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Brandom
The Pragmatist Enlightenment
(and its Problematic Semantics)
I. A Second Enlightenment
Classical American pragmatism can be viewed as a minor, parochial philosophical
movement that was theoretically derivative and practically and politically
inconseqential. !rom this point o" view#roghly that o" Rssell and $eidegger
%&andarins spea'ing "or two qite di""erent philosophical cltres(#it is an American
echo, in the last part o" the nineteenth centry, o" the British tilitarianism o" the "irst
part. )hat is echoed is a crass shop'eeper*s sensibility that sees everything throgh the
redctive lenses o" comparative pro"it and loss. Bentham and &ill had soght a seclar
basis "or moral, political, and social theory in the bl"" borgeois boo''eeping habits o"
the competitive egoist, "or whom the "orm o" a reason "or action is an answer to the
qestion +)hat*s in it "or me,-. .ames and /ewey then show p as adopting this
conception o" a practical reason and e0tending it to the theoretical sphere o"
epistemology, semantics, and the philosophy o" mind. Rationality in general appears as
instrmental intelligence1 a generali2ed capacity "or getting what one wants. !rom this
point o" view, the trth is what wor's3 'nowledge is a species o" the se"l3 mind and
langage are tools. 4he instinctive materialism and anti5intellectalism o" ncltivated
common sense is given re"ined e0pression in the "orm o" a philosophical theory.
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4he tilitarian pro9ect o" "onding morality on instrmental reason is notoriosly sb9ect
to serios ob9ections, both in principle and in practice. Bt it is right"lly seen as the
progenitor o" contemporary rational choice theory, which reqired only the development
o" the power"l mathematical tools o" modern decision theory and game theory to emerge
%"or better or worse( as a dominant conceptal "ramewor' in the social sciences. :othing
comparable can be said abot the sbseqent in"lence o" the pragmatists* e0tension o"
instrmentalism to the theoretical realm. ;n American philosophy, the heyday o" /ewey
qic'ly gave way to the heyday o" Carnap, and the analytic philosophy to which
Carnap*s logical empiricism gave birth spplanted and largely swept away its
predecessor. Althogh pragmatism has some prominent contemporary heirs and
advocates#most notably, perhaps, Richard Rorty and $ilary <tnam#there are not
many contemporary American philosophers wor'ing on the central topics o" trth,
meaning, and 'nowledge who wold cite pragmatism as a central in"lence in their
thin'ing.
Bt classical American pragmatism can also be seen di""erently, as a movement o" world
historical signi"icance#as the annoncement, commencement, and "irst "ormlation o"
the "ighting "aith o" a second =nlightenment. !or the pragmatists, li'e their
=nlightenment predecessors, reason is the sovereign "orce in hman li"e. And "or the
later philosophes, as "or the earlier, reason in that capacity is to be nderstood on the
model provided by the "orms o" nderstanding distinctive o" the natral sciences. Bt the
sciences o" the late nineteenth centry, "rom which the pragmatists too' their ce, were
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very di""erent "rom those that animated the "irst enlightenment. 4he philosophical pictre
that emerged o" the rational creatres who prse and develop that sort o" nderstanding
o" their srrondings was accordingly also di""erent.
>nderstanding and e0planation are coordinate concepts. =0planation is a 'ind o" saying1
ma'ing claims that render something intelligible. ;t is a way o" engendering
nderstanding by essentially discrsive means. 4here are, o" corse, di""erent literary
approaches to the problem o" achieving this end, di""erent strategies "or doing so. Bt
there are also di""erent operative conceptions o" what conts as doing it#that is, o" what
one needs to do to have done it. ;t is a change o" the latter sort %bringing in its train, o"
corse, a change o" the "ormer sort( that the pragmatists prse. !or the original
=nlightenment, e0plaining a phenomenon %occrrence, state o" a""airs, process( is
showing why what actually happened had to happen that way, why what is actal is %at
least conditionally( necessary. By contrast, "or the new pragmatist enlightenment, it is
possible to e0plain what remains, and is ac'nowledged as, contingent. >nderstanding
whose paradigm is :ewton*s physics consists o" niversal, necessary, eternal principles,
e0pressed in the abstract, impersonal langage o" pre mathematics. >nderstanding
whose paradigm is /arwin*s biology is a concrete, sitated narrative o" local, contingent,
mtable practical reciprocal accommodations o" particlar creatres and habitats. Again,
the nineteenth centry was +the statistical centry-, which saw the advent o" new "orms
o" e0planation in natral and social sciences. ;n place o" dedcing what happens "rom
e0ceptionless laws, it pts a "orm o" intelligibility that consists in showing what made the
events probable. Acconts in terms both o" natral selection and o" statistical li'elihood
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show how observed order can arise, contingently, bt e0plicably, ot o" chaos#as the
cmlative diachronic and synchronic reslt respectively o" individally random
occrrences.
4he mathematical laws articlating the basic order o" the niverse were "or enlightened
thin'ers o" the seventeenth and eighteenth centry the ltimate given, the "ondational
ne0plainable e0plainers#strctral "eatres o" things so basic that this e0planatory
reside might even %as it did "or the transitionally post5religios /eists( reqire and so
9sti"y a "inal, minimal, care"lly circmscribed, nostalgic appeal to the Creator. Charles
@anders <ierce, the "onding genis o" American pragmatism, elaborated "rom the new
selectional and statistical "orms o" scienti"ic theory a philosophical vision that sees even
the laws o" physics as contingently emerging by selectional processes "rom primordial
indeterminateness. 4hey are adaptational habits, each o" which is in a statistical sense
relatively stable and robst in the environment provided by the rest. 4he old "orms o"
scienti"ic e0planation then appear as special, limiting cases o" the new. 4he now
restricted validity o" appeal to laws and niversal principles is e0plicable against the
wider bac'grond provided by the new scienti"ic paradigms o" how reglarity can arise
ot o" and be sstained by variability. 4he +calm realm o" laws- o" the "irst
enlightenment becomes "or the second a dynamic poplation o" habits, winnowed "rom a
larger one, which has so "ar escaped e0tinction by maintaining a more or less "ragile
collective sel"5reprodctive eqilibrim. ;t is not 9st that we cannot be sre that we
have got the principles right. !or the correct principles and laws may themselves change.
