"Science without action is mania,
action without science is utopia"
Abou-Hamid Al-
GHAZALI Ô. SON!
by Boukhari HAMMANA
Institute
of PhilosophyUniversity of Oran Es-Sénia, ALGERIAAs paradoxical as it may seem, the
forerunner of pragmatism, or rather “pragmaticism” as he later on came to call
it, Charles Sanders Peirce(1839-1914) has come to be known in the
Arab World only half a century after his successors, namely William James (1842-1910) and John Dewey(1859-1952).
The Arabic philosophical essays that
deal with pragmatism in general, date back only to the 1930's and do not exceed
about ten. As to those universities of the Arab World where this philosophical
trend is more or less present today, they are very scarce (1).
Such a state of affairs which is not
necessarily typical of the Arab World seems much more inexplicable be it only
regarding the increasing interest that the Arab World manifests, in the search
process of its renewal particularly since World War II, towards America and her
scientific and technological progress.Is this to be interpreted as a clear
case of the resistant nature of Arab thought, or at least its lack of interest
for this philosophy ... as some have tried to believe or make it a belief?Judging from the previous steps of
this thinking and its current preoccupations, the answer can only be negative.In fact, an analysis of the Arab
thinking process along the lines of the fundamental thesis of pragmatism as Ch.
S. Pierce himself put it (2), makes it possible to state without necessarily
reducing this philosophy to the mere notion of effectiveness, that this Arab
thought was, in its own way, and through more than one era of its long history,
a pragmatic thought.
We shall not dwell too long on the
history of this "Arab pragmatism". Suffice it here to mention two
examples:a. The first example comes from the pre-Islamic
thought:
Indeed, the nature of the desert
itself that transformed them and their living ever changing and misleading
mirages, ancient Arabs ended up, within this hostile environment, accepting as
a truth only that which stems out of facts, and by doing so they gravitated
thus around some kind of pragmatism which was for sure unviewed but which
nonetheless shaped their vision of reality.
Brief and attached to the real facts
to the point of leaning towards materialism (3), the ancient Arabs, so poetic
as some of them were, constructed their odes as a faithful reflection of this
hostile environment where only winds, traces of abandoned camps and tribal
battles fed their muse and aroused their inspiration(4)In spite of all the fears that some of
their wise men expressed on the mysteries of Life and Death, coupled with their
often so heartrending doubt have drifted them only so little from this
pragmatic approach.It is this very approach (which in
fact constituted the source of their fierce resistance to Islam) which led more
than a specialist of Arab Thought to conclude "to the little interest that
ancient Arabs attributed to super-terrestrial values"(5). It has also led
others to note "this practical concern in them, and contrary to the Athenians
who were more tempted by specious rhetoric and likely to present the worse in
the form of the better"(6).
B. The
second example will be taken from the fusion of pre-Islamic Arab thought with
Islam.
Indeed, and as early as the year
622, Islam as a religion of Tawhid (Unification) has become one of the major
components of Arab Thought. This unification which represented the dissociable
element between the Spiritual and the Temporal, Religion and the State, Faith
and Action(7), has soon endowed this Thought with new modes of perception,
reflex ion and representation before it was assigned the heavy burden of taking
over the culture and civilization of the people who were newly islamicized as
well as that of the neigh boring people, some of which were rather important as
was the Hellenic culture.Needless to say here that the Arab
Thought which was so confined then to the limits of its Arabian desert, has
been able to take in this inextricable jumble of cultures, idioms and beliefs,
and then take on the responsibility to raise high up the torch of human
civilization and culture which were then threatened even at the doors of its
last strongholds of Athens, Alexandria and Edessa by the Justinian (529), the
Theophile (412) and the Zénon (489) as a result of the collapse of the Greek,
the Roman, and the Persian Empires. Such an achievement was possible only
thanks to this pragmatic approach the context of which reminds us singularly
that of Peircian Thought.
Our aim here is not to evaluate the
scope and the overall results of this effort. We shall simply point out that
Arabo-muslim Thought must have had a whole strategy in order to neutralize
hostilities towards its approach. These hostilities came from all sides, were
and still remain numerous for her to achieve again this junction with
pragmatism.This represented the main aspect of
the reformist effort achieved by the arabo-muslim thinkers of the golden ages
of Arab culture (4th-7th centuries).By applying the principle of
Ijtihad, that is the personal (individual) thinking effort on the data emerging
in the light of actual realities, they succeeded to preserve and conciliate the
essential in religion and reason, and by the same token neutralize all dogmas.Someone like Ghazali (d.1111) for instance, a Pragmaticist beforehand, who was
so unfairly accused by others to be the source of the collapse of philosophy in
the Arab-Muslim world - an accusation which lasted over seven centuries - and
who through some of his works, particularly his criterion science (8) and his
scales of action(9) reminds us strangely of the criticism of "Pure
reason" and the criticism of "Practical Reason" by E. Kant*
(1804). Did he not, in his search for certitude as he presents it to us in his
Munquid(10) refuted the philosophical cognitions and negative theologies of his
time? Was he not exposed, and this well before Ch. S. Peirce, to the conflicts with real doubt (11) to the point
of becoming physically and psychologically crippled? Did he not reach, given
the tenacity and objectivity of his method, a certain individual truth for
sure, but in which faith was only the straightforward result of the living
experience? Did he not, when he faced the idea of God(12), end up lapsing into
