Abstract This article investigates the impact of Rudolph Hermann Lotze’s philosophy on William James’s The Principles of Psychology (1890). It argues that several of James’s core concepts are deeply indebted to Lotze’s work. Both thinkers maintain that psychology is not a natural science and advance a sustained critique of scientific psychology and of the associationist account of the mind. Moreover, Lotze’s arguments inform James’s theories of ideomotor action, emotion, and local signs. Taken together, these parallels show that James draws extensively on Lotze’s philosophy in formulating many of the original and distinctive claims of The Principles of Psychology .
Michele Vagnetti (Sun,) studied this question.