В каких известных сочинениях изложены и кантом

Первой опубликованной работой Канта был трактат “Мысли к истинной оценке живых сил”. Эта работа, посвященная одной физической проблеме, была представлена на цензуру декану философского факультета еще весной 1746 г., но из-за ряда причин опубликована только в 1749 г. на деньги его дяди сапожника Рихтера.

Следующая важная работа Канта – “Всеобщая естественная история и теория неба”, которую он публикует в 1755 г. вскоре после возвращения в университет. В этой работе Кантом была выдвинута знаменитая гипотеза, объясняющая образование Солнечной системы из первоначальной газо-пылевой туманности при помощи только сил притяжения и отталкивания. В том же 1755 г. Кант представляет философскому факультету латинскую диссертацию “Новое освещение первых принципов метафизического познания” – первую собственно философскую работу.

Далее Кант публикует ряд естественнонаучных сочинений, а в 1762 году появляется его большая работа “О единственно возможном доказательстве бытия Бога” а также небольшой трактат по логике «Ложное мудрствование в четырех фигурах силлогизма».

В 1763 г. он в качестве работы, представленной на соискание премии Берлинской академии наук, публикует “Исследование степени ясности принципов естественной теологии и морали”. Правда, работа не получила первой премии, зато была опубликована в числе лучших.

В конце 1763 г. или в начале 1764 г. выходит чисто философская работа, к тому же написанная в блестящем, “легком” стиле “Наблюдения над чувством прекрасного и возвышенного”. В 1766 г. появляется работа Канта “Грезы духовидца, поясненные грезами метафизики”, содержащая критику теософических взглядов шведского ученого и духовидца Эммануэля Сведенборга (1688-1772).

В 1770 г. в связи с вступлением в должность ординарного профессора логики и метафизики Кант готовит еще одну латинскую диссертацию “О форме и принципах чувственного и умопостигаемого мира”. Эта работа имела важное значение в философской эволюции Канта, поскольку в ней впервые могут быть ясно прослежены идеи философии, составившей эпоху в развитии человеческой мысли – “критической философии” Канта.

С 1770 г. по 1781 г. наступает практически полное молчание. За это время было опубликовано всего лишь три небольших работы. Главной задачей Канта становится выработка собственной философской концепции, которая и была сформулирована в знаменитой работе Канта, совершившей коперниканский переворот в философии, – “Критике чистого разума”(1781). Наступает эпоха критической философии. Вскоре Канту понадобилось разъяснить более популярно идеи своей новой философии, и он издает “Пролегомены ко всякой будущей метафизике, которая может рассматриваться как наука”.

В середине восьмидесятых годов были также опубликованы небольшие, но важные работы, знаменующие переход Канта к проблемам, связанным с рассмотрением общественных процессов “Идея всеобщей истории с всемирно-гражданской точки зрения” (1784) и “Ответ на вопрос: Что такое просвещение?” (1784). За ними следует первая работа, посвященная собственно морали – “Основы метафизики нравов” (1785), подготовившая почву для второй критики Канта – “Критики практического разума” (1788), в которой в полном объеме рассмотрены проблемы практической философии, включающей в себя философское обоснование морали.

Вскоре следует третья критика – “Критика способности суждения” (1790), в которой Кант рассматривает учение о целесообразности в природе и человеке и тем самым закладывает основы критической эстетики. В 1793 г. выходит книга “Религия в пределах только разума”, где Кант попытался дать теорию религии, основанную на его критической философии. В 1795 г. появляется небольшая, но важная работа “К вечному миру”, в которой Кант попытался сформулировать философские принципы, принятие которых могло бы способствовать установлению на земле вечного мира.

В 1797 г. появляется “Метафизика нравов”, состоящих из двух частей: “Метафизических начал учения о праве” и “Метафизических начал учения о добродетели”, в этой книге Кант не только развивает свое учение о морали, но и строит философскую теорию права.

В 1798 г. появляется большая последняя работа Канта “Антропология с прагматической точки зрения”. В 1800 г., возможно, с участием Канта появляется изданная Йеше “Логика. Пособие к лекциям”. В 1802-1803 гг. появляется “Физическая география”, изданная Ринком, а в 1803 г. “О педагогике” под редакцией того же Ринка.

На этом заканчивается прижизненная история издания сочинений Канта.

Кант считал, что философия обязана ответить человечеству, по крайней мере, на четыре вопроса:

Что я могу знать?
Что я должен делать?
На что я могу надеяться?
Что такое человек?
Три вопроса сформулированы в “Критике чистого разума” (3, 661), а в лекциях по логике добавлен четвертый. Они последовательно охватывают область возможного для нас знания и способов познания того, что находится за пределами знания, область нашего практического действия и той части этих действий, которые относятся к должному, а также область будущего, которое может проистечь из наших должных (или не должных) действий, а, следовательно, определяет то, на что мы можем, а на что не можем надеяться.

В дальнейшем мы последовательно разберем кантовские ответы на эти вопросы.

Первой опубликованной работой Канта был трактат «Мысли к истинной оценке живых сил». Эта работа, посвященная одной физической проблеме, была представлена на цензуру декану философского факультета еще весной 1746 г., но из-за ряда причин опубликована только в 1749 г. на деньги его дяди сапожника Рихтера. 

Следующая важная работа Канта — «Всеобщая естественная история и теория неба», которую он публикует в 1755 г. вскоре после возвращения в университет. В этой работе Кантом была выдвинута знаменитая гипотеза, объясняющая образование Солнечной системы из первоначальной газо-пылевой туманности при помощи только сил притяжения и отталкивания. В том же 1755 г. Кант представляет философскому факультету латинскую диссертацию «Новое освещение первых принципов метафизического познания» — первую собственно философскую работу.

Далее Кант публикует ряд естественнонаучных сочинений, а в 1762 году появляется его большая работа «О единственно возможном доказательстве бытия Бога» а также небольшой трактат по логике «Ложное мудрствование в четырех фигурах силлогизма».

В 1763 г. он в качестве работы, представленной на соискание премии Берлинской академии наук, публикует «Исследование степени ясности принципов естественной теологии и морали». Правда, работа не получила первой премии, зато была опубликована в числе лучших.

В конце 1763 г. или в начале 1764 г. выходит чисто философская работа, к тому же написанная в блестящем, «легком» стиле «Наблюдения над чувством прекрасного и возвышенного». В 1766 г. появляется работа Канта «Грезы духовидца, поясненные грезами метафизики», содержащая критику теософических взглядов шведского ученого и духовидца Эммануэля Сведенборга (1688-1772).

В 1770 г. в связи с вступлением в должность ординарного профессора логики и метафизики Кант готовит еще одну латинскую диссертацию «О форме и принципах чувственного и умопостигаемого мира». Эта работа имела важное значение в философской эволюции Канта, поскольку в ней впервые могут быть ясно прослежены идеи философии, составившей эпоху в развитии человеческой мысли — «критической философии» Канта.

С 1770 г. по 1781 г. наступает практически полное молчание. За это время было опубликовано всего лишь три небольших работы. Главной задачей Канта становится выработка собственной философской концепции, которая и была сформулирована в знаменитой работе Канта, совершившей коперниканский переворот в философии, — «Критике чистого разума» (1781). Наступает эпоха критической философии. Вскоре Канту понадобилось разъяснить более популярно идеи своей новой философии, и он издает «Пролегомены ко всякой будущей метафизике, которая может рассматриваться как наука».

В середине восьмидесятых годов были также опубликованы небольшие, но важные работы, знаменующие переход Канта к проблемам, связанным с рассмотрением общественных процессов «Идея всеобщей истории с всемирно-гражданской точки зрения» (1784) и «Ответ на вопрос: Что такое просвещение?» (1784). За ними следует первая работа, посвященная собственно морали — «Основы метафизики нравов» (1785), подготовившая почву для второй критики Канта — «Критики практического разума» (1788), в которой в полном объеме рассмотрены проблемы практической философии, включающей в себя философское обоснование морали.

Вскоре следует третья критика — «Критика способности суждения» (1790), в которой Кант рассматривает учение о целесообразности в природе и человеке и тем самым закладывает основы критической эстетики. В 1793 г. выходит книга «Религия в пределах только разума», где Кант попытался дать теорию религии, основанную на его критической философии. В 1795 г. появляется небольшая, но важная работа «К вечному миру», в которой Кант попытался сформулировать философские принципы, принятие которых могло бы способствовать установлению на земле вечного мира.

В 1797 г. появляется «Метафизика нравов», состоящих из двух частей: «Метафизических начал учения о праве» и «Метафизических начал учения о добродетели», в этой книге Кант не только развивает свое учение о морали, но и строит философскую теорию права.

В 1798 г. появляется большая последняя работа Канта «Антропология с прагматической точки зрения». В 1800 г., возможно, с участием Канта появляется изданная Йеше «Логика. Пособие к лекциям». В 1802-1803 гг. появляется «Физическая география», изданная Ринком, а в 1803 г. «О педагогике» под редакцией того же Ринка.

На этом заканчивается прижизненная история издания сочинений Канта.

Immanuel Kant

Kant gemaelde 3.jpg

Portrait by Johann Gottlieb Becker, 1768

Born 22 April 1724

Königsberg, Kingdom of Prussia
(present-day Kaliningrad, Russia)

Died 12 February 1804 (aged 79)

Königsberg, East Prussia, Kingdom of Prussia

Education Collegium Fridericianum
University of Königsberg
(B.A.; M.A., April 1755; PhD, September 1755; PhD,[1] August 1770)
Era Age of Enlightenment
Region Western philosophy
School
  • Enlightenment philosophy
  • Kantianism

Other schools

  • Classical liberalism
  • Correspondence theory of truth[a][3]
  • Empirical realism
  • Foundationalism[4]
  • German idealism[5]
  • Indirect realism[6]
  • Liberal naturalism[7]
  • Metaphysical conceptualism[8]
  • Perceptual non-conceptualism[9][10]
  • Transcendental idealism
Institutions University of Königsberg
Theses
  • Principiorum primorum cognitionis metaphysicae nova dilucidatio (September 1755)
  • De mundi sensibilis atque intelligibilis forma et principiis (August 1770)
Academic advisors Martin Knutzen, Johann Gottfried Teske (M.A. advisor), Konrad Gottlieb Marquardt[11]
Notable students Jakob Sigismund Beck, Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Johann Gottfried Herder, Karl Leonhard Reinhold (epistolary correspondent)[19]

Main interests

Aesthetics, cosmogony, epistemology, ethics, metaphysics, systematic philosophy

Notable ideas

  • Abstract–concrete distinction[12]
  • Aesthetic–teleological judgments
  • Analytic–synthetic distinction
  • Categorical and hypothetical imperative
  • Categories
  • Cosmotheology
  • Critical philosophy
  • Copernican revolution in philosophy
  • Disinterested delight
  • Empirical realism
  • Kant’s antinomies
  • Kant’s pitchfork
  • Kantian ethics
  • Kingdom of Ends
  • Mathematical vs. dynamical sublimity[13]
  • Nebular hypothesis
  • Noogony and noology
  • Noumenon vs. thing-in-itself
  • Ontotheology
  • Primacy of practical reason[14]
  • Public reason
  • Radical evil
  • Rechtsstaat
  • Sapere aude
  • Transcendental schema
  • Theoretical vs. practical philosophy
  • Transcendental idealism
  • Transcendental subject
  • Transcendental theology
  • Understanding–reason distinction

Influences

    • Wolff
    • Baumgarten
    • Green[15][16]
    • Plato
    • Aristotle
    • Hamann
    • Empiricus
    • Lucretius
    • Hume
    • Smith
    • Descartes
    • Leibniz
    • Locke
    • Rousseau
    • Newton
    • Tetens[17]
    • Crusius[18]
    • Swedenborg (disputed)

Influenced

  • Virtually all subsequent Western philosophy, especially Beck, Beneke, Bolzano, Carnap, Fichte, Frege, Guyer, Habermas, Hegel, Heidegger, Herder, Jacobi, Jaspers, Maimon, Peirce, Popper, Rawls, Reinhold, Schelling, Schleiermacher, Schlegel, Schopenhauer, Spir, Zeller

Signature
Signature written in ink in a flowing script

Immanuel Kant (,[20][21] ,[22][23] German: [ɪˈmaːnu̯eːl ˈkant];[24][25] 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German philosopher and one of the central Enlightenment thinkers.[26][27] Born in Königsberg, Kant’s comprehensive and systematic works in epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and aesthetics have made him one of the most influential figures in modern Western philosophy.[26][28]

In his doctrine of transcendental idealism, Kant argued that space and time are mere «forms of intuition» which structure all experience, and therefore that, while «things-in-themselves» exist and contribute to experience, they are nonetheless distinct from the objects of experience. From this it follows that the objects of experience are mere «appearances», and that the nature of things as they are in themselves is unknowable to us.[29][30] In an attempt to counter the skepticism he found in the writings of philosopher David Hume,[31] he wrote the Critique of Pure Reason (1781/1787),[32] one of his most well-known works. In it, he developed his theory of experience to answer the question of whether synthetic a priori knowledge is possible, which would in turn make it possible to determine the limits of metaphysical inquiry. Kant drew a parallel to the Copernican revolution in his proposal to think of the objects of the senses as conforming to our spatial and temporal forms of intuition, so that we have a priori cognition of those objects.[b]

Kant believed that reason is also the source of morality, and that aesthetics arise from a faculty of disinterested judgment. Kant’s views continue to have a major influence on contemporary philosophy, especially the fields of epistemology, ethics, political theory, and post-modern aesthetics.[28] He attempted to explain the relationship between reason and human experience and to move beyond what he believed to be the failures of traditional philosophy and metaphysics. He wanted to put an end to what he saw as an era of futile and speculative theories of human experience, while resisting the skepticism of thinkers such as Hume. He regarded himself as showing the way past the impasse between rationalists and empiricists,[34] and is widely held to have synthesized both traditions in his thought.[35]

Kant was an exponent of the idea that perpetual peace could be secured through universal democracy and international cooperation, and that perhaps this could be the culminating stage of world history.[36] The nature of Kant’s religious views continues to be the subject of scholarly dispute, with viewpoints ranging from the impression that he shifted from an early defense of an ontological argument for the existence of God to a principled agnosticism, to more critical treatments epitomized by Schopenhauer, who criticized the imperative form of Kantian ethics as «theological morals» and the «Mosaic Decalogue in disguise»,[37] and Nietzsche, who claimed that Kant had «theologian blood»[38] and was merely a sophisticated apologist for traditional Christian faith.[c] Beyond his religious views, Kant has also been criticized for the racism presented in some of his lesser-known papers, such as «On the Use of Teleological Principles in Philosophy» and «On the Different Races of Man».[40][41][42][43] Although he was a proponent of scientific racism for much of his career, Kant’s views on race changed significantly in the last decade of his life, and he ultimately rejected racial hierarchies and European colonialism in Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch (1795).[44]

Kant published other important works on ethics, religion, law, aesthetics, astronomy, and history during his lifetime. These include the Universal Natural History (1755), the Critique of Practical Reason (1788), the Critique of Judgment (1790), Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason (1793), and the Metaphysics of Morals (1797).[27]

Biography[edit]

Kant was born on 22 April 1724 into a Prussian German family of Lutheran Protestant faith in Königsberg, East Prussia (since 1946 the city of Kaliningrad, Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia). His mother, Anna Regina Reuter[45] (1697–1737), was born in Königsberg to a father from Nuremberg.[citation needed] Her surname is sometimes erroneously given as Porter. Kant’s father, Johann Georg Kant (1682–1746), was a German harness maker from Memel, at the time Prussia’s most northeastern city (now Klaipėda, Lithuania). Kant believed that his paternal grandfather Hans Kant was of Scottish origin.[46] While scholars of Kant’s life long accepted the claim, modern scholarship challenges it. It is possible that Kants got their name from the village of Kantvainiai (German: Kantwaggen – today part of Priekulė) and were of Kursenieki origin.[47][48] Kant was the fourth of nine children (six of whom reached adulthood).[49]

Baptized Emanuel, he later changed the spelling of his name to Immanuel[50] after learning Hebrew. He was brought up in a Pietist household that stressed religious devotion, humility, and a literal interpretation of the Bible.[51][citation needed] His education was strict, punitive and disciplinary, and focused on Latin and religious instruction over mathematics and science.[52] In his Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals, he reveals a belief in immortality as the necessary condition of humanity’s approach to the highest morality possible.[53][54] However, as Kant was skeptical about some of the arguments used prior to him in defence of theism and maintained that human understanding is limited and can never attain knowledge about God or the soul, various commentators have labelled him a philosophical agnostic,[55][56][57][58][59][60] even though it has also been suggested that Kant intends other people to think of him as a «pure rationalist», who is defined by Kant himself as someone who recognizes revelation but asserts that to know and accept it as real is not a necessary requisite to religion.[61]

Kant apparently lived a very strict and disciplined life; it was said that neighbors would set their clocks by his daily walks. He never married,[62] but seems to have had a rewarding social life—he was a popular teacher, as well as a modestly successful author even before starting on his major philosophical works. He had a circle of friends with whom he frequently met—among them Joseph Green, an English merchant in Königsberg, whom reportedly he first spoke to in an argument in 1763 or before. According to the story, Kant was strolling in the Dänhofscher Garten when he saw one of his acquaintances speaking to a group of men he did not know. He joined the conversation, which soon turned to unusual current events in the world. The topic of the disagreement between the British and the Americans came up. Kant took the side of the Americans, and this upset Green. He challenged Kant to a fight. Kant reportedly explained that patriotism did not get in the way of his view, and that any cosmopolitan citizen could take his position if he held Kant’s political principles, which Kant explained to Green. Green was so stunned by Kant’s ability to express his views, that Green offered to become friends with Kant, and invited him to his apartment that evening.[63]

Between 1750 and 1754 Kant worked as a tutor (Hauslehrer) in the Lithuanian village of Jučiai (German: Judtschen;[64] approximately 20 km east of Königsberg, and in Groß-Arnsdorf[65] (now Jarnołtowo near Morąg (German: Mohrungen), Poland), approximately 145 km east of Königsberg.

Many myths grew up about Kant’s personal mannerisms; these are listed, explained, and refuted in Goldthwait’s introduction to his translation of Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime.[66]

Young scholar[edit]

Kant showed a great aptitude for study at an early age. He first attended the Collegium Fridericianum from which he graduated at the end of the summer of 1740. In 1740, aged 16, he enrolled at the University of Königsberg, where he spent his whole career.[67] He studied the philosophy of Gottfried Leibniz and Christian Wolff under Martin Knutzen (Associate Professor of Logic and Metaphysics from 1734 until his death in 1751), a rationalist who was also familiar with developments in British philosophy and science and introduced Kant to the new mathematical physics of Isaac Newton. Knutzen dissuaded Kant from the theory of pre-established harmony, which he regarded as «the pillow for the lazy mind».[68] He also dissuaded Kant from idealism, the idea that reality is purely mental, which most philosophers in the 18th century regarded in a negative light. The theory of transcendental idealism that Kant later included in the Critique of Pure Reason was developed partially in opposition to traditional idealism.

His father’s stroke and subsequent death in 1746 interrupted his studies. Kant left Königsberg shortly after August 1748[69]—he would return there in August 1754.[70] He became a private tutor in the towns surrounding Königsberg, but continued his scholarly research. In 1749, he published his first philosophical work, Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces (written in 1745–47).[71]

Early work[edit]

Kant is best known for his work in the philosophy of ethics and metaphysics,[26] but he made significant contributions to other disciplines. In 1754, while contemplating on a prize question by the Berlin Academy about the problem of Earth’s rotation, he argued that the Moon’s gravity would slow down Earth’s spin and he also put forth the argument that gravity would eventually cause the Moon’s tidal locking to coincide with the Earth’s rotation.[d][73] The next year, he expanded this reasoning to the formation and evolution of the Solar System in his Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens.[73] In 1755, Kant received a license to lecture in the University of Königsberg and began lecturing on a variety of topics including mathematics, physics, logic and metaphysics. In his 1756 essay on the theory of winds, Kant laid out an original insight into the Coriolis force.

In 1756 Kant also published three papers on the 1755 Lisbon earthquake.[74] Kant’s theory, which involved shifts in huge caverns filled with hot gases, though inaccurate, was one of the first systematic attempts to explain earthquakes in natural rather than supernatural terms. According to Walter Benjamin, Kant’s slim early book on the earthquake «probably represents the beginnings of scientific geography in Germany. And certainly the beginnings of seismology».

In 1757, Kant began lecturing on geography making him one of the first lecturers to explicitly teach geography as its own subject.[75][76] Geography was one of Kant’s most popular lecturing topics and in 1802 a compilation by Friedrich Theodor Rink of Kant’s lecturing notes, Physical Geography, was released. After Kant became a professor in 1770, he expanded the topics of his lectures to include lectures on natural law, ethics, and anthropology, along with other topics.[75]

Kant’s house in Königsberg

In the Universal Natural History, Kant laid out the Nebular hypothesis, in which he deduced that the Solar System had formed from a large cloud of gas, a nebula. Kant also correctly deduced that the Milky Way was a large disk of stars, which he theorized formed from a much larger spinning gas cloud. He further suggested that other distant «nebulae» might be other galaxies. These postulations opened new horizons for astronomy, for the first time extending it beyond the Solar System to galactic and intergalactic realms.[77] According to Thomas Huxley (1867), Kant also made contributions to geology in his Universal Natural History.[78][79]

From then on, Kant turned increasingly to philosophical issues, although he continued to write on the sciences throughout his life. In the early 1760s, Kant produced a series of important works in philosophy. The False Subtlety of the Four Syllogistic Figures, a work in logic, was published in 1762. Two more works appeared the following year: Attempt to Introduce the Concept of Negative Magnitudes into Philosophy and The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God. By 1764, Kant had become a notable popular author, and wrote Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime;[80] he was second to Moses Mendelssohn in a Berlin Academy prize competition with his Inquiry Concerning the Distinctness of the Principles of Natural Theology and Morality (often referred to as «The Prize Essay»). In 1766 Kant wrote Dreams of a Spirit-Seer which dealt with the writings of Emanuel Swedenborg. The exact influence of Swedenborg on Kant, as well as the extent of Kant’s belief in mysticism according to Dreams of a Spirit-Seer, remain controversial. On the face of it, Dreams of a Spirit-Seer argued against the ideas of Swedenborg. Kant poked holes in the logic of Swedenborg’s view of the nature of spirits,[81] but also communicated his curiosity about Swedenborg’s mysticism.[82] On 31 March 1770, aged 45, Kant was finally appointed Full Professor of Logic and Metaphysics (Professor Ordinarius der Logic und Metaphysic) at the University of Königsberg. In defense of this appointment, Kant wrote his inaugural dissertation (Inaugural-Dissertation) De Mundi Sensibilis atque Intelligibilis Forma et Principiis (On the Form and Principles of the Sensible and the Intelligible World).[1] This work saw the emergence of several central themes of his mature work, including the distinction between the faculties of intellectual thought and sensible receptivity. To miss this distinction would mean to commit the error of subreption, and, as he says in the last chapter of the dissertation, only in avoiding this error does metaphysics flourish.

The issue that vexed Kant was central to what 20th-century scholars called «the philosophy of mind». The flowering of the natural sciences had led to an understanding of how data reaches the brain. Sunlight falling on an object is reflected from its surface in a way that maps the surface features (color, texture, etc.). The reflected light reaches the human eye, passes through the cornea, is focused by the lens onto the retina where it forms an image similar to that formed by light passing through a pinhole into a camera obscura. The retinal cells send impulses through the optic nerve and then they form a mapping in the brain of the visual features of the object. The interior mapping is not the exterior object, and our belief that there is a meaningful relationship between the object and the mapping in the brain depends on a chain of reasoning that is not fully grounded. But the uncertainty aroused by these considerations, by optical illusions, misperceptions, delusions, etc., is not the end of the problem.

Kant saw that the mind could not function as an empty container that simply receives data from outside. Something must be giving order to the incoming data. Images of external objects must be kept in the same sequence in which they were received. This ordering occurs through the mind’s intuition of time. The same considerations apply to the mind’s function of constituting space for ordering mappings of visual and tactile signals arriving via the already described chains of physical causation.

It is often claimed that Kant was a late developer, that he only became an important philosopher in his mid-50s after rejecting his earlier views. While it is true that Kant wrote his greatest works relatively late in life, there is a tendency to underestimate the value of his earlier works. Recent Kant scholarship has devoted more attention to these «pre-critical» writings and has recognized a degree of continuity with his mature work.[83]

Critique of Pure Reason[edit]

At age 46, Kant was an established scholar and an increasingly influential philosopher, and much was expected of him. In correspondence with his ex-student and friend Markus Herz, Kant admitted that, in the inaugural dissertation, he had failed to account for the relation between our sensible and intellectual faculties.[84] He needed to explain how we combine what is known as sensory knowledge with the other type of knowledge—i.e. reasoned knowledge—these two being related but having very different processes.

Kant also credited David Hume with awakening him from a «dogmatic slumber» in which he had unquestioningly accepted the tenets of both religion and natural philosophy.[85][86] Hume in his 1739 Treatise on Human Nature had argued that we only know the mind through a subjective—essentially illusory—series of perceptions.[85] Ideas such as causality, morality, and objects are not evident in experience, so their reality may be questioned. Kant felt that reason could remove this skepticism, and he set himself to solving these problems. Although fond of company and conversation with others, Kant isolated himself, and resisted friends’ attempts to bring him out of his isolation.[e] When Kant emerged from his silence in 1781, the result was the Critique of Pure Reason. Kant countered Hume’s empiricism by claiming that some knowledge exists inherently in the mind, independent of experience.[85] He drew a parallel to the Copernican revolution in his proposal that worldly objects can be intuited a priori (‘beforehand’), and that intuition is consequently distinct from objective reality.[b] He acquiesced to Hume somewhat by defining causality as a «regular, constant sequence of events in time, and nothing more.»[88]

Although now uniformly recognized as one of the greatest works in the history of philosophy, this Critique disappointed Kant’s readers upon its initial publication.[89] The book was long, over 800 pages in the original German edition, and written in a convoluted style. It received few reviews, and these granted it no significance.[citation needed] Kant’s former student, Johann Gottfried Herder criticized it for placing reason as an entity worthy of criticism instead of considering the process of reasoning within the context of language and one’s entire personality.[90] Similar to Christian Garve and Johann Georg Heinrich Feder, he rejected Kant’s position that space and time possessed a form that could be analyzed. Additionally, Garve and Feder also faulted Kant’s Critique for not explaining differences in perception of sensations.[91] Its density made it, as Herder said in a letter to Johann Georg Hamann, a «tough nut to crack», obscured by «all this heavy gossamer».[92] Its reception stood in stark contrast to the praise Kant had received for earlier works, such as his Prize Essay and shorter works that preceded the first Critique. These well-received and readable tracts include one on the earthquake in Lisbon that was so popular that it was sold by the page.[93] Prior to the change in course documented in the first Critique, his books had sold well.[80] Kant was disappointed with the first Critique’s reception. Recognizing the need to clarify the original treatise, Kant wrote the Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics in 1783 as a summary of its main views. Shortly thereafter, Kant’s friend Johann Friedrich Schultz (1739–1805) (professor of mathematics) published Erläuterungen über des Herrn Professor Kant Critik der reinen Vernunft (Königsberg, 1784), which was a brief but very accurate commentary on Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason.

Engraving of Immanuel Kant

Kant’s reputation gradually rose through the latter portion of the 1780s, sparked by a series of important works: the 1784 essay, «Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment?»; 1785’s Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (his first work on moral philosophy); and, from 1786, Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science. But Kant’s fame ultimately arrived from an unexpected source. In 1786, Karl Leonhard Reinhold published a series of public letters on Kantian philosophy.[94] In these letters, Reinhold framed Kant’s philosophy as a response to the central intellectual controversy of the era: the pantheism controversy. Friedrich Jacobi had accused the recently deceased Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (a distinguished dramatist and philosophical essayist) of Spinozism. Such a charge, tantamount to atheism, was vigorously denied by Lessing’s friend Moses Mendelssohn, leading to a bitter public dispute among partisans. The controversy gradually escalated into a debate about the values of the Enlightenment and the value of reason.

Reinhold maintained in his letters that Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason could settle this dispute by defending the authority and bounds of reason. Reinhold’s letters were widely read and made Kant the most famous philosopher of his era.

Later work[edit]

Kant published a second edition of the Critique of Pure Reason in 1787, heavily revising the first parts of the book. Most of his subsequent work focused on other areas of philosophy. He continued to develop his moral philosophy, notably in 1788’s Critique of Practical Reason (known as the second Critique) and 1797’s Metaphysics of Morals. The 1790 Critique of Judgment (the third Critique) applied the Kantian system to aesthetics and teleology.

In 1792, Kant’s attempt to publish the Second of the four Pieces of Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason,[95] in the journal Berlinische Monatsschrift, met with opposition from the King’s censorship commission, which had been established that same year in the context of the French Revolution.[96] Kant then arranged to have all four pieces published as a book, routing it through the philosophy department at the University of Jena to avoid the need for theological censorship.[96] This insubordination earned him a now famous reprimand from the King.[96] When he nevertheless published a second edition in 1794, the censor was so irate that he arranged for a royal order that required Kant never to publish or even speak publicly about religion.[96] Kant then published his response to the King’s reprimand and explained himself, in the preface of The Conflict of the Faculties.[96]

He also wrote a number of semi-popular essays on history, religion, politics and other topics. These works were well received by Kant’s contemporaries and confirmed his preeminent status in 18th-century philosophy. There were several journals devoted solely to defending and criticizing Kantian philosophy. Despite his success, philosophical trends were moving in another direction. Many of Kant’s most important disciples and followers (including Reinhold, Beck and Fichte) transformed the Kantian position into increasingly radical forms of idealism. The progressive stages of revision of Kant’s teachings marked the emergence of German idealism. Kant opposed these developments and publicly denounced Fichte in an open letter in 1799.[97] It was one of his final acts expounding a stance on philosophical questions. In 1800, a student of Kant named Gottlob Benjamin Jäsche (1762–1842) published a manual of logic for teachers called Logik, which he had prepared at Kant’s request. Jäsche prepared the Logik using a copy of a textbook in logic by Georg Friedrich Meier entitled Auszug aus der Vernunftlehre, in which Kant had written copious notes and annotations. The Logik has been considered of fundamental importance to Kant’s philosophy, and the understanding of it. The great 19th-century logician Charles Sanders Peirce remarked, in an incomplete review of Thomas Kingsmill Abbott’s English translation of the introduction to Logik, that «Kant’s whole philosophy turns upon his logic.»[98] Also, Robert Schirokauer Hartman and Wolfgang Schwarz, wrote in the translators’ introduction to their English translation of the Logik, «Its importance lies not only in its significance for the Critique of Pure Reason, the second part of which is a restatement of fundamental tenets of the Logic, but in its position within the whole of Kant’s work.»[99]

Death and burial[edit]

Kant’s health, long poor, worsened and he died at Königsberg on 12 February 1804, uttering «Es ist gut» (It is good) before expiring.[100] His unfinished final work was published as Opus Postumum. Kant always cut a curious figure in his lifetime for his modest, rigorously scheduled habits, which have been referred to as clocklike. However, Heinrich Heine noted the magnitude of «his destructive, world-crushing thoughts» and considered him a sort of philosophical «executioner», comparing him to Robespierre with the observation that both men «represented in the highest the type of provincial bourgeois. Nature had destined them to weigh coffee and sugar, but Fate determined that they should weigh other things and placed on the scales of the one a king, on the scales of the other a god.»[101]

When his body was transferred to a new burial spot, his skull was measured during the exhumation and found to be larger than the average German male’s with a «high and broad» forehead.[102] His forehead has been an object of interest ever since it became well-known through his portraits: «In Döbler’s portrait and in Kiefer’s faithful if expressionistic reproduction of it—as well as in many of the other late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century portraits of Kant—the forehead is remarkably large and decidedly retreating. Was Kant’s forehead shaped this way in these images because he was a philosopher, or, to follow the implications of Lavater’s system, was he a philosopher because of the intellectual acuity manifested by his forehead? Kant and Johann Kaspar Lavater were correspondents on theological matters, and Lavater refers to Kant in his work «Physiognomic Fragments, for the Education of Human Knowledge and Love of People» (Leipzig & Winterthur, 1775–1778).[103]

Kant’s mausoleum adjoins the northeast corner of Königsberg Cathedral in Kaliningrad, Russia. The mausoleum was constructed by the architect Friedrich Lahrs and was finished in 1924 in time for the bicentenary of Kant’s birth. Originally, Kant was buried inside the cathedral, but in 1880 his remains were moved to a neo-Gothic chapel adjoining the northeast corner of the cathedral. Over the years, the chapel became dilapidated and was demolished to make way for the mausoleum, which was built on the same location.

The tomb and its mausoleum are among the few artifacts of German times preserved by the Soviets after they captured the city.[104] Today, many newlyweds bring flowers to the mausoleum. Artifacts previously owned by Kant, known as Kantiana, were included in the Königsberg City Museum. However, the museum was destroyed during World War II. A replica of the statue of Kant that in German times stood in front of the main University of Königsberg building was donated by a German entity in the early 1990s and placed in the same grounds.

After the expulsion of Königsberg’s German population at the end of World War II, the University of Königsberg where Kant taught was replaced by the Russian-language Kaliningrad State University, which appropriated the campus and surviving buildings. In 2005, the university was renamed Immanuel Kant State University of Russia. The name change was announced at a ceremony attended by President Vladimir Putin of Russia and Chancellor Gerhard Schröder of Germany, and the university formed a Kant Society, dedicated to the study of Kantianism. The university was again renamed in the 2010s, to Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University.[105]

In 2018, his tomb and statue were vandalized with paint by unknown assailants, who also scattered leaflets glorifying Rus’ and denouncing Kant as a «traitor». The incident was apparently connected with a recent vote to rename Khrabrovo Airport, where Kant was in the lead for a while, prompting Russian nationalist resentment.[106]

Philosophy[edit]

In Kant’s essay «Answering the Question: What is Enlightenment?», he defined the Enlightenment as an age shaped by the Latin motto Sapere aude («Dare to be wise»). Kant maintained that one ought to think autonomously, free of the dictates of external authority. His work reconciled many of the differences between the rationalist and empiricist traditions of the 18th century. He had a decisive impact on the Romantic and German Idealist philosophies of the 19th century. His work has also been a starting point for many 20th century philosophers.

Kant asserted that, because of the limitations of argumentation in the absence of irrefutable evidence, no one could really know whether there is a God and an afterlife or not. For the sake of morality and as a ground for reason, Kant asserted, people are justified in believing in God, even though they could never know God’s presence empirically.

Thus the entire armament of reason, in the undertaking that one can call pure philosophy, is in fact directed only at the three problems that have been mentioned [God, the soul, and freedom]. These themselves, however, have in turn their more remote aim, namely, what is to be done if the will is free, if there is a God, and if there is a future world. Now since these concern our conduct in relation to the highest end, the ultimate aim of nature which provides for us wisely in the disposition of reason is properly directed only to what is moral.[33]: 674–5 (A 800–1/B 828–9) 

The sense of an enlightened approach and the critical method required that «If one cannot prove that a thing is, he may try to prove that it is not. If he fails to do either (as often occurs), he may still ask whether it is in his interest to accept one or the other of the alternatives hypothetically, from the theoretical or the practical point of view. Hence the question no longer is as to whether perpetual peace is a real thing or not a real thing, or as to whether we may not be deceiving ourselves when we adopt the former alternative, but we must act on the supposition of its being real.»[107] The presupposition of God, soul, and freedom was then a practical concern, for

Morality in itself constitutes a system, but happiness does not, except insofar as it is distributed precisely in accordance with morality. This, however, is possible only in the intelligible world, under a wise author and regent. Reason sees itself as compelled either to assume such a thing, together with life in such a world, which we must regard as a future one, or else to regard the moral laws as empty figments of the brain …[33]: 680 (A 811/B 839) 

Kant drew a parallel between the Copernican revolution and the epistemology of his new transcendental philosophy, involving two interconnected foundations of his «critical philosophy»:

  • the epistemology of transcendental idealism and
  • the moral philosophy of the autonomy of practical reason.

These teachings placed the active, rational human subject at the center of the cognitive and moral worlds. Kant argued that the rational order of the world as known by science was not just the accidental accumulation of sense perceptions.

Conceptual unification and integration is carried out by the mind through concepts or the «categories of the understanding» operating on the perceptual manifold within space and time. The latter are not concepts,[108] but are forms of sensibility that are a priori necessary conditions for any possible experience. Thus the objective order of nature and the causal necessity that operates within it depend on the mind’s processes, the product of the rule-based activity that Kant called «synthesis». There is much discussion among Kant scholars about the correct interpretation of this train of thought.

The ‘two-world’ interpretation regards Kant’s position as a statement of epistemological limitation, that we are not able to transcend the bounds of our own mind, meaning that we cannot access the «thing-in-itself». However, Kant also speaks of the thing in itself or transcendental object as a product of the (human) understanding as it attempts to conceive of objects in abstraction from the conditions of sensibility. Following this line of thought, some interpreters have argued that the thing in itself does not represent a separate ontological domain but simply a way of considering objects by means of the understanding alone—this is known as the two-aspect view.

The notion of the «thing in itself» was much discussed by philosophers after Kant. It was argued that, because the «thing in itself» was unknowable, its existence must not be assumed. Rather than arbitrarily switching to an account that was ungrounded in anything supposed to be the «real», as did the German Idealists, another group arose who asked how our (presumably reliable) accounts of a coherent and rule-abiding universe were actually grounded. This new kind of philosophy became known as Phenomenology, and its founder was Edmund Husserl.

With regard to morality, Kant argued that the source of the good lies not in anything outside the human subject, either in nature or given by God, but rather is only the good will itself. A good will is one that acts from duty in accordance with the universal moral law that the autonomous human being freely gives itself. This law obliges one to treat humanity – understood as rational agency, and represented through oneself as well as others – as an end in itself rather than (merely) as means to other ends the individual might hold. This necessitates practical self-reflection in which we universalize our reasons.

These ideas have largely framed or influenced all subsequent philosophical discussion and analysis. The specifics of Kant’s account generated immediate and lasting controversy. Nevertheless, his theses – that the mind itself necessarily makes a constitutive contribution to its knowledge, that this contribution is transcendental rather than psychological, that philosophy involves self-critical activity, that morality is rooted in human freedom, and that to act autonomously is to act according to rational moral principles – have all had a lasting effect on subsequent philosophy.

Epistemology[edit]

Theory of perception[edit]

Kant defines his theory of perception in his very influential 1781 work the Critique of Pure Reason, which has often been cited as the most significant volume of metaphysics and epistemology in modern philosophy.[109] Kant maintains that understanding of the external world had its foundations not merely in experience, but in both experience and a priori concepts, thus offering a non-empiricist critique of rationalist philosophy, which is what has been referred to as his Copernican revolution.[110]

Firstly, Kant distinguishes between analytic and synthetic propositions:

  1. Analytic proposition: a proposition whose predicate concept is contained in its subject concept; e.g., «All bachelors are unmarried,» or, «All bodies take up space.»
  2. Synthetic proposition: a proposition whose predicate concept is not contained in its subject concept; e.g., «All bachelors are alone,» or, «All bodies have weight.»

