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Kant's idealism
The freer humans get, the more idealist they become – philosophically, epistemologically, and practically. Relative freedom from want makes possible all kinds of human projects, while individuality is less tightly grasped by communal imperatives.
When there isn't as much freedom, philosophical dogmatism results. The idea that we are dominated by things, that the mind is their product rather than vice versa, is especially well-suited to a world where survival requires society's full attention, where the only "ideal" is found in heaven.
Kant's Critique of pure reason is an example of the turn to idealist philosophy in the wake of a long and powerful wave of creativity and intellectual independence made possible by Europe's increasing prosperity, especially as it was shocked by the accelerant called "the new world." Boy did people in Europe start to make a lot of money. Either they or their children can afford to go to school, indulge in romantic love affairs that highlight pesonal feelings rather than tactically-dictated marriages, read Sorrows of the young Werther by Goethe, become less directly and intimately tied to that great slave-owner and declared enemy of the individual, the land. Historically, Kant's Critique of pure reason was exquisitely situated: first version 1781, second substantive revision in 1787, the very year the founding parents were revising the Articles of Confederation in Philadelphia, and just two tiny, tiny years before the whole five or so centuries-long European game of Risk (those games seem to go on forever!) was upended by – would everyone please rise – the French Revolution of 1789. Please listen to the following short version of the French national anthem.
I have said it was a shame-faced idealism. I think of his immediate successor, J.G. Fichte as "Kant + French Revolution." His first work, The Science of Knowledge (Wissenschaftslehre) came out in 1794. It is a lot more unapologetically idealist.
Kant points to the quickness of the times himself: "No more than a century and a half has elapsed since Bacon's ingenious proposal partly initiated that discovery, partly gave a new impetus to it as others were already on the right track – a discovery which, like the former, can be explained only by a rapid intellectual revolution." "es sind nur etwa anderthalb Jahrhunderte, daß der Vorschlag des sinnreichen Bacon von Verulam diese Entdeckung teils veranlaßte, teils, da man bereits auf der Spur derselben war, mehr belebte, welche eben sowohl durch eine schnell vorgegangene Revolution der Denkart erklärt werden kann." (Bxii-xiii). As we can see, Kant is very concerned to include a lot of references to key figures from the Scientific Revolution when explicating his idealist project:
When Galilei experimented with balls of a definite weight on the inclined plane, when Torricelli caused the air to sustain a weight which he had calculated beforehand to be equal to that of a definite column of water, or when Stahl, at a later period, converted metals into lime, and reconverted lime into metal, by the addition and subtraction of certain elements; a light broke upon all natural philosophers. They learned that reason only perceives that which it produces after its own design . . .
Als Galilei seine Kugeln die schiefe Fläche mit einer von ihm selbst gewählten Schwere herabrollen, oder Torricelli die Luft ein Gewicht, was er sich zum voraus dem einer ihm bekannten Wassersäule gleich gedacht hatte, tragen ließ, oder in noch späterer Zeit Stahl Metalle in Kalk und diesen wiederum in Metall verwandelte, indem er ihnen etwas entzog und wiedergab; so ging allen Naturforschern ein Licht auf. Sie begriffen, daß die Vernunft nur das einsieht, was sie selbst nach ihrem Entwurfe hervorbringt . . . (Bxiii)
And a little later:
Even the science of physics owes the beneficial revolution in its character entirely to the happy thought that we ought to seek in nature (and not import into it by means of fiction) whatever reason has to learn from nature and could not know by itself, and that we must do this in accordance with what reason has originally placed in nature.
Und so hat sogar Physik die so vorteilhafte Revolution ihrer Denkart lediglich dem Einfalle zu verdanken, demjenigen, was die Vernunft selbst in die Natur hineinlegt, gemäß, dasjenige in ihr zu suchen (nicht ihr anzudichten), was sie von dieser lernen muß, und wovon sie für sich selbst nichts wissen würde. (Bxiii)
If, when we 'look' at nature, "we must do [so] in accordance with what reason has originally placed in nature/was die Vernunft selbst in die Natur hineinlegt", then we are thinking idealistically.
Kant's name-dropping from the pantheon of the scientific revolution is at its most ingenious just a few paragraphs later. He says we should imitate the approach taken in the scientific revolution:
Hitherto it has been supposed that all our knowledge must conform to
objects; but under that supposition all attempts to establish anything
about them a priori by means of concepts, and thus to enlarge our
knowledge, have come to nothing. The experiment ought therefore to be
made whether we might not succeed better with the problems of
metaphysics by assuming that objects must conform to our mode of
cognition . . . . We have here the same case as with the first thought
of Copernicus, who, not being able to get on with the explanation of
the movements of the heavenly bodies as long as he assumed that all the
stars turned round the spectator, tried to ascertain whether he could
not better succeed by assuming the spectator to be turning round and
the stars to be at rest. A similar experiment may be tried in
metaphysics so far as the intuition of objects is concerned. If the
intuition had to conform to the constitution of objects, I do not see
how we could know anything a priori, but if the object, as an object of
the senses, conforms to the constitution of our faculty of intuition, I
can very well conceive of such a possibility.
Bisher nahm man an, alle unsere Erkenntnis müsse sich nach den
Gegenständen richten, aber alle Versuche über sie a priori etwas durch
Begriffe auszumachen, wodurch unsere Erkenntnis erweitert würde, gingen
unter dieser Voraussetzung zunichte. Man versuche es daher einmal, ob
wir nicht in den Aufgaben der Metaphysik damit besser fortkommen, daß
wir annehmen, die Gegenstände müssen sich nach unserem Erkenntnis
richten . . . . Es ist hiermit ebenso, als mit den ersten Gedanken des
Kopernikus bewandt, der, nachdem es mit der Erklärung der
Himmelsbewegungen nicht gut fort wollte, wenn er annahm, das ganze
Sternenheer drehe sich um den Zuschauer, versuchte, ob es nicht besser
gelingen möchte, wenn er den Zuschauer sich drehen, und dagegen die
Sterne in Ruhe ließ. In der Metaphysik kann man nun, was die Anschauung
der Gegenstände betrifft, es auf ähnliche Weise versuchen. (Bxvi-xvii)
" . . . die Gegenstände müssen sich nach unserem Erkenntnis richten/the objects must adjust themselves to our knowledge." It must be admitted, using Copernicus is a brilliant cover for the idealist project. Because who is going to say we shouldn't try imitating Copernicus, one of the patron saints of the Enlightenment? But Kant's well-played use of Copernicus, Bacon, and the rest, points to an anxiety about the reception of idealist thinking.
