The Story of Philosophy by Will Durant presents a fascinating summary of Kant’s philosophy, which, otherwise, is quite difficult to understand. Here is the whole summary: Immanuel Kant and German Idealism
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Durant introduces Kant as follows:
NEVER has a system of thought so dominated an epoch as the philosophy of Immanuel Kant dominated the thought of the nineteenth century. After almost three-score years of quiet and secluded development, the uncanny Scot of Konigsberg roused the world from its “dogmatic slumber,” in 1781, with his famous Critique of Pure Reason; and from that year to our own the “critical philosophy” has ruled the speculative roost of Europe. The philosophy of Schopenhauer rose to brief power on the romantic wave that broke in 1848; the theory of evolution swept everything before it after 1859; and the exhilarating iconoclasm of Nietzsche won the center of the philosophic stage as the century came to a close. But these were secondary and surface developments; underneath them the strong and steady current of the Kantian movement flowed on, always wider and deeper; until today its essential theorems are the axioms of all mature philosophy. Nietzsche takes Kant for granted, and passes on; Schopenhauer calls the Critique “the most important work in German literature,” and considers any man a child until he has understood Kant; Spencer could not understand Kant, and for precisely that reason, perhaps, fell a little short of the fullest philosophic stature. To adapt Hegel’s phrase about Spinoza: to be a philosopher, one must first have been a Kantian…
Here is how Durant starts out with his summary of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason:
The Critique comes to the point at once. “Experience is by no means the only field to which our understanding can be confined. Experience tells us what is, but not that it must be necessarily what it is and not otherwise. It therefore never gives us any really general truths; and our reason, which is particularly anxious for that class of knowledge, is roused by it rather than satisfied. General truths, which at the same time bear the character of an inward necessity, must be independent of experience,—clear and certain in themselves.” That is to say, they must be true no matter what our later experience may be; true even before experience; true a priori. “How far we can advance independently of all experience, in a priori knowledge, is shown by the brilliant example of mathematics.” Mathematical knowledge is necessary and certain; we cannot conceive of future experience violating it. We may believe that the sun will “rise” in the west to-morrow, or that someday, in some conceivable asbestos world, fire will not burn stick; but we cannot for the life of us believe that two times two will ever make anything else than four. Such truths are true before experience; they do not depend on experience past, present, or to come. Therefore they are absolute and necessary truths; it is inconceivable that they should ever become untrue. But whence do we get this character of absoluteness and necessity? Not from experience; for experience gives us nothing but separate sensations and events, which may alter their sequence in the future. These truths derive their necessary character from the inherent structure of our minds, from the natural and inevitable manner in which our minds must operate. For the mind of man (and here at last is the great thesis of Kant) is not passive wax upon which experience and sensation write their absolute and yet whimsical will; nor is it a mere abstract name for the series or group of mental states; it is an active organ which molds and coordinates sensations into ideas, an organ which transforms the chaotic multiplicity of experience into the ordered unity of thought…
Kant’s thoughts are the ultimate in philosophy at the moment. I shall be posting my comments based on this summary of Kant’s philosophy.
COMMENTS:
Mindfulness looks at mind as a sense organ that perceives mental objects. All knowledge is derived from physical and mental sense-experience. It is an arbitrary assumption that “pure” reason is to mean knowledge that does not come through our senses, but is independent of all sense experience.
Knowledge seems to exist as associations among data. This data may be perceived as being arranged in a matrix form. Each node of the matrix may be perceived as a matrix in its own right. This may keep on going to any number of levels. This is the inherent nature and structure of the mind.
Pure knowledge is characterized by continuity, harmony and consistency in this matrix at all levels. Knowledge does not become impure just by being sensed. Knowledge becomes impure to the degree it is discontinuous, disharmonious and inconsistent in its matrix.
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Comments
Durant writes:
III. THE CRITIQUE OF PURE REASON
What is meant by this title? Critique is not precisely a criticism, but a critical analysis; Kant is not attacking “pure reason,” except, at the end, to show its limitations; rather he hopes to show its possibility, and to exalt it above the impure knowledge which comes to us through the distorting channels of sense. For “pure” reason is to mean knowledge that does not come through our senses, but is independent of all sense experience; knowledge belonging to us by the inherent nature and structure of the mind.
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This is how I see it.
(1) Reason is based on logical associations among what one perceives.
(2) Such logical associations are ideally consistent, but they can be inconsistent.
(3) There exists an inherent sense of consistency and inconsistency.
(4) When the factor causing inconsistency comes to view, a readjustment occurs in understanding to cancel out the inconsistency.
(5) “Impure” knowledge is the knowledge which contains inconsistencies.
(6) “Pure” knowledge is that which is consistent throughout.
I do not see how there can be knowledge, which is independent of sense experience. Maybe Kant is not looking at mind as a sense organ.
Mindfulness looks at mind as a sense organ that perceives mental objects. All knowledge is derived from physical and mental sense-experience.
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Vin: I do not see how there can be knowledge, which is independent of sense experience. Maybe Kant is not looking at mind as a sense organ, which mindfulness does. Mind is also a sense organ that perceives mental objects.
