Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by William James

Quote by William James

Work

The Principles of Psychology

Written by William James, this comprehensive work delves into the nature of the mind, consciousness, and the workings of the human psyche. It is considered a cornerstone in the development of modern psychology and offers insights into the scientific study of human behavior. more

Author

William James
William James

William James, born on January 11, 1842, and died on August 26, 1910, was an influential American philosopher, psychologist, and writer. He is considered one of the founders of functionalism in psychology and has had a profound impact on the fields of psychology, philosophy, and religion. more

You May Also Like

“The human understanding is moved by those things most which strike and enter the mind simultaneously and suddenly, and so fill the imagination; and then it feigns and supposes all other things to be somehow, though it cannot see how, similar to those few things by which it is surrounded.”

MindHumansScienceUnderstandingImaginationMovedStrikes
Book:The New Organon: or True Directions Concerning the Interpretation of Nature
Create image

“The mind is a vagrant thing ... Thinking is not analogous to a person working in a laboratory who invents something on company time. Answering criticism that the book for which he won a Pulitzer Prize was written in the years he had been employed at the Smithsonian. He specified that did not write on the premises there, but only at home outside of working hours.”

ThinkingWritingYearsMindPersonsBookHomeScienceHoursCompanyWrittenCriticismInventionPrizeEmployedLaboratoryPremisesVagrantsSmithsonian
Author:Daniel J. Boorstin
Create image

“The popularisation of scientific doctrines is producing as great an alteration in the mental state of society as the material applications of science are effecting in its outward life. Such indeed is the respect paid to science, that the most absurd opinions may become current, provided they are expressed in language, the sound of which recals [sic] some well-known scientific phrase.”

MindWellsMayStatesScienceLanguageSoundKnownOpinionMaterialsPaidCurrentsDoctrineAbsurdPhrasesApplicationWell KnownAlterations
Book:Maxwell on Molecules and Gases
Create image

“To us ... the only acceptable point of view appears to be the one that recognizes both sides of reality-the quantitative and the qualitative, the physical and the psychical-as compatible with each other, and can embrace them simultaneously ... It would be most satisfactory of all if physis and psyche (i.e., matter and mind) could be seen as complementary aspects of the same reality.”

IfsMindMatterRealityWould BeScienceSidesViewsAspectEmbracePoint Of ViewAcceptableBoth SidesCompatibleComplementaryQualitative
Author:Wolfgang Pauli
Create image

“We are at our human finest, dancing with our minds, when there are more choices than two. Sometimes there are ten, even twenty different ways to go, all but one bound to be wrong, and the richness of the selection in such situations can lift us onto totally new ground.”

WayMindHumansTwoDifferentSometimesScienceChoicesSituationTenTwentiesDancingBoundsLiftsDifferent WaysFinestSelectionRichness
Book:A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays
Create image

“We are ... led to a somewhat vague distinction between what we may call "hard" data and "soft" data. This distinction is a matter of degree, and must not be pressed; but if not taken too seriously it may help to make the situation clear. I mean by "hard" data those which resist the solvent influence of critical reflection, and by "soft" data those which, under the operation of this process, become to our minds more or less doubtful.”

IfsMindMayMeanMatterHardHelpingScienceProcessSituationTakenClearInfluenceDegreesReflectionCriticalDataOperationsDistinctionVagueDoubtfulCritical Reflection
Book:Our Knowledge of the External World as a Field for Scientific Method in Philosophy
Create image