Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, Robert Paul Wolff Lecture 2

[nicolasisaksson]

This is trascendental. I recommend a priori that everybody watch it. You will thank me a posteriori.

[easyspanish]

Someone get this man a replica of his old license plate 😂

[giorgiomalvezzi]

These conferences are truly fascinating even if the topics dealt with are not at all simple nor do they have the concreteness of everyday problems; the way in which the Professor manages to involve us and drag us into philosophical reasoning is very beautiful. Thank you for the opportunity to attend these classes, it is a privilege, it is a great personal enrichment!

[luckOFtheIRISH]

Also I would like to state that it's extremely enjoyable listening to someone who grasps the profound notions that Kant realized. I'm sure it wasn't easy for him to cram 9 years worth of meditation and compartmentalizing the grandest concepts known to man into a couple of books, and anyone that can understand his incoherent rambling for pages and pages has my utmost respect.

[fredjohnson]

This is beyond fabulous. I can't wait for each one. Thank

[achimkriechel]

I never tought that Kant realy cross the Atlantic and find such a profound understanding. Thanks a lot for these impressiv lectures.

[mistymouse]

The point made at the end, that Kant makes a sharp distinction between understanding and sensibility, reminds me of a similar point Alfred North Whitehead made. In Process and Reality, Whitehead wrote, "It is a complete mistake to ask how concrete particular fact can be built up out of universals. The answer is 'In no way.' The true philosophic question is, how can concrete fact exhibit entities abstract from itself and yet participated in by its own nature? In other words, philosophy is explanatory of abstraction, not of concreteness."

Thanks for making these lectures publicly available.

[arlofarts]

This is so wonderful - and I love all of his joy filled stories and enriching tangents

[RAMZIAARON]

" I gotta tell you a story. I cant help my self " Love it!

[finmoorhouse]

Thanks so much for posting these, they're really useful!

[bambamhookes]

I have to say I was impressed by the Russel story, and I'm absolutely mindblown by the Quine--Tarski story. Awesome! thanks for uploading

[charlesdesobry]

I think the reason Kant draws a sharp distinction between sensibility and understanding is two-fold:

1. Without this distinction, true certainty is always in question. This is what Kant identifies as the issue between the Empiricists and the Rationalists—that the Empiricists beginning with intuition could never reach any universal claim about reality. Intuition can only ever tell us something might happen and never that it must—the problem of induction. The rationalist, on the other hand, lacked a true reference for their conceptual mode of grasping the world. Concept only ever related to other concepts and therefore there was always a risk of circular truths.

Second, Kant must posit a distinction between understanding and sensibility to remain consistent with his theory of space and time as forms of intuition. Kant identifies these forms of intuition as substrates of subjectivity in which space makes possible our relationship to external objects, and time makes possible our self-relation, and therefore the very unity of the thinking subject. Kant therefore must draw a distinction within the subject between modes of knowledge which are fundamentally self-referential (concepts and categories) and modes of knowledge which depend on external affects (empirical judgements). The only way of making sense of a subject whose basic relationship to the world is spatio-temporal is to divide the subject into the inner/outer sense. One corresponds to understanding, and the other correspond to intuition

[Alkis]

"The important is not Kant,
It is the stories you enjoy along the way."

[alexandrapopova]

Amazing! The way you deliver your lectures makes me feel as if I participate in a philosophical discourse in one of your classes. You make years spent in college, and dollars paid to boring, snobbish professors seem worthless. Thank you

[imnot_]

Wonderful to experience these series. Very thankful to prof Wolff and authors of this video.

[OdradekLive]

Few academic philosophers are genuinely hilariously funny. RPW's humor is of a piece with his sensitive, thoughtful engagement with issues of serious concern for human beings. Dream grandfather figure/mentor/interlocutor, this guy. Obviously also these lectures are fantastic, the content yes of course but the fact that he cares about doing these publicly--it's quite rare that academic philosophers will open up their serious lectures to the public. As in, not insulting the intelligence of non-academics by dumbing everything down but rather giving the public the straight not-from-concentrate Juice of the philosophy; and also not insulating these robust discussions within the confines of the academy

[enlightenedturtle]

Thank you.

I'm coming to Kant from Schopenhauer, which makes this significantly easier.

[cotecine]

Thank you for your lectures. Keep them coming. 👍

[psychonaut]

Absolutely fascinating. I will be watching the rest.

[JohnVKaravitis]

15:30 Explanation of word "transcendental."