This landmark book is now reissued in a new edition that has been vastly rewritten and updated to respond to recent Kantian literature.

What is it to judge something to be a natural end? And what objects may properly be judged natural ends? These questions pose a challenge, because the predicates “natural” and “end” seemingly can not be instantiated at the same time – at least given some Kantian assumptions. My paper defends the thesis that Kant’s “Critique of Teleological Judgment” (CTJ), nevertheless, provides a sensible account of judging something a natural end. On the account, a person judges an object O a natural (...) end, if she thinks that the parts of O cause O and if she is committed to approach O in a top-down manner, as if the parts were produced in view of the whole. The account is non-realist, because it involves a commitment. With the account comes a characterization that provides necessary and sufficient conditions on objects that may properly be judged natural ends. My paper reconstructs the argument in CTJ, §§64-65 where the account and the characterization are derived. (shrink)

In both Introductions to the Critique of Judgment Kant seems to identify the a priori principle at the basis of aesthetic judgments with the principle that guides reflective judgment in its cognitive inquiry of nature, i.e. the purposiveness of nature or systematicity. For instance Kant writes.

The aim of this paper is to show firstly why Kant believes we should hang on to teleology, and, secondly, that his views on the matter are still relevant to contemporary epistemology despite the fact that theories of evolution now allow purely mechanical explanations of organic processes. By considering Kant’s account in light of that of Daniel Dennett, I elucidate what I believe to be the strength of Kant’s theory, namely, the pragmatic role it assigns to reflective teleological principles. (edited).

An analysis of Hegel's chapter on teleology in the Science of Logic. Hegel argues that the 'intentional model' of teleology assumed by Kant actually presupposes a natural or organic teleology more like along Aristotelian lines.

The article surveys Kant’s treatment of biological teleology in the ’Critique of Judgment’, with special attention to the question of whether the notion of natural teleology is coherent. It argues that our entitlement to regard nature as teleological is not established by the argument of the ’Antinomy’, but rather results from our entitlement to regard the workings of our own cognitive faculties in normative terms. This implies a view of the relation between biological teleology and the representational character of mind (...) which is the reverse of that adopted by naturalistic theorists of mind like Fred Dretske and Ruth Millikan. (shrink)

: I distinguish two senses in which organisms are mechanically inexplicable for Kant. Mechanical inexplicability in the first sense is shared with artefacts, and consists in their exhibiting regularities irreducible to the regularities of matter. Mechanical inexplicability in the second sense is peculiar to organisms, consisting in the reciprocal causal dependence of an organism's parts. This distinction corresponds to two strands of thought in Aristotle, one supporting a teleological conception of organisms, the other supporting a conception of organisms as natural. (...) Recognizing this distinction helps us to see how a teleological conception of organisms is compatible with recent advances in biology. (shrink)

This essay examines Kant's idea of organic teleology. The first two sections are devoted to Kant's analysis and justification of teleological conceptions in biology. Both the idea of teleology and Kant's anti-reductionism are derived from basic elements of his critical treatment of the human intellect. The third section discusses the limitations Kant places on accounts of origins in the life world. It is argued that the limitations Kant places on accounts of the origins of species do not follow from his (...) idea of teleology. The final section briefly outlines the fate of the Kantian formulation of teleology in the nineteenth century. (shrink)

Kant’s treatment of teleology and life in the Critique of the Power of Judgment is complicated and difficult to interpret; Hegel’s response adds considerable complexity. I propose a new way of understanding the underlying philosophical issues in this debate, allowing a better understanding of the underlying structure of the arguments in Kant and Hegel. My new way is unusual: I use for an interpretive lens some structural features of familiar debates about freedom of the will. These debates, I argue, allow (...) us to see more clearly the underlying structure of a great many philosophical issues. Aside from some suggested avenues of approach, however, I do not aim to interpret what Kant or Hegel has to say about freedom of the will. The idea is to use this interpretive lens to better understand the philosophical issues at stake in their disagreement concerning teleology and life. This will clarify the precise philosophical burden that must be met by Kant’s argument in defense of his skepticism, and why his case has considerable philosophical force. But it will also explain why Kant’s argument itself inevitably provides the opening for Hegel’s reply, and sets a standard that Hegel will meet in a surprising way. Finally, this approach will explain why we can learn a great deal from the philosophical arguments in Kant and Hegel about this topic, despite the intervening years of such great progress in the biological sciences: by looking to Kant and Hegel we can better understand the structure of underlying philosophical terrain of the issues concerning teleology and life—terrain we are still fighting over today. (shrink)

