On Learning: A General Theory of Objects and Object-Relations (1st)

Thisis a philosophical work that develops a general theory of ontological objectsand object-relations. It does this by examining concepts as acquireddispositions, and then focuses on perhaps the most important of these: theconcept of learning. This concept is important because everything that we knowand do in the world is predicated on a prior act of learning.

Aconcept can have many meanings and can be used in a number of different ways,and this creates difficulty when considering the nature of objects and therelationships between them. To enable this, David Scott answers a series ofquestions about concepts in general and the concept of learning in particular.Some of these questions are: What is learning? What different meanings can begiven to the notion of learning? How does the concept of learning relate toother concepts, such as innatism, development and progression?

Thebook offers a counter-argument to empiricist conceptions of learning, to thepropagation of simple messages about learning, knowledge, curriculum andassessment, and to the denial that values arecentral to understanding how we live. It argues that values permeate everything:our descriptions of the world, the attempts we make at creating better futuresand our relations with other people.