The criticism and evaluation of existing standards The standards of a group are criticized and changed in essentially the same manner as the standards of the individual are formed-through the interaction of impulse, expectation, and natural fact. This is the case, of course, because there is no group apart from its constituent individuals, and no group values resident outside of individuals. The values common to the group can only change through changes in the values of members of the group. This process, however, is continually going on, and so there is always a certain amount of pressure towards the change of the commonly accepted values. Anything which acts to give this pressure a constant direction will therefore have the effect of changing the prevailing views. A number of things are capable of producing this result. When people move into a new natural environment the stage is often set for great changes in their views, as can be seen when inhabitants of the temperate zones migrate to the tropics, or when urban folk become pioneers. With a change in occupations and in other fundamental life activities, similarly, new notions are bred. When inventions and discoveries give a new direction to life and thought, once more, the resultant changes may invade every aspect of culture and greatly affect its standards, as was strikingly illustrated by the startling and still incomplete effects of the Industrial Revolution on the western world. The contact and fusion of cultures is also a potent factor in the alteration of standards. People who have lived in isolation from each other are bound to develop different norms, and when through diffusion these divergent standards are brought into contact much intercriticism and adjustment is possible. Thus the meeting of East and West offers opportunity for the interchange and mutual criticism of values. Altered ideas respecting the past may perhaps be considered as a special instance of cultural contact. The same process goes on within a culture when fairly well isolated groups come into closer relations, as when persons with different interests and training join in a common enterprise. It is to be noted that in all of the instances cited the primary condition for a change in standards is an altered perspective in terms of which the old materials may be viewed. This should be taken strictly to heart in connection with all deliberate efforts to improve our standards, and indeed in every instance where an enlightened control is attempted over any human processes. The situation has two phases: (1) It is absolutely necessary to work in terms of the materials already at hand and accepted. The existing situation must be taken for granted, not as immutable and unchangeable but as present and real. It is folly to deny the existence of the very thing one is criticizing. No proposal for change is worth considering which depends upon magic -which supposes, for example, that men will be very different creatures under some new arrangement which contains no devices for making them different. Bertrand Russell has some wise words upon this topic: 13 Socialists... imagine that the Socialist State will be governed by men like those who now advocate it. This is, of course, a delusion. The rulers of the State then will bear as little resemblance to the present Socialists as the dignitaries of the Church after the time of Constantine bore to the Apostles. The men who advocate an unpopular reform are exceptional in disinterestedness and zeal for the public good; but those who hold power after the reform has been carried out are likely to belong, in the main, to the ambitious executive type which has in all ages possessed itself of the government of nations. And this type has never shown itself tolerant of opposition or friendly to freedom. There is here indicated the need of knowledge or understanding of the existing state of affairs as a prerequisite to serious efforts towards its improvement. This knowledge can seldom be achieved with sufficient thoroughness for the purpose without great effort and unusual advantages, whether of position, of training, or of natural aptitude. (2) The old materials must be viewed in a different perspective of facts and possibilities. When they are considered merely in their present settings and relations, it is only possible to take them or leave them; if they are to be critically evaluated or deliberately changed they must somehow be brought into new connections with relevant data, so that the process of criticism may not prove irresponsible or sterile. This is the great advantage of breadth of vision and a wide experience, for out of many and varied contacts is born the capacity to look upon the old as though it were new, and upon the new as though it were old. The man who is in the habit of doing this has to some slight extent freed himself from slavery to the here and the now. The success of our deliberate efforts to change existing arrangements therefore depends upon the adequate envisaging of instruments competent to transform things as they are into things as they might be. The need is for tools which can be applied to the existing situation in such a way as to transform it into another which we have good reason to believe is more desirable. REFERENCES 1 William James, The Principles of Psychology (N. Y., Holt, 1890), Vol. 2, 386-387. 