What Happened to Live Journal? Kant.
The Dragon Lord (Chris)
using the live journal page? Cuz I just looked at it hasn't changed
from the time Al made it almost a year ago. Did you guys decide to not
be digital?
Anyhow, I have not spoken with the assorted masses in ages but I
wanted to say hi to you all and I had a pondery regarding Immanuel
Kant.
I'm currently reading Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics and the
Critique and strangely I'm starting to see a fundamental relationship
with what Kant was attempting and what current philosophers of science
(i.e. Russ and his colleagues) are doing with regards to the rebuttal
of the positivist viewpoint. They are seemingly doing exactly what
Kant attempted, form a 'critique' or as I think was the mindset of
enlightenment thinkers, "precisely", highly defining their terms in
such a way that with precise logical reasoning it became possible to
solve the great problem of Hume.
Kant also criticized Hume (while simultaneously contemplating on his
utter brilliance) for as he put it "Yet even he [Hume] did not suspect
such a formal science [metaphysics], but ran his ship ashore, for
safety's sake, landing on skepticism, there to let it lie and rot;
whereas my object is rather to give it a pilot who, by means of safe
navigational principles drawn from a knowledge of the globe and
provided with a complete chart and compass, may steer the ship safely
whither he listeth."
He was during this paragraph attempting to express the limitations of
Hume, where he arrived at such a great problem, but instead of solving
it, he left it to his contemporaries, even though he himself believed
it was crucial to solve.
I'm not sure what exactly this reading series will come to be in terms
of, but, perhaps Kant was 200 years ahead of his time. And, I have to
disagree to an extent with you Dave/Russ, because a lot of the
problems with understanding Kant does come from bad translations
compounded by his epically rambling Gothic prose (sound familiar?).
Although, the other problem Kant openly admits to in the Prolegomena
(pg. 6 of my text):
"But I fear that the working out of Hume's problem in its widest
extent (namely, my Critique of Pure reason( will fare as the problem
itself fared when first proposed. It will be misjudged because it is
misunderstood, and misunderstood because men choose to skim through
the book and not to think through it--a disagreeable task, because the
work is dry, obscure, opposed to all ordinary notions, and moreover
long-winded. Now I confess that I did not expect to hear from
philosophers complaints of want of popularity, entertainment, and
facility when the existence of a highly prized and indispensable
cognition is at stake, which cannot be established otherwise than by
the strictest rules of scholarly precision. Popularity may follow, but
is inadmissible at the beginning. Yet as regards a certain obscurity,
arising particularly from the diffuseness of the plan, owing to which
the principal points of the investigation are easily lost sight of,
the complaint is just, and I intend to remove it by the present
Prolegomena." (Kant, pg. 6, Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics)
I hope everyone is doing well. I'm adding you guys to Thunderbird and
I have some messages I need to send people now that I am out of my
lamaze. Bad two years. Being back home really helped my spirits.
Seattle was nice, but not what I remembered in a way. I guess it's
hard not having your family together when you still need to grow in
that sense. Good luck! And Al, please let me know what you guys are
using so I can stay in touch.
I've started a new club at my college called Philosophiæ Naturalis
Scientiæ (Philosophy and Natural Science), I'm setting up a blog at
http://www.philosophyandnaturalscience.com
Hopefully, I'll see some of you guys there. ^_^' Good luck!
-Chris
The Dragon Lord (Chris)
interested in reasoning precisely as to defer confusion in discourse.
^_^'
On Feb 8, 11:40 am, "The Dragon Lord (Chris)" <dragoon91...@gmail.com>
wrote:
> Scientiæ (Philosophy and Natural Science), I'm setting up a blog athttp://www.philosophyandnaturalscience.com