3 Hegel on Kantian Theory of Knowledge

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S L I D E S 5 0 - 5 3

Insert into 3: Kants Theory of

Morality1


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Issues in moral theory2

1) phenomenology of moral duty

Separating duty from desire (for happiness)

2) How do we know what is our duty?

Formulations of the Categorical Imperative 3) relation of duty and happiness: the Highest Good

4) realizability of the Highest Good: antinomy ofpractical reason

Leads to discussion of the postulates of morality

5) what is the source of the power of moralconsciousness?


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Is there a 3rd possibility?

We are all faced throughout our lives with agonizingdecisions, moral choices. Some are on a grand scale.Most of these choices are on a lesser scale. But we defineourselves by the choices we have made. We are in fact thesum total of our choices. Events unfold so unpredictably,

so unfairly. Human happiness does not seem to havebeen included in the design of creation. It is only we withour capacity to love that give meaning to the indifferentuniverse. And yet most human beings seem to have theability to keep trying, and even to find joy from simple

things, like their family, their work, and from the hopethat future generations might understand more. Louis Levi in Woody Allens Crimes and Misdemeanors

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The universe is a pretty cold place

1) The universe follows laws of science that areindifferent to human welfare:

the universe is a pretty cold place. Its we who invest

it with our feelings. 2) It is up to us to make the best of our lives by giving

and seeking love; by trying to make the world abetter place, in the hope that future generations will

benefit from our choices.

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Q1: How does he know that the universe is a coldplace, indifferent to human welfare and justice?

A: the laws of science

Q: If the laws of science apply to the universe, how isit possible to make choices in our lives?

A: We must believe we are free to make importantchoices

Q2: But to have such a belief dont we have tosuppose that deterministic science does not give usthe ultimate answer regarding the nature of reality? Kant: appearance and reality

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Q3: If we can postulate freedom, why not postulate afriendlier universe? (Kants postulates: Freedom, God and Immortality)

Q4: If we project our feelings on to the universe, perhapswe are projecting the values of a cold, indifferent socialorder, based on Me-firstism, onto the universe? (Kant: we create a cold world by choosing to act on the principle of

individual self-interest)

Q5: Compare the beauty of a forest with the bleakness ofa strip mall: which is cold, indifferent? Kant: Beauty is the symbol of morality.

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4 Hegels Critique of Kants

Theory of Knowledge7


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Kants reversal of Plato

Plato: sensible experience gives us opinions, whilereason leads us beyond the illusions of sensibility toultimate truths

Kant: scientific knowledge gives us appearances, notreality. It is (such) knowledge that traps us in thecave of illusion. Morally based belief leads us topossible truth

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Dissatisfaction with Kant

Post-Kantians are dissatisfied with this argument thatphilosophical truth should be founded on mere belief.

Isnt there a kind of higher order knowledge in Kantspicture?

1) We know that there is a Reality, a Thing-in-itself. Kanthimself says this.

2) Kant gives us a kind of moral certainty that appealsto the experience of duty. Isnt this a kind of knowing?

3) Doesnt the 1st person perspective of practical reasonrely on some kind of knowing? At least we know what weare trying to do, the principles we are acting on, etc.

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Fichtes I and not-I

Fichte attempted to extend Kants transcendentalmethod of argumenation

What are the underlying grounds of our experience?

-> what must the thing in itself be like for ourexperience to have the characteristics it has?

E.g., reality must be capable of resisting our efforts to imposeour ideas and whims.

There is a not-I which is the other side of the coin of I. Hence there is no unknowable thing in itself:

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Schelling: Knowledge and Intuition

Fichte reduces everything to being forms ofknowledge

But reality is an infinity that transcends the limited

nature of our subjective forms of knowing These forms divide reality into separate objects, but

reality is a unity

Through intuitionwe have direct knowledge of this

fundamental unity of reality

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Hegel: night in which all cows are black

But what do we really know with such intuition ofunity? It is a night in which all cows are black.

To have real knowledge we need to make distinctionsin the unity.

Reality is like an organism, with living parts relatedto one another.

The standard empirical sciences, based on analyticalunderstanding, do indeed divide reality in ways thatdistort this organic unity.

Therefore we need another form of scientificknowledge: dialectical reason

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We can know the thing in itself

Hegel: The Thing-in-itself (and under thing isembraced even Mind and God) expresses the object

when we leave out of sight all that consciousnessmakes of it, all its emotional aspects, and all specific

thoughts of it. It is easy to see what is leftutterabstraction, total emptiness, only described still asan other-worldthe negative of every image,feeling, and definite thought. Hence one can only

read with surprise the perpetual remark that we donot know the Thing-in-itself. On the contrary there isnothing we can know so easily.

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Paying attention to concepts

Hegel here examines the thing-in-itself as aconcept having a certain meaning.

Kant draws our attention to the importance ofconcepts in the knowing process

But he limits his position to the question: are theysubjective or objective, a priori or empiricallyacquired?

It is a major step forward beyond empiricism to drawattention to the role of concepts in our knowing Empiricism: we can know reality directly, without any

conceptual or theoretical framework

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Kants vicious circle

Hegel to Kant: but how do we know the meaning of ourconcepts themselves?

Kant: all knowing is mediated by concepts, and so we donot know thing-in-itself, but only the thing-as-known-through-concepts

Hegel: This is a major step beyond ordinary empiricism. But can we apply this perspective to knowledge of the concepts

themselves?

Kants position leads to a vicious circle: We only know concepts through concepts, only as mediated by

(other) concepts; and so we cannot know the concepts as they are in themselves but

only as they appear to us

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How does Kant know the a priori concepts?

Kant takes the concepts of metaphysics fromAristotle, and later logicians

He argues that they are a priori subjective forms of

experiencing, not features of the objective worldwhich we know through generalization

But either our knowledge of concepts is mediated byother concepts -> circularity

Or we know our concepts through generalizationfrom experience

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Kant falls back to empiricism

But then we are back to Humes empiricism We know our concepts by generalizing through limited

experience How do we know that all people (humans) experience the

world through these concepts? (universality) How do we know that such concepts are necessary forms

of experience? (necessity) Kant claims to ground the universality and necessity of

science on the universality and necessity of our a priori

categories But all he can establish is that some people (perhaps just

himself) sometimes experience reality in time and space,as objects with properties, etc.

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We ought--reasons Kant, according to Hegel--tobecome acquainted with the instrument, before weundertake the work for which it is to be employed;for if the instrument be insufficient, all our trouble

will be spent in vain. The plausibility of thissuggestion has won for it general assent andadmiration; the result of which has been to withdraw

cognition from an interest in its objects andabsorption in the study of them, and to direct it backupon itself; and so turn it to a question of form.

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Unless we wish to be deceived by words, it is easy tosee what this amounts to. In the case of otherinstruments, we can try and criticise them in other

ways than by setting about the special work for

which they are destined. But the examination ofknowledge can only be carried out by an act ofknowledge. To examine this so-called instrument isthe same thing as to know it. But to seek to know

before we know is as absurd as the wise resolution ofScholasticus, not to venture into the water until hehad learned to swim.

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Where to begin?

We cannot know before we know Kant admits that we at least know our concepts, if not

reality in itself So he too supposes knowledge

But his theory that all knowledge rests on a prioriconcepts leads to a vicious circle Therefore we must enter the stream of knowledge by first

getting our feet wet We should begin with knowing something thats easy to

know Whatever it is in itself (e.g., appearance or reality) we

at least knowthis sensible object here and now

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3 Hegel on Kantian Theory of Knowledge