From Dr. Doug Browning
William James: "The Will to Believe"
James' claim:
"Our passional nature not only lawfully may, but must, decide an option between propositions, whenever it is a genuine option that cannot by its nature be decided on intellectual grounds. . ."
The boldfaced terms need to be carefully considered and understood in order to see what James is claiming.
1. passional nature. What constitutes our passional nature are all of those tendencies, predilections, desires, hopes, fears, etc., which we bring to the option which we confront. As such, this side of our nature is
(a) non-intellectual, i.e., not a part of our "objective" consideration of evidence and "scientific" or logical arguments,
(b) weighted, i.e., present on a continuum of our commitment from superficial to deep. (What is superficial is passing, temporary, or trivial to us; what is deep is closer to our "hearts."),and
(c) individual and unique with each one of us. (Though we may indeed share certain of our passionately held beliefs, desire, hopes, etc., we do not by any means share them all.)
2. genuine option. A genuine option for someone X is a choice between two alternatives A and not-A, such that the option is
(a) living, i.e., such that it is an option between alternatives each of which it is really possible that X could take. (Thus, X already has some predilection to take both A and not-A and thus to consider both alternatives seriously. It is therefore only living relative to X, for to another person Y either A or not-A may not be a live possibility, but simply dead.)
(b) forced, i.e., such that there are only two alternatives to take and one must, by the nature of the case, take one and not the other. (To choose not to take A is to choose to take not-A.)
(c) momentous, i. e., not trivial, but important for the direction and develop- ment of our lives. An option is trivial if both alternatives are such that either (i) the opportunity is not unique, (ii) the stake is insignificant, or (iii) the decision to take one alternative or the other is reversible if it later prove unwise.
3. cannot by its nature be decided on intellectual grounds, i.e., the question "Which is the alternative which I ought to take?" or "Which alternative is the true or better one?" is intellectually undecidable. This can be the case because either
(a) there cannot be, by the nature of the case, any factual evidence or a priori arguments to confirm or disconfirm either alternative (as, for example, in "The Dilemma of Determinism" evidence can only be given for what does happen, but not for what might have happened and in "The Will to Believe" evidence cannot be made available for what ought to be rather than for what is) or
(b) though there might in principle be such evidence in the future, X cannot in his or her situation of a forced option right now wait for it (as, for example, when pursued by killers on a mountain path and suddenly faced with a chasm I ask "Can I jump this chasm or not?" and therefore confront the option of accepting that I can and make the leap or failing to accept that I can, or as in "The Will to Believe" I ask myself whether you like me or not).
4. whenever. This has the logical force of 'if', so that the claim by James may be rephrased like this:
If someone X is
(i) in a situation S in which he or she is faced with an option O of choosing between two alternatives A and not-A,
(ii) O is genuine, i.e., living, forced, and momentous for X in S and
(iii) the choice between A and not-A is intellectually undecidable,
then it is the case that both
(a) X will (because X must) choose that alternative which X believes to conform best with his or her passional nature and
(b) X is rationally justified in choosing that alternative which in fact conforms best with X's passional nature as X believes it to be upon whatever careful consideration is possible under the circumstances.
5. must be decided by one's passional nature, i.e., as indicated under 4 above, when X is faced with the option between A and not-A and conditions (ii) and (iii) under the 'if' in 4 above hold, X's passional nature becomes motivationally compelling. Thus, X will be determined to choose that alternative which X believes to best conform to X's passional nature.
6. lawfully may, i.e., as indicated under 4 above, when conditions (i), (ii), and (iii) hold, one is rationally justified in choosing that alternative which X believes upon careful consideration to be in best conformity with X's passional nature (thus attempting to find conformity with the deeper stratum of passional nature in preference to the superficial). Thus, it would be irrational not to take account of one's passional nature in such a case. To put it another way, X ought (rationally speaking) to choose that alternative which is thought to so conform.
COMMENT: I am not convinced by item 5 above and, therefore, not by consequent (a) under item 4. What James probably believes is that our passional nature (as we read it) is determining between A and not-A only because the option is forced. But I'm not sure that we cannot choose to decide the issue by chance, by flipping a coin.
Now let us assume that James' claim is correct. An important issue remains. Are we (you and I) ever confronted with such a genuine and intellectually undecidable option? Remember, all three of the conditions in 4 above must be satisfied in order for the consequent to follow. Are there such situations? James ends his discussion in "The Will to Believe" by providing us with three such situations or sorts of cases,
(a) moral questions,
(b) questions concerning personal relations, and
(c) the question of religious faith.
He might, it seems to me, have added a fourth:
(d) the question of determinism or indeterminism.
And even a fifth:
(e) the question "How am I to live in order that my life have meaning?"
But, of course, all of these questions are inextricable from each other and perhaps are best gathered together under (e), which then may be considered, not a single genuine option, but several.
COMMENT: In any case, it is quite clear that James did not think that his personal choice of the religious alternative (as I assume it was for him) provides of itself an answer to the question of whether his life has meaning or to the more general question "Can life be meaningful and, if so, how?" This is quite clear from the fact that in his article "What Makes a Life Significant" the religious/non-religious option, however genuine it may be for you or me, does not play a significant role.
Douglas Browning, The University of Texas at Austin
Latest Update by DLH: April 11, 1999