A noble attitude, for which I salute you.

A thesis cannot be true and false simultaneously was my response when I was reminded that the antinomies were a logical response — val p miranda

True enough, but that isn’t “a different point of view, not a logical one”. What you say here is still a logical point of view.

I suppose I didn't like Kant's reform and correction of metaphysics. — val p miranda

As is your prerogative.

I’d be interested in how you regard the antinomies from other than a logical point of view. Not sure I’d understand, but I’d at least gain familiarity.

Proof of a contention and then proof of the opposite — val p miranda

An antinomy isn’t a proof; it’s a logical argument, a “...dialectical proposition or theorem of pure reason...”

“....This method of watching, or rather of originating, a conflict of assertions, not for the purpose of finally deciding in favour of either side, but to discover whether the object of the struggle is not a mere illusion, which each strives in vain to reach, but which would be no gain even when reached....”

Indeed. I don’t give a damn WHY there is a universe. That there is something I think of as it, is good enough.

if this innate sense of reason provides for an abstract objective reality, what is the nature of [this] our reality? — 3017amen

Why...or rather, how....would there be any difference between them, our reality or objective reality? Doesn’t matter what there is under any conditions whatsoever, reason is the one and only way a human is ever going to find out about it. Even accident or pure reflex as mere occasion for experience, still needs its possible understanding, which reverts right back to reason.

But what is mathematics itself? — 3017amen

Simply put, I guess, mathematics is the science developed by reason out of the category of “quantity”, in response to observations in the world. If the categories are part of our innate rational constitution, as transcendental philosophy stipulates, then the ground of mathematical structures resides in us naturally.

But if mathematical structures describe the nature of the universe — 3017amen

We don’t know that they do; we only know they describe the universe in such a way the universe becomes comprehensible to us, strictly given the kind of intelligence we are.

for additional fodder:..... — 3017amen

.....all good.

is the concept of Noumenon (....) something that exists a priori like mathematical structures? — 3017amen

The concept of noumena....maybe, yes. Noumena themselves, iff there were such things.....not a chance. Mathematical structures, while a priori for their construction, lend themselves intuitively to phenomenal representation for their reality. Noumena, on the other hand, as products of the understanding, hence are only discursive constructs which eliminates them from intuition, hence can never be phenomena, hence can never be represented in the human world of objects.

Kant has already explained why the antinomies are faulty — val p miranda

Actually, no, he did not, for they are not faulty in the least. An antinomy perfectly exemplifies a case in which pure speculative reason inevitably conflicts with itself with respect to transcendental ideas.

“....If we employ our reason not merely in the application of the principles of the understanding to objects of experience, but venture with it beyond these boundaries, there arise certain sophistical propositions or theorems. These assertions have the following peculiarities: They can find neither confirmation nor confutation in experience; and each is in itself not only self-consistent, but possesses conditions of its necessity in the very nature of reason—only that, unluckily, there exist just as valid and necessary grounds for maintaining the contrary proposition. The questions which naturally arise in the consideration of this dialectic of pure reason, are therefore: 1st. In what propositions is pure reason unavoidably subject to an antinomy? 2nd. What are the causes of this antinomy? 3rd. Whether and in what way can reason free itself from this self-contradiction? A dialectical proposition or theorem of pure reason must, according to what has been said, be distinguishable from all sophistical propositions, by the fact that it is not an answer to an arbitrary question, which may be raised at the mere pleasure of any person, but to one which human reason must necessarily encounter in its progress. In the second place, a dialectical proposition, with its opposite, does not carry the appearance of a merely artificial illusion, which disappears as soon as it is investigated, but a natural and unavoidable illusion, which, even when we are no longer deceived by it, continues to mock us and, although rendered harmless, can never be completely removed....”
(CPR A421/B449)

The world of time and space do not allow us to do whatever we want, so the LNC applies to it in a sense. — Gregory

Not sure what to say about that. If you care to elaborate....that’d be nice.
——————

As Fitche pointed out, there is a sense in which we bind ourselves to morality — Gregory

In Kant, morality is a human condition, and as such, there is no need to bind ourselves to it, for it is exactly half of our intrinsic nature, the other half being pure speculative reason. No need to bind to that which is inescapable anyway.

