Kant vs Nietzsche

As with Kant I had always insisted one is not qualified to comment on Kant unless one had delved into his philosophy via his original works thoroughly.
I had not dig deep into Fichte’s and Schelling’s original works. Thus I would have to provide reservation when commenting on them.

I noted Ficthe’s central view on Kant is this;

If this is what Ficthe meant, then he has misunderstood Kant re thing-in-itself.
Kant never considered the thing-in-itself as mind-independent, external ‘cause’ of sensation. He has no way of inferring that. Kant starts from outer world of experience, the human condition [Copernican Revolution] and link them interdependently to the assumed thing-in-itself.

At present, I do not have Schelling’s views within my grasp, thus will have to refresh and research further to give any credible views on him. However I don’t think I will divert resources to it unless someone show something very convincing from Schelling.

prismatic, regardless of whether the thing in itself is dependent or independent of human thoughts , it is closed. The distinction becomes totally irrelevant. the main thing is, that it is closed system, and it’s closure is not attributable to what source the closure is to be accounted to. Predecessor philosophers may, also,have views on this, which do or do not relate to such an idea, but even within this view, such preceding views, and the degree to which, they may have been inffluential on Kant is immaterial.

In this case I do not want to venture to say it is ‘closed’ or ‘open’ as that lead to an infinite regress, i.e. 'what is behind the ‘closed.’

As one of the many uses, Kant justified the idea of the Noumenom [thing-in-itself] rationally to deal with the infinite regress on Negative basis and, thus thwart and give no room for theists to jump in and insist on a real first cause. For Kant, to insist on a positively real first cause is illusory.

This is fast becoming pointless if you going yell strawman every time.

To restate, my basic problem with the CI is that Kant doesn’t present an actual argument for it. It pretty much all follows from definition. “A moral law is a law, and therefore needs to be universal and derived from reason only, etc…” If you don’t buy into his metaphysical jumbling with mere definitions of words, there is no reason to accept any of it. Why use the CI, and not - to give but one example - Nietzsche’s twist on it in the eternal recurrence?

As for practical concerns for why the CI doesn’t work, or at least is of no real use, I think the Artful Pauper did a pretty good job. The CI just doesn’t say alot. If you come up with some maxim (like killing is not permissible), you immediately need to amend it with a host of exception for it to have any use in the real world. The real content comes from experience with real world situations. And it’s not like we can’t come up with some general principle without using the CI.

So in the end I’m stuck with the same question and no real answer : why the CI?

So your argument is that there is something like social criticism, and it’s nihilistic… and therefor philosophy cannot be that. You argue like Kant from definition.

You know, the root of Nihilism, is not some criticism on the societal system, but the allready present lack of belief in the societal promoted values… because the values end up being hollow. God is dead because people killed him. The philosopher, or societal critic if you really will, merely reports that God is in fact dead. He’s the doctor diagnosing society. To find a cure, it doesn’t suffice to desparately try to stitch together the deceased corpse and hope that it will magically come back to live, like Kant does. You need to dispose of it alltogether, to create space for something new…

As a side note, no the human rights don’t really work, there is contradiction abound… and one doesn’t have the power to enforced the rights that are given in the declarations.

Double post.

It is not my “Argument”, it is an historical fact.

No. Therfore nihilistic philosophy can not be an entire philosophy and has to remain something like criticism, skepticism … and so on. I am not complainin about this much but referring to the topic of this thread and saying that philosophy is the better means than criticism, skepticism … and so on, but if we do not have any other possibility, then we have to accept it.

Really?

I hope you are not referring to Nietzsche, because: long before Nietzsche was born there was alraedy nihilism. Nihilism began in the end of the 18th century or the beginning of the 19th century, thus, let’s say, nihilism began about 1800.

Who is “the doctor diagnosing society”? I think, you are again referring to social criticism, aren’t you? A social critic or a nihilist nihilistic philosopher is not the better philosopher (and this is the question of this thread) but merely the better cocial critic or nihilistic philosopher. It’s simple. You only have to refer to the topic of this thread.

No. I do not need to, but I can “dispose of it alltogether, to create space for something new”. If all current humans would “create space for something new”, then there were perhaps already no humans anymore. :wink:

So, in that point, you agree with me. That’s fine.

You are leaving out the reëvaluation part, i never said a philosopher should only criticize, but it will be an important part of it. There is the sceptic deflationary part and also the constructive positing of his own values. You (the philosopher, not you specifically!) cannot build on unsolid ground to good result. The philosopher is the doctor diagnosing… and looking for a cure.

The god is dead reference is ofcourse a reference to Nietzsche… and i don’t see the problem as he didn’t say he died at that exact moment, he was allready dead (for a while), people just hadn’t got the memo yet.

No. I am not “leaving out the reëvaluation part”. Please read ort reread my posts.

Yes, unfortunately, because it is too much criticism. The more criticicsm or nihilism the less philosophy you have. You have to accept the historical facts. You can not have both non-philosophy and philosophy.

