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Objective evidence and certitude are doubtless very fine ideals to play with, but where on this moonlit and dream-visited planet are they found?

William James

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William James
Age: 68 †
Born: 1842
Born: January 11
Died: 1910
Died: August 26
Philosopher
Physician
Psychologist
University Teacher
W. James
Dream
Objectives
Play
Ideals
Planet
Planets
Moonlit
Evidence
Certitude
Fine
Doubtless
Science
Visited
Found
Objective

More quotes by William James

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The science of logic never made a man reason rightly, and the science of ethics never made a man behave rightly. The most such sciences can do is to help us to catch ourselves up and check ourselves, if we start to reason or to behave wrongly and to criticise ourselves more articulately after we have made mistakes.
William James
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If you want a confidence, act as if you already have it. Try the as if technique.
William James
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Need and struggle are what excite and inspire us our hour of triumph is what brings the void.
William James
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Success or failure depends more upon attitude than upon capacity.
William James
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I am only a philosopher, and there is only one thing that a philosopher can be relied on to do, and that is, to contradict other philosophers.
William James
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To know one thing thoroughly would be to know the universe.
William James
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Just for today I will exercise my soul in three ways: I will do somebody a good turn and not get found out. I will do at least two things I don't want to do
William James
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Truth for us is simply a collective name for verification processes
William James
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Intelligence is a fixed goal with variable means of achieving it.
William James
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Is life worth living? It all depends on the liver.
William James
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Mankind's common instinct for reality has always held the world to be essentially a theatre for heroism.
William James
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...as I apprehend the Buddhist doctrine of karma, I agree in principle with that.
William James
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Mental fire is what won't burn real sticks mental water is what won't necessarily (though of course it may) put out even a mentalfire.
William James
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The ideas gained by men before they are twenty-five are practically the only ideas they shall have in their lives.
William James
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For the moment, what we attend to is reality.
William James
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The emotions aren't always immediately subject to reason, but they are always immediately subject to action.
William James
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We don't laugh because we're happy - we're happy because we laugh.
William James
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Need and struggle are what excite and inspire us our hour of triumph is what brings the void. Not the Jews of the captivity, but those of the days of Solomon 's glory are those from whom the pessimistic utterances in our Bible come.
William James
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Faith means belief in something concerning which doubt is still theoretically possible ... faith is the readiness to act in a cause the prosperous issue of which is not certified to us in advance.
William James
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Man's chief difference from the brutes lies in the exuberant excess of his subjective propensities. Prune his extravagance, sober him, and you undo him.
William James