It must be all the recent Kant commentators who pigeonholed Kant to be an idealist, realist, or phenomenologist etc etc, and we are just to trying to find on what basis was Kant so and so-ist? Maybe Kant had all those characteristic tendencies in his writings? It is just part and parcel of trying to understand Kant better suppose. Of course Kant was a Kantian.What would be the ground of making him anything but what he made himself? — Mww
Could Transcendental have implied "Anti"? I am not quite sure what the true definition of "Transcendental" in Kant exactly means either. I am suspicious if it meant simply "prior to experience".So a guy knows what TI stands for, then reads herein TI has nothing to do with idealism. What’s he to think, when he understands perfectly well that the I in TI intentionally represents idealism? — Mww
Yeah, whenever I read "Indirect X", I always get curious, "Indirect" from what, how and why?Possibly. The Wikipedia article on Direct and Indirect Realism does give alternate names:
In the philosophy of perception and philosophy of mind, direct or naïve realism, as opposed to indirect or representational realism, are differing models that describe the nature of conscious experiences.
The problem is, is it possible to describe a theory about which millions of words have been written using just two words. — RussellA
Perhaps you could be right.I think of "Indirect Realism" as a name rather than a description, as the Taj Mahal is the name of and not a description of a building. Similarly I think of "Transcendental Idealism" as a name rather than a description. — RussellA
we are just to trying to find on what basis was Kant so and so-ist? — Corvus
I am not quite sure what the true definition of "Transcendental" in Kant exactly means either. — Corvus
Could Transcendental have implied "Anti"? — Corvus
I am suspicious if it meant simply "prior to experience". — Corvus
What are your definitions….. — Corvus
The first of these is that if all the characteristics we are able to ascribe to phenomena are subject-dependent then there can be no object in any sense that we are capable of attaching to the word without the existence of a subject. Bryan Magee.
The earth, say, as it was before there was life, is a field of empirical enquiry in which we have come to know a great deal; its reality is no more being denied than is the reality of perceived objects in the same room. Bryan Magee. — Wayfarer
Yeah, whenever I read "Indirect X", I always get curious, "Indirect" from what, how and why? — Corvus
I think your belief in the mind-independent nature of existence is innate. — Wayfarer
What is Kant's own definition of Transcendental Idealism? I was under impression that he hadn't given out clear definitions on TI as such. According to your answer, it sounds like it is highly challenging or even impossible to come up with a clearcut definition of TI. But there got to be one, if you claim that yours is Kant's definition.What are your definitions…..
— Corvus
Mine are his. But having the definition still requires understanding the myriad instances of the term in accordance with it. THAT’S the hard part. — Mww
I am not quite sure what the true definition of "Transcendental" in Kant exactly means either. I am suspicious if it meant simply "prior to experience".
What are your definitions of "Transcendental" and "Transcendental Idealism" in Kant? — Corvus
Thank you for your post. It is always good to have more different opinions on the topic, which makes discussions more diverse and interesting.(well aware you did not ask me.. Just adding a perspective as I'm reading CPR right now for the first time so feel like i need this type of thing to nut out whether i understand.. any.. of it LOL) — AmadeusD
Yes, I think this is quite interesting point and also where there are different interpretations between the traditional and contemporary commentators on Kant.Issue is, it seems to me Kant denies the 'actual' existence of the object aside from the inner sense of it, so... I need to read more lol. — AmadeusD
Find A491/B519.
It will tell you what you want to know, but not what you should be asking, at least with respect to Kantian metaphysics in general and CPR in particular. — Mww
Find A491/B519.
— Mww
Could it be the part of CPR where Kant explains the antinomy of Pure Reason? — Corvus
Kant's references to the "a priori" are explained by what we know today as Innatism, a natural consequence of life's 3.7 billion years of evolution in a dynamic dance with the world of which it is a part. — RussellA
Concepts in the mind must refer to something. They cannot be empty terms. — RussellA
Another case of linguistic aberration? — Corvus
What do the Indirect Realist say about A priori concepts and space and time? Can these be mind-independent?I believe that Kant would say that he has both an indirect perception (causally indirect) and indirect cognition of the postbox as it really is in a mind-independent world, ie, the same as what an Indirect Realist would say. — RussellA
I get the idea that Plato’s appeal to the ‘innate wisdom of the Soul’ can be explained naturalistically with reference to evolutionary psychology...But no other evolved species has the capacity for abstract reasoning and language in anything more than rudimentary forms....................So my rather more idealist stance is that the human being is able to transcend the biological. — Wayfarer
Why cannot abstract reasoning and language be explained within biology? — RussellA
What do the Indirect Realist say about A priori concepts and space and time? Can these be mind-independent? — Corvus
But in Kant, Space and Time are a priori condition for our experience of the external world. He doesn't see them as illusion — Corvus
his distinction between the two terms — Wayfarer
Aren't illusions to do with unfounded or mistaken sense perception?It wouldn't be an illusion if I saw an Ichthyocentaur, but to think that Ichthyocentaurs exist in the world would be an illusion. — RussellA
So our perception of time is an illusion
— RussellA
So our perception of space is also an illusion.
— RussellA
But in Kant, Space and Time are a priori condition for our experience of the external world. He doesn't see them as illusion. — Corvus
You’re saying, ideas must refer to something - they must have a real referent that exists ‘out there somewhere’ as the saying has it. That is what I think Magee is referring to when he wrote "the inborn realism which arises from the original disposition of the intellect". It is what later phenomenology refers to as ’the natural attitude’. — Wayfarer
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