Der Kummer der Vernunft. Zu Kants Idee einer allgemeinen Geschichtsphilosophie in therapeutischer Absicht
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Arnd Pollmann
Abstract
A cursory overview of the most recent studies on Kant's philosophy of history might lead one to suspect that Kant was so confident of the moral potential of human reason that the future could only lead to human progress. But in fact Kant was very much conscious of the disheartening picture that human development presented. In the conclusion to his Conjectures on the Beginnings of Human History he writes: “The thinking person is assailed by a melancholy that can even lead to moral corruption, something of which the unthinking person knows nothing: namely a dissatisfaction with that providence that rules the course of the world.” But Kant not wish to remain in a state of “melancholy”. He sees a possible connection between melancholy and the philosophy of history. In his relevant writings Kant addresses himself directly to the threat of this despair. The horrors of history can yield a philosophical meaning. Not history itself, but rather the philosophy of history has the capacity to console us. It can “heal” that which is lacking in wholeness through human progress. And because the history of philosophy contributes to the recovery of hope and conviction, it itself becomes an important movens of history.
© Walter de Gruyter 2011
Artikel in diesem Heft
- A Revolution in Method, Kant's “Copernican Hypothesis”, and the Necessity of Natural Laws
- Kant and Whewell on Bridging Principles between Metaphysics and Science
- The Structure of the Theoretical Power of Judgment. Kant and the Value of Our Empirical Cognitions
- Der Kummer der Vernunft. Zu Kants Idee einer allgemeinen Geschichtsphilosophie in therapeutischer Absicht
- Der Briefwechsel zwischen Immanuel Kant und Jeronimo de Bosch. Oder ein Beitrag zum holländisch-deutschen Austausch über die kritische Philosophie
- Gründlich zerstört oder gründlich gelesen? Eine Replik auf Brandts alternative Lesart des § 9 der Tugendlehre
- Buchbesprechungen
- Siglenverzeichnis
- Appel à communications: Kant: Théologie et religion
- Die Kant-Gesellschaft trauert um Hans-Martin Gerlach
Artikel in diesem Heft
- A Revolution in Method, Kant's “Copernican Hypothesis”, and the Necessity of Natural Laws
- Kant and Whewell on Bridging Principles between Metaphysics and Science
- The Structure of the Theoretical Power of Judgment. Kant and the Value of Our Empirical Cognitions
- Der Kummer der Vernunft. Zu Kants Idee einer allgemeinen Geschichtsphilosophie in therapeutischer Absicht
- Der Briefwechsel zwischen Immanuel Kant und Jeronimo de Bosch. Oder ein Beitrag zum holländisch-deutschen Austausch über die kritische Philosophie
- Gründlich zerstört oder gründlich gelesen? Eine Replik auf Brandts alternative Lesart des § 9 der Tugendlehre
- Buchbesprechungen
- Siglenverzeichnis
- Appel à communications: Kant: Théologie et religion
- Die Kant-Gesellschaft trauert um Hans-Martin Gerlach
