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advance is made in adjustment when connections are made between the essentials of situations and the essentials of reactions that adjust the organism to them. In the case just cited, one step in that direction would be the connecting of the reaction shutting-off-the-supply-ofoxygen with the essential stimuli belonging to both blanket and rug in the situation something-on-fire-and rug-or-blanket-near-by. The further this is carried, that is, the more situations are simplified so that one form of reaction will be connected with a larger number of situations, the more effective does adjustment become. Reactions also may be simplified by eliminating nonessential movements. For instance, the woman might have attempted to wrap the blanket about a victim of fire in some special way that had been used under similar circumstances, when some other way would have fitted the situation better. The case cited above in which primitive man unnecessarily impressed the stamp of unwoven willow on pottery, is another instance of this. Organizing the essentials of reactions is just what the sciences do. The sciences, which appear largely in the form of word symbols that affect the immature organism, are created by group influence, since, although each advance is made through some particular organism, it is causally dependent upon other reactions which have been acquired under group influence.

The materialistic view supports the facts that means of control acquired under the guidance of history and the fine arts, and purposes acquired under the guidance of the sciences are developed only incidentally and not in the most economical ways. The efficiency of new reactions developed by history and the fine arts is not tested systematically as the sciences would test it, and

indeed, these reactions may not give the best adjustment to the environment. On the other hand, connections made by sciences between new reactions and larger systems of habits are not so intimate and thorough as those made by history and the fine arts.

Natural science reveals very definitely the short-sightedness of the belief that the essential function of history, the fine arts, and the sciences is to give pleasure. The organism is made for active adjustment to environment. In this adjustment process, the brain is the medium between the incoming nerves, which bring stimuli from the environment, and the outgoing nerves, which cause reactions to this environment. Brain changes are thus in the service of action. Since thoughts and feelings are the counterparts of brain changes, their fundamental significance, too, is practical. Indeed, history, the fine arts, and the sciences are biological necessities in the development of adjustment to environment; they mark a new chapter in this development.

REFERENCES

CHARTERS, W. W., Methods of Teaching, 1912, pp. 26-40. (Discusses the nature of subject matter from the functional point of view.) BAGLEY, W. C., Educational Values, 1911, pp. 164-179. (Points to history, biography, literature, art in any of its forms, and religion as the chief sources of materials for the direct development of ideals.)

BALDWIN, J. M., Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental Development, 1906, pp. 465-484. (Shows the social influence in the development of subject matter.)

ROBINSON, J. H., The New History, 1912, pp. 1-25. (Discusses the function of history.)

PARKER, DEW. H., The Principles of Esthetics, 1920. (Gives an analysis of the nature and meaning of art.)

GORDON, K., Esthetics, 1909, pp. 46-67. (Explains the origins and functions of art.)

FAIRCHILD, A. H. R., The Making of Poetry, 1912, pp. 187-209. (Discusses the need and value of poetry.)

THORNDIKE, E. L., Principles of Teaching, 1906, pp. 198-202. (Holds that the emotions have a practical value.)

THOMSON, J. A., Introduction to Science, 1911, pp. 224-248. (Explains in a simple manner the utility of science.)

PROBLEMS

1. Why should teachers have definite ideas of the functions of the various kinds of subject matter they teach?

2. Name five ideals you have acquired as a result of your home influence and explain how you acquired them.

3. Name five means of control you have acquired in the home and explain how you acquired them.

4. Name five ideals you have acquired that were created or strengthened by the study of history or literature.

5. Name five valuable means of control you have learned from the study of science.

6. a. Can you trace any ideal you have formed to the study of Latin, mathematics, English grammar, or physical science? b. If so, explain how the ideal was derived from this study.

7. If a teacher believes that knowledge is an end in itself and not for the sake of action, what is the most serious error he is liable to make in teaching geography or grammar?

CHAPTER VIII

THE NATURE OF PATTERNS FOR PURPOSESHISTORY AND THE FINE ARTS

The particular natures of history and the several fine arts are determined by various limitations under which they guide in forming new purposes. In giving an appreciative understanding of present social practices, history is limited to connecting them intimately with purposes in the service of which they were established. Literature, sculpture, painting, architecture, and music are free to represent necessary or probable connections between means and ends, irrespective of whether these have been experienced before, but are limited in various ways by different media of expression. A new and widely influential medium of artistic expression is the moving picture. The freedom of the fine arts in transferring values makes it easily possible for them to be perverted so as to give false appreciations of worth.

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The problem of this chapter is to find in detail how history and each of the more important fine arts guide in forming new purposes. History is limited to past experiences; the fine arts are free to create probable situations that may not have actually existed. The fine arts differ one from another because they use different media of expression.

History and the fine arts, as we have learned, are the truest guides in forming new purposes. Sciences may develop purposes incidentally, but sciences are concerned essentially with making means of control, not with the far-reaching values which these means of control may serve. Social authority is widely influential and very

effective in developing purposes, but its guidance is unreliable and arbitrary. Social authority, it is true, puts a stamp of approval upon acts because they have been found worthful, just as governmental authority puts a coinage stamp upon gold because the gold is valuable in itself. But acts are less stable in value than gold; they may depreciate greatly when better standards are found; they may become even worthless when social conditions change; and yet those which have lost much or all of their value may still retain the social stamp. History and the fine arts, however, reveal the intrinsic values of acts as truly as the methods of the assayer test gold. Not only are they truer guides than social authority because they are more reliable, but they are truer to the nature of the individual, for they free him from arbitrary social authority. They lead him to accept purposes, not through external compulsion, but because his inner nature demands them, because he feels them necessary for personal development, through which he may realize his highest possibilities and become in the fullest sense himself.

Our problem now is to examine history and each of the more important fine arts separately, so that we may learn in greater detail how they function as purposegiving subject matter. Each of them conforms to the law which controls the making of new purposes; each brings to consciousness valuable ends, associates intimately with these ends means of control, and under normal conditions, leads to action; but they do this in various ways, because of differences in scope and differences in media of expression used.

The wider distinction is between history and the fine arts. History gives accurately the essentials of past

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