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"James, William - Philosophy"
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Ontology after philosophical psychology : the continuity of consciousness in William James's philosophy of mind
\"Ontology after Philosophical Psychology addresses the question of William James's continuity of consciousness, with a view to its possible actualizations. In particular, Michela Bella critically delineates James's discourse. In the wake of Darwin's theory of evolution at the end of the nineteenth century, James's reflections emerged in the field of physiological psychology, where he developed for the case for a renewed epistemology and a new metaphysical framework to help us understand the most interesting theories and scientific discoveries about the human mind. Bella's analysis of the theme of continuity makes it possible to appreciate, both historically and theoretically, the importance of James's gradual transition from making observations of experimental psychology on the continuity of thought to developing an epistemological and ontological argument that continuity is a characteristic of experience and reality. This analysis makes it possible both to clarify James's position in relation to his historical context and to highlight the most original results of his work.\"-- Provided by publisher.
Book
Reconstructing Individualism:A Pragmatic Tradition from Emerson to Ellison
America has a love-hate relationship with individualism. In Reconstructing Individualism, James Albrecht argues that our conceptions of individualism have remained trapped within the assumptions of classic liberalism. He traces an alternative genealogy of individualist ethics in four major American thinkers-Ralph Waldo Emerson, William James, John Dewey, and Ralph Ellison. These writers' shared commitments to pluralism (metaphysical and cultural), experimentalism, and a melioristic stance toward value and reform led them to describe the self as inherently relational. Accordingly, they articulate models of selfhood that are socially engaged and ethically responsible, and they argue that a reconceived-or, in Dewey's term, \"reconstructed\"-individualism is not merely compatible with but necessary to democratic community. Conceiving selfhood and community as interrelated processes, they call for an ongoing reform of social conditions so as to educate and liberate individuality, and, conversely, they affirm the essential role individuality plays in vitalizing communal efforts at reform.
eBook
Ever not quite : pluralism(s) in William James and contemporary psychology
\"William James made many references to pluralism throughout his career. Interestingly, many contemporary psychologists also discuss pluralism and indeed call for pluralism as a corrective to the discipline's philosophical and methodological foundations. Yet, pluralism and the purposes to which it is applied are understood in a variety of ways, and the relation of contemporary pluralism to the pluralism(s) of William James is uncertain. This book offers conceptual clarification in both contexts, first distinguishing diverse senses of pluralism in psychology and then systematically examining different forms of pluralism across the writings of James. A comparison of meanings and analysis of implications follows, aimed at illuminating what is at stake in ongoing calls for pluralism in psychology\"-- Provided by publisher.
BOOK
William James On Radical Empiricism and Religion
Hunter Brown shows that Henry James's views of religious experience do not in fact lapse into subjectivismor fideism that critics have accused him of but occasions hardships and self-sacrifice which James describes.
eBook
American Pragmatism
This chapter contains sections titled:
Charles Sanders Peirce
William James
John Dewey
Contemporary Directions
Works cited
Book Chapter
Wm & H'ry
Readers generally know only one of the two famous James brothers. Literary types know Henry James; psychologists, philosophers, and religion scholars know William James. In reality, the brothers' minds were inseparable, as the more than eight hundred letters they wrote to each other reveal. In this book, J. C. Hallman mines the letters for mutual affection and influence, painting a moving portrait of a relationship between two extraordinary men. Deeply intimate, sometimes antagonistic, rife with wit, and on the cutting edge of art and science, the letters portray the brothers' relationship and measure the manner in which their dialogue helped shape, through the influence of their literary and intellectual output, the philosophy, science, and literature of the century that followed.
