[lit-ideas] Re: The meaning of life

Enthusiasm for projects aiming at philosophical truth and rightness - to
differentiate it from the "moral enthusiasm" Kant deprecated - is not balanced
by caricature. Justifiable enthusiasm is, I believe, the
Golden Mean between caricaturing and ... whatever the contrary vice would be.
(Is it a vice to be overly accurate and precise?)  Anyway ...

In the passage Phil cites, Habermas is indeed very much in keeping with Kant.
As
he generally is in matters transcendental throughout his writings of the 80s and
90s. What Kant meant by the distinction between moral law and conceptions of the
good is basically - yes, there's room to debate the scope of "basically" here,
but perhaps some other time -  what Habermas refers to in the distinction he
draws below between moral argumentation (discourse) which intends the
discovery/construction of universally valid norms/judgements/decisions and
"ethical" matters which concern culture-/religion-specific worldviews admitting
of no universal validity. 

Neither Kant nor Habermas denigrate the ethical. As Phil's choice of
quotation clearly shows, one's socialization into a cultural form of life is
empirically necessary for any attempt to deliberate upon moral matters. One
who abides by Kant's Categorical Imperative, or by Habermas's dialogical
reinterpretation of it, is one who has already been acculturated into a
tradition of values, virtues and practices from which she draws for the
formation of her maxims (willings and actions). The CI cannot itself generate
maxims for individuals who ain't got none. The CI, like Habermas's notion of
"discourse," identifies only the form of law - only the formal, procedural
epistemic conditions transcendentally universal because necessary for the
justifiability of validity claims to moral rightness.
Interlocutors within discourse offer for mutual agreement and joint
deliberation their present and particular understandings of their own needs and
interests as these have been shaped by the cultural traditions and worldviews
they have biographically appropriated. 

Walter O
MUN 







Quoting Phil Enns <phil.enns@xxxxxxxxx>:

> Eric Yost wrote:
> 
> "Human beings have layerings of motives -- some explicit, some
> undiscovered, some adventitious -- that interfere with the "purity" of
> an attempt at ideal judgment. The very term "transcendental" reeks of
> the sly power grab, the looming, the looking down upon, the lording it
> over ... whether in moral judgment or in a swami's meditation."
> 
> This is a caricature, perhaps balancing the somewhat enthusiastic
> defence by Walter of Kantian transcendental thought.  Here is a more
> nuanced account from Habermas that is relevant to this thread:
> 
> 'Since a philosophy which has become self-critical does not trust
> itself any longer to offer universal assertions about the concrete
> whole of exemplary forms of life, it must refer those affected to
> discourses in which they answer their substantial questions
> themselves.  The parties should examine in moral argumentation what is
> equally good for all.  But first they must become clear about what the
> good is for themselves in their respective contexts.  These ethical
> questions in a stricter sense, concerning a life that is worthwhile or
> is preferable, can find an answer only in context-dependent discourses
> of self-understanding.  These answers will be more differentiated and
> more appropriate depending upon how rich the identity-building
> traditions are that support self-assurance.'
> 
> Habermas' thought isn't always consistent with this admission but here
> he is in accord with the Master.
> 
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> Phil Enns
> Yogyakarta, Indonesia
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