In regards to human reason and its predestined “peculiar fate,” Kant attempts to illustrate the difficulty human reason encounters in order to achieve true understanding. In contrast, to the dogmatic perspective which promotes the idea that humans have the capacity to acquire knowledge of worldly things, including understanding of things of which do not provide immediate impressions e.g. God, by pure reason alone. Instead, Kant claims there are principles to which human reason must oblige to, must exercise, and are not provided through experience, in order to achieve knowledge. Thus, on a mission to achieve knowledge, human reason remains on an ever constant climb up steep rugged mountainous terrains, to which it guides itself by those principles mentioned above. On this treacherous climb, reason encounters new obstacles in the form of new questions, questions it is unable to answer, because the answers lay beyond the capacities of experience. Thus, reason has no alternative but to resort to unsubstantiated principles that extend beyond our experience, and leads reason to errors, of which it is unable to recognize. Thus, reason becomes stagnant, disorientated, and at variance with it self: metaphysics. (para. Critique of Pure Reason: Preface to the First Edition, 1781).
I believe what can be deduced from what I have paraphrased above, is that the true basis for knowledge is not just about the actual acquirement of knowledge. Also, and just as important is the role determination plays in order to work through difficulties, not rely solely on other peoples inferences, and most importantly refrain ourselves from letting other people influence our way of thinking.
In regards to human reason and its predestined “peculiar fate,” Kant attempts to illustrate the difficulty human reason encounters in order to achieve true understanding. In contrast, to the dogmatic perspective which promotes the idea that humans have the capacity to acquire knowledge of worldly things, including understanding of things of which do not provide immediate impressions e.g. God, by pure reason alone. Instead, Kant claims there are principles to which human reason must oblige to, must exercise, and are not provided through experience, in order to achieve knowledge. Thus, on a mission to achieve knowledge, human reason remains on an ever constant climb up steep rugged mountainous terrains, to which it guides itself by those principles mentioned above. On this treacherous climb, reason encounters new obstacles in the form of new questions, questions it is unable to answer, because the answers lay beyond the capacities of experience. Thus, reason has no alternative but to resort to unsubstantiated principles that extend beyond our experience, and leads reason to errors, of which it is unable to recognize. Thus, reason becomes stagnant, disorientated, and at variance with it self: metaphysics. (para. Critique of Pure Reason: Preface to the First Edition, 1781).
ReplyDeleteI believe what can be deduced from what I have paraphrased above, is that the true basis for knowledge is not just about the actual acquirement of knowledge. Also, and just as important is the role determination plays in order to work through difficulties, not rely solely on other peoples inferences, and most importantly refrain ourselves from letting other people influence our way of thinking.