Immanuel Kant
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{{Infobox Philosopher
|region = Western Philosophy
|era = [[18th-century philosophy]]
|color = #B0C4DE
|image = Immanuel Kant (painted portrait).jpg
|caption = Immanuel Kant
|name = Immanuel Kant
|birth = [[April 22]], [[1724]]<br/> [[Königsberg]], [[Kingdom of Prussia]]
|death = {{death date and age|1804|02|12|1724|04|22}}<br/> [[Königsberg]], [[Kingdom of Prussia]]
|school_tradition = [[Kantianism]], [[Age of Enlightenment|enlightenment philosophy]]
|main_interests = [[Epistemology]], [[Metaphysics]], [[Ethics]]
|influences = [[Christian Wolff (philosopher)|Wolff]], [[Johannes Nikolaus Tetens|Tetens]], [[Francis Hutcheson (philosopher)|Hutcheson]], [[Sextus Empiricus|Empiricus]], [[Michel de Montaigne|Montaigne]], [[David Hume|Hume]], [[René Descartes|Descartes]], [[Nicolas Malebranche|Malebranche]], [[Spinoza]], [[Gottfried Leibniz|Leibniz]], [[John Locke|Locke]], [[George Berkeley|Berkeley]], [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau|Rousseau]], [[Isaac Newton|Newton]], [[Emanuel Swedenborg]]
|influenced = [[Johann Gottlieb Fichte|Fichte]], [[Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling|Schelling]], [[Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel|Hegel]], [[Arthur Schopenhauer|Schopenhauer]], [[Friedrich Nietzsche|Nietzsche]], [[Charles Peirce|Peirce]], [[Edmund Husserl|Husserl]], [[Martin Heidegger|Heidegger]], [[Ludwig Wittgenstein|Wittgenstein]], [[Jean-Paul Sartre|Sartre]], [[Ernst Cassirer|Cassirer]], [[Jürgen Habermas|Habermas]], [[John Rawls|Rawls]], [[Noam Chomsky|Chomsky]], [[Robert Nozick|Nozick]], [[Karl Popper]], [[Søren Kierkegaard|Kierkegaard]], [[C. G. Jung|Jung]], [[John R. Searle|Searle]], [[Michel Foucault]], [[Hannah Arendt]], [[Karl Marx]], [[Giovanni Gentile]], [[Karl Jaspers]], [[Friedrich Hayek|Hayek]], [[Henri Bergson|Bergson]], [[Ørsted]], [[A.J. Ayer]], [[Ralph Waldo Emerson|Emerson]], [[Otto Weininger|Weininger]]
|notable_ideas = [[Categorical imperative]], [[Transcendental Idealism]], [[Synthetic proposition|Synthetic a priori]], [[Noumenon]], [[Sapere aude]], [[Nebular hypothesis]]
|signature = Autograph-ImmanuelKant.png
}}
{{redirect|Kant}}
'''Immanuel Kant''' {{IPA2|ɪmanuəl kant}} ([[22 April]], [[1724]]{{ndash}} [[12 February]], [[1804]]) was an 18th-century [[Germany|German]] [[philosopher]] from the [[Kingdom of Prussia|Prussian]] city of [[Königsberg]] (now [[Kaliningrad]], [[Russia]]). He is regarded as one of the most influential thinkers of modern [[Europe]] and of the late [[Age of Enlightenment|Enlightenment]].
Among his most important works are the [[Critique of Pure Reason]] and the [[Critique of Practical Reason]], which examine the relation of [[epistemology]], [[metaphysics]], and [[ethics]].
To briefly summarize Kant’s metaphysics and epistemology, it can be said that Kant wanted to know whether metaphysics, the science of ultimate reality, is possible. To search for clues, he examined how it was possible for us to know that an object must have a certain property prior to the experience of said object. In the end, he came to the conclusion that the mind can only think in a particular manner, so all objects that it can think about must conform to this manner of thought. Therefore if the mind can only think in terms of causality -- which he concluded that it does -- then we can know prior to experiencing them that all objects we experience must either be a cause or an effect. However, it follows from this that it is possible that there are objects of such a nature that the mind cannot think of them, and so the principle of causality, for instance, cannot be applied outside of experience: hence we cannot know, for example, whether the world always existed or if it had a cause. And so the grand questions of speculative metaphysics are off limits, but the sciences are firmly grounded in synthetic a priori laws.
In this sense, Kant believed himself to be creating a compromise between the [[empiricism|empiricists]] and the [[rationalism|rationalists]]. The former, according to Kant, believe that knowledge necessarily comes from experience, and that experience can yield only imperfect laws of nature, that past events do not predict future events. Therefore, there is no sound foundation for science. Knowledge of our selves, the external world and causality are off limits. The latter believed that reason ion provides us with certain truths that can provide a sound foundation for science. Kant said we can know some things through reason, but these things are only of how the world appears to us, and that the world we know is objective, compromising with the rationalists. But he also said that what we know through pure reason can only be applied to experience, and that it is through experience that we get most of our knowledge, compromising with the empiricists.
Kant’s thought was very influential in Germany while he was still alive, moving philosophy beyond the debate between the rationalists and empiricists. The philosophers [[Fichte]], [[Schelling]], [[Hegel]] and [[Schopenhauer]] all saw themselves as correcting and expanding the Kantian system, thus bringing about [[German Idealism]]. And Kant continues to be a major influence on philosophy to this day, influencing such giants as [[Wittgenstein]] and [[Lyotard]].
==Biography==
Immanuel Kant was born in 1724 in [[Königsberg]], as the fourth of eleven children (five of them reached adulthood). He was baptized as 'Emanuel' but later changed his name to 'Immanuel'<ref>Kuehn, Manfred. Kant: A Biography. Cambridge University Press, 2001, p. 26 </ref> after he learned Hebrew. He spent his entire life in and around his hometown, the capital of [[Prussia]] at that time, never traveling more than a hundred miles from Königsberg.<ref>Lewis, Rick. 2007. 'Kant 200 Years On'. ''Philosophy Now''. No. 62.</ref> His father Johann Georg Kant (1682–1746) was a German craftsman from [[Memel]], at the time [[Prussia|Prussia's]] most northeastern city (now [[Klaipėda]], [[Lithuania]]). His mother Anna Regina Porter (1697–1737), born in Nuremberg, was the daughter of a Scottish saddle and harness maker. In his youth, Kant was a solid, albeit unspectacular, student. He was raised in a [[Pietism|Pietist]] household that stressed intense religious devotion, personal humility, and a literal interpretation of the [[Bible]]. Consequently, Kant received a stern education — strict, punitive, and disciplinary — that favored Latin and religious instruction over mathematics and science.<ref>Biographical information sourced from: Kuehn, Manfred. ''Kant: A Biography.'' Cambridge University Press, 2001. ISBN 0-521-49704-3 which is now the standard biography of Kant in English.</ref>
====The Young Scholar====
Kant showed great application to study early in his life. He was first sent to Collegium Fredericianum and then enrolled in the [[University of Königsberg]] in 1740, at the age of 16.<ref>The American International Encyclopedia, J.J. Little & Ives, New York 1954, Volume IX</ref> He studied the philosophy of [[Gottfried Leibniz|Leibniz]] and [[Christian Wolff (philosopher)|Wolff]] under [[Martin Knutsen]], a [[rationalism|rationalist]] who was also familiar with developments in British philosophy and science and who introduced Kant to the new mathematical physics of [[Isaac Newton|Newton]]. Knutsen dissuaded Kant from the theory of pre-established harmony, which he regarded as "the pillow for the lazy mind". He also dissuaded the young scholar from idealism, which was negatively regarded by the whole philosophy of the 18th century. Even after Kant developed the theory of transcendental idealism in the "Critique of Pure Reason", he nevertheless refuted traditional idealism, i.e. the idea that reality is mental, in the second part of that work. His father's stroke and subsequent death in 1746 interrupted his studies. Kant became a private tutor in the smaller towns surrounding Königsberg, but continued his scholarly research. 1749 saw the publication of his first philosophical work, ''[[Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces]]''. Kant published several more works on scientific topics, becoming a university lecturer in 1755. The subject on which he lectured was "Metaphysics"; the course textbook was written by [[A.G. Baumgarten]], the author of the term "aesthetics" in its modern meaning.
In the ''General History of Nature and Theory of the Heavens (Allgemeine Naturgeschichte und Theorie des Himmels)'' (1755), Kant laid out the [[Nebular Hypothesis]], in which he deduced that the Solar System formed from a large cloud of gas, a nebula. He thus attempted to explain the order of the solar system, seen previously by [[Newton]] as being imposed from the beginning by God. Kant also correctly deduced that the [[Milky Way]] was a large disk of stars, which he theorized also formed from a (much larger) spinning cloud of gas. He further suggested the possibility that other nebulae might also be similarly large and distant disks of stars. These postulations opened new horizons for astronomy: for the first time extending astronomy beyond the solar system to galactic and extragalactic realms.<ref>George Gamow, ''One, Two, Three... Infinity'', p. 300ff. Viking Press, 1954</ref>
From this point on, Kant turned increasingly to philosophical issues, although he continued to write on the sciences throughout his life. In the early 1760s, Kant produced a series of important works in philosophy. ''[[The False Subtlety of the Four Syllogistic Figures]]'', a work in logic, was published in 1762. Two more works appeared the following year: ''[[Attempt to Introduce the Concept of Negative Magnitudes into Philosophy]]'' and ''[[The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God]]''. In 1764, Kant wrote ''[[Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime]]'' and then was second to [[Moses Mendelssohn]] in a Berlin Academy prize competition with his ''[[Inquiry Concerning the Distinctness of the Principles of Natural Theology and Morality]]'' (often referred to as "the Prize Essay"). In 1770, at the age of 45, Kant was finally appointed Professor of Logic and Metaphysics at the University of Königsberg. Kant wrote his ''Inaugural Dissertation'' in defense of this appointment. This work saw the emergence of several central themes of his mature work, including the distinction between the faculties of intellectual thought and sensible receptivity. Not to observe this distinction would mean to commit the error of [[subreption]], and, as he says in the last chapter of the dissertation, only in avoidance of this error will metaphysics flourish.
The issue that vexed Kant was central to what twentieth century scholars termed "the philosophy of mind." The flowering of the natural sciences had led to an understanding of how data reaches the brain. Sunlight may fall upon a distant object, whereupon light is reflected from various parts of the object in a way that maps the surface features (color, texture, etc.) of the object. The light reaches the eye of a human observer, passes through the cornea, is focused by the lens upon the retina where it forms an image similar to that formed by light passing through a pinhole into a [[camera obscura]]. The retinal cells next send impulses through the optic nerve (actually a dense cable of individual nerve cells) and thereafter they form a mapping in the brain of the visual features of the distant object. The interior mapping is not the exterior thing being mapped, and our belief that there is a meaningful relationship between the exterior object and the mapping in the brain depends on a chain of reasoning that is itself not fully grounded. But the uncertainty aroused by this considerations, the uncertainties raised by optical illusions, misperceptions, delusions, etc., are not the end of the worries of the philosopher who is no longer slumbering.
