SUSAN HAACK
97
the real nature of time, space, laws of nature, matter, etc. (1.181-192).
SH:
Could you please explain your reference to "ironists," Professor
Rorty?
RR:
[Ironists] take naturally to the line of thought developed in ... [my]
book.... The opposite of irony is common sense.
(CIS, p.74).
CSP:
Pragmatici sm will be sure to carry critical common-sensism in its
arms ... (5.499).
RR:
Sentences like ... "Truth is independent of the human mind" are
simply platitudes used to inculcate ... the common sense of the West
(CIS,
p.76-7).
CSP:
The Critical Common-sensist holds that all the veritably indu–
bitable beliefs are
vaglle ...
(5.505); [that they J refer to a somewhat primitive
mode of life ... (5.511); [he] has a high esteem for doubt (5.514); [he] crit–
icizes the cri tical method (5.523).
RR:
[We ironists emphasizeJ the spirit of playfulness ...
(CIS,
p.39). [We
are] never quite able to take [our]selves seriously ...
(p.73).
CSP:
[The Critical Common-sensist] is none of those overcultivated
Oxford dons - [ hope their day is over - whom any discovery that brought
quietus to a vexed question would evidently vex because it would end the
fun of arguing around it and about it and over it (5.520).
RR:
...
I have spent forty years looking for a coherent ... way of formu–
lating my worries about what, if anything, philosophy is good for
(TWO,
p.146).
CSP:
It is true that philosophy is in a lamentably crude condition at pre–
sent; ... most philosophers set up a pretension of knowing all there is to
know - a pretension calculated to disgust anybody who is at home in any
real science. But all we have to do is to turn our backs upon all such truly
vicious conduct, and we shall find ourselves enjoying the advantages of
having an almost virgin soil to till, where a given amount of really scien–
tific work will bring in an extraordinary harvest ... of very fundamental
truth of exceptional value from every point of view (1.128).
SH:
How do you fee l about Mr. Peirce's description of philosophy as "sci–
entific work," Professor Rorty?
RR:
[One] side of pragmatism has been scientific. ... Let me call the claim
that there is raj "reliable [scientific] method" "scientism" ... If one takes
the core of pragmatism to be its attempt to replace the notion of true
