Journal of Philosophy, Inc.

The Postulate of Immediate Empiricism

Author(s): John Dewey
Source: The Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Methods, Vol. 2, No. 15 (Jul. 20,
1905), pp. 393-399
Published by: Journal of Philosophy, Inc.
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2011400
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VOL. II. No. 15.

JULY20, 1905

THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY

PSYCHOLOGY AND SCIENTIFIC METHODS
THE POSTULATE OF IMMEDIATE EMPIRICISM

HE criticismsmade upon thatvital but still unformedmovement

variouslytermedradical empiricism,pragmatism,humanism,
functionalism,
accordingas one or anotheraspect of it is uppermost,
is not
have leftme with a convictionthat the fundamentaldifference
so much in mattersovertlydiscussed as in a presuppositionwhich
remainstacit: a presuppositionas to what experienceis and means.
To do my littlepart in clearingup the confusion,I shall tryto make
my own presuppositionexplicit. The object of this paper is, then,
to set forthwhat I understandto be the postulateand the criterion
of immediateempiricism.l
Immediate empiricismpostulates that things-anything,everything,in the ordinaryor non-technicaluse of the term'thing'-are
what they are experienced as. Hence, if one wishes to describe
anythingtruly,his task is to tell what it is experiencedas being.
If it is a horsewhich is to be described,or the equus whichis to be
or the jockey,or the timidfamily
defined,thenmustthe horse-trader,
man who wants a 'safe driver,'or the zoologistor the paleontologist
tell us what the horse is which is experienced. If these accounts
turn out differentin some respects,as well as congruousin others,
this is no reason for assumingthe contentof one to be exclusively
'real,' and that of othersto be 'phenomenal'; for each account of
what is experiencedwill manifestthat it is the account of the horsedealer, or of the zoologist,etc., and hence will give the conditions
as well as the agreements
requisitefor understandingthe differences
1All labels are, of course,obnoxiousand misleading. I hope, however,
the termwill be takenby the readerin the sense in whichit is forthwith
exas herein
plained,and notin somemoreusual and familiarsense. Empiricism,
as it is to transcendentalused, is as antipodalto sensationalisticempiricism,
ism, and forthe same reason. Both of these systemsfall back on something
whichis defined
in non-directly-experienced
termsin orderto justifythat which
is directlyexperienced. Hence I have criticizedsuch empiricism(Phil, Rev.,
Vol. XI., No. 4, p. 364) as essentiallyabsolutisticin character; and also
(' Studies in Logical Theory,'p. 30, 58) as an attemptto build up experience
in termsof certainmethodological
checksand cues of attainingcertaintyin
knowledge.
393
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394

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of the various accounts. And the principlevaries not a whit if we

bring in the psychologist'shorse,the logician's horse or the metaphysician'shorse.
In each case, the nub of the question is, what sort of experience
is meant or indicated: a concreteand determinateexperience,varying, when it varies, in specificreal elements,and agreeing,when it
agrees, in specificreal elements,so that we have a contrast,not
between a Reality, and various approximationsto, or phenomenal
of Reality,but betweendifferent
reals of experience.
representations
And the reader is begged to bear in mind that fromthis standpoint,
when 'an experience' or 'some sort of experience' is referredto,
'some thing' or 'some sort of thing' is always meant.
Now, this statementthat things are what they are experienced
to be is usually translatedinto the statementthat things (or, ultimately,Reality, Being) are only and just what they are knownto
be or that thingsare, or Reality is, what it is for a consciousknower
-whether the knowerbe conceivedprimarilyas a perceiveror as a
thinkerbeing a furtherand secondaryquestion. This is the rootparalogismof all idealisms,whethersubjectiveor objective,psychological or epistemological. By our postulate,thingsare what they
are experiencedto be; and, unless knowingis the sole and only genuine mode of experiencing,it is fallaciousto say that Reality is just
and exclusivelywhat it is or would be to an all-competent
all-knower;
or even that it is, relativelyand piecemeal,what it is to a finiteand
partial knower. Or, put more positively,knowingis one mode of
experiencing,and the primaryphilosophicdemand (fromthe standpoint of immediatism)is to find out what sort of an experience
knowing is-or, concretelyhow things are experiencedwhen they
are experiencedas knownthings.2 By concretelyis meant,obviously
enough (among otherthings), such an account of the experienceof
thingsas knownthat will bringout the characteristictraits and distinctionstheypossessas thingsof a knowingexperience,as compared
with thingsexperiencedesthetically,or morally,or economically,or
etc. To assume,because fromthe standpointof the
technologically,
knowledgeexperiencethingsare what they are known to be, that,
therefore,metaphysically,absolutely,without qualification,everythingin its reality (as distinctfromits 'appearance,' or phenomenal
occurrence)is what a knowerwould findit to be, is, fromthe imme2I hope the reader will not therefore assume that from the empiricist's
standpoint knowledge is of small worth or import. On the contrary, from
the empiricist's standpoint it has all the worth which it is concretelyexperienced as possessing-which is simply tremendous. But the exact nature of
this worth is a thing to be found out in describing what we mean by experiencing objects as known-the actual differencesmade or found in experience.