[[Donald Davidson]], an influential Stanford University professor of philosophy, introduced the next level of perplexity by pointing out that simply having a mapping, something like a little television screen somewhere in the brain, does not at all answer the question of how humans then '''think about''' or process the information present in that form. Imagine, Davidson said, that there is a little man in the brain who watches the television screen and directs the whole organism based on those perceptions. But, wait, that will not work either because the little man has his own eyes, and a mapping of the image on the television screen appears on an even tinier television screen in his brain. And immediately upon discovering this chain of dependence it becomes clear that it implies infinite regress.
So something else has to be going on. There may indeed be a mapping in the brain. In fact, brain scientists can actually find physical maps of the body in the brain. The volume of cells that monitors the hand has the approximate form of a human hand, for instance. But somehow the mind, or the brain, has to "reach out" and comprehend that mapping and in some way process the information in a way that does not simply create another mapping of it.
Without knowing the details now known about neurophysiology, Kant clearly saw that the mind could not function if it were only an empty container at the end of a fire hose of data coming in from the outside. Something had to be giving order to the incoming data. If, for instance, part of the incoming data included a visual mapping of a fertile frog egg, then that data would not remain constant. It would be followed by visual mappings of the tadpole and frog sorts. But, to be useful information for the budding biology student, some kind of meta-data would have to be created to keep those images in the same sequence in which they were received. The ordering of data in this kind of sequence is the mind's function of constituting '''time''' for the purposes of human awareness of the environment. The same general considerations apply to the mind's function of constituting '''space''' for ordering mappings of visual and tactile signals arriving via the already described chains of physical causation.
As [[Willard van Orman Quine]] pointed out much later in his '''Logic''', the internal storage of visual data does not even have to be stored in contiguous portions of the brain, any more than a computer file on a hard drive has to be entirely in one solid block on a hard drive. As long as the brain has a mapping of where it has put the parts of the visual record of the tadpole or the frog, those parts can "written" anywhere. Or, to put it in terms more closely approximating Quine's original formulation, an entity does not have to be contiguous to be an entity.
====The Silent Decade====
At the age of 46, Kant was an established scholar and an increasingly influential philosopher. Much was expected of him. In response to a letter from his student, [[Markus Herz]], Kant came to recognize that in the ''[[Inaugural Dissertation]]'', he had failed to account for the relation and connection between our sensible and intellectual faculties, i.e., he needed to explain both how humans acquire data and how they process data—related but very different processes. He also credited [[David Hume]] with awakening him from "dogmatic slumber" (circa 1770). Kant did not publish any work in philosophy for the next eleven years.
[[Image:Immanuel Kant 3.jpg|thumb|left|Immanuel Kant]]
Kant spent his silent decade working on a solution to the problem mentioned above. Although fond of company and conversation with others, Kant isolated himself. He resisted friends' attempts to bring him out of his isolation. In 1778, in response to one of these offers by a former pupil, Kant wrote "Any change makes me apprehensive, even if it offers the greatest promise of improving my condition, and I am persuaded by this natural instinct of mine that I must take heed if I wish that the threads which the Fates spin so thin and weak in my case to be spun to any length. My great thanks, to my well-wishers and friends, who think so kindly of me as to undertake my welfare, but at the same time a most humble request to protect me in my current condition from any disturbance."<ref><u>Introducing: Kant<u> by Christopher Kui-Want and Andrzej Klimowski, 2005. Icon books, Cambridge. ISBN 1-84046-664-2</ref>
When Kant emerged from his silence in 1781, the result was the ''[[Critique of Pure Reason]]''. Although now uniformly recognized as one of the greatest works in the history of philosophy, this ''Critique'' was largely ignored upon its initial publication. The book was long, over 800 pages in the original German edition, and written in what some considered a convoluted style. It received few reviews, and these granted no significance to the work. Its density made it, as [[Johann Gottfried Herder]] put it in a letter to [[Johann Georg Hamann]], a "tough nut to crack," obscured by "…all this heavy gossamer."<ref>''Ein Jahrhundert deutscher Literaturkritik'', vol/. III, ''Der Aufsteig zur Klassik in der Kritik der Zeit' (Berlin, 1959), pp. 315; as quoted in Gulyga, Arsenij. ''Immanuel Kunt: His Life and Thought.'' Trans., Marijan Despaltović. Boston: Birkhäuser, 1987.</ref> Its reception stood in stark contrast, to the praise Kant had received for earlier works such as his "Prize Essay" and other shorter works that precede the first Critique. These well-received and readable tracts include one on the [[1755 Lisbon earthquake|earthquake in Lisbon]] which was so popular that it was sold by the page.<ref>Gulyga, Arsenij. ''Immanuel Kant: His Life and Thought.'' Trans., Marijan Despaltović. Boston: Birkhäuser, 1987 pp. 28–9.</ref> Prior to the change in course documented in the first Critique, his books sold well, and by the time he published ''Observations On the Feeling of the Beautiful and the Sublime'' in 1764 he had become a popular author of some note.<ref>Gulyga, Arsenij. ''Immanuel Kant: His Life and Thought.'' Trans., Marijan Despaltović. Boston: Birkhäuser, 1987, p. 62.</ref> Kant was disappointed with the first Critique's reception. Recognizing the need to clarify the original treatise, Kant wrote the ''[[Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics]]'' in 1783 as a summary of its main views. He also encouraged his friend, [[Johann Heinrich Schultz|Johann Schultz]], to publish a brief commentary on the ''Critique of Pure Reason.''
Kant's reputation gradually rose through the 1780s, sparked by a series of important works: the 1784 essay, "[[What is Enlightenment?|Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment?]]"; 1785s ''[[Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals]]'' (his first work on moral philosophy); and, from 1786, ''[[Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science]].'' But Kant's fame ultimately arrived from an unexpected source. In 1786, [[Karl Reinhold]] began to publish a series of public letters on the Kantian philosophy. In these letters, Reinhold framed Kant's philosophy as a response to the central intellectual controversy of the era: the [[Pantheism Dispute]]. [[Friedrich Jacobi]] had accused the recently deceased [[Gotthold Ephraim Lessing|G. E. Lessing]] (a distinguished dramatist and philosophical essayist) of [[Spinozism]]. Such a charge, tantamount to atheism, was vigorously denied by Lessing's friend [[Moses Mendelssohn]], and a bitter public dispute arose among partisans. The controversy gradually escalated into a general debate over the values of the Enlightenment and the value of reason itself. Reinhold maintained in his letters that Kant's ''[[Critique of Pure Reason]]'' could settle this dispute by defending the authority and bounds of reason. Reinhold's letters were widely read and made Kant the most famous philosopher of his era.
====Kant's later work====
Kant published a second edition of the ''[[Critique of Pure Reason]]'' (Kritik der reinen Vernunft) in 1787, heavily revising the first parts of the book. Most of his subsequent work focused on other areas of philosophy. He continued to develop his moral philosophy, notably in 1788's ''[[Critique of Practical Reason]]'' (known as the second ''Critique'') and 1797’s ''[[Metaphysics of Morals]]''. The 1790 ''[[Critique of Judgment]]'' (the third ''Critique'') applied the Kantian system to aesthetics and [[teleology]]. He also wrote a number of semi-popular essays on history, religion, politics and other topics. These works were well received by Kant's contemporaries and confirmed his preeminent status in eighteenth century philosophy. There were several journals devoted solely to defending and criticizing the Kantian philosophy. But despite his success, philosophical trends were moving in another direction. Many of Kant's most important disciples (including [[Karl Leonhard Reinhold|Reinhold]], [[Jakob Sigismund Beck|Beck]] and [[Fichte]]) transformed the Kantian position into increasingly radical forms of idealism. The progressive stages of revision of Kant's teachings marked the emergence of [[German Idealism]]. Kant opposed these developments and publicly denounced Fichte in an open letter<ref name = "Fichte">[http://www.ikp.uni-bonn.de/kant/aa12/370.html Open letter by Kant denouncing Fichte's Philosophy (German)]</ref> in 1799. It was one of his final philosophical acts. Kant's health, long poor, took a turn for the worse and he died at Konigsberg on 12 February 1804 uttering "Genug" [enough] before expiring.<ref>Norman Davies, ''Europe: A history'', pp. 687</ref> His unfinished final work, the fragmentary ''[[Opus Postumum]]'', was (as its title suggests) published posthumously.
Kant never concluded that one could form a coherent account of the universe and of human experience without grounding such an account in the "thing in itself." Many of those who followed him argued that since the "thing in itself" was unknowable its existence could not simply be assumed. Rather than arbitrarily switching to an account that was ungrounded in anything supposed to be the "real," as did the German Idealists, another group arose to ask how our (generally reliable) accounts of a coherent and rule-abiding universe were actually grounded. This new kind of philosophy became known as [[Phenomenology]], and its preeminent spokesman was [[Edmund Husserl]].
====Kant the man====
A variety of popular beliefs have arisen concerning Kant's life. It is often held, for instance, that Kant was a late bloomer, that he only became an important philosopher in his mid-50s after rejecting his earlier views. While it is true that Kant wrote his greatest works relatively late in life, there is a tendency to underestimate the value of his earlier works. Recent Kant scholarship has devoted more attention to these "pre-critical" writings and has recognized a degree of continuity with his mature work.{{Facts|date=October 2007}}
Many of the common myths concerning Kant's personal mannerisms are
enumerated, explained, and refuted in Goldwaite's
introduction to his translation of ''[[Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime]]''.<ref>Kant, Immanuel. ''[[Observations on the Feeling of the
Beautiful and Sublime]]''. Trans. John T. Goldthwait. University of
California Press, 1961, 2003. ISBN 0-520-24078-2</ref> It is often held
that Kant lived a very strict and predictable life, leading to the
oft-repeated story that neighbors would set their clocks by his daily
walks.<ref>Simmons, A. John. 1996. 'Associative Political Obligations'.
''Ethics'', Vol. 106, No. 2: 247-273</ref> He never married. Only later in his life, under the influence of his
friend, the English merchant [[Joseph Green (18th century)|Joseph Green]], did Kant adopt a more regulated lifestyle.<ref>M. Kuehn, ''Kant: A Biography'', pp. 154–6. This work, along with the older ''Kant's Life and Thought'', by E. Cassirer, are the main sources, in English, on the life of Kant.</ref>
==Kant's philosophy==
{{Confusing|date=March 2008}}
In his essay "[[What is Enlightenment?|Answering the Question: What is Enlightenment?]],"
Kant defined the Enlightenment as an age shaped by the [[Latin]] motto, ''[[Sapere aude]]'' ("Dare to Know"). Kant maintained that one ought to think autonomously, free of the dictates of external [[authority]]. His work reconciled many of the differences between the [[Rationalism|Rationalist]] and [[Empiricism|Empiricist]] traditions of the 18th century. He had a decisive impact on the [[Romanticism|Romantic]] and [[German Idealism|German Idealist]] philosophies of the 19th century. His work has also been a starting point for many 20th century philosophers.
