Kant A Very Short Introduction

A Kant Dictionary
Blackwell Philosopher Dictionaries

Written by leacling scholars, each volume in the Blackwell Philosopher
Dictionaries series presents the life and work ofan individual philosopher
in a scholarly yet accessible manner. Entries cover key ideas and thoughts,
as well as the main themes ofthe philosopher's work. A comprehensive
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both research and course use.
A Descartes Dictionary
John Cottingbam
A Hegel Dictionary
Michael Inwood
A Heidegger Dictionary
Michael lnwood
A Hobbes Dictionary
A. P. Martinich
A Kant Dictionary
Howard Caygill
A Locke Dictionary
John W. Yolton
A Rousseau Dictionary
N. J. H. Dent
A Wittgenstein Dictionary
Hans-Johann Glock
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ßI.ACKWELL PHILOSOPHER DICTIONARIES
A Kant
Dictionary
Howard Caygill
t.b Publishing
• � Blackwell
© 1995 by Howard Caygill
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Contents
Preface and acknowledgements IX
lntroduction: Kant and the language of philosophy 1

System of citations and abbreviations 4
Kant and the 'age of criticism' 7
DICTIONARY ENTRIES 35
Kant' s published writings 418
Works referred to in the text 428
Recommended further reading 436
Index of philosophers 440
Index of concepts 444
vii
Preface and acknowledgements
My first experience of reading Kant was not an altogether happy one. I

was bewildered by his use of language and alienated by what seemed to be
a manic desire to classify and establish endless fine distinctions. Fortu
nately, this initial disorientation soon settled into an abiding fascination -
not that Kant has ever lost his ability to surprise. My book tries to stay true
to this experience by offering an aid to orientation in Kant's philosophy
which does not lose sight of what remains disturbing about it. I have not
sought to embalm Kant by producing a philologically correct aid for 'pro
fessional' Kant scholars, a task I suspect to be beyond the powers of any
finite individual - and certainly this one - and which would demand more
than one volume. Instead I have written for readers and potential readers
of Kant interested not only in philosophy but also in the humanities and
social sciences which are heirs to the critical philosophy.
lt is a pleasure to acknowledge the support and good humour given me
by my family, friends and colleagues while writing this book. I am particu
larly indebted to my sister Carotine for her unfailing levity, to Greg Bright
who deserves a martyr's palm for reading from A to Z, to Onora O'Neill
for her perceptive critical comments at an early �tage of composition, and
to Jay Bernstein, Judith Mehta and Gillian Rose for sustaining my confid
ence in the project. I have benefited greatly from conversations on matters
Kantian and non-Kantian with Richard Beardsworth, Sara Beardsworth,
Monika Fludernik, David Owen and Alan Scott. Thanks are also due to
Blackwell Publishers for their patience, to the British Academy for their
support of a research trip to Berlin in 1990, and to the University of East
Anglia for granting me study leave in the summer of 1992. Finally, I wish
to acknowledge the assistance from beyond the grave of past generations
of Kant lexicographers - above all Mellin, Schmid and Eisler - without
whom I could not have begun.
Norwich, England
12 April 1994
ix
Introduction: Kant and the
language of philosophy
The influence of Kant s philosophy has been , and continues to be, so

profound and so widespread as to have become imperceptible. Philo¬
sophical inquiry within both the analytic and the continental’ traditions
is unthinkable without the lexical and conceptual resources bequeathed
by Kant. Even outside philosophy, in the humanities, social sciences and
natural sciences, Kantian concepts and structures of argument are ubiqui¬
tous. Anyone practicing literary or social criticism is contributing to the
Kantian tradition; anyone reflecting on the epistemological implications
of their work will find themselves doing so within parameters established
by Kant. Indeed, many contemporary debates, whether in aesthetics, liter¬
ary or political theory, show a peculiar tendency to mutate into disputes
in Kant exegesis. All in all, in the less than 200 years since the death of
its author, Kantian philosophy has established itself as an indispensable
point of intellectual orientation.
While few would quarrel with the fact of Kant’ s influence, opinions
differ widely regarding its significance and desirability, and nowhere more
than in his innovations with respect to the language of philosophy. It is
widely recognized that Kant transformed philosophical language, but there
is little agreement as to whether this was a good thing; Isaiah Berlin for
one considers him to have ‘ruined’ it. Whatever the final verdict, the main
problem facing the lexicographer is more technical, and concerns the way
in which Kant achieved this transformation and, to a lesser extent, his
motives for doing so. For Kant did not only extend Christian Wolff ’ s
translation of Latin philosophical terminology into the vernacular, but he
also confronted it with areas of experience previously excluded from
philosophy. He reinvented philosophical language by introducing new
terms and concepts from outside philosophy, as well as self-consciously re¬
defining many of its traditional ones. The matrix for this linguistic and
conceptual transformation lies in the lectures which he delivered for over
four decades in a wide range of subjects. In these he explicated the tra¬
ditional philosophical concepts of the officially prescribed textbooks by
1
KANT AND IBE LANGUAGE OF PHILOSOPHY
means of material drawn from contemporary natural science, newspapers,

novels and poetry, as well as from medical and travel books.
The first generation of Kant's lexicographers, notably Mellin (1797)
and Schmid (1798), prizedKant for improving the accuracy of philosophi
cal language as well as for extending its limits. Both stressed the enhanced
philosophical precision afforded by Kant's linguistic innovations. Yet
throughout their lexicons there is a discemible tension between the accu
racy arising from Kant's improvements to the language and the unsettling
effects of his enrichmmt of it. A century later, however, this tension had all
but disappeared: Eisler's monumental Kant Lexicon (1930) enshrined an
academic orthodoxy which stressed Kant's accuracy and fidelity to tradi
tion over his innovation. The sensitivity to the radical character ofKant's
reinvention of philosophical language evident in the early lexicons had
almost completely vanished. For Eisler, unlike Mellin and Schmid, Kant's
philosophy is no longer contentious; its text is considered a self-sufficient
whole and is approached by means of a lexicographic strategy which in
discriminately lists the uses to which a particular term was put at various
points in the oeuvre. Eisler's lexicon was bom of the same monumental
desire which presided over the formulation of the editorial policy pursued
by the editors of the BerlinAcademy's canonical edition ofKant's writings.
Kant would probably have been dismayed by the imposing edifice created
in his name by later editors and lexicographers. He himself took a prob
lematic and a relational view of philosophizing and philosophical language,
and allowed this approach to inform his linguistic innovations. In Kant's
own terms, philosophical concepts were acroamatic and not axiomatic, by
which he meant that they were the discursive outcome of an open-ended
process of reflection upon philosophical problems. Unlike geometrical
axioms, philosophical concepts are forKant less the indisputable products
of definition than the equivocal outcomes of a process of indirect pres
entation resting ultimately on analogy. Kant discussed this process of
analogical definition in Critique ofJudgement (§59) where he applied it to
such philosophical concepts as 'substance' and 'ground' which transfer a
particular relation between one set of terms to another. Not only are such
concepts discovered in the course of reflection upon a problem or difficulty,
but their 'definition' is accomplished by means of relating them to other
terms. Substance, for example, is defined in complementary opposition to
accident, as is concept to intuition, matter to form, and so on. Not only
are many terms defined disjunctively, but they also participate in a network
of related terms which further enrich and complicate their meanings.
They bear with them traces of defunct problems, of which they may be
purified, as Kant shows in the case of the term 'abstraction', or which are
still active in ways which must be respected, as in the case of 'absolute'.
2
KANT AND TIIE LANGUAGE OF PHILOSOPHY
This dictionary attempts to map the problematic and relational aspects

of Kant's philosophical vocabulary. Instead of presenting a concept as a
fixed, axiomatic element of Kant's philosophy in the manner of Eisler, the
entries stress the problematic, exploratory character of his philosophizing.
To this end, an entry will review the history of the problem to which the
term is a response, and show the ways in which Kant set about defining its
meaning in the course of reflection. Furthermore, each entry will be pre
ceded by a list of related terms which form the network within which it
gains its füll range of meaning. Finally, entries will also, where appropri
ate, consider the fate of concepts following Kant, thus underlining the
pivotal position his work occupies between philosophical tradition and
modemity. I hope this strategy will give the reader a sense of the power
and range of Kant's philosophizing, and through this some insight into
the reason for its enormous and seemingly inexhaustible influence upon
modern culture.
3
System of citations and
abbreviations
Citations of works by Kant
Most of the works by Kant referred to in the text are cited by abbrevia
tions. To find the füll title of any work, the reader should look first at the
'List of abbreviations' below. For each abbreviation, the 'List' gives the
year of publication and a short title. To find the full titles in both German
and English, the reader should then refer to the bibliography entitled
'Kant's published writings' (pp. 418-27).
Other works by Kant are cited in the text by means of a short title and
year of publication. To find full titles, the reader -should refer directly to
the year of publication in the bibliography of 'Kant's published writings'.
Citations of particular sections of text by Kant usually specify the unit
referred to (whether by page or by section, §). There is one important
exception: references to the Critique of Pure Reason. Kant produced two
editions of this work: the first edition (published in 1781) is cited as CPR
A, the second, revised edition (published in 1787) as CPR B. Following
convention, citations refer to one or both editions by page, but omit 'p.'
(e.g., CPR A 324/B 380).
Where an abbreviation is followed by two page numbers (e.g., GMM p.
425, p. 33), the first refers to the German 'Academy Edition', the second
to an English translation - both as listed in the bibliography of 'Kant's
published writings'.
Citations of works by other authors
Works by other authors are cited by reference to author or editor and year
of publication. To find full details, the reader should look under the
author's name in the bibliography entitled 'Works referred to in the text'
(pp. 428-35).
The reader's attention is drawn to the citation of works_ by Plato, Aris
totle and Aquinas. Citations from Plato are taken from the 1961 collected
4
SYSTEM OF CITATIONS AND ABBREVIATIONS
translation and follow the standard system of reference according to the

pagination and page subdivisions of particular dialogues in Henri Estienne's
edition of 1578 (as in Plato, 1961, Rep. 2.378a). Citations from Aristotle
are taken from the 1941 collected translation and follow the system of
reference according to page, column (a/b) and line oflmmanuel Bekk.er's
edition of 1831-70 (as in Aristotle, 1941, 431b, 18). Citations from Aquinas's
Summa Theowgica refer to the 1952 translation, and are organized in terms
of part, question and article (as in Aquinas, 1952, I, 85, 1).
List of abbreviations of Kant's published writings
A 1798b Anthwpowgy from .a Pragmatic Point of View

CBH 1786b Conjectures on the &ginning of Human History
CF 1798a The Conflict of the Faculties
CJ 1790a Critique ofJudgement
CPRA 1781 Critique of Pure R.eason; 1st edition
CPRB 1787 Critique of Pure R.eason; 2nd edition
CPrR 1788b Critique of Practical R.eason
DRS 1768 Concerning the ultimate Ground of the Differentiation
ofRegions in space
DS 1766 Dreams of a spirit-Seer elucidated by Dreams of Metaphysics
FI 1790b First Introduction to the Critique ofJudgement
FPT 1791a 'On the Failure of all Philosophical Attempts at
Theodicy'
FS 1762 The False Subtlety of the Four Sylwgistic Figures
GMM 1785e Grounding for the Metaphysics of Moral,s
1D 1770 'Inaugural Dissertation', On the Form and Principks of
the Sensible and the Intelligible World
IUH 1784a 'Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan
Purpose'
L 1800a Logic
LE 1924 Lectures on Ethics
LF 1747 Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces
LPT 1817 Lectures on Phiwsophical Theowgy
MF 1786a Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science
MM 1797a The Metaphysics of Morals
ND 1755c Nova dilucidatio, A New Elucidation of the First Principks
of Metaphysical Cognition
NM 1763b Attempt to Introduce the Concept of Negative Magnitudes
into Phiwsophy
NT 1758 A New Theory [or Conception] of Motion and Rest
5
SYSTEM OF CITATIONS AND ABBREVIATIONS
OBS 1764a Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and the Sublime
0D 1790c On a Discovery according to which any New Critique of Pure
&ason has been made Supe,ftuous by an Earlier One
OP 1936 Opus postumum
OPA 1763a The Only Possibl,e Argu ment in Support of a Demonstration
of the Existence of God
p 1783a Prol,egomena to Any Future Metaphysics that will be abl,e to
come Jorward as Science
PC 1967 Philosophical Correspondence
PE 1764c 'Prize Essay', Inquiry Conceming the Distindness of the
Principks of Natural Theolog;y and Morality
PM 1756d The Employment in Natural Philosophy of Metaphysics com-
bined with Geometry, of which Samp!,e I contains the Physical
Monadology
PP 1795 Perpetual Peace
R 1925-34 &flections
RL 1793a Religion within the Limits of &ason Alone
TP 1793b 'On the Common Saying: 'This may be true in theory,
but it does not apply in practice"'
UNH 1755a Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens
WE 1784b 'An Answer to the Question: "What is Enlightenment?"'
wo 1786c 'What is Orientation in Thinking?'
WP 1791b What Real Progress has Metaphysics made in Germany since
the Time of Leibniz and Wal.ff?
6
Kant and the 'age of criticism'
de nobis ipsis silemus - of ourselves we are sil,ent

(epigraph from Francis Bacon to the Critique of Pure Reason)
Kant's biography has been tak.en to exemplify the complete submersion of

a philosopher's life in their work. 1 Described by Elias Canetti as a 'head
without a world', it would seem as if, outside his writings, Kant did not
lead much of a life: he lectured for several hours a week, he dined with
friends and took regular, aftemoon walks famed for their neurotic punc
tuality. In the memoirs of his contemporaries the incidentals of Kant's
daily life have a quality of 'noises off', with the main action taking place
in his study, or wherever it was that he read and wrote. The opposition
between Kant's quiet life and explosive thought, between his provincial
surroundings in the East Prussian city of Königsberg and the world
historic significance of his writings, have become the stuff of philosophical
legend. Yet it must be said that such a view of Kant is severely distorted,
and obstructs an appreciation of both his life and his work.
Suppose we respect Kant's reticence, and look only to his work, even
then the sheer intemal diversity of his oeuvre would urge caution. This
diversity is apparent in spite of the best efforts of the editors of the monu
mental Berlin Academy of Sciences edition of Kant's writings (Akademie
Ausgabe, now in its 29th volume) and the narrow focus of much Kant
scholarship. 2 The uniformly bound volumes of the Academy Edition give
the impression of a monolithic corpus, a body of writings severed from the
circumstances of their original publication and inhabiting a philosophical
Valhalla. Given the consistency of editorial treatment, it is not surprising
that the Academy Edition has encouraged the proliferation of develop
mental narratives which bind together the various 'phases' of Kant's au
thorship. All ofKant's texts appear tobe of the same status, with differences
between them marked in terms of chronology and the regulation AK
references; the edition gives an impression of the smooth unfolding of an
intellectual project independent of circumstances - a work without a world.
7
KANT AND 1HE 'AGE OF CRITICISM'
But if we step behind the monument and reconsider its constituent parts,
the sheer heterogeneity of Kant's writings is striking. And if we look be
yond the philosophical letter to the publication details of the individual
texts - who they were published by, and for whom - we begin to gain a
complex appreciation of the internal diversity of Kant's work, one moreover
which allows us to situate his authorship within the changing structures of
intellectual life that characterised the German Enlightenment.
Recent work in the social history of the German Enlightenment has
prepared the ground for a reconsideration of Kant's life and work within
its emergent structures. Such a biography - when written - would contrib
ute to the interpretation of Kant's thought by breaking down the mono
lithic kantian Text into diverse Kantian texts. Instead of simply relating
Kant's texts to each other in some more or less sophisticated teleological
narrative of his 'development', it would read these against other texts,
events and processes of institutional change. To use Kant's own distinction,
his thought would then be read less as a definitive body of philosophy
than as an open-ended process of philosophizing, one in which the philo
sophical tradition was re-invented in the face of changes in the structures
of University, Church and State, as weil as in the publishing industry and
the reading public. In such a biography, Kant's writings would be viewed
as responses from within the philosophical tradition to the complex set of
structural changes and cultural developments that typify modernity. Un
fortunately, such a biography has yet to be written, although a few prelimi
nary indications of the close relationship between Kant's writing and his
world are possible on the basis of existing material.
A good place to begin is with Kant's definition of his own epoch. In the
Preface to the first edition of the Critique of Pure &ason (1781) he writes:
Our age is, in especial degree, the age of criticism, and to criticism
everything must submit. Religion through its sanctity, and law giving
through its majesty, may seek to exempt themselves from it. But they
then awaken just suspicion, and cannot claim the sincere respect
which reason accords only to that which has been able to sustain the
test of free and open examination. (CPR A xi)
The age of criticism requires a critical philosophy, one which presumes,
indeed demands the freedom to examine and criticize the institutions of
Church and State. Kant presented what he saw as the preconditions for
such a philosophy three years later in his essay 'An Answer to the Ques
tion: "What is Enlightenment?"'. Here the fundamental 'condition of the
possibility' for the age of criticism is described as the 'freedom to make
public use of one's reason in all matters' which for Kant means 'that use
which anyone may make of it as an intellectual [ Gelehrter] addressing the
8
KANT AND THE 'AGE OF CRITICISM'
entire reading public (WE p. 37, p. 55). This freedom in turn requires not
only the suspension of state and ecclesiastical censorship, but also the
existence of a publishing industry capable of serving the needs of authors
and the reading public. Thus in order to understand Kant's contribution
to enlightenment, we cannot be content with looking only at what he said
to his public; we must also pay attention to how he said it, and to the ex
tent to which the said was determined by the saying. In more concrete
terms, it is necessary to attend to the relationship between the content of
reason and the forms through which it was addressed to the reading
public, notably the media Kant used to exercise the public use of his
reason, and in particular the channels of publication open to him and the
reading public(s) they enabled him to reach. Moreover, Kant himself
must be considered not only in his guise as a writer, but also as a reader,
or as a member of the reading public addressed by other authors.
The relationship between Kant's public use of reason and the modes of
addressing the reading public available to him is complicated by Kant's
distinction between the private and public uses of reason. He somewhat
counter-intuitively described the private use of reason as 'that which a
person may make of it in a particular civil post or office with which he is
entrusted' (WE p. 37, p. 55) as opposed to the public use of reason in
addressing the reading public. The writer inhabits two worlds, one in
which they act passively 'as part of the machine' and the other in which
they freely address through their writings 'a public in the truest sense of
the word' (WE p. 37, p. 56). 3 Writers occupy that ambiguous and vulner
able space permitted them by 'a ruler who is himself enlightened and has
no fear of phantoms, yet who likewise has at hand a well-disciplined and
numerous army to guarantee public security' and who can 'dare to say: Argue
as much as you like and about whatever you like, but obey!' (WE p. 41, p. 59).
Kant's wager is that the habit of thinking freely will gradually translate
into the habit of acting freely, and thus eventually overcome the division
between public and private uses of reason. But in 'the age of enlighten
ment, the century of Frederick' (WE p. 40, p. 59) the freedom to argue but
obey is the lesser evil: while not as desirable as freedom in thought and
deed, it is better than obedience in both.
Kant's examples of the private use of reason include the soldier who
must obey orders while on duty, the citizen who must pay taxes and the
clergyman who must instruct his congregation in the doctrine of the church.
While each is obliged to obey while perlorming their office, they are also
free as writers to address the reading public with their thoughts on mili
tary strategy, taxation and religion. lt is striking that when discussing this
distinction Kant does not refer to the example closest to home - his own
profession of university teacher. In what sense does the distinction between
9
the private and public use of reason apply to these employees of the state?
There is clearly a tension between their capacities as state-employed intel
lectuals and those they exercise as free intellectuals addressing a reading
public. This tension is evident throughout Kant's writings, and requires us
to locate the public use of reason embodied in his writings not only with
respect to the reading public, but also with respect to the private use of
reason in his academic career.
The delicate balance between Kant's private and public use of reason
was exposed after the death of Frederick the Great in 1786. Frederick's
successor, Frederick William II, initiated a counter-Enlightenment which
sought, by means of censorship, to curb the freedom of the press and to
extend obedience to precisely those arguments concerning Church and
State permitted by his predecessor. Following the publication of &ligi.on
within the Limits of &ason Alone (RL) in 1793, Kant received a Cabinet
Order from Frederick William II which reprimanded him for his 'misuse
of philosophy' to 'distort and disparage many of the cardinal and basic
teachings of the Holy Scripture and Christianity'. lt ordered him to give
a 'conscientious account' of himself and to apply his authority and talents
'to the progressive realisation of our paternal purpose. Failing this, you
must expect unpleasant measures for your continuing obstinacy'.4 In re
ply, Kant maintained that in the private use of reason as a professor and
'teacher of youth' he never mixed 'any evaluation of the Holy Scriptures
and of Christianity into my lectures' and merely followed the texts of
Baumgarten 'which are the basis of my lectures'.5 Furthermore, with re
spect to the public use of reason 'as a teacher of the people' he did 'no
harm to the public religi.on of the /,an,! since 'the book in question is not
at all suitable for the public: to them it is an unintelligible, closed book,
only a debate among scholars of the faculty, of which the people take no
notice'.6 The faculty, in their turn, Kant says, are sanctioned by the crown
to debate religious matters and publicly to judge all contributions. Kant's
defence of the pUblic use of his reason hinges upon a distinction between
a scholarly public authorized by the state to make judgements, and a wider
reading public for whom such works are unsuitable. In other words, his
public use of reason is defended - self-destructively - as the private use of
reason by a publicly authorized 'scholar of the faculty'.
Kant ended his reply to the Monarch by undertaking 'hereafter [to]
refrain altogether from discoursing publicly, in lectures or writings, on
religion, whether natural or revealed'.7 By making this undertaking he
implicitly acknowledged the collapse of the distinction between public
and private uses of reason on which he had founded his authorship.
This was recognized by J.E. Biester, the beleaguered editor of the pro
enlightenment Berlinische Monatsschrift, when he read Kant's reply. He gently
10
observed in a letter to Kant dated 17 December 1794 that with his under
taking Kant prepared 'a great triumph for the enemies ofenlightenment,
and the good cause suffers a great loss'. He believed that Kant did not
have to silence his criticism for the sake of obedience in this way, and
regarded him as having withdrawn from the struggle for enlightenment,
leaving it to others to 'continue to work on the great philosophical and
theological enlightenment that you have so happily begun'.8 Although
Kant considered himself released from his promise with the death of
Frederick William II in 1797 9 Biester was correct in his assessment: Kant
was unable to go beyond the tension between obedience and criticism
which characterized both the Fredrician 'Age of Enlightenment' and the
Kantian 'Age of Criticism'.
Tue episode of the Cabinet Order reveals many of the institutional
forces and tensions which traversed Kant's texts. These include organs of
publication (book and joumal) and the audiences for which they were
intended, the university as a place ofteaching and research, and the role
ofacademic, ecclesiastic and public censorship. lt points without ambigu
ity to the tension between being a 'teacher ofyouth' and a 'teacher ofthe
people'. Indeed, the tension between the private and the public use of
reason was especially marked in the case of a university teacher, since the
lines ofdemarcation between privately reasoning as a teacher and publicly
reasoning as an author were not strongly drawn. There were many points
of intersection between the two uses of reason, with some texts, such as
RL, attempting to serve both masters.
Nevertheless, it is possible, with reservations, to distinguish within Kant's
oeuvre texts which represent the private, semi-private, and public uses of
his reason. The texts of Kant's private use of reason include those in
tended to satisfy the formal requirements of entering and progressing
through an academic career and those concerned in some direct or indi
rect way with the 'teaching of youth'. Such texts, as we shall see, form a
large proportion ofKant's publishing output. With them is a further group
ofsemi-private texts which were produced in response to specific circum
stances (such as the public questions set by the Berlin Academy) and in
which Kant appears as a university teacher addressing an intellectual public
beyond the university. Finally, ofcourse, there are the books which make
up Kant's public use of reason as an author. These include books not
directly intended for a university audience, as weil as articles written for
newspapers and journals, whether for local, regional or national audiences.
These distinctions within the Kantian text are best analysed in terms of
the development ofKant's career as an author and a teacher. He was born
in the East Prussian city of Königsberg (now Kaliningrad) at 5 a.m. on 22
April 1724, and remained, unlike Descartes, an habitual early riser. He was
11
the fourth of nine children ( only five survived) born to Anna Regina and
Johann Georg Kant, a harness-maker. He spent his childhood in an artisanal
suburb of the eity, growing up in an intensely pietlst milieu. In many
respects the time and circumstances of Kant's birth were extremely pro
pitlous for his subsequent upward soeial and professional mobility. The
eity of Königsberg had only been offieially founded out of the amalgam of
three large towns clustered around the mouth of the River Pregel in the
year of Kant's birth. Its recent foundatlon was one reason, but not the
most important, why it did not possess the closed and impervious urban
elite characteristlc of most German eitles of the period. lt was the second
largest eity in Prussia, and certainly one of the most economically and
culturally dynamic in Germany. Tue eity experienced a boom in trade
throughout the eighteenth century, exportlng agricultural produce from
its rural hinterland to the markets of England and Scandinavia, and im
portlng from them metal, manufactured goods and 'colonial products'. Its
populatlon of 40,000 inhabitants in 1724 had expanded to 50,000 in 1770,
among whom were a number of expatriate English merchants, two of
whom,Joseph Green and Robert Motherby, became Kant's closest friends
and introduced him to English philosophy and literature. 10 Apart from its
maritime links with the rest of Europe and the world, the eity also acted
as a regional capital, hostlng a university - the Albertlna - founded by
Prince Albrecht in 1544, and a lively provineial culture of newspapers,
journals and bookshops well abreast with the latest developments from the
Leipzig and Frankfurt book fairs. 11
Although Königsberg certainly possessed the relatlvely liberal climate
and soeial openness characteristlc of most major port eitles, it was not this
alone that permitted Kant to pursue his chosen career. Other, more
speeific factors also contributed, prime among which was the relative
weakness of the local, patrieian elites in comparison to those which domi
nated other German eities. 12 This was due not so much to the recent
foundatlon of the eity, nor to the influence of trade - the patrieian elite
maintained control in Hamburg untll the end of the nineteenth century13
- but more to the struggle for control of the eity waged since the mid
seventeenth century between urban patrieians, local rural aristocracy and
the Prussian state. By Kant's time, the modemizing Prussian state was
largely victorious over the other forces, and served as a counterweight to
the particularism of local elites. A further factor was the decline in the
fortunes of the German universitles since the late seventeenth century,
which contlnued into the eighteenth century with falling enrolments and
the consequently diminished prestlge and income of the professoriat. 14
This made the profession less attractlve to patrieian and aristocratlc en
trants, and more open to talent from Kant's soeial background. A fourth
12
major factor was pietism, which at the time of Kant's birth was undergoing
the transition from private, apolitical devotion to becoming an important
feature of the institutional structure of the Prussian state. To these struc
tural factors may be added the impact of the Russian administration of the
city from January 1758 until August 1762. This was a period of levity and
relaxation of manners, which did a great deal to soften and undermine
any of the remaining rigid social distinctions and disciplines of Königsberg
society. 15
The development of pietist educational institutions in the early eight
eenth century provides the setting for Kant's austere education in the
Collegium Fridericianum between 1732 and 1740. The school owed its
origin to a private, pietist foundation of 1698 which received the royal
privilege in 1701. Recommended and aided by the Kant family pastor,
Franz Albert Schutz, who was also principal of the school, Immanuel fol
lowed a rigorous and austere schooling in grammar and philology accom
panied by a regime of inflexible piety. While Kant cherished the memory
of the domestic pietism of his parents, he had nothing but scom for the
official version he encountered at school. 16 Kant's one inspiring school
teacher, the Latin master Heydenreich, introduced him to a lifelong love
of classical Latin literature; unfortunately, not one of his colleagues, Kant
later reminisced with fellow sufferer Johannes Cunde, was capable of 'in
flaming the sparks within us for the study of philosophy or mathematics'
although they 'could certainly blow them out'. 17 Nevertheless, by the age
of 16 Kant was more than capable of fulfilling the state-imposed matricula
tion requirement of the local university. 18
The University of Königsberg was organized in terms of the four tradi
tional faculties, the three 'higher faculties' of theology, law and medicine,
and the fourth or 'lower faculty' of philosophy. Since Frederick William
I saw the main function of the universities to consist in training civil
servants - above all clergy, lawyers and medical practitioners - he or
dained that students must enrol in one of the three higher faculties. lt is
not known which faculty Kant enrolled in; whether, as is conventionally
assumed, in the faculty of theology, or in medicine. 19 Whichever it was,
and in spite of great poverty, Kant did not pursue the qualification for a
bureaucratic post in the Prussian administration, but dedicated himself to
the 'lower faculty' of philosophy. For much of the eighteenth century the
lower faculty of philosophy was the most dynamic and innovative in the
university. Because its curriculum was not adapted to the demands of a
profession, it was possible to extend the range of subjects covered by
philosophy to include not only subjects such as physics and geography
which were ignored by the higher faculties, but even those of religion,
jurisprudence and medicine which were their protected domains.
13
lt was the comprehensive character of the education provided in the

philosophical faculty which attracted Kant to it as a student, and which led
him to commit his life to defending and extending the claims of the
discipline, even as late as 1798 in The Conflict of the Faculties (CF). However,
the most important single factor in his enthusiasm for philosophy was the
influence of his teacher, Professor Martin Knutzen. 20 Knutzen was born in
Königsberg in 1714, and became Extraordinary Professor of Logic and
Metaphysics, 21 a post he pursued with self-destructive diligence until his
early death at the age of 37. A representative of the generation of pietist
Wolffians of the late 1730s, Knutzen combined in his teaching and writing
interests in philosophy, religion, mathematics and natural science. Through
his daily six hours of lectures, and additional seminars and private sessions,
Kant was introduced to a wide range of material, including Newton's
Mathematical Principks of Natural Phiwsophy.
Kant technically remained a student or 'candidate' at the university
until 1755, when he gained in quick succession his master's degree
(Magi,ster) and his venia kgendi or licence to teach as a Magi,ster kgens or
Pri�atdoz.ent. This meant that his income as a teacher was dependent upon
the fees of his students; he was not to receive the public salary of a füll
professor until 15 years later in 1770. The reason for the long period of
study (1740-55) was largely economic; accounts of Kant during his early
student years show him to be poor, if not wholly destitute. 22 In 1747 he left
Königsberg to work in the surrounding countryside as a domestic tutor or
Hauskhrer. His departure coincided with the long-drawn-out passage of his
first book through the press, while his return in 1754 was marked by a
minor explosion of journalism, academic theses and a book - Universal
Natural Histqry and Theqry of the Heavens (UNH) - on which he had occupied
himself during his period of rural exile.
Kant summed up his early career in a petition to the Russian Empress
Elisabeth dated 14 December 1758 in support of his application for a
vacant chair in logic and metaphysics. After describing how logic and
metaphysics 'have always been the special fields of my study' he continued:
Since becoming a lecturer at said university, I have taught logic and
metaphysics every semester. I have publicly defended two dissertations
in these subjects; in addition, I have published four treatises in the
learned journal of Königsberg, three Programmata and three other
philosophical tracts which give some sense of my research. 23
The petition shows how the private and the public uses of reason were
inextricably entangled in the case of a university teacher. Most obviously,
Kant is using the products of his public use of reason to justify his case for
an official position. What is more significant, however, is the way in which
14
KANT AND THE 'AGE OF CRillCISM'
he classifies his 12 publications. Five of them are directly concerned with

fulfilling the requirements of an academic career, namely the two disser
tations and the three Programmata or announcements of lectures essential
to making a living as a Privatdozent. The remaining texts were divided into
contributions to a local journal, addressing topics of local interest, and
three extremely diverse books intended for specific audiences.
Kant prepared three dissertations in the mid-1750s, but only two were
published: all three were written in Latin. The first, unpublished disserta
tion - Concise Outline of some &flections on Fire - was submitted as Kant's
master's thesis to the philosophy faculty on 17 April 1755 (see 1755b in
'Kant's published writings'). lt comprised 12 handwritten pages, and was
intended for a small academic audience.24 Tue thesis was examined on 13
May and on 12June Kant was admitted to the degree of Master of Philoso
phy at a formal ceremony. Three months later Kant submitted a second
thesis for the purposes of obtaining the venia kgendi, one which had to be
defended in public. This was the remarkable 'A New Elucidation of the
First Principles of Metaphysical Cognition' (ND) published byJ.H. Hartung,
the 'royally appointed Court and Academic Book Printer', in Königsberg
in 1755.25 The thesis was defended in the auditorium of the faculty of
philosophy by means of a formal disputation. Kant was admitted to the
faculty and received the venia legendi, which permitted him to give lectures
in the university and to charge students a fee.
In the following April Kant applied for the extraordinary chair in
philosophy left vacant since Knutzen's death. According to a regulation
issued by Frederick II a Privatdozent could only be promoted to an extra
ordinary chair after three public disputations. In fulfillment of this re
quirement, Kant had already submitted in March a further thesis in Latin,
the Physical Monadology (PM), again published by Hartung, which was dis
puted sometime in April with Kant's later biographer Borowski opposing.
The petition for the chair came to nothing since the post was abolished,
but left to posterity an invaluable statement of Kant's early thoughts on
the relationship between physics and metaphysics.
Kant's oeuvre contains two other significant works intended exclusively
for an academic audience, and which together with the above disserta
tions and a reply to a dissertation (1777) comprise the extent of his Latin
authorship. The first was the dissertation he defended for the purposes of
promotion to the chair in Logic and Metaphysics in 1770: On the Form and
Prindpks of the Sensible and the Intelligi.ble World (ID). In 1763 Kant had been
offered the chair of poetry at Königsberg, but refused it, as he did the
more financially attractive offers from the Universities of Erlangen (late
1769) and Jena (early 1770). These offers testified to the growing fame of
the Privatdozent, and pointed to the need to promote him to a füll chair.
15
An opening occurred with the death of Langhansen, the Professor of

Mathematics. Kant marked the passing of bis colleague with an elegy and
a letter to Berlin proposing that either of bis two colleagues, the Professor
of Logic and Metaphysics F. Job. Buck (who was preferred over Kant on
grounds of seniority by the Academic Senate in 1758) or the Professor of
Moral Philosophy, Christiani, be shifted sidewards to make room forKant
in the chair of Logic and Metaphysics. A fortnight later, Kant was ap
pointed to the chair by Royal Order and granted an annual salary of 166
talers and 60 groschen.
In order to qualify for the chair, Kant was required to present another
dissertation for public dispute, which he wrote over the summer vacation
and defended on 21 August 1770. Tue 'Inaugural Dissertation' is a pivotal
work, the most important of all Kant's writings before the three critiques,
and one which sums up the achievements of the 1750s and 1760s while
preparing the ground for the critical philosophy of the 1780s. lt was
published (or at least distributed) by Kant's main publisher of the 1760s,
Johann Jacob Kanter (see below), but occupies a peculiar position in the
publishing history of bis works, being neither simply an academic thesis
nor a work specifically intended for the reading public. Unlike Kant's
other major writings, but like most academic dissertations intended for
dispute at the University of Königsberg, the Inaugural Dissertation was
hastily printed with a small print run in the city itself. lt was not an
nounced in the all important commercial catalogue of the Leipzig book
fair, and seems to have been distributed outside Königsberg after a delay
and almost as an afterthought.
Kant sent copies of the 'Inaugural Dissertation' to J.H. Lambert and
M. Mendelssohn in Berlin via bis erstwhile student and respondent in
the debate Marcus Herz.26 In bis accompanying letter to Lambert he
mentioned a plan to revise the work by adding a few pages 'before the
publisher presents it at the coming bookfair', but this intended revision
expanded into an entirely new work. This is first explicitly mentioned two
years later in a letter to Herz (21 February 1772), where Kant muses it
'might perhaps have the title, 'The Limits of Sense and Reason" '.27 This
comment is usually taken to mark the beginning to the compositional
history of the Critique of Pure Reason.
Kant's remaining academic production in Latin is a minor, but none
theless interesting address given in 1786 at the end of one of bis periods
as Rektor of the University: On the Philosophers' Medicine of the Body. This work
closes an important phase ofKant's private use of reason in the university.
Although the form and the occasions for composing the Latin writings
were prescribed by official university requirements, the format of the
academic dissertation and address provided an opportunity to Kant for
16
KANT AND TiiE 'AGE OF CRITICISM'
exploratory reflection and the establishment of research agendas. However,

the Latin dissertations did not exhaust that part of Kant's publications
which was directed almost exclusively to the specific academic audience of
the University of Königsberg. The 1758 petition to Empress Elisabeth also
refers to three Programmata. These were the writings through which
Privatdounten, dependent on the fees of students attending their lectures,
announced their forthcoming lecture programmes and gave students a
taste of their work in the guise of a short reflection on a particular aca
demic topic. 28 The Programmata were basically adverts for students, and
were scrutinized by the academic censor; they were usually printed at the
Privatdounfs own expense in small runs by a local print shop.
On receiving the licence to teach in 1755 Kant was obliged to make his
presence feit with a number of Programmata. The petition of 1758 men
tions three dating from 1756, 1757 and 1758; these were followed after
the petition by a further four Programmata from 1759, 1762, 1765 and
1775. Together the seven Programmata form a significant if underestimated
part of Kant's authorship. The first appeared on 25 April 1756 with
an announcement of Kant's proposed lectures for the summer semester:
M[agister] Kant's New Notes Towards a Discussion ofthe Theory ofWinds, which
contains at the same time an lnvitation to his Lectures. lt gives a sample ofKant's
thought in the shape of a theory that relates wind to the rotation of the
earth upon its axis. The inscription 'Printed in Driest'sKönigsberg Royally
Privileged Book Press' shows that this publication was not supported by a
publisher, but was privately printed and intended for a local student au
dience.29 This accounts for the minimal impact of the work outside of
Königsberg; it was written to impress local students and not the meteor
ologists in the wider reading public, Kant published the following three
Programmata in the same way, with M. Kant's Outline and Announcement of
a Course of Lectures on Physical Geography together with an Appendix of an
lnquiry into the. Qµestion of Whether the West Winds in our Regions are Humid
because they have traversed a Great Sea announcing the lectures for the sum
mer semester of 1757, M. Immanuel Kant's New Theory of Motion and Rest
and its Consequences Jor the Primary Grounds ofNatural Science, through which
at the same time his Lectures Jor this Half Year are Announced those for summer
semester 1758, and An Attempt at some Reflections on optimism by M. Immanuel
Kant also containing an Announcement of his Lectures for the coming Semesterfor
the winter semester 1759-60.
The two following Programmata from 1762 and 1765-6 differ from the
previous four in that they were no longer privately printed by Driest, but
published by Johann Jacob Kanter, and announced to a wider public in
the Leipzig book fair catalogue. The first accordingly plays down its char
acter as an announcement of lectures, and is entitled simply The False Subtlay
17
uy
of the Four Syllogistic Figures demonstrated M. Immanuel Kant, although in
it Kant presents the direction he intends to take in his 'course on logic'
for the winter semester. This was available for sale throughout Germany,
and thus straddles the genres of an independent published work and
an intemal university announcement.30 The second Programma was also
published by Kanter, and this time its title makes no attempt to conceal
its pedagogic function: M. Immanuel Kant's Announcement of the Programme
of his Lectures for the Winter Semester 1765-1766. However, it is in fact a deep
meditation on the public significance of philosophy from a teacher fully
aware of the exemplary character of his vocation, and should be read as
a contribution to a redefinition of philosophy's place in the German
university.31 lt also represents Kant's elevation of the genre of the Programma
from its function as part of the private use of reason within the university
to a way of practicing the public use of reason for the benefit of a wider
reading public. In it Kant makes a case for the teaching of philosophy to
both youth and the people as being the prime example of the public use
of reason.
The last of Kant's Programmata is the text On the Different Human Rac.es,
uy way ofAnnouncing the Lectures on Physical Geography for the Summer Semester
1775 from 1775. When he published this text with G.L. Hartung, the
official academic publisher and the son of J.H. Hartung with whom Kant
published his dissertations in the 1750s, Kant was already an ordinary
professor in receipt of a salary, and thus not obliged to pursue students
in the manner of a Privatdozent. His reasons for producing this text are not
entirely clear; perhaps he found the genre congenial for the short, specu
lative exploration of a particular topic? This explanation is supported by
Kant's reworking the text for re-publication two years later without the
accompanying references to his lectures. Indeed, Kant's own editorial
practice in this case was followed by many of his subsequent editors. With
few exceptions, the texts Kant wrote in this genre are often published
and read without any reference to their basic function as advertisments,
and it has become accepted editorial practice to delete all references to
lecture courses from their titles.32 This practice serves tacitly to convert
these contributions to the private use of reason in the teaching activities
of the university into public uses of reason for a wider public. The 1775
Programma was the last of the genre for Kant; thereafter he developed other
channels for publishing short, speculative essays which were dedicated
unequivocally to the wider 'reading public' but which drew on the experi
ence he had gained in presenting ideas in a concise and accessible way
through the composition of Programmata.
Unlike the dissertations which were directed towards the faculty and the
senate of the university and meant to ensure bis passage through the
18
KANT AND TIIE 'AGE OF CRITICISM'
academic bureaucracy, the Programmata were directed to students and were

inseparable from the particular relationship between Privatdm.ent and paying
students. Tue Programmata then point to another important link between
Kant's private use of reason as a university teacher and his public use of
reason as an author. However, they do not exhaust the direct and indirect
ways in which Kant's teaching and publishing activities were deeply en
meshed with each other. However, in order fully to understand this rela
tionship it is necessary to look more closely at Kant's activity as a teacher,
and at the enormous demands it made upon his time and energy.
In a letter to J.G. Lindner of 1759, four years into his career as a
Privatdozent, Kant paints a melancholy picture of himself at work:
I sit daily at the anvil of my lectem and guide the heavy hammer of
my repetitious lectures, always beating out the same rhythm ...In
this town where I find myself and with the modest prosperity for
which I allow myself to hope, I make do finally with the applause I
receive and the benefits I derive from that, dreaming my life away.
(PC p. 4)
His first lecture in 1755 was a great occasion, and was given in the lecture
room in Professor Kypke's house where he lodged at this time.33 The
room was full to overflowing as the student population and members of
Königsberg society packed in to hear the diffident first of the many thou
sand lectures which Kant was to give over the next 41 years. Giving lectures
was the main activity of a university teacher at this time, supplemented by
the regulation Disputatoria 34 or seminars accompanying lectures which Kant
regularly offered on Wednesdays and Fridays between 8 and 9 a.m. He
offered in addition free sessions for repetitions of points and the solution
of difficulties which may have arisen for students during the lectures, as
well as private classes and tutorial sessions. Later, when he was promoted
to his chair, the demands on his time from lecturing were augmented by
his having to conduct matriculation examinations as well as other university
duties.35
lt is not surprising that Kant was depressed by the grind of lecturing,
given the amount he had to do in order to survive as a Privatdoumt. 36 He
lectured regularly in the morning, with a minimum weekly average of
16 hours at the lectem. The subjects in which he lectured were extremely
diverse. In his first winter semester of 1755 he offered lecture courses in
logic, metaphysics and mathematics; he added in the following summer
an innovative course in physical geography. In the following winter he
added ethics, and in 1759-60 offered pure mathematics and mechanical
sciences, and in 1767 offered a course in the then fashionable subject of
natural law (Naturrecht). Then in 1772 he offered an introductory course
19
in the encyclopaedia and history of philosophy, and in the same year

divided his course on physical geography into separate courses on physical
geography and anthropology; two years later he began lectures in natural
theology and thereafter, in 1776-7, in pedagogy.37 Throughout his career
Kant gave 268 lecture courses: 54 on logic, 49 on metaphysics, 46 on
physical geography, 28 on ethics, 24 on anthropology, 20 on physics,
16 on mathematics, 12 on jurisprudence, 11 on the encyclopaedia and
history of philosophy, 4 on pedagogy, 2 on mechanics, and one each on
mineralogy and theology. The attendance was greatest at the required
lecture courses on logic and metaphysics: the crowd at the lectures on
logic ranged between 45 (1775) and Kant's personal record of 100 in
1780, while attendance at the lectures on metaphysics ranged between 20
and 30 at the beginning of his career, rising to 70 at its end. Attendance
at non-required but popular courses such as physical geography and
anthropology ranged between 24 and 81 and 28 and 55 respectively.
According to govemment regulations a lecture course in a Prussian
university was to consist of the lecturer explicating an authorized text or
compendium. This rule was affirmed by the enlightened Prussian Minister
of Church and Educational Affairs von Zedlitz, with the express exception
of 'Professor Kant and his course on physical geography, for which as is
known there is not a completely suitable teaching text'.38 Thus in the
Programma for his lectures of the winter semester 1765-6 Kant announces
that his lectures on metaphysics will follow AG. Baumgarten's Metaphysics
(1739), those on logic, G.F. Meier's Extractfrom the Theory of &ason (1752),
those on ethics, Baumgarten's Fundamental Principl.es of Ekmentary Practical
Phiwsophy (1760). Kant's technique when lecturing on these and other
handbooks in his other courses was to cover his texts with marginalia and
to interleave pages covered with additional notes, remarks and marginalia
to the marginalia. In this way his lectures transformed the text, often
leaving little trace of the original. These commentaries now fill several
volumes of the Academy Edition of his works, and, when added to the
remainder ofKant's reflections, malte up what Gulyga has nicely described
as a 'scientific diary'.39
Kant's teaching activities had a significant direct and indirect impact
upon his authorship. The most obvious direct impact, apart of course
from the Programmata, consisted in the publication of his lectures. During
his lifetime there was a considerable demand for the transcripts of Kant's
lectures, some of which now offer invaluable information on the develop
ment of his thought.40 Kant attempted to satisfy this demand at the end
of his career by producing authorized versions of the lectures, especially
the two most original series on anthropology and physical geography. He
only completed the anthropology lectures, which were published in 1798
20
as Anthropology .from a Pragmatic Point of View (A), but expressed doubts

whether anybody else would be in a position to read his notes in order to
prepare a text for physical geography. However, during his lifetime ver
sions appeared of his lectures in logic (1800) edited by G.B. Jäsche, phys
ical geography (1802) edited by F.T. von Rink, and pedagogy, again edited
by Rink. After his death followed texts on philosophical theology (1817)
edited by KH.L. Pölitz, and metaphysics (1821), again by Pölitz.41 This of
course is not to mention the publishing programme of the twentieth
century Academy Edition.
The demand for transcripts and the publication ofKant's lectures shows
that they were considered an integral part of his oeuvre even during his
lifetime. However, his lectures also fed indirectly into his published texts.
Tracing this influence is an extremely subtle branch of Kant scholarship
which it would be inappropriate to pursue too closely at this point, al
though the following issues may be briefly addressed. First of all, the texts
Kant lectured on often supplied the broad structure of his later works.
This is no�bly the case with the Critique of Pure Reason which transforms
the subject matter and organisation of Wolffian general and special meta
physics presented in Baumgarten's Metaphysica. Secondly, the marginalia
Kant brought to his texts emerged from his wider reading and thinking,
and point to the way in which he transformed and extended the philo
sophical tradition. He was famous for bringing to his lectures interesting
examples drawn from a wide range of diverse sources. In this respect, the ·
lectures reveal the process by which Kant was able, while working within
the philosophical tradition, to adapt the tradition to the new concems of
modemity, whether those of natural science, politics, art and literature, or
medicine. His lectures fused the traditional concems and language of the
philosophical compendia with new material drawn from the newspapers,
joumals and books satisfying the demands of a new reading public.
This conjunction of the private use of reason in the lecture theatre and
the public use of reason on thc printed page brings us to the two other
basic categories of Kantian text, his joumal publications and his books.
Both categories are intemally diverse. Kant wrote several sorts of joumal
articles and books meant for distinct geographically and socially deter
mined audiences. Retuming to the petition to the Empress Elisabeth from
1758, Kant claimed that he had published 'four treatises in the leamed
joumal of Königsberg'. These mark the debut of a distinguished career in
popular joumalism which Kant pursued until the end of his life. He par
ticipated in the emergence of a new form of publication intended for a
broad, and enlightened, reading public.42
The first four joumalistic writings which Kant mentions were published
after his retum to Königsberg in 1754 in a local joumal called the
21
KANT AND IBE 'AGE OF CRITICISM'
Wochentliche Königsbergische Frag- und Anzeigungs-Nachrichten. The first essay

was a reply to a question set by the Berlin Academy in 1752, 'Inquiry into
the Question whether the Earth in its Rotation around its Axis, by which
it produces the Change of Day and Night, has undergone any Alterations
since the Time of its Origin'. This was published in two weekly instalments,
and does not seem to have been entered into the Academy's competition.
lt marks the first of an important sub-genre of Kant's writings, namely the
competition essay. His next try for an Academy medal, in 1764, was sub
mitted and, although it did not win the competition, was judged worthy
for publication by the Berlin Academy. This was the lnquiry Conceming the
Distinctness of the Principl,es of Natural Theol,ogy and Morality. In Answer to the
Qµ.estion which the Berlin Academy of Sciences set for the Year 1763. lt was this
essay more than any which brought Kant to the attention of the enlight
ened public beyond Königsberg. 43
Tue next three essays published in the Wochentliche Königsbergische Frag
und Anzeigungs-Nachrichten were 'The Question whether the Earth is aging,
considered from a physicalist Point of View', serialized over four issues
during the summer of 1754, and two essays on the Lisbon Earthquake
published in January and April 1756. Between the latter, in March, Kant
published a successful book on the earthquake with Hartung, thus co
ordinating his joumal and book publications. He published one further
article in this joumal, the important essay 'Conceming the ultimate Ground
of the Differentiation of Regions in Space' 12 years later in 1768. Follow
ing the four essays from the mid-1750s Kant did not publish any more
short works in this form until 1764, when he commenced anonymous
publication in the Königsbergsche Gel,ehrte und Politische äitungen. This
joumal, founded in 1764 by Johann Jacob Kanter, Kant's publisher of the
1760s, was edited by Hamann on the model of the literary and political
joumals he had read during his stay in England. lt is a fine example of the
new generation of joumals which emerged all over Germany during the
1750s and 1760s. Although still intended for local circulation, such joumals
responded to, and to some degree led, a shift in public interest from
scientific to literary and political topics. In the Königsbergsche Gel,ehrte und
Politische äitungen Kant anonymously published the 'Essay on the Maladies
of the Mind' (1764) as well as reviews of books by Silberschlag and Moscati
in 1764 and 1771, the essays 'On the Dessau Philanthropin Academy' in
1776 and 1777, and the 'Report to Physicians' in 1782.
After 1771 Kant no longer published his short essays and reviews in the
local joumals. After a long period of silence he retumed with a review in
the R.aisonierendes Verzeichnis neuer Bücher in 1783, followed in 1784 by 'Idea
for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose' in the Berlinische
Monatsschrift. This was the first of a long and distinguished series of essays
22
for this journal; indeed, with the exception of some short reviews for the
Allgemeine Literatur üitung and the essay 'On the Use of Teleological Prin
ciples in Philosophy' for Der Teutsche Merkur in 1788, all Kant's shorter
writings of the last two decades of his life were published in the Berlinische
Monatsschrift. 44 Thus almost all the texts on the philosophy of history and
the contributions to contemporary political, religious and scientific con
troversies described by Jean-Fran�ois Lyotard as Kant's 'fourth critique'
appeared in this one journal (see 'Kant's published writings' for füll details).
The Berlinische Monatsschrift is remarkable not only for having published
many of Kant's finest and most influential writings, but also for being the
public face of an Enlightenment secret society in Berlin, the Mittwoch
gesellschaft, a group of intellectuals and senior bureaucrats who met
secretly to discuss themes relevant to philosophy and contemporary Prus
sian society. 45 The secretary of this society who arranged the circulation of
papers between its members was Johann Erich Biester, the secretary to
Minister von Zedlitz and the editor of the Berlinische Monatsschrift. The first
edition of 1783 presented itself as a 'Moral Weekly' but the journal quickly
assumed a more explicitly pro-Enlightenment social, political and cultural
agenda. 46 Through Biester the journal was closely associated with Zedlitz
and reform circles in Berlin and dedicated to disseminating the cause of
enlightenment throughout Prussia. Kant's publishing in this journal was
a clear statement of position, as Biester underlined in his offer to Kant
in a letter of 5 June 1785 to 'use our mouth to bring your speech to the
public'. The Berlinische Monatsschrift was one of the main means by which
Kant conducted the public use of reason which he recommended in his
essay 'An Answer to the Question: "What is Enlightenment?"' published in
its pages in 1784. He also continued to support Biester's journal with
contributions after the change in political climate with the accession of
Frederick William II in 1786, as well as after the episode with the censor
which successfully halted the serialization of Religion within the Limits of
&ason Alone in 1792. 47
The final means by which Kant addressed the reading public was through
his books, but even here his access to the media of publication changed
during his career, and is reflected in the kinds of books he wrote. In the
petition to Empress Elisabeth Kant mentions 'three other philosophical
tracts which give some sense of my research'. The first of these, Thoughts
on the True Estimation of Living Forces, was published over several years
(1747-9) at Kant's own expense with the support of a relative, a shoe
maker called Richter: it accordingly bears only the name of the printer -
Martin Eberhard Dorn - and not that of a publisher. Kant himself
observed that the circumstances of publication meant that his book did
not enter the book trade and consequently was barely circulated making
23
KANT AND 1HE 'AGE OF CRITICISM'
hardly any impact on the public. 48 His second venture into publishing was
equally unsatisfactory, namely the anonymously published Universal Natural
History and Theory of the Heavens of 1755 which was written during Kant's
career as a domestic tutor. The book was published by Johann Friedrich
Petersen of Königsberg and Leipzig who promptly went bankrupt. The
stock was impounded with only a few copies escaping. Thus, although
announced in the all-important catalogue of the Frankfurt and Leipzig
book fairs, it did not gain wide circulation, though it did receive a review
in the Hamburg journal Freyen Urtheil,en und Nachrichten. lt re-appeared for
sale a year later in an advert in the Wochentlichen ](jjnigsbergischen Frag- und
Anzeigungs- Nachrichten under the heading of 'things which can be bought
in Königsberg' under Kant's name and available at 'the bookprinters Herr
Joh. Driest' - presumably bankrupt stock accepted in lieu of payment by
the printer from Petersen. 49 Kant's third philosophical tract was a quite
different matter. Published by the official and academic bookseller Hartung
in March 1756, the History and Natural Description of the Most &markable
Occurrences associated with the Earthquake which at the End of 1755 Shook a
Large Part of the World responded to local interest aroused by an article on
the earthquake which Kant had published in January. This text is said
to be unique in Kant's oeuvre for being printed as fast as it was written,
although this also seems to have been the case with the Obseroations on the
Feeling of the Beautiful and the Sublime and the Critique ofJudgement. lt was a
local success in Königsberg, but does not seem to have been more widely
distributed.
Following these inauspicious debuts, Kant's relations with his publishers
settled into a more established pattern which may be presented chrono
logically. From 1762 until 1770 Kant published with Johann Jacob Kanter
of Königsberg, and then, after an interval of 11 years (the 'silent decade')
he resumed publishing activities in 1781 withJohann Friedrich Hartknoch
of Riga with whom he stayed until 1788. In 1790 he published the Critique
ofJudgement with Lagarde and Friederich of Berlin and Libau, and from
then until his death his books were published by Friedrich Nicolovius of
Königsberg. In each case, with the exception of Lagarde and Friedrich,
Kant's relationship with his publisher was far more than economic. He
relied on publishers not only to publish and distribute his books, but also
to keep him supplied with the publications of others: they were his link
to the public exercise of reason both as an author and as a reader. This
was largely due to the structure of the eighteenth-century book trade in
which a bookseller also served as a publisher in order to gain their stock
by exchanging the books they produced with those of other publishers,
above all at the Leipzig book fair. Kant's publishers, we shall see, were
expected to keep him informed of recent publications, and to lend them
24
to him when they came into the shop. While Kant did not demand a large
cash honorarium from his publishers, 50 he certainly expected to be re
warded in kind.
The close relationship between author and publisher is immediately
evident in the case of Kant's publisher during the 1760s, Johann Jacob
Kanter (1738-86). Kanter published the False Subtkty of the Four Syllogistic
Figures (FS) in 1762, The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration
of the Existence of God (OPA) and the Attempt to Introduce the Concept of
Negative Magnitudes into Philosophy (NM) in 1763, the Obseroations on the
Feeling of the Beautiful and the Sublime (OBS) in 1764, the Programmata of
1765, the Dreams of a Spirit-Seer Elucidated by Dreams of Metaphysics (DS) in
1766, and finally (although this is not entirely certain) the 'Inaugural
Dissertation' (1D) in 1770. Kanter combined the talents of an energetic
and gifted entrepreneur with a commitment to disseminating Enlighten
ment ideas. The twenty-two-year old entered the bookselling business in
Königsberg in 1760 with premises in Langgasse in the old town, and with
success moved to the old town hall at Löbnicht. Kanter developed his
business in several directions, pursuing a strategy of vertical integration by
expanding from bookselling to book publishing, to publishing the
Königsbergsche Gelehrte und Politische llitungen in 1764, and eventually to
founding a paper factory; he also diversified into the lucrative sphere of
gambling by becoming the organizer of a lottery.
Kanter was not only an ambitious businessman, he was also interested
in providing a service to the intellectual community ofKönigsberg. He ran
his bookshop as a form of meeting place for Königsberg intellectuals and
students - it was described by a contemporary as the 'Börse für die Gelehrtenwelt
der Stadf 51 or the 'Exchange for the intellectual world of the city'. Kant
among many others included a visit to Kanter's as part of his daily routine
in the early 1760s, and would there read the newspapers, borrow the latest
books and discuss ideas with the other habitues as weil as his own pub
lishing plans with Kanter. In 1766 Kant moved to the second floor of the
bookshop, where he lived and taught until 1769 (when he was driven out
by the incessant crowing of a neighbour's cock). Thus Kant lived and even
taught on the premises of his publisher, 52 and was given füll access to the
stock of books. He also enjoyed information on intellectual developments
outside Königsberg brought to him by the peripatetic Kanter. The book
shop exemplified the notion of the reading public which Kant evokes in
'An Answer to the Question: "What is Enlightenment?" ', where readers
and authors meet and reason with one another regardless of their official
capacities.
A fascinating insight into the relationship of author and publisher is
afforded by Kant's correspondence with Lambert from the mid 1760s.
25
Lambert wrote to Kant from Berlin on 13 November 1765 bemoaning the

difficulties of finding a publisher for his Architectonic - if it were a novel
'I think it would already have found numerous publishers . . .'. Lambert
notes that Kanter is 'a man who will also publish philosophy and larger
works' and encloses a sheet for Kanter to consider for publication. He
makes three incidental observations that are of interest in connection with
the development of philosophy publishing during this period. The first
is his concem that the book should be printed in Leipzig, which would
be better for various reasons, but above all because of the 'difference in
prices and the freight charges'. lt was increasingly the case that books
published in a city such as Königsberg would be printed elsewhere, usually
Leipzig, in order to benefit from economies of scale in the printing indus
try there, but also because of the pivotal role of its book fair in distribu
tion and the consequent savings in transport costs. Lambert then mentions
that Kanter might wish to publish the book in time for the Easter book
fair, which was one of the main events in the publisher's diary. If a book
was intended for more than a local market, then it had to be announced
in the catalogue of the Leipzig fair and be available there for sale or
exchange with books from other publishers/booksellers from all parts of
Germany. Finally Lambert mentions a possible honorarium of around two
hundred talers, which he considers moderate 'because the work will neces
sarily create a stir'. 53 This indicates that authors were paid by a system of
down-payment or honorarium upon delivery of their manuscripts, and not
by royalties on sales. Kant informed Kanter of Lambert's proposal, and
forwarded a letter from Kanter proposing a meeting in Berlin.
Other details ofKanter's publishing enterprise also emerge from a closer
consideration of Kant's publishing history. lt seems as if most of Kant's
writings for Kanter were printed in Königsberg, which suggests a small
print run. Evidence for this is Hamann's claim in a letter to Nicolai on 21
December 1762 that Kant's OPA hadjust left the printers in Königsberg,
as well as the episode surrounding the censorship of Kant's Dreams of a
Spi:rit-Seer. Kanter was fined 10 talers by the senate of the University of
Königsberg for publishing this book without the approval of the academic
censor. In an appeal Kanter observed that Kant's manuscript was almost
unreadable, and was sent to the printer in stages. This meant that the
author corrected and revised it as he went along, and that there was
accordingly no single copy which could have been submitted for censor
ship prior to the final printed version. Kanter thus printed in Königsberg,
but announced his publications in the catalogues of the Leipzig book fair,
to which he took samples of his product. The overall impression is that his
business was first and foremost a local bookshop, which was supported by
means of a specialized, but small-scale local publishing enterprise.
26
Hints of dissatisfaction with Kanter are discemible in Kant's reply to

Lambert on 31 December 1765, which also contains the first mention of
his future publisher,Johann Friedrich Hartknoch (1740-89). When refer
ring to Kanter's being 'overwhelmed with other commitments' (the lottery
perhaps?) he observes that 'He has gone into partnership with his former
employee, Mr Hartknoch, who managed his affairs in Riga till now . . .'.54
A near contemporary of Kanter, Hartknoch managed the expansion of
Kanter's bookshop first into Mitau (1763) and then into Riga (1764),
moving a year later into partnership with, and then independence from
Kanter. Hartknoch studied theology at Königsberg University and was one
of Kant's students. His enterprise was more efficiently organized, better
focused and more ambitious than Kanter's, as is evident not only from the
range and quality of authors he published (Hamann and Herder as well
as Kant)55 but also from his mastery of the international production and
distribution of books.
The publication of the Critique of Pure Reason is a case in point. In
formed by Hamann in September 1780 that Kant had almost completed
this work, Hartknoch wrote offering his services; he would produce Kant's
book with speed and taste, and could undertake that it would be widely
distributed. The book was printed in Halle by the printing firm of Grunert,
under the supervision of Spener's book company in Berlin. Printing be
gan at the end of 1780, with Kant receiving the first 29 proof sheets in
April 1781. The book appeared in the Easter book fair of the same year,
with Riga as the place of publication.
Similar arrangements were followed with Kant's subsequent books pub
lished by Hartknoch, namely the Prol.egomena to Any Future Metaphysic that
will be abk to come Jorward as Science (P) of 1783, the Grounding Jor the
Metaphysics of Morals (GMM) of 1785, the Metaphysical Foundations of
Natural Science (MF) of 1786 and the Critique of Practical Reason (CPrR) of
1788. All of these texts were printed by Grunert in Halle, to whom Kant
directly sent his manuscripts (informing Hartknoch when he had done
so), and were distributed at the bookfair. With respect to the Prol.egomena,
Hamann's correspondence with Hartknoch mentions that Kant is at work
on a popular version of the first critique as early as summer 1781, and
both publisher and his informer clearly regarded this work as a form of
compensation for the unsuccessful tome which was 'too abstract and ex
pensive for the crowd'. By publishing with Hartknoch, Kant's works were
reliably available to a large audience throughout Germany even though
their place of publication was on the eastem periphery of German culture.
His audience was no longer primarily local, as was still the case when he
published with Kanter. However, Kant's relationship with his publisher
was again not exclusively economic: Hartknoch is known to have personally
27
KANT AND 'IRE 'AGE OF CRITICISM'
delivered to Kant the first copies of the Grounding in April 1785,56 and to
have sent him caviar from Riga.
On Hartknoch's death in 1789 Kant ceased to publish with the firm,
even though he had given Hartknoch's son a vague undertaking to pub
lish the third critique (CJ) with him. Kant seems to have considered his
relationship with Hartknoch's firm to have ended with the death of the
father, and to have doubted the capacity of the son to carry out the speedy
and efficient distribution of the third critique. The latter considerations
were foremost when he tumed, through his former studentJ.G. Kiesewetter,
to the Berlin book dealer and publisher de la Garde late in 1789. With the
despatch of the first part of the manuscript on 21 January 1790 Kant
stated that the 'first and most important condition' was that the work be
published in time for the Leipzig Easter book fair. The rest of the manu
script followed in early March, quickly followed by the Preface and In
troduction which, with minimal correction, were published on time.
However, following this episode with de la Garde, Kant retumed to his
more accustomed relationship with a publisher, this time with the
Königsberg publisher Friedrich Nicolovius (1768-1836), with whom he
remained for the rest of his life.
Nicolovius, like Hartknoch, was one of Kant's students who opened a
bookshop and publishing business in Königsberg, in 1790. In the same
year he published Kant's polemic On a Discovery according to which any New
Critique of Pure Reason has been made Superfluous uy an Earlier One (0D),
which appeared at the same Leipzig Easter book fair as the third critique.
Following this successful trial run, Kant entrusted his remaining books to
Nicolovius, namely Religion within the Limits of Reason Awne (RL) of 1793,
The Metaphysics of Morals (MM) of 1797, The Conflict of the Faculties (CF) of
1798, the Anthropowgy from a Pragmatic Point of View (A) of 1798, and finally
the authorized editions of the Logic (L) and Education edited by Rink.
Nicolovius printed the books in Leipzig in large editions intended for a
national audience, 57 and yet he also continued to serve Kant in much the
same way as Kanter had done in the 1760s. Thus Jachmann reports in his
biography that Nicolovius would send Kant his catalogue and that Kant
would send back Lampe to borrow the interesting titles.58
Kant's relationships with his publishers underline the diverse character
of his texts, and the different audiences for which they were intended.
More work on Kant's publishing enterprise would clarify the nature and
intemal diversity of his address to the reading public, and introduce some
important discriminations between his works. lt would also serve to reveal
the various rhetorics which he employed when addressing distinct publics.
Yet even a brief consideration of his relations with his publishers shows
that his relationship as author to the reading public was by no means
28
KANT AND THE 'AGE OF CRITJCISM'
straightfmward. lt also shows the extent to which Kant's participation in

the reading public both as author and as reader was mediated through his
publishers. They not only disseminated his works, but also provided him
with a means of access to contemporary intellectual developments. This
explains why, although a voracious reader, Kant did not possess a large
private library. According to an inventory taken after his death, Kant owned
450 unbound volumes, most of them the gifts of publishers and not held
in particular esteem by their owner. 59
The history of Kant's publishing enterprise shows a steady development
from his addressing first a local, then a national and ultimately an inter
national audience. By the 1780s he possessed a reputation outside of Prussia
in both Protestant and Catholic German principalities. His philosophy was
known and taught in the universities and, as his correspondence testifies,
was familiar to and esteemed by those excluded from the university such
as women. In the 1790s his work was known and debated in England,
France and Russia. However, upon his death, Kant's work was being se
verely criticized by a younger generation of German philosophers includ
ing Fichte, Hegel and Schelling who were impatient with its equivocations.
lnforming their considerable philosophical differences was a refusal to
accept that the 'age of criticism' could be contained within the parameters
of the 'age of enlightenment' and the 'century of Frederick'.
For the post-Kantians, criticism was revolutionary, and should not be
restricted to oppositions such as those of theory and practice or the public
and private uses of reason. For these philosophers, the vocation of the
philosopher was to address both 'youth' and 'the people', while that of
philosophy was to unite theoretical and practical criticism in order, in the
words of one of the most radical of Kantians, not only to interpret, but
also to change the world. These developments for good or ill would not
have been possible without Kant's work, which, paradoxically, they both
exceeded and fell short of: by seeking to realize philosophy, whether
through the nation, the proletariat or the overman, the post-Kantians
transformed Kant's philosophizing into philosophy. However, far from
superseding Kant, it seems as if, after two revolutionary centuries, the
'lesser evil' of Kant's accommodation with the 'century of Frederick' and
the studied equivocations and sensitivity to aporia which characterize his
philosophizing still offer a future to which it might be worth returning.
29
KANT AND lHE 'AGE OF CRITICISM'
Notes
1. Thus Gulyga writes in the preface to his excellent biography of Kant (1985,
p. xi) that 'Kant has no biography other than the history of his thought.'
2. For a history of the Academy Edition see Lehmann's essay 'Zur Geschichte der
Kantausgabe 1896-1955' in Lehmann, 1969.
3. The distinction between passive and active aspects of the author is analogous
to other distinctions at work throughout Kant's philosophy, such as that be
tween human beings as occupants of the realms of both intelligible freedom
and natural causality.
4. This was subsequently published with Kant's reply in the Preface to The Conflict
of the Faculties (CF), 1798, p. 6, p. 11.
5. lbid., p. 7, p. 13.
6. lbid., p. 8, p. 15. This defence was disingenuous, since RL was originally
intended to be serialized in the joumal Berlinische Monatsschrift, the extent of
whose readership far exceeded that of the university. Indeed, the first part was
published there, the rest of the text falling victim to the Berlin censorship.
7. lbid., p. 10, p. 19.
8. PC p. 220.
9. His somewhat Jesuitical justification of this pledge troubled some of Kant's
friends and admirers, notably Borowski who tried to justify his conduct in his
biography; see Borowski et al., 1912, p. 67.
10. Kant's knowledge of English and Scottish philosophers such as Locke, Hume,
Hutcheson, Kames, Burke and Smith is widely appreciated; less weil known is
his taste for English literature, especially Samuel Butler's Hudibras and Henry
Fielding's Tom]ones; see Malter, 1990, p. 73.
11. See Stavenhagen, 1949, pp. 8-10. The often underestimated dynamic and
cosmopolitan character of Königsberg was beautifully expressed by Kant him
self in a footnote to the Introduction to A: 'A large city like Königsberg on the
river Pregel, the capital of a state, where the representative National Assembly
of the govemment resides, a city with a university (for the cultivation of the
sciences), a city also favoured by its location for maritime commerce, and
which, by way of rivers, has the advantages of commerce with the interior of
the country as weil as with neighbouring countries of different languages and
customs, can weil be taken as an appropriate place for enlarging one's know
ledge of people as weil as of the world at large, where such knowledge can be
acquired even without travel' (p. 120, pp. 4-5).
12. See Walker, 1971.
13. See Evans, 1987.
14. See McClelland, 1980.
15. This period of the city's history is perhaps best captured in Kant's OBS, his
most lighthearted and consistently popular text.
16. For the good memories of the everyday pietism of his parents, see Vorländer,
1911, pp. 4-5; for the bad memories of the pietism of the school, ibid., pp.
10-11.
17. lbid., p. 11.
18. The matriculation requirement was ordained by the spartan King Frederick
William I on 25 October 1735, and included familiarity with classical lan
guages (Latin, New Testament Greek, Hebrew), elementary syllogistics, and
30
the basics of history, geography and letter-writing. For the füll text of the
regulation, see Vorländer, 1911, p. 15.
19. As suggested in Gulyga, 1985, p. 11.
20. Erdmann's 1876 book on Knutzen, despite its age, is still usefül for its description
of the conditions at the University at Königsberg during the first half of the
eighteenth century.
21. There is some confüsion surrounding the title of Knutzen's chair. According
to Vorländer, 1911, it was in Logic and Metaphysics while the editors of the
Academy Edition describe it being in Mathematics and Philosophy; Gulyga
discreetly ignores the inconsistency.
22. Vorländer, 1911, pp. 26-7.
23. Cited in füll by Gulyga, 1985, pp. 34-5.
24. lt was kept in the records of the philosophy faculty and handed over to the
university library after Kant's death.The text was first published in Rosenkranz
and Schubert's edition of 1839.
25. The publisher Johann Heinrich Hartung was also a bookseller whose son (who
took over the business) was the brother-in-law of Kant's biographer Borowski.
Kant mainly published works intended for an academic public with the
Hartungs, publishing the two early dissertations and the last of the Programmata,
On the Different Human Races, in 1775. The sole exception was his scientific pot
boiler of 1756 on the Lisbon earthquake. However, he seems to have been in
fairly constant contact with the firm through Borowski, later using his relation
ship with Borowski to secure Hartung's interest in publishing Fichte's Critique
of all Revelation in 1791 (see Borowski, 1912, p. 70). We also know from an
anecdote concerning Kant's obtuse servant Lampe that Hartung also pub
lished a newspaper of which Kant was a regular reader for over 38 years. For
these four decades, and to Kant's intense annoyance, Lampe called the
Hartungsche Zeitungthe Hartmannsche Zeitung, apparently not to confüse it with
the Hamburger Zeitung. Lampe's job was to fetch the paper from Hartung's
shop and then return it when Kant had finished, an incidental detail which
suggests the existence of a fairly formal circulation arrangement for journals
and newspapers.
26. See PC pp. 58-70.
27. lbid., p. 71.
28. 'lt was customary for a Privatdozent at that time to print programmatic or short
essays to attract prospective students giving an example of the sort of topics
that might be dealt with in dass and the manner in which they would be
treated', Polonoff, 1973, p. 67.
29. Driest also printed another private commission for Kant, this time the small
(eight sides) pamphlet of 1760, Thoughts on the Premature Demise of Herr Johann
Friedrich von Funk.
30. lt was thus announced for sale in the Berlin journal Berlinische Nachrichten von
Staats- und Gelehrten Sachen on 7 October 1762 prior to receiving the approval
of the academic censor in Königsberg on the 11th.
31. The Universities of Göttingen and Königsberg pioneered the change in the
status of the philosophy faculty from being an 'ante-chamber to the higher
faculties' to offering a broad curriculum which 'in addition to the traditional
introductory course of logic, metaphysic, and ethics ...offered lectures in
"empirical psychology", the law of nature, politics, physics, natural history,
pure and applied mathematics (including surveying, military and civilian
31
KANT AND T}IE 'AGE OF CRITICISM'
architecture), history and its "auxiliary" sciences such as geography, diplomatics,

science, art, and ancient and modern language' (McClelland, 1980, pp. 42-3).
The main forces for change in the University ofKönigsberg were Kant and his
close colleague, the Göttingen-trained disciple of Adam Smith, Christian Jakob
Kraus (1753-1807).
32. The editor of the re-publication of M. Kant's Outline and Announcement of a
Course of Lectures on Physical Geography, together with an Appendix of an Inquiry into
the Qy,estion of Whether the West Winds in our Regions are Humid because they have
traversed a Great Sea in 1807 removed all references to the örigins of the text,
and re-titled it as simply On the Qy,estion of Whether the West Winds are Humid
because they have traversed a Great Sea.
33. Borowski, 1912, pp. 94-5 gives an invaluable eye-witness account of this event
in his biography.
34. See Vorländer, 1911, pp. 41-2.
35. In the winter semester of 1777 Kant lectured for 28 hours a week. Kant schol
ars have often puzzled over the reasons for Kant's 'silent decade' of the 1770s
- they should take a look at his workload of teaching and administration
during this period.
36. Although Kant's income was sufficient to take on a servant in 1751 - the surly
Lampe - most of his period as a Privatdozent was passed in relative poverty. His
income from teaching was not high, and even so he would often excuse poorer
students their fees, while the income from his publications was inconsiderable.
In the difficult 1760s circumstances forced Kant to undertake additional du
ties such as that of Sub-Librarian at the Royal Library in the Castle (1766-72)
and as custodian of a private natural history collection. Tue former post brought
the 41-year-old Kant his first regular annual salary of 62 talers and various
payments in kind such as corn, beer and firewood. (Kant incidentally, like
Nietzsche, preferred wine to beer, considering beer the surest recipe for a
short life; like Hegel, however, he was addicted to caffeine.) He also supple
mented his income during this period by taking in lodgers, and in the mid
i 760s even sold his books in order to make ends meet. He could not afford
to buy a house until 1784, three years after publishing the Critique of Pure
Reason, and at the age of 60.
37. Since Emil Arnold's 1894 work Kritische Excurse im Gebiet der Kantforschungit has
become convention to divide Kant's lecture courses into four groups: (a) the
required courses on logic, metaphysics and ethics, along with physical geogra
phy and anthropology; (b) those on philosophical encyclopaedia, natural law
and pedagogy; (c) natural science and mathematics; (d) private lectures on
military architecture and fortification given to Russian officers during the
Russian administration. See also Lehmann, 1969, p. 75.
38. Vorländer, 1911, p. 43. See also 'Einführung in Kants Vorlesungen' in Lehmann,
1969. Zedlitz was the most powerful advocate of the Enlightenment in the
Prussian Government, and was in his post from 1771 until replaced by the
anti-Enlightenment Wöllner in 1788, two years after the death of Frederick I.
He took a personal interest in Kant's work and career, attending the lectures
on his philosophy in Berlin by Markus Herz, requesting transcripts of Kant's
lectures, and encouraging Kant to move to a more influential and better
placed post in Halle. Kant acknowledged his support by dedicating to him
the Critique of Pure Reason. Zedlitz's secretary Biester subsequently played an
32
KANT AND 'IHE 'AGE OF CRITICISM'
important part in disseminating Kant's ideas by opening to him the pages of

the Berlinische Monatsschrift.
39. Gulyga, 1985, p. 59.
40. In the case of logic, for example, we possess transcripts of Kant's lecture series
from three decades: from the early 1770s (the 'Blomberg Logic', named after
an earlier owner of the transcript, and the 'Philippi Logic'); from the 1780s
('Vienna', 'Heschel' and 'Pölitz' Logics); and from 1792 (the 'Dohna
Wundlacken Logic').
41. The complex editorial procedures followed by these editors is still imperfectly
understood.For some idea of the challenge they faced, see J.M. Young's intro
duction to his 1992 translation of Kant's Lectures on Logic, esp. pp. xvii-xviii.
42. For an analysis of the rapid expansion of journal publication and its place in
the German Enlightenment, see Hans Erich Bödeker's 'Journals and Public
Opinion: The Politicisation of the German Enlightenment in the second half
of the Eighteenth Century', in Hellmuth, 1990, pp. 423-45.
43. The francophone Berlin Academy was distinct from both the universities and
the 'enlightenment societies' which met in the capital to discuss philosophical
and reform issues (see Horst Möller, 'Enlightened Societies in the Metropolis:
The Case of Berlin' in Hellmuth, 1990, pp. 219-33). However, it provided a
forum for the discussion and dissemination of enlightenment ideas to a na
tional and international audience. As Kant's fame spread during the 1780s
he was elected a füll member of the Berlin Academy in 1786. Kant's post
humously published treatise What Real Progress has Metaphysics made in Germany
since the Time of Leibniz and Wolff? is the third example in Kant's oeuvre of an
answer to a question set by the Academy, this time in 1788.
44. The essay 'On a Presumed Right to Lie from Love of Mankind' was published
in the Berlinische Bfiitter, the magazine that succeeded the Berlinische Monatsschrift,
also edited by Johann Erich Biester (1749-1816).
45. The history of secret societies and discussion groups in the German Enlight
enment is considered by Im Hof, 1982, and Kosselek, 1959, while the history
of the Mittwochgesetlschaft is covered by Möller in Hellmuth, 1990.
46. For the moral weeklies in general see Martens, 1968; for the specific history
of the Berlinische Monatsschriftsee Weber, 1985.
47. lt appears as if Kant and the Berlinische Monatsschrift served as tests of strength
for the censorship following Wöllner's counter-enlightenment religious and
censorship edicts of 1788. Between them the two edicts represented an at
tempt to close down the space for the public exercise of reason. The first
affirmed 'freedom of conscience' but ordered subjects to 'keep their opinions
to themselves' while the second sought to rein in the 'excesses of the so-called
enlighteners' and to end the freedom of the press (see Gulyga, 1985, p. 201
and Weber, 1985, pp. 283-4). These edicts were not enforced until 1791, and
were then stringently applied in the case of Kant; for if he and the Berlinische
Monatsschrift could be silenced, that would send a clear message to lesser
writers and journals. lt was for this reason that Biester was so dismayed that
Kant eventually agreed to be muzzled with regard to publishing on religious
subjects.
48. Borowski, 1912, pp. 31-2.
49. Borowski, 1912, p. 34, mentions this episode and describes the unhappy fate
ofUNH not gaining the attention of either the 'greater public' or ofFrederick
33
the Great to whom it was dedicated. Its translator Jaki (1981, p. 27) regards
it, uncharitably but not wholly implausibly, as a failed attempt at 'a rapid rise
on the academic ladder'.
50. According to Borowski, 1912, Kant did not receive an honorarium for his early
writings, and even with his later works received comparatively little (p. 73). His
honorarium for the Critique of Pure Reason for example was 4 talers per sheet
for 55 sheets (220 talers) plus 10-12 free copies, one on fine paper and bound
for presentation to Zedlitz. All the same, the poor sales of the book in the
years immediately following publication apparently led Hartknoch to consider
selling it off as bulk paper.
51. Cited in Stavenhagen, 1949, p. 46. Kanter's office was graced with portraits of
eminent Prussians, to which he added a portrait of Kant by JG. Becker in
1768.
52. Kanter also perfonned a service for the student community by pennitting
them twice a week to read the stock free of charge.
53. All citations from Lambert in PC, p. 45.
54. PC p. 47. A further critical note regarding Kanter also enters this letter, with
Kant observing that 'Mr Kanter, in true bookseller's fashion, did not hesitate
to announce the title in the Leipzig catalogue when he heard from me that
I might have a work with that title ['on the proper method of metaphysics']
ready for the next easter fair' (p. 48). This is one of the earliest references to
what became the Critique of Pure Reason.
55. Stavenhagen, 1949, p. 31, notes that Hartknoch also published Russian authors,
commenting that 'In the best style, Hartknoch understood his publishing
vocation to consist in acting as an intennediary between the West and the
intellectually emergent East'.
56. Letter from Hamann to Herder, 14 April 1785, Immanuel Kant's gesammelte
Schriften, Vol. IV, .p. 628.
57. His firm still had 1,100 copies of The Conflict of the Faculties in stock in 1832.
This book generated litigation on account of parts of it being published
elsewhere, and signalled the beginnings of the disputes around the lucrative
publishing rights to Kant's works which also afflicted the publication of his
lectures on physical geography.
58. Jachmann, in Borowski, 1912, p. 147.
59. See Borowski and Wasianski's observations in Borowski, 1912, pp. 79 and 277.
For details of the inventory of Kant's library left after his death to Prof.
Gensichen, see Warda, 1922.
34
A
a priori /a posteriori see also CONCEPT, DEDUCTION , EXPOSITION , INTUITION ,

JUDGEMENT, KNOWLEDGE, LOGIC, METAPHYSICS, ONTOLOGY, PURE, SYNTHESIS
The distinction between a priori and posteriori in the century before Kant
was used to distinguish between modes of logical demonstration: When
the mind reasons from causes to effects, the demonstration is called a
priori; when from effects to causes, the demonstration is called a posteriori
(Arnauld, 1662, p. 301) . It was still broadly used in this sense by Wolff and
Baumgarten in the mid-eighteenth century, and it was this usage which
Hume criticized in the Treatise (1739) . Kant extended the distinction con¬
siderably in CPR, where the notion of a priori plays a pivotal role. While
the two terms referred traditionally to forms of demonstration , and addi¬
tionally in the Wolffian school to the kinds of knowledge gained in those
demonstrations, Kant extended their range beyond kinds of knowledge
first to judgements and then , more significantly, to the very elements of
knowledge ( intuitions and concepts) .
For Kant, a posteriori knowledge and judgements did not pose any
particular problem for philosophy: The possibility of synthetic a posteriori
judgements, of those which are gathered from experience, [like analytic
judgements] also requires no special explanation; for experience is noth¬
ing but a continual joining together (synthesis) of perceptions ( P §5) .
Such knowledge and its elements are derived from experience, their
synthesis resting on ‘custom’ or ‘association ’ . Kant is prepared to concede
Hume’ s objections to the validity of this form of knowledge, but defends
the validity of a priori knowledge and its constituent judgements and
elements. Therefore most of Kant’s analysis of the distinction between a
posteriori and a priori focuses on the character of the a priori. The choice
of this focus was motivated by the desire to defend the synthetic a priori
character of the judgements which make up metaphysics.
The traditional criterion for distinguishing between the two forms of
demonstration according to whether they moved from cause to effect or
vice versa is clearly no longer valid for Kant. He thus develops new criteria
for a priori knowledge: it is (a ) pure and ( b) universal and necessary. The
35
A PRIORI/ A POSTERIORI
criteria are employed separately, but more often together, with, on occa
sions, one criterion being assumed in order illegitimately to support an
argument for the other.
The argument for the purity of a priori knowledge, judgements and
elements holds that they are 'clear and certain' modes of knowledge inde
pendent of experience. They have 'arisen completely a priori, independ
ently of experience' as opposed to those a posteriori modes of knowledge
which are 'borrowed solely from experience' (CPR A 2). They are inde
pendent of experience in that they do not contain any 'admixture' of
sensibility, and in that they may not be derived from it. Kant argues
further that they are not only splendidly independent of experience -
'knowledge absolutely independent of all experience' (CPR B 3) - but are
even the condition of experience.
The purity of the elements of a priori knowledge is proven by a process
of abstraction. The 'pure forms of sensible intuition in general' - space and
time - are discovered by abstracting from experience 'everything which
the understanding thinks through its concepts' thus 'isolating' sensibility
and then 'separating' off 'everything which belongs to sensation, so that
nothing may remain save pure intuition and the mere form of appear
ances, which is all that sensibility can supply a prion� (CPR A 22/B 36).
The same holds for the a priori concepts or 'categories' which are 'the a
priori conditions upon which the possibility of experience rests, and which
remain as its underlying grounds when everything empirical is abstracted
from appearances' (A 96). However, establishing the purity of a priori
principles itself requires a criterion, for how otherwise can it be known
that the process of abstraction has reached its terminus in the a priori?
The criteria of universality and necessity are used to register the arrival
at an a priori judgement or element. If this intuition or concept neces
sarily holds for every experience then it is said to a priori. Kant uses this
argument on several occasions in CPR, moving between universal and
necessary knowledge, judgements, concepts and intuitions, all described
as a priori. On one occasion in the. 'Second Introduction' he moves from
a priori knowledge, to judgements, to concepts, and ends with a 'faculty
of a priori knowledge'. He begins: 'Necessity and strict universality are
thus sure criteria of a priori knowledge, and are inseparable from one
another' (CPR B 4). Then he claims: 'it is easy to show that there actually
are in human knowledge judgements which are necessary and in the strictest
sense universal, and which are therefore pure a priori judgements' (CPR
B 4), and cites the example of mathematical propositions.
From the analysis of a priori knowledge and judgements Kant moves
quickly into the proofs for the existence of a priori principles. The first proof
appeals to their necessary role in experience: 'it is possible to show that
36
A PRIORI/A POSTERIORI
pure a priori principles are indispensable for the possibility of experience,

and so prove their existence a priori. For whence could experience derive
its certainty, if all the rules, according to which it proceeds, were always
themselves empirical, and therefore contingent?' (CPR B 5). Here the
purity of the a priori is used to support its universality and necessity. The
second proof proceeds by way of abstraction. The proof of an a priori
form of intuition abstracts from an empirical body all its qualities until it
arrives at space as its ineluctable residuum or a priori form of intuition.
The proof of an a priori concept abstracts from an object 'all properties
which experience has taught us' in order to arrive at the concept or a
priori category of, in this case, substance (B 5-6).
The proof of the purity or universality and necessity of an a priori form
of intuition is called an exposition while that of an a priori concept of the
understanding or category is called a deduction. If a priori principles or
elements can be established through exposition and deduction, then Kant
can claim not only to have established the existence of a priori principles,
but also to have determined their extent. However, his arguments in the
'Transcendental Doctrine of Elements' provoked an enormous debate
which shows no sign of abating. At stake is an account of justified knowl
edge which is neither empiricist nor idealist. Much of the debate has
involved the source of a priori principles and their universality and necessity.
The source does not lie in sensibility or experience (Locke), nor does it
lie in God (Descartes and Malebranche), nor even in 'innate' or 'inborn'
ideas (Leibniz and Wolff).
One of the main reasons for the longevity of the debate is the ambigu
ous and often cryptic account of the source of a priori universality which
Kant offers in his published writings. However, these may be clarified by
reference to his unpublished notes and reflections. In CPR Kant obliquely
relates the source of a priori universality and necessity to the spontaneous
activity of the subject, but his unpublished notes are less inhibited: 'All
our and other beings' actions are necessitated, only the understanding
(and the will insofar as it can be determined by the understanding) is free
and a pure self-activity that is determined through nothing else but itself.
Without this originary and unchangeable spontaneity we would know
nothing a priori . . .' (R §5441). Here the theoretical problem of the a
priori is unequivocally linked to spontaneity and freedom, and through
them to practical philosophy. Thus the issue of the a priori threatens to
dissolve the distinction between theoretical and practical philosophy, a
step which was taken by Kant's immediate idealist heirs.
Fichte located the a priori in the simultaneously theoretical and prac
tical activity of the subject. His argument had a great impact on mid- to
late-nineteenth-century neo-Kantianism which largely set the agenda for
37
ABSOLUTE
the emphasis of twentieth-century Kant studies on the problems of the

exposition and the deduction. Hermann Cohen's influential Kants Theorie
der Eifahrung (1871) pursued a typical agenda of proving 'Kant's theory of
a priority anew'. This was part of a general tendency to seek new a priori
sources of universality and necessity, whether in psychology, physiology or
sociology. One influential development was initiated by Frege, who shifted
the emphasis away from the source of a priori universality and necessity to
the justification of a priori judgements. In doing so he unconsciously
returned to Kant's original problem of establishing criteria for a priori
judgements, a return sealed by Wittgenstein's pre-Kantian definition of an
a priori truth as being 'one whose possibility guaranteed its truth' (1922,
3.04).
absolute [ absolutus, Absolut] see also ANTINOMY, COSMOLOGY, FREEDOM, GOD

'Absolute' is the past participle of absolvere 'to absolve, to acquit, to free
from debt'. The term can be used adjectivally or substantively: it either
qualifies something as free from any relation, condition or limitation, or
designates that which is thus free. The philosophical use of the term is
modern, appearing first in Spinoza where it echoes political discussions of
'absolute sovereignty' and theological discussions of God as absolute.
Spinoza's use of the term is adjectival, as in 'absolute certainty', 'absolute
motion', the 'absolute dominion of the mind over the affects' (see Deleuze,
1988, p. 44). Even God is only adjectivally qualified as absolute, and is
defined in Ethics I def. 6 (1677) as 'a being absolutely infinite' (Spinoza,
1985, p. 409; see also pp. 237, 264, 595).
Kant too uses the term adjectivally, and usually in opposition to 'rela
tive' and 'comparative'. His earliest recorded use appears in the distinc
tion between absolute and relative position in OPA. In CPR he devotes
over two pages to clarifying 'an expression with which we cannot dispense,
and which yet, owing to an ambiguity that attaches to it through long
standing misuse, we also cannot with safety employ.' (A 324/B 380). The
ambiguity involves two adjectival senses of absolute. The first refers to
internal possibility - 'that which is in itself possible', i.e., the bare possibil
ity or 'the least that can be said of an object'; the second indicates 'that
something is valid in all respects, without limitation, e.g., absolute despot
ism, and in this sense the absolutely possible would mean what is in every
relation (in all respects) possible - which is the most which can be said of the
possibility of a thing.' (A 324/B 381). Kant opts for the second, broader
sense of absolute, but warns that it must be used circumspectly.
Throughout the critical philosophy Kant criticizes pure reason's illegiti
mate claims to know the absolute. The cosmological ideas may claim to
represent 'absolute completeness' in the composition, division, origination
38
ABSTRACTION
and dependence of appearances (A 415/B 443), but are shown upon

critical scrutiny to yield the antinomies. Kant on the whole refrains from
giving the absolute any substantive content; he does not use the term to
qualify either the thing-in-itself or the categorical imperative. However, he
does refer in passing to 'absolute self-activity (freedom)' (A 418/B 446),
parenthetically suggesting a substantive identification of the absolute with
freedom.
The thought suggested by this parenthesis was taken up by Fichte and
Schelling, who developed philosophies of the substantive absolute based
on the 'I' of the knowing and acting subject and the 'it' of nature and
history (see Fichte, 1794, especially Part l, §1; Schelling, 1856, especially
'Die Naturphilosophie'). Hegel's philosophy of absolute spirit, on the con
trary, breaks with the opposition of adjectival and substantive absolute and
rethinks the absolute as processional. (Hegel, 1807, especially 'Preface'
and 'Introduction'; 1812, especially 'Actuality' and 'The Absolute Idea').
However, this departure was reduced to the terms of the substantive ab
solute by contemporary critics such as Schopenhauer (see 1813, pp. 59-
62), and in this guise dominated nineteenth-century European and
American idealism. Heidegger's attempts to deconstruct the opposition of
adjectival and substantive absolutes in his readings of Hegel and Schelling
during the 1930s (Heidegger, 1930, 1936) have contributed to a contem
porary re-assessment of the absolute in philosophy, theology and social
theory (see Derrida, 1974; Rose, 1981; Milbank, 1990).
abstraction [aphairesis, abstrahere, Abstraktion] see also CONCEPT, EMPIRICAL,

INTUITION, REFLECTION
Kant refers on three occasions (ID §6; OD p. 199, p. 117; L pp. 592-3)
to an 'extreme ambiguity' in the concept of abstraction which 'must pref
erably be wiped clean away beforehand lest it mar our investigation into
things intellectual' (1D §6). He distinguishes between 'abstracting some
thing from' (abstrahere aliquid) and 'abstracting from something' (abstrahere
ab aliquo) (L p. 592). He maintains that 'an intellectual concept abstracts
from everything sensitive, but is not abstracted from things which are sen
sitive, and perhaps it would more rightly be called abstracting rather than
abstract' (1D §6). A chemist abstracts in the former sense when isolating
a liquid from matter whereas the philosopher 'abstracts from that which
he, in a certain use of the concept, does not wish to take into considera
tion' (OD p. 199, p. 117). Kant illustrates philosophical abstraction with
the example of colour: 'With a scarlet cloth, for example, if I think only
of the red colour, then I abstract from the cloth' (L p. 592); he does not
abstract a quality 'red' from the cloth, but considers it in abstraction from
the cloth.
39
ABSTRACTION
Although the issue of abstraction was at first peripheral to critical philo

sophy, it became a major issue in its defence against empiricist objections.
Kant uses it to distinguish his account of the origin of concepts from in
ductive arguments such as those ofEberhardt (see 0D). Kant distinguishes
between two senses of abstraction: (i) as an inductive account of the genesis
of concepts from experience; (ii) as a specification of the use of concepts.
In making this distinction Kant recognizes his <lebt to medieval philo
sophy: 'The neglect of this scholastic distinction often falsifies the judge
ment conceming the object' (0D p. 199, p. 117), although his proximate
source seems to have been the debate between Locke and Leibniz.
The ambiguity Kant mentions first appears in Aristotle's two contrasting
discussions of abstraction in the Posterior Analytics and On the Soul Both are
critiques of Plato's separation of ideas from matter, but with quite differ
ent points of emphasis. The first is an inductive account of the origins of
ideas in sense perception (Aristotle, 1941, 81b, 1-9) while the second
relies on the imaginative work of the active intellect (431b, 13-21) in
separating the ideas from their material instantiation.
Aquinas, in commenting upon Aristotle's passage, anticipates Kant's
distinction between the abstraction from particulars in search of a genus
(genus from species) and the inductive abstraction of a genus from indi
vidual things (Aquinas, 1951, p. 451; see also Aquinas, 1952, I 85, 1). How
ever, he notes that Aristotle's elliptical characterization of the first sense
of abstraction in terms of 'the mind which is actively thinking is the objects
which it thinks' (Aristotle, 1941, 431b, 18) ultimately raises a metaphysical
aporia respecting the status of these neither ideal nor material abstractions.
For the species or qualities present to the mind and from which it abstracts
are themselves already the product of a primary abstraction.
The subsequent history of the concept of abstraction is characterized by
various attempts to clarify the ambiguity between its transcendental and
inductive senses, reaching its high point in Suarez's influential Metaphysical
Disputations of 1597 (Suarez, 1976). However, in the seventeenth century,
first with Hobbes and subsequently Locke, the inductive account of the
genesis of concepts prevailed. Locke defines abstraction as the process
'whereby ideas taken from particular beings become general representa
tives of all of the same kind' (1690, p. 74). Leibniz criticized this view in
the New Essays on Human Understanding, pursuing the transcendental sense
of abstraction as involving 'an ascent from species to genera rather than
from individuals to species' (Leibniz, 1765, p. 289).
Kant follows Leibniz in refusing to see abstraction as providing an
account of the inductive origins of concepts or intuitions. Space and time
are certainly abstracted from experience, but not in the sense of being
derived from it; they are considered as far as possible in abstraction, or
40
ABSTRACTION
apart from, experience (CPR A 78). Similarly, while formal logic abstracts
from all content of knowledge, it is not itself abstracted from it (A 131/
B 170). Kant illustrates this use of abstraction with the example of the
concept of body. Qualities such as size, colour, hardness and liquidity are
not abstracted from bodies, although the concept of body may be consid
ered in abstraction from them (L p. 593). With respect to concept forma
tion, abstraction is only the 'negative condition', performing the regulative
function of establishing the limits of a concept prior to the work of the
constitutive 'positive conditions' of comparison and reflection (L p. 592).
In NM and A Kant further describes abstraction as the negation of
attention, or the considered separation of one sense impression from all
the others, which he illustrates by the example of 'shutting our eyes to the
shortcomings of others' (A §3). This sense is crucial in the CJ where
aesthetic judgement must abstract from both the concept and the matter of
an aesthetic object. This is not to suggest that such objects are, or should
be, without conceptual and material content, but that such content must
be disregarded, or abstracted from, when making an aesthetic judgement.
Empiricist critiques of Kant have largely resorted to restatements of
an inductive account of abstraction, regarding it as a source of concept
formation. Kant's immediate successors responded to these criticisms by
emphasizing the transcendental character of abstraction. This led to the
further confusion of abstraction and analysis, one still evident in Paton's
commentary (1936, p. 250). Yet Kant is careful to distinguish between
abstraction and analysis: abstraction separates a single quality from a com
posite whole, whereas analysis distinguishes between all present qualities.
While analysis is crucial to Kant's account of concept formation, abstraction
plays a minor role.
In Fichte's development of the critical philosophy during the 1790s,
abstraction is elevated to 'an absolute power' even 'reason itself': 'the
same power which Kant made the object of his investigation in the Critique
of Pure &ason' (Fichte, 1794, p. 216). lt is abstraction which eliminates all
objects of consciousness leaving only the Ich - which determines and is
determined by itself - and the Nicht Ich. Here abstraction becomes the
'firm point of distinction between object and subject' and the locus for
the derivation of the concepts of the theoretical and practical science of
knowledge.
Hegel criticized Fichte's elevation of abstraction to the centre of philo
sophy on two grounds. Abstraction is the work of natural consciousness, as
opposed to the concrete thought of philosophical consciousness. Ordinary
abstract representations such as 'man, house, animal' 'retain out of all the
functions of the notion only that of universality, they leave particularity
and individuality out of account' (Hegel, 1830, p. 295; see also p. 180).
41
ACCIDENT
Fichte's account of abstraction mirrors this unphilosophical vanquishing

of particularity and individuality in favour of abstract universals. Hegel
describes the political consequences of such abstraction in the discussion
of revolutionary terror in the Phenomenology of Spi,rit where the 'ultimate
abstraction' can only negate the concrete in the 'fwy of destruction' (Hegel,
1807, pp. 359-62). Abstraction for Hegel is but the negative moment of
thinking and cannot be allowed to dominate the formation of concepts.
Kant's sensitivity to the received 'ambiguity' of abstraction was largely
lost upon his successors, who used the concept as a means of combining
inductive and transcendental arguments. An interesting exception is Marx,
who rigorously distinguishes the two senses of abstraction. In the Contri
bution to the Critique of Political Economy he criticizes political economy for
converting inductive abstractions such as 'production in general', 'popu
lation' and 'labour' into transcendental and thus transhistorical categories.
Following Kant and the scholastic tradition, Marx restricts the use of
abstractions to revealing specific differences through comparison with
'common specific qualities', in his case those between different social
formations and the specific qualities they appear to have in common
(Marx, 1859, pp. 190-1, 206-10).
The part played by abstraction in late-nineteenth and early-twentieth
century inductive and psychologistic accounts of concept formation has
led to its being discredited. Husserl consistently associates abstraction with
induction, and distinguishes it from the 'phenomenological reduction'
(Husserl, 1913, pp. 81, 141-2; 1948, p. 345), even though the reduction
closely approximates Kant's non-inductive definition of abstraction.
accident [symbebekos, accidens, Akzidens] see also ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, ES

SENCE, HYPOTYPOSIS, 'I THINK', SCHEMATISM, SUBJECT
Accident is classically defined in opposition to substance, and features in
late scholastic and Cartesian logic as one of five 'universal ideas' alongside
genus, species, difference and property. Since Aristotle the term has com
bined logical and ontological senses: an accident is both that which may
be predicated of a subject and which cannot exist without a subject. lt
is the inverse of substance or that which 'is neither predicable of a sub
ject nor present in a subject' (Aristotle, 1941, 2a, 12). Following Aristotle,
Aquinas defines an accident as that which has its 'being in another'
(Aquinas, 1975, I, 63, 3), adding that 'a substance does not depend on an
accident, although an accident depends on a substance' (ibid., I, 23, 7).
Accidents can happen to a substance, although they are not necessary for
its definition or existence. Descartes refines this point, using the example of
a triangle to distinguish between the five 'universal ideas': a figure bounded
by three lines forms the genus of triangle; some are differentiated from
42
ACCIDENT
others by possession of a right angle, which distinguishes them as a spe

cies; these right angles possess the property that the sum of the squares
of the sides is equal to the square of the hypotenuse. Finally, some trian
gles are moved and others remain still; movement, however, is an accident
and in no way essential to the definition of triangle (Descartes, 1644, p.
26; see also Amauld, 1662, p. 58).
Leibniz largely followed Descartes but clarified the temporal character
of substance and accident: 'An entity is either in itself [per se] or accidental
[per accidens]; or, a term is either necessary or mutable. Thus, "man" is an
entity in itself, but "learned man" or "king" are accidental entities. For
that which is called "a man" cannot cease to be a man except by anni
hilation; but someone can begin or cease to be a king, or learned, though
he himself remains the same' (Leibniz, 1966, p. 47). Substance is thus
re-defined as that which can endure over time, while accidents are those
qualities which can change over time without annihilating substance.
Hobbes, Locke and Hume tended to downplay the distinction of sub
stance and accident. Locke notes: 'They who first ran into the notion of
accidents, as a sort of real beings that needed something to inhere in, were
forced to find out the word substance to support them' (Locke, 1690, p.
86). Hume is even less charitable: 'the same habit, which makes us infer
a connexion betwixt cause and effect, makes us here infer a dependance
of every quality on the unknown substance' (Hume, 1739, p.222).But just
as Kant sought to rescue the category of causality from Hume's scepticism,
so too does he defend the relational category of substance and accident,
but in its Leibnizian form as a mode of temporality.
Kant's discussion of substance and accidents has several interesting
features: substantia et accidens comprises the first of the categories of rela
tion (CPR A 80/B 106), but is 'assigned a place among the categories of
relation ...rather as the condition of relations than as itself containing a
relation' (A 187/B 230). As Mellin observed, this makes the category 'the
ground of all the others' (Mellin, 1797, Vol. 1, p. 49). Kant also observes
that the distinction of accidents and substance has, 'in all ages', been
recognized by 'not only philosophers, but even the common understand
ing' as 'lying at the basis of experience', and that 'while the need of it is
felt', 'it has never itself been proved' (CPR, A 184-5/B 227-8).
Kant does not conclude from the absence of a proof that he should
follow Hume and jettison accidents and substance, but that the form of
proof itself should be reconsidered (P §46). Kant's insight into the futility
of seeking the ground of relation in another relation leads him to chal
lenge the equivocation between the logical and ontological aspects of
accidents and substance. Substance cannot be considered as if it were the
subject of a judgement or proposition, nor accidents as if they were simply
43
ACCIDENT
predicates. lt is impossible to attain the ultimate subject - i.e., substance

- by discursive means, since discursive thought tends to an infinite regress
in which each subject is revealed as but the predicate of another subject.
Kant concludes: 'we must not hold anything at which we can arrive to be
an ultimate subject, and that substance itself never can be thought by our
understanding, however deep we may penetrate, even if all nature were
unveiled to us' (P §46). Least of all - and this is the lesson of the paralogisms
- may we follow the Cartesians and consider the thinking subject, or the
I of the cogi,to, as an absolute subject or substance.
Yet there is a need for a proof of accidents/substance, one which may
only be satisfied by an analogical argument to the principle of perma
nence/alteration. Instead of considering substance as subject, as a 'thing
in itself' to which accidents may be predicated, it is necessary to prove that
the analogous principle of permanence and alteration forms a necessary
condition for experience. This proof is presented in the first analogy of
experience in the CPR.
With the argument by analogy Kant both preserves the traditional relation
of accident and substance while translating it into the modern principle
of permanence and alteration. In the translation, accident and substance
are freed from their dependence on logical predication and considered in
ontological terms of existence and time. Kant argues that alteration - the
co-existence and succession of appearances - is dependent on permanence
in a manner analogous to the dependence of accidents on substance. That
is, alteration cannot be experienced, measured or represented without
permanence.
Kant is not saying, as some analytical commentators maintain, that
permanence in time itself becomes substance; rather that it stands in an
analogous relation to alteration as substance to accidents. lt is the 'abiding
correlate' of alteration; it may be thought without alterable things, but
they cannot be thought without it. The relation of permanence and al
teration is analogous to that of substance and accidents: 'substance
remains . . . only the accidents change' (CPR A 184/B 227); 'an accident
[is] simply the way in which the existence of a substance is positively
determined' (A 187 /B 230). lt is what Kant called in the Critique ofjudge
ment (I 790) 'hypotyposis' or 'indirect presentation' (CJ §59). There he
directly cites Locke and the example of substance and accident in order
to illustrate the distinction of symbol and schema and the uses of analogi
cal reasoning (§59). In this case accident and substance offer a symbol of
a relation, while permanence and alteration provide its schema.
Since the understanding can only think substance and accidents under
the category of relation, it artificially separates them from each other rather
than seeing them as inextricable and mutually dependent. Analogously,
44
ACQUISITION
the understanding separates permanence and alteration, seeing existents

as undergoing alteration in time, rather than disceming the inextricability
of permanence and alteration. Yet precisely this dependence is the ground
for logical relation and thus for all categorical synthesis, and offers 'the
criterion, consequently, of the substantiality of appearances' (CPR A 189/
B 232).
Kant's use of analogical reasoning was not fully recognized by his suc
cessors: most critics and commentators have either taken his account of
substance and accidents literally, or ignored it altogether. In the Sdence of
Knowkdge Fichte criticizes Kant for not explaining the relation between
substance and its accidents (Fichte, 1794, p. 23), and proceeds to do so
by converting substance into the subject or 'positing I' (ibid., p. 185).
Schopenhauer claims a specious Kantian legitimation for his identifica
tion of substance with matter, and accidents with modes of action or
matter in motion (Schopenhauer, 1813, p. 119). Nietzsche, later in the
nineteenth century, criticizes Kant for colluding in the traditional elision
of the logical subject with ontological substance and thus converting ap
pearances into mere manifestations of an unknowable substance (see
Nietzsche, 1901, §§484-5). Recent work has led to a renewed understand
ing of analogical forms of argument (see Derrida, 1987, pp. 75-6) and
has opened the way for a more subtle appreciation of Kant's strategic use
of such classical terms as accident and substance.
acquisition [Enverbung] see also DEDUCTION, INNATE IDEAS, QUAESTIO QUID JURIS,
PROPER1Y, RIGHT
This term, translated from Roman private law, undergoes a peculiar meta
morphosis in Kant's philosophy. He translates the juridical discussion of
the ways in which rights in things and over persons may be acquired -
discussed in the section of MM on 'Private Right' (especially §10) - into
a framework for analysing the acquisition and justification of theoretical
and practical concepts. The critical philosophy is cast as a critical 'tribunal
which will assure to reason its lawful claims, and dismiss all groundless
pretensions' (CPR A xii), one which will establish an 'inventory of all our
possessions through pure reason' (A xx).
In ID Kant distinguishes his view of the acquisition of concepts from
that of the empiricist tradition, stating that 'each of the concepts has, without
any doubt, been acquired, not, indeed, by abstraction from the sensing of
objects (for sensation gives the matter and not the form of human cogni
tion), but from the very action of the mind, which coordinates what is
sensed by it, doing so in accordance with permanent laws' (ID §15). This
passage focuses equally upon the origins of concepts through the coordi
nating activity of the mind and the justi.fication of their possession according
45
ACROAMATA/IC
to 'permanent laws'. In the 'Transcendental Deduction' of CPR, on the

whole, it is the latter approach - justifying the possession of concepts -
which predominates in the guise of the deduction of the pure concepts of
the understanding.
In CPR Kant refers to the juridical distinction between the question of
right ( quid juris) and the question of fact ( quid Jactz). The statement of the
'legal claim' to the possession of a concept - its deduction - is complicated
by critical philosophy's injunction against any appeal either to experience
or to reason. There can be no appeal to the origins of a concept; in other
words, to its original mode - legitimate or otherwise - of acquisition.
However, in the face of criticisms conceming the origin of concepts, Kant
in the l 790s admits consideration of the acquisition of concepts into the
deduction or their justification.
This is most clearly apparent in OD where Kant denies innate or di
vinely implanted ideas in favour of regarding all representations as acquired.
These include the forms of intuition and the pure categories of the un
derstanding which are acquired in an act of 'original acquisition (as the
teachers of natural right formulate it) ...of that which previously did
not exist, and therefore did not pertain to anything before the act' (OD
p. 221, p. 135). This act of original acquisition, which distinguishes Kant's
view of the origins of concepts from empiricist and rationalist accounts,
bases the act of acquisition upon 'a ground in the subject which makes it
possible for these representations to originale in this and no other manner'.
He specifies this ground by distinguishing between forms of acquisition:
intuitions are original acquisitions, whose ground is receptivity; while the
concepts of the understanding are original acquisitions whose ground is
'the spontaneity of thought (in accordance with the unity of apperception)'
(OD p.223, p.136). Particular concepts however are 'derived acquisitions'
and presuppose the two former original acquisitions.
Kant deliberately exploits the 'analogy between the juridical relation of
human actions and the mechanical relation of moving forces' (P §58),
and uses, in Schopenhauer's words, 'Latin legal expressions ... for in
terpreting the most secret stirrings of the human heart.' (1841, p. 105).
For Nietzsche this represented an anthropomorphic projection of human
legal relations onto nature. More radically, Rose has argued that Kant's
framing of nature and human action in terms of Roman law marks the
'fusion of Roman dominium, absolute property, with modern subjective
rights' in a usurpatory notion of freedom (Rose, 1984, chapter 1).
acroamata/ic (something heard) see also coNSTRUCTION, PRINCIPLE

Although Kant only explicitly distinguishes between acroams and axioms
in L, the distinction is implied throughout his theoretical philosophy.
46
ACTION
Both are basic principles (Grundsätze), but axioms are exhibited in in
tuition while acroams are presented discursively (L p. 606). The reason
for the distinction between the two sorts of basic principle is to be found
in Kant's polemics against Wolff's extension of mathematical forms of
proof to philosophy. In PE Kant distinguishes between the 'unanalysable
principles' of mathematics and philosophy, regarding the former (axioms)
as figural, the latter (acroams) as discursive. As opposed to mathematical
axioms, philosophical principles 'are never anything other than words'
(PE Part I, §2).
In CPR the distinction between axioms and discursive principles is no
longer immediately linguistic, but hangs on the condition of the temporal
determination of experience. The acroams are the 12 principles of pure
understanding (axioms of intuition, anticipations of perception, analogies
of experience, postulates of empirical thought). These principles are not
axiomatic, but discursive; they receive their authority through a discursive
process of legitimation or proof. This proof is performed through the
re-work.ing of traditional philosophical terms, such as, in the case of the
first analogy, those of 'substance and accident'. The acroams are open
to constant discursive challenge, and are legitimated through language
and the analysis of language. Kant's insight into the linguistic character of
philosophical principles was largely lost until the twentieth century and
the emergence of interpretations informed by hermeneutic and analytical
philosophies of language (see, e.g., Bennett, 1966, 1974; Gadamer, 1960;
Heidegger, 1929; Strawson, 1966).
action [ergon/poiesis/praxis, opere/fadio/ actio, Handlung] see also ACTUALITY,

AUTONOMY, CAUSALITY, FREEDOM, LEGISLATION, SPONTANEITY, WILL
Kant's accoimt of Handlung was heir to a tradition of discussion in the
theory of action that originated in Aristotle and was shaped by the intro
duction of Christian moral perspectives. His work was informed by the
equivocations of this tradition, especially with regard to the distinction
between the various k.inds of action, the problem of intention and the
distinction between moral and political action.
For Aristotle the generic term for act;ion was ergon (activity) from which
he derived energei,a (Aristotle, 1941, 1050a). When the latter was disclosed
in 'things made' (poieton), its mode was poetic (poiesis); when disclosed in
'actions done' (prakton), its mode was practical (praxis). Aristotle rigor
ously distinguishes between poiesis and praxis-. the former directs itself to
the world according to rules of art ( techne), while the latter directs itself
to the life of the polis according to phronesis (Aristotle, 1941, 1140a; see
Riedel, 1975, pp. 99-101). The former is technical, producing according
to rules; the latter is deliberative and discursive. Praxis furthermore directs
47
ACTION
itself to the good of both individual and the polis, there is little trace in
Aristotle of the later distinction between moral and political action.
The Christian reception of Aristotle in the thirteenth centmy considerably
reworked his account of action, introducing new distinctions while blurring
others. Praxis or actio no longer balances the good of the individual and
the polis through phronesis:, instead the relation between moral, legal and
political goods becomes undefined and the subject of uneasy debate.
Equally significant is the collapse of the distinction between poiesis and
praxis, evident in Aquinas's translation of praxis as Jactio. 'Actions done' are
increasingly thought of in terms of 'things made' or the movement through
which a thing is produced. In the words of Aquinas's technical definition,
'action implies nothing more than order of origin, in so far as action pro
ceeds from some cause or principle to what is from that principle' (Aquinas,
1952, I, 41, 1).
Action is thought of in terms of techne, as originating in a cause or a
principle, rather than in a process of deliberation (phronesis). The conse
quences of this shift become evident in the problems Aquinas encounters
with the temporality of action: instead of the coexistence of cause, action
and effect in the moment of deliberation, action must now take place
after the presence of the cause, but before the presence of the effect
(Aquinas, 1952, I, 42, 2). This introduces two hiatuses into the account of
action (between cause and action and action and effect), which in turn
underpin the scholastic distinction between internal and external action.
The theory of action is subsequently dominated by a three-stage account
which moves from (i) the source of an act in an agent's motivation or
intention, to (ii) its production or manifestation, and arrives at (iii) its
effects or consequences.
This tradition proved extremely resilient. lt survived Machiavelli's scis
sion of political and ethical motivation, which merely drew the anti-Christian
consequences of the Christian separation of ethics and politics. lt also
survived Luther's equally threatening separation of intention from mani
festation in his rejection of justification by works, let alone his use of the
distinction between motivation and external actions to support justifica
tion by faith. However, as is evident from the tortuous dialectic of Luther's
Freedom of a Christian (1520), the pressures exerted by and upon this model
of action led to extraordinary feats of imaginative practical reasoning, not
only at the casuistic level of everyday conduct (Weber, 1904-5), but also
in the more elevated reaches of philosophy and theology.
Kant's theory of action is the most enduring monument to the effort to
maintain the Christian/ Aristotelian synthesis in the face of the pressures
released by protestant modernity. In conformity with the received elision
of poiesis and praxis, action for Kant is fundamental to both theoretical and
48
ACTION
practical reason (O'Neill, 1989). Actions are produced according to rules

which are themselves governed by higher laws of indeterminate origin.
The understanding in theoretical reason acts through judgements which
apply rules whose ultimate necessity rests in inscrutable higher laws. In
practical reason, actions are produced by the will operating according to
a subjective maxim which is in its turn policed by a higher law.
The core of Kant's theory of action is to be found not so much in his
accounts of practical reasoning (CPrR, GMM) as in the 'Second Analogy'
of the CPR. This concerns 'the coming into being or passing away of
substance' (B 233) or, as in the title of the 1781 edition (CPR A), the
'principle of production'. Here Kant seeks a solution to the temporal
hiatuses attendant upon the differentiation between cause, action and
effect. He maintains first of all that cause and effect are ordered tempo
rally - effect follows cause - even if there is no Japse of time between them
(A 203/B 248). In this way order or relation defines action: 'Action sig
nifies the relation of the subject of causality to its effect' (A 205/B 250).
But in addition to this relation which exists between the subject of cau
sality and its effect, action is also described as the 'self-revelation of sub
stance' through 'activity and force' (Tätigkeit und Kraft) (A 204/B 249). In
this view of action as the 'first ground of all change of appearances' (A 205/
B 250), the source of action in the self-revelation of substance is not itself
ordered according to cause and effect.
The question then shifts to the character of the substance which reveals
itself through action. The cause of action cannot itself be subject to action,
but must freely and unconditionally initiate it. lt is outside the relation
of cause, action and effect, outside the succession and co-existence of ap
pearances through which it reveals itself. Kant thus juxtaposes two accounts
of action: one relates the 'subject of causality to its effect' while the other,
the self-revelation of substance, acts spontaneously to produce the order
of cause-action-effect. The separation of what may be described as the
executive and the legislative aspects of human action is a consequence of
thinking action in terms of the production of effects from causal princi
ples. lt contrasts with the inseparability of these aspects in the moment of
phronesis which combines legislative and executive aspects of action.
The distinction between spontaneous, legislative action - autonomy -
and action subjected to causality - heteronomy - is ubiquitous in Kant's
practical philosophy. Here action is seen as determined either directly
through the will's [Willkür] heteronomous inclination towards objects
(sensible impulses) as articulated in its maxims, or indirectly by the rea
son's scrutiny (through the will - [Wille]) of such maxims for their con
formity to the form of the supreme law - the fitness of the maxim to be
a universal law. Because the maxims governing human action are prone
49
ACTION
to 'external' influence, reason's scrutiny can only be experienced as a

command or prohibition. The will 'acts' legislatively when it commands or
prohibits the choice of a particular maxim, while Willkür produces action
according to maxims which combine the causality of the will and causality
of objects. This dual aspect theory of action informs the further distinc
tion of legal and moral action. In the former the action itself agrees with
the law, whereas in the latter not only the action but also the agent's
maxim is in agreement.
With this account Kant sought to avoid the implications of both the
'rationalist' accounts of action associated with the school of Christian Wolff
and the 'empiricist' accounts of Shaftesbury, Hutcheson and Hume. The
former considered the perception of a rational perfection to be a suffi
cient motivation for action, while the latter emphasized sensible motives
for action. Kant's theory combines both forms of motivation while giving
them a Rousseauesque accent in the distinction between an inscrutable
legislative will and the acts of concrete particular wills.
Kant's theory of action set the agenda for subsequent developments in
this branch of philosophy. Many philosophers, such as the late-nineteenth
century neo-Kantians and contemporary philosophers such as John Rawls,
have continued to work within a Kantian framework. Others have chosen
to emphasize one aspect of his account: Fichte, for example, stressed the
absolute autonomy of human action, while the positivist sociology devel
oped by Auguste Comte underlined its heteronomy by emphasizing the
element of 'social determination'. Some theorists of action have looked
elsewhere in Kant for an alternative theory of action, notably two of
Heidegger's students, Arendt (1958, 1989) and Gadamer (1960), who read
his account of common sense and reflective judgement in CJ as a modern
restatement of classical phronesis.
Other theorists of action have fundamentally challenged the Kantian
account of action while remaining indebted to it as a critical point of de
parture. The first was Hegel, who challenged Kant's oppositions between
autonomy-heteronomy, morality-legality with a phenomenological attempt
to 'think the absolute' as Sittlichkeit or 'ethical life'. Some idea of the
fecundity of Hegel's work on action and the diverse responses it has pro
voked may b.e gained by a comparison of contemporary writers such as
Derrida (1974), Rose (1981) and Taylor (1975).
Another influential critic of Kant's theory of action was Nietzsche, who
exposed its anthropocentric character and its presumption that the acting
subject must be in possession of a fixed 'human' identity. This critique has
inspired anti-humanist theories of action which detach the theory of ac
tion from the problems of the acting subject and its motivation. In this
tradition action is not seen as issuing from a unified subject, nor is it
50
ACTUALITY
motivated by desire articulated in maxims and dedicated to the produc

tion of actions. Philosophers working within this extremely diverse tradi
tion (often inaccurately described as 'post-structuralist' or 'postmodern'),
which draws upon Marx, Freud and Heidegger, include Deleuze and
Guattari (1972), Levinas (1961) and Lyotard (1983).
actuality [energeia, actus, Wirltlichkeit] see also ACTION, BEING, EXISTENCE, POS
SIBILITY, POSTUIATES OF EMPIRICAL THOUGHT, PRINCIPLES
Kant's use of the term actuality in the second postulate of empirical thought
may be clarified by means of a comparison with the Aristotelian term
energeia, which meant both action and actuality. The latter term usually
referred to energeia in conjunction with dynamis, a term equivocally trans
lated as either possibility or potentiality. Energeia meant the putting into
action of dynamis, but without the requirement that dynamis be thought
either ontologically or epistemologically prior to energeia. To make such
a claim would entail subordinating both terms to the categorical deter
minations of being. This is unacceptable because energeia and dynamis are
pre-categorical; indeed, for Aristotle they even give rise to the categories
of quantity, quality, condition and location (Aristotle, 1941, 201a, 10). For
this reason the relation between them cannot be stated categorically, but
only analogically (see Aristotle, 1941, 1048a and 1065b).
Even though Kant situates the principle of actuality categorically, in
terms of the second modal category of existence/non-existence, it still
bears many of the features of Aristotle's initial statement, but as
overdetermined by the Christian tradition. Aristotle's argument- for the
etemity of matter and the world posed obvious difficulties for the Chris
tian doctrine of creation ex nihilo (see 'The Condemnation of 1277' in
Hyman and Walsh, 1984). A solution favoured by the scholastics was to
subordinate the cosmological exposition of actuality (which had its origins
in Aristotle's attempts to explain change - kinesis - in the Physics) to an
onto-theological one. God, in Aquinas, is thus self-actualizing and without
potential, while the world receives both its potentiality and actuality from
God as its creator (Aquinas, 1975, Book 1, chapter 16). In this way actuality
becomes imbricated with the problem of the existence of God and the
world; existence, or the making actual of a possible world, is treated as a
predicate. For Kant this tradition of thought was exemplified by the phi
losophy of Christian Wolff, who included existence within the rational
definition of a possible being.
Kant consistently opposed this position throughout his career; it stimu
lated the development of many of his characteristic positions, such as the
doctrine of intuition. In OPA he made the celebrated claim against Wolff
that 'existence cannot itself be a predicate' (p. 74, p. 120) and argued that
51
ACTIJALITY
the actual and the possible were generically distinguished. To add the
predicate 'existence' as a complement to a possible being does not suffice
to make it actual. At this stage in his argument Kant develops a subtle
distinction between the existence posited 'in' a possible being and that
posited 'through' it (p. 75, p. 121). However, in CPR's 'Postulates of
Empirical Thought' Kant fundamentally recasts the traditional opposition
of possibility and actuality in terms of what is logically possible and what
actually conforms to the forms of intuition.
Tue postulates lay down the conditions for the empirical use of the modal
concepts of possibility, actuality and necessity. The second postulate defines
the actual as 'bound up with the material conditions of experience, that
is, with sensation' (CPR A 218/B 265). However, actuality is not secured
by mere, unarticulated sensation, but through a 'sensation of which we
are conscious' or perception. Perception itself though is govemed by the
analogies of experience, so actuality involves conformity with the rules
goveming a possible experience. But as in Aristotle, actuality does not
simply supplement a possibility with existence, but may precede it. lt may
actualize a possible concept, but it can also be manifest in a perception for
which a concept is lacking. Thus while Kant introduces actuality as the
principle of a discrete category, it quickly becomes apparent that it also
underlies all forms of categorical judgement; for such judgements actualize
concepts by determining them according to the conditions of existence in
time.
Two features of Kant's discussion of actuality were important for sub
sequent philosophers. First, it did not simply mean 'reality' or sensation,
but perception in accord with the analogies of permanence, succession
and co-existence. Second, it was both a categorical principle and the con
dition for categorical synthesis. Thus in Fichte, there are two actualities:
one is the original productive activity of the 'I' while the other is the result
of the understanding distinguishing between it and possibility (Fichte,
1794, pp. 206-8). Hegel overcomes this distinction by describing actuality
as both the absolute and its formally separated moments. In the Logi,c he
presents a phenomenological analysis of the joumey of actuality from its
beginnings in being as activity through its reflections in the categories of
essence and appearance (actuality opposed to possibility as outside to
inside) to the 'absolute relation' of the absolute and its reflection. (Hegel,
1812, pp. 529-71; 1830, pp. 257-67).
During the nineteenth century actuality was increasingly confused with
'reality'; Hegel's dictum that the 'rational is actual, and the actual rational'
(1821, p. 20) was an early casualty. Marx in his critique of Hegel reduces
rational to ideal and actual to real, thus erasing the dynamic character of
actuality. Kant's two senses of actuality were recovered in the twentieth
52
AESTHETIC
century by Husserl, who distinguished between dormant and focal actuali

ties: dormant actualities are perceived as present in the field of intuition,
but are not 'singled out'; they form a zone for the emergence of focal
actualities (Husserl, 1913, 105-7). In terms of his later thought, they form
a life world, actual but unthematized, out of which may be drawn focal
objects and relations.
The implication in Kant and Husserl that actuality was marked by 'pres
ence' - by the bringing to presence or being present of things - was
criticized by Heidegger in Being and Time. He contrasts actuality as the
bringing to presence of possibility with the actualization of the possibility
of death. The former 'annihilates the possibility of the possible by making
it available to us' (Heidegger, 1927, p. 305); while the latter is actualized
in a possibility 'as far as possible from anything actual' which is the
'possibility of authentic existence' (ibid., p. 307). With these comments
Heidegger begins a re-description of the relation between actuality and
action which originally informed Aristotle's conception of energeia.
aesthetic see also ART, BEAUTY, CULTURE, INTUITION, REFLECTIVE JUDGEMENT, SPACE,
TASTE, TIME
Kant, consistent with eighteenth-century German usage, gives the term
'aesthetic' two distinct meanings. lt refers to both the 'science of a priori
sensibility' and the 'critique of taste' or philosophy of art. The first usage
prevails in the 'Transcendental Aesthetic' of CPR, the second in the
'Critique of Aesthetic Judgement' - the first part of CJ.
As Kant himself notes in a footnote (CPR A 21/B 35), the two distinct
meanings of the term were established by the Wolffian philosopher AG.
Baumgarten. In his Rejlections on Poetry (1735) and later in his Aesthetica
(1750-8), Baumgarten revived the Greek term 'aisthesis' in order to
remedy problems in the areas of sensibility and art which had become
apparent with Wolff's system. Wolff's rationalism had reduced sensibility
to the 'confused perception of a rational perfection' and had left no place
for the philosophical treatment of art. Baumgarten tried to solve both
problems at once by claiming that sensible or aesthetic knowledge had its
own dignity and contributed to rational knowledge, and that art exempli
fied this knowledge by offering a sensible image of perfection.
Although Baumgarten revived the Greek term, his equation of art and
sensible knowledge had no classical precedent. Some aspects of Kant's CJ
are anticipated by Plato in the Timaeus when he relates aisthesis to pleasure
and pain, but this was no part of Baumgarten or Kant's concern. Indeed,
in the first edition of CPR Kant tries to reserve aesthetic for the 'doctrine
of sensibility', excluding the philosophy of art (A 21/B 36). lt forms the
first part of the 'Transcendental Doctrine of Elements' which considers
53
AESTHETIC
the ways in which objects are 'given' immediately to the human mind in
intuitions. Much of the 'doctrine of sensibility', however, is concerned
with the 'pure forms' of sensibility considered in abstraction from both
concepts and the matter of sensation. Kant argues that there are two such
'pure forms of sensible intuition' which determine what can be intuited
and limit the application of concepts in judgement: these are space, or the
form of 'outer' sense, and time, the form of 'inner' sense.
In the 'Transcendental Aesthetic' Kant distinguishes bis view of sensibil
ity from the views of Leibniz and Wolff. The relation between the sensible
and the rational is far more complex than the view that the former is
merely a confused version of the latter (CPR A 44/B 61). Time and space
are neither confused perceptions of an objective rational order, nor ab
stractions from empirical experience. For sensible perception in space
and time has its own 'origin and content': it is not derived from either
empirical sensation or understanding. Its relation to the conceptual frame
work of the understanding involves principles of judgement which mutually
adapt spatio/temporal experience to abstract concepts. For these reasons
the aesthetic is a crucial element in any account of knowledge.
In the second edition of CPR (B, 1787) Kant subtly extends the text of
bis limitation of the domain of aesthetic to include the critique of taste.
Three years later he published the CJ, in whose first part 'aesthetic' now
unequivocally means the 'critique of taste'. Aesthetic is no longer part of
an account of determinant theoretical judgement, but is taken to exem
plify another form of judgement - 'reflective judgement'. Determinant
judgement possesses its concept and faces the difficulty of applying it
properly to the multiplicity of spatio-temporal appearances, while reflec
tive judgement is in search of its concept through this multiplicity. lt
obeys a peculiar principle - related to the feeling of pleasure and dis
pleasure - which enables it to act as a bridge between the theoretical
judgements of the 'faculty of knowing' analyzed in the first and the prac
tical judgements of the 'faculty of desire' analyzed in the second critique.
The 'Critique of Aesthetic Judgement' in CJ is divided into an 'analytic'
and a 'dialectic', with the analytic considering judgements of the beautiful
and the sublime. In the 'Analytic of the Beautiful' Kant analyzes the vari
ous forms of the 'aesthetic judgement of taste' and the conditions which
make valid the judgement 'this is beautiful'. The exposition of these judge
ments follows the analytic structure of the first critique by first classifying
them according to their quantity, quality, relation and modality and then
justifying their validity with a deduction.
The 'Analytic' proceeds by co1J.trasting the account of aesthetic judge
ments proposed by the German aesthetic philosophy of art with that offered
in the theory of taste developed by the British philosophers Shaftesbury,
54
AESTHETIC
Hutcheson, Hume and Burke. The quality of a judgement of taste con

cerns neither the interest in the agreeable (taste) nor that in reason (aes
thetic); it is a judgement that pleases 'apart from any interest' (CJ §5).
With respect to quantity, the judgement is universally valid; it pleases
universally, but with reference neither to the sum of individual feelings
(taste) nor to an objective good (aesthetic).In a judgement that something
is beautiful, the subject is neither charmed by the object (taste) nor in
structed by its perfection; the relation of such a judgement involves 'the
form of finality in an object ...apart from the representation of an end'
(§17). Finally, the modality of a judgement of taste holds that something
beautiful is necessarily so; it is an object of necessary delight, but not
because it is 'in possession of a definite objective principle' (§20) nor
because it rests on an individual sense of necessity.
In the 'Analytic' the positive characteristics of aesthetic are left relatively
open, as is also the case in the 'Analytic of the Sublime' and the 'Dialectic
of Aesthetic Judgement'. The 'Analytic of the Sublime', apart from distin
guishing between the pleasures of exceeding judgement in the dynamic
and mathematical sublimes, also offers a deduction of aesthetic judgement,
an analysis of genius and a typology of the arts. The 'Dialectic' reviews the
neither/nor structure of the 'Analytic of the Beautiful' through the
'antinomy of taste' in which it appears that aesthetic judgements are both
based and not based on concepts. Kant's aesthetic ends with extremely
suggestive comments on symbolization (hypotyposis) and cultural politics.
The impact of the third critique rests as much on its extraordinary
ambition to bridge the realms of theoretical necessity and practical freedom
as on the open character of its achievement. The principle of reflective
judgement remains undetermined, although it clearly involves pleasure,
the enhancement of life, communication through common sense and
tradition, and hints of a supersensible harmony. These elements recur
throughout the text in varying combinations; they are evident in the analytic
of aesthetic judgement, in the various deductions and in the account of
genius. The import of these themes, their location in what was widely
perceived as the 'crowning phase' of the critical philosophy, and their
indeterminacy, made Kant's aesthetic philosophy of art extremely fertile.
Kant's critics from Schiller (1793) and Hegel (1835) to Derrida (1978)
and Lyotard (1988) are agreed that his use of the the table of judgements
to <lescribe aesthetic experience was ill-advised. Aesthetic experience can
not be contained within a logical framework borrowed from theoretical
philosophy. This dissatisfaction was almost immediately apparent in the
emergence of new forms of philosophical and para-philosophical writing
in the field of aesthetics. These ranged from Schiller's edifying letters on
aesthetic education, to Novalis and Friedrich Schlegel's fragments, to Kleist's
55
AFFECT
short stories,Jean Paul's ironic manual for beginners in aesthetics, and to

