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BR A N D O M , H E G EL A N D IN FE R EN T IA LI S M
BR A N D O M , H E G EL A N D IN FE R EN T IA LI S M
Brandoms Pragmatism
Brandoms suggestions that his inferentialism is pragmatist and Hegelian
may strike some readers as arbitrary. After all, it is not every day that
someone who traces his position to Sellars and Frege also insists on its
relation to pragmatism and to Hegel. Some observers might want to
emphasize the differences between such thinkers, or the differences
between pragmatism and Hegel. Brandoms conviction that pragmatism
is semantic since (all) cognitive claims appeal to, and hence rely on,
semantic inference at best shows that pragmatism relies, or ought to rely,
on semantics for claims to know. It suggests that pragmatism, which some
see as epistemological, has a semantic dimension since knowledge claims
of all kinds rely on semantics. We will return to this claim below. But it
does not show that all forms of semantics, or even those forms associated
with Frege and Sellars, are pragmatist.
One thing Brandom gets right about pragmatism is its often neglected
epistemological thrust (see Rescher, 2000). Broadly speaking, classical
American pragmatism, which was founded by Peirce, follows from the
continuing concern with knowledge after the rejection of Cartesian epistemological foundationalism. In current terminology, Peirces critique
amounts to a rejection of epistemological foundationalism while simultaneously avoiding epistemological scepticism. In different ways, this concern
unites Peirces theory of meaning, James theory of truth, Deweys evolutionary approach to knowledge through warranted true belief, C. I. Lewis
interest in a relativized a priori, and so on.
The evolution of the discussion in the hands of analytic thinkers turned
pragmatist (Quine, Putnam, Rorty, Brandom) has more recently broadened the understanding of pragmatism in a way that makes it
questionable whether the term is still meaningful. When Quine claimed
that his position was pragmatic, he meant that ideas could not be matched
up with the real (Quine, 1961). Rorty extends the appelation to Putnam,
supposedly the most important current pragmatist, Nietzsche, Davidson,
and others. His two favourite pragmatists at present are Davidson and
Dewey (Rorty, 1999: p. 24). In Brandom, the term has been extended, to
the best of my knowledge for the rst time, to apply even to Frege,
someone who until now has always seemed to fall outside pragmatism,
however understood.
Brandom has almost nothing to say, except in the most general terms,
about the classical pragmatists. In identifying his position as pragmatist,
he seems to have in mind specically cognitive forms of inferential practice as opposed to theory. Unlike Marxists, Brandom has in mind
specically cognitive practices, like asserting, making a claim, or giving or
asking for reasons, as opposed to theory. But that is simply not enough
to justify the claim for pragmatism, since beginning with Socrates I cannot
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BR A N D O M , H E G EL A N D IN FE R EN T IA LI S M
like a concept. Clearly if there are concepts, selves have them; but selves
are not and cannot be reduced to concepts. Finally, as for Kant, though
in a wholly different way, concept (Begriff) is a technical term for Hegel.
To put the point quickly, Hegel uses concept to designate the form of
knowledge possible after abandoning representation in the Kantian sense
while restricting cognition to conscious experience. For Hegel, philosophical knowledge, which relies on concepts, grasps what is as it is given
in experience through the identity of the theory of the cognitive object
and the object of the theory. Brandoms understanding of concept, which
remains unclear, includes reference to the world as it is, which the concept
is intended to grasp. Since Hegel specically denies that we ever know
the world as it is, he cannot be using concept in that sense. Hence,
Brandom gives us no reason to believe that either he or Quine understands concepts in a way even remotely similar to Hegels technical
understanding of the same term.
Brandoms Sellarsian Hegelianism
Brandoms comparison between Hegelian idealism and Quinean pragmatism presupposes a similarity based on a shared commitment to holism,
but a distinction between idealism and pragmatism. I contest the similarity between Hegel and Quine, but I nd the distinction between
pragmatism and idealism helpful. They are not the same and need to be
distinguished. In different ways, the classical American pragmatists all
react for or against Hegel and other forms of idealism. Whatever idealism
is, it is not identical with pragmatism.
