Kantian Sense Research Articles

The Necessary Illusion – Giannotti on Fetishism

The main aim of this article is to investigate the most fundamental meanings that José Arthur Giannotti attributes to the phenomenon of fetishism in Marx. His interpretation, as expounded in Certa herança marxista [Certain Marxist Heritage] and grounded in the concept of a necessary illusion in a predominantly Kantian sense, appears to challenge a fundamental aspect of the new readings that Uspian Philosophical Marxism, with Giannotti as a key figure, has advanced since the 1960s. These new readings have underscored the notion of real abstraction as the foundation of commodity fetishism in a predominantly Hegelian sense. The article aims to clarify that Giannotti's interpretation does not aim to replace one perspective with another but rather to integrate the initial insights of the critique of real abstraction with the illusory measurement practices inherent in the process of production and exchange of commodities.

The Kantian Notion of Categories and their Origin

The objective of the present work is to understand and elucidate Kant’s notion of category and how he derived the categories from a single transcendental principle. Kant did not put forward any definition of categories. He believed that categories cannot be defined without perpetrating a circle. Thus, he began his discourse with certain features of categories in his work Critique of Pure Reason. We have discussed the characteristic features of Kantian categories. An important point to be noted here is that the categories, in the fullest Kantian sense of the term, must have a distinct property, namely that it should necessarily be applicable to all objects of knowledge. However, we are not concerned with the necessary applicability of concept to all objects of knowledge here in this paper. The analysis about the Kantian notion of categories, more importantly, necessitates a discussion about how he derived them from a single transcendental principle. Kant referred to the single principle which guides the search for the categories as “the clue to the discovery of the categories.” The specific and clear formulation of the principle which served as the transcendental clue to the discovery of the categories for Kant is that to every form of judgment there corresponds a pure and basic concept of the understanding. The forms of judgments and the categories both originate from the same source, namely, the function of the understanding, i.e., thinking. It may be noted here that the understanding is the power or faculty of knowing and thinking or judging is the function of understanding. Kant argued that the twelve logical forms of judgments provided the clue to the origin of twelve corresponding a priori concepts or categories. Two arguments provided by Kant in support of the principle serving as a transcendental clue to the discovery of the categories are analysed. An orthodox view held by some philosophers that for Kant the forms of judgment are forms of analytic judgment has been critically analyzed and is interpreted as erroneous. Keywords: category, judgment, understanding, categorematic, syncategorematic

What kind of «thing» is mental illness? Listening to Kraepelin, Jaspers and Kronfeld

Since its beginnings psychiatry controversely debated about the appropriate concept of illness, about nosology and the diagnostic terms and procedures based upon it. This paper discusses the approaches introduced by Emil Kraepelin (1856–1926), Karl Jaspers (1883–1969) and Arthur Kronfeld (1886–1941). Whereas Kraepelin postulated the existence of «natural entities» with regard to mental illness, Jaspers acknowledged the heuristic value of the term «disease entity», but declared it a «regulative idea» in a Kantian sense, i.e. an appropriate and useful, albeit never fully achievable aim. Kronfeld, in a way situated «between» Kraepelin and Jaspers, defended the notion of disease entities. However, he spoke clearly against primarily anchoring these entities in neighbouring scientific fields like neurobiology or social sciences. Psychiatry should stay (or become) «autological», in the first place using the psychological perspective. In full respect for neighbouring approaches as scientific fields in their own right, he rejected their premature transfer to mental phenomena as «heterological», i.e. as unduly narrowing down the scope of psychiatry. These issues, up to debate 100 years ago, still are of utmost relevance for psychiatry in the 21st century, a field struggling with its rather fragile scientific identity.

Infinity, Ideality, Transcendentality: The Idea in the Kantian Sense in Husserl and Derrida

ABSTRACT When Derrida translated and commented on Husserl’s manuscript The Origin of Geometry in 1962, he gave a central place to what Husserl called the Idea “in the Kantian sense”. This article reflects on the use and function of this Idea in Derrida’s reading of Husserl. It critically interrogates the relationship between the Idea in the Kantian sense and mathematical ideality, as well as the use of this Idea in the interpretation of the Thing (Ding) and the stream of experience (Erlebnisstrom). In the centre of the discussion stands what Derrida calls “pure thinking”, on which he tries to ground the Idea in the Kantian sense.

