CTK

Ileana Beade, Universidad Nacional del Rosario, Argentina Marceline Morais, Cégep Saint Laurent, Montréal, Canadá Antonino Falduto, Univ. de Halle, Alemania

Cinara Nahra, UFRN, Brasil

Pablo Muchnik, Emerson College, Estados Unidos

Margit Ruffing, Universidad de Mainz, Alemania

Ileana Beade, Universidad Nacional del Rosario, Argentina Marceline Morais, Cégep Saint Laurent, Montréal, Canadá Antonino Falduto, Univ. de Halle, Alemania

Cinara Nahra, UFRN, Brasil

Editora de noticias / Newsletter Editor

Ana-Carolina Gutiérrez-Xivillé, Philipps-Universität Marburg / Universidad de Barcelona, España

Consejo Editorial / Editorial Board

Juan Arana, Universidad de Sevilla, España

Rodolfo Arango, Universidad de los Andes, Colombia Sorin Baiasu, Universidad de Keele, Reino Unido Aylton Barbieri Durao, UFSC, Brasil

Ileana Beade, Universidad Nacional del Rosario, Argentina Giorgia Cecchinato, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais,Brasil Angelo Cicatello, Università di Palermo, Italia

Alix A. Cohen, Universidad de Edimburgo, Reino Unido

Vadim Chaly, Univ. Federal Báltica I. Kant, Federación de Rusia Silvia Del Luján Di Sanza, Universidad de San Martín,Argentina Francesca Fantasia, Univ. de Palermo/Univ. de Halle, Italia

CTK 6

Luca Fonnesu, Universidad de Pavía, Italia

Roe Fremstedal, University of Tromsø – The Arctic University of Norway, Noruega

Jesús González Fisac, Universidad de Cádiz, España

Caroline Guibet-Lafaye, CNRS, Francia

Ricardo Gutiérrez Aguilar, IFS-CSIC, España

Ana-Carolina Gutiérrez-Xivillé, Philipps-Universität Marburg / Universidad de Barcelona, España

Claudia Jáuregui, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina

Mai Lequan, Universidad de Lyon III, Francia

Reidar Maliks, Universitetet i Oslo, Noruega

Macarena Marey, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina Pablo Muchnik, Emerson College, Estados Unidos Faustino Oncina, Universidad de Valencia, España

Pablo Oyarzún, Universidad de Chile, Chile

Ricardo Parellada, UCM, España

Alice Pinheiro Walla, Trinity College Dublin, Irlanda Hernán Pringe, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina Faviola Rivera, IIF-UNAM, México

Concha Roldán, IFS-CSIC, España

Rogelio Rovira, UCM, España

Konstantinos Sargentis, University of Crete, Grecia

Manuel Sánchez Rodríguez, Universidad de Granada, España Thomas Sturm, Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona, España Pedro Jesús Teruel, Universidad de Valencia, España Gabriele Tomasi, Universidad de Padua, Italia

Marcos Thisted, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina

Salvi Turró, Universidad de Barcelona, España

Milla Vaha, Univ. of Turku, Finlandia

Astrid Wagner, TU-Berlín, Alemania

Sandra Zakutna, Univ. de PreŠov, Eslovaquia

Consejo Asesor / Advisory Board

Lubomir Bélas, Univ. de PreŠov, Eslovaquia

Reinhard Brandt, Universidad de Marburgo, Alemania

Juan Adolfo Bonaccini, Universidad Federal de Pernambuco, Brasil

Mario Caimi, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina Monique Castillo, Universidad de París XII-Créteil, Francia Jesús Conill, Universidad de Valencia, España

Adela Cortina, Universidad de Valencia, España

María José Callejo, UCM, España

Robinson dos Santos, Universidad Federal de Pelotas, Brasil

Vicente Durán, Pontificia Universidad Javeriana de Bogotá, Colombia

Bernd Dörflinger, Universidad de Trier, Alemania Jean Ferrari, Universidad de Bourgogne, Francia Miguel Giusti, PUPC, Perú

Wilson Herrera, Universidad del Rosario, Colombia Luís Eduardo Hoyos, Universidad Nacional, Colombia Claudio La Rocca, Universidad de Genova, Italia Heiner Klemme, Universidad de Mainz, Alemania

