[MD] Babylonian intellectuals

[david buchanan]

DT quoted Goldberg:
 "Governmental "experimentation," the watchword of pragmatic liberals such as Dewey and Wilson, to FDR was the social analogue to evolutionary adaption. Constitutional democracy, as the founder understood it, was a momentary phase in this progression."
DT said:
 Marx's theory placed capitalism as the evolutionary step before socialism. His theory also claimed that cultures that weren't at the capitalist step were too far behind, would never catch up, and should be eliminated. ...The problem is that applying a new theory (a very limited and partially understood one even now) of the biological level to the social level has and continues to be fraught with unintended and often tragic consequences. Something developers of pragmatism should have been aware of.  For instance, social engineering though planning, zoning, and building codes whatever goods they achieved have been directly linked to the unintended consequences of urban sprawl, homelessness, the lack of affordable housing and many other similar current problems worldwide.


dmb says:

Well, that's the kind of "reasoning" that makes Goldberg a laughing stock. Phrases like "governmental experimentation" and "social engineering" are well-worn ways to demonize progressive policies, to demonize any effort to have an intellectually guided society. You might recall the way Pirsig approvingly quotes Harry Truman as a pragmatic liberal, saying we'll try to fix the problem this way and if that doesn't work we'll try something else. Pragmatists are meliorists. They subscribe to the notion that the world can and has and should be made better by human effort. 

In Dewey's case I happen to know that he used the theory of evolution to develop a theory of inquiry and a theory of education that emphasized hands-on practical knowledge. He saw a remarkable continuity between the scientific method and the methods by which an organism makes adjustments within the ongoing process of living. He also happens to have been the patron saint of liberalism and the right liked him about as much as they liked FDR. 

As Wiki says, "The overriding theme of Dewey's works was his profound belief in democracy, be it in politics, education or communication and journalism. As Dewey himself stated in 1888, while still at the University of Michigan, 'Democracy and the one, ultimate, ethical ideal of humanity are to my mind synonymous'."

Also, planning and zoning lead to sprawl? Planning and zoning are supposed to prevent sprawl. Around here, it's pretty obvious that some municipalities plan well and some don't. 

Wiki also says:
As a major advocate for academic freedom, in 1935 Dewey, together with Albert Einstein and Alvin Johnson, became a member of the United States section of the International League for Academic Freedom, and in 1940, together with Horace M Kallen, edited a series of articles related to the infamous Bertrand Russell Case.As well as being active in defending the independence of teachers, and opposing a communist takeover of the New York Teacher's Union, Dewey was involved in the organization that eventually became the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).He directed the famous Dewey Commission held in Mexico in 1937, which cleared Trotsky of the charges made against him by Stalin, and marched for women's rights, among many other causes.In 1950, Dewey, together with Bertrand Russell, Benedetto Croce, Karl Jaspers, and Jacques Maritain agreed to act as honorary chairman of the Congress for Cultural Freedom."

dmb says:
Don't you think these descriptions paint him as a dude who pushing for intellectual values, for freedom of speech, for anti-racism, for women's rights, for academic and cultural freedom and, in short, freedom of thought. Interestingly, Dewey operated out of the University of Chicago so that it was a center of liberalism but in the years shortly before Pirsig started in the Ph.D. program there, it became a bastion of conservatism and more or less remains so to this day. I wonder how things might have turned out for Pirsig if had had attended the same school during it's period of pragmatic liberalism. He didn't know it at the time but Dewey, following James, had already rejected SOM. Discovering such a philosophical ally at that point in his quest could have saved him a whole lot of grief, I suppose.




 		 	   		  
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