Pragmatism
In his post on Pragmatism on Dogen Sangha Blog, Nishijima Roshi wrote: "Dewey realized that the most important matter in our life is whether our act is the most suitable at the present moment to meet with the circumstances."
Dewey himself did not hesitate to acknowledge that he was helped towards this realization by lessons with FM Alexander, each of which he described as "a laboratory experimental demonstration.... And so I verified in personal experience all that Mr Alexander says about the unity of the physical and psychical in the psycho-physical; about our habitually wrong use of ourselves; and the part this wrong use plays in generating all kinds of unnecessary tensions and wastes of energy."
Here are some other quotes taken from John Dewey's introduction to FM Alexander's books:
"In re-affirming my conviction as to the scientific character of Mr Alexander's discoveries and technique, I do so then not as one who has experienced a 'cure,' but as one who has brought whatever intellectual capacity he has to the study of a problem. In the study I found things which I had 'known'-- in the sense of theoretical belief -- in philosophy and psychology, changed into vital experiences which gave a new meaning to knowledge of them."
"Mr Alexander has demonstrated a new scientific principle with respect to the control of human behaviour, as important as any principle which has ever been discovered in the domain of external nature."
"The technique of Mr Alexander bears the same relation to education that education itself bears to all other human activities."
Dewey himself did not hesitate to acknowledge that he was helped towards this realization by lessons with FM Alexander, each of which he described as "a laboratory experimental demonstration.... And so I verified in personal experience all that Mr Alexander says about the unity of the physical and psychical in the psycho-physical; about our habitually wrong use of ourselves; and the part this wrong use plays in generating all kinds of unnecessary tensions and wastes of energy."
Here are some other quotes taken from John Dewey's introduction to FM Alexander's books:
"In re-affirming my conviction as to the scientific character of Mr Alexander's discoveries and technique, I do so then not as one who has experienced a 'cure,' but as one who has brought whatever intellectual capacity he has to the study of a problem. In the study I found things which I had 'known'-- in the sense of theoretical belief -- in philosophy and psychology, changed into vital experiences which gave a new meaning to knowledge of them."
"Mr Alexander has demonstrated a new scientific principle with respect to the control of human behaviour, as important as any principle which has ever been discovered in the domain of external nature."
"The technique of Mr Alexander bears the same relation to education that education itself bears to all other human activities."
posted by Mike Cross at 1:46 PM
3 Comments:
Yes, I sincerely believe so.
(1) We are suffering; there is noise in the system.This is the truth of suffering.
(2) We are causing that noise in the system by what we are doing, by our wrong use of the self.This is the truth of the origin of suffering.
(3)The third noble truth is to stop our wrong doing.
(4) The fourth noble truth is the middle way, the way which is free of wrong doing, liberated from the extremes of blind emotional reaction.
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