In my view, the transition from sensation to knowledge is not a passage from one realm (sensibility) to another (understanding), but an enrichment of the subject's relation to what is given. — Esse Quam Videri

Enrichment, yes; made possible at the minimum by whatever the experienced sensation is, even if judgement of the sensation remains uncertain.

The same conscious subject who senses also inquires, understands, and judges — and these are not operations performed on different objects — Esse Quam Videri

They can be, for the same subject can perform inquires, understandings and judgements when there is nothing given from sensation, which makes explicit the objects on which the operations are performed are very different. Even those operations performed on past sensations, which we call the content of consciousness, are not the same kind of object as were the things first sensed which gave us the content. Or, just call it memory if you wish.

I think it necessary system functionality has different aspects, which implies different outcomes for its aspects, which we can call different objects. The objects of intuition are phenomena; the objects of understanding are conceptions; the objects of judgements are cognitions, the objects of cognitions are experiences, the objects of reason are principles; the object of will is volition, and so on.
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What's crucial is that understanding and judgment don't take a different object than sensation. They take the same given and determine it further. — Esse Quam Videri

But sensation is in the sensory apparatuses. The content of the apparatuses is not what is transported on the nerves to the brain. The product of them is, but the product is very different from the content and the product doesn’t change, which further determination implies. So understanding and judgements must take, must concern themselves with, objects different than the objects of sensation.

One of the manifold of objects of tactile sensation is an itch. Neither understanding not judgement takes an itch and determines it further; they take the phenomenon represented by an itch, determine its cause (understanding) on the one hand, and affirm or deny the validity of that cause (judgment) on the other.

I agree with further determinations, though. One can say an itch is caused by a bug without contradicting himself, but he cannot say this itch is only caused by a bug when it is equally non-contradictory to say it is possibly caused by a wayward hair. Hence the benefit of a variety of sensory devices: got an itch, think bug (judge possible bug causality), see spider web (judge dismissal of bug, judge necessary web causality). Swipe web rather than slap bug. Life goes on.

We can leave it anywhere anytime. I think we’re pretty much disassociated on the finer points, and the common points aren’t interesting anyway.

I would say that experience (sensation) provides the data, understanding grasps intelligibility in that data, and judgment affirms whether that grasp is correct. No one of these levels alone constitutes knowledge of an apple. — Esse Quam Videri

Well said. I, on the other hand, would un-relate experience from sensation, leaving sensation itself as a member of your levels. Experience then becomes the terminus of cognition you spoke of last time.
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Where I'd gently push back is on the separation of sensibility from cognition as distinct faculties or systems. — Esse Quam Videri

I think they can be distinct faculties within one system, from which it can be argued sensation does mediate between the real and cognition, because, while we are conscious of sensation, we are not the least conscious of its objects, and furthermore, we regain conscious awareness of such objects, from a metaphysical point of view only upon understanding, and from a physical point of view only from what the brain tells us about it. From the physical fact that the peripheral nervous system is dark to us, follows the non-contradictory metaphysical justification for phenomena.

I suspect you’re familiar with the principle paraphrased as understanding cannot intuit and intuition cannot think. This is no different in principle from the fact the brain cannot sense and the senses cannot recognize.

…..it denies that sensation constitutes a self-contained representational realm that cognition must then "bridge." — Esse Quam Videri

It being your account, then I agree. Cognition doesn’t bridge the self-contained representational realm of sensation; but rather incorporates it into its own self-contained realm of representations.
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In my view, experience, understanding, and judgment are dynamically related operations within a single conscious subject — not separate systems handing data from one to the next. — Esse Quam Videri

Yes, you’re not alone. Me, being of the mindset I am, put experience at the end, thus, while certainly contained with a single conscious subject and probably in one form or another in conscious subjects in general, not related to dynamic operators at all. It’s the ends, that to which the dynamics advance, much as perception is that from which it begins, all else simply the means.
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I would say it like this: the real is not first given and then re-represented; it is given, then understood and then affirmed. — Esse Quam Videri

I don’t know what re-represented means. I can relate the presented of the real to appearance, but even in doing that, appearance isn’t what’s represented downstream, and the real that is given is a thing and not a representation.

Are you suggesting there’s nothing going on between the given and understanding? If the real is external to the body and understanding is internal in the body, then how is it that the real is what is understood? The real is given, yes. But the real that is given can’t be what is understood and affirmed. You know this must be true; I mean….there’s just no room up there for real basketballs and dinner forks.


I may have said enough on this sub-topic, regarding being unaware of the peripheral nervous system. It is at least non-contradictory to attribute to this part of the overall system some logical metaphysical prescriptions, but it is explanatorily catastrophic to bypass it completely by going from the real as given, which is always necessary, to the understanding and judgement of it. In effect, then, if it is the case understanding and judgement is directed to something that is not the real, and if not directed to representation, then it is directed to nothing at all, in which case there is nothing to understand or affirm, and experience becomes impossible.
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it's just that I'd locate the transition differently than Kant does. — Esse Quam Videri

That’s fine, you can put it wherever you think it fits. I’m more interested in what you think the transition entails then where it may be located.

Anyway….good talk.

The question is what role sensation plays in the structure of cognition. — Esse Quam Videri

The thesis under duress here is perception, and the relative directness of it, given the title of the thread. The structure of cognition is something other than that. But to respond to the supposed question, the role sensation plays relative to the structure of cognition, is that it doesn’t have one. Relative to the systemic procedure of cognition, whatever its structure may be, its role would be the empirical ground for its object.

I’m satisfied with your agreement sensation is an intermediary entity the subject is aware of through the activity of the sensory system, even if not that which we inspect in its own right.
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I guess my point was….how does the entity we do not inspect in its own right earn the name “apple”? How does anything at all, given its mere sensation, obtain particular identifying nomenclature? This relates, because if it is the case no naming arises from the structure of perception, and all structures of cognition are that from which naming does arise, then all naming is direct relative to cognition, from which follows necessarily, all talk of apple at the systemic point of sensation, is illegitimate.

