Cosmological Ideas 3 & 4

In in third part of Proglegomena, Kant discusses cosmological ideas, which he separates into four different arguments. The third and fourth are:

3. The claim that we can act in accordance with our own free will vs. the claim that everything we do is determined by nature.

4. The claim that there are necessary causes vs. the claim that nothing is necessary and everything is contingent.

Kant says that in 3, causal necessity and freedom are made to seem contradictory when in fact they are compatible. He says that the laws of nature are applicable only to appearances since they can only operate within the limits of space and time. He says that freedom is only applicable to things in themselves because it is the ability to exist outside the confines of experience. He says that we can be free and also be subject to the laws of nature because our faculty of reason does not deal with experience and so we are free in our capacity as rational beings. The freedom has to express itself in and only in general maxims that do not depend on causal influence or particular times and places, so we still follow the regular laws in the world of appearances.

In 4, the contradiction is resolved somewhat like 3 is. He says that half of the proposition talks about things in themselves and the other half talks about appearances. He says that every causal connection may be contingent in the world of appearances, meaning it could have happened otherwise, but these appearances might have a necessary connection to things in themselves.

Cosmological Ideas 1 & 2

In in third part of Proglegomena, Kant discusses cosmological ideas, which he separates into four different arguments. The first two are:

1. The claim that the world has a definite beginning and end vs. the claim that the world is infinite

2. The claim that all things are made up of simple, indestructible, indivisible parts vs. the claim that everything is composite and infinitely divisible

Since these claims cannot be proved with experience, we tend to think they deal with things in themselves rather than with appearances. Kant does not attack either side, instead he shows what mistakes come about in each one. He says that the mistake in the first one comes from treating space and time are features of our experience, and do not exist independently of experience. He says that it does not make sense to asked if the world has a limit in space and time since the limit would exist where we would not experience it.

The problem with the second argument, according to Kant, is that when we talk about the parts into which a composite thing can be divided, we are assuming that these parts already exists inside the composite thing, but they are only appearances, so they cannot have any existence until the are experienced.

Psychological Ideas

Kant says that psychological ideas attempt to identify some kind of substance or an ultimate subject that underlies all the predicates we can apply to a subject. He says that this is pointless because the understanding helps us make sense of experience by applying pure concepts to empirical intuitions and concepts take the form of predicates. So knowledge comes in the form of predicates attached to subjects. Kant says that we can consider the ego or soul as an ultimate subject because we refer to an "I" when we describe any internal state, but he says that we cannot have knowledge of this "I" in itself. The fact that we are capable of experience suggests that we have consciousness, but we refer to it without having any ample knowledge of it, we can know nothing about our consciousness, we can only know about appearances. All that we can say about our consciousness or "soul" is in reference to our own experience.

A priori vs. A posteriori

In the first section of Proglegomena, Kant discusses the distinction between a priori and a posteriori knowledge and how it shows the two possible sources of knowledge, the intellect and experience. He says that a priori means that we know something independently of observation and a posteriori means that we know something through observation. He claims that math is an excellent example of a priori knowledge since we can figure it out in our heads and nothing we experience can contradict this.

Causation

In the latter sections of the second part, Kant discusses Hume's ideas about causation. He says that Hume was right when he said that we cannot comprehend the possibility of causality by reason or experience, but he does not feel that this concept is the result of habit or custom. Kant says that maybe we can only know how things appear to us by the form that our senses give to those things and that we know nothing about these things in themselves. Kant is basically saying that experience is more than simple impressions and that everything we experience happens in space and time and they are not impressions or sensations; they are pure intuitions.He goes on to say that pure intuitions and concepts organize experience for us and give it form.

I like how Kant seems to find a middle ground between the empiricist and rationalist views by saying that we can have a priori knowledge relating to experience and that this knowledge does not tell us anything about things in themselves. He says that innate faculties give form to what we perceive and that even though they determine the patterns according to which the world appears to us, they do not tell us anything about what the world is really like.

Judgments: Perception vs. Experience

In the second part of Prolegomena, Kant discusses the difference between judgments of perception and judgments of experience. He says that judgments of perception are only "subjectively valid" and that they "only require the the logical connection of perception in a thinking subject." (sect. 18) He goes on to say that all of our judgments are "at first merely judgments of perception; they hold good only for us." (sect. 18) Kant then discusses judgments of experience and says that if they have objective validity, then they are empirical judgments. He says that those judgments always require special concepts originally generated in the understanding, which make the judgment of experience objectively valid.

Kant is basically showing the difference between things in themselves and our perceiving mind. Judgments of perception are joining and associating two or more intuitions with each other and making a connection between them. They deal with our senses. He says that we turn judgments of perception into judgments of experience by using concepts of pure understanding because empirical intuitions in themselves cannot be generalized.

