William James

• William James, late 1800s. Book 'varieties of religious experiance'.
• James defines RE as 'feelings, acts, experiances of individual men in their solitude so far as they apprehended themselves to stand in relation to whatever they consider the divine".
• James gives 4 marks if a RE: pint

  P - passive, not initiated by the person.

  I - ineffable

  N - noetic, people learn information that is not otherwise avalible. they are direct revelations from god.

  T - transient, temporary and cannot be sustained.
• Additional features of RE according to James: profound sence of union with god, a sence of joy, transcendence of time.
• James viewed RE as a psychological phenomena, a part of a persons psychological make up. They are simalar to any other psychological experiance Eg thinking.
• James conclusions are based on 3 key principles: empiricism; pluralism and pragmatism.
• 1. empiricism: many case studies prove that RE is a 'thing'.
• 2) Pluralism: experiances in different faiths led to the conclusion that REs are similar. Eg a christian may describe an experiance as the Holy Spirit where a Sikh may interpret that experiance differently.
• 3) Pragmatism: james believed that truth is not fixed and that what is true is whatever has great value to us. RE has great value to those it effects, we have to conclude that there is truth to be found in religion.
• A pragmatic approach means looking at something logically and practically.
• James felt RE could have a significant impact on a persons life so should be taken seriously as they have great authority for the person; are understood by the recipiant to be totally real; can bring LT change (effects are more significant that those from logic)
• James thought a true RE would be validated by the 'fruits' (like gifts of spirit eg joy);
• Other psychological studies have suggested certain personality types are more open to conversion experiances such as those who suffer depression. Can be angled that Re (especially conversion experiances) are a result of social factors rather than god.
• James concluded that Re does not act as proof for the existence of god. but for the induvidual it does act as proof of god - the effects are real and cannot be dismissed.
• James concluded the only thing we know from Re is that we can experience union with something larger than ourselves and in that union find peace.
• A strength of james is that he is a medical professional studying a range of experiances and effects. His goal is not to prove/disprove the existance of god.
• Noetic: experiance gives the person an understanding of something they could not have reached through reason alone. While this does not help the onlooker, a description in language may not be possible.
• Criticism: lack of authority, if they are just psycological experiances they lack authority as they are no different to other psycological experiances.
• PINT: James argues that common features indicate a common cause.
• PINT, Passive: implies an external force. OR socio economic factors etc are the external force
• The large impact of an RE could also be explained by a influential book