We spoke in the previous section of Kant’s notion of truth lies in human experiences. That we are conscious of the ‘here’ and ‘now’ and we express them into propositions that may or may not be coherent with reality. But what is reality anyways? The only truth for us as a subjecting observer lies in the experiencing. Truth for us is nothing but something subjective and idiosyncratic for us. Nothing can take that away. We tell ourselves this story. It is our only source of truth to keep us going as a unique human being. As (B)eings, substance of experience and ability to rationalize behind the curtains of our irrationality. But we are always in flux, although the ‘now’ of our state is static. The past, present and future are dependent on our current static self, peeling into the chaos that is our projecting future.
The idea of self-consciousness is a pragmatic truth we create for ourselves. It is an accumulation of our experience that we come to conceptualize as such a thing. I can see the heavenly blue sky, but in a couple of hours, I know it will be night. I will experience the same tomorrow and the day after. And because I exist into the future and hold memories of my past, I must exist and live. It is an undeniable fact. How can one refuse such a simple statement from common sense reasoning? But one must be understanding that this chain of reasoning is merely a subjection condition from our cognition. Only a function of thought, an idea that is universally acceptable. It is not from experience that I come to the conclusion of the self, but only a form of apperception, by assimilating the body of ideas that I process.
The same goes for the idea of a pure substance. That I am a collection of my thoughts. Indivisible and centralized to myself. These are mere ideas. What then is the distinction between me proposing that ‘I’ am an individual relative to ‘I’ am that of a collective. Such tension will rest on ideologies conflict, none that are empirical. The idea of personality is the same throughout, although the psychological evidence may contradict if we were to follow the behaviourist line of thought.
We would see the dilemma if we were to posit forward. We have to accept these thoughts regardless of their foundationless bases. For how are we to contemplate the meaning of life without these initial presuppositions. I am a substance, a simple composite of my thoughts, my own identity, I exist to experience reality for myself. These are concepts that we possibly hold as dogmatic and should never use as first principle for further propositions of thoughts. But we can still use it to create meaning and morality for ourselves, for these existential questions lies together at the transcendental plane.

There is a mystery element within our consciousness that we are unaware, objective categories manifest within the mind itself which bind to the very subject of experience. Before Kant rise to prominence, David Hume distinguishes our innate ability to recognise the causation of objects as uniform repetition closest to determinate truth. Still, he left out the question of the medium which brings the cause and effect as a unified proposition. How is it possible to cognise the concepts of causality in the first place. Immanuel Kant awoke from his dogmatic slumber after reading Hume. Shaken into a state of limbo for 13 years, before publishing his magnum-opus, on the Critique of Pure Reasons, changing the trajectory of philosophy towards a new era.

Hume lived in the period of the enlightenment where (to put it simplicity) the stage of philosophy battle is between the rationalist and the empiricist prevails. Hume would position himself as a sceptical empiricist, qualifying as one of the big three on the side of the empiricist. He dismisses the rationalist as too abstract and un-practical. Our imagination is too limitless, able to access into the realm beyond the universe in our mind and travel into uncharted chaos. But we need to ground ourselves back into reality.

Its tough looking at the situation in Hong Kong. There’s so much suffering, and it deeply affects me personally - part of my roots are from Hong Kong. There seems to be no way out of the turmoil. I can’t bring myself to think politically, because if I were to engage with it at that level, I have to pick a side, and both sides seem to be a losing battle; between pro-democracy and pro-China.

The way I see it, one of the explanations of the resulting situation is social inequality, but that answer leads to no end. The empirical evidence on inequality is quite clear, that the only viable compression to long-term inequality is through violent means; Warfare, State Failure, Pandemics and Revolution. To say revolution in Hong Kong as an inevitable consequence of human nature is such a pessimistic answer. The same as saying that there’s nothing we could do but let the patterns of history play itself out again. :(

I have to view it form another perceptive, as a socially constructed phenomenon. That in appearances, it curious why there seem to be only two groups in opposition, pro-democracy and pro-China. From a macrocosm perspective, the two groups seem to be a battle between Western values against the Eastern values. If we were to trace their philosophy, the two would share different first-principles. The former from rationality since the Greek period, and the latter from moral virtue in Confucianism, and both build their empire from different grounds, constructing different approaches and progression.
Once the existing structure is dramatically shifted in the case of integrating China into westernizes Hong Kong, chaos will occur. The human’s belief is shaken and immediately relies on its defence mechanism.

