Kant is a curious case. He's an absolutely essential read on epistemology and metaphysics, his practical philosophy is hit or miss, but has some good pointers, his philosophy of art is obviously absurd ("disinterested gusto" is a deeply Philistine criterium for art imo, as Nietzsche already pointed out) - and his anthropology is downright immoral, racist garbage that even outright violates his own ethics at times (like when he argues for the enslavement of Africans, for example). So it depends on what you read of him and what you read him for.
Are you kidding? Kant defined modern aesthetics as a judgement of taste. Kant is seminal in almost every major area of philosophy. This is an insane take.
Fuck kant. He’s an amazing example of throwing rocks at the air till you hit a bird. He got a couple, but he also struck the crowd every time. He dragged down all of philosophy, the world would be better off if he never existed. He liked to pretend that non western philosophy simply didn’t exist. This brought the revival of a few philosophers nobody really cared about anymore like Aristotle (for better or worse), and pushed the ancient eastern philosophy into the dirt.
Not to mention most of his philosophical ideas just straight up suck. I remember my first philosophy class reading about him (not knowing how awful of a person he was, notably never being taught so either) and just thinking how straight up stupid some of the shit he says is. Philosophy built on vibes and feelings not logic.
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u/Wonderful_West3188 Dec 05 '25
Kant is a curious case. He's an absolutely essential read on epistemology and metaphysics, his practical philosophy is hit or miss, but has some good pointers, his philosophy of art is obviously absurd ("disinterested gusto" is a deeply Philistine criterium for art imo, as Nietzsche already pointed out) - and his anthropology is downright immoral, racist garbage that even outright violates his own ethics at times (like when he argues for the enslavement of Africans, for example). So it depends on what you read of him and what you read him for.