Schelling and Hegel's historical narratives. Kant's aesthetics placed the
problem of presentation high on the philosophical agenda, where it has
remained, at least in the European tradition of philosophy.
Kant's vision of a reconciliation of freedom and necessity in the third
critique motivated some of the most powerful and influential writings of
German Idealism. Schiller and Schelling's philosophies of art drew aes
thetic solutions to the split between nature and human freedom, which
were mobilized in the cultural policies of modernizing restoration monar
chies such as Prussia. Art and beauty were considered to be the highest
sources of meaning, reconciling humanity with themselves and with nature.
Withdrawing from similar early enthusiasms, Hegel extended reflective
judgement into a speculative logic which eventually exceeded aesthetics
with its proclamation of the death of art. For him the configurations of art
were inadequate for the presentation of the absolute (see Hegel, 1835).
The implications of Hegel's reservations about art and aesthetics were
not realized until the twentieth century, least of all by the eternal Schillerian
Marx. Almost half a century after Hegel, the young Nietzsche came out of
his studies of the third critique with a programme for cultural renewal in
which 'we have our highest dignity in our significance as works of art'
(1872, p. 52). He later inverted the significance of this phrase, moving
from the Schillerian view of art as the highest source of meaning to re
garding art as the highest source of meaninglessness.
Readings of Kant's aesthetic in the twentieth century have been largely
dystopic, emphasizing the open character of his text and the ways in which
it fails to deliver the promised reconciliation of freedom and necessity.
Theodor Adorno pointed to the ecological and political implications of
confining the reconciliation of freedom and necessity to art (Adorno,
1970) while Hannah Arendt stressed the communicative aspect of aes
thetic reflective judgement in drawing pragmatic political consequences
far removed from a programme of reconciling freedom and necessity
(Arendt, 1989) . A similar return to Kant's CJ in search of an account of
indeterminate judgement amid the ruins of the failed synthetic ambition
has also characterized recent work by Lyotard (1991) and Derrida (1978)
on CJ, while Caygill (1989) and Welsch (1987, 1990) have begun to re
explore the relationship between the two senses of aesthetic as a philosophy
of sensibility and as a philosophy of art.
affect [pathos, affectus, Affekt] see also APPEARANCE, ENIHUSIASM, GEMÜT, IMAGINA
TION, PASSION, PSYCHOLOGY
The confusion surrounding this term is compounded by Kant's translators
who have variously rendered it as 'passion', 'emotion' and 'affection'.
56
AFFECT
Following Strachey's translation of Freud's term Affekt as 'affect' helps to

clarify Kant's usage, although the term is intrinsically ambiguous. Its am
biguity was already noted by Augustine in the fifth century. He observed
in the City o/God (426) that 'these agitations ofthe soul, which the Greeks
call pathe [are described by] some ofour Latin authors, Cicero for example
...as disturbances [peturbationes], others as affections [affectiones] or affects
[�ectus], or again as passions [passiones]' (Augustine, 1972, Book 10,
chapter 4). Moreover, Augustine's contrast between the Platonic view that
the passions are restrained by reason and the Stoic doctrine of ataraxia
(freedom from passion) still underestimates the many meanings given to
pathos in classical Greek philosophy.
Aristotle uses the term pathos in at least three complementary but dis
tinct senses.First, it denotes a quality whose cause is not constitutive ofthe
definition ofits subject (see Aristotle, 1941, 9b, 28); thus change in quality
or 'alteration' is defined in the Metaphysics as 'change in respect of an
affection [pathos]' (Aristotle, 1941, 1069b, 12). A second sense emerges in
the Nicomachean Ethics where pathe are 'the feelings that are accompanied
by pleasure and pain' (Aristotle, 1941, 1105b, 23) and are distinguished
from faculties and virtues. Third, in De anima, pathos is presented as a
certain 'mode or movement of the body' (Aristotle, 1941, 403a).
The narrowing of the meaning of pathos from quality in general to the
specific quality of the soul noted by Augustine persisted until Descartes
and Spinoza. Descartes distinguished between affectio, which for him is
synonymous with Aristotle's first sense of pathos as a quality, and affectus
meaning feeling, emotion or 'passion of the soul'. Spinoza reworks this
distinction in the Ethics, moving from affection as quality or mode of
substance (as in Spinoza, 1985, Part 1, proposition 4) to affect as synony
mous with emotion ( commotionem, seu affectum; in Part V, proposition 2).
The transition is made in the crucial Part III, entitled 'The Origin and
Nature of the Affects', where Spinoza naturalizes emotional affects by
converting them into affections or qualities of nature (see Wolfson, 1962,
Vol. 2, pp. 193-5).
Spinoza's reasoned overcoming of the Cartesian distinction between
affect and affection is followed by Kant, who relates the two terms through
the power of imagination, a solution by no means free of ambiguity. He
presents affect as a concept ofempirical psychology, but assumes through
out that it is the result of a human subject being affected by objects and
ideas.Similarly, the epistemological discussion ofaffection in CPR assumes
it to involve not only quality in general, as in Aristotle's first sense, but also
a movement of the Gemüt, in other words, an emotional affect.
Kant discusses the empirical psychology of affect most extensively in A
§§73-8; CF Part II, §6; MM §XVII; CJ §29.In each case affect is allied with
57
AFFECT
passion (Leidenschaft) in so far as both 'exclude the sovereignty of reason'

(A §73) and 'belong to sensibility' (MM p. 407, p. 208) as 'motions' of the
Gemüt. Affect differs from passion in being unreflective; it is an 'intoxicant'
while passion is reflective and brooding, an 'illness' (A §73). Affect is 'blind'
to choice, whether of ends or means, and is an impulsive movement which
mak.es 'free deliberation' and 'self determination' impossible. (CJ §29).
This characterization of affect recalls Aristotle's third sense of pathos as
a movement of the body, but Kant extends it to include the second sense
as well. For affect is not simply movement as such, but a movement which
overcomes an obstacle 'like water that break.s through a dam' (A §74).
This allies it with the feeling of pleasure and pain, and leads Kant to make
a crucial distinction between two kinds of affect. In A the distinction is
couched in terms borrowed from Ekmenta medicina (1780) by the Scottish
physician John Brown (1735-88). Affects are either 'sthenic' - 'exciting
and frequently exhausting' - or 'asthenic' - sedative and relaxing. Both
are pleasurable in that they 'liberale from whatever curbs vitality' (A §76),
but this pleasure may tak.e different forms. This is apparent in CJ where
Kant distinguishes between 'strenuous' and 'languid affects'; the former
are characterized as sublime, and excite the 'consciousness of overcoming
every resistance', while the latter are beautiful in that they neutralize the
feeling of resistance (CJ §29).
The condemnation of affect is qualified in Kant's discussion of 'enthu
siasm' - the 'affective participation in the good' (CF Part II, §6). This
affect can be constitutive, as in the case of the revolution of the French
people, yet it cannot wholly be esteemed since 'affects as such deserve
censure'. Nevertheless, Kant develops a positive valuation of affect through
his distinction between the beautiful and the sublime. If enthusiasm were
a beautiful affect, then it would be condemned as 'a momentary glittering
appearance which leaves one languid' (MM p. 409, p. 209). If it is regarded
as a sublime affect, then it becomes formative, a movement of the Gemüt
which 'leaves behind [it] a temper of mind [ Gemütsstimmung] which, though
it be only indirect, has an influence upon its consciousness of it own
strength and resolution'. The affect of enthusiasm is consequential, but
may be endangered by lapsing into either beautiful langour or fanatical
passion.
Kant's characterization of affect as a motion of the soul ( Gemütsbewegung)
which combines sensuous and ideal aspects while evoking pleasure and pain
identifies it as the expression of the power of imagination (Einbi1dungskraft).
lt is through this power that Kant relates affect to affection, or the mode
or qualification of imagination central to CPR
The discussion of affection in the 'Transcendental Aesthetic' and 'De
duction' of CPR has features which Kant himself describes as paradoxical.
58
AFFECT
Affection is the mode in which an appearance affects the Gemüt, a pro

position which escapes tautology only if it is admitted that the forms of
intuition which constitute appearances are 'the mode in which the mind
[Gemüt] is affected through its own activity ...and so is affected by itself'
(CPR B 67).By so relating affection as a quality to the affects of the Gemüt,
Kant raises 'problems' and 'difficulties' which he tackles in the second
deduction in the course of what has become known as the problem of
'double-affection'.
The problem involves the relation between the empirical psychology of
affect and the affection of apperception, or how the Gemüt can come to
affect itself. Self-affection seems contradictory since 'we should then have
to be in a passive relation [of active affection] to ourselves' (CPR B 153).
One answer lies in double-affection, wherein the apperceptive I that thinks
is distinguished from the psychological I that intuits. This argument rests
on an implied distinction between the affection of the apperceptive I,
which qualifies appearances according to the table of categories, and the
intuiting I, which is affected both by categories and objects of perception.
lt is thus a Cartesian reading of this problem which insists on the separation
of affection and affect.
Kant's text, with its stress on the role ofthe power of imagination, seems
however to incline toward a non-Cartesian fusion of affect and affection.
Imagination disposes itself actively and passively; it produces (CPR B 154)
the categories and sensations which affect it. In terms of CJ, imagination
is formative, leaving traces of its affects which in turn affect it or become
affections or modes of appearing. This interpretation points to a con
troversial link between the first and third critiques which has been ex
plored in recent French philosophy inspired by the psychoanalytic account
of affect.lt informs, for example, Lyotard's turn from a Freudian 'libidinal
economy' (1974) to a Kantianism which stresses the role of enthusiasm
and common sense (1988, 1991).
After Kant the discussions of affect and affection branched into psychol
ogy and epistemology. Psychologists largely accepted Kant's alignment of
affect with non-conscious activity, although late-nineteenth-century natu
ralists did not accept his postulate of the soul. Probably the most influen
tial employment of the term in twentieth-century thought was that of
Freud, who gave it an important place in his metapsychological account
of repression.In post-Kantian epistemology the discussion of affection was
largely subordinated to wider problems of the relation of knowing subject
and known object, and rehearsed the double-affection problem with phi
losophers defending one side against the other. However, Kant himself
seems to have chosen not to solve the problem, but rather to leave it open
as an ineluctable but fertile philosophical difficulty or 'aporia'.
59
AFFECTION
affection see AFFECT
affinity [Affinität, Verwandtschaft] see also APPERCEPTION, ASSOCIATION, DEDUC

TION, HETEROGENEITY, IMAGINATION, SYNTHESIS, UNITY
Mfinity is an enigmatic concept used by Kant in various contexts to relate
otherwise heterogeneous elements. In CPR it serves to relate both sensi
bility to understanding and understanding to reason. lt is central to the
'first deduction' where it forms the 'objective ground of all association of
appearances'. From it are derived not only the 'association of appear
ances' as 'data of the senses', but also their 'reproduction according to
laws' and even 'experience itself' (CPR A 123). In the 'Appendix to the
Transcendental Dialectic' it appears as a regulative idea or law prescribed
by reason to the understanding. Here affinity combines the laws of 'generic
homogeneity' and 'specific heterogeneity' in prescribing the continuity
between genera and species (CPR A 658-9/B 686-7).
In the 'first deduction', affinity not only relates sensibility and under
standing but also appears to possess both objective and subjective charac
teristics. lt is the 'transcendental ground of unity' which secures the
objective validity of associations between phenomena such as cause and
effect. But while affinity thus establishes 'the possibility of the association
of the manifold, so far as it lies in the object' (CPR A 113) it is itself
'nowhere to be found save in the principle of the unity of apperception'
(A 122) and is 'only possible' by means of the 'transcendental function of
imagination' (A 123). The latter is the work of 'productive imagination'
securing the 'necessary unity in the synthesis of what is manifold in ap
pearance' (A 123). With affinity the unity of the manifold created by
productive imagination is thus treated as if it lay in the object.
Kant's argument in the 'first deduction' is clarified by some casual
comments in A (§3lc), which show him working with two senses of affin
ity, one genealogical, the other productive. In the first, Kant defines affinity
as 'the union established by the derivation of the manifold from a single
foundation'; in the second - resorting to a chemical analogy - he defines
it as an interaction 'which links two elements specifically distinct from
each other, but intimately affecting each other, whereby the combination
creates a third entity that has properties which can only be brought about
by the union of two heterogeneous elements' (§31c). In a suggestive
footnote the scope of the analogy is extended from chemical synthesfa to
sexual reproduction, for both inorganic and organic nature, as much as
body and soul, are 'based on separating and uniting the dissimilar'.
With regard to the deduction, affinity may be read genealogically as the
'transcendental ground' for the association of appearances, and produc
tively as the work of imagination in producing experience out of the
60
AGREEABLE
heterogeneous materials of sensibility and understanding. This reading is

explicitly supported by the comment in A that 'Despite their dissimilarity,
understanding and sensibility by themselves form a close union for bringing
about our cognition, as though one were begotten by the other, or as
though both had a common origin' (§3lc). Kant admits that the union of
genealogical and productive affinities is difficult to analyze, a point echoed
throughout the CPR. These admissions have been used in the twentieth
century to support 'anti-foundationalist' readings of Kant which empha
size the ongoing work of productive imagination against static views of
there being fixed 'transcendental grounds' which serve as foundations for
knowledge and action (Deleuze and Guattari, 1984; Heidegger, 1929).
affirmation see BEING, NEGATION, NOTHING, REALITY, TRANSCENDENTAL
agreeable [Angenehm] see also AESTHETIC, AFFECT, BEAlITY, DELIGHT, FEELING,

PLEASURE, TASTE
One of a duster of terms in Kant's aesthetic and practical philosophy,
'agreeable' is used to describe the feeling of pleasure. lt appears as a term
in an historical opposition which Kant rehearses in order to define his
own position. He associates it with the writings of the British 'moral sense'
school which he contrasts with the German rational-perfectionist school
of Christian Wolff and his followers. In GMM the feeling of the agreeable
subjectively 'influences the will only by means of sensation' (GMM p. 413,
p. 24) and is opposed to the pure rational determination of the will pro
posed by the Wolffians. Kant situates himself between the two arguments
by developing the concept of an imperative, which has both subjective and
objective characteristics.
An analogous form of argument is pursued in CJ §§3-7, where the
contrast between the agreeable (i.e., British theory of 'taste') and the
good (i.e., German theory of 'aesthetic') is used to highlight Kant's own,
third position. The agreeable, the good and the beautiful are all species
of the genus 'delight'; each is a 'modification of the feeling of pleasure
and displeasure' as well as a relation of a representation to its object (CJ
§3). But the delight in the agreeable consists in what the 'senses find
pleasing in sensation' (§3) or in the feeling of pleasure evoked by the
presence of an object of sensation. Conversely, the good involves the
presence of a concept of the understanding. Kant's view of the nature of
the delight in the beautiful is defined negatively against this opposition as
neither sensible nor rational, requiring the presence of neither object nor
concept.
In order fully to exploit the contrast between agreeable and good, Kant
exaggerates the unfortunate characteristics of the former. lt dispenses
61
AGREEMENT/ OPPOSITION
with judgement and gratifies desire, and as mere enjoyment it offers a

delight 'pathologically conditioned (by stimuli)' (§5). Even worse, it is a
significant factor 'even with irrational animals', a 'private feeling', essen
tially asocial. This form of argument has been taken as an example of the
deleterious effects upon philosophical analysis of thinking in terms of
dichotomies. Indeed some writers see Kant's procedure as complicit with
a series of inherited dichotomous formulations which characterize West
ern philosophy, dichotomies which, among others, privilege reason over
the body, male over female, European over non-European (see Irigaray,
1974 and 1984). However, Kant's procedure may be defended as the dis
covery of alternative philosophical formulations through the rehearsal of
culturally received oppositions (see Caygill, 1989).
agreement/ opposition see CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION
amphiboly see also CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION, SENSIBILITY, UNDERSTANDING

A term drawn from classical rhetoric, amphiboly denotes the ambiguity
arising from the equivocal arrangement in a phrase of otherwise un
equivocal terms.In Aristotle's On Sophistical Refutations it is one of six forms
of philosophical fallacy arising from the sophistical misuse of language
(Aristotle, 1941, 165b). For Kant the 'amphiboly of the concepts of reflec
tion' occurs when either the empirical use of the understanding is con
fused with the transcendental, or when a concept of reflection properly
applicable to either sensibility or the understanding is improperly applied
to the other or to both terms (CPR A 260/B 316ff).
Most of Kant's argument in CPR is directed against the amphibolous
use of concepts of reflection such as identity/difference, agreement/
opposition, inner/outer, determinable/determination (matter/form) (CPR
A 261/B 317). These are the orientational concepts which are employed
prior to 'constructing any objective judgement' (A 262/B 317). Kant
argues that they themselves must be properly oriented through transcen
dental reflection: this assigns each use of a concept of reflection to its
proper faculty of knowledge. For example, when speaking of identity and
difference it is necessary to distinguish between their distinct conceptual
and intuitive applications, since the 'conditions of sensible intuition ...carry
with them their own differences' (A 270/B 326). The failure thus to dis
tinguish between the sensible and intelligible fields of application results
in a transcendental amphiboly which confounds 'an object of pure under
standing with appearance' and generates illegitimate synthetic principles
of knowledge.
Kant claims that the philosophies of both Leibniz and Locke were
amphibolous. Leibniz applied to sensibility concepts of reflection proper
62
ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE
to the understanding, and thus 'inteUectualised appearances' while Locke,

in his account of conceptual abstraction, 'sensualised all concepts of the
understanding' (A 271/B 327). Kant steers a difficult course between these
two positions, maintaining that concepts proper to sensibility and under
standing must be distinguished while seeing knowledge as arising from
their legitimate coajunction in properly justified a priori synthetic princi
ples. The entire critical philosophy wagers that such principles exist, are
not amphibolous, and respect the differences proper to concept and in
tuition while yet bringing them into conjunction.
Kant's analysis of amphiboly has received a new currency with respect
to late-twentieth-century 'philosophies ofdifference' elaborated by among
others Deleuze (1968), Derrida (1967, 1972) and Irigaray (1984). Critics
ofthis philosophical movement such as Rose (1984) see it as resting upon
an amphibolous use of 'difference' which effaces historically founded
distinctions between concept and intuition.
analogies of experience see also ACCIDENT, ANALOGY, APPEARANCE, CATEGORY,

CAUSALITY, PRINCIPLES, RELATION, TIME
The analogies ofexperience are the group ofthree principles which serve
as rules for the objective employment of the categories of relation. Each
group of categories has its corresponding group of principles: those of
quantity, the 'axioms of intuition'; quality, the 'anticipations of percep
tion'; and those of modality, the 'postulates of empirical thought'. The
general function ofthe principles is to determine how things must appear
to finite beings in time. In the case ofthe analogies, they must determine
how things appear to be related in time. Our experience of the ways in
which things are related to each other is not directly categorical - we do
not experience the relations between things directly in terms of the cat
egories ofsubstance and accident, causality and dependence, and commu
nity - but then neither do we experience their relations as simply random
coincidences. Appearances in time are related in terms ofthe three analo
gies which look both to intuition and to the categories: they 'precede' the
empirical cognition of relation and are a 'rule for the objective employ
ment' of the relational categories.
Kant's main discussion of the analogies is in CPR (A 176-218/B 218-
65), supplemented by his further thoughts in P. They and the other prin
ciples were the outcome of the work of the 'silent decade' of the l 770s,
in which Kant tried to reform the scholastic heritage by transforming the
categories ofontology received via the Wolffian tradition into those ofthe
transcendental analytic. In place of such etemally valid ontological rela
tions as substance and accident, cause and effect, and community he
proposed temporally specific principles ofrelation. They take the form of
63
ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE
temporal analogies to the ontological predicates, analogies which are ap

propriate to the experience of a finite being who can know only appear
ances in space and time.
The general principle informing the analogies holds that experience is
only possible 'through the representation of a necessary connection of
perceptions' (CPR B 218). This requires that the perception of objects in
time can be shown to be necessarily related to each other, and indeed that
these relations are 'prior to all experience, and indeed make it possible'
(A 177/B 219). This is achieved by showing that the relations between
appearances are governed by the three 'modes' of time - duration, succes
sion and co-existence. Each mode of time yields a particular rule for
relating appearances; together they form the analogies of experience.
The first analogy is the 'principle of the permanence of substance'. The
details of Kant's proof are internally inconsistent and vary between the
1781 and 1787 editions, but the general intent is clear. He argues that in
order to experience change or co-existence in time it is necessary to
postulate a permanence underlying things in time: 'Without the perma
nent, there is no time relation' (CPR A 183/B 226). However, he argues
against the philosophical tradition's claim that the permanent is substance.
lt is unnecessary to hypostasize permanence as substance; it suffices to
point to the principle of permanence as 'the mode in which we represent
to ourselves the existence of things in [the field] of appearance' (A 186/
B 229). The 'permanance of substance' does not refer to an ontological
predicate, but to duration itself, or the way in which 'we' as finite beings
represent appearances 'to ourselves' as in time.
The second analogy governs the relation of appearances in time thought
under the mode of succession - the principle that 'All alterations take
place in conformity with the law of the connection of cause and effect' (B
232). With this principle Kant tackles Hume's objections to the principle
of causality by showing the necessity for causal relations. There is no such
thing as 'causality' or 'sufficient reason', but there is a particular experi
ence of time - its irreversibility - which requires us to order our experi
ences in time according to the analogy of cause and effect. Kant's proof
for this principle argues that appearances are related to each other as
successive, and that this succession is necessary; i.e., that the order of
appearances in time cannot be reversed. Kant relates this property of time
to the irreversibility of the causal chain, a necessary mode of alteration of
appearances in time.
The third analogy governs the co-existence of appearances according to
the 'law of reciprocity or community' (A 211/B 256) and corresponds to
the temporal mode of co-existence. The relation of appearances in time
is here thought in terms of simultaneity: everything that co-exists does so
64
ANALOGY
at the same time. Without this principle, Kant argues, experience would
not be possible, since we would be unable to relate to each other with
certainty the things which appear to occupy the same space and time. This
co-existence is not an ontological predicate, existing outside its relata, nor
is it a property of appearances; it is rather a condition for experiencing
the relation of appearances which are manifest as simultaneous.
In common with the other principles, the analogies are among the most
diffi.cult and perplexing features ofKant's philosophy. They are both highly
specific to his theoretical philosophy and crucial to his entire critical un
dertaking. For this reason, while they have not had a wide general philo
sophical impact they have been the subject of some of the most interesting
if opaque works of Kant exegesis. For two contrasting accounts of the
analogies see Heidegger, 1935, Guyer, 1987.
analogy [analogon, proportio, ratio] see also ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, AS-IF,

HYPOTYPOSIS, PRESENTATION, REASON, REGUIATIVE IDEA, SCHEMATISM
A foundational term of philosophy, 'analogy' has a continuous if under
estimated history since Pythagoras. A general theory of analogy was first
developed by Eudoxus (?406-?355 Be) in response to the crisis of incom
mensurable ratios (logoit) encountered by the Pythagoreans. The over
coming of this early crisis of Greek reason ( logos) is codified in the
definitions of logos and analogos, in book five of Euclid's E/,ements. These
situate analogy in terms of the similarity between the ratios of different
magnitudes, as in Definition 6: 'Let magnitudes which have the same ratio
be called analogical' (Euclid, Vol. II, p. 114). Euclid makes a clear distinc
tion between an analogy of terms and one of ratios, focusing his attention
upon the latter. As a result, his account of analogy stresses the similarity
in the relation between the antecedent and consequent terms of at least
three ratios, and not any similarity between the terms themselves.
The philosophical implications of analogical similarity were first realized
by Aristotle, who shows in the Topics how it might be used to relate 'things
belonging to different genera, the formulae being "A:B = C:D" (e.g., as
knowledge stands to the object of knowledge, so is sensation related to the
object of sensation)' (Aristotle, 1941, 108a, 7-8). He proceeds to extend
this form of reasoning to metaphysics (1017a), ethics (1096b) and politics
(1296b).
The origins of analogy as a supplement to reason also characterized its
subsequent development. lt was, for example, crucial to Aquinas's philo
sophical theology, where it redeems the inability of human reason to
understand God. While God's participation in creation cannot be grasped
by human logos, it may be understood analogically in terms of the relation
between human and divine knowledge and action. Kant's writings on the
65
ANALOGY
subject of analogy nearly all involve similar theological questions, and may
be regarded as philosophical determinations of the forms of reasoning
appropriate for thinking about the supersensible.
While Kant does not deny the value of analogical reasoning, he is
concerned to confine its use within properly defined limits. Analogical
similarity is an important supplement to logical identity, but must not
surreptitiously be employed as a substitute for it. In P (§§57-8) and CJ (§59)
he contrasts the symbolic/analogical with the schematic/logical judgement.
Logical judgements involve the direct presentation of a concept to an
object of intuition, while analogical judgements apply 'the mere rule of
reflection upon that intuition to quite another object' (CJ §59). This is a
classical restriction of the scope of analogy to the relation between terms,
and not the tenns themselves: for Kant, cognition by analogy 'does not
signify (as is commonly understood) an imperfect similarity of two things,
but a perfect similarity of relations between two quite dissimilar things'
(P §58).
Analogy may be used legitimately to gain 'relational knowledge' but not
objective knowledge, and the main object of such relational knowledge is
God. lt is only legitimate to reason analogically of God in such a way
'as the promotion of the welfare of children (=a) is to the love of parents
(=b), so the welfare of the human species (=c) is to that unknown in God
(=x), which we call love' if we admit that this argument holds only 'for us,
though we have left out everything that could detennine it absolutely and
in itself ' (P §58). In such reasoning we do speak of the object itself, but
only of a way in which it might be made comprehensible to us.
Kant develops this thought in RL by dropping the distinction between
symbolic and schematic procedures of judgement and regarding both
objective and analogical determinations as forms of schematism. While it
is permitted in the passage from the sensible to the supersensible 'to
schematiz.e (that is to render a concept intelligible by the help of an analogy
to something sensible), it is on no account permitted us to infer' (RL p.
65, p. 59). We cannot infer from the analogy that makes a concept such
as God intelligible to us the conclusion that 'this schema must necessarily
belong to the object itself as its predicate' (RL p. 65, p. 59). lt is legitimate
to employ analogy to speak of the supersensible, but not to use it as if it
gave us objective knowledge; its use is permitted as an aid to human self
understanding, but not as a source of objective knowledge of such objects
as God, the World and the Soul.
Kant also discussed analogy in L, distinguishing between inductive and
analogical conclusions to judgements, although his discussion here is largely
derivative of Baumgarten. After Kant analogical reasoning seems to have
been confined to theology, with a consequent loss of sensitivity on the part
66
ANALYSIS
of Kant exegesis to the role of argument by analogy in the critical philoso

phy. There are, however, signs of a renewed sensitivity to the issue in the
writings and Kant commentaries ofDerrida (1978) and Lyotard (1983). lt
would appear that a greater appreciation of the role of analogical reason
ing in Kant would not only clarify some of the problems of Kant exegesis
- notably the 'transcendental object = x' - but would also deepen our
understanding of the structure of the 'Kantian argument'.
analysis [analusis] see also ANALYTIC, MATHEMATICS, METHOD, SYNTHESIS

Kant combines two senses of analysis in his work, one derived from Greek
geometry, the other from modern physics and chemistry. Both remain
close to the original Greek sense of analysis as a 'loosening up' or 'releasing',
but each proceeds in different ways. The former proceeds 'lemmatically'
by assuming a proposition to be true and searching for another known
truth from which the proposition may be deduced. The latter proceeds by
resolving complex wholes into their elements.
Diogenes Laertius mentions that Plato was 'the first to explain to
Leodamus of Thasos the method of solving problems by analysis' (1925,
Vol. I, p. 299). That this does not refer to the general platonic method of
division is stressed by Proclus in his Commentary on the First Book of Euclid's
Elements, where analysis is presented as a method of investigation by means
of lemmas (Proclus, 1970, p. 165). This method of geometrical analysis is
most clearly presented by Arnauld in The Art of Thinking: geometers faced
with a problem to solve grant the truth of the proposition and examine
the consequences of this assumption. They conclude that what is assumed
is in fact true if during the course of their examination they arrive at some
clear truth from which the assumption can be inferred as a necessary
consequence (Arnauld, 1662, p. 308). Following the discovery of the 'clear
truth', the proof of the proposition may then be reconstructed synthetically.
The specific, geometrical method of analysis ascribed to Plato was par
alleled by a more general account originating in Aristotelian physics. In
On Generation and Corruption Aristotle describes an 'analysis' (which he
also ascribes to Plato) which moves from complexes to elements: 'he carries
his analysis of the "elements" - solids though they are - back to "planes"'
(Aristotle, 1941, 329a, 24). The Aristotelian tradition emphasized this mode
of analysis, using it to justify the passage from physics to metaphysics.
Aquinas, for example, described 'the ultimate end of analysis' as the 'at
tainment of the highest and most simple causes, which are the separate
substances' or, in other words, 'the consideration of being and the prop
erties of being as being' (Aquinas, 1986, p. 72). Here too, analysis is
contrasted with synthesis, analysis proceeding from 'effects to causes', syn
thesis from 'causes to effects'.
67
ANALYSIS
Descartes seems to suggest a combination of the geometrical and the

reductive senses of analysis in the 'Reply to the Second Objection'. He
wrote: 'Analysis shows the true way by which a thing was methodically
discovered [geometric analysis] and derived, as it were effect from cause
[physical analysis]' (Descartes, 1968, Vol. II, p. 48). He also suggested that
the ancients concealed their method of analysis behind their synthetic
presentation in terms ofaxioms, postulates and definitions. Unlike Aquinas
and the scholastic heritage, Descartes saw no smooth transition between
analysis ofphysics and metaphysics. The 'primary notions' ofthe latter are
'contradicted' by the senses, and so can only be analyzed and not given
a synthetic presentation. Descartes comments: 'This is why my writing took
the form of Meditations rather than that of Philosophical Disputations
or the theorems and problems of a geometer', although he was to prove
inconsistent on this point.
Following Descartes the combination ofgeometrical and physical analysis
was taken for granted, although there were further developments. Spinoza
in a letter to Heinrich Oldenburg mentions Boyle's chemical analysis of
nitre, an experiment destined not only to undermine scholastic doctrines
ofsubstance, but also to introduce the metaphor ofchemical analysis into
philosophy. Newton and Leibniz also broadened the meaning of analysis
to include their development of calculus. In the Mathematical Princifles
Newton concealed his analytical 'method of fluxions' behind a synthetic,
geometrical presentation while Leibniz attempted openly to extend 'analy
sis' to include analysis situs, a precursor of topology (1976, pp. 254-9).
While all ofthese changes in the meaning ofanalysis fed into Kant's use
ofthe term, this was mainly governed by an elision not only ofgeometrical
and physical analysis but also of the methods of discovery and presenta
tion. In the PE Kant distinguishes between mathematics and philosophy in
terms of their methods of achieving certainty; mathematics employs a
synthetic method, philosophy an analytic method (PE p. 276, p. 248).
Philosophy analyzes 'confused or insufficiently determined' concepts, and
proceeds through the two stages of, first, clarifying their qualities and
then, second, determining the relation of these qualities to each other.
At this stage Kant restricts philosophy to analysis, criticising Wolff's use
of the geometrical form of synthetic presentation. While refraining from
geometrical presentation, philosophical analysis as a method of discovery
follows the lemmatic procedures of geometrical analysis. Kant illustrates
the method ofanalysis with the example of time: 'The idea of time has to
be examined in all kinds of relation if its characteristic marks are to be
discovered by means ofanalysis [clarification]: different characteristic marks
which have been abstracted have to be combined together to see whether
they yield an adequate concept [determination]' (PE p. 277, p. 249). By
68
ANALYSIS
working through hypothetical examples, qualities and combinations, Kant

seeks - like the geometers - to discover the essential elements. To use any
other procedure is to rely on the 'fortunate accident' that the given qualities
and determinations prove to be the right ones.
Kant clarifies the distinction between geometrical and physical analysis in
the ID, aligning philosophical with reductive analysis. Philosophical analysis
does not proceed solely from effects to causes, but instead explores the
possible parts ofa given concept through hypothesis: 'analysis, taken in its
first sense, is a regression from that which is grounded to the ground, whereas,
in its second sense, it is a regression from a whok to its possibk or mediate
parts' (ID § 1). Philosophical analysis does not proceed in search ofa causal
or principial hierarchy, but seeks through experiment and hypothesis to
determine elementary qualities and their possible combinations.
The geometrical form of analysis deeply informs the CPR, although its
presence has been obscured by Kant's distinction in P between synthetic
and analytic forms ofpresentation. There he describes the CPR as 'executed
in the synthetical style' and the P as 'sketched out after an analytical
method'. The two modes of presentation indeed move in different di
rections: one moves from 'principles to consequents, or from the simple
to the composite' while the other 'begins with the conditioned and with
what is grounded and goes on to principles' (L p. 639). Analysis as 'the
method of discovery' follows a different procedure: just as the Greek
geometers discovered their proofs by means of analysis but presented
them synthetically (OD p. 191, p. 111), so too Kant makes his discoveries
through analysis, but presents them in synthetic form.
Consequently, analysis is presented in the CPR as a lemmatic procedure,
assuming the forms ofjudgement and then determining the elements and
combinations that make them possible. In the 'lntroduction' analysis is
accordingly distinguished from 'doctrine' (which would be a form of
presentation) and described as a 'transcendental critique', 'a touchstone
of the value, or lack ofvalue, of all a priori knowledge' (CPR A 12/B 26).
The analysis proceeds by hypothesizing possible qualities and combinations
in order to see how they correspond to each other.
This analytical procedure is illustrated by the 'B' deduction, which be
gins with the discovery that 'combination' or the quality of combining
concept and intuition is fundamental. Kant then analyzes combination
and discovers in it the 'act of a subject' and an extra-categorical unity.
Following the discovery of these qualities it becomes necessary to hy
pothesize determinations, or relations between them, for which Kant fol
lows the 'clue' ofthe table ofjudgements. He adds a further, characteristic
twist by maintaining that if analysis analyzed itself it would find itself
constituted by combination 'since only as having been combined by the
69
ANALYTIC
understanding can anything that allows of analysis be given to the faculty of

representation' (CPR B 130).
The term analysis has been widely employed in the twentieth century
and often illegitimately projected back upon Kant. Most contemporary
usage, to quote Wittgenstein, 'oscillates between natural science and
grammar' (Wittgenstein, 1953, §392) and largely overlooks the geometri
cal method of analysis employed by Kant. But there are similarities between
Kant's and modern forms of analysis. Freud, for example, while analogi
cally relating his use of 'analysis' to chemistry is like Kant in pursuit of
clarified 'qualities' and their 'determinate relations': 'we point out to the
patient these instinctual motives, which are present in his symptoms and
of which he has hitherto been unaware - just as a chemist isolates the
fundamental substance, the chemical 'element' out of the salt in which it
had been combined with other elements' (Laplanche and Pontalis, 1973,
p. 368). Wittgenstein's influential programme of 'grammatical investiga
tion' analyzes forms of expression through a process 'like one of taking a
thing apart' (Wittgenstein, 1953, §90) although unlike Kant and Freud he
is not in search of 'qualities' or analogical 'salts' but is content to state
determinate relations. Mathematical analysis, however (i.e., the study of
the properties of continuous functions), has little to do with Kant and
traces its genealogy to Descartes' geometry and the development of calculus.
analytic see also ANALYSIS, DIALECTIC, ONTOLOGY, PRINCIPLES, REASON

Aristotle's work on demonstrative reasoning was known under the titles
Prior and Posterior Analytics, the former analyzing the syllogism, the latter
the conditions of demonstrative knowledge. They formed, along with the
Categories, On Interpretation, Topics and Sophistical R.efutations, the influential
collection of logical treatises known to the tradition as the 'Organon'.
They were the subject of intense commentary by Boethius in the sixth
century AD and were rediscovered in Northem Europe during the thir
teenth century. Their influence was challenged first by the Renaissance
humanists, then by Ramus in the sixteenth century. Ramus sought to
break the hegemony of the Organon by re-0rganizing logic on the basis
of the rhetorical distinction between the 'invention' of arguments and
their 'disposition'.
Ramus's distinction was maintained even during the German Aristote
lian revival of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. 'Invention' was
rephrased in Aristotelian terms as the 'analytic', and 'disposition' as the
'dialectic'; the former was deemed to 'discover' the basic elements of
judgement, while the latter presents their use in persuasive but not neces
sarily valid syllogisms. The extent of the elision of Ramus and Aristotle is
evident in Kant's ascription of the distinction between analytic and dialectic
70
ANALYTICAL JUDGEMENT
to Aristotle himself (L p. 534). Kant went on to adopt this framework as

the structure for the contents of the three critiques. The task of critical
analytics is to 'discover through analysis all the actions of reason that we
perform in thinking' (L p. 531). They uncover in the first critique the
'concepts and principles' oftheoretical reason, in the second critique the
principles of 'pure practical reason' and, in the third the principles of
aesthetic and teleological powers of judgement.
The 'Transcendental Analytic' of the CPR forms the first division of
the 'Transcendental Logic'. lt resolves 'understanding and reason into its
elements' and is a 'canon ofjudgement' or 'negative touchstone oftruth'
(CPR A 60/B 85). lt precedes the second division of the 'Transcendental
Logic' or 'Transcendental Dialectic' which is a 'logic ofillusion' or scrutiny
of the illegitimate extension of judgement beyond its legitimate objects.
The analytic is described as the 'part of transcendental logic which deals
with the elements of pure knowledge yielded by the understanding, and
the principles without which no object can be thought' (A 62/B 87) and
is accordingly divided into an 'analytic of concepts' and an 'analytic of
principles'. The former discovers the concepts which compose the totality
of pure understanding by means ofa deduction, while the latter presents
the conditions or 'principles' under which concepts may legitimately be
related to 'sensibility in general'. As the presentation of the 'rules for the
exposition of appearances', transcendental analytic takes the place of an
'Ontology that presumptuously claims to supply in systematic doctrinal
form, synthetic a priori knowledge of things in general' (A 247/B 303).
The 'Analytic ofPure Practical Reason' in CPrR also offers an 'analytic'
or 'rule oftruth' for practical judgements, but here the logical framework
sits uncomfortably with the content of moral philosophy. Similarly, the
'analytics' ofaesthetic and teleological judgement in CJ contain material
which patently exceeds the framework ofanalytic and dialectic. The insights
of Kant's philosophical modernity, in other words, could no longer be
contained within the traditional framework ofpresentation. His successors
were uniformly critical of his use of this framework and rejected it; in its
place they developed the diversity of presentations characteristic of post
Kantian philosophy. Indeed, the historically specific form of presentation
in terms of analytic and dialectic died with Kant, and survives in a philo
logical limbo as something that has to be mastered only in order to under
stand the three critiques.
analytical judgement see also ANALYSIS, JUDGEMENT, RATIONALISM, SYNTHETIC A

PRIORI JUDGEMENT
The distinction between analytic and synthetic a priori judgements is central
to Kant's theoretical philosophy and developed out ofhis early critique of
71
ANALYTICAL JUDGEMENT
the 'rationalist' philosophy of the Wolffian school. In the course of his

exposure of this philosophy's shortcomings, Kant elaborated a distinction
between analytic and synthetic judgements. The Wolffian philosophers
treated all judgements as if they were analytical, whereas, Kant daimed,
they were only a specific dass of judgement which he contrasted with the
distinct dass of synthetic judgements. He noted later in P that 'whatever
be their origin or their logical form, there is a distinction in judgements,
as to their content, according to which they are merely explicative, adding
nothing to the content of the cognition, or ampliative, increasing the given
cognition: the former may be called analytic, the latter synthetic, judge
ment' (P §2).
The main distinguishing feature of analytic judgements is that their
predicates 'belong to the subject ...as something which is (covertly) con
tained in this concept' (CPR A 6/B 10). The subjects of analytical judge
ments 'contain' their predicates, although covertly or 'confusedly'.lt follows
from this basic characteristic that the act of making an analytic judgement
adds 'nothing through the predicate to the concept of the subject, but
merely break[s] it up into those constituent concepts that have all along
been thought in it, although confusedly' (A 7/B 11). Such a judgement
serves 'merely more dearly to represent and assert what is already thought
and contained in the given concept' (0D p.228, p. 141). Through all this
work of 'breaking up', 'representing' and 'asserting' the virtual content of
a given concept, the analytic judgement is governed by the principle of
contradiction: 'For the predicate of an affirmative analytic judgement is
already thought in the concept of the subject, of which it cannot be denied
without contradiction' (P §2).
Kant's account of the distinction between analytic and synthetic
judgements rests on the difference between their content. The predicate
of the synthetic judgement adds something to the subject, while the predi
cate of the analytical judgement simply draws out what is already present
in the subject.During the nineteenth century, various candidates emerged
as the source for synthetic judgements, induding psychological, physio
logical and sociological factors as well as the abstract considerations of
value and validity beloved of the neo-Kantians.Frege in The F<fUndations of
Arithmeticrevolutionized the question of judgement and undermined Kant's
distinction by turning away from the problem of content to that of the
�ustification of assertions' (Frege, 1950, §3). This development shifted
attention away from the content of judgements, and led to the rejection
of Kant's transcendental logic.
This radical move against Kant's distinction between analytic and syn
thetic judgements was anticipated by Kant's earliest critics, beginning with
Eberhard and Maimon, who assumed that the critical philosophy stood or
72
ANTHROPOLOGY FROM A PRAGMATIC POINT OF VIEW
fell with the distinction. However, this distinction emerged from, and was
but a formula for, the critique of the Wolffian philosophy; it was a result
of the critical philosophy and not its fundamental assumption.
Amhropology from a Pragmatic Point oJ View Published in 1798, Kant's

manuscript was derived from notes for a series of lectures on anthropology
he had given since the autumn semester of 1772-3. These in their turn
had developed out of the series of lectures on physical geography which
Kant had delivered since 1756. In a note to his introduction, Kant refers
to his having lectured twice a year 'for some thirty years' to an audience
comprised of students and the general public on 'knowledge of the world',
namely anthropology and physical geography. Although Kant states that
his manuscript for the physical geography lectures was illegible to anyone
but himself, a text edited by Friedrich Theodor Rink was published in
1802, and may profitably be read alongside A The text of A published
according to Kant's manuscript in 1798 is known as the 'A edition' while the
version published in 1800 and incorporating minor revisions and stylistic
changes is known as the 'B edition'. Most modern editions and translations
tend to follow the 'B edition', sometimes incorporating material drawn
from the 'A edition'.
In his introduction Kant defines anthropology as a 'systematic doctrine
containing our knowledge of man' and suggests this knowledge may be
given a physiological or a pragmatic perspective. The former involves
knowledge of the things of the world, or man as an object of and in
nature; the latter is knowledge of man as a 'freely acting being' or 'as a
citizen of the world'. Kant's anthropology pursues the pragmatic per
spective, and divides its material according to 'Anthropological Didactic'
and 'Anthropological Characterisation'. The former is described as the
'art of knowing the interior as well as the exterior of man' and is subdi
vided into three books: (i) 'On the Cognitive Faculty'; (ii) 'On the Feeling
of Pleasure and Displeasure'; (iii) 'On the Faculty of Desire'. These books,
which shadow the organization of the three critiques, offer several distinc
tive perspectives on cognition, pleasure and morality which both augment
and occasionally undermine the critical accounts of the same phenomena.
By contrast, 'Anthropological Characterisation' is dedicated to knowing 'a
man's interior from his exterior' and consists in the anecdotal reflections
on such salient characteristics of the human species as personality, sex,
nationality and race.
Kant's anthropology has been the subject of increasing attention, especi
ally in the anti-foundationalist readings of his work (see Heidegger, 1929).
Anti-foundationalist readings stress the historical and political features of
Kant's work over the strictly logical ones, which were the focus of earlier
73
ANTICIPATIONS OF PERCEPTION
interpretations. The homology between the 'Anthropological Didactic' and

the three critiques has led some scholars to explicate the latter by means
of the former. A notable example is provided by Heidegger, whose ac
count of the work of imagination in CPR is supported by reference to A.
For him, the lectures on anthropology, predating CPR by at least a decade,
'provide us with information conceming the already-laid ground for
metaphysics' (Heidegger, 1929, p. 88) which may be used to interpret
later, critical doctrines.
anticipations of perception [Antizipationen der Wahrnehmung] see also

ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, AXIOMS OF INTUITION, POSTULATES OF EMPIRICAL THOUGHT,
PRINCIPLES, REALITY
Anticipations of perception are the principles corresponding to the cat
egories of quality. Along with the axioms of intuition, corresponding to
the categories of quantity, they form the two sets of 'mathematical prin
ciples' which are complemented by the 'dynamic principles' of the analogies
of experience (corresponding to the categories of relation) and the pos
tulates of empirical thought (corresponding to the categories of modal
ity). Overall the principles determine how appearances will manifest
themselves to the sensible intuition of a finite being without the capacity
for direct categorical intuition. The anticipations of perception specifically
determine the quality of appearances for such a being, namely their
reality, negation and limitation in space and time.
Kant claims that the quality of appearances requires that they possess an
'intensive magnitude': 'In all appearances, the real that is an object of
sensation has intensive magnitude, that is, a degree' (CPR B 207). In the
A edition of CPR Kant specifies this principle as 'anticipating all percep
tions' and describes the 'real' as that which corresponds to sensation in
the object. Both editions agree that the real that corresponds to the object
of sensation possesses an intensive magnitude: it is impossible for us to
perceive appearances unless they possess this intensive magnitude.
Kant uses the term 'anticipation' to translate Epicurus's term prolepsis,
which designates a preconception that allows perception to take place.
Kant regards the understanding as 'ascribing a degree to all that is real in
appearances' (CPR A 175/B 217), distinguishing between the accidental
qualities of an empirical act of sensation - 'colour, taste, etc.' - and the
anticipation that every sensation will possess a degree of reality. This is the
only quality which may be assumed a priori, and is the basis for the sub
sequent assignment of any empirical qualities. Kant illustrates the point
with the examples of the empirical qualities of colour, heat and gravity
(A 169/B 211). lt is a condition for perceiving each of these qualities that
it should possess a degree of reality, however infinitesimally small this
74
ANTINOMY OF PURE REASON
may become. In the case ofcolour, when red approaches the point ofzero
reality it remains red; but when it attains to degree zero reality it ceases
to be the quality red, since this quality has no meaning unless it can be
anticipated to possess some degree of reality.
Sensation then possesses a degree of reality, and as such has magnitude.
But this is not the extensive magnitude of the axioms of intuition which
is bom of the 'successive synthesis' of the imagination in space and time,
but an instantaneous synthesis 'generated in the act of apprehension'
(CPRAl67/B 209). lt antidpates sensation and its intuitive, spatio-temporal
synthesis.
Without this anticipation, the possibility might be entertained of per
ceiving objects which were not real, perceptions which Kant considered to
be unavailable to a finite being. Indeed, for Kant, perceiving the absence
of reality by means of sensible intuition was a contradiction in terms. An
object of sensible intuition must possess a degree of reality, for without
such it cannot be an object of sensible intuition. In other words, and in
conformity with the 'general principle' of the four groups of principles, a
condition of experience is also a condition for an object of experience.
The anticipations can be interpreted as the most fundamental of the
principles. They chart the 'givenness' of the real prior even to the forms
ofintuition, for in the words ofP, under the anticipations 'sensation is not
an intuition that contains either space or time, though it posits [setzt] the
object corresponding to sensation in both space and time' (P §24). Kant
himself found the idea of a pre-intuitive positing perplexing: it 'must
always appear somewhat strange to anyone trained in transcendental reflec
tion' (CPRA 175/B 217). However, the analysis ofthis positing was pursued
systematically by Fichte, who proceeded to establish the science of knowl
edge on a primal act of positing. lt was also considered by the pheno
menological school, who through the eidetic reduction sought to describe
the givenness ofphenomena (see Husserl, 1913, and the phenomenological
exegesis of the anticipations in Heidegger, 1935, pp. 206-24).
antinomy of pure reason see also CAUSALITY, COSMOLOGY, DIALECTIC, FREEDOM,

IDEAL, INFERENCE, NATURE, PARALOGISMS, UNCONDITIONED
Antinomy is a rhetorical form ofpresentation cited by Quintilian (35-100)
in his Institutio oratoria of 92-5 (Book VIII, chapter 7) in which opposed
arguments are presented side-by-side with each other. The form was widely
used in seventeenth-century jurisprudence (as in Eckolt's De Antinomiis of
1660) to point to differences between laws arising from clashes between
legal jurisdictions. Kant uses the form in the 'dialectic' of each of the
three critiques as a key part of his analysis of 'dialectical assertions'. The
form is well suited to this purpose since it can show reason making
75
opposed and yet equally justifiable inferences. Kant claims that such infer
ences point to an illegitimate extension of finite human reason beyond its
proper jurisdiction.
Kant considered the antinomy as a 'decisive experiment, which must
necessarily expose any error lying hidden in the assumptions of reason'
(P §52b). He regarded the discovery of the theoretical antinomy of the
cosmological ideas to be, along with Hume's scepticism, one of the shocks
that awoke him from the dogmatic slumbers of speculative philosophy
(P §50). In the CPR the form of antinomy is used in the second of the
three major divisions of the 'Transcendental Dialectic'. Here Kant shows
how the three disciplines and objects of traditional metaphysics, exemplified
by Wolff (1719), rest on dialectical inferences. 'The Paralogisms of Pure
Reason' show this to be the case for the science of psychology and its
object the human soul; 'The Antinomy of Pure Reason' for cosmology and
its object the world; 'The Ideal of Pure Reason' for theology and God.
The 'Antinomy of Pure Reason' forms one of the largest single sections
of the CPR. In it Kant presents four sets of dialectical inferences about the
nature of the world which correspond to the four groups of categories.
The mathematical categories of quantity and quality and the dynamic
categories of relation and modality yield the mathematical and dynamic
antinomies. Each antinomy formally presents opposed arguments on the
nature of the world taken from the history of philosophy; Kant even goes
on to refer to them in juridical terms as opposed 'parties'. The presenta
tion of the antinomy consists of two supposedly opposed and yet equally
convincing arguments placed side-by-side on opposite pages (not on the
same page as in the Kemp Smith translation of 1929) as proofs of thesis
and antithesis.
The first, or quantitative antinomy, is concerned with the limits of the
world. lt opposes to the thesis that the 'world has a beginning in time, and
is also limited as regards space' (CPR A 426/B 454) the antithetical claim
that the world 'has no beginning, and no limits in space; it is infinite as
regards both time and space' (A 427/B 455). The second, or qualitative,
antinomy presents opposed claims respecting the constitution or quality
of the world. The thesis argues that 'nothing anywhere exists save the
simple or what is composed of the simple' (A 434/B 462) while the anti
thesis claims 'there nowhere exists in the world anything simple' (A 435/
B 463). The third or relational antinomy considers the nature of the
causal relation in the world, with the thesis that causality is in accordance
with both the laws of nature and freedom opposed by the antithesis that
'There is no freedom; everything in the world takes place solely in ac
cordance with laws of nature' (A 445/B 473). Finally, the modal antinomy
opposes to the thesis that 'There belongs to the world, either as its part
76
or as its cause, a being that is absolutely necessary' (A 452/B 480) the

antithesis that 'An absolutely necessary being nowhere exists in the world,
nor does it exist outside the world as its cause' (A 453/B 481).
Kant does not present the opposed arguments in order to prove one
superior over the other, but rather to show that both are dialectical.
Proceeding from spatio-temporal experience they claim to offer insight
into 'absolute completeness' of the composition and division 'of the given
whole of all appearances' as well as absolute completeness in 'the origi
nation of an appearance' as well as 'Dependence of Existence of the alterable
in appearance' (CPR A 415/B 443). lt is the search for 'absolute com
pleteness' on the basis of spatially and temporally limited experience that
leads reason into the antinomies. Kant considers it 'unavoidable' and
'natural' for reason to do so, but by presenting the antinomy hopes both
to shake reason from 'the slumber of fictitious conviction' while not casting
it into 'sceptical despair' - the 'euthanasia of pure reason' - or leading it
to the 'death of sound philosophy' in the dogmatic attachment to a single
position (A 407/B 434). Tue 'solutions' to the antinomies, developed at
great length and subtlety, consist in showing how they arise from reason's
failure to comprehend its own limits; that is, its mistaking appearances for
things in themselves. Tue solutions are thus carried out on the basis of the
results of the analytic, which limited legitimate knowledge to the bounds
of human experience.
Kant also uses the antinomic form in the 'Dialectics' of the second and
third critiques to present opposed positions drawn from the history of ethics
and aesthetics. The practical antinomy consists in the opposed claims that
'the desire for happiness must be the motive to maxims of virtue' and 'the
maxim of virtue must be the efficient cause of happiness' (CPrR p. 115,
p. 119). Both claims are then shown to be insupportable. For the solution
to this antinomy, Kant refers back to the third theoretical antinomy of
freedom and natural causation, and distinguishes between freedom in the
noumenal and natural causality in the sensible world.
In the third critique the antinomy of aesthetic judgement opposes the
claim that the �udgement of taste is not based on concepts' to its antithesis
that 'the judgement of taste is based on concepts'. The antinomy follows
from the opposition between the British theory of taste and German
perfectionist aesthetics which informs the entire critique of aesthetic judge
ment. Kant's solution broadly suggests that both claims assume a narrow
definition of the 'concept', and that they may be compatible if the 'con
cept' in question is defined as an indeterminate one. The solution is then
taken controversially to point to a 'supersensible ground' informing both
subject and object, a suggestion which was to prove significant for the
development of German idealism.
77
APODEICTIC JUDGEMENTS OR PROPOSITIONS
In the second part of CJ on teleological judgement, Kant describes an

antinomy of reflective judgement. Here the antinomy consists in the op
posed maxims of reflection: the thesis reads 'All production of material
things and their forms must be estimated as possible on mere mechanical
laws'; the antithesis is that 'Some products of material nature cannot be
estimated as possible on mere mechanical laws' (§70). Kant converts these
maxims ofreflective judgement into constitutive principles ofdeterminant
judgement in order to show that it is only in the latter case that they form
a true antinomy. For reflective judgement, the solution to the 'antinomy'
is that the opposed maxims 'do not contain any contradiction at all'; they
are complementary maxims for the exercise of reflective judgement.
The antinomies after Kant were reincarnated in the bizarre form of the
schematic 'Marxist' dialectic of thesis-antithesis-synthesis. This schema
arose from a misunderstanding of Hegel's claim in the Encydopaedia Logic
that 'the antinomies are not confined to the four special objects taken
from Cosmology: they appear in all objects of every kind, in all concep
tions, notions and Ideas' (Hegel, 1830, §48). Hegel wished to extend the
anti-dogmatic import ofKant's statement ofthe antinomies from cosmology
to all areas of thought; however, it ironically became a new schematic
dogmatism. The anti-dogmatic character of antinomy was revived in
Lukäcs's analysis of German idealism in History and Class Consciousness
(1922). In the section entitled 'The Antinomies ofBourgeois Thought' he
points to the 'reified structure of consciousness' which concentrates on
the products of human activity to the exclusion of that activity itself.
Following Lukäcs, the antinomic form of argument was further developed
by 'Western Marxist' philosophers, notably T.W. Adorno.
apodeictic judgements or propositions see also ACTUALITY, CATEGORIES, CER

TAINTY, CONSCIOUSNESS, HOLDING-TO-BE-TRUE, JUDGEMENT, KNOWLEDGE, NECESSITY
Apodeictic judgements and propositions are those 'which are bound up
with the consciousness oftheir necessity' (CPR B 41). They are contrasted
with problematic and assertoric judgements, all three ofwhich correspond
to the modal categories of possibility (problematic), actuality (assertoric)
and necessity (apodeictic). Each is characterized by a distinctive mode of
subjective assent to, or 'consciousness of', the truth claim or 'holding
to-be-true' (Fürwahrhalten) of a judgement. This consciousness is either
necessary, assertoric or problematic: the first assents to the certainty of a
judgement, the second to its uncertain but subjectively sufficient status,
the third to its uncertain and objectively insufficient status. Certainty is the
holding-to-be-true characteristic of universal and objective knowledge; it
yields apodeictically certain knowledge. Subjectively sufficient uncertainty
78
APPEARANCE
is believed to be true, and yields assertoric belief, while insufficient uncer

tainty is problematically held to be true, and yields only opinion.
appearance [Erscheinung] see also ACTUALITY, EXPERIENCE, FORM, IDEAL, ILLUSION,

MATTER, NOUMENON, PHENOMENON, SENSIBILITY, TRUTH
In CPR and P Kant refines the traditional philosophical account of ap
pearance by distinguishing between appearance, phenomenon and illu
sion. He insists on these distinctions in order to redeem appearance from
the obloquy it suffered at the hands of the philosophical tradition: it is
not simply illusion - the deceptive semblance of sensible perception - but
rather experience within the limits of human intuitions of space and time.
However, Kant did maintain a qualified version of the ancient distinction
between appearance and truth - between phenomena and noumena -
along with its correlates of becoming and being, the sensible and the
ideal, matter and form. For this compromise Kant was subsequently
criticized, most vehemently by Nietzsche, for being inconsistent and re
treating from his insights into the ineluctability of appearances.
In ID Kant is still working within a traditional opposition of appearance
and reality. Appearance is an object of sensible knowledge and is opposed
to the intellectual or rational knowledge of the intellect. The objects of
each branch of knowledge, Kant comments neutrally, were called 'in the
schools of the ancients' (ID §3) phenomenon and noumenon. Further
more, appearance (here indistinguishable from phenomena) is unequivo
cally opposed to truth, and identified with the matter of sensation as
opposed to the form of the intelligence: 'things which are thought sen
sitively are representations of things as they appear, while things which are
intellectual are representations of things as they are' (ID §4). In spite of
such unequivocal statements, even in this text Kant is already undermin
ing this opposition, and by the CPR he has gone a considerable distance
towards rejecting it.
In CPR appearance is itself divided into matter and form: its matter is
what in it 'corresponds to sensation', while its form is that 'which so
determines the manifold of appearance that it allows of being ordered in
certain relations' (CPR A 20/B 34). The form which orders sensation,
Kant claims, cannot itself be sensation, from which he infers that it is an
a priori form of intuition. He discovers two such a priori forms of appear
ance in space and time. He will show that we cannot have legitimate
knowledge outside these forms of intuition, and consequently that we can
only properly know appearances in space and time. Appearances then are
not potentially deceptive sensible impressions, but possess their own order
and organization. However, this order by itself may be further articulated
by a priori concepts of the understanding or 'categories'. Appearances
79
APPEARANCE
which are thus 'synthesized' become phenomena: 'Appearances, so far as

they are thought as objects according to the unity of the categories, are
called phaenomena' (CP�A 249). Thus phenomena are appearances which
have been organized within the unifying framework of the categories.
The transition from appearances to phenomena is the occasion for
some of the most involved and intricate argument in CPR. The complexity
is largely due to Kant's reluctance to fall back into the traditional opposition
of truth and appearance which still characterized his position in ID. While
we can only have knowledge of appearances, our knowledge is not ex
clusively drawn from appearances. The understanding organizes appear
ances in space and time according to a priori concepts whose origin does
not lie in the realm of appearances but which have no meaning if they are
applied outside it: 'since that which is not appearance cannot be an object
of experience, the understanding can never transcend those limits of
sensibility within which alone objects can be given to us. Its principles are
merely rules for the exposition of appearances . . .' (CPR A 246/B 303).
Appearances then are not arbitrary sense impressions indistinguishable
from illusion (Schein). Quite the contrary, for illusion consists in taking
appearances as if they were objects in themselves: 'in the relation of the
given object to the subject, such properties depend upon the mode of
intuition of the subject, this object as appearance is to be distinguished
from itself as object in itself' (CPR B 69). For appearance, Kant specifies
in a footnote, is 'That which, while inseparable from the representation of
the object, is not to be met with in the object in itself, but always in
relation to the subject' (B 70). A judgement made without limiting itself
to this relation to the subject gives rise to illusion.
Kant's distinction between appearance and illusion in terms of the
relation to the subject carries with it the further implication of a relation
to the 'object in itself'. This implication has led to much controversy,
since by admitting it Kant seems to restore a distinction between appear
ance and truth. Many critics, from Nietzsche to Strawson, can follow Kant
to the bounds of sense, but quail at his tendency to point beyond them
to an object or thing in itself. How indeed can he accept a relation to the
object in itself since he consistently insists that such objects cannot be
known: 'What objects may be in themselves, and apart from all this re
ceptivity of our sensibility, remains completely unknown to us' (CPR A 42/
B 59). If it is unknown, indeed unknowable, why does Kant insist upon
deriving appearances not only from their relation to a subject, but also to
an object?
Kant emphasizes one or the other of the particular relations to subject
or object according to the position he is criticizing. When distinguishing
his account of appearance and sensible intuition from Leibniz and Wolff
80
APPERCEPTION
he strenuously underplays the relation of appearance to the object in

itself: 'lt is not that by our sensibility we cannot know the nature of things
in themselves in any save a confused fashion; we do not apprehend them
in any fashion whatsoever' (CPR A 44/B 62). Conversely, when he is argu
ing against empiricism or scepticism, he stresses the case for appearances
being grounded in a 'transcendental object' even if this is unknowable:
'Neither the transcendental object which underlies outer appearances nor
that which underlies inner intuition, is in itself either matter or a thinking
being, but a ground (to us unknown) of the appearances which supply to
us the empirical concept of the former as well as of the latter mode of
existence' (CPR A 380).
Kant seems to adopt an undogmatic and experimental approach to the
issue of appearances. While insisting that they are neither simply illusory
nor true, he nevertheless refuses to commit himself to an exclusively
subjective or objective account of them. He uses his understanding of
appearance to criticize the one-sided and opposed positions on the issue
bequeathed to him by the philosophical tradition. Unfortunately many of
his successors returned to an insistence on the exclusive character of one
position over the other, even reading these back into Kant as his 'true'
position. Thus Fichte insisted on the exclusive relation of appearances to
the subject, while Schelling insisted on their relation to the object: both
claimed justification for their positions from Kant. Following them, Hegel
(1807, 1812) chose to thematize the opposition and make the subjective
and objective relations moments of a dialectic.
apperception see also COMBINATION, CONSCIOUSNESS, DEDUCTION, IDENTITY, 'r

THINK', KNOWLEDGE, PARALOGISM, PSYCHOLOGY, SPONTANEITY, SUBJECT, SYNTHESIS,
TRANSCENDENTAL
Apperception is a term coined by Leibniz in the New Essays (1765) from the
French s 'apercevoir de - to be aware of - which had been used by Locke' s
translator Pierre Coste to translate 'perceive' (Leibniz, 1976, p. 553). He
used it in the Monadology (written 1714, published 1720) to criticize the
Cartesian cogi,to for taking no account of unconscious perceptions, or 'per
ceptions that are not apperceived' (1720, §14). He defines perception as
'The transitory state which enfolds and represents a multiplicity in a unity'
(§14) or, from the 1714 text of The Prindpl.esßf Nature and Grace, as 'the
inner state of the monad representing external things' (1976, p. 637).
Apperception 'is consciousness or reflective knowledge of this inner state
itself and which is not given to all souls or to any souls all of the time'
(p. 637). The concept played a central role in Kant' s theoretical philosophy,
and is one of the reasons why he was able to describe the CPR as 'the
genuine apology for Leibniz' against 'his partisans' (OD p. 250, p. 160).
81
APPERCEPTION
Kant adopted Leibniz's distinction between perception and appercep

tion, roughly mapping it onto that between intuition and the understand
ing. But he considerably extended the function of apperception, in many
respects adapting it to the Cartesian cogi,to to which it was originally a
critical response. Leibnizian apperception proper features in CPR as 'em
pirical apperception' or the 'inner sense' which is 'Consciousness of self
according to the determinations of our state in inner perception' (CPR A
107). Empirical apperception, as with the Leibnizian version, is episodic
and 'in itself diverse and without relation to the identity of the subject'
(CPR B 133). As such it forms a minor part of psychology, while its partner
'transcendental apperception' is one of the cornerstones of the critical
philosophy, of particular significance for the deduction of the a priori
universality and necessity of the categories.
As early as 1762 Kant referred to the 'mysterious power' which 'makes
judging possible' as 'nothing other than the faculty of inner sense, that is
to say, the faculty of making one's own representations the objects of
one's thought' (FS p. 60, p. 104). In CPR the 'mysterious power' is re
vealed as 'transcendental apperception'. The combination of concept and
intuition in knowledge requires a unity which is not conceptual, 'which
precedes a priori all concepts of combination' (CPR B 130). The unity
which enables judgements to be marle has to be sought 'yet higher' 'in
that which itself contains the ground of the unity of diverse concepts in
judgement, and therefore of the possibility of the understanding, even as
regards its logical employment' (B 131). lt is found in transcendental
apperception or 'the highest principle in the whole sphere of human
knowledge' (B 135).
Kant approached transcendental apperception from two directions: (i)
by distinguishing it from intuition; (ii) by showing that it is disposed
according to the categories of the understanding. Intuition is the 'repre
sentation which can be given prior to all thought' but is meaningless
without 'a necessary relation to the "I think" in the same subject in which
[its] manifold is found' (CPR B 132). For this intuition to be my intuition,
it must be related to an apperceptive 'I think'. The 'I think' itself however
'is an act of spontaneity' which does not originate in or belong to sensi
bility. lt is the product of a 'pure' or 'originary' apperception, namely
'that self-consciousness which, while generating the representation '/
think' ... cannot itself be accompanied by any further representation'
(B 132). The 'I think' of transcendental apperception allows intuitions to
be considered as proper objects of knowledge; it is also the condition for
their synthesis by the understanding.
The 'I think' of transcendental apperceptioil permits intuitions to
belong to a subject and to be bought before it for combination through
82
ARCHETYPE
judgement. Thus it makes, in the words of FS, 'one's own representations

into objects of one's thoughts' (FS p. 60, p. 104), but can only do so
according to the categories or functions of judgement. These themselves
originate in transcendental apperception, indeed the understanding 'can
produce a priori unity of apperception solely by means of the categories,
and only by such and so many' (CPR B 145). Transcendental appercep
tion permits intuitions to belong to a subject, and is distributed according
to the categories; it is also the ground for the unity of concepts and
intuitions in judgement.
The account of apperception proved crucial for the development of
German idealism. The emphasis on self-consciousness was transformed
into Fichte's subjective idealism in which subjective self-consciousness was
the basis for the derivation of the intuitions, concepts and ideas in the
Science of Knowl,edge (1794). However, in Kant, apperception served only as
the ground for combination in judgement: it allowed intuitions to belong
to the subject and was the source of the a priori concepts of the under
standing while also providing the ground for their combination in judge
ment. lt could not itself be further determined, although Kant was
extremely careful to distinguish it from any form of intellectual intuition.
apprehension see S\NTHESIS
archetype (archetypon, Urbila) see also FAITH, IDEA, IDEAL, IMITATION

The archetype for Kant is to the ectype as original is to copy, or as the
possible holistic understanding of an intell,ectus archetypus to a 'discursive
understanding that has need ofimages ( intell,ectus ectypus)' (CJ § 77). U nder
lying these distinctions is a critical engagement with Platonism. In CPR
Kant criticized Plato's 'mystical deduction' ofthe 'ideas' which hypostatized
them by making them into the 'archetypes of the things themselves' (CPR
A 313/B 370). Kant claims that Plato's 'flight from the ectypal mode of
reflecting upon the physical world-order to the architectonic ordering of
it according to ends, that is, according to ideas' (CPRA 318/B 375) makes
'regulative principles' for the systematic completion of knowledge into
constitutive principles of the origin of things. Kant's critique of Plato's
practical philosophy follows similar lines, by arguing for an idea of the
good which would serve as a regulative principle for 'any judgement as to
moral worth' but which would not itself be an archetype. Yet this principle
can serve as an archetype when it serves as an ideal for imitation. In CPR
Kant describes the wise man of the stoics as just such an archetype which
serves 'for the complete determination of the copy; and we have no other
standard for our actions than the conduct of this divine man within us,
with which we compare and judge ourselves, and so reform ourselves,
83
ARCHITECTONIC
although we can never attain to the perfection thereby prescribed' (CPR

A 569/B 597). In RL the stoic archetype has been replaced by Christ as
the 'archetype of humanity well-pleasing to God' (p. 119, p. 109) which it
is our duty to imitate. This understanding of the archetype as an ideal for
imitation also appears in Kant's aesthetics in CJ. There he uses the oppo
sition of arche- and ectype as a means of distinguishing between sculpture
and painting: the 'fundamental basis' of both is the aesthetic idea as
'archetype' and its mode of expression or ectype, whether in the 'bodily
extension' of sculpture or in its 'appearance when projected on a flat
surface' characteristic of painting (CJ § 51).
architectonic see al,so IDEA, PHILOSOPHY, SYSTEM, TECHNIC

Architectonic refers to both the art of constructing a system of science on
the basis of an 'idea of the whole' of the science, and to that idea itself,
its 'general delineation or outline' (L p. 590). Kant thus combines
Baumgarten's definition of architectonic in §4 of his Metaphysica (1739),
where it designates the structure of metaphysical knowledge, with Lam
bert's more methodological approach in his Architectonik (written 1764,
published 1771) which sees it as the art of establishing such a structure.
Kant specifically explores the subject of architectonic in the third chap
ter of the CPR's 'Transcendental Doctrine of Method' entitled 'The
Architectonic of Pure Reason'. There he sees it as 'the doctrine of the
scientific in our knowledge' or the art of making 'a system out of a mere
aggregate of knowledge' (CPR A 832/B 860). The system is characterized
by an 'organised unity' which is the end to which the parts of the science
relate, and in which they relate to each other. The architectonic end is
distinguished from a 'technical' one by not being derived from empirical
criteria arising from scientific discoveries; rather, it anticipates them.
Earlier in CPR Kant defined human reason as 'architectonic' by nature,
and saw all knowledge as belonging to a possible system. The possible
system or 'architectonic' of human reason is unveiled in 'The Architectonic
of Pure Reason' as philosophy. Not philosophy as it exists, but philosophy
as a 'general delineation or outline' of the system of human reason. The
ideal philosopher practising this architectonic would not simply reflect on
the products of human reason - which would be 'technical' and thus the
work of an artificer - but would act as 'the lawgiver of human reason' (CPR
A 839/B 867). Kant goes on to outline the architectonic of human reason:
it would have two objects, nature and freedom, underwriting the division
between the philosophy of nature which 'deals with all that is, [and] the
philosophy of morals with that which ought tobe' (CPR A 840/B 868).
With this concern for the philosophical system Kant inherited the
Wolffian project of encyclopaedic philosophy or philosophia generalis. This
84
ART
project was the form in which German philosophy defended its claims
against the discrete sciences (and faculties) of law, theology and medicine
as well as the emergent natural sciences. The view of philosophy as an
architectonic system flourished after Kant in the systems of Fichte (1794),
Schelling (1800) and Hegel (1830), but was abandoned by the middle of
the nineteenth century.
art [techne, ars, Kunst] see al,so ACTION, AESTHETIC, BEAUTY, TECHNIC
Kant follows Aristotle's definition of art as a skill or disposition for produc
ing things. In this definition a 'work of art' is anything produced by the
practice of an art. In the Nicomachean Ethics (Aristotle, 1941, 1140a) and
Posteri<Yr Analytics (100a, 3-9) Aristotle gathered Plato's various uses of the
term into a rigorous and consequential distinction between the art (techne)
of producing things (poiesis), the episteme of theoretical knowledge
(the<Yria), and the deliberation (phronesis) of action (praxis). Art consists in
rules generalized from experience and applied to the realization of an
intention.
This distinction had an extraordinarily long-lived and widespread influ
ence. Aquinas defines art as 'nothing eise but the right reason about
certain works to be marle' (Aquinas, 1952, II, 57, 3) but distinguished
between the servile arts 'ordered to works done by the body' and those of
the soul or 'liberal arts'. The latter formed the basis of the early medieval
curriculum of the seven liberal arts divided into the trivium (grammar,
dialectic, rhetoric) and quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, astronomy,
music). By the eighteenth century, although the sense of art as a skill
remained, it was frequently illustrated by reference to the art of producing
poetry or painting. Meissner's Wolffian Philosophisches Lexicon (1737) de
fines Kunst as the 'ability' or 'skill' of a human being 'to bring into exist
ence a thing outside of itself ', as for example when 'the skill of a poet
brings a poem into existence'.
Kant's main discussion of art is to be found in sections 43-53 of CJ. He
defines it as 'human skill, distinguished from science (as amlity from knowl
edge), as a practical from a theoretical faculty, as technic from theory (as
the art of surveying from geometry)' (CJ §43). He reserves particular
attention for the fine arts, distinguishing these activities from handicrafts,
which produce without an intention, and the mechanical arts, which per
fectly realize their intention. The practice of fine arts produces works
which paradoxically 'must be clothed with the aspect of nature, although
we recognise it to be art' (CJ §45). The consideration of this kind of
productive art led Kant into his theory of genius, regarded as the ability
or disposition to produce correct works of art which yet show no sign 'of
the artist having always had a rule present to them'.
85
AS-IF
Kant classifies the fine arts by an analogy with the three ways in which
human beings communicate with each other: through speech, gesture and
tone. The arts of speech are rhetoric and poetry, those of gesture ( or the
'formative arts') include the plastic arts of architecture and sculpture and
the art of painting, while the tonal arts include those of music and colour.
He also admits of mixed arts. The key to understanding these divisions is
to remember that they refer to skills or practices and not primarily to
objects. The same may be said of his reference in CPR to schematism as
'an art concealed in the depths of the human soul' (A 141, B 181) - it is
a skill or an activity which produces schemas, and not itself an object.
Kant's philosophy of art is often confused with his account of aesthetics,
or his anatomy of aesthetic judgement. This allowed many of his successors,
including Schiller and Hegel, to criticize him for producing an aesthetic
which excluded the production of works of art. In fact his account com
bines aspects of the traditional Aristotelian account of art as a skill with
the new emphasis on the fine arts. This combination has been of con
siderable importance in recent debates in aesthetics, which have sought to
restore the element of skill into accounts of the production and reception
of art.
as-if [als ob] see also ACTION, ANALOGY, IDEA, REGUIATIVE PRINCIPLE
A form of analogical argument, as-if is often used by Kant in his theoreti
cal, practical and aesthetic philosophies. lt appears in theoretical philosophy
as a maxim of regulative judgement, and is ubiquitous in the conclusion
to CPR's 'Transcendental Dialectic'. Having proved that God, the world
and the soul are not appropriate objects for a limited human judgement,
Kant proceeds to re-admit them as regulative principles. Thus in theology,
although we can never know whether God is the cause of the world, we
can nevertheless view 'all objects as ifthey drew their origin from such an
archetype' (CPR A 673/B 701). Similarly in cosmology, we can never
know whether the world has a beginning or an end, although we are able
to conduct an inquiry 'as if it had an absolute beginning, through an
intelligible cause' (CPRA 685/B 713). Finally, in psychology, although we
can never know the nature of the soul, we can 'connect all the appearances,
all the actions and receptivity of our mind, as if the mind were a simple
substance which persists with personal identity' (CPR A 672/B 700).
Apart from serving as the form of the regulative principles of theoretical
judgement, the as-if is also crucial to the maxims of practical judgement.
The most significant, but often ignored, use of the as-if form is in conjunc
tion with the 'kingdom of ends' and the formulae of the categorical
imperative. In GMM Kant states that 'every rational being must so act as
if he were through his maxim always a legislating member in the universal
86
AITRACTION
kingdom of ends' or, stated more formally, 'So act as if your maxims were
to serve at the same time as a universal law' (GMM p. 438, p. 43). The as
if also discreetly features at crucial junctures of the CJ: the finality of form
of a work of art, for example, 'must appear just as free from the constraint
of arbitrary rules as if it were a product of mere nature' (CJ §45). Thus
analogical reasoning in the ubiquitous, but often overlooked form of the
as-if is central to all areas of Kant's philosophy. Its ubiquity, but not its
relation to Kant's use of analogical reasoning in general, was recognized
by Vaihinger in his Philosophy of As .lf (1911), which led to the formation
of a fan club called 'The Society of Friends of the Philosophy of As If '!
assertoric see APODEICTIC, JUDGEMENT, NECESSJ'IY
association see also AFFINI'IY, IMAGINATION' PSYCHOLOGY, SYNTHESIS

The psychological phenomenon of joining together different objects of
consciousness, association was mentioned by Plato and Aristotle in con
nection with mnemonics, but came to play an important part in empiricist
epistemology. Locke distinguished between natural (simultaneous) and
acquired (successive) associations of ideas, the latter being due to chance
or custom. Hume too devoted considerable attention to association, con
centrating on the relations according to which ideas were associated with
each other.
Association did not play a major part in Kant's epistemology, largely
because of his interest in justifying synthetic a priori judgements. Association
is a psychological or empirical phenomenon which does not have a promi
nent place in the transcendental justification of these judgements. In
deed, in CPR Kant criticized Locke and Hume for their pre-occupation
with association, especially the place given by the latter to custom 'which
arises from repeated association in experience' (CPR A 94/B 127). Kant
is happy to grant association a place in synthesis as 'the subjective and
empirical ground of reproduction according to rule' in empirical repro
ductive imagination. Yet even this empirical rule of association is for him
not self-sufficient, and always subject to the transcendental question of
'How is this association itself possible?' (CPRA 113). The answer is that it
too has a ground in the 'transcendental affinity, of which the empirical is
a mere consequence' (CPRA 114). Thus association is a relatively periph
eral issue for Kant, although it has been the subject of considerable inter
pretation from critics working within the empiricist tradition.
atom see CONTINUI'IY, DMSIBILI'IY, MATTER, MONAD
attraction see FORCE, IMPENETRABILI'IY, REPULSION
87
AUTONOMY
autonomy [Autonomie] see also CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, COMMAND, FREEDOM,

SPONTANEITY, WILL
The early modern ideology of political autonomy developed by Machiavelli
in the Discourses (1531) combined two senses of autonomy: the first was
freedom from dependence, the second the power to self-legislate. The
political aspects of autonomy thus developed in the context of the early
modern city-state were given their complement in the spiritual life by
Luther in his Freedom ofA Christian (1520). For him, autonomy as freedom
from dependence was translated into the 'spiritual, new, and inner, man's'
freedom from the body and its inclinations as well as freedom to obey
God's law' (Luther, 1961, p. 53). Kant's account of autonomy in his prac
tical philosophy in its turn marks a philosophical transposition and cri
tique of Luther's religious autonomy into moral autonomy.
Kant's practical philosophy combines the two aspects of autonomy within
an account of the determination of the will. His position emerged from
the critique of a number of then prevailing perspectives. These included
his pre-critical opposition to the accounts of moral action proposed by the
dominant rational, perfectionist account of the Wolffian school and the
contemporary British theory of the moral sense, his critique of pietist
theological appeals to the will of God, and finally Montaigne's view of the
importance of custom in human action. He later identified all of these
accounts as based on 'heteronomous principles' and sought to develop a
moral philosophy based on an 'autonomous principle' of self-legislation.
The opposition between heteronomous and autonomous principles
persists throughout Kant's moral philosophy. In GMM an autonomous will
gives itself its law, and is distinguished from a heteronomous will whose
law is given by the object 'because of its relation to the will' (GMM p. 441,
p. 45). In the latter case the maxims of the will depend on heteronomous
principles, which Kant identifies in terms of the contemporary accounts
of moral action cited above. The former are 'drawn from the principle of
happiness, and are based upon either physical or moral feeling' while the
latter are 'drawn from the principle of perfection, [and] are based upon
either the rational concept of perfection as a possible effect of our will or
eise upon the concept of an independent perfection (the will of God) as
a determining cause of our will' (GMM p. 442, p. 46). The heteronomous
principles yield only hypothetical imperatives - 'I ought to do something
because I will something eise' - rather than the categorical imperatives of
the autonomous principle which abstracts from every object of the will.
The autonomous principle of the categorical imperative commands
nothing other than its own autonomy. The principle of autonomy is stated
as 'Always choose in such a way that in the same volition the maxims of
the choice are at the same time present as a universal law' (GMM p. 440,
88
AXIOMS OF INTUITION
p. 44). Such a principle is only possible 'on the pre-supposition of free

dom of the will' (GMM p. 461, p. 60) which establishes the 'will's au
tonomy as the formal condition under which alone the will can be
determined' (p. 461, p. 60). This means that the will must will its own
autonomy and that its freedom lies in thus being a law to itself. This
freedom is 'intelligible', that is to say, 'independent of any determination
by alien causes' and formal/universal in that it does not stand in any
relation to an object.
Kant's purification of the will from the influence of any heteronomous
principle or object has been consistently criticized since Hegel, most notably
by Nietzsche (1887) and Scheler (1973). Such an autonomy has been seen
as at best empty, formalistic and irrelevant, or at worst tyrannical. lt is seen
to subjugate sensibility to reason and, in Hegel's eyes, to do violence to
both (Hegel, 1807). Kant's account of autonomy has however recently
been re-appraised and defended by O'Neill (1989) as providing an ad
equate methodological basis for both theoretical and practical reasoning.
axiom see ACROAMATA, AXIOMS OF INTUITION, PRINCIPLES
axioms of intuition see also ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, ANTICIPATIONS OF PERCEP

TION, CATEGORIES, JUDGEMENT, PRINCIPLES, QUANTITY, UNITY
These axioms are a group of principles which serve as rules for the objective
employment of the categories of quantity. Each group of categories has its
corresponding principles which serve to determine how things must ap
pear in time: those corresponding to the categories of quality are the
'anticipations of perception', those of relation the 'analogies of experi
ence' and those of modality the 'postulates of empirical thought'. Since
our experience of the world cannot be directly categorical, we are unable
to organize our quantitative experience in terms of the categories 'unity',
'plurality' and 'totality'; we thus require principles to make them conform
to the conditions of finite intuition.
The 'axioms' and the 'anticipations' form the 'mathematical principles'
in contrast to the 'dynamic principles' of the 'analogies' and the 'postu
lates'. The mathematical principles translate the categories into principles
adequate to the intuition of objects in space and time - those of extensive
and intensive magnitude. The leading principle of the axioms, which is all
Kant gives us in the CPR, is in the A edition (p. 162) 'All appearances are,
in their intuition, extensive magnitudes' and in B (p. 202) 'All intuitions
are extensive magnitudes'. This means that it is impossible for an appear
ance to become an object of intuition unless it possesses an extensive
magnitude: the latter is a condition both of experience and of all objects
of experience. Kant describes magnitude in terms of the process of moving
89
AXIOMS OF INTUITION
from unity or a 'representation of a part' through plurality over a period

of time, to the achievement of totality or a whole at the end of the period
of time. He gives the example of the construction of geometrical line,
which proceeds over time from a point, to a plurality of points, to a line
(CPR A 162/B 203).
In common with all Kant's principles, the axioms convert formal predi
cates of being into temporally and spatially defined principles of appear
ances. Thus the 'mathematics of space (geometry)' is founded on the
'successive synthesis of the productive imagination' (CPR A 162/B 203)
which proceeds from unity at an instant of time, to plurality in the course
of time, to totality at the end of a period of time. Even the maintenance
of unity through time requires a successive synthesis, without which the
unity would suffer an inadmissible change of quality - it would instanta
neously pass out of existence and become something else. The objects of
geometry are the product of this construction over time, as are the numbers
and the arithmetical operation of addition. Operations involving the
persistence or change of magnitude are accomplished by a synthesis of the
imagination over time.
Kant concludes with the claim that 'The synthesis of spaces and times'
- the generation of extensive magnitude through the move from unity to
plurality and totality - 'is what mak.es possible the apprehension of appear
ance, and consequently every outer experience and all knowledge of the
objects of experience' (CPRA 165/B 206). This mak.es the axioms conform
with the 'general principle' of all four groups of principles, namely that
the conditions for experience are the conditions for objects of experience.
90
B
beauty see also AESTHETIC, ART, GOOD, TRANSCENDENTAL, TRUTH, UNITY

In Hippias Major Socrates summed up his dialogue on beauty with the
Greek proverb all beauty is difficult . The main philosophical difficulty
involved reconciling beauty as an objective idea with the subjective pleasure
taken in beautiful things. In Plato s Symposium the reconciliation is ac¬
complished by means of eros, with the emphasis falling on the experience
of, and pleasure taken in, beauty. The Platonic alignment of beauty and
eros was countered by Aristotle’s more objectively inclined definition in
the Metaphysics which held that The chief forms of beauty are order and
symmetry, and definiteness’ (Aristotle, 1941, 1078b, 1) . The two differ¬
ences in emphasis already evident in Greek philosophies of beauty persisted
until and beyond Kant in the distinction between subjective and objective
accounts of beauty.
The objective account of beauty prevailed in medieval philosophy,
wherein beauty was classified as one of the transcendentals, or those at¬
tributes including the One, the Good and the True which accord with
every genus. Aquinas famously describes the three ‘conditions’ of beauty
as Integritas or perfection . . . due proportion or harmony [ consonatia] ; and
lastly, brightness or clarity [ claritas] . . .’ (Aquinas, 1952, I, 39, 8) . These
conditions allow beauty to be ‘convertible’ with the other transcendentals:
Integritas with the One, consonatia with the good and claritas with the true.
The transcendental view of beauty was subsequendy combined by Leibniz
with the experience of pleasure; an objective perfection perceived obscurely
was held to evoke subjective pleasure. An analogous view was also held by
Shaftesbury in his Characteristics (1711) . However, the successors of Leibniz
and Shaftesbury tended to exaggerate either one of the objective and
subjective aspects of beauty. For Wolff and his school, most notably his
disciple Baumgarten, beauty consisted in ‘perfection’ or the unity of a
manifold. For followers of Shaftesbury such as Hutcheson, beauty was
based on an inner, subjective ‘sense’ of beauty without any obvious objective
correlates beyond those provided by providence.
Kant was well acquainted with both accounts of beauty as early as the
91
BEAU1Y
1760s. On the whole his pre-critical reflections and the account of aes
thetic developed in L emphasize the objective side of beauty. In L (pp.
547-9) he sides with the Wolffians in identifying perfection as the ground
of beauty, and seeing the experience of pleasure in the beautiful as arising
from the subjective, sensible perception of such perfection. Perfection in
its turn comprises the 'harmonious union' of 'manifoldness and unity'
(L p. 547).
In the critical account of beauty elaborated in CJ, Kant abandons the
perfectionist position inherited from the Wolffians. His analysis of the
judgements of the beautiful in the 'Analytic of the Beautiful' shows that
they conform to neither the subjective nor the objective accounts of beauty.
Judgements of the beautiful are defined negatively in the CJ according to
the table of the categories as: (quality) that which 'pleases apart from any
interest' (§5); (quantity) that which 'pleases universally' without a concept
(§9); (relation) the 'form of finality in an object . . . perceived in it apart
from the representation of an end'; and (modality) the object of a 'neces
sary delight' 'apart from a concept' (§22). In each case Kant distinguishes
the beautiful from the prevailing accounts of beauty which rested on the
basis of perfection or a sense. He presents the nature of beauty either in
terms of the negations of sensibility and the concept, or in terms of para
doxical formulations such as finality without an end (Zweckmässigkei,t ohne
Zweck).
This approach led Kant into some fresh difficulties with beauty. By
distinguishing beauty from any content, whether rational or sensible, he
severely limited its scope. If sensible content were to play any part, then
the object would not be beautiful but only agreeable; if a concept were
involved, then the beautiful would be too easily convertible with the rational.
If they could exist, such beauties would be 'dependent' and contrasted
with the 'free' beauties which 'represent nothing' and cannot strictly speak
ing even be artifacts. Consequently, Kant appeared to many critics as unduly
privileging the beauty of nature over the beauty of art, even on those
occasions when he attempts to rescue the beauty of art by insisting that it
appear as if it were natural. He also, on one celebrated occasion (CJ §59),
claimed beauty to be a 'symbol of morality' precisely because of its para
doxical properties. Here the beautiful allows judgement to find 'a refer
ence in itself to something in the subject itself and outside it, and which
is not nature, nor yet freedom, but still is connected with the groun<l of
the latter, i.e., the supersensible . . .' (CJ §59).
The influence of Kant's account of beauty has been enormous, partly
because of its ability to mean everything to everyone. To the German
idealists it marked the attempt to bridge the realms of nature and freedom,
and features prominently in Schiller, Schelling and Hegel. In the late
92
BEING
nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the third critique's focus upon
the purity of the judgement of the beautiful endeared it to neo-Kantians,
and after the Second World War it was used by critic Clement Greenberg
among others as a theoretical justification for abstract art. As a result,
Kant's account of beauty continues to serve as a starting point for a great
deal of philosophical reflection on beauty, and perhaps less in spite of its
inconsistencies and shortcomings than because of them.
being [to on, ens, Sein] see also ACTUALITY, ESSENCE, EXISTENCE, NOTHING,
ONTOLOGY, SYNTHESIS
Kant's account of being is heir to a long and complex philosophical de
velopment of the theme, one whose significance remains the subject of
intense debate. For Aristotle in the Metaphysics, the question of being -
'what is being?' - 'was raised of old and is raised now and always, and is
always the subject of doubt' (Aristotle, 1941, 1028b, 2). Kant's most signifi
cant innovation was the translation of traditional themes and distinctions
into modern terminology, restating the traditional problem of the relation
between being and Logos in terms of judgement. lt was on the basis of both
received distinctions and the re-statement that Kant developed his con
sequential distinctions between being, actuality and existence.
The traditional starting point for the question of being in Western
philosophy are the fragments of Parmenides (sixth century Be). There
being is distinguished from non-being in terms of the distinction between
the way of truth and the way of opinion. There can be no transition from
non-being to being, no change or motion; being is all that can be known,
and is one (Bames, 1987, pp. 129-42). The problems posed by Parmenides
and their accentuation in Zeno's paradoxes were tackled by the following
generation of Greek philosophers, above all Plato and Aristotle. Plato
paradoxically both softened and intensified Parmenides' distinction be
tween being and non-being. The latter is no longer the absolute opposite
to being, but participates in being to varying degrees; being at once informs
the ideas as well as forming a higher idea in itself. Aristotle in the Metaphysics
however emphasizes the participation of discrete beings in Being in general,
establishing a repertoire of ways in which Being may be spoken of beings
(see Aristotle, 1941, 1012a). He makes a crucial distinction between energeia
and dynamis, which later evolved first into that of esse and essentia and then
into that of existence and actuality.
In their reception of the extremely diverse heritage of the Greek thought
of Being, the medieval Islamic and Christian commentators systematized
some of its more salient features. Tue basic problematic of describing the
various ways in which Being may be spoken of beings persisted, as did the
insight into the aporetic character of this relation (Booth, 1983). And as
93
BEING
in Plato and Aristotle, being continues to be understood as a 'transcen

dental' term which cannot be predicated categorically. For the Thomist
tradition being could only be predicated analogically - the being of God
and the being of the world are only analogically the same. For the Scotist
tradition, being may be predicated univocally, with the same sense of
being meant when it is predicated of the world or of God. The scholastics
agreed in distinguishing between being as existence, being as actuality
and being as such: being as existence, or esse designated the existence of
an essence, as in the 'being' of mankind; being as essentia designated the
individual here and now actuality of, say, this woman or man; while being
as such, that being whose essence is existence and actuality, can only be
said of God.
The terms and distinctions of the scholastic discussions of being contin
ued to inform the Cartesian inauguration of philosophical modemity (see
Gilson, 1949). Although for Descartes and Leibniz (but not Spinoza) the
focus for the question of the being of God, the world and the soul shifted
from God to the soul and its certainty of its own existence, the basic
structure of the problem persisted. For the modems, Being remains extra
categorical, and is not something that can simply be predicated in a judge
ment like any other predicate. For them, esse now designates possibility, or
that which is without contradiction, while essentia are those phenomena
which are perceived to exist, while being as such is now taken to refer to
the privileged being in itself, whether this is described in terms of God or
causa sui, the subject, or the being-in-itself of the new, post-Cartesian
science of ontology.
Kant's discussion of being follows precedent in claiming that being can
be spoken of in many ways, but for him what is common to them all is the
notion of synthesis. In OPA he defines the concept of being (Sein) in
terms of a 'positing or setting' (p. 73, p. 119) which underlies the rela
tions of logical judgement, describing it as 'the positing of this relation
[which] is nothing other than the copula in a judgement' (p. 73, p. 119).
Here being denotes a purely logical synthesis, one operating at the level
of esse, a synthesis that conforms to the law of contradiction. When how
ever both the relation and the related are posited, then being becomes
existence, and is spoken of as essentia; that is, in terms of both logical and
actual relations.
In CPR Kant largely repeats this earlier distinction, but goes on to use
it to refute the ontological proof for the existence of God. Being is not a
predicate, it adds nothing to the subject of a judgement, but designates
'merely what is possible, by my thinking its object' (CPR A 599/B 627).
The statement that 'there is a God' may be without contradiction. lt is a
way of speaking of being at the level of esse, but it says nothing about the
94
BODY
existence of its object. If we wish to speak of being in terms of existence,

then we must pay heed to the conditions of synthetic knowledge, for 'Our
consciousness of all existence ...belongs exclusively to the unity of expe
rience' (CPR A 601/B 629). This critical perspective enabled Kant nar
rowly to specify the ways in which being may be spoken by referring to
actuality, or the principle corresponding to the second modal category of
existence/non-existence.
With such comments it would seem as if Kant was severely qualifying the
traditional significance of being. This certainly seemed to be the case to
Hegel, who attempted to restore the question of being by giving it a new
exposition in the Sdence ofLogic (1812).lt also seemed the case to Nietzsche,
who saw himself as radicalizing Kant's insight into the illusory character of
being by describing it as a 'mere vapour'. For an extremely influential
current of interpretation, Kant marks the move in the history of philoso
phy from ontology to epistemology. However, in the twentieth century,
ontological readings of Kant by Heidegger (1929) and Heimsoeth (1956)
have taken seriously his claim to have replaced ontology with an 'analytic
of the understanding'. Heidegger in particular has pointed to the onto
logical significance of synthesis in Kant, and the crucial role played in it
by imagination (1929). Such readings have proven extremely influential
in recovering the structures of traditional ontology which continued to
inform the critical philosophy.
belief see FAITH
binding [Verbindung] see OBLIGATION, SYNTI-IESIS
body [soma, Körper] see also ACCIDENT, HETERONOMY, LIFE, MATTER, MOTION,
PLEASURE, SPIRIT
In CPR Kant considered the meaning of the concept of body to be so
immediately obvious that he used it to illustrate the distinction between
synthetic and analytical judgements: 'All bodies are extended' is analytical
judgement because the concept of body contains the predicate of exten
sion, along with 'impenetrability, figure etc'; 'All bodies are heavy' is a
synthetic judgement because the concept of weight is not intrinsic to the
concept of body (A 7-9/B 11-13). Unfortunately Kant could not have
chosen a less straightforward example, since even in his own work the
nature of body was far from obvious and was a matter of considerable
debate and even disquiet.
Kant's discussions of body may be divided, somewhat artificially, according
to whether they emphasize the physical or the phenomenological aspect
of the concept. The first concentrates on the natural scientific notion of
95
BODY
body as comprising material objects, while the second focuses on the

human body. Even the first view of body is far from straightforward in
Kant; it is by no means simply the rule for the unity of the manifold
serving our knowledge ofexternal appearances which is blandly presented
at one point in CPR (A 106). Kant's first published work, LF (1747), is a
sustained scrutiny of the nature of physical bodies. In it he disputes both
the Cartesian view that body is defined by extension, and the Aristotelian
view that it possesses an entelechy or principle of motion. He defends the
Leibnizian thesis that body contains an essential force 'prior to its exten
sion' (LF §1), and goes so far as to claim that the three dimensions of
spatial extension may be derived from the working of this force. He thus
distinguishes between the constitution of the mathematical body in terms
of extension and the constitution of natural bodies in terms of an inher
ently expansive force. These discussions are dedicated, among other things,
to showing that the concept of body must be distinguished from that of
substance.
Although Kant did not sustain all the details ofthis early position through
out his career, it is by no means the case that he simply accepted the
Cartesian view of body which seems to underlie the discussions in CPR.
The relationship between body and space continued to puzzle him: do
bodies occupy or constitute space, or do they merely denote a rule for the
synthesis of intuitions? These questions continue to inform the critical
definitions of body ventured in MF, where body features as 'matter be
tween determinate boundaries' (MF p. 525, p. 80). Yet Kant is aware that
even the mechanical definition of body which sees it only as a 'mass of
determinate shape' itself assumes the prior qualitative occupation of a
discrete space. These analyses of the quantitative and qualitative aspects of
body continued into OP and were left unresolved by him on his death;
they may without exaggeration be described as one of the most important
single, continuous pre-occupations of his authorship.
Alongside his discussion of the physical body of natural science, Kant
also developed an analysis ofthe human body. In the 'Paralogisms' ofCPR
he touches on the Cartesian mind-body problem, but his interest in the
significance of the experience of the human body for philosophy was far
more wide-reaching. In the pre-critical DRS (1768) he derived the spatial
ordering of above-below, left-right, front-back so crucial for his account
of intuition from the spatial experience of the human body (DRS pp.
378-9, pp. 366-7). Analogously, in FS he derived the phenomenon of
impenetrability from an object's resistance to the body's touch. Thus the
analysis of the experience of the human body is implied throughout the
more technical theoretical analyses of CPR.
The experience ofthe body is also central to Kant's practical and aesthetic
96
BOUNDARY
philosophies. The 'Doctrine of Virtue' in MM is largely concerned with

bodily management, an approach to the physical regimen that Kant also
developed in terms of medicine in his essay on 'Philosophers' Medicine of
the Body' (1 786). The issue of bodily pleasure and pain features pro
minently in A, as well as in the CJ, where it forms part of an increasingly
evident Epicurean agenda. Thus in the latter, Kant analyzes the different
experiences of bodily pleasure ranging from the agreeable to the aesthetic,
and relates them to the promotion of life to the hindrance and further
ance of the pleasures of the body. He also in CJ discusses the ideal body
and its artistic representation. Regarding differences between bodies, Kant
was predictably insensitive to the significance of sexual difference, and in
the A and some shorter works he contributes to a debate among his con
temporaries regarding racial distinctions between human bodies.
Kant's broad and wide-ranging analysis of the human body far exceeded
the limits of the Cartesian mind-body debate, so far indeed as to remain
neglected until the twentieth century. Many of his insights were recovered
by the phenomenological movement in the course of its deconstruction of
Cartesian dualism. In Being and Time (1927) Heidegger engages directly
with Kant's text DRS, and its influence is also evident in Merleau-Ponty's
(1962) phenomenology of the body. Foucault's influential work on the
body was not only inspired by Kant's work (he translated the A), but also
contributed to making the body a proper object of study and led to a
reconsideration of some of Kant's previously overlooked texts and argu
ments (see Foucault, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988).
boundary see LIMIT
97
c
canon see also ANALYTIC, DISCIPLINE, JUDGEMENT, LOGIC, METAPHYSICS, RULE

The historical basis of Kant s contrast between canon and organon is the
critique of the Aristotelian organon by Epicurus ( 341-271 BC) . In place of
Aristotle s Organon, which presented rules for achieving demonstrative
knowledge, Epicurus proposed a Canon of the rules for making correct
judgements. The title of his text on the subject was entitled The Canon, and
comprised various rules and criteria for discriminating between true and
false judgements ( Diogenes Laertius, 1925, Vol. II, pp. 559-61) . Epicurus
distinguished canonics from dialectics, seeing it as concerned with the
correctness of judgement rather than with the extension of knowledge.
Kant formalizes this historical distinction in CPR, although he alludes to
its origins in L, where he refers to logic as the universal art of reason
( canonica Epicuri )' ( L p. 529 ) . His own formal distinction between canon
and organon remains very close to its historical precedent. The transcen¬
dental analytic, for example, was conceived in the spirit of Epicurus’ s
canon as a means of distinguishing between true and false judgements,
for passing judgement on the empirical employment of the understand¬
ing’ ( CPR A 63/ B 88) . It does not, like the Aristotelian organon , profess
to give rules for the extension of the understanding; indeed , for Kant ‘it
is misapplied if appealed to as an organon of its general and unlimited
application’ (A 63/ B 88) .
In the section of CPR on ‘The Transcendental Doctrine of Method’ -
Chapter II ‘The Canon of Pure Reason ’ - Kant identifies the ‘sole use of
a philosophy of pure reason’ to be a canon which serves ‘not as an organon
for the extension but as a discipline for the limitation of pure reason ’
(A 795/ B 823) . He describes the analytic part of general logic as ‘a canon
for the understanding and reason in general’ and the transcendental
analytic as a ‘canon of the pure understanding ; for understanding alone is
capable of true synthetic modes of knowledge a priori' (A 796/ B 825) . He
goes on to consider the canon of pure reason , which can be applied only
in the context of reason’s practical employment. The canon of pure reason
deals with two questions relating to the practical interest, namely ‘Is there
98
CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE
a God? and, Is there a future life?' (A 803/B 831). These questions are
translated into the two criteria of the canon of pure reason: 'what ought
I to do?' and 'What may I hope?' (A 805/B 835) which yield the postulates
of the existence of God and a future life.
The notion of the canon received from Epicurus can be extended to
characterize the entire critical enterprise. Critical philosophy may be said
to offer the rules or criteria for distinguishing between true and false
judgements while not immediately proposing a systematic account of cor
rect judgements and the means ofextending them. In this sense Epicurus's
discipline of canonics may be said to have been revived by the critical
philosophy and continued in the critical disciplines inspired by it.
categorical imperative see also AS-IF, AUTONOMY, FREEDOM, HETERONOMY,

IMPERATIVE, LAW, MAX.IM, PRACTICAL PHILOSOPHY, WILL
The categorical imperative is without doubt one of the best known and
most disputed aspects of Kant's practical philosophy. lt has been variously
interpreted as the principle of an empty formalist moral philosophy, a
glorification of the Prussian virtue of disinterested obedience to the call
of duty, and the founding principle of an objectivist, rational account of
moral action. For Kant himselfthe categorical imperative seems to combine
two possibly inconsistent philosophical ambitions. The first, more modest
ambition, was to establish the categorical imperative as a canonical principle
for discriminating between maxims of action, while the second saw it as a
means of justifying a metaphysically grounded account of freedom as the
autonomy of the will. Subsequent debate has consisted in assessing the
coherence of Kant's account of the categorical imperative, and in particu
lar whether it is sustainable without the entailment of a metaphysics of
freedom.
Before looking at Kant's statements of the categorical imperative in
GMM and CPrR it may be helpful to define what is meant by the terms
'categorical' and 'imperative'. Kant defines an imperative as every 'propo
sition that expresses a possible free action, whereby a certain end is to be
made real' (L p. 587). Such statements are grounded in a 'kind ofnecessity'
which is distinct from that of theoretical statements; rather than stating
what is, they state what ought to be the case. And just as there are various
ways of stating the 'is' in a proposition, so are there various ways of stating
the 'ought'. These are the various forms of imperative, of which the cat
egorical is but a special and privileged case.
The form ofnecessity expressed by the 'ought' common to all imperatives
expresses for Kant 'the relation of an objective law of reason to a will that
is not necessarily determined by this law because of its subjective consti
tution' (GMM p. 413, p. 24). The imperative can be either hypothetical or
99
categorical, with the distinction depending on whether or not the relation

of law to will is directed toward the achievement of an end. In the case of
hypothetical imperatives, this relation is directed toward achieving an end,
while in the case of the categorical imperative it is not. Kant further sub
divides hypothetical imperatives according to whether they are assertoric
or problematic; that is, whether they are directed toward an actual or
a possible end. The principles of a hypothetical actual imperative are
described as 'rules of skill' or 'technical imperatives' while those of a
hypothetical possible imperative are 'counsels of prudence' or pragmatic
imperatives.
lt is clear from both GMM and CPrR that Kant regards the received
tradition of moral philosophy as having only explored the forms of hy
pothetical imperative (see for example the historical table of the grounds
of moral principles in CPrR p. 40, p. 41). They all offer statements of the
form 'act so as to realize the end X' (X = happiness, beatitude, pleasure,
welfare, perfection, the glory of God). The categorical imperative, by con
trast, declares an action to be necessary 'without reference to any purpose'
and is concemed only with 'the form of the action and the principle from
which it follows' (GMM p. 416, p. 26). In this case the necessity which
relates the objective law to the will 'holds as an apodeictic practical
principle' (p. 415, p. 25).
Kant offers several conditions to account for why this imperative of the
law holds categorically for a subjective will. The first is that it is formal.
This follows from its not being concemed to realize any particular end; the
categorical imperative 'is not concemed with the matter of the action and
its intended result, but rather with the form of the action and the prin
ciple from which it follows' (p. 416, p. 26). Another condition entails that
the categorical imperative must be known immediately, which leads to the
most important condition, which is that the categorical imperative states
the universality of the law. This informs the statement of what Kant describes
as the one and only categorical imperative, which is 'Act only according
to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become
a universal law' (p. 421, p. 30).
Kant employs this statement of the categorical imperative as 'the canon
for morally estimating any of our actions' (p. 424, p. 32). He uses it to
clarify actions accomplished within the terms of the imperative of duty.
Such imperatives are categorical when they obey the form 'Act as if the
maxim of your action were to become through your will a universal law of
nature' (p. 421, p. 30). Yet Kant was not content with the considerable
results which could be achieved by this canonical use of the categorical
imperative. The categorical imperative had itself to be justified: it was
necessary 'to prove a priori that there actually is an imperative of this
100
kind'. But not only this, the categorical imperative was also called upon to
show 'that there is a practical law which of itself commands absolutely and
without any incentives, and that following this law is duty' (p. 425, p. 33).
As a result he drove a wedge between the practical law and the 'special
characteristics of human nature' analogous to that between the noumenal
and phenomenal realms in his theoretical philosophy.
The need to prove the existence of the imperative led first to the search
for the law which commanded absolutely, and then to the 'something
which as an end in itself could be a ground of determinate laws' (p. 428,
p. 35). This would form the ground of both the practical law and the
categorical imperative. Kant diverts the search for an end in itself into that
for beings with 'absolute value' who were ends in themselves. He very
quickly identifies these beings with 'persons' and proceeds to derive the
universality of the categorical imperative 'from the conception of what is
necessarily an end for everyone because this end is an end in itself'. The
formula of this imperative now reads: 'Act in such a way that you treat
humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of another, always
at the same time as an end, and never as a means' (p. 429, p. 36). This
imperative is then used canonically in order to judge the maxims informing
concrete cases.
Kant admits that the move to a 'metaphysics of morals' which is necessary
to buttress the categorical imperative puts practical philosophy into a
precarious position. This risk was motivated by the importance Kant at
tached to the concept of freedom. lt is freedom which permits the transition
from a 'metaphysics of morals' to a 'critique of practical reason', but
freedom is held both to justify and be justified by the categorical impera
tive. This follows from the two senses which Kant gives to the concept of
freedom. He distinguishes between negative freedom, which consists in
freedom from 'determination by alien causes' (heteronomy), and freedom
as autonomy, which consists in a subject giving itself its own law. The latter
consists in the will being a law to itself, which is nothing other than acting
according to a maxim which can 'at the same time have itself as a universal
law for its object' (p. 447, p. 49). The idea of freedom as autonomy is thus
uncovered as the ground for the categorical imperative, the necessary
presupposition accorded by us to ourselves and other rational beings in so
far as they possess a will or 'consciousness of [their] causality as regards
actions' (p. 449, p. 51). Yet we are only secured in the possession of such
freedom in so far as we make categorical imperatives.
The direction of the critique of the categorical imperative by Kant's
successors is best summed up in Nietzsche's phrase 'the categorical im
perative smells of cruelty' (Nietzsche, 1887, p. 65). Kant's attempt to ground
the categorical imperative in a positive notion of freedom as autonomy
101
CATEGORIES
failed, since freedom and the categorical imperative could only be defined
in reactive terms as the suppression or exclusion ofheteronomy, ofhuman
feelings and inclinations. This critique was but an extreme statement of a
direction of criticism inaugurated by Hegel and Schopenhauer's critiques
of the categorical imperative. Hegel, while regarding favourably Kant's
definition of freedom as autonomy of the will, nevertheless saw its moral
formulation in the categorical imperative as formal and abstract, resting
on the exclusion of 'all content and specification'. Schopenhauer consid
ered himself to have 'put to death' the categorical imperative and the
moral law, and with it the entire attempt to ground practical philosophy
on the freedom of the will. Recent work in Kantian ethics has largely
accepted these doubts concerning the metaphysical basis of the categori
cal imperative, and has focused on its use as a canonical formula for
testing maxims of action for their consistency and universalizability (see
O'Neill, 1989).
categories [Kategorien] see also ANALITIC, DEDUCTION, JUDGEMENT, LOGIC, PRINCI

PLES, SYNTHESIS, TABLE OF JUDGEMENTS/ CATEGORIES
Categories are the forms according to which objects of experience are
structured and ordered. The classical Greek term kategorei,n meant 'to
accuse', 'to say of' or 'to judge', and was adopted by Aristotle to describe
the ways in which it was possible to speak of being. In the Categories he
proposed a list of ten such 'categories': substance, quantity, quality, rela
tion, place, time, position, state, action, affection. Even in the classical
period this list was criticized for containing repetitions, and attempts were
made to reduce the number of categories, in many cases to a single op
position such as 'substance and accident', 'matter and form' or, as in the
case of Plotinus, 'motion and stability' (Plotinus, 1971, p. 253). These
reductions were to a certain extent supported by passages drawn from
some of Aristotle's other works.
Through Boethius's translation of Aristotle's Categories the schema of the
ten categories exercised an enormous influence upon the development of
early medieval European philosophy. Yet with the expansion of the Aris
totelian corpus available in Latin during the thirteenth century, a tension
was discerned between Aristotle's account of being in terms of the catego
ries and his other, more economical descriptions of being in terms such
as 'substance and accident'. The authority of Aristotle obliged philoso
phers such as Aquinas and Duns Scotus to reconcile the categories with
other aspects of Aristotelian ontology, with complex and often baffling
results. The increasingly baroque character of the doctrine of the catego
ries was an important factor in the rejection of scholasticism by early
modern philosophers such as Hobbes and Descartes. Their reasons for
102
CATEGORIES
rejecting the Aristotelian categories were summed up in the mid-seventeenth

century by Arnauld, who claimed that the categories 'of which so much
mystery has been made' 'help but slightly in the formation of judgement,
the true end of logic.' What is more, they are 'entirely arbitrary and
founded on the imagination of a man who had no authority to prescribe
a law to others' (Arnauld, 1662, p. 43), and encourage philosophers to
speak with authority about 'arbitrary classifications' rather than about the
things themselves.
The categories were rescued from the general opprobrium by their
resuscitation in CPR, a remarkable episode in what Tonelli (1964) has
described as the 'revival of German-Aristotelian vocabulary'. In order to
rescue the categories from the prevailing disrepute into which they had
fallen, Kant had to answer the kind of objections made by Arnauld, and
not only distinguish his table of categories from the Aristotelian 'rhapsody'
but also show that they were authoritative and contributed to the 'formation
of judgement'. This task required him to attend to (a) the derivation of
the categories - they could no longer rest on Aristotle or any other phi
losopher's personal authority; (b) their systematic presentation in a 'table
of categories'; (c) their justification or 'deduction'; and (d) their applica
tion in making judgements.
In a letter to Marcus Herz of 21 February 1772, and later in P §39 ('Of
the System of the Categories'), Kant accounted for his discovery of the
categories in terms of a revision of the Aristotelian 'rhapsody'. He claims
that Aristotle's categories were derived from 'ordinary knowledge' and
laid out largely 'as he found them', a method Kant compares with collect
ing elements of grammar from the observation of usage. He, by contrast,
seeks to give a reason for why knowledge, like a language, 'has just this
and no other formal constitution' and why it has 'exactly so many, neither
more nor less, of such formal determinations' (P §39). 'After long reflec
tion on the pure elements of human knowledge (those which contain
nothing empirical)' Kant claimed that he was able to distinguish space
and time as 'pure elementary concepts of sensibility' allowing him to
exclude the '7th, 8th, and 9th categories from the old list' (P §39).
The exclusion of the spatio-temporal categories corresponds largely with
the stage reached by Kant in the ID. But the problem remained of how
to derive the remaining categories. In the letter to Herz, Kant confesses
that in respect of the 'intellectual representations' the outcome of the ID
was negative - they were not 'produced by the object'. But this left the
problem of 'how is the understanding to construct for itself entirely a
priori concepts of things, with which the things are necessarily in agree
ment?'; that is, principles which both agree with and are yet independent
of experience. In the 'silent decade' of the 1770s Kant sought a solution
103
CATEGORIES
to this problem: 'I looked about for an act of the understanding which
comprises all the rest and is differentiated only by various modifications
or moments, in bringing the manifold of representation under the unity
ofthinking in general' (P §3). He 'found this act ofthe understanding to
consist in judging' which he described in terms ofthe bringing into agree
ment of the representations of things and the a priori concepts of the
understanding.
The act of judgement thus became the source from which to derive the
basic concepts that together form the grammar of thinking. Since judge
ment for Kant is the unification of a manifold, the basic concepts refer to
the various ways in which manifolds may be unified. Kant drew on the
anatomy of judgement given by logicians in order to map the various
'modifications' of the act of judgement, and thus to 'exhibit a complete
table of the pure functions of the understanding'. These were modes of
judgement which were pure constructions of the understanding 'undeter
mined in regard to any object'. These modes were then extended to apply
to 'objects in general'; that is, not to discrete judgements but to the con
ditions that made such judgements not only possible but also objectively
valid: these conditions or 'pure concepts of the understanding' were given
'their old name of categories' (P §39).
The derivation of the categories from the various modes of the act of
judgement is the core of CPR's 'Analytic ofConcepts'. The basic argument
of this extremely involved and much discussed part of CPR is relatively
straightforward. All acts of the understanding are judgements, and the
understanding is the faculty of judgement. The 'functions of unity in
judgement' can be divided into four sets, each of which contains three
members: collectively they comprise the table ofjudgements (see table 1).
The quantity of a judgement is determined by whether a predicate
includes all, some or one of its subjects; the quality refers to the ways in
which a predicate may be predicated of a subject; the relation involves the
manner in which predicates may be related to a subject, while modality
specifies the relation of the judgement to the conditions of thought in
general.
Kant then proceeds to relate judgement to synthesis, describing as
categories those concepts which give unity to pure synthesis, and thus
provide the conditions for objectivity in general. These concepts corre
spond to the basic acts of judgement listed above, and in their turn yield
a table of categories (see table 2).
These fundamental concepts, which Kant also calls 'original and primi
tive', are embedded in every act ofjudgement, and have their own peculiar
properties. The categories of quantity and quality share the property of
referring judgement to objects ofintuition and are entitled 'mathematical',
104
CATEGORIES
Table 1 Table of judgements
I
Quantity of Judgements
Universal
Particular
Singular
II III
Quality Relation
Affirmative Categorical
Negative Hypothetical
Infinite Disjunctive
N
Modality
Problematic
Assertoric
Apodeictic
Source: CPR A 70/B 95
Table 2 Table of categories
I
Categories ofQuantity
Unity
Plurality
Totality
II III
OfQuality Of Relation
Reality Of Inherence and Subsistence
Negation (substantia et accidens)
Limitation Of Causality and Dependence
(cause and effect)
Of Community
(reciprocity between agent and patient)
N
Modality
Possibility-lmpossibility
Existence-Nonexistence
Necessity-Contingency
Source: CPR A 80/B 106
105
CATEGORIES
while the categories of relation and modality are labelled 'dynamical' and
refer judgement to a relation either between the objects of intuition them
selves, or these objects and the understanding. Within each group, Kant
observes, the first pair of categories in each set forms a dichotomy, with
the third arising from their combination.
The derivation of the categories also serves in part as their justification.
The 'metaphysical deduction' consists in showing their agreement with
the 'logical functions of judgement', while the 'transcendental deduction'
shows that the categories form the conditions for objectively valid judge
ments of experience. With this the categories can become, in Arnauld's
words, 'formative for judgement' (1662, p. 43), since they can now deter
mine empirical judgements. By themselves they are merely 'logical func
tions', but when they are brought into conformity with the conditions of
sensuous intuition through schematism and the principles, then they make
possible 'judgements of experience in general'. Although produced auto
nomously by the understanding in the act of judgement, the categories
nevertheless agree, through the principles, with the manifold of intuition
or, in the language of the letter to Herz, with 'the things' themselves (PC
p. 72).
Kant's revival of the categories has been the source of incessant philo
sophical controversy, both within and outside the framework of the critical
philosophy. Fichte claimed that Kant's deduction was a failure: 'he by no
means proved the categories he set up to be conditions of self-consciousness,
but merely said that they were so' (Fichte, 1794, p. 51). He attempted to
remedy the alleged shortcomings of the Kantian deduction by re-0rienting
Kant's view of judgement within an account of 'positing' as the I's basic
mode of action. Hegel saw Fichte's insistence upon a fresh deduction of
the categories as justified, but criticized him for not questioning suffi
ciently the implied opposition between unity and plurality. This opposi
tion itself is an abstraction, worthy of an abstract notion of the I or subject.
Schopenhauer too rejected the 'complicated clockwork' ofKant's categories
in favour of immediate, intuitive knowledge.
The early critiques of Kant's categories all shared the critical project of
deriving the grammar of knowledge from a fundamental principle or act.
The neo-Kantians later in the nineteenth century were more pragmatic,
borrowing their categories in an act of second order reflection upon the
natural and human sciences. The ethos of twentieth-century philosophy
has been largely unsympathetic toward systems of categories. Wittgenstein's
work in particular, investigating judgements without any attempt to uncover
their basic structure, seems akin to the 'study of the actual use of words'
as opposed to that of the 'formal constitution' of a language whichKant had
earlier considered, but rejected, as a model for philosophical reflection.
106
CAUSALITY
causality [Kausalität] see also ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, ANALYTIC, CATEGORIES,

FORCE, FREEDOM, NATURE, PRINCIPLES, SUCCESSION
Causality is a theme central to both Kant's theoretical and practical phi
losophy. His theoretical discussion of causality is couched entirely in terms
of a modern conception of causality which rejected the Aristotelian order
of material, formal, efficient and final causes and confined causality to
local motion. Although this conception may be traced back to Galileo, he
himself did not explain motion in terms of causality; he destroyed the old
notion of causality and left the justification of the new to the philosophers.
Kant's response to the problem of justifying theoretical causality under
went several changes in the course of his career. In ND he followed the
Wolffian school's identification of causality with the rational principle of
ground and consequence. This ontological justification of causality was
abandoned in DS and other works of the 1760s where the relation of
cause and effect is described as a 'fundamental relation' which cannot be
further determined: 'lt is impossible for reason ever to understand how
something can be a cause, or have a force; such relations can only be
derived from experience' (DS p. 370, p. 356). Already Kant is uneasy in
his dogmatic slumbers, but was finally woken up by what he saw as Hume's
demonstration that causality rested upon custom rather than any a priori
necessity (see CPR A 760/B 788).
Hume's doubts regarding the principle of causality were taken by Kant
as a challenge to a priori knowledge and thus to metaphysics (P p. 259,
p. 4). In response, Kant sought a critical position in which causality is
based neither on a custom derived from repeated experiences nor on the
a priori ontological order of ground and consequence governed only by
the laws of contradiction and sufficient reason. The results of this search
were presented in the 'Transcendental Analytic' of CPR where causality
takes its place within the broader architectonic of categories and princi
ples. For in course of seeking to justify causality, Kant discovered a number
of other concepts 'by which the understanding thinks the connection of
things a priori' (P p. 260, p. 6). These were not derived from experience,
but from the acts of judgement performed by the pure understanding. A
particular judgement that A caused B was shown by Kant to be synthetic;
that is, one which combined an intuition with an a priori concept.
Within the 'Transcendental Analytic', causality- more properly 'causality
and dependence (cause and effect)' - features as the second of the cat
egories of relation. These are derived from the pure judgements of relation,
the second of which concerns the logical relation of ground to conse
quence. Causality, along with the other categories, is justified in the de
duction as a form of 'connection and unity' which 'precedes all experience'
and without which experience would not be possible. However, along with
107
CENSORSHIP OF REASON
the other categories, causality by itself cannot be applied directly to

intuitions; it has to be schematized; that is, adapted to intuitions, in the
course of which it becomes 'the succession of the manifold, in so far as
that succession is subject to a rule' (A 144/B 183).
This is also achieved in 'Analytic of Principles' which aligns the catego
ries - justified in terms of 'transcendental judgement' with reference to
'universal conditions' - with the actual conditions of the 'relation to
sensibility in general' (CPR A 148/B 187). To the categories of relation
correspond the principles of the analogies of experience which determine
how appearances are ordered temporally.As the second category of relation,
causality yields the second analogy which states that all experience obeys
the law of succession according to cause and effect. This analogy is then
justified by aligning the irreversibility of causal succession with the irre
versibility of time.
With such arguments Kant attempted to prove that causality was a con
dition of experience and could not be derived from it. His argument has
subsequently been criticized from all directions, with Hegel (1817) re
garding causality as the relation posited between substance and accident,
and Nietzsche (1901) reducing it to a necessary fiction. Although inter
pretations and critiques of Kant's understanding of causality continue, his
working within the framework of Galilean science has now made his work
on causality largely of historical interest. Even in orthodox Kantian terms
the discovery of the Uncertainty Principle which suspends causal laws at
a quantum level refutes the claim that the category of causality and its
principle are indispensable preconditions of experience.
Kant also distinguished between the causality of nature and the causality
of freedom. The 'law' of causality prescribed by the understanding for
nature is not the same as that prescribed by reason for freedom. The
opposition between the two forms of causality forms the conflict of the
'third antinomy' in CPR. This opposes the spontaneity of a free cause to
the utter determination of the laws of nature. For Kant it is essential for
both theoretical and practical philosophy that the two causalities be not
confused. This is not to deny that for human beings who inhabit both
intelligible and sensible realms 'the causality of freedom ...is the causality
of a natural cause subordinated to freedom' (CJ, §IX), but rather to insist
that the causality of freedom, or the ground of intelligible determination,
while qualified by the causality of nature is not reduced to it. By the same
principle the laws of natural causality are restricted to appearances, and
may not be extended to supersensible objects.
censorship of reason see also CRITICAL PHILOSOPHY, FACT, METHOD, REASON, TRUTH
The censorship of reason is described in CPR as the second, sceptical
108
CERTAINTY
stage in the development of pure reason. The first stage is the dogmatic,
identified with the Wolffian school, which proposes transcendent princi
ples without properly justifying them; the second is the sceptical censor
ship of these principles, identified with Hume; while the third stage is the
critical scrutiny of the limits of reason accomplished by Kant himself. In
the third stage, Kant claims, the sceptical censorship of the facts of reason
or its present bounds is succeeded by criticism of its limits (CPR A 760/
B 788).
certainty [certitudo, Gewissheit] see also FAITH, HOLDING-TO-BE-TRUE, KNOWLEDGE

The problem of certainty was peripheral to medieval philosophy - Aquinas
defines certitude as knowledge which does not depart from that which is
found in the thing. Certitude was assured ontologically through a 'cause'
of knowledge in the thing producing an effect in the mind, with the order
of things and the mind objectively proportioned to each other. Early
modern philosophers were not so certain about certainty, as is evident
from Descartes' attempt in the Discourse on Method (1637) to establish the
certitude of perceptions and judgement in the face of doubt. With this
text Descartes inaugurated the peculiarly modern pre-occupation with epi
stemology; for him, as for subsequent philosophers as diverse as Malebranche
and Spinoza, truth itself is defined as certainty, or, in Spinoza's words, as
'that which removes all doubt' (Spinoza, 1985, p. 313).
The theme of certainty plays a specific role in Kant's philosophy; it is
not part of a general problematic of doubt which extends from the evid
ence of the senses to that of reason, but specifically concerns the subjec
tive validity of judgements. The beginnings of this position are evident in
the third reflection of PE - 'Of the nature of philosophical certainty' -
where Kant distinguishes between philosophical and mathematical certainty.
Both disciplines make judgements which are governed by 'laws of identity
and contradiction', but for Kant these laws are negative conditions of
certainty. They are the necessary but not sufficient conditions of certainty,
for while a concept or judgement that does not conform to them defin
itely lacks certainty, they cannot in themselves serve as sufficient sources
of it. In order to be certain, mathematical concepts, while conforming to
the laws of identity and contradiction, must in addition possess intuitive
certainty, and philosophical concepts must possess discursive certainty.
With this claim Kant detached himself from rationalist accounts of cer
tainty, and then began to search for criteria of certainty beyond mere
absence of doubt.
In the critical philosophy the problem of certainty is restricted to the
'subjective validity of a judgement' or our subjectively 'holding it to be
true' (Fürwahrhalten) (CPR A 822/B 850; see also L pp. 570ff). For this
109
CHILDREN
reason the critical discussion of certainty is largely confined to the section

of CPR on 'The Transcendental Doctrine of Method'. Judgements are
held to be subjectively and/or objectively sufficient: 'subjective sufficiency
is termed conviction (for myself ), the objective sufficiency is termed certainty
(for everyone)' (A 822/B 850). A judgement of opinion is neither subjec
tively nor objectively sufficient; one which is believed to be true is subjec
tively sufficient; while one which is known to be true is both subjectively
and objectively sufficient.
In the critical philosophy, certainty is important in establishing the limits
of what can be known; it consists in reason coming 'to a decision either
in regard of the objects of its enquiries or in regard to the capacity or
incapacity of reason to pass any judgement upon them' (CPR B 22). How
ever, certainty does not serve as a criterion for truth, but only as a mark
of the subjective experience of the truth of a judgement. The sources of
truth themselves lie elsewhere than in subjective certainty. In restricting
the importance of certainty in this way, Kant deviates considerably from
the Cartesian epistemological tradition. Nevertheless, this has not pre
vented many commentators from attempting to retum him to this tradi
tion, and to interpret the Transcendental Analytic of CPR as a search for
truth through certainty.
children see MARRIAGE, SEX, WOMAN
Christ see ARCHETYPE, CHURCH, GOD
church [Kirche] see also GOD, STATE, THEODICY, THEOLOGY