Now I can say, I certainly do first attend to sensation, insofar as it is for all practical purposes impossible to ignore, then infer an apple, upon furtherance of the systemic procedure by which naming arises. The apple is not presented in and through the sensory manifold, insofar as at that point, it isn’t an apple. It is no more than a thing, as Martin proposed in the clip Micheal posted on page….whatever.

40 pages of infinitesimal critical analysis, which is good, but with an implicit carelessness which defeats it, insofar as it should have been dialectically obligatory to distinguish and separate direct/indirect and real/valid under completely different systemic conditions then have been touched on so far in this thread.

With sufficiently explanatory distinction, then, that perception is only of the real, and the real is directly given to it, irrespective of knowledge or experience, should have been incontestable, hardly worth 40 pages, the indirectly real being something else entirely, for which you at least, have given the clue.

It was all fun to read and think about, though, so there is that.
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But the structural point stands: sensation is a moment within cognition, not an intermediary entity that cognition takes as its terminus. — Esse Quam Videri

Agreed, sensation is not an intermediary entity cognition takes, but disagreed it is a moment within it. I rather think sensation is a moment, an intermediary entity, within sensibility, which relates the directly real in perception to the indirectly representational in phenomena.

….the structures of perception entail operational mediation (the system actively processes)…., — Esse Quam Videri

Yes. Five physiological devices, each modality unlike the other, by which the external becomes internal.

…..but not objective mediation (the system does not produce an intermediary entity that the subject is aware of). — Esse Quam Videri

Then what of sensation?

On Martin:
I’m fine with the naive realist’s position that the senses are that by which we are directly and immediately aware of things, but deny such direct awareness is necessarily as those things really are.

He talks of things in general, whereas you talk of specific named things. His things are real existents and belong to Nature, directly corresponding to perception; your apple is a valid cognition related to some real existent thing and belongs only to an intelligence, directly corresponding to experience, and for which perception is presupposed. They are not the same.

P1: No. For any perception, its representation is the constituent of experience;
P2: No. For any constituent representation contained in an experience, the existence of the object represented, is given necessarily;
P3: No. That an object exists and causes representation from which an experience follows, proves that the object itself does not entail experience. The object does entail, not the constituency of, but the necessary, albeit empirical, condition for, experience.

People are wont to assert sensation is itself an experience. It isn’t; it is a feeling, in that experience presupposes logical function while mere sensation does not, from which follows they cannot be considered synonymous. The proper empirical constituent of experience is that representation called phenomenon. Without the affiliated logical function connected with it, nothing more can be said.
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For you to carry on with a further exposition implies I’ve misunderstood what I was responding to. Be that as it may….

On your argument:
C1: You’ll see an apple 10s after the time light reflects from it, for whatever the duration of that reflection, determinable by t=d/r.
C2: The light from the destroyed apple takes its own 10s to be received, so the initial reflection sustains for 10s from the 5s change-of-state reflection.
To say an apple doesn’t exist when I see an apple is self-contradictory.
Sorry, I don’t know what to do with C3.
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So there is this thing in logic, that a condition is true iff its negation is also true. Consider the reverse: take the destroyed apple you see, back through time, to the re-assembly of it, to its whole. With the given parameters, that should take 10s, from which it is only for 5s that you will see the apple as a whole. Is there not a duration of 15s of light, not perceived but projected, by which two distinct conditions of a singular thing, is perceivable?

I suppose the concession must be made, insofar as science demands it, that the truth of the existence of a thing is not certified by immediate perception alone. But it remains a necessary condition that all that is perceived and from which experience is possible, must either exist or have existed. I don’t know how the experiment alters that necessity.

Anyway, I’ve reached the limit for defending myself, so I’ll quit here.

Let's assume that we live in a world in which the air is thick and light has mass and travels at a slow 1m/s. An apple is placed 10m in front of you. After 5 seconds it is disintegrated. After a further 5 seconds the light reaches your eyes and you see an intact apple for 5 seconds.

In those 5 seconds in which you see an intact apple do you have direct perception of the now disintegrated apple? If the apple is now disintegrated then what is the intact apple you see if not an image? — Michael

It is assumed the thing has been at 10m for sufficient time, re: >/= 10s, given the velocity stipulation, otherwise its appearance to sensibility wouldn’t have occurred in the first place, hence no perception at all is possible related to it.

….at 1m/s it will take 10s for the thing 10m away to be perceived, call the time of some event describing the primary condition of the thing to be perceived, t0;
….at t0 + 5s, there occurs an event for which there is a change in the primary condition of the thing, call it t1;
….at t1 neither the primary nor the secondary condition of the thing has made an appearance, nor even that there is a thing at all, hence there is no possible judgement to be made relative to it;
….given d=rt, @10s the t0 thing in its primary condition makes its appearance to sensibility, which is called perception, call it t2;
….at t2, the t1 change in the thing to its secondary condition has endured 5s, and given consistent d=rt, its appearance to sensibility is still 5s away from making its appearance, from which there remains to sensibility only the primary condition of the thing relative to t2, as its perception;
….the change in the condition of the thing perceived at t2 manifests as its own distinct appearance at t1 plus 10s, call it t4, fully 15s after the event at t0;
….without the change in the condition of the thing that appears, there is no ground for change in the judgement of the perception obtained from the event at t0, from which follows necessarily that for the 10s duration between t1 and t4, whatever the condition of the thing at t0 will remain the ground for which judgement regarding the thing is made. Nothing at all can be said with respect to that which never makes its appearance insofar as it relates to experience, while anything at all can be said with respect to mere inference, which regards only the possibility of experience without relation to an appearance.

