deeper source of knowledge that is neither based on reason nor the senses. See: An Enquiry Concerning Hume's Misunderstanding

 Dr Michael Huemer has brought together arguments and added his own to show knowledge can not be based only on sense perception and not only on reason. Thus you would think that knowledge needs both,-- or perhaps a better approach is that of Dr Kelley Ross [the Kant- Fries School of thought] that there is a deeper source of knowledge that is neither based on reason nor the senses.

It occurred to me that this might very well answer a question in the Critique of Pure Reason where Kant shows that there must be a connection between the categories [of pure reason] and the sense perception data that comes in. [That he calls the Transcendental Deduction.] Yet it has been a source of difficulty to see that just because something Must Be So, why should it be so? [I mean that the data from the senses must be ordered by Reason,-- but how?

I think Dr Kelley Ross based on Kant, Fries, and Leonard Nelson shows this well.

[Hegel thinks that  Being leads up to Logos.  That is the structure of his whole system. [like Plotinus] So he surely believes there is this connection, but he has a different answer --that even sense perception is thought. His idea of what "thought" is a wider than the Hume definition that it is only what can be derived by definitions. You can see this approach in Cunningham in his thesis in 1910. But more than that, you might note that Hume's limitation on reason is assumed, but never proved. [as Bryan Caplan noted] (in: An Enquiry Concerning Hume's Misunderstanding ). He just says over and over that reason alone can only tell us about self contradictions of deductions from axioms. Something he learned from Euclid. As Kant showed that is not true. There are apriori truths not based on definitions. It does seem hard to see why it took such a long time for the implications of Fries and Nelson to be put together in a systematic way by Kelley Ross.--but I guess that is just the way things turned out. 

The implication of all this is simple--it gives justification of faith. And it also shows the approach of the mediaevals -that reason tells us what to believe in. [Not that there is just faith and reason in the Middle Ages, but that reason tells us what to believe in. ]

See Maverick Philosopher who hold the same way but not in so many words.

z50 music file

 z50 D Minor

I have never been very happy about Communism.

Even though there is some debate about China --especially due to their claim on the South China Sea and Taiwan I have to to say that I have never been very happy about Communism. But a lot depends on your starting point. If you are in a Western Democracy--Taiwan, Japan, Europe, England, the USA, Australia, etc. well then obviously a totalitarian communist dictatorship is a step down. But if one is in a situation of chaos and breakdown of civilization then you need some system that can bring order and peace even if it is totalitarian. I discovered this in the Ukraine where everyone said that things were better under the USSR than now.

So there is some element of the deception of the Zohar

I can see that in Torah also there us the legal aspect Gemara, and the spiritual.

The thing about the spiritual aspect is that  it has the highest danger of delusion. And in Torah there were books like the Sefer Hayetzira and mystics. The problem that the Sitra Achra, the Dark Side,  that gets mixed up in this area. And when it comes to "spiritual" things, it is hard to now what is from the realm of holiness and what is from the Dark Side. 

You can have great saints [tzadikim] that serve God through personal  fasting and prayer, like the Ari, the Gra. Rav Nahman, still the fact that they believed in the Zohar means there is a certain element that gets mixed up with them. After all the Zohar can not be from R. Shimon ben Yochai since on every few pages is contained the phrase עם כל דא מתורגם מן עם כל זה--"although" in the time of R Shimon ben Yochai was אף על פי או אף על גב. The  עם כל דא מתורגם מן עם כל זה is a medieval invention by the family of translators --the Ibn Tibon family.  So there is some element of the deception of the Zohar that gets mixed up with the good. Most people involved in mysticism are not spiritual but delusional

John Locke and Montesquieu, the American system of Justice

I wish I could share with others the feeling of being astounded realizing that the American system of Justice  which finds some middle ground between freedom and equality--which are after all exact opposites. [If you force everyone to be equal then no-one is free. If everyone is free then immediately no one is equal because some fail and some excel.] 

I wonder from where this system comes from? I know the founding fathers studied John Locke and Montesquieu and the Roman republic and the Athenian Democracy. But I also began to see that it was highly based on the English system. But I could see little in philosophy that could result in such a system. It seemed piecemeal. Ad Hoc. Rather than based on John Locke, the English system was explained by John Locke after it was already in place especially after the Glorious Revolution.

[Plato certainly never recommended such a system. Rather his system resembled many aspects of Sparta but with most of the brutality taken out. The Roman Republic  had  two central bodies of authority, the  the Plebeians and the Senate, [as reflected in the sign of Rome SPQR ] . But that was just as Ad Hoc. The people were given  authority and the tribunes in order to stop the disintegration of Rome. There was no theory behind it. There was no theory behind the Magna Carta nor the Provisions of Oxford. Only after the fact, did it become clear that this form of government meant freedom and human flourishing.

one is not supposed to worship an intermediate.

We know one is not supposed to worship an intermediate. And the Rambam considers that to be the main prohibition of idolatry. So it is easy nowadays to see the reason for the signature of the Gra on the letter of excommunication. I can understand that at the time of the herem/ excommunication it was not clear to most people what the problem was. So most people ignored the herem (excommunication) that the Gra signed. But\ nowadays it is abundantly clear.

[Even Rav Nahman mentions this important principle in the LeM vol I perek 62. One is not supposed  to worship an intermediate. So one could ask on why Rav Nahman seems to contradict himself in terms of the need to a "tzadik." I am not sure how to answer this, but I still feel that Rav Nahman himself was not included in the herem, so I feel more or less at ease in learning what is possible from his writings.

Attitudes. One is total belief like when one is a child. Then skepticism like when one gets to college and doubts everything. The higher naivety is in between. The Goldie Locks approach. Not too hot, not too cold.

 In the study of history there is something called "the higher naivety". There are two other attitudes. One is total belief like when one is a child. )Then skepticism like when one gets to college and doubts everything. (as some say about Homer. They say you can not learn anything from Homer about the age before the Greek States.] Like chariots. Some thought they were an anachronism. But later it turned out from archeology that there were chariots in the time of the war on Troy. ) The higher naivety is in between. It is to believe unless one can not. What can make something not believable? Self contradictions. Or external evidence. [You might see some of Hegel here about synthesis.]

Similar in philosophy there is an attitude to try to take apart. Then there is the sort of reading called "charity"--that is if a great philosopher writes something that does not seem to make sense, to try to make sense of it and say he meant something that is more sensible. (Michael Huemer is with "He meant what he said'' view.))Then there is "He meant what he said" but to try to find some way of making sense of it.

This is  how many other issues can be approached. The Goldie Locks approach. Not too hot, not too cold. But just right.  In Rav Nahman' writings there are amazing insights and other things that are less than believable. {Maybe he himself was saying these in a half humorous fashion, or perhaps not well understood. So you throw out everything? I say not. You leave the great insights and ignore what seems less well thought out. {It is characteristic of Western thought to be "either or." It is all right or all wrong.. I tend to be in the middle. Some is right and some needs to be ignored.