Andrey Krouglov, Universidad Estatal de Moscú, Federación de Rusia

Salvador Mas, UNED, España

Javier Muguerza, UNED, España

Lisímaco Parra, Universidad Nacional, Colombia

Antonio Pérez Quintana, Universidad de La Laguna, España Carlos Pereda, UNAM, México

Alessandro Pinzani, UFSC, Brasil

Lubomir Bélas, Univ. de PreŠov, Eslovaquia

Reinhard Brandt, Universidad de Marburgo, Alemania

Juan Adolfo Bonaccini, Universidad Federal de Pernambuco, Brasil

Mario Caimi, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina Monique Castillo, Universidad de París XII-Créteil, Francia Jesús Conill, Universidad de Valencia, España

Adela Cortina, Universidad de Valencia, España

María José Callejo, UCM, España

Robinson dos Santos, Universidad Federal de Pelotas, Brasil

Vicente Durán, Pontificia Universidad Javeriana de Bogotá, Colombia

Bernd Dörflinger, Universidad de Trier, Alemania Jean Ferrari, Universidad de Bourgogne, Francia Miguel Giusti, PUPC, Perú

Wilson Herrera, Universidad del Rosario, Colombia Luís Eduardo Hoyos, Universidad Nacional, Colombia Claudio La Rocca, Universidad de Genova, Italia Heiner Klemme, Universidad de Mainz, Alemania

Andrey Krouglov, Universidad Estatal de Moscú, Federación de Rusia

Salvador Mas, UNED, España

Javier Muguerza, UNED, España

Lisímaco Parra, Universidad Nacional, Colombia

Antonio Pérez Quintana, Universidad de La Laguna, España Carlos Pereda, UNAM, México

Alessandro Pinzani, UFSC, Brasil

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Equipo editor / Editorial Team

Jacinto Rivera de Rosales, UNED, España

Pedro Ribas, UAM, España

Begoña Román, Universidad de Barcelona, España Margit Ruffing, Universidad de Mainz, Alemania Pedro Stepanenko, IIF, UNAM, México

Sergio Sevilla, Universidad de Valencia, España

Ricardo Terra, USP, Brasil

María Jesús Vázquez Lobeiras, Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, España

Alberto Vanzo, University of Warwick, Reino Unido

José Luis Villacañas, UCM, España

Jacinto Rivera de Rosales, UNED, España

Pedro Ribas, UAM, España

Begoña Román, Universidad de Barcelona, España Margit Ruffing, Universidad de Mainz, Alemania Pedro Stepanenko, IIF, UNAM, México

Sergio Sevilla, Universidad de Valencia, España

Ricardo Terra, USP, Brasil

María Jesús Vázquez Lobeiras, Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, España

Alberto Vanzo, University of Warwick, Reino Unido

José Luis Villacañas, UCM, España

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS

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SUMARIO / TABLE OF CONTENTS

[ES / EN] «Equipo editor» / «Editorial Team» pp. i-iii

[ES / EN] «Sumario» / «Table of contents» pp. 1-5

[ES] «Editorial de CTK 6», Roberto R. Aramayo (Instituto de Filosofia / CSIC, España)

p. 6

[EN] «CTK 6 Editorial Note», Roberto R. Aramayo (Institute of Philosophy / CSIC, Spain)

p. 7

ENTREVISTA / INTERVIEW

[PT] «Entrevista com Maria Lourdes Alves Borges, Presidenta da Sociedade Kant Brasileira» (Univ. Federal de Santa Caterina, Brasil), Cinara Nahra (Univ. Federal de Rio Grande do Norte, Brasil)

pp. 8-12

NÚMERO MONOGRÁFICO / MONOGRAPHIC ISSUE:

Kant in Current Philosophy of Mind and Epistemology (Sofia Miguens and Paulo Tunhas editors, University of Porto)

[EN] «Presentation of the Editors», Sofia Miguens and Paulo Tunhas (Univ. of Porto, Portugal)

pp. 13-17

[EN] « Analytic Kantianism: Sellars and McDowell on Sensory Consciousness», Johannes Haag (Univ. of Potsdam, Germany)

pp. 18-41

CTK 6

[EN] «Kant, Causal Judgment & Locating the Purloined Letter», Kenneth R. Westphal