Kant's understanding of the church may be situated within the broad
context of Protestant ecclesiology. This was concerned above all with the
problems of the relation of the church to its believers and to the state. His
treatment of the two problems in RL and MM evince an often unstable
combination of themes drawn from the Calvinist and Pietist traditions
then prevailing in Prussia.
The most obvious inheritance from Calvinism is Kant's distinction be
tween the invisible and visible church. The former is the 'idea of the
union of all the righteous under direct and moral divine world govern
ment' (RL p. 101, p. 92). The invisible church would be the realization of
the ethical commonwealth, but this may also be pursued through the
visible church which is the 'actual union of men into a whole which
harmonises with that ideal'. Kant describes the characteristics of the true
visible church in terms of the categorical schema of quantity, quality,
relation and modality: it would be quantitatively universal and unified,
qualitatively pure, its intemal and extemal relations would be govemed by
the principle of freedom, and it would be modally unchangeable.
llO
CLARI1Y
With respect to the constitution of the visible church Kant refuses to

accept either the Catholic or Orthodox reliance on monarchic and aris
tocratic forms of ecclesiastical organization; he also rejects the representa
tive democratic forms of organization pursued by the Calvinists. Instead,
surprisingly, he prefers the Pietist, patriarchal form of church organization
modelled on an analogy with the holy family. He writes: 'its constitution
is neither monarchical (under a pope or patriarch), nor aristocratic (under
bishops and prelates), nor democratic ... lt could best of all be likened
to that of a household (family) under a common, though invisible, moral
Father . . .' (RL p. 102, p. 93) The son makes the father's will known to
the family, in which spirit they 'enter with one another into a voluntary,
universal, and enduring union of hearts' (ibid.).
When Kant tums to the relation of church and state he abandons the
quietistic apolitical stance of Pietism in favour of a more Calvinist approach.
The state cannot legitimately interfere with the church since its sphere of
influence does not extend thus far. lt cannot impose a religion upon a
people, nor require conformity, nor dispossess the church of its property
or ministers (MM p. 368, p. 173). However, this is not to say that a church
enjoys its autonomy in perpetuity. For Kant, now in a strong Calvinist vein,
the organization of a church and the rights and privileges of its clergy are
the result of a contract with its members. If they withdraw from this con
tract, then the church and its clergy may legitimately be dispossessed
'since the reason for their possession hitherto lay only in the peopk's
opinion and also had to hold as long as that lasted. But as soon as this
opinion lapses, and even lapses only in the judgement of those who by
their merit have the strongest claim to guide judgement, the supposed
property has to cease, as if by an appeal of the people to the state' (MM
p. 325, p. 135).
Perhaps because of its eclectic character, Kant's ecclesiology has had
relatively little impact upon modern theology. Nor has it played a central
role in interpretations of his philosophical or religious thought. lt has,
however, been the object of renewed scrutiny as part of the growing in
terest in Kant's account of social and political organization.
citizenship see STATE, WOMAN
civilization see CULTURE, HISTORY
clarity [Klarheit] see al,so CONSCIOUSNESS, ENLIGHTENMENT, HOLDING-TO-BE-TRUE,

KNOWLEDGE, TRUTH
In the Meditations on Knowkdge, Truth, and Ideas (1684; see Leibniz, 1976,
pp. 291-5) Leibniz distinguished between grades of knowledge in terms of
111
CO-EXISTENCE
the contraries clear--obscure, confused-distinct, adequate-inadequate and

symbolic-intuitive. The first pair of contraries proved enormously influen
tial, and were pivotal in the development of German Enlightenment
philosophy, especially that of Christian Wolff. For Leibniz, a clear concept
is one which suffices to recognize a representation; it is distinct when the
'marks' which enable it to be recognized can be described and enumer
ated. For Leibniz's Enlightenment successors, clarity and distinctness be
came characteristics marking stages in the perfection of knowledge. The
move from obscurity to clarity and distinctness was considered in terms of
the move from knowledge of the senses to that of the understanding, or
from prejudice to enlightenment.
This progressive schema was first challenged by the Pietist opponents
of the Wolffian enlightenment who argued that there were limits to the
perfection of knowledge. This view was adopted and developed byKant in
PE where he argued for the existence of basic, unanalyzable concepts
(p. 279, p. 252). This early critique of the Enlightenment model of the pro
gressive perfection of knowledge towards greater clarity and distinctness
was largely sustained by Kant, although the terms clarity and distinctness
do not feature prominently in any of the Critiques. The model does ap
pear in some of the Reflections and published lecture transcripts, notably
in A and L.
In L Kant reproduces Leibniz' and Wolff's distinction between the per
fection of cognition according to the quality of clarity, and distinctness as
the 'clarity of marks'. lndeed, in A he couches the distinction in orthodox
Leibnizian terms, defining clarity as 'the consciousness of one's represen
tations sufficient for distinguishing one object from another' and distinct
ness as 'consciousness which makes the composition of representations
clear' (§6). He also follows Baumgarten in distinguishing between the
subjective clarity and distinctness of aesthetic cognition and the objective
variants of rational cognition. He develops an intriguing attempt to adapt
the Wolffian schema to his own critical insights by distinguishing between
analytic and synthetic distinctness: analytic clarity and distinctness apply to
concepts and simply break them down into their parts, while their synthetic
counterparts apply to objects and expand the concept. This distinction
was later carried over into that between formal and transcendental logic
proposed in CPR (A 150/B 190) but without the schema of clarity and
distinctness. Although there was an attempt to revive the schema by neo
Leibnizian critics ofKant such as Eberhard (see 0D) and Maimon (1790),
it remained largely dormant until the return to the analysis of concepts
inaugurated by Frege at the end of the nineteenth century.
c�xistence see ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, SUCCESSION
112
COMMAND
cognition [Emenntnis] see also CONCEPT, FACULTY, HOLDINO-TO-BE-TRUE, INTUI

TION, KNOWLEDGE, PERCEPTION, REPRESENTATION, THINKING
Kant's distinctions between cognition (Erkenntnis), knowledge (Wissen) and
thinking (Denken) have not been consistently respected by his translators
- nor were they on occasion by Kant himself. Even Kemp Smith in his
influential translation of CPR systematically elides the distinction between
knowledge and cognition by translating Emenntnis as 'knowledge'. In his
typology of representations in CPR A 320/B 377, Kant defines cognition
as 'objective perception' or objective 'representation with consciousness'.
There are two sorts of cognition, namely intuitions and concepts, which
correspond to the two sources of cognition in sensibility and understand
ing (A 294/B 351). Cognition is with occasional exceptions (such as CPR
A 69/B 94) distinguished from both knowledge and thinking. Knowledge
signifies the subjective and objective sufficiency of a judgement, and is
thus a qualification of thinking. Thinking, in turn, consists in the unification
of representations in a consciousness, or judgement. While the categories
of thinking 'are not limited by the conditions of our sensible intuition',
the cognition 'of that which we think, the determining of the object,
requires intuition' (CPR B p. 166). For as Kant reflected, 'to cognise an
object I must be able to prove its possibility, either from its actuality as
attested by experience, or a priori by means of reason. But I can think
whatever I please, provided only that I do not contradict myself . . .' (CPR
B xxvi). Cognition of that which we think requires not only that cognitions
in the shape of concepts and intuitions be present, but also that the
judgement which unifies them satisfies the principle of contradiction: such
conditions are met in the case of synthetic a priori judgements.
combination [Verbindung] see also ACTION, APPERCEPTION, CONSCIOUSNESS, MANI

FOLD, SUBJECT, SYNTHESIS, UNITY
Of all the representations, combination 'cannot be given through objects'
but is 'an act of the self-activity of the subject' (CPR B 130). lt contains
not only the 'concept of the manifold and of its synthesis' but also the
concept of the unity of the manifold. The latter is not an object of possible
experience, but is nevertheless its essential condition. The concept of the
unity of the manifold represents the 'syn thetic unity of a manifold' and is
the condition for combination. This unity is then related by Kant to the
identity of consciousness guaranteed by the 'syn thetic unity of apperception'.
command [ Gebot] see also CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, INCLINATION, LAW, SYLLOGISM,

WILL
The concept of command is central to Kant's moral philosophy, express
ing the relationship between objective law and the will. In GMM Kant
113
COMMON SENSE
defines it as the 'representation of an objective principle insofar as it

necessitates the will' (p. 414, p. 24) distinguishing it from the law which
it represents, and the imperative through which it is formulated. Because
of the 'subjective constitution' of the human will - the fact that it is 'not
thoroughly good' - the command is expressed as an ought, as the law's
outweighing of the will's inclinations. For this reason Kant often casts the
command as ensuring 'submission to law' as in CPrR where it is said to
'constrain the sensuously affected subject' (p. 81, p. 83). Kant rigorously
distinguishes this 'command (law) of morality' associated with the cat
egorical imperative from the 'rules of skill' and 'councils of prudence'
derived from hypothetical imperatives (GMM p. 416, p. 26).
The complex structure underlying Kant's use of the term is most appar
ent in MM. There the command is described as that which is proper to the
executive arm of the state, situated between the legislator and the judici
ary, and responsible for ensuring conformity to law. lt also appears imme
diately afterwards as the middle term of a practical syllogism: 'the major
premise, which contains the /,aw of that will; the minor premise which
contains the command to behave in accordance with the law, i.e., the prin
ciple of subsumption under the law; and the conclusion, which contains
the verdict (sentence) . . .' (MM p. 313, p. 125). There is thus an analogy
at work between the practical syllogism, the organization of the state and
the articulation of moral judgement in terms of the distinction between
law, command and imperative.
common sense [sensus communis, Gemeinsinn] see also COMMUNICABILITY,

FEELING, GEMÜT, PUBLICITY, REFLECTION, REFLECTIVE JUDGEMENT, SENSE, TASTE
Common sense has two distinct meanings in Kant which are elided in the
English translation of the term. The first appears in the Preface to P and
refers to colloquial 'plain common sense' (gemeinen Menschenverstand) and
the appeal to it by so-called 'common sense' philosophers such as T. Reitl
(1710-96) and J. Priestly (1733-1804). For Kant, the way in which these
writers, 'missed the point of [Hume's] problem was positively painful'
(p. 258, p. 4): 'To appeal to common sense when insight and science fail,
and no sooner - this is one of the subtle discoveries of modern times, by
means of which the most superficial ranter can safely enter the lists with
the most thorough thinker and hold his own' (p. 259, p. 5). In this con
text, common sense 'is but an appeal to the opinion of the multitude' in
which 'the popular charlatan glories' (p. 259, p. 5).
In CJ however, Kant develops a positive account of 'common sense'
( sensus communis) which is central to his discussion of reflective judge
ment. lt appears in §40 entitled 'Taste as a kind of sensus communis' where
it is distinguished from the 'vulgar' common sense of the gemeinen
114
COMMUNICABILITY
Menschenverstand. Sensus communis is a 'public sense', a 'critical faculty which

in its reflective act tak.es account of the mode of representation of everyone
eise, in order, as it were, to weigh its judgement with the collective reason
of mankind'. With this view of common sense Kant revives the Renaissance
humanist understanding of sensus communis as a form of republican virtue,
and goes even further in this direction when he aligns this reflective form
of judgement with taste. Thus Kant concludes: 'that the aesthetic, rather
than the intellectual, judgement can bear the name of a public sense, i.e.,
taking it that we are prepared to use the word "sense" of an effect that
mere reflection has upon the mind; for then by sense we mean the feeling
of pleasure' (CJ § 40). This definition of an 'enlightened', 'critical', and
yet also public 'common sense' is set against prejudice of the 'vulgar'
commonsense of the British philosophers.
By describing the act of reflection as a 'sense' Kant also retrieves the
original Aristotelian connotations of sensus communis. For Aristotle it is not
a 'special sense' or a faculty, but rather a 'general sensibility' which informs
the five discrete senses. This sensibility is neither 'of the flesh' (Aristotle,
1941, 426b, 15) nor is it intelligible, but is an 'awareness' of, and sensitivity
to, differences (see Welsch, 1987). For Kant too, sensus communis is reflec
tive without being an intuition or a concept - he describes it as 'internal
feeling of a final state of the Gemüf occasioned when 'the imagination in
its freedom stirs the understanding, and the understanding apart from
concepts puts the imagination into regular play'. lt points to a pleasurable
mode of communication dominated by neither concept nor law, one for
which the aesthetic judgement of taste is paradigmatic.
The importance of 'common sense' for Kant's notions of 'critique',
'enlightenment' and 'judgement', as well as its broader implications for
theoretical, practical and aesthetic philosophy were not fully appreciated
until the twentieth century. Then it became crucial not only for the in
terpretation of Kant, but also in the fields of political philosophy and
aesthetics. Kant's notion of sensus communis is central to Arendt's attempts
to develop a post-totalitarian account of political judgement (see Arendt,
1989) as well as Lyotard's elaboration of new models of reflective judgement
appropriate to the scientific, political and aesthetic experience of post
modernity (see Lyotard, 1983, 1988, 1991).
communicability [Mitteilung] see also AESTHETICS, COMMON SENSE, COMMUNilY,

HISTORY, PLEASURE, PUBLICATION, TASTE
Communicability is central to Kant's anthropology and philosophy of his
tory, as well as to his account of the aesthetic judgement of taste. In CBH
he describes the 'urge to communicate' of the first man, expressed in
sounds intended 'to announce their existence to living creatures outside
115
COMMUNI1Y
themselves' (p. 110, p. 222). In CJ §41 he describes the end of history in

terms of the refinement of this capacity: 'Eventually, when civilization has
reached its height it makes this work of communication almost the main
business of refined inclination, and the entire value of sensations is placed
in the degree to which they permit of universal communication.' This
state of pure communication is anticipated in the reflective activity of the
sensus communis or 'public sense' which abstracts from the content of a
judgement, attending only to its formal communicability. This is grounded
upon, but also grounds, the relation of imagination and understanding
'without the mediation of a concept' (§40) which is peculiar to the aes
thetic judgement of taste. Kant also suggests that the interest in commun
icability may explain why judgements of taste are felt to involve 'a sort of
duty' which is not, however, based on the moral law.
Kant's comments on communicability have become increasingly im
portant for twentieth-century philosophy. They have informed Arendt and
Lyotard's attempts to apply Kant's model of reflective judgement to pol
itics and art, as well as Habermas's attempts to establish a communicative
ethics on the basis of a communicative theory of action (Habermas, 1981).
In terms of Kant exegesis, they point to a dimension of intersubjectivity
which underpins the more austere accounts of theoretical and practical
judgement essayed in the first two critiques.
community [ Gemeinschaft] see also ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, CATEGORIES, CHURCH,

COMMUNICABILl1Y, COSMOPOLITANISM, STATE
Community is strictly speaking the third category of relation, and like all
categories is derived from a form of judgement, in this case the disjunc
tive. lt yields a schema and a principle in the third analogy. A disjunctive
judgement is one which includes propositions which are mutually exclu
sive but which between them add up to a totality of knowledge. Kant
represents totality as 'a whole divided into parts (the subordinate con
cepts), and that since no one of them can be contained under any other,
they are thought as co-ordinated with, not subordinated to, each other,
and so determining each other, not in one direction only, as in a series,
but reciprocally, as in an aggregate' (CPR B 112). By analogy he extends
this logical relationship of concepts to 'a whole which is marle up of
things', claiming that in the latter 'a similar combination is being thought'.
This is because, in contrast to the category of causality, 'one thing is not
subordinated, as effect, to another, as cause of its existence, but, simulta
neously and reciprocally, is co-ordinated with it, as cause of the determi
nation of the other' (CPR B 112). This co-ordination is characterized by
parts existing independently of each other and 'yet combined together in
one whole' (CPR B 113).
116
COMPREHENSION
As with all the categories, Kant derives from community a schema and
a principle. The schema adapts the abstract category to the conditions of
a finite intuition; for community this results in the 'schema ofcommunity
or reciprocity' that 'the reciprocal causality of substances in respect of
their accidents, is the co-existence, according to a universal rule, of the
determinations ofthe one substance with those ofthe other' (CPRA 144/
B 183). The principle, as expressed in the third analogy of experience,
holds that substances perceived to co-exist in space 'stand in thorough
going community, that is, in mutual interaction' (CPR A 211) or 'are in
thoroughgoing reciprocity' (CPR B 256). This is a principle which cannot
be derived empirically from the mere existence of several objects - their
co-existence must be assumed a priori and cannot 'be an object of a
possible perception' (CPR A 212/B 258).
In the discussion of the third analogy Kant identifies an 'ambiguity' in
the word Gemeinschaft which he settles by making a distinction in Latin
between communio and commercium. He defines the category ofcommunity
in terms ofthe latter, 'as signifying a dynamical community, without which
even local community (communio spatiz) could never be empirically known'
(CPRA 213/B 260). Without the dynamic reciprocal influence ofsubstances
in commercium there could be no empirical relation ofco-existence or communio.
The latter distinction is of interest with respect to Kant's views on social
and political community. Kant's understanding of political community is
primarily oriented towards commercium rather than communio. The latter
term, deriving from the Latin word for a fortification, sees community in
terms of an exclusive sharing of space protected from the outsi�e, while
the former derives from the processes of exchange and commun\cation.
Thus when Kant describes social or political community, it is usu\lly in
terms of free exchange and respect between individuals rather than in
terms of shared characteristics or space. He markedly prefers the term
Gesellschaft (society) or &ich (kingdom) over Gemeinschaft (community) -
indeed he uses the latter very rarely, although on occasion he uses the
term Gemeinwesen (commonwealth). Nevertheless, Kant's view ofsocial and
political community is close in spirit to the category ofcommunity, stress
ing co-ordination and co-existence of mutually exclusive interests which
although opposed to each other nevertheless add up to a whole. This
model is extended from the relations between individuals, to those be
tween social groups, and eventually to those between states (see RL Book
III, Division l; CJ §83; PP p. 367, p. 113).
comparison see REFLECTION
comprebension see SYNTHESIS
117
CONCEPT
concept [Begriff] see al,so CATEGORY, EPISTEMOLOGY, IMAGINATION, METAPHYSICS,

REPRESENTATION, SYNTHESIS, UNDERSTANDING, UNITY
The German word for concept - Begriff - translates the past participle of
the Latin verb concipere: 'to take to oneself, to take and hold'. As a sub
stantive it does not appear in the philosophical vocabulary before the late
seventeenth century; prior to this it meant a 'provisional sketch' of a legal
document or agreement, or even a poetic conceit. lt was first used in a
logical and epistemological context by Leibniz, most probably in his influ
ential Meditations on Knowkdge, Truth, and ldeas (1784; see Leibniz, 1976,
pp. 291-5). This names the product of conception as the 'concept', a
deliberate neologism directed against the Cartesian reliance on terms such
as 'idea' and 'notion' (although Leibniz also uses these). The neologism
was accepted by Wolff in his Logi,c and through this became part of the
German philosophical language. Meissner's PhUosophisches Lexicon (1737)
gives notio and idea as synonyms of Begriff, but they are clearly in the
process of being distinguished from each other. Concepts are broadly
defined by Leibniz and his followers as 'any representation of a thing' and
are classified according to their degrees of clarity, distinctness, completion
and adequacy. This is the context in which Kant began to use the term in
his pre-critical writings, and certain ambiguities inherent in this usage are
carried over by him into the critical philosophy, notably with respect to
the relationship between the logical and epistemological senses of the
term.
The Cartesian account of conception to which Leibniz objected was
itself an intervention within an extremely ancient philosophical debate on
the nature of knowledge and its sources. Aristotle set the terms for this
debate in his review of early Greek philosophy in the Metaphysics. He
criticized his predecessors for 'supposing knowledge to be sensation' and
for seeking the origins of knowledge in 'physical alteration' (Aristotle,
1941, 1009b). He introduced a distinction between two operations of the
mind - noiesis and aisthesis - 'perceiving' and 'thinking'. While this dis
tinction solved some problems, it also raised others which were destined
to have a long and perplexed future. Basically, if noiesis and aisthesis were
really radically distinct operations of the mind, how then could they be
related to each other in order to generate knowledge? One option was to
derive the noeta from the aistheta, privileging sensation; another would be
to derive aistheta from noeta, privileging thought. The first option was
pursued by Atomists such as Democritus (but not, we shall see, by Epicurus),
while the second was pursued by the Platonists and later neo-Platonists.
Aristotle's own position was a complex combination of both positions
which regarded both aistheta and noeta as abstracted sensible and intelli
gible forms. The Epicurean school developed a further compromise which
118
CONCEPT
was crucial for Kant: in this the senses are held to produce sensible images
which are apprehended proleptically by the mind. The noeta, in other
words, anticipate the shape of the aistheta, but possess no meaning apart
from them.
Medieval Aristotelianism developed an extremely sophisticated version
of Aristotle's account of the abstraction of sensible and intelligible forms.
However, by the seventeenth century this account had become narrowed
by the focus upon the problem of conception, or the abstraction of ideas
and notions from sensible experience. The human subject was divided
into faculties of sensibility and intellect, and the problem of how to bring
together sense data and intellectual ideas was solved either rationalistic
ally, by deriving sensibility from ideas, or empirically, by deriving ideas
from sensibility. In order to avoid this impasse Leibniz placed sense data
and ideas on a continuum of representation and gave them the generic
name 'concepts'. However, his follower Christian Wolff gave the new term
a further rationalist twist which provoked renewed empiricist objections.
These in turn led, in the 1730s, to the attempt by the Wolffian philoso
pher A.G. Baumgarten to clarify matters by restating the ancient distinction
between aisthesis and noiesis.
lt was in this context of terminological inconsistency that Kant developed
his account of the concept. His version is complicated not only by the
inherent equivocality of the term, but also by the close relationship be
tween the epistemological problem of conception involving the validity of
a concept's relation to the world, and the logical problem of judgement,
or the use of concepts in making valid judgements. Kant combined the
two problems in the transcendental logic of the first critique, but he had
already prepared for this move in the pre-critical writings. In these he
avoided both extremes of the empiricist-rationalist opposition by refusing
to derive concepts from either abstraction from sensible perception or from
the rational principle of non-contradiction; he looked instead to the process
of imaginative reflection on the form and content of experience. He refers
in FS to the 'fundamental capacity' of the human mind to make 'one's own
representations into objects of one's own thoughts' (p. 60, p. 104) and
derives concepts from this capacity. Thus the concept of a solid body is
derived not from the experience of such a body, nor from its rational
necessity, but by the philosopher representing to himself what is known of
such a body, and reflecting upon this representation. Reflection takes
'what is known immediately of a thing as its attribute' and if it finds the
thing unthinkable without the attribute, it converts it into the concept of
the thing. In the case of a body, the attribute 'impenetrability' is first ab
stracted, and then reflected upon; when it is recognized to be indispensable
to the thought of body it may be accepted as a concept (p. 58, p. 102).
119
CONCEPT
In the course ofthis analysis ofthe process ofconception Kant discovered

two classes of concept. The first includes derived or complex concepts,
which are open to analysis; the second includes concepts described in NM
as 'simple and unanalysable' and in other places as 'basic' or 'elementary'.
Kant also describes the basic concepts as 'undemonstrable fundamental
judgements' which are means of 'producing' knowledge. At this stage
Kant is by no means certain about the properties of such basic concepts,
except that they are 'unanalysable'. His exploration oftheir properties was
to prove one of the main sources of the later critical philosophy.
After reflecting on the sources and extent ofthe basic concepts for over
a decade Kant made them, in the guise of 'categories', into the prime
object of metaphysical investigation. He discovered that they had several
important properties which distinguished them from other products of
conception. Both basic and derived concepts were generically distinct from
intuitions; all were cognitions, but intuitions were singular while concepts
were general or reflected presentations. Derived or 'empirical' concepts
are drawn from experience by means of comparison, reflection and ab
straction while basic or 'pure' concepts 'are not abstracted from experi
ence' (L p. 590) and are 'investigated by metaphysics'. Having made this
distinction, Kant is faced with the problem of how pure concepts may be
related to intuitions. Ifthey are used without an object, they become ideas
- concepts without any possible object of experience - but what prevents
all such pure concepts becoming ideas?
Kant's solution in CPR is to see the pure, a priori concepts of the
understanding as fundamental to experience. Beginning with the various
functions of judgement carried out by the understanding, Kant proceeds
to describe the concepts as a parallel order of 'concepts of intuitions in
general' which adapt intuitions to judgements. Judgements unify a mani
fold, and the basic unities through which this is accomplished are the
categories. Thus the pure concepts ofthe understanding or categories are
derived from the table ofjudgements (forming four groups ofthree under
the titles quantity, quality, relation and modality). These concepts adapt
themselves to the conditions of appearances in space and time, a process
Kant describes as schematism, or they adapt intuitions to themselves by
anticipating intuitions in the shape of the system of principles. In CPR
Kant concentrates on the latter, developing the Epicurean position that
noeta (concepts) anticipate the shape in which aestheta (intuitions) are
presented to the understanding.
The ambition of the 'transcendental logic' of CPR is to reform meta
physics on the basis of a fusion of the logical and epistemological aspects
of the concept. The one account views the concept as a function of the
unity ofjudgement, while the other sees it as a noeta related to an aestheta.
120
CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION
In the latter the concept takes its place within the general Kantian problem
of synthesis, with its connotations of freedom, spontaneity and finitude.
This aspect was developed in the systematic logics of the German idealists
- Fichte, Schelling and above all Hegel. In the Science of Logic (1812) Hegel
.draws out the ambiguities of the Kantian account of the concept, showing
that its attempt to reconcile logic and epistemology is informed by an
ontology, and that its equivocal relationship between concept and intui
tion may be analyzed in terms of the relationship between universality,
particularity and individuality.
The programme of transcendental logic was severely challenged in the
century following Kant, with criticism focusing on the nature of the con
cept. For Frege concepts are objective and subject only to the laws of logic;
they must not be confused with epistemological 'ideas'. In direct criticism
of Kant he maintained that 'The concept has a power of collecting to
gether far superior to the unifying power of synthetic apperception' (Frege,
1950, §47). An analogous dislocation of the transcendental logic was carried
out by Wittgenstein when he treated the concept not in terms of its relation
to the world through perception, but in its syntactical relation to other
concepts. A different route was taken by neo-Kantian critiques of psycho
logical and empiricist accounts of the origin of concepts. Their discussion
of 'concept formation' regarded it as neither an introspective, psychological
process nor a process of abstracting from empirically given data, but paid
homage to Kant by regarding it as a form of transcendental reflection. An
important version of the latter was developed by Husserl, who sought the
process of concept formation in the work of the imagination, distinguish
ing the 'lived experience of the imagination' from both psychological and
abstractive processes.
concepts of reason see REASON
concepts of reflection see also AMPHIBOLY, CATEGORIES, CONCEPTS, FORM, IDEN

TITY, INNER/OUTER, JUDGEMENT, MATTER, ORIENTATION, REFLECTION
The concepts of reflection are employed in an act of judgement to com
pare given concepts with each other and with intuitions, and thus unlike
concepts of the understanding have no reference to an object. Kant lists
them as identity and difference, agreement and opposition, inner and
outer, and matter and form (CPR A 260-80/B 316-36). They are orien
tational concepts applied by the judgement to both concepts and intuitions,
and for this reason are prone to amphiboly, that is, being used illegitimately
to elide the distinction between understanding and intuition. For Kant the
concepts of reflection point to an operation of the faculty of judgement
prior to the act of judgement which synthesizes concept and intuition.
121
CONCEPTS OF THE UNDERSTANDING
This prior work of judgement reflects on the character of a representation

(whether it is a concept or an intuition) through transcendental reflec
tion, and then assigns it a place according to a transcendental topic.
The transcendental topic, Kant claims, 'contains no more than the
above-mentioned four headings of all comparison and distinction. They
are distinguished from categories by the fact that they do not present
the object according to what constitutes its concept (quantity, reality), but
only serve to describe in all its manifoldness the comparison of the rep
resentations which is prior to the concept of things. But this comparison
requires in the first place a reflection; that is, a determination of the
location to which the representations of the things that are being com
pared belong, namely whether they are thought by the pure understanding
or given in appearance by sensibility' (CPRA 269/B 326). On the basis of
this account of the concepts of reflection, Kant accused Leibniz and Locke
of making an amphibolous use of these concepts, with the former using
them to 'intellectualise appearances' and the latter to 'sensualise the
concepts of the understanding' (CPR A 271/B 327). The <langer of the
amphibolous use of concepts of reflection such as identity and difference
is that it permits them to 'intrude into ontology' and to appear as if they
were properties of things rather than a means for orienting judgement.
concepts of the understanding see CATEGORIES, CONCEPTS, UNDERSTANDING

The pure concepts of the understanding are another name for the catego
ries (see CPR A 79/B 105).
condition [Bedingung] see also ABSOLUTE, ACCIDENT, APPEARANCE, CAUSALITY,
DIALECTIC, EXPERIENCE, INTUffiON, SPACE, SUCCESSION, TIME
Appearances are conditioned by space and time, while judgements are
conditioned by 'the unification of given representations in a conscious
ness'. Together they form the conditions for objects of possible experi
ence, and the knowledge of such objects. Reason, however, strives for the
unconditioned in knowledge and experience, and when it infers an un
conditioned or absolute on the basis of an extended series of conditions
it exceeds the bounds of possible objects and legitimate knowledge of
experience. Kant calls such illegitimate inferences of the unconditioned
from the conditioned 'dialectical', and gives an analysis of them in the
'Transcendental Dialectic' of CPR.
Conflict of the Faculties First published by Nicolovius in autumn 1798, CF

comprises, in Kant's words, 'three essays that I wrote for different purposes
at different times' with a preface and an introduction. The three essays -
'The Conflict of the Philosophy Faculty with the Theology Faculty', 'The
Conflict of the Philosophy Faculty with the Faculty of Law' and 'The
122
CONFLlCT OF THE FACULTIES
Conflict of the Philosophy Faculty with the Faculty of Medicine' - address

the general problem of the relationship between knowledge and power
and the specific problem of the relationship between the university and
the state by means of a discussion of the relationship of the 'lower faculty'
of philosophy to the three 'higher faculties' of theology, law and medicine.
The broad background to CF was the increasing tension throughout the
second half of the eighteenth century between the claims of higher fac
ulties largely dedicated to vocational training of priests, lawyers and doctors
and those of the lower, philosophical faculty to speak philosophically upon
theological, legal and medical issues. The immediate context of Kant's
text, however, was the tightening of the censorship following the accession
of Frederick William in 1786 with the intention to reverse the process of
enlightenment encouraged by Frederick II.
The first essay concerns the conflict of philosophy with the theology
faculty. lt arose directly from Kant's difficulties with the religious censor
over the publication of RL. This was to have been published in four parts
by the Berlin enlightenment j<>urnal Berlinische Monatsschrift in 1792. The
first instalment was approved by the philosophy censor for publication,
and appeared in April 1792. The remaining three parts were submitted to
the religious censor, who withheld approval. The editor of the Berlinische
Monatsschrift then appealed unsuccessfully to both the Censorship Com
mission and the King. Kant's response was to submit the manuscript first
to the Königsberg theology faculty in order to establish it as a work of
philosophy, and thus under the jurisdiction of the philosophy censor, and
then for censorship to the philosophy faculty of the University of Jena.
The text as a whole received the imprimatur, and was published in
Königsberg in 1793.
Following the events surrounding the publication ofRL, Kant was invited
on 14 June 1794 by Carl Friedrich Stäudlin, the editor of the Göttingen
theological journal, to contribute an article. Kant replied on December
4th of the same year declining the invitation, for the reason that, although
he bad written the article, he had since received a Cabinet Order dated
October Ist which accused him of misusing his philosophy to 'distort and
disparage many of the cardinal and basic teachings of the Holy Scriptures
and Christianity' and of leading youth astray. The Order threatened 'un
pleasant measures' in the case of 'continuing obstinacy'. Kant replied
defending himself against the charges, but undertaking 'hereafter [ to]
refrain altogether from discoursing publicly, in lectures or writings, on
religion, whether natural or revealed'. The text he bad written for Stäudlin
was the first casualty of this vow, and was withheld until after the death of
Frederick William in 1797, when it formed the first of the three parts
of CF. The Cabinet Order and Kant's reply were also published as the
123
CONSCIENCE
preface to CF along with some barbed comments on 'any new invasions

of obscurantism'.
The second essay on the conflict between the philosophy and the law
faculties was also written for the Berlinische Monatsschrift and also refused
the imprimatur by the censor. The artide, 'An Old Question Raised Again:
Is the Human Race Constantly Progressing?' was written in 1795, and was
published again following the death of Frederick William II. The third
essay conceming the conflict with the medical faculty was the exception
in not falling foul of the censor. lt takes the form of a letter to C.W.
Hufeland and was written in response to a copy of Hufeland's Macrobiotics,
or the Arl of Prolonging Human Life which the author sent to Kant late in
1796. Kant's philosophical account of the body and health was first pub
lished by Hufeland in 1798 in the Journal of Practical PharmacolofsY and
Surgery before its appearance in CF.
The three essays are brought loosely together by an introduction which
reflects on the mission of the University, the tension between the de
mands of scholarship and those of the state, and a call for the academic
freedom of the lower faculty. The characteristics and the purposes of the
teachings of the three higher faculties are described and distinguished
from those of philosophy. Tue higher faculties are concemed with policing
the interpretation of religious and legal texts and the training of doctors,
while the lower faculty is concemed above all with public criticism. Kant
proceeds to explore these, more or less tangentially, with great insight and
wry humour. In spite of the book's contrived character, Kant makes sev
eral insightful points conceming the relationship of power and knowledge
which eventually cohere into a consistent case for academic freedom as
well as a still timely assessment of the forces within and without the uni
versity which threaten it.
conscience [syneidesis, conscientia, Gewissen] see also CONSCIOUSNESS, FEAR, FREE

DOM, GOD, JUDGEMENT, POSTUIATE, PUNISHMENT
Conscience is originally a Greek ethical term meaning �oint knowledge'.
lt was systematically developed as a part of Christian doctrine by Paul in
the New Testament (e.g., Acts 24:16). lt is a sense or conviction that a
thought or course of action is correct, one which is held to originate in
the voice of God. Kant's use of the concept is more indebted to Calvin and
Calvinism than to Luther and the Pietists. The latter regarded conscience
as being in a state of torment which was healed by God's grace. Pietists
such as Arndt considered the state of grace to consist in the passive renun
ciation of the world (Arndt, 1605, p. 122) and saw the joy of conscience
as arising from an inner piety. Calvin, on the contrary, saw conscience as
an important aspect of Christian liberty. He distinguished between the .
124
CONSCIOUSNESS
'external forum' of the world and the 'forum of conscience' not in order
to justify a retreat from the world but in order to live a just life in the
world. He defines conscience as 'knowledge or science' to which 'a sense
of the divine justice [is] added as witness'; it stands as it were between God
and man, not suffering man to suppress what he knows in himself' (Calvin,
1962, Vol. II, p. 141).
Kant's discussions of conscience in RL, LE and MM all follow Calvin in
considering conscience to be an inner forum or court. In the first text
Kant defines conscience as 'a state of consciousness which in itself is duty'
(RL p. 185, p. 173), and by this he means that it is 'the moral faculty of
judgement passing judgement on itself'. lt does not judge actions as if
they were cases falling under a law, but is reason judging itself 'as to
whether it has really undertaken that appraisal of actions (as to whether
they are right or wrong) with all diligence, and it calls the man himself to
witness Jor or against himself whether this diligent appraisal did or did not
take place' (RL p. 186, p. 174). In LE this self:iudgement is described as
the passing of a sentence: conscience 'pronounces a judicial verdict, and,
like a judge who can only punish or acquit but cannot reward, so also our
conscience either acquits or declares us guilty and deserving of punish
ment' (LE p. 130). In fairly orthodox fashion, Kant considers conscience
to be 'the representative within us of the divine judgement seat: it weighs
our dispositions and actions in the scales of a law which is holy and pure;
we cannot deceive it, and, lastly, we cannot escape it because, like the
divine omnipresence, it is always with us' (LE p. 133).
The workings of the inner court of conscience are described most fully
in MM. lt is the 'inner judge' by which everyone 'finds themselves ob
served, threatened, and in general, kept in awe' (MM p. 438, p. 233).
Before an action is undertaken, conscience issues a warning, but after the
deed has been done 'the prosecutor comes forward in conscience' accom
panied by a defence council. The dispute cannot be settled amicably, and
the judge of conscience has to pass sentence, acquitting or condemning.
An acquittal does not bring reward or joy (as the Pietists thought) but only
a relief from anxiety. In an interesting reflection on his own judicial analogy,
Kant suggests that the existence of conscience may be used to support the
postulate of the existence of God as an 'omnipotent moral being' (MM
p. 439, p. 234).
consciousness [Bewusstsein] see also APPERCEPTION, COGNITION, I, '1 THINK',

IDENTITY, PARALOGISMS, PERCEPTION, PSYCHOLOGY, REPRESENTATION, SPONTANEITY,
SUBJECT, SYNTHESIS, UNITY
Kant defines consciousness in L as the 'representation that another rep
resentation is in me' which forms the 'universal condition of all cognition
125
CONSCIOUSNESS
in general' (L p.544).lt is held to 'accompany' all cognitions, determining

their form or the 'how' (as opposed to the matter or 'what' of cognition).
With the notion of a 'condition' which is also an 'accompaniment' to
cognition, Kant shows himself to be heir to a deeply perplexed tradition
of thought conceming the precise status of consciousness.
In De Anima Aristotle rehearsed many of the problems which subse
quently informed the attempt to define consciousness. He asks whether
the awareness of seeing is given us by sight 'or some sense other than
sight', and, if the latter, whether 'we must either fall into an infinite
regress, or we must somewhere assume a sense which is aware of itself '
(Aristotle, 1941, 425b, 17). Aristotle prefers the latter option, but the
problem of the status of the 'awareness' or 'consciousness', with regard to
what it is conscious of, remains a cause of concern. The same problem
arises with the mind which 'is itself thinkable in exactly the same way as
its objects are' (Aristotle, 1941, 430a, 2). Were it not, we would then be
required to seek a form of consciousness capable of containing both the
mind and its objects, and then how could we become conscious of this?
In other words, the consciousness which accompanies a perception always
points beyond itself to a more inclusive form of consciousness.
Prior to the seventeenth century there was no specific term correspond
ing to 'consciousness'; it was not considered to be a property of the mind
or senses but one of their actions. Descartes describes acts of becoming
conscious, not acts of a consciousness, while Spinoza describes the act of
the soul becoming aware of itself as 'sensibility'. The term consciousness
is first used consistently by Locke (1690), and following him Leibniz (1765,
where he uses the term consciosite). Locke defines consciousness as 'the
perception of what passes in a man's own mind' (1690, p. 42) and derives
it from acts of consciousness. His main concern, however, is to argue from
the fact of consciousness to that of personal identity, making conscious
ness the basis of a subject: 'For, it being the same consciousness that
makes a man be himself to himself, personal identity depends on that only ...'
(p. 163). Consciousness, from being the action of the mind or senses,
becomes an act of self-consciousness which serves as a condition for all
other acts of consciousness. With this the Aristotelian fear of an infinite
regress is allayed. Kant develops the thought that consciousness is one
with self-consciousness, but refuses to regard the latter as the property of
an empirical subject.
The Wolffian school of philosophy regarded consciousness as the act of
being conscious (Beurust seyn, conscium esse) , or as Meissner ( 1737) defined
it, 'a characteristic by which we know that we are thinking'. lt is a purely
formal characteristic without any implications for the issues of self
consciousness and personal identity. Kant subscribed to this view of
126
CONSTITUTION
consciousness, maintaining in the third paralogism that the 'identity of

the consciousness of myself at different times is therefore only a formal
condition of my thoughts and their coherence, and in no way proves the
numerical identity of my subject' (CPR A p. 363). This formal condition
is the product of an 'act of spontaneity' which cannot be invested in any
empirical subject; it is 'that self-consciousness which, while generating the
representation "I think" (a representation which must be capable of ac
companying all other representations, and which in all consciousness is
one and the same), cannot itself be accompanied by any further represen
tation' (CPR B p. 132). This act, identical with pure apperception, pro
duces the 'transcendental unity of self-consciousness' which is both the
condition and accompaniment of experience while not being itself a
possible object of experience. lt provides an a priori horizon for the judge
ments of experience which are none other than 'the uniting of represen
tations in a consciousness' (P §22). As such it must be radically distinguished
from the consciousness of ourselves as empirical, finite beings, which is
the concem of 'psychological (applied) consciousness' (A §7).
The immediate post-Kantian generation of philosophers made self
consciousness the 'highest principle' of their philosophical systems. Schell
ing, for example, claimed that 'primary knowledge is for us without doubt
the knowledge of ourselves, or self-knowledge' (1800, p. 23). Hegel, how
ever, attempted to work through and beyond the philosophy of conscious
ness. He distinguished between consciousness, which involved a relation
to an object, and self-consciousness which involved the relation between
a subject and another self-consciousness. He criticized Kant and Fichte for
eliding consciousness and self-consciousness, arguing that this led to the
positing of an unknowable and yet sovereign self-consciousness which
treated other self-consciousnesses as if they were things. In the Phenomenowgy
of Spirit he gave an exposition of the emergence of consciousness and
self-consciousness in terms of a struggle for recognition in which self
consciousness was discovered through the recognition of another self
consciousness. This development away from the theoretical alignment
of self-consciousness and the unitary subject anticipated many twentieth
century developments in the philosophy of consciousness, especially those
in the field of psychoanalysis, where the unconscious is considered to be
a source of meaning situated beyond the individual subject (see Freud,
1915). The theme of consciousness took on political significance in Marx
ist theory and its account of dass consciousness (see Lenin, 1902; Lukacs,
1922).
constitution [Veifassung] see also COSMOPOLITANISM, GOD, HISTORY, LAW, STATE,

SYSTEM, THEODICY, WORLD
127
CONSTITUTION
The term 'constitution' is first used by Kant in UNH to describe the

'systematic constitution of the universe' or the order of the stars and
planets (UNH p. vi, p. 100). The bodies making up a constituted system
relate both to a 'common centre' such as the sun, and to each other by
sharing a common plane or ecliptic. The constitution of the universe is
dynamic and progressive, manifesting a process of eternal creation which
relates the parts of the universe to each other, and all to the original
creative act of God. The course of creation will 'enliven all spaces of the
presence of God and will gradually place them into the regularity which
is appropriate to the magnificence of his plan' (UNH p. 114, p. 154). In
DS this view of constitution is extended to the moral world where it refers
to the 'moral unity [of] a systematic constitution, drawn up in a accord
ance with purely spiritual laws' (p. 335, p. 322). Once again, this consti
tution is an. aspect of a theodicy in which 'A secret power forces us to
direct our will towards the well-being of others or regulate it in accord
ance with the will of another, although this often happens contrary to our
will and in strong opposition to our selfish inclination' (p. 334, p. 322).
That Kant discerned a relationship between the physical and the moral
and political aspects of constitution is evident in texts from the critical
period such as IUH and CJ - even CPR. In defence of the thesis that the
'history of mankind' is the 'realisation of a hidden plan of nature to bring
about a perfect political constitution', Kant appeals to evidence that the
universe 'is constituted as a system' (IUH p. 27, p. 50). From this he
argues further that nature is working slowly through 'reformative revo
lutions', towards universal government. Similarly, in CJ the formal condition
for attaining 'The Ultimate End of Nature as a Teleological System' is 'a
constitution so regulating the mutual relations of men that the abuse of
freedom by individuals striving one against another is opposed by a lawful
authority centred in a whole, called civil society' (§83). Such a constitu
tion is necessary for 'the greatest development of natural tendencies' but
must be supplemented by a 'cosmopolitan constitution' or a 'system of all
states that are in <langer of acting injuriously to one another'. In CPR the
same constitution is described as one which allows 'the gr-eatest possibk human
freedom in accordance with laws by which the freedom of each is made to be
consistent with that of all the others' (CPR A 316/B 373).
Kant's discussions of the constitutional forms of state and international
relations in PP and MM, as well as those of the church in RL, are set
within the context of progressive history. This allowed him to abjure the
right to revolution, and to prefer a reformist course of historical develop
ment. The idea of a civil constitution, he says in MM, is 'an absolute com
mand [of] practical reason' (MM p. 372, p. 176) but it may not be acted
upon by any subordinate authority in the state, even if the organization of
128
CONSTITUTIVE PRINCIPLES
the state is faulty. The authoritarian implications of this idea are hinted at
in a footnote on the French Revolution in CJ in which, while every mem
ber is called at to be an end and not a means, they should nevertheless,
because of their contribution to 'the possibility of the entire body', 'have
their position and function defined by the idea of the whole' (CJ §65).
This emerges in PP as the defence of a republican, but not democratic,
constitution founded upon the three principles of 'jreedom for all mem
bers of society', dependence of everyone upon a single common legislation
(as subjects) and 'legal equality for everyone (as citizens)' (p. 350, p. 99).
This idea of a republican constitution offers a canon for judging existing
monarchic, aristocratic and democratic constitutions, as well the idea for
a future constitution which combines the greatest freedom for individual
persons and individual states to relate to each other with their mutual
dependence upon a lawful authority or 'common centre'.
constitutive principles see also IDEAS, PRINCIPLES, RULES

Constitutive principles 'seek to bring the e:ristence of appearances under
rules a priori' (CPR A 179/B 221) and are distinguished in CPR from
regulative principles which offer rules 'according to which a unity of ex
perience may arise from perception' (CPR A 180/B 223). Kant uses the
distinction in his discussions of the 'principles of pure reason' and the
'transcendental ideas'. Of the four principles only the axioms of intuition
and the anticipations of perception are constitutive, in so far as they de
scribe the ways in which 'perception or empirical intuition in general itself
comes about'. The analogies of experience and the postulates of empirical
thought offer rules according to which experience may be organized; un
like the former they do not involve the constitution of appearances, but
only the ways in which they may be regulated. Similarly, the cosmological
ideas conceming the beginning of the universe and its divisibility are not
constitutive but regulative, 'not indeed as the axiom that we think the
totality as actually in the object, but as a problem for the understanding'
(CPR A 508/B 536). The principle of reason which regresses from the
conditioned to the unconditioned is not constitutive, 'enabling us to extend
our concept of the sensible world beyond all possible experience', but is
a rule 'postulating what we ought to do in the regress, but not anticipating
what is present in the object as it is in itself, prior to all regress' (CPR A
509/B 537).
The entire 'Transcendental Dialectic' in CPR may be considered as an
analysis of what happens when regulative ideas are applied constitutively.
When ideas of reason such as God, the world and the soul are used con
stitutively 'as supplying concepts of certain objects, they are but pseudo
rational, merely dialectical concepts' (CPR A 644/B 672) and are liable to
129
CONSTRUCTION
come into conflict with themselves (see also A 666/B 694). When used
constitutively, the ideas are given an illusory existence; however, when
they are restricted to their proper, regulative use, they serve only to direct
'the understanding towards a certain goal upon which the routes marked
out by all its mies converge, as upon their point of intersection. This point
is indeed a mere idea, a Jocus ima[finarius, from which, since it lies quite
outside the bounds of possible experience, the concepts of the under
standing do not in reality proceed' (CPR A 644/B 672). The regulative
principles and ideas, in other words, contribute to the orientation of the
understanding without claiming to constitute an object, nor to contribute
directly to knowledge.
construction see also HYPOTYPOSIS, MATHEMATICS, SCHEMATISM

In his Commentary on the First Book ofEuclid's Ekments Proclus lists construc
tion along with enunciation, exposition, specification, proof and conclusion
as the constituent parts of a Euclidean geometrical theorem. lt 'adds what
is lacking in the given for finding what is sought' (Proclus, 1970, p. 159).
Kant maintained this geometrical sense of the word, but broadened its
scope to include a general account of presentation or hypotyposis. His
account of construction is crucial for both his specific philosophy of math
ematics and his more general account of knowledge and cognition.
Kant answers the question posed in P, 'how is pure mathematics pos
sible?', by stating its 'first and highest condition of possibility', which is
that 'some pure intuition must form its basis, in which all its concepts may
be presented or constructed, in concreto and yet a priori' (P §7). Construc
tion combines the a priori and the concrete, and does so by means of
'presenting its concepts in intuition'. When the concept of the under
standing or 'ground of the unity of construction' is presented in intuition,
it accordingly 'determines space to assume the form of a circle, or the
figures of a cone and a sphere' (P §38). Kant described the insight into
the nature of construction as the 'intellectual revolution' which gave rise
to mathematics, one which consisted in the mathematician bringing out
'what was necessarily implied in the concepts that he had himself formed
a priori, and had put into the figures in the construction by which he
presented it to himself' (CPR B xii).
Kant extends his account of construction in two not entirely consistent
directions. In the methodology of CPR he uses it to distinguish between
geometrical and philosophical method. This was the continuation of his
quarre! with the Wolffian style of geometrical presentation commenced in
PE. Mathematical knowledge is axiomatic and considers 'the universal in
the particular, or even in the single instance' while philosophical knowledge
is acroamaticor discursive, and 'considers the particular only in the universal'
130
CONTINUITY
(CPR A 714/B 742). However, Kant also made the notion of construction
pivotal in his account of the origins of experience in the combination of
concept and intuition. In OD, construction is defined as 'all presentation
of a concept through the (spontaneous) production of a corresponding
intuition' (OD p. 192, p. 111). Such construction is pure 'if it occurs
through the mere imagination in accordance with an a priori concept'
and empirical 'if it is practised on some kind of material' (ibid.). The first
kind of construction is schematic and is carried over into the schematism
chapter of CPR, while the latter is technical and is discussed in CJ, notably
in the 'First Introduction'. In both cases, the significance of construction
is extended beyond the original geometrical context into a general ac
count of the presentation of concepts in intuition.
Kant's extension of geometrical construction into an account of pres
entation in general has been important for radical developments in
twentieth-century phenomenology, notably Husserl's Origi,ns of Geometry
(1954) and the commentary upon it by Derrida (1962), as well as in
Lyotard's work on 'presentation' since (1971), above all in The Differend
(1983). lt offers a point of departure for an inquiry into the presentation
of the concept or law which nevertheless respects concrete singularity.
content see FORM
contingency see NECESSITY
continuity see also ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, ANTICIPATIONS OF PERCEPTION,

CAUSALITY, CONTRACT, HOMOGENEITY, MAGNITUDE
For Kant continuity is a fundamental property which informs intuition,
the understanding and reason. lt is defined in CPR as 'the property of
magnitudes by which no part of them is the smallest possible; that is, by
which no part is simple' (A 169/B 212). lt underlies the claim made in the
anticipations of perception that the real of appearances possesses inten
sive magnitude or degree, and is the only quality which may be known a
priori of magnitudes (CPR A 176/B 218). The forms of intuition - space
and time - are described as continuous quantities (quanta continua) be
cause they have no smallest part; points and instants are described as
'limit positions' which 'presuppose the intuitions which they limit or are
intended to limit' (CPR A 169/B 211). The categories too obey the 'law
of the continuity of all alteration', as may be illustrated by the discussion
of the category of causality in the second analogy of experience. The
action of causality is continuous; a change of state occurs continuously
over time since 'neither time nor appearance in time consists of parts
which are the smallest' (CPRA 209/B 254). Reason too 'prepares the field
131
CONTRACT
for the understanding' (A 657/B 685), by the regulative principle of con

tinuity. lt is introduced as the 'union' of the principles of generic homo
geneity and specific variety or heterogeneity which allows us 'even amidst
the utmost manifoldness [ to] observe homogeneity in the gradual transition
from one species to another . . .' (A 660/B 688). Although Kant concedes
that the 'logical law of the continuum speciernm (jormarum lop;i,carum) pre
supposes a transcendental law (/,ex continui in natura)' (A 660/B 688) he
carefully specifies that such transcendental continuity cannot be an object
of experience, nor as a principle may it be given a deduction, but may
only be used regulatively as a 'heuristic principle' for the 'guidance of
the empirical employment of reason' and the 'elaboration of experience'
(A 663/B 691).
Continuity also plays a considerable role in Kant's philosophy of right.
In his discussion of possession in MM, he claims that transfer by contract
'takes place in accordance with the law of continuity (/,ex continuz)' (MM
p. 274, p. 93). This is necessary to prevent ownership of the object lapsing
even for an instant in the course of its transfer. Kant justifies this use of
continuity by recourse to the notion of 'united will' through which, at the
moment of transfer, both parties to a contract form a third, 'united will'
which ensures continuity of possession.
contract see also CONTINUITY, JUSTICE, LAW, MARRIAGE, OBLIGATION, PROPERTY, RIGHT,
STATE, WILL
Contract has become the dominant form of social relationship in modern
society, giving shape to our conceptions of volition, consent and obliga
tion. Originally limited in Justinian's Digest of Roman law to private law
obligations between citizens, the scope of contract was extended in the
early modern period to include not only the formation of the state (as in
Rousseau's Social Contract of 1762) but also moral and ethical relation
ships. This extension of the scope of contract is evident in, and promoted
by, Kant's practical philosophy, especially MM. This was indebted to the
systematization ofRoman legal concepts carried to an extreme byWolffian
philosophers of law in the period immediately prior to Kant.
Kant defines a contract in terms of 'two acts that establish a right: a
promise and its acceptance' (MM p. 284, p. 102). Since he wishes to
develop a transcendental account of contract he abstracts from the matter
of contracts - their objects - and concentrates upon the form of obliga
tion. He accordingly emphasizes the personal over the real aspects of
contract, not regarding delivery and acquisition as constitutive parts of a
contract, but only as its effects. To ensure the desired result, Kant postulates
three parties to a contract: a promisor, an acceptor and a guarantor. This
leads to a duplication of contracts, that between the promisor and acceptor
132
CONTRACT
being supplemented by that between the promisor and guarantor. Kant

proceeds to divide contracts according to three types. The first grants
'unilateral acquisition' and is a 'gratuitous contract' such as trust, loan
and gift. The second form of contract- 'onerous contrac_t'- grants acqui
sition to both parties, and includes harter, sale, loan and agency. The
third group comprises contracts of guarantee which provide security
through pledge and assumption of liability. With this Kant develops a
typology of contracts which emphasizes the personal form of liability and
obligation over the real objects of contract.
The emphasis on the personal aspects of the contract follows from
Kant's voluntaristic characterization of the contractual act. The 'prepara
tive' and the 'constitutive' elements of a contract are dedicated to achiev
ing a unity of will between the parties. In the preparatory stage of
'negotiating' a contract, an offer is marle and assented to; this is followed
in the constitutive or concluding stage by a promise and an acceptance.
What is acquired initially is not a real right to an extemal thing, but a
right 'against a person . ..a right to act upon his causality (his choice) to
perform something for me ...' (MM p. 274, p. 93). A right to a thing only
follows after performance, but this transfer of ownership raises consider
able problems for Kant's account of contract. If all rights are fundamen
tally personal, then a hiatus in ownership arises in the course of transferring
an object from one party to another. Kant attempts to solve this difficulty
by appealing to a third united will comprised of that of the two parties
which provides continuity of ownership even while the object is trans
ferred from one party to the other.
Kant extended the scope of contract from basically commercial trans
actions between individuals to ethical and political relations. A notorious
example is his definition of marriage as the contract which ensures 'the
union of two persons of different sexes for lifelong possession of each
other's sexual attributes' (MM p. 277, p. 96 - a complex example which
threatens the distinction between real and personal possession). He also
discusses the founding of a state in terms of the idea of an original contract,
as 'the act by which a people forms itself into a state' (MM p. 315, p. 127).
In this contract, everyone exchanges their 'extemal freedom' for 'civil
freedom'.Three distinct contracts are in fact undertaken in the formation
of the state: the first is between future citizens in which 'each comple
ments the others to complete the constitution of a state' (MM p. 315, p.
127); the second is between the people and a superior, the contract of
'subordination'; and the third is between the superior and the people
through which 'each subject is apportioned his rights' (MM p. 316, p.
127).The idea of this original contract provides a regulative idea by which
'to think of the legitimacy of a state' (MM p.315, p.127) and thus 'involves
133
CONTRADICTION
an obligation on the part of the constituting authority to make the kind

of government suited to the idea of the original contract' (MM p. 340, p.
148). Kant extends this original contract within a state to that between
states, proposing a 'league of nations' based on an association of sovereign
authorities.
The indirect influence of Kant's account of contract is incalculable,
since his contractual accounts of property, government and international
relations have given rise to an enormous polemical literature which now
bears little relation to his original texts and their intentions.
contradiction [Widerspruch] see also CERTAINTY, CONCEPT, EXISTENCE, FORCE,

MOTION, TIME, TRUTH
The law or principle of contradiction is described by Aristotle in the
Metaphysics as the most 'certain' and 'indisputable' of principles. However,
his definition - 'that the same attribute cannot at the same time belong
and not belong to the same subject and in the same respect' (Aristotle,
1941, 1005b, 18-20) - contains a crucial, and extremely consequential
temporal qualification. This is spelt out in his work On Interpretation, where
the principle is said to hold only on the assumption of temporal simulta
neity: 'since these same affirmations and denials are possible with refer
ence to those times which lie outside the present' (Aristotle, 1941, 17a, 30).
This significance of this proviso had been lost by the early eighteenth
century, with Christian Wolff establishing a rationalist philosophical system
based on the primacy of the principle of contradiction. According to
Wolff 's reading of the principle, being follows non-contradiction: 'some
thing cannot simultaneously be and not-be' (1719, §10) is interpreted to
mean that anything which is not contradictory can ipso facto exist. Kant's
early critiques of Wolff's reliance on this principle formed one of his
major steps towards the position of the critical philosophy, and broadly
consisted in a reconsideration of the significance of the Aristotelian tem
poral qualifier.
The ND of 1755 is dedicated to a critical investigation of 'the things
which are asserted, usually with more confidence than truth, concerning
the supreme statements - usually put forward with more confidence than
accuracy - about the supreme and undoubted primacy of the principle of
contradiction over all truths' (p. 387, p. 5). In this text Kant sought to
uncover additional principles of truth, but in subsequent writings he fo
cused increasingly on the limitations of logical affirmation and negation.
In NM he distinguished between logical and real opposition, the former
consisting in 'simultaneously asserting and denying something of the same
thing' while in the latter 'two predicates of a thing are opposed to each
other, but not through the law of contradiction' (p. 171, p. 211). He
134
COPERNICAN REVOLUTION
illustrates his point with the example of motion and rest (previously dis
cussed in NT).According to the principle of contradiction a body cannot
both be and not-be in motion, yet Kant observes 'The motive force of a
body in one direction and an equal tendency of the same body in the
opposite direction do not contradict each other; as predicates they are
simultaneously possible in the same body. The consequence of such an
opposition is rest' (p. 171, p. 211). Kant then develops his point further
by insisting on the importance of the temporal horizon: what may be
contradictory at one time is not necessarily so at another.
The points made in the early writings against the principle of contra
diction are developed systematically in the critical philosophy. The prin
ciple of contradiction is a 'negative criterion of truth' and restricted to
serving as the 'princi,p!,e of all analytic knowkdge (CPR A 151/B 191). lt is
a purely formal principle, for in the words of L, 'a cognition that contra
dicts itself is of course false, but if it does not contradict itself it is not
always true' (p. 559). Kant maintains that while it is a 'necessary logical
condition that a concept of the possible must not contain any contradiction
...this is not by any means sufficient to determine the objective reality
of the concept, that is, the possibility of such an object as it is thought
through the concept' (CPR A 220/B 268). For the latter kind of synthetic
a priori knowledge it is necessary to supplement the principle of contra
diction with a series of additional principles which respect the spatial and
temporal conditions of finite human cognition.
Copernican revolution The 'revolution' was described by Nicolaus

Copemicus in the Introduction to his book On the R.evolutions of the Heav
enly Spheres (1543) as the 'hypothesis' 'which sets the earth in motion and
puts an immovable sun at the centre of the universe'. lt attempted to
explain the appearances of planetary motion by replacing a geocentric,
Ptolemaic explanatory framework with a heliocentric one while maintain
ing the Ptolemaic machinery of epicycles and circular celestial motion. In
the Preface to the Second Edition of CPR, Kant described his critical
philosophy as proceeding along the lines of 'Copemicus's primary hy
pothesis'.While previously metaphysics assumed that 'our knowledge must
conform to objects', now 'we must make trial' and 'suppose that objects
must conform to our knowledge' (CPR B xvi). Thus Copemicus, 'Failing
of satisfactory progress in explaining the movements of the heavenly bodies
on the supposition that they all revolved around the spectator, tried whether
he might not have better success if he made the spectator to revolve and
the stars to remain at rest'.Yet while Copemicus's revolution was based on
an hypothesis only subsequently confirmed by Kepler, 'who found an un
expected means of reducing the eccentric orbits of the planets to definite
135
COSMOTHEOLOGICAL PROOF
laws', and Newton 'who explained these laws in terms of a universal natu
ral cause' (IUH p. 18, p. 42) Kant maintains that his CPR will go further
than Copemicus by proving 'apodeictically not hypothetically, from the
nature of our representations of space and time and from the elementary
concepts of the understanding' (CPR B xxiii) that objects confonn to
knowledge, not knowledge to objects.
cosmotheological proof (of the existence of God) see THEOLOGY
cosmology see also ABSOLUTE, ANTINOMY, CAUSALI1Y, DIAf,ECfIC, NATURE, ONTOL

OGY, PSYCHOLOGY, THEOLOGY, WORLD
Cosmology is one of the three branches of 'Special Metaphysics' which
with ontology comprise the influential system of metaphysics developed by
Christian Wolff (1719). While ontology considered being-in-general, the
branches of special metaphysics concentrated upon the being of particular
objects: theology considered the being of God, psychology the being of
the soul and cosmology the being of the world. Wolff's metaphysics was
the 'pure reason' criticized by Kant, and the CPR closely follows its struc
ture: ontology is replaced by transcendental analytic, and special meta
physics by the transcendental dialectic. In the critical revision of special
metaphysics, the soul or 'idea of the absolute subject', the world or 'idea
of the complete series of conditions', and God or 'idea of a complete
complex of that which is possible' are revealed to be dialectical, and their
sciences ridden with dialectical inferences - psychology with paralogism,
cosmology with antinomy and theology with transcendent ideas.
Kant's early essay in cosmology, UNH, is a collection of speculative hyp o
theses concerning the constitution of the universe which idiosyncratically
combines arguments drawn from physics, theology and anthropology. lt is
precisely the kind of enterprise which CPR would prove to be ill-founded
and illegitimate, for the basic reason that it treated its hypothetical or
'regulative principles' as if they were apodeictic or 'constitutive'. The criti
cal cosmology concerns itself with showing the dialectical consequences of
over-extending categories properly applicable only to appearances. The
results are presented in the four antinomies, which reveal what happens
when the quantitative, qualitative, relational and modal categories are
made absolute, or extended beyond their proper spatio-temporal limits in
the world of appearances.
Kant begins with the dialectical employment of the categories of quan
tity. If we consider the magnitude of the world, whether it is finite or
infinite, we discover that we cannot conclusively prove that it is either; we
are left with the first antinomy which presents two opposed, but equally
convincing cases for the finitude and infinitude of the world. A similar
136
COSMOPOLITANISM
strategy of argument is pursued in the second, qualitative antinomy, which

concems the quality of the basic elements of the world. This too yields
both the thesis that the world is composed of simple atoms or monads and
the equally convincing antithesis that there are no simples and the world
is constituted of complexes. In these 'mathematical' antinomies, the dia
lectical illusions arise out of the equivocation of appearances in time and
space and things in themselves; we treat our conditions of knowledge as
if they were the absolute conditions of things.
The second pair of 'dynamical' antinomies also yield dialectical infer
ences, but for the reason that we presume on the basis of our spatio
temporally limited experience to make contradictory what might from
another standpoint be compatible. Our categorical understanding of causal
relations when extended to an absolute object becomes dialectical: either
everything is causally related and there is no independent cause, or there
is independent causality through freedom. Similarly with the modal cat
egories: when they are extended beyond appearances they produce the
antinomy that either there is an absolutely necessary being or there is not.
Kant's critical cosmology is 'canonical' in his sense of providing criteria
for establishing falsity. His cosmology is presented as a precautionary
measure taken against the 'natural illusion' of human reason which seeks
absolute knowledge of the world. lt shows that when reason extends the
concepts of the understanding beyond the world of appearances in space
and time it falls into conflict with itself. With this Kant effectively aban
doned the project of a philosophical cosmology, even though he left open
the possibility for a regulative use of the cosmological ideas. After him
Hegel and Schelling attempted to rescue the enterprise with the philosophy
of nature, but this was largely a rearguard action in the face of the move
ment of cosmological concerns out of philosophy and into natural science.
cosmopolitanism see also FEDERALISM, HISTORY, JUSTICE, NATURAL RIGHT, PEACE,

RIGHT, STATE, WAR
Cosmopolitanism is described in IUH as the 'matrix within which all the
original capacities of the human race may develop' (p. 28, p. 51). lt is a
necessary step towards the solution of the 'greatest problem for the hu
man species', which is that of 'attaining a civil society which can admin
ister justice universally' (p. 22, p. 45). This end cannot be achieved within
an individual state which participates in an antagonistic order of extemal
relations. Consequently, in this text and in PP Kant focuses upon a 'cos
mopolitan system of general political security' (p. 26, p. 49) between states,
one which he describes as a 'federation of peoples in which every state,
even the smallest, could expect to derive its security and rights not
from its own power or its own legal judgement, but solely from this great
137
CRITICAL PHILOSOPHY
federation ( foedus Amphictyonum), from a united power and the law gov
erned decisions of a united will' ( p. 24, p. 47). By contrast, in the closing
pages ofA, cosmopolitanism is itself described as the goal of the develop
ment of the human species. lt is not a constitutive but a regulative prin
ciple which demands that each individual, and not just each state, 'yield
generously to the cosmopolitan society as the destiny of the human race'
(A p. 331, p. 249). In accordance with the cosmopolitan regulative idea,
each individual should direct their actions towards the 'progressive or
ganisation of the citizens of the earth within and towards the species as a
system which is united by cosmopolitan bonds' (A p. 333, p. 251.)
critical philosophy see also CANON, ENLIGHTENMENT, HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,

JUDGEMENT, KNOWLEDGE, PEACE, PHILOSOPHY, PUBLICITY, WAR
Critical philosophy is the name given to the philosophical project ex
ecuted by Kant in the three critiques, of Pure Reason, Practical Reason and
Judgement. lt was Kant's response to what he described as his epoch: 'Our
epoch is, in especial degree, the epoch of criticism, and to criticism every
thing must submit' (CPR A xii). Not only 'Religion through its sanctity,
and law-giving through its majesty' must submit to reason's 'test of free
and open examination' but even reason itself. The 'maturedjudgement of
the epoch' issues 'a call to reason to undertake anew the most difficult of
all its tasks, that of self-knowledge' (CPR A xi) and to do this it must
institute a 'tribunal which will assure to reason its lawful claims', one
which will be 'at once strict andjust' (CPRA 395). The use ofthejuridical
metaphor for the self-examination of reason is not fortuitous, since for
Kant, without this tribunal reason is in a 'state ofnature, and can establish
and secure its assertions and claims only through war' (CPR A 751/
B 779). While the warring parties of dogmatism and scepticism settle their
disputes by each claiming victory and declaring a temporary armistice, the
critique of reason conducts its affairs 'solely by the recognised methods of
kgal adion'. lt does so according to 'fundamental principles of its own in
stitution, the authority of which no-one can question' (CPRA 751/B 779).
Critical philosophy gains its fundamental principles not through the
'critique of books and systems' but through that of 'the faculty of reason
in general' (CPR A xii). Its procedure is to 'investigate the faculty of
reason in respect of all its pure a priori knowledge' (A 841/B 870) and is
the propadeutic or preparation for a future metaphysical system of prin
ciples. Kant phrases the preparatory nature of critical philosophy in sev
eral ways: it is a canonical investigation of reason prior to its organization
into an organon; a negative clarification of the limits ofreason prior to its
positive exposition, and even the 'making room for faith' (CPR B xxx).
lt is distinguished from dogmatism and scepticism in that it does not
138
CRITIQUE OF JUDGEMENT
'lay claim to such insight into [its] object as is required to assert or deny
something in regard to it' but 'confines itself to pointing out that in the
making of the asseition something has been presupposed that is void and
merely fictitious' (CPR A 389). In other words, critical philosophy 'does
not consider the question objectively, but in relation to the foundation of
the knowledge upon which the question is based' (CPR A 484/B 512).
Kant's claim that western society had entered a critical age in which
nothing was exempt from criticism has been conclusively supported by the
experience of the two centuries since the publication of his critiques. The
objects of critique have ranged from religion, to political economy, to
literature and have produced powerful institutions or 'tribunals' of criti
cism. Yet even Kant's contemporaries found his claims to be establishing
a critical tribunal to be disingenuous, with Hamann (1967) and Herder
(1953) pointing out in their 'metacritiques' that the 'purism' of reason
overlooks its absolute reliance on an existing institution, namely language.
The immediately succeeding generation of philosophers such as Hegel
were unconvinced that reason was in a position adequately to criticize
itself. Later philosophers such as Marx and Nietzsche were similarly sceptical
ofthe 'critical tribunal', applauding the negative, critical moment ofKant's
philosophy while deploring his attempts to be a philosopher-legislator.
For them, and for many twentieth-century philosophers, critique must
remain vigilant against any relapse into institutional and intellectual dog
matism. This ethos has even returned into recent Kant exegesis, which has
downplayed the 'foundational' aspects of the critical philosophy in favour
of its 'anti-foundationalist' methodology.
Critique ofJudgement Published in 1790, the Critique forms the third work
in the critical trilogy, the one with which Kant claimed to bring his 'entire
critical undertaking to a close'. Quite what he meant by this claim is a
subject of controversy. The third critique may be regarded as the text
which brings together the otherwise opposed realms of nature and free
dom discussed in the theoretical philosophy of the first critique and the
practical philosophy ofthe second. Or it may be the text which rounds off
the discussion ofthe faculty ofthe understanding in the first critique, and
of reason in the second with a discussion of the faculty of judgement; or
alternatively the faculty of pleasure and pain. lt may even be that the third
critique closes the critical undertaking simply by adding a critical discussion
of the aesthetic judgement of taste to those of the theoretical and prac
tical judgements ventured in the first two critiques. Characteristically, Kant's
two introductions to CJ (the first, longer version initially discarded as
being too long and later published separately) can be called upon to
license all of these interpretations of the significance of the text in the
139
critical trilogy. Yet they also point beyond them to a more inclusive in
terpretation, which includes all of the above themes, and more.
lt must be remembered that CJ in fact comprises two critiques, each
complete with its own analytic and dialectic: the first is a critique of the
aesthetic judgement of taste, the second a critique of teleological judge
ment. Thus before any decision can be made on the place of the third
critique in the critical trilogy, it is necessary to establish what is at stake in
the text's intemal organization. The clue to solving both problems is given
in the tiße: this is a critique of the power of judgement (Urteilskraft), or
a critique of our ability to make judgements. In this respect, the text
addresses what was tak.en for granted in the previous two critiques. They
assumed that it was possible to make theoretical and practical judgements,
and set about justifying the conditions for this possibility. The third cri
tique, however, inquires into the conditions of the possibility not of dis
crete theoretical or practical judgements but of judgement itself. lt does
so by means of an analysis of two particularly problematic forms of judge
ment, the aesthetic judgement of taste and the teleological judgement.
These forms of judgement are problematic in that they do not assume
the givenness of a law or condition for the synthesis of a manifold. Thus
they seem to point to an operation of the power of judgement distinct
from, and perhaps prior to, that analyzed in the first two critiques. Kant
states this distinction formally in terms of the difference between determi
nant and reflective judgement: the former subsumes a manifold of intui
tion under a concept or law given by the understanding; the latter discovers
its law in the course of reflecting on the manifold which is presented to
it. This process of reflection, Kant suggests, might be considered to lie at
the origin of the categories themselves; that is, determinant judgement
might be a species of a generic reflective judgement. What is more, this
process of reflective judgement is inseparable from the experience of
pleasure, which-,is evidently present in reflective judgement, and even,
Kant hints, at one time accompanied determinant judgement which has
now become habitual and unnoteworthy (CJ §VI).
The relationship hinted at here between judgement and pleasure
contains several extraordinary and exciting implications. First of all, it
suggests an expanded view of imagination, which no longer serves as an
intermediary between intuition and understanding, merely facilitating
synthesis as in the first critique, but lies at the root of both faculties.
Second, the introduction of pleasure into the equation points to a new
relationship between the knowing subject and the objects of its knowledge
and judgements. This subject is no longer the abstract apperceptive 'I' but
has become embodied, a living part of nature. Throughout the 'Critique
of Aesthetic Judgement' Kant refers repeatedly to the 'feeling of life'
140
which is augmented by pleasure and diminished by pain, a feeling which

is an integral part of human nature. The analysis of the pleasure and pain
of embodiment in nature described in the 'Critique of AestheticJudgement'
may be complemented by the analysis of nature itself, of which human
beings form a part, undertaken in the 'Critique ofTeleologicalJudgement'.
The two parts of CJ may be read as offering access to the originary expe
rience of judgement, one in which a live, embodied subject engages with
its world. lt is a finite, embodied subject which through imagination in
habits past, present and future, and which experiences the pleasure and
pain of its judgements.
In CJ aesthetic no longer comprises simply the sensibility discussed in
the aesthetic of CPR, nor is it restricted to the analysis of our experience
of works of art, but instead explores the place of the body in nature and
its resultant pleasures and pains. The 'Critique of Aesthetic Judgement'
considers this relationship to nature by means of an analysis of judge
ments of taste which stresses the role of the 'subjective' experience of
imagination and reflective judgement in pleasure, while the 'Critique of
Teleological Judgement' considers the role of the 'objective' experience
of imagination and reflective judgement in the finality (Zweckmässigkei,t)
which we impute to nature. Together, both present an account of nature
and the place of human beings in it which far exceeds the oppositional
framework informing some parts of the first and all of the second critique.
The 'Critique of Aesthetic Judgement' loosely follows the structure of
the previous critiques with a doctrine of the elements and a methodology.
The doctrine of the elements is similarly divided into an analytic and a
dialectic. However, the exposition of the argument proceeds by means of
a neither/nor opposition which opposes an argument drawn from the
British theory of taste (Burke, Hutcheson, Hume and Kames) to one drawn
from the German theory of aesthetic (Baumgarten). Following the schema
of the table of the categories, Kant maintains that the quality of the judge
ment of taste is disinterested, unlike the arguments presented by the
competing traditions. The quantity of the judgement is universal, which
distinguishes it from the lack of universality in the theory of taste, and the
rational universality proposed by the aesthetic tradition. The relation of a
judgement of taste is, unlike in the theory of taste, 'final', but, now unlike
in the theory of aesthetic, it is a finality without an end. Similarly, the mo
dality of a judgement of taste is necessary, which distinguishes it from the
theory of taste, but it is not the rational necessity of an obscurely perceived
perfection as maintained by the theory of aesthetic.
The second part of the analytic moves to the consideration of the sub
lime, divided according to the mathematical and the dynamical sublime.
While the beautiful evoked pleasure directly, in the case of the sublime
141
pleasure arises from overcoming an initial experience of pain. This is

followed by a deduction of the aesthetic judgement of taste, which sum
mons various possible sources of justification of the peculiar universality
and necessity of these judgements, notably the common sense (sensus
communis), the 'universal voice', and a supersensible ground. The 'Dialec
tic of Aesthetic Judgement' comprises an examination of the antinomy
of the principle of taste, with the thesis claiming that the judgement of
taste is not based on concepts, the antithesis claiming that it is (§56). The
antinomy is 'solved' on the basis of the results of the analytic, by claiming
that the aesthetic judgement of taste rests upon an indeterminate con
cept. Finally, following some fascinating comments on beauty as a symbol
for morality, Kant presents a few thoughts on the teaching of taste by way
of a methodology.
On the evidence of most interpretations of CJ a reader would be justi
fied in thinking that the book ended with the 'Critique of Aesthetic Judge
ment'; in fact this comprises only the first half, and is followed by the
'Critique of Teleological Judgement'. This text is unjustly neglected, since
it is one of the most interesting, challenging and accomplished of Kant's
later texts. The analytic makes the case for a teleological explanation of
nature as opposed to the mechanical one, but specifies the rigorous con
ditions which it must satisfy. These come down to the fact that teleology
may only be treated as a mode of judgement, and that finality in nature
can only be considered as if it were objective. In this way Kant prepares
for his solution to the antinomy discussed in the dialectic between the
thesis of considering all material things as produced according to me
chanical laws, and the antithesis of regarding some material things as
requiring a different causality, namely final causality. The antinomy is
'solved' by regarding both thesis and antithesis as principles of reflection.
The larger part of the 'Critique of Teleological Judgement' is devoted to
the method, or the use of teleological judgement as a methodological
device for extending our knowledge of nature. In the succeeding teflec
tions on nature and judgement, Kant discusses the difference between the
Epicurean and the Spinozist systems of nature, as well as analyzing history
as the cultivation of nature. He ends the text with sustained reflections
upon physico- and ethico-theology, and by repeating his earlier critiques
of the ontological and cosmological proofs of the existence of God.
The first two critiques assumed a particular place for human beings in
nature, either opposed to it as subject to object, or uneasily inhabiting
both natural and intelligible realms. In CJ the place of human beings in
nature is rendered far more complex with the introduction of the themes
of pleasure, embodiment, imagination and judgement. The opposition
informing the first two critiques between the sensible and intelligible is
142
CRITIQUE OF PRACTICAL REASON
broken down and replaced by a complex account of our self-orientation

in nature and in history. This aspect of Kant's thought has captured the
imagination of many of his readers, from Goethe, to Nietzsche, to the
contemporary focusing of critical attention upon the third critique. Quite
in what sense it marks the closure of the critical undertaking still remains
open to interpretation. lt might even be argued that CPrR and CJ mark
distinct and irreconcilable developments of tendencies present in CPR,
and that CJ marks Kant's turning away from the dualistic tendency in
critical philosophy taken to an unwholesome extreme in CPrR.
Critique of Practical Reason Published in 1788, this Critique is the second

text in the critical trilogy and the second of Kant's three mature works in
moral philosophy. lt was preceded in 1785 by the Grounding Jor the Meta
physics of Moralsand succeeded in 1797 by The Metaphysics of Morals. As with
CPR, CPrR follows a synthetic method of exposition, proceeding from
moral principles through the moral law to freedom. In its justification of
the postulates of God, freedom and immortality it delivers the promise
made in the second preface to CPR 'to deny know/,edge, in order to make
room for Jaith' (B xxx). The work follows the organization of the critical
text established in CPR, with a 'Doctrine of the Elements of Pure Practical
Reason' followed by a 'Methodology of Pure Practical Reason'. As in CPR,
the 'Doctrine of Elements' is divided into an analytic and a dialectic. The
former begins with the definition of a practical principle as a 'general
determination of the will' distinguished as maxims, if subjectively valid,
and laws if objectively valid.
The first chapter of CPrR opens with eight theorems which establish the
nature of objective, practical principles by means of a polemic against the
principles of moral judgement - i.e., happiness, moral feeling, perfection
- as defended by moral philosophers prior to Kant. After establishing the
basis of the moral law in freedom, and its relationship to autonomy and
the categorical imperative, Kant proceeds to a deduction of the principles
in terms of the moral law's causality 'in an intelligible world (causality
through freedom)' (p. 49, p. 50). On this basis Kant presents a 'table of
categories of freedom' which are organized according to the familiar
schema of quantity, quality, relation and modality (CPrR p. 66, pp. 68-9).
This is followed by an interesting section on the 'typic of pure practical
judgement' which parallels the discussion of schematism in CPR, pro
ceeding to the pivotal section on the 'Incentives of Pure Practical Reason'.
Here Kant discusses the feeling of respect for the moral law as a mode of
the will's self-determination, and makes the important distinction between
acting according to, and from, duty, identifying the latter with acting with
respect for the law.
143
CRITIQUE OF PURE REASON
The 'Dialectic of Pure Practical Reason' focuses upon the antinomic

definitions of the highest good, presented in terms of the opposition
between the Epicurean and Stoic schools. This is translated into the op
posed positions on whether the desire for happiness is the motive for
maxims of virtue, or maxims of virtue the efficient cause of happiness
(CPrR p. 114, pp. 117-18). Kant argues away the opposition by claiming
that both principles assume 'existence in this world to be the only mode
of existence of a rational being', thus overlooking our 'existence as that
of a noumenon in an intelligible world' (p. 114, p. 119). This then leads
into the section 'On the Postulates of Pure Reason' which follow from the
existence of the moral law: these are immortality (to supply the necessary
duration for fulfilling the moral law), freedom (to satisfy the conditions
of independence from sensibility and the intelligible determination of
the will), and God (as the necessary condition of an intelligible world and
the highest good) (p. 132, p. 137). The postulates are then held to satisfy
practically the needs of reason whose speculative extension was severely
limited by the 'Transcendental Dialectic' of CPR. The text is completed in
the methodology by some comments on the extension of the influence of
practical reason, or 'the way we can make objectively practical reason also
subjectively practical' (p. 151, p. 155).
From the mass of criticism and commentary upon CPrR which has
accumulated, l select a particularly suggestive, and entirely plausible, pas
sage from Nietzsche's The Gay Science:
And now don't cite the categorical imperative, my friend! This term
tickles my ear and makes me laugh despite your serious presence. lt
makes me think of the old Kant who had obtained the 'thing in itself'
by stealth - another very ridiculous thing! - and was punished for this
when the 'categorical imperative' crept stealthily into his heart and
led him astray - back to 'God,' 'soul,' 'freedom,' and 'immortality,'
like a fox who loses his way and goes astray back into his cage. Yet it
had been his strength and clevemess that had lnvken open the cage!
(Nietzsche, 1882, §335)
Critique of Pure Reason The first of the critiques was published in 1781,
with a considerably revised second edition following in 1787. The original
edition is known as 'A', the second as 'B'. Tue Critique was over ten years
in the writing, and was followed in 1788 by the Critique of Practical &ason
and in 1790 by the Critique ofJudgement. lt presents among other things
Kant's mature reflections on metaphysics, epistemology, cosmology, psy
chology and theology, and has become famed as the founding text of
'critical' and 'transcendental philosophy'. lt is one of the most interpreted
texts in the history of philosophy, and set the agenda for many subsequent
144
developments. The barriers to entry posed by the text are, as Kant himself
acknowledged, formidable, but should not be exaggerated. Since the main
obstacle for contemporary readers lies in the unfamiliar organization of
the contents, which often leads to sight of the wood being lost for the
trees, this entry will concentrate on the overall ambition of the text, and
on the ways in which its various parts fit together. More detailed informa
tion on the parts of CPR may be gathered from other entries ( see especially
CONCEPT, COSMOLOGY, INTUITION, METAPHYSICS, PRINCIPLE, PSYCHOLOGY, REASON,
THEOLOGY, UNDERSTANDING).
CPR is in many respects a janus-faced text, one which looks back to the
philosophical tradition and forward to new developments both in phi
losophy and natural science. This accounts not only for the mingling of
traditional and modern terms and distinctions throughout the text - such
as 'transcendental unity of apperception', which combines the scholastic
'transcendental' with the modern 'apperception' - but also for its themes
and organization. CPR provides a traditional doctrine of the categories,
but bases them on the modern cogüo or thinking subject. lt takes a tradi
tional philosophical concept such as substance and reworks it to justify
Newtonian physics. lt proclaims a 'Copernican revolution' in philosophy,
proposing that 'objects must conform to our knowledge', and then stu
diously presents the results in the guise of a traditional metaphysical treatise.
An appreciation of these ironies, of which Kant himself was very much
aware, can contribute considerably to the pleasure of the text; if they are
not appreciated, the text can quickly become a burden.
In P Kant described the plan of CPR as 'executed in the synthetical
style' (p. 263, p. 8), which meant that the 'structure of a peculiar cognitive
faculty' was presented in its 'natural combination'. This is evident from
the contents of CPR following the Prefaces and the Introduction, which
are presented schematically in table 3.
The basic structural division is between the transcendental doctrines of
'elements' and 'method'. The meaning of the terms 'transcendental' and
'doctrine' is by no means fixed in Kant's writings, but here they mean that
the teaching of the elements and the method are not derived from em
pirical experience. The distinction of elements and method itself originates
in the parts of classical rhetoric, namely 'invention', or the discovery of
the basic elements of a speech; 'disposition', their organization in a speech;
and 'elocution', the delivery and presentation of the speech. Ramus used
a variant of this schema in his reorganization of Aristotelian logic which
brought together the parts of rhetoric as 'method', focusing upon invention
and disposition (see Ong, 1983). In Kant, this schema is superimposed
upon a more traditional Aristotelian organization. His doctrine of method
concerns the disposition of the elements of pure reason discovered in the
145
CRITIQUE
0
Table 3 Schematic representation of contents of the Critique of Pure Reason ..,,
�
Critique of Pure Reason 1;l
REAS
Transcendental Doctrine of Elements Transcendental Doctrine of Method 0

z
First Part: Transcendental Aesthetic Second Part: Transcendental Logic
1
Space Time First Division: Second Division:
Transcendental Analytic Transcendental Dialectic
146
Book I: Analytic of Concepts Book II: Analytic of Principles Transcendental Illusion Pure Reason
as the Seat of
Transcendental Illusion
Clue to the Discovery Deduction of Schematism System of all Phenomena and Book I Book II
of all Pure Concepts of the Pure Concepts of Principles Noumena Concepts of Dialectical Inferences
Understanding Understanding Pure Reason of Pure Reason
Paralogisms Antinomies The Ideal

(psychology) (cosmology) (theology)
doctrine of the elements into a 'complete system of pure reason'. The

doctrine of elements, which forms the bulk of CPR, concerns the invention
of the basic elements of knowledge which can be systematically disposed
and presented through the method.
The CPR stands or falls with the assessment of the doctrine of the
elements which presents the basic, underiveable elements of experience.
Yet it also presents several difficulties, not least of which is its polyphonic
character: it contains several complex, often overlapping and conflicting
internal articulations and thematic directions. The first part on 'Transcen
dental Aesthetic' and the two divisions of the second part 'Transcendental
Logic' may be read as the analysis of the parts of a 'cognitive faculty', be
ginning with sensibility and its intuition of objects, moving to the under
standing and its use of concepts in making judgements about intuited
objects, and then to reason and its inferences from and beyond these
judgements. The same sections can also be read in terms of the analysis
of a peculiar form of judgement in which the predicate enlarges the
meaning of its subject and does so in ways which can be shown to hold
universally and necessarily. For such 'synthetic a priori judgements' to be
possible, it is necessary that both the spatial and temporal conditions of
experience, as well as its concepts, be shown to possess universal and
necessary validity, one which Kant establishes on the basis of an idiosyn
cratic inflection of the Cartesian cogito or 'I think'.
These two readings of the doctrine of the elements by no means exhaust
all the possibilities; the same sections may also be read as a deconstruction
of traditional metaphysics, but in at least two ways. lt may most plausibly
be read as a systematic, critical analysis of the dominant metaphysical
tradition as established by Christian Wolff (1719). On this reading, tran
scendental analytic takes the place of general metaphysics or ontology,
with the three disciplines of special metaphysics - psychology, cosmology
and theology - being subject to critical scrutiny in the transcendental
dialectic. Finally, and perhaps less plausibly, the entire doctrine of the
elements can be read as a modern reworking of Aristotle's Organon with
the transcendental aesthetic replacing The Categories by providing the basic
elements of knowledge; the transcendental analytic taking the place of Of
Interpretation and perhaps the Prior and Posterior Analytics with its account
of judgement; and the transcendental dialectic taking the place of the
Topics and Sophistical R.efutations.
Each of these readings has some truth, all of them together a great deal,
but they do not exhaust the range of concerns explored in the 'Transcen
dental Doctrine of Elements'. They all, to varying degrees, exert an influ
ence on the general and discrete arguments, and in this respect contribute
to its perennial fascination for interpreters. These often show great (if not
147
perverse) ingenuity in playing one thematic current off against another

(the 'cognitive faculty' version being a favourite target). However, the
subtlety of such manoeuvres and their attention to the fine grain of the
argument often obscures the neo-classical simplicity of Kant's exposition.
The general line of Kant's argument can be discerned beneath the
various thematic modulations. He follows Baumgarten in dividing the
elements of experience into aestheta and noeta, things sensed and things
known, which correspond to the 'Transcendental Aesthetic' and 'Tran
scendental Logic'. The former considers the ways in which objects are
intuited, and proposes that this takes place by means of the forms of space
and time. These are neither merely subjective nor the property of objects,
but necessary conditions of our initial experience of the world. This is
followed by the first division of the 'Transcendental Logic', namely the
'Transcendental Analytic'. This section presents the intelligible elements
of our experience, and has two basic directions of argument. The first,
comprising the 'Analytic of Concepts', is to derive the set of 'pure con
cepts of the understanding' from the various forms of logical judgement,
and to justify their fundamental, a priori (that is, underived) character as
elements by means of a deduction. The second direction, followed in the
analytic of principles, seeks ways of adapting the categories to the spatio
temporal conditions of our intuition of objects, through the schematism
and the set of principles corresponding to each category.
The basic lesson of the transcendental aesthetic and analytic is summed
up in CPR A 158/B 197 as 'the conditions of the possibility of experience in
general are likewise conditions of the possibility of the of1ects of experienci. This
put simply means that we can experience the objects that we are able to
experience, those which appear to us, and not the 'things in themselves'
allegedly beyond our experience. lt follows from this that objects beyond
our ability to experience are not legitimate objects of knowledge, and yet
they are nonetheless of great interest to human beings. In the second part
of the 'Transcendental Logic', entitled 'Transcendental Dialectic', Kant
shows how attempts to talk about such objects on the basis of our expe
rience are internally inconsistent. Psychology's attempts to know the soul
as if it were an object of experience lead to paralogisms; cosmology's
attempt to know the spatial and temporal extent of the universe as if it
were an object of experience leads to antinomies; while theology's at
tempts to prove the existence of God are shown to be illusory and dia
lectical. Thus in the 'Doctrine of Elements' Kant establishes the limits of
experience, and criticizes those attempts to reason as if they did not exist.
This leads the way to the 'Doctrine of Method' and its presentation of the
means of reasoning and gaining knowledge within the critically established
limits of our experience.
148
CULTURE
A confessional note which Kant jotted down while writing CPR reveals
the motivation behind the work in progress. lt is the same project of
defending metaphysics as bad already been announced in DS: human
beings are impelled to ask metaphysical questions such as 'From whence
am I? What is the origin of all that is?' (R p. 128). In order to make any
judgement in response to these questions, it is necessary to be oriented in
the realm of metaphysics. But this realm does not lie without, but within
us, and so 'the critique of pure reason thrusts a torch into this gloom, but
it illuminates the dark spaces of our own understanding, not the things
unknown to us beyond the world of sense' (R p. 128). The image captures
nicely the equivocal character of CPR: the torch illuminates our own dark
spaces, but it also puts whatever is in them to the flame. God, the world
and the soul are revealed as our own shadowy projections, products of our
own lack of enlightenment or, in Kant's terms, our 'self-imposed tutelage'.
The impact of CPR has been commensurate with its ambition. The
attempt to ground the conditions for the possibility of objects in the
conditions of the possibility of experience led to the great systematic
syntheses of German idealism. But this constructive aspect of the critique
was rejected by thinkers who embraced its destructive potential, including
Young Hegelians such as Bauer, Feuerbach and Marx, and perhaps above
all Nietzsche. In Nietzsche's radical Kantianism, God, the world, the soul
and even reason itself are criticized to death. Against this radical direction,
other readings of CPR have stressed its philosophical justification of sci
ence (e.g., those of the late-nineteenth-century neo-Kantians such as Cohen
and Rickert), its ontology (Heidegger and Heimsoeth), its analysis of the
bounds of sense (Strawson) and more recently its work of orienting a
finite understanding within the world and the events of history (Arendt
and Lyotard).
culture see also COSMOPOLITANISM, DISCIPLINE, FEDERALISM, FINALITY, HISTORY,

HUMANITY, NATURE, PEACE, SOCIABILITY, WAR
Culture is defined as the 'ultimate end which we have cause to attribute
to nature in respect of the human race' (CJ §83) and consists in the 'ap
titude and skill for all manner of ends for which [humanity] may employ
nature both external and internal'. lt is characterized by two, often an
tagonistic features. The first is the ability to choose ends, the second is the
skill to realize them. The discrepancy between the two provides for both
the progress and the ruination of culture. Kant discovers the origins of
culture in the restriction of human freedom - 'all the culture and art
which adorn mankind . . . are the fruits of their unsociability' (IUH p. 22,
p. 46) - and describes culture as a discipline of the will and inclinations.
However, the discipline of the will and inclinations in the choice of ends
149
CULTURE
has no necessary relation to the ability to realize them. This results in a

social conflict between those who, 'in a mechanical kind of way that calls
for no special art, provide the necessary conveniences of life' and others
who 'apply themselves to the less necessary branches of culture in science
and art' (CJ §83). The former are kept in a state of imposed tutelage - 'in
a state of oppression, with hard work and little enjoyment' - unable to
develop the aptitude for choosing their own ends, while the latter, who do
not have to labour to gain the skill necessary to realize their ends, become
over-civilized and pursue luxury and superfluous ends. Kant sees this
'splendid misery' of culture as tending to catastrophe at the same time as
developing the 'natural tendencies' of humanity towards a cosmopolitan
civil society in which the aptitude for choosing ends and the skill to realize
them will be in harmony.
Kant's theory of culture, while deeply indebted to Rousseau's Emile, or
On Education ( 1762), nevertheless recognized the necessity of conflict.
This aspect of his theory of culture was developed further by Hegel and
Marx. His account of the conflict between the oppressed masses and the
luxurious but superfluous masters anticipates the master-slave dialectic of
Hegel's Phenomenology of spirit and Marx's claim in the Communist Manifesto
that the 'history of all hitherto existing societies has been the history of
dass struggle'. Kant's focus on material culture distinguishes his theory of
culture from his contemporary linguistic and idealist theories such as that
of Herder. However, it is not until very recently that these features of
Kant's theory of culture have played any significant role in the exegesis of
his philosophy.
150
D
death see FEAR, FINITUDE, IMMORTALITY, PUNISHMENT, TIME
deduction [ deductio, Deduktion ] see also APPERCEPTION , CATEGORIES, COMBINA¬

TION , CONCEPTS, FACT, IMAGINATION , INDUCTION , INTUITION , POSSESSION , SPACE,
SYNTHESIS, TIME, UNDERSTANDING
In each of the analytics of the three critiques Kant offers a deduction: in
CPR it involves the pure concepts of the understanding; in CPrR the
principles of pure practical reason; and in CJ, the legitimacy of pure
aesthetic judgements of taste. Unlike Descartes, Kant does not use deduc¬
tion in the geometrical sense to mean everything which is necessarily
concluded from certain other things which are known with certainty
( Descartes, 1968, p. 8) . On the contrary, his usage is drawn from the
practice of the Imperial jurists who when speaking of rights and claims,
distinguish in a legal action the question of right ( quid juris ) from the
question of fact ( quid facti) ; and they demand that both be proved. Proof
of the former, which has to state the right or the legal claim, they entitle
the deduction ( CPR A 84/ B 116 ) . The philosophical deduction in each of
the three critiques is required to justify the possession and / or employ¬
ment of the theoretical pure concepts of the understanding , the practical
principles of pure practical reason , and the aesthetic judgements of taste.
Kant consistently described the ‘deduction of the categories in CPR as
a ‘matter of extreme difficulty’ and one which had been ‘never before
attempted ’ ( CPR A 98) . In it he undertook to justify ‘how these concepts
can relate to objects which they yet do not obtain from any experience ’
(A 85/ B 117) . He distinguished this form of transcendental deduction which
sought to establish the legitimacy of such concepts from an empirical de ¬
duction which sought their origins in experience. In P and the second

edition of CPR he attributed the former procedure to Locke and Hume
( P p. 260, p. 6, CPR B 127 ) and contrasted it with his own transcendental
deduction which , as if to stress the point, he once again described as ‘the
most difficult task undertaken in the service of metaphysics’ ( P p. 260,
p. 6) . Theirs was a ‘physiological derivation’ , concerned not with the
151
DEDUCfION
legitimacy (quid juris) but with the fact (quid Jactz) of the possession of
concepts.
Kant's procedure of transcendental deduction has several stages. The
first stage establishes the legitimacy of the forms of intuition, space and
time. Since objects may only appear to us 'by means of such pure forms
of sensibility', space and time are legitimate 'pure intuitions which con
tain a priori the condition of the possibility of objects as appearances'
(CPRA 89/B 121).From this Kant goes on to ask whether 'a priori concepts
do not also serve as antecedent conditions under which alone anything
can be, if not intuited, then at least thought as object in general. In that
case all empirical knowledge ofobjects would necessarily conform to such
concepts, because only as thus presupposing them is anything possible as
object of experience (CPRA 93/B 126). The deduction ofthe categories will
be accomplished if it can be proven that 'by their means alone an object
can be thought' (CPRA 97). The number and character ofthe categories
had already been established in a metaphysical deduction from the forms of
judgement (see CPR A 70/B 95ff).
In P and the Preface to the second edition of CPR Kant expressed his
dissatisfaction with the second chapter ofthe analytic on the transcenden
tal deduction, and rewrote it for the 1787 edition. Consequently there
are differences between the two versions which have led to them being
described, with some exaggeration, as the 'subjective' and 'objective' de
ductions. The key to both deductions is that 'appearances in experience
must stand under the conditions of the necessary unity of apperception,
just as in mere intuition they must be subject to the formal conditions of
space and time' (CPRA 110).The unity ofapperception introduces 'order
and regularity in the appearances' (A 125) achieving the 'synthetic unity
of all appearances' according to the forms of the categories. In the 1781
deduction, the account of the unity of apperception is couched in terms
of the synthetic activities (apprehension, reproduction, synthesis) of a
finite subject all of whose representations are 'subject to time, the formal
condition of inner sense' (A 99). This version emphasizes the work of the
'productive imagination' which in relation to the 'unity of apperception'
constitutes the understanding, with its categories or 'pure a priori modes'.
The account of the transcendental deduction in the second edition
differs in respect of the character ascribed to the unity of apperception:
it is now 'entitled objective, and ...distinguished from the subjectiveunity of
consciousness, which is a determination of inner sense' (CPR B 139). This
leads to a greater emphasis upon combination and the playing-down of
subjective synthesis, but the overall conclusion remains unchanged: 'laws
of appearances in nature must agree with the understanding and its a priori
form, that is, with its faculty of combining the manifold in general' (B 164).
152
DEFlNITION
Nevertheless, expressing a preference for one or other of the deductions

has become a shibboleth in Kant studies, with Heidegger and the continen
tal tradition preferring the first, and the more Cartesian Anglo-American
tradition opting for the second version.
Kant's deductions in the second and third critiques are far less elabo
rate than the transcendental deduction of the first. In the second critique
Kant claims that the 'objective reality of the moral law' cannot be proven
through a deduction, but can itself serve ('unexpectedly') as a 'principle
of the deduction of an inscrutable faculty which no experience can prove'
(CPrR p. 47, p. 48). This is 'freedom as a causality of pure reason' and its
deduction through the moral law supplies a lack in the cosmological ideas
of the first critique, which Kant claimed were unamenable to 'objective
deduction' (CPRA 336/B 393). The deduction in the third critique is also
peculiar in that the object of deduction is a form of judgement. Here the
deduction consists in legitimating the claims of the aesthetic judgement of
taste to be universally and necessarily valid, even though it is a subjective
judgement. Kant proposes a number of grounds for this validity, ranging
from a postulated 'universal voice' to the 'mutual harmony of imagination
and understanding' to a 'supersensible ground'.
definition [ definitio, Erklärung] see also ANALYSIS, ESSENCE, METHOD, PHILOSOPHY,

TRUTH
Kant describes definition in CPR as the presentation of 'the complete,
original concept of a thing within the limits of its concept', with 'com
pleteness' further defined as 'clearness and sufficiency of characteristics';
'limit' is defined as the precise number of characteristics in a concept; and
'original' refers to the underived character of the limit (CPR A 728/B
756). Kant goes to some length to show that, strictly speaking, there can
be no philosophical definitions. Empirical concepts cannot be defined
because it is impossible to know their precise limits, nor is it possible to
be certain that they are original. They may be explicated by making their
contents explicit, but they do not fulfil the criteria of definition. Nor do
a priori concepts, since it is impossible to be certain that analysis has been
completely effected: 'the completeness of the analysis of my concept is
always in doubt, and a multiplicity of suitable examples suffices only to
make the completeness probabk, never to make it apodeictically certain'
(CPR A 729/B 757). Such concepts may be given an exposition, which is
but a probabilistic 'approximation' (L p. 633) to a definition. The only
concept which may be defined is one 'which I have invented' (CPR A
729/B 757) because then I am sure of its conforming to the requirements
of 'limit' and 'originality'. Only mathematics possesses such concepts, so
only it is in possession of definitions.
153
DELIGHT
Kant immediately relaxes his austere strictures on the use of the word
definition in philosophy on the grounds that 'The German language has
for the [Latin] terms exposition, explication, dec/,aration, and definition only
one word, Erklärung (CPR A 730/B 758). But he remains adamant that
the philosophical use of the term be distinguished from the proper, math
ematical one. This concem goes back to his earlier, anti-Wolffian, attempt
in PE to distinguish the synthetic method of mathematics from the ana
lytic method of philosophy. Mathematics produces its definitions syntheti
cally, is apodeictically certain of them, and on the basis of this can
confidently proceed to synthetic deductions. Philosophy, on the other
hand, cannot begin with definitions, but has only confused concepts which
it must subject to analysis. Kant disarmingly notes that 'Philosophy is full
of faulty definitions' and would be in a 'pitiable plight' if it could make
no use of a concept until it was adequately defined (CPR A 731/B 759).
Its analytical expositions of concepts may not achieve the rigour required
by definition proper, but its approximations may be close to truth and
'employed with great advantage' (ibid.).
In the account of definition in L §§105-8 Kant remains within the orbit
of the Wolffian tradition, and provides a series of criteria for establishing
philosophical definitions. Since his practice regarding definition in CPR
often belies his preaching in that text, it may be helpful to present some
of the most important distinctions. The first is the distinction between
nominal and real definition, the former comprising the nominal meaning
of a term, its 'logical essence' which distinguishes it from other terms,
while the latter 'suffice[s] for cognition of the object according to its
inner determinations' (L p. 634). Kant additionally presents the require
ments of definition in terms of the table of categories: its quantity con
cems the 'sphere of the definition', its quality its 'completeness' and
'precision', its relation, that it be not tautological, and its modality, which
is that it be necessary (p. 635). Finally he offers some extremely Wolffian
rules for testing whether definitions are true, distinct, complete and ad
equate to their objects (ibid.). Although these criteria and rules are never
spelt out in CPR, the extent to which they inform its exposition is striking.
delight (satisfaction) [Wohlgefallen] see also AESTHETIC, AGREEABLE, BEAUTY,

FEELING, GOOD, LIFE, PERFECTION, PLEASURE, SENSATION, SUBLIME
Delight is defined by Kant as the 'sensation [Empfindung] (of a pleasure)
[Lust]' (C] §3) which he further specifies as a 'determination of the feel
ing of pleasure or pain'. lt is a modal term describing the ways in which
this feeling is affected by different objects. As such it assumes a number
of distinct forms: delight in a desired object is agreeable, delight in the
good or perfection is 'pure and practical', while delight in the beautiful
154
DETERMINANT JUDGEMENT
has to satisfy the criteria outlined in the analytic of CJ. These follow the
headings of the table of categories, and hold that delight in the beautiful
must be without interest (quality), subjectively universal (quantity), final
without an end (relation), and necessary but without a concept (modal
ity). In addition Kant specifies that delight in the beautiful is positive,
while that in the sublime is negative; this is because the former augments
the feeling of pleasure and pain, while the latter diminishes it.
While the notion of delight is central to Kant's aesthetic, its precise
character remains obscure. lt is not only related to the 'feeling of pleasure
and pain' but is also described as a sensation, one furthermore which is
capable of possessing the properties of the understanding without formally
being subsumed by it. Yet in CJ Kant neither fully justifies why delight
should involve a 'sensation of pleasure' in addition to the feeling of pleasure
and pain, nor how it can possess the properties of the understanding. At
issue is the role of consciousness in the sensation of delight, but on the
rare occasions when Kant directly addresses this problem, his arguments
are impenetrably obscure (CJ §1; see Caygill, 1989, pp. 321-4). A hint is
given in the methodology of CPrR, where delight is said to be 'produced'
by a 'consciousness of the harmony of our powers of representation' which
strengthens 'our entire cognitive faculty (understanding and imagination)'
(p. 160, p. 164). Here it is the 'strengthening' of the 'cognitive faculty'
which occasions delight; that is to say, less the harmony of imagination
and understanding itself than the augmentation of power which it occasions.
dependent beauty see BEAUTY
desire see INCLINATION, INTEREST, NEED, PLEASURE, WILL
determinant judgement see a/,so ANALYfIC, CATEGORIES, JUDGEMENT, REFLECTIVE

JUDGEMENT, REFLECTION, SCHEMATISM, SUBSUMPTION
In CJ Kant contrasts determinant with reflective judgements in terms
of two ways of 'thinking the particular as contained under the universal'
(CJ §IV). In determinant judgement 'the universal (the rule, principle, or
law) is given' (ibid.) and the judgement subsumes the particular under it.
By contrast, in reflective judgement only the particular is given and the
universal has to be found for it through a process of reflection. Determi
nant judgement is subsumptive, which means 'it has no need to devise a
law for its own guidance to enable it to subordinate the particular in
nature to the universal' (ibid.). lt is neither autonomous nor 'independ
ently nomothetic' 'for it subsumes merely under given laws, or concepts, as
principles' (CJ §69). Such judgements are exemplified by the theoretical
judgements of CPR in which the concepts of the understanding are the
155
DETERMINATION
given laws and concepts which subsume the particulars of the manifold of
intuition through schematism and the principles.
determination [Bestimmen] see also ABSOLUTE, GROUND, LOGIC, PREDICATE, SUB

JECT, THEOLOGY
Kant first discusses determination in the context of his critique of Wolff
in ND. He defines it in terms of positing 'a predicate while excluding its
opposite' (ND p. 391, p. 11). From this he goes on to define a ground or
reason (ratio) 'as that which determines a subject in respect of any of
its predicates', showing that determination is concerned with the logical
relation between a subject and predicate. Some relations of subject and
predicate determine whf a particular subject is as it is, and these Kant
entitles grounds/reasons which determine antecedently; others determine
that a subject is as it is, and these are grounds/reasons which determine
consequently. To give an example, gravity is the antecedently determining
ground/reason for the orbits of the planets - it explains why they are thus;
but the ground/reason that they are thus is determined consequently by
the combined mass of the sun and planets. The point of this distinction
is to criticize Wolff's definition of ground/reason as that by which to
understand why something is rather than is not. Determination gives a
ground/reason not only for why something is, but also why it is in this and
not any other way.
Determination re-appears in CPR in the guise of the transcendental
ideal. Here Kant supplements the Wolffian account of determination
according to the principle of contradiction with one of 'complete deter
mination'. According to the first or 'principle of determinability', 'of every
two contradictorily opposed predicates only one can belong to a concept'
(CPR A 571/B 599). According to the second principle of 'complete
determination' which governs the possibility of things, 'if all the possib/,e
predicates of things be taken together with their contradictory opposites,
then one of each pair of contradictory opposites must belong to it' (CPR
A 572/B 600). This means that each thing is determined not only accord
ing to its relations to contradictory predicates (such that if a thing is
coloured it cannot be not-coloured) but also to the 'sum-total of all predi
cates of things'. This latter is an a priori condition which serves as the
background for the determination of particular things with particular predi
cates. Affirmation and negation of predicates are therefore not only
governed by their contraries, but also by the sum of all other possible
predicates. Kant finds such determination acceptable if the sum of possi
ble predicates is recognized as the field of appearances constituted by the
categories; that is, as 'the context of possible experience' (CPR A 582/B
156
DIALECTIC
610); however, it is unacceptable and 'dialectical' if it is hypostatized into

an ens realissimum, 'being of all beings' (ibid.).
Kant's account of determination was further developed by Hegel, who
used it to dissolve the fixity of specific determinations. Not only are predi
cates only thinkable in the context of their opposites, but this opposition
itself is only thinkable in relation to the absolute (Hegel, 1812, 'Intro
duction'). A notion of determinate negation has also been developed in
the twentieth century by Adorno in his Negative Dialectics (1966); his ver
sion, however, restricts itself to exploring the mutual determination of
opposed predicates while relinquishing the possibility of situating them
with regard to the absolute or sum of possible predicates.
dialectic see also ABSOLUTE, ANALYTIC, ANTINOMY, COSMOLOGY, GOD, IDEA, ILLU
SION, PARALOGISM, PSYCHOLOGY, SUBJECT, THEOLOGY, TRANSCENDENT, UNITY, WORLD
The contents of transcendental logic in CPR are divided under the two
headings of 'Analytic' and 'Dialectic'. The analytic resolves the formal
procedures of the understanding and reason into their elements, and
serves as a canon, or 'negative touchstone of truth', while dialectic consists
in using these elements 'as if [they] were an mganonfor the actual produc
tion of at least the semblance of objective assertions' (CPR A 61/B 85). lt
is a 'logi,c of illusion' which is countered in the critical philosophy by 'a
critique of dialedical illusion' (CPR A 62/B 86). Dialectic as the critique of
dialectical illusion thus finds its place following the analytic in each of the
three critiques.
Kant justifies his use of dialectic with a reference to the 'v4rious
significations' 'in which the ancients used "dialectic" as the title for a
science or art' ( CPR A 61/B 86) but his own definition is resolutely
Aristotelian. This was but one of the three influential d'efinitions of the
term transmitted from antiquity. The first was Plato's, which elevated dia
lectic 'above all other studies to be as it were the coping stone - and that
no other study could rightly be placed above it' (Plato, 1961, Rep. 534e).
lt was no less than the method of scientific investigation itself, which
sought definition through the dialectical procedures of collection and
division (Plato, 1961, Phaed. 266b). Aristotle, by contrast, distinguished
sharply in the Topics between 'demonstrative' (scientific) and dialectical
reasoning, with the former reasoning from premises that are 'true and
primary' and the latter reasoning 'from opinions that are generally ac
cepted' (Aristotle, 1941, 100a, 28-30). In the Posterior Analytics dialectic is
likened 'in principle' to rhetoric in that it uses syllogistic and inductive
reasoning from premises accepted by a given audience to persuade and
convince. For Aristotle it is indeed, in Kant's words, a logic of illusion.
157
DIALECTIC
Cicero further developed the rhetorical potential of dialectic in his

attempt to elevate rhetoric above philosophy. He divided rhetoric or the
science of argument into two parts: the first concerned with the invention
of the materials of an argument he entitled 'Topics', the second, con
cerned with the method of making judgements, he entitled 'Dialectic'
(Long and Sedley, 1987, p. 185).
Through Boethius the dominant tradition of dialectic bequeathed to
Western European philosophy was Cicero's, with the entire science of
argument now entitled 'Dialectic'. Following this, the tradition ofdialectic
moved between the Ciceronic and Aristotelian positions, with the final
major attempt to reconcile them being Ramus's Diakctical lnstitutions (1543).
This divides dialectic - 'the power of precise discoursing' - into invention
and disposition ( judgement) (see Ramus, 1549, pp. 12-14). This division
was widely reproduced and became standard for the presentation of logi
cal texts: Kant's own division oflogic into analytic (invention) and dialectic
( judgement) echoes this division, but also decisively undermines it. His
dialectic no longer offers rules for executing convincing judgements, but
teaches how to detect and uncover judgements which bear a semblance of
truth but are in fact illusory. lt is a 'critique ofdialectical illusion' and not
(as previously) 'an art of producing such illusion dogmatically (an art
unfortunately very commonly practised by metaphysical jugglers)' (CPR A
63/B 88).
The illusions which Kant will criticize are not simply sophisms born of
the desire to convince, but follow from the 'natural and inevitable illusion'
ofhuman reason. Such transcendental illusion arises from the 'fundamental
rules and maxims for the employment of our reason' having 'the appear
ance of being objective principles' (CPR A 297/B 353). The basic source
ofillusion is human reason's pursuit ofcompleteness and unity 'to advance
towards completeness by an ascent to ever higher conditions and so to give
our knowledge the greatest possible unity of reason' (CPR A 309/B 365).
Reason seeks the absolute totality of conditions for a given conditioned
thing, but instead of regarding this search as the pursuit of a regulative
asymptotic principle, the reason, through 'transcendent and diakctical
inferences' hypostatizes the goal of completeness into ·'transcendent concepts
of pure reason' (CPR A 309/B 366). These are the object of criticism in
the two books of the 'Dialectic'.
The first book of the 'Dialectic' criticizes the transcendent concepts of
God, the world and the subject (soul), while the second criticizes the
inferences of the sciences which pretend to knowledge of these objects.
The science of God, theology, is shown to resort to ideals in its reasoning;
that of the world, cosmology, falls into antinomies; while that of the
soul, psychology, is paralogistic. In each case, the attempt to produce
158
DISCIPLINE
completeness and unity with regard to God, the world and the soul is
exposed as dialectical, as resting on illusory premises and unjustifiable
inferences.
Kant also organized the contents of the second and third critiques in
terms of analytic and dialectic. The dialectic of practical reason arises
from the attempt to define the 'highest good', which leads to the 'antinomy
of practical reason' (CPrR p. 108, p. 112). Kant then offers a 'critical
resolution' of this antinomy based on the results of the analytic of pure
practical reason. Similarly in CJ, the dialectics of aesthetic and teleological
judgement arise from the search for fundamental principles of judgement.
The 'antinomy of taste' involves the thesis and antithesis that the judge
ment of taste is, and is not, based on concepts. Once again this is given
a critical resolution which rescues the opposition by defining the concept
involved as 'indeterminate'. Tue dialectic of teleological judgement presents
an antinomy between the maxims of physical/mechanical and teleological
explanations, whichKant critically resolves by exposing a confusion between
principles of reflective and determinant judgement.
In the latter two critiques the dialectic has lost much of the focus it
possessed in CPR. In the dialectic of aesthetic judgement it has become
little more than a miscellaneous collection of thoughts and observations.
Its main distinguishing feature is no longer the logic of illusion, but the
antinomy of thesis and antithesis followed by a critical synthesis. What was
once simply one form of dialectical inference (the antinomy) has now
come to characterize the entire dialectic. Following Kant, only Hegel in
the Science of Logi,c (1812) pursued dialectic as the logic of illusion with
comparable rigour to that achieved in CPR. After Hegel, dialectic became
almost exclusively identified with the narrow antinomic schema. In the
Marxist tradition this view of dialectic reached extravagant heights in
'dialectical materialism' which, in the name of dialectic, extended the
antinomic schema of thesis-antithesis-synthesis to the history of the world,
nature and everything. In spite ofKant's efforts in CPR, dialectic was once
more in the hands of the 'metaphysical jugglers'.
difference see CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION, IDENTITY
discipline see also CULTURE, HABITUS, HISTORY, INCLINATION, REASON, RULES

Discipline is defined in CPR as the 'compulsion, by which the constant
tendency to disobey certain rules is restrained and finally extirpated' (CPR
A 709/B 737). lt is there distinguished from culture, 'which is intended
solely to give a certain kind of skill, and not to cancel any habitual mode
of action already present', although in CJ Kant does discuss 'culture by
way of discipline' (§83). Discipline has two objects: in MM and Education
159
DISJUNCTIVE JUDGEMENT
(1803) it is the inclinations that are restrained, while in CPR it is the

extravagant tendency of the reason to overstep the bounds of legitimate
knowledge. Kant's discussion ofthe discipline ofthe inclinations emphasizes
that discipline should take second place to 'moral culture', the point
being to cultivate the will to desire the good rather than disciplining the
inclination to choose evil: 'the one prevents evil habits, the other trains
the mind to think' (Education, 1803, §77). Excessive discipline of the in
clinations brings about violent social and individual discontent; the former
is discussed in CJ §83, the latter in MM, where it is described as 'opposed
to man's duty to himself' (MM p. 452, p. 246).
In CPR the object ofdiscipline is the tendency ofreason 'towards exten
sion beyond the narrow limits ofpossible experience' (A 711/B 739). Along
with the canon, architectonic, and history ofreason it is acrorded a chapter
in the 'Transcendental Doctrine ofMethod'. Because in the case ofreason
'we come upon a whole system of illusions and fallacies, intimately bound
together and united under common principles', Kant claims it is necessary
to propose 'a quite special negative legislation' in the shape of 'a system
of precautions and self-examination' in the face of which 'no pseudo
rational illusion will be able to stand' (CPR A 711/B 739). He does so by
giving rules for exposing the dogmatic, polemical, hypothetical and demon
strative employments of pure reason. In the course of so doing Kant wrote
some of the most exquisitely ironic passages of CPR, confirming his claim
in MM that discipline 'can become meritorious and exemplary only through
the cheerfulness that accompanies it' (MM p. 485, p. 274).
disjunctive judgement see also ANALOGIES, COMMUNITY, JUDGEMENT, RELATION,

TABLE OF JUDGEMENTS/ CATEGORIES
The disjunctive judgement is the third of the judgements of relation pre
sented in CPR's 'Table ofJudgements' (A 70/B 71) - see table 1 in CATE
GORIES. lt is defined as containing 'a relation of two or more propositions
to each other, a relation not, however, of logical sequence, but of logical
opposition, in so far as the sphere of the one excludes the sphere of the
other, and yet at the same time ofcommunity, in so far as the propositions
taken together occupy the whole sphere ofknowledge' (CPR A 73/B 99).
This form of judgement has the property of 'a certain community of the
known constituents, such that they mutually exclude each other, and
thereby determine in their totality the true knowledge' (A 74/B 99). An
example of such a judgement is: 'The world exists either through blind
chance, or through inner necessity, or through an external cause.' This
judgement is disjunctive because all of these propositions add up to the
totality of possible knowled�e of the existence of the world, yet each
mutually excludes the other.
160
DISPUTE
Kant employs the table of judgements to derive the categories, from

which he further derives the schemas and principles. The disjunctive judge
ment accordingly yields the third category of relation, namely community,
the schema of 'reciprocity' and the principle of the third analogy of experi
ence which states that co-existing substances are govemed by the law of
reciprocity or community.
disposition [ Gesinnung] see al,so AFFECT, EVIL, INCLINATION, LAW, MAXIM, WILL,
WILLKÜR
Disposition features in Kant's later moral philosophy as a subjective affect
of the moral law and the source of the value of moral actions. lt is the
'ultimate subjective ground of the adoption of maxims' (RL p. 25, p. 20)
and is itself freely chosen, 'although the subjective ground or cause of this
adoption cannot further be known' (ibid.). The disposition forms the
bedrock of Kant's moral philosophy, for if we could know the conditions
for choosing it we could incorporate this choice into a further maxim, the
choice of which itself would then require explanation. lt consequently
plays an important role in his account of moral action. Disposition orients
the Willkürpositioned between will and inclination in one direction or the
other. lt influences whether Willkür is disposed to accept the maxims of
the will or inclination, but plays little role in the concrete and specific
choices which are made by Willkür.
dispute [Streit] see also ANTINOMY, WAR
Kant's first published text, LF, is a critical review of a dispute conceming
the force possessed by bodies: it examines the positions of the Leibnizian
and opposing parties and seeks to adjudicate between them. This mode of
argument characterized a number of Kant's works, including the three
critiques, in spite of the claim made in CPR that it was a critique of the
faculty of reason in general - not a judgement of competing 'books and
systems'. The second critique establishes the critical position by opposing
accounts of the highest good with each other (Stoic and Epicurean for
example) while the critique of judgement is structured around the dis
pute between the perfectionist account of beauty defended by Baumgarten
and claims for a sense of taste defended by Hutcheson, Burke and others.
However, Kant's rehearsal of disputes and polemics in the critical philoso
phy is quite distinct from that in LF. In the later texts the opposed posi
tions are made the anonymous manifestation of the conflict of reason with
itself. This served the purposes of the critical philosophy extremely well,
since the 'critical tribunal' of CPR aspired to be a fresh start in metaphysics,
and not just another moment in the metaphysical tradition. As a result,
the positions criticized in the dialectic, especially in the antinomies, are
presented as reason in dispute with itself rather than reasoners in dispute
161
DISTINCINESS
with each other. The discipline of pure reason too, a strategic manual for
settling the disputes of reason, presents itself as an objective instance
rather than as a participant in a debate. This tendency to purify reason of
its tradition had the effect of reducing philosophy to a soliloquy, a tendency
criticized by Hamann (1967) and Herder (1953) in their 'metacritiques' and
which was tak.en to an extreme by Fichte (1794). Nevertheless, when Kant
did enter into dispute around the meaning of the critical philosophy, in
OD, he dropped the mask of the impartial judge of the critical tribunal
and clearly revealed himself and the critical philosophy to be interested
parties in the dispute over the heritage and custody of metaphysics.
distinctness [Deutlichktnt] see CLARITY
divisibility [ Teilbarktnt] see also CONTINUITY, MATTER, MONAD, SPACE, SUBSTANCE

Divisibility along with continuity was a constant preoccupation in Kant's
thought. lt was present in PM and still being explored in the second
antinomy of CPR and in MF. lt formed the key part in his argument that
although matter in space was infinitely divisible, it was not as a conse
quence composed of an infinite number of simple parts. Kant presents
this thought in the third proposition of PM as 'Space which bodies fill is
divisible to infinity; space does not, therefore, consist of primitive and
simple parts' (PM p. 149, p. 54). His reasoning at this stage was that since
space is a relation, the infinite division of a relation will never arrive at
simple parts or substances. In the critical version, in the second antinomy
of CPR, the cases for and against the infinite divisibility of matter are both
criticized for forgetting that it is appearances in space and time that are
being divided. Since the 'composites' are appearances, so are any imag
ined parts, for 'the division reaches only as far as such experience reaches'
and it is impossible through the division of appearances to reach 'an
existence previous to experience' (P §52c). Kant thus maintains that the
choice presented by the antinomy between a finite and an infinite number
of simple parts is the result of a 'misunderstood problem' which does not
recognize that the object of division is a spatio-temporally limited ap
pearance. In MF he amplifies this point by arguing that since intuitive
space is infinitely divisible mathematically, so is matter in space; thus the
proposition 'Matter is divisible to infinity, and indeed into parts each of
which is again matter' (MF p. 503, p. 49) underlines the point that divis
ibility is infinitely iterated without reaching ultimate, simple parts.
dogm.atism see also CRITICAL PHILOSOPHY, HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY, PHILOSOPHY,

RATIONALISM, SCEPTICISM
In the preface to P Kant made the famous claim that 'my remembering
David Hume was the very thing which many years ago first interrupted my
162
DOGMATISM
dogmatic slumber and gave my investigations in the field of speculative

philosophy a quite new direction' (P p. 260, p. 5). Whatever its biographical
interest, this passage brings together what Kant regarded as the three main
possibilities for philosophy: dogmatism, scepticism and criticism. He pre
sents them in the preface to the first edition of CPR by means of an analogy
with forms of govemment: the govemment of reason 'under the adminis
tration of the dogmatists, was at first despotic, but through 'intestine wars gave
way to complete anarchy; and the sceptics, a species of nomads, despising
all settled modes of life, broke up from time to time all civil society' (CPR
A ix). The 'critical tribunal' will, contrary to both, 'assure to reason its law
ful claims, and dismiss all groundless pretensions, not by despotic decrees,
but in accordance with its own etemal and unalterable laws' (A xi).
The 'sweet dogmatic dreams' (CPR A 758/B 786) of reason which
incline it to despotism arise from the 'presumption that it is possible to
make progress with pure knowledge, according to principles, from con
cepts alone' (CPR B xxv). For Kant, dogmatists believe that on the basis
of pure reason it is possible to attain knowledge of the existence of God,
of freedom in a world govemed by necessity, and of the existence and
even immortality of the soul. Dogmatic philosophers such as Plato (CPR
A 5/B 8), Spinoza and Mendelssohn (WO p. 143, p. 246), but above all
Wolff - 'the greatest of all the dogmatic philosophers' (CPR B xxxvi) -
were in danger of 'philosophical zealotry' (WO p. 138, p. 242) or pretend
ing to knowledge which they could not legitimately possess and defending
their pretensions with whatever means available.
Kant claimed that the 'Critique clips the wings of dogmatism completely
as far as knowledge of supra-sensory objects is concemed' (WO p. 143, p.
246). In place of the dogmatists' enquiry 'into things', it proposes a 'critical
enquiry concerning the limits of my possible knowledge' (CPR A 758/B
786), an enquiry which reveals that our knowledge is limited to appear
ances constituted by human understanding. Yet this is not simply a retreat
from dogmatism to scepticism, which is for Kant but a 'short cut'; it is
necessary to combine the strengths of both dogmatism and scepticism in
the critical method. He accordingly distinguishes between dogmatism and
the 'dogmatic method' of 'orderly establishment of principles, clear deter
mination of concepts, insistence upon strictness of proof, and avoidance
of venturesome, non-consecutive steps in our inferences' (CPR B xxxvi).
The latter method, exemplified by Wolff, is necessary for any scientific
presentation, but must be supplemented by a critique of pure reason
itself, for those 'who reject both the method of Wolff and the procedure
of a critique of pure reason can have no other aim than to shake off the
fetters of science altogether, and thus turn work into play, certainty into
opinion, philosophy into philodoxy' (CPR B xxxvii).
163
DOUBLE-AFFECTION
double-affection see AFFECT
drive [Trieb] see also INCENTIVE, INCLINATION, PASSION

Drives are described by Kant in the 'Essay on the Maladies of the Mind'
(1764) as constitutive of human nature and manifest in the various grades
of the passions. They are also mentioned in OBS as being 'proportioned'
when the inclinations are subordinated to a wider viewpoint. Although it
was rarely mentioned by Kant himself, the notion of an economy of drives
underlying the practical topology of reason and inclination has been re
peatedly revived and developed, first by Fichte (1794) and Schopenhauer
(1841), and more recently by psychoanalytically inspired writers such as
Kristeva in Revolution in Poetic Language (1974) and Lyotard in Libidinal
Economy (1974).
dualism see IDEALISM, THING-IN-ITSELF
duration see ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, ANTINOMIES, CONTINUI1Y, DMSIBILI1Y,

EXISTENCE, FINITUDE, IMMORTALI1Y, INFINI1Y, MATTER, SUCCESSION, TIME
duty [Pflicht] see also CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, FREEDOM, IMPERATIVE, INCLINA

TION, LAW, MAXIM, NATURAL RIGHT, PERSON, RESPECT
A central concept in Kant's practical philosophy, the remote origins of
duty lie in the Stoic critique of classical ethics. The Stoies replaced the
classical 'highest good' as the main criterion for ethical action with that
of the 'rightness of action' or action in accordance with 'right reason'.
The 'rightness' of an act depended on the actor's disposition, not on the
act's consequences. The proper disposition consisted in acting in accord
with the duties imposed both by universal reason and particular circum
stances (see Cicero, On Duties). Although Kant was well acquainted with
the Stoies, references to whom appear throughout his writings, the more
proximale source of his account of duty was the seventeenth-century Stoic
revival in Holland which was particularly important in Prussia (see
Oestreich, 1982). The reception of the Stoic texts was influenced by three
factors: first, the Protestant emphasis on intention rather than works; sec
ond, natural rights theory with its emphasis on 'right reason'; and, third,
the disciplinary practices of the early modern police state (see Caygill, 1989,
chapter 3). From Pufendorf (1672) these elements fed into the practical
philosophy of the Prussian Universities, first through Thomasius (see Bloch,
1968) and then, above all, through Christian Wolff (1720, 1721).
Wolff's practical philosophy - Vernünftige Gedanken von der Menschen
Thun und Lassen zu Beförderung ihrer Glückseligkeit (1720) - consisted of an
attempt to adapt the revised Stoic account of duty to an Aristotelian concept
164
DUTY
of the highest good. Part One, comprising three chapters on 'Human

Action in General', discusses the highest good - which is to act according
to natural law - and the obstacles to it presented by the senses, imagination
and affections. The remaining three parts of the book, 15 chapters, are
concemed exclusively with duty defined as 'actions which are in accord
with the law' (§221). Part Two presents the 'Duties of Humans Toward
Themselves'; Part Three, 'Human Duties toward God'; and Part Four,
'Human Duties towards Others'. This text gave rise to a Wolffian school
of practical philosophy, whose literature included the two texts by Wolff's
follower Baumgarten (Ethica phiwsophica, 1740, and Initiae philosophiae
practicae primae, 1760) which Kant used as the basis of his lectures on
ethics. Kant developed his practical philosophy in the course of comment
ing on these texts in his lectures, and thus his emphasis on duty is in some
respects part of the tradition of Prussian practical philosophy. Yet in his
critical philosophy he transformed this tradition, maintaining the form of
its view of duty while radically reworking its content.
In Kant's Lectures on Ethics (LE), 'essential morality' is presented as
synonymous with 'our proper duties towards everything in the world'
(p. 117). This standpoint is maintained in the critical practical philosophy,
where it is developed in terms of three thematic groups: (a) the definition
of duty, its sources and function in an account of moral action; (b) the
modalities of duty (perfect/imperfect, etc.); (c) the objects of duty (self,
others, God, animals, nature). The definition underlines Kant's concem
with the proper way of being in the world, a perspective which is often
neglected in the more narrowly focused interpretations of his practical
philosophy.
In the preface to GMM, the first statement of his mature practical
philosophy, Kant distinguishes his critical project from the 'celebrated
Wolff's moral philosophy' (p. 390, p. 3), in particular from its propadeutic
which Wolff 'calls universal practical philosophy'. Wolff is criticised for
basing his practical philosophy on 'volition in general', and thus combin
ing pure and empirical elements. Kant's critical propadeutic to practical
philosophy on the contrary (GMM, CPrR) will investigate 'the idea and
principles of a possible pure will and not the actions and conditions of
human volition as such' (GMM p. 390, p. 4). Kant's efforts to distinguish
his practical philosophy from Wolffian orthodoxy leads him in GMM to
argue for an extremely purified definition of duty as 'a practical, uncon
ditioned necessity of action [which] must hold for all rational beings (to
whom alone an imperative is at all applicable) and for this reason only can
it also be a law for all human wills' (GMM p. 425, p. 33).
In CPrR Kant confirms that duty is peculiar to human beings, but with
out conceding that it is anthropologically determined. All rational beings
165
DUTY
are subject to universal law, but only human beings experience this sub
jection in the form of an imperative, one which because of its uncondi
tioned source is categorical. This form of subjection is necessary because
human beings are in possession not only of a 'pure will' but also of 'wants
and sensuous motives' which conflict with it. The tension between pure
will and sensuous motives which informs human volition requires that the
relation of human will to law be 'one of dependence under the name of
"obligation"' which 'implies a constraint to an action' (CPrR p. 32, p. 32).
This constraint is 'called duty' and opposes pure objective to subjective
grounds of motivation in a will which, although 'pathologically affected',
is not pathologically determined.
Kant makes an important distinction between two functions of duty: in
the first, duty 'requires ofan action that it subjectively agree with the law',
while in the second it 'demands' ofthe maxim ofaction 'subjective respect
for the law as the sole mode of determining the will through itself' (CPrR
p. 82, p. 84). The former consists in the 'consciousness of having acted
according to duty' and is called 'legality', while the latter is consciousness of
having acted 'from duty, i.e., from respect for the law', and is morality
proper. With this Kant bases his morality on intention, for while it is
possible to act according to duty with maxims determined by inclination,
moral action follows only from duty, that is, according to maxims con
formable to the law. This distinction served as a propaedeutic to the later
division of MM into doctrines of right and virtue.
In his celebrated, if not notorious apostrophe to duty - 'Thou sublime
and mighty name . . .' - Kant inquires into the genealogy ofduty, 'the root
ofthy noble descent which proudly rejects all kinship with the inclinations
. . .' (CPrR p. 87, p. 89). lt originates in a source which 'elevates man
above himself as a part of the world of sense' and is no less than person
ality or 'the freedom and independence from the mechanism of nature',
a being participating in the 'intelligible world' and subject only to 'pure
practical laws given by its own reason' (ibid.). The source of duty is the
self-legislation ofhuman reason, possible because ofthe equivocal character
of human beings, inhabiting both realms of nature and freedom. When
we consider these laws under the aspect of divinity, then 'the moral law
leads to religion' (CPrR p. 130, p. 134) wherein all duties are recognized
as divine commands, but commands which cannot ever be fulfilled. Kant
makes this move late in CPrR in order to prepare for the re-introduction
of the 'highest good' into his practical philosophy. This is eventually ac
complished in CJ (§83), but above all in RL, where human beings pursue
duty for the sake of a highest good whose disposal is in the hands of God:
here 'humans know conceming each duty nothing but what they must
themselves do in order to be worthy of that supplement [the highest
166
DYNAMICS
good] unknown, or at least incomprehensible to them' (RL, p. 139, p.

