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Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics
O propósito do autor é pensar a ciência e a metafísica, inquirir a possibilidade desta última como ciência através da elucidação da estrutura da matemática e da física. Esta obra sintética expõe a doutrina da sensibilidade, do entendimento e da razão.
160 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1783
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About the author
Immanuel Kant
2,930 books4,241 followersImmanuel Kant was an 18th-century philosopher from Königsberg, Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia). He's regarded as one of the most influential thinkers of modern Europe & of the late Enlightenment. His most important work is The Critique of Pure Reason, an investigation of reason itself. It encompasses an attack on traditional metaphysics & epistemology, & highlights his own contribution to these areas. Other main works of his maturity are The Critique of Practical Reason, which is about ethics, & The Critique of Judgment, about esthetics & teleology.
Pursuing metaphysics involves asking questions about the ultimate nature of reality. Kant suggested that metaphysics can be reformed thru epistemology. He suggested that by understanding the sources & limits of human knowledge we can ask fruitful metaphysical questions. He asked if an object can be known to have certain properties prior to the experience of that object. He concluded that all objects that the mind can think about must conform to its manner of thought. Therefore if the mind can think only 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's possible that there are objects of such a nature that the mind cannot think of them, & so the principle of causality, for instance, cannot be applied outside experience: hence we cannot know, for example, whether the world always existed or if it had a cause. So the grand questions of speculative metaphysics are off limits, but the sciences are firmly grounded in laws of the mind. Kant believed himself to be creating a compromise between the empiricists & the rationalists. The empiricists believed that knowledge is acquired thru experience alone, but the rationalists maintained that such knowledge is open to Cartesian doubt and that reason alone provides us with knowledge. Kant argues, however, that using reason without applying it to experience will only lead to illusions, while experience will be purely subjective without first being subsumed under pure reason. Kant’s thought was very influential in Germany during his lifetime, moving philosophy beyond the debate between the rationalists & empiricists. The philosophers Fichte, Schelling, Hegel and Schopenhauer saw themselves as correcting and expanding Kant's system, thus bringing about various forms of German Idealism. Kant continues to be a major influence on philosophy to this day, influencing both Analytic and Continental philosophy.
Pursuing metaphysics involves asking questions about the ultimate nature of reality. Kant suggested that metaphysics can be reformed thru epistemology. He suggested that by understanding the sources & limits of human knowledge we can ask fruitful metaphysical questions. He asked if an object can be known to have certain properties prior to the experience of that object. He concluded that all objects that the mind can think about must conform to its manner of thought. Therefore if the mind can think only 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's possible that there are objects of such a nature that the mind cannot think of them, & so the principle of causality, for instance, cannot be applied outside experience: hence we cannot know, for example, whether the world always existed or if it had a cause. So the grand questions of speculative metaphysics are off limits, but the sciences are firmly grounded in laws of the mind. Kant believed himself to be creating a compromise between the empiricists & the rationalists. The empiricists believed that knowledge is acquired thru experience alone, but the rationalists maintained that such knowledge is open to Cartesian doubt and that reason alone provides us with knowledge. Kant argues, however, that using reason without applying it to experience will only lead to illusions, while experience will be purely subjective without first being subsumed under pure reason. Kant’s thought was very influential in Germany during his lifetime, moving philosophy beyond the debate between the rationalists & empiricists. The philosophers Fichte, Schelling, Hegel and Schopenhauer saw themselves as correcting and expanding Kant's system, thus bringing about various forms of German Idealism. Kant continues to be a major influence on philosophy to this day, influencing both Analytic and Continental philosophy.
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April 18, 2025
Impressive. Open the doors of perception!
I didn't understand everything; it feels good to read a book without a character, story, or philosophy (the pros will laugh). For a simple, curious person devoid of knowledge in this area, I have not demonstrated human perception. What is metaphysics? The intuition of what is not physically conceivable. I am corrected if I am wrong.
There is no philosophy; there is only a demonstration of our ignorance of what surrounds us, despite what one might think given our daily life.
As I read it, I told myself that a person like Einstein (the only one I know a bit) is like a metaphysician. I then demonstrated his intuition so that we mortals could understand his reasoning.
So metaphysics is beautiful and is indeed a science.
I didn't understand everything; it feels good to read a book without a character, story, or philosophy (the pros will laugh). For a simple, curious person devoid of knowledge in this area, I have not demonstrated human perception. What is metaphysics? The intuition of what is not physically conceivable. I am corrected if I am wrong.
There is no philosophy; there is only a demonstration of our ignorance of what surrounds us, despite what one might think given our daily life.
As I read it, I told myself that a person like Einstein (the only one I know a bit) is like a metaphysician. I then demonstrated his intuition so that we mortals could understand his reasoning.
So metaphysics is beautiful and is indeed a science.
October 20, 2017
کتاب
کانت اول کتاب "نقد عقل محض" رو نوشت. اما بعد از یک سال انتظار، متوجه شد که انگار کسی کتاب رو نخونده، از بس که طولانیه، و سخت نوشته شده، و مخصوصاً این که فلسفه ای به کلی جدید بنیان گذاشته، و خواننده ها با ذهنیتی که از فلسفۀ قدیم دارن، درست متوجه نمیشن که حرف حساب کانت در این درازگویی ها چیه.
این باعث شد که دست به کار بشه و خلاصه ای روشن از کتاب تهیه کنه، و توضیح بده که مقصودش از نوشتن کتاب چیه و چه مسئله ای رو می خواد جواب بده، و حاصل شد "تمهیدات"، همین کتاب حاضر.
من قبل از تمهیدات سه کتاب راجع به کانت خونده بودم، و هر چند از هر سه تا خیلی یاد گرفته بودم، ولی هنوز متوجه نمی شدم مسئلۀ اصلی کانت چیه. نمی دونم اون کتاب ها توضیح نداده بودن، یا من متوجه نمی شدم. از یکی از بزرگواران گودریدز پرسیدم که بعد از این سه کتاب، چه کتابی راجع به کانت بخونم؟ و ایشون گفتن: شروع کنم به خوندن از خود کانت، و این کتاب رو توصیه کردن. همون موقع کتاب رو خریدم، اما به مدت یک سال می ترسیدم طرفش برم. تا این که اخیراً بعد از خوندن راجع به "روشنگری" و بعدتر تلاش نافرجامم برای فهم آینشتاین، متوجه شدم که لازمه باز از کانت بخونم. پس عزمم رو جزم کردم و این کتاب رو از قفسه برداشتم.
کتاب ترجمۀ خیلی خوبی داره، هر چند این به معنای راحت بودن کتاب نیست. خیلی از بخش ها رو دو یا سه بار می خوندم تا درست متوجه بشم، و خیلی از بخش ها رو فقط با تکیه به چیزهایی که از قبل می دونستم متوجه می شدم. ولی در کل تجربۀ خوبی بود، مواجه شدن رو در رو با فیلسوفی که خیلی وقت بود از مواجهه باهاش فرار می کردم. به خصوص فصل های پایانی کتاب، جایی که وظیفۀ تنظیمی فلسفه رو توضیح میده، به نظرم هم راحت تر و هم جذاب تر بودن.
در پایین توضیحی اجمالی از هدف کانت از کتاب نوشتم، که اگه علاقه ای ندارید می تونید ازش صرف نظر کنید.
کانت به دنبال چیست؟
کانت اول کتاب "نقد عقل محض" رو نوشت. اما بعد از یک سال انتظار، متوجه شد که انگار کسی کتاب رو نخونده، از بس که طولانیه، و سخت نوشته شده، و مخصوصاً این که فلسفه ای به کلی جدید بنیان گذاشته، و خواننده ها با ذهنیتی که از فلسفۀ قدیم دارن، درست متوجه نمیشن که حرف حساب کانت در این درازگویی ها چیه.
این باعث شد که دست به کار بشه و خلاصه ای روشن از کتاب تهیه کنه، و توضیح بده که مقصودش از نوشتن کتاب چیه و چه مسئله ای رو می خواد جواب بده، و حاصل شد "تمهیدات"، همین کتاب حاضر.
