Nishida, James, and Peirce from a Comparative Perspective

Revisiting Logic in An Enquiry into the Good

Abstract

This paper develops a comparative analysis of the philosophies of Kitaro Nishida, William James, and Charles Sanders Peirce, who was James’ contemporary logician and lifelong friend. The influence of James on the early philosophy of Nishida is widely known, but there are significant differences between what James and Nishida respectively understand as pure experience. The main view of this paper is that for both Nishida and Peirce pure experience is marked with phenomenal as well as logical unity, whereas James fervently rejected such logical unity. Torataro Shimomura once noted that Nishida was sympathetic with James’ notion of pure experience and that he inherited the term junsuikeiken from James, but not its philosophical content. By focusing on logic in An Inquiry into the Good, this paper identifies striking commonalities between Nishida and Peirce rather than between Nishida and James. Given Nishida’s strong leaning toward logic, on the one hand, and James’ persistent repulsion for logic, on the other, it is unsurprising that this reading receives solid textual support, which may lead to a reappraisal of James’ influence on Nishida’s early philosophy.