Analysis in the Critique of Pure Reason

2007 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 61-89 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melissa McBay Merritt
Keyword(s):  
Categorical Imperative ◽  
Practical Philosophy ◽  
Pure Reason ◽  
Critique Of Pure Reason ◽  
Critical Philosophy ◽  
No Innovation ◽  
Principal Task ◽  
Theoretical Philosophy

It is widely supposed that the principal task of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason is to carry out some kind of analysis of experience. Commentators as profoundly at odds on fundamental points of interpretation as P. F. Strawson and Patricia Kitcher share this supposition. In a letter to J. S. Beck, Kant seems to endorse this view himself, referring to some unspecified stretch of the Critique as an ‘analysis of experience in general’. The idea that the Critique is engaged in an analysis of experience accords well with an attractive conception of Critical philosophy as making something explicit that is generally only implicit in our cognitive lives. After all, the categorical imperative is no innovation of Kant's practical philosophy, but rather is meant to be revealed as the animating principle of ‘ordinary moral rational cognition’. Likewise, the principles revealed in Kant's theoretical philosophy should be nothing other than the principles that necessarily animate ordinary empirical cognition; and Kant says that experience is, or is a mode of, empirical cognition. For this reason, it is undeniably compelling to think of the Critique as offering some kind of analysis of experience.

Beck, Jacob Sigismund (1761–1840)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eckart Forster
Keyword(s):  
Pure Reason ◽  
Critique Of Pure Reason ◽  
Critical Philosophy ◽  
The Third ◽  
Thing In Itself ◽  
Kantian Philosophy ◽  
Theoretical Philosophy

Beck played a brief but important role in the development of post-Kantian philosophy. A former student of Kant, he published at his teacher’s instigation three volumes of ‘Explanatory Abstracts’ of Kant’s major writings. In the third volume Beck presented what he regarded as the ‘Only Possible Standpoint’ from which Critical Philosophy had to be judged if misunderstandings of Kant’s work were to be avoided. His ‘Doctrine of the Standpoint’ involved a ‘reversal’ of the method of the Critique of Pure Reason and the elimination of the ‘thing-in-itself’ from Kant’s theoretical philosophy.

Immanuel Kant: Theoretical Philosophy

Philosophy ◽  
2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Watkins
Keyword(s):  
Modern Philosophy ◽  
Immanuel Kant ◽  
Current Situation ◽  
Practical Philosophy ◽  
Pure Reason ◽  
Critique Of Pure Reason ◽  
Philosophical Thought ◽  
Present Context ◽  
Systematic Importance ◽  
Theoretical Philosophy

The historical and systematic importance of Kant’s philosophy can hardly be exaggerated. The revolutionary contribution it made to earlier modern philosophy, the influence it had on the subsequent course of philosophical thought, and the significance it has for an understanding of our current situation are unparalleled. Given its importance, it is not surprising that scholarship on Kant’s philosophy has also been extremely rich, with attention being paid both to specific sections of Kant’s famous Critique of Pure Reason and to the systematic topics that are treated therein. While Kant’s practical philosophy and aesthetics are revolutionary in their own right, the focus in the present context is on Kant’s theoretical philosophy, which is expressed primarily, though not exclusively, in the Critique of Pure Reason.

Some Persistent Presumptions of Hegelian Anti-Subjectivism

2019 ◽  
pp. 139-152
Author(s):  
Karl Ameriks
Keyword(s):  
Transcendental Idealism ◽  
Recent Criticism ◽  
Pure Reason ◽  
Critique Of Pure Reason ◽  
Critical System ◽  
Theoretical Philosophy

This chapter responds primarily to a recent criticism of Kant by Stephen Houlgate. Like many other recent Hegelian accounts, Houlgate’s severe critique of Kant’s theoretical philosophy contends that, in contrast to Hegel, Kant’s Critical system, especially because of its doctrine of transcendental idealism, presupposes a subjectivist and therefore inadequate position. On the basis of a moderate interpretation of Kant’s idealism and his general Critical procedure, the chapter defends Kant from the charge of subjectivism, and also gives an account of how subjectivist interpretations in general can arise from a series of understandable misunderstandings of difficult passages in Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason.