No, there is no perception of whatever the event at t1 such that judgements relative to the event at t0, in this case an intact thing known as an apple, is superseded by judgements conditioned by different perceptions.

It is absurd to say the judgement related to the only perception there is, re: the thing at t0, is false, insofar as there is nothing at all at t2 </=10s, to negate it. The absurdity, technically the irrationality, resides in insisting the judgements determinable by conditions between t0 and t2 still hold after the time >/= 10s of t1, which is just to say the disintegrated apple didn’t disintegrate, in contradiction with the certainty of its relative appearance.

On what possible ground could one say, at any time before t2, the condition of the apple wasn’t precisely as it appeared? By the same token, on what ground can one possible say he didn’t have the antecedent perception of an intact apple, even after having subsequently perceived an entirely different appearance he already knows is the very same apple, destroyed?

I’m sure I can’t figure out what problem there can be, at least regarding this apple gedankenexperiment, and therefrom, direct realism relative to perception in general.

….when asking what is an apple: (…) Kant convincingly tells us we can't know. — Hanover

Kant convinces us….as much as metaphysical doctrine is convincing at all….apple is precisely and only what we do know; what the mere invented word represents, on the other hand, we do not.

Anyhow my ideas of the interpretation on the issues might be different from yours or others. — Corvus

Yeah, standard state of affairs, right? Human subjectivity…the bane and the blessing of philosophical discourse.

Have fun with it, I say

What do you mean by sensibility in general…. — Corvus

With respect to the Kantian system for human empirical knowledge, sensibility in general is that part of the system having to do with bridging the external world of real things to the internal world of representation of things.

…..and the pure form of intuitions? — Corvus

Form is meant to be in conjunction with the matter of real things, a continuation of the standard matter/form duality established by the classical philosophers. Form is that criteria which must be met by this or that thing, the matter of which is given by sensation, and pure form, then, is that criteria which must be met by every possible thing, whether it is perceived or not, such that any of these are or may be phenomena in us and by which external/internal, thing/representation bridging is successful.

Part of the problem may be that intuition itself hasn’t even been touched, and thereby the part pure forms of it take their meaning, lose some explanatory power. It doesn’t help that Kant didn’t discuss intuition all that much either, so there’s precious little to interpret, forcing us to just accept what there is in the way of description of methodological processes.

But ironically enough, he was correct in not getting too deep into the metaphysics, because humans in general are not aware of what’s going on in their peripheral nervous system, which just is, after all, what is meant by the faculty of intuition for the construction of sensory representations, from the point of sensation to reception in the brain. In other words, it’s very hard to construct even a speculative theory with respect to that for which the human isn’t the least conscious of actually doing. Which is what he was saying with, “…intuitions without conceptions are blind…”

So anyway….if the switch is to thinking, and the thinking is of things, then we are thinking of things in a certain way, which means we attach stuff to things in order to say what we think they are. If we think stuff onto things, we can think stuff off them just as well. So we think all the stuff off, say, a basketball, all the properties we’ve already assigned to it, we still cannot think away that which belongs to its shape. We can think away the sphere, we can imagine the immediate disappearance of the whole ball, but that into which it had extended remains, and thinking that away is impossible for the excruciatingly simple reason that we didn’t think it into the thing called basketball in the first place. From which arises that necessary idea, which, after reason gets done with it, becomes the transcendental conception represented as “space”.

Time’s very different, as should be expected, but reason’s arriving at the idea of it is just as legitimate.

….the statement that Time is intuition, said by Kant. — Corvus

“… In this investigation it will be found that there are two pure forms of sensible intuition as principles of a priori cognition, namely space and time…” (A22/B36)

I did say they were intuitions, when I should have said they were the pure forms of intuitions, and of sensibility in general.

“…. We have therefore wanted to say that all our intuition is nothing but the representation of appearance; that the things that we intuit are not in themselves what we intuit them to be, nor are their relations so constituted in themselves as they appear to us, (…). What may be the case with objects in themselves and abstracted from all this receptivity of our sensibility remains entirely unknown to us. We are acquainted with nothing except our way of perceiving them, which is peculiar to us, (…). We are concerned solely with this. Space and time are its pure forms, sensation in general its matter. We can cognize only the former a priori, i.e., prior to all actual perception, and they are therefore called pure intuition; the latter, however, is that in our cognition that is responsible for it being called a posteriori cognition, i.e., empirical intuition….” (A42/B60)

All intuition is representation of appearance, space and time are not representations of any appearances, therefore not any intuition. Kant would not have said time is intuition, or time is an intuition.

“…. Time can no more be intuited externally than space can be intuited as something in us. Now what are space and time? Are they actual entities? Are they only determinations or relations of things, yet ones that would pertain to them even if they were not intuited, or are they relations that only attach to the form of intuition alone, and thus to the subjective constitution of our mind, without which these predicates could not be ascribed to any thing at all?…”

What they are, covers 15 A paginations and 16 B.
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If time can no more be intuited externally than space can be intuited internally, can that be extended to mean time can be intuited internally and space can be intuited externally? In which case, space and time can indeed be intuitions, even if Kant didn’t actually say they were?

But if space and time, in and of themselves alone, are said to represent conceptions the transcendental expositions of which are idealities, must it then be possible to intuit idealities in the same regard as appearances? No, for to cognize transcendentally is to reason, from which follows in the cognition of a ideal representation, we in effect represent to ourselves purely a priori nothing more than the ground of a principle, in this case for the use of sensibility in general insofar as by it the representation of appearances in intuition, re: phenomena, becomes possible.

Which is why everybody hates speculative metaphysics: in most cases, the greater the explanation the less the comprehension.

That nothing in the world changes is impossible; things in relation to the impossible are unintelligible.

The sun doesn't rise.

I don’t agree Kant said time is intuition.

Space and time are both intuitions. This statement needs some clarification. — Corvus

Yes, it does. Thanks for pointing it out, and sorry I was inattentive with my statements in the first place.