من قبل از تمهیدات سه کتاب راجع به کانت خونده بودم، و هر چند از هر سه تا خیلی یاد گرفته بودم، ولی هنوز متوجه نمی شدم مسئلۀ اصلی کانت چیه. نمی دونم اون کتاب ها توضیح نداده بودن، یا من متوجه نمی شدم. از یکی از بزرگواران گودریدز پرسیدم که بعد از این سه کتاب، چه کتابی راجع به کانت بخونم؟ و ایشون گفتن: شروع کنم به خوندن از خود کانت، و این کتاب رو توصیه کردن. همون موقع کتاب رو خریدم، اما به مدت یک سال می ترسیدم طرفش برم. تا این که اخیراً بعد از خوندن راجع به "روشنگری" و بعدتر تلاش نافرجامم برای فهم آینشتاین، متوجه شدم که لازمه باز از کانت بخونم. پس عزمم رو جزم کردم و این کتاب رو از قفسه برداشتم.
کتاب ترجمۀ خیلی خوبی داره، هر چند این به معنای راحت بودن کتاب نیست. خیلی از بخش ها رو دو یا سه بار می خوندم تا درست متوجه بشم، و خیلی از بخش ها رو فقط با تکیه به چیزهایی که از قبل می دونستم متوجه می شدم. ولی در کل تجربۀ خوبی بود، مواجه شدن رو در رو با فیلسوفی که خیلی وقت بود از مواجهه باهاش فرار می کردم. به خصوص فصل های پایانی کتاب، جایی که وظیفۀ تنظیمی فلسفه رو توضیح میده، به نظرم هم راحت تر و هم جذاب تر بودن.
در پایین توضیحی اجمالی از هدف کانت از کتاب نوشتم، که اگه علاقه ای ندارید می تونید ازش صرف نظر کنید.
کانت به دنبال چیست؟
August 5, 2016
My object is to persuade all those who think metaphysics worth studying that it is absolutely necessary to pause a moment and, disregarding all that has been done, to propose first the preliminary question, "Whether such a thing as metaphysics be at all possible?"With the completion of this essaying piece by the remarkably ideal Königsberger, I have, more or less, put paid to my desire to read Kant without having gained any degree of comprehension commensurate with the amount of time I have put in. This is not in any way the fault of Kant—I am simply not constituted to be a philosopher of higher rank than one who pinches just enough off of the cerebrally sound edifice to be able to pretend towards parleying its contours and construct. It was actually rather fun trying to grasp the message, and coevally disheartening to discover that, heading into the greying era, my mental faculties are too slippery and scabrous to be able to accomplish such. Still, it's worth a bit of gabbling about, if only because there are probably sufficient people about who don't get the dude any better, and hence would be uncomfortable with boldly proclaiming that this emperor, having finally managed egress from the water closet, is sashaying about desnudo.
If it is a science, how does it happen that it cannot, like other sciences, obtain universal and permanent recognition? If not, how can it maintain its pretensions, and keep the human understanding in suspense with hopes never ceasing, yet never fulfilled? Whether then we demonstrate our knowledge or our ignorance in this field, we must come once and for all to a definite conclusion respecting the nature of this so-called science, which cannot possibly remain on its present footing. It seems almost ridiculous, while every other science is continually advancing, that in this, which pretends to be wisdom incarnate, for whose oracle every one inquires, we should constantly move around the same spot, without gaining a single step. And so its followers having melted away, we do not find that men confident of their ability to shine in other sciences venture their reputation here, where everybody, however ignorant in other matters, presumes to deliver a final verdict, inasmuch as in this domain there is as yet no standard weight and measure to distinguish soundness from shallow talk.
It was definitely an easier reading experience than The Critique of Pure Reason, but still a difficult row to hoe throughout: it would also prove most helpful to the prospective philosophical explorer if she forearmed herself with a passable knowledge of the Kantian lexicon. The ways in which Kant expresses his proofs of Time and Space being pure forms of intuition strike me as brilliant—irrefutable to a plebhead such as myself, while his processed discursion upon how judgments of experience arise from a priori conceptual superadditions to judgments of perception, while somewhat tortuous, yet, in toto, elucidates his thought schema potently. I really do need to devour such as the appendix to Schopenhauer's The World as Will and Representation, that I might understand why the Critical Philosophy was fated to being considered such a knackered perspective in days like ours: it is my opinion that his Transcendental Idealism—in which objective legislation proves a participatory process involving both sides of that great, perduring, and confounding philosophic divide—is one of the more tenable thought schematics I've encountered, though admittedly dry as dust and lacking tangible tenterhooks sunk into such modern unearthing as that of the subconscious. Yet it sensibly endows the sensibly-derived with sole knowledgeable potential; smartly refutes the uber-scepticism of When-Empiricism-Attacks; promotes the individual as processor of encompassed reality whilst placing her within a universal framework of laws and forms; respects the conundrums and paradoxical sky-hooks of the infinite and absolute by admitting its potential whilst denying its sussing (though it is in this, I believe, that Schopey found the rot settling in); and sorts intangible and ephemeral cognitive processes into logically-derived and -defensible categories that were subsequently shoe-horned into fascinating aesthetic and moral mental loafers—all whilst keeping God's essence simultaneously alive and fully under the thumb of his mortal progenitors and, hence, well away from dangerous far-faring amongst the occluded thickets of any metaphysical wood.
That the Neo-Kantians have taken it to extremes, as seems the wont of all such en-prefixed progeny, fails to detract from the inspired way in which the originator separated the noumenal from the phenomenal once and for all within the parlous halls of knowing, while yet leaving room for the former to be potentially explored in non-epistemological manners and memes courtesy of the malachite bridges set down and forth to span those in-itself waters. Indeed, I always hold in mind the fact that Abraham Pais spoke of the great physicist Niels Bohr as being the natural successor to Kant, what with the latter's concept of complementarity, of a synthesis of reasoning mind with sensibly plenitudinous but transcendentally unknowable nature, meshing rather nicely in parts with the former's Copenhagen-backed postulation of Quantum Reality. Once again, it's little fault reflected upon Kant that so many have failed to heed the purely prudent (if unsettling) limits which he so carefully erected in the post-Enlightenment crush, what with reasonableness lacking the excitement and aesthetic soloing a world in flux importunely demands...
April 27, 2017
I'm afraid I have to read the Critiques now.
July 19, 2025
“Reason by all its a priori principles never teaches us anything more than objects of possible experience, and even of these nothing more than can be cognized in experience” (95-361).
The aim of the Prolegomenais to provide a more accessible version of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, in which he is showing how pure reason is insufficient to obtain understanding of the world. His goal is metaphysics, so utility never explicitly factors in. He is instead attempting to understand how it is that we can have what he calls “synthetic a priori” knowledge of the world, or knowledge that independent of experience (a priori) but that adds to or amplifies cognition by adding information that is not inherent in the concept but that comes out of perceptions (synthetic) (14-274). There is nothing less at stake here than justifying the work of the natural sciences, which is made up of such knowledge claims “which are everywhere recognized as apodeictically certain, partly by mere reason, partly by universal agreement from experience, and yet as independent from experience” (17-275).
Understanding is achieved, necessarily, through the formation of concepts that we make by encountering the world and forming impressions of that world via our senses. But “[I]n one way only can my intuition anticipate the actuality of the object, and be a cognition a priori, viz., if my intuition contains nothing but the form of sensibility, which in me as subject precedes all the actual impressions through which I am affected by objects” (24-282, my emphasis). As I take it, because we encounter the world through the instrument of the self and because we experience our bodies as existing in Time and Space those become media through which we order (i.e., mediate) our perceptions of things in the world and draw conclusions about them (29-288)
“Nature is the existence of things, so far as it is determined according to universal laws” (35-294). And this cannot be known as “things in themselves” (noumena) because we can never arrive at it through a dissection or concatenation of concepts (35-294). Neither can we know things in themselves a posteriori “for if experience is to teach us laws to which the existence of things is subject, these laws, if they refer to things in themselves, would have to refer to them of necessity even outside our experience” (35-295). Nature is the “totality of all objects of existence” (36-295) in all of their states of space and time. And our scope of perception is limited. We cannot possibly know all of them.
We do, however, perceive things in terms of the kinds of possible perceptions we can have of them. We know how we perceive something and what we can know entails what must be true of that thing to make our sensory experience a possibility. The things in themselves mediate our perceptions but it is the concepts that we form to explain our experiences that make up what becomes the objects of our understanding that we can grasp and manipulate a priori. I am imagining a set of nested states pertaining to the scope of understanding with pure understanding subsuming judgements subsuming concepts subsuming perceptions. So, what we are understanding are not the things at all but our experiences of them, which are how things are capable of appearing to and being perceived by us based on the thing it is in itself. This is a model of the world that is a synthesis of being “mind-independent” (i.e., present whether or not we think about it) and “mind-dependent” (i.e., only available to us in terms of appearances). It is in this dual formulation that Kant differs, markedly, from Leibniz’s notion of the pre-established harmony of a world created by God.