(Univ. Bogaziçi, Turkey) pp. 42-78

[EN] «Apperception or Environment. J. McDowell and Ch.Travis on the nature of perceptual judgement», Sofia Miguens (Univ. of Porto, Portugal)

pp. 79-92

[ES] «El (no)-conceptualismo de Kant y los juicios de gusto», Matías Oroño (Univ. de Buenos Aires/CONICET, Argentina)

pp. 93-105

[ES] «La epistemología kantiana y el contenido no conceptual», Juan Rosales (Univ. Yachay Tech, Ecuador)

pp. 106-120

[PT] «A interpretação heideggeriana da Crítica da Razão Pura: a questão da imaginação»,

Sílvia Bento (Univ. do Porto, Portugal) pp. 121-137

[EN] «The Case for Absolute Spontaneity in Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason», Addison Ellis (Univ. of Urbana-Champaign, USA)

pp. 138-164

[ES] «¿Por qué la psicología empírica no es una ciencia natural? Una lectura del “Prólogo” a los Primeros principios metafísicos de la ciencia de la naturaleza de Kant», Martín Arias-Albisu (CONICET, Argentina)

pp. 165-185

[FR] «La fonction épistémologique du jugement réfléchissant chez Kant», Eric Beauron

(Univ. Paris I-Sorbonne, France) pp. 186-206

[PT] «Frege sobre Kant: uma motivação filosófica do logicismo», Manuela Teles (Univ. do Porto, Portugal)

pp. 207-236

[PT] «Da afinidade à acção», Paulo Tunhas (Univ. do Porto, Portugal) pp. 237-255

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Sumario / Table of Contents

DOSSIER / DOSSIER:

Kant on Grace (Editors: Pablo Muchnik, Emerson College, USA and Lawrence Pasternack, Okhlahoma State Univ., USA)

[EN] «A Guide to Kant’s Treatment of Grace», Pablo Muchnik (Emerson College, USA) and Lawrence Pasternack (Okhlahoma State Univ., USA)‌

pp. 256-271

[EN] «Why Is Kant Noncommittal About Grace?», Robert Gressis (California State University, USA)

pp. 272-284

[EN] «Kantian Grace as Ethical Gymnastics», Dennis Vanden Auweele (RU Groningen (Netherlands) and KU Leuven (Belgium)

pp. 285-301

[EN] «Kant’s Robust Theory of Grace», Jacqueline Mariña (Purdue University, USA) pp. 302-320

NOTAS Y DISCUSIONES / NOTES AND DISCUSSIONS:

Discussion on Robert Hanna’s article “Exiting the State and Debunking the State of Nature”, published in CTK 5

[EN] «Why Even Kantian Angels Need the State: Comments on Robert Hanna’s “Exiting the State and Debunking the State of Nature”», Anne Margaret Baxley (Washington University, USA)

pp. 321-328

[EN] «Why The Better Angels of Our Nature Must Hate the State», Robert Hanna

(Independent Researcher, USA) pp. 329-334

DOCUMENTOS / DOCUMENTS

[ES] «Julius Ebbinghaus y la filosofía del derecho de Kant», Óscar Cubo Ugarte

(Universitat de València, España) pp. 335-354

[ES] «La ley de la humanidad y los límites del poder estatal», Julius Ebbinghaus (Univ. de Marburgo, Alemania), traducción del alemán por Cristina Gómez Baggethun (Universidad de Oslo, Noruega) y Óscar Cubo Ugarte (Universitat de València, España)

pp. 355-365

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CTK 6

CONVERSANDO SOBRE KANT CON… / TALKING ABOUT KANT WITH…

[ES] «Conversación con Roberto R. Aramayo con motivo de su 60 cumpleaños», Ileana P. Beade (Univ. Nacional de Rosario, Argentina)

pp. 366-380

CRÍTICA DE LIBROS / REVIEWS

[ES] «Kant y la política», Luciana Martínez (Univ. de Buenos Aires/CONICET, Argentina). Reseña de: A. Faggion, A. Pinzani, N. Sánchez Madrid (eds.), Kant and Social Policies, Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016

