I address the recognized but largely unexamined affinity between the evolutionary philosophies of John Dewey and Daniel C. Dennett, in order to resolve a problematic tension within Dennett's naturalism that results from his emphasis and dependence on science without having a proper account of science. Briefly, many of Dennett's critics argue that this neglect results in the neopragmatic relativism of Richard Rorty. I argue that there is another alternative by making use of John Dewey's philosophy of inquiry. The role of experimental inquiry is neglected by Rorty yet is central to Dewey's project of reconstruction, as opposed to the neurophilosophical and neopragmatic project of reconciling what Wilfrid Sellars called the scientific and manifest images of humanity. In promoting reconstruction as opposed to reconciliation, the tension in both Dennett and much contemporary neurophilosophy is simply evaded. Moreover, the conflict between the sciences and the humanities can be ameliorated through an emphasis on experimental method. In presenting this neurophilosophical pragmatism, I not only continue Dennett's project of imagining new metaphors for consciousness, I meet Rorty's challenge to Dennett to reconstruct science in light of the new metaphors for consciousness - yet I do so in a way that does not simply reduce science to literature as Rorty professed. This first lengthy presentation of neuropragmatism promises to advance not only rapprochement between science and the humanities but also points a way forward for pragmatism in the twenty-first century that takes seriously the advances in the sciences of life and mind without succumbing to the dangers of much of the neuro-hype found both inside and outside of philosophical circles.

Agency and desire are interdependent. Agency is not a given, but an achievement of ordered desiring. We want to control our desires rather than be controlled by them, but the dilemma is that our selves are separate neither from our desires nor our control. John Dewey articulates this dynamic and proposes a solution; we can control desire and thereby ourselves by an immanent and reflective reconstruction of the meaning and object of desire. However, Dewey over-estimates the cognitive control of meaning and desire, because he presumes that desire is always ideational, rather than explaining how desire comes into cognitive awareness and control to be available for reflective manipulation. This work will extend Dewey's theory of experience and habit by explaining the structural habitual conditions necessary for the cognitive control of desire, e.g., how desire becomes ideational and subsequently an ideal. It offers a constructive criticism and a new heterodox phenomenological method based on the works of John Dewey, Thomas Alexander, and Victor Kestenbaum.

This dissertation carries out a systematic study of the religious thought of the 20th century American philosopher John Dewey. Its motivation is that Dewey’s religious views have been seriously misunderstood and under appreciated by philosophers and Dewey scholars to date. Breaking with the standard interpretation of Dewey as a thoroughly scientific and secular thinker, the dissertation shows that Dewey’s writings reveal a robust and highly original religious naturalism. It further demonstrates that Dewey’s novel understanding of the religious dimensions of nature and the experiencing self can capably meet the challenges posed to philosophy of religion by the ecological turn presently transforming the philosophical landscape. The driving insight of the ecological turn in contemporary philosophy is the need to reconstruct our basic philosophical concepts and principles in light of the results of the ecological sciences, many of which challenge core tenets of modern Western thought. To make the case for Dewey as a serious religious thinker, the dissertation places him into critical-constructive dialogue with other theorists representing a wide range of philosophical and scientific perspectives, including those of pragmatism, naturalism, ecological and Gestalt psychology, deep ecology, and recent cognitive science. Dewey’s religious views are also analyzed in relation to the self-cultivation doctrines of Daoism and Zen Buddhism, highlighting rich connections between Dewey and Eastern thought; all of these thinkers and schools of thought share Dewey’s overriding concern to restore continuity between facts and values, between knowledge and action, between nature and the full range of human experience. The dissertation shows that by recovering Dewey’s religious naturalism, full of ecological insight and relevance, a new paradigm for philosophy of religion can be discerned, one that promises to bring philosophy of religion’s core problems and methods in line with the most up-to-date scientific developments.

