Fooloso4 wrote: ↑July 22nd, 2018, 2:42 pm
Spectrum:
I don't see A491 as directly relevant in this case.
It makes clear Kant’s criticism of the realist, that is, making things given in sensible intuition into things subsisting in themselves. This is an epistemological rather than ontological issue. It sets limits on what we can know not limits on what is. Once again: The realist’s mistake, according to Kant, is to make representations in things in themselves.
I don't agree with the above.
The realist's mistake is insisting there is a thing-in-itself that is independent of its representation in the mind.
see
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_realism
Kant point is there is no thing-in-itself out there or anywhere AT ALL in a positive sense.
At best what the realist's is insisting as an independent thing-in-itself is only their representation in mind, not a thing independent of mind, thus the illusion.
This is why Kant exposed so the called 'realists' as Empirical Idealists. [wonder you understand the reasoning behind this point?]
You have to take the whole context of the CPR into account to understand this.
I had explained, in a meta-perspective both are the same and interdependent just as the very contrasting piece of charcoal and diamond are both pure carbon.
The conclusions we draw are not independent of us but this does not mean the correctness of that conclusion is dependent on us. If you murdered someone then the correctness of that conclusion is not based on me but on what actually happened. If the correctness of that conclusion cannot be determined it would be wrong to draw the further conclusion that whether you did murder someone is dependent on the person drawing the conclusion. Whether the moon existed before mankind is a determination we must make, but the correctness of that determination is not dependent on us even though the determination of its correctness is not independent of us.
The problem is complicated by the fact that we are, according to Kant, talking about an object given in sensible intuition. Another creature sufficiently different from us may not see the moon as we do.
What is perceived is dependent on the way the creature perceives, but that
there is something to be perceived is not dependent on the creature who perceives it.[/quote]
I have stated the conclusions we draw are
interdependent with us.
A scientist [say Einstein] or a group of scientist can drawn an objective conclusion about a thing [object or principle of nature] that is independent of themselves or humans.
But however, the apparent objective independent conclusion by one scientist or a group is conditioned upon the Scientific Framework and System established and maintained by the whole community of scientists.
As you are aware, objective scientific theories are changed or are discarded all the time.
E.g. Pluto was concluded as a planet but is now reclassified as a dwarf planet.
But you could insist there is still
something there.
But what is there that we conclude as Pluto the dwarf planet? rocks, sand and earth or a bundle of molecules or bundle of energy or God particles?
Ultimately there is no pluto-in-itself, there is nothing!
Whatever creatures who perceive will have their own self-dependent Framework and System.
According to the realists, where something exists independently and objectively as a thing-in-itself, its essence will be the same throughout regardless of whichever creatures perceives it.
Note Heidegger condemned such a theory that there is an independent "it" or "that" that is perceived.
Science do consider the thing-in-itself but the Scientific Framework and System merely introduce the thing-in-itself as an ASSUMPTION and assumptions are at best 'ass' intellectually. This is the meta-perspective or Philosophy of Science that I am talking about.
There is no thing-in-itself or that-which-is-there underlying whatever is perceived.
According to Kant's CPR, the thing-in-itself is an illusion. Note Kant mentioned 'Home of Illusion' where the thing-it-itself is sited.
I am introducing a meta-perspective but you cannot follow.
There is no “meta-perspective” only different perspectives and different descriptions based on those perspectives. Whether charcoal and diamond are the same depends on what we take to be the same. We might say that all words are the same since they are all made up of letters or sounds, but, of course, they are not the same. We can talk about the table from the perspective of where we put the plates and food or at the level of its atomic structure. When I put the plate on the table it does not crash to the floor because pace Russell “there is not table at all”. The table does not hold the plates because we are as we are but because it is the way it is. We can correctly describe this in terms of the table being solid or correctly say that the table is not solid because it is mostly empty space between atoms or the table may not be part of our description at all from the cosmological perspective within which tables play no part.
What you are claiming for the above is merely subjective truths. Such subjective truths are not objective.
This is why there is no table-in-itself and no things-in-themselves.
Yet, you still insist that there is
something [positive] that is perceived within the various perspectives.
Note the holy grail of philosophy [re the traditionalists] was to look for the 'real' table that is independent of human conditons [philosophical realists].
You may conclude [empirical idealism] a table exist out there independent of your physical self.
You have misunderstood what is at issue. It is not a matter of concluding a table exists out there independent of your physical self, but that what is given in sense perception differs from what is given in dreams. Neither is independent of us but they are not the same, although we might describe them in such a way that they are the same as, for example,
something present in the mind.
Are you now saying the table is only in mind [awake] or dream [also in mind -asleep].
What about the table we see outside/independent our mind everyday?
This is a dilemma of the table in the mind and outside the mind in different perspectives.
The whole of the CPR is focused on reconciling this dilemma and there is no absolute independent table-in-itself.
