Transcendental Dialectic

Transcendental Elementary Doctrine
(General Epistemology)

Transcendental aesthetics
(theory of perception)

Transcendental Logic
(Theory of Thought)

Transcendental Analytics
(theory of concepts and principles,
judgment)

Transcendental dialectic
(logic of appearances,
conclusions)

The transcendental dialectic within the architecture of the Critique of Pure Reason

The transcendental dialectic is the second main part of the transcendental logic from the Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant .

The transcendental dialectic deals with reason in the narrower sense. In the preceding sections of the Critique of Pure Reason (KrV), Kant had shown that and how knowledge arises through the interplay of perception (sensory perception) and thinking as concept formation and judgment by the mind. Based on this, it was his goal to show in the transcendental dialectic, where in the previous metaphysics statements were made due to conceptual errors that are in the nature of reason , but are to be judged as sham in the result.

In an introductory section, Kant clarified what he meant by appearance and how knowledge and reason relate to one another. He emphasized that no additional knowledge can arise from reason alone, because this is nothing other than a reflection on the concepts and judgments already present in the mind. However, for him it was part of the essence of reason to constantly strive for an expansion of knowledge . Kant wrote in the preface to the first edition of the KrV:

“Human reason has a special fate in the genre of its knowledge: that it is bothered by questions that it cannot reject, because they are given to it by the nature of reason itself, which it cannot answer either because it exceeds them all the faculties of human reason. "(A VII)

In the first book of the transcendental dialectic it is clarified what the concepts of pure reason are and with which questions man tends to accept knowledge from reasoning that extends beyond the limits of reason. By constantly looking for a state of affairs, which is always a conditioned, the underlying conditions, it comes to the point that at the end of this chain there must be an unconditional. This unconditional is conceivable for Kant in three ways. The inner sense connects the subject's ideas with an immortal soul. The external sense strives for the totality of the world as a whole. And the eternal source for soul and world, the condition of all conditions, is sought in God. Kant called these three ideas transcendental ideas, since they are only formed in pure reason without any empirical basis.

The problem of transcendental appearance arises when real existence is ascribed to these ideas. The core of the transcendental dialectic is concerned with showing that precisely this mistake has been made over and over again in the history of special metaphysics.

Transcendental appearance

At the beginning of the transcendental logic, Kant pointed out that logic is purely analytical. With it, no content extensions of the knowledge can be achieved. It is only "the negative touchstone of truth ." (B 84) It is a fundamental mistake to use logic "as a tool ( Organon ) in order to spread and expand one's knowledge, at least according to what it claims." ( B 86) If the principles of logic are applied to the realm of pure reason, no new knowledge can be gained either.

"The logical appearance, which consists in the mere imitation of the form of reason, (the appearance of fallacies) arises only from a lack of attention to the logical rule." (B 353)

The creation of such fallacies is in the nature of man, who links concepts into objective principles. From these principles man derives the objective givenness of thought, and this is where his illusion lies . This contrast between the way of thinking and the given and its dissolution is the reason for the title "Transcendental Dialectic". The conditions of knowledge are transferred to thinking, even if this has no empirical content for this. The subjectively necessary way of linking concepts is thought of as the objective necessity of determining things in themselves. It is the task of dialectics to reveal this appearance.

"All my knowledge starts with the senses, goes from there to the understanding and ends with reason, beyond which nothing higher is found in us, to work the material of the perceptions and to bring it under the highest unity of thought." (B 354 )

While the understanding is the ability of rules to bring phenomena to unity, reason is the ability to place the rules of understanding under principles. (B 359) Reason therefore never directly accesses sensual perceptions, but only accesses concepts and judgments of the understanding.

Conclusions of reason according to Kant (B359-360)
Relationship of knowledge in the mind	Rules of Mind (major)	Cognition (minor)	Predicate of the rule (conclusio)
categorically	all M are P	all S are M	all S are P
hypothetical	if p then q	now p (mode ponens) now not q (mode tollens)	so q so not p
disjunctive	X is either Y or Z	X is Y X is not Z	X is not Z X is Y

Kant subsequently discussed the logical use of reason in the form of possible reasoning. In the mind, simple, mostly immediate and therefore only two-stage conclusions are made based on empirical facts, for example: "All people are mortal", "Some people are mortal." or "Immortals are not humans."