a Sophism when he stated that despite its improvable nature, the belief in God
dictated only by the heart is more worthy of faith than objective belief ?(13)Is it not him he who wrote, by
applying this pragmatic approach to morals, "that the truth is not
advocated by religion and morals because it is good in itself ... and by the
same token lying is not advocated because it is bad in itself, but because of
the consequences, be they good or bad, that affect the doer and others ... of
one or the other. So that if, in some constraining circumstances the fact of
telling the truth is bad for the community, the appeal to lying is
allowed"(14).Therefore, and by virtue of this
vision of things and of the world, we do not believe it is an exaggeration to
say that Arab thought could have elaborated a whole philosophy which probably
would not have been the same as that of Pierce, but close to the general
meaning that he confers to it.If this did not take place, it is
not at all because of a reluctance of one kind or another to pragmatism, but
rather because of the socio-cultural conditions which prevailed later on within
the arabo-muslim world and which came to be called "decline" by
modern Arab historians.Indeed, the growing and grumbling
hostility of theof all sorts- who under the effects
of such decline since the 11th century became the main characters in the
arabo-muslim scene- was such that none of the successors achieved or dared
continue the work of the masters, let alone impose it. Even people like Ibn
Roshd (Averroès, d.1198) with his genius "Ijtihad" or Ibn Khaldun (d.1406) with his pragmatic
and reformist project who tried to achieve this goal, were in their turn
disheartened.It is only after more than six
centuries that the Arab world woke up facing the shock of a Western modernity
from which it was absent, shall we say at the expenses of the Arab world; a
modernity whose military and scientific challenges nowadays assault this very
world from all sides.Out of the rubbles resulting from
this decline and the destruction of the political structures (shakiness of the
Khalifat under the burden of its internal disintegration and external threats),
the destruction of the modes of thinking and acting, and the direct or indirect
Western colonization of more than one of its lands which are only but examples,
an idea and a project sprang up.The idea was this very West which
has suddenly become a source of admiration and repulsion. Its more and more
precise image exemplifies hereafter for the Arabs, not only this colonization
of which they are victims and which has consecrated their economic, political,
social and cultural rupture with the middle ages(15). But the West is also and
mainly this "other world" where reason is generative of efficient sciences,
inventive of techniques, the tamer of nature and a source of knowledge.
Synonymous of happiness and greatness..., this image which they believe they
can apprehend only to realize that it is already obsolete and which henceforth
serves as a reference point for them to redefine themselves, to be born again
and to react.
In his description of this West, the
Egyptian Rifaât Tahtawi writes as
early as 1826, after his return from
Paris where he had just finished studies, "the West is freedom, reason,
equality, law and order, comfort, cleanliness, and efficiency"(16).
Similar statements will come from his contemporaries (Kheir-Eddine, the Tunisian (d.1889) and his followers, especially Djamal-EddineAfghani (d.1897) and his
Egyptian disciple Muhammad Abduh
(d.1905) whose efforts and audacity for reconciling Western modernity with
Islam, remain unrivalled.Their disciples and successors in
the Arab world (Rachid Rédha) (Syria,
d.1935), Taher ben Achour(Tunisia), Abdelhamid Ben Badis(Algeria, d. 1940); Chakib Arsalane (Lebanon, d. 1946); Allal Al-Fassi(Morocco, d. 1974), etc...
will intensify and develop this effort further as early as the thirties in
their political and cultural struggle against Western colonization. The
project, on the other hand, stemmed from an overall reaction of the
Arabo-Muslim world. It started at the end of the last century and was named
"Nahdha" (Renaissance). The chief objective of this reaction was to
integrate again the Arabo-Muslim society within the chorus of modern nations by
means of "Islah" (Reform) of all its structures and within the
framework of the values of Islam as it was lived and explicated by the ancient
great scholars (Salaf).Nevertheless, this reformist project
which gathered the totality of Arab intelligentsia as early as the 1920's, saw its major religious and
modernist theses being radicalized by ones and the others.As a matter of fact, the trend of
Reformation was divided into two opposed sub-trends because of the rapid
penetration of Western modernity, the colonial extortion and awkwardness of
some orientalists towards the Arabo-Muslim
patrimony. The
first sub-trend inaugurated as early as 1928
by the Muslim Brothers (Egypt) was
called Integrist Fundamentalism(17).The second, called Scientist
Rationalism, was represented by some adepts after Spencer and Darwin (e.g., Salama Moussa, d.1958; Chebli Choummyyel and Ismaïl Madhar...); Descartes (e.g. Taha Hussein, d. 1973; Youcef Karam, d. 1959; Ali Abderrazak, d. 1966); Marx (e.g. Youcef Derwiche, 1940; Boukort, 1936; Khaled Bakdache, 1940, etc.).While admitting that the
potentialities of these two sub-trends, as well as those of Reformism continued
since then to operate though unequally in the Arab world, we believe, however,
and on the basis of its creed that
"Islam is Faith and Culture, Koran and Sword, Horizon and Morals, Mode of
life and Vision of the world"(18); and on the basis of its subsequent
refusal to make the least concession to Western modernity, Integrist
fundamentalism spare us for the moment to fix our attention on it. Thus,
is it not in Scientific Rationalism (all tendencies together) that one should
endeavor to mark this pragmatic approach of contemporary Arab thought ? More
concerned by the how of this renewal than by the why of this decline which has
only diverted the Arabs' attention from the chief aim, the rationalo-scientists
most of whom educated in-between the two wars at the universities of London and
Paris, suggested to the Arab World the pure, straightforward adoption of
Western modernity ...
