Noumenal World Research Articles

Рhenomenon of Fantasy as a Form of Human Consciousness

The article deals with the problem of fantasy as a form of consciousness. Ideas about consciousness change along with ideas about human nature. One form of the existence of consciousness is fantasy. Fantasy becomes a part of an anthropological study project about human existence as a reality of dominance of integrative knowledge. The era of conceptualization forms a request for awareness of a priori grounds for figurative perception of information and its living as an object in a fantasy form of consciousness. A feature of fantasy is that in the imagination there is a translation from perception into a generalized transcendental representation by creating a chain of associations, a drawing, a narrative. Non-linear description of the feelings and thoughts of a person in the epoch of romanticism, feeling surpasses intelligence. The formation of fantasy states of consciousness is associated with overcoming mirror reflection and getting into the noumenal world in higher dimensions, similar to mathematics and physics. External situation turns out to be a surface hiding fantasy as a dimension of human creative potential. Modern discussions of the reality of fantasy oppose it as a special form of reality, equal in its properties to the mind. Fantasy is the source of human experience of his being, embodied conceptually in the process of imaging. Imaginative cognition conceptually connects the experience of previous generations preserved in images with experiences in one's own life and the lives of others. As a source of creativity, fantasy extends to scientific knowledge, creating syntheses of different sciences

Clearing Up Correlationism

In After Finitude, Quentin Meillassoux speculates from the principle of noncontradiction’s a priori enclosure toward a standpoint of absolute contingency. Based on his propositions, I argue that his thinking continues to reproduce a contradiction between the finitude of the subject and the infinitude of the noumenal world. Accordingly, I eschew the principle of noncontradiction in favor of a principle of contradiction derived from Hermann Levin Goldschmidt’s Contradiction Set Free. Goldschmidt formulates contradiction as an Either-And-Or whereby the two contradictory terms share a space between them in which there elapses a continuous process of negotiation. If the relation between finitude and infinitude is an Either-And-Or, then there is an interpenetration between the finite and the infinite, between bounded subject and noumenal world. Goldschmidt’s method reinvigorates the contradiction with which Meillassoux is grappling and introduces a more immanent mode of infinitude that echoes certain Spinozist and pre-Spinozist strains of Jewish thought.

Oroonoko: Post-colonialism, Kant and Todorov

Postcolonial theory looks at history, and it links to culture, sociology, psychology, and even politics and law. This study aims to analyze Aphra Behn Oroonoko with respect to post-colonialism, in particular, investigation of the extent colonialism, slavery, and being other. Oroonoko displays literary fiction and reality at the same time; thus, Immanuel Kant’s concepts of the noumenal world and phenomenal world have significant meaning. It draws on these theories and worlds: while the phenomenal world is day-to-day life conditions, the noumenal world is impossible to experience. On the other hand, Tzvetan Todorov’s perspectives on stories and novels are different, and he puts them in scales such as fantastic, uncanny and marvelous. For Oroonoko, readers can decide the scales only if they are willing to understand Todorov’s aims. The aim of this study is to examine Kant's concepts of the noumenal world and the phenomenal world, and Todorov's scales, as well as colonialism, slavery and being other.

Kant’tan Wittgenstein’a: Mantığın Sınırları

Immanuel Kant proclaims that the ‘transcendental logic’, the form of logic that he uniquely offers, aims at laying out the necessary laws and principles of nature on the basis of the synthesis of the a priori concepts of understanding and the a priori elements of intuition. In this regard, logic, in Kantian sense, is directed towards the knowledge of the nature which he identifies as the phenomenal world (appearances). The noumenal world (transcendental concepts of God, immortality and freedom), on the other hand, is acclaimed to extend beyond the boundaries of logic. Likewise, Ludwig Wittgenstein points to the boundaries of logic. In his view, logic is limited to the states of affairs in the world (the whole reality). In other words, Wittgenstein argues that one can logically think and talk about merely the facts in the world. The transcendental concepts like logical form, philosophy, aesthetic and ethics, on the other hand, are offered to be beyond the boundaries of logicality. Hence, my aim in this study will be to embark on the boundaries and the legitimate use of logic in Kant and Wittgenstein in parallel to each other.