Complex conclusions, on the other hand, require an intermediate judgment. For example, the statement “All scholars are mortal” also requires a definition of the concept of a scholar. According to Kant, such steps are all too easily overlooked out of habit. The assignment of a knowledge to a rule of the understanding takes place through the power of judgment. (B 360) Conclusions of reason show what is special in general.

"Accordingly, in the conclusion of a reasoning, we restrict a predicate to a certain object after we have thought it beforehand with the major proposition in its entire scope under a certain condition." (B 378–379)

In accordance with the peculiar nature of reason, the condition of the condition is sought again for the rule, with the aim of finding the unconditioned in the end.

“So the transcendental concept of reason is none other than that of the totality of conditions for a given conditioned. Since the unconditioned alone makes the totality of the conditions possible and, conversely, the totality of the conditions itself is unconditional at all times: a pure concept of reason can generally be explained by the concept of the unconditioned insofar as it contains a reason for synthesis ”(B 379 )

Because rational conclusions refer to something conditioned, they fall under the judgment form of relation in the judgment table, i.e. they are categorical, hypothetical or disjunctive.

Transcendental ideas

Aspects of transcendental ideas in Kant
Transcendental Idea	soul	The whole of the world	Essence of all beings
Unconditionality	immortality	infinity	eternity
idea	subject	totality	Reason
metaphysica specialis	psychology	cosmology	theology
Reasoning	categorically	hypothetical	disjunctive
Fallacy	Paralogism	Antinomy	Proof of God
purpose	morality	Laws of nature	bliss
Thinking level	practice	theory	Believe
action	To do	Knowledge	To hope

Kant named concepts of reason with reference to Plato ideas . If these concepts are pure, that is, without an empirical basis, they are then transcendental ideas. They exceed the limits of experience and can never be imagined “in concrete terms”. According to the final types, the transcendental ideas can be divided into three classes:

the soul as the unconditional unity of the thinking subject
the world as the unconditional unity of the series of conditions of appearance
the essence of all beings ( God ) as the unconditional unity of the condition of all objects of thought in general.

With this structure, Kant followed Christian Wolff's division of special metaphysics into a rational psychology (theory of the soul), a rational cosmology (world science) and a rational theology (knowledge of God). Kant used the addition rational to indicate that the respective considerations have to be transcendental, i.e. free of empirical knowledge. Kant conducted the discussion on the respective topics using the categories . In the sense of uncovering the transcendental appearance that is connected with these ideas, the following sections on paralogisms (fallacies of the theory of the soul), antinomies (contradictions of world science) and on the ideal of pure reason (faulty proofs of God) are a fundamental critique of previous school metaphysics .

Paralogisms

A paralogism (from the Greek "para" against and "logos" reason, ie "irrational") is an unwanted logical fallacy in terms of form. Kant called it transcendental insofar as it relates to a transcendental idea. In the scheme of the categorical judgment, the subject of the statement is swapped in the middle clause (minor) unnoticed by the use of an equivocal term:

	All foxes have red tails
	Socrates is a fox
Fallacy	Socrates has a red tail

According to the categorical way of inferring, there arises the idea of an unconditional unity of the thinking subject on which all our ideas are based, the psychological idea of the soul. This is attributed to substantiality, immateriality and finally immortality. The “misunderstanding” leading to a fallacy lies in the fact that the purely linguistic unity of consciousness (the “I think!”) Is identified as identical with the view of the subject of himself, i.e. as an object, and the category of substance is applied to it.

The transcendental “I think” is a purely conceptual figure, a borderline concept, an empty X, which is used to identify the fact that each thought can only ever be thought by one subject. Every thought and every statement is necessarily accompanied by the fact that an “I” carries this thought. It is a “vehicle for all concepts in general” (B 399). This “I” is always a subject and never a predicate, i.e. the content of what is thought. The logical ego is the determining self in contrast to the empirical ego as the determined self (B 407). You cannot make any substantive statements about this “I think”. In the sentence “I think that X is the case”, the “I” does not yet have any empirical content. It has no other function than to bind the sentence to a subject.

