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HELP!!!!! Philosophy Mid-term Tomorrow and dont understand any of it!!!!

ok its an entry level course into John Dewey....me and my friend have tried studying him but we cant make heads or tails of it. now we're at the nite before the mid-term and soooo f-ing lost! we kinda have an elementary grasp of pragmatism but even thats pretty shaky. If anyone can give insight into how to go about re-learning the answer/debate on this question it would REALLY help us. thx for any and all help! heres the question:

1. Dewey claims that traditional philosophy and traditional metaphysics came out of one way that early human beings tried to deal with what he calls an "aleatory world." What does he mean by that term and what exactly is the response. What conception of philosophy grew out of that conception?

again thx! we are so screwed if we can't figure it out

lol

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_D...eyan_pragmatism
http://www.iep.utm.edu/d/dewey.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleatory

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/dewey-moral/
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/dewey-political/

I'm taking an ethical philosophy class this semester, it's fucking hard stuff if you haven't done any philosophy courses previously. If it was a question concerning Plato I might be able to help, sorry.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pragmatism
http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/eandc/vol20/iss2/art3/ Download the file.

BTW... You are a total dumbass. Leaving this until the last minute without understanding any of it, you deserve to fail.

You have had plenty of time to talk to your professor, and you wait until late at night, the day before to freak out about it??

Total moron.

theresa, sometimes, like.. seriously

quote:

Originally posted by Allied Nations theresa, sometimes, like.. seriously

Whatever, if you're gonna be a tardass about shit, and then come running to other people asking for help, then you deserve to get told that you're a tardass.

It's not my fault he's a tardass.

quote:

Originally posted by Theresa Whatever, if you're gonna be a tardass about shit, and then come running to other people asking for help, then you deserve to get told that you're a tardass. It's not my fault he's a tardass.

lol, ok

thx for all the help guys!

teresa: usu im not like this (leaving studying to last min) but this time is diff and yes it my dumbass fault that i didnt study more and ahead of time, but then again its not like everytime i have a hard test coming up i come running for help. ive got my around descartes, aristotle, plato, hume, hell even kierkegaard ect but for some reason dewey is evading me.


oh and allied-nations lemme know if ya did a new mix....last one was good

quote:

Originally posted by Theresa Whatever, if you're gonna be a tardass about shit, and then come running to other people asking for help, then you deserve to get told that you're a tardass. It's not my fault he's a tardass.

Haha, I lol'd hard at "tardass."

quote:

Originally posted by idoru Haha, I lol'd hard at "tardass."

lol god damnit
i was about to say almost exactly that

quote:

Originally posted by rapfiend03 thx for all the help guys! teresa: usu im not like this (leaving studying to last min) but this time is diff and yes it my dumbass fault that i didnt study more and ahead of time, but then again its not like everytime i have a hard test coming up i come running for help. ive got my around descartes, aristotle, plato, hume, hell even kierkegaard ect but for some reason dewey is evading me. oh and allied-nations lemme know if ya did a new mix....last one was good

Clickly Clicky! Two 30 min promo mixes

1. Dewey claims that traditional philosophy and traditional metaphysics came out of one way that early human beings tried to deal with what he calls an "aleatory world." What does he mean by that term and what exactly is the response. What conception of philosophy grew out of that conception?

aleatory world = unpredictable world - or perhaps in this case, the unexplainable/unknown, which resulted in religion. People used religion to explain the unknowns about life.

pragmatism = the attribute of accepting the facts of life and favoring practicality and literal truth

Otherwise known as atheism, as a person who only accepts facts, and literal truth is incapable of accepting something based off of faith, such as religion.

"What conception of philosophy grew out of that conception?" What? That doesn't even make sense.

The question is worded terribly.

Damnit! I should be in bed... not reading philosophy.



Gah, I am so addicted to philosophy!

Must... stop... reading... philosophical theories!

Are you sure you copied the question down properly? That last part doesn't make sense.

quote:

Originally posted by Theresa Are you sure you copied the question down properly? That last part doesn't make sense.

you left my stickam a while ago saying you were going to sleep, only to come back here and post
nonetheless, its adorable

quote:

Originally posted by mezzir you left my stickam a while ago saying you were going to sleep, only to come back here and post nonetheless, its adorable

I can't help it... I love philosophy.

I am REALLY going to regret this in the morning.

quote:

Originally posted by Theresa pragmatism = the attribute of accepting the facts of life and favoring practicality and literal truth.

This is a very poor and narrow characterization of philosophical pragmatism. Pragmatism says that the only philosophical problems worth bothering with are the ones that have some "cash value," that make a visible difference in the way a person lives life. This typically amounts to a rejection of most metaphysical speculation. Also, pragmatists often urge an acceptance of science and experimental democracy as the "ideals" or paradigm examples for human knowledge-seeking and self-rule.

quote:

Otherwise known as atheism, as a person who only accepts facts, and literal truth is incapable of accepting something based off of faith, such as religion.