4he pragmatists endorse a 'ind o" ontological fallibilism or mutabilism. @ince laws
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emerge only statistically, they may change. :o /arwinian adaptation is "inal, "or the
environment it is adapting to may change#indeed must eventally change, in response to
other /arwinian adaptations. And the relatively settled, "i0ed properties o" things, their
habits, as <eirce and /ewey wold say, are themselves to be nderstood as sch
adaptations. 4he pragmatists were natralists, bt they saw themselves con"ronting a
new sort o" natre, a natre that is "lid, stochastic, with reglarities the statistical
prodct o" many particlar contingent interactions between things and their ever5
changing environments, hence emergent and potentially evanescent, "loating statistically
on a sea o" chaos.
4he science to which this later enlightenment loo'ed "or its inspiration had changed since
that o" the earlier in more than 9st the conceptal resorces that it o""ered to its
philosophical interpreters and admirers. ;n the seventeenth and eighteenth centries, the
impact o" science was still largely a matter o" its theories. ;ts devotees dreamed o",
predicted, and planned "or great social and political trans"ormations that they saw the
insights o" the new science as pre"igring and preparing. Bt dring this period those
new ways o" thin'ing were largely devoid o" practical conseqences. 4hey were
mani"estations, rather than motors, o" the rising tide o" modernity. By the middle o" the
nineteenth centry, thogh, technology, the practical arm o" science, had changed the
world radically and irrevocably throgh the ;ndstrial Revoltion. !rom the vantage
point o" established indstrial capitalism, science appeared as the most spectaclarly
sccess"l social instittion o" the previos two hndred years becase it had become not
only a practice, bt a business. ;ts practical sccesses paraded as the warrant o" its
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claims to theoretical insight. 4echnology embodies nderstanding. 4he more general
philosophical lessons the pragmatists drew "rom science "or an nderstanding o" the
natre o" reason and its central role in hman li"e accordingly soght to comprehend
intellectal nderstanding as an aspect o" e""ective agency, to sitate 'nowing that %some
claim is tre( in the larger "ield o" 'nowing how %to do something(. 4he sort o" e0plicit
reason that can be codi"ied in principles appears as 9st one, o"ten dispensable, e0pression
o" the sort o" implicit intelligence that can be e0hibited in s'ill"l, becase e0perienced,
practice#"le0ible, adaptable habit that has emerged in a particlar environment, by
selection via a learning process.
Ai'e their =nlightenment ancestors, the pragmatists were not only resoltely natralist in
their ontology, bt also broadly empiricist in their epistemology. !or both grops,
science is the measre o" all things#o" those that are, that they are, and o" those that are
not, that they are not. And "or both, science is not 9st one sort, bt the very "orm o"
'nowing1 what it 'nows not, is not 'nowledge. Bt in place o" the atomistic
sensationalist empiricism o" the older scientism %which was later resced and resscitated
by the application o" power"l modern mathematical and logical techniqes, to yield
twentieth centry logical empiricism( the pragmatists sbstitted a more holistic, less
redctive, practical empiricism. Both varieties give pride o" place to e0perience in
e0plaining the content and rationality o" 'nowledge and agency. Bt their
nderstandings o" that concept are very di""erent, corresponding to the di""erent
characters o" the science o" their times.
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4he older empiricism thoght o" the nit o" e0perience as sel"5contained, sel"5intimating
events1 episodes that constitte 'nowings 9st in virte o" their brte occrrence. 4hese
primordial acts o" awareness are then ta'en to be available to provide the raw materials
that ma'e any sort o" learning possible %paradigmatically, by association and abstraction(.
By contrast to this notion o" e0perience as =rlebnis, the pragmatists %having learned the
lesson "rom $egel( conceive e0perience as =r"ahrng. !or them the nit o" e0perience is
a 4est5Cperate54est5=0it cycle o" perception, action, and "rther perception o" the reslts
o" the action. Cn this model, e0perience is not an input to the process o" learning.
=0perience is the process o" learning1 the statistical emergence by selection o" behavioral
variants that srvive and become habits inso"ar as they are, in company with their
"ellows, adaptive in the environments in which they are sccessively and sccess"lly
e0ercised. %4his is the sense o" De0perienceD, as /ewey says, in which the 9ob ad speci"ies
E4hree years o" e0perience necessary.E( 4he rationality o" science is best epitomi2ed not
in the occasion o" the theorist*s sdden intellectal glimpse o" some aspect o" the tre
strctre o" reality, bt in the process by which the s'illed practitioner coa0es sable
observations by e0perimental intervention, cra"ts theories by in"erential postlation and
e0trapolation, and dynamically wor's ot a more or less stable bt always evolving
accommodation between the provisional reslts o" those two enterprises. 4he distinctive
pragmatist shi"t in imagery "or the mind is not "rom mirror to lamp, bt "rom telescope
and microscope to "lywheel governor.
4hese new "orms o" natralism and empiricism, pdated so as to be responsive to the
changed character and circmstances o" nineteenth centry science, meshed with each
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other "ar better than their predecessors had. =arly modern philosophers notoriosly had
troble "itting hman 'nowledge and agency into its mechanist, materialist version o" the
natral world. A Cartesian chasm opened p between the activity o" the theorist, whose
nderstanding consists in the maniplation o" algebraic symbolic representings, and what
is thereby nderstood1 the e0tended, geometrical world represented by those symbols.
>nderstanding, discovering, and acting on principles e0hibited "or them one sort o"
intelligibility, matter moving according to eternal, inelctable laws another.
