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True ideas are those that we can assimilate, validate, corroborate, and verify. False ideas are those that we cannot

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
True
Cannot
Truth
Ideas
Validate
Assimilate
Verify
False

More quotes by William James

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We can act as if there were a God feel as if we were free consider Nature as if she were full of special designs lay plans as if we were to be immortal and we find then that these words do make a genuine difference in our moral life.
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An unlearned carpenter of my acquaintance once said in my hearing: There is very little difference between one man and another but what little there is, is very important. This distinction seems to me to go to the root of the matter.
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The great use of life is to spend it for something that will outlast it.
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A purely disembodied human emotion is a nonentity.
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Philosophy is an unusually stubborn attempt to think clearly.
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A paradise of inward tranquility seems to be faith's usual result.
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The greatest weapon we have to combat stress is the ability to choose our thoughts.
William James
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The true'to put it very briefly, is only the expedient in the way of our thinking, just as 'the right' is only the expedient in the way of our behaving.
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Since belief is measured by action, he who forbids us to believe religion to be true, necessarily also forbids us to act as we should if we did believe it to be true.
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Man, whatever else he may be, is primarily a practical being, whose mind is given him to aid in adapting him to this world's life
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Men's activities are occupied into ways -- in grappling with external circumstances and in striving to set things at one in their own topsy-turvy mind.
William James
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One of the greatest discoveries of our time is that a man can alter the state of their life by altering the state of their mind.
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To give the theory plenty of 'rope' and see if it hangs itself eventually is better tactics than to choke it off at the outset b abstract accusations of self-contradiction
William James
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Knowledge about life is one thing effective occupation of a place in life, with its dynamic currents passing through your being, is another.
William James
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Our volitional habits depend, then, first, on what the stock of ideas is which we have and, second, on the habitual coupling of the several ideas with action or inaction respectively.
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We must make automatic and habitual, as early as possible, as many useful actions as we can...in the acquisition of a new habit, we must take car to launch ourselves with as strong and decided initiative as possible. Never suffer an exception to occur till the new habit is securely rooted in your life.
William James
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The mind of your own enemy, the pupil, is working away from you, as keenly and eagerly as is the mind of the commander on the other side from the scientific general. Just what the respective enemies want and think, and what they know or do not know, are as hard things for the teachers as for the general to find out.
William James
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Man lives in only one small room of the enormous house of his consciousness.
William James
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My experience is what I agree to attend to.
William James
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There's nothing so absurd that if you repeat it often enough, people will believe it.
William James