Kant asserted that, because of the limitations of argumentation in the absence of irrefutable evidence, no one could really know whether there is a God and an afterlife or not, and, conversely, that no one could really know that there is no God and no afterlife. For the sake of society and morality, Kant asserted, people are reasonably justified in believing in them, even though they could never know for sure whether they are real or not. He explained:
{{quote|All the preparations of reason, therefore, in what may be called pure philosophy, are in reality directed to those three problems only [God, the soul, and freedom]. However, these three elements in themselves still hold independent, proportional, objective weight individually. Moreover, in a collective relational context; namely, to know ''what ought to be done'': if the will is free, if there is a God, and if there is a future [[World (philosophy)| world]]. As this concerns our actions with reference to the highest aims of life, we see that the ultimate intention of nature in her wise provision was really, in the constitution of our reason, directed to moral interests only.<ref name = "CPR A801">''[[Critique of Pure Reason]]'', A801.</ref>}} The sense of an enlightened approach and the [[scientific method|critical method]] required that "If one cannot prove that a thing ''is,'' he may try to prove that it is ''not.'' And if he succeeds in doing neither (as often occurs), he may still ask whether it is in his ''interest'' to ''accept'' one or the other of the alternatives hypothetically, from the theoretical or the practical point of view. Hence the question no longer is as to whether [[perpetual peace]] is a real thing or not a real thing, or as to whether we may not be deceiving ourselves when we adopt the former alternative, but we must ''act'' on the supposition of its being real."<ref name = "SoR Concl">''The Science of Right,'' Conclusion.</ref> The presupposition of God, soul, and freedom was then a practical concern, for "Morality, by itself, constitutes a system, but happiness does not, unless it is distributed in exact proportion to morality. This, however, is possible in an intelligible world only under a wise author and ruler. Reason compels us to admit such a ruler, together with life in such a world, which we must consider as future life, or else all moral laws are to be considered as idle dreams… ."<ref name = "CPR A811">''Critique of Pure Reason'', A811).</ref>
The two interconnected foundations of what Kant called his "[[critical philosophy]]" that created the "[[Copernican revolution]]" that he claimed to have wrought in philosophy were his [[epistemology]] of [[transcendental idealism| Transcendental Idealism]] and his [[moral philosophy]] of the autonomy of practical reason. These teachings placed the active, rational human [[subject (philosophy)|subject]] at the center of the cognitive and moral worlds. With regard to knowledge, Kant argued that the rational order of the world as known by science could never be accounted for merely by the fortuitous accumulation of sense perceptions. It was instead the product of the rule-based activity of "synthesis." This activity consisted of conceptual unification and integration carried out by the mind through [[concepts]] or the "categories of the understanding" operating on the perceptual manifold within [[space and time]], which are not concepts,<ref>In the first edition of the ''Critique of Pure Reason'' Kant refers to space as "no discursive or...general conception of the relation of things, but a pure intuition" and maintained that "We can only represent to ourselves one space". The "general notion of spaces...depends solely upon limitations" (Meikeljohn trans., A25). In the second edition of the CPR, Kant adds, "The original representation of space is an ''a priori'' intuition, not a concept" (Kemp Smith trans., B40). In regard to time, Kant states that "Time is not a discursive, or what is called a general concept, but a pure form of sensible intuition. Different times are but parts of one and the same time; and the representation which can be given only through a single object is intuition" (A31/B47). For the differences in the discursive use of reason according to concepts and its intuitive use through the construction of concepts, see ''Critique of Pure Reason'' (A719/B747 ff. and A837/B865). On "One and the same thing in space and time" and the mathematical construction of concepts, see A724/B752.</ref> but are forms of sensibility that are [[A priori and a posteriori (philosophy)|a priori]] necessary conditions for any possible experience. Thus the objective order of nature and the causal necessity that operates within it are dependent upon the mind. There is wide disagreement among Kant scholars on the correct interpretation of this train of thought. The 'two-world' interpretation regards Kant's position as a statement of epistemological limitation, that we are never able to transcend the bounds of our own mind, meaning that we cannot access the "[[thing-in-itself]]". Kant, however, also speaks of the thing in itself or ''transcendental object'' as a product of the (human) understanding as it attempts to conceive of objects in abstraction from the conditions of sensibility. Following this line of thought, some interpreters have argued that the thing in itself does not represent a separate ontological domain but simply a way of considering objects by means of the understanding alone — this is known as the two-aspect view. With regard to [[morality]], Kant argued that the source of the [[Goodness and value theory|good]] lies not in anything outside the [[human]] subject, either in [[nature]] or given by [[God]], but rather is only the good will itself. A good will is one that acts from duty in accordance with the universal moral law that the autonomous human being freely gives itself. This law obliges one to treat humanity — understood as rational agency, and represented through oneself as well as others — as an [[end in itself]] rather than (merely) as [[Means (philosophy)|means]] to other ends the individual might hold.
These ideas have largely framed or influenced all subsequent philosophical discussion and analysis. The specifics of Kant's account generated immediate and lasting controversy. Nevertheless, his theses — that the [[mind]] itself necessarily makes a constitutive contribution to its [[knowledge]], that this contribution is transcendental rather than psychological, that philosophy involves self-critical activity, that morality is rooted in human freedom, and that to act autonomously is to act according to rational moral principles — have all had a lasting effect on subsequent philosophy.
===Kant's theory of perception===
{{main|The Critique of Pure Reason|Transcendental Doctrine of Elements}}
Kant defines his theory of perception in his influential 1781 work ''[[The Critique of Pure Reason]]'', which has often been cited as the most significant volume of metaphysics and epistemology in modern philosophy. Kant maintains that our understanding of the external world has its foundations not merely in experience, but in both experience and [[A priori and a posteriori (philosophy)|a priori]] [[concepts]], thus offering a '''non-empiricist critique of rationalist philosophy''', which is what he and others referred to as his "Copernican revolution."<ref>See, e.g., "Kant, Immanuel", in The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition [http://www.bartleby.com/65/ka/Kant-Imm.html]</ref>
Before discussing his theory, it is necessary to explain Kant's distinction between analytic and synthetic propositions.
#Analytic proposition: a proposition whose predicate concept is contained in its subject concept; ''e.g., "All bachelors are unmarried," or, "All bodies take up space."''
#Synthetic proposition: a proposition whose predicate concept is not contained in its subject concept ; ''e.g., "All bachelors are happy," or, "All bodies have mass."
Analytic propositions are true by nature of the meaning of the words involved in the sentence—we require no further knowledge than a grasp of the language to understand this proposition. On the other hand, synthetic statements are those that tell us something about the world. The truth or falsehood of synthetic statements derives from something outside of their linguistic content. In this instance, mass is not a necessary [[predicate (grammar)|predicate]] of the body; until we are told the heaviness of the body we do not know that it has mass. In this case, experience of the body is required before its heaviness becomes clear. Before Kant's first Critique, empiricists (cf. [[Hume]]) and rationalists (cf. [[Leibniz]]) assumed that all synthetic statements required experience in order to be known.
{{Details|Analytic-synthetic distinction}}
Kant, however, contests this: he claims that elementary mathematics, like arithmetic, is synthetic ''a priori'', in that its statements provide new knowledge, but knowledge that is not derived from experience. This becomes part of his over-all argument for [[transcendental idealism]]. That is, he argues that the possibility of experience depends on certain [[Necessary and sufficient conditions|necessary conditions]]—which he calls ''a priori'' forms—and that these conditions structure and hold true of the world of experience. In so doing, his main claims in the "[[The Critique of Pure Reason#Transcendental Doctrine of Elements| Transcendental Aesthetic]]" are that mathematic judgments are synthetic ''a priori'' and in addition, that [[Space]] and [[Time]] are not derived from experience but rather are its preconditions
{{Details|A priori and a posteriori (philosophy)}}
This is quite naturally confusing, yet Kant's idea is that since his first claim—about mathematic judgments—is true, then it will follow that his claims about space and time are true as well. The next paragraph deals with the notion of mathematic judgments being synthetic ''a priori'', skip to the paragraph afterward to read more about perception and Kant.
Once we have grasped the concepts of addition, subtraction or the functions of basic arithmetic, we do not need any empirical experience to know that 100 + 100 = 200, and in this way it would appear that arithmetic is in fact analytic. However, that it is analytic can be disproved thus: if the numbers five and seven in the calculation 5 + 7 = 12 are examined, there is nothing to be found in them by which the number 12 can be inferred. Such it is that "5 + 7" and "the cube root of 1,728" or "12" are not analytic because their reference is the same but their sense is not—that the mathematic judgment "5 + 7 = 12" tells us something new about the world. It is self-evident, and undeniably a priori, but at the same time it is synthetic. And so Kant proves a proposition can be synthetic and known a priori.
{{Details|Sense and Reference}}
Kant asserts that experience is based both upon the perception of external objects and a priori knowledge<ref>The German word ''Anschauung'', which Kant used, literally means 'looking at' and generally means what in philosophy in English is called "perception". However it sometimes is rendered as "intuition": not, however, with the vernacular meaning of an indescribable or mystical experience or sixth sense, but rather with the meaning of the direct perception or grasping of sensory phenomena. In this article, both terms, "perception" and "intuition" are used to stand for Kant's ''Anschauung''.</ref>. The external world, he writes, provides those things which we sense. It is our mind, though, that processes this information about the world and gives it order, allowing us to comprehend it. Our mind supplies the conditions of space and time to experienced objects. According to the "transcendental unity of apperception", the concepts of the mind (Understanding) and the perceptions or intuitions that garner information from phenomena (Sensibility) are synthesized by comprehension. Without the concepts, intuitions are nondescript; without the intuitions, concepts are meaningless—thus the famous quotation, "Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind."<ref>Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason [1781], trans. Norman Kemp Smith (N.Y.: St. Martins, 1965), A 51/B 75.</ref>
=== Kant’s Categories of the Faculty of Understanding ===
{{see_also|Category (Kant)}}
In studying the work of Kant one must realize that there is a distinction between "understanding" as the general concept (in German, ''das Verstehen'') and the "understanding" as a faculty of the human mind (in German, ''der Verstand''). In much English language scholarship, the word "understanding" is used in both senses.