Cn the pragmatist nderstanding, however, 'nower and 'nown are ali'e e0plicable by
appeal to the same general mechanisms that bring order ot o" chaos, settled habit "rom
random variation1 the statistical selective strctre shared by processes o" evoltion and
o" learning. 4hat strctre ties together all the members o" a great continm o" being
stretching "rom the processes by which physical reglarities emerge, throgh those by
which the organic evolves locally and temporarily stable "orms, throgh the learning
processes by which the animate acqire locally and temporarily adaptive habits, to the
intelligence o" the nttored common sense o" ordinary langage sers, and ltimately to
the methodology o" the scienti"ic theorist#which is 9st the e0plicit, systematic
re"inement o" the implicit, nsystematic bt nonetheless intelligent procedres
characteristic o" everyday practical li"e. !or the "irst time, the rational practices
embodying the paradigmatic sort o" reason e0ercised by scientists nderstanding natral
processes become visible as continos with, and intelligible in 9st the same terms as,
the physical processes paradigmatic o" what is nderstood. 4his ni"ied vision stands at
the center o" the pragmatists* second enlightenment.
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A nmber o" these master ideas o" classical American pragmatism evidently echo themes
introdced and prsed by earlier romantic critics o" the "irst enlightenment. <ragmatism
and romanticism both re9ect spectator theories o" 'nowledge, according to which the
mind 'nows best when it inter"eres least and is most passive, merely re"lecting the real.
Hnowledge is seen rather as an aspect o" agency, a 'ind o" doing. &a'ing, not "inding, is
the gens o" hman involvement with the world. 4hey share a sspicion o" laws,
"ormlae, and dedction. Abstract principle is hollow nless rooted in and e0pressive o"
concrete practice. Reality is revealed in the "irst instance by lived e0perience, in the li"e
world. @cienti"ic practice and the theories it prodces cannot be nderstood apart "rom
their relation to their origin in the s'ill"l attnements o" everyday li"e. <ragmatists and
romantics accordingly agree in re9ecting niversality as a hallmar' o" nderstanding.
=ssential "eatres o" or basic, local, temporary, conte0tali2ed cognitive engagements
with things are leached ot in their occasional niversali2ed prodcts. Both see necessity
as e0ceptional, and as intelligible only against the bac'grond o" the massive
contingency o" hman li"e. Both emphasi2e biology over physics, and see in the concept
o" the organic conceptal resorces to heal the dalistic wond in"licted by the heedless
se o" an over5sharp distinction between mind and world. )here the =ropean
enlightenment had seen the +natral light o" reason- as universal in the sense o" shared,
or common, so that what one disinterested, sel"less scientist cold add as a bric' to the
edi"ice o" 'nowledge, another cold in principle do as well, the pragmatists, loo'ing at
the division o" labor in what had become a modern indstrial economy saw the enterprise
o" reason as social in a more genine, articlated, ecological sense, in which the
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contribtions o" individals are not interchangeable or "ngible, bt each has potentially a
niqe contribtion to ma'e to the common enterprise, which reqires many di""erent
sorts o" s'ills, responses, ideas, and assessments, which all collectively serve as the
environment in which each adapts and evolves. $ere too they made some common case
with the romantics on some general isses, while o""ering their own distinctive blend o"
rationalism, natralism, and /arwinian5statistical scientism as a way o" "illing in those
approaches.
:onetheless, pragmatism is not a 'ind o" romanticism. 4hogh the two movements o"
thoght share an antipathy to =nlightenment intellectalism, pragmatism does not recoil
into the re9ection o" reason, into the privileging o" "eeling over thoght, intition over
e0perience, or o" art over science. <ragmatism o""ers a conception o" reason that is
practical rather than intellectal, e0pressed in intelligent doings rather than abstract
sayings. !le0ibility and adaptability are its hallmar's, rather than mastery o" nchanging
niversal principles. ;t is the reason o" Cdysses rather than <lato. Bt both are thoght
o" as part o" the natral world#in the sense in which natral science is ac'nowledged to
have "inal athority over claims abot natre. 4he pragmatists are also materialists#
thogh theirs is /arwinian, rather than :ewtonian materialism. =voltionary natral
history aside, the biology that inspires them is the reslt o" the shi"t o" attention %largely
e""ected in Jermany in the "irst hal" o" the nineteenth centry( "rom anatomy to
physiology, "rom strctre to "nction. 4he climate o" Jerman romanticism may have
provided an encoraging environment "or this development, bt the vitalistic biology that
provided their organic metaphors was only a by5then5embarrassing, prescienti"ic
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precrsor o" the recogni2ably modern sort o" biology prsed in the Jerman laboratories
in which )illiam .ames trained.
;n "act, Romanticism had almost no direct in"lence on American pragmatism#another
point o" contrast with the varios "orms o" nineteenth centry materialism in =rope.
4here was an indirect in"lence, throgh $egel*s idealism %which was particlarly
important "or <eirce and /ewey(#bt $egel*s rationalism mattered as mch "or them as
his romanticism. 4he 4ranscendentalism o" =merson is another condit "or
idiosyncratically "iltered and trans"igred romantic ideas. ;t was pervasive, thogh
perhaps not dominant, in the Boston milie in which Charles <eirce, )illiam .ames, and
Cliver )endell $olmes .r. %who was a pragmatist, even thogh he disavowed the label
becase he associated it with .ames*s +sentimental- attempt to "ind a place "or religion in
the modern world5view( were "irst accltrated, and it clearly a""ected their thoght in
comple0 ways. Bt the pragmatists thoght o" themselves as contining the
=nlightenment philosophical tradition o" /escartes, Aoc'e, $me, and Hant#all o"
whom thoght that being a philosopher meant being a philosopher o" science,
nderstanding above all what the new science had to teach s not only abot the world,
bt abot s 'nowers o" it and agents in it. 4he advances o" nineteenth centry science
were to provide the corrective needed to remedy the conceptal pathologies to which the
giants o" the =nlightenment had "allen prey. 4hose advances, properly nderstood,
wold ma'e it possible to reconcile its central rationalist and materialist implses in an
irenic empiricist natralism. Althogh prsing some elements o" the anti5=nlightenment
agenda o" Romanticism by qite other means, the pragmatists always thoght o"
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themselves as o""ering "riendly amendments in spport o" the basic philosophical mission
o" rethin'ing inherited ideas o" rationality, nderstanding, agency, and sel", in the light o"
the very best contemporary scienti"ic nderstanding o" the natral world.