130).
In MM Kant presented the 'system ofour proper duties to all the world'
on the basis of the critically scrutinized concept of duty developed in
GMM and CPrR. Duties are first subjected to a generic distinction of their
modes and objects, and then to a further subdivision. With respect to the
modes of duty, Kant distinguishes between juridical and ethical, positive
and negative, and perfect and imperfect duties. The latter two distinc
tions, drawn by analogy from the theory of rights, concern the relative
extent and direction ofthe obligations entailed by duties. Imperfect duties
are of broad extent while imperfect duties are narrow; positive duties
command, negative duties forbid. The distinction of juridical and ethical
duties parallels the distinction between 'in accordance with' and 'from
duty', although with some important distinctions. Here the ground of the
distinction is whether legislation admits an incentive to action other than
the idea ofduty itself, or whether this idea alone suffices. The former gives
rise to the legality of the law, the latter to its morality (MM pp. 219-20,
pp. 46-7). Finally Kant also distinguishes in MM between the objects of
duty, which range across duties to God, to animals and to human beings,
the last considered as both animal and rational. These considerations are
explored through a fascinating yet extremely questionable casuistry.
Kant's account of duty has been the subject of almost two centuries of
continuous criticism and mockery. In spite oftheir other differences, Hegel,
Schopenhauer and Nietzsche were as one in abhorring its reliance upon
a pseudo-Platonic and ultimately repressive distinction between the sensi
ble and intelligible worlds, one which had been critically undermined in
CPR. This response supported the widespread view that with his account
of duty Kant merely justified one of the less attractive 'Prussian virtues'.
Another widely held critical view regards Kant's practical philosophy as a
deontological, a priori account ofmoral action. With these interpretations
much ofthe background to and subtlety ofKant's texts have been lost; for
in order to be fully appreciated his account of duty must be set in the
context of the wider tradition of neo-Stoic writings on duty, and the spe
cifically Prussian political and religious conditions of its reception.
dynamics see also ANTICIPATIONS OF PERCEPTION, CATEGORIES, MATTER, MECHANICS,

MOTION, PHENOMENOLOGY
The chapter on dynamics is the largest offour chapters in Kant's treatment
of natural science in MF. Following his definition of natural science as
'either a pure or an applied doctrine ofmotion', each ofthe four chapters
considers motion according to the four headings of the table of catego
ries. Phoronomy considers the quantitative aspects of motion; dynamics
167
DYNAMICAL CATEGORIES, PRINCIPLES AND IDEAS
the qualitative; mechanics the relational; and phenomenology the modal.

As the qualitative analysis of motion, dynamics focuses upon 'the quality
ofmatter under the name ofan original moving force' (MF p. 477, p. 14).
Its 'universal principle' states that 'all that is real in the objects of öur
external senses and is not merely a determination ofspace (place, extension,
and figure) must be regarded as moving force' (MF p. 523, p. 77). In
accordance with the three categories of quality, the force is considered in
terms of its affirmative reality, matter's occupation of space 'through re
pulsive force'; its negation, or 'attractive force by which as far as may be,
all space would be penetrated'; and finally, the mutual limitation ofattrac
tive and repulsive force 'and the consequent perceptible determination of
the degree of a filling of space' (MF p. 523, p. 76).
dynamical categories, principles and ideas see also ACROAMATIC, AXIOM, CAT
EGORIES, IDEAS, PRINCIPLES, REGULATNE IDEA, SUBLIME
In the 'Transcendental Dialectic' in CPR Kant refers to an 'essential dis
tinction that obtains among the objects, that is, among those concepts of
understanding which reason endeavours to raise to ideas' (CPR A 529/B
557). This is the distinction between mathematical and dynamical catego
ries and principles. Tue table of categories comprises 12 categories gath
ered under the four headings of quantity, quality, relation and modality.
The first two groups are identified as the mathematical, the second as the
dynamical categories. The mathematical categories of quantity and quality
are 'concerned with objects of intuition, pure as well as empirical' while
the dynamical categories of relation and modality are concerned with the
'existence ofthese objects, in their relation either to each other or to the
understanding' (CPR B llO). In order to apply the categories to possible
experience it is necessary to transform them into principles, and these
too, discussed in the 'Analytic of Principles', are divided into mathemati
cal and dynamical principles.
The mathematical principles comprise the axioms of intuition and the
anticipations of perception, and are constitutive of intuition. Since expe
rience is not possible without intuition, the principles form 'absolutely
necessary conditions ofany possible experience' and their employment 'is
unconditionally necessary, that is, apodeictic' (CPR A 160/B 199). The
dynamical principles of the analogies of experience and the postulates of
empirical thought determine the 'existence of the objects of a possible
empirical intuition' and are not apodeictic. They are, however, constitu
tive of empirical experience, and thus 'possess the character of a priori
necessity' but this necessity can only be proven after the fact of experi
ence, and so 'notwithstanding their undoubted certainty throughout ex
perience, they will not contain that immediate evidence that is peculiar
168
DYNAMICAL CATEGORIES, PRINCIPLES AND IDEAS
to the former' (CPR A 160/B 200). The mathematical principles present

the conditions necessary for an object to appear in space and time, while
the dynamical principles present the conditions necessary for an object to
appear to us, especially with respect to its relations with other appearances
(relation) and to our understanding (modality). Both sets of principles
are nevertheless constitutive of experience, the mathematical in directly
constituting intuition, the dynamical in rendering 'the concepts, without
which there can be no experience, possible a prüni' (CPR A 664/B 692).
With the discussion of the mathematical and dynamic ideas the distinc
tion becomes crucial. If all four antinomies are treated as if they were
mathematical, as if the condition was homogeneous with the conditioned,
or 'a member of a series along with the conditioned' (CPR A 528/B 556),
then the antinomies would appear irresolvable. For in the case of 'the
mathematical connection of the series of appearances no other than a
sensibk condition is admissible', but if the connection of the series is thought
dynamically, according to a 'synthesis of the heterogeneous' then 'a hetero
geneous condition, not itself part of the series, but purely intelligi,bk, and
as such outside the series, can be allowed' (CPR A 530/B 558). With this
view of the series it is possible to satisfy both the understanding and
reason with respect to the antinomies first of freedom and causality, and
then of contingency and a necessary being. In this case, reason cannot be
employed constitutively, but only regulatively through maxims for the
systematic unity of the employment of the understanding.
The distinction between mathematical and dynamical is also signifi
cant in the 'Analytic of the Sublime' in CJ, where the distinction of the
'mathematical' and 'dynamical' replaces the 'Table of Categories' used in
'Analytic of the Beautiful'. In the first case the sublime object is considered
'mathematically' in terms of its scale, as that which is 'absolutely' or
'beyond all comparison great' (CJ §25). In the second, the dynamical
sublime is registered by its 'affection of the imagination' or the fear and
terror aroused in the viewer by the sublime spectacle.
169
E
ectype see ARCHETYPE
education see CULTURE, HABITUS, HISTORY, METHOD
elements [ stoicheion ] The Greek term for elements referred originally to

the letters of the alphabet, but this meaning was adapted by philosophers
to mean basic, underived principles. These range from the four physical
elements of early Greek cosmology to the elements of an intellectual
discipline such as geometry. Thus in Proclus commentary on Euclid, ele¬
ments are defined as those theorems whose understanding leads to the
knowledge of the rest and by which the difficulties in them are resolved
( Proclus, 1970, p. 59) . He goes on to say that, like the letters of the
alphabet, elements do not make sense outside of their use; their meaning
is determined by the order ( taxis ) and position ( thesis) in which they are
placed with regard to each other. Although Kant discusses the physical
elements in early texts such as UNH and PM, his main use of the term
occurs in those sections of the first two critiques ( CPR, CPrR) concerned
with presenting the basic elements of theoretical and practical judgement.
The critiques are accordingly divided between Transcendental Doctrines
of the Elements and ‘Methodology’ ; in the former Kant seeks to establish
the basic, underivable elements of judgement, whether the forms of intui¬
tion and the pure concepts of the understanding for theoretical, or the
moral law for practical judgement. It should be added that Kant was well
aware that these elements were meaningless in abstraction from their use
in judgement, and that contrary to the opinion of many critics, he did not
intend the doctrine of elements to provide the basis for a total, rational ¬
istic theory of judgement.
empirical, empiricism, empiricists see also ABSTRACTION , CRITICAL PHILOSOPHY,

DOGMATISM, HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY, PURE , RATIONALISM
An empirical concept or intuition is one which ‘contains sensation’ and
thereby ‘presupposes the actual presence of the object’ ( CPR A 50 / B 74) .
170
A Kant Dictionary, First Edition. Howard Cagill.
© 1995 Howard Caygill. Published 1995 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
END
lt is contrasted with a pure intuition which 'contains only the form under
which something is intuited' and a pure concept which contains 'only the
form of the thought of an object in general' (A 51/B 75). An empirical
intuition or concept is only possible a posteriori, while a pure intuition or
concept is a priori. For this reason, transcendental objects which exceed
the bounds of sense are said to be 'empirically unknown'. lnforming this
distinction between empirical and pure is a further distinction between
empiricism and rationalism, often indeed between named empiricists and
rationalists. In the antinomies, the antithesis represents the empiricist
riposte to the rationalist thesis. Kant finds that a 'pure empiricism' under
mines the practical interest of reason, but has advantages for the specu
lative interest (CPRA 468/B 496). As a control upon rationalism's excesses,
empiricism is useful, but 'as frequently happens' 'empiricism itself be
comes dogmatic in its attitudes towards ideas, and confidently denies
whatever lies beyond the sphere of its intuitive knowledge' (A 471/B 499).
Thus in theoretical philosophy and aesthetics Kant's strategy is to play
empiricism and rationalism off against each other, while only in practical
philosophy does he unequivocally privilege the rationalist over the empiri
cist position (CPrR p. 72, p. 74).
The contrast between empiricism and rationalism quickly reveals itself
to be one between named empiricists and rationalists. InCPR the contrast
is introduced as one between the 'empiricist' Epicurus and the 'rational
ist' Plato (A 471/B 499); this is subsequently repeated in terms of the objed
of knowledge, with Epicurus cast as the sensualist and Plato the intellec
tualist, but supplemented by the contrast of Aristotle and Plato with re
spect to the empirical and ideal origins of knowledge, the former labelled
an empiricist the latter a noologist. The latter distinction is transferred on
to that between Locke and Leibniz (CPR A 854/B 882), and is developed
in the 'Note to the Amphiboly of the Concepts of Reflection' (CPR A
269/B 325ff). In GMM andCPrR the named empiricists include Hutcheson
and the British theorists of the 'moral sense' (GMM p. 442, p. 46) and
Hume (CPrR p. 13, p. 13), all of whom are opposed to the rationalist
Wolff. A similar cast is present in CJ, which opposes the empirical theory
of taste (Burke, Hutcheson, Hume and Kames) to the perfectionist aes
thetic of Wolff and Baumgarten. Whether Kant derived the opposition of
empirical and rational from the named empiricists and rationalists or vice
versa is an open question, but an important one for judging his claim to
have provided a critique of the 'faculty of reason alone' rather than one
of 'books and systems' (CPR A xii).
end [telos, Zweck] see also CAUSALITY, CULTURE, FINALlTY, FREEDOM, HUMANITY,
KINGDOM OF ENDS, LIMIT, TELEOLOGY
171
END
Kant's concept of an end is a version of the Aristotelian 'final cause'. In

the Physics Aristotle presented four causes ofphysical change: the material
cause, or 'that out ofwhich a thing comes to be'; the formal cause, or the
'essence' which determines the shape of the matter; the efficient cause
which is 'the primary source of the change or coming to rest'; and the
final cause or 'the sense of end, or "that for the sake of which" a thing is
done' (Aristotle, 1941, 195a, 23-35). The causes are ways ofanswering the
question of 'why' a thing has come to be or passed away, and were ex
tended by Aristotle from physical to metaphysical questions (see 983a, 24-
30). Yet the final cause was special in applying not only to physical and
metaphysical questions - answering 'Why?' with 'for the sake of this par
ticular end' - but also in extending to questions ofhuman action. Accord
ingly, the Nicomachean Ethics describes ethical and political action as directed
above all to achieving the end of the good (see Aristotle, 1941, 1094a).
Thus the notion of 'end' classically crosses over between theoretical and
practical philosophy, a role it also plays in Kant's philosophy.
In the early modern period teleological explanations ofphysical change
were increasingly discredited. Galileo rejected all aetiology in favour of
the analysis of local motion, and while Descartes was reluctant to follow
him this far (see Descartes, 1644, p. 104), he did conclusively reject the
investigation of final in favour of efficient causes (ibid., p. 14). Kant's
theoretical philosophy likewise refrains from using final causes as princi
ples of explanation, although he does contrive a new role for the use of
'ends' in theoretical philosophy. Like Aristotle, his practical philosophy
places the concept ofan 'end' in the foreground, and in CJ it becomes the
main means by which Kant establishes a transition between the natural
necessity of theoretical and the freedom of practical philosophy.
Kant's most extended discussion of ends and purposes is in the second
part of CJ, the 'Critique of Dialectical Judgement'. Here he distinguishes
between physical and moral teleologies, or the explanation of physical
nature and human action according to ends. In both cases he refers to a
distinction between efficient and final causation - the 'mechanical' causal
ity of the nexus effectivus (efficient cause) and the final causality of the
nexusfinalis (final cause) (CJ, 'Introduction', Part II; see also GMM p. 450,
p. 52). The theoretical philosophy of the first critique is overwhelmingly
concerned with the explication of efficient causes, but with a limited role
for final causality according to an end as a regulative idea for securing the
systematic completion of knowledge (CPR A 626/B 654). This scope and
these parameters for a limited 'physical teleology' are further developed
in CJ Part II. In the general introduction to CJ Kant distinguishes between
an end as the 'concept of an object, so far as it contains at the same time
the ground of the actuality of this object' and finality, which is the
172
END
'agreement of a thing with that constitution of things which is only pos

sible according to ends' (CJ §IV). He uses this distinction to argue against
deriving 'physical ends' from the appearance offinality presented by nature.
We cannot know such an objective end nor can we make it a constitutive
principle; we can, however, postulate such an end as a regulative principle
for reflective judgement, and by so doing 'extend physical science accord
ing to another principle, that, namely, of final causes, yet without interfer
ing with the principle of the mechanism of physical causality' (§67). The
notion ofan end as a 'subjective maxim' or principle ofreflectivejudgement
may be used to supplement and extend the determinant judgements of
mechanical causality, but it is not permitted to encroach upon them, let
alone replace them.
While Kant severely limits the extent and operation of physical teleol
ogy, the same restriction does not apply to moral teleology. In fact Kant's
practical philosophy, like Aristotle's, is resolutely teleological, insisting as
it does that action is end-directed. In GMM he defines the will 'as a faculty
of determining itself to action in accordance with the representation of
certain laws' and defines the 'end' as that which serves as 'the objective
ground of its self-determination' (p. 427, p. 35). He further distinguishes
these ends according to whether they are subjective or objective: the former
are 'material' ends entitled 'incentives'; the latter are 'formal' ends which
are abstracted from subjective ends and are able to serve as 'motives' valid
for all rational beings. Rational beings are 'ends in themselves' whose
existence possesses 'absolute worth', a derivation which leads Kant to the
statement of the categorical imperative of acting so as to treat the other
'always at the same time as an end and never simply as a means' (p. 429,
p. 36). Underlying these and the other formulas of the categorical impera
tive is the notion of a kingdom of ends in which each member is both
legislator and legislated.
In all three critiques Kant alludes to the 'ultimate end' which unites the
realms of theoretical and practical philosophy. In CPR the 'ultimate end'
is 'no other than the whole vocation of humanity' and is described in
terms of the unity of the two objects of 'the legislation of human reason
(philosophy)' namely nature and freedom, which although at first are
presented in 'two distinct systems' ultimately form 'one single philosophi
cal system' (CPR A 840/B 868). The character of this 'ultimate end' and
thus the 'vocation of humanity' is considered extensively in CJ §83, enti
tled 'The Ultimate End ofNature as a Teleological System'. Here human
beings are described as the 'ultimate end of nature, and the one in relation
to whom all other natural things constitute a system of ends'. This follows
from the human capacity, founded in freedom, 'of setting before them
selves ends of their deliberate choice' and culturing nature in accord with
173
ENLIGHTENMENT
them. At this point Kant makes a transition to a fascinating discussion of

physical and ethical theology, in the course of which he presents grounds
for the existence of God as the moral author of the world.
Kant's analysis of ends was carried over into the systematic philosophy
of German idealism. This was based upon a Kantian view of human freedom
as the ability to posit ends, and also to legislate systems of freedom and
nature. However, much of the detail of Kant's discussion of physical------and
moral ends in CJ Part II has been comparatively neglected by Kant schol-
arship. This is unfortunate because the concept of an end provides an
extremely useful way of reading Kant's philosophy as the integral and
systematic whole that he desired it to be.
enlightenment [Aufklärung] see also COMMON SENSE, CRITICAL PHILOSOPHY,

HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY, PUBLICITY, REASON
The eighteenth-century European intellectual movement known as the
Enlightenment went through three distinct phases in Germany. The first,
rationalist phase was inaugurated at the beginning of the century at the
University of Halle by Thomasius, and codified by Christian Wolff. Both
abandoned academic Latin in favour of the vernacular, with Wolff aiming
his works beyond the confines of the universities and professions. His
system commenced with logic, and proceeded through metaphysics to
ethics, politics and economics. Under political pressure from the Prussian
monarch Frederick William I, Wolff was forced to leave Prussia in 1723.
He went into exile, where he re-wrote his system, this time in Latin for an
international audience of scholars. With his return to Prussia on the ac
cession of Frederick II in 1740, Wolff already seemed like an intellectual
fossil. The temper of the Enlightenment had changed, now emphasizing
scepticism and common sense over the exercise of abstract reason. In the
middle of the century very few philosophers wrote rational systems, the
preference being for witty 'sceptical' essays modelled on those of Hume.
Kant's pre-critical writings fall into this phase of the Enlightenment, which
is exemplified by his Obseroations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and the Sublime
(1764). However, in the 'silent decade' of the 1770s Kant returned to
rigorous, systematic philosophy, taking sides with Wolff against those (in
cluding his younger seif) who 'have no other aim than to shake off the
fetters of science altogether' (CPR B xxxvii). With the publication of CPR
in 1781 he launched the third phase of the Enlightenment, which sought
to combine critical scepticism with systematic rigour.
In the preface to the first edition of CPR, Kant describes his epoch as
one of criticism; criticism of religion, politics and even reason itself. Criti
cism involved putting religious, political and intellectual beliefs to 'the test
of free and open examination' (CPR A xii) leaving the verdict to 'the
174
ENTHUSIASM
agreement of free citizens, of whom each one must be permitted to ex

press, without let or hindrance, his objections or even his veto' (CPR A
739/B 767). In the essay 'An Answer to the Question: "What is Enlighten
ment?" ', (1784) he characterizes the 'age of enlightenment' in very similar
terms. Enlightenment is defined famously as the 'emergence from self
incurred immaturity' or inability to judge without the guidance of an
other. This self-emergence can exceptionally be achieved by individuals,
but is overwhelmingly the work of a public freely using its reason. The
public must not submit to the guidance of religion, nor to that of the
state, but only to that of its own reason. Frederick II's dictum 'Argue as
much as you like and about whatever you like, but obey!' indicates for
Kant that he lives, if not in an 'enlightened age', then in 'an age of
enlightenment', one in which at least some of the obstacles to the free,
public use of reason had been removed.
Many critics have regarded Kant's willingness to adapt his view of en
lightenment to the Fredrician state as a powerful argument against his
philosophy. However, in many respects his position is extremely consist
ent, especially since he believed that freedom to think created the ability
to act freely, while the inverse did not necessarily hold. He also distinguished
between the responsibility exercised when using one's reason publicly to
that exercised when occupying a private 'office', such as that of clergyman
or bureaucrat: the former for Kant always took precedence. In this way the
public sphere of reason becomes the highest instance of criticism, even if
judgements pronounced in it are religiously unorthodox, or 'entail forth
right criticism of the current legislation' (WE p. 41, p. 59).
The arguments around the meaning of the Enlightenment provoked by
Kant raised a substantial echo in the twentieth century, one largely inspired
by Nietzsche's ruthless extension of enlightenment critique to reason it
self. Kant's instrument of criticism, the basis of enlightenment, has itself
been seen as a threat to enlightenment. This argument featured in Adorno
and Horkheimer's critique of technical reason in Diakctic of Enlightenrnent
(1944) as well as in the work ofFrench philosophers such as Derrida (1967),
Foucault (1984) and Lyotard (1983). In an influential polemic, Jürgen
Habermas in The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (1985) has accused
these writers of being opposed to the Enlightenment. However, it seems
more accurate to describe them as quintessentially enlightened, as publicly
exploring, in a distinctly Kantian spirit, the consequences of extending
the critical impulse of enlightenment to reason itself.
enthusiasm see also AFFECT, FEELING, HISTORY, IMAGINATION, SUBLIME

Enthusiasm is a feeling of the sublime arising from the combination of
an idea with an affect. lt is described in OBS as the 'inflammation' of the
175
EPISTEMOLOGY
mind by a principle, be it the 'maxims of patriotic virtue, or of friend

ship, or of religion' but is distinguished from fanaticism, which 'believes
itself to feel an immediate and extraordinary communion with a higher
nature' (OBS p. 108). Kant maintains this distinction in CJ where enthu
siasm is described as the 'unbridling' and fanaticism the 'anomaly' of the
imagination. As the affect of the idea of the good, enthusiasm gives the
Gemüt 'an impetus of far stronger an enduring efficacy than the stimulus
afforded by sensible representations' (CJ §29). lt arises from the fusion of
affect, idea and imagination, and can serve as a spur to action. The impli
cations of enthusiasm for Kant's philosophy of history have been explored
by Lyotard in The Differend (1983), where it is described as the paradoxical
'abstract presentation which presents nothingness'. As the irruption of the
idea into affect and action, enthusiasm is capable of inspiring events which
break the continuum of history; the main example of this for Kant was the
contemporary French Revolution inspired by the idea of the republic, an
event which was both the outcome of enthusiasm and the source of enthu
siastic feelings in its spectators.
epistemology This term, meaning theory of knowledge, is derived from

Greek episteme, knowledge, and wgos, an account of; it was not used by
Kant and only appeared later in the middle of the nineteenth century.
The German term Eikmntnistheorie (theory of knowledge) often translated
as epistemology, is also post-Kantian, and was coined by KL. Reinhold as
part of his attempt to transform the critical philosophy into a theory of
representation in Letters on the Kantian Philosophy (1790-2). This translated
a term used by Baumgarten - gnoseowgy - of which Kant was aware and to
which he made allusion on some insignificant occasions. Paradoxically
then, although Kant's philosophy has since come to epitomize the theory
of knowledge, or epistemology, he did not himself use the word or any
synonym for it. This suggests that reading the critical philosophy as an
epistemological project is an anachronistic, post hoc interpretation, one
based on the nineteenth-century pre-occupation of distinguishing between
epistemology and ontology. Kant himself described the 'Transcendental
Analytic' of CPR - his most apparently 'epistemological' text - as a refor
mulation of ontology (see CPR A 247/B 303). Once the anachronistic
distinction between epistemology and ontology is suspended many of the
puzzling features of CPR become less enigmatic, such as the claim that
'the conditions of the possibility of experience in general are likewise conditions
of the possibility of the objects of experience' (CPR A 158/B 197). From the
perspective of the nineteenth century this claim is inexplicable, appearing
to confuse the ontological and the epistemological orders.
176
ESSENCE
essence [ousia, essentia, Wesen] see also ACCIDENT, DEFINffiON, EXISTENCE, FORM,
MATTER, NATURE, SUBSTANCE, SYNTHESIS
Essence is classically that which constitutes the specific nature of a thing
and which is given in its definition. The notion of essence was developed
by Aristotle in the Metaphysics as part of an answer to the question of 'what
is a thing?'. In the definition of a thing the essence is distinguished from
accidents and substance: accidents are always predicated of a subject and
serve only to qualify an essence (Aristotle, 1941, 1007b, 1-15), while sub
stance denotes that and not what a thing is. Essence accordingly defines
the 'species of a genus' or its specific character (1030a). Aquinas clarifies
these points when he discusses essence as a function of the composition
of matter and form. The definition of essence is not formal, not separated
from matter, nor is it material and derived from 'individualizing matter'.
Using the example of the essence of 'humanity', Aquinas says that it is
neither the 'form' of humanity nor 'the flesh, the bones, and accidents
designating this matter' but rather the 'formal constituent in re/,a,tion to the
individualizing matter' (Aquinas, 1952, I, 3, 3, my emphasis).
One of the effects of the Aristotelian definition of essence was the
emergence of an equivocal relation between essence and existence. As a
function of the relation of form and matter, essence was neither purely
formal, distinct from existence, nor purely material, identified with exist
ence. With Descartes, and following him Spinoza, this ambiguity was
transformed into an opposition between what can be conceived and what
exists. Thus in the 'Fifth Meditation' Descartes attributes essence to pos
sible objects, even though they may not exist, a point which he stresses in
the Conversations with Burman where he claims that the object of physics is
'something actually and physically existing' while that of mathematics
'considers its object merely as possible' (Descartes, 1976, p. 23). The trans
formation of essence into possibility was systematized by Wolff and his
school, for whom essence became defined as simple possibility (for exam
ple - 'The essence of a thing is its possibility', Meissner, 1737, entry on
Wesen). lt is from this tradition that Kant received his notion of essence.
In MF Kant defines essence in Wolflian terms as 'the prima!, internal
principle of everything that belongs to the possibility of a thing' and
distinguishes it from nature or 'the prima!, internal principle of every
thing that belongs to the existence of a thing' (p. 467, p. 3). This distinc
tion is informed by Kant's claim in L that it is impossible to define 'the
real or natural essence of things' (pp. 566-7) and that our understanding
is restricted to 'logical essence'. His reasoning is clarified in a letter to KL.
Reinhold of 12 May 1789 in which he criticizes Baumgarten and other
Wolflians for giving metaphysical status to the 'discussion of essence, at
tributes, and so on' (PC p. 139). He, on the contrary, insists that the
177
ESTIMATE
possibility is only of logical significance. Logical essence or the 'primary

constitutiva of a given concept' can be determined 'by the analysis of my
concepts into all that I think under them'; while the 'real essence (the
nature) of any object, that is, the primary inner ground of all that neces
sarily belongs to a given thing, this is impossible for man to discover' (PC
p. 140). The concept of matter possesses the logical essence of extension
and impenetrability which are 'all that is necessarily and primitively con
tained in my, and every man's concept of matter', but the real essence of
matter, 'the primary, inner, sufficient ground of all that necessarily belongs
to matter, this far exceeds the capacity of human powers' (ibid.). The
reason for this is that there is a 'ground of synthesis' for essence which
'brings us at least to a standstill'. Thus it is precisely the classical status of
essence as a function of the combination of form and matter (in Kant's
term 'synthesis') which limits our knowledge of logical essence to the
synthetic constitution of appearances and disqualifies us from any knowl
edge of real essence.
estimate [Beurteilung] see also CANON, JUDGEMENT, REFLECTIVE JUDGEMENT,

SUBSUMPTION, TRUTH
Estimation and subsumption are the two modes of judgement recognized
by Kant: the former distinguishes 'whether something does or does not
stand under a given rule' while the latter is the 'faculty of subsuming
under rules' (CPR A 132/B 171). Estimation is concerned with the ca
nonical use of judgement in distinguishing between true and false judge
ments, while subsumption effects judgement, and is part of its organon.
Kant discusses the estimative use of judgement in the context of theoretical,
practical, aesthetic and teleological judgements, referring on occasions to
the 'faculty' or 'power' of estimation (Beurteilung) (a term consistently
mistranslated as faculty or power of judgement). In GMM Kant refers to a
'principle' which while not known 'abstractly in its universal form' serves
as a 'standard' or 'compass' for distinguishing between good and evil
actions (p. 404, p. 16), and which is yet not so effective in the case of
theoretical judgements. Estimative judgements do not require the knowl
edge of a rule, but simply the ability to discriminate; this makes it particu
larly significant for aesthetic and teleological reflective judgements, which
are defined by the absence of a definite rule. Accordingly, most of the
judgements discussed in CJ are estimative: the aesthetic judgements of §9,
to take only one example, are estimates of objects according to the sub
jective free play of imagination and understanding, while teleological judge
ments are estimates of nature according to an 'analogy to the causality that
looks to ends' (CJ Part II, lntroduction).
The significance ofKant's distinction between estimative and subsumptive
178
EVIL
judgement has only recently been fully appreciated. This is largely the
result of the recent emphasis in cultural and political philosophy upon
difference and differential judgement. The interpretations of Kant's re
flective judgement by Arendt (1989) and Lyotard (1983), for example,
explore the implications of discri.minative judgement for political action
and the practice of art and literary criticism.
ethics see CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, COMMAND, EVIL, GOOD, IMPERATIVE, MAXIMS,

RIGHT, WILL
ethical commonwealth see CHURCH
evidence [Evidenz] see also ACROAMATIC, AXIOMS, CERTAINTY

Evidence is the intuitive certainty restricted to the intuitive principles or
axioms of mathematics (CPR A 733/B 761). lt is not applicable to the
discursive principles, or acroamata, of philosophy. Kant illustrates the con
trast by comparing the evidence of mathematical axioms, such as 'three
points lie in a plane', with the philosophical proposition that 'everything
has a cause'. The former 'combines the predicates of the object both a
priori and immediately' while the latter cannot be known 'directly and
immediately from the concepts alone' but requires a deduction or proof
which appeals to the 'condition of time determination in an experience'
(CPR A 733/B 761).
evil [kakon, malum, Böse, Übel] see also DISPOSITION, FREEDOM, GOOD, MAXIM,
WILL
Kant's discussion of evil was heir to a long and internally complex philo
sophical and religious tradition, outside of which many of his critical dis
tinctions and emphases are almost incomprehensible. This tradition, which
combined Judaic, Christian and Greek philosophical ideas, was concemed
above all with (a) the place and (b) the origin or cause of evil. With
regard to the former, evil was invariably placed in a dualistic opposition
to the good, whether the good was conceived philosophically as virtue or
excellence, or religiously as righteousness or God-fearing. The nature of
the good in its turn was variously conceived, whether in terms of the idea
of the good, as the will of God, or as the good or pleasant life. The
definition of the good determined to a large extent the definition of evil.
ff the good was considered to be an idea, as it was by Plato, then did this
entail considering evil also as an idea, or was it to be identified with the
opposite of the idea, i.e., matter, or was it a principle in its own right, in
conflict with the good? Plato argues in various places for each of these
positions, as indeed did Kant later. Similarly, the conception of the divine
179
EVIL
institution of the good also raised problems concerning the status of evil;
did it, like the good, also originate in God, or in an adversary to God, or
was it just an illusion caused by the lack of human insight into the ways
of God? These problems were avoided in Aristotelian and Epicurean ac
counts of evil, the former regarding it as an extreme deviation from the
mean, the latter as whatever caused pain, but these positions themselves
bequeathed further problems to posterity.
The definition of evil was further complicated by differences concern
ing the proper focus of discussions of evil. Should evil be considered
supernaturally, with reference to the theology of evil, or naturally with
reference to evil events in the world, or even psychologically, with refer
ence to human evil dispositions and actions? Most authors combined as
pects of all three, notably Plato and the Stoies in philosophy, the author
of the book of Job in the Jewish tradition, and the authors of the Christian
canon. Christians increasingly emphasized the psychological dimension of
evil - an emphasis derived from the theologically and naturally founded
doctrine of original sin - and emphasized in turn the role of will over
reason. This orientation reached its theological apogee in the writings of
Augustine which served to focus subsequent Christian reflection upon the
problem of the good and evil will (see Augustine, 1960, Book VII). Sub
sequent medieval Christian speculation upon evil may broadly be divided
in terms of the natural/supernatural emphasis of Aquinas and the more
supernatural/voluntaristic direction taken by Augustinians such as
Bonaventura, and much later by Luther.
The specific focus of Kant's discussion varied at different stages of his
career, although his concern with the connection between evil and the
human will remained constant. In ND Proposition IX, for example, he
moves from a theological discussion of the coexistence of good and evil
in God's most perfect creation to an aetiology of evil, one which finds its
origin not in God but in 'an inner principle of self-determination' proper
to human beings. This principle, it subsequently becomes clear, is not as
the rationalist Wolff had argued, based on our defective knowledge of the
good, but is a radically evil principle inherent to the human will. In terms
of the distinction offered in ND, human evil is a negative evil of defect
( malum defectus) not of reason but of the will; it is not a positive evil of
privation (malum privationis); the former involves a negation of the good,
while the latter proposes positive grounds for superseding the good.
By the time of his mature writings, Kant has focused his account of evil
almost exclusively on the problem of the human will. While he shows
himself conversant with arguments for and against the compatibility of the
existence of God with evil in the world, he states clearly in FPT that the
question of evil posed in this way cannot be addressed by knowledge.
180
EVIL
What can be addressed by knowledge, however, is the evil discernible in

the human will, and this Kant considers in CPrR and RL.
In the context of a discussion of the objects of practical reason in CPrR,
Kant develops a distinction between two forms of evil. The only possible
objects of practical reason are good and evil, terms which Kant says are
used to translate bonum and malum. He then points out that the 'German
language has the good fortune to possess expressions' (CPrR p. 61, p. 59)
which permit a distinction to be made between two forms of good and
evil. Kant translates bonum as both das Gute or the good and das Wohl or
well-being, corresponding to which he translates malum as das Böse or evil
and das Übel or bad. The opposition of well-being and bad holds with
respect to the 'sensibility and to the feeling of pleasure or displeasure which
it produces' (CPrR p. 60, p. 62). lt thus repeats the Epicurean alignment
of good and evil with pleasure and pain, and is distinguished by Kant from
good and evil proper. These do not refer to 'the sensory state of the
person' but indicate 'a relation to the will' which is 'not a thing but only
the manner of acting ...only the maxim of the will ...' (CPrR p. 60, p.
62).
The locating of evil within the maxims of the will is explored further in
RL, where Kant develops the thesis of radical evil. The source of evil lies
not in an object determining the will, nor in an inclination or natural
impulse, but only in 'a rule made by the will for the use of its freedom,
that is, in a maxim' (RL p. 21, p. 17). The ground for choosing between
a good or evil maxim cannot be found in experience; it is a free act based
neither upon sensible inclinations nor upon a further maxim of the will.
Human beings choose between maxims which determine the will according
to incentives of either the moral law or their sensuous natures. The dis
tinction between a good and an evil will depends upon 'which of the two
incentives [is made] the condition of the other' (RL p. 36, p. 31). Kant
continues by saying that this predicament of choice is ineluctable because
of the radical character of evil, which is described as a 'natural propensity,
inextirpabl.e by human powers' (RL p. 37, p. 32). But while human nature
is frail, it is not diabolic - it does not mal{e evil itself into an incentive of
the will; rather, human nature lacks the strength to follow principles and
the discrimination to distinguish between incentives. Yet because of the
same freedom which leads to the malum defedus of radical evil it is never
theless possible for human beings to overcome, if not extirpate, the
propensity to prefer the incentives of their sensuous natures over the
moral law. So while the propensities to good and evil do battle to direct
the maxims of the will, the 'seed of goodness [is prevented] from devel
oping as it otherwise would', although this does not prevent the will from
being cultured and possessing a history. This is not to suggest that there
181
EXAMPLE/EXEMPLARITY
is a quasi-Aristotelian mean between good and evil - Kant expressly rules

this out in a footnote on RL p. 39, p. 34 - but rather that good and evil
are continually struggling for predominance (RL p. 82, p. 77).
Kant's notion of radical evil is an example of a malum defectus and not
of a malum privationis. it negates the good or the moral law as an incentive
for maxims of the will, but does not replace it with an incentive to prefer
the evil maxim. This concept of evil allowed Kant to maintain the possibil
ity of a progressive human history in which the good is achieved through
the culturing of the will. The subtleties of this position were overlooked
by many of his critics, who regarded his doctrine of radical evil as quali
fying his defence of human freedom and thus, in the words of Goethe,
'besmirching his philosophical robe'. Nevertheless Kant's version of the
relationship of freedom and evil inspired some of the great nineteenth
century philosophical meditations on evil, notably Hegel's Philosophy of
Right (1821, §§139-40), Schelling's OfHumanFreedom (1809), Kierkegaard's
Concept ofAnxiety (1844), and Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals (1887). In the
light of political events in the twentieth century, Kant's notion of radical
evil as a malum defectus seems to many critics to be insufficient. The Jewish
Holocaust in World War II has been regarded by some writers as a diabolic
malum privationis involving the choice of an evil principle; others, notably
HannahArendt (1964), have spoken in a more Kantian"vein ofthe 'banality
of evil' arising from a will informed not by diabolic or even sensuous
incentives, but from an unreflective, bureaucratic obedience to 'duty'.
example/exemplarity [Beispiel, exemplarisch] see also CANON, ESTIMATE, EXHIBI

TION, GENIUS, IMITATION, JUDGEMENT
Examples are intuitions corresponding to empirical concepts, and serve as
'the g<K:art [ Gängelwagen] of judgement' (CPR A 134/B 173). Kant says
that those without a natural talent for applying general rules to particular
cases cannot dispense with the use of examples. They are a pragmatic
means for avoiding the 'aporia ofjudgement' which arises with the search
for rules for the application of rules. Examples for imitation are produced
by genius, whose works are exemplary precisely because 'though not them
selves derived from imitation, they must serve that purpose for others' (CJ
§46). Such works do not provide a formula or a rule, but act as a standard
by which the followers of genius may put their talent to the test. Thus
examples provide a canon for estimative judgement, they do not provide
a rule ofjudgement but simply a standard by which to distinguish between
good and bad judgements.
exhibition [exhibitio] see also CONSTRUCTION, EXAMPLE, JUDGEMENT, PRESENTA

TION, SYN1HESIS
182
EXISTENCE
Exhibition is the function of judgement which presents to a given concept

its corresponding intuition (see CJ § VIII). There are two forms of exhi
bition. The first, in which the corresponding intuition is added a priori to
a concept, is entitled construction. The second, in which an intuition is
presented to an empirical concept, is called an example. Kant claims that
without the basic addition of concept to intuition through exhibitio there
can be no knowledge, because the intuition would be blind and the concept
empty (WP p. 325, p. 181).
existence [Dasein, Existenz] see also ACTUALITY, BEING, CATEGORIES, GOD, NE
CESSITY, ONTOLOGY, POSSIBILITY, POSTULATES OF EMPIRICAL THOUGHT, SOUL,
SUBREPTION, THEOLOGY, WORLD
Kant followed Aristotle in distinguishing between being, actuality and
existence, regarding each term as a distinct way in which to speak of
being. The difficulty in defining the generic and specific differences be
tween the terms follows from their place within, and beyond, the order of
categorical judgement. Not only may none of these terms be used
subreptively as a predicate, it is equally unacceptable to describe the re
lations between them in terms of categorical functions such as quantity,
quality, relation or modality. Yet although each of these terms is extra
categorical - denoting the 'relation' through which categorial judgements
take place - they nevertheless form the basis of categorial judgement and
are thus crucial to it.
Kant describes the entire 'Analytic of Concepts' of CPR as covering the
ground of ontology, or the doctrine of being. The two main sections of
the analytic thus correspond to being thought of first as existence (in the
order ofthe categories) and then as actuality (in the principles). With this
distinction Kant implicitly follows Aristotle's distinction between dynamis
and energeia, the one designating potentiality, the other actuality. Although
the former is actualized by the latter this does not imply that the former
has an ontological or even epistemological priority; they are inextricable.
Thus the categories structure potential relations to objects which are ac
tualized by the principles, without either necessarily having priority over
the other.
The categorical order determines not only the contours of a possible
experience, but also the object of such an experiencc. The determination
is described as 'existence', which is not a predicate that may be applied in
a discrete act of judgement, but the position of the understanding as a
whole with respect to a possible object of experience. To qualify, this
object must exist for the understanding. lndeed, 'existence' denotes the
way in which an object of possible experience comes into being through
the categorical structure of the understanding; it is distinguished from
183
EXPERIENCE
actuality, which is the coming into being in space and time of the object
of experience. The general relation between existence and actuality as
'modes' ofbeing (although, strictly speaking, such recourse to the categories
of modality is illegitimate when speaking extra-categorically) is under
lined by the transformation of the second modal category of existence
nonexistence into the second postulate of empirical thought.
The limitation of the term existence to the categorial order of being
holds also for its use in describing the being of such objects as God, the
world and the soul. Kant maintains that the being of these objects cannot
be spoken of in terms of existence, nor, of course, of actuality. In the case
of each of these objects the condition through which they may (or may
not) be thought is hypostatized, leading to subreptions in which existence
is applied as if it were a predicate. The being of God cannot be spoken
of in terms of existence because 'all existential propositions are synthetic'
(CPR A 598/B 626) or presuppose the relation through which judge
ments of objects of possible experience may be made. God is by definition
not such an object, however much human reason may 'persuade itself'
(CPR A 586/B 614) to the contrary. Similarly with the world: we may
persuade ourselves of the existence of the world dogmatically, and thus
overlook the fact that all existence can tel1 us is the way in which 'objective
reality' 'is capable of being given to us' (CPR A 217/B 264). Finally the
soul - or 'the correlate of all existence' - cannot properly be said itself to
exist unless it could think itself through itself, a procedure evidently un
acceptable to Kant since 'I cannot know as an object that which I must
presuppose in order to know any object' (CPR A 402).
Kant's subtle distinctions between being, existence and actuality were
largely eroded in the reception of his philosophy. While his critique of
hypostatizing existence into a predicate and seeking to apply it to all
beings was well understood, his narrow distinction between existence and
actuality was largely overlooked. The relevance of the distinction was re
covered by Heidegger in Being and Time (1927), where he also further
distinguished between Dasein and Existenz, terms which Kant invariably
used synonymously.
experience [empeiria, experientia, Erfahrung] see also CONCEPT, CONSCIOUSNESS,

INTUITION, KNOWLEDGE, ONTOLOGY, REFLECTION, SENSIBILITY, UNDERSTANDING
At the end of the Posterior Analytics Aristotle re-capitulates the essentials of
his account of knowledge, which consists in the movement from sense
perception of particulars to universals. Experience plays an important part
in his argument, since it is both what emerges from the memory of repeated
sense perceptions and the source of the 'universal now stabilised in its
entirety within the soul, the one beside the many which is a single identity
184
EXPERIENCE
within them all' (Aristotle, 1941, 100a, 7-8). As such it the source of the
sk.ill of the craftsman in the 'sphere of becoming' and the knowledge of
the scientist in the 'sphere of being'. Experience thus mediates between
the particulars of perception and the universal of knowledge, and was
consistently considered in medieval philosophy as the dass of knowledge
associated with sense perception, and characterized by being received from
an extemal source.
The emphasis upon the extemal sources of experience is maintained by
Descartes, although he adds a significant qualification. In the Ru/,es Jor the
Direction of the Mind (1628) he describes experience as 'what we perceive
by sense, what we hear from the lips of others, and generally whatever
reaches our understanding either from extemal sources or from that con
templation which our mind directs backwards on itself' (Descartes, 1968,
pp. 43-4). Here, along with the extemal sources of experience, is added
an intemal source of the mind's reflection on itself. This could be con
strued in a routine Aristotelian fashion as 'memory', although that would
underestimate the implications raised by Descartes' revision of the notion
of experience. For the relationship between extemal and intemal sources
of experience could be construed in two directions. The first would be to
regard extemal experience as the source of intemal experience, to see
intemal experience as derived by means of reflection from outer experi
ence. The second would be to regard both sources of experience as in
dependent of each other, but nevertheless related, with the data of extemal
experience being complemented by that which is produced by means of
the mind's intemal reflection on itself.
The first direction, which regarded extemal experience as primary and
succeeded secondarily by internal reflection was followed in the work of
Locke and Hume. Locke, for example, opens his Essay Concerning Human
Understandingwith the claim that it is from experience 'that all our knowl
edge is founded, and from that it ultimately derives itself' (1690, p. 33). By
experience he intends, following Descartes, that derived from either 'external
sensib/,e objects' or 'the internal operations of our minds perceived and rejlected on
uy ourselves', namely, sensation and reflection. Reflection for Locke was the
reflection on sensation, a restriction which leads him to the sceptical doubt
conceming whether 'our know/,edge reaches much further than our experi
ence' (p. 285), an insight developed by Hume in his account of experi
ence in the Treatise of Human Nature (see, for example, Hume, 1739, p.
87). Leibniz, however, in his critical commentary on Locke in the New
Essays on Human Understanding, shifted the emphasis away from extemal to
inner experience, seeing the 'innate truths' of inner experience as prior
to, and conditions of, the data and truths of extemal experience (Leibniz,
1765, pp. 83-4). Kant, who at the end of his career described CPR as 'the
185
EXPERIENCE
genuine apology for Leibniz' (0D p. 251, p. 160), attempted to develop

a concept of experience which combined both directions opened by De
scartes, bringing into balance the aspects of inner and outer experience
emphasized by Leibniz and by Locke.
Kant agreed with Locke's limitation of knowledge to the bounds of
experience, even if his definition of experience was quite distinct. In fact,
the concept of experience used in such early writings as OS (1766) is not
far removed from Locke's. There, when he programmatically rejects the
view of metaphysics as the 'search for hidden things' in favour of its
redefinition as the 'science of the limits of human reason', he describes
with relief his retum to the 'humble ground of experience and common
sense' (OS p. 368, p. 355). While never repudiating this definition of
metaphysics and its consequent limitation of knowledge to the limits of
experience, Kant considerably redefines his concept of experience, mak
ing it something far from humble and commonsensical. The first stages of
this redefinition are evident in 1D. Kant rejects Locke's view that ideas (in
his case concepts and intuitions) may be derived from outer experience,
and inclines to Leibniz's position that they are presupposed by experience.
He defines experience as the 'reflective cognition, which arises when sev
eral appearances are compared by the understanding' but immediately
qualifies this position (which would be compatible with Locke's) by saying
that 'there is no way from appearance to experience except by reflection
in accordance with the logical use of the understanding' (1D §5). Thus the
reflection is itself pre-determined by the logical use of the understanding.
The elements of Kant's new concept of experience in 1D are developed
in the critical philosophy. He defines experience as 'the synthetic connec
tion of appearances (perceptions) in consciousness, so far as this connec
tion is necessary' (P §22). Experience is accordingly synthetic, described
as 'this product of the senses and understanding' which may be analysed
into elements. There are first of all 'intuition[s] of which I become con
scious, i.e., perception (perceptio), which pertains merely to the senses'
(P §20). These provide the element of external experience, but do not
add up to a füll experience. There is the synthesis in a judgement, but this
synthesis has particular properties; it does not 'merely compare percep
tions and connect them in a consciousness of my state' as was claimed by
empiricist accounts of perception, but subsumes intuitions under a con
cept 'which determines the form of judging in general with regard to the
intuition' (P §20). These are the a priori concepts of the understanding,
such as cause, which are not derived from experience but which give it its
character of necessity.
In the more subtle account of experience in CPR, the synthesis which
constitutes experience is not the simple conceptual unification of an
186
EXTENSION
intuited manifold, but takes place on the basis of a mutual adaptation of

concept and intuition. Kant maintains that all synthesis, 'even that which
renders perception possible, is subject to the categories; and since experi
ence is cognition by means of connected perceptions, the categories are
the conditions of the possibility of experience, and therefore valid a priori
for all objects of experience' (CPR B 161). Kant ultimately derives the
categories from the spontaneity of the understanding, thus establishing
the conditions of the possibility of experience in the mutual adaptation
between outer experience (receptivity of sensibility) and inner experience
(spontaneity of understanding). The a priori forms of intuition (space
and time) as well as the pure concepts of the understanding or categories
establish the conditions of possible experience which determine the limits
of legitimate knowledge. As Kant noted with respect to the categories,
'everything which the understanding derives from itself is, though not
borrowed from experience, at the disposal of the understanding solely for
use in experience' (CPR A 236/B 295).
Kant's concept of experience has rightly been one of the main areas of
critical contention in the interpretation of his philosophy. His attempt to
maintain the virtues of both empiricist and idealist accounts of experience
naturally provoked empiricist and idealist critiques of it. Similarly, the
subversive potential of his limitation of knowledge to objects of possible
experience provoked critiques from those who would defend the ideas of
God, the world and the soul. A popular avenue of criticism claims, largely
on the basis of P, that Kant in CPR worked with an impoverished concept
of experience, namely one restricted to the objects of Euclidean geometry
and Newtonian mechanics. Against this it was possible to point to CPrR
and CJ for broader notions of moral and aesthetic experience. This po
sition however, exaggerates the restrictions on the concept of experience
employed in CPR, and underestimates the ways in which the three critiques
complement each other in extending and refining aspects of the received
notions of experience.
explication see DEFINITION
exposition see DEFINITION
extension [Ausdehnung] see also BODY, DYNAMICS, EXTENSION, FORCE, MATTER

Extension was defined by Descartes in the Rul,es Jor the Direction of the Mind
(1628) as 'whatever has length, breadth, and depth' and which thus
'occupies space' while remaining distinct from body (Descartes, 1968, p.
57). His definition was motivated by the attempt to undercut metaphysical
notions of substance by replacing them with extensinn. This was resisted
187
EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL LIFE
by Leibniz, who defended the view that extension was an attribute of

substance. Kant largely adhered to the latter view, agreeing with Leibniz
in LF that a force inheres in body 'prior to its extension' (LF §1). For Kant
as for Leibniz, extended objects occupy space not because of their ex
tension, but by virtue of the dynamic qualities of impenetrability and
resistance. Kant thus claims in MF that '"to fill a space" is therefore a
closer determination of the concept "to occupy a space"' ( MF p. 497, p.
41). For these reasons he differed from the Cartesians in not regarding
extension as a fundamental property of matter, and thus it plays a rela
tively insignificant part in his philosophy.
extra-terrestrial life This is discussed most fully in the third part of UNH.
Although the treatment verges on irony at the expense of humanity, it is
clearly meant seriously. There Kant argues from natural theology and the
'infinity of nature' to the existence of extra-terrestrial life. He maintains
that most planets are inhabited, and that the inhabitants' bodily charac
teristics are determined by their environments (see the discussion of the
characteristics ofVenusians andjovians, UNH pp. 185-7, pp. 188-9). He
concludes with the thought of human migrations to other planets, adding
that 'such uncertain pictures of the force of imagination' (UNH p. 199,
p. 196) are insufficient for the 'hope of future life'. In CJ §91 he underlines
the hypothetical nature of the claim for the existence of extra-terrestrial
life by presenting it as an example of an empirical 'matter of opinion': 'for
ifwe could get nearer to the planets, which is intrinsically possible, experi
ence would decide whether such inhabitants are there or not, but as we
shall never get so near to them, the matter remains one of opinion'.
188
F
fact [ factum, Faktum, Tatsache] see also DEDUCTION , FREEDOM

Although Kant uses both the Latinate Faktum and the German Tatsache as
equivalents for factum, the Latin past participle of facere ( to do ) meaning
something done , he consistently distinguishes between the two terms. He
uses the term Faktum in CPrR in order to signal that it is being used by
analogy with Tatsache. However, the situation is complicated by his incon¬
sistent use of Tatsache in CPR and CJ. Faktum in the CPrR s fact of reason’
is used by analogy with the narrow sense of Tatsache in CPR, while in CJ
Tatsache is given a broader significance which contains both theoretical
and practical senses of the term.
In the deduction chapter of CPR, Kant translates quid facti or the ques¬
tion of fact ( ‘What has been done?’ ) as ‘die Frage . . . die Tatsache angeht’ .
The question of fact addresses the employment and origin of a concept
and not the legitimacy of using it ( CPR A 84/ B 116) . Here fact refers to
the sheer givenness of empirical concepts which allows us to use them -
‘appropriating to them a meaning, an ascribed significance’ ( ibid. ) - with¬
out the justification of a deduction. The immediacy of fact is used by
analogy in CPrR to describe the consciousness of the moral law, but this
usage is severely qualified by CJ §91 where Kant divides the genus of
‘knowable things’ into ‘matters of opinion ’ , ‘matters of fact’ ( Tatsachen) and
‘matters of faith’ . Now, far from being immediately and unproblematically
given, facts are objects which ‘answer to concepts which can be proven’
whether through experience or pure reason. These include the properties
of geometrical magnitudes, things verifiable by experience and finally,
and exceptionally, one idea of reason , the only one which may be proven
through experience. This is freedom, the only factual idea whose ‘reality
as a particular kind of causality’ is verified by the both the ‘practical laws
of pure reason’ and the ‘actions which take place in obedience to them’ .
In the deduction of freedom as a fact Kant signals a change in strategy
from that pursued with respect to the ‘fact of reason’ in CPrR. In CPrR
Faktum is unverifiable; it describes the immediate consciousness of the
fundamental law of pure reason which ‘forces itself upon us as a ‘fact of
189
FACULTY
reason' without presupposition, and which 'proclaims itself as originating

law' (p. 31, p. 31). The moral law or 'fact of pure reason' is 'apodictically
certain', not through any verifiable grounds but because we are 'a priori
conscious' of it. lt is like Tatsache of CPR in that it has not been called to
answer any question of right or quaestio quid juris, but unlike it in so far
as it can never be called to do so; it is 'firmly established of itself ' (p. 47,
p. 48). Thus Kant is using the term analogically, and clearly indicates this
by saying that the moral law is given 'as it were' (g/,eichsam) through a fact.
lt is not that the moral law is a fact, but rather that its peculiar immediacy
may be described in terms of an analogy with that of a fact. In CJ however,
Kant abandons the argument by analogy, preferring to argue that free
dom, like any other fact, may be verified by both freedom and experience.
faculty [ dynamis, Jacultas, Fakultät, Vermögen] see also DRIVE, POSSIBILITY, POWER
The English word 'faculty' translates two distinct ideas: the first signifies
a part of the structure of a university, the second a potential or power to
realize some end. Kant's concern with the first sense arose from the
anomalous place of philosophy in the curriculum and organization of the
eighteenth-century university. Philosophy did not have a natural place in
any of the three 'higher faculties' of law, medicine and theology, and
usually served as a propaedeutic to study in one of these disciplines. Kant
was a part of a cultural movement which sought to re-define the place of
philosophy in the university, as weil as to justify its encroachments upon
the higher faculties in the areas of philosophical jurisprudence and the
ology. His main contribution to the debate between the 'lower' and the
'higher' faculties is CF (1798), a work which addressed the conflict be
tween philosophy and theology, law and medicine.
The second sense of faculty translates the term Vermögen which in its turn
is derived from Latin facultas and Greek dynamis. Although the latter was
used by several pre-Socratic philosophers, notably Empedocles, its meaning
was definitively fixed by Aristotle in the Metaphysics. He broadly attributed
two senses to the term: the first referred to an ability or power to achieve
an end, the other to a potential for change which would be actualized
through energeia. This dual definition of faculty was enormously influen
tial, and remained remarkably stable throughout its transmission in me
dieval Aristotelianism. lt was especially prominent in the discussion of the
nature of the soul, which was divided into various potentials or faculties
of action. The two senses of faculty as potentiality and as a power of the
mind persist in Descartes and even as late as Wolff: Meissner's Wolflian
Philosophisches Lexicon (1737) gives facultas and potentia as synonyms for
Vermögen, and defines it in Aristotelian terms as the possibility of either
doing or suffering an action. He further specifies the faculties of desire as
190
FACULTY
sensible desire or appetite and the will, and the faculties of knowing as
sensibility and reason.
The term faculty is ubiquitous in Kant's writings, and indeed under
lies the architectonic of the critical philosophy. He reflects upon it most
systematically in the lntroduction to CJ, where he distinguishes between
faculties of the soul and faculties of cognition. Faculties of the soul, vari
ously described as Seilenvermögen or gesamte Vermögen des Gemüts or capaci
ties (Fähigkei,ten) (§III), comprise a fundamental, tripartite 'order of our
powers of representation'; these are: (a) the faculty of knowledge; (b) the
feeling of pleasure and displeasure; and (c) the faculty of desire. The
architectonic of the critical trilogy corresponds to the three faculties, with
the capacity for pleasure and displeasure forming a transition between the
theoretical and the practical, even though none of them may be derived
from a common principle.
Kant introduces the fundamental faculties of the soul by way of an
analogy to a related or kindred family ( Verwandschaft mit der Familie) of
cognitive faculties (Erkenntnisvermögen) (CJ §III). These faculties form a
distinct but related order of cognitive powers, divided between lower and
higher; the former are the faculties of sensibility, the latter the faculties of
reason, judgement and the understanding. Kant points to an analogy
between the two 'orders' of faculties, aligning the cognitive faculty of
understanding with the knowledge-faculty of the soul; reason with desire;
and judgement with the feeling of pleasure and displeasure. He later
(§IX) distributes them according to a systematic table, in which the two
sets of faculties are supplied with a priori principles and objects of appli
cation: the faculties of knowledge/understanding are accorded the prin
ciple of 'conformity to law' and the object of application 'nature'; those
of reason/desire are accorded 'final end' and 'freedom'; while the facul
ties judgement/pleasure and displeasure correspond to 'finality' and 'art'.
Thus it is clear that for Kant the faculties form internally articulated
orders which are analogous to each other. However, in spite of the im
portance of the term faculty for the entire critical project, he never fully
discusses or analyses it - unless, of course, the entire critical philosophy is
viewed as such. The lack of precision around this central term has proven
extremely fruitful, giving rise to psychologistic and other forms of
Kantianism. Indeed, even anti-psychologistic Kantianism maintains the
division of the cognitive faculties, to surrender which would probably be
to leave the ambit of the Kantian tradition. The reliance on the notion of
faculty by Kant and his followers was mocked by Nietzsche in §11 of Bey ond
Good and Evil as the 'honeymoon time of German philosophy' when 'the
young theologians of the College of Tübingen [Hegel, Schelling and
Hölderlin] went straightaway off into the bushes - all in search of
191
FAITH
"faculties" '. He regarded the appeal to faculties as analogous to the appeal

to a virtus darmitiva (a sleep-inducing faculty) to explain why opium induces
sleep, and proposed replacing the question 'How are synthetic a priori
judgements possible?' with 'Why are they necessary?' Such a question, of
course, intentionally and shrewdly challenges the entire ethos ofKantianism
at one of its most vulnerable points.
faith [fides, Glaube] see also BELIEF, HOPE, KNOWLEDGE, LOVE, OPINION, POSWLATES
The concept of faith played a relatively minor role in classical Greek
philosophy; it was used by Plato to describe one of the grades of knowl
edge by opinion (Plato, 1961, Rep., 5lle) and also to describe belief in
the gods (ibid., Laws, 966d). For Aristotle, faith refers to a form of proof
based upon induction or rhetorical persuasion. The philosophical con
cept of faith derives from the Christian tradition, and in particular its
Pauline strand. This provenance led to a tension between faith and knowl
edge, or religious doctrine and philosophy. lt stimulated various imaginative
efforts at reconciliation, which continued up to and after Kant.
In the New Testament faith is an attitude of belief in Christ, whether in
his words, his gift of healing or his works; it was codified by Paul, who uses
the term over 200 times in his Epistl,es, as a means of distinguishing the
Christian attitude towards the law from that of the Jews. He also initiated
the extremely influential idea that faith was a gift of grace: 'For by grace
you have been saved through faith; and this is not your own doing, it is
the gift of God' (Ephesians 2:8). This idea was developed by Augustine in
several works, and given its place within the medieval Aristotelian revival
by Aquinas. In the Summa contra genti/,es he distinguishes the ascent of
natural knowledge to God from the descent of the knowledge of faith
through grace from God, movements which he regards as complementary
(Aquinas, 1975, p. 39). Another relationship between faith and philoso
phy (or knowledge) was explored by Anselm, in whose Proslogfon faith
serves as the condition of understanding, a thought which led to the view
that faith has precedence over understanding, and then to the confession
credo quid absurdum - 'I believe because it is absurd'. Following the Refor
mation, arguments for faith as a subjective gift of grace were used to
criticize the doctrine of justification through works, and to support the
case for ecclesiastical and secular toleration (see Luther, 1961, p. 385).
Kant's discussion of faith is heir to the arguments between faith and
knowledge, and appears in several different contexts. In one he presents
his discussion of faith within a framework analogous to Plato's three forms
of knowledge (Plato, 1961, Rep. 5lle); faith, knowledge and belief are
modes of subjective assent or 'holding-to-be-true' (Fürwahrhalten). In CPR
he presents such assent in terms of subjective and objective sufficiency:
192
FAITH
opinion is neither subjectively nor objectively sufficient; knowledge is both

subjectively and objectively sufficient; while faith is subjectively yet consciously
not objectively sufficient (CPR A 822/B 850; see also WO). In CJ the
distinction is framed in terms of the objects of opinion, knowledge and
faith: an object of opinion is one whose existence is empirically possible
but unprovable; while the existence of an object of knowledge may be
attested to both factually and by means of pure reason. Objects of faith,
however, while they are thought a priori are nevertheless 'transcendent
for the theoretical use of reason' (CJ §91); they are ideas which have
subjective conviction, but 'whose objective reality cannot be guaranteed
theoretically'. Kant gives three examples of such objects: (a) 'the highest
good in the world attainable through freedom'; (b) the existence of God;
and (c) the immortality of the soul. Finally, in L Kant distinguishes be
tween the three forms of holding-to-be-true in terms of the modality of
their judgements: opinion is problematic, knowledge is apodeictic and
faith is assertoric.
The three objects of faith listed in CJ echo the three 'postulates of pure
practical reason' - freedom, immortality and the existence of God - which
in CPrR are presented in terms of the objective reality given to the ideas
of reason. They are not objects of theoretical knowledge, but possess their
own practical dignity. The same three ideas serve in the preface to the
second edition of CPR to disqualify 'all practical extension of pure reason'
and thus, in Kant's famous phrase, 'to sublate [aufheben] knowledgein order
to make room for Jaith' (CPR B xxx). Yet this is far from conceding credo
quid absurdum, since for Kant the subjective certainty of faith is well founded
and need neither appeal to nor negate knowledge. This is even the case
for 'doctrinal faith' such as physico-theology which applies the subjective
certainty of moral faith analogously (CPR A 825/B 853) to objects of nature.
An example, analysed at length in CJ Part II, is the purposiveness of the
world which follows from 'postulating' analogously a 'wise author of the
world'. The claim cannot be theoretically justified, but the degree of sub
jective conviction associated with it far exceeds that of opinion.
Kant regards such doctrinal faith as inherently unstable, unlike the moral
faith and the rational faith to which it gives rise. Moral faith bestows
certainty on the existence of freedom, immortality and God, and this
certainty is based upon the inability to disclaim these postulates without
'becoming abhorrent in my own eyes' (CPR A 828/B 856). The rational
faith issuing from this moral certainty involves an insight into the condi
tions necessary to achieve 'the unity of ends under the moral law' (see also
WO). And even if one were indifferent to moral laws, rational faith would
give rise to a negative faith along the lines of Pascal's wager; since it is
impossible to achieve 'any certainty that there is no such being and no such
193
FAITH
life' (CPR A 830/B. 858) such faith would form an 'analogon' of good
sentiments, namely a check on the outbreak of evil ones.
Kant's discussion of faith emphasizes what differentiates it from knowl
edge while aligning it with the practical ideas of reason. Although Kant
seems to stress the existence of God and immortality, his concerns are not
primarily religious ones. However, this does not mean that he excludes
religious considerations, for these are discussed at considerable length in
RL. There Kant uses the idea of faith as a gift conferring subjective cer
tainty upon its recipient to justify the distinction between religion, of
which there is only one, and faiths of which there are several ( Jewish,
Moslem, Hindu, Christian). Religion is 'hidden within and has to do with
moral dispositions' (RL p. 108, p. 99) while 'ecclesiastical faiths' are exter
nal, empirical and several. Kant discerns (and recommends) a transition
from partial ecclesiastical faiths to the universal church of religion; every
individual 'possesses' a 'saving faith' or 'pure religious faith' - i.e., prac
tical faith - even if they practice an ecclesiastical faith (RL p. 115, p. 106).
The latter are developments of 'historical faiths' founded upon specific
and attested acts of revelation, and stress outward acts of 'drudging and
mercenary faith' which, unlike saving faith, may weil be performed with
an evil disposition.
Saving or 'pure religious faith' has two elements: the first is faith in an
atonement or reparation for unjust actions, while the second is 'the faith
that we can become well-pleasing to God through a good course of life in
the future' (RL p. 115, p. 106). Both elements are derived from each
other, but in certain circumstances one may take precedence over the
other. Ecclesiastical/historical faith privileges atonement, conferring pri
ority upon faith in a 'vicarious atonement' over leading a good life, while
in religion the inverse holds, with the practical faith preferred over faith
in revelation. Kant sees a possible fusion of the two positions in a form of
Christology wherein Christ is an object of saving faith not because he once
existed and was the son of God, but because he is an exemplary 'archetype
lying in our reason . . . of a course of life well-pleasing to God' (RL p. 119,
p. 110).
Kant's discussion of religious and ecclesiastical faith may be criticized
for its crypto-Pauline elements, which prefer a 'Kingdom' founded upon
an ahistorical saving faith over other religious orientations which are in
different to matters of faith but which emphasize their historical charac
ter. This, however, was not the aspect of his account of faith which most
intrigued his successors (with the exception of Hermann Cohen who
aligned Judaism with the religion of pure reason which Kant described
in terms of Christianity). Most were interested in Kant's version of the
perennial problem of faith and knowledge, with F.H. Jacobi (1743-1819)
194
FEDERALISM
at the end of the eighteenth century arguing for faith against knowledge
in much the same way as Hamann had done in his metacritiques of Kant
(see Jacobi, 1787, Hamann, 1967). Hegel in Faith and Knowkdge (1802)
attempted to sublate the distinction by showing how an abstract concep
tion of knowledge gives rise to an opposition of faith and knowledge.
Kierkegaard's anti-Hegelian discourse on faith in Fear and Trembling (1843)
defends faith both as a presupposition of knowledge and as a leap without
knowledge into the absurd. Nietzsche, on the contrary, inquires into the
genealogy of faith, describing his 'basic problem' as 'whence this omni
potence of faith?' (Nietzsche, 1901, §259), whether in morality or truth.
Although this inquiry is presented as a critique ofKant, it characteristically
maintains several Kantian aspects, notably in the self-loathing and abhor
rence of the 'ugliest man' following the collapse of faith and the death of
God.
fear [Furcht] see also AFFECT, EVIL, FEELING, SUBLIME

Fear is defined as the emotional 'aversion to danger' and is of varying
degrees, ranging across anguish, anxiety, horror and dread (A §77). Anxi
ety, for example, is defined as 'fear of an object that threatens an unde
termined evil', while anguish is fear combined with reflection. The emotion
that may be evoked by the terrors of the sublime is not actual fear, but is
an astonishment which vertiginously exemplifies the superiority of the
imagination over internal and external nature.
federalism see alsoMHF, COSMOPOLITANISM, CULTURE, HISTORY, IDEA, PEACE, RIGHT,

STATE, WAR
The idea of federalism is discussed by Kant in the context of international
law and the federation of states, and marks a stage in the realization of the
idea of perpetual peace. The theme is discussed in MM in the context of
'Public Right', in TP in the context of cosmopolitanism, and in PP as the
second of three 'definitive articles of a perpetual peace'. While these
discussions differ significantly in detail, they share certain underlying
characteristics. The first is an analogy Kant draws between the formation
of a federation of states and 'that [process] by which a people becomes
a state' (MM p. 350, p. 156). Just as individuals before the formation of
a state are in a condition of war, so too are states before the constitution
of a federation. As often happens in Kant's arguments from analogy, the
similarity is accompanied by a difference, namely that states remain in the
condition of war and retain their sovereignty, thus permitting them to
leave or renew the federation of states. In PP and TP the analogy is ex
tended to an historical genealogy of the federation. The distress occa
sioned by universal violence 'makes a people submit to the coercion which
195
FEDERALlSM
reason itself prescribes' and to 'enter into a civil constitution' which will
also lead them 'into a cosmopolitan constitution' (TP p. 310, p. 90).
The motivation for entering into a federation of states lies in the con
cern for mutual security arising from the perpetual state of war that pre
vails between states; neighbouring states, writes Kant in PP, 'are a standing
offence to one another by the very fact that they are neighbours' (PP p.
354, p. 102). The character of such a federation, however, poses problems.
lt is here that the analogy with the constitution of the civil state breaks
down. This 'league of nations' must 'involve no sovereign authority (as in
a civil constitution) but only an association (federation)' (MM p. 344, p.
151) from which states may exit and whose terms they can renegotiate.
lndeed Kant sees an 'international state' as 'contradictory' since it re
quires the subordination of individual states to an international state, an
act which would found an empire and not a federation, and which would
effectively dissolve the constituent states (PP p. 356, p. 103). Kant describes
the league of nations as a 'pacific federation' which would not possess
'public laws and a coercive power' (PP p. 356, p. 104) but which, without
power, would secure the freedom of each state. However, quite how it
would achieve this end is unclear, and Kant himself is not sanguine about
its chances. He refers in MM to a 'permanent congress of states' which is
even weaker than a federation; it is a voluntary coalition 'that can be
dissolved at any time, not a federation (like that of the American states)
which is based on a constitution' (MM p. 351, p. 156). lt would serve
ultimately to provide a forum in which disputes between nations could be
decided juridically, by analogy with civil disputes, but without the law and
means of enforcement possessed by the civil state.
Kant's idea of a federation of states was influential in the discussions
which surrounded the constitution of the League of Nations and later the
United Nations. However, the difficulties faced by these institutions in
constituting ajuridically effective forum of states were anticipated by Kant.
On his analysis it could be argued that the constitution of a federation of
states is an asymptotic idea, one which cannot be realized in space and
time and which will give rise to antinomies and contradictions. The most
fundamental would be that of constituting an international legal order
which would govern the behaviour of states without a coercive apparatus
of enforcement: a legal order without such enforcement has little power
over constituent states; but one with such power would threaten to be
come an imperial state, one with the potential to dissolve the independent
existence of its constituents. Kant's characteristic solution is to argue in
terms of analogy and the as-if: he says it is in the interest of member states
to act as if they were participating in a legal order which did possess the
means of enforcing its judgements.
196
FEELlNG
feeling [ Gefahl] see also AFFECT, COMMON SENSE, FACULTY, GEMÜT, INCLlNATION,
LlFE, PLEASURE, RESPECT, SENSIBILITY
Feeling is one of Kant's most ambiguous and therefore fascinating con
cepts. Much of his writing may be read as the attempt properly to situate
'feeling' with respect to theoretical and practical philosophy, with the
concept shifting continuously between the margins and the centre of his
philosophy. This movement is exemplified by the place of feeling with
respect to the faculties of cognition and desire: Kant excludes feeling
from the critical practical philosophy only for it to retum in the shape of
the feeling of respect for the law (e.g., CPrR p. 76, p. 79); it is similarly
excluded from consideration in CPR as lying 'outside our whole faculty of
knowledge' (A 802/B 830) only to retum in the Introduction to CJ as a
necessary condition 'of the most ordinary experience' (§VI). But not only
does it appear unsettlingly in the contexts of theoretical and practical
philosophy, it even features as the object of a special branch of philosophy
concemed with feelings of pleasure and pain and their correlates beauty
and the sublime (OBS, A, Book Two), which serves as a bridge between the
two branches of philosophy and ultimately, in CJ, as their shared terrain.
Although it is described along with space and time in PE as a partially
analyzable concept, Kant does consistently attribute certain characteristics
to feeling. First of all, it expresses the subjective condition of a finite,
sensible being 'constantly compelled to pass beyond the present state' (A
p. 133) and whose experience is of an overwhelmingly sensuous character
(CPrR p. 67, p. 79). This feature not only relates feeling to the themes of
embodiment and life, but also accounts for its polar structure as the feel
ing of pleasure and pain (Lust und Unlust). In NM (p. 181, p. 220) and
A (§60) pleasure and pain are described as 'counterparts' which determine
each other; and since for Kant the life of a finite being consists in activity,
the feeling of pleasure and pain serves both as an expression of and as an
incentive to further activity. Such activity consists in mutually defined surges
and checks on the 'vital power' which generate 'erratic sequences of pleas
ant feelings (constantly interspersed with pain)' (A §60). The oscillation
between pleasure and pain provokes all the 'various feelings of enjoyment
or displeasure' and rests 'not so much upon the nature of the extemal
�ings that arouse them as upon each person's own disposition to be
moved by these to pleasure and pain' (OBS p. 207, p. 45). This wavering
informs the plethora of feelings 'which we experience in the highly com
plex circumstances of life' (NM p. 182, p. 220) including feelings such as
syippathy/hostility, friendship/enmity, love/hatred, beauty/sublime.
In the pre-critical philosophy Kant established the pattem of examining
the feelings of pleasure and pain both in their own terms and with respect
to the opposition of theoretical and practical philosophy. In OBS he offers
197
FEELING
an empirically oriented analysis of feeling through reflections on exam

ples organized in terms of the beautiful and the sublime. The anthropo
logical slant of this text is systematically extended in his lectures on
Anthropology, and in particular in Book Two 'On the Feeling of Pleasure
and Displeasure' which forms the transition from Book One on the 'cog
nitive faculty' to Book Three on the 'faculty of desire'. Alongside this
characterization of feeling in terms of a transition between theoretical and
practical philosophy Kant also tries to distinguish it from both. In the final
pages of PE he distinguishes between the faculty of representing the true
or cognition and that of representing the good or feeling, describing the
latter as necessarily relative to 'a being endowed with sensibility' (p. 299,
p. 273). This feeling of the good issues neither from cognition nor from
a supposed moral sense, although Kant admits that, regarding first prin
ciples, in practical philosophy the precedence of feeling or cognition has
yet to be determined (p. 300, p. 274).
A similar structure persists in the critical practical philosophy of GMM
and CPrR, where Kant identifies feeling and rational principles as
'heteronomous principles of morality' (GMM p. 442, p. 46; CPrR p. 40, p.
41). There, however, sensuous feeling - 'the condition of all our inclina
tions' - is also a condition for the feeling of respect occasioned by the
reverence for the law of 'pure practical reason'; it is this which removes
'in the judgement of reason, the counterweight to the moral law which
bears on a will affected by the sensibility' (CPrR p. 76, p. 78). Although
respect is a 'singular feeling' which cannot be compared with other feel
ings, it remains nevertheless a feeling. Yet it has two peculiarities which
render it incomparable: the first is that its object, as distinct from the
feeling of pleasure and pain, is always a person, never a thing (p. 77, p.
79); the second is that it does not arise from the oscillation of pleasure
and pain which characterizes the life of a finite being, and gives neither
pleasure nor pain (p. 78, p. 80). Yet in spite of the latter distinction, the
feeling of respect does have distinct effects; it has a negative effect when
it serves as a 'check' on the inclinations experienced as 'humiliation' and
a positive one when it serves as an incentive for obedience to the law
(p. 80, p. 82).
In CPrR Kant redefined feeling in order to establish a place for respect
as a special kind of feeling. In CJ, his treatise on feeling and judgement,
he pursues an altogether more audacious strategy. At first glance Kant
seems to be following the approach of OBS and A in developing a special
philosophy of the aesthetic feelings of the beautiful and sublime, one
which inhabits the interstices between the theoretical and practical domains.
However, this special philosophy soon assumes the role not only of facili
tating a transition from one realm to the other, but also of providing the
198
FINAIJTY
common ground between them. The feeling of pleasure and pain is held
to offer a key to the 'riddle of judgement' (CJ Preface) which perplexed
theoretical and practical philosophy. In CJ the alignment of feeling and
judgement has several fascinating consequences: it makes feeling both
subjective (in the free-play of the cognitive faculties) and objective (as a
necessary and universal judgement); it also dissolves the distinction crucial
to CPrR between the objects of the feeling of pleasure and displeasure
and the feeling of respect, for it refers to both objects and persons; finally,
feeling is no longer 'intemal' and subjective but as a form of common
sense becomes 'social' and intersubjective (for a short and dense state
ment of these points see, inter alia, CJ §12). These augmented properties
of feeling are further extended to underlie both theoretical and practical
philosophy: feeling provides the basis for the former in the intimation of
an accord between the finality of nature and our understanding (Intro
duction §VI) and the latter as the summum bonum of a flourishing life
(e.g., §87). In the CJ the domains of theoretical and practical judgement
are shown to follow from a prior arrangement of feeling, nature, inter
subjectivity and judgement.
The direction of the argument in CJ has given it a peculiar status in
Kant's oeuvre, making it for some the crowning phase of, and for others an
indiscreet coda to, the critical philosophy. At stake in these contrary judge
ments is not just a difference of opinion conceming the proper place of
feeling in Kant's philosophy, but the far broader problem of the relation
ship of philosophical speculation to areas of human life and activity which
do not obey limited or formal notions of rationality. The issue of feeling
raises in acute form the question of the nature of philosophy and its rela
tionship to 'non-philosophical' areas of experience. The working through
of this issue is not confined to the reception of Kant's philosophy, but is
clearly present throughout Kant's own texts.
finality [Zweckmässigkeit] see also CAUSALITY, END, NATURE, REFLECTIVE JUDGE

MENT, TELEOLOGY
Finality is an extremely rich concept which Kant developed in CJ. In CPR
the 'finality of nature' is referred to on a small number of occasions with
the waming that it must 'be explained from natural grounds and accord
ing to natural laws' (A 773/B 801). In CJ, however, finality plays a central
role in the accounts of both aesthetic and teleological judgement, as well
as having been given retrospective significance with respect to the deter
minant judgements analysed in CPR.
In CJ Kant gives two definitions of finality, both of which relate it to the
notion of an end. In the first definition an 'end' is 'the concept of an
object, so far as it contains at the same time the ground of the actuality
199
FINITUDE
of this object' (CJ §IV), while in the second it is 'the object of a concept
so far as this concept is regarded as the cause of the object' (§10). Both
definitions of 'end' yieldformalfinality or, in the first case, the 'agreement
of a thing with that constitution of things which is only possible according
to ends' (§IV) and in the second 'the causality of a concept in respect of
its object' (§10). The first describes subjective finality, the second objec
tive finality. lt is necessary to assume some form of finality in order for any
judgement to take place; this is because finality describes an attunement
between human judgement and the world, without which, in Kant's words,
the 'understanding could not feel itself at home in nature' (§VII).
Kant's account of the aesthetic judgement of taste rests on the distinc
tion between subjective and objective finality. Objective finality is causal:
it realizes an end. Subjective finality is merely the power of judgement
disceming the possibility of an end. Kant first criticizes views which ground
beauty in extemal objective finality, in the utility or agreeableness of the
object, and then goes on to criticize Baumgarten's account of aesthetic
judgement in terms of intemal objective finality for basing its estimate of
an object's beauty upon its perfection, or the extent to which it realizes
its end (§15). Kant, however, grounds aesthetic judgement in subjective
finality, or 'finality without an end' (Zweckmässigkei,t ohne Zweck), or the
agreement of the form with the subjective harmony of the imagination
and understanding. Furthermore, the consciousness of such finality is
defined by Kant as 'pleasure itself ' generated by the agreement of the
1.magination and understanding.
In the second part of CJ - 'Critique of Teleological Judgement' - Kant
further develops the distinction between the forms of finality, but adds a
further specification in his distinction between the 'idealism' and the 're
alism' of the finality of nature: the former regards finality as accidental
and without an author, while the latter sees it as inherent to matter
(hylozoism) or derived from an original source (theism) (§72). He criticizes
both for treating finality as a constitutive principle, and suggests its use be
restricted to serving as a regulative principle of reflective judgement.
finitude see also FEELING, IMMORTALITY, IMPERATIVE, INTUITION, NEED, REASON,

RECEPTMTY, SENSIBILITY, SYNTHESIS, TIME, UNDERSTANDING
In the closing pages of CPrR Kant evokes the 'awe and admiration' evoked
by 'the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me' (p. 162, p.
166). The reflection on the two objects creates a movement between the
feelings of finitude and insignificance and those of immortality and infi
nite worth. The sense of the annihilation of 'my importance as an animal
creature, which must give back to the planet (a mere speck in the uni
verse) the matter from which it came, the matter which is for a little time
200
FORCE
provided with vital force' co-exists with the revelation through the moral
law 'of a life independent of all animality and even of the whole world of
sense' (p. 162, p. 166). This movement informs the entire critical philoso
phy, and is manifest in the limitation of knowledge to the bounds of a
finite intuition and understanding accompanied by the elevation through
the moral law beyond those limits. Human finite intuition is distinguished
from divine or 'intellectual' intuition by the temporal character of the
synthesis which constitutes experience and knowledge. The various syn
theses which unify concept and intuition are oriented with respect to past
and future experience, and remain essentially incomplete. With respect
to practical philosophy, the inclination towards discrete ends arise from
human need, which for Kant follows from the finitude of the human
condition. lt is the tension between a 'finite practical reason' and the
moral law which renders necessary the moral imperative and the 'endless
task' of pursuing the model of a holy will (CPrR, p. 32, p. 32).
In CPR Kant insists upon the finitude of human experience, limiting its
scope to appearances or the perceptions of a finite intuition. The only
exception is moral experience which for Kant includes faith. Yet many
critics, above all Nietzsche and later Heidegger, have questioned Kant's
admission of non-finite dimensions of moral experience. There is a defi
nite fault line in his philosophy between the rigorous accounts of experi
ence in terms of human finitude that broadly informs the first and third
critiques (i.e., CPR, CJ), accounts which may be described as Epicurean,
and the more Platonic emphasis on the opposition between finite and
infinite worlds presented in CPrR Whether it is possible to maintain the
former emphasis while rejecting the latter is an open question. A satisfactory
answer to it would largely hinge on whether it was possible to conceive of
moral experience in the absence of infinity (which Kant could not), and
whether the crucial role played by freedom and spontaneity in all branches
of the critical philosophy could be sustained within a rigorously finite
framework.
force [ vis, Kraft] see also ACfUALI1Y, BODY, MATTER, MOTION, POWER, REPULSION
This concept arises from philosophical and scientific reflection upon the
causes of the motion of material bodies. The currently prevailing defini
tion is the natural scientific one, which regards force as an action that
alters the state of rest or uniform motion of a body. In the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries, the concept of force was ill-clefined scientifically
and philosophically (insofar as the two approaches were separable), lead
ing to considerable confusion in which Kant fully participated. One of the
fundamental confusions arose from the distinction between inertial and
active force. The former, in Descartes' terms, was the force by which a
201
FORCE
body remained at rest, the latter the force by which a body commenced
and remained in motion (see Descartes, 1981, p. 79). By conceiving of
inertial force as 'innate' and active force as extemally caused, some phi
losophers, including Leibniz and Kant, went on to regard force in tradi
tional, Aristotelian terms as a principle or cause of motion. This led to
further confusion around the distinction between what became known as
the two 'extemal forces' - body and surface forces. Body forces such as
gravity act throughout material bodies, while surface forces are applied by
one solid body to another. The illegitimate extension of the model of
surface forces to the account of force as a whole underlies Kant's central
distinction between attractive and repulsive force.
The philosophical reflection upon the concept of force remained a
constant throughout Kant's career. His first work LF (1747) defines 'es
sential force' not as vis motrix but as vis activa - as active rather than motive
force. Kant's conception of essential force, it is clear from §3, combines
inertial and active force.The 'essential force' in question cannot be known
mathematically (according to the 'Cartesian measure') since such knowl
edge is restricted to extemal appearances of motion. Its füll appreciation
requires metaphysical knowledge, which is not confined to extemal mo
tion but also extends to the intemal vis activa which is a property of both
material and intelligible substance. The latter move permits Kant in §6 to
extend the range of the concept of force from physics to psychology, using
it to 'solve' the Cartesian difficulty of the relationship between body and
soul.
Although there are many instances of this metaphysics of force in Kant's
pre-critical writings, there is also a clear realization of its dangers. In DS
Kant describes those fundamental forces not derived from experience as
'wholly arbitrary' and warns against inventing 'fundamental forces' in place
of connecting 'the forces, which one already knows through experience,
in a manner which is appropriate to the phenomena' (p. 371, p. 357).
This view is sharpened in 1D where Kant rails against the kind of meta
physics of force exemplified by his own LF: 'so many vain fabrications of
I know not what forces are invented at pleasure ...they hurst forth in a
horde from any architectonic mind, or if you prefer, any mind which
inclines to chimaeras' (§28). This development corresponded to Kant's
redefinition of metaphysics as 'a science of the limits of human reason' (DS
p. 368, p. 354), and intimates his later critical account of force.
Yet in spite of this development, Kant's account of force does not en
tirely escape its initial limitations.Already in PM (1756), in the context of
discussions of inertial force, Kant introduces a distinction between attrac
tive and repulsive force (p. 484, p. 62). The distinction generalizes the
action of surface force to internal 'active force' and was extended by Kant
202
FORM
from the realm of physics to moral and political phenomena. Tue view of
the mutual determination of attractive and repulsive forces offered a use
ful analogy by which to explain a wide variety of phenomena, ranging
from the impenetrability of matter to the 'asocial sociability' of Kant's
practical philosophy.
In CPR force, along with action, is described as a derived concept of
causality, one which the understanding thinks in regard to body (A 20/
B 35), particularly with respect to 'successive appearances, as motions,
which indicate [ the presence of] such forces' (A 207/B 252). The forces
themselves, however, are for us 'inscrutable' and unavailable to observa
tion (A 614/B 642). Kant maintains this position in MF, except that here
he acknowledges the existence of the two 'fundamental forces' of attrac
tion and repulsion. The fundamental forces lie at the root of the concept
of matter, but cannot themselves be comprehended or constructed for
presentation in a possible intuition. This means that they cannot be given
a mathematical analysis (MF p. 524, p. 78). Later however, in the OP, Kant
attempts to articulate the empirical forces which make up physics into a
rational and systematic unity. As the 'Transition from the Metaphysical to
the Physical Principles ofNature' this derives an a priori system ofpossible
forces from the table ofcategories and the general properties ofmatter; the
unification of force and matter is accomplished by the concept of ether.
Kant's reliance on ether in bis final account of philosophical physics
indicates the limitations of bis concept of force. Yet the basic opposition
of the fundamental forces of attraction and repulsion seems to have ap
pealed to Kant for philosophical rather than scientific reasons, and was
used for a similar reason in Schelling's (1813) and Schopenhauer's (1813)
philosophies ofnature. Hegel critically analyzed the oppositional structure
ofthe concept offorce (Hegel, 1812, pp. 518-23), but after him the philo
sophical and the natural scientific analyses of force diverged substantially.
fonn see also ARCHETYPE, BEAUIY, CATEGORIES, CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION, FORMAL

ISM, FORMS OF INTUIDON, IDEAS, MATTER, PURE
The analysis of 'the forms of thought' is described in 1796a as 'the ever
proceeding labour and careful work' (p. 404, p. 70) of metaphysical phi
losophy. Kant justifies this claim by a historical account of the problem of
form in Plato and Aristotle, and their influence upon the 'recently elevated
tone in philosophy'. Kant criticizes Plato for seeking the origins of the
forms in the 'divine understanding' or 'primal ground of all things' in
stead ofin our own understanding. This leads in Kant's view to a doubling
of the world into arche- and ectypal aspects which permits philosophical
and religious enthusiasts to claim immediate intuitive knowledge of the
'true world' without going through the bother ofphilosophizing. Aristotle
203
FORM
too is indicted for the same offence in trying to extend the forms of
knowledge from the physical to the metaphysical world. But it is Plato,
above all, who for Kant is to blame for philosophical enthusiasm, even
though Kant does not hold him personally responsible (p. 391, p. 54).
The 'recently elevated tone' that Kant decries either mystically intuits
form or rejects it as 'mere pedantry' or 'form-manufacturing' (p. 404,
p. 70). Against both of these tendencies Kant proposes the critical treat
ment of form as a pure a priori feature of experience.
In ET Kant approvingly cites the scholastic formula forma dat esse rei
('form gives the essence of things') and gives it a critical inflection. If the
things in question are 'objects of sense' then the forms of things are the
'forms of intuition' identified in CPR as space and time. Mathematics, he
adds, is nothing but the doctrine of the forms of pure intuition. Metaphys
ics or 'pure philosophy', on the contrary, is based upon the 'forms of
thought' under which every object or 'matter of knowledge' may be sub
sumed. These forms of the understanding are the conditions of the pos
sibility of synthetic knowledge. In CPR, Kant also adds that the 'ideas of
reason' are forms of reason, but in ET he insists (not inconsistently) on
restricting the formal employment of reason to practical laws, in which it
is not the material aspect of an action - its desired end - but only its form
which is morally significant. This consists in the suitability of a maxim for
being made into a universal law. To Kant's summary of the importance of
form in theoretical and practical philosophy in ET may be added the role
it plays in his aesthetic philosophy. In CJ the quality of a judgement of
taste is abstracted from the matter of the art object, and consists only in
its 'form of finality' (§17).
While form is a central concept in the critical philosophy, it is not free
of ambiguity. This stems largely from Kant's maintaining a Platonic dis
tinction between form and matter while also trying to overcome it: he at
one moment shows form and matter to be inseparable while at the next
denies that they are in any way implicated in each other. Thus on one
occasion in CJ he can claim that the quality of a judgement of taste
consists in its pure finality of form, while at another showing that this form
can only be revealed by means of contrasting it with 'charm' or the matter
of a judgement of taste (§14). More significantly, in the discussion of the
concepts of reflection in CPR, matter and form are taken together to
'underlie all other reflection', with matter serving as 'the determinable in
general [and form as] its determination' (A 266/B 322). Both are mutu
ally implicated, since form as determination is meaningless without a matter
to be determined. Furthermore, the opposition of form and matter is
played out analogously in other oppositions scattered throughout Kant's
texts, such as those between form as purity, matter as impurity; form as
204
FORM
universality, matter as particularity; form as identity, matter as difference;

and even form as subject and matter as object.
If form means very little outside of its opposition to matter, then prob
lems arise when the attempt is made to separate formal and material
elements. These problems have been worked through in various guises by
Kant and bis subsequent followers and critics. They may rather crudely be
reduced to two related classes of problem: the first concerns the
subsumption ofmatter by form, the second the sources or origins ofform.
If form stood in no relation whatsoever to matter, ifthere were no relation
between determining and determinable, then there would be no knowl
edge or moral action: for knowledge is knowledge of determinable ap
pearances, and moral actions are those of a determinate finite being. In
the face of this Kant develops some extremely subtle analogues for Pla
tonic participation, such as schematism and the principles in CPR and the
typic in CPrR. The analysis of pleasure in CJ also marks the attempt to
relate formal and material aspects ofaesthetic pleasure, although here, on
occasions, it does seem as ifKant renounces the residual Platonic opposition
of matter and form in favour of a broader notion of 'proportionality'.
The main difficulty that Kant engages with in these parts of bis argu
ment is one of keeping matter in its place, allowing it to relate to form
without becoming too insubordinate. This problem is compounded in
Kant's analysis ofthe accounts ofthe sources ofform. Kant does not admit
the empiricist argument that form may be derived by abstraction from the
experience of matter; he maintains that form precedes 'the things them
selves' (A 267/B 323) and does so by restricting the scope of the critical
philosophy to the analysis of appearances in space and time. But he also
wishes to avoid the contrary position, namely that form is ofpurely rational
origin; this would expose him to the risk of regarding form in Leibnizian
or Wolffian terms as an intuition ofrational perfection, or in Malebranchian
terms as a gift of God. He is also wary of any psychological genealogies of
form, whether as an innate idea or as the issue of feeling. His own, noto
riously complex position(s), derive form from the transcendental unity of
apperception, as in CPR, or from the negotiation between subject and the
world in CJ and later writings.
The problems surrounding the notion of form gave and continue to
give rise to a great deal ofcritical commentary. As one ofthe fundamental
problems of philosophy it will probably remain perennial, and not only
within the confines of Kant criticism. What is undeniable is that Kant, in
spite of remaining within a Platonic opposition, substantially redefined
the terms of the problem, seeing it as one which spanned theoretical,
practical and aesthetic philosophy and which has as its starting point not
the supersensible realm, but the experience of finite human subjects.
205
FORMAL LOGIC
formal logic see LOGIC
formalism A blanket criticism often directed against the critical philoso

phy, formalism has taken various guises. Versions range from those of
Hamann and Hegel to those of Nietzsche and Husserl, with more recent
contributions from phenomenology and critical theory. lt basically main
tains thatKant's preoccupation with the formal aspects of experience and
action led him to suppress their material and affective sides. The alleged
preoccupation with form is held by many to lead to a distorted and partial
account of experience and action which cannot fully justify its own formal
premises and represses other aspects of experience. The table of catego
ries, the moral law and the aesthetic 'form of finality' are all cited as
evidence of a formalistic orientation.
Many philosophers have attempted to trace the origins ofKant's alleged
formalism. His earliest critic Hamann saw its source to lie in the purifica
tion of language (see Hamann, 1967); for Hegel it arose from an abstract,
ahistorical account of experience (see Hegel, 1807); while for Nietzsche,
the origins of the 'will to form' were traced to the need for ascetic philoso
phers to rule over the body and its affects (see Nietzsche, 1886). Critical
theorists such as Adorno saw in Kant's formalism an example of the dia
lectic of enlightenment which reduced experience to a formal calculus
the better to control it (see Adorno and Horkheimer, 1944). This genea
logical critique is often, but not necessarily, accompanied by an attempt to
develop a non-formalistic philosophy such as Max Scheler's non-formalist
(i.e., anti-Kantian) ethics based on sympathy and other affects (Scheler,
1973), and Georges Bataille's anti-formal, anti-idealist materialism (Bataille,
1985).
forms of intuition see also AESTHETIC, FORM, INTUITION, SENSATION, SENSIBILITY,
SPACE, TIME
In the first part of CPR on 'Transcendental Aesthetic', intuition is defined
as the immediate relation of a mode of knowledge to its objects (A 19/
B 33). The effect of the intuition of objects on the faculty of representa
tion is sensation, which has material and formal aspects. The matter of
intuition is 'the appearance which corresponds to sensation' and the form
'that which so determines the manifold of appearance that it allows of
being ordered in certain relations' (A 20/B 34). Following a process of
abstraction which first isolates sensibility from the understanding and then
further removes everything belonging to sensation, Kant derives the 'two
pure forms of sensible intuition, serving as principles of a priori knowledge'
(A 22/B 36) which he identifies as space and time.
foundation see GROUND
206
FREEDOM
freedom [libertas, Freiheit] see also ANTINOMY, AUTONOMY, CAUSALITY, LAW,

REASON, SPONTANEITY, SYNTHESIS, WILL
Freedom is a pivotal concept in Kant's philosophy, informing both its
theoretical and practical sections. lt has two significant and related quali
ties, which were first described in the early modern conception of freedom
developed by Machiavelli: freedom involves both independence from any
form of dependency - freedom from - and the power for a subject to
legislate for itself - freedom to. Achieving the correct balance of these two
aspects of freedom is the implicit aim of the critical philosophy, as is
evident in both the theoretical philosophy of CPR and the practical phi
losophy of CPrR, GMM and MM. In the former freedom features as spon
taneity as opposed to receptivity, in the latter as autonomy as opposed to
heteronomy.
In CPR Kant identifies spontaneity as the theoretical analogue of free
dom; in the discussion of the third antinomy and the problem of natural
and free causality he refers to the cosmological and practical senses of
freedom. By the former he understands 'the power of beginning a state
spontaneously' and describes it as reason creating 'for itself the idea of a
spontaneity which can begin to act of itself, without requiring to be deter
mined to action by an antecedent cause in accordance with the law of
causality' (CPR A 533/B 561). This spontaneity is thus opposed to natural
causes, and has the grounds for its determination within itself. In the
analytic of CPR this spontaneity is described as one of the sources of knowl
edge along with receptivity. Kant consistently opposes the spontaneity of
the imagination and understanding to the receptivity of the sensibility;
spontaneity is the 'Gemüt's power of producing representations from itself '
(A 51/B 75), but it is a power incapable of producing knowledge without
the contribution of receptivity. For the spontaneous act of synthesis to
tak.e place there has to be something present in sensibility to be synthesized.
Thus on the one hand freedom as spontaneity is absolute in giving itself
laws of synthesis, but on the other it is intrinsically qualified by receptivity.
The problem of the pure spontaneity of the understanding being
dependent upon receptivity in order to become effective is described by
Kant in connection with practical freedom as 'the real source of the dif
ficulty by which the question of the possibility of freedom has always been
beset' (A 533/B 561). In the case of practical freedom it is the motivating
grounds of the will which have to be autonomous. Instead of the heteron
omous principles of the will, whether of rational provenance (perfection)
or empirical provenance (pleasure, happiness), Kant insists on an intelli
gible freedom based upon the autonomy of the will. Yet this freedom finds
extreme difficulty both in freeing itself from heteronomy, and once it
has thus freed itself, in restraining its inherent anarchic and perhaps even
207
FREEDOM
self-destructive impulse, for 'it is in the power of freedom to pass beyond

any and every specified limit' (A 317/B 374). Accordingly, in GMM free
dom is defined negatively and positively. In the first case, 'The will is a
kind of causality belonging to living beings insofar as they are rational;
freedom would be the property of this causality that makes it effective
independent of any determination by alien causes' (GMM p. 446, p. 49)
or freedom from. In the second case, freedom consists in self-legislation,
'What eise, then, can freedom of the will be but autonomy, i.e. the prop
erty that the will has of being a law unto itself?' (p. 447, p. 49).
The imperatives appropriate for such a conception of freedom can be
neither hypothetical nor material; they are not rules of skill for attaining
some determinate, material end, but are categorical and formal: they 'are
not concerned with the matter of the action and its intended result, but
rather with the form of the action and the principle from which it follows'
(GMM p. 416, p. 26). Yet these actions have to be effective in a world of
space and time beset by competing and incompatible material ends. If the
imperative had no application in this world then it would be empty, like
the pure spontaneity of the understanding. The outcome was a bifocal
moral philosophy: at its most ambitious but ill-focused extreme, autonomy
is the core of a metaphysically grounded account of freedom; but at the
other extreme it is but the more modest basis of a canonical principle for
testing maxims of action.
Kant's immediate successors pursued the ambitious programme of a
metaphysically grounded account of freedom. Both Fichte (1794) and
Schelling (1800) transformed spontaneity and autonomy into subjective
and objective absolutes, a practice which Hegel was the first to criticize for
positing absolutist and insatiable demands which remained empty and
incapable of realization except through destructive terror, one which in
deed passes 'beyond any and every specified limit'. While accepting that
modern philosophy was one of freedom, he sought to qualify the absolute
demands of freedom with respect to the categories and to ethical life.
Hegel's discovery of a suppression of receptivity and heteronomy at the
heart of freedom was developed by Nietzsche who famously claimed that
'the categorical imperative smells of cruelty' (Nietzsche, 1887, p. 65).
Twentieth-century philosophers from Heidegger (1947) to Adorno and
Horkheimer (1944) have defended the view of freedom as intrinsically
qualified by its other against neo-Fichtean accounts such as that of Sartre.
They claim that absolutist accounts of freedom based on absolutely au
tonomous and spontaneous subjects insensitive to the ways in which their
freedom is qualified lead to terror and subjugation in the very name of
freedom.
208
FUIURE
friendship [philia, amica, Freundschaft] see also AFFECT, LOVE, REPULSION,

SOCIABILITY
Friendship was central to Greek and Roman theoretical and practical
philosophy, where its meanings ranged from Empedocles' metaphysical
contrast of friendship and strife to Aristotle's praise of friendship in the
Nicomachean Ethics, and to the Roman Stoic conception of friendship for
the human race. In Christian philosophy it is secondary to considerations
of love, but with Kant assumes again an important place in ethics.
Kant regards friendship as an ideal defined as the 'union of two persons
through equal mutual love and respect' (MM p. 469, p. 261). Friendship
consists in achieving a balance between the attraction of love and the
repulsion of respect. For this reason Kant regards it as extremely difficult
both to attain and sustain. He distinguishes between moral and aesthetic/
pragmatic friendship: the former emphasizes the element of respect and
is defined as 'the complete confidence of two persons in revealing their
secret judgements and feelings to each other, as far as such disclosures are
consistent with mutual respect' (p. 471, p. 263), while the latter empha
sizes love, and is based on feelings of benevolence.
function [Funktion] see also APPERCEPTION, COMBINATION, JUDGEMENT, REPRESEN

TATION, SYN'IHESIS, TABLE OF JUDGEMENTS, UNITY
In CPR Kant defines function as 'the unity of the act of bringing together
various representations under one common representation'. Such an act
of the understanding is judgement, the 'mediate knowledge of an object'
or 'the representation of a representation' (A 68/B 93). Kant claims that
it is possible to discover all the functions of the understanding through
the statement of the functions of unity in judgment. He organizes these
under the four headings of the quantity, quality, relation and modality of
judgements and derives from them the table of the categories. He traces
the source of the unity of a function, also described as its ability to com
bine synthetically, to the transcendental unity of apperception or 'the
original and necessary consciousness of the identity of the seif ' (CPR A
108). In the discussion of 'Phenomena and Noumena' Kant further main
tains that such functions of unity are meaningless without a relation to an
object, since they supply only the formal conditions of cognition which
have to be supplemented by schemas and principles.
future see FINITUDE, HISTORY, HOPE, IMAGINATION, MEMORY, TIME
209
G
gap/ interval see CONTINUITY
Gemiit [ animus ] see also AFFECT, BODY, FEELING, IDENTITY, LIFE, PLEASURE, REFLEC
¬
TION , SOUL, SUBJECT

Gemiit is a key term in Kant s philosophy and is variously translated as
mind , mental state’ and ‘soul’ , even though these translations fail to do
justice to the term’s significance. It does not mean ‘mind’ or ‘soul’ in the
Cartesian sense of a thinking substance, but denotes instead a corporeal
awareness of sensation and self-affection. Indeed , at one point in CPR he
explicitly distinguishes Gemiit and Seele (A 22/ B 37) , a distinction expounded
in Zu Sommering ilber das Organ der Seek ( To Sommering, Concerning the Organ
of the Soul, 1796) in terms of the ‘capacity to effect the unity of empirical
apperception ( animus) but not its substance ( anima ) ’ (1796c, p. 256 ) .
Gemiit does not designate a substance (whether material or ideal ) but is
the position or place of the Gemiltskrafte ( the Gemiit s powers ) of sensibility,
imagination , understanding and reason.
Kant’ s use of Gemiit remains close to the meaning the term possessed in
medieval philosophy and mysticism , where it referred to the ‘stable dispo¬
sition of the soul which conditions the exercise of all its faculties’ ( Gilson ,
1955, pp. 444, 758) . This contrasts with Leibniz’ s restriction of the term
to mean ‘feeling’ as opposed to understanding ( Leibniz, 1976, p. 428 ) . For
Kant ‘the Gemiit is all life ( the life-principle itself ) , and its hindrance or
furtherance has to be sought outside it, and yet in the man himself, con¬
sequently in connexion with his body’ ( CJ §29 ) . With this view of the
Gemiit Kant sought to bypass many of the problems of mind-body rela¬
tions bequeathed by Cartesian dualism , a strategy explicitly stated again in
Zu Sommering ilber das Organ der Seek , but insufficiently appreciated by many
of his later critics. This view of Gemiit also provides a linkage across the
three theoretical, practical and aesthetic / teleological sections of the critical
philosophy, once again explicitly stated by Kant, this time in a variant of
A §7 where it is described as the ‘essence [ Inbegriff ] of all representations
which in the same place occupy a sphere which includes the three basic
210
GEMÜT
faculties of knowledge, the feeling of pleasure and displeasure, and the

faculty of desire . . .'.
In CPR Kant locates the origin of knowledge in 'two basic sources of the
Gemüf: the first source is that of 'receiving representations (the receptivity
of impressions)', the second is that of 'knowing an object through these
representations (spontaneity of concepts)' (A 50/B 74). The Gemüt may
accordingly be disposed either passively or actively, in the former mode
receiving representations, in the latter creating concepts. The mutual
workings of passive and active aspects of Gemüt may be seen most clearly
in Kant's discussion of intuition. In the opening paragraph of CPR it is
said that objects can only be given to us 'insofar as the Gemüt is affected
in a particular way' (A 19/B 33). The Gemüt here is in its receptive, sen
sible mode of 'extemal sense' through which we represent objects as outside
of us and in space. Apart from being passively affected by means of extemal
sense, the Gemüt however can also be actively affected by means of the
inner sense. In this case the 'Gemüt intuits itself or its inner condition'
giving rise to the 'determinate form' of time (A 23/B 37).
The passive affection of the Gemüt by extemal objects and its active self
affection is also crucial to the argument of CJ, where this property is
described as the 'life principle' itself, and the source not only of the
faculties of knowledge and volition, but also of pleasure and displeasure.
In CJ §1 Kant distinguishes between perceiving a 'regular and appropriate
building' and being conscious of this representation with a feeling of de
light. Here the pleasure concemed emerges from both the receptive and
spontaneous work of the Gemüt. The perception of the building is received
and then 'tied wholly to the subject, indeed to its feeling of life'. The
delight arises from the Gemüt becoming conscious, through this represen
tation, of its condition, or 'whole capacity for representation'; in other
words, it makes itself an object of reflection, and thus finds delight in its
own powers. Kant describes this reflection in terms of a harmony between
the Gemütskräfte of the understanding and imagination, one which he says
occasions delight by 'quickening' or by the 'relieved play of the mutually
harmonising enlivened powers [ Gemütskräfte] (the imagination and under
standing)' (CJ §10).
Although Kant's discussion of Gemüt is central to his understanding of
mental topography, and clearly significant for his theories of knowledge,
action and aesthetic, it has never been the object of sustained scholarly
scrutiny. The significance of the concept was still appreciated by Mellin in
his 1797 Encyclojlädisches Wörterbuch der kritischen Phiwsophie, but thereafter
disappeared from view. lt has recently reappeared, however, in the work
of Heidegger and Derrida in the context of reflections on the notions of
spirit and soul. lt features in Being and Time (Heidegger, 1927) as that which
211
GENUS
has not been correctly understood in Cartesian subjective metaphysics; it

is also scrutinized and given an historical genealogy as the topos of spirit
by Derrida in Of spirit (see Derrida, 1987, pp. 78, 127). But these fresh
insights have yet to be systematically employed in the interpretation of
Kant's use of the term.
genus [genos, genus, Gattung] see also CONTINUITY, DEF1NITION, DETERMINATION,

ESSENCE, HOMOGENEITY
A genus is a 'type' or 'kind' and is usually used in conjunction with the
term species. Originally developed by the Greeks, the notion of genus had
both ontological and logical significance. In Plato genus is often used
synonymously with 'idea', and in Sophist the division of ideas according to
genus is said to define 'dialectic' (Plato, 1961, Sophist 253b). In Aristotle,
the ontological significance of genus is downplayed in favour of its logical
properties of predication. Here genus is specified, or determined, into
species by means of a specific difference, which intemally articulates the
genus. Within this predicational framework Aristotle presented the cat
egories as those ultimate genera of being which could not themselves be
derived from higher genera. The ontological possibilities of this view were
developed by neo-Platonic metaphysicians such as Plotinus into an hierar
chical, emanationalist view of the participation of the ideas and individual
beings. This had an enormous influence upon medieval philosophy, which
in broad terms equivocated between logical and ontological senses of
genus. Aquinas, for example, identified four senses of genus: the first, as
the sense of the principle which generates species; the second, as arche or
first generator or cause; the third, as the underlying 'subject' of accidents
belonging to different species; and the fourth, as that which is stated first
in a definition and of which specific differences are qualities (i.e., genus
= animal; specific difference = rational/non-rational; definition = 'rational
animal', namely 'man').
Kant's explicit discussion of genus and species is fairly limited, being
confined to Land CPR; however, the schema is assumed implicitly through
out his philosophy. In L Kant describes concepts in terms of genus and
species, and points to the 'subordination of concepts' or their property of
being both genus and species: 'A conceptus communis is called genus in
regard to concepts that are contained under it, but species in regard to the
concepts under which it is contained' (L p. 191). This approach to the
articulation of concepts in terms of genus and species is developed further
in Kant's reflections on the systematic completion of knowledge in CPR.
lt is a condition of the employment of reason that different individuals
may be gathered under species, and the species under genera. This gives rise
to the three regulative principles of reason: homogeneity, specification,
212
GENIUS
continuity. The first is the generic principle, the second the specific and
the third the principle which pennits the passage from the homogeneity
of the genus to the variety of the species (CPR A 658/B 686).
Throughout his work, Kant's accounts of theoretical, practical and aes
thetic judgement are couched in terms of subsumption under universal
genera - whether categories, laws or rules - and discrimination of specific
differences in instances, examples and particular cases. Many of the most
interesting problems arising in his work may be traced back to difficulties
generated by the schema, difficulties which have a long philosophical
pedigree. The schema also infonns his discussion of the classification of
animals - and, indeed, his classification of human beings into discrete
races.
general logic see LOGIC
genius [ Genie] see also AESTHETIC, ART, BEAUTY, EXAMPLE, IMAGINATION, IMITATION,
ORIGINALI'IY
Kant's main discussions of genius are to be found in A and in CJ §§46-
50. The essential characteristic of genius for Kant is originality, and a
genius is accordingly one 'who makes use of originality and produces out
of himself what must ordinarily be learned under the guidance of others'
(A §6). Originality itself has two aspects: the first is 'non imitative produc
tion' (A §30); the second is 'discovering what cannot be taught or learned'
(A p. 318, p. 234). In the fonner, genius imitates neither nature nor other
artifacts; in the latter, genius features as an ability which cannot be taught
or otherwise passed on. Such originality, although rare, is potentially
'fanatical' since it is by definition disciplined by neither an object nor a
canon. Consequently, Kant attempts to limit it by proposing that 'original
ity of imagination is called genius when it harmonises with concepts' (§30),
a thought which he expanded and developed further in CJ.
In CJ Kant brings together the various aspects of genius proposed in A.
Genius is still defined in tenns of originality, but this is now described
as 'a talent for producing that for which no definite rule can be given'
(CJ §46). This talent is limited by the requirement that its products be
exemplary, that 'though not themselves derived from imitation, they must
serve that purpose for others' (ibid.). In addition, a genius cannot give an
account of the rule infonning its product, which is prescribed to art by
nature. Kant goes on to distinguish between imitating and following works
of genius: the fonner is 'slavish' while the latter involves a follower putting
'their own talent to the test', and allowing the product of genius to provoke
'original ideas' in them. Consequently fine art, or the product of genius,
presents 'aesthetic ideas' which are representations of the imagination -
213
GEOGRAPHY
a 'second nature [created] out of the material supplied to it by actual

nature' - which excite 'a whole host of kindred representations' (CJ §49).
The aesthetic idea is produced by, and provokes, a harmony of the facul
ties of imagination and understanding characteristic of genius.
Through Goethe and the early Romantics, Kant's views on genius were
extremely influential in the early nineteenth century. They have also un
dergone fresh scrutiny since the 1980s. This is due to an increased sen
sitivity to the political implications of CJ, and in particular the intimations
of non-hierarchical forms of political judgement implied in the accounts
of reflective judgement and genius. The notions of originality and
exemplarity discussed in the context of genius have been developed in the
direction of a non-subsumptive form of legislation and political judge
ment by such writers as Castoriadis (1987) and Lyotard (1991).
geography see also ANTHROPOLOGY FROM A PRAGMATIC POINT OF WEW, HISTORY

In his Announcement of the Organisation of his Lectures in the Winter Semester
1765-1766 Kant describes how, early in his career, he tried to provide
students with 'knowledge of historical matters which could make good
their lack of experience'. He did so by means of a course on physical geo
graphy, one which reflected his interest during the 1750s in such questions
as the reasons for changes in the earth's rotation, the age of the earth and
the causes of earthquakes. In 1765 he divided the subject matter of his
lectures according to physical, moral and political geography, with the
first concerned with the 'natural relationship which holds between all the
countries and seas in the world', the second with 'man' and the third with
the interaction of the former in the 'condition of the states and nations
throughout the world' (p. 312, p. 299). In the subsequent development
of his teaching, the second part of the course was separated off to form
the lectures on anthropology. This was subsequently published in 1798 as
Anthropologi,e in pragmatischer Hinsicht (Anthropology Jrom a Prag;matic Point of
View), with the lectures on physical geography following in 1802 as Physische
Geographie edited by F.T. von Rink.
In the introduction to the lectures on physical geography, Kant describes
his subject as complementing anthropology as part of the knowledge of
the world. He assigns to anthropology whatever is revealed to the inner
sense or 'soul of man', while physical geography deals with the objects of
outer sense or 'knowledge of nature ...or description of the earth'. Kant
also distinguishes geography from history, this time in terms of the de
scription of time and space: history is concerned with events which occur
successively in time, geography with 'appearances under the aspect of
space which occur simultaneously'. Physical geography, however, is the
foundation of history, as well as of all other forms of geography which
214
GOD
Kant lists as: 'mathematical geography', 'moral geography', 'political geo

graphy', 'commercial geography' and 'theological geography'. In addition
to this explicit treatment of geography in his lectures, it is interesting
to note Kant's reliance on geographical terms and metaphors in his more
strictly defined philosophical work.
geometry see MATIIEMATICS
go-cart [ Gängelwagen] see EXAMPLE
God see also ANALOGY, CHURCH, FAITH, POSTULATE, TIIEODICY, TIIEOLOGY

Kant's philosophical understanding of God remained constant through
out bis authorship. lt is clearly stated in the final sentence of OPA, where
he concluded a critical review of proofs for the existence of God with the
disclaimer: 'lt is absolutely necessary that one should convince oneself
that God exists; that bis existence should be demonstrated, is not so nec
essary' (p. 163, p. 201). This sentiment is echoed in the hostage to fortune
Kant offered in the second Preface of CPR, where he admitted that in
matters of God, freedom and immortality he 'found it necessary to sublate
knowkdge, in order to make room for Jaith' (CPR B xxx). His writings on
the subject of God are all informed by the tension between faith in God
and demonstrative knowledge of bis existence, and may be divided into
five distinct groups.
In the first group, which includes the theological writings OPA, 'The
Ideal of Pure Reason' in CPR and LPT, Kant undermines the onto-, cosmo
and physico-theological proofs of the existence of God proposed by philo
sophical theology. In these texts he opposes the pretensions to speculative
knowledge of God possessed by such 'dream castle builders' of reason (DS
p. 324, p. 329) as Christian Wolff, the codifier of philosophical theology.
In the second group, which contains DS, WO and RL, he corrects the
balance by opposing the pretensions to direct intuitive experience of God
maintained by such fanatics of faith as Swedenborg, Hamann and Jacobi.
While philosophers believed that their demonstrative proofs yielded them
knowledge of God, the fanatics believed that their crude anthropomor
phic analogies gave them a mystical experience of divinity. From the stand
point of his critique of philosophical theology, Kant restricted knowledge
of God to analogy and its use as a regulative idea; this restriction along
with his critique of the mystical experience of God combined to establish
the parameters of the third group of writings which include CPR, RL and
above all CPrR These locate the proper place of God to be in practical
experience, and explore the moral meaning of God as a 'postulate of pure
practical reason' (CPrR p. 133, p. 137ff) necessary for ensuring reverence
215
GOOD
for the law. A fourth group of writings, consisting mainly of RL, analyzed
the institution of the church, while a fifth and somewhat ambiguous group
of texts including CJ, IUH, PP and FPT, focus on the role of God in
history, with particular reference to theodicy and providence.
Of the five groups of writings, the most influential have been the first
and the third. The relationship between the critique of theology and the
argument for practical faith has intrigued generations of interpreters.
Additionally, a large amount of work has been done on the detail of the
critique of the three philosophical/theological proofs for the existence of
God. The recent upsurge of interest in Kant's philosophy of history has
led to increased sensitivity around the issue of providence, and the rela
tion of this view of God with the critique of theology and moral faith.
However, a comprehensive account of the entirety of Kant's view of God,
one which would encompass all five groups of texts, is still awaited.
good [ Gut] see also AGREEABLE, DUTY, EVIL, FORMALISM, GOOD WILL, HIGHEST
GOOD, PRACTICAL PHILOSOPHY
In CJ §4 Kant defines the good as 'that which by means of reason commends
itself by its mere concept' and distinguishes between 'good for something'
and 'good in itself'. He further distinguishes between the agreeable and
the good in terms of the presence or otherwise of an end: the agreeable
concems the relation between an object and sense, the good the relation
implied in 'a concept of an end . . . as an object of will'. On another
occasion, in TP, Kant develops these thoughts into a rigorous distinction
between absolute and relative good; that is, between 'something absolutely
good in itself, as opposed to that which is evil in itself' and something
'relatively good, as opposed to something more or less good than itself'
(TP p. 278, p. 67). He distinguishes between absolute good or 'obedience
to a categorically binding law of the free will (i.e., of duty) without refer
ence to any ulterior end', which is 'good in itself', from the relative good
of the pursuit of happiness in which 'no law is absolutely binding but
always relative to the end adopted' (TP p. 278, p. 67). Absolute good
disregards any particular or substantive ends and is purely formal. This
means that the determinant of the good 'is not the content of the will
(i.e., a particular basic object) but the pure form of universal lawfulness
embodied in its maxim' (TP p. 27a, p. 68). This position has led to the
criticism of Kant's account of the good, and indeed of his practical phi
losophy as a whole, for being formalistic.
good will see also EVIL, GOOD, HIGHEST GOOD, PRACTICAL PHILOSOPHY
In GMM Kant describes the only unqualified good as being a 'good will',
and in so doing effected a new beginning in moral philosophy. He argued
216
GROUND
that the traditional virtues of moral philosophy such as courage and reso
lution, moderation and self-control, along with talents such as wit and
judgement, gifts of fortune such as power and wealth can all, in certain
circumstances, be put to bad use. The good will, however, is an unquali
fied good, 'good only through willing' and not 'because of what it effects
or accomplishes' (GMM p. 393, p. 7). lt is for Kant the basis of the good
use of all the traditional characteristics of virtue, and may be discemed
through the concept of duty. By analysing duty Kant is able to show that
'the pre-eminent good which is called moral can consist in nothing but
the representation of the law in itself, and such a representation can
admittedly be found only in a rational being insofar as this representation,
and not some expected effect, is the determining ground of the will'
(GMM p. 401, p. 13). This means that the good will is determined by the
universal form of law as such, rather than by any end envisaged by the law.
This requires that action be willed in accordance with the categorical
imperative, or that the maxim of the will 'should become a universal law'
(GMM p. 402, p. 14).
grace see FAITH
ground [ arche, aiton, ratio, Grund] see also CAUSALIJY, CONTRADICTTON, LOGIC,
ONTOLOGY, PRINCIPLE, REASON, TRANSCENDENTAL
Ground is an extremely rieb and ambiguous concept which Kant uses in
several senses, including 'formal ground', 'natural ground', 'moral ground',
'metaphysical ground' and 'teleological ground' to list but a few. lt is often
synonymous with ratio or reason as well as with cause and, on occasions,
with principle. This polysemy has generated severe problems with trans
lating the term, which has consequently rendered Kant's usage even more
opaque. However, it is possible to identify three broad senses in which the
term is used: (a) as a premise in an argument or motivating ground for
ajudgement; (b) the cause of an effect; (c) the reason or intention for an
action. Although each of these senses shares an underlying pattem of
thought with the others, an ambiguity which Kant often exploited, he was
also concemed to distinguish and establish boundaries between them.
Kant's motive for both exploiting and clarifying the ambiguity surround
ing ground may be traced to his critical opposition to what was known as
the 'Leibniz-Wolff philosophy'. Wolff in particular founded his entire
philosophical system upon the ambiguities of the term ground, using it to
unite the fields of logic, metaphysics, ethics and politics into a rationalistic
system. Kant consistently opposed this project throughout his career, from
ND (1755) to 0D (1790), and the focus of his criticism was precisely the
ambiguous notion of ground.
217
GROUND
In ND Kant defines ground as that 'which detennines a subject in

respect of any of its predicates' or which 'establishes a connection and
a conjunction between the subject and some predicate or other' (ND
p. 392, p. 11). He stresses that ground 'always requires' a subject and a
predicate which can be joined to the subject. The relation of subject and
predicate is the pattern of thought which underlies the logical, ontological
and practical senses of ground. Kant then proceeds to distinguish between
'antecedently' and 'consequentially' determining grounds, the first being
the ontological 'ground why, or the ground of being or becoming' while
the second is the logical and epistemological 'ground that, or the ground
of knowing' (ibid.). This distinction is used expressly by Kant to criticize
'the celebrated Wolf!' for eliding ontological and logical ground with the
implication that this elision compromises bis entire rationalist system.
lt would not be too mucb of an exaggeration to regard Kant's subsequent
philosopbical work as the attempt systematically to think througb the
implications of rejecting the unity of logical and ontological ground
(crudely, knowing and being) wbile not abandoning science to mysticism
in the manner of Crusius (see Caygill, 1989, pp. 207-11). In CPR Kant
approves the method of Wolff wbile criticizing bis dogmatic claim that the
distinction between the sensible and the intelligible was merely logical
and not transcendental (see CPR B xxxvii and A 44/B 61). In place of the
elision of the grounds of knowing and being, Kant separates them in
order to explore the parameters of their proper relationship. One result
of this inquiry was the distinction between real and logical grounds (ecboing
that between antecedently and consequentially detennining grounds), with
the fonner further divided according to 'formal-real ground' or the in
tuition of an object, and 'material-real ground' or the existence of an
object (see the letter to Reinbold of 12 May 1789 outlining the nature of
Eberbard's misunderstanding of the critical pbilosophy, PC, p. 139). A
further result was the distinction between both real and logical grounds
and tbe practical ground. Tbe grounds of action cannot be subordinated
to either of the latter since this would qualify freedom of action (a critique
repeatedly urged against Wolff in the eigbteenth century). Accordingly,
practical grounds are 'grounds of reason [wbicb] give tbe rule universally
to actions, according to principles, without influence of the circumstances
of either time or place' (P §53).
Tbe theoretical aspects of the critical account of ground are spelt out
by Kant in bis riposte to Eberbard's Leibnizian objections to the pro
gramme of CPR. Kant iddntifies in Eberhard an elision of the 'logical
(formal) principle of knowledge' that 'every proposition must have a groun<l
subordinated to the 'principle of contradiction' with the 'transcendental
(material) principle' that 'everything must have its groun<l subordinate to the
218
GROUNDING FOR TIIE METAPHYSICS OF MORALS
principle of sufficient reason (OD pp. 193-4, pp. 113-14). Kant then
insists repeatedly on the separation of the two senses of ground, restrict
ing the latter to 'objects of sensible intuition' (OD p. 194, p. 113). Tue
order of knowledge and that of being are related, but in far more com
plex ways than are admitted by their simple elision. The CPR has shown
experience to be impossible without 'the harmony between understand
ing and sensibility in so far as it makes possible an a priori knowledge of
universal laws', but it does not provide any reason for why 'two otherwise
completely heterogeneous sources of knowledge always agree so well as to
permit empirical knowledge' (OD p. 250, p. 159) The two understandings
of ground do agree, but the grounds for this agreement cannot themselves
be easily identified, let alone assumed.
The discussion of ground continued after Kant, and provoked a splendid
essay and historical review of the topic from Schopenhauer (1813). In it
he showed that the problem of ground is a refraction of a fundamental
philosophical problem conceming the relationship between being and
logos. This position also informs Heidegger's reflections on the problem
of ground in the MetaphysicalFoundations of Logi,c (1928) which proposes an
explanation for the relationship between logical, real and practical ground,
or in his terms reason, cause and intention. For him this consists in the
relationship between logos and techne, or our 'being engaged in the world
in producing one being from another' ( techne) and our being engaged in
speech with each other (logos) (p. 118).
Grounding /ur the Metaphysics of Murals Published in 1785, GMM was the
first of Kant's three critical texts in moral philosophy. lt was followed in
1788 by the Critique of Practical Reason and in 1797 by the Metaphysics of
Morals. lt marks a first statement of the main themes of Kant's critical
practical philosophy, including duty, the categorical imperative and the
free will. lt differs from CPrR above all in its method, which is analytical
rather than synthetic. lt begins with the 'common experience' of morality
as something known and proceeds to its sources in the 'supreme principle
of morality'. The analytical method employed accounts for the organization
of the contents of the text, which does not follow the critical schema of
'Doctrine of Elements' and 'Methodology'. The contents are organized in
three sections, the first two of which involve transitions from 'Ordinary
Rational Knowledge of Morality to the Philosophical' and from 'Popular
Moral Philosophy to a Metaphysics of Morals'. The third section makes
the 'Final Step from a Metaphysics of Morals to a Critique of Pure Practical
Reason'.
Each of the sections pursues the 'Supreme Principle of Morality' by
means of criticizing previous accounts of it and establishing the conditions
219
GROUNDING FOR 'IHE METAPHYSICS OF MORALS
of an 'unqualified good'. The latter is described as a 'good will' which is

nevertheless prone to 'subjective restrictions or hindrances' which are
gathered together under the concept of duty. In the first section Kant
explicates this principle by means of popular casuistry, in the second by
an analysis of the forms of imperative 'ought' which accompany moral
action. He distinguishes hypothetical and categorical imperatives, con
sidering only the latter to qualify as moral. Through this distinction he is
able to criticize previous philosophical accounts of the 'supreme principle
of morality', both 'empirical' and 'rational', for relying upon forms of the
hypothetical imperative. Only the categorical imperative is the autono
mous form of willing able to test maxims for their universalizability. The
third section reflects on freedom and autonomy in an attempt to answer
the question 'How is the categorical imperative possible?' lt concludes
that human beings are members of both the sensible and the intelligible
realms. This means that the freedom of the will, as a property of the
intelligible world, is strictly speaking unintelligible in terms of our sensibly
conditioned forms of knowledge. The text thus concludes, on an appro
priately aporetic note, that 'even though we do not indeed grasp the
practical unconditioned necessity of the moral imperative, we do never
theless grasp its inconceivability'.
220
H
habitus see also ART, CULTURE, FEELING, MOTIVE, NATURE, SENSIBILITY

Kant introduces this term in his discussion of moral feeling in LE, using
it to bring the impulses of the sensibility under the sway of the moral rules
of the understanding. It is one of the means by which the understanding
could move the sensibility to conformity and induce motives in it ( LE p.
46) . Kant believes that since human beings are not naturally disposed to
this desirable result it is advisable to produce a habitus, which is not natural,
but takes the place of nature, and is produced by imitation and oft-
repeated practice ( LE p. 46 ) . Kant developed this thought in his later
theory of culture in CJ, and in his writings on education. A suggestive
affinity can also be detected between the habitus and the work of art,
which too is a ‘second nature [created ] out of the material supplied to it
by actual nature’ ( CJ §49 ) . Common to both is a sense of cultivation - in
the first case of nature within , in the second case of nature without oneself
- through free but also disciplined activity.
happiness [ eudaimonia, felicitas, Gluckseligkeit\ see also AUTONOMY, FREEDOM,
GOOD, HIGHEST GOOD, HOPE , PLEASURE
In the Nicomachean Ethics Aristotle discovered that the ‘chief good’ or
‘final end’ of human action - ‘something final and self-sufficient, and the
end of action’ (Aristotle, 1941, 1097b, 22 ) - is happiness. His account of
happiness is admirably balanced: perfect happiness consists in leading the
contemplative life, but not to the exclusion of other aspects of the good
life such as bravery, liberality and pleasure ( ibid., 1178a-ll 79b ) . However,
Aristotle’ s balanced view of happiness was gradually transformed by the
Platonic distinction between the happiness and self-sufficiency of the mind
and soul and the pleasures of the body. In Aquinas’s work this distinction
takes the form of the objective experience of beatitudo ( blessed happiness )
and the less preferred and subjective experience of eudaimonia. This dis ¬
tinction was largely preserved by Descartes, for whom happiness ( hear )

‘depends only on outward things’ as opposed to blessedness ( beatitude )
which consists in ‘a perfect contentment of mind and inner satisfaction’
221
HAPPINESS
(letter to Elizabeth, 4 August 1645, Descartes, 1981, p. 164). With Kant

the distinction is preserved in modified form, with objective happiness
issuing from free and autonomous action, and subjective happiness from
heteronomous feelings of pleasure and well-being.
Kant's discussion of happiness is thoroughly permeated by an opposi
tion between freedom and happiness. The opposition is most apparent in
the distinction in MM between 'eudaimonism (the principle of happiness )'
and 'ekutheronomy (the principle of the freedom of intemal law-giving)',
with its accompanying claim that if the former is made the basic principle
of action the result would be the 'euthanasia (easy death) of all morals'
(MM p. 378, p. 183). Kant tackles the eudaimonist objection to his ac
count of duty, which claims that duty is pursued because of the pleasure
resulting from doing duty, by replying that while pleasure may be involved
in obedience to law it cannot precede it as a motivational ground. Pleasure
preceding duty or observance of the law is 'sensibly dependent' and part
of the natural order, while pleasure which follows duty is based on intel
ligible freedom and is part of the moral order. The distinction between
the two accounts of obedience to law has several consequences which duly
unfold throughout Kant's practical philosophy.
The opposition between eudaimonia and ekutheronomy is developed into
a series of consistent corollaries. The first, already mentioned, is the
distinction between the natural and the moral orders: the natural order
is the realm of causality, inclination and heteronomy; the moral order the
realm of freedom, self-determination and autonomy (MM p. 216, p. 44).
Principles based on happiness and heteronomy are material, subjective
and partial as opposed to those based on freedom and autonomy which
are formal, objective and universal (GMM p. 442, p. 46). The idea of the
good as happiness is, because of its many potential goods, indeterminate;
while that of the good as freedom is focused and determinate (CJ §83). The
pursuit of happiness determines the will only indirectly, the eudaimonist
does their duty 'only by means of the happiness they anticipate' while duty
commands the will directly and is not directed towards any end outside
itself (MM p. 377, p. 183). As a consequence, the imperatives associated
with the pursuit of happiness are hypothetical 'counsels of prudence'
conditioned according to 'whether this or that man counts this or that as
belonging to his happiness', while those of the law of freedom are cat
egorical and unconditioned commands (GMM p. 416, p. 26). This form
of oppositional argument leads to the repressive proposition in IUH that
humanity 'should not partake of any other happiness or perfection than
that which they have procured for themselves without instinct and by their
own reason' (p. 19, p. 43).
Yet while Kant excludes happiness from any role in the determination
222
HETERONOMY
of the will to action, he nevertheless regards it as a vital aspect of the

highest human good. At one point in CPR he assumes that happiness will
automatically follow freedom: 'I do not speak of the greatest happiness,
for this will follow [the greatest possible freedom] of itself ' (CPR B 373).
Here the constitution which permits the greatest possible freedom is
described as a necessary idea for human progress which will bring with it
happiness; in CJ, however, happiness itself is the idea according to which
human beings 'seek to make their actual state of being adequate' (§83).
Kant has already potentially reconciled the terms of this opposition in his
answers in CPR to the three questions of the interest of reason: '1. What
can I know? 2. What ought I to do? 3. What may I hope?' (CPR A 804/
B 832). Happiness features in the answers to these questions, although not
as an achieved state but as worthiness for being happy. The highest good
consists in both worthiness to be happy or 'morality' and in actual hap
piness - one without the other is partial and incomplete. Characteristically
for Kant, happiness is excluded from the determination of moral action
only to return as its indispensable accompaniment in the highest good.
heautonomy see also AUTONOMY, HETERONOMY, JUDGEMENT, REFLECTIVE JUDGEMENT

Heautonomy is a principle of reflective judgement according to which the
subject gives itself a law 'not to nature (as autonomy), but to itself (as
heautonomy), to guide its reflection upon nature' (CJ Introduction §V).
lt may be described as 'the law of the specification of nature' and is not
'cognised a priori' and thus applied to nature in the way of a scientific law.
Rather it is a rule used by the judgement in order to facilitate its inves
tigations of nature - 'finding the universal for the particular presented to
it by perception' - and to relate the universal laws of the understanding
with the specific empirical laws of nature.
heterogeneity see HOMOGENEITY
heteronomy see also AUTONOMY, CAUSALlTY, HAPPINESS, INCLlNATION, LAW, LEGIS

LATION, PERFECTION, WILL
In GMM Kant contrasts the freedom of the will manifest in autonomy with
the dependence of the will on external or heteronomous causes and in
terests. The moral law under heteronomy would only be valid because of
an interest that we held in obeying it, which would amount to 'the de
pendence of practical reason on sensibility, viz., on an underlying feeling
whereby reason could never be morally legislative' (GMM p. 461, p. 60).
Kant deemed a great deal of previous moral philosophy to be based on
heteronomous principles which act 'as an attracting stimulus or as a
constraining force for obedience' (GMM p. 433, p. 39). He accordingly
223
HIGHEST GOOD
contrasts his 'principle of the autonomy of the will' with 'every other
principle, which I accordingly count under heteronomy' (ibid.). Such
heteronomous principles may be either empirical or rational, the former
'drawn from the principle of happiness, are based upon either physical or
moral feeling', while the latter, drawn from the principle of perfection,
are 'based upon either the rational concept of perfection as a possible
effect of our will or else upon the concept of an independent perfection
(the will of God) as a determining cause of our will' (p. 442, p. 46).
highest good [summum bonum, höchstes Gut] see al.so ABSOLUTE, AUTONOMY,
GOOD, GOOD WILL, HAPPINESS, HOPE, WILL
The highest good is described in CPR as the combination of happiness
and worthiness to be happy. Kant's practical philosophy rigorously sepa
rated the heteronomy of happiness and its doctrine of eudaimonia from
that of the autonomy of freedom and its doctrine of ekutheronomy (MM p.
378, p. 183). However, when considering the highest good in terms of the
answers to the questions of the three interests ofreason (What can I know?
What ought I to do? What may I hope?), Kant claims that neither happi
ness nor moral freedom by itself is adequate to serve as the highest good.
lt must be a combination of both which brings together morality or 'wor
thiness to be happy' with the hope of actual happiness: 'Happiness, taken
by itself, is, for our reason, far from being the complete good. Reason
does not approve happiness (however inclination may desire it) except in
sofar as it is united with worthiness to be happy, that is, with moral conduct.
Morality, taken by itself, and with it, the mere worthiness to be happy, is
also far from being the complete good' (CPRA 813/B 841). The answer
to the second question of the interest of reason - 'What ought I to do?'
- is 'make yourself worthy of happiness', and to the third question - 'What
may I hope?' - is 'hope you will participate in happiness'. Kant concludes
that 'Happiness ...in exact proportion with the morality of the rational
beings who are thereby rendered worthy of it, alone constitutes the supreme
good of [the] world' (CPRA 814/B 842) and sees the reality of this unity
as based on the 'postulate' of an intelligible, 'supreme original good'.
history see al.so CULTURE, GEOGRAPHY, HUMANITY, KNOWLEDGE, TIME

Kant's view of history may be divided into two broad subspecies, the first
indicating a form of knowledge, the second a pattern informing the events
of natural and human history. With regard to the first, Kant adopts the
Wolffian distinction between 'rational' and 'historical' knowledge. Using
one of Wolff's examples, he distinguishes in P between the historical
knowledge of the fact that the sun warms a stone and the rational knowl
edge ofwhy it does so (P §20). In the words of CPR, 'Historical knowledge
224
HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY
is cognitio ex datis; rational knowledge is cognitio ex principiis' (A 836/B 864).

