Lesson #1

Please read this excerpt from James' "The Will To Believe," 1896:

"Our belief in truth itself, for instance, that there is a truth, and that our minds and it are made for each other,—what is it but a passionate affirmation of desire, in which our social system backs us up? We want to have a truth; we want to believe that our {10}experiments and studies and discussions must put us in a continually better and better position towards it; and on this line we agree to fight out our thinking lives. But if a pyrrhonistic sceptic asks us how we know all this, can our logic find a reply? No! certainly it cannot. It is just one volition against another,—we willing to go in for life upon a trust or assumption which he, for his part, does not care to make."

Read this highlight and just consider it. It is the crux of modern philosophy. If you ever wondered what Rand was screaming about, this is it. It gives you, clearly, one half of the debate over subjective/objective. It also gives you about 90 percent of modern philosophy.

Ask yourself these questions:

How committed is James to subjectivism?

Can you not like James, as I did, prior to reading it?

Does covering over an idea with decoration make it any more or less true?

And most importantly ...

What does it mean to declare, whole-heartedly, a truth that has as its conclusion non-truth? Can I say that there is nothing when, as I say it, I'm positing a something? And does this contradiction rise up to a measuring stick of all human thought?

IBID, James. Section VI:

"Objective evidence and certitude are doubtless very fine ideals to play with, but where on this moonlit and dream-visited planet are they found?"