# Do Immanuel Kant's racist opinions render the rest of his philosophy suspect? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 4, 2011, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731 "2011-05-04T18:51:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![historyaccessdotcom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3bc359/32.png) [@historyaccessdotcom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/historyaccessdotcom)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/61 "2011-05-06T01:53:14Z")
Do tell (#60). If I broken a rule by offering a relevant link to a non-profit Website, I am certainly willing to be corrected. ---
**Author:** ![Naxos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/50afbb/32.png) [@Naxos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Naxos)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/62 "2011-05-06T01:59:02Z")
Kant is obsolete. The scientific knowledge we have acquired in the past 100 years have pushed wasteful mental meanderings of past centuries’ philosophers to the margins of history. They may be interesting for sociological study, but not a philosophical one. The ancient Greek philosophers are excluded from obsolescence, of course. Everyone else is obsolete, unless they have addressed current cosmological scientific facts, and the universal truth that human beings are irrelevant to the universe. ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/63 "2011-05-06T02:17:19Z")
> [@Naxos](#): > > and the universal truth that human beings are irrelevant to the universe. I might have something to say about that. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/64 "2011-05-06T02:17:20Z")
> [@historyaccessdotcom](#): > > Do tell (#60). If I broken a rule by offering a relevant link to a non-profit Website, I am certainly willing to be corrected. It’s _your_ site, isn’t it? We ask that you not use the SDMB just to steer web traffic your way. ---
**Author:** ![Naxos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/50afbb/32.png) [@Naxos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Naxos)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/65 "2011-05-06T02:20:05Z")
> [@Kozmik](#): > > I might have something to say about that. You may, but it’s irrelevant. ---
**Author:** ![historyaccessdotcom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3bc359/32.png) [@historyaccessdotcom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/historyaccessdotcom)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/66 "2011-05-06T03:18:40Z")
(#64) Indeed it is my site. I stand corrected, thank you. For the record, I didn’t post “just” to steer traffic. God knows what a terrible thing that would be. Kant too. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/67 "2011-05-06T03:21:51Z")
> [@historyaccessdotcom](#): > > (#64) Indeed it is my site. I stand corrected, thank you. For the record, I didn’t post “just” to steer traffic. God knows what a terrible thing that would be. Kant too. I’m just explaining what the rule is for future reference. Your post was on topic and that’s welcome. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/68 "2011-05-06T03:53:24Z")
> [@historyaccessdotcom](#): > > Q. You write in one of your essays that “Western knowledge is not to be trusted; everything in it needs careful inspection for insults and blind spots.” I wonder if you could elaborate on that statement. My understanding is, the essence of Western knowledge is careful inspection of all the evidence, critical thinking, so I’m not clear what you’re saying there. > > A. Let’s take, for instance, somebody like Kant, who is revered in the United States and especially in France and Germany - gosh, you know, any discussion of anything must start with Kant! But Kant was a misogynist. Kant assumed that people of African descent were almost not people. So what he says about humanity cannot, to my eyes, be taken on face value. For reasons that have been pretty thoroughly covered by now, what she is saying does not in any way contradict the position that Western knowledge is careful inspection, etc. Nor have any relevance to it. for that matter. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 12:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/69 "2011-05-06T12:08:05Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > Why? Is the wrongness of racism self evident? Yes > [@](#): > > Kant, as was said, spent all his life in Koeningsburg. He didn’t know anyone of different races. So, if he wanted to know about the “Negroes of Africa”, his only real source of information about them was what people told him. And so if Hume is saying that there are no blacks who have ever produced anything superior in art or science, does Kant have any reason not to believe him? Well, yes, he does. Hume wasn’t a world traveller either. Kant taking Hume at his word is a sign of intellectually laziness and probably his inherent privilege, not because he has gone into a rigorous investigation into the matter. But that’s irrelevant, anyway - _even assuming Hume was right_ and Africans completely lacked any art (which is just a Scotsman argument, anyway, since Kant goes on to mention fetishes etc. which are clearly works of art, so it’s down to “what is superior art”, which no philosopher worth his sponge _should_ be touching, IMO), that does not mean a conclusion that Africans are inferior\* in every way\* is supported. But that’s what Kant goes on to do. A less intellectually-lazy philosopher might ask the hard questions like “y’know, why am I _assuming_ that just “freeing” this heavily-traumatized and culturally-raped individual tells me anything about what he would be capable of as a human being if he had been nurtured from the start” and “is it \*possible \*that the colonist’s viewpoint on what the colonized are like may just be a little biased?” and “I wonder if I need to get some perspective from a representative of the race in question, and maybe I should just shut my fucking trap until then?” But that requires the Other to start speaking for\*[themselves](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ant%C3%A9nor_Firmin)\* and turn [philosopher](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orientalism_%28book%29). Or, in other words, to summarise: “Check your privilege” should not be something a leading philosopher \*needs \*to be told, ever. