About the Author
William James may well have been born into the nineteenth century’s most interesting family. His father, Henry, was the wayward son of successful Irish immigrants in New York State. William James, born in 1842, was the first in a remarkable series of children that included famous novelist Henry, Jr. In 1875 William James began teaching at Harvard, where he established the first ever psychology laboratory and in 1890 he practically invented the modern discipline of psychology in his two-volume Principles of Psychology. Shortly after this, he discovered the philosophy of Charles Renouvier and responded to his ideas about belief in a series of lectures and articles that culminated in the publication of Pragmatism in 1907.
