Experiments with truth. A sociological variation on William James's Varieties of Religious Experience

Experiments with truth. A sociological variation on William James's Varieties of Religious Experience

William James's Varieties of Religious Experience is a classic psycho‐philosophical study of the experience of the sacred and of its practical effects on the ordinary life of extraordinary persons. In a pragmatic variation of Kant's proof of god's existence, James uses personal accoun...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal for the theory of social behaviour 2018-03, Vol.48 (1), p.31-47
Main Author: Vandenberghe, Frédéric
Format: Article
Language:eng
Subjects:
conversion ‐ humanism
God
Political factors
Pragmatism
Religion
Religious beliefs
Sacredness
Sociology
Truth
William James
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:William James's Varieties of Religious Experience is a classic psycho‐philosophical study of the experience of the sacred and of its practical effects on the ordinary life of extraordinary persons. In a pragmatic variation of Kant's proof of god's existence, James uses personal accounts of converts to empirically demonstrate that there's “something” that has causal effects on the well‐being of the person. While the article is largely sympathetic to James explorations of the mystical, it offers a sociological variation on the Varieties that foregrounds the social, cultural and political aspects of religion.
ISSN:0021-8308
1468-5914