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PSYCHOLOGY

AND SCIENTIFIC

METHODS

395

diatist's standpoint,if not the root of all philosophicevil, at least

one of its main roots.
For example, I start and am flusteredby a noise heard. Empirically, that noise is fearsome; it really is, not merelyphenomenally or subjectivelyso. That is whiatit is experiencedas being.
But, when I experiencethe noise as a knownthing,I findit to be
innocentof harm. It is the tapping of a shade against the window,
owing to movementsof the wind. The experiencehas changed;
that is, the thing experiencedhas changed-not that an unreality
has givenplace to a reality,nor that sometranscendental(unexperienced) Reality has changed,3not that truth has changed,but just
and only the concreterealityexperiencedhas changed. I now feel
ashamed of my fright;and the noise as fearsomeis changedto noise
as a wind-curtainfact, and hence practicallyindifferent
to my welfare. This is a change of experiencedreality effectedthroughthe
medium of cognition. The contentof the latter experience cognitivelyregardedis doubtlesstruerthan the contentof the earlier;
but it is in no sense more real. To call it truer,moreover,must,
fromthe empiricalstandpoint,mean a concretedifferencein actual
thingsexperienced.4 Again, in many cases, it is only in retrospect
that the prior experienceis cognitionallyregarded at all. In such
cases, it is only in regard to contrastedcontentsin the subsequent
experiencethat the determination'truer' has force.
Perhaps some reader may now object that as matterof fact the
entire experienceis cognitive,but that the earlier parts of it are
only imperfectlyso, resultingin a phenomenonwhich is not real;
while the latter part,-being a more complete cognition,results in
what is relatively,at least, more real.5 In short,a critic may say
Since the non-empiricistbelieves in things-in-themselves(which he may
term 'atoms,' 'sensations,' transcendental unities, a priori concepts, an absolute experience,or whatever), and since he findsthat the empiricist makes much
of change (as he must, since change is continuouslyexperienced) he assumes that
the empiricist means that his own non-empirical Realities are in continual
flux, and he naturally shudders at having his divinities so violently treated.
But, once recognize that the empiricist doesn't have any such Realities at all,
and the entire problem of the relation of change to reality takes a very differentaspect.
It would lead us aside from the point to try to tell just what is the
nature of the experienced differencewe call truth. Professor James's recent
articles may well be consulted. The point to bear in mind here is just what
sort of a thing the empiricist must mean by true, or truer (the noun Truth
The adequacy
is, of course, a generic name for all cases of 'Trues').
of any particular account is not a matter to be settled by general reasoning,
but by findingout what sort of an experience the truth-experienceactually is.
6I say 'relatively,' because the transcendentalist still holds that finally
the cognition is imperfect,giving us only some symbol or phenomenonof Reality

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that, when I was frightenedby the noise, I knew I was frightened;

