Worlds of Truth: A Philosophy of Knowledge

"This volume will be useful for specialists in pragmatism, but perhaps not sufficiently original for all collections." (CHOICE, October 2009)

"Worlds of Truth develops an epistemology that accommodates science. It construes knowledge as advancing holistically. Because justification accrues through systematization, it is a property of theories, not primarily of individual sentences. Drawing on and contributing to the pragmatic tradition, Scheffler shows how a commitment to fallibilism is not a concession to epistemic inadequacy but an asset to understanding."
–Catherine Z. Elgin, Harvard University

"Israel Scheffler’s Worlds of Truth is a book that can be read with profit and enjoyment by the general reader as well as by the philosophical expert. In recent years both general readers and professional philosophers have tended to think of "pragmatism" as a fuzzy philosophy closely allied to postmodernism, and as in deep opposition to analytic philosophy, which is often seen as anti-humanistic. In this important book, and in clear and elegant prose, Scheffler performs a great service by showing in detail how to combine the antifoundationalism, the holism, and the deep fallibilism of the pragmatists with the respect for the notion of absolute truth, and the sharp distinction between being true and being warranted at a given moment characteristic of the analytic philosophers. The result is both an attractive and I believe largely right epistemological picture, and a portrait of the philosophical thinking of a significant philosopher, whose work deserves to be more widely known."
–Hilary Putnam, Harvard University

"Many things pass for 'pragmatism' these days that the original pragmatists would not recognize. It might well be said that the pragmatist tradition has lost its way. It is the perfect time for this book, which builds upon the groundbreaking work of the original figures, but does not hesitate to criticize their earlier discussions where appropriate and improve on them in the service of the development of a philosophically adequate pragmatic epistemology and metaphysics."
–Harvey Siegel, University of Miami