More on these points soon.
By Swifty | April 1, 2007 in Kant | Permalink
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I'm having trouble with the first two paragraphs. That subsistence economies encourage "communal imperatives" doesn't necessarily mean a priority of things over mind, which scheme implies a (possibly anachronous) dualism. Also, this
...especially well-suited to a world where survival requires society's full attention, where the only "ideal" is found in heaven.
sounds to me like a transcendent (as opposed to immanentist) understanding of the religious, and that sort of religion is thought to have originated in politically developed societies, during the so-called Axial Age.
Posted by: Wade | Apr 1, 2007 11:52:58 PM
I'm a idealist. I talk about our idea thougts with my soul friends on tallfriends.com. If you are intrested, you can join us.
Posted by: Lily | Apr 2, 2007 4:52:18 AM
""""A word now against Kant as a moralist. A virtue must be our invention; it must spring out of our personal need and defence. In every other case it is a source of danger. That which does not belong to our life menaces it; a virtue which has its roots in mere respect for the concept of "virtue," as Kant would have it, is pernicious. "Virtue," "duty," "good for its own sake," goodness grounded upon impersonality or a notion of universal validity--these are all chimeras, and in them one finds only an expression of the decay, the last collapse of life, the Chinese spirit of Konigsberg. Quite the contrary is demanded by the most profound laws of self-preservation and of growth: to wit, that every man find hisown virtue, his own categorical imperative. A nation goes to pieces when it confounds its duty with the general concept of duty. Nothing works a more complete and penetrating disaster than every "impersonal" duty, every sacrifice before the Moloch of abstraction.--To think that no one has thought of Kant's categorical imperative as dangerous to life!...The theological instinct alone took it under protection !--An action prompted by the life-instinct proves that it is a right action by the amount of pleasure that goes with it: and yet that Nihilist, with his bowels of Christian dogmatism, regarded pleasure as an objection . . . """"""""
Spitze!
(from THE ANTICHRIST Friedrich Nietzsche
translation by H.L. Mencken (tho' me dutch is not perfect, ah suspect HL did the boy a quite a bit more justice than Walt Kaufstein ever did))
Posted by: Phritz | Apr 2, 2007 9:11:37 AM
Wade writes:
That subsistence economies encourage "communal imperatives" doesn't necessarily mean a priority of things over mind [end Wade]
No, not necessarily, but overall and for the most part, I think so.
Phritz writes:
"Virtue," "duty," "good for its own sake," goodness grounded upon impersonality or a notion of universal validity--these are all chimeras, and in them one finds only an expression of the decay, the last collapse of life, the Chinese spirit of Konigsberg. [end Phritz]
No Chinese spirit of Konigsberg, no intemperate comments from Nietzsche about how we need to free ourselves from the categorical imperative. The categorical imperative -- do you know who it was directed against (okay, okay -- "in part")? Against God. One of the primary features of God is His goodness. He also speaks the language of morality to His creatures. And yet He Himself is exempt from these strictures. A classic do as I say not as I do stance. Kant refuses this exemption for God -- a position not without risks. He says: "Nothing in the world – indeed, nothing even beyond the world – can possibly be conceived which could be called good without qualification except a GOOD WILL." "Es ist überall nichts in der Welt, ja überhaupt auch außer derselben zu denken möglich, was ohne Einschränkung für gut könnte gehalten werden, als allein ein guter Wille."
Posted by: Swifty | Apr 2, 2007 10:07:29 AM
The CI's really utilitarianism, ultimately. What if, on his way to work, Schmendrick ponders the CI in regards to his job: imagine if everyone was a junk-bond salesman? How can he say it's wrong except by understanding the impact (for good or ill) that junk-bond salesmen have on society (ie act--go to work as junkbond saleman--as if it were a maxim applying to everyone. So everyone should be a junkbond king). No?
Similarly for lying: Lil Orphan Annie learns to never tell a lie. Then one day some big mean gangstas pound on her door, and say where's yr Uncle Pepe? And say Pepe is a snitch, or narq, and just ratted out the gangsta's Boss. Annie knows where Uncle Pepe is--just a few doors down at Venus La Rue's pad, enjoying some R n R. Does Annie tell the Twuth? If so Pepe is whacked, and lovely Venus La Rue izz too. If not there might be unsavory business in store for Annie! So she lies, and protects Pepe (who is really a decent goomba). And that could not really be justified via CI, except by modifying to something like do the right (ie less harmful thing),even if it requires lying...........or somethin' like that .
(really Nietzsche's just an old-fashioned machiavellian-stoic at heart.)
Posted by: Phritz | Apr 2, 2007 11:21:54 AM
My first comment wasn't very clear. I didn't mean to say that primitive societies aren't preoccupied with things, as we understand them, over against mental life--only that this way of dividing up the world, between subjects and objects, or between the physical and the psychic, is a fairly novel cultural product. Aristotle's doctrine of the Forms, for example, is much more "participative," in that the Forms are supposed to reside equally in objects and in the person apprehending them; something like this sort of view is probably widespread outside of modern or early-modern Europe.
