XPost: alt.buddha.short.fat.guy, alt.philosophy.taoism, alt.philosophy.zen   
   From: tanghuyen@gmail.com   
      
   On 11/15/2016 8:10 AM, Lee Dillion wrote:   
      
   > The danger, of course, that all things may appear to   
   > be nails to the hammer of reason.   
      
   The danger always exists, of being more Royalist   
   than the King. However, I take reason, more   
   specifically pure reason, in the strict Kantian sense,   
   of being a priori and therefore independent of   
   experience. This is the domain that is largely   
   refractory to white scholars in the humanities, and   
   many of them have abandoned it for the simpler   
   and easier sense of reason in the ordinary,   
   non-Kantian sense, namely thinking and behaviour   
   not based on faith or superstition.   
      
   An example amongst many is Robert Audi, The   
   Architecture of Reason: The Structure and   
   Substance of Rationality, OUP, 2002. The blurb for   
   it says: "The literature on theoretical reason has   
   been dominated by epistemological concerns,   
   treatments of practical reason by ethical concerns.   
   This book overcomes the limitations of dealing with   
   each separately. It sets out a comprehensive theory   
   of rationality applicable to both practical and   
   theoretical reason. In both domains, the book   
   explains how experience grounds rationality,   
   delineates the structure of central elements, and   
   attacks the egocentric conception of rationality. It   
   establishes the rationality of altruism and thereby   
   supports major moral principles."   
      
   The rationale for the book says it all: "In both   
   domains, the book explains how experience grounds   
   rationality." Right off, Kant is starkly abandoned, as   
   the a priori domain, independent of experience, has   
   been unceremoniously jettisoned. I haven't seen the   
   book, even less read it, and don't know how and why   
   the author dumps Kant, but he is in the direction of   
   many other white scholars who unload the strict   
   Kantian sense of reason as the a priori domain,   
   independent of experience. I need not mention   
   non-white scholars, even those living in the civilised   
   West, who have yet to insert themselves into this   
   esoteric, arcane discipline. A few white scholars in   
   the French-speaking countries are still fooling around   
   with pure reason in the Kantian sense, the a priori   
   domain, independent of experience, but they are lost   
   in the austere abstraction of it. Hey, Kant, Hegel,   
   Husserl and Heidegger are, too, along with the   
   lackeys like Cassirer and Michael Friedman.   
      
   Returning to your warning, of the danger that all   
   things may appear to be nails to the hammer of   
   reason, even in the loose, non-Kantian sense of   
   thinking and behaviour not based on faith or   
   superstition, Jewish mythology is easily eliminated,   
   as it is based on faith or superstition. As to the strict   
   Kantian sense of the a priori domain, independent of   
   experience, it can even more easily dismissed, as it   
   relies on natural and social associations, like thunders   
   and tribal and family relations. Merely the idea of an   
   elected people already ejects it from consideration.   
      
   Even so, in both senses, the temptation to overshoot   
   the criteria, as enunciated above, can be   
   overwhelming. It has to be checked at all time.   
      
   However, the strict Kantian sense has scarcely been   
   broached, even by the luminaries, as above, not to   
   mention the run-of-the-mill white scholars in the   
   humanities who scarcely have any idea about   
   applying the critical methods that they preach   
   constantly, as they almost entirely treat such methods   
   as content and not as forms or structures, except at   
   low levels of abstraction. It still is mostly a virgin forest,   
   waiting to be explored.   
      
   Tang Huyen   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)