Ehhhh....there’s a bunch of exposure already. Doubt there’ll be much more without specific inquiry.

Gotta say, though. There’s been some pretty respectable responses so far.

A minor exposition on the confusion of noumena with things-in-themselves:

“....The conception of a noumenon, that is, of a thing which must be cogitated not as an object of sense, but as a thing in itself (solely through the pure understanding) ....”
(CPR, B310)

This reduces to the stipulation that noumena are to cognized in the same way the ding an sich is to be cognized, not that noumena are things in themselves. Both are cognized through the understanding alone, but that does not make them the same thing. Conception of noumena by the understanding does not give things in themselves, and conception of things in themselves by the understanding does not give noumena.
———-

“....for things in themselves, which lie beyond its** province, are called noumena for the very purpose of indicating that this cognition does not extend its application to all that the understanding thinks....”
**re: “sensible knowledge”
(Ibid, A255)

This reduces to the stipulation that the only reason to call things in themselves “noumena”, is to show both these conceptions abide by the same restrictions, but does not indicate they are the same thing.

Kant never meant noumena to be called.....understood as....things in themselves, even while interchanging object in itself with thing in itself. The text makes explicit the differences in them which should have prevented it. Things-in-themselves are empirical, laid out in the Transcendental Aesthetic, noumena are logical, laid out in the Transcendental Analytic. Every instance of the concept noumena referenced as a thing in itself, is in the context of pure logical thought itself, hence is never included in the Aesthetic.....because it isn’t an intuitive conception at all. One might even do so far as to say, you know....he certainly did differentiate the intuitive from the abstract, insofar as noumena are logically abstracted from phenomena, in keeping with his inherently dualistic paradigm.

Fast and loose with terminology? Yeah, maybe, but it’s not his fault if we mistake in the parts what he says as a whole.

Unless I got it all wrong, in which case, it’s entirely his fault.

The Tao is called "non-being" and the multiplicity is called "being." It can't be conceptualized. It can't be spoken. Conceptualizing it is what turns the one into a multiplicity. — T Clark

I can see some parallels here. Noumena are non-being; it is itself a conception but cannot be conceptualized, which is to say there are no schema represented under it. For that reason, while noumena can be spoken, it is nevertheless, empty, content-less, hence cannot ever be a multiplicity.

Reflecting this on Kantian methodology, which makes explicit all humans reason exactly the same way, does not mean human reason is the only way to know the world, which at least makes room for the logical possibility of noumenal worlds. Understanding “...takes for granted....” the possibility of the logical form, but it is pure reason alone that prevents population of the form by its schema.

IknowIknowIknow.....hold the details, please (grin).

Incidentally I'm puzzled by Kant's attitude to the noumenal. — Wayfarer

“.....I can think what I please, provided only I do not contradict myself; that is, provided my conception is a possible thought....”

“....understanding may be represented as (...) a faculty of thought....”

“....Now as the understanding possesses no other fundamental conceptions besides the categories, it takes for granted that an object considered as a thing in itself must be capable of being thought by means of these pure conceptions, and is thereby led to hold the perfectly undetermined conception of an intelligible existence, a something out of the sphere of our sensibility, for a determinate conception of an existence which we can cognize in some way or other by means of the understanding...”

That I can think whatever I want is the same as saying understanding can conceive whatever it wants. But consistency within the Kantian system cannot grant understanding powers of experience on its own accord, for if such were the case, there would be no need for the affects of objects on sensibility. So there is understanding that facilitates experience, and the same understanding that denies it. How that can happen, and maintain the explanatory predicates, however speculative they may be, of the system as a whole, is explained with noumena.
———-

whether 'the noumena' and 'things in themselves' really are synonymous - this is one of the things Schopenhauer criticized, saying he used both terms inconsistently. — Wayfarer

The criticism is warranted. Nonetheless, the Kantian text in which noumena are explicitly defined, distinguishes them from the physically real ding an sich. The thing-in-itself resides in the empirical world of things, noumena reside in the intelligible world of conceptions, but those without object or functionality belonging to them.

Can Kant’s noumenal world to be understood to potentially have any kind of physical form — Tom Storm

Long story short, in Kant.....yes.

