quantum, I think you’re having a meltdown here. This is a wonderful site, it may not be as populated as others which seems to bother you, but shit man, this site hasn’t banned me, and all the others have, I have a lot of respect for this site and its mods, posters are bright people. You have it pretty good quantum. Maybe his account was hacked…
This site won’t ban
If there is no Western philosopher greater than Kant, then there is no philosopher greater than Kant.
Now I would like add that I do not be,I’ve in A Philosophy, therefore can not hold out to the idea of A Philosopher, greater than. let me explain.
People like me holding out to ideals, have been pretty much relegated to archaic and useless dust bins,mind labeled as dated, hopeless or worse, useless. Since I do consider Leibnitz to be able to solve this problem mathematically, vis, to re integrate the products of many differentially laden products of thought, I see no reason not to answer the problem in terms of positivist ic terms. what does it mean to say one man or one idea is greater than another? what model of excellence does one compare other men’s ideas to effect a sensible conclusion? I would hazard, modeling has been deconstructed into the last holdouts of ideal recurrance, the world of dreams, of subconscious psychic content, repressed, into the annals of the lost, as Beckett would say, or, create an ideal delusion, purposefully sustained in a epoche of aesthetic insistence. but such eros he has lost it’s ground, when Andre Breton’s Comminist Manifesto suffered a gradual decline, notwhitstanding Sartre’s disillusionment with it. But there are those hard dies who are unwilling to give up a model, even at the most Unimaginable cost, basing their rationale on the need to be truthful to one’s self. This does not invalidate Kan’t Critique, it only enables it as a medium through which necessary social processes can be understood generally, as tools of thought.
Philosophers are rated on their level of their importance as regarded by their level of relevance and adaptibility. Given these kinds of criteria, one could say, they are all important, as their thoughts
are interdependent.
Perhaps Leibniz war greater than Kant … (!) … (?) …(!).
The point is we have not exhausted all philosophers from the East and elsewhere, where there could be [?] philosophers greater than Kant. Thus this OP has to set a limit, i.e. to Western Philosophers.
IMO, Buddha’s philosopher is comparable to Kant but I think Kant is more intellectual and systematic however is without much practical aspects. The Buddha’s philosophy comprised aspects for actual practice and rewiring of one’s brain for it.
Leibniz was more famous for mathematics rather than philosophy [on Monads].
Kant was born [1724] after Leibniz’s death [1716].
Kant demonstrated the shortfalls of Leibniz’s Monad and his ‘identity of indiscernible’.
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) was an universal genius; he was a philosopher, the originator of the monadology and of the pre-established harmony, he was a scientist, especially a mathematician, the originator of the infinitesimal calculus (1665, published 1684), a physicist, and a historician, he was a technician, he was the builder of the first mechanical calculator, a machine of multiplication, he was a diplomat and a political consultant.
Okay, Leibniz lived from 1646 to 1716 and Kant from 1724 to 1804 - so according to that birth-and-death dates they are not as much comparable as they are according to other facts, So Leibniz was much more a scientist (mathematician, physicist, historcian) and technician than Kant, because Leibniz was an universal genius and one of the greatest scientists and technicians ever, whereas Kant was merely an average scientist and even no technician - and that does not necessarily or even automatically mean that Kant was a greater philosopher than Leibniz.
But perhaps you are right by saying that Kant was the greatest Western philosopher.
And what about Hegel?
I mentioned and compared Hegel earlier.
Hegel was supposedly one of those neo-Kantian. Hegel is a very great philosopher but imo, not greater than Kant where it matters, i.e. on the ultimate issues that carry the heavier weights.
Kant warned in the Critique of Pure Reason and I think Hegel may have missed or forgotten about this warning and other similar ones;
Hegel was seduced by the above illusion and clung to it as the Absolute. Hegel’s absolute is similar to that of the pantheist and the Hindu Brahman which Buddha and Kant demonstrated and proved as illusory.
If Hegel’s philosophy is leveraged on such an illusion, the rest that follow are compromised.
I would say i agree with the above, very simply, Hegel tried to free the world from the material manifestations hindering the spiritual rebirth which he was hoping to heral in. Kant closed metaphysics, while Hegel opened it. Kant took note of Hume’s doubt, and incorporated it(here goes that word again), and he used the synthesis as an incoporation, meaning placing the corpus within the idea, hoping for the synthesis. Hegel excluded everything but theworld of the spirit, the spirit of man imbued wihin his reason. I think Kant was much more indebted to Leibnitz, than Hegel, Leibnitz mathematics liberated him to a certain extent from the critique, inasmuch as the difference between logic and reason was much more indiscernible in Kant then in Hegel. Nietzche, after all, rebelled against Hegel, and the result of that rebellion was Nihilism, and Dialectical Materialism.
