The will to Believe. William James, l'inclusive principle e le retoriche del liberalismo

Aim of the work is an attempt of William James’s ‘the will of believe doctrine’ reinterpretation , starting from the nineteenth century context The work, (after a introductory first chapter centred on the misfortune of the James’s will to believe doctrine in some classical reinterpretations of James’s thought) is then divided in two parts. In the first there is an analysis of the agnostic position of Stephen, Huxley and of course mainly of Clifford and , subsequently, of the opposite choice of authors as Wilfrid Ward and Balfour, In the second a reconstruction of James’s theory through the chief texts, from Reflex Action and Theism and The Sentiment of Rationality to Pragmatism In the last chapter a comparative valuation of James and Clifford opposite perspectives in a rortyan spirit: ‘the will to believe theory’ is mainly an attempt to reappraise the claims of ‘stenuous mood men’ and their absolute values in structural opposition to the claims of ‘easy going men’ in a modern secular society, governed by a rortyan irony .