The logical discussion of the transcendental unity of the subject is purely analytical, that is, just a dissection of the term “I think”, from which no content-related expansion results. On the other hand, statements about the soul, about the self, can only be made on the basis of experience. Statements that are based on experience, however, are not suitable to prove the immortality of the soul. The thesis of the immortality of the soul is transcendent, because it is directed towards a world beyond, which cannot be experienced. A rational psychology based solely on reason can only be analytical. Otherwise it would be an empirical discipline that deals with the human psyche based on experience.

The basic mistake of rational psychology lies in the following reasoning:

“What cannot be thought of as otherwise than a subject does not exist as otherwise than a subject and is therefore substance.

Now, a thinking being, viewed merely as such, cannot be thought of as a subject in any other way.

So it also exists as such, ie substance. "(B 410-411)

Kant pointed out that the major proposition is based on the empirical ego, which one grasps through intuition and reflection on one's own consciousness. The minor premise of the reasoning, however, only relates to the logical unit of the subject.

“Thinking is taken in completely different meanings in both premises: In the major, how it relates to the object in general (thus how it may be given in perception); in the subordinate clause, however, only as it consists in the relationship to self-consciousness, whereby no object is thought of at all, but only the relationship to oneself as a subject (as the form of thinking) is presented. In the first one speaks of things that cannot be thought of as subjects; in the second, however, not of things, but of thinking (by abstracting from all objects), in which the ego always serves as the subject of consciousness; [...] "(B 411 FN)

The concept of substance is always already an empirically charged concept. Because a substance is always an object, something specific. In relation to the subject, one can only speak of a substance if one tries to think of consciousness as an (empirical) object. The question of self is a question of knowledge. However, a statement about immortality is not possible by way of knowledge. Kant emphasized accordingly:

“That the first reasoning of transcendental psychology only imposes on us a supposed new insight, in that it presents the constant logical subject of thought as the knowledge of the real subject of inherence , of which we do not have the slightest knowledge, nor can we have, because consciousness the only thing is that turns ideas into thoughts, and consequently all of our perceptions, as the transcendental subject, must be encountered and, apart from this logical consideration of the I, we have no knowledge of the subject in itself. "(A 350)

Paralogisms of rational psychology according to Kant (B 407-409)
category	In the logical discussion this is "I think" (analytical)	in rational psychology the soul is (synthetic)	Paralogism of
relation	always the determining subject	a substance	Substantiality
quality	a singular in thinking (logically simple)	easy	simplicity
quantity	self-identical	a person	Personality
modality	different from external things	the existence of external things doubtful	Ideality

In the first edition of the KrV, Kant supplemented his fundamental criticism of rational psychology with further paralogisms that he formed according to his categories. The order of the categories is changed, since the concept of substance forms the key to all paralogisms and was thus first considered by Kant.

The second paralogism is the thesis that the soul is simple.

“That thing whose actions can never be seen as the competition of many acting things is simple.

Now the soul, or what I think, is one of these:

So etc. "(A 351)

Kant called this paralogism "Achilles of all dialectical conclusions of the pure theory of the soul" (A 351) because the argument is strong and hardly refutable. The reasoning sounds (at first) plausible to Kant, because a thought, no matter how many elements it consists of, only comes to a unity if there is a simple reference point of the inner sense, the unity of the thinking subject. The verse of a poem arises not only from the individual words, but from the way they are combined.

Kant started his criticism on the term "the absolute unity of the thinking subject". This is not an analytical statement, but has an empirical content because the idea of a thinking being who forms a thought is already an object of thought. The phrase “I am simple” is synthetic. According to Kant, this is also where Descartes' problem lies :

"[S] o how the supposed Cartesian conclusion, cogito ergo sum , is in fact tautological in that the cogito (sum cogitans [= I am thinking]) expresses reality directly." (A 355)

With Descartes and in his successor with Wolff and Baumgarten , the “I think” is linked to the idea of one's own existence. But this is an empirical idea (B 428) which cannot be the basis for proving the immortality of the soul. There is again a confusion of the logical function of the "view of myself as a thinking object" (B 406)

"The simplicity of the idea of a subject is therefore not a knowledge of the simplicity of the subject itself, because its properties are completely abstracted if it is only through the expression I, which is completely empty of content (which I can apply to any thinking subject) is designated, "(A 355)

In the third paralogism the thesis is considered that the soul is a person .

