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Humanistic Pragmatism: The Philosophy of F.C.S. Schiller
347 pages, Paperback
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Ferdinand Canning Scott Schiller
36 books6 followersFerdinand Canning Scott Schiller (August 16, 1864 - August 9, 1937) was a German-British philosopher. Born in Altona, Holstein (at that time member of the German Confederation, but under Danish administration), Schiller studied at the University of Oxford, and later was a professor there, after being invited back after a brief time at Cornell University. Later in his life he taught at the University of Southern California. In his lifetime he was well-known as a philosopher; after his death his work was largely forgotten.
Schiller's philosophy was very similar to and often aligned with the pragmatism of William James, although Schiller referred to it as "humanism". He argued vigorously against both logical positivism and associated philosophers (for example, Bertrand Russell) as well as absolute idealism (such as F.H. Bradley).
Schiller was an early supporter of evolution and a founding member of the English Eugenics Society.
Schiller's philosophy was very similar to and often aligned with the pragmatism of William James, although Schiller referred to it as "humanism". He argued vigorously against both logical positivism and associated philosophers (for example, Bertrand Russell) as well as absolute idealism (such as F.H. Bradley).
Schiller was an early supporter of evolution and a founding member of the English Eugenics Society.
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October 22, 2024
AN EXCELLENT COLLECTION OF THE WRITINGS OF THIS PRAGMATIST PHILOSOPHER
Ferdinand Canning Scott Schiller (1864-1937) was a German-British philosopher, who taught at the University of Oxford, Cornell University, and the University of Southern California.
He says, “If finally we turn to a region which the vested interests of time-honored organizations… must always render hard of access to a sincere philosophy, and consider the attitude of Pragmatism towards the religious side of life, we shall find once more that it has a most important bearing. For in principle Pragmatism overcomes the old antithesis of faith and reason. It shows on the one side that ‘faith’ must underlie all ‘reason’ and pervade it, nay, that at bottom rationality itself is the supremest postulate of faith. Without faith, therefore, there can be no reason, and initially the demands of ‘faith’ must be as legitimate and essentially as reasonable as those of the ‘reason’ they pervade.” (Pg. 19)
He suggests, “Humanism is fully able to vindicate itself, and so we can now define it as the philosophic attitude which, without wasting thought upon attempts to construct experience a priori, is content to take human experience as the clue to the world of human experience, content to take man on his own merits, just as he is to start with, without insisting that he must first be disemboweled of his interests and have his individuality evaporated and translated into technical jargon, before he can be deemed deserving of scientific notice.” (Pg. 23)
He defines Pragmatism: “the thorough recognition that the purposive character of mental life generally must influence and pervade also our most remotely cognitive activities.” (Pg. 46) Later, he adds, “Pragmatism [is] the doctrine that (1) truths are logical values, and as the method which systematically tests claims to truth in accordance with this principle… (2) the ‘truth’ of an assertion depends on its application… (3) the meaning of a rule lies in its application… (4) all meaning depends on purpose… (5) all mental life is purposive… (6) a systematic protest against all ignoring of the purposiveness of actual knowing… (7) a conscious application to epistemology (or logic) of a teleological psychology, which implies, ultimately, a voluntarist metaphysic.” (Pg. 61-65)
He points out, “Two men… with different fortunes, histories, and temperaments, OUGHT NOT to arrive at the same metaphysic, nor can they do so honestly; each should react individually on the food for thought which his personal life affords, and the resulting differences OUGHT NOT to be set aside as void of ultimate significance.” (Pg. 71)
He rejects the Deterministic universe: “I should prefer a universe marred by chance to such a certainty. For the ‘chance’ in this case means a chance of improvement. Of course, a world that was really perfect in a simple and human way, and was incapable of declining from the perfection because it contained no indetermination, would be better still.” (Pg. 121)
He says, “the bodies of ‘truth’ which de facto we acknowledge in our sciences are all partial systems, incomplete in themselves and discrepant with each other. If nothing short of absolute truth is perfectly systematic, and if all our systems are imperfect, is not all our ‘truth’ tainted with falsehood, and must it not be admitted that NO (actual) ‘systems’ are ‘true’?” (Pg. 157-158)
