PHILOSOPHY - Kant: On Metaphysical Knowledge [HD]

Kant famously claims that we have synthetic apriori knowledge. Indeed, this claim is absolutely central to all of his philosophy. But what is synthetic apriori knowledge? Scott Edgar helpfully breaks-down this category of knowledge by first walking through Kant's distinction between empirical and apriori knowledge and then his distinction between analytic and synthetic judgments. The interaction between these distinctions is then illustrated with numerous examples, making it clear why Kant, unlike Hume, thought that there is knowledge that is both apriori and synthetic and that this is the type of knowledge philosophers seek.

Help us caption & translate this video!

[GainingUnderstanding]

This video did a great job of explaining the complexities of Kant. He's a difficult read.

[ryanh.]

This description is excellent! I've been struggling with understanding this concept for the past 4 hours. Specifically, Kant's concept in contrast to Hume's. I wish I would have watched this video 4 hours ago.

[rhYT]

My 2 cents: This video, while good, is presented in isolation from all that Kant was saying in the Critique. With his Critique, Kant was objecting to Hume and Locke, whose explanations resulted in a totally constructivist world view, thus a totally subjective world view. Kant agreed that we see a constructed world view, but claimed we don't actively construct it, rather the brain/mind is set up in such a way - with filters and concepts built in - that what we see (world picture) is fated. Then, if there is a way to get beyond that fate, the way might be to find apriori synthetic stuff that helps reveal how the mind/brain bases it's construction of our world view. Then maybe we get closer to knowing things in themselves rather than just their attributes. Maybe apriori synthetics offer shortcuts to certainties.

I think Kant would agree that any way we may get at certainties may not reveal ultimate reality, or it might, we won't know for sure, but merely cutting to the chase may be very useful in sorting things out. Apriori synthetic may be the most reliable knowledge that we can bank on.

[ili]

this is a great video, very concise and to the point- makes it easy to understand Kant's transcendental idealism

[josephmarcotte]

I reduced the settings speed down to a lower level in this video so I can hear it at a slower rate to absorb the information better and allowing me time in between to think and compare to what is being said.

[cfalcon]

Great, but shouldve included a few more examples/spent more time on the last portion explaining synthetic apriori

[oarevalo]

What is the current state of philosophy in accepting this idea about metaphysics? It seems to me that's falling out of favor for a few reasons, but mainly because science has begun to tackle metaphysics questions like free will, the arrow of time, and existence of time itself as an irreducible property of reality, and the need for causality relations. The metaphysical idea of locality and absolute time have already been tackled and found to not hold experimentally, which means that these metaphysical ideas cannot be a priori. That raises the question if any metaphysical ideas are a priori. It's also clear to mathematicians that definitions used in mathematics are arbitrary and in fact many varieties of mathematics exist which have been found useful in physics but where the set of those a priori axioms are different. I don't think we can take Kant's claim about the necessity and universality of a priori truths seriously anymore.

[daledheyalef]

Math was not a very helpful example...it's highly debatable. Aren't time and space generally given as examples of synthetic a priori? We necessarily interpret experience according to time and space (also cause-and-effect), but they cannot be intuited prior to experience. Meaning: we only discover the constructs of time and space through experience, but there is no way to experience reality without time or space. Synthetic (we know it through experience), a priori (necessarily true).

[zubairahmadshahi]

Thank you Sir, I hope everyone enjoyed the vedio, it is one of the most easiest look to understand Kant, I got 80% by the grace of ur this act, thank you once again... 👌👌👌👌

[rumplstiltztinkerstein]

Don't read the comments! You will regret it.

[TheGerogero]

I don't see the fact that the angles of a triangle sum to 180° as a fact that is not contained in the definition of a triangle, "a three sided figure enclosed on a plane". Mathematical knowledge is discovered, not invented; analytic knowledge is not necessarily trivial.

[fredrikj]

Fun fact: for non-flat geometries there can be triangles which angles sum up to more or less than 180 degrees.

[abhishalsharma]

2:57 can't we say that maths or a priori knowledge is also ultimately empirical knowledge as we know those truths only after having the empirical experience of our world?
e.g., we know 7+5=12 only after having experienced such truth in our childhood. Whereas a stone or any other thing can't say that 7+5=12 simply because they can't experience it like we do.

[matthewa]

I'm of the impression that Frege didn't agree here and subsequently nor did Quine? However, I still think Kant is key to understanding the nature of knowledge in any deep way.

Thanks.

[jessshu]

less than a minute into the video — Kant was Prussian; stop Prussian Erasure from history

[FatehBazerbachi]

I see that this is restricted to the realm of math, however, is there any other examples of synthetic a priori knowledge? I cant fathom any.

[faridabdulov]

I've just discovered your channel and I'm more than happy! Great job!

[kaleyhall]

Kant is the most overrated philosopher. Every time I read Kant, I am struck by how doggedly fallacious his arguments were. This goes from his position on lying, to his glorification of reason, from which he indulged in a grandiose sense of intellect, as do many today.

[sled]

"this is the type of knowledge philosophers seek",   sure there are mathematical axioms etc. that existed but were unknown at the time Kant wrote his philosophy, but can it really be called "knowledge" if its not yet known? doesn't this negate the metaphysical idea since it does take empirical knowledge of things to understand and even come up with abstract ideas like mathematics.?

[johnnowakowski]

Why can't people just explain the basic idea without the gobbldiguk?.??