Editor's comment

John Dewey was the
most influential voice in modernizing education through the first half of
the 20th century. He urged educators to let students learn by doing. He was
a philosopher of change who enthusiastically embraced the scientific evolutionary point of view.

For Dewey anything
that existed was in process of becoming. What was real was experience. Events
have multiple meanings and may have many purposes. The search for absolutes
is doomed to fail. What is good is growth.

"Such happiness as life is
capable of comes from the full participation of all our powers in the endeavor
to wrest from each changing situation of experience its own full and unique meaning."

 

Reading on: Reactions to the new naturalism

Dewey, John in Living Philosophies, Simon and Schuster, New York 1931 [abstract– 70 words] — what we experience is the real world – and it is forever changing

The real shift to the modern intellectual life involved the reliance on the methods of science as the most dependable means of knowing. What is needed now is a new philosophy of experience which will accept that all things are in a state of continuous change.

There is no one purpose or meaning to life although there may be multiple ones. Process, growth, change and experience are key ideas.