This paper situates Lynne Huffer’s recent queer-feminist Foucaultian critique of reason within the context of earlier feminist debates about reason and critically assesses Huffer’s work from the point of view of its faithfulness to Foucault’s work and its implications for feminism. I argue that Huffer’s characterization of Enlightenment reason as despotic not only departs from Foucault’s account of the relationship between power and reason, it also leaves her stuck in the same double binds that plagued earlier (...) feminist critiques of reason. An appreciation of the profoundly ambivalent nature of Foucault’s critique of reason offers feminists some insights into how to navigate those double binds. What feminists should learn from the early Foucault is precisely his commitment to engage in a rational critique of reason that highlights reason’s dangerous entanglements with power while resisting the temptation to reject or refuse reason altogether. (shrink)

This book focuses on a question issued from The Architectonic of Pure Reason, one of the most important sections of Kant's first Critique: what is the human being? It suggests that the answer to this question is tied to a particular account of the unity of reason - one that stresses its purposive character.

Westphal shows us that Kierkegaard's philosophy makes an important contribution to what we now call the 'critique of ideology,' embracing both political and sociological concerns, and squarely based upon as affirmation of human reason-a reason that is fully aware of its own nature, neither shirking its responsibilities nor overstepping its capacities. For those who would like to get beyond the myth of Kierkegaard as an apostle of the 'solitary self,' Kierkegaard's Critique of Reason and Society is just (...) the book to read. -Stephen N. Dunning, University of Pennsylvania. (shrink)

There are three steps in my description of the ground-problem of value: First, Husserl’s analysis of the crisis of reason is based on the systematic loss and phenomenological recovery of the intuitive evidence of the lifeworld. But if letter symbols are essential to formalizing abstraction, as Klein’s de-sedimentation of Vieta’s institution of modern algebra shows, then the ultimate substrates upon which formalization rests cannot be “individuals” in Husserl’s sense. The consequence of the essentiality of the letter symbols to formalization (...) is that no direct reference to intuitive evidence of individuals is possible from formal structures. Second, the crisis of reason in Marx’s Capital on commodities contains a parallel analysis of the contradictory relation between formalism and evidence. The value-structure of capitalist society expels qualitative value to subjective use and imposes a homogeneous standard on social representation of value such that quantitative values are not grounded in the experience of use which entails that the system of general value becomes a mere aggregate. Third, the problem of value, or formal axiology, is the core of a teleological convergence between phenomenology and Marxism. A short phenomenological description of the experience of value shows that practical activities generate valuations that are experienced with an intensity through which they aim toward social representation. The conclusion is that the social representation of value in capitalist society intervenes into the constitution of the community by the intensity of individuals’ value-experience to reduce its system of value to an unthematized simple aggregate of value-quantities. (shrink)

In this essay I distinguish four different modes of feminist critique of reason. Discussing the work of authors such as Keller, Irigaray, and Butler, I point out that the issue of masculine connotations has been addressed with regard to different concepts-or at least different aspects-of reason. In view of a tendency to overdraw the objections, I suggest to reformulate the feminist critique of reason. I also argue that a rediscovery of those philosophical concepts of reason that (...) do not restrict this term to instrumental rationality might be useful for this purpose. (shrink)

First Professor of Logic and Metaphysics at Main Pedagogical Institute and then also St. Petersburg University, Carpatho-Rusyn P. D. Lodij spent a quarter of a century teaching philosophy and law in the Russian Empire in the first third of the 19th century. His knowledge of Kant’s philosophy and his attitude to Kant’s criticism are estimated diametrically opposed in the research literature. An analysis of his main philosophical work, “Logical Precepts which Lead to Cognition and the Distinction of the True from (...) the False” (1815), convincingly proves that Lodij was an excellent scholar of Kant’s philosophy. In Russia, he was the first thinker who spoke about the differences between the first and second editions of the “Critique of Pure Reason”. Lodij also was the first who noted both the revolutionary role of Kant’s Copernican turn, and the importance of Humeʼs causality problem for the formation of critical philosophy. In Russia, Lodij was the first who proposed a detailed description of Kant’s transcendental idealism. At the same time, Lodij’s general attitude to Kant was rather skeptical. In his own logic, he does not follow Kant’s division of logic into pure and applied, but he returns to pre-Kant’s split into theoretical and practical logics. Lodij disputes with the basic conclusions about the space derived from the transcendental aesthetic, denies synthetic judgments a priori and the rooting of the cognizing reason in illusions. Despite his unequivocal claims regarding Kant’s philosophy, “Logical Precepts” and its author were persecuted during the so-called “professorsʼ affair” of the 1820s. As a result, Lodij was suspended from teaching philosophy, and his logic textbook was withdrawn from teaching for both “disgrace” and imaginary Kantianism. (shrink)

