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The Evolutionary Ethics of John Dewey
The American philosopher John Dewey wrote another of my favorite philosophy passages in the last paragraph of his 1898 essay Evolution and Ethics. Dewey articulates in this paragraph what he sees as a monumental leap that occurs when human beings discover the mechanisms through which the evolutionary process unfolds. Dewey must have been feeling the same excitement that the great early scientists felt as they were discovering the laws of mechanics that governed all motion in the universe. No longer did we need to assume supernatural causes for the motion of bodies on earth or in the heavens. We had discovered the logical rules according to which motion occurred. This gave us the power to organize motion and put it to use in ways that had never been imagined possible.
Now that we had discovered the rules by which evolution’s arrow carried one form into the next we could begin to apply consciousness to guide and direct that process. This possibility for evolutionary control brought with it a need to develop and define an evolutionary ethics that would be equally powerful. If we were to become masters of evolution we had to expand our moral accountability to include our evolutionary effects.
“There are no doubt sufficiently profound distinctions between the ethical process and the cosmic process as it existed prior to man and to the formation of human society. So far as I know, however, all of these differences are summed up in the fact that the process and the forces bound up with the cosmic have come to consciousness in man. That which was instinct in the animal is conscious impulse in man. That which was “tendency to vary” in the animal is conscious foresight in man. That which was unconscious adaptation and survival in the animal, taking place by the “cut and try” method until it worked itself out, is with man conscious deliberation and experimentation. That this transfer from unconsciousness to consciousness has immense importance, need hardly be argued. It is enough to say that it means the whole distinction of the moral from the unmoral. We have, however, no reason to suppose that the cosmic process has become arrested or that some new force has supervened to struggle against the cosmic. Some theologians and moralists, to be sure, welcomed Huxley’s apparent return to the idea of a dualism between the cosmic and the ethical as likely to inure favorably to the spiritual life. But I question whether the spiritual life does not get its surest and most ample guarantees when it is learned that the laws and conditions of righteousness are implicated in the working processes of the universe; when it is found that man in his conscious struggles, in his doubts, temptations, and defeats, in his aspirations and successes, is moved on and buoyed up by the forces which have developed nature; and that in this moral struggle he acts not as a mere individual but as an organ in maintaining and carrying forward the universal process.”
This is a great post. The connection between natural processes and human destiny are welded together. Thanks Jeff for posting this.
What has happened since Dewey’s time is the rules he mentions for motion and causality have changed. We understand them better. The Newtonian mechanics he was referring to evolved into quantum mechanics and quantum is now evolving into structural field determinism. We seeing a way to get through the Uncertainity (the Uncertainty Principle). The obscuring cloud of probabilities that has introduced chaos and catastropy theory is lifting. This is news I think Dewey would welcome. The havoc quantum mechanics has had on the human consciousness has been horrendous; the night of the soul where the rational pundits insist we can know nothing in its pure and natural state, that chaos and chance are at the bottom of all things. This kind of thinking gives the ego the excuse it needs to assert itself.
Field consciousness begins with the whole and derives the parts. Field physics will show how comprehension of the field sweeps aside uncertainty and allows us once again to know momentum and location at the same time. This is a major step in evolution in my humble opinion. It comes with a special boon, an unexpected realization.
Instead of producing a world that is shrouded with ‘uncertainty’, it offers us multiple certainties. This is a new concept that comes with this new field theory. Books will be written about this.
Don
Great post, Jeff. It took me a while to grasp what Dewey was saying (and I still haven’t grasped what Don is pointing to, but it sounds powerful). I think the most important point was, as you said, at the end, where Dewey asserts that our striving for morality and goodness is the force that moves the cosmic process forward. It’s profound, the significance he attributes to the role of human consciousness in the evolutionary process. Truly a cosmic perspective.
What I like about these quotes is that is that it inspires so much to read more. For me Dewey was new and I was surprised to find so much of the evolutionary theory grounded there. For who is also interested , here are some findings I got from Louis Logister’s books and Jeff’s paper about Pragmatism on Academia.edu. Jeff points to Emerson’s conviction that ’individuals have the freedom to make choices that will control their destiny and unleash their true creative potential’ as source of inspiration for the early pagmatics.
