What science is--Science as explanation--Science and a world view--The aesthetic value of science--The danger of "pure science"--Practical or applied science--Analysis of scientific procedure--Science and common sense--Curiosity and scientific inquiry--Thinking begins with a problem--The quality of thinking: suggestion--Classification--Experimental variation of conditions--Generalizations, their elaboration and testing--The quantitative basis of scientific procedure--Statistics and probability--Science as an instrument of human progress. CHAPTER XV MORALS AND MORAL VALUATION The pre-conditions of morality: instinct, impulse, and desire--The conflict of interests between men and groups--The levels of moral action: custom; the establishment of "folkways"--Morality as conformity to the established--The values of customary morality--The defects of customary morality--Custom and progress--Origin and nature of reflective morality--Reflective reconstruction of moral standards--The values of reflective morality--Reflection transforms customs into principles--Reflective action genuinely moral--Reflection sets up ideal standards--The defects of reflective morality--The inadequacy of theory in moral life--The danger of intellectualism in morals--Types of moral theory--Absolutism--Relativistic or teleological morality--Utilitarianism--Moral knowledge--Intuitionalism--Empiricism--Ethics and life--Morality and human nature--Morals, law, and education. INDEX INTRODUCTION HUMAN TRAITS AND CIVILIZATION. Throughout the long enterprise of civilization in which mankind have more or less consciously changed the world they found into one more in conformity with their desires, two factors have remained constant: (1) the physical order of the universe, which we commonly call Nature, and (2) the native biological equipment of man, commonly known as human nature. Both of these, we are almost unanimously assured by modern science, have remained essentially the same from the dawn of history to the present. They are the raw material out of which is built up the vast complex of government, industry, science, art--all that we call civilization. In a very genuine sense, there is nothing new under the sun. Matter and men remain the same.