I pretty much just say "Nuh uh". If asked for proof, I say "No".

But, then, I'm not interested in persuading them, and am giving just about as much thought to my replies as I tend to feel they're giving.

Why respond at all? It's sort of like shitting on art or science. It's just like. . . uhhh, OK. Good luck with that, buddy.

I think you're approaching the problem from the wrong end.

Rather than defining ideals, choosing identities, and judging which methods of judgment might lead you to an objective set of beliefs on the matter I'd say you learn politics -- including what you find to be more acceptable and less acceptable, the "practical reason" or values that you find to be correct, and not merely know-how -- simply by doing political things.

This is not to say that political philosophy is neutered or irrelevant. It's very relevant -- just as relevant as actually getting your hands dirty. Without either you won't be able to answer which political philosophy you find to be closest to the truth.

Ingmar Bergman is one of my favorite directors, and that's probably his most famous flick. I don't want to spoil too much, but if you happen to give it a try you should post your thoughts afterwords. (negative or positive -- I've heard both kinds of reactions to it)

7th Seal is the first one that popped to mind for me.

Emotions are what is felt on the inside. And I don't think this necessarily has to resort to a Cartesian subject who feels the feeling. Aren't feelings actually shared, after all? Aren't they even infectious? When someone I know is scared I will often feel worry, when someone is laughing I will often feel humor even without knowing the joke. This is why comedy is best in the theater or in person -- one person's laughter builds another persons, and everyone slowly feels the humor more deeply as the infection spreads.

Emotions are relatively basic to our lives. They are similar to object-kinds, in this way. "What are objects?" or "What are chairs?" we might ask. "What is doing the sitting?" or "What is doing the seeing of these objects?". And so many other variations. But is there any more of an answer, here, than there is with emotions? If we believe we see because light hits objects and reflects off into our eye which sends a signal to our brain to give us an image, won't we believe similarly so with emotions? "The brain is at work" -- "the chemicals are released"


Or, is the question more akin to asking how it is possible to perceive an inside? "We grant objects and all that, but what do we make of our internal lives? Why do we have internal lives at all? What is an internal life?"
??

I answered in the negative. I sort of feel like I've ridden that pony and know what it has to offer. In an abstract sense I can acknowledge that, certainly, I don't know my beliefs to be correct, and so could be open to it -- but emotionally speaking, it's just not a thing that's even on my radar. I know what I find of interest and I know what aspects I enjoy and dislike. As such, it wouldn't be fair of me to say that I'm open to conversion, since I'm basically decided at this point. It seems to me a natural sort of place to land, regardless if one is religious or irreligious. I wouldn't expect a religious person to feel differently from myself, I mean.

I don't know what the word "gnostic" means in your diagram.



As for your question: Do you believe there are not two moons that revolve around the earth? Do you believe there are not three moons that revolve around the earth? And so on?

It seems to me that we do not walk about carrying beliefs about what is not the case, at least if its the sort of thing which we haven't given much thought. So I could be an atheist if I were the sort of person who came across this category "atheist" and said, well, yes, that is something I do not have a belief in.

It also seems to me that a person could actively form a disbelief, or a belief that God does not exist, and so could be an atheist.

Both seem to fit the category to me. Which kind of atheist a person is is just a psychological fact about their state of belief. And maybe a person could even slide from one kind to the other, too.

My thoughts are always drawn back to time when it comes to understanding causality. It's the explanation which makes sense of change over time. We have events, encounters, and actions, all of which imply a variety of entities. In making sense of these we create stories. And some of these stories -- we might say the more reliable kind, perhaps, or the de-personified stories -- are causal stories, where the plot is fixed.

So I think, rather than defining causality in a metaphysical way I'd take a stab at saying it is more a feature of our knowledge, how we create knowledge, and what counts as a satisfying explanation of change over time. I think, then, that the question of understanding causality becomes one of characterizing time.

hahah. Maybe. Though I'd say my principles are the same. I know I don't like really-existing-democracy, but also believe the evils of really-existing-socialism aren't worth fighting for. It's hard to judge which is better or worse without living it. It probably depends on where in the hierarchy of each society one falls that would make it better or worse for them, as well as the time period.

