Popper uses the "Humean challenge" as a justification for his falsificationism. It is claimed that in his basic argument he confuses two different doubts: (a) the Humean doubt (Popper's problem of induction), and (b) the "Popperean" doubt whether - presupposing that there are laws of nature - the laws we accept are in fact valid. Popper's alleged solution of the problem of induction does not solve the problem in a straightforward way (as Levison and Salmon have remarked before). But if (...) Popper's solution of the Humean challenge is re-interpreted as being close to Kant's it makes sense. Even though Popper explicitly rejects Kant's synthetic judgements a priori, it is claimed here that this is so because he misinterprets Kant's argument. If he had understood Kant correctly he should have been a modern "Kantianer"! (shrink)

are synthetic a priori judgements possible?" In both cases, i~thas usually been t'aken for granted in fife one case by Kant that synthetic a priori judgements were possible, and in the other case in contemporary,'d-". philosophical literature that contingent statements of identity are ppss. ible. I do not intend to deal with the Kantian question except to mention:ssj~".

The problem of Kant's first Critique is the problem of pure reason: how are synthetic judgments possible a priori? Many of his readers have believed that the problem depends upon a delimitation within the class of a priori truths of a class of irreducibly synthetic truths—a delimitation whose possibility is doubtful—because absent this it is not excluded that all a priori truths are analytic. I argue, on the contrary, that the problem depends on nothing more (...) than the human knower's everyday consciousness of her own finitude: her dependence in thinking and knowing on what is given to her. The problem is a difficulty about how the concepts which figure in metaphysical judgments could represent reality given that they cannot do so in the way in which concepts figuring in empirical judgments do. Empirical judgment here functions as exemplary of thought and knowledge because it is exemplary of finite thought and knowledge. Mere analysis could not, therefore, dissolve the problem even in principle, because to say that a concept can be analyzed is not yet to explain the possibility of its real representative power. The significance of the analytic-synthetic distinction in the context of the problem of pure reason is that its formulation allows Kant to say this. (shrink)

In twentieth-century Kant scholarship, few have provided an account of the analytic-synthetic distinction and of the problem of the synthetic a priori that takes into consideration the views of Kant's idealist successors such as Maimon, Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel. I first explain how Kant formulates the analytic-synthetic distinction in terms of the determinate-indeterminate distinction, which, in turn, is based on the distinction between general and transcendental logic. Kant's problem of the synthetic a priori , (...) then, is the problem of showing how the logical forms of judgment can be employed determinately (and not merely indeterminately). I then show that Maimon also formulates the distinction and the problem in the same way, and that his interpretation will shape how Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel each construe and address Kant's question, How are synthetic judgments possible a priori ? (shrink)

The problem of synthetic judgements touches on the question of whether philosophy can draw independent statements about reality in the first place. For Kant, the synthetic judgements a priori formulate the conditions of the possibility for objectively valid knowledge. Despite the principle fallibility of its statements, modern science aims for objective knowledge. This gives the topic of synthetic a priori unbroken currency. This paper aims to show that a modernized version of transcendental philosophy, (...) if it is to be feasible at all, must “bid farewell” to the concept of being “free of empiricism” or the “purity” of the a priori. Approaches to this end can already been found in Kant’s reflections on non-pure synthetic knowledge. Moreover, the a priori validity of knowledge does not exclude the possibility that it can be discovered empirically. In keeping with Kant, Fries and Nelson anticipated this separation (usually first attributed to Reichenbach) between the validity and discovery context of knowledge and pointed out that the a priori could be discovered empirically, but never proven. There are currently still good reasons why transcendental philosophical concepts are of fundamental importance for modern science, although it must not be overlooked that even within the framework of a modernized transcendental philosophy, several unsolved problems remain or are raised. For example, the irredeemability of the universal validity and necessary claims of the a priori, the problem of a clear demarcation between the phenomenal and noumenal world. Moreover, the “beautiful structure” or the Kantian system, which constituted its persuasive power, is lost. (shrink)

English title: The Problem of the Synthetic a priori Judgements According to Hermann Lotze. The present article compares Kant’s and Lotze’s concepts of synthetic judgements. Lotze’s aim is a renewing of the Kant’s solutions, what he achieves thanks to introduction of the distinction between analytic (identical) content and synthetic form of these judgements which Kant recognised as synthetic. This distinction makes possible to lay down the concept of intentional sense which has influence (...) over Frege and Husserl. (shrink)