Kantian epistemology is a system, with integrated functions. When you ask if something can be understood, you are bypassing those functions in the system by which physical objects are represented through the senses. As such, thinking a physical form is possible, but that in itself can never be sufficient to establish the reality, and therefore the experience, of a corresponding physical object.

On the other hand, asking about a noumenal world in general presupposes it, in which case the ask becomes....can the physical forms of noumena be understood. Now the answer is incomprehensible, insofar as only real physical objects which affect the senses can be intuited, and these, being phenomena, as arrangement or synthesis of object matter into a logical form, are for that reason, not noumena but actual objects of knowledge. It is quite absurd, and mutually destructive, to attempt the cognition, and thereby the experience of two entirely different kinds of worlds at the same time under the same conditions.

End game: in Kant, there is no such thing as a noumenal world, as far as the human cognitive system is concerned. If there is one, merely from logical non-contradiction, our system does not admit the possibility of the experience of its constituency.

Footnote 7 is the reference to LaPlace, 1814, for a description of how Bohr wants his own use of “phenomena” to be understood. Tough read...Wheeler (English) referencing Bohr (Danish) referencing LaPlace (French).....with respect to phenomena, which probably originates in Kant (German). YIKES!!!

LaPlace was a Kantian, but my French isn’t good enough......been many a minute since those classes...to see if LaPlace’s phenomena is Kant’s. Which makes it Bohr’s, which makes it Wheeler’s. Or not.

My interest is in how Bohr was “....forced to introduce the word ‘phenomena’...”, when, of course, the word had already been introduced in Kant, regarding the same general context as this discussion is presently engaged.

On another note, I agree with you with respect to that Geiger counter scenario. There was a Nova show awhile ago....bunch of young, eager faces gathered around a bunch of monitors, all giddy with anticipation, waiting for the very first pictures from Cassini’s pass through the inner rings. Telemetry showed the craft had survived, but the time delay for the pictures had them all in veritable rapture. Cameras worked just fine, but in the time between the first click to the first perception.....there is no intelligence proper whatsoever. It only becomes intelligence/data/information when a receptive cognitive system says so. All those eager faces proved the point.

Briefly...what does footnote 7 say?

Never mind. Spoke too soon.

So the idea that the fields are physical is not supported with any empirical evidence. — Metaphysician Undercover

“...By a field, you remember, we mean a quantity which depends upon position in space....”
(Feynman Lectures, Vol 2, Ch 2. Sec 2, 1964, CalTech)

As in most stuff....depends on who’s talking.

it's impossible to conceive of any of them in absolute terms apart from perspective. (...) And there is no 'world' apart from that. — Wayfarer

Every human being ever, finds himself at the inescapable mercy of his own kind of intellect, which is the only possible origin of ‘world’ in absolute terms. Incident to the occupation of that intellect.....

“....we should require to affirm the existence of an appearance, without something that appears—which would be absurd....”
(CPR Bxxvii)

.....is all he is ever entitled to say about ‘world’, or, in fact, anything else.

Both of these giants blamed the schools, which was meant to be taken as the source of any formal, rote, instruction, including parents. We are taught, from the earliest of our individual times, at the expense of understanding how it is we learn. Ironically enough, perhaps it is Mother Nature Herself that should be faulted, insofar as in our earliest times formal instruction doesn’t permit understanding qua non-contradictory judgement, and even if it did, we are not sufficiently capable of it. And to heap insult onto injury, upon becoming so capable, that is to say when we turn our investigative attention inward, in conjunction with, or in despite of, experience, we already lay claim to so great an empirical knowledge base, itself grounded by a set of rules by which the internal human, albeit speculative, learning process itself does not abide, we inevitably end up disguising the entire human knowledge system as merely a product of the rules by which we are taught.

This is a pencil. It was a pencil to your father, and his father, and his. That’s all you need to know.

(Sigh)

elaborate on this last point about anthro and psych. — Garrett Travers

Ehhhhh.....those investigate humanity and its behaviors generally, albeit under empirical conditions, without due regard for man’s intrinsic metaphysical nature.

