Pragmatic is a philosophical term that describes the way an individual makes decisions. People who are pragmatic tend to weigh options and consider consequences before taking action. They often balance this approach with idealism, which involves sticking to their principles no matter what the cost.
The word pragmatic comes from the Latin “to weigh.” A person who is pragmatic is a person who looks at situations and decides what course of action will have the best results for a particular situation. For example, a business owner who is pragmatic with his money may hire employees based on their skills and experience rather than their education. Similarly, a politician who is pragmatic with his policy making may choose to focus on the needs of the nation as opposed to strict obedience to ideological ideals.
A philosophy based on pragmatism was introduced to America by Charles S. Peirce and later influenced John Dewey, William James, and Richard Rorty. This approach is known as classical pragmatism, and it was popular in American culture for about half a century. However, the movement lost its momentum after Dewey’s death.
Although some philosophers have attempted to revive the pragmatism movement, it is now largely ignored by mainstream analytic philosophers. A notable exception is Quine, whose article “Two Dogmas of Empiricism” challenged positivist orthodoxy by drawing on pragmatism. However, most analytic philosophers have not considered pragmatism seriously since then.
Modern pragmatics includes a broad array of subfields, most of which deal with various aspects of language and meaning. For example, linguistic pragmatics, which emerged from the work of J.L. Austin and Paul Grice, investigates how different contexts influence a speaker’s use of natural language to carry out actions.
Another pragmatics-related field is speech act theory, which studies how people use words to perform social and personal acts. This is important for understanding human communication, and it can be applied to a wide range of topics, including interpersonal relations, organizational management, and law enforcement.
There is also a field called formal pragmatics, which develops and analyzes different formalizations of the context dependence that pragmatics explores. This can include near-side pragmatics (dealing with ambiguity and indexicality), far-side pragmatics, and the formalizations of conversational implicature.
In philosophy, pragmatic is often used as a synonym for utilitarian or consequentialist, although it can also be applied to realism, empiricism, and various other schools of thought. People who are pragmatic with their feelings are often viewed as being reasonable and sensible.
In business, politicians, and public affairs, a pragmatic leader is often seen as someone who is effective in getting things done. For example, a politician who supports tough labor laws is often described as being pragmatic about them. People who are pragmatic with their political views are often seen as being practical, and they try to think about what will work best in a given situation. Those who are pragmatic with their money, for example, spend their wealth wisely and avoid extravagant spending.