Central and East European
Society for Phenomenology

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Sociologizing metaphysics and mind

a pragmatist point of view on the methodology of the social sciences

Osmo Kivinen Tero Piiroinen

pp. 97-114

Abstract

There are realist philosophers and social scientists who believe in the indispensability of social ontology. However, we argue that certain pragmatist outlines for inquiry open more fruitful roads to empirical research than such ontologizing perspectives. The pragmatist conceptual tools in a Darwinian vein—concepts like action, habit, coping and community—are in a particularly stark contrast with, for instance, the Searlean and Chomskian metaphysics of human being. In particular, we bring Searle's realist philosophy of society and mind under critical survey in this paper and contrast it with a pragmatist, sociologizing approach. Drawing from Dewey, James, and recent antirepresentationalism, we propose for research work a methodological relationalism of its own kind, altogether detached from the ontologies of society and mind.

Publication details

Published in:

(2007) Human Studies 30 (2).

Pages: 97-114

DOI: 10.1007/s10746-007-9049-6

Full citation:

Kivinen Osmo, Piiroinen Tero (2007) „Sociologizing metaphysics and mind: a pragmatist point of view on the methodology of the social sciences“. Human Studies 30 (2), 97–114.