“Experience consists in the synthetic connection of appearances (perception) in consciousness, so far as this connection is necessary. Hence the pure concepts of the understanding are those under which all perceptions must first be subsumed before they can serve for judgements of experience, in which the synthetic unity of the perceptions is represented as necessary and universally valid” (44-305). As I take it, more perceptions refine the concepts by which we understand our experiences and through these we develop a better understanding of the things that make that range of perceptions possible. The development of this understanding is what guides (maybe the wrong word) additional experience.
The reason this formulation foregrounds a critique of pure reason is that without experience, pure a priori reasoning can lead to statements about things that can be logically possible but contradictory if not instantiated in the phenomenal realm of appearances. But the a priori is essential for making sense from perceptions. In this way, Kant distances himself from the radically empirical standpoints that Hume and Locke offer and the radically analytic position that Descartes takes.
So far, Kant is living up to his reputation as an abstruse thinker. There is a lot of terminology in just the Prolegomena that a reader needs to sort out. Kant does his best to define his terms but readers will find that some more commonplace terms like “represent” and “concept” have different usages in this argument, some in ways that are contrary to intuition. Nevertheless, with some patient re-reading, it is clear how the parts of Kant’s argument come together … elegantly, I would say. Kant also does a fair bit of repeating himself, which is part of his overall method of argumentation, for which each piece of the argument requires explicit connection to all the pieces that preceded it.
I also appreciate Kant’s authorial voice which comes across as a little exasperated early on. I had the distinct impression that he was a little dismayed at the reception and uptake of his Critique of Pure Reason. There was a definite sense that the Prolegomena was written for those who just didn’t get it or didn’t try to get it. I also admired his sense of accomplishment in delivering his critique as a way of showing how one can arrive at understanding of the world that does not need to default to God or God’s will as an explanation. I imagine Kant pounding his fist on the table while exclaiming: “This much is certain: whoever has once tasted critique will be ever after disgusted with all dogmatic twaddle which he formerly put up with because his reason had to have something and could find nothing better for its support” (99-366).
The aim of the Prolegomenais to provide a more accessible version of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, in which he is showing how pure reason is insufficient to obtain understanding of the world. His goal is metaphysics, so utility never explicitly factors in. He is instead attempting to understand how it is that we can have what he calls “synthetic a priori” knowledge of the world, or knowledge that independent of experience (a priori) but that adds to or amplifies cognition by adding information that is not inherent in the concept but that comes out of perceptions (synthetic) (14-274). There is nothing less at stake here than justifying the work of the natural sciences, which is made up of such knowledge claims “which are everywhere recognized as apodeictically certain, partly by mere reason, partly by universal agreement from experience, and yet as independent from experience” (17-275).
Understanding is achieved, necessarily, through the formation of concepts that we make by encountering the world and forming impressions of that world via our senses. But “[I]n one way only can my intuition anticipate the actuality of the object, and be a cognition a priori, viz., if my intuition contains nothing but the form of sensibility, which in me as subject precedes all the actual impressions through which I am affected by objects” (24-282, my emphasis). As I take it, because we encounter the world through the instrument of the self and because we experience our bodies as existing in Time and Space those become media through which we order (i.e., mediate) our perceptions of things in the world and draw conclusions about them (29-288)
“Nature is the existence of things, so far as it is determined according to universal laws” (35-294). And this cannot be known as “things in themselves” (noumena) because we can never arrive at it through a dissection or concatenation of concepts (35-294). Neither can we know things in themselves a posteriori “for if experience is to teach us laws to which the existence of things is subject, these laws, if they refer to things in themselves, would have to refer to them of necessity even outside our experience” (35-295). Nature is the “totality of all objects of existence” (36-295) in all of their states of space and time. And our scope of perception is limited. We cannot possibly know all of them.
We do, however, perceive things in terms of the kinds of possible perceptions we can have of them. We know how we perceive something and what we can know entails what must be true of that thing to make our sensory experience a possibility. The things in themselves mediate our perceptions but it is the concepts that we form to explain our experiences that make up what becomes the objects of our understanding that we can grasp and manipulate a priori. I am imagining a set of nested states pertaining to the scope of understanding with pure understanding subsuming judgements subsuming concepts subsuming perceptions. So, what we are understanding are not the things at all but our experiences of them, which are how things are capable of appearing to and being perceived by us based on the thing it is in itself. This is a model of the world that is a synthesis of being “mind-independent” (i.e., present whether or not we think about it) and “mind-dependent” (i.e., only available to us in terms of appearances). It is in this dual formulation that Kant differs, markedly, from Leibniz’s notion of the pre-established harmony of a world created by God.
“Experience consists in the synthetic connection of appearances (perception) in consciousness, so far as this connection is necessary. Hence the pure concepts of the understanding are those under which all perceptions must first be subsumed before they can serve for judgements of experience, in which the synthetic unity of the perceptions is represented as necessary and universally valid” (44-305). As I take it, more perceptions refine the concepts by which we understand our experiences and through these we develop a better understanding of the things that make that range of perceptions possible. The development of this understanding is what guides (maybe the wrong word) additional experience.
The reason this formulation foregrounds a critique of pure reason is that without experience, pure a priori reasoning can lead to statements about things that can be logically possible but contradictory if not instantiated in the phenomenal realm of appearances. But the a priori is essential for making sense from perceptions. In this way, Kant distances himself from the radically empirical standpoints that Hume and Locke offer and the radically analytic position that Descartes takes.
So far, Kant is living up to his reputation as an abstruse thinker. There is a lot of terminology in just the Prolegomena that a reader needs to sort out. Kant does his best to define his terms but readers will find that some more commonplace terms like “represent” and “concept” have different usages in this argument, some in ways that are contrary to intuition. Nevertheless, with some patient re-reading, it is clear how the parts of Kant’s argument come together … elegantly, I would say. Kant also does a fair bit of repeating himself, which is part of his overall method of argumentation, for which each piece of the argument requires explicit connection to all the pieces that preceded it.
I also appreciate Kant’s authorial voice which comes across as a little exasperated early on. I had the distinct impression that he was a little dismayed at the reception and uptake of his Critique of Pure Reason. There was a definite sense that the Prolegomena was written for those who just didn’t get it or didn’t try to get it. I also admired his sense of accomplishment in delivering his critique as a way of showing how one can arrive at understanding of the world that does not need to default to God or God’s will as an explanation. I imagine Kant pounding his fist on the table while exclaiming: “This much is certain: whoever has once tasted critique will be ever after disgusted with all dogmatic twaddle which he formerly put up with because his reason had to have something and could find nothing better for its support” (99-366).
November 10, 2013
98% of all philosophers spend their professional lives bullshitting. What most people fail to appreciate about Kant is that he actually said things specific enough that they turned out to be wrong. Einstein was able to refute his claims about the nature of time and space and show they were incorrect.
How many other philosophers can say as much? Go Kant!
How many other philosophers can say as much? Go Kant!
September 11, 2007
Kant necessitated a paradigm shift in philosophy with the Prolegomena. Prior to Kant, philosophy sought to discover and ask questions about an objective world. Kant showed that it made no sense to talk about the world without also talking about a subject through whom it filtered. The forms of human intuition, and our own conceptual framework, rightfully entered philosophy. For anyone interested in the history of the discipline, this little text (as unnecessarily difficult as it can sometimes be) is a must. For anyone else, it will seem to be inscrutable nonsense.
April 14, 2023
Finished the Prolegomena and I don’t find it as powerful as the Critique, it likely isn’t supposed to be? I found it elastic in its ambitions, which isn’t necessarily bad. Alas I didn’t know the code for extracting the scientific out of the noumenal. Found myself instead stranded at the crossroads of production and consumption.
November 14, 2016
Kant starts off really well, seemingly chrushing skepticism, demolishing rationalism and empirism. But then...something happens...something terrifying...we end up in the marshlands of IDEALISM and we are sinking slowly while Kant promises us that he will save us with his metafysik. But he Kant.
