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THE WILL TO BEHOLD: THORSTEIN VEBLEN'S PRAGMATIC AESTHETICS*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 November 2008

TRYGVE THRONTVEIT
TRYGVE THRONTVEIT*
Affiliation:
Department of History, Harvard University
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Abstract

No philistine, Thorstein Veblen thought humankind's innate impulse to imbue experience with aesthetic unity advanced all knowledge, and that the most beautiful objects, ideas, and actions met a standard of communal benefit reflecting humanity's naturally selected sociability. Though German idealism was an early influence, it clashed with Veblen's historicist critique of Western institutions, and it was William James's psychology that refined his ideas into a coherent aesthetics with ethical and political applications, by clarifying how instinct, habit, and environment could interact to institutionalize standards of beauty subverting the native altruism of the aesthetic impulse. Over years of association with John Dewey, Veblen concluded that a redeemed and reflective will to behold and create beauty in and through selfless activity could advance a more efficient and egalitarian society, and that humans cooperatively shaping their environments for the common good could approximate the German tradition's ideal of harmonizing personal freedom and external reality.

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Articles
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Modern Intellectual History , Volume 5 , Issue 3 , November 2008 , pp. 519 - 546
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008

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References

1 Thorstein Veblen, “Mr. Cummings's Strictures on The Theory of the Leisure Class” (1899), in idem, Essays in Our Changing Order, ed. Leon Ardzrooni (New York, 1934), 16–17; Veblen, The Theory of the Leisure Class (New York, 1994; first published 1899).

2 Adorno, T. W., “Veblen's Attack on Culture,” Studies in Philosophy and Social Science 9 (1941), 391, 391 n. 4, 411–13Google Scholar.

3 Eby, Clare Virginia, Dreiser and Veblen: Saboteurs of the Status Quo (Columbia, MO, 1998)Google Scholar.

4 Tilman, Rick, Thorstein Veblen, John Dewey, C. Wright Mills, and the Generic Ends of Life (Lanham, MD, 2004), 201Google Scholar; idem, Thorstein Veblen and the Enrichment of Evolutionary Naturalism (Columbia, MO, 2007), 160. These works expand upon Tilman, Rick and Griffin, Robert, “The Aesthetics of Thorstein Veblen Revisited,” Cultural Dynamics 10 (1998), 325–40CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 See e.g. William James, “The Will to Believe” (1896) and “The Moral Philosopher and the Moral Life” (1891), in idem, Pragmatism and Other Writings, ed. Giles Gunn (New York, 2000); John Dewey, “Why Study Philosophy” (1893), in idem, The Early Works, 1882–1898, ed. Jo Ann Boydston et al., 5 vols. (Carbondale, IL, 1967–72; hereafter EW), 4: 62–6.

6 Edgell, Stephen, Veblen in Perspective: His Life and Thought (Armonk, NY, 2001), 30–55Google Scholar, summarizes these interpretations. Most influential are Dorfman, Joseph, Thorstein Veblen and His America (New York, 1934)Google Scholar; and Riesman, David, Thorstein Veblen: A Critical Interpretation (New York, 1953)Google Scholar.

7 See Veblen's copy of David Hume, Essays Literary, Moral, and Political (London, n.d.), Special Collections-Veblen, Carleton College Archives (hereafter SpCol Veblen), no. 124, for tangible evidence of his exposure to Scottish empiricism. At Johns Hopkins, Veblen took all three of Morris's courses, including his course on “Kant's Critique of Pure Reason”; at Yale, Veblen's study of German idealism ranged from Kant to Hegel. See Dorfman, Joseph, Thorstein Veblen and His America, with New Appendices (Clifton, NJ, 1972) 39–40Google Scholar; and Veblen to John Franklin Jameson, 12 Feb. 1883, reprinted in ibid., 544.

8 Veblen, “Kant's Critique of Judgment” (1884), in Our Changing Order, 191.

9 Ibid., 193. Veblen used “induction” idiosyncratically, to mean “adding to our knowledge something which is not and cannot be given in experience.” That “something” was a system of “general laws,” subsequently tested by its usefulness in organizing knowledge—challenging Hume's skepticism about reason's ability to substantiate inductive inferences (ibid., 179, 189).