Capitalistic empiricism ‘borrows’ from both, nihilizing-deconstructin Hegel’s ideal model, while at the same time, disassociating any relationship between that and it’s substance. Basically, Leibnitz is the winnder here, since he has seemd to superceede this conflict of ideas, and i think he has been grossly misunderstood, underrated by such cliches as : ‘this is the best of all possible worlds’. It is usual to see misinterpretation of German philosophy, the very same thing can be said of Nietzche, and the misapplicationand misunderstanding of his ideas.
However the basic development, the structural succession of one philosopher into the other, i do not believe, is as distintice as we are led to believe, on the contrary, there is more inter relation between the different approaces, even when there may not be direct evidence of one philosopher having exclusive and obvious effect on the other. Indirect effect, in philosophy is inavoidable, even in cases where there is no evidence of much inffluence of one on another thought. The hidden perimeters of thought, those which drive the exposed ones, are perhaps much more dynamic and powerful. What we do not see in thought may be by far more important then those with which we occupy our minds in everyday concerns of practical philosophy.
I am not trying to attack the notion that Kant maybe the most important Western philosopher, he may very well be, but to advocate such a thing, we must dismiss Plato, Descates, Leibnitz, and other indispensible figures of thought. I do not think this is
possible.
Kant imo is the greatest Western Philosopher, but at the same time he was stepping on the giant shoulders of Socrates, Plato, Descartes, Aristotle and others. Leibniz was a great Mathematician and in other areas but I cannot see anything super with his ideas of the Monads and identity of the discernible.
As for Kant being greater than Plato, Socrates, Aristotle and other Greek philosophy, Kant had the advantage of appearing 1500++ years later and thus improved upon their philosophical thoughts which before Kant was going in parallel lines.
Why Kant was great was his ability to converge the parallel lines and systematize all the previous philosophical thoughts on the critical issues and put them within a very Organized Framework which imo [90% confidence] has not much room for future philosophers to improve on. It is just like the Scientific Framework and Scientific Method which we do not foresee significant changes at least for a long time.
We are not dismissing the ideas of all other philosophers. What Kant had contributed critically was his Framework [Critical Philosophy], and his specific & the various philosophical thoughts of philosophical giants and others will be aligned within the framework where they belong. Where they don’t fit we still have to justify [philosophically] why.
To Prismatic,
A bit off topic from your previous entries, but do you agree with Kant that space/time is an aspect of our minds? In other words, that it’s not something that exists independently of minds?
Yes, from the perspective of Kant’s Copernican Revolution, space & time are interdependent with the human conditions.
This is not to say that time & space are invented and created by the mind.
Time and Space cannot be absolutely independent of minds in the ontological sense.
If he was famous, he wasn’t the greatest philosopher.
Does it matter if, say, Merleu Ponty’s philosophy holds up better with modern science? Is best the one who allowed for the most debate and opened up the most avenues of inquiry or is best the one who is or seems to be the most correct? What are the criteria for greatness? Well organized, clearly presented thought that really has just lead to debate but not necessarily useful conclusions vs. less well organized ideas that led to useful conclusions? Is it a creative activity primarily one evaluated on internal coherence? One evaluated in some other way?
It is very true, Kant was a grat thinker, however nowedays, who takes him at faxe value? Maybe Chomsky, but he himself is an apologist. Let’s face it, Kant’s only objective success was a rationalized version of the Godlen Rule. His synthetic a-priori suffwred the same logical fate as Hegel’s ultra rationalism, synthesis is not possible. Can an ball be red and green all over? The reduction leads to a semantic difficulty of trying to determine th use of ‘all over’. By trying to connect Descrtes’s doubt with
the great pursuasive power of empirical knowledge, he did not deny the existence of inherent knowledge, he categorically removed it from the realm of the new, coming science. In fact, he resurrected dualism in a new form.
Again, for neo-Kantians, it works like a charm, because it implies hidden meanings related to historicity and evolutionary successin of ideas. This presupposes the inviolability of conceptual truths.