scholarly journals LA ANGUSTIA, MÁS ACÁ DEL CONOCIMIENTO

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (30) ◽  
pp. 132-143
Author(s):  
Maximiliano Ariel Maximiliano
Keyword(s):  
Jacques Lacan ◽  
Fundamental Difference ◽  
Practical Philosophy ◽  
Pure Reason ◽  
Critique Of Pure Reason ◽  
Object A ◽  
Conditions Of Possibility

ResumenEn el presente artículo nos proponemos abordar un aspecto escasamente trabajado en la bibliografía lacaniana, a saber, la recepción de la Crítica de la razón pura –especialmente, “La estética trascendental”-– en el seminario La angustia de Jacques Lacan. Efectivamente, los comentadores de la obra de Lacan se han centrado casi de manera exclusiva en la recepción de la filosofía práctica de Kant que ha realizado el psicoanalista francés, dejando de lado la importancia de la Crítica de la razón pura para delimitar al objeto a. En este punto, será necesario evocar la distinción fundamental entre objetividad y objetalidad para distinguir, así, el deseo a la base de las condiciones de posibilidad del conocimiento al deseo.Palabras claves: objetividad, objetalidad, epistemología, Kant, objeto a. AbstractThis paper aims at addressing one aspect barely studied of the Lacanian bibliography, i.e., the reception of the Critique of Pure Reason –especially, the “Transcendental Aesthetic”– in Jacques Lacan's seminary on Anxiety. Indeed, commentators of Lacan's work have almost exclusively focused on his reception of Kant's practical philosophy, putting aside the importance of the Critique of Pure Reason to delimit the object a. In this point, it will be necessary to recall the fundamental difference between objectivity and objectality in order to distinguish the desire on the base of the conditions of possibility from knowledge to desire.Keywords: objectivity, objectality, epistemology, Kant, object a. Résumé Cet article aborde un aspect peu étudié de l'œuvre lacanienne, à savoir, la réception de la Critique de la raison pure - notamment “L'esthétique transcendantale "– dans le séminaire L'angoisse de Jacques Lacan. En effet, les commentateurs de l'œuvre de Lacan se sont focalisés presque exclusivement sur la réception de la philosophie pratique de Kant de la part du psychanalyste français, en oubliant l'importance de la Critique de la raison pure pour délimiter l'objet a. Sur ce point, il est nécessaire d'évoquer la distinction fondamentale entre objectivité et objectalité, pour différencier ainsi le désir à la base des conditions de possibilité de la connaissance au désir.Mots-clés : objectivité, objectalité, épistémologie, Kant, objet a. 

The Remarriage of Reason and Experience in Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason

2019 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 53-69
Author(s):  
J. Colin McQuillan ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Immanuel Kant ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Pure Reason ◽  
Critique Of Pure Reason ◽  
Critical Philosophy ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Intelligible World

This article argues that Immanuel Kant recreates in his critical philosophy one of the most distinctive features of Christian Wolff’s rationalism—the marriage of reason and experience (connubium rationis et experientiae). The article begins with an overview of Wolff’s connubium and then surveys the reasons some of his contemporaries opposed the marriage of reason and experience, paying special attention to the distinctions between phenomena and noumena, sensible and intellectual cognition, and empirical and pure cognition that Kant employs in his inaugural dissertation On the Form and Principles of the Sensible and the Intelligible World (1770). The final section of the article argues that, in the Critique of Pure Reason (1781/1787), Kant rejects the anticonnubialist positions he defended in his inaugural dissertation and introduces a new account of the relation between reason and experience that recreates Wolff’s connubium within the context of his critical philosophy.

scholarly journals Darwinism as the Missing Link in Kant’s Critical Philosophy

2019 ◽  
Vol 38 (4) ◽  
pp. 51-80
Author(s):  
Igor K. Kalinin
Keyword(s):  
A Priori ◽  
Physical Nature ◽  
Pure Reason ◽  
Entire System ◽  
Critique Of Pure Reason ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Critical Philosophy ◽  
Transcendental Deduction ◽  
Critical Attitude ◽  
Logical Functions