An Alaskan Inuit elder, back in The Day, when I commented how cool it was that they used snowmobiles instead of dog sleds......in giving me a glance reserved for young, white, practically useless cheechakos said, we love our things so much we are forgetting ourselves.

As an aside, it is contradictory to say that which is presupposed is the conditioned. Something you might wish to reconsider. Ethics cannot condition that which is presupposed for it.

OK. Thanks.

yes, Ethics presupposes morailty. — Garrett Travers

Cool. But then, if ethics presupposes morality, then ethics is necessarily conditioned by it, which may not be sufficient to consider ethics an artifact, per se, but ethics generally remains in principle a consequence of morality, I would think.

Not a big deal. As long as morality comes first; all else is social anthropology or empirical psychology, neither of which interests me personally.

What of the argument that ethics presupposes morality? Don’t the legitimizing standards properly belong to moral philosophy? And if that is the case, might ethics indeed be an artifact of moral theory?

“....To know what questions we may reasonably propose...... — Mww

Digging a hole to discover what’s in the dirt is one thing. Digging a hole just to put the dirt in a different place, is quite something else.
— Mww

A reference to deconstruction? — Astrophel

No. It is a rhetorical comment on your series of questions that are unreasonably proposed, thereby drawing attention away from the project at hand. I find myself spending more time figuring out how the questions relate to a philosophy, then I do critiquing it.

can go on forever in a childish game of what and why. — Astrophel

“....To know what questions we may reasonably propose is in itself a strong evidence of sagacity and intelligence. For if a question be in itself absurd and unsusceptible of a rational answer, it is attended with the danger—not to mention the shame that falls upon the person who proposes it—of seducing the unguarded listener into making absurd answers, and we are presented with the ridiculous spectacle of one (as the ancients said) "milking the he-goat, and the other holding a sieve.".....”

Digging a hole to discover what’s in the dirt is one thing. Digging a hole just to put the dirt in a different place, is quite something else.

Ok. Thanks.

Times two.

I think the existence of a thing, that default sense that things ARE, is inherently affective. — Astrophel

I, on the other hand, think the default sense that things ARE, is inherently logical.

I am weary of the answer to every question being “it’s purpose-relative”. — Srap Tasmaner

For every question, absolutely, certainly with respect to that which occurs naturally in the world of things. Those things we ourselves invent or create, I think the value, meaning and purpose are generally presupposed in them. Otherwise, there’s no reason for them, or, what’s worse, the creation and the purpose conflict with each other, the existence of the thing becomes irrelevant, which in turn negates its value. Some questions about these things could be purpose-relative, as, which hammers for which nails.

Given your purpose, the world presents itself to you a certain way, things announce their suitability or insuitability to your purpose, or occasionally, but not universally, as ambiguous, requiring reflection. — Srap Tasmaner

I dunno about that. The world presents itself, sure, but I get to decide suitability of things for a purpose. Should I fail in according to a purpose because I chose improperly, it can’t be the thing’s fault. You probably mean “announce” is a loose sense; things just kinda sit there, doing not much of anything on their own.

At some point, the world and the things in it must be understood in a certain way — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, which helps alleviate the ad infinitum process between having and accomplishing a purpose. Because we are human, the certain way of understanding anything at all, is the human way. We don’t know how that works, so the only way we can talk about it, is from speculative metaphysical theory.
Which is where the reservations in vocabulary enters the stage.

Tip of the pointy hat to .....made me flash on something:



Are you saying the value of a thing is its purpose? That which has purpose has value, and that value is its affectivity? So an act, the purpose of which is to solve some ethical problem, obtains its value from that solution, and that’s what ethics is?

That works for me, iff value is not taken to be a quality. If the value of the solution reduces to a relative quality, which is where I was coming from, we’re no better off than before.

Do you have any reservations about this vocabulary — that we classify something as valuable or assign it value? — Srap Tasmaner

I have no reservations, no, but the vocabulary is reserved for representing the conceptions of speculative metaphysics, in order to separate value as a quality from value as a purpose.

Same-page construct (?):
Affectivity...that from which a change in a given system is possible.
Structure of affectivity, then, is that by which the change occurs.
The first is an element in a system, the second is a method of that element in that system.

