ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the William James’s understanding of philosophical reasons: the reasons showing why one philosophical theory as opposed to another one is true. It deals with the reasons that show why one philosophical theory are opposed to another is true. James’s formulation of this thesis is ambivalent with respect to the relationship between our passional nature and the insufficiency of the intellectual grounds. James turns next to the debate between the “objective sort of moralist” and the “subjectivist in morals”. James’s elaboration on the test for truth in the controversy between subjectivism and objectivism makes clear that he thinks of this test as assuming the congruence principle. The philological and philosophical value of the constitutive interpretation is that it enables people to see the originality and importance of James’s contribution.
