Jane Addams is one of the influential philosophers in the history. She is regarded as one of the most important thinkers in the history of the modern America. Her thought and influence in the western thought cannot be measured. She is considered as the starting point of the inspiration of the idealism in America during the late 19th and early 20th century. Her contributions to the metaphysics, ethics, epistemology, as well as aesthetics have had an effect on almost all the philosophical movements after him (Addams 4). Her masterworks include the critique of critical thinking as well as the critique of pure reason. This masterwork moved philosophy beyond debates between the empiricists and rationalists who dominated the age of reason as well as the new age of enlightenment.
The hull house had a neighborhood of a mix of ethnic groups of Europeans that did migrate to Chicago around the beginning of the 20th century. The mix was the grounding of the Hull House’s innermost social as well as philanthropic elitists that tested their theories and also challenged their establishment. The Jews and Germans lived to the south of the inner core. The Jews and Greeks as well as the other remnants of the immigrant groups had their travel out of the Hull House during the early 20th century. The Italians were the only people who continued to be intact as well as a thriving community throughout the great depression and well after the ultimate demise of the Hull House properly in 1963 (Addams 14). The Hull House was the Americas best settlement house. Jane Addams used it to create and generate system directed changes on the principle that. “To keep families safe the societal conditions as well as family conditions had to be improved” the local political bosses were the controllers of the neighborhood.
Addams and Starr created three ethical principles for social settlement. The principles were; to practice cooperation, practicing social democracy as well as to do teaching through example. Social democracy included egalitarian or having social relations across all class the lines. The Hull House did provide a comprehensive program of cultural, civic, educational as well as the recreational activities, which were admired by social visitors from all over the world (Addams 16). Addams did bring prominent visitors and had links to prominent Chicago philanthropists.
Empiricists such as Hume and Berkeley had an argument that human knowledge had an origin from their own sensations. They argued that the mind is an empty slate that gets filled with the ideas through its interactions with the world. Experience is the teacher for everything, which includes concepts of identity, relationship, causation and many others. Jane Addams argued that the blank slate model is not enough to explain the belief towards objects that surrounds us. Some believes must be brought by the mind for it to experience.
Her ideology differed with Locke’s. She raised questions regarding the inference from characteristics of individuals own sensation towards the conclusions about the mind independence towards objects. Since the human mind is highly restricted for the senses of the minds output, Berkeley had an argument that the mind has no independence on the way it identifies and its accuracy towards the independence between sensations, and how objects present themselves (Addams 25). She argued that in the individual’s judgment towards objects are basically judgments towards the mental representations only. In his work “refutation of material idealism” Jane argued that individuals are capable of making judgment about their experiences.
She did express dissatisfaction with the ideas that seemed to have a skeptical result of the empirical measures of inquiry.in every case; she showed an argument towards these philosophers’ ideas. The entire manner we deal we do perform even the most rudimentary mental behaviors is because of personal awareness and making the judgments towards objects must overcome the claims (Addams 29). She is seen to be sympathetic towards many areas of empiricism is seen to be affecting many parts of individuals experience to the world.
The rationalists such as Descartes, Leibniz as well as Spinoza, had another angle of approaching the human knowledge problem. They wished to get away from the Epistemology confinement of the mind through construction of knowledge of the world, the soul, the self, God, science as well as ethics out of the simple, indubitable ideas that passes innately in mind. Leibniz for example viewed that the world was a priority, by doing an analysis of ideas and derivations, which is done through logics (Addams 248). The rationalists argued that, supersensible knowledge can be achieved through the means of reasoning. Descartes had a belief that some truths such as if I am thinking I do exist for example are not vulnerable to many pernicious skeptics. With use of his own knowledge of existence, Descartes hoped to give a foundation of knowledge.
She had come to doubt the rationalists because of his ideas which he named as “Antinomies” or contradictory. Jane faced such contradictory statements such as the world has a beginning as well as an end as to that one, which said that the world had no beginning and had no limits in space. She said that these contradictory statements revealed metaphysical and methodological mistakes done by the rationalists (Addams 108). She argues that these antinomies can be resolved if individuals understands the proper domains and functioning of the various areas that provide knowledge. She said that individuals cannot identify things as they are and that the knowledge is due to the experience one have.