I value what are often termed "bourgeois freedoms", such as freedom of speech, if not property. So I suppose I would just say that Marxism has this double-edge to it -- it strives for liberation, but there are authoritarian seeds in the thought as well. And, if one is not libertarian in their orientation, then these wouldn't even be seen as a negative. But if we are, then perhaps we should view Marxism in a partially negative light after all. Not one born out of ignorance of this possibility for greater liberty in Marxist thought, but rather out of familiarity and reflection -- being able to qualify which aspect of Marxist thought is preferable and which isn't.

Also, while I do not like authoritarian politics, I will say that the reason they work is because people are more comfortable with authority than they'd like to admit. People express the desire for liberty, but authoritarian tactics work to organize people precisely because they bring comfort and stability. There's something about us, as humans, that is susceptible to this way of doing things. I'm not sure what, precisely. But this is just to say that even if Marxism is authoritarian, this isn't something that qualifies it as particularly evil. Authoritarian tactics are used the world over, regardless of ideology.

So you think that based on these movements of capital to global East and West, and mechanization of production will produce some sort of communist state- one described by Marx in whichever stage of his writing you prefer to draw from? — schopenhauer1

I think that capital moving from the west to the east is a reasonable prediction of Marx's work, yes. The production of a communist state, no. I don't believe in historical necessity, and certainly not one which will produce communism. I see it as a possibility, but not a necessity resulting from capital.

I do not consider the Soviet Union or China a successful example of Marxism, Communism, or the like. I see it as dictators and or cadres of dictators (politburo, etc.) taking control of a country and running it like a police state and then easing up on restrictions when it became economically necessary to allow for more free trade elements and accumulation of wealth. It was all top down. Dictatorship of the Proletariat not being a metaphor but literally a dictatorship. People "needed" to programmed to be Marxist through gulags, workforce programs, and stifling of free speech. If man was supposed to be free and self-actualized because they weren't exploited or worried about accumulation of wealth, that never really worked out. They may not have accumulated much wealth, bu they were certainly exploited by whatever the state mechanisms dictated to them. There was never a good way to implement the transition of the modes of production and accumulation of wealth without mass death and total control of people's movements and lives. More democratic socialism is just capitalism with safety nets. I do not think that as Marxist or Communist. — schopenhauer1

I do. I'd say that both the Soviet Union and China, along with other states, are reasonable end-points for Marxist thought. I'd highlight here that I don't believe they are necessary, but they fit the program.

They weren't utopian communist societies, but they were reasonable extrapolations of Marxist thought. And they accomplished good things as well as bad, just like most states. Literal dictatorship isn't opposed to Marxist thought -- the seeds for authoritarian politics are certainly in even Marx's work. You don't need to follow him on these points in your own political practice, but that doesn't mean that the Soviet Union or China weren't actual or real examples of Marxist politics, either. They certainly were.

And you can even judge just how good Marxist thought is or isn't based upon what they brought to the world.

I wouldn't believe the depictions of the Soviet Union casually on offer. They tend to highlight what is evil, because it's propaganda. The Soviet Union, and other communist states, do this to the west as well. They create propaganda which focuses on our evils to persuade others that their state is the better one.

But in reality, it was a mixed bag, just like western Democracy. Both good and evil.

I don't disagree with your first sentence, and I know one reading of Marx is that the revolution was supposed to happen in Germany. One reading, too, states that economies follow a historical progression from feudalism to capitalism to socialism to communism.

Both @jamalrob and @Benkei have anticipated what I would say in response. It's a varied body of work. So while Marx is wrong about x, y, and z when we interpret it as a, b, or c, I don't think it's damning of Marx's body of work. (I'd note that insofar that we read Marx like this then I'd agree with anyone who believes it to be false, too)

Also Marxism is broader than Marx too -- you can't just ignore the various revolutions which put the theoretical ideas into practice. Consider the Theses on Feurbach (it's short! no worries :D ) -- I'd say it points that the practical, in-the-world action is just as if not more important than the understanding of ideas.

