William James' ArgumentWilliam James argues that agnosticism is not a valid choice to make. He opens his argument with the conjecture that the “voluntarily adopted faith” respects philosophical lawfulness (74). He starts from this by defining a hypothesis as “anything that can be proposed to…belief” and may be alive or dead in terms of quality. A life hypothesis is one that appears to be a real possibility. The quality of being alive or dead is not an “intrinsic property”. Instead, they are “relationships with the individual thinker; measured by…willingness to act." James defines an option as a decision between two hypotheses that can be 1) alive or dead, 2) forced or avoidable, and 3) important or trivial (75). An option can be genuine if it is alive, forced and important. James's next move will be to demonstrate that scientific questions are "trivial options" with dead hypotheses and are avoidable, unlike the religious question that we have particular scientific theories or scientific beliefs. He hypothesizes that it “makes no difference” in these cases: Science says that things are; morality says that some things are better than others; .1) the best things are the most eternal things,…and 2) we are better off even now if we believe [1] (76). James suggests that the religious hypothesis is forced and important therefore, for whom religion is a living hypothesis, is a genuine option. Thus, James concludes that he cannot accept “agnostic rules for truth-seeking” because any “rule of thought that would absolutely prevent us from recognizing certain kinds of truths if those kinds of truths. were actually present, it would be an irrational rule” (77). U...... half of the document ......personal decision; --just like deciding yes or no,-- and carries the same risk of losing the truth” (75). Thus, each individual's hand is forced in making a decision regarding the religious hypothesis. We must believe in the eternal or believe in the temporal because there is no intermediate option. According to James, if and when someone identifies with an agnostic philosophy, they do not choose ambiguity, they ultimately choose the disbelief of the religious hypothesis, and will be subject to the same consequences of disbelief if the religious hypothesis is valid. Therefore, according to James's argument, agnosticism is not philosophically permissible. Works Cited James, W. (1896). “The will to believe”. In G. L. Bowie, M. W. Michaels, & R. C. Solomon (eds.), Twenty Questions: An Introduction to Philosophy (74-78). Boston, MA: Wadsworth.