I proceed from the hypothesis that the difficulties in Kant’s presentation of his plan and, accordingly, the implicit reason for the critical attitude to this plan on the part of many contemporary philosophers stem from the fact that he had no theoretical link at his disposal which would offer a more solid scientific grounding for his entire system. I believe that Darwinism is such a link which bolsters the central but ungrounded thesis of the Critique of Pure Reason on the existence of a priori synthetic judgments. The synthesis of Darwinism and critical philosophy dictates, however, a substantial restructuring of the latter since some of its key elements prove to be weak in the light of modern studies and need to be revised or even reversed. The first reversal explored in this article determines the origin of the categories which are now revealed not “from the top down” where Kant sought them, i. e. not in logical functions in accordance with metaphysical deduction and not in self-consciousness as transcendental deduction claims, but “from the bottom up” if one considers things in the evolutionary dimension, i. e. in the instincts. The second reversal shifts the freedom of will which Kant placed in the same ontological basket with things in themselves at “the top,” to another level of the pyramid of ontologies, by changing dualism to pluralism because dualism is too narrow to accommodate all the autonomous components of critical philosophy. Thus spirit and freedom find a new place separate from the sphere of physical nature; the category of adaptation explains how different ontologies can coexist; while the problem of two interpretations of transcendental idealism (two-world vs. two-aspect interpretation) finds a solution through their reconciliation.

scholarly journals Of empty thoughts and blind intuitions Kant's answer to McDowell

2010 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-96 ◽  
Author(s):  
Günter Zöller
Keyword(s):  
Pure Reason ◽  
Critique Of Pure Reason ◽  
The Real ◽  
Myth Of The Given ◽  
Passive Data ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Senses ◽  
The Given ◽  
Theoretical Philosophy

This paper examines the relation between intuition and concept in Kant in light of John McDowell's neo-Kantian position that intuitions are concept-laden.2 The focus is on Kant's twofold pronouncement that thoughts without content are empty and that intuitions without concepts are blind. I show that intuitions as singular representations are not instances of passive data intake but the result of synthetic unification of the given manifold of the senses by the power of the imagination under the guidance of the understanding. Against McDowell I argue that the amenability of intuitions to conceptual determination is not due some pre-existing, absolute conceptuality of the real but to the "work of the subject."3 On a more programmatic level, this paper seeks to demonstrate the limitations of a selective appropriation of Kant and the philosophical potential of a more comprehensive and thorough consideration of his work. Section 1 addresses the unique balance in Kant's philosophy between the work on particular problems and the orientation toward a systematic whole. Section 2 outlines McDowell's take on the Kantian distinction between intuition and concept in the context of the Kant readings by Sellars and Strawson. Section 3 exposes McDowell's relapse into the Myth of the Given. Section 4 proposes a reading of Kant's theoretical philosophy as an epistemology of metaphysical cognition. Section 5 details Kant's original account of sensible intuition in the Inaugural-Dissertation of 1770. Section 6 presents the transition from the manifold of the senses to the synthesis in the imagination and the unification through the categories in the Critique of pure reason (1781 and 1787). Section 7 addresses Kant's formalism in epistemology and metaphysics.

scholarly journals KANTAS IR DELEUZE’AS: KOKIA YRA GILIAUSIA VAIZDUOTĖS PASLAPTIS?

Problemos ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 84 ◽  
pp. 153-169 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jūratė Baranova
Keyword(s):  
Point Of View ◽  
Pure Reason ◽  
Critique Of Pure Reason ◽  
Critical Philosophy ◽  
Do So ◽  
Philosophical Understanding

