Similarly, it is now frequently observed that all knowledge is _humanly fruitful_, and it is proposed that this shall be regarded as the very criterion of truth. According to this principle science as a whole, even knowledge as a whole, is primarily a human utility. The nature which science defines is an artifact or construct. It is designed to express briefly and conveniently what man may practically expect from his environment. This tendency is known as _pragmatism_. It ranges from systematic doctrines, reminiscent of Fichte, which seek to define practical needs and deduce knowledge from them, to the more irresponsible utterances of those who liken science to "shorthand,"[407:8] and mathematics to a game of chess. In any case pragmatism attributes to nature a certain dependence on will, and therefore implies, even when it does not avow, that will with its peculiar principles or values cannot be reduced to the terms of nature. In short, it would be more true to say that nature expresses will, than that will expresses nature.[408:9] [Sidenote: Summary, and Transition to Epistemology.] § 204. Such, then, is the contemporary eclecticism as respects the central problem of metaphysics. There are _naturalistic_ and _individualistic_ tendencies in _absolutism_; _rationalistic_ and _ethical_ tendencies in _naturalism_; and finally the independent and spontaneous movements of _personal idealism_ and _pragmatism_. Since the rise of the Kantian and post-Kantian philosophy, metaphysics and epistemology have maintained relations so intimate that the present state of the former cannot be characterized without some reference to the present state of the latter. Indeed, the very issues upon which metaphysicians divide are most commonly those provoked by the problem of knowledge. The counter-tendencies of naturalism and absolutism are always connected, and often coincide with, the epistemological opposition between empiricism, which proclaims perception, and rationalism, which proclaims reason, to be the proper organ of knowledge. The other great epistemological controversy does not bear so direct and simple a relation to the central metaphysical issues, and must be examined on its own account. [Sidenote: The Antagonistic Doctrines of Realism and Idealism. Realistic Tendency in Empirical Idealism.]