First steps: Pragmatism

I wanted to start with pragmatism because of an idea that I remember as being associated with this philosophy. It is the idea that we choose a particular philosophy because we find it congenial, not because of its intrinsic merit.

I went looking on wikipedia for the reference, but I can't find it now. Anyway, here's a pointer to the wikipedia article on pragmatism.

What I like best about pragmatism is the idea that you can judge an idea or a philosophy by its results. If you find that adopting a particular philosophy leads to horrific acts or terrible depression, then just don't go there! No need to bogged down in long chains of logic.

But pragmatism, for me, doesn't really work as an axiom or a basis for philosophy. I see it more as a sanity check. Or perhaps as a tool, something to be used in philosophy like Ockham's razor for science.

The problem is that I am interested in issues of ethics and morality, and I would like to establish a philosophical basis for discussions on these topics. When the pragmatic test is applied, it pre-supposes some ethical or moral standards. So there is a problem of circular reasoning if I were to use pragmatism as this basis.

Returning to the first point in this post, pragmatism is a philosophy that I find congenial, so far as I understand it, but it doesn't seem to work for my intended application. So in subsequent posts I will attempt to identify a philosophy (or philosophies) that is both congenial to me and suitable for use in discussions on ethics and morality.