The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy
E170997
The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy is a collection of philosophical essays by William James that defends the legitimacy of religious and moral belief in the absence of conclusive evidence.
All labels observed (3)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| The Will to Believe | 3 |
| The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy canonical | 2 |
| William James's "The Will to Believe" | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T1489070 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy Context triple: [William James, notableWork, The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy]
-
A.
The Problems of Philosophy
The Problems of Philosophy is a short, accessible 1912 book by Bertrand Russell that introduces key issues in epistemology and metaphysics, such as the nature of reality, knowledge, and appearance versus reality.
-
B.
The Natural History of Religion
The Natural History of Religion is a philosophical work by David Hume that examines the origins and development of religious belief in human societies through a skeptical and empirical lens.
-
C.
Course of Positive Philosophy
Course of Positive Philosophy is Auguste Comte’s foundational multi-volume work that systematically outlines positivism and the hierarchy of the sciences, laying the groundwork for modern sociology.
-
D.
God and Man at Yale
God and Man at Yale is a 1951 book by William F. Buckley Jr. criticizing Yale University for promoting secularism and collectivism over traditional religious and conservative values.
-
E.
Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion
Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion is a posthumously published collection of G. W. F. Hegel’s university lectures that systematically interpret the historical religions through the lens of his idealist philosophical system.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy Target entity description: The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy is a collection of philosophical essays by William James that defends the legitimacy of religious and moral belief in the absence of conclusive evidence.
-
A.
The Problems of Philosophy
The Problems of Philosophy is a short, accessible 1912 book by Bertrand Russell that introduces key issues in epistemology and metaphysics, such as the nature of reality, knowledge, and appearance versus reality.
-
B.
The Natural History of Religion
The Natural History of Religion is a philosophical work by David Hume that examines the origins and development of religious belief in human societies through a skeptical and empirical lens.
-
C.
Course of Positive Philosophy
Course of Positive Philosophy is Auguste Comte’s foundational multi-volume work that systematically outlines positivism and the hierarchy of the sciences, laying the groundwork for modern sociology.
-
D.
God and Man at Yale
God and Man at Yale is a 1951 book by William F. Buckley Jr. criticizing Yale University for promoting secularism and collectivism over traditional religious and conservative values.
-
E.
Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion
Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion is a posthumously published collection of G. W. F. Hegel’s university lectures that systematically interpret the historical religions through the lens of his idealist philosophical system.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (45)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
book
ⓘ
essay collection ⓘ |
| academicDiscipline |
epistemology
ⓘ
ethics ⓘ philosophy of religion ⓘ |
| arguesFor |
legitimacy of faith-based commitment
ⓘ
right to believe without sufficient evidence in certain cases ⓘ |
| author | William James ⓘ |
| contrastsWith | evidentialism ⓘ |
| countryOfOrigin |
United States of America
ⓘ
surface form:
United States
|
| genre |
moral philosophy
ⓘ
philosophy ⓘ religious philosophy ⓘ |
| hasEssay |
Great Men and Their Environment
ⓘ
Is Life Worth Living? ⓘ On Some Hegelisms ⓘ Reflex Action and Theism ⓘ The Dilemma of Determinism ⓘ The Importance of Individuals ⓘ The Moral Philosopher and the Moral Life ⓘ The Sentiment of Rationality ⓘ The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy self-linksurface differs ⓘ
surface form:
The Will to Believe
What Psychical Research Has Accomplished ⓘ |
| hasPhilosophicalPosition | permissivism about belief ⓘ |
| hasReprint | various 20th-century editions ⓘ |
| influenced |
20th-century philosophy of religion
ⓘ
pragmatic theories of truth and belief ⓘ |
| influencedBy |
American religious culture
ⓘ
empiricism ⓘ |
| language | English ⓘ |
| mainTheme |
defense of religious belief without conclusive evidence
ⓘ
pragmatist justification of belief ⓘ |
| notableEssay |
The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
surface form:
The Will to Believe
|
| originalMediaType | print ⓘ |
| philosophicalMovement | pragmatism ⓘ |
| publicationYear | 1897 ⓘ |
| publisher |
Longmans, Green, Reader, and Dyer
ⓘ
surface form:
Longmans, Green, and Co.
|
| relatedWork |
pragmatism
ⓘ
surface form:
Pragmatism
The Varieties of Religious Experience ⓘ |
| subject |
ethics
ⓘ
free will and determinism ⓘ rationality ⓘ religious belief ⓘ theism ⓘ |
| timePeriod | late 19th century ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy Description of subject: The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy is a collection of philosophical essays by William James that defends the legitimacy of religious and moral belief in the absence of conclusive evidence.
Referenced by (6)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
this entity surface form:
William James's "The Will to Believe"
subject surface form:
Pragmatism
this entity surface form:
The Will to Believe
The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy
→
hasEssay
→
The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
this entity surface form:
The Will to Believe
The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy
→
notableEssay
→
The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
this entity surface form:
The Will to Believe
Pragmatism: A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking
→
relatedWork
→
The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy
ⓘ