What we do bind ourselves is to duty, insofar as there are certain duties, re: “perfect” duties, sufficient to oblige our compliance to our c.i.

Kant/Fitche/Schopenhauer. What a mass of intellect, right there. The latter two picked on the Master, but, really....what else could they do. Kant’s a hard act to follow, and everybody knew it.

The trouble with the Critique is that it got time and space wrong. — val p miranda

And to make it right is to.....what?
————-

Man created time and space is a real immaterial existence. — val p miranda

Man created, sure. Real, immaterial, ok. But existence? That which exists can be phenomena; can time or space be phenomena?
—————

Fundamental concepts are still valid and useful such as the law of non-contradiction..... — val p miranda

The Kantian system holds better if the LNC is considered a principle, not a fundamental concept, or, which is the same thing, a category.
—————

The Antinomies seem faulty because time is a part of them. — val p miranda

Not part of the second. Nevertheless, why does time make the antinomies faulty?

It's hard to say "what out to happen" from the principle of duty alone understood as the categorical imperative. — Gregory

Actually, what ought to happen is that which the transcendental conception of freedom grants. So it is easy to say what ought to happen, because we tell ourselves what that is, but it is not from duty that we are told. It is from the autonomy of the will.

While it may be easy to say what ought to happen, it is not always so easy to actually cause to happen that which we have told ourselves, should. If it does, we consider ourselves moral; if we do not we cannot consider ourselves moral, for we have defied our own will.

I do not understand the principle of duty as the categorical imperative. If you do, I won’t argue about it.

As for the golden rule, I needn't remind you it is a rule by definition, therefore cannot carry the authority of an imperative, which has the force of law. Just as a rule is distinct from a law, so too is the golden rule distinct....not part of....the c.i.

is there such thing as a transcendental truth? — 3017amen

Not sure Kant used those terms together, but I guess a truth derived under transcendental conditions would be a transcendental truth. All that needs be, are transcendental conditions. What they can’t be, is empirical, for if every truth was derived from empirical conditions, there would be no need for pure reason in the first place, hence no imagination of supersensible, transcendent, possibilities. In other words....we would cease to wonder. Or, rather, we wouldn’t have an understanding that thinks of things the reality of which it cannot obtain.

By transferring space from the external world to the internal system of reason, Kant removed the need for explaining a real medium for the existence of objects, which Newton couldn’t provide.

I find it useful, that is, to maintain the bookkeeping on what exactly is being spoken of. — tim wood

As do I, and the bookkeeping reduces to.....us. Humans.....

his an account of how the mind assembles the world, which assembly is necessarily prior to any attempt to account for it. — tim wood

.....just like that. Assembly presupposes being, which is sufficient reason for why Kant doesn’t pay much attention to it. Doesn’t matter what is, if we cannot fathom how it is possible to know the manner in which we are affected by it.

But the hazard seems always to slip, slide, and fall into supposing that Kant speaks of the world itself when it's the mind's apperception's workings he's analyzing — tim wood

Hence the fundamental principle for transcendental philosophy, to maintain reason where it belongs, where it can do the least harm, by “...closing up its sources of error...”. To speak of the world is nothing but to speak of the human’s understanding of the world.

Because it's my "take" that what Kant takes away in his analysis of pure knowledge, he gives back (as possibility) in practical knowledge. — tim wood

Not sure about pure knowledge, but what he takes away in pure speculative reason (causality belongs to Nature alone, and not one whit belongs to man), he gives back in pure practical reason (causality belongs to man and not one whit belongs to Nature).

“...All rational knowledge is either material or formal: the former considers some object, the latter is concerned only with the form of the understanding and of the reason itself, and with the universal laws of thought in general without distinction of its objects. Formal philosophy is called logic. Material philosophy, however, has to do with determinate objects and the laws to which they are subject, is again twofold; for these laws are either laws of nature or of freedom. The science of the former is physics, that of the latter, ethics; they are also called natural philosophy and moral philosophy respectively. Logic cannot have any empirical part; that is, a part in which the universal and necessary laws of thought should rest on grounds taken from experience; otherwise it would not be logic, i.e., a canon for the understanding or the reason, valid for all thought, and capable of demonstration. Natural and moral philosophy, on the contrary, can each have their empirical part, since the former has to determine the laws of nature as an object of experience; the latter the laws of the human will, so far as it is affected by nature: the former, however, being laws according to which everything does happen; the latter, laws according to which everything ought to happen. Ethics, however, must also consider the conditions under which what ought to happen frequently does not.....”
(F.P.M.M., 1785, in T. K. Abbott, 1895)

Paragraph granted!!!!!