Chris: We have been taught that the mind is composed of mental objects. There is the issue of imagination with which we dream up mental objects and not only sense them. Perhaps we have to work over the word sense.
The mind seems to have much to do with the self. Possibly there is a set of mind and of imagination which is a set of reality or vice versa. Possibly the mind and self are subsets of reality or is reality a subset of mind and self?
I am beginning to do chicken and egg flip flops and it’s evening and I am not thinking about this very clearly. I better try again in the morning.
Imagination seems to be re-association among existing mental object. We assume that mind imagines because we do not know the actual process. Mind simply acts as a place-holder for many such unknowns. There is no such thing as mind. In actuality we have many different mental processes, which are not explained by a single consistent theory, and whose mechanics are pretty much unknown. So, there is no single thing called mind.
But we can see that a process exists, which recognizes mental objects.
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Yes. Very good.
Mind and self seems to be interchangeable place-holders.
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Agree. This is my current feeling about the subject. When a person is fixated upon the self, they have an unnatural and persistent on things like survival. When a person lets go of the self; less fixation on their selves; they operate much more freely; intelligently; and with less fixation on survival.
To me the following is a conjecture:
“Pure reason is knowledge belonging to us by the the inherent nature and structure of the mind.”
It is a good conjecture, the verification will come in terms of consistency.
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Durant writes,
At the very outset, then, Kant flings down a challenge to Locke and the English school: knowledge is not all derived from the senses.
Hume thought he had shown that there is no soul, and no science; that our minds are but our ideas in procession and association; and our certainties but probabilities in perpetual danger of violation.
These false conclusions, says Kant, are the result of false premises: you assume that all knowledge comes from “separate and distinct” sensations; naturally these cannot give you necessity, or invariable sequences of which you may be forever certain; and naturally you must not expect to “see” your soul, even with the eyes of the internal sense.
Let us grant that absolute certainty of knowledge is impossible if all knowledge comes from sensation, from an independent external world which owes us no promise of regularity of behavior. But what if we have knowledge that is independent of sense-experience, knowledge whose truth is certain to us even before experience —a priori?
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(1) At the time of Hume and Kant, “sense-experience” was limited to the experience from the five physical senses.
(2) “Mental sensations” were looked upon as “inner life.”
(3) External world was looked upon as independent of the “inner life.”
All these are arbitrary and unverified assumptions.
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In the framework of mindfulness,
(1) Mind is a sense organ that perceives mental objects.
(2) Mental and physical objects complement each other. They are not independent of each other.
When mindfulness is allowed as above, then there is no necessity for the conjecture that “we have knowledge that is independent of sense-experience.”
Kant is actually postulating knowledge outside of PHYSICAL sense-experience because he is not looking at mind as a sense organ.
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Vin: Kant is actually postulating knowledge outside of PHYSICAL sense-experience.
Chris: This was nothing new. It is called faith.
Or, speculation!
Faith and speculation are mental objects.
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I’m only saying it is easy to be certain of things outside one’s experience. Certainty must not be confused with correctness.
Certainty is fixidity and an inconsistency.
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And certainty was pretty much the entire goal of Hubbard’s technology. He stampeded us there just as fast as he could. This is the hallmark of the true believer — certainty.
And Hubbard’s own certainty finally got to him, when it didn’t work.
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Vin: And Hubbard’s own certainty finally got to him, when it didn’t work.
Chris: The best that I am finally taking with me from Scientology is the utter absurdity of my own predilection to be bamboozled by cult think. I’ve learned something valuable but I’ve gone about learning it in a most inefficient way.
Learning is always good, when it simplifies observations.
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Vin: Learning is always good, when it simplifies observations.
Chris: Not saying you are wrong but even this example needs to be scrutinized. Scientology was a big improvement, much simpler than the Christian upbringing that I had recently divorced from in 1977. And I learned. But was that the best path I could’ve taken? I’m not really thinking so. How about you? You had a sophisticated education by the time you found Scientology and yet it seemed apropos at that time.
What Scientology told me was that there could be a structure to meditation. Meditation, as I knew, was so unstructured that it took a long time for anyone to get anywhere with it.
Hubbard went about it with a shotgun sort of approach. But among all those potshots there seemed to be a pattern. It was interesting.
However, it didn’t come together for me until I came across Idenics. I just took off after that. I now had a basis from which to understand Buddha. And then Buddha became the basis.
After 2600 years, there has been so much confusion introduced in Buddhism that I could not have understood it without going through the path of Scientology and Idenics. But now that I understand the basis of Buddhism, I can recommend improvements to the processes used in Scientology and Idenics.
Yes, there has been sort of an “iterative-mechanics” in reverse here, or, at least, there has been a lot of going back and forth.
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Vin: But now that I understand the basis of Buddhism, I can recommend improvements to the processes used in Scientology and Idenics.
Chris: Just put the word “true” in front of the word Buddhism and see what I mean by creating another ideology.
