Pragmatic is a word that describes choices or actions that are practical and reasonable. People who are pragmatic tend to be willing to take the time to think through the consequences of their decisions, before they make them. They are not afraid to change course if it will improve the outcome of their situation. They may also have a willingness to compromise, and are often more willing to listen to other opinions than they are to assert their own.
Pragmatists tend to be pragmatic in a moral sense as well, meaning that they will take into account the effect of their actions on others, as well as on themselves. For example, if someone kills their creditor in order to avoid paying their debt, it might seem pragmatic only from the point of view of that individual, but it would not be considered pragmatic when one considers the impact that killing that person will have on family, community and the economy as a whole.
The concept of pragmatism is growing in popularity worldwide, as an alternative to the traditional analytic and Continental philosophical traditions. It was introduced to the United States by Charles Sanders Peirce, who outlined his view of philosophy in a series of papers published in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He was followed by his friend William James, who applied the idea to questions of truth in religion and inquiry as a theory of truth. Pragmatism has influenced a wide range of philosophers, and continues to do so today.
In addition to epistemology, pragmatism is also found in areas such as ethics, metaphysics and the philosophy of science. It has helped to inspire a wide variety of applied fields, such as public administration, political science and leadership studies. It has also influenced social policy, conflict resolution and research methodology. In philosophy, it is sometimes contrasted with rationalism and idealism.
Pragmatism is now the subject of a significant new branch of philosophical study, pragmatics, which examines the nature of human language and communication. The central issue is how people manage to communicate with each other, including the ways that they use words and other symbols. The field of pragmatics is vast and includes such topics as intercultural and interlinguistic pragmatics; theoretical and computational pragmatics; clinical and experimental pragmatics; neuropragmatics, as well as the history of pragmatics.
Generally speaking, pragmatism is not a particularly dogmatic position, and scholars often explore various possibilities. However, there are a number of important general principles that are often taken as given by pragmatic philosophers. These include: