Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Tue Jul 05, 2022 10:28 am
Why does what we call reality or nature consist of 'appearances'?
Appearances
of what?
We're back to Russell's table: empiricist skepticism.
The scandal is a scandal only if the starting assumption is that all we can ever have is appearances - and never the things-in-themselves.
But why is that the case?
Why are things-in-themselves different from the way they appear?
Why do we need to introduce order and regularity into appearances?
The Kantian approach can be broken down into 3 levels, i.e.
- 1. Kindergarten
2. High School
3. Degree to PhD levels
Appearances of what?
At the kindergarten level [1], Kant acknowledged the following;
- But our further contention must also be duly borne in mind, namely, that though we cannot know these Objects as Things-in-Themselves, we must yet be in position at least to think them as Things-in-Themselves;*
otherwise we should be landed in the absurd conclusion that there can be Appearance without anything that appears. [Bxxvi]
Thus Kant acknowledge "logically" there must be some thing that appears as appearance, which we "cannot know" but at least can "think" of logically.
The sentence is tricky, "cannot know" and can think of do not imply that such a thing exists in the absolute sense as a real thing.
At the High School level [2] Kant introduce that thing we cannot know but can think of as the noumenon, i.e. there for any phenomenon there must be something it represent, thus the noumenon.
Then he advised,
- The Concept of a Noumenon is thus a merely limiting Concept, the Function of which is to curb the pretensions of Sensibility; and it is therefore only of negative employment.
At the same time it [Noumenon] is no arbitrary invention; it is Bound up with the Limitation of Sensibility, though it [Noumenon] cannot affirm anything Positive beyond the Field of Sensibility.
B311
Note the point that the noumenon is merely a limiting concept of negative use and can never be views as real beyond the empirical.
Thus-that-which-appear in appearance cannot be real at all.
At level 3 Degree to PhD levels, Kant then demonstrated that-which-appear in appearance, the noumenon is ultimately an illusion and cannot be verified nor reified as real.
- There will therefore be Syllogisms which contain no Empirical premisses, and by means of which we conclude from something which we know* to something else of which we have no Concept,
and to which, owing to an inevitable Illusion, we yet ascribe Objective Reality.
These conclusions are, then, rather to be called pseudo-Rational 2 than Rational,
although in view of their Origin they may well lay claim to the latter title {rational},
since they {conclusions} are not fictitious and have not arisen fortuitously, but have sprung from the very nature of Reason.
They {conclusions} are sophistications not of men but of Pure Reason itself.
Even the wisest of men cannot free himself from them {the illusions}.
After long effort he perhaps succeeds in guarding himself against actual error; but he will never be able to free himself from the Illusion, which unceasingly mocks and torments him. B397
Read the points above carefully and don't just ignore them because they are foundational.
Kant was trying to solve a problem. But if there's no problem, we don't need to solve it. And as I've explained to you before, Wittgenstein was teasing Moore, and through him the absurdity of philosophers' thinking we can't 'prove' the existence of the 'external world', as though we're not part of it. Kant was a Cartesian dualist through-and-through, in my opinion - like everyone else - a man of his time.
I have already mentioned this a "million" times.
All humans are "programmed" innately to view external reality out there independent of human conditions which is critical for survival to look for food, threats, spouse, etc. and this impulse had been adapted from billion of years via our non-human and human ancestors.
That is why is it so ingrained and natural that there exists an external reality independent of the human conditions. This is the assumption of the 'thing-in-itself' or things-in-themselves giving rise to dualism.
Whilst this assumption is realistic at the kindergarten level [e.g. Newtonian Physics] the metaphysical realists like you [regardless of your denial] insist the external world independent of the human conditions is absolute real without exceptions!
But Kant countered there is no such real external world that is independent of the human conditions and no humans has ever been able to prove it, thus the scandal of philosophy.
Moore took up Kant's challenge but failed miserably and Wittgenstein critiqued Moore severely. But that did not imply W agreed with Kant, W had his own version in approach what is reality.
Kant was a Cartesian dualist through-and-through, in my opinion - like everyone else - a man of his time.
Don't make such absurd claims when you are not thoroughly familiar with Kant.
Re the quotes above, Kant is an empirical realist and transcendental idealist which oppose Descartes dual
ism. Note:
..today I want to briefly touch on his critique of the man who began said tradition, Rene Descartes, in order to put Kant’s theory in context.
Kant sets his sights on Descartes’ rationalistic theory, but which Kant terms ‘idealistic’, which holds that the existence of external objects are doubtful and indemonstrable unless sufficient evidence can be given for them through reasoning. Kant calls this view ‘problematic idealism’.
It is worth making clear that Kant opposes this position because it entails that the existence of objects are not known immediately through perception, but only through reasoned reflection.
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