Note the whole argument re the thing-in-itself stretches across the empirical to Pure Reason.
It was Kant who condemned Plato of muddying the water from empirical world to the
'Home of Illusion.'
We were talking about quarks, black holes, galaxies, and the moon. Plato’s Forms are not empirical things in themselves. He does not commit the error of taking empirical objects as things in themselves. You claimed:
But the ultimate Kantian view is whatever has existed or is existing is grounded on the human condition.
Kant makes no such claim. What he says is that
what can be perceived and hence known by us is grounded on the human condition. With regard to the Forms Plato too held that objects of perception are not things in themselves. That the so called “theory of Forms” posits them as intelligible things in themselves is not relevant to your claim that of the existence of the moon is grounded on the human condition.
Kant's Copernican Revolution implied whatever has existed or is existing is grounded on the human condition. The whole of the CPR support this point.
I agree with the above.
You may agree but what you have claimed says otherwise. You have claimed that there are no things in themselves, that what exists, rather than what can be known, is grounded on the human condition. Those are definitive claims about things in themselves.
This is actually a problem of the
language games.
"
That can be known, is grounded in the human condition"
Problem is we are conditioned to use 'that' which imply 'something' and dualistic.
I habitually do that, and often I am misinterpreted.
To counter the above I mentioned 'spontaneous emergent reality'.
Even then someone has asked, 'emerged from what?"
That is the problem when we are instinctly embedded with the Language Games.
It is the same problem for Kant because he has no choice but to play using the Language Games and many misunderstood him.
I think it is best just to say 'knowing' [being, realizing, and the likes] for the ultimate without any other predicates.
When we introduce any predicates it has to be related to human conditions. e.g. knowing scientific knowledge.
While you state we cannot make any definitive claim of things-in-themselves, you seem to be very definite of the indefinite of something that cannot be known of the thing-in-itself.
I have made no claims about what can be known of things in themselves. Following Kant, I say that we can
think of them (Bxxvi). But to think of them is not to know them. To say that we know that quarks, black holes, galaxies, and the moon existed prior to human beings is not to know them as things in themselves, but to think of
them as things in themselves. That is how I read Kant. I do not agree with Kant, however, that space and time are merely the forms of our sensible intuition of objects, but that is not relevant to the question of how Kant is to be understood.
That is the problem of the Language Games when we have to use 'them' 'that' or 'what' which Heidegger condemned.
True Kant stated we can nevertheless 'think' of "
them" [need to be careful here], so the 'thinking' is just a mental exercise and nothing more but ultimately there is "nothing" in "them" at all. Whatever is thought cannot be done in the positive sense in whatever ways.
One of the main reason why Kant put a limit to it is to stop theists [absolutely] from extending to reify 'that' 'it' 'what' as some entity, i.e. God so to prevent all the terrible evils [besides the pros] related to a God.
This is the same reason why the Buddhists and other Eastern religions are doing in promoting the same principle of [absolutely] no independent thing-in-itself.
This is how the Tibetan Buddhists always say, "Reality is from
your-side not from
outside."
I am inferring from your various post.
If I am wrong, then clarify what is your exact position.
I cannot be responsible for the erroneous inferences you have drawn. If what I have said lacks clarity then ask me to clarify what I have said. You would do well to consider the ambiguity of the term ‘external object’. I discussed this in a previous post.
I am not doing any personal attack but merely inferring your stance.
When I guess your stance, the default is an expectation to respond accordingly.
But I think I have explained the problem, i.e. due to the necessary Language Games we have to play with.
Every time we have to state 'that which cannot be known' 'that can be known but not known' the implication is there is still 'something' to the word 'that'.
Even when I say 'nothing can be known' that 'nothing' [empty air] is still something in a way.
Kant tried his best to avoid the above problem of the language games, that is why he emphasized the noumenon aka thing-in-itself cannot be used in the positive sense and he threw a ring of illusion around the thing-in-itself all over the CPR.
In NKS the phrase is
".. but a Ground (to us Unknown) of the Appearances ..."
The term "unknown" is in brackets () which downplay its significance.
Seemingly Guyer is trying subtle deception here in throwing away the brackets.
Have you verified that the parenthesis is in the German edition? Here it is:
Das transzendentale Objekt, welches den äußeren Erscheinungen, imgleichen das, Was der inneren Anschauung I zum Grunde liegt, ist weder Materie, noch ein denkend Wesen an sich selbst, sondern ein uns unbekannter Grund der Erscheinungen, die den empirischen Begriff von der ersten sowohl als zweiten Art an die Hand geben.
I will not bother discussing the use of parentheses. The only one attempting to downplay its significance is you. The deception here is not subtle and it is not Guyer’s but you own self-deception.
I am limited here because of the German language.
Overall in the context of the CPR, I believed you are deceived as in A339 by that illusion Kant was talking all over the CPR.