Of Miracles 2

Hume goes on in this section to discuss four reasons why he feels that there isn't or ever has been enough evidence to prove miracles to be true. He starts off by saying that there has never been a miracle that has had a large number of trustworthy people testify for it. In order for a miracle to be considered possible or true, there would have to be a decent number of sane people that agree on the same event occurring and can give the same details of the event. The second reason Hume gives is basically that our imagination runs wild and that although we should believe we should believe what we have known to be true in the past, we can't help but believe things that surprise us. The third reason Hume gives us against miracles is that a majority of reports of miracles occur amongst ignorant or uneducated people who do not have the sense to question the testimony of a fellow citizen. The final reason he gives to doubt miracles is that miracles from each religion differ and oppose each other and therefore could never be agreed upon by every religion in the world.

I definitely agree with Hume on this subject. Miracles have never had any evidence to support them and a majority of the time, when they are investigated, they are explained pretty quickly. I think he is right in assuming that people love the unknown and love to believe things that surprise them rather than use their common sense to reason that the experience could not be true.

Of Miracles 1

In section 10, Hume discusses miracles and says that we really have no reason to believe in miracles or to consider them foundational to religion. He says that all knowledge we have of miracle comes from the account of others and what they say they have seen, which should make us more skeptical of them. He goes on to say that there is no evidence that miracles exist and we should not believe something that we do not have evidence for. He says that the only evidence we have for miracles is the testimony of others, but the laws of nature show evidence of against miracles. Since we have observed and have evidence that the laws of nature are true and a miracle is, by definition, a violation of these laws, it leads us to believe that miracles cannot be true.

Probability

In section 6, Hume says that chance does not exist in the world, but "our imagination of the real cause of any event has the same influence on the understanding, and begets a like species of belief or opinion." (pg 37) He says that there is a probability that arises from a superiority of chances on any side. Hume uses an example of a die to demonstrate his point and says that if it was marked with a certain figure or number on 4 sides and marked with a different symbol on the other 2 sides, the symbol that is on 4 sides would be more likely to appear than the symbol on 2 sides. He goes on to say the if 1000 sides were marked with a different one, the probability would be even higher.
Later in this section, Hume says that the probability of the die is the same as probability of causes. Some of the effects from causes are relatively constant while others are more irregular. He says that when this happens, philosophers do not claim its due to an irregularity in nature, he says "but suppose that some secret causes, in the particular structure of parts, have prevented the operation."
I think Hume may be onto something here; He's right to assume that there is a kind of probability to every effect and that some effects are more probable than others. It is not simply due to chance that certain causes almost always have the same effect. Although there are some effects we may not know the probability of, this doesn't mean that the effects are chances.

Knowledge of Future Events

In section 4, Hume discusses our knowledge of future events and suggests that we base all of this knowledge on things we've already experienced. He gives 2 types of reasoning that may help us to determine if it is a good idea to base future knowledge on past events. The first type, "demonstrative reasoning" is based on relations of ideas. Hume says that since there is no contradiction in suggesting that the future will resemble the past, we cannot know that it will by means of demonstrative reasoning. The second type is moral reasoning, which is based on matters of fact. He says that since moral reasoning ends up going in circles, it also does not help us. Hume ends this section by saying that there is no form of reasoning that can show how we connect similarities between past and present. I think that there must be some type of reasoning that we use in order to connect past experience to future and learn from it. If there wasn't I would imagine we would never learn from our mistakes.

Laws of Association

Hume discusses the links between ideas in section 3. He says that all ideas are connected in some way and gives three ways that this is accomplished. The first is resemblance, where a picture of a thing will make us think of that thing. The second is contiguity in time or place. This is when a specific thing is discussed and that discussion leads to the discussion of similar things. The third way is cause and effect, which is when we think of one thing and it leads us to think of what follows from it. This seems to make a lot of sense to me. It seems like anytime we think of anything something else always seems to come from it and this is how we form new ideas.

Impressions and Ideas

In sections 2 & 3, Hume discusses impressions and ideas and distinguishes between the two. He says that impressions are "lively and vivid" and ideas deal with memory and imagination, therefore they are less "lively and vivid". Hume says that impressions are "all are more lively perceptions, when we hear, or see, or feel, or hate, or desire, or will". He continues to say that ideas are merely the memories of impressions. Since Hume is an empiricist, this means he feels all our knowledge must come from impressions.

Easy & Obvious Philosophy vs. Accurate & Abstract Philosophy

Hume begins the "Enquiry" by saying that there are two kinds of philosophical thinking. The first is "easy and obvious philosophy" and the second is "accurate and abstract philosophy". He describes the first as being written in a poetic style and that it uses examples from everyday life so we can see the difference between right and wrong.He says that this type of philosophy is popular and follows from common sense, therefore there are rarely errors in it.

The second philosophy, accurate and abstract philosophy, does not direct our behavior. Instead, it focuses on what causes that behavior and why we do the things we do and uses abstract reasoning to attempt to make sense of it. He says that since this area of philosophy does not use common sense, errors are made often and because of this, this area is sometimes rejected.

