Human Nature and Conduct: An introduction to social psychology — John Shaqi
Human Nature and Conduct: An introduction to social psychologyDewey, John
Philosophy
Human Nature and Conduct: An introduction to social psychology
Dewey, John
Habit; Social psychology
The dynamic force of habit taken in connection with the continuity of
habits with one another explains the unity of character and conduct, or
speaking more concretely of motive and act, will and deed. Moral
theories have frequently separated these things from each other. One
type of theory, for example, has asserted that only will, disposition,
motive counts morally; that acts are external, physical, accidental;
that moral good is different from goodness in act since the latter is
measured by consequences, while moral good or virtue is intrinsic,
complete in itself, a jewel shining by its own light--a somewhat
dangerous metaphor however. The other type of theory has asserted that
such a view is equivalent to saying that all that is necessary to be
virtuous is to cultivate states of feeling; that a premium is put on
disregard of the actual consequences of conduct, and agents are deprived
of any objective criterion for the rightness and wrongness of acts,
being thrown back on their own whims, prejudices and private
peculiarities. Like most opposite extremes in philosophic theories, the
two theories suffer from a common mistake. Both of them ignore the
projective force of habit and the implication of habits in one another.
Hence they separate a unified deed into two disjoined parts, an inner
called motive and an outer called act.
The doctrine that the chief good of man is good will easily wins
acceptance from honest men. For common-sense employs a juster psychology
than either of the theories just mentioned. By will, common-sense
understands something practical and moving. It understands the body of
habits, of active dispositions which makes a man do what he does. Will
is thus not something opposed to consequences or severed from them. It
is a _cause_ of consequences; it is causation in its personal aspect,
the aspect immediately preceding action. It hardly seems conceivable to
practical sense that by will is meant something which can be complete
without reference to deeds prompted and results occasioned. Even the
sophisticated specialist cannot prevent relapses from such an absurdity
back into common-sense. Kant, who went the limit in excluding
consequences from moral value, was sane enough to maintain that a
society of men of good will would be a society which in fact would
maintain social peace, freedom and cooperation. We take the will for the
deed not as a substitute for doing, or a form of doing nothing, but in
the sense that, other things being equal, the right disposition will
produce the right deed. For a disposition means a tendency to act, a
potential energy needing only opportunity to become kinetic and overt.
Apart from such tendency a "virtuous" disposition is either hypocrisy or
self-deceit.
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