This useful distinction (between idealism and pragmatism) simply
disappears in Articulating Reasons, where Brandom takes a Sellarsian
approach in directly linking his own position to Hegels. The reason for
what certainly looks like a transition from a Quinean to a Sellarsian
approach to Hegel is mysterious. There is no indication that Brandom has
meanwhile become critical of Quine, and hence critical of his own earlier,
specically Quinean way of interpreting Hegel. In the later book,
Brandoms Hegel interpretation combines a series of complex claims about
the relation of analytic and continental philosophy, Brandoms relation
to Sellars, Sellars relation to Kant, and Brandoms relation to Hegel.
Following Rortys practice, each of Brandoms claims depends on
blurring a series of distinctions.
Brandoms recent Sellarsian reading of Hegel rests on two specic claims
by Rorty. First, through their proto-Hegelianism the text says prope
(Latin for near)-Hegelianism, but this looks like a misprint Sellars and
Brandom overcome the split between analytic and continental philosophy
(Rorty, 1997: p. 11). Second, Brandom provides a Hegelian extension of
Sellars Kantian approach to thought and action (Rorty, 1997: p. 11).
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This passage, which clearly indicates Brandoms intent, raises more questions than its answers. Left unclear are such crucial claims as how can we
ever know which inferences are in fact correct? Do quarks exist because
we infer that they do? What does it mean for inferences about electrons
or aromatic compounds, in Brandoms language, really to follow? Does
that mean we can check them against the way the world is?
Brandom is aware of the consequences of his claim with respect to
currently popular views. He criticizes Rorty, who is annoyed by any claim
for truth, in contending that facts make claims true for they make claimings true and that in a central range of perceptual experience, the facts
are the reasons that entitle perceivers to their empirical beliefs (Brandom,
2000c, p. 162).
Brandoms epistemological intention is clear in the claim that through
concepts we know how it is with electrons and aromatic compounds, and,
more generally, through facts we know how it is with the mind-independent world. His suggestion that in appropriate conditions it just is the case
that natural science is correct about the world is a version of the traditional realist claim to know. Realism of all types, which goes back in the
Western tradition at least to Plato, can be understood as the claim to
know what is as it is, to know the way the mind-independent external
world is (Devitt, 1997). In modern philosophy, Descartes typically claims
that certain ideas about the mind-independent world must necessarily be
true. Versions of realism are still widely popular after a century of analytic
criticism of empiricism.
Rorty rejects the idea of getting it right in any form about the world
in favour of more conversation, since no amount of discussion will show
that a given belief cuts reality at the joints (Rorty, 2000, in Brandom,
2000c). His observation that there is no way to know if beliefs are true
merely because reasons can be asked for and given concerning a particular belief without matching it up with the world effectively disposes of
Brandoms inferentialist realism at the cost of endorsing epistemological
scepticism. For Rorty, either we know how the world is, in which case
discussion comes to an end, or we do not and cannot know how the world
is, and the discussion is endless and not worth conducting since we nally
cannot know anything other than that we cannot know anything.
Hegel offers a promising alternative to Brandom and Rorty. It has been
known at least since Kant that, other than by accident, there is no way
to know the mind-independent external world as it is. Brandom and Rorty,
who in this respect are pre-Kantians, still make the possibility of knowledge depend on somehow getting it right about external reality. Hegel,
who accepts Kants point, constructs a view of knowledge that makes no
pretence to knowing the way the world is, which does not gure in his
account, in conning knowledge claims to conscious experience. Unlike
Brandom, he does not claim to know, or that it is possible to know, the
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BR A N D O M , H E G EL A N D IN FE R EN T IA LI S M
BR A N D O M , H E G EL A N D IN FE R EN T IA LI S M
This task is harder than it looks. Analytic writers could usefully become
more interested in continental gures and conversely. Analytic philosophers might insist less on doing philosophy as opposed to doing the history
of philosophy. And continental philosophers could become more
concerned with problems than people. Many of the differences can indeed
be relativized, but it is unlikely that they can all be overcome. For the
analytic and the continental traditions are substantively different. I suspect
that in time Brandom will realize this point and talk less and less, not
more and more, about Hegel. For Brandoms position has to succeed or
fail on its own merits, not on any claimed relation to Hegels, which he
has not so far justied.
Duquesne University
References
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Brandom, Robert (2000a) Articulating Reasons: An Introduction to Inferentialism,
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