It's hard to overemphasis this revolution — Gregory

And hidden in that, is the paradigm shift from ontology to epistemology.

It is a truth, insofar as its negation is a contradiction.
— Mww

Can you speak to that quote in a bit more detail? It seems very intriguing to me. — 3017amen

You said....

what is a priori, is this judgement that we believe all events must have a cause. — 3017amen

....to which I responded by saying that to believe events MUST have causes precludes the notion from being a mere belief. If it was a belief, it would have to be stated as events might, or events should, have causes. If, on the other hand, the very concept of “event” immediately invokes an ordering of time, insofar as any perceived event follows from some antecedent event related to it, then the a priori synthetical principle of cause and effect, relative to any perception, is established as universally necessary, hence true because its negation contradicts experience, re: it is impossible to perceive the same thing for all time, therefore every perception is conditioned by successions in time, that condition being an antecedent event that is necessarily its cause.

It is good to bear in mind we don’t care about events unknowable, but only events present or possibly present to our perception. We don’t care at this point what the event is, nor do we care what the cause is, but only that anything given to sensibility has that relation, and that relation must be conceivable, hence understood, by us, otherwise experience itself is impossible.

Even if it is the case that you meant “this judgement that we believe” we still have a problem, in that, because belief is itself a judgement of relative certainty, we have subjected a judgement to a judgement, which jeopardizes the possibility of a cognition developing from it. Infinite regress, or stalemate, both of which are anathema to knowledge.

Is this too abstract in a Kantian discussion — Gregory

Yeah, it’s a long ways past where our knowledge of things needs to be. All we need is cause and effect as the bottom line, without regard to the subtleties of either one by itself. The exception is, from a Kantian point of view, that the conception of freedom can be used as an uncaused cause, in which case we can have one without the other. Kant recognizes the inherent contradiction, so he just says we only need to think of freedom as an uncaused cause, not that we have to prove that it actually is one. Which is pretty abstract, when you stop and think about it.

Yeah....I used quantifies only because the thread title showed a plurality of single instances.

I agree any single law is qualified by whichever principle reason assigns as its ground. And just as reason covers all principles, universality and necessity, as principles, cover all laws.

Once a moral principle is employed in making a law it makes it a law. — James Riley

Now we’re getting somewhere. Once a moral principle is employed in making a law it makes it a MORAL law. Once a logical principle is employed in making a law it makes it a LOGICAL law. Once a civic principle is employed in making a law it makes it a CIVIL law. Pick a domain, find a principle, make a law grounded by it.

All laws of kind have principles from which they are made laws of that kind. It follows there must be at least one principle that makes any law a law, or that makes any law, lawful. Which succinctly quantifies the thread title...a law is a law is a law.

See page 1.

All events must have a cause = a synthetic a priori proposition. — 3017amen

Agreed, as long as it’s being expressed, “a priori” and “synthetic” confine the expression to certain conditions.

what is a priori, is this judgement that we believe all events must have a cause. — 3017amen

And if a judgement, for which no expression is necessary, “a priori” and “synthetic” confine the judgement to certain relations, and such judgement can never be a mere belief. It is a truth, insofar as its negation is a contradiction.

The synthetic a priori judgement is, first, a product of pure reason because its ground is a category (relation, schema: causality/dependence), and second, it is transcendental because it relates to concepts in general and from which other a priori cognitions become possible.

In other words, in consciousness, how are synthetic a priori judgments possible (?). Kant's argument is that it's not learned. — 3017amen

In consciousness, they are not; it is reason alone from which such judgements arise. We are conscious of that to which the principle applies, but not of the principle itself, unless or until we wish to examine how experience is possible and we find everything reduces to this fundamental logical necessity. From this, it follows such judgements are not learned; they are given. What we might learn, is how to exchange the subjectivity of our reason for the objectivity of our expression.