10 Ibid., 175–90; quotations at 189–90, 182–3.

11 Porter listed Schiller's “reaction” to Kant in an outline of lecture “Topics” preserved at Yale, and discussed the same in Kant's Ethics (Chicago, 1886), composed during Veblen's time there. But Veblen likely studied Schiller more intently under George Trumbull Ladd, a popularizer of post-Kantian German thought before turning to experimental psychology. Veblen's brother Andrew had “an impression that Ladd came next to Pres. Porter and Prof. [William Graham] Sumner in importance of the men he worked under”; Ladd lectured in the history of philosophy all three years Veblen was at Yale. See Porter, “Notes on Philosophical Lectures,” n.d. (c.1875–86), MS notebook in Noah Porter Papers, Yale University Library, fourth page from end; the relevant editions of the Catalogue of the Officers and Students of Yale College (New Haven, CT, 1881–3); “Ladd, George Trumbull, 1842–1921,” Dictionary of American Biography, 22 vols. (New York, 1928–58) 10: 525–6; and Andrew Anderson Veblen to Joseph Dorfman, 18 March 1930, Andrew Anderson Veblen Papers, Minnesota Historical Society (hereafter Andrew Veblen Papers).

12 Veblen, “The Place of Science in Modern Civilization,” American Journal of Sociology 11 (March 1906), 590 (emphasis added). Perhaps anticipating objections from the materialist Spencerian evolutionists he engaged in this piece, and having at this point abandoned idealism, Veblen snubbed Schiller and cited Karl Groos's work on animal and child psychology, along with Herbert Spencer himself: K. Groos (“Gross” in Veblen's note), Die Spiel der Tiere (Jena, 1896); idem, The Play of Man (New York, 1901); Spencer, H., The Principles of Psychology (London, 1855)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

13 Dyer, Alan W., “Veblen on Scientific Creativity: The Influence of Charles S. Peirce,” Journal of Economic Issues 20 (March 1986), 28–30, 29CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

14 Veblen, “Science in Modern Civilization,” 590–91, 604.

15 On Schiller's aesthetics see Hammermeister, Kai, The German Aesthetic Tradition (Cambridge, 2002), 42–61CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

16 Porter, Noah, The Human Intellect: With an Introduction upon Psychology and the Soul (New York, 1876Google Scholar; first published 1868), 60.

17 Veblen, “Some Neglected Points in the Theory of Socialism,” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 2 (Nov. 1891), 57–74.

18 Hammermeister, German Aesthetic Tradition, 23, 36–9, 44–59; Fiala, Andrew G., “Aesthetic Education and the Aesthetic State,” in Maker, William, ed., Hegel and Aesthetics (Albany, NY, 2000)Google Scholar; Veblen, Imperial Germany and the Industrial Revolution (New York, 1915), esp. 225–9, 228 n.

19 Becky Veblen Meyers to David Riesman, 20 Feb. 1954, Thorstein Veblen Collection, Carleton College Archives (hereafter Veblen Collection), series 77B.

20 Veblen, “The Evolution of the Scientific Point of View” (1908), in idem, The Place of Science in Modern Civilization and Other Essays (New York, 1919), 32–3.

21 Veblen, “Why is Economics Not an Evolutionary Science?”, Quarterly Journal of Economics 12 (July 1898), 390; idem, “The Instinct of Workmanship and the Irksomeness of Labor,” American Journal of Sociology 4 (Sept. 1898), 189–90.

22 William James, The Principles of Psychology, 2 vols. (Boston, 1896; first published 1890), SpCol Veblen nos. 129 and 130.

23 Spencer, Herbert, First Principles of a New System of Philosophy (New York, 1875; first published 1864), SpCol Veblen no. 250, 47Google Scholar.

