Since the
lecture and seminar I have gotten a better understanding for Kant and his view
of life in a sense. First of all I have realised that this course isn´t about
finding the right answer. Everything is more or less right or wrong at the same
time, it´s more about understanding on how you can explain and look at the
world. For me this became clearer during the seminar. Then I could compare my
view with others and learn more. What I realised was that I was trying to
simplify something very complex, and by doing so I was missing out on the
exiting part of learning on different theories.
Of course you do need to know some facts before you can talk about it,
but it is when you discuss you get the deeper understanding. My approach
towards the two different texts for theme 1, was that them both was about
finding out the “truth”. But now I know that it´s so much more then that! And
when I now stopped trying to narrow it down, I could learn more and ask more
questions and compare it more.
From the
lecture I got a deeper understanding about Kants view on life. It was a good
lecture and it gave a good background on Naturalism
to ideal of objectivity. Since the
text, in my opinion, lacked on that it was good to get that from the lecture.
It became clearer what Kant was trying to accomplish when we went through some
keywords.
A priori:
is analytic judgement. Kant say that “all bodies have extensions”, but numbers
for example is a concept and therefor
knowledge that can be a priori. If I say
that it is 5 students in the classroom then you don´t have to check it and
there for that knowledge is a priori.
Posteriori: is
synthetic judgment. The opposite of a priori, and you have to check it and you can’t
know that for sure, a priori.
And what
Kant was trying to accomplish was to find if it was possible to have synthetic
A priori judgement, so, having no knowledge of concept but still a priori.
How would
this be possible then? Well then we might have to change our way of thinking:
“Lets us assume that our faculties of knowledge
does nor confirm to objects, but the objects do confirm to our faculties of
knowledge.”
This way of
thinking makes it hard to understand objects if you can´t see them. During the
seminar my group and I was discussing the branch of philosophy; metaphysics. It
involves questioning God and other phenomena that we can´t see. And we imagined
what Kant would say if we asked him whether or not God exists. And his answer
would probably be: if I can´t see it then I can´t know for sure.
But for the
most part of the seminar we discussed if we ever can see the true world? How we see the world can never be objective,
we see through our eyes, our own experiences and knowledge builds up the world
according to us. And the seminar leader asked us to imagine the world without
humans, and we all did so but since we all could see it then it must then you
were still there witch proves that it will always be our own world.
During the
seminar I contributed with what I knew and asked questions that could take the
discussion further. Like I said in the beginning I think that I got the most
out of the seminar, that’s when I got the hang of this course and what is all
about. I takes some time before you can let go of the idea of that there is
only one correct answer but when you do, the whole world opens up.
I agree with discussion being the key to deeper understanding. Often when I read the texts, there were some things I didn't agree with, but at the same time I suspected that my simple laypersons's objections were probably worthless since I didn't fully understand the arguments. It was much easier to further understanding in the seminars, where there was an abundance of different interpretations and where the seminar leader could confirm some objections as very valid and established by philosophers since a while back.
SvaraRaderaI think you have a priori and a posteriori a bit mixed up (or maybe I have). As I understood it, a priori judgements are judgements that can be formed through reasoning alone, e.g. mathematics or truths that arise by definition. So it would not be an a priori judgement that there are five students in the classroom – you'd have to find that out empirically which would be an a posteriori judgement. However it would be an a priori judgement to know that there are students (at all) in a class, because by the definition of class (at least the definition used by the lecturer when he used this example), there can't be a class without students. A class consists of students.
It is interesting how you said that after attending the seminar you got a better idea about the material we were reading, because that is exactly how I felt. These topics are complex, with a lot of detail and written in, for me at least, difficult language to understand. Lecture and especially discussion on seminar help me to gain a deeper understanding.
SvaraRaderaThe only thing I would disagree with you is your example for a priori knowledge where you say that if you say there is 5 student in the classroom you don't have to check if that is true. In this case I think that it is impossible to know if that is the case without checking. You have to gain that knowledge a posteriori.
Your reflective text is easy to follow and I too found that I felt like I got a deeper understanding of the texts after the seminars and the lectures.
SvaraRaderaI also think that when you say that you tried to “simplify something very complex” you are not alone! These texts share some complex thoughts on knowledge and how we perceive things, and it is hard to understand it all at once.
However I liked the fact that you tried to “simplify” things in your first blog post in terms of you writing examples on how you understood the texts. They made it easier to understand how you interpreted the texts.
Hello fellow blogger!
SvaraRaderaI agree with previous comment on what you wrote about a priori and a posteriori. Although I think that you just misplaced the example that you wrote on a priori since you do explain that a priori is something that we do not need to examine to confirm, meanwhile a posteriori is something that we actually have to experience or investigate on our own.
You have explained many parts of this theme in a good and easy way to understand. You bring out the things that I also thought were the main learning point. Such as learning to seeking an answer but instead discussing and thinking.
Keep up the good reflections!
It's interesting about the whole thing with imagining the world without humans as you write! We humans have a special way of perceiving the world totally different from other creatures. They have some senses we might not have (maybe feeling magnetic fields) and we have some they don't (some animals don't have eyesight for example), and this makes them see the world totally different.
SvaraRaderaSo the world according to us is very different than theirs, and imagining the world without humans would be to imagine it as other creatures would see it or from "god's point of view", which is the totally objective view of the world. This is unthinkable for us, as Kant notes: the world/reality is only as we perceive it through our senses and cognition.
yes in the heat of the moment i mixed it up with my example, what I meant to write was if i say the students are in the classroom you don´t have to check it :) compared if i write 5 students then you have to check it. Thanks for pointing it out.
SvaraRadera