Time is not a cause of sensation, thus is not a perception.
What is typically referred to as the passage of time, is one of the common ways of speaking about how Nature is comprehensible.
Intuition is a mental activity, time is not a mental activity therefore not an intuition, but derived nonetheless from mental activity.
The mind requires time to qualify relations as simultaneous or sequential, and to quantify durations.
Time is not known or knowable, so there’s no need of perception of change for that reason.

Time doesn’t change at all; one moment is exactly the same as every other.
The changes in intuitions is from changes in perception.
We perceive things, objects, whatever causes sensation.
It isn’t the passage of time we notice; it is change in relations.

Or so the story goes….

The problem he says arises from an assumed "difference on kind" between the intuition of space as an object, and the intuition of time as an object. — Metaphysician Undercover

“….The difficulty presented by this problem consists, as is well known, in the presumed difference in kind between the object of inner sense (the soul) and the object of outer sense…” (B427)

Time and space are both intuitions, hence there is no difference in kind between them;
Space and time never were and cannot be treated as objects, hence the assumption of a difference in kind in their treatment is not the problem being addressed in the text.

A grasp of what the problem actually is, rather than misrepresenting what it arises from, might be helpful.
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…the only reason why the resolution to this problem lies outside the capacity of human cognition is that he has incorrectly reduced space and time to two dimensions of the same thing. — Metaphysician Undercover

What was “said in the Analytic about fundamental powers and faculties” that proves “(the resolution of) the difficulty (…) concerning how a community of substances is possible at all (…) lies outside the field of all human cognition…”, is very different from space and time incorrectly reduced to two dimensions of the same thing, thus isn’t rightly the only reason, and isn’t the proposed reason at all.
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IV. Of the Division of Transcendental Logic into Transcendental Analytic and Dialectic.

“… The part of transcendental logic, therefore, that expounds the elements of the pure cognition of the understanding and the principles without which no object can be thought at all, is the transcendental analytic, and at the same time a logic of truth. For no cognition can contradict it without at the same time losing all content, i.e., all relation to any object, hence all truth. But because it is very enticing and seductive to make use of these pure cognitions of the understanding and principles by themselves,
and even beyond all bounds of experience, which however itself alone can give us the matter (objects) to which those pure concepts of the understanding can be applied, the understanding falls into the danger of making a material use of the merely formal principles of pure understanding through empty sophistries, and of judging without distinction about objects that are not given to us, which perhaps indeed could not be given to us in any way. Since it should properly be only a canon for the assessment of empirical use, it is misused if one lets it count as the organon of a general and unrestricted use, and dares to synthetically judge, assert, and decide about objects in general with the
pure understanding alone.

The second part of our transcendental logic must therefore be a critique of dialectical illusion, and this critique we shall term transcendental dialectic—not meaning it as an art of producing dogmatically such illusion (an art which is unfortunately too current among the practitioners of metaphysical juggling) but rather as a critique of the understanding and reason in regard to their hyperphysical use, in order to uncover the false illusion of their groundless pretensions….”
(A63,4/B87,8)

Now all you need are the pure cognitions and principles of the understanding, and why and how these are different in kind and preside over that which is outside the field of all human cognition.

pure speculative reason in its transcendental use (…) is a faculty of individual rational beings in general.
— Mww

Ok. But it is instantiated in individual rational beings? — boundless

Individual rational beings in general implies every individual rational being, yes.

So, if individual rational beings are contingent so is pure speculative reason. — boundless

Yes, only insofar as individual rational beings are contingent, and every rational being possesses pure speculative reason, than pure speculative reason is contingent on the existence of rational beings, same as toenails and bellybutton lint. Piss-poor philosophy, that.
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The framework is speculative ..…
— Mww

Not sure what you mean by 'speculative' here. — boundless

Simply put, speculation is just metaphysics, the disposition of humans for thinking outside the box of empirical knowledge, disregarding the set limits on how big the box can be. Pure speculative reason, then, just gets him out but can’t help him once he’s there because there’s no limit on the dumb shit he can dream up for himself.

if I am right in what I said above, it also seems that the framework is speculative. — boundless

Already stated as speculative.

What’s the point again?

Ok. Thanks.

We are acquainted with the noumenon through our presence in the world. — Punshhh

This just says we can think noumenon simply because we exist.

With respect to the real world in general, why would anyone care that he is acquainted, if he cannot know from possible experience what he is acquainted with?

Is the 'consciousness of every thought' the consciousness of a given individual sentient/rational being? — boundless

Understanding, the faculty of thought, the objects of which are representations, cannot think the object that is a subject, a subject that thinks and understands, thus cannot represent itself to itself. It is reason that allows to understanding that which represents the thinking subject itself, a.k.a. “I”, which is the subject represented transcendentally.

So it is, not consciousness, but pure speculative reason in its transcendental use, from which the subject in its transcendental meaning originates, and that is a faculty of individual rational beings in general.

I guess you could say the transcendental subject is that by which a rational being identifies himself as such. Represents is better than identifies, insofar as identifies implies the imposition of qualities, which such a simple concept as “I” cannot possess or be assigned.
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I think that Kant's 'transcendental idealism' (…) mistaken because (…) the 'framework' in which it makes sense to speak of an intelligible world is contingent.
Am I wrong about this? — boundless

No. The framework is speculative, hence all its conclusions are contingent on the premises from which the conclusions are inferred.

All this rightfully belongs in the lecture hall with an honest-ta-gawd philosopher in attendance, not so much amongst we mere philosophizers on an anonymous forum.

Why would you say this? I think it clearly is. — Metaphysician Undercover

I suspect you’d clearly see it isn’t, when you understand we’re talking about two completely different domains of discourse, given from two distinctly different conditions of human intelligence, providing altogether distinct functionality.