An analytic proposition is true by nature of the meaning of the words in the sentence—we require no further knowledge than a grasp of the language to understand this proposition. On the other hand, a synthetic statement is one that tells us something about the world. The truth or falsehood of synthetic statements derives from something outside their linguistic content. In this instance, weight is not a necessary predicate of the body; until we are told the heaviness of the body we do not know that it has weight. In this case, experience of the body is required before its heaviness becomes clear. Before Kant’s first Critique, empiricists (cf. Hume) and rationalists (cf. Leibniz) assumed that all synthetic statements required experience to be known.

Kant contests this assumption by claiming that elementary mathematics, like arithmetic, is synthetic a priori, in that its statements provide new knowledge not derived from experience. This becomes part of his over-all argument for transcendental idealism. That is, he argues that the possibility of experience depends on certain necessary conditions—which he calls a priori forms—and that these conditions structure and hold true of the world of experience. His main claims in the «Transcendental Aesthetic» are that mathematic judgments are synthetic a priori and that space and time are not derived from experience but rather are its preconditions.

Once we have grasped the functions of basic arithmetic, we do not need empirical experience to know that 100 + 100 = 200, and so it appears that arithmetic is analytic. However, that it is analytic can be disproved by considering the calculation 5 + 7 = 12: there is nothing in the numbers 5 and 7 by which the number 12 can be inferred.[111] Thus «5 + 7» and «the cube root of 1,728» or «12» are not analytic because their reference is the same but their sense is not—the statement «5 + 7 = 12» tells us something new about the world. It is self-evident, and undeniably a priori, but at the same time it is synthetic. Thus Kant argued that a proposition can be synthetic and a priori. This statement is synthetic because it supposes both quantity in general which is a conceit from our understanding and succession which is a mode of time that belongs to our sensibility. To produce 12 from 5, one needs to add unity to unity seven time. Thus to add is not an operation of pure reason but a process that needs time : one and then one, and again one, etc.[112]

Kant asserts that experience is based on the perception of external objects and a priori knowledge.[113] The external world, he writes, provides those things that we sense. But our mind processes this information and gives it order, allowing us to comprehend it. Our mind supplies the conditions of space and time to experience objects. According to the «transcendental unity of apperception», the concepts of the mind (Understanding) and perceptions or intuitions that garner information from phenomena (Sensibility) are synthesized by comprehension. Without concepts, perceptions are nondescript; without perceptions, concepts are meaningless. Thus the famous statement: «Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions [perceptions] without concepts are blind.»[33]: 193–194 (A 51/B 75) 

Kant also claims that an external environment is necessary for the establishment of the self. Although Kant would want to argue that there is no empirical way of observing the self, we can see the logical necessity of the self when we observe that we can have different perceptions of the external environment over time. By uniting these general representations into one global representation, we can see how a transcendental self emerges. «I am therefore conscious of the identical self in regard to the manifold of the representations that are given to me in an intuition because I call them all together my representations, which constitute one[33]: 248 (B 135) 

According to Guillaume Pigeard de Gurbert, Kant’s philosophy has its unity in the conceit of time, which different uses – speculative, practical, pragmatical, historical or teleogical – is crucial.[114]

Time and space[edit]

The Kantian revolution breaks with previous conceptions of time, either metaphysical (Leibniz) or empirical ones (Hume), in its relation to space. Against metaphysical time and space Kant explains they are not things in themselves but mere shape of the way we feel things. Against empiricism he says that these subjective shapes are a priori—are not given by experience, since any experience of such or such time and space supposes that we are feeling things in the way of time and space. The word «transcendental» qualifies this space and this time lying within the subject that make possible any sensible experience. Kant adds that space itself depends on time, because nothing can be in space without being within time. This crucial idea is settled in 1770, when Kant writes that time includes «absolument tout dans ses rapports, y compris l’espace.»[115] Kant divides time into three modes: permanency, succession, and simultaneity. Many subsequent philosophers inspired by Kant (Heidegger, Hermann Cohen, Béatrice Longuenesse, Bergson, Deleuze, Philonenko) have been accused of missing this triple partition of time.[116]

Categories of the Faculty of Understanding[edit]

Kant statue in the School of Philosophy and Human Sciences (FAFICH) in the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG), Belo Horizonte, Brazil

Kant deemed it obvious that we have some objective knowledge of the world, such as, say, Newtonian physics. But this knowledge relies on synthetic, a priori laws of nature, like causality and substance. How is this possible? Kant’s solution was that the subject must supply laws that make experience of objects possible, and that these laws are synthetic, a priori laws of nature that apply to all objects before we experience them. To deduce all these laws, Kant examined experience in general, dissecting in it what is supplied by the mind from what is supplied by the given intuitions. This is commonly called a transcendental deduction.[117]

To begin with, Kant’s distinction between the a posteriori being contingent and particular knowledge, and the a priori being universal and necessary knowledge, must be kept in mind. If we merely connect two intuitions together in a perceiving subject, the knowledge is always subjective because it is derived a posteriori, when what is desired is for the knowledge to be objective, that is, for the two intuitions to refer to the object and hold good of it for anyone at any time, not just the perceiving subject in its current condition. What else is equivalent to objective knowledge besides the a priori (universal and necessary knowledge)? Before knowledge can be objective, it must be incorporated under an a priori category of understanding.[117][118]

For example, if one says «The sun shines on the stone; the stone grows warm», all that one perceives is phenomena. One’s judgment is contingent and holds no necessity. But, if one says «The sunshine causes the stone to warm», one subsumes the perception under the category of causality, which is not found in the perception, and one necessarily synthesizes the concept sunshine with the concept heat, producing a necessarily universally true judgment.[117]

To explain the categories in more detail, they are the preconditions of the construction of objects in the mind. Indeed, to even think of the sun and stone presupposes the category of subsistence, that is, substance. For the categories synthesize the random data of the sensory manifold into intelligible objects. This means that the categories are also the most abstract things one can say of any object whatsoever, and hence one can have an a priori cognition of the totality of all objects of experience if one can list all of them. To do so, Kant formulates another transcendental deduction.[117]

Judgments are, for Kant, the preconditions of any thought. Man thinks via judgments, so all possible judgments must be listed and the perceptions connected within them put aside, so as to make it possible to examine the moments when the understanding is engaged in constructing judgments. For the categories are equivalent to these moments, in that they are concepts of intuitions in general, so far as they are determined by these moments universally and necessarily. Thus by listing all the moments, one can deduce from them all of the categories.[117]

One may now ask: How many possible judgments are there? Kant believed that all the possible propositions within Aristotle’s syllogistic logic are equivalent to all possible judgments, and that all the logical operators within the propositions are equivalent to the moments of the understanding within judgments. Thus he listed Aristotle’s system in four groups of three: quantity (universal, particular, singular), quality (affirmative, negative, infinite), relation (categorical, hypothetical, disjunctive) and modality (problematic, assertoric, apodeictic). The parallelism with Kant’s categories is obvious: quantity (unity, plurality, totality), quality (reality, negation, limitation), relation (substance, cause, community) and modality (possibility, existence, necessity).[117]

The fundamental building blocks of experience, i.e. objective knowledge, are now in place. First there is the sensibility, which supplies the mind with intuitions, and then there is the understanding, which produces judgments of these intuitions and can subsume them under categories. These categories lift the intuitions up out of the subject’s current state of consciousness and place them within consciousness in general, producing universally necessary knowledge. For the categories are innate in any rational being, so any intuition thought within a category in one mind is necessarily subsumed and understood identically in any mind. In other words, we filter what we see and hear.[117]

Transcendental schema doctrine[edit]

Kant ran into a problem with his theory that the mind plays a part in producing objective knowledge. Intuitions and categories are entirely disparate, so how can they interact? Kant’s solution is the (transcendental) schema: a priori principles by which the transcendental imagination connects concepts with intuitions through time. All the principles are temporally bound, for if a concept is purely a priori, as the categories are, then they must apply for all times. Hence there are principles such as substance is that which endures through time, and the cause must always be prior to the effect.[117][119] In the context of transcendental schema the concept of transcendental reflection is of a great importance.[120]

Ethics[edit]

Kant developed his ethics, or moral philosophy, in three works: Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals (1785), Critique of Practical Reason (1788), and Metaphysics of Morals (1797).

In Groundwork, Kant tries to convert our everyday, obvious, rational[121] knowledge of morality into philosophical knowledge. The latter two works used «practical reason», which is based only on things about which reason can tell us, and not deriving any principles from experience, to reach conclusions which can be applied to the world of experience (in the second part of The Metaphysics of Morals).

Kant is known for his theory that there is a single moral obligation, which he called the «Categorical Imperative», and is derived from the concept of duty. Kant defines the demands of moral law as «categorical imperatives». Categorical imperatives are principles that are intrinsically valid; they are good in and of themselves; they must be obeyed in all situations and circumstances, if our behavior is to observe the moral law. The Categorical Imperative provides a test against which moral statements can be assessed. Kant also stated that the moral means and ends can be applied to the categorical imperative, that rational beings can pursue certain «ends» using the appropriate «means». Ends based on physical needs or wants create hypothetical imperatives. The categorical imperative can only be based on something that is an «end in itself», that is, an end that is not a means to some other need, desire, or purpose.[122] Kant believed that the moral law is a principle of reason itself, and is not based on contingent facts about the world, such as what would make us happy, but to act on the moral law which has no other motive than «worthiness to be happy».[33]: 677 (A 806/B 834)  Accordingly, he believed that moral obligation applies only to rational agents.[123]

Unlike a hypothetical imperative, a categorical imperative is an unconditional obligation; it has the force of an obligation regardless of our will or desires[124] In Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals (1785) Kant enumerated three formulations of the categorical imperative that he believed to be roughly equivalent.[125] In the same book, Kant stated:

Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.[126]

According to Kant, one cannot make exceptions for oneself. The philosophical maxim on which one acts should always be considered to be a universal law without exception. One cannot allow oneself to do a particular action unless one thinks it appropriate that the reason for the action should become a universal law. For example, one should not steal, however dire the circumstances—because, by permitting oneself to steal, one makes stealing a universally acceptable act. This is the first formulation of the categorical imperative, often known as the universalizability principle.

Kant believed that, if an action is not done with the motive of duty, then it is without moral value. He thought that every action should have pure intention behind it; otherwise, it is meaningless. The final result is not the most important aspect of an action; rather, how the person feels while carrying out the action is the time when value is attached to the result.

In Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals, Kant also posited the «counter-utilitarian idea that there is a difference between preferences and values, and that considerations of individual rights temper calculations of aggregate utility», a concept that is an axiom in economics:[127]

Everything has either a price or a dignity. Whatever has a price can be replaced by something else as its equivalent; on the other hand, whatever is above all price, and therefore admits of no equivalent, has a dignity. But that which constitutes the condition under which alone something can be an end in itself does not have mere relative worth, i.e., price, but an intrinsic worth, i.e., a dignity. (p. 53, italics in original).

A phrase quoted by Kant, which is used to summarize the counter-utilitarian nature of his moral philosophy, is Fiat justitia, pereat mundus («Let justice be done, though the world perish»), which he translates loosely as «Let justice reign even if all the rascals in the world should perish from it». This appears in his 1795 Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical SketchZum ewigen Frieden. Ein philosophischer Entwurf«), Appendix 1.[128][129][130]

First formulation[edit]

In his Metaphysics, Immanuel Kant introduced the categorical imperative: «Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.»

The first formulation (Formula of Universal Law) of the moral imperative «requires that the maxims be chosen as though they should hold as universal laws of nature».[125] This formulation in principle has as its supreme law the creed «Always act according to that maxim whose universality as a law you can at the same time will» and is the «only condition under which a will can never come into conflict with itself [….]»[131]

One interpretation of the first formulation is called the «universalizability test».[132] An agent’s maxim, according to Kant, is his «subjective principle of human actions»: that is, what the agent believes is his reason to act.[133] The universalisability test has five steps:

  1. Find the agent’s maxim (i.e., an action paired with its motivation). Take, for example, the declaration «I will lie for personal benefit». Lying is the action; the motivation is to fulfill some sort of desire. Together, they form the maxim.
  2. Imagine a possible world in which everyone in a similar position to the real-world agent followed that maxim.
  3. Decide if contradictions or irrationalities would arise in the possible world as a result of following the maxim.
  4. If a contradiction or irrationality would arise, acting on that maxim is not allowed in the real world.
  5. If there is no contradiction, then acting on that maxim is permissible, and is sometimes required.

(For a modern parallel, see John Rawls’ hypothetical situation, the original position.)

Second formulation[edit]

The second formulation (or Formula of the End in Itself) holds that «the rational being, as by its nature an end and thus as an end in itself, must serve in every maxim as the condition restricting all merely relative and arbitrary ends».[125] The principle dictates that you «[a]ct with reference to every rational being (whether yourself or another) so that it is an end in itself in your maxim», meaning that the rational being is «the basis of all maxims of action» and «must be treated never as a mere means but as the supreme limiting condition in the use of all means, i.e., as an end at the same time».[134]

Third formulation[edit]

The third formulation (i.e. Formula of Autonomy) is a synthesis of the first two and is the basis for the «complete determination of all maxims». It states «that all maxims which stem from autonomous legislation ought to harmonize with a possible realm of ends as with a realm of nature».[125]

In principle, «So act as if your maxims should serve at the same time as the universal law (of all rational beings)», meaning that we should so act that we may think of ourselves as «a member in the universal realm of ends», legislating universal laws through our maxims (that is, a universal code of conduct), in a «possible realm of ends».[135] No one may elevate themselves above the universal law, therefore it is one’s duty to follow the maxim(s).

Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason[edit]

Commentators, starting in the 20th century, have tended to see Kant as having a strained relationship with religion, though this was not the prevalent view in the 19th century. Karl Leonhard Reinhold, whose letters first made Kant famous, wrote «I believe that I may infer without reservation that the interest of religion, and of Christianity in particular, accords completely with the result of the Critique of Reason.»[136] Johann Schultz, who wrote one of the first Kant commentaries, wrote «And does not this system itself cohere most splendidly with the Christian religion? Do not the divinity and beneficence of the latter become all the more evident?»[137] This view continued throughout the 19th century, as noted by Friedrich Nietzsche, who said «Kant’s success is merely a theologian’s success.»[138] The reason for these views was Kant’s moral theology, and the widespread belief that his philosophy was the great antithesis to Spinozism, which had been convulsing the European academy for much of the 18th century. Spinozism was widely seen as the cause of the Pantheism controversy, and as a form of sophisticated pantheism or even atheism. As Kant’s philosophy disregarded the possibility of arguing for God through pure reason alone, for the same reasons it also disregarded the possibility of arguing against God through pure reason alone. This, coupled with his moral philosophy (his argument that the existence of morality is a rational reason why God and an afterlife do and must exist), was the reason he was seen by many, at least through the end of the 19th century, as a great defender of religion in general and Christianity in particular.[citation needed]

Kant articulates his strongest criticisms of the organization and practices of religious organizations to those that encourage what he sees as a religion of counterfeit service to God.[139] Among the major targets of his criticism are external ritual, superstition and a hierarchical church order. He sees these as efforts to make oneself pleasing to God in ways other than conscientious adherence to the principle of moral rightness in choosing and acting upon one’s maxims. Kant’s criticisms on these matters, along with his rejection of certain theoretical proofs grounded in pure reason (particularly the ontological argument) for the existence of God and his philosophical commentary on some Christian doctrines, have resulted in interpretations that see Kant as hostile to religion in general and Christianity in particular (e.g., Walsh 1967). Nevertheless, other interpreters consider that Kant was trying to mark off defensible from indefensible Christian belief.[140] Kant sees in Jesus Christ the affirmation of a «pure moral disposition of the heart» that «can make man well-pleasing to God».[139] Regarding Kant’s conception of religion, some critics have argued that he was sympathetic to deism.[141] Other critics have argued that Kant’s moral conception moves from deism to theism (as moral theism), for example Allen W. Wood[142] and Merold Westphal.[143] As for Kant’s book Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason,[95] it was emphasized that Kant reduced religiosity to rationality, religion to morality and Christianity to ethics.[144] However, many interpreters, including Allen W. Wood[145] and Lawrence Pasternack,[146] now agree with Stephen Palmquist’s claim that a better way of reading Kant’s Religion is to see him as raising morality to the status of religion.[147]

Idea of freedom[edit]

In the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant distinguishes between the transcendental idea of freedom, which as a psychological concept is «mainly empirical» and refers to «whether a faculty of beginning a series of successive things or states from itself is to be assumed»[33]: 486 (A 448/B 467)  and the practical concept of freedom as the independence of our will from the «coercion» or «necessitation through sensuous impulses». Kant finds it a source of difficulty that the practical idea of freedom is founded on the transcendental idea of freedom,[33]: 533 (A 533–4/B 561–2)  but for the sake of practical interests uses the practical meaning, taking «no account of… its transcendental meaning,» which he feels was properly «disposed of» in the Third Antinomy, and as an element in the question of the freedom of the will is for philosophy «a real stumbling block» that has embarrassed speculative reason.[33]: 486 (A 448/B 467) 

Kant calls practical «everything that is possible through freedom», and the pure practical laws that are never given through sensuous conditions but are held analogously with the universal law of causality are moral laws. Reason can give us only the «pragmatic laws of free action through the senses», but pure practical laws given by reason a priori[33]: 486 (A 448/B 467)  dictate «what is to be done».[33]: 674–676 (A 800–2/B 828–30)  (The same distinction of transcendental and practical meaning can be applied to the idea of God, with the proviso that the practical concept of freedom can be experienced.[148])

Categories of freedom[edit]

In the Critique of Practical Reason, at the end of the second Main Part of the Analytics,[149] Kant introduces the categories of freedom, in analogy with the categories of understanding their practical counterparts. Kant’s categories of freedom apparently function primarily as conditions for the possibility for actions (i) to be free, (ii) to be understood as free and (iii) to be morally evaluated. For Kant, although actions as theoretical objects are constituted by means of the theoretical categories, actions as practical objects (objects of practical use of reason, and which can be good or bad) are constituted by means of the categories of freedom. Only in this way can actions, as phenomena, be a consequence of freedom, and be understood and evaluated as such.[150]

Aesthetic philosophy[edit]

Kant discusses the subjective nature of aesthetic qualities and experiences in Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime (1764). Kant’s contribution to aesthetic theory is developed in the Critique of Judgment (1790) where he investigates the possibility and logical status of «judgments of taste.» In the «Critique of Aesthetic Judgment,» the first major division of the Critique of Judgment, Kant used the term «aesthetic» in a manner that, according to Kant scholar W.H. Walsh, differs from its modern sense.[151] In the Critique of Pure Reason, to note essential differences between judgments of taste, moral judgments, and scientific judgments, Kant abandoned the term «aesthetic» as «designating the critique of taste,» noting that judgments of taste could never be «directed» by «laws a priori[152] After A. G. Baumgarten, who wrote Aesthetica (1750–58),[153] Kant was one of the first philosophers to develop and integrate aesthetic theory into a unified and comprehensive philosophical system, utilizing ideas that played an integral role throughout his philosophy.[154]

In the chapter «Analytic of the Beautiful» in the Critique of Judgment, Kant states that beauty is not a property of an artwork or natural phenomenon, but is instead consciousness of the pleasure that attends the ‘free play’ of the imagination and the understanding. Even though it appears that we are using reason to decide what is beautiful, the judgment is not a cognitive judgment,[155] «and is consequently not logical, but aesthetical» (§ 1). A pure judgement of taste is subjective since it refers to the emotional response of the subject and is based upon nothing but esteem for an object itself: it is a disinterested pleasure, and we feel that pure judgements of taste (i.e. judgements of beauty), lay claim to universal validity (§§ 20–22). It is important to note that this universal validity is not derived from a determinate concept of beauty but from common sense (§40). Kant also believed that a judgement of taste shares characteristics engaged in a moral judgement: both are disinterested, and we hold them to be universal. In the chapter «Analytic of the Sublime» Kant identifies the sublime as an aesthetic quality that, like beauty, is subjective, but unlike beauty refers to an indeterminate relationship between the faculties of the imagination and of reason, and shares the character of moral judgments in the use of reason. The feeling of the sublime, divided into two distinct modes (the mathematical and the dynamical sublime), describes two subjective moments that concern the relationship of the faculty of the imagination to reason. Some commentators[156] argue that Kant’s critical philosophy contains a third kind of the sublime, the moral sublime, which is the aesthetic response to the moral law or a representation, and a development of the «noble» sublime in Kant’s theory of 1764. The mathematical sublime results from the failure of the imagination to comprehend natural objects that appear boundless and formless, or appear «absolutely great» (§§ 23–25). This imaginative failure is then recuperated through the pleasure taken in reason’s assertion of the concept of infinity. In this move the faculty of reason proves itself superior to our fallible sensible self (§§ 25–26). In the dynamical sublime there is the sense of annihilation of the sensible self as the imagination tries to comprehend a vast might. This power of nature threatens us but through the resistance of reason to such sensible annihilation, the subject feels a pleasure and a sense of the human moral vocation. This appreciation of moral feeling through exposure to the sublime helps to develop moral character.

Kant developed a theory of humor (§ 54) that has been interpreted as an «incongruity» theory. He illustrated his theory of humor by telling three narrative jokes in the Critique of Judgment. He thought that the physiological impact of humor is akin to that of music.[157] His knowledge of music, however, has been reported to be much weaker than his sense of humor: He told many more jokes throughout his lectures and writings.[158]

Kant developed a distinction between an object of art as a material value subject to the conventions of society and the transcendental condition of the judgment of taste as a «refined» value in his Idea of A Universal History (1784). In the Fourth and Fifth Theses of that work he identified all art as the «fruits of unsociableness» due to men’s «antagonism in society»[159] and, in the Seventh Thesis, asserted that while such material property is indicative of a civilized state, only the ideal of morality and the universalization of refined value through the improvement of the mind «belongs to culture».[160]

Political philosophy[edit]

In Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch,[161] Kant listed several conditions that he thought necessary for ending wars and creating a lasting peace. They included a world of constitutional republics.[162] His classical republican theory was extended in the Science of Right, the first part of the Metaphysics of Morals (1797).[163] Kant believed that universal history leads to the ultimate world of republican states at peace, but his theory was not pragmatic. The process was described in «Perpetual Peace» as natural rather than rational:

The guarantee of perpetual peace is nothing less than that great artist, nature…In her mechanical course we see that her aim is to produce a harmony among men, against their will, and indeed through their discord. As a necessity working according to laws we do not know, we call it destiny. But, considering its designs in universal history, we call it «providence,» inasmuch as we discern in it the profound wisdom of a higher cause which predetermines the course of nature and directs it to the objective final end of the human race.[164]

Kant’s political thought can be summarized as republican government and international organization. «In more characteristically Kantian terms, it is doctrine of the state based upon the law (Rechtsstaat) and of eternal peace. Indeed, in each of these formulations, both terms express the same idea: that of legal constitution or of ‘peace through law’. Kant’s political philosophy, being essentially a legal doctrine, rejects by definition the opposition between moral education and the play of passions as alternate foundations for social life. The state is defined as the union of men under law. The state is constituted by laws which are necessary a priori because they flow from the very concept of law. «A regime can be judged by no other criteria nor be assigned any other functions, than those proper to the lawful order as such.»[165]

He opposed «democracy,» which at his time meant direct democracy, believing that majority rule posed a threat to individual liberty. He stated, «…democracy is, properly speaking, necessarily a despotism, because it establishes an executive power in which ‘all’ decide for or even against one who does not agree; that is, ‘all,’ who are not quite all, decide, and this is a contradiction of the general will with itself and with freedom.»[166] As with most writers at the time, he distinguished three forms of government i.e. democracy, aristocracy, and monarchy with mixed government as the most ideal form of it.

Anthropology[edit]

5 DM 1974 D silver coin commemorating the 250th birthday of Immanuel Kant in Königsberg

Kant lectured on anthropology, the study of human nature, for twenty-three and a half years.[167] His Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View was published in 1798. (This was the subject of Michel Foucault’s secondary dissertation for his State doctorate, Introduction to Kant’s Anthropology.) Kant’s Lectures on Anthropology were published for the first time in 1997 in German.[168] Introduction to Kant’s Anthropology was translated into English and published by the Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy series in 2006.[169]

Kant was among the first people of his time to introduce anthropology as an intellectual area of study, long before the field gained popularity, and his texts are considered to have advanced the field. His point of view was to influence the works of later philosophers such as Martin Heidegger and Paul Ricoeur.

Kant was also the first to suggest using a dimensionality approach to human diversity. He analyzed the nature of the Hippocrates-Galen four temperaments and plotted them in two dimensions: (1) «activation», or energetic aspect of behaviour, and (2) «orientation on emotionality».[170] Cholerics were described as emotional and energetic; Phlegmatics as balanced and weak; Sanguines as balanced and energetic, and Melancholics as emotional and weak. These two dimensions reappeared in all subsequent models of temperament and personality traits.

Kant viewed anthropology in two broad categories: (1) the physiological approach, which he referred to as «what nature makes of the human being»; and (2) the pragmatic approach, which explored the things that a human «can and should make of himself.»[171]

Racism[edit]

Kant was one of the most notable Enlightenment thinkers to defend racism, and some have claimed that he was one of the central figures in the birth of modern scientific racism. Where figures such as Carl Linnaeus and Johann Friedrich Blumenbach had supposed only «empirical» observation for racism, Kant produced a fully developed theory of race. Using the Four Temperaments of ancient Greece, he proposed a hierarchy of four racial categories: white Europeans, yellow Asians, black Africans, and red Amerindians.[43][41][40][42][172][173]

Kant wrote that «[Whites] contain all the impulses of nature in affects and passions, all talents, all dispositions to culture and civilization and can as readily obey as govern. They are the only ones who always advance to perfection.” He describes South Asians as «educated to the highest degree but only in the arts and not in the sciences». He goes on that Hindustanis can never reach the level of abstract concepts and that a «great hindustani man» is one who has «gone far in the art of deception and has much money». He stated that the Hindus always stay the way they are and can never advance. About black Africans, Kant wrote that «they can be educated but only as servants, that is they allow themselves to be trained». He quotes David Hume as challenging anyone to «cite a [single] example in which a Negro has shown talents» and asserts that, among the «hundreds of thousands» of blacks transported during the Atlantic slave trade, even among the freed «still not a single one was ever found who presented anything great in art or science or any other praiseworthy quality». To Kant, «the Negro can be disciplined and cultivated, but is never genuinely civilized. He falls of his own accord into savagery.» Native Americans, Kant opined, «cannot be educated». He calls them unmotivated, lacking affect, passion and love, describing them as too weak for labor, unfit for any culture, and too phlegmatic for diligence. He said the Native Americans are «far below the Negro, who undoubtedly holds the lowest of all remaining levels by which we designate the different races». Kant stated that «Americans and Blacks cannot govern themselves. They thus serve only for slaves.»[173][41][40][174]

Kant was an opponent of miscegenation, believing that whites would be «degraded» and the «fusing of races» is undesirable, for «not every race adopts the morals and customs of the Europeans». He stated that «instead of assimilation, which was intended by the melting together of the various races, Nature has here made a law of just the opposite».[175] He believed that in the future all races would be extinguished, except that of the whites.[173]

Kant was also an antisemite, believing that Jews were incapable of transcending material forces, which a moral order required. In this way, Jews are the opposite of autonomous, rational Christians, and are therefore incapable of being incorporated into an ethical Christian society. In his “Anthropology,” Kant called the Jews “a nation of cheaters” and portrayed them as “a group that has followed not the path of transcendental freedom but that of enslavement to the material world.”[176]

Charles W. Mills wrote that Kant has been «sanitized for public consumption», his racist works conveniently ignored.[173] Robert Bernasconi stated that Kant «supplied the first scientific definition of race». Emmanuel Chukwudi Eze is credited with bringing Kant’s contributions to racism to light in the 1990s among Western philosophers, who often gloss over this part of his life and works.[42] He wrote about Kant’s ideas of race:

Kant’s position on the importance of skin color not only as encoding but as proof of this codification of rational superiority or inferiority is evident in a comment he made on the subject of the reasoning capacity of a «black» person. When he evaluated a statement made by an African, Kant dismissed the statement with the comment: «this fellow was quite black from head to foot, a clear proof that what he said was stupid.» It cannot, therefore, be argued that skin color for Kant was merely a physical characteristic. It is, rather, evidence of an unchanging and unchangeable moral quality.

— Emmanuel Chukwudi Eze, «The Color of Reason: The Idea of ‘Race’ in Kant’s Anthropology», Postcolonial African Philosophy: A Critical Reader (1997)[40]

Pauline Kleingeld argues that while Kant was indeed a staunch advocate of scientific racism for much of his career, his views on race changed significantly in works published in the last decade of his life.[44] In particular, she argues that Kant unambiguously rejected past views related to racial hierarchies and the diminished rights or moral status of non-whites in Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch (1795). This work also saw him providing extended arguments against European colonialism, which he claimed was morally unjust and incompatible with the equal rights held by indigenous populations. Kleingeld argues that this shift in Kant’s views later in life has often been forgotten or ignored in the literature on Kant’s racist anthropology, and that the shift suggests a belated recognition of the fact that racial hierarchy was incompatible with a universalized moral framework.[44] While Kant’s perspective on the topic of European colonialism became more balanced, he still considered Europeans «civilized» to the exception of others:

But to this perfection compare the inhospitable actions of the civilized and especially of the commercial states of our part of the world. The injustice which they show to lands and peoples they visit (which is equivalent to conquering them) is carried by them to terrifying lengths. America, the lands inhabited by the Negro, the Spice Islands, the Cape, etc., were at the time of their discovery considered by these civilized intruders as lands without owners, for they counted the inhabitants as nothing. In East India (Hindustan), under the pretense of establishing economic undertakings, they brought in foreign soldiers and used them to oppress the natives, excited widespread wars among the various states, spread famine, rebellion, perfidy, and the whole litany of evils which afflict mankind.

— Immanuel Kant, «Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch» (1795)[177]

Influence and legacy[edit]

Kant’s influence on Western thought has been profound.[178] Although the basic tenets of Kant’s transcendental idealism (i.e. that space and time are a priori forms of human perception rather than real properties and the claim that formal logic and transcendental logic coincide) have been claimed to be falsified by modern science and logic,[179][180][181] and no longer set the intellectual agenda of contemporary philosophers, Kant is credited with having innovated the way philosophical inquiry has been carried at least up to the early nineteenth century. This shift consisted in several closely related innovations that, although highly contentious in themselves, have become important in postmodern philosophy and in the social sciences broadly construed:

  • The human subject seen as the centre of inquiry into human knowledge, such that it is impossible to philosophize about things as they exist independently of human perception or of how they are for us;[182]
  • The notion that is possible to discover and systematically explore the inherent limits to our ability to know entirely a priori;
  • The notion of the «categorical imperative», an assertion that people are naturally endowed with the ability and obligation toward right reason and acting. Perhaps his most famous quote is drawn from the Critique of Practical Reason: «Two things fill my mind with ever-increasing wonder and awe . . . : the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me.»
  • The concept of «conditions of possibility», as in his notion of «the conditions of possible experience» – that is that things, knowledge, and forms of consciousness rest on prior conditions that make them possible, so that, to understand or to know them, we must first understand these conditions;
  • The theory that objective experience is actively constituted or constructed by the functioning of the human mind;
  • His notion of moral autonomy as central to humanity;
  • His assertion of the principle that human beings should be treated as ends rather than as means.

Kant’s ideas have been incorporated into a variety of schools of thought. These include German idealism, Marxism, positivism, phenomenology, existentialism, critical theory, linguistic philosophy, structuralism, post-structuralism, and deconstruction.[citation needed]

Historical influence[edit]

During his own life, much critical attention was paid to his thought. He influenced Reinhold, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel and Novalis during the 1780s and 1790s. The school of thinking known as German idealism developed from his writings. The German idealists Fichte and Schelling, for example, tried to bring traditional «metaphysically» laden notions like «the Absolute», «God», and «Being» into the scope of Kant’s critical thought.[183] In so doing, the German idealists tried to reverse Kant’s view that we cannot know what we cannot observe.

The influential English Romantic poet and aesthetic philosopher Samuel Taylor Coleridge was greatly influenced by Kant and helped to spread awareness of him, and of German idealism generally, in the UK and the USA. In his Biographia Literaria (1817), he credits Kant’s ideas in coming to believe that the mind is not a passive but an active agent in the apprehension of reality.

Hegel was one of Kant’s first major critics. The main accusations Hegel charged Kant’s philosophy with were formalism (or «abstractism») and irrationality. In Hegel’s view the entire project of setting a «transcendental subject» (i.e. human consciousness) apart from nature, history, and society was fundamentally flawed,[184] although parts of that very project could be put to good use in a new direction, that Hegel called the «absolute idealism». Similar concerns moved Hegel’s criticisms to Kant’s concept of moral autonomy, to which Hegel opposed an ethic focused on the «ethical life» of the community.[185] In a sense, Hegel’s notion of «ethical life» is meant to subsume, rather than replace, Kantian ethics. And Hegel can be seen as trying to defend Kant’s idea of freedom as going beyond finite «desires», by means of reason. Thus, in contrast to later critics like Nietzsche or Russell, Hegel shares some of Kant’s concerns.[186]

Kant’s thinking on religion was used in Britain to challenge the decline in religious faith in the nineteenth century. British Catholic writers, notably G. K. Chesterton and Hilaire Belloc, followed this approach. Ronald Englefield debated this movement, and Kant’s use of language.[f] Criticisms of Kant were common in the realist views of the new positivism at that time.

Arthur Schopenhauer was strongly influenced by Kant’s transcendental idealism. He, like G. E. Schulze, Jacobi and Fichte before him, was critical of Kant’s theory of the thing in itself. Things in themselves, they argued, are neither the cause of what we observe nor are they completely beyond our access. Ever since the first Critique of Pure Reason philosophers have been critical of Kant’s theory of the thing in itself. Many have argued, if such a thing exists beyond experience then one cannot posit that it affects us causally, since that would entail stretching the category «causality» beyond the realm of experience.[g] For Schopenhauer things in themselves do not exist outside the non-rational will. The world, as Schopenhauer would have it, is the striving and largely unconscious will. Michael Kelly, in the preface to his 1910 book Kant’s Ethics and Schopenhauer’s Criticism, stated: «Of Kant it may be said that what is good and true in his philosophy would have been buried with him, were it not for Schopenhauer….»

With the success and wide influence of Hegel’s writings, Kant’s influence began to wane, though there was in Germany a movement that hailed a return to Kant in the 1860s, beginning with the publication of Kant und die Epigonen in 1865 by Otto Liebmann. His motto was «Back to Kant», and a re-examination of his ideas began (see Neo-Kantianism). During the turn of the 20th century there was an important revival of Kant’s theoretical philosophy, known as the Marburg School, represented in the work of Hermann Cohen, Paul Natorp, Ernst Cassirer,[187] and anti-Neo-Kantian Nicolai Hartmann.[188]

Kant’s notion of «Critique» has been quite influential. The early German Romantics, especially Friedrich Schlegel in his «Athenaeum Fragments», used Kant’s self-reflexive conception of criticism in their Romantic theory of poetry.[189] Also in aesthetics, Clement Greenberg, in his classic essay «Modernist Painting», uses Kantian criticism, what Greenberg refers to as «immanent criticism», to justify the aims of abstract painting, a movement Greenberg saw as aware of the key limitation—flatness—that makes up the medium of painting.[190] French philosopher Michel Foucault was also greatly influenced by Kant’s notion of «Critique» and wrote several pieces on Kant for a re-thinking of the Enlightenment as a form of «critical thought». He went so far as to classify his own philosophy as a «critical history of modernity, rooted in Kant».[191]

Kant believed that mathematical truths were forms of synthetic a priori knowledge, which means they are necessary and universal, yet known through the apriori ‘intuition’ of space and time, as transcendental preconditions of all phenomenal sense experience.[192] Kant’s often brief remarks about mathematics influenced the mathematical school known as intuitionism, a movement in philosophy of mathematics opposed to Hilbert’s formalism, and Frege and Bertrand Russell’s logicism.[193]

Influence on modern thinkers[edit]

West German postage stamp, 1974, commemorating the 250th anniversary of Kant’s birth

With his Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch, Kant is considered to have foreshadowed many of the ideas that have come to form the democratic peace theory, one of the main controversies in political science.[194]

Prominent recent Kantians include the British philosophers P. F. Strawson,[195] Onora O’Neill[196] and Quassim Cassam,[197] and the American philosophers Wilfrid Sellars[198] and Christine Korsgaard.[199] Due to the influence of Strawson and Sellars, among others, there has been a renewed interest in Kant’s view of the mind. Central to many debates in philosophy of psychology and cognitive science is Kant’s conception of the unity of consciousness.[200]

Jürgen Habermas and John Rawls are two significant political and moral philosophers whose work is strongly influenced by Kant’s moral philosophy.[201] They argued against relativism,[202] supporting the Kantian view that universality is essential to any viable moral philosophy. Jean-François Lyotard, however, emphasized the indeterminacy in the nature of thought and language and has engaged in debates with Habermas based on the effects this indeterminacy has on philosophical and political debates.[203]

Mou Zongsan’s study of Kant has been cited as a highly crucial part in the development of Mou’s personal philosophy, namely New Confucianism. Widely regarded as the most influential Kant scholar in China, Mou’s rigorous critique of Kant’s philosophy—having translated all three of Kant’s critiques—served as an ardent attempt to reconcile Chinese and Western philosophy whilst increasing pressure to westernize in China.[204][205]

Kant’s influence also has extended to the social, behavioral, and physical sciences, as in the sociology of Max Weber, the psychology of Jean Piaget and Carl Gustav Jung,[206][207] and the linguistics of Noam Chomsky. Kant’s work on mathematics and synthetic a priori knowledge is also cited by theoretical physicist Albert Einstein as an early influence on his intellectual development, but which he later criticised heavily and rejected.[208] He held the view that «if one does not want to assert that relativity theory goes against reason, one cannot retain the a priori concepts and norms of Kant’s system».[209] However, Kant scholar Stephen Palmquist has argued that Einstein’s rejection of Kant’s influence was primarily «a response to mistaken interpretations of Kant being adopted by contemporary philosophers», when in fact Kant’s transcendental perspective informed Einstein’s early worldview and led to his insights regarding simultaneity, and eventually to his proposal of the theory of relativity.[210] Because of the thoroughness of the Kantian paradigm shift, his influence extends to thinkers who neither specifically refer to his work nor use his terminology.