“....V. In all Theoretical Sciences of Reason, Synthetical Judgements "a priori" are contained as Principles....” (CPR, B15)

I respect your interpretations of the Good Professor, even if I might disagree with some of them. Hell....it might be me that’s barking at the moon, dunno.

The proposition all events must have a cause is not formulated from pure reason. — 3017amen

Ok...the proposition does not derive from pure reason, any proposition being merely an expression derived from antecedent cognitions. That all events have a cause is a principle of pure reason, nonetheless. Can we say that much is true?

If we were not able to ask that question/said proposition, virtually no scientific discoveries would be made. — 3017amen

There are accidental scientific discoveries, right? Not many, to be sure, but enough to prove it is not necessary to ask that question in order to have such discoveries. I guess it’s probably true enough, that, while not absolutely necessary, they are conditionally necessary if one doesn’t wish to wait around for accidents.

What Kant is trying to say in his Prussian Enlightenment way is that the world is as it appears...... — Gregory

We can only know the world as it appears to us, yes. That doesn’t mean the world is as it appears, but only that we have no other way to judge how it is, other than as it appears to us.

Kant didn’t mind Aristotle’s forms; he just didn’t like where they were located: Aristotle::world; Kant::mind.

we never see the tree itself, but only the reflected light from the tree, itself then assembled into our own image of it - our image removed in time and substance and by successive media from anything the tree itself might be. — tim wood

There’s a perfect little nutshell if there ever was one, right there. Especially the successive media part, which even the rabid physicalists cannot deny, without making themselves foolish. The brain doesn’t sense stuff; it only registers that other body parts have sensed stuff. As long as a one-to-one correspondence between those is physically impossible, any epistemological theory centered around the thing-in-itself can never be refuted.
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Defining science as the asking of well-crafted and answerable questions, which in the course of experiment are in fact answered (some way or other), with respect to, say, that tree over there, is it the Kantian position that we can know nothing about it (-in-itself-as-it-is-in-itself)? — tim wood

Correct, according to his theory of human knowledge, keeping in mind this is with respect to our perception of things, meaning our basic sensory apparatus in juxtaposition to real spacetime objects. When using devices of experiment, on the other hand, we have merely relinquished the sensing of the object, from which we get our representations, and replaced it with the sensing of the equipment, which is still a representation to us, but a representation that represents what is being tested.
————

And we can build up quite bit of knowledge about the tree, if even only by negation (e.g., by what it isn't and where it isn't, etc.). — tim wood

Yeah, but, Abboooottttt!!!! We don’t care about what a tree isn’t. All the conceptions judged not belonging to the intuition of a thing, does nothing to tell us what it is. Instead, we end up with a perpetually undetermined phenomenon. So, yes, we can build up quite a bit of knowledge, by synthesizing conceptions understanding thinks as belonging to an intuition. How do you think it is, that we got so farging many kinds of nails!!!
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The substance being not that science cannot know.... — tim wood

Yep. It isn’t that science cannot know, meaning it isn’t that science cannot tell us, but rather, it is us that sometimes may not know what to ask science to tell us and, possibly, it is us that doesn’t accept what science has to say.

Kant, through logic, felt like all metaphysical inquiries were fruitless — 3017amen

I wouldn’t agree with that, as much as I would agree Kant thought metaphysical pursuits....wondering, if you will.....culminating in the certainty of a science, is fruitless. While it is necessary to treat metaphysics as if it were a science, in order to gain as much certainty as possible, and that using the purity of logical form, as long as experience is required to prove what metaphysics proposes by means of that logic, just as experience is required to prove the sciences proper, we are at a loss.

