New Releases by William James

What is reality? How do we test the value of any given philosophical system? Can philosophy be useful? Why must we reject the notion that there is one concrete truth? American psychologist and philosopher WILLIAM JAMES (18421910), brother of novelist Henry James, was a groundbreaking researcher at Harvard University, author of such works as Principles of Psychology (1890) and The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature (1902), and one of the most influential academics of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Here, over a series of eight lectures delivered at the Lowell Institute in Boston in late 1906 and at Columbia University in early 1907, he explores these questions as he discusses: [ The Present Dilemma in Philosophy [ What Pragmatism Means [ Some Metaphysical Problems Pragmatically Considered [ The One and the Many [ Pragmatism and Common Sense [ Pragmatisms Conception of Truth [ Pragmatism and Humanism [ Pragmatism and Religion

How do students learn? What is the mental life of the pupil? How can students and teachers alike intensify their relationship and enhance the learning environment? American psychologist and philosopher WILLIAM JAMES (18421910), brother of novelist Henry James, was a groundbreaking researcher at Harvard University, as well as a profoundly influential explorer of the learning process and one of the most significant academics of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In these essays, considered a vital companion to Jamess Principles of Psychology (1890) and gleaned from a series of lectures on psychology given to teachers at Harvard in 1892James addresses both students and teachers on: [ psychology and the teaching art t[ he stream of consciousness [ education and behavior [ the laws of habit [ the acquisition of ideas [ the gospel of relaxation [ what makes a life significant [ and more.

Selected by the Modern Library as one of the 100 best nonfiction books of all time The Varieties of Religious Experience was an immediate bestseller upon its publication in June 1902. Reflecting the pluralistic views of psychologist turned philosopher William James, it posits that individual religious experiences, rather than the tenets of organized religions, form the backbone of religious life. James’s discussion of conversion, repentance, mysticism, and hope of reward and fears of punishment in the hereafter—as well as his observations on the religious experiences of such diverse thinkers as Voltaire, Emerson, Luther, and others—all support his thesis. Walter Houston Clark in Psychology Today deemed it “the most notable of all books in the field of the psychology of religion.”

A pioneer in early studies of the human mind and founder of that peculiarly American philosophy called Pragmatism, William James remains America''s most widely read philosopher. Generations of students have been drawn to his lucid presentations of philosophical problems. His works, now being made available for the first time in a definitive edition, have a permanent place in American letters and a continuing influence in philosophy and psychology. The essays gathered in the posthumously published Essays in Radical Empiricism formulate ideas that had brewed in James''s mind for thirty years as he sought a way out of the philosophical dilemmas generated by the new psychology of the late nineteenth century. They constitute the explanatory core of his doctrine of radical empiricism, a doctrine that charts his course between the absolute idealism he could not accept and, at the other extreme, the law of associationism, which reduces knowledge to sheer contiguity of ideas. In his introduction John J. McDermott describes the historical background and the genesis of James''s theory and considers the objections raised by its opponents.

With the clarity that William James deemed obligatory, Some Problems of Philosophy outlines his theory of perception. The early chapters expose the defects of intellectualism and monism and the advantages of empiricism and pluralism. The novelty that enters into concrete perceptual experience, and that is disallowed by the rationalizing intellect, suggests exciting possibilities. Denied any absolute truth in an ever-changing world, privy to only a piece of the truth at any given moment, the individual can, with faith and good will, help create order out of chaos. Some Problems of Philosophy, published posthumously, represents an important advance in William James''s thought

"This book provides a chronological presentation and explanation of letters by William James from 1893-1910. Readers of this book will have seen that the center of his interest had always been religious and philosophical"--Create. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2005 APA, all rights reserved).