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/70 "2011-05-06T12:25:12Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > I’ve never been to Australia, but I rely on the tales of others as to whether such a place exists and what its denizens are like. Well - do you rely on first-hand accounts by Australians, or _Crocodile Dundee_, _Mad Max_ and _Home and Away_ and _Neighbours_? Because that’s the level that Kant is at. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/71 "2011-05-06T12:31:25Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Wait, how could Kant **reason** that racism is wrong? The same way we do - principle of reciprocity and all that. “judge not lest ye be judged” could apply, too. “Assume nothing I’ve been told is true” is also a good principle ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/72 "2011-05-06T13:03:12Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Kant was not, himself, immoral. Doubt he ever wronged a soul in his life. Kant subscribed to the conventional opinion of his society on a point which, in hindsight, appears so utterly wrong, and the wrongness of which has occasioned so much evil in the world, that the very opinion seems tainted was evil. But, in and of itself, the opinion that one race is mentally inferior to another is not evil; it is merely wrong. immoral =/= evil. IMO, it _is_ immoral to spout off about something you don’t know the truth about. It’s\* not\* evil, but it is small-minded and _can_ have evil consequences, should someone else take your words as truth. So there \*is \*a moral responsibility to not just mouth off uninformed. As to the opinion that one race is inferior - sorry, no, evil from the get-go. The evils being those of “hasty reductionism” and “failing to do your research properly”. They’re small evils, really, compared to the “applied evils” of pogrom and colonialism, but they’re not “good” for all that. And you have to be one or the other. ---
**Author:** ![orcenio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/orcenio/32/1036_2.png) [@orcenio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/orcenio)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/73 "2011-05-06T13:17:32Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > immoral =/= evil. IMO, it _is_ immoral to spout off about something you don’t know the truth about. That’s pretty much the standard I hold dopers to. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/74 "2011-05-06T13:34:24Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Well - do you rely on first-hand accounts by Australians, or _Crocodile Dundee_, _Mad Max_ and _Home and Away_ and _Neighbours_? Because that’s the level that Kant is at. It would certainly be wrong of me, today, to rely on _Crocodile Dundee_ as an anthropological account of Australians. But then, today I have much, much better sources of information on Australia than that. Relying on a comedy-adventure movie would be inexcusable. Things were, however, somewhat different in the mid-18th century. The _only_ accounts of Africa were likely to be those brought back by slavers and the like - this was before the Euro age of African exploration. Sub-saharan Africa was, for information purposes, as remote from Koningsburg as the moon - the average German person whould have had close to zero chance for ever going there and seeing for themselves. There were no objective, scientific anthropological studies of Africans because the very notion of applying objective scientific analysis to humanity had yet to be invented - all that existed was traveller’s tales, and most of those “travellers” from europe were involved in the slave trade - and thus, quite aside from their natural tendency to view other peoples with different ways of life as “inferior”, they had a vested interest in making their dispicable livelihood more palatable by depicting Africans as brutish sub-humans (thus enslaving them not a crime). In sum, what would be unforgivable for people to believe today, is much more understandable in people at that time. Even giants of scientific thought like Sir Issac Newton believed in stuff like alchemy - that doesn’t make his work in mathematics and physics _worthless_, because he must have been a credulous fool to believe in something so obviously silly as alchemy, though any scientist today doing major work in alchemical studies would be considered a nutter. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/75 "2011-05-06T13:40:23Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > . . .that does not mean a conclusion that Africans are inferior\* in every way\* is supported. But that’s what Kant goes on to do. Well, no, he’s quoting Hume in saying that. I don’t think any of it is Kant’s conclusion. He’s just citing Hume. And since Hume is one of the preeminent thinkers of the day, Kant is just relying on his expertise. This is what Hume said: > [@](#): > > I am apt to suspect the Negroes to be naturally inferior to the Whites. There scarcely ever was a civilized nation of that complexion, nor even any individual, eminent either in action or speculation. No ingenious manufactures amongst them, no arts, no sciences. On the other hand, the most rude and barbarous of the Whites, such as the ancient Germans, the present Tartars, have still something eminent about them, in their valour, form of government, or some other particular. Such a uniform and constant difference could not happen, in so many countries and ages, if nature had not made an original distinction between these breeds of men. Not to mention our colonies, there are Negro slaves dispersed all over Europe, of whom none ever discovered the symptoms of