“What is aware of the numerical identity of itself at different times is a person.

Now the soul etc.

So she is a person. "(A 361)

The identity thesis implies that an object is persistent in time. The identity of the self also presupposes numerically identical correspondence over time. Kant's critique again takes up the opposition between the logical subject and empirical consciousness:

“So the identity of the consciousness of myself in different times is only a formal condition of my thoughts and their context, but does not prove the numerical identity of my subject in which, regardless of the logical identity of the ego, such a change can have taken place which does not allow it to be maintained; [...] "(A 363)

The fourth paralogism has not only the soul, but its relation to matter to the object. It is a direct confrontation with Descartes and thus a sketch of the philosophy of mind in Kant. The paralogism reads:

"That which can be inferred to exist only as a cause for given perceptions has a dubious existence:

Now all external appearances are of the kind that their existence is not perceived directly, but can only be inferred from them as the cause of given perceptions:

So the existence of all objects in the external sense is doubtful. This uncertainty I call the ideality of external appearances and the doctrine of this ideality idealism, in comparison with which the assertion of a possible certainty of objects of external senses is called dualism. ”(A 366–367)

Kant first expressly agreed with Descartes that one can only infer external things because one really knows the effect of the inner sense. This conclusion is uncertain, however, because the effect can have various causes both in external things and in the type of processing in the internal sense. Hence one can justifiably speak as existence only of what is immediately given in the internal sense, and these are the appearances.

Transcendental idealism
(4th paralogism: A369-371)
Transcendental idealism	Transcendental realism
Space and time are sensual forms of our perception	Space and time exist as things in themselves
Reality only have appearances	Space and time are conditions of objects
The existence of matter is based on the self-confidence of the secure existence of oneself	Things also exist without our senses
The security of my existence also makes the reality of external things certain	The reality of things outside of us is mere imagination
Consciousness is sufficient proof of the reality of things for me	The existence of external things is doubtful
Empirical realism	Empirical idealism

For the following considerations, Kant worked out the difference between transcendental idealism and transcendental realism (A 369-377). The two opposing positions differ in their assessment of "things in themselves". At this point it becomes clear why Kant, according to the classical epistemological classification, can be classified as a realist, albeit a weak one. For the transcendental idealist, space and time are pure forms of sensual intuition. They therefore belong to the realm of the inner sense. The idea of space belongs as a pure intuition to the inner sense, but is directed towards the outer appearances. Objects in space therefore only have reality as appearances. The existence of matter is based on the self-awareness of one's own existence. It is not closed, but perceived. The security of one's own existence through the perception of the inner sense makes the reality of outer things certain through the connection with the idea of space. For Kant, consciousness was sufficient proof of the reality of things. In this respect he could also call himself an empirical realist. However, in terms of content, humans cannot say anything about things in themselves, but can only come to material statements about them as phenomena.

With the transcendental realist it is the other way round. For him, space and time exist as things in themselves. Space and time are conditions for the existence of objects. As a consequence, these also exist without humans grasping them with their senses. The empirical problem, however, is that we don't know exactly how things outside of us differ from our perception. The existence of external things is therefore only doubtful. This turns the transcendental realist into someone who doubts the knowability of reality from experience, i.e. an empirical idealist.

“By an [empirical] idealist one does not have to understand someone who [like Berkeley ] denies the existence of external objects of the senses, but who [like Hume ] just does not admit that it is known through direct perception, but concludes from this that we can never be completely certain of their reality through all possible experience. ”(A 368-369)

According to Kant, the problem of doubt arises from the reification (hypostatization) of external appearances, when these are "no longer viewed as representations, but in the same quality as they are in us, also as things existing outside of us" (A 386 ). If, instead, one assumes that bodies or movements are mere appearances “who knows which unknown object” (A 387), one has no problem understanding what is known as reality.

Kant called the mind-body problem “a notorious question” (A 392).

"Such a predetermined community between two kinds of substances, the thinking and the extended, is based on a gross dualism and makes the latter, which are nothing but mere representations of the thinking subject, into things that exist in themselves."