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II. Pragmatist Semantics
<ragmatism was a distinctively American movement o" thoght in ways "ar more
important than its immnity to romantic implses, however. )e have recently been
taght 9st how mch it owes to the pecliarities o" its native cltral and historical soil
by a magni"icent boo'1 Aois &enand*s The Metaphysical Club: Story of !deas in
merica.
8
4he pragmatists themselves tended to sitate and motivate their views by
re"erence to the speci"ically philosophical tradition. 4hey were, a"ter all %with the
e0ception o" $olmes(, at least at some point in their careers, pro"essional philosophers.
%;n <eirce*s case, a chronically unemployed pro"essional philosopher#bt the point
remains.( 4heir interpreters, also pro"essional philosophers, have generally "ollowed
them in this practice. &enand*s great achievement is to widen the cltral "ocs and
increase the depth o" "ield o" the scene in which they show p "or s.
4he conte0t &enand provides e0tends "ar beyond the sort o" philosophical and scienti"ic
considerations s'etched by way o" introdction above. $e shows how mch more there
is to the history o" ideas than 9st their intellectal history. 4he rise o" mass democracy,
the ascendancy o" indstrial capitalism, the instittional pro"essionali2ation o" niversity
edcation and the high cltre more generally, and the decentrali2ation and shi"t o" the
cltral center o" gravity o" the contry away "rom its original seat in Boston are all
shown so to shape the development o" pragmatism as to stamp it indelibly as a
speci"ically American phenomenon. &enand de"tly portrays the relations between these
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grand historical "orces and the particlarities, pecliarities, and personalities o" the idea5
empowered pragmatists who are his heroes. A principal limb o" his argment concerns
the signi"icance o" the e0perience o" the Civil )ar on the birth and growth o"
pragmatism.
:orthern politics be"ore the war was driven by the disagreement between Abolitionists
and >nionists. Abolitionists saw slavery in terms o" absolte moral principles1 slavery
was evil, and so the contry had to pay whatever price was reqired to eliminate
itinclding, i" necessary, splitting the @oth o"" so as to 'eep the >nion pre. 4he
>nionists, by contrast, ac'nowledged slavery as an evil, bt rged that means be "ond to
eliminate it more gradally, over a period o" decades, so as to ac'nowledge the economic
and cltral interests o" white @otherners, and 'eep the >nion whole. 4he @oth*s
secession rendered the >nionistsD argments moot, by niting both parties as patriots o"
the >nion. 4he attac' on !ort @mter made navoidable a war that the bl' o" the
Abolitionists, no less than the >nionists, had neither anticipated nor desired. 4he horri"ic
violence that ensed changed "orever the thin'ing o" the yong generation o" $arvard
men who went o"" idealistically to "ight. $olmes, who had been a stanch Abolitionist,
was severely wonded more than once. .ames was not a combatant, bt two o" his
yonger brothers were, and one was seriosly wonded. <eirce, li'e the others, had
"riends and classmates maimed and 'illed.
4hey saw the Civil )ar as above all a colossal "ailre o" American democracy. 4he
democratic instittions on which we pride orselves had proven themselves incapable o"
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dealing with the high sta'es moral and economic isse o" slavery. <olitically
nresolvable disptes degenerated into military con"lict. $olmes, closest to the "ighting,
was also the most e0plicit abot the lessons he drew "rom his e0perience, and abot their
e""ect on the li"elong corse o" his thoght. As &enand pts it1 +4he lesson $olmes too'
home "rom the war can be pt in a sentence. ;t is that certitde leads to violence- KB8L.
Bt &enand also ma'es a persasive case that roghly the same dynamic moved the
other "onder members o" the &etaphysical Clb to draw the same general conclsion.
)hat had cho'ed democracy was in"le0ible, ncompromising commitment to principles.
)hat was needed was a di""erent attitde toward or belie"s1 a less ideologically
con"ident, more tentative and critical attitde, one that wold treat them as the always
provisional reslts o" inqiry to date, sb9ect to e0perimental test and revision in the light
o" new evidence and e0perience, as permanently liable to obsolescence de to altered
circmstances, shi"ting conte0ts, or changes o" interest. 4hogh the point is not pt this
way in the boo', we are to see the American Civil )ar as playing a role in shaping the
pragmatist enlightenment comparable to that played by the wars o" religion "or the earlier
=ropean enlightenment.
&enand ma'es a cmlatively plasible case "or how the climate o" ideas in which
pragmatism arose was shaped by the e0perience o" passionate political convictions
overwhelming democratic instittions and leading with seeming inevitability to the sort
o" senseless slaghter $olmes e0perienced %and happened to srvive( at Ball*s Bl"",
Antietam, and the Bloody Angle o" @potsylvania. Bt he is not very clear abot 9st what
sort o" connection he envisages between this historical impets and the contents o" the
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philosophical theories the pragmatists came to hold. A nmber o" isses need to be
separated. !or it cold be that while pragmatism wold not have arisen withot the
in"lence o" the war, that merely necessary condition is o" little help in nderstanding the
thoght to which it gave rise. A"ter all, one o" the crcial material conditions that made
possible 9a22#another distinctively American cltral phenomenon#was the "lood o"
cheap, war srpls trmpets and military band instrments le"t over "rom the same war.
Bt 'nowing that won*t tell one mch abot what ma'es the msic special.
4o begin with, the view that immediately emerges "rom consideration o" the "ailre o"
antebellm %more or less( democratic political practices concerns how one holds basic,
action5orienting belie"s. )hat rles ot compromise, accommodation, and reciprocal
adaptation is the sort o" nsha'eable conviction that broo's no opposition, admits no
qali"ication, ignores the possibility or signi"icance o" collision with other important
principles, and is rec'less o" the practical conseqences o" its absoltism "or the possibly
worthy aims o" others and the stability o" the "ramewor' instittions o" the commnity.