It's the document where the famous statement of Marx's comes from:

The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point is to change it.

Anyway, I'd say that Marx's work predicts the way capital moved and has moved up to today -- by global expansion. I don't think that nationalist petit bourgeois people are objectively motivated to enact communist revolution. I'm not arguing that point. Only that what you cite as things against Marxism could also reasonably be read as predictions of Marxism, given the characterization of capital.

Eh.

I kinda feel like this is focused on European countries + USA. If you widen the scope of your evidence, which Marxist analysis would require given its global perspective (due to capital's global aims), then I'd say you're off the mark. The office space class rose in industrial nations which exploit 3rd world nations -- but that doesn't mean the proletariat has been annihilated, only broadened (as one would predict from the global nature of capital).

2 fits into my reply above. Capital is global, and the proletariat is a global class, not a national one. Communism, at least, is anti-nationalist. Marxism can be pro-nationalist in various circumstances, but the end-goal qua Marx is the elimination of nations. Even where nations exist, the proletariat is international regardless.

3 is questionable. if you mean that people lower on the rung of income in the United States can afford DVD players, then sure. But that's not really a strike against Marx, I'd say. Who gives a fuck about DVD players vs. healthcare, for instance? As you mention... I am most sure that the majority of people would be happy to trade in their Sony-whatever for regular and reliable healtchare when needed. Basic needs trump luxury goods -- and all capital has to offer are luxury goods, because this is what generates profits.


I'm not against luxury, by any means., but it's just silly to say that Marx got this wrong. It ignores the international character of communism, and it ignores why lower-class peeps in rich countries would buy luxury goods (both socially speaking, i.e. capital, and personally speaking, i.e. looking for a reason to live)

Actually -- it's worth noting:

James had a health condition wherein insulin would not be produced, and he was a participant in political organizations which promoted the white race. Today he walked around at his apartment reading the most famous fantasy book ever written, with its cover torn off. He had the unusual ability by which he couldn't be known by words, as well.


The verbal imagination can differ from itself, as well. There are various ways to say similar things. And the verbal imagination can craft sentences which negate our ability to understand said sentences too.

What's the visual property of being a diabetic racist? — Michael

There is no property for being a diabetic racist. It's not a singular aspect like red or square. It's more like a cultural archetype -- it's not necessary, unique, or fixed, but all the same a visual picture came to me which fit.

How could you see that the cover-less book was the Lord of the Rings? — Michael

I think my response here is similar to my previous response. Visual imagery doesn't have to be unique and differentiated from other books. But an image which fit the words involuntarily still appeared.

Actually, my copy of Lord of the Rings is what came to me, because it is now cover-less, and images from Lord of the Rings too.

What about the image of the location showed it to be that person's home? — Michael

Sitting on a porch.

Or as another example, what about imagining an invisible man reading an invisible book and imagining an invisible cat sitting on an invisible mat. Surely we can do both, but that in neither case is there any visual imagery. — Michael

Honestly, I saw an outline of each of those things -- the visual representation of invisibility.

So what, exactly, does this imagining consist of if not have some inner visual imagery? I can certainly understand where Dennett is coming from in saying that this imagining is verbal in nature, that really just involves considering and understanding certain words and phrases.

And if we can imagine invisible cats sitting on invisible mats in a verbal manner then surely we can imagine a visible zebra in a verbal manner. — Michael

I don't think I'd say there's no such thing as a verbal imagination. I don't think the imagination is strictly visual. I was just noting that the particularity of things doesn't restrict proper visual imagery. The visual imagination doesn't need to map perfectly to the verbal imagination in order for one to have a visual imagin-thing (not sure what to call it) of particularities.

a priori, I would say we have none. But, then, I do think the hard problem is a real problem, and at the same time I don't think the proposed solutions are satisfactory except insofar that they are intentionally vague and admit of their own ignorance.

I certainly agree that our internal lives differ -- not so radically that it's impossible to discuss, but still different. And that language usage of a certain type seems to mask these differences -- in particular, functionalist-oriented discourse.