He explains, “in the fullest sense of truth its definition must be pragmatic. Truth is the useful, efficient, workable, to which our practical experience tends to restrict our truth valuations; if anything the reverse of this professes to be true, it is (sooner or later) dejected and rejected.” (Pg. 168) Later, he adds, “The claims to truth involved are validated by their consequences when used. Thus Pragmatism as a logical method is merely the CONSCIOUS application of a NATURAL procedure of our minds in actual knowing. It merely proposes (1) to realize clearly the nature of these facts, and of the risks and gains which they involve, and (2) to simplify and reform logical theory thereby.” (Pg. 238)
He asserts, “The new philosophy… has been taught… that knowledge cannot be DEPERSONALIZED, and that the full consciousness of personal interest is indispensable for the attainment of truth. Hence the theologians’ insistence on the personal character of ‘faith,’ which on the old assumptions had seemed a logical absurdity, was completely vindicated.” (Pg. 259)
But he also argues, “all religions will be greatly benefited and strengthened by getting rid of their nonfunctional accretions and appendages. These constitute … the THEOLOGICAL side of religion; and it nearly always does more harm than good. For even where ‘theological’ systems are not merely products of professional pedantry, and their ‘rationality’ is not illusory, they absorb too much energy better devoted to the more truly religious function.” (Pg. 273)
He contends, “We have, I claim, no logical ground for supposing the world to be knowable, and yet utterly disregardful of happiness and goodness. For a world supposed to be fully knowable… would… include an intellectually insoluble puzzle which would render it fundamentally UNKNOWABLE. Nay, more, is not the supposition directly self-contradictory? Does not a knowable world satisfy at least one of our emotional demands---the desire for knowledge? It cannot be then, as alleged, UTTERLY out of relation to our emotional nature. But if it can satisfy one postulate, why not the rest?” (P… g. 284-285)
He states, “the ethical argument for immortality seems logically as sound and metaphysically as legitimate as any argument can be… [but] when immortality has been shown to be an ethical postulate, nothing has been decided as to the CONTENT of that idea. All we know is that immortality must be of a sort as to be capable of being an ethical postulate… It is difficult, for instance, to see how eternal damnation could be regarded as an ethical postulate, while some appropriate modification of the Hindu doctrine of karma might seem ethically welcome. But though ethics could thus PROHIBIT certain ethically outrageous beliefs in immortality, it cannot aspire positively to determine the way in which the postulate is to be realized.” (Pg. 288)
He acknowledges, “there is no such intrinsic impossibility about a scientific proof of the persistence of consciousness through death; there is, in fact, no particular difficulty about conceiving empirical evidence sufficient to establish this doctrine with as high a degree of certainty as we have for any of our beliefs as to matters of fact. The whole difficulty consists in getting the evidence. If we had succeeded, the theoretic readjustment of our opinions would be easy…” (Pg. 310)
Schiller is not well-known these days, though he was rather popular during his lifetime. This is an excellent, broad, and well-balanced collection of his writings, and will make an excellent introduction to him.
Ferdinand Canning Scott Schiller (1864-1937) was a German-British philosopher, who taught at the University of Oxford, Cornell University, and the University of Southern California.
He says, “If finally we turn to a region which the vested interests of time-honored organizations… must always render hard of access to a sincere philosophy, and consider the attitude of Pragmatism towards the religious side of life, we shall find once more that it has a most important bearing. For in principle Pragmatism overcomes the old antithesis of faith and reason. It shows on the one side that ‘faith’ must underlie all ‘reason’ and pervade it, nay, that at bottom rationality itself is the supremest postulate of faith. Without faith, therefore, there can be no reason, and initially the demands of ‘faith’ must be as legitimate and essentially as reasonable as those of the ‘reason’ they pervade.” (Pg. 19)
He suggests, “Humanism is fully able to vindicate itself, and so we can now define it as the philosophic attitude which, without wasting thought upon attempts to construct experience a priori, is content to take human experience as the clue to the world of human experience, content to take man on his own merits, just as he is to start with, without insisting that he must first be disemboweled of his interests and have his individuality evaporated and translated into technical jargon, before he can be deemed deserving of scientific notice.” (Pg. 23)
