Friday, 10 June 2011

The sleep of dogmatism and its function

We sleep an intellectual sleep; it is the sleep of dogmatism - or “slumber” as Kant called it (1783). Why this dogmatic sleep?

Because this sleep helps us. How? Its function is to protect us against the troublesome affordances and the boulversing power of a question:
  • how could the reality we refer to be constituted also by profound inner patterns and images made by ourselves?
To ask this question requires to be ready to accept an answer that explains the "how" asked for in the question. It means that we could have to accept an answer which shows, that the reality we claim to be independent from us and valid for all (and "social") is merely our own individual reality, valid for one single person.

As a consequence the dogmatic sleep protects us also against the potentially threatening insight that the reality we refer to (RWRT), although experienced as independent from us/me, is always merely our/my individual reality.






1 comment:

  1. Dear Sir/Madam
    We are the Tibetan Children Educational Project situated in Dharamsala India.
    The purpose of our project is to keep Tibetan culture and language alive in a time when under the Communist regime it is in danger of dying out.
    Every year hundreds of children make the 1 month journey over the Himalaya on foot to seek refuge in India to safety and also to be near to HH. The Dalai Lama our spiritual leader. Sadly, some don.t survive the journey, but for those who do we try to keep the Tibetan traditions going so that Tibetan Children can have the same chances as anyone else in life.
    Really this message is just to let you know who we are and to ask if you would follow us. Thank you so much Tcep

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