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There would seem to be no substantive or empirical argument against the proposition that knowledge comes to us through reflective thinking as well as practical experience. There is a vital need for substantive reason (that which exists in and of itself, in which attributes, properties and qualities reside) and empirical data (knowledge from experience or through the senses). But nothing to suggest one exists without the other. We can use deduction from principles to particulars or induction from particulars to principles. Our method might be pragmatic where we innovate what, to do, (Websters, 1979), based on outcome or consequences. Or a praxis where we decide, to do, (Websters, 1979), something using a time tested or traditional system. Still we have to decide both why we are doing something and how it can be done.
Duality of ideas and experience, mind, and body, subject and object (ad infinitum) tends to favor one part over the other. The analogy of man as a machine has led some to conclude that our existence is a purely mechanical one. At the other extreme some would have us transcend our physical frame were we exist as pure spirit. The truth is that our essential nature is both. It always has been and it always will be. I intend to demonstrate how those who deny this are flatly contradicted by their own reasoning.
The praxis of western thought can be traced back to Aristotle. In Aristotles logic our thinking must be theoretical as well as practical in order to know anything with certainty. R.W Ross describes this parody and progression From what sort of proposition he should demand proof (singular) and what sort of proofs should be demanded (plural). Aristotle says in Nicomachean Ethics Every art and every inquiry similarly every action or pursuit has been thought to aim at some good but a certain difference is found in the ends. How do we balance this parody? We have to be mindful of the extremes and maintain a deliberate balance. Not everyone can find the center of a circle but only a man who has proper knowledge the first concern of a man who aims at a median (balance, center, focal point, hub) should be to avoid the extreme which is opposed to it.(Luper, Brown, 1992). Aristotle is describing structure common to all reasoning without regard to its subject matter (W. Ross, 1959). Good shipbuilding produces a ship, good military strategy produces victory, and good economics produces wealth. The substance (ship, victory, profit) required a logical, empirical progression whether a product, goal, or profit. Reason required an objective that began, as an idea was a reaction to empirical sense data. The process is circular, like a gear the ratio of the outer teeth meshes the external world of sense and is connected by the spokes of conscious interaction with the hub of human cognition, the ego.
The question of where all substantive reason is derived presents a backup problem in philosophy; Thomas Aquinas resolves this using deduction. He starts with the need for things caused (plural) to have a primary first cause (singular). Then he describes how all reasoning must have commonality natural things (plural) are directed to their end (singular). This he said is understood to be God. More about this later.
Immanuel Kant in his Critique of Pure Reason says that knowledge comes to us through experience but that experience alone is not enough, General truths must be independent of experience, -clear and certain by themselves. Here he is telling us that the main problem of metaphysics is parody. For reason to transcend the particulars there is a need for singularity. Socrates in his discussion with Meno deals with this, Meno; I should answer that bees do not differ from one another as bees. Socrates; and if I went on to say Meno; tell me what is the quality in which they do not differ but are alike. (Titus, Smith, Noland, 1972). This is a search for the transcendent principle of commonality. The substantive element in reality. This singularity is what Kant called apriori; a thing in and of itself, apprehended by us as an idea. Examples he gave were God, freedom and immortality.
Lebniz describes how we form ideas from our sense. We become aware of a discrepancy between the idea and what actually exists Thus the idea of things which exists is exclusively due to the fact that God, the author of both things and the mind has endowed our mind with this power to infer from its own internal operations the truths that correspond perfectly (singular) with that of external things (plural). Whence although the idea of a circle, is not exactly like a circle, we may infer from the idea truths which experience would undoubtedly confirm concerning the true circle. (Titus, 1995).
These discrepancies have to be addressed using inductive reasoning. Obstacles appear in the sources of knowledge. Bacon makes a distinction between the various idols (representations) of cognition. For it is a false assertion that the sense of man is the measure of things because the individual man refracts and discolors the light of nature. We also have outside influences. By the intercourse and association in commerce because ill and unchoice words obstructs the understanding Finally we have to critically discern systems of thought dogmas of philosophy and wrong laws of demonstration, not only entire systems but many principles of science. This is how you work from particulars to principles in empirical science.
