Pragmatism
The most distinctively American philosophy of all time is pragmatism, which is associated mainly with the Harvard physiologist, psychologist and philosopher William James (1842-1910). James took the idea of pragmatism from Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914). (For some reason, "Peirce" is pronounced "Purse.") Peirce believed that James and others had misunderstood his ideas, so to distinguish his theory he gave it the name pragmaticism. Pragmaticism is the idea that the meaning of a word is defined by its practical consequences. Words and ideas that cannot in any way be tested practically are meaningless. (Compare Hume on which ideas are acceptable.)
James’s pragmatism was a method intended:
1. To free the mind from futile, and ultimately depressing, abstract metaphysical questions
2. To sort out good beliefs from bad ones.
"True ideas are those that we can assimilate, validate, corroborate and verify. False ideas are those that we cannot."
So whether an idea is true depends not just on how the world is, but on us and what we can do with the idea.
"Truth happens to an idea."
Different minds will feel more comfortable with, and have an easier time assimilating, different ideas. James divides philosophers into two types:
A. The Tender-Minded: these people favor rational principles, religion, intellectual things, etc., e.g. Plato and Descartes
B. The Tough-Minded: these people favor empirical facts, scepticism, material things, etc., e.g. Aristotle and Hume.
Most people have some of each tendency, so most philosophy does not suit them. What we need is something in between the two. This new philosophy will give us the intellectual and religious comfort we need.
Religion
We are justified in believing in God, says James, for the following reasons:
1. Such belief is a genuine option (i.e. a) belief in God is a genuine temptation (as opposed to, say, belief in invisible life on Mars), b) we must either believe or not believe, and c) it is
momentous whether one believes in God or not) and the evidence either way is inconclusive.
2. Those who believe in God might discover evidence for His existence, evidence of a mystical kind. This evidence might be ‘invisible’ to closed-minded atheists.
So in the absence of undeniable evidence to the contrary, we have a right to believe that there is a God. We also have a right to believe something if the belief makes itself come true, e.g. if believing in one’s own likeableness makes one likeable.
Free Will
In the old debate about determinism and free will, James believed, there was no conclusive evidence either way. Again we have a right to believe whatever is most psychologically useful to us.
Determinism is bad (i.e. hard to believe and assimilate) because:
a) it conflicts with our apparent experience of free will
b) it makes everything that happens seem inevitable, so praising people for good deeds, or blaming them for bad ones, seems absurd
c) it is depressing: what is the point of getting up in the morning if we have no influence over things and the future is already mapped out so that ‘whatever will be, will be’?
Morality
In choosing belief in free will, we choose belief in responsibility and morality over belief in science and materialism. But what is morality?
"The essence of good is simply to satisfy demand."
Demand will be satisfied more or less inevitably, because liberals will initiate any necessary reforms and conservatives will stop them from going too far. Even so, we should still fight for what is right rather than sitting back and letting progress happen. An active life is more interesting, sane and healthy than a passive one.
Objections and Problems
Are things true because they are useful, or useful because they are true?
Couldn’t a belief be both useful and false?
Do we need consistent beliefs in order to be happy?
The pragmatic paradox: can we believe in God if we think of this belief in purely pragmatic terms (i.e. as useful rather than true)?
Can we just choose to believe in free will?
Is James’s conception of good (and his belief in progress) naive?