- Immanuel Kant: AA IV, 245– A 392

The evidence for the physical influence is "void and surreptitious" (A 392). Such an assertion cannot be substantiated, only presupposed (A 394). This creates an “imaginary science” that “revolves in an eternal circle of ambiguities and contradictions.” (A 395) Just like the question of immortality, the mind-body problem was also a pseudo -problem for Kant. Knowledge of the self is limited to the logical “I think”. The psyche, like the body, can at best be grasped empirically as an object.

Antinomies

Just as the search for the unconditioned in the inner sense leads to the soul as the absolute unity of the thinking subject, so also in the outer sense seeks to infer the unconditioned, the totality of all appearances, from the conditioned, the perceived phenomenon. The particular metaphysics that deals with this question is rational cosmology. Kant tried to derive the principles of the unconditional in the external sense with the concept of absolute completeness and from the categories. From this Kant formed the "system of cosmological ideas". They “deal with the totality of the regressive synthesis”, that is, going back to an origin. Totality is the coherent whole of all empirical things and events.

Cosmological ideas in Kant
object	The absolute	Absolute completeness (B 442)	feature
World beginning / world border	unit	the composition of the given whole of all phenomena	Mathematical world concepts (size and number)
matter	simplicity	the division of a given whole in appearance	Mathematical world concepts (size and number)
Automatic cause	causality	the emergence of a phenomenon in general	Concepts of nature dynamic (existence of phenomena)
World reason	need	the dependence of the existence of the changeable in appearance	Concepts of nature dynamic (existence of phenomena)

The pure understanding concepts of space and time form the origin related to quantity. Their unity results from the absolute completeness of the composition of the given whole of all phenomena. When looking at space, the regression leads to an imaginary world boundary and when looking at time to an imaginary beginning of the world. With regard to quality, Kant saw the unconditional in the absolute completeness of the division of a given whole in appearance. A complete division leads to the unity of matter. In relation to each other, it is causality "which presents a number of the causes for a given effect". The recourse to the absolute completeness of the emergence of a phenomenon in general leads to an automatic cause of every existence. The absolute in the modality arises as the necessity of a world ground. This is the absolute completeness of the dependence of the existence of the changeable in appearance.

Just as Kant distinguished mathematical forms of judgment in terms of quantity and quality from dynamic forms of judgment in terms of relation and modality in the transcendental analytics, he also made a distinction between mathematical and dynamic ideas in cosmological ideas. The consideration of the totality of the world from the point of view of space and time as well as matter is done according to number and size. Composition and division lead to a world concept of a "mathematical whole". If, on the other hand, one examines the origin of things and the interdependencies between the changes in the phenomena, a picture of the “dynamic whole” in nature emerges in the existence of the phenomena.

“We have two expressions: world and nature, which sometimes run into each other. The first signifies the mathematical whole of all phenomena and the totality of their synthesis, both large and small, that is, both in their progress through composition and division. But the very same world is called nature, insofar as it is viewed as a dynamic whole, and one does not look to agregation in space or time in order to bring it about as size, but to the unity in the existence of appearances. "(B. 446-447)

According to Kant, the problem of pure reason lies in the fact that after finding the cosmological ideas that enable the unity of thought, it allows itself to be led into making statements that cannot be substantiated by any experience. Such judgments about cosmological ideas lead, according to Kant, to antinomies, which he also referred to as "conflict of laws" (B 434). To demonstrate this conflict, he used the "skeptical method". This is not to be confused with skepticism , but a methodical procedure that is of particular importance for criticalism and in which the conflicting statements are compared in a thesis and an antithesis (antithesis).

Antinomies of pure reason according to Kant (B454ff)
	thesis	Antithesis
I.	"The world has a beginning in time, and according to space it is also enclosed within limits."	"The world has no beginning and no limits in space, but is, both in terms of time and space, infinite."
II.	"Every compound substance in the world consists of simple parts, and everywhere there is nothing but the simple, or that which is composed of it."	"No compound thing in the world consists of simple parts, and nothing simple exists in the same anywhere."
III.	“Causality according to the laws of nature is not the only one from which the phenomena of the world as a whole can be derived. It is still necessary to assume a causality through freedom to explain it. "	"It is not freedom, everything in the world just happens according to the laws of nature."
IV.	"Something belongs to the world which, either as its part or its cause, is an absolutely necessary being."	"There is no absolutely necessary being everywhere, neither in the world nor outside the world, as its cause."