Not to argue without cause, but there is at least one condition under which metaphysical pursuits are fruit-FUL, and that is to restrict pure reason to its proper bounds. But that’s the very philosophy of which Everydayman has no recognition of needing despite being endlessly guilty of violating.

he at least did acknowledge that humans have that (....) wonder...which is intrinsic a priori to the intellect. — 3017amen

Absolutely. The opening paragraph of the A edition says almost exactly that, albeit in Prussian academic Enlightenment prose, setting the stage for the next 700 pages. He does walk it back slightly in the B edition, by saying all that, but it only applies if one “rises to the height of speculation”. I guess he had to account for the folks that didn’t care about wondering, blessed with a mere “common understanding”. Which is still a lot kinder than Hume, who says of Everydayman “a man of vulgar understanding”. (Grin)

science is indirectly working on totally uncovering the thing-in-itself with the Standard Model as a good beginning. — val p miranda

You know, from a Kantian point of view, science only tells of a thing, what a human asks. If we don’t know a thing as it is in itself, but only as our sensibility presents it to us, what could we direct science toward, other than the representations sensibility gives us? In effect, we are asking science to justify our interpretation of the world, rather than inform us with direct evidence of the world as it is in itself.

An appearance is not what appears; a representation is a word for appearance. — val p miranda

Substituting, it should be congruent that a representation is not what appears.

What appears is the thing-in-self.... — val p miranda

Substituting again, it should be congruent that representation is not what appears, but rather, the thing-in-itself is what appears, from which follows that it should be congruent that the thing-in-itself is not a representation nor an appearance.

......but our sensibility detects macro reality. — val p miranda

It can only be assumed now, rather than substituted, that because the thing-in-itself is not representation, and our sensibility only detects macro reality, then the thing-in-itself is what our sensibility detects such that it then appears to us, making the thing-in-itself contained in or by macro reality.

But the assertion reads, “the thing-in-itself is what appears, but our sensibility detects macro reality”, which implies the thing-in-itself is not what our sensibility detects thus is not contained in macro reality. Or, put another way, the thing-in-itself is what appears, but the thing-in-itself is not what is detected, which reduces to, what appears is not what is detected.

Or it could be that the thing-in-itself appears by some other means than its detection by our sensibility, which carries the implication that there is a multiplicity of methods for the manifestation of what appears, that at the same time must not be a representation, given from the first substitution.
—————-

As a matter of curiosity alone, did you derive your entry from this little tidbit......

“...At the same time, it must be carefully borne in mind that, while we surrender the power of cognizing, we still reserve the power of thinking objects, as things in themselves. For, otherwise, we should require to affirm the existence of an appearance, without something that appears, which is absurd...” (CPR Bxxvii)

.......and if not, wherefrom, may I ask?

Do you agree with the argument? — Aoife Jones

To say I don’t know what it is like to be a bat, but I do know that to be a bat is to be like something....otherwise, for me, there can be nothing in any way like a bat at all, an obvious contradiction.....all I have said about my knowledge system is its determination of its own limits, but nothing about any particular kind of world to which my knowledge directs itself.

So saying, no, I do not agree with the argument.

1.) The major is true, in that there is something it is like to be a bat.
2.) The minor is partially true, in that no matter the quantity of things I do know, the fact remains that my knowledge of everything is impossible, hence not knowing the something the being of a bat is like, is merely among the things I don’t know, and also partially incomplete, in that the “I can never know” can arise from either an inductive inference as an a priori condition of time, or, from a deductive inference as an empirical condition of mere physiological impossibility. But....
3.) The conclusion does not follow from the premises, in that.....

A.) it neglects the possibility that reality and the objective world are already determined as indistinguishable by the very self-limiting knowledge system that is investigating things possible to know.....
B.) it neglects the logic that because it is the case that something is not known, warrant is immediately relinquished for determining the world to which that something belongs, and....
C.) having knowledge of something is sufficient to claim its necessity, but having no knowledge of something is not sufficient to claim its impossibility.

Or so it seems.......

I hope you’re aware that the A249-A254 section from which that quote is taken, was re-written by the author, in the B edition. While it is true he said all that stuff, it is just as true he thought better of it six years later, thereby making this quote obsolete, as far as the overall treatise is concerned.

Doesn’t really matter all that much, with respect to the thread title. Kant never did posit a noumenal “world”, hence whether or not he was justified in positing its existence, is moot.

Just sayin’......

I asked if you would grant that morality derives from respect. — Banno

I answered to the best of my interpretation of your question:

No, I would not. It is my philosophical contention that morality is given, as a pure subjective human condition, hence not derivable. I qualified my answer with......the loss of self-respect being the greatest possible affront to morality......which indicates respect presupposes morality itself, its form be what it may.
—————-

You're not behaving morally, nor immorally, if you are acting only out of obligation. — Banno

Correct, insofar as, deontologically speaking, obligation is necessary but not in itself sufficient, for acting morally, for there must still be practical reasons for being obligated, that are not mere inclinations. Being aware of your predispositions on the topic, I won’t burden you with the theoretical predicates. Just the kinda guy I am, doncha know.