Maybe Kant is a sort of watershed here. My point, though, was that this change depended on other things besides economic conditions. (At the risk of becoming a bore, I'll recommend Marcel Gauchet's book The Disenchantment of the World as an interesting account of the matter.) Ancient Egyptian society allowed its priestly class endless time and leisure to think about stuff, without their ever coming up with the Critical philosophy.
Posted by: Wade | Apr 2, 2007 2:29:03 PM
X says there are grounds for some view of Mind as premised on a priori truths (analytical and/or synthetic): thus Kantian "categories," space/time, logical form etc are NOT learned from experience, but sort of pre-programmed (the materiality issue is separate).
Y says there are grounds for some view of Mind as premised on posteriori "truths" (analytical and/or synthetic).thus Kantian "categories," space/time, logical form etc are learned from experience, and are not pre-programmed (the materiality issue is separate).
That cannot really be answered EXCEPT by a posteriori type of argument or inference, etc.; or if there is another way to establish it except as a given or presumption it is not clear. And it is highly probable that, in some Lord of the Flies-like epistemological experiment (say without any language, science, communication, but necessaries provided) that human-children would not have any pre-programmed knowledge whatsoever, though yes they might develop some rudimentary symbol language or something. (that's not to invoke Wittgenstein). So do the Credo already. (Ah yeah, Cogito Ergo cogito ergo Sum; credo, Credo ad Absurdum......)
Posted by: Phritz | Apr 2, 2007 4:15:38 PM
Phritz,
I agree with you on the Machiavelli/Nietzsche comparison. That's how I regard some of the comments you quoted from him on, I think it was *Twilight*. Nietzsche never just says, but always, in his saying, does. A speech actor. Often when I read something of his, I don't find myself asking myself if I agree or disagree, but rather from what tactical position this particular comment is deployed.
Regarding the categorical imperative, Phritz writes:
"Similarly for lying: Lil Orphan Annie learns to never tell a lie. Then one day some big mean gangstas pound on her door, and say where's yr Uncle Pepe? And say Pepe is a snitch, or narq, and just ratted out the gangsta's Boss. Annie knows where Uncle Pepe is--just a few doors down at Venus La Rue's pad, enjoying some R n R. Does Annie tell the Twuth?" [end Phritz]
But this is where Kant is *hard* with us. It's right here that he introduces his own bite, the very thing that Nietzsche complained utilitarianism lacked. (Take a look at _Will to Power_ section 262 in the old Kaufmann version.) Kant's challenge is this:
What do you want? Do you want to be *moral* or do you want to save Uncle Pepe? Maybe you want to save Uncle Pepe, and if that's what you want, then go ahead. But the illusion that you have acted *rightly* that was added, without argument, to the lie on behalf of Uncle Pepe is another thing. The example does not prove the silliness of Kant's primary moral principle -- that is, the categorical imperative -- and in general we should grant ahead of time that if we think a genius of world-historic rank like Immanuel Kant has proposed a silly idea, we must be on our guard against disappointment. I would compare it to playing a game of chess against, in my case, someone who knows how to play chess moderately well. Or against a computer! If you see a computer make what seems like a poor move on the chess board, you're going to be very careful about assessing that supposed error.
What is the goal of the categorical imperative? If we obey categorical imperatives, what happens? What concrete result justifies sticking with them; what motivates us to obey them in all cases whatsoever?
The wrong answer in my view is: "Implement Kant's idea about categorical imperatives because then the world around us will become more moral." But it is not with a view to producing a more just world that Kant writes. The assumption that all morality is judged relative to its effects in the broader community is itself a utilitarian prejudice, and a mark of that doctrine's pervasiveness.
Kant's approach is more 'conservationist.' He's not hoping to make the world moral, he's trying to make possible the continued existence of a 'threatened species,' one that losing the last traces of terrain in which it can exist. The 'good will.'
Morality is absolute. The Ten Commandments as an example. Notice the Sermon on the Mount isn't 'moral.' So to be a morality, unconditional laws must be involved. There are no "if . . . then" clauses in The Ten Commandments (those are in Deuteronomy).
A good will is an autonomous will, a self-law-giving will. Uninfluenced by extraneous considerations, such as, for instance, everything empirical. Not that the Uncle Pepe case is empirical, because in that example the fate of Uncle Pepe is non-empirically assumed to be the one that awaits him.
And so with Kant's approach, you do not 'look out on the world' and then consider your act, and decide what to do based on what will happen out there when you act. Which, by the way, even as a practical matter, is a very tricky and unreliable way either to be moral or to help others.
Instead, the Kantian moralist thinks like this:
Here's a situation in the world that confronts me: namely, I am urged (by circumstances, by other people, by my own emotions and feelings) to lie in order to save a life. In my mind is the law I have given myself concerning situations of this kind: "I shall not lie." In considering my action, my sole concern is to keep alive the flickering and rare light of the moral law. But even if it weren't flickering the "value hierarchy" would be the same. What I am *concerned about* in the Kantian frame of mind is whether or not I continue to be autonomous (to obey my own *laws*), and that I treat those laws as laws that cannot be broken.
We cannot conclude, however, that Kant is saying we "should act morally regardless of the consequences." There is a specific consequence involved in acting morally in Kant's sense of the word: morality continues to exist in the world! And preserving that might be worth staring straight ahead, yes, and telling the gangsta boss, as you put it, the Twuth.
Posted by: Swifty | Apr 2, 2007 6:11:16 PM
That sounds rather mystical. In some sense, I think Kant himself was suggesting a sort of consequentialist view, a maxim like "put yourself in another's shoes before acting". And if that is the case (tho' a Kantian or theist would probably object), maxim-formation would require some knowledge of what maxims entail: say Uncle Pepe loses his job as casino boss (itself subject to CI) and decides, after meeting with Frenchy, to deal heroin. But he has been reading Long Sunday (he's a bit of a red) and notes one of the LS Kantian-marxists, who says one must put his act--becoming a Heroin-salesman-- into ye olde CI as a maxim. How does he know what to do? Only by knowing or attempting to know what specific consequence heroin sales will result in. And I think that is generally the case; certainly in most economic or bio-political situations. Lying is rather peculiar I grant; but one could imagine numerous scenarios where lying would definitely be the right thing to do, and not lying would indeed be sinister (in a totalitarian regime, or mob-controlled city, etc.). And Kant's zealous--if not naive--- insistence on duty (i.e. always tell the truth) is what irked Nietzsche, I suspect.