No one of those skepticists has ever achieved and will never achieve such a huge influence that Kant has achieved. And that belongs to the answer of the question in the topic of this thread. I remind you again: please refer to the topic. This little philosophers you mean are dwarfs in comparison to Kant.

Nietzsche said that - and I like it very much -, but that does not mean that it is always (for ever, ad infinitum) right. It depends on the time and space humans live in.

They had got the memo. An example: In the 1790’s Johann Gottlieb Fichte was accused of atheism. And because of this Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi used also the word „Nihilismus“ („nihilism“) in his „Sendschreiben an Fichte“ (1799). I know for a fact that at least since then the God-is-dead-philosophem has been knowing and keeping in mind. Later, Nietzsche just repeated it, but he did it with much language violence, because he was powerfully eloquent.

I don’t agree with your characterisation of non-philosophy and philosophy. Criticism is intrinsically tied into philosophy, it’s not non-philosophy. I don’t think you can get good philosophy without it. If it were that simple you could just build whatever arbitrary thing and call it philosophy.

Influence isn’t the only, or even the most important, criterium for a good philosopher. A good philosopher has both aspects, he reëvaluates which implies a certain scepsis and a creative act.

And some got the memo, but most didn’t. Kant for example didn’t really get the memo, nor did the whole tradition that followed him. And if they did get the memo, they certainly didn’t fully realise all the ramification of it. Nietzsche was the first to do that… to do philosophy without metaphysics.

That was not a “characterisation” but a statement that you can not have both non-philosophy and philosophy. That is logical, even tautolgical: A non-philosophy can not also be a philosophy. That is impossible. Either “It rains” or “it does not rain” - both is not possible.

Philosophy contains logic, Diekon. Is ILP a philosophy forum or not?

I did not say that criticism has nothing to do with philosophy, but I said: if criticism is merely nihilism or turns its fury on philosophy, then it is not a part of philosophy anymore.

Have you really read my posts?

Again: I did not say that criticism has nothing to do with philosophy, but I said: if criticism is merely nihilism or turns its fury on philosophy, then it is not a part of philosophy anymore. Modern criticisms are often advertised as philosophy, although most of them are obviously not philosophy. That is the problem. We do not have too much philosophy - we have too little philosophy. That’s why I joined ILP, b.t.w… :sunglasses:

Did I say that a philosopher has nothing to do with reevaluation or skepsis? No. I did not.

Be honest: you do not want Kant to be the greatest philosopher. Not your or anybody else’s “opinion” but the history itself decides about the greatness of a philosopher. You do not accept historical facts. That’s all.

Some are enough. There have always been merely some with an interest in getting a memo. Most have always been not interested in philosophy. So why should they have got the memo? It’s just irrelevant.

That is not true.

That is also not true. I think you do not know much about Kant and Kantians, Neo-Kantians, Neo-Neo-Kantians.

And already about 20 years after his death metaphysics returned (was it because of the eternal recurrence? :wink: ).

Yeah some never seem to get the memo… I’m done here.

Yes and no. Yes, that goes for all of us: I want Nietzsche to be the greatest philosopher, and you want Kant to be the greatest philosopher. But because Nietzsche would, in sharp contrast with Kant, actually affirm this, he is the greatest philosopher.

Even if there were such a thing as a fact, that depends on what you mean by “greatness”. You seem to mean “influence”. I therefore give you an excerpt of an old post of mine:

No, it was not eternal recurrence, nor even historical recurrence; it was merely a shadow of the dead God (compare section 108 of The Gay Science).

It’s good that you brought this up Sauwelios, because i hadn’t really thought about it much further when i wrote my response. I kinda just assumed what i wrote.

Thinking about it some more, maybe a useful way to look at it is throught concepts used in poker. Playing a hand of poker you need to evaluate at every stage whether or not you want to put your money in. It’s an evaluation you make based on a calculation of odds and incomplete information. A good decision, is a decision that gives you positive expected value at the time you needed to make the desicion. But because it’s a game of odds and incomplete information, you can allways loose the hand even if you made a good decision. You loosing the hand, doesn’t make the decision bad retrospectively, because at the time you didn’t have that information. If you’d base your future decisions on what the results happened to be, you are going to start to loose a lot more. Results-oriented thinking is a big no no in poker.

Tying it back to philosophy and value… I guess in the evaluation of a work of philosophy, i’m going to filter out what an author could actually do to at the time of writing. Quality of arguments, method, technique, originality of ideas, knowledge of the subject given the times, style,… all these things matter. And what influence it had only is an indicator insofar there are people reading it that know something about philosophy. Ultimatly chance plays a large part in what makes something influencial or not. Because it’s something you don’t have much control over as an author(it’s not a solid value), i don’t think one should put to much value on it.

Nietzsche is i think the better philosopher simply because his works are a lot better in a lot of these aspects.

Isn’t that a fair request?

Did any other philosophers provide an actual argument for their moral/ethical system?
What Kant did was he provided sound and reasonable justifications from various angles to support his moral/ethical system with the CI therein.