otherwisetherewould have been no experienceat all. At this point,
it is necessaryto make a distinctionso simple and yet so all-fundamentalthat I am afraid the reader will be inclinedto pooh-poohit
away as a mereverbal distinction. But to see that to the empiricist
this distinctionis not verbal, but real, is the preconditionof any
understandingof him. The immediatistmust,by his postulate,ask
what is the frightexperiencedas. Is what is actually experienced,
or I-am-frightened? I see absolutely no
I-know-I-am-frightened,
reason for claiming that the experiencemust be describedby the
formerphrase. In all probability(and all the empiricistlogically
needs is just one case of whichthis is true) the experienceis simply
and just of fright-at-the-noise.Later one may (or may not) have
an experiencedescribableas I-know-I-am-(-or-was) and improperly
or properly,frightened. But this is a differentexperience-that
is, a different
thing. And if the criticgoeson to urge thattheperson
'really' must have knownthat he was frightened,I can only point
out that the criticis shiftingthe venue. He may be right,but,if so,
it is onlybecause the 'really' is somethingnot concretelyexperienced
(whose nature accordinglyis the critic's business); and this is to
depart from the empiricist'spoint of view, to attributeto him a
postulatewhichhe expresslyrepudiates.
The material point may come out more clearly if I say that we
must make a distinctionbetween a thing as cognitive,and one
as cognized.6 I should definea cognitiveexperienceas one which
has certain bearingsor implicationswhich induce and fulfillthemselves in a subsequent experience in which the relevant thing is
experiencedas cognized,as a known object, and is therebytransin the case cited
formed,or reorganized. The fright-at-the-noise
is obviouslycognitive,in this sense. By description,it induces an
investigationor inquiryin whichbothnoise and frightare objectively
stated or presented-the noise as a shade-windfact,the frightas an
organic reaction to a sudden acoustic stimulus,a reaction which
under the given circumstanceswas useless or even detrimental,a
maladaptation. Now, prettymuch all of experienceis of this sort
(the 'is' meaning,of course,is experiencedas), and the empiricistis
-otherwise the
(which is only in the Absolute or in some Thing-in-Itself)
curtain-wind
factwouldhave as muchontologicalrealityas the existenceof the
Absoluteitself: a conclusionat whichthe non-empiricist
for no
perhorresces,
reasonobviousto me-save that it would put an end to his transcendentalism.
In general,I thinkthe distinctionbetween-ive and -ed one of the most
fundamentalof philosophicdistinctions,
and one of the most neglected. The
same holdof -tionand -ing.

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PSYCHOLOGY

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false to his principleif he does not duly note this fact.7 But he is
equally false to his principleif he permitshimselfto be confusedas
to the concretedifferences
in the two thingsexperienced.
There are two little words throughexplicationof which the empiricist's position may be broughtout-'as' and 'that.' We may
expresshis presuppositionby saying that thingsare what they are
experiencedas being; or that to give a just account of anythingis
to tell what thatthingis experiencedto be. By thesewords I want
to indicatethe absolute,final,irreducibleand inexpugnableconcrete
quale which everythingexperiencednot so much has as is. To
grasp this aspect of empiricismis to see what the empiricistmeans
by objectivity,by the elementof control,a principle of guidance
and selection, the normativeor standard element in experience.
Suppose we take,as a crucial case forthe empiricist,an out and out
illusion,say of Zollner's lines. These are experiencedas convergent;
they are 'truly' parallel. If thingsare what they are experienced
as being,how can therebe the distinctionthat we draw betweenillusion and the true state of the case ? There is no answerto thisquestion exceptby stickingto the fact that the experienceof the lines as
divergentis a concretequalitativethingor that. It is that experience whichit is, and no other. And if the readerrebelsat the iteration of such obvious tautology,I can only reiteratethat the realization of the meaningof thistautologyis the key to the whole question
of the objectivityof experience,as thatstandsto the empiricist. The
lines of thatexperienceare divergent:not merelyseemso. The questionof truthis not as to whetherBeing or Non-Being,Realityor mere
Appearance,is experienced,but as to theworthof a certainconcretely
experiencedthing. The onlyway of passingupon thisquestionis by
fashionto thatexperienceas real.
stickingin themostuncompromising
That experienceis that two lines withcertaincross-hatchings
are apas
that
real
as
and
prehended convergent;only by.taking
experience
as fully real, is there any basis for or way of going to an experienced knowledgethat the lines are parallel. It is in the concrete
thingas experiencedthat all the groundsand clues to its own intellectual or logical rectification
are contained. It is because thisthing,
afterwardsadjudged false,is a concretethat,that it developsinto a
correctedexperience (that is, experienceof a correctedthing-we
reformthingsjust as we reformourselvesor a bad boy) whose full
contentis not a whitmore real, but whichis experiencedas true or
as truer.
7What is criticized,now as 'geneticism' (if I may coin the word) and
nowas 'pragmatism'is, in its truth,just the factthatthe empiricistdoes take
accountof the experienced'drift, occasionand contexture'of thingsexperienced-to use Hobbes'sphrase.
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398