January 14, 2022
"Aga et inimvaim kunagi täielikult loobuks metafüüsikauurimustest, on niisama vähe tõenäoline nagu seegi, et kartusel hingata sisse saastunud õhku lakkaksime me kunagi täielikult hingamast." (lk 148)
"Kui ma ütlen, et me oleme sunnitud vaatlema maailma nii, just nagu [als ob] oleks ta mingi kõrgeima mõistuse ja kõrgeima tahte looming, siis ei ütle me tegelikult midagi rohkemat kui et: nii nagu kell on suhtes meistriga, laev ehitajaga, korraldus selle andjaga, nii on meeltemaailm (või kõik see, mis moodustab selle nähtumuste kogumi aluse) suhtes tundmatuga, mida me küll ei tunneta sellisena, nagu ta on iseeneses, küll aga sellisena, nagu ta on minu jaoks, ja nimelt suhtes maailmaga, mille osa ma olen." (lk 135)
"Kui ma ütlen, et me oleme sunnitud vaatlema maailma nii, just nagu [als ob] oleks ta mingi kõrgeima mõistuse ja kõrgeima tahte looming, siis ei ütle me tegelikult midagi rohkemat kui et: nii nagu kell on suhtes meistriga, laev ehitajaga, korraldus selle andjaga, nii on meeltemaailm (või kõik see, mis moodustab selle nähtumuste kogumi aluse) suhtes tundmatuga, mida me küll ei tunneta sellisena, nagu ta on iseeneses, küll aga sellisena, nagu ta on minu jaoks, ja nimelt suhtes maailmaga, mille osa ma olen." (lk 135)
March 17, 2016
I'd started but not finished this supplementary polemic to the Critique of Pure Reason while working on my seminary thesis at the Hungarian Pastry Shop on 110th and Cathedral in New York City. Although some had recommended it as an easy approach to the critical project, time was short and I wanted to get through the three Critiques and all the Kant texts either cited by C.G. Jung or contained in his library at the time of his death first. I did so, then got back to this after graduation. It served as a nice little review of the critical programme.
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December 16, 2010Reading Kant is pretty interesting. The Prolegomena is doubtless a masterful work... Kant found a totally novel way of reconciling empirical, scientific concepts with an idealistic worldview. Granted, my own perspectives are pretty far from the transcendental idealist system that he proposes, but I have massive appreciation for his insights... recognizing the lens quality of space and time, for instance.
I should note that I don't, for a minute, buy transcendental idealism. He's willing to chalk a lot more up to the a priori side of things than me. And it feels lame to poo-poo Kant or any other august philosopher, but it's hard for me to really jibe with his approach. I somehow feel that I'm missing something because I'm not bowing down before his radiant genius. Deleuze wrote that he wanted to buttfuck Kant. I don't know that I share that sentiment, but hey, more power to you.
I should note that I don't, for a minute, buy transcendental idealism. He's willing to chalk a lot more up to the a priori side of things than me. And it feels lame to poo-poo Kant or any other august philosopher, but it's hard for me to really jibe with his approach. I somehow feel that I'm missing something because I'm not bowing down before his radiant genius. Deleuze wrote that he wanted to buttfuck Kant. I don't know that I share that sentiment, but hey, more power to you.
June 14, 2022
A brief synopsis of Kant's Copernican Revolution provided by the monk from Königsberg himself. I am still not exactly sure how synthetic a priori cognitions, and hence a scientific metaphysics, are possible, but I'll leave all doubts for the first Critique itself. The Prolegomena is immensely helpful for figuring out what motivates Kant's monumental task, and how sharply does he differ from pre-Kantian modern philosophy.
October 28, 2019
"Debemos desechar la noción de que el espacio y el tiempo son en si auténticas cualidades de los objetos...todos los cuerpos, junto, con el espacio en que se hallan, deben considerarse meras representaciones presentes en nosotros, y que no existen sino en nuestros pensamientos"
January 10, 2023
Kui mõistus on intellektuaalne pimesool ja traditsiooniline metafüüsika on pimesoolepõletik, siis Kant on kirurg, kes viib läbi transtsendentaalse operatsiooni.
Ühtlasi kõik teed viivad Kantini - sapere aude!
Ühtlasi kõik teed viivad Kantini - sapere aude!
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April 17, 2023Wrap it up nerd
May 10, 2020
This is a book written after the publication of Kant's first critique, designed as a companion to it. Shorter and more accessible, the central aim of the book is to give metaphysicians pause and consider whether metaphysics is possible at all. It's goal is to convince the reader that precritical metaphysics is incoherent and in need of radical reform.
Kant begins with a brief discussion of metaphysics generally, attributing the most important event in its history to Hume's attack on it via his scepticism, which famously awoke Kant from his 'dogmatic slumber'.
Kant then proceeds to discuss the particular features of metaphysical cognition generally, before determining that it must be an apriori-synthetic cognition rooted in the pure understanding and reason. The concept of metaphysics implies its source cannot be empirical - it's principles can never be derived from experience as it must be metaphysical, not physical, knowledge. Therefore it cannot have its source in external experience (physics) or internal experience (psychology).
Kant starts his investigation proper by enquiring into how pure mathematics is possible. Pure mathematics is an example of apriori-synthetic cognition, and a good place to start to determine whether this classification is possible for metaphysics too. Mathematics is apriori because it's propositions are always necessary, and synthetic because it increases our knowledge of the subject. In the sum '7+5=12', the concept of 12 is not thought by merely thinking of the combination of 7 and 5. We must go beyond these concepts by using our intuition and we must add 5 units from our intuition to the concept of 7, hence we add something not previously contained within the concept and the proposition is synthetic.
In his investigations into pure mathematics, Kant determines that the only way our intuition can anticipate the actuality of the object and be a cognition apriori is if the intuition contains nothing but the form of sensibility, which precedes all actual sense impressions. Therefore, propositions of this form of sensuous intuition are only possible and valid for objects of the senses. Intuitions which are possible apriori can never concern anything other than the objects of the senses.
For Kant, the senses never know things in themselves, but only as appearances. This, according to Kant, is not idealism: he admits that objects exist outside of us, but that we know nothing of what they may be in themselves. Kant doesn't distinguish between primary and secondary qualities. Instead all the properties which constitute the intuition of a body belong merely to its appearance. Kant believe his doctrine of the ideality of space and time (that they exist only as projections by us the subject) actually safeguards reality from becoming illusion.
Kant makes it clear that his idealism concerns not the existence of things, but their sensuous representation - the word transcendental never means a reference of our cognition of things, but only to the faculty of cognition itself.
The second part of the book is concerned with how is pure natural science possible. 'Substance is permanent' is an example of a universal law of nature that subsists apriori. therefore, there exists a pure natural science, but how is this possible?
Here we are only concerned with experience and the universal conditions of its possibility which are given apriori. While all judgements of experience are empirical, not all empirical judgements are judgements of experience - special concepts must be superadded, concepts that have their origin apriori in the pure understanding, under which every perception must be subsumed and then changed into experience. Judgements of experience take their objective validity not from the immediate cognition of the object, but from the condition of the universal validity of empirical judgements, which comes from the pure understanding.
Kant then presents his table of categories, which he says are objectively and universally valid synthetic propositions. All synthetic principles, he declares, are nothing more than principles of possible experience. The possibility of experience in general is at the same time the universal law of nature, and the principles of experience are the very laws of nature.
Kant finally moves onto to the question at hand - how is metaphysics in general possible?
The objective validity and the truth or falsity of metaphysical assertions cannot be discovered or confirmed by experience. The representation of this problem for reason requires different concepts from the pure concepts of the understanding. The concepts of reason aim at the collective unity of all possible experience, and in doing so, go beyond every given experience and become transcendent.
The understanding requires categories for experience, whereas reason contains innately the ground of ideas, necessary concepts whose object cannot be given in experience. For metaphysics to be a science, we must distinguish between the pure concepts of reason, and the categories, whose use refers to experience. However, there must be a harmony between the nature of reason and the understanding: the former must contribute to the perfection of the latter. On this Kant says: 'Pure reason does not in its ideas point to particular objects beyond the field of experience, but only requires completeness of the use of the understanding in the complex of experience. But this is only a completeness of principles, not of intuitions and objects. Reason conceives the ideas in the fashion of the cognition of an object. This cognition is completely determined, but the object is only an idea invented for the purpose of bringing the cognition of the understanding as near as possible to the completeness indicated by the idea'
Kant also discusses his famous antinomies, derived from the nature of human reason. These are made up of pairs of contradictory statements, both validly deduced from reason. These are: 'The world has a beginning - The world is infinite', 'Everything is constituted out of the simple - Everything is composite', ' There is freedom - No freedom, only nature' and 'There is a causal necessary being - Everything is contingent'. Kant argues that the first two antinomies are actually conceptually false in the same way the statements 'a square circle is round - a square circle is not round' are both false. These first two antinomies are called mathematical antinomies, because they are concerned with addition and division of the homogeneous. The latter two, dynamic antinomies, are presented as contradictory, but are actually compatible, according to Kant.
