Kant's Argument for Transcendental Idealism in the Transcendental Aesthetic (original) (raw)
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In this paper I present a new solution to the so-called ‚neglected alternative'-objection against Kant's argument for transcendental idealism. According to this objection, Kant does not give sufficient justification for his claim that not only are space and time forms of our intuition but that they also fail to be things in themselves or properties thereof. I first discuss a proposal by Willaschek and Allais, who try to defend Kant against this charge by building on his account of a priori intuition, and argue that it is insufficient in order to meet the objection in its full force. I then present my own solution to the problem. It is based on a reconstruction of Kant's account of properties of appearances and tries to show that this account implies that spatio-temporal properties could in principle not pertain both to appearances and to things in themselves.
Kant's, Critique of Pure Reason, Transcendental Aesthetic
The Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant is one of the most influential works in the history of philosophy and in this work in the part of Transcendental Aesthetic Kant dealt with sensibility and intuition; and with the Metaphysical Exposition of the Concept of Time and Space. Here, Kant's discussion of space and time in the Transcendental Aesthetic is introduced by his analysis of cognition "scientific knowing", which presents an unfamiliar philosophical terminology. Kant, here, highlighted some term as Intuition, a means through which knowledge is immediate relation to objects and through which all thought as a means is directed. Thereafter, term sensibility which means the capacity (receptivity) for receiving representations through the mode in which we are affected by objects. And as Kant induced and believe that there are synthetic a priori truths for this reason he also said about the form of appearance: a priori, which means the knowledge obtained independent of experiences; a posteriori, which means the knowledge obtained through experiences. In this transcendental aesthetics , Kant made the exposition, therefore , first A isolate sensibility, by taking away from it everything which the understanding thinks through is concept, so that nothing may be left save empirical intuition. Secondly, separated off from it everything which belongs to sensation can supply a priori. He also showed tow pure forms of sensible intuition, serving as principles of a priori knowledge, namely, space and time. Kant's wanted to prove the possibility of cognition that is separate from all instruction from experience, in the Critique of Pure Reason which has the possibility and existence of synthetic a priori judgments. Kant contends that a priori knowledge is possible if and only if the sensible world is not independent of the inherited structure of the mind. Aesthetic and logical knowledge combined form a cognition of the sensible world, which therefore necessarily conforms to our a priori methods of sensibility and our a priori structure of understanding. In order to prove the existence of synthetic a priori judgments, Kant must justify the validity of the transcendental idealist worldview. In the Transcendental Aesthetic, Kant sets out to do two things to further this cause: to prove that the sensible media of experience space and time are forms of a priori intuition; and subsequently, to demonstrate that space and time are subjective projections of the inherited structure of the mind. Thus, he aims to justify his revolution to transcendental idealism.
Kant's Transcendental Idealism
This paper discusses the extent to which Kant's transcendental idealism is successful in proving space as an a priori form of our intuition.
On Kant’s Transcendental Idealism & Empirical Realism, and his Conception of Objectivity
I make a critical exposition of Kant’s transcendental idealism and empirical realism about space and time: I see that while transcendental idealism, to Kant, warrants his distinction between mere appearances (mere presentations) and things-in-themselves pertaining to external objects, it necessitates empirical realism which demarcates it from the other ‘metaphysically erroneous’ versions of idealism. I argue that Kant’s distinction between these two “doctrinal systems” – or rather, the correlation between the two – serves to defend his conception of objectivity (of perceptual experiences and of judgments) as that which arises from subjectivity. Such relationship between subjectivity and objectivity, in turn, defends his contention of synthetic a priority, the possibility of which determines the plausibility of metaphysics as a science of pure reason. Furthermore, I argue that Kant’s treatment of objectivity goes against the Lockean construal of “secondary qualities” as the ‘powers of objects’; rather, to Kant, the cognitive powers lie in us. (Content word count 1,624)
Imagination and Transcendental Objects: Kant on the Imaginary Focus of Reason
The Being of Negation in Post-Kantian Philosophy, 2022
Going back to Jacobi, commentators have often considered Kant’s notion of the transcendental object (thing in itself, monad, or object = X) to be concerned merely with empirical affection. Although most agree that this argument of Kant’s forbids the understanding from making illegitimate claims regarding the transcendental object, it is often assumed that no positive function can be ascribed to metaphysical illusions produced by reason. I will show in this paper, in contrast to most commentators, that a positive notion of transcendental illusion is brought about by the cooperation of the imagination and reason in the latter’s pursuit of positing transcendental objects––in the same way that the imagination aids the understanding in determining objects of empirical cognition. When describing reason’s pursuit of systematicity, Kant writes that the transcendent ideas serve as a focus imaginarius that unifies cognition as such (A644/B672). It is not merely the case that metaphysical illusions regarding the soul, the world as such, and God are entirely useless, just because the understanding is prohibited from claiming having knowledge of such concepts. I take it that the transcendental object so considered in Kant’s Dialectic refers only to a representation of the imagination. I show that all three transcendental ideas––namely, God, the World as such, and the soul––are imaginary projections of unity carried out by the power of reason. Drawing on Kant’s notion of the focus imaginarius, I claim that reason regards transcendental illusions as being real objects. This holds as much for the schema of scientific knowledge, which is merely regulative, as it does for the three transcendental ideas. Unlike most commentators, I do not take Kant’s consideration of the transcendental object to concern empirical affection. Rather, reason posits this object in order to transcend the limits of the understanding, and to thereby use its own inner illusions for systematic purposes (cf. A250–53 and A393). To my mind, reason necessarily posits ideas, but the imagination often leads reason into holding that the focus imaginarius of the idea is an actual object. The critical use of reason must then put limits on the imagination (cf. A770/B798). But the imagination nonetheless serves reason’s interest by allowing it to put otherwise negative illusions to work for the sake of systematicity.