Kant argues that we necessarily conceive of living beings in irreducibly teleological terms, but that we cannot know that living beings themselves truly satisfy the implications of teleological judgment. Hegel argues in response that we can know that living beings are teleological systems. Both Kant and Hegel here advocate positions distinct from those most popular today. And although much of the biological science of their time is now outdated, each has philosophical arguments of lasting interest and import. I focus on (...) Hegel’s case, its philosophical strengths, and its relevance to his broader metaphysical views. (shrink)

Kant’s position on teleology and biology is neither inconsistent nor obsolete; his arguments have some surprising and enduring philosophical strengths. But Kant’s account will appear weak if we muddy the waters by reading him as aiming to defend teleology by appealing to considerations popular in contemporary philosophy. Kant argues for very different conclusions: we can neither know teleological judgments of living beings to be true, nor legitimately explain living beings in teleological terms; such teleological judgment is justified only as a (...) “problematic” guideline in our search for mechanistic explanations. These conclusions are well supported by Kant’s defense of his demanding analysis, according to which teleological judgment literally applies to a complex whole only where teleology truly explains the presence of its parts. (shrink)

In this illuminating study of Kant's theory of imagination and its role in interpretation, Rudolf A. Makkreel argues against the commonly held notion that Kant's transcendental philosophy is incompatible with hermeneutics. The charge that Kant's foundational philosophy is inadequate to the task of interpretation can be rebutted, explains Makkreel, if we fully understand the role of imagination in his work. In identifying this role, Makkreel also reevaluates the relationship among Kant's discussions of the feeling of life, common sense, and the (...) purposiveness of history. (shrink)

There is much more said in the Critique of Pure Reason about the relationship between God and purposiveness than what is found in Kant's analysis of the physico-theological (design) argument. The ‘Wise Author of Nature’ is central to his analysis of regulative principles in the ‘Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic’ and also appears in the ‘Canon’, first with regards to the Highest Good and then again in relation to our theoretical use of purposiveness. This paper will begin with a brief (...) discussion of the physico-theological argument before moving on to the Appendix and the Canon. Finally, it will consider some changes to the role of the Wise Author in the Critique of Judgement. (shrink)

Kant stresses the regulative status of teleological attributions, but sometimes he seems to treat teleology as a constitutive condition for biology. To clarify this issue, the concept of natural purpose and its role for biology are examined. I suggest that the concept serves an identificatory function: it singles out objects as natural purposes, whereby the special science of biology is constituted. This relative constitutivity of teleology is explicated by means of a distinction of levels: on the object level of biological (...) science, teleology is taken as constitutive, though it is merely regulative on the philosophical meta level. This distinction also concerns the place of Aristotelian teleology in Kant: on the object level, the Aristotelian view is accepted, whereas on the meta level, as agnostic stance is taken concerning teleology. (edited). (shrink)

Summary Kant's characterization of organic inities by the principle of aninner, and that is to say, immanently natural andmind-independent purposiveness has continued to retain validity. Difficulties however exist for Kant's theory from theconditions of their realization. The following inquiry attempts to describe to what extent this difficulty has currently found asystem-theoretical solution: The realizability of cyclical causal relationships proves itself here to be a fundamental prerequisite. The possibility forself-regulating systems thus consequently ensues. Decisive for the cybernetical reconstructability ofinner purposiveness is (...) however the evidence that the principle of self-regulation — which has apparently been misunderstood in recent discussions (Jonas, Spaemann, Löw) includes not only the possibility of active goalpursuance (robots) but, additionally, the possibility forexistential self-reference (organism). This has fostered greater insight into hownormative instances can be establish upon a purely physical basis. The status ofinformation will then accordingly be questioned. This inquiry closes with a look to possibleontological consequences. (shrink)