In addition to this, Arab Thought ,
being the main tool for this revival, still remains stagnant in its
old-fashionned modes of knowledge which derive from the dark ages; and
therefore trod on the heels of Western thought. Everything,
the past, the present and the future, culture, politics , economy, industry,
morals, etc., must be accepted or rejected according to this thought. From
a Fundamentalo-Integrist stand-point, contrary to what one may think,
everything should be conceived, adopted or rejected, according to Islam as it
was actually practised in the Prophet's time ... We must note "en
passant", that reference to such a founder society of Islam reminds us of
the Athenian society of Pericles and what it represents for Western democrats. Thus,
what does Western modernity mean according to the Occidentalo-rationalists?
"It is freedom, education, the constitution, the factory and the overall
and objective vision of the universe", answers Salama Moussa, that champion of Occidentalism in the Arab world of
the 1940's (19). This
rationalo-scientists' wave... that the champions of occidentalism have
succeeded to produce for the first time in the history of contemporary Arab
world with its printing works (Egypt, 1822), its universities (Lebanon, 1860; Cairo, 1924;Syria, 1932; etc.), its academies (Syria, 1919), its literary and political magazines (Lebanon, 1876), its historians and Feminist movements (1920); its
syndicates (1920), its theatres, its
fine arts encyclopaedias, etc. reminds us of the Enlightenment in Europe.
It
is within this context that the Arab world called on the European social
sciences. More
than any other, social sciences given their object of study (Man), the relative
easiness of their method, the 'universal' nature of their results and the
identity of their producers (i.e. the Westerners) seemed to be according to this category of
Arab intelligentsia, the best means to achieve this junction with modernity. What
is wrong with understanding oneself better in order to be born again and with
educating oneself in order to achieve development?
It
was only three decades later on that the advocates of Occidentalism in the Arab
world (and in the Third World), as they struggled for their political
independence which was recovered especially throughout the 1960's, that they became aware of the enormous gaps which exit
between these sciences at the level of concepts and results, and the reality of
the Arab world (20). In
any case, it was only thanks to this wave of rationale-scientists that some of
the psychological and pedagogical works by W.
James(21) and J. Dewey(22) paved
their way into the Arab world. Nevertheless,
and as far as the major works by C. Peirce are concerned, it was only nearly
half a century later, and by the combination of more than political and
cultural factors, that his works , in their turn, paved their way into the Arab
world.Out of these factors we shall
mention among other things:1. The revolutionary wave which followed
the Arab disaster in Palestine (1948),
the movement of the "Free Officers" (Egypt, 1952) and the National
Liberation War in Algeria (1954-1962) are but examples.2. The growing hostility,
particularly that of some of the formerly colonial powers which tried, under
the cover of thwarting the progression of communism in the Arab world, to
hamper politically and militarily (the tripartite aggression against Egypt, 1956) Arab eagerness for freedom
and esteem. However,
despite this atmosphere of conflict between the Arab world and a large part of
the West which was joined by the U.S.A. (under the same cover) in the
late 1950's, pragmatism still continued its way in the Arab world. Evidence
of such a state of affairs lies in the first work in Arabic (devoted to
American philosophy) (*), the translations in Arabic of Peirce's article: The Fixation of Belief (23), and
those studies and translations into
Arabic of the major works by W. James and by J. Dewey.
The Arab military defeat of June
1967 by Israel where the non-involvement of the U.S.A., according to the Arabs,
remains to be proved, was far from
putting an end to that pragmatic breakthrough in the Arab world. In fact, it
only contributed to the acceleration of this process. As
a matter of fact, if some Fundamentalo-Integrists still condemned to live
underground found in this defeat which spared not a single aspect of Arab life,
and in the heartbreaking re-look it provoked in the Arab intelligentsia, the
opportunity to come to surface once more on the Arab scene and to lead an open
and merciless struggle against the Arab regimes described as
"ungodly" by Sayyed Kotb
(1966) and his followers (the group of "Excommunication and Exile"
and the group "The Survivors of Hell")(24), some rationalo-scientists
have nonetheless taken advantage of such a situation.
Since
the 1950's, and urged by the "Thawra" (Revolution) in order to
prepare itself to political, military and social struggles, hence driven to
relegate to secondary place their nonetheless important epistemological and
cognitive tools, the Arab intelligentsia which by now was more aware of the
presence of an increasing influence by the U.S.A.
on the Arab World, instituted for the first time, and after more than two
decades had passed, a deep critical analysis of their approach and of their
previous philosophical and ideological choices. Out
of such an analysis, a non-negligible group from that intelligentsia was
somehow dissatisfied by the results of their former philosophical and
ideological adherences and paid more and more attention to this American
philosophy advocating pragmatism.
This
attention increased steadily since the 70's. A proof of this being the
flourishing philosophical and political
literary works in the Arab world which appear with a touch of pragmatism.
However,
what does contemporary Arab thought find in pragmatism, and in pragmaticism in particular? First
of all, it finds in it "a logical method that accounts for meaning"
(25), where words and ideas have meaning only through the final results
(whether material or moral) (26), where faith, whatever its object may be, is
but an establishment of a consequent rule of behavior (27) where the idea is
not an object of thought but a plan, an invitation to action; and where
philosophy becomes experimental (28), not in the strict meaning of science
(e.g. physics), but in the sense that the idea it conveys becomes a truth and
not in abstract meditations or subjective sensory experience as it is the case
with English philosophy, but in its exposure to public experience(29).For the Arabs, so frequently seen by
some as a people preoccupied in the first instance with the verb at the expense
of action, "turning to signs rather than facts", and to symbols
rather than things, the pragmatic thought represents through its new concept of
signs (30), this new science so long sought for in which the word becomes the
exact equivalent of the thing and where the idea becomes a strategy for action.
