The Later Works, 1925-1953, Volume 15

John Dewey

SIU Press, 1981 - Education - 690 pages

John Dewey's Experience and Nature has been considered the fullest expression of his mature philosophy since its eagerly awaited publication in 1925. Irwin Edman wrote at that time that "with monumental care, detail and completeness, Professor Dewey has in this volume revealed the metaphysical heart that beats its unvarying alert tempo through all his writings, whatever their explicit themes." In his introduction to this volume, Sidney Hook points out that "Dewey's Experience and Nature is both the most suggestive and most difficult of his writings." The meticulously edited text published here as the first volume in the series The Later Works of John Dewey, 1925-1953 spans that entire period in Dewey's thought by including two important and previously unpublished documents from the book's history: Dewey's unfinished new introduction written between 1947 and 1949, edited by the late Joseph Ratner, and Dewey's unedited final draft of that introduction written the year before his death. In the intervening years Dewey realized the impossibility of making his use of the word 'experience' understood. He wrote in his 1951 draft for a new introduction: "Were I to write (or rewrite) Experience and Nature today I would entitle the book Culture and Nature and the treatment of specific subject-matters would be correspondingly modified. I would abandon the term 'experience' because of my growing realization that the historical obstacles which prevented understanding of my use of 'experience' are, for all practical purposes, insurmountable. I would substitute the term 'culture' because with its meanings as now firmly established it can fully and freely carry my philosophy of experience."

Contents

• William James and the World Today: 3
• The Principles: 18
• Inquiry and Indeterminateness of Situations: 34
• Valuation Judgments and Immediate Quality: 63
• By Nature and by Art: 84
• A Comment on the Foregoing Criticisms: 97
• Ethical SubjectMatter and Language: 127
• Peirces Theory of Linguistic Signs Thought: 141
• The Problems: 154
• Religion and Morality in a Free Society: 170
• The Penningin of Natural Science: 184
• Dualism and the Split Atom: 199
• Liberating the Social Scientist: 224
• Henry Wallace and the 1948 Elections: 239
• Challenge to Liberal Thought: 261
• The Problem of the Liberal Arts College: 276
• Mission to Moscow Reveals No: 289
• Introduction to The Little Red School House: 303
• Foreword to Earl C Kelleys Education: 310
• James Hayden Tufts: 324
• Rejoinder to Meiklejohn: 337
• Moscow Film Again Attacked: 351
• Letter in Introduction to Dont Be Afraid: 365
• Selected Democracy and America: 367
• Comment on I Want to Be Like Stalin: 373
• The Attack on Western Morality: 381
• What Does Mr Dewey Mean by: 393
• Objectivity in Value Judgments: 402
• Quality and Value: 413
• Types of Value Judgments: 426
• On the Aesthetics of Dewey: 438
• Can We Choose between Values?: 445
• Critique of Naturalism: 453
• Reply to Dewey: 473
• Meiklejohn Replies to Dewey: 486
• Merit Seen in Moscow Film: 499
• Textual Notes: 513
• Emendations List: 557
• Alterations in Typescripts: 603
• LineEnd Hyphenation: 652
• INDEX: 671

About the author

John Dewey was born in 1859 in Burlington, Vermont. He founded the Laboratory School at the University of Chicago in 1896 to apply his original theories of learning based on pragmatism and "directed living." This combination of learning with concrete activities and practical experience helped earn him the title, "father of progressive education." After leaving Chicago he went to Columbia University as a professor of philosophy from 1904 to 1930, bringing his educational philosophy to the Teachers College there. Dewey was known and consulted internationally for his opinions on a wide variety of social, educational and political issues. His many books on these topics began with Psychology (1887), and include The School and Society (1899), Experience and Nature (1925), and Freedom and Culture (1939).Dewey died of pneumonia in 1952.

Bibliographic information

• Title: The Later Works, 1925-1953, Volume 15; Past masters; Philosophy, education; Volume 3; Volume 15 of The Later Works of John Dewey, 1925-1953; The Later Works, 1925-1953, John Dewey; Volume 15 of The later works / John Dewey; Volume 3 of [The collected works, 1882-1953]
• Author: John Dewey
• Editor: Jo Ann Boydston
• Contributor: John Dewey
• Publisher: SIU Press, 1981
• ISBN: 0809315351, 9780809315352
• Length: 690 pages
• Subjects: Education / Philosophy, Theory & Social Aspects; Philosophy / History & Surveys / Modern; Philosophy / Logic