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Reviewed by:
  • C. I. Lewis in Focus: The Pulse of Pragmatism
  • Melissa Bergeron
Sandra B. Rosenthal. C. I. Lewis in Focus: The Pulse of Pragmatism. American Philosophy. Bloomington-Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2007. Pp. xi + 184. Paper, $ 19.95.

While C. I. Lewis’s most celebrated logical innovation is by no means neglected, strict implication features in Rosenthal’s discussion in a fashion parallel, one comes to understand, to its role in his broader philosophical efforts, viz., as one component of a much more ambitious philosophical enterprise. Were one pressed to apply a label to Lewis’s broader project, “epistemological” is perhaps the most fitting term, with his accomplishments in logic paving the way to this broader effort. As with Lewis, Rosenthal sets for herself an ambitious project. She offers a meticulous explication of Lewis’s philosophical development, ranging from his logical investigations to his treatment of a priori knowledge, and, eventually, to a pragmatic understanding of moral imperatives. But always in her sights is the promise of a bridge between traditions, one might say, in which Lewis’s work is relevant both to analysts and to continentalists (both groups broadly and non-pejoratively construed). Similarly, but more narrowly, Rosenthal’s Lewis manages to plaster over many of the cracks in the work of other classical pragmatists. For example, in response to James’s apparent commitment to the notion of degrees of truth whereby new systems of thought are judged “truer” than older, less workable systems, we find Lewis’s theory holding that “[r]ejected systems are not empirically true, but they remain consistent logical systems, and any empirical claims that were true relative to that framework remain true relative to that framework” (55). However compelling one finds Lewis’s solutions to such problems, Rosenthal’s case that Lewis’s ideas warrant closer attention is unassailable.

This slim tome presents Lewis’s philosophical vision over the course of six chapters, the first treating primarily his intellectual history and the genesis of his ideas. Chapter two introduces the reader to Lewis’s logical ruminations, offering a non-symbolic account of strict implication specifically, and a brief gloss on his interests in logics in general, spilling into a discussion of Lewis’s “pragmatic Kantianism,” i.e., his theory of a priori knowledge. Lewis’s pragmatic empiricism, discussed in chapter three, features his notion of “the given” [End Page 651] in experience, a discussion in which Rosenthal masterfully employs a linguistic style traditionally encountered, say, in works of phenomenology as well as the usual epistemological jargon of the staunch analyst—and this to impressive effect. The remaining chapters treat Lewis’s metaphysics, ethics, and social philosophy, respectively, with the second half of the book tracing out the central concepts expounded in the first.

Rosenthal’s marrying the general linguistic style of the continental tradition (again, broadly construed) and the methodology of the analyst seems to illustrate how Lewis’s body of work might naturally fit in either camp, linguistic innovation and terminological precision working in concert. In fact, Lewis’s theory of empirical knowledge comes into focus via Rosenthal’s subtle alterations of core concepts and her unpacking of Lewis’s occasionally abrupt glosses and unfortunate comments. We begin, e.g., with “the given”—what is sensibly presented in experience (69)—and from this root concept acquire the “absolutely given,” which is contrasted with the “relatively given” or the “given as taken,” the “element of givenness” (72–75). Rosenthal meticulously guides her reader through Lewis’s more demanding passages, clarifying and adding precision to his remarks along the way.

Rosenthal gives a wonderful exposition of Lewis’s theory of a priori knowledge. Of particular interest is the analysis of Lewis’s theory relative to Kant’s notion of the a priori, Lewis’s dismissal of the existence of a priori synthetic propositions (51), and his response to the seeming “capriciousness” of other classical pragmatists, who suggest that truth is contingent upon the human mind (55). In presenting Lewis’s theory of meaning, Rosenthal attributes to him the view that “the sense of unactualized possibilities embedded in meaning as dispositional brings a sense of real alternatives—the ‘could do otherwise’—into the heart of...

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