In recent years, there has been renewed interest in Kant’s theory of mind from the point of view of formal logic and computer science.[211]

Film/television[edit]

Kant and his work was heavily referenced in the comedy television show The Good Place, as the show deals with the subject of ethics and moral philosophy.[212]

Bibliography[edit]

List of major works[edit]

  • Lectures on Ethics, trans. Louis Infield (London: Methuen, 1930)
  • (1749) Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces (Gedanken von der wahren Schätzung der lebendigen Kräfte)
  • (March 1755) Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens (Allgemeine Naturgeschichte und Theorie des Himmels)
  • (April 1755) Brief Outline of Certain Meditations on Fire (Meditationum quarundam de igne succinta delineatio (master’s thesis under Johann Gottfried Teske))[213][214][215][216]
  • (September 1755) A New Elucidation of the First Principles of Metaphysical Cognition (Principiorum primorum cognitionis metaphysicae nova dilucidatio (doctoral thesis))[217][218]
  • (1756) The Use in Natural Philosophy of Metaphysics Combined with Geometry, Part I: Physical Monadology (Metaphysicae cum geometrica iunctae usus in philosophia naturali, cuius specimen I. continet monadologiam physicam, abbreviated as Monadologia Physica (thesis as a prerequisite of associate professorship))[219]
  • (1762) The False Subtlety of the Four Syllogistic Figures (Die falsche Spitzfindigkeit der vier syllogistischen Figuren)
  • (1763) The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God (Der einzig mögliche Beweisgrund zu einer Demonstration des Daseins Gottes)
  • (1763) Attempt to Introduce the Concept of Negative Magnitudes into Philosophy (Versuch den Begriff der negativen Größen in die Weltweisheit einzuführen)
  • (1764) Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime (Beobachtungen über das Gefühl des Schönen und Erhabenen)
  • (1764) Essay on the Illness of the Head (Über die Krankheit des Kopfes)
  • (1764) Inquiry Concerning the Distinctness of the Principles of Natural Theology and Morality (the Prize Essay) (Untersuchungen über die Deutlichkeit der Grundsätze der natürlichen Theologie und der Moral)
  • (1766) Dreams of a Spirit-Seer (Träume eines Geistersehers)[220]
  • (1768) On the Ultimate Ground of the Differentiation of Regions in Space (Von dem ersten Grunde des Unterschiedes der Gegenden im Raume)[221]
  • (August 1770) Dissertation on the Form and Principles of the Sensible and the Intelligible World (De mundi sensibilis atque intelligibilis forma et principiis (doctoral thesis))[222][223][224][1]
  • (1775) On the Different Races of Man (Über die verschiedenen Rassen der Menschen)
  • (1781) First edition of the Critique of Pure Reason[225] (Kritik der reinen Vernunft)[226]
  • (1783) Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics (Prolegomena zu einer jeden künftigen Metaphysik)
  • (1784) «An Answer to the Question: What Is Enlightenment?» («Beantwortung der Frage: Was ist Aufklärung?«)[227]
  • (1784) «Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose» («Idee zu einer allgemeinen Geschichte in weltbürgerlicher Absicht«)
  • (1785) Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten)
  • (1786) Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Naturwissenschaft)
  • (1786) «What does it mean to orient oneself in thinking?» («Was heißt: sich im Denken orientieren?«)
  • (1786) Conjectural Beginning of Human History (Mutmaßlicher Anfang der Menschengeschichte)
  • (1787) Second edition of the Critique of Pure Reason[228] (Kritik der reinen Vernunft)[229]
  • (1788) Critique of Practical Reason (Kritik der praktischen Vernunft)[230]
  • (1790) Critique of Judgment (Kritik der Urteilskraft)[231]
  • (1793) Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason (Die Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der bloßen Vernunft)[95][232]
  • (1793) On the Old Saw: That May be Right in Theory But It Won’t Work in Practice (Über den Gemeinspruch: Das mag in der Theorie richtig sein, taugt aber nicht für die Praxis)
  • (1795) Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch[233]Zum ewigen Frieden«)[234]
  • (1797) Metaphysics of Morals (Metaphysik der Sitten). First part is The Doctrine of Right, which has often been published separately as The Science of Right.
  • (1798) Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View (Anthropologie in pragmatischer Hinsicht)
  • (1798) The Contest of Faculties[235] (Der Streit der Fakultäten)[236]
  • (1800) Logic (Logik)
  • (1803) On Pedagogy (Über Pädagogik)[237]
  • (1804) Opus Postumum
  • (1817) Lectures on Philosophical Theology (Immanuel Kants Vorlesungen über die philosophische Religionslehre edited by K.H.L. Pölitz) [The English edition of A.W. Wood & G.M. Clark (Cornell, 1978) is based on Pölitz’ second edition, 1830, of these lectures.][238]

Collected works in German[edit]

Printed version

Wilhelm Dilthey inaugurated the Academy edition (the Akademie-Ausgabe abbreviated as AA or Ak) of Kant’s writings (Gesammelte Schriften, Königlich-Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Berlin, 1902–38) in 1895,[239] and served as its first editor. The volumes are grouped into four sections:

  • I. Kant’s published writings (vols. 1–9),
  • II. Kant’s correspondence (vols. 10–13),
  • III. Kant’s literary remains, or Nachlass (vols. 14–23), and
  • IV. Student notes from Kant’s lectures (vols. 24–29).

Electronic version

  • Elektronische Edition der Gesammelten Werke Immanuel Kants (vols. 1–23).

See also[edit]

  • Aenesidemus
  • Arthur Schopenhauer’s criticism of Immanuel Kant’s schemata
  • Critique of the Kantian Philosophy
  • Kant’s influence on Mou Zongsan
  • Kantian fallacy
  • List of liberal theorists
  • On the Basis of Morality
  • On Vision and Colors
  • Political philosophy of Immanuel Kant
  • Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University, Kaliningrad, Russia
  • Immanuel Kant – Wikiquote

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ However, Kant has also been interpreted as a defender of the coherence theory of truth.[2]
  2. ^ a b «Up to now it has been assumed that all our cognition must conform to the objects; but all attempts to find out something about them a priori through concepts that would extend our cognition have, on this presupposition, come to nothing. Hence let us once try whether we do not get farther with the problems of metaphysics by assuming that the objects must conform to our cognition, which would agree better with the requested possibility of an a priori cognition of them, which is to establish something about objects before they are given to us. This would be just like the first thoughts of Copernicus, who, when he did not make good progress in the explanation of the celestial motions if he assumed that the entire celestial host revolves around the observer, tried to see if he might not have greater success if he made the observer revolve and left the stars at rest. Now in metaphysics we can try in a similar way regarding the intuition of objects. If intuition has to conform to the constitution of the objects, then I do not see how we can know anything of them a priori; but if the object (as an object of the senses) conforms to the constitution of our faculty of intuition, then I can very well represent this possibility to myself.»[33]: 110 (B xvi–vii) 
  3. ^ Nietzsche wrote that «Kant wanted to prove, in a way that would dumbfound the common man, that the common man was right: that was the secret joke of this soul.»[39]
  4. ^ Kant himself seems to have found his contribution not significant enough that he published his arguments in a newspaper commentary on the prize question and did not submit them to the Academy: «Whether the Earth has Undergone an Alteration of its Axial Rotation». Kant’s Cosmogony. Translated by Hastie, William. Glasgow: James Maclehose. 1900 [1754]. pp. 1–11. Retrieved 29 March 2022.. The prize was instead awarded in 1756 to P. Frisi, who incorrectly argued against the slowing down of the spin.[72]
  5. ^ It has been noted that in 1778, in response to one of these offers by a former pupil, Kant wrote:

    Any change makes me apprehensive, even if it offers the greatest promise of improving my condition, and I am persuaded by this natural instinct of mine that I must take heed if I wish that the threads which the Fates spin so thin and weak in my case to be spun to any length. My great thanks, to my well-wishers and friends, who think so kindly of me as to undertake my welfare, but at the same time a most humble request to protect me in my current condition from any disturbance.[87]

  6. ^ See Englefield’s article «Kant as Defender of the Faith in Nineteenth-century England», Question, 12, 16–27 (London, Pemberton) reprinted in Critique of Pure Verbiage, Essays on Abuses of Language in Literary, Religious, and Philosophical Writings, edited by G. A. Wells and D. R. Oppenheimer, Open Court, 1990.
  7. ^ For a review of this problem and the relevant literature see The Thing in Itself and the Problem of Affection in the revised edition of Henry Allison’s Kant’s Transcendental Idealism.

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c Since he had written his last habilitation thesis 14 years earlier, a new habilitation thesis was required (see S.J. McGrath, Joseph Carew (eds.), Rethinking German Idealism, Palgrave Macmillan, 2016, p. 24).
  2. ^ «The Coherence Theory of Truth (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)». Archived from the original on 1 November 2019. Retrieved 29 April 2020.
  3. ^ David, Marian. «The Correspondence Theory of Truth». In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Archived copy. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2016 ed.). Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. Archived from the original on 14 February 2014. Retrieved 18 October 2019.{{cite encyclopedia}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  4. ^ Rockmore, Tom (2004). On Foundationalism: A Strategy for Metaphysical Realism. Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 65. ISBN 978-0-7425-3427-8.
  5. ^ Frederick C. Beiser, German Idealism: The Struggle Against Subjectivism, 1781–1801, Harvard University Press, 2002, part I.
  6. ^ Santos, Robinson dos; Schmidt, Elke Elisabeth (2017). Realism and Antirealism in Kant’s Moral Philosophy: New Essays. Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. p. 199. ISBN 978-3-11-057451-7. Kant is an indirect realist.
  7. ^ Hanna, Robert, Kant, Science, and Human Nature. Clarendon Press, 2006, p. 16.
  8. ^ Oberst, Michael (2015). «Kant on Universals». History of Philosophy Quarterly. 32 (4): 335–352.
  9. ^ Hanna, Robert (January 2008). «Kantian non-conceptualism». Philosophical Studies. 137 (1): 41–64. doi:10.1007/s11098-007-9166-0. S2CID 170296391.
  10. ^ The application of the term «perceptual non-conceptualism» to Kant’s philosophy of perception is debatable (see Hanna, Robert. «The Togetherness Principle, Kant’s Conceptualism, and Kant’s Non-Conceptualism: Supplement to Kant’s Theory of Judgment». In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Kant’s Theory of Judgment > the Togetherness Principle, Kant’s Conceptualism, and Kant’s Non-Conceptualism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Archived from the original on 11 June 2018. Retrieved 20 August 2018.).
  11. ^ Biographies: Königsberg Professors – Manchester University Archived 26 December 2016 at the Wayback Machine: «His lectures on logic and metaphysics were quite popular, and he still taught theology, philosophy, and mathematics when Kant studied at the university. The only textbook found in Kant’s library that stems from his student years was Marquardt’s book on astronomy.»
  12. ^ KrV A51/B75–6. See also: Edward Willatt, Kant, Deleuze and Architectonics, Continuum, 2010 p. 17: «Kant argues that cognition can only come about as a result of the union of the abstract work of the understanding and the concrete input of sensation.»
  13. ^ Burnham, Douglas. «Immanuel Kant: Aesthetics». Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Archived from the original on 20 February 2018. Retrieved 18 October 2019.
  14. ^ KpV 101–102 (=Ak V, 121–22). See also: Paul Saurette, The Kantian Imperative: Humiliation, Common Sense, Politics, University of Toronto Press, 2005, p. 255 n. 32.
  15. ^ «Meet Mr Green». The Economist. Retrieved 11 December 2022.
  16. ^ «Wie schwul war Kant? (How gay was Kant?)» (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 11 December 2022.
  17. ^ Kuehn 2001, p. 251.
  18. ^ I. Kant, Theoretical Philosophy: 1755–1770, Cambridge University Press, p. 496
  19. ^ Immanuel Kant, Philosophical Correspondence, 1759–1799, University of Chicago Press, 1967, p. 18.
  20. ^ «Kant» Archived 27 September 2019 at the Wayback Machine. Collins English Dictionary.
  21. ^ «Kant» Archived 23 October 2014 at the Wayback Machine. Random House Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary.
  22. ^ Wells, John C. (2008). Longman Pronunciation Dictionary (3rd ed.). Longman. ISBN 978-1-4058-8118-0.
  23. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011). Roach, Peter; Setter, Jane; Esling, John (eds.). Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary (18th ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-15255-6.
  24. ^ «Immanuel». Duden (in German). Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 20 October 2018.
  25. ^ «Kant». Duden (in German). Archived from the original on 20 October 2018. Retrieved 20 October 2018.
  26. ^ a b c McCormick, Matt. «Immanuel Kant: Metaphysics». Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Archived from the original on 15 February 2019. Retrieved 20 February 2019.
  27. ^ a b Rohlf, Michael (2020), «Immanuel Kant», in Zalta, Edward N. (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2020 ed.), Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, archived from the original on 3 September 2020, retrieved 27 May 2020
  28. ^ a b «Immanuel Kant | Biography, Philosophy, Books, & Facts». Encyclopedia Britannica. Archived from the original on 16 June 2015. Retrieved 27 May 2020.
  29. ^ Durant, Will; Durant, Ariel (1967). The Story of Civilization: Rousseau and Revolution. MJF Books. pp. 571, 574. ISBN 978-1-56731-021-4. Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 22 August 2020.
  30. ^ Nigel Warburton (2011). «Chapter 19: Rose-tinted reality: Immanuel Kant». A little history of philosophy. Yale University Press. p. 134. ISBN 978-0-300-15208-1.
  31. ^ Kitcher, Patrica (1996) [First edition originally published in 1781; second edition originally published in 1787]. «Introduction by Patricia Kitcher, C. The Analytic of Principles». Critique of Pure Reason. By Kant, Immanuel. Translated by Pluhar, Werner S. (Unified Edition with all variants from the 1781 and 1787 editions ed.). Indianapolis/Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. p. l. ISBN 0-87220-257-7. Although Hume’s name is not mentioned in either version of this section, from the beginning, Kant’s readers have understood that his purpose was to vindicate the causal concept after Hume’s devastating attack […] Kant’s “reply to Hume” was to argue we could have no cognition of events, of objects changing by acquiring or losing a property, unless we used a concept of causation that included both the offending and related properties of universality and necessity.
  32. ^ There are two relatively recent translations:
    • Kant, Immanuel (1999). Critique of Pure Reason. The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant. Translated by Guyer, Paul; Wood, Allen W. Cambridge: Cambridge U.P. ISBN 978-0-5216-5729-7. Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 22 August 2020.
    • Kant, Immanuel (1996). Critique of Pure Reason. Translated by Pluhar, Werner S. Indianapolis: Hackett. ISBN 978-0-87220-257-3.

    Both translations have their virtues and both are better than earlier translations: McLaughlin, Peter (1999). «Review». Erkenntnis. 51 (2/3): 357. doi:10.1023/a:1005483714722.

    Page references to the Critique of Pure Reason are commonly given to the first (1781) and second (1787) editions, as published in the Prussian Academy series, as respectively «A [page number]» and «B [page number]».

  33. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Kant, Immanuel (1999). Critique of Pure Reason. The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant. Translated and edited by Paul Guyer and Allen W. Wood. Cambridge: Cambridge U.P. ISBN 978-0-5216-5729-7.
  34. ^ Vanzo, Alberto (January 2013). «Kant on Empiricism and Rationalism». History of Philosophy Quarterly. 30 (1): 53–74. Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 17 December 2015.
  35. ^ Rohlf, Michael. «Immanuel Kant». In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2018 ed.). Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. Archived from the original on 12 January 2012. Retrieved 6 October 2015.
  36. ^ Kant, Immanuel (1784). «Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose».
  37. ^ Arthur Schopenhauer, On the Basis of Morals, in The Two Fundamental Problems of Ethics, trans. Chris Janaway (2009), sections 4–5.
  38. ^ Friedrich Nietzsche, The Anti-Christ (1895), para. 10 Archived 3 August 2020 at the Wayback Machine.
  39. ^ Friedrich Nietzsche (trans. Walter Arnold Kaufmann), The Portable Nietzsche, 1976, p. 96.
  40. ^ a b c d Eze, Emmanuel Chukwudi (1997). Postcolonial African Philosophy: A Critical Reader. Wiley. pp. 103–131. ISBN 978-0-631-20339-1. Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 15 June 2020.
  41. ^ a b c Eze, Emmanuel Chukwudi (1997). Race and the Enlightenment: A Reader. Wiley. pp. 39–48. ISBN 978-0-631-20136-6. Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 15 June 2020.
  42. ^ a b c Bouie, Jamelle (5 June 2018). «How the Enlightenment Created Modern Race Thinking and Why We Should Confront It». Slate Magazine. Archived from the original on 15 June 2020. Retrieved 15 June 2020.
  43. ^ a b Bernasconi, Robert (2010). «Defining Race Scientifically: A response to Michael Banton». Ethnicities. 10 (1): 141–148. doi:10.1177/14687968100100010802. ISSN 1468-7968. JSTOR 23890861. S2CID 143925406.
  44. ^ a b c Kleingeld, Pauline (October 2007). «Kant’s Second Thoughts on Race» (PDF). The Philosophical Quarterly. 57 (229): 573–592. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9213.2007.498.x. hdl:11370/e15b6815-5eab-42d6-a789-24a2f6ecb946. S2CID 55185762. Archived (PDF) from the original on 16 February 2019. Retrieved 14 December 2020.
  45. ^ «Cosmopolis». Koenigsberg-is-dead.de. 23 April 2001. Archived from the original on 22 March 2009. Retrieved 24 July 2009.
  46. ^ Mortensen, Hans and Gertrud, Kants väterliche Ahnen und ihre Umwelt, Rede von 1952 in Jahrbuch der Albertus-Universität zu Königsberg, Pr., Holzner-Verlag, Kitzingen, Main 1953, Vol. 3, p. 26.
  47. ^ R.K. Murray, «The Origin of Immanuel Kant’s Family Name», Kantian Review 13(1), March 2008, pp. 190-93.
  48. ^ Rosa Kohlheim, Volker Kohlheim, Duden – Familiennamen: Herkunft und Bedeutung von 20.000 Nachnamen, Bibliographisches Institut & F.A. Brockhaus AG, Mannheim 2005, p. 365.
  49. ^ Haupt, Viktor. «Rede des Bohnenkönigs – Von Petersburg bis Panama – Die Genealogie der Familie Kant» (PDF). freunde-kants.com (in German). p. 7. Archived from the original (PDF) on 25 September 2015.
  50. ^ Kuehn 2001, p. 26.
  51. ^ Pasternack, Lawrence; Fugate, Courtney (2020), «Kant’s Philosophy of Religion», in Zalta, Edward N. (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2020 ed.), Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, retrieved 25 February 2021
  52. ^ Kuehn 2001, p. 47.
  53. ^ Metaphysics, p. 131
  54. ^ «Immanuel Kant». Christian Research Institute. 30 September 2010. Archived from the original on 20 June 2017. Retrieved 15 June 2017.
  55. ^ «While this sounds skeptical, Kant is only agnostic about our knowledge of metaphysical objects such as God. And, as noted above, Kant’s agnosticism leads to the conclusion that we can neither affirm nor deny claims made by traditional metaphysics.» Andrew Fiala, J.M.D. Meiklejohn, Critique of Pure Reason – Introduction, p. xi.
  56. ^
    Edward J. Verstraete (2008). «The Popular Encyclopedia of Apologetics». In Ed Hindson; Ergun Caner (eds.). The Popular Encyclopedia of Apologetics: Surveying the Evidence for the Truth of Christianity. Harvest House Publishers. p. 82. ISBN 978-0-7369-2084-1. It is in this sense that modern atheism rests heavily upon the skepticism of David Hume and the agnosticism of Immanuel Kant.
  57. ^
    Norman L. Geisler; Frank Turek (2004). «Kant’s Agnosticism: Should We Be Agnostic About It?». I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist. Crossway. pp. 59–60. ISBN 978-1-58134-561-2. Immanuel Kant’s impact has been even more devastating to the Christian worldview than David Hume’s. For if Kant’s philosophy is right, then there is no way to know anything about the real world, even empirically verifiable things!
  58. ^
    Gary D. Badcock (1997). Light of Truth and Fire of Love: A Theology of the Holy Spirit. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. p. 113. ISBN 978-0-8028-4288-6. Kant has no interest in prayer or worship, and is in fact agnostic when it comes to such classical theological questions as the doctrine of God or of the Holy Spirit.
  59. ^
    Norman L. Geisler, Paul K. Hoffman, ed. (2006). «The Agnosticism of Immanuel Kant». Why I Am a Christian: Leading Thinkers Explain Why They Believe. Baker Books. p. 45. ISBN 978-0-8010-6712-9.
  60. ^
    Flinn, Frank K. (2007). Encyclopedia of Catholicism. Infobase Publishing. p. 10. ISBN 978-0-8160-7565-2. Following Locke, the classic agnostic claims not to accept more propositions than are warranted by empirical evidence. In this sense an agnostic appeals to Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), who claims in his Critique of Pure Reason that since God, freedom, immortality, and the soul can be both proved and disproved by theoretical reason, we ought to suspend judgement about them.
  61. ^ Hare, John E. (1996). The Moral Gap: Kantian Ethics, Human Limits, and God’s Assistance. Oxford: Clarendon Press. p. 42. Hare further suggests that Kant is not, in the ordinary sense, an agnostic about God. In his view, Kant thinks that there are good moral grounds for theistic belief. A person who already understands the claims of duty will find the teachings of Christianity worthy of love, even though they are not objectively necessary (p. 47).
  62. ^ Kuehn, M. (2001). Kant: A biography. New York: Cambridge University Press. p 169
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    Kant, Immanuel. Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime. Trans. John T. Goldthwait. University of California Press, 1961, 2003. ISBN 978-0-520-24078-0
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  69. ^ Kuehn 2001, p. 94.
  70. ^ Kuehn 2001, p. 98.
  71. ^ Eric Watkins (ed.), Immanuel Kant: Natural Science, Cambridge University Press, 2012: «Thoughts on the true estimation…» Archived 7 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine.
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  73. ^ a b Brush, Stephen G. (2014). A History of Modern Planetary Physics: Nebulous Earth. p. 7. ISBN 978-0-521-44171-1.
  74. ^ See:
    • Kant, I. (1756a) «Von den Ursachen der Erderschütterungen bei Gelegenheit des Unglücks, welches die westliche Länder von Europa gegen das Ende des vorigen Jahres betroffen hat» [On the causes of the earthquakes on the occasion of the disaster which affected the western countries of Europe towards the end of last year] In: Königlich Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften (Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences), ed.s (1902) Kant’s gesammelte Schriften [Kant’s collected writings] (in German) Berlin, Germany: G. Reimer. vol. 1, pp. 417–427.
    • Kant, I. (1756b) «Geschichte und Naturbeschreibung der merkwürdigsten Vorfälle des Erdbebens, welches an dem Ende des 1755sten Jahres einen großen Theil der Erde erschüttert hat» [History and description of the nature of the most remarkable events of the earthquake which shook a large part of the Earth at the end of the year 1755], ibid. pp. 429–461.
    • Kant, I. (1756c) «Immanuel Kants fortgesetzte Betrachtung der seit einiger Zeit wahrgenommenen Erderschütterungen» [Immanuel Kant’s continued consideration of the earthquakes that were felt some time ago], ibid. pp. 463–472.
    • Amador, Filomena (2004) «The causes of 1755 Lisbon earthquake on Kant» In: Escribano Benito, J.J.; Español González, L.; Martínez García, M.A., ed.s. Actas VIII Congreso de la Sociedad Española de Historia de las Ciencias y de las Técnicas [Proceedings of the Eighth Congress of the Spanish Society of the History of the Sciences and Technology] (in English) Logroño, Spain: Sociedad Española de Historia de las Ciencias y de las Técnicas (Universidad de la Rioja), vol. 2, pp. 485–495.

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  113. ^ The German word Anschauung, which Kant used, literally means ‘looking at’ and generally means what in philosophy in English is called «perception». However it sometimes is rendered as «intuition»: not, however, with the vernacular meaning of an indescribable or mystical experience or sixth sense, but rather with the meaning of the direct perception or grasping of sensory phenomena. In this article, both terms, «perception» and «intuition» are used to stand for Kant’s Anschauung.
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  138. ^ «The Protestant pastor is the grandfather of German philosophy…German philosophy is at bottom—a cunning theology…Why the rejoicing heard through the German academic world—three-quarters composed of the sons of pastors and teachers-at the appearance of Kant? Why the Germans’ conviction, which still find echo even today, that with Kant things were taking a turn of the better? Kant’s success is merely a theologian’s success». Nietzsche, The Antichrist, 10
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  141. ^ For example Peter Byrne, who wrote about Kant’s relationship with deism. Byrne, Peter (2007), Kant on God, London: Ashgate, p. 159.
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  145. ^ Wood, Allen W. (2020), Kant and Religion, Cambridge University Press, p.2.
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  148. ^ The concept of freedom is also handled in the third section of the Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals; in the Critique of Practical Reason see § VII and § VIII.
  149. ^ 5:65–67
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Works cited[edit]

  • Kant, Immanuel. Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals. Trans. Lewis White Beck, Indianapolis, Bobbs-Merrill, 1969. Page numbers citing this work are Beck’s marginal numbers that refer to the page numbers of the standard edition of Königlich-Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften (Berlin, 1902–38).
  • Kuehn, Manfred. Kant: a Biography. Cambridge University Press, 2001. ISBN 978-0-521-49704-6.

Further reading[edit]

In Germany, one important contemporary interpreter of Kant and the movement of German Idealism he began is Dieter Henrich, who has some work available in English. P. F. Strawson’s The Bounds of Sense (1966) played a significant role in determining the contemporary reception of Kant in England and America. More recent interpreters of note in the English-speaking world include Lewis White Beck, Jonathan Bennett, Henry Allison, Paul Guyer, Christine Korsgaard, Stephen Palmquist, Robert B. Pippin, Roger Scruton, Rudolf Makkreel, and Béatrice Longuenesse.

General introductions to his thought

  • Broad, C.D. Kant: An Introduction. Cambridge University Press, 1978. ISBN 978-0-521-21755-2, 0-521-29265-4
  • Gardner, Sebastian. Kant and the Critique of Pure Reason. Routledge, 1999. ISBN 978-0-415-11909-2
  • Martin, Gottfried. Kant’s Metaphysics and Theory of Science. Greenwood Press, 1955 ISBN 978-0-8371-7154-8 (elucidates Kant’s most fundamental concepts in their historical context)
  • Palmquist, Stephen. Kant’s System of Perspectives Archived 14 April 2012 at the Wayback Machine: an architectonic interpretation of the Critical philosophy. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1993. ISBN 978-0-8191-8927-1
  • Seung, T.K. 2007. Kant: a Guide for the Perplexed. London: Continuum. ISBN 978-0-8264-8580-9
  • Satyananda Giri. Kant. Durham, CT: Strategic Publishing Group, 2010. ISBN 978-1-60911-686-6
  • Scruton, Roger. Kant: a Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press, 2001. ISBN 978-0-19-280199-9 (provides a brief account of his life, and a lucid introduction to the three major critiques)
  • Uleman, Jennifer. An Introduction to Kant’s Moral Philosophy. Cambridge University Press, 2010. ISBN 978-0-521-13644-0
  • Luchte, James. Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2007. ISBN 978-0-8264-9322-4
  • Deleuze, Gilles. Kant’s Critical Philosophy: The Doctrine of the Faculties. The Athlone Press, 1983. ISBN 978-0-485-11249-8

Biography and historical context

  • Bader, Ralph (2008). «Kant, Immanuel (1724–1804)». In Hamowy, Ronald (ed.). The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; Cato Institute. pp. 269–271. doi:10.4135/9781412965811.n161. ISBN 978-1-4129-6580-4. LCCN 2008009151. OCLC 750831024.
  • Beck, Lewis White. Early German Philosophy: Kant and his Predecessors. Harvard University Press, 1969. (a survey of Kant’s intellectual background)
  • Beiser, Frederick C. The Fate of Reason: German Philosophy from Kant to Fichte. Harvard University Press, 1987.
  • Beiser, Frederick C. German Idealism: the Struggle against Subjectivism, 1781–1801. Harvard University Press, 2002
  • Cassirer, Ernst. Kant’s Life and Thought. Translation of Kants Leben und Lehre. Trans., Jame S. Haden, intr. Stephan Körner. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1981.
  • Chamberlain, Houston Stewart. Immanuel Kant – a study and a comparison with Goethe, Leonardo da Vinci, Bruno, Plato and Descartes, the authorised translation from the German by Lord Redesdale, with his ‘Introduction’, The Bodley Head, London, 1914, (2 volumes).
  • Gulyga, Arsenij. Immanuel Kant: His Life and Thought. Trans., Marijan Despaltović. Boston: Birkhäuser, 1987.
  • Johnson, G.R. (ed.). Kant on Swedenborg. Dreams of a Spirit-Seer and Other Writings. Swedenborg Foundation, 2002. (new translation and analysis, many supplementary texts)
  • Lehner, Ulrich L., Kants Vorsehungskonzept auf dem Hintergrund der deutschen Schulphilosophie und theologie Archived 23 September 2006 at the Wayback Machine (Leiden: 2007) (Kant’s concept of Providence and its background in German school philosophy and theology)
  • Pinkard, Terry. German Philosophy, 1760–1860: the Legacy of Idealism. Cambridge, 2002.
  • Pippin, Robert. Idealism as Modernism. Cambridge University Press, 1996.
  • Sassen, Brigitte (ed.). Kant’s Early Critics: the Empiricist Critique of the Theoretical Philosophy, Cambridge, 2000.
  • Schabert, Joseph A. «Kant’s Influence on his Successors», The American Catholic Quarterly Review, Vol. XLVII, January 1922.

Collections of essays

  • Firestone, Chris L. and Palmquist, Stephen (eds.). Kant and the New Philosophy of Religion. Notre Dame: Indiana University Press, 2006. ISBN 978-0-253-21800-1
  • Förster, Eckart (ed.). Kant’s Transcendental Deductions:. The Three ‘Critiques’ and the ‘Opus Postumum’ Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1989. Includes an important essay by Dieter Henrich.
  • Guyer, Paul (ed.). The Cambridge Companion to Kant, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. ISBN 978-0-521-36587-1. Excellent collection of papers that covers most areas of Kant’s thought.
  • Mohanty, J.N. and Shahan, Robert W. (eds.). Essays on Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1982. ISBN 978-0-8061-1782-9
  • Phillips, Dewi et al. (eds.). Kant and Kierkegaard on Religion. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2000, ISBN 978-0-312-23234-4 Collection of essays about Kantian religion and its influence on Kierkegaardian and contemporary philosophy of religion.
  • Proceedings of the International Kant Congresses. Several Congresses (numbered) edited by various publishers.

Theoretical philosophy

  • Allison, Henry. Kant’s Transcendental Idealism. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1983, 2004. ISBN 978-0-300-03629-9 (a very influential defense of Kant’s idealism, recently revised).
  • Ameriks, Karl. Kant’s Theory of Mind: An Analysis of the Paralogisms of Pure Reason. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982 (one of the first detailed studies of the Dialectic in English).
  • Banham, Gary. Kant’s Transcendental Imagination. London and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006.
  • Deleuze, Gilles. Kant’s Critical Philosophy. Trans., Hugh Tomlinson and Barbara Habberjam. University of Minnesota Press, 1984. ISBN 978-0-8166-1341-0
  • Gram, Moltke S. The Transcendental Turn: The Foundation of Kant’s Idealism. Gainesville: University Presses of Florida, 1984. ISBN 978-0-8130-0787-8
  • Greenberg, Robert. Kant’s Theory of A Priori Knowledge. Penn State Press, 2001 ISBN 978-0-271-02083-9
  • Guyer, Paul. Kant and the Claims of Knowledge. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987 (modern defense of the view that Kant’s theoretical philosophy is a «patchwork» of ill-fitting arguments).
  • Heidegger, Martin. Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics. Trans., Richard Taft. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997. ISBN 978-0-253-21067-8
  • Henrich, Dieter. The Unity of Reason: Essays on Kant’s Philosophy. Ed. with introduction by Richard L. Velkley; trans. Jeffrey Edwards et al. Harvard University Press, 1994. ISBN 978-0-674-92905-0
  • Kemp Smith, Norman. A Commentary to Kant’s ‘Critique of Pure Reason. London: Macmillan, 1930 (influential commentary on the first Critique, recently reprinted).
  • Kitcher, Patricia. Kant’s Transcendental Psychology. New York: Oxford University Press, 1990.
  • Longuenesse, Béatrice. Kant and the Capacity to Judge. Princeton University Press, 1998. ISBN 978-0-691-04348-7. (argues that the notion of judgment provides the key to understanding the overall argument of the first Critique)
  • Melnick, Arthur. Kant’s Analogies of Experience. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1973. (important study of Kant’s Analogies, including his defense of the principle of causality)
  • Paton, H.J. Kant’s Metaphysic of Experience: a Commentary on the First Half of the Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Two volumes. London: Macmillan, 1936. (extensive study of Kant’s theoretical philosophy)
  • Pippin, Robert B. Kant’s Theory of Form: An Essay on the Critique of Pure Reason. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982. (influential examination of the formal character of Kant’s work)
  • Schopenhauer, Arthur. Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung. Erster Band. Anhang. Kritik der Kantischen Philosophie. F.A. Brockhaus, Leipzig 1859 (In English: Arthur Schopenhauer, New York: Dover Press, Volume I, Appendix, «Critique of the Kantian Philosophy», ISBN 978-0-486-21761-1)
  • Schott, Robin May (1997). Feminist interpretations of Immanuel Kant. University Park, Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State University Press. ISBN 978-0-271-01676-4.
  • Seung, T.K. Kant’s Transcendental Logic. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1969.
  • Strawson, P.F. The Bounds of Sense: An Essay on Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Routledge, 1989 (the work that revitalized the interest of contemporary analytic philosophers in Kant).
  • Sturm, Thomas, Kant und die Wissenschaften vom Menschen. Paderborn: Mentis Verlag, 2009. ISBN 978-3-89785-608-0. review Archived 11 December 2013 at the Wayback Machine (Treats Kant’s anthropology and his views on psychology and history in relation to his philosophy of science.)
  • Tonelli, Giorgio. Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason within the Tradition of Modern Logic. A Commentary on its History. Hildesheim, Olms 1994
  • Werkmeister, W.H., Kant: The Architectonic and Development of His Philosophy, Open Court Publishing Co., La Salle, Ill.; 1980 ISBN 978-0-87548-345-0 (it treats, as a whole, the architectonic and development of Kant’s philosophy from 1755 through the Opus postumum.)
  • Wolff, Robert Paul. Kant’s Theory of Mental Activity: A Commentary on the Transcendental Analytic of the Critique of Pure Reason. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1963. (detailed and influential commentary on the first part of the Critique of Pure Reason)
  • Yovel, Yirmiyahu. Kant and the Philosophy of History. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1980. (review Archived 4 January 2017 at the Wayback Machine)

Practical philosophy

  • Allison, Henry. Kant’s Theory of Freedom. Cambridge University Press 1990.
  • Banham, Gary. Kant’s Practical Philosophy: From Critique to Doctrine. Palgrave Macmillan, 2003.
  • Dorschel, Andreas. Die idealistische Kritik des Willens: Versuch über die Theorie der praktischen Subjektivität bei Kant und Hegel. Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 1992 (Schriften zur Transzendentalphilosophie 10) ISBN 978-3-7873-1046-3.
  • Friedman, Michael (June 1998). «Kantian themes in contemporary philosophy». Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes. 72 (1): 111–130. doi:10.1111/1467-8349.00038. JSTOR 4107015.
  • Korsgaard, Christine M. The Sources of Normativity. Cambridge University Press, 1996.
  • Michalson, Gordon E. Fallen Freedom: Kant on Radical Evil and Moral Regeneration. Cambridge University Press, 1990.
  • Michalson, Gordon E. Kant and the Problem of God. Blackwell Publishers, 1999.
  • Paton, H.J. The Categorical Imperative: A Study in Kant’s Moral Philosophy. University of Pennsylvania Press 1971.
  • Rawls, John. Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy. Cambridge, 2000.
  • Seung, T.K. Kant’s Platonic Revolution in Moral and Political Philosophy. Johns Hopkins, 1994.
  • Wolff, Robert Paul. The Autonomy of Reason: A Commentary on Kant’s Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals. New York: HarperCollins, 1974. ISBN 978-0-06-131792-7.
  • Wood, Allen. Kant’s Ethical Thought. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999.

Aesthetics

  • Allison, Henry. Kant’s Theory of Taste: A Reading of the Critique of Aesthetic Judgment. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
  • Banham, Gary. Kant and the Ends of Aesthetics. London and New York: Macmillan Press, 2000.
  • Clewis, Robert. The Kantian Sublime and the Revelation of Freedom. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2009.
  • Crawford, Donald. Kant’s Aesthetic Theory. Wisconsin, 1974.
  • Doran, Robert. The Theory of the Sublime from Longinus to Kant. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
  • Guyer, Paul. Kant and the Claims of Taste. Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, 1979.
  • Hammermeister, Kai. The German Aesthetic Tradition. Cambridge University Press, 2002.
  • Immanuel Kant entry in Kelly, Michael (Editor in Chief) (1998) Encyclopedia of Aesthetics. New York, Oxford, Oxford University Press.
  • Kaplama, Erman. Cosmological Aesthetics through the Kantian Sublime and Nietzschean Dionysian. Lanham: UPA, Rowman & Littlefield, 2014.
  • Makkreel, Rudolf, Imagination and Interpretation in Kant. Chicago, 1990.
  • McCloskey, Mary. Kant’s Aesthetic. SUNY, 1987.
  • Schaper, Eva. Studies in Kant’s Aesthetics. Edinburgh, 1979.
  • Zammito, John H. The Genesis of Kant’s Critique of Judgment. Chicago and London: Chicago University Press, 1992.
  • Zupancic, Alenka. Ethics of the Real: Kant and Lacan. Verso, 2000.

Philosophy of religion

  • Palmquist, Stephen. Kant’s Critical Religion Archived 14 April 2012 at the Wayback Machine: Volume Two of Kant’s System of Perspectives. Ashgate, 2000. ISBN 978-0-7546-1333-6
  • Perez, Daniel Omar. «Religión, Política y Medicina en Kant: El Conflicto de las Proposiciones». Cinta de Moebio. Revista de Epistemologia de Ciencias Sociales, v. 28, p. 91–103, 2007. Uchile.cl Archived 20 October 2017 at the Wayback Machine (Spanish)

Perpetual peace and international relations

  • Sir Harry Hinsley, Power and the Pursuit of Peace, Cambridge University Press, 1962.
  • Martin Wight, Four Seminal Thinkers in International Theory: Machiavelli, Grotius, Kant and Mazzini Archived 29 November 2014 at the Wayback Machine ed. Gabriele Wight & Brian Porter (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005).
  • Bennington, Geoffrey (December 2011). «Kant’s open secret» (PDF). Theory, Culture & Society. 28 (7–8): 26–40. doi:10.1177/0263276411423036. S2CID 143513241. Archived (PDF) from the original on 8 February 2020. Retrieved 31 May 2020.

Other works

  • Botul, Jean-Baptiste. La vie sexuelle d’Emmanuel Kant. Paris, Éd. Mille et une Nuits, 2008. ISBN 978-2-84205-424-3
  • Caygill, Howard. A Kant Dictionary. Oxford; Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell Reference, 1995. ISBN 978-0-631-17534-6
  • Derrida, Jacques. Mochlos; or, The Conflict of the Faculties. Columbia University, 1980.
  • Kelly, Michael. Kant’s Ethics and Schopenhauer’s Criticism, London: Swan Sonnenschein 1910. [Reprinted 2010 Nabu Press, ISBN 978-1-171-70795-0]
  • Mosser, Kurt. Necessity and Possibility; The Logical Strategy of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Catholic University of America Press, 2008. ISBN 978-0-8132-1532-7
  • White, Mark D. Kantian Ethics and Economics: Autonomy, Dignity, and Character Archived 16 November 2011 at the Wayback Machine. Stanford University Press, 2011. ISBN 978-0-8047-6894-8.