But I rather doubt I'm the target of your example, here. I'm the low fruit. ;)

Well, what does imagining a diabetic racist sitting at home reading a cover-less copy of the Lord of the Rings consist of? I can understand having a quasi-visual image of a person reading a book, but the rest isn't so clear. — Michael

I have a pretty vivid visual imagination.

I actually had a specific picture pop up to your question. Clearly it could be different, but I saw something particular.

It seems to me that there is no the first rule -- but rather, there are first rules. And depending on which first rule you state first that has a kind of guiding force on what follows.


The first rule of philosophy club is "know yourself" -- followed hastily by "but not just yourself"

Meh. Put it in a lab. What do you do?

You use a clock.

Is time an aspect of an object, even?

Scientifically speaking, time is that which a chronometer measures. There is such and such a tension placed upon a visual apparatus with a slightly lesser tension, and the first tension changes the apparatus at what appears to us to be regular intervals.

I do not understand time at all, except in common parlance. I know that I must clock in 2 days from now 5 minutes prior to 7 am (central standard). But to define what seems to be something wider and more general in terms of my life now doesn't seem quite right.

I rather like Heidegger's take when he says that we are time. But, at the same time, I am not certain what it means. It just strikes me "right", in comparison to the alternatives.

It doesn't help that there are so many horrible people who deny the holocaust, but even so, does that mean that I am not allowed to say that there are also many Israelis that deny anything bad going on in Palestine too, unless I am a holocaust-denier, anti-semite? — TimeLine

I don't think this is disallowed. I think, here, it's all in the timing.

An appropriate response to the Holocaust is deferential reverence.

Similarly so to slavery and the effects of white supremacy.

Now, there are flaws we could point out about African American communities. I am uncertain to what extent they are generalizable, but I am familiar. However, the time to discuss them is not in the same conversation as one about the horrors of slavery. Not only is it off topic, but it would be an insult, and the interlocutor would be right to wonder if I am trying to downplay their suffering, even if that is not what I am trying to do, because it's something that happens so often.

I think it is, only because of the above mentioned complexity and sensitivity, but certainly it must be carefully explored. — TimeLine

We can empathize with the suffering of others. I think we should do so, actually. And that this is a good thing. But in so doing it still makes sense to be considered an outsider. People who go through experiences will often see and hear more than those who don't. It can be transferred through communication, but only that way.

It makes sense to be treated as an outsider.

As horrible as these events are I will always be outside in one very salient point: it did not target me or mine. It is appropriate to treat me like an outsider for this fact.

The reaction to the Emmet Till painting makes sense for these reasons. She is an outsider. She should be treated as one. And, what's more, often times the suffering of African American's is used as a sick form of entertainment more than a bridge -- a kind of cathartic entertainment which is meant to alleviate guilt and help us feel pure and free of racism at last.

That may not be what's going on here, but it happens often enough that the reaction makes sense. Since that is the case it really does make sense to treat people like outsiders rather than members. Our coming from different backgrounds makes it so that I am not the target of these persecutions nor do I feel their ramifications -- as such, I just won't ever be a member of the group.

I can feel compassion and empathy for people. But in so doing, at least for myself, I'd think that I'd basically have the same attitude were I in their position.

I have to admit that the remark on Palestine did seem to come out of the blue, to me.

And I am not a-political or neutral on that topic :D.

There is very much a difference between the state of Israel, and Jewish ethnicity. And it doesn't seem to respond to @Hanover 's point -- that he would welcome anyone who wishes to express compassion towards Jewish people regardless of there ethnicity by making art about the Holocaust. So it should be viewed as a good thing, at least in a moral dimension even if the art fails at what it intends.

Whether someone is consistent or not with respect to other political topics is a bit off the beaten path, no?

