Re: [xmca] Zo-peds, roads, and Senseis

From: Matt Brown (mjb001@ucsd.edu)
Date: Mon Dec 25 2006 - 16:48:52 PST


I think Michael has exactly the right thing to say, here. Andy would
have Dewey dead to rights if we treat him as speaking apart from
situations and problems. But we have to remember that, for Dewey (and
I think, to a lesser degree of clarity, in the other American
pragmatists), all thinking happens in a context that is to some degree
non-intellectual. So, a problem is not just "thought up," it is felt,
it is existential, it is a real quality or feature of the situation of
organism-environment(-culture) interaction. And a problem is not
solved by intellectual or authoritative decision (though many have
tried to do so, most unfortunately in the case of some key
socio-political problems), it requires a change in the situation that
removes the problematicity (contradictions?).

On 12/24/06, Michael Glassman <MGlassman@ehe.ohio-state.edu> wrote:
> Andy,
>
> This sort of talks to Pragmatism's reliance on experimentalism. I found it interesting that David Backhurst used the term radical empiricism to describe the more liberal aspects of Lenin, because of course James termed his theoretical approach radical empiricism. The idea being you can only know what you do know from experimentation - and understanding the consequences comes from experimentation in particular situations. You determine what the problem is, you determine what the problem would look like if it was solved (in a very concrete manner), and you see if you achieved that end-in-view. Very concrete and very much attached to the situation. I believe that is what Dewey is talking about when he mentions consequences - the only issue is whether you have achieved a solution to the problem - if not, you go back and do another experiment.
>
> Michael
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu on behalf of Andy Blunden
> Sent: Sun 12/24/2006 6:01 PM
> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: RE: [xmca] Zo-peds, roads, and Senseis
>
>
>
> At 11:55 AM 24/12/2006 -0500, you wrote:
> >... >From Chapter 5 [Dewey]
> > "The test of ideas, of thinking generally, is found in the consequences
> > of the acts to which the ideas lead, that is in the new arrangements of
> > things which are brought into existence. Such is the unequivocal
> > evidence as to the worth of ideas which is derived from observing their
> > position and rule in experimental knowing. But tradition makes the tests
> > of ideas to be their agreement with some antecedent [i.e. already
> > existing] state of things. This change of outlook and standard from what
> > precedes to what comes after, from the retrospective to the prospective,
> > from antecedents to consequences, is extremely hard to accomplish. Hence
> > when the physical sciences describe objects and the world as being such
> > and such, it is thought that the description is of reality as it exists
> > in itself."
>
> It seems to me that the Achilles' heel of American Pragmatism is how it
> (and Dewey in the above passage) reduce the relation between consciousness
> and activity to: "The test of ideas, of thinking generally, is found in the
> consequences of the acts to which the ideas lead." This overlooks the fact
> that it is by no means given exactly what these consequences are, at what
> time consequences are deemed to have been realised, for whom they are
> effective, and from the standpoint of what system of activity they are
> assessed; all of which refers back to the very idea which is supposed to be
> tested in its consequences. One can equally say: "The test of the
> consequences of an act is the ideas, and thinking generally, by which they
> were brought about."
>
> Fascinating and important as Dewey is, I prefer Marx.
>
> Andy
>
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-- 
Matt Brown (thehangedman@gmail.com)
Philosophy Graduate Student, UCSD
Web: http://thm.askee.net
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