Nietszche (himself hardly a model of argumentative clarity) has a similar complaint: "they muddy the water, to make it appear deep". Basically, it's not just that unclear writing gives work for interpreters. It also lets you seem deep, and let's you (or better, your acolytes) respond to objections to your work with charges that the objectors have misinterpreted you.
I think the use of unclear or confusing language can be levelled against a lot of philosophers but some philosophers, arguably Kant included, are difficult to read just because they're working with very fine-grained concepts. Take this typically confusing passage of Sartre's Being and Nothingness:
"Let us look more closely at this dimension of being. We said that consciousness is the knowing being in his capacity as being and not as being known. This means that we must abandon the primacy of knowledge if we wish to establish that knowledge. Of course consciousness can know and know itself. But it is in itself something other than a knowledge turned back upon itself."
Sartre is perhaps saying something substantial, but he's couched everything in this very difficult to parse way that leaves the reader unsure whether perhaps some trick is being played. Compare first with an easy passage in Kant's Critique of Pure Reason:
"Holding for true, or the subjective validity of a judgement in relation to conviction (which is, at the same time, objectively valid), has the three following degrees: opinion, belief, and knowledge. Opinion is a consciously insufficient judgement, subjectively as well as objectively. Belief is subjectively sufficient, but is recognized as being objectively insufficient. Knowledge is both subjectively and objectively sufficient. Subjective sufficiency is termed conviction (for myself); objective sufficiency is termed certainty (for all). I need not dwell longer on the explanation of such simple conceptions."
He uses technical philosophical language (what philosopher doesn't!) but his meaning is very clear and it's all well expressed. Kant isn't always the best stylist but he's not a deliberate obscurantist. So we have more trust when we read more difficult passages, such as:
"Immanent physiology, on the contrary, considers nature as the sum of all sensuous objects, consequently, as it is presented to us—but still according to à priori conditions, for it is under these alone that nature can be presented to our minds at all."
The meaning of the sentence doesn't give way entirely on first glance, but we know that he'll explain himself well in the lines to come and that the full sense can be unpacked. Kant didn't have a career incentive to be hard to read, but that sort of accusation could be levelled against someone like Derrida or a lot of published critical theory.
Nietszche (himself hardly a model of argumentative clarity) has a similar complaint: "they muddy the water, to make it appear deep". Basically, it's not just that unclear writing gives work for interpreters. It also lets you seem deep, and let's you (or better, your acolytes) respond to objections to your work with charges that the objectors have misinterpreted you.
I think the use of unclear or confusing language can be levelled against a lot of philosophers but some philosophers, arguably Kant included, are difficult to read just because they're working with very fine-grained concepts. Take this typically confusing passage of Sartre's Being and Nothingness:
"Let us look more closely at this dimension of being. We said that consciousness is the knowing being in his capacity as being and not as being known. This means that we must abandon the primacy of knowledge if we wish to establish that knowledge. Of course consciousness can know and know itself. But it is in itself something other than a knowledge turned back upon itself."
Sartre is perhaps saying something substantial, but he's couched everything in this very difficult to parse way that leaves the reader unsure whether perhaps some trick is being played. Compare first with an easy passage in Kant's Critique of Pure Reason:
"Holding for true, or the subjective validity of a judgement in relation to conviction (which is, at the same time, objectively valid), has the three following degrees: opinion, belief, and knowledge. Opinion is a consciously insufficient judgement, subjectively as well as objectively. Belief is subjectively sufficient, but is recognized as being objectively insufficient. Knowledge is both subjectively and objectively sufficient. Subjective sufficiency is termed conviction (for myself); objective sufficiency is termed certainty (for all). I need not dwell longer on the explanation of such simple conceptions."
He uses technical philosophical language (what philosopher doesn't!) but his meaning is very clear and it's all well expressed. Kant isn't always the best stylist but he's not a deliberate obscurantist. So we have more trust when we read more difficult passages, such as:
"Immanent physiology, on the contrary, considers nature as the sum of all sensuous objects, consequently, as it is presented to us—but still according to à priori conditions, for it is under these alone that nature can be presented to our minds at all."
The meaning of the sentence doesn't give way entirely on first glance, but we know that he'll explain himself well in the lines to come and that the full sense can be unpacked. Kant didn't have a career incentive to be hard to read, but that sort of accusation could be levelled against someone like Derrida or a lot of published critical theory.