Page:Philosophical Review Volume 24.djvu/369

No. 3.] right, the latter should give way to the former. Institutions are but the tools of a community; they are not civilization or ends in themselves. Concrete common needs are the basis of true rights. In case of doubt as to whether apparently common needs are really genuine, it may be well to have the institution help decide, but it should not be allowed to hinder such a discisiondecision [sic]. Institutions of government must give way to common human needs.

The few studies of social values that have been made have confined themselves to the actions of children and crowds: developed minds have rarely been the objects of direct attention in this connection. This article aims to suggest the problems concerning adult social acts and attitudes by examining the familiar experience of having a friend. Analysis of experiences of intimate friendship show that the friend himself, not the advantages he gives, is the valued object. Friendship is anthitetical to barter. The giver of the gifts experienced in friendship is valued above his gifts because he has experiences of his own. His experiences are valued. Friends have one another. Social psychology has rarely tried to analyze the value thus realized. It has examined such processes as suggestion; it has given a genetic account of social intercourse; it has shown that such an experience implies the knowledge of other minds and refutes the atomic theory of mind. With the fact that social experience means multiple experience, social psychology has done but little. The description given by functional psychology evades this problem when it treats consciousness merely as a means of adjustment: we adjust ourselves to consciousness, not merely through it.