Contemporary philosophy with a Kantian influence

  • Assiter, Alison (July 2013). «Kant and Kierkegaard on freedom and evil». Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement. 72: 275–296. Bibcode:1995kppp.book…..O. doi:10.1017/S1358246113000155. S2CID 170661991.
  • Bird, Graham (June 1998). «Kantian themes in contemporary philosophy». Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes. 72 (1): 131–152. doi:10.1111/1467-8349.00039. JSTOR 4107015.
  • Guyer, Paul. Knowledge, Reason, and Taste: Kant’s Response to Hume. Princeton University Press, 2008.
  • Hanna, Robert, Kant and the Foundations of Analytic Philosophy. Clarendon Press, 2004.
  • Hanna, Robert, Kant, Science, and Human Nature. Clarendon Press, 2006.
  • Herman, Barbara. The Practice of Moral Judgement. Harvard University Press, 1993.
  • Hill, Judith M. (June 1987). «Pornography and degradation». Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy. 2 (2): 39–54. doi:10.1111/j.1527-2001.1987.tb01064.x. JSTOR 3810015. S2CID 145504474. (A Kantian approach to the issue of pornography and degradation.)
  • Korsgaard, Christine. Creating the Kingdom of Ends. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996. ISBN 978-0-521-49644-5 (not a commentary, but a defense of a broadly Kantian approach to ethics)
  • McDowell, John. Mind and World. Harvard University Press, 1994. ISBN 978-0-674-57609-4. (offers a Kantian solution to a dilemma in contemporary epistemology regarding the relation between mind and world)
  • O’Neill, Onora (June 1998). «Kant on duties regarding nonrational nature». Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes. 72 (1): 211–228. doi:10.1111/1467-8349.00043. JSTOR 4107017.
  • Parfit, Derek. On What Matters (2 vols.). New York: Oxford University Press, 2011. ISBN 978-0-19-926592-3
  • Pinker, Steven. The Stuff of Thought. Viking Press, 2007. ISBN 978-0-670-06327-7. (Chapter 4 «Cleaving the Air» discusses Kant’s anticipation of modern cognitive science)
  • Wood, Allen W. Kant’s Ethical Thought. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999. ISBN 978-0-521-64836-3. (comprehensive, in-depth study of Kant’s ethics, with emphasis on formula of humanity as most accurate formulation of the categorical imperative)
  • Wood, Allen W. (June 1998). «Kant on duties regarding nonrational nature». Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes. 72 (1): 189–210. doi:10.1111/1467-8349.00042. JSTOR 4107017.

External links[edit]

  • Works by Immanuel Kant at Project Gutenberg
  • Works by or about Immanuel Kant at Internet Archive
  • Works by Immanuel Kant at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)
  • KantPapers, authors and papers database powered by PhilPapers, focused on Kant, and located at Cornell University
  • Immanuel Kant at the Encyclopædia Britannica
  • Immanuel Kant in the Christian Cyclopedia
  • Works by Immanuel Kant at Duisburg-Essen University
  • Stephen Palmquist’s Glossary of Kantian Terminology
  • Kant’s Ethical Theory – Kantian ethics explained, applied and evaluated
  • Notes on Utilitarianism – A conveniently brief survey of Kant’s Utilitarianism
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: An Overview
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Aesthetics
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Logic
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Metaphysics
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Philosophy of Mind
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Philosophy of Religion
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Radical Evil
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Transcendental Idealism
  • The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant

Immanuel Kant

Kant gemaelde 3.jpg

Portrait by Johann Gottlieb Becker, 1768

Born 22 April 1724

Königsberg, Kingdom of Prussia
(present-day Kaliningrad, Russia)

Died 12 February 1804 (aged 79)

Königsberg, East Prussia, Kingdom of Prussia

Education Collegium Fridericianum
University of Königsberg
(B.A.; M.A., April 1755; PhD, September 1755; PhD,[1] August 1770)
Era Age of Enlightenment
Region Western philosophy
School
  • Enlightenment philosophy
  • Kantianism

Other schools

  • Classical liberalism
  • Correspondence theory of truth[a][3]
  • Empirical realism
  • Foundationalism[4]
  • German idealism[5]
  • Indirect realism[6]
  • Liberal naturalism[7]
  • Metaphysical conceptualism[8]
  • Perceptual non-conceptualism[9][10]
  • Transcendental idealism
Institutions University of Königsberg
Theses
  • Principiorum primorum cognitionis metaphysicae nova dilucidatio (September 1755)
  • De mundi sensibilis atque intelligibilis forma et principiis (August 1770)
Academic advisors Martin Knutzen, Johann Gottfried Teske (M.A. advisor), Konrad Gottlieb Marquardt[11]
Notable students Jakob Sigismund Beck, Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Johann Gottfried Herder, Karl Leonhard Reinhold (epistolary correspondent)[19]

Main interests

Aesthetics, cosmogony, epistemology, ethics, metaphysics, systematic philosophy

Notable ideas

  • Abstract–concrete distinction[12]
  • Aesthetic–teleological judgments
  • Analytic–synthetic distinction
  • Categorical and hypothetical imperative
  • Categories
  • Cosmotheology
  • Critical philosophy
  • Copernican revolution in philosophy
  • Disinterested delight
  • Empirical realism
  • Kant’s antinomies
  • Kant’s pitchfork
  • Kantian ethics
  • Kingdom of Ends
  • Mathematical vs. dynamical sublimity[13]
  • Nebular hypothesis
  • Noogony and noology
  • Noumenon vs. thing-in-itself
  • Ontotheology
  • Primacy of practical reason[14]
  • Public reason
  • Radical evil
  • Rechtsstaat
  • Sapere aude
  • Transcendental schema
  • Theoretical vs. practical philosophy
  • Transcendental idealism
  • Transcendental subject
  • Transcendental theology
  • Understanding–reason distinction

Influences

    • Wolff
    • Baumgarten
    • Green[15][16]
    • Plato
    • Aristotle
    • Hamann
    • Empiricus
    • Lucretius
    • Hume
    • Smith
    • Descartes
    • Leibniz
    • Locke
    • Rousseau
    • Newton
    • Tetens[17]
    • Crusius[18]
    • Swedenborg (disputed)

Influenced

  • Virtually all subsequent Western philosophy, especially Beck, Beneke, Bolzano, Carnap, Fichte, Frege, Guyer, Habermas, Hegel, Heidegger, Herder, Jacobi, Jaspers, Maimon, Peirce, Popper, Rawls, Reinhold, Schelling, Schleiermacher, Schlegel, Schopenhauer, Spir, Zeller

Signature
Signature written in ink in a flowing script

Immanuel Kant (,[20][21] ,[22][23] German: [ɪˈmaːnu̯eːl ˈkant];[24][25] 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German philosopher and one of the central Enlightenment thinkers.[26][27] Born in Königsberg, Kant’s comprehensive and systematic works in epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and aesthetics have made him one of the most influential figures in modern Western philosophy.[26][28]

In his doctrine of transcendental idealism, Kant argued that space and time are mere «forms of intuition» which structure all experience, and therefore that, while «things-in-themselves» exist and contribute to experience, they are nonetheless distinct from the objects of experience. From this it follows that the objects of experience are mere «appearances», and that the nature of things as they are in themselves is unknowable to us.[29][30] In an attempt to counter the skepticism he found in the writings of philosopher David Hume,[31] he wrote the Critique of Pure Reason (1781/1787),[32] one of his most well-known works. In it, he developed his theory of experience to answer the question of whether synthetic a priori knowledge is possible, which would in turn make it possible to determine the limits of metaphysical inquiry. Kant drew a parallel to the Copernican revolution in his proposal to think of the objects of the senses as conforming to our spatial and temporal forms of intuition, so that we have a priori cognition of those objects.[b]

Kant believed that reason is also the source of morality, and that aesthetics arise from a faculty of disinterested judgment. Kant’s views continue to have a major influence on contemporary philosophy, especially the fields of epistemology, ethics, political theory, and post-modern aesthetics.[28] He attempted to explain the relationship between reason and human experience and to move beyond what he believed to be the failures of traditional philosophy and metaphysics. He wanted to put an end to what he saw as an era of futile and speculative theories of human experience, while resisting the skepticism of thinkers such as Hume. He regarded himself as showing the way past the impasse between rationalists and empiricists,[34] and is widely held to have synthesized both traditions in his thought.[35]

Kant was an exponent of the idea that perpetual peace could be secured through universal democracy and international cooperation, and that perhaps this could be the culminating stage of world history.[36] The nature of Kant’s religious views continues to be the subject of scholarly dispute, with viewpoints ranging from the impression that he shifted from an early defense of an ontological argument for the existence of God to a principled agnosticism, to more critical treatments epitomized by Schopenhauer, who criticized the imperative form of Kantian ethics as «theological morals» and the «Mosaic Decalogue in disguise»,[37] and Nietzsche, who claimed that Kant had «theologian blood»[38] and was merely a sophisticated apologist for traditional Christian faith.[c] Beyond his religious views, Kant has also been criticized for the racism presented in some of his lesser-known papers, such as «On the Use of Teleological Principles in Philosophy» and «On the Different Races of Man».[40][41][42][43] Although he was a proponent of scientific racism for much of his career, Kant’s views on race changed significantly in the last decade of his life, and he ultimately rejected racial hierarchies and European colonialism in Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch (1795).[44]

Kant published other important works on ethics, religion, law, aesthetics, astronomy, and history during his lifetime. These include the Universal Natural History (1755), the Critique of Practical Reason (1788), the Critique of Judgment (1790), Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason (1793), and the Metaphysics of Morals (1797).[27]

Biography[edit]

Kant was born on 22 April 1724 into a Prussian German family of Lutheran Protestant faith in Königsberg, East Prussia (since 1946 the city of Kaliningrad, Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia). His mother, Anna Regina Reuter[45] (1697–1737), was born in Königsberg to a father from Nuremberg.[citation needed] Her surname is sometimes erroneously given as Porter. Kant’s father, Johann Georg Kant (1682–1746), was a German harness maker from Memel, at the time Prussia’s most northeastern city (now Klaipėda, Lithuania). Kant believed that his paternal grandfather Hans Kant was of Scottish origin.[46] While scholars of Kant’s life long accepted the claim, modern scholarship challenges it. It is possible that Kants got their name from the village of Kantvainiai (German: Kantwaggen – today part of Priekulė) and were of Kursenieki origin.[47][48] Kant was the fourth of nine children (six of whom reached adulthood).[49]

Baptized Emanuel, he later changed the spelling of his name to Immanuel[50] after learning Hebrew. He was brought up in a Pietist household that stressed religious devotion, humility, and a literal interpretation of the Bible.[51][citation needed] His education was strict, punitive and disciplinary, and focused on Latin and religious instruction over mathematics and science.[52] In his Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals, he reveals a belief in immortality as the necessary condition of humanity’s approach to the highest morality possible.[53][54] However, as Kant was skeptical about some of the arguments used prior to him in defence of theism and maintained that human understanding is limited and can never attain knowledge about God or the soul, various commentators have labelled him a philosophical agnostic,[55][56][57][58][59][60] even though it has also been suggested that Kant intends other people to think of him as a «pure rationalist», who is defined by Kant himself as someone who recognizes revelation but asserts that to know and accept it as real is not a necessary requisite to religion.[61]

Kant apparently lived a very strict and disciplined life; it was said that neighbors would set their clocks by his daily walks. He never married,[62] but seems to have had a rewarding social life—he was a popular teacher, as well as a modestly successful author even before starting on his major philosophical works. He had a circle of friends with whom he frequently met—among them Joseph Green, an English merchant in Königsberg, whom reportedly he first spoke to in an argument in 1763 or before. According to the story, Kant was strolling in the Dänhofscher Garten when he saw one of his acquaintances speaking to a group of men he did not know. He joined the conversation, which soon turned to unusual current events in the world. The topic of the disagreement between the British and the Americans came up. Kant took the side of the Americans, and this upset Green. He challenged Kant to a fight. Kant reportedly explained that patriotism did not get in the way of his view, and that any cosmopolitan citizen could take his position if he held Kant’s political principles, which Kant explained to Green. Green was so stunned by Kant’s ability to express his views, that Green offered to become friends with Kant, and invited him to his apartment that evening.[63]

Between 1750 and 1754 Kant worked as a tutor (Hauslehrer) in the Lithuanian village of Jučiai (German: Judtschen;[64] approximately 20 km east of Königsberg, and in Groß-Arnsdorf[65] (now Jarnołtowo near Morąg (German: Mohrungen), Poland), approximately 145 km east of Königsberg.

Many myths grew up about Kant’s personal mannerisms; these are listed, explained, and refuted in Goldthwait’s introduction to his translation of Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime.[66]

Young scholar[edit]

Kant showed a great aptitude for study at an early age. He first attended the Collegium Fridericianum from which he graduated at the end of the summer of 1740. In 1740, aged 16, he enrolled at the University of Königsberg, where he spent his whole career.[67] He studied the philosophy of Gottfried Leibniz and Christian Wolff under Martin Knutzen (Associate Professor of Logic and Metaphysics from 1734 until his death in 1751), a rationalist who was also familiar with developments in British philosophy and science and introduced Kant to the new mathematical physics of Isaac Newton. Knutzen dissuaded Kant from the theory of pre-established harmony, which he regarded as «the pillow for the lazy mind».[68] He also dissuaded Kant from idealism, the idea that reality is purely mental, which most philosophers in the 18th century regarded in a negative light. The theory of transcendental idealism that Kant later included in the Critique of Pure Reason was developed partially in opposition to traditional idealism.

His father’s stroke and subsequent death in 1746 interrupted his studies. Kant left Königsberg shortly after August 1748[69]—he would return there in August 1754.[70] He became a private tutor in the towns surrounding Königsberg, but continued his scholarly research. In 1749, he published his first philosophical work, Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces (written in 1745–47).[71]

Early work[edit]

Kant is best known for his work in the philosophy of ethics and metaphysics,[26] but he made significant contributions to other disciplines. In 1754, while contemplating on a prize question by the Berlin Academy about the problem of Earth’s rotation, he argued that the Moon’s gravity would slow down Earth’s spin and he also put forth the argument that gravity would eventually cause the Moon’s tidal locking to coincide with the Earth’s rotation.[d][73] The next year, he expanded this reasoning to the formation and evolution of the Solar System in his Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens.[73] In 1755, Kant received a license to lecture in the University of Königsberg and began lecturing on a variety of topics including mathematics, physics, logic and metaphysics. In his 1756 essay on the theory of winds, Kant laid out an original insight into the Coriolis force.

In 1756 Kant also published three papers on the 1755 Lisbon earthquake.[74] Kant’s theory, which involved shifts in huge caverns filled with hot gases, though inaccurate, was one of the first systematic attempts to explain earthquakes in natural rather than supernatural terms. According to Walter Benjamin, Kant’s slim early book on the earthquake «probably represents the beginnings of scientific geography in Germany. And certainly the beginnings of seismology».

In 1757, Kant began lecturing on geography making him one of the first lecturers to explicitly teach geography as its own subject.[75][76] Geography was one of Kant’s most popular lecturing topics and in 1802 a compilation by Friedrich Theodor Rink of Kant’s lecturing notes, Physical Geography, was released. After Kant became a professor in 1770, he expanded the topics of his lectures to include lectures on natural law, ethics, and anthropology, along with other topics.[75]

Kant’s house in Königsberg

In the Universal Natural History, Kant laid out the Nebular hypothesis, in which he deduced that the Solar System had formed from a large cloud of gas, a nebula. Kant also correctly deduced that the Milky Way was a large disk of stars, which he theorized formed from a much larger spinning gas cloud. He further suggested that other distant «nebulae» might be other galaxies. These postulations opened new horizons for astronomy, for the first time extending it beyond the Solar System to galactic and intergalactic realms.[77] According to Thomas Huxley (1867), Kant also made contributions to geology in his Universal Natural History.[78][79]

From then on, Kant turned increasingly to philosophical issues, although he continued to write on the sciences throughout his life. In the early 1760s, Kant produced a series of important works in philosophy. The False Subtlety of the Four Syllogistic Figures, a work in logic, was published in 1762. Two more works appeared the following year: Attempt to Introduce the Concept of Negative Magnitudes into Philosophy and The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God. By 1764, Kant had become a notable popular author, and wrote Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime;[80] he was second to Moses Mendelssohn in a Berlin Academy prize competition with his Inquiry Concerning the Distinctness of the Principles of Natural Theology and Morality (often referred to as «The Prize Essay»). In 1766 Kant wrote Dreams of a Spirit-Seer which dealt with the writings of Emanuel Swedenborg. The exact influence of Swedenborg on Kant, as well as the extent of Kant’s belief in mysticism according to Dreams of a Spirit-Seer, remain controversial. On the face of it, Dreams of a Spirit-Seer argued against the ideas of Swedenborg. Kant poked holes in the logic of Swedenborg’s view of the nature of spirits,[81] but also communicated his curiosity about Swedenborg’s mysticism.[82] On 31 March 1770, aged 45, Kant was finally appointed Full Professor of Logic and Metaphysics (Professor Ordinarius der Logic und Metaphysic) at the University of Königsberg. In defense of this appointment, Kant wrote his inaugural dissertation (Inaugural-Dissertation) De Mundi Sensibilis atque Intelligibilis Forma et Principiis (On the Form and Principles of the Sensible and the Intelligible World).[1] This work saw the emergence of several central themes of his mature work, including the distinction between the faculties of intellectual thought and sensible receptivity. To miss this distinction would mean to commit the error of subreption, and, as he says in the last chapter of the dissertation, only in avoiding this error does metaphysics flourish.

The issue that vexed Kant was central to what 20th-century scholars called «the philosophy of mind». The flowering of the natural sciences had led to an understanding of how data reaches the brain. Sunlight falling on an object is reflected from its surface in a way that maps the surface features (color, texture, etc.). The reflected light reaches the human eye, passes through the cornea, is focused by the lens onto the retina where it forms an image similar to that formed by light passing through a pinhole into a camera obscura. The retinal cells send impulses through the optic nerve and then they form a mapping in the brain of the visual features of the object. The interior mapping is not the exterior object, and our belief that there is a meaningful relationship between the object and the mapping in the brain depends on a chain of reasoning that is not fully grounded. But the uncertainty aroused by these considerations, by optical illusions, misperceptions, delusions, etc., is not the end of the problem.

Kant saw that the mind could not function as an empty container that simply receives data from outside. Something must be giving order to the incoming data. Images of external objects must be kept in the same sequence in which they were received. This ordering occurs through the mind’s intuition of time. The same considerations apply to the mind’s function of constituting space for ordering mappings of visual and tactile signals arriving via the already described chains of physical causation.

It is often claimed that Kant was a late developer, that he only became an important philosopher in his mid-50s after rejecting his earlier views. While it is true that Kant wrote his greatest works relatively late in life, there is a tendency to underestimate the value of his earlier works. Recent Kant scholarship has devoted more attention to these «pre-critical» writings and has recognized a degree of continuity with his mature work.[83]

Critique of Pure Reason[edit]

At age 46, Kant was an established scholar and an increasingly influential philosopher, and much was expected of him. In correspondence with his ex-student and friend Markus Herz, Kant admitted that, in the inaugural dissertation, he had failed to account for the relation between our sensible and intellectual faculties.[84] He needed to explain how we combine what is known as sensory knowledge with the other type of knowledge—i.e. reasoned knowledge—these two being related but having very different processes.

Kant also credited David Hume with awakening him from a «dogmatic slumber» in which he had unquestioningly accepted the tenets of both religion and natural philosophy.[85][86] Hume in his 1739 Treatise on Human Nature had argued that we only know the mind through a subjective—essentially illusory—series of perceptions.[85] Ideas such as causality, morality, and objects are not evident in experience, so their reality may be questioned. Kant felt that reason could remove this skepticism, and he set himself to solving these problems. Although fond of company and conversation with others, Kant isolated himself, and resisted friends’ attempts to bring him out of his isolation.[e] When Kant emerged from his silence in 1781, the result was the Critique of Pure Reason. Kant countered Hume’s empiricism by claiming that some knowledge exists inherently in the mind, independent of experience.[85] He drew a parallel to the Copernican revolution in his proposal that worldly objects can be intuited a priori (‘beforehand’), and that intuition is consequently distinct from objective reality.[b] He acquiesced to Hume somewhat by defining causality as a «regular, constant sequence of events in time, and nothing more.»[88]

Although now uniformly recognized as one of the greatest works in the history of philosophy, this Critique disappointed Kant’s readers upon its initial publication.[89] The book was long, over 800 pages in the original German edition, and written in a convoluted style. It received few reviews, and these granted it no significance.[citation needed] Kant’s former student, Johann Gottfried Herder criticized it for placing reason as an entity worthy of criticism instead of considering the process of reasoning within the context of language and one’s entire personality.[90] Similar to Christian Garve and Johann Georg Heinrich Feder, he rejected Kant’s position that space and time possessed a form that could be analyzed. Additionally, Garve and Feder also faulted Kant’s Critique for not explaining differences in perception of sensations.[91] Its density made it, as Herder said in a letter to Johann Georg Hamann, a «tough nut to crack», obscured by «all this heavy gossamer».[92] Its reception stood in stark contrast to the praise Kant had received for earlier works, such as his Prize Essay and shorter works that preceded the first Critique. These well-received and readable tracts include one on the earthquake in Lisbon that was so popular that it was sold by the page.[93] Prior to the change in course documented in the first Critique, his books had sold well.[80] Kant was disappointed with the first Critique’s reception. Recognizing the need to clarify the original treatise, Kant wrote the Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics in 1783 as a summary of its main views. Shortly thereafter, Kant’s friend Johann Friedrich Schultz (1739–1805) (professor of mathematics) published Erläuterungen über des Herrn Professor Kant Critik der reinen Vernunft (Königsberg, 1784), which was a brief but very accurate commentary on Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason.

Engraving of Immanuel Kant

Kant’s reputation gradually rose through the latter portion of the 1780s, sparked by a series of important works: the 1784 essay, «Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment?»; 1785’s Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (his first work on moral philosophy); and, from 1786, Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science. But Kant’s fame ultimately arrived from an unexpected source. In 1786, Karl Leonhard Reinhold published a series of public letters on Kantian philosophy.[94] In these letters, Reinhold framed Kant’s philosophy as a response to the central intellectual controversy of the era: the pantheism controversy. Friedrich Jacobi had accused the recently deceased Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (a distinguished dramatist and philosophical essayist) of Spinozism. Such a charge, tantamount to atheism, was vigorously denied by Lessing’s friend Moses Mendelssohn, leading to a bitter public dispute among partisans. The controversy gradually escalated into a debate about the values of the Enlightenment and the value of reason.

Reinhold maintained in his letters that Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason could settle this dispute by defending the authority and bounds of reason. Reinhold’s letters were widely read and made Kant the most famous philosopher of his era.

Later work[edit]

Kant published a second edition of the Critique of Pure Reason in 1787, heavily revising the first parts of the book. Most of his subsequent work focused on other areas of philosophy. He continued to develop his moral philosophy, notably in 1788’s Critique of Practical Reason (known as the second Critique) and 1797’s Metaphysics of Morals. The 1790 Critique of Judgment (the third Critique) applied the Kantian system to aesthetics and teleology.

In 1792, Kant’s attempt to publish the Second of the four Pieces of Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason,[95] in the journal Berlinische Monatsschrift, met with opposition from the King’s censorship commission, which had been established that same year in the context of the French Revolution.[96] Kant then arranged to have all four pieces published as a book, routing it through the philosophy department at the University of Jena to avoid the need for theological censorship.[96] This insubordination earned him a now famous reprimand from the King.[96] When he nevertheless published a second edition in 1794, the censor was so irate that he arranged for a royal order that required Kant never to publish or even speak publicly about religion.[96] Kant then published his response to the King’s reprimand and explained himself, in the preface of The Conflict of the Faculties.[96]

He also wrote a number of semi-popular essays on history, religion, politics and other topics. These works were well received by Kant’s contemporaries and confirmed his preeminent status in 18th-century philosophy. There were several journals devoted solely to defending and criticizing Kantian philosophy. Despite his success, philosophical trends were moving in another direction. Many of Kant’s most important disciples and followers (including Reinhold, Beck and Fichte) transformed the Kantian position into increasingly radical forms of idealism. The progressive stages of revision of Kant’s teachings marked the emergence of German idealism. Kant opposed these developments and publicly denounced Fichte in an open letter in 1799.[97] It was one of his final acts expounding a stance on philosophical questions. In 1800, a student of Kant named Gottlob Benjamin Jäsche (1762–1842) published a manual of logic for teachers called Logik, which he had prepared at Kant’s request. Jäsche prepared the Logik using a copy of a textbook in logic by Georg Friedrich Meier entitled Auszug aus der Vernunftlehre, in which Kant had written copious notes and annotations. The Logik has been considered of fundamental importance to Kant’s philosophy, and the understanding of it. The great 19th-century logician Charles Sanders Peirce remarked, in an incomplete review of Thomas Kingsmill Abbott’s English translation of the introduction to Logik, that «Kant’s whole philosophy turns upon his logic.»[98] Also, Robert Schirokauer Hartman and Wolfgang Schwarz, wrote in the translators’ introduction to their English translation of the Logik, «Its importance lies not only in its significance for the Critique of Pure Reason, the second part of which is a restatement of fundamental tenets of the Logic, but in its position within the whole of Kant’s work.»[99]

Death and burial[edit]

Kant’s health, long poor, worsened and he died at Königsberg on 12 February 1804, uttering «Es ist gut» (It is good) before expiring.[100] His unfinished final work was published as Opus Postumum. Kant always cut a curious figure in his lifetime for his modest, rigorously scheduled habits, which have been referred to as clocklike. However, Heinrich Heine noted the magnitude of «his destructive, world-crushing thoughts» and considered him a sort of philosophical «executioner», comparing him to Robespierre with the observation that both men «represented in the highest the type of provincial bourgeois. Nature had destined them to weigh coffee and sugar, but Fate determined that they should weigh other things and placed on the scales of the one a king, on the scales of the other a god.»[101]

When his body was transferred to a new burial spot, his skull was measured during the exhumation and found to be larger than the average German male’s with a «high and broad» forehead.[102] His forehead has been an object of interest ever since it became well-known through his portraits: «In Döbler’s portrait and in Kiefer’s faithful if expressionistic reproduction of it—as well as in many of the other late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century portraits of Kant—the forehead is remarkably large and decidedly retreating. Was Kant’s forehead shaped this way in these images because he was a philosopher, or, to follow the implications of Lavater’s system, was he a philosopher because of the intellectual acuity manifested by his forehead? Kant and Johann Kaspar Lavater were correspondents on theological matters, and Lavater refers to Kant in his work «Physiognomic Fragments, for the Education of Human Knowledge and Love of People» (Leipzig & Winterthur, 1775–1778).[103]

Kant’s mausoleum adjoins the northeast corner of Königsberg Cathedral in Kaliningrad, Russia. The mausoleum was constructed by the architect Friedrich Lahrs and was finished in 1924 in time for the bicentenary of Kant’s birth. Originally, Kant was buried inside the cathedral, but in 1880 his remains were moved to a neo-Gothic chapel adjoining the northeast corner of the cathedral. Over the years, the chapel became dilapidated and was demolished to make way for the mausoleum, which was built on the same location.

The tomb and its mausoleum are among the few artifacts of German times preserved by the Soviets after they captured the city.[104] Today, many newlyweds bring flowers to the mausoleum. Artifacts previously owned by Kant, known as Kantiana, were included in the Königsberg City Museum. However, the museum was destroyed during World War II. A replica of the statue of Kant that in German times stood in front of the main University of Königsberg building was donated by a German entity in the early 1990s and placed in the same grounds.

After the expulsion of Königsberg’s German population at the end of World War II, the University of Königsberg where Kant taught was replaced by the Russian-language Kaliningrad State University, which appropriated the campus and surviving buildings. In 2005, the university was renamed Immanuel Kant State University of Russia. The name change was announced at a ceremony attended by President Vladimir Putin of Russia and Chancellor Gerhard Schröder of Germany, and the university formed a Kant Society, dedicated to the study of Kantianism. The university was again renamed in the 2010s, to Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University.[105]

In 2018, his tomb and statue were vandalized with paint by unknown assailants, who also scattered leaflets glorifying Rus’ and denouncing Kant as a «traitor». The incident was apparently connected with a recent vote to rename Khrabrovo Airport, where Kant was in the lead for a while, prompting Russian nationalist resentment.[106]

Philosophy[edit]

In Kant’s essay «Answering the Question: What is Enlightenment?», he defined the Enlightenment as an age shaped by the Latin motto Sapere aude («Dare to be wise»). Kant maintained that one ought to think autonomously, free of the dictates of external authority. His work reconciled many of the differences between the rationalist and empiricist traditions of the 18th century. He had a decisive impact on the Romantic and German Idealist philosophies of the 19th century. His work has also been a starting point for many 20th century philosophers.

Kant asserted that, because of the limitations of argumentation in the absence of irrefutable evidence, no one could really know whether there is a God and an afterlife or not. For the sake of morality and as a ground for reason, Kant asserted, people are justified in believing in God, even though they could never know God’s presence empirically.

Thus the entire armament of reason, in the undertaking that one can call pure philosophy, is in fact directed only at the three problems that have been mentioned [God, the soul, and freedom]. These themselves, however, have in turn their more remote aim, namely, what is to be done if the will is free, if there is a God, and if there is a future world. Now since these concern our conduct in relation to the highest end, the ultimate aim of nature which provides for us wisely in the disposition of reason is properly directed only to what is moral.[33]: 674–5 (A 800–1/B 828–9) 

The sense of an enlightened approach and the critical method required that «If one cannot prove that a thing is, he may try to prove that it is not. If he fails to do either (as often occurs), he may still ask whether it is in his interest to accept one or the other of the alternatives hypothetically, from the theoretical or the practical point of view. Hence the question no longer is as to whether perpetual peace is a real thing or not a real thing, or as to whether we may not be deceiving ourselves when we adopt the former alternative, but we must act on the supposition of its being real.»[107] The presupposition of God, soul, and freedom was then a practical concern, for

Morality in itself constitutes a system, but happiness does not, except insofar as it is distributed precisely in accordance with morality. This, however, is possible only in the intelligible world, under a wise author and regent. Reason sees itself as compelled either to assume such a thing, together with life in such a world, which we must regard as a future one, or else to regard the moral laws as empty figments of the brain …[33]: 680 (A 811/B 839) 

Kant drew a parallel between the Copernican revolution and the epistemology of his new transcendental philosophy, involving two interconnected foundations of his «critical philosophy»:

  • the epistemology of transcendental idealism and
  • the moral philosophy of the autonomy of practical reason.

These teachings placed the active, rational human subject at the center of the cognitive and moral worlds. Kant argued that the rational order of the world as known by science was not just the accidental accumulation of sense perceptions.

Conceptual unification and integration is carried out by the mind through concepts or the «categories of the understanding» operating on the perceptual manifold within space and time. The latter are not concepts,[108] but are forms of sensibility that are a priori necessary conditions for any possible experience. Thus the objective order of nature and the causal necessity that operates within it depend on the mind’s processes, the product of the rule-based activity that Kant called «synthesis». There is much discussion among Kant scholars about the correct interpretation of this train of thought.

The ‘two-world’ interpretation regards Kant’s position as a statement of epistemological limitation, that we are not able to transcend the bounds of our own mind, meaning that we cannot access the «thing-in-itself». However, Kant also speaks of the thing in itself or transcendental object as a product of the (human) understanding as it attempts to conceive of objects in abstraction from the conditions of sensibility. Following this line of thought, some interpreters have argued that the thing in itself does not represent a separate ontological domain but simply a way of considering objects by means of the understanding alone—this is known as the two-aspect view.

The notion of the «thing in itself» was much discussed by philosophers after Kant. It was argued that, because the «thing in itself» was unknowable, its existence must not be assumed. Rather than arbitrarily switching to an account that was ungrounded in anything supposed to be the «real», as did the German Idealists, another group arose who asked how our (presumably reliable) accounts of a coherent and rule-abiding universe were actually grounded. This new kind of philosophy became known as Phenomenology, and its founder was Edmund Husserl.

With regard to morality, Kant argued that the source of the good lies not in anything outside the human subject, either in nature or given by God, but rather is only the good will itself. A good will is one that acts from duty in accordance with the universal moral law that the autonomous human being freely gives itself. This law obliges one to treat humanity – understood as rational agency, and represented through oneself as well as others – as an end in itself rather than (merely) as means to other ends the individual might hold. This necessitates practical self-reflection in which we universalize our reasons.

These ideas have largely framed or influenced all subsequent philosophical discussion and analysis. The specifics of Kant’s account generated immediate and lasting controversy. Nevertheless, his theses – that the mind itself necessarily makes a constitutive contribution to its knowledge, that this contribution is transcendental rather than psychological, that philosophy involves self-critical activity, that morality is rooted in human freedom, and that to act autonomously is to act according to rational moral principles – have all had a lasting effect on subsequent philosophy.

Epistemology[edit]

Theory of perception[edit]

Kant defines his theory of perception in his very influential 1781 work the Critique of Pure Reason, which has often been cited as the most significant volume of metaphysics and epistemology in modern philosophy.[109] Kant maintains that understanding of the external world had its foundations not merely in experience, but in both experience and a priori concepts, thus offering a non-empiricist critique of rationalist philosophy, which is what has been referred to as his Copernican revolution.[110]

Firstly, Kant distinguishes between analytic and synthetic propositions:

  1. Analytic proposition: a proposition whose predicate concept is contained in its subject concept; e.g., «All bachelors are unmarried,» or, «All bodies take up space.»
  2. Synthetic proposition: a proposition whose predicate concept is not contained in its subject concept; e.g., «All bachelors are alone,» or, «All bodies have weight.»

An analytic proposition is true by nature of the meaning of the words in the sentence—we require no further knowledge than a grasp of the language to understand this proposition. On the other hand, a synthetic statement is one that tells us something about the world. The truth or falsehood of synthetic statements derives from something outside their linguistic content. In this instance, weight is not a necessary predicate of the body; until we are told the heaviness of the body we do not know that it has weight. In this case, experience of the body is required before its heaviness becomes clear. Before Kant’s first Critique, empiricists (cf. Hume) and rationalists (cf. Leibniz) assumed that all synthetic statements required experience to be known.

Kant contests this assumption by claiming that elementary mathematics, like arithmetic, is synthetic a priori, in that its statements provide new knowledge not derived from experience. This becomes part of his over-all argument for transcendental idealism. That is, he argues that the possibility of experience depends on certain necessary conditions—which he calls a priori forms—and that these conditions structure and hold true of the world of experience. His main claims in the «Transcendental Aesthetic» are that mathematic judgments are synthetic a priori and that space and time are not derived from experience but rather are its preconditions.

Once we have grasped the functions of basic arithmetic, we do not need empirical experience to know that 100 + 100 = 200, and so it appears that arithmetic is analytic. However, that it is analytic can be disproved by considering the calculation 5 + 7 = 12: there is nothing in the numbers 5 and 7 by which the number 12 can be inferred.[111] Thus «5 + 7» and «the cube root of 1,728» or «12» are not analytic because their reference is the same but their sense is not—the statement «5 + 7 = 12» tells us something new about the world. It is self-evident, and undeniably a priori, but at the same time it is synthetic. Thus Kant argued that a proposition can be synthetic and a priori. This statement is synthetic because it supposes both quantity in general which is a conceit from our understanding and succession which is a mode of time that belongs to our sensibility. To produce 12 from 5, one needs to add unity to unity seven time. Thus to add is not an operation of pure reason but a process that needs time : one and then one, and again one, etc.[112]

Kant asserts that experience is based on the perception of external objects and a priori knowledge.[113] The external world, he writes, provides those things that we sense. But our mind processes this information and gives it order, allowing us to comprehend it. Our mind supplies the conditions of space and time to experience objects. According to the «transcendental unity of apperception», the concepts of the mind (Understanding) and perceptions or intuitions that garner information from phenomena (Sensibility) are synthesized by comprehension. Without concepts, perceptions are nondescript; without perceptions, concepts are meaningless. Thus the famous statement: «Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions [perceptions] without concepts are blind.»[33]: 193–194 (A 51/B 75) 

Kant also claims that an external environment is necessary for the establishment of the self. Although Kant would want to argue that there is no empirical way of observing the self, we can see the logical necessity of the self when we observe that we can have different perceptions of the external environment over time. By uniting these general representations into one global representation, we can see how a transcendental self emerges. «I am therefore conscious of the identical self in regard to the manifold of the representations that are given to me in an intuition because I call them all together my representations, which constitute one[33]: 248 (B 135) 

According to Guillaume Pigeard de Gurbert, Kant’s philosophy has its unity in the conceit of time, which different uses – speculative, practical, pragmatical, historical or teleogical – is crucial.[114]

Time and space[edit]

The Kantian revolution breaks with previous conceptions of time, either metaphysical (Leibniz) or empirical ones (Hume), in its relation to space. Against metaphysical time and space Kant explains they are not things in themselves but mere shape of the way we feel things. Against empiricism he says that these subjective shapes are a priori—are not given by experience, since any experience of such or such time and space supposes that we are feeling things in the way of time and space. The word «transcendental» qualifies this space and this time lying within the subject that make possible any sensible experience. Kant adds that space itself depends on time, because nothing can be in space without being within time. This crucial idea is settled in 1770, when Kant writes that time includes «absolument tout dans ses rapports, y compris l’espace.»[115] Kant divides time into three modes: permanency, succession, and simultaneity. Many subsequent philosophers inspired by Kant (Heidegger, Hermann Cohen, Béatrice Longuenesse, Bergson, Deleuze, Philonenko) have been accused of missing this triple partition of time.[116]

Categories of the Faculty of Understanding[edit]

Kant statue in the School of Philosophy and Human Sciences (FAFICH) in the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG), Belo Horizonte, Brazil

Kant deemed it obvious that we have some objective knowledge of the world, such as, say, Newtonian physics. But this knowledge relies on synthetic, a priori laws of nature, like causality and substance. How is this possible? Kant’s solution was that the subject must supply laws that make experience of objects possible, and that these laws are synthetic, a priori laws of nature that apply to all objects before we experience them. To deduce all these laws, Kant examined experience in general, dissecting in it what is supplied by the mind from what is supplied by the given intuitions. This is commonly called a transcendental deduction.[117]

To begin with, Kant’s distinction between the a posteriori being contingent and particular knowledge, and the a priori being universal and necessary knowledge, must be kept in mind. If we merely connect two intuitions together in a perceiving subject, the knowledge is always subjective because it is derived a posteriori, when what is desired is for the knowledge to be objective, that is, for the two intuitions to refer to the object and hold good of it for anyone at any time, not just the perceiving subject in its current condition. What else is equivalent to objective knowledge besides the a priori (universal and necessary knowledge)? Before knowledge can be objective, it must be incorporated under an a priori category of understanding.[117][118]

For example, if one says «The sun shines on the stone; the stone grows warm», all that one perceives is phenomena. One’s judgment is contingent and holds no necessity. But, if one says «The sunshine causes the stone to warm», one subsumes the perception under the category of causality, which is not found in the perception, and one necessarily synthesizes the concept sunshine with the concept heat, producing a necessarily universally true judgment.[117]

To explain the categories in more detail, they are the preconditions of the construction of objects in the mind. Indeed, to even think of the sun and stone presupposes the category of subsistence, that is, substance. For the categories synthesize the random data of the sensory manifold into intelligible objects. This means that the categories are also the most abstract things one can say of any object whatsoever, and hence one can have an a priori cognition of the totality of all objects of experience if one can list all of them. To do so, Kant formulates another transcendental deduction.[117]

Judgments are, for Kant, the preconditions of any thought. Man thinks via judgments, so all possible judgments must be listed and the perceptions connected within them put aside, so as to make it possible to examine the moments when the understanding is engaged in constructing judgments. For the categories are equivalent to these moments, in that they are concepts of intuitions in general, so far as they are determined by these moments universally and necessarily. Thus by listing all the moments, one can deduce from them all of the categories.[117]

One may now ask: How many possible judgments are there? Kant believed that all the possible propositions within Aristotle’s syllogistic logic are equivalent to all possible judgments, and that all the logical operators within the propositions are equivalent to the moments of the understanding within judgments. Thus he listed Aristotle’s system in four groups of three: quantity (universal, particular, singular), quality (affirmative, negative, infinite), relation (categorical, hypothetical, disjunctive) and modality (problematic, assertoric, apodeictic). The parallelism with Kant’s categories is obvious: quantity (unity, plurality, totality), quality (reality, negation, limitation), relation (substance, cause, community) and modality (possibility, existence, necessity).[117]

The fundamental building blocks of experience, i.e. objective knowledge, are now in place. First there is the sensibility, which supplies the mind with intuitions, and then there is the understanding, which produces judgments of these intuitions and can subsume them under categories. These categories lift the intuitions up out of the subject’s current state of consciousness and place them within consciousness in general, producing universally necessary knowledge. For the categories are innate in any rational being, so any intuition thought within a category in one mind is necessarily subsumed and understood identically in any mind. In other words, we filter what we see and hear.[117]

Transcendental schema doctrine[edit]

Kant ran into a problem with his theory that the mind plays a part in producing objective knowledge. Intuitions and categories are entirely disparate, so how can they interact? Kant’s solution is the (transcendental) schema: a priori principles by which the transcendental imagination connects concepts with intuitions through time. All the principles are temporally bound, for if a concept is purely a priori, as the categories are, then they must apply for all times. Hence there are principles such as substance is that which endures through time, and the cause must always be prior to the effect.[117][119] In the context of transcendental schema the concept of transcendental reflection is of a great importance.[120]

Ethics[edit]

Kant developed his ethics, or moral philosophy, in three works: Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals (1785), Critique of Practical Reason (1788), and Metaphysics of Morals (1797).