Kant’s Critique of Judgment is one of the most important texts in the history of modern aesthetics. This GuideBook discusses the third Critique section by section, and introduces and assesses: Kant's life and the background of the Critique of Judgment the ideas and text of the Critique of Judgment , including a critical explanation of Kant’s theories of natural beauty The continuing relevance of Kant’s work to contemporary philosophy and aesthetics This GuideBook is an accessible introduction to a notoriously difficult (...) work and will be essential reading for students of Kant and aesthetics. (shrink)

Kant -- drawing on his eighteenth-century predecessors -- provided a discerning and powerful characterization of what biologists had to explain in organic form. His difference from the rest is that he opined that was impossible to explain it. Its ’inscrutability’ was intrinsic. The third ’Critique’ essentially proposed the reduction of biology to a kind of prescientific descriptivism, doomed never to attain authentic scientificity. By contrast, for Locke, and ’a fortiori’ for Buffon and his followers, ’intrinsic purposiveness’ was a fact of (...) the matter about concrete biological phenomena; the features of internal self-regulation were hypotheses arising out of actual research practice. The difference comes most vividly to light once we recognize Kant’s distinction of the concept of organism from the concept of life. (edited). (shrink)

Kant's Critique of Judgment has often been interpreted by scholars as comprising separate treatments of three uneasily connected topics: beauty, biology, and empirical knowledge. Rachel Zuckert's book is the first to interpret the Critique as a unified argument concerning all three domains. She argues that on Kant's view, human beings demonstrate a distinctive cognitive ability in appreciating beauty and understanding organic life: an ability to anticipate a whole that we do not completely understand according to preconceived categories. This ability is (...) necessary, moreover, for human beings to gain knowledge of nature in its empirical character as it is, not as we might assume it to be. Her wide-ranging and original study will be valuable for readers in all areas of Kant's philosophy. (shrink)

CHAPTER I Teleological phenomena that the cause or causes of order in the universe probably bear some remote analogy to human intelligence... David Hume. ...

I DISCUSS KANT’S ARGUMENT FOR THE IRREDUCIBILITY OF BIOLOGY TO "MECHANISTIC" SCIENCE AS IT IS FOUND IN THE SECOND PART OF THE "CRITIQUE OF JUDGMENT", THE CRITIQUE OF TELEOLOGICAL JUDGMENT. THE PAPER CONSISTS OF TWO PARTS. IN THE FIRST I LAY OUT KANT’S POSITION, SHOWING THE RESPECT IN WHICH TELEOLOGY, FOR KANT, IS THE MARK OF THE LIVING. IN THE SECOND I TEST KANT’S VIEW AGAINST THE RECENT MECHANISTIC ANALYSIS OF TELEOLOGY PUT FORWARD BY ERNEST NAGEL IN "TELEOLOGY REVISITED" AND (...) SHOW THAT KANT’S POSITION MAY BE UNDERSTOOD AS A SERIOUS OBJECTION TO THE POSITION DEFENDED BY NAGEL. (shrink)

Kant’s position on teleology and biology is neither inconsistent nor obsolete; his arguments have some surprising and enduring philosophical strengths. But Kant’s account will appear weak if we muddy the waters by reading him as aiming to defend teleology by appealing to considerations popular in contemporary philosophy. Kant argues for very different conclusions: we can neither know teleological judgments of living beings to be true, nor legitimately explain living beings in teleological terms; such teleological judgment is justified only as a (...) “problematic” guideline in our search for mechanistic explanations. These conclusions are well supported by Kant’s defense of his demanding analysis, according to which teleological judgment literally applies to a complex whole only where teleology truly explains the presence of its parts. (shrink)

In this illuminating study of Kant's theory of imagination and its role in interpretation, Rudolf A. Makkreel argues against the commonly held notion that Kant's transcendental philosophy is incompatible with hermeneutics. The charge that Kant's foundational philosophy is inadequate to the task of interpretation can be rebutted, explains Makkreel, if we fully understand the role of imagination in his work. In identifying this role, Makkreel also reevaluates the relationship among Kant's discussions of the feeling of life, common sense, and the (...) purposiveness of history. (shrink)