Most, if not everything you say, is pretty much accepted. It’s just not what I’m talking about, and can never be connected to it.

You’re describing the operation of a system; I’m relating the theorized prescriptions of a single part of it.

You’re talking about things; I’m talking about an idea in general, for which there never is a thing.
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Or, you’ve successfully integrated one with the other, the ways and means of that, and indeed the very reason for doing so, completely escaping me.

From the movie “Wargames”, in my best WOPR computer voice, “would you like to play a game?”.

Your last is a transcendental illusion, a paralogism of pure reason, what CPR is all about. This time, it isn’t yours; it’s mine. It is reason’s proclivity for treating a given in two dialectically opposed ways, without recognizing an error in the method.

Here it is: from my perspective, by saying “Exactly”, you’ve eliminated the very plurality in views you’ve asked me to imagine.

So, yes, the “in-itself” idea can only refer to itself….
— Mww

The relation between a thing and itself is what Aristotle called "identity". — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes, I know, but the thing’s identity as itself, the first law of rational thought, is not what the transcendental idea “in-itself” is about.

But it is relevant to the thread because it is known as a temporal relation, constituting the temporal extension of a thing — Metaphysician Undercover

It is relevant to the title of the thread, but not for temporal extension, but for the permanence, or maybe persistence, of an idea. But there’s no change in the “in-itself”, so any measure in units of time, are impossible.

I can make sense of what you say there. — Janus

Cool. Making sense for somebody, isn’t attempting to make him believe…

….some resonate and others not so much… — Janus

…just like that.

Kant's own model….. — boundless

Since when is, or could ever be, a paradigm shifting speculative metaphysics a model? If there’s never been anything like it, what is it supposed to be a model of? Why can’t it just be a theory, like the guy who wrote it said it was?

The transcendental subject, being nothing but the consciousness of every thought, A346/B404, cannot be subject or predicate in a composed logical proposition.

I don’t do Buddhism.

‘Nuff said.

Sensibility is not a passive window onto a ready-made Nature… — Joshs

Never said it was; perception, on the other hand, is. Sensibility, the faculty of receptivity of representations, cannot be as physiological as the sensory apparatuses.

What is given is given in space and time…. — Joshs

What is given is conditioned by space and time.

….the phrase “given to the senses” already presupposes the subject’s contribution. — Joshs

Presupposes the subject’s participation, given to the senses merely the occassion for it.

….empirical object is “given by Nature herself” as opposed to arising from cognitive faculties…. — Joshs

The object is given by, the representation of it arises from.

the empirical world “arises also from the cognitive faculties of the subject” is correct if it is understood transcendentally rather than causally. — Joshs

That’s the implication of what I said, yes. I just didn’t get that technical. It remains the case that anything considered in general, as the empirical world must be, is transcendental.

Kant is an empirical realist because he insists that objects of experience are not illusions or mere ideas — Joshs

Objects of experience are representations, which are possible illusions whereas ideas are not. He says he is an empirical realist, not for that, but because real objects are really given to sensibility and not arising from it, as some established idealist doctrines maintained.

To invoke “Nature herself” as the source of particular empirical things is to speak as if we had access to Nature as it is in itself. — Joshs

Not necessarily. It is just as logical to say Nature is the source of particular empirical things insofar as they are given to us as necessary and sufficient causality of our sensations, in which case it is not contradictory to say we have access to Nature herself, but not as it is in itself.

….the illusion his critical philosophy is meant to dispel. — Joshs

…resides in pure reason alone, hence the name, or, in understanding only insofar as that which reason provides for its use, is itself illusory. Case in point…to attribute to the empirical world in general that which relates only to particular instances of it.
————-

Or…..I’ve got it all wrong and led many a folk astray. (Sigh)

….see if it makes sense to you. (…) the idea 'the in itself' is undoubtedly purely conceptual. What does the idea refer to? Well, it refers to the in itself of course. — Janus

If the “in-itself” is to be considered as an idea, it can only be so as an act of reason, for understanding, the source of empirical conceptions, does not concern itself with mere ideas. Insofar as ideas do originate in reason, they are transcendental conceptions, rather than empirical or aesthetic.

The thing about transcendental ideas is they do not have objects belonging to them, which is indicated by the “in-itself” being a general conception, having no particular reference. So, yes, the “in-itself” idea can only refer to itself, but from which occurs a problem for the other cognitive faculties, for a reference to itself contains no relations, hence would be worthless as a principle. Without a relation of conceptions there is no cognition, so while the transcendental conception is valid as such, it is without meaning.

It is a problem for the other cognitive faculties, because reason, in accordance with the theory from which it receives its warrant, is the faculty of principles for the express use of the understanding as rules for its own functionality regarding empirical conditions. It should be quite clear understanding can cognize nothing empirical at all from the mere idea “in-itself”, and, upon any use of the general idea, assumes the liberty of conceiving the “thing-in-itself”, or, the “object-in-itself”**, which just is to subsume another conception under the general, or, relate one to the other.
** “…I can think whatever I please, so long as I do not contradict myself…”

Now there becomes that with which understanding can form a judgement, in that “thing” and/or “object” have already been empirically thought and their own possible empirical relations already determined, re: being related to this or that matter/form intuition, called…..waaaiiiittt for iitttttt….phenomenon!!!!!!, and it is therefrom this synthesis that the new cognition, the “thing-in-itself” receives its cognitive validity, a.k.a., its definition, as that “thing” which does not meet the requirements of its original synthesis. Or, simply put, the cognition of that which is not ever to be phenomenon because that thing does not meet the criteria sensibility requires.