For the Arabs whose thought was once
the promoter of universal culture and knowledge, and which is now given by some
the cliché of Eschatologist, Obscurantism and attachment to the past, the
Peircian thought by virtue of its conception of truth as the product of the
interaction between the spiritual and
the real between the individual and his environment, represents the best means
to detach oneself from his classical
processes in achieving knowledge which consisted up to now in the cogitations
over truth instead of turning it into action.
Finally, for the Arabs who are now
the first to denounce this gap which exists between their speech and their
acts, the Peircian Thought, in particular, provides them with the right means
to reduce that gap. This would be achieved through the conception of experience
as pruned by this thought, not only as an objective attempt which can be
translated to a great extent into an action (31), but also as an earnest
commitment to the truth (32).
In short, here is to the Arab's
mind, a thought in which man is presented as a dynamic creature, facing a world
he can and must assume not by means of an abstract thinking or a resignation to
its constraints, but through a consistent and thought out action. A
thought where truth is the privilege of no institution, no individual, but
which is democratically everybody's property in the sense that it stands out
only through the diverse modes of action it produces on each and every one (33),
and where it will consequently be recognized by all in the long run (34).
These
are the reasons, among so many others, of the undoubtedly still heterogeneous,
but nonetheless increasingly growing influence that the Peircian thought in
particular and pragmatism in general exert nowadays on the Arab thought.
From
the translation into Arabic - around the 1950's - of Peirce's article "The
Fixation of Belief" and of his chief writings to the subsequent teaching
of pragmatism and Pragmaticism in many Arab universities, Peirce's work is from
then on omnipresent in the Arab World. It
would take long here to discuss in details this interest that the Arabs express
for pragmatism in general and for Peirce's Thought in particular. That
is why we prefer to confine ourselves only to the philosophical and political
areas where the influence of Peirce's thought exerts itself strongly. One
finds this influence in the Egyptian Zaki
Naguib Mahmoud
in the first place. This
forerunner of logical positivism in the Arab World who continually invited Arab
thinking to spouse positivism for more than two decades (1950-1970) and for
whom metaphysics is a myth and religion only a state of mind (35), defines the
Peircian thought as the "philosophy of the future" (36).As one of the first scholars in the
Arab World to have devoted more than a
book to American philosophy (37) Zaki N.
Mahmoud has become as early as the 70's, more thoughtful towards pragmatism
and the Arabo-Islamic cultural patrimony to which he nowadays devotes the rest
of his life. Summing
up the prime importance of pragmatism for the Arab World, Zaki N. Mahmoud
stresses that "many changes would occur in our Arab life, if before
pronouncing any word, any idea, we asked ourselves what action (be it moral or
material) it might serve. It's by doing so, he goes on to say, that all
meaningless talk, all abstract and sterile ideas would disappear from our
cultural and social environments" (38).
The
same concern underlies the work by Azmi
Islam who regards the Peircian Thought as being first and foremost a
thought of meaning, faith and action (39). As
he exposes in details the fundamentals of Peircian philosophy, notably its
conception of meaning and faith and their mutual relationships, Azmi Islam ends
up with a comparison between this belief and doubt. "If
the object of doubt and of faith is the same, he writes, their nature and their
results are not. The real doubt (and not the artificial doubt as advocated by
Descartes), he adds, is a source of idleness and ill-being while faith is
generative of action and relief".
"Arab
thought nowadays is in need of such a conception of truth, of faith and of
meaning", he concludes (40). In
this effort to discover the Peircian thought one must give pride of place to
the Doctoral thesis by the Syrian Hamed
Khalil who devoted it to the logic of the founder of pragmatism (41). Throughout
this thesis, the novelty of Peircian logic seems to lie essentially "in
his conception of induction whose function is no longer the discovery of
general rules, but that of examining of the validity of hypotheses and the
search for laws that stem from reality and experience; as well as in his
abortive attempt to make of metaphysics a science". To
conclude, it is worth mentioning two
other stands which though they are not as enthusiastic as those mentioned
earlier regarding Peircian thought, they nevertheless see in it some positive
aspects that the Arab thought is more in need of today. The
first stand is represented by the Egyptian Fouad
Zakaria the forerunner of rationalism and scientism in the Arab World
today. He sees in pragmatism as a whole a doctrine which is essentially geared
towards action and which he thinks constitutes "the secret of American
success" (42). Nevertheless,
this success exists, according to him, only in scattered phenomena ... and not
in global or strategic situations. The American human output, with regard to
progress, is virtually nil in comparison to the efforts produced by each
individual American ... and the bitter defeat of the U.S.A in their war in Vietnam,
a defeat which is far too disproportional compared to the efficiency and the
perfectness of the American war machine, are presented as examples (43). However,
and despite these grievances, F. Zakaria
does not ultimately hesitate to advise all the countries wishing for renewal,
and to the Arabs in particular who have close links with the U.S.A. and
following the possibility that they may find themselves one day confronted with
the same problems of development, to meditate thoroughly on the American "pragmatic"
experience. Moreover,
in his recent book The Arabs and the
American Example, F. Zakaria
advises openly to the Arabs to "take as it is the American recipe if they
want to reach quickly, as America did, the level of power and
greatness"(44). Much
more critical than this is the stand of the Algerian Malek Bennabi (d. 1973), of the "Libanese" Noumeyr El-Ani and the Egyptians Hani Soulimane and Yahya Houeidi.