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Syftet med den här studien var att få kunskap om vilka möjligheter och utmaningar som tekniklärare i årskurs 4 – 7 beskriver när de ska undervisa om programmering. Denna studie fokuserade på undervisning som bidrar till elevers förståelse för användningsområdena inom programmering och betydelsen i vårt teknikintensiva samhälle samt elevernas förståelse för att vissa föremål i vår vardag och vårt samhälle är programmerade för att fungera. Den här studien genomfördes med aktionsforskning där fokusgruppdiskussioner användes som datainsamlingsmetod. Aktionsforskningen genomfördes i två cykler där planering, genomförande, utvärdering och ny planering med vissa förändringar utfördes. Resultatet i denna studie visade sig i olika teman som visade sig i möjligheter och utmaningar. Studien visar att utmaningar för lärarna inbegriper progression i undervisningen av planering, lärarnas intresse och kompetens samt tillgången på digitala verktyg. Andra utmaningar var att tydliggöra syftet med undervisningen för eleverna. Slutsatsen i denna studie var att lärare behöver mer stöd när det kommer till progressionen i undervisningen om programmering, då det skrivs fram så lite och otydligt centralt innehåll. Tidigare forskning visade inte på kunskapsluckan när det gäller progressionen i de olika årskurserna, hur lärare ska genomföra sin bedömning och hur lärare som saknar eget intresse eller kunskaper ska sätta betyg på elever i de olika årskurserna. Det här ger inte en likvärdig skola, då alla elever riskerar att få olika kunskaper med sig beroende på omderas lärare är intresserad eller inte samt om läraren är kompetent eller inte. Studien var kopplad till det teoretiska perspektivet pragmatismen, vilka anser att man ska undervisa barn och inte ämne och att det är viktigt att integrera teori och praktik. / <p>Pedagogiskt arbete, inriktning NO-teknik</p>

Administrative reform as we have known it has been constrained by the ontological and epistemological premises and assumptions of Newtonian physics and the positivism of the early behavioral sciences, leaving constructs vital to a democratic polity impoverished and problematized by power inequities and distorted communication. If public administration could be liberated from those ontological limits through adoption of concepts from the new sciences - quantum theory, chaos theory, complexity theory, and today's ecological sciences - it might be possible to restore to the practices of citizenship and governance appropriate institutional structures which will preserve and nurture them. This dissertation develops lessons and activities pertinent to the practices of citizenship and governance drawn from the life work of John Dewey and Mary Parker Follett - lessons clarified by the premises and assumptions of the new sciences and activities congruent with those lessons. This dissertation is comprised of four broad components: a history of administrative reform as told through the literatures of the fields of public administration and public space philosophy; a history of science in two parts - the development of classical science and the development of the new sciences - from which defining ontological and epistemological characteristics of each are abstracted; case studies from American history that demonstrate the influence of classical science on political and social thought and action; and lessons and activities for public administration and its practitioners, framed in the context of the new sciences, drawn from the life work of John Dewey and Mary Parker Follett. The argument this dissertation makes is twofold. First, it is argued that, given the pervasiveness of the influence of modern thought in American society, it is unlikely that early reformers could have conceptualized administrative structure differently than they did. The modern worldview still dominates our thinking, despite the new understandings of how the world works that are available to us now. The second argument is that it is possible, if we choose to do so, to overcome the modern worldview and the structure it imposes on how we think and act, and that this could lead to alternative practices for public administration. The lessons that are our heritage from Dewey and Follett, and from the traditionalists of our own field, if viewed through the lens of the new sciences, resonate with the ontological perspectives of those sciences and provide a starting point for a reconceptualization of democratic administrative practice. / Ph. D.

Calvinism and Pragmatism may not seem to present similar religious significance for politics. However, Abraham Kuyper (1837-1920) and John Dewey (1859-1952), share a similar appreciation for the scope and depth of religiosity in public life. Although Kuyper was a Christian and Dewey did not consider himself a theist, each understands religious experience as informing every sphere of existence. According to their thought, a distinction exists between a religion and the religious. Both men may be termed "political poets," because they used language as an expression of their esthetic imaginations to create concepts and objects within society as expressions of their religious values. Kuyper's work in the Netherlands is a useful case study for Dewey's valuation of art. Kuyper wrote political philosophy and theology, founded the first widely distributed national newspaper, wrote for this publication over fifty years, founded what would be the largest university in the country, and eventually became Prime Minister of the Netherlands. Throughout his life, he used rhetoric to create change in his society. Dewey and Kuyper integrated academic work with public activity and sought to obtain consistency of being in experiences. If religiosity potentially encompasses every part of humanity's common life, then individuals and groups should be aware of their own positions and participate in honest dialogue with others. "Neutrality," "objectivity," and "uniformity" often have problematic implications according to Dewey and Kuyper. Their thought in this area is salient to a discussion of education culture in the United States. The Common School and High-Stakes Testing models are useful for grounding Kuyper's and Dewey's philosophy in current educational and schooling experiences. / Master of Arts