Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-10-13

anu I1dtlVS 1OTCSS OOIII 1TOn NOTGu anu
West Africa, by the Mediterranean anc
the Atlantic.
Patiently the French have in mind
cative and reconstructive value Of gen.
timely public opinion.
1t Is misleading. however, to regard
John Dewey as simply one more cru
sader for liberal democracy. or even to
dismiss him as one more noble but naive
devotee of equality. What is significant
about Deweyis form of democracy Is
that 1t has little to do with the tradi-
tional principles of liberty, equality and
fraternity considered as ends in them
selves. His democracy Is based on hard
boiled. sophisticated social psychology.
Reduced TO common parlance. this psy-
chology amounts to the following propo-
SitionS: That no one Is really happy uFl-
til he is allowed to mind his own BUSH
ness; that no one can be intelligent
about his own affairs unless he knows
the consequences OF his actions. and
that no one can know these consequences
when his experience Is restricted on all
sides by artificial barriers.
Freedom Requires Intelligence.
In other words, practical freedom re-
Quires intelligence and intelligence re-
Quires experience. Such a gospel has
usually been preached by philosophers
as q justification Of the superiority of
the philosopher. or by scientists as q
claim to exclusive authority and expert
ness. To regard 1t as a way of life for
each human being and as a principle of
reconstruction for every society is the
essence of what John Dewey represents
in American liberalism.
From this point of view, living intel
ligently and living socially are identical.
Reason, government and control are not
external powers imposed upon society
by supernatural design. but are qualities
which social life naturally generates.
The physical interdependence of man
flowers naturally into language, and
language produces thought. The world
is so constituted that individuals cannot
live without communication Commu-
nication (or society Is simply a process
by which experience Is shared, and the
consequences of this sharing for each
participant are ultimately the measure
of intelligence.
The social symbols of shared expert
ence are the indispensable instruments
OF reason Where there is a minimum
of sharing there is a minimum Of mean
ing in life, and hence a maximum OF
short sightedneSS and Illustration. In
this way social experience makes ra-
tional conduct possible; even solitary
meditation requires background of So
ctal symbols and shared experience. The
classic doctrine is that society Is an en-
bodiment of reason; Dewey's doctrine is
that reason is an embodiment of society.
Views Applied to Nature.
This same point Of view applied TO
nature instead of to society Is what is
known as Dewey'S naturalism. PhiloSo-
pliers have always found it difficult to
IN M doing
violence to one or the other, and today
it is fashionable among realists to give
up the attempt. They simply render
unto Caesar what is Caesars and unto
God whatever they want to keep. But
Dewey has attempted to understand the
realm of mind and the souls OF men IN
their natural setting. In order to DO
this he was obliged to disprove the
classic attributes of matter--its inertia,
blindness and mechanical construction
and to substitute picture OF the phys
ical world in terms of what 1t actually
achieves-no more. no less.
He gives nature the credit for making
not only mans body but also his hopes
and fears, his ideas and arts. But he
attributes to nature likewise those quail
tiles Of uncertainty, contingency, sue
cess and failure which characterize exc
perience. Hence the world, as Dewey
sees IL, Is Reuulnely ana ulLlMaCeiy SuD-
ject to change. 1t is temporal or event.
full. There Is no finished, eternal real
ity, either spiritual or mechanical: for
reality is precisely what 1t appears to
be-a complicated course Of events,
more or less Ineligible, moro or less
orderly and more or less enjoyable.
Such an honest and unreserved ac-
ceptance OF nature is rare among philos-
ophers. They usually make living by
people that things are not |
what they seem. These supposedly wise |
men will always be In demand so long as
people seek short cuts to salvation |
Meanwhile more candid lovers of wis |
dom will be content to turn their ears |
to the ground of human experience and |
gather laboriously what bits of wisdom |
nature grants. Such philosophers may |
not agree among themselves nor dis
cover eternal truths, but they will have |
In common a spirit of inquiry and q
readiness to test their ideas In the
laboratory Of human life; and In these
qualities Of mind they will find their
prototype and exemplar in John Dewey. I