Note my point re the limitation of the inherent avoidable Language Games and I believe you are caught in that net and insisting that is something to "that" "it' or 'them" which is normally used in ordinary language.
Note the point to escape the above traps the Buddhists used Koans, contradictions, and Heidegger sort of leaning toward poetry.
Side Point:
From the evolutionary psychology perspective, the present humans has evolved from ancestors who had success with assuming 'that' or "it" must be something and not nothing. When our ancestors eons ago heard a sound in the bushes it MUST be something, e.g. a saber-toothed tiger or some dangerous beasts so that quickly run based on that assumption. Those who did not run would have a greater chance of being eaten by beasts. The present humans evolved from the survivals of the past and are thus instinctively prone to assume that is 'something' to any unknown situation. This I believe is the instinct you are caught with in this case re the ultimate unknown. I am weaned from it after much reading and thinking.
note the later points in A380 where Kant stipulated if anyone were to take the point further, then they are engaging in pseudo-rational arguments and ending with an illusion that deceived them no matter how wise they are. A339.
I don’t understand how a reference to A339 is a later point in A380. In any case, it is not a question of taking the point further. The ‘unbekannter Grund der Erscheinungen’, the unknown ground of appearance, is the point.
Note as in Science, to get to the bottom of the reality of the physical world, Science dug further [deeper] to get to the essence of that ultimate particle [assumed initially]. The truth is there is not particle-in-itself and Science will have to hang on to its assumption.
You quoted A380 but do not take into account Kant stated if one go further one will end up with illusions stated therein and where the warned in A339.
Just because Kant mentioned "although we can’t know these objects" you assumed there must be something that is knowable.
Nonsense. I do not think that what is unknowable is knowable. What we can know is that Kant thought that these unknowable objects exist.
No, Kant did not state what these unknowable objects exists in any positive sense.
Kant stated whatever [knowable and unknowable] if taken as positive [reified] ultimately is an illusion.
Note my point regarding the problem of the Language Games re the seduction of 'that' and 'it' that seduces one to imagine there is 'something' regardless.
Therefore, even when Kant mentioned "although we can’t know these objects" you cannot assume there is 'something' unknown now but can be known somehow in any positive sense at all.
What seems clear is that when Kant asserts that there are these objects he is not denying that there are these objects. That they cannot be known is why Kant calls them “unknown”. This obviously raises problems which are not resolved by claiming they are an illusion. For that would mean that illusion is the ground of appearance. Now that idea may appeal to you but it is not what Kant is saying. It is not an illusion to think there is a thing in itself, it is, however, an illusion to think one knows the thing in itself.
It is not an illusion in thinking for one can think of anything including illusions.
It is an illusion to insist there is something [positive] in relation to what one thinks when there is actually [justifiably] nothing.
One can think of a perfect circle, but to insist a perfect circle exists in reality is insisting on an illusion.
One can think of any God but to insist God exists as real and delivering a holy texts is an illusion.
One can think of a thing-in-itself [e.g. apple-in-itself] but to insist the thing-in-itself is ultimately real is an illusion.
In the CPR Kant argued in detail how the whole of reality is reduced from the empirical to pure understanding to pure reason and ultimate on one illusory thing-in-itself which the theists insist is God.
Now, the underlying problem you are attempting to get at, as you stated early on, is the question of the existence of God. Your argument is that there is no thing in itself, it is an illusion, therefore there is no God as thing in itself, that God is an illusion. Once again, Kant does not deny the existence of the thing in itself or the existence of God, he is simply saying that they are not objects of knowledge, that the attempt to prove the existence of God via a priori reason leads to illusion. You have argued that Kant rejects the legitimacy of faith (except perhaps as a condition for morals (which would ground morality on illusion)(the parentheses is not to be construed as downplaying the significance of this)). As Kant’s essay “Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason” makes clear, he does not reject God as an object of faith, but rather rejected certain specific claims, beliefs, and practices of faith. Kant points to the limits of what can be known and puts the question of God’s existence beyond this limit. He accepts God as a matter of faith and guards this faith from criticism based on pure reason.
To Kant the idea of God is an illusion if reified as the theistic God that delivers commands in holy texts or exists are real in whatever positive forms.
To Kant, the idea of God [as he defined it] is an illusion but it is only useful* a guide [note guide not some policemen] for a Framework and System of Morality and Ethics. I agree with Kant on this in principle but do accept his use of the term God [his definition] because the term 'God' already has a terrible negative baggage.
Note Kant discussion on Constitutive vs Regulative.
Kant did mention faith, but it is not a critical element in the CPR at all. The idea of faith was raised to counter and leave room against the 100% certainty of objective reality of the philosophical realists.
Note everyone [even scientists] rely on faith in various degrees in accordance to the circumstances. Since I am not a scientist I have to rely on certain degrees of faith to trust their accepted and agreed theories.
Not-a-theist. Religion is a critical necessity for humanity now, but not the FUTURE.