There is much more said in the Critique of Pure Reason about the relationship between God and purposiveness than what is found in Kant's analysis of the physico-theological (design) argument. The ‘Wise Author of Nature’ is central to his analysis of regulative principles in the ‘Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic’ and also appears in the ‘Canon’, first with regards to the Highest Good and then again in relation to our theoretical use of purposiveness. This paper will begin with a brief (...) discussion of the physico-theological argument before moving on to the Appendix and the Canon. Finally, it will consider some changes to the role of the Wise Author in the Critique of Judgement. (shrink)

In his mature period Kant maintained that human beings have never devised a theory that shows how the existence of God is compatible with the evil that actually exists. But he also held that an argument could be developed that we human beings might well not have the cognitive capacity to understand the relation between God and the world, and that therefore the existence of God might nevertheless be compatible with the evil that exists. At the core of Kant’s position (...) lies the claim that God’s relation to the world might well not be purposive in the way we humans can genuinely understand such a relation. His strategy involves demonstrating that the teleological argument is unsound - for this argument would establish that the relation between God and the world is purposive in a way we can grasp - and showing that by way of a Spinozan conception we can catch an intellectual glimpse of an alternative picture of the relation between God and the world. (shrink)

Kant’s Critique of Judgment is one of the most important texts in the history of modern aesthetics. This GuideBook discusses the third Critique section by section, and introduces and assesses: Kant's life and the background of the Critique of Judgment the ideas and text of the Critique of Judgment , including a critical explanation of Kant’s theories of natural beauty The continuing relevance of Kant’s work to contemporary philosophy and aesthetics This GuideBook is an accessible introduction to a notoriously difficult (...) work and will be essential reading for students of Kant and aesthetics. (shrink)

What is it to judge something to be a natural end? And what objects may properly be judged natural ends? These questions pose a challenge, because the predicates “natural” and “end” seemingly can not be instantiated at the same time – at least given some Kantian assumptions. My paper defends the thesis that Kant’s “Critique of Teleological Judgment” (CTJ), nevertheless, provides a sensible account of judging something a natural end. On the account, a person judges an object O a natural (...) end, if she thinks that the parts of O cause O and if she is committed to approach O in a top-down manner, as if the parts were produced in view of the whole. The account is non-realist, because it involves a commitment. With the account comes a characterization that provides necessary and sufficient conditions on objects that may properly be judged natural ends. My paper reconstructs the argument in CTJ, §§64-65 where the account and the characterization are derived. (shrink)

In both Introductions to the Critique of Judgment Kant seems to identify the a priori principle at the basis of aesthetic judgments with the principle that guides reflective judgment in its cognitive inquiry of nature, i.e. the purposiveness of nature or systematicity. For instance Kant writes.

While Kant is perhaps best known for his writings in metaphysics and epistemology (in particular the Critique of Pure Reason of 1781, with a second edition in 1787) and in ethics (the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals of 1785 and the Critique of Practical Reason of 1788), he also developed an influential and much-discussed theory of aesthetics. This theory is presented in his Critique of Judgment Kritik der Urteilskraft , also translated as Critique of the Power of Judgment ) (...) of 1790, a two-part work which deals successively with aesthetics and with the role of teleology (that is, appeal to ends or goals) in natural science and in our understanding of nature more generally. Although Kant's theory of teleology has traditionally been both less influential, and less widely discussed, than his aesthetic theory, its historical and philosophical importance is increasingly coming to be recognized. (shrink)

I draw a connection between the question, raised by Hume and Kant, of how aesthetic judgments can claim universal agreement, and the question, raised in recent discussions of nonconceptual content, of how concepts can be acquired on the basis of experience. Developing an idea suggested by Kant's linkage of aesthetic judgment with the capacity for empirical conceptualization, I propose that both questions can be resolved by appealing to the idea of "perceptual normativity". Perceptual experience, on this proposal, involves the awareness (...) of its own appropriateness with respect to the object perceived, where this appropriateness is more primitive than truth or veridicality. This means that a subject can take herself to be perceiving an object as she (and anyone else) ought to perceive it, without first recognizing the object as falling under a corresponding concept. I motivate the proposal through a criticism of Peacocke's account of concept-acquisition, which, I argue, rests on a confusion between the notion of a way something is perceived, and that of a way it is perceived as being. Whereas Peacocke's account of concept-acquisition depends on an illicit slide between these two notions, the notion of perceptual normativity allows a legitimate transition between them: if someone's perceiving something a certain way involves her taking it that she ought to perceive it that way, then she perceives the thing as being a certain way, so that the corresponding concept is available to her in perceptual experience. (shrink)

