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Kant see it?


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The categorical imperative demands absolute necessity, in other words it must happen universally and under absolutely ALL conditions. There can be no qualifications. For Kant, it was also a moral basis, not a practical one.

 

Most importantly, the categorical imperative applies to man (meaning "people") alone and it applies to man's reason.

 

Much photography is guided by more important things to it than reason, so I'm with Mike.

 

No.

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Would it be the principle that photographs are an absolute good thing, and therefore making more of them is a good way to spend our time?

:)

 

Interestingly, Kant and photography go together well. Kant says that there is a real world out there but we can’t know it. We don’t have access to reality, just to our perception and experience of it. What we see is filtered through “categories” structured in our minds. An absolute good, for him, would be a human, moral way of being, not an activity like photography. But it seems to be that photographs which sometimes get mistaken for the things in the world they are photographs of are very much like Kant’s idea of human perceptions. Our perceptions, for Kant, bring us a representation and sometimes an enhancement and sometimes a restricted or even false view of reality. Photos can do the same.

 

The only Kantian categorical imperative I can imagine would be, “Photograph others as you would have them photograph you,” which I don’t think works for photography much better than the Golden Rule works in real life.

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raises the question of the relation, or not, of the Categorical Imperative and the Golden Rule,

Indeed, they're related but perhaps more like cousins than sisters. The Golden Rule is more individual and more empirical ... "as you would have others do unto you." The Categorical Imperative, though there are some instances of it that sound more like the Golden Rule, is a more universal maxim. Most importantly, Kant's Imperative comes from rationality itself and tells us to act as we would want all others to act to all others, in similar circumstances. Kant's is a universal law in that it makes all others the basis for how we act, not just how we would want to be treated.

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In terms of any kind of moral question and photography, I find myself to be on a comfortable track when I think of it as a shared endeavor with my human and non-human subjects and my human (and sometimes non-human:)) viewers. Photography is something shared with the world itself because the camera is so often pointed at it, and something I also share with viewers. Sharing, at its most potent, involves empathy, which is a good place for any universal moral maxim to start.

 

There's plenty of room for a strong will or ego in there, if you make room for it, especially since so many of us share in having a strong sense of self.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Wittgenstein even rejected his own explanations in his later and more seasoned reflections, less explanations than written impressions.

Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language.

—Ludwig Wittgenstein,

Philosophical Investigations

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Kant’s brilliance was shaped by a strict mindset, thus the imperative sought and found. Wittgenstein yielded to a change in core thinking which became a kind of lack of core thinking, thus a more malleable approach to life’s questions.

 

The notion of imperative doesn’t suit how I view and practice photography. I’ll usually choose a could over being dictated to by a should.

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Ouch!

 

I like the idea of a "no imperative" imperative, if and when you like. A voluntary imperative.

 

So we can keep our lens caps on, forget to put film or batteries in our cameras, create images that are or are not worth creating and/or seeing, et cetera, just because we feel like it.

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Kant was not terribly in favor of stating the obvious. This is why his categorical imperative was something beyond, "Remember to breathe." He thought, and so did others, it was a pivotal and deep moral founding of being human. "Take your lens cap off" would not have served his purpose, even though he'd recognize it as a good idea for taking pictures.

 

He, of course, doesn't say anything about photography, but his aesthetics suggest that, for him, art would involve many similar concerns as morality. Were he to take up photography, my guess would be his imperative would be to show the order of the world and the wonder of nature.

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