• Asketa
    2
    As the title says, can someone explain the difference and similarities between Kant's, Fichte's, and Husserl's concept of the I or ego? Be it pure I, empirical I, or transcendental I. Or perhaps point to some literature.
  • Gregory
    4.7k


    I've been reading Kant today. He says, "Thus the intelligible cause, with its causality, is outside the series; its effects, on the contrary, are encountered in the series of empirical conditions. The effect can therefore be regarded as free in regard to the intelligible cause". But the intelligible cause is 1) noumena and 2) our true selves. Fitche said these were the same thing, but it is interesting that Kant says phenomena is free with respect to noumena on either side of it and yet he says noumena determines phenomena. It seems that Kant reacted to Hume's philosophy that we basically live in a world that is beyond our control and above all rationality, and went on (Kant) to espouse a new thought, one that says we have control of our reality because we are that reality. "I call intelligible that in an object of sense that is not itself appearance". So rationality rules in Kant's kingdom. Scientific laws are objective for him. "Accordingly, if that which must be regarded as appearance in the world of sense has in itself a faculty which is not an object of intuition THROUGH WHICH it can be the cause of appearances, then one can consider the causality of this being in two aspects, as intelligible in its actions as a thing in itself, and as sensible in the effects of that action as an appearance of the world of sense." Kant adds in his copy of the first edition, "The causality of representations of a being in respect of the objects of them is life. The determinability of the power of representation to this causality is the faculty of reason. The power of representation, if it is reason, hence is the determinability of its causality in respect of objects: its faculty of desire is will. If pure reason has causality, then the will is a pure will, and its causality is called freedom. [Now] we cannot cognize any causes, nor in general any intuitions corresponding to the categories, or relationships between them, but we must take all these from experience, Hence whether freedom is possible cannot be settled". Our thoughts create our reality and yet we are so entagled with ourselves and our worlds that we cannot see for sure what our nature is and if we are free at all. Husserl wanted to heal the divide in the thought of Kant imo. His relationship with Fitche's thought would be interesting
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