This leads to the modern view. James describes it this way; that possibilities may exceed actualities. That is to say that the universe is not one unbending fact but there is a certain ultimate plurality in it What are lost here are primary or substantive first principles. A criticism of current philosophizing from the standpoint of the traditional quality of its problems must begin somewhere, and the choice of a beginning is arbitrary. (Titus, 1995). The beginning has never been arbitrary it has just lost its substance.
There may be any number of proofs used to demonstrate the need for first cause (i.e. light must have a source; sun, fire, candle) but the need for a context never negates the need for a starting point (in geometry you start with a point and draw a line from there). The choice of beginning according to Aquinas is always the same the only things differ at is the context. For at one time nothing was in if existence it would not have been possible for anything to have began to exist there must also be something to which all beings have as the cause of their being, goodness and every other perfection and this being we call God. Thats causation (first mover), ontology (being), teleology (end to which all thins aim), but its always God. At least from the standpoint of the traditional qualities of philosophies problems (Titus, 1995).
Scientific positivists wield an analytical knife and start by slicing things that are natural parts of human cognition into pieces Aguste Comte writes each branch of our knowledge passes successively through three different theoretical states: the theological of fictitious, the metaphysical or abstract, and the scientific or the positive.(Titus, H., 1995). Notice that he has stated that these are successive he then goes on to say that they are by nature even opposed. Finally he tells us that they are mutually exclusive If they are mutually exclusive (dont share with one another) how can they be successive? I must have missed something. But then he describes them as systems regarding the totality of phenomena Does he mean to say that you need all three to get the totality? The answer would seem to be an emphatic yes. If its fictitious then how is it necessary? The reason is that there has to be a substantive objective for there to be a quality. Something good has to have some tangible context. The only tangible primary source as an objective reality would have to be God. Something that is true only if its empirically verified (a postoria) depends on a priori propositions that arent true? The contradiction here is that they are mutually exclusive and successive since they cannot be both.
Whenever we find someone saying that no one can know anything, its only natural to wonder whether [or how] the skeptic knows this. (McDowell, 1972). According to Davis Hume empirical reason is so important it negates our idea of reality but our idea of self. It cannot therefore be from any of these impressions (pain, pleasure, grief, joy, passions, sensations) or from any other that the idea of self is derived; consequently there is no such idea. This is so obvious it almost goes without saying but to refute this all you have to do is walk into a room where Hume is sitting and say Im looking for David Hume. If he so much as think Im David Hume he proves by that very thought that he has an idea of self. He even has a name for it, he calls it David Hume. This is not just a question of but knowledge itself is suspect. That all our ideas are nothing but copies of our impressions, or in other words. That tis impossible for us to think of anything that we have not antecedently felt (Titus, 1972). You go into a machine shop with this kind of thinking you not only will have wheels with spokes missing, they will have no hubs.
East is east and west is west and never the two shall meet except in empirical and Buddhist thinking. Suzuki, a Buddhist scholar writes: So we are told that the pleasures and pains they are transitory, like Maya. They have no substantial reality If Im asked then what Zen teaches, I would answer, Zen teaches nothing. On a later page he writes; the famous gatha (saying) of Jeyne by no means exhausts all Zen teaches. So what does Zen teach, something or nothing? Admittedly logic has its limitations and not everything has to have an antithesis but I cant accept that Zen teaches something and nothing at the same time. This is what happens when you abandon substantive reason; your circles have no true centers.
We have a sense of both substantive and empirical truth. We use inductive reasoning but why does that have to diminish the deductive reasoning that traditional philosophy has to offer. The praxis of tradition can serve me as well as the pragmos of modern innovation, why must I choose between the two as if they were enemies. The need to find the median is still difficult to the point of being almost rare, but I belive its doable .
References:
Kant, I. A critique of pure reason.(1961). Second edition. Dolphin Books. Garden City, New York.
Luper, S.; Brown, C. (1992). Harcourt, Brace College Publishers. Fort Worth, TX.
McDowell, J. (1972). The New evidence that demands a verdict. Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, TN
Titus, H.H.; Smith, S.M.; Noland, R.T. Living issues in philosophy. (1995). Wadsworth Publishing Company. Belmont CA.
W.D. Ross. Aristotle, a complete exposition of his works and thought. (1959). The World Publishing Company. Cleveland Ohio and New York, NY.