Posted by: Phritz | Apr 2, 2007 10:02:29 PM
"the Sermon on the Mount isn't 'moral."
That's debatable. Recall the Golden rule: "do unto others as you would have them do unto you." What do the ethics people call that? Reciprocity, methinx. I'm not xtian, but that's a bit different than the absolutes of the Decalogue. Indeed it could a practical maxim of sorts, prudent, etc.: nearly Buddhistic (and perhaps unwise in tactical sense--Aurelius was a doing Nietzsche act--or Heinlein-- in 200 AD ). But virtue/prudence readings of ethics--and of Kant-- overlook the central, and even empirical issue: ethics presumes society.
Hobbes precedes Kant (and it is my contention that Hobbes's state of nature anticipates Nietzsche, as well as Marx, Darwin etc.). Most ethical maxims would be part of a covenant, and social contract. And any such act-maxims would be formulated--indeed "ought" to be---in regards to the consequences of the acts, politically, socially, bio-chemically. What is the alternative? Judging acts by some a priori platonic or Kantian ghost? So lying would be verboten in a social contract, more than likely, since lying would lead to all sorts of unsavory and unpleasant situations. Rationalist ethics might have a certain formal appeal, but for practical, economic society, consequentialism holds; tho' of course if one simply rejects democracy (as Nietzsche does) then it's a moot point, and I think in some sense the sublime nature of Nietzschean misanthropy is that anti-democratic, and anti-ethical aspect: the Nietzschean, like the rebel knight in Hobbes' Leviathan, simply refuses to accept the terms of the social contract, including the ethics (and theology).
Posted by: Phritz | Apr 3, 2007 9:54:25 AM
I don't think the bit about 'do unto your neighbors as you would have them do to you' is in the Sermon on the Mount. Here's the version from Matthew:
Matthew 5:1-12
And seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain: and when he was set, his disciples came unto him:
And he opened his mouth, and taught them, saying,
Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.
Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.
Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.
Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake.
Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward
Matthew 5:38-40
Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth:
But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.
And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also.
And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain.
Matthew 5:43-44
Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.
But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;
[end Sermon from Matthew]
Notice the last bit about loving your enemy -- that's much more radical than 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you.' Precisely because that's so reciprocal, Jesus rejects it. 'Love your enemies' means doing unto others nice things even when they do not act nicely to you. Someone slaps you really hard across the face? Offer your other cheek so he can slap that one really hard too. Someone asks you for your coat? Give him your shirt too. That's what Jesus says. And those aren't 'moral' injunctions. Notice too the comment about an "eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," which is an old principle of justice and morality. Jesus rejects it and dictates a replacement for it.
Posted by: Swifty | Apr 3, 2007 11:03:45 AM
You are beginning to sound like a theologian (and I hope you grant that theology cannot be rationally defended). Universalist ethics does seem opposed to economic-political realism in some sense: I do not think there are many people who would agree that a "good" lie, or shall we say, pleading the 5th--say by Annie, when she refuses to answer the mafiosos/gestapo/cheka at her door (or email etc.)--- would be the greatest sin in the world. And I imagine that there were scenarios like that with the Cheka, Gestapo etc., where the lie was the right thing to do; wouldn't the world had been much better if Rommel and his cronies had succeeded in offing Der Fuhrer? I think most people would say yes (and marxism certainly has a relation to consequentialism, for better or worse).
In regards to Kant and Screepture, one could invoke all the old skeptical arguments: Ivan Karamazov's ticket-refusal to the Deity (who, a few decades apres-Dostoyevsky, allowed, watched, monitored the events of the 20th century and refused to intervene) being one of the best. Concentration camps, ICBMs, pol pots: all part of Providence for theists (and proof of the absurdity of theological claims for some of us, uh searching for unclaimed federal funds online). So while He may supposedly hold us to some imperative (tho' Screepture is far from consistent, nor is it even relevant, really), He hisself is not bound by any such trivial rules.
Posted by: Phritz | Apr 3, 2007 11:33:45 AM
Additionally, you yourself have been known to quote Master Hume on occasion, Swifty, and must realize, however troubling it seems, that Kant seems to be suggesting some type of obligation, however cleverly he constructs his "imperative." And if obligation, there is sort of "prologema" chat to that obligation: Kant makes some assumptions which are more a matter of faith than reason. Why are we obligated to universalize any act-maxim, for one? I do not think Kant can really establish that. It might seem "good" (ie. good for society, conducive to democracy, even ---pleasant, harmonius, etc): so again he assumes some good end of the CI. Why else are we obligated to uphold the CI, unless it produces "good"? (I suspect you will bring Screepture, or absolutes, etc.--but those are all secondary, and unprovable assumptions). Which is to say the Hume fact/value problem (and I don't think we should admire Humean skepticism) remains a problem for any ethical rationalist: at some point he has to establish why we are obligated to uphold any maxim (rule, law, contract, duty) , and to do so, I suggest requires some type of consequentialism. We agree to be ethical---really, to abide by contracts (and to have the sovereign enforce them)--- because it is in our best interest, and the alternative is anarchy, or something to that effect. Or one rejects ethics--- and democracy.
Posted by: Phritz | Apr 3, 2007 12:43:36 PM
At Bxviii Kant refers to the "altered method of our thinking, namely that we can cognize of things a priori only what we ourselves have put into them. / veränderte Methode der Denkungsart annehmen, daß wir nämlich von den Dingen nur das a priori erkennen, was wir selbst in sie legen."