This is what I meant, another straw man again because you have not a thorough knowledge of how Kant moral/ethical system works.
I have stated many times, Kant moral/ethical system comprised theory and its use in the real world. So why is the complain about adapting the CI to the real world.

I have already given a lot of draft examples on how Kant moral/ethical system works but you did not seem to understand nor did not read them.

Note, earlier I listed this draft process of how the Kantian system would work, i.e.
viewtopic.php?p=2530896#p2530896

A. The Categorical Imperative
Formulation (1) “Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law without contradiction.”
Formulation (2) - (5) to note.

B. The Maxims/Laws/Rules to be acted upon
(1) …
(11) Others …
Note this section can be quite complex and need further deliberations to refine and simplify within a system, otherwise it is impossible to deal with the full details within the infinite diversified empirical world.

C. Check to ensure all your Maxims in B comply with A.
D. Implement and apply the Maxims, Laws and Rules in the actual world
E. Measure gap/variance between C and D
F. Introduce strategies to close the gap in E
G. Review to maintain overall system from A-F

Do you have any issue with the above?

When we set the general maxim, ‘killing is not permissible,’ it is in alignment with A, the CI [note 5 of them].
Based on an iterative control loop form A-F, it will be natural to adapt it [without changing the original obligatory maxim] to the varied real world.
I don’t see anything wrong with that.
The CI and Maxim are very useful as benchmarks in telling us that we need further constant improvements within the real world as situation changes.

Note the zero defect example I gave earlier.

I have given you the reason for the CI, i.e. it is an ideal benchmark for humanity to strive towards. Of course the ideal is not expected to be achieved at all times, but such a benchmark is a ‘push factor’ to enable continuous improvement at every optimal point.

The other reason why the CI is necessary because the CI as a guide is based on reason which is more preferable than any thing that is based primarily on emotions and subjective feelings, e.g. utilitarianism and consequentialism ethical system.
For any actions, there must be a good “reason.” However in general a ‘good’ reason influenced by psychological feelings in not good enough. As such we have to rely on the best or highest possible reason, i.e. pure reason.

Note the other formulations of the CI assume all normal human beings within the ethical community [Kingdom of Ends] are perfect individuals who collectively formulate the necessary Law, rules and maxim acting on the basis of absolute freewill. Btw, I am not interested to discuss these more complicated elements till you are really familiar and understand [not necessary agree] them.

Prismatic, when will you reply to The Artful Pauper’s last reply to you, in which I think he raised all the pertinent questions begged by your last reply to me?

Which one?

This one: http://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtopic.php?p=2530257#p2530257

Yes some other philosophers did provide actual arguments. A lot of Nietzsche deals precisely with that question, with the value of morality.

You say Kant provides sound and reasonable justifications for his moral/ethical system… maybe he has for some other parts of his system, but i don’t think he has one for the CI, which is of key importance i’d think becaue it’s where he starts and how he determines the basic moral laws. I doubt his moral system still works if you don’t accept the CI.

He kinda just deduces it from the definition of a moral law. That is only a tautology, not a justification.

Yeah, i mean i have an issue with the CI, and i don’t think i can follow him further if i don’t accept that. I think if we were to determine moral laws, we shouldn’t start with the CI. They should reflect from the start at least some of our inner and outer experiences… e.g. we come up with moral laws like killing is wrong, because killing harms people and it has been shown to lead to more violence, and we want to do something to prevent that.

But emotions and feelings are the core of humans valuing things. I don’t think you can just cut them out. Reason by itself is empty, and doesn’t tell us much on it’s own (I probably disagree with Kant’s metaphysics here)… don’t you think it’s strange to start from there?

[size=110]No, only no.[/size]

No. I do not want Kant to be the greatest philosopher, but history has proved that Kant is the greatest philosopher. I only repeat what history has decided.

That’s no argument. :laughing:

Like I said: you and all the other Nietzschean(ist)s want Nietzsche (the little mouse) to be the greatest philosopher (the greatest elephant), and that is also a good joke. :laughing:

When I joned ILP, my sympathy with Nietzsche was about 70%; now it is about 40%. That’s the merit of the ILP Nietzscheanists (extreme Nietzscheans). Thank you very much! =D>

Are you a Nietzschean(ist)?

(1) Yes, I am a Nietzschean.
(2) Yes, I am even a Nietzscheanist (extreme Nietzschean).
(3) No.
(4) No, and I hate Nietzscheanists.
(5) No, and I hate both Nietzscheanists and Nietzscheans.
(6) No, and I hate Nietzscheanists, Nietzscheans, and Nietzsche.
(7) I do not know.
(8) I do even not know who Nietzsche is.

You, Sauwelios, are a Nietzschean (=> 1) or even a Nietzscheanist (=> 2).

It’s your funeral! But the question in the op of this thread is not “Who is the greater sympathiser?” but “Who is the greatest philosopher?”. I am not a Kantian; I am an historian, in this case: an historian of philosophy.

So you are prejudiced, biased.

I am not a Kantian, and I am not a Nietzschean (because of the Nietzscheanists - again: thank you very much).


[size=150]“Who …?”[/size]