Her answer to the predecessors changed the phase of philosophy. She first said that the difference between the priori truth and the posteriori truths were not sufficient to provide the description of metaphysical ideas that were under dispute. The analysis of the knowledge had to require a distinction of analytic truth as well as the synthetic truths. Through analytic claims, the predicate areas are contained within the subjects. A synthetic argument of priori, Jane says is the one which must be true as a result of categories that are exhaustive (Addams 66). Empiricists failed to give a justification due to the lack of the logical which was contained in the subject.
Synthetic of a priori claims, she has an argument that there is a demand of entirely different kind of proof than those which are needed in analytic a priori claims or even synthetic of a posteriori claims. An indication of how to proceed, Jane argues that it can be got through the synthetic a priori claim in mathematics and natural science, specifically geometry. A synthetic a priori claim has a construction that adds to what is being contained analytically in any concept without experience appealing. If we can answer the question “how the judgment of synthetic a priori possible” then we can answer and determine the possibilities, range as well as the legitimacy of all the metaphysical claims.
With the availability of Jane’s claims that an individual’s mind makes an active result and contribution to those experiences towards objects that surrounds us. Through the power of mind, we are capable of understanding the transcendental idealism. Jane’s arguments were designed so as to limit of our knowledge. The rationalists believed that we could have knowledge of God, Soul, as well as substance and they believed that the knowledge was acquired and it was transcendentally real. She however argues that no one can acquire knowledge of realm beyond the empirical knowledge. She said transcendental knowledge is not real for that mind like ours. She said mind has the receptive capacity (the sensibility) as well as the mind has a possession of conceptual capacities (the understanding).
In the area of transcendental synthetic, Jane argues that understanding is the manner in which mind accesses objects. The reason synthetic a priori claim judgments are possible in geometrics. She argues that a space is a priori space of sense. She also argues that people cannot experience type of objects that are only representable in a spatial manner. It is not possible to grasp a type of object unless we do a delineation of that space the object occupies. With no spatial representation, the sensations that we have cannot be differentiated as well as we are not able to give properties to particular objects. She also has an argument that time is also a condition or a form of our intuitions of the objects surrounding us (Addams 149). The time idea itself can never be gathered from the experiences we have since simultaneity and succession of objects, the manner of representing the past time would not be possible if we had no ideas of representing objects in time.
Another method of understanding her argument is that it is not possible to for individuals to experience any object that is not in space or time. It is also good to note that time and space are not perceivable in a direct manner. They must be in that form the object is experienced. A conscious way that apprehends objects in a direct manner, as they are can be possible not by means of space and time. Any form of concept that use consciousness like for humans must recognize that objects occupies space for a period of time.
In conjunction with Jane’s analysis of all the possible ways of understanding the empirical objects, that was referred to as the transcendental psychology. Most of his arguments are seen as subjective, not due to the variations of the mind to mind but due to the source of the necessity as well as the universality of the mind to know the object. The mind has the presence of a faculty of understanding that do provide empirical concepts as well as for the categories of judgment. The various faculties that make various judgments must be unified in the mind (Addams 316). Time as well as space is the necessary forms of apprehensions for that respective faculty.
We have gone through Jane’s analysis of the faculties of judgment of the mind that do represent the transcendental structuring of the experiences that are performed by the judgment faculties in the mind. Firstly, in his analysis of the sensibility, she argued that there is need for the spatiotemporal characters of sensation. In understanding, Jane analyzes the category of the sensory experience through that faculty. He came to conclusions that did provide necessary and fundamental foundations for our experiences that are in sensory experiences. In addition to his transcendental concepts, Jane concluded that understanding of objects is possible. The understanding does provide the rules for our identifying the representations.
At the analytic, she does address the challenges of submission of particular sensations in the schematic sections. The transcendental schemata, she has an argument that that helps in identification of homogeneous features that are picked out through the concept from all the heterogeneous concepts. The schema does make it possible for example concrete and particular sensations.
Bibliography
Addams, Jane. Twenty years at hull house. New York: The Macmillan Company, (1860-1835).