In a well-known passage from the Introduction to Kant’s Critique of Judgment, Kant defines the power or faculty of judgment [Urteilskraft] as "the capacity to think the particular as contained under the universal" (Introduction IV, 5:179).1 He then distinguishes two ways in which this faculty can be exercised, namely as determining or as reflecting. These two ways are defined as follows: "If the universal (the rule, the principle, the law) is given, then judgment, which subsumes the particular under it... is (...) determining. But if merely the particular is given, for which the universal is to be found, then judgment is merely reflecting" (ibid.) As Kant goes on to make clear, the Critique of Judgment is particularly concerned with judgment in its capacity as reflecting rather than determining. It is concerned, that is, with how we are to find universals (which he glosses as rules, principles, or laws) for given particulars. Despite the fact that the term "concept" does not appear in this set of definitions, Kant’s discussions of judgment elsewhere make it clear that this faculty can be identified at least in part with our capacity to think particular objects under concepts, in particular empirical concepts.2 The.. (shrink)

I point out some unclarities in Allison's interpretation of Kant's aesthetic theory, specifically in his account of the free play of the faculties. I argue that there is a tension between Allison's commitment to the intentionality of the pleasure involved in a judgment of beauty, and his view that the pleasure is distinct from the judgment, and I claim that the tension should be resolved by rejecting the latter view. I conclude by addressing Allison's objection that my own view fails (...) to accommodate judgments of non-beauty or ugliness. (shrink)

I offer a critical reconstruction of Kant's thesis that aesthetic judgement is founded on the principle of the purposiveness of nature. This has been taken as equivalent to the claim that aesthetics is directly linked to the systematicity of nature in its empirical laws. I take issue both with Henry Allison, who seeks to marginalize this claim, and with Avner Baz, who highlights it in order to argue that Kant's aesthetics are merely instrumental for his epistemology. My solution is that (...) aesthetic judgement operates as an exemplary presentation of our general ability to schematise an intuition with a concept at the empirical level. I suggest that this counts as an empirical schematism. Although aesthetic judgement is not based on empirical systematicity, it can nevertheless offer indirect support for the latter in so far as it is a particular revelation of purposiveness in general. (shrink)

Philosophical aesthetics have seen an amazing revival over the past decade, as a radical questioning of the very grounds of Western epistemology has revealed that descriptions of what used to be seen as specific to aesthetic experience can instead be viewed as a general model for human cognition. In this revival, no text in the classical corpus of Western philosophy has been more frequently discussed and debated than the dense, complex paragraphs inserted into Kant's Critique of Judgment as sections 23-29: (...) the Analytic of the Sublime. This book is a rigorous explication de texte, a close reading of these sections. The Analytic of the Sublime, he points out, tries to argue that human thought is always constituted through a similar incompatibility between different intellectual and affective faculties. These lessons thus try to isolate the analysis of a differend of feeling in Kant's text, which is also the analysis of a feeling of differend, and to connect this feeling with the transport that leads all thought (critical thought included) to its limits. (shrink)

In this illuminating study of Kant's theory of imagination and its role in interpretation, Rudolf A. Makkreel argues against the commonly held notion that Kant's transcendental philosophy is incompatible with hermeneutics. The charge that Kant's foundational philosophy is inadequate to the task of interpretation can be rebutted, explains Makkreel, if we fully understand the role of imagination in his work. In identifying this role, Makkreel also reevaluates the relationship among Kant's discussions of the feeling of life, common sense, and the (...) purposiveness of history. (shrink)

