What, at the Shroomery?  Get this crazy talk outta here. 

But seriously, I'd mostly agree with Kant.  Subjective reality is all we can truly perceive through, and this is all he's getting at with that quote.  I'll admit, most of Western philosophy would be radically changed if any of the great philosophers had had a psychedelic experience.  However, I'm a bit skeptical of your assertion:

Quote:

We can be aware of our own true nature, and in that, we can be aware of the nature of other things that exist in the universe.

---

Quote:

It remains completely unknown to us what may be the nature of objects in themselves and apart from the receptivity of our senses.

---

Quote:

We know nothing except our own way of perceiving them, a way peculiar to us, and which does not necessarily pertain to every being, though it surely pertains to every human being." -Immanuel Kant in his momentous Critique of Pure Reason

---

Quote:

My own take on it:

First off, how can anyone be "completely" sure of anything? We can be aware of our own true nature, and in that, we can be aware of the nature of other things that exist in the universe.
Kant's statements above use the words "our" and "our own" as if our ego-self is possessive over what it sees and experiences in the world. However, this is an assumption that we can't afford to make in such a world that exists both on an individual, egotistical level... as well as a unified oneness; a Universe where Everything is Everything, where I am you and You are me. Mystics, Zen masters, and many of you on P&S will understand what I am saying here.

I don't think Kant understood this, or at the very least, I don't think that he had experienced oneness or unification with the Universe before he said this... and I think that without the experience of this, you will believe what Kant said above...

---

MarkostheGnostic said:

Perhaps you just don't grok his awareness of samsara and nirvana as "phenomenal" and "noumenal."
The noumenal is exactly THAT which IS, independently of a subject-object dichotomy. In that sense an individual ego cannot 'know' the noumenal. The ego is a product of the noumenal. So long as one wants to 'taste' sugar, one has not 'become' sugar, as Ram Dass once put it.

---

smmu said:

I think that Kant was a little off his rocker... to put it in less-than-philosophical terms. What do you all think about one of his assertions in 1781:

"It remains completely unknown to us what may be the nature of objects in themselves and apart from the receptivity of our senses. We know nothing except our own way of perceiving them, a way peculiar to us, and which does not necessarily pertain to every being, though it surely pertains to every human being." -Immanuel Kant in his momentous Critique of Pure Reason

My own take on it:

First off, how can anyone be "completely" sure of anything? We can be aware of our own true nature, and in that, we can be aware of the nature of other things that exist in the universe.
Kant's statements above use the words "our" and "our own" as if our ego-self is possessive over what it sees and experiences in the world. However, this is an assumption that we can't afford to make in such a world that exists both on an individual, egotistical level... as well as a unified oneness; a Universe where Everything is Everything, where I am you and You are me. Mystics, Zen masters, and many of you on P&S will understand what I am saying here.

I don't think Kant understood this, or at the very least, I don't think that he had experienced oneness or unification with the Universe before he said this... and I think that without the experience of this, you will believe what Kant said above...

---

Lakefingers said:

"what we know of the world,
is a production of our sense faculties and that we cannot
attain pure knowledge of nature."

---

Quote:

He's tackling the source of knowledge: man.

---

Icelander said:

smmu said:

I think that Kant was a little off his rocker... to put it in less-than-philosophical terms. What do you all think about one of his assertions in 1781:

"It remains completely unknown to us what may be the nature of objects in themselves and apart from the receptivity of our senses. We know nothing except our own way of perceiving them, a way peculiar to us, and which does not necessarily pertain to every being, though it surely pertains to every human being." -Immanuel Kant in his momentous Critique of Pure Reason

My own take on it:

First off, how can anyone be "completely" sure of anything? We can be aware of our own true nature, and in that, we can be aware of the nature of other things that exist in the universe.
Kant's statements above use the words "our" and "our own" as if our ego-self is possessive over what it sees and experiences in the world. However, this is an assumption that we can't afford to make in such a world that exists both on an individual, egotistical level... as well as a unified oneness; a Universe where Everything is Everything, where I am you and You are me. Mystics, Zen masters, and many of you on P&S will understand what I am saying here.

I don't think Kant understood this, or at the very least, I don't think that he had experienced oneness or unification with the Universe before he said this... and I think that without the experience of this, you will believe what Kant said above...

---

I'm a zen master and I say you don't have a clue. Just because you had an emotional experience you think that means something about reality. But you remain encased in your body and perceptions. On the atomic level we are all the same. So what? Show me how that knowledge does anything but relieve your death anxiety.

---

redgreenvines said:

i am a worm
I hardly knew that this is what I would become
but I am what i am.
sometimes I am short and sometimes i am long
i wear human clothing but i am a worm such as it is.

---

Quote:

smmu said:A-ha. I disagree with this. When we become one with nature and truly experience it... we CAN understand it through and through. Please do some research on kensho, satori, and other relevant experiences. Philosophy can only take us so far... experience is what takes over where philosophy must end.

---

Quote:

When we become one with nature and truly experience it... we CAN understand it through and through.

---

Quote:

SMMU SAID: First off, how can anyone be "completely" sure of anything?

---

Quote:

ICE SAID: Show me how that knowledge does anything but relieve your death anxiety.

---

Quote:

ICE SAID: Show me how that knowledge does anything but relieve your death anxiety.

---

Quote:

That's good...

But why does life have to be about gaining anything? Can't we just be?

---