990118 1240 - conforming of objects and knowledge

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Von: Marco Bettoni <m.bettoni@fhbb.ch>
An: Kant List Bucknell <kant-l@bucknell.edu>
Cc: Rolf Todesco <todesco@compuserve.com>; Robert Ottiger <ottiger@swissonline.ch>
Betreff: Re: conforming of objects and knowledge
Datum: Dienstag, 19. Januar 1999 16:40

Datum: Montag, 18. Januar 1999, 12:40 (gesendet)

Dear all, dear Bruce,

ENGINEERING APPROACH
=====================
my opinion poll B XVI (started one week ago) and my following comments or
answers may be better understood if I declare explicitely, that I am trying
(since 1988) to link Kant's CpR to engineering (of software systems, of
robots).

This is why I try to understand Kant's fundamental hypothesis of CpR (the
objects must conform to our - faculty of - knowledge) as an engineer.

Understanding that hypothesis as an engineer means that I expect from CpR an
"operational" explanation of the components of that hypothesis, i.e.:

1. operational explanation of "object"
2. operational explanation of "conform to"
3. operational explanation of "faculty of knowledge" and "knowledge"

KANT'S METHOD
=============

Because Kant writes that his method will be the "hitherto rarely attempted
dissection of the faculty of the understanding itself" (B 90) and because I
consider this as an operational method, I expect that Kant's explanation of
his hypothesis (mainly his "Analytic of Concepts") will be an operational
explanation. This fits my engineering expectations and helps me in designing
a "Kantian robot".

OPERATIONAL EXPLANATION
=======================

By "operational explanation" I mean an explanation of the kind defined by
Humberto Maturana in some of his papers (for example: "Reality: The Search
for Objectivity or the Quest for a Compelling Argument," The Irish Journal
of Psychology, 9, 25-82, (1988).")

Following what Maturana calls a "scientific explanation", for me an
"operational explanation" is a proposition which describes a mechanism
which, if you let it operate gives as result of its operation that what I
want to explain.

That is, operational explanations are propositions of generative mechanisms.

In my reading, Kant's "Analytic of Concepts" and especially his
"Transcendental Deduction of the Pure Concepts of the Understanding" are
such propositions of generative mechanisms. In these texts I can find:

1. a generative mechanism for "object"
2. a generative mechanism for "must conform to"
3. a generative mechanism for "faculty of knowledge" and "knowledge"

ONTOLOGICAL EXPLANATION
=======================
The opposed of an operational explanation is an "ontological explanation",
a
proposition which describes "dasjenige, was an sich ist" (that which is in
itself, Hegel).

Hegel claims that it is "widersinnig" (absurd) to investigate the faculty of
knowledge before having investigated that which is in itself ("das
Ansichseiende"): this is Hegel's post-Kantian restoration of the pre-Kantian
approach to cognition.

POST-KANTIAN DESERT
===================
Post-Kantian philosophy has selected to continue with Hegel's method and
abandoned Kant's method: for this reason the domain of ontological
explanations has florished wheras the domain of operational explanations has
been abandoned and has become a "desert" (even if "the desert is alive"
thanks to contributors like Piaget, Maturana, von Glasersfeld, Ceccato,
etc.)

Marco Bettoni

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