On
the basis of the principle that the great miracles in History have always been
related to fundamental ideas (true and authentic), any pragmatic subjection of what is true to what
is efficient is refuted by Malek Bennabi. For
this famous figure of contemporary Islamism, "an authentic idea is not
always an efficient one, and an efficient idea is not always authentic". "The
idea is born either as true or false. When it is true, it keeps its
authenticity forever". "On
the other hand, it may lose its efficiency in the course of its history even if
it is true." "History
proliferates with ideas that stem out wrong and which had their dreadful
efficiency in a wide range of domains, and of true philosophical and scientific
ideas whose efficiency has been proven much later on"(45).
Thus,
for M. Bennabi, the danger which
threatens the Muslim society and which may project it into a world stuffed with
things but apathetic and lacking social dynamism, lies exactly in its tendency
to substitute the thing for the idea and efficiency and usefulness for truth
and authenticity (46). For
his part and in an article with a Marxist resonance (47), Noumeyr Al Ani exposes the major guide-lines of Peircian thought
which he regards as "machiavellian", and points out that it
ultimately represents only a mixture of
Solipsism and Idealism in Berkley's sense, in the same way as its notion of
Fallibilism (48) is nothing but a disguised agnosticism. Finally, while he
recognizes to Peirce his contribution to the development of this new science of
Semiotics (49), Noumeyr Al Ani
concludes that "despite his earlier definition of the truth, a definition
which was closer to objectivity, Peirce has failed to gather around it the
remaining pioneers of pragmatism, and W.
James in particular".
The
article by Hani Soulimane (50) is by far less bitter. In this article
which is an answer to that of one of his Egyptian colleagues, he notes that
"pragmatism in general can be of no rescue to the Arabo-Islamic cultural patrimony because any pragmatic vision of
Arab patrimony, and especially of its religious component, would mean the
reconstituting of this component in an arbitrary way provided it responds to
our present preoccupations". As
to Yahya Houeidi (Egypt), he believes
as much as Z.N. Mahmoud (51) that, by
virtue of its attitude which consists in adapting oneself to reality rather
than changing reality, pragmatism stands at the other extreme of the spirit of
any socialist philosophy (52).
That
Peirce becomes subject to enthusiastic praise or to bitter criticism is not a
main concern. What is important, however, is that he represents nowadays and
for a substantial part of Arab intelligentsia, the philosopher who was able to
break a number of dogmas which were up to now taken for granted by everybody,
and to give experience a meaning that this intelligentsia feels is much closer
to her than the one it is involved in nowadays. Nevertheless,
while such writings are indicative of the end of this strange indifference
towards pragmatism as a whole and pragmaticism in particular which has been
characteristic of the Arab World for many decades, they nevertheless represent
only attitudes and not reconstructions. Thus,
if it is hard for the moment to know exactly what use would be made out of
these writings, it is nevertheless possible to scrutinize the new horizon they
announce for the Arab thought. This
horizon which becomes clearer and clearer especially since the 80's in favor of
this new realistic and pragmatic environment which is since then taking over
from the high-flown socialist
revolutions (Egypt, Algeria, etc.) which promise all equalities and the flood
of oil incomes which encourages all sorts of caprices. The
rest was taken care of by the consolidation, particularly since 1967, of the
military and economic presence of the U.S.A. (whose likings for Israel, the
sworn enemy of the Arabs are nobody's secret) in the Arab Machrek which has
been transformed into a field of rivalry because of its strategic position, its
oil resources and its high-flown centers for revolutionaries (Nasser's Egypt,
The South Yemen, Syria, Libya, etc.) or its Islamists (Iran, 1978).
Throughout
the Arab World people are more aware than ever before of the limited success of
its socialist revolutions. They are so
concerned with the catching up of this ever increasing westernized and
americanized modernity that it's high time now for pragmatism and liberalism. Everywhere,
the emphasis is on the urgency for the building up of a modern economy capable
of answering Arab needs for the third millenium and the giving up of empty
slogans in favor of efficiency and rationality. In
this respect, a former Algerian Minister of industry stresses that "It
doesn't matter whether the cat is black or white What matters is that he can
catch mice". He adds, "a socialist or capitalist society does not
progress under egualitarism because, it
is not synonymous to social equality ... Earn and consume more! that's
what makes a population work and produce more than moral slogans do" (53).
Beyond the peace treaty, 1795 and the war between
USA and Algeria, 1815,we underline here,
that for Algeria, in particular, interest of American
Pragmatism , find , on the one hand ,its reasons, through its concordance with Islam , who
considers, also, that the belief, is inseparable from the
consequent action (sourat, 61, verset ,2 ) . On the other
hand, these reasons
are historical and human .Among these reasons we will only mention, here, the main one:
- various military and economic treaties, some of which dated since the 16th
and 17th centuries.
- the recognition of the independence
of USA, by Algeria .
-for the first time in U.S.A, and Arab World, history , one American city , in
the Iowa , is named ” El -Kader “, in homage to the former leader Emir
Abdelkader ( city today twinned with the city of Mascara, in Algeria ).
- the demand of the Algerian politician, Farhat Abbas, to the
head of the U.S. military in Algeria , during the World War 2, ( a
Lebanese native colonel ) to intervene with the U.S. government in favor of the
Algerian cause .
- the report of the U.S. ambassador in Cairo , M. Tuk , who denied the French
number of victims of colonial massacres on May 8th , 1945 , and revealed that
they have not been tens , or hundreds , as France said , but
hundreds of thousands.