In Groundwork, Kant tries to convert our everyday, obvious, rational[121] knowledge of morality into philosophical knowledge. The latter two works used «practical reason», which is based only on things about which reason can tell us, and not deriving any principles from experience, to reach conclusions which can be applied to the world of experience (in the second part of The Metaphysics of Morals).

Kant is known for his theory that there is a single moral obligation, which he called the «Categorical Imperative», and is derived from the concept of duty. Kant defines the demands of moral law as «categorical imperatives». Categorical imperatives are principles that are intrinsically valid; they are good in and of themselves; they must be obeyed in all situations and circumstances, if our behavior is to observe the moral law. The Categorical Imperative provides a test against which moral statements can be assessed. Kant also stated that the moral means and ends can be applied to the categorical imperative, that rational beings can pursue certain «ends» using the appropriate «means». Ends based on physical needs or wants create hypothetical imperatives. The categorical imperative can only be based on something that is an «end in itself», that is, an end that is not a means to some other need, desire, or purpose.[122] Kant believed that the moral law is a principle of reason itself, and is not based on contingent facts about the world, such as what would make us happy, but to act on the moral law which has no other motive than «worthiness to be happy».[33]: 677 (A 806/B 834)  Accordingly, he believed that moral obligation applies only to rational agents.[123]

Unlike a hypothetical imperative, a categorical imperative is an unconditional obligation; it has the force of an obligation regardless of our will or desires[124] In Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals (1785) Kant enumerated three formulations of the categorical imperative that he believed to be roughly equivalent.[125] In the same book, Kant stated:

Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.[126]

According to Kant, one cannot make exceptions for oneself. The philosophical maxim on which one acts should always be considered to be a universal law without exception. One cannot allow oneself to do a particular action unless one thinks it appropriate that the reason for the action should become a universal law. For example, one should not steal, however dire the circumstances—because, by permitting oneself to steal, one makes stealing a universally acceptable act. This is the first formulation of the categorical imperative, often known as the universalizability principle.

Kant believed that, if an action is not done with the motive of duty, then it is without moral value. He thought that every action should have pure intention behind it; otherwise, it is meaningless. The final result is not the most important aspect of an action; rather, how the person feels while carrying out the action is the time when value is attached to the result.

In Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals, Kant also posited the «counter-utilitarian idea that there is a difference between preferences and values, and that considerations of individual rights temper calculations of aggregate utility», a concept that is an axiom in economics:[127]

Everything has either a price or a dignity. Whatever has a price can be replaced by something else as its equivalent; on the other hand, whatever is above all price, and therefore admits of no equivalent, has a dignity. But that which constitutes the condition under which alone something can be an end in itself does not have mere relative worth, i.e., price, but an intrinsic worth, i.e., a dignity. (p. 53, italics in original).

A phrase quoted by Kant, which is used to summarize the counter-utilitarian nature of his moral philosophy, is Fiat justitia, pereat mundus («Let justice be done, though the world perish»), which he translates loosely as «Let justice reign even if all the rascals in the world should perish from it». This appears in his 1795 Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical SketchZum ewigen Frieden. Ein philosophischer Entwurf«), Appendix 1.[128][129][130]

First formulation[edit]

In his Metaphysics, Immanuel Kant introduced the categorical imperative: «Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.»

The first formulation (Formula of Universal Law) of the moral imperative «requires that the maxims be chosen as though they should hold as universal laws of nature».[125] This formulation in principle has as its supreme law the creed «Always act according to that maxim whose universality as a law you can at the same time will» and is the «only condition under which a will can never come into conflict with itself [….]»[131]

One interpretation of the first formulation is called the «universalizability test».[132] An agent’s maxim, according to Kant, is his «subjective principle of human actions»: that is, what the agent believes is his reason to act.[133] The universalisability test has five steps:

  1. Find the agent’s maxim (i.e., an action paired with its motivation). Take, for example, the declaration «I will lie for personal benefit». Lying is the action; the motivation is to fulfill some sort of desire. Together, they form the maxim.
  2. Imagine a possible world in which everyone in a similar position to the real-world agent followed that maxim.
  3. Decide if contradictions or irrationalities would arise in the possible world as a result of following the maxim.
  4. If a contradiction or irrationality would arise, acting on that maxim is not allowed in the real world.
  5. If there is no contradiction, then acting on that maxim is permissible, and is sometimes required.

(For a modern parallel, see John Rawls’ hypothetical situation, the original position.)

Second formulation[edit]

The second formulation (or Formula of the End in Itself) holds that «the rational being, as by its nature an end and thus as an end in itself, must serve in every maxim as the condition restricting all merely relative and arbitrary ends».[125] The principle dictates that you «[a]ct with reference to every rational being (whether yourself or another) so that it is an end in itself in your maxim», meaning that the rational being is «the basis of all maxims of action» and «must be treated never as a mere means but as the supreme limiting condition in the use of all means, i.e., as an end at the same time».[134]

Third formulation[edit]

The third formulation (i.e. Formula of Autonomy) is a synthesis of the first two and is the basis for the «complete determination of all maxims». It states «that all maxims which stem from autonomous legislation ought to harmonize with a possible realm of ends as with a realm of nature».[125]

In principle, «So act as if your maxims should serve at the same time as the universal law (of all rational beings)», meaning that we should so act that we may think of ourselves as «a member in the universal realm of ends», legislating universal laws through our maxims (that is, a universal code of conduct), in a «possible realm of ends».[135] No one may elevate themselves above the universal law, therefore it is one’s duty to follow the maxim(s).

Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason[edit]

Commentators, starting in the 20th century, have tended to see Kant as having a strained relationship with religion, though this was not the prevalent view in the 19th century. Karl Leonhard Reinhold, whose letters first made Kant famous, wrote «I believe that I may infer without reservation that the interest of religion, and of Christianity in particular, accords completely with the result of the Critique of Reason.»[136] Johann Schultz, who wrote one of the first Kant commentaries, wrote «And does not this system itself cohere most splendidly with the Christian religion? Do not the divinity and beneficence of the latter become all the more evident?»[137] This view continued throughout the 19th century, as noted by Friedrich Nietzsche, who said «Kant’s success is merely a theologian’s success.»[138] The reason for these views was Kant’s moral theology, and the widespread belief that his philosophy was the great antithesis to Spinozism, which had been convulsing the European academy for much of the 18th century. Spinozism was widely seen as the cause of the Pantheism controversy, and as a form of sophisticated pantheism or even atheism. As Kant’s philosophy disregarded the possibility of arguing for God through pure reason alone, for the same reasons it also disregarded the possibility of arguing against God through pure reason alone. This, coupled with his moral philosophy (his argument that the existence of morality is a rational reason why God and an afterlife do and must exist), was the reason he was seen by many, at least through the end of the 19th century, as a great defender of religion in general and Christianity in particular.[citation needed]

Kant articulates his strongest criticisms of the organization and practices of religious organizations to those that encourage what he sees as a religion of counterfeit service to God.[139] Among the major targets of his criticism are external ritual, superstition and a hierarchical church order. He sees these as efforts to make oneself pleasing to God in ways other than conscientious adherence to the principle of moral rightness in choosing and acting upon one’s maxims. Kant’s criticisms on these matters, along with his rejection of certain theoretical proofs grounded in pure reason (particularly the ontological argument) for the existence of God and his philosophical commentary on some Christian doctrines, have resulted in interpretations that see Kant as hostile to religion in general and Christianity in particular (e.g., Walsh 1967). Nevertheless, other interpreters consider that Kant was trying to mark off defensible from indefensible Christian belief.[140] Kant sees in Jesus Christ the affirmation of a «pure moral disposition of the heart» that «can make man well-pleasing to God».[139] Regarding Kant’s conception of religion, some critics have argued that he was sympathetic to deism.[141] Other critics have argued that Kant’s moral conception moves from deism to theism (as moral theism), for example Allen W. Wood[142] and Merold Westphal.[143] As for Kant’s book Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason,[95] it was emphasized that Kant reduced religiosity to rationality, religion to morality and Christianity to ethics.[144] However, many interpreters, including Allen W. Wood[145] and Lawrence Pasternack,[146] now agree with Stephen Palmquist’s claim that a better way of reading Kant’s Religion is to see him as raising morality to the status of religion.[147]

Idea of freedom[edit]

In the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant distinguishes between the transcendental idea of freedom, which as a psychological concept is «mainly empirical» and refers to «whether a faculty of beginning a series of successive things or states from itself is to be assumed»[33]: 486 (A 448/B 467)  and the practical concept of freedom as the independence of our will from the «coercion» or «necessitation through sensuous impulses». Kant finds it a source of difficulty that the practical idea of freedom is founded on the transcendental idea of freedom,[33]: 533 (A 533–4/B 561–2)  but for the sake of practical interests uses the practical meaning, taking «no account of… its transcendental meaning,» which he feels was properly «disposed of» in the Third Antinomy, and as an element in the question of the freedom of the will is for philosophy «a real stumbling block» that has embarrassed speculative reason.[33]: 486 (A 448/B 467) 

Kant calls practical «everything that is possible through freedom», and the pure practical laws that are never given through sensuous conditions but are held analogously with the universal law of causality are moral laws. Reason can give us only the «pragmatic laws of free action through the senses», but pure practical laws given by reason a priori[33]: 486 (A 448/B 467)  dictate «what is to be done».[33]: 674–676 (A 800–2/B 828–30)  (The same distinction of transcendental and practical meaning can be applied to the idea of God, with the proviso that the practical concept of freedom can be experienced.[148])

Categories of freedom[edit]

In the Critique of Practical Reason, at the end of the second Main Part of the Analytics,[149] Kant introduces the categories of freedom, in analogy with the categories of understanding their practical counterparts. Kant’s categories of freedom apparently function primarily as conditions for the possibility for actions (i) to be free, (ii) to be understood as free and (iii) to be morally evaluated. For Kant, although actions as theoretical objects are constituted by means of the theoretical categories, actions as practical objects (objects of practical use of reason, and which can be good or bad) are constituted by means of the categories of freedom. Only in this way can actions, as phenomena, be a consequence of freedom, and be understood and evaluated as such.[150]

Aesthetic philosophy[edit]

Kant discusses the subjective nature of aesthetic qualities and experiences in Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime (1764). Kant’s contribution to aesthetic theory is developed in the Critique of Judgment (1790) where he investigates the possibility and logical status of «judgments of taste.» In the «Critique of Aesthetic Judgment,» the first major division of the Critique of Judgment, Kant used the term «aesthetic» in a manner that, according to Kant scholar W.H. Walsh, differs from its modern sense.[151] In the Critique of Pure Reason, to note essential differences between judgments of taste, moral judgments, and scientific judgments, Kant abandoned the term «aesthetic» as «designating the critique of taste,» noting that judgments of taste could never be «directed» by «laws a priori[152] After A. G. Baumgarten, who wrote Aesthetica (1750–58),[153] Kant was one of the first philosophers to develop and integrate aesthetic theory into a unified and comprehensive philosophical system, utilizing ideas that played an integral role throughout his philosophy.[154]

In the chapter «Analytic of the Beautiful» in the Critique of Judgment, Kant states that beauty is not a property of an artwork or natural phenomenon, but is instead consciousness of the pleasure that attends the ‘free play’ of the imagination and the understanding. Even though it appears that we are using reason to decide what is beautiful, the judgment is not a cognitive judgment,[155] «and is consequently not logical, but aesthetical» (§ 1). A pure judgement of taste is subjective since it refers to the emotional response of the subject and is based upon nothing but esteem for an object itself: it is a disinterested pleasure, and we feel that pure judgements of taste (i.e. judgements of beauty), lay claim to universal validity (§§ 20–22). It is important to note that this universal validity is not derived from a determinate concept of beauty but from common sense (§40). Kant also believed that a judgement of taste shares characteristics engaged in a moral judgement: both are disinterested, and we hold them to be universal. In the chapter «Analytic of the Sublime» Kant identifies the sublime as an aesthetic quality that, like beauty, is subjective, but unlike beauty refers to an indeterminate relationship between the faculties of the imagination and of reason, and shares the character of moral judgments in the use of reason. The feeling of the sublime, divided into two distinct modes (the mathematical and the dynamical sublime), describes two subjective moments that concern the relationship of the faculty of the imagination to reason. Some commentators[156] argue that Kant’s critical philosophy contains a third kind of the sublime, the moral sublime, which is the aesthetic response to the moral law or a representation, and a development of the «noble» sublime in Kant’s theory of 1764. The mathematical sublime results from the failure of the imagination to comprehend natural objects that appear boundless and formless, or appear «absolutely great» (§§ 23–25). This imaginative failure is then recuperated through the pleasure taken in reason’s assertion of the concept of infinity. In this move the faculty of reason proves itself superior to our fallible sensible self (§§ 25–26). In the dynamical sublime there is the sense of annihilation of the sensible self as the imagination tries to comprehend a vast might. This power of nature threatens us but through the resistance of reason to such sensible annihilation, the subject feels a pleasure and a sense of the human moral vocation. This appreciation of moral feeling through exposure to the sublime helps to develop moral character.

Kant developed a theory of humor (§ 54) that has been interpreted as an «incongruity» theory. He illustrated his theory of humor by telling three narrative jokes in the Critique of Judgment. He thought that the physiological impact of humor is akin to that of music.[157] His knowledge of music, however, has been reported to be much weaker than his sense of humor: He told many more jokes throughout his lectures and writings.[158]

Kant developed a distinction between an object of art as a material value subject to the conventions of society and the transcendental condition of the judgment of taste as a «refined» value in his Idea of A Universal History (1784). In the Fourth and Fifth Theses of that work he identified all art as the «fruits of unsociableness» due to men’s «antagonism in society»[159] and, in the Seventh Thesis, asserted that while such material property is indicative of a civilized state, only the ideal of morality and the universalization of refined value through the improvement of the mind «belongs to culture».[160]

Political philosophy[edit]

In Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch,[161] Kant listed several conditions that he thought necessary for ending wars and creating a lasting peace. They included a world of constitutional republics.[162] His classical republican theory was extended in the Science of Right, the first part of the Metaphysics of Morals (1797).[163] Kant believed that universal history leads to the ultimate world of republican states at peace, but his theory was not pragmatic. The process was described in «Perpetual Peace» as natural rather than rational:

The guarantee of perpetual peace is nothing less than that great artist, nature…In her mechanical course we see that her aim is to produce a harmony among men, against their will, and indeed through their discord. As a necessity working according to laws we do not know, we call it destiny. But, considering its designs in universal history, we call it «providence,» inasmuch as we discern in it the profound wisdom of a higher cause which predetermines the course of nature and directs it to the objective final end of the human race.[164]

Kant’s political thought can be summarized as republican government and international organization. «In more characteristically Kantian terms, it is doctrine of the state based upon the law (Rechtsstaat) and of eternal peace. Indeed, in each of these formulations, both terms express the same idea: that of legal constitution or of ‘peace through law’. Kant’s political philosophy, being essentially a legal doctrine, rejects by definition the opposition between moral education and the play of passions as alternate foundations for social life. The state is defined as the union of men under law. The state is constituted by laws which are necessary a priori because they flow from the very concept of law. «A regime can be judged by no other criteria nor be assigned any other functions, than those proper to the lawful order as such.»[165]

He opposed «democracy,» which at his time meant direct democracy, believing that majority rule posed a threat to individual liberty. He stated, «…democracy is, properly speaking, necessarily a despotism, because it establishes an executive power in which ‘all’ decide for or even against one who does not agree; that is, ‘all,’ who are not quite all, decide, and this is a contradiction of the general will with itself and with freedom.»[166] As with most writers at the time, he distinguished three forms of government i.e. democracy, aristocracy, and monarchy with mixed government as the most ideal form of it.

Anthropology[edit]

5 DM 1974 D silver coin commemorating the 250th birthday of Immanuel Kant in Königsberg

Kant lectured on anthropology, the study of human nature, for twenty-three and a half years.[167] His Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View was published in 1798. (This was the subject of Michel Foucault’s secondary dissertation for his State doctorate, Introduction to Kant’s Anthropology.) Kant’s Lectures on Anthropology were published for the first time in 1997 in German.[168] Introduction to Kant’s Anthropology was translated into English and published by the Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy series in 2006.[169]

Kant was among the first people of his time to introduce anthropology as an intellectual area of study, long before the field gained popularity, and his texts are considered to have advanced the field. His point of view was to influence the works of later philosophers such as Martin Heidegger and Paul Ricoeur.

Kant was also the first to suggest using a dimensionality approach to human diversity. He analyzed the nature of the Hippocrates-Galen four temperaments and plotted them in two dimensions: (1) «activation», or energetic aspect of behaviour, and (2) «orientation on emotionality».[170] Cholerics were described as emotional and energetic; Phlegmatics as balanced and weak; Sanguines as balanced and energetic, and Melancholics as emotional and weak. These two dimensions reappeared in all subsequent models of temperament and personality traits.

Kant viewed anthropology in two broad categories: (1) the physiological approach, which he referred to as «what nature makes of the human being»; and (2) the pragmatic approach, which explored the things that a human «can and should make of himself.»[171]

Racism[edit]

Kant was one of the most notable Enlightenment thinkers to defend racism, and some have claimed that he was one of the central figures in the birth of modern scientific racism. Where figures such as Carl Linnaeus and Johann Friedrich Blumenbach had supposed only «empirical» observation for racism, Kant produced a fully developed theory of race. Using the Four Temperaments of ancient Greece, he proposed a hierarchy of four racial categories: white Europeans, yellow Asians, black Africans, and red Amerindians.[43][41][40][42][172][173]

Kant wrote that «[Whites] contain all the impulses of nature in affects and passions, all talents, all dispositions to culture and civilization and can as readily obey as govern. They are the only ones who always advance to perfection.” He describes South Asians as «educated to the highest degree but only in the arts and not in the sciences». He goes on that Hindustanis can never reach the level of abstract concepts and that a «great hindustani man» is one who has «gone far in the art of deception and has much money». He stated that the Hindus always stay the way they are and can never advance. About black Africans, Kant wrote that «they can be educated but only as servants, that is they allow themselves to be trained». He quotes David Hume as challenging anyone to «cite a [single] example in which a Negro has shown talents» and asserts that, among the «hundreds of thousands» of blacks transported during the Atlantic slave trade, even among the freed «still not a single one was ever found who presented anything great in art or science or any other praiseworthy quality». To Kant, «the Negro can be disciplined and cultivated, but is never genuinely civilized. He falls of his own accord into savagery.» Native Americans, Kant opined, «cannot be educated». He calls them unmotivated, lacking affect, passion and love, describing them as too weak for labor, unfit for any culture, and too phlegmatic for diligence. He said the Native Americans are «far below the Negro, who undoubtedly holds the lowest of all remaining levels by which we designate the different races». Kant stated that «Americans and Blacks cannot govern themselves. They thus serve only for slaves.»[173][41][40][174]

Kant was an opponent of miscegenation, believing that whites would be «degraded» and the «fusing of races» is undesirable, for «not every race adopts the morals and customs of the Europeans». He stated that «instead of assimilation, which was intended by the melting together of the various races, Nature has here made a law of just the opposite».[175] He believed that in the future all races would be extinguished, except that of the whites.[173]

Kant was also an antisemite, believing that Jews were incapable of transcending material forces, which a moral order required. In this way, Jews are the opposite of autonomous, rational Christians, and are therefore incapable of being incorporated into an ethical Christian society. In his “Anthropology,” Kant called the Jews “a nation of cheaters” and portrayed them as “a group that has followed not the path of transcendental freedom but that of enslavement to the material world.”[176]

Charles W. Mills wrote that Kant has been «sanitized for public consumption», his racist works conveniently ignored.[173] Robert Bernasconi stated that Kant «supplied the first scientific definition of race». Emmanuel Chukwudi Eze is credited with bringing Kant’s contributions to racism to light in the 1990s among Western philosophers, who often gloss over this part of his life and works.[42] He wrote about Kant’s ideas of race:

Kant’s position on the importance of skin color not only as encoding but as proof of this codification of rational superiority or inferiority is evident in a comment he made on the subject of the reasoning capacity of a «black» person. When he evaluated a statement made by an African, Kant dismissed the statement with the comment: «this fellow was quite black from head to foot, a clear proof that what he said was stupid.» It cannot, therefore, be argued that skin color for Kant was merely a physical characteristic. It is, rather, evidence of an unchanging and unchangeable moral quality.

— Emmanuel Chukwudi Eze, «The Color of Reason: The Idea of ‘Race’ in Kant’s Anthropology», Postcolonial African Philosophy: A Critical Reader (1997)[40]

Pauline Kleingeld argues that while Kant was indeed a staunch advocate of scientific racism for much of his career, his views on race changed significantly in works published in the last decade of his life.[44] In particular, she argues that Kant unambiguously rejected past views related to racial hierarchies and the diminished rights or moral status of non-whites in Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch (1795). This work also saw him providing extended arguments against European colonialism, which he claimed was morally unjust and incompatible with the equal rights held by indigenous populations. Kleingeld argues that this shift in Kant’s views later in life has often been forgotten or ignored in the literature on Kant’s racist anthropology, and that the shift suggests a belated recognition of the fact that racial hierarchy was incompatible with a universalized moral framework.[44] While Kant’s perspective on the topic of European colonialism became more balanced, he still considered Europeans «civilized» to the exception of others:

But to this perfection compare the inhospitable actions of the civilized and especially of the commercial states of our part of the world. The injustice which they show to lands and peoples they visit (which is equivalent to conquering them) is carried by them to terrifying lengths. America, the lands inhabited by the Negro, the Spice Islands, the Cape, etc., were at the time of their discovery considered by these civilized intruders as lands without owners, for they counted the inhabitants as nothing. In East India (Hindustan), under the pretense of establishing economic undertakings, they brought in foreign soldiers and used them to oppress the natives, excited widespread wars among the various states, spread famine, rebellion, perfidy, and the whole litany of evils which afflict mankind.

— Immanuel Kant, «Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch» (1795)[177]

Influence and legacy[edit]

Kant’s influence on Western thought has been profound.[178] Although the basic tenets of Kant’s transcendental idealism (i.e. that space and time are a priori forms of human perception rather than real properties and the claim that formal logic and transcendental logic coincide) have been claimed to be falsified by modern science and logic,[179][180][181] and no longer set the intellectual agenda of contemporary philosophers, Kant is credited with having innovated the way philosophical inquiry has been carried at least up to the early nineteenth century. This shift consisted in several closely related innovations that, although highly contentious in themselves, have become important in postmodern philosophy and in the social sciences broadly construed:

  • The human subject seen as the centre of inquiry into human knowledge, such that it is impossible to philosophize about things as they exist independently of human perception or of how they are for us;[182]
  • The notion that is possible to discover and systematically explore the inherent limits to our ability to know entirely a priori;
  • The notion of the «categorical imperative», an assertion that people are naturally endowed with the ability and obligation toward right reason and acting. Perhaps his most famous quote is drawn from the Critique of Practical Reason: «Two things fill my mind with ever-increasing wonder and awe . . . : the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me.»
  • The concept of «conditions of possibility», as in his notion of «the conditions of possible experience» – that is that things, knowledge, and forms of consciousness rest on prior conditions that make them possible, so that, to understand or to know them, we must first understand these conditions;
  • The theory that objective experience is actively constituted or constructed by the functioning of the human mind;
  • His notion of moral autonomy as central to humanity;
  • His assertion of the principle that human beings should be treated as ends rather than as means.

Kant’s ideas have been incorporated into a variety of schools of thought. These include German idealism, Marxism, positivism, phenomenology, existentialism, critical theory, linguistic philosophy, structuralism, post-structuralism, and deconstruction.[citation needed]

Historical influence[edit]

During his own life, much critical attention was paid to his thought. He influenced Reinhold, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel and Novalis during the 1780s and 1790s. The school of thinking known as German idealism developed from his writings. The German idealists Fichte and Schelling, for example, tried to bring traditional «metaphysically» laden notions like «the Absolute», «God», and «Being» into the scope of Kant’s critical thought.[183] In so doing, the German idealists tried to reverse Kant’s view that we cannot know what we cannot observe.

The influential English Romantic poet and aesthetic philosopher Samuel Taylor Coleridge was greatly influenced by Kant and helped to spread awareness of him, and of German idealism generally, in the UK and the USA. In his Biographia Literaria (1817), he credits Kant’s ideas in coming to believe that the mind is not a passive but an active agent in the apprehension of reality.

Hegel was one of Kant’s first major critics. The main accusations Hegel charged Kant’s philosophy with were formalism (or «abstractism») and irrationality. In Hegel’s view the entire project of setting a «transcendental subject» (i.e. human consciousness) apart from nature, history, and society was fundamentally flawed,[184] although parts of that very project could be put to good use in a new direction, that Hegel called the «absolute idealism». Similar concerns moved Hegel’s criticisms to Kant’s concept of moral autonomy, to which Hegel opposed an ethic focused on the «ethical life» of the community.[185] In a sense, Hegel’s notion of «ethical life» is meant to subsume, rather than replace, Kantian ethics. And Hegel can be seen as trying to defend Kant’s idea of freedom as going beyond finite «desires», by means of reason. Thus, in contrast to later critics like Nietzsche or Russell, Hegel shares some of Kant’s concerns.[186]

Kant’s thinking on religion was used in Britain to challenge the decline in religious faith in the nineteenth century. British Catholic writers, notably G. K. Chesterton and Hilaire Belloc, followed this approach. Ronald Englefield debated this movement, and Kant’s use of language.[f] Criticisms of Kant were common in the realist views of the new positivism at that time.

Arthur Schopenhauer was strongly influenced by Kant’s transcendental idealism. He, like G. E. Schulze, Jacobi and Fichte before him, was critical of Kant’s theory of the thing in itself. Things in themselves, they argued, are neither the cause of what we observe nor are they completely beyond our access. Ever since the first Critique of Pure Reason philosophers have been critical of Kant’s theory of the thing in itself. Many have argued, if such a thing exists beyond experience then one cannot posit that it affects us causally, since that would entail stretching the category «causality» beyond the realm of experience.[g] For Schopenhauer things in themselves do not exist outside the non-rational will. The world, as Schopenhauer would have it, is the striving and largely unconscious will. Michael Kelly, in the preface to his 1910 book Kant’s Ethics and Schopenhauer’s Criticism, stated: «Of Kant it may be said that what is good and true in his philosophy would have been buried with him, were it not for Schopenhauer….»

With the success and wide influence of Hegel’s writings, Kant’s influence began to wane, though there was in Germany a movement that hailed a return to Kant in the 1860s, beginning with the publication of Kant und die Epigonen in 1865 by Otto Liebmann. His motto was «Back to Kant», and a re-examination of his ideas began (see Neo-Kantianism). During the turn of the 20th century there was an important revival of Kant’s theoretical philosophy, known as the Marburg School, represented in the work of Hermann Cohen, Paul Natorp, Ernst Cassirer,[187] and anti-Neo-Kantian Nicolai Hartmann.[188]

Kant’s notion of «Critique» has been quite influential. The early German Romantics, especially Friedrich Schlegel in his «Athenaeum Fragments», used Kant’s self-reflexive conception of criticism in their Romantic theory of poetry.[189] Also in aesthetics, Clement Greenberg, in his classic essay «Modernist Painting», uses Kantian criticism, what Greenberg refers to as «immanent criticism», to justify the aims of abstract painting, a movement Greenberg saw as aware of the key limitation—flatness—that makes up the medium of painting.[190] French philosopher Michel Foucault was also greatly influenced by Kant’s notion of «Critique» and wrote several pieces on Kant for a re-thinking of the Enlightenment as a form of «critical thought». He went so far as to classify his own philosophy as a «critical history of modernity, rooted in Kant».[191]

Kant believed that mathematical truths were forms of synthetic a priori knowledge, which means they are necessary and universal, yet known through the apriori ‘intuition’ of space and time, as transcendental preconditions of all phenomenal sense experience.[192] Kant’s often brief remarks about mathematics influenced the mathematical school known as intuitionism, a movement in philosophy of mathematics opposed to Hilbert’s formalism, and Frege and Bertrand Russell’s logicism.[193]

Influence on modern thinkers[edit]

West German postage stamp, 1974, commemorating the 250th anniversary of Kant’s birth

With his Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch, Kant is considered to have foreshadowed many of the ideas that have come to form the democratic peace theory, one of the main controversies in political science.[194]

Prominent recent Kantians include the British philosophers P. F. Strawson,[195] Onora O’Neill[196] and Quassim Cassam,[197] and the American philosophers Wilfrid Sellars[198] and Christine Korsgaard.[199] Due to the influence of Strawson and Sellars, among others, there has been a renewed interest in Kant’s view of the mind. Central to many debates in philosophy of psychology and cognitive science is Kant’s conception of the unity of consciousness.[200]

Jürgen Habermas and John Rawls are two significant political and moral philosophers whose work is strongly influenced by Kant’s moral philosophy.[201] They argued against relativism,[202] supporting the Kantian view that universality is essential to any viable moral philosophy. Jean-François Lyotard, however, emphasized the indeterminacy in the nature of thought and language and has engaged in debates with Habermas based on the effects this indeterminacy has on philosophical and political debates.[203]

Mou Zongsan’s study of Kant has been cited as a highly crucial part in the development of Mou’s personal philosophy, namely New Confucianism. Widely regarded as the most influential Kant scholar in China, Mou’s rigorous critique of Kant’s philosophy—having translated all three of Kant’s critiques—served as an ardent attempt to reconcile Chinese and Western philosophy whilst increasing pressure to westernize in China.[204][205]

Kant’s influence also has extended to the social, behavioral, and physical sciences, as in the sociology of Max Weber, the psychology of Jean Piaget and Carl Gustav Jung,[206][207] and the linguistics of Noam Chomsky. Kant’s work on mathematics and synthetic a priori knowledge is also cited by theoretical physicist Albert Einstein as an early influence on his intellectual development, but which he later criticised heavily and rejected.[208] He held the view that «if one does not want to assert that relativity theory goes against reason, one cannot retain the a priori concepts and norms of Kant’s system».[209] However, Kant scholar Stephen Palmquist has argued that Einstein’s rejection of Kant’s influence was primarily «a response to mistaken interpretations of Kant being adopted by contemporary philosophers», when in fact Kant’s transcendental perspective informed Einstein’s early worldview and led to his insights regarding simultaneity, and eventually to his proposal of the theory of relativity.[210] Because of the thoroughness of the Kantian paradigm shift, his influence extends to thinkers who neither specifically refer to his work nor use his terminology.

In recent years, there has been renewed interest in Kant’s theory of mind from the point of view of formal logic and computer science.[211]

Film/television[edit]

Kant and his work was heavily referenced in the comedy television show The Good Place, as the show deals with the subject of ethics and moral philosophy.[212]

Bibliography[edit]

List of major works[edit]

  • Lectures on Ethics, trans. Louis Infield (London: Methuen, 1930)
  • (1749) Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces (Gedanken von der wahren Schätzung der lebendigen Kräfte)
  • (March 1755) Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens (Allgemeine Naturgeschichte und Theorie des Himmels)
  • (April 1755) Brief Outline of Certain Meditations on Fire (Meditationum quarundam de igne succinta delineatio (master’s thesis under Johann Gottfried Teske))[213][214][215][216]
  • (September 1755) A New Elucidation of the First Principles of Metaphysical Cognition (Principiorum primorum cognitionis metaphysicae nova dilucidatio (doctoral thesis))[217][218]
  • (1756) The Use in Natural Philosophy of Metaphysics Combined with Geometry, Part I: Physical Monadology (Metaphysicae cum geometrica iunctae usus in philosophia naturali, cuius specimen I. continet monadologiam physicam, abbreviated as Monadologia Physica (thesis as a prerequisite of associate professorship))[219]
  • (1762) The False Subtlety of the Four Syllogistic Figures (Die falsche Spitzfindigkeit der vier syllogistischen Figuren)
  • (1763) The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God (Der einzig mögliche Beweisgrund zu einer Demonstration des Daseins Gottes)
  • (1763) Attempt to Introduce the Concept of Negative Magnitudes into Philosophy (Versuch den Begriff der negativen Größen in die Weltweisheit einzuführen)
  • (1764) Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime (Beobachtungen über das Gefühl des Schönen und Erhabenen)
  • (1764) Essay on the Illness of the Head (Über die Krankheit des Kopfes)
  • (1764) Inquiry Concerning the Distinctness of the Principles of Natural Theology and Morality (the Prize Essay) (Untersuchungen über die Deutlichkeit der Grundsätze der natürlichen Theologie und der Moral)
  • (1766) Dreams of a Spirit-Seer (Träume eines Geistersehers)[220]
  • (1768) On the Ultimate Ground of the Differentiation of Regions in Space (Von dem ersten Grunde des Unterschiedes der Gegenden im Raume)[221]
  • (August 1770) Dissertation on the Form and Principles of the Sensible and the Intelligible World (De mundi sensibilis atque intelligibilis forma et principiis (doctoral thesis))[222][223][224][1]
  • (1775) On the Different Races of Man (Über die verschiedenen Rassen der Menschen)
  • (1781) First edition of the Critique of Pure Reason[225] (Kritik der reinen Vernunft)[226]
  • (1783) Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics (Prolegomena zu einer jeden künftigen Metaphysik)
  • (1784) «An Answer to the Question: What Is Enlightenment?» («Beantwortung der Frage: Was ist Aufklärung?«)[227]
  • (1784) «Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose» («Idee zu einer allgemeinen Geschichte in weltbürgerlicher Absicht«)
  • (1785) Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten)
  • (1786) Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Naturwissenschaft)
  • (1786) «What does it mean to orient oneself in thinking?» («Was heißt: sich im Denken orientieren?«)
  • (1786) Conjectural Beginning of Human History (Mutmaßlicher Anfang der Menschengeschichte)
  • (1787) Second edition of the Critique of Pure Reason[228] (Kritik der reinen Vernunft)[229]
  • (1788) Critique of Practical Reason (Kritik der praktischen Vernunft)[230]
  • (1790) Critique of Judgment (Kritik der Urteilskraft)[231]
  • (1793) Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason (Die Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der bloßen Vernunft)[95][232]
  • (1793) On the Old Saw: That May be Right in Theory But It Won’t Work in Practice (Über den Gemeinspruch: Das mag in der Theorie richtig sein, taugt aber nicht für die Praxis)
  • (1795) Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch[233]Zum ewigen Frieden«)[234]
  • (1797) Metaphysics of Morals (Metaphysik der Sitten). First part is The Doctrine of Right, which has often been published separately as The Science of Right.
  • (1798) Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View (Anthropologie in pragmatischer Hinsicht)
  • (1798) The Contest of Faculties[235] (Der Streit der Fakultäten)[236]
  • (1800) Logic (Logik)
  • (1803) On Pedagogy (Über Pädagogik)[237]
  • (1804) Opus Postumum
  • (1817) Lectures on Philosophical Theology (Immanuel Kants Vorlesungen über die philosophische Religionslehre edited by K.H.L. Pölitz) [The English edition of A.W. Wood & G.M. Clark (Cornell, 1978) is based on Pölitz’ second edition, 1830, of these lectures.][238]

Collected works in German[edit]

Printed version

Wilhelm Dilthey inaugurated the Academy edition (the Akademie-Ausgabe abbreviated as AA or Ak) of Kant’s writings (Gesammelte Schriften, Königlich-Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Berlin, 1902–38) in 1895,[239] and served as its first editor. The volumes are grouped into four sections:

  • I. Kant’s published writings (vols. 1–9),
  • II. Kant’s correspondence (vols. 10–13),
  • III. Kant’s literary remains, or Nachlass (vols. 14–23), and
  • IV. Student notes from Kant’s lectures (vols. 24–29).

Electronic version

  • Elektronische Edition der Gesammelten Werke Immanuel Kants (vols. 1–23).

See also[edit]

  • Aenesidemus
  • Arthur Schopenhauer’s criticism of Immanuel Kant’s schemata
  • Critique of the Kantian Philosophy
  • Kant’s influence on Mou Zongsan
  • Kantian fallacy
  • List of liberal theorists
  • On the Basis of Morality
  • On Vision and Colors
  • Political philosophy of Immanuel Kant
  • Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University, Kaliningrad, Russia
  • Immanuel Kant – Wikiquote

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ However, Kant has also been interpreted as a defender of the coherence theory of truth.[2]
  2. ^ a b «Up to now it has been assumed that all our cognition must conform to the objects; but all attempts to find out something about them a priori through concepts that would extend our cognition have, on this presupposition, come to nothing. Hence let us once try whether we do not get farther with the problems of metaphysics by assuming that the objects must conform to our cognition, which would agree better with the requested possibility of an a priori cognition of them, which is to establish something about objects before they are given to us. This would be just like the first thoughts of Copernicus, who, when he did not make good progress in the explanation of the celestial motions if he assumed that the entire celestial host revolves around the observer, tried to see if he might not have greater success if he made the observer revolve and left the stars at rest. Now in metaphysics we can try in a similar way regarding the intuition of objects. If intuition has to conform to the constitution of the objects, then I do not see how we can know anything of them a priori; but if the object (as an object of the senses) conforms to the constitution of our faculty of intuition, then I can very well represent this possibility to myself.»[33]: 110 (B xvi–vii) 
  3. ^ Nietzsche wrote that «Kant wanted to prove, in a way that would dumbfound the common man, that the common man was right: that was the secret joke of this soul.»[39]
  4. ^ Kant himself seems to have found his contribution not significant enough that he published his arguments in a newspaper commentary on the prize question and did not submit them to the Academy: «Whether the Earth has Undergone an Alteration of its Axial Rotation». Kant’s Cosmogony. Translated by Hastie, William. Glasgow: James Maclehose. 1900 [1754]. pp. 1–11. Retrieved 29 March 2022.. The prize was instead awarded in 1756 to P. Frisi, who incorrectly argued against the slowing down of the spin.[72]
  5. ^ It has been noted that in 1778, in response to one of these offers by a former pupil, Kant wrote:

    Any change makes me apprehensive, even if it offers the greatest promise of improving my condition, and I am persuaded by this natural instinct of mine that I must take heed if I wish that the threads which the Fates spin so thin and weak in my case to be spun to any length. My great thanks, to my well-wishers and friends, who think so kindly of me as to undertake my welfare, but at the same time a most humble request to protect me in my current condition from any disturbance.[87]

  6. ^ See Englefield’s article «Kant as Defender of the Faith in Nineteenth-century England», Question, 12, 16–27 (London, Pemberton) reprinted in Critique of Pure Verbiage, Essays on Abuses of Language in Literary, Religious, and Philosophical Writings, edited by G. A. Wells and D. R. Oppenheimer, Open Court, 1990.
  7. ^ For a review of this problem and the relevant literature see The Thing in Itself and the Problem of Affection in the revised edition of Henry Allison’s Kant’s Transcendental Idealism.

