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But the individual butterfly or earthquake remains just the unique existence which it is. We forget in explaining its occurrence that it is only the occurrence that is explained, not the thing itself.

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
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Trade Unionist
Burlington
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Dewey
Remains
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Forget
Earthquake
Individual
Earthquakes
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Explained
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Butterfly

More quotes by John Dewey

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The young of human beings compare so poorly in original efficiency with the young of many of the lower animals, that even the powers needed for physical sustentation have to be acquired under tuition. How much more, then, is this the case with respect to all the technological, artistic, scientific, and moral achievements of humanity!
John Dewey
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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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Any experience, however, trivial in its first appearance, is capable of assuming an indefinite richness of significance by extending its range of perceived connections.
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Legislation is a matter of more or less intelligent improvisation aiming at palliating conditions by means of patchwork policies.
John Dewey
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To be a recipient of a communication is to have an enlarged and changed experience.
John Dewey
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Society exists through a process of transmission quite as much as biological life. This transmission occurs by means of communication of habits of doing, thinking, and feeling from the older to the younger.
John Dewey
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A democracy is more than a form of government it is primarily a mode of associated living, of conjoint communicated experience.
John Dewey
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Despite the never ending play of conscious correction and instruction, the surrounding atmosphere and spirit is in the end the chief agent in forming manners.
John Dewey
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The conception of education as a social process and function has no definite meaning until we define the kind of society we have in mind.
John Dewey
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All direction is but re-direction it shifts the activities already going on into another channel. Unless one is cognizant of the energies which are already in operation, one's attempts at direction will almost surely go amiss.
John Dewey
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There is no common understanding, and no community life. But in a shared activity, each person refers what he is doing to what the other is doing and vice-versa.
John Dewey
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As a society becomes more enlightened, it realizes that it is responsible not to transmit and conserve the whole of its existing achievements, but only such as make for a better future society. The school is its chief agency for the accomplishment of this end.
John Dewey
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A child might be made to bow every time he met a certain person by pressure on his neck muscles, and bowing would finally become automatic. It would not, however, be an act of recognition or deference on his part, till he did it with a certain end in view - as having a certain meaning.
John Dewey
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Mind is a verb not a noun.
John Dewey
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The school has the function of coordinating within the disposition of each individual the diverse influences of the various social environments into which he enters.
John Dewey
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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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Mankind likes to think in terms of extreme opposites.
John Dewey
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Since education is not a means to living, but is identical with the operation of living a life which is fruitful and inherently significant, the only ultimate value which can be set up is just the process of living itself. And this is not an end to which studies and activities are subordinate means it is the whole of which they are ingredients.
John Dewey
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It is obvious to any observer that in every western country the increase of importance of public schools has been at least coincident with the relaxation of older family ties.
John Dewey
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If a person cannot foresee the consequences of his act, and is not capable of understanding what he is told about its outcome by those with more experience, it is impossible for him to guide his act intelligently. In such a state, every act is alike to him.
John Dewey