I mean, I don't even know @Hanover 's stance on that issue -- but I do know that we can't blame the Jews for the actions of Israel, or even equate the two (many Jews are anti-apartheid, after all), and that whatever faults Israel may have it doesn't make sense to, immediately in response to the Holocaust, to bring up those faults. And I have to admit that though I do not think you intended this, that one fair interpretation was that Jews are to blame for the suffering of Palestinians and therefore we shouldn't have compassion for the Holocaust. I don't think you believe this -- but as you note, it's a sensitive topic. And with sensitive topics we tend to jump to the worst in others (sadly, with respect to race relations, because the worst is so often right).

While that is one fair interpretation I thought this is what you basically were saying: If we believe minorities, in general, shouldn't be persecuted for their minority status then as Palestinians are a minority then we should also believe, and stand with, them for the persecutions they suffer under the state of Israel. But, when visiting Israel, you were viewed as an outsider who shouldn't express these sorts of things or have an opinion on the matter because you are an outsider. So, while some jews might welcome people who express compassion for our pain, it seemed that some jews didn't want that same interaction when it came to their faults. So you would question Hanover on whether he is consistent on this point -- does he welcome outsider's only with respect to the past, or are outsiders always welcome?


But that's just a rough guess on my part. I'd welcome clarification or remonstration if I am wrong.

I do think that the ethics of insider/outsider is worth exploring. But maybe the Palestinian-Israeli conflict isn't the best ground in which to explore it?

I found myself agreeing with that Lisa Whittington interview you posted. I think she said it right.

Why not just the terms you used?

The

placing the interests safety and welfare of the citizens of a country above all else. — Question

taken to its logical extreme?


It would have the merit of not alluding to already well-used terms which have relatively entrenched meanings just because of historical and academic usage. Plus, it seems you're taking something of a theoretical approach anyways, so it would avoid referencing actual states which will run counter to what it is you want to say in the first place (as you already noted).

I don't believe that the logical form of socialism, taken to its extreme, is a fascist society. I'm not sure what lead you to believe that, @Question.

It's all just words, I suppose, so if that's what socialism means for you --

I understand socialism to be placing the interests safety and welfare of the citizens of a country above all else. That's as concise as I can present the concept without idiotizing it. — Question

, then I can keep track in this discussion. But it wouldn't be how I'd put things, and it's a pretty confusing way of talking, considering that it excludes what we usually term fascist Germany.



But then. . . I don't know what's wrong with that. I don't think it's in the interests of the citizenry to be murdered for belonging to unclean categories, or for those in the clean categories to be mobilized into war machines for the domination of other countries. I don't think that the trenches of the losing side of World War I are in the interests of anyone to replicate within a bureaucratic machine. I don't believe that the suspension of democratic practices and the suppression of the press and the usage of propaganda are in the interests, safety, or welfare of the citizens -- even as the final and ultimate value.


But these are features of actual states that at least claimed to be fascist.

It would be useful to use different words, I think.

Your question reminds me of the Ignmar Berman flick Winter Light. The main character seems to fit the bill -- though granted, this is fiction.

Fair. I wasn't sure which way you were saying.

How so?

Frustration is understandable. And even if frustration is expressed it doesn't draw away from the point -- that in order to criticize a text or group of texts it is fair to ask the critic to read them, or at least to not have an opinion on them until they do -- or, even if one has an opinion, it is fair to say that said opinion is not an informed one which is going to hit its mark.

This sort of requirement looks like a pretty standard, run-of-the-mill norm for rational understanding, discussion, critique, and debate. So I'd say no one here, at least, has rejected either truth or logic as tools of Western oppression.

On space for certain I agree with you, though I'd express uncertainty on my part about saying Kant was in line with Leibniz -- though maybe you're just saying it's similar, not the same. I think he takes a position in-between the two -- which is kind of his "move", if you think about it.

What I had more in mind were the laws of motion and our ability to predict the motion of matter with them, which we know and carries a kind of mathematical necessity with it which goes against the assertion that we can never know some effect through a cause but are merely habituated by repetition. Given such and such conditions, I can tell you where some bit of stuff will be in so much time, and I know this will be so -- I am not merely habituated to it.