Bt the pragmatists didn*t 9st draw conclsions abot the act o" believing#roghly, that
"allibilism is a better attitde than "anaticism. 4he centerpiece o" their philosophical
theory was an accont o" the contents that are believed or believable. 4o sqee2e the
most e0planatory 9ice ot o" &enand*s "ascinating and instrctive story, we need to
'now something abot how an nderstanding o" the act or attitde o" believing might be
thoght to connect with and in"orm an nderstanding o" the contents o" those acts or
attitdes.
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Again, even at the level o" how belie"s shold be held, the immediate lesson seems to
concern political belie"s1 the ones we se to orient or practical nderta'ings, in
particlar those that involve cooperation or decisions abot what we all shall do. ;t is not
obvios that considerations bearing on or assessment o" admissible, desirable, or
de"ensible "eatres o" sch practical political commitments carry over to apply as well to
theoretical and do0astic commitments#"rom claims abot what we should do to claims
abot how things are in the natral world.
;", as &enand persasively arges, the pragmatists* ideas were in "act motivated by the
spectacle o" abstract, absolte political principles proving indigestible by democratic
instittions and leading to the most violent sort o" con"lict resoltion imaginable, aren*t
they gilty o" illegitimately e0tending a lesson appropriate to the practical sphere o"
deciding what we oght to do, to the theoretical sphere o" deciding what belie"s are tre,
$ere is a way one might thin' abot sch a move. ;n the practical sphere o" morality, the
=ropean =nlightenment had taght s that we need not thin' o" or moral principles as
deriving their athority "rom their con"ormity to %mirroring o"( an antecedent, eternal,
non5hman ontological %theological( reality. )e cold and shold instead thin' o" them
as prodcts o" or own rational activity#as something "or which we mst orselves
ltimately ta'e responsibility. As Hant pt the point in +)hat is =nlightenment,-, it is
by ac'nowledging that responsibility that hmanity passes "rom its age o" sel"5imposed
ttelage by paternal athority into the atonomos matrity o" its adlthood. A second
enlightenment might then repeat that lesson, only now on the theoretical side. /oing that
wold be seeing norms "or belie", no less than "or action, as or doing and or
67472084#8F
2004 Robert B. Brandom
responsibility, as not needing to re"lect the athority o" an alien, non5hman Reality,
which comes to seem as mythical, dispensable, and ltimately 9venile a conception as
Cld :obodaddy came to seem to the Mrdits. Richard Rorty, inspired by /ewey and
.ames, has been rging 9st sch a conception o" what wold be reqired to "inish the
wor' o" the "irst enlightenment.
2
$e arges that the move "rom thin'ing o" moral norms
in terms o" divine commandments to thin'ing o" them in terms o" social compacts shold
be "ollowed by one "rom thin'ing o" the trth o" belie" in terms o" correspondence with
reality to thin'ing o" it in terms o" agreement with or "ellows.
@ch a conception is vlnerable to the charge that in so assimilating the theoretical to the
practical, the distinction between intentions and belie"s is being elided. ;ntentions have a
world5to5mind direction o" "it1 the aim is "or the world to con"orm to or attitdes.
Belie"s have a mind5to5world direction o" "it1 the aim is "or or attitdes to con"orm to the
world. ;n her classic wor' !ntention
?
, Anscombe illstrates the di""erence with a parable
o" a man shopping "rom a list, "ollowed by a detective assigned to write on his own list
everything the man bys. 4he two lists e0hibit the two di""erent directions o" "it. ;" what
is boght doesn*t match what is on the lists, in the "irst case the error lies in what is
boght, and in the second it lies in what is written %c". lamp shadows and mirror
re"lections(. 4he "irst enlightenment can then be seen as liberating s "rom inappropriate
se o" a theoretical, spectatorial model o" the practical#as thogh or reasoning abot
what we oght to do shold, li'e or reasoning abot how we oght to believe things are,
re"lects an antecedent reality whose athority settles its correctness. 4he old pictre sed
the wrong direction o" "it "or practical matters. Bt srely it wold be a
67472084#8G
2004 Robert B. Brandom
misnderstanding o" this lesson simply to trn the old pictre on its head by treating the
theoretical as thogh it had the direction o" "it, and so the strctre o" athority and
responsibility, appropriate to the practical.
Bt the pragmatists don*t do that. 4hey re9ect the dalism o" a practical sphere with 9st
one direction o" "it and theoretical sphere with 9st the complementary one. 4hey start
with the idea o" a cyclical process o" intervening and learning, o" perception o" an initial
sitation, action in it, and perception o" the reslt, leading to new action %inclding the
twea'ing both o" means and goals(, with the loop repeated ntil it converges or is
abandoned. 4his is what they call Ne0perience*. 4al' o" belie" and intention ma'es sense
"or them only as the abstraction o" phases or aspects "rom sch a process. Cr belie"s
have practical conseqences and or intentions have theoretical conditions. ;n the
nderta'ing o" actal inqiries and practical pro9ects one does not "ind one direction o" "it
withot the other. At this level, the pragmatists are not modeling the theoretical on the
practical as the tradition had conceived those categories, bt reconceptali2ing both in
terms o" ecological5adaptational processes o" interaction o" organism and environment o"
the sort epitomi2ed by evoltion and learning.