Kant’s Critique of Judgment is one of the most important texts in the history of modern aesthetics. This GuideBook discusses the third Critique section by section, and introduces and assesses: Kant's life and the background of the Critique of Judgment the ideas and text of the Critique of Judgment , including a critical explanation of Kant’s theories of natural beauty The continuing relevance of Kant’s work to contemporary philosophy and aesthetics This GuideBook is an accessible introduction to a notoriously difficult (...) work and will be essential reading for students of Kant and aesthetics. (shrink)

Kant's Critique of Judgment has often been interpreted by scholars as comprising separate treatments of three uneasily connected topics: beauty, biology, and empirical knowledge. Rachel Zuckert's book is the first to interpret the Critique as a unified argument concerning all three domains. She argues that on Kant's view, human beings demonstrate a distinctive cognitive ability in appreciating beauty and understanding organic life: an ability to anticipate a whole that we do not completely understand according to preconceived categories. This ability is (...) necessary, moreover, for human beings to gain knowledge of nature in its empirical character as it is, not as we might assume it to be. Her wide-ranging and original study will be valuable for readers in all areas of Kant's philosophy. (shrink)

It is quite standard, even banal, to describe Kant's project in the Critique of Pure Reason [KrV] as a critical reconciliation of rationalism and empiricism, most directly expressed in Kant's claim that intuitions and concepts are two distinct, yet equally necessary, and necessarily interdependent sources of cognition. Similarly, though Kant rejects both the rationalist foundation of morality in the concept of perfection and that of the empiricists in feeling or in the moral sense, one might broadly characterize Kant's moral philosophy (...) as an attempt to reconcile the apriori universality and necessity of rationalist ethics with empiricist (Humean) or sentimentalist (Rousseauean) strictures concerning the distinction between the ‘ought’ and the ‘is’, between third personal knowledge of the good and first personal motivation. (shrink)

This paper argues that Kant's account of the "ideal of beauty" in paragraph 17 of the Critique of Judgment is not only a plausible account of one kind of beauty ("boring" beauty), but also that it can address some of our moral qualms concerning the aesthetic evaluation of persons, including our psychological propensity to take a person's beauty to represent her moral character.

This piece presents an account of Kant's notion of provisional right and connects this conception to his defence of two principles of publicity. The argument is to the effect that understanding the notion of provisional right will enable us to comprehend the Kantian picture of the state of nature, the basis of the transition from such a state to the civil condition and also his treatment of international right. The paper also presents the sketch of a Kantian theory of normatively (...) justified institutions. (shrink)

In the concluding section of his *Anthropology* textbook, Kant offers the outlines of a portrait of the human race and of its collective character and vocation. The section is of interest for students of Kant’s Geschichtsphilosophie because of what it reveals about Kant’s conception of human progress, and the processes responsible for it. On Kant’s view, we can only expect collective progress through incremental political reform, and our expectation of progress rests significantly upon our own, specifically moral, reflections upon human (...) activity. (shrink)

In the Critique of Judgement, Kant offers a penetrating analysis of our experience of the beautiful and the sublime. He discusses the objectivity of taste, aesthetic disinterestedness, the relation of art and nature, the role of imagination, genius and originality, the limits of representation, and the connection between morality and the aesthetic. He also investigates the validity of our judgements concerning the degree in which nature has a purpose, with respect to the highest interests of reason and enlightenment. The work (...) profoundly influenced the artists, writers, and philosophers of the classical and romantic period, including Hegel, Schelling, Schopenhauer, and Nietzsche. In addition, it has remained a landmark work in fields such as phenomenology, hermeneutics, the Frankfurt School, analytical aesthetics, and contemporary critical theory. Today it remains an essential work of philosophy, and required reading for all with an interest in aesthetics. (shrink)

In this illuminating study of Kant's theory of imagination and its role in interpretation, Rudolf A. Makkreel argues against the commonly held notion that Kant's transcendental philosophy is incompatible with hermeneutics. The charge that Kant's foundational philosophy is inadequate to the task of interpretation can be rebutted, explains Makkreel, if we fully understand the role of imagination in his work. In identifying this role, Makkreel also reevaluates the relationship among Kant's discussions of the feeling of life, common sense, and the (...) purposiveness of history. (shrink)

