The Meaning of Truth – William James – Günce Yayınları

"The pivotal part of my book named Pragmatism is its account of the relation called 'truth' whichmay obtain between an idea (opinion, belief, statement, or what not) and its object. 'Truth,' I theresay, 'is a property of certain of our ideas. It means their agreement, as falsity means their ofcourse.
'Where our ideas [do] not copy definitely their object, what does agreement with that objectmean? ... Pragmatism asks its usual question. "Grant an idea or belief to be true," it says, "whatconcrete difference will its being true make in any one's actual life? What experiences [may] bedifferent from those which would obtain if the belief were false? How will the truth be realized?What, in short, is the truth's cash-value in experiential terms?" The moment pragmatism asks thisquestion, it sees the answer: True ideas are those that we can assimilate,validate, corroborate, and verify. False ideas are those that wecannot. That is the practical difference it makes to us to have true ideas; that therefore is the meaning of truth, for it is all that truth is known as."