Vive la Philosophy of Kant

Kant is the philosopher that I can most relate to so far in our studies of the philosophy of human nature. It seems like we have kept a lot of his ideas and they influence our daily lives. An interesting idea that he believed was this idea of the human mind only being capable of knowing things in space and time. We cannot know something that we are not programmed to perceive. To illustrate this unique view of the human perspective, Dr. Clark gave the example that our minds are like a black and white television. The reality of what we are seeing may be in color, but our minds are only programmed to see in black and white. We cannot really know what the reality is because what we perceive in our mind is different than the contents that came into our mind. I cannot know something the way it was prior to my experiencing it because it was out of my time and space. I can relate this to the idea we have now of cultures being ethnocentric. This is not a perfect parallel, but more like the idea of ethnocentricity stemmed off of Kant's ideas. It helps me to understand his idea by relating it to the cultural lens that we perceive the world out of. It is almost like Kant's idea is that there is a common lens for all humankind that affects our assessment of the things we experience.

Kant also believes that we should treat people as ends. We are all rational beings that are capable of reason and morality and it is not within our power to decide what one person is of greater importance or value than another. If we treat ourselves as an end because you think that you are valuable, you should treat everyone else that way because we are all capable of the same things. This idea is a great advancement from the philosophy that we have studied prior to Kant. It is the first time that we have seen an expectancy of humility in human nature. Past philosophers have talked about the importance of striving for your own happiness and not worrying about others, this idea of what's right for you is what's right for me. I believe that every human is capable of being good and moral, so it is interesting to see where this idea originated and what other ideas were popping up at this time.

The area that I find Kant disagreeable in is his view on God and the soul. He treats both God and the soul as an afterthought; they are things we can hope for, but will never truly know. It is almost as if he is saying, "It would be nice if there was a God and an afterlife, but these are things we can only hope for." To believe in something is not just to hope for it. It is not just something that you dream about. It is something that you put your trust in and you spend time and effort to understand. You can get to know God if you want to, but you can't just hope that he's there and that he's listening. You have to try and build a relationship with Him and you will know that He is real.