pp. 381-383

[ES] «A propósito del dualismo cognitivo de Kant. Un análisis no-conceptualista de la heterogeneidad entre sensibilidad y entendimiento en la Crítica de la razón pura», Marcos Thisted (Univ. de Buenos Aires/CONICET, Argentina). Reseña de: M. Birrer, Kant und die Heterogeneität der Erkenntnisquellen, Boston/Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2017

pp. 384-389

[ES] «El fin último aristotélico y el sumo bien kantiano: Una visión comparada», César Casimiro Elena (Universidad Cardenal Herrera - CEU València, España). Reseña de: J. Aufderheide & R.B. Bader (ed.): The Highest Good in Aristotle &Kant, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015

pp. 390-396

[ES] «Una nueva colección de ensayos sobre la Doctrina del derecho», Fiorella Tomassini (Univ. Buenos Aires/CONICET, Argentina). Reseña de: J. Ormeño Karzulovic/M. Vatter, (eds.), Forzados a ser libres. Kant y la teoría republicana del derecho, Santiago de Chile,

Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2017 pp. 397-400

[EN] «The functions of cognition and the unity of the Kantian system», Lara Scaglia (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, España). Reseña de: M. Bunte, Erkenntnis und Funktion. Zur Vollstandigkeit der Urteilstafel und Einheit des Kantischen Systems, Berlin,

De Gruyter, 2016

pp. 401-403

[ES] «La posibilidad de la unidad de la razón o el abismo infranqueable a través de las categorías de la libertad», Laura Herrero Olivera (Universidad Complutense de Madrid, España). Reseña de: S. Zimmermann (Hrsg.), Die Kategorien der Freiheit in Kants Praktischer Philosophie, Boston/New York, Walter de Gruyter, 2016

pp. 404-409

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Sumario / Table of Contents

[ES] «Lo genético y lo trascendental: a propósito del problema del lenguaje en la filosofía kantiana», Alba Jiménez (Universidad Complutense de Madrid, España). Reseña de: R.

Ehrsam, Le problème du Langage chez Kant, Paris: Vrin, 2016 pp. 410-414

[ES] «El fenómeno y el reenvío. Sobre el fundamento kantiano de la finitud de la razón humana», Leonardo Mattana (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, España). Reseña de: G. Goria, Il fenomeno e il rimando. Sul fondamento kantiano della finitezza della ragione umana, ETS, Pisa, 2014

pp. 415-420

[ES] «Sobre la teoría de la biología de Kant», Matías Oroño (Univ. de Buenos Aires/CONICET, Argentina. Reseña de: I. Goy, Kants Theorie der Biologie. Ein Kommentar. Eine Lesart. Eine historische Einordnung, Berlin/Boston, Walter de Gruyter, 2017

pp. 421-426

[ES] «Contextualizando el pensamiento jurídico de Kant», Nuria Sánchez Madrid (Universidad Complutense de Madrid, España). Reseña de: R. Maliks, Kant’s Politics in Context, Oxford: Oxford U.P., 2014

pp. 427-430

Normas editoriales / Editorial Policy

pp. 431-434

Listado de evaluadores / Reviewers List

p. 435

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Editorial de CTK6

CTK6 publica una sustanciosa parte monográfica dedicada a Kant in Current Philosophy of Mind and Epistemology, que han coordinado Sofia Mingues y Paulo Tunhas de la Universidad de Oporto. Esta sección monográfica incluye once trabajos provenientes de Argentina, Alemania, Francia, Portugal, Turquía, USA y Ecuador. CTK6 recoge también un Dossier sobre Kant on Grace, preparado por Pablo Muchnik (Emerson College) y Lawrence Pasternack (Oklahoma State Univ.), que cuenta con colaboraciones de Bélgica y USA. E igualmente incluye una Discusión mantenida con un artículo de, investigador independiente Robert Hanna que apareció en CTK5.