24 Veblen, “Instinct of Workmanship,” 188.

25 See James, Principles of Psychology, 1, SpCol Veblen no. 129: 166–8.

26 Veblen, “Science in Modern Civilization,” 588.

27 Ibid., 588–90.

28 Ibid., 592, 600; at 600 Veblen cites “James, Psychology, Vol. II, chap. 28, pp. 633–71, esp. p. 640 note”—James's chapter on “Necessary Truths and the Effects of Experience,” which charts a middle course between Spencerian empiricism and idealism. In the section Veblen cited, James argued that all object relations of thought were imagined, while so-called “scientific” relations were merely imagined relations that experience proved “congruent with the time- and space-relations which our impressions affect.” The note highlighted begins: “The aspiration to be ‘scientific’ is such an idol of the tribe to the present generation, is so sucked in with his mother's milk by every one of us, that we find it hard to . . . treat it freely as the altogether peculiar and one-sided subjective interest which it is.” James, Principles of Psychology, 2, SpCol Veblen no. 130: 639–40.

29 Veblen, “Science in Modern Civilization,” 592. It is possible that another pragmatist influenced Veblen's idea of “idle curiosity”: Alan Dyer has analyzed the similarities between the Veblenian concept previously described as aesthetic induction, which anticipated “idle curiosity” in his thinking, and Charles Peirce's concept of “abduction,” both of which Dyer likens to Schiller's “play.” Yet the only evidence that Peirce influenced Veblen is Veblen's attending Peirce's lectures at Johns Hopkins, and as Veblen's brother and fellow matriculant Andrew recalled, Peirce's course required “extensive knowledge of formal mathematics, and I do not think Th.[orstein] would have enjoyed it.” Alan Dyer, “Veblen on Scientific Creativity,” 25, 30–31; Andrew Veblen to Joseph Dorfman, 1 Oct. 1926, Andrew Veblen Papers.

30 Veblen, The Instinct of Workmanship and the State of the Industrial Arts (New York, 1914), 38–9 (to avoid confusion with Veblen's similarly titled article of 1898, both works are hereafter cited with publication dates appended). Oddly, in this work Veblen cited James's Principles to support his adaptively teleological understanding of instincts, yet criticized James for presenting instincts as “determinate” and ignoring the “spiritual complex into which they all enter” (4, 8). Veblen overlooked, in 1914, what he read in the same chapter, “Instinct,” years earlier: that every instinct “must take its chances” with all the others, and “sometimes succeed, and sometimes fail, in drafting off the currents [of stimulus] through itself”—so that “irregularities” of expression were expected (James, Principles of Psychology, 2, SpCol Veblen no. 130: 391–2).

31 The first two works have been cited; “The Beginnings of Ownership” appeared in American Journal of Sociology 4 (Nov. 1898), 352–65. On their incorporation into Leisure Class see Dorfman, J., “New Light on Veblen,” in Veblen, Essays, Reviews, and Reports: Previously Uncollected Writings, ed. Dorfman, J. (Clifton, NJ, 1973), 251–2Google Scholar.

32 Veblen, “Instinct of Workmanship,” 188–9; idem, “Economics not an Evolutionary Science,” 390.

33 Andrew Veblen to Joseph Dorfman, 12 July 1930, Andrew Veblen Papers; Warner B. Fite to Joseph Dorfman, 1 March 1933, Joseph Dorfman Papers, Columbia University.

34 See James, Principles of Psychology, 2, SpCol Veblen no. 130: chaps. 24, “Instinct,” and 28, “Necessary Truths and the Effects of Experience.” A characteristic ink-blot appears on 423, flanking a section in “Instinct” discussing (unsurprisingly) “appropriation.” For Veblen's citation of the similarly marked chapter “Necessary Truths,” see note 28 above.

