What is right reason?
  • MichaelJYoo
    9
    What does “reason” or “right reason” mean, especially when used in contradistinction to passions/appetites? And what does it mean when philosophers (Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, the Stoics, Christian philosophers, Locke, and others) have said that we “ought to live according to right reason?” It doesn’t seem to me that by “reason” here, they mean that faculty unique to man whereby he is able to make logical deductions based on premises, or something of that sort. I feel like I understand experientially what is being conveyed especially since I myself feel tension between a part of me that recognizes, approves, and esteems what is good (or what is better) whereas another part of me desires the opposite. I feel like my reason is my “true and better self” whereas my passions are the unruly part that need to be subject to what I know is good. Anyhow, what have philosophers meant by “reason/right reason” in contradistinction to passions/appetite, and what does it mean to live according to right reason?
    MichaelJYoo Options
  • javi2541997
    5.8k
    ↪MichaelJYoo


    It is a free open answer. Also, it depends of which philosopher are we influenced of. I guess when they explain
    right reason
    it refers to all of these thoughts that wouldn't make me feel like I am
    mistaken
    . I mean, the purest dorm of reason.
    For example, Descartes said that right reason is equivalent to reality and then he estated that reality is something that despite your are dreaming you are not wrong (Descartes put as example in this context, geometry).
    In the other hand, John Locke, as empiricist, thought the right reason comes from primary attributes then we are taught what is a right reason.

    So, in this point, it is so open define what we should consider as a right reason and everyone can even make their own answer.
    javi2541997 Options
  • Wayfarer
    22.6k
    Anyhow, what have philosophers meant by “reason/right reason” in contradistinction to passions/appetite, and what does it mean to live according to right reason? — MichaelJYoo

    There is a big difference between the conception of reason in ancient philosophy and modern. The ancients intuitively felt that there was a relationship between the faculty of reason, and the order of the cosmos, that they mirror each other in some way. This is of course a rather mystical intuition, and modern philosophy generally despises mysticism. As a consequence reason has been, from the ancients' viewpoint, deprecated by moderns, by being seen as a subjective faculty that has been shaped by the requirements of biological adaption. While it is still powerful, it's power has been instrumentalised, that is, rationalised in terms of the kinds of outcomes favoured by the prevailing culture. This idea is explored more fully in Max Horkheimer's book The Eclipse of Reason, which was written shortly after WWII.

    Refs

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nous

    https://www.rep.routledge.com/articles/thematic/critical-theory/v-1/sections/critique-of-instrumental-reason
    Wayfarer Options
  • TheMadFool
    13.8k
    Anyhow, what have philosophers meant by “reason/right reason” in contradistinction to passions/appetite, and what does it mean to live according to right reason? — MichaelJYoo

    Reason, as per the prevailing wisdom in philosophical circles, is the faculty that ultimately decides proportion/appropriateness. If this sounds like art, you're on the right track.

    Take logic for example and the choice seems appropriate since we're discussing reason. A good argument's conclusion is proportionate to the evidence.

    Likewise, when even hate, the worst passion, is in proportion to what causes it, that's right reason in action. Of course, whether hating itself is worth it is a different story.

    I suppose what I'm driving at is the aesthetics of it all. Beauty has been interpreted in terms of proportion (ref: the golden ratio) and that's, in the context of this post, the be all and end all of right reason.
    TheMadFool Options
  • counterpunch
    1.6k
    ↪MichaelJYoo


    You don't name any particular text, so - impossible to say, but what the authors you mention mean by 'right reason' is almost certainly explained in the text. They mean, their own manner of reasoning - because, everyone thinks they are right.
    counterpunch Options
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