Normative coherence of philosophical discourse

The author of the article assumes that any human activity is normative. In the case of philosophical discourse, the normative ground is its indispensable condition, which makes it possible to compare the foundations of philosophy and other scientific disciplines. The norm (law) has, on the one hand, descriptive content related to the description of the noumenal world, and, on the other, prescriptive content related to the counterfactuality of what ought to be. The author emphasizes that the functional aspect of a norm is that it is a means of socially integrating the behavior of people and social groups into a whole. Due to the requirements and requirements of society, social groups are transformed into standards, models, standards of modal and obligatory behavior of the representatives of these groups, performing the function of motivation, orientation and legitimacy. In the second part of the article, the author focuses on a narrower understanding of discourse as speech, dialogue, discussions, which presuppose argumentation based on certain principles, rules, rules and regulations. This interpretation of discourse is peculiar to representatives of the ethics of discourse (K.-O. Apel, Y. Habermas, D. Böhler, V. Kulman, G. Gronke, etc.). Within ethics, principles, imperatives, rules, norms and guidelines both normalize the discourse and substantiate this discourse. Adherence to these principles, rules, norms, and guidelines ensures the normative coherence of discourse as the instance of consensus building on the basis of revealing the performative contradiction of the statement. The normative coherence of discourse is also the basis for its functioning as a meta-institution of justification of social (moral, legal) norms and legitimation of institutions of deliberative democracy in a society of communication and dialogical civilization. Summarizing, the author formulates generalized requirements-guidelines that make it possible to implement the principles, norms and rules of discourse as a meta-institutional instance of society.

Концепция теургического творчества у Вл. Соловьева и Вяч. Иванова

The philosophy of Vladimir Solovyov is considered from the perspective of its existential value. He understood his philosophy as a philosophy of life intended to give a man the highest meaning of his existence rather than as a philosophy of the school of thought. For Solovyov, the highest meaning of human existence consists in pursuing the matter of nature that is to overcome the disunified empirical state and ascend to the world of positive all-unity. The paper introduces and explains the concept of individual theurgy by Solovyov manifested in two fundamental varieties, i.e. the path of love and the path of art both available to everyone. Solovyov’s theory of art is analyzed as the basic theurgic principle that implies the creation of beauty as the spiritualization and idealization of the empirical world. Then Solovyov’s theurgic art is revised in the theory of artistic creativity developed by the Russian poet Vyacheslav Ivanov. This theory is closely related to the anthropological teaching of Ivanov where the theurgic artist is an anthropological ideal. The study notes that the basic aspects of Ivanov’s theory of art are semantically interconnected and divide art into two types: violent and transformative or non-violent and transfigurative. Genuinely theurgic art is characterized by a non-violent transfiguration of reality. The study also examines the distinction between symbolic and theurgic arts by Ivanov. The research shows that the achievement of the stage of theurgic art requires the spiritual transformation of the artist that raises him to the level of the spiritual beings of the noumenal world. A person who has reached the stage of theurgic art is defined by Ivanov as a superhuman being in the specific spiritual sense that is a part of this concept from the standpoint of the Russian philosophy of all-unity.

Eschatological Perspective of N. Berdyaev’s Philosophy of History

The fundamental insight that N. Berdyaev obtains in his historiosophical reflections is that history is antinomic and the historical process is catastrophic since it has to end, because “the world cannot exist eternally”. In its global, empirical (objective) dimension, history resembles an absurd comedy “in which nothing ever succeeds”. The idea of history as a long duration (long duree) and permanent progress misses its essence. According to Berdyaev, such history is meaningless, and it has to end. Its true meaning is revealed only in “its end” and “before the face of eternity”. Terrestrial history does not have its epilogue and the final solution in historical time but in celestial history when the boundaries between the immanent and the transcendent world disappear. History is the path to another and different, sublime and spiritual (noumenal) world that lies beyond the boundaries of everything historical. The destiny of man, which lies at the heart of history, assumes a meta-historical goal and a trans-historical solution to the destiny of history in a different, eternal time. To summarize, history has an eschatological meaning. Although there is an unsolvable tragic conflict between the individual human destiny and the destiny of humanity as a whole within the framework of history, Berdyaev, following the entire tradition of Russian religious philosophy, is convinced that the overcoming of that contradiction on the historical level is possible with love as the salvation and the main driving force of the soul and the source of all the spiritual creation of man.