But I think that was a bit of my own reading into the opening, there, to make sense of it. Natural science certainly doesn't have to be Newtonian -- it just seemed to make sense given its mathematical certainty and its relation to cause-and-effect. (and, of course, the frequent references to the three laws of motion, or at least formulations really similar to them)

haha! Yup.

Scientific methodologies have been successful. Theories have explained diverse phenomena.

What need have we of saying 'reduction'?

Physics isn't reductionist. The physical world isn't "just matter in motion", or some such. Not everything is explained by the 2nd law of thermodynamics -- it's not all "just entropy increasing". Neither is chemistry. There are two broad pillars of chemical theory -- thermodynamics and kinetics -- and several subsets of chemistry which focus on the reactions of chemicals in many various ways.

But, then, these statements turn on a particular way of looking at "reductionism". If one just means that some phenomena can be explained by some simpler and more general statements, then OK. But by that same statement I'd say some phenomena can't be explained by some simpler and more general statements -- perhaps they require another simpler, more general statement, or they are an anomaly of sorts.


Ah, @Arkady did a better job than I, I think, just as I was writing this.

But to reduce myself to anti-reduction would be terribly reductionist, don't you think?

;)

Why does it bugger belief?

I don't think that it is common sense or obvious that political power influences the hard sciences. Many people seem to resist the idea.

I agree with you on the latter point, now. I just had to read the text again to see why I thought that, and came up short. Thanks for the clarification.

I'm reading this article, though, and I don't think he's opposed to the law of inertia. He's opposed to the term "inertial force" -- because a force is what acts on an object or is the cause for a bit of matter's changing course.

EDIT: That was a really cool article. Just finished it now. Thanks for sharing it.

I decided to track down the quotes I was thinking of in making my assertions. I found that I've made a mistake in saying Newton is the counter-example to Humean causation. What I was thinking was Newton, but that's not really stated in the quotes I was thinking of.

Something very much like the argument I outlined is there -- but not Newton. So, my bad there. But, to go over the quotes I was thinking. . .

In the preface to the 2nd edition, at the end of Bx:

Two [sciences involving] theoretical cognitions by reason are to determine their objects a priori: they are mathematics and physics. In mathematics this determination is to be entirely pure; in physics it is to be at least partly pure, but to some extent also in accordance with sources of cognition other than reason

That's definitely the quote I was thinking of in saying Newton, though this in particular doesn't link physics to Newton (as K. was definitely interested in physics at large, and not just Newton), or how that might serve as a counter-example to Humean criticisms of causation.

Later, on B21 there is a footnote in the introduction to the second edition, 2 paragraphs after introducing the central question of the critique, to these lines:

How is pure mathematics possible?
How is pure natural science possible?

Since these sciences are actually given [as existent], it is surely proper for us to ask how they are possible; for that they must be possible is proved by their being actual.

And the footnote reads:

This actuality may still be doubted by some in the case of pure natural science. Yet we need only examine the propositions that are to be found at the beginning of physics proper (empirical physics), such as those about the permanence of the quantity of matter, about inertia, about the equality of action and reaction, etc., in order to soon be convinced that these propositions themselves amount to a physica pura (or physica rationalis). Such a physics, as a science in its own right, surely deserves to be put forth separately and in its whole range, whether this range be narrow or broad

To this footnote the translator adds a footnote of his own, appended to the last sentence:

This Kant did in his Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (1786), Ak. IV, 465-565

This is where I got the notion of him deriving Newtonian physics, but surely Newton is not mentioned here either. Nor is the notion of Newtonian physics serving as the counter-example against Humean skepticism.

Earlier in the introduction, under II. "We are in Possession of Certain A Priori Cognitions, And Even Common Understanding is Never without Them" at B5 Kant stated:

...Now, it is easy to show that in human cognition there actually are such judgments, judgments that are necessary and in the strictest sense universal, and hence are pure a priori judgments. If we want an example from the sciences, we need only look to all the propositions of mathematics; if we want one from the most ordinary use of understanding, then we can use the proposition that all change must have a cause.

This is getting closer to how Kant is in disagreement with Hume, and highlighting a sort of principle which the common understanding uses (though, perhaps, this principle isn't something that Newton uses -- again, no support for that particular claim of mine).

