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实用主义 Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy that studies the nature of reality. In metaphysics, a very essential controversy is about what is real. Two traditional views on that question are materialism and idealism. Materialists and idealists have been arguing with each other for thousands of years until today. However, to many people, the debate between materialism and idealism seems to be a pointless philosophical exercise. Therefore, a new thought of the reality began in the late nineteenth century with Charles S. Peirce (1839-1914) and his pragmatic maxim. Since then, pragmatism has become the most popular philosophical idea in U.S. In my opinion, pragmatism is still the most reasonable approach to the study of mataphysics. 　　 Materialism and idealism are the traditional views of reality. Materialism is the view that matter is the ultimate constituent of reality. This view is as old as philosophy itself. In the west, many of the ancient Greeks thought that everything in the universe was made out of the four main physical substances: water, fire, air, or earth. In the philosophy of Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679), we see the belief that every thing can be explained in terms of measureable matter, which takes up space, has length, width, mass, volume, colours, tastes, weight, and measurement. Today’s materialism has at least four characteristics. First, materialism seeks answers through objective methodology. Second, materialism is deterministic. Third, materialism denies any form of supernatural belief, including belief in spirit, soul, mind, or any other nonmaterial substance. Finally, materialism is reductionistic, it attempts to explain the whole exclusively in terms of its parts or units. By contrast, idealism is the belief that reality is ultimately non-matter; in epistemology, the position that all we know are our ideas. George Berkeley is the founder of the modern idealism. He claimed that the conscious mind and its ideas or perceptions are the only reality an