Why does Kant want morality to be universal?

Why does Kant want morality to be universal? The reason is that he wants its existence to be perceived by reason. And reason perceives universals. (note 1) Now some universals are laws like laws of math. Some universals are other types of predicates. But Kant knows that he can't make morality into a universal like laws of math. Remember he was highly influenced by Hume. So he wants the universal morality to be a universal "ought".

 He also wants a certain ambiguity about its nature, but not about its existence. This is his opinion for dinge an sich (things in themselves). ("Unconditioned realities" in the language of philosophers.)

 Use the modification of Kant by Hegel. With Kant by himself you can't get reason to perceive the character of ethical laws. You need Reason to get to where Kant is trying to go.
[I should mention you always need to modify Kant. The surface level of what he says is sometimes wrong. But if you look into the deeper idea behind the words he is often implying a true and deep idea.]






  That personal freedom and economic freedom are valuable really seems to be  from  the separation of realms and different grounds of validity.

[note: The third formulation of the Categorical Imperative is “the Idea of the will of every rational being as a will that legislates universal law.” (4:432)]

At any rate, let me just say that I think the human problem needs a lot more that political or economic solutions. The problem is not just the dimension of morality, but the basic question what is the meaning of life? (This was the primary question of the 1960's, and sadly the answer to most people was political Liberation movements or fanatic Jewish or Eastern religious cults.)

I admit I have no great answer for this. But I do have an idea. It starts with  Maimonides. Because Maimonides managed to mediate between the two poles of Reason and Faith and formed a kind of synthesis or lightening rod. With him there is no contraction between Aristotle and the Torah.

The ground of holiness is different from that of reason. The radical Maimonides synthesis between Torah and Aristotle seems to me to need some improvement. First of all I am a Neo-Platonist. This is by education and also it is the way I think. Reading Plato when I was a teenager it think contributes to me tendency to say unpopular opinions and not be afraid to do so. I think clearly the example of Socrates contributed to this. But at any rate, I see spiritual reality just as real as atoms and molecules.


The thing which complicates this issue is often a doctrine that seems promising, seems to have a long string of crazy people attached to it. Since what makes spirituality interesting is its human element --it is impossible to separate it from the actions of people following a certain doctrine. What I mean is if the Talmud  was just some intellectual exercise that had nothing to do with people, then first of all they would not be interesting. So the fact that they have to so with people means that people following their teachings have to indicate to us to some degree the qualities of that doctrine.

However I do agree with Maimonides in that we should deny ‘there are good reasons for the polarization between faith and knowledge (which became an empirical feature of European modernity). There are no such reasons, on Maimonides' view,

The question is of course why is there no conflict? Is it because because Jewish theism – proved hospitable to and incorporated rational inquiry from the beginning, in the form of Greek philosophy.

However there is a ground of spirituality that is different from reason. The ground of spirit and the ground of reason in some way are in conflict because the principles are different but they are not in conflict in that both are important parts of what it means to be human.
If this is not clear just think of a circle of values. The closer you get to the top the more numinous value you have and less form. The more towards the bottom the more form and less numinous content

Notes
(note 1) Universals. I have (let's say for an example) two white pieces of paper in front of me. Do they have something in common? Yes. Whiteness.  So Whiteness is a universal. It is something that individuals have in common.

Appendix: One reason why Kant ought to be important to people is he provides a nice modification of Plato and neo Platonism. This is to where Jewish Philosophers were trying to go after the Rambam, [e.g. Crescas and Abravenal,] The Rambam was going pretty much with Aristotle and this seems to me to be a problem because knowledge of the physical form does not give knowledge of universals plus some basic problem in the Metaphysics. Maybe the Rambam can account for these problems? It would be nice to know if he does. But I do no have  Guide with me to do the research to see if he does. [I mean it is likely that he did hint to some answers in the Guide but I have not heard that anyone has found such hints.]

Where there are Muslims, things go "Boom!"

Iran’s chief of staff vowed Sunday to eliminate Israel.
As usual in the media there is not a peep.
The problem here is simple cause and effect. Where there are Muslims, things blow up. Most Jewish and Christian people don't have explosives in their underwear. Let's see now, who attacked us on 9/11? Muslims. Who was the attempted shoe bomber? A Muslim. Who attacked the USS Cole? Muslims. So, who should we be watching? Buddhists? Catholic nuns? I don't think so!!


In face of the Muslim threat to the continuance of Human Life on Earth, I suggest that people should prepare a survival kit. And in particular, I recommend the essay of Dr. Leonard Horowitz on the how to protect oneself in case of a Terrorist Chemical or Biological attack. Also notice the covertness blog I have a link to which has lots of good suggestions.
http://www.tetrahedron.org/articles/apocalypse/bio_chem_guide.html

I should mention it is a good idea to be part of a community in which people care about each other.  This is the reason there are communities that I decided to leave when I saw this kind of relationship between people was publicly advertised, but in fact missing. In fact, I have become wary of people that are too friendly. Over friendliness is the first most important sign that someone has something up their sleeve.