This paper attempts to shed light on three sets of issues that bear directly on our understanding of Locke and Kant. The first is whether Kant believes Locke merely anticipates his distinction between analytic and synthetic judgments or also believes Locke anticipates his notion of synthetic a priori cognition. The second is what should we as readers of Kant and Locke should think about Kant’s view whatever it turns out to be, and the third is the nature (...) of Kant’s justification for the comparison he draws between his philosophy and Locke’s. I argue (1) that Kant believes Locke anticipates both the analytic-synthetic distinction and Kant’s notion of synthetic a priori cognition, (2) that the best justification for Kant’s claim draws on Locke’s distinction between trifling and instructive knowledge, (3) that the arguments against this claim developed by Carson, Allison, and Newman fail to undermine it, and (4) that Kant’s own justification for his claim is quite different from what many commentators have thought it was (or should have been). (shrink)

“Mathematics, synthetic unity and constitutive a priori”. Starting from the emphasis about the Kantian idea of the originary synthetic unity of apperception like the basic function on which rest the production of all synthetic judgment, in this paper I defend the idea of constitutive a priori of experience under the form of a similar synthetic principle but essentially formal, namely, the concept of transformation and group of transformations. To the same time, I try to (...) show that Kant himself inspired, for articulate his own position, on mathematics, especially on synthetic geometry. (shrink)

The main thesis defended in this paper is that Hildebrand’s distinction between what we could call quiddities—or “quasi-essences,” endowed with chaotic and accidental unity—and genuine essences possessing an intrinsically necessary unity, grounds the radical distinction between analytic and synthetic a priori knowledge. This thesis has not been expressly emphasized by Hildebrand himself. In order to prove it, we: (1) relate the three types of unities distinguished by Hildebrand with the three kinds of judgments discriminated by Kant; (2) outline (...) what we can call the “crux of empiricism”; (3) analyze four characteristic examples of synthetic a priori judgements; and (4) elaborate a provisional typology of synthetic a priori propositions, trying to include in it Hildebrand’s favorite examples. (shrink)

The main thesis defended in this paper is that Hildebrand’s distinction between what we could call quiddities—or “quasi-essences,” endowed with chaotic and accidental unity—and genuine essences possessing an intrinsically necessary unity, grounds the radical distinction between analytic and synthetic a priori knowledge. This thesis has not been expressly emphasized by Hildebrand himself. In order to prove it, we: relate the three types of unities distinguished by Hildebrand with the three kinds of judgments discriminated by Kant; outline what we (...) can call the “crux of empiricism”; analyze four characteristic examples of synthetic a priori judgements; and elaborate a provisional typology of synthetic a priori propositions, trying to include in it Hildebrand’s favorite examples. (shrink)

In his essay “Logical Empiricism”, in the anthologyTwentieth Century Philosophy, Professor Feigl writes: “All forms of empiricism agree in repudiating the existence of synthetic a priori knowledge.”2Schlick makes the same point even more forcibly: “The empiricism which I represent believes itself to be clear on the point that, as a matter of principle, all propositions are either synthetic a posteriori or tautologous; synthetic aprioripropositions seem to it to be a logical impossibility.”3 The denial of synthetic (...) apriorisis a major thesis of the logical empiricist position, being found in the writings of most of the leaders of the movement.4 The reason for its importance is fairly clear. It provides a formula on which the empiricists can base their critique of traditional philosophy. To use Ayer's phrase, denial of the synthetic aprioriresults in “the elimination of metaphysics”. The philosophical tradition to which the empiricists are opposed and whose “metaphysics” they wish to eliminate can be called, somewhat loosely, rationalism. (shrink)

