Kant on Formal Modality

Ian S. Blecher

doi:10.1515/kant-2013-0005

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Kant on Formal Modality

Ian S. Blecher

Published/Copyright: March 20, 2013

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From the journal Kant-Studien Volume 104 Issue 1

Abstract: I propose to explain Kant’s novel claim, in the Critique of Pure Reason, that all judgments have a formal modality. I begin by distinguishing the modality of a judgment’s form from the modality of its content, and I suggest that the former is peculiar in merely affecting the subject’s understanding of his own act of judging. I then contrast the modal account of such an understanding (in terms of the possibility and actuality of a judgment) with the traditional, non-modal understanding of it (in terms of the giving and withholding of assent). I conclude by suggesting that Kant prefers the former because he conceives of knowledge on Aristotle’s model: as a progress in the mind from capacity to act.

: Logic; theory of judgment; modal theory; Aristotle

Published Online: 2013-03-20

Published in Print: 2013-03-01

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https://doi.org/10.1515/kant-2013-0005