2 See W. G. Sumner, Folkways, A study of the sociological importance of usages, manners, customs, mores, and morals (Boston, Ginn, 1907). See the essay by Dhan Gopal Mukerji in the volume entitled What is Civilization? (N. Y., Duffield, 1925). J. E. Boodin, Value and social interpretation, Amer. Journ. of Sociol., Vol. 21 (1915-6), 95. F. L. Wells, Mental Adjustments (N. Y., Appleton, 1917), 23. Charles E. Garman, in Amer. Journ. of Psych., Vol. 9 (1897-8), 606. 7 Cf. Sumner, 201 f. 8 C. A. Mercier, in Bernard Hollander, The Psychology of Misconduct, Vice, and Crime (London, Allen and Unwin, 1922), 193. Lyof Tolstoi, quoted in W. Jethro Brown, The Underlying Principles of Modern Legislation (6 ed., N. Y., Dutton, 1920), 1. 10 Sumner, iii. 11 Cf. the travesty of this situation in the character of Pooh-Bah, Lord High Everything Else, in W. S. Gilbert, The Mikado (Modern Library ed.). 12 Jeremy Bentham, An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation (first publ., 1780; Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1907), Chap. 13. See also Chap. 14 of the same work. 13 Bertrand Russell, Proposed Roads to Freedom; Socialism, anarchism, and syndicalism (N. Y., Holt, 1919), 107-108. Chapter XIII COMMON SENSE, OPINION, AND INNOVATION Matter-of-fact knowledge in the group Every society possesses a large though somewhat haphazard store of information of different degrees of utility and accuracy concerning the nature and behavior of the various items in its environment, together with a knowledge of the techniques which are necessary to turn this information to practical account. Thus in a primitive group the men know when, where, and how fish are to be caught, and they are familiar with the habits of wild game; they can forecast the weather from an inspection of the heavens and they are acquainted with the order of the seasons, together with the bounties and scarcities afforded by each time of year; they are familiar with the region in which they live and how to get from place to place; they are old hands at clearing away the brush, digging wells, cutting down trees and stripping them of bark, making fire, finding honey, telling time by the stars, chipping flints to make tools, and a thousand other similar tasks. Similarly the women perform a multitude of functions, from the planting, tending, and harvesting of foodstuffs, the gathering of fruits and berries, caring for the young, cooking the foods, etc., down to the tiniest features of the daily routine. In considering the life of a group we are likely to ignore this enormous body of unostentatious matter-of-fact, and to concentrate our attention upon the gaudier and more pretentious constructions of the culture. The common-sense knowledge of a society seldom receives its due even in learned anthropological treatises, although it is absolutely indispensable for the maintenance of the group life, and in addition constitutes perhaps the most important differentiating cultural feature of a group, so far as its actual life is con cerned. The individuals who use this knowledge in their daily lives almost invariably take it entirely for granted, and are seldom properly appreciative of its importance, although persons who are exceptionally competent in its manipulation are respected. And yet, it must be repeated, this common-sense knowledge forms the necessary basis for all the developed arts and more than any other single thing keeps the group alive and prosperous. Although cultures can easily be differentiated by a comparison of the specific common-sense knowledges and practices upon which their daily life depends, it is perhaps in this field also that cultures are most nearly alike in their more general features. This is, no doubt, due to the basic identity of human biological needs under all the diverse conditions of cultural life, on the one hand, and on the other to the fairly limited possibilities offered by the natural environment for the satisfaction of these needs, as compared with its relative indifference to the manner in which many other cultural patterns function. Wherever men are found, they urgently need to breathe, to eat, to provide themselves with shelter against the elements, to protect themselves against environmental pests and enemies, and to store up reserves against a lean season. Most of the other impulses shared by human beings are by no means so ubiquitous and insistent, and they are therefore canalized in a greater variety of cultural forms. In no culture, of course, is the whole body of commonsense knowledge controlled by every one. Thus in our own group the homely knowledges connected with the preparation of food belong almost exclusively to the women, while the men are as a rule better acquainted with the handling of the common tools available to practically all members of our society. Farmers are well acquainted with many simple facts of basic importance in agricultural operations that escape city folk, and sailors share technical secrets not known to landlubbers. In these broad differentiations we see the marks of specialization in activity and interest, a topic that will be discussed in the next section but one. |