But as a member of the union he cannot be treated as antithetical to the union in which he belongs.
John Dewey
The Public Record
John Dewey was an American philosopher, psychologist, and educational reformer. He was one of the most prominent American scholars in the first half of the twentieth century.
gutenberg.org
One approaches the truth more nearly when one says that the argument proves too much for its own cause.
But indubitably one great trouble at present is that the data for good judgment are lacking; and no innate faculty of mind can make up for the absence of facts.
Many persons seem to suppose that facts carry their meaning along with themselves on their face.
But the power of physical facts to coerce belief does not reside in the bare phenomena.
No one is ever forced by just the collection of facts to accept a particular theory of their meaning, so long as one retains intact some other doctrine by which he can marshal them.
Only when the facts are allowed free play for the suggestion of new points of view is any significant conversion of conviction as to meaning possible.
Take away from physical science its laboratory apparatus and its mathematical technique, and the human imagination might run wild in its theories of interpretation even if we suppose the brute facts to remain the same.
In any event, social philosophy exhibits an immense gap between facts and doctrines.
Compare, for example, the facts of politics with the theories which are extant regarding the nature of the state.
If inquirers confine themselves to observed phenomena, the behavior of kings, presidents, legislators, judges, sheriffs, assessors and all other public officials, surely a reasonable consensus is not difficult to attain.
If one wishes to realize the distance which may lie between “facts” and the meaning of facts, let one go to the field of social discussion.