Archetypes of WisdomArchetypes of WisdomDouglas J. SoccioDouglas J. Soccio

Chapter 15Chapter 15

The Pragmatist: William JamesThe Pragmatist: William James

Learning Objectives

On completion of this chapter, you should be able to answer the following questions:

What is pragmatism?What is pragmaticism?What is the “pragmatic theory of meaning”?What is the “pragmatic method”?What is meant by the “cash value” of an idea?What is determinism?What does it mean to be “healthy-minded”?What is a self-fulfilling prophecy?What is the “pragmatic paradox”?

William James

William James (1842-1910) was the first truly great American philosopher, and the most original and influential advocate of pragmatism.Pragmatism is an empirically based philosophy that defines knowledge and truth in terms of practical consequences.James believed that philosophy must be more than a mere intellectual enterprise. Its true purpose is to help us live by showing how to discover and adopt beliefs that fit our individual needs and temperaments.

The Education of a Philosopher

In 1855, James’s father lost faith in American education and moved the entire family to Europe – from Switzerland to England, France, and Italy.At sixteen, James started college and for the first time managed to attend the same school for an entire year.In 1861, James entered Harvard as a chemistry major, but his interests shifted to biology and anatomy, which led to Harvard’s Medical School.During his time at Harvard, James became so impressed by the paleontologist Jean Louis Agassiz that he accompanied Agassiz on an eight-month expedition into the Amazon.

Anxiety and Depression

During his student years, James suffered mentally and physically, describing himself as “on the continual verge of suicide.”

In a constant state of anxiety, and dreading to be alone, James went into a severe depression, writing in his journal that “nature and life have unfitted me for any affectionate relations with other individuals.”

The Idea of Free Will

Some time later, James was saved by an idea from the French philosopher Charles Renouvier, who had characterized free will as the ability to hold onto one idea among a number of possibilities.

Willing himself to hold onto the idea of health and well-being, James effectively decided to get well.

“My first act of freedom,” he said, “will be to believe in free will.”

James’s interest in medicine and psychology developed. In 1878, he was asked to write a psychology textbook.

Principles of Psychology

Twelve years later, he produced Principles of Psychology, establishing him as an important figure in the early history of the field.He became interested in philosophy but regarded it as a matter of personal involvement, as a function of the will, and as a means to overcome despair and futility. He developed the kind of philosophy he needed to cope and presented it in a series of lectures, making it accessible to others.Convinced that life was too important and complex to reduce to any philosophical system, he refused to offer one. Instead, he offered a method for marshalling the will.

Charles Sanders Peirce

The first expression of pragmatism actually appears in the work of Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914).

Peirce studied philosophy, mathematics, and chemistry at Harvard before going to work for the United States Coastal and Geodetic Survey.

A brilliant but eccentric man, Peirce was never able to secure a full-time university position.

As a result, he had a difficult time publishing his work.

Peirce’s “Pragmaticism”

Peirce first presented what he referred to as “pragmatism” in the 1878 article, “How to Make Our Ideas Clear.” The article was largely ignored until James devoted a series of lectures to it, but Peirce strenuously objected to James’s version of pragmatism. So Peirce “gave” him the term and coined yet another for himself – pragmaticism. He wanted to show that the meanings of words depend on some kind of action. Both “pragmatism” and “pragmaticism” come from the Greek root pragma, meaning “an act” or “consequence.” The slight variation signifies the difference in meaning between Peirce and James’s thoughts.

Pragmatic Theory of Meaning

Peirce argued that the only differences between the meanings of words are how they test out in experience.

He thus equated meaning with the effects related to words, saying, “Our idea of anything is our idea of its sensible effects.”

Meaningful statements refer to practical effects (consequences).

But Peirce pointed out that all thinking and all meaning are context dependent. Context includes material, social, and emotional components, as well as an intellectual one.

Pragmatic Method and Philosophy

Agreeing with the empiricists, Peirce argued that meaning is based on experience. We test to see whether a surface is hard before calling it that. If there is no way of testing the effects of words (and ideas), no way of verifying their public consequences, they are meaningless. Meaningful ideas make a practical difference.Building on Peirce’s foundation, James advocated a philosophical approach he claimed others had recognized before, but only in parts. For James, pragmatism was to be a method for solving those problems that interfere with feeling “at home” in the world.

James’ Pragmatism

James looked for what he called the cash value of statements, the practical payoff, and he rejected any philosophy that lacked it. This includes virtually all metaphysics.