- the independence of Algeria was one of mains slogans of
J.F.Kennedy, as a candidate to be President of the USA , 1960.
--The role of the Algerian government in the release of American hostages
in Tehran,(Iran), in 1978.
- the increasing role of the USA, as a super power, especially after the Second
World War, with the hope of Algeria to influence their unconditional
support to Zionist usurper of Palestine.
- In the end, the relationship between Algeria and the founder of American
Pragmatism, Charles Sanders Peirce and his philosophy, appears in all its human
and philosophical dimensions, when it is remembered that his friend and
translator and corrector of its pragmatist articles from English to French , Mr. Leo Seguin .
Military correspondent of the
newspaper,” Le Telegraphe”, in Tunis. Injured in Beja,(Tunisia), during a
dispute with an Algerian deserter
of the French Army, L.Seguin decease
in Tunis in 1881..
Meanwhile, Egypt had a clearer and more advanced attitude where a
liberalism with a pragmatic resonance has come to surface once more as Saddate
came to power (1970). His assassination (1982) has not succeeded in any way to stop the liberalised open door policy of
"Infitah" which has since had its most determined supporters among
the majority of the Egyptian intelligentsia and the Cairo media, especially the
"Revue Assyassa Addawlya" (54) (Journal of International Politics).
When
one recalls that both thought and culture in the Arab World today remain, as H. Djaït (55) puts it, dependent upon
politics, it is easily understood why the holders of pragmatism among Arab
intelligentsia attach a particular interest nowadays to any sensible and
objective improvement of Arab politics towards the U.S.A.(56). When
one also understands the substantial steps made by social sciences in general
and philosophy in particular within many Arab countries (Egypt, Lebanon,
Algeria, Morocco, Syria, etc.), one can easily talk about the place pragmatic
philosophy and pragmaticism have taken in the Arab World today. To
define the scope of this place would mean to try to locate it in relation to
the various philosophical trends (rationalo-scientists, fundamentalo-integrist,
and ideologico-political) mentioned earlier and which are contesting the Arab
scene today. Out
of these trends, only those whose influence is proven will be of interest to
us. Thus,
if the fundamentalo-integrist trend and the rationalo-scientist trend gather
almost all of the Arab intelligentsia around them today, and by so doing they
impose themselves, though unequally, in the Arab scene, positivism and Marxism
were not so popular, and it was even less so for sub-trends like the
existentialist (A. Badawi, Zakaria
Ibrahim and Souheil Idriss), the personalist (R. Habachi and Mohammed A. Lahbabi), the spiritualist (Othmane Amine, etc.).
Indeed,
as it comes from a crystalized western society, positivism cannot expect to see
its method make a breakthrough in the Arab World where Society and the State
are setting themselves up (57). Similar
reasons were and still are the source of the failure of Marxism which despite
its long lasting settlement in the Arab World has remained ignorant of (or
indifferent to) its specificities with which it could not set itself up. To
return to the rationalo-scientist trend, one can say that the new generation
which claims it today like the Hegliano-marxist (A. Laroui, H. Djaït), the positivo-logicist (Z.N. Mahmoud), the socialo-marxist (M. Amel, T. Tizini, S. Al-Azameh), the structuralo-islamist (Mohamed Arkoun, Mohamed Abed Al-Jabiri),
the islamo-marxist (H. Mouroua, etc.)
is more aware of the gap that separates social sciences ... in the Western
World ... from Arab reality, and of the impact of the fundamentalo-integrists.
This new generation seems, to the same extent as the present reformist generation
(Mohamed Al-Ghazali, S.R. El-Bouti,
Youcef Al-Kardawi), and more especially its neo-reformist wing (H. Hanafi)(58), more anxious and in its
own way, about a modernity that does not allow itself any repudiation (59). As
to the Fundamentalo-integrist trend, whose influence on Arab masses (that are
subjected to economic, political, and cultural crises; masses which more than
ever before equate the West in general and America in particular with
materialism, egoism, and bad morals) is unquestionable today, it does not seem
to represent a real threat to the reformist trend which has always managed to
absorb because of its moderation all the radicalism trends ... that the Arab
World has known throughout its long history.
...
The remaining ideologico-political trends whose impact on Arab Thought is
decisive, as it was mentioned earlier, boil down to two, we believe :
A.
An Arabism taking over from Nasser's arabism and which now wants to be more
realistic and more anxious about its economic strength (the Gulf States
Cooperation Council, 1971), the Union of the Maghrebi Arab States (Mauritania,
Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, 1988), The Arab Cooperation Council (Egypt,
North Yemen, Jordan, Iraq, 1989). B.
An economic and political liberalism at its early stages and which desperately
keeps itself related to a socialism that now claims social justice rather than
egalitarianism. For
Arab masses in general, and for a large part of Arab youth in particular which
represent the inevitable addresses of the theses of these religious,
philosophical, ideological and political trends which dispute the Arab scene
today, they find themselves, by the end of the day and after more than a
century away from this Arab Nahdha, only too far from this "reviving"
Islam, this promised modernity and this socialism promising of happiness. There's
no doubt this is one of the main reasons behind this growing interest that the
Arabs show today for the Thought of the founder of Pragmatism and for those of
his colleagues W. James and J. Dewey in particular.
The
second generation of pragmatists, C.I.
Lewis (1883-1964), Charles Morris
(1901-1979), W.N. Quine (born in
1908), Charles Hartshorne (born in 1897), Charles Stevenson (born in 1908) P. Weiss (born in 1901), remains in as
much as a part from the first generation - Josiah
Royce (1855-1916), George H. Mead
(1863-1931) - known a little in the Arab
world.