The transcendental ideas express the particular application of reason as a regulative principle of systematic unity in the use of the understanding. They point out the bounds of pure reason, and how to determine those bounds. Metaphysics in general is possible by ascending from the data of its actual use to the grounds of its possibility. For metaphysics to be considered a science, it must first exhibit the whole stock of apriori concepts, their division according to source, analysis of the concepts, the possibility of synthetic cognition apriori by means of deduction of these concepts and their principles and bounds in one complete system.
This is a fantastic book for people interested in metaphysics. It presents a thorough and decisive attack on precritical metaphysics, and is a real watershed moment in the history of philosophy. I would recommend this as an introductory work to the Kantian project.
Kant begins with a brief discussion of metaphysics generally, attributing the most important event in its history to Hume's attack on it via his scepticism, which famously awoke Kant from his 'dogmatic slumber'.
Kant then proceeds to discuss the particular features of metaphysical cognition generally, before determining that it must be an apriori-synthetic cognition rooted in the pure understanding and reason. The concept of metaphysics implies its source cannot be empirical - it's principles can never be derived from experience as it must be metaphysical, not physical, knowledge. Therefore it cannot have its source in external experience (physics) or internal experience (psychology).
Kant starts his investigation proper by enquiring into how pure mathematics is possible. Pure mathematics is an example of apriori-synthetic cognition, and a good place to start to determine whether this classification is possible for metaphysics too. Mathematics is apriori because it's propositions are always necessary, and synthetic because it increases our knowledge of the subject. In the sum '7+5=12', the concept of 12 is not thought by merely thinking of the combination of 7 and 5. We must go beyond these concepts by using our intuition and we must add 5 units from our intuition to the concept of 7, hence we add something not previously contained within the concept and the proposition is synthetic.
In his investigations into pure mathematics, Kant determines that the only way our intuition can anticipate the actuality of the object and be a cognition apriori is if the intuition contains nothing but the form of sensibility, which precedes all actual sense impressions. Therefore, propositions of this form of sensuous intuition are only possible and valid for objects of the senses. Intuitions which are possible apriori can never concern anything other than the objects of the senses.
For Kant, the senses never know things in themselves, but only as appearances. This, according to Kant, is not idealism: he admits that objects exist outside of us, but that we know nothing of what they may be in themselves. Kant doesn't distinguish between primary and secondary qualities. Instead all the properties which constitute the intuition of a body belong merely to its appearance. Kant believe his doctrine of the ideality of space and time (that they exist only as projections by us the subject) actually safeguards reality from becoming illusion.
Kant makes it clear that his idealism concerns not the existence of things, but their sensuous representation - the word transcendental never means a reference of our cognition of things, but only to the faculty of cognition itself.
The second part of the book is concerned with how is pure natural science possible. 'Substance is permanent' is an example of a universal law of nature that subsists apriori. therefore, there exists a pure natural science, but how is this possible?
Here we are only concerned with experience and the universal conditions of its possibility which are given apriori. While all judgements of experience are empirical, not all empirical judgements are judgements of experience - special concepts must be superadded, concepts that have their origin apriori in the pure understanding, under which every perception must be subsumed and then changed into experience. Judgements of experience take their objective validity not from the immediate cognition of the object, but from the condition of the universal validity of empirical judgements, which comes from the pure understanding.
Kant then presents his table of categories, which he says are objectively and universally valid synthetic propositions. All synthetic principles, he declares, are nothing more than principles of possible experience. The possibility of experience in general is at the same time the universal law of nature, and the principles of experience are the very laws of nature.
Kant finally moves onto to the question at hand - how is metaphysics in general possible?
The objective validity and the truth or falsity of metaphysical assertions cannot be discovered or confirmed by experience. The representation of this problem for reason requires different concepts from the pure concepts of the understanding. The concepts of reason aim at the collective unity of all possible experience, and in doing so, go beyond every given experience and become transcendent.
The understanding requires categories for experience, whereas reason contains innately the ground of ideas, necessary concepts whose object cannot be given in experience. For metaphysics to be a science, we must distinguish between the pure concepts of reason, and the categories, whose use refers to experience. However, there must be a harmony between the nature of reason and the understanding: the former must contribute to the perfection of the latter. On this Kant says: 'Pure reason does not in its ideas point to particular objects beyond the field of experience, but only requires completeness of the use of the understanding in the complex of experience. But this is only a completeness of principles, not of intuitions and objects. Reason conceives the ideas in the fashion of the cognition of an object. This cognition is completely determined, but the object is only an idea invented for the purpose of bringing the cognition of the understanding as near as possible to the completeness indicated by the idea'
Kant also discusses his famous antinomies, derived from the nature of human reason. These are made up of pairs of contradictory statements, both validly deduced from reason. These are: 'The world has a beginning - The world is infinite', 'Everything is constituted out of the simple - Everything is composite', ' There is freedom - No freedom, only nature' and 'There is a causal necessary being - Everything is contingent'. Kant argues that the first two antinomies are actually conceptually false in the same way the statements 'a square circle is round - a square circle is not round' are both false. These first two antinomies are called mathematical antinomies, because they are concerned with addition and division of the homogeneous. The latter two, dynamic antinomies, are presented as contradictory, but are actually compatible, according to Kant.
The transcendental ideas express the particular application of reason as a regulative principle of systematic unity in the use of the understanding. They point out the bounds of pure reason, and how to determine those bounds. Metaphysics in general is possible by ascending from the data of its actual use to the grounds of its possibility. For metaphysics to be considered a science, it must first exhibit the whole stock of apriori concepts, their division according to source, analysis of the concepts, the possibility of synthetic cognition apriori by means of deduction of these concepts and their principles and bounds in one complete system.
This is a fantastic book for people interested in metaphysics. It presents a thorough and decisive attack on precritical metaphysics, and is a real watershed moment in the history of philosophy. I would recommend this as an introductory work to the Kantian project.
September 10, 2019
now i'm inspired to actually read the Critique. thank you based kant
March 11, 2025
Dupa proasta receptare a primei editii a Criticii Ratiunii Pure, Kant isi asuma un nou efort: de a scrie o lucrare explicativa pentru prima. In final, acest efort rezulta in Prolegomenele sale. O carticica destul de scurta (190 de pagini) in care argumentul Criticii este luat de la coada la cap si explicat frumos si concis pe puncte. Nu este varianta definitiva a ideilor sale, dar este un minim extrem de folositor, care poate sa-i dea oricui o intelegere generala si suficienta a ganditorului.
9/10
9/10
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December 4, 2024So fascinating. Maybe someday I'll actually understand at least half of it
January 25, 2021
The Prolegomena by Kant functions as a summarised and simplified version of the Critique of Pure Reason. Having realized the difficulty of understanding CPR, Kant thought it helpful to produce a more accessible work. I think he succeeded, the book lays out a rough outline of his metaphysical project, and offers some answers to common objections. Having read CPR once, I found it helpful to be explained by Kant himself in a somewhat more approachable language.
Kant set out to shed light on a rather fundamental question: Does knowledge derive from our senses (Hume), or, does it derive from rational reasoning (Descartes)? As far as I understand, Kant was the first philosopher who provided a systematic synthesis of these positions. Kant lays out, in a rigorous manner, exactly how and why these two domains of knowledge interact. In his view, the world as it exists in itself is not directly graspable to us, we are by necessity only percieving it as it appears to our sensibility. This includes time and space, which he concieves of as "pure forms of human intuition contributed by our own faculty of sensibility", which are a priori conditions for how objects appears to us at all. If you are struggling with the dichotomy of realism (the world is there, don't you see it?) and idealism (mind is the only reality, the world is an illusion!) - this book might be of help.
These ideas might sound strange when you first encounter them. However, if you want to read Kant, I suggest reading the Prolegomena before delving into the CPR. Would likely be beneficial to read his short essay "What Is Enlightenment?" first, to be familiar with the man behind the pen.
