Novelty and Causality in William James’s Pluralistic Universe

European Journal of Pragmatism and American Philosophy 11 (2) (2019)
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Abstract

The issue of the emergence of genuinely new events in a paradigm of natural continuity has been analyzed in different fields by Pragmatists authors like Peirce, Dewey, and Mead. Another way to consider the problematic relationship between novelty and continuity is by considering William James’s understanding of causal connections. This article addresses the concept of causality that James repeatedly addressed and deeply rethought throughout his career. I believe that the concept of causality provides an excellent platform from which to view the various aspects that have made James’s epistemological and metaphysical thinking so influential in the history of theories of emergence, and which is experiencing currently a major revival.

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References found in this work

Physicalism, or Something Near Enough.Jaegwon Kim - 2005 - Princeton University Press.
The Will to Believe: And Other Essays in Popular Philosophy.William James - 1897 - New York: Cambridge University Press. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt, Fredson Bowers & Ignas K. Skrupskelis.
The Rise and Fall of British Emergentism.Brian P. Mclaughlin - 1992 - In Ansgar Beckermann, Hans Flohr & Jaegwon Kim, Emergence or Reduction?: Prospects for Nonreductive Physicalism. New York: De Gruyter. pp. 49-93.
Evolution and the Founders of Pragmatism.Philip Paul Wiener - 1949 - Cambridge, MA, USA: University of Pennsylvania Press.

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