In his essay “Logical Empiricism”, in the anthology Twentieth Century Philosophy, Professor Feigl writes: “All forms of empiricism agree in repudiating the existence of synthetic a priori knowledge.” Schlick makes the same point even more forcibly: “The empiricism which I represent believes itself to be clear on the point that, as a matter of principle, all propositions are either synthetic a posteriori or tautologous; synthetic a priori propositions seem to it to be a logical impossibility.” (...) The denial of synthetic a prioris is a major thesis of the logical empiricist position, being found in the writings of most of the leaders of the movement. The reason for its importance is fairly clear. It provides a formula on which the empiricists can base their critique of traditional philosophy. To use Ayer's phrase, denial of the synthetic a priori results in “the elimination of metaphysics”. The philosophical tradition to which the empiricists are opposed and whose “metaphysics” they wish to eliminate can be called, somewhat loosely, rationalism. (shrink)

According to Kant, arithmetic judgements are not analytic since they are about our practice of operating with figures and things in a certain way. Hence the empiricist thesis that any meaningful assertion is either analytic or synthetic a posteriori seems to be refuted (§§ 1, 2). Using syntax and semantics of truth-conditional logic Frege nevertheless shows that arithmetic can be understood as a system of quasi-analytic sentences speaking about numbers as abstract entities (§§ 3, 4). Axiomatic set theory, (...) however, conceals the connection between (internal) truth-functional arithmetic and our (external) practice of counting and computing (§§ 5-€“7). ---” In spite of the insights truth-conditional semantics provides for a non-psychological understanding of mathematical thinking, it is neither a general theory of meaning and analyticity nor a foundation of a general sense-criterion (§§ 8, 9). (shrink)

El problema fundamental para que la Teoría de la relatividad pueda ser acorde con la filosofía de Kant es el de la utilización de una geometría no euclídea. Que sus principios sean interpretados como juicios sintéticos a priori es, a nuestro entender, un problema secundario. Si queremos que los principios de una ciencia de la naturaleza sean universales y necesarios sin recurrir a dogmatismos, no queda otra posibilidad que entenderlos trascendentalmente. Como se observa en el principio de relatividad, Einstein (...) también pensaba que las leyes físicas son universales y necesarias. Sin embargo, su perspectiva fue más racionalista que crítica. Sea como fuere, si los principios de la Teoría de la relatividad son a priori y enlazan sintéticamente la experiencia posible, esta teoría nos servirá para entender que las geometrías no euclídeas no son ajenas a los planteamientos de Kant, si bien requieren dar un rodeo epistemológico. La doctrina que nos permite fundamentar las geometrías no euclidianas desde la filosofía de Kant la llamamos “Álgebra de la experiencia”.The main problem for the Theory of the relativity to be in agreement with the Kant´s philosophy is the use of a non-Euclidean geometry. The fact that their principles could be interpreted a priori as synthetic trials is, in our opinion, a secondary problem. If we want that the principles of a science of the nature would be universal and necessary ones without appealing to dogmatisms, then, he have to understand them transcendentally. As in the principle of relativity it is observed, Einstein also thought that the physical laws are universal and necessary ones. However, their perspective was more rationalistic than critic. In any case, if the Theory of Relativity principles are a priori and they synthetically connect the possible experience, then, this theory will allow us to understand that the non-Euclidean geometries are not far away from the Kant´s positions, although they require to made a epistemological turn around. The principle that allows us to base the geometries non Euclidian from the Kant´s philosophy is called “Algebra of the experience”. (shrink)

This paper will make the case that we can find in Kant’s Second Analogy a substantive response to Hume’s argument on induction. This response is substantive insofar as it does not merely consist in independently arguing for the opposite conclusion, but rather, it identifies and exploits a gap in this argument. More specifically, Hume misses the possibility of justifying the uniformity of nature as a synthetic a priori proposition, which Kant looks to establish in the Second Analogy. Note (...) that the focus on the paper is on Kant’s identification of the form that a solution to Hume’s inductive scepticism must take. In making this point, my paper will look to establish two lemmas: Kant identifies synthetic a priori judgments as a means of justifying metaphysical knowledge in a way that circumvents Hume’s dichotomy between matters of fact and relations of ideas; the Second Analogy looks to establish the uniformity of nature of as a synthetic a priori proposition. However, my paper generally abstains from the question of the tenability of Kant’s argument in the Second Analogy. Doing justice to this latter discussion would require more space than I am able to offer here. My paper therefore has a conditional bearing on the philosophical issue of inductive scepticism. If one believes Kant’s Second Analogy to be philosophically cogent, then Kant offers a successful justification of induction against Hume’s scepticism. If not, then at least one can still admire Kant’s identification of the gap in Hume’s argument, which, to a degree, can be exploited independently of Kant’s system. (shrink)

