Abstract
Chapter 2 explained how David Hume aestheticized moral philosophy to some extent, arguing that our feelings and sentiments, not our reason, contribute to our moral judgments. Peirce shared a similarly conservative approach to the conduct of life. As he argued, “it is the instincts, the sentiments, that make the substance of the soul. Cognition is only its surface.”2 Peirce articulated the connection between the aesthetic approach to ethics and conservatism when he stated that “sentimentalism implies conservatism.”3 Additionally, Chapter 5 discussed how Gadamer articulated the role of prejudice in our interpretive endeavors, and these include our interpretation of morally problematic situations.
Sentimentalism implies conservatism.1
Charles Sanders Peirce, “Philosophy and the Conduct of Life” Taste and reflective judgment
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Notes
Kenneth Minogue, The Liberal Mind, (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1963), p. 69.
Hans Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method, (London: Continuum, 2006), p. 31.
Thomas Alexander, (1993) “John Dewey and the Moral Imagination: Beyond Putnam and Rorty Toward a Postmodern Ethics,” Transactions of the Charles Sanders Peirce Society, 29(3), p. 373
James Gouinlock, (1972) John Dewey’s Philosophy of Value, (New York: Humanities Press) pp. 191–192.
Anne C. Dailey, (1998), “Holmes and the Romantic Mind,” Duke Law Journal, 48(3), p. 431.
Seth Vannatta, (2014) “Pragmatism without the Fighting Tag: Functional Realism in Justice Holmes Jurisprudence and Moral Philosophy,” in Graham Hubbs and Douglas Lind, eds., Pragmatism, Law, and Language, (New York: Routledge) p. 261.
John Dewey, (1967) Experience and Nature, 1 of The Later Works of John Dewey, Ed. Jo Ann Boydston, (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1967) p. 42–45.
John Dewey, (1986) Logic: The Theory of Inquiry, Vol. 12 of The Later Works of John Dewey, Ed. Jo Ann Boydston, (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press) p. 110.
John Dewey, (1977) “The Postulate of Immediate Empiricism,” in The Middle Works of John Dewey, Vol. 3, Ed. Jo Ann Boydston (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press) p. 158.
Gouinlock , (1972) John Dewey’s Philosophy of Value, p. 132.
Greggory F. Pappas, (1998) “Dewey’s Ethics: Morality as Experience,” in Reading Dewey Interpretations for a Postmodern Generation, Ed. Larry A. Hickman, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press) p. 103.
John Dewey, “Three Independent Factors in Morals,” in The Later Works of John Dewey, Vol. 5, Ed. Jo Ann Boydston, (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1984c), p. 280.
and James Gouinlock, “Dewey,” in Ethics in the History of Western Philosophy, Ed. James Gouinlock, (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1989) p. 314.
John Dewey, The Child and the Curriculum, in The Middle Works of John Dewey, Vol. 2, Ed. Jo Ann Boydston, (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1976) p. 299 and Gouinlock, “Dewey,” p. 315.
Thomas Alexander, (1998) “The Art of Life: Dewey’s Aesthetics,” in Reading Dewey Interpretations for a Postmodern Generation, Ed. Larry Hickman, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press) p. 3.
Murray Murphey, in Human Nature and Conduct, in The Middle Works of John Dewey, Vol. 14, Ed. Jo Ann Boydston, (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1983) p. x.
Anthony Kronman, (1987) “Alexander Bickel’s Philosophy of Prudence,” Yale Law Journal, 94, p. 1582.
Cheryl Misak, (2013) The American Pragmatists, (Oxford: Oxford University Press) p. 33.
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Vannatta, S. (2014). The Aesthetic Dimensions of Moral Experience. In: Conservatism and Pragmatism. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137466839_9
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