William James

(1842-1910)
Psychologist and Philosopher.


Influences

Education

  • Lawrence Scientific School, Harvard, studied anatomy, chemistry and physiology, 1863.
  • MD Harvard Medical School 1869.

Career

  • 1872 Teacher at Harvard.
  • 1879 Opened the first psychology laboratory in the United States.
  • 1885 Professor of Philosophy, Harvard
  • 1889 Professor of Psychology, Harvard

Major Contributions

  • Gifford Lectures on ‘National Religion’ delivered at Edinburgh University, 1901-2
  • ‘Pragmatism’ given at the Lowell Institute, Boston in 1906.

Greatly honored in his time, known by many as a profound and original thinker and considered to be by many in his time the most widely known of American scholars.

Publications

  • Principles of Psychology, 1890. Establish psychology as a separate science.
  • Collected Essays and Reviews (1892);
  • The Will to Believe and Other Essays (1897);
  • Pragmatism: A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking (1907);
  • The Meaning of Truth (1909).

References: 3, 10

Image Courtesy of the National Library of Medicine