The structure of affectivity is twofold — Astrophel

Agreed, as stated in a plethora of texts. So saying, from the continental tradition, as you admit this current subject matter takes its ground, the duality of affectivity, in its Enlightenment continental form, is given from the distinction in judgements, re: aesthetic, which regards what the subject feels about a thing, and, discursive, which regards what a subject thinks about that thing.

On the other side of this subjective, call it a deficit, there is the true object, the qualified existent, the phenomenon of deliciousness, say, or misery. — Astrophel

Wherein lay the problem.
1.) The true object is not in the same system as affectivity and its structure. The true object is an effect on the system such that the system is affected by it. The true object is external to the system it affects.
2.) It is implied that the true object and the qualified existent are indistinguishable. While it may be necessary that a true object is an existent, it remains that there are no conditions under which its qualities are given from its mere existence.
3.) Phenomena are the affects of true objects on the system of sensibility in humans. If it is the case that no qualities are given from a mere existence, and mere existence is necessary for phenomena as affects of those true objects, then it follows that qualities do not belong to phenomena.
4.) Because qualities are determinable, but cannot belong to phenomena as an element in a system of sensibility, it follows that qualities are determinable by a method in a system which is itself affected by phenomena.
5.) Deliciousness does not belong to, is not a quality of, phenomena. The true object that effects, and the qualified existent that is an affect, are in fact distinguishable. Deliciousness, and all qualities, cannot be determined from a given object by sensibility, but must arise from a system incorporating a method capable of it, such that qualities can be determinable as relating to an object.

There is a valid “other side of this subjective”, but it does not entail an affectivity, which belongs to the affected subject alone. A cake sitting on the table is a true object, from which its affect on a subject as a phenomenon is given. Whether the cake is made with sugar or gasoline, by which the quality of its existence is determinable, cannot be ascertained from its merely sitting on the table.

That I will act when an act is called for, is given. How I should act is not given from the mere fact an act is called for. That I will act in a prescribed manner is not given from the mere fact I should act. If ethics is the compendium of acts, a description of personal conduct in general, nothing whatsoever is given from that, that suffices as determination of the acts themselves.

Consequentialism, therefore, is valid on the one hand for its effect (there are acts), yet insufficient on the other for a cause (that which determines the act)
—————-

we are res affectus, a "thing" of affectivity" — Astrophel

Yes. WE.....are. Not another thing not us. It is we alone that is affected and exhibit affectivity. All else is merely occasion for it.
—————-

.....value: the "impossible" goodness of something we call good. Non contingent goodness. — Astrophel

No such thing. Any good-ness is contingent on the something said to bear the quality of good. To call something good immediately makes it goodness possible.

Non-contingent good, on the other hand, is that good which has nothing related to it. Contingent on nothing. Good in and of itself, as that by which relative.....contingent.....goodness is judged.
—————-

It is the entirety of phenomenal possibilities we classify as value that I am saying is the essence of ethics. — Astrophel

Value is THE existential foundation of ethics, something existence "does" — Astrophel

Might it be that the entirety of phenomenal possibilities we classify as valuable serve as essence of ethics? In which case, consequentialism holds. But if we classify something as valuable, value is then a contingent assignment, and cannot be existential in that to which we assign the value, so consequentialism fails.

Closer to the content of the topic at hand.....true story......the other day I anonymously bought dinner for a young family unknown to me, for which I had no prior experience. If I understand you correctly, there was something about my immediate phenomenal experience of that family that was of such value as to cause my donation. Admittedly, I noticed a variety of existential matters of fact, insofar as they were not all that well-dressed, ordered less expensive items from the menu, ordered no dessert even with the presence of youngsters who would have appreciated a bowl of ice cream.
(This place....their in-house chocolate/peanut butter cheese cake is superb)

When there are a myriad of reasons for any of those existential matters of fact.....how is it possible to assign value merely because of an immediate observation? If the kids were lactose intolerant, if the whole family had just left the house they were in the process of remodeling, if nothing on the menu suited their tastes......all sufficiently explain what I observed, but do not necessarily explain why I paid for the dining occasion.