Vin: Yes, there has been sort of an “iterative-mechanics” in reverse here, or, at least, going back and forth.
Chris: I think we are looking at a quantity of space-time. Maybe back is minus and forth is plus.
I would not put ‘true’ before Buddhism because Buddhism denies any absolute truth. Ideology comes only when people start believing in something as absolute truth. That is what happened with Scientology.
On FaceBook there is a group called ‘Free Scientology’. I am working on cutting down Scientology there as an ideology. You may find that group interesting.
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I dunno about that. Is that purpose of that to get TA on them or us?
There is no them or us. It is all us.
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The only way to reverse the “iterative-mechanic” of conditioning is to resolve inconsistencies wherever you find them.
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Durant writes,
But what if we have knowledge that is independent of sense-experience, knowledge whose truth is certain to us even before experience —a priori? Then absolute truth, and absolute science, would become possible, would it not? Is there such absolute knowledge? This is the problem of the first Critique. “My question is, what we can hope to achieve with reason, when all the material and assistance of experience are taken away.”
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Is there absolute knowledge? I believe Kant never answered that question.
From the viewpoint of mindfulness, all knowledge is relative. No matter how much you may know, there would still be more to know.
As far as the function of pure reason is concerned, apparently it is to recognize the consistency or inconsistency among knowledge.
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Yes, given our work on this subject, these assertions of Durant and Kant and the problems they are trying to resolve seem elementary.
But we haven’t built a consistent model in our work yet.
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I shouldn’t write tonight. I should rest instead. I feel like saying that at the level we are looking at, models become diaphanous.
There is a long way to go before it disappears.
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I just mean that when I look closely at a model, it begins to appear thinner than if I look at it from a distance.
Durant writes,
The Critique becomes a detailed biology of thought, an examination of the origin and evolution of concepts, an analysis of the inherited structure of the mind. This, as Kant believes, is the entire problem of metaphysics. “In this book I have chiefly aimed at completeness; and I venture to maintain that there ought not to be one single metaphysical problem that has not been solved here, or to the solution of which the key at least has not here been supplied.” Exegi monumentum aere perennius! With such egotism nature spurs us on to creation.
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I believe that it is not necessary to examine these details of the structure of the mind as worked out by Kant. We shall look at this area only if the resolution of some inconsistency demands it.
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All philosophical structures of the mind are metaphorical.
Durant writes,
The Critique comes to the point at once. “Experience is by no means the only field to which our understanding can be confined. Experience tells us what is, but not that it must be necessarily what it is and not otherwise. It therefore never gives us any really general truths; and our reason, which is particularly anxious for that class of knowledge, is roused by it rather than satisfied. General truths, which at the same time bear the character of an inward necessity, must be independent of experience,—clear and certain in themselves.” That is to say, they must be true no matter what our later experience may be; true even before experience; true a priori.
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(1) What is there is there. We perceive it directly. Nothing needs to be proved about it.
(2) What needs to be proved are the expectations, speculations and assumptions that we use to interpret what is there.
(3) The correctness of what we perceive to be there is determined by the consistency of what we perceive.
(4) Presence of inconsistency may indicate missing perception or the presence of filter (expectations, speculations and assumptions).
(5) General truths will be visible if the filter is removed.
Maybe what Kant is calling “experience” is actually a reference to the “filter” that one is looking through. When there is no filter, there is no need to not accept the perception for what it is.
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Vin: (1) What is there is there. We perceive it directly. Nothing needs to be proved about it.
Chris: To make this assumption, we have to make some other decisions about assumptions as well. 1. There has to be a real world out there; 2. Our perception has to be paired down until it perceives only what is there and nothing more and nothing less; 3. Our experience as a filter must somehow be left out of that perception.
Each of these points is troublesome to me. Include “what is there. We perceive it directly.” There are gaps here that I am not comfortable with. I seem drawn toward making more assumptions, speculations, conjectures, and making the lot firm somehow.
What is there is there. That has to be the starting point. No assumptions, speculations or expectations should be added.
That is mindfulness.
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Vin: Maybe what Kant is calling “experience” is actually reference to “filter” that one is lookin g through.
Chris: Maybe.
Vin: (3) The correctness of what we perceive to be there is determined by the consistency of what we perceive.
Chris: This is another tautology and the reason why I say that is that when that consistency is among a set, then it is consistent until we compare it outside that set. Our favorite Scientology is consistent within its own set and the reason is because it defines itself as consistent. No matter how outrageous that is, it is still consistent within its own set.
So my point is that the consistency in what we perceive is tricky. The “ideology” of mindfulness seems to be putting in place as a poka-yoke for that trickiness… Am I being clear or not? So I am again troubled that we are setting up more “things within itself” as a solution for seeing clearly.
If perception is limited to a particular set, that is an inconsistency right there.
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Maybe but why do you think that would be inconsistent? Also, given the choice, whether perception is limited or not, I choose that it is limited to a set of something at all times. Perception would be the subset of a hyper-set at all times — that is how we are using manifestation and perception, isn’t it?