The problem with Muslims I think is that they are de-evolving. This would probably be because  of lack of female choice. Female choice is an important part of evolution. When the females choose the best guys the species improves. Muslim women have not had female choice so it is inevitable they would degenerate into a sub species, while the rest of the human species evolves upward.

Now this does not seem like a John Locke kind of concept of the common rights of man. But for that to work mankind would have to be one species. And we are rapidly evolving into two different ones.
The West is becoming Homo Occident. Muslims are becomes Homo Simia

.
After all the most basic assumption in all American universities (outside of the natural science departments) is relativism. The trouble with relativism is not just that is is wrong, but that it is self refuting. It makes a claim that you can't make a claim about truth values that is independent of the person making the claim. So it denies its own claim to truth.
I quote [http://www.euvolution.com/euvolution/useless.html]: Today's postmodern philosophers deny the very existence of science, nature and truth, largely because their favorite verbal abstraction of "equality" is undermined by the brute statistical reality of human biological differences. The philosopher Richard Rorty recently informed us in Atlantic Monthly that " 'The homosexual,' 'the Negro,' and 'the female' are best seen not as inevitable classifications of human beings but rather as inventions that have done more harm than good." Therefore, according to Rorty, many deconstructionists "go on to suggest that quarks and genes probably are [inventions] too." You have to be as eminent a philosopher as Rorty to believe that the category of "the female" is a mere social convention.:


The way one might defend moral relativism would be by saying a claim about moral claims is a meta moral claim and not a moral claim in itself. It is about the set of all moral claims, and thus not self refuting.  See John Seale in his refutation of all relativism. But his refutation does not seem to apply to moral relativism
The aspect of orthodoxy that is bad is that it makes fanaticism into a norm. And then goes out of its way to claim that that is not what it is doing. This is a new invention and has nothing to do with traditional Judaism.

I think there is a deep spiritual reality inside the Torah and Talmud.

This was a question asked of me a few years back and my answer:

 (from the beginning of this May 4.5.12):"First, I am in need of some kind of deprogramming. I attended aish ten years ago for ten months and have never been able to shake the feeling that I am a bad person for not being orthodox. Any suggestions?
Second, do you believe or think that the Torah was actually given to Moses on Mt. Sinai? Everything I read in the academic world (James Kugel and some of his footnotes, David Carr at Union Theological, several others here and there) tells me that Orthodox Jews are mistaken in this belief. Also, the Greeks began the idea of authorship and it it is even likely that until Hellenic times no one said that Moses wrote the Torah. But once they gave authorship out, the Jews gave the Torah to Moses.
Third, are all of us ex-aishers suffering cult like symptoms of guilt and fear? Are all Jews suffering this as well? What is the future of Orthodoxy? I think it will always “pretend” because the community matters so very much. But what do you think?"


Torah from heaven is not the same as Torah from Sinai.
The Written and Oral Torah are inspired from Heaven. That has nothing to do with the physical location of where there were written. From what we know from the Rambam many parts of the Torah are allegories and were never meant to be taken literally. That includes Genesis.
Genesis was meant to tell us Creation ex nihilo. (That already cancels Orthodoxy. The irony is they like to claim others are falsify Torah.)





First Torah from Sinai is often confused with the issue of "Is the Talmud from Sinai?"
Part of the problem in the Orthodox world is that they succeeded in spreading the claim that everyone in Europe accepted that the Talmud was from Mount Sinai. This stacks the deck for Orthodox Judaism.
But it is false. No Jews in Europe thought the Talmud was given at Mount Sinai. The very idea in itself is ludicrous. Jews thought it is a great book that explains with great logical rigor how to keep the Torah. Saying it is a great book is not the same as the claim that it is from Sinai. No Jewish people in America thought the Talmud was from Sinai before the fanatic Orthodox came. The way the got people to believe this is by the fact that faith is a good. When it gets too expensive people don't buy it. The orthodox paid people to believe it by the promise of sex, shiduch, and money.

[My parents and all their friends had never heard of the idea that Talmud was from Sinai and if it had been mentioned they would have laughed.]


However being influenced by Plato and Kant (I believe in the world of Forms), I have to admit that I think there is a deep spiritual reality inside the Torah and Talmud [numinous is the current word for it]. (The dinge als sich selbest- the thing in itself.) Normally I would have just gone with Schopenhauer on this question and called God "the Will" and be done with it [i.e. an irrational force]. But according to later writings of Schopenhauer the the thing in itself is multidimensional. The irrational will is just one dimension. So I am led back to the basic idea of God being good in the long run. i.e the God of Moses, Job and Plato.
First I think holiness belongs to the realm of the thing in itself.
note: Things-in-themselves are the way that reality exists apart from our experience, our consciousness, our minds, and all the conditions that our minds might impose on phenomenal objects.

The Talmud excels.

The Talmud rocks!

