This week's lecture and seminar have helped me to clarify a few things I could not really get my head around before. My main issue was the question about a priori and a posteriori knowledge and if one can exist without the other - especially if a priori knowledge or cognition can exist without a posteriori knowledge. Our discussion around this, especially in the seminar, helped me to come to the conclusion that NO, a priori knowledge cannot really exist without a posteriori knowledge. Also, my initial understanding of a priori wasn't completely true and the seminar helped me to understand its true meaning.
However, this was not Kant's focus area anyways. His main goal was to question our intuitively self-evident perception of the world and our knowledge about the world. A priori and a posteriori were only two concepts which he used to describe his thoughts. Nonetheless, solving the a priori/a posteriori issue first helped me to understand his intuition better.
In the lecture, I also learned about other interesting principles related to Kant, such as analytic and synthetic judgement and scientific objectivity, as well as primary vs. secondary qualities. Also, some hands-on examples, especially in the seminar, made it a lot easier to understand more of Kant - not only the "school book version". One of our examples was what would happen if E.T. came to the earth and pointed at a white rabbit and said a random word, this is a scenario I will definitely keep in my head.
It was also very interesting to have Kant put into a context with other philosophers, from Plato, centuries before him, to, for example, Foucault and Thomas Kuhn who investigated Kant's ideas further and from another angle. Having said that, we did not really discuss Plato's Theaetetus in any detail. On the one hand, I thought that it would have been good to discuss this text a bit more - on the other hand, I felt that I personally, and seemingly also the others in the group, had more problems and unclear thoughts about Kant, so it was good that we split up the time as we did.
All in all, this week's lecture and seminar have actually provided me with the feeling of having understood at least a bit of Kant's thoughts, even though I had already studied him a bit in high school - but probably only the "school book version".
Thank you for your text. I liked that you started with explaining two terms, a priori and a posteriori and then coming to the conclusion about what Kant really wanted to investigate; our perception and knowledge of the world. I think that synthetic a priori still is a part of that investigation. He contemplates on to what extent we can rely on synthetic a priori to gain knowledge of the world. I agree in that it is interesting to see Kants philosophy investigated and developed further by other philosophers.
SvaraRaderaI liked how you connected the two philosophies of Kant and Plato and compared them to each other putting Kant's concept of a priori and a posteriori knowledge on Plato’s theories! I might now read into the themes of philosophical empiricism, this sounds interesting!
SvaraRaderaReading your after blog post on the lecture and the seminar, it gets clear that the discussions elucidated things for you, especially how we should understand Kant's theory on a priori knowledge. I was in the same seminar where E.T. came up as a visual sample, which surprisingly clarified things up for me as well. Who knew that changing to the perspective of an alien would make our own understanding of the world clearer!
Hi,about the apriori knowledge,professor assumed if we came to a room which exactly had 20 people.however,we can not clear how many people there without counting or other preparation.In some degree,it convinced the existence of a posteriori knowledge.I think there is the cause relationship between the apriori and posteriori knowledge.
SvaraRaderaHi, very interesting comparison of a priori and posteriori in perspectives of Socrates and Kant. It was new for me that a posteriori cognition perceived through the senses. Now I understand what is the relation between these two texts and how a priori and posteriori are connected. So if I understand correctly, to Socrates' mind, we perceive that world through senses, so it means that our gained knowledge is posteriori?
SvaraRaderaHi!
SvaraRaderaGreat blog post. You wrote that you initial understanding of some of Kant's thoughts about a priori and posteriori where not entirely true. I think this goes for most of us. I also find it difficult at first but the seminar helped me understand. You also wrote that Kant's main objective was to explain knowledge and perception and that a priori and posteriori are just ways of doing so - which I agree on! Kant's starting point is that there is lots of knowledge in the world, he never questions this. He wants to know HOW the knowledge is structured.
Really interesting to read your explanation of what a priori and a posteriori knowledge is, and it really makes sense that a priori knowledge should not be able to exist without a posteriori knowledge. Because, like I just read in another blog, a theory is a priori only if we can verify it by thinking. And without the a posteriori knowledge we would not be able to think about anything really.
SvaraRaderaGreat post! I feel like for every post I read I understand the topic a little bit more.
Hi, you are not alone with being a bit confused after reading the texts. Just like you i had som trouble understanding the different concepts. But it all became more clear after the seminar and lecture. So I think your explanation of posteriori and priori knowledge is good and it seems like you have gotten a better understanding now.
SvaraRaderaI thought you blog post for this theme was interesting to read and I would like to know more about the E.T senario :)