The modern world for these die hards isbased on aesthetic idelas of immutable perfection of forms, and resurrects an equally inviolate Platonic scheme of
evolutionary suceeding formal reach toward perfection. Perfection ad summum possesses axiomatic self referencial attributes toward the Summum, God Himself, and the guarantee of this is based on belief in the ultra self refereintoal ideal unto Himself. It implies total reflexibility ofm self.
That God was thus estranged from Himself, succeeds in Nietzche.
The final arbitermismof coursem the will to believe on the neccesity to sustain ideal forms of apprehending perfection, and this is based on an either or logical proposition: , the question becoming, how did thesemforms arise, ifnotmoutof the nether world ofmthe huan experience? He could not possibly have risen itthroughn himself, butonly through a self higher then Him, through an apothesis of himself to an ideal perfection of himself , in His Image. This was the origin of the self conception of the image, following Narcissus’ hallucionatory self image, which caused his punishment.
I do believe Kant is very great to sustain this aesthetic tension, but others dealt with it more formadibly, and anywone post Decartes would try it. Among the existentialists, Heidegger, Husserl, were the forerunners in metaphysics, and Nietzche and Kierkegaard and Sartre putting a more lyrical interpretation on it.
At present Kant is still a popular philosopher but not many would rate him the greatest Western philosopher.
It is my personal opinion after putting A LOT of time reading Kant extensively and comparing him with other great Western philosophers [with sufficient knowledge of many] that I arrived at the view that Kant is the Greatest Western philosopher.
However I cannot be very certain of my view, that is the reason for the OP.
However, so far all the other proposals made here are not greater than Kant from my perspective and based on the extensive criteria I envisaged. I hope there will be more proposals supported with justified reasons why there are other Western philosophers greater than Kant within a set of criteria.
As I had mentioned, why Kant is the greatest is due to his Architectonic Framework to provide structure and represent the full spectrum of reality. Kant admitted he is more interested presenting the framework [in addition to some relevant principles and theories], i.e. the substance than focusing on the detailed forms.
The detailed forms are too diversified and extensive to be dealt by one person and thus require specialists in various fields to attach ‘chunks of meat’ to the ‘bone’ structure of framework.
The details are subsequently filled in by specialists on the form with the likes of Hegel [History], Heidegger, Husserl, Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Sartre, Foucault, Derrida, other postmodernists, other analytical philosophers plus support from other advance knowledge, e.g, neuroscience, cognitive science and others.
Any other W philosopher greater than Kant?
If there are others to knock off Kant from that pedestal I raised for Kant, it is still a win-win as I will have the opportunity seek for more knowledge from other greater philosophers.
So far, there don’t seem to be any candidate to replace Kant [IMO].
I wrote this earlier
I have not produced a list of criteria [yet] but implicitly it would have included the following with certain weightages for specific criteria;
- Revolutionary philosophical theories -justified and soundly proven
- Extensiveness and range of involvement in philosophical topics
- Completeness, efficiency, systematic, etc.
- Specialization, academic, [to vary weightage for these]
- Practically and contribution to humanity
- Extent of potential in time [less weight is only specific to an era]
- Use significantly in the modern era
- ?? Etc. [to list]
You can propose other critical and relevant criteria for consensus.
If you take Merleau Ponty, you can rate him within the above set of criteria and compare his total points against Kant.
If you trace Merleau Ponty’s Phenomenology to its roots, you will come to Kant’s overall structure and Phenomenology [Kant regarded as a pioneer in this field] is merely a twig in that structure.
Is there anything revolutionary about Ponty’s ideas of reference to the body? This is covered with Kant principle of his Copernican Revolution of directing attention to the human conditions rather than a physical external reality out there.
You can review all of Ponty’s ideas and I am certain it will fit into one of Kant’s proposed or already dealt with branches, twig or leaves of Kant’s total framework.
You can do the same for any other Western philosophers.
Gyahd, could you be more socialisticly brain washed.
[i]"Good == Whatever I think is kewl.
Evil == whatever I think is un-kewl.
Whatever I think == my current programming."[/i]
By the way:
Heinrich Heine compared Kant with the French revolution, Fichte with the Napoleonic empire, Schelling with the Restauration, but in Hegel he saw the philosophical king, the finisher of all philosophical revolutions, of all philosophy. - Compare: Heinrich Heine, Zur Geschichte der Religion und Philosophie in Deutschland (Religion and Philosophy in Germany), 1834, S. 33-34.
Right or wrong - it is an interesting comparison.