No, not at all. William James, the originator of "pragmatism" as a "systematic" philosophical orientation, believed in God and argued in favor of the value of religion.

quote:

Originally posted by Theresa I can't help it... I love philosophy. I am REALLY going to regret this in the morning.

have fun



*snickers*

quote:

Originally posted by Theresa Are you sure you copied the question down properly? That last part doesn't make sense.

yea thats the exact wording. that last part is really tugging at me too. and thx for all the help teresa we really do appreciate it.

and as far as the last question we've kinda come to the conclusion that its the philosophy of religon an how it explains the world ect.

quote:

he pragmatic method is primarily a method of settling metaphysical disputes that otherwise might be interminable. Is the world one or many? � fated or free? � material or spiritual? � here are notions either of which may or may not hold good of the world; and disputes over such notions are unending. The pragmatic method in such cases is to try to interpret each notion by tracing its respective practical consequences. What difference would it practically make to any one if this notion rather than that notion were true? If no practical difference whatever can be traced, then the alternatives mean practically the same thing, and all dispute is idle. Whenever a dispute is serious, we ought to be able to show some practical difference that must follow from one side or the other�s being right.

From "What Pragmatism Means" by William James. Pragmatism also means a very thoroughgoing nominalism, as in this passage from the same work:

quote:

Metaphysics has usually followed a very primitive kind of quest. You know how men have always hankered after unlawful magic, and you know what a great part in magic words have always played. If you have his name, or the formula of incantation that binds him, you can control the spirit, genie, afrite, or whatever the power may be. Solomon knew the names of all the spirits, and having their names, he held them subject to his will. So the universe has always appeared to the natural mind as a kind of enigma, of which the key must be sought in the shape of some illuminating or power-bringing word or name. That word names the universe�s principle, and to possess it is after a fashion to possess the universe itself. �God,� �Matter,� �Reason,� �the Absolute,� �Energy ,� are so many solving names. You can rest when you have them. You are at the end of your metaphysical quest. But if you follow the pragmatic method, you cannot look on any such word as closing your quest. You must bring out of each word its practical cash-value, set it at work within the stream of your experience. It appears less as a solution, then, than as a program for more work, and more particularly as an indication of the ways in which existing realities may be changed.

quote:

Originally posted by rapfiend03 yea thats the exact wording. that last part is really tugging at me too. and thx for all the help teresa we really do appreciate it.

err, not to be dissing theresa or anything, but you really should be going with what mrjivebojingles said and expand further using the five links i provided.

quote:

Originally posted by RandomGirl 1. Dewey claims that traditional philosophy and traditional metaphysics came out of one way that early human beings tried to deal with what he calls an "aleatory world." What does he mean by that term and what exactly is the response. What conception of philosophy grew out of that conception? aleatory world = unpredictable world - or perhaps in this case, the unexplainable/unknown, which resulted in religion. People used religion to explain the unknowns about life. pragmatism = the attribute of accepting the facts of life and favoring practicality and literal truth Otherwise known as atheism, as a person who only accepts facts, and literal truth is incapable of accepting something based off of faith, such as religion. "What conception of philosophy grew out of that conception?" What? That doesn't even make sense. The question is worded terribly.

I have not thouroghly studied this, so I wouldn't bank your mid-term on what I say, but this is my understanding of it.

My answer would be like this:

Traditional philosophy and metaphysics are built on the foundations of understanding what we do not know. As Dewey has stated, the world is aleatory; dependant on chance, mysterious, and never predictable or perhaps better applicable, the inability to be explained or understood.

Given the human innate desire to cognize what surrounds them, it is only understandable that people would begin to theorize, and create their own explanations for things that simply had none at the time.

From this, religion was born. The inability to obtain factual, physical proof or evidence to explain seemingly super-natural things such as the weather, and death, man began to formulate their own philosophies.

Dewey however, came to his own conception generally stressing practical consequences as constituting the essential criterion in determining meaning, truth, or value. He advocated accepting the facts of life and favoring practicality and literal truth, rather than supporting a thesis based off of faith.

Blah blah blah.

I need sleep.

quote:

Originally posted by MrJiveBoJingles From "What Pragmatism Means" by William James. Pragmatism also means a very thoroughgoing nominalism, as in this passage from the same work:

just wondering, do you happen to agree with the pragmatists or the pragmatic method?

well im not going on the wording of anyone inparticular. im kinda just listening and trying to get my head around the concept of the aleatory world. so far its just a completley random world that any disaster or miracle can happen. like the early days of humanity where we didnt have telescopes and weathermen to explain everything. we just looke up to the tribe leaders that created religon to prove why everything happend. the only conception of philosophy i can think of that matches that is the conception of religion in regards to proving natural phenomenom.

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