However, within this division of forms of knowledge Kant establishes fur
ther distinctions.In the introduction to his lectures on physical geography
he defines history as an account of events which have succeeded each
other over time, and geography as an account of events which take place
simultaneously in space: the former account is a narrative, the latter a
description. Kant himself offered several such narratives including the
summary histories of Judaism and Christianity in RL (pp. 124-36, pp.
115-28), oflogic in the Jäsche Logic' (L pp. 531-5), and of pure reason
in CPR (A 852/B 880ff).
The second main division of Kant's concept of history involves the
philosophy of history or the re-working of traditional theodicy. Kant's
attitude towards the philosophy of history was distinctly ambiguous: he
severely criticized Herder's Ideas on the Philosophy of History of Mankind
(1785), and wrote an essay 'On the Failure of all Philosophical Attempts
at Theodicy' (1791) while at the same time clearly acknowledging in IUH
the virtues of a philosophy of history. There he describes history as giving
an account of human actions in terms of 'the will's manifestations in the
world of phenomena' in order, through the examination of 'the free
exercise of the human will on a /,arge scak . ..to discover a regular pro
gression among freely willed actions' (IUH p. 17, p. 41). The point of
such an account is to show 'that what strikes us in the actions of individu
als as confused and fortuitous may be recognized in the history of the
entire species, as a steadily advancing but slow development ofhumanity's
original capacities'. Through this individuals would realize 'that they are
unconsciously promoting an end which, even if they knew what it was,
would scarcely arouse their interest' (ibid.).
This approach to the philosophy ofhistory complements Kant's attempt
to develop an account of culture, notably in the second part of CJ where
it is set within the context of a discussion of the 'ultimate end of nature
as a teleological system'.lt should be added, however, that this teleological
view of history is paralleled by another view of history which regards it as
the result of breaks and innovations heralded by genius and enthusiasm.
lt is this latter, relatively underdeveloped view in Kant's own text, which
has been increasingly important in contemporary philosophy of history.
history of philosophy see also AMPHIBOLY, CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION, CRITICAL

PHILOSOPHY, DISPUTE, PHILOSOPHY, REASON
Although Kant claimed in the Preface to CPR to be criticizing 'the faculty
ofreason in general' and not 'books and systems', the history ofphilosophy
nevertheless plays an important role in his philosophy. The 'books and
systems' ofthe history ofphilosophy are omnipresent in CPR and are even
225
explicitly addressed in its concluding pages on 'Tue History of Pure Reason'.

Yet Kant consistently treats historical philosophers as if they were his own
contemporaries, attributing them respect not by virtue of their being his
torical, but only insofar as they contribute to the critical philosophy. His
interpretative principle, or 'key to the interpretation of all the products of
pure reason' (stated at the close of his polemic with Eberhard), is the
'critique of reason itself '. While the 'historians of philosophy, with all their
intended praise, only attribute mere nonsense' he, with the critical key, is
able to recognize 'beyond what the philosophers actually said, what they
really meant to say' (OD p. 251, p. 160).
Kant's most systematic account of the history of philosophy is to be
found in the introductions to his lectures on logic. For the general outline
of his history, Kant is indebted to J.H.S. Formey's Histoire a/,regee de la
philosophie (1760) and F. Gentzke's Historia philosophia (1724), although he
was naturally acquainted with several original sources. His account is
informed by the enlightenment prejudice that philosophy originated
with the Greeks, and is barely to be discerned in ancient Chinese, Persian,
Egyptian and Arabic thought. lt also reflects the prejudice that philosophical
innovation was largely confined to the classical and modern periods, with
the medieval scholastics being traduced as 'slavish' imitators of Aristotle
and proponents of 'pseudo-philosophizing' (L p. 543). Yet within the
accounts of the history of classical and modern philosophy Kant expresses
some surprising preferences, and makes some unexpected judgements.
Kant's discussion of the pre-Socratic philosophers is, with one excep
tion, summary and unenthusiastic; the only philosopher who merits a
more extended discussion is Pythagoras. He regards the 'most important
epoch of Greek philosophy' as commencing with Socrates, and praises the
'new practical direction' opened by his work (L p. 542). When describing
the philosophical succession to Socrates, Kant does not share the modern
fascination with Plato and Aristotle, but gives equal if not more weight to
the Hellenistic philosophical schools of the Stoies, Epicureans and Scep
tics. With regard to these he evinces a nuanced and detailed knowledge,
both of their doctrines and the differences between them. This preference
is also evident in his critical work, where references to Epicurus exceed
references to Plato. However, recent interpretations tend to focus on
Platonic elements in Kant's thought, perhaps because these correspond to
our assumptions about what is important in the history of philosophy. Yet
the procedure of critique itself, the view of the canon and prolepsis in the
CPR, as well as that of pleasure and Gemüt in CJ, are taken directly from
Epicurus. References to Stoic and ancient sceptics also abound through
out his work, but have been overshadowed by the subsequent interpreta
tive focus upon Plato and Aristotle.
226
The role Kant accords Plato in the history of philosophy is extremely

ambiguous. In CPR he praises Plato's Republic and its model of the phi
losopher (A 316), but sees considerable <langer in Plato's notion of the
transcendent ideas. Kant's opposition to this aspect of Plato's thought was
fired and fed by his opposition to the Platonic mysticism of some of his
contemporaries. This is evident in his late texts on the history of philoso
phy, 'On a Newly Arisen Superior Tone in Philosophy' and 'Announcement
of the Near Conclusion of a Treaty for Eternal Peace in Philosophy' (both
1796). In these texts Kant distinguishes between the philosophical and
mystagogic tendencies in Platonism, seeing the latter as exemplified in
ancient and modern Neo-Platonism (see 1796a p. 399, p. 64). Aristotle
features primarily in Kant's writings as the inventor of logic, and while he
shows awareness of other aspects of the Stagirite's thought, his enthusiasm
is distinctly bounded.
When discussing modern philosophy Kant refers repeatedly to the Ref
ormation, drawing a parallel between the reformation of the Church and
that of philosophy. Bacon and Descartes are noted, the former for his
emphasis on experiment and observation, the latter for his criterion of
truth; but the 'greatest and most meritorious reformers of philosophy in
our times' (L p. 543) were Leibniz and Locke. Kant opposes both Leibniz
and Locke at several points, particularly in CPR. Indeed, many of his early
writings engage with Leibniz and the dominant 'Leibnizian' school of
philosophy led by Christian Wolff. The consistent object of Kant's criticism
was the continuum Leibniz established between sensibility and reason,
which regarded sensibility as a confused perception of reason; this was
contrasted with the argument in Locke, which abstracted reason from
sensibility through reflection. Although both positions seemed diametri
cally opposed, Kant saw them as sharing the confusion of sense and reason.
In CPR Kant brings together classical and modern philosophy in order
to present a drama of pure reason. One example is the history of the
decline, fall and revival of metaphysics discussed in the first Preface. Under
the 'dogmatists' the government of metaphysics was despotic; this collapsed
into anarchy under the onslaught of the nomadic sceptics; Locke's attempt
to put an end to controversy did not succeed, and with the triumph of
Newtonian science there arose an indifference to metaphysical issues.
In the face of this indifference, CPR represents a call to order and the
establishment of a metaphysical tribunal. This 'political history' of the
government of philosophy given at the beginning of CPR contrasts with
the 'revolutionary' history at its end. Here, in the 'History of Pure Rea
son', Kant makes the history of philosophy contemporary by identifying
the three controversial issues of the 'object of knowledge', the 'origin of
knowledge' and the 'method' of philosophy. With respect to the first
227
HOLDING-TO-BE-TRUE
issue, Kant distinguishes between 'sensualists' such as Epicurus and idealists

such as Plato; with respect to the second, Kant distinguishes between the
empiricist school of Aristotle and Locke and the 'noologists' Plato and
Leibniz; and with respect to method Kant first distinguishes between the
'scientific' and the 'naturalistic' methods (regarding the latter as 'mere
misology') and then distinguishes between the dogmatic scientific method
represented by Wolff and the sceptical scientific method represented by
Hume. Although he names individual philosophers, they are but repre
sentatives of a drama of reason in which other players may be left 'un
named' (CPRA 856/B 884) and which culminates in the critical philosophy.
holding-to-be-true [Fürwahrhalten] see also CERTAINTY, FAITH, JUDGEMENT,

KNOWLEDGE, OPINION
Holding-to-be-true concerns the validity of a judgement, which may be
subjectively and/or objectively sufficient, and is distributed into three dis
tinct classes. The first is opinion, which is consciously insufficient objec
tively and subjectively. The second is faith, which is consciously insufficient
objectively but sufficient subjectively. The third is knowledge, which is
both subjectively and objectively sufficient or 'certain' (CPRA 822/B 850).
Each dass has: (a) its own object - matters of opinion, faith and knowl
edge (CJ §91); (b) its own particular modality of judgement - opinion is
hypothetical, faith is assertoric, knowledge is apodeictic (L p. 571).
homogeneity see also CONTINUITY, GENUS, REGULATIVE PRINCIPLE

Homogeneity, along with continuity and variety, comprise the three regu
lative principles of reason which 'prepare the field for the understanding'
in its systematic elaboration of experience. lt is one of the 'antecedent
rule[s] of reason' without which the understanding could not function,
since Kant argues 'it is only on the assumption of differences in nature,
just as it is also only under the condition that its objects exhibit homo
geneity, that we can have any faculty of understanding whatsoever' (A
657/B 685). While the principle of variety states that the manifold is
differentiated according to 'lower species', the principle of homogeneity
claims that the manifold is homogeneous according to 'higher genera'.
The two principles are fused into a third, and apparently more fundamental
principle of continuity. The principles also correspond to transcendental
laws which are not objects of experience, nor open to deduction, but
which nevertheless 'possess, as synthetic a priori propositions, objective but
indeterminate validity, and serve as rules for possible experience' (A 663/
B 691). The law of homogeneity 'keeps us from resting satisfied with an
excessive number of different original genera, and bids us pay due regard
to homogeneity', while that of variety 'in turn, imposes a check upon this
228
HOPE
tendency towards unity, and insists that before we proceed to apply a

universal concept to individuals we distinguish subspecies within it' (CPR
A 660/B 688). Finally, the law of continuity combines the two former 'by
prescribing that even amidst the utmost manifoldness we observe homo
geneity in the gradual transition from one species to another' (ibid.).
hope [elpis, spes, Hoffnung] see also FAITH, LOVE

Hope along with faith and love forms the set of 'theological virtues' first
elaborated by Paul in Corinthians 13:13 (see Aquinas, 1952, II, I, 62).
They were contrasted with the four 'cardinal virtues' of temperance, jus
tice, prudence and fortitude. The theological virtues were the ends for
which the cardinal virtues were means. Largely absent from classical Greek
philosophy, hope features prominently in the New Testament as an
eschatological expectation of future salvation; the importance of hope is
underlined by Paul's description of God as the 'God of hope' (Romans
15:13).
The concept of hope is central to Kant's thought, and yet he nowhere
explicitly addresses it. In DS he introduces a 'bias of reason' into the scales
by which we weigh arguments, claiming that the tray with the inscription
'future hopes' always outweighs that marked 'speculation'. This explains
for Kant the fascination with tales of the after-life and of the spirits inhab
iting it. Our hopes for a future outweigh our judgements of the present.
This 'bias of reason' towards hope becomes in CPR one of the three
'interests of reason' expressed in the questions: 'l. What can I know? 2.
What ought I to do? 3. What may I hope?' (A 805/B 833). He emphasizes
what is at stake in this question by claiming that 'all hoping is directed to
happiness' and arrives 'at the conclusion that something is (which deter
mines the ultimate possible end) because something ought to kappen' (A 806/
B 834).
The ecstatic structure of hope is evident throughout Kant's historical
and political writings. In PP he sees the guarantee that perpetual peace is
not an 'empty idea' to lie in the 'gegründete hoffnung or 'well grounded
hope' that it can actually be achieved; this hope itself can serve to realize
the idea, bringing it from the future into the present (PP p. 386, p. 130).
lt is also evident in the practical philosophy, where the hope of an eternal
life shapes the courses of action taken in this one. Less obvious but equally
significant is the role it plays in the theoretical philosophy, as is shown in
Heidegger's interpretation of the projective and proleptic role of the
imagination in the act of synthesis described in Kant and the Probkm of
Metaphysics (1929). While Kant himself did not seem to be fully aware of
the philosophical implications of his own concept of hope, these have
been expounded and further developed by twentieth-century philosophers
229
HUMANI1Y
such as Heidegger in his notion of ecstatic temporality, Benjamin with his

notion of Messianic time (see Benjamin, 1973, pp. 255-66) and Bloch
with his wide-ranging exploration of The Prindpk of Hope (1959).
humanity see also COMMUNICATION, CULTURE, HISTORY, IMPERATIVE, PERSON,

SOCIABILI1Y
Humanity is defined in CJ
§60 as 'on the one hand, the universal Jeeling
of sympathy, and on the other, the faculty of being able to communicate
universally one's inmost self - properties constituting in conjunction the
befitting sodal spirit of mankind, in contradistinction to the narrow life of
the lower animals'. In RL the distinction of humanity from animality is
maintained, but supplemented by a further distinction between humanity
and personality. Kant identifies three dispositions in mankind: the first is
the 'predisposition to animality in man, taken as a living being', the second
that to 'humanity in man, taken as a living and at the same time as a
rational being', with the third being that to 'personality in man, taken as
a rational and at the same time an accountabk being' (RL p. 26, p. 21).
Thus humanity occupies an intermediate position between animality and
a purely rational, free and accountable personality.
The definition of humanity is filled out considerably in MM, while
remaining within the basic distinction between humanity and animality.
Human beings, unlike animals, possess the capacity to set themselves ends,
and to cultivate this capacity (MM p. 392, p. 195). Animal impulses are
aimed at self-preservation, preservation of the species, and the preserva
tion of the capacity to enjoy life; against these the duty of an individual
consists, according to Kant, in the consistency of the formal maxims of the
will with the dignity of humanity (MM p. 420, p. 216). The latter is closely
associated with the idea of humanity, with mankind as it ought to be -
potential, free, rational beings - rather than with what it is. Indeed, Kant
maintains that freedom or 'independence from being constrained by
another's choice' is the 'only original right belonging to every man by
virtue of his humanity' (MM p. 237, p. 63). This definition of humanity
deeply informs Kant's moral philosophy, featuring prominently in one of
the formulations of the categorical imperative: 'Act in such a way that you
treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of another,
always at the same time as an end, and never as a means' (GMM p. 429,
p. 36).
hypothetical see also APODEICTIC, CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, DISJUNCTIVE, IMPERA

TIVE, JUDGEMENT, RELATION
Hypothetical judgements and imperatives play a considerable role in Kant's
theoretical and practical philosophy. In CPR hypothetical judgements form
230
HYPOTYPOSIS
the second group ofthe judgements ofrelation in the table ofjudgements,

following categorical and preceding disjunctive judgements (A 70/B 95).
Categorical judgements concern the relation of subject and predicate,
disjunctive judgements the relationship between discrete judgements, while
hypothetical judgements concern the relation of ground to consequence.
The form ofthe hyp othetical judgement relates two propositions, the first
the hyp othesis, the second the consequence, as in 'If there is a perfect
justice, the obstinately wicked are punished' (CPR A 73/B 98), which
relates a hypothetical first proposition with its consequence in the second
proposition. The hyp othetical imperative obeys a similar form. In GMM
Kant describes all imperatives as commanding either categorically or hy
pothetically. Hypothetical imperatives 'represent the practical necessity of
a possible action as a means ofattaining something else that one wants (or
may possibly want)' (GMM p. 414, p. 25). Kant divides the hypothetical
imperatives into those of skill and prudence. Imperatives of skill point to
a course of action which will attain a possible end and are 'technical
(belonging to art)', while those ofprudence point to the means for attain
ing a given end and are 'pragmatic (belonging to welfare)' (GMM p. 417,
p. 27). Unlike categorical imperatives, hyp othetical imperatives are con
cerned 'with the matter ofthe action and its intended result' and are thus
determined heteronomously.
hypotyposis see also ACROAMATIC, ANALOGY, CONSTRUCTION, PRESENTATION,

SCHEMATISM
Kant's formal discussion of hypotyposis occurs in CJ §59, but it appears
throughout his philosophy in the guise of 'presentation' or the rendering
of concepts and ideas 'in terms of sense'. Such presentation is two-fold,
differing according to whether it is a concept or an idea that is being
rendered. In the first case the rendering of a concept is schernatic, 'where
the intuition corresponding to a concept comprehended by the under
standing is given a priori', while in the second it is symbolic, 'where the
concept is one which only reason can think, and to which no sensible
intuition can be adequate' (CJ §59). The first form of hypotyposis gives
rise to schemata or 'direct' and 'demonstrative' presentations, the second
generates symbols, which are indirect presentations governed by analogy.
Kant analyzed schematic hyp otyposis more fully in the 'Schematism' chap
ter of CPR, and thus concentrates in CJ upon its symbolic operation. The
latter consists 'first in applying the concept to the object of a sensible
intuition, and then, secondly, in applying the mere rule of its reflection
upon that intuition to quite another object, ofwhich the former is but the
symbol' (CJ §59). His examples of symbolic hypotyposis include: the anal
ogy between the properly constituted state and a living body; a despotic
231
HYPOTYPOSIS
state and a handmill; philosophical concepts such as ground, depend

ence, flow, substance 'and numberless others'; all knowledge of God; and
finally the analogy between beauty and the morally good. This passage has
become particularly important for those twentieth-century interpretations
of Kant which stress the role of indeterminacy in his accounts of judge
ment and method.
232
I
I [ Ich ] see also ABSTRACTION, APPERCEPTION, CONSCIOUSNESS, I THINK , IDENTITY,

PARALOGISM, PSYCHOLOGY, SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS, SUBJECT
Kant distinguished between two senses of I , even though he varied the
terms in which he framed the distinction, referring on occasion to the
empirical and the transcendental’ I, the ‘psychological’ and the ‘logical’
I, and the ‘I as object’ and the ‘I as subject’ . The bifurcation of the I
follows from the nature of self-consciousness: ‘That I am conscious of
myself is a thought that already contains a two-fold I’ ( WP p. 270, p. 73)
- it requires that the I be thought both as an object of intuition and as
that which thinks (see also CPR B 155) . The first I is the ‘psychological I’
which underlies ‘all perceptions and their connection , whose apprehen¬
sion ( apprehensio) is the way the subject is affected ’ ( WP p. 270, p. 73) .
This I may be considered as an object of intuition , and its workings de ¬
scribed through psychological or anthropological observations ( see A §1) .

The second I is more difficult to describe since it is not an object of
intuition . Kant warns repeatedly against converting the transcendental I as
a logical subject of knowledge, namely the I of ‘I think’ or ‘that which
remains after all the accidents ( as predicates) are abstracted’ ( P §46 ) into
a substance. This I cannot be an ‘ absolute subject’ or even a concept but
‘only the reference of the internal phenomena to their unknown subject’
( P §46) . To make this I into a substance capable of acting as a ‘ground
of thought’ is to commit a paralogism and to apply to something which
is not an appearance the categories of substance and cause properly ap ¬
plicable only to appearances. Nevertheless, while very little can be said of

the transcendental I of ‘I think , it nevertheless remains central to Kant’ s
account of experience. It serves as ‘the one condition which accompanies
all thought’ , not as an object of a possible experience , but as ‘only the
formal condition , namely, the logical unity of every thought, in which I
abstract from all objects’ ( CPR A 398) .
Kant describes the transcendental I as a ‘mere prefix [designating]
a thing of indeterminate signification’ ( MF p. 543, p. 103) and as a
‘completely empty representation I . . . we cannot even say that this is a
233
'I THINK'
concept, but only that it is a bare consciousness which accompanies all

concepts' (CPR A 436/B 404). lt is but the logical terminus of a process
of abstracting from the predicates of knowledge to a postulated, ultimate
subject which underlies them and which cannot be further specified. Kant
is prepared to characterize it in terms of analogy: on one occasion he
maintains that by 'this I, he or it (the thing) which thinks, nothing further
is represented than a transcendental subject of the thoughts = X' (CPR A
346/B 404), while on another he describes it as 'the universal correlate of
apperception and itself merely a thought' (MF p. 542, p. 103). He insists
that I is an 'entirely empty expression' which designates nothing more
than 'the thought of an absolute, but logical unity of the subject' (CPR A
356); it does not of itself exist as an ultimate substance or ground under
lying knowledge and experience, but is simply a necessary logical function
which accompanies it.
Far from making the I into the straightforward subject of thought and
action, Kant insists that its character can never be known except by anal
ogy. He describes the relationship between the empirical I of the indi
vidual person and the transcendental I as the subject of knowledge as
extremely difficult - if not impossible - to specify. His immediate succes
sors were less reluctant to convert the I into a transcendental subject
whose character and workings were knowable in principle. Transcenden
tal idealists, above all Fichte (1794) and Schelling (1800), made the tran
scendental I into a substantive ground for all knowledge and action. Hegel
(1807) criticized Kant for positing a formal distinction within the I of self
consciousness, and Fichte and Schelling for dissolving all distinctions in
the transcendental 1. Instead, by means of a phenomenology, he traced
the historical shapes assumed by the diremptions of the I, thought both
as subject and as substance. Subsequently, 'Young Hegelians' such as
Feuerbach (1830) and Marx (1843) sought to unify the transcendental
and empirical I's into a human subject, a development which remained
enormously influential and persuasive through to post-World War II exi
stentialists such as Sartre (1960). However, in recent decades the identi
fication of empirical and transcendental subjects in the human subject has
been questioned by accounts stimulated above all by Nietzsche (1886) and
Freud (1915). Such accounts once more separate the transcendental I (or
'unconscious') from the empirical I, and resist the temptation to assign an
ultimate subject - human or otherwise - to thought and action.
'I think' [cogito, Ich denke] see also APPERCEPTION, CONSCIOUSNESS, I, IDENTITY,
PARALOGISM, PSYCHOLOGY, SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS
Descartes regarded his proposition 'I think therefore I am' (widely known
in its Latin form, Cogito ergo sum) in the Discourse on Method (1637) to be
234
'1 THINK'
a truth 'so certain and assured' that it could serve as a touchstone for cer
tainty. Descartes' discovery of the cogi,to by means of a process of sceptical
abstraction, which discounted the claims of all knowledge reached by
means of authority and experience, is widely recognized as the foundational
moment of modern philosophy. However, the reception of Descartes'
proposition by German philosophers before Kant was extremely cautious
and sceptical. Leibniz generalized the problem of the cogi,to into one of
consciousness and self-consciousness in general (see Leibniz, 1976, pp.
291-5), a development which was codified by Christian Wolff in his 'Ger
man Logic' (1719).The first proposition of this work maintained: 'We are
conscious of ourselves and other things, and therefore it is clear that we
exist' (§1). Kant's reception of the cogi,to was even more qualified: unlike
Wolff he did not believe it was possible to prove existence by means of
consciousness, but he was prepared to admit the cogi,to or 'I think' as the
ultimate, but unknowable, result of a process of abstraction from the dis
crete contents of experience and as its necessary complement.
Kant points to the anomalous status of the 'concept' or, if the term is
preferred, the judgement 'I think' when he describes it as one 'which was
not included in the general list of transcendental concepts but which must
yet be counted as belonging to that list, without, however, in the least
altering it or declaring it defective' (CPR A 341/B 400). lt is clearly not
a category among categories, even though it belongs to the table of cat
egories; it is, Kant specifies, 'the vehicle of all concepts' with no special
designation 'because it serves only to introduce all our thought, as belong
ing to consciousness' (ibid.). The proposition 'I think' is not itself an
experience, nor, unlike the categories, is it 'a condition of the possibility
of a knowledge of objects'; it is the 'form of apperception, which belongs
to and precedes every experience' (CPR A 354). lt accompanies and pre
cedes experience as the subject of experience, but only in a formal sense:
the 'I' of 'I think' can be regarded as neither a subject nor an object of
experience but only as its 'vehicle' and 'necessary accompaniment'.
Kant further claims that 'I think' is the necessary vehicle/form/accom
paniment of experience: to have a representation it is necessary to accom
pany it with 'I think' or eise the representation 'would not belong to the
subject' (CPR B 132). With this claim he draws back from some of the
extremely radical implications of his dissolution of the substantive char
acter of the ultimate subject of experience, and implicitly commits the
very paralogism of the subject which he himself exposed. The disquieting
implications of his position were subsequently explored by Nietzsche, who
pursued to its limit Kant's suggestion that the substantive 'I' in 'I think'
be replaced by 'he or it (the thing) which thinks ...the transcendental
subject of the thoughts = X' (CPR A 346/B 404). Nietzsche's (1886)
235
IDEA
destruction of the cogito along with Freud's (1915) excavation of the un
conscious paved the way for twentieth-century critiques of the cogito by the
tradition represented by philosophers such as Heidegger (1927), Foucault
(1988), Deleuze and Guattari (1972), and Derrida (1967).
idea [eidos, forma, Idee] see also ARCHETYPES, CONSTITUTIVE PRINCIPLES, FORM,
IDEAL, INNATE IDEAS, POSTUIATES, REASON
Kant deliberately and self-consciously redefined the meaning of this an
cient philosophical term. In the extraordinary Question XV of the Summa
theol,ogica - 'Of ldeas' - Aquinas provides a lapidary summing up of the
classical debates around the definition of ideas: 'by ideas are understood
the forms of things existing apart from the things themselves ... [ these
are either] the type of that which is called the form, or the principle of
the knowledge of that thing' (Aquinas, 1952, I, 15, 1). The former are the
transcendent Platonic ideas which provide a pattern for the things them
selves; the latter are the Aristotelian and later Stoic ideas which are ab
stracted from sensible perception and serve as concepts for knowing objects.
Both positions, as Aquinas shows, relate to objects, whether as their para
digmatic form or as their abstracted principle of knowledge. This relation
ship between idea and object survived the philosophical controversies of
the early modern period such as those between Descartes and Spinoza
and between Leibniz and Locke, both of which focused on the origin of
ideas. While the participants differed over whether ideas were 'innate' or
abstracted from sensible perception, they did not radically question the
basic relationship of idea and object. For Kant, however, 'The idea is a
concept of reason whose object can be met with nowhere in experience'
(L p. 590), or precisely that which does not stand in any relation to an
object.
Kant's main discussion of ideas is in the 'Transcendental Dialectic' of
CPR. This begins with a reflection on philosophical language and the
situation which arises when a thinker finds themself 'at a loss for the
expression which exactly fits their concept' (A 312/B 368). Rather than
resort to the 'desperate expedient' of neologism, Kant looks for the term
in a 'dead and learned language'. This excursus introduces his justifica
tion for using the term 'idea', which hinges on a contrast of Plato and
Aristotle. For Kant, both philosophers captured important aspects of the
term 'idea', but exaggerated some characteristics and neglected others.In
Kant's reading, Plato used the term to mean 'something which not only
can never be borrowed from the senses but far surpasses even the con
cepts of the understanding (with which Aristotle concerned himself)' (CPR
A 313/B 370). For him, Plato hypostatized the ideas, making them into
archetypes by means of a 'mystical deduction', while Aristotle confined
236
IDEA
their scope to empirical experience.With his use of the term, Kant sought
to establish a middle position which both acknowledged the transcend
ence of the ideas and the rigorous distinction of idea and concept (P p.
329, p. 70).
Kant considered the distinction between transcendental ideas or 'pure
concepts of reason' and the categories or 'pure concepts of the under
standing' to be one of the main achievements of CPR. The categories of
the understanding relate to possible objects of experience, while the ideas
of reason refer to the 'absolute totality of all possible experience' which,
Kant says, 'is itself not experience' (P §40). Having thus established the
generic transcendence of the ideas, Kant proceeds to derive their specific
character from the basic function of the reason, which is to make syllogistic
inferences. In this he mirrors the procedure applied earlier to the deduc
tion of the categories from the understanding' s function of making judge
ments. For Kant the syllogism consists in relating a particular judgement
to a universal condition, in his words 'in the conclusion of a syllogism we
restrict a predicate to a certain object, after having first thought it in the
major premise in its whole extension under a given condition' (CPR A
322/B 379). The idea corresponds to the unconditioned totality of con
ditions necessary for any given conditioned state.
Having established the general link between ideas and the form of the
syllogism, Kant proceeds to derive discrete ideas from the three categorial
forms of relation which connect the universal condition of the major
premise with the particular judgement of the conclusion. They are the
categorical relation of substance and accident, the hypothetical relation of
cause and effect, and the disjunctive relation of community, each of which
respectively permits the derivation of 'an unconditioned first, of the categorial
synthesis in a subject . ..the hypothetical synthesis of the members of a series
... [and] the disjunctive synthesis of the parts in a system' (CPR A 323/
B 379). The first idea involves the relation to a thinking subject, the
second the relation to the world as the sum of all appearances, and the
third the relation to things in general, or the ens realissimum. These ideas
form the 'objects' of the sciences of psychology, cosmology and theology,
namely the three divisions of 'special metaphysics' in the Wolffian system.
lt is when these ideas are treated as if they were objects that these sciences
lapse into errors of inference, treating the totality of experience in the
major premise of the syllogism as if it were a possible object of experience.
Such errors are anatomized by Kant in his scrutiny of the 'dialectical
inferences' of the psychological paralogisms, the cosmological antinomies
and 'impossible proofs' of theology in the 'Transcendental Dialectic' of
CPR.
lt might seem as if Kant has so painfully derived the ideas only to deny
237
IDEAL
them any possible utility; yet this is not the case. He wishes to avoid the
illegitimate use of the ideas as constitutive principles, as referring to ob
jects of possible experience, but does not rule out their regulative employ
ment as maxims for the orientation of the understanding with respect to
the totality of knowledge. While this holds for the theoretical ideas, the
case with the practical ideas is somewhat different; as the postulates of
pure practical reason, the ideas of immortality, freedom and God are
validated, not as objects of knowledge but as part of an a priori 'practical
concept of the highest good as the object of our will' (CPrR p. 133, p.
138). Finally, in CJ, Kant makes a further distinction between the tran
scendental and aesthetic ideas. The former are 'referred to a concept
according to an objective principle and are yet incapable of ever fumish
ing a cognition of the object', while the latter are 'referred to an intuition,
in accordance with a merely subjective principle of the harmony of the
cognitive faculties (imagination and understanding)' (CJ §57). While the
transcendental ideas stimulate the extension of the understanding, and
the practical ideas together constitute the concept of the highest good,
the work of the aesthetic ideas is to stimulate the harmony of understand
ing and imagination through vividness and unity in variety, and thus con
tribute to the augmentation of pleasure.
Although Kant's redefinition of 'idea' has generated a great deal of
exegesis and criticism, it has not been broadly influential until recently
(see Lyotard, 1983). Since members of the generation of German idealists
after Kant were dedicated to breaking down Kant's distinction between
reason and understanding, his distinction between idea and category was
an inevitable casualty, and with it the entire challenge to the traditional
understanding of the term 'idea'. As a result many philosophers in the
nineteenth and twentieth centuries, both within and without the ranks of
the Kantians, revived the traditional opposition between the Platonic and
Aristotelian understandings of the 'idea' thus overlooking Kant's innovation.
ideal see also ARCHETYPE, DETERMINATION, EXAMPLE, GOD, IDEA, IMITATION

The ideal is defined as the 'representation of an individual existence as
adequate to an idea' (CJ §17). In CPR Kant specifies that the ideal is 'the
idea, not merely in concreto, but in individuo, that is, as an individual thing,
determinable or even determined by the idea alone' (CPR A 568/B 596).
Although a self-determined individual being, the ideal stands as an arche
type which completely determines its copies: Kant's examples in CPR are
the stoic wise man, existing in 'complete conformity with the idea of
wisdom' (A 569/B 597), and God or the transcendental ideal. Both serve
as archetypes for imitation, but in different ways: the stoic sage as an
exemplar, and God as a source of all being. God as the ens realissimum is
238
IDEALISM
an individual being whose existence is adequate to the idea of the being

of beings; for Kant God is the only true ideal, the only ideal which satisfies
the condition of being 'completely determined in and through itself, and
known as the representation of an individual' (CPR A 577/B 605). In the
analysis of the 'Ideal of Reason' in the 'Transcendental Dialectic' Kant
refutes all attempts to prove the existence of God as a transcendental
ideal; it is not a knowable object, but must be thought in terms of reason's
need for the unity of knowledge, or that being to which all beings may
ultimately be referred. Later, in the 'Canon of Pure Reason', Kant also
discusses the ideals of the 'supreme' and 'original' goods of practical
reason, or the supreme reason which brings together happiness and
morality. The two aspects of the ideal, as exemplar and source, play an
important role in the discussion of the production of art in CJ (see §§17
and 60). The ideal of the beautiful consists in the exemplary products of
genius; the products of genius do not follow rules, but are nevertheless
exemplary, self-sufficient archetypes.
idealism see also HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY, I, REALISM, SUBJECT, SUBJECTIVE

Kant described the 'dictum of all genuine idealists, from the Eleatic school
to Bishop Berkeley' as ' "All cognition through the senses and experience
is nothing but sheer illusion, and only in the ideas of the pure under
standing and reason is there truth"' (P p. 374, p. 113). He distinguishes
three tendencies within modern idealism: the first is the 'dogmatic' and
sometimes visionary idealism of Berkeley; the second is the 'sceptical' or
'problematic' idealism of Descartes. Both of these are in turn opposed as
'empirical' idealisms to the third, Kant's own 'transcendental', 'formal' or,
as he later renamed it, 'critical' idealism. Initially in CPR Kant was happy
to describe his work as 'transcendental idealism', but with the proviso that
his idealism be accepted as a 'reversal' of empirical idealism. He under
lined this position in P, following misunderstandings of CPR, where he
simultaneously protests 'against all charges of idealism' while at the same
time defining his philosophy as 'idealist'.
The idealism which Kant was concerned to reverse doubted the reality
of external objects: in the case of Cartesian 'sceptical' idealism only inner
experience was indubitable; the existence of eternal objects could not be
established; while for Berkeley's visionary idealism, space and the things in
it are 'merely imaginary entities' (CPR B 275; see also p. 293, p. 36 and
p. 375, p. 114). Kant's reversal consisted in proposing a transcendental
idealism which was also an empirical realism, one which proves that 'even
our inner experience, which for Descartes is indubitable, is possible only
on the assumption of outer experience' (CPR B 275). P gives a stronger
version of this: 'All cognition of things merely from pure understanding
239
IDENTITY
or pure reason is nothing but sheer illusion, and only in experience is

there truth' (p. 374, p. 113).
The terrain upon which Kant defended his 'transcendental' or 'critical'
idealism consisted of the forms of intuition and the character of the 'I'.
For transcendental idealism it is axiomatic that 'objects of experience ...are
neuer given in themselves, but only in experience, and have no existence
outside it' (CPR A 492/B 521). The objects in the space of outer intuition
and those in the time of inner intuition cannot be present without these
forms of intuition. But, Kant adds, 'this space and this time, and with
them all appearances, are not in themselves things [as a transcendental
realist would claim]; they are nothing but representations, and cannot
exist outside our mind' (CPR A 492/B 520). Similarly the pure concepts
of the understanding generated by the spontaneity of the I are not them
selves things, but are the conditions of the possibility of things. Both the
forms of intuition and the concepts of the understanding originale in the
subject, and may thus be described as 'idealist', but the way in which they
organize experience is objectively valid. While it may be possible to pos
tulate objective correlates as underlying the appearances of the subject
and objects of experience in a 'transcendental subject' and a 'transcen
dental object', these are by no means necessary to secure the claims of
transcendental or critical idealism.
Kant's transcendental idealism gave rise to a generation of idealist
philosophers, whose leading representatives were Fichte and Schelling.
Their idealism radicalized Kant's claims, placing more emphasis on the
spontaneity of the I and demoting those aspects of empirical realism and
sensibility which remained in Kant's account. Kant regarded this develop
ment as retrograde, a retum to the forms of idealism which he had coun
tered in CPR His disquiet was reflected in an 'open letter' on Fichte's
Sdence of Knowkdge (1794) on 7 August 1799 in which he condemned the
new idealism as 'mere logic' and berated its attempt 'to cull a real object
out of logic' as a 'vain effort and therefore a thing that no one has ever
done' (PC p. 253).
identity [Identität] see also APPERCEPTION, CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION, DIFFERENCE,

I, PARALOGISM, PSYCHOLOGY, SUBJECT, UNITY
The notion of identity plays a variegated and complex role in Kant's
philosophy. lt features in the pre-critical writings as the logical 'supreme
principle in the hierarchy of truths' and in the disputed Leibnizian onto
logical principle of the 'identity of indiscemibles'. In CPR it features in
conjunction with difference as one of the concepts of reflection, and as
the pre-categorical double of the category of unity. In the latter capacity
240
IDENTITY
it provides the guarantee for the extra-categorical 'logical' identity of the

'I' indispensable for experience.
In ND (1759) Kant moves from claiming that 'all reasoning amounts to
uncovering the identity between predicate and subject' (p. 390, p. 9) to
proposing as the supreme principle of truth the 'principle of identity'
which states that 'whatever is, is, and whatever is not, is not' (p. 389, p. 7).
His preference at this stage for the principle of identity arose out of his
opposition to the Wolffian principle of contradiction, but already by the
time of writing NM (1763) he is dissatisfied with both formal principles.
He distinguishes there between the identity of logical ground and conse
quence and the identity of real cause and effect, claiming that 'the real
ground is never a logical ground, and the rain is not posited by the wind
by virtue of the rule of identity' (p. 203, p. 240). With this development
Kant anticipated his later, critical distinction between formal and tran
scendental logic.
Another aspect of identity which Kant explores in the pre-critical writ
ings is the Leibnizian law of the identity of indiscemibles. In §9 of his
Monadology Leibniz argues that no two beings exist for which 'it would not
be possible to find a difference that is intemal or founded on an intrinsic
denomination' (Leibniz, 1720, p. 62). Already in ND Kant disputes the
'metaphysical universality' (p. 410, p. 36) of the law, appealing to the dif
ference of position between indiscemibles as sufficient to justify rejecting
the law. This view of position, later developed into the spatial form of
intuition of 1D and CPR, marks another qualification of logical identity,
here discussed in terms of 'intemal denomination' by the real determina
tion of spatial position.
Kant continues his critique of the law of indiscemibles in the section of
CPR devoted to the concepts of reflection (A 260/B 316ff). Identity and
difference are concepts of reflection which serve to orient judgement
when it is presented with appearances. They denote characteristics of the
spatial form of intuition, and not 'things in themselves'. Kant maintains
that Leibniz regarded identity and difference as ontological characteristics
of things rather than as products of the reflection upon the ways in which
appearances are organized in terms of space, time and the categories.
This for Kant resulted in the elision of the conditions of sensibility and the
understanding, with the result that conceptual or logical identity and
difference were confused with sensible or real identity and difference.
This elision made possible the allegedly false claims of the law of
indiscemibles, such as 'all things which are not distinguishable from one
another in their concepts (in quality or quantity) are completely identical
(numero eadem)' (A 281/B 337).
In CPR Kant rarely refers to the logical principle of identity, and indeed
241
IDENTITY
regards the principle of contradiction as the 'highest principle of analyti

cal judgements'. Yet the logical application of the principle of identity
maintains a crucial, if covert, position in the critical architecture. This
becomes apparent when Kant discusses the identity of the transcendental
subject or I. A number of interesting problems duster around the tran
scendental subject: it is the subject which underlies and accompanies all
acts of predication but which may not itself serve as a predicate, nor
however can it be described as a substance. Kant insists that this is because
substance is a category, and the I is prior to categorial determination; thus
the I cannot be known in terms of the categories. The problem arises,
however, of the numerical identity of the transcendental subject: it must
be one to ensure the continuity of acts of predication, but it cannot be a
unity since unity is a category of quantity, which cannot legitimately be
applied to the transcendental subject.
Kant relies on the notion of identity as opposed to categorical unity in
order to secure the transcendental subject. The self-conscious I of tran
scendental apperception must be 'fixed and abiding' and this 'numerical
identity' must be one which 'precedes all experience, and which makes
experience itself possible' (CPR A 107). Since it is the 'a priori ground of
all concepts' it cannot be properly determined by such concepts as unity
and substance, and so in a difficult passage Kant derives the 'unity of
consciousness' (how it appears to our category of unity) from the con
sciousness of 'the identity of function whereby it [unity] synthetically
combines [the manifold] in one knowledge'. This is the 'original and
necessary consciousness of the identity of the seif' which informs the
'equally necessary unity of the synthesis of all appearances' (CPR A 108).
Thus the identity of the transcendental subject secures the unity of its
consoousness.
Kant is extremely careful not to attribute the categorial qualities of
unity to identity. In the discussion of the third paralogism in the 1781
edition of CPR Kant refused to move from consciousness of numerical
identity to the notion of a person. He insists that the 'identity of the
consciousness of myself at different times is only a formal condition of my
thoughts and their coherence, and in no way proves the numerical iden
tity of my subject' (CPR A 363). Furthermore, the permanence of identity
over time does not point to the I being a substance, but is itself the
consequence of identity. In his 1787 restatement of the paralogisms in the
second edition of CPR Kant underlines that the identity of the transcen
dental subject cannot be resolved into a 'simple substance' since this would
require it to become an 'object of intuition' to which the categories of
unity and substance would be applicable (CPR B 407-8). Were this to be
admitted, the consequence would be the relegation of the identity of the
242
ILLUSION
transcendental subject which founds the categories into an object of the

categories, thus converting the transcendental into an empirical subject,
with catastrophic consequences for the critical project. Instead Kant chooses
to restrict identity to the logical identity of a subject rather than to extend
it to that of a thinking and unified substance.
illusion [Schein] see also AESTHETIC, APPEARANCE, BEAUTY, DIALECTIC, SUBREPTION,

TRUTH
The analysis of the nature of illusion is one of the abiding themes of
Kant's work, and the main motivation of his redefinition of metaphysics.
As early as DS (1766) Kant programmatically declared metaphysics to be
the 'science of the limits of human reason' which 'eliminate[s] the illusion
and the vain knowledge which inflates the understanding' (DS p. 368,
p. 354). He adopts a similar position in 1D (1770), where metaphysics is
called to purge itself of the illusory axioms and principles 'which deceive
the understanding and which have disastrously permeated the whole of
metaphysics' (ID §24). CPR, in accordance with this project, is divided
into the analytic, which determines the limits of metaphysics, and a dialec
tic, or 'logic of illusion', which shows how these limits are transgressed by
the reason in producing transcendent and thus illusory ideas.
Kant's understanding of the nature of illusion developed considerably
between the pre-critical writings and CPR. In DS he focuses upon the
illusions of the imagination which he understands by means of an analogy
with optical illusion. He is here interested in the way in which 'spirit-seers'
such as Emanuel Swedenborg 'transpose the illusion of their imagination
and locate it outside themselves' (p. 343, p. 331). A similar view of illusion
as a form of visual error also prevails in A (§13). Alongside this view of
illusion as avoidable delusion in DS, Kant also hints at a more fundamen
tal and unavoidable human tendency to illusion in his metaphor of the
biased scale of human understanding, unavoidably weighted towards 'hope
for the future' (DS p. 349, p. 337).
In ID Kant has considerably refined his account of illusion, concentrat
ing upon 'illusions of the understanding' or 'subreptic axioms' 'which try
to pass off what is sensitive as if it necessarily belonged to a concept of the
understanding' (ID §24). He proposes to inquire into them further in
order to discover a 'touchstone' by which to distinguish true from illusory
judgements. To this end he presents three species of subreptic axioms or
'illusions of sensitive cognitions': the first is that the condition of the
possibility of intuiting an object is taken for a condition of possibility for
the object itself; the second that the sensitive conditions by which to com
pare what is given in order to form a concept are taken for conditions of
the possibility of the object; and the third, that the sensitive conditions of
243
ILLUSION
subsuming an object under a concept are taken to be conditions of the

possibility of objects (ID §§26-9).In each case the illusion assayed consists
in mistaking an appearance for the truth. In ID Kant still subscribes to
Descartes' suspicions conceming the illusory nature of appearance per se,
although he does begin to develop the distinction, crucial for the critical
philosophy, between appearance and illusion. This distinction appears in
Conceming Sensury Illusion and Poetic Fiction of 1777 (p. 203) and forms one
of the central arguments of CPR.
In CPR Kant presents his mature analysis of illusion. He firmly distin
guishes appearance from illusion in terms of judgement: the appearances
given to the sensibility are not illusions but necessary appearances while
'truth and error ...and consequently also illusion as leading to error, are
only to be found in the judgement, i.e. only in the relation of the object
to our understanding' (CPR A 293/B 350). Our understanding may, for
example, falsely infer that things of appearance intuited through the forms
of intuition (space and time) are not objects of appearance but things in
themselves. In this case 'out of that which I ought to reckon as appear
ance, I [have] made mere illusion' (B 69). This development of the
subreptic axioms of ID is crucial to the critical analysis of the limits of the
understanding, but it is no longer the main focus of Kant's anatomy of
illusion in CPR. This now lies in the 'transcendental illusion' of human
reason which is surveyed in the 'Transcendental Dialectic' and its scrutiny
of illusory inferences.
Kant opens the transcendental dialectic with an introduction entitled
'Transcendental Illusion' in which he distinguishes transcendental from
the accidental and avoidable 'logical illusions' of fallacious judgements
and the related 'empirical illusions' of subreption. Transcendental illu
sion is 'natural and inevitable' (CPR A 298/B 354) and consists in the
'deceptive extension of [the concepts of] pure understanding' to their ab
solute conditions beyond the limits of possible experience. The transcen
dental dialectic is directed towards revealing the transcendent extension
of the concepts of experience, and the necessary dialectic which it evokes,
one which is 'inseparable from human reason, and which, even after its
deceptiveness has been exposed, will not cease to play tricks with reason'
(A 298/B 355). Kant describes three cases of the natural dialectic of tran
scendental illusion upon which are founded the 'pretend sciences' of
psychology, cosmology and theology. In each case the properties of the
'subjective condition of thinking' are extended and regarded as 'knowl
edge of the object' (A 396), in these cases knowledge of objects such as
the soul, the world as a whole and God. Kant goes on to show how in each
case the sciences of these illusory objects succumb to a 'natural dialectic'
and then gives an account, or a logic, of their illusions.
244
IMAGE
In CJ Kant develops a further account of illusion, in this case artistic

illusion. The beautiful work of art must not appear as a product, but 'must
be clothed with the asped of nature, although we recognise it to be art' (CJ
§45). This position was largely a consequence of the strict conditions
which Kant established for a valid aesthetic judgement of taste in the
'Analytic of the Beautiful', which stripped such judgements of any refer
ence to interest. The view that the work of art represents an illusory
'second nature' proved immensely significant for romantic aesthetics, and
persisted long after the recognition of the limits of Kant's description of
the aesthetic judgement of taste.
image [Bild] see also IMAGINATION, MANIFOLD, SCHEMATISM, SYNTHESIS

In Kant's critical architecture the image occupies the grey area between
concept and intuition. As a form of mediation between the heterogeneous
faculties of understanding and intuition it has a distinctly equivocal status.
The image is understood both as a presentation of a concept to intuition,
as with the concept of 'substance in appearance' which is presented as 'an
abiding image of sensibility' (CPR A 525/B 553; see also 0D p. 222, p.
136) and as something generated from the manifold of intuition and
presented to the understanding. Most of Kant's discussion focuses on the
latter, since the presentation of a concept to intuition is largely covered
by the schema, which is a 'representation of a universal procedure of
imagination in providing an image for a concept' (CPR A 140/B 179)
rather than the concept itself. Schematism is the work of transcendental
imagination which 'aims at no special intuition' while the discrete image
is a product of empirical imagination. The generation of images by em
pirical imagination from the manifold of intuition is central to the ac
count of synthesis in the 'deduction' of the first edition of CPR. Kant refers
there to imagination as the 'active faculty for the synthesis of [the] mani
fold' (CPR A 120) and sees its work as the forming of an image through
the syntheses of apprehension and reproduction. The image is then suited
for presentation to the concepts of the understanding in order to be
worked into knowledge.
The account of the generation of images from the manifold of intuition
is both paralleled and extended in the account of the 'aesthetic normal
idea' developed in CJ. Kant here tries to explain how the aesthetic normal
idea may be normative without the subsumptive requirements of a con
cept. The problem is resolved into that of presenting an aesthetic idea 'in
concreto in a model image' (CJ §17), one whose solution can only be
hinted at since 'who can wrest nature's whole secret from her?' (§17). The
Gemüt superimposes several images of a particular object upon each other
until arriving at a 'mean contour which serves as a common standard for
245
IMAGINATION
all'. The latter phenomenon is illustrated by an analogy with the optical

presentation of images where the mean contour is the 'place illuminated
by the greatest concentration of colour' (§17). The 'mean contour' is
neither a concept of the understanding nor simply a derivative of the
manifold of intuition, but is 'a floating image for the whole genus, which
nature has set as an archetype underlying those of her products that
belong to the same species' (§17). With this account of the image, Kant
seems both to supplement the account of the image under subsumptive,
determinate judgement in CPR and to give substance to the workings of
reflective judgement in CJ.
imagination [phantasia, Jacultas imagi,nandi, Einbiuiungskraft] see also AES

THETIC, GENIUS, ILLUSION, IMAGE, INTUITION, JUDGEMENT, REASON, SCHEMA(TISM),
SYNTHESIS, UNDERSTANDING
In De anima Aristotle described imagination as 'different from either per
ceiving ( aisthesis) or discursive thinking ( noesis), though it is not found
without sensation, or judgement without it' (Aristotle, 1941, 427b, 16).
The peculiar, intermediate status of imagination, accepted by Aquinas as
seif-evident in his commentary on De anima, contributed to the consider
able fascination of philosophers and artists with the concept. In the syn
thesis of Plato and Aristotle ventured by the Renaissance philosophers
Ficino and Pico della Mirandola, imagination featured as the vehicle of
participation between human sensation and the ideas, with the art of
genius featuring prominently as the perfect expression of their unity (see
Cassirer et al., 1948). Imagination maintained this elevated status in spite
of the best efforts of Descartes to bring it down to earth 'by dissecting the
heads of various animals' in search of it. Imagination posed considerable
problems for rationalist philosophers such as Christian Wolff who saw its
association with sensibility as detracting from the clarity and distinctness
of rational thought. By the mid 1730s dissatisfaction with this position had
led some Wolffians to call for a logic of the imagination and senses to
complement that of the understanding. In the hands of the Wolffian
lexicographer Heinrich Meissner this entailed subordinating imagination
to empirical psychology, but for the philosopher A.G. Baumgarten and
the critic Jacob Bodmer it led to the extension of philosophy to include
aesthetics and poetics (see Caygill, 1989, chapter 3).
Kant's view of imagination was developed in this context, and displays
several classical features, above all the intermediate status of imagination
between sensibility and the understanding as well as its role in artistic
production. However, he also gave it several characteristic inflections when
situating it within the context of his broader philosophical concerns. With
one signal exception Kant's discussion of imagination in the pre-critical
246
IMAGINATION
writings is usually confined to berating its bad influence, as in the analysis

of the illusions of imagination in DS (see p. 344, p. 331) and less directly
1D (§27). Exceptionally in NM Kant offers a more sophisticated analysis
which anticipates his later positions. He reflects on the ability to entertain
and exclude a representation 'by virtue of the power of imagination' and
sees its task as the bringing into existence and destruction of representa
tion, rather than as a straightforward act of presentation and removal. He
alludes to this activity as 'concealed within the depths of our minds which
goes unnoticed even while it is being exercised' (p. 191, p. 229), terms
which anticipate his latter description of the schematizing work of imagi
nation as 'an art concealed within the depths of the human soul' (CPR
A 141/B 181).
In the Blomberg Logic (L pp. 5-246) from the early 1770s imagination
features as an obstacle to knowledge; there Kant maintains that 'From this
mingling of the imagination with the understanding arise effects that do
not agree perfectly with the rules of the understanding and of reason' (L
p. 79). Yet by CPR , Kant's position on the imagination had undergone a
near complete reversal. The extent of this change may be gathered from
the comments on imagination in A, which to a large degree codify the
assumptions about imagination which inform and underlie the three cri
tiques (CPR, CPrR, CJ). These comments combine aspects of argument
such as the place of imagination in logic and metaphysics (A §4) and in
genius and taste (A §67) which were later separated and distributed be
tween the first and third critiques.
Kant divides sensibility into sense (Sinn) and imagination, the former
comprising the 'faculty of intuition in the presence of an object' and latter
'intuition without the presence of an object' (A §15). The non-presence
of the object for imagination can be thought in two ways: either the object
was present but is no longer, or its presence lies in the future. Considered
from the standpoint of empirical imagination, this gives rise to the facul
ties of memory and prevision, which recollect and predict the presence of
discrete objects. However, Kant also introduces another distinction within
the concept of imagination which allows him to distinguish between (a)
empirical or recollective imagination and (b) productive or poetic imagi
nation. This is the distinction between imagination as 'a faculty of the
original representation of the object (exhimtio originaria), which conse
quently precedes experience' and as 'a faculty of the derived representa
tion (exhibitio derivativa), which recalls to mind a previous empirical
perception' (A §28). lt is the work of the productive imagination which
most interests Kant, and which he puts to most use.
The reference to productive imagination producing an 'original repre
sentation of the object' prior to experience is a clear anticipation of Kant's
247
IMAGINATION
critical idealism. He subsequently describes 'pure perceptions of space

and time' as belonging to the productive faculty. What is crucial here is
that the productive imagination produces original representations, i.e. they
are not derived from experience but provide conditions of experience,
and they are furthermore not wilful or accidental (this constitutes 'fan
tasy') but ordered. At this point the subsequently divided arguments of
the first and third critiques overlap. Kant analyzes the 'three distinct vari
eties of the sensory productive faculty' of 'pictorial representation in space
(imaginatio flastica), associative perception in time (imaginatio associans), and
the sensory productive faculty of affinity' (A §31) in terms of artistic inven
tion. The three forms of productive imagination testify to the 'common
origin' or 'close union' of 'understanding and sensibility' (A §31), which
also characterizes the original productions of genius (where 'imagination
harmonises with concepts', §30) and the aesthetic judgement of taste with
its Judgement about the harmony or discord conceming the freedom of
play between imagination and the law-abiding character of the imagination'
(A §67). Yet the three modes of productive imagination also feature crucially
as the 'three-fold synthesis' in the first critique's analysis of experience.
In both CPR and CJ imagination is situated both between sensibility and
the understanding and beyond both them and itself. This paradoxical
location may be clarified by the distinction between empirical and produc
tive imagination, with the former situated between the other faculties and
the latter encompassing them all. At several points in CPR, such as A 95,
imagination attends to the synthesis of the manifold between the synopsis
of sense and the unification of original apperception. Yet on other occa
sions synthesis in general is described as the 'result of the power of imagi
nation, a blind but indispensable power of the soul, without which we
should have no knowledge whatsoever, but of which we are scarcely ever
conscious' (CPR A 78/B 103). The all-encompassing role given to imagi
nation is consistently maintained in both A and B deductions. In the
former the 'principle of the necessary unity of pure (productive) synthesis
of imagination, prior to apperception, is the ground of the possibility of
all knowledge, especially of experience' (CPR A 118) while in the latter
imagination features as the spontaneous source of all synthesis (CPR B
152). lt thus informs all the modes of the synthesis of the manifold of
intuition - apprehension, reproduction and recognition - even while, as
empirical imagination, serving as one of the discrete moments of synthe
sis, as well as featurin:g in the schematic synthesis of concept and intuition
which generates knowledge and experience (see CPR A 140/B 179).
In CJ the discussion of imagination assumes even greater complexity. lt
appears in §VII of the 'First Introduction' in the context of the three-fold
synthesis as a discrete faculty beside judgement and reason. But in the
248
IMITATION
course of the work, the relationship between imagination and judgement,

already adumbrated in CPR in terms of synthesis, is deepened. Imagina
tion and judgement do not merely apply the laws of the understanding
but in reflective judgement simultaneously invent and apply laws: that is,
their function is not reproductive and imitative, but productive and origi
nal. Furthermore the 'unity' of imagination and judgement also evokes
pleasure, as may be discerned most clearly in the aesthetic judgement of
taste - with its 'conformity to law without a law, and [its] subjective har
monising of the imagination and the understanding without an objective
one' (§22) - as well as in the productive activity of genius, whose primary
quality is 'originality' or the 'talent for producing that for which no defi
nite rule can be given' (§46).
The crucial role of imagination in Kant's philosophy was first urged by
Heidegger (1929), and has since been widely accepted by Kant scholar
ship, although often without a füll appreciation of its implications. These
are not only textual in providing a bridge between the first and third
critiques, but also substantive, transforming Kant from a normative phi
losopher concerned with rules and their correct application to one con
cerned with issues of production, originality and pleasure. lt is, however,
noteworthy that imagination does not feature prominently in Kant's prac
tical philosophy, and where it is mentioned it is usually in a dismissive
context, as in the discussion of the typic in CPrR (p. 69, p. 71). According
to the reader's temperament, the absence of imagination from CPrR may
be regarded as the saving grace of Kant's practical philosophy, or as good
reason for seeking his practical philosophy in the pages of the first and
third critiques.
imitation [Nachahmung] see also ENLIGHTENMENT, GENIUS, IDEA, IMAGINATION,

ORIGINALITY
Kant was consistently critical of imitation, seeing the spirit of imitation as
the worst of 'all the things that can only harm and be opposed to the
philosophical spirit' (L p. 128). From his description of imitation as 'the
cultivation of one's understanding, will, indeed, of choice, according to
the example of others' it is clear that it is imitation which is castigated in
WE as 'self-imposed tutelage' and which is given 'no place at all in moral
matters' in GMM (p. 408, p. 21). On the question of artistic imitation in
CJ, however, Kant's position is rather more nuanced. He distinguishes
imitation as producing_ copies of the work of genius (Nachmachung) and
imitation as an emulation or following (Nachahmung) which puts the fol
lower's 'own talent to the test' of the comparison with the productivity of
genius (CJ §47). In the latter case, the pupil's own talent and originality
249
IMMANENT
is stimulated by the example of genius, which thus 'arouses like ideas on

the part of their pupil' (ibid.).
immanent see TRANSCENDENT
immortality see also I, FINITUDE, PARALOGISM, POSTUIATE, PSYCHOLOGY, SOUL,

SUBJECT
In CPR Kant claimed to have refuted speculative proofs of the immortality
of the soul - such as those proposed by Moses Mendelssohn in Phädon
(1767) - by exposing them as paralogistic (see CPR B 413ff). Such proofs
depend on the assumption that the I as formal condition or logical subject
of thought is also a substantial self which possesses the quality of perma
nence. While Kant conclusively destroyed the bases of such speculative
proofs, this did not require him to abandon the conviction of immortality.
lt re-appears in CPrR along with freedom and God as a 'postulate of pure
practical reason' which 'consigns to the subject the requisite duration' (p.
133, p. 138) that was denied it by the paralogisms which afflicted the
speculative proof. The postulate of immortality, Kant observes, 'derives
from the practically necessary condition of a duration adequate to the
perfect fulfilment of the moral law' (p. 132, p. 137), a condition which is
supported by its accompanying postulates of freedom and God. Subse
quent writers, such as Heine (1965, p. 295) and Nietzsche (1882), rejected
all three postulates either as Kant's attempts to placate his manservant
Lampe or as lapses from the radical destruction of the speculative proofs
accomplished in the transcendental dialectic of CPR. Both positions are
probably unfair, although it is noteworthy that few contemporary defences
of Kant's account of freedom and moral action refer to the other suppos
edly inseparable postulates of God and immortality.
impenetrability [ Undurchdringlichkeit] see also EXTENSION, FORCE, MATTER

Impenetrability is defined as 'the fundamental property of matter whereby
it first reveals itself as something real in the space of our external senses,
[and] is nothing but matter's capacity of extension' (MF p. 508, p. 56).
Although Kant seems to be working within the Cartesian view of matter as
extension, this is quickly belied by the claim that the 'ground' of matter's
impenetrability is its 'repulsive force'. For Descartes, impenetrability was
part of the essence of extended substance, it was certainly not grounded
in a repulsive force. In MF Kant criticizes this view as part of a 'mechanical
mode of explication' which prevailed from Democritus to Descartes whose
main assumption was 'the absolute impenetrability of the primitive matter'
(MF p. 533, p. 91). His first published work, LF, which appeared fifty years
before MF, had already attacked this view of matter with arguments for
250
IMPRESSION
the presence of an active force in a body 'prior to extension' (§1). This

position was quickly refined, and in PM and later NM Kant argued that
the repulsive force evinced by impenetrability had to be countered by an
opposed attractive force; if not, 'bodies would have no cohesive structure
at all, for the particles would only repel each other' (PM p. 484, p. 61),
an argument which also appears in MF. The 'force of impenetrability' thus
'prevents anything extemal from approaching more closely' (p. 484, p. 61)
and is the property of a body which excludes another body in contact with
it from the space which it occupies. Yet it is always limited by the force of
attraction which does not operate through contact (Kant here has in mind
the force of gravity). These forces not only constitute physical bodies, but
also the elements of matter itself. Kant retained these positions in MF,
adapting them only slightly to the new critical framework established by
CPR.
imperative see also CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, COMMAND, HYPOTHETICAL

While the representation of an object which commands the will is a com
mand, the formula of such a command is an imperative. Such formulas of
command are always 'expressed by an ought and thereby indicate the re
lation of an objective law of reason to a will that is not necessarily deter
mined by this law because of its subjective constitution (the relation of
necessitation)' (GMM p. 413, p. 24). Imperatives thus recommend courses
of action to refractory wills, necessitating them against their inclinations.
Kant sees imperatives as taking several forms, but makes a fundamental
division between hypothetical and categorical varieties. Tue former com
mand hypothetically, by recommending a course of action appropriate to
a particular end. If this end is a 'possible end' then the imperative is
hypothetical and problematic or a 'rule of skill' of the form 'if you would
achieve w and x, then do y and z'. If this end is 'presupposed as actual for
all rational beings' (p. 415, p. 26), such as 'happiness', then the impera
tive is hypothetical and assertoric or a council of prudence of the form 'if
you would be x (= happy) then do y'. By contrast, a categorical imperative
'declares an action to be of itself objectively necessary without any pur
pose' (p. 414, p. 25) and is thus an apodeictic law of morality expressed
in the form 'Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the
same time will that it should become a universal law' (p. 421, p. 30).
impression [Eindruck] see alsoAFFECT, GEMÜT, RECEPTIVTIY, REFLECTION, SENSIBIIJTY

Sense-impression was the main source of experience and knowledge for
classical anti-Platonic sensualist and sceptical philosophies such as those of
Democritus, Lucretius and Pyrrho. Diogenes Laertius reports that the Stoies
regarded impressions and sense perception as prior to thought and the
251
'INAUGURAL DISSERTATION'
source of the 'criterion which decides the truth of things'. They also
divided impressions according to whether they were sensory or other than
sensory, a distinction developed by their modern successors Locke and
Hume in their distinction between sensible and reflected impressions. For
Kant, the notion of an 'impression' became prominent in the pre-critical
DS, the text where Kant is most anxious to secure the proper boundaries
between 'real' and 'imaginary' experience. lt maintains a somewhat un
derdeveloped but emphatic presence in Kant's account of the receptivity
of sensibility, where it serves as the bottom line of perception, the matter
of sense-perception. In ID, for example, the discovery that space and time
are the formal elements of intuition is qualified by the claim that they,
and other formal aspects of cognition, are not derived from sense impres
sions as 'reflected impressions' but are only excited into action by them;
through them the mind 'joins together in a fixed manner the sense
impressions made by the presence of an object' (§15). Impressions have
a similarly residual status in CPR, where the receptivity of the mind through
which objects are given to us is defined as the 'receptivity for impressions'
(A 50/B 74). lt was necessary for Kant's 'critical idealism' to preserve the
impressions in some form in order to avoid the Scylla of 'absolute ideal
ism', but they bad also to be marginalized in order to avoid the Charybdis
of empiricism.
'lnaugural Dissertation' (On the Form and Principles of the Sensible and
Intelligiöle World) see PRE-CRITICAL WRITINGS
incentive [ Triebfeder] see also CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, DRIVE, IMPERATIVE, MO

TIVE, PRACTICAL PHILOSOPHY, RESPECT, WILL
In GMM Kant distinguishes between the incentive as a 'subjective ground
of desire' and the motive as the 'objective ground of volition' (p. 427, p.
35). Both supply ends for the determination of the will; the incentive
supplies a subjective and the motive an objective end. Practical principles
based on subjective ends and incentives are 'material' and relative to a
particular subject, and can only supply grounds for hypothetical impera
tives. By contrast, practical principles which abstract from subjective ends
are formal, and potentially universalizable for all rational subjects and
capable of serving as a categorical imperative.
Although Kant does not consider incentives as providing grounds for
properly moral actions (they suffice only for rules of skill and counsels of
prudence), he does explore the notion of a moral incentive in CPrR,
chapter 3. There he defines incentive consistently with GMM as a 'subjec
tive determining ground of a will whose reason does not by its nature
necessarily conform to the objective law' (p. 72, p. 74), and acknowledges
252
INCONGRUENT COUNTERPARTS
that this raises the 'insoluble problem for the human reason' of 'how a law
in itself can be the direct determining ground of the will'. Instead of
seeking an answer in terms of an incentive appropriate to the moral law,
Kant asks instead what the moral law 'effects (or better, must effect) in the
mind, so far as it is an incentive' (p. 72, p. 75). The answer is 'reverence
for the law', not as the incentive to morality but as 'morality itself, re
garded subjectively as an incentive', one which rejects the 'rival claims of
self-love' and which as 'moral feeling' is 'an incentive to make this law
itself a maxim' (p. 76, pp. 78-9).
inclination [Neigung] see also AFFECT, COMMAND, DUTY, FEELING, IMPERATIVE,

INCENTIVE, INTEREST, PRACTICAL PHILOSOPHY, RESPECT, SENSIBLE WORLD, WILL
Kant's moral philosophy is structured around the opposition between duty
and inclination. For him duty 'proudly rejects all kinship with the inclina
tions' (CPrR p. 87, p. 89); it is grounded in freedom from the world of
sense in which inclination is firmly rooted. For this reason inclination is
called in Kant's practical philosophy to represent the subjective, materially
founded and partial aspects of human moral experience which are coun
tered by the objective, formal and universal categorical imperative. lncli
nation is 'the dependence of the faculty of desire on sensations ...which
accordingly always indicates a need' (GMM p. 413, p. 24), and for Kant to
possess a will determined exclusively by inclination is to be without spon
taneity, merely reacting to stimuli, a condition Kant describes as 'animal
choice (arbitrium lnutum)' (MM p. 213, p. 42). Human choice can be
affected but not determined by inclination, which for Kant serves only to
undermine the freedom of the will. lnclination, then, is the source for the
heteronomy of the will, namely its determination by objects outside of the
will; in its case the will 'does not give itself the law, but the object does so
because of its relation to the will' (GMM p. 441, p. 45). The objects of
inclination have only a 'conditioned value'; that is, they are not desired
'for their own sake' but only for the sake of satisfying ends outside of
them, namely the needs of inclination (GMM p. 427, p. 35).This for Kant
makes them unworthy to serve as principles of moral judgement, for as
they cannot be universalized they can only serve as the basis of hypothetical
and not categorical imperatives.
incongruent counterparts [inkongruentes Gegenstück] see also INTUITION,

ORIENTATION, SPACE
Kant's most extended discussion of incongruent counterparts is to be
found in DRS (1768) where it forms the core of his proof in support of
Newtonian absolute space against the view of his Leibnizian contempor
aries that space 'consists in the external relation of the parts of matter
253
INDMDUAL
which exist alongside each other' (p. 383, p. 371). He argues that 'the
complete determination of a corporeal form does not depend simply on
the relation and position of its parts to each other; it also depends on the
reference of that physical form to universal absolute space' (p. 381, p.
369). A counterpart of an object is one which is identical to it with respect
to its definition and intemal relations, as in Kant's example of the right
and the left hand. He argues that even if the counterparts are formally
identical, there remains an 'inner difference' which consists in the prop
erty that 'the surface enclosing the one cannot possibly enclose the other'
(p. 383, p. 371). This inner difference relates 'exclusively to absolute and
arigi,nal space' since it would be inexplicable on the premises of Leibnizian
relative space. Kant maintained an interest in topological arguments even
after he had rejected the concept of absolute space; the notions of
directionality and orientation implied in his discussion of incongruent
counterparts are explored in his essay on orientation (WO) and are ger
mane to his understanding of space and geometry.
individual see MONAD, PERSON
inducti.on [Induktion] see also DEDUCTION, INFERENCE

Induction is defined in the 'Blomberg Logic' as an inference of the form
'what belongs to as many things as I have ever cognised must also belong
to all things that are of this species and genus' (L p. 232). He describes
this form of inference as a 'crutch' for the understanding, without which
most of our cognition would be impossible, but one which is 'completely
opposed to logical rule'. In the 'Hechse} Logic' he expands on the latter
point by maintaining that the 'universality' of the inference is only empiri
cal, as opposed to rational universality in which 'what I attribute to the
concept universally actually does belong to all the things without excep
tion' (p. 408). The ground of such rational universality is the principle of
contradiction, which informs deductive inferences.
In CPR the logical point conceming induction is extended to the uni
versality and necessity of the rules of synthesis proper to synthetic a priori
judgements. While analytical judgements are justified according to the
principle of contradiction, this does not suffice to justify synthetic a priori
judgements. The categories possess a strict universality and necessity which
can be justified by neither the principle of contradiction nor through
induction. This is exemplified by the category of cause discussed in the
second analogy. Kant criticizes the inductive derivation of the concept of
cause from the 'perception and comparison of events repeatedly following
in a uniform manner upon preceding appearances' for yielding only an
'empirical' and 'fictitious' universality and necessity (CPR A 196/B 241).
254
INFINITY
He maintains that only the transcendental turn will supply the desired
criteria, and furthermore, that it underlies the very possibility of induc
tion: 'We can extract clear concepts of [a priori representations] from
experience, only because we have put them into experience, and because
experience is thus itelf brought about only by their means' (A 196/B 241).
inference [Auftchliessen] see also ANTINOMIES, DIALECTIC, IDEAS, ILLUSION, LOGIC,

PARALOGISMS
Kant distinguished the immediate knowledge that, say, in a figure bounded
by three straight lines there are three angles from the inferred knowledge
that the sum of these angles is equal to two right angles. The inference
consists in the logical sequence which moves from the truth of a funda
mental proposition or judgement to the conclusion that is drawn from it.
A case in which the conclusion is directly drawn from the fundamental
judgement is an immediate 'inference of the understanding'. Inferences
of reason are those which require at least one further judgement in addi
tion to the primary one in order to secure a conclusion. The classic exam
ple of a mediated inference is the syllogism, whose three parts - (a) major
premise, (b) minor premise and (c) conclusion - are rephrased by Kant
in terms of (a) understanding thinking of a rule, (b) judgement subsum
ing under a rule, (c) reason determining the predicate of the rule (CPR
A 304/B 361). Kant believed that faulty inferences lay at the root of illu
sion and error. Fallacious inferences of the understanding 'treat as being
immediately perceived what has really only been inferred' (A 303/B 359),
while those of reason arise from drawing conclusions which exceed the
limits of experience, converting the predicates of rules of the understand
ing employed in the major premises into unconditioned totalities. Kant
analyzes three forms of dialectical inference: the first moves from the
transcendental concept of the subject to the absolute unity of the subject
and takes the form of a paralogism; the second moves from the series of
conditions for an appearance to the absolute totality of these conditions
and takes the form of antinomy, while the third moves from the totality
of conditions of an object of experience to those of objects in general and
generates 'the dialectical syllogism I shall entitle the ideal of pure reason'
(A 340/B 398).
infinity [ Unendlichkeit] see also ANTINOMIES, IMMORTALITY, MATHEMATICS, TIME,

WORLD
The paradoxes generated by attempts to conceive of the infinite have
proven a perennial problem for philosophers since the early Greek specu
lations of Anaximander, Parmenides and Zeno. AW. Moore (1990) has
helpfully distinguished between metaphysical and mathematical infinity,
255
INFINITY
and shown how the paradoxes of infinitely big, infinitely small, and the
one and the many arise from the application to space and time of the
endless divisibility and iteration of a mathematical series. These paradoxes,
classically stated by Zeno (Bames, 1987, pp. 150-8) were criticized by
Aristotle who sought to redefine the terms of thinking the infinite by
means of the distinction between potential and actual. An actual infinite
would have to exist in time, a potential infinite over time; yet the former
would require traversing the infinite in time, which contradicted the origi
nal notion of the infinite (see Moore, 1990, p. 40).
Kant's response to the speculative problems of the infinitely large and
infinitely small in the first two 'cosmological' antinomies of CPR pursues
a similar strategy of argument. The infinitely large or small cannot be
objects of experience, and are illusions produced by the dialectical infer
ences of the reason. In the first antinomy Kant opposes the thesis that the
world has a beginning in time and is limited in space with the antithesis
that it has no beginning and no limits in space and is infinite with regard
to both (CPR A 426/B 454). The second antinomy concems the infinite
divisibility of the substance of the world, with the thesis maintaining that
composite substances are composed of simple parts and that only they can
exist, opposed by the antithesis that no composite thing is made up of
simple parts, and that simples do not exist (A 434/B 462). Kant subscribes
to neither position, but uses them to show the dialectical consequences
provoked by reason's attempt to infer absolute, unconditioned conse
quences from premises conditioned by finite human understanding.
While theoretical philosophy has to recognize the dialectical character
of applying the mathematical infinite to nature, Kant insists that meta
physical infinitude in the guise of immortality be granted as a postulate of
pure practical reason. In the celebrated concluding apostrophe to CPrR,
on 'the starry heavens above and the moral law within', Kant contrasts the
infinity of the cosmos whose 'countless multitude of worlds annihilates
... my importance as an animal creature' to the infinitude of personality
revealed by the moral law from which may be inferred 'a vocation which
is not restricted to the conditions and limits of this life, but reaches into
the infinite' (p. 162, p. 166). Thus in a form of dialectical opposition, the
inability of theoretical reason to comprehend the infinite is countered by
the moral law's intimations of immortality.
Kant's reflections on the infinite were extremely critical for the devel
opment of transcendental idealism. Fichte, Schelling and above all Hegel
sought ways of 'thinking the absolute' or retuming the infinite to theoretical
philosophy. For Hegel (1812, 1830), Kant had developed a 'bad infinity'
in both his theoretical and practical investigation of the concept. The in
finities criticized in CPR were 'bad infinities' of the endless mathematical
256
INNER/ OUTER
series extending to the infinitely large and descending to the infinitely

small. Similarly, the infinity postulated in the practical philosophy was one
which made morality an 'endless task', something to be striven for across
the whole of etemity. In place of these views of infinity, Hegel proposed
an actual infinity similar to that of Aristotle, one in which the infinite was
not simply viewed as negation of the finite but as actualized within it, and
where ethical life (as opposed to Kantian 'morality') could be made actual
within this life and did not require the endless task implied by the postu
late of immortality.
innate ideas see also ABSTRACTION, ACQUISmON, CATEGORIES, IDEA

In the New Essays on Human Understanding Leibniz opposed Locke's ac
count of the abstraction of ideas from sense impressions with one which
stressed the role of innate ideas. Such ideas as 'being, possib/,e and same are
so thoroughly innate that they enter into all our thoughts and reasoning'
(Leibniz, 1765, p. 102); they are presupposed by perception, not abstracted
from it. Kant shared with Leibniz the critique of empiricist accounts of
concept formation, but in his early writings distinguished his position
from that of Leibniz. Already in 1D (1770) the concepts of metaphysics are
'not to be sought in the senses' but nor are they 'innate concepts'; for
Kant such concepts are acquired by abstraction 'from 'the laws inherent
in the mind' (ID §8). The difference between this and Leibniz's view is
very subtle, and led to inevitable misunderstandings of the CPR which
Kant clarified in his reply to Eberhard's Leibnizian critique in OD. There
he insists that the forms of intuition and the categories are 'acquired and
not innate' and presuppose 'nothing innate except the subjective condi
tions of the spontaneity of thought (in accordance with the unity of ap
perception)' (p. 223, p. 136).
inner/outer [das Innere und Äussere] see also CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION, IDEN
TITY, ILLUSION, OPPOSillON
This opposition, along with those of identity and difference, agreement
and opposition, and matter and form comprise the concepts of reflection
discussed in CPR. These are concepts employed by the judgement prior
to synthesis, and serve to assign representations to the intuition or the
understanding. If these concepts are applied directly to experience, they
give rise to amphibolies such as those Kant identified in the work of Locke
and Leibniz, who respectively 'intellectualised appearances' and 'sensualised
all concepts of the understanding' (CPR A 271/B 327). In the case of
inner and outer, the amphiboly consisted in relational concepts for the
orientation of concept and intuition being taken for objective qualities;
instead of marking a relation between objects and our judgements they
257
INNER SENSE
are improperly considered to be objective relations between things. The

illusions to which this amphiboly gives rise are a species of the illusions of
the understanding first discussed in DS in terms of the confusion of inner
and outer.
inner sense [innere Sinn] see al,so APPERCEPTION, INTUffiON, JUDGEMENT, SENSE,
SENSIBILITY, TIME
In FS Kant finds the 'mysterious power which makes judging possible' and
so distinguishes humans as rational beings from animals to be 'nothing
other than the faculty of inner sense, that is to say, the faculty of making
one's own representations the objects of one's thoughts' (FS p. 60, p.
104). Kant does not follow Descartes and later Mendelssohn in seeing
inner sense as the source for the certainty of the subject's existence in the
co[sito or 'I think', but distinguishes rigorously between inner sense and
the pure apperception of the co[sito. The perceptions of inner sense are
psychologically founded and have no transcendental reference; the psy
chological subject that experiences inner sense is not to be confused with
the transcendental subject of the 'I think'. The latter is the spontaneous
source of synthesis, while the former, as a sense, is receptive. This distinc
tion is taken as axiomatic in CPR, for without it there arises the paradox
that the I must be both active/spontaneous and passive/receptive, thus
requiring us 'to be in a passive relation [of active affection] to ourselves'.
lt is to avoid this contradiction, Kant continues, that he carefully distin
guishes psychological inner sense 'from the faculty of apperception' (CPR
B 153).
Kant further undermines the Cartesian primacy of the inner sense by
adopting Wolff's view of the inseparability of the consciousness of self and
of the world. Both inner and outer senses are 'necessarily bound up' with
each other 'if experience is to be possible at all' (CPR B xli). With the
outer sense 'we represent to ourselves objects as outside us, and all with
out exception in space' (CPR A 22/B 37): space is the pure form of its
sensible intuition, through which extemal objects are determined or de
terminable in terms of 'shape, magnitude, and relation to one another'.
By means of inner sense the 'mind' ( Gemüt) 'intuits itself or its inner state'
not as an object but as the 'determinate form in which alone the intuition
of inner states is possible' (A 23/B 37). The form of inner sense is time,
and determines the 'relation of representations in our inner state' and the
'immediate condition of inner appearances (of our souls), and thereby
the mediate condition of outer appearances' (A 34/B 51). Kant indeed
privileges the inner over the outer sense, although without denying the
indispensability of each to the other. 'Time', he says, 'is an a priori condi
tion of all appearance whatsoever' (ibid.) since all representations, whether
258
INTELLIGIBLE WORLD
their objects are intemal or extemal, must be objects of the inner sense.
At this point his strong distinction between psychological and transcen
dental subjectivity protects him from any reproach of idealism, since time
as the form of inner sense is receptive and cannot be said to constitute
appearances.
intelligible world [mundus intelligibilis] see also APPEARANCE, KINGDOM OF ENDS,

NOUMENON, SENSIBILI1Y, TRANSCENDENT, TRANSCENDENTAL, TRANSCENDENTAL OBJECT,
WORLD
In CPR Kant criticizes the use by 'modern philosophers' of the 'expres
sions mundus sensibilis and intelligibilis' for leading to an 'empty play on
words' (A 257/B 312). The usage he criticizes regards the 'sensible world'
as the 'sum of appearances, in so far as they are intuited' and the 'intel
ligible world' as the relations between appearances as they are 'thought in
conformity with the laws of understanding'. As an example of this mis
placed distinction he cites the 'sensible world' of observational astronomy
and the intelligible world of theoretical astronomy according to Copemicus
and Newton. He notes that this distinction illegitimately moves from sen
sible and intellectual ways of knowing to sensible and intellectual objects.
Kant's own distinction, first developed in 1D ( On the Form and Principks
of the Sensib/,e and Intelligibl,e World), is stated in terms of the subjective form
and principles of the sensible world, or the 'universal connection of all
things, in so far as they are phenomena' and the objective principle or
cause of the intelligible world 'in virtue of which there is a combining
together of the things which exist in themselves' (ID §13). He does not
regard the latter in terms of invisible forces such as gravity, and indeed
says very little about it; most of his discussion concentrates upon space and
time as the subjective principles of the sensible world. Even in section 4
of ID, entitled 'On the Principle of the Form of the Intelligible World',
Kant is remarkably reticent about this principle which should combine the
plurality of substances. His characterization closest to a definition is the
negative one of the intelligible as 'devoid of all that is given in human
intuition' (ID §10).
This reticence is justified in CPR, where Kant claims that 'intelligible
objects' or 'those things thought through pure categories' without schemas
of sensibility, cannot be objects of experience (CPR A 286/B 342). Yet he
also considers it undeniable that such objects can be thought, and further
more that they accompany sensible knowledge, as is suggested in his defi
nition of the intelligible as 'whatever in an object of the senses is not itself
appearance' (A 538/B 566). Nevertheless, there can be no knowledge of
intelligible objects except as noumena or problematic objects whose exist
ence can be neither proved nor disproved. And if intelligible objects are
259
INTELLECIUAL INTUITION
inadmissible as objects of positive knowledge, what of an intelligible world

or totality of such objects (ID §§32 and 34)? Such a world, Kant notes in
the observation appended to the first antinomy, 'is nothing but the gen
eral concept of a world in general, in which abstraction is made from all
conditions of its intuition' (CPR A 433/B 462). The transcendent use of
such a general concept would regard the intelligible world as lying outside
the sensible world and serving as the transcendental ground or model of
the latter. This broadly Platonic view of the intelligible world as an exist
ent realm behind appearances is disallowed by Kant; what is permitted is
the transcendental use of the concept in terms of an intelligible cause
which 'signifies only the purely transcendental and to us unknown ground
of the possibility of the sensible series in general' (CPR A 564/B 592).
From the standpoint of CPR the only permissible intelligible world is
the 'moral world, in the concept of which we leave out of account all the
hindrances to morality' (A 809/B 837). The main object of this world is
freedom, which is in turn evinced in the 'intelligible character' of the
subject 'free from all influence of sensibility' (A 541/B 569). lt is freedom
which signifies the 'intelligible cause' which grounds the intelligible char
acter of causality. While the empirical character of causality connects
appearances with appearances in the sensible world, the intelligible char
acter grounds the series of efficient causes in a 'law of causality' which is
not itself subject to efficient cause (A 539/B 567). Tue latter is transcen
dental, that is to say, a condition of the extension of thought which cannot
itself ever be an object of thought. With this Kant aligns the sensible and
intelligible worlds with the worlds of nature and freedom, which he says
'can exist together without any conflict, in the same actions, according as
their actions are referred to their intelligible or to their sensible cause' (A
541/B 569). In GMM the intelligible world is identified with the 'world of
rational beings ( mundus intelligjbUis) as a kingdom of ends' (p. 438, p. 43)
which human beings partially inhabit; they are not, however, 'solely mem
bers of the intelligible world' since all their actions would then 'perfectly
conform to the principle of the autonomy of a pure will' (GMM p. 54, p.
453).
intellectual intuition see INTumoN
interest see also AESIBETIC, AGREEABLE, CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, DRIVE, GOOD,

INCLINATION, IMPERATIVE, INCENTIVE, PRACTICAL PHILOSOPHY, REASON, RESPECT
Interest is a term which features in each of the three critiques, but with
slightly different meanings. In CPR the 'twofold interest' of reason mani
fests itself in the diverse ways of thinking of the 'students of nature'. Those
whose interest makes them 'hostile to heterogeneity are always on the
260
INTEREST
watch for the unity of the genus', while those whose interest is more
empirically directed 'are constantly endeavouring to differentiate nature'
(A 655/B 683), with the former stressing the search for the genus, the
latter the search for the species. In this theoretical context, interest signi
fies a pre-commitment to a mode of thought which is not itself rationally
founded.
The use of interest in the practical philosophy is quite distinct from the
use in CPR, and is also more precisely defined. In GMM Kant distin
guishes between (a) pure and practical and (b) mediate and pathological
forms of reason. Both signify the dependence of a 'contingently determin
able will on principles of reason', but the interest of the former 'indicates
only dependence of the will on principles of reason by itself ' while the
latter indicates dependence 'for the sake of inclination' (GMM p. 413, p.
24). The former interest is directed towards an action for its own sake, the
latter towards an 'object of action (so far as this object is pleasant for me)';
that is, it regards the principles of reason as means to achieving the ends
set by inclination. In the case of the immediate interest of reason, the
'universal validity of the maxim of action is a sufficient determining ground
of the will', while in the pathologically mediated interest reason can only
determine the will 'by means of another object of desire or under the
presupposition of some special feeling in the subject' (GMM p. 460, p. 59).
What is at stake in this distinction is the choice between the autonomy or
the heteronomy of the moral law; whether we are interested in the moral
law for heteronomous, pathologically mediated reasons, or whether 'the
moral law interests us because it is valid for us as human beings' (p. 461,
p. 60).
In CPR Kant combines the speculative and the practical interests of
reason into the questions '1. What can I know? 2. What ought I to do? 3.
What may I hope?' (A 805/B 833). The first is a speculative interest, which
Kant deems satisfied by the answer supplied in CPR. The second interest
is practical and can only be satisfied by a moral answer. The third interest
is satisfied by the 'worthiness of being happy' (A 806/B 834). The 'inter
ests' evoked by these questions are not discrete ends desired by reason,
but rather denote its basic orientation in the world.
In CJ Kant defines the quality of the aesthetic judgement of taste as
'apart from any interest' (§5), whether pure or pathological. The pure
interest in the good and the pathological interest in the agreeable link the
subject's desire with 'the real existence of the object' (§5) which vitiates
the contemplative character of the aesthetic judgement of taste. This should
be concemed only with the pleasure and displeasure evoked by the object.
Quite what this entails remains unclear in CJ, whose argument proceeds
by negation of existing accounts of aesthetic judgement. The interest in
261
INTEREST OF REASON
the object evinced by the agreeable refers to the accounts of beauty given
by the British theory of taste in the eighteenth century, that in the good
to the Wolffian account of beauty as a confused perception of perfection.
Both are informed by an interest in their respective objects, but one which
Kant shows cannot serve as the basis for a judgement of the beautiful,
even though in the case of natural beauty, the intellectual interest may
contribute to the pleasure evoked by the object (CJ §42).
interest of reason see HAPPINESS, HOPE, INTEREST, KNOWLEDGE
international relations see FEDERATION OF STATES, GEOGRAPHY, HISTORY, PERPETUAL

PEACE, POLITICS, WAR
interpretation [Auslegung]
In CF Kant distinguishes between the authentic and doctrinal interpreta
tions of a biblical text. In the former 'exegesis must conform literally
(philologically) with the author's meaning', while in the latter the inter
preter is obliged 'to ascribe to the text (philosophically) the meaning it
admits of for formally moral purposes (the pupil's edification); for faith
in a merely historical proposition is, in itself, dead' (CF p. 66, p. 121).
Kant applies this distinction between interpreting the letter and the spirit
to the interpretation of his philosophical predecessors. In 0D he de
scribes CPR as 'the genuine apology for Leibniz' against his partisans who,
like many historians of philosophy, 'cannot comprehend the purpose of
these philosophers because they neglect the key to the interpretation of
all products of pure reason from mere concepts, the critique of reason
itself'. They remain confined to authentic and ignore the doctrinal inter
pretation of the philosophical text, and, in Kant's concluding wprds, are
'incapable of recognizing beyond what the philosophers actually said, what
they really meant to say' (0D p. 251, p. 160).
intuition [Anschauung] see also A PRIORI, AESTHETIC, AXIOMS, FORM, INNER SENSE,
MATHEMATICS, RECEPTM1Y, SENSE, SENSIBILITY, SPACE, TIME, TRANSCENDENTAL OBJEGf
In the Aristotelian tradition there was considerable perplexity conceming
the relationship between Aristotle's account of intuitive and demonstra
tive knowledge in the Posterior Analytics and the account of intelligible and
sensible perception ( noesis and aisthesis) in De anima. In the Posterior Analytics
Aristotle claims that the 'primary premises' of scientific knowledge are
apprehended intuitively, and that intuition is the 'originative source of
scientific knowledge' (Aristotle, 1941, 100b). Intuitive apprehension is thus
immediate as opposed to the mediated, discursive knowledge of scientific
demonstration. According to De anima, knowledge arises out of the
abstraction of noeta from aistheta, but with the proviso that the sensible
262
INTUITION
and intelligible elements thought separately do not exist separately, or in

Aristotle's words, 'that the mind which is actively thinking is the objects
which it thinks' (Aristotle, 1941, 431b, 18).
The perplexity facing the tradition was whether to unite these two
accounts of knowledge, and if so, in what way. Apart from denying any
relationship between them, there were basically three available options.
One was to emphasize the Platonic elements in Aristotle, and to identify
immediate intuitive knowledge with the noeta; another was to identify
intuitive knowledge with sense perception or aistheta; while a third was to
postulate a group of objects occupying an intermediate position between
noeta and aistheta (see Wolfson, 1962, Vol. II, p. 156). In formal terms,
Kant's doctrine of intuition adumbrated in ID and developed in CPR may
be situated within the terms of the third option, but emphasizing the
paradoxical character of such intermediate objects.
Prior to Kant, Descartes and Spinoza distinguished radically between
intuitive and other forms of knowledge. Although Descartes makes great
play in the Ruf.es for the Direction of the Mind (1628) of 'paying no attention'
to the 'way in which particular terms have of late been employed in the
schools', his professedly 'new use of the term intuition' departs little from
the Aristotelian tradition. He distinguishes it from the 'testimony of the
senses' and defines it as an 'undoubting conception of an unclouded and
attentive mind [ which] springs from the light of reason alone' (Rule III).
Unlike deductive knowledge it is immediate and simple, and is exempli
fied by the individual's 'intuition of the fact that they exist, and that they
think'. Spinoza in Ethics (1677) followed Descartes in distinguisliing be
tween three forms of knowing: knowledge of opinion grounded in the
senses and imagination (broadly Aristotle's aistheta), knowledge of reason
grounded in common notions or concepts (noeta) and, finally, immediate,
intuitive knowledge of the formal essence of the attributes of God and
things in general (1985, pp. 475-8).
Both Descartes and Spinoza lean towards a Platonic view of intuitive
knowledge which prefers the immediate knowledge of the intelligible realm
to the mediated knowledge of the senses. Locke in An Essay Concerning
Human Understanding agreed that intuitive knowledge was not only imme
diate, but also 'the clearest and most certain that human frailty is capable
of ' (Locke, 1690, p. 272). Yet for him this knowledge is not derived from
the intelligible noeta, as it was with Descartes and Spinoza, but from the
objects of external perception: 'there can be nothing more certain than
that the idea we receive from an external object is in our minds: this is
intuitive knowledge' (p. 277). This knowledge is immediate, but oriented
more towards aistheta than to noeta. Leibniz, in his critique of Locke in the
New Essays on Human Understanding (completed 1705 but published in 1765),
263
INTUITION
attempted to reconcile Descartes and Locke by proposing intuitive truths

of both fact and reason (Leibniz, 1765, pp. 361-7), but his follower and
popularizer Christian Wolff confined intuitive knowledge to the direct
intuition of rational perfection. This view in its turn was criticized by the
heretical Wolffian A.G. Baumgarten, who argued for the intuitive knowl
edge ofrational perfection by way of sensible perception, a form ofknowl
edge he christened 'aesthetic'.
Kant's doctrine of intuition must be situated within the agenda estab
lished by Aristotle. He remained consistent with the Aristotelian tradition
in respect ofthe direct, unmediated character ofintuition, but established
his own variant of it which refused the opposition of direct knowledge
between the rationalists' noeta or the empiricists' aistheta. While Kant
situates intuition at the level of sensibility or aisthesis in the 'Transcen
dental Aesthetic' of CPR (that is, below the understanding and the rea
son), he also accords it an a priori formal character, managing in this way
to stress the immediate, sensible element in knowledge without being
Lockean, and the a priori, formal element without being Cartesian. lt was
essential to establish this balance in order to satisfy one of the major con
ditions required 'for solution of the general problem of transcendental
philosophy: how are synthetic a priori judgements possib/,e?' (CPR B 73). Such
judgements synthesize concepts with sensible intuitions which, while hetero
geneous to them, nevertheless possess an a priori, intelligible character.
Most of the elements of Kant's doctrine of intuition are present in §10
ofID. He begins by claiming that 'There is (for man) no intuition ofwhat
belongs to the understanding ...thinking is only possible for us by means
of universal concepts in the abstract, not by means of a singular concept
in the concrete'. Here he subscribes to the orthodox distinction between
the immediate knowledge of intuition, and the mediated knowledge of
the understanding. The human understanding can only function 'discur
sively by means of general concepts', but for Kant this does not exclude
the possibility of other, differently constituted, understandings and
intuitions. The ones which he considers in §10 are intellectual and divine
intuition, both of which retum in CPR. Intellectual intuition consists in a
direct, intellectual knowledge of things in themselves rather than as ap
pearances in space and time (CPR B 307) while divine intuition is pro
ductive, producing the objects which it thinks rather than being passively
affected by given objects in the manner of human intuition (ibid.).
In the second sentence of §10 Kant writes that 'all our intuition is
bound to a certain principle of form, and it is only under this form that
anything can be apprehended by the mind immediately or as singu/,ar, and
not merely conceived discursively by means ofgeneral concepts'.With this
he converts intuition from an adjectival characteristic of knowledge into
264
INTUITION
a faculty of knowledge. The faculty of intuition possesses a 'certain prin

ciple of form' through which the mind may directly apprehend the con
crete singularity of things and not subsume them as instances of abstract
and general concepts. In this sentence Kant presents the central paradox
ofhis account ofintuition: that it directly apprehends objects yet does so
by means of formal principles. This quality of intuition recurs repeatedly
in CPR where intuition is both the 'immediate relation' (sie) to objects and
takes place 'only in so far as the object is given to us' (CPR A 20/B 34).
In the third sentence of 1D §10 the formal principles of intuition are
revealed as space and time, which are further specified as the conditions
'under which something can be an object of our senses'. Although in ID
Kant lists the properties space and time possess as pure intuitions - they
are 'singular', neither 'innate' nor 'acquired', both the conditions ofsen
sations and excited into action by them - he does not venture a proof of
why they are the conditions for the objects ofour senses. This he supplies
in CPR and P by means of the analytic and synthetic methods. In the
'Transcendental Aesthetic' ofCPR Kant analyzes or breaks sensibility down
into its elements. He proposes first to 'isolate sensibility, by taking away
from it everything which the understanding thinks through its concepts'
(CPR A 22/B 36). This leaves nothing 'save empirical intuition' from
which is separated 'everything which belongs to sensation, so that nothing
may remain save pure intuition and the mere form ofappearances'. These
are then found to be 'the forms of sensible intuition' namely space and
time. In P Kant argues synthetically from the forms of intuition to sense
objects. He argues that intuitions of present things are not possible with
out a 'ground ofrelation between my representation and the object' (§9)
which 'precedes all the actual impressions through which I am affected l7y objects';
without the a priori forms ofintuition to relate the I and its objects, there
would be no experience of objects (see also CPR B 132).
In CPR Kant offers proofs for why only space and time qualify as forms
of intuition. The one he seems to find most compelling holds that while
all concepts except space and time presuppose 'something empirical',
space and time are pure and a priori: space does not occupy space and
time does not suffer alteration in time (CPR A 41/B 58). This argument
also validates the transcendental status ofspace and time, namely that they
are conditions of spatio-temporal experience and cannot be abstracted
from sensation or the nature ofthinking substance. This accords with the
view stated in 1D §10 that the forms ofintuition provide 'the condition of
sensitive cognition' and are prior to sensitive cognition and not derived
from it. But this claim sits uneasily with the view that intuition is passive,
that the 'matter ofcognition' is given through the senses, and that intuition
is 'only possible in so far as it is possible for something to affect our sense'
265
INTUIDON
(ibid.). Intuition here seems both to provide the conditions/orsomething

to affect our sensibility, and to be conditioned by something affecting it.
The paradoxical character of intuition as both condition of and condi
tioned by objects of sense is used in 1D to prevent noumena being 'con
ceived by means of representations drawn from sensations'. lt is further
employed in CPR to underpin the critique of claims that space and time
are more than the forms which structure our intuition. The latter devel
opment is already implied in the distinction between representation and
sensation mentioned in 1D §10, which anticipates the crucial critical distinc
tion between appearance and sensation in CPR. Appearances are divided
into sensation, or 'matter of appearance', and the 'form of appearance',
or space and time. The latter are in a state of potentiality, or in Kant's
words 'lie ready for the sensations a priori in the mind' (CPR A 20/B 34),
and are activated by sensation. In this way the notion of appearance makes
it possible for the forms of intuition to be regarded as potentially prior to
(but in actuality posterior to) sensation or the matter of intuition. A fur
ther complexity arises here, which is that the matter of intuition which is
directly intuited cannot be considered as objects in themselves, but are
already constituted as appearances, since it is axiomatic for Kant 'that the
things we intuit are not in themselves what we intuit them as being' (CPR
A 42/B 59). This is again paradoxical since it requires that we consider
intuition both as direct knowledge of objects, namely 'the things we intuit',
and as a mediated appearance or 'what we intuit them as being' (ibid.).
When the perspective on intuition shifts from the relationship between
intuition and objects of sense to that between intuition and understand
ing, an analogous set of paradoxes manifest themselves. lt is vital for the
critical project that the concepts of the understanding and the forms of
intuition be generically distinguished. Intuition corresponds to the 'pas
sive' or 'receptive' aspect of human experience and the understanding to
the part played in it by the active, spontaneous synthesis of apperception.
While the two must be rigorously distinguished from each other, they
must also be related in synthetic a priori judgements. Kant noted this in
the lapidary sentence 'Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions
without concepts are blind' (CPR A 51/B 75), from which he concluded
that concepts must be made sensible and intuitions intelligible without
either exchanging their proper function and domain.
Tue results presented in the 'Transcendental Logic' of CPR show how the
aistheta and the noeta of the tradition may be brought into relation without
either being subordinated to the other. In this way the critical philosophy
both respects the received Aristotelian distinction, while reconfiguring it
in accordance with a doctrine of intuition which combines sensible and
intelligible aspects.
266
J
judgement [ krinein, indicium, Urteil ] see also CANON, DETERMINANT JUDGEMENT,

FACULTY OF JUDGEMENT , INFERENCE, PRINCIPLES, REFLECTIVE JUDGEMENT, SCHEMATISM,
SUBSUMPTION , SYNTHESIS, UNITY
Judgement provides the matrix of Kant s entire philosophy. Each of the
three critiques is directed towards the analysis of a particular class of
judgement: theoretical judgements in CPR, practical judgements in CPrR,
and aesthetic and teleological judgements in CJ. Moreover, within each
critique the analyses of judgement are themselves further articulated and
subdivided. Some idea of the centrality of judgement to Kant s philosophy
may be gathered from a comment from as early as 1762 in FS in which
Kant identifies the mysterious power’ which ‘makes judgement possible’
and distinguishes humans from the animals as ‘nothing other than the
faculty of inner sense . . . the faculty of making one’s own representations
the objects of one’s thought’ ( p. 60, p. 104) . Kant adds that this power
or capacity to judge is fundamental’ and ‘cannot be derived from some
other faculty’ , a point he reiterated in CPR (A 133/ B 172) and CJ ( Preface) .
The faculty of judgement can only be known through its activity, which,
naturally, consists in making judgements. Judgements form the starting
points of Kant’ s analyses of the workings of the faculty of judgement in its
theoretical, practical and aesthetic/ teleological modes. Each mode of judge ¬
ment has a particular distinguishing feature: the theoretical judgement

‘contains an is or an is not’, the practical judgement an ‘ought, the neces¬
sity of why something happens for some purpose or other’ ( ‘Vienna Logic’
in L p. 376 ) , while the aesthetic judgement of taste contains a reference
to the feeling of pleasure and displeasure. The critical philosophy as a
whole is dedicated to determining the limits of legitimate judgements in
each of these fields, and does so by means of a dual but complementary
strategy. This first supplies the rules of subsumption necessary for legiti ¬
mate judgement. It offers an organon for judgement, from which may be

derived criteria or principles for a canon with which to discriminate true
from false judgement. Elements of both strategies may be found in each
of the three critiques.
267
JUDGEMENT
At the core of CPR is the claim that 'all judgements are functions of
unity among our representations' (A 69/B 93) and its consequence that
'we can reduce all acts of the understanding tojudgements' (A 69/B 94).
With this Kant is able to move from regarding concepts as formal func
tions of unity in judgement to their serving 'as predicates of possible
judgments' related to 'some representation of a not yet determined object'
(ibid.). From the formaljudgements grouped in the table ofjudgements
according to their quantity, quality, relation and modality Kant is able to
derive the table of categories. The move from formaljudgements to cat
egories is extremely significant, implying a shift of focus from the 'logical
form of a judgement' determined by analytical unity of the representa
tions making up ajudgement to one which introduces 'a transcendental
content into its representations, by means of the synthetic unity of the
manifold in intuition in general' (A 79/B 105). The latter form of unity
is the synthetic a priorijudgement on which hangs the success or failure
of the critical philosophy. Unlike analytic judgements, which are deter
mined by the principle of contradiction, the synthetic a priorijudgement
has a number of principles derived from the pure concepts of the under
standing. These are described in the section of CPR on the 'Analytic of
Principles' which Kant describes as 'a canon solely for judgement, instructing
it how to apply to appearances the concepts of the understanding, which
contain the condition for a priori, rules' (A 132/B 171).
The 'Transcendental Analytic' of CPR presents the concepts of under
standing and establishes the conditions of their proper use. lt provides a
'logic of truth' (A 131/B 170) by developing an organon for correct
subsumptive use of the concepts of the understanding as well a canon with
which to identify false judgements. In the 'logic of illusion' unfolded in
the transcendental dialectic, Kant's attention is devoted to establishing a
canon against the illusory inferences of reason. An inference involves a
relationship between two or more judgements, which lead to fallacies of
understanding which take as immediate what is in reality inferred, and
those of the reason which draw conclusions which exceed the limits of
experience. The transcendental dialectic shows how the illusory inferences
of reason may be detected and limited in their scope.
Similar strategies of argument inform the accounts of practical and
aesthetic judgement. Practical judgements are given a principle in the
shape of the categorical imperative with which to assess the maxims in
forming practicaljudgements; it thus serves as a canon for practicaljudge
ment. Similarly, in CJ Kant establishes a canon for aesthetic judgements
of taste. He weighs the claims for justifying the aesthetic judgement of
taste lodged by the theory of taste and aesthetic according to a 'subjective
a priori principle' ofjudgement. They are found insufficient in terms of
268
JUDGEMENT, POWER AND FACULTY OF
the quality, quantity, relation and modality of suchjudgements. In CJ Kant

considerably shifts the focus of his account ofjudgement, moving from an
emphasis on completed judgements to one directed towards the working
of the faculty ofjudgement (Urteilskraft). From this perspective judgement
is viewed less in terms of subsumption than in those of 'thinking the
particular as contained under the universal' (CJ §IV). When the universal
is given, and the particular subsumed under it by the faculty of judge
ment, then the judgement is determinant; when only the particular is
given and the universal has to be sought by the faculty of judgement, then
its judgement is reflective.
judgement, power and faculty of [ Urteilskraft, Beurteilungsvermögen] see also

AESTHETIC, BEAUTY, CONCEPT, DETERMINANT JUDGEMENT, HEAUTONOMY, IMAGINATION,
INTUITION, PLEASURE, REFLECTIVE JUDGEMENT, REASON, UNDERSTANDING
The faculty of judgement is one of the three 'higher faculties of knowl
edge' situated between understanding and reason, and forming 'a middle
term between understanding and reason' (CJ Preface). But it not only
mediates between understanding and reason, it also encompasses them
both; in CPR, for example, Kant describes the understanding as 'a Jaculty
ofjudgemenf (A 69/B 94), and in CJ the 'critique of pure reason' is none
other than that of 'our faculty ofjudging on a priori principles' (Preface).
Each of the critiques is concemed fundamentally with the faculty ofjudge
ment in its theoretical, practical and aesthetic/teleological applications. In
CPR the faculty of judgement synthesizes the concepts of the understand
ing with the manifold in intuition, with the entire 'Analytic of Principles'
devoted to a 'doctrine ofjudgement' providing a 'canon solely for judgement,
instructing it how to apply to appearances the concepts of the understand
ing' (A 132/B 171). The CPrR is in turn devoted to developing a canon
for moral judgement by means of assessing maxims for their conformity
to the categorical imperative. The CJ finally attempts to answer fundamen
tal questions about the faculty of judgement, such as whether it possesses
a priori principles; whether such principles function constitutively or
regulatively; and the character of the relationship of judgement to pleas
ure and pain. CJ tackles these problems by means of an analysis of the
peculiar properties of aesthetic judgements of taste.
The faculty of judgement has two basic functions which Kant treats as
synonymous in CPR: 'judgement [is] the faculty of subsuming under rules;
that is, of distinguishing whether something does or does not stand under
a given rule' (A 132/B 171). The two aspects ofjudgement- subsumption
and distinction - are combined in CPR. The first is discussed in the second
chapter of the 'Analytic of Principles', which explores the syntheticjudge
ments 'which lie a priori at the foundation of all other modes of knowledge'
269
JURISPRUDENCE
or subsumption under a rule. The second is considered in the first chapter

on 'Schematism', which examines the sensible conditions of the employ
ment of the pure concepts of understanding, or the discrimination of
possible objects for subsumption.
By way ofcontrast, in his practical philosophy Kant distinguishes the two
functions of judgement from each other. The discriminative function is
described as the work of Beurtei,lungskra:ft, which functions in everyday
practical reason by discriminating between actions and courses of actions.
Such acts of discrimination do not apply the principle of duty abstractly
in its universal form, but do always have it actually in view and use it as the
standard of judgement (GMM p. 403, p. 15). The faculty of judgement
proper ( Urteilskraft) makes subsumptive judgements according to present
and clearly articulated rational principles.
In CJ Kant tries to bring the two functions of judgement together by
means of a 'subjective a priori principle'. The architecture of the third
critique is determined by the search for a principle which would steer
between the excessively discriminative account of aesthetic judgement
offered by British theorists of taste, and the excessively subsumptive ver
sion of the Wolffian school of aesthetics. Kant admits that establishing
such a principle - which can make no appeal to concepts - is 'a task in
volving considerable difficulties' and hopes that the obscurity of his solu
tion will be ameliorated by the accuracy of his 'statement of the principle'
(CJ, Preface). The eventual statement of the subjective a priori principle
of the faculty ofjudgement marked a departure in the critical philosophy,
encompassing the sensus communis, pleasure in intersubjective communica
tion, and the imaginative productions of genius. In it Kant developed the
notion of reflective judgement, in which the rule of judgement is derived
from reflection on particulars, and that of originality, wherein the rule of
judgement may be challenged and transformed by the exception.
In recent years various aspects of Kant's 'subjective a priori principle' of
judgement have been the subject of debate in the context of postmodern
ism. Much of the argument within and against postmodernism has been
conducted around the issue of judgement, and its relation to pleasure,
intersubjectivity, discrimination and difference. This has led to a re
consideration ofKant's account ofjudgement in CJ by such philosophers as
Arendt (1989), Derrida (1978), Habermas (1985) and Lyotard (1983, 1991).
This has not only refreshed the exegesis of Kant's text, but also has led to
a reconsideration
-, ofhis place within the 'modern' philosophical tradition.
jurisprudence see also INTERPRETATION, JUSTICE, LAW, RIGHT

In CF Kant distinguishes between the interpretation of law as practised by
jurists and as undertaken by philosophers. The former are public officials
270
JUSTICE
who are authorities in interpreting the text of the law as it has been
'promulgated and sanctioned by the highest authority' (CF p. 24, p. 37).
Jurists - as it were, legal positivists avant /,a /,ettre - are not permitted
opinions on the truth or justice of laws, for the enacted laws themselves
'first determine what is right, and the jurist must straightaway dismiss as
nonsense the further question of whether the decrees themselves are right'
(CF p. 25, p. 38). The jurists make 'authentic' philological interpretations
of the law, while it is for philosophers to make the doctrinal interpreta
tions of the truth and conformity to right of law according to reason.
justice [Recht] see also MARRIAGE, POSSESSION, PROPERTY, PUNISHMENT, RIGHT,

SOCIETY, STATE
Kant's discussions of justice in MM may be divided according to civil and
criminal justice: the first refers to relations of men with each other, the
second to relations between individuals and the public criminal law. He
presents three forms of civil justice, namely protective, commutative and
distributive, regarding the first two as comprising private right, the third,
public right. He also paired commutative and distributive justice under
natural right, or the non-statutory right known a priori to everyone's reason;
as such, natural right includes 'not only the justice that holds of persons
with one another (iustitia commutativa) but also distributive justice (iustitia
distributiva)' (MM p. 297, p. 113). The first two forms of justice are present
in the state of nature, but the third is only possible in 'the civil condition'
with the existence of a court to administer distributive justice.
The distinction between commutative and distributive justice is nicely
illustrated by Kant's example of buying a horse. A right is established 'on
the formalities of the act of exchange ( commutatio) between the possessor
of the thing and th7one acquiring it' (MM p. 301, p. 116). But this is only
a right between persons (ius ad personam), not a right to a thing (ius ad
rem). Consequently it is possible for owners with prior personal rights
under commutative justice to come forward and declare an interest. This
leads to the situation in which 'no trade in external things, no matter how
well it may agree with the formal conditions of this kind of justice ( iustitia
commutativa), can guarantee a secure acquisition' (MM p. 302, p. 117).
While acquisition cannot be secured in a state of nature, leading to pos
sible injustice, within the civil state it may be secured before a court by
means of distributive justice. This is achieved by the court converting a
personal into a real right: 'what is in itself a right against a person, when
brought before a court, holds as a right to a thing' (MM p. 303, p. 118). In
this way distributive justice is used to secure the claims of commutative
justice to property and exchange.
Kant's view of criminal justice is unswervingly retributive, resting on the
271
JUSTICE
ius talionis or an a priori 'principle of equality' through which the court

applies a punishment to the offender which is equal to their crime. The
thief, for example, may be punished by temporary or permanent state
slavery; murderers and their accomplices must suffer the punishment of
death, in express repudiation of the ideas of Cesare Beccaria (1738-94)
(see Beccaria, 1764); and Kant suggests that rapists and pederasts should
be castrated. Nor does he flinch from this retributive logic in cases such
as the matemal infanticide of an illegitimate child: being born outside of
marriage places the child 'outside the protection of the law' and thus the
law will 'ignore' the 'annihilation' of such a child' (MM p. 337, p. 145).
The 'innate personality' of human beings which requires that they should
not be treated as 'things' only entails that punishment be inflicted for a
crime, and not as a means to some other end (e.g., discouraging others,
or rehabilitation). lt does not qualify the state's right to punish, but en
sures that punishment is predictable and dispassionate. Although Kant's
retributive argument was developed by Hegel (1821), it has until very
recently been eclipsed by what might be described as 'heteronomous'
accounts which stress the deterrent and rehabilitative ends served by
punishment. However, since the 1980s there has been renewed interest in
retributive philosophies ofpunishment, with Kant's version achieving fresh
prominence.
Kant ends MM with some meditations on divine justice. He argues that
divine justice should not be understood through analogies to human civil
or punitive justice. Divine justice does not recognize rights and obliga
tions, nqr is it punitive; such relations can only be applied to relations
between human beings, and not to divinity. This marks an interesting
application of the general critical ban on extending relations founded in
human finitude to absolute objects.
272
K
kingdom of ends [ Reich der Zwecke] see also ANALOGY, AS-IF, CATEGORICAL IM¬
PERATIVE, END, FREEDOM, INTELLIGIBLE WORLD, MAXIM
The kingdom of ends is introduced in GMM as a consequence of the
concept of every rational being as one who must regard himself as legis¬
lating universal law by all his will s maxims ( GMM p. 435, p. 39 ) . By
‘kingdom’ is understood ‘a systematic union of different rational beings
through common laws’, each of which determines ends according to ‘uni¬
versal validity’ (ibid.) . To be a member of such a kingdom requires of
rational beings ‘that they legislate in it universal laws while also being
themselves subject to such laws’, or if they are its sovereign, that they
legislate without being thus subject ( GMM p. 233, p. 40). The kingdom of
ends is an ‘ideal’ or ‘intelligible world’ which can only be used regulatively,
as an as-if principle for testing practical maxims. Morality, Kant says, con¬
sists in the ‘relation of all action to that legislation whereby alone a king¬
dom of ends is possible’, or the principle to act only on maxims that can
also be universal laws of which the will can regard itself as legislator ( GMM
p. 434, p. 40). This is described later as the rational being acting ‘as if they
were through their maxim always a legislating member in the universal
kingdom of ends’ ( p. 438, p. 43) . In CJ the kingdom of ends serves as an
important link in the ethico-theological proof of the existence of God.
God is the ‘sovereign head legislating in a moral kingdom of ends’ ( CJ
§86) and from this may be derived such transcendental qualities as omnis¬
cience, omnipotence, eternity and omnipresence.
kingdom of God see CHURCH
knowledge [Wissen] see also - - -

COGNITION, FAITH , HOLDING TO BE TRUE, OPINION,
THOUGHT
Knowledge, faith and opinion together make up the three grades of hold¬
ing a judgement to be true. The holding-to-be-true of faith is insufficient
objectively but sufficient subjectively, and gives rise to conviction; that of
opinion is insufficient in both respects, while knowledge is both objectively
273
KNOWLEDGE, FACULTIES OF
and subjectively suflicient, and gives rise to both conviction and certainty
(CPR A 822/B 850). Each degree of holding-to-be-true has its own appro
priate object and modality of judgement. The object of knowledge 'an
swers to conceptions whose objective reality can be proved' and are 'matters
of fact' or scibile (CJ §91). They include the 'mathematical properties of
geometrical magnitudes' and the practical idea offreedom; in other words
'things or qualities ofthings which are capable ofbeing verified by experi
ence' (ibid.). The modality ofjudgements ofknowledge is apodeictic, that
is 'universally and objectively necessary (holding for all)' (L p. 571).
knowledge, faculties of [Erkenntnisvennögen] see COGNITION
274
L
law [ Gesetz ] see also CATEGORY, COMMAND, JUSTICE, MAXIM, NATURE, OBLIGATION ,
RIGHT, RULE
The general concept of law which spans both theoretical and practical
philosophy is characterized by objective universality and necessity. This
distinguishes theoretical laws from rules, and practical laws from rules and
counsels. A theoretical rule of relation , such as that if the sun shines long
enough upon a body it grows warm , is converted into a law if it is phrased
in terms of causality, as in the sun is by its light the cause of heat ( P §29 ) .
The ‘rule of relation’ derived from a judgement of experience is in this
way accorded the universal and necessary validity of a law (see CPR A
126) . A law of practical philosophy is similarly described as one which
carries an ‘absolute necessity’ ( GMM p. 389, p. 2) which distinguishes it
from both rules of skill and counsels of prudence; the latter, like the
theoretical rule of relation, can only offer hypothetical and not absolute
or categorical necessity.
Beyond the similarity between theoretical and practical concepts of law
are some extremely significant differences. Theoretical knowledge is con ¬
cerned with ‘what is’ according to the causality of natural laws, while
practical knowledge is concerned with what ought to be according to the
causality of the laws of freedom . Kant’ s account of theoretical laws
explores the character and sources of the universality and necessity of
‘what is’ , or nature in its formal and material aspects, while his account
of practical laws inquires into the character and sources informing obliga¬
tion or ‘what ought to be’.
The account of theoretical laws emphasizes the relationship between
the empirical laws of nature discovered by the sciences ( physics, chemistry
and biology) and the pure laws of the understanding. In CPR Kant is
concerned mostly with the character and sources of physical laws; in CJ he
turns his attention to biology. In CPR he describes all empirical laws as
‘special determinations of the pure laws of understanding’ which is de¬
scribed as the ‘lawgiver of nature’ (A 127) . Empirical laws apply ‘higher
principles of understanding’ to ‘special cases of appearance’ and derive
275
IAW, CONFORMITY TO
their necessity from 'grounds which are valid a priori and antecedently to
all experience' (A 159/B 198). This follows from Kant's axiom that the
conditions of the possibility of experience are the conditions of the pos
sibility ofobjects ofexperience, or, the same thought put differently, that
'categories are concepts which prescribe laws a priori to appearances, and
therefore to nature, the sum of all appearances' (B 163). Thus laws are
both prescribed to nature by the subject and are universally and necessarily
valid and may, in the case of physics, be gathered into a systematic whole.
In the case ofthe laws ofbiology discussed in the second part ofCJ Kant
is not so confident ofthe universality and necessity ofmechanical laws. He
considers it 'quite certain that we can never get a sufficient knowledge of
organized beings and their inner possibility, much less get an explanation
of them, by looking merely to mechanical principles of nature' (Cj §75).
lt is absurd even to hope that 'maybe another Newton may some day arise,
to make intelligible to us even the genesis ofbut a blade from natural laws
that no design has ordered'. Here the insufficiency of mechanical laws to
explain living phenomena is aligned with an argument for the possibility
ofthe existence ofan 'author ofthe world' who has designed natural laws
whose intelligibility exceeds the restrictions of our reason.
The discussion of the laws of freedom in the practical philosophy is
based on the premise of the capacity of pure reason to be practical. This
consists in the 'subjection of the maxim of every action to the condition
ofits qualifying as universal law' (MM p. 214, p. 42). Since human maxims
do not automatically conform to the conditions for being universal laws,
the law is prescribed as an imperative or command. Such laws may be
distinguished according to whether they are directed towards 'extemal
actions', in which case they are juridical, or towards the 'determining
grounds of actions', in which case they are ethical (p. 214, p. 42). Con
formity ofactions to the former kind constitutes legality, while conformity
to the latter kind constitutes morality. Juridical laws which 'can be re
cognised as obligatory a priori by reason even without extemal law giving'
are natural laws, while those which require 'actual extemal lawgiving' are
positive laws. The fundamental law of morality and source of moral obli
gation is unique, and is stated in the autonomously founded principle of
the categorical imperative: 'So act that the maxim ofyour will could always
hold at the same time as a principle establishing universal law' (CPrR
p. 31, p. 30).
law, conformity to [ Gesetzmässigkeit] see also CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, END,

FINALITY, HETERONOMY, IMPERATIVE, IAW, PRACTICAL PHILOSOPHY
In Kant's practical philosophy, particular laws or ends cannot serve as
principles for determining the will since they introduce heteronomous
276
LIES
elements into moral judgement. The only suitable principle is 'universal

conformity to law' or 'conformity to law as such (without having as its basis
any law determining particular actions )' which is expressed in the formula
'I should never act except in such a way that I can also will that my maxim
should become a universal law' (GMM p. 402, p. 14 ). Without this prin
ciple of the will duty is but a 'vain delusion' and 'chimerical concept'
(ibid.). In theoretical philosophy the 'conformity to law of all the objects
of experience' defines the 'formal aspect of nature' which complements
its material aspect as the 'totality of all of1ects of experience' (P §16). This
'conformity to law' is 'conferred' upon nature by the understanding, making
possible both experience and the objects of experience (CPR A 126). In
CJ the apparent contradiction of the imagination being free and conform
ing to law is resolved by the 'subjective harmonising of the imagination
and the understanding without an objective end'. This state describes the
'subjective a priori principle' of the judgement of taste otherwise known
as 'finality apart from an end' (CJ §22, see also §35).
legislation [ Gesetzgebung] see also LAW, RIGHT, RULE, STATE
Kant uses the model of legislation in both his theoretical and his practical
philosophy. In CPR the understanding is described as the 'legislator of
nature', with Kant claiming that nature is only possible by means of the
prescribed 'synthetic unity of the manifold of appearances according to
rules' (A 127). He refers later to the ideal philosopher as a 'legislator of
human reason' (A 83 9/B 867) and in the context of a discussion of Plato's
Republic describes the ideal of the perfect state as the harmony of legisla
tion and govemment within a constitution which makes the freedom of
each consistent with that of all others. Intimations of this ideal state are
written into one of the formulations of the categorical imperative in GMM,
wherein 'all maxims are rejected which are not consistent with the will's
own legislation of universal law' (p. 431, p. 38 ). Such a formulation of the
categorical imperative conforms to the criteria of ethical legislation pre
sented in MM: there is a universal law, and an incentive in duty; legislation
with an 'incentive other than the idea of duty itself' is, by contrast, juridi
cal (p. 21 9, p. 46).
lies (Lüge) see also CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, COMMUNICATION, ILLUSION, MAX.IM,
TRUTH
In the 'Announcement of ...a Treaty ...' (1796) and MM (1797) Kant
describes the lie as the 'foul spot on human nature' ('Announcement ...'
p. 422, p. 93, MM p. 430, p. 227), and distinguishes it from error in terms
of the intent to deceive. The lie breaches the 'duty of honesty' derived in
GMM from the categorical imperative.A lie cannot be willed as a universal
maxim, it can only be willed to achieve a particular end; only 'the concept
277
LIFE
of the action' of truthfulness itself can be made a universal maxim. Kant

considers lies as 'directly opposed to the natural purposiveness of the
speaker's capacity to communicate his thoughts' and to result in no less
than 'the renunciation by the speaker ofhis personality' and the status of
a human being (MM p. 430, p. 226). lt is not surprising that Kant did not
consider lies to be justified under any circumstances, even in the circum
stance cited in the title of an essay of 1797: 'On a Presumed Right to Lie
from Love of Mankind'. The duty to be honest 'is a holy, unconditionally
commanding decree of reason, which cannot be limited by any conven
tions' while lies strike at the basis not only of what it is to be human, but
also at the entire legal order.
Kant classifies lies according to, first, whether they are 'intemal' or
'extemal', and then according to the consciousness which attends them.
An intemal lie such as dissembling a belief is contrasted with an extemal
lie, such as deliberately deceiving another person. Both species of lie are
further distinguished according to whether the lie presents as truth what
the liar is conscious ofbeing an untruth, or whether the liar represents as
certain what they are consciously uncertain of ('Announcement . . .', 1796,
p. 421, p. 93 ). While Kant condemns lies made on the basis of 'frivolity or
even good nature' and even those made as a means to a worthy end (MM
p. 430, p. 226), most ofhis examples concem breach ofpromise. The two
main cases of lying discussed in GMM involve making false promises. In
the first, a false promise justified on the grounds of prudence is con
demned because it cannot be made a universal maxim of the will (GMM
p. 402, p. 15); in the second the false promise is condemned on the
ground that it would entail the promisor using the promisee as a means
to an end, and not as an end in themselves (p. 430, p. 37).
life [Leben] see also BODY, GEMÜT, PLEASURE

