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Kant vs Hume

Kallisti23
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Posted 04/27/07 - 08:12 AM: Subject: Kant vs Hume	#1
Hello, everyone. I am a freshman year undergraduate studying philosophy. Next week I have an exam regarding modern philosophy. I have been given a study guide for the exam, but there is one part of it that I am having trouble understanding. Kant regarded Hume's skepticism as so problematic for science that, according to Kant, it awoke him from his "dogmatic slumber." This prompted Kant to defend science. How does Kant try to save science? I am confused about Kant's philosophy regarding this question. Any help will be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Kallisti23
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Posted 04/27/07 - 08:19 AM:	#2
Also what are the negative results of Kant's attempt to refute Hume.

lee_elkin
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Posted 04/27/07 - 08:19 AM:	#3
I think that Kant's concern about Hume's treatise can be found in the preface of the Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics. I hope that helps.

Morrandir
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Posted 04/27/07 - 10:27 AM:	#4
Prolegomena helps, yes. Kant attempted to save science by first distinguishing between a priori and a posteriori and then between analytic and synthetic judgments. Something is known a priori if it is known on the basis of something we have put into experience (or, as it is somewhat misleadingly said, regardless of or prior to experience) and it is known a posteriori if it is known on the basis of experience. A judgment is analytic if it is true (or false) merely on the basis of the relations of the concepts in the judgment. Synthetic if it is not analytic, basically. So for instance "bachelors are unmarried" is an a priori analytic statement, because bachelors are by definition unmarried, so the proposition is true on the basis of the concepts themselves. "Kant was a bachelor" is an a posteriori synthetic proposition. Now even though it would seem that all analytic statements are a priori and all synthetic statements a posteriori, according to Kant only the former is true. There is also a very important (and problematic) class of synthetic a priori propositions. These are to save science and metaphysics from the clutches of Hume's skepticism. A synthetic a priori statement is something that is justified regardless of experience yet says something of the world. Critique of Pure Reason is mostly about trying to show the possibility of such judgments. These have been considered very problematic, of course, but mostly because they are taken apart from Kant's overall philosophy, in the context of which they make a lot of sense. Anyway, according to Kant mathematical, certain scientific and metaphysical statements are synthetic a priori (of course, some metaphysical statements are just nonsensical, not synthetic a priori, but insofar as a statement is a proper one and a metaphysical, it must be synthetic a priori). Anyway, synthetic a priori statements could be something like "all events have a cause." That's the basic gist of it, but it would take a month to explain it properly ~M~
Philosophy is disciplined bewilderment. A mathematician is a person who thinks that if there are supposed to be three people in a room, but five come out, then two more must enter the room in order for it to be empty. http://www.beyondappearances.com

Kallisti23
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Posted 04/27/07 - 10:48 AM:	#5
Thanks, guys. Morrandir your explanation was very helpful, but I have one more question about what you said. What parts of Kant's overall philosophy make his argument sensible. Edited by Kallisti23 on 04/27/07 - 10:55 AM

Kallisti23
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Posted 04/27/07 - 11:18 AM:	#6
Also, how does Kant justify the existence of a priori synthetic arguments?

Morrandir
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Posted 04/27/07 - 12:10 PM:	#7
Well, to be honest, you are asking question to which the answers cannot be given all that easily. Kant's system is complex. But if you want to look into his justification, you should take up Critique of Pure Reason and read Transcendental Aesthetic and Transcendental Analytic. The basic idea is that every experience has a matter and a form, the former of which is the given part of experience (i.e. what is experienced) and the latter part is the set part of experience (i.e. how this something is experienced). According to Kant then, our cognition determines the way in which things appear to us (even if it does not determine what appears to us). If he is correct and we add something to every experience, then this added part is a priori (because it is added to experience, not drawn from it) and it is synthetic (because it concerns the world, not just concepts). I hope that helps a bit. EDIT: I should remark that the forms of every experience are space and time (for sensibility, i.e. intuitions) and the 12 categories (found in the Prolegomena, for instance) (for understanding, i.e. concepts and judgments). ~M~
Philosophy is disciplined bewilderment. A mathematician is a person who thinks that if there are supposed to be three people in a room, but five come out, then two more must enter the room in order for it to be empty. http://www.beyondappearances.com

Kallisti23
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Posted 04/27/07 - 12:11 PM:	#8
Nevermind the second question; I've figured it out.

Kallisti23
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Posted 04/27/07 - 12:53 PM:	#9
Ok, so this is my understanding thus far: To refute Hume, Kant needed to prove the existence of a priori propositions whose truth-value is determined by observation or facts, such as â€œevery event must have a cause.â€ To do so, Kant separated judgments into analytic judgments, and synthetic judgments. The judgments may combine with a priori and a posteriori knowledge to form various combinations. Everything that can be known, according to Kant, can be assigned to one of the four categories. The area of most interest for Kant, as would have been Hume, was that of synthetic a priori judgments. Hume as an empiricist, believed the area of synthetic a priori judgments to be empty, allowing him to assert his position on causality. Kant, in response, asserts that in actuality there are synthetic a prior categories or concepts built into the human mind. Kant declares that there are specific notions that are characteristic of human cognizance. To prove this, in what is called Transcendental Deduction, Kant argues that the categories, types of understanding that are innate in consciousness, are necessary for experience. Kant states that for awareness to be possible there needs to be a â€œunity of consciousness.â€ This is what Kant calls â€œthe transcendental unity of apperception,â€ or TUAP. The TUAP is not an awareness of a mental self because it is the unity of consciousness, which is necessary for all awareness, including self-consciousness. It is an a priori structural feature of experience and not an object of experienceâ€¦because experience must be subject to the TUAP, it must consist in judgments that have the categories as their form. Thus, in essence, Kant has refuted Empiricism, by proving experience must be derived from something a priori. But has Kant also refuted Hume by showing this, or is there more to it?

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Posted 04/27/07 - 01:02 PM:	#10
That is the gist of it, yes. Few remarks: If you say that the truth values of synthetic a priori propositions are determined by observation, you are in danger of getting into a contradiction, if observation is understood as experience of sorts. If it is understood as a sort of "mind's eye" kind of observation, then it works. The category of analytic a posteriori propositions is empty for Kant. Hume never had any contact with Kant, just to kill of the impression that Hume would have known of synthetic a priori propositions. This is a Kantian term of which Hume had not an inkling. Kant also (allegedly) refuted rationalism in addition to empiricism. According to his system cognition can never arise from experience alone, nor can it arise from reason alone. I am sure that it is impossible on this basis to say whether Kant has refuted anyone. The jury is still out on that (and, knowing philosophy, will always be ). Kant's system has problems as well, and Humean philosophers might indeed have something to say about Kant's response. ~M~
Philosophy is disciplined bewilderment. A mathematician is a person who thinks that if there are supposed to be three people in a room, but five come out, then two more must enter the room in order for it to be empty. http://www.beyondappearances.com

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