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c Since he had written his last habilitation thesis 14 years earlier, a new habilitation thesis was required (see S.J. McGrath, Joseph Carew (eds.), Rethinking German Idealism, Palgrave Macmillan, 2016, p. 24).
  2. ^ «The Coherence Theory of Truth (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)». Archived from the original on 1 November 2019. Retrieved 29 April 2020.
  3. ^ David, Marian. «The Correspondence Theory of Truth». In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Archived copy. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2016 ed.). Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. Archived from the original on 14 February 2014. Retrieved 18 October 2019.{{cite encyclopedia}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  4. ^ Rockmore, Tom (2004). On Foundationalism: A Strategy for Metaphysical Realism. Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 65. ISBN 978-0-7425-3427-8.
  5. ^ Frederick C. Beiser, German Idealism: The Struggle Against Subjectivism, 1781–1801, Harvard University Press, 2002, part I.
  6. ^ Santos, Robinson dos; Schmidt, Elke Elisabeth (2017). Realism and Antirealism in Kant’s Moral Philosophy: New Essays. Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. p. 199. ISBN 978-3-11-057451-7. Kant is an indirect realist.
  7. ^ Hanna, Robert, Kant, Science, and Human Nature. Clarendon Press, 2006, p. 16.
  8. ^ Oberst, Michael (2015). «Kant on Universals». History of Philosophy Quarterly. 32 (4): 335–352.
  9. ^ Hanna, Robert (January 2008). «Kantian non-conceptualism». Philosophical Studies. 137 (1): 41–64. doi:10.1007/s11098-007-9166-0. S2CID 170296391.
  10. ^ The application of the term «perceptual non-conceptualism» to Kant’s philosophy of perception is debatable (see Hanna, Robert. «The Togetherness Principle, Kant’s Conceptualism, and Kant’s Non-Conceptualism: Supplement to Kant’s Theory of Judgment». In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Kant’s Theory of Judgment > the Togetherness Principle, Kant’s Conceptualism, and Kant’s Non-Conceptualism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Archived from the original on 11 June 2018. Retrieved 20 August 2018.).
  11. ^ Biographies: Königsberg Professors – Manchester University Archived 26 December 2016 at the Wayback Machine: «His lectures on logic and metaphysics were quite popular, and he still taught theology, philosophy, and mathematics when Kant studied at the university. The only textbook found in Kant’s library that stems from his student years was Marquardt’s book on astronomy.»
  12. ^ KrV A51/B75–6. See also: Edward Willatt, Kant, Deleuze and Architectonics, Continuum, 2010 p. 17: «Kant argues that cognition can only come about as a result of the union of the abstract work of the understanding and the concrete input of sensation.»
  13. ^ Burnham, Douglas. «Immanuel Kant: Aesthetics». Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Archived from the original on 20 February 2018. Retrieved 18 October 2019.
  14. ^ KpV 101–102 (=Ak V, 121–22). See also: Paul Saurette, The Kantian Imperative: Humiliation, Common Sense, Politics, University of Toronto Press, 2005, p. 255 n. 32.
  15. ^ «Meet Mr Green». The Economist. Retrieved 11 December 2022.
  16. ^ «Wie schwul war Kant? (How gay was Kant?)» (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 11 December 2022.
  17. ^ Kuehn 2001, p. 251.
  18. ^ I. Kant, Theoretical Philosophy: 1755–1770, Cambridge University Press, p. 496
  19. ^ Immanuel Kant, Philosophical Correspondence, 1759–1799, University of Chicago Press, 1967, p. 18.
  20. ^ «Kant» Archived 27 September 2019 at the Wayback Machine. Collins English Dictionary.
  21. ^ «Kant» Archived 23 October 2014 at the Wayback Machine. Random House Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary.
  22. ^ Wells, John C. (2008). Longman Pronunciation Dictionary (3rd ed.). Longman. ISBN 978-1-4058-8118-0.
  23. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011). Roach, Peter; Setter, Jane; Esling, John (eds.). Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary (18th ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-15255-6.
  24. ^ «Immanuel». Duden (in German). Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 20 October 2018.
  25. ^ «Kant». Duden (in German). Archived from the original on 20 October 2018. Retrieved 20 October 2018.
  26. ^ a b c McCormick, Matt. «Immanuel Kant: Metaphysics». Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Archived from the original on 15 February 2019. Retrieved 20 February 2019.
  27. ^ a b Rohlf, Michael (2020), «Immanuel Kant», in Zalta, Edward N. (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2020 ed.), Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, archived from the original on 3 September 2020, retrieved 27 May 2020
  28. ^ a b «Immanuel Kant | Biography, Philosophy, Books, & Facts». Encyclopedia Britannica. Archived from the original on 16 June 2015. Retrieved 27 May 2020.
  29. ^ Durant, Will; Durant, Ariel (1967). The Story of Civilization: Rousseau and Revolution. MJF Books. pp. 571, 574. ISBN 978-1-56731-021-4. Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 22 August 2020.
  30. ^ Nigel Warburton (2011). «Chapter 19: Rose-tinted reality: Immanuel Kant». A little history of philosophy. Yale University Press. p. 134. ISBN 978-0-300-15208-1.
  31. ^ Kitcher, Patrica (1996) [First edition originally published in 1781; second edition originally published in 1787]. «Introduction by Patricia Kitcher, C. The Analytic of Principles». Critique of Pure Reason. By Kant, Immanuel. Translated by Pluhar, Werner S. (Unified Edition with all variants from the 1781 and 1787 editions ed.). Indianapolis/Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. p. l. ISBN 0-87220-257-7. Although Hume’s name is not mentioned in either version of this section, from the beginning, Kant’s readers have understood that his purpose was to vindicate the causal concept after Hume’s devastating attack […] Kant’s “reply to Hume” was to argue we could have no cognition of events, of objects changing by acquiring or losing a property, unless we used a concept of causation that included both the offending and related properties of universality and necessity.
  32. ^ There are two relatively recent translations:
    • Kant, Immanuel (1999). Critique of Pure Reason. The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant. Translated by Guyer, Paul; Wood, Allen W. Cambridge: Cambridge U.P. ISBN 978-0-5216-5729-7. Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 22 August 2020.
    • Kant, Immanuel (1996). Critique of Pure Reason. Translated by Pluhar, Werner S. Indianapolis: Hackett. ISBN 978-0-87220-257-3.

    Both translations have their virtues and both are better than earlier translations: McLaughlin, Peter (1999). «Review». Erkenntnis. 51 (2/3): 357. doi:10.1023/a:1005483714722.

    Page references to the Critique of Pure Reason are commonly given to the first (1781) and second (1787) editions, as published in the Prussian Academy series, as respectively «A [page number]» and «B [page number]».

  33. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Kant, Immanuel (1999). Critique of Pure Reason. The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant. Translated and edited by Paul Guyer and Allen W. Wood. Cambridge: Cambridge U.P. ISBN 978-0-5216-5729-7.
  34. ^ Vanzo, Alberto (January 2013). «Kant on Empiricism and Rationalism». History of Philosophy Quarterly. 30 (1): 53–74. Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 17 December 2015.
  35. ^ Rohlf, Michael. «Immanuel Kant». In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2018 ed.). Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. Archived from the original on 12 January 2012. Retrieved 6 October 2015.
  36. ^ Kant, Immanuel (1784). «Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose».
  37. ^ Arthur Schopenhauer, On the Basis of Morals, in The Two Fundamental Problems of Ethics, trans. Chris Janaway (2009), sections 4–5.
  38. ^ Friedrich Nietzsche, The Anti-Christ (1895), para. 10 Archived 3 August 2020 at the Wayback Machine.
  39. ^ Friedrich Nietzsche (trans. Walter Arnold Kaufmann), The Portable Nietzsche, 1976, p. 96.
  40. ^ a b c d Eze, Emmanuel Chukwudi (1997). Postcolonial African Philosophy: A Critical Reader. Wiley. pp. 103–131. ISBN 978-0-631-20339-1. Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 15 June 2020.
  41. ^ a b c Eze, Emmanuel Chukwudi (1997). Race and the Enlightenment: A Reader. Wiley. pp. 39–48. ISBN 978-0-631-20136-6. Archived from the original on 20 December 2020. Retrieved 15 June 2020.
  42. ^ a b c Bouie, Jamelle (5 June 2018). «How the Enlightenment Created Modern Race Thinking and Why We Should Confront It». Slate Magazine. Archived from the original on 15 June 2020. Retrieved 15 June 2020.
  43. ^ a b Bernasconi, Robert (2010). «Defining Race Scientifically: A response to Michael Banton». Ethnicities. 10 (1): 141–148. doi:10.1177/14687968100100010802. ISSN 1468-7968. JSTOR 23890861. S2CID 143925406.
  44. ^ a b c Kleingeld, Pauline (October 2007). «Kant’s Second Thoughts on Race» (PDF). The Philosophical Quarterly. 57 (229): 573–592. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9213.2007.498.x. hdl:11370/e15b6815-5eab-42d6-a789-24a2f6ecb946. S2CID 55185762. Archived (PDF) from the original on 16 February 2019. Retrieved 14 December 2020.
  45. ^ «Cosmopolis». Koenigsberg-is-dead.de. 23 April 2001. Archived from the original on 22 March 2009. Retrieved 24 July 2009.
  46. ^ Mortensen, Hans and Gertrud, Kants väterliche Ahnen und ihre Umwelt, Rede von 1952 in Jahrbuch der Albertus-Universität zu Königsberg, Pr., Holzner-Verlag, Kitzingen, Main 1953, Vol. 3, p. 26.
  47. ^ R.K. Murray, «The Origin of Immanuel Kant’s Family Name», Kantian Review 13(1), March 2008, pp. 190-93.
  48. ^ Rosa Kohlheim, Volker Kohlheim, Duden – Familiennamen: Herkunft und Bedeutung von 20.000 Nachnamen, Bibliographisches Institut & F.A. Brockhaus AG, Mannheim 2005, p. 365.
  49. ^ Haupt, Viktor. «Rede des Bohnenkönigs – Von Petersburg bis Panama – Die Genealogie der Familie Kant» (PDF). freunde-kants.com (in German). p. 7. Archived from the original (PDF) on 25 September 2015.
  50. ^ Kuehn 2001, p. 26.
  51. ^ Pasternack, Lawrence; Fugate, Courtney (2020), «Kant’s Philosophy of Religion», in Zalta, Edward N. (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2020 ed.), Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, retrieved 25 February 2021
  52. ^ Kuehn 2001, p. 47.
  53. ^ Metaphysics, p. 131
  54. ^ «Immanuel Kant». Christian Research Institute. 30 September 2010. Archived from the original on 20 June 2017. Retrieved 15 June 2017.
  55. ^ «While this sounds skeptical, Kant is only agnostic about our knowledge of metaphysical objects such as God. And, as noted above, Kant’s agnosticism leads to the conclusion that we can neither affirm nor deny claims made by traditional metaphysics.» Andrew Fiala, J.M.D. Meiklejohn, Critique of Pure Reason – Introduction, p. xi.
  56. ^
    Edward J. Verstraete (2008). «The Popular Encyclopedia of Apologetics». In Ed Hindson; Ergun Caner (eds.). The Popular Encyclopedia of Apologetics: Surveying the Evidence for the Truth of Christianity. Harvest House Publishers. p. 82. ISBN 978-0-7369-2084-1. It is in this sense that modern atheism rests heavily upon the skepticism of David Hume and the agnosticism of Immanuel Kant.
  57. ^
    Norman L. Geisler; Frank Turek (2004). «Kant’s Agnosticism: Should We Be Agnostic About It?». I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist. Crossway. pp. 59–60. ISBN 978-1-58134-561-2. Immanuel Kant’s impact has been even more devastating to the Christian worldview than David Hume’s. For if Kant’s philosophy is right, then there is no way to know anything about the real world, even empirically verifiable things!
  58. ^
    Gary D. Badcock (1997). Light of Truth and Fire of Love: A Theology of the Holy Spirit. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. p. 113. ISBN 978-0-8028-4288-6. Kant has no interest in prayer or worship, and is in fact agnostic when it comes to such classical theological questions as the doctrine of God or of the Holy Spirit.
  59. ^
    Norman L. Geisler, Paul K. Hoffman, ed. (2006). «The Agnosticism of Immanuel Kant». Why I Am a Christian: Leading Thinkers Explain Why They Believe. Baker Books. p. 45. ISBN 978-0-8010-6712-9.
  60. ^
    Flinn, Frank K. (2007). Encyclopedia of Catholicism. Infobase Publishing. p. 10. ISBN 978-0-8160-7565-2. Following Locke, the classic agnostic claims not to accept more propositions than are warranted by empirical evidence. In this sense an agnostic appeals to Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), who claims in his Critique of Pure Reason that since God, freedom, immortality, and the soul can be both proved and disproved by theoretical reason, we ought to suspend judgement about them.
  61. ^ Hare, John E. (1996). The Moral Gap: Kantian Ethics, Human Limits, and God’s Assistance. Oxford: Clarendon Press. p. 42. Hare further suggests that Kant is not, in the ordinary sense, an agnostic about God. In his view, Kant thinks that there are good moral grounds for theistic belief. A person who already understands the claims of duty will find the teachings of Christianity worthy of love, even though they are not objectively necessary (p. 47).
  62. ^ Kuehn, M. (2001). Kant: A biography. New York: Cambridge University Press. p 169
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    Kant, Immanuel. Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime. Trans. John T. Goldthwait. University of California Press, 1961, 2003. ISBN 978-0-520-24078-0
  67. ^ The American International Encyclopedia (New York: J.J. Little & Ives, 1954), Vol. IX.
  68. ^ Porter, Burton (2010). What the Tortoise Taught Us: The Story of Philosophy. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. p. 133.
  69. ^ Kuehn 2001, p. 94.
  70. ^ Kuehn 2001, p. 98.
  71. ^ Eric Watkins (ed.), Immanuel Kant: Natural Science, Cambridge University Press, 2012: «Thoughts on the true estimation…» Archived 7 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine.
  72. ^ Schönfeld, Martin (2000). The Philosophy of the Young Kant: The Precritical Project. Oxford University Press. p. 84. ISBN 978-0-19-513218-2.
  73. ^ a b Brush, Stephen G. (2014). A History of Modern Planetary Physics: Nebulous Earth. p. 7. ISBN 978-0-521-44171-1.
  74. ^ See:
    • Kant, I. (1756a) «Von den Ursachen der Erderschütterungen bei Gelegenheit des Unglücks, welches die westliche Länder von Europa gegen das Ende des vorigen Jahres betroffen hat» [On the causes of the earthquakes on the occasion of the disaster which affected the western countries of Europe towards the end of last year] In: Königlich Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften (Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences), ed.s (1902) Kant’s gesammelte Schriften [Kant’s collected writings] (in German) Berlin, Germany: G. Reimer. vol. 1, pp. 417–427.
    • Kant, I. (1756b) «Geschichte und Naturbeschreibung der merkwürdigsten Vorfälle des Erdbebens, welches an dem Ende des 1755sten Jahres einen großen Theil der Erde erschüttert hat» [History and description of the nature of the most remarkable events of the earthquake which shook a large part of the Earth at the end of the year 1755], ibid. pp. 429–461.
    • Kant, I. (1756c) «Immanuel Kants fortgesetzte Betrachtung der seit einiger Zeit wahrgenommenen Erderschütterungen» [Immanuel Kant’s continued consideration of the earthquakes that were felt some time ago], ibid. pp. 463–472.
    • Amador, Filomena (2004) «The causes of 1755 Lisbon earthquake on Kant» In: Escribano Benito, J.J.; Español González, L.; Martínez García, M.A., ed.s. Actas VIII Congreso de la Sociedad Española de Historia de las Ciencias y de las Técnicas [Proceedings of the Eighth Congress of the Spanish Society of the History of the Sciences and Technology] (in English) Logroño, Spain: Sociedad Española de Historia de las Ciencias y de las Técnicas (Universidad de la Rioja), vol. 2, pp. 485–495.

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  102. ^ Examined Lives, From Socrates to Nietzsche, James Miller p. 284
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  108. ^ In the first edition of the Critique of Pure Reason Kant refers to space as «no discursive or…general conception of the relation of things, but a pure intuition» and maintained that «We can only represent to ourselves one space». The «general notion of spaces…depends solely upon limitations» (Meikeljohn trans., A25). In the second edition of the CPR, Kant adds, «The original representation of space is an a priori intuition, not a concept» (Kemp Smith trans., B40). In regard to time, Kant states that «Time is not a discursive, or what is called a general concept, but a pure form of sensible intuition. Different times are but parts of one and the same time; and the representation which can be given only through a single object is intuition» (A31/B47). For the differences in the discursive use of reason according to concepts and its intuitive use through the construction of concepts, see Critique of Pure Reason (A719/B747 ff. and A837/B865). On «One and the same thing in space and time» and the mathematical construction of concepts, see A724/B752.
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  113. ^ The German word Anschauung, which Kant used, literally means ‘looking at’ and generally means what in philosophy in English is called «perception». However it sometimes is rendered as «intuition»: not, however, with the vernacular meaning of an indescribable or mystical experience or sixth sense, but rather with the meaning of the direct perception or grasping of sensory phenomena. In this article, both terms, «perception» and «intuition» are used to stand for Kant’s Anschauung.
  114. ^ Pigeard de Gurbert, Guillaume (2015). Kant et le temps (in French). Paris: Kimé. ISBN 978-2-84174-708-5.
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  118. ^ Deleuze on Kant Archived 14 November 2007 at the Wayback Machine, from where the definitions of a priori and a posteriori were obtained.
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  121. ^ The distinction between rational and philosophical knowledge is given in the Preface to the Groundwork, 1785.
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  127. ^ Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2003) Ecosystems and Well-being: A Framework for Assessment. Washington, DC: Island Press, p. 142.
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  137. ^ Johann Schultz, Exposition of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason (1784), 141.
  138. ^ «The Protestant pastor is the grandfather of German philosophy…German philosophy is at bottom—a cunning theology…Why the rejoicing heard through the German academic world—three-quarters composed of the sons of pastors and teachers-at the appearance of Kant? Why the Germans’ conviction, which still find echo even today, that with Kant things were taking a turn of the better? Kant’s success is merely a theologian’s success». Nietzsche, The Antichrist, 10
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  140. ^ Pasternack, Lawrence; Rossi, Philip. «Kant’s Philosophy of Religion». In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2014 ed.). Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. Archived from the original on 9 July 2010. Retrieved 18 October 2019.
  141. ^ For example Peter Byrne, who wrote about Kant’s relationship with deism. Byrne, Peter (2007), Kant on God, London: Ashgate, p. 159.
  142. ^ Wood, Allen W. (1970), Kant’s moral religion, London and Ithaca: Cornell University Press, p. 16.
  143. ^ Westphal, Merold (2010),The Emerge of Modern Philosophy of Religion, in Taliaferro, Charles, Draper, Paul and Quinn, Philip (editors), A Companion to Philosophy of Religion, Oxford: Blackwell, p. 135.
  144. ^ Iţu, Mircia (2004), Dumnezeu şi religia în concepţia lui Immanuel Kant din Religia în limitele raţiunii, in Boboc, Alexandru and Mariş, N.I. (editors), Studii de istoria filosofiei universale, volume 12, Bucharest: Romanian Academy.
  145. ^ Wood, Allen W. (2020), Kant and Religion, Cambridge University Press, p.2.
  146. ^ See e.g., Lawrence Pasternack, Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Kant on Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason (New York, Routledge, 2014), pp.239-240.
  147. ^ Palmquist, Stephen (1992), «Does Kant Reduce Religion to Morality?», Kant-Studien 83.2, pp. 129–148.
  148. ^ The concept of freedom is also handled in the third section of the Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals; in the Critique of Practical Reason see § VII and § VIII.
  149. ^ 5:65–67
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  153. ^ Beardsley, Monroe. «History of Aesthetics». Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Vol. 1, section on «Toward a unified aesthetics», p. 25, Macmillan 1973. Baumgarten coined the term «aesthetics» and expanded, clarified, and unified Wolffian aesthetic theory, but had left the Aesthetica unfinished (See also: Tonelli, Giorgio. «Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten». Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Vol. 1, Macmillan 1973). In Bernard’s translation of the Critique of Judgment he indicates in the notes that Kant’s reference in § 15 in regard to the identification of perfection and beauty is probably a reference to Baumgarten.
  154. ^ German Idealism in «History of Aesthetics» Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Vol 1. Macmillan, 1973.
  155. ^ Kant’s general discussions of the distinction between «cognition» and «conscious of» are also given in the Critique of Pure Reason (notably A320/B376), and section V and the conclusion of section VIII of his Introduction in Logic.
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  183. ^ There is much debate in the recent scholarship about the extent to which Fichte and Schelling actually overstep the boundaries of Kant’s critical philosophy, thus entering the realm of dogmatic or pre-Critical philosophy. Beiser’s German Idealism discusses some of these issues. Beiser, Frederick C. German Idealism: The Struggle against Subjectivism, 1781–1801. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2002.
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  186. ^ Robert Pippin’s Hegel’s Idealism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989) emphasizes the continuity of Hegel’s concerns with Kant’s. Robert Wallace, Hegel’s Philosophy of Reality, Freedom, and God (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) explains how Hegel’s Science of Logic defends Kant’s idea of freedom as going beyond finite «inclinations», contra skeptics such as David Hume.
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  233. ^ «Immanuel Kant, «Perpetual Peace»«. Mtholyoke.edu. Archived from the original on 6 April 2019. Retrieved 24 July 2009.
  234. ^ «Immanuel Kant: Zum ewigen Frieden, 12.02.2004 (Friedensratschlag)». Uni-kassel.de. Archived from the original on 23 September 2009. Retrieved 24 July 2009.
  235. ^ «Kant, The Contest of Faculties». Chnm.gmu.edu. 1798. Archived from the original on 4 August 2011. Retrieved 24 July 2009.
  236. ^ Immanuel Kant. «Immanuel Kant: Der Streit der Facultäten – Kapitel 1» (in German). Projekt Gutenberg-DE. Archived from the original on 9 June 2007. Retrieved 24 July 2009.
  237. ^ Available online at DeutschesTextArchiv.de Archived 10 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine.
  238. ^ As noted by Allen W. Wood in his Introduction, p. 12. Wood further speculates that the lectures themselves were delivered in the Winter of 1783–84.
  239. ^ Immanuel Kant, Notes and Fragments, Cambridge University Press, 2005, p. xvi.

Works cited[edit]

  • Kant, Immanuel. Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals. Trans. Lewis White Beck, Indianapolis, Bobbs-Merrill, 1969. Page numbers citing this work are Beck’s marginal numbers that refer to the page numbers of the standard edition of Königlich-Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften (Berlin, 1902–38).
  • Kuehn, Manfred. Kant: a Biography. Cambridge University Press, 2001. ISBN 978-0-521-49704-6.

Further reading[edit]

In Germany, one important contemporary interpreter of Kant and the movement of German Idealism he began is Dieter Henrich, who has some work available in English. P. F. Strawson’s The Bounds of Sense (1966) played a significant role in determining the contemporary reception of Kant in England and America. More recent interpreters of note in the English-speaking world include Lewis White Beck, Jonathan Bennett, Henry Allison, Paul Guyer, Christine Korsgaard, Stephen Palmquist, Robert B. Pippin, Roger Scruton, Rudolf Makkreel, and Béatrice Longuenesse.

General introductions to his thought

  • Broad, C.D. Kant: An Introduction. Cambridge University Press, 1978. ISBN 978-0-521-21755-2, 0-521-29265-4
  • Gardner, Sebastian. Kant and the Critique of Pure Reason. Routledge, 1999. ISBN 978-0-415-11909-2
  • Martin, Gottfried. Kant’s Metaphysics and Theory of Science. Greenwood Press, 1955 ISBN 978-0-8371-7154-8 (elucidates Kant’s most fundamental concepts in their historical context)
  • Palmquist, Stephen. Kant’s System of Perspectives Archived 14 April 2012 at the Wayback Machine: an architectonic interpretation of the Critical philosophy. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1993. ISBN 978-0-8191-8927-1
  • Seung, T.K. 2007. Kant: a Guide for the Perplexed. London: Continuum. ISBN 978-0-8264-8580-9
  • Satyananda Giri. Kant. Durham, CT: Strategic Publishing Group, 2010. ISBN 978-1-60911-686-6
  • Scruton, Roger. Kant: a Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press, 2001. ISBN 978-0-19-280199-9 (provides a brief account of his life, and a lucid introduction to the three major critiques)
  • Uleman, Jennifer. An Introduction to Kant’s Moral Philosophy. Cambridge University Press, 2010. ISBN 978-0-521-13644-0
  • Luchte, James. Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2007. ISBN 978-0-8264-9322-4
  • Deleuze, Gilles. Kant’s Critical Philosophy: The Doctrine of the Faculties. The Athlone Press, 1983. ISBN 978-0-485-11249-8

Biography and historical context

  • Bader, Ralph (2008). «Kant, Immanuel (1724–1804)». In Hamowy, Ronald (ed.). The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; Cato Institute. pp. 269–271. doi:10.4135/9781412965811.n161. ISBN 978-1-4129-6580-4. LCCN 2008009151. OCLC 750831024.
  • Beck, Lewis White. Early German Philosophy: Kant and his Predecessors. Harvard University Press, 1969. (a survey of Kant’s intellectual background)
  • Beiser, Frederick C. The Fate of Reason: German Philosophy from Kant to Fichte. Harvard University Press, 1987.
  • Beiser, Frederick C. German Idealism: the Struggle against Subjectivism, 1781–1801. Harvard University Press, 2002
  • Cassirer, Ernst. Kant’s Life and Thought. Translation of Kants Leben und Lehre. Trans., Jame S. Haden, intr. Stephan Körner. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1981.
  • Chamberlain, Houston Stewart. Immanuel Kant – a study and a comparison with Goethe, Leonardo da Vinci, Bruno, Plato and Descartes, the authorised translation from the German by Lord Redesdale, with his ‘Introduction’, The Bodley Head, London, 1914, (2 volumes).
  • Gulyga, Arsenij. Immanuel Kant: His Life and Thought. Trans., Marijan Despaltović. Boston: Birkhäuser, 1987.
  • Johnson, G.R. (ed.). Kant on Swedenborg. Dreams of a Spirit-Seer and Other Writings. Swedenborg Foundation, 2002. (new translation and analysis, many supplementary texts)
  • Lehner, Ulrich L., Kants Vorsehungskonzept auf dem Hintergrund der deutschen Schulphilosophie und theologie Archived 23 September 2006 at the Wayback Machine (Leiden: 2007) (Kant’s concept of Providence and its background in German school philosophy and theology)
  • Pinkard, Terry. German Philosophy, 1760–1860: the Legacy of Idealism. Cambridge, 2002.
  • Pippin, Robert. Idealism as Modernism. Cambridge University Press, 1996.
  • Sassen, Brigitte (ed.). Kant’s Early Critics: the Empiricist Critique of the Theoretical Philosophy, Cambridge, 2000.
  • Schabert, Joseph A. «Kant’s Influence on his Successors», The American Catholic Quarterly Review, Vol. XLVII, January 1922.

Collections of essays

  • Firestone, Chris L. and Palmquist, Stephen (eds.). Kant and the New Philosophy of Religion. Notre Dame: Indiana University Press, 2006. ISBN 978-0-253-21800-1
  • Förster, Eckart (ed.). Kant’s Transcendental Deductions:. The Three ‘Critiques’ and the ‘Opus Postumum’ Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1989. Includes an important essay by Dieter Henrich.
  • Guyer, Paul (ed.). The Cambridge Companion to Kant, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. ISBN 978-0-521-36587-1. Excellent collection of papers that covers most areas of Kant’s thought.
  • Mohanty, J.N. and Shahan, Robert W. (eds.). Essays on Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1982. ISBN 978-0-8061-1782-9
  • Phillips, Dewi et al. (eds.). Kant and Kierkegaard on Religion. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2000, ISBN 978-0-312-23234-4 Collection of essays about Kantian religion and its influence on Kierkegaardian and contemporary philosophy of religion.
  • Proceedings of the International Kant Congresses. Several Congresses (numbered) edited by various publishers.

Theoretical philosophy

  • Allison, Henry. Kant’s Transcendental Idealism. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1983, 2004. ISBN 978-0-300-03629-9 (a very influential defense of Kant’s idealism, recently revised).
  • Ameriks, Karl. Kant’s Theory of Mind: An Analysis of the Paralogisms of Pure Reason. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982 (one of the first detailed studies of the Dialectic in English).
  • Banham, Gary. Kant’s Transcendental Imagination. London and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006.
  • Deleuze, Gilles. Kant’s Critical Philosophy. Trans., Hugh Tomlinson and Barbara Habberjam. University of Minnesota Press, 1984. ISBN 978-0-8166-1341-0
  • Gram, Moltke S. The Transcendental Turn: The Foundation of Kant’s Idealism. Gainesville: University Presses of Florida, 1984. ISBN 978-0-8130-0787-8
  • Greenberg, Robert. Kant’s Theory of A Priori Knowledge. Penn State Press, 2001 ISBN 978-0-271-02083-9
  • Guyer, Paul. Kant and the Claims of Knowledge. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987 (modern defense of the view that Kant’s theoretical philosophy is a «patchwork» of ill-fitting arguments).
  • Heidegger, Martin. Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics. Trans., Richard Taft. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997. ISBN 978-0-253-21067-8
  • Henrich, Dieter. The Unity of Reason: Essays on Kant’s Philosophy. Ed. with introduction by Richard L. Velkley; trans. Jeffrey Edwards et al. Harvard University Press, 1994. ISBN 978-0-674-92905-0
  • Kemp Smith, Norman. A Commentary to Kant’s ‘Critique of Pure Reason. London: Macmillan, 1930 (influential commentary on the first Critique, recently reprinted).
  • Kitcher, Patricia. Kant’s Transcendental Psychology. New York: Oxford University Press, 1990.
  • Longuenesse, Béatrice. Kant and the Capacity to Judge. Princeton University Press, 1998. ISBN 978-0-691-04348-7. (argues that the notion of judgment provides the key to understanding the overall argument of the first Critique)
  • Melnick, Arthur. Kant’s Analogies of Experience. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1973. (important study of Kant’s Analogies, including his defense of the principle of causality)
  • Paton, H.J. Kant’s Metaphysic of Experience: a Commentary on the First Half of the Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Two volumes. London: Macmillan, 1936. (extensive study of Kant’s theoretical philosophy)
  • Pippin, Robert B. Kant’s Theory of Form: An Essay on the Critique of Pure Reason. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982. (influential examination of the formal character of Kant’s work)
  • Schopenhauer, Arthur. Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung. Erster Band. Anhang. Kritik der Kantischen Philosophie. F.A. Brockhaus, Leipzig 1859 (In English: Arthur Schopenhauer, New York: Dover Press, Volume I, Appendix, «Critique of the Kantian Philosophy», ISBN 978-0-486-21761-1)
  • Schott, Robin May (1997). Feminist interpretations of Immanuel Kant. University Park, Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State University Press. ISBN 978-0-271-01676-4.
  • Seung, T.K. Kant’s Transcendental Logic. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1969.
  • Strawson, P.F. The Bounds of Sense: An Essay on Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Routledge, 1989 (the work that revitalized the interest of contemporary analytic philosophers in Kant).
  • Sturm, Thomas, Kant und die Wissenschaften vom Menschen. Paderborn: Mentis Verlag, 2009. ISBN 978-3-89785-608-0. review Archived 11 December 2013 at the Wayback Machine (Treats Kant’s anthropology and his views on psychology and history in relation to his philosophy of science.)
  • Tonelli, Giorgio. Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason within the Tradition of Modern Logic. A Commentary on its History. Hildesheim, Olms 1994
  • Werkmeister, W.H., Kant: The Architectonic and Development of His Philosophy, Open Court Publishing Co., La Salle, Ill.; 1980 ISBN 978-0-87548-345-0 (it treats, as a whole, the architectonic and development of Kant’s philosophy from 1755 through the Opus postumum.)
  • Wolff, Robert Paul. Kant’s Theory of Mental Activity: A Commentary on the Transcendental Analytic of the Critique of Pure Reason. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1963. (detailed and influential commentary on the first part of the Critique of Pure Reason)
  • Yovel, Yirmiyahu. Kant and the Philosophy of History. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1980. (review Archived 4 January 2017 at the Wayback Machine)

Practical philosophy

  • Allison, Henry. Kant’s Theory of Freedom. Cambridge University Press 1990.
  • Banham, Gary. Kant’s Practical Philosophy: From Critique to Doctrine. Palgrave Macmillan, 2003.
  • Dorschel, Andreas. Die idealistische Kritik des Willens: Versuch über die Theorie der praktischen Subjektivität bei Kant und Hegel. Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 1992 (Schriften zur Transzendentalphilosophie 10) ISBN 978-3-7873-1046-3.
  • Friedman, Michael (June 1998). «Kantian themes in contemporary philosophy». Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes. 72 (1): 111–130. doi:10.1111/1467-8349.00038. JSTOR 4107015.
  • Korsgaard, Christine M. The Sources of Normativity. Cambridge University Press, 1996.
  • Michalson, Gordon E. Fallen Freedom: Kant on Radical Evil and Moral Regeneration. Cambridge University Press, 1990.
  • Michalson, Gordon E. Kant and the Problem of God. Blackwell Publishers, 1999.
  • Paton, H.J. The Categorical Imperative: A Study in Kant’s Moral Philosophy. University of Pennsylvania Press 1971.
  • Rawls, John. Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy. Cambridge, 2000.
  • Seung, T.K. Kant’s Platonic Revolution in Moral and Political Philosophy. Johns Hopkins, 1994.
  • Wolff, Robert Paul. The Autonomy of Reason: A Commentary on Kant’s Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals. New York: HarperCollins, 1974. ISBN 978-0-06-131792-7.
  • Wood, Allen. Kant’s Ethical Thought. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999.

Aesthetics

  • Allison, Henry. Kant’s Theory of Taste: A Reading of the Critique of Aesthetic Judgment. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
  • Banham, Gary. Kant and the Ends of Aesthetics. London and New York: Macmillan Press, 2000.
  • Clewis, Robert. The Kantian Sublime and the Revelation of Freedom. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2009.
  • Crawford, Donald. Kant’s Aesthetic Theory. Wisconsin, 1974.
  • Doran, Robert. The Theory of the Sublime from Longinus to Kant. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
  • Guyer, Paul. Kant and the Claims of Taste. Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, 1979.
  • Hammermeister, Kai. The German Aesthetic Tradition. Cambridge University Press, 2002.
  • Immanuel Kant entry in Kelly, Michael (Editor in Chief) (1998) Encyclopedia of Aesthetics. New York, Oxford, Oxford University Press.
  • Kaplama, Erman. Cosmological Aesthetics through the Kantian Sublime and Nietzschean Dionysian. Lanham: UPA, Rowman & Littlefield, 2014.
  • Makkreel, Rudolf, Imagination and Interpretation in Kant. Chicago, 1990.
  • McCloskey, Mary. Kant’s Aesthetic. SUNY, 1987.
  • Schaper, Eva. Studies in Kant’s Aesthetics. Edinburgh, 1979.
  • Zammito, John H. The Genesis of Kant’s Critique of Judgment. Chicago and London: Chicago University Press, 1992.
  • Zupancic, Alenka. Ethics of the Real: Kant and Lacan. Verso, 2000.

Philosophy of religion

  • Palmquist, Stephen. Kant’s Critical Religion Archived 14 April 2012 at the Wayback Machine: Volume Two of Kant’s System of Perspectives. Ashgate, 2000. ISBN 978-0-7546-1333-6
  • Perez, Daniel Omar. «Religión, Política y Medicina en Kant: El Conflicto de las Proposiciones». Cinta de Moebio. Revista de Epistemologia de Ciencias Sociales, v. 28, p. 91–103, 2007. Uchile.cl Archived 20 October 2017 at the Wayback Machine (Spanish)

Perpetual peace and international relations

  • Sir Harry Hinsley, Power and the Pursuit of Peace, Cambridge University Press, 1962.
  • Martin Wight, Four Seminal Thinkers in International Theory: Machiavelli, Grotius, Kant and Mazzini Archived 29 November 2014 at the Wayback Machine ed. Gabriele Wight & Brian Porter (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005).
  • Bennington, Geoffrey (December 2011). «Kant’s open secret» (PDF). Theory, Culture & Society. 28 (7–8): 26–40. doi:10.1177/0263276411423036. S2CID 143513241. Archived (PDF) from the original on 8 February 2020. Retrieved 31 May 2020.

Other works

  • Botul, Jean-Baptiste. La vie sexuelle d’Emmanuel Kant. Paris, Éd. Mille et une Nuits, 2008. ISBN 978-2-84205-424-3
  • Caygill, Howard. A Kant Dictionary. Oxford; Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell Reference, 1995. ISBN 978-0-631-17534-6
  • Derrida, Jacques. Mochlos; or, The Conflict of the Faculties. Columbia University, 1980.
  • Kelly, Michael. Kant’s Ethics and Schopenhauer’s Criticism, London: Swan Sonnenschein 1910. [Reprinted 2010 Nabu Press, ISBN 978-1-171-70795-0]
  • Mosser, Kurt. Necessity and Possibility; The Logical Strategy of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Catholic University of America Press, 2008. ISBN 978-0-8132-1532-7
  • White, Mark D. Kantian Ethics and Economics: Autonomy, Dignity, and Character Archived 16 November 2011 at the Wayback Machine. Stanford University Press, 2011. ISBN 978-0-8047-6894-8.

Contemporary philosophy with a Kantian influence

  • Assiter, Alison (July 2013). «Kant and Kierkegaard on freedom and evil». Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement. 72: 275–296. Bibcode:1995kppp.book…..O. doi:10.1017/S1358246113000155. S2CID 170661991.
  • Bird, Graham (June 1998). «Kantian themes in contemporary philosophy». Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes. 72 (1): 131–152. doi:10.1111/1467-8349.00039. JSTOR 4107015.
  • Guyer, Paul. Knowledge, Reason, and Taste: Kant’s Response to Hume. Princeton University Press, 2008.
  • Hanna, Robert, Kant and the Foundations of Analytic Philosophy. Clarendon Press, 2004.
  • Hanna, Robert, Kant, Science, and Human Nature. Clarendon Press, 2006.
  • Herman, Barbara. The Practice of Moral Judgement. Harvard University Press, 1993.
  • Hill, Judith M. (June 1987). «Pornography and degradation». Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy. 2 (2): 39–54. doi:10.1111/j.1527-2001.1987.tb01064.x. JSTOR 3810015. S2CID 145504474. (A Kantian approach to the issue of pornography and degradation.)
  • Korsgaard, Christine. Creating the Kingdom of Ends. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996. ISBN 978-0-521-49644-5 (not a commentary, but a defense of a broadly Kantian approach to ethics)
  • McDowell, John. Mind and World. Harvard University Press, 1994. ISBN 978-0-674-57609-4. (offers a Kantian solution to a dilemma in contemporary epistemology regarding the relation between mind and world)
  • O’Neill, Onora (June 1998). «Kant on duties regarding nonrational nature». Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes. 72 (1): 211–228. doi:10.1111/1467-8349.00043. JSTOR 4107017.
  • Parfit, Derek. On What Matters (2 vols.). New York: Oxford University Press, 2011. ISBN 978-0-19-926592-3
  • Pinker, Steven. The Stuff of Thought. Viking Press, 2007. ISBN 978-0-670-06327-7. (Chapter 4 «Cleaving the Air» discusses Kant’s anticipation of modern cognitive science)
  • Wood, Allen W. Kant’s Ethical Thought. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999. ISBN 978-0-521-64836-3. (comprehensive, in-depth study of Kant’s ethics, with emphasis on formula of humanity as most accurate formulation of the categorical imperative)
  • Wood, Allen W. (June 1998). «Kant on duties regarding nonrational nature». Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes. 72 (1): 189–210. doi:10.1111/1467-8349.00042. JSTOR 4107017.