I am having trouble with this “it is what it is.” Unless, that is the root mechanic of the universe in which case it is. haha I never wanted my TU tautological universe to catch on so quickly!
There is nothing interesting about consistency. I wouldn’t waste time thinking about consistencies. Growth occurs only when inconsistencies are resolved.
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Durant writes,
“How far we can advance independently of all experience, in a priori knowledge, is shown by the brilliant example of mathematics.” Mathematical knowledge is necessary and certain; we cannot conceive of future experience violating it. We may believe that the sun will “rise” in the west to-morrow, or that someday, in some conceivable asbestos world, fire will not burn stick; but we cannot for the life of us believe that two times two will ever make anything else than four. Such truths are true before experience; they do not depend on experience past, present, or to come. Therefore they are absolute and necessary truths; it is inconceivable that they should ever become untrue.
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(1) Mathematics basically makes certain postulates and then explores where they lead to.
(2) Mathematics may be looked upon as exploration of the basic structure of thought.
(3) “Two plus two equals four” is actually a tautology. Here we are looking at the same mental object in two different ways. Maybe the thought is ultimately tautological. This needs to be investigated.
(4) “A priori” knowledge is tautological. It is absolute only in a tautological sense.
We may thus say that all fundamental premise, which are looked upon as absolute, must be tautological in nature.
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Vin: We may thus say that all fundamental premise, which are looked upon as absolute, must be tautological in nature.
Chris: Yes, now you come under my spell, and soon my faithful friend, I will start a new cult! mwha-hahahaha!
Durant writes,
But whence do we get this character of absoluteness and necessity? Not from experience; for experience gives us nothing but separate sensations and events, which may alter their sequence in the future. These truths derive their necessary character from the inherent structure of our minds, from the natural and inevitable manner in which our minds must operate. For the mind of man (and here at last is the great thesis of Kant) is not passive wax upon which experience and sensation write their absolute and yet whimsical will; nor is it a mere abstract name for the series or group of mental states; it is an active organ which molds and coordinates sensations into ideas, an organ which transforms the chaotic multiplicity of experience into the ordered unity of thought.
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(1) We get this character of absoluteness and necessity from a fundamental tautology. Maybe we’ll discover through our investigation how a fundamental tautology comes to be manifested.
(2) Per this fundamental tautology, what is, IS.
(3) Experience comes from the logical associations that flow from the fundamental tautologies.
(4) When consistency is maintained throughout these logical associations, we have an absolute and necessary subject such as mathematics.
(5) When consistency is NOT maintained and inconsistencies abound in these logical associations, then we have something like “experience” that is full of variability and unpredictability.
(6) The basic structure of the mind that can spot inconsistencies is absolute and necessary like mathematics.
(7) The mind may be looked upon as shrouded by filters that are full of variability and unpredictability.
(8) The filters act as “inconsistency generators” when “experience” is extracted from “what is.”
(9) The mind “transforms the chaotic multiplicity of experience into the ordered unity of thought” only when it ia allowed to spot the inconsistencies and follows them through to spot filters.
(10) Mindfulness allows the mind to spot inconsistencies and to follow them through.
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Vin: (2) Per this fundamental tautology, what is, IS.
Chris: You’ve defined my tautological universe better than I. I think you may be seeing what I am seeing. Or possibly the irony that I am seeing.
Do you think using “what is, IS” that we could be knocking on the door of the basic “iterative-mechanic?” You know by now that I postulate and am searching for clues to the basic mechanic which could be responsible for fundamental particles which are coming and going – creating an apparently discrete and brief presentation of each moment.
Every philosopher seems to digress to this tautology. They start off like houses on fire, but then . . . always with the “I am that I am” and “I think therefore I am” I wonder if there is an exception? This is your “thing within itself” and your “awareness of awareness unit.” It is said many different ways, but seemingly always tautologically. Am I on a vector which is tending away, or toward some resolution of this inconsistency?
I see this universe to be thing-in-itself.
Kant sees thing-in-itself to be something beyond perception,
Mindfulness starts with ‘what is’ and not with some speculation, such as, ‘I think therefore I am .
If there is inconsistency spotted in ‘what is’ then one follows it through.
“Iterative-mechanic” is speculation.
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Vin: I see this universe to be thing-in-itself.
Chris: Oh! Right! Very good.
Vin: “Iterative-mechanic” is speculation.
Chris: The precise nature of it is speculation; However, that there is iterative-mechanic is apparent if one looks.
Example of iterative-mechanic?
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Mitosis.
Mitosis is cell division at physical level. It seems that “iterative-mechanic” is like a pattern being used in explaining some repeating and growing phenomenon like fractal.
“What is’ is more basic.