Kant set out to shed light on a rather fundamental question: Does knowledge derive from our senses (Hume), or, does it derive from rational reasoning (Descartes)? As far as I understand, Kant was the first philosopher who provided a systematic synthesis of these positions. Kant lays out, in a rigorous manner, exactly how and why these two domains of knowledge interact. In his view, the world as it exists in itself is not directly graspable to us, we are by necessity only percieving it as it appears to our sensibility. This includes time and space, which he concieves of as "pure forms of human intuition contributed by our own faculty of sensibility", which are a priori conditions for how objects appears to us at all. If you are struggling with the dichotomy of realism (the world is there, don't you see it?) and idealism (mind is the only reality, the world is an illusion!) - this book might be of help.
These ideas might sound strange when you first encounter them. However, if you want to read Kant, I suggest reading the Prolegomena before delving into the CPR. Would likely be beneficial to read his short essay "What Is Enlightenment?" first, to be familiar with the man behind the pen.
December 26, 2007
I don't get Kant, and I've never derived any pleasure from reading him.
November 23, 2021
In summary: I'm not a fan. I Kant even pretend I enjoyed this.
January 29, 2023
Changed the game for good.
May 20, 2019
Se há livros difíceis na história da Filosofia são as três Críticas de Immanuel Kant. A mais importante de entre elas é provavelmente a Crítica da Razão Pura, na qual, discutindo os limites do conhecimento e as condições de sua possibilidade, Kant lança as bases para sua Filosofia Crítica, também chamado de Idealismo Transcendental.
Felizmente, para quem quer se introduzir nesse mundo e, talvez, ler a obra, Kant teve a delicadeza de lançar um resumo desse livro, intitulado Prolegômenos a qualquer metafísica futura que possa apresentar-se como ciência, de 1783. O objetivo do livro não é só esse, obviamente. Depois da publicação da Crítica da Razão Pura, em 1781, Kant percebe que alguns argumentos, por serem muito prolixos (como por exemplo a discussão da dedução dos conceitos do entendimento e dos paralogismos da razão pura), mais causavam erros do que compreensão no leitor. Enquanto não podia preparar uma nova edição alterada da Crítica (publicada somente em 1787), ele publicou os Prolegômenos, um livro muito menor e muito mais acessível que qualquer das duas edições da Crítica da Razão Pura.
Neste livro, Kant parte diretamente das três perguntas pressupostas na Crítica da Razão Pura: Como é possível a Matemática (tema da Estética Transcendental na Crítica), Como é possível a Física (tema da Analítica Transcendental) e Como (ou, talvez, se) é possível a Metafísica? As duas primeiras questões recebem uma resposta positiva de Kant: A Matemática é possível porque a sensibilidade possui intuições puras a priori, o espaço e o tempo, que fazem parte do sujeito, e não do mundo. Em outros termos, antes de conhecer objetos físicos a sensibilidade já está disposta a percebe-los através do espaço e do tempo, que não são propriedades das coisas em si mesmas, mas do modo como a sensibilidade percebe os fenômenos (argumento que, em um certo sentido, remonta a Santo Agostinho e a Descartes. Uma interessante prova apresentada na Metafísica é o experimento mental da mão espelhada - § 13). A Física é possível porque também o entendimento possui categorias a priori, como a própria causalidade (que liga temporalmente dois eventos entre si). Mas não podemos conhecer a coisa-em-si, o noumenon, mas apenas o modo como ela se apresenta em nossa experiência, o fenômeno. Os juízos sintéticos a priori que formulamos (ou seja, juízos que ligam por meio da razão, e não da sensibilidade, um predicado a um sujeito que não estão implicitamente contidos um no outro) nas leis científicas que elaboramos são descrições dos fenômenos, ou seja, do modo como se apresentam para nós. E é aqui que começam os problemas da Metafísica, que quer conhecer não os fenômenos (como a Física e a Matemática), mas a coisa-em-si (eu poderia dizer que a coisa-em-si é Deus, mas como poderia de fato dizê-lo, se não conhecemos a coisa em si?).
Somente o que se dá na experiência (é o que decorre dos argumentos anteriores) pode ser de fato conhecido, e, ainda que nossa Razão seja tendente a procurar conhecer a coisa-em-si, as ideias que formula não podem ser preenchidas pela intuição ou relacionadas pelas categorias, e permanecem sempre duvidosas ou, em termos kantianos, dialéticas. A metafísica, portanto, até hoje, não foi possível, porque nela a razão abandona sua natureza regulativa e pretende assumir uma natureza constitutiva, que, apesar de legítima, não encontra apoio na experiência, limite de todo conhecimento.
Kant não diz que a Metafísica não seja possível (e portanto as questões sobre a existência de Deus, a imortalidade da alma, e a eternidade do mundo, que são dialéticas, ou seja, tanto elas como as ideias opostas podem ser provadas ao mesmo tempo falsas ou verdadeiras), mas que ainda não temos condições de criar tal ciência. A única ideia que encontrará uma resposta positiva (e que já foi tratada na Crítica da Razão Pura, e também o será tratada na Fundamentação da Metafísica dos Costumes e na Crítica da Razão Prática) é a ideia dialética de que o homem é livre. Essa ideia é dialética porque o homem pode ser concebido ao mesmo tempo como livre e como submetido a leis (esse é o fundamento do conceito kantiano de autonomia). Isso é possível se o homem for concebido ao mesmo tempo como legislador (e portanto como coisa-em-si, ser numênico) e como súdito da legislação moral (e portanto como fenomênico). No campo da moral, pensa Kant, nós podemos conhecer a coisa-em-si porque a legislação não é externa (o que exigiria, para conhece-la, a experiência e os problemas que dela decorrem), mas interna à razão (e portanto conhecida sem a necessidade de uma estética transcendental).
Essa nova tradução em português, realizada por José Oscar de Almeidas Marques, é muito boa, e pareceu-me mais clara que as traduções anteriores (de Tânia Maria Bernkopf e de Artur Morão). O tradutor explica no início a preferência por alguns termos em sua tradução, mas ainda sentimos falta de notas explicativas ao texto de Kant, e sobretudo de uma introdução mais detalhada que parafraseie o texto de Kant de modo mais acessível ao leitor iniciante.
Felizmente, para quem quer se introduzir nesse mundo e, talvez, ler a obra, Kant teve a delicadeza de lançar um resumo desse livro, intitulado Prolegômenos a qualquer metafísica futura que possa apresentar-se como ciência, de 1783. O objetivo do livro não é só esse, obviamente. Depois da publicação da Crítica da Razão Pura, em 1781, Kant percebe que alguns argumentos, por serem muito prolixos (como por exemplo a discussão da dedução dos conceitos do entendimento e dos paralogismos da razão pura), mais causavam erros do que compreensão no leitor. Enquanto não podia preparar uma nova edição alterada da Crítica (publicada somente em 1787), ele publicou os Prolegômenos, um livro muito menor e muito mais acessível que qualquer das duas edições da Crítica da Razão Pura.
Neste livro, Kant parte diretamente das três perguntas pressupostas na Crítica da Razão Pura: Como é possível a Matemática (tema da Estética Transcendental na Crítica), Como é possível a Física (tema da Analítica Transcendental) e Como (ou, talvez, se) é possível a Metafísica? As duas primeiras questões recebem uma resposta positiva de Kant: A Matemática é possível porque a sensibilidade possui intuições puras a priori, o espaço e o tempo, que fazem parte do sujeito, e não do mundo. Em outros termos, antes de conhecer objetos físicos a sensibilidade já está disposta a percebe-los através do espaço e do tempo, que não são propriedades das coisas em si mesmas, mas do modo como a sensibilidade percebe os fenômenos (argumento que, em um certo sentido, remonta a Santo Agostinho e a Descartes. Uma interessante prova apresentada na Metafísica é o experimento mental da mão espelhada - § 13). A Física é possível porque também o entendimento possui categorias a priori, como a própria causalidade (que liga temporalmente dois eventos entre si). Mas não podemos conhecer a coisa-em-si, o noumenon, mas apenas o modo como ela se apresenta em nossa experiência, o fenômeno. Os juízos sintéticos a priori que formulamos (ou seja, juízos que ligam por meio da razão, e não da sensibilidade, um predicado a um sujeito que não estão implicitamente contidos um no outro) nas leis científicas que elaboramos são descrições dos fenômenos, ou seja, do modo como se apresentam para nós. E é aqui que começam os problemas da Metafísica, que quer conhecer não os fenômenos (como a Física e a Matemática), mas a coisa-em-si (eu poderia dizer que a coisa-em-si é Deus, mas como poderia de fato dizê-lo, se não conhecemos a coisa em si?).
