Ethics
- Language:
- English
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~220,000 words · 1,048 passages
Cite this work
- APAJohn Dewey. (n.d.). Ethics. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/john-dewey/ethics
- MLAJohn Dewey. Ethics. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/john-dewey/ethics.
- ChicagoJohn Dewey. Ethics. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/john-dewey/ethics.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
A textbook of ethics in three parts: the history of morals, moral theory, and its application to the social and economic problems of the day.
Context and history
This has to be said because the catalogue does not: the book is not Dewey's alone. He wrote it with James Hayden Tufts and it appeared in 1908 under both names; the division of labour is documented, and the historical part is largely Tufts's. Attributing the whole to Dewey is a common error that comes from the title pages of later reprints. The third part, on labour, property and the family, is the most dated and at the same time the clearest demonstration of what Dewey meant by applied ethics.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
automatic activities upon the one hand and acquired habitual activities upon the other." Where the original equipment of instincts fails to meet some new situation, when there are stimulations for which the system has no ready-made response, consciousness appears. It selects from the various responses those which suit the purpose, and when these responses have become themselves automatic, habitual, consciousness "betakes itself elsewhere to points where habitual accommodatory movements are as yet wanting and needed."[2] To apply this to the moral development we need only to add that this process repeats itself over and over. The starting-point for each later repetition is not the hereditary instinct, but the habits which have been formed. For the habits formed at one age of the individual's life, or at one stage of race development, prove inadequate for more complex situations. The child leaves home, the savage tribe changes to agricultural life, and the old habits no longer meet the need. Attention is again demanded. There is deliberation, struggle, effort. If the result is successful new habits are formed, but upon a higher level. For the new habits, the new character, embody more intelligence. The first stage, purely instinctive action, we do not call moral conduct. It is of course not _im_moral; it is merely _un_moral. The second stage shows morality in the making. It includes the process of transition from impulse, through desire to will. It involves the stress of conflicting interests, the processes of deliberation and valuation, and the final act of choice. It will be illustrated in our treatment of race development by the change from early group life and customs to the more conscious moral life of higher civilization. The third stage, well-organized character, is the goal of the process. But it is evidently only a relative point. A good man has built up a set of habits; a good society has established certain laws and moral codes.…