Webster. New twentieth century dictionary. (2nd ed.) William Collins Publishers (1979)
Duality of ideas and experience, mind, and body, subject and object (ad infinitum) tends to favor one part over the other. The analogy of man as a machine has led some to conclude that our existence is a purely mechanical one. At the other extreme some would have us transcend our physical frame were we exist as pure spirit. The truth is that our essential nature is both. It always has been and it always will be. I intend to demonstrate how those who deny this are flatly contradicted by their own reasoning.
The praxis of western thought can be traced back to Aristotle. In Aristotles logic our thinking must be theoretical as well as practical in order to know anything with certainty. R.W Ross describes this parody and progression From what sort of proposition he should demand proof (singular) and what sort of proofs should be demanded (plural). Aristotle says in Nicomachean Ethics Every art and every inquiry similarly every action or pursuit has been thought to aim at some good but a certain difference is found in the ends. How do we balance this parody? We have to be mindful of the extremes and maintain a deliberate balance. Not everyone can find the center of a circle but only a man who has proper knowledge the first concern of a man who aims at a median (balance, center, focal point, hub) should be to avoid the extreme which is opposed to it.(Luper, Brown, 1992). Aristotle is describing structure common to all reasoning without regard to its subject matter (W. Ross, 1959). Good shipbuilding produces a ship, good military strategy produces victory, and good economics produces wealth. The substance (ship, victory, profit) required a logical, empirical progression whether a product, goal, or profit. Reason required an objective that began, as an idea was a reaction to empirical sense data. The process is circular, like a gear the ratio of the outer teeth meshes the external world of sense and is connected by the spokes of conscious interaction with the hub of human cognition, the ego.
The question of where all substantive reason is derived presents a backup problem in philosophy; Thomas Aquinas resolves this using deduction. He starts with the need for things caused (plural) to have a primary first cause (singular). Then he describes how all reasoning must have commonality natural things (plural) are directed to their end (singular). This he said is understood to be God. More about this later.
Immanuel Kant in his Critique of Pure Reason says that knowledge comes to us through experience but that experience alone is not enough, General truths must be independent of experience, -clear and certain by themselves. Here he is telling us that the main problem of metaphysics is parody. For reason to transcend the particulars there is a need for singularity. Socrates in his discussion with Meno deals with this, Meno; I should answer that bees do not differ from one another as bees. Socrates; and if I went on to say Meno; tell me what is the quality in which they do not differ but are alike. (Titus, Smith, Noland, 1972). This is a search for the transcendent principle of commonality. The substantive element in reality. This singularity is what Kant called apriori; a thing in and of itself, apprehended by us as an idea. Examples he gave were God, freedom and immortality.
Lebniz describes how we form ideas from our sense. We become aware of a discrepancy between the idea and what actually exists Thus the idea of things which exists is exclusively due to the fact that God, the author of both things and the mind has endowed our mind with this power to infer from its own internal operations the truths that correspond perfectly (singular) with that of external things (plural). Whence although the idea of a circle, is not exactly like a circle, we may infer from the idea truths which experience would undoubtedly confirm concerning the true circle. (Titus, 1995).
These discrepancies have to be addressed using inductive reasoning. Obstacles appear in the sources of knowledge. Bacon makes a distinction between the various idols (representations) of cognition. For it is a false assertion that the sense of man is the measure of things because the individual man refracts and discolors the light of nature. We also have outside influences. By the intercourse and association in commerce because ill and unchoice words obstructs the understanding Finally we have to critically discern systems of thought dogmas of philosophy and wrong laws of demonstration, not only entire systems but many principles of science. This is how you work from particulars to principles in empirical science.
This leads to the modern view. James describes it this way; that possibilities may exceed actualities. That is to say that the universe is not one unbending fact but there is a certain ultimate plurality in it What are lost here are primary or substantive first principles. A criticism of current philosophizing from the standpoint of the traditional quality of its problems must begin somewhere, and the choice of a beginning is arbitrary. (Titus, 1995). The beginning has never been arbitrary it has just lost its substance.
