[lit-ideas] Re: Thinking as a kind of suicide
- From: wokshevs@xxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, Chris Bruce <bruce@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 9 Nov 2007 15:50:34 -0330
Chris Bruce performs a valuable service in identifying a couple of passages from
The Philosopher which strongly influenced Arendt's attempt to develop an
account of political judgment on the basis of Kant's views on aesthetic
judgment.
Walter Okshevsky
MUN
Quoting Chris Bruce <bruce@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>:
> On 5. Nov 2007, at 20:02, wokshevs@xxxxxx wrote:
>
> > I think Arendt's use of the term "common sense" may bear strong
> > connotations with the L term "sensus communis." A term Kant uses in
> > his political writings, of which the 3rd Critique is a central text,
> > according to Arendt's deliberations on the analogies between the
> > aesthetic and the political. Does anyone know what "sensus communis"
> > is about? (I don't pay much attention to Kant's last, political
> > writings.)
> >
> > Walter O.
> > MUN
> >
>
> Is the following any help in understanding Kant's use of 'sensus
> communis'? (R. Eisler's _Kant Lexikon_ pointed the way.)
>
> > From " THE CRITIQUE OF JUDGEMENT by Immanuel Kant (trans. J.C.
> > Meredith). SS 40. Taste as a kind of sensus communis."
> >
> > "... by the name sensus communis is to be understood the idea of a
> > public sense, i.e., a critical faculty which in its reflective act
> > takes account (a priori) of the mode of representation of everyone
> > else, in order, as it were, to weigh its judgement with the collective
> > reason of mankind, and thereby avoid the illusion arising from
> > subjective and personal conditions which could readily be taken for
> > objective, an illusion that would exert a prejudicial influence upon
> > its judgement. This is accomplished by weighing the judgement, not so
> > much with actual, as rather with the merely possible, judgements of
> > others, and by putting ourselves in the position of everyone else, as
> > the result of a mere abstraction from the limitations which
> > contingently affect our own estimate. ...
> >
> > ... the ... maxims of common human understanding ... are these: (I) to
> > think for oneself; (2) to think from the standpoint of everyone else;
> > (3) always to think consistently. ... As to the second maxim belonging
> > to our habits of thought [i.e., to think from the standpoint of
> > everyone else - in other words to use our 'common sense'], we have
> > quite got into the way of calling a man narrow (narrow, as opposed to
> > being of enlarged mind) whose talents fall short of what is required
> > for employment upon work of any magnitude (especially that involving
> > intensity). But the question here is not one of the faculty of
> > cognition, but of the mental habit of making a final use of it. This,
> > however small the range and degree to which man's natural endowments
> > extend, still indicates a man of enlarged mind: if he detaches himself
> > from the subjective personal conditions of his judgement, which cramp
> > the minds of so many others, and reflects upon his own judgement from
> > a universal standpoint (which he can only determine by shifting his
> > ground to the standpoint of others)."
>
> Chris Bruce
> Kiel, Germany
> --
>
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