Humanism Lecture Six

Humanism – Lecture Six 17/11/05

Humanism – and the idea of the human – is based on the idea that a human is fundamentally a reasoning (thinking) being – and that human reason can solve human problems – so that much of what we a discussing as we discuss these philosophers is there critiques and understanding of reason – very important to this discussion is Kant – we have already discussed Hume and Rousseau – who both in a way represent different models of reason – both of these thinkers were very important to the philosophy of Kant – who tried to bring these two conceptions of reason together.

It is important to take this tour through different conceptions of reason so that we might understand the argument that we are going to approach eventually – that of Jean-Paul Sartre’s and Martin Heidegger’s response – the approach should give you not only an understanding of Humanism as perhaps the most important idea in Western philosophy – but because it is such an important idea in Western philosophy it will also gives an overview of the most important ideas in the whole tradition.


Immanuel Kant (1724-1804)

Kant lived all of his eighty years in Konigsberg – in fact he never traveled further than 10 kilometers from the place he was born.

(quote 1a)

“two things fill me with ever new and increasing admiration and awe … the starry heavens above and the moral law within”

(quote 1)

Critique of Pure Reason (1781)
Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics (1783)
Principles of the Metaphysics of Ethics (1785)
Metaphysical First Principles of Natural Science (1786)
Critique of Practical Reason (1788)
Critique of Judgment (1790)
Religion within the Limits of Mere Reason (1793)
Perpetual Peace (1795)

Kant is very important to Western philosophy.

Kant had a picture of Rousseau in his bedroom – Rousseau’s idea of ethics was very important to Kant – just as Hume woke Kant out of his “dogmatic slumbers.”

Kant wanted to overcome this problem of determinism and free-will.

Kant thought too that there was a real danger in science trying to describe human nature in terms of cause and effect.

On this scientific model there would be no room for freedom or God.

The two main philosophies in Kant’s time were: British Empiricism and Continental Rationalism


(quote 2)

Kant criticized:

The ‘dogmatism’ of Rationality

The ‘skepticism’ of Empiricism

dogmatic means to strongly argue that something is true with very little evidence
skepticism – almost the opposite – thinking that it is almost impossible to say anything is true for sure

Rationality can be accused of dogmatism because it makes many claims without the evidence of the senses.

Because rationalism is at the very heart of metaphysics which are central to ethics – rationalism is the idea that we have knowledge of realties beyond our experience just by moving from idea to idea (like proof of Descartes, etc proofs of God) – like we do in mathematics.

But Hume and other empiricists argue that we can only have knowledge from experience and perception – impression and ideas.

We have already discussed Hume and how his questioning of causality led to the questioning of science altogether.

But it was science itself that raised two questions for Kant:

(1) this we have already discussed that science’s mechanical view of the universe could bring freedom and God into doubt.

(2) How to explain scientific knowledge – what it is.

Kant discovered that these two problems were similar – in that the explanation of scientific knowledge and the explaining of metaphysics – thought concerning freedom and God – were the same.

Kant said that what the scientist is doing when he is describing reality is the same as what the metaphysician is doing when he or she philosophizes about freedom and ethics.

(quote 3)

In science and metaphysics there is some datum which gives rise to judgment in human reason
So Kant is said to have brought a new life to philosophy at this time because no longer was it a battle between the schools of rationalism and empiricism – but now it was reason that was central to both.

data – facts or information used in deciding or discussing something.

It was this that Kant is known for – examine the reason that is common both to rationalism and empiricism – this he does in his most famous book – Critique of Pure Reason.

The work of philosophy from Kant on – is the examining of what human reason can do.

Kant’s Critical Philosophy

Kant had been a rationalist philosopher until he read the work of David Hume.

Remember what rationalism is: rationalism is the idea that we have knowledge of realties (like God) beyond our experience just by moving from idea to idea.

But after reading David Hume – Kant began to question rationalism – but he did not want to go all the way – because he did not want to give up some of the subjects of rationalism – i.e. God, freedom, and morality/ethics.

These topics of God, freedom, morality – were topics which a philosopher could not ignore.

So Kan want to build upon what he thought was good in both and rationalism and empiricism and reject what was not good.

Kant invented a whole new approached in philosophy to do this: critical philosophy.

(quote 4)

Critical Philosophy: the analysis of the powers of human reason.

“a critical inquiry into the faculty of reason with reference to all the knowledge which it may strive independently of all experience”

Critical Philosophy asks this question: “What and how much can understanding and reason know, apart from all experience?”

So where rationalist might try to prove the existence of God only through reason – Kant thought that the question they should ask themselves is – not whether they have proved through reason the existence of God or not – but does reason have the power to answer such questions.

Kant thought that it was crazy for rationalist/metaphysicians to argue amongst themselves about the trueness of their arguments without first asking themselves if reason was up to the job.
Critical philosophy was for Kant not to do away with metaphysics – but to prepare for it by asking how is a priori (knowledge before experience) knowledge possible.

The Nature of a Priori Knowledge

Kant thought that we were able to gain a type of knowledge that did not need experience – though he agreed with David Hume and other empiricists that our knowledge began with experience – but it doesn’t stop there.

(quote 5)

“though our knowledge begins with experience, it does not follow that it all rises out of experience”

To understand what Kant means by this we have to think back – again – to Hume’s argument about causality - Kant thought that Hume was right that we do not experience causality – but Kant thought that Hume was wrong in thinking that causality was just a habit of our minds connecting two events together – Kant thought that rather our knowledge of causality came with (was already there) with the two event – and agreed with Hume that our knowledge of causality didn’t come out of experience (causality was not something that we experienced.

What is this a priori knowledge? Knowledge such as mathematics, or knowing that every change must have a cause – the kind of knowledge that cannot be come from experience.

In other words, experience cannot show us that every change must have cause – since we cannot have experienced every cause.

Knowledge based on experience can NEVER give necessity or universal understanding – but a priori knowledge CAN - example: 1+1=2

Kant came to an understanding that there was obviously a priori knowledge – but what he wanted to know was: How is a priori knowledge possible?

But it simply a question of how a priori knowledge is possible – but …

(quote 6)

How is synthetic a priori knowledge possible?

analytic
synthetic
a priori
a posteriori