Nahhhh.....my ethical contribution was the consequence of my having already assigned the value of “deserving” as an aesthetic judgement, which may have been an affect of my observations, but cannot thereby be predicated on them alone. I judged them as deserving because I related that value in that instance, to another in which it was absent. It follows that the observation, the phenomenal experience, was valuable, in that it elicited an assignable value to my ethical act, but contained no predicate value in itself.

Again, the consequentialist ethics was given in the act; the cause of it was not.
————

I do have my arguments. — Astrophel

Yes, you do. But are they enough?

It is, if you will, right there on the sleeve of ethical issues, ignored because it is simply a given, and people don't argue about what is simply given. — Astrophel

Agreed. People love the cake they are given, but don’t bother considering its ingredients. That ethics manifests as a relation between humans is given, but without the bother of considering the humans which constitute the ingredients of it.

there is no need to justify wanting something delicious..... — Astrophel

Superficially true enough, and by the same logic, there is no need to justify not wanting something distasteful. The affirmation or negation of a “want” is given, without the need for arguing its justification, which reduces to the instance of a given effect (want of the cake), the cause of which is left empty (the ingredients of the how of delicious).

Now if the cause is left empty, and a superficial truth exemplified, if there is no need to judge a relative quality.....how is delicious or distasteful at all determinable? It must herein, be that the justification for the want, formerly posited as unnecessary, is given merely because it is delicious, which is the same as saying there is no reason for wanting something other than its quality. But to say there’s no need to judge an effect (the want) presupposes the judgement already made for its cause (its being delicious). Thus it is that “no need to justify” is superficial, because in truth, it contradicts itself.

It is fine to say an agent is effected by a want, but it shouldn’t be omitted that an agent is also a cause for the wanting.

And people don’t argue the given mostly because either the subtleties hidden within them are too difficult, or, they are simply not deemed to matter. The first is anthropologically lazy, the second, philosophically ignorant.

“.....In our times indeed this might perhaps be necessary; for if we collected votes whether pure rational knowledge separated from everything empirical, that is to say, metaphysic of morals, or whether popular practical philosophy is to be preferred, it is easy to guess which side would preponderate. This descending to popular notions is certainly very commendable, if the ascent to the principles of pure reason has first taken place and been satisfactorily accomplished. This implies that we first found ethics on metaphysics, and then, when it is firmly established, procure a hearing for it by giving it a popular character. But it is quite absurd to try to be popular in the first inquiry, on which the soundness of the principles depends. It is not only that this proceeding can never lay claim to the very rare merit of a true philosophical popularity, since there is no art in being intelligible if one renounces all thoroughness of insight; but also it produces a disgusting medley of compiled observations and half-reasoned principles. Shallow pates enjoy this because it can be used for every-day chat, but the sagacious find in it only confusion, and being unsatisfied and unable to help themselves, they turn away their eyes, while philosophers, who see quite well through this delusion, are little listened to when they call men off for a time from this pretended popularity, in order that they might be rightfully popular after they have attained a definite insight....”

Interesting read. Thanks.

All good.

But in the ethical problem, there is this unknown X, call it, in the spirit of Kant. As is, and this is a big point, I believe, speaking of Kant: where did Kant ever get that idea of noumena? He grudgingly had to postulate it, but why? — Astrophel

Yes, he did, and that’s an excellent reading. Nonetheless, Kant’s noumena pertains to the understanding thinking objects for itself, without relation to either the categories, or the human version of intuition.

If you’re thinking there is some possible unknown X pertaining to the matter of ethics, it would have to have a ground set for it. What would that look like? Kant’s unknown something reduces to a prohibition on sensibility, but that wouldn’t work for ethics, which requires unrestricted sensibility.

Interesting possibility, but methinks ‘tis a hard row to hoe.
———-

Aesthetics and ethics Wittgenstein puts in the same bin. — Astrophel

I’m sorry.....who???

Ahhh....so she’s showing the non-believers how foolish they are. I can dig that.

Sometimes I’m too literal for my own good. Comes from being a virgoyankeebabyboomer, ‘nuff said.

