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The Desired and the Desirable in Dewey's Ethics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 September 1963

Irving Block
Irving Block
Affiliation:
University of Western Ontario.
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Extract

That x is desired is a necessary but not a sufficient ground for claiming that x is good or that x ought to be or that x is desirable—and these three phrases I take to be synonymous for Dewey. Everything that is desirable is desired but it is not the case that everything that is desired is desirable. What else is needed to make a desire desirable is the main burden of Dewey's ethics.

Type
Articles
Information
Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review / Revue canadienne de philosophie , Volume 2 , Issue 2 , September 1963 , pp. 170 - 181
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 1963

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References

1 John Dewey, Logic, The Theory of Inquiry, Henry Holt, 1938, p. 66.

2 I have used quotes around this word to indicate that I have been using it as Dewey uses it in his specific meaning of the word. Hereafter, the quotes will be dropped with the understanding that I still intend Dewey's meaning of the term.

3 Ibid., p. 165.

4 Ibid., p. 68–9, The italicized words are Dewey's.

5 John Dewey, Quest for Certainty; Minton, Balch & Co., 1929, p. 277

6 D. W. Prall, Collected Papers; see articles of the discussion between Dewey and Prall in the Journal of Philosophy, 1943.

7 Philosophical Review No. 58, 1949.

8 John Dewey, Philosopher of Science and Freedom, ed. S. Hook, p. 194.

9 Quest for Certainty, p. 276.