false http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1167933323m/28202.jpg 28202 13 If past is prologue, then <I>The Metaphysical Club</I> by Louis Menand may suggest an intellectual course for the United States in the 21st century. At least Menand, a frequent contributor to <I>The New Yorker</I> and <I>The New York Review of Books</I>, thinks so. This enthralling study of Oliver Wendell Holmes, William James, Charles Sanders Peirce, and John Dewey shows how these four men developed a philosophy of pragmatism following the Civil War, a period Menand likens to post-cold-war times. Together, "they were more responsible than any other group for moving American thought into the modern world." <p> Despite this potentially forbidding theme, <I>The Metaphysical Club</I> is not a dry tome for academics. Instead, it is a quadruple biography, a wonderfully told story of ideas that advances by turning these thinkers into characters and bringing them to life. Menand links them through the Metaphysical Club, a conversational club formed in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1872. It lasted but a few months, and references to it appear only in Peirce's writings (its real significance seems rather limited), though Holmes and James were both members. (Dewey was much younger than these three, and more an heir than a contemporary.) It is difficult to describe in a sentence or two what they accomplished, though Menand takes a stab at it: "They helped put an end to the idea that the universe is an idea, that beyond the mundane business of making our way as best we can in a world shot through with contingency, there exists some order, invisible to us, whose logic we transgress at our peril." Academic freedom and cultural pluralism are just two of their legacies, and they are linchpins of democracy in a nonideological age, says Menand. <p> A book like this is necessarily idiosyncratic, yet at the same time this one is sweeping. It presents an accessible survey of intellectual life from roughly the end of the Civil War to the start of the cold war. Dozens of figures receive fascinating thumbnail sketches, from Ralph Waldo Emerson and Charles Darwin to Jane Addams and Eugene Debs. The result is a grand portrait of an age that will appeal to anyone with even a modest interest in the history of philosophy and ideas. <I>--John Miller</I> 889248 2001 The Metaphysical Club total:746|5:259|4:319|3:139|2:22|1:7| 746 3039 1329 126 4 1 true false Fri Dec 01 00:00:00 -0800 2006 Sun Mar 18 16:12:33 -0700 2007 Sun Mar 18 16:38:48 -0700 2007 more...]]> 5 1 false false Sun Jul 06 20:07:17 -0700 2008 Sun Jul 06 22:47:10 -0700 2008 more...]]> 4 1 false false Sun May 11 11:52:44 -0700 2008 Thu May 29 16:37:17 -0700 2008 more...]]> 5 1 false false Mon Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Wed May 14 11:59:57 -0700 2008 Wed May 14 12:02:56 -0700 2008 more...]]> 4 0 false false Mon Jan 05 05:58:21 -0800 2009 Mon Jan 05 05:58:34 -0800 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Fri May 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Wed Sep 09 12:58:49 -0700 2009 Wed Sep 09 12:58:49 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 1 false false Sat Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2000 Wed Aug 29 18:58:49 -0700 2007 Wed Aug 29 19:00:30 -0700 2007 4 0 false false Sun Feb 01 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Thu Jan 15 12:11:16 -0800 2009 Tue Feb 10 20:45:06 -0800 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Sun Mar 08 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Thu Nov 27 12:22:59 -0800 2008 Sun Mar 08 17:35:40 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Sat Nov 15 12:26:15 -0800 2008 Sat Nov 15 12:35:54 -0800 2008 more...]]> 5 0 false false Mon May 26 11:22:40 -0700 2008 Mon May 26 11:31:54 -0700 2008
The main purpose of this book is really to show how our concepts of civil liberties is deeply grounded in pragmatic philosophy. The idea of free spee...more...]]> 3 0 false false Thu Nov 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Tue Nov 06 07:14:21 -0800 2007 Sat Nov 10 08:55:09 -0800 2007
So far, I like this concept:

-"We think that a re...more...]]> 4 0 false false Fri Aug 03 11:33:45 -0700 2007 Fri Aug 03 11:35:04 -0700 2007 more...]]> 5 0 false false Fri Apr 10 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Mon Mar 12 06:59:33 -0700 2007 Fri Apr 10 09:02:49 -0700 2009 2 more...]]> 4 0 false false Sat Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Aug 21 23:29:13 -0700 2009 Fri Aug 21 23:35:13 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Fri Jun 12 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Thu Jun 18 16:32:48 -0700 2009 Thu Jun 18 16:35:31 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Sun Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Wed Jun 13 07:24:11 -0700 2007 Mon Aug 20 07:11:53 -0700 2007 more...]]> 0 0 false false Sun May 17 12:39:31 -0700 2009 Sun May 17 12:43:31 -0700 2009
I'm also struck by ho...more...]]> 5 0 false false Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2002 Mon Jan 05 14:00:11 -0800 2009 Mon Jan 05 14:07:54 -0800 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Wed Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2003 Tue Jan 06 15:40:21 -0800 2009 Tue Jan 06 15:43:12 -0800 2009 more...]]> http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=28202