One
wonders if the new Arab intelligentsia which is the first to know that
"faith for the Arab masses is a phenomenon which is as much popular as it
is venerable" (60), will take advantage of a number of assets that
pragmatism as a whole and pragmaticism in particular offer, and of the union
this thought has succeeded to make between philosophy, applied sciences and
religion (61) is but an example, in order to be successful in its turn in
realizing a union which thought it is of a different type, it remains as
important as the first. The union between the Arabs who are more than ever
anxious about their authenticity (Açala) and this modernity which becomes more
and more rebellious and complex and of which they are nowadays and more than
ever before so fond of. In any case, this appears to be the wish of the Arab
majority. However,
there are some Western experts of contemporary Arab thought and society who see
it otherwise. "Though Americanism, some may write, spreads in the Arab world and largely takes over from
the West, it does not stand for
this old people as a would be
cultural substitution, but only as a useful means, ... a comfort" (62). How
will such a statement (whose author is the first to maintain that he is among
the advocates of a given simplistic conception which claims that the mind,
matter and comfort constitute the shares of the West whereas physical strength,
the spiritual and discomfort would belong to the rest) find its way among the
Americano-liberalist wave which is howling nowadays not only in the Arab World
but also deep inside the strongholds of socialism and Marxism? This Americanism
and this liberalism are so much vilified verbally by some only for the sake of
being equally stubbornly courted. What
the Arabs - whose growing wave of religiosity and protesting Islam is, we
believe, only the manifestation of a revolt against their own decay and against
all those who nowadays persist in maintaining them in this situation - have
been seeking for more than a century is neither comfort nor useful means but a
philosophy of life drawn from their own experience and open to the reality of
their century. A philosophy they hope to work out on the basis of science and
faith, freedom and work, and whose substantial acquirements achieved so far by
the Arab intelligentsia in fields like the study of the Arab cultural patrimony
as well as political, philosophical, social ... and linguistic ... studies etc. represent only a first step. This
is the reason why the Arabs are interested today more than ever before in
pragmatism in general and in the thought of its founder in particular, thought
that they still consider to be that which contributed to make out of the U.S.A.
what they are today. Would
this not be the reason, among many others, which encourages us to believe
without too much risk for us to be proven wrong, that the future of pragmatism
in general and of Peirce's thought in particular is more promising than some
people think ?
Will the Arab thought, be able,
particularly after “The Arab Spring”,2011-2014,its problems and sudden leaps,
to draw all the necessary conclusions concerning the set-backs of the other
philosophical and ideological trends in the Arab World while preserving at the
same time the main components of pragmatism (especially the religious
component) so that it can adapt it better to Arab reality in the meantime while
it works out its own philosophy ?Only the future can tell !
B.H
N O T E S(°)- Conference presented on 1984 at Charles. S.
Peirce Sesquicentennial International Congress Harvard University, at Texas
Tech University, USA, and at many others universities through the world.
1-Pragmatism is now taught in Lebanon (1960),
in Egypt (1970), in Syria (1976), in Algeria (1980),in Jordan, Morocco; etc.
2. J.M. BALDWIN, The Dictionary of Philosophy
and Psychology (1902)
3. Jacques BERQUE :
Les dix grandes odes arabes de l'anté-Islam, Lib. Sindbad, Paris, 1975
(Introduction).
4. Boukhari HAMMANA
: "Le génie de la langue arabe", Revue des Sciences Sociales
(Panorama), ed. Ministère de l'Enseignement Supérieur, Algiers, 1980, n° 10, june-august.
5. I. GOLDZIHIER :
"Le dogme et la loi de l'Islam", French trans. by Félix AREN, Lib.
orientaliste, P. GEUTHNER, Paris, 1973, p.11.
6. W.M. WATT : Mohammed at Mecca, French
Transl., by F. Dourveil, SNED, Algiers, 1977, p. 31.
7. The Koran,
61 : 3.
8. Abou Hamed
AL-GHAZALI, Le critérium de la science, Lib. Al-Maâref, Cairo, 1961 (in Arabic).
9. A.H. AL-GHAZALI, Mizane Al Amal, Lib. Al-Joundi,
(n.d.), Le Caire (in Arabic).
-See : Jean
FERRARI : "Notes sur quelques références à la pensée arabo-musulmane dans
la pensée d'E. Kant", pp. 38-46.
10. A.H. AL-GHAZALI, Al
Munquid Mina-addalal (n.d.), Cairo (in Arabic).
11. Cf. Charles Sanders
PEIRCE, Collected Papers (C.P.), ed. Hartshorme, Weiss and Burks,
Harvard University Press (5, 372), (5. 265), (5. 397).
12. C.S. PIERCE : Collected
Papers (C.P.), (6.483), (6.493).
13. A.H. AL-GHAZALI, Al
Munquid, pp. 45-50, (in Arabic).
14. Zaki MOUBARAK, L'éthique chez Al-Ghazali, Dar Al-Kitab
Al-Arabi, Cairo, 1968, p. 93 (in Arabic).
15. Cf. A. LARAOUI,
L'idéologie arabe contemporaine, ed. Maspéro Paris, 1982, p. 29,
et Mohammed ARKOUN, La pensée arabe, P.U.F., Paris, 1975, pp. 85-89.
16. Cf. M. ARKOUN, La Pensée Arabe, Q.S.J?, Paris 1975,
pp. 95-98.