)hat abot the other charge, that the pragmatists slide "rom a view abot how belie"s
shold be held %tentatively, provisionally, negotiably( to a view abot what belie"s are
%something li'e practical coping strategies(#"rom an insight into the attitde o"
believing to a claim abot the contents believed, Cnce again the pragmatists %in 'eeping
with the $egelian roots o" <eirce*s and /ewey*s thoght( see' to reconceptali2e belie"
67472084#8I
2004 Robert B. Brandom
and meaning so as to resist a dalism o" "orce and content, doing and thoght, pragmatics
and semantics. 4heir strategy may be thoght o" as coming in two pieces. !irst,
believing or 'nowing that things are ths and so %the category o" e0plicit, statable,
theoretical attitdes characteristic o" s( is to be nderstood in terms o" s'ill"l 'nowing
how to do something %the category o" implicit, enactable, practical capacities
characteristic o" or intelligent bt not rational mammalian cosins and ancestors(. 4heir
qestion is what yo have to be able to do in order to cont as having conceptally
content"l belie"s. And their answer will loo' to the role o" those belie"s in practical
reasoning, to their capacity to serve as reasons "or action. !or their second move is to
o""er a 'ind o" functionalism abot the propositional contents o" belie"s, an accont o"
meaning in terms o" use. 4he contents o" belie"s and the meanings o" sentences are to be
nderstood in terms o" the roles they play in processes o" intelligent reciprocal adaptation
o" organism and environment in which inqiry and goal5prsit are ine0tricably
intertwined aspects. !nctionalist %and most recently, teleosemantic( strategies in the
philosophy o" mind dominate the second hal" o" the twentieth centry. Bt the
pragmatists deserve to be thoght o" as having pioneered them.
;" that is not generally recogni2ed, it is in part becase the pragmatists did not achieve the
sort o" clarity o" methodological sel"5consciosness that wold have allowed them to
separate the general strategy o" "nctionalism abot the relations between pragmatics and
semantics %what is done with words and what they mean, or the role o" belie"s in the
behavioral economies o" believers and the contents o" those belie"s( "rom the speci"ic
conceptal tactics they employed to prse that strategy. And there are some real
67472084#20
2004 Robert B. Brandom
problems with their ideas at this more speci"ic level. !or they o""er an instrumentalist
semantics, nderstanding content in terms o" success conditions rather than truth
conditions. 4his is not a silly idea. Bt a"ter a centry o" intensive sbseqent wor' in
philosophical semantics, we are in a position to be mch clearer abot the criteria o"
adeqacy sch acconts mst answer to, and some o" the sorts o" ways they can go
wrong. !rom this contemporary vantage point, we can see that the pragmatists*
instrmentalist program involves "or distinct mista'es.
!irst, in thin'ing abot the "nctional role o" belie" in reciprocal interactions and
attnements between believers and their environments, the pragmatists loo' only
downstream, to the practical conse"uences o" belie"s. 4hat is to say that they loo' only at
the role o" belie"s as premises in practical in"erences. 4hey don*t also loo' upstream, to
the antecedents o" belie", to their role as conclusions o" in"erences, or as the reslts o"
other processes o" belie" "ormation. ;n this regard, they simply invert the e0clsive
emphasis on the origin o" belie" in e0perience characteristic o" the semantics o"
traditional empiricism. Bt each o" these one5sided approaches to semantics leaves ot
the crcial complementary aspect o" the "nctional role o" belie"s. !or whether one
thin's o" the role o" belie" as a node in a networ' o" matter5o"5"actal causal relations, or
o" normative inferential ones#corresponding to two "lavors o" "nctionalism#one mst
loo' both to antecedents and to conseqences.
4he meaning con"erred on an e0pression by its role in a langage game can be identi"ied
with the pair o" its circmstances o" appropriate application, speci"ying when it is
67472084#28
2004 Robert B. Brandom
properly ttered, and its appropriate conseqences o" application, speci"ying what
properly "ollows "rom its tterance.
4
:either one by itsel" will do, "or sentences can have
the same circmstances o" application and di""erent conseqences o" application, or the
same conseqences o" application and di""erent circmstances o" application. ;n either
case they will have di""erent meanings. As an e0ample o" the "irst 'ind, we cold
regiment the se o" N"oresee* so that the sentence +; "oresee that ; will write a boo' abot
$egel,- is appropriately asserted %the belie" it e0presses appropriately acqired( in 9st
the same circmstances as +; will write a boo' abot $egel.- Bt they have di""erent
meanings, "or di""erent things "ollow "rom them, as is clear i" we thin' abot the very
di""erent stats o" the two conditionals +;" ; will write a boo' abot $egel, then ; will
write a boo' abot $egel,- and +;" ; "oresee that ; will write a boo' abot $egel, then ;
will write a boo' abot $egel.- 4he "irst, stttering, in"erence is as secre as cold well
be. 4he trth o" the second depends on how good ; am at "oreseeing %and whether ; am
hit by a bs(. 4o see the second point, notice that one cold 'now what "ollows "rom the
claim that someone is responsible "or an action, or that the action is immoral or sin"l,
withot "or that reason conting as nderstanding the claims or concepts in qestion
%grasping the meaning o" the words(, i" one 'new nothing at all abot the circmstances
in which it was appropriate to ma'e those claims or apply those concepts. =mpiricist,
veri"icationist, reliabilist, and assertibilist semantic theories are de"ective becase they
ignore the conseqences o" application o" e0pressions in "avor o" their circmstances o"
application. <ragmatist semantic theories are de"ective becase they ma'e the
complementary mista'e o" ignoring the circmstances in "avor o" the conseqences. ;n
"act, both aspects are essential to meaning.
67472084#22
2004 Robert B. Brandom
4he second mista'e the pragmatists ma'e is to loo' only at the role o" belie"s in
9sti"ying or prodcing actions. Bt their role in 9sti"ying or prodcing "rther beliefs is
eqally important in articlating their content, and there is no good reason to thin' that
the latter can be redced to or "lly e0plained in terms o" the "ormer. 4rying to de"ine the
contents o" internal states 9st in terms o" relations to outputs %even#ta'ing on board the
previos point#in terms o" otpts and inpts( to the system is a broadly behaviorist
strategy. And one o" the things we have learned by chewing these things over in the last
"orty years or so is that ta'ing into accont also the relations o" internal states to each
other yields a mch more power"l and plasible accont. 4his is precisely the srpls
e0planatory vale o" "nctionalism over behaviorism in the philosophy o" mind. 4hogh
the general considerations that motivate the pragmatists approach are recogni2ably
"nctionalist, when it came to wor'ing ot their ideas, the pragmatists did so in
behaviorist terms becase the varios distinctions and considerations in the vicinity had
not yet been sorted ot.
