Kant Wesley Web Log

The conspiracy theory of freedom

December 13, 2009

Conspiracy theory.

This is interesting, the conception of a reality which may or may not have an object corresponding to it, e.g., the Masons want to subdue the world for their private gain. So what you have to do is to dream up this object, e.g., the immoral Scot, and make sure that it is self consistent, e.g., Scots don’t do good acts, but only prudent acts, and so no good may be ascribed to them and no matter the appearances (helping the sick).

Now how do you determine such an object, to see if it is real or not? You might try to infiltrate the Scottish society and make suggestive remarks concerning mutually prudent acts and see the response. But this could never be conclusive and it always be possible that the society was on to you and so continued the conspiracy (and indeed perhaps even inspired it) or that there were no conspiracy.

So the conspiracy theory regarding the Scots can continue because it is self-consistent and it explains all the phenomena and thus “makes sense”.

I think the same thing holds with regard to freedom in the thinking of Kant. I am able to dream up an object called freedom and assert that people and perhaps even things are free from the laws of natural necessity. I can assert that the leaf did not want to leave the company of the branch until the weather cooled and the winds picked up, and then it occurred to the leaf just to let go of the tree and fly about for a while before landing and taking a long rest. This is self consistent and it explains all the phenomena, and so it can be entertained at will.

Now science is so organized (per the categories of pure thought) that such a notion as freedom would be an insanity, like thinking you were made of glass (and reacted rationally to that condition) and would call for medical treatment.

Kant had noted the effect of the moral law on the humans, namely that we are in advance affected by just the idea of this law, namely that it promises to cause us great pain and that it gives us a meaning to the word “pride”. For it is only by virtue of conformity to this law that anyone can imagine having a reason to be proud of himself. (I need to consider this more.) This he called respect for the moral law, this inability to be happy with one’s self when conscious of a violation of this moral law (of universal human dignity).

Now the only way that this respect can possibly arises is if we are indeed free of the laws of nature and able to act with spontaneity according to principles of conduct (moral conduct). And so the respect for the moral law is so great that science refuses to consider insane a man who is troubled by violations of the moral law. And the scientist can understand how it is that this “free man” thinks highly or lowly of himself per a moral measure.

As a result we can accept freedom as a fact even though it cannot be understood and is contrary to the thinking of experience and science, but still can be maintained and is not refuted by experience.

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