Primal

Me thinks the gentle doth protest too much. Kant showing that you are aware of some criticisms for the philosopher Kant does not change the fact that you adopted his SN,are defending his concepts to the point of absurdity and seem to consider him to have started some sort of "copernican revolution" in philosophy. It also does not change the fact that you become closed-minded and start calling names whenever someone else criticizes Kant or subjectivism.
Someone who really has an open-mind about the subject keeps the discourse civil so as to keep emotions that may cloud the issue as low as possible and stop the whole enterprise from become an "us-vs-them" mudslinging debate. Such people also do not resort to personal attacks just because someone likes a philosopher you may not approve of. Like a fundy you seem not to get this and believe your claims do not actually require any evidence and it is for this reason I say your hold an almost religious reverence for Kant,and your own subjectivist viewpoint.

The fact that Kant may have argued against certain superstitions does not change the fact that Kant bad mouthed atheism,freethought and materialism in a most unjust manner, and implicit in him seems to be a very dogmatic theism.

[ October 01, 2002: Message edited by: Primal ]</p>

Kantian

Dost thou, dost thou now?
Fact: The criticisms are valid because they start from a philosophical background, not from the layman’s first whiff of highbrow thought. So you do yourself a disservice in the presumption that you can attack a thinker with the tools of those of a college freshman.

Fact: I adopted his name. So? <img src="graemlins/boohoo.gif" border="0" alt="[Boo Hoo]" />

Fact: Immanuel Kant is a great philosopher whose nearly unquestioned status among intellectuals today merits far greater respect than either you or Keith has been willing to give so far. That is why I defend his concepts, with ease, against your and Keith’s juvenile mischaracterizations.

Fact: You do not understand what the phrase “Copernican revolution” really means.
Yet, on the other hand I am not so open-minded to let my brain fall out and accept all criticism as apodictically valid. And since you have not read my posts, I have already criticized subjectivism in the previous page of this thread. I hear crow is mighty tasty this time of the year. May I suggest a little dash of oregano and a side dish of brie?
Fact: In the other thread, you ran away from my criticism of your inept effort at inventing strawmans out of the wazoo. Therefore, it leads me to the safe inference that it was your feelings which were hurt.
Nyet! In my opinion, Rand is not a philosopher but a fiction writer who pretends otherwise, and I have written several criticisms that are valid, and remain unanswered. You choose to rush to the defense of Keith and reinterpret them as personal attacks.
Fact: I’m discussing philosophy, not science. Therefore I do not need evidence beyond the quoted material in order to corroborate my assertions.
Fact: Kant was an agnostic.
That you base your entire case on this mischaracterization on a single, half-sentence needs no further comment. I need not state the obvious conclusion and I am confident that lurkers or other participants are capable of drawing the obvious fallacy themselves.
~Transcendentalist~

phlebas

This is the most civil fight I've ever seen in EoG You guys should hang out in Rants & Raves to see how to really bring it.

But it might be time to suggest that we move this back towards the topic? Feel free to open another thread to discuss the merits of Ayn Rand or the original Immanuel Kant.

Thanks

Primal

Argument from authority, worthless for a debate.

Shows admiration.

Actually I agree Kant was a genius philosopher. So you missed the mark there. I just recognize Kant's flaws as well and don't see any correlations between Kantianism and the Copernican Revolution.

How would you know? I never even proposed a description.

Yet you should be open mindedenough to at least offer a refutation rather then reject claims off hand. And you should likewise consider the evidence for the other side in a fair and civil manner, I hardly see how that is letting your brains fall out.

Whatever Kant. The last comment is 100 percent irrelevant to this discussion. I have read your responses to Keith via Keith and realize that you are being unfair and fallacious in your treatment of him and his ideas.

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Primal: Someone who really has an open-mind about the subject keeps the discourse civil so as to keep emotions that may cloud the issue as low as possible and stop the whole enterprise from become an "us-vs-them" mudslinging debate.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Not really Kant, you made some bold claims about how my post was just all straw mans, ad hominems and such. I asked for evidence for this, you offered none saying you don't need to prove anything essentially.

I hardly ran away from your criticisms and asked only that you support them with something other then "they just fit you to the 't'".