External links[edit]

  • Works by Immanuel Kant at Project Gutenberg
  • Works by or about Immanuel Kant at Internet Archive
  • Works by Immanuel Kant at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)
  • KantPapers, authors and papers database powered by PhilPapers, focused on Kant, and located at Cornell University
  • Immanuel Kant at the Encyclopædia Britannica
  • Immanuel Kant in the Christian Cyclopedia
  • Works by Immanuel Kant at Duisburg-Essen University
  • Stephen Palmquist’s Glossary of Kantian Terminology
  • Kant’s Ethical Theory – Kantian ethics explained, applied and evaluated
  • Notes on Utilitarianism – A conveniently brief survey of Kant’s Utilitarianism
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: An Overview
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Aesthetics
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Logic
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Metaphysics
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Philosophy of Mind
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Philosophy of Religion
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Radical Evil
  • Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant: Transcendental Idealism
  • The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Immanuel Kant

Иммануил Кант (нем. Immanuel Kant) 22 апреля 1724, Кёнигсберг, Пруссия — 12 февраля 1804, там же) — немецкий философ, родоначальник немецкой классической философии, стоящий на грани эпох Просвещения и Романтизма.
Родился в небогатой семье ремесленника-седельщика. Мальчик был назван в честь святого Эммануила. Под попечением доктора теологии Франца Альберта Шульца, заметившего в Иммануиле одарённость, Кант окончил престижную гимназию «Фридрихс-Коллегиум», а затем поступил в Кёнигсбергский университет. Из-за смерти отца завершить учёбу ему не удаётся и, чтобы прокормить семью, Кант на 10 лет становится домашним учителем. Именно в это время, в 1747—1755, он разработал и опубликовал свою космогоническую гипотезу происхождения Солнечной системы из первоначальной туманности, не утратившую актуальности до сих пор.
В 1755 Кант защищает диссертацию и получает докторскую степень, что, наконец, даёт ему право преподавать в университете. Начались сорок лет преподавательской деятельности.
Во время Семилетней войны с 1758 по 1762 год Кёнигсберг находился под юрисдикцией российского правительства, что нашло отражение в деловой переписке философа.
В частности, прошение на должность ординарного профессора в 1758 г. он адресует императрице Елизавете Петровне.
Естественнонаучные и философские изыскания Канта дополняются «политологическими» опусами: в трактате «К вечному миру» он впервые прописал культурные и философские основы будущего объединения Европы в семью просвещённых народов, утверждая, что «просвещение — это мужество пользоваться собственным разумом».
С 1770 принято вести отсчёт «критического» периода в творчестве Канта. В этом году в возрасте 46 лет он назначен профессором логики и метафизики Кёнигсбергского университета, где до 1797 преподавал обширный цикл дисциплин — философских, математических, физических.
В этот период Кантом были написаны фундаментальные философские работы, принёсшие учёному репутацию одного из выдающихся мыслителей XVIII века и оказавшие огромное влияние на дальнейшее развитие мировой философской мысли:
«Критика чистого разума» (1781) — гносеология (эпистемология)
«Критика практического разума» (1788) — этика
«Критика способности суждения» (1790) — эстетика
Будучи слаб здоровьем, Кант подчинил свою жизнь жёсткому режиму, что позволило ему пережить всех своих друзей. Его точность следования распорядку стала притчей во языцех даже среди пунктуальных немцев и вызвала к жизни немало поговорок и анекдотов. Женат он не был. Шутил, что когда он хотел иметь жену, не мог её содержать, а когда уже мог — то не хотел. Впрочем, женоненавистником также не был, охотно с ними беседовал, был приятным светским собеседником. В старости за ним ухаживала одна из сестёр.
Несмотря на философию, мог иногда проявить этнические предрассудки, в частности, юдофобию.
Кант был похоронен у восточного угла северной стороны Кафедрального собора Кёнигсберга в профессорском склепе, над его могилой была возведена часовня. В 1924 году, к 200-летию Канта, часовню заменили новым сооружением, в виде открытого колонного зала, разительно отличающимся по стилю от самого собора.

Иммануи́л Кант (нем. Immanuel Kant [ɪˈmaːnu̯eːl ˈkant]; 22 апреля 1724, Кёнигсберг, Пруссия — 12 февраля 1804, там же) — немецкий философ, родоначальник немецкой классической философии, человек, оказавший широчайшее влияние на историю современной западной философии. Написал ставший важнейшим и в то же время одним из самых трудных для понимания философских трудов — «Критика чистого разума». Идейный вдохновитель философской школы неокантианства.

Творчество Канта условно разделяют на два периода: докритический (1746—1770) и критический (начиная с 1780). Между ними находится так называемый «период молчания», когда Кант не издаёт важных работ, но набрасывает материал для будущей «критики». Докритический период — время, когда выходят натурфилософские и естественнонаучные труды. В течение же критического периода были написаны труды, определившие мысль Канта и ставшие основой его философии, а именно:

  • «Критика чистого разума» (1781 и 1787)
  • «Критика практического разума» (1788)
  • «Критика способности суждения» (1790)

И ряд менее значимых работ.

Биография

Детство и юность (1724—1740)

Семья и раннее детство

Иммануил Кант родился 22 апреля 1724 года в городе Кёнигсберг, Пруссия. Его отец — Иоганн Георг Кант — был мастером изготовления упряжек, переехал в Кёнигсберг из Тильзита. А мать Иммануила, Анна Регина Рейтер, была дочерью другого мастера упряжки. Георг Кант владел домашней мастерской, где и работал. Семья не была слишком богатой, однако пользовалась определённым местом в общественной иерархии. Кант по праву своего рождения стал членом гильдии мастеров упряжки, к которой относился Георг. Семья жила в трёхэтажном доме на окраине города. Иммануил был четвёртым ребёнком Георга и Анны, но к его рождению в живых осталась только его пятилетняя сестра. Из пяти рождённый после Иммануила детей только трое пережили раннее детство. Ни с кем из них философ особенно близок не был.

Семья Иммануила была религиозной, особенно это касалось Регины, которая являлась пиетисткой — движение внутри лютеранства, распространённое среди малообразованных горожан Кёнигсберга в те времена. Пиетистские общины подвергались дискриминации со стороны православного духовенства и администрации города. Пиетисты были в упадке после прибытия в город Франца Шульца, немецкого богослова, который был знаком с семьёй Канта, часто приходил к ним в гости. Иммануил вместе со своими братьями и сёстрами посещал библейские уроки Шульца. Кант уважал образ жизни своих родителей, однако это не связано с теологией. Нет также оснований полагать, что раннее знакомство с пиетизмом оставило какой-либо значительный след на последующем мировоззрении и философии Канта. Окраины Кёнигсберга не были безопасным местом для жизни. Наводнения, пожары и прочие бедствия часто преследовали жителей. Старый дом семьи Кантов сгорел в 1769 году.

При рождении Иммануила семья жила относительно благополучно, однако дела семьи пошли на спад по мере взросления мальчика. 1 марта 1729 умер его дед и семье пришлось взять ответственность за его бизнес. В 1733 году вся семья переехала в дом требующей ухода бабушки Иммануила, которая потеряла средства к жизни после смерти своего супруга. На новом месте финансовое состояние Кантов постоянно ухудшалось; этому способствовал и возраст Георга, и возросшая конкуренция. В 1730-х и 40-х годах Георгу стало слишком тяжело зарабатывать деньги, он не мог позволить дорогое и плотное питание. Тем не менее, во взрослом возрасте Иммануил Кант, исходя из рассказов знакомых, был благодарен воспитанию, полученному в своём доме. Он описывал своих родителей как честных, «нравственных и порядочных людей». Описывая свою мать, Кант представлял её как правоверную и заботливую женщину, «заложившую первый росток добра» в личность Канта. В 1735 году умерла его бабушка, а 18 декабря 1737 — и Регина Рейтер в возрасте 40 лет. Со смертью матери денежная ситуация в семье продолжала стремительно идти ко дну. В 1740 году дом семьи начал значиться «бедным», что позволяло платить сниженную налоговую ставку. Они получали помощь от других людей и родственников, в частности они получали дрова от благотворителей. Несмотря на вышеизложенное, будущий переписчик Иммануила Канта — Эхргот Васянски — отметил, что семья была значительно бедна, но не настолько, чтобы остро нуждаться в чём-либо.

Школьные годы

Вид на Фридрихс-Коллегиум

Иммануил Кант непродолжительное время обучался в окраинной школе при хосписе Святого Георгия. Франц Шульц находил Канта способным ребёнком и порекомендовал родителям перевести ребёнка для изучения богословия в престижную гимназию, в так называемый «Фридрихс-Коллегиум». Летом 1732 года восьмилетний Иммануил перевёлся в это учебное заведение, известное своей пиететской направленностью. Дети в нём обучались христианским ценностям, в учёбе ставился упор на гуманитарные науки. Его выходцы готовились к высоким церковным и гражданским должностям, поэтому для многих бедных семей Коллегиум был своего рода «социальным лифтом». Иммануил был занят школьными делами большую часть школьного периода жизни; практически большую часть учебного года не было никаких выходных, кроме как в воскресенье. Внутренняя разбивка на классы мешала детям заводить прочные отношения друг с другом. В гимназии Кант изучал древние языки и Библию, философию, логику и прочие предметы. Ему тяжело давалась теология, но, тем не менее, по выходе из гимназии он обладал обширными знаниями в этой области. Там он получил знания о древнегреческой философии и литературе, в частности студенты читали хрестоматию Иоганна Геснера, в которой содержались отрывки Аристотеля, Геродота, Ксенофонта, Плутарха и других философов. Также изучению подлежали древнегреческие литераторы: Гомер, Пиндар и Гесиод.

Кант хорошо владел латынью и между 1739 годом и сентябрём 1740 он вместе со своими товарищами свободно читали классических авторов во внеурочное время. На протяжении всей жизни он высоко ценил творчество древних авторов, среди которых находились Луций Сенека, Лукреций и Гораций. Даже в преклонном возрасте он мог цитировать по памяти многих авторов. Интерес к древней литературе подогревался учителем латыни, которого Кант очень почитал. Уроки каллиграфии ему нравились наименее всех других, по ним он регулярно получал низкие отметки. Возможно, Кант умел по меньшей мере читать тексты на французском языке, поскольку посещал необязательный курс французского языка в гимназии. Он не имел больших навыков английского языка; он не входил ни в программу гимназии, ни в программу университета, в который поступит Кант.

Уже взрослый Иммануил Кант с тревогой относился к своей гимназии и с «ужасом и страхом» вспоминал об этом, приравнивая своё школьное образование к рабству. Он критически описывал такие моменты воспитания, как необходимость вести так называемый «учёт души» — эссе, в котором каждый ученик регулярно должен был описывать своё душевное состояние. Он говорил, что подобное «наблюдение за собой» приводит к помешательству. Атмосфера строгости и наказаний царила в заведении, хотя сам Иммануил, вероятно, не подвергался частым наказаниям, поскольку практически по всем предметам имел высокие баллы. И всё же он плохо отзывался обо всех своих учителях, за исключением учителя латыни, вспоминал жестокость и телесные наказания в отношении учащихся. В конечном итоге зрелый Кант отверг пиетиетскую доктрину, связывая её с «рабским мышлением». Иммануил окончил Фридрихс-Коллегиум в 1740 году. В том же году Кёнигсберг посещал король Пруссии Фридрих II для своей инаугурации.

Студенчество (1740—1755)

Университетская жизнь

Изображение Кёнигсбергского университета на открытке 19 века

Поступив в Кёнигсбергский университет в 16 лет, Кант впервые за долгие годы испытал свободу в учении. После этого съехал из родительского дома и поселился в собственном жилье. Став студентом, Кант приобретает статус «гражданина академии», который тогда действовал в Пруссии. Это означало, что Кант отныне находится под юрисдикцией университета и фактически не должен исполнять повеления властей города или государства. Он также освобождался от воинской службы. Официальное зачисление в реестр студентов свершилось 24 сентября 1740. Фактически это означало переход из гильдии ремесленников в гильдию учёных, которые были значительно ближе к знати, чем простые торговцы. Становясь студентом, каждый должен был принести присягу на верность стране и религии, а к такой присяге допускались лишь лютеране, и чуть позже реформаторы. Кант же был освобождён от такой процедуры и был зачислен в студенты с обещанием подчиняться правилам. Поступая на факультет, Кант должен был выступить перед деканатом и показать свои знания в области логики, древней литературы, чтении Моисея и двух Евангелий в оригинале и общей эрудиции. Он успешно справился со вступительным испытанием. Точно неизвестно, на какую специальность поступил Кант, однако философию преподавали всем студентам вне зависимости от их интересов. Студент нашёл своё увлечение в философии и сильно преуспел в ней. Он давал уроки философии некоторым студентам и даже имел с этого некоторый доход. В университете он познакомился с Иоганном Вломером, с которым в одно время делил квартиру. В те времена молодой философ жил весьма экономно, но не испытывал нужны в чём либо, а многие потребности, такие как обновление одежды, если Кант не имел возможности приобрести её сам, на себя брал студенческий коллектив. Учёба для него была превыше всего, в розыгрышах, пьянках, драках и прочих развлечениях студенческой жизни он не участвовал. Ещё в студенческие годы многие новые ученики предпочитали держаться Канта, помогавшего им в учёбе. Многие младшекурсники уважали и брали пример с Канта. На тот период жизни пришлось увлечение Канта философией Мишель де Монтень, многие отрывки из которого он знал наизусть. Редким развлечением была игра со своими друзьями в бильярд, в который он часто играл и выигрывал деньги. Кант посещал даже лекции по теологии от Шульца, он стремился к любому знанию, даже не связанному с его непосредственными интересами. Он слушал лекции Иоганн Кипке, а его работы в области философии оставили впечатлили Канта. Одним из самых известных и почитаемых философов, у которых учился Кант, был Мартин Кнутцен. Несмотря на то, что Кнутцен ни разу не упоминается в трудах Иммануила Канта, принято считать, что он оказал значительное влияние, наибольшее из всех его университетских преподавателей. Он любил своего преподавателя больше всех остальных и не пропустил ни одного занятия. В 1738 Кнутцен предсказал падение кометы зимой 1744 года и, когда это произошло, он мгновенно стал знаменитостью далеко за пределами Кёнигсберга. В этом году был издан его труд «Rational Thoughts on the Comets». Это подтолкнуло Канта к науке и, вероятно, послужило в будущем источником вдохновения для книги «Всеобщая естественная история и теория небес». Иммануил Кант увлечённо следил за академическими диспутами вокруг предсказания Кнутцена, что вместе с изложенным ранее развило у мыслителя интерес к космогонии. Кроме того, именно Кнутцен познакомил Канта с трудами Исаака Ньютона. Сам Кнутцен при этом не придавал Канту большого значения. Перечисляя выдающихся учеников в переписке с Эйлером, он ни разу не упомянул имя Иммануила Канта.

Начало творчества

Обложка немецкого издания первого труда И. Канта

Разум Канта «созрел» в 1744 году, когда он берётся за написание своей первой работы — Мысли об истинной оценке живых сил. Кант публикует эту работу независимо, в то время как имел шанс написать её на латыни и представить как магистерскую диссертацию, однако, обходя барьеры академического рецензирования, пишет её на немецком языке в весьма надменном тоне, намереваясь посягнуть на авторитет Ньютона и Лейбница. Вероятно, он преследовал цель привлечь внимание к своей персоне, а не добиться успеха в академическом сообществе, хотя некоторые комментаторы Канта ложно приняли эту работу за его диссертацию, в то время как до защиты диссертации Канту оставалось по меньшей мере 10 лет. Произведение было окончено к 1746 году, когда Канту было 22 года, а в следующем году он написал введение и предисловие к труду. Кант выставил произведение на рецензирование ещё в 1746 году и оно было одобрено, но произведение было официально опубликовано с опозданием в 1749. В своём труде Кант исследует феномен силы в физике с точки зрения метафизики, полагая, что любая подобная проблема должна рассматриваться в таком ключе. В работе Кант вступает в полемику по поводу живой и мёртвой сил между Декартом и Лейбницем. Таким образом книга была посвящена в первую очередь научному сообществу, а именно участникам дискуссии вокруг феномена силы. Трактат изобилует нестандартными для современной физики натурфилософскими терминами. Профессор философии Мартин Шёнфельд называет «Мысли об истинной оценке живых сил» худшей работой Канта, критикуя в частности стиль изложения и излишнюю многословность. Иммануил Кант пытался урегулировать дебаты, найдя компромисс в обеих позициях, видя часть правды с обеих сторон, оставаясь при этом беспристрастным. Во введении он отвергает безусловный авторитет великих учёных и свободно высказывает как аргументы «за», так и «против» обеих сторон конфликта. Фактически проблема была решена Жаном Д’Аламбером ещё до входа книги Канта, но к моменту написания трактата Кант не был знаком с произведением Д’Аламбера. В работе был и ряд фактологических ошибок. Например, Кант не всегда правильно понимал аргументы сторон, делал ошибки в формулах, из чего Шёнфельд делает вывод, что на момент написания познания Канта в области механики были поверхностными. На произведение было написано несколько рецензий, среди них была критика от Готхольда Эфраима Лессинга, заявивший, что Кант «…исследует живые силы, но свои собственные оценить не может». Рассматривая свою работу в более зрелом возрасте, Кант испытывал чувство неловкости.

Отъезд из Кёнигсберга

В конце 1744 года тяжело заболел Георг Кант. Переживший инсульт отец Иммануила скончался 24 марта 1746, оставив без присмотра двух младших сестёр 17 и 14 лет и девятилетнего брата. Когда отец болел, Канту приходилось проводить долгое время у себя дома. Вероятно, значительная часть «Мысли об истинной оценке живых сил» была написана именно в этот период, когда посещения лекций в университете было затруднено. В течение двух лет после смерти отца Кант вынужден заботиться о доме, в котором он жил. Потребовалось много времени, чтобы продать имущество отца и позаботиться о сёстрах. Погрязнув в домашних делах, он теряет возможность продолжать обучение в университете, и вскоре после августа 1748 Иммануил Кант покидает Кёнигсберг. Иммануил Кант становится частным учителем для трёх семей: детей из баронского рода Кейзерлингов, Бернхарда Фридриха фон Хюльсена и пастора реформатской церкви в деревне Юдшен, сегодняшняя Весёловка, там он обучал троих детей пастора. У него сложились некоторые отношениями с членами местной общины, ему даже несколько раз предлагали стать крёстным отцом. У него сложились хорошие отношения с семьёй Бернхарда фон Хюльсена и общались с Кантом даже после его отъезда. Они считали Канта практически членом их семьи. Позже двое из учеников Канта делили с ним жильё в Кёнигсберге, когда те поступили в университет. Он старался помочь им продвинуться в университете. Несмотря на любовь его работодателей, сам Иммануил Кант критически относился к себе как к учителю, да и вовсе полагал профессию учителя слишком хлопотной. На протяжении своей работы частным учителем Кант делал наброски для будущих научных трудов и, вероятно, всегда рассматривал возможность возвращения в университет, поскольку не прекращал процесс обучения и не отказывался от «академического гражданства».

Кант — преподаватель (1755—1762)

Возвращение

Спустя шесть лет отсутствия, в августе 1754 года, Кант возвращается в Кёнигсберг для защиты диссертации и издания новых работ. Он постепенно возвращается к университетской жизни и, возможно, становится научным руководителем для одного из своих учеников из Кейзерлингов. В течение этого года он опубликовал два сочинения о космогонии в местном еженедельнике в преддверии выхода своего второго произведения — «Всеобщая естественная история и теория небес». Изначально он отвечал на конкурсный вопрос, выдвинутый Прусской академией наук: «изменяла ли Земля движение вокруг своей оси со времён возникновения?» В конкурсе он тем не менее участия не принимал. Кант опасался гонений со стороны духовенства, а потому приступил к работе над книгой только когда убедился, что будет в безопасности. Однако опасения были напрасны, поскольку произведение вышло практически незамеченным. У издателя труда в то время были проблемы в связи с банкротством. Кант решил продолжить над своей университетской карьерой. В это время Кант работал над своей магистерской диссертацией, которую представил на соискание 17 апреля 1755. Она носила название «Кратное размышление об огне». Кант выступил на публичном экзамене и 12 июня получил титул магистра философии. Учёное общество Кёнигсбергского университета хорошо приняло Канта и многое от него ожидало. Чтобы иметь возможность преподавать в университете, Канту пришлось написать ещё одну диссертацию, которая имела название «Каковы окончательные границы истины?». В этой работе поднимались вопросы о том, что считать истинным, критиковались модели истинности Вольфа и Лейбница, дополнялся принцип достаточного основания.

Титульный лист немецкого издания «Всеобщей истории», 1755

Космогония

В изданной анонимно в 1755 году книге «Всеобщая естественная история и теория небес» Кант отвечает на вопрос о происхождении Солнечной системы. Вероятно, источников вдохновения для написания труда послужил выпущенный в 1750 году труд Томаса Райта «Теория вселенной». Кант пытается объяснить происхождение и закономерностей, по которым движутся тела в Солнечной системе, тем, что нет оснований полагать, что то, как действуют небесные тела сейчас, действовали так всегда. Кант заключает, что пространство, на месте которого ныне находится Солнечная система, могло быть заполнено частицами пыли различной плотности, после чего наиболее плотные частицы стали притягивать окружающие. Наряду с силой тяготения он вводит «силу отталкивания» между наиболее мелкими частицами, что объясняет, почему частицы не сложились в единое целое. Под постоянным действием сил притяжения и отталкивания объекты начали вращаться, и этот процесс занимал миллионы лет. Он также допускал возможность жизни и в других галактиках, а также постулировал, что у земли есть начало, но нет конца. По Канту, Солнце начало нагреваться из-за силы трения между образующими его материй. Солнечная система продолжает развитие всё время и однажды все планеты и спутники «упадут» на Солнце, что вызовет увеличение его теплоты и расщепление тел на мелкие частицы. Туманности же, которые часто видны в телескоп, как считал Кант, являются такими же галактиками, как Млечный Путь, но они являются скоплениями более высокого порядка. Кант высказал предположение, что за Сатурном скрываются другие планеты, что действительно было подтверждено в будущем. Труд не был математически точным, однако был опубликован по просьбам знакомых, которые полагали, что таким образом можно привлечь внимание короля и получить финансирование на подтверждение этой гипотезы. Он был посвящён Фридриху II. Произведение не вызвало ажиотажа: большая часть тиража была либо уничтожена ввиду банкротства издателя, либо продана лишь в 60-е годы. Уже после публикации произведения, в 1761 и 1796 годах гипотеза Канта была независимо от первоисточника воспроизведена учёными Пьер-Симоном Лапласом и Иоганном Генрихом Ламбертом, не знавшими о своём предшественнике.

Портрет Иммануила Канта, выполненный в 1755 году Каролиной фон Кейзерлинг

Преподавание

Итак, в 1755 Кант становится преподавателем Кёнигсбергского университета, но не получает заработной платы от университета. Он довольствуется гонорарами, получаемыми от студентов, посещающих его курсы. Таким образом доход преподавателя определялся количеством студентов, записанных на лекции. Свою первую публичную лекцию Кант дал в переполненном студентами доме профессора Кипке, где он в то время жил. Занятия проводились отдельных лекционных залах, которыми преподаватели либо владели, либо арендовали. Каждый преподаватель должен был строго следовать учебным пособиям, прилагаемым к университетской программе, однако сам Кант лишь соблюдал порядок тем, намеченных в учебниках, в то время как на лекциях давал студентам свой собственный материал. На лекциях философ часто демонстрировал так называемый «сухой юмор». Его редко видели улыбающимся, так же он реагировал на смех аудитории от своих шуток. Людвиг Боровски, ученик и биограф Канта, отмечал, что Кант вёл свои занятия «свободно и остроумно», часто шутил, но «не позволял себе шуток с сексуальным подтекстом, которыми пользовались другие преподаватели». Своим ученикам преподаватель советовал «систематизировать свои знания у себя в голове под разными рубриками». С самого начала своей преподавательской деятельности Кант был весьма популярным лектором — его аудитории всегда были заполнены. В этот период Иммануил Кант интересовался этикой Фрэнсиса Хатчесона и философскими исследованиями Давида Юма, что во многом было продиктовано временем. Оба мыслителя были известны в те времена в столице. Со времён выпуска из гимназии богословие в его спектр интересов практически не попадало. Чтобы заработать на жизнь Канту приходилось брать изнурительное количество занятий. Он преподавал математику и логику, физику и метафизику. В 1756 году он также добавил и географию, а следующем году — этику. Университетские учебники были заполнены пустыми страницами, на которых Кант писал собственные заметки. Эти книги сохранились, что позволило исследователям лучше понимать генеалогию философии Канта. Он также носил с собой блокнот для записей. Первые два-три года преподавания были тяжелы для Канта. Он имел запас денег на крайний случай, но предпочитал при нужде продавать свои книги. Он носил одежду до тех пор, пока она окончательно не обветшает. Позже его дела значительно улучшились, как признавался сам Кант, он зарабатывал «более, чем достаточно». Имел двухкомнатную квартиру, мог позволить себе хорошую еду, а также нанять прислугу, но его работа всегда была шаткой и его благосостояние всегда зависело от его успешности как лектора. В 1756 его место преподавателя логики и метафизики было занято Кнутценом. Не желая терять место, Кант даже написал письмо королю, в котором сообщил, что «философия является наиболее важной областью его интересов», однако не получил никакого ответа. Чтобы улучшить своё положение, он попытался устроиться в местную школу, однако вакантное место занял Вильгельм Канерт, являвшийся ярым пиетистом. Скорее всего Кант был отвергнут по религиозным причинам, хотя в то же время у его конкурента на должность имелся больший опыт преподавания. Среди друзей Канта были писатель Иоганн Линднер и востоковед Георг Кипке.

К концу 50-х годов в Пруссии бушевала Семилетняя война. После сражения при Гросс-Егерсдорфе прусским войскам пришлось сдать город Кёнигсберг. В самом городе боевых действий не велось. 22 января 1758 года в Кёнигсберг вошли русские солдаты во главе с Виллимом Фермором, так началась оккупация города Российской империей вплоть до 1762 года. Российские офицеры посещали лекции в университете и Кант не сторонился их общества и даже проводил для них частные занятия; всё это шло на пользу финансовому благополучию Канта. Также русские часто приглашали преподавателя на обед. Кант с удовольствием посещал встречи дворянских офицеров, богатых купцов и прочей знати, на которые его звали. В это же время он стал частым гостем у Кейзерлингов. Графиня этого рода была увлечена философией, что послужило причиной её тёплых отношений с Кантом. За обеденным столом Кант почти всегда занимал почётное место рядом с графиней. Канту приходилось заботиться о своём внешнем виде прилежнее прошлого, он тщательно подбирал одежду, носил пальто с золотой каймой и даже использовал в качестве украшения церемониальный меч. Кант никогда не был женат и, возможно, до конца жизни оставался девственен. Это не свидетельствует, тем не менее, что он находился на расстоянии он женщин или был женоненавистником. Кроме графини он испытывал симпатию к другим женщинам, что отмечается его биографами, однако неоднократно не решался сделать предложение брака, боясь, что не сможет содержать супругу. В какой-то момент Кант перестал испытывать потребность в браке, даже когда его финансы позволяли содержать семью. Тем временем в 1758 году должности преподавателя логики и метафизики стали вакантными, Кант подал на них заявление, но безуспешно.

На пути к «Критике» (1762—)

Портрет Эммануила Сведенборга, около 1766

До возвращения Кёнигсберга Пруссии в 1762 году Кант не написал значимых трудов. С 1756 по 1762 были изданы лишь три буклета для рекламы его лекций и небольшое эссе «Мысли, вызванные безвременной кончиной высокоблагородного господина Иоганна Фридриха фон Функа». Перед тем как вступить на дорогу изучения метафизики в критическом периоде, внимание Канта устремлено на проблемы метафизики и формальной логики, которой посвящает вышедший в 1762 году труд «Ложное мудрствование в четырёх фигурах силлогизма», где ставит под сомнение силлогизмы в логике, и вышедший в следующем году «Опыт введения в философию понятия отрицательных величин», где продолжает своё рассуждение. В «Опыте введения» Кант размышляет о противоположностях. Он заключает, что между противоположностями в логике как инструменте суждения и противоположностями на практике существует противоречие. К тому же Кант предложил ввести в философскую дисциплину часть математической методологии, не связанной, однако, со строгими логическими рассуждениями, поскольку они, как Кант уже постулировал, часто не показывают реальную суть вещей.

Кант и Сведенборг

10 августа 1763 году Кант в переписке с Шарлоттой фон Кноблох обсуждает фигуру Эммануила Сведенборга — шведского философа и христианского мистика. Незадолго до этого Шарлотта попросила философа прокомментировать фигуру Сведенборга, рассказы о духовидении которого были популярны в то время, что и послужило своего рода толчком к исследованию феномена. В письме Кант указал, что впервые узнал об этой персоне от его студента — датского офицера, которому позже отослал письмо с просьбой собрать всевозможную информацию о Сведенборге. Более того: Кант сам написал письмо лично Сведенборгу, тот принял его с трепетом, но ответить обязался в своей новой книге, выход которой готовился в Лондоне. Не дожидаясь ответа, Кант попросил своего знакомого из Англии при поездке в Стокгольм собрать всевозможные сведения касательно духовидения Сведенборга; он поведал Канту о двух историях, которые ему удалось услышать. Во-первых, со слов свидетелей, Сведенборг помог одной женщине найти квитанцию при помощи якобы диалога с духом её умершего супруга. Во-вторых, Сведенборг предсказал пожар в Стокгольме, действительно имевший место через несколько дней после провидения.

Критический период

В письме К. Ф. Штойдлину от 4 мая 1793 года Кант рассказал о целях своей работы:

Давно задуманный план относительно того, как нужно обработать поле чистой философии, состоял в решении трёх задач:

  1. что я могу знать? (метафизика);
  2. что я должен делать? (мораль);
  3. на что я смею надеяться? (религия);

наконец, за этим должна была последовать четвёртая задача — что такое человек? (антропология, лекции по которой я читаю в течение более чем двадцати лет).

В этот период Кантом были написаны фундаментальные философские работы, принёсшие учёному репутацию одного из выдающихся мыслителей XVIII века и оказавшие огромное влияние на дальнейшее развитие мировой философской мысли:

  • «Критика чистого разума» (1781) — гносеология (эпистемология)
  • «Критика практического разума» (1788) — этика
  • «Критика способности суждения» (1790) — эстетика

Старчество Канта (1796—1804)

Похороны и смерть

Последние мгновения жизни Иммануила Канта пришлись на конец 18-го века, когда, в 1799 году, его ум ввиду старости стал постепенно слабеть, что особенно проявилось в последние два года жизни философа, а к самому себе в беседе с некоторыми из приятелей он просил относиться «как к ребёнку». Немецкий юрист Иоганн Шеффнер — близкий друг Канта — ещё за годы до его смерти полагал, что «гений, которым всё было сделано за его [Канта] жизнь, исчез». Шеффнер описал смерть друга как «спокойную и тихую». В последние годы жизни Канта за ним присматривала его сестра Катрина Барбара. Мертвое тело Иммануила Канта было похоронено лишь через 16 дней после смерти, потому что заледеневшая ввиду холодной погоды земля не позволила выкопать могилу. В течение этого времени тело Канта было представлено широкому числу желающих попрощаться. Многие местные жители, даже незнакомые с Кантом и его творчеством, были заинтересованы происходящим. В день похорон все церковные колокола звенели, похоронная процессия была достаточно многолюдной. Для Канта была адаптирована кантата, изначально написанная после смерти для прусского короля Фридриха II. Некоторые особенно правоверные христиане, даже лично знакомые с Кантом (такие как, например, Людвиг Боровски), опасаясь за свою церковную репутацию, воздержались от посещения похорон Канта.

Могила Иммануила Канта

Здание бывшего кафедрального собора, в котором покоится Кант

Общий вид на могилу

Надгробие Канта вблизи

Члены Ассоциации немецких домохозяек на фоне колонн

Существует мнение, что Кант иногда проявлял юдофобию.

Кант писал: «Sapere aude! — имей мужество пользоваться собственным умом! — таков… девиз Просвещения».

Кант был похоронен у восточного угла северной стороны Кафедрального собора Кёнигсберга в профессорском склепе, над его могилой была возведена часовня. В 1924 году, к 200-летию Канта, часовню заменили новым сооружением, в виде открытого колонного зала, разительно отличающимся по стилю от самого собора.

Философия

Гносеология

Кант отвергал догматический способ познания и считал, что вместо него нужно взять за основу метод критического философствования, сущность которого заключается в исследовании самого разума, границ, которые может достичь разумом человек, и изучении отдельных способов человеческого познания.

Главным философским произведением Канта является «Критика чистого разума». Исходной проблемой для Канта является вопрос «Как возможно чистое знание?». Прежде всего, это касается возможности чистой математики и чистого естествознания («чистый» означает «неэмпирический», априорный, или внеопытный). Указанный вопрос Кант формулировал в терминах различения аналитических и синтетических суждений — «Как возможны синтетические суждения априори?». Под «синтетическими» суждениями Кант понимал суждения с приращением содержания по сравнению с содержанием входящих в суждение понятий. Эти суждения Кант отличал от аналитических суждений, раскрывающих смысл понятий. Аналитические и синтетические суждения различаются тем, вытекает ли содержание предиката суждения из содержания его субъекта (таковы аналитические суждения) или, наоборот, добавляется к нему «извне» (таковы синтетические суждения). Термин «априори» означает «вне опыта», в противоположность термину «апостериори» — «из опыта». Так возникают четыре рубрики:

суждения аналитические синтетические
апостериорные  

невозможны

например:

«некоторые тела тяжелы»

априорные например:

«квадрат имеет четыре угла»

«тела протяжённы»

например:

«прямая есть кратчайшее расстояние между двумя точками»

«во всех телесных изменениях количество материи остаётся неизменным»

Аналитические суждения всегда априорны: опыт для них не нужен, поэтому апостериорных аналитических суждений не бывает. Соответственно, опытные (апостериорные) суждения всегда синтетичны, поскольку их предикаты черпают из опыта содержание, которого не было в субъекте суждения. Что касается априорных синтетических суждений, то они, согласно Канту, входят в состав математики и естествознания. Благодаря априорности, эти суждения содержат всеобщее и необходимое знание, то есть такое, которое невозможно извлечь из опыта; благодаря синтетичности, такие суждения дают прирост знания.

Кант, вслед за Юмом, соглашается, что если наше познание начинается с опыта, то его связь — всеобщность и необходимость — не из него. Однако, если Юм из этого делает скептический вывод о том, что связь опыта является всего лишь привычкой, то Кант эту связь относит к необходимой априорной деятельности разума (в широком смысле). Выявление этой деятельности разума в отношении опыта Кант называет трансцендентальным исследованием. «Я называю трансцендентальным… познание, занимающееся не столько предметами, сколько видами нашего познания предметов…», — пишет Кант.

Кант не разделял безграничной веры в силы человеческого разума, называя эту веру догматизмом. Кант, по его словам, совершил Коперниканский переворот в философии, тем, что первым указал, что для обоснования возможности знания следует исходить из того, что не наши познавательные способности соответствуют миру, а мир должен сообразовываться с нашими способностями, чтобы вообще могло состояться познание. Иначе говоря, наше сознание не просто пассивно постигает мир как он есть на самом деле (догматизм), но, скорее, наоборот, мир сообразуется с возможностями нашего познания, а именно: разум является активным участником становления самого мира, данного нам в опыте. Опыт по сути есть синтез того чувственного содержания («материи»), которое даётся миром (вещей в себе) и той субъективной формы, в которой эта материя (ощущения) постигается сознанием. Единое синтетическое целое материи и формы Кант и называет опытом, который по необходимости становится чем-то только субъективным. Именно поэтому Кант различает мир как он есть сам по себе (то есть вне формирующей деятельности разума) — вещь-в-себе, и мир как он дан в явлении, то есть в опыте.

В опыте выделяются два уровня формообразования (активности) субъекта. Во-первых, это априорные формы чувства (чувственного созерцания)— пространство (внешнее чувство) и время (внутреннее чувство). В созерцании чувственные данные (материя) осознаются нами в формах пространства и времени, и тем самым опыт чувства становится чем-то необходимым и всеобщим. Это чувственный синтез. На вопрос, как возможна чистая, то есть теоретическая, математика, Кант отвечает: она возможна как априорная наука на основе чистых созерцаний пространства и времени. Чистое созерцание (представление) пространства лежит в основе геометрии (трёхмерность: например, взаиморасположение точек и прямых и других фигур), чистое представление времени — в основе арифметики (числовой ряд предполагает наличие счёта, а условием для счёта является время).

Во-вторых, благодаря категориям рассудка связываются данности созерцания. Это рассудочный синтез. Рассудок, согласно Канту, имеет дело с априорными категориями, которые суть «формы мышления». Путь к синтезированному знанию лежит через синтез ощущений и их априорных форм — пространства и времени — с априорными категориями рассудка. «Без чувственности ни один предмет не был бы нам дан, а без рассудка ни один нельзя было бы мыслить» (Кант). Познание достигается путём соединения созерцаний и понятий (категорий) и представляет собой априорное упорядочение явлений, выражающееся в конструировании предметов на основе ощущений.

Кант выделяет 12 категорий рассудка:

  1. категории количества
    1. единство
    2. множество
    3. цельность
  2. категории качества
    1. реальность
    2. отрицание
    3. ограничение
  3. категории отношения
    1. субстанция и принадлежность
    2. причина и следствие
    3. взаимодействие
  4. категории модальности
    1. возможность и невозможность
    2. существование и несуществование
    3. необходимость и случайность

Чувственный материал познания, упорядоченный посредством априорных механизмов созерцания и рассудка, становится тем, что Кант называет опытом. На основе ощущений (которые можно выразить констатациями типа «это жёлтое» или «это сладкое»), которые оформляются через время и пространство, а также через априорные категории рассудка, возникают суждения восприятия: «камень тёплый», «солнце круглое», затем — «солнце светило, а потом камень стал тёплым», и далее — развитые суждения опыта, в которых наблюдаемые объекты и процессы подведены под категорию причинности: «солнце вызвало нагревание камня» и т. д. Понятие опыта у Канта совпадает с понятием природы: «…природа и возможный опыт — совершенно одно и то же».

