詹姆斯(1842～1910年)

James, William

美国哲学家和心理学家。哲学作家亨利.詹姆斯（1811～1882）的长子，其弟是小说家亨利.詹姆斯。他出生於纽约市，在哈佛大学修读医学，1872年开始在那里任教。第一部重要着作是《心理学原理》（1890），他把思想和知识视为生活奋斗的工具。最出名的作品是《宗教经验的种种》（1902）。在《实用主义》（1907）中，他把皮尔斯的实用主义作了一番归纳，指出任何一个观念的意义最後必然体现在这一观念所经历和导致的顺序而来的经验性後果中；真理和谬误端视这些後果来评断。他把实用主义应用於变化与偶然的观念、自由、变异、多元性以及新奇的观念上。他也用实用主义来反对一元论、「宇宙板块论」、内部关系的非现实理论和一切表示现实是静止的观点。他也是功能主义这一心理学运动的领袖。

English version：

1842～1910年

James, William

U.S. philosopher and psychologist. Son of the philosophical writer Henry James (1811-1882) and brother of Henry James, he was born in New York City and studied medicine at Harvard, where he taught from 1872. His first major work, The Principles of Psychology (1890), treated thinking and knowledge as instruments in the struggle to live. His most famous work is The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902). In Pragmatism (1907), he generalized the pragmatism of Charles Sanders Peirce by asserting that the meaning of any idea must be analyzed in terms of the succession of experiential consequences it leads to; that truth and error depend solely on these consequences. He applied pragmatism to the analysis of change and chance, freedom, variety, pluralism, and novelty. Pragmatism was also the basis for his polemic against monism, the “block universe,” the idealistic doctrine of internal relations, and all views that presented reality as a static whole. He was also a leader of the psychological movement of functionalism.

参考文章

• 詹姆斯岛及附近区域建筑与名胜