AdPh Archives de Philosophie (Paris) AGPh Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie (Berlin/New York) AZPh Allgemeine Zeitschrift für Philosophie (Berlin) BrJHPh British Journal for the History of Philosophy (London) CTK Con-Textos Kantianos. International Journal of Philosophy (Madrid) [online] Diam Diametros: An Online Journal of Philosophy EstKant Estudos Kantianos (Marília, SP) [online] EuJPh European Journal of Philosophy (London) GPhSt Grazer Philosophische Studien (Graz) IPhQ International Philosophical Quarterly (New York) JHPh Journal of the History of Philosophy (Baltimore) JRE Jahrbuch für Recht und Ethik/ Annual Review of Law and Ethics (Berlin) KRev Kantian Review (Cardiff) KS Kant-Studien (Berlin/Bostontijdschru) KSb Kantovskij Sbornik (Kaliningrad) PhJ Philosophisches Jahrbuch (München) PhLA Philosophischer Literaturanzeiger (Frankfurt a. M.) RF Revista de filosofie (Bucureşti) RPF Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia (Braga) RStF Rivista di Storia della Filosofia (Milano) RThPh Revue de Théologie et de Philosophie (Fribourg) SJPh Southern Journal of Philosophy (Memphis, TN) StKa Studi Kantiani (Pisa) StudKant Studia Kantiana (Santa Maria, RS, Bras.) [online] TF Tijdschrift voor Filosofie (Leuven) ZphF Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung (Frankfurt a.M.) * nicht durch Autopsie verifiziert

