Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of EducationDewey, John
Philosophy
Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education
Dewey, John
Education -- Philosophy; Education -- Social aspects
When the social quality of individualized mental operations is denied,
it becomes a problem to find connections which will unite an individual
with his fellows. Moral individualism is set up by the conscious
separation of different centers of life. It has its roots in the notion
that the consciousness of each person is wholly private, a self-inclosed
continent, intrinsically independent of the ideas, wishes, purposes of
everybody else. But when men act, they act in a common and public world.
This is the problem to which the theory of isolated and independent
conscious minds gave rise: Given feelings, ideas, desires, which have
nothing to do with one another, how can actions proceeding from them
be controlled in a social or public interest? Given an egoistic
consciousness, how can action which has regard for others take place?
Moral philosophies which have started from such premises have developed
four typical ways of dealing with the question. (i) One method
represents the survival of the older authoritative position, with
such concessions and compromises as the progress of events has made
absolutely inevitable. The deviations and departures characterizing an
individual are still looked upon with suspicion; in principle they are
evidences of the disturbances, revolts, and corruptions inhering in
an individual apart from external authoritative guidance. In fact, as
distinct from principle, intellectual individualism is tolerated in
certain technical regions--in subjects like mathematics and physics and
astronomy, and in the technical inventions resulting therefrom. But
the applicability of a similar method to morals, social, legal, and
political matters, is denied. In such matters, dogma is still to be
supreme; certain eternal truths made known by revelation, intuition,
or the wisdom of our forefathers set unpassable limits to individual
observation and speculation. The evils from which society suffers are
set down to the efforts of misguided individuals to transgress
these boundaries. Between the physical and the moral sciences, lie
intermediate sciences of life, where the territory is only grudgingly
yielded to freedom of inquiry under the pressure of accomplished fact.
Although past history has demonstrated that the possibilities of human
good are widened and made more secure by trusting to a responsibility
built up within the very process of inquiry, the "authority" theory sets
apart a sacred domain of truth which must be protected from the inroads
of variation of beliefs. Educationally, emphasis may not be put on
eternal truth, but it is put on the authority of book and teacher, and
individual variation is discouraged.
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