Now, does this notion that we put things into nature that we then observe and call "objective truth independent of subjective willing"; our "empirical truth purified of everything subjective" – does that make Kant an 'idealist'? Paul Valery writes: "The Universe is built on a plan the profound symmetry of which is somehow present in the inner structure of our intellect." Kant speaks of "the laws which lie a priori at the foundation of nature / die Gesetze, welche a priori der Natur . . . zum Grunde liegen." Are Valery and Kant on the same page here?
Posted by: Swifty | Apr 3, 2007 5:56:51 PM
Nietzsche often provides a valuable critical perspective on the epistemological question.
"Man is a creature that makes shapes and rhythms; he is practiced at nothing better and it seems that he takes pleasure in nothing more than in inventing figures. Only observe how our eye occupies itself as soon as it receives nothing more to see: it creates itself something to see. Presumably in the same situation our hearing does just that, too: it practices. Without the transformation of the world into figures and rhythms there would be nothing 'the same' for us, thus nothing recurrent, and thus no possibility of experiencing and appropriating, of feeding. In all perception, i.e., in the most original appropriation, what is essentially happening is an action, or more precisely: an imposition of shapes upon things -- only the superficial talk of 'impressions.' In this way man comes to know his force as a resisting and even more as a determining force -- rejecting, selecting, shaping to fit, slotting into his schemata. There is something active about our taking on a stimulus in the first place and taking it on as that particular stimulus. It is in the nature of this activity not only to posit shapes, rhythms and successions of shapes, but also to appraise the formation it has created with an eye to incorporation or rejection. Thus arises our world, our whole world: and no supposed 'true reality', no 'in-themselves of things' corresponds to this whole world which we have created, belonging to us alone. Rather it is itself our only reality, and 'knowledge' thus considered proves to be only a means of feeding. But we are beings who are difficult to feed and have everywhere enemies and, as it were, indigestibles -- that is what has made human knowledge refined, and ultimately so proud of its refinement that it doesn't want to hear that it is not a goal but a means, or even a tool of the stomach -- if not a kind of stomach! --
-- Nietzsche, Writings from the Late Notebooks CUP: 2003 pp. 37-38
Posted by: Swifty | Apr 7, 2007 9:59:58 PM
Nietzschean naturalism suggests the real problem of Kantian/rationalist ethics (and any politics based on rationalist ethics): any supposed obligations, maxims, laws are dependent on pre-existing social relations--generally premised on military occupation, invasions, seizure, theocracy, etc. Since those initial conditions were not themselves ever really negotiated (i.e Nietzsche objects greatly to the beulah-land visions of Rousseau and Locke--tho' Hobbes certainly anticipates Nietzsche's political ideas, and anti-democratic views), any objective, rationalist ethics is itself sort of meaningless--Caesar is not stopping to perform an act-maxim; an outlaw robbing someone during a famine is no more guilty than a wolf hunting a deer, or something to that effect.
In theory, a truth-telling obligation seems somewhat necessary (i.e. ethics as rationality, instead of via the utilitarian hedonism), but that is subsequent to economic and social formation (marxists thus are often close to Nietzschean naturalist views, but are of course infaturated with the state, and misguided in regards to the generalizations of class struggle). One might be acting inconsistently or irrationally, say, during a famine or revolution or war, when hording food, lying, robbing people, (think Katrina), etc. but Hobbes would simply say morality does not exist in a state of nature, anymore than it does when a lion hunts a gazelle--Hobbes however grants that people can and will negotiate some consistent moral- and democratic foundation at some point, whereas Nietzsche does not consent to that................
Posted by: Phlojo | Apr 8, 2007 12:34:23 PM
In his footnote to Bxviii Kant introduces the idea that we should look at objects from two sides. The value of this "twofold standpoint / doppelten Gesichtspunkte" is that there is an "unavoidable conflict of reason with itself [that] arises with a single standpoint / ein unvermeidlicher Widerstreit der Vernunft mit sich selbst entspringe".
The double standpoint is this: [T]he same objects can be considered from two different sides, on the one side as objects of the senses and the understanding for experience, and on the other side as objects that are merely thought at most for isolated reason striving beyond the bounds of experience. / dieselben Gegenstände einerseits als Gegenstände der Sinne und des Verstandes für die Erfahrung, andererseits aber doch als Gegenstände, die man bloß denkt, allenfalls für die isolierte und über Erfahrungsgrenze hinausstrebende Vernunft.
But why would anyone want to think about objects from this double perspective? That would be because human reason is so often confronted with questions that it cannot avoid but which reason – the faculty usually assigned to deal with questions – is unable to address satisfactorily. If we confine all objects (rocks, plants, God, the soul) to one perspective, and ask reason to deal with them, it will do fine with rocks and plants but will end up misusing reason to patch together answers about God and soul. The "primary purpose / erster Nutzen" (Bxxiv-xxv) of the Critique of pure reason is "negative . . . teaching us never to venture with speculative reason beyond the boundaries of experience / negativ . . . uns nämlich mit der spekulativen Vernunft niemals über die Erfahrungsgrenze hinaus zu wagen" (Ibid.).
But this negative limitation on reason, Kant argues, also has a positive side, the same kind of beneficial effect as that provided by police who keep a town safe, thus allowing its citizens to go about their lives (Bxxvi). The truth is, Kant says, is that "when we become aware of the principles with which speculative reason ventures beyond its boundaries do not in fact result in extending our use of reason, but rather, if one considers them more closely, inevitably results in narrowing it by threatening to extend the boundaries of sensibility, to which these principles really belong, beyond everything, and so even to dislodge the use of pure (practical) reason / wenn man inne wird, daß die Grundsätze, mit denen sich spekulative Vernunft über ihre Grenze hinauswagt, in der Tat nicht Erweiterung, sondern, wenn man sie näher betrachtet, Verengung unseres Vernunftgebrauchs zum unausbleiblichen Erfolg haben, indem sie wirklich die Grenzen der Sinnlichkeit, zu der sie eigentlich gehören, über alles zu erweitern und so den reinen (praktischen) Vernunftgebrauch gar zu verdrängen drohen" (Bxxiv-xxv).
