Abstract
In this chapter, I examine the debate between Rorty and two neopragmatists, Hilary Putnam and Jürgen Habermas. Though Putnam and Habermas have quite different philosophical backgrounds, their critiques of Rorty converge. Both argue that pragmatic radicalization of the linguistic turn requires seeing that our practices are guided from within by unconditional claims, and both argue that this conclusion follows from taking seriously the agent’s point of view. Rorty argues, in contrast, that the pragmatic radicalization of the linguistic turn requires naturalizing human reason and rejecting all claims to unconditionality. I analyze the dialectic at the heart of this debate and suggest that it may not get at what is deepest in the pragmatic tradition.
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Notes
- 1.
The term “neo-pragmatism” can refer either to the distinctive position that Rorty worked out in the 1970s or to the thought of any pragmatic thinker who worked contemporaneously with, or in the wake of, the resurgence of pragmatism in the 1970s, and who takes seriously the development of the analytical form of pragmatism that begins with C. I. Lewis and culminates with Rorty. In this sense, Hilary Putman, Richard Bernstein, Jürgen Habermas, Cornel West, Jeffrey Stout, Bjørn Ramberg, Cheryl Misak, Huw Price, and Robert Brandom are all neopragmatists. For the resurgence of pragmatism, see Bernstein 1992 and Kloppenberg 1996.
- 2.
One might balk at calling Habermas a pragmatist in any respect, but in recent years he has defined himself as one – as a “Kantian pragmatist” (see Habermas 2003a). This is also how he characterizes Putnam’s position. In this chapter, I do not take up the complex relationship between Putnam and Habermas. For this relationship, see Putnam 1987, 2002, and Habermas 2003b.
- 3.
In recent years, Cheryl Misak has coined the term “new pragmatism” to contrast with Rorty’s neopragmatism (see Misak 2013). New pragmatists are those contemporary pragmatists who wish to rehabilitate truth and objectivity in the wake of Rorty’s dismissal. In this respect, Putnam and Habermas are new pragmatists and we could characterize the debate between them and Rorty as one between new and neopragmatism.
- 4.
Habermas and Rorty first engaged one another in the 1980s at the height of the debate about modernity and postmodernity. I am not going to discuss this debate in this chapter. For this debate, see the papers in Bernstein 1985.
- 5.
Putnam eventually gave up this theory of truth. But this is the theory at play in his dialogue with Rorty.
- 6.
This statement is exaggerated in the sense that Rorty stresses that we are causally constrained by the world. But when “something causal happens…as many facts are brought into the world as there are languages for describing that causal transaction” (Rorty 1991d, p. 81). So what facts there are depend on how causal transactions are taken by a linguistic community, and this is determined by the contingent history of the linguistic community, not the causal transactions themselves.
- 7.
Rorty’s only quibble with this quote is that Sartre should not have said that there is a truth of man, as there is no such thing.
- 8.
- 9.
For a full account of the concept of performative contradiction, see Habermas 1987.
- 10.
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Recommended Literature for Further Reading
Bernstein, Richard J. 2010. Jürgen Habermas’s Kantian Pragmatism. In The pragmatic turn, 168–199. Cambridge: Polity Press. This paper contains an illuminating discussion of Habermas’s pragmatic theory of truth in relation to Rorty’s contextualism and his overall Kantian pragmatism.
Hildebrand, David. 2003. Beyond realism and anti-realism: John Dewey and the Neo-Pragmatists. Nashville, TN: Vanderbilt University Press. This book has an extensive discussion of the relation between neopragmatism and classical pragmatism and of the place of Rorty and Putnam in the development of neopragmatism.
Levine, Steven. 2011. Truth and moral validity: Habermas’ domesticated pragmatism. Constellations 18(2): 244–259. This paper contains a discussion of Habermas’s pragmatic theory of truth and argues that it is inconsistent with his Kantian pragmatic commitments.
Malachowski, Alan. 2014. The new pragmatism. New York: Routledge Press. This book contains chapters on Rorty’s and Putnam’s pragmatic positions, and contains a thorough discussion of their debate.
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Levine, S. (2023). Neopragmatism (Putnam and Habermas). In: Müller, M. (eds) Handbuch Richard Rorty. Springer VS, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-16253-5_23
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