William James
William James
William Jameswas an American philosopher and psychologist who was also trained as a physician. The first educator to offer a psychology course in the United States, James was one of the leading thinkers of the late nineteenth century and is believed by many to be one of the most influential philosophers the United States has ever produced, while others have labelled him the "Father of American psychology". Along with Charles Sanders Peirce and John Dewey, he is considered to be...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth11 January 1842
CityNew York City, NY
CountryUnited States of America
In the dim background of mind we know what we ought to be doing but somehow we cannot start.
If merely 'feeling good' could decide, drunkenness would be the supremely valid human experience.
All our life, so far as it has definite form, is but a mass of habits.
Our faith is faith in someone else's faith, and in the greatest matters this is most the case.
Deepest principle of human nature is to be appreciated.
Pretend what we may, the whole man within us is at work when we form our philosophical opinions. Intellect, will, taste, and passion co-operate just as they do in practical affairs; and lucky it is if the passion be not something as petty as a love of personal conquest over the philosopher across the way.
Touch is the alpha and omega of affection.
A paradise of inward tranquility seems to be faith's usual result.
There is but one indefectibly certain truth , and that is the truth that pyrrhonistic scepticism itself leaves standing, the truth that the present phenomenon of consciousness exists.
We have nothing to do but to receive, resting absolutely upon the merit , power , and love of our Redeemer.
The lunatic's visions of horror are all drawn from the material of daily fact.
Habit is thus the enormous fly-wheel of society, its most precious conservative agent. It alone is what keeps us all within the bounds of ordinance.
If evolution and the survival of the fittest be true at all, the destruction of prey and of human rivals must have been among the most important. . . . It is just because human bloodthirstiness is such a primitive part of us that it is so hard to eradicate, especially when a fight or a hunt is promised as part of the fun.
The thinker philosophizes as the lover loves. Even were the consequences not only useless but harmful, he must obey his impulse.