In the second part of the essay, the discussion passes into a keen and rather clever recital of the difficulties that result from taking the knowledge relation to be 'ubiquitous.'[255] Since this relation is a constant factor in experience, it would seem as if it might be eliminated from philosophical calculations. The realist would be glad to eliminate it, but the idealist is not so willing; for, "since the point at issue is precisely the statement of the most universally defining trait of existence as existence, the invitation deliberately to disregard the most universal trait is nothing more or less than an invitation to philosophic suicide."[256] It is, Dewey says, as if two philosophers should set out to ascertain the relation which holds between an organism as 'eater' and the environment as 'food,' and one should find the essential thing to be the food, the other the eating. The 'foodists' would represent the realists, the 'eaterists' the idealists. No advance, he believes, can be made on this basis.
In opposition to the epistemologists, Dewey would consider the knowledge relation not ubiquitous, but specific and occasional. As man bears other relations to his environment than that of eater, so is he also something more than a knower. "If the one who is knower is, in relation to objects, something else and more than their knower, and if objects are, in relation to the one who knows them, something else and other than things in a knowledge relation, there is somewhat to define and discuss...."[2] Dewey proposes to advance certain facts to support his contention that knowing is "a relation to things which depends upon other and more primary connections between a self and things; a relation which grows out of these more fundamental connections and which operates in their interests at specifiable crises."[257]
This brings the discussion back to familiar ground again, and nothing is added to his previous statements of the functional conception of knowledge. While the realist (explicitly or implicitly) conceives the knowledge relation as obtaining between a subject knower and the external world, Dewey interprets the knowledge relation in terms of organism and environment. The 'ubiquity' of the knowledge relation is disposed of, as has been seen, by conceiving knowledge from an entirely different standpoint; by reducing all knowledge to inference, and abolishing the knowing subject. Dewey is plainly under the impression that the only alternative to the ubiquitous knower is his naturalistic, biological interpretation of the processes of inference.
In support of his naturalistic logic, Dewey argues as follows: (1) All perception involves reference to an organism. "We might about as well talk of the production of a specimen case of water as a presentation of water to hydrogen as talk in the way we are only too accustomed to talk about perceptions and the organism."[258] (2) Awareness is only a single phase of experience. We 'know' only a small part of the causes which affect us as agents. "This means, of course, that things, the things that come to be known, are primarily not objects of awareness, but causes of weal and woe, things to get and things to avoid, means and obstacles, tools and results."[259] (3) Knowing is only a special phase of the behaver-enjoyer-sufferer situation, but very important as having to do with means for the practical and scientific control of the environment.
In the final analysis, it will be seen that Dewey refutes the realist by substituting inference for what the realist calls 'consciousness,' and settling the issue by this triumph in the field of dialectics, rather than by an appeal to the facts. Nowhere does Dewey do justice to those concrete situations which, to the realist, seem to necessitate a definition of consciousness as awareness. His attitude toward the realists may be summed up in the statement that he finds in most realistic systems the fault to which his logical theory is especially opposed: the tendency to define the problem of logic as that of the relation of thought at large to reality at large, and to distinguish the content of mind from the content of the world on an existential rather than on a functional basis.
One of Dewey's more recent studies, "The Logic of Judgments of Practise,"[260] seems to add something positive to his interpretation of knowledge. A practical judgment, Dewey explains at the outset of this study, is differentiated from others, not by having a separate organ and source, but by having a specific sort of subject-matter. It is concerned with things to be done or situations demanding action. "He had better consult a physician," and "It would be well for you to invest in these bonds," are examples of the practical judgment.
These propositions, as will be seen, are not cast in what the logician calls logical form, with regular terms and copula. When put in that form, they seem to lose the direct reference to action which, Dewey says, differentiates them from the 'descriptive' judgment of the form S is P.[261] This apparently trivial matter is really important. Although every statement embodies judgment, some statements do not reflect the ground upon which they are asserted. In this condition they may be viewed as opinions, suggestions, or guesses, looking towards judgment rather than reflecting its results. True judgment is occupied with reasons, proofs, and grounds, and does not concern itself with action as action. Only when taken as the expression of an individual's attitude, do Dewey's practical judgments (or assertions) possess the direct reference to action which he selects as their chief characteristic. The statement, "You ought to invest in these bonds," does, indeed, suggest a specific action, but in so doing it loses its character as a judgment. Put in more logical form, "You are one of those who should invest in these bonds," the proposition is more clearly the expression of a judgment, and leads back to its premises. Attention turns from specific action as such to action as a typical or universal fact. In short, Dewey's practical judgment is not a true judgment; it will be seen that it is studied, not as a logical, but as a psychological phenomenon.
In pursuance of his psychological method, Dewey discovers several interesting facts about judgments of practice.(1) These judgments imply an incomplete situation,—concretely and specifically incomplete; they express a need. (2) The judgment is itself a factor in assisting toward the completion of the situation, since it directs an action necessary to the fulfilment of the need. (3) The subject-matter of the judgment expresses the fact that one outcome is to be preferred to another. The element of preference is peculiar to the practical judgment, for it is not found in merely descriptive judgments, or those 'confined to the given.' (4) A practical judgment implies both means and end, the act that completes, and the completeness. It is in this respect 'binary.' (5) The judgment of what is to be done demands an accurate statement of the course of action to be pursued and the means to be employed, and these are to be determined relatively to the end in view. (6) It finally appears that what is true of the practical judgment may be true of all judgments of fact; it may be held that "all judgments of fact have reference to a determination of courses of action to be tried and the discovery of means for their attempted realization."[262]
This ingenious reading of functionalism out of the practical judgment is, after all, merely a drawing forth of the psychological implications previously placed in it. That judgment is an instrument for completing a situation; that it is linked up with action through desire and preference; that it seeks to determine the means for effecting a practical outcome,—these typically instrumental notions are of one piece with the system of belief that led Dewey to hit upon the practical judgment as the embodiment of a direction to action. It is important to distinguish between the logical and the psychological aspects of these propositions. Action as psychological is one thing; as the subject-matter of judgment, it is another. In coming to a decision as to how to act, the agent sets his proposed action over against himself, and considers it in its universal and typical character. His motor tendencies, his feelings, his desires factor in the situation psychologically considered; but they do not enter judgment as psychological facts, but rather, if at all, as data which have a significance beyond their mere particularity. Dewey remains at the psychological standpoint, giving no attention to the genuinely logical aspects of his 'judgments of practice.'