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Well, that is how I see it. So when we look for “what is” and come up with an iterative mechanic, if we can nail it, then we will actually have “what is.” To me, “what is” is not the coordinate point on a graph but rather the iterative mechanic. It is a slight-of-hand trick if you don’t mind me saying. By this I mean we are looking and we see the coordinate point in the complex plane (this is only an analogy) and it seems fairly indivisible — it is a point after all — and we might go “oh, here is what is” but the slight of hand is a diversion from seeing why it happens to be there. That would be the iterative-mechanic. The iterative-mechanic is simply why the point is there and not to leap to any larger conclusion of the iterative-mechanic being “cause.” We don’t need “cause” to understand how things are. We can divorce our own thinking from this endless searching and judgmental assumption that there is “cause” at the end of the rainbow. I am trying to calmly look and dissolve assumptions as soon as they present to me. I no longer care what I find. I no longer think I know what I will find. I’m operating more freely and efficiently in life unburdened by quite so many assumptions and structured thinking and I am watching both in front of me and also with peripheral vision for any movement, any indication, anything out of place, and really this is where and why I talk about tautology. Sometimes tautology is all this universe has to offer in the way of understanding. The tautology are the dots.
Vin: “What is’ is more basic.
Chris: So what I think I am arguing for is the iterative-mechanic being more basic than the resultant iteration. Meaning that I feel the iterative-mechanic is more nearly “what is” than the resultant dot. I look around and see things coming and going. And more and more dots The tendency for me is to fixate upon these things coming and going and not to see the pattern that the great ones — Mandelbrot, Julia, and Wolfram — seem to have seen. There is your matrix. Not the dots, but how the dots come and go.
You mentioned noise this week. The dots are the noise.
I get what you are saying. To me, “iterative-mechanic” is a given. My interest is in finding out the basic pattern that is iterating.
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The iterative-mechanic can be seen EVERYWHERE. It’s in photosynthesis, and cell mitosis and meiosis. EVERYTHING in the universe EATS and is EATEN. When one galaxy eats another there’s your iterative-mechanic. When some bacteria digest god knows what in an anaerobic environment and the resulting alcohol is consumed and the car wreck ensues, there’s your iterative-mechanic. It’s not the dots, it’s the machine. Turn the crank and out comes a dot. Put that dot back into the machine and crank and out comes another dot. Not the same dot. Not the same answer. But a similar and recursive dot. And the dots begin to form recognizable patterns and then the dots drift and tend away from the recognizable pattern and form unrecognizable patterns which we term random patterns.
Randomness seems to be a pattern which has not been recognized as a pattern. Now I’ve come full circle back to the tautology, wisely scratching my chin and going uh-huh!
That is what Buddha says, “Everything in this universe is conditioned. One thing conditions the next thing, and is itself conditioned by the previous thing.”
It is a network of conditioning. That is the fabric of mental space.
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Harmonious balance in life would describe for me a desirable condition. That for me would be the greatest truth and in that truth I do not care too much about locating a greater truth. My question is such a postulated state consistency the best goal? Some postulate to escape from the physical universe. This seems counterintuitive and fruitless to me. Does this make a trustee of the asylum or enlightened? Would there be a way to tell the difference. Would both of these labels look just the same as each other?
Vin: It is a network of conditioning. That is the fabric of mental space.
Chris: So my questions seem to revolve around what is the goal of looking? What am I hoping for? The goal cannot possibly be a state or condition in the world outside myself, can it? I have no power or authority except over my interpretation of my own experience in the world, if that.
What is the difference between harmonious balance and consistency?
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If we are talking about a consistency which is relative, conditioned and impermanent then there is no particular difference between consistency and harmonious balance. I plucked out harmonious balance to shake up my label making machinery – to use another synonym to help keep from falling asleep.
The stress on harmonious balance is to use a term which really sounds relative, conditioned and impermanent; and I think it does give that surfboard riding the wave sense.
To me, the goal of looking is looking. There are no expectations, speculations and assumptions.
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And we are right back to tautology… The goal of any goal is the goal. There is something here to understand something basic about the world in these tautologies. Possibly something about the fractal equations being recursive and self similar.
Do what you are doing when you are doing it… mindfully. 🙂
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Vin: (6) The basic structure of the mind that can spot inconsistencies is absolute and necessary like mathematics.
Chris: And yet, how mathematical? More like a simple arithmetic machine, slow and with few iterations? Because only after tremendous concentration and work have I begun to see randomity as not random, but rather algorithmic. And so it came to pass that there is not randomity in the universe but rather tremendous mathematics which the human mind cannot fathom but simply raises the “blue screen” of overwhelm.
When mindfulness is practiced it is effortless.
The presence of effort is an inconsistency.
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Vin: The presence of effort is an inconsistency.
Chris: I do not think so. I think effort is an elementary step on the way to ability.
Vin: When mindfulness is practiced it is effortless.
Chris: Not at first it isn’t. Mindfulness is a skill which requires practice to become effortless.
Mindfulness can be effortless from the very first moment. Please see step #12 of the following:
12 STEPS OF MINDFULNESS
To understand mindfulness, the following exercises may be helpful:
TRAINING IN MINDFULNESS
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Vin: (10) Mindfulness allows the mind to spot inconsistencies and to follow them through.