La sección Documentos rescata del olvido un texto de Julius Ebbinghaus, titulado “La ley de la humanidad y la filosofía del derecho de Kant”, que han traducido al español Cristina Gómez Baggethum (Univ. de Oslo) y Óscar Cubo Ugarte (Univ. de València), quien es responsable asimismo de una presentación al texto traducido. La Crítica de libros muestra una buena panorámica de los estudios kantianos aparecidos en alemán, español, francés, inglés italiano. De las Entrevistas que teníamos comprometidas nos ha llegado la que Cinara Nahra (UFRN, Brasil) ha hecho a Maria Lourdes Alves Borges, actual presidenta de la Sociedade Kant Brasileira, y la sección Conversaciones, inaugurada en CTK5, incluye aquí una que Ileana Paula Beade (Univ. Nacional de Rosario) mantiene con el editor principal de CTK. Por primera vez no se incluye la traducción de un texto kantiano, pero siempre fuimos conscientes de que no siempre habría colaboraciones para todas las secciones de la revista, al igual que por el contrario han ido abriéndose otras y los sumarios se han ido adaptando a esa circunstancia con la apertura de nuevos apartados.

De otro lado, la Biblioteca Digital de Estudios Kantianos que se halla asociada a nuestra revista, y que se llama CTK E-Books, acaba de publicar el segundo título de su serie Hemeneutica Kantiana1 y también ha suscrito su primer contrato de coedición, en este caso con la UNALCO y la UNAM. Se trata de un volumen colectivo sobre La filosofía práctica de Kant.

Roberto R. Aramayo

Editor principal de CTK

Berlín, 30 de Noviembre de 2017

1 https://www.con-textoskantianos.net/index.php/revista/pages/view/hermeneutica

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CTK6 Editorial Note

CTK6 hosts a large monographic issue devoted to the subject Kant in Current Philosophy of Mind and Epistemology, coordinated by the colleagues Sofia Mingues y Paulo Tunhas from the University of Porto. The issue includes 11 papers by authors from Argentina, Germany, France, Portugal, Turkey, USA and Ecuador. This CTK6 issue also includes a Dossier with the title Kant on Grace, coordinated by Pablo Muchnik from the Emerson College, and Lawrence Pasternack, from the Oklahoma State University, with contributions from Kant scholars from Belgium and USA.

It contains also a Discussion section with an article that the independent researcher Robert Hanna published in CTK 5. The section Documents rescues from oblivion a text on Kant’s juridical writings by Julius Ebbinghaus, with the title “The Law of Humanity and Kant’s Philosophy of Right”, translated into Spanish by Cristina Gómez Baggethum (Univ. of Oslo) and Óscar Cubo Ugarte (Univ. of Valencia). The latter introduces and displays the context of the translated text for the Spanish speaker audience. The Books reviews furnish a wide overview of recent Kant-related publications released in German, Spanish, French, English and Italian.

We have the honour to publish the Interview that Cinara Nahra, from the UFRN (Brazil), made to Maria Lourdes Alves Borges, current President of the Sociedade Kant Brasileira. The new section Conversations, appeared for first time in CTK5, brings a dialogue between Ileana Paula Beade, from the National Univ. of Rosario (Argentina) with CTK main editor. Despite the editorial team expected to be able to schedule a translation of a Kant’s text in every issue, this time this section remains without content. In the meanwhile some other new sections were created in the journal, giving it its own mark.

Moreover, the Digital Library of Kantian Studies, associated to our journal under the name of CTK E-Books, has released the second volume of the series Hemeneutica Kantiana 1. This electronic publishing house has also signed its first coedition contract with the UNALCO and the UNAM publishing houses. The supported collective volume will have the title Kant’s practical philosophy.

Roberto R. Aramayo (CTK Editor-In-Chief), Berlin, 30th November 2017

1 https://www.con-textoskantianos.net/index.php/revista/pages/view/hermeneutica

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Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1092747

Entrevista com Maria de Lourdes Alves Borges

Interview with Maria de Lourdes Alves Borges

CINARA NAHRA 

Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Brasil

A Professora Maria de Lourdes Alves Borges é a atual presidente da Sociedade Brasileira de Kant sendo uma renomada pesquisadora da obra kantiana. Maria de Lourdes estuda há muito tempo o papel das emoções em Kant sendo uma das pioneiras na pesquisa desta temática com a publicação do artigo “What Can Kant Teach us about Emotions”, no The Journal of Philosophy em 2004. Atualmente tem se dedicado a pesquisa sobre o mal e a religião na filosofia Kantiana. Maria de Lourdes é também uma feminista e tenta fazer um resgate contemporâneo da filosofia kantiana no que se refere a temas relacionados ao sexo feminino. Escreveu também sobre o amor e temas diversos na área da ética.