17. According to Mohammed
ARKOUN, Fundamentalism is that trend which tends to rethink Islam starting from
its foundations, while integrism would be the calamitous twitch on a past that
has never existed anywhere. Cf. "L'Islam, morale et politique",
UNESCO, 1987.
18. Cf. Anwar ABDELMALEK : La pensée arabe
contemporaine, ed. Seuil, Paris, 1975, p. 70.
19. Salama MOUSSA : Réthorique moderne et langue arabe,
(in Arabic), 4th edition, Cairo, 1964, pp. 29-67.
20. Boukhari HAMMANA : "Les sciences sociales et le
Tiers-Monde, (le cas de l'Algérie), colloque international sur les "Sciences Sociales" aujourd'hui,
Université d'Oran (Algeria), 1984, ed. OPU Algiers, 1986.
21. See W. JAMES's "The
will to believe" translated in arabic by Mahmoud HOB-ALLAH (1958) and that
of Mohammad Fethi CHENITI (1960)
22. See J. DEWEY's Logic
: the theory of inquiry, translated by Zaki NAGUIB MAHMOUD (1960) and Reconstruction
inPhilosophy as well as The Quest of Certainty translated by Amine
M. KENDIL and Ahmed Fouad AL-AHWANI (1960).
* Zaqui N. MAHMOUD: Life
Story of Thinking in the New World (1956)
23. This translation was
made in more than one arab country since 1960.
24. See G. KEPEL, Le Prophète et le Pharaon, edit.
Ladecouverte, Paris, 1985, p. 217.
25. Zaki NAGUIB MAHMOUD : D'un point de vue
philosophique (in Arabic), Dar Achourouk, Beirut, 1979, p. 208.
26. Charles S. PIERCE, C.P. (5.402), (5.403), (5.
422).
27. Charles S. PIERCE, C.P. (5.397), (5.398), (5.
400).
28. Charles S. PIERCE, C.P. (5.411), (5.391).
29. Gérard DELEDALLE, La Philosophie Americaine,
éd. L'âge d'homme, Lausanne, Switzerland, 1983, Introduction.
30. J. BERQUE, Les Arabes , ed. Sindbad, Paris,
1979, p. 167.
31. Charles S. PIERCE, C.P. (5.400), (5.411).
32. L. MARCUSE : La philosophie américaine (French
Transl.), Danièle BOHIER, col. Idées, Paris, 1976, p. 73.
33. Charles S. PIERCE, C.P. (5.400).
34. L. MARCUSE , op.cit., p. 78.
35. Z.N. MAHMOUD : Le mythe de la métaphysique (in
Arabic), Cairo, 1953, (in Arabic)
36. Z.N. MAHMOUD : Notre culture face au siècle (in
Arabic), Lib. Achourouk, Beirut, 1979, p. 44.
37. Z.N. MAHMOUD : Life
Story of Thinking in the New World (in Arabic), Lib. Anglo-egyptienne,
Cairo, 1956.
38. Z.N. MAHMOUD : Notre culture, op.cit., p. 44.
39. Azmi ISLAM : Les tendances de la philosophie
contemporaine (in Arabic), Koweit, 1980, p. 92.
40. See also Azmi ISLAM : La vraie logique selon Ch. S.
PEIRCE, (in arabic), Rev. Héritage de l'humanité, Vol. 7, N° 2, Cairo,
1969. (in arabic)
41. Hamed KHALIL : La logique chez PEIRCE,
unpublished Doctoral Thesis (in arabic), Cairo, 1977.
42. Fouad ZAKARIA : Discours à la raison arabe, (in
arabic), Koweit, 1987, p. 138.
43. Ibid.
44. F. ZAKARIA : Les arabes et l'exemple américain,
(in arabic), 1988.
45. M. BENNABI : Le problème des idées dans le Monde
Musulman, ed. El-Bay'yinate, Algiers, 1990, p. 88.
46. Ibid.
47. Al-Ani NUMEYR : "A propos de la vérité dans la
philosophie pragmatique (ou comment PEIRCE nie la vérité)", in Revue
Attarik, (in arabic) n° 6, Beyrouth, pp.
48. Charles S. PIERCE, C.P. (5.948).
49. Charles S. PIERCE, C.P. (1.559), (2.229).
50. Hani SOULIMANE : in
Revue "Contemporary Thought", (in arabic), n° 6 June, 1970, Cairo.
51. Zaki Naguib MAHMOUD : Notre culture, op. cit.,
p. 45.
52. Yahya HOUEIDI : "in
Revue "Contemporary Thought", (in arabic), n° 6, June, 1965, Cairo.
53. El-Moudjahid (Daily
newspaper), Algiers, October 14, 1985.
54. A Journal led since its
publication by the former Egyptian State Minister to Foreign Affairs, Dr.
BOUTROUS Ghali.
55. Hicham DJAIT : La personalité et le devenir
arabo-islamique, Paris, Seuil, 1974, pp. 111-115-291.
56. Boukhari HAMMANA : "La politique arabe des
U.S.A." Conférence/débate, Oran, in the Daily El-Moudjahid, Algiers,
August 1st, 1980.
57. A. LARAOUI : L'idéologie arabe contemporaine,
pp. 136-137.
58. Hassan HANAFI : Revue "La gauche islamique",
n° 1, Cairo, 1981
59. Louis GARDET : Les hommes de l'Islam, ed.
Complex, Hachette, Paris, 1979, p. 351.
60. J. BERQUE : Les arabes, p. 109.
61. G. DELEDALLE : La philosophie américaine,
Introduction.62. J. BERQUE : Les Arabes, pp. 93-113-147.