Westphal shows us that Kierkegaard's philosophy makes an important contribution to what we now call the 'critique of ideology,' embracing both political and sociological concerns, and squarely based upon as affirmation of human reason-a reason that is fully aware of its own nature, neither shirking its responsibilities nor overstepping its capacities. For those who would like to get beyond the myth of Kierkegaard as an apostle of the 'solitary self,' Kierkegaard's Critique of Reason and Society is just (...) the book to read. -Stephen N. Dunning, University of Pennsylvania. (shrink)

This entirely new translation of Critique of Pure Reason by Paul Guyer and Allan Wood is the most accurate and informative English translation ever produced of this epochal philosophical text. Though its simple, direct style will make it suitable for all new readers of Kant, the translation displays a philosophical and textual sophistication that will enlighten Kant scholars as well. This translation recreates as far as possible a text with the same interpretative nuances and richness as the original.

ABSTRACT In this paper, I advance a new interpretation of the argumentative structure of the third Critique, which in turn clarifies the connection between its two apparently unrelated parts. I propose to read the third Critique as a response to Kant’s question of hope, which concerns the satisfaction of reason’s practical and theoretical interests. On this proposal, while the first part on aesthetics describes what we—as possessors of theoretical reason – may hope for, the second part, on teleology, (...) describes what we – as possessors of practical reason – may hope for. The main question of the third Critique is, ‘What may we hope if we act as we should, i.e. act rationally?’ Kant’s implicit answer is, ‘to attain the ideals of reason, which leads to happiness as a consequence of it.’ This novel reconstruction of the argumentative structure of the third Critique contributes to the literature by (i) explaining how the two parts of the third Critique on aesthetics and teleology are connected, (ii) clarifying how the ideals of reason are connected to hope and happiness, and (iii) showing how the spheres of nature and freedom can be synthetically unified through the faculty of judgment. (shrink)

One of the cornerstone books of Western philosophy, Critique of Pure Reason is Kant's seminal treatise, where he seeks to define the nature of reason itself and builds his own unique system of philosophical thought with an approach known as transcendental idealism. He argues that human knowledge is limited by the capacity for perception and attempts a logical designation of two varieties of knowledge: a posteriori, the knowledge acquired through experience; and a priori, knowledge not derived through experience. (...) This accurate translation by J. M. D. Meiklejohn offers a simple and direct rendering of Kant's work that is suitable for readers at all levels. (shrink)

This thesis is a critique of Jaakko Hintikka’s reconstruction of Kantian intuition in logical and mathematical reasoning. I argue that Hintikka’s reconstruction of Kantian intuition in particular and his reconstruction of Kant's philosophy of mathematics in general fails to be successful in two ways: First, the logical formula which contains an instantiated term (henceforth, instantial term) that is introduced by the rule of existential instantiation in the ecthesis part of a proof of an argument is not even a proper singular (...) proposition whose relation to its object is supposed to be immediate. It is not a proper singular proposition because its truth conditions are general, i.e., it makes a general statement about a class of individuals of the sort instantiated- a statement whose analysis is based on quantifiers. Second, I show that certain proofs in mathematics- those in the form of reductio ad absurdum- are not captured by Hintikka’s reconstruction of Kant’s philosophy of mathematics either. (shrink)

This paper argues that Cassirer’s development of ‘the critique of reason into a critique of culture’ was prompted by two motives that ultimately seem to collide. On the one hand, Cassirer attempts to overcome the Kantian dichotomy between the faculties of sensibility and the understanding. To this end, he turns to the schemata of the Critique of Judgment. On the other hand, Cassirer expands the scope of transcendental philosophy to include cultural domains such as myth, language, and the human (...) sciences. His desire to maintain both the differences between these domains and the unity of reason however leads to a new dualism between the material modalities of the symbols and their ideal, recurring, forms. Yet, by adopting both a constitutive and a regulative conception of objectivity, Cassirer renders this duality legitimate, and his motives for a philosophy of culture on a Kantian foundation compatible. (shrink)

