15.13. Kant's Room (Part 1): Kant's (Self-Created) Epistemolgical Crisis

I wrote this paper last night and was not completely happy with the results. So I am going to try to write it again tonight seeking more clarity in what I write. It is easy to get lost in a philosopher's abstract words. The good philosopher seeks clarity in his or her abstract words; not confusion and mysticism. And so it is with my work last night. Tonight I seek more clarity in my work because last night I am sure there was at least one point of significant confusion, if not several more.

Kant's first challenge in his most famous book -- The Critique of Pure Reason -- was to 'epistemology'. (The second challenge was to 'ontology' which we will examine in Part 2 of Kant's Room).

Some might say that Kant, in effect, destroyed epistemology. At least, he seriously deflated the epistemology balloon -- which included the balloon of science, sensory awareness, empiricism, and reason.

Here were some of the responses to Kant's ultimate epistemological skepticism which surpassed even David Hume's 'ultimate decontructionist philosophy' in its devastating effect on the academic world at the time -- which I am sure is not what Kant intended.

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'Kant's intellect was essentially destructive.'

-- Thomas de Quincey (1785-1859).
(Duncan Heath, Introducing Romanticism, 1999, pg. 29, 'Metaphysical
Terror')


It seems that I shall become another of the many
victims of folly whom Kantian philosophy has on its
conscience...I cannot wrest myself from its chains.
The idea that we can know nothing, nothing at all,
about truth in this life...has upset me in the very
sanctity of my soul. My sole and highest aim has
vanished. I no longer have one. Since then, I abhor
books...

-- Heinrich von Kleist (1777-1811). (IBID, pg. 29)

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What Kant did that drove many a philosopher to the brink of insanity and/or suicide (I am exaggerating partly here) was he created a 'black and white -- no gray area -- epistemological dualistic world' where man's subjective, phenomenal world could not have any direct form of contact with -- and thus 'not know' the objective, noumenal world because the latter was outside the domain and power of man's senses.

Before we go any further we need to clear up what I mean by 'noumenal' world here which I am finding out seems to be quite different perhaps than what Kant had in mind by this concept.

What I was missing when I wrote this paper last night was an awareness of how significantly Kant seemed to have been influenced in his thinking by Plato and the latter's epistemological 'Ideal Forms'. This is quite different than what I thought up until today Kant meant by the term 'noumenal world' which was an 'objective, empirical world' -- i.e., 'the thing in itelf' -- that defied the limitation of man's senses and power of reasoning.

Let us try this distinction again becaue it is an imperative distinction relative to my own particular line of 'dialectic thinking'.

If Kant's meaning of 'noumenal world' is something that is completely idealistic and untouchable in line with Plato's epistemological theory of 'Ideal Forms', then everything else that follows here is irrelevant. I don't want to waste my time arguing against such a 'pie in the sky' theory. Such a theory, whether we are talking about either Plato's 'Ideal Forms' or Kant's more 'modern' rendition (created in the 1700s) of Plato's earlier theory substituting the Kantian name 'noumenal world' -- is completely mystical and mythological. Such a theory is all 'smoke and mirrors' and leaves people/left people more confused than before the theory was devised. It should have been left on the drawing board -- in both cases.

Only if we mean by 'noumenal world' the same as what we usually call today our 'objective world' does the argument that follows make any sense. And since I don't now think that Kant meant the idea of 'noumenal-objective-empirical world' when he used this concept -- most of what follows is a Kantian waste of time. Just like I view Plato's epistemological theory of 'Ideal Forms'. And any Kantian rendition of Plato's earlier mystical theory.

There is only one sense in which Plato's epistemological theory of 'Ideal Forms' makes any kind of normal, understandable, common sense: specifically, if I have an idea in my mind -- say, I want to write a book online called 'Hegel's Hotel' -- and that idea in my mind is perculating in my mind before it ever is committed to paper or a blogsite, then this type of idea might be considered to be an 'Ideal Form' -- a sort of 'internal template' of what eventually is being committed to my blogsite here -- but that perspective and argument has holes in it too. Simply stated, the 'internal template' that we are talking about is far from 'idealistic' and only begins to take a more 'idealistic form' as it 'dialectically interacts' with the world outside me, and in so doing, starts to polish over some of the original internal gliches in my thinking.

Thus, in any 'epistemological theory' developed by man to help explain the relationship between man and his inside and/or outside world, there is great deal of 'dialectical interplay and feedback' that goes on between what I am calling our 'objective-empirical-noumenal world' and our internal 'theory-devising-subjective world'.

Ideas don't come out of nowhere. They come from our past and present experience. They may 'hook up' with 'other ideas and experiences' via: 1. association, (generalization, abstraction, classification, categorization, inference and interpetation, causality); 2. distinction (differentation, boundary-making...), and; 3. memory.

These are the three main 'a priori' mental devices that Nature/God blessed us with relative to helping us in our 'evolution' and our 'will to survive'. They do indeed, help us to 'know' our objective, empirical, noumenal world (in the sense that I have been using it here) by taking us to a 'deeper and more essential level of understanding' than can be derived by most animals with smaller brains to work with than man. Having said this, a bigger brain can mean a bigger danger of 'cognitive-emotional self-abuse'. Our chief evolutionary asset -- our brain -- can turn on us under the duress of bad personal experiences -- and become our worst enemy, our worst nightmare. This is 'self-induced-psycho-pathology'.

What am I trying to achieve here?

1. I wish to marginalize Plato's theory of 'Ideal Forms' and any Kantian 'noumenal' rendtion of it. Both theories are mystical and mythological. As David Hume would say, 'Commit them both to flames';

2. It is worth viewing the world we live in as being 'dualistic' in nature just as long as we appreciate the importance of the 'dialectic interplay between our senses and rational self on the one hand (i.e., our 'subjective, phenomenal world') in conjunction with our 'objective, empirical, noumenal world'. Our first subjective world -- when used right -- 'dialectically bridges the gap' between our subjective and objective worlds.

The better we do this -- i.e., the better we 'know' our objective, empirical, noumenal world -- the better we survive.

No fear of an epistemological breakdown.

dgb, dec. 28th, 2007.