"
Pragmatism: a New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking" is a book by philosopher William James known for his idea and theory of pragmatism. Some critics consider it to be the most significant work of American
philosophy. This was published in 1907 based on the lectures he delivered in Boston and later, at Columbia University.
William James describes pragmatism as not much of a theory but more of a
methodology, method of choosing among theories a means of mediating between rationalist absolutism and empiricist materialism, that pragmatism is a philosophical option to essentialism.
Although James distrusts the abstract manipulation of words or rationalism, he does not reject
abstraction altogether, as perhaps a rigid empiricist would. Rather, he accepts abstractions in so far as they redirect one profitably into experience. Ideals are "real" because they have results.
James argues that truth, an abstraction, does not reside innately within any
proposition; rather, one can call a proposition truthful if it has
practical consequences… For the pragmatist, therefore, truth is relative… that ideas are only meaningful when they have practical consequences in concrete human experience.