Often overlooked but very pertinent: for any conception its negation is given automatically, from which follows for any thing given to us there must necessarily be that very same thing not given to us. Now, that thing not given to us in perception may be determinable from its non-existence on the one hand, or, on the other may be determinable merely from the possibility that it hasn’t yet been given, in which case it cannot be non-existent. It is from these mutually-canceling inferences that existence cannot be a condition of the conceptual “thing-in-itself”, and, if existence cannot be a condition for negation it can be at least a non-contradictory condition for affirmation, in which case, it is not wrong to say “things-in-themselves” exist, the absence of its appearance to perception notwithstanding.

Nothing illogical in the principle: that thing perceived must exist but that thing not perceived does not necessarily not exist. Kant does in fact hint strongly in Bxxviii, “….if the critique has not erred in teaching that the object should be taken in a twofold meaning, namely as appearance or as thing in itself…”, that the thing-in-itself really is as much an existent as the appearance provided by it really must be.

Hopefully there’s something you find useful in there. It is all only my interpretive opinion, after all.

I believe his 'system' implies that it arises from the 'interaction' between the subject and the 'noumenon' — boundless

It being the world; the world arises from. Ok, it doesn’t, that notwithstanding, how would it work in order to be the case?

I can't see how his system doesn't say that: the noumenon is in part the 'basis' for the arising of the empirical world. — boundless

His doesn’t say, and his system doesn’t allow, that the noumenon is in part the basis for the arising of the empirical world.

Granting the empirical world is the totality of all possible real things, it is absurd to suppose a single human logical construct is responsible for the existence of it. And even if the empirical world is merely a concept, in that we as humans could never experience such a thing as the totality of all possible real things….what has noumena to do with any of that?

Also it is hard to me to think how could the noumenon be 'structureless/inintelligible' if it is the basis for the arising of the empirical world. — boundless

Which just says it’s not hard to think the opposite if it isn’t. Which makes more sense? It depends on what one thinks a noumenon to be, doesn’t it? What do you think it is, other than structureless/inintelligible, and if that, why is it that way and not some other?

If you are making noumena your own, which you’re perfectly entitled to do, the burden then falls on you to say what any relation of which it is a part is, and how that relation is possible.

Proceed?
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Notice that I do agree with Kant that the 'empirical world' arises also from the cognitive faculties of the subject. — boundless

Only if the empirical world is a general conception representing all possible real things does it arise from the cognitive faculties of the subject. For any particular thing in the collection of all possible things, given to the senses in perception and by which experience is possible, that thing does not arise from the cognitive faculties of the subject, but, insofar as it is given, arises from Nature herself.

So you might not be agreeing with what you think you are.

Feynman was actually very good at explaining complicated physics. — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes, he was. For those liking their physics complicated.

You’re taking things into a realm I don’t care anything about. It’s highly unlikely I’ll be doing the SOL anytime soon, and there’s really no good reason for getting two candles into the same holder.

I’m ok with things the way I’ve thought of them, and I don’t deny what you’ve said. I just like my way better.

Is the in itself purely imaginary or is it real? — Janus

Hmmm…..the in-itself is purely conceptual, as a mere notion of the understanding, thus not real, so of the two choices, and in conjunction with conceptions being merely representations, I’m forced to go with imaginary. But every conception is representation of a thought, so while to conceive/imagine/think is always mind-dependent, we can further imagine such mind-dependent in-itself conceptions as representing a real mind-independent thing, by qualifying the conditions the conception is supposed to satisfy. This is what he meant by the thought of something being not at all contradictory.
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Would you say the refusal to infer from experience the nature of the in itself (while acknowledging that it cannot be certainly known) is motivated by the practical reason of making room for faith? — Janus

While the gist of what you’re asking here comes from the CPR B intro, your altogether different application of it isn’t really wrong. It actually does take some faith to accept some transcendental idea born from pure speculative reason, the experience of which is quite impossible. The impossibility of knowledge does make room for faith, but making room for faith doesn’t make faith necessary.

Refusal to infer from experience is really loaded. Inferences from experience belong to judgement, a fully operational logical faculty that only does inferences. Inferences for experience in general is transcendental and belongs to reason. Dunno how refusal to infer is possible. A faculty the job of which is inference can’t not infer.

Anyway…fun to think about.

What I was talking about is distinct fields in the same place. — Metaphysician Undercover

I think I’m ok with that. Earth’s magnetic field and gravitational field are in the same space. But the particles associated with those fields are not in each other’s spaces. Neutrinos pass through the gravitational field without bothering anything, right? Jets pass through the magnetic field, and while some of the particles of the jet’s composition may be affected, for all intents and purposes, the jet isn’t, despite the reality that it’s 1 x 10 -32nd of an inch shorter than it was when it was on the ground.

But I see your point. It was Feynman in a CalTech lecture, who said fields could be considered things, insofar as they do occupy space. But you know ol’ Richard….he’s somewhat cryptic, if not facetious.

It’s as if Kant doesn’t want to be a full-blown idealist…. — Tom Storm

Correct, he does not want to be thought of as a full-blown idealist. He does, on the other hand, state for the record (A370), of all the idealist doctrines he lists, he is of the transcendental variety. It is this variety alone which argues as you say.

He argues against all full-blown idealists, such as Descartes and Berkeley, and even the quasi-transcendental idealists, here and there, but those mostly because they don’t realize that’s what they really are, or are oh-so-close to really being if they’d just gone one or two steps further, such as Mendelssohn, Libneitz, Wolff, Baumgartner, et al.

As for noumena directed/indirect compromise…maybe, maybe not. I don’t have any interest in it, and Kant didn’t even know about the direct/indirect dichotomy. Or perhaps what it represents he would have called it something else.

But at any rate, noumena in the Kantian sense is not a compromise of any kind, but rather an example of understanding coloring outside its own rule-bound lines.

I thought that Kant believed we could know nothing of the noumenon. — boundless

He didn’t believe it; he stated for the record that nothing can be known of noumena as a logical deduction in accordance with a theory he himself constructed. I’d rather think he trusted in the logical construction of the theory, rather than only believed in its conclusions.