The Interpretation of Role Model and Its Contemporary Value Under Kant's Moral Education Thought

Kant's moral education ideology is an important component of his entire ideological system and a brilliant gem in the history of human educational thought. Kant's moral education philosophy is mainly reflected in stimulating the intrinsic moral motivation of the educated and cultivating their kind will, advocating for the construction of moral freedom and spiritual meaning based on the principle of formality and universality as the basis for their own will. However, the current moral education in schools is still fundamentally based on material practical principles such as utilitarianism, emotion, self love, and reputation, which leads to low efficiency and formalization of moral education practice. In this sense, moral education cannot truly cultivate the sense of responsibility and obligation of the educated, let alone generate a Kantian sense of moral respect and sublimity from the depths of their hearts. The author believes that universities can change the way learners think and enhance people's moral motivation through the role of role models in moral education. By playing a role model, laying the foundation for the construction of ideas, and then making free choices, true freedom can be achieved. This article analyzes the connotation and characteristics of exemplary education in Kant's educational philosophy based on current research experience and relevant academic literature, and further explains the role of exemplary education in Kant's moral education philosophy. Finally, combining the role of role models, this paper focuses on exploring the contemporary value of the concept of role models in Kant's moral education ideas, aiming to draw on the essence of Kant's role model education and promote the reform and innovation of moral education in Chinese universities.

Normativity, Autonomy, and Agency: A Critical Review of Three Essays on Agency in Nature, and a Modest Proposal for the Road Ahead

Has the renewal of interest in the ostensible agency of living beings signaled an advance from a merely heuristic Kantian sense of purposiveness to an unequivocally, empirically grounded research program or are there as yet hidden tensions or contradictions in, for example, the organizational autonomy approach to natural agency? Can normativity be found to be immanent in nature but only beginning with the living cell or must a thoroughgoing naturalism find the seeds of normativity immanent throughout abiotic as well as biotic nature? Beginning with a brief exposition of Kant´s influential treatment and recommendation for how to methodologically combine what he took to be the inevitable epistemological limit to explaining the origins of ostensible biotic purposefulness with the legitimate intentions of scientific research and explanation, this essay will critically engage with three recent essays that attempt to grapple with the preceding questions. Having putatively raised questions about the consistency and adequacy of each of the individual positions, the essay will attempt to move synthetically, drawing upon aspects of all three contributions, in the direction of a “cooperativity theoretic” approach to incipient natural normativity and agency.

Cooperation – Kantian-style

ABSTRACT Should you reduce your energy consumption? Tragically enough, it may be better for you, and for everyone involved, to refrain from doing so even if you care about the climate. Given this tragedy, why cooperate? This paper defends the view that not cooperating is morally problematic because it is not universalizable (in a Kantian sense). That is, I will argue that we have universalizability-based reasons to cooperate as long as we have a preference for ‘collective success’ (e.g. a sustainable planet). The problem is that defectors let others fix the problem for them, and in this way make an unfair exception of themselves. Moreover, even when selected agents might not share this preference, they still have to cooperate for the sake of others.

THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF MYSTERY IN RUDOLF OTTO’S METAPHYSICS

The interrogation of the sacred proposed by Rudolf Otto’s metaphysical theology is not so much an answerless question as it is a conceptual open invitation to becoming aware of the phenomenon of meeting sacrality. It is also desired to become aware of the limits of reason in the process of analyzing the phenomenology of the sacred. Thus, the irrational is assumed to have the sense of mystery and knowledge becomes, then, an assumption of that which cannot be known about mystery. Regarded analytically, in the Kantian sense, the mystery and the numinous state it induces, that of mysterum tremendum, is revealed to be situated beyond the formalisms of reason, but also of the conventional ethics, metaphysically undefinable, above the relations of causality or dependency. Its reality, confirmed, at the level of the impact on human conscience, and by the philosophies of empirical pragmatism, could better be postulated by appealing to similar perspectives of the negative theology. For Rudolf Otto, these ascertainments and the appeal to the terminological genesis and evolution of the concept of divine mystery’s typology constitute landmarks which confirm the dimension of the human being’s spiritual life, a dimension which remains, for now, undefinable for the potential of our reason and argumentative logic.