=ven i" these two di""iclties with the pragmatists* instrmentalist semantics are pt
aside, they "ace a third. !or in see'ing to move "rom %the sccess or "ailre o"( actions to
the contents o" beliefs, they were ignoring the necessary third component in the eqation1
desires# preferences# goals# or norms. Oor action o" closing yor mbrella nderwrites
the attribtion o" a belie" that it has stopped raining only against the bac'grond o" the
assmption that yo desire to stay dry. ;" instead yo have the Jene Helly desire to sing
and dance in the rain, the signi"icance o" that action "or a characteri2ation o" the content
67472084#2?
2004 Robert B. Brandom
o" yor belie" will be qite di""erent. And the point is "lly general. )hat actions belie"s
rationali2e or prodce depends on what desires, aims, or pro5attitdes they are con9oined
with.
6
4he conditions o" the sccess o" or actions depend on what we want 9st as mch
as they do on what we believe. Contemporary rational choice theory incorporates this
insight. Copling this "ndamental observation with the insight that the semantic
contents o" belie"s and desires are also and eqally p "or grabs %contrary to the rational
choice approach, which ta'es these "or granted as inpts to its process( leads /onald
/avidson to his sophisticated interpretivist sccessor to narrowly pragmatist approaches
to semantics. ;t is clear in retrospect that withot some sch strctral emendation, the
pragmatist strategy cannot wor'.
4he "orth problem is intimately connected with the third. !or althogh the pragmatists
"ailed to appreciate the signi"icance o" the "act that desires can vary independently o"
belie"s, they did not simply ignore desires. Rather, they eqated the sccess o" actions
with the satis"action o" desires, and wanted to attribte to the belie"s that condced to
satis"action and hence sccess a special desirable property1 their sccessor notion to the
classical concept o" trth. ;n their sense, tre belie"s were those that condced to the
satis"action o" desires. Bt the notion o" desire and its satis"action reqired by their
e0planatory strategy is "atally eqivocal. ;t rns together immediate inclination and
conceptally articlated commitment in 9st the way )il"rid @ellars critici2es, "or belie"s
rather than desires, nder the rbric +the &yth o" the Jiven-.
B
!or on the one hand,
desires are thoght o" as things li'e itches and thirst1 one can tell whether desires in this
sense are satis"ied 9st by having them. ;" one is no longer moved to do something, the
67472084#24
2004 Robert B. Brandom
desire is satis"ied. ;"#brac'eting the previos point#one cold in"er "rom the sccess
o" an action in satis"ying a desire in this sense to the trth o" a belie", the pragmatist
semantic strategy wold be sond. 4he idea is to ma'e that transition by e0ploiting the
role o" belie"s and desires in practical reasoning1 in in"erences leading to the "ormation o"
intentions and the per"ormance o" actions. Bt the desires that, along with belie"s, play a
role in rationali2ing actions are not li'e itches and thirst. 4hey have the same sort o"
conceptally e0plicit propositional contents that belie"s do. ; can*t tell 9st by having raw
"eels whether my desire that the ball go throgh the hoop is satis"ied#never mind my
desire that the engineering problem have been solved or that the chances o" achieving
world peace have been increased. !or "inding ot whether desires o" that sort have been
satis"ied 9st is "inding ot whether varios claims are true1 that the ball has gone throgh
the hoop, that the engineering problem has been solved, or that the chances o" achieving
world peace have been increased. @atis"action o" the sorts o" desires that are elements o"
reasons "or actions gives s no immediate, nonconceptal point o" entry into the
conceptal realm o" contents o" belie"s. 4he only reason to thin' that e0planatory grond
is gained by starting with satis"action o" desires %sccess o" actions( in attempting to
e0plain the trth o" belie"s#that is, the only reason to prse the instrmental strategy in
semantics#is that one has con"lated o" the two sorts o" desire. !or what is needed to
ma'e it wor' is something that is li'e an itch in that one can tell whether it has been
scratched withot needing to decide what is tre, and li'e a conceptally articlated
desire in that it combines in"erentially with propositionally content"l belie"s to yield
reasons "or action. Bt nothing can do both.
F
4he traditional =arly &odern conception
o" e0perience as =rlebnis wanted to have it both ways. %4his di""iclty is orthogonal to
67472084#26
2004 Robert B. Brandom
those cased by eliding what @ellars called +the notorios Ning*7*ed* distinction- between
acts o" e0periencing and the contents e0perienced.( ;t is 9st at this point that
dispositional5casal and in"erential5normative "nctionalisms part company. 4he
challenge behind calling givenness a myth is a qestion Hant taght s to as'1 does the
e0perience %or whatever( merely incline one %dispositionally(, Cr does it $ustify one in
ma'ing a claim, drawing a conclsion,
!rom or privileged vantage point a centry or more later, then, we can see that the
pragmatists* instrmentalist semantic strategy "or e0plaining credenda in terms o"
agenda, and so their theory o" meaning and trth, is "ndamentally "lawed. 4his is o"
corse not to say that they didn*t have any good ideas, or that they didn*t ma'e any
progress, or that we don*t still have something to learn "rom them. ; thin' we also 'now
by now that the semantic strategy o" the logical empiricism that scceeded pragmatism in
American academic philosophy is nwor'able, and that its conceptions o" meaning and
trth are also wrong. 4he point is that "orging, "rom the insights o" either, a theory that
"ares better by the contemporary standards that were achieved with great e""ort in no
small part by critici2ing those earlier attempts, will reqire sbstantial selection,
spplementation, and reconstral.
