John Dewey

We value possessing knowledge more than true belief. Both someone with knowledge and someone with a true belief possess the correct answer to a question. Why is knowledge more valuable than true belief if both contain the correct answer? I examine the philosophy of American pragmatist John Dewey and then I offer a novel solution to this question often called the value problem of knowledge. I present and explicate (my interpretation of) Dewey’s pragmatic theory of inquiry. Dewey values competent inquiry and claims it is a knowledge-forming process, and I argue that it is competently conducting inquiry that explains why knowledge is more valuable than mere true belief. Knowledge is always the result of a process of competent inquiry (itself valuable) whereas belief can but need not be the result of inquiry. I end by considering and replying to reasonable objections to my pragmatic solution.

In this study, we have tried to identify two different approaches for dealing with social problems and issues. The first one is causal explanation, which is retrospective, static and physical. The other one, functional analysis, is prospective, dynamic, and normative. Institutions are the main subject of economics. Human social-institutional reality has a common underlying structure and these structures are matters of status functions. We proposed a method which aims at efficacy of these functions using intelligence rather than assuming these functions as intrinsic and trying to grasp the realty from without by a rationality apparatus. The aim of this article is to show that, Dewey’s Logic provides us with this alternative functionalistic approach in a comprehensive way.