William and Henry James served as each other's muse and critic. For instance, the event of the death of Mrs. Sands illustrates what H'ry never stated: even if the \"matter\" of his fiction was light, the minds behind it lived and died as though it was very heavy indeed. He seemed to best understand this himself only after Wmfully fleshed out his system. \"I can't now explain save by the very fact of the spell itself . . . that [Pragmatism] cast upon me,\" H'ry wrote in 1907. \"All my life I have . . . unconsciously pragmatised.\"
Wmwas never able to be quite so gracious in return. In 1868, he lashed out at the \"every day\" elements of two of H'ry's early stories, and then explained: \"I have uttered this long rigmarole in a dogmatic manner, as one speaks, to himself, but of course you will use it merely as a mass to react against in your own way, so that it may serve you some good purpose.\" He believed he was doing H'ry a service as he criticized a growing tendency toward \"over-refinement\" or \"curliness\" of style. \"I think it ought to be of use to you,\" he wrote in 1872, \"to have any detailed criticism fm even a wrong judge, and you don't get much fm. any one else.\" For the most part, H'ry agreed. \"I hope you will continue to give me, when you can, your free impression of my performance. It is a great thing to have some one write to one of one's things as if one were a 3d person & you are the only individual who will do this.\"
eBook
Feminist interpretations of William James
Widely regarded as the father of American psychology, William James is by any measure a mammoth presence on the stage of pragmatist philosophy. But despite his indisputable influence on philosophical thinkers of all genders, men remain the movers and shakers in the Jamesian universe—while women exist primarily to support their endeavors and serve their needs. How could the philosophy of William James, a man devoted to Victorian ideals, be used to support feminism?
Feminist Interpretations of William James lays out the elements of James's philosophy that are particularly problematic for feminism, offers a novel feminist approach to James's ethical philosophy, and takes up epistemic contestations in and with James's pragmatism. The results are surprising. In short, James's philosophy can prove useful for feminist efforts to challenge sexism and male privilege, in spite of James himself.
In this latest installment of the Re-Reading the Canon series, contributors appeal to William James's controversial texts not simply as an exercise in feminist critique but in the service of feminism.
Along with the editors, the contributors are Jeremy Carrette, Lorraine Code, Megan Craig, Susan Dieleman, Jacob L. Goodson, Maurice Hamington, Erin McKenna, José Medina, and Charlene Haddock Seigfried.
eBook
On William James’s Implicit Schopenhauerianism
While William James has often been taken to be critical of, or even hostile to, Arthur Schopenhauer’s pessimism, it is important to recognize implicitly Schopenhauerian tendencies in James’s philosophy. This paper argues that the uneasiness associated with our metaphysical wonder at the radical contingency of the world—the fact that there is being instead of nothingness—is, for James, irreducibly ethical: the “problem of being”, discussed by James in, e.g., Some Problems of Philosophy (1911), is ultimately the problem of suffering. It is suggested that James’s rejection of naïve optimism and theodicist justifications of suffering (and thus of the world) are grounded in his taking seriously Schopenhauerian pessimism, even though he defended meliorism as the critical middle ground between optimism and pessimism. Therefore, interpretations and further developments of Jamesian pragmatism should not ignore the Schopenhauerian influences that can be perceived throughout James’s key writings from The Will to Believe essays (especially “The Sentiment of Rationality”) via Pragmatism to Some Problems of Philosophy .
Journal Article
A Relationalist Rethinking of Destructive Events
The purpose of this article is to show how William James's thought can help to construct a critical approach to the conceptualization of unexpected destructive events and suggest modes of conceptualization that reduce social injustice. I draw on several interrelated themes in James's thought, including, but not limited to: metaphysical and moral relationalism, the tragedy of choice, and the psychology of selective attention (with particular emphasis on its consequences for ethical pluralism). Specifically, I argue that James provides resources for mounting a criticism of a kind of essentialist thinking about unexpected events; for showing how this essentialism can create social injustice by obfuscating social choices and causing marginalized groups to bear a disproportionate share of social costs; for helping to construct a pluralistic approach to unexpected events that makes transparent the tragic choices laying behind them; and for putting this approach to use in ways that mitigate social injustice.
Journal Article