Me and Kant

Me and Kant ...

--
I want to begin to try and explain how my ideas are fundamentally different from Kant's. This may take several attempts and I am open to the possibility that during the course of these attempts I may come away seeing things your way, or some other. But let me see if I can explain what I'm getting at with an analogy.

The analogy I want to use is numbers. I know that mathematicians define 'prime' numbers as numbers whose only factors are the number itself and one (with the number one itself being excluded). I would ask your indulgence and allow me to temporarily redefine the meaning of prime number. And the definition I use (and in fact I really believe this, but that's another story) is that there is really only one prime number and that is the number 1. All other numbers are composite numbers that are reducible to bunches of 1s.

So here's the analogy. What I am arguing is that, objectively speaking, "out there" beyond our subjective experience the universe is made up of 1s. Objectively there are no 2s or 3s or 42s or 666s. In other words, objectively speaking, there are no composite numbers. It's all just 1s. So where do composite numbers occur? They occur ONLY in our subjective experience.

Now Kant, if I understand him correctly, would argue that there really are composite numbers "out there" - out there in the noumenal realm. But when we experience these composite numbers we don't experience them as the numbers themselves. Rather, we experience them all green and hairy. 'Green' and 'hairy' are the a priori categories of all our experience. So Kant would say that there are 2s and 3s and 42s "out there". But our phenomenal, subjective experience of these numbers is always green and hairy. (Again, this is an analogy, and perhaps not a very good one. But hopefully you get my point.)

Now let's leave the numbers analogy and think of objects instead, let's say a table. Kant would argue that there is a real table "out there" in the noumenal realm. But we don't experience the table in itself, in its noumenal purity. Rather, we experience the table phenomenally as a spatiotemporal object, and this spatiotemporal condition is how we experience all objects. Space and time are the a priori categories of all experience (like the green and hairy in my analogy).

The point I want to stress here is that the table, like the numbers other than 1, is a composite entity. And Kant believes that composite entities exist independent of our experience (in this noumenal realm). This is where Kant and I part ways. What I am arguing is that there are no composite entities independent of our experience. Let me be very clear. There are entities independent of our experience. But these entities are not composite entities. Independent of our experience there are only prime entities. Independent of our experience there are only 1s.

Of course this raises the obvious question: How do composite entities get created in our experience, especially if our experience is a subset of the larger objective universe which is (as I just argued) made entirely of prime entities? The 'creation' of composite entities from prime entities is the crux of the "hard" problem.

Part of the challenge, I think, concerns overcoming certain long-held (and perfectly understandable) beliefs we have about the nature of objective reality. We traditionally think of it as a bunch of physical stuff, and I think this is a mistake. Our experience is not made from physical objects. Rather, physical objects are part of the content of our physical experience (which is subjective, just like our other experiences). So a big part of the problem, as I see it, is that we have been trying to explain experience in terms of the content of that experience (ie, physical objects), rather than examining experience itself (which we do have direct access to!) irrespective of any particular content of that experience.

If I may offer one more silly analogy. Trying to understand experience by studying (exclusively) the physical brain would by like someone trying to understand paint by examining a painting of a horse and from there thinking that the only way to understand paint is by studying horses!

Of course there is much more to say about this, for what I have said here makes experience seem like some kind of miracle (which I don't believe it is). But perhaps what I've said here will help you better understand why I don't think of myself as a Kantian.

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• Kant
• consciousness
• phenomenology
• noumena

[otakurocklee]

Schopenhauer was more explicit and said, since differentiation is an act done by the mind on sense-data... it doesn't apply to noumena... which exist independent of the senses... so he deduced that if there is any noumena, it has to be a single undifferentiated, noumenon which he called Will.

[SpiritualAtheist]

otakurocklee - First I owe you an apology. As I tried to reply to your other comment i mistakenly hit "remove". Let me assure you and anyone else who might be reading this that that was totally unintentional. Anyway, you had mentioned that my views sound similar to those of Schopenhauer. I am no expert on Schopenhauer but from what I do know I agree with you. I had watched a conversation with Frederick Copleston about Schopenhauer and found myself nodding in agreement with much of it.

[emblemOFbeing]

First, seems a bit strange to say there are only 1s (plural) in objective reality (outside of human experience). Second, 1s are not to be found in human experience outside of perceptual gestalts. Third, what about the experiences of other life forms? Fourth, anticipating your response: what about the experience of an infant, then? Just when do 'ones' and 'twos' appear for the infant? Prior to learning to count, to be sure. Fifth, for ants exp. no 'ones' only 'general' particulars, perhaps.

[SpiritualAtheist]

It was an analogy. You seem to be taking it literally.

[otakurocklee]

Hi SpiritualAtheist. No problem. :) Same type of thing has happened to me many times.

I just watched that video also (I've been watching the entire series, really great stuff). Copleston did mention that Kant would say there was a table in itself... I could definitely have been wrong in my understanding.

I wish I had more time to read all the philosophy I want to.

[Anarch0tec]

Perhaps your just using it figuratively, but there is no "out there" for the noumenal realm in Kant's epistemology, as there can be no spatial-dimension what would be 'out there.' Also:

4:52 - I think your confusing it with Plato's idealism, as there is no table out there. I think that idea would be incomprehensible for Kant.

What do you mean by 'composite' entity?

Are you getting at a phenomenological critique of traditional idealism? which is great. I hope to see more vid's.

[emblemOFbeing]

Have you read Schopenhauer? You should, he reformulated Kant's view in an ingenious and very readable way.

Either you were making a metaphysical point, or there is no analogy to be had.

[vikkipollard5]

ps My brain has been irrepairably damaged and I enjoyed every second of it!!!!

[vikkipollard5]

I will take your answer with good intentions. But, heres an analogy that often crosses my mind. There's an anthill in my garden. Ants have highly complex 'social systems' and communication, but they do not understand how radio waves work, nor even that they exist. Nor do we try to explain anything to them for obvious reasons. Sometimes I feel like we are ants.

[SpiritualAtheist]

vikki - Yes, i do think we have the tools. I know that many thinkers today believe we do not. That our brains evolved to survive on the savanna, not to figure out the nature of subjective experience. This attitude makes no sense to me. It's like searching for treasure without believing there is any treasure. I think when things begin to seem impossible, then perhaps it's time to question one of our assumptions. I think that is the case here. Btw, good luck with that melted brain.