Immanuel Kant deemed it obvious that we have some objective knowledge of the world, such as, say, Newtonian physics. But this knowledge relies on [[Analytic-synthetic distinction|synthetic]], ''a priori'' laws of nature, like causality and substance. The problem, then, is how this is possible. Kant’s solution was to reason that the [[Subject_%28philosophy%29#The_Subject_in_German_Idealism|subject]] must supply laws that make experience of objects possible, and that these laws are the synthetic, ''a priori'' laws of nature which we can know all objects are subject to prior to experiencing them. So to deduce all these laws, Kant examined experience in general, dissecting in it what is supplied by the mind from what is supplied by the given intuitions. This which has just been explicated is commonly called a transcendental reduction.<ref name="Prolegomena">Immanuel Kant, ''Prolegomena to perhaps Any Future Metaphysics'', pages 35 to 43.</ref>
To begin with, Kant’s distinction between the ''a posteriori'' being contingent and particular knowledge, and the ''a priori'' being universal and necessary knowledge, must be kept in mind. For if we merely connect two intuitions together in a perceiving subject, the knowledge will always be subjective because it is derived ''a posteriori,'' when what is desired is for the knowledge to be objective, that is, for the two intuitions to refer to the object and hold good of it necessarily universally for anyone at anytime, not just the perceiving subject in its current condition. Now what else is equivalent to objective knowledge besides the ''a priori,'' that is to say, universal and necessary knowledge? Nothing else, and hence before knowledge can be objective, it must be incorporated under an ''a priori'' category of ''the understanding''. <ref name="Prolegomena">Immanuel Kant, ''Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics'', pages 35 to 43.</ref><ref> [http://www.webdeleuze.com/php/texte.php?cle=66&groupe=Kant&langue=2 Deleuze on Kant], from where the definitions of ''a priori'' and ''a posteriori'' were obtained.</ref>
For example, say a subject says, “The sun shines on the stone; the stone grows warm”, which is all he perceives in perception. His judgment is contingent and holds no necessity. But if he says, “The sunshine causes the stone to warm”, he subsumes the perception under the category of causality, which is not found in the perception, and necessarily synthesizes the concept sunshine with the concept heat, producing a necessarily universally true judgment.<ref name="Prolegomena">Immanuel Kant, ''Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics'', pages 35 to 43.</ref>
To explain the categories in more detail, they are the preconditions of the construction of objects in the mind. Indeed, to even think of the sun and stone presupposes the category of subsistence, that is, substance. For the categories synthesize the random data of the sensory manifold into intelligible objects. This means that the categories are also the most abstract things one can say of any object whatsoever, and hence one can have an ''a priori'' cognition of the totality of all objects of experience if one can list all of them. To do so, Kant formulates another transcendental reduction.<ref name="Prolegomena">Immanuel Kant, ''Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics'', pages 35 to 43.</ref>
Judgments are, for Kant, the preconditions of any thought. Man thinks via judgments, so all possible judgments must be listed and the perceptions connected within them put aside, so as to make it possible to examine the moments when ''the understanding'' is engaged in constructing judgments. For the categories are equivalent to these moments, in that they are concepts of intuitions in general, so far as they are determined by these moments universally and necessarily. Thus by listing all the moments, one can deduce from them all of the categories.<ref name="Prolegomena">Immanuel Kant, ''Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics'', pages 35 to 43.</ref>
One may now ask: How many possible judgments are there? Kant believed that all the possible propositions within Aristotle’s syllogistic logic are equivalent to all possible judgments, and that all the logical operators within the propositions are equivalent to the moments of the understanding within judgments. Thus he listed Aristotle’s system in four groups of three: quantity (universal, particular, singular), quality (affirmative, negative, infinite), relation (categorical, hypothetical, disjunctive) and modality (problematic, assertoric, apodeictic). The parallelism with Kant’s categories is obvious: quantity (unity, plurality, totality), quality (reality, negation, limitation), relation (substance, cause, community) and modality (possibility, existence, necessity).<ref name="Prolegomena">Immanuel Kant, ''Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics'', pages 35 to 43.</ref>
The fundamental building blocks of experience, i.e. objective knowledge, are now in place. First there is the sensibility, which supplies the mind with intuitions, and then there is the understanding, which produces judgments of these intuitions and can subsume them under categories. These categories lift the intuitions up out of the subject’s current state of consciousness and place them within consciousness in general, producing universally necessary knowledge. For the categories are innate in any rational being, so any intuition thought within a category in one mind will necessarily be subsumed and understood identically in any mind.<ref name="Prolegomena">Immanuel Kant, ''Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics'', pages 35 to 43.</ref>
=== Kant’s Schema ===
{{see_also|Schema (Kant)}}
Kant ran into a problem with his theory that the mind plays a part in producing objective knowledge. Intuitions and categories are entirely disparate, so how can they interact? Kant’s solution is the schema: a priori principles by which the transcendental imagination connects concepts with intuitions through time. All the principles are temporally bound, for if a concept is purely a priori, as the categories are, then they must apply for all times. Hence there are principles such as ''substance is that which endures through time'', and ''the cause must always be prior to the effect''.<ref name="Prolegomena">Immanuel Kant, ''Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics'', pages 35 to 43.</ref><ref name=Hackett>Immanuel Kant, ''Critique of Judgment'', the Introduction to the Hackett edition.</ref>
===Moral philosophy===
[[Image:Immanuel Kant.jpg|right|thumb|Immanuel Kant]]
Kant developed his moral philosophy in three works: ''[[Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals]]'' (1785),<ref name= Beck1>Kant, Immanuel. ''Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals''. Trans. Lewis White Beck. Page numbers citing this work are Beck's marginal numbers that refer to the page numbers of the standard edition of ''Königliche Preussische Akademie der Wissenschaften''. Berlin, 1902–38.</ref> ''[[Critique of Practical Reason]]'' (1788), and ''[[Metaphysics of Morals]]'' (1797) .
In the ''Groundwork'', Kant's method involves trying to convert our everyday, obvious, rational<ref>The distinction between rational and philosophical knowledge is given in the Preface to the Groundwork, 1785.</ref> knowledge of morality into philosophical knowledge. The latter two works followed a method of using "practical reason", which is based only upon things about which reason can tell us, and not deriving any principles from experience, to reach conclusions which are able to be applied to the world of experience (in the second part of ''The Metaphysic of Morals'').
Kant is known for his theory that there is a single moral obligation, which he called the "[[Categorical Imperative]]", and is derived from the concept of '''[[duty]]'''. Kant defines the demands of the moral law as "categorical imperatives." Categorical imperatives are principles that are intrinsically valid; they are good in and of themselves; they must be obeyed in all situations and circumstances if our behavior is to observe the moral law. It is from the Categorical Imperative that all other moral obligations are generated, and by which all moral obligations can be tested. Kant also stated that the moral means and ends can be applied to the categorical imperative, that rational beings can pursue certain "ends" using the appropriate "means." Ends that are based on physical needs or wants will always give for merely hypothetical imperatives. The categorical imperative, however, may be based only on something that is an "end in itself". That is, an end that is a means only to itself and not to some other need, desire, or purpose.<ref name= "Beck 421">Kant, Foundations, p. 421.</ref> He believed that the moral law is a principle of [[reason]] itself, and is not based on contingent facts about the world, such as what would make us happy, but to act upon the moral law which has no other motive than "worthiness of being happy"<ref name = "CPR A806 B834">''Critique of Pure Reason'', A806/B834.</ref>. Accordingly, he believed that moral obligation applies to all and only rational agents.<ref name= "Beck 408">Kant, Foundations, p. 408.</ref>
A categorical imperative is an unconditional obligation; that is, it has the force of an obligation regardless of our will or desires (Contrast this with [[hypothetical imperative]])<ref name= "Beck 420-1">Kant, Foundations, p. 420–1.</ref> In ''Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals'' (1785) Kant enumerated three formulations of the categorical imperative which he believed to be roughly equivalent<ref name= "Beck 436">Kant, Foundations, p. 436.</ref>:
Kant believed that if an action is not done with the motive of duty, then it is without moral value. He thought that every action should have pure intention behind it; otherwise it was meaningless. He didn't necessarily believe that the final result was the most important aspect of an action, but that how the person felt while carrying out the action was the time at which value was set to the result.
In ''Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals'', Kant also posited the "counter-[[utilitarian]] idea that there is a difference between preferences and values and that considerations of individual rights temper calculations of aggregate utility", a concept that is an axiom in economics: <ref>Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2003) ''Ecosystems and Well-being: A Framework for Assessment''. Washington DC: Island Press, p. 142.</ref>
<blockquote>Everything has either a ''price'' or a ''dignity''. Whatever has a price can be replaced by something else as its equivalent; on the other hand, whatever is above all price, and therefore admits of no equivalent, has a dignity. But that which constitutes the condition under which alone something can be an end in itself does not have mere relative worth, i.e., price, but an intrinsic worth, i.e., a dignity. (p. 53, italics in original).</blockquote>
====The first formulation====
The first formulation (Formula of Universal Law) of the moral imperative "requires that the maxims be chosen as though they should hold as universal [[law of nature|laws of nature]]" (436).<ref name= "Beck 436">Kant, Foundations, p. 436.</ref> This formulation in principle has as its supreme law "Always act according to that maxim whose universality as a law you can at the same time will", and is the "only condition under which a will can never come into conflict with itself…"<ref name= "Beck 437">Kant, Foundations, p. 437.</ref>
One interpretation of the first formulation is called the "universalizability test."<ref>Kant and the German Enlightenment in "History of Ethics". ''Encyclopedia of Philosophy.'' Vol. 3, pp. 95–96. MacMillan, 1973.</ref> An agent's maxim, according to Kant, is his "subjective principle of human actions" — that is, what the agent believes is his reason to act.<ref name= "Beck 400 429">Kant, Foundations, pp. 400, 429.</ref> The universalizability test has five steps:
# Find the agent's maxim. The maxim is an action paired with its motivation. Example: "I will lie for personal benefit." Lying is the action, the motivation is to get what you desire. Paired together they form the maxim.
# Imagine a possible world in which everyone in a similar position to the real-world agent followed that maxim.
# Decide whether any contradictions or irrationalities arise in the possible world as a result of following the maxim.
# If a contradiction or irrationality arises, acting on that maxim is not allowed in the real world.
# If there is no contradiction, then acting on that maxim is permissible, and in some instances required.
(For a modern parallel, see [[John Rawls]]' hypothetical situation, the [[original position]].)
====The second formulation====
The second formulation (Formula of the End in Itself) says that "the rational being, as by its nature an end and thus as an end in itself, must serve in every maxim as the condition restricting all merely relative and arbitrary ends."<ref name = "Beck 436">Kant, Foundations, p. 436.</ref> The principle is "Act with reference to every rational being (whether yourself or another) so that it is an end in itself in your maxim…", meaning the rational being is "the basis of all maxims of action" and "must be treated never as a mere means but as the supreme limiting condition in the use of all means, i.e., as an end at the same time."<ref name= "Beck 437-8">Kant, Foundations, pp. 437–8.</ref>
====The third formulation====
The third formulation (Formula of Autonomy) is a synthesis of the first two and is the basis for the "complete determination of all maxims". It says "that all maxims which stem from autonomous legislation ought to harmonize with a possible realm of ends as with a realm of nature."<ref name= "Beck 436">Kant, Foundations, p. 436.</ref> In principle, "So act as if your maxims should serve at the same time as the universal law (of all rational beings)", meaning that we should so act that we may think of ourselves as "a member in the universal realm of ends", [[legislating]] universal laws through our maxims, in a "possible realm of ends."<ref name= "Beck 438-9">Kant, Foundations, pp. 438–9.</ref> (See also [[Kingdom of Ends]])
====Idea of God====
Kant stated the practical necessity for a belief in God in his ''[[Critique of Pure Reason]]''. As an idea of pure reason, "we do not have the slightest ground to assume in an absolute manner… the object of this idea…"<ref name = "CPR A685 B713">Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A685/B713.</ref>, but adds that the idea of God cannot be separated from the relation of happiness with morality as the "ideal of the supreme good." The foundation of this connection is an intelligible moral world, and "is necessary from the practical point of view"<ref name = "CPR A810 B838">Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A810/B838.</ref>. Later, in the ''Logic,'' § 3 (1800) he argued that the idea of God can only be proved through the moral law and only with practical intent, that is, "the intent so as to act ''as if'' there be a God" (trans. Hartmann and Schwartz). See [[Argument from morality]] for more details.
