Human Nature and Conduct · Question
How does Human Nature and Conduct develop the theme of Critique of Traditional Morality and Dualisms?
Answer
Human Nature and Conduct by John Dewey develops Critique of Traditional Morality and Dualisms across the chapters the companion marks for this theme.
The book criticizes moral theories that separate mind from body, reason from habit, and individual from society, arguing they create false dichotomies and hinder genuine moral progress.
Dewey critiques the dualistic separation of will from habit, mind from body, and individual from environment, which he sees as foundational to traditional moral philosophy.
Dewey criticizes the separation of motive and act, inner and outer, subjective and objective, arguing that these dualisms stem from ignoring the projective force of habit.
Dewey attacks the dualism between self-love and altruism, and the fixed classification of instincts, arguing they are artificial and hinder moral growth.
Evidence in the book
- Part I: The Place of Habit in Conduct
Dewey critiques the dualistic separation of will from habit, mind from body, and individual from environment, which he sees as foundational to traditional moral philosophy.
- III: Character and Conduct
Dewey criticizes the separation of motive and act, inner and outer, subjective and objective, arguing that these dualisms stem from ignoring the projective force of habit.
- V: Classification of Instincts
Dewey attacks the dualism between self-love and altruism, and the fixed classification of instincts, arguing they are artificial and hinder moral growth.
- No Separate Instincts
Dewey criticizes the dualism between work and play, useful and useless, and the Puritanical distrust of art, arguing that art and play are moral necessities.
- Habit and Intelligence
Dewey critiques the philosophical fallacy of universalizing specific ends, targeting Aristotle, Spencer, Kant, and others for positing static perfection as an ideal.
- The Psychology of Thinking
Dewey rejects the separation of moral knowledge from natural human processes, opposing intuitionist theories of conscience.
- The Nature of Aims
The chapter critiques the dualism between fixed ends and means, and the separation of moral ideals from scientific inquiry, arguing that this renders ideals impotent.
- The Nature of Principles
Dewey criticizes the traditional moral ambition for fixed, universal principles, the false dichotomy between absolute fixity and absolute looseness, and Kant's separation of reason from experience.