Kant now tried to prove the thesis and the antithesis in accordance with his skeptical procedure. It should be noted that the related arguments are "staged"; for in the end Kant had the goal of proving the contradictions as insoluble, and thus to underpin his fundamental thesis that knowledge of this kind cannot be derived from pure reason.

In resolving the first two, the mathematical antinomies, the realization arises that thesis and antithesis are wrong, because they argue dogmatically and treat the appearances as if they were things in themselves. With regard to the resolution of the last two, the dynamic antinomies, it is possible that the thesis and the antithesis are both true. While the thesis relates to things in themselves, the antithesis discusses the world of appearances. So the freedom of action and the existence of a necessary being are at least conceivable.

Proof of God

The disjunctive, exclusive type of connection gives rise to the idea of an unconditional unity of all objects of thought in general, the idea of a supreme being, the theological idea of God. In the discussion of the three classical proofs of God , it turns out that the real reason for proof lies in the ontological argument. Because the cosmological proof can only pass from the assumed, absolutely necessary existence of a being to the highest being if this itself can be proven to be absolutely necessary, and the physico-theological proof only reaches a world builder, but not an absolutely necessary being . The fault of the ontological proof lies in the thought of necessary existence. We can only escape from it if we understand the thought of necessity and the corresponding concept of contingency not as determinations of things, but as regulative principles of reason. God can be thought but not known.

The functions of human reason

The systematic criticism of traditional special metaphysics has shown that hopes of being able to recognize an immortal soul, the world as the totality of appearances or God as the source of the world with the means of pure reason, turn out to be transcendental appearances. Moses Mendelssohn therefore spoke of the "Kant crushing everything". However, Kant did not leave it at that. The final chapter of the transcendental dialectic (the "appendix") rather gives a positive outlook on the function of a pure reason purified by criticism. For Kant it would be nonsensical if man had a reason that only drives him into error.

"Everything that is based in the nature of our powers must be appropriate and unanimous with the correct use of them, if we can only prevent a certain misunderstanding and find the actual direction of them." (B 670-671)

On the regulative use of ideas

The function of reason is to bring concepts and judgments of the understanding under principles. This does not create any new knowledge, but an order that is necessary for man's progress in knowledge in the sciences.

“I therefore maintain: the transcendental ideas are never of constitutive use in such a way that certain objects are given by concepts, and in the case that they are understood in this way, they are merely rational (dialectical) concepts. On the other hand, however, they have an excellent and indispensable regulative use, namely to direct the understanding towards a certain goal, [...] "(B 672)

Reason creates systematics in knowledge. Such a system requires the idea of a whole behind it. Only then do knowledge lose the character of the accidental. Empirically there is no such thing as pure water or pure air. Nevertheless, one needs such terms as an idea for scientific research in order to be able to explain effects in nature. In the creation of regulative principles, reason is only used hypothetically in order to "derive the particular from the general." (B 674)

"All possible intellectual cognitions (including the empirical) have rational unity, and are subject to common principles from which they can be mapped, regardless of their difference: that would be a transcendental principle of reason, which the systematic unity is not merely subjective and logical, as a method, but objectively necessary. "(B 676)

To clarify this thesis, Kant referred to so-called “school rules” or “logical principles” in philosophy.

“That the beginnings (principles) do not have to be duplicated without need (entia praeter necessitatem non esse mulitplicanda)” (B 680, see Ockhams razor ). Kant called this "the logical principle of the species", the law of homogeneity or the economy of the basic causes.
The diversity of things must not be blindly diminished (“entium varietatis non temere esse minuendas”) (B 683). This is the principle of the variety of species, the law of specification, or the multiplicity of effects.
The continuous "transition from one species to another through the gradual growth of diversity" (B 685-686) as the principle of the continuity of forms, the law of the affinity of all concepts or the relationship of the members of nature ("datur continuum formarum" - there is a continuum of forms; B 687)

These principles of reason are synthetic propositions a priori, since they hold independent of experience. They are objective, but not constitutive for knowledge, only hypothetical because they are mere ideas. For them there is “no corresponding scheme of sensuality” (B 692). Philosophy of science concepts are accordingly pure constructs of the mind, only subjectively valid maxims (B 694). But they must follow logical principles, be it in the descent from the general (from a highest species) or in the rise from the manifold (from the lowest species). The principle of continuity requires coherence of theories.