According to Dewey the individual -as acting organism- and his environment are ONE unity of interaction (Dewey calls it transaction), which he names ‘coordination’ and connects with reaching a ‘goal’(end-in-view). An organism is always in-action (maintaining an equilibrium between habits and environment). If there is no appropriate action, if the organism doesn’t know how to react, there is no coordination.
Jeff: the Pragmatists (Peirce, James and Dewey) had in common that they saw thought as a lawful process of unfolding reality. In that way all of them were battling against a “representational” world model in which thoughts are seen as only descriptions of reality. For Peirce, James, and Dewey – thoughts were part of reality, part of a naturally occurring process of unfolding.
If the inner and the outer are truly one continuous event, then our thoughts inevitably lead to actions which result in what the world becomes. Change and integration are important aspects. Jeff: ‘Dewey felt that in an evolving universe our goals and ideals would also need to be continuously evolving to keep pace with the changes all around us. Because the nature of evolution is such that, although its forward progress creates unity and harmony, it simultaneously creates new and greater chaos, with new and greater challenges to face’.
Thinking, or human intelligence, grows when habitual acting is blocked, creativity has to be used to chose a alternative path. Thinking only starts when solving a specific practical idea. Central is the choice of action. The change of action reflects accumulated experience. Every action contains something of former and future actions (continuity). For Dewey experience is the way to penetrate deeper into reality. ‘Knowing’ is understanding the relationship between actions and their consequences which can help us to act better, more focused and more intelligent. The ‘knowing’ how to act, Dewey calls ‘habits’, this means a ‘sensitivity’ in connection with situations; this connects with ‘meaning’. Objects are ‘events with meaning’. Experimental (can be virtual=in the mind) learning is that the world is ‘no longer a vast penumbra of vague, unfigured things’. Important is imagination, it lies between a habit and a new meaning. ‘Imagination is the only gateway through which these meanings can be found their way into a present interaction, or rather.. the conscious adjustment of the new and the old is imagination’, which is the source of creativity.
Creativity as basis for creating a better world. Dewey calls ‘God’ the active relationship between ideal and reality, that which creates new actions. For him ethics are rooted in concrete situations: he aspires to ‘bring morals to earth, and if they still aspire to heaven it is to the heaven of this earth’. God is present where people together use their creativity to reach for the Good. This is where Dewey brings up ethics as the most important theme, it is connected with seeing reality as a process. As humans we are dependent on each other. This social dimension is given (culture), just like the language we use. There is friction with social-Darwinism. He sees humans as part of nature, but with the evolution of habits it is about ‘adopting more or less intelligent and significant customs’.
The Good is an experimental and continuous creative process, which is related to a vision, that is rooted in imagination: the combination between the old and the new creates the vision. The fact that we ACT on this, is ‘faith’ which is connected with emotion and trust that change is possible. Intelligence is the ability to see the possible consequences of different actions, which leads to moral principles (‘a principle is intellectually what a habit is for direct action’). They are not fixed but have to be tested in new situations continuously. Ethics is an ‘evaluative process’.
Experience leads to more habits in a more differentiated world. It connects with possibilities, causalities: but knowledge is always fallible, not because there is a gap between us and the world, but because we do not know what the future brings, it can also change because of our own interventions. The transactual approach means that we are in relation with an evolving universe, due to our actions. It is a dynamic between action and undergoing (individual and collective). The meaning connected to the experience is always cultural/context dependent. When we look at social interaction, it is an intersubjective world, constructed in and through collective action. Jeff: Wilber reintroduced the Greek spelling of Kosmos, using a “K” in his writings because he felt that the word “Cosmos,” as it was generally used, was limited to only the physical part of the universe, and left out the interior dimension of consciousness. Wilber’s conception of an integrated and unified Kosmos that evolves simultaneously internally and externally is clearly aligned with the work of the early Pragmatists.
It wasn’t till I was in highschool that I learned about Dewey’s influence on American public school education and realized I’d gone through an elementary school that espoused his teachings. I feel so grateful to have had that fortuitous elementary school experience and marvel that that early education has influenced me in countless ways, from the first grade through the 6th. As things turned out, English Standard Schools were deemed elitist in Honolulu but fortunately by then, I was on to middle and high school by then and the benefits were gained in my case.