Also you kept accusing me of straw man for not showing how subjectivism is contradictory with itself, even though I never even tried to adress that point. My point was, had you paid attention, instead about why I don't think such a criticism would get anywhere.

Well your inference was mistaken, I just saw you didn't feel like proving anything and safely infered discussion would get nowhere.

I believe Rand is a philosopher, you may think she's a bad one but she still is one. I rush to defense of Keith because I see prjudice and know from past experience you are not always the most open minded, fair or civil debater. Not that Keith needs any defense.


Actually you do Kant, just because philosophy is not as rigorous as science in empirical methodolgy it doesn't mean you can throw out claims without evidence. If that was the case everything would quickly devolve into a "he says/she says" disaster.


Oh really? From the internet encyclopedia of philosophy:

-Bold word added

<a href="http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/k/kantmeta.htm#The%20Ideas%20of%20Reason" target="_blank">http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/k/kantmeta.htm#The%20Ideas%20of%20Reason</a>

That likewise should prove something to the "lurkers".

Kantian

Wrong again, due to your failure to comprehend what that specific fallacy really is. A <a href="http://www.intrepidsoftware.com/fallacy/aa.htm" target="_blank">argumentum ad verecundiam </a> is when a person speaks out on an area that is not of his expertise. After taking a semester's worth of Kant and acing it, that cannot apply to me, or Kant himself, because I am making a valid argument from authority. So far, at least in this thread, I am qualified to talk about Kant. You're making this too easy. <img src="graemlins/banghead.gif" border="0" alt="[Bang Head]" />

Incidentally, this is exactly how you should have addressed my charges of fallacies, not stalling by demanding for proof or evidence in the other thread.

I guess the irony is lost upon thickwits like you.
There you go again, exposing your ignorance. Nevertheless, I am more than happy to alleviate that. The Copernican revolution was essentially replacing the egocentric model of the universe with a heliocentric one. Kant's <a href="http://www.angelfire.com/nj/richnfamous/pubwk25.html" target="_blank">"Copernican revolution"</a> was to replace the "external world" model to a "transcendental idealist" model of epistemology. In layman's terms, instead of looking at how the external world structured the mind, Kant turned it around and focused on how the mind structures reality, and renders it intelligible. Kant denied that there was a world independent of our experience. The entire history of metaphysics depended on that belief of an independent reality- from Thales to Plato’s World of Being to Descartes' dualism to Hume’s skepticism. Nobody, says Kant, had the concept of metaphysics correct: “Metaphysics has rather to be regarded as a battle-ground quite peculiarly suited for those who desire to exercise themselves in mock combatants, and in which no participant has ever yet succeeded in gaining even so much as an inch of territory, not at least in such a manner as to secure him in its permanent possession.” The central thesis of the first critique: Knowledge is possible because the self determines the structure of its experience. The shift from the notion of a passive mind to the active was monumental in traditional philosophy. Instead of posing the mind as a receptacle, Kant insisted that the mind configured its order on nature: “The understanding does not derive its laws from, but prescribes them to nature.”

I guessed correctly. It was a shot in the dark that found your forehead.

I already refuted most of the misunderstandings with clarification and elucidation of certain points of transcendentalism. You're still sore over that beating you got in the other thread, I see.

Unfair, because I correctly described his underwear colors? A spade is a spade. Fallacious, how? I wasn't aware of making any fallacies. Please show me where I made a boo-boo.

First you say i am closed minded when someone criticized subjectivism, and when i show you that i have done so myself, now you say it is irrelevant. You are a dishonest person. I admire your clintonian waffling.

Bottom line: You refused to defend your arguments, and asked me for evidence of my calling your reasoning fallacious. Your reasoning is fallacious. You have to show why I am wrong, instead of asking for proof of why your bad arguments are fetid and decomposed.

One: you asked me not to address you anymore, for fear of further embarrassment. Two: you refused to read my posts, for fear of further evidence of why you have a long way to go in debates. In my book, that constitutes as running away.

Well, you answered my post, which was mistakenly addressed to you, and you failed to present why subjectivism was self-contradictory. I can think of reasons why it is, but you have yet to show why it is so. In good faith I assumed you had something up your sleeve and kept asking you to stop beating around the bush and show us all the money!
I don't believe you.