Основой всякого синтеза является, согласно Канту, трансцендентальное единство апперцепции («апперцепция» — термин Лейбница). Это — логическое самосознание, «порождающее представление я мыслю, которое должно иметь возможность сопровождать все остальные представления и быть одним и тем же во всяком сознании». Как пишет И. С. Нарский, трансцендентальная апперцепция Канта — это «принцип постоянства и системной организации действия категорий, вытекающей из единства применяющего их, рассуждающего „я“. (…) Она есть общая для… эмпирических „я“ и в этом смысле объективная логическая структура их сознания, обеспечивающая внутреннее единство опыта, науки и природы».

В «Критике» много места уделяется тому, как представления подводятся под понятия рассудка (категории). Здесь решающую роль играют способность суждения, воображение и рассудочный категориальный схематизм. Согласно Канту, между созерцаниями и категориями должно быть посредствующее звено, благодаря которому абстрактные понятия, каковыми являются категории, оказываются способными организовывать чувственные данные, превращая их в законосообразный опыт, то есть в природу. Посредником между мышлением и чувственностью у Канта выступает продуктивная сила воображения. Эта способность создаёт схему времени как «чистого образа всех предметов чувств вообще». Благодаря схеме времени существует, например, схема «множественности» — число как последовательное присоединение друг к другу единиц; схема «реальности» — бытие предмета во времени; схема «субстанциальности» — устойчивость реального предмета во времени; схема «существования» — наличие предмета в определённое время; схема «необходимости» — наличие некоего предмета во всякое время. Продуктивной силой воображения субъект, по Канту, порождает основоположения чистого естествознания (они же — наиболее общие законы природы). Согласно Канту, чистое естествознание есть результат априорного категориального синтеза.

Знание даётся путём синтеза категорий и наблюдений. Кант впервые показал, что наше знание о мире не является пассивным отображением реальности; по Канту, оно возникает благодаря активной творческой деятельности бессознательной продуктивной силы воображения.

Наконец, описав эмпирическое применение рассудка (то есть применение его в опыте), Кант задаётся вопросом возможности чистого применения разума (рассудок, согласно Канту — низшая ступень разума, применение которой ограничивается сферой опыта). Здесь возникает новый вопрос: «Как возможна метафизика?». В результате исследования чистого разума Кант показывает, что разум, когда он пытается получить однозначные и доказательные ответы на собственно философские вопросы, неизбежно ввергает себя в противоречия; это означает, что разум не может иметь трансцендентного применения, которое позволило бы ему достигать теоретического знания о вещах в себе, поскольку, стремясь выйти за пределы опыта, он «запутывается» в паралогизмах и антиномиях (противоречиях, каждое из утверждений которых одинаково обосновано); разум в узком смысле — как противоположность оперирующему категориями рассудку — может иметь только регулятивное значение: быть регулятором движения мысли к целям систематического единства, давать систему принципов, которым должно удовлетворять всякое знание.

антиномии
чистого разума
тезисы антитезисы
1 «Мир имеет начало во времени и ограничен также в пространстве» «Мир не имеет начала во времени и границ в пространстве; он бесконечен и во времени, и в пространстве»
2 «Всякая сложная субстанция в мире состоит из простых частей, и вообще существует только простое или то, что сложено из простого» «Ни одна сложная вещь в мире не состоит из простых частей, и вообще в мире нет ничего простого»
3 «Причинность по законам природы есть не единственная причинность, из которой можно вывести все явления в мире. Для объяснения явлений необходимо ещё допустить свободную причинность» «Нет никакой свободы, всё совершается в мире только по законам природы»
4 «К миру принадлежит или как часть его, или как его причина безусловно необходимая сущность» «Нигде нет никакой абсолютно необходимой сущности — ни в мире, ни вне мира — как его причины»

Кант утверждает, что решение антиномий «никогда нельзя найти в опыте…».

Решением первых двух антиномий Кант считает выявление ситуации, при которой «сам вопрос не имеет смысла». Кант утверждает, как пишет И. С. Нарский, «что к миру вещей в себе вне времени и пространства свойства „начала“, „границы“, „простоты“ и „сложности“ не применимы, а мир явлений никогда не бывает нам дан во всей полноте именно как целостный „мир“, эмпирия же фрагментов феноменального мира вложению в эти характеристики не поддаётся…». Что касается третьей и четвёртой антиномий, то спор в них, согласно Канту «улаживается», если признать истинность их антитезисов для явлений и предположить (регулятивную) истинность их тезисов для вещей в себе. Таким образом, существование антиномий, по Канту, является одним из доказательств правоты его трансцендентального идеализма, противопоставившего мир вещей в себе и мир явлений.

Согласно Канту, всякая будущая метафизика, которая хочет быть наукой, должна принимать во внимание выводы его критики чистого разума.

Этика и проблема религии

В «Основах метафизики нравственности» и «Критике практического разума» Кант излагает теорию этики. Практический разум в учении Канта — единственный источник принципов морального поведения; это разум, перерастающий в волю. Этика Канта автономна и априорна, она устремлена на должное, а не на сущее. Её автономность означает независимость моральных принципов от внеморальных доводов и оснований. Ориентиром для кантовской этики являются не фактические поступки людей, а нормы, вытекающие из «чистой» моральной воли. Это этика долга. В априоризме долга Кант ищет источник всеобщности моральных норм.

Категорический императив

Императив — правило, которое содержит «объективное принуждение к поступку». Нравственный закон — принуждение, необходимость действовать вопреки эмпирическим воздействиям. А значит, он приобретает форму принудительного веления — императива.

Гипотетические императивы (относительные или условные императивы) говорят о том, что поступки эффективны для достижения определённых целей (например, удовольствия или успеха).

Принципы морали восходят к одному верховному принципу — категорическому императиву, предписывающему поступки, которые хороши сами по себе, объективно, безотносительно к какой-либо иной, кроме самой нравственности, цели (например, требование честности). Категорический императив гласит:

  • «поступай только согласно такой максиме, руководствуясь которой ты в то же время можешь пожелать, чтобы она стала всеобщим законом» [варианты: «поступай всегда так, чтобы максима (принцип) твоего поведения могла стать всеобщим законом (поступай так, как ты бы мог пожелать, чтобы поступали все)»];
  • «поступай так, чтобы ты всегда относился к человечеству и в своём лице, и в лице всякого другого также, как к цели, и никогда не относился бы к нему только как к средству» [вариант формулировки: «относись к человечеству в своём лице (так же, как и в лице всякого другого) всегда как к цели и никогда — только как к средству»];
  • «принцип воли каждого человека как воли, всеми своими максимами устанавливающей всеобщие законы»: следует «совершать всё, исходя из максимы своей воли как такой, которая могла бы также иметь предметом самое себя как волю, устанавливающую всеобщие законы».

Это три разных способа представлять один и тот же закон, и каждый из них объединяет в себе два других.

Существование человека «имеет в себе самом высшую цель…»; «… только нравственность и человечество, поскольку оно к ней способно, обладают достоинством», — пишет Кант.

Долг есть необходимость действия из уважения к нравственному закону.

В этическом учении человек рассматривается с двух точек зрения:

  • человек как явление;
  • человек как вещь в себе.

Поведение первого определено исключительно внешними обстоятельствами и подчиняется гипотетическому императиву. Поведение второго должно подчиняться категорическому императиву, высшему априорному моральному принципу. Таким образом, поведение может определяться и практическими интересами, и моральными принципами. Возникают две тенденции: стремление к счастью (удовлетворению некоторых материальных потребностей) и стремление к добродетели. Эти стремления могут противоречить друг другу, и так возникает «антиномия практического разума».

В качестве условий применимости категорического императива в мире явлений Кант выдвигает три постулата практического разума. Первый постулат требует полной автономии человеческой воли, её свободы. Этот постулат Кант выражает формулой: «Ты должен, значит ты можешь». Признавая, что без надежды на счастье у людей не хватило бы душевных сил исполнять свой долг вопреки внутренним и внешним препятствиям, Кант выдвигает второй постулат: «должно существовать бессмертие души человека». Антиномию стремления к счастью и стремления к добродетели Кант, таким образом, разрешает путём перенесения надежд личности в сверхэмпирический мир. Для первого и второго постулатов нужен гарант, а им может быть только Бог, значит, он должен существовать — таков третий постулат практического разума.

Автономность этики Канта означает зависимость религии от этики. Согласно Канту, «религия ничем не отличается от морали по своему содержанию».

Учение о праве и государстве

Государство — объединение множества людей, подчинённых правовым законам.

В учении о праве Кант развивал идеи французских просветителей: необходимость уничтожения всех форм личной зависимости, утверждение личной свободы и равенство перед законом. Юридические законы Кант выводил из нравственных. Кант признавал право на свободное высказывание своего мнения, но с оговоркой: «рассуждайте сколько угодно и о чём угодно, только повинуйтесь».

Государственные устройства не могут быть неизменными и меняются тогда, когда перестают быть необходимыми. И лишь республика отличается прочностью (закон самостоятелен и не зависит от какого-то отдельного лица).

В учении об отношениях между государствами Кант выступает против несправедливого состояния этих отношений, против господства в международных отношениях права сильного. Он высказывается за создание равноправного союза народов. Кант считал, что такой союз приближает человечество к осуществлению идеи вечного мира.

Учение о целесообразности. Эстетика

В 1790 году, после написания «Критики чистого разума» (1781) и «Критики практического разума» (1788) Иммануил Кант создаёт ещё один труд, «Критику способности суждения». Именно он должен связать две предшествующие критики в одну систему философских суждений Канта.

Понятие целесообразности является одним из основных понятий в философии Канта и является критерием соответствия предмета с его целью, сущностью. В соответствии с понятием целесообразности способность суждения, согласно Канту, разделяется на рефлектирующую и определяющую. Если объективная с точки зрения целесообразности, определяющая способность суждения неразрывно связана с процессом познания окружающего мира и изучением его устройства, то рефлектирующая способность суждения не связана с понятием рассудка и представляет собой лишь обращение внимание на частности. Субъективная, рефлектирующая способность суждения, не связанная с научными методами, оказывается у Канта эстетической.

«Если общее (правило, принцип, закон) дано, то способность суждения, которая подводит под него особенное (и в том случае, если она в качестве трансцендентальной способности суждения априорно указывает условия, при которых только и может быть совершено это подведение) есть определяющая способность суждения; если же дано только особенное, для которого способность суждения должна найти общее, то эта способность есть рефлектирующая способность суждения».

Особым случаем целесообразности по Канту становится формальная целесообразность природы. Поскольку в природе нет цели, её следует рассматривать с точки зрения целесообразности её формы. Именно из-за своей бесцельности природа по Канту становится самым значимым объектом его эстетики.

В эстетике Кант различает два вида эстетических категорий — прекрасное и возвышенное. У Канта прекрасное выступает как «символ нравственно доброго». Возвышенное — это совершенство, связанное с безграничностью в силе (динамически возвышенное) или в пространстве (математически возвышенное).

«Представляя возвышенное в природе, душа ощущает себя взволнованной, тогда как при эстетическом суждении о прекрасном она находится в состоянии спокойного созерцания».

В «Критике способности суждения» Иммануил Кант даёт определение гения в соответствии с его философской концепцией. Так, гений, существующий только в искусстве, — врождённая способность души воплощать эстетические идеи.

«Гений — это врождённая способность души (ingenium), посредством которой природа даёт искусству правила».

О человеке

Воззрения Канта на человека отражены в книге «Антропология с прагматической точки зрения» (1798 год). Главная её часть состоит из трёх разделов в соответствии с тремя способностями человека: познание, чувство удовольствия и неудовольствия, способность желать.

Человек — это «самый главный предмет в мире», так как у него есть самосознание.

Человек — это высшая ценность, это личность. Самосознание человека порождает эгоизм как природное свойство человека. Человек не проявляет его только тогда, когда рассматривает своё «Я» не как весь мир, а только как часть его. Нужно обуздывать эгоизм, контролировать разумом душевные проявления личности.

Человек может иметь неосознанные представления — «тёмные». Во мраке может протекать процесс рождения творческих идей, о которых человек может знать только на уровне ощущений.

От сексуального чувства (страсти) мутится разум. Но у человека на чувства и желания накладывается нравственная и культурная норма.

Анализу Канта подверглось такое понятие, как гений. «Талант к изобретению называют гением».

Память

Могила Иммануила Канта у Кафедрального собора Кёнигсберга

После Второй мировой войны могила была восстановлена и сохранена большевиками. В первый месяцах 1974 года в газету «Известия» поступило анонимное письмо от некоего Любимова, выступившего в защиту усыпальнице, в которой покоится Кант. Копии письма были отосланы в Министерство культуры РСФСР. В апреле 1947 на заседании городской ВКП(б) в городе Калининграде было вынесено решение касательно немецких памятников. Городское управление обязали осуществить разбор завалин и приведение территории близ могилы Иммануила Канта в надлежащий вид. К могиле на следующий день была приставлена охрана. Отдел агитации и пропаганды должен был составить текст для мемориальной доски, который был готов 12 мая. Он гласил: «Имманиул Кант, 1724—1804. Крупный буржуазный философ-идеалист. Родился, безвыездно жил и умер в г. Кёнигсберге». В будущем власти города принимали участие в благоустройстве могилы Канта. Окончательный статус могилы был определён 24 февраля 1950, когда Совет министров РСФСР внёс могилу философа в список памятников культуры общесоюзного значения. Областное управление культуры 24 апреля 1954 года попросило заведующего городским похоронным бюро В. Т. Святцева возвести двухметровую ограду на могиле Иммануила Канта, а на стене сделать надпись «Могила Канта охраняется государством». Ремонт и благоустройство объекта было завершено к 1956 году.

Имя Иммануила Канта после голосования граждан было занесено в список кандидатов конкурса Великие имена России, организованном в 2018 году для того, чтобы присвоить аэропортам России имена выдающихся деятелей. Среди конкурентов Канта были такие персоны, как Иван Баграмян, Михаил Богданович Барклай-де-Толли, императрица Елизавета Петровна и прочие. Имя Канта в списках вызвало негодование у Игоря Мухаметшина, вице-адмирала ВМФ Российской Федерации, который назвал Иммануила Канта «предателем родины».

Все говорят Кант, Кант, философ, там еще чего-то — это человек, который предал свою родину, который унижался и на коленях ползал, чтобы ему дали кафедру, понимаете, в университете — чтобы он там преподавал, писал какие-то непонятные книги, которые никто из здесь стоящих не читал и никогда читать не будет.

Игорь Мухаметшин

Игорь Мухаметшин призвал подчинённых, а также их родственников голосовать «против» фигуры Иммануила Канта. Аналогичным образом выступил депутат Государственной Думы от Республики Татарстан Марат Бариев. По мнению Бариева, «скандальная» ситуация вокруг фигурирующего в списках имени Иммануила Канта «оскорбляет ветеранов Великой Отечественной войны». Он аргументирует это тем, что Канта «нельзя назвать соотечественником». Ночью 27 Ноября 2018 года памятник Канту подвергся нападению вандалов. Рядом с облитой краской статуей философа были разбросаны листовки с призывом срывать таблички, посвящённые Канту. Подобной атаке подверглись могила и мемориальная табличка на Ленинском проспекте города Калининграда. Кант некоторое время уверенно лидировал в голосовании, но в конечном счёте первенство досталось Елизавете Петровне.

Ошибка с портретом

Существует широко распространённое заблуждение, когда под видом портрета Иммануила Канта даётся портрет философа Фридриха Генриха Якоби, кисти Иоганна Христиана фон Манлиха. Эта ошибка сопутствует не только интернет-публикациям, но и некоторым официальным изданиям. Так, в России под портретом Якоби были неоднократно опубликованы как сочинения самого философа, так и его биографии. Например, «Критика чистого разума», биография Канта, за авторством Манфреда Кюна, «Жизнь и учение Канта» и многие другие. Сопутствует эта ошибка и иностранным изданиям, связанным с философом.

Сочинения

  • Критика чистого разума
  • Пролегомены ко всякой будущей метафизике
  • Критика практического разума
  • Основы метафизики нравственности
  • Критика способности суждения
  • Антропология с прагматической точки зрения
  • Akademieausgabe von Immanuel Kants Gesammelten Werken (нем.)

Русские издания

  • Иммануил Кант. Классические космогонические гипотезы. Сборник оригинальных работ. — 1923
  • Иммануил Кант. Сочинения в шести томах. Том 1. — М., 1963, 543 с (Философское наследие, Т. 4)
  • Иммануил Кант. Сочинения в шести томах. Том 2. — М., 1964, 510 с (Философское наследие, Т. 5)
  • Иммануил Кант. Сочинения в шести томах. Том 3. — М., 1964, 799 с (Философское наследие, Т. 6)
  • Иммануил Кант. Сочинения в шести томах. Том 4, часть 1. — М., 1965, 544 с (Философское наследие, Т. 14)
  • Иммануил Кант. Сочинения в шести томах. Том 4, часть 2. — М., 1965, 478 с (Философское наследие, Т. 15)
  • Иммануил Кант. Сочинения в шести томах. Том 5. — М., 1966, 564 с (Философское наследие, Т. 16)
  • Иммануил Кант. Сочинения в шести томах. Том 6. — М., 1966, 743 с (Философское наследие, Т. 17)
  • Иммануил Кант. Трактаты и письма. — М.: «Наука», 1980, 710 с. (Памятники философской мысли)
  • Иммануил Кант. Критика чистого разума. — М., 1994, 574 с (Философское наследие, Т. 118)
  • Иммануил Кант. Собрание сочинений в 8 томах. — Издательство: ЧОРО, 1994 г. — ISBN 5-8497-0001-3, ISBN 5-8497-0002-1, ISBN 5-8497-0003-X, ISBN 5-8497-0004-8, ISBN 5-8497-0005-6, ISBN 5-8497-0006-4, ISBN 5-8497-0007-2, ISBN 5-8497-0008-0.
  • Иммануил Кант. Лекции по этике. — М.: Республика, 2000. — 431 с.
  • Иммануил Кант. Критика чистого разума / Пер. с нем. Н. Лосского сверен и отредактирован Ц. Г. Арзаканяном и М. И. Иткиным; Примеч. Ц. Г. Арзаканяна. — М.: Эксмо, 2007. — 736 с. — ISBN 5-699-14702-0
  • Иммануил Кант. Критика чистого разума / (Пер. с нем.; предисл. И. Евлампиева). — М.: Эксмо; СПб.:Мидгард, 2007. — 1120 с. — (Гиганты мысли) — ISBN 5-91016-017-4
  • Иммануил Кант. Лекции о философском учении о религии / И. Кант; пер. с нем. Л. Э. Крыштоп. — М.: Канон+, 2016. — 384 с. — ISBN 978-5-88373-004-6

Собрание сочинений в 8 томах

Том 1

  • Мысли об истинной оценке живых сил (1749)
  • Исследование вопроса, претерпела ли Земля в своём вращении вокруг оси, благодаря которому происходит смена дня и ночи, некоторые изменения со времени своего возникновения (1754)
  • Вопрос о том, стареет ли Земля с физической точки зрения (1754)
  • Всеобщая естественная история и теория неба (1755)
  • Новое освещение первых принципов метафизического познания (1755)
  • Физическая монадология (1756)
  • О причинах землетрясений (1756)
  • Новые замечания для пояснения теории ветров (1756)
  • План лекций по физической географии и уведомление о них (1757)
  • Новая теория движения и покоя (1758)
  • Единственно возможное основание для доказательства бытия Бога (1762)

Том 2

  • Опыт некоторых рассуждений об оптимизме (1759)
  • Мысли, вызванные безвременной кончиной высокоблагородного господина Иоганна Фридриха фон Функа (1760)
  • Ложное мудрствование в четырёх фигурах силлогизма (1762)
  • Опыт введения в философию понятия отрицательных величин (1963)
  • Наблюдения над чувством прекрасного и возвышенного (1764)
  • Опыт о болезнях головы (1764)
  • Исследования отчетливости принципов естественной теологии и морали (1764)
  • Уведомление о расписании лекций на зимнее полугодие (1765)
  • Грёзы духовидца, пояснённые грёзами метафизики (1766)
  • О первом основании различия сторон в пространстве (1768)
  • О форме и принципах чувственно воспринимаемого и интеллигибельного мира (1770)
  • Рецензия на сочинение Москати «О существенном различии в строении тела животных и людей» (1771)
  • О различных человеческих расах (1775)
  • Две статьи относительно «Филантропина» (1776—1777)
  • Заметки в книге «Наблюдения над чувством прекрасного и возвышенного»

Том 3

  • Критика чистого разума (1-е изд. — 1781, 2-е — 1787)
  • Из первого издания «Критики чистого разума»

Том 4

  • Пролегомены ко всякой будущей метафизике, которая может появиться как наука (1783)
  • Основоположения метафизики нравов (1785) • Метафизические начала естествознания (1786)
  • Критика практического разума (1788)

Том 5

  • Критика способности суждения (1790)
  • Первое введение в «Критику способности суждения»

Том 6

  • Религия в пределах только разума (1796)
  • Метафизика нравов (1797)

Том 7

  • К вечному миру. Философский проект (1795)
  • Спор факультетов (1798)
  • Антропология с прагматической точки зрения (1798)
  • Приложение о вопросе, предложенном на премию Королевской Берлинской академией наук в 1791 году: какие действительные успехи создала метафизика в Германии со времени Лейбница и Вольфа?

Том 8

  • Рецензия на книгу И. Шульца «Опыт руководства к учению о нравственности» (1783)
  • Идея всеобщей истории во всемирно-гражданском плане (1784)
  • Ответ на вопрос «Что такое просвещение?» (1784)
  • Рецензии на книгу И. Г. Гердера «Идеи к философии истории человечества» (1785)
  • О вулканах на Луне (1785)
  • Предполагаемое начало человеческой истории (1786)
  • Что значит ориентироваться в мышлении? (1786)
  • О применении телеологических принципов в философии (1788)
  • О неудаче всех философских попыток теодицеи (1791)
  • О поговорке «Может это и верно в теории, но не годится для практики» (1793)
  • Конец всего сущего (1794)
  • Об органе души (1796)
  • О вельможном тоне, недавно возникшем в философии
  • Благая весть о близком заключении договора о вечном мире в философии (1797)
  • О мнимом праве лгать из человеколюбия (1797)
  • Заявление по поводу наукоучения Фихте (1799)

Другие русские переводы

  • Критика чистого разума
  • Критика практического разума
  • Критика способности суждения
  • Основы метафизики нравственности
  • Вопрос о том, стареет ли Земля с физической точки зрения
  • Всеобщая естественная история и теория неба
  • Мысли об истинной оценке живых сил
  • Ответ на вопрос: Что такое просвещение?

Переводчики на русский язык

  • Бурдес, Борис Павлович
  • Владиславлев, Михаил Иванович
  • Лосский, Николай Онуфриевич
  • Фохт, Борис Александрович
  • Соколов, Николай Матвеевич
  • Шейнман, Сесиль Яковлевна
  • Соловьёв, Владимир Сергеевич

Литература

Книги и статьи на английском языке

  • Manfred Kuehn. Kant: A Biography. — Марбург: Cambridge University Press, 2014. — 544 с. — ISBN 9781107050433.
  • Martin Schӧ The Philosophy of the Young Kant. — Oxford University Press, 2000. — 348 с. — ISBN 0195132181.
  • Roger Scruton. Kant: A Very Short Introduction. — Oxford University Press, 2001. — 141 с. — ISBN 9780192801999.
  • Kant on Emotion and Value / Alix Cohen. — Macmillan Publishers, 2014. — 301 с. — ISBN 9781137276650.
  • Jennifer Uleman. An Introduction to Kant’s Moral Philosophy. — Cambridge University Press, 2010. — 189 с. — ISBN 9780511676642.
  • Roger Sullivan. An Introduction to Kant’s Ethics. — Cambridge University Press, 1994. — 183 с. — ISBN 9780511606151.
  • Ralph Walker. Kant: The Arguments of the Philosophers. — Routledge, 1978. — 201 с. — ISBN 9780710000095.
  • Jennifer Uleman. On Kant, Infanticide, and Finding Oneself in a State of Nature (англ.) // Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung. — 2000. — 54, no. 2. — P. 173—195.
  • Marilea Bramer. The Importance of Personal Relationships in Kantian Moral Theory: A Reply to Care Ethics (англ.) // Hypatia. — 2010. — 25, no. 1. — P. 121—139.

Книги и статьи на русском языке

  • А. В. Гулыга. Немецкая классическая философия. — Москва: Мысль, 1986. — 334 с.
  • А. В. Гулыга. Кант. — Москва: Молодая гвардия, 1977. — 330 с. — (ЖЗЛ).
  • Эрнст Кассирер. Жизнь и учение Канта = Kants Leben und Lehre. — Санкт-Петербург: Книга света, 1997. — 447 с. — ISBN 5791400233.
  • Т. Г. Румянцева. Немецкий идеализм: от Канта до Гегеля. — Минск: Вышэйная школа, 2015. — 271 с. — ISBN 9789850625816.
  • К. Лавринович. Космогоническая гипотеза И. Канта — сущность и методология // Кантовский сборник. — 1982. — Т. 7, № 1. — С. 43—54.
  • Ю. В. Костяшов. Кто спас усыпальницу Иммануила Канта от разрушения? // Кантовский сборник. — Калининград: Издательство КГУ, 2002. — № 23. — С. 125—131. — ISSN 02076918.
  • А. И. Хотинская. Полемика Иммануила Канта с Эмануэлем Сведенборгом (отношение Канта к эзотерической философии) // Проблемы современного антропосоциального познания. — 2012. — № 10. — С. 103—116. — ISBN 9785898386306.
  • Т. Г. Румянцева. Работа И. Канта «Грёзы духовидца, пояснённые грёзами метафизики» и её значение для становления нового типа метафизики // Веснік БДУ. — 2012. — № 1. — С. 33—37.

1. Общее понятие и периодизация философии и. Канта, его основные произведения.

  1. Естественно-научная
    философия Канта докритического периода.

  1. Гносеология
    (учение о познании) Канта.
    Открытие
    границ познавательной способности
    человеческого разума.

    Антиномии.
    Априорное и апостериорное

    знание,

    «вещь
    в себе».
    I

  1. Стадии
    познавательного процесса.

  2. Структура
    сознания (разума).

  1. Категории
    философии, выдвинутые Иммануилом
    Кантом.

7.
«Критика
практического
разума
»
Канта. Моральный закон (категорический
императив).

  1. «Критика
    способности суждения». Всеобщая
    целесообразность.

  2. Социально-политические
    взгляды И. Канта.

10.Историческое значение философии Канта.

1.
Основоположником немецкого
классического идеализма
считается
Им­мануил
Кант
(1724
— 1804) — немецкий (прусский) философ,
профессор Кенигсберского университета.

Все
творчество И. Канта можно разделить на
два больших периода: докритический (до
начала 70-х гг. XVIII
в.); критический (начало 70-х гг. XVIII
в. и до 1804 г,).

В
течение докритического
периода
философский
интерес И. Канта был направлен на проблемы
естествознания и природы.

В более
поздний, критический период интерес
Канта сместился на воп­росы деятельности
разума, познания, механизма познания,
границ познания, логики, этики, социальной
философии. Свое наименование критический
период
получил
в связи с названием вышедших в то время
трех фундаментальных философских
произведений Канта: «Критика чистого
разума»; «Критика практического
разума»; «Критика способности
суждения».

2.
Важнейшими проблемами философских
исследований Канта докрити-ческосо
периода
были
проблемы
бытия, природы, естествознания.
Нова­торство
Канта при исследовании данных проблем
заключается в том, что он был одним из
первых философов, который, рассматривая
дан­ные проблемы, большое внимание
уделил проблеме
развития.

Философские
выводы Канта были революционными для
его эпохи:

  • Солнечная
    система возникла из большого
    первоначального облака раз­реженных
    в космосе частиц материи в результате
    вращения данного облака, которое стало
    возможным благодаря движению и
    взаимодей­ствию (притяжению,
    отталкиванию, столкновению) составлявших
    его частиц.

  • природа имеет
    свою историю во времени (начало и конец),
    а не вечна и неизменна;

  • природа находится
    в постоянном изменении и развитии;

  • движение и покой
    относительны;.

  • все
    живое на земле, в том числе и человек,
    — результат естественной биологической
    эволюции.

В то
же время идеи Канта несут в себе отпечаток
мировоззрения того времени:

  • механические
    законы изначально не заложены в материи,
    а имеют свою внешнюю причину;

  • данной внешней
    причиной (первоначалом) является Бог.

Несмотря
на это, современники Канта считали, что
его открытия (осо­бенно о возникновении
Солнечной системы и биологической
эволю­ции человека) по своей значимости
соизмеримы с открытием Копер­ника
(вращение Земли вокруг Солнца).

3
основе философских исследований Канта
критического
периода
(на­чало
70-х гг. XVIII
в. и до 1804 г.) лежит проблема
познания.
В
своей книге «Критика
чистого разума»
Кант
отстаивает идею агности­цизма

невозможности познания окружающей
действительности.

Большинство
философов до Канта видело в качестве
главной причины трудностей познания
именно объект познавательной деятельности
-бытие, окружающий мир, который содержит
в себе множество нераз­гаданных на
протяжении тысячелетий тайн. Кант же
выдвигает гипоте­зу, согласно которой
причиной
трудностей при познании
является
не окружающая действительность — объект,
а субъект
познавательной дея­тельности —
человек,
а точнее, его
разум.

Познавательные
возможности (способности) человеческого
разума ограни­чены
(то
есть разум не может всего). Как только
разум человека со сво­им арсеналом
познавательных средств пытается выйти
за собственные рамки (возможности)
познания, он наталкивается на неразрешимые
противоречия. Данные неразрешимые
противоречия, которых Кантом было
обнаружено четыре, Кант назвал антиномиями.

Первая антиномия
— ОГРАНИЧЕННОСТЬ ПРОСТРАНСТВА

Мир
имеет начало во времени Мир не имеет
начала во времени

и
ограничен в пространстве. и безграничен.

Вторая антиномия
— ПРОСТОЕ И СЛОЖНОЕ

Существуют
только простые элементы В мире нет
ничего простого.

и
то, что состоит из простых.

Третья антиномия
— СВОБОДА И ПРИЧИННОСТЬ

Существует
не только причинность Свободы не
существует. Все в мире

по
законам природы, но и свобода.
совершается в силу строгой

причинности по
законам природы.

Четвертая антиномия
— НАЛИЧИЕ БОГА

Есть
Бог — безусловно необходимое Бога
нет. Нет никакого абсолютно

существо,
причина всего сущего. необходимого
существа — причины

всего сущего.

С
помощью разума можно логически доказать
одновременно оба про­тивоположных
положения антиномий — разум заходит в
тупик. Наличие антиномий, по Канту, —
доказательство наличия границ
познаватель­ных способностей разума.

Также
в «Критике чистого разума» И. Кант
классифицирует само знание как результат
познавательной деятельности и выделяет
три понятия, характеризующих знание:
апостериорное знание; априорное знание;
«вещь в себе».

Апостериорное
знание

то знание, которое получает человек в
резуль­тате опыта.
Данное
знание может быть только предположительным,
но не достоверным, поскольку каждое
утверждение, взятое из данного типа
знания, необходимо проверять на практике,
и не всегда такое знание истинное.
Например, человек из опыта знает, что
все металлы плавят­ся, однако
теоретически могут встретиться металлы,
не подвержен­ные плавлению; или «все
лебеди белые», но иногда в природе
могут встретиться и черные, следовательно,
опытное (эмпирическое, апос­териорное)
знание может давать осечки, не обладает
полной достовер­ностью и не может
претендовать на всеобщность.

Априорное
знание

доопытное, то есть то, которое существует
в разуме изначально
и
не требует никакого опытного доказательства.
Например «Все тела протяженные»,
«Человеческая жизнь протекает во
времени», «Все тела имеют массу».
Любое из этих положений очевидно и
абсолютно достоверно как с опытной
проверкой, так и без нее. Нельзя, например,
встретить тело, не имеющее размеров или
без массы, жизнь жи­вого человека,
протекающую вне времени. Только априорное
(доопыт­ное) знание абсолютно достоверно
и надежно, обладает качествами всеобщности
и необходимости.

Следует
оговориться: теория Канта об априорном
(изначально истин­ном) знании была
полностью логичной в эпоху Канта, однако
откры­тая А. Энштейном в середине XX
в. теория относительности поставила ее
под сомнение.

«Вещь
в себе»

одно из центральных понятий всей
философии Канта. «Вещь в себе» — это
внутренняя сущность вещи, которая
никогда не будет познана разумом.

  1. Кант
    выделяет схему
    познавательного процесса,
    согласно
    которой:

  • внешний
    мир первоначально осуществляет
    воздействие («аффицирование»)
    на
    органы чувств человека;

  • органы
    чувств человека принимают аффицированные
    образы внешнего мира в виде ощущений;

  • человеческое
    сознание приводит полученные органами
    чувств разрозненные образы, ощущения
    в систему, в результате чего в человечес­ком
    разуме возникает целостная картина
    окружающего мира;

  • целостная
    картина окружающего мира, возникающая
    в разуме на основании ощущений, есть
    всего лишь видимый
    разумом и чувствами об­раз внешнего
    мира, который не имеет ничего общего с
    реальным миром;

  • реальный
    мир,
    образы
    которого воспринимают разум и чувства,
    являет­ся «вещью
    в себе»

    субстанцией, которая абсолютно
    не может быть понята разумом;

  • человеческий
    разум может лишь познать
    образы
    огромного
    множества предметов и явлений окружающего
    мира — «вещей в себе», но
    не их внутреннюю сущность.

Таким
образом, при познании разум наталкивается
на две непроницаемые границы: собственные
(внутренние для разума) границы, за
которыми возникают неразрешимые
противоречия — антиномии; внешние
границы — внутреннюю сущность вещей в
себе.

5.
Само человеческое сознание (чистый
разум), принимающее сигналы

образы
от непознаваемых «вещей в себе» —
окружающего мира, также, по Канту, имеет
свою структуру,
которая
включает в себя: формы чувственности;
формы рассудка; формы разума.

Чувственность

первый уровень сознания. Формы
чувственности
пространство
и время.
Благодаря
чувственности сознание первоначально
систематизирует ощущения, размещая их
в пространстве и времени.

Рассудок

следующий уровень сознания. Формы
рассудка —
категории

предельно общие понятия, с помощью
которых происходит дальнейшее осмысление
и систематизация первоначальных
ощущений, размещенных
«системе
координат» пространства и времени.
(Примеры категорий — количество, качество,
возможность, невозможность, необходимость
и т. д.)

Разум

высший уровень сознания. Формами
разума
являются
окончательные высшие
идеи,
например:
идея Бога; идея души; идея сущности мира
и др.

Философия, по
Канту, является наукой о данных (высших)
идеях.

6.
Большая заслуга Канта перед философией
в том, что им было выдвинуто учение
о
категориях-(в
переводе с греческого — высказываниях)
-предельно общих понятиях, с помощью
которых можно описать и к которым можно
свести все сущее. (То есть нет таких
вещей или явлений окружающего мира,
которые не обладали бы признаками,
характери­зуемыми данными категориями.)
Таких
категорий Кант выделяет две­надцать
и делит их на четыре класса по три в
каждом.

Данными
классами
являются:
количество, качество, отношение,
модальность.

(То
есть все в мире обладает количеством,
качеством, отношениями, модальностью.)

Сами
категории:

  • количества —
    единство, множество, цельность;

  • качества —
    реальность, отрицание, ограничение;

  • отношения
    — субстанциональность (присущность) и
    акциденция (са­мостоятельность);
    причина и следствие; взаимодействие;

  • модальность
    — возможность и невозможность,
    существование и несу­ществование,
    необходимость и случайность.

Система
категорий также имеет свою внутреннюю
структуру: первые две категории каждого
из четырех классов — противоположные
характе­ристики свойства класса,
третьи — их синтез. Например, крайними
про­тивоположными характеристиками
количества являются единство и множество,
их синтезом — цельность; качества —
реальность и отрица­ние (нереальность),
их синтез — ограничение и т. д.

Согласно
Канту с помощью категорий — предельно
общих характери­стик всего сущего —
рассудок осуществляет свою деятельность:
располагает по «полочкам разума»
хаос первоначальных ощущений, благодаря
чему является возможной упорядоченная
мыслительная деятельность.

  1. Наряду
    с «чистым разумом» — сознанием,
    осуществляющим мыслитель­ную
    деятельность и познание, Кант выделяет
    «практический
    разум»,
    под
    которым понимает нравственность и
    также подвергает его критике в своем
    другом ключевом произведении — «Критика
    практического разума».

Главные
вопросы «Критики
практического разума»:
Какой
должна быть мораль? Что есть моральное
(нравственное) поведение человека?

Осмысливая данные
вопросы, Кант приходит к следующим
выводам:

  • чистая
    нравственность

    признанное всеми добродетельное
    общественное сознание, которое отдельный
    индивид воспринимает как свое собственное;

  • между
    чистой нравственностью и реальной
    жизнью (поступками, по­буждениями,
    интересами людей) существует сильное
    противоречие;

  • мораль,
    поведение человека должны быть независимы
    от всяких внешних условий и должны
    подчиняться только моральному закону.

И. Кант
следующим образом сформулировал
моральный
закон,
кото­рый
имеет высший и безусловный характер, и
назвал его категоричес­ким
императивом:
«Поступай
так, чтобы максима твоего поступка могла
быть принципом всеобщего законодательства».

В
настоящее время моральный закон
(категорический императив), сфор­мулированный
Кантом, понимается следующим образом:
человек должен действовать так, чтобы
его поступки были образцом для всех;
человек должен относиться к другому
человеку (как и он – мыслящему существу
и уникальной личности) только как к
цели, а не как к средству.

8.
В
своей третьей книге критического периода
«Критика
способности суждения»

Кант выдвигает идею
всеобщей целесообразности:
целесообразности
в эстетике (человек наделен способностями,
кото­рые должен максимально успешно
использовать в различных сферах жизни
и культуры); целесообразности в природе
(все в природе имеет свой смысл — в
орга­низации живой природы, организации
неживой природы, строении орга­низмов,
размножении, развитии); целесообразности
духа (наличие Бога).

9.
Социально-политические взгляды
И.
Канта: философ считал, что человек
наделен изначально злой природой; видел
спасение человека в моральном воспитании
и жестком следова­нии моральному
закону (категорическому императиву);
был сторонником распространения
демократии и правового порядка —
во-первых, в каждом отдельном обществе;
во-вторых, в отношениях между государствами
и народами; осуждал войны как наиболее
тяжкое заблуждение и преступление
че­ловечества; считал, что в будущем
неизбежно наступит «высший мир» —
войны будут либо запрещены правом, либо
станут экономически невыгодными.

  1. Историческое
    значение философии Канта
    в
    том, что им было: дано основанное на
    науке (механике Ньютона) объяснение
    возникно­вения Солнечной системы
    (из вращающейся туманности разряженных
    в пространстве элементов); выдвинута
    идея о наличии границ познавательной
    способности разума человека (антиномии,
    «вещи в себе»); выведено двенадцать
    категорий — предельно общих понятий,
    которые составляют каркас мышления;
    сформулирован категорический императив
    — моральный закон;

выдвинута
идея демократии и правового порядка
как в каждом отдель­ном обществе, так
и в международных отношениях; осуждены
войны, предсказан «вечный мир» в
будущем, основанный на экономической
невыгодности войн и их правовом запрете.

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