Straipsnyje nagrinėjama Kanto nužymėtos ir Deleuze’o eksperimentiniame mąstyme rekonstruotos vaizduotės kaip vieno iš trijų proto gebėjimų raiškos lauko alternatyvos. Siekiama atsakyti į paties Deleuze’o išsikeltą kantišką klausimą: kokia yra giliausia paslaptis? Aptinkamos kelios atsakymo alternatyvos. Šiame tyrime paaiškėjo, kad Deleuze’o atsakymai į paties išsikeltą klausimą „kokia yra giliausia vaizduotės paslaptis?“ patiria metamorfozes, kurios apsuka ratą. Nuo pradinės pozicijos, kai vaizduotė veikia tik paklusdama intelektui ar protui, ji juda link laisvo trijų nepriklausomų sugebėjimų – intelekto, proto, vaizduotės atitikimo, paskui – link jų nedarnios dermės, jų kovos, kuri skatina kiekvienos naują atsiskleidimą, galiausiai – prie vaizduotės anihiliacijos, kuri leidžia užgimti naujai minčiai, taigi, ratas apsisuka ir grįžtama prie jų dermės naujame lygmenyje, moderuojant filosofiniam skoniui. Tačiau visas šias metaformorfozes jungia viena bendra Kanto suformuluota prielaida: vaizduotė niekada neišvengia triadinės priklausomybės, ji neveikia viena; ji galima tik santykyje su intelektu ir protu, t. y. kitais trimis jai paraleliais ir simultaniškais sugebėjimais.Pagrindiniai žodžiai: Kantas, Deleuze’as, vaizduotėKant and Deleuze: What is the Deepest Secret of Imagination? Jūratė Baranova Abstract The paper discusses the problem of possible philosophical understanding of imagination from the Kantian-Deleuzean point of view. At the begining of his philosophical carreer, one can say, “early Deleuze” in 1963 published the book „Kant’s Critical Philosophy“ (La philosophie critique de Kant). The same year he wrote an essay “The Idea of Genesis in Kant’s Esthetics”. In both texts returning to Kant’s book Critique of Pure Reason, Deleuze notices, that it is widely acknowledged that schematizing is an original and irreducible act of imagination: only imagination can and knows how to schematize. Nevertheless, the imagination does not schematize of its own accord, simply because it is free to do so. It schematizes only for a speculative purpose, in accordance with the determinate concepts of the understanding; when the understanding itself plays the role of legislator. This is why it would be misguided to search the mistery of schematizing for the last word on the imagination in its essence or in its free spontaneity. “Schematizing is indeed a secret, but not the deepest secret of imagination,” – writes Deleuze. Some questions arise at this point. The first one – who speaks here: Kant or Deleuze? The second one – what is this deepest secret of imagination, as an intrigue of this kantian-deleuzean voice? How many possible answers to this question one can discern passing from “early Deleuze” to “late Deleuze”? In this article the author discoved some possible metamorphosis or twists of imagination in the experimental reading of Deleuze. It starts from the submissive position being directed by Understanding or Reason, to the free accord of three independent faculties, towards their discord, even fight, even death of the imagination for the sake of the thought and at least – the whirl closes and comes to the same point but from a different point of view: imagination, together with understanding and reason participate as an integral part of philosophical taste in later Deleuze. But one point united all these different adventures of imagination. Imagination always acts only in relation to the understanding and reason, it never plays free. It could never be able to play alone. Keywords: Kant, Deleuze, imagination.

The Epoch of Critique

2020 ◽  
pp. 33-35
Author(s):  
Willy Thayer
Keyword(s):  
Pure Reason ◽  
Critique Of Pure Reason ◽  
Critical Philosophy ◽  
True Source ◽  
Points Of View

This chapter explains what delimits the epoch of critique that is inaugurated by Immanuel Kant's critical philosophy, the Critique of Pure Reason. It focuses on the epoch of critique that separates itself from dogmatism, that long epoch of many epochs and multiple schools whose natural disposition Kant referred to as “metaphysical.” Before even the arbitrary universalization of beliefs, values, actions, points of view, and particular judgments, dogmatism consists in the inadvertent setting in motion of the presuppositions, conditions, and limits of judgments, convictions, and values. This chapter points out that dogmatism does not lie so much in the intransigent affirmation of an opinion or doctrine as it does in the unsuspecting application of unforeseen conditions and circulates as a liberal or flexible disposition. It emphasizes that the true source of dogmatism is the result of an athematic, inertial use of the form, whatever the circumstances may be.

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