Quote

To be fertile in hypotheses is the first perquisite of creativity and to be willing to throw them away the moment experience contradicts them is the next.

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
Firsts
Throw
First
Creativity
Willing
Moment
Experience
Contradicts
Away
Hypotheses
Next
Fertile
Moments
Hypothesis

More quotes by William James

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Our normal waking consciousness, rational consciousness as we call it, is but one special type of consciousness, whilst all about it, parted from it by the filmiest of screens, there lie potential forms of consciousness entirely different.
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Truth lives, in fact, for the most part on a credit system
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Tension is a habit. Relaxing is a habit. Bad habits can be broken, good habits formed.
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I myself believe that the evidence for God lies primarily in inner personal experiences.
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No matter how full a reservoir of maxims one may possess, and no matter how good one's sentiments may be, if one has not taken advantage of every concrete opportunity to act, one's character may remain entirely unaffected for the better.
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We are thinking beings, and we cannot exclude the intellect from participating in any of our functions.
William James
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Our view of the world is truly shaped by what we decide to hear.
William James
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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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We need only in cold blood to act as if the thing in question were real and it will infallibly end by growing into such a connection with our life that it will become real.
William James
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We want all our friends to tell us our bad qualities it is only the particular ass that does so whom we can't tolerate.
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a man does not cry because he is sad, he is sad because he cries
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The desire to gain wealth and the fear to lose it are our chief breeders of cowardice and propagators of corruption.
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The essence of genius is to know what to overlook.
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Every sort of energy and endurance, of courage and capacity for handling life's evils, is set free in those who have religious faith.
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The bottom of being is left logically opaque to us, a datum in the strict sense of the word, something we simply come upon and find, and about which (if we wish to act) we should pause and wonder as little as possible. In this confession lies the lasting truth of empiricism.
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It is very important that teachers should realize the importance of habit.
William James
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Our lives are like islands in the sea, or like trees in the forest. The maple and the pine may whisper to each other with their leaves ... But the trees also commingle their roots in the darkness underground, and the islands also hang together through the ocean's bottom.
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If merely 'feeling good' could decide, drunkenness would be the supremely valid human experience.
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O my Bergson, you are a magician, and your book is a marvel, a real wonder in the history of philosophy . . . In finishing it I found . . . such a flavor of persistent euphony, as of a rich river that never foamed or ran thin, but steadily and firmly proceeded with its banks full to the brim.
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Beyond the very extreme of fatigue and distress, we may find amounts of ease and power we never dreamed ourselves to own sources of strength never taxed at all because we never push through the obstruction
William James