Kant-Bibliographie 2014

ion, this is a basically analytical task, in which we examine our concepts in order to make ourselves explicitly aware of their possible uses. It is not entirely unlike like the process of defining a concept in mathematics or the sciences, Kant tells us, but, since a priori concepts are given to us through the nature of our reason and so are in some way instantiated in (and hence descriptive of) all possible experiences, cannot in principle be 516 completed. This is one of the key lessons of a passage I have already cited in my discussion of the discursive nature of philosophy, as Kant sees it: I can never be certain that the distinct representation of a (still confused) given concept has been exhaustively developed unless I know that it is adequate to the object. But since the concept of [a priori items like substance, cause, or right], as it is given, can contain many obscure representations, which we pass by in our analysis though we always use them in application, the exhaustiveness of the analysis of my concept is always doubtful, and by many appropriate examples can only be made probably but never apodictically certain. Instead of the expression “definition” I would rather use that of exposition [Exposition], which is always cautious, and which the critic can accept as valid to a certain degree while yet retaining reservations about its exhaustiveness. (A728-729/B756-757) 87 Exposition, of course, is not introspection – not a Humean attempt to catch our ideas in the act. It is, rather, analytic judgment in Kant's technical sense of an attempt to craft a conceptually explicit designation, via reflection, of the marks we employ in applying a particular conceptual rule. We might undertake such expositions for a variety of reasons, but as Kant tells us in the Transcendental Aesthetic, their primary use in 87 Since it will be relevant for points made the close of this chapter, I should note one especially interesting feature of Kant's notion of a conceptual exposition, namely the looseness of fit Kant finds between the a priori principles we actually, though tacitly, deploy in experience, and our explicit, higher-order philosophical re-representations of those principles. As Kant suggests here, rational empirical cognition always (ex hypothesi) employs the whole concept (e.g., of substance), and nothing but the concept. But our philosophical expositions of these very same concepts can never be rendered apodictically certain, because we cannot actually show that these re-representations apply to everything we can cognize under the original, tacit concepts. As Kant has it at A731n/B759n, then: If one would not know what to do with a concept until one had defined it [in the strict sense of a complete analytical exposition], then all philosophizing would be in a bad way. But since, however far the elements (of the analysis) reach, a good and secure use can always be made of them, even imperfect definitions, i.e., propositions that are not really definitions but are true and thus approximations to them, can be used with great advantage. In mathematics definitions belong ad esse [to the being], in philosophy ad melius esse [to the improvement of being]. In one way, this helps Kant's case, by showing how philosophers can provide concepts that are normative for our cognition, even though they cannot be shown to have a strictly ontological status with respect to the appearances (as mathematical definitions do, on Kant's account). But in another way, it points to a serious problem with Kant's transcendental system, stemming from his tendency to conflate the standpoint of the philosopher and the standpoint of reason, as though these were unproblematically the same. 517 transcendental philosophy is to display the transcendental functionality of certain concepts, either by demonstrating that these concepts are suitable for informative a priori application to objects of experience, or by displaying their fruitfulness for synthetic a priori cognition more generally. Kant refers to these two ways of incompletely analyzing our concepts as their “metaphysical” and their “transcendental” expositions: I understand by exposition (expositio) the distinct (even if not complete) representation of that which belongs to a concept; but the exposition is metaphysical when it contains that which exhibits the concept as given a priori. (B37) I understand by a transcendental exposition the explanation of a concept as a principle from which insight into the possibility of other synthetic a priori cognitions can be gained. For this aim it is required 1) that such cognitions actually flow from the given concept, and 2) that these cognitions are only possible under the presupposition of a given way of explaining this concept. (B40) Although these terms themselves are introduced only in the B edition, Kant's procedure is the same in both editions: he studies the concepts of space and time, in order to show that they are indeed the concepts of a pure and formal intuition which is capable of grounding putatively metaphysical knowledge. The two forms of exposition play a complementary role in our investigations, and provide the raw materials for transcendental proof. What is crucial is that, as analytical, these arguments cannot justify synthetic a priori cognition as such. They can only show that a concept is a genuine element of a possible a priori synthesis, and so provide us with knowledge of the “grounds” of an alleged truth of metaphysics. Kant is clear in his comparison of philosophy with mathematics in the Doctrine of Method that the philosopher cannot simply clarify her concepts and thereby achieve her goal of invoking the a priori 518 synthesis which normatively determines all of our judgments: “the entire final aim of our speculative a priori cognition rests on such synthetic, i.e., ampliative principles; for the analytic ones are, to be sure, most important and necessary, but only for attaining that distinctness of concepts which is requisite for a secure and extended synthesis as a really new acquisition” (A9-10/13-14; cf. A730-731/B758-759). Only an appeal to apperceptive self-awareness (in the next stage of Kant's transcendental procedure) can show us the possibility of a priori synthetic activity which actually combines these grounds. 88 This same analytical procedure is repeated in the other two major sections of the Doctrine of Elements, where Kant tries to define the nature and function of the pure concepts of the understanding, insofar as these make objectively-valid synthetic judgments possible. Consider Kant's preface to the Analytic: This [Transcendental] Analytic is the analysis of the entirety of our a priori cognition into the elements of the pure cognition of the understanding. It is concerned with the following points: 1. That the concepts be pure and not empirical concepts. 2. That they belong not to intuition and to sensibility, but rather to thinking and understanding. 3. That they be elementary concepts, and clearly distinguished from those which are derived or composed from them. 4. That the table of them be complete, and that they entirely exhaust the entire field of pure understanding. (A64/B89; cf. Kant's emendation EXXXIII, and A309/B366 for a similar division of the Dialectic into analysis of the ideas of reason and the failed attempt to find corresponding synthetic inferences) 89 88 The expositions are most prominent in the Aesthetic, but that does not mean that they are self-standing. Kant's argument there is that only his preferred concepts of space and time are metaphysically coherent, against rival theories – he does nothing to prove that they have any real traction in ordinary experience. That further step is only taken in the Deduction. 89 Kant elaborates at A65-66/B90-91: I understand by an analytic of concepts not their analysis, or the usual procedure of philosophical investigations, that of analyzing the content of concepts that present themselves and bringing them to distinctness, but rather the much less frequently attempted analysis of the faculty of understanding itself, in order to research the possibility of a priori concepts by seeking them only in the understanding as their birthplace and analyzing its pure use in general; for this is the proper business of a transcendental philosophy; the rest is the logical treatment of concepts in philosophy 519 So described, Kant's intention is to provide a mix of abstractive and investigatory analysis, in preparation for the synthesis at which the whole Critique is aimed. This is the role of the (so-called) Metaphysical Deduction, with its attempt to derive the full table of the logical forms of judgment; and of much of the Transcendental Deduction, insofar as it constitutes “the exhibition of the pure concepts of the understanding [...] as principles of the possibility of experience” (B168). 90 In this way, the two basic parts of the Analytic in general. We will therefore pursue the pure concepts into their first seeds and predispositions in the human understanding, where they lie ready, until with the opportunity of experience they are finally developed and exhibited in their clarity by the very same understanding, liberated from the empirical conditions attaching to them. Such an “analysis of the faculty” is still an analysis, but it is one with a purpose beyond simply clarifying concepts and making them distinct, namely the purpose of showing how a given concept can be regarded as bearing the normative signature of a basic cognitive faculty, such that it is suitable for inclusion in the transcendental unity of apperception. 90 The Transcendental Deduction plays other roles as well, which is why Kant does not refer to it simply as an exposition. Most crucially, as we have seen, the Deduction aims to establish the necessity of a transcendental a priori synthesis if we are to be regarded as the rational agents of all of our judgments. But the bulk of 

