Thomas Adajian (James Madison University)
The founder of pragmatism, Charles Peirce, wrote little about art, but quite a few interesting things about aesthetics. A working scientist, he defended pragmatism as an “experimentalist” approach to philosophy. The talk sketches a reconstruction of a Peircean definition of art, modeled on his approach to the demarcation problem in the philosophy of science. The definition incorporates Peirce’s distinctive views of meaning, natural kinds, aesthetic value, ideals, and artistic expression. It compares favorably (I argue) with contemporary historically-flavored definitions like those of Carroll, Levinson, and Stecker.
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