Somente o que se dá na experiência (é o que decorre dos argumentos anteriores) pode ser de fato conhecido, e, ainda que nossa Razão seja tendente a procurar conhecer a coisa-em-si, as ideias que formula não podem ser preenchidas pela intuição ou relacionadas pelas categorias, e permanecem sempre duvidosas ou, em termos kantianos, dialéticas. A metafísica, portanto, até hoje, não foi possível, porque nela a razão abandona sua natureza regulativa e pretende assumir uma natureza constitutiva, que, apesar de legítima, não encontra apoio na experiência, limite de todo conhecimento.
Kant não diz que a Metafísica não seja possível (e portanto as questões sobre a existência de Deus, a imortalidade da alma, e a eternidade do mundo, que são dialéticas, ou seja, tanto elas como as ideias opostas podem ser provadas ao mesmo tempo falsas ou verdadeiras), mas que ainda não temos condições de criar tal ciência. A única ideia que encontrará uma resposta positiva (e que já foi tratada na Crítica da Razão Pura, e também o será tratada na Fundamentação da Metafísica dos Costumes e na Crítica da Razão Prática) é a ideia dialética de que o homem é livre. Essa ideia é dialética porque o homem pode ser concebido ao mesmo tempo como livre e como submetido a leis (esse é o fundamento do conceito kantiano de autonomia). Isso é possível se o homem for concebido ao mesmo tempo como legislador (e portanto como coisa-em-si, ser numênico) e como súdito da legislação moral (e portanto como fenomênico). No campo da moral, pensa Kant, nós podemos conhecer a coisa-em-si porque a legislação não é externa (o que exigiria, para conhece-la, a experiência e os problemas que dela decorrem), mas interna à razão (e portanto conhecida sem a necessidade de uma estética transcendental).
Essa nova tradução em português, realizada por José Oscar de Almeidas Marques, é muito boa, e pareceu-me mais clara que as traduções anteriores (de Tânia Maria Bernkopf e de Artur Morão). O tradutor explica no início a preferência por alguns termos em sua tradução, mas ainda sentimos falta de notas explicativas ao texto de Kant, e sobretudo de uma introdução mais detalhada que parafraseie o texto de Kant de modo mais acessível ao leitor iniciante.
July 27, 2023
Deze inleidende oefeningen tot de Kritiek van de Zuivere Rede, zoals Kant het boekje zelf noemt, zijn enorm behulpzaam. Kant vat de Kritiek van de Zuivere Rede behappelijk samen en verduidelijkt heel wat obscure passages. Een grote aanrader voor zij die de Kritiek willen doorploeteren maar toch een houvast willen hebben.
August 20, 2025
solved something fundamental within me
April 11, 2023
I have always wanted to read Kant's magnum opus, The Critique of Pure Reason (CPR) and I did get started with it a couple of times, but the unnecessary verbosity of the text always made me quit after about a hundred pages. Apparently, minds much much greater than mine felt the same way and expressed as much to the great philosopher shortly after he published the CPR, much to his irritation. The Prolegomena was Kant's response to such feedback and is a summary of the important ideas, questions and approaches that he deals with in the CPR.
The particular edition that I read had a nice introduction as well as interesting footnotes and annotations, all of which made understanding the Prolegomena quite easy. The text is well structured and organized which certainly adds to the reading experience.
Regarding Kant's ideas, revolutionary as they might have been, they don't convince me all that much. I am not in general, a fan of the Idealist school of thought and although Kant does not advocate a fully Idealist philosophy, his 'Transcendental Idealism' runs into other issues, in my opinion. In particular, his idea of 'things-as-they-are-in-themselves' or the true nature of things, beyond our sensory experiences, just sounds like escapism to me, by virtue of which he simply avoids taking a definite stand on several metaphysical questions.
In any case, I feel that the Prolegomena is a valuable first book for anyone who wishes to enter Kantian philosophy and deserves credits for its relatively more accessible language and organization.
The particular edition that I read had a nice introduction as well as interesting footnotes and annotations, all of which made understanding the Prolegomena quite easy. The text is well structured and organized which certainly adds to the reading experience.
Regarding Kant's ideas, revolutionary as they might have been, they don't convince me all that much. I am not in general, a fan of the Idealist school of thought and although Kant does not advocate a fully Idealist philosophy, his 'Transcendental Idealism' runs into other issues, in my opinion. In particular, his idea of 'things-as-they-are-in-themselves' or the true nature of things, beyond our sensory experiences, just sounds like escapism to me, by virtue of which he simply avoids taking a definite stand on several metaphysical questions.
In any case, I feel that the Prolegomena is a valuable first book for anyone who wishes to enter Kantian philosophy and deserves credits for its relatively more accessible language and organization.
September 15, 2008
Kant was a pretty smart guy and maybe I'm not so smart, but I can't understand what he thought he accomplished with the Prolegomena. Kant's stated purpose was to refute Hume, who had cast doubt on the concept of causation by pointing out that we only observe one event following another and have no reason to conclude that the first caused the second. Kant's solution is posit that all sensory information is subjective. Even so basic information as the spatial and temporal orientation of objects and events is constructed by our minds and bears no necessary relation to reality.
This is a very interesting and influential idea, but as a philosophical solution to Hume's problem, I don't get it. From this starting point, Kant goes on to show that not only causation but other rational constructs are valid. That's nice, but they're only valid in the sphere of ideas. Kant has completely divorced them from any meaningful relationship to empirical reality, because all the information we have about the outside world is a construct of our own minds. Kant allows that there is something out there, but we can't know anything about it as it really is.
Hume, it seems to me, was pointing to a problem with empiricism, which Kant solves by retreating to idealism. That's a kind of solution, but a very unsatisfying one for anyone with any interest in establishing something metaphysical about the world outside one's brain.
This is a very interesting and influential idea, but as a philosophical solution to Hume's problem, I don't get it. From this starting point, Kant goes on to show that not only causation but other rational constructs are valid. That's nice, but they're only valid in the sphere of ideas. Kant has completely divorced them from any meaningful relationship to empirical reality, because all the information we have about the outside world is a construct of our own minds. Kant allows that there is something out there, but we can't know anything about it as it really is.
Hume, it seems to me, was pointing to a problem with empiricism, which Kant solves by retreating to idealism. That's a kind of solution, but a very unsatisfying one for anyone with any interest in establishing something metaphysical about the world outside one's brain.
August 31, 2020
Kant se propuso en Crítica de la Razón Pura una tarea enorme: fundamentar el conocimiento humano, examinar sus límites y valorar si la metafísica es posible y cómo se podría constituir como una ciencia. Para ello se sirvió de una terminología personal muchas veces ambigua (ya que trascendental y trascendente son cosas muy diferentes, o alma y Dios significan cosas muy diferentes a lo que normalmente pensamos al usar esos conceptos). Es un libro obtuso, extenso y oscuro, por lo que gozó de poca atención al principio, lo que resultó en que Kant decidiese escribir otro libro para clarificar qué es lo que quería decir y por qué es importante: Prologómenos.
Prologómenos se debe entender como un libro introductorio que debe acompañar (y no sustituir) a la Crítica, y repasa las tres partes principales de esta:
-Estética trascendental, que trata sobre de qué manera percibimos los fenómenos
-Analítica trascendental: de qué manera interpretamos los fenómenos para dar lugar a conocimiento
-Dialéctica trascendental: de qué manera opera la razón pura, es decir, la razón sin ayuda de objetos empíricos, para fundamentar una posible ciencia metafísica.
En ellas realiza su célebre separación entre fenómeno y noúmeno, siendo lo primero las percepciones sensibles de lo segundo, que son las cosas en sí. La idea más relevante de la obra de Kant es muy sencilla: conocemos el mundo (los fenómenos) de la manera que nuestras facultades nos lo permiten. Nuestras facultades (percepción + interpretación de los fenómenos) son las que dan lugar a la experiencia y el conocimiento objetivo. A través de esto Kant fundamenta la objetividad de las ciencias puras: la matemática y la física. Puesto que sólo conocemos de la manera que nuestras intuiciones y construcciones cognitivas nos lo permiten (son las gafas a través de las cuales vemos el mundo), y nuestras matemáticas se crean sobre esta base, las matemáticas necesariamente se corresponden con aquello que podemos experimentar: «El entendimiento no extrae sus leyes (a priori) de la naturaleza, sino que se las prescribe a ella». De esta manera, Kant busca separarse del escepticismo (pues crea una vía para el conocimiento fenomenológico objetivo) y del idealismo dogmático (ya que los noúmenos existen independientemente de la experiencia humana).