35 Ibid., 383, 390–91, 625–76; Veblen, Leisure Class, 92.

36 Veblen, “Science in Modern Civilization,” 591–2. John P. Diggins often has called attention to what he sees as Veblen's critique of philosophical pragmatism; see, most recently, Diggins, John P., “Thorstein Veblen and the Literature of the Theory Class,” International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society 6 (Summer 1993), 486CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

37 Veblen, “Science in Modern Civilization,” 591 n. 4. Indeed, Veblen later cited James's Principles as recognizing in 1890 the “idle curiosity” Veblen first discussed in 1906; Veblen, Instinct of Workmanship (1914), 85.

38 James launched his campaign for pragmatism in an 1898 lecture entitled “Philosophical Conceptions and Practical Results,” reprinted in idem, Collected Essays and Reviews, ed. Ralph Barton Perry (New York, 1920), 406–37.

39 James, W., “What Makes a Life Significant?” Talks to Teachers on Psychology, and to Students on Some of Life's Ideals (New York, 1899), 273CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Veblen, “Science in Modern Civilization,” 591, 609.

40 Veblen, Leisure Class, 9–10.

41 Ibid., 92.

42 Ibid., 92, 94.

43 Ibid., 79.

44 Ibid., 72, 94, 135; Veblen, “Instinct of Workmanship” (1898), 190.

45 Veblen, Leisure Class, 94.

46 James, Principles of Psychology, 2, SpCol Veblen no. 130: 409.

47 Veblen, Leisure Class, chaps. 1, 2, and 9.

48 Ibid.; quotations at 15–16.

49 Ibid., 71–2, 79–80, 95.

50 Ibid., 79. On Veblen's reputation as a functionalist see Tilman, Rick, Thorstein Veblen and his Critics, 1891–1963: Conservative, Liberal, and Radical Perspectives (Princeton, NJ, 1992)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

51 Veblen, Leisure Class, 97.

52 Veblen's collection comprises several of Morris's fantasy stories rather than theoretical works.

53 Veblen's correspondence regarding the printing of Leisure Class is in the Macmillan papers, New York Public Library; selections are printed and quoted in Dorfman, “New Light on Veblen,” 8–14.

54 Veblen, Leisure Class, 99–100.

55 Veblen, “Arts and Crafts” (1902), in idem, Our Changing Order, 195–8.

56 Veblen, Leisure Class, 100, 243. The “classical tradition” in economics is first invoked on 6.

57 Ibid., 92–93.

58 Ibid., 104–5.

59 Ibid., 108–9.

60 Ibid., 107; cf. James on ever-protean value systems in “What Makes a Life Significant?”, esp. 303.

61 Veblen, Leisure Class, 98.

62 See e.g. Ayres, C. E., “Veblen's Theory of Instincts Reconsidered,” in Dowd, Douglas F., ed., Thorstein Veblen: A Critical Reappraisal (Ithaca, NY, 1958), esp. 35Google Scholar.

63 Veblen, “Kant's Critique of Judgment,” 182–3; idem, Leisure Class, 79.

64 Veblen, Instinct of Workmanship (1914), 15–16, 36.

65 Veblen, Leisure Class, 82–3, 88; Veblen's flowers are in Carleton's Veblen Collection, series 77G.

66 On Veblen's furniture-making see Becky Veblen Meyers to David Riesman, 20 Feb. 1954, Veblen Collection, series 77B. Veblen's remarks on his grandfather's knife are from Thorstein Veblen to Andrew Veblen, 17 Oct. 1899, Andrew Veblen Papers.

67 Veblen, “Instinct of Workmanship” (1898), 193–4; idem, Instinct of Workmanship (1914), 36–7.

68 Veblen, Leisure Class, 92.

69 Veblen to Sarah Hardy, 23 Jan. 1896, Thorstein Veblen Papers, University of Chicago.

70 Becky Veblen Meyers, “Becky's Biography” (unpaginated typescript), Veblen Collection, series 77B; J. Dewey, “The Reflex Arc Concept in Psychology” (1896), in idem, EW, 5: 96–103; cf. Veblen, “The Preconceptions of Economic Science: III,” Quarterly Journal of Economics 14 (Feb. 1900), 240–69, in which Veblen also uses the term “reflex arc” in describing the hedonist psychology of classical economists. For more on James's role in Dewey's changing views see Kloppenberg, James T., Uncertain Victory: Social Democracy and Progressivism in European and American Thought, 1870–1920 (New York, 1986), 41–4, 109–10Google Scholar.

