Abstract

Almeder's book is a substantive contribution both to Peirce scholarship and to contemporary analytic epistemology. The great strength of The Philosophy of Charles S. Peirce is its engagement of Peirce's later thought with current issues in the foundation of knowledge and the philosophy of science. Almeder brings Peirce's ideas to bear on positions held by Quine, Sellars, Rescher, Hintikka, Scheffler, Popper, Feyerabend, and Russell and in so doing makes Peirce this group's contemporary and, in most cases, its philosophical better. In addition, Almeder provides a rather sophisticated defense of epistemological realism, a defense broadly Peircean but supplemented considerably by Almeder's own friendly arguments.