====Idea of freedom====
In the ''Critique of Pure Reason''<ref>Norman Kemp Smith translation was used for this section with citation noting the pagination of the first and second editions.</ref> Kant distinguishes between the transcendental idea of freedom, which as a psychological concept is "mainly empirical" and refers to "the question whether we must admit a power of spontaneously beginning a series of successive things or states" as a real ground of necessity in regard to causality<ref name = "CPR A448 B476">Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A448/B476.</ref>, and the practical concept of freedom as the independence of our will from the "coercion" or "necessitation through sensuous impulses." Kant finds it a source of difficulty that the practical concept of freedom is founded on the transcendental idea of freedom<ref name = "CPR A534 B562">Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A534/B562.</ref>, but for the sake of practical interests uses the practical meaning, taking "no account of… its transcendental meaning", which he feels was properly "disposed of" in the Third Antinomy, and as an element in the question of the freedom of the will is for philosophy "a real stumbling-block" that has "embarrassed speculative reason"<ref name = "CPR A448 B476">Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A448/B476.</ref>.
Kant calls practical "everything that is possible through freedom", and the pure practical laws that are never given through sensuous conditions but are held analogously with the universal law of causality are moral laws. Reason can give us only the "pragmatic laws of free action through the senses", but pure practical laws given by reason ''a priori''<ref>the same distinction of transcendental and practical meaning can be applied to the idea of God, with the ''proviso'' that the practical concept of freedom can be experienced (''Critique of Pure Reason'', A801-804/B829-832).</ref> dictate "''what ought to be done''"<ref name = "CPR A800-802 B828-830">Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A800–2/B828–30.</ref><ref>The concept of freedom is also handled in the third section of the ''Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals''. In the ''Critique of Practical Reason'' see § VII and § VIII.</ref>.
===Aesthetic philosophy===
Kant discusses the subjective nature of aesthetic qualities and experiences in ''[[Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime]]'', (1764). Kant's contribution to [[aesthetics|aesthetic theory]] is developed in the ''[[Critique of Judgment]]'' (1790) where he investigates the possibility and logical status of "judgments of taste." In the "Critique of Aesthetic Judgment," the first major division of the ''Critique of Judgment'', Kant used the term "aesthetic" in a manner that is, according to Kant scholar W.H. Walsh, its modern sense.<ref>Critique of Judgment in "Kant, Immanuel" ''Encyclopedia of Philosophy''. Vol 4. Macmillan, 1973.</ref> Prior to this, in the ''Critique of Pure Reason'', Kant had, in order to note the essential differences between judgments of taste, moral judgments, and scientific judgments, abandoned the use of the term "aesthetic" as "designating the critique of taste," noting that judgments of taste could never be "directed" by "laws ''a priori''"<ref name = "CPR A22 B36">Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A22/B36.</ref>. After [[Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten| A. G. Baumgarten]], who wrote ''Aesthetica'' (1750–58),<ref>Beardsley, Monroe. "History of Aesthetics". ''Encyclopedia of Philosophy''. Vol. 1, section on "Toward a unified aesthetics", p. 25, Macmillan 1973. Baumgarten coined the term "aesthetics" and expanded, clarified, and unified Wolffian aesthetic theory, but had left the ''Aesthetica'' unfinished (See also: Tonelli, Giorgio. "Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten". ''Encyclopedia of Philosophy''. Vol. 1, Macmillan 1973). In Bernard's translation of the ''Critique of Judgment'' he indicates in the notes that Kant's reference in § 15 in regard to the identification of perfection and beauty is probably a reference to Baumgarten.</ref> Kant was one of the first philosophers to develop and integrate aesthetic theory into a unified and comprehensive philosophical system, utilizing ideas that played an integral role throughout his philosophy.<ref>German Idealism in "History of Aesthetics" ''Encyclopedia of Philosophy''. Vol 1. Macmillan, 1973.</ref>
In the chapter "Analytic of the Beautiful" of the ''Critique of Judgment'', Kant states that beauty is not a property of an artwork or natural phenomenon, but is instead a consciousness of the pleasure which attends the 'free play' of the imagination and the understanding. Even though it appears that we are using reason to decide that which is beautiful, the judgment is not a cognitive judgment,<ref>Kant's general discussions of the distinction between "cognition" and "conscious of" are also given in the ''Critique of Pure Reason'' (notably A320/B376), and section V and the conclusion of section VIII of his Introduction in ''Logic''.</ref> "and is consequently not logical, but aesthetical" (§ 1). A pure judgement of taste is in fact subjective insofar as it refers to the emotional response of the subject and is based upon nothing but esteem for an object itself: it is a ''disinterested'' pleasure, and we feel that pure judgements of taste, i.e. judgements of beauty, lay claim to universal validity (§§20–22). It is important to note that this universal validity is not derived from a determinate concept of beauty but from ''common sense''. Kant also believed that a judgement of taste shares characteristics engaged in a moral judgement: both are disinterested, and we hold them to be universal. In the chapter "Analytic of the Sublime" Kant identifies the sublime as an aesthetic quality which, like beauty, is subjective, but unlike beauty refers to an indeterminate relationship between the faculties of the imagination and of reason, and shares the character of moral judgments in the use of reason. The feeling of the sublime, itself comprised of two distinct modes (the mathematical sublime and the dynamical sublime), describe two subjective moments both of which concern the relationship of the faculty of the imagination to reason. The mathematical sublime is situated in the failure of the imagination to comprehend natural objects which appear boundless and formless, or which appear "absolutely great" (§ 23–25). This imaginative failure is then recuperated through the pleasure taken in reason's assertion of the concept of infinity. In this move the faculty of reason proves itself superior to our fallible sensible self (§§ 25–26). In the dynamical sublime there is the sense of annihilation of the sensible self as the imagination tries to comprehend a vast might. This power of nature threatens us but through the resistance of reason to such sensible annihilation, the subject feels a pleasure and a sense of the human moral vocation. This appreciation of moral feeling through exposure to the [[Sublime (philosophy)|sublime]] helps to develop moral character.
Kant had developed the distinction between an object of art as a material value subject to the conventions of society and the transcendental condition of the judgment of taste as a "refined" value in the propositions of his ''[[Idea of A Universal History]]'' (1784). In the Fourth and Fifth Theses of that work he identified all art as the "fruits of unsociableness" due to men's "antagonism in society",<ref>Kant, Immanuel. ''Idea for a Universal History''. Trans. Lewis White Beck (20, 22). Page numbers are Beck's marginal numbers that refer to the page numbers of the standard edition of ''Königliche Preussische Akademie der Wissenschaften''. Berlin, 1902–38.</ref> and in the Seventh Thesis asserted that while such material property is indicative of a civilized state, only the ideal of morality and the universalization of refined value through the improvement of the mind of man "belongs to culture".<ref>Kant, Immanuel. ''Idea for a Universal History''. Trans. Lewis White Beck (26).</ref>
===Political philosophy===
{{Main|Political philosophy of Immanuel Kant}}
In ''[http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/kant/kant1.htm Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch]'' (1795) Kant listed several conditions that he thought necessary for ending wars and creating a lasting peace. They included a world of [[constitutional republic]]s.<ref>Kant, Immanuel. ''Perpetual Peace.'' Trans. Lewis White Beck (377).</ref> This was the first version of the [[democratic peace theory]].
He opposed "democracy," which at his time meant [[direct democracy]], believing that majority rule posed a threat to individual liberty. He stated, "…democracy is, properly speaking, necessarily a despotism, because it establishes an executive power in which 'all' decide for or even against one who does not agree; that is, 'all,' who are not quite all, decide, and this is a contradiction of the general will with itself and with freedom."<ref>Kant, Immanuel. ''Perpetual Peace.'' Trans. Lewis White Beck (352).</ref>
==Anthropology==
Kant lectured on anthropology for over 25 years. His ''[[Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View]]'' was published in 1798. (This was the subject of [[Michel Foucault]]'s doctoral dissertation.) Kant's Lectures on Anthropology was published for the first time in 1997 in German. They have not been translated into English.
==Influence==
[[Image:Kant Kaliningrad.jpg|right|thumb|Statue of Immanuel Kant in Kaliningrad, Russia]]
The vastness of Kant's influence on Western thought is immeasurable.<ref>Prof. Oliver A. Johnson claims that, "With the possible exception of Plato's Republic, (Critique of Pure Reason) is the most important philosophical book ever written." Article on Kant within the collection "Great thinkers of the Western World", Ian P. McGreal, Ed., HarperCollins, 1992.</ref> Over and above his specific influence on specific thinkers, Kant changed the framework within which philosophical inquiry has been carried out from his day through the present in ways that have been irreversible. In other words, he accomplished a [[paradigm shift]]: very little philosophy since Kant has been carried out as an extension of pre-Kantian philosophy or in the mode of thought and discourse of pre-Kantian philosophy. This shift consists in several closely related innovations that have become axiomatic to post-Kantian thought, both in philosophy itself and in the social sciences and humanities generally:
*Kant's "Copernican revolution", that placed the role of the human subject or knower at the center of inquiry into our knowledge, such that it is impossible to philosophize about things as they are independently of us or of how they are for us;
*his invention of critical philosophy, that is of the notion of being able to discover and systematically explore possible inherent limits to our ability to know through philosophical reasoning;
*his creation of the concept of "conditions of possibility", as in his notion of "the conditions of possible experience" -- that is that things, knowledge, and forms of consciousness rest on prior conditions that make them possible, so that to understand or know them we have to first understand these conditions;
*his theory that objective experience is actively constituted or constructed by the functioning of the human mind;
*his notion of moral autonomy as central to humanity;
*his assertion of the principle that human beings should be treated as ends rather than as means.
Some or all of these Kantian ideas can be seen in schools of thought as different from one another as [[German Idealism]], [[Marxism]], [[positivism]], [[phenomenology]], [[existentialism]], [[critical theory]], [[linguistic philosophy]], [[structuralism]], [[post-structuralism]], and [[deconstructionism]]. Kant's influence also has extended to the social and behavioral sciences, as in the sociology of [[Max Weber]], the psychology of [[Jean Piaget]], and the linguistics of [[Noam Chomsky]]. Because of the thoroughness of the Kantian paradigm shift, his influence extends even to thinkers who do not specifically refer to his work or use his terminology.
During his own life, there was a considerable amount of attention paid to his thought, much of it critical, though he did have a positive influence on [[Karl Leonhard Reinhold|Reinhold]], [[Fichte]], [[Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von Schelling|Schelling]], [[Hegel]], and [[Novalis]] during the 1780s and 1790s. The philosophical movement known as [[German Idealism]] developed from Kant's theoretical and practical writings. The German Idealists Fichte and Schelling, for example, attempted to bring traditionally "metaphysically" laden notions like "the Absolute," "God," or "Being" into the scope of Kant's critical philosophy.<ref>There is much debate in the recent scholarship about the extent to which Fichte and Schelling actually overstep the boundaries of Kant's critical philosophy, thus entering the realm of dogmatic or pre-Critical philosophy. Beiser's ''German Idealism'' discusses some of these issues. Beiser, Frederick C. ''German Idealism: The Struggle against Subjectivism, 1781–1801.'' Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2002.</ref> In so doing, the German Idealists attempted to reverse Kant's establishment of the unknowableness of unexperiencable ideas.