;t is a se"l e0ercise to divide the pragmatists* motivations and conceptal responses to
those motivations into two categories1 large, orienting, strategic commitments, and the
more local, e0ective, tactical ones. %=0ample o" the genre1 /escartes* ontological
semantics generically divides the world into representings and representeds. $e then
67472084#2B
2004 Robert B. Brandom
"illed in that pictre with a theory o" representings as immediately sel"5intimating
episodes, and o" representeds as e0tended and moving. =ven given that way o" setting
things p, it is a nice qestion whether to treat the "act that his paradigm o" the
representing7represented relation is the relation between discrsive algebraic eqations
and the e0tended geometrical "igres they speci"y in his algebraic coordinate geometry as
a generic, "raming commitment or as part o" the "illing5in o" sch a pictre.( &y
criticisms primarily address the latter1 the more detailed ways in which the pragmatists
trying to entitle themselves to the more sweeping "ramewor' commitments. 4hose
"raming commitments#the ones ; ta'e it they see' to entitle themselves to by doing the
more detailed wor'#are by and large admirable.
Among the large "eatres o" their thoght that ; ta'e to be progressive are these1
4hey were /arwinian, evoltionary natralists, aiming to reconstre the world, s,
and or 'nowledge o" the world in the terms made available by the novel e0planatory
strctres characteristic o" the best new science o" their time.
;n the service o" a renovated empiricism to go methodologically with that natralism
in ontology, they developed a concept o" e0perience as =r"ahrng rather than
=rlebnis1 as sitated, embodied, transactional, and strctred as learning, a process
rather than a state or episode. ;ts slogan might be E:o e0perience withot
e0periment.E Representing and intervening were "or them two sides o" one
conceptal coinor less imagistically, reciprocally sense dependent concepts
concerning aspects o" processes e0hibiting the selectional, adaptational strctre
common to evoltion and learning.
67472084#2F
2004 Robert B. Brandom
4hey appreciated the e0planatory priority o" semantic over epistemological isses,
which had been one o" HantDs great lessons. @o they see' to nderstand content in
terms o" e0perience %as they constre it(, that is, in terms o" role in learning, re9ecting
an orienting goal thoght o" as achievement o" %nowledge as a static, permanent state,
in "avor o" thin'ing o" it as a dynamic process o" adaptation.
4hey nderstood the normative character o" semantic concepts1 that they mst
nderwrite assessments o" correctness and incorrectness, trth and "alsity, sccess and
"ailre. 4he semantic instrmentalism critici2ed above is the more speci"ic strategy
the pragmatists adopted in their attempt to give a natralistic accont o" this
normative dimension o" semantic concepts.
;n semantics, they tried to develop nonmagical, indeed, scienti"ic theories o" content,
by contrast to Nideas* theories, which are constrctively responsive to s'eptical
worries abot the success o" ideas re"erence to things in the world#intentionality#
bt not abot its purport. 4he pragmatists tried to "igre ot what it is we do#
something continos with what pre5conceptal critters can do#that adds p to
thin%ing or %nowing something, even unsccess"lly. 4hey were broadly
functionalists in thin'ing abot the contents o" the concepts that articlate intentional
states, loo'ing to the role the content"l states play in the whole synchronic,
developing behavioral economy o" an organism in order to nderstand the concepts
they involve.
)hile reason and the sort o" intelligence that ltimately isses in scienti"ic theories
and technologies are given pride o" place in their pictre o" s, they move decisively
beyond the intellectalism and platonism that had plaged the "irst enlightenment, by
67472084#2G
2004 Robert B. Brandom
privileging practical 'nowing how over theoretical 'nowing that in their order o"
e0planation.
At this level o" very general e0planatory strategy, what one misses most in the
pragmatistsat any rate, what most separates them "rom sis that they do not %<eirce
aside( share the distinctively twentieth centry philosophical concern with language, and
with the discontinities with natre that it establishes and en"orces. 4he dominant
philosophical lineages o" the centry are soa'ed in a sense o" the centrality o" langage1
both the $sserl5$eidegger5Jadamer line and the strctralist5poststrctralist lines that
come together in /errida, on the one hand, and the !rege5Rssell line that goes throgh
Carnap to @ellars, Pine and /avidson and to )ittgenstein and /mmett on the other.
4his is partly becase o" the pragmatists* assimilationism abot the conceptal1 their
emphasi2ing continuities between concept sers and organic natre. 4hat emphasis, too,
has good credentials, and ; thin' it is "air to say that even now we have not yet sorted ot
the tensions between natralistic assimilationism and normative e0ceptionalism abot the
discrsive practices most distinctive o" s. Bt ; also ta'e it that the philosophical way
"orward "rom the ideas o" the American pragmatists mst be a linguistic pragmatism,
allied with the later )ittgenstein and the $eidegger o" /ivision Cne o" &eing and Time.
67472084#2I
2004 Robert B. Brandom
Re"erences1
Anscombe, J.=.&. %8I6F( !ntention. ;thaca, :.O.1Cornell >niversity <ress. Reprinted
%2000( Cambridge &A1 $arvard >niversity <ress.
Brandom, R. B. %2000( rticulating 'easons. Cambridge, &A1 $arvard >niversity <ress.
&enand, A. %2008( The Metaphysical Club: Story of !deas in merica. :ew Oor'1
!arrar, @trass, and Jiro0.
Rorty, R. %2000( N>niversality and 4rth* in R. Brandom %ed.( 'orty and (is Critics.
C0"ord1 Blacwell <blishers.
@ellars, ). %8IIF( Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind. R. Brandom %ed.( Cambridge,
&A1 $arvard >niversity <ress.
:otes1
67472084#?0
8
&enand %2008(.
2
Rorty %2000(.
?
Anscombe %8I6F(.
4
; discss this way o" thin'ing abot semantics "rther in Chapter Cne o" Brandom %2000(.
6
;n Chapter 4wo o" Brandom %2000(, ; arge "or an in"erential constral o" the e0pressive role o"
statements o" pre"erence or pro5attitde, and o" normative vocablary generally. Bt this reconstral
does not a""ect the point that there is a "rther element in play, besides belie"s and actions or intentions,
whose variability ndercts the possibility o" any straight"orward in"erence "rom things done to things
believed.
B
;n @ellars %8IIF(.
F
/ewey at least appreciated and articlated this crcial distinction#bt even he did not manage to
thin' throgh its conseqences "or "ndamental strctral "eatres o" his giding methodology.