This study focuses on Kant's attempt to find the link between feeling and cognition on a priori grounds in the three Critiques to make philosophical judgment possible. As such it treats the area of aesthetics and its formal principles. This work explores the enigma: How is it that Kant values the talent to judge more than understanding and reason; indeed the lack of it «no school can make good». Yet, even though Kant demonstrates how a priori synthetic (...) judgments and a priori moral judgments are possible as particular pronouncements, he analyzes the power of judgment itself as an independent faculty only in the last Critique. The author argues that the aesthetic factor plays a recalcitrant, yet vital and necessary role in all human judging. Finding an adequate niche for feeling and its a priori principles becomes a key problem not just for Kant but for the entire philosophical enterprise. (shrink)

The Critique of the Quantum Power of Judgement analyzes the a priori principles which underlie the empirical knowledge provided by quantum theory. In contrast to other transcendental approaches to quantum physics, none of the transcendental principles established by Kant is modified in order to cope with the new epistemological situation that arises with the asumption of the quantum postulate. Rather, by considering Bohr's views, it is argued that classical concepts provide the mathematical formalism of quantum theory with physical reference (...) through symbolic analogies in the strict Kantian sense. The main result of the investigation is the determination of the highest principle under which quantum objects are subsumed. This principle states that the conditions of the possibility of the systematic unity of contextual experience are at the same time the conditions of the possibility of quantum objects. Upon this principle rests the possibility of any a priori synthetic knowledge of quantum objects. Therefore, the Critique of the Quantum Power of Judgement yields the prolegomena to any future quantum metaphysics. (shrink)

I argue for the claim that there are instances of a priori justified belief – in particular, justified belief in moral principles – that are not analytic, i.e., that cannot be explained solely by the understanding we have of their propositions. §1–2 provides the background necessary for understanding this claim: in particular, it distinguishes between two ways a proposition can be analytic, Basis and Constitutive, and provides the general form of a moral principle. §§3–5 consider whether Hume's Law, properly (...) interpreted, can be established by Moore's Open Question Argument, and concludes that it cannot: while Moore's argument – appropriately modified – is effective against the idea that moral judgments are either reductively analyzable or Constitutive-analytic, a different argument is needed to show that they are not Basis-analytic. Such an argument is supplied in §6. §§7–8 conclude by considering how these considerations bear on recent discussions of “alternative normative concepts”, on the epistemology of intuitions, and on the differences between disagreement in moral domains and in other a priori domains such as logic and mathematics. (shrink)

Many philosophers take the distinguishing mark of their subject to be its a priori status. In their view, where empirical science is based on the data of experience, philosophy is founded on a priori intuitions. In this paper I shall argue that there is no good sense in which philosophical knowledge is informed by a priori intuitions. Philosophical results have just the same a posteriori status as scientific theories. My strategy will be to pose a familiar dilemma (...) for the friends of a priori philosophical intuitions. I shall ask them whether their intuitions are supposed to be analytic or synthetic. And then I shall argue that, if the intuitions are analytic, they may be a priori, but will be philosophically uninteresting; while, if they are synthetic, they may be philosophically interesting, but will not merit being treated as a priori in the context of philosophical debate. At the end of the paper I explain that this does not mean that philosophy should abandon ‘armchair’ methods. We still need to uncover and examine the often unrecognized intuitions that drive our thinking. However this is not because they provide a distinctive source of a priori knowledge, but on the contrary because they may be leading us astray. (shrink)

An influential strand in philosophy of science claims that scientific paradigms can be understood as relativized a priori frameworks. Here, Kant’s constitutive a priori principles are no longer held to establish conditions of possibility for knowledge which are unchanging and universally true, but are restricted only to a given scientific domain. Yet it is unclear how exactly a relativized a priori can be construed as both stable and dynamical, establishing foundations for current scientific claims while simultaneously making (...) intelligible the transition to a subsequent framework. In this article, I show that important resources for this problem have been overlooked in Kant’s theory of reflective judgement in the third Critique. I argue that Kant accorded the task of formulating new scientific laws to reflective judgement, which is charged with forming new ‘universals’ that guide the experience of nature. I show that this is the very task attributed to the relativized a priori: the constitution of a given conceptual framework, not of the conditions for object-reference as such. I conclude that Kant’s considered conception of science encompasses the operations of both reflective and determining judgement. Relativizations of the a priori should follow Kant’s lead. (shrink)