This makes him in my perception a somewhat harder and less soft man than I supposed — tim wood

Absolutely. The law is the law, Everyone wishes to be protected by law, and everyone accepts that the world operates according to law, so why not make law sufficient causality for personal conduct?

And feelings as pleasure and pain?! Perhaps the jewel bearing in this watchwork — tim wood

Yep. Feeling is an intrinsic human condition, as is reason. It’s just what we do as humans. Kantian dualism: we feel and we think. And just as there are different reasonings there are different feelings. But each have a irreducible, pure a priori origin, however metaphysically speculative that may be, that reflects the nature of the intellectual beast.

She not only clearly establishes that Kant was a transcendental idealist, but also an empirical realist. — Manuel

What benefit can there possibly be, in claiming to establish what has already been stated in the record?

I think when one looks closely at an ethical matter, and puts aside all else that would otherwise intrude into an interpretation of what is there, one will "see" that matter for what it is, and it is not a discursive discovery, it is intuitive. — Astrophel

Yes, I would agree with all that, considering your disposition towards consequentialism. On the other hand, from another disposition rather than yours, ethics in itself, as a doctrine, is neither discursive nor intuitive; it is aesthetic. This follows from the notion that ethics presupposes morality. Whether or not that presuppositions holds, is what the philosophy is all about.

The key, I think, is your “what is there” is in need of something that says how “what is there” got to be there, and perhaps more importantly, what the “what” actually is.

To put aside intrusions into matters by interpretations of them, is counter to basic human epistemological nature. We want to know stuff, always have, always will. Even granting that intrusions, re: analysis, of matters sometimes just makes the matter less explained, isn’t going to prevent us from doing it.

That a tough one, right there. Typical Kant....says something here, says something there that makes the here one confusing. Not only that, but he’s got this aggravating propensity to reduce concepts in definitions to definitions of their own, in a chain of definitions, in which by the time you get to the end, you’ve forgotten what he was defining. Plus, the architectonic system of all Kantian philosophy....the absolute necessity of dualism in its most general sense.

I’ve come to the conclusion....mine alone, I must say.....that what Kant means by “feelings” is found in CJ, 1788, Intro, Pt III:

“....For all faculties or capacities of the soul** can be reduced to three, which cannot be any further derived from one common ground***: the faculty of knowledge, the feeling of pleasure and pain, and the faculty of desire....”
** to replace soul with human condition may be more palatable;
*** the common ground simply being awake, aware and rationally competent.

It becomes clear that there are only two feelings, re: pain and pleasure. The moral feeling, then, with respect to this thread, merely announces a pain in disrespect for the moral law, or a pleasure in the conformity to the duty which a moral law prescribes.

Elsewhere in the Kant catalog, differences in feelings are stated as possible subjective conditions....how a subject feels because of something-or-other......determinable by aesthetic judgements from one source or another.

The intent of all that reduces to....it is provable that our empirical knowledge changes with experience, so it must be at least possible to comprehend why sometimes our inner convictions do not, regardless of experience. A nightmare for the metaphysician, and a complete non-issue for Everydayman.

As an aside, and I’m sure you’re aware, that Notes on Lectures on Ethics is not Kant, but iterations of Kant by his students. And just as everybody writing from Kant on venues such as this may have misinterpreted him, there is no promise whatsoever that his students didn’t as well. The Dude Himself said that students that take too much time taking notes probably missed the most important stuff. One can either pay attention, or he can write, but he can’t do both simultaneously.

What if an imperfect duty, say taking care of the moral well being of others conflicts with the perfect duty not to lie, as in Amalac's case. — Tobias

The relative texts in Kant’s corpus make clear to lie is always an affront to a good will, from which is derived to lie is never a moral practical objective. From that, it is just as clear the perfect duty is always more compelling.

I would rather be responsible for a guy’s possible torment that may not even manifest seriously, or that torment which subsides over time, than to jeopardize my moral character by lying in order to not cause it.

Well, this just a tad general, don't you think? — Astrophel

Sure it is, but so was the question to which it referred.