That being said, we can know nothing of what a noumenon is. We can think anything of it we please, as long as we don’t contradict ourselves. To think a thing as a mere conception, is not to know it as an experience. The confusion of the two, is exactly where we begin to contradict ourselves.

The direct/indirect realism debate is meaningless to me. You’ll notice I don’t have enough interest to partake in any of it.

Why can’t two things occupy the same field without occupying the same space?

If the sun’s light is a field projected from itself, how can it occupy the same field as that which receives it?

Any division of space is still just itself a space. So while a molecule occupies its space, the atoms comprising it occupy their own spaces, from which follows they are not in the same space as each other, although they are all in the same space of all possible things.

This signifies the ideality of space, and of time, in that everything sometime must be somewhere.

This is some good stuff, I must say. Well-thought, well-written.

Two relatively minor counterarguments, if I may:

One, at the beginning, where you relate the in-itself to mind-independence. No conception can be mind-independent, and any thinking with respect to a mere concept, is itself conceptual, hence likewise must not be mind-independent.

“…. The concept of a thing that is not to be thought of as an object of the senses but rather as a thing in itself (solely through a pure understanding), is not at all contradictory…” (A255/B310)

The text designates the thing-in-itself as a conception, so…..
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The other…

Kant posits it simply on the logical grounds that if there are appearances then there must be something which appears. — Janus

….very true, and in which the logical ground is key, but one degree of freedom, so to speak, out of place. If there are appearances there must be that which appears, and that which appears are things. I think correctly placed, the logic adhering to the “in-itself” says, that because there are things that appear, there must be things in themselves from which the things that appear are given.

It is in this way the perceiver is relieved from being in any way necessary causality for the things that appear, which immediately falsifies the proposition we create our own reality, and as an offshoot of that he can say he doesn’t care where a thing comes from or how it got to be as it is, but only cares about how he is to know it, the possibility of which is the primary consideration of the CPR thesis anyway.

Now, on the one hand it may be that the in-itself is, as you say, either utterly amorphous or else nothing at all, but on the other is merely that by which infinite regress regarding the ontology of things becomes moot. This particular, and perhaps on my part rather subjective, deduction receives its justification from Kant himself, in that “… the proud name of an ontology which presumes to offer (…) things in general in a systematic doctrine (…), must give way to the modest one of a mere analytic of the pure understanding….” (A247/B304)

Two cents…

Many things seem to share the same space, and that becomes problematic for physics. — Metaphysician Undercover

True enough, but my response would be….my experiences are not on so small a scale. I remember reading…a million years ago it seems….if the nucleus of a hydrogen atom was the size of a basketball, and it was placing on the 50yd-line of a standard American football field, its electron’s orbit would be outside the stadium. Point being, there’s plenty of room for particles to share without bumping into each other. And even if the science at this scale says something different, it remains a fact I can’t seem to get two candles to fit in the same holder without FUBARing both of ‘em.

Another way to look at the overall problem of distinctions and differences, and more of my particular interest: find out what the rules are, let the sufficiently related exceptions to those rules be what they may.
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….you accept the idea that intelligibility doesn't come from the subject? — boundless

Yes. Intelligence comes from the subject; intelligibility is that to which the subject’s intelligence responds.
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….this tension could label Kant as dogmatic on noumena… — Tom Storm

Noumena being altogether irrelevant, Kant labels himself as dogmatic, that is, to be dogmatic is to prove conclusions from “secure principles” a priori (Bxxxv). Technically, it is reason itself that is dogmatic.

The subject himself, on the other hand in the use of his reason, engages in dogmatism in its “loquacious shallowness under the presumed name of popularity”…. ibid

(The regular run-of-the-mill genius Prussian academic’s way of saying, hey, don’t gimme that look; I’m just repeating what I been told)

…..but in dogmatism is technically using “philosophical concepts according to principles which reason has been using for a long time without first inquiring in what way and by what right it has obtained them.” (ibid

And how, you ask, and I know you are….doesn’t everyone?…..is the way obtained and the right secured, for these principle’s use as dogmatically conclusive proofs? Why, from the critique of pure reason, of course.

And there’s more. Oh so much more.
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….he is meant to remain entirely agnostic, yet he slips into asserting what the noumenon cannot be…. — Tom Storm

He is perfectly justified in asserting what a thing is not, without ever knowing what it is. A thing is or is not (this or that) iff it does or does not conform to the relevant principles the critique of pure reason as shown to be rightfully secure. From which follows, a noumenon is in every way and by every right a valid conception according to the principles by which any conception is possible, but in no way and not by any right at all, is anything to be known of it, according to those principles by which knowledge is possible.

All that is mainly responsible for the advent of analytical philosophy, re: the attempt to relegate systemic speculative metaphysics to practical nonsense, insofar as the proofs are all logical, conditioned by premises, rather than empirical, conditioned by observation.

Over ’n’ out.

The fact that it might be impossible for us to know how sentient beings came into existence doesn't exclude that an explanation is possible in principle. — boundless

Tautologically true; we’re here, for which some explanation is necessary.

Me: ….impossibility to know the truth of an explanation.
You: …impossibility to know an explanation;

Me: ….proof of an explanation.
You: …absence of an explanation;

I don’t know what to do with this.
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an impossibility to know an explanation isn't a conclusive evidence of an absence of an explanation. — boundless

That’s exactly what it means. The possibility of knowing a thing, herein an explanation, presupposes that thing by its existence in some time….somebody made one up. The most conclusive evidence for the impossibility of knowing a thing is that the thing doesn’t exist in any time…no one has made one up ….which just is the absence of it.

All of which is irrelevant, insofar as I never said there wasn’t or couldn’t be an explanation, which means there always was or possibly was something to know. The justification for the explanation, on the other hand, the ground of its truth, may or may not meet the criteria for knowledge in general. It follows we may well know an explanation without granting that it is sufficient for what it seeks to explain.