Then what are you doing here?
Then you haven't done your homework on the comedy of 3000 years of bad misunderstandings in highbrow literature. I wouldn't mistake philosophy for science. It is a certain kind of art that pretends it employs logic in its method, which is far more rigorous, but also far more abstract in its dealing with concepts instead of evidence. Try again, chico.

I understand the implications of the difference between pure reason and practical reason in that passage, but i am curious to see what that passage means to you. I'm very interested to see how you will end up strangling yourself with the rope you'll predictably pull out this time. Kant is an agnostic who thought that morality could be derived from the noumenon, that illegitimate concepts like God, immortality and freedom were valid as long as one employed them with practical reason. After all, a thinker who destroyed the ontological argument forever can't really be the theist you're hellbent on trying to caricature.

~Transcendentalist~

[ October 01, 2002: Message edited by: Immanuel Kant ]</p>

Primal

Actually Kant that is a subspecies of a inappropriate apeal to authority and if you knew anything about fallacies you would know there is no official number or designation of them, just general ideas. Some logicians destinguish between a dozen or so, some make categories for almost 200 different types. But in any event, are you admitting to purposely introducing fallacious reasoning into your post?

Incidentally Kant you should work on your table manners instead of coming at people like snarling animals, it makes for much more constructive/critical discussion.

Oh yeah....that's exactly what you want to avoid though. NM.


Gee guess it is. We can't all be as devoted to figureheads like the ever so intelligent Immanuel Kant, you figured us all out. <img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" />

How so? I never said I didn't know anything about why people make this claim, I just said I don't adhere to it.


Well bless your heart.

Not so much the egocentric as the heleocentric though I'm sure egoism may have something to do with it, it more replaced the person/human centered model though.

Actually if anything that sounds like the opposite of the Copernican revolution.

Structures reality or data, if the former is meant then this is metaphysics as well as epistemology.



This again seems more like a reaction to the Copernican revolution then anything, and is more egocentric then even the Catholic Church was during the days of Ptolemic astronomy.


Actually this is not the case, there were mentalists before Kant. Such as Protagoras, who declared "man is the measure of all things". Berkeley was one as well to advance the centrality of the subjective or percieved as making things real, as Liebniz to a lesser extent those his mentalism, I admit cannot be called subjectivism. The fact was Kant didn't challenge anything new, all that divides him from the sophists of ancient is that 1) You like to call them relativists instead of subjectivists, when in fact the label is very thin and one you try to back up by analyzing historical connections over actual content in ideas.

2)Kant still believed in some absolutes which is why he is not considered a pure subjectivist by most and is instead a transcedentalist. This position is superfluous for a number of reasons, one being its inability to solve the problem of dualism.


Well that is an interesting albeit problematic way of looking at it. I'd rather not use the word "combat" which suggests an "us vs them" way of thinking of things to describe a discipline based on finding truth by evidence.

Or perhaps the self and its experience is determined by material hard-ware. Perhaps it is possible because certain fundamental concepts and organs make it so.

Agreed. But active in what sense?


Yes Kant's viewpoint was unique even if his challenge wasn't. As were the viewpoints of most philosophers I hardly see how this compares to Cpernicus any more then when this started. If anything it can be compared to the opposite: a great leap backwards.

In reality it is somewhat both, concepts and sensations, though the two are not always clean cut, that determine what one calls knowledge. I say somewhat because such concepts are not the same thing Kant had in mind, as things believed but not imagined but are instead the principles of logic, evidence and axioms.


Actually it was a shot in the dark that whiffed. More bloopers from Immanuel Kant.

Not really Kant there were more then a few pot shots added here and there.


Actually Kant it is you who seems to keep bringing it up.

But in any case,; here's me:
Here's me not caring:
Here's me:




Oh yeaaah real mature Kant. And look how it rhymes too. I can tell your going to be the next great mind of the 2oth century.


Nothing gets past you.


Calm down there tiger. No need to throw a tantrum over a simple accusation. With Keith you were making these fallacies: appealing to authority by asking him to read Critique instead of explaining your beliefs, making ad hominem after ad hominem, i.e. contstantly reffering to rand, saying he never read Critique time and time again instead of explaining yourself. Throwing out red herrings, again mentioning Ayn Rand.