In his words, “A pragmatist turns his back…once and for all upon a lot of inveterate habits dear to professional philosophers. He turns away from… pretended absolutes and origins. He turns toward concreteness and adequacy, toward facts, toward action and toward power.”

Sophistic Relativism?

If any theory with a practical payoff is true, does it not follow that one theory is as good as another to those who believe it? It would seem as if James were advocating sophistic relativism, but he did not see pragmatism that way.Because he saw pragmatism as a method, rather than a system of beliefs, he saw no use for theories of verification and meaning. For James, “True ideas are those we can assimilate, validate, corroborate, and verify. False ideas are those that we cannot. That is the practical difference it makes to us to have true ideas; that, therefore, is the meaning of truth, for it is all that truth is known as…”

The Temper of Belief

James sometimes refers to pragmatism as a creed, a body of beliefs by which we can live our lives and cope better in the world.James classified philosophical outlooks into two temperamental types, which he called the tough-minded and the tender-minded.The tender-minded go by “principles,” are religious, “free-willist,” and “dogmatic.”The tough-minded go by “facts,” are materialistic, irreligious, fatalistic, and skeptical.

The Temper of Belief

James felt philosophers tended to these extremes, while most of us are a mixture of both.

Rather than forcing ourselves into a particular mold, we should adopt those beliefs that are products of our own temperament and experience.

The Temper of Belief

The Will to Believe

Because life demands action, we have no choice but to believe something.

Our options are what James calls “forced,” so that even “not acting” is a course of action.

Even if the rationalist’s demand for certainty is never met, we must continue to act.

The Will to Believe

James thinks believing itself makes a difference: “Suppose you are climbing a mountain…Have faith that you can successfully make it, and your feet are nerved to its accomplishment. But mistrust yourself, and…you roll into the abyss. In such a case, the part of wisdom as well as courage is to believe in the line of your needs, for only by such belief is the need fulfilled.”

James’s ultimate position is that beliefs are “adaptations.”They can only be justified by whether they help us navigate our way through life.

Truth Happens to an Idea

James rejected the rationalist’s model of truth, taken from logic and mathematics, as simplistic.

Instead, we decide whether an idea is true by testing it.

Experience shows that ideas become true; elsewhere he says that truth happens to an idea.

We test ideas against our past experiences, keeping some and discarding others (as we and the world change).

Truth Happens to an Idea

So there is no such thing as disinterested truth. Pragmatic truth is human truth.

“Purely objective truth,” James asserts, “plays no role whatsoever, is nowhere to be found.”

The most absolute-seeming truths “also were once plastic…also called for human reasons. They mediated between still earlier truths and what in those days were novel observations.”

The Dilemma of Determinism

Determinism is the belief that everything that happens must happen exactly the way it does.

Some say that it is inevitable, since all matter is governed by cause and effect.

James acknowledged that there is no scientific way to refute such a possibility, but argued that belief in determinism is incompatible with our need for freedom.

But this process is public, and others force us to retest, or re-evaluate, our ideas.

The Dilemma of Determinism

We believe in the uniformity of the laws of nature, though – as Hume said – it cannot be proven.

We believe in free will as a necessary condition for moral responsibility, though it can’t be proven.

In the end, James opts for acting “as if” free will exists, since it “pays” more than not believing so.

This, as much as anything, is an illustration of what believing is for James – action and consequence.

Pragmatic Religion

In The Varieties of Religious Experience – a psychological study of a number of cases with a keen philosophical analysis, James attempted to discover how God works in people’s lives.

James asserted that we judge the truth of religious ideas by their “moral helpfulness.”

Accordingly, moral absolutes are impossible, and attempts to impose them are especially bad.

Pragmatic Religion

James’s position is that we are entitled to commit ourselves to whatever beliefs best express our deepest selves.

He was less worried about being “duped” by a false belief than he was about being unhappy.

“He who says, ‘Better go without belief forever than believe a lie!’ merely shows his own preponderant private horror of becoming a dupe.”

So it is better to live “a lie” than never to live at all.

Discussion Questions

What was James driving at when he claimed that a religious orientation is more effective than a non-religious one?

What reasons did he have for this belief?

Do you share his opinion? Why or why not?

Chapter Review:Key Concepts and Figures

Pragmatism

Determinism

Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

Pragmatic Paradox

William James (1842-1910)

Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914)