Pragmatism: A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking

James begins by criticizing the rationalist claim that there exists such a thing as “the Truth” (92), for example, insisting on rigid rules in the use of language, ignoring the fact that experience modifies the way people speak. James argues that such concepts as “law, language, truth” are not “antecedent principles” but “abstract names” for the “results” of a constantly evolving process (93).

As a pragmatist, James insists that there are truths, plural, and that “the truth” is merely a generalizing abstraction. He sees pragmatism not as a way of discovering “the truth” but as a workable system for judging the merits of various competing theories.

In this lecture, James explores the relationship between pragmatism and what the 19th-century philosopher F. C. S. Schiller called humanism: the doctrine that “to an unascertainable extent our truths are man-made products” and that “[t]he world […] is what we make of it” (93). James is quick to assert that reality is “found, not manufactured” (94), to reassure readers that the pragmatic view of truth is not merely subjective and relativistic.

James says that there are three parts to reality. The first part is sense data, which simply come to us. The second part is “the relations that obtain between our sensations” (94), i.e., making logical connections between things. The third part consists of the “previous truths” with which we compare our new beliefs (as described in Lecture 6). James stresses that although our sense perceptions are beyond our control, we do have the ability to privilege certain of them according to “our own interests” (94). Thus, “What we say about reality […] depends on the perspective into which we throw it. The that of it is its own; but the what depends on the which; and the which depends on us” (95). In other words, having encountered the sensory and logical aspects of reality, we impose meaning on them: “We receive in short the block of marble, but we carve the statue ourselves” (95). Reality says nothing about itself; we speak for it and interpret it.

Thus, our humanness affects the way we perceive reality; we put the data we encounter into a manmade form, as reflected in branches of knowledge like mathematics, geometry, etc. In another vivid metaphor, James says that human thinking “cooks” reality “for our consumption” (96). James concludes: “When we talk of reality ‘independent’ of human thinking […], it seems a thing very hard to find” (95). This is the essence of humanism, which James sees as virtually synonymous with pragmatism; for James, “the humanistic principle” is embodied in the sentence “you can’t weed out the human contribution” (98).

Taking a cue from the 19th-century German philosopher R.H. Lotze, James asks whether our descriptions of reality may not themselves be “important additions to reality”—could reality exist “for the very purpose of stimulating our minds to such additions as shall enhance the universe’s total value” (99)? This is in fact the pragmatic view. Nature, reality, or the world, is “malleable, waiting to receive its final touches at our hands” (99). Human creativity can actually contribute to the sum total of reality. This capacity adds to both our “dignity” and “responsibility as thinkers” (99). James is now prepared to state the essential difference between rationalism and pragmatism, which concerns no less than “the structure of the universe itself” (100):

[F]or rationalism reality is ready-made and complete from all eternity, while for pragmatism it is still in the making, and awaits part of its complexion from the future. On the one side the universe is absolutely secure, on the other it is still pursuing its adventures (99).

This view is controversial: Critics claim that for pragmatists, anything may be called true if the pragmatist wants it to be so. To counter, James argues that rationalists do not look at the real world squarely in the face, but instead postulate an absolute, ideal, timeless, and “perfect, finished” world overlaid on top of the world “we find ourselves born into” (102). For James, this is tantamount to substituting an idealized fantasy for reality.

Sidestepping, James argues that, according to his own principles, a pragmatist is obligated not to reject this absolutist view outright, but to see its usefulness for certain people and in certain circumstances. For example, the belief in an ideal world draws many people to religion and morality. James emphasizes that pragmatism is a philosophical mediation tool that weighs various possibilities for thought—both rationalist and empiricist—against the norm of experience.

To drive home this point, James quotes a message he received that morning, saying that pragmatism naturally leads to materialism and agnosticism. This is a misunderstanding—pragmatism is not an absolute system, but rather a mediator between different systems. Here again, exasperation comes out as James reacts to his critics—in this case, “one of my oldest friends, who ought to know me better” (103). James reiterates that, although he has been hard on rationalism in these lectures, he is just as prepared, on pragmatic grounds, to defend rationalist ideas if they are useful to life.

James proposes to show in the final lecture how the “absolutistic hypothesis” about the world has “a perfectly definite meaning” (104) by examining what pragmatism has to say about religion. The lectures have been working toward this most practical and concrete side of philosophy, since religious questions interest countless people who do not otherwise engage in philosophical speculation.