My reading of the above is that if we insist on applying reason to every object of reason, all across the spectrum of conceivable objects, whether moral or natural, we will end up undermining morality by treating human beings as natural objects, determined all the way down, in which there is no room for freedom and thus none for morality. See also Bxxvii. Kant:
Hence a critique that limits the speculative use of reason is, to be sure, to that extent negative, but because it simultaneously removes an obstacle that limits or even threatens to wipe out the practical use of reason, this critique is also in fact of positive and very important utility, as soon as we have convinced ourselves that there is an absolutely necessary practical use of pure reason (the moral use), in which reason unavoidably extends itself beyond the boundaries of reason, but in which it must also be made secure against any counteraction from the latter, in order not to fall into contradiction with itself. / Daher ist eine Kritik, welche die erstere einschränkt, sofern zwar negativ, aber, indem sie dadurch zugleich ein Hindernis, welches den letzteren Gebrauch einschränkt oder gar zu vernichten droht, aufhebt, in der Tat von positivem und sehr wichtigem Nutzen, sobald man überzeugt wird, daß es einen schlechterdings notwendigen praktischen Gebrauch der reinen Vernunft (den moralischen) gebe, in welchem sie sich unvermeidlich über die Grenzen der Sinnlichkeit erweitert, dazu sie zwar von der spekulativen keiner Beihilfe bedarf, dennoch aber wider ihre Gegenwirkung gesichert sein muß, um nicht in Widerspruch mit sich selbst zu geraten. Bxxv-xxvi
And so: limit reason's application to experience-based phenomenon. That will keep reason from being authorized to address non-experience-based phenomena like God, the soul, freedom of the will, and so on. And that might seem like a big disappointment, because what, is Kant suggesting we stop thinking about God and soul? Does "limit reason's application to x, y, and z" also mean "stop thinking about" them? By no means. As Kant said above, there is an "absolutely necessary practical use of pure reason (the moral use)", in which reason "unavoidably extends itself beyond the boundaries of reason / einen schlechterdings notwendigen praktischen Gebrauch der reinen Vernunft (den moralischen) gebe, in welchem sie sich unvermeidlich über die Grenzen der Sinnlichkeit erweitert."
But then what does this "absolutely necessary practical use of pure reason" base itself on? One of the big conclusions of this Critique is that "we have no concepts of the understanding and hence no elements for the cognition of things except insofar as an intuition can be given corresponding to these concepts, consequently . . . we can have cognition of no object as a thing in itself, but only insofar as it is an object of sensible intuition, i.e. as an appearance from which follows the limitation of all even possible speculative cognition of reason to mere objects of experience. Yet the reservation must also be well noted, that even if we cannot cognize these same objects as things in themselves, we at least must be able to think them as things in themselves. / wir . . . keine Verstandesbegriffe, mithin auch gar keine Elemente zur Erkenntnis der Dinge haben, als sofern diesen Begriffen korrespondierende Anschauung gegeben werden kann, folglich wir von keinem Gegenstande als Dinge an sich selbst, nur sofern es Objekt der sinnlichen Anschauung ist, d.i. als Erscheinung, Erkenntnis haben können, wird im analytischen Teile der Kritik bewiesen; woraus denn freilich die Einschränkung aller nur möglichen spekulativen Erkenntnis der Vernunft auf bloße Gegenstände der Erfahrung folgt. Gleichwohl wird, welches wohl gemerkt werden muß, doch dabei immer vorbehalten, daß wir eben dieselben Gegenstände auch als Dinge an sich selbst, wenn gleich nicht erkennen, doch wenigstens müssen denken können. (Bxxvi-xxvii)
We can think about them as things in themselves. The idea 'God' shows up as an appearance in our minds. We can think about that appearance! As Kant assures us, "I can think whatever I like, as long as I do not contradict myself, i.e., as long as my concept is a possible thought, even if I cannot give any assurance whether or not there is a corresponding object somewhere. / denken kann ich, was ich will, wenn ich mir nur nicht selbst widerspreche, d.i. wenn mein Begriff nur ein möglicher Gedanke ist, ob ich zwar dafür nicht stehen kann, ob im Inbegriffe aller Möglichkeiten diesem auch ein Objekt korrespondiere oder nicht" (Bxxvi).
But does this solve anything for us regarding, for example, God? Go ahead and think about him. But first of all, you can't assure yourself there's a corresponding object out there called God. Not using reason you can't. What about his features? Can we say that "God is just," or "God is good"? That, I'm afraid, is going to be a problem, and sends us full circle back to the first and best Enlightenment commentators, like Pierre Bayle. Once reason starts working it is very hard to control it.
Believer in God: God is just.
User of reason: Is God just like others are just? Is our current ruler just?
Believer in God: Our current ruler is sometimes just, sometimes not; but overall, she is just.
User of reason: Is the justice of God like the justice of our ruler?
Believer in God: Yes, only much purer, without any of the flaws of our current ruler.
User of reason: And this God, is he powerful as our ruler is?
Believer in God: Yes, only much more powerful; indeed, omnipotent.
User of reason: Perfect justice combined with omnipotence, then?
Believer in God: Exactly.
User of reason: Do you see injustice in the world?
Believer in God: Everyone sees injustice in the world.
User of reason: Is it the job of a ruler to to right injustice?
Believer: It is the most important job of a ruler.
User: And our current ruler, she is unable to right every wrong partly due to her own mistakes, partly due to her lack of power to effect all cases?
Believer: Those are features of our earthly, fallen condition.
User: But "mistakes" and "insufficient efficacy" – these cannot be ascribed to your God, can they?