To not know is very far from the impossibility of knowing.

Passage. Movement. Passage of time, movement of time, movement of an infinite immaterial. Irrational.
Passage. Change. Change of time. Change of a motionless, infinite immaterial. Irrational.
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There is measure of duration or succession of things in relation to each other, in units of time.
There is measure of change of place, the motion of a thing in relation to itself or something else over a series of units of time. These empirical measurements are physical activities in the use of instruments, therefore objective, but they are measures of duration or succession/coexistence, which all relate to determinable empirical change, not to time itself.

There is a change in the condition of a subject, e.g., from aesthetic measure of having no fear to the fear of, having no hope for, etc, the object for which there is possibly no experience, hence this determinable change is entirely subjective.

There is a change in the condition of a subject, from having no knowledge of the duration of a thing, or the succession of a thing in relation to another thing, to knowledge of these insofar as he has accomplished a relevant measurement, such change precisely as subjective as his fear or hope, albeit with an object of experience related to it.

When is the last time? What is there that will be the last time of? If it cannot be said what the first or last time is, how can it be said to pass? Or to change? That the last time of a house is the burning down of it, such that the passage of the house’s time is given, says nothing at all about the first or last of time.

Pretty sad and quite unphilosophical, for a guy to look at his watch and actually think he’s observing time. Or for him to ask what time it is, and actually think he’s getting an answer about time.

That same sad unphilosophical guy is perfectly aware the time he thinks he sees on a watch, or the answer he gets when asking of the time, is always and only given in numbers. He’s no more aware of the infinite, immaterial primitive condition of numbers, then he is of the necessity that time be just as infinitely and immaterially primitive as the numbers used as the units representing it. Guy might as well be doing magic.

If the units created to represent the immovable, infinite immaterial are strictly human conceptual constructs, how can that which is represented by them be any less a conceptual construct? Just as Nature has no numbers of its own, so too does it not have time and space of its own.
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Everydayman doesn’t know and doesn’t care that no space is dependent on another, which is to say no one space is conditioned by any other space, but any one time absolutely presupposes that time antecedent to it, which is to say any one time is conditioned by that time antecedent to it.

Because of this, there is no conceptual conflict in a thing being in this space or in an adjacent space, whether a progressively or regressively conditioned space, and there is no conceptual conflict in a thing being in this time and a regressively conditioned time, re: the past, but there is necessarily an experiential conflict in the thing being in this time and then in a progressively conditioned time, re: the future.

Also from this, it is the case it is impossible that a thing can be in a space at one time and in an adjacent space in the same time, but a thing can be in a space at a time and in the same space in another time. No two things can be in one space, but any one thing can be in two times.

For he who proclaims all these space/time conditions are of Nature herself, cannot explain how the human intelligence grasps by itself, and that a priori, that of which only the totality of all experience can prove. To prove these all belong to Nature herself, there must be found no exception in the totality of all experiences, to which he does not have even the least access.

Where he can find no exception is only if these conditions belong to him alone, in direct correspondence to the totality of his own experiences, the rest of all possible experiences remain subject to logical inference regarding experience in general.

If the human intelligence does not permit, merely from the impossibility of its proof, that these conditions are laws of Nature with respect to its objects, they must then be no more than the rules of that intelligence with respect to the objects of its experiences.
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On About time. Not this or that time, not the time in, not the time for, not time the measurement of.

On About time itself, as intended by the thread title.

(Blush)

….measuring something doesn't mean we've created the thing that we've invented a measurement for. — Philosophim

Isn’t the mere observation of difference outside the intellect sufficient reason for its creating a relation representing that difference, within itself? And if we, the subjects in possession of that intellect, want to know what that observed difference is with respect to its relation represented in us, isn’t it required of us, by means of our own intellect, to invent a method for its determination?

The relation we create is the thing we invent measurement for, given some difference we observe. After it’s all said and done, we find there are but two fundamental, primitive relations for any possible observation, aggregate and succession, from which follows the intellect’s logical deduction of “space” as representing the one and “time” as representing the other.

The common rejoinder is…why not just measure the difference, insofar as it is not by our intellect that differences are possible. But we don’t care that there is difference, if we want to know what the difference is, which manifestly requires we be affected by it, which is precisely to observe there is one.

As soon as we are affected, the difference in things immediately becomes the difference in us, the very relation our intellect creates…..and from there it’s off to the epistemological rodeo.

The problem is that, insofar as understanding cannot work with a mere idea,…..
— Mww

Not sure of what you mean. — boundless

Yeah, my fault. I never should have gone so far into the metaphysical weeds, probably further than required for grasping the OP’s basic ideas, and certainly much further than most folks are prepared to accept.

I was only voicing concern for attributing to time plausible explanatory ground for the existence of sentient beings. It’s like…seeking an answer the truth of which is impossible to prove, given from something the truth of which is impossible to know.

The OP and its arguments have nothing to do with (…) any kind of creature….
— Mww

This is true. And while I agree with the OP, I think we need to do better at responding to the type of question that boundless raises. — J

The OP concerns itself with time. The type of objection subsequently raised, re: existential contingency of sentient beings, and therefrom better attempts at responding to such objections, involves an altogether different set of initial conditions.

As the transcendental origin of time is noted in the OP, the logic of relations to it is quite something else.
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'antinomy' is a call for a resolution/explanation rather than a statement that such a resolution is impossible. — boundless

Which is fine; reason itself calls for resolutions, but it is understanding from which any and all empirical resolutions originate. The problem is that, insofar as understanding cannot work with a mere idea, re: the existential contingency of sentient beings in general, there can be no empirical resolution possible from judgements made relative to those ideas, that isn’t either thetic or antithetic, meaning in dogmatic conflict with each other relative to the idea.

Anyway….the OP stands iff sufficiently capable sentient beings are given.