Can artificial intelligence be a Kantian moral agent? On moral autonomy of AI system

Machine Ethics emphasises the importance of collaboration between engineers, philosophers and psychologists to develop artificial intelligence-endowed systems and other ‘smart’ machines as artificial moral agents (AMA). They point out that there are top-down and bottom-up approaches for programming values into artificial autonomous systems. A number of thinkers argue that formalisation of the Kantian categorical imperatives is feasible, and hence, it is possible for smart machines to become Kantian moral agents, through the top-down approach of programming the Kantian categorical imperatives as algorithms into the AI systems. This paper examines some of the arguments put forth by the defendants of the possibility of Kantian AMAs such as Powers to point out that what these thinkers ignore is that in the Kantian schema, a moral agent is a rational being who is capable of ‘universalising’ as the law, the subjective maxims of her actions. Can the AMA be rational in this Kantian sense? The paper argues that though Kantian deontology may be attractive a theory for designing AMAs, the artificial agents cannot be Kantian moral agents in the real sense of the term.

How does one Cosmotheoretically Respond to the Heat Death of the Universe?

AbstractThis article asks what an adequate philosophical response to the certainty of heat death would be: the moment in the timeline of the universe when all possible energy transformations have been actualized and life, thought, and action cease to be possible. Through a reading of Hans Jonas’s existential work on Gnosticism, the article begins by defining what is meant by the notions cosmotheoretical and cosmoethical as well as offering a description of what Jonas calls “cosmic nihilism.” After this, the article looks at two extreme philosophical responses to heat death. The first response examined is by Friedrich Nietzsche, whose eternal return is shown to be a reactive philosophical response to the linear entropic finitude that heat death implies. The second response is by Ray Brassier. Different from Nietzsche, Brassier is shown to affirm the extinction that heat death promises. However, his insistence that heat death partakes of the transcendentalandthe real, but not the ideal, is demonstrated to be amphibolous. In the final part of the article, I offer what could be called a thermodynamic architectonic response to the heat death of the universe, arguing that heat death should be understood as a guiding transcendental Idea in the Kantian sense of the term.

Kant’s political enlightenment: Free public use of reason as self-discipline

According to recent scholarship, Kant’sAn Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment?and the introductory section toThe Conflict of the Facultiesare masterpieces of philosophical rhetoric. The philosophical significance of these texts lies in establishing the free public use of reason as a tool to discipline political power through pure practical reason, and the rhetorical mastery consists in presenting the free public use of reason as a means to satisfy the ruler’s pragmatic practical reason. Elaborating on this interpretation, I flesh out three further aspects of the writings in question. First, I examine the four types of arguments that Kant crafts in defence of the public use of reason and show how their pragmatic practical character is fully in keeping with the foundation of politics on pure practical ideas. Second, contrasting Kant’s notion of the public use of reason with the classical liberal conception of free speech, I argue that the distinctive character of Kant’s notion of the public use of reason consists in adding to the liberal demand for freedom from state censorship the requirement of the self-discipline of the participants in the public use of reason. Third, I contend that Kant’s notion of the public use of reason goes beyond a mere non-coercive discursive procedure and conclude that, to qualify as public in the distinctive Kantian sense, publicly presented positions must uphold theoretical and moral criteria informed by critical philosophy.

Dostoevsky – Not a Defeated Idol in Akim Volynsky’s

Abstract In Dostoevsky’s artistic quest, Volynsky saw general paths of development of culture and literature. In his last book on dance, Kniga likovanii: Azbuka klassicheskogo tantsa (1925)[The Book of Exaltations: The Alphabet of Classical Dance], Volynsky espouses a new ‘motor aesthetics’, in which the language and rules of ballet, as well as the connection of classical ballet with other arts is set out, whereby the technique of the emergence of the human spirit is reflected in the movements of the human body. The Book of Exaltations is proof that Dostoevsky never became a ‘defeated idol’ for Volynsky. In the article Infernal Woman (1900), answering the question why exactly beauty is undefinable, Volynsky gives the brief but exhaustive explanation that the undefined is in the “dualism of the span of beauty” (‘размах красоты’). In The Book of Exaltations, Volynsky already operates with this accidentally found image of ‘the span of beauty’, transposed into the term ‘coupé’, expanding it to a synthetic judgment in the Kantian sense.