Kant's thoughts on life may be divided into three groups, all ofwhich are
to be found in CJ. The first group is concemed with what might be de
scribed as the 'worth oflife' and is exemplified by the footnote to CJ §83.
The 'worth of life' measured in terms of enjoyment or happiness is 'less
than nothing'; it only receives worth when lived in accordance with reason
or 'with a view to an end so independent ofnature that the very existence
of nature itself can only be an end subject to the condition so imposed'.
Alongside this view of the value of life Kant holds another, opposed but
intemally consistent position. This is summed up by the sentence from
§2 9 that 'ofitselfalone, the Gemütis all life (the life principle itself), and
its hindrance or furtherance has to be sought outside it, and yet in the
human beings themselves, and consequently in connection with their
bodies'. In this view, life is a complex relationship between the body, the
278
LIMIT
outside world and the Gemüt. This may be related to §1 of CJ where Kant
relates the feeling of life possessed by a subject with the 'feeling of pleas
ure or displeasure', thus bringing together life, the mind or Gemüt, and
pleasure and pain. In the light of this concept of life, many of Kant's
unremarked comments on 'life' in the first part ofCJ take on considerable
significance. In the third group, Kant considers life in terms of the 'organ
ised products' of nature; it is in this context that he made the celebrated
claim conceming the absurdity of the hope 'that maybe another Newton
may some day arise, to make intelligible to us even the genesis of but a
blade of grass from natural laws that no design has ordered' (§75).
limit [Schranke] see also END, FlNITUDE, KNOWLEDGE, METAPHYSICS, SPACE,

TRANSCENDENT
In P Kant introduces a distinction between limits (Schranken) and bounda
ries (Grenzen), with the former being 'mere negations which affect a quan
tity so far as it is not absolutely complete' while the latter 'always presuppose
a space existing outside of a certain definite place and enclosing it' (P
§57). Kant uses both terms as analogies for the extent of legitimate knowl
edge. The analogy of limit is derived from the category of limitation, the
third of the categories of quality which is defined as 'reality combined
with negation' (CPR B 111), while that of the boundary is drawn from the
properties of spatial intuition which regard a boundary as marking the
enclosure of intemal and extemal spaces. Kant uses this analogy to illus
trate the distinction between the limits to mathematics and natural scientific
knowledge and the boundaries of metaphysics: knowledge of the former
is limited in that it is never complete, while that of the latter is on the
boundary between the knowable and unknowable. The former is confined
to experience and pursues completeness 'from the conditioned to some
other equally conditioned thing' (P §59) but without determining its bound
ary. Reason and metaphysics attempt to think the boundary between what
can and cannot be known, and accordingly must limit itself 'as befits the
knowledge of a boundary, to the relation between what lies beyond it and
what is contained within it' (P §59).
The distinction between limit and boundaiy was criticized by Hegel
(1812) for being abstract and indeterminate. The positing of a boundary
between what is known and what is unknown simply creates an absolute
opposition which allows the limit to be experienced unreflectively as mere
rather than as determinate negation, or as a 'mediation through which
something and other each as well is, as is not' (Hegel, 1812, p. 127). For
Hegel, Kant makes finite thought into an absolute, so banishing the infinite
absolute to the realm of the unknowable. By questioning this distinction
Hegel would make the first steps toward the comprehension of the absolute.
279
LIMITATION
limitation see LIMIT
logic, general/transcendental see also ANALITIC, APPERCEPTION, CANON, CATEGO

RIES, CONCEPT, DIALECTIC, ELEMENTS, FORM, INFERENCE, JUDGEMENT, METHODOLOGY,
TABLE OF CATEGORIES
Although Kant's entire oeuvre may be regarded as an extended meditation
on logic, he is responsible for only two works explicitly dedicated to the
subject. One of these, FS, was a short, early contribution to the reform
of some of the baroque excesses of the Aristotelian tradition. The other,
L, was compiled by Gottlob Benjamin Jäsche from Kant's heavily anno
tated copy of George Friedrich Meier's textbook on logic Auszug aus der
Vernunft/,ehre (1752). Kant used the latter as the text for the lectures on
logic which he gave over four decades from the outset of his academic
career in 1755-6 to its end in 1796. Transcripts of these lectures have
survived from the early 1770s (the 'Blomberg Logic'), the early 1780s
('Vienna' and 'Heschel' Logics), and the early 1790s ('Dohna-Wundlacken
Logic'), all of which have been translated in volume 9 of the Guyer and
Wood edition (i.e., L). From these sources it is possible to reconstruct the
technical background to Kant's ambitious attempt to redefine the scope
of logic in the critical philosophy.
The contents of each of the three critiques are organized in terms of
an early modern Aristotelian treatise on logic, divided into a 'doctrine of
the elements' (comprising an 'analytic' and a 'dialectic') and a 'doctrine
of method'. Embedded within this structure, and notably in CPR, is an
other, distinct organization of the contents of logic derived from the anti
Aristotelian Cartesian tradition exemplified by Arnauld's Arl ofThinkingor
'Port-Royal Logic' (1662). In this tradition, logic is concemed not so much
with the forms of inference which so fascinated the Aristotelian tradition,
but with training the judgement to distinguish between true and false,
thus providing an exercise in 'self-discipline' (see the 'First Discourse'). To
this end, the An ofThinkingis organized according to 'conception', 'judge
ment', 'reasoning' and 'ordering'. This division informs Kant's critical
analysis of theoretical, practical and aesthetic judgement, and is most
evident in CPR, which superimposes the Aristotelian and Cartesian para
digms in an attempt to produce a 'Transcendental Logic'. The 'Transcen
dental Aesthetic' serves the function of providing the materials of thought
carried out by 'conception'; the 'Transcendental Analytic' provides the
initial ordering of thought analyzed in 'judgement'; the 'Transcendental
Dialectic' generates the (illusory) syllogistic inferences analysed in 'rea
soning'; and the methodology leads to the systematic articulation of
knowledge discussed in 'ordering'.
Kant's sensitivity to the differences between the 'Aristotelian' and
280
LOGIC, GENERAL/TRANSCENDENTAL
'modern' traditions oflogic is evident throughout his writings and lectures

on logic. At the most general level, FS may be read as the attempt to
replace the traditional emphasis on the subtleties of the syllogistic figures
with a new focus on self-consciousness and judgement. The struggle and
accommodation between the two traditions of logic announced in this
text may be followed throughout Kant's writings. lt is most evident in the
Preface to the second edition ofCPR, where Kant observes that logic since
Aristotle 'has not been able to advance a single step, and is thus to all ap
pearance a closed and completed body of doctrine' (B viii). He does not
consider the attempts by 'moderns' to enlarge logic by means of material
drawn from psychology, metaphysics and anthropology to have contrib
uted much. Kant argued that the 'sole concem [of logic] is to give an
exhaustive exposition of the formal rules of all thought, whether it be a
priori or empirical, whatever be its origin or its object' (CPRB ix). He adds
that logic leaves 'the understanding nothing to deal with save itself and its
form' (B ix), and regards any attempt to supplement it as simply compro
mising the integrity of the discipline.
In spite of limiting logic to the exposition of the form of the under
standing and renouncing its psychological, metaphysical and anthropo
logical supplements, Kant's commitment to the modern project of
extending logic was never in question. His proposed extension is far more
ambitious than simply adding 'chapters' from discrete sciences, and en
tails recasting the 'general logic' of the tradition into a modern 'transcen
dental logic'. Pure general logic 'deals with nothing but the pure form of
thought' (CPRA 54/B 78) and is entirely a priori; it is distinguished from
applied general logic which is 'directed to the rules ofthe employment of
understanding under the subjective empirical conditions dealt with by
psychology' (A 53/B 77). Both are distinguished from the transcendental
logic presented in CPR which 'concerns itself with the laws of under
standing and of reason solely in so far as they relate a priori to objects'
(A 57/B 82).
With the development ofa modern, transcendental logic Kant does not
intend to reject the achievements ofthe logical tradition. Instead he takes
the analyses of judgement drawn from the tradition and uses them as a
clue for discovering the operations of the understanding in transcenden
tal logic. Tue concepts he uses to make the transition from traditional
logic to modern logic are 'unity' and 'syn thesis'. The judgements of gen
eral logic, abstracted from all content, are 'functions ofunity' (CPRA 69/
B 94); when translated into transcendental logic they signify the syntheses
ofa spontaneous, apperceptive subject confronted by a 'manifold of a priori
sensibility' (A 77/B 102). The transcendental syntheses derived from the
logical functions of general logic form the table of the categories or 'the
281
LOVE
list of all original pure concepts of synthesis that the understanding con
tains within itself a priori' (A 80/B 106). With these syntheses Kant would
accommodate both the traditional logic based on forms of judgement and
inference and the modern logic stemming from the Cartesian cop;i,to and
based on self-consciousness and apperception.
A further historical tradition of logic is also manifest in Kant's work: the
Epicurean definition of logic as a canon or 'science of the cautious and
correct use of the understanding' (L p. 257). This is distinguished from
the Aristotelian 'organon for the art of disputation' which offers rules for
correct or convincing inferences. Kant professedly follows the Epicurean
tradition in his emphasis upon the role of logic as a science of distinguish
ing between judgements, with CPR providing a canon for distinguishing
between true and false judgements and inferences, CPrR between good
and bad maxims of action, and CJ between judgements of the beautiful
and those of the agreeable and the good. In each of the critiques, both
the critical analytic and dialectic are canons in this sense: analytic is a
'canon for adjudication (of the formal correctness of our cognition)' (L
p. 531) while dialectic contains 'the marks and rules in accordance with
which we could recognise that something does not agree with the formal
criteria of truth, although it seems to agree with them' (L p. 532).
Kant's attempt in his transcendental logic to bring together traditional
and modern logic was radicalized by successors such as Fichte and Hegel.
They did not consider it necessary to reconcile the traditional table of
judgements with the syntheses of self-consciousness, but argued directly
from the synthetic activity of self-consciousness to both the form and content
of judgement. The perceived excesses of this development of Kant' s logic
eventually provoked a reaction against the project of transcendental logic.
This took a variety of influential forms, ranging from psychological and
sociological accounts of forms of reasoning to a logic of validity which
focused on the formal justification of propositions irrespective of their
content or relation to the world.
love [eros/agape, amor, Liebe] see also FAITH, HOPE, MARRIAGE, RESPECT, SEX
As the third and greatest of the medieval 'theological virtues' (see Aquinas,
1952, II, I, 62), the concept of love followed a long and complex history
which combined elements of Greek philosophical eros, or desire for the
other based on want, with Christian agape or love of the neighbour and
even of the enemy (see Nygren, 1982). While Kant was not directly inter
ested in the concept of love, and discussed it only tangentially, the frame
work of his analysis nevertheless combines both erotic and agapic aspects.
When discussing love as a feeling, his discussion is usually couched in
an erotic vein, and concerns the disciplining of the sexual instinct. In
282
LOVE
CBH the deferral of sexual intercourse is one of the four steps by which
'reason' distinguished humans from animals: 'R.efusalwas the device which
invested purely sensuous stimuli with an ideal quality, and which gradually
showed the way from purely animal desire to love' (CBH p. 113, p. 224).
The key feature in this transition is the investing of sensuous desire with
the rational qualities of respect. This pairing of love and respect also
informs the more agapic account of love of the neighbour in MM, where
love 'attracts' human beings to each other, and respect distances them:
carrying out the duty of love puts another 'under obligation' to me, while
that of respect puts me under an obligation to 'keep myself within my own
bounds so as not to detract anything from the worth that the other, as a
human being, is authorised to put upon themselves' (MM p. 450, p. 244).
Kant's discussion of love is characteristically Protestant in its emphasis
upon intention over works - the three 'duties of love' ('benevolence,
gratitude and sympathy') are accordingly states of mind and not works.
This emphasis also informs his commentary upon Jesus' two command
ments to 'love God' and to 'love your neighbour as yourself ' (Matthew 22:
38-9). The first love is translated into terms of motivation of action: 'Per
form your duty for no motive other than unconditional esteem for duty
itself, i.e., love God.' So too is the second: 'further [your neighbour's]
welfare from good-will that is immediate and not derived from motives of
self-advantage' (RL pp. 160-1, p. 148).
As with so many of Kant's concepts, his comments on love stimulated a
great deal of thought, much of it in opposition to his ideas. The immedi
ate post-Kantian generation of German philosophers were deeply con
cemed with the philosophy of love. Hegel, in his Early Theolog;i,cal Writing3",
strove to unify love and respect in the notion of 'mutual recognition'.
Novalis and Hölderlin attempted to fuse erotic and agapic love, while
Friedrich Schlegel explored aspects of erotic love in his novel Lucinde.
Nevertheless, in these and in subsequent philosophies of love, Kant's in
fluence was minimal and indirect.
283
M
manifold see also APPERCEPTION, COMBINATION , IDENTITY, INTUITION , RECEPTIVITY,

SENSIBILITY, SPONTANEITY, SYNTHESIS, UNITY
Kant described the manifold of a priori sensibility as the material for the
concepts of pure understanding , without which the latter would be ‘with¬
out any content’ ( CPR A 77) . For knowledge arises from the synthesis of
a manifold, which requires that the manifold ‘be gone through in a cer¬
tain way, taken up, and connected’ ( ibid. ) by the spontaneity of thought.
Manifolds may be either empirical manifolds of sensibility, or a priori
manifolds of space and time, but in both cases they issue from the recep¬
tive capacity of the mind, the ‘conditions under which alone it can receive
representations of objects’ (ibid.) . Yet this poses the problem of how the
synthesis of two heterogeneous capacities - the spontaneous unity and the
receptive manifold - may be accomplished. What is required is a ‘special
act of synthesis of the manifold ( CPR B 139) , one which would combine
the manifold with the modes of transcendental unity represented by the
categories. The exploration of this synthesis forms the core of the critical
philosophy, and in particular the discussion of the principles, and fore¬
most among them , of the axioms of intuition (see CPR A 162/ B 203 for
magnitude as the ‘homogeneous manifold’ ) .
In the A deduction of the first edition of CPR Kant also describes
the specific synthesis of the manifold in terms of the syntheses of appre ¬
hension , reproduction and recognition. All involve making the manifold

compatible with the unity of the understanding, with the synthesis of
apprehension being the most significant. This synthesis ‘runs through’ the
manifold and ‘holds it together’ (CPR A 99) ; the synthetically apprehended
manifold is then gathered into an image by the reproductive synthesis (A
121) , which is then unified in a preliminary way by the synthesis of recog¬
nition in a concept.
marriage see also CONTRACT, EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL LIFE, JUSTICE, RIGHT, SEX, WOMAN
In MM Kant presents a rigorously secular and contractual account of the
Christian sacrament of marriage, listing it among the ‘rights to persons
284
MARRIAGE
akin to rights to things' (MM p. 276, p. 95). This dass of private law rights
entails 'possession of an external object as a thing and use of it as a person'
(ibid.) and is exercised by men acquiring wives, couples acquiring chil
dren, and families acquiring servants. Yet although Kant speaks of the
husband acquiring a wife, he stresses the equality of the possession held by
both parties to a marriage; both husband and wife are formally and equally
obliged to, as well as being the possessions of, each other. Their mutual
possession both as persons and as things is expressed in sexual inter
course; indeed, Kant defines marriage dispassionately as 'the union of two
persons of different sexes for lifelong possession of each other's sexual
attributes' (p. 278, p. 96). Apparently, while having intercourse each part
ner enjoys the other by acquiring, and being acquired by them, as if they
were things. But in order to respect the partner's humanity as an 'end in
themselves' it is necessary for the act of acquisition to be supplemented
contractually by commitment for life.
The peculiar character of marriage as a personal right to possess an
other human being as if they were the object of a right to a thing has
interesting consequences for acquiring a husband or a wife. Kant says
nothing about the free consent of partners to a marriage contract, but
argues that the contract requires both legal title and real possession. Thus
it can take place neither 'facto (by intercourse) without a contract preced
ing it nor pacto (by a mere marriage contract without intercourse follow
ing it) but only l,ege ' (MM p. 280, p. 98); that is, through a legal contract
followed by possession in sexual intercourse. The absence of any major
role for consent in the marriage contract leads to the omission of any
discussion of divorce (although see, exceptionally, LE p. 169). Indeed, the
possession of the person of the partner requires a life-long, legally en
forceable commitment, of which Kant says 'if one of the partners in a
marriage has left or given itself into someone else's possession, the other
partner is justified, always and without question, in bringing its partner
back under its control, just as it is justified in retrieving a thing' (MM
p. 278, p. 97).
While the begetting of children is not requisite for marriage - 'other
wise marriage would be dissolved when procreation ceases' (MM p. 277,
p. 96) - with procreation the parents incur an obligation to bring up the
child. Part of this obligation entails a limitation on the parents' freedom
to destroy their child 'as if it were something they had made', because the
child is a 'being endowed with freedom' (MM p. 281, p. 99). However, at
another place in MM, Kant describes a child born outside of marriage as
'outside of the protection ofthe law' and 'contraband merchandise' which
can indeed be destroyed by the mother as if it were a thing (see MM p.
336, p. 144). Here it seems as if the 'endowment of freedom' only holds
285
MATHEMATICS
if the child is bom within the law. This view of citizenship as dependent
on being bom within marriage suggests that an aspect of public law has
been smuggled into the private law definition of the marriage contract.
When Kant directs his attention away from the formal aspects of the
marriage contract to the real relations between husband and wife that
make up the 'domestic society' of family and household, his position
becomes distinctly illiberal. In his earlier comments on marriage in OBS
he describes the role of the wife as that of providing 'merry conversation'
while being 'govemed by the understanding of the man' (OBS p. 95). In
MM he is more explicit, seeing no conflict between the formal equality of
the marriage contract and 'the natural superiority of the husband to the
wife in his capacity to promote the common interest of the household'
(MM p. 279, p. 98). After the marriage contract, the husband will direct
the affairs of the family and household by virtue of his superior under
standing, while the wife will provide merry conversation, sex and children.
The comic perversity of Kant's attempt to cast marriage in terms of the
categories of contractual law has been the source of a great deal of amuse
ment. A fine example is Brecht's poem 'On Kant's Definition of Marriage
in the Metaphysics of Morals', where he imagines partners calling in the
bailiffs to reclaim erring sexual organs. More seriously, it can be read as
a contradictory attempt to translate the characteristics of sacramental
marriage - fidelity, irreversible life-long commitment and legitimate off
spring - into contractual terms, while at the same time understating the
consensual elements which define personal contracts. The consensual
element in a personal contract undermines the very sacramental aspects
of marriage which Kant sought to buttress with his ingenious description
of marriage as a combination of both personal and real rights.
mathematics see also APODEICTIC, AXIOM, CONSTRUCIION, EVIDENCE, INTUITION

In the Preface to the second edition of CPR Kant imagines the origins of
mathematics to lie in a 'reuolution brought about by the happy thought of
a sin� man' (B xi). He locates this revolution in Greek geometry, whose
method, he claims, consisted in the geometer bringing out 'what was
necessarily implied in the concepts that he himself had formed a priori
and had put into the figure in the construction by which he presented it
to himself ' (B xii). With this Kant announces his controversial claim that
mathematics is concemed 'with objects and with knowledge solely in so
far as they allow of being exhibited in intuition' and in particular with a
priori intuition (A 4/B 8). This entails the further claim that mathemati
cal knowledge is not analytic, and thereby founded on the principle of
contradiction, but synthetic a priori: 'all mathematical judgements, wi,thout
exception, are synthetic (B 14). In CPR Kant strives to justify this claim with
286
MATHEMATICS
reference to arithmetic, geometry and algebra. He does so in order osten

sibly to explicate the problem of why mathematical knowledge may be
applied to nature, but also to distinguish between the proofs and proce
dures of mathematics and philosophy.
Kant's arithmetical example is the proposition 7 + 5 = 12, which he
insists is not an analytical proposition. The sum 12, he argues, is derived
from 'the concept of the sum of 7 and 5' which contains 'nothing save the
union of the two numbers into one, and in this no thought is being tak.en
as to what that single number may be' (CPR B 15). In order to discover
the specific number 12, Kant claims it is necessary to 'call in the aid' of
intuition and to construct the number 12 out of the addition of five to
seven units (in this case the fingers ofhis hand). Later in the 'Anticipations
of Perception' Kant specifies the synthetic operation carried out in arith
metic as a 'synthesis of the homogeneous (of units)' or a 'numerical
formula' which 'produces' a unique sum through the general use of
numbers (CPR A 165/B 205). He distinguishes the synthetic production
of an arithmetical sum from that involved in the intuitive exhibition of
geometrical axioms. These too are synthetic, as Kant shows with the exam
ples of 'the straight line between two points is the shortest', a = a, and (a
+ b) > a, which can only be admitted because they may be exhibited in
intuition (B 17). These axioms are derived from properties of pure intui
tion which may be manipulated by the productive imagination to con
struct geometrical figures with which to demonstrate geometrical proofs.
Unlike an arithmetical operation such as addition, whose synthesis pro
duces a unique sum, the axioms of intuition can be deployed to construct
every possible angle. Algebra, finally, also proceeds by means ofexhibiting
'in intuition, in accordance with certain universal rules, all the various
operations through which the magnitudes are produced and modified'
(CPR A 717/B 745). The presentation of the magnitudes and the alge
braic symbols are analogous for Kant to the construction of a geometrical
figure, taking the form of a 'symbolic construction' which parallels the
'ostensive construction' of geometry.
Kant's attempt to restrict mathematical constructions to the forms of
human intuition contradicts some ofhis own earlier positions, which enter
tained the possibility of geometries not confined to the limits of three
dimensional space. By generalizing the notion of construction in an early
text such as LF (§9) he was able to intimate the possibility of geometries
based on axioms quite different from those of Euclid. He was also con
cerned in PE to distinguish mathematical from philosophical proof and
certainty. This was motivated by the desire to distance his philosophy from
that ofthe Wolffian school, which borrowed the authority ofmathematical
prooffor philosophical demonstrations. Kant rested his distinction between
287
MATHEMATICAL CATEGORIES, PRINCIPLES AND IDEAS
philosophy and mathematics on the generic difference between the dis

cursive, acroamatic character of the former, and the intuitive, axiomatic
character of the latter. In the words of CPR, philosophical knowledge 'is
gained by reason from concepts' while mathematical knowledge 'is gained
by reason from the construction of concepts' (A 713/B 741); the former
'considers the particular only in the universal', the latter 'the universal in
the particular' (A 714/B 742). lt is not implausible to suggest that it was
Kant's attempt to sustain the distinction between mathematical and philo
sophical argument which led him to emphasize the intuitive, synthetic
character of mathematics, even in the face of some of his own earlier
insights to the contrary.
mathematical categories, principles and ideas see CATEGORIES, DYNAMIC CAT

EGORIES, PRINCIPLES, IDEAS
matter [Materie] see also ACCIDENT, BODY, CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION, DYNAMICS,

FORM, MECHANICS, MOTION, PHENOMENOLOGY, PHORONOMY, SUBSTANCE
In the critical philosophy Kant accords a comparatively limited role to the
concept of matter. lt is defined adjectivally as the 'matter of appearance'
and as the 'matter ofknowledge', with the former being 'the appearance
[which] corresponds to sensation' (CPR A 20/B 34) and the latter that
which is 'obtained from the senses' (A 86/B 118). lt is always contrasted
with form, and in conjunction with it comprises one of the four pairs of
concepts of reflection. lt signifies 'the determinable in general' as op
posed to form, which is determination in general (A 267/B 323). As with
all the concepts of reflection, matter and form are not anything in them
selves but denote ways in which the understanding orients itself with re
gard to experience. Hence matter simply designates that in experience
which is determined by the forms of intuition and the understanding; it
is thus a term ofreflection for 'the things themselves which appear' (A 268/
B 324), and is not an appearance or a thing in itself.
In CPR matter is distinguished from substance, or the permanent in
experience, since it 'does not mean a kind ofsubstance quite distinct and
heterogeneous from the object of inner sense (the soul), but only the
distinctive nature of those appearances of objects - in themselves quite
unknown to us - the representations ofwhich we call outer' (CPR A 385).
Indeed, what is called matter is no more than the effects in outer sense
of 'changes ofplace' while the forces informing matter are no more than
'mere tendencies which issue in spatial relations as their effects' (A 386).
Nor is matter a thing in itself; as a concept ofreflection it is 'not among the
objects ofpure understanding' and even ifwe were to consider it as such,
'the transcendental object which may be the ground of this appearance
288
MAXIM
that we call matter is a mere something of which we should not under

stand what it is, even if someone were in a position to tel1 us' (A 277 /B
333). The critical concept of matter has indeed been stripped of all the
dignities which were accorded to the concept in the history of philosophy,
being neither the 'matter in itself ' (hyle) nor even the material substance
underlying accidents.
Nevertheless, with MF Kant devotes an entire text to matter, or rather
to the 'principles of the construction of concepts that belong to the pos
sibility of matter' (MF p. 472, p. 9), namely those which precede any at
tempt to apply mathematics to 'the doctrine of body' or natural science.
Following the headings of the table of categories, Kant presents 'all
determinations of the universal concept of matter in general and, there
fore, everything that can be thought a priori respecting it' (MF p. 476, p.
12). He describes his procedure as one of running 'the concept of matter
through all four of the functions of the concepts of the understanding' (p.
476, p. 13). The fundamental determination of matter for our sensibility
is motion, and thus 'all predicates which pertain to the nature of matter'
may be traced back 'to motion' (p. 477, p. 14). Thus matter is analyzed
in terms of motion: first, by phoronomy, as a pure quantum of motion,
then by dynamics, as the quality of motion as the expression of a force,
then again by mechanics, in terms of the relation of moving parts of
matter to each other, and finally, by phenomenology, as 'matter's motion
or rest determined merely with reference to the mode of representation,
or modality, i.e., as an appearance of the extemal senses' (p. 477, p. 15).
maxim see also CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, COMMAND, FREEDOM, IMPERATIVE, WILL

A maxim is defined as a 'subjective principle of volition' and is distin
guished from the objective principle or 'practical law' (GMM p. 400, p.
13). While the latter is valid for every rational being and is a 'principle
according to which they ought to act' a maxim 'contains the practical rule
which reason determines in accordance with the conditions of the subject
(often their ignorance or inclinations) and is thus the principle according
to which the subject does act' (GMM p. 421, p. 30). In GMM Kant lists the
conditions for a maxim in terms of the quantitative categories of unity,
plurality and totality. A maxim must possess unity in the form of univer
sality arising from the unity of the will; plurality in its matter or 'ends'; and
totality in the 'complete determination' of 'all maxims by the formula that
all maxims proceeding from his own legislation ought to harmonise with
a possible kingdom of ends as a kingdom of nature' (p. 436, pp. 41-2).
In Kant's view, moral action consists largely in the testing of maxims by
the various formulations of the categorical imperative. Such testing of
maxims is the way in which the objective law of reason relates to a will
289
MECHANICS
subject to other influences and inclinations. The categorical imperative

serves as a canon for estimating maxims of action; moral action requires
us to 'Act as ifthe maxim ofyour action were to become through your will
a universal law of nature' (p. 421, p. 30). Thus the prudential maxim of
action that 'when I am in distress I may make a lying promise' fails the test
of the categorical imperative, because, Kant maintains, 'I can indeed will
the lie but cannot at all will a universal law to lie' (p. 403, p. 15).
mechanics see also DYNAMICS, LAW, MATTER, PHENOMENOLOGY, TABLE OF CATEGORIES

Mechanics is one of the four divisions of the system of matter presented
in MF. Each of these corresponds to matter considered in terms ofone of
the headings ofthe table ofcategories: phoronomy corresponds to quan
tity and is the science of the quantity of the motion of matter; dynamics
corresponds to quality and is the science ofthe qualities ofmatter, namely
its attractive and repulsive force; phenomenology corresponds to modality
and is the science ofthe appearance ofthe motion ofmatter to perception,
while mechanics corresponds to relation, and is the science ofthe relation
of the parts of matter to each other (see MF pp. 536-53, pp. 95-117).
In Part II ofCJ Kant doubts the ability ofa mechanical explanation (i.e.,
one which believes that everything may be explained in terms of the re
lation of the parts of matter to each other) to explain living beings. He
resolves the antinomy of the 'Critique of Teleological Judgement', which
opposes the thesis that nature be estimated 'as possible on mere mechani
cal laws', with the antithesis that it cannot be so estimated, by arguing that
reason can prove neither, and so judgement should be used in a reflective
and not a determinant mode (§70). Similarly, the laws offreedom which
inform human moral action also exceed mechanical notions ofcausation,
and obey their own, non-mechanical causality, a position explored at length
in the 'Third Antinomy' of CPR (see CPR A 444/B 472ff).
memory see also HOPE, IDENTITY, IMAGINATION, SYNTHESIS, TIME

Memory is defined as the 'faculty of visualising the past intentionally'
which, along with the 'faculty ofvisualising something as future', serves to
associate 'ideas of the past and future condition of the subject with the
present' (A §34). Together, both memory and prevision are important for
'linking together perceptions in time' and connecting 'in a coherent
experience what is no more with what does not yet exist, by means ofwhat
is present' (ibid.). lt can thus be seen to play a significant role in the
problem of identity, and more particularly, in the character of syn thesis.
Memory is implied in two of the three syntheses of the 'transcendental
faculty ofimagination' presented in the deduction ofCPR: in the 'synthesis
ofapprehension' where it informs the consistency ofappearances, and in
290
METAPHYSICS
the 'syn thesis of recognition' where it is implied in the continuity of the

consciousness of appearances.
metaphysical deduction see DEDUCTION
metaphysics see also COSMOLOGY, ONTOLOGY, PSYCHOLOGY, THEOLOGY,

TRANSCENDENTAL
Metaphysics was the name given in the first century AD to the corpus of
Aristotelian writings which came 'after the physics'. By the time of Aquinas
this catalogue title had been converted into the name of the highest
science, comprising objects such as God and Angels who 'do not depend
upon matter for their being', and of concepts such as 'substance, quality,
being, potency, act, one and many and the like' (Aquinas, 1986, p. 14). lt
is called metaphysics or 'first philosophy' because it is 'beyond physics' in as
much as 'all the other sciences receiving their principles from it, come
after it' (ibid., p. 15). In the period immediately prior to Kant the content
of metaphysics had settled into four sections: the first was general meta
physics or ontology, which was concemed, in the words of Wolff's meta
physics, with 'The First Grounds of our Knowledge and of Things in
General'; the remaining three were the objects and sciences of 'special
metaphysics', namely (a) the soul and psychology, (b) the world and
cosmology, and (c) God and theology. Kant closely followed this schema
in CPR, with the 'Transcendental Analytic' critically treating of ontology,
and the three sections of the 'Transcendental Dialectic' considering the
three parts of special metaphysics.
Kant's adherence to this schema shows that the pure reason he was
subjecting to critique was no other than the metaphysics of the Wolffian
school. He was familiar with this tradition through his annual lectures on
metaphysics which began in winter 1755-6. These lectures were based on
A.G. Baumgarten's Metaphysica of 1739, a· substantially Wolffian text in
form and content. In PE (1764) Kant professes great dissatisfaction with
Wolffian metaphysics and its reliance upon the principle of contradiction,
as well as expressing sympathetic disagreement with Crusius's pietist cri
tique ofWolff. In DS, Kant describes bothWolff's and Crusius's metaphys
ics as 'castles in the sky' (p. 342, p. 329), but in a remarkable apostrophe
he declares he has nevertheless 'fallen in love' with metaphysics. He sees
two advantages promised by the science: the first and least promising is
that 'it can solve the problems thrown up by the enquiring mind, when it
uses reason to spy after the more hidden properties of things', and the
second, most important yet least appreciated is that it can serve as a 'sci
ence of the limits of human reason' (p. 368, p. 354).With the admission that
he has as yet 'not precisely determined this limit' Kant points to the
291
METAPHYSICAL FOUNDATIONS OF NATURAL SCIENCE
project of establishing the limits of human reason which was to occupy

him for the next 15 years and issued in CPR.
The preface to the first edition of CPR begins by evoking a 'species of
knowledge' which reason cannot ignore, but which transcends its powers
and throws it into a perplexity of darkness and contradiction. This knowl
edge is metaphysics, the Hecuba of the sciences, once queen but now
scomed.Kant proposes a critique ofreason in respect ofknowledge 'after
which it may strive independently of all experience' and through which it will
become possible to decide on the 'possibility and impossibility of meta
physics in general, and determine its sources, its extent, and its limits'
(CPR A xii). For Kant metaphysics is composed of 'a priori synthetic
knowledge' which 'adds to the given concept something that was not con
tained in it' and which may extend knowledge beyond the limits of expe
rience (B 18). Thus the critical propaedeutic to metaphysics will examine
the proper limits of such judgements in order to establish whether they
may be extended to knowledge of such metaphysical objects as God, the
world and the soul. Kant will conclude that they cannot, but this does not
lead him to abandon metaphysics, but rather to undertake a redefinition
of its purpose and scope.
In the penultimate section of CPR on 'The Architectonic of Pure Rea
son' Kant describes metaphysics as the 'criticism of the faculty of reason
in respect ofall its pure a pri<rri knowledge' and the 'systematic connection
[of] the whole body (true as well as illusory) of philosophical knowledge
arising out of pure reason' (A 841/B 869). The latter may be divided
according to the speculative and practical employments of reason, yield
ing the metaphysics of nature and the metaphysics of morals (see also
GMM p. 388, pp.1-2).The former contains the 'principles ofpure reason
that are derived from mere concepts ...employed in the theoretical
knowledge ofall things', the latter 'the principles which in a pri<rri fashion
determine and make necessary all our actions' (CPR A 841/B 869), pre
sented in their true employments in the analytics, in their illusory
employments in the dialectics. All three taken together constitute meta
physics, which Kant goes on to suggest is synonymous with philosophy or
the love of wisdom as well as the 'füll and complete development of
human reason' (A 850/B 878).
Metaphysical Foundatüms of Natural Science Published in 1786, Kant de

scribed this work as an 'application' of the 'Metaphysics of Nature' which
he planned to write on critical principles in the mid l 780s. lt is cast as an
attempt to provide 'the metaphysical foundations of the theory of body'
(PC p. 119), one which, in the words of the book's preface, presents the
conditions which make possible the 'application of mathematics to the
292
METAPHYSICS OF MORAL.S
doctrine of body' (MF p. 472, p. 9). This requires a 'complete analysis of

the concept of matter in general', which is presented in four chapters
corresponding to the four headings of the table of categories. In these
Kant carries 'the concept of matter through all four of the functions of
the understanding' (MF p. 476, p. 13), considering it in terms of motion,
since 'all predicates which pertain to the nature of matter' may be traced
back 'to motion' (p. 477 p. 14). The first chapter, on the 'Metaphysical
Foundations of Phoronomy', considers the quantitative aspects of matter,
looking at matter in terms of a pure quantum of motion. The second
chapter, on the 'Metaphysical Foundations of Dynamics', considers the
qualitative aspects of matter with respect to its being the expression of
attractive and repulsive forces. The third chapter, on the 'Metaphysical
Foundations of Mechanics', considers the relational aspects of matter,
namely the relation of the moving parts of matter to each other. The
fourth and final chapter, on the 'Metaphysical Foundations of Phenom
enology', corresponds to the modal group of categories, and considers
'matter's motion or rest determined merely with reference to the mode of
representation, or modality, i.e., as an appearance of the external senses'
(p. 417, p. 15).
Meta,phyncs of Morals MM is the third of Kant's critical texts in moral

philosophy. The first, GMM, published in 1785, analyz ed the 'supreme
principle of morality'. The second, CPrR, published in 1788, justified
morality synthetically. MM, however, published in 1797, derived from the
principle of morality a 'metaphysics of morals'. As with MF, MM does not
present the entire metaphysical system of morals but only the 'first prin
ciples'; in MF these basic principles were those associated with the con
cept of matter, in MM they concern the concepts of right and virtue. The
work is accordingly divided into metaphysical first principles of the 'Doc
trine of Right' and of the 'Doctrine of Virtue'. Both sets of principles are
derived from the freedom of the will and its correlate of duty, with those
of right dedicated to 'duties that can be given by external laws, and the
system of the doctrine of virtue (Ethica), which treats of duties that cannot
be so given' (MM p. 379, p. 185). The 'Doctrine of Right' considers the
laws of private and public right, moving in the former from the concept
of possession to acquisition, and regarding the latter in the light of the
rights of property, contract and 'Domestic Right'. In the discussion of
public right, Kant moves from the internal rights of states to the 'rights of
nations', of their external relations, and to a brief section on cosmopoli
tan right. The elements of the 'Doctrine of Virtue' ";hich follow are di
vided according to duties to seif and duties to others, while the 'method
of ethics' treats of how virtue may be acquired and taught.
293
METHOD
method see also ANALYSIS, ANALYTIC, CRITIQUE, HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY, LOGIC,

SYNTHESIS
Method is generically defined as 'a procedure in accordance with princi
ples' and is subdivided into several different species of method. In CPR
Kant distinguishes between 'naturalist' and 'scientific' methods: the former
proceeds according to common sense and is dismissed by him as 'mere
misology', while the latter comprises dogmatic, sceptical and critical meth
ods. The dogmatic method represented by Wolff follows a systematic pro
cedure borrowed from mathematics, but one which is based on unexamined
axioms. The sceptical method represented by Hume systematically ques
tions all the claims of reason to establish necessary connections between
events, but without inquiring into possible sources of necessity. Finally, the
critical method consists in the systematic self-examination of reason in
order to determine the sources and scope of its a priori concepts, and to
act as a canon against their improper extension beyond the limits of
possible experience.
methodology see also ANALYTIC, DIALECTIC, ELEMENTS, LOGIC

Kant followed the early modern division of logic into doctrines of ele
ments and method or methodology. The former comprises an inventory
of the essential functions of thought (concepts, judgements, inferences),
while the latter presents their practical application in terms of the princi
ples of scientific exposition. Each of the three critiques is organized ac
cording to the division of elements and method, with the CPR's doctrine
of method being the most fully developed. The latter determines the
'formal conditions of a complete system of pure reason' (A 708/B 736)
subdivided according to a 'discipline', a 'canon', an 'architectonic' and a
'history' of pure reason.
mind seeCOGNiTION, GEMÜT, I, '1 THINK', KNOWLEDGE, PARALOGISMS, SUBJECT, THINKING
modality see APODEICTIC, CATEGORIES, EXISTENCE, JUDGEMENT, NECESSITY, POSSIBIL

ITY, PROBLEMATIC, TABLE OF CATEGORIES
monad see also BODY, DMSIBILITY, DIFFERENCE, MATTER, MOTION, SUBSTANCE

Leibniz defined a monad in the Monadology (written 1714, published 1720)
as a 'simple substance that enters into composites' (§1), one which is
capable of 'perception' (§15) and 'appetition' (§16). In the pre-critical
PM (1756) Kant saw body as composed of 'simple substances' or 'monads'
(p. 477, p. 53) which occupied space not by virtue of extension, but by
exercising an active force (p. 481, p. 57). At this early stage of his career
Kant was extremely influenced by Leibniz's dynamics, which was based on
294
MOTION
the forces exercised by simple substances, although by the time of PE

(1764) he has become extremely sceptical of the monad, using it to exem
plify an 'invented' philosophical concept (p. 227, p. 249). In the section
of CPR entitled 'Amphiboly of the Concepts of Reflection' Kant sharpens
this scepticism into a füll critique which questions the simplicity of the
monads, their power of representation, and the problems raised by the
attempt to relate simple substances to each other (see CPR A 267/B 323
and A 274/B 330). However, in his later reply to the Leibnizian Eberhard
in 0D (1790), where Kant calls CPR 'the genuine apology for Leibniz'
(0D p. 251, p. 160), his critical position is more nuanced. He defends
Leibniz against his disciples, claiming in the case of the monad that it
should not be confused with a physical being, but is an 'unknown substrate',
an 'idea of reason' in which 'we must certainly represent to ourselves
everything which we think as a composite substance as composed of sim
ple substances' (p. 248, p. 158). Kant here presents CPR as the develop
ment of Leibnizian themes, and above all that of the monad.
monogram see SCHEMA
morals see CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, COMMAND, IMPERATIVE, MAXIMS, PERSON
mortality see FINITUDE, IMMORTALITY
motion see a/,so BODY, DYNAMICS, EXTENSION, FORCE, MATTER, MECHANICS, PHENOM
ENOLOGY, PHORONOMY, SPACE, SUCCESSION, TIME
The concept of motion was extremely significant to Kant at all stages of
his authorship, and was often used to exemplify larger, metaphysical argu
ments. In his first work, LF, he used the concept of motion to criticize the
Cartesian view of the body as extended substance; there he followed Leibniz
in opting for a dynamical explanation of motion in terms of force or vis
activa which is prior to extension (§1). Motion played an important role
in the cosmology of UNH (1755), where Kant supposes the matter of the
universe as scattered, but forming itself through motion and the forces of
attraction and repulsion into an orderly, law-governed whole. Here, as
eight years later in OPA, Kant argued that mechanical laws of motion
indicate an original divine design which does not require the constant
intervention of God in the running of the universe. Kant also uses the
concept of motion as a part of his critique of the then hegemonic Wolffian
philosophy, and in particular its use of the principle of contradiction. The
beginnings of this argument are evident in NT (1758), where Kant shows,
the relativity of the concepts of motion and rest, a point he uses in NM
(1763) to distinguish between logical contradiction and real opposition
(see pp. 171 and 178, pp. 211 and 217).
295
MOTIVE
In CPR Kant again uses the concept of motion to criticize the principle
of contradiction. He maintains that arguing analytically from concepts
alone cannot 'render comprehensible the possibility of an alteration, that
is, of a combination of contradictorily opposed predicates in one and the
same object ...only in time can two contradictorily opposed predicates
meet in one and the same object, namely, one after the other' (CPR A 32/
B 49). Thus the experience of motion requires the intuition of time and
space, but does not lie at their foundation. The concept of motion re
quires an 'empirical datum' that is experienced in terms of time and
space; it 'presupposes the perception of something existing and of the
succession of its determinations; that is to say, it presupposes experience'
(A 41/B 58). This point is subsequently speit out when Kant describes
motion 'as an act of the subject (not as a determination of an object)'
which is accomplished by 'the synthesis of the manifold in space' (B 154).
Kant regards the claim that motion is a 'property of outer things' to
mistak.e 'what merely exists in thought' as a 'real object existing, in the
same character, outside the thinking subject' (A 384). Thus extension is
regarded not as an appearance but as a property of outer things and from
this it is inferred that 'motion is due to these things and really occurs in
and by itself, apart from our senses' (A 385). Contrary to this, Kant re
gards motion as one of three relations that can take place within appear
ances: extension as 'location in an intuition'; motion as 'change of location'
within intuition; and motive force as the 'laws according to which this
change is determined' (B 67). The knowing subject can only have knowl
edge of these relations, and raust not consider either them or their objects
as things in themselves.
In his presentation of the principles of matter presupposed by a math
ematical natural science in MF, Kant proceeds from motion, claiming that
'all predicates which pertain to the nature of matter' (p. 477, p. 14) may
be traced back to it.He then develops the fundamental concepts of matter
by analyzing motion in terms of the four headings of the table of catego
ries.Its quantity or character as a pure quantum is analyzed in the chapter
on phoronomy; its quality as the expression of the basic forces of attrac
tion and repulsion in dynamics; the relation of the parts of matter to each
in terms of motion is analyzed in mechanics; and the mode of represen
tation of motion to our consciousness is analyz ed in phenomenology.Once
again Kant uses the concept of motion as a means to the end of present
ing a broader argument concerning both the nature and the character of
our knowledge of matter.
motive see INCENTIVE, MAXIM, PATHOLOGY, RESPECT
296
N
natural right see ACQUISITION, FREEDOM, JURISPRUDENCE, JUSTICE, LAW, PROPERTY,

RIGHT
Kant s legal and political writings contributed to the modern tradition of
natural rights theory which succeeded the Aristotelian medieval tradition
of natural law. In natural rights theory, the basic element is not an objec ¬
tive, divinely founded justice or proportionality, but an individual in pos¬

session of certain rights with respect to things, other individuals, and the
state. Kant defines natural right as nonstatutory Right, hence simply right
that can be known a priori by everyone s reason’ ( MM p. 297, p. 113) ; that
is, natural rights rest on a priori principles’ as opposed to positive or
statutory right which proceeds from the will of a legislator’ ( MM p. 237,
p. 63) . Natural right includes the commutative justice that holds among
persons in their exchanges with one another’ and distributive justice in so
far as its decisions may be known a priori according to the principle of
distributive justice. By emphasising the a priori and principled character
of natural right, Kant aligns himself with the German , rationalistic wing of
the tradition developed by Pufendorf and Wolff, as opposed to the more
affective, Grotian tradition developed by Hutcheson and Smith (see Caygill,
1989, Part One ) . However, with the exception of a few elements, his work
is firmly within the rights tradition , and vulnerable to the criticisms of
Hegel and others that it illegitimately extends the real and personal rights
characteristic of private law into the realm of public law.
natural science see DYNAMICS, MATTER, MOTION , PHENOMENOLOGY, PHILOSOPHY
nature see alsoBEAUTY, FINALITY, FREEDOM , MATTER, SPACE , WORLD

In P Kant describes the question ‘how is nature itself possible?’ as ‘the
highest point that transcendental philosophy can ever reach , and to which ,
as its boundary and completion , it must proceed’ (§36) . He breaks the
question down into two sub-questions: how is nature possible in the ma¬
terial, and how is it possible in the formal sense ? With regard to the first
question , concerning the possibility of nature in its material sense as the
297
NATURE
'totality ofappearances', Kant answers that it is possible by means of 'con

stitution of our sensibility'. With regard to the second question, concern
ing the possibility of nature in the formal sense as the 'totality of rules
under which all appearances must come in order to be thought as con
nected in an experience', this is only possible by means of the 'constitu
tion of our understanding'.
The distinction between nature in its material and formal senses is
developed in the critical philosophy into the two definitions of nature
proposed in CPR: one stresses its material aspect as the 'aggregate of
appearances' (A 114), the other its formal aspect in 'the order and regu
larity in the appearances' (A 125). However, in a footnote to the second
edition ofCPR, Kant regards both the material and the formal definitions
ofnature to be dynamical: taken formally, nature 'signifies the connection
of the determinations of a thing according to an inner principle of cau
sality'; taken materially it is the 'sum ofappearances in so far as they stand,
in virtue ofan inner principle ofcausality, in thoroughgoing interconnec
tion' (B 446). In addition to these distinctions internal to the concept of
nature, Kant also makes two important extemal distinctions in CPR. The
first consists in the distinction between the concepts of nature and world:
the world 'signifies the mathematical sum total ofall appearances and the
totality of their synthesis' while nature is the same world 'viewed as a
dynamical whole' (A 418/B 446). The second distinction is between the
laws of nature and those of freedom articulated in the third antinomy.
The distinction between nature and freedom informs that between the
metaphysics of nature in the first critique (CPR) and that of freedom in
the second critique (CPrR). In the latter the freedom of the will is con
sistently opposed to the necessity ofnature, and the fundamental problem
of practical philosophy is posed as one of reconciling natural and free
causality. In an interesting deviation from this approach in GMM, Kant
uses the formal aspect ofnature, or 'the existence ofthings as determined
by universal law', to enunciate the categorical imperative as 'Act as if the
maxim of your action were to become through your will a universal law of
nature' (p. 421, p. 30).
The concept of nature is ubiquitous in CJ, where it features in Part I as
the object of natural beauty and the sublime, as well as offering intima
tions of a supersensible harmony offreedom and necessity. In Part II, the
discussion is directed towards a repudiation of exclusively mechanical
explanations of nature, with the view that the 'organisation of nature has
nothing analogous to any causality known to us' (CJ §65). Here nature is
defined as a 'formative power' whose products are those 'in which every part
is reciprocally both end and rneans' (§66). The products of this formative power
cannot be understood through mechanical principles nor 'ascribed to a
298
NECESSI1Y
blind mechanism of nature' (see §70). With this Kant extends the dynami
cal aspect of nature, described in CPR in terms of forces and laws of
motion, to encompass a view of nature as a dynamical or formative, pro
ductive power. lt was a short step for Schelling to replace the knowing
subject of CPR with formative nature, and thus to transform Kant's phi
losophy of the subject into the philosophy of nature.
necessity [Notwendigkeit] see also APODEICTIC, CATEGORIES, CAUSALI1Y, DEDUCTION,

POSTULATES OF EMPIRICAL THOUGHT, TABLE OF CATEGORIES, VALIDl1Y
Necessity is the third category of modality, derived from the third modal
or apodeictic judgement, which corresponds to the third postulate of
empirical thought. Kant ascribes to the modal judgements 'a quite pecu
liar function', which is to determine the 'value of the copula' in a propo
sition with respect 'to thought in general' (CPRA74/B 100). Aproposition
such as 'Ais the cause of B' may be understood problematically as 'it may
be the case that A is the cause of B', or assertorically as 'it is the case A
is the cause of B', or apodeictically as 'it must be the case that A is the
cause of B'. The 'peculiar function' of the modal judgements has consid
erable implications for the categories derived from them, in particular for
the category of necessity. In the table of categories the modal groups do
not determine an object - this can only be achieved in respect of its
quantity, quality and relation - but they do determine the way in which
objects are categorically determined, whether in terms of possibility, exist
ence or necessity. The category of necessity is thus particularly significant
because it, along with universality, determines the character of a priori
knowledge.
The category of necessity is particularly problematic with respect to the
second category of relation, namely the relation of cause and effect. In P
Kant referred to the challenge posed by Hume's having shown 'irrefuta
bly' that reason could not prove the necessary connection of cause and
effect (preface). He responded to it by proving that the category of cause
and effect was not derived from experience, but was an a priori condition
of experience. This was indicated by the two 'criteria' of a priori knowl
edge, namely 'necessity and strict universality' (CPRB 4); accordingly, the
category of cause and effect had to be shown to be universally and nec
essarily valid in order for experience to be deemed possible. These criteria
were extended to the other categories, as well as to any pure a priori
judgement, including moral and aesthetic judgement. Yet as a category,
necessity must itself be shown to be necessary, and this may be achieved,
Kant claims, by showing that 'all necessity, without exception, is grounded in
a transcendental condition' (CPRA 106). This condition is 'transcendental
apperception' or the unified, 'pure original unchangeable consciousness'
299
NEEDS
(A 107) which underwrites the organization of experience in terms of

categories.
Problems with the relationship between necessity and causality are al
ready manifest in the third antinomy of CPR which opposes the causalities
of nature and freedom. Tue necessity of natural causality seems to imply
a denial of freedom, or free causality, which has serious implications for
Kant's practical philosophy. His resolution of the antinomy consists in
distinguishing between the necessity of natural and of free causality. The
causality of freedom has its own necessity which becomes evident in a
comparison of the practical imperatives. The hypothetical imperatives which
issue in the rules of sk.ill and the counsels of prudence possess a necessity
which concerns the means necessary to achieve certain ends. The categori
cal imperative, on the other band, has an absolute necessity which follows
from the unconditional character of the moral law.
needs [Bedüifnisse] see also INCLlNATIONS, INTEREST, WILL

In GMM Kant relates needs to inclinations, seeing both as arising from the
'dependence of the faculty of desire on sensations' (p. 413, p. 24). On this
occasion he regards inclination as 'indicating' a need, while on another
he sees needs as 'founded on' inclination (p. 428, p. 35). There is prob
ably little at stake in any debate about which is to be given priority.
negation see also DETERMINATION, LlMITATION, NOTHING

In NM Kant distinguishes between two senses of negation, namely, priva
tion and lack. The former is the consequence of a 'real opposition' in
which a 'ground of positing' is opposed and cancelled by another ground,
while the latter is the consequence of the lack of a positive ground (p.
178, p. 217). The privative view of negation arises from a real opposition
of two grounds which cancel each other out. The view of negation as lack
arises from logical negation according to the principle of contradiction, in
which opposed predicates cannot be present in the same subject. In CPR
the view of logical negation as signalling lack remains intact, while priva
tive negation is given a far broader field of application. Kant argues that
concepts of negation are derived from reality, and moves from this to
claiming that they are 'nothing but limitations' of reality. From this he
infers that limitation must be 'based on the unlimited' or the ideal of an
ens realissimum (CPR A 575/B 603), by which he means that the determi
nation of limited objects can only be accomplished by means of the nega
tion of an unlimited, but also unknowable reality.
nothing see also BEING, DETERMINATION, EXISTENCE, LIMITATION, NEGATION

In NM Kant distinguishes between the nothing issuing from logical nega
tion according to the principle of contradiction and that produced by real
300
NOUMENON
opposition. The first arises when contradictory predicates are affirmed of

the same subject, such as a body 'both in motion and also, in the very
same sense, not in motion'. The first nothing is described as a 'negative
nothing which cannot be represented' (NM p. 171, p. 211). In the second
nothing, the two predicates, such as 'the motive force of a body in one
direction and an equal tendency of the same body in an opposite direc
tion' (p. 172, p. 211) do not logically contradict each other, but cancel
each other out and issue in a representable nothing or the state of 'rest'.
Kant illustrates the latter form of nothing as the sum of positive and
negative numbers in which the cancellation of opposed predicates pro
duces the sum '= O'. This notion of nothing and the model of real nega
tion which underlies it later emerged in CPR in the view of negation as
determination.
In CPR Kant includes the two concepts of nothing in his typology of
nothing at the end of the 'Amphiboly of the Concepts of Reflection'. The
concepts of reflection are basic distinctions necessary for the orientation
of categorical judgement, and by way of an apparent afterthought Kant
looks at the most fundamental distinction which consists in whether the
object in general of judgement is 'something or nothing'. He follows the
distinction between something and nothing through the table of the cat
egories, showing that the contrary of the object of the quantitative catego
ries of all, many and one is 'none', an ens rationis or 'empty concept
without an object' (CPR A 290/B 347). The contrary to the object in
general of the categories of quality is 'nothing' - nihil privatum - or 'a
concept of the absence of an object'. The contrary of the object in general
of the categories of relation is absence of substance or 'the merely formal
condition of an object (as appearance)' namely pure space and time
abstracted from the objects in them as 'ens imagi,narium'. Finally, the
contrary of the object in general of the categories of modality is a logically
self-contradictory object, or the nihil negativum - the logical nothing dis
cussed in NM. Kant observes that the ens rationis of quantity is not possible
since it is only an, albeit logically consistent, fiction; the nihil negativum of
modality is not possible since its concept cancels itself. This leaves the nihil
privatum of quality and the ens imagi,narium of quality as determinate
negations which, while themselves not real, are necessary for determina
tion of the real.
notion see CATEGORIES, REPRESENTATION
noumenon see also APPEARANCE, ARCHETWE, INTEWGIBLE WORLD, PHENOMENON,

SENSE, SENSIBILITY, THING IN ITSELF
In 1D (§§3, 7) and P (§32) Kant refers to the distinction between phenom
ena and noumena as one of the oldest and noblest achievements of ancient
301
NOUMENON
philosophy. In P it is clear that he is referring to Plato's distinction between

the apparent world of sensible phenomena and the 'real' intelligible world
of ideas. In ID Kant criticizes the 'illustrious Wolff' for abolishing this dis
tinction by proposing a continuum between the clear ideas of the intellect
and the confused ideas of sensibility. This has been to the great detriment
of philosophy, and Kant accordingly re-states the distinction; but his re
statement is very far from the classical distinction between the real world
of ideas and the phenomenal world of sensibility.
The most salient feature of noumena is that they are not objects of
intuition but problems 'unavoidably bound up with the limitation of our
sensibility', namely 'whether there may not be objects' for a 'quite .differ
ent intuition and a quite different understanding from ours' (CPR A 287/
B 344). This question, and its corollary of whether there can be a sum
total of noumena or an intelligible world, is declared by Kant a problem
incapable of solution, whether by proof or disproof. In the light of this
Kant outlines illegitimate and legitimate uses of the noumena.
The fundamental illegitimate use of noumena is to attribute objectivity
to them, to move from 'a mode of determining the object by thought
alone - a merely logical form without content' to what 'seems to us to be
a mode in which the object exists in itself (noumenon) without regard to
intuition' (CPR A 289/B 345). Kant identifies two forms of illegitimate
objectification or 'positive use' of the noumena in theoretical reason. The
first is the transcendent use of the pure concepts of the understanding
such as substance, power, action, reality, causality, as if they were either
noumena themselves (P §45) or at least applicable to noumena (P §33).
The second form arises from reason representing 'objects of experience
in a series so extended that no experience can grasp it' and thus seeking
'beyond experience noumena to which it can attach that chain' (P §45).
These are the transcendental ideas of God, the world and the soul analyzed
in the 'Transcendental Dialectic' of CPR.
In theoretical reason noumena may be permitted a negative use in
which they are accorded the title 'of an unknown something' (CPR A
256/B 311) or used to 'mark the limits of our sensible knowledge and to
leave open a space which we can fill neither through possible experience
nor through pure understanding' (A 289/B 345). Their main negative use
consists in reminding us of the limits to the categories, that they are not
appropriately applied to non-sensible objects (A 287/B 343), while yet
ensuring that 'a place remains open for other and different objects; and
consequently that these latter must not be absolutely denied' (A 288/
B 344). The latter proviso leaves open the option of conceiving of noumenal
objects or extensions of the concepts of understanding beyond intuition,
an option Kant takes up in the notion of the noumenal cause employed
302
NUMBER
in the solution of the antinomies. There is causality in its 'empirical char

acter' restricted to appearances, and causality in its intelligible character
- causa noumenon - of freedom: the same subject can be determined in
one aspect, but free in the other (see WP p. 291, pp. 118-19). This
noumenal application of the category of causality and the noumenal object
of freedom marks a point of transition between Kant's theoretical and
practical philosophy. In CPrR Kant reiterates that while positive knowl
edge of noumena was denied theoretical reason, he had nevertheless shown
'the possibility- indeed, the necessity- of thinking of them' with particu
lar respect to freedom. He adds that, for practical reason, the 'moral law'
is inexplicable in theoretical terms but points to 'a pure intelligible world'
and furthermore 'defines it positively and enables us to know something
of it, namely, a law' (CPrR p. 43, p. 44).
number see MATHEMATICS
303
o
object [ Ding, Objekt, Gegenstand ] see also APPEARANCE, BEING, EXISTENCE, NOTHING,
-
THING IN-ITSELF, TRANSCENDENTAL OBJECT
Kant s concept of an object is extremely subtle , although its nuances are
often lost in the indiscriminate and unsystematic translation of his terms
Ding, Gegenstand , and Objekt. At the most general level in his practical
philosophy, Kant follows the distinction in Roman law between persons
and things (see Justinian s Institutes, books 1 and 2 ) . A person is a subject
whose actions can be imputed to him’ while a thing is that to which noth ¬
ing can be imputed’; the former is specified as a subject in possession of

freedom and spontaneity, able to act according to principles, while the
latter is without freedom and spontaneity. A human being acting in
response to inclinations is a thing, as is one used simply as a means to
another’s ends.
The thing is distinguished from the person in terms of its passivity and
lack of autonomous, free agency, and these are features which broadly
determine the character of the thing or object in theoretical philosophy.
Yet while the thing is largely passive in Kant’ s account of experience, he
is careful to distinguish between various ways in which things and objects
stand against the spontaneous syntheses of the human understanding.
These different modes of thinghood may be identified by the different
German words Kant uses for them - Ding, Gegenstand, Objekt - and the
contexts in which they appear.
Ding is the term Kant uses least frequently in the critical philosophy, a
fact which may be explained by his attempt to distinguish the critical
philosophy from the dogmatic metaphysics of the Wolffian school. The
term Ding was used by Wolff and his school to determine metaphysical
thinghood; it designates everything which is possible, even if it is not
actual. The Wolffians rarely if ever used the terms Objekt and Gegenstand
which Kant preferred. In CPR accordingly, Ding appears in contexts con¬
cerned with metaphysical thinghood, as in the discussion of transcenden¬
tal affirmation and negation (A 574/ B 603) . Here Kant argues first that
transcendental affirmation establishes reality, and that only through it can
304
OBJECT
objects be considered to possess thinghood, or that 'Gegenstände etwas (Dinge)

sind'. Transcendental affirmation also establishes the possibility of nega
tion, since 'All concepts of negations are derivative' (A 575/B 603), and,
what is more, the possibility of all limitation, since Kant regards limitation
as a form of negation. Thus he argues that we require a general sense or
'ideal' of thinghood in general, or omnitudo realitas, in order to perceive
determinate, limited objects. He gives the concept of this undetermined
thinghood the name 'thing-in-itself', using the term Ding an sich, as op
posed to Gegenstand or Objekt an sich.
Kant underlines the distinction between Ding and Gegenstand in the
postulates of empirical thought. There he distinguishes between the
knowledge of a determined existence (Dasein) which can only be known
as an appearance or 'the existence of effects from given causes in accord
ance with laws of causality' (CPR A 227/B 279), from the undetermined
'existence of things (substances) [Dasein der Dinge (Substanzen)]' (A 227/
B 279) which cannot be known. Once again, Ding is synonymous with
metaphysical substance, and is distinguished from the 'condition [of
things] ...which we can only know from other conditions given in per
ception, in accordance with empirical laws of causality' (A 227/B 280).
With the latter Kant's focus on the concept of the thing or object shifts
from Ding to Gegenstand and Objekt.
Kant's distinction between Gegenstand and Objekt is crucial to his tran
scendental philosophy, although never explicitly thematized and wholly
obliterated in Kemp Smith's translation of CPR. lt involves the axiomatic
claim that 'the conditions for the possibility of experience in general are
likewise conditions of the possibility of objects [Gegenstände] of experience' (CPR
A 158/B 197), and the complex relationship which this entails between
concept and intuition. Gegenstände are objects of experience or appear
ances which conform to the limits of the understanding and intuition;
they may be appearances in intuition without 'being related to the func
tions of the understanding' (A 89/B 122), or 'objects of consciousness'
which 'are not in any way distinct from their apprehension' (A 190/B
235). When objects [ Gegenstände] of experience are made into objects for
knowledge, they become Objekte. The knowledge of the understanding
'consists in the determinate relation of given representations to an object
[Objekt]' with Objekt described as 'that in the concept of which the manifold
of a given intuition is united' (B 137). The 'given intuition' or Gegenstand
is thus made into an Objekt under the condition of the unity of apperception.
Kant's various accounts of the object may, at risk of underestimating
their internal differences, be organized in terms of a consistent account
of the object. A specific Objekt of knowledge knowable through the con
cepts of the understanding requires an object of experience or Gegenstand.
305
OBJECTIVE
For there to be such objects requires that there be something rather than
nothing; this latter something or thinghood - Ding - is unknowable, but
discussed in terms of the metaphysical Ding an sich or substance. This
reading of the Kantian object stresses the affinity of CPR with the onto
logical tradition which Kant hinted at in CPR A 247/B 303. As Kant noted
in MM, 'teachers of ontology' begin with concepts of 'something and noth
ing but forget that this distinction is already a division of the concept of
'object in general' (p. 218, p. 46). He thus begins with object in general
or Ding which is divided into something and nothing by transcendental
affirmation and negation. The Ding is then further specified as an object
of experience - Gegenstand - and then finally as an object for knowledge
- Objekt- thus producing a critically revised version of traditional ontology.
objective see SUBJECTIVE
obligation [ Verbindlichkeit] see also CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, COMMAND, DUTY,

IMPERATIVE, JURISPRUDENCE, LAW, OUGHT
In GMM Kant defines obligation as the 'dependence of a will which is not
absolutely good upon the principle of autonomy' and specifies 'the objec
tive necessity of an action from obligation' as duty (p. 439, p. 44). Here
obligation denotes the dependent condition of the will while duty refers
to the necessity of acting according to obligation. This is confirmed by
CPrR where obligation is defined as the general dependence of the hu
man will upon the moral law, and duty as the 'constraint to an action'
which follows from it (p. 32, p. 32). In MM Kant maintains this general
view of obligation and duty alongside an extension of the concept of
obligation to include rights. With respect to the broader definition, obli
gation stands as the general 'necessity of a free action under a categorical
imperative' while duty is 'that action to which someone is bound'. Kant
concludes from this that, while there is only one duty to perform an
action, there are several possible forms of obligation (MM p. 222, p. 49)
but that duty and obligation cannot conflict, since both are necessary (p.
224, p. 50). Obligation informs not only duty but also rights, since the
latter will be explicated by Kant in terms of 'the capacity for putting others
under obligation' (p. 239, p. 64).
Kant's discussion of the relationship between obligation and rights is
couched overwhelmingly in terms of private right, or obligations of indi
viduals to each other, and rarely extends to political obligation. He men
tions the latter in MM when discussing the obligation of the head of state
to the laws of the sovereign body, but this is largely an aside (p. 317, p.
128). The reason for this emphasis on private rather than political obliga
tion may be gathered from Kant's review of the Wolffian Hufeland's
306
ONTOLOGY
Grundsatz der Naturrechts ('Basis of Natural Rights') of 1786. Kant criticizes

Hufeland for preferring, in Wolffian fashion, the principle of perfecting
human beings, if necessary through force, over that of respecting the
rights and obligations derived from the form of free will.Kant then wished
to base political obligation in the rights of individuals against each other,
and by extension, against the state, and to derive these rights from a
fundamental obligation to obey the moral law. With this argument he
undermined the Wolffian position, which derived individual rights and
obligations from the state's fundamental obligation to promote the gen
eral welfare.
ontological proof of the existence of God see GOD, THEOLOGY
ontology A neologism coined in the seventeenth century, ontology was

originally used to describe the 'general metaphysics' which preceded the
'special metaphysics' of cosmology, psychology and theology. lt was con
cerned, in the words of Wolff (1719), with the 'First Principles of Knowl
edge and of Things in General' and prepared the ground for the knowledge
of such particular things as the world, the soul and God. For Baumgarten,
in his influential Wolffian Metaphysica (1739), ontology was the 'science of
the predicates of things in general' (§4). For most of his professional life
Kant lectured on metaphysics according to Baumgarten's text, although
for didactic purposes he did not follow Baumgarten's order of exposition by
beginning with ontology (overwhelmingly the largest part ofBaumgarten's
metaphysics).As he explained in his Announcement ofthe Organisation ofhis
Lectures ...for 1765-6, his lectures on metaphysics begin with empirical
psychology, proceed to cosmology and only then arrive at ontology and,
after it, rational psychology and theology (p. 309, p. 295).
The concern with ontology in the lectures on metaphysics ensured that
ontological concerns ranked high on Kant's critical agenda. Indeed, the
architecture of CPR critically shadows that of Wolffian metaphysics, with
the three sections of special metaphysics considered in the 'Transcenden
tal Dialectic' and ontology in the 'Transcendental Analytic'. Kant explic
itly refers to the 'mere analytic of the understanding' taking the place of
'the proud name of an Ontology that presumptuously claims to supply, in
systematic doctrinal form, synthetic a priori knowledge of things in gen
eral' (CPR A 247/B 303). By this he means that the principles of transcen
dental analytic are 'merely rules for the exposition of appearances', and
is concerned not with things in general, but only with objects of experi
ence. In subsequent writings Kant simply referred to the transcendental
analytic as ontology; thus in WP ontology is described as 'the science that
comprises a system of all concepts and principles of the understanding,
307
OPINION
but only insofar as these extend to objects given by the senses and can,
therefore, be justified by experience' (WP p. 260, p. 53) or as containing
'the elements of a priori human cognition, both concepts and fundamen
tal principles' (p. 315, p. 161).
The ontological hinterground to the 'Transcendental Analytic' of CPR
was rediscovered in the twentieth century by German scholars such as
Heimsoeth (1956) and Heidegger (1929). Their work recovered aspects
ofKant's thought which had been lost under the epistemological interpre
tations of late-nineteenth-century neo-Kantians. One example is the mani
fold ways in which Kant spoke of the 'thing' or object. His distinctions
between Ding, Objekt and Gegenstand were lost in the epistemological read
ings of the neo-Kantians, and are almost imperceptible in a neo-Kantian
translation such as Kemp Smith's. They could be recognized and given
their proper significance in readings sensitive to the ontological background
to the critical philosophy. The ontological readings ofKant have enhanced
the appreciation of Kant's place in the history of philosophy, as well as
deepened our understanding of the relationship between the various parts
of his philosophy.
opinion [doxa, opinio, Meinung] see also FAITH, HOLDING-TO-BE-TRUE, ILLUSION,

KNOWLEDGE, TRUTH
Classically, opinion is opposed to truth, and is situated within a further
series of oppositions such as becoming-being, knowledge-sensation. In
Parmenides, opinion (doxa) is confined to the sensation (aisthesis) of the
realm of becoming, while knowing ( noesis) concems itself with the knowl
edge of the unchangeable realm of being. In the Republic Plato develops
a more intemally articulated division which situates opinion between the
knowing of the true idea and the ignorance of the unreal (Plato, 1961,
Rep. 478). While opinion remains confined to sensible things, it is also
said to include common knowledge. Later in the Republic Plato further
divides opinion into 'belief' and 'picture thinking', underlining the rela
tionship between opinion, illusion and common knowledge.
On many occasions Kant maintains the opposition between opinion and
truth, as in the Preface to CPR where he distinguishes between opinion
and certainty. Most consistently, however, in CPR (A 822/B 850ff), CJ
(§91) and L (pp. 570-6) he implicitly follows Plato's tripartite schema by
contrasting opinion with truth and belief as one of the three forms in which
a judgement may be 'held to be true' (Fürwahrhalten). The three forms are
distinguished according to degree of conviction, which is in turn divided
in terms of 'subjective sufficiency' or 'conviction (for myself)' and 'objective
sufficiency' or 'certainty (for everyone)' (CPR A 822/B 850). Knowledge,
or holding a judgement to be true, is sufficient both subjectively and
308
OPUS POSTUMUM
objectively; a judgement of belief is held to be subjectively sufficient, but

objectively insufficient; while holding a judgement of opinion is insuffi
cient both objectively and subjectively.
In CJ the tripartite distinction is extended to the three objects of judge
ment: matters of fact, belief and opinion. Matters of fact 'answer to con
ceptions whose objective reality can be proved', matters of belief to those
which may be 'thought a priori' but 'whose objective reality cannot be
proven in any way' such as the existence of God or the summum bonum
(highest good), while matters of opinion are those 'objects belonging to
the world of sense, but objects of which an empirical knowledge is impos
sible Jor us because the degree of empirical knowledge we possess is as it
is' (CJ §91). Kant's examples of opinionable objects are 'ether' and 'extra
terrestrial life'; and they point to a crucial difference between his and the
classical understanding of opinion. For Kant opinion, while confined to
sensible experience, is not therefore illusory; it is, on the contrary, prob
able, but as knowledge it is yet insufficiently convincing or certain (CPR
A 775/B 803). The provisional status of judgements of opinion is con
firmed in L, where Kant distinguishes the three forms of holding-to-be
true in terms of the modality proper to their judgements: certain
judgements of fact are apodeictic, convincing judgements of belief are
assertoric, while judgements of opinion are problematic. Opinion is a
'preliminary judging', 'a vague awareness of truth' with which we cannot
dispense when making judgements; it is 'that [which] I hold in the con
sciousness of my judgement to be problematic' (L 570-6).
opposition see CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION
optimism see HISTORY, HOPE, THEODICY
opus postumum This title was given to the surviving manuscripts of an

incomplete work-in-progress dating from the 1790s. In letters to Christian
Garve and J.G.C.C. Kiesewetter of 21 September and 19 October 1798
respectively, Kant describes his efforts to produce a work which will settle
'the unpaid bill of my uncompleted philosophy' by filling the 'gap' which
'remains in the critical philosophy' (PC pp. 251,252). He gives this project
the working title 'Transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural
science to physics' but the state of his concentration and health in the
final years of his life prevented him from seeing the work to the press.
After a vexed editorial history an imperfect version of the manuscript was
first published in 1882, with the first (incomplete) English translation
appearing in 1993, almost two centuries after it was written.
309
ORGANON
The contents of OP challenge many received ideas about the critical

philosophy, above all the claim that it was completed with the publication
of the third critique (CJ). The work also challenges the conventional
wisdom conceming the break between critical and pre-critical phases in
Kant's authorship, since in it many pre-critical themes, notably that of
positing, retum to prominence. Broadly speaking, the content of OP moves
from a number of reflections on the problems of attractive and repulsive
force to a redefinition of the self-positing subject and finally to a re
statement of the system of transcendental philosophy itself.
The first series of problems discussed in OP concem the transition from
the science of nature considered systematically as 'the moveable in space
(matter) under laws of motion, according to concepts a priori' (OP p.
524, p. 36) in MF to 'physics' or nature considered according to 'empirical
principles'. The transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural
science to physics requires a number of 'intermediate concepts' (p. 476,
p. 40) which empirically specify the operation of the forces of attraction
and repulsion. However the search for these concepts forced Kant to
reconsider such basic themes as space, time, motion and free-will, and
following these, to reconsider the nature of the thinking and willing sub
ject. The renewed discussion of the subject led Kant to re-introduce the
pre-critical themes of positing and self-affection, and to move from these
to a reconsideration of the place of humanity between God and world.
Thus from a concem with identifying the 'intermediate concepts' of a
transition from MF to physics, the mansucript moves to a re-appraisal of
the extent and the meaning of transcendental philosophy. Kant accord
ingly notes that the transitions at stake are not only those from MF to
physics, but also from 'physics to transcendental philosophy' and from
'transcendental philosophy to the system of nature and freedom'; these
transitions are concluded in 'the universal connection of the living forces
of all things in reciprocal relation: God and the world' (p. 18, p. 224).
When read from the standpoint of OP, the development and the out
come of Kant's philosophizing is cast in an unfamiliar and, for some,
disturbing light. Perhaps for this reason the late manuscripts have been
regarded as the product of Kant's dotage rather than a legitimate devel
opment and deepening of the critical philosophy. There are certainly very
few readings of Kant's word which depart from OP (with the exception of
Lehmann, 1969), which is unfortunate since the text may potentially clarify
many of the breaks and points of continuity not only between the critical
and pre-critical philosophy but also between the critical philosophy and its
successors.
organon see CANON
310
ORIGIN
orientation see also CANON, COMMON SENSE, CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION, INCONGRU

ENT COUNTERPARTS, JUDGEMENT
Kant's writings are replete with metaphors of orientation drawn from
navigation and cartography, but the concept signifies for him far more
than a convenient figure of speech. If the critical philosophy is read as an
Epicurean canon for distinguishing between correct and incorrect theo
retical, moral and aesthetic judgements, then Kant's entire philosophy
may be read as an exercise in the orientation of judgement. The notion
of orientation is used in theoretical philosophy to pass judgement on the
speculative use of reason with respect to the supersensible. In L, orientation
is described as the use of the sensus communis as a 'touchstone for discov
ering the mistakes of the artificial use of the understanding' (L p. 563).
In the essay 'What is Orientation in Thinking?' (1786), Kant draws an
analogy between orientation in space by means of the feit difference
between left and right and orientation in the supersensible realm by the
'feeling of a need which is inherent in reason itself' (WO p. 136, p. 240).
lt is possible to be oriented in thought by the need of reason by recogniz
ing the 'subjective ground for presupposing and accepting something which
reason cannot presume to know on objective grounds' (p. 137, pp. 240-
1). This orientation recognizes the value of the ideas of reason as regula
tive principles, while denying that they correspond to objects. Although
Kant focuses in this essay on the relationship between the needs of reason
and the concepts of the understanding, the notion of orientation is also
central to the relationship between sensibility and the understanding de
termined by the 'transcendental topic' discussed in CPR's 'Concepts of
Reflection'. lt is also evident in the account of testing maxims for their
suitability as principles of moral action in the practical philosophy.
origin [ Ursprung] see also ACQUISITION, APPERCEPTION, EVIL, GENIUS, '1 THINK',
PURE, SPONTANEI1Y
Kant defines origin in RL as 'the derivation of an effect from a first cause'
and distinguishes between origin in reason and origin in time. The former
is concerned with the mere existence of an effect, the latter with its occur
rence 'as an event [related] to its first cause in time' (RL p. 39, p. 35). On
the basis of this distinction Kant separates the rational origin of evil in
human freedom from the temporal origin of evil acts. In CPR Kant uses
the notion of rational origin to distinguish the 'original' ( ursprunglich) or
its synonym 'pure apperception' from 'empirical apperception'. The
'original synthetic unity of apperception' is produced in an act of sponta
neity or 'I think' which, while it 'must be capable of accompanying all
other representations ... cannot itself be accompanied by any further
representation' (CPR B 132). The 'I think' is a 'rational origin' or an
311
ORIGINAL SIN
effect which accompanies all experience, but one whose cause cannot be
located in terms of experience. Origin thus serves as an important link
between the emphasis on spontaneity informing the account of experi
ence in theoretical philosophy, and the emphasis on freedom and auto
nomy in the practical philosophy. lt was as such that it became prominent
in Marburg neo-Kantianism towards the end of the nineteenth century,
particularly in Hermann Cohen's influential interpretations ofKant (1871,
1902).
original sin see EVIL, FREEDOM, GOD, THEOLOGY
originality see GENIUS, IMAGINATION, IMITATION
ought [Sollen] see COMMAND, IMPERATIVE, OBLIGATION, ROUSSEAU
outer see CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION, INNER/OUTER
outer sense see APPERCEPTION, INNER SENSE, INTUITION, SENSE, SENSIBILITY, SPACE
312
p
pain see PLEASURE
paralogism see also GEMUT, I , I THINK , IDENTITY, INFERENCE, PERSON , PSYCHOLOGY,

SUBJECT
In the Poetics Aristotle defined paralogism as falsely inferring the truth of
an antecedent from the truth of a consequent premise: Whenever, if A is
or happens, a consequent B is or happens, men s notion is that if the B
is, the A also is - but that is a false conclusion’ (Aristode, 1941, 1460a, 21) .
Extending this, Kant defines a logical paralogism as a syllogism which is
fallacious in form , be its content what it may’ and a transcendental paralogism
as one in which there is a transcendental ground, constraining us to draw
a formally invalid conclusion’ ( CPR A 341/ B 399 ) . The psychological
paralogisms of the transcendental dialectic exemplify the latter. In them
Kant shows how the transcendental ground of thought, the ‘I think’ (Ar¬
istotle’ s ‘consequent B’ ) is the basis for inferences concerning the substan ¬
tiality, simplicity, identity and relations of the soul or thinking substance
( ‘antecedent A’ ) . Kant argues that the inference from the formal condi ¬
tion of thought to a substance of thought is paralogistic and gives rise to

the dialectical ideas of rational psychology.
part see ANTINOMY, CONTINUITY, DIVISIBILITY, MONAD, SIMPLICITY
passion [ Leidenschaft] see also AFFECT, EVIL, FREEDOM, INCLINATION, SEX

Kant describes the passions as the incurable ‘cancerous sores for pure
practical reason’ which ‘presuppose a maxim of the subject, namely, to act
according to a purpose prescribed . . . by the inclination’ (A §181) . In RL
and A he presents a genealogy of the affects which describes how the
passions come into existence. He begins with the propensity { Hang) for a
particular delight driven by instinct ( RL p. 28, p. 24) which ‘precedes the
representation of its object’ (A §80) ; when the propensity has been in¬
dulged it ‘arouses in the subject an inclination to it’ ( RL p. 28, p. 24) .
Passion follows the development of an inclination as the renunciation of
313
PEACE
'mastery over oneself' (ibid.) and the elevation of the object of inclination
to the status of the object of a maxim of the will. Passions are thus distin
guished from affects, which are quickly aroused and spent, since they are
'lasting inclinations' on which the mind has formed principles. When the
object of a passion is contrary to the law, the adoption of it into a maxim
for the will is evil, and results in vice. Kant further distinguishes in A
between innate passions of 'natural inclination' and acquired passions
'arising from the culture of mankind'. The first variety includes the 'burn
ing passions' for freedom and sex, while the second includes such 'cold
passions' as ambition, lust for power and avarice (A §81).
peace [Friede] see also FEDERATION OF STATES, POLITICAL WRITINGS, WAR

In MM Kant described perpetual peace as the 'highest political good' and
an idea of practical reason towards which 'we must act as if it is something
real, though perhaps it is not' (MM p. 354, p. 160). lt is defined in both
MM and PP as an 'end to hostilities', whether between human beings in
the state of nature, or between states in a state of war. Although it is to
be achieved 'by gradual reform in accordance with firm principles' (MM
p. 355, p. 161) it is also, in the words of PP, ' g;uaranteed by no less an
authority than the great artist Nature herself' (PP p. 360, p. 108) which is
revealed in the purposive plan, whether of fate or providence, 'of produc
ing concord among men, even against their will and indeed by means of
their very discord' (ibid.). In PP Kant presents the 'firm principles' he has
in mind in the form of a treaty with two sections and an appendix. In the
first section he presents the 'preliminary articles' of a perpetual peace
between states in the guise of prohibitive laws. These comprise the exclu
sion of secret reservations in treaties between states for future war, the
forbidding of the acquisition by any means of one state by another, the
gradual abolition of standing armies, the forbidding of raising national
debt for the purposes of external affairs, non-interference, and the respect
for the laws of war. In the second section of definitive articles, Kant stipu
lates that every state shall be republican, that the right of nations shall be
based on a federation of free states, and that cosmopolitan right shall be
limited to the conditions of universal hospitality.
perception [Wahrnehmung] see also ANTICIPATIONS OF PERCEPTION, COGNITION,

INTUITION,JUDGEMENT, THOUGHT
Perceptions are variously described in CPR as appearances 'combined
with consciousness' (A 120), 'representations accompanied by sensation'
(B 147) and sensations 'of which we are conscious' (A 225/B 272). They
are described as 'empirical intuitions' or 'that which is immediately rep
resented, through sensation, as actual in space and time' (B 147) as weil
314
PERSON
as 'empirical consciousness' or a 'consciousness in which sensation is to be

found' (A 166/B 207). Thus perceptions partake of both sensation and
consciousness, an ambiguity which assures the possibility of experience by
allowing the distinction between consciousness and sensibility to be both
observed and suspended. For if perceptions were exclusively sensible, then
they could not be ordered by the categories; but if they were exclusively
generated by consciousness, then they could have no relationship to objects
of sense. As a consequence perception also stands in a complex relation
to the forms of intuition, space and time. These 'dwell in us as forms of
our sensible intuition, before any real object, determining our sense
through sensation, has enabled us to represent the object under those
sensible relations'; but in order for them to represent this object they
must themselves 'presuppose perception' (A 373). In this case, even though
they are prior to an object, the forms of intuition nevertheless presuppose
perception or 'the reality of something in space' (A 373).
perfection [Vollkommenheit] This concept was central to the Wolffian phi

losophy against which Kant defined many of his characteristic positions. In
his metaphysics (1719), Wolff defined perfection as the 'harmony of a
manifold' (§152) which may be traced to a common ground (§§153-6).
The entire Wolffian system was organized around the principle of promot
ing perfection, whether perfection of knowledge, self-perfection or social
perfection. From an early stage in his career Kant criticized this principle,
and in the three critiques unequivocally rejects it as a principle of judge
ment. In CPR he argues against the perfection of knowledge on the basis
of the inherent limitations of human knowledge to appearances in space
and time; in GMM and CPrR he rejects moral perfection as a heteronomous
principle of practical judgement; while in CJ he opposes perfection and
the agreeable as equally unsuitable principles for the aesthetic judgement
of taste. In his late political writings Kant also rejects perfection as a
principle of political judgement, mainly because it puts citizens under the
tutelage of the state, giving it the power to decide for its citizens what for
it will best promote their welfare or perfection.
permanence see ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, IMMORTALlTY, SUBSTANCE
person see a/,so HUMANITY, IDENTITY, PARALOGISM, PSYCHOLOGY, SUBJECT

In the third paralogism of personality in CPR Kant defines a person as
'that which is conscious of the numerical identity of itself at different
times' (A 361). He argues that it is fallacious to infer from the unity of the
thinking subject to the existence of a personality which endures through
time. Within the limits of theoretical philosophy only 'psychological
315
PHENOMENOLOGY
personality' can legitimately be an object of knowledge, namely 'the ca

pacity for being conscious of one's identity in different conditions of one's
existence' (MM p. 223, p. 50). Nevertheless the concept of the person 'is
necessary for practical employment' (CPR A 365). There, personality is the
third and highest of the 'elements in the fixed character and destiny of
man', following animality and humanity. lt is a predisposition to being 'a
rational and at the same time an accountab/,e being' (RL p. 26, p. 21). A
being with reason, argues Kant, would not necessarily determine its will by
merely representing to itself the fitness of its maxims to be moral laws. Yet
an accountable and rational being possesses 'respect for the moral law as
in itself a sufficient incentive of the will' (RL p. 27, p. 23). From the premise
of accountability flow two practical consequences: the first is the practical
postulate of the immortality of the soul (CPrR p. 123, p. 127), the second
that 'a person is subject to no other laws than those he gives to himself '
(MM p. 223, p. 50). Thus in order for a person to be properly accountable
they must be postulated as being both immortal and autonomous.
phenomenology see al,so DYNAMICS, MECHANICS, MODALITY, MOTION, PHORONOMY

'Phenomenology' is the subject of the fourth chapter of Kant's treatment
of natural science in MF. Each of the four chapters considers motion (for
Kant the subject matter of natural science) from the standpoint of one of
the four groups of the table of categories. 'Phoronomy' considers the
quantitative, 'Dynamics' the qualitative, 'Mechanics' the relational, and
'Phenomenology' the modal aspects of motion. In phenomenology 'mat
ter's motion or rest is determined merely with reference to the mode of
representation, or modality, i.e., as an appearance of the extemal senses'
(MF p. 477, p. 15). The chapter presents three propositions which deter
mine the modality of motion for the previous three chapters. The first
maintains that rectilinear motion of matter, as opposed to the opposite
motion of the relative space in which it is situated, is a 'merely possible
predicate' and that as a consequence neither the necessity nor actuality of
phoronomy can be established. The second proposition presents circular
motion of matter in appearance as merely possible (i.e., either it or its
space can be in motion), but holds it, in accordance with the 'complex of
all appearances', to be actually in motion. Kant argues that such motion
'cannot take place without the influence of a continuously acting extemal
moving force' (MF p. 557, p. 123) which proves the actuality of the fofces
of attraction and repulsion, and thus the object of dynamics. The third
proposition maintains that the motion of a body in relation to another
requires the opposite and equal motion of the latter, a requirement which
'follows immediately and inevitably from the concept of the relation of
the moved in space to every other thing thereby moveable' (MF p. 558,
316
PHENOMENON
p. 124) and which entails that the modality of motion in mechanics is

necessary.
Kant took the term phenomenology fromJ.H. Lambert's Neues Organon
(1764) (see Lambert 1988) where it forms one of four sections of an
epistemology dedicated to distinguishing between truth, error and illu
sion. The phenomenology considers the forms of appearance and illusion.
However, in a letter to Lambert dated September 2, accompanying a copy
of 1D, Kant reveals a far broader view of the potential of phenomenology,
describing it in terms which anticipate those he used later to describe the
project of CPR. lt is a 'quite special, though purely negative science', one
'presupposed by metaphysics' in which 'the principles of sensibility, their
validity and their limitations, would be determined, so that these princi
ples could not be confusedly applied to objects of pure reason, as has
heretofore almost always happened.' (PC p. 59) This wide view of phe
nomenology as a propaedeutic to metaphysics persists ostensibly in MF if
not in CPR. lt was taken up by Hegel who described his Phenomenolog;y of
Spirit on the title page as the 'First Part' of the 'System of Science'. The
term was revived by Edmund Husserl at the turn of the twentieth century
to describe a new beginning for philosophy in the analysis of phenomena
(see Husserl, 1913, 1950).
phenomenon see also APPEARANCE, ARCHETIPE, INTELLIGIBLE WORLD, INTUITION,

NOUMENON, SENSIBILITY
Phenomena are distinguished from both noumena and appearances, but
the terms in which Kant couched the distinction changed radically during
his career. In his first work, LF (1747), Kant conventionally employs phe
nomenon in the sense of an external manifestation of an invisible force,
as in the proposition 'motion is only the extemal phenomenon of the
state of the body' (LF §3). While elements of this view persist even into
the critical philosophy, by 1D (1770) the terms of the distinction have
shifted from phenomena being the extemal manifestation of invisible
forces or objects, to them being simply 'objects of sensibility' as opposed
to noumena or intelligible objects which can only be 'cognised through
the intelligence' (ID §3). Kant also intimates a distinction between phe
nomena and appearances, with the term appearance being used to signify
'that which precedes the logical use of the understanding' and phenom
ena the 'objects of experience' which result from the comparison of ap
pearances by the understanding (§5). In this view the 'laws of phenomena'
comprise 'the laws both of experience and generally of all sensitive cog
nition' (§5). These distinction are carried over into CPR, with phenomena
distinguished from noumena in terms of sensible and intelligible worlds
(A 249) and in terms of sensible and intelligible objects (B 306). Similarly,
317
PHILOSOPHY
phenomena are distinguished from appearances in so far as they combine

the laws of sensible and intellectual cognition or, to use the language of
CPR, they are 'Appearances, so far as they are thought as objects accord
ing to the unity of the categories' (A 248).
philosophy see also HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY, METAPHYSICS, SYSTEM

Kant offers several characterizations of philosophy, the most extended
being in CPR, GMM and L.Although his definitions of philosophy are on
the whole formal - concerned with its concept, objects, types, contents
and questions - they are usually accompanied by a reference either to
contemporary or to ancient Greek philosophy.The definitions of philoso
phy developed in CPR at A 838/B 866 are polemically addressed against
the Wolffian concept of philosophy; the definition proposed in GMM
refers to the 'ancient Greek division' of philosophy into physics, ethics
and logic; while that in L is situated according to a general history of
philosophy ranging from the Greeks to the 'age of critique'. Indeed, the
concept of philosophy was intrinsically historical for Kant.For him it rested
on a distinction between (a) philosophy as 'a mere idea of a possible
science, which nowhere exists in concreto', which no one possesses and which
cannot be learnt or even recognized; and (b) philosophizing, or exercis
ing 'the talent of reason, in accordance with its universal principles, on
certain actually existing attempts at philosophy' (CPR A 838/B 866).
With respect to the concept of philosophy, Kant distinguishes in CPR
between the scholastic and the cosmic concepts. The former, which Kant
says has 'hitherto prevailed' and by which he means the dominant Wolffian
conception of philosophy, regards it as 'a system of knowledge which is
sought solely in its character as a science ... [and is] consequently no
more than the logical perfection of knowledge' (CPR A 838/B 866). The
cosmic concept of philosophy is wider and has 'always formed the real
basis of the term "philosophy", especially when it has been as it were
personified and its archetype represented in the ideal philosopher' (A 838/
B 866). lt involves the 'science of the relation of all knowledge to the
essential ends of human reason' (A 839/B 867) or 'that in which everyone
necessarily has an interest'. In the latter concept of philosophy, the phi
losopher is a 'lawgiver of human reason' and his legislation, or 'philoso
phy' has, Kant continues, the two objects of nature and freedom, or 'what
is' and what 'ought to be' (A 840/B 868).
The division of the objects of philosophy into nature and freedom cor
responds to the division of philosophy into physics and ethics which pref
aces GMM, except there they are joined by a third division of logic.Echoes
of this division are discemible in CPR's classification of philosophy in
terms of propaedeutic or 'criticism' 'which investigates the faculty of reason
318
PHILOSOPHY
in respect of all its pure a priori knowledge' and 'metaphysics' or the

system ofpure reason divided into metaphysics ofnature and metaphysics
of morals (A 841/B 869). The metaphysics of nature and morals corre�
spond to the 'speculative' and 'practical' employments of pure reason,
with the former comprising the principles of pure reason 'employed in
the theoretical knowledge of all things', the latter the a priori principles
which 'determine and make necessary all our actions' (A 841/B 869). In
tersecting with this distinction is yet another system ofclassification couched
in terms ofempirical and pure philosophy, the one comprising knowledge
derived from empirical principles, the other knowledge derived from pure
reason; only the latter is philosophy proper. In CPR Kant makes a further,
internal distinction within the metaphysics of nature; he describes this as
metaphysics in a narrow sense, which consists of (a) 'transcendental phi
losophy' which treats of understanding and reason and corresponds to
ontology, and (b) 'physiology of pure reason', which corresponds to na
ture. Immediately after making this distinction, Kant describes the system
of metaphysics in traditional terms as comprising ontology, physiology,
cosmology and theology, with the second including rational physics and
rational psychology.
A further definition ofphilosophy is developed in FI, where philosophy
is distinguished as 'the system of rational knowledge by means of con
cepts' from a critique ofpure reason which 'demarcates and examines the
very idea of the system' (FI p. 195, p. 3). Here the philosophical system
is divided into formal and material domains, with the former (logic)
embracing the 'form of thought in a system of rules' and the latter the
'possibility of rational, conceptual knowledge of thinkable objects' (FI p.
195, p. 3). The latter or 'real' system of philosophy is divided according
to theoretical and practical objects, with theoretical philosophy concerned
with propositions about 'the possibility ofthings and their determinations'
(Fl p. 196, p. 3) and practical philosophy with propositions which 'give
freedom its law' (p. 197, p. 4).
The myriad definitions of philosophy given in the critiques are further
complicated by the definitions of philosophy to be found in L and in the
late essays 'On a Newly Arisen Superior Tone in Philosophy' and the
'Announcement of the Near Conclusion ofa Treaty for External Peace in
Philosophy' (both 1796). The latter continue the project inaugurated in
DS of fencing off philosophy in general, and metaphysics in particular,
from mysticism and sentimental religiosity. Philosophy is prone to the
attentions of the latter because ofwhat is described in CPR as its 'cosmic
concept' or the relation of knowledge to the essential ends of humanity.
The scope of the latter or the 'field of philosophy' is determined in L in
terms ofthe four questions: (a) what can I know? (b) what ought I to do?
319
PHORONOMY
(c) what may I hope? (d) what is man? The first three questions recur in
CPR as those of the 'interests of reason', but in L they together form the
field of philosophy covered by metaphysics, morals, religion and anthro
pology respectively.
Kant's definition of philosophy is undogmatic and shifting. This is due
to his historical view of philosophy as the outcome of philosophizing.
Since philosophizing cannot come to end, even in the critical philosophy,
the definition of philosophy remains open and subject to current and
future philosophizing. The questions which determine the field of phi
losophy are inseparable from the interests of human reason, and cannot
ever be given a dogmatic answer. For this reason, it is impossible to give
a definition of the philosophy which would answer these questions: such
a philosophy would mark the end of philosophizing and the death of
philosophy itself.
phoronomy see also DYNAMICS, MATTER, MECHANICS, MOTION, PHENOMENOLOGY

In MF Kant classifies the science of matter and motion according to the
four headings of the table of categories. Dynamics, mechanics and phe
nomenology correspond respectively to quality, relation and modality, while
phoronomy corresponds to quantity. As such it concems only the quanti
tative aspects of the motion of matter, and is discussed in MF (pp. 480-
95, pp. 18-39).
pleasure see also AESTHETICS, BEAUlY, BODY, DELIGHT, FEELING, LIFE, SEX
As early as NM Kant claimed that pleasure and displeasure (pain) were
complementary: both were expressions of the same 'feeling of pleasure
and pain'. In A he describes them as 'opposed to each other, not like gain
and deficiency (+ or 0), but like gain and loss (= and -), that is, one is not
contrasted with the other merely as an opposite ( contradictorie, sive logi,ce
oppositum), but rather as a counterpart ( contrarie sive realiter oppositum)' (A
§60). Kant maintains that beyond claiming that pleasure and displeasure
are counterparts of the same subjective feeling, they 'cannot be explained
more clearly in themselves; instead, one can only specify what results they
have in certain circumstances' (MM p. 212, p. 41). One of these results
follows from whether the feeling incites the subject to abandon or main
tain a particular state; another consists in the tendency of pleasure to
enhance the feeling of life, and of displeasure or pain to hinder it (A
§60). Both however are necessary to each other: without the check of
displeasure, the steady advancement of vitality accompanying pleasure
would result in a 'quick death'.
In A Kant distinguishes between sensuous and intellectual pleasure and
320
POLEMIC
displeasure, subdividing the former according to whether the pleasure/

displeasure is caused by sensation or imagination, and the latter according
to whether or not its cause lies in representable concepts or ideas. The
pleasures/displeasures of sensation include food, sex and drugs (tobacco
and alcohol); those of imagination the partly intellectual pleasures of taste
and beauty. The intellectual pleasures/displeasures are discussed more
fully in MM. There the distinction is framed in terms of whether the
pleasure/displeasure precedes or succeeds a determination of desire. If
it precedes desire and involves an object, then it is sensuous or a 'pleasure
of inclination'; if it precedes desire but does not involve an object, it is a
contemplative pleasure of taste; if it is preceded by a determination of
desire, it is an intellectual pleasure occasioned by an 'interest of reason'
(MM p. 212, p. 41)
Kant follows an analogous schema in CJ, his great treatise on pleasure.
Here the pleasures of taste, which seemed an afterthought in the above
taxonomies, are called, in association with judgement, to mediate between
the theoretical and the practical faculties. The feeling of pleasure/dis
pleasure which 'denotes nothing in the object, but is a feeling which the
subject has of itself and of the manner in which it is affected by the
representation' (CJ §1) quickly expands to underlie both the theoretical
and practical faculties. A manifestation of this extended definition of
pleasure is the new distinction between pleasure/displeasure and delight.
The schema of sensuous, imaginative and intellectual pleasures is now
translated into the delights of the agreeable, the good and the beautiful.
Delight is a sensation of pleasure, its manifestation at the level of the
judgement of taste, with analogues in practical and theoretical judgement.
Pleasure accompanies practical judgement insofar as 'The attainment of
every aim is coupled with a feeling of pleasure', and theoretical judge
ment, 'by reason of the most ordinary experience being impossible with
out it [pleasure] '; he adds that it 'has become gradually fused with simple
cognition and no longer arrests particular attention' (CJ §VI). Pleasure/
displeasure is well on its way to becoming identified with vital force - or
the feeling of life - and even the mind as such, 'For, of itself alone, the
mind [Gemüt] is all life (the life principle itself), and hindrance or fur
therance has to be sought outside it, and yet within human beings them
selves, consequently in connection with their body' (CJ §29). The extremely
broad implications ofKant's philosophy of pleasure/displeasure went largely
unremarked until the twentieth century, when, under the impulse of cri
tiques of Kantian formalism in ethics and aesthetics, a more sensitive
interpretation of bis later thought began slowly to emerge.
polemic see DISPUTE
321
POLITICAL WRITINGS
political writings see also CONSTITUTION, COSMOPOLITANISM, CULTURE, FEDERAL

ISM, HISTORY, SOCIABILITY, STATE
Kant made many steps towards a political philosophy in the course of his
lectures on geography and anthropology, but it is only with his articles for
the pro-Enlightenment Berlinische Monatsschrift from the mid 1780s that he
began to develop an explicit, public political philosophy. The first texts
which may be included under this heading are IUH and WE of 1784. The
former saw the attainment of a 'civil society which can administer justice
universally', that is, to combine 'freedom under external laws' with 'irre
sistible force' (p. 22, p. 45) as the most difficult and last problem to be
solved by the human race. lt announces what was to become the main
theme of Kant's political philosophy, namely the relationship between a
just civil constitution and international peace. In WE Kant calls for the
widest possible arena of political debate, contributing to the articulation
of a civil public sphere for the discussion of political matters.
The pattern established in these pre-revolutionary texts persists in those
written after the French Revolution (1789), which refer with critical en
thusiasm to events in France. The first of these is CJ, regarded by com
mentators such as Arendt (1989) and Lyotard (1991) as containing in its
account of reflective judgement the core ofKant's political philosophy. CJ
also contains interesting comments in Part II on the constitution of state
and civil society (§83), as well as reflections on the French Revolution
(§65). Further contributions to an explicit political philosophy are also
made in TP (1793), and above all in PP (1795). The latter is Kant's most
considered statement of the republican nature of a just civil constitution,
and its contribution to world peace; if read alongside the political sections
of MM (1797) it offers a good insight into the liberal but anti-democratic
character of Kant's political philosophy.
The sources for Kant's political philosophy should not, however, be
restricted to his political essays. Political insights inform not only GMM
and CPrR but also CPR; they are also evident in Kant's interventions into
institutional politics, such as those of the university in CF and those of the
church in RL. The implications of the ostensibly political texts for the
interpretation of Kant in general have been drawn out in recent work,
which focuses on what Lyotard has described as the 'fourth critique' of
historico-political reason. This gives a fresh slant not only to Kant's moral
and theoretical philosophy, but also to the politics of critique in general.
possession [possessio, Besitz] see also ACQUISITION, CONTRACT, MARRIAGE, PROP

ERTY, RIGHT
Possession is defined in MM as the 'subjective condition of any possible
use' (p. 245, p. 68) and is divided into 'sensible' and 'intelligible' possession
322
POSTULATE
or possessio phaenomenon and possessio noumenon. The former is possession

by means of holding an extemal object in space and time, while the latter
is 'rightful possession' which is not restricted to the physical holding of an
object. The latter is justified, or given a deduction, according to a postulate
of practical reason that 'it is a duty of Right to act towards others so that
what is extemal (usable) could also become someone's' (a maxim in accord
with the categorical imperative), thus showing that the concept of extemal
possession presupposes intelligible possession (MM p. 252, p. 74). Posses
sion is thus treated as a synthetic a priori judgement which combines the
physical holding of an object with intelligible justification of thus holding
it. Furthermore, by distinguishing between sensible and intelligible posses
sion, Kant is able to resolve the antinomy of possession. This holds as
follows: thesis, it is possible to have something extemal as mine, without
possessing it; antithesis, it is not possible to have something without being
in possession of it. Kant's resolution of the antinomy consists in exposing
the equivocal senses in which possession is used in the thesis and antithesis.
Kant's account of possession in MM is important for illuminating the
metaphor of the possession of concepts in CPR. He refers to this in MM
when he describes how an a priori intuition was held to underlie a given
concept, in order to make a synthetic judgement and thus supplement the
sensible possession of an object in intuition. Possession of concepts is
faced by both the question of fact (quid facti) with reference to sensible
possession, and that of right (quid juris) with reference to intelligible pos
session (CPR A 84/B 116). The justification of the latter requires a deduc
tion both in MM and CPR in order to establish their legal title.
possibility see CATEGORIES
possible experience see EXPERIENCE
postulate [hypothesis, Postulat] see also AXIOMS, DEFINITION, FREEDOM, GOD,

IMMORTALITY, PRINCIPLE
In the Posterior Analytics (1941, 76a, 31-77a, 5) Aristotle introduces postu
lates along with axioms and definitions as the indemonstrable principles
of demonstrative knowledge. Axioms are indemonstrable principles com
mon to all sciences; definitions state the characteristics peculiar to particu
lar sciences; while postulates are statements of fact 'on the being of which
depends the being of the fact inferred' (1941, 76b, 39). The three prin
ciples of knowledge may be illustrated by Euclid's Elements of Geometry, whose
first axiom states the generic truth that 'Things which are equal to the
same thing are also equal to one another', whose first definition defines
the characteristic of the geometrical point as 'that which has no part', and
323
POSTULATE
which postulates that for geometrical objects to exist it must be granted

possible 'to draw a straight line from any point to any point' (see Euclid,
1956).
Kant's use of the postulate remains within Aristotelian orthodoxy, see
ing it as a procedural specification necessary for demonstrative knowledge
of the 'inferred fact'. In L he defines it as 'a practical, immediately certain
proposition or a fundamental proposition which determines a possible
action of which it is presupposed that the manner of executing it is im
mediately certain' (L p. 607). The term is used in theoretical philosophy
to describe the modal principles of the 'postulates of empirical thought'
- the procedural specification of the relation between the understanding
and the synthesis of appearances. Its main application, however, is in the
practical philosophy.
In L Kant refers to 'theoretical postulates for the purpose of practical
reason' and lists them as the existence of God, freedom and the existence
of another world (p. 608). These reappear in CPrR, with 'another world'
replaced by 'immortality', as the three 'postulates of pure practical rea
son'. They are the 'necessary conditions for obedience' of a finite being
to the moral law which determines its will. They must be postulated in
order to establish reverence for the moral law, and the possibility of its
being realized. Immortality must be postulated in order to satisfy 'the
practically necessary condition of a duration adequate to the perfect ful
filment of the moral law'; freedom for the condition of 'independence
from the world of sense and of the capacity of determining man's will by
the law of an intelligible world'; and God for the presupposition of 'the
highest independent good' (CPrR p. 131, p. 136).
Kant also follows Aristotle in regarding the postulates as indemonstrable.
In this way he sustains his critique of attempts to know such beings as God,
the world and the soul in the 'Transcendental Dialectic' of CPR, while
justifying them in CPrR as conditions 'of the possibility of the object of a
will determined by that law' (p. 133, p. 138). In a phrasing parallel to
Aristotle's definition of the postulates cited above, Kant claims that they
are 'postulated through the moral law and for its sake' (p. 131, p. 133).
They are statements on which the existence of the moral law depends, but
which themselves derive their own validity from its existence.
Kant's successors, first Hegel and subsequently Nietzsche, could not
accept the postulates. For them they were, in Aristotle's terms 'illegitimate
hypotheses', with Nietzsche even seeing them as Kant's punishment for
conceiving of the categorical imperative which 'led him astray - back to
"God," "soul," "freedom," and "immortality," like a fox who loses his way
and goes astray back into his cage. Yet it had been his strength and clever
ness that had broken open the cage!' (Nietzsche, 1882, §335).
324
POSTUIATES OF EMPIRICAL KNOWLEDGE
postulates of empirical knowledge [Die Postulaten des empirischen Denkens]

see also CATEGORIES, MODALllY, PHENOMENOLOGY, PRINCIPLES
The postulates ofempirical knowledge are the group ofprinciples serving
as rules for the employment ofthe categories ofmodality. Along with the
'axioms of intuition', 'anticipations of perception' and the 'analogies of
experience', they comprise the 'system of principles ofpure understand
ing' in CPR and are also described in Pas the 'physiological principles'.
Although classed with the analogies as 'dynamic' as opposed to 'math
ematical' principles, the postulates differ from the other three sets of
principles. The latter are responses to the problem of the ways in which
appearances must be related to each other, and find that they are related
quantitatively, qualitatively and relationally. These relations are neither
directly categorical nor empirical, but form the 'conditions ofexperience'
which are also the 'conditions for the objects of experience' of a finite
being with sensible intuition.
The postulates, however, do not govem the relations ofdiscrete appear
ances to each other, but the relation of appearances to the 'faculty of
knowledge'. They ask how appearances are related to a finite being, and
accordingly transform the modal categories of possibility, actuality and
necessity into spatio-temporal principles. The postulates are neither merely
logically significant, 'analytically expressing the form ofthought' (CPR A
219/B 266), nor are they ontological predicates ofbeings such as God (a
'necessary being'). They express the mode or way in which a discrete
experience relates to the conditions ofpossible experience. Furthermore,
as postulates, they possess the formal characteristic ofall Kant's postulates,
which is that they both depend on the 'being' ofthe conditions ofpossible
experience, as well as forming a condition for the 'being' of experience.
Kant transforms the category of possibility into the 'possible', or 'That
which agrees with the formal conditions of experience, that is, with the
conditions of intuition and concepts' (CPR A 218/B 266). A possible
concept is one that does not contravene the formal conditions ofexperi
ence, although this makes no claim that an object corresponding to the
concept actually exists. The category ofactuality is in its turn transformed
into the principle of the actual; an actual concept must indeed observe
the formal conditions of experience (that is, it must be possible), but it
must in addition be 'bound up with the material conditions ofexperience,
that is, with sensation' (A 218/B 266). This does not mean that its object
must be perceived, but that it must accord 'with the analogies of experi
ence, which define all real connection in an experience in general' (A
225/B 272). That is, possible experiences cannot be considered actual
unless they obey the rules ofrelating appearances in terms ofthe perma
nence ofsubstance, the nexus ofcause and effect, and reciprocal action.
325
POWER
Finally, the category of necessity becomes the 'necessary', or 'That which

in its connection with the actual is determined in accordance with universal
conditions of experience' (A 218/B 266). In this case the actual experi
ence is deemed to conform fully with both the formal and material con
ditions of experience (A 227/B 279).
Since the postulates determine the relation of the subject of experience
to its experiences, they are clearly of great significance for debates around
idealism and realism. Indeed, in the second edition of CPR the discussion
of the postulates is interrupted by a digression on the 'Refutation of Ide
alism'. This is to be found between the discussions of the second and third
postulates, and develops into a critique of the 'problematic idealism' of
Descartes and the 'dogmatic idealism' of Berkeley. Unfortunately more
interpretative energy has been expended on the polemical digression than
on the systematic account of the postulates which underlies it.
power [potentia, Gewalt, Macht] see also DRIVE, FORCE, POSSESSION

Power is the term used to translate the German words Macht and Gewalt
and the Latin potentia. The three terms, however, have different meanings
and are used in different contexts. Macht is defined in the 'Analytic of the
Sublime' in CJ as a 'power superior to great hindrances' as possessed by
nature considered in an aesthetic judgement (§28). Nature has might
over us, but no dominion (Gewalt), for dominion is a power 'which is
superior to that which itself possesses might' (§28). When Kant discusses
legitimate political power he inevitably refers to Gewalt, as in CJ §83 when
he refers to a lawful authority as a 'gesetzmässige Gewalt'; however, if the
context is that of rebellion against the state, the power of the state is its
Macht, as in TP, where it is used to refer to the 'legislative power'
('gesetzgebende Macht') which cannot be resisted by rebellious subjects, or
in MM, where in the same paragraph legitimate supreme power is Gewalt
which, when resisted, becomes absolute power - 'Machtvollkommenheit' (MM
p. 372, p. 177). Potentia is yet another sense of power, this time referring
to the physical capacity to use an object; as such it forms the basis of
physical possession or possessio phaenomenon.
practical philosophy/reason see AUTONOMY, CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, CRITIQUE

OF PRACTICAL REASON, GOOD, HETERONOMY, IMPERATIVE, MAXIM, METAPHYSICS OF
MORALS, PHILOSOPHY, REASON
pre-critical writings In a letter to J.H. Tieftrunk dated 13 October 1797,

Kant agreed to a proposal to 'publish a collection of my minor writings'
but with the proviso that 'I would not want you to start the collection with
anything before 1770, that is, my dissertation on the sensible world and
326
PRE-CRITICAL WRITINGS
the intelligible world' (PC p. 239). With this he effectively disowned all
the writings of the 'pre-critical period' with the exception of the last, the
ID. His judgement of his writings between 1746 and 1770, which amount
to 25 published items, has on the whole been tacitly accepted by Kant
scholarship. With a few signal exceptions, these texts have been relatively
neglected, especially in comparison with the interpretative industry sur
rounding the critical texts; many of the pre-critical writings remain
untranslated and terra incognita even for many Kant scholars.
Those interpretations of Kant which have referred to the pre-critical
writings have themselves tended to be selective, scouring the texts for
themes which are later developed in the critical writings, such as 'tran
scendental deduction', 'causality' or �udgement'. This use of the texts
carries with it the danger of restricting their exegesis to the illustration of
a particular interpretative hobby-horse. With the best will in the world,
though, it is difficult to find a framework of classification which would
encompass the diversity of the pre-critical writings. However, there is a set
of recurrent themes, which may be gathered under the general problem
of the condition and possible futures for metaphysics.
For the pre-critical, as indeed for the critical Kant, metaphysics meant
specifically the Wolffian metaphysics in which he had been trained, and
which he spent his entire professional life teaching. Wolff's influential
system of philosophy, in its German and Latin versions, commenced with
a logical propaedeutic, and was followed by a metaphysics and thereafter
an ethics and a politics. The contents of the metaphysics were organized
in terms of a general metaphysics or 'ontology' and a 'special metaphysics'
comprising theology, cosmology and psychology. The object of ontology
was 'being in general', while the objects of theology, cosmology and psy
chology were the being of God, the world and the soul. These divisions
provided the fronts on which Kant pursued his critique of metaphysics,
and inform even his most apparently specific and narrowly defined pre
critical texts.
The concem with the state and future of metaphysics is already evident
in Kant's first published work, Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living
Forces ( 1747). This academic meditation upon contemporary disputes con
ceming the nature of force is informed by a metaphysical agenda. In § 19
Kant concludes the first section on 'The Force of Bodies in General' by
musing that 'Our metaphysics is like many other sciences, in fact, only on
the threshold of properly, well-grounded knowledge; God knows when it
will cross that threshold'. This happens because everyone wants knowl
edge, but is reluctant to make the effort of ensuring that it is well-founded.
Throughout this text Kant alludes to the tension between natural science
and metaphysics, hinting that metaphysics does not come out weil from it.
327
The stage for Kant's engagement with metaphysics is already set in terms
of the concepts of matter, space and time.
lt has been argued that, following LF, Kant did not return to explicit
philosophical themes until 1762, and that the writings between 1747 and
the latter date are largely ofinterest to the history ofscience.These texts,
including reflections on the earth such as 'The Question Whether the
Earth is Aging considered from a Physicalist Point ofView' (1754, see also
texts from 1754 and 1756), on meteorology (1756, 1757), and on cosmology
(UNH), nevertheless represent meditations on such metaphysical issues as
God's role in natural events and the nature of the universe and creation.
They are, furthermore, punctuated by an explicit reflection on metaphysics,
namely the New Elucidation of the First Principl,es of Metaphysical Co1:;rtition
(1755). This text criticizes Wolffian metaphysics, and in particular the
centrality of the principle of contradiction to its account of being and
truth. The argument, prosecuted in three sections, begins with a critique
of the principle of contradiction; proceeds through a discussion of the
theoretical and practical issues of a principle of 'determining ground';
and arrives at two new principles of metaphysical cognition, namely the
principles of succession and co-existence.While these are couched in the
idiom of a metaphysics of substance, they clearly point to Kant's focusing
his renewal of metaphysics upon the issues of time and space, with their
associated problems of motion and causality. These themes were taken up
again in the New Theory of Motion and Rest . .. (1758) where Kant inveighs
against the 'Wolffian treadmill' and argues for the relativity ofjudgements
of motion and rest.
From 1762 Kant's writings become more explicitly focused upon philo
sophical issues, but with the concerns about the conditions and prospects
for metaphysics remaining uppermost. In the False Subtl,ety of the Four Syl
logi,Stic Figures (1762) Kant focuses on the act of judgement, which he
discerns to lie at the heart of the syllogistic figures. Among the various
interesting matters tackled in this remarkably short text are the relationships
between judgement and concepts and between judgement and reflection;
the existence ofa number ofindemonstrable judgements in human knowl
edge, and the distinction between logical and physical differentiation.The
last, which marked a decisive critique ofWolff's principle ofcontradiction,
was developed further in NM and PE, being extended in the latter into a
distinction between the synthetic mathematical method ofphilosophy used
by Wolff and an analytic method recommended by Kant. The previous
concerns of FS in their turn announce a series of more general themes
and problems which Kant continued to work on into the critical period.
Another important departure in FS is the view that the traditional pre
occupation with the forms of the syllogism lies at the root of the 'fate of
328
human understanding' to 'brood over deep matters and fall into bizarre
ideas, or audaciously [to] chase after objects too great for its grasp and
build castles in the air' (p. 57, p. 100). lt is precisely this characteristic of
the syllogistic inferences of reason which Kant will identify in CPR as the
root of the dialectical inferences of special metaphysics. He made a start
at criticizing these in OPA where he refused to treat existence as a predi
cate which could legitimately be predicated of God. The critique of the
syllogism is extended into a general critique of prevailing metaphysics in
DS, where Kant criticizes 'those who build castles in the sky' naming Wolff
and Crusius as such 'dreamers of reason' (p. 342, p. 329). In spite of the
metaphysical enormities perpetrated by Swedenborg which Kant satirizes
in this text, he ends with a profession of love for metaphysics. He claims
that its attraction follows from its two main features, one of which is 'to
spy after the more hidden properties of things' which offers only disap
pointment, and the other of which is 'knowing the limits of human reason'
(DS p. 268, p. 354). The latter view, metaphysics as self-knowledge, leads
the metaphysician 'back to the humble ground of experience and com
mon sense' (DS p. 368, p. 355).
The programmatic character of Kant's profession of love for metaphys
ics is unmistakable even in the midst of the relentless satire in DS. As self
knowledge, or the knowledge of the limits of reason, metaphysics becomes
closely allied with anthropology. This current of Kant's work surfaces in
OBS which uses the distinction of the beautiful and the sublime as a
framework through which to pursue a number of anthropological reflec
tions far removed from the 'empty space whither the butterfly wings of
metaphysics have raised us' (OBS p. 368, p. 355). A similar tendency is
discernible in DRS which, while ostensibly making a case for Newtonian
absolute space against the relative version of the Wolffians, discovers a
third position which consists in examining the corporeal origins of spatial
differentiation. Kant's description of absolute space as a 'fundamental
concept' which 'makes possible all outer sensation' marks a point of tran
sition between (a) an objective and (b) a subjective but not relational
understanding of space.
The metaphysical reflections of the pre-critical writings are gathered
together in the last text of this period, the 1D. This begins with some
cosmological reflections on the concept of the world, but now described
in terms of synthesis, intuition and the understanding. Kant quickly moves
to make the point that the limits of the human mind are often mistakenly
taken to be those of things themselves. The text then proceeds to establish
these limits by reflecting on the distinction between sensible and intelli
gible things, as well as on sensitive and intellectual cognition. Kant repeat
edly criticizes Wolffian metaphysics for confusing these realms, to the
329
PREDICABLES
detriment of metaphysics, and redefines the latter as the 'first principles

of the use of pure understanding' (§8) which encompass the principles of
sensitive and intellectual cognition. The former are, above all, the 'prin
ciples of the form of the sensible world' (§13), namely time and space.
These are presented as subjective forms which are presupposed by the
senses. The presentation of them is followed by a brief and relatively
underdeveloped section on the 'principle of the form of the intelligible
world' followed by a section on 'method in metaphysics' which lists the
'subreptic axioms' which arise when the distinction of sensitive and intel
lectual cognition is not observed.
With ID much of the general plan of CPR is in place, even though the
detailed work required to 'cross the threshold' and make metaphysics into
a properly grounded science would require a further decade of work,
Kant's so-called 'silent decade'. In spite of the differences in style between
the writings either side of the 'silent decade', there is a continuity between
the pre-critical and critical periods, one which may be summed up as the
diagnosis of the ailing condition of metaphysics, and the prescription of
an austere regime of self-knowledge in order to ensure its survival.
predicables see also CATEGORIES, PREDICAMENT, TABLE OF CATEGORIES
In the Aristotelian tradition, the predicables are the five, sometimes six,
predicates which may be affirmed or denied of the subject in a logical
proposition. They are definition, genus, difference, property, accident and
species. Kant's use of the term diverges considerably from the received
sense, since for him they refer to the 'pure but derivative concepts of the
understanding' (CPR A 82/B 108). From the table of judgements Kant
derives the set of pure functions of the understanding, and by relating
these to 'objects in general' generates the 'pure concepts of the under
standing'. From these are derived a 'complete list' of predicables arising
from the combination of the categories with each other and with the
forms of intuition, space and time (see P §39). In CPR Kant refrains from
giving the 'complete inventory' of predicables, but gives some helpful
examples. From the category of causality are derived the predicables of
force, action and passion; from that of community the predicables of
presence and resistance; from modality, those of coming to be, ceasing to
be and change (CPR A 82/B 108).
predicament see also CATEGORIES, PREDICABLES
Predicament is used in CPR A 81/B 107 as a synonym for the categories;
indeed, in WP Kant historically specifies the term as the medieval scholas
tic equivalent of Aristotle's categories (WP pp. 271-2, pp. 75-7). For him
they are the 'primary concepts of the pure understanding' from which are
derived the 'post-predicaments' or predicables of pure understanding.
330
PREJUDICE
predicate see also JUDGEMENT' LOGIC, SUBJECT

Kant regards judgement as the relation in thought of a subject to a predi
cate, and claims that this relation can take two possible forms. In the first,
the 'predicate B belongs to the subject A, as something which is (covertly)
contained in this concept A', while in the second, predicate B 'lies outside
the concept A, although it does indeed stand in connection with it' (CPR
A 6/B IO). The first form of judgement is analytic, the second synthetic.
The proof of the possibility of synthetic a priori judgements is the task of
CPR, and consists in showing that a predicate can be synthesized with a
subject in a judgement. Kant was extremely concemed to ensure that the
logical combination of subject and predicate, restricted only by the prin
ciple ofcontradiction, was not extended to real or synthetic combinations.
In order to do so he distinguished between logical and real predicates,
claiming that 'anything we please can be made to serve as a logical predi
cate' (CPR A 598/B 626) while real predicates must be confined within
the limits ofpossible experience. He was particularly concemed after OPA
to disqualify the use of 'being' as a real predicate. The copula 'is' in a
judgement is 'not a concept of something which could be added to the
concept of a thing'. lt is logically permitted to say 'God is omnipotent'
since this proposition is not self-contradictory; but the copula cannot be
taken as a real predicate since 'it adds no new predicate, but only serves
to posit the predicate in its relation to the subject' (CPR A 599/B 627). lt
is noteworthy that Kant nowhere discusses the predicate as such, but
always considers it in relation to the modes of predication; the basic
subject-predicate schema of categorical logic is extended by the notion
of synthetic a priori judgements, but it is not fundamentally challenged.
prejudice [ Vorurteil] see also ENLIGHTENMENT, PUBLICITY

In CJ §40, on 'Taste as a sensus communis', Kant introduces three maxims
of 'common human understanding': (a) to think for oneself; (b) to think
from the standpoint of everyone else; (c) always to think consistently. All
three are opposed to prejudicial thinking, and call for active, enlarged
and consistent thought; but the first is explicitly dedicated against preju
dice. To think for oneself is the mark of a 'never-passive reason' while 'to
be given to such passivity, consequently to heteronomy ofreason, is called
prejudice' (CJ §40). Here Kant particularly targets the prejudice of super
stition, and describes enlightenment as freedom from superstition in
particular, but also as 'emancipation from prejudices generally'. The
broader view of enlightenment is developed in WE, with its claim for
freedom of thought against the prejudices of both tradition and revolu
tionary modemity. Kant shows in that essay how prejudice is promoted by
such 'guardians' as priests, soldiers, doctors and other intellectuals who
331
PRESENTATION
disable the public and lead them to the comfortable, passive and self
incurred tutelage of prejudice. Release from prejudice has to be gradual,
and accomplished in füll publicity; revolutionary change, says Kant, 'may
well put an end to autocratic despotism and to rapacious, power-seeking
oppression, but it will never produce a true reform in ways of thinking.
Instead, new prejudices, like the ones they replaced, will serve as a leash
to control the great unthinking mass' (WE p. 36, p. 55). One of the
interesting features of this account of prejudice is that it is not opposed
by reason per se but by 'freedom to make public use of one's freedom in all
matters' (p. 36, p. 55); that is, to engage in active rather than passive
reasoning. This is sensitive to the danger that reason may itself become a
prejudice if its validity is assumed and its criteria passively applied.
presentation [Darstellung] see also ANALOGY, CONSTRUCTION, HYPOTYPOSIS,

JUDGEMENT, REPRESENTATION, SCHEMATISM, SYNTHESIS
Presentation is a specific function of determinant judgement which consists
in presentation (exhibitio) of an intuition which corresponds to a given
concept (see CJ §VIII). The nature of presentation is further specified in
FI, where it is situated with respect to the 'three acts of the spontaneous
faculty of cognition'. The first act is the 'apprehension (apprehensio) of the
manifold of intuition' which requires imagination; the second is synthesis
or 'the synthetic unity of consciousness of this manifold in the concept of
an object'; while the third is 'presentation (exhibitio) in intuition of the
object corresponding to this concept' (p. 220, p. 24). lt is one of a duster
of terms Kant uses to describe the extremely complex relationship between
concept and intuition, and which enables their synthesis to take place.
principle [arche, principium, Grundsatz] see also PRINCIPLES OF PRACTICAL REA

SON, PRINCIPLES OF PURE UNDERSTANDING
A principle is a beginning or a starting point classically possessing both
ontological and logical characteristics. For Kant, the main point of mod
ern philosophy is to 'supply' adequate principles for the classical Greek
divisions of philosophy - physics, ethics and logic (GMM p. 388, p. 1).
In his discussion of the 'Pre-Socratic' and Platonic accounts of arche in
the Metaphysics (1941, 983b-988b) Aristotle describes a development from
the single material principle of Thales - who says the principle is water -
to the plural material principles of Empedocles. This is succeeded in
Aristotle's account by Plato's proposal that the 'ideas' are principles and
then followed by Aristotle's own decision to organize the principles around
causality - the material, the efficient, the formal and the final causes.
These principles are both the ultimate ontological ground for everything
332
PRINCIPLE
that is, as well as the ultimate source of knowledge. The equivocation

between the two senses became manifest in the two terms used to translate
arche: the ontological 'ground' and the epistemological 'reason'.
For the Wolffian tradition, Grund and ratio were synonymous (see Wolff,
1719, and Meissner, 1737), since for rationalists the reason for existence
was at the same time the ground for existing.Thus the science of principles
- in Wolff's words 'Of Our Knowledge and of Things in General' - is
ontology. For Wolffians the two fundamental principles common to both
being and knowing were actually fundamental propositions (Grundsätze).
The most basic was the principle of contradiction - something cannot
simultaneously be and not be - followed by the principle of sufficient
reason, which held that everything that exists has a reason or ground for
doing so.
In the pre-critical writings Kant criticizes the Wolffian elision of the
reason for knowing with the ground of being.This critique developed into
the later distinction in the CPR between formal and transcendental logic,
composed respectively of analytic and synthetic a priori judgements. Each
of these logics and their judgements has a supreme Grundsatz or principle;
for the analytical judgement it is the principle of contradiction, while for
the synthetic a priori judgement it is that the 'conditions of the possibility
of experience in general are likewise conditions of the possibility of the objects
of experience' (CPR A 158/B 197). This means that the conditions for a
coherent experience also determine the objects of such experience -
marking a philosophically sophisticated attempt to align being and logic
which is characteristic of the entire critical philosophy.Heidegger remarked:
'Whoever understands this principle understands Kant's Critique of Pure
R.eason' (1935, p.183).The immediate generation of post-Kantian philoso
phers, such as Reinhold and Fichte, tended to emphasize the rational,
deductive origin of the principles over the empirical; neo-Kantians later in
the nineteenth century emphasized their empirical sources in the practice
of the natural and human sciences.
Kant also discusses principles in L where he describes them as 'imme
diately certain judgements a priori' from which 'other judgements are
proved ...but they themselves cannot be subordinated to any other' (p.
606). He further divides them into two classes: intuitive principles, or
axioms, and discursive principles or acroamata, regarding all philosophi
cal principles as belonging to the latter. This distinction was first devel
oped in the anti-Wolffian PE in order to distinguish between the methods
of mathematical and philosophical proof. A further, but distinct, discus
sion of principles is to be found in the practical philosophy where they
serve as the source of maxims for determining the will.
333
PRINCIPLES OF PURE UNDERSTANDING
principles of pure understanding see also ANAL OGIES OF EXPERIENCE,