On the Parfitian Thesis of Moral Responsibility

There seems to be a tension between determinism and moral responsibility such that, if determinism is true then perhaps we cannot be responsible for our actions. In his On What Matters, Derek Parfit tried to find a way to dissolve this tension through discussing a Kantian argument about the noumenal world. In recent years Parfit’s argument has received some criticism, which has sought to undermine his argument while also making a variety of different claims about his actual views on this issue. In this paper, I argue that Parfit’s argument requires modification: and my proposals not only promise to make his argument clearer, but can also be used to answer some of his critics. I conclude by setting out a coherent argument—based on Parfit’s writings—for defusing the tension between determinism and moral responsibility. We will see that the truth of determinism is not a threat for moral responsibility—at least in some senses.

The physics and Metaphysics of the sensitivity of calorimetric instruments and human senses

The onset temperature for a reaction detected by an apparatus in an experimental study is an overestimated value compared with the actual value existing within large batches. Models are used to estimate the “actual value” for large batches. The onset temperature is dependent on the Phi-factor (thermal inertia), adiabaticity, and detection sensitivity of the calorimeter. It is therefore advisable to penalize the detected onset temperature by an arbitrary number, such as 50°C for Accelerating Rate Calorimeter (ARC), to arrive at the recommended (Adjusted) onset decomposition or reaction temperature for the purpose of setting control parameters in operations. The influence of Phi-factor and detection- sensitivity of the Heat-Wait-Search mode in the ARC on the detected onset temperature is discussed. A parallel is drawn between the instrumental sensitivity [1] in the phenomenal world and the mental sensitivity in the noumenal world. © 2016 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Process Saf Prog 36: 280–283, 2017

NEO-KANTIANISM AND GEORG SIMMEL'S INTERPRETATION OF KANT

This essay explores the development of Georg Simmel's interpretation of Immanuel Kant's philosophy in the context of neo-Kantianism and its preoccupation with the question of unity in modern diversity. It argues that the neo-Kantian movement can be divided into two periods: in the first, unity was addressed with regard to Kant's epistemology; in the second period, the main issue was the overall coherence of Kantian teaching. Simmel, who belonged to the younger generation of neo-Kantians, absorbed the conclusions of the previous generation that purged Kantian epistemology from its metaphysical foundations related to the noumenal world. Yet he did not share the views of his peers who considered Kant to be the philosopher of cultural plurality. On the contrary, he argued that Kant's system is thoroughly intellectualistic, and that ethics, aesthetics and religion within it are subordinated to logic. At the same time, his own philosophy presupposed cultural plurality akin to that of other neo-Kantians. In other words, Simmel abandoned Kant in order to develop his own version of neo-Kantianism.

Kants „Ich“ in „Ich soll …“ und Freuds Über-Ich

Abstract Kant’s and Freud’s respective investigations of the mind obey fundamentally different concerns. And yet their views of the structure of our mental life are strikingly similar. The article explores some of those similarities. It compares Kant’s transcendental unity of apperception and the organization of mental processes Freud calls ‘ego’ (Ich). It then proceeds to compare Kant’s categorical imperative of morality and Freud’s structure of ego/superego (Ich/ÜberIch). Freud’s structural view of the mind, it is suggested, might offer a developmental account of just those aspects of mental life Kant thought could be explained only by appealing to our belonging in a noumenal world escaping the deterministic laws of the natural world. However, Freud’s approach is exclusively developmental. He does not take any position on questions of justification, the very questions that are central to Kant’s concern. The paper offers a cautious response to the question: what remains, under the Freudian developmental account, of the justificatory ambition of Kant’s formulation of the categorical imperative as an imperative of pure practical reason?