Sin embargo, hay muchas preguntas sin resolver. Kant no explica por qué la clasificación de formas en las que interpretamos los fenómenos para dar conocimiento (los conceptos del entendimiento) son las que son, ni por qué es una clasificación completa, ni por qué son fijas en cada persona y a lo largo del tiempo. Tampoco explica por qué llegamos a conclusiones erróneas o diferentes si nuestro entendimiento es el mismo, ni por qué se consideran muchas intuiciones como conceptos a priori del entendimiento.
Es en la última parte, que resume la Dialéctica trascendental, cuando el libro pierde gran parte de su brillo y lucidez. Afirma sin justificar que la razón pura (aquella que supuestamente opera al margen de la experiencia) se tiene que servir de silogismos como método, que esta sirve para delimitar el conocimiento empírico posible y, que en su frontera podemos atisbar qué no puede ser conocido, los noúmenos. A pesar de que Kant deja claro en toda la obra que los noúmenos no son cognoscibles, a través de extrapolación e inferencia del conocimiento empírico la razón pura es capaz de llegar a los conceptos de alma, libertad y Dios.
El primero, alma, significa "sujeto que no puede ser predicado de otra cosa", y que posee continuidad porque a lo largo de nuestra vida nos referimos al "yo" como sujeto continuamente. Sin embargo, no podemos afirmar que este alma permanezca tras la muerte, porque no se da en la experiencia. Kant no explica por qué este sujeto último no tiene trato especial al denominar humanos y no otros objetos.
Por otro lado, la libertad se la saca de la chistera inventándose causas incausadas provenientes de los noúmenos, que a su vez provocarían efectos en los fenómenos. No explica cómo operan estas causas incausadas, y si son incausadas y espontáneas, no explica si quiera cómo se le pueden asociar a sujeto alguno. Tampoco explica si esas causas incausadas se dan solo en los fenómenos provocados por humanos o si, por ejemplo, en una roca puede ocurrir fortuitamente una causa incausada.
La justificación de la existencia de algo llamado Dios (que significa "cosa que contiene toda la realidad, fundamento último de la existencia") es bochornosa, prácticamente inexistente: «Tenemos que pensar un mundo inteligible y un Ser supremo porque la razón sólo en estos encuentra la perfección y la satisfacción que nunca puede esperar de la derivación de los fenómenos» «el único camino posible para llevar hasta el máximo grado el uso de la razón con respecto a toda experiencia posible en el mundo sensible, es el admitir una razón suprema como causa de todas las cosas». Después utiliza la falacia del relojero, ya que si un reloj es complejo y ha sido creado por la razón humana, el mundo que es mucho más complejo ha tenido que ser creado por una razón superior.
A pesar de la decepción y falta de claridad y rigurosidad final, Prologómenos es un texto muy interesante y fundamental para entender el pensamiento kantiano. La influencia de esta filosofía es tan grande que solo por eso deberíamos leer este libro que, por otro lado, es interesante y estimulante en los dos primeros tercios. Esta influencia también alcanza las teorías científicas, y conceptos que él describe y desarrolla por primera vez en su obra son dados por sentado en la ciencia actual. En definitiva, es un gran ejercicio intelectual que ofrece una puerta para comprender autores posteriores que beben de él sin tener que leer la Crítica de la Razón Pura en su totalidad.
Prologómenos se debe entender como un libro introductorio que debe acompañar (y no sustituir) a la Crítica, y repasa las tres partes principales de esta:
-Estética trascendental, que trata sobre de qué manera percibimos los fenómenos
-Analítica trascendental: de qué manera interpretamos los fenómenos para dar lugar a conocimiento
-Dialéctica trascendental: de qué manera opera la razón pura, es decir, la razón sin ayuda de objetos empíricos, para fundamentar una posible ciencia metafísica.
En ellas realiza su célebre separación entre fenómeno y noúmeno, siendo lo primero las percepciones sensibles de lo segundo, que son las cosas en sí. La idea más relevante de la obra de Kant es muy sencilla: conocemos el mundo (los fenómenos) de la manera que nuestras facultades nos lo permiten. Nuestras facultades (percepción + interpretación de los fenómenos) son las que dan lugar a la experiencia y el conocimiento objetivo. A través de esto Kant fundamenta la objetividad de las ciencias puras: la matemática y la física. Puesto que sólo conocemos de la manera que nuestras intuiciones y construcciones cognitivas nos lo permiten (son las gafas a través de las cuales vemos el mundo), y nuestras matemáticas se crean sobre esta base, las matemáticas necesariamente se corresponden con aquello que podemos experimentar: «El entendimiento no extrae sus leyes (a priori) de la naturaleza, sino que se las prescribe a ella». De esta manera, Kant busca separarse del escepticismo (pues crea una vía para el conocimiento fenomenológico objetivo) y del idealismo dogmático (ya que los noúmenos existen independientemente de la experiencia humana).
Sin embargo, hay muchas preguntas sin resolver. Kant no explica por qué la clasificación de formas en las que interpretamos los fenómenos para dar conocimiento (los conceptos del entendimiento) son las que son, ni por qué es una clasificación completa, ni por qué son fijas en cada persona y a lo largo del tiempo. Tampoco explica por qué llegamos a conclusiones erróneas o diferentes si nuestro entendimiento es el mismo, ni por qué se consideran muchas intuiciones como conceptos a priori del entendimiento.
Es en la última parte, que resume la Dialéctica trascendental, cuando el libro pierde gran parte de su brillo y lucidez. Afirma sin justificar que la razón pura (aquella que supuestamente opera al margen de la experiencia) se tiene que servir de silogismos como método, que esta sirve para delimitar el conocimiento empírico posible y, que en su frontera podemos atisbar qué no puede ser conocido, los noúmenos. A pesar de que Kant deja claro en toda la obra que los noúmenos no son cognoscibles, a través de extrapolación e inferencia del conocimiento empírico la razón pura es capaz de llegar a los conceptos de alma, libertad y Dios.
El primero, alma, significa "sujeto que no puede ser predicado de otra cosa", y que posee continuidad porque a lo largo de nuestra vida nos referimos al "yo" como sujeto continuamente. Sin embargo, no podemos afirmar que este alma permanezca tras la muerte, porque no se da en la experiencia. Kant no explica por qué este sujeto último no tiene trato especial al denominar humanos y no otros objetos.
Por otro lado, la libertad se la saca de la chistera inventándose causas incausadas provenientes de los noúmenos, que a su vez provocarían efectos en los fenómenos. No explica cómo operan estas causas incausadas, y si son incausadas y espontáneas, no explica si quiera cómo se le pueden asociar a sujeto alguno. Tampoco explica si esas causas incausadas se dan solo en los fenómenos provocados por humanos o si, por ejemplo, en una roca puede ocurrir fortuitamente una causa incausada.
La justificación de la existencia de algo llamado Dios (que significa "cosa que contiene toda la realidad, fundamento último de la existencia") es bochornosa, prácticamente inexistente: «Tenemos que pensar un mundo inteligible y un Ser supremo porque la razón sólo en estos encuentra la perfección y la satisfacción que nunca puede esperar de la derivación de los fenómenos» «el único camino posible para llevar hasta el máximo grado el uso de la razón con respecto a toda experiencia posible en el mundo sensible, es el admitir una razón suprema como causa de todas las cosas». Después utiliza la falacia del relojero, ya que si un reloj es complejo y ha sido creado por la razón humana, el mundo que es mucho más complejo ha tenido que ser creado por una razón superior.
A pesar de la decepción y falta de claridad y rigurosidad final, Prologómenos es un texto muy interesante y fundamental para entender el pensamiento kantiano. La influencia de esta filosofía es tan grande que solo por eso deberíamos leer este libro que, por otro lado, es interesante y estimulante en los dos primeros tercios. Esta influencia también alcanza las teorías científicas, y conceptos que él describe y desarrolla por primera vez en su obra son dados por sentado en la ciencia actual. En definitiva, es un gran ejercicio intelectual que ofrece una puerta para comprender autores posteriores que beben de él sin tener que leer la Crítica de la Razón Pura en su totalidad.
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