Kant’s Critique of Judgment is one of the most important texts in the history of modern aesthetics. This GuideBook discusses the third Critique section by section, and introduces and assesses: Kant's life and the background of the Critique of Judgment the ideas and text of the Critique of Judgment , including a critical explanation of Kant’s theories of natural beauty The continuing relevance of Kant’s work to contemporary philosophy and aesthetics This GuideBook is an accessible introduction to a notoriously difficult (...) work and will be essential reading for students of Kant and aesthetics. (shrink)

Among many important claims, Allen Wood in Kant's Ethical ought proposes that Kant's philosophy of history can be grasped as a "naturalist" approach, grounding human nature in biology. I suggest some reservations. First, I question Kant's conception of biology as (a still emergent) science. Second, I question Kant's extension of his notion of "natural predisposition" to reason and freedom. Third, I question the naturalism of Kant's philosophy of history by suggesting the excessive role providence must play in Kant's account. The (...) upshot is to find Kant's philosophy of history one of the less persuasive elements in his system of thought, despite Wood's energetic effort at a contemporary reconstruction. (shrink)

Abstract In this paper I set the debate between Kant and Schiller in terms of the role that an ideal of life can play within an autonomist ethic. I begin by examining the critical role Schiller gives to emotions in tackling specific motivational concerns in Kant's ethics. In the Kantian response I offer to these criticisms, I emphasise the role of metaphysics for a proper understanding of Kant's position whilst allowing that with respect to moral psychology, Kant and Schiller are (...) in agreement about the importance of emotions in our moral lives. I conclude by returning to the themes broached in the introduction to consider the extent to which the teleological concerns that motivate Schiller can be addressed within Kant's autonomist ethics. (shrink)

While Kant is perhaps best known for his writings in metaphysics and epistemology (in particular the Critique of Pure Reason of 1781, with a second edition in 1787) and in ethics (the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals of 1785 and the Critique of Practical Reason of 1788), he also developed an influential and much-discussed theory of aesthetics. This theory is presented in his Critique of Judgment Kritik der Urteilskraft , also translated as Critique of the Power of Judgment ) (...) of 1790, a two-part work which deals successively with aesthetics and with the role of teleology (that is, appeal to ends or goals) in natural science and in our understanding of nature more generally. Although Kant's theory of teleology has traditionally been both less influential, and less widely discussed, than his aesthetic theory, its historical and philosophical importance is increasingly coming to be recognized. (shrink)

The article surveys Kant’s treatment of biological teleology in the ’Critique of Judgment’, with special attention to the question of whether the notion of natural teleology is coherent. It argues that our entitlement to regard nature as teleological is not established by the argument of the ’Antinomy’, but rather results from our entitlement to regard the workings of our own cognitive faculties in normative terms. This implies a view of the relation between biological teleology and the representational character of mind (...) which is the reverse of that adopted by naturalistic theorists of mind like Fred Dretske and Ruth Millikan. (shrink)

Dieser Band analysiert den Begriff des ‚Abenteuers der Vernunft’, welcher in der dritten Kritik von Kant als Hypothese für die Erklärung des Ursprungs des Lebendigen aufgestellt wird. In systematischer Hinsicht werden vornehmlich zwei Themen behandelt: der kantische Materialismus und das Verhältnis zwischen dem Abenteuer der Vernunft und der kopernikanisch-newtonianischen Wende. Der Nietzsche gewidmete Teil hat das Anliegen, seine Theorie aus dem Jahre 1868 als eine selbständige Erarbeitung physiologischer, empirischer und materialistischer Aspekte des Kantischen Kritizismus zu präsentieren.