71 On the connection between the pragmatists' psychological, philosophical, and reformist political views see Kloppenberg, Uncertain Victory, esp. part I.

72 Veblen, Leisure Class, 140, 139.

73 Veblen, Absentee Ownership and Business Enterprise in Recent Times (New York, 1923), 438–9.

74 Veblen, “Instinct of Workmanship” (1898), 192.

75 Veblen, Leisure Class, 140; Instinct of Workmanship (1914), 25–7.

76 Veblen, Instinct of Workmanship (1914), 7.

77 Veblen, “Christian Morals and the Competitive System” (1902), in idem, Our Changing Order, 200–6, 208–12, 214–16, 218.

78 Veblen, Instinct of Workmanship (1914), 16–18, 180–81; “Instinct of Workmanship” (1898), 192.

79 As Rick Tilman has noted, Veblen has been criticized for eschewing politics on grounds that incremental reform could never dislodge vested interests' control over policy-making; Tilman, R., The Intellectual Legacy of Thorstein Veblen: Unresolved Issues (Westport, CT, 1996), 119–20Google Scholar. Such charges ignore Veblen's wartime arguments that the liberal state itself should pursue social and economic reorganization; see e.g. Veblen, On the Nature of Peace and the Terms of Its Perpetuation (New York, 1917), esp. chap. 7.

80 Veblen, Instinct of Workmanship (1914), 303, 310; idem, The Theory of Business Enterprise (New York, 1904), 374; idem, The Vested Interests and the Common Man (New York, 1919), 178.

81 J. Dewey, “The Need of an Industrial Education in an Industrial Democracy” (1916), in idem, The Middle Works, 1899–1924, ed. Jo Ann Boydston et al., 15 vols. (Carbondale, IL, 1976–83; hereafter MW), 10: 140; Veblen, Instinct of Workmanship (1914), 303–4, 327.

82 Dewey, “The Need of an Industrial Education,” 140–41.

83 E.g. Bell, Daniel, “Veblen and the New Class,” American Scholar 32 (Autumn 1963), 638Google Scholar.

84 Veblen, Instinct of Workmanship (1914), 303, 310.

85 Ibid., 310, 320–21, 331–3; “Pragmatism” at 331 n.

86 Indeed, three pages later Veblen described “pragmatism” as a “revulsion against thinking in uncoloured mechanistic terms” and a “free movement of the human spirit” (ibid., 334).

87 Veblen, On the Nature of Peace, 367; idem, “A Memorandum on a Practicable Soviet of Technicians” (1919), in idem, The Engineers and the Price System (New York, 1921); idem, Absentee Ownership, 16 n, 290 n, 445; pamphlet, The New School for Social Research: Announcement, 1919–1920 (New York, 1919), 5, Andrew Veblen Papers. Cf. J. Dewey, “What America Will Fight For” (1917), in idem, MW, 10: 271–5, and idem, Human Nature and Conduct (New York, 1922). Both Dewey and Veblen supported Wilson's wartime policies; Versailles dashed their faith in his domestic and international agenda both.

88 J. Dewey, Art as Experience (1934), in idem, The Later Works, 1925–1953, ed. Jo Ann Boydston et al., 17 vols. (Carbondale, IL, 1981–91), 10: 45–6.

89 Veblen, Instinct of Workmanship (1914), 31–2.

90 The following remarks draw upon Hammermeister, German Aesthetic Tradition, chaps. 2–5.

91 Veblen, “Neglected Points in the Theory of Socialism,” 57–9, 74.

92 Forsey, Jane, “The Disenfranchisement of Philosophical Aesthetics,” Journal of the History of Ideas 64 (Oct. 2003), 596–7CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Gombrich quoted at 596.

93 Meyers to Riesman, 20 Feb. 1954, Veblen Collection series 77B.