Surely you’d grant that morality derives from respect for others, not for oneself... — Banno

No, I would not. If what you say is the case, then I am morally destitute for no other reason than I hold no respect for another human. I am no more obliged to respect another than I am myself; the difference is the sense of loss associated with it, the loss of self-respect being the greatest possible affront to morality. Keeping in mind that to not respect is very far from to disrespect.

It is my philosophical contention that morality is given, as a pure subjective human condition, hence not derivable. The exhibition of it, on the other hand, by one from his sense of it, and the judgement of that, by another from his own sense of it, according to the Great and Highly Esteemed Roger Waters, “is what the fighting’s all about”.

Surely you’d grant that a virtuous man thwarts his desires for the sake of his precious, better known as self-respect.

If the illusion is persuasive enough, maybe it isn’t one.

True, he can chose his rules. But if he chooses different rules for different situations, without a rule to rule them all, he is hard pressed to assume a standard of action, being rather at the whim and whimsy of his own desires.

Gotta be a bottom, do-not-cross, line somewhere, somehow, right?

What does your brand of virtue ethics say about that?

If there is a way to know what one should do, why is it still a question?
— Mww

The question shouldn’t exist because morality should be inherently there like thinking — SteveMinjares

Agreed, and was my point.

As for the rest, too anthropological/psychological for me. I prefer my philosophy, and particularly moral theory, separate and distinct from them. I’m old-fashioned that way.

I rather think Everydayman’s core is pretty tidy, as a rule.

It still remains, that the ground for how he acts, in response to "What should I do, now, in this situation?", isn’t given by the situation.

The real question is "What should I do, now, in this situation?" — Banno

How is that not haphazardly contingent?

If there is a way to know what one should do, why is it still a question?

I maintain you also have a sense of morality — counterpunch

I maintain that (....) morality is primarily subjective — counterpunch

Robinson Crusoe cannot behave immorally, alone on a desert island — counterpunch

You had my support.....as clandestine as it may have been, tucked away in the back of the room here.....but now I’m having second thoughts.

Better you fix it, elst the vultures get a freebie.

It's unclear what Mww is doing, especially given that he says "I agree with it" then "I don't"... — Banno

You asked what I found interesting, so I told you. This part of the essay is interesting to me so I give it a thumbs up, that part of the essay is interesting to me as well, but I give it a thumbs down. Simple.

A guy that takes a metaphor and turns it into a riddle, by the employment of conceptions that contradict each other, re: “foundation walls carried by the whole house” is just wasting himself in doing crappy philosophy.

But nobody’s gonna buy that he was doing crappy philosophy, so it is given a nice comforting name, language games. The epitome of which is found in Grayling’s characterization of #248, “the clever rendition of the transcendental argument”. The reader is required to substitute the constituents of the proposition, while retaining its intent, arriving at something like....all my rock-bottom convictions are carried by my propositions. So the game is the choice of substitutions, the language is what is substituted, and the result......which has been the case since man dragged woman back to the cave by the hair......obtains as right back to crappy philosophy. Not because no one can make sense of it, but when he does make sense of it by playing language games, he finds it’s all been said before.

But, you know. Opinions are like noses......

I say: There is no Law but the Law! — Ciceronianus the White

Agreed, if you mean there must be the pure conception of law before there can be instances of it.

The belief that the law must conform to an "assumed standard" of some kind, and isn't the law if it does not, ignores the law; it doesn't explain it. It leads to a fundamental ignorance of the nature of the law and its operation. — Ciceronianus the White

Disagreed. Law, by which I do not mean a law, or the law, but law in itself, does conform to a standard, it isn’t law if it doesn’t, and it explains what law is, hence is not the ignoring of it even while ignoring its instances.

Agreed, though, that there is already a fundamental ignorance of the nature of law, in the ignorance of its assumed standards, and that because the standards for law in general, without regard to that which law directs itself, are universality and absolute necessity.