The chakra system as a bio-socio-psycho-spiritual model of consciousness: Anahata as heart-centered consciousness

Today, to most scientific materialists the seat of consciousness is the brain. According to the dominant strand of this reductionist monist view, consciousness - and naturally the mind of which it is a part - is an epiphenomenon of the brain. This is a metaphysical assumption and as far as I know, there has not been any proof as of yet to support such a claim (aka the hard problem of consciousness). According to scientism, the mind is an illusion, albeit, a useful one from an evolutionary standpoint. This illusion - which strangely enough is not too different from the Hindu notion of maya - has helped us not only survive for thousands of years but also adapt more quickly to our environment. Even though our holographic-like representations of physical reality or the noumenal world are not accurate they are close enough to the-thing-itself that we have succeeded to control and abuse the planet and its resources while dominating other species along the way, to say the least. Why is this the case? Are we too much in our heads? Are we too caught up in our emotions? Clearly, there is an imbalance within and without us for which we are primarily responsible; the results of this global imbalance are such things as threats to biodiversity, war, poverty, and health issues to name but a few. We are using the wrong lenses metaphysically speaking and that is partially why we have been distorting reality, be it monism or dualism. The contributions of science ever since the Scientific Revolution are immense and grateful to them we are, especially in terms of their technological application. However, the dark side is that industrialization has made us more dehumanized and social media has made us more disconnected in the real world. The argument here is not whether technology is good or bad, but rather the question is how can we create eco-friendly technologies (from our cars to our cities) that are harmonious with nature in the ultimate or nondual sense. So what is missing? Perhaps the will is. Maybe we have been blinded by our selfishness to the extent that we cannot see beyond our desires. The paradigm shift hinted at here is one that is reminiscent of the Buddhist concept of the Middle Way, the goal being global coherence through individual transformation, which cannot happen unless there is balance in the first place and the key is balancing the heart.

Theology and Mathematics—Key Themes and Central Historical Figures

This article provides a survey of the history of the dialogue between the disciplines of mathematics and theology. It identifies three principal historical periods—the ancient, the scientific revolution, and modern. It identifies five key themes—the ontological status of mathematics; mathematics as a bridge to a noumenal world; God's relationship to the physical universe and how mathematics is part of this; truth—its nature, how we know it, certitude; and the role of mathematics in culture. The author develops these themes by exploring the thinking of several major historical figures.

Kant’s Theory of Action (review)

Reviewed by: Kant’s Theory of Action Lara Denis Richard McCarty. Kant’s Theory of Action. Oxford-New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. Pp. xxiv + 250. Cloth, $74.00. This significant, stimulating contribution to Kantian practical philosophy strives to interpret Kant’s theory of action in ways that will increase readers’ understanding and appreciation of Kant’s moral theory. Its thesis is that Kant combines metaphysical freedom and psychological determinism: our actions within the phenomenal world are causally determined by our prior psychological states in that world and are appearances of our free action in the noumenal world. McCarty argues for a metaphysical, “two-worlds” interpretation of Kant’s transcendental distinction between appearances and things in themselves over epistemological or methodological “two-standpoints” interpretations familiar from Christine Korsgaard [End Page 533] and Henry Allison (along the way, McCarty also challenges Allison’s “Incorporation Thesis”). Some of the book’s arguments are textual, displaying perceptive readings of Kant’s lecture notes, published works, and philosophical influences. Others primarily concern the philosophical plausibility or moral tenability of various positions one might attribute to Kant. The book’s greatest strength is McCarty’s positive account of Kant’s theory of action. He presents a coherent, even elegant, two-worlds model. His interpretations of maxims, incentives, empirical character, and Gesinnung are insightful. The book’s first two chapters introduce McCarty’s understanding of maxims and incentives and begin tackling what he calls “the problem of justification and explanation.” Chapter 3 defends the claim that Kant embraced psychological determinism. Chapters 4 and 5 present McCarty’s two-worlds interpretation of the transcendental distinction, defend it from objections, and argue for its superiority over two-standpoint interpretations. Chapter 6 focuses on moral motivation, presenting respect for the moral law as an incentive capable of explaining morally justified actions, and distinguishing between morally worthy and virtuous action so as to defend Kant’s ethics from common objections. Chapter 7 similarly disentangles notions of a good will and virtue, provocatively claiming that all human agents have both a good will and virtue. The main task of chapter 7, however, is analysis of the radical evil in human nature. Chapter 8 raises questions about Kant’s conception of the highest good—particularly, the afterlife in which we are to continue our moral progress—as an object of rational hope. I read the book’s main argument as follows: 1. Kant’s theory of action must solve “the problem of justification and explanation”: it must show how the reasons that justify a judgment that one ought to do something can also explain one’s doing it. Kant’s theory of action must solve this problem because if what justifies an action cannot also explain it, such justification is “irrelevant.” Only if our actions are explicable in terms of practical reasoning is justification of action by practical reasoning (e.g. by reference to hypothetical or categorical imperatives) “relevant” to our conduct. The problem of justification and explanation arises as it does within Kant’s ethics because Kant holds that pure reason is capable of issuing in action; yet he also holds that human beings and other imperfectly rational agents do not invariably act as we recognize we ought. So we cannot explain our acting as we ought (when we do) simply by appeal to “ought implies can,” internalism, or “the causality of freedom.” 2. Psychological determinism, combined with a metaphysical interpretation of Kant’s transcendental distinction, allows Kant to solve the problem of justification and explanation. Through a timeless, free act in the noumenal world, we each fix our empirical character, which serves as the “causal law” for our actions in the phenomenal world. Maxims, which function as both major premises in practical syllogisms and rules of our empirical characters, provide bases for both the imperatival justifications and motivational explanations of human actions. The “logical force” of a maxim justifies action on it; the “psychological force” of the maxim—specifically, of the incentive incorporated into the maxim—explains action on it. 3. Psychological determinism is compatible with and beneficial for Kant’s moral theory. Most crucially, it is compatible with the freedom necessary for moral agency and responsibility. 4. Two-standpoint...