Reason could be here substituted for ethics and it would still be true. — Astrophel

To ask “what IS reason, you mean? Otherwise, I don’t understand the question. Anyway, not so sure it makes sense to ask what reason is. To reason about reason is intrinsically circular, whereas to reason from an ethical...or more accurately, a moral, predisposition.....is not. Ethics presupposes reason; reason does not presupposes ethics. So I don’t think there’s sufficient justification to substitute one for the other.

What kind of doctrine would an ethical doctrine be? — Astrophel

If ethics in general is the nature of man, then an ethical doctrine would be the kind premised on whatever one thinks the nature of man to be, then develops a metaphysics that relates one to the other. Pick a starting point, go from there.

what are the assumptions built into it that would expose a deeper understanding of ethics? — Astrophel

A deeper understanding of what ethics is, would be given as logical derivative of the metaphysics. It’s a metaphysical domain.....there are no proofs beyond the logical. So maybe something is always assumed, somewhere in the system.

what IS ethics? — Astrophel

Ethics in general, is the nature of man.

A theory on the nature of man gives a ethical doctrine related to it.

Same as it ever was.....

“....(a) I am only bound then to sacrifice to others a part of my welfare without hope of recompense: because it is my duty, and it is impossible to assign definite limits how far that may go. Much depends on what would be the true want of each according to his own feelings, and it must be left to each to determine this for himself. For that one should sacrifice his own happiness, his true wants, in order to promote that of others, would be a self-contradictory maxim if made a universal law. This duty, therefore, is only indeterminate; it has a certain latitude within which one may do more or less without our being able to assign its limits definitely. The law holds only for the maxims, not for definite actions.

.....(b) Moral well-being of others (salus moralis) also belongs to the happiness of others, which it is our duty to promote, but only a negative duty. The pain that a man feels from remorse or conscience, although its origin is moral, is yet in its operation physical, like grief, fear, and every other diseased condition. To take care that he should not be deservedly smitten by this inward reproach is not indeed my duty but his business; nevertheless, it is my duty to do nothing which by the nature of man might seduce him to that for which his conscience may hereafter torment him, that is, it is my duty not to give him occasion of stumbling. But there are no definite limits within which this care for the moral satisfaction of others must be kept; therefore it involves only an indeterminate obligation....”
(The Metaphysical Element of Ethics, VIII, 2, 1780)

No excuses. Rest assured I shall make the sincerest effort to release my head from its anal captivity.

Good post, well articulated. On this.....

Kant's reverence for the principle of autonomy. — Tobias

....I might rather have substituted the reverence for freedom, which autonomy presupposes, but......minor point and takes nothing substantial away from your comments.

Delete.

The question of whether I think another’s acts are right or wrong is irrelevant,
— Mww

Maybe to you it is, but not to me. — Amalac

Understood. Perhaps nothing but a distinction between your doctrine of normative teleological ethics with respect to rule-based community, and my doctrine of individual, subjective a priori principles with respect to practical applications in a rule-based community.

Yours presupposes community, mine makes community possible.
———

I should have said: Is it his duty to tell the truth about how he thinks I should have acted, according to the imperative? — Amalac

One more time: morality is subjective; what you do morally is your business. I have the authority to think for myself. I do not have the authority to think for you. The extent of my thinking about your moral actions is limited to their effect on me alone, given the experience they cause in me. In such case, nonetheless, I am judging the cause of the experience, and not the a priori subjective principles responsible for your actions, which I could never know.

This shouldn’t be so difficult to grasp. Me judging your moral dispositions, is like me judging your choice of favorite color. Which, by extension, makes my duty to tell the truth about what I think about your moral principles, beyond the boundaries of my authority.

I would not have lied.
— Mww

But I didn't ask him what he would have done, I asked him if he thinks what I did is wrong. So that doesn't answer the question. — Amalac

The point being, the rightness or wrongness of an act is never a thought of mine, but only the act’s felt moral integrity. To lie is to be intentionally deceitful, and the principle of intentional deceit can never stand as ground for a universal law, therefore to lie is refuse obligation to a c.i., and is thereby immoral. The question of whether I think another’s acts are right or wrong is irrelevant, for my thinking does not, and cannot, supervene on my purely subjective moral principles.

