[Buddha-l] What the Sam Harris is Peirce about?

Timothy Smith smith at wheelwrightassoc.com
Sun Sep 16 22:58:50 MDT 2007


Just a note on this for interested parties.  Robert Richardson's  
excellent bio of James is a terrific window into the world of  
American philosophy and
psychology to which both Pierce and James contributed mightily.  And  
while the B word is not mentioned as a major preoccupation of James,
I was consistently struck by the affinities I perceived between  
James' approach to the mechanics of mind and the B-man's  
understanding of suffering and the
responses to it.

Richard says hijacked, but I'm not so sure based on my reading of  
Richardson's book, aptly subtitled "In the Maelstrom of American  
Modernism".  Given the
players present there in Cambridge, MA at the time, one can imagine  
vortices awhirl.
Timothy Smith
Wheelwright Associates
www.wheelwrightassoc.com

On Sep 15, 2007, at 8:09 PM, John Whalen-Bridge wrote:

> Could Richard, who I know has written on Pragmatism and Buddhism,  
> say a wee bit more about why Peirce is is favorite Buddhist writer,  
> other than that Peirce never used the "B word"?  Perhaps a  
> distinction between Peirce and Paris (Hilton), who, I would  
> supposed, also never used it neither, might be performed,  
> piercingly?  Is it something about semiotics and emptiness?
> Please parse Peirce.  J Non-Osho Whalen-Bridge
>
>> Message: 9
>> Date: Sat, 15 Sep 2007 10:28:06 -0600
>> From: Richard Hayes <rhayes at unm.edu>
>> Charles S. Peirce was a scientific writer in the last 1800s who is  
>> often
>> credited without founding the Pragmatist movement of American  
>> philosophy,
>> which was eventually highjacked by William James. Peirce is  
>> remembered for
>> his work on logical theory, scientific method and mathematics. He  
>> never wrote
>> even a single sentence, as far as I know, on Buddhism. That is  
>> part of what
>> makes him my favorite Buddhist author.
>>> Richard Hayes>>
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