This essay examines the reasons for Hegel's frequently professed claim that Kant's Critique of Judgment simultaneously reveals the internal limits of critical philosophy and opens the door to his own system of speculative idealism. It evaluates Hegel's contention that the conceptions of aesthetic experience, organic purposiveness, and the intuitive intellect developed in the third Critique together conspire to undermine the epistemological and metaphysical foundations of the theories of nature and freedom advanced in the first and second Critiques . Finally it (...) explains how Hegel understands his logic and real philosophy as a realist and quasi-naturalistic alternative to Kant's subjective idealism, one that purports to generate a system of categories adequate not only to dead matter but also to organic life and free self-conscious spirit. (shrink)

In the Critique of Judgement, Kant offers a penetrating analysis of our experience of the beautiful and the sublime. He discusses the objectivity of taste, aesthetic disinterestedness, the relation of art and nature, the role of imagination, genius and originality, the limits of representation, and the connection between morality and the aesthetic. He also investigates the validity of our judgements concerning the degree in which nature has a purpose, with respect to the highest interests of reason and enlightenment. The work (...) profoundly influenced the artists, writers, and philosophers of the classical and romantic period, including Hegel, Schelling, Schopenhauer, and Nietzsche. In addition, it has remained a landmark work in fields such as phenomenology, hermeneutics, the Frankfurt School, analytical aesthetics, and contemporary critical theory. Today it remains an essential work of philosophy, and required reading for all with an interest in aesthetics. (shrink)

Kant’s position on teleology and biology is neither inconsistent nor obsolete; his arguments have some surprising and enduring philosophical strengths. But Kant’s account will appear weak if we muddy the waters by reading him as aiming to defend teleology by appealing to considerations popular in contemporary philosophy. Kant argues for very different conclusions: we can neither know teleological judgments of living beings to be true, nor legitimately explain living beings in teleological terms; such teleological judgment is justified only as a (...) “problematic” guideline in our search for mechanistic explanations. These conclusions are well supported by Kant’s defense of his demanding analysis, according to which teleological judgment literally applies to a complex whole only where teleology truly explains the presence of its parts. (shrink)

In this illuminating study of Kant's theory of imagination and its role in interpretation, Rudolf A. Makkreel argues against the commonly held notion that Kant's transcendental philosophy is incompatible with hermeneutics. The charge that Kant's foundational philosophy is inadequate to the task of interpretation can be rebutted, explains Makkreel, if we fully understand the role of imagination in his work. In identifying this role, Makkreel also reevaluates the relationship among Kant's discussions of the feeling of life, common sense, and the (...) purposiveness of history. (shrink)

Kant stresses the regulative status of teleological attributions, but sometimes he seems to treat teleology as a constitutive condition for biology. To clarify this issue, the concept of natural purpose and its role for biology are examined. I suggest that the concept serves an identificatory function: it singles out objects as natural purposes, whereby the special science of biology is constituted. This relative constitutivity of teleology is explicated by means of a distinction of levels: on the object level of biological (...) science, teleology is taken as constitutive, though it is merely regulative on the philosophical meta level. This distinction also concerns the place of Aristotelian teleology in Kant: on the object level, the Aristotelian view is accepted, whereas on the meta level, as agnostic stance is taken concerning teleology. (edited). (shrink)

Kant’s Critique of Judgment is one of the most important texts in the history of modern aesthetics. This GuideBook discusses the third Critique section by section, and introduces and assesses: Kant's life and the background of the Critique of Judgment the ideas and text of the Critique of Judgment , including a critical explanation of Kant’s theories of natural beauty The continuing relevance of Kant’s work to contemporary philosophy and aesthetics This GuideBook is an accessible introduction to a notoriously difficult (...) work and will be essential reading for students of Kant and aesthetics. (shrink)

Kant's Critique of Judgment has often been interpreted by scholars as comprising separate treatments of three uneasily connected topics: beauty, biology, and empirical knowledge. Rachel Zuckert's book is the first to interpret the Critique as a unified argument concerning all three domains. She argues that on Kant's view, human beings demonstrate a distinctive cognitive ability in appreciating beauty and understanding organic life: an ability to anticipate a whole that we do not completely understand according to preconceived categories. This ability is (...) necessary, moreover, for human beings to gain knowledge of nature in its empirical character as it is, not as we might assume it to be. Her wide-ranging and original study will be valuable for readers in all areas of Kant's philosophy. (shrink)

CHAPTER I Teleological phenomena that the cause or causes of order in the universe probably bear some remote analogy to human intelligence... David Hume. ...