He defines Pragmatism: “the thorough recognition that the purposive character of mental life generally must influence and pervade also our most remotely cognitive activities.” (Pg. 46) Later, he adds, “Pragmatism [is] the doctrine that (1) truths are logical values, and as the method which systematically tests claims to truth in accordance with this principle… (2) the ‘truth’ of an assertion depends on its application… (3) the meaning of a rule lies in its application… (4) all meaning depends on purpose… (5) all mental life is purposive… (6) a systematic protest against all ignoring of the purposiveness of actual knowing… (7) a conscious application to epistemology (or logic) of a teleological psychology, which implies, ultimately, a voluntarist metaphysic.” (Pg. 61-65)
He points out, “Two men… with different fortunes, histories, and temperaments, OUGHT NOT to arrive at the same metaphysic, nor can they do so honestly; each should react individually on the food for thought which his personal life affords, and the resulting differences OUGHT NOT to be set aside as void of ultimate significance.” (Pg. 71)
He rejects the Deterministic universe: “I should prefer a universe marred by chance to such a certainty. For the ‘chance’ in this case means a chance of improvement. Of course, a world that was really perfect in a simple and human way, and was incapable of declining from the perfection because it contained no indetermination, would be better still.” (Pg. 121)
He says, “the bodies of ‘truth’ which de facto we acknowledge in our sciences are all partial systems, incomplete in themselves and discrepant with each other. If nothing short of absolute truth is perfectly systematic, and if all our systems are imperfect, is not all our ‘truth’ tainted with falsehood, and must it not be admitted that NO (actual) ‘systems’ are ‘true’?” (Pg. 157-158)
He explains, “in the fullest sense of truth its definition must be pragmatic. Truth is the useful, efficient, workable, to which our practical experience tends to restrict our truth valuations; if anything the reverse of this professes to be true, it is (sooner or later) dejected and rejected.” (Pg. 168) Later, he adds, “The claims to truth involved are validated by their consequences when used. Thus Pragmatism as a logical method is merely the CONSCIOUS application of a NATURAL procedure of our minds in actual knowing. It merely proposes (1) to realize clearly the nature of these facts, and of the risks and gains which they involve, and (2) to simplify and reform logical theory thereby.” (Pg. 238)
He asserts, “The new philosophy… has been taught… that knowledge cannot be DEPERSONALIZED, and that the full consciousness of personal interest is indispensable for the attainment of truth. Hence the theologians’ insistence on the personal character of ‘faith,’ which on the old assumptions had seemed a logical absurdity, was completely vindicated.” (Pg. 259)
But he also argues, “all religions will be greatly benefited and strengthened by getting rid of their nonfunctional accretions and appendages. These constitute … the THEOLOGICAL side of religion; and it nearly always does more harm than good. For even where ‘theological’ systems are not merely products of professional pedantry, and their ‘rationality’ is not illusory, they absorb too much energy better devoted to the more truly religious function.” (Pg. 273)
He contends, “We have, I claim, no logical ground for supposing the world to be knowable, and yet utterly disregardful of happiness and goodness. For a world supposed to be fully knowable… would… include an intellectually insoluble puzzle which would render it fundamentally UNKNOWABLE. Nay, more, is not the supposition directly self-contradictory? Does not a knowable world satisfy at least one of our emotional demands---the desire for knowledge? It cannot be then, as alleged, UTTERLY out of relation to our emotional nature. But if it can satisfy one postulate, why not the rest?” (P… g. 284-285)
He states, “the ethical argument for immortality seems logically as sound and metaphysically as legitimate as any argument can be… [but] when immortality has been shown to be an ethical postulate, nothing has been decided as to the CONTENT of that idea. All we know is that immortality must be of a sort as to be capable of being an ethical postulate… It is difficult, for instance, to see how eternal damnation could be regarded as an ethical postulate, while some appropriate modification of the Hindu doctrine of karma might seem ethically welcome. But though ethics could thus PROHIBIT certain ethically outrageous beliefs in immortality, it cannot aspire positively to determine the way in which the postulate is to be realized.” (Pg. 288)
He acknowledges, “there is no such intrinsic impossibility about a scientific proof of the persistence of consciousness through death; there is, in fact, no particular difficulty about conceiving empirical evidence sufficient to establish this doctrine with as high a degree of certainty as we have for any of our beliefs as to matters of fact. The whole difficulty consists in getting the evidence. If we had succeeded, the theoretic readjustment of our opinions would be easy…” (Pg. 310)
Schiller is not well-known these days, though he was rather popular during his lifetime. This is an excellent, broad, and well-balanced collection of his writings, and will make an excellent introduction to him.
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