Hegel was one of the first major critics of Kant's philosophy. Hegel thought Kant's moral philosophy was too formal, abstract and ahistorical. In response to Kant's abstract and formal account of morality, Hegel developed an ethics that considered the "ethical life" of the community.<ref>Hegel, ''Natural Law: The Scientific Ways of Treating Natural Law, Its Place in Moral Philosophy, and Its Relation to the Positive Sciences.'' trans. T. M. Knox. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1975. Hegel's mature view and his concept of "ethical life" is elaborated in his ''Philosophy of Right.'' Hegel, ''Philosophy of Right.'' trans. T. M. Knox. Oxford University Press, 1967.</ref> But Hegel's notion of "ethical life" is meant to subsume, rather than replace, Kantian "morality." And Hegel's philosophical work as a whole can be understood as attempting to defend Kant's conception of freedom as going beyond finite "inclinations," by means of reason. Thus, in contrast to later critics like [[Friedrich Nietzsche]] or [[Bertrand Russell]], Hegel shares some of Kant's most basic concerns.<ref>Robert Pippin's ''Hegel's Idealism'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989) emphasizes the continuity of Hegel's concerns with Kant's. Robert Wallace, ''Hegel's Philosophy of Reality, Freedom, and God'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) explains how Hegel's ''Science of Logic'' seeks to defend Kant's conception of freedom as going beyond finite "inclinations," against skeptics such as David Hume.</ref>
Many British [[Roman Catholic]] writers, notably [[G. K. Chesterton]] and [[Hilaire Belloc]], seized on Kant and promoted his work, with a view to restoring the philosophical legitimacy of a belief in [[God]]. Reaction against this, and an attack on Kant's use of language, is found in [[Ronald Englefield]]'s article, "Kant as Defender of the Faith in Nineteenth-century England''<ref> Englefield, Ronald, "Kant as Defender of the Faith in Nineteenth-century England", ''Question'', 12, 16–27, (Pemberton, London)</ref>, reprinted in ''Critique of Pure Verbiage, Essays on Abuses of Language in Literary, Religious, and Philosophical Writings.''<ref> Englefield, Ronald, Critique of Pure Verbiage, Essays on Abuses of Language in Literary, Religious, and Philosophical Writings, edited by G. A. Wells and D. R. Oppenheimer, Open Court, 1990.</ref>
[[Arthur Schopenhauer]] was strongly influenced by Kant's [[transcendental idealism]]. He, like [[G. E. Schulze]], [[Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi|Jacobi]] and Fichte before him, was critical of Kant's theory of the thing in itself. Things in themselves, they argued, are neither the cause of our representations nor are they something completely beyond our access.<ref>Ever since the first publication of the ''Critique of Pure Reason'' philosophers have been critical of Kant's theory of the thing in itself. Many have argued, if such a thing exists beyond experience then one cannot posit that it affects us causally, since that would entail stretching the category 'causality' beyond the realm of experience. For a review of this problem and the relevant literature see "The Thing in Itself and the Problem of Affection" in the revised edition of Henry Allison's ''Kant's Transcendental Idealism''.</ref> For Schopenhauer things in themselves do not exist independently of the non-rational will. The world, as Schopenhauer would have it, is the striving and largely unconscious will.
With the success and wide influence of Hegel's writings, Kant's influence began to wane, though there was in Germany a brief movement that hailed a return to Kant in the 1860s, beginning with the publication of ''Kant und die Epigonen'' in 1865 by [[Otto Liebmann]], whose motto was "Back to Kant". During the turn of the 20th century there was an important revival of Kant's theoretical philosophy, known as Marburg [[Neo-Kantianism]], represented in the work of [[Hermann Cohen]], [[Paul Natorp]], [[Ernst Cassirer]],<ref>Beck, Lewis White. "Neo-Kantianism". In ''Encyclopedia of Philosophy''. Vol. 5–6. Macmillan, 1973. Article on Neo-Kantianism by a translator and scholar of Kant.</ref> and anti-Neo-Kantian [[Nicolai Hartmann]].<ref>Cerf, Walter. "Nicolai Hartmann". In ''Encyclopedia of Philosophy''. Vol. 3-4. Macmillan, 1973. Nicolai was a realist who later rejected the idealism of Neo-Kantianism, his anti-Neo-Kantian views emerging with the publication of the second volume of ''Hegel'' (1929).</ref>
[[Jurgen Habermas]] and [[John Rawls]] are two significant political and moral philosophers whose work is strongly influenced by Kant's moral philosophy.<ref> See Habermas, J. ''Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action.'' Trans. Christian Lenhardt and Shierry Weber Nicholsen. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996. For Rawls see, Rawls, John. ''Theory of Justice'' Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971. Rawls has a well known essay on Kant's concept of good. See, Rawls, "Themes in Kant's Moral Philosophy" in ''Kant's Transcendental Deductions''. Ed. Eckart Förster. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1989.</ref> They both, regardless of recent relativist trends in philosophy, have argued that universality is essential to any viable moral philosophy.
[[Image:DBP - 250 Jahre Immanuel Kant - 90 Pfennig - 1974.jpg|thumb|West German postage stamp, 1974, commemorating the 250th anniversary of Kant's birth.]]
With his ''[[Perpetual Peace]]'', Kant is considered to have foreshadowed many of the ideas that have come to form the [[democratic peace theory]], one of the main controversies in [[political science]].
Kant's notion of "Critique" or [[criticism]] has been quite influential. The Early German Romantics, especially [[Friedrich Schlegel]] in his "Athenaeum Fragments", used Kant's self-reflexive conception of criticism in their Romantic theory of poetry.<ref>Schlegel, Friedrich. "Athenaeum Fragments", in ''Philosophical Fragments''. Trans. Peter Firchow. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 1991. See especially fragments Nos. 1, 43, 44.</ref> Also in [[Aesthetics]], [[Clement Greenberg]], in his classic essay "Modernist Painting", uses Kantian criticism, what Greenberg refers to as "immanent criticism", to justify the aims of [[Abstract Art|Abstract painting]], a movement Greenberg saw as aware of the key limitiaton—flatness—that makes up the medium of painting.<ref>Greenberg, Clement. "Modernist Painting", in ''The Philosophy of Art'', ed. Alex Neill and Aaron Ridley, McGraw-Hill, 1995.</ref>
Kant believed that mathematical truths were forms of [[synthetic a priori]] knowledge, which means they are necessary and universal, yet known through intuition. Kant’s often brief remarks about [[mathematics]] influenced the mathematical school known as [[intuitionism]], a movement in [[philosophy of mathematics]] opposed to [[David Hilbert|Hilbert’s]] [[formalism]], and the [[logicism]] of [[Frege]] and [[Bertrand Russell]].<ref> [[Stephan Körner|Körner, Stephan]], ''The Philosophy of Mathematics'', Dover, 1986. For an analysis of Kant's writings on mathematics see, Friedman, Michael, ''Kant and the Exact Sciences'', Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992. </ref>
Post-Kantian philosophy has yet to return to the style of thinking and arguing that characterized much of philosophy and metaphysics before Kant, although many British and American philosophers have preferred to trace their intellectual origins to Hume,<ref> Empiricists like A. J. Ayer stand out in this regard. See A. J. Ayer's ''Language Truth and Logic.'' Dover, 1952.</ref> thus bypassing Kant. The British philosopher [[P. F. Strawson]] is a notable exception,<ref>Strawson, P. F., ''The Bounds of Sense: An Essay on Kant's Critique of Pure Reason.'' Routledge: 2004. When first published in 1966, this book forced many Anglo-American philosophers to reconsider Kant's ''Critique of Pure Reason''.</ref> as is the American philosopher [[Wilfrid Sellars]].<ref>Sellars, Wilfrid, ''Science and Metaphysics: Variations on Kantian Themes.'' Ridgeview Publishing Company, 1967.</ref>
Due in part to the influence of Strawson and Sellars, among others, there has been a renewed interest in Kant's view of the mind. Central to many debates in [[philosophy of psychology]] and [[cognitive science]] is Kant's conception of the unity of consciousness.<ref>Brook, Andrew. ''Kant and the Mind''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994. See also, Meerbote, R. "Kant's [[Functionalism (psychology)|Functionalism]]". In: J. C. Smith, ed. ''Historical Foundations of Cognitive Science''. Dordrecht, Holland: Reidel, 1991. Brook has an article on Kant's View of the Mind in the [http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-mind/ Stanford Encyclopedia]</ref>
==Tomb & Statue in Kaliningrad==
[[Image:Immanuel Kant Tomb.jpg|right|thumb|200px|Immanuel Kant's tomb today]]
[[Image:Kant's tombstone Kaliningrad.jpeg|right|thumb|250px|Plaque on a wall in Kaliningrad, in [[German language|German]] and [[Russian language|Russian]], with the words taken from the conclusion of Kant's Critique of Practical Reason: ''Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and awe, the more often and steadily we reflect upon them: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me.'' (The wall is next to where the southwest part of [[Königsberg Castle]] used to be.)]]
Kant's [[tomb]] is today in a [[mausoleum]] adjoining the northeast corner of [[Königsberg Cathedral]]. The mausoleum was constructed by the architect Friedrich Lahrs and was finished in 1924 in time for the bicentenary of Kant's birth. Originally, Kant was buried inside the cathedral, but in 1880 his remains were moved outside and placed in a [[neo-Gothic]] chapel adjoining the northeast corner of the cathedral. Over the years, the chapel became dilapidated before it was demolished to make way for the mausoleum, which was built on the same spot, where it is today.
The tomb and its mausoleum are some of the few artefacts of German times preserved by the [[Soviets]] after they conquered and annexed the city. Today, many newlyweds bring flowers to the mausoleum.
A replica of the statue of Kant that stood in German times in front of the main [[University of Königsberg]] building was donated by a German entity in the early 1990s and placed in the same grounds.