Ultimate purpose of the natural dialectic of reason

The dialectic does not come directly from the ideas of pure reason, but it is “their mere abuse” that leads to “deceptive appearances”. Kant did not want to regard the ideas of reason as “merely empty things of thought (entia rationis ratiocinantis)” (B 697). Kant was convinced that there is an expediency in nature on which natural research is oriented. And this expediency is based on the idea of an author.

"If one then asks [...]: whether there is anything different from the world that contains the basis of the world order and its connection according to general laws, the answer is: without a doubt." (B 722-723)

This difference lies outside the experience and is only an analogy, only an “object in the idea and not in reality”. One can even link this idea with “certain anthropomorphisms”, as long as one regards it only as a regulative principle of the systematic unity of the world. (B 723)

"For the regulative law of systematic unity wants us to study nature as if systematic and purposeful unity, with the greatest possible diversity, were encountered everywhere into infinity." (B 728)

Man can look at the things of the world "as if they had their existence from a supreme intelligence." (B 699) From this it follows for the natural scientist that he can always suspect something else beyond what has been known and as the basis of his theories Metaphysics of nature is possible. On the other hand, the regulative idea of the origin of the world also justifies a metaphysics of freedom, which is reflected in the practical area of human activity, in the metaphysics of morals.

Remarks

↑ Immanuel Kant, Collected Writings. Ed .: Vol. 1-22 Prussian Academy of Sciences, Vol. 23 German Academy of Sciences in Berlin, from Vol. 24 Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Berlin 1900ff., AA 000004IV, 245– A 392 .
^ Otfried Höffe: Kant, Beck, Munich 7th edition 2007, 147
↑ Moses Mendelssohn: Morning Hours or Lectures on God's Daseyn, 1785, in: Gesammelte Werke, Volume 3.2, Stuttgart 1974, p. 3
↑ Hans Michael Baumgartner: Kant's "Critique of Pure Reason", 6th edition Munich 2006, 123-124

literature

Jiři Chotaš (Ed.): Metaphysics and Criticism: Interpretations of the "Transcendental Dialectic" of the Critique of Pure Reason . Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2010. ISBN 978-3-8260-3580-7 .
Immanuel Kant: Critique of Pure Reason
Rudolf Eisler : Kant-Lexikon , Olms, ISBN 3487007444 online
Nikolai F. Klimmek: Kant's system of transcendental ideas (= book series Kant studies , supplementary books . Volume 147, Kant Society (ed.): Gerhard Funke , Manfred Baum , Bernd Dörflinger, Thomas M. Seebohm). de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2005, ISBN 978-3-11-018349-8 / doi : 10.1515 / 9783110919301
Jannis Pissis: Kant's transcendental dialectic: on its systematic meaning . (At the same time: Dissertation, Berlin, Free University 2010 udT: Jannis Pissis: On the systematic meaning of Kant's transcendental dialectic ). De Gruyter, Berlin [a. a.], 2012. ISBN 978-3-11-028156-9 .
Friedhelm Schneider: Kant's transcendental dialectic or The Unreason in Reason . Attempto-Verlag, Tübingen 1999. ISBN 3-89308-303-0 .

Web links

[1] Immanuel Kant, Collected Writings. Ed .: Vol. 1-22 Prussian Academy of Sciences, Vol. 23 German Academy of Sciences in Berlin, from Vol. 24 Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Berlin 1900ff., AA 000004IV, 245– A 392 .

[2] Otfried Höffe: Kant, Beck, Munich 7th edition 2007, 147

[3] Moses Mendelssohn: Morning Hours or Lectures on God's Daseyn, 1785, in: Gesammelte Werke, Volume 3.2, Stuttgart 1974, p. 3

[4] Hans Michael Baumgartner: Kant's "Critique of Pure Reason", 6th edition Munich 2006, 123-124