Chris: To succeed at playing this game, we need better minds. I believe that mindfulness is helping give us that tool. I also feel like a tool. Not in a bad way, but as part of a tremendous manifestation. I won’t call it a game on a grand scale for that is too big a leap or assumption. That reifies and personifies something much grander and not human at all into human terms, thereby losing its massive order of magnitude.
Just be mindful.
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Vin: Just be mindful.
Chris: Always good advice. I am just telling you where mindfulness has gotten me so far…
Durant writes,
1. Transcendental Esthetic
The effort to answer this question, to study the inherent structure of the mind, or the innate laws of thought, is what Kant calls “transcendental philosophy,” because it is a problem transcending sense-experience. “I call knowledge transcendental which is occupied not so much with objects, as with our a priori concepts of objects.” —with our modes of correlating our experience into knowledge.
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Transcendental to the physical objects are the mental objects. One may say that mental objects lie in a dimension beyond the physical dimension.
For Kant, the “sense-experience” means the experience with physical objects. When knowledge transcends the physical dimension, it is now occupied with the objects in the mental dimension.
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Durant writes,
There are two grades or stages in this process of working up the raw material of sensation into the finished product of thought. The first stage is the coordination of sensations by applying to them the forms of perception—space and time; the second stage is the coordination of the perceptions so developed, by applying to them the forms of conception—the “categories” of thought. Kant, using the word esthetic in its original and etymological sense, as connoting sensation or feeling, calls the study of the first of these stages “Transcendental Esthetic”; and using the word logic as meaning the science of the forms of thought, he calls the study of the second stage “Transcendental Logic.” These are terrible words, which will take meaning as the argument proceeds; once over this hill, the road to Kant will be comparatively clear.
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(1) “Space – time” in physical dimension may be called the “fabric of perception.” It gives physical form to what is there. Kant calls this “Transcendental Esthetic.” A better term would be “percept” because it is simple and less intimidating.
(2) “Space – time” in mental dimension may be called the “fabric of conception.” It gives mental or conceptual form to what is there. Kant calls this “Transcendental Logic.” A better term would be “concept.”
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Durant writes,
Now just what is meant by sensations and perceptions? — and how does the mind change the former into the latter? By itself a sensation is merely the awareness of a stimulus; we have a taste on the tongue, an odor in the nostrils, a sound in the ears, a temperature on the skin, a flash of light on the retina, a pressure on the fingers: it is the raw crude beginning of experience; it is what the infant has in the early days of its groping mental life; it is not yet knowledge. But let these various sensations group themselves about an object in space and time—say this apple; let the odor in the nostrils, and the taste on the tongue, the light on the retina, the shape-revealing pressure on the fingers and the hand, unite and group themselves about this “thing”: and there is now an awareness not so much of a stimulus as of a specific object; there is a perception. Sensation has passed into knowledge.
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The physical sense organs provide physical sensations which are then perceived in the form given to them by physical space-time. The physical sense organs work in concert to provide a complete picture. Inconsistency arises when the sense organs do not work in concert.
A basic perception-point, without any filters, will make a straight-forward use of space-time to provide the purest perception.
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Durant writes,
But again, was this passage, this grouping, automatic? Did the sensations of themselves, spontaneously and naturally, fall into a cluster and an order, and so become perception? Yes, said Locke and Hume ; not at all, says Kant.
For these varied sensations come to us through varied channels of sense, through a thousand “afferent nerves” that pass from skin and eye and ear and tongue into the brain ; what a medley of messengers they must be as they crowd into the chambers of the mind, calling for attention! No wonder Plato spoke of “the rabble of the senses.” And left to themselves, they remain rabble, a chaotic “manifold,” pitifully impotent, waiting to be ordered into meaning and purpose and power. As readily might the messages brought to a general from a thousand sectors of the battle-line weave themselves unaided into comprehension and command. No; there is a law-giver for this mob, a directing and coordinating power that does not merely receive, but takes these atoms of sensation and molds them into sense.
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(1) The sensations seem to get molded into perception by the structure of the mind.
(2) Space-time seems to form that basic structure of the mind.
(3) The structure of the mind (space-time) gets distorted when filters are introduced.
(4) A distorted space-time then molds the sensations into a perception that has inconsistencies in it.
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Space-time seems to be an elastic fluid which is not homogeneous and wants to find equilibrium. I say elastic because it seems to be stretched tightly by the Big Bang. If any of it condenses into energy or matter, more of it seems to want to condense against that already condensed. This seems to resemble galaxies, clusters of galaxies, and superclusters of galaxies.
To me, Big bang is a conjecture. I haven’t examined it in detail yet. So, I won’t use it in my arguments until I have examined it in detail.
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Well, right now, it is extant knowledge. If I use it incorrectly or it comes into disrepute, I will recant.
Do you actually see it that way without making any assumptions?
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Yes, I am making assumptions but I am holding to them lightly. I take every word of the myth of red-shift on faith since there is no part of my own experience I can draw on to fortify my knowledge without faith in these stories. Every bit of my knowledge of chemistry is taken on faith. The last thing I am trying to become is dogmatic . . . but I recognize where my knowledge is weak.