One of the cornerstone books of Western philosophy, Critique of Pure Reason is Kant's seminal treatise, where he seeks to define the nature of reason itself and builds his own unique system of philosophical thought with an approach known as transcendental idealism. He argues that human knowledge is limited by the capacity for perception and attempts a logical designation of two varieties of knowledge: a posteriori, the knowledge acquired through experience; and a priori, knowledge not derived through experience. (...) This accurate translation by J. M. D. Meiklejohn offers a simple and direct rendering of Kant's work that is suitable for readers at all levels. (shrink)

Most of the core concepts of the Western philosophical tradition originate in antiquity. Yet boredom is strikingly absent from classical thought. In this philosophical study, Dmitri Nikulin explores the concept’s genealogy to argue that boredom is the mark of modernity. Nikulin contends that boredom is a specifically modern phenomenon. He provides a critical reconstruction of the concept of the modern subject as universal, rational, autonomous, and self-sufficient. Understanding itself in this way, this subject is at once the protagonist, playwright, director, (...) and spectator of the staged drama of human existence. It is therefore inevitably monological, lonely, and alone, and can neither escape its own presence nor get rid of it. In other words, it is bored—and this boredom is the fundamental expression and symptom of the modern condition. Considering such thinkers as Descartes, Pascal, Kant, Kierkegaard, Kracauer, Heidegger, and Benjamin, Critique of Bored Reason places boredom on center stage in the philosophical critique of modernity. Nikulin also considers the alternative to the notion of the autonomous subject in the—nonbored and nonboring—dialogic and comic subject capable of shared existence with others. (shrink)

The highly arcane 'wisdom' produced by the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan is either endlessly regurgitated and recited as holy writ by his numerous acolytes, or radically dismissed as unpalatable nonsense by his equally countless detractors. Contrary to these common, strictly antagonistic yet uniformly uncritical practices, this book offers a meticulous critique of some key theoretical and clinical aspects of Lacan's expansive oeuvre, testing their consistency, examining their implications, and investigating their significance. In nine interrelated chapters, the book highlights both the (...) flaws and the strengths of Lacan's ideas, in areas of investigation that are as crucial as they are contentious, within as well as outside psychoanalysis. Drawing on a vast range of source-materials, including many unpublished archival documents, it teases out controversial issues such as money, organisational failure, and lighthearted, 'gay' thinking, and it relies on the highest standards of scholarly excellence to develop its arguments. At the same time, the book does not presuppose any prior knowledge of Lacanian psychoanalysis on the part of the reader, but allows its readership to indulge in the joys of in-depth critical analysis, trans-disciplinary creative thinking, and persistent questioning. This book will appeal to researchers and students alike in psychoanalytic studies and philosophy, as well as all those interested in French theory and the history of ideas. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Neue Zeitschrift für Systematische Theologie und Religionsphilosophie Jahrgang: 61 Heft: 2 Seiten: 207-222.

In The Principles of Psychology, William James addressed ten justifications for the concept of the unconscious mind, each of which he refuted. Twenty – five years later in The Unconscious, Freud presented many of the same, original arguments to justify the unconscious, without any acknowledgement of James’s refutations. Some scholars in the last few decades have claimed that James was in fact a supporter of a Freudian unconscious, contrary to expectations. In this essay, I first summarize Freud’s justification for the (...) unconscious to highlight the arguments he used in 1915, before then demonstrating how clearly James had undercut these same argument in the Principles, published in 1890. Interpreters of James’s thought should resist the claim that he would or did support Freud’s idea of the unconscious, even if he at times spoke generously about other scholars. We also have reason to wonder about Freud’s inattention to James’s remarkable early work in psychology, especially given James’s critiques of the concept of the unconscious. (shrink)