==Bibliography==
* (1746) ''[[Thoughts on the True Estimation of Vital Forces]]'' (''Gedanken von der wahren Schätzung der lebendigen Kräfte'')
* (1755) ''[[A New Explanation of the First Principles of Metaphysical Knowledge]]'' (''Neue Erhellung der ersten Grundsätze metaphysischer Erkenntnisse''; Doctoral Thesis: ''Principiorum primorum cognitionis metaphysicae nova dilucidatio'')
* (1755) ''[[Universal Natural History and Theory of Heaven]]'' (''Allgemeine Naturgeschichte und Theorie des Himmels'')
* (1756) ''[[Monadologia Physica]]''
* (1762) ''[[The False Subtlety of the Four Syllogistic Figures]]'' (''Die falsche Spitzfindigkeit der vier syllogistischen Figuren'')
* (1763) ''[[The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God]]'' (''Der einzig mögliche Beweisgrund zu einer Demonstration des Daseins Gottes'')
* (1763) ''[[Attempt to Introduce the Concept of Negative Magnitudes into Philosophy]]'' (''Versuch den Begriff der negativen Größen in die Weltweisheit einzuführen'')
* (1764) ''[[Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime]]'' (''Beobachtungen über das Gefühl des Schönen und Erhabenen'')
* (1764) ''[[Essay on the Illness of the Head]]'' (''Über die Krankheit des Kopfes'')
* (1764) ''[[Inquiry Concerning the Distinctness of the Principles of Natural Theology and Morality]]'' (the ''Prize Essay'') (''Untersuchungen über die Deutlichkeit der Grundsätze der natürlichen Theologie und der Moral'')
* (1766) ''[[Dreams of a Spirit Seer]]'' (''On [[Emanuel Swedenborg|Emmanuel Swedenborg]]'') (''Träume eines Geistersehers'')
* (1770) ''[[Inaugural Dissertation]]'' (''De mundi sensibilis atque intelligibilis forma et principiis'')
* (1775) ''[[On the Different Races of Man]]'' (''Über die verschiedenen Rassen der Menschen'')
* (1781) First edition of the ''[[Critique of Pure Reason]]'' [http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/k/kant/immanuel/k16p/] (''Kritik der reinen Vernunft'' [http://gutenberg.spiegel.de/kant/krva/krva.htm])
* (1783) ''[[Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics]]'' [http://eserver.org/philosophy/kant-prolegomena.txt] (''Prolegomena zu einer jeden künftigen Metaphysik'')
* (1784) "[[What Is Enlightenment?|An Answer To The Question: What Is Enlightenment?]]" (''Beantwortung der Frage: Was ist Aufklärung?'' [http://www.prometheusonline.de/heureka/philosophie/klassiker/kant/aufklaerung.htm])
* (1784) ''[[Idea For A Universal History With A Cosmopolitan Purpose]]'' (''Idee zu einer allgemeinen Geschichte in weltbürgerlicher Absicht'')
* (1785) ''[[Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals]]'' (''Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten'')
* (1786) ''[[Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science]]'' (''Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Naturwissenschaft'')
* (1787) Second edition of the ''[[Critique of Pure Reason]]'' [http://www.hkbu.edu.hk/~ppp/cpr/toc.html] (''Kritik der reinen Vernunft'' [http://gutenberg.spiegel.de/kant/krvb/krvb.htm])
* (1788) ''[[Critique of Practical Reason]]'' [http://eserver.org/philosophy/kant/critique-of-practical-reaso.txt] (''Kritik der praktischen Vernunft'' [http://gutenberg.spiegel.de/kant/kritikpr/kritikpr.htm])
* (1790) ''[[Critique of Judgement]]'' (''Kritik der Urteilskraft'' [http://wikisource.org/wiki/Kritik_der_Urteilskraft])
* (1790) ''[[The Science of Right]]'' [http://eserver.org/philosophy/kant/science-of-right.txt]
* (1793) ''[[Religion Within the Limits of Reason Alone]]'' (''Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der bloßen Vernunft'') [http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/ethics/kant/religion/religion-within-reason.htm]
* (1795) ''[[Perpetual Peace]]'' [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/kant/kant1.htm] (''Zum ewigen Frieden'' [http://www.uni-kassel.de/fb5/frieden/themen/Theorie/kant.html])
* (1797) ''[[Metaphysics of Morals]]'' (''Metaphysik der Sitten'')
* (1798) ''[[Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View]]'' (''Anthropologie in pragmatischer Hinsicht'')
* (1798) ''[[The Contest of Faculties]]'' [http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/d/564/] (''Der Streit der Fakultäten'' [http://gutenberg.spiegel.de/kant/streit/streit.htm])
* (1800) ''[[Kant's Logik|Logic]]'' (''Logik'')
* (1803) ''[[On Pedagogy]]'' (''Über Pädagogik'' [http://www1.uni-bremen.de/~kr538/kantpaed.html])
* (1804) ''[[Opus Postumum]]''
* (More German works at [http://de.wikisource.org/wiki/Immanuel_Kant Wikisource])
* (More German works at [http://gutenberg.spiegel.de/autoren/kant.htm Project Gutenberg])
* (More English works at [http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/aut/kant_immanuel.html The University of Adelaide Library])
== Footnotes ==
<!--See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Footnotes for an explanation of how to generate footnotes using the <ref(erences/)> tags-->
{{reflist|2}}
==See also==
{{Wikiquotepar|Immanuel Kant}}
{{commons|Immanuel Kant}}
{{wikisource author}}
<div style="-moz-column-count:2; column-count:2;">
<!-- Alphabetical order, please -->
'''Concepts'''
*[[A priori and a posteriori (philosophy)]]
*[[Categorical imperative]]
*[[Category (Kant)]]
*[[Contributions to liberal theory]]
*[[Empiricism]]
*[[German Idealism]]
*[[Liberalism]]
*[[Meaning of life (philosophy)]]
*[[Neo-Kantianism]]
*[[Philosophy of freedom]]
*[[Rationalism]]
*[[Schema (Kant)]]
'''Criticism'''
*[[Ayn_Rand_and_the_history_of_philosophy#Kant|Ayn Rand's criticism of the Kantian philosophy]]
*[[Schopenhauer's criticism of the Kantian philosophy]]
*[[Schopenhauer's criticism of Kant's Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals]]
*[[Schopenhauer's criticism of Kant's schemata]]
'''Persons'''
*[[David Hume]]
*[[John Locke]]
*[[Arthur Schopenhauer]]
*[[Karl Leonhard Reinhold]]
*[[Gottlob Ernst Schulze]]
'''Other'''
*[[Aenesidemus (book)]]
*[[Kant Russian State University]]
</div>
==References and further reading==
Any suggestion of further reading on Kant has to take cognizance of the fact that his work has dominated philosophy like no other figure after him. Nevertheless, several guideposts can be made out. In Germany, the most important contemporary interpreter of Kant and the movement of [[German Idealism]] which he began is [[Dieter Henrich]], who has some work available in English. [[P.F. Strawson]]'s "The Bounds of Sense" (1969) played a significant role in determining the contemporary reception of Kant in England and America. More recent interpreters of note in the English-speaking world include [[Lewis White Beck]], [[Jonathan Bennett (philosopher)|Jonathan Bennett]], Henry Allison, [[Paul Guyer]], [[Christine Korsgaard]], [[Robert B. Pippin]], [[Rudolf Makkreel]], and [[Béatrice Longuenesse]].
===General introductions to Kant's thought===
*Broad C. D. ''Kant: An Introduction''. [[Cambridge University Press]], 1978. ISBN 0-521-21755-5, ISBN 0-521-29265-4
*Gardner, Sebastian ''Kant and the Critique of Pure Reason''. [[Routledge]], 1999. ISBN 0-415-11909-X
* [[Seung, T.K.]] 2007. ''Kant: Guide for the Perplexed''. London: Continuum. ISBN 0-8264-8580-4
*Martin, Gottfried ''Kant's Metaphysics and Theory of Science''. [[Greenwood Press]], 1955 ISBN 9780837171548 (This study elucidates Kant's most fundamental concepts in their historical context.)
===Biography and historical context===
*Beck, Lewis White. ''Early German Philosophy: Kant and his Predecessors.'' Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1969.
:''a survey of Kant's intellectual background''
*Beiser, Frederick C. ''The Fate of Reason: German Philosophy from Kant to Fichte.'' Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987.
*Beiser, Frederick C. ''German Idealism: The Struggle against Subjectivism, 1781-1801.'' Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2002.
*Cassirer, Ernst. ''Kant's Life and Thought.'' Translation of ''Kants Leben und Lehre''. Trans., Jame S. Haden, intr. Stephan Körner. New Haven, CT: [[Yale University Press]], 1981.
*Gulyga, Arsenij. ''Immanuel Kant: His Life and Thought''. Trans., Marijan Despaltović. Boston: Birkhäuser, 1987.
*Kuehn, Manfred. ''Kant: A Biography.'' Cambridge University Press, 2001. ISBN 0-521-49704-3
:''this is now the standard biography of Kant in English''
*Pinkard, Terry. ''German philosophy, 1760-1860: The Legacy of Idealism.'' Cambridge, 2002.
*Sassen, Brigitte. ed. ''Kant's Early Critics: The Empiricist Critique of the Theoretical Philosophy'', 2000.
*Lehner, Ulrich L., [http://www.brill.nl/default.aspx?partid=73&pid=26413 Kants Vorsehungskonzept auf dem Hintergrund der deutschen Schulphilosophie und -theologie] (Leiden: 2007) (Kant's Concept of Providence and its background in German School Philosophy & Theology)
*[[Houston Stewart Chamberlain]], ''Immanuel Kant — a study and a comparison with [[Goethe]], [[Leonardo da Vinci]], Bruno, [[Plato]] and [[Descartes]]'', the authorised translation from the German by [[Lord Redesdale]], with his 'Introduction', [[The Bodley Head]], London, 1914, (2 volumes).
===Collections of essays===
*Guyer, Paul. ed. ''The Cambridge Companion to Kant.'' [[Cambridge University Press]], 1992. ISBN 0-521-36587-2, ISBN 0-521-36768-9
:''an excellent collection of papers that covers most areas of Kant's thought''
*Mohanty, J.N. and Robert W. Shahan. eds. ''Essays on Kant's Critique of Pure Reason.'' Norman: [[University of Oklahoma Press]], 1982. ISBN 0-8061-1782-6
*''Proceedings of the International Kant Congresses.'' Several Congresses (numbered) edited by various publishers.
*Förster, Eckart ed. "Kant's Transcendental Deductions: The Three 'Critiques' and the 'Opus Postumum.'" Stanford: [[Stanford University Press]], 1989.
:''includes an important essay by Dieter Henrich'
*Cohen, Ted and Paul Guyer eds. ''Essays in Kant's Aesthetics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982.
:''essays on Kant's Critique of Judgment''
*Phillips, Dewi et al. ''Kant and Kierkegaard on Religion.'' Palgrave Macmillian, 2000, ISBN 0-312-23234-9
:''A collection of essays about Kantian religion and its influence on Kierkegaardian and contemporary philosophy of religion.''
===On Kant's theoretical philosophy===
*Allison, Henry. ''Kant’s Transcendental Idealism.'' New Haven: Yale University Press, 1983, 2004. ISBN 0-300-03629-9, ISBN 0-300-03002-9
:''very influential defense of Kant's idealism, recently revised''
*Ameriks, Karl. ''Kant's Theory of Mind: An Analysis of the Paralogisms of Pure Reason.'' Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982.
:''one of the first detailed studies of the Dialectic in English''
*Banham, Gary. ''Kant's Transcendental Imagination'' London and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006: "has an unrivalled ability to make Kant our contemporary and to show that the critical philosophy still contains untapped resources and even surprises".
*[[Deleuze]], Gilles. ''Kant's Critical Philosophy''. Trans., Hugh Tomlinson and Barbara Habberjam. [[University of Minnesota Press]], 1984. ISBN 0-8166-1341-9, ISBN 0-8166-1436-9
*Gram, Moltke S. ''The Transcendental Turn: The Foundation of Kant's Idealism.'' Gainesville: University Presses of Florida, 1984. ISBN 0-8130-0787-9
Greenberg, Robert. Kant's Theory of A Priori Knowledge, Penn State Press, 2001 ISBN 0-271-02083-0
*Guyer, Paul. ''Kant and the Claims of Knowledge.'' Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1987.
:''a modern defense of the view that Kant's theoretical philosophy is a "patchwork" of ill-fitting arguments''
*Henrich, Dieter. ''The Unity of Reason: Essays on Kant’s Philosophy.'' Edited and with an introduction by Richard L. Velkley; translated by Jeffrey Edwards… [et al.]. Harvard University Press, 1994. ISBN 0-674-92905-5
*Kemp Smith, Norman. ''A Commentary to Kant's ‘Critique of Pure Reason''. London: Macmillan, 1930.