I try to show that there is much sap (synthetic a priori) knowledge although one may not find many, or even any, sap true statements in most natural languages. Reasons are given for the difficulty of expressing sap truths in natural languages, but it is argued that these are not necessary features of language as such. There are, then, sap true statements in some possible languages.Admission of the sap gives one a way of distinguishing logical from metaphysical possiblity. (...) Something is metaphysically impossible just in case it is a sap truth that it is impossible. I argue that the realm of logically possible entities is vastly larger than the realm of metaphysically possible entities.My.defence of the sap begins with a partial defence of the analytic/synthetic distinction. In particular, I attack the intentionality circle argument,Quine's indeterminacy thesis and some applications of the Kripke/Putnam theory of meaning for natural kind terms. Without being a conclusive defence of the analytic/synthetic distinction, this section makes the defence of the sap more secure. Arguments are then mounted in direct defence of the sap by showing that the purported reduction of sap truths to analytic truths is mistaken. Examples are adduced to show that, even where expressions of natural language fail, one can stipulate usage in ways that allow expression of sap truths. I then consider and reply to various objections, giving an example of the sort of meaning theory which illegitimately legislates the analyticity of any purported sap true statement. (shrink)

In contrast to the systematic development of the previously published La Estructura del Valor, this new work by Hartman proceeds by critical examination of ethical theory from G. E. Moore to the present. If the first work was an attempt to establish on an axiomatic basis a new axiological science, the second intends to confront the paralogisms contained in preceding philosophical discussions of the moral field. Hartman accepts Moore's Principia Ethica as a critique of axiological reason. He also feels that (...) new fallacies other than the naturalistic one have crept into the treatment of morality since Moore. These fallacies affect noncognitivist as well as semi-cognitivist and cognitivist attitudes. In all of these there are dichotomies of the formal/material type which create an impasse in the formation of a scientific, synthetic a priori body of moral propositions. Hartman's critique is better than his own solutions. The most interesting part of this work is that devoted to the measurement of value.--A. M. (shrink)

Fifteen years after the first edition of this comprehensive work, German historicism remains largely and conspicuously in the shadows. The great historico-philological and historico-sociological work produced by, and on the fringes of, this school has given way to specialization. Great polygraphs of the caliber of a Meinecke, a Vossler, a Curtius, a Cassirer, a Croce, or an Auerbach seem to have completely disappeared from the scene. But is the necessity for cultural synthesis that these men stressed any less urgent today (...) than before? One of the major tasks envisioned by thinkers of the early twentieth century was the development of a philosophical anthropology which would consolidate all the preceding work of cultural synthesis. Today this task remains in the far horizon after a series of distinguished but discontinuous achievements. Thus the reappearance of the ambitious work of Professor Rossi is a welcome event. There are now indications that sociology is moving away from the neutral functionalism of the consensus years and is beginning to show some interest in the subconscious and in concrete constellations of values representative of communal forms of consciousness in a situation. Post-industrial society can no longer be examined with the rough tools of micro- or even macro-analysis. Because of their refinements in quantification and their awareness of the most specific features of every particular form of group consciousness, the new middle range methods are akin to the synthetic spirit of the historical school. As middle range research progresses, its results can provide the ontic ground for an ontology of the human condition in its adjustment to the world, and in its communicative-transcendent goals. For this reason, Rossi’s work, though excellent in its expository aspects should be read with care to avoid overemphasizing, as he does, the distance between rationalism and irrationalism that was apparent in the main tendencies of the historical school. Surely it is a worthwhile thing to show the tensions between the relativists such as Simmel and Spengler, the intuitionists such as Windelband and Rickert, and finally the neo-idealists such as Troeltsch and Meinecke. The tension that pulled apart these intellectual currents shows by contrast the great synthetic force operative in the systems of Dilthey and Weber, which provided the dominant inspiration for the whole school. But the fundamental perspective in today’s reconsideration of historicism need not be the tempering of any search for ideals through the insistence on sober methodological limits. A more fruitful emphasis can be placed today on action as a mediator between thought and adjustment, on community as a mediator between society and individuals, and most of all on expression and adventure as mediators between survival and moral absolutes. With his neo-Kantian insistence on the historical method, on the discovery of the historical horizon of the human condition, and on the establishment of the institutional connections within historical periods, Professor Rossi: a) misses the point of the anti-mechanistic efforts of modern philosophy, i.e., the constitution of synthetic a priori judgments in their true home grounds, the field of spontaneous human communication and action; b) restricts the ability on the part of the historical method to penetrate and elucidate the areas of the unconscious and of passive syntheses ; c) both presupposes and trivializes the definition of freedom. Freedom in Rossi’s interpretation of historicism, seems to result from the objective displacement of values, rather than from the dramatic insufficiency of every finite person as it transpires in the highest forms of symbolic communication and interaction.—A. M. (shrink)