Believer: In no way. God is all powerful and completely just.
User: But then how do you account for the presence of evil and injustice in the world? Either God is all-powerful and just; all-powerful but not just; just but not all-powerful; neither just nor all-powerful. The last three possibilities do not accord with the nature of God, but if the first one is right, where does evil come from, or why doesn't God intervene and fix it? (very freely adapted from Bayle; see his "Paulicians" article in Critical and Historical Dictionary).
So, saying that we can 'think' an idea but then we have to quarantine it, not as a virus itself, but as subject to the virus of reason. In other words, Kant wants to put in quarantine and exempt from all criticism the very thing that got the Enlightenment going in the first place as an intellectual movement. Kant wants to circumscribe the kinds of questions reason will allow itself to expend serious energy on. There's no point in trying to use reason to establish the existence of God, the soul, or free will, because those items go beyond our experience, and after Kant, reason will have learned its lesson that it can't go beyond experience that way. So reason will no longer spend long afternoons trying to accommodate God and reason. But will reason also stop spending long afternoons showing us how God cannot exist – not, at least, as the kind of God that has been thought of up until now. The excessively optimistic 'constructivist' side of reason is checked, but what about the – frankly more prevalent – 'deconstructionist' efforts? The supposedly amoral effects of reason are not confined to attempts to reconcile God and reason by using the latter to prove or explicate the former. The usual operation coming out of the Enlightenment is not "God and reason can be reconciled" – though this may be the tradition Kant was thinking of. The more usual approach is "even the idea of God – forget about debating his existence – is completely impossible, self-contradictory, and is easily exploded." And Kant's not suggesting anything be done about that kind of activity, is he?
Kant:
Just the same sort of exposition of the positive utility of critical principles of pure reason can be given to the concepts of God and of the simple nature of our soul, which, however, I forgo for the sake of brevity. Thus I cannot even assume God, freedom and immortality for the sake of the necessary practical use of my reason unless I simultaneously deprive speculative reason of its pretension to extravagant insights; because in order to attain such insights, speculative reason would have to help itself to principles that in fact reach only to objects of possible experience, and which, if they were to be applied to what cannot be an object of possible experience, then they would always actually transform it into an appearance, and thus declare all practical extension of pure reason to be impossible. Thus I had to deny knowledge in order to make room for faith; and the dogmatism of metaphysics, i.e., the prejudice that without criticism reason can make progress in metaphysics, is the true source of all unbelief conflicting with morality, which belief is always very dogmatic.
Eben diese Erörterung des positiven Nutzens kritischer Grundsätze der reinen Vernunft läßt sich in Ansehung des Begriffs von Gott und der einfachen Natur unserer Seele zeigen, die ich aber der Kürze halber vorbeigehe. Ich kann also Gott, Freiheit und Unsterblichkeit zum Behuf des notwendigen praktischen Gebrauchs meiner Vernunft nicht einmal annehmen, wenn ich nicht der spekulativen Vernunft zugleich ihre Anmaßung überschwenglicher Einsichten benehme, weil sie sich, um zu diesen zu gelangen, solcher Grundsätze bedienen muß, die, indem sie in der Tag bloß auf Gegenstände möglicher Erfahrung reichen, wenn sie gleichwohl auf das angewandt werden, was nicht ein Gegenstand der Erfahrung sein kann, wirklich dieses jederzeit in Erscheinung verwandeln, und so alle praktische Erweiterung der reinen Vernunft für unmöglich erklären. Ich mußte also das Wissen aufheben, um zum Glauben Platz zu bekommen, und der Dogmatismus der Metaphysik, d.i. das Vorurteil, in ihr ohne Kritik der reinen Vernunft fortzukommen, ist die wahre Quelle alles der Moralität widerstreitenden Unglaubens, der jederzeit gar sehr dogmatisch ist.
Posted by: Swifty | Apr 9, 2007 1:58:32 PM
Sehr gut, mein Herr, yet if you read those sections more closely you might note that he more or less denies the possibility of any sure knowledge of Noumena, including Gott: ah think it's rather clear that Kant consistently suggests that knowledge, (including conceptual knowledge via the reflection of the understanding) follows from experience, and is dependent upon perceivable phenomena (another point that is forgotten daily by Heideggerians, if not most postmods): the speculations regarding the synthetic a priori, space/time, categories, etc, then a sort of cognitive foundation (and it's not entirely clear whether Kant's "idealism" was intended to be immaterial or not). Even granting Kant's empirical aspects (well that is except for his mostly ludicrous thoughts on physics as a priori), however, Kantian rationalism generally serves as a hindrance to economic-historical awareness, and an assistance to the theologians. Which is to say, as schema theory, and even as political epistemology Kant's First Critique may have some use (since cognitivists have hardly succeeded as of yet); as statements about some transcendental, noumenal realm, it is probably worse than like Descartes if not Aquinas (Descartes rarely indulges in such grand speculations about non-perceivable mental faculties).
""This schematism of our understanding in regard to phenomena and their mere form, is an art, hidden in the depths of the human soul, whose true modes of action we shall only with difficulty discover and unveil. Thus much only can we say: “The image is a product of the empirical faculty of the productive imagination—the schema of sensuous conceptions (of figures in space, for example) is a product, and, as it were, a monogram of the pure imagination a priori, whereby and according to which images first become possible, which, however, can be connected with the conception only mediately by means of the schema which they indicate, and are in themselves never fully adequate to it.” On the other hand, the schema of a pure conception of the understanding is something that cannot be reduced into any image—it is nothing else than the pure synthesis expressed by the category, conformably, to a rule of unity according to conceptions. It is a transcendental product of the imagination, a product which concerns the determination of the internal sense, according to conditions of its form (time) in respect to all representations, in so far as these representations must be conjoined a priori in one conception, conformably to the unity of apperception.""