ingenuity; though low people, without education, will start up amongst us, and distinguish themselves in every profession. In Jamaica, indeed, they talk of one Negro as a man of parts and learning; but it is likely he is admired for slender accomplishments, like a parrot who speaks a few words plainly. I think it came down, for Hume, to a simple thing, even though he never actually states it. If blacks were capable of independent thought; if they could actually be raised to a level of mental, civilizational and moral equality with the white man, then racial slavery would be an unthinkable moral evil; a transgression against humanity of such magnitude almost unheard of in human history. Since the British, and French, and Spanish were not so tremendously wicked, then blacks couldn’t become equal to whites. For him, it’s simple logic: “If X is immoral, and I do X, then I’m acting immorally. Since I do X and I’m not acting immorally, then X isn’t immoral.” ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/76 "2011-05-06T14:23:43Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > As to the opinion that one race is inferior - sorry, no, evil from the get-go. :rolleyes: It **cannot** be **evil,** because it **could** be **true.** It is not logically impossible that different racial groups of _Homo sapiens_ should have different hereditary psychological characteristics, including differences in average intelligence levels. If scientific research actually supported that, there would be no virtue in ignoring it and no evil in accepting it. There **might** be much evil in how people act inspired by that knowledge – just because A is more intelligent or whatever than B does not mean B has no rights A is bound to respect, but A might well read it that way – but, that really, **really** is another discussion. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/77 "2011-05-06T14:33:27Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > Well, no, he’s quoting Hume in saying that. I don’t think any of it is Kant’s conclusion. He’s just citing Hume. And since Hume is one of the preeminent thinkers of the day, Kant is just relying on his expertise. This is what Hume said: > > I think it came down, for Hume, to a simple thing, even though he never actually states it. If blacks were capable of independent thought; if they could actually be raised to a level of mental, civilizational and moral equality with the white man, then racial slavery would be an unthinkable moral evil; a transgression against humanity of such magnitude almost unheard of in human history. Since the British, and French, and Spanish were not so tremendously wicked, then blacks couldn’t become equal to whites. For him, it’s simple logic: “If X is immoral, and I do X, then I’m acting immorally. Since I do X and I’m not acting immorally, then X isn’t immoral.” If so, then that is a quite astonishingly unnoticed subconscious rationalization coming from the skeptic **Hume,** of all philosophers! ---
**Author:** ![Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/half_man_half_wit/32/21766_2.png) [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Half_Man_Half_Wit)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/78 "2011-05-06T14:56:03Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > immoral =/= evil. IMO, it _is_ immoral to spout off about something you don’t know the truth about. Depending on what standard of ‘knowing the truth’ one uses, a moral person might be a very silent person… > [@BrainGlutton](#): > > :rolleyes: It **cannot** be **evil,** because it **could** be **true.** It is not logically impossible that different racial groups of _Homo sapiens_ should have different hereditary psychological characteristics, including differences in average intelligence levels. I think one should be careful in delineating what one means by ‘inferiority’, i.e. if it’s a judgement of value, or merely a judgement of capacity. Somebody might be less intelligent than another person, and thus, of inferior capacity; but that does not mean that they are of less value (I’m not saying that you implied that it did, but I think it’s an issue of confusion on this point). Calling that person ‘inferior’ is thus susceptible to (mis-)interpretation. On this issue, I would say that considering an individual, racial or ethnic group inferior in the value-judgement sense _is_ in principle wrong, but considering them inferior in capacity is something in principle to be decided empirically. The question remains, however, what sense Kant was using… ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/79 "2011-05-06T15:18:52Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > YesWell, yes, he does. Hume wasn’t a world traveller either. Kant taking Hume at his word is a sign of intellectually laziness and probably his inherent privilege, not because he has gone into a rigorous investigation into the matter. > {rest of post snipped} This is probably the first time I’ve really agreed with you outside of Cafe Society. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2011, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731/80 "2011-05-06T15:20:46Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > :rolleyes: It **cannot** be **evil,** because it **could** be **true.** It is not logically impossible that different racial groups of _Homo sapiens_ should have different hereditary psychological characteristics, including differences in average intelligence levels. If scientific research actually supported that, there would be no virtue in ignoring it and no evil in accepting it. There **might** be much evil in how people act inspired by that knowledge – just because A is more intelligent or whatever than B does not mean B has no rights A is bound to respect, but A might well read it that way – but, that really, **really** is another discussion. Different =/= inferior. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-immanuel-kants-racist-opinions-render-the-rest-of-his-philosophy-suspect/580731.md?page=5)