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The mother of chaos and night: Kant's metaphilosophical attack on indifferentism

In the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant famously criticizes traditional metaphysics and its proofs of immortality, free will and God's existence. What is often overlooked is that Kant also explains why rational beings must ask metaphysical questions about 'unconditioned' objects such as souls, uncaused causes or God, and why answers to these questions will appear rationally compelling to them. In this book, Marcus Willaschek reconstructs and defends Kant's account of the rational sources of metaphysics. After carefully explaining Kant's conceptions of reason and metaphysics, he offers detailed interpretations of the relevant passages from the Critique of Pure Reason (in particular, the 'Transcendental Dialectic') in which Kant explains why reason seeks 'the unconditioned'. Willaschek offers a novel interpretation of the Transcendental Dialectic, pointing up its 'positive' side, while at the same time it uncovers a highly original account of metaphysical thinking that will be relevant to contemporary philosophical debates.

Kant on the Sources of Metaphysics: The Dialectic of Pure Reason

I argue for a new delimitation of what Kant means by ‘cognition [Erkenntnis]’, on the basis of the intermediate, transitional place that Kant gives to cognition in the ‘progression [Stufenleiter]’ of our representations and our consciousness of them. I show how cognition differs from mental acts lying earlier on this progression—such as sensing, intuiting, and perceiving—and also how cognition differs from acts lying later on this progression—such as explaining, having insight, and comprehending. I also argue that cognition should not be confused with ‘knowledge [Wissen]’, insofar as knowledge represents the culmination of a separate orthogonal progression of acts of ‘holding-true’. Along the way, I show how having in focus the specific progression from representation, to consciousness, to cognition (and beyond) allows us to better appreciate the architectonic significance of the progression of Kant’s analysis in the first Critique (and beyond), and also helps to illuminate the unity of Kant’s account of cognition itself across its variety of (empirical, mathematical, philosophical) forms.

Kant on the place of cognition in the progression of our representations

Kant’s enigmatic term Gesinnung baffles many readers of Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason. This study clarifies the notion in Kant’s theories of both general moral decision-making and specifically religious conversion. It is argued that Kantian Gesinnung is volitional, referring to a person’s principle-based choice to live a certain way. More specifically, interpreted as principled ‘conviction’, Kantian Gesinnung is a religiously manifested, moral form of Uberzeugung (‘convincing’). This is confirmed by a detailed analysis of the 169 occurrences of Gesinnung and cognate words in Religion. It contrasts with what is suggested by translating Gesinnung as ‘disposition’, which reinforces a tendency to interpret the notion more metaphysically, and also with Pluhar’s translation as ‘attitude’, which has too strongly psychological connotations.

https://repository.hkbu.edu.hk/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1037&context=rel_ja

What is Kantian Gesinnung? On the priority of volition over metaphysics and psychology in religion within the bounds of bare reason

Abstract: Kant identifies knowledge [Wissen], belief [Glaube], and opinion [Meinung] as our three primary modes of “holding-to-be-true” [Fürwahrhalten]. He also identifies opinion as making up the greatest part of our cognition. After a preliminary sketch of Kant’s system of propositional attitudes, this paper will explore what he says about the norms governing opinion and empirical hypotheses. The final section will turn to what, in the Critique of Pure Reason and elsewhere, Kant refers to as “General Applied Logic”. It concerns the “contingent conditions of the subject, which can hinder or promote” good inquiry; and, though rarely mentioned in the secondary literature, it offers Kant’s methodological alternative to the traditional epistemological goal of finding “a sufficient and yet at the same time general criterion of truth”.

Kant on Opinion: Assent, Hypothesis, and the Norms of General Applied Logic

Abstract This paper offers an account of the historical development of Kant's understanding of belief (Glaube) from its early ties to George Friedrich Meier's Auszug aus der Vernunftlehre through various stages of refinement. It will be argued that the Critique of Pure Reason reflects an important but not final stage in Kant's understanding of belief. Its structure is further refined and its scope narrowed in later works, including the Critique of Practical Reason and Critique of Judgment. After charting these stages, an analysis of how belief relates to the Fact of Reason will be presented.

Lawrence Pasternack

Papers

Kant on Opinion: Assent, Hypothesis, and the Norms of General Applied Logic

The Development and Scope of Kantian Belief: The Highest Good, The Practical Postulates and The Fact of Reason

The Lawfulness of the Will and Timeless Agency

Berichte und Diskussionen: The Lawfulness of the Will and Timeless Agency