:''a somewhat dated, but influential commentary on the first Critique, recently reprinted''
*Kitcher, Patricia. ''Kant's Transcendental Psychology.'' New York: [[Oxford University Press]], 1990.
*Longuenesse, Béatrice. ''Kant and the Capacity to Judge.'' [[Princeton University Press]], 1998. ISBN 0-691-04348-5
:''argues that the notion of judgment provides the key to understanding the overall argument of the first Critique''
*Melnick, Arthur. ''Kant's Analogies of Experience.'' Chicago: [[University of Chicago Press]], 1973.
:''an important study of Kant's Analogies, including his defense of the principle of causality''
*Paton, H. J. ''Kant’s Metaphysic of Experience: A Commentary on the First Half of the Kritik der reinen Vernunft''. Two volumes. London: Macmillan, 1936.
:''an extensive study of Kant's theoretical philosophy''
*[[Robert B. Pippin|Pippin, Robert B.]]. ''Kant's Theory of Form: An Essay on the Critique of Pure Reason.'' New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982.
:''an influential examination of the formal character of Kant's work''
*[[Schopenhauer|Schopenhauer, Arthur]]. ''Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung. Erster Band. Anhang. Kritik der Kantischen Philosophie''. F. A. Brockhaus, Leipzig 1859 (In English: Arthur [[Schopenhauer]], New York: Dover Press, Volume I, Appendix, "[[Criticism of the Kantian Philosophy]]," ISBN 0-486-21761-2)
* Sala, Giovanni: Kant, Lonergan und der christliche Glaube (Nordhausen: Bautz, 2005), ed. by Ulrich L. Lehner and Ronald K. Tacelli [http://www.bautz.de/neuerscheinungen-2005/3883092363.html]
*[[P. F. Strawson|Strawson, P.F]]. ''The Bounds of Sense: an essay on Kant's Critique of Pure Reason.'' Routledge, 1989.
:''the work that revitalized the interest of contemporary analytic philosophers in Kant''
*Wolff, Robert Paul. ''Kant's theory of mental activity: A commentary on the transcendental analytic of the Critique of Pure Reason.'' Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1963.
:''a detailed and influential commentary on the first part of the Critique of Pure Reason''
*Yovel, Yirmiyahu. ''[http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0031-8108(198304)92%3A2%3C288%3AKATPOH%3E2.0.CO%3B2-9 Kant and the Philosophy of History].'' Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989.
*Farias, Vanderlei de Oliveira. Kants Realismus und der Aussenweltskeptizismus. OLMS. Hildesheim, Zürich, New York. 2006.
===On Kant's practical philosophy===
*Allison, Henry, ''Kant's theory of freedom'' Cambridge University Press 1990.
*Banham, Gary. ''Kant's Practical Philosophy: From Critique to Doctrine'' Palgrave Macmillan, 2003.
*Michalson, Gordon E. ''Fallen Freedom: Kant on Radical Evil and Moral Regeneration.'' Cambridge University Press, 1990.
*Michalson, Gordon E. ''Kant and the Problem of God.'' Blackwell Publishers, 1999.
*Paton, H. J. ''The Categorical Imperative; a study in Kant's moral philosophy'' [[University of Pennsylvania press]] 1971.
*Rawls, John. ''Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy. '' Cambridge, 2000.
*[[Seung, T.K.]] ''Kant's Platonic Revolution in Moral and Political Philosophy''. Johns Hopkins, 1994.
*Wolff, Robert Paul. ''The Autonomy of Reason: A Commentary on Kant's Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals.'' New York: HarperCollins, 1974. ISBN 0-06-131792-6.
*Wood, Allen. ''Kant's Ethical Thought'' New York: Cambridge University Press: 1999.
===On Kant's aesthetics===
*Allison, Henry. ''Kant's Theory of Taste: A Reading of the Critique of Aesthetic Judgment''. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
*Banham, Gary "Kant and the Ends of Aesthetics" London and New York: Macmillan Press, 2000.
*Crawford, Donald. ''Kant's Aesthetic Theory''. Wisconsin, 1974.
*Guyer, Paul. "Kant and the Claims of Taste''. Cambridge, MA and London, 1979.
*Hammermeister, Kai. ''The German Aesthetic Tradition''. Cambridge University Press, 2002.
*''Immanuel Kant'' entry in Kelly, Michael (Editor in Chief) (1998) ''[[Encyclopedia of Aesthetics]]''. New York, Oxford, [[Oxford University Press]].
*Makkreel, Rudolf, ''Imagination and Interpretation in Kant''. Chicago, 1990.
*McCloskey, Mary. ''Kant's Aesthetic.'' SUNY, 1987.
*Schaper, Eva. ''Studies in Kant's Aesthetics''. Edinburgh, 1979.
*Zammito, John Z. ''The Genesis of Kant's'' Critique of Judgment. Chicago and London: Chicago University Press, 1992.
*Zupancic, Alenka. ''Ethics of the Real: Kant and Lacan''. Verso, 2000.
===Other work on Kant===
*Caygill, Howard. ''A Kant Dictionary''. Oxford, UK; Cambridge, Mass., USA: Blackwell Reference, 1995. ISBN 0-631-17534-2, ISBN 0-631-17535-0
*Derrida, Jacques. ''Mochlos; or, The Conflict of the Faculties''. Columbia University, 1980.
===Contemporary philosophy with a Kantian influence===
* Herman, Barbara. ''The Practice of Moral Judgement''. Harvard University Press, 1993.
* Korsgaard, Christine. ''Creating the Kingdom of Ends.'' Cambridge; New York, NY, USA: Cambridge University Press, 1996. ISBN 0-521-49644-6, ISBN 0-521-49962-3 (pbk.)
::''not a commentary, but a defense of a broadly Kantian approach to ethics''
* McDowell, John. ''Mind and World.'' Harvard University Press, 1994. ISBN 0-674-57609-8
::''offers a Kantian solution to a dilemma in contemporary epistemology regarding the relation between mind and world''
* Wood, Allen. ''Kant's Ethical Thought.'' Cambridge; New York, NY, USA: Cambridge University Press, 1999. ISBN 0-521-64836-X
::''a comprehensive, in depth study of Kant's ethics, with emphasis on formula of humanity as most accurate formulation of the categorical imperative (according to similar arguments as Korsgaard)''
* [[Derek Parfit|Parfit, Derek]]. Climbing the Mountain.
==External links==
*[http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/ethics/kant/reason/ch01.htm Immanuel.Kant,Critique of Pure Reason (1787 (english)]
*[http://www.iep.utm.edu/ Internet Encyclopaedia of Philosophy] The Internet Encyclopaedia of Philosophy has several topics about Kant
*[http://users.unimi.it/~it_kant/it_kant.htm Immanuel Kant in Italia] A Website on the presence and diffusion of the philosophy of Immanuel Kant in Italy
*[http://www.hkbu.edu.hk/~ppp/ksp1/KSPglos.html Stephen Palmquist's Glossary of Kantian Terminology]
*[http://www.percepp.com/kantcats.htm Kant's Categories as grammatical reifications]
*[http://www.rsrevision.com/Alevel/ethics/kant/index.htm Kant's Ethical Theory] Kantian ethics explained, applied and evaluated
*[http://ethics.sandiego.edu/theories/Kant/index.asp Kant & Ethics] Extensive links and discussions from Lawrence Hinman at University of San Diego
*[http://webs.wofford.edu/kaycd/ethics/deon.htm Notes on Deontology] A conveniently brief survey of Kant's deontology
*[http://users.unimi.it/~it_kant/kantethics.htm Kant's Ethics in Italy today] Contemporary Italian writings about Kant's Ethics
*[http://naks.ucsd.edu/ North American Kant Society (NAKS)]
*[http://www.hkbu.edu.hk/~ppp/Kant.html Kant on the Web]
*[http://comp.uark.edu/~rlee/semiau96/kantlink.html Kant Links]
*[http://www.friesian.com/kant.htm Kant's Epistemology and Metaphysics according to the Friesian school]
*[http://www.phil.upenn.edu/~cubowman/kant.html Kant and the project of enlightenment]
*[http://theoryandscience.icaap.org/content/vol003.001/tekiner.html German Idealist Foundations of Durkheim's Sociology and Teleology of Knowledge]
*[http://www.e-text.org/text/ Several Kant's works in clickable pdf]
*[http://www.rep.routledge.com/article/DB047 Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy (14 sections on Kant)]
*{{gutenberg author|id=Kant, |name=Immanuel Kant}}
*[http://www.philos.msu.ru/community/staff/vasiliev/Kant_Interview/Kant_Interview.html International Kant Interview - 2004]
*[http://www.earlymoderntexts.com/f_kant.html Readable versions of Prolegomena, Groundwork for the Metaphysic of Morals, and Critique of Pure Reason]
*[http://www.ikp.uni-bonn.de/kant/ All works of Kant (German)]
*[http://www.sens-public.org/article.php3?id_article=150 Kant's moral philosophy and the question of pre-emptive war, Revue Sens Public]
*[http://www.manchester.edu/kant Kant in the Classroom] (background information for Kant's lectures)
* [http://www.intratext.com/Catalogo/Autori/AUT216.HTM Immanuel Kant's works]: text, concordances and frequency list
* [http://www.philosophy.northwestern.edu/people/facDocuments/McCarthy%20Kant%20on%20Race.pdf Kant On Race and Development]
* [http://www.generation-online.org/p/fpfoucault1.htm Michel Foucault's Dissertation on Kant's Anthropology]
* [http://www.mises.org/fullstory.aspx?control=1605 Kant on property]
* [http://denisdutton.com/kant_third_critique.htm Part one of 'The Critique of Aesthetic Judgment']
*The [[Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy]] has several entries on Kant:
**[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-science/ Kant's Philosophy of Science]
**[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-metaphysics/ Kant's Critique of Metaphysics]
**[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-mind/ Kant's View of the Mind and Consciousness of Self]
**[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-aesthetics/ Kant's Aesthetics and Teleology]
**[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-religion/ Kant's Philosophy of Religion]
**[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-development/ Kant's Philosophical Development]
**[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-moral/ Kant's Moral Philosophy]
**[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-leibniz/ Kant and Leibniz]
**[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-judgment/ Kant's Theory of Judgment]
* [http://users.unimi.it/~it_kant/it_attualita.htm Kant's Fourth Critique] Italian writings
{{Enlightenment}}
{{Philosophy topics}}
{{lifetime|1724|1804|Kant, Immanuel}}
{{Persondata
|NAME=Kant, Immanuel
|ALTERNATIVE NAMES=Kant, Emanuel
|SHORT DESCRIPTION=German philosopher
|DATE OF BIRTH={{birth date|1724|4|22|df=y}}
|PLACE OF BIRTH=[[Königsberg]], [[Kingdom of Prussia]]
|DATE OF DEATH={{death date|1804|2|12|df=y}}
|PLACE OF DEATH=[[Königsberg]], [[Kingdom of Prussia]]
}}
[[Category:Immanuel Kant| ]]
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