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Conflict is the gadfly of thought. It stirs us to observation and memory. It instigates invention. It shocks us out of sheep-like passivity, and sets us at noting and contriving…conflict is a sine qua non of reflection and ingenuity.

John Dewey

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John Dewey
Age: 92 †
Born: 1859
Born: October 20
Died: 1952
Died: June 1
Aesthetician
Pedagogue
Philosopher
Professor
Psychologist
Sociologist
Teacher
Trade Unionist
Burlington
Vermont
Dewey
Thought
Sets
Gadflies
Like
Shock
Sine
Observation
Noting
Invention
Shocks
Reflection
Stirs
Memory
Passivity
Conflict
Ingenuity
Memories
Sheep
Contriving

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most notable distinction between living and inanimate beings is that the former maintain themselves by renewal.
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Legislation is a matter of more or less intelligent improvisation aiming at palliating conditions by means of patchwork policies.
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Such happiness as life is capable of comes from the full participation of all our powers in the endeavor to wrest from each changing situations of experience its own full and unique meaning.
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The phrase think for one's self is a pleonasm. Unless one does it for one's self, it isn't thinking.
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Not only does social life demand teaching and learning for its own permanence, but the very process of living together educates. It enlarges and enlightens experience it stimulates and enriches imagination it creates responsibility for accuracy and vividness of statement and thought.
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If humanity has made some headway in realizing that the ultimate value of every institution is its distinctively human effect - its effect upon conscious experience - we may well believe that this lesson has been learned largely through dealings with the young.
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In order to have a large number of values in common, all the members of the group must have an equable opportunity, to receive and to take from others. There must be a large variety of shared undertakings and experiences. Otherwise, the influences which educate some into masters, educates others into slaves.
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Schools should take an active part in directing social change, and share in the construction of a new social order
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The aim of education is growth: the aim of growth is more growth
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I believe that in this way the teacher always is the prophet of the true God and the usherer in of the true kingdom of God.
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To savages it would seem preposterous to seek out a place where nothing but learning was going on in order that one might learn.
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Men have never fully used [their] powers to advance the good in life, because they have waited upon some power external to themselves and to nature to do the work they are responsible for doing.
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There is no greater egoism than that of learning when it is treated simply as a mark of personal distinction to be held and cherished for its own sake. ... [K]knowledge is a possession held in trust for the furthering of the well-being of all
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Like the soil, mind is fertilized while it lies fallow, until a new burst of bloom ensues.
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That which distinguishes the Soviet system both from other national systems and from the progressive schools of other countries is the conscious control of every educational procedure by reference to a single and comprehensive social purpose.
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Luck, bad if not good, will always be with us. But it has a way of favoring the intelligent and showing its back to the stupid.
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The bare fact that language consists of sounds which are mutually intelligible is enough of itself to show that its meaning depends upon connection with a shared experience.
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Time and memory are true artists they remould reality nearer to the heart's desire.
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Experience alone cannot deliver to us necessary truths truths completely demonstrated by reason. Its conclusions are particular, not universal.
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To avoid a split between what men consciously know because they are aware of having learned it by a specific job of learning, and what they unconsciously know because they have absorbed it in the formation of their characters by intercourse with others, becomes an increasingly delicate task with every development of special schooling.
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