[FRIAM] Is Chemero TRULY a pragmatist.

[thompnickson2 at gmail.com]

Dear colleagues, 

 

Metaphysics and Pragmatism

 

Today's discussion clarified many things for me, including why Peirce and
James's group was called The Metaphysical Club. Pragmatism IS a metaphysics,
but one that collapses metaphysics onto epistemology.  The meaning of a term
is the effect that it has on inquiry and the meaning of "truth", therefore,
is that it sends inquirers looking for a single answer to their questions.
That aspiration will be hopeless in most cases, but as an aspiration it has
the effect to draw people into discourse.  

What Chemero's passage misses is that there is no further metaphysics to be
had, after one has announced oneself to be an "American Naturalist" as he
calls it, or pragmatist, as I would call it.   Once a pragmatist, you have
already spent your metaphysical wad: you have already committed yourself to
a search for truths wherever they may be found and however rarely they may
be encountered.  

Where you got me is probably anathema to you all, but thanks for getting me
there, anyway. 

 

Nick   

 

 

Nick Thompson

 <mailto:ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com

 <https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/>
https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/

 

From: thompnickson2 at gmail.com <thompnickson2 at gmail.com> 
Sent: Thursday, November 11, 2021 12:30 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <friam at redfish.com>
Cc: 'Mike Bybee' <mikebybee at earthlink.net>
Subject: Is Chemero TRULY a pragmatist.

 

And I quote:

 

When one proclaims oneself to be an antirepresentationalist, as proponents
of radical embodied cognitive science do, there are two things one might be
saying.  First, one might be making a claim about the nature of cognitive
systems, namely that nothing in them is a representation.  For the rest o
this chapter I will call this the metaphysical claim.  Second, one might be
claiming that our best explanation of cognitive systems will not involve
representations.  I will call this the epistemological claim.  These are
pretty clearly separate claims.  It is easy to imagine, for example, that
the metaphysical  claim is true and that humans really are just complex
dynamical systems, but they are so complex that the best way for us (with
our limited intellects) to explain them is by metaphorically or
instrumentally ascribing [to] them mental representation.  [Chemero, A.
2011. Radical embodied cognitive science.  MIT: Cambridge, MA. p67.]  

 

Given the pragmatic Maxim concerning meaning, that the meaning of a term is
just those practices of investigation that the term's use would imply, how
is this passage not anti-pragmatic?  What other truth is there but a
metaphorically or instrumentally best explanation?  

 

Chemero's overall position is that his RADICAL  embodied cognitive science
is the only rightful heir of the American Naturalism of which Peirce and
James are the progenitors.  Therefore you, many FRIAMMERS just might just
see this as a internecine dustup in the anti-representationalist coven, and
because you are computationalists (ergo, representationalists), ignore it.
That's OK.   Others may say "-ist, -ist, ist; blah, blah blah."  That's ok
too.  But perhaps those few of you who are members of the coven may want to
help me square this circle.  

 

Nick 

 

 

 

Nick Thompson

ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com <mailto:ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com> 

https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/

 

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