Hume goes on to say that the best objection against A&A philosophy is that it is a confused attempt to explain what we don't know by blind prejudice. Hume's reply to this is that this should be more reason for us to study it closely.

Knowledge

Unlike the rationalists, who think that knowledge is limitless, and the skeptics, who think we are incapable of knowing anything at all, Locke takes the middle ground and says that knowledge is possible, but it's limited. He says that a person can only be said to know something when they see why it is necessarily so. He says our minds are not capable of grasping every necessary connection there is. This is mainly because he is an empiricist and feels that all our knowledge comes from experience and we cannot experience neccessary connections. The natural world consists of observable;e properties and since he feels we cannot grasp the connections of these things we observe we can never truly know everything.

I definitely agree with Locke's position here. I think it's naive of the rationalists to believe that it is possible for anybody to ever know everything and obviously we have some knowledge of our world so we can't say that we cannot know anything. I think that Locke has the right idea that the capacity of our minds can hold an enormous amount of information, but there is a limit to everything.

Abuses of Language

Locke focuses on the problems with language in book 3. He says that words refer to ideas and that we shouldn't use a word if there is not a clear idea of what that word refers to. He says that the only way we can guarantee that language does not lead us astray is to define our terms and stick to strict policies of usage. I agree with Locke on this point about our language. There are so many different views of words with each area of the country and in different parts of the world.

Complex Ideas

In book 2, Locke discusses simple and complex ideas. He says that there are 4 types of complex ideas; modes, substances, relations and abstract generals. He says that modes are ideas without the notion of self-subsistence. Substances are self-subsisting things or collections of self-subsisting things. Relations are relational concepts.

He says that there are 3 methods that complex ideas are created by. In the first method, ideas are put together through combination, by taking simple ideas that come to the mind naturally through sensation or ideas from the imagination. In the second method, ideas come from a comparison of simple ideas. In this method, the similarities and differences of 2 or more simple ideas are observed and the complex ideas of relations results from it. The last method, abstraction, is when the ideas that have been joined by the mind are separated by the mind.

Simple Ideas

In Book II, Locke wishes to show where knowledge comes from, since he feels he has clearly shown where it does not come from. He basically says that all knowledge comes from simple ideas and simple ideas come from experience. Therefore implying that knowledge comes from experience. Locke says that the only 2 ways a mind can pick up simple ideas is through sensation or by reflection. Sensation deals with the senses, meaning we obtain information through sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste. Reflection deals with actions of the mind; such as thinking, doubting, etc.

I agree with Locke on this subject. I think that all knowledge we have must come from our senses and experience. It seems that there is no other way for us to obtain any information. As Locke pointed out in Book I, innate ideas are impossible since not everybody agrees on a single thing, so therefore there is no other way for us to obtain knowledge except through senses.

Locke: Innate Knowledge

In book 1, Locke attacks the theory of innate knowledge. He begins by criticizing the possibility of innate theoretical principles by basically saying that if there are any innate principles, then everyone would accept them. There are no principles that everybody accepts, therefore there are no innate principles. He later addresses the possibility of innate moral knowledge. He uses the same logical argument here, that there is no moral code agreed on by ever human, therefore there cannot be innate moral knowledge. He uses several examples to support his claim that innate knowledge is not possible. His strongest argument is his use of children for an example, saying that anything they know or any ideas they have come directly from things they have experienced. I think Locke is much more realistic than Descartes was. His arguments use more logic rather than relying on "God's power". Locke has claims with more reasonable backup and better conclusions than Descartes. I agree with Locke that innate knowledge is impossible and in order for it to be true, every person would have to have some moral code written to their brains or at least have one thing that everybody in the world agrees on, which clearly is not the case.

Discourse 5- Rationality

In part 5 of Discourse, D says that a majority of our biological processes can be explained by science, but our rationality cannot be explained by science. He says that since it cannot be explained, it must be a gift from God. He goes on to say that animals do not have intelligence and that animals do not use language to express themselves. I definitely disagree with D on this point. Given, in his defense, he wrote the Discourse years before any studies about animal behavior and language were done, but it has been prove many times that animals have their own language and use rationality for problem solving.

Meditations 4- Human Error

In part 4 of Meditations, D discusses the source of human error. He says that error depends on both intellect and the will. He says that intellect cannot be the source of error since it only allows us to perceive ideas, not make judgements on them. He says that the only property we have that is infinite and perfect is our will, everything else like our intellect, imagination, memory, etc is flawed. Since our will is perfect, it also cannot be the source of error. He decides that error occurs because the will is infinite and intellect is not, meaning that we judge things because of our will, but we do not fully understand the things we judge. I think this is one of D's better arguments, but I still do not agree with it. D seems to just aim at defending God's existence with every argument. I do understand his point about our intellect is true, it is limited and we can never know everything there is to know, but there is no way to prove that our will is infinite.