In defence of Kant’s moral prohibition on suicide solely to avoid suffering

In Ian Brassington’s article in a previous issue of this journal, he argues that suicide for the purpose of avoiding suffering is not, as Kant has contended, contrary to the...

Noumenal Technology

Noumena are distinct from phenomena. While the latter are the things as they appear to us and as we experience them, the noumena are the philosophically infamous and mysterious things-in- themselves.2 The “noumenal technology” referred to in the title of this paper would therefore appear to be a contradiction in terms: Technology is a human creation that involves human knowledge and serves human needs; this firmly roots it in phenomena and it appears absurd to speak of technology that exists beyond human perception and experience among the things-in-themselves. The noumenal world is nature uncomprehended, unexperienced, and uncontrolled; it is nature in the sense of uncultivated, uncanny otherness. By speaking of “noumenal technology” this paper argues that some technologies are retreating from human access, perception, and control, and thus assume the character of this uncanny otherness. Three seemingly disparate reflections prepare the formulation of this thesis, and the remaining sections work to establish at least its plausibility.

Disconsolate labours : Derek Mahon and Nerval

This essay examines some of the ways in which Derek Mahon has been influenced by the poetry of Gerard de Nerval. The first half explores Nerval's impact on Mahon's poetic consciousness as it developed during the 1960s. Analysis of some of Mahon's early poems, such as "After Nerval" and "Glengormley", reveals his irony-tinged affinity with Nerval's vision of a noumenal world existing beyond the limits of sensory experience. This world is contrasted with the physical world and its incumbent political, religious and emotional tensions. The second half of the essay focuses on Mahon's version of Nerval's sonnet cycle, Les Chimères, which explores Mahon's responses to personal loss. Mahon does not simply translate Les Chimères, however. He adapts and disrupts this already highly personal series of poems to examine his own sense of disconsolation with a religious inheritance in which he discerns the fundamental aspects of existential absurdity.

The Kharmsian Absurd and the Bergsonian Comic: Against Kant and Causality

T he deep-rooted tradition in Russian thought of Orthodox ontologism'-whereby knowing is not separated from the known and faith informs cognition-is opposed to the traditionally rational emphasis in Western philosophy on an epistemology informed by the dichotomy between knower and object of knowledge. Russian thinkers historically have rebelled against this dichotomy (epitomized by Kant's assertion that it is impossible to know the thing-in-itself') because it contradicts the notion of the world as an organic whole and stifles man's intuitive ability to apprehend and take part in the true nature of reality. Russian modernists such as Daniil Kharms sought to grasp the noumenal world through pointedly nonanalytical means, and thus were attracted to Bergsonian philosophy, which emphasized artistic intuition and an antimechanistic approach to life. As part of the nineteenth-century Romantic, anti-Enlightenment trend in Russian thought and culture, Slavophiles and Westernizers alike shared this distrust of pure reason and reacted against what they perceived to be a Kantian overreliance on intellect as the sole means of attaining knowledge of the external world. Bakunin emphasized the eternally creative spirit at the heart of life, while linking it with the destructive element in the universe: Let us therefore trust the eternal Spirit which destroys and annihilates only because it is the unfathomable and eternally creative source of all life.2 For Belinskii, art is characterized by its immediacy (neposmrds/vennost), which may only be apprehended intuitively, and he writes about the aesthetic inferiority of pure reason compared to inte-

