Recovering the ‘True Meaning’ of the Pre-Established Harmony: On a Neglected Key to Kant’s Theory of Intuition
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Rahel Villinger
Abstract:
The paper discusses Kant’s enigmatic claim that his critical philosophy succeeds in articulating a philosophical insight at which Leibniz’s pre-established harmony was ‘truly’ aimed. Kant makes the claim in response to Salomon Maimon’s (mis)reading of his Transcendental Deduction of the Categories, which involves, in Kant’s words, the untenable assumption of a capacity of divine (intuitive) understanding in humans. The paper argues that Maimon’s misreading of Kant’s account of human intuition has found influential followers in contemporary Kant scholarship and that it is based on a failure to distinguish between what Kant calls “mere sensible appearances” and real phenomena of nature. While the former are entirely sensible singularities without unity, the latter are units composed of infinitely many sensible appearances, and their unity requires understanding. Kant thus appeals to a refurbished version of Leibniz’s pre-established harmony of mind and world, which takes the form of an immanent, indubitable, but ultimately inexplicable harmony of the faculties of sensibility and understanding. The paper includes a reconstruction of both the B-Deduction’s argument and the role of transcendental imagination in the proof.
© 2017 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Titelseiten
- Abhandlungen
- Kant on Modalities and Justification
- Recovering the ‘True Meaning’ of the Pre-Established Harmony: On a Neglected Key to Kant’s Theory of Intuition
- Das Prinzip der Apperzeption und der Aufbau der Beweisführung der Deduktion B
- Mendelssohn’s Refutation of Kant’s Critique of the Ontological Proof
- Enthusiasmus und Ekel
- Buchbesprechungen
- Corey W. Dyck: Kant and Rational Psychology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. xx, 257 pp. ISBN 978-0-19-968829-6.
- Georg Cavallar: Kant’s Embedded Cosmopolitanism: History, Philosophy, and Education for World Citizens. Berlin/Boston: de Gruyter, 2015, 215 pp., ISBN 9783110438499.
- Matthias Hoesch: Vernunft und Vorsehung. Säkularisierte Eschatologie in Kants Religions- und Geschichtsphilosophie. Berlin/Boston: Verlag Walter de Gruyter, 2014. 390 Seiten. ISBN 978-3110351255.
- Kant on Emotion and Value. Ed. by Alix Cohen. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. XIII, 301 p. ISBN 978-1-137-27664-3.
- Lawrence R. Pasternack: Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Kant on Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason: An Interpretation and Defense. London/New York: Routledge, 2014. XV; 272 pp. ISBN 978-0-415-50786-8.
- Alfredo Ferrarin: The Powers of Pure Reason: Kant and the Idea of Cosmic Philosophy, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2015, 325 p., ISBN 9780226243153.
- Kants Begründung von Freiheit und Moral in Grundlegung III. Neue Interpretationen. Hrsg. von Dieter Schönecker. Münster: Mentis, 2015. 332 Seiten. ISBN 978-3-89785-078-1.
- Kant’s Lectures on Ethics. A Critical Guide. Ed. by Lara Denis and Oliver Sensen. Cambridge University Press, 2015. 289 pp. ISBN 978-1-107-03631-4.
- Johann Nicolaus Tetens: Metaphysik. Hrsg. von Michael Sellhoff. Hamburg: Meiner, 2015. CXLIII, 349 Seiten. ISBN 978-3-7873-2765-2.
- Diane Williamson: Kant’s Theory of Emotion. Emotional Universalism. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. X, 279 Seiten. ISBN 978-1-137-49981-3.
- Comparing Kant and Sartre. Ed. by Sorin Baiasu. London/New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016, 262 pp. ISBN 978-1-137-45452-2.
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Titelseiten
- Abhandlungen
- Kant on Modalities and Justification
- Recovering the ‘True Meaning’ of the Pre-Established Harmony: On a Neglected Key to Kant’s Theory of Intuition
- Das Prinzip der Apperzeption und der Aufbau der Beweisführung der Deduktion B
- Mendelssohn’s Refutation of Kant’s Critique of the Ontological Proof
- Enthusiasmus und Ekel
- Buchbesprechungen
- Corey W. Dyck: Kant and Rational Psychology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. xx, 257 pp. ISBN 978-0-19-968829-6.
- Georg Cavallar: Kant’s Embedded Cosmopolitanism: History, Philosophy, and Education for World Citizens. Berlin/Boston: de Gruyter, 2015, 215 pp., ISBN 9783110438499.
- Matthias Hoesch: Vernunft und Vorsehung. Säkularisierte Eschatologie in Kants Religions- und Geschichtsphilosophie. Berlin/Boston: Verlag Walter de Gruyter, 2014. 390 Seiten. ISBN 978-3110351255.
- Kant on Emotion and Value. Ed. by Alix Cohen. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. XIII, 301 p. ISBN 978-1-137-27664-3.
- Lawrence R. Pasternack: Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Kant on Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason: An Interpretation and Defense. London/New York: Routledge, 2014. XV; 272 pp. ISBN 978-0-415-50786-8.
- Alfredo Ferrarin: The Powers of Pure Reason: Kant and the Idea of Cosmic Philosophy, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2015, 325 p., ISBN 9780226243153.
- Kants Begründung von Freiheit und Moral in Grundlegung III. Neue Interpretationen. Hrsg. von Dieter Schönecker. Münster: Mentis, 2015. 332 Seiten. ISBN 978-3-89785-078-1.
- Kant’s Lectures on Ethics. A Critical Guide. Ed. by Lara Denis and Oliver Sensen. Cambridge University Press, 2015. 289 pp. ISBN 978-1-107-03631-4.
- Johann Nicolaus Tetens: Metaphysik. Hrsg. von Michael Sellhoff. Hamburg: Meiner, 2015. CXLIII, 349 Seiten. ISBN 978-3-7873-2765-2.
- Diane Williamson: Kant’s Theory of Emotion. Emotional Universalism. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. X, 279 Seiten. ISBN 978-1-137-49981-3.
- Comparing Kant and Sartre. Ed. by Sorin Baiasu. London/New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016, 262 pp. ISBN 978-1-137-45452-2.