Later we get closer to the language I used, albeit admittedly not with Newton referenced. I'll just note here I'm now uncertain why I thought Newton in particular to Hume. Kant certainly references Newtonian physics throughout the CPR, but I overstepped in stating that it was Newton who served as the counter to Humean skepticism, I believe, unless there's some reference I missed. However, even in that case I overstepped, because after reading this highlighted portion I'm pretty sure this is where I was getting everything I stated before. So even if the reference is there, I was in error because these were the sections I was thinking of anyways.

Mea culpa.

At B127, or in the section titled "Transition to the Transcendental Deduction of the Categories":

The illustrious Locke, not having engaged in this contemplation, and encountering pure concepts of understanding in experience, also derived them from experience. Yet he proceeded so inconsistently that he dared to try using these concepts for cognitions that go far beyond any boundary of experience. David Hume recognized that in order for us to be able to do this, the origin of these concepts must be a priori. But he was quite unable to explain how it is possible that concepts not in themselves combined in the understanding should nonetheless have to be thought by it as necessarily combined in the object. Nor did it occur to him that perhaps the understanding itself might, through these concepts, be the author of the experience wherein we encounter the understanding's objects. Thus, in his plight, he derived these concepts from experience (viz. from habit, a subjective necessity that arises in experience through repeated association and that ultimately is falsely regarded as objective). But he proceeded quite consistently after that, for he declared that we cannot use these concepts and the principles that they occasion in order to go beyond the boundary of experience. Yet the empirical derivation of these concepts which occurred to both cannot be reconciled with the scientific a priori cognitions that we actually have, viz., our a priori cognitions of pure mathematics and universal natural science, and hence this empirical derivation is refuted by that fact.

That last sentence, in particular, is pretty much what I was thinking of. I believe I must have basically interpreted "universal natural science" as equivalent to Newtonian physics, though by no means is that asserted here.

The facts, though, which are meant to stand as counter-examples to the Humean account of causation are the sciences of pure mathematics, and universal natural science.

I'm running on memory here, but my understanding was that Newton's principia, ala Kant, was partially a priori synthetic and partially a posteriori. So it was both empirical and logical -- not transcendental, but rather a sort of fact which couldn't be true in light of Hume's critique of causation.

Or, maybe a better way to say it: a fact which is true, while Hume's critique of causation also seems true, and these two things cannot both be true.

So I don't know if I'd say he was out to defend Newton, or provide a foundation for him either, as I said before. Rather, Newton is given as a kind of evidence for our having knowledge of causation in spite of Hume's critique.

Me too. CoJ is definitely a book I'll be rereading again.

I have access to the Opum Postumum, but my eyes kind of glazed over when I tried it, to be honest. :D I was kind of "Kanted out" at the time. I do want to read it some day though.

For two, it seems like an attempt to enshrine contemporary physics forever by fiat, instead of doing the reasonable thing, which is admitting that while explanatorily powerful, the Newtonian picture was without epistemic foundation — The Great Whatever

I think the tension between the problem of induction and the necessity which we see in the world with Newtonian physics is what's at issue more than a foundation, per se. He intended to derive Newtonian physics from the categories eventually, but I think it's the implication of Newtonian physics -- that we will know where the cannon ball will land, that the sun will rise tomorrow, and we know these things partly based upon a priori knowledge -- more than asking after foundations is what's the goal. (or, goal? Maybe focus is better -- Hume's critique of causation vs. the fact that Newtonian physics shows we have knowledge of causation as the tension)

Not in any precision. Vaguely, I seem to recall the way he talks about God in that section seemed to at least get very very close to the noumena. I think he meant to place the power of judgment somewhere between pure and practical reason, but the way he talks about God in CoJ seemd to contradict the way he talks about God in CPR.

That sounds about right -- of course it's been a long time for me too. We got through the aesthetics, I remember -- we got stuck on the second half on teleological judgment where an uncharitable first reading on my part was "sooo ... you can know the noumena" :D