WTF? Are you some anti-Democrat bigot or something? That has nothing to do with the subject whatsoever. Last time it was being PC. What's next mentions of PETA, NAMBLA, draft dodging? Tell me Sean Hannity.

I am saying that to be truly open minded you have to openly discuss your ideas with others, paying attention to their evidence and offering solid refutations instead of saying things like "your a rand follower" or "unfair I described your underwear". Because such juevenille comments make the argument hit the toilet and turn the issue into an emotionally driven conflict instead of a critical discussion.



Defend them from what? Trumo charges pulled out of thin air.

Person X: Person Y is a liar.

Person Y: How so?

Person X: Just are.

How is person Y supposed to defend himself? and from what? Person X is just making wild claims.

Oh there we go Kant. You are just sooo great you don't actually have to back up your assertions, you can just yell "straw man, ad hominem etc" and people are supposed to take your word on pure faith.

Nevermind faith in God, have faith in Immanuel Kant. Bow down to Kant everybody!

*bows down to Kant* <img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" />

Can anyone say:

SNOB!


No actually because you had little to contribute to a serious intellectual discussion. Statements like "put up or shut up" can hardly be called serious intellectual challenges.


No, actually I just didn't want to waste my time. I know how dogmatic you so why should I? It would be like reading Kent Hovind all day. I guess I'm just so scared of that guy I'm "running away" from him too, good call macho man.

Actually I did later on. Go back and read the thread. In the meantime get this through your head: I wasn't arguing for why subjectivism was self-contradictory, I was arguing for why discussions of such types are fruitless and presuppose both world views as correct before hand.


Oh ok, you were just testing me. Kant what was the point of that if you already new I was right? Wasting my time?


In good faith? Let me just say: BWAHAHAHAHA.

Here were your closing comments:

(keep in mind none of this was supported)

I would hardly call that good faith or even on the mark at all Kant.

That's right Kant, I was flat out lying. I think Kant was a complete moron, Forrest Gump level moron. Never mind that he did have a large influence in philosophy, and Kantianism is still a staple in philosophy texts. I must think he was stupid if I disagreed with him.

Actually I was on this thread a little before you Kant. And why do you even care why I;m here anyways? Is this your "territory" or something?
Basically I'm commenting on the issue and was arguing against you indirectly so as not to create one of those soap opera's you love so much.


Haven't done my homework? The saying and the accusation gets old Kant. Especially when you don't really know.

Actually "chico" I disagree with this assesment as only a few recent schools of philosophy have begun to think this way again, perhaps you can stretch this an say the oldesy one is Kant but that's only a small sect. In any event you still need proof, why don't you stop beating around the bush and offer some?

It means Kant a strong believer in reason was advocating belief in theism as a necessary precondition.


Don't know Kant, you're predictions have been wrong before, to say the least. LOL.


Oh so he was a theist then and I wasn't wrong after all. Thanks for clearing that up.

BTW, an agnostic can be a theist Kant. Just bringing you up to date.


Actually the article says otherwise and you admit this as well, via "practical reason" of course.

And yes, someone may disagree with a certain argument for God yet still believe in God. Theists go at it with eachother all the time, just look at YEC and OECs. Kant obviosly thought God was established via different means: under God being necessary for reason not from cosmological/ontological type arguments which establishes God by reason instead of vice versa. In that way he can't be said to be a theist like Thomas Aquinas but a theist he was nonetheless.

Hugo Holbling

Mods:

Is trolling okay in EoG now?

Keith Russell

Greetings:

I think this entire episode is best summed up by Kant, who said:
"Fact: I’m discussing philosophy, not science. Therefore I do not need evidence beyond the quoted material in order to corroborate my assertions."

Kant, not so. We were not arguing about what Kant wrote, but about the validity of what Kant wrote..

Keith.

Kantian

Much apologies to everyone for this pitstop: <a href="http://iidb.org/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=47&t=001163" target="_blank">Primal's Divine Comedy</a>

Jobar

OK kiddies, if you can't play nice together, I'm closing this playground. Kant, Primal- if the two of you want to continue this, take it to RR&P- or better yet, to e-mail. If you do continue, I foresee the need for a level field, seconds, and choice of swords or pistols.

For those who made this thread a far better one than my musings justified, thanks, and sorry to end it this way. J.