It is, on the other hand, I may judge the rightness or wrongness of me telling a lie, iff there results an experience of mine because of it, insofar as all experiences presuppose a discursive judgement that makes the experience possible. Even while knowing the immorality of telling a lie, I go ahead and tell one anyway, I am then offered the chance to judge its effect. The problem with this consequentialist approach is, I am judging the effect of my deceit on another subject, in which such effect can never be properly understood, for if it was I could claim to know his thoughts, which is impossible. I am, for all intents and purposes, assigning a right to my reason that far exceeds its boundaries. Thus, not only am I committing an immoral act, I am committing an irrational act as well. I am but a sad, ignoble, immoral egocentric. Woe is me. (Sniff)
(Kidding)
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To stay silent is not to lie.
— Mww

I didn't mean to imply that it was, I was just wandering if the deontologist was forced to tell the truth about how he feels according to the imperative, or if he could stay silent. — Amalac

Wandering, were we? Spellchecker: can’t live with it, can’t kill it. (Sigh)

Forced is kinda harsh, but I get it. Guided by is more apt, in that reason has no causal force. So, no, the deontologist is not forced into anything. As to whether silence is justified as opposed to a definitive response, that is the prerogative of the subject.

Also, for the sake of consistency, “to tell the truth about how he feels according to the imperative” has the proverbial cart before the horse. Feeling is always the antecedent ground, being primal in humans, interactive with yet separable from, reason. As such, imperatives don’t tell you how you feel, you don’t feel according to an imperative. The proposition is better stated as.....he feels telling the truth is imperative categorically.

Disclaimer: not sure of your context here. It makes sense to tell the truth about how one feels about the taste of Lima beans, but that actually reduces to a cognition. He is merely being accurate in his recounting of what he thinks of Lima beans, insofar as he thinks they are an affront to his taste buds. Hardly a moral judgement preconditioned by an act of will.
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do you think most such people spend a significant amount of time pondering about their actions and philosophizing? I don't. — Amalac

Nor do I. Generally, folks go with “that just doesn’t feel right”, or, “why did I do/say that”, without actually finding the why. If he thinks about it long enough, and under his given conditions, he might arrive at an answer already provided by one philosopher or another.

if I ask a deontologist if he thinks it was wrong for me to lie to the man on his deathbed about his son’s condition, would he answer with a “yes” or a “no”? — Amalac

A regular dude would answer by how he thinks, a pure moral deontologist would answer by how he feels. The former may answer yes or no, the latter would only answer....I would not have lied.

What does the categorical imperative say here? Should the deontologist truthfully answer that question, or is he allowed to stay silent? — Amalac

To stay silent is not to lie. The imperative is merely a formula, determined by principles held by the subject. Only the subject knows what the imperative commands.
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When you think something is for the best, you think a good as it is for yourself.
— Mww

In a sense yes, in so far as another person’s suffering would also make me suffer more, and their happiness make me happier. — Amalac

These two statements do not hold the same truth value. There is no reason why another person’s subjective condition must necessarily pertain to yours. You can allow it, but it is neither biologically nor metaphysically the case that it must be allowed. If you feel another’s subjective condition and make no reaction to it, you may merely sympathize and you’ve violated no moral law. If you feel another’s condition and do react to it from some sorryful inclination, you’ve more than merely sympathized, you’ve treated the other as an end for yourself, which does violate a moral law.

It has never been a consideration here, as to whether people in general actually do things this way. All this is about, is a exposition of what proper Kantian moral philosophy entails. As such, it is a determination of principles, which are always certain, not the actions possible because of them, which are not.
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Is that “using another as an end for my own good”? Maybe, but why is that bad? — Amalac

It isn’t bad to help people. It is praiseworthy and admirable, from a common point of view, but may lack any moral import without the determining conditions for why you do it. Do you help people to alleviate their suffering to make yourself feel better, or do you help people from a duty that prevents you from not helping people. The former is mere inclination, the latter is lawful obligation.
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I wouldn’t want psychopaths who feel nothing when they watch or contemplate the sufferings of others to adopt a consequentialist criterion — Amalac

And how would you ever make that preventable? You cannot, so what matters what you want?