Thursday, October 21, 2010

Reason and Organism

Kant's concept of Organism seems to be derived from his Rational Idea, the 'Kingdom of Ends'. If so, then his focus on Purposiveness distracts him from a deeper problem with any Spinozist concept of Organism. The primary characteristic of Reason, Purposive or otherwise, is its non-contradictoriness. Hence, a Nature that is a product of Reason should be conflict-free. And, yet, Spinoza affirms that one part of Nature can be harmful to another. So, the question for Spinozism is not 'how are organisms possible?', but 'how are non-organistic entities possible?, and it is unclear that he has a satisfactory answer.

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