The following is an analysis of the relationship between incompatibility, conflict and breakdown. It is restricted to situations of a certain sort — to the isolation of the conditions under which breakdowns occur. These conditions are specific and defineable. Under certain circumstances incompatibilities and conflicts culminate in growth, under others in separation, under others in outright destruction of one of the incompatible elements, under others still in dominance-subserviance relationships and under others in breakdown. This is a matter of some importance (...) since influential current conceptions treat incompatibility and conflict as though they were uniform in outcome. The followers of Hegel regard them as always making for growth whereas certain contemporaries look upon them as the prime movers of breakdown and decline. The truth of the matter would seem to be that neither of these theories is correct. Conflicts vary, their consequences vary and the conditions under which they occur vary. For empirical analysis the important thing is the disengagement of the differences making for different culminations as well as the relations common to all; and the working out, as far as possible, of the way in which alterations in certain basic factors make for changes in result. A specific analysis of this sort may be valuable for foresight and even for a degree of control where the conditions are accessible to our manipulation. (shrink)

What can we say of space and time when we consider them as attributes of nature and as attributes of nature in the context of experience? The following is an examination of this question in the light of those portions of the writings of Locke and Kant which were concerned with it. Since men have no difficulty in speaking about and utilizing the familiar spatial and temporal relations of things, we begin with these and shall avoid definition and debate except (...) insofar as it is pertinent to the present inquiry. Nor shall we consider it necessary to examine space and time in any other context as, for example, that of modern physics. The familiar world is the necessary condition for the conception of any intellectual development of it, and to begin with the intellectual development is to render it unintelligible. This is evidenced in several ways. When we begin with physics and mathematics, we cannot account for the world within which we live and consequently end in scepticism about it, whereas this is not the case when we begin with the actual world itself. Furthermore, the manifestly perceptible is indispensible to scientific enquiry for we must employ instruments and objects directly accessible to experience. Without these there would be neither experiment, observation nor inference. Communication would be impossible without it as well as discussion about subject matters such as logic and esthetics. It is for these reasons, therefore, that we begin with the familiar spatial and temporal relations of things. (shrink)

Like most other subjects under discussion today, the theory of nature is largely controlled by considerations of knowledge. Treatment of it is, consequently, incidental to the treatment of these other problems, and is undertaken, in the main, because they compel it. A brief catalogue of characteristic statements about nature will illustrate this. “Nature,” says one writer, “is that which we observe in perception through the senses”; and another writes, “It is not experience which is experienced, but nature—stones, plants, animals, diseases, (...) health, temperature, electricity, and so on.” Nothing is more apparent in these sentences than the fact that it is not nature that the writers are so much concerned with, as with what it is that appears through the senses. The theory of nature, that is, is not so much guided by an analysis of the word's context and usage, as it is by the question: what is the proper object of knowledge? Consequently it is the latter question that is answered and not the question: what is nature? The reason for this is evident in the purpose of these statements and in their history; their purpose: the desire to do away with the separation between experience and nature, and to transform nature into a field familiar and accessible; and their history: the very framework against which they are directed, for they are embedded in the set-up from which they are trying to disentangle themselves. Perhaps something ought to be said to substantiate the thesis that the sentences cited are controlled by the problem of knowledge, especially since their intent seems to be to escape that problem. In any case, their history should serve to clarify them, and render a different approach to the theory of nature more significant. (shrink)

The question of the character, function and possibility of philosophy can best be considered through an analysis of how men come to philosophize. Were the ideals man seeks always satisfactory to him and the consequences of his conduct and allegiances always what he expected, undoubtedly he would not be the philosophical animal he is. It is precisely because his emotional attachments are so often disillusioning and his actions ineffectual, that he is compelled to reflect upon what ends are worthwhile and (...) what conduct and instrumentalities would bring them into being. Such reflection is the practice of philosophy and, where it is systematic and grounded on the evidence available, constitutes the discipline known as philosophy. Its source is living itself, and it is a kind of life. It is a method whereby life seeks the solution of its own problems; for living is made up of man's responses to his world, responses directed to the management of things for better and worse; and what would constitute the better and what the conditions are upon which it depends, are matters with which life will ever concern itself. The reconstruction of living so that it will have the utmost value is the primary objective of philosophy. (shrink)