Abstract

An examination of William James' epistemology was presented, with particular emphasis placed on his theory of truth. The thesis was that James never fully developed a pragmatic theory of the nature of truth, although he did develop pragmatic theories of the nature of reality, thinking, and the meaning of ideas. The development of his theory of truth was traced from his realism through his theory of truth as verification. Included in that discussion was examination of his notions of sensation, perception, reality, usefulness, and satisfaction. Based on his other epistemological theories, and building upon his incomplete theory of truth, a revised version of his theory was developed. In this new theory, the terms that James used ambiguously and those that he failed to develop within his own theory were more rigorously defined. The relative merits of both James' theory and the new pragmatic theory were then examined in relation to the following traditional criticisms: criticisms concerning the definition of "truth" as "usefulness", criticisms concerning the definition of "truth" as "verification", and criticisms concerning the general notion of relativized "truths", and criticisms questioning the originality of the theory