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If any experience,then a determinateexperience; and this determinatenessis the only,and is the adequate, principle of control,
or 'objectivity.' The experiencemay be of the vaguest sort. I
may not see any thingwhich I can identifyas a familiarobject-a
table, a chair, etc. It may be dark; I may have only the vaguest
impressionthat there is somethingwhich looks like a table. Or I
may be completelybefoggedand confused,as when one rises quickly
fromsleep in a pitch-darkroom. But this vagueness,this doubtfulness,this confusionis the thing experienced,and, qua real, is as
visionof an Absolute. It is not
'good' a realityas the self-luminous
just vagueness,doubtfulness,confusion,at large or in general. It is
this vagueness,and no other; absolutelyunique, absolutelywhat it
is.8 Whatevergain in clearness,in fullness,in truenessof content
is experiencedmust grow out of some elementin the experienceof
this experiencedas what it is. To returnto the illusion: If the
experienceof the lines as convergentis illusory,it is because of some
elementsin the thing as experienced,not because of somethingdefinedin termsof externalityto this particular experience. If the
illusorinesscan be detected,it is becausethe thingexperiencedis real,
having within its experiencedreality elementswhose own mutual
transcendenceeffectsits reconstruction. Taken concretely,the experience of convergentlines contains within itself the elementsof
the transformationof its own content. It is this thing, and not
some separate truth, which clamors for its own reform. There
is, then, from the empiricist's point of view, no need to search
for some aboriginal that to which all successive experiences are
attached, and which is somehow thereby undergoing continuous
change. Experience is always of thats; and, the most comprehensive and inclusive experience of the universe which the philosopher himself can obtain is the experience of a characteristic
that. From the empiricist'spoint of view, this is as true of the
exhaustive and complete insight of a hypotheticalall-knoweras
of the vague, blind experienceof the awakened sleeper. As reals,
they stand on the same level. As trues, the latter has by definitionthe betterof it; but if this insightis in any way the truthof
the blind awakening,it is because the latter has, in its own determinate quale, elementsof real continuitywith the former;it is, ex
hypothesi,transformable
througha series of experiencedreals, without breakof continuityinto the absolutethought-experience.There
is no need of logical manipulationto effectthe transformation,
nor
could any logical considerationeffectit. If effectedat all it is just
8One does not so easily escape medievalRealism as one thinks. Either
its own unsubstitutable,
everyexperiencedthinghas its own determinateness,
unredeemable
reality,or else 'generals' are separateexistencesafterall.
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PSYCHOLOGY

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by immediateexperiences,each of whichis just as real (no more,no

less) as eitherof the two termsbetweenwhichit lies. Such, at least,
is the meaningof the empiricist'scontention. So, whenhe talks of
experience,he does not mean some grandiose,remoteaffairwhichis
cast like a net around a successionof fleetingexperiences;he does
not mean an indefinitetotal, comprehensiveexperiencewhich somehow engirdlesan endless flux; he means that thingsare what they
are experiencedto be, and that everyexperienceis something.
From the postulate of empiricism,then (or, what is the same
thing,from a general considerationof the concept of experience),
nothingcan be deduced,not a singlephilosophicalproposition.9The
readermay henceconcludethat all this just comesto the truismthat
experienceis experience,or is what it is. If one attemptsto draw
conclusionsfromthe bare conceptof experience,the reader is quite
right. But the real significanceof the principleis that of a method
of philosophicalanalysis-a methodidenticalin kind (but differing
in problemand hence in operation) with that of the scientist. If
you wish to find out what subjective, objective, physical, mental,
cosmic,psychic,cause, substance,purpose,activity,evil,being,quantity-any philosophicterm,in short-means,go to experienceand see
what it is experiencedas.
Such a methodis not spectacular; it permitsof no offhanddemonstrationsof God, freedom,immortality,
nor of the exclusivereality
of matter,or ideas, or consciousness,etc. But it supplies a way
of tellingwhat all thesetermsmean. It may seem insignificant,
or
chillinglydisappointing,but only upon condition that it be not
worked. Philosophicconceptionshave, I believe,outlivedtheirusefulnessconsideredas stimulantsto emotion,or as a species of sanctions; and a larger,more fruitfuland more valuable career awaits
themconsideredas specificallyexperiencedmeanings.
JOEN DEWEY.

COLUMBIAUNIVERSITY.
9Excepting, of course, some
negative ones. One could say that certain
views are certainly not true, because, by hypothesis,they refer to nonentities,
i. e., non-empiricals. But even here the empiricist must go slowly. From
his own standpoint, even the most professedly transcendental statements are,
after all, real as experiences, and hence negotiate some transaction with facts.
For this reason, he can not, in theory,reject them in toto, but has to show concretely how they arose and how they are to be corrected. In a word, his logical
relationship to statements that profess to relate to things-in-themselves,unknowables, inexperienced substances, etc., is precisely that of the psychologist
to the Zollner lines.

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