ANTICIPATIONS OF PERCEPTION, AXIOMS OF INTUITION, POSTULATES OF EMPIRICAL
THOUGHT
The 'Principles of Pure Understanding' are discussed in the second chap
ter of the 'Transcendental Doctrine of Judgement' (or 'Analytic of Prin
ciples') in CPR. Kant introduces the principles as containing in themselves
the grounds of other judgements, while not being themselves derived
from a higher principle (CPR A 149/B 188). A principle is difficult to
prove because it has 'the peculiar character that it makes possible the very
experience which is its own ground of proof, and that in this experience
it must always itself be presupposed' (A 737/B 765). The proof of a prin
ciple then, which is 'indeed, indispensable', has to be established on the
basis of the experience that it makes possible, in this case 'the knowledge
of an object in general' (A 149/B 188).
Kant distinguishes between the principles which relate to the categories
and those which relate to intuition, the latter including principles such as
'space and time are the conditions of the possibility of all things as appear
ances' (CPR A 149/B 188). He then distinguishes between the principles
of analytic and synthetic judgements, discovering two distinct fundamental
principles for each dass of judgement. The principle of analytic judgements
is the same principle of contradiction which served as the fundamental
principle of Wolffian logic/ontology; for Kant 'it belongs only to logic'
and is a 'universal, though merely negative criterion of all truth' (CPR
A 151/B 190). lt is of only limited use in the synthetic judgements of
transcendental logic, which also possess an ontological character. In order
to justify synthetic a priori judgements it is necessary to discover a Grundsatz
or a number of Grundsätze, or fundamental principles, capable of giving
an object to a concept, or, in a general sense, of combining logic and
ontology.
Kant finds this logico-ontological principle in the statement that 'the
conditions of the possilnlity of experience in general are likewise conditions
of the possilnlity of the objects of experience' (CPR A 158/B 197). In other
words, the same conditions that make experience possible also make
possible objects of experience. Kant details these conditions as those of
the (a) 'formal conditions of a priori intuition', (b) 'the synthesis of imagi
nation' and (c) 'the necessary unity of this synthesis in a transcendental
apperception' (ibid.). The first condition, (a), refers to the human experi
ence of space and time; the second, (b), to the presentation of objects of
intuition to the understanding; and the third, (c), to the categories of the
understanding. Basically the principle states that the combination of the
three conditions necessary to constitute a coherent experience also con
stitutes the objects of experience, or appearances in space and time.
334
PRINCIPLES OF PRACTICAL REASON
Since there is more than one category, there is also more than one
principle - indeed, there is a group of principles corresponding to each
group ofcategories. To the categories ofquantity correspond the 'Axioms
of Intuition'; to those of quality the 'Anticipations of Perception'; to those
of relation the 'Analogies of Experience'; and to those of modality the
'Postulates ofEmpirical Thought'. Our experience is not merely intuitive,
nor directly categorial, but combines intuition, imaginative presentation
and the categories. The principles in general determine how things ap
pear in time, or how the categorial quantity, quality, relation and modality
are adapted to the limited spatio-temporal experience of a finite being.
The system of the principles was the result of Kant's re-working of the
scholastic ontological heritage as transmitted by Wolff into a 'transcenden
tal analytic'. The labours of the 'silent decade' of the 1770s were dedi
cated to the problem ofconverting the traditional ontological predicates
into the temporal principles ofthe new 'Transcendental Analytic'. In place
of such quantitative ontological predicates as unity and plurality Kant
proposed the principle ofmagnitude; in place ofthe qualitative ontologi
cal predicates of being and nothingness he proposed the principle of
intensive degree. Equally, he replaced such eternally valid ontological
relations as substance and accident, cause and effect, and community with
temporally specific principles ofrelation in the 'Analogies ofExperience',
as he did also the modal predicates of possibility, actuality and necessity.
Kant's development of the principles is one of his finest achievements
and the place where his philosophical radicalism is most pronounced and
evident. Unfortunately, with the exception ofthe ontological readings of
Kant initiated by Heidegger (1929) and Heimsoeth (1956), the beautiful
display of philosophical argument in the principles has been eclipsed by
discussion of the less scintillating deduction of the categories.
principles of practical reason see also CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, FREEDOM, GOOD,

IMPERATIVE, MAXIM, WILL
The principles of practical reason are propositions expressing a general
determination ofthe will. They are subjective maxims when valid only for
a human will, but objective practical laws when valid for every rational
being (CPrR, p. 19, p. 17). Kant's analysis ofthe practical principles takes
two directions: a problematic analysis of candidates for the principles of
practical reason in the pre-critical writings and GMM, and a synthetic
presentation of the principles determining a pure will in CPrR and MM.
The problematic analysis distinguishes between two candidates for pos
sible principles of practical action. The first is the Wolffian principle of
perfection, stated by Kant as 'abstain from doing that which will hinder
the realisation of the greatest possible perfection' (PE p. 299, p. 273).
335
PROBLEMATIC
Kant regards this candidate for a practical principle as being, like Wolff's
principle of contradiction in theoretical philosophy, empty and incapable
of serving as the source of a definite obligation. With discrete, material
principles such as pleasure, happiness and the moral sense, however, the
principle is 'blind', unable to deliver the universality and necessity re
quired from a practical principle. A similar impasse is reached in the
GMM, where both the 'rational' principle of 'perfection' and the 'empirical'
principle of the 'moral sense' are found not to suffice as a 'supreme
principle of morality'.
The only adequate practical principle admitted in GMM is the 'auto
nomy of the will' - that the will be a law to itself. Such a principle will be
experienced as imperative by human beings, and may be enunciated in
the categorical imperative 'Always choose in such a way that in the same
volition the maxims of the choice are at the same time present as universal
law' (GMM p. 440, p. 44; cf. CPrR p. 30, p. 30). Kant then strives to prove,
above all in CPrR, that this principle avoids the heteronomy of the re
jected formal and material principles. His conclusions have intrigued many
readers, but have convinced few. They were further developed in the
more detailed 'Metaphysical Principles' of the doctrines of 'Right' and
'Virtue' which comprise MM.
p roblematic see ACTUALITY, APODEICTIC, CATEGORIES, HOLDING-TO-BE-TRUE,

HYPOTHETICAL
productive imagination see IMAGINATION
Prol,egomena to Any Future Metaphysics that will be abk to come forward as

Sci.ence Published soon after CPR in 1783, P was intended by Kant 'not for
the use of pupils but of future teachers'. lt forms, along with OD, Kant's
reply to the first wave of criticism of the critical philosophy, and like OD
consists in an explication of the critical philosophy's basic themes. He
regarded it as a sequel to CPR, a sketch of the science which would enable
readers to grasp the whole. Unlike CPR, which is presented in a synthetic
style proceeding from principles, P is 'sketched out after an analytical
method' (p. 263, p. 8) which proceeds from the questions of how the
given sciences of pure mathematics, pure natural science, metaphysics in
general, and metaphysics as a science are possible to establishing the
conditions of their possibility. The result is an overview of the contents of
the 'Transcendental Doctrine of Elements' of CPR, prefaced by comments
on synthetic a priori judgements, and succeeded by reflections on 'the
determination of the bounds of pure reason'. The first part, on the con
ditions of the possibility of pure mathematics, reviews the 'Transcendental
336
PROPERTY
Aesthetic' of CPR; the second, on the conditions of the possibility of pure

natural science, reviews the 'Transcendental Analytic'; while the third, on
the conditions of possibility of metaphysics in general, reviews the 'Tran
scendental Dialectic'.Apart from the useful function of producing a sketch
of CPR, P is significant not only for bringing out the metaphysical
motivations informing CPR, but also for Kant's reflections on the events
which provoked him to awake from his 'dogmatic slumbers' and to pro
duce the critical philosophy.
promise see CONTRACT' LIES
proofs of the existence of God see THEOLOGY
property see also ACQUISITION, CONTRACT, JUSTICE, OBLIGATION, POSSESSION

In TP, PP and MM Kant determines the civil state by the three a priori
principles of freedom, equality and independence. Within this schema
property plays an extremely significant role. In TP, for example, Kant
moves from the freedom of every member of the commonwealth as a
human being, to their equality before the law. The latter, however, is for
him 'perfectly consistent with the utmost inequality of the mass in the
degree of its possessions' dubiously defining possessions as 'physical or
mental superiority over others', 'fortuitous external property' and 'par
ticular rights (of which there are many) against others' (TP p. 75). By
identifying property with other fortuitous endowments, Kant is able to
proceed, in his discussion of 'independence', severely to restrict the number
of citizens 'entitled to vote on matters of legislation' to property owners
(TP p. 78). This restriction is qualified by his extending the definition of
property to include not only landowners (possessors of 'permanent prop
erty') but also those adult males - 'naturally, not a child, nor a woman'
(p. 78) - who possess property in the shape of a skill, a trade, fine art or
science. Clearly, a great deal is at stake in the way in which property is
acquired and allocated.
Kant disqualifies two conventional justifications for property, the feudal
justification in terms of military seizure (TP p. 78) and the labour theory
of property (MM p. 268, p. 89). Instead, Kant directs his account of the
right to property away from the object possessed and focuses instead on
the claims against others that property embodies.He abstracts from sensible
possession or the 'sensible conditions of possession, as a relation of a
person to objects' and focuses instead on possession as a 'relation of a
person to persons' (MM p. 268, p. 88). An individual's right to property
is one which everyone else is bound to respect; this right is respected
because the 'will of the first person ...conforms with the axiom of outer
337
PROPORTION
freedom, with the postul,ate of his capacity to use external objects of choice,
and with the l,awfsi,ving of the will of all thought as united a priori' (MM
p. 268, p. 88). Kant hopes with this analysis to provide a justification of
'intelligible possession', although it is difficult in this case to separate the
intelligible from the sensible and the historical. This is particularly the
case if those legislators of a commonwealth who unite to found an order
of property are themselves already defined as property owners.
proportion see ANALOGY
Protestantism see CHURCH, GOD, THEOLOGY
prudence see IMPERATIVE
psychology see also COSMOLOGY, DIALECTIC, '1 THINK', IDENTITY, INFERENCE ONTOL
OGY, PARALOGISM, SUBJECT, THEOLOGY
Along with cosmology and theology, psychology comprised one of the
branches of 'Special Metaphysics' which, along with ontology, marle up
the influential system of metaphysics presented by Wolff in his Rational
Thoughts on God, the World, the Human Soul, and on things in General (1719).
For Wolff, each branch of metaphysics had its own object: for ontology it
was being-in-general; for theology, God; for cosmology, the world; and for
psychology, the soul. Kant mirrored the structure of Wolff's metaphysics
in CPR - indeed, the 'Pure Reason' of the latter's title was none other
than Wolff's rationalist metaphysics. Accordingly, ontology is replaced by
transcendental analytic, and the branches of special metaphysics by the
transcendental dialectic. In the critique of special metaphysics, the objects
God or 'idea of a complete complex of that which is possible', the world
or 'idea of the complete series of conditions', and the soul or 'idea of the
absolute subject' are revealed to be dialectical. They are, moreover, sci
ences ridden with dialectical inferences - theology with transcendental
ideas, cosmology with antinomy, and psychology with paralogism.
Already in Wolff's system, however, the position of psychology was
anomalous. lt was discussed twice, first in chapter 3 from the standpoint
of the empirical powers of the human soul (perception, etc.), and then in
chapter 5 from the standpoint of the essence of the rational soul as the
non-empirical subject of consciousness. The distinction may be traced
back to that between naturalistic accounts of the soul, such as Aristotle's
in De anima ('On the Soul'), and theological versions which stress the
soul's separation from the body. Aquinas, in his commentary on Aristotle's
text, emphasized that such a distinction was already manifest between Plato
and the other Greek 'natural philosophers' (Aquinas, 1951, pp. 48-9). By
338
PSYCHOLOGY
the time of Descartes the distinction bad blurred into an equivocation. He

insists on several occasions that the soul is entirely independent of the
body, while seeing it on others as residing in the brain. Sometimes he
insists that the 'vegetative and sensitive or motor' forces of the body are
distinct from the rational soul or the 'thing which thinks', while on others
he concedes that the two cannot be separated. By systematically separating
the two notions of the soul, Wolff paved the way for Kant's rigorous dis
tinction between empirical and rational psychology and bis critique of
both sciences.
From at least as early as 1765 Kant was working with the distinction
between empirical and rational psychology. The object of the former was
the workings of the inner sense, and Kant was convinced that such an
inquiry would remain 'a natural description of the soul, but not a science
of the soul, nor even a psychological experimental doctrine' (MF p. 471,
p. 8). This is because the observation of the soul 'itself alters and distorts
the state of the object observed'. For this reason, and because empirical
psychology presumes to replace a priori philosophizing, Kant in CPR
declares empirical psychology 'banished from the domain of metaphysics'
(A 848/B 876). He nevertheless defers sentence 'until it is in a position
to set up an establishment of its own in a complete anthropology, the
pendant to the empirical doctrine of nature' (A 849/B 877). In spite of
these comments, Kant showed an abiding interest in empirical psychology,
evident in A as well as in several writings on mental illness (see DS, and
'Essay on the Illnesses of the Mind', 1764).
While Kant maintained a place for empirical psychology within anthro
pology, the position of rational psychology was more ambiguous. In CJ he
described his critical scrutiny of the dialectical idea of 'the thinking sub
ject' in the paralogisms as consigning it to the same fate as that which
befell theology: 'lt supplies no more than a negative conception of our
thinking being' (CJ §89). Kant shows that the search for thinking sub
stance or 'the absolute subject' of 'I think' - 'the sole text of rational
psychology' (CPR A 343/B 401) - is bound to be disappointed. lt assumes
that the subject of 'I think' may be an object of knowledge, and conse
quently extends the categories beyond their legitimate limits. Thus the
soul is treated as if were a substance, as if it were simple, numerically
identical and (in the A edition of CPR) capable of standing in a relation
to all possible objects in space. Although there are differences between
the 1781 (A) and 1787 (B) editions, the basic argument is not materially
altered: both maintain that the substantiality, identity and simplicity of the
soul rests on a paralogism, or a formally fallacious syllogism.
The first statement of rational psychology criticized in CPR infers from
the premises that the absolute subject is substance and that I, as thinking
339
PROVIDENCE
being, 'am the absolute subject of all my possible judgements' (CPR A

348/B 406) the conclusion that 'Therefore 1, as thinking being (soul) am
substanci (ibid.). The paralogism here lies in assuming that the 'I' which
accompanies thought is substance; Kant claims, on the contrary, that 'be
yond this logical meaning of the "I", we have no knowledge of the subject
in itself, which as substratum underlies this "1", as it does all thoughts'
(CPR A 350). The second claim of rational psychology, that the thinking
1 is simple, is criticized for illegitimately transforming the 'formal propo
sition of apperception' into a thinking subject: 'through the "I", 1 always
entertain the thought of an absolute, but logical, unity of the subject
(simplicity). lt does not, however, follow that I thereby know the actual
simplicity of my subject' (CPR A 356). With the third paralogism of per
sonality, the identity of the soul is once again 'only a formal condition of
my thoughts and their coherence, and in no way proves the numerical
identity of my subject' (CPR A 363). To infer thus an identical subject is
illegitimately to convert the premise of the formal condition of thought
into a substantive. Finally, the claim that the soul is in necessary relation
to objects in space once again confuses the 'I think' as a condition of
thinking with the operation of a thinking substance.
Kant's destruction of rational psychology sealed the distinction between
rational and empirical psychology. lt was succeeded in the following cen
tury by the development of an experimental psychology which increas
ingly encroached upon what were perceived to be traditional philosophical
problems of consciousness and knowledge. These were met at the end
of the nineteenth century by a vigorous critique of 'psychologism', first
by neo-Kantians and then most influentially by Husserl. Many of these
critiques seemed to point to a restoration of the transcendental subject.
Another series of developments at the end of the century prepared a
different philosophical direction. Nietzsche's (1886) attack on the notion
of the subject in the spirit of the paralogisms and Freud's (1915) exten
sion of the bounds of the subject to include the unconscious suggested a
way beyond the paralogisms which did not follow the path of empirical
psychology. This entailed a reconsideration of problems of knowledge and
action without the postulate of a subject, a development which led, after
the Second World War, to the emergence in philosophy of new 'anti
humanist' topologies of thought and action. These debates have departed
not only from the works of Freud and Nietzsche, but also significantly
from the work of Heidegger (1927). (For a representative selection of
texts from this tradition, see Cadava et al., 1991.)
providence see CHURCH, FAITH, GOD, HISTORY, HOPE, LOVE, OPTIMISM, THEODICY,
THEOLOGY
340
PURE
public/publicity see also ENLIGHTENMENT, PEACE, PRFJUDICE

In PP Kant abstracts from the material aspects of political and interna
tional public rights the 'formal attribute of publicness [Publizität] (PP p. 381,
p. 125) which may be expressed, in the negative 'transcendental formula',
as 'All actions affecting the rights of other human beings are wrong if
their maxim is not compatible with their being made public' (PP p. 381,
p. 126). Since 'happiness' is the 'universal aim ofthe public', the maxims
of politics directed to this end must be in harmony not only with the
negative but also with the positive 'transcendental formula' which is 'All
maxims which require publicity if they are not to fail in their purpose can
be reconciled both with right and with politics' (PP p. 386, p. 130). In WE
the 'freedom to make public use ofone's reason in all matters' is the pre
supposition of enlightenment. lt consists in putting prejudice openly to
the test of reason, whether this is an old established conservative, or a
newly founded, revolutionary prejudice. Common to both forms ofpreju
dice is the inducement ofpassivity through a usurped authority. The 'guard
ians' criticized in WE derive their authority by usurping the right to think
for others, whether as clergy, medical doctors, politicians, military officers
or intellectuals. Their authority is not subject to the public test ofreason,
but instead disables the public's judgement by rendering the public pas
sive and incapable of freely using its reason.
The association between reason, communication and enlightenment
opened in WE and developed in CJ has been a considerable stimulus to
the development of political theory in the twentieth century. Arendt ex
plored the implications of Kant's notion of publicity most fully in her
Origi,ns of Totalitarianism (1951) and The Human Condition (1958), while
the relationship between publicity and communicative reason has been
extensively studied by Habermas (1981).
punishment see JVSTICE
pure [rein] see also EMPIRICAL, FORM, ORIGIN

In Kant's philosophy pure is inevitably opposed to empirical, and both
are aligned with a matrix of oppositions which include form-matter,
spontaneity-receptivity, autonomy-heteronomy, original--derived, condition
conditioned, prior-posterior, and a priori-a posteriori. Schmitt in the
Sachregi,Ster to his edition of CPR lists its adjectival uses as extending to
concepts such as apperception (B 132), concepts (B 91), consciousness
(B 208), thought (B 79), empiricism (B 494), cognition (B 1), form (B 34),
principles (B 198), categories (B 304), space and time (B 374), synthesis
(B 103) and representation (B 34). Although it was widely used by Kant,
the concept itself is rarely thematized. Pure knowledge, for example, is
341
PURE REASON
defined in CPR as that which is 'not mixed with anything extraneous' (A

11/B 24), although what it is in itself is harder to determine. To give
another example of the negative definition of purity, a representation
is pure 'when there is no mingling of sensation' with it (A 50/B 74); in
other words, its pure state is largely a reflex of its being mingled with
sensation.
Pure is often used synonymously with terms such as a priori, form,
condition, autonomy and original, but it is also used to qualify these same
terms as in 'pure a priori' (CPR A 85/B 117). On some occasions a priori
concepts and intuitions are pure because they are a priori; on others they
are a priori because they are pure. One of the few points at which Kant
approaches a self-sufficent definition of purity is in his equation of the
pure and the original. Pure apperception is distinguished from empirical
apperception by virtue of its spontaneity; it is 'original' in being a 'self
consciousness which, while generating the representation "I think" ...
cannot itself be accompanied by any further representation' (CPR B 132).
By thus locating the source of the purity of theoretical reason in sponta
neity, Kant uncovers a link between it and practical purity. Pure practical
reason discovers its principle not in the heteronomous grounds of the
pursuit of ends such as happiness, but in the autonomously generated
pure form of the categorical imperative.
pure reason see also CRITIQUE OF PURE REASON

Pure reason was a term used by Wolffians to describe their philosophy.
Meissner, in his Wolffian Philosophisches Lexicon (1737) defines pure reason
as 'a completely distinct cognition in which the understanding is sepa
rated from the senses and imagination'. Thus when Kant criticizes 'pure
reason' he intends both this form of knowledge and the dominant philo
sophical viewpoint which laid claim to it. This is evident above all in the
structure of CPR, which critically shadows the structure of the Wolffian
metaphysics system with its distinction of general metaphysics (ontology
transcendental analytic) and special metaphysics (cosmology, psychology
and theology).
purpose/purposiveness see END, FINALITY
342
Q
quaestio quid facti/ quid juris see DEDUCTION
quality see AESTHETICS, CATEGORIES, JUDGEMENT, TABLE OF CATEGORIES
quantity see AESTHETICS, CATEGORIES, JUDGEMENT, TABLE OF CATEGORIES
questions of reason see ENLIGHTENMENT, INTEREST, PHILOSOPHY, REASON
343
R
rationalism see also CRITICAL PHILOSOPHY, DOGMATISM, EMPIRICISM, SCEPTICISM

Kant s use of this term should not be confused with the rationalist tra¬
dition in the history of philosophy (Spinoza, Leibniz, Wolff, etc. ) , nor
identified with dogmatism. On only one occasion does Kant relate the
rationalist to the dogmatist ( CPR B 417 ) ; he does, however, consistently
oppose rationalism to empiricism. He concludes the typic of CPrR with the
contrast between rationalism and dogmatism, claiming that only rational ¬
ism of judgements is suitable to the use of moral laws, for rationalism

takes no more from sensuous nature than that which pure reason can also
think for itself ’ ( CPrR p. 71, p. 73) The rationalist notion of ‘lawfulness’
in general guards and protests against the empiricism of practical reason ,
which uproots the morality of intentions’ ( p. 71, p. 74) . Similarly, in the
third critique aesthetic judgements resting on an a priori ground evince the
rationalism of the aesthetic judgement of taste, while those which rest on
empirical grounds evince its empiricism . Beauty in the case of the former
would be indistinguishable from the good , while in the case of the latter
it would be indistinguishable from the agreeable. As in CPR, the critical
position is established by means of a contrast between otherwise opposed
positions; here between rationalism and empiricism , there between dog ¬
matism and scepticism. This setting of the scene for critique is put in
question by Kant’ s own account of the first critique in WP; in this version ,
rationalism features as the privileged term in opposition to empiricism:
the claim that all cognition should be derived from experience alone
‘would introduce an empiricism of transcendental philosophy and a
denial of its rationalism’ (WP p. 275, p. 83) .
realism see also IDEALISM, SPACE, TIME

In CPR Kant exploits the received equivocation between ontological and
epistemological senses of realism to establish a dialectical opposition of
transcendental realism-empirical idealism and transcendental idealism-
empirical realism . In its ontological sense, realism denotes the Platonic
primacy of the forms or ideas over particular things. In its epistemological
344
REALI1Y
sense it entails a direct and accurate knowledge of the extemal world.

Kant accordingly characterizes transcendental realism in CPR as the belief
that 'time and space [are] something given in themselves, independently
of our sensibility' and that outer appearances are 'things-in-themselves' (A
369, see also A 491/B 519). Kant then shows that such a belief in the
transcendental reality of objects of the senses makes it difficult 'to estab
lish their reality' in particular cases. As a result transcendental realism
provokes empirical idealism. This is by contrast with transcendental ideal
ism which maintains that appearances are constituted by subjective struc
tures ofexperience, but that within these structures reality 'is immediately
perceived' (A 371), which thus gives rise to empirical realism.
reality [Realität] see also ACfUALI1Y, CATEGORIES, NEGATION, ONTOLOGY, PERCEP

TION, SENSATION, TABLE OF CATEGORIES
Reality is the first of the categories of quality which corresponds to the
affirmative function ofjudgement. Along with the remaining categories of
quality - negation and limitation - it yields the principles that make up
the anticipations of perception. As a category or 'pure concept of the
understanding' reality is defined as 'that which corresponds to a sensation
in general' or that 'the concept ofwhich points to being (in time)' (CPR
A 143/B 182). lt is opposed by the second category of quality, namely
negation, which represents 'not-being (in time)' (ibid.). Since Descartes,
philosophers had conceived ofreality as possessing degree, as in the view
that substance possessed more reality than its accidents. Kant used this
quality ofreality to underwrite the claim for the existence ofa continuum
between reality and negation, one 'which makes every reality represent
able as a quantum' (CPR A 143/B 183). This quality is then extended to
sensation or the representation of objects in intuition.
The correspondence ofthe category of reality with sensation is accom
plished by means of perception. Kant writes at one point that 'the material
or real element, the something which is to be intuited in space, necessarily
presupposes perception' (CPR A 373). But this perception is not to be
understood as pre-categorical, but as a principle or 'anticipation of per
ception'. Kant's use ofthe Epicurean term pro!,epsis or 'anticipation' allows
him to situate the anticipations ofperception between sense and 'formal
a priori consciousness': perception is not prior to the category ofreality,
underwriting it in some way, but requires that the category be given in
order to take place. The 'real' intuited in space may indeed presuppose
perception, but perception itselfis only possible when anticipated by the
principle that 'the real that is an object ofsensation has intensive magni
tude, that is, a degree' (CPR B 207). Kant admits that this must 'appear
somewhat strange' and points to the source of the strangeness as the
345
REASON
question of 'how the understanding can thus in a priori fashion pronounce

synthetically upon appearances' (CPR B 217).
The reason for the complex machinery which relates the category of
reality to sensation in general is the need to prove that the 'absence of
reality from a sensible intuition can never itself be perceived' and that
consequently an empty space or time 'can never be derived from experi
ence' (CPR B 214). This proof is desirable as a prop in the argument
against the absolute reality of space and time. The reality of the forms of
intuition cannot be separated from the reality of the objects of experi
ence; they do not, Kant insists, belong 'to things absolutely, as their con
dition or property, independent of any reference to the form of our sensible
intuition' (CPR A 36/B 52). The category of reality can thus only be
applied as empirical reality in space and time, and never absolutely to
space and time themselves.
Another critical dimension of the category of reality is revealed in the
'Transcendental Dialectic' where Kant argues against the elision of reality
and existence. The word 'reality' 'which in the concept of the thing sounds
other than the word "existence" in the concept of the predicate' (CPR A
597/B 625) cannot in fact be applied to something wfiich is not a possible
object of experience, such as God. lf it was so applied, it would be illegiti
mately extended beyond the bounds of its proper jurisdiction, which are
set by the limits of possible experience.
Although Kant on the whole rigorously confines reality to the limits of
possible experience, he does at one point in CPR hint at an extra-categorial
dimension to the concept. This is in the context of the discussion of
transcendental affirmation and negation, when he identifies the former
wi!}l 'reality' 'because through it alone, and so far only as it reaches, are
objects something (things)' (CPR A 574/B 602). In this context reality is
an idea of reason, a 'transcendental substrate' of 'the reality of everything
( omnitudo realitatas)' (A 575/B 604). With this view of reality, Kant extends
the concept far beyond its categorical bounds, while yet keeping it, as an
idea of reason, within the wider critical project.
reason [logos/nous, ratio, Vernunft] see also ABSOLUTE, INTUITION, PRINCIPLE,

UNCONDITIONED, UNDERSTANDING, UNITY
The nature of reason is one of the central themes of philosophy, and has
provoked continuous controversy fot almost two and a half millennia.
There are, however, some fixed points in this controversy which help
situate Kant's contribution. The first, which is clearly evident in Aristotle,
is a tendency to move from the act of reasoning to a power or property
of the soul which reasons. This distinction between reasoning and reason
appears throughout the history of philosophy, apparent in Aquinas's
346
REASON
distinction between the power or faculty which is reason and reason as

argumentation, as well as in Descartes' descriptions of reason in the Discourse
on Method as both 'the power to judge correctly ...naturally equal in all
men' (1637, p. 4) and as a general 'reasoning about affairs' (p. 9). A
further abiding characteristic of reason is its elevated character and asso
ciation with sight and light.Aristotle described it by means of the analogy
'as sight is in the eye, so is reason in the soul' (1941, 108a, 10). Descartes
habitually describes it in terms of the 'natural light' of the soul. Possession
of reason is also universally taken as the defining characteristic of a hu
man being and the main specific difference between it and animals, or, in
Descartes' words, 'it is the only thing which makes us men, and distin
guishes us from the beasts' (p. 4).
Kant's use of reason may be broadly situated within these parameters of
debate, although he makes some significant departures from the tradi
tion. In the pre-critical FS it is reason which distinguishes human beings
from animals, and consists in a fundamental faculty of judgement. The
faculty ofjudgement is 'reason' in a broad sense, but within this definition
Kant follows the Wolffian distinction between understanding and 'reason'
in a narrow sense. He observes that 'both consist in the capacity to judge'
but describes understanding as the faculty of distinct cognition and medi
atejudgement, and reason in the narrow sense as 'the faculty of syllogistic
reasoning' by which 'one draws an inference' (FS p. 59, p. 103). These
distinctions between reason in the broad and narrow senses and between
reason and understanding are carried over into CPR, as is the view that
reason defines what is proper to human beings.
Although Kant maintains many features of the Wolffian distinction
between FS and CPR, he strikingly extends the range and significance of
reason. This is largely the outcome of his systematic exploration of the
relationship between human reason and human freedom. The alignment
of reason and freedom had been proposed by Renaissance humanists such
as Pico della Mirandola and Pomponazzi (see Cassirer et al., 1948), but it
was Kant who revealed that rear,on and freedom could as easily undermine
as support each other. This in ;ight informed his distinction between the
theoretical and practical applications of reason. From the standpoint of
reason, human beings are free of the determining influence of the world of
sense; this allows them to act according to principles which are independ
ent of nature; but it also encourages them to make inferences about the
world which exceed the limits of the understanding. Reason allied with
freedom is excessive, pursuing the unconditioned, breaking all limits, for
'it is in the power of freedom to pass beyond any and every specified limit'
(CPR A 317/B 374). The implications of this power for theoretical reason
are discussed in CPR under the title of the 'Transcendental Dialectic',
347
REASON
while the quite distinct practical and aesthetic implications are considered
in CPrR and the 'Analytic of the Sublime' in CJ.
In CPR Kant proposes two taxonomies of the faculties of knowledge
that make up reason in the broad sense. The first is the division of 'higher
faculties of knowledge' which places reason after understanding and judge
ment, and restricts its activity to making 'inferences' (CPR A 131/B 169).
In the second taxonomy, reason is placed after sense and understanding,
and seives to unify thought; it is this taxonomy which Kant relies upon
throughout the 'Transcendental Dialectic' (the former becomes promi
nent in the introductions to CJ). On the basis of the latter Kant proposes
two trajectories of knowledge. The first, from bottom up, 'starts with the
senses, proceeds thence to understanding, and ends with reason' (A 298/
B 355). The second, from top down, departs from the distinction between
the spontaneity of reason and the understanding and the receptivity of
sensibility; it begins by viewing 'its objects exclusively in the light of ideas,
and in accordance with them determines the understanding, which then
proceeds to make an empirical use of its own similarly pure concepts' (A
547/B 575). In both cases reason seives to unify knowledge, but the way
in which it does so differs from the unification of the manifold of intuition
accomplished by the understanding.
The understanding secures 'the unity of appearances by means of rules'
while reason 'secures the unity of the rules of understanding under prin
ciples' (CPR A 302/B 359). Each faculty unifies distinct objects in distinct
ways, the understanding applying itself to unifying the manifold in intui
tion, and reason applying itself 'to understanding, in order to give to the
manifold knowledge of the latter an a priori unity by means of concepts,
a unity which may be called the unity of reason, and which is quite differ
ent in kind from any unity that can be accomplished by the understand
ing' (CPR A 302/B 359). Although the respective unities of reason and
the understanding are quite different, Kant pursues a strategy for deduc
ing the variously titled 'concepts', 'principles' and 'ideas' of the reason
analogous to that employed on the concepts of the understanding or
categories. That is, he moves from the logical employment of the judge
ment to the 'functions of unity' which inform them: in the case of the
understanding he moves from the table of judgements to the table of
categories; in the case of reason he follows an analogous path from the
form of inferences or syllogisms to the ideas (CPRA 321/B 378). Applying
the analogy of the deduction to reason leads to the search for 'an un
conditioned, first, of the categorical synthesis in a subject; secondly, of the
hypothetical synthesis of the members of a series; thirdly, of the disjunctive
synthesis of the parts in a system' (CPR A 323/B 379). From the logical
functions of reason in the forms of the syllogism, Kant derives such
348
REASON
transcendental or absolute, unconditioned ideas of reason as an absolute

'subject' or 'soul', an absolute 'object' or 'world', and an absolute 'ideal'
or God. Each of these ideas of reason has their corresponding scientific
presentation in psychology, cosmology and theology.
Reason, unlike the understanding, is not tied to the conditions of a
possible experience but is 'directed always solely towards absolute totality
in the synthesis of conditions, and never terminates save in what is abso
lutely, that is, in all relations, unconditioned' (CPR A 326/B 382). Rea
son's drive for totality is always in practice 'limited and defective' precisely
because it is never 'confined within determinable boundaries' (A 328/B
385). In freeing itself from the limitations of experience, it is driven to
regard objects such as the soul, the world as a whole, and God as if they
were objects of a possible experience. This leads reason in a tangle of
paralogism, antinomy and constitutive ideals. Kant's proposal to amelio
rate this situation has two broad aspects: the first is to recognize that the
ideas of reason are only regulative and not constitutive principles (A 509/
B 537); the second is to recognize that the limits faced by the speculative
use of reason when confronted by 'what is' do not hold for the practical
use of reason when it determines what 'ought to be' (A 547/B 575).
In the 'Transcendental Dialectic' of CPR and throughout CPrR, Kant
argues that however much 'natural grounds', 'sensuois ; impulses' and 'in
clinations' may sway the will to act, 'they can neveygive rise to an ought'
(CPR A 548/B 576). The latter must be abso ut and unconditioned, and
can only be given by the reason. Furthermor� , only if it is thus given can
action be free and autonomous, determin<, not by heteronomous prin
ciples but by the laws laid down by reason. Kant insists that reason does
not 'follow the order of things as they present themselves in appearance,
but frames for itself with perfect spontaneity an order of its own according
to ideas, to which it adapts the empirical conditions, and according to
which it declares actions to be necessary, even though they have never
taken place, and perhaps never will take place' (CPR A 548/B 576). The
inseparability of reason and freedom is argued on almost every page of
CPrR, and enables Kant to translate the three theoretically unjustifiable
ideas of reason into the practically justified 'postulates of pure practical
reason' of immortality, freedom and the existence of God.
The feeling of reason introduced by Kant as reverence for the law is the
same as that which underlines the experience of the sublime discussed in
CJ. There reverence is defined as 'the feeling of our incapacity to attain
to an idea that is a /,aw JM us', in this case 'an idea imposed upon us by
a law of reason' (CJ §27). The feeling of the 'sublime in nature is respect
for our own vocation, which we attribute to an object of nature by a cer
tain subreption' (ibid.). lt is this feeling which informs Kant's panegyric
349
RECEPTIVITY
to freedom and reason at the end ofCPrR in the form of 'the stany heavens
above me and the moral law within me' (p. 162, p. 166), one which could
have been written three centuries earlier in Florence, and in which recur
all the themes present in the humanist equation of reason and freedom.
receptivity see also AFFECT, INTUITION, OBJECT, SENSIBILITY, SPONTANEITY

Receptivity involves the 'capacity [of the subject] to be affected by ob
jects' and precedes all discrete intuitions of objects (CPR A 26/B 42). lt
forms one of the two sources of knowledge identified at the beginning of
the transcendental logic, namely the 'capacity for receiving representa
tions (receptivity for impressions)', which is accompanied by the 'sponta
neity ofconcepts' (A 50/B 74). By itselfreceptivity yields only 'the manifold
of representations [which] can be given in an intuition which is purely
sensible' according to the form of intuition or 'the mode in which the
subject is affected' (CPR B 130). However, in combination with spontane
ity it enables the generation of knowledge. Describing the character of
this combination is the basic philosophical challenge faced in CPR, par
ticularly since Kant refused the option of subordinating either receptivity
or spontaneity each to the other, whether in an empiricism which would
abstract concepts from intuitions, or a rationalism which would regard
intuitions as confusedly perceived concepts. However, in the course of
analysis the distinction between receptivity and spontaneity repeatedly
collapses, notably in the antinomies. There Kant finds that he cannot
describe receptivity without assuming both the results of the spontaneity
ofthe understanding and the postulate ofa transcendental object. He first
of all describes 'the faculty of sensible intuition' as 'strictly only a recep
tivity, a capacity of being affected in a certain manner with representa
tions' and then goes on to point first to these representations being related
to each other in terms ofthe forms ofintuition, and then as determinable
'according to the unity of experience' (CPR A 494/B 522). Only having
got this far can these representations be entitled objects, and the cause of
the representation of these objects through the sensibility be identified as
an unknowable correlate of receptivity - in other words, the 'transcenden
tal object' or the 'something corresponding to sensibility viewed as a re
ceptivity' (ibid.).
reciprocity see ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, COMMUNITY, DISJUNCTION
recognition see APPREHENSION, PRESFNTATION, SYNTHESIS
reflection [ Überkgung] see also ABSTRACTION, APPREHENSION, COMPARISON, CON

CEPTS OF REFLECTION, REFLECTIVE JUDGEMENT
350
REFLECTION
Kant discusses reflection in the three distinct contexts of epistemology,

concept-formation and judgement. The three discussions are clearly linked,
although Kant never thematized their connection. The discussion of per
ception in A follows Leibniz in distinguishing between perception and
reflection, with the latter described by Leibniz as awareness of perception
or 'apperception' (Leibniz, 1765, p. 134). Kant refines Leibniz's account
by dividing self-consciousness or apperception into apprehension and re
flection, with the former denoting consciousness of the receptivity of a
perception and the latter consciousness of the spontaneity of conception.
Apprehension is described as 'empirical' apperception characterized by
consciousness of the 'inner sense', while reflection is 'pure' apperception
and is characterized by consciousness of the understanding (A §5). While
on this account reflection is consciousness of the spontaneity of concep
tion, the version in L is closer to Leibniz in placing reflection in the act
of perception itself.
In the discussion of the formation of concepts in L, reflection joins
comparison and abstraction as one of the logical acts through which the
understanding generates concepts. In converting a representation into a
concept, the understanding first compares it with others 'in relation to the
unity of consciousness'. Then it reflects or 'goes over' several representa
tions in order to discover 'how they can be comprehended in one con
sciousness', and finally it abstracts ('removes') 'everything else by which
given presentations differ' (L p. 592). Kant gives an example of the for
mation of the concept of tree. First, representations of several trees are
compared in order to mark their differences; these are then reflected
upon for what they have in common, in the course of which insignificant
differences such as size and shape are removed from consideration.
In CPR Kant divides reflection into logical and transcendental versions.
Logical reflection here corresponds to the act of 'comparison' discussed
in L. Thus the concepts of reflection (identity and difference, agreement
and opposition, inner and outer, and matter and form) can be used com
paratively in an act of logical reflection to compare concepts in order to
discover their agreement, difference, etc. They can, however, also be used
in an act of transcendental reflection which looks to whether or not they
are being referred to the understanding or intuition; that is, whether the
identity, difference, etc. is formal or whether 'things are themselves iden
tical or different. . .' (CPR A 262/B 318). Every act of judgement 're
quires' transcendental reflection, or the assignment of a representation to
its proper cognitive faculty. This is a form of judgement prior to judge
ment, one which does not consist in referring a concept to an intuition,
but in establishing where the given representation belongs with respect to
the two faculties and the fundamental orientations of judgement expressed
351
REFLECTIVE JUDGEMENT
in the concepts of reflection. These are the basic modes of judgement

which situate the representations ofboth sensibility and the understanding.
The appearance of reflection in each of these contexts suggests that it
may be of fundamental significance in Kant's philosophy. This was cer
tainly believed to be the case by those of Kant's contemporaries such as
his lexicographer G.S.A. Mellin (1797), who saw the entire critical philo
sophy as an account of the origin of human knowledge in the act of re
flection. Reflection is a fundamental act of the human soul, one which was
the condition ofjudgement. Support for this view can be found in Kant's
early account of the power of judgement in terms in FS of reflection (see
FS p. 60, p. 104) and in the claim marle in CJ that the act of reflective
judgement was in some sense prior to determinate judgement (§N).
Evidence against, however, may be provided by Kant's consistently oblique
discussion of the concept.
Reflection was central to the German idealist development and critique
of Kant. Fichte bases the entire Science of Knowkdge (1794) on the act of
reflection, and the exposition of the illusions and inversions of reflection
forms the core of Hegel's logic of essence in the Science of Log;i,c (1812).
In twentieth-century European philosophy, the critique of reflection has
been part of a deep-seated suspicion of philosophies based on the self
consciousness of a unified subject. Whether in their psychoanalytic,
deconstructive or postmodern forms, these critiques appear to hold only
for Fichte's development of the concept. In Kant, the relation between
reflection and the subject of reflection is, on the contrary, extremely
nuanced - it is by no means clear whether reflection is an act of a subject
or whether the subject is nothing but a mode of reflection - while Hegel's
entire logic precisely thematizes the tortuous relation between reflection
and its subject.
reßective judgement see also DETERMINANT JUDGEMENT, JUDGEMENT, REFLECTION

In the first and second introductions to CJ Kant distinguishes between
determinant and reflective forms of judgement. Judgement in general is
described as 'the faculty of thinking the particular as contained under the
universal', and if the universal is already given 'then the judgement which
subsumes the particular under it is determinant' (C] §N). If, on the other
hand, 'only the particular is given and the universal has to be found for
it, then the judgement is simply rejlective' (ibid.). The reflective judgement
'is compelled to ascend from the particular in nature to the universal' and
is, Kant says, 'in need of a principle'. This principle cannot be a universal,
since this would make the judgement determinant, but is located by Kant
in judgement proposing to itself the reflective principle of the 'finality of
nature'.
352
RELIGION WITHIN THE LIMITS OF REASON ALONE
In the FI §V - 'Of Reflective Judgement' - Kant is rather more specific.

He suggests that judgement be regarded either as a capacity for reflecting
on a given representation according to a principle, or as a capacity for
making concepts determinate by means of an empirical representation.
The former 'compare[s] and combine[s] given representations either with
other representations, or with one's cognitive powers . . .', while the latter
schematizes given concepts. In the former case, where no appropriate
concept is given the judgement proceeds reflectively, either by means of
comparing and combining concepts with each other according to the
'universal but at the same time undefined principle of a purposive, system
atic ordering of nature' - the 'technic of nature' - or by comparison and
combination with the harmonious play of the cognitive powers (§V). The
former yields reflective teleological judgement the latter reflective aes
thetic judgements. The analytic and dialectic of these judgements form
the two major sections of CJ.
Kant hints on occasion in CJ that reflective judgements are in some
sense prior to determinant judgement. lt is they which form a bridge
between the realms of theoretical and practical reason and their judge
ments. This suggestion proved immensely fertile, with writers such as
Schelling (1800) and Nietzsche (1901) attempting to develop further Kant's
allusive hints of a potential post-critical metaphysics based on reflective
judgement. The theme has returned to prominence in the work of Arendt
(1989) - who conceives of political judgement on the basis of reflective
judgement - and also with Lyotard (1983), who has used the reflective
judgement as a means of questioning the dogmatic, determinant struc
tures ofjudgement prevalent in modern societies. Both thinkers are struck
by the potential enhancement of freedom implied in making judgements
in the absence of a given law.
refonn seeCONSTITUTION, ENLIGHTENMENT, POLITICAL WRITINGS, REVOLUTION, STATE
regulative principles and ideas see CONSTITUTIVE PRINCIPLES
relation see CATEGORIES
religion see CHURCH, GOD, THEOLOGY, REUGION WITHIN THE UMITS OF REASON ALONE,
THEODICY
Religiun within the Limits of Reasun Al<me Kant's text on philosophical the
ology may be read as a supplement to CPrR In it he considers religion
according to 'pure reason' or 'unassisted principles a priori', a sphere of
inquiry which he represents as a smaller concentric circle within the wider
353
RELIGION WITHIN THE LIMITS OF REASON ALONE
circles of faith and the historical and scriptural experience of revelation.

He chooses as his point of departure morality and its notion of a free
human being who gives themself the law. Morality does not require a
supreme being in order to be valid, but it does 'lead ineluctably to reli
gion' in that it 'extends itself to the idea of a powernd moral lawgiver,
outside of mankind, for whose will that is the final end (of creation) which
at the same time can and ought to be man's final end' (RL p. 6, pp. 5-
6). The text explores the religious implications of this conception of the
highest good by means of an analysis of the relationship between the good
and evil principles in human nature. The first book accordingly discusses
'radical evil' or the relationship between human freedom and evil. This
leads to the contents of the second book, which presents the conflict of
good and evil principles. Here Kant distinguishes his position from that of
the Stoies, who saw the 'moral struggle' as one between duty and incli
nations, pointing instead to the struggle taking place between the freely
adopted maxims which determine the will. The third book considers the
theologico-political implications of this view of the struggle between good
and evil, and distinguishes between the :iuridico-civil state' and the 'ethico
civil state' which is only conceivable in the shape of a church. Kant de
scribes the requirements of such a church in a particularly inspired
application of the four headings of the table of categories: in terms of
quantity it must be 'universal'; quality, pure; relation, freedom by analogy
to a republic; modality, the 'unchangeableness of its constitution' (RL pp.
100-1, p. 93). The fourth and final book distinguishes between the church
based on the 'pure religion of reason' and historical churches based on
statutes and authoritative interpretations of scripture.
In spite of its show of diffidence, RL marked a significant challenge not
only to organized religion, but also to theological faculties in the Univer
sity. In the atmosphere of the clerical regime of Frederick William II,
dedicated to stamping out the Enlightenment fostered by Frederick 'the
Great' (who died in 1786), RL met with a frosty reception from the censor.
Kant's initial plan was to publish the work in instalments in the Berlinische
Monatsschrift. The first section received the imprimatur of the censor of
philosophy and was published in April 1792. For the subsequent sections,
however, the theology censor was consulted. He refused the imprimatur
and his decision was confirmed on appeal by the Censorship Commission
and the King with the result that remaining sections could not be pub
lished in the Berlinische Monatsschrift. Kant's response was to submit the
entire text to a theology faculty (probably at Königsberg) in order to
establish whether it encroached on the field of theology. Having received
the favourable verdict that it did not, he forwarded it to the philosophy
faculty at the University ofjena where it received the imprimatur. The work
354
REPRESENTATION
as a whole was then cleared for publication in 1793. The episode is indica
tive of the political conditions under which Kant was working during the
1790s, and the ways in which they affected the development of his think
ing. One happy outcome of this episode was the book CF, which was
conceived as a response to these events.
representation [repraesentatio, Vorstellung] see also CATEGORY, COGNITION, CON

CEPT, INTUITION, IDEA, PERCEPTION, PRESENTATION, SENSATION
InCPR Kant defines representations as 'inner determinations of our mind
in this or that relation of time' (A 197/B 242). This ostensibly modest
definition belies the central importance of the concept of representation
in the critical philosophy. A better idea of its scope may be gathered from
the classification of representations which appears later in CPR. The ge
nus 'representation in general' is divided into representations with or
without consciousness. While in the more Leibnizian pre-critical writings
Kant often discusses unconscious representations (NM p. 191, pp. 228-9),
in CPR he is only interested in the former, and proposes a division of
conscious representations which includes all the elements of his account
of knowledge and experience. Representations with consciousness are
entitled perceptions, and these are divided into sensations, or those 'which
relate solely to the subject as the modification of its state' and 'objective
perceptions' or cognitions (CPRA 320/B 376). Kant had earlier criticized
the Leibnizian view that sensibility was the 'confused representation of
things' and argued instead that sensibility and its sensations were 'the
appearance of something, and the mode in which we are affected by that
something' (A 44/B 51). Such subjective perception is 'toto coelo different'
from objective perception.
Objective perception is further divided into intuition and concept, the
former relating 'immediately to the object and is single [while] the latter
refers to it mediately by means of a feature which several things may have
in common' (CPR A 320/B 377). Both are produced in an 'act of sponta
neity' with intuition being 'given prior to all thought' (B 132); but while
the intuition provides a field within which the manifold of intuition may
appear as a representation, it is the concept which synthesizes these rep
resentations into experience and knowledge. The application of a concept
to an intuition in judgement is nothing other than the 'representation of
a representation' of an object (A 68/B 93). What is more, the 'I think'
which enables such judgement to take place is itself described as 'a rep
resentation which must be capable of accompanying all other representa
tions' (B 132). Concepts themselves are further distinguished according
to whether they are empirical or pure, with pure concepts, or 'notions' as
Kant calls them here, categories in other places, being described as having
355
REPRODUCTION
their 'origin in the understanding alone' (A 320/B 377). In addition to

these special representations there is the further dass of ideas or 'con
cepts of reason' which are 'notions' which transcend the possibility of
experience.
Although representation is crucial to Kant's account of knowledge and
experience, there is little explicit discussion of what is being represented,
by whom (or what), and in what way. Kant seems to suggest in CPR that
the Gemüt possesses a 'representative power' which is disposed passively in
the 'capacity of receiving representations' and actively in the 'spontaneity
[in the production] of concepts' (CPR A 50/B 74). The nature of this
power of representation is further complicated in CJ where Kant states
that 'all representations within us, no matter whether they are objectively
merely sensible or wholly intellectual, are still subjectively associable with
gratification or pain, however imperceptible these may be' (CJ §29). They
have this effect because of their 'influence on the feeling of life' and their
contribution to either 'promoting or inhibiting the vital forces [Lebenskräfte]'
(ibid.). With this the entire theory of representation proposed in CPR is
situated within the account of pleasure and the Epicurean philosophy of
life which is developed between the lines of CJ. The association between
representation and corporeal pleasure which Kant hints at in CJ may go
some way to explaining why the nature of representation itself, rather
than merely its taxonomy, remained relatively unexplored in CPR.
reproduction see SYNTHESIS
reproductive imagination see IMAGINATION
respect/reverence [Achtung] see a/,so EXAMPLE, INCENTIVE, KINGDOM OF ENDS,

LAW, PERSON, PRACTICAL PHILOSOPHY, SUBLIME
Kant defines Achtung in CJ as the 'feeling of our incapacity to attain to an
idea that is a law for us' (§27), although he uses the term in several
distinct ways. In CJ, for example, the feeling for the sublime in nature 'is
respect [Achtung] for our own vocation which we attribute to an object
of nature by a certain subreption' (ibid.). In this case, Achtung should
be translated, following Kant's suggestion in CPrR (p. 77, p. 79) as the
feeling of admiration or the affect of astonishment. In CPrR the 'moral
feeling' of Achtung is produced solely by reason, and has nothing patho
logical in it; it serves only as an incentive to make the moral law our
maxim of action. However, even here it is important to distinguish be
tween Achtung proper and Achtung attributed to persons by 'a certain
subreption'. The Achtung for our own vocation, which was attributed to
nature and made the source of the admiration and astonishment that
356
REVOLUTION
constitutes the feeling of the sublime, can also be attributed to persons.

In this case Achtung may be translated as respect for persons as ends in
themselves, a respect 'which always applies to persons only, never to things'
(p. 77, p. 79). Yet this too, like the sublime, is also only a subreption of
the Achtung or reverence for the law: the respect which we have for a
person is 'really [reverence] for the law, which his example holds before
us' (p. 78, p. 81).
rest see MOTION
retribution see JUSTICE
reverence see RESPECT
revolution see a/,so CONSTITUTION, ENLIGHTENMENT, POLITICAL WRITINGS, STATE

Although in WE Kant saw revolution as potentially putting 'an end to
autocratic despotism and rapacious or power-seeking oppression' (p. 36,
p. 55), he also regarded it as a potential source for new prejudices which
'like the ones they replaced, will serve as a leash to control the great
unthinking mass' (ibid.). He puts his faith for social change and the
extension of enlightened thought not in institutional change, but in the
development of an enlightened public and a 'true reform in thinking'.
This reformist position is urged even more strongly in MM where Kant
refuses to countenance a 'right to resistance' (p. 320, p. 131). If constitu
tional change is necessary, it should be carried out 'only through reform by
the sovereign itself, and not by the people, and therefore not by revolution'
(p. 322, p. 133).
Yet Kant's response to the revolutions of his time was far more equivocal
than might be expected from his theoretical comments. He was an ardent
supporter of the American Revolution, and his response to the French
Revolution was extremely mixed. In CJ §65 his comments on the 'com
plete transformation, recently undertaken, of a great people into a state'
is entirely supportive of the American Revolution; in CF he speaks of a
'sympathy bordering on enthusiasm' grasping onlookers of the French
Revolution which involved the 'moral disposition within the human race'
(p. 85, p. 182). The 'moral cause' at work here has two aspects: the first
is the 'right of every people to give itself a civil constitution', and the
second, the contribution of a republican constitution to peace. Yet in a
footnote Kant insists that these comments do not attribute to people living
under monarchic constitution:; the right to change them. In MM, Kant's
position is even more strongly stated, with the 'moral feeling' of spectators
of the revolution turning to horror at the spectacle of the execution of the
357
RIGHT/RIGHTS
monarch in which, he says, 'it is as if the state commits suicide' (MM p.

321, p. 132). lt may be possible to read a consistency into these comments
either by attributing the differences to Kant's reactions to different phases
of the revolution, or even to regard him as a Jacobin concemed to cover
his traces. What seems most likely, however, is that he allowed his posi
tions to be tested, and altered, in response to historical events.
right/rights [ius, Recht, Rechte] see also ACQUISITION, CONSTITUTION, CONTRACT,

FREEDOM, JURISPRUDENCE, JUSTICE, LAW, NATURAL RIGHT, POUTICAL WRITINGS, STATE
In TP Kant defines right in general as the 'restriction of each individual's
freedom so that it harmonises with the freedom of everyone eise' (p. 73),
and in MM he distinguishes between the various kinds of rights which
follow from the general definition. Kant's primary distinction is between
(a) natural rights resting on a priori grounds and (b) positive (statutory)
rights which 'proceed from the will of a legislator' (MM p. 237, p. 63).
This 'doctrinal' distinction is followed by one couched in terms of moral
capacities between (a) 'innate' rights belonging to everyone by nature,
and (b) acquired rights which require an act for their establishment. Yet
these distinctions are subordinate to the juristic distinction between pri
vate and public rights, or those rights established between individuals and
those between the individual and the state. Kant describes the former as
proper to a 'state of nature' and the latter to the civil state. The first part
of MM on the 'Metaphysical First Principles of the Doctrine of Right' is
accordingly divided into sections on private and public right. Under pri
vate right Kant discusses, first of all, the notion of a right to something
extemal, and then the modes of acquiring such rights, whether by original
acquisition or by contract. Although the detail of his argument is often
obscure and apparently contradictory, he seems broadly to suggest that
rights to things (in re) are a species of rights between persons (in personam).
He reverses this emphasis when discussing the rights involved in marriage,
parentage and being 'head of the household'; for these he develops 'rights
to persons akin to rights to things'. Under public right Kant considers the
intemal right of a state, the right of nations and cosmopolitan right, all
within the context of his broader political argument for a 'republican'
state and constitution.
rule [Regel] see also CONCEPT, IDEA, IMPERATIVE, JUDGEMENT, LAW, REASON, UNDER
STANDING, UNITY
A rule is defined in P as ajudgement 'considered merely as the condition
of the unification of given representations in a consciousness' (§22), and
features as both condition of unity and as procedure for unification. The
rule which unifies given representations is given by the understanding to
358
RULE
appearances in the 'order and regularity in the appearances . . . which we

ourselves introduce' (CPR A 125) and yet is also discovered by it through
the process of cognition. The understanding is characterized by Kant as
'thefaculty ofrules' (A 126). lt not only applies rules in unifying the mani
fold in intuition, but is also 'itself the source of principles according to
which everything that can be presented to us as an object must conform
to rules' (A 158/B 197). In the first case the understanding is following
a procedural rule for unifying the manifold, in the second it is providing
the conditions for unification. The role ofthe understanding as the 'faculty
which secures the unity of appearances by means of rules' is comple
mented by that of reason which 'secures the unity of the rules of under
standing under principles' (A 302/B 359). Yet in each case the rule of
unification functions differently: for the understanding the rule is consti
tutive, establishing the conditions ofboth experience and objects ofexperi
ence; while for reason the rule is problematic, 'prescribing a regress in the
series of the conditions of given appearances, and forbidding it to bring
the regress to a close' (A 509/B 537).
In his practical philosophy Kant separates the two senses of rule as
condition and procedure. A 'practical rule' is discussed in one context as
the condition of what we ought to do - it 'is always a product of reason,
because it prescribes action as a means to an effect which is its purpose'
(CPrR p. 20, p. 18) - and in another as what is applied in a 'rule of skill'
in order to attain a particular end (GMM p. 416, p. 26). The distinction
between the kinds of rule is also evident in CJ in the discussion of origi
nality and genius. The original productivity ofgenius 'gives the rule to art'
by producing works 'for which no definite rule can be given' (CJ §46).
The rule here provides the condition for works of art; it cannot be made
into a procedure or rule of skill, since it 'cannot be one set down in a
formula and serving as a precept' (§47). To make the rule prescriptive
would stifte originality and turn the products of genius into objects of
slavish imitation. Rather, the rule discemed in these works should stimu
late more works, 'the rule must be gathered from the performance, i.e.,
from the product, which others may use to put their talent to the test'
(§47). This view of the rule as something both productive and canonical
which serves as a condition for further works and discoveries, as well
providing a formative experience for the subject, is contrasted with the
view which sees the rule as a mere procedure for producing identical
effects. The distinction developed in CJ between the original and the
imitative rule may indeed be profitably read back into the discussion of
rules in the first two critiques, where it makes sense of the distinction
between the rule as a condition for unity and the rule as a procedure for
unification.
359
s
scepticism see CRITICAL PHILOSOPHY, DOGMATISM , EMPIRICISM , HISTORY OF PHILO¬

SOPHY, METHOD, RATIONALISM
schema (tism ) see also ANALOGY, HYPOTYPOSIS, JUDGEMENT, PRINCIPLES, SYMBOL

The schematism of judgement schematises concepts a priori and applies
these schemata, without which no experiential judgement would be pos¬
sible, to each empirical synthesis ( FI §V) . It is a procedure of the judge¬
ment which adapts otherwise heterogeneous concepts to the spatial and
temporal conditions of intuition. As such it is a species of the genus
hypotyposis or rendering in terms of sense ( CJ §59) . Hypotyposis in ¬
volves the presentation of concepts to intuitions, and it does so in two
ways: directly by means of schemas, indirectly by means of symbols. A
direct, schematic presentation takes place in those cases ( namely, determi¬
nant judgements) ‘where the intuition corresponding to a concept com¬
prehended by the understanding is given a priori’ ( CJ §59) . It is also
described as a mechanical presentation, in which the judgement operates
‘like a tool controlled by the understanding’ ( FI §V) . The schemas of
direct presentation are contrasted with the symbols of indirect presenta¬
tion. The latter presentations have recourse to analogy or a doubling of
judgement, in which the concept is first applied to an object of sensible
intuition and then its rule of reflection is applied ‘to quite another object,
of which the former is but the symbol’ ( CJ §59 ) . The symbolic use of
judgement is distinguished from the schematic as being ‘artistic’ ( FI §V)
although in WP Kant describes both forms of judgement as schematisms:
direct presentation is a ‘real schematism ( transcendental) ’ while indirect
presentation is ‘schematism by analogy (symbolic ) ’ ( WP p. 332, p. 195) .
Schemas and schematism play an important but disputed role in the
architecture of CPR. They are discussed in the first chapter of the ‘Tran ¬
scendental Doctrine of Judgement’ where they tire held to be the ‘third

thing’ (CPR A 138/ B 177) which mediates between the otherwise hetero¬
geneous concept and intuition. They play a necessary part in the doctrine
of judgement by enabling categories to be applied to appearances. But in
360
SCHEMA ( TISM)
order to do so they must be homogeneous with both concept and intui

tion, as much intellectual as sensible, and yet void of the defining charac
teristics of both (spontaneity and receptivity). If the schemas are peculiar,
then how much more so the work of schematism itself, which is described
as 'an art concealed in the depths of the human soul, whose real modes
of activity nature is hardly likely ever to allow us to discover, and to have
open to our gaze' (CPR A 141/B 181). Schematism works in two direc
tions: it prepares the intuition for being determined by the concept, but
also adapts the concept for application to intuition. In both cases it ena
bles judgement to take place by offering 'rules of synthesis of the imagi
nation' (CPR A 141/B 180). Kant is further concerned to distinguish the
schema from the image; the schema should not be thought exclusively in
terms of the analogy of the visual image, although he does occasionally
resort to it.
The schemas of the categories or 'pure concepts of the understanding'
are laid out in terms of the table of categories. The schema of the quan
titative categories is number, while those of the categories of quality are
being in time (reality), not being in time (negation), and the same time
both filled and empty (limitation) (CPR A 143/B 182). The schemas of
relation are 'permanence of the real in time' (substance), 'the real upon
which, whenever posited, something eise always follows' (causality), and
the 'co-existence, according to a universal rule, of the determinations of
the one substance with those of the other' (community) (CPR A 144/B
183). The schemas of modality are 'the determination of the representa
tion of a thing at some time or other' (possibility), 'existence in some
determinate time' (actuality), and 'existence of an object at all times
(necessity). What all these have in common is that they make a category
'capable of representation only as a determination of time' (CPR A 145/
B 184). Schematism and the schemas thus have the property of 'realising'
the categories at the same time as restricting their scope to appearances.
They play a pivotal role in bringing together the otherwise empty 'thoughts
without content' and blind 'intuitions without concepts' (CPR A 51/B
75). lt is through schematism and the schemas that concepts, which are
'merely functions of the understanding', are given meaning in relation to
sensibility 'which realises the understanding in the very process of restrict
ing it' (CPR A 147/B 187).
The character of the schema is illustrated in a quite different context
by the discussion of systematicity in the section of CPR on the 'Architectonic
of Pure Reason'. There Kant refers to the schema as a way of realizing the
idea of a systematic unity of reason. He defines it as a 'constituent mani
fold and an order of its parts, both of which must be determined a priori
from the principle defined by its end' (CPR A 833/B 861). Here the
361
SELF
schema features as both a manifold and an ordering of a manifold, thus

participating materially and formally in producing a unified whole. A
schema which unifies empirically according to 'purposes that are contin
gently occasioned' is technical, while a schema derived from an idea of
reason is architectonic. The latter provides an anticipatory outline or
monogramma of the entire system, a reference which clarifies Kant's earlier
description of the schema as 'a monogram, of pure a priori imagination,
through which, and in accordance with which, images themselves first
become possible' (CPR A 141/B 181).
self see APPERCEPTION, I, '1 THINK', IDENTITY, PARALOGISM, PSYCHOLOGY, SUBJECT
self-consciousness see APPERCEPTION, CONSCIOUSNESS, SPONTANEITY, SYNTHESIS
sensation [Empfindung] see also AFFECT, GEMÜT, PERCEPTION, REPRESENTATION

A sensation arises out of the faculty of representation being affected by
the presence of an object (CPRA 19/B 34). lt is described as the 'matter'
of appearance and distinguished from perception which is sensation ac
companied by consciousness, although it too is occasionally described as
the 'matter' of perception. lt is also described (in ID §4) as the matter of
sensibility, which is complemented by its form or 'co-ordination'.
sense [Sinn] see also AFFECT, IMAGINATION, SENSIBILITY

In A Kant divides sensibility into sense and imagination, with sense denot
ing 'the faculty of intuition in the presence of an object', imagination the
same without the presence of the object (A §15). He further distinguishes
between inner and outer sense, with the latter denoting the affection of
the human body by physical things, the former the affection of the body
by the Gemüt itself. The extemal senses correspond to the five physical
senses discussed in §§17-20, and are divided into the 'objective' senses of
touch, sight and hearing, and the 'subjective' senses of taste and smell.
The intemal sense in turn corresponds to a 'consciousness of what hu
mans experience, as far as they are affected by their own play of thought'
(A §24). In CPR the inner sense is far more significant, denoting the
determination of our existence in time.
sensible intuition see INTUITION, SENSIBILITY, SPACE AND TIME
sensibility [Sinnlichkeit] see also AESTHETIC, AMPHIBOLY, IMPRESSION, INTUITION,

RECEPTMTY, SPACE AND TIME, UNDERSTANDING
Kant's doctrine of sensibility, which plays a crucial role in the critical
philosophy, is an uneasy amalgam of several mutually incompatible forms
362
SENSIBILI1Y
of argument. The remote historical precedents for Kant's position were

the arguments of Plato and Epicurus (Aristotle is surprisingly absent in
this context), with Plato representing the 'intellectualist' relegation of
sensibility to the realms of passivity and illusion, and Epicurus the sensualist
school who 'maintained that reality is to be found solely in the objects of
the senses' (CPRA 853/B 881). The proximale sources ofKant's discussions
were what he saw as the latter day representatives of the intellectualist and
sensualist schools, namely Leibniz and Locke. Kant argued that both ten
dencies elided the distinction between sensibility and the understanding, the
one by subordinating sensibility to understanding, the other understanding
to sensibility. Kant tries to avoid the choice by specifying the relationship
between the two in a way which does not collapse either into the other,
but which nevertheless allows them to be conjoined in experience.
Such a specification of sensibility leads to some extremely complex and
occasionally baffling argumentation concerning its character. Sensibility
must be distinguished from the understanding, but nevertheless possesses
a formal element; this formal element, however, does not subsume the
objects of sensibility in the same way as a concept. Similarly, sensibility is
receptive, as opposed to the spontaneity of the understanding, but this
does not mean that it is a passive talm/,a rasa merely registering impres
sions. For sensibility possesses an a priori element, although unlike the a
priori categories this not derived from the original unity of apperception.
Thus sensibility is neither the confused perception of a rational perfection
maintained by the Leibnizian school, nor the immediate receptivity to
impressions of Locke, but seems to partake of aspects of both positions,
while being fully committed to neither.
Kant's balancing act is evident in ID, both in the proliferation of terms
used to denote sensibility and sensitive/sensible (see the translator's note
to ID, pp. 487-8) and in the argument of section two 'On the distinction
between sensible things and intelligible things in general'. In ID §3 he
defines sensibility as 'the receptivity of a subject in virtue of which it is
possible for the subject's own representative state to be affected in a defi
nite way by the presence of some object'. The character of this receptivity,
or the ways in which a subject may possibly be affected by the presence of
an object, is not left undefined; Kant proceeds in §4 to distinguish be
tween the matter and form of a 'representation of sense'. The matter or
'sensation' of a 'sensible representation' is not immediately sensed by a
subject, but is dependent for its 'quality' on the way in which the nature
of the subject 'is capable of modification by the object in question'. The
complementary character of the relation between subject and object is
even more pronounced in the case of the form of sensibility. In §2 of 1D
Kant is above all concerned to distinguish the form of sensibility from the
363
SENSIBILITY
form of reason, and describes it as arising from the 'co-ordination' of

objects which affect the senses 'by a certain natural law of the mind'. He
uses the term 'co-ordination' in order to distinguish the form of sensibility
from the 'outline or any kind of schema of the object' which may be given
by reason; the form which co-ordinates the objects of sense is described as
an 'aspect' which cloak.s or clothes the matter of sensibility according to
'stable and innate laws'.
While the discussion of sensibility in §2 of 1D emphasizes the ways in
which it differs from the rationalist account of sensibility as a confused
perception (see §7), in §3 'On the principles of the form of the sensible
world' Kant distinguishes it sharply from empiricist arguments. He iden
tifies two principles of the sensible world, space and time. Kant argues that
neither principle may be abstracted from the senses, but that both are pre
supposed by them (§§14-15) and are thus pure and not empirical prin
ciples. Furthermore, both are intuitions or subjective conditions 'in virtue
of the nature of the human mind, for the co-ordinating of all sensible
things in a fixed law' (§14). Their character as pure intuitions distin
guishes them both from qualities abstracted from objects of sense, since
they presuppose such objects, but also from concepts since objects of
sense are conceived of as 'situated in time, and not as contained under the
general concept of time'.
With these arguments the basic outline of the critical view of sensibility
is largely in place. In CPR Kant distinguishes between sensibility and the
understanding as the 'two stems of human knowledge'; objects are 'given
to us' through sensibility and then 'thought' by the understanding (CPR
A 15/B 19). Sensibility is receptive (A 19/B 32) but nevertheless contains
a priori principles which are discussed in the 'Transcendental Aesthetic'
which forms the first part of the doctrine of elements. The matter of
sensibility, or 'the appearance which corresponds to sensation', is capable
of being 'ordered in certain relations' which constitute the form of sen
sibility. These are the pure, a priori intuitions of space and time, which
are pure and a priori by virtue of their priority to appearances, that is,
their not being abstracted from them, and intuitions by virtue of co
ordinating but not subsuming sensations in the manner of concepts. The
objects of sense are given to our receptivity, but in a highly organized and
articulated way; and although this organization is subjective, it is not a
product of our spontaneity in the manner of the pure concepts of the
understanding. And while sensibility is rigorously distinguished from the
understanding, its intuitions are empty without the contributions of con
cepts. The intuitions of sensibility and the concepts of the understanding
adapt, and are adapted, to each other, the co-ordinated manifolds of the
one structuring and being structured by the formal unities of the other.
364
SEX
With this position Kant seems to avoid the idealist Scylla of reducing
sense to the 'confused perceptions ofreason' (see CPRA 13/B 61 ff) and
the empiricist Charybdis of abstracting reason from sense. Both positions
for him entail an objectivist view of space and time, the one regarding
them as objective conceptual relations confusedly perceived, the other as
properties ofobjects in the world perceived by the senses. Kant attempted
to formulate a position which would encompass the virtues of the idealist
and empiricist perspectives while not subscribing to the füll implications
ofeither position. He does so by maintaining the rational character ofthe
idealist, and the receptive character ofthe empiricist arguments, by distin
guishing the forms of sensibility from concepts, and the matter of sensi
bility from immediate sensation. However, his solution raises as many
questions as it answers, and has proven extremely vulnerable to objections
from both the idealist and the empiricist positions which it was meant to
supersede.
sensible world see INTELLIGIBLE WORLD
sensus communis see COMMON SENSE
sex see also MARRIAGE, PASSION, WOMAN

Kant's discussion of sex, sexuality and sexual behaviour is surprisingly
wide-ranging, and is to be found in MM and LE. He regards sexual differ
ence as a specific difference in the genus humanity, and makes this differ
ence the basis of his account of sexual desire. Central to his view of sex
is the morally founded distinction between sexual union according to
'mere animal nature' and that according to 'principle' in marriage. In
deed he explicitly defines marriage as 'sexual union in accordance with
principle' (MM p. 277, p. 96) and sees mutual sexual enjoyment as pos
sible only on the basis of marriage, and its corollary of the 'lifelong pos
session of each other's sexual organs'. Kant did not maintain that sex
should be subordinate to the end of procreation, but regarded 'sexual
desire' or 'sexuality' as an 'inclination', 'sixth sense' or 'appetite for an
other human being' (LE p. 163). This appetite is impersonal, it 'is not an
inclination which one human being has for another as such, but is an in
clination for the sex ofanother' (LE p. 164) and is said to expose human
ity to 'the <langer ofequality with the beasts'. For this reason Kant restricted
the expression of sexuality to the confines of the marriage contract, ac
cording to which partners both enjoyed the use of each other's sexual
attributes, while recognizing each other as persons or ends in themselves.
Outside of the recognition of a sexual partner's status as an end in
themself through marriage, Kant regarded sexuality as leading inevitably
365
SEX
to the exploitation of sexual partners as things, or as means to ends.

Prostitution and concubinage involve contracts which detract from the
partner's humanity and reduce them to the condition of means to anoth
er's ends. Kant extends similar reasoning to masturbation, an act by which
'man sets aside his person and degrades himself below the level of ani
mals' by using himself as means to his own 'loathsome' ends (MM p. 425,
p. 221). In the case of homosexual behaviour, Kant contradicts himself
quite egregiously, regarding it as 'contrary to the ends of humanity', one
of which, in respect of sexuality, is now defined as 'to preserve the species
without debasing the person' (LE p. 170). However, earlier in LE and in
MM Kant explicitly repudiated the link between sexuality and procreation,
and sought to order the expression of sexuality by means of the mutual
respect of persons as ends in themselves, something which is not incom
patible with homosexual desire.
In his discussion of incest Kant saw absolute moral grounds for forbid
ding sexual relations between parents and children, grounds which he
discusses in terms of the 'respect' between parents and children which
'rules out of court any question of equality', and the unequal relation of
submission in which children find themselves in relation to their parents.
He is, however, equivocal about incestuous sexual relations between sib
lings, which he considers not to be 'absolutely forbidden by nature' (LE
p. 168). He claims that sibling incest is avoided by familiarity and the
'fastidiousness' of sexual desire.
The alleged fastidiousness of sexual desire is severely qualified in Kant's
discussion of sexual intercourse with animals of the opposite sex, which he
regards as 'contrary to the ends of humanity and against our natural
instinct' (LE p. 170). He considers such behaviour as 'the most disgraceful
and degrading of which man is capable' (LE p. 170) and in MM regards
'expulsion from civil society' as the appropriate punishment for bestiality
(MM p. 363, p. 169). In LE he adds the intriguing caveat that there are
even more 'unmentionable', 'abominable' and 'nauseating' vices which
are of 'frequent occurrence' but which he cannot mention. He reflects on
the dilemma which this raises for the Enlightenment: should these vices
be named and thus recognized and avoided by the people, or should they
be kept in the dark, so that people would not learn of them and conse
quently not be led into temptation? Kant opts for the latter option, but
not without having considerably extended the limits of discussion.
Kant's discussion of sex is in many respects extremely modern. Like
Freud a century later, he regarded sexual desire as an equivocal feature
of human life, one capable of stimulating the best and worst in human
behaviour. He also, if inconsistently, broke the link between the expres
sion of sexual desire and procreation, choosing to govern sexuality by
366
SPACE
means of the principle of respect for others as ends in themselves drawn

from his moral philosophy. However, the limitations of his position be
come apparent in the inability to look beyond the institution of hetero
sexual marriage as the only institution capable of supporting the principle
of respect for the other. This led him inexorably to reinstate the link
between marriage and procreation, and then procreation and sexuality.
simplicity see DMSIBILITY, MONAD, PARALOGISM
sociability [ Geselligkeit] see also CONSTITUTION, CULTURE, HUMANITY, JUSTICE,

PERSONALITY, STATE
Throughout his writings Kant describes human beings as naturally socia
ble, and in CJ describes sociability 'as a property essential to the require
ments of man as a creature intended for society, and one, therefore, that
belongs to humanity' (§41). However, in IUH he regards this impulse as
tempered by a 'continual resistance which constantly threatens to break
this society up' (p. 20, p. 44). This leads to the celebrated description of
the 'unsocial sociamlity' (p. 20, p. 44) of human beings, their 'inclination
to live in society' and their tendency 'to live as an individual' with the
'unsocial characteristic of wanting to direct everything in accordance with
their own ideas' (p. 21, p. 44). This tension has been ordained by nature
in order to bring about the development of innate capacities. lt does,
however, pose problems for social order, which requires human beings to
establish 'a society in which freedom under extemal laws would be combined
to the greatest possible extent with irresistible force, in other words of
establishing a perfectly just civil constitution' (IUH p. 22, pp. 45-6, see also
CPR B 373, CJ §83). Kant sees this as the most difficult and the last
problem to be solved by the human race, but sees the beginnings of a
solution in a republican constitution and a law-governed extemal relation
ship with other states.
society see COMMUNITY, CULTURE, JUSTICE, SOCIABILITY
soul see GEMÜT, I, 'I THINK'' IDENTITY, PARALOGISMS, PSYCHOLOGY
space [kara, spatium, Raum] see also AESTHETIC, FORCE, INCONGRUENT COUNTER
PARTS, INTUffiON, METAPHYSICS, SPACE AND TIME, TIME
In the Physics Aristotle explored some of the 'difficulties that may be raised
about the essential nature' of space (1941, 210a, 12), directing his critical
comments against Plato's identification of space (or receptacle, kora) with
matter (hy/,e). The basic difficulty in conceiving of the 'essential nature' of
space arises from the inapplicability to it of the distinction of matter and
form, a feature which is highlighted by the fact of motion in space, for 'in
367
SPACE
so far as [space] is separable from the thing, it is not the form: qua
containing, it is different from the matter' (1941, 209b, 31). Aristotle's
suggestion is that space is 'the boundary of the containing body at which
it is in contact with the contained' (1941, 212a, 6), thus bringing together
the formal and material aspects of space in the notion of the limit. Much
subsequent thinking around space remained within the parameters de
fined by Plato and Aristotle, with positions oscillating between regarding
space in Platonic terms as a receptacle or 'vessel' for objects in motion, or
in Aristotelian terms as the limits of such a receptacle or vessel. The basic
difficulty identified by Aristotle persisted in the philosophical tradition,
and consisted in how to specify the nature of space if it was not identified
with matter or form.
Descartes' understanding of space inclined towards the Platonic posi
tion, with the identification of space with 'extension in length, breadth,
and depth' (Descartes, 1644, p. 46). By regarding extension as material
substance he was able to regard change of place as accidental, and to
maintain the identity of space and extension: 'we attribute a generic unity
to the extension of space, so that when the body which fills the space has
been changed, the extension of the space itself is not considered to have
changed but to remain one and the same' (ibid., p. 44). Descartes' posi
tion prompted several fascinating directions of criticism, all of which fea
ture in Kant's account of space.
One direction, taken by Newton, broke with the Cartesian identification
of space and extension by distinguishing between absolute and relative
space. The former is the space of God, the latter the space of human
perception: absolute space is 'without relation to anything external, re
mains always similar and immovable. Relative space is some movable di
mension or measure of the absolute spaces; which our senses determine
by its position to bodies; and which is commonly taken for immovable
space' (Newton, 1687, p. 8). Another position, developed by Newton's
rival Leibniz, counters both Descartes' and Newton's views that space is
in some sense substantial; in his 'Correspondence with Clarke' (1715-16)
he argued that space is relative, an 'order of things which exist at the same
time, considered as existing together' (Leibniz, 1976, p. 682). However,
what is ordered by space are not simply existing things, but metaphysical
substances or monads, and their order is fully conformable with reason.
Locke, also criticizing the Cartesians, regards space as a simple idea which
is modified into measures of distance and into figures. For Locke, the
sources of the idea of space are the senses of sight and touch, for it is as
evident to him that 'men perceive, by their sight, a distance between
bodies of different colours, or between the parts of the same body, as that
they see colours themselves' (1690, p. 80). By regarding space as a simple
368
SPACE
idea he is able to avoid the dilemmas raised by regarding space as a

substance, whether material or non-material (see 1690, p. 85).
In his pre-critical writings of the 1740s and 1750s Kant's thoughts on
space were broadly in the tradition of Leibniz's critique of Descartes. In
LF he criticizes Descartes' understanding of substance as extension by
arguing, with Leibniz, that a body possesses force prior to extension, and
that extension may thus be viewed as an accident of force. From this view
of substantial force Kant went on to claim that 'there would be no space
and no extension, if substances had no force whereby they can act outside
themselves' (LF §9). The character of the laws of substantial force 'deter
mine the character of the union and composition of a multiplicity of
them' (§10) which are expressed in extension and three-dimensional space.
Kant adds that if God had chosen a different law for the relation of forces,
this would have led to an extension and a space 'with other properties and
dimensions' than those familiar to us, an observation which raises the
possibility of a 'science of all these possible kinds of space [which] would
undoubtedly be the highest enterprise which a finite understanding could
undertake in the field of geometry' (ibid.). With this Kant effectively situ
ates the validity of Euclidean geometry within the limits of a possible
space, but not the only possible space.
Although in LF Kant does go on to analyze the subjective aspects of
space, his primary focus here, and in texts such as PM, is upon space as
the phenomenon of the relations between substantial forces. In LF he
attributes the 'impossibility, which we observe in ourselves, of represent
ing a space of more than three dimensions' to the fact that the soul is
constituted in such a way as to be 'affected' or to 'receive impressions
from without according to the inverse square of the distances'. In PM the
focus is again on the objective relations of substantial force which produce
space, and is once more self-consciously directed towards a defence of the
Leibnizian metaphysics of force against the Cartesian geometry of exten
sion. The major forces now considered are those of attraction and repul
sion, but space remains defined in Leibnizian terms as 'not a substance
but a certain appearance of the extemal relation of substances' (PM p.
481, p. 57). Space, then, is the appearance of substances relating in terms
of the forces of attraction and repulsion; it is still defined objectively, and
in this text at least, without reference to the subject.
From the mid 1760s Kant's understanding of space seems to have
changed considerably, moving away from the Leibnizian definition of space
as the objective relation of substances, to a more subjective view. This
development emerged from the growing doubts Kant seems to have enter
tained conceming the Leibniz/Wolff philosophy. Kant's early Leibnizian
view of metaphysics which gave insights into the relation of forces denied
369
SPACE
to Cartesian geometry, which was still evident in PM, is succeeded in DS

by a view of metaphysics as the 'science of the limits of human reason' (p.
368, p. 354). By considering the hallucinations of the mystics and the
philosophers in DS Kant developed an appreciation of the role of subjec
tive perception in the constitution of space.This insight is evident in DRS,
where Kant moves from a Leibnizian to a Newtonian position. Ostensibly,
the essay is a defence of Newton's absolute space by means of a develop
ment of Leibniz's analysis situs, his anticipation of topology, against
Leibnizian metaphysics. By studying the phenomena of direction and
orientation in space, Kant hoped to show that space as an 'ordering' was
only defensible with reference to absolute space. He moves from the claim
that 'the direction ...in which this order of parts is orientated, refers to the
space outside the thing' to one which claims that the order of things in the
universe must be oriented according to 'universal space as a unity, of which
every extension must be regarded as a part' (DRS p. 378, pp. 365-6).
Kant's adherence to Newton's doctrine of absolute space was short
lived, but the means by which he sought to establish its validity in terms
of 'the intuitive judgements of extension' were destined to have a future
in the development of his thought. The three dimensions of space which
in LF and PM were derived from the law of the relation between substan
tial forces are now attributed to the experience of being embodied. De
parting from the three intersecting planes which figure three dimensional
space, Kant claims that 'the ultimate ground, on the basis of which we form
our concepts of directions in space, derives from the relation of these
intersecting planes to our bodies' (DRS p. 379, p. 366). The orientations
above and below, front and back, left and right are all derived from the
spatial experience of a standing body and are described as 'distinct feelings'.
These distinctions within spatial experience give rise to the phenomenon
of incongruent counterparts, a phenomenon which for Kant decisively re
futed Leibniz's conception of space as a rational order, as well as its cor
ollary of the identity of indiscernibles. The phenomenon of incongruent
counterparts, founded on fundamental spatial differentiations, suggests
that conceptually identical objects differ in terms of spatial orientation.
Throughout DRS Kant consistently relates the differentiations within
space back to 'absolute and original space' which, while not an object of
outer sensation, is a 'fundamental concept which first of all makes possi
ble all such outer sensation' (p. 383, p. 371). Kant acknowledges that his
Newtonian distinction between relative and absolute space 'is not without
its difficulties' and that these arise 'when one attempts to philosophise
about the ultimate data of our cognition' (p. 383, p. 372). However,
postulating an absolute space goes against the grain of his new definition
of metaphysics as the science of the limits of human reason. Accordingly,
370
SPACE
two years later in ID, Kant's position on space has again radically altered,
but in a way which builds on the positions he has so far established. His
new position rejects the Cartesian identification of matter and space, as
well as Leibniz's view of it as a quasi-rational order of substances; the
Newtonian moment of DRS has also been left behind, and the Lockean
view of space as an abstraction from sensibles consistently rejected. What
remains is an understanding of space as: (a) an order of relations between
objects of sense, but without the objective ordering of substantial forces
underlying them; (b) the co-ordination of objects of sense according to
non-conceptual differences; (c) making possible objects of sense without
being derived from them; and (d) a phenomenon inseparable from the
human experience of possessing a body.
The turn to a more subjective understanding of space coincided with a
fresh insistence upon the revised definition of metaphysics. Metaphysics is
no longer equated with the science of substantial forces, but is now cast
as the science of the limits of human cognition. Geometry in this new
definition is no longer opposed to metaphysics, but is recognized as the
science of spatial relations. But these too are no longer considered to
consist simply of the shapes and quantities assumed by extension, but are
now taken to refer to properties of the human intuition of space. In ID
space is no longer 'some real and absolutely necessary bond, as it were,
linking all possible substances and states' (ID §16) but has become one of
the principles of the form of the sensible world. As such, space is an
intuition, which means that it is, along with time, part of the mind's
passive co-ordination of objects of sense (ID §10) and thus inseparable
from the receptive sensibility of a subject. As an intuition, space is not
spontaneous and discursive in the manner of a concept, but nevertheless
co-0rdinates objects of sense; it does not subsume them under general
concepts, but apprehends them 'immediately or as singular' and in doing
so 'clothes them with a certain asped (ID §4). What is more, space is not
derived by abstraction from objects of sense, but is a 'condition under
which something can be the object of our senses' (ID §10).
Kant specifies these features in ID §15, where he draws out five signifi
cant features of the definition of the space. The first is that the possibility
of 'outer perceptions as such presupposes the concept of space; it does not
create it', with its corollary that 'things which are in space affect the
senses, but space itself cannot be derived from the senses' (§15). The
second is that space 'is a singular representation embracing all things within
itself; it is not an abstract concept containing them under itself' (ibid.). A
consequence of this is that space is, thirdly, a 'pure intuition' or singular
concept which is 'the fundamental form of all outer sensation'. lt cannot
be derived, either from sensations or from concepts; in respect to the
371
SPACE
latter, Kant revives his demonstration of the intrinsic directionality of space

and incongruent counterparts to show that there are properties of objects
in space which 'cannot be described discursively' (ibid.). Kant does not
now use these arguments in support of the existence of absolute space,
but rather to argue, fourthly, that 'space is not something objective and real'.
Explicitly denying the Newtonian and Leibnizian theories of space, Kant
says it is not a substance, accident or relation but is 'subjective and ideal',
issuing from the 'nature of mind in accordance with a stable law as a
scheme, so to speak, for co-ordinating everything which is sensed exter
nally' (ibid.). Fifth and finally, although space is subjective and ideal, it is
nevertheless 'the foundation of all truth in outer sensibility'. This is be
cause 'things cannot appear to the senses under any aspect at all except
by the mediation of the power of the mind which co-ordinates all sensa
tions according to a law which is stable and which is inherent in the
nature of the mind' (ibid.). Things may only be phenomena by virtue of
space, and only in accordance with it can nature come before the senses.
With these theses Kant anticipates many of the arguments concerning
space presented in CPR where space is discussed along with time in the
'Transcendental Aesthetic'. Both are now described as pure a priori
intuitions: they are pure in so far as they cannot be derived from either
sensibility or understanding; a priori in that they anticipate, or are presup
posed by, sensible perception; and intuitions in that they co-ordinate a
manifold without subsuming it in the manner of a concept. Kant justifies
the pure, a priori and synthetic character of space by means of a meta
physical and a transcendental exposition. The metaphysical exposition
consists in 'the clear, though not necessarily exhaustive, representation of
that which belongs to a concept' (CPR A 23/B 38). In this case Kant shows
that space cannot be derived from 'outer experience' but is an 'a priori
representation, which necessarily underlies outer appearances' (A 24/B
39); he shows further that space is a pure intuition and thus distinguished
from a concept, and that it is an 'infinite given magnitude' which, unlike
a concept, contains an 'infinite number of representations within itself'
(CPR B 40). In the accompanying transcendental exposition, Kant uses
geometry as a body of 'a priori synthetic knowledge' which follows from
the principle of space.
On the basis of these expositions Kant concludes that space does not
represent a property of things themselves or their relations to one an
other. lt is the 'subjective condition of sensibility, under which alone outer
intuition is possible for us' (CPR A 26/B 42). This condition consists in
the 'receptivity of the subject, its capacity to be affected by objects' and as
such precedes actual perceptions. lt is the condition for things to be
appearances for us, and since there is no other means of access to them
372
SPACE AND TIME
but through space it can be said to possess objective validity with respect
to 'whatever can be presented to us outwardly as object' (CPR A 28/B 44).
Intuitions of objects under the aspect of space are then adapted to, and
by, the concepts of the understanding in order to produce experience
and k.nowledge. Claims to k.nowledge of objects which do not respect the
spatial (and of course temporal) limits of human intuition are to be dis
qualified as invalid.
Although Kant's critical position on space presents a subtle critical syn
thesis of several philosophical positions on the issue, it in many respects
leaves the Aristotelian difficulties concerning the nature of space unre
solved. The alignment of space as a form of intuition with passive recep
tivity leads to problems in conceiving how space can passively co-ordinate
objects of sense. Kant does not follow Aristotle's suggestion to focus on
space as limit, preferring to emphasize its co-ordinative character, but he
clearly shares his difficulty of not being able convincingly to distinguish it
from matter and form. By regarding space as an intuition which contains
within it an 'infinite number of representations' which it 'clothes' in a
certain as,pect, Kant may be seen to redescribe the difficulty rather than
propose a convincing solution to it.
space anl time see also AESTHETIC, INCONGRUENT COUNTERPARTS, INTUITION,

.�.-:
POSITION, 1>CHEMA, SENSIBILITY
Space an<i" time are discussed together in section three of ID as the prin
ciples of' the form of the sensible world. They are the 'schemata and
conditions of everything sensitive in human cognition' (§13) and consti
tute the 'i�rmal element of sensibility. Kant argues that they are 'pure
intuitions: (§14), 'pure' in so far as they are presupposed in the sensation
of things md thus cannot 'be abstracted from outer Sensations' (§15), and
'intuitiom_: _ in that they 'co-ordinate' objects of sense but do not subsume
them in �he manner of concepts. By so arguing Kant is able to distinguish
his account of space and time from the empiricist view that they are
abstracted from objects of sense, from the rationalist view that they are
confused perceptions of an objective order of things, and from the
Newtonian distinction between absolute and relative space and time. Fur
thermore, although space and time co-ordinate objects of sense, they do
so in accordance with 'an internal principle of the mind' governed by
'stable and innate laws' (§4) which is not spontaneously produced by the
mind. They are aspects of the receptivity or passivity of the mind as op
posed to the active and spontaneous work of the understanding, but they
nevertheless organize the matter of sensation.
The discussion of space and time in the 'Transcendental Aesthetic' of
CPR further develops the perspective proposed in ID. Space and time are
373
SPECIES
pure a priori forms of intuition which, as outer and inner sense, form the
necessary conditions of inner and outer experience as well as the objects
ofsuch experience (CPRA 48-9/B 66). They are pure in that they cannot
be derived from experience, a priori in that they are 'antecedent to any
and every act of thinking' (B 67), formal in that they order 'the manifold
of appearance', and intuitions in so far as their manner of ordering the
matter ofsensibility is distinct from that of a concept (they co-ordinate but
do not subsume their manifold). As pure forms of intuition they are able
to legitimate bodies ofknowledge such as mathematics (in particular geo
metry), which are concerned with exploring the properties of the formal
characteristics of intuition.
The role ofspace and time within the structure ofCPR is to co-ordinate
the objects of sensibility prior to their unification in a judgement by the
concepts of the understanding. To do so they must be distinguished from
the spontaneously produced concepts of the understanding while at the
same time organizing the matter of sensibility in a way which is conform
able to them. Much of the philosophical action of CPR is dedicated to
showing how this may be accomplished, but underlying it is a set of prob
lems generated by Kant's view of space and time. These may be stated in
terms of the fundamental difficulty of maintaining that the mind is recep
tive to the givenness of objects while yet co-ordinating them in definite
relations. If sensibility were wholly receptive, there would be no place for
any co-ordinating activity; but if this activity is admitted, then it is hard to
see how the sensibility can be said to be passive. But ifthe sensibility is said
to be active in co-ordinating objects of sense according to spatio-temporal
relations, then the givenness of objects - Kant's bulwark against idealism
- begins to look shaky. Yet the importance of establishing space and time
as forms of intuition cannot be exaggerated, since it is the basis of not
only Kant's critiques of empiricism and idealism, but also of his question
ing of whether God, the world and the soul may be legitimate objects of
theoretical knowledge, or whether they are simply the illegitimate extension
of knowledge beyond the spatio-temporal bounds of human sensibility.
species see GENUS
speculative philosophy see PHILOSOPHY
spirit see DREAMS OF A SPIRIT-SF.ER, GENIUS, ILLUSION
spontaneity see also APPERCEPTION, FREEDOM, GEMÜT, RECEPTM1Y, SYNTHESIS

Spontaneity is the theoretical aspect of freedom, and a close analogue to
its practical aspect ofautonomy. As in Kant's general discussion offreedom,
374
SPONTANEITY
spontaneity combines the two properties of freedom from external deter

mination and freedom to self-legislate. The first aspect is prominent in CPR,
where spontaneity is consistently opposed (and yet related) to receptivity.
At the beginning of the 'Transcendental Logic' Kant identifies two sources
of knowledge in the Gemüt 'the first is the capacity for receiving represen
tations (receptivity for impressions), the second is the power of knowing
an object through these representations (spontaneity of concepts)' (CPR
A 50/B 74). The former is then described as sensibility, while the latter,
or 'the Gemüt's power of producing representations from itself' (A 51/
B 75) is the understanding. Only through the combination of both may
knowledge arise - 'receptivity can only make knowledge possible when
combined with spontaneity' (CPR A 97) - but to understand how this
takes place requires that their functions be first rigorously distinguished.
The function of spontaneity is to combine the manifold given by the
sensibility or to synthesize it in the production of experience (see CPR
B 130). This requires of spontaneity not only that it be purified of all
trace of receptivity, but also that it give itself its laws or mies of synthesis.
Kant imagines two limit cases of this purification and spontaneous self
legislation: the first, explored in CJ §77, imagines a spontaneous intuition
which would not require the supplement of universals in order to generate
knowledge; the second, discussed in CPR, imagines reason producing 'laws
which are not merely logical mies, but which holding a priori also deter
mine our existence - ground for regarding ourselves as legislatingcompieteiy
a priori.. .' (CPR B 430). The latter, claims Kant, would reveal 'a sponta
neity through which our reality would be determinable, independently of
the conditions of empirical intuition' (ibid.). However, such spontaneity
is both seif-legislative and qualified with respect to receptivity and the
conditions of intuition.
While the source of spontaneity is recognized by Kant to be freedom -
that 'something a priori' in 'the consciousness of our existence' - he de
scribes its operation in diverse ways. In a footnote in A, spontaneity is
described vaguely as 'the inner action (spontaneity) whereby a concept (a
thought) becomes possible', while in CPR it is described first, in the 'A
Deduction', as the ground for three-fold synthesis, and second, in the 'B
Deduction', as the product of productive imagination. In the first case,
Kant develops his claim that both receptivity and spontaneity are required
for knowledge into the view that 'spontaneity is the ground of a three-fold
synthesis which must necessarily be found in all knowledge; namely, the
apprehension of representations of the mind in intuition, their reproduction
in imagination, and their recognition in a concept' (CPR A 97). In the
second account, the work of synthesis requisite for knowledge is carried
out by the 'productive imagination' which 'in so far as imagination is
375
STATE
spontaneity' is distinguished from 'reproductive imagination, whose syn

thesis is entirely subject to empirical laws' (CPR B 152).
Kant's account of spontaneity was radicalized by Fichte (1794) as part
of a deliberate attempt to establish the primacy of practical reason. Taking
a direction already considered but rejected by Kant, Fichte proposed an
absolute spontaneity, akin to Kant's spontaneity of reason, which would
contain within itself the limitations of its own spontaneity (1794, p. 272).
This position was further developed by Schelling (1800) but rejected by
Hegel, who was wary of any claim to an 'absolute spontaneous subject'
which nevertheless was able, and indeed required, to limit itself.
state see also CONSTITUTION, FEDERATION OF STATES, HETERONOMY, PEACE, POLIT

ICAL WRITINGS
In his philosophy of the state Kant distinguishes between state and consti
tution. In CJ §83 he describes the constitution as 'so regulating the mutual
relations of men that the abuse of freedom by individuals striving one
against another is opposed by a lawful authority centred in a whole',
thereby identifying the state as a part of a broader constitution. This
allows him in PP to distinguish between a 'republican constitution' and a
democratic one. There he lays out two classifications of the state: one in
terms of the 'form of sovereignty' which may be autocratic, aristocratic or
democratic; the other in terms of 'form of govemment' which may te
either republican or despotic. A republican form of govemment separates
executive from legislative power, and is possible in auto- and aristocratic
forms of sovereignty; democracy, however, is for Kant 'necessarily a des
potism' (PP p. 352, p. 101). The reason for this is that democracy offers
the least potential for republican govemment of the three forms of sov
ereignty, and is for Kant the most prone to collapse together the legisla
ture and executive.
Kant's distrust of democracy appears to contradict his three principles
of the republican constitution also presented in PP, which are: 'freedom
for all members of society'; the 'dependence of everyone upon a single
common legislation'; and 'legal equality as citizens' (PP p. 350, p. 99). He
presents a similar set of principles in MM to define the citizen and in TP
to define the civil, lawful state (p. 290, p. 74). Following a rehearsal of the
doctrine of the separation of powers between the sovereign legislator,
executive and judicial authorities, he locates sovereignty in 'the united will
of the people' (MM p. 313, p. 125). Each citizen is free, equal and inde
pendent, although it is quickly apparent that some are more independent
than others. Kant goes on to distinguish between passive and active citizens,
the former lacking independence, and thus 'civil personality', and who
are consequently forbidden to vote. They include apprentices, domestic
376
SUBJECT
servants, minors, 'all women', tradesmen, teachers, tenant farmers - basic

ally, 'all the mere underlings of the commonwealth ... [ who] have to be
under the direction or protection of other individuals, and so do not pos
sess civil independence' (MM p. 315, p. 126). They are, however, assured
freedom and equality; but quite what this is worth in the absence of pol
itical rights is an open question.
subject [hupokeimenon, subiectum, Subjekt] see also ACCIDENT, I, 'r THINK', PREDI
CATE, SUBSTANCE
In Aristotle the subject, or hupokeimenon, designates 'that which lies under'
and is used in several senses. lt is used logically to speak of the 'subject
genus' or that of which things are predicated; it is also used as a way of
designating matter, and as a way of designating substance as the 'ultimate
subject' or those beings which 'are called substance because they are not
predicated of a subject but everything else is predicated of them' (1941,
1017b, 14). With Descartes the ultimate subject was identified with the
self-conscious I disclosed by the cogi,to ergo sum ('I think therefore I am'),
and this was subsequently regarded as the ground or basis of predication.
While Kant accepted that the subject as I was the formal, logical condition
of experience, he argued vigorously against the claim that it designated an
existing substance.
Kant's account of the logical subject is very close to Aristotelian ortho
doxy. He claims that all judgements (whether synthetic a priori or analyti
cal) are ways of thinking 'the relation of a subject to the predicate' (CPR
A 6/B 10). In the analytical judgement 'All bodies are extended' and in
the synthetic a priori judgement 'All bodies are heavy' the concept of
body is the subject; the concepts of extension and weight are the predi
cates of the judgement. While Kant is willing to concede that the self
conscious I is the ultimate subject of knowing and acting, he is unwilling
to grant this subject any substantial existence: the I as absolute subject is
a logical function, and not an existing being. Thus while it is possible to
represent 'to myself something which can exist only as subject and never
as predicate ...I am ignorant of any conditions under which this logical
pre-eminence may belong to anything ...consequently we do not know
whether it signifies anything whatsoever' (CPR A 243/B 301). Thus the I
as subject is only 'a mere prefix' or a 'completely empty representation'.
Kant was extremely sensitive to the <langer of converting the logical
subject and its predicates into the substance and accidents of ontology.
The logical subject of knowledge is the I 'which remains after all the
accidents (as predicates) are abstracted' (P §45) but the process of ab
straction itself cannot vouch for the existence of the 1. To expect it to do
so is to commit the fallacy of paralogism, as in the first paralogism which
377
SUBJECTIVE
moves falsely from the premises that 'the absolute subject of our judge
ments' is substance, and that 'I, as a thinking being, am the absolute subject
of all my possible judgements' to the conclusion that 'Therefore I, as
thinking being (soul), am substance (CPR A 348). Thus Kant accepts the
cogi,to or 'I think' as the proposition of an absolute I or subject, but resists the
ergo sum or paralogistic inference that this subject is a substantial being.
Kant's theoretical radicalism regarding the subject is qualified in several
respects, above all with respect to the practical subject. In the antinomies
of CPR and in CPrR Kant assumes that the acting subject is a substance.
The acting subject occupies both the intelligible realm of freedom and
the realm of natural causality; in its intelligible character this 'subject must
be considered to be free from all influence of sensibility' although its acts
produce effects in the empirical world (CPR A 541/B 569). The conclu
sion that the acting subject, like the thinking subject, is also merely a
logical function without substantial existence was drawn by Nietzsche (1886)
and Freud (1915). Under their inspiration the consequences of Kant's
original separation of the cogi,to from the ergo sum were drawn by late
twentieth-century writers such as Foucault (1980, 1988), Lacan (1986) and
Derrida (1967).
subjective [subjektiv] see also CONSCIOUSNESS, ILLUSION, REALITY, SELF

CONSCIOUSNESS
With one important exception, this adjective is usually used in qualified
opposition to 'objective'. lt signifies that a particular claim or judgement
is not objectively secured but arises from the peculiar constitution of the
empirical human subject. Kant uses this distinction with respect to time
and space in ID, which are not 'objective and real' but rather the 'subjec
tive condition[s] which [are] necessary, in virtue of the nature of the
human mind, for the co-ordinating of all sensible things in accordance
with a fixed law' (ID §14). In CPR Kant distinguishes in a similar way
between the 'subjective' and 'objective' unities of self-consciousness, the
former being 'a determination of inner sense - through which the manifold
of intuition ...is empirically given' (CPR B 139) - and between the em
pirical and transcendental 'l's, one of which forms the empirical, the
other the logical condition of thought.Analogously, in GMM, Kant distin
guishes between objective ends valid for all rational beings, and subjective
ends whose 'subjective ground of desire is the incentive' and which are
peculiar to empirical human beings (p. 427, p. 35). However, when in CJ
Kant distinguishes between objective and subjective finality, or the 'objective
necessity' of a cognitive judgement and the 'subjective necessity' of the
aesthetic judgement of taste, he regards the subjective judgement as dif
ferent but not necessarily inferior to the objective (§VIII and §22). Here
378
SUBLIME
the difference hangs on the presence or otherwise of a directly subsumable

concept.
The last point indicates an important quality attaching to the notion of
objectivity which is opposed to subjectivity. By objectivity Kant does not
mean either 'derived from objects' or 'derived from (Platonic) ideas'. An
objective ground or judgement is in fact derived from the subject, but the
subject understood in transcendental terms. This understanding of objec
tivity forms the crux of the critical philosophy, and its central difficulty of
'how subjedive conditions of thought can have objective validity, that is, can
furnish conditions of the possibility of all knowledge of objects' (CPR A
89/B 122). Kant expressly rules out the possibility of objectivity in either
of the above mentioned senses; objectivity is grounded in the 'order and
regularity in the appearances' which 'we ourselves introduce'. The 'subjec
tive grounds' for the unity which informs such order and regularity origi
nale in the 'subjective conditions' of the 'cognitive powers of our mind',
and are valid by virtue of their constituting 'the grounds of the possibility
of knowing any object whatsoever in experience' which are 'at the same
time objectively valid' (CPR A 125). Thus Kant's account of objectivity
does not exclude subjectivity, but is indeed grounded in it. The nature of
this grounding, surveyed in CPR, is most profoundly explored in CJ, where
Kant decisively suspends the opposition of subjective and objective in the
notion of proportionality.
sublime see a/,so AESTHETIC, BEAUTY, MEASURE, PLEASURE, PROPORTION, REASON

In PE the sublime appears in a list of 'partially analysable concepts', in
cluding space and time, as well as the feelings of the beautiful and the
disgusting (p. 280, p. 252). The reason why feelings such as the sublime
and beautiful cannot be analyzed is due to their arising 'not so much
[from] the nature of external things that arouse them as upon each per
son's own disposition to be moved by these to pleasure and pain' (OBS
p. 207, p. 45). However, Kant does offer a partial characterization of the
feeling of the sublime, mainly by way of contrast to the beautiful: both are
pleasant, but while the beautiful charms, the sublime 'moves' the Gemüt
(OBS p. 209, p. 47); the sublime must be simple, the beautiful adorned
and ornamented. In OBS Kant uses the distinction mainly as a means for
characterizing objects and human types, but in CJ he has extended the
concept to include the feeling aroused by the failure of the imagination
to comprehend the 'absolutely great', whether in terms of measure (math
ematical sublime) or might (dynamically sublime).
Central to the account of the sublime is the way in which it seems
'to contravene the ends of our power of judgement, and to be ill-adapted
to our faculty of presentation, and to be as it were an outrage on the
379
SUBREPTION
imagination' (CJ §23). However, while the sublime is indeed a check

(Hemmung) on the vital forces it is 'followed at once by a discharge all the
more powernd' (§23). This movement occurs because the check on the
power of judgement is followed by a realization of the power and extent
of the ideas of reason (§27). The sublime in nature is nothing more than
a reflex of the ideas of reason which we read into it by means of subreption,
or the 'substitution of respect for the object in place of one by the idea
of humanity in our own self ' (§27). This unrepresentable aspect of the
sublime has made the 'Analytic of the Sublime' extremely significant for
the interpretations by Derrida (1978) and Lyotard (1991) which stress the
ways in which the critical philosophy is perpetually interrupted by
uncontainable moments of excess such as the sublime.
subreption see also AMPHIBOLY, CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION, HYPOTWOSIS, ILLUSION,

PREJUDICE
In ID Kant describes subreption as the fallacy of confusing what is sensible
with what belongs to the understanding. When a 'sensitive concept' is
used as if it were a 'mark deriving from the understanding' a logical
'fallacy of subreption' has been made, whereas if what is sensitive is con
fused with what belongs to the understanding there has been a 'meta
physical fallacy of subreption' (§24). Subreptic axioms are those which
'pass off what is sensitive as if it necessarily belonged to a concept of the
understanding' and may be detected by the 'principle of reduction', which
requires that a concept of the understanding predicated of anything in
space and time cannot be asserted objectively. Kant proposes three species
of subreptic axioms: the first are informed by the 'prejudice' that 'what
ever is, is somewhere and somewhen' (§27); the second are those which
state that an 'actual multiplicity can be given numerically' and 'whatever
is impossible contradicts itself ' (§28); the third are those which transfer
to objects the 'conditions which are peculiar to subjects' (§29). In each
case Kant reveals that a covert spatial or temporal determination has been
smuggled into what appear rational determinations of objects by the
understanding. His main target in identifying the subreptic axioms is the
rational metaphysics of the Wolffian school, which becomes particularly
evident in his critique of the temporal assumptions of the 'principle of
contradiction' exposed in the discussion of the second species of subreptic
axioms. The identification of the fallacy of subreption marked an impor
tant stage in the development of the critical philosophy, although the
term itself is rarely used in CPR (see exceptionally A 643/B 671). The
third species of subreption reappears in CJ, where it describes the attribu
tion to an object of nature of our own moral vocation which gives rise to
the feeling of the sublime.
380
SUCCESSION
substance see ACCIDENT, SUBJECT
subsumption see also DETERMINANT JUDGEMENT, SCHEMATISM

In CJ Kant describes determinant judgement as subsumptive insofar as its
'universal (the rule, principle, or law) is given' and 'has no need to devise
a law for its own guidance to subordinate the particular in nature to the
universal' (CJ §IV). He enters into more detail in the discussion of
schematism in CPR. The subsumption of intuitions under pure concepts
is the same as the application of a category to appearances. This is only
possible if concept and intuition have something in common, 'if the rep
resentation of the object [is] homogeneous with the concept' (CPR A 137/
B 176). Since they are not, 'there must be some third thing, which is
homogeneous on the one hand with the category, and on the other with
the appearance', which 'must in one respect be intelkdual' and in another
be sensibk (A 138/B 177). The third thing is the transcendental schema
lacking which 'all subsumption becomes impossible [for] nothing is given
that could be subsumed under the concept' (A 248/B 304). Most ofKant's
discussion of subsumption is thus concemed with the relation between
the pure concepts of the understanding and the manifold; however, he
also uses the term to describes the inferences of reason which subsume
'the condition of a possible judgement under the condition of a given
judgement' (A 330/B 386).
succession see also ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, CAUSALITY, IMAGINATION, MOTION,

PRINCIPLES, SYNTHESIS, TIME
Succession along with duration and co-existence make up the three modes
of time which in turn determine the 'mies of all relations of appearances'
which are 'prior to all experience, and indeed make it possible' (CPR B
219). lt forms the second of the 'Analogies of Experience' or group of
principles corresponding to the categories of relation, and is the principle
for the category of causality and dependence. The second analogy states
that 'all alterations take place in conformity with the law of the connec
tion of cause and effect' (CPR B 232) and with it Kant attempts to meet
Hume's objections to the necessary connection between cause and effect.
Kant argues that causality is not, as Hume believed, derived from the
subjective experience of cause and effect, but rather the inverse, that the
'objedive succession of appearances' is the source of the 'subjedive succession
of apprehension' (CPR A 193/B 238). He thus argues that 'experience
itself ' is only possible if 'we subject the succession of appearances, and
therefore all alteration, to the law of causality' and that, furthermore, 'the
appearances, as objects of experience, are themselves possible only in
conformity with the law' (CPR B 234).
381
SUFFICIENT REASON, PRINCIPLE OF
sufficient reason, p
rinciple of see CONTRADICTION, DETERMINATION
supersensible see ARCHETYPE, INTELLIGIBLE, NOUMENON, THING-IN-INSELF, TRAN

SCENDENTAL OBJECT
syllogism see DIALECTIC, INFERENCE, LOGIC
symbol see ANALOGY, HYPOTYPOSIS, SCHEMA
synopsis see SYNTHESIS
synthesis [Synthesis, Verbindung] see also APPERCEPTION, COMBINATION, IMAGINA

TION, SPONTANEITY, UNITY
That knowledge may be referred to an originary act of synthesis is perhaps
one of the most fundamental thoughts of Kant's theoretical philosophy.
This recognition is mainly a development of the 1770s, and appears
throughout CPR (first edition, 1781). Most references to synthesis in the
pre-critical writings merely contrast the synthetic, additive method with
the analytic, subtractive method, with the former proceeding from simples
to complexes, the latter from complexes to simples. However, by the time
of the critical philosophy, and consistently thereafter, synthesis is cast as
the fundamental activity of the human mind. Thus in the first critique the
existence of 'a priori synthetic modes of knowledge' is shown first by the
necessity for 'principles of the understanding which anticipate experi
ence' and then by the derivation of the principles themselves from the act
of synthesis.
Synthesis is the basis for transcendental logic, the logic which yields
synthetic a priori knowledge through the combination of concepts and
intuitions. Indeed, Kant insists that it is to the study of synthesis 'that we
must first direct our attention, if we would determine the first origin of
our knowledge' (CPR A 78/B 103). Kant defines it as 'the act of putting
different representations together, and of grasping what is manifold in
them in one [act of] knowledge' (A77/B 103). The synthesis of a mani
fold, whether this be pure (as the forms of intuition) or empirical 'is what
first gives rise to knowledge' (ibid.). What is crucial is that this act of
synthesis is excessive: it cannot be derived from the manifold but is always
added to it. In Kant's terms, synthesis is transcendental, 'not merely as
taking place a priori, but also as conditioning the possibility of other a
priori knowledge' (CPR B 151). For this reason Kant consistently relates
synthesis either to 'the power of the imagination, a blind but indispensable
function of the soul, without which we should have no knowledge what
soever, but of which we are scarcely ever conscious' (CPRA 78/B 103), or
382
S\NTHESIS
to 'an act of spontaneity of the faculty of representation' or 'an act of the

self-activity of the subject' (B 130). Synthesis, in other words, is a product
of the human subject's freedom.
In the first 'subjective' deduction Kant tries to distribute the activity of
synthesis between concept and intuition in terms of sense, imagination
and apperception. In the deduction of the A edition, synthesis features as
both a fundamental form of combination, and as one form of combina
tion alongside synopsis and unity. In order for experience to be possible
it is necessary first to combine the manifold of sense through the ' sy nopsis
of the manifold a priori'. Then follows the ' synthesis of this manifold through
imagination' and then 'the unity of this synthesis through original apper
ception' (CPRA 95, deleted in B). Here synthesis, along with synopsis and
unity, presents a particular form of combination. At the same time, how
ever, Kant describes all three forms of combination as the 'threefold syn
thesis': 'spontaneity is the ground of a threefold synthesis which must
necessarily be found in all knowledge; namely, the apprehension of repre
sentations as modifications of the mind in intuition, their reprodudion in
imagination, and their recognition in a concept' (CPR A 97).
In most of the first deduction Kant consistently refers to the three
modes of synthesis. The first or 'synthesis of apprehension in intuition',
also called the figurative synthesis or synthesis speciosa, 'orders, connects,
and [brings] into relation' intuitions according to time, or according to
their co-presence in a particular moment. The second mode of synthesis,
the synthesis of reproduction, ensures continuity at the level of given
representations, thus ensuring that the representation is given continuity
over time. Since there is nothing in the representation itself to guarantee
such continuity, Kant describes this synthesis as the .'transcendental syn
thesis of imagination'. The third mode of synthesis, the synthesis of rec
ognition or synthesis intelledualis, ensures the continuity of the experience
of the perceiving subject. lt is based on the synthesis of the 'consciousness
of identity of the self ' with a 'consciousness of an equally necessary unity of
the synthesis of all appearances according to concepts' (CPR A 108).
In the second or 'objective' deduction the emphasis on the modes of
synthesis and their relationship to time is played down in favour of a
treatment of combination in general as the 'representation of the synthetic
unity of the manifold' (CPR B 130). Thus Kant restricts himself to speak
ing of the representation of synthesis, and not of the transcendental acts
themselves. Yet his stress upon the third synthesis of apperception - the
only one of which we can have experience through the certainty of
the co{!;i,to - should not divert attention away from the continuing role of
the syntheses of intuition and imagination under the sign of their repre
sentation as combination.
383
SYMBOL/ SYMBOLIZATION
The relationship between theoretical synthesis, freedom and spontane

ity which informed Kant's exposition in the first critique proved definitive
for post-Kantian philosophy. lt offered a way to link theoretical and prac
tical philosophy, and was crucial for Fichte's declaration of the primacy of
practical reason and his exposition of the Wissenschaftskhre (1794). In the
twentieth century, outside ofexegetical debates within Kantianism, synthe-
sis has played an important role in phenomenology, with Husserl claiming
that 'the whok of conscious life is unified synthetically' (1950, p. 42). lt has
been seen as a way of describing unity in difference rather than, as in
Fichte, serving as an agent of unification. The synthesis of imagination is
central to Heidegger's extremely influential reading ofKant (1929), which
sees in the modes of synthesis expounded in the first deduction an analy
sis of the relations between the appearance of being and human finitude.
symbol/symbolization see ANALOGY, HWOTYPOSIS, SCHEMA(TISM)
synthetic a priorijudgement see alsoA PRIORI, ANALYTICJUDGEMENT,JUDGEMENT,

PURITY, SYNTHESIS
One of the central themes of the pre-critical writings is the distinction
between logical and real grounds ofjudgement. Kant repeatedly criticized
Wolff for reducing all judgements to their logical grounds governed by
the principle of contradiction, thus ignoring the fact that some judge
ments had additional 'real grounds' governed by other principles. This
early critical position developed into the critical opposition of analytical
and synthetic judgements, with the former governed by the principle of
contradiction (see CPR A 150/B 190ff) and the latter by the principle
that 'every object stands under the necessary conditions of synthetic unity
of the manifold of intuition in a possible experience' (A 158/B 197). An
analytic judgement is explicative: it adds nothing to the subject through
the predicate of the judgement since the predicate has 'all along been
thought in it, although confusedly' (A 7/B 11, see also P §2). A synthetic
judgement, on the contrary, is 'ampliative' and adds 'to the concept ofthe
subject a predicate which has not been in any wise thought in it, and
which no analysis could possibly extract from it' (A 7/B 11).
In P Kant claims that there are two forms of synthetic judgement, syn
thetic a posteriori and synthetic a priori, but most of his attention is
directed towards the latter. In CPR the 'general problem of transcenden
tal philosophy' is described in the question 'how are synthetic a priori judg
ments possibk?' (B 73, see also CJ §36). This problem is later described in
OD as the 'inevitable stone of offence on which all metaphysical dogma
tists must unavoidably founder' (p. 226, p. 139). There are two elements
comprising synthetic a priori judgements, namely pure a priori intuitions
384
S\STEM/SWTEMATIC UNITY
and pure a priori concepts. Such judgements are only to be deemed

possible if it can be shown that the two a priori elements may be synthe
sized in a judgement. In order to show that such judgements are possible,
Kant must establish first that there exist a priori concepts and intuitions,
and that these are capable of synthesis. The two tasks comprise much of
the analysis in the 'Transcendental Doctrine of Elements'.
The pure a priori forms of intuition, time and space, are 'two sources
of knowledge from which bodies of a priori synthetic knowledge can be
derived' (CPR A 38/B 55). By themselves they cannot yield the conditions
of possibility for synthetic a priori judgements; this can only happen when
they are aligned with a priori concepts. Nor may pure a priori concepts
or categories by themselves provide the necessary conditions for the pos
sibility of synthetic a priori judgements, since 'no synthetic proposition
can be made from mere categories' (CPR B 289). For this reason it is
impossible to have 'synthetic a priori knowledge of things in general' as
claimed in ontology (A 247/B 303). Synthetic a priori judgements must
consequently bring together both intuitive and conceptual elements, with
a priori intuitions containing 'that which cannot be discovered in the
concept but which is certainly found a priori in the intuition correspond
ing to the concept, and can be connected with it synthetically' (B 73). The
way Kant achieves this is by showing not only that such judgements are
permitted only 'in relation to objects of possible experience' but that
further, they are indeed 'principles of the possibility of this experience' (B
410). What this means is that the conditions of the possibility of synthetic
a priori judgements comprise principles which unite conceptual and intui
tive elements, and which are presupposed by discrete acts of synthetic a
priori judgement. In Kant's own words, ' syn thetic a priorijudgements are
thus possible when we relate the formal conditions of a priori intuition, the
synthesis of imagination and the necessary unity of this synthesis in a
transcendental apperception, to a possible empirical knowledge in gen
eral' (A 158/B 197). This relation between intuitions, concepts and the
presentation of concepts to the intuition though imagination is the an
swer to the question of how synthetic a priori judgements are possible,
one which forms the core of the critical philosophy and which is summed
up in the formula 'the conditions of the possibility of experience in general
are likewise conditions of the possibility of the ofdects of experience (A 158/B
197).
system/systematic unity see also ARCHITECTONIC, PHILOSOPHY, SCHEMA(TISM)

Kant describes systematic unity as 'what first raises ordinary knowledge to
the rank of science' or that which 'makes a system out of a mere aggregate
of knowledge' (CPR A 832/B 860). The art of constructing such systems
385
SYSTEM/ SYSTEMATIC UNITY
is architectonic, and consists of unifying an aggregate of knowledge by

means of an idea.The idea is realized in the system by means of a schema
which combines a 'constituent manifold' with an 'order of its parts' (A
833/B 861); a schema derived empirically yields a technical unity of the
aggregate, while one derived from the idea itself yields an architectonic
unity.Kant focuses his discussion of a system of knowledge on philosophy,
whose idea is a conceptus cosmicus of philosophy as 'the science of the
relation of all knowledge to the essential ends of human reason' (A 839/
B 867). The schema of the system of philosophy is best described in FI,
where Kant distinguishes the 'system of rational knowledge by means of
concepts' which makes up philosophy from a critique of pure reason.The
latter provides the schema or monogram of such a system when it 'demar
cates and examines the very idea of the system' (FI p. 195, p. 3). Accord
ing to this, the 'real system of philosophy can be divided into theoretical
and practical philosophy,' a division Kant, not unproblematically, may be
said to have followed in MF and MM.
In CPR Kant also develops a set of regulative principles for ensuring the
systematic unity of the empirical knowledge gained by the understanding.
These are the principles of the 'homogeneity of the manifold under higher
genera', the 'variety of the homogeneous under lower species' and the
'affinity of all concepts ...which prescribes that we proceed from each
species to every other by gradual increase of the diversity' (CPR A 657/
B 686).Variously titled 'homogeneity', 'variety' and 'affinity'; 'homogene
ity', 'specification' and 'continuity'; and 'unity', 'manifoldness' and 'affin
ity', these three principles are used regulatively to pursue the goal of the
unity of the knowledge gained by the understanding. Kant regards the
systematic unity of knowledge as a regulative idea; this distinguishes his
notion both from the Wolffian system which preceded his work and from
the systems of Schelling and Hegel which succeeded it. The former of
fered only an aggregate of knowledge devoid of any definite principle (A
836/B 864) while the latter converted systematic unity into a constitutive
principle, and strove to deliver as the realized system of philosophy what
Kant considered to be but the regulative idea of its progressive development.
386
T
table of judgements / categories see also CATEGORIES, COMBINATION , JUDGEMENT

SYNTHESIS, UNITY
In CPR Kant described the table of judgements as the clue to the dis ¬
covery of all pure concepts of the understanding’ . By this he meant that

the 12 categories or pure concepts of the understanding may be derived
from the 12 ‘function [s] of thought in judgement’ ( CPR A 70 / B 95) . The
concept which links the two tables is that of synthesis, or the unity of a
manifold. In a crucial step in his argument Kant claims that ‘the same
function which gives unity to the various representations in a judgement
also gives unity to the mere synthesis of various representations in an
intuition; and this unity, in its most general expression , we entitle the pure
concept of the understanding’ ( CPR A 79 / B 104 ) . Thus a pure concept
of the understanding corresponds to each of the judgements, as may be
seen if the two tables are compared - see tables 1 and 2 in CATEGORIES.
Kant claimed that the categories offered an ‘exhaustive inventory’ of
the powers of the understanding ( CPR A 80 / B 106 ) , a position which has
been consistently disputed since the publication of CPR. Critics ranging
from Strawson (1966 ) to Derrida (1978 ) have been unanimously critical
of the way in which the tables of judgements and categories not only
dominated Kant’ s presentation of his thoughts in CPR, but in also in CPrR
and CJ. The second critique ( CPrR ) presents a ‘Table of Categories of
Freedom’ ( p. 66, p. 68) while the third ( CJ ) expounds the aesthetic judge¬
ment of taste in terms of quality, quantity, relation and modality. Opinions
are still divided about whether the table of categories is simply an historical
and dispensable form of presentation , or whether it is integral to Kant’ s
philosophy.
taste see AESTHETIC, BEAUTY, JUDGEMENT, REFLECTIVE JUDGEMENT
technic/ technique [ Technik ] see also ART, IMPERATIVE, JUDGEMENT, REFLECTIVE
JUDGEMENT, SYSTEM, TELEOLOGY
In FI Kant distinguishes between practical judgements, which are based
on freedom, and technical judgements which ‘belong to the art of realising
387
TELEOLOGY
some desired thing' (FI p. 200, p. 7). He illustrates the distinction by

redescribing the imperatives of skill and prudence presented in GMM as
'technical' imperatives. He then extends the concept of technical judge
ment to include a technical procedure which is followed by the power of
judgement, and argues that this procedure is followed when judging natural
objects. From this he derives a 'technic of nature' which consists in judg
ing natural objects 'as iftheir possibility rested on art' (p. 201, p. 8). The
concept of a 'technic of nature' is crucial for Kant's philosophy of nature
developed in the second part of CJ and subsequently extended in OP.
In Part II of CJ Kant argues that nature cannot be understood on the
basis of mechanical principles alone, but must be supplemented by the
principles of teleological judgement. The products of nature may be viewed
as ends, and its causality in this respect is described in FI as a 'technic of
nature' (FI p. 219, p. 23). The technic of nature is not a category, and is
rigorously distinguished from the 'nomothetic of nature' which consists in
bringing nature under the laws of the understanding. The technic of
nature arises from the unifying procedures followed by judgement when
it brings an empirical intuition under a concept, or the laws of the under
standing under common principles. Kant concludes that the 'faculty of
judgement is essentially technical; nature is represented as technical only
to the extent that it agrees with this procedure and makes it necessary' (FI
p. 220, p. 24). The technic of nature thus serves as a principle for reflec
tive judgement, and denotes but 'a relation of things to our power of
judging; in the latter alone can be found the idea of that finality which we
attribute to nature itself' (p. 221, p. 25).
teleology see also END, FINALITY, KINGDOM OF ENDS, TECHNIQUE

A teleological explanation is one couched in terms of final ends. Its ori
gins lie in the Aristotelian distinction between material, formal, efficient
and final causes, which he applied to the explanation of physical change.
The final cause or "'th'.lt for the sake of which" a thing is done' (1941,
195a, 33) was applied both to physical change and to human action.
Teleological explanations were applied to both nature and action, until
the early modern period when Galileo rejected all the Aristotelian causes,
and Descartes banished final causes from the explanation of physical change
in favour of efficient causes. Kant, however, argued for a limited role for
teleological principles in supplementing mechanical explanations. In the
second part of CJ he presented a 'Critique of Teleological Judgement'
which, in an analytic, dialectic and methodology, established the limits for
the legitimate use of teleologicaljudgement (but see also his 'On the Use
of Teleological Principles in Philosophy', 1788). Teleological judgements
may supplement determinant judgement as a 'regulative principle' for
388
THEODICY
reflective judgement, and thus extend 'physical science according to an

other principle, that, namely, of final causes, yet without interfering with
the principle of the mechanism of physical causality' (CJ §67). Teleologi
cal judgements may not be used simply to ascribe human purposes to the
objects of nature, which is simply a form of 'mental jugglery that only
reads the conception of an end into the nature of the things', but may
serve as a means of achieving the systematic completeness of our knowl
edge. Teleological principles, in other words, have no explanatory signifi
cance (CJ introduction to Part II).
Teleology comes into its own in Kant's practical philosophy, although
there it is no longer regarded as teleology proper. What makes practical
judgements teleological for Kant is their reference to an end. The ground
of the self-determination of the will is an 'end' (GMM p. 427, p. 35) and
so technically all moral judgements, since they are determined by an end,
are teleological. However, they are not teleological in the sense of ascrib
ing significance to an accomplished action, but only in so far as these ends
serve as inclinations or motives for the determination of the will. Although
the two forms of teleological judgement seem to be opposed as physical
and ethical teleology (to use the terms of CJ Part II), Kant strove to unite
them in an 'ultimate end' of human freedom culturing itself in the leg
islation of natural and moral laws. In this respect teleology can be seen to
play a crucial role in the critical philosophy, not only in extending the
realm of knowledge of nature as a regulative principle and acting as a
source for end-directed moral judgements, but above all in integrating the
realms of natural necessity and practical freedom.
theodicy see also FAITH, GOD, HISTORY, PROVIDENCE, THEOLOGY

In FPT (1791) Kant retumed to the problem of theodicy, which had pre
occupied him during the mid to late 1750s. He was concemed in the earlier
period with Leibniz's theodicy or 'defence of God's good cause' encapsu
lated in the proposition that 'this world was the best of all possible worlds'.
Although in An Attempt at some &flections on üptimism (1759) Kant on the
whole defends God's good cause, he had methodological doubts about the
ability of human beings to discem the ways of the Almighty (ibid., p. 35,
p. 76). These were re-stated in FPT on the basis of the critical philosophy's
limitation of legitimate knowledge to the bounds of possible experience.
Defining theodicy as the 'defences of the highest wisdom of the Creator
against the complaints which reason makes by pointing to the existence of
things in the world which contradict the wise purpose' (FPT p. 283), Kant
lays out three areas of complaint: (a) 'the holiness of the creator contrasts
with moral evil in the world'; (b) the goodness of the Creator contrasts
with woes and suffering; (c) the justice of the Creator contrasts with the
389
THEOLOGY
impunity of the guilty (FPT p. 285). He argues that in each case 'reason
is completely powerless when it comes to determining the relationship be
tween this worl,d as we know it through experience and the suprerne wisdom' (FPT
p. 290). In full accord with the results of the critical philosophy, Kant
describes this realization of the 'necessary limits of our reflections' as a
'negative wisdom' which by showing the failure of a speculative theodicy,
clears the way for a practical one. Through an interpretation of the story
ofJob, Kant reaches the conclusion that 'theodicy is not a task of science
but is a matter of faith' (FPT p. 293).
theology see also ANALOGY, CHURCH, COSMOLOGY, GOD, HISTORY, PROVIDENCE,