LA LIMITE SANS LIMITES QUELQUES RREMARQUES SUE LE PRINCIPE PHENOMENOLOGIQUE DE LA GEGEBENHEIT A L’EPREUVE DU NEOKANTISME

Abstract What, if any, are the limits of the Husserlian concept of Gegebenheit? Is there a limit beyond which nothing can be seen by the phenomenologist? In asking these questions, we allude to a distinction typical of Kantian criticism: “Grenze” or “Schranke”, limit or boundary? These same questions are reformulated in a famous review of Ideen I by Paul Natorp, a Marburg neo-Kantian who directly attacks the unlimited scope Husserl gives to the phenomenological principle of intuition. From a phenomenological point of view, however, the Achilles’ heel of the critical method lies in the impossibility of accessing by intuition, beyond phenomena, the thing-in-itself. A major consequence is that the phenomenological dissolution of the “Grenze” prescribes a limitless opening to the horizon of phenomena. But if we can speak of a limitless openness, it is because in a certain way everything gives itself to be seen. What kind of vision is this? And what kind of Gegebenheit is at work here? The Husserlian answer lies in the recovery of a concept, the “idea in the Kantian sense”, without its counterpart, the “limit”, whereas for Kant as well as for Natorp it is precisely the concept of “limit” that characterizes the gnoseological status of the “idea”.

Two Roads to Guantanamo: The Canadian and United States Supreme Courts’ Approaches to the Extraterritorial Application of Fundamental Rights

Following Catherine Kellogg’s engagement with Hannah Arendt’s question of whether there are modes of non-nationalist belonging, I begin with the recognition that the moment when the “nation-state ... will nullify itself as such” still lies far in the future, if it ever occurs at all. Real (as opposed to ideal) history happens through incremental, fragile evolutionary change, not through sudden leaps from one fundamental paradigm to another. If the ideal of the self-nullifying nation-state is an intellectual fantasy, however, it is also an ideal in the Kantian sense, one that can motivate and orient political action. Indeed, it is precisely the contingency of actual history that makes space for real-world political movements of groups and individuals that change paradigms from within.

Destructiveness: a 'neglected child' in the theory of analytical psychology.

C.G. Jung postulates the child motif as the central symbol of the unfolding self towards wholeness. From the 'abandoned child' and the 'invincibility of the child', Jung derives the 'divine child' as hero. It is about the victory of consciousness over the unconscious, about the 'overcoming of the darkness monster'. But in this ego-psychological approach, there is no 'evil', no destructive child. The author is surprised that there is no concept of destructiveness per se, in the Kantian sense, in either psychoanalysis or analytical psychology. In Jung, 'evil' exists as a shadow dynamic that needs to be integrated. This paper is about destructiveness that cannot be integrated. The author's hypothesis is that some patients have the unconscious belief that they are a discarded child and were born as a 'bad' destructive child or have acquired this unconscious belief in the course of their development. Both possibilities are explored with regard to their treatability using clinical vignettes from the therapy of a child, an adolescent and an adult patient. With regard to collective destructiveness, an attempt is also made to highlight some characteristic beliefs of increasingly radicalized political and social groups.

Poder versus querer: sobre o livre-arbítrio em Agostinho e em Schopenhauer

O artigo que se segue pretende analisar a noção schopenhaueriana de liberdade da vontade (entendida como liberum arbitrium indifferentiae), cuja definição, como defendo, pressupõe a distinção agostiniana entre o velle e o posse, assim como a acepção kantiana de caráter inteligível. Considero que a liberdade plena, ou a completa negação da vontade, conforme a perspectiva de Schopenhauer, tem por base a noção agostiniana de libertas, que só é alcançada por meio da graça, e também sua errônea interpretação sobre o conceito agostiniano de liberum arbitrium. O objetivo principal desse artigo consiste em apresentar Agostinho como um precursor fundamental para a teoria de Schopenhauer.

