[115] [Omitted from reprint in Meaning of Truth. The review referred to is reprinted below, pp. 244-265, under the title “Humanism and Truth Once More.” ED.]