Mr. Pitkin's 'reply' to me,[125] [...] perplexes me by the obscurity of style which I find in almost all our younger philosophers. He asks me, however, two direct questions which I understand, so I take the liberty of answering. First he asks: Do not experience and science show 'that countless things are[126] experienced as that which they are not or are only partially?' I reply: Yes, assuredly, as, for example, 'things' distorted by refractive media, 'molecules,' or whatever else is taken to be more ultimately real than the immediate content of the perceptive moment. Secondly: "If experience is self-supporting[127] (in _any_ intelligible sense) does this fact preclude the possibility of (a) something not experienced and (b) action of experience upon a noumenon?" My reply is: Assuredly not the possibility of either--how could it? Yet in my opinion we should be wise not to _consider_ any thing or action of that nature, and to restrict our universe of philosophic discourse to what is experienced or, at least, experienceable.[128] FOOTNOTES: [122] [Reprinted from the _Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Methods_, vol. III, No. 26, December 20, 1906; and _ibid._, vol. IV, No. 4, February 14, 1907, where the original is entitled "A Reply to Mr. Pitkin." ED.] [123] [W. B. Pitkin: "A Problem of Evidence in Radical Empiricism," _ibid._, vol. III, No. 24, November 22, 1906. ED.] [124] [Above, p. 42. ED.] [125] ["In Reply to Professor James," _Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Methods_, vol. IV, No. 2, January 17, 1907. ED.] [126] Mr. Pitkin inserts the clause: 'by reason of the very nature of experience itself.' Not understanding just what reason is meant, I do not include this clause in my answer. [127] [See above, p. 193. ED.] [128] [Elsewhere, in speaking of 'reality' as "conceptual or perceptual experiences," the author says: "This is meant merely to exclude reality of an 'unknowable' sort, of which no account in either perceptual or conceptual terms can be given. It includes, of course, any amount of empirical reality independent of the knower." _Meaning of Truth_, p. 100, note. ED.] XI HUMANISM AND TRUTH ONCE MORE.[129] Mr. Joseph's criticism of my article 'Humanism and Truth'[130] is a useful contribution to the general clearing up. He has seriously tried to comprehend what the pragmatic movement may intelligibly mean; and if he has failed, it is the fault neither of his patience nor of his sincerity, but rather of stubborn tricks of thought which he could not easily get rid of. Minute polemics, in which the parties try to rebut every detail of each of the other's charges, are a useful exercise only to the disputants. They can but breed confusion in a reader. I will therefore ignore as much as possible the text of both our articles (mine was inadequate enough) and treat once more the general objective situation.