Peace and the rule of law: A brief theoretical overview

Having in mind that peace is a basic, universal social and legal value and a substantial prerequisite for realising all other values, the author observes the complex relationship between peace and the rule of law. In that relationship of mutual dependence, one of the disputable matters could be the fact that the issue resembles a chicken-and-egg dilemma: which of the two values is the preceding factor, which one is older, which one should be considered the cause and which one the consequence? Is peace a necessary environment for the rule of law establishing, or the rule of law is a necessary prerequisite for peace? The answer to this question depends primarily on how the rule of law is perceived. Following the prevalent view that the rule of law is a formal/material concept, which implies that it has both institutional and value aspects, the author takes a standpoint that the value-openness of the rule of law concept should be regarded as its advantage rather than a weakness. The author criticises the one-sided perception of the rule of law based exclusively on the ideology and values of liberalism and the tendency among western countries to present that vision of the rule of law as the only one that can ensure peace. According to the position of liberal scholars, without 'liberal peace', war and disorder would govern. However, the reality proves that imposition and export of a liberal version of the rule of law and the tendency to establish universal 'liberal peace' could also feed wars and conflicts. Correlation between peace and the rule of law is required but is not necessary (if one perceives the rule of law in its 'thinnest' form - the existence of an order). However, without peace, it is impossible to establish any kind of value-based 'thick' rule of law. On the other hand, no one-sided value-burdened vision of the rule of law is a necessary prerequisite for the existence of peace and order. The author believes that if there is a wish to take a step in the direction of 'perpetual peace' in Kant's sense, the necessary presumption is tolerance and open-mindedness toward different ideological (value) models of the rule of law.

Ensaio sobre a formação e adaptação em Adorno

This article evaluates the issue of formation and adaptation in the context of the bourgeois society, as seen under the lights of Theodor W. Adorno’s thinking, (1903-1969), especially in following the texts: Education and Emancipation (1995); Semiculture Theory (1996) and Dialectic of Enlightenment (1985), aiming at exposing the inherent forceful conditions of the capitalist system that validates the exit of man from the tutelage of divine authority, without, however, bestowing upon him effective autonomy, in the Kantian sense, to self-govern. Such a society chooses scientific knowledge, enhanced by technical-instrumental rationality, as the only valid form of knowledge that will forge a type of subjectivity whose thinking that support it is reified. Education is linked to the interests of the capitalist system to train operators of scientific knowledge to produce goods, without considering the critical reflections that it will provoke on life marked by exploitation and inequalities in this dominating society. &nbsp

Kant, casuistry and casuistical questions

Abstract Interest in the role of casuistry and casuistical questions in Kant's Doctrine of Virtue (DV), i.e. the second part of the Metaphysics of Morals, has grown in recent years. My own position is formulated in Schuessler (2012, in German), the main thesis of which will be retained here in an updated form and with some shifts of emphasis. I hold that the casuistical questions concerning perfect duties in the DV are not intended to represent casuistry in Kant's sense. Casuistry and casuistical questions are neither equivalent in the DV nor do they serve the same purposes.

Expert vs. influencer: Philosophy presented under conditions of second-order observation

Abstract Philosophy is presented in a wide range of forms, none of which can be convincingly claimed to be the “genuine” one. Historically speaking, there is not one “proper” way of doing philosophy, evidencing what may be called the social contingency of philosophy. This paper aims to provide a “critical” philosophy of today, in the Kantian sense of a philosophy that reflects on the conditions of its possibility, and thereby acknowledges the limitations they impose. Conceptually, our approach is grounded in Niklas Luhmann’s social systems theory, in which “functional differentiation” and “second-order observation” are two crucial characteristics of modern society. The paper discusses how presentations of philosophy align themselves with the second-order observation mechanisms of the specific social systems in which they are “hosted.” This paper deals in particular with two such systems: academics and social (or mass) media. These forms of presenting philosophy produce two different kinds of philosophy presenters: the expert and the influencer.