Interesting, Doc Kant, even sublime, but some rubes might wonder if IK actually knew what eyes were, much less a brain. Those could conceivably be empirical questions about neurology--not metaphysics.
Posted by: Pozo | Apr 9, 2007 3:08:55 PM
Pozo writes, quoting Kant:
"On the other hand, the schema of a pure conception of the understanding is something that cannot be reduced into any image—it is nothing else than the pure synthesis expressed by the category, conformably, to a rule of unity according to conceptions. It is a transcendental product of the imagination, a product which concerns the determination of the internal sense, according to conditions of its form (time) in respect to all representations, in so far as these representations must be conjoined a priori in one conception, conformably to the unity of apperception."
And they complain about Heidegger! And they complain about Derrida!
Plotz writes (this time not a quotation):
ah think it's rather clear that Kant consistently suggests that knowledge, (including conceptual knowledge via the reflection of the understanding) follows from experience, and is dependent upon perceivable phenomena (another point that is forgotten daily by Heideggerians, if not most postmods)
[end Plotz]
The reading above of Kant -- namely that, according to him, knowledge, including conceptual knowledge, follows from experience and is dependent upon perceivable phenomena -- reminds me of Fichte's comment in the First Introduction to the Wissenschaftslehre:
"Modern philosophers . . . are as a whole dogmatists and are firmly resolved to remain so. The only reason they put up with Kant at all is that it was possible to make him out to be a dogmatist . . . . But these same sages necessarily find the Wissenschaftslehre to be unbearable, because it cannot be transformed in this way. The rapid diffusion of the Kantian philosophy just as soon as it became interpreted in the [dogmatic] manner in which it is now interpreted is no proof of the profundity of our age; on the contrary, it testifies to the superficiality of the same. This form of 'Kantianism' is the most fantastic monster that human fantasy has ever engendered, and it does little credit to the perspicuity of its defenders that they fail to realize this. Furthermore, it can be easily proven that the only thing that recommends this philosophy is that it allows people to dispense with all serious speculation and allows them to believe that they have been granted a royal patent authorizing them to continue cultivating their beloved and superficial empiricism." Fichte, Introductions to the Wissenschaftslehre and Other Writings, trans. Daniel Breazele, Hackett, p. 15.
My reading is that for Kant this point cut both ways: yes, knowledge comes from experience, knowledge comes from perceivable phenomena, but the perceivable phenomena is only that way via the concepts. In other words that there is an irreducible interaction between concepts and appearances, such that you can't separate them out and point to the appearance (the "sensation") as being in one place while over there, independently observable, is found the concept; the mental array of sortings and groupings that make our perception of that 'perceivable' what it is.
Posted by: Swifty | Apr 9, 2007 5:11:00 PM
"""In other words that there is an irreducible interaction between concepts and appearances, such that you can't separate them out and point to the appearance (the "sensation") as being in one place while over there, independently observable, is found the concept; the mental array of sortings and groupings that make our perception of that 'perceivable' what it is.""
That's just it: the immense problem of separating sensations from the understanding (or in Hume's more minimal language, impressions from ideas (or subsequent relations of ideas to ideas---conceptions, etc.) or demonstrating how a priori or supposedly innate categories process perceptions doesn't phase Kant: he writes hundreds of pages (and even grants the speculative nature of his thought) in hopes of providing some grand cognitive metaphysics which will account for all knowledge (and various theological concepts as well).
Not to wax Popperian (not my fave of 20th century hacks), but how does one even disprove Kant's system, really? Since you referred to dogma, I would claim that the large proportion of Kantian idealism is a type of dogma: we cannot really ascertain the reality of the mental/cognitive processes in question (is the synthetic a priori a brain function and mental process, or something else?), thus statements regarding their existence are contingent, ambiguous, if not odd.
We might not go as far as the positivists and say Kant's metaphysical propositions are meaningless (since there exists no sure way to confirm them), but that he was attempting a sort of cognitive psychology and analysis of perception (regardless of what any anti-psych. people might say) decades before any decent brain science existed--and again, I suggest Kant does some rather unaware of basic perceptive facts, such as eyesight, hearing, touch, etc, as well as shall we say economic and biological functions (at least Hobbes and Locke have a keen awareness of human's economic nature (as Marx, no pal of Kantianism, realizes). I tend to think even Descartes was more aware of the natural sciences than was the mysterious Herr K.). As phun or maybe conceptual indulgence, Kant's somewhat interesting (tho' some of us hear preacherly rhetoric, loud and clear): as first philosophy or political foundation, hell no. (Es toot mir leid, but that is how Pozo feels.)
Posted by: Pozo | Apr 9, 2007 5:59:10 PM
Does the Kantian empiricist approve of the Foucaultian pathologist? Not entirely sure, but as with Freud's reflections on trench warfare in WWI, Foucault's perceptions of widespread madness (the historical phenomena) do seem slightly more cogent than the great hymns to Reason of Hegel and his school. The anti-Enlightenment tone doesn't play well in philosophy or belle-lettres (or science for that matter): the belle-lettrist prefers his tragedy in a vintage circa, oh 1600, if not 400 BC........
Posted by: Malfeasancio | Apr 12, 2007 1:04:26 PM
" . . . die Gegenstände müssen sich nach unserem Erkenntnis richten/the objects must adjust themselves to our knowledge." It must be admitted, using Copernicus is a brilliant cover for the idealist project.
Yes, and a rather questionable cover. Copernicus' discoveries might as easily be read as inductive and empirical instead of idealist: getting rid of the ancient Aristotelian assumptions (including a priori ones), Copernicus finally makes the correct observation about a heliocentric system. The Kantian idea (idealist idea) that reason is somehow present in nature seems at least as dubious as naive empiricism. German metaphysicians, even ones as scientifically informed as Kant, could never accept a godless nature, so instead of providence or design or whatever, they substitute in Reason itself.
Posted by: Vato | Aug 24, 2007 3:41:35 PM
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