PSYCHOLOGY, THEODICY
Kant's critique of theology engaged with a highly specific object, namely
the philosophical theology developed by Christian Wolff which was con
sidered as a branch of 'special metaphysics'. Wolff's theology marked the
first stage ofthe trespass ofphilosophy - a lower faculty ofthe eighteenth
century university - into the territory of the higher faculty of theology.
This move was vigorously combatted by the theologians who used all means,
including court intrigue, to keep philosophy in its place. These struggles
led eventually to Wolff's banishment from Prussia and an edict forbidding
discussion of his books. Echoes of this struggle between the philosophical
and theological faculties still resound in Kant's CF, and determined the
character of his critique of theology.
Kant's discussion of theology rarely strays beyond the critique of the
Wolffian treatment of God as an object of 'special metaphysics' along with
the world (cosmology) and the soul (psychology). His lectures on philo
sophical theology largely took the form of a critical commentary on the
section in Baumgarten's Wolffian Metaphysica (1739) on God, and his
critique of theology in the 'Transcendental Dialectic' is a feature of the
critique's point-by-point demolition ofthe 'pure reason' ofWolffian meta
physics. Yet in his critique Kant was careful not to surrender philosophical
theology to the theologians. Rather he argued that while God could not
be an object ofspeculative knowledge, it could nevertheless be a postulate
ofpractical reason. His denial ofknowledge 'to make room for faith' (CPR
B xxx) was directed at both philosophical theology and the Biblical ex
egesis ofthe theology faculty. The discussion ofthe conflict ofphilosophy
and theology in CF thus concludes with a gesture of solidarity with non
institutional, non-theological religion which takes the form of publishing
a letter from Carol Arnold Wilmans on 'separatists and mystics' who claims
that although he has never 'found a theologian among them' yet 'if these
people were philosophers they would be (pardon the term!) true Kantians'
(CF pp. 74-5, pp. 137-8).
390
THEOLOGY
Kant's critique of theology is thus an important part of his broader

critique of metaphysics, and concentrates almost exclusively upon the proofs
for the existence of God. In OPA from 1763 his critique is part of a
general movement in his thought against 'false subtlety' (see also FS):
'Providence has not intended that the insights most necessary for human
blessedness should rest upon the subtlety of refined inferences' (OPA p.
65, p. 43). But while 'natural common sense' will suffice, it can be 'con
fused by false artifice' (ibid.) and so it is necessary, as with the logical Fa"lse
Subtl,ety of the Four Syllogistic Figures, written at the same time, to oppose
'false artifice' in reasoning.
In OPA Kant identifies four proofs for the existence of God, and groups
them according to whether they are taken 'either from rational concepts
of the merely possible, or from empirical concepts of the existent' (p. 155,
p. 223). The first group is entitled the 'ontological', the second the
'cosmological' proofs. Of the ontological proofs Kant is critical of the 'so
called Cartesian' proof, which reasons from the perfection of God to its
existence. A perfect being would possess all predicates including exist
ence, yet Kant shows that existence is not a predicate but the position of
predicates. His own favoured proof does not seek grounds for the exist
ence of God, but instead reasons that God exists because the opposite
proposition (God does not exist) is unthinkable (OPA p. 162, p. 237, see
also ND p. 392, p. 69); but this quintessentially 'artificial' argument is
pursued with all the signs of a bad conscience and palpably decreasing
conviction. Kant is, however, equally critical of the first of the cosmological
proofs, which reasons through the principle of sufficient reason from
perceived effects to a fundamental cause, and which has 'gained much
attention through the Wolffian school of philosophy' (OPA p. 158, p.
229). He is less critical of the second cosmological proof, which reasons
from the perceived purposive arrangement of the world to a creator, but
argues that, while it can never achieve precision, it is to be respected for
its power 'to vitalise mankind with elevated sentiments which are produc
tive of noble activity' (OPA p. 161, p. 235). He maintains this position in
CJ and LPT where the second cosmological proof was seen as establishing
a moral theology on the basis of analogical knowledge of God.
In CPR Kant abandons even the residual and unenthusiastic attempt of
OPA to provide a proof for the existence of God. In the third chapter of
the 'Transcendental Dialectic', on the 'Ideal of Pure Reason' (which fol
lows the demolitions of rational psychology and cosmology in the
paralogisms and antinomies), he declares the three proofs of rational
theology- the 'ontological', 'cosmological' and 'physico-theological' - to
be unsustainable. An analogous train of argument, with some differences
of detail, may be discemed in the first part of LPT on 'Transcendental
391
THEOLOGY
Theology'. Both versions of Kant's critique of theology defend the claim

that it is impossible for human reason to attain speculative or theoretical
knowledge of God.
Kant thinks the ontological proof is impossible because being is not a
predicate, and thus cannot be said to belong to the set of predicates which
make up the most real being (ens realissimum). The predicate being 'only
serves to posit the predicate in its relation to the subject' (CPR A 599/B
627), and to say 'God is' attaches no new predicate to the concept 'God'
but only 'posits [God] as being an object that stands in relation to my
concepf (ibid.). To claim that the most real and perfect being must possess
the predicate 'existence' confuses the orders of real and logical predication.
For existence is not a concept but the position through which concept
and object may be brought into relation. The real position of existence or
the 'context of experience as a whole' is rigorously distinguished from the
logical concept which simply 'conform[s] to the universal conditions of
possible empirical knowledge' (CPR A 601/B 629). Any consciousness of
existence, whether iqimediate/perceptive or inferred, can only hold within
the field of the 'unity of experience'. Outside of this it makes no sense,
and attempting to prove otherwise is 'merely so much labour and effort
lost' (CPR A 602/B 630).
Unlike the ontological proof for the existence of God, a wholly a priori
argument which moves 'from the highest reality to the necessity of exist
ence' (CPR A 604/B 632), the cosmological proof moves from the major
premise 'If anything exists, an absolutely necessary being must also exist'
through the minor premise 'I exist' to the conclusion 'an absolutely nec
essary being exists' (CPR A 604/B 632). Kant claims that this proof con
tains 'a whole nest of dialectical assumptions', such as the extension of the
category of causality - which only possesses meaning within the sensible
world - to the supersensible; the inference of a first cause from an infinite
series; and the confusion of the logical and transcendental possibilities of
an ens realissimum (CPR A 610/B 638).
The ontological and cosmological proofs both make the error of con
verting potentially regulative principles into constitutive ones, thus
hypostatizing necessity as a formal principle of thought into a 'material
condition of existence' (CPR A 620/B 648). Both proofs move from ab
stractions such as 'existence in general' to 'concepts of things in general',
whereas the physico-theological proof moves from the 'determinate expe
rience' of order in nature to a free 'sublime and wise cause (or more than
one)' (CPR A 625/B 653). Yet in order to advance from the experience
of this world to its origin, Kant claims that this proof must have recourse
to the discredited ontological and cosmological proofs, and must thus fall
with them.
392
THING-IN-ITSELF
By criticizing the three proofs, Kant claims to have undermined specu

lative theology definitively. In CPR the ens realissimum is only permitted as
a regulative principle; no speculative inferences from the concept to an
object of existence are permissible. In LPT he develops a moral theology,
based loosely on Baumgarten which points to a constructive complement
to the destruction of the proofs of speculative theology. This proposes the
existence of God as a 'necessary postulate for the incontrovertible laws of
my own nature' (p. ll0) and establishes a determinate concept of God as
the necessary condition for morality. In this way, specious knowledge of
God is removed in order to make room for practical faith.
theoretical philosophy see PHILOSOPHY
thing [Ding] see APPEARANCE, OBJECT, PERSON
thing-in-itself [Ding an sich] see also APPEARANCE, ARCHETYPE, IDENTI1Y, INTELLIGIBLE

WORLD, INTUITION, NOUMENON, OBJECT, PHENOMENON, TRANSCENDENTAL OBJECT
Kant uses this term to denote a duster of meanings which include those
properly attributed to noumena and to transcendent ideas. The thing-in
itself shares with these the negative quality of limiting the employment of
the understanding and reason to what can be an object of intuition, and
the positive quality of denoting a problematic space beyond these limits.
Thus the thing-in-itself cannot be known since knowledge is limited to
possible experience, but it can be thought, provided that it satisfies the
condition of a possible thought which is not to be self-contradictory. In P
Kant uses things-in-themselves synonymously with noumena, namely in
the application of pure concepts of the understanding 'beyond objects of
experience' to 'things in themselves (noumena)' (P §29). Similarly in CPR
he regards things-in-themselves as potential ideas of reason, and speaks of
'the unconditioned which reason, by necessity and by right, demands in
things in themselves' (CPR B xx).
What distinguishes the things-in-themselves from the other forms of
noumena are their property of being the 'true correlate of sensibility'
(CPR A 30/B 45). Kant moves from the premise that 'nothing intuited in
space is a thing in itself ' to the conclusion that 'the thing in itself is not
known, and cannot be known, through these representations [ of our sen
sibility]; and in experience no question is ever asked in regard to it' (CPR
A 30/B 45). Yet Kant does not follow his own self-limiting ordinance here,
since he assumes that there must be a correlate which can be thought,
even if not known. On critical principles he can properly say no more
than that the thing in itself may be a correlate of sensibility. That he does
not do so arises from his resistance to the 'absurd conclusion that there
can be appearance without anything that appears' (CPR B xxvi).
393
THINKING
The residual dogmatism of bis position, which rests on the principle of

contradiction, was criticized by Hegel and Nietzsche. Neither was con
vinced ofthe necessity ofthere being something beyond appearance which
is manifest in it. Hegel's exposition ofappearances in the Phenomenology of
Spirit (1807) is informed by an immanent absolute, not one which is
manifest in appearances, while Nietzsche regards the opposition of ap
pearance and thing-in-itself as a Platonic prejudice of the philosophers,
one ofwhich, he noted in The Gay Science (1882), we know too little to be
entitled to use (§355).
thinking [Denken] see also COGNITION, HOLDING-TO-BE-TRUE, 'I THINK'' JUDGE
MENT, KNOWLEDGE
Thinking (Denken) is distinct from both knowing (Wissen) and cognition
(Erkenntnis), although these distinctions are not observed in translation;
nor are they uniformly observed by Kant. Thinking consists in 'uniting
representations in a consciousness' and the latter is a description ofjudge
ment; 'thinking therefore is the same as judging' (P §22). As such it is an
activity proper to the understanding, for 'through mere intuition nothing
is thought' (CPRA 253/B 309). The unification ofrepresentations accom
plished in thinking is based on spontaneous, pure apperception of the 'I
think', which is also entitled the 'transcendental unity ofself-consciousness'
which indicates 'the possibility of a priori knowledge arising from it' (CPR
B 132). Although at one point Kant describes thinking as 'cognition by
means of concepts' (CPR A 69/B 94), apparently suggesting that thinking
is a form of cognition, he otherwise consistently distinguishes between
them. In order to cognize an object 'I must be able to prove its possibility,
either from its actuality as attested by experience, or a priori by means
of reason' but 'I can think whatever I please, provided only that I do not
contradict myself' (CPR B xxvi). Thus it is possible to think things-in
themselves, but not to know them, for as Kant 'reminds' bis readers 'for
thought the categories are not limited by the conditions of our sensible
intuition, but have an unlimited field' (CPR B 166). lt is, of course, also
possible for thinking to be consistent with cognition, as in the case of
synthetic a priori judgements where 'thinking is the act whereby given
intuitions are related to an object' (CPRA 247/B 304). Such thinking must
fulfil the conditions for the subsumption of intuitions under concepts,
and its objects are accordingly restricted to those ofa possible experience.
time see AESTHETIC, ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, CONTINUITY, IMMORTALITY, INFINITY,
INNER SENSE, INTUITION, SCHEMA(TISM), SPACE, SPACE AND TIME, SUCCESSION
Kant's exploration of the problem of time takes place within the param
eters of an ancient tradition of thought whose perplexities inform, at a
distance, bis critique of the modern theories held by Leibniz, Locke and
394
TIME
Newton. Similarly, his view of the existential and moral significance of

time is indebted to Christian speculation, and the crucial roles played in
it by the immortality of the soul and the imputation of responsibility for
action. lt is, of course, impossible to separate the two dimensions of physi
cal and moral time, even though Kant appears to establish a rigorous
distinction between the physical time discussed in CPR and the moral
time discussed in CPrR.
The distinct positions on the nature of time held by Plato and Aristotle
were extremely significant for the subsequent development of the philoso
phy of time. Less influential upon the tradition, but important for Kant,
was the position reported to have been held by Epicurus. The medieval
reception of ancient debates was further determined by Augustine's re
flection on the moral and spiritual significance of time in his Confessions
(1960). Put at their emdest, the differences at stake in the various defini
tions of time involved the relationship between time and eternity, and
between time and motion. Plato followed a Pythagorean strain of argu
ment, which distinguished between limited and unlimited, or infinite,
time. In his cosmological dialogue Timaeus he speaks of time as a 'moving
image of eternity', distinguishing between eternal time which 'rests in unity'
and the time of 'those states which affect moving and sensible things of
which generation is the cause' (Plato, 1961, 37d, e). While Plato begins
with eternal time and sees temporal events as oriented towards it, Aristotle
begins with the now, and sees time as an accident of motion which emerges
from the experience of before and after: 'when we do perceive a "before"
and an "after", then we say that there is time. For time is just this -
number of motion in respect of "before" and "after" ' (1941, 219b, 1-2).
Epicurus's position, as reported by Diogenes Laertius (1925, Book X), sees
time as an immediate sensation (or in Kant's terms, an 'intuition') which
is distinguished from the anticipation or prowpsis by not being built up out
of successive sensations, but by being presupposed by them.
Plotinus's subtle defence of a Platonic understanding of time in The Six
Enneads maintains that time is independent of motion, but can be meas
ured in terms of it (see Plotinus, 1971, Third Ennead, VII, 12). Here time
is discussed not just in terms of motion, but in terms of an analogy (if it
is one) with life, with one term being eternity figured as a 'life change
lessly motionless and ever holding the Universal content [time, space and
phenomena] in actual presence' (Third Ennead, VII, 3) and the other
being the time of before, now, and after as the 'constant progress of
novelty ...contained in the differentiation of life' (Third Ennead, VII,
11). These themes, along with emphasis on the experience of the soul,
were taken up by Augustine in Book XI of the Confessions on 'Time and
Eternity' but reworked into a meditation upon the soul's experience of
395
TIME
time and upon the role of the soul in the measure of time. With this, the
problem of physical time is inflected in the direction of the problem of
the experience of time, and with it the themes of past memory, present
despair and future hope.
The difficulties generated by the physical and moral concepts of time
persisted into the works of Descartes and such critics as Leibniz, Locke
and Newton. Descartes' concept of time distinguished between duration
and time, the former described as a 'mode under which we conceive of
that thing as long as it continues to exist' (Descartes, 1644, p. 24), with the
latter serving as a measure of motion which is 'only in our minds'. Dura
tion is an attribute or mode of the being of things, while time is a subjec
tive mode used as a measure for motion, with duration being held to be
prior to time. Locke also emphasizes duration, seeing time and etemity as
its simple modes and tracing the origins ofduration back to 'one ofthose
sources of all our knowledge, viz., sensation and rejlection' (Locke, 1690, p.
90), in this case the 'rejlection on these appearances of several ideas one
after the other in our minds'. This reflection gives rise to the idea of
succession, and the intervals between the appearance of two successive
ideas is duration; since we are aware of our own existence while thinking
these successive ideas, we are able to call the continuation of existence of
ourselves or of others 'duration'.
The nominalist tendency inherent in the subordination of time to du
ration was resisted by both Leibniz and Newton. Newton seems to revive
a Platonic view oftime in his distinction between duration, defined by him
as 'Absolute, true, and mathematical time, [ which] of itself, and from its
own nature, flows equably without relation to anything external' and 'rela
tive, apparent and common time' which is a 'measure of duration by the
means ofmotion' (Newton, 1687, p. 8). Leibniz criticized Locke in the New
Essays for presupposing a definition of time in bis description of succes
sion, claiming against him that 'a train of perceptions arouses the idea of
duration in us, but it does not create it' (Leibniz, 1765, p. 152). But he
also criticized the view ofabsolute time maintained by the Newtonians in
his correspondence with Clarke. He satisfies both directions ofcriticism by
regarding time as an 'order of successions'; that is, time is 'relative' in so
far as it is an 'order' but not a structure, and objective in so far as it is a
necessary order. This position was developed by Wolff (1719) into an
account of time which regarded it as a confused, sensible perception of a
rational order.
The development of Kant's view of time took place within the frame
work of the debates outlined above. In PE Kant considers time to be a
partially analyzable concept, which is not open to a real definition, but
only a nominal one. Thus his account remains within the Wolffian view of
396
TIME
time which regarded it as a confused concept which could, to a certain

extent, be clarified through analysis. However, only a nominal definition
was possible - that is, an analysis of the ways in which the word 'time'
could be used - and not a real definition, that is, a definition of the nature
of time. By the time of writing 1D, Kant still maintained that time was
incapable of real definition although bis justification of this position bad
changed its character. He no longer considered time to be a confused
concept, nor did he consider it to be something real. He developed in
stead a new concept of time which was critical not only of Locke's deri
vation of time from sense and reflection, but also of the arguments for the
'objective reality of time' maintained by both the Newtonians and by
'Leibniz and bis followers' (ID §14).
He presented bis new theory of time in the shape of seven theses which
distinguished it from other positions by defining it as an intuition. The
first thesis holds that 'time does not arise from but is presupposed by the
senses' (ID §14), and implicitly agrees with Leibniz's view that Locke's
derivation of time from succession is a petitio principii. The second thesis
attacks the view held by the Leibnizians that time is a concept: 'you con
ceive all actual things as situated in time, and not as contained under the
general concept of time, as under a common characteristic mark' (ibid.).
This means, in terms of the third thesis, that time is an intuition, one
which, since it is prior to sensation, is a pure intuition. The fourth thesis
holds that time is a continuous magnitude, and that moments of time are
not parts of time 'but limits with time between them'. In the fifth, and
most controversial thesis, Kant maintains that 'time is not something
objective and real' (ibid.) and is neither a substance, nor an accident, nor
a relation. This thesis, directed as much against the Newtonians as the
Leibnizians, claims that time is a subjective condition 'necessary, in virtue
of the nature of the human mind, for the co-ordinating of all sensible
things in accordance with a fixed law' (ibid.). Yet while it is neither real
nor objective, it is not simply subjective in the Lockean sense since it is a
form of co-ordination prior to the objects of sense that it co-ordinates.
Sixth, and following from this, time is not simply imaginary, but supplies
the only condition under which objects of the senses can be co-ordinated.
lt is 'fundamental and originary' and, in the words of the seventh thesis,
an 'absolutely firstformal principl,e ofthe sensibl,e world' (ibid.) without which
our intuition of objects of sense would not be possible.
In the 'Transcendental Aesthetic' of CPR the insights into the nature of
time announced in 1D are further developed and refined. As in the case
of space, Kant offers a metaphysical and a transcendental exposition of
time: the former is a representation of what belongs to the concept of
time 'as given a priori' (CPR A 23/B 38), the explanation of time as a
397
TIME
principle 'from which the possibility of other a priori synthetic knowledge

can be understood' (B 41). The metaphysical exposition covers five points,
with the basic direction of the argument following that of ID. First of all,
time is not an empirical concept derived from experience, but is its pre
supposition: 'Only on the presupposition of time can we represent to
ourselves a number of things as existing at one and the same time (simul
taneously) or at different times (successively)' (A 30/B 46). lt is according
to the second point a priori and 'underlies all intuitions' (A 31/B 46).
Apodeictic principles concerning relations in time, according to the third
point, are grounded in the a priori necessity of time and are not derived
from experience. This is a crucial step in the elaboration of the argument
for the principles developed in the 'Transcendental Doctrine of Judge
ment'. The fourth point is that time does not possess the subsumptive
properties of a concept, by which objects are collected under a general term,
but rather those of an intuition which co-ordinates objects in a singular
intuition. With his fifth point Kant tackles the problem of infinite or un
limited time which had beset philosophers since Plato: he agrees that time
is unlimited, and that determinate magnitudes of time are 'possible only
through limitations of one single time that underlies it' (A 32/B 48), but
he does not locate this unlimited time in the empyrean but in the 'inner
sense' which underlies all appearances in determinate times (A 33/B 50).
Although Kant discusses space and time together in the 'Transcenden
tal Aesthetic' he accords time a more fundamental role in the determina
tion of experience. The adaptation of the concepts of the understanding
to the appearances given by the forms of intuition is discussed in terms of
the 'inner sense' or time. The schemas and the principles may be under
stood, albeit crudely, as temporally adapted forms of the categories which
establish the pattems of intuitive co-ordination and conceptual subsumption
which make up experience. The ineluctable temporal dimension of hu
man experience is the basis of Kant's insistence on the subjective nature
of time, and thus it brings together theoretical and practical issues. The
moral negotiation of human desire is inseparable from the finite charac
ter of human life, with its experience composed of an inextricable mesh
of memory, hope and fear. In order to underwrite these aspects of tem
poral experience, Kant postulates 'immortality' in CPrR as the only con
dition capable of providing 'the practically necessary condition of a duration
adequate to the perfect fulfilment of the moral law' (p. 133, p. 137). This
move was consistently criticized by nineteenth- and twentieth-century
philosophers, notably Nietzsche (1886) and Heidegger (1927), who ex
plored the implications of extending Kant's restriction of theoretical time
to the limits of finite human experience to the reflection upon action and
responsibility in practical philosophy.
398
TRANSCENDENTAL
topic, transcendental see CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION
totality (third category of quantity) see CATEGORIES, JUDGEMENT, TABLE OF

CATEGORIES
transcendent [transzendent] see also ABSOLUTE, REASON, TRANSCENDENTAL

Kant distinguishes between the transcendent and the transcendental. Tran
scendent is the term used to describe those principles which 'profess to
pass beyond' the limits of experience, as opposed to immanent principles
'whose application is confined entirely within the limits of possible experi
ence' (CPR A 296/B 352). Transcendent principles 'which recognise no
limits' are to be distinguished from the transcendental employment of
immanent principles beyond their proper limits. Such principles include
the psychological, cosmological and theological ideas discussed in the 'Tran
scendental Dialectic'. Kant also described the 'objective employment of
the pure concepts of reason' as 'transcendent', confusingly describing them
as 'transcendental ideas' (CPR A 327/B 383). In CJ Kant distinguishes be
tween aesthetic and rational ideas, with the former referred to intuition
according to a 'merely subjective principle of the harmony of the cogni
tive faculties' and the latter referred according to an objective principle
which is 'incapable of ever furnishing a cognition of the object' (CJ §57).
The latter is transcendent, as opposed to the subjective principle of the
aesthetic idea, and the immanent concept of the understanding. As in
CPR, the rational ideas are produced by the reason and may be used
regulatively in the search for the systematic unity of the understanding,
or in a transcendent manner 'once reason advances beyond pursuit of
understanding' (CJ §76).
transcendental see also TRANSCENDENT

In medieval philosophy the transcendentals denoted the extra-categorical
attributes of beings: unity, truth, goodness, beauty (and, in some classifi
cations, thing and something). For Kant, a trace of this usage survives in
his use of transcendental as a form of knowledge, not of objects them
selves but of the ways in which we are able to know them, namely the
conditions of possible experience. Thus he 'entitle[s] transcendental all
knowledge which is occupied not so much with objects as with the mode
of our knowledge of objects in so far as this mode of knowledge is to be
possible a priori' (CPR A 12). The system of the concepts which constitute
a priori knowledge may be described as transcendental philosophy, for
which the critique of pure reason is variously described as a propaedeutic,
canon or architectonic. The term transcendental is used ubiquitously to
qualify nouns such as logic, aesthetic, unity of apperception, faculties,
399
TRANSCENDENTAL AESTHETIC
illusion; in each case it signals that the noun it qualifies is being consid
ered in terms of its conditions of possibility.
The precise meaning of the term transcendental shifts throughout CPR,
but its semantic parameters may be indicated by showing the ways in
which Kant distinguishes it from its contraries. The transcendental is dis
tinguished from the empirical, and aligned with the a priori in so far as
the a priori involves a reference to the mode of knowledge; it 'signifies
such knowledge as concems the a priori possibility of knowledge, or its a
priori employment' (CPR A 56/B 86). The distinction of transcendental
and empirical thus involves the metacritique of knowledge and its a priori
sources. Kant regards the psychological account of knowledge as a branch
of the empirical, and thus in turn distinguishes it from transcendental
knowledge (A 801/B 829). The transcendental is also distinguished from
the metaphysical and the logical. A metaphysical exposition of space, for
example, is one which represents what belongs to a concept given a priori
(A 23/B 38), while a transcendental exposition explains a concept 'as a
principle from which the possibility of other a priori synthetic knowledge
can be understood' (B 40). A transcendental distinction of the sensible
and the intelligible differs from a logical distinction - which involves 'their
form as being either clear or confused' - by its concem with 'origin and
content' (A 44/B 62). Finally, Kant distinguishes between transcendental
and transcendent, contrasting the transcendent principles which 'incite us
to tear down all those boundary-fences and seize possession of an entirely
new domain which recognises no limits of demarcation' from the tran
scendental 'misemployment' of the categories, which extends their appli
cation beyond the limits of possible experience, and 'which is merely an
error of the faculty of judgement' (A 296/B 352).
transcendental aesthetic see AESTHETIC, INTUITION, RECEPTMTY, SENSIBILI1Y, SPACE,

TIME
transcendental analytic see ANALYfIC, CATEGORIES, CONCEPTS, JUDGEMENT, LOGIC,

ONTOLOGY, PRINCIPLES, TRUTH
transcendental deduction see DEDUCTION
transcendental dialectic see ANTINOMY, DIALECTIC, IDEAL, ILLUSION, INFERENCE,

PARALOGISM
transcendental idea see REASON
transcendental illusion see DIALECTic, ILLUSION
400
TRANSCENDENTAL OBJECT AND �UBJECT
transcendental logic see ANALITIC, CATEGORIES, CONCEPTS, INTUITION, LOGIC
transcendental object and subject see also I, INTUITION, MANIFOLD, NOUMENON,

OBJECT, RECEPTMTY, SUBJECT, THING-IN-ITSELF, UNITY
The transcendental object was a theoretical consequence ofKant's confin
ing human intuition to the receptivity of appearances and his belief that
there can be no 'appearance without anything that appears' (CPR B xxvii).
The transcendental object is postulated as that which 'appears' or the cor
relate to receptivity. When discussing the transcendental object Kant sus
pends his usual distinctions between Of1ekt and Gegenstand, and on occasions
even uses 'thing' (Ding). This is a consequence of the unknowability of the
transcendental object, a property which it shares with the noumenon and
thing-in-itself; like them, it can be thought according to the principle of
contradiction, but cannot be known as an object of experience. lndeed,
on some occasions, mainly in the first edition of CPR, Kant uses the terms
noumenon and thing-in-itselfas synonyms for transcendental object (A 366,
A 358, A 614/B 642). But while all three share the quality of being think
able but not objects of experience, the transcendental object is specifically
the intelligible correlate of sensible appearances. Kant concedes unen
thusiastically that we may call 'the purely intelligible cause of appearances
in general the transcendental object', with the added qualification 'but
merely in order to have something corresponding to sensibility viewed as
a receptivity' (A 494/B 522). lt is, as he noted earlier in CPR, simply a
function of the requirement that appearances as representations must
represent something, call it 'the non-empirical, that is, transcendental
object = x' (A 109).
On a number of occasions in CPR Kant seems to point beyond the
merely functional requirements of the transcendental object as a correlate
of appearances. These are the moments at which the transcendental ob
ject undergoes metamorphosis into a transcendental subject. The transi
tional link is the unity informing a manifold of intuition. At A 613/B 641
Kant moves from describing the transcendental object as 'lying at the basis
of appearances' and thus 'to us inscrutable' to saying that this is the
reason 'why our sensibility is subject to certain supreme conditions rather
than others'. This may be placed alongside his earlier comment that the
transcendental object 'expresses only the thought of an object in general,
according to different modes [of intuition]' (A 247/B 304). By this he
does not mean that the transcendental object determines our spatio
temporal mode of intuition, but that it offers 'the unity of the thought of
a manifold in general', regardless of the mode of intuition. This unity,
however, is subsequently made the property of the 'transcendental sub
ject' or 'a something in general' signified by the expression 'I' which
401
TRANSCENDENTAL PHILOSOPHY
forms the vehicle for every experience. lt supplies the most fundamental
condition of experience which is that the manifolds of intuition be capa
ble of unity.
transcendental philosophy see also METAPHYSICS, ONTOLOGY, PHILOSOPHY, SYN

THETIC A PRIORI, SYSTEM, TRANSCENDENTAL
In CPR (B 73) and CJ (§36) Kant describes the general problem of tran
scendental philosophy as 'how are synthetic a priori judgements possible?'
lt is thus concerned with the rules which govern such judgements - given
in the pure concept of the understanding - as well as specifying 'a priori
the instance to which the rule is to be applied' (CPR A 135/B 174) or the
principles of transcendental judgement. Kant distinguishes transcendental
philosophy from the 'critique of pure reason' in that the latter provides
an analysis of only 'fundamental concepts' while a füll transcendental
philosophy would be required to present 'an exhaustive analysis of the
whole of a priori human knowledge' (A 13/B 27). lt is more specific than
ontology in that it extends only to the understanding and reason 'in a
system of concepts and principles which relate to objects in general but
tak.es no account of objects that may be gi,ven ( Ontologi,a) ', but is more general
than physiology which for Kant extends only as far as nature or 'the sum
of gi,ven objects' (A 845/B 873). Transcendental philosophy bears with it
an obligation to answer questions concerning objects given to pure rea
son, since the 'very concept which puts us in a position to ask the question
must also qualify us to answer it' (A 477/B 505), even if the answer con
sists in pointing to unjustified assumptions implied in the question.
transcendental reßection see CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION
transcendental subject see APPERCEPTION, I, SUBJECT, TRANSCENDENTAL OBJECT/

SUBJECT
transcendental unity of apperception see APPERCEPTION, I, '1 THINK', IDENTITY,

JUDGEMENT, SPONTANEITY, SUBJECT, SYNTHESIS, UNITY
treaties see FEDERATION OF STATES, PEACE, WAR
truth [aletheia, veritas, Wahrheit] see also ANALYTIC, APPEARANCE, CERTAINTY,

HOLDING-TO-BE-TRUE, ILLUSION
Kant's reply to the question 'what is truth?' is couched in terms of 'the
general and sure criterion of the truth of any and every knowledge' (CPR
A 58/B 82). After taking as given the nominal definition of truth as 'the
agreement of knowledge with its object' (A 58/B 82) he claims that there
402
TYPE/TYPIC
can be no general criterion 'such as would be valid in each and every

instance of knowledge, however their objects may vary' (A 58/B 83). Yet
while this holds for the content of knowledge, it is possible to establish a
negative, logical criterion of truth in so far as the 'universal and necessary
rules of the understanding' (A 59/B 84) expounded by logic are a conditio
sine qua non. For 'whatever contradicts these rules is false' (ibid.) although
agreement with these rules is not in itself a sufficient criterion of truth.
Within the critical framework the notion of the 'agreement of knowl
edge with its object' takes on a new meaning, particularly in the light of
its basic axiom that 'the conditions of the possibility of experience in general
are likewise conditions of the possibility of the o/1ects of experience' (CPR A
158/B 197). This means that the conditions of experience determine the
agreement of knowledge and object, or as Kant put it, 'experience sup
plies the rules and is the source of truth' (A 318/B 375). The conditions
of experience comprise appearances given through a priori intuition and
synthesized with pure a priori concepts of the understanding. Thus Kant
can say that the synthesis of these elements 'as knowledge a priori, can
possess truth, that is, agreement with the object, only in so far as it con
tains nothing save what is necessary to synthetic unity of experience in
general' (A 158/B 197). This must include, as Kant spells out, the 'formal
conditions of a priori intuition, the synthesis of imagination and the nec
essary unity of this synthesis in a transcendental apperception' (A 158/B
197). With this argument Kant rejects any Platonic view of truth as agree
ment of knowledge with an idea, as well as a Platonic equation of sensi
bility with illusion. Appearances are no longer considered to be illusions,
but are an essential element of experience and consequently of truth.
Alongside this account of truth as 'agreement with an object' Kant also
presents one couched in terms of validity. In this version truth is discussed
in terms of 'holding-to-be-true' or the subjective and objective validity of
judgements. lt has three grades: opinion, which is consciously insufficient
both subjectively and objectively; faith, which is consciously insufficient
objectively but suffices subjectively; and knowledge, which is both subjec
tively and objectively sufficient and thus certain (CPR A 822/B 850).
However, the notion of objective sufficiency may be taken to include within
it the definition of 'truth as agreement with an object' (A 58/B 82).
type/typic see also ANALOGY, HYPOTYPOSIS, JUDGEMENT, SCHEMA(TISM)

The section of CPrR on the 'Typic of Pure Practical Judgement' addresses
the problem of practical judgement, and in particular the problem of
presenting the 'ideal' of the morally good in concreto. lt forms, along with
schematism and symbolization, another species of the genre hypotyposis.
Kant compares it directly with schematism, noting that the problem
403
TYPE/TYPIC
addressed by the schematism of presenting a concept to an intuition in a

judgement is further complicated in practical judgement by the supersen
sible character of the moral law. He does however concede that a 'natural
law' may be admitted 'for the purpose of judgement ... [but] only in its
formal aspect, and it may, therefore, be called the type of the moral law'
(CPrR p. 70, p. 72). The type of the moral law makes it possible to 'com
pare maxims of action with a universal natural law' without succumbing
to 'empiricism of practical reason' which grounds moral judgements in
empirical principles, or to a 'mysticism of practical reason'. Tue latter,
Kant observes, 'makes into a schema that which should only serve as a
symbol, i.e., proposes to supply real yet non-sensuous intuitions (of an
invisible kingdom of God) for the application of the moral law' (p. 71, p.
73). lt thus converts what should only be an analogy of a kingdom of ends
into a transcendent object.
404
u
unconditioned see ABSOLUTE, ANTINOMY, FREEDOM , IDEA, REASON
understanding [ dianoia, intellectio, Verstand] see also AMPHIBOLY, ANALYTIC,

CONCEPTS OF REFLECTION, FACULTY, FINITUDE, INTUITION , LOGIC, REASON, RULES,
SENSIBILITY, SPONTANEITY, TABLE OF CATEGORIES /JUDGEMENTS
The history of the understanding has been largely determined by the
problems in establishing the relationship between acts of understanding,
or thought in general, and the faculty of the mind which is responsible for
these acts. The early disputes around the nature of the faculty of under¬
standing motivate one of Aquinas s best known polemics, On the Unity of
the Intellect against the Averroists (Aquinas, 1968) , and persisted throughout
medieval philosophy in the guise of the role of divine illumination in acts
of understanding and the contribution to knowledge made by the senses
and imagination. In the Meditations Descartes gave the faculty of under¬
standing a broad role in the creation of knowledge, placing its contribu¬
tion above that of the imagination and senses. In his reply to objections
he clearly distinguished between acts of understanding or intellection
and the thing which understands’ or ‘understanding as a faculty’ and in
so doing clearly identified the complex relationship between the constitu¬
tion of the faculty and the acts of understanding that it accomplished.
The debate over the nature of the understanding and its relationship to
acts of understanding took a fascinating turn in the encounter of Leibniz
with Locke’ s theory of human understanding in the New Essays on Human
Understanding (1765) . In An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690 )
Locke described the understanding as ‘not much unlike a closet wholly
shut from light, with only some little opening left, to let in external visible
resemblances, or ideas of things without’ ( p. 76) . Leibniz replied that to
characterize the work of the understanding fully, it would be necessary for
Locke to equip his closet with a screen , and that screen would not be
uniform but would be under tension , ‘diversified by folds representing
items of innate knowledge’ , and would respond to impressions like the
string of a musical instrument ( Leibniz, 1765, p. 144) . This extremely
405
UNDERSTANDING
complex characterization of the operation of the human understanding

was not adopted by Leibniz's Wolffian followers, although like both Leibniz
and Locke, the Wolffians saw the understanding as the 'capacity to repre
sent possible things' (Meissner, 1737, 'Verstand'); that is, as a power of
representation which included sensibility and imagination, and which
operated through concepts, judgements and inferences.
Traces of the Wolffian view of the understanding as the general power
of representation persist in Kant, although he was concemed to separate
the understanding as a faculty from both sensibility and reason. For him
it was possible to 'reduce all acts of the understanding to judgements' and
thus to represent the understanding as a 'faculty of judgement' (CPR A
69/B 94). By judgement he meant the 'mediate knowledge of an object,
that is, the representation of a representation of it' (A 68/B 93), whether
this representation be an intuition or a concept. All judgements are ac
cordingly 'functions of unity among our representations', so the under
standing may be further characterized as a faculty for unifying
representations. Thus from the acts of understanding - judgements -
Kant moves to the 'dissection of the Jaculty of the understanding itself' in which
he 'investigate[s] the possibility of concepts a priort (A 65/B 90). His
'clue' in the search for these basic concepts of the understanding - its
basic forms of unification - is the table of judgements comprising the four
classes of the quantity, quality, relation and modality of judgements.
In order to characterize how it is possible for the understanding to
originate its own pure concepts, Kant has to distinguish it from the other
two faculties of sensibility and reason. This leads to what he himself admits
are 'various different' definitions of the understanding. lt is defined as 'a
spontaneity of knowledge (in distinction from the receptivity of sensibil
ity)' (CPR A 126), because its concepts are modes of the transcendental
unity of apperception, which is original and spontaneous:. lt is also de
scribed as a 'power of thought', 'a faculty of concepts' in that it comprises
the categories through which it gives 'the law of the synthetic unity of all
appearances' (A 128), a faculty of judgement, and the 'faculty of rules'. In
the guise of the latter, the understanding 'is always occupied in investigat
ing appearances, in order to detect some rule in them' (A 126). These
rules, however, 'issue a priori from the understanding itself ', for it is also
characterized as the 'lawgiver of nature' (ibid.). On one of the readings
that Kant's description of the understanding seems to invite, the under
standing is given the materials of experience by the sensibility, which it
then processes by means of subsuming them under a rule. But this does
not do justice to the füll dignity he accords understanding as the 'lawgiver
of nature', for it is able to 'confer upon appearances their conformity to
law, and so make experience possible' (A 126).
406
UNITY
The relationship Kant establishes between understanding and sensibility

is extremely intricate and complex, and consists in bringing together the
otherwise heterogeneous intuitions and concepts. Both are representa
tions, but the former originate in the receptivity of human sensibility, the
latter in the spontaneity of the understanding. Intuitions and concepts
must be adapted to each other in a way which respects their heterogene
ity, but which nevertheless permits their synthesis to be accomplished.
Kant ventures to describe how this is accomplished in the schematism and
in the principles. The understanding's relationship to reason is character
ized in a more straightforward way. The understanding secures 'the unity
of appearances by means of rules' while reason pursues 'the unity of the
rules of understanding under principles' (CPR A 302/B 359). While the
understanding is restricted to the range of possible experience, reason is
'directed always towards absolute totality in the synthesis of conditions'
(A 326/B 382); this leads it to drive the concepts of the understanding
beyond their legitimate limits, and to generate the fallacious inferences
scrutinized in the 'Transcendental Dialectic' of CPR.
The understanding has been the site of a great deal of opposition to the
critical philosophy. Early 'metacritiques', such as those ofHamann (1967)
andHerder (1953), objected to the separation of understanding and sen
sibility, while later critics such as Fichte (1794) and Hegel (1807, 1812)
criticized the separation of understanding and reason. Later generations
of critics, above all Nietzsche and the neo-Kantians in the late nineteenth
century, resisted Kant's tendency to transform the discussion of acts of
understanding into the dissection of the faculty of understanding. This
current of criticism, which merged with anti-psychologistic readings of
Kant's philosophy, remained extremely influential during the twentieth
century, and will be encountered in fairly pure form by readers of Strawson's
The Bounds of Sense (1966).
unity [Einheit] see also CATEGORY, CONCEPT, IDENTITY, MANIFOLD, QUANTITY, REASON,
RELATION, RULE, UNDERSTANDING
Unity is a ubiquitous concept in Kant's philosophy, and is consequently
used in specific and general senses. However, his usage evinces a basic
equivocation in the definition of the concept, between (a) the traditional
'transcendental' sense of unity and (b) its critical sense as the first of the
categories of quantity. Kant himself reflects on the two senses of unity in
CPR when he discusses the scholastic proposition 'being, unity, truth, and
the good are convertible' (B 113). Kant recognized that the transcendentals
were traditionally regarded as extra-categorical determinations of being,
but he audaciously proposed to demote them to being mere categories of
quantity: 'These supposedly transcendental predicates of things are, in fact,
407
UNI'IY
nothing but logical requirements and criteria of all knowkdge of things in

general, and prescribe for such knowledge the categories of quantity,
namely, unity, plurality, and totality' (B 114). In spite of this claim, the
transcendental status of unity returned to haunt Kant in several painful
ways.
In OPA Kant followed the traditional transcendental sense of unity,
deriving it 'from a ground in the supreme being' (p. 119, p. 160) and
seeing it as informing 'natural perfection'.However, by PE unity has become
- along with magnitude, plurality and space - one of the fundamental,
'unanalysable' concepts which were subsequently worked through into the
table of categories (PE p. 280, p. 252). The two senses of unity co-exist in
ID where it features both as the subjective co-ordination of phenomena
and as the 'corollary of the dependence of all substances on one being'
(ID �O). In CPR the two senses of unity also co-exist, although the extra
categorical sense of the term has lost its theological hue.
Although Kant sought in CPR to reduce unity to a category of quantity,
he stresses the distinction between the categorical and extra-categorical
senses when he observes that the 'unity, which precedes a priori all con
cepts of combination, is not the category of unity ...for all categories are
grounded in logical functions of judgement, and in these functions com
bination, and therefore unity of given concepts, is already thought' (CPR
B 131). The problem Kant encountered is most clearly stated in P. In
seeking to derive the table of categories Kant 'looked about for an act of
the understanding which comprises all the rest and is differentiated only
by various modifications or moments' (P §39). He found this to consist in
the act of judgement which brought the 'manifold of representation under
the unity of thinking in general' (P §39). However, the unity in question
could not be the category of unity which was supposedly derived from the
unity of thinking; the latter then had to be of a different order from the
categories; in other words, 'transcendental'.
The resort to an extra-categorical unity posed extremely serious problems
for the critical philosophy, but was ineluctable. lt was necessary for Kant to
postulate a 'pure original unchangeable consciousness' or 'transcendental
apperception' whose 'numerical unity' 'is thus the a priori ground of all
concepts' (CPR A 107). Without it the entire transcendental philosophy
would be in <langer of becoming an empirical psychology; yet how can he
justify the equivocal use of unity as a categorical and extra-categorical
synthesis? One avenue Kant explored was to describe the extra-categorical
'unity' of the transcendental subject as an 'identity' which informs cat
egorical 'unity': 'The original and necessary consciousness of the identity
of the seif is thus at the same time a consciousness of an equally necessary
unity of the synthesis of all appearances according to concepts ...' (CPR
408
UNIVERSALITY
A 108, my italics). Another avenue was to qualify unity according to whether

or not it was intended categorically or transcendentally, as when Kant
deliberately entitles the unity of apperception 'the transcendental unity of
self-consciousness, in order to indicate the possibility of a priori knowledge
arising from it' (CPR B 132, Kant's italics).
On top of the distinction between categorical and transcendental unity
Kant adds the unity of the understanding and the unity of reason. The
former is categorical unity while the latter is concemed to 'carry the
synthetic unity, which is thought in the category, up to the completely
unconditioned' (CPR B 383). The unity of reason differs from transcen
dental unity in at least one important respect. Transcendental unity ena
bles the act of judgement to tak.e place from which the categories are
derived as modes, while the unity of reason is the extension of the already
given category of unity beyond the limits of sense to the unconditioned.
universality see CATEGORIES, DEDUCTION, INDMDUAL, NECESSITY
409
V
validity [ Gdtung/ Giiltigkmt ] see O&OCOMMON SENSE,JUDGEMENT, NECESSITY, PRINCIPLES

In CPR, P and CJ Kant distinguished between the various ways in which
judgements can be held to possess validity. Subjectively valid judgements
or judgements of perception require no pure concept of the under¬
standing, but only the logical connection of perception in a thinking
subject ( P §18) . Objectively valid judgements, on the contrary, require
‘besides the representation of the sensuous intuition , special concepts
-
originally generated in the understanding , they are manifest by the fact that
they are universally and necessarily valid, that is, ‘if they hold good for us
and in the same way for everybody else’ ( ibid.) . In P Kant holds that this
shared validity follows from the ‘unity of the object to which they all refer
and with which they accord’ because otherwise ‘there would be no reason
for the judgements of other men necessarily to agree with mine’ (§18) .
Later, in CJ, he disagreed with his own position , and admitted a sensus
communis or shared common sense which could lead to universally shared
and necessarily valid judgements without a ‘unity of the object’. Indeed,
he attributed ‘exemplary validity’ to aesthetic judgements of taste on the
basis of common sense as an ‘ideal norm ’ , or an idea which is ‘subjectively
universal’ but ‘necessary for everyone’ ( CJ §22 ) . However, the idea of a
sensus communis cannot be used on a constitutive basis but only on a
regulative one; yet this need not necessarily be prejudicial to its validity.
This is evident in CPR, where Kant admits into the class of objectively valid
judgements those governed by both constitutive and regulative principles.
Objective validity is accorded not only to those judgements which possess
‘immanent validity’ from obeying the formal conditions of a possible
experience ( CPR A 638/ B 666 ) , but also to those asymptotic regulative
ideas of reason which possess ‘objective but indeterminate validity’ (A
663/ B 691) .
value [ Wert] see also END, MAXIM, PERSON

Kant’ s philosophy of value is structured around a distinction between ab¬
solute and relative value, which in its turn is determined by one between
410
VIRTUE
ends and means. Any thing or action which is a means to an end is valued
relative to that end; so, for example, the traditional virtues of courage,
resolution and perseverance receive their value only with respect to the
ends they serve. If the end is good, then means are good relative to it; if
ends are bad, then means are bad. The only things which are good in
themselves and thus of absolute worth are a good will and a person. A
good will is an end in itselfbecause 'it is good only through its willing, i.e.,
it is good in itself' (GMM p. 394, p. 7), while persons are ends in them
selves, and thus of absolute worth, because 'their nature already marks
them out as ends in themselves, i.e., as something which is not to be used
merely as means and . . . which are thus objects of respect' (p. 428, p. 36).
Persons are so marked out because a rational being cannot will the maxim
that another rational being should be used as a means to another's ends
should become a universal law. For in willing such a maxim, a rational
being wills their own potential subordination as a means to another's
ends. In CJ §83 Kant gives this view of value an historical dimension by
claiming that the value of life and the final end of creation are deter
mined by the worth we assign to our lives by acting with a view to an
absolute end, independent of nature.
variety see CONTINUITY, HOMOGENEITY
vice see SEX, VIRTUE
virtue [arete, virtus Tugend] see also JUSTICE, RIGHT, SEX

Although in GMM Kant seems to regard such traditional virtues as mod
eration and self-control as possessing value only as means relative to the
end of a good will, he nevertheless accords the doctrine of virtue a signifi
cant part in his metaphysics of morals. The MM is divided into 'the system
of the doctrine of Right ( ius), which deals with duties which can be given by
extemal laws, and the system of the doctrine of virtue (Ethica) which treats
of duties which cannot be so given' (p. 379, p. 185). Kant distinguishes
between ethical duties which follow from ethical obligation in general and
concem only 'what is formal in the moral determination of the will' and
duties of virtue which concem ends which are also duties (MM p. 383, p.
188). The latter form the contents of the doctrine of virtue and are dis
tributed according to the two classes of ends which are also duties, namely
those relating to 'one's own perfection' and those relating to 'the happi
ness of others'. The discussion of these two classes forms the contents of
Part I and Part II respectively of the 'Doctrine of Virtue'. Part I discusses
duties of virtue to oneself as an animal being, such as not to commit
suicide or to defile oneself by lust, or to eat and drink too much; duties
411
vom
to oneself as a moral being such as the avoidance of lying, avarice and

servility; the duty of conscience, and the imperfect duty to improve one
self. The second part considers the duties of virtue to others, above all to
love and respect them.
Although Kant redefines the content and scope of the traditional, sub
stantive doctrine of virtue in relation to his new, formal definition of
moral value and the good, there are traces of the old doctrine throughout
his writings. A notable example is provided by the discussions of Platonic
and Stoic virtue in CPR as ideals for judging examples of virtue (see A
315/B 372 and A 569/B 597).
void see NOTHING
412
w
war [ Krieg] see also DISPUTE, FEDERATION OF STATES, PEACE, STATE

In MM Kant describes each state as living in relation to another state in
the condition of natural freedom and therefore in a condition of constant
war ( p. 343, p. 150) . The rights of states with respect to each other
concern their going to war, their actions during wars, and their right after
war to constrain each other to leave this condition of war and so form a
constitution that will establish lasting peace ( p. 343, p. 150; see also PP) .
For Kant, war is the means by which a state prosecutes its rights with
regard to other states through its own force, with grounds for a state going
to war including not only such active violations as first aggression ’ or ‘a
state’ s taking upon itself to obtain satisfaction for an offence committed
against its people by the people of another state’ ( MM p. 346, p. 153) , but
also threatened hostility. This includes another state’ s preparations for
hostility, or even the menacing increase in another state’ s power ’ (ibid. ) . The
rights of a state at war include using any means of defence except those
‘which would make its subjects unfit to be citizens’ , and any means except
those which ‘would destroy the trust requisite to establishing a lasting
peace in the future’ such as using its subjects for purposes of espionage,
assassination , and the spreading of false reports ( p. 347, p. 154 ) . In con¬
ducting a war, it is permitted to ‘exact supplies and contributions’ from
an enemy, but not to plunder the people, since for Kant the people and
the state are not the same. Kant considered war to be the source of the
‘greatest evils which oppress civilised nations’ ( CBH p. 121, p. 231 ) , and
not so much actual warfare as ‘the unremitting, indeed ever-increasing
preparation for war in the future’ ( ibid.) . He noted presciently that all the
‘resources of the state, and all the fruits of its culture which might be used
to enhance that culture even further, are devoted to this purpose’ with the
additional unhappy result that ‘freedom suffers greatly in numerous areas’
( CBH p. 121, p. 232 ) .
will see also CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, FREEDOM, REASON, SPONTANEITY
Kant’s discussion of the will is conducted in terms of a distinction between
the will ( Wille ) and the ‘capacity for choice’ ( Willkur) , with both terms often
413
WILL
being translated as 'will'. This is occasionally the case in Kemp Smith's

translation of CPR, which has led to claims that Kant developed the dis
tinction of Wille and Willkür after GMM (1785). Yet it is clearly apparent
in CPR (1781), where Kant consistently uses Willkür to refer to the ca
pacity of choice. Freedom is defined as the 'independence of the capacity
of choice from coercion by sensuous impulses'; and while the human
capacity for choice is affected by 'sensuous motives' it is not necessitated
by them. This is because, Kant explains, 'there is in man a power of self
determination, independently of any coercion through sensuous impulses'
(CPR A 534/B 562). This power of self-determination, manifest in the
'ought', is the will. Kant uses the distinction of Wille and Willkürwhen he
identifies the will as the source of the ought which determines the capacity
for choice, and effects its independence from sensuous impulses.However,
even here his distinction shows signs of slippage, with the ought determin
ing the will and the capacity for choice. Yet in spite of this, will is never
theless consistently associated with freedom, autonomy and spontaneity.
The discussions of the will in GMM and CPrR follow the broad distinc
tion between Wille and Willkür, although there is some slippage with the
'will' being described as determined by heteronomous principles. On the
whole, however, the will is considered to be the source of obligation which
directs moral attention away from heteronomous, unworthy maxims of
actions, to those consistent with the moral law. In CPrR, while human
beings can be supposed to have a pure will, they are nonetheless 'affected
by wants and sensuous motives' (p. 32, p. 32); this means that they cannot
be said to have a 'holy will' which would be 'incapable of any maxims
which conflict with the moral law'. The human will is dependent on the
moral, a dependence registered by the term 'obligation' and manifest in
the 'constraint to an action' called duty. Obligation originates in the will,
and serves to influence a 'pathologically affected capacity of choice [ Willkür] '
by means of the 'constraint of a resistance offered by the practical reason,
which may be called an inner, but intellectual compulsion' (CPrR p. 33,
p. 33). With this argument Kant can maintain that the will is free and
creates an obligation to the moral law, while also claiming that the human
capacity of choice ( Willkür not Wille) is pathologically affected by sensuous
impulses.Thus Kant can argue that the 'autonomy of the will [ Autonomie des
Willens] is the sole principle of all moral laws' which is opposed by the
'heteronomy of the capacity of choice [ Willkür] ...opposed to the principle
of duty and to the morality of the will' (CPrR p. 33, p. 33).
This direction of Kant's argument is confirmed by RL and MM. When
discussing evil in the former, Kant does not see it as a corruption of the
will itself ( Wille) but of the capacity for choice (Willkür). The corruption
414
WILL
of Willkürconsists in making 'lower incentives supreme among its maxims'

(RL p. 42, p. 38), that is, in choosing ends and actions according to
maxims which have a sensible origin. This is a corruption of Willkür be
cause it subordinates reason in the shape of maxims to the pursuit of non
rational ends. This tendency is countered by 'the injunction that we ought
to become better men' (RL p. 45, p. 40), which originales in the 'good
will' (Wille). The way in which the distinction of Wille and Willkürworks is
shown most clearly in MM. Willkür is defined as the 'capacity for doing or
refraining from doing as one pleases' in so far as this capacity is JOined with
one's consciousness of the capacity to bring about its object' (MM p. 213,
p. 42). While Willkür is concerned with action and the realization of ends,
Wille is 'the capacity for desire considered not so much in relation to
action (as the capacity for choice [Willkür] is) but rather in the relation
to the ground determining choice to action'. From this Kant infers that
in so far as the will 'can determine the capacity for choice, it is indeed
practical reason itself ' (p. 213, p. 42), and that it does so autonomously,
without any 'determining ground', through the form or 'fitness of maxims
of choice to be universal law' which is prescribed as an 'imperative that
commands or prohibits absolutely' (p. 214, p. 42).
Kant's separation of will and the capacity for choice corrected a ten
dency to make the will into a faculty, and consequently to conjure up
problems concerning the relationship between free will and determinism.
By focusing upon maxims to action chosen by Willkür, Kant is able to
distinguish the freedom and self-legislation of the will from the choices
made by the Willkür. For his account to be convincing, he has to show the
ways in which the will can be the source of an obligation which can
discriminate between maxims. The advantages of this position are patent,
notably that it avoids the opposition between free will and determinism;
its danger, however, lies in it separating the will altogether from the capac
ity of choice, and hyp ostatizing it. Schelling took some steps in this direc
tion in Über das Wesen der menschlichen Freiheit (1809) (and in later writings)
where the will is cast as the 'primordial being [Wollen ist Ursein]' (p. 46)
which is limited by the understanding and in which both will and being
mutually raise and clarify each other in spirit. In the World as Will and
Representation (1819) Schopenhauer opposed will and representation, mak
ing will into an unknowable force. Nietzsche (1887) rejected both the
hypostatization of the will and the tendency to treat it as a faculty, and
returned to a more Kantian position with his notion of will-to-power as a
form of regulative idea with which to test potential courses of action for
the presence of reactive elements (ressentiment), or what Kant would have
described as maxims influenced by 'sensuous impulses'.
415
WOMAN
woman see also MARRIAGE, SEX, STATE

Kant's comments on women are, on the whole, the predictably superficial
observations of an eighteenth-century gallant who is happy to patronize
women as long as they keep to their place. In section three of OBS,
women are introduced as the 'fair sex' in possession of a 'secret magic'
and an 'inborn feeling for all that is beautiful, elegant, and decorated' (p.
229, p. 77). Their 'beautiful understanding' is contrasted with the 'deep
understanding' of men; hers is 'not to reason, but to sense' (p. 230, p. 79).
As a wife she is to provide children and 'merry talkativeness' and to 'com
plement her husband's understanding with her taste' (ibid.). In A Kant
ventures an explanation for the dependency of women on men: since
nature entrusted the future of the species to women's wombs, and was
concerned for the preservation of the embryo, it thoughtfully 'implanted
fear into the woman's character, a fear of physical injury and a timidity
towards similar dangers. On the basis of this weakness, the woman legiti
mately asks for masculine protection' (A p. 306, p. 219). Not only this,
nature also ingeniously provided that the request for protection would
also lead to women improving and refining coarse male society. The scope
for improvement is limited, however, by the denial of political participation
to women. Kant's republicanism is based on the three formal principles of
freedom, equality and independence. True, women are deemed to be free
by virtue of being human beings, and as equal 'before the law', but they
are not independent. And as the only qualification for citizenship, 'apart of
course, from not being a child or a woman' (TP p. 295, p. 78) is economic
independence, women are consigned by Kant to passive citizenship on
grounds both of sex and economic status (see also MM p. 314, p. 126).
Kant seems to raise himself above this dismal catalogue of cliches when
he turns to discussing marriage and domestic society in MM. The mar
riage contract of 'two persons of different sexes for lifelong possession of
each other's sexual attributes' (p. 277, p. 96) is a relation between equals. In
formal terms both man and woman equally 'possess each other as persons'
(p. 278, p. 97), yet in substantive terms, within the domestic society of
family and household the wife is subordinate to the husband. Kant sees no
essential conflict between the 'equality of partners' and the 'natural supe
riority of the husband to the wife in his capacity to promote the common
interest of the household' (p. 279, p. 98). Indeed, Kant's understanding of
women may be summed up in his parenthesis on the relation bet
sexes in marriage, namely 'he is the party to direct, she to obey
world see also ANTINOMY, COSMOLOGY, INTELLIGIBLE WORLD, NATURE

In CPR the world is the 'sum total of all appearances' (A 334/B 391 and
A 507/B 535) and is the object of cosmology. lt is not a 'whole existing
416
WORLD
in itself' outside of our representations, and therefore cannot itself be an

object of legitimate knowledge. The concept of the world is distinguished
from that of nature: it is the 'mathematical sum total of all appearances
and the totality of their synthesis' while nature is the same world 'viewed
as dynamical whole' (A 418/B 446). Kant consistently rejected the Wolffian
distinction between sensible and intelligible worlds (A 257/B 312), while
admitting one between sensible and intellectual concepts (A 255/B 311);
the only admissible 'intelligible world' is the moral world of free causality,
determined by the laws of freedom. Kant's most extensive discussion of
the concept of world appears in the context of his critique of the 'special
metaphysics' of cosmology in the 'Transcendental Dialectic' of CPR. The
attempts by cosmologists to treat the world as if it were an object of
knowledge, and to inquire into its ultimate spatial and temporal limits (its
spatio-temporal beginning and end), its composition (whether ultimately
simple or composite), and the nature of its causality (whether free or
determined) generate the first three of the four antinomies presented in
CPR.
417
Kant s published writings
NOTE: the following list is arranged in chronological order of publication . For each
title it provides information about both the German ( or Latin ) text and an English
translation . It also, wherever possible, gives details of the original printer or book¬
seller / publisher of the text as well as details of where the German text can be
found in the Academy Edition of Kant s writings ( Immanuel Kant s gesammelte
Schriften, 29 volumes, Vols. I-XXII edited by the Prussian Academy of Sciences;
Vol. XXIII by the German Academy of Sciences in Berlin; Vols. XXTV-XXIX by
the Academy of Sciences in Gottingen ) . References to the Academy Edition (cited
as AK’ ) refer to volume and page numbers. Wherever possible the English trans¬
lation is the text published in the Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel
Kant’ (cited as ‘Cambridge Edition ’ together with the volume number ) .
1747 Gedanken von dor wahren Schatzung der lebendigen Krafte und Beurtheilung
der Beweise, derer sich Herr von Leibnitz und andere Mechaniker in dieser
Streitsache bedienet haben, nebst einigen vorhergehenden Betrachtungen, welche
die Kraft der Korper uberhaupt betreffen, Konigsberg, gedruckt bey Martin
Eberhard Dorn , 1746 (AK I , 1-181) .
Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces, and criticism of the proofs
propounded by Herr von Leibniz and other mechanists in their treatment of this
controversy, along with some preliminary observations concerning the force of
bodies in general, in Cambridge Edition VIII, Natural Science, ed. H.B.
Nisbet, Cambridge University Press, forthcoming.
1754a ‘Untersuchung der Frage, ob die Erde in ihrer Umdrehung um die Achse,
wodurch sie die Abwechslung des Tages und der Nacht hervorbringt,
einige Veranderungen seit den ersten Zeiten ihres Ursprungs erlitten
habe und woraus man sich ihrer versichern konne, welche von der
Konigl. Akademie der Wissenschaften zum Preise fur das jetzt laufende
Jahr aufgegeben worden’ , Wochentliche KonigsbergischeFrag- und Anzeigungs-
Nachrichten, Nrs, 23 and 24 of 8 and 15 June 1754 (AK I, 183-91) .
‘Inquiry into the Question whether the Earth in its Rotation around its
Axis, by which it produces the Change of Day and Night, has undergone
any Alterations since the Time of its Origin ’ , in Cambridge Edition VIII ,
Natural Science, ed. H.B. Nisbet, Cambridge University Press, forthcoming.
1754b ‘Die Frage: ob die Erde veralte, physikalisch erwogen’ , Wochentliche
418
KANT'S PUBLISHED WRITINGS
Königsbergische Frag- und Anzeigungs-Nachrichten, Nrs 32-7 of 10 August to

14 September (AK I, 193-213).
'The Question whether the Earth is aging, considered from a physicalist
Point of View', in Cambridge Edition VIII, Natural Science, ed. H.B.
1755a Allgemeine Naturgeschichte und Theorie des Himmels, oder Versuch von der
Verfassung und dem mechanischen Ursprunge des ganzen Weltgebäudes nach
Newtonischen Grundsätzen abgehandelt, Königsberg und Leipzig, bey Johann
Friedrich Petersen (AK I, 215-368).
Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens, or An Essay on the Con
stitution and Mechanical Origin of the Entire World Ediftce treated according
to Newtonian Principl.es, tr. Stanley L. Jaki, Edinburgh, Scottish Academic
Press, 1981.
1755b Meditationum quarundum de igne succincta delineatio, manuscript first pub
lished in Kant, Sämtliche Werke, eds. Karl Friedrich Rosenkranz and
Friedrich Wilhelm Schubert, Vol. 5, Leipzig, 1839 (AK I, 369-84).
On Fire, in Cambridge Edition VIII, Natural Science, ed. H.B. Nisbet,
Cambridge University Press, forthcoming.
1755c Principiorum primorum cognitionis metaphysicae nova dilucidatio, disserta
tion, Königsberg, J.H. Hartung (AK I, 385-416).
A New Elucidation of the First Principl,es of Metaphysical Cognition, in Cam
bridge Edition I, Theoretical Philosr,phy 1755-1770, tr. and ed. David
Walford in collaboration with RalfMeerbote, Cambridge University Press,
1992, pp. 1-45.
1756a 'Von den Ursachen der Erderschütterungen bei Gelegenheit des
Unglücks, welches die westlichen Länder von Europa gegen das Ende
des vorigen Jahres betroffen hat', Wochentliche Königsbergische Frag- und
Anzeigungs-Nachrichten, Nrs 4 and 5 of 24 and 31 January (AK I, 417-27).
'Concerning the Causes of the Terrestrial Convulsions on the Occasion
of the Disaster which affiicted the Western Countries of Europe towards
the End of Last Year', in Cambridge Edition VIII, Natural Science, ed.
H.B. Nisbet, Cambridge University Press, forthcoming.
1756b Geschichte und Naturbeschreibung der merkwürdigsten Voifäl/,e des Erdbebens,
welches an dem Ende des 1755stenjahres einen grossen Teil der Erde Erschüttert
hat, Königsberg, gedrückt und verlegt von Joh. Heinr. Hartung (AK I,
429-61).
History and Natural Description of the Most Remarkab/,e Occurrences associated
with the Earthquake which at the end of 1755 Shook a Large Part of the World,
in Cambridge Edition VIII, Natural Science, ed. H.B. Nisbet, Cambridge
University Press, forthcoming.
1756c 'Fortgesetzte Betrachtung der seit einigen Zeit wahrgenommenen
Erderschütterungen', Wochentliche Königsbergische Frag- und Anzeigungs
Nachrichten, Nrs 15 and 16 of 10 and 17 April (AK I, 463-72).
'Further Observation on the Terrestrial Convulsions which have been
for Some Time Observed', in Cambridge Edition VIII, Natural Science,
ed. H.B. Nisbet, Cambridge University Press, forthcoming.
419
1756d Metaphysico.e cum geometria iunctae usus in philosophia naturali, cuius specimen
L continet monadologiam physicam, dissertation, Königsberg, J.H. Hartung
(AK I, 473-87).
The Employment in Natural Philosophy of Metaphysics combined with Geometry,
of which Sampl,e I contains the Physical Monadology, in Cambridge Edition I,
Theoretical Philosophy 1755-1770, tr. and ed. David Walford in collabora
tion with Ralf Meerbote, Cambridge University Press, 1992, pp. 47-56.
1756e Neue Anmerkungen zur Erläuterung der Theorie der Winde, wodurch er zugl,eich
zu seinen Vorlesungen einladet, Königsberg, den 25. April 1756, Gedrückt in
der Königl. priviligierten Driestischen Buchdruckerey (AK I, 489-503).
New Notes towards a Discussion of the Theory of Winds, in Cambridge Edi
tion VIII, Natural Science, ed. H.B. Nisbet, Cambridge University Press,
forthcoming.
1757 Entwurf und Ankündigung eines Collegii der physischen Geographie nebst dem
Anhänge einer Betrachtung über die Frage, ob die Westwinde in unsern Gegenden
darum feucht seien, weil sie über ein grosses Meer streichen, Königsberg,
gedruckt beyJ.F. Driest, Königl. Preuss. privil. Buchdrucker (AK II, 1-12).
Outline and Announcement of a Course of Lectures on Physical Geography,
together with an Appendix of an Inquiry into the QJ.testion of Whether the West
Winds in our Regions are Humid because they have traversed a Great Sea, in
Cambridge Edition VIII, Natural Science, ed. H.B. Nisbet, Cambridge
1758 Neuer Lehrbegriff der Bewegung und Ruhe und der damit verknüpften Folgerungen
in den ersten Gründen der Naturwissenschaft, wodurch zugl,eich seine Vorlesungen
in diesem halbenJahre angekündigt werden, Den lsten April 1758 Königsberg,
gedruckt bey Johann Friedrich Driest (AK II, 13-25).
New Conception of Motion and Rest and its Consequences for the Primary
Grounds of Natural Science, through which at the same time his Lectures for this
Semester are Announced, in Cambridge Edition VIII, Natural Science, ed.
1759 Versuch einiger Betrachtungen über den optimismus von M. Immanuel Kant,
wodurch er zugl,eich seine Vorlesungen auf das bevorstehende halbeJahr ankündigt,
den 7. October 1759, Königsberg, gedruckt bey Johann Friedrich Driest
(AK II, 27-35).
An Attempt at some Rejlections on Dptimism by M. Immanuel Kant, a/,so contain
ing an Announcement of his Lectures for the coming Semester 7 October 1759,
in Cambridge Edition I, Theoretical Philosophy 1755-1770, tr. and ed.
David Walford in collaboration with Ralf Meerbote, Cambridge Univer
sity Press, 1992, pp. 67-76.
1760 Gedanken bei dem frühzeitigen Abl,eben des Herrn Johann Friedrich von Funk,
in einer Sendschreiben an seine Mutter, Königsberg, gedruckt bey Johann
Friedrich Driest (AK II, 37-44).
Thoughts on the Premature Demise of Herr Johann Friedrich von Funk, in an
Epistl,e to his Mother, untranslated.
1762 Die fa/,sche spitzfindigkeit der vier syllogistischen Figuren erwiesen von M.
Immanuel Kant, Königsberg, bey Johann Jacob Kanter (AK II, 45-61).
420
The False Subtlety of the Four Syllogistic Figures demonstrated by M. Immanuel

Kant, in Cambridge Edition I,Theoretical Philosophy 1755-1770, tr. and
ed. David Walford in collaboration with RalfMeerbote, Cambridge Uni
versity Press, 1992, pp. 85-105.
1763a Der einzig mögliche Beweisgrund zu einer Demonstration des Daseins Gottes,
Königsberg, bey Johann Jacob Kanter (AK II, 63-163).
The Only Possible A,gu ment in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence
of God, by M. Immanuel Kant, in Cambridge Edition I, Theoretical Philos�
phy 1755-1770, tr. and ed. David Walford in collaboration with Ralf
Meerbote, Cambridge University Press, 1992, pp. 107-201.
1763b Versuch, den Begriff der negativen Grössen in die Weltweisheit einzuführen,
Königsberg, bey Johann Jacob Kanter (AK II, 165-204).
Attempt to Introduce the Concept of Negative Magnitudes into Philosophy, in
Cambridge Edition I, Theoretical Philosophy 1755-1770, tr. and ed. David
1992, pp. 203-10.
1764a Beobachtungen über das Gefühl des Schönen und Erhabenen, Königsberg, bey
Johann Jacob Kanter (AK II, 205-56).
Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and the Sublime, tr. John T.
Goldthwaite, Los Angeles, University of Califomia Press, 1973.
1764b 'Versuch über die Krankheiten des Kopfes', Königsbergsche Gelehrte und
Politische Zeitungen, 13-27 February 1764 (AK II, 257-71).
'An Essay on the Maladies of the Mind', in Cambridge Edition VII,
Anthropology, Philosophy of Histury and Education, ed. Guenter Zoeller,
1764c Untersuchungen über die Deutlichkeit der Grundsätze der natürlichen Theologie
und der Moral. Zur Beantwortung der Frage, welche die Königl Akad. d. Wiss.
zu Berlin auf das Jahr 1763 aufgegeben hat, Berlin (AK II, 273-301).
Inquiry Concerning the Distinctness of the Principles of Natural Theology
and Morality. In Answer to the Question which the Berlin Royal Academy of
Sciences set for the Year 1763 (published together withMosesMendelssohn's
winning contribution to the same competition), in Cambridge Edition
I, Theoretical Philosophy 1755-1770, tr. and ed. David Walford in collabo
ration with Ralf Meerbote, Cambridge University Press, 1992, pp. 243-
86.
1764d 'Rezension von Silberschlags Erklärung der vor einigen Jahren erschien
enen Feuerkugel', Königsbersche Gelehrte und Politische Zeitungen, 23March.
'Review of Silberschlag's Essay on the Fireball of 1762', in Cambridge
Edition VIII, Natural Science, ed. H.B. Nisbet, Cambridge University Press,
forthcoming.
1765 Nachricht von der Einrichtung seiner Vorlesungen in der Winterhalbenjahre von
1765-1766, Königsberg, bey Johann Jacob Kanter (AK II, 303-13).
M. Immanuel Kant's Announcement of the Organisation of his Lectures in the
Winter Semester 1765-1766, in Cambridge Edition I, Theoretical Philosophy
1755-1770, tr. and ed. David Walford in collaboration with Ralf
Meerbote, Cambridge University Press, 1992, pp. 287-300.
421
1766 Träume eines Geistersehers, erliiutert durch Träume der Metaphysik, Königsberg,
bey Johann Jacob Kanter (AK II, 315-73).
Dreams of a Spirit-Seer eluddated l,y Dreams of Metaphysics, in Cambridge
Edition I, Theoretical Philosophy 1755-1770, tr. and ed. David Walford in
collaboration with Ralf Meerbote, Cambridge University Press, 1992,
pp. 301-59.
1768 'Von dem ersten Grunde der Unterschiedes der Gegenden im Raume',
in Wochentliche Königsbergische Frag- und Anzeigungs-Nachrichten, Parts
6-8 (AK II, 375-83).
Concerning the ultimate Ground of the Differentiation of Regions in space, in
Cambridge Edition I, Theoretical Philosophy 1755-1770, tr. and ed. David
1992, pp. 361-72.
1770 De mundi sensibilis atque intelligibilis forma et princi,piis, dissertation,
Königsberg, Regiomonti, Stanno regiae aulicae et academicae typo
graphae (AK II, 385-419).
On the Form and Prinaples of the Sensible and Intelligible World ['lnaugural
Dissertation'], in Cambridge Edition I, Theoretical Philosophy 1755-1770,
tr. and ed. David Walford in collaboration with Ralf Meerbote, Cam
bridge University Press, 1992, pp. 373 -416.
1771 'Rezension von Moscatis Schrift: Von dem körperlichen wesentlichen
Unterschiede zwischen der Structur der Thiere und Menschen', pub
lished anonymously in Königsbergsche Gelehrte und Politische Zeitungen, No.
67, 23 August 1771, pp. 265-6 (AK II, 421-5).
'Review of Moscati's Book: On the Essential Physical Differences be
tween the Structures of Animals and Humans', in Cambridge Edition
VII, Anthropology, Philosophy of History and Education, ed. Guenter Zoeller,
1775 Von den verschiedenen Racen der Menschen, zur Ankündigung der Vorlesungen
der physischen Geographie im Sommerhalbjahre 1775, Königsberg, gedruckt
bey E.L. Hartung, Konigl. Hof- und Academ. Buchdrucker (2nd edi
tion, Der Philosoph für die Welt, hsg. von J J. Engel. Zweiter Theil, Leipzig
1777) (AK II, 427-43).
On the Different Human Races, l,y way of Announdng the Lectures on Physical
Geography for the Summer Semester 1775, in Cambridge Edition VII, Anthro
pology, Philosophy of History and Education, ed. Guenter Zoeller, Cam
bridge University Press, forthcoming.
1776-7 'Uber das Dessauer Philanthropin', Königsbergische Gelehrte und Politische
7.eitungen, 28. März 1776 und 27. März 1777 (AK II, 445-52).
'On the Dessau Philanthropin Academy', in Cambridge Edition VII,
Anthropology, Philosophy of History and Education, ed. Guenter Zoeller,
1777 Concerning Sensory Illusion and Poetic Fiaion (A Latin address in response
to Johann Gottlieb Kreutzfeld's Dissertatio philologica-poetica de prindpiis
fictionum generalioribus), in Kant's Latin Writings: Transf.ations, Commentaries
and Notes, ed. Lewis White Beck, New York, 1986.
422
1781 Kritik der reinen Vernunft, Riga, verlegts Johann Friedrich Hartknoch (AK
IV, 1-252); see 1787 below for details of second edition.
Critique ofPure Reason, tr. Norman Kemp Smith, London, Macmillan, 1978.
1782 'Nachricht an Artze', Königsbergsche Gelehrte und Politische Zeitungen, 31.
Stück, 18 April (AK VIII, 5-8).
'Report to Physicians' in Cambridge Edition VII, Anthropology, Philosophy
ofHistory and Education, ed. Guenter Zoeller, Cambridge University Press,
forthcoming.
1783a Prolegomena zu einer jeden künftigen Metaphysik, die als Wissenschaft wird
auftreten können, bey Johann Friedrich Hartknoch (AK IV, 253-83).
Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics that will be able to come forward as
Science, in Immanuel Kant: Philosophy of Material Nature, tr. James W.
Ellington, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing Company, 1985.
1783b 'Recension von Schulz's Versuch einer Anleitung zur Sittenl,ehre', in
Raisonierendes Verzeichnis neuer Bücher, No. 8, April 1783 (AK VIII, 9-14).
'Review of Schulz's Attempt at an Introduction to Moral Theory', in Cam
bridge Edition IV, Practical Philosophy, ed. Mary J. Gregor, Cambridge
1784a 'Idee zu einer allgemeinen Geschichte in weltbürgerlichen Absicht', in
Berlinische Monatsschrift, Vol. IV (11 November), pp. 385-411 (AK VIII,
15-31).
'Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose', in Kant:
Political Writings, tr. H.B. Nisbet, ed. Hans Reiss, Cambridge University
Press, 1991, 41-53.
1784b 'Beantwortung der Frage: Was ist Aufklärung?', in Berlinische Monatsschrift,
Vol. IV (12 December), pp. 481-94 (AK VIII, 33-42).
'An Answer to the Question: "What is Enlightenment?" ' in Kant: Political
Writings, tr. H.B. Nisbet, ed. Hans Reiss, Cambridge University Press,
1991, 54-60.
1785a 'Rezensionen von Johann Gottfried Herders Ideen zur Philosophie der
Geschichte der Menschheit', in Allgemeine Literatur Zeitung (Jena und Leipzig,
No. 4, 6 January 1785), pp. 17-20, Supplement (Beilage) to No. 4, pp.
21-2, and issue No. 271, 15 November, pp. 153-6 (AK VIII, 43-66).
'Reviews ofJohann Gottfried Herder's Ideas on the Philosophy of the His
tory of Mankind', in Kant: Political Writings, tr. H.B. Nisbet, ed. Hans
Reiss, Cambridge University Press, 1991, pp. 201-20.
1785b 'Uber die Vulkane im Monde', in Berlinische Monatsschrift, Vol. 5, pp.
199-213 (AK VIII, 67-76).
The Volcanoes on the Moon, in Cambridge Edition VIII, Natural Science, ed.
1785c 'Von der Unrechtmässigkeit des Büchernachdrucks', Berlinische Monats
schrift, Vol. 5, pp. 403-17 (AK VIII, 77-87).
'On the Urtjust Printing of Books', in Cambridge Edition IV, Practical
Philosophy, ed. Mary J. Gregor, Cambridge University Press, forthcoming.
1785d 'Bestimmung des Begriffs einer Menschenrasse', in Berlinische Monats
schrift, Vol. 6, November, pp. 390-417 (AK VIII, 89-106).
423
'On the Different Human Races', in Cambridge Edition VII, Anthropolog;y,

Philoso,phy ofHistory and Education, ed. Guenter Zoeller, Cambridge Uni
versity Press, forthcoming.
1785e Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten, Riga, bey Johann Friedrich
Hartknoch (AK N, 385-463).
Groundingfor the Metaphysics ofMoral,s, tr.James W. Ellington, Indianapolis,
Hackett Publishing Company, 1981.
1786a Metaphysiche Anfangsgründe der Naturwissenschaft, Riga, bey Johann
Friedrich Hartknoch (AK N, 465-565).
MetaphysicalFoundations ofNatural Science, tr.James W. Ellington, Immanuel
Kant: PhilosofJhy ofMaterial Nature, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing Com
pany, 1985.
1786b 'Mutmasslicher Anfang der Menschengeschichte', in Berlinische
Monatsschrift, Vol. 7, January 1786, 1-27 (AK VIII, 107-23).
'Conjectures on the Beginning of Human History', in Kant: Political
Writings, tr. H.B. Nisbet, ed. Hans Reiss, Cambridge University Press,
1991, 221-34.
1786c 'Was heisst: Sich im Denken orientieren?', in Berlinische Monatsschrift,
Vol. 8, October 1986, pp. 304-30 (AK VIII, 131-47).
'What is Orientation in Thinking?', in Kant: Political Writings, tr. H.B.
Nisbet, ed. Hans Reiss, Cambridge University Press, 1991, pp. 237-49.
1786d 'Recension von Gottlieb Hufelands Versuch über den Grundsatz der
Naturrechts', in Allgemeine Literatur äitung, No. 92, 18 April (AK VIII,
125-30).
'Review of Gottfried Hufeland's Attempt at a Principle of Natural Right', in
Cambridge Edition IV, Practical Philoso,phy, ed. Mary J. Gregor, Cam
bridge University Press, forthcoming.
1786e De medicina corporis, quae philosofJhorum est, Rectoral Address (AK XV,
939-53).
On the Philoso,phers' Medicine ofthe Body, tr. Mary J. Gregor, in Kant's Latin
Writings: Translations, Commentaries and Notes, ed. Lewis White Beck, New
York, 1986.
1787 Kritik der reinen Vernunft Zweite hin und wieder verbesserte Auflage, Riga bei
Johann Friedrich Hartknoch.
Critique of Pure &ason, tr. Norman Kemp Smith, London, Macmillan,
1978.
1788a 'Uber den Gebrauch teleologischer Principien in der Philosophie', in
Der Teutsche Merkur, Weimar, Ist Quarter, No. 1, pp. 36-52, No. 2, pp.
107-36, (AK VIII, 157-84).
'On the Use of Teleological Principles in Philosophy', Cambridge Edi
tion V, Aes_thetics_and Teleolog;y, eds. Eric Matthews and Eva Schaper,
Cambridge University Press, forthcaming.
1788b Kritik der praktischen Vernunft, Riga, Johann Friedrich Hartknoch (AK V,
1-163).
Critique of Practical &ason, tr. Lewis White Beck, Indianapolis, Bobbs
Merrill, 1976.
424
1790a Kritik der Urtheilskraft, Berlin und Libau, bey Lagarde und Friederich
(AK V, 165-485).
Critique ofJudgement, tr. James Creed Meredith, Oxford University Press,
1973.
1790b 'Erste Einleitung in die Kritik der Urteilskraft', hsg. 0. Buek in Kant's
Werke, Vol. V, hsg. E. Cassirer, 1922 (AK XX, 193-252).
First Introduction to the Critique ofJudgement, tr. James Haden, Indianapolis,
Bobbs-Merrill, 1965.
1790c Uber eine Entdeckung, nach der alle neue Kritik der reinen Vernunft durch eine
ältere entbehrlich gemacht werden soll, Königsberg bey Friedrich Nicolovius
(AK Vlll, 185-241).
On a Discovery according to which any New Critique of Pure Reason has been
made Superfluous lTy an Earlier One, tr. Henry E. Allison, Baltimore and
London, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973.
1791a 'Uber das Misslingen aller philosophischen Versuche in der Theodizee',
Berlinische Monatsschrift, Vol. 18, September, pp. 194-225 (AK Vlll, 253-
71).
'On the Failure of all Philosophical Attempts at Theodicy', in Cam
bridge Edition Vl, Religion and Rational Theology, ed. George di Giovanni
and Allen W. Wood, Cambridge University Press, forthcoming.
1791b Uber die von der König! Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin für das Jahr
1791 ausgesetzte Preisfrage: Welches sind die wirklichen Fortschritte, die die
Metaphysik seit Leibnizens und Wolf's Zeiten in Deutschland gemacht hat?, ed.
F.D. Rink, Königsberg, 1804, bey Goebbels und Unzer (AK XX, 253-
351).
Concerning the prize question posed lTy the Royal Academy of Sciences in Berlin
for the year 1791: What Real Progress has Metaphysics made in Germany since
the Time of Leibniz and Woljf?, tr. Ted Humphrey, New York, Arabis
Books Inc., 1983.
1793a Die Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der blossen Vernunft, Königsberg, Friedrich
Nicolovius (2nd edition 1794) (AK Vl, 1-202).
Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone, trs. Theodore M. Greene and
Hoyt H. Hudson, San Francisco, Harper Torchbooks, 1960.
1793b 'Uber den Gemeinspruch: Das Mag in der Theorie richtig sein, taugt
aber nicht für die Praxis', Berlinische Monatsschrift, Vol. 22, pp. 201- 84
(AK Vlll, 273-313).
'On the Common Saying: "This may be true in theory, but it does not
apply in practice" ', in Kant: Political Writings, tr. H.B. Nisbet, ed. Hans
Reiss, Cambridge University Press, 1991, pp. 61-92.
1794a 'Etwas über den Einfluss des Mondes auf die Witterung', Berlinische
Monatsschrift, Vol. 23 (AK Vlll, 315-24).
'Something on the Moon's Influence over the Weather', in Cambridge
Edition Vlll, Natural Science, ed. H.B. Nisbet, Cambridge University Press,
forthcoming.
1794b 'Das Ende aller Dinge', Berlinische Monatsschrift, Vol. 23, pp. 495-522
(AK Vlll, 327-39).
425
'The End of all Things', tr. Robert E. Anchor in Kant: On History, ed.
Lewis White Beck, Indianapolis, Bobbs-Merrill, 1980, pp. 69- 84 .
1795 Zum ewigen Frieden: Ein phiwsophischer Entwurf, Königsberg bey Friedrich
Nicolovius (2nd edition 1796) (AK VIII, 341- 86).
Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch, in Kant: Political Writings, tr. H.B.
Nisbet, ed. Hans Reiss, Cambridge University Press, 1991, pp. 93-130.
1796a 'Von einem neuerdings erhobenen vornehmen Tone in der Philosophie',
in Berlinische Monatsschrift, Vol. 27, pp. 387-426 (AK VIII, 389-406).
'On a Newly Arisen Superior Tone in Philosophy', ed. and tr. Peter
Fenves, Baltimore and London, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993,
pp. 51-72.
1796b 'Verkündigung des nahen Abschlusses eines Traktes zum ewigen Frieden
in der Philosophie', in Berlinische Monatsschrift, Vol. 28, pp. 485-504
(AK VIII, 413-22).
'Announcement of the Near Conclusion of a Treaty for Etemal Peace
in Philosophy', in Raising the Tone of Phiwsophy, ed. and tr. Peter Fenves,
Baltimore and London, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993, pp. 83-
93.
1796c Zu Sömmering über das Organ der Seele, Königsberg, Friedrich Nicolovius.
To Sömmering, Concerning the Organ of the Sou� in Cambridge Edition VII,
Anthropowgy, Phiwsophy of History and Education, ed. Guenter Zoeller,
1797a Metaphysik der Sitten: 1. Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Rechtslehre, 2.
Metaphysiche Anfangsgründe der Tugendlehre, Königsberg, Friedrich
Nicolovius (AK VI, 203-493).
The Metaphysics of Morals: 1. Metaphysical First Principles of the Doctrine of
Right, 2. Metaphysical First Principles of the Doctrine of Virtue, tr. Mary J.
Gregor, Cambridge University Press, 1991.
1797b 'Uber ein vermeintliches Recht, aus Menschenliebe zu lügen', Berlinische
Blätter, No. 10 (AK VIII, 423-30).
'On a Presumed Right to Lie from Love of Mankind', in Cambridge
Edition IV, Practical Philosophy, ed. Mary J. Gregor, Cambridge Univer
sity Press, forthcoming.
1798a Der Streit der Fakultäten, Königsberg, Friedrich Nicolovius (AK VII, 1-
116).
The Conflid of the Faculties, tr. Mary J. Gregor, New York, Arabis Books
Inc., 1979.
1798b Anthropologie in pragmatischer Hinsicht, Königsberg, bey Friedrich
Nicolovius (AK VII, 117-333).
Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View, tr. Victor Lyle Dowdell,
Carbondale and Edwardsville, Southem Illinois University Press, 1978.
1800a Logik. Ein Handbuch zu Vorlesungen, hrsg. von G.B. Jäsche, Königsberg,
Friedrich Nicolovius (AK IX, 1-150).
The Jäsche Logic, in Cambridge Edition IX, Ledures on Logic, tr. and ed.
J. Michael Young, Cambridge University Press, 1992, pp. 517-640.
426
1800b Nachschrift eines Freundes zu Heilsbergs Vorrede zu Mielkes Litauischem

Wörterbuch (AK VIII, 443-5).
Postscript to Miel,kes' Lithuanian-German and German-Lithuanian Dictionary,
in Cambridge Edition VII, Anthropolog;J, Philosophy of History and Educa
tion, ed. Guenter Zoeller, Cambridge University Press, forthcoming.
1802 Physische Geographie, hrsg. von F.T. von Rink, Königsberg, bey Göbbels
und Unzer (AK IX, 151-436).
Physical Geography, in Cambridge Edition VIII, Natural Science, ed. H.B.
1803 Kant über Pädagogi,k, hsg. F.T. von Rink, Königsberg, bey Friedrich
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The editorial organization of the Academy Edition

(Immanuel Kants gesammelte Schriften)
Section I Werke (Works) (Vois 1-IX)

Section II Briefwechsel ( Correspondence) (Vois X-XIII)
Section III Handschriftlicher Nachlass (Handwritten Remains) (Vois XIV-XXIII)
Section IV Vorlesungen (Lectures) (Vois XXIV-XXIX)
427
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Recommended further reading
GENERAL GERMAN HISTORY
Behrens, C.B.A. [1985] , Society, Government, and the Enlightenment: the Experiences of
Eighteenth Century France and Prussia, London , Thames and Hudson
Dorwart, Reinhold August [1971] , The Prussian Welfare State before 1740, Cambridge ,
Mass., Harvard University Press
Hinrichs, Carl [1971] , Preussentum und Pietismus. Der Pietismus in Brandenburg-Preussen
als religids-soziale Reformbewegung, Gottingen , Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht
Kirby, David [1990] , Northern Europe in the Early Modem Period: The Baltic World
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1492 1772, London and New York, Longman Group
Oestreich , Gerhard [1982] , Neo-Stoicism and the Early Modem State, tr. David
McLintock, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press
Raeff, Marc [1985] , The Well-Ordered Police State - Social and Institutional Change
through Law in the Germanics and Russia, 1600-1800, New Haven , Yale University
Press
Rosenberg, Hans [1966] , Bureaucracy, Aristocracy and Autocracy: The Prussian Experi ¬
ence 1660-1815 , Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press

Vierhaus, Rudolf [1978 ] , Deutschland im Zeitalter des Absolutismus , Gottingen ,
Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht
Walker, Mack [1971] , German Home Towns: Community, State, and General Estate
1648 -1871, Ithaca and London , Cornell University Press
GERMAN INTELLECTUAL HISTORY
Beck, Lewis White [1969] , Early German Philosophy: Kant and his Predecessors,
Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press
Blackall, E.A. [1959] , The Development of German as a Literary Language, Cambridge,
Cambridge University Press
Brunschwig, Henri [1974] , Enlightenment and Romanticism in Eighteenth Century Prussia,
tr. Frank Jellinek , Chicago, Chicago University Press
Cassirer , Ernst [1951] , The Philosophy of the Enlightenment , Princeton , University of
Princeton Press
Erdmann , Benno [1876] , Martin Knutzen und seine Zeit, Leipzig
Krieger , Leonard [1957] , The German Idea of Freedom, Boston , Beacon Press
Petersen , Peter [1921] , Geschichte der Aristotelischen Philosophic in Protestantischen
Deutschland , Leipzig
Reill, Peter Hans [1975] , The German Enlightenment and the Rise of Historicism, Los
Angeles, University of California Press
436
RECOMMENDED FURTHER READING
Wolff, Hans M. [1963], Die Weltanschauung der deutschen Aufkliirung in geschichtlicher

Entwicklung, Bern und München, Francke Verlag
Wundt, Max [1939), Die deutsche Schulmetaphysik des 17. Jahrhunderts, Tübingen,
Verlag von J.C.B. Mohr
--- [1945), Die deutsche Schulmetaphysik im üitalter der Aujkliirung, Hildesheim,
Georg Olms, 1964
KANT: SELECTED SECONDARY WORKS
Allison, Henry E. [1990), Kant's Theory of Freedom, Cambridge, Cambridge Univer

sity Press
Bartuschat, Wolfgang [1972), Zum systematischen Ort von Kants Kritik der Urteilskraft,
Frankfurt-am-Main, Vittorio Klostermann
Batscha, Zwi [1976), Materialien zu Kants Rechtsphilosophie, Frankfurt-am-Main,
Suhrkamp Verlag
Bäumler, Alfred [1967), Das Irrationalitätsprobl,em in der Asthetik und Logik des 18.
Jahrhunderts bis zur Kritik der Urteilskraft, Tübingen, Max Niemeyer
Beck, Lewis White [1960), A Commentary on Kant's Critique of Practical Reason,
Chicago, Chicago University Press
Bennett, Jonathan [1966], Kant's Analytic, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press
--- [1974), Kant's Dialectic, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press
Böckerstette, Heinrich [1982), Aporien der Freiheit und ihre Auflösung durch Kant,
Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt, Frohmann-Holzboog
Booth, William James [1986), Interpreting the World: Kant's Philosophy of History and
Politics, Toronto, University of Toronto Press
Buroker, Jill Vance [1981), Space and Incongruence, Dordrecht, D. Reidel
Cohen, Ted, and Guyer, Paul, eds. [1982), Essays in Kant's Aesthetics, Chicago,
Chicago University Press
Coleman, Francis XJ. [1974), The Harmony of Reason: A Study in Kant's Aesthetic,
Pittsburgh, University of Pittsburgh Press
de Man, Paul [1986), The Resistance to Theory, Manchester, Manchester University
Press
de Vleeschauwer, Hermann:J. [1962), The Development of Kantian Thought: The History
of a Doctrine, tr. AR.C. Duncan, London, Thomas Nelson and Sons
Deleuze, Gilles [1984), Kant's Critical Philosophy, The Doctrine of the Faculties, tr.
Hugh Tomlinson and Barbara Habberjam, Athlone Press, London, 1984
Despland, Michel [1973), Kant on History and Religion, Montreal and London,
McGill-Queens University Press
Findlay,J.N. [1981), Kant and the Transcendental Object: A Hermeneutic Study, Oxford,
Oxford University Press
Gram, Moltke S. [1967), Kant: Disputed Qµestions, Chicago, Quadrangle Books
Gregor, Mary J. [1963), Laws of Freedom: A Study of Kant's Method of Applying the
Categorical Imperative in the Metaphysik der Sitten, Oxford, Basil Blackwell
Guyer, Paul [1979), Kant and the Claims of Taste, Cambridge, Mass., Harvard
University Press
-- [1987), Kant and the Claims of Knowledge, Cambridge, Cambridge University
Press
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Heimsoeth, Heinz [1966-71), Transzendentale Dialektik: Ein Kommentar zu Kants
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437
Vernunftantinomie, Dritter Teil: Das Ideal der reinen Vernunft, Vierter Teil: Die
Methodenlehre, Berlin, de Gruyter
Hinske, Norbert [1970], Kants Weg zur Tranzendentalphilowphie: der dreissigjährige
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--- [1974], 'Kants neue Terminologie und ihre alten Quellen', in Kant-Studien,
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Kersting, Wolfgang [1984], Wohlgeordnete Freiheit: Immanuel Kants &chts und
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Koehnke, Klaus Christian [1991], The Rise of Neo-Kantianism: German Academic
Philosophy between Idealism and Positivism, tr. RJ. Hollingdale, Cambridge, Cam
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Körner, Stephan [1955], Kant, Harmondsworth, Penguin
Kudielka, Robert [1977], Urteil und Eros: Erörterungen zu Kants Kritik der Urteilskraft,
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--- [1978], Kants Logik des ästhetischen Urteils, Frankfurt-am-Main, Vittorio
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Kants, Berlin, Walter de Gruyter
--- [1980], Kants Tugenden: Neue Beiträge zur Geschichte und Interpretation der
Philosophie Kants, Berlin, Walter de Gruyter
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439
Index of philosophers
Adomo, Theodor W. 1903-69: aesthetic; antinomies; determination ; enlighten ¬
ment; formalism ; freedom .
Aquinas, Thomas, Saint 12251-74: abstraction ; accident; action ; actuality; analysis;

art; beauty; categories; essence; evil; genius; happiness; idea; metaphysics; reason ;
understanding.
Arendt, Hannah 1906-75: action; aesthetic; common sense; communicability; esti ¬
mation; evil; faculty of judgement; political writings; public / publicity; reflective

judgement.
Aristode 384-321 BC: absolute; accident; action; actuality; affect; analogy; analysis;
analytic; art; association; beauty; being; body; canon ; categories; common sense;
concept; consciousness; dialectic; empirical; end ; essence; evil; existence; experi¬
ence; faculty; faith; form; friendship; genus; happiness; history of philosophy; idea;
infinity ; intuition ; logic; metaphysics; natural right; paralogism ; postulates;
predicables; predicaments; principle; psychology; reason; space; subject; teleology.
Amauld, Antoine 1611-94: a priori / a posteriori; categories; logic.
Augustine, Saint 354-430: affect; evil; time.
Baumgarten, Alexander Gottlieb 1714-62: aesthetic; a priori / a posteriori; ap ¬
pearance ; beauty; clarity; concept; dispute; duty; empirical; essence; finality; imagi¬
nation; intuition; metaphysics; ontology; theology.
Boethius, Anicius Manlius Severinus 480-524: analytic; categories; dialectic
Burke, Edmund 1729-97: aesthetic; dispute; empirical.
-
Cohen, Hermann 1842 1918: a priori / a posteriori; experience; faith; origin.
Deleuze, Gilles 1925-: absolute; action; amphiboly; I think.
Derrida, Jacques 1930-: accident; action; aesthetic; amphiboly; analogy; construc¬

tion ; enlightenment; faculty of judgement; Gemiit, I think ; subject; sublime; table
of categories.
440
INDEX OF PHILOSOPHERS
Descartes, Rene 1596-1650: accident; affect; analysis; a priori/a posteriori; apper

ception; being; body; categories; causality; certainty; consciousness; deduction; end;
essence; experience; extension; force; Gemüt; history of philosophy; 'I think'; idea;
idealism; impenetrability; inner sense; intuition; motion; psychology; reality; rea
son; space; subject; teleology; theology; time; understanding.
Diogenes Laertius c. 3rd century AD: analysis; impression; time.
Eberhard, Johann Augustus 1739-1809: analytic judgement; clarity; ground; his

tory of philosophy; innate ideas.
Empedocles c.490--430 Be: faculty; friendship; principle.
Epicurus 341-270 BC: anticipations of perception; canon; concept; dispute; em

pirical; evil; finitude; history ofphilosophy; logic; orientation; reality; representation;
sensibility; time.
Euclid c.400 Be: analogy; analysis; consciousness; elements; mathematics; postulate;

space.
Fichte,Johann Gottlieb 1762-1814: absolute; abstraction; accident; action; actuality;

anticipations of perceptions; a priori/a posteriori; appearance; apperception;
architectonic; categories; concept; consciousness; dispute; freedom; I; idealism;
infinity; logic; principle; reflection; spontaneity; synthesis; understanding.
Foucault, Michel 1926-84: body; enlightenment; 'I think'; subject.
Freud, Sigmund 1856-1939: action; affect; analysis; consciousness; drive; I; 'I think';
psychology; sex; subject.
Galileo 1564-1642: causality; end; teleology.
Habermas, Jürgen 1929-: communication; enlightenment; faculty of judgement;

public/publicity.
Hamann, Johann Georg 1730-88: critical philosophy; dispute; faith; formalism;

God; understanding.
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich 1770-1831: absolute; abstraction; action; actual

ity; aesthetic; antinomies; appearance; architectonic; art; autonomy; being; cat
egorical imperative; categories; causality; concept; consciousness; cosmology; critical
philosophy; culture; determination; dialectic; duty; evil; faith; force; formalism;
freedom; I; infinity; justice; limit; logic; love; natural right; phenomenology; pos
tulate; reflection; spontaneity; system; thing-in-itself; understanding.
Heidegger, Martin 1889-1976: acroam/atic; action; actuality; analogies of experi

ence; anticipations of perception; being; existence; finitude; freedom; Gemüt;
ground; hope; 'I think'; imagination; ontology; principle; principles ofpure under
standing; psychology; synthesis; time.
441
Herder,Johann Gottfried 1744-1803: critical philosophy; culture; dispute; history;

understanding.
Hobbes, Thomas 1588-1679: absolute; abstraction; accident; categories.
Hume, David 1711-76: a priori/a posteriori; accident; action; aesthetic; analogy;

association; causality; deduction; dogmatism; empirical; enlightenment; experience;
impression; necessity.
Husserl, Edmund 1859-1938: abstraction; actuality; anticipations of perception;

concept; construction; formalism; phenomenology; psychology; synthesis.
Hutcheson, Francis 1694-1746: action; aesthetic; beauty; dispute; empirical; natu

ral right.
Leibniz, Gottfried WiJhelm 1646-1716: a priori/a posteriori; accident; aesthetic;

amphiboly; analysis; appearance; beauty; being; body; clarity; concept; concepts of
reflection; consciousness; dispute; empirical; experience; extension; force; history
of philosophy; identity; innate ideas; inner/outer; interpretation; intuition; monad;
motion; perception; rationalism; reflection; representation; sensibility; space;
theodicy; time; understanding.
Locke,John 1632-1704: abstraction; accident; amphiboly; apperception; association;

concepts of reflection; deduction; empirical; experience; history of philosophy;
impression; inner/outer; sensibility; space; time; understanding.
Luther, Martin 1483-1546: action; autonomy; church; conscience; evil; faith.
Lyotard, Jean-Frani;ois 1924-: aesthetic; affect; analogy; common sense; commu

nication; construction; drive; enlightenment; enthusiasm; estimation; political
writings; reflective judgement; sublime.
Machiavelli, Niccolo 1469-1527: action; autonomy; freedom.
Malebranche, Nicolas 1638-1715: a priori/a posteriori; certainty; form.
Marx, Karl 1818-83: abstraction; action; antinomies; critical philosophy; culture;

dialectic; I.
Mendelssohn, Moses 1729-86: dogmatism; immortality; inner-sense.
Newton, Isaac 1642-1727: analysis; Copernican revolution; history of philosophy;

incongruent counterparts; intelligible world; law; space; time.
Nietzsche, Friedrich 1844-1900: accident; action; aesthetic; appearance; autonomy;

being; categorical imperative; causality; critical philosophy; duty; evil; faculty; faith;
finitude; formalism; freedom; I; 'f think'; immortality; postulate; psychology; re
flective judgement; subject; thing-in-itself; time; understanding; will.
Parmenides c. 6th-5th century Be: being; infinity; opinion.
442
Plato 428/7-348/7: affect; analysis; art; association; beauty; being; concept; dialec
tic; dogmatism; empirical; evil; finitude; form; genus; happiness; history of philo
sophy; idea; noumenon; opinion; principle; psychology; sensibility; space; time;
trnth.
Pythagoras c.572-497 Be: analogy; mathematics; history of philosophy; time.
Reinhold, Karl Leonhard 1758-1823: epistemology; essence; principle.
Schelling, Friedrich WIiheim Joseph von 1775-1854: absolute; aesthetic; appear

ance; architectonic; concept; consciousness; cosmology; evil; force; I; idealism;
infinity; spontaneity; system; will.
Schopenhauer, Arthur 1788-1860: absolute; accident; acquisition; categorical im

perative; categories; drive; duty; force; will.
Shaftesbury, Anthony Ashley Cooper 1671-1713: action; aesthetic; beauty.
Spinoza, Benedict 1632-77: absolute; affect; analysis; certainty; consciousness;

dogmatism; essence; idea; intuition; rationalism.
Stoies, affect; dispute; evil; friendship; history of philosophy; ideal; virtue.
Wolff, Christian 1679-1754: a priori/a posteriori; acroam/atic; action; actuality;

aesthetic; analytic judgement; beauty; clarity; concept; consciousness; contradiction;
cosmology; definition; determination; dogmatism; duty; empirical; enlightenment;
essence; faculty; God; ground; history; 'I think'; identity; interest; intuition; math
ematics; metaphysics; natural right; noumenon; obligation; ontology; perfection;
principle; psychology; pure reason; rationalism; synthetic a priorijudgement; system;
theology; time; understanding; world.
443
Index of concepts
NOTE: Page numbers in bold refer to main entries.
a priori / a posteriori, 35-8, 69, 71, 79, 96, 113, 130, 138, 152, 171, 264, 269-70,
281, 292, 334, 341, 360, 372, 374, 375, 382, 384-5, 397, 399, 402-3, 406, 408
absolute, 2, 38-9, 56, 77, 122, 136-7, 157, 233, 237, 349, 378
abstraction , 2, 36, 39-42, 54, 119-20, 171, 204, 233, 236, 247, 265, 351, 364, 373
accident, 2, 42-5, 47, 63-4, 74, 105, 117, 177, 377
acquisition , 45-6, 133, 151, 257, 271, 285, 293, 323, 358
acroamata / ic, 2 , 46-7, 130, 179, 288, 333
action , 47-51, 99-102, 125, 133, 143- 4, 161, 165-7, 207-8, 219-20, 221-3, 276,
306, 330, 349, 375, 411, 413-15
actuality, 47, 51-3, 78, 93-5, 113, 183-4, 304, 325-6, 333, 345-6, 361
aesthetic, 53-6, 61-2, 86, 92, 96, 112, 115, 119, 154-5, 245, 263-6, 321, 238, 270;
judgement , 41, 55, 115, 140, 178, 200, 204, 248, 269 , 410; transcendental , 53, 147,
206, 264, 280, 350, 364, 372, 373- 4, 397-8, 400, 407
affect , 56-9, 154, 161, 175-6, 197-9, 210-12, 233, 314-15, 350, 355, 363- 4, 369,
414-15
affection , 59, 233, 264, 350, 355, 364; self-affection , 59, 211, 233, 378
affinity, 60-1, 87, 248, 386
agreeable, 55, 61-2, 92, 96, 154, 197-9, 216, 282, 321
amphiboly, 62-3, 121-2, 171, 227, 257, 295, 301
analogies of experience, 44, 49, 52, 63-5, 74, 89, 108, 116-17, 129, 131, 161, 169,
325, 334-5, 381
analogy, 44, 64, 65-7, 86-7, 94, 111, 116, 178, 193-5, 231-2, 334-5, 361, 391, 401,
404
analysis, 41, 67-70, 71, 72, 112, 120, 147, 255, 267, 293, 294, 383, 402
analytic, 70-1, 77, 104, 112, 135, 143, 157, 183, 267-9, 280-2; of concepts, 104,
108, 148, 151, 183; of principles, 108, 269; of the beautiful, 54, 92, 140-1; of the
sublime, 55, 379-80; transcendental , 63, 71, 98, 107, 136, 148, 176, 268, 280, 307,
337, 400
444
INDEX OF CONCEPTS
anticipations of perception, 63, 74-5, 89, 129, 131, 168, 287, 325, 334-5, 345-6
antinomy,39, 75-8, 108,129,136-7,144,157-9,169,207,233,237, 255-6, 291-
2, 313, 348-9, 417; of taste, 55, 142, 159, 417
appearance,39,63-4,74,77,79-81,89-90,96,120,122,129,136,148,152,156-
8,162-3,169, 186, 201, 244, 259, 264-6, 269, 276, 288, 305, 307, 314, 317, 325,
346,373,393,401,403,408,416
apperception,59,81-3,121,127,140,152,235,242,248,258,281,299,311,324,
334,342,383,394,403,406;unity o�46,60,113,144,152,205,209,257,305,340,
361-3, 385,394,406,408
apprehension, 75, 233, 245, 284, 351, 383
archetype/ectype, 83- 4, 86, 194, 204, 236-8, 246, 318
architectonic, 84-5, 191, 202, 292, 294, 362, 386, 399
art, 53, 85-6, 87, 92, 213, 221, 239, 246, 387; as techne, 47-8, 85
a�if, 60, 86-7, 100,142,197,273
association, 60, 87, 100, 248
autonomy, 49, 88-9, 99,101, 106, 143, 155, 207-8, 220, 261, 276, 306, 311, 349,
374-6, 414
axioms,2,46-7,130,179,243,287,323;ofintuition,63,74,89-90,129,168,284,
323-5, 334-5
beauty,54,58,61,91-3,155,161,197,200,232,239,261,298,321,329,379,399
being, 79, 89, 93-5, 134, 183-4, 218, 325, 331, 338, 345, 396
body,95-6,119,140,162,188,201-2,206,210-ll,221,278,289,293,294,339,
362, 370
canon and organon, 98-9, 100, 137, 157, 178, 182, 213, 226, 239, 268, 269, 282,
290, 294, 311, 399
categories,43,74,76,80,82,89,102-6,120,122,145,148,151,167,187,212-13,
237, 242, 254, 257, 268, 281, 284, 293, 318, 334, 355, 387, 400
causality, 43, 49, 63-4, 76, 107-8, 116, 131, 137,142-3,153, 172, 179, 186, 200,
202, 207, 212, 217, 237, 254, 260, 275, 298-9, 303, 328, 330, 332, 361, 381, 392
clarity, 68, 72, 111-12
co-existence, 49, 64, 112, 117, 328
cogito ('I think'), 44,81-3,127,145,147,234-6,258,311,339,342,355,377,394
cognition, 61, 113, 126, 187, 197, 355, 359, 394
combination, 69, 82, 113, 116, 152, 331, 383, 408
command, 50, 113-14, 251, 276, 415
common sense, 50, 114-15, 116, 142, 174, 186, 270, 311, 329, 331, 410
communication, 56, 115, 116, 278, 341
445
INDEX OF CONCEPTS
community, 63-4, 116-17, 161, 237, 330, 335, 361

concepts, 45-6, 69,71,72,77,82,113,118-21, 131,135,153,156,163,169,183,
201,212,237,240,245,264,269,305,308,328,332,351,355,373,382,385,406;
confused, 68, 72, 154, 350, 397
concepts of reflection, 62, 121-2, 204, 240, 257, 288, 301, 311, 351
confused perception, 53-4, 81, 112
conscience, 124-5, 411
consciousness,78,81,112,125-7, 155,166,186,190,200,234,235,258,278,299,
340, 351, 355, 362; of seif, 82, 126-7, 233, 242, 258, 281, 352, 378
constitution, 128-9, 196, 223, 322, 357, 376, 413
construction, 90, 130-1, 183,286
continuity, 60, 131-2, 162,212-3,228
contract, 132-4, 284-5, 293, 358, 365-7
contradiction, 72,78,94,107,109,113, 134-5, 156,218,241,254,291,295, 300,
328,331, 333-4, 336,379,384, 393-4, 401,403
cosmology,51,76,86,136-7, 147,158,244,291,307,327,338,349,390,416-17
cosmopolitanism, 137-8, 150, 237, 293
criticism and critique, 8, 69, 99, 124, 138-9, 148, 163, 175, 284, 319, 399
culture, 149-50, 159, 173-4, 181-2, 221, 225, 230, 389, 413
deduction,46-7,60,69,71,82,103,106,142,148,151-3, 189,248,284,290,323,
348, 383
delight, 61, 154-5, 211, 321
democracy, 111, 129, 322, 376-7
desire, 73, 155, 191, 197, 211, 252-3, 283, 300, 321, 365, 378, 398
determination, 68-9, 89, 156-7, 166, 168, 300
dialectic,75,98,122,144,157-9, 212,255,280,329,392; of aesthetic judgement,
55, 141; transcendental, 71, 86, 122, 129, 136, 147, 168, 236, 244, 280, 302, 307,
338, 347, 349, 407
difference, 42, 121, 195, 212, 240, 351, 365
discipline, 98, 149, 159-60, 162, 221, 280, 282, 294
dogmatism, 162-3, 171, 227, 344, 394
duty, 100,116,125,143,160, 164-7, 182,217,219,222,253,277,283,293,306,
411, 414-15
dynamics, 167-8, 289, 290, 293-4, 296, 298
elements, 67, 71, 143, 145-6, 170, 280, 294

empiricism, 81, 170-1
446
INDEX OF CONCEPTS
end,83,84,100,149, 171-4,201,208,222,229,230,251,252,261,277,285,290,
342, 388-9, 411
enlightenment, 8, 112, 123, 149, 174-5, 331-2, 341, 366
enthusiasm, 58, 175-6, 225
equality, 129, 376, 416
essence, 154, 172, 177-8
existence, 51, 93, 156, 163, 177, 183-4, 235, 240, 299, 305, 329, 346, 391
experience,36,52,64,75,79,89,95,103,107,120,129,132,148,151-2,160,162,
168, 184-7, 201, 206, 219, 233-6, 239-40, 248, 254, 258, 276-7, 305, 307, 311,
325, 355, 402, 406
extension, 96, 178, 187-8,250, 294, 369
faculty, 57, 73, 190-2, 265, 268, 269-70, 325

faith, 110, 143, 189, 192-5, 201, 215, 228, 229, 273, 309, 354, 390, 403
feeling, 55, 57-8, 61, 197-9, 223, 282, 379
finality, 141-2, 172-4, 199-200, 204, 378, 388
finitude, 121, 197, 200-1, 256, 279, 325, 334-5, 384, 396, 398
force, 107, 168, 188, 201-3, 250, 293, 294-6, 310, 327, 330, 369
form, 79,100,118,132,152,165,171,177,200, 203-6, 216,236,253,258,264,
268, 281, 288-9, 298, 330, 342,362-3,368, 371
freedom, 37, 39,55, 73, 76,84,88,92,99,101,108,121,128,129,132,139,143,
149,153,163,166,172,181-2,189,201,207-8,220,222-3,230,260,275-6,293,
298, 300, 318, 324, 337, 347, 358, 374-6, 414-16
function, 104,268,281,387
Gemü457-9,86,115,176,191,207,210-12,226,245,258,278,356,362,375,379
genius, 55, 85, 182, 213-14, 225, 239, 246-7, 249, 270, 359
geography, 73, 214-15, 225, 322
geometry, 67,274, 286-7, 370-2
God,51,65-6,76,86,88,94,99,125,128,129,136,142,144,158,163,166,174,
180, 184, 194, 215-16, 232, 238, 273, 302, 310, 324, 328, 338, 349, 389
good,55,61,154,161,164,166-7,172,176,179,199,216,219-220,224,232,238,
282, 324, 354, 403, 411
ground, 61, 69, 82-3, 107, 156, 181, 217-19, 276, 333, 379
happiness, 77, 144, 221-3, 229, 336, 341, 342, 411

heterogeneity, 60, 132, 169, 261
heteronomy, 49, 88, 101, 198, 207-8, 223-4, 253, 261, 277, 342, 349, 414
447
INDEX OF CONCEPTS
history, 128, 142, 214, 216, 224-5, 294

homogeneity, 60, 132, 212-13, 228-9, 287, 386
humanity, 101, 138, 149, 173, 188, 230, 278, 283, 285, 310, 347, 365, 367
hypotyposis, 44, 55, 130, 231-2, 360-2, 403
idea, 75-7, 120, 129, 168, 175, 179, 214, 236-8, 379; transcendent, 136, 158-9,
193,237, 238-9, 243,339,348,356,393
ideal, 76, 83, 156, 158, 238-9, 255, 318, 403, 410
identity, 62, 66, 82, 109, 121-2, 126-7, 205, 209, 240-3, 408; of indiscemibles,
240-1, 290, 339, 351, 370
illusion, 71, 79-80, 137, 157-9, 160, 180, 243-5, 255-6, 258, 268, 280, 403
image, 119, 245-6, 284, 361
imagination,57-9,60,74,90,95,115,121,131,140,152,155,176,200,210,213,
229,243,245-6,246-9,277,287,321,332,334,361,362,375,380,382,385,406
imitation, 84, 182, 213, 221, 238, 249-50
impenetrability, 96, 119, 178, 188, 250-1
imperative, 114, 165-6, 201, 208, 220, 251; categorical, 39, 86-7, 88-9, 99-102,
114,143,166,173,217,219-20,222-3,251-2,269,276,289,300,342,415; hypo
thetical, 88, 99, 114, 220, 222, 230-1, 251-2, 300
inclination, 161, 164-6, 181, 251, 253, 300, 389
incongruent counterparts, 96, 253-4, 370, 372
induction, 66, 254-5
inference, 75-7, 147, 157-9, 237, 244, 254, 255, 268, 280, 324, 329, 347-8, 406
infinity, 76, 201, 255-7, 395
inner sense, 82, 211, 258-9, 339
interest, 99, 171, 223, 224, 260-2, 320
intuition,36,46,52,54,69,74,79,82,89,96,113,120,121,130-1,147,168,186,
201,206,231,233,240,245,247,257, 262-6, 268,286,296,302,329,332,334,
350, 355, 371, 374, 382, 385, 397
judgement,49,51,66,70,71-3,78-9,82,93,94,98,103-4,113,119,139-43,158,
160, 178, 182-3, 186, 199, 209, 244, 248, 267-9, 280, 311, 328, 347, 351, 406;
analytical,71-3,95,135,254,268,281,287,331,334,377,383-4; determinant,54,
78,140, 155-6,159,269,332,381; faculty of,121,140,269,269-70; practical,49,
143-4, 219-20, 403; reflective, 50, 54, 56, 77, 114, 116, 140, 155, 159, 223, 249,
269,322,352; synthetic a priori,87,95,107,113,147,191,254,264,268,331,360,
377, 384-5, 402; of taste, 55, 204; teleological, 78; theoretical, 139, 155
justice, 137, 271-2, 297, 322
448
INDEX OF CONCEPTS
kingdom, of ends, 173, 273, 289, 404; of God, 273

knowledge,35-9,53,63,77,78-80,90,112,113,118,130,135,142,148,152,163,
176, 180, 186, 191, 193, 204, 211, 228, 263, 273-4, 279, 292, 308, 318, 333, 355,
382, 394, 399, 403
law, 88-9, 99-102, 113-14, 128, 131, 138, 140, 143, 155, 165, 192, 213, 216, 222,
253, 270-1, 273, 275-6, 286,289, 38l;moral, 189,193,198, 200-1, 208,223,306,
324, 344, 356, 404, 414-15
legislation, 88, 160, 166-7, 173, 214, 273, 276, 338, 358
life, 55, 97, 141, 197-9, 200-1, 210, 230, 278-9, 320, 356, 395
limit, 77, 131, 153, 163, 187, 208, 279, 291, 302, 368
limitation, 74, 168, 279, 300, 305, 345, 398
logic, 70-1, 156-7, 178, 217, 240, 280-2;general, 98, 281;transcendental, 71, 72,
112, 119-21, 147, 157, 241, 280, 333, 375, 382
love, 66, 209, 229, 282-3, 412
magnitude, 75, 89, 131, 136, 284, 287, 335, 408

manifold,60,82,92,104,106,113,140,152,156,206,245,248,277,281,284,305,
348, 359, 374, 382, 401, 408
marriage, 133, 284-5, 358, 365-8, 416
mathematics, 67-8, 90, 130-1, 179, 204, 279, 286-8, 289, 336-7, 374
matter, 51, 79, 96, 177-8, 179, 203, 205, 250, 253, 288-9, 290, 293, 298, 320, 328,
362, 368; divisibility of, 162
maxims, 49-50, 78, 86, 88-9, 99-101, 143, 158, 161, 166,181,204,208,216,251,
261, 269, 273, 276, 289-90, 311, 333, 335-6, 341, 356, 414
mechanics and mechanism, 78, 142, 166, 173, 187, 250, 276, 290, 293, 296, 298
metaphysics, 68,107,136, 144, 147-8, 161,172,186,202,203,217,227,243,247,
279, 291-2, 307, 316, 319, 327, 336-7
method, 68, 110, 130, 142, 144, 145-6, 148, 154, 160, 218, 227, 280, 294
mind, see Gemüt
modality (categories of), 51, 104-5, 137, 184, 193, 228, 299, 325, 335, 361
motion, 96, 107-8, 135, 167, 172, 201, 289, 293, 295-6, 301, 310, 317, 320, 328,
395
motive, 48, 173, 222, 252, 283
nature, 56, 73, 84, 87, 92, 108, 139-40, 173, 207, 213, 221, 222, 260, 275-6, 278,
292-3, 297-9, 310, 318, 326, 388, 402, 417
necessity, 36, 55, 78, 99, 163, 172, 254, 275-6, 299-300, 336, 361, 392, 410
negation, 42, 74, 134, 156, 168, 279, 300-1, 305, 345, 361
noumenon, 79, 209, 259, 266, 301-3, 317, 393, 401
449
INDEX OF CONCEPTS
object,75,130, 135-6, 170,181,183,198-9,200-1,205,216,236,261,265,281,

304-6,346,350,362-3,403
obligation, 132, 166-7, 251, 283, 285, 306-7, 414
ontology,63,71,94-5,122,136,147,176,183,218,291,306,307-8,319,327,333,
338, 377, 385, 402
opinion, 110, 189, 193, 228, 273, 308-9, 403
orientation, 62, 121, 143, 148, 238, 254, 257, 261, 288, 311, 351, 370
paralogism,76,127,136,148,158-9,233,237,242,250,255,313,339,349,377-8
passion, 56-7, 164, 313-14,330
peace, 137, 195, 229, 314, 322, 357, 413
perception,52,64,74-5,81,113,126,129,186,227,252,314-15,345,351,355,
362, 364, 372
perfection, 53, 84, 88, 91, 112, 200, 224, 262, 264, 31 5, 335, 392, 408, 411
permanence, 44, 64, 242, 250, 288, 325
personality, 73, 166, 199, 230, 242, 256, 278, 304, 340, 411
phenomenon, 79-80, 209, 259, 302, 317-18
philosophy,2-3,8,68,84,123,163,173,190,271,277,287,318-20,384,386,402;
history of, 225-7, 262; practical, 86, 132, 139, 164, 172, 197, 219-220, 275, 386;
theoretical,84, 86, 139, 172, 197, 275, 386
pietism, 13, 111
pleasure,54-5,57-8,61,73,91,97,115,139-40,154,181, 191,197-9,205,211,
222,226,249,261,270,279, 320-1, 336,379
plurality, 89, 289, 335, 408
possession, 132, 271, 285, 293, 322, 326, 337; of concepts, 45-6, 151, 323
possibility, 51, 78, 94, 130, 135, 177, 240, 299, 361
postulates, 323-4; of empirical knowledge, 51-2, 63, 74, 89, 129, 168, 184, 299,
305,325-6,335; pure practical,99,125, 143-4,193,215,238,250,256,323,349,
393
predicate, 43, 72, 94, 156, 183, 218, 241, 331, 391
presence, 53, 170, 247, 252, 330, 362-3
presentation, 69, 71, 130-1, 183, 231-2, 245-8, 332, 360, 385, 404
principles, 36, 47, 63, 71, 74, 78, 89, 106, 120, 148, 155, 161, 168, 205, 217, 268,
269,284,292,308,325,332-4,359,382,407; constitutive, 1 29-30,136,173,200,
349, 410; practical, 88, 100, 143, 151, 198, 207, 219-20, 223, 252, 293-4, 335-6;
regulative, 3, 86, 129, 132, 136, 158, 173, 200, 228, 238, 349, 386, 389, 410
psychology,57-8,76-7,86,127,136,144,147,158,233-4,237,244,291,307,327,
338-40, 349,390,408
pure, 89, 93, 131, 171, 204, 265, 319, 341-2, 372-3
450
INDEX OF CONCEPTS
quality (categories of), 74,104-5,137, 168, 279, 335, 345, 361

quantity (categories of), 89, 104-5, 136, 335, 361, 407-8
rationalism, 81, 88, 134, 171, 174, 218, 333, 344

reality, 52, 74, 239, 250, 274, 279, 300-1, 345-6, 361
reason,41,71,76,122, 129, 131, 138,139, 158, 163, 175, 191, 210, 216, 217,237,
291,346-50,406; fact of,189-90; practical,49,89,128,143-4,166,269; theoreti
cal, 49, 89,279, 333
receptivity,80,187,207-8,211,252,258,266,284,348,350,361,363-4,371,375,
401, 406
reflection, 119, 121, 140, 155, 185-6, 211, 223, 328, 350-2, 360, 396
relation (categories of),43,63,104-5,107,116,137,160,231,237,290,299,335,
361, 381
representation,79,82,112,113,118-19,125-6,176,206,209,211,235,240,247,
258,265,268,284,294,342,350, 355-6, 362,406
respect, 143,197-8,209, 283, 356-7,366-7,412
revolution, 128, 286, 322, 332, 357
right, 166-7,271,285,293,297,306,341,358
rule,85,89,108,155,159,178,181,182,213,231,254,267,270,275,298,358-
9, 375, 403
scepticism, 43, 81, 109, 138, 163, 227

schema(tism),66,86,106-7,117,120,131,143,148,156,161,205,231,245,248,
259,270,353, 360-2, 373,381,386,398,403,407
sensation,52,61,74,116,118,154,170,185-6,206,210,253,265,288,325,342,
345,355,362,373,397
sensibility,36, 53, 61, 62, 71, 80-1, 82,103, 113, 115,147, 152, 191, 197-9,207,
210, 248,252, 281,298,329, 348, 351, 362-5, 371, 373, 375, 393, 406
sex, 60, 73, 97, 285, 321, 365-7, 416
simultaneity, 64, 134
soul, 57, 66, 76, 86, 94, 136, 158, 163, 184, 291, 302, 338-40, 349, 395
sovereignty,195, 376
space,96,162,168,187-8,214,239,241,250,253,258,265-6,279,288,310,328-
9, 367-73, 408
space and time (forms of intuition),36,54, 74,77,103,120,131,148,152, 184,
187,204,206,208,240,244,248,251,256, 265-6, 284,296,323,334,346,364,
373-4, 385
spontaneity,37,46,82,121,127,187,201,207-8,211,240,253,258,284,311,342,
350, 355, 361, 363-4, 374-6, 382, 406, 414
451
INDEX OF CONCEPTS
state,110-11,114,117,124,128,132,133,137,195,293,297,322,326,354,358,
376-7,413
subject,44,69,72,113,126,156,205,208,212,217,281; as T,233-4,242,250,
255,276,301,310,326,339,362-4,377-8,379
sublime,141-2,155,166,169,197,298,326,329,379-80
subreption,330,356,380
substance,2,36,42-5,63,68,96,117,145,162,177,187,202,210,233,237,242,
288,305,335,339,377
subsumption,155,178,213,267-8,269-70,381,394
succession, 49,64,108,328,381,396,398
sufficient-reason,107,333,391
supersensible,66,77,92,142,153,311,404; harmony,55
symbol,66,231,287,360,404
synthesis,35,52,67,75,82,87,90,94,104,121,140,152,178,186,201,207,227,
245-6,248-9,277,281,284,290,329,331,332,334,360,375,382-4,385,387,
403,407-8
system,128,169,173,212,237,276,361,385-6
table of categories,103,110,141,154,155,168,209,268,282,289,290,296,354,
361, 387; of judgements,69,120,161,209,231,268,330,406
taste, 53-6, 61,114-15,141,161,171,262,270,321
technic,84, 85-6, 100,131,219,231,353,362,388
teleology,78,140-2,353,388-9
theology, 76, 86, 136, 144, 147, 158, 215-16, 237, 244, 291, 307, 327, 338, 349,
353-5,390-3
thing-in-itself,39,77,264,288,296,305, 393-4, 401
thinking,71,104,113,393,394,401
time,64-5,68,131,141,152,211,214,258-9,265-6,290,296,311,328,345,355,
361,362,364,394-8
totality,89,160,237,255, 260, 277,289,298, 349, 407
transcendental,91,94,145,234,255,260,305,310,319,351,382,384,399-400,
407; illusion,244; object,171,240,288,350,401-2; subject,235,239,241,340,401
truth,79,109,134,241,244,255,268,308,372,399,402-3
typic,205,249,403-4
understanding,49,61,62,71,80,113,114,131,139,147,155,169,183,186,199,
210,228,248,266,269,275,281,302,329,346,348,351,375,386,405-7
unity,82,89,92,104,113,127,152,158,209,228,233,240-3,261,268,277,281,
289,318,335,348,350,358,363,379,386,387,399,401,404,406,407-9
452
INDEX OF CONCEPTS
universality, 36, 82, 142, 205, 253-4, 274, 275-6, 289, 299, 336, 410; of the law,
100
validity, 36, 72, 109, 228, 282, 410

value, 69, 72, 253, 278, 410-11
virtue, 77, 115, 144, 166, 179, 217, 229, 282, 293, 411-12
war, 138, 195, 413

will, 49, 88, 99-102, 113-14, 132, 133, 138, 143, 149, 161, 165-6, 173, 180, 198,
207,216,219,221-3,225,252-3,261,276,289,293,324,335,349,354,411,413-
15
world, 51, 66, 73, 75, 86, 94, 129, 136, 158, 160, 184, 259-61, 298, 302, 310, 329,
338, 349, 416-17
453

Kant A Very Short Introduction

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A Kant Dictionary

Blackwell Philosopher Dictionaries

First published 1995

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data has been applied for.

ISBN 978-0-6311-7534-6 (hardback)

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Preface and acknowledgements IX

lntroduction: Kant and the language of philosophy 1

My first experience of reading Kant was not an altogether happy one. I

The influence of Kant s philosophy has been , and continues to be, so

means of material drawn from contemporary natural science, newspapers,

This dictionary attempts to map the problematic and relational aspects

Citations of works by Kant

Citations of works by other authors

translation and follow the standard system of reference according to the

List of abbreviations of Kant's published writings

A 1798b Anthwpowgy from .a Pragmatic Point of View

de nobis ipsis silemus - of ourselves we are sil,ent

Kant's biography has been tak.en to exemplify the complete submersion of

lt was the comprehensive character of the education provided in the

he classifies his 12 publications. Five of them are directly concerned with

An opening occurred with the death of Langhansen, the Professor of

exploratory reflection and the establishment of research agendas. However,

academic bureaucracy, the Programmata were directed to students and were

in the encyclopaedia and history of philosophy, and in the same year

as Anthropology .from a Pragmatic Point of View (A), but expressed doubts

Wochentliche Königsbergische Frag- und Anzeigungs-Nachrichten. The first essay

Lambert wrote to Kant from Berlin on 13 November 1765 bemoaning the

Hints of dissatisfaction with Kanter are discemible in Kant's reply to

straightfmward. lt also shows the extent to which Kant's participation in

architecture), history and its "auxiliary" sciences such as geography, diplomatics,

important part in disseminating Kant's ideas by opening to him the pages of

a priori /a posteriori see also CONCEPT, DEDUCTION , EXPOSITION , INTUITION ,

pure a priori principles are indispensable for the possibility of experience,

the emphasis of twentieth-century Kant studies on the problems of the

absolute [ absolutus, Absolut] see also ANTINOMY, COSMOLOGY, FREEDOM, GOD

and dependence of appearances (A 415/B 443), but are shown upon

abstraction [aphairesis, abstrahere, Abstraktion] see also CONCEPT, EMPIRICAL,

Although the issue of abstraction was at first peripheral to critical philo­

Fichte's account of abstraction mirrors this unphilosophical vanquishing

accident [symbebekos, accidens, Akzidens] see also ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, ES­

others by possession of a right angle, which distinguishes them as a spe­

predicates. lt is impossible to attain the ultimate subject - i.e., substance

the understanding separates permanence and alteration, seeing existents

to 'permanent laws'. In the 'Transcendental Deduction' of CPR, on the

acroamata/ic (something heard) see also coNSTRUCTION, PRINCIPLE

action [ergon/poiesis/praxis, opere/fadio/ actio, Handlung] see also ACTUALITY,

practical reason (O'Neill, 1989). Actions are produced according to rules

to 'external' influence, reason's scrutiny can only be experienced as a

motivated by desire articulated in maxims and dedicated to the produc­

century by Husserl, who distinguished between dormant and focal actuali­

Hutcheson, Hume and Burke. The quality of a judgement of taste con­

short stories,Jean Paul's ironic manual for beginners in aesthetics, and to

Following Strachey's translation of Freud's term Affekt as 'affect' helps to

passion (Leidenschaft) in so far as both 'exclude the sovereignty of reason'

Affection is the mode in which an appearance affects the Gemüt, a pro­

affection see AFFECT

affinity [Affinität, Verwandtschaft] see also APPERCEPTION, ASSOCIATION, DEDUC­

heterogeneous materials of sensibility and understanding. This reading is

Although the issue of abstraction was at first peripheral to critical philo

accident [symbebekos, accidens, Akzidens] see also ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, ES

others by possession of a right angle, which distinguishes them as a spe

motivated by desire articulated in maxims and dedicated to the produc

century by Husserl, who distinguished between dormant and focal actuali

Hutcheson, Hume and Burke. The quality of a judgement of taste con

Affection is the mode in which an appearance affects the Gemüt, a pro

affinity [Affinität, Verwandtschaft] see also APPERCEPTION, ASSOCIATION, DEDUC

temporal analogies to the ontological predicates, analogies which are ap

of Kant exegesis to the role of argument by analogy in the critical philoso

apodeictic judgements or propositions see also ACTUALITY, CATEGORIES, CER

is believed to be true, and yields assertoric belief, while insufficient uncer

Kant adopted Leibniz's distinction between perception and appercep

p. 44). Such a principle is only possible 'on the pre-supposition of free

axioms of intuition see also ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE, ANTICIPATIONS OF PERCEP

in Plato and Aristotle, being continues to be understood as a 'transcen

categories [Kategorien] see also ANALITIC, DEDUCTION, JUDGEMENT, LOGIC, PRINCI