The Interpretation of Naavgmin- Missionary Ethnography, African Theology, and History Among the Lodagaa

Several years ago Benedict Der argued in the pages of this journal that both the LoDagaa and Kasena of northern Ghana had always worshipped a single and absolute God despite the views of many missionaries and anthropologists to the contrary.1 In particular he singled out the work of Meyer Fortes and Jack Goody, which had focused largely on the veneration of ancestors, claiming that they had failed to mention the fact that God could be approached indirectly... or implicitly' in communications with the noumenal world. Based on an interpretation of selective documentary evidence and limited ethnographic research, he argued that Naangmin, the prime noumenal force among the LoDagaa, was the 'ultimate objective' of sacrifice. This interpretation became the basis for the more dramatic assertion that both societies also sacrificed directly to God. Among the Kasena he argued that God was the main focus of all sacrifice, while among the LoDagaa the ancestors were 'regarded as only mediums or intermediaries.'2 Justin Ukpong responded to Der's article in a subsequent issue of this journal, pointing out that from the general perspective of West African cosmologies the mediumistic interpretations put forward by proponents such as Der were at best problematic, and at worst 'repugnant to these peoples' conception of God.'3 More recently, Roger Some has called into question the very existence, let alone worship, of a supreme god among the LoDagaa. He argued that the word used by Catholics to refer to God, Naangmin, was not an indigenous term or entity, but a neologism, meaning 'head-deity,' which only emerged from the Christianization of LoDagaa thought wrought by missionaries.4 Even so, Der's argument remains significant in two respects. First, it anticipated two highly influential theological arguments by LoDagaa

Does Hegel's Critique of Kant's Moral Theory Apply to Discourse Ethics?

Several years ago Jürgen Habermas wrote a short answer to the question: “Does Hegel's Critique of Kant apply to Discourse Ethics?” The gist of his short answer is, “no”. Insofar as Hegel's criticisms of the formalism and abstract universalism of the moral law never even applied to Kant's moral theory in the first place, they also fail to apply to discourse ethics. Insofar as Hegel's criticisms of the rigorism of the moral law and of Kant's conception of autonomy do hit the mark, discourse ethics successfully draws their sting by reconceiving Kant's moral standpoint along the following lines. 1. Kant wrongly undertakes to establish the moral law as a “fact of reason”: discourse ethics derives the moral standpoint from two premises — one formal, a rationally reconstructed logic of argumentation, and one material, namely our intuitions about how to justify utterances. 2. Kant wrongly contends that we must be able to think of ourselves as both intelligible characters, inhabiting a noumenal world, and as empirical characters inhabiting the world of appearances: discourse ethics allows that in everyday contexts of action and in the context of moral discourse we have one character that has real needs and interests. 3. Kant is also mistaken in arguing that moral autonomy requires human beings to abstract away from their needs and interests and to will universalizable maxims for the sake of their universal form: discourse ethics understands moral autonomy to consist in the free adoption of a standpoint from which conflicts of interest can be impartially regulated, by giving special weight to the satisfaction of universalizable interests. 4. Kant misconceives the categorical imperative as an objective test of universalizability that is applied by individual wills in isolation: discourse ethics reconceives the moral universalism as an ideal of intersubjective agreement of participants in discourse. On the differences between the principles of discourse ethics and Kant's categorical imperative Habermas is wont to cite McCarthy's summary of his — Habermas' — position: “Rather than ascribing as valid to all others any maxim that I can will to be a universal law, I must submit my maxim to all others for the purposes of discursively testing its claim to universality. The emphasis shifts from what each can will without contradiction to be a general law, to what all can will in agreement to be a universal norm” (MCCA 67).