In _Critique of Black Reason_ eminent critic Achille Mbembe offers a capacious genealogy of the category of Blackness—from the Atlantic slave trade to the present—to critically reevaluate history, racism, and the future of humanity. Mbembe teases out the intellectual consequences of the reality that Europe is no longer the world's center of gravity while mapping the relations among colonialism, slavery, and contemporary financial and extractive capital. Tracing the conjunction of Blackness with the biological fiction of race, he theorizes Black (...) class='Hi'>reason as the collection of discourses and practices that equated Blackness with the nonhuman in order to uphold forms of oppression. Mbembe powerfully argues that this equation of Blackness with the nonhuman will serve as the template for all new forms of exclusion. With _Critique of Black Reason_, Mbembe offers nothing less than a map of the world as it has been constituted through colonialism and racial thinking while providing the first glimpses of a more just future. (shrink)

Unity is a central concept in the Critique of Pure Reason, since it is only through the unifying act of our spontaneous faculties that an experience can emerge, according to Kant. However, the faculty of reason brings forth a different unity than that of the understanding: Kant characterizes the former as a collective unity, while the latter as a distributive unity. This article aims to explain the meaning of these terms, with reference to the Nachlass on metaphysics and (...) the writings on right where Kant employs them in a clearer manner. This explanation can provide a basis to understand the difference between the faculty of understanding and the faculty of reason within the first Critique, a difference rather neglected by scholars, who have focused mainly on Kant’s distinction between sensibility and understanding. (shrink)

The result was the Critique of Dialectical Reason, an intellectual masterpiece of the twentieth century, now republished in two volumes with major original ...

This new translation of the first Critique forms part of a fifteen-volume English-language edition of the works of Immanuel Kant under the general editorship of this volume’s editor-translators, Paul Guyer and Allen Wood. The edition, which is almost complete by now, comprises all of Kant’s published works along with extensive selections from his literary remains, his correspondence, and student transcripts of his lecture courses in metaphysics, ethics, logic, and anthropology. The Cambridge edition aims at a consistent English rendition of Kant’s (...) works, both within a given volume and across volumes. In terms of scope and detail, the Cambridge edition is unrivaled in any language, except for the authoritative Academy edition begun under the directorship of Wilhelm Dilthey in 1900, which, however, is still not completed and several volumes of which are in serious need of re-editing. In one case, that of the Opus postumum, the best edition currently available seems to be the one in the Cambridge edition. (shrink)

In the Critique of Pure Reason (1781/7), Kant laid out a deep-running and largely original picture of the apperceptive mind, including a claim that in consciousness of self, one does not appear to oneself as an object and that consciousness of self is presupposed by consciousness of other things. As a result, consciousness of oneself does not provide knowledge of oneself and the referential apparatus of consciousness of self is radically different from other kinds of referential apparatus. The main (...) purpose of this paper is to summarize this picture and then explore how much of it is still to be found in his late, unfinished Opus Postumum (1800/04). (shrink)

Foundations of the metaphysics of morals.--Critique of practical reason.--An inquiry into the distinctness of the principles of natural theology and morals.--What is enlightenment?--What is orientation in thinking.--Perpetual peace: a philosophical sketch.--On a supposed right to lie from altruistic motives.--Selections from The metaphysics of morals.

This article intends to show how the philosophy of Kant supposes a rupture with the doctrines based on a system of absolute rationality, where the most important element is the unity of reason. In this way, it will try to underline the main critiques of the Prussian philosopher to theories based on the unity of reason and direct access to reality, as well as exposing the Kantian proposal of a unitary formal rational structure, but with several irreconcilable (...) uses. (shrink)

This article intends to show how the philosophy of Kant supposes a rupture with the doctrines based on a system of absolute rationality, where the most important element is the unity of reason. In this way, it will try to underline the main critiques of the Prussian philosopher to theories based on the unity of reason and direct access to reality, as well as exposing the Kantian proposal of a unitary formal rational structure, but with several irreconcilable (...) uses. (shrink)