I do not doubt scientific observations. But Big Bang is a conjecture that contains quite a leap of logic.
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Vin: I do not doubt scientific observations. But Big Bang is a conjecture that contains quite a leap of logic.
Chris: You mean the bang of something from nothing conjecture? Yes huge leap. The motion, however, is fairly tracked, do you think? The attention on space is where it would be at for me if I were an astrophysicist.
What iterative-mechanic is “big bang” part of?
I very much doubt that there is a singularity within “iterative-mechanic.”
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Well, so the myth goes that sub-atomic particles condensed out of the primordial space soup of a primary explosion. Something occurred to the primordial soup of space-time as conditions passed and as time marched on. And lo, there was hydrogen; then helium, and so on it went. And the space congealed, or condensed and the condensation condensed more. And the iterative-mechanic was working on auto-pilot and it was good.
LOL! You ought to write a new Bible for scientists!
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Yes! I believe I could do that! What are the hours, sir?
9 to 5.
Fabulous!
Durant writes,
Observe, first, that not all of the messages are accepted. Myriad forces play upon your body at this moment; a storm of stimuli beats down upon the nerve-endings which, amoeba-like, you put forth to experience the external world: but not all that call are chosen; only those sensations are selected that can be molded into perceptions suited to your present purpose, or that bring those imperious messages of danger which are always relevant. The clock is ticking, and you do not hear it; but that same ticking, not louder than before, will be heard at once if your purpose wills it so. The mother asleep at her infant’s cradle is deaf to the turmoil of life about her; but let the little one move, and the mother gropes her way back to waking attention like a diver rising hurriedly to the surface of the sea. Let the purpose be addition, and the stimulus “two and three” brings the response, “five”; let the purpose be multiplication, and the same stimulus, the same auditory sensations, “two and three,” bring the response, “six.” Association of sensations or ideas is not merely by contiguity in space or time, nor by similarity, nor by recency, frequency or intensity of experience; it is, above all, determined by the purpose of the mind. Sensations and thoughts are servants, they await our call, they do not come unless we need them. There is an agent of selection and direction that uses them and is their master. In addition to the sensations and the ideas there is the mind.
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Here is process of selection and direction that is imposed on top of space-time (molding of sensation). It’s characteristics may be described in terms of (a) attention, and (b) purpose.
This is the basic filter which may be termed as “I” or “self.”
Inconsistencies may get introduced into this filter.
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Durant writes,
This agent of selection and coordination, Kant thinks, uses first of all two simple methods for the classification of the material presented to it: the sense of space, and the sense of time. As the general arranges the messages brought him according to the place for which they come, and the time at which they were written, and so finds an order and a system for them all; so the mind allocates its sensations in space and time, attributes them to this object here or that object there, to this present time or to that past. Space and time are not things perceived, but modes of perception, ways of putting sense into sensation ; space and time are organs of perception.
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Space-time provides the fabric of perception.
This is the most basic level of programming that identifies what is there.
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Durant writes,
They are a priori , because all ordered experience involves and presupposes them. Without them, sensations could never grow into perceptions. They are a priori because it is inconceivable that we should ever have any future experience that will not also involve them. And because they are a priori, their laws, which are the laws of mathematics, are a priori, absolute and necessary, world without end. It is not merely probable, it is certain that we shall never find a straight line that is not the shortest distance between two points. Mathematics, at least, is saved from the dissolvent scepticism of David Hume.
Can all the sciences be similarly saved? Yes, if their basic principle, the law of causality—that a given cause must always be followed by a given effect—can be shown, like space and time, to be so inherent in all the processes of understanding that no future experience can be conceived that would violate or escape it. Is causality, too, a priori, an indispensable prerequisite and condition of all thought?
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Space-time provides the most basic programming to the mind. The nature of this programming is not known as yet. It seems to define at the lowest level ‘what is there’.
This applies to the perception of physical objects.
A different dimension of it may apply to mental objects.
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I couldn’t follow this.
What does ‘a priori’ mean to you?
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In this context, it seems that a priori is a logical grab by Durant to beg several questions and state almost as many fixed ideas in one paragraph as he uses words. He’s written this without knowledge of fractals and so makes blatantly false statements; unless of course we want to limit his logic to the little-world set that he is describing. Maybe I’m wrong – I might need to spend as much time getting used to Durant’s context and lingo as I have spent with yours. My wife has drawn the short-stick with regards to time shared since I’ve been spending time with you!
A priori (“from the earlier”)
Distinguishes one of the two types of knowledge, justifications or arguments. It is independent of experience (for example “All bachelors are unmarried”)
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A priori = a tautology
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Well, I really had that wrong. I thought a priori was a cousin to a cognitive dissonance.
I am finding in my KHTK sessions that word clearing is quite an important part of clearing up confusions in life.
Agreed. My Scientology training in words was and continues to be a very helpful tool. Actually, vital.