The separation of milk and meat is in fact based on verses. This is one area in which the Talmud excels. Even if I think the Talmud is not perfect, but it excels in certain areas; and understanding verses is one of those areas. Though I am not holding in that subject matter right now, in working out in a logically rigorous manner the meaning and the laws of different commandments the Gemara [Talmud] does an excellent job, and in fact the only job.



It has been many years since I looked at that subject but so I don't remember the exact idea but just for an example of the way the Gemara looks at verses from a rigorous perceptive look at Bava Metzia at the end of chapter 11 and the many long Tosphot there.

The greatness of stereotypes

The greatness of stereotypes.
I have made a career of not believing stereotypes and giving different groups the benefit of a doubt. I have always been proved wrong and the stereotypes have always proved true.




Observe:

Kirsten Brydum was traveling across the country with an Amtrak pass and an old bicycle. She was meeting with fellow Marxists around the country and campaigning for Obama. Fresh from protesting the RNC National Convention, she arrived in New Orleans by train. While bicycling around New Orleans’ all black 9th ward ghetto to campaign for Obama, she was shot in the head. Residents would not even call the police to notify them that a dead white girl was laying on the sidewalk. Her body laid in the streets for hours until a construction crew drove by and noticed her.

Even the New Orleans police issued a statement saying “robbery does not appear to be the motivation.” All evidence suggests that she was murdered simply because she was white.

That girl would still be alive today, if only she had believed the “racist” stereotypes about black violence.

I quote Pinker: "The Blank Slate has also served as a sacred scripture for political and ethical beliefs. According to the doctrine, any differences we see among races, ethnic groups, sexes, and individuals come not from differences in their innate constitution but from differences in their experiences. Change their experiences—by reforming parenting, education, the media, and social rewards—and you can change the person. Underachievement, poverty, and antisocial behavior can be ameliorated; indeed, it is irresponsible not to do so. [Hence, the social engineering of the Left.] And discrimination on the basis of purportedly inborn traits of a sex or ethnic group is simply irrational.
The doctrine of the Blank Slate became entrenched in intellectual life in a form that has been called the Standard Social Science Model or social constructionism. The model is now second nature to people and few are aware of the history behind it."

There is a curious feature about American politics. A substantial body of political opinion, in the media, academia, and popular culture,and the White House [ simply despises America -- its history, its principles, and its institutions.

A few problems in America that need correcting


[1] The empirical approach of John Locke is not true for these reasons: (1) People have other ways of receiving information than just the five senses. For example I know a piece of paper can't be green and blue at the same time in the same place. I don't know how much this affects the whole John Locke type of Government scheme which eventually became the United States of America. Maybe not much. Clearly Kant was just as liberal as Locke and he was the one who plowed the middle ground between the empiricists like Locke and the Rationalist like Leibniz.
(2) Desire for sex overcomes the desire for self preservation. Desire to protect one's family and children overcomes the desire for self preservation. If self preservation was so absolute no one would cross the street-ever.
(3) People are not born blank slates and can't be social engineered to be what you want them to be. However it is a fundamental tenet of Feminism that people can be socially engineered. This is wrong and they know it because they never admit to this principle in public.


[2] The other problem is that while there are individual black people that are fine outstanding Americans (Allen West is a good examples) the general black population is highly hostile to the U.S.A. except to get as much money they can by welfare, and have contributed highly to its moral and social decay. The problem of a major hostile population in America is something the Constitution was never meant to deal with. It is the same reason you don't want Arabs to be voting for their governments in the Middle East;-- because that will only result in a major Muslim terrorist state that is powerful rich with oil and highly antagonistic towards Western Civilization.

[3] Civil society is like a circle inside a larger circle. It is the area the American government was meant designed to protect. This is the area of private contracts between people that government has no right to interfere with. This is a realm that the government has already entered and controls. But this precious area I hold was intended to be the place for personal observance of the Bible. For civil society needs a holy core to power it. Without that it is empty of meaning.

[4] "Democrat" has come to mean ideas that are wrong. For example while human rights are good, the meaning of rights in the Bill of Rights are negative rights. They refer to things you have that the government can't take away. Rights do not refer to things you can demand from other people, e.g. not to feel insulted. There is no such thing as a right to receive money, goods, or services from anyone else. Social benefits and health care are charities, not rights. The idea of rights has become useless. I claim it is better to go back to the Ten Commandments, and especially the one that goes contrary to all liberal agenda: "Thou shalt not covet anything that is of thy neighbors'."


[5] An example of where this entitlement mentality leads. The family of Thomas Duncan, the person that brought the Ebola Virus to the USA from Africa wants to sue? What is wrong with this family? Duncan lied to get onto his flight to the U.S. and never should have been here to begin with. He exposed hundreds of people to Ebola and infected at least two of the nurses who dedicated themselves to his care and are now fighting for their own lives. Duncan received far better care than he would have in Liberia. It would be appropriate for the Duncan Family to express nothing but gratitude to Texas Health Presbyterian which provided the best care they could for Duncan and did so with compassion and risk to their own lives.