Santayana's Life of Reason, published in five books from 1905 to 1906, ranks as one of the greatest works in modern philosophical naturalism. Acknowledging the natural material bases of human life, Santayana traces the development of the human capacity for appreciating and cultivating the ideal. It is a capacity he exhibits as he articulates a continuity running through animal impulse, practical intelligence, and ideal harmony in reason, society, art, religion, and science. The work is an exquisitely rendered vision (...) of human life lived sanely. In this first book of the work, Santayana provides an account of how the human animal develops instinct, passion, and chaotic experience into rationality and ideal life. Inspired by Aristotle's De Anima, Darwin's evolutionary theory, and William James's The Principles of Psychology, Santayana contends that the requirements of action in a hazardous and uncertain environment are the sources of the development of mind. More specifically, instinct and imagination are crucial to the emergence of reason from chaos. Separating himself from the typical thought of the time by his recognition of the imagination, Santayana in this volume offers extensive critiques of various philosophies of mind, including those of Kant and the British empiricists. This Critical Edition, volume VII of The Works of George Santayana, includes a chronology, notes, bibliography, textual commentary, lists of variants, and other tools useful to Santayana scholars. The other four books of the volume include Reason in Society, Reason in Religion, Reason in Art, and Reason in Science. (shrink)

This is a primer on Steven James Bartlett's book CRITIQUE OF IMPURE REASON: HORIZONS OF POSSIBILITY AND MEANING. ●●●●● -/- Some books are long and complex. The Critique of Impure Reason is such a book. It is long enough and complex enough so that it may be a service to some readers to offer a primer to introduce and partially summarize the book’s objectives and method. Here, the author of Critique of Impure Reason: Horizons of Possibility and (...) Meaning provides such a guide, a vade mecum to accompany a reader should he or she embark on a study of the long and complex work. ●●●●● -/- The book is available in a printed edition, ISBN 978-0-578-88646-6, from online booksellers such as Barnes & Noble, Amazon, and through independent bookstores. The book is also available as an eBook, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.5458352, through Zenodo, PhilSci, PhilPapers, HAL, and other online archives. (shrink)

Immanuel Kant was one of the leading lights of 18th-century philosophy; his work provided the foundations for later revolutionary thinkers such as Hegel and Marx. This work contains the keystone of his critical philosophy - the basis of human knowledge and truth.

Considered one of the most important works of modern philosophy, Critique of Pure Reason offers a profound exploration of the nature of knowledge and perception. In this English-language translation by JMD Meiklejohn, Immanuel Kant's seminal work is made accessible to a wider audience. Illuminating and challenging, this book is an essential resource for anyone interested in the history of philosophy and the nature of human thought. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part (...) of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

This entirely new translation of Critique of Pure Reason is the most accurate and informative English translation ever produced of this epochal philosophical text. Though its simple and direct style will make it suitable for all new readers of Kant, the translation displays an unprecedented philosophical and textual sophistication that will enlighten Kant scholars as well. This translation recreates as far as possible a text with the same interpretative nuances and richness as the original. The extensive editorial apparatus includes (...) informative annotation, detailed glossaries, an index, and a large-scale general introduction in which two of the world's preeminent Kant scholars provide both a succinct summary of the structure and argument of the Critique and a detailed account of its long and complex genesis. (shrink)

Santayana argues that instinct and imagination are crucial to the emergence of reason from chaos. Santayana's Life of Reason, published in five books from 1905 to 1906, ranks as one of the greatest works in modern philosophical naturalism. Acknowledging the natural material bases of human life, Santayana traces the development of the human capacity for appreciating and cultivating the ideal. It is a capacity he exhibits as he articulates a continuity running through animal impulse, practical intelligence, and ideal (...) harmony in reason, society, art, religion, and science. The work is an exquisitely rendered vision of human life lived sanely. In this first book of the work, Santayana provides an account of how the human animal develops instinct, passion, and chaotic experience into rationality and ideal life. Inspired by Aristotle's De Anima, Darwin's evolutionary theory, and William James's The Principles of Psychology, Santayana contends that the requirements of action in a hazardous and uncertain environment are the sources of the development of mind. More specifically, instinct and imagination are crucial to the emergence of reason from chaos. Separating himself from the typical thought of the time by his recognition of the imagination, Santayana in this volume offers extensive critiques of various philosophies of mind, including those of Kant and the British empiricists. This Critical Edition, volume VII of The Works of George Santayana, includes a chronology, notes, bibliography, textual commentary, lists of variants, and other tools useful to Santayana scholars. The other four books of the volume include Reason in Society, Reason in Religion, Reason in Art, and Reason in Science. (shrink)

This volume, originally published in 1987, is a collection of seven previously published essays, here slightly modified. Six of these were previously published in various journals over the years 1971-1984 and one was presented at a Kierkegaard conference at St. Olaf college in 1985.