There may be any number of proofs used to demonstrate the need for first cause (i.e. light must have a source; sun, fire, candle) but the need for a context never negates the need for a starting point (in geometry you start with a point and draw a line from there). The choice of beginning according to Aquinas is always the same the only things differ at is the context. For at one time nothing was in if existence it would not have been possible for anything to have began to exist there must also be something to which all beings have as the cause of their being, goodness and every other perfection and this being we call God. Thats causation (first mover), ontology (being), teleology (end to which all thins aim), but its always God. At least from the standpoint of the traditional qualities of philosophies problems (Titus, 1995).
Scientific positivists wield an analytical knife and start by slicing things that are natural parts of human cognition into pieces Aguste Comte writes each branch of our knowledge passes successively through three different theoretical states: the theological of fictitious, the metaphysical or abstract, and the scientific or the positive.(Titus, H., 1995). Notice that he has stated that these are successive he then goes on to say that they are by nature even opposed. Finally he tells us that they are mutually exclusive If they are mutually exclusive (dont share with one another) how can they be successive? I must have missed something. But then he describes them as systems regarding the totality of phenomena Does he mean to say that you need all three to get the totality? The answer would seem to be an emphatic yes. If its fictitious then how is it necessary? The reason is that there has to be a substantive objective for there to be a quality. Something good has to have some tangible context. The only tangible primary source as an objective reality would have to be God. Something that is true only if its empirically verified (a postoria) depends on a priori propositions that arent true? The contradiction here is that they are mutually exclusive and successive since they cannot be both.
Whenever we find someone saying that no one can know anything, its only natural to wonder whether [or how] the skeptic knows this. (McDowell, 1972). According to Davis Hume empirical reason is so important it negates our idea of reality but our idea of self. It cannot therefore be from any of these impressions (pain, pleasure, grief, joy, passions, sensations) or from any other that the idea of self is derived; consequently there is no such idea. This is so obvious it almost goes without saying but to refute this all you have to do is walk into a room where Hume is sitting and say Im looking for David Hume. If he so much as think Im David Hume he proves by that very thought that he has an idea of self. He even has a name for it, he calls it David Hume. This is not just a question of but knowledge itself is suspect. That all our ideas are nothing but copies of our impressions, or in other words. That tis impossible for us to think of anything that we have not antecedently felt (Titus, 1972). You go into a machine shop with this kind of thinking you not only will have wheels with spokes missing, they will have no hubs.
East is east and west is west and never the two shall meet except in empirical and Buddhist thinking. Suzuki, a Buddhist scholar writes: So we are told that the pleasures and pains they are transitory, like Maya. They have no substantial reality If Im asked then what Zen teaches, I would answer, Zen teaches nothing. On a later page he writes; the famous gatha (saying) of Jeyne by no means exhausts all Zen teaches. So what does Zen teach, something or nothing? Admittedly logic has its limitations and not everything has to have an antithesis but I cant accept that Zen teaches something and nothing at the same time. This is what happens when you abandon substantive reason; your circles have no true centers.
We have a sense of both substantive and empirical truth. We use inductive reasoning but why does that have to diminish the deductive reasoning that traditional philosophy has to offer. The praxis of tradition can serve me as well as the pragmos of modern innovation, why must I choose between the two as if they were enemies. The need to find the median is still difficult to the point of being almost rare, but I belive its doable .
References:
Kant, I. A critique of pure reason.(1961). Second edition. Dolphin Books. Garden City, New York.
Luper, S.; Brown, C. (1992). Harcourt, Brace College Publishers. Fort Worth, TX.
McDowell, J. (1972). The New evidence that demands a verdict. Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, TN
Titus, H.H.; Smith, S.M.; Noland, R.T. Living issues in philosophy. (1995). Wadsworth Publishing Company. Belmont CA.
W.D. Ross. Aristotle, a complete exposition of his works and thought. (1959). The World Publishing Company. Cleveland Ohio and New York, NY.
Webster. New twentieth century dictionary. (2nd ed.) William Collins Publishers (1979)
I don't recall his argumentation, but probably something with the idea of an infinite being. How can such an idea exist, if only the now-and-here self exists? Yes, we do appear to have ideas that cannot be reduced to sense impressions, such as an idea of an infinite god. But do we at all know, what we mean by such an idea? That's what I see as the question: such irreducible ideas are extremely vague, when we try to explain them - or we need to define them negatively: everything we know about is finite, so in-finite (not finite) is a quality we ascribe to a non-observable god. At least imho 
