The Kant Debate continues: reader considers taking a vow of silence

A READER OF KANT WRITES: “I think I must have read on a little further than you thought [in Kant's Critique of Pure Reason] – I know all about those conceptual sunglasses we go around wearing putting a form on reality – and I didn’t read about them in Look – though I’m sure they will do a feature on them in the spring issue. But what is the point when all that ‘noumena’ is unknowable? How do we not know that we are all wearing different pairs? Look will do a whole spread feature you know. I could be wearing a sexy little red pair and you could be wearing a nerdy thick rimmed black pair with Jack Duckworth sticky plaster keeping them together. And if you are seeing a different world to me; why should I listen to your advice on anything? It doesn’t pertain to me, like last years fashion faux pas – you’d have no relevance in my world. best, your admirer”

BB SAYS: The position you hold is a valid one (although it is certainly not Kant’s position). You are referring to the possibility that everyone sees and experiences the world completely differently. If this is so then there is no common experience between human beings, and communication is impossible. Nothing that I or anybody else says can be relevant to you, since there is no common ground or common experience to make communication possible. Each of us exists entirely in isolation.

If this is so, then it also follows that nothing you say can be of any relevance to me or anyone else. Therefore, if what your post says is true, we should all ignore it, because it cannot possibly contain any relevant information for anyone. Furthermore, your attempt to read Kant would be pointless, since he would be wearing different glasses to you. But how can you know for sure that he is wearing different glasses to you? How can you know for sure that there are no common human experiences?

Regardless of this, the position you put forth is, to some extent, a coherent one. However, in order to hold it consistently, you would need to concede that all conversation is pointless and that all communication between human beings is impossible – you would need to be COMPLETELY SILENT. However, your posts would indicate that you are not completely silent. It would appear that you hold conversations and that you try to communicate with other human beings. I invite you to consider the possibility that your actions give the lie to your solipsistic posturing. However, if you wish to embrace a vow of silence, then I support that decision. As Wittgenstein once put it “whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent”.