Durant writes,
So we pass from the wide field of sensation and perception to the dark and narrow chamber of thought; from “transcendental esthetic” to “transcendental logic.” And first to the naming and analysis of those elements in our thought which are not so much given to the mind by perception as given to perception by the mind ; those levers which raise the “perceptual” knowledge of objects into the “conceptual” knowledge of relationships, sequences, and laws; those tools of the mind which refine experience into science. Just as perceptions arranged sensations around objects in space and time, so conception arranges perceptions (objects and events) about the ideas of cause, unity, reciprocal relation, necessity, contingency, etc.; these and other “categories” are the structure into which perceptions are received, and by which they are classified and molded into the ordered concepts of thought. These are the very essence and character of the mind; mind is the coordination of experience.
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Physical space-time is the “software” that converts sensation to perception. Here we have form, or the primary shape.
Mental space-time is the “software” that converts perception to conception. Here we have name, or the primary significance.
Beyond this level logical association comes into play, which modifies and generates combinations of shapes and significance.
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Durant writes,
And here again observe the activity of this mind that was, to Locke and Hume, mere “passive wax” under the blows of sense-experience. Consider a system of thought like Aristotle’s; is it conceivable that this almost cosmic ordering of data should have come by the automatic, anarchistic spontaneity of the data themselves? See this magnificent card catalogue in the library, intelligently ordered into sequence by human purpose. Then picture all these card-cases thrown upon the floor, all these cards scattered pell-mell into riotous disorder. Can you now conceive these scattered cards pulling themselves up, Munchausen-like, from their disarray, passing quietly into their alphabetical and topical places in their proper boxes, and each box into its fit place in the rack,—until all should be order and sense and purpose again? What a miracle-story these skeptics have given us after all!
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There is a process here that organizes sensations into perceptions, conceptions and then into logical associations. This process needs to be fully understood and described.
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Durant writes,
Sensation is unorganized stimulus, perception is organized sensation, conception is organized perception, science is organized knowledge, wisdom is organized life : each is a greater degree of order, and sequence, and unity. Whence this order, this sequence, this unity? Not from the things themselves; for they are known to us only by sensations that come through a thousand channels at once in disorderly multitude; it is our purpose that put order and sequence and unity upon this importunate lawlessness; it is ourselves, our personalities, our minds, that bring light upon these seas. Locke was wrong when he said, “There is nothing in the intellect except what was first in the senses”; Leibnitz was right when he added,—”nothing, except the intellect itself.” “Perceptions without conceptions,” says Kant, “are blind.” If perceptions wove themselves automatically into ordered thought, if mind were not an active effort hammering out order from chaos, how could the same experience leave one man mediocre, and in a more active and tireless soul be raised to the light of wisdom and the beautiful logic of truth?
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It is not something “out there” and something else “in here”.
It is the system “as a whole” that needs to be fully understood.
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Well, I was responding to the mental objects as vs physical objects. The language for me is drifting with too wide a variance. “Meaning” is a mental idea that doesn’t seem to fit smoothly. Attention; focus; humanity; significance like that.
There is a lot of stuff that needs to be sorted out here. The common denominator among all physical and mental objects is that they are manifestations.
There seem to be a spectrum of manifestations. We assume a sharp divide between physical and mental objects. But is there really one?
There is no such sharp divide observed when we examine mental patients.
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Vin: The common denominator among all physical and mental objects is that they are manifestations.
Chris: Yes, according to our speculations.
What else could it be?
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I don’t know that they are something else, I am only saying that we are speculating. I like that we are making mental objects and physical objects part of the same system. It doesn’t make any sense to me that they aren’t, but then I have a few of these per week that I change my mind about within a fortnight. I bet you didn’t know I knew a word like fortnight, did you?
I look at speculation as something wild and inconsistent. When it brings consistency and simplifies the thought I call it conjecture… a possibility.
You certainly astound me using a word like fortnight. America has some hope! LOL!
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Vin: I look at speculation as something wild and inconsistent. When it brings consistency and simplifies the thought I call it conjecture… a possibility.
Chris: Cool, then I’ll use that, use it that way.
Durant writes,
The world, then, has order, not of itself, but because the thought that knows the world is itself an ordering, the first stage in that classification of experience which at last is science and philosophy. The laws of thought are also the laws of things, for things are known to us only through this thought that must obey these laws, since it and they are one; in effect, as Hegel was to say, the laws of logic and the laws of nature are one, and logic and metaphysics merge. The generalized principles of science are necessary because they are ultimately laws of thought that are involved and presupposed in every experience, past, present, and to come. Science is absolute, and truth is everlasting.
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There is a lot of speculation in the paragraph above. If we look at it mindfully we see,
World = what is perceived (manifestation)
Thought = perception
“Manifestation-perception” seems to form a single system.
Manifestation is the subject of PHYSICS.
Perception is the subject of METAPHYSICS.
“Physics-metaphysics” seems to form a single subject.
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Right – I see that.
The arbitrary thing in this whole system seems to be the idea of “us”, or that, which is perceiving.
The arbitrary seems to be the perception-point.
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Good. Let’s look at that.
A perception-point is probably a fractal of mental objects.
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Yes, maybe. That is pretty good.