I was thinking the other day as I was driving about the role of emotion in our lives. The Stoic party line is essentially that emotions are a manifestation of incorrect reason, of irrational thinking. I think that it many cases this is true. Anger, jealousy, disappointment, fear - these all arise from a non-Stoic view of the situation. The mythical Stoic sage surely would not have emotions, but would rather only reason calmly. But emotion does have its uses, and it is here I diverge from Stoic dogma. First of all, God has emotion. At various times in Biblical literature he is angry and at other times he is sympathetic, able to be swayed from his decisions. The original Stoics worshipped the Pantheon of Greek gods and goddesses - surely they too showed emotion. And how can gods be less than perfect? On a more modern note, my second objection is that emotion helps us learn. A strong emotional reaction imprints deeply upon us - a strong feeling of anger, if we are penitent for it, makes us less likely to be angry under the same conditions a second time. What does modern psychology say about completely non-emotional people, assuming such a person exists? Yet while I challenge the theoretical basis that emotion can and should be eradicated, I do subscribe to the theory that emotion should be opposed and minimized, while recognizing it for what it is and how it can help develop us.
I just began reading Kant. I started with an overview of his works, Kant's Introduction to Logic. The first three chapters have been on logic, on what can be known, and on the definition and structure of knowledge. I was interested in reading that mathematics and philosophy are the only rational sciences, all others are empirical. I suppose this means that only mathematics and philosophy can be positively known. Though, I am not sure philosophy is true a priori knowledge. How can it be? How can the study of correct living be known before living? They say mathematics is the only pure science, uncorrupted by observational error and biases and such. I wonder why reason, the basic rules of logic, are not also included in this category. I would hesitate to put them in the a priori category of knowledge, but surely the rules can be positively known.
My New Year's resolution is to read one philosophy book per week. Let's hope I can stick to it.
I just began reading Kant. I started with an overview of his works, Kant's Introduction to Logic. The first three chapters have been on logic, on what can be known, and on the definition and structure of knowledge. I was interested in reading that mathematics and philosophy are the only rational sciences, all others are empirical. I suppose this means that only mathematics and philosophy can be positively known. Though, I am not sure philosophy is true a priori knowledge. How can it be? How can the study of correct living be known before living? They say mathematics is the only pure science, uncorrupted by observational error and biases and such. I wonder why reason, the basic rules of logic, are not also included in this category. I would hesitate to put them in the a priori category of knowledge, but surely the rules can be positively known.
My New Year's resolution is to read one philosophy book per week. Let's hope I can stick to it.
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