A survey of the literature on the problem of the synthetic a priori soon reveals that the term “analytic” is used in a narrower and a broader sense. In the narrower sense, a proposition is analytic if it is either a truth of logic or is logically true. By saying of a proposition that it is logically true, I mean, roughly, and with an eye on the problem of the relation of logical categories to natural languages, that when (...) defined terms are replaced by their definientia, it becomes a substitution instance of a truth of logic. And a truth of logic can be adequately characterized for present purposes as a proposition which occurs in the body of Principia Mathematica, or which would properly occur in a vermehrte und verbesserte Auflage of this already monumental work. If we now agree to extend the convenient phrase “logically true” to cover truths of logic as well as propositions which are logically true in the sense just defined, we can say that an analytic proposition in the narrower sense is a proposition which is logically true. (shrink)

Hans Reichenbach is well known for his limiting frequency view of probability, with his most thorough account given in The Theory of Probability in 1935/1949. Perhaps less known are Reichenbach's early views on probability and its epistemology. In his doctoral thesis from 1915, Reichenbach espouses a Kantian view of probability, where the convergence limit of an empirical frequency distribution is guaranteed to exist thanks to the synthetic a priori principle of lawful distribution. Reichenbach claims to have given a (...) purely objective account of probability, while integrating the concept into a more general philosophical and epistemological framework. A brief synopsis of Reichenbach's thesis and a critical analysis of the problematic steps of his argument will show that the roots of many of his most influential insights on probability and causality can be found in this early work. (shrink)

This article considers an apparent Achilles heel for Kant’s transcendental idealism, concerning his account of how synthetic a priori knowledge is possible. The problem is that while Kant’s distinctive attempt to explain synthetic a priori knowledge lies at the heart of his transcendental idealism, this explanation appears to face a dilemma: either the explanation generates a problematic regress, or the explanation it offers gives us no reason to favour transcendental idealism over transcendental realism. In the article, (...) I consider G. E. Moore’s version of the problem, which I argue has not yet received an adequate response. Instead, I offer a way out of this dilemma by focusing on the normativity rather than the metaphysics of the mind. (shrink)

The feature of being ‘double blind’, where neither patients nor physicians are aware of who receives the experimental treatment, is universally trumpeted as being a virtue of clinical trials. The rationale for this view is unobjectionable: double blinding rules out the potential confounding influences of patient and physician beliefs. Nonetheless, viewing successfully double blind trials as necessarily superior leads to the paradox that very effective experimental treatments will not be supportable by best (double-blind) evidence. It seems strange that an account (...) of evidence should make a priori judgments that certain claims can never be supported by ‘best evidence’. So far as treatments with large effects go, the claim that they are effective is highly testable and intuitively they should receive greater support from the evidence. In this paper I argue that the two potential confounders ruled out by double blinding are often not actual confounders outside placebo controlled trials of treatments with mild effects and that have subjective outcome measures. (shrink)

According to rationalists, synthetic a priori propositions convey new knowledge, whereas analytic propositions are non-informative or vacuous conceptual truths. However, as we argue in this article, each a priori proposition is necessarily true because of its semantic constituents and the way they are combined, and hence can be transformed into its equivalent analytic form. So each synthetic a priori proposition conveys only non-informative conceptual truths like analytic propositions.