Currently, we see both sides in the extreme form leading to the outbreaks of violence. Riots being emphasized in the news outlet and social media, leading to more tension at an international level. The world is spectating, picking a side as well.
But I prefer to be optimistic, there should and could a more hopeful alternative. Being a socially constructed phenomenon, it is possible to choose a new moment, a synthesis of the two. I see it as a humanitarian movement, of the position that violence as a means cannot justify whatever end. It could be an opportunity for people of Hong Kong to spark a third movement, to re-establish whatever small hope of peace left in Hong Kong. To accept the current state of oppression but to hold it back, and internalize it for the moment, and to work towards their sense of justice incrementally and widely deem acceptable from both sides. That I see, is the only positive way out of the mess, although working it through is complicated and I have no definite answers.

Confucianism is a philosophy practised in the East, written obscurely by Confucious himself and his student as a guide to the Way of the Tao. The reason for his obscurity is that the interpretation of the writing is multi-dimensional; each point is in relation to each other. I’ll take my hermeneutics from the book, A guide for the perplexed, quoting from the author, Yong Huang, a liberal view on Confucianism. I’ll draw comparisons from the Western philosophy to make some distinction as well.

What does it mean to be free? First and foremost, it is a word, obviously, so it must come from somewhere. According to John Locke political theory in the Age of Enlightenment, Liberty is one being free from a superpower. Adam Smith, grandfather of economy, based his entire economic theory on individual liberty. Even in the bible, the concept of liberty run strongly to the core, embedding in the logos, a spark of divinity in every man. This appearance of Western thought runs through the veins of every free individual. So strongly, in fact, it is manifested in The Bill of Rights. How unthinkable to even reject it through reason when it is Western history itself.

But even the impeccable concept is still intangible ideas. Look at Eastern Philosophy, trace back to Confucius teaching. The Western notion diffuse and differs. Men here in the Orient are men as a community. To take one’s self-interest is the same thing as the regard for others. Egoism and Altruism combined. Combined not in a way that virtuous person is partially egoistic and partially altruistic but both simultaneously. Personal and Politics circulating as one in terms of virtue ethics of the synthesis between Egoism and Altruism, that is the role of the government in the East, different from the liberal view.

To learn and understand the foundation of roots is to alienate from one’s manifestation. How am I to feel indifferent about both views. But the external is binary, to make a choice between one-another. No longer in the state of paradox left in the mind. To choose one is to reject the solid ground of an empire. How am I to decide? To view as the eye of Horus staring down at the pyramid. Now we have a split, between the above and the within, the minority and the majority, the master and the slave. Pick a side, through the guidance or multiplication.

Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit (1807) tackles the question of experience. Not ordinary experience but dialectical experience in our pursuit of absolute knowledge. The Introduction is simply a short preliminary conception, only justifiable by going through the entire book. By searching section by section, digging into the text, contemplating and re-contemplating, discovering and re-discovering, can we understand Hegel (and any book) to the fullest in a dialectical sense?

But look… still we have to start somewhere. So here’s an attempt of an introduction to the Introduction of the Phenomenology of Spirit.

The way we perceive the world around us has an underlying structure. That structure comes from philosophy, written by PhD professors in the past or contemporary. People adapt their liberal ideas to counter the fallacy in the previous generations. The next generation adapts those idea unconsciously. Today, with the rise of democracy and technology, we have an implosion of different ideas. Too much so that we come to accept that my truth may not be your truth. The world today is relative and subjective. You see here I’m making a very bold statement from experience and observation from the world around me that I say is true. It’s probably not until we analyze the history of philosophy.

Looking at inequality, we see that it is an issue in every economy. It’s a problem that we have to look that, but it’s much more complicated then you think. There are different lenses one can view from, and I’ll try to lay out some of them.

The truth could be replace as rational thought, common sense (although I would argue not very common sense), some empirical data, metaphor, or an analogy to prove a certain point. But which methodology is closer to the truth? Maybe there’s a voice at the back of your head telling you otherwise? Perhaps you’re using someone else thoughts as your own without justifying it?

The world is a complicated place beyond comprehension. We could possibly never have the capacity to understand the truth. We simplify, reduce, shorten the “truth” so could get our point across during a conversation/thought. To reach a point, we chain our thoughts into a sequential flow that makes sense. Imagine having someone break that chain of thought with another/opposing idea. Now you have to re-think. Now you have to have a debate to move forward. What if its something that has manifested in you so deeply close to your soul. Will you pull the “Well, it’s up to your interpretation” card? Aha! Someone caught you between your feet. You are not who you think you are.

We may not be adapted for truth. We’re tribal, biased, emotional, irrational creatures. You have to work tirelessly to get to the truth. It isn’t easy, especially when we’re unsure how to define truth.

How then? We explore… the quest of finding the truth.
We’re starting from antiquity and work our way to the Now.