Our Bookshelf.: Psychology and Philosophy

Abstract

THIRTY years ago, the young American who wanted to pursue the higher learning was apt to betake himself to a German university for three or four years. But, independently of the changes brought about by the War, that custom, has become greatly modified. If he comes to Europe at all, he is more likely to stay only one year, and it is not a foregone conclusion that the year is spent in Germany. The fact is that America has been growing her own science and her own philosophy. In philosophy she had, following the European model, her school of neo-Hegelians, represented by such a man as W. T. Harris. But she seems to have cast aside the isms of the Old World, and to have excogitated a philosophy more in keeping with her own genius and her own outlook. The names of William James and John Dewey stand out in this connexion as names of which any nation might well be proud. Through them the influence of American thought is being felt to the ends of the earth. James died young, but Dewey is happily still with us. He passed his seventieth birthday in October last, and the occasion was marked by a celebration in which some of the foremost of American thinkers took part. This book places on record what was said on that occasion. The speeches constitute a worthy tribute to a very distinguished man; and we may add, for the benefit of people who have not read Dewey, that a good general idea of what has been going on in recent years in philosophical and educational America may be gathered from a perusal of these speeches.

John Dewey, the Man and his Philosophy: Addresses delivered in New York in celebration of his Seventieth Birthday.

Pp. vii + 181. (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press; London: Oxford University Press, 1930.) 10s. 6d. net.