Maria Borges, nos conte sobre a sua experiência à frente da SBK
A Sociedade Kant Brasileira é talvez a sociedade mais antiga dedicada a um filósofo no Brasil. Sua primeira diretoria data de 1988 e foi composta de nomes importantes na constituição da filosofia no Brasil e sua consolidação pós -ditadura militar, como Zeliko Loparic, Ricardo Terra e Balthazar Barbosa Filho. Essa diretoria da SBK foi depois encabeçada pelo Prof. Valério Rodem, que permanece na direção da sociedade até 2006.
Nossa diretoria atua num momento em que várias outras sociedades filosóficas já foram criadas e estão consolidadas. A SBK passa a dedicar - se mais ao próprio Kant, articulando os vários grupos e seções que existem no Brasil dedicadas ao estudo desse autor.
-  Professora do Departamento de Filosofia da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte/ Brasil. E mail de contato: cinaranahra@hotmail.com
Entrevista com Maria de Lourdes Alves Borges

Uma das novidades da nossa diretoria é que ela é composta majoritariamente por mulheres, o que é uma mudança significativa nos estudos kantianos. Eu sou a Presidente, Sílvia Altman é vice Presidente, Monique Hulshof é tesoureira e Andreia Fagione é Secretaria Geral, além de Joel Klein. Acredito que esse tipo de composição acentua mais a importância de um grupo, ao invés de nomes individuais. Queremos ressaltar a existência de um grupo brasileiro de filósofos e filósofas que discutem Kant com alto conhecimento e grande criatividade.
Como você vê a evolução dos estudos e da pesquisa sobre Kant aqui no Brasil do tempo em que você era estudante de filosofia na graduação até agora.

Os estudos kantianos eram mais voltados à exegese estrita de textos. Até hoje penso que essa é uma característica da filosofia brasileira. Atualmente porém há uma abertura maior e enfoca-se mais questões filosóficas do que propriamente a exegese, ainda que essa seja uma marca positiva da filosofia kantiana brasileira.
Houve nos últimos anos um deslocamento de uma exegese de texto e de uma influência quase que exclusivamente de comentadores alemães e franceses para os comentários americanos. Três membros da nossa diretoria, eu incluída, fizeram pós-doutoramento em universidades americanas.
Há também uma liberdade de análise maior, um pouco mais descolada dos textos, unida a um escopo mais amplo de textos kantianos considerados relevantes, que incluem, por exemplo, a Antropologia do ponto de vista pragmático.
A produção kantiana aumentou exponencialmente nos últimos 20 anos no Brasil. Se nos anos 80, época da minha graduação, tínhamos 3 ou 4 especialistas de Kant reconhecidos no Brasil, hoje esse número é 5 ou 6 vezes maior. As referências kantianas no Brasil também encontram-se em universidades fora do eixo Rio, São Paulo, abrangendo pesquisadores do nordeste ao sul do país, o que inclui a minha universidade, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina.
Você é professora da Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina (UFSC) e a UFSC é sede do CIK, Centro de Investigações Kantianas. Fale um pouco sobre as atividades que o Centro vem desenvolvendo

O CIK foi criado por um grupo de Kantianos da UFSC e tinha como proposta fomentar a discussão e pesquisa sobre Kant. Temos uma biblioteca própria e organizamos periodicamente eventos para a discussão de temas da filosofia kantiana. Esses colóquios, unidos a uma biblioteca especializada, fomenta a produção kantiana, tanto de professores, quanto de alunos, tendo como consequencia um grande número de dissertações e teses de doutorado sobre Kant.
Fale um pouco sobre as principais revistas dedicadas aos estudos de Kant no Brasil hoje.

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Cinara Nahra

Temos tem 3 revistas principais dedicadas ao estudo de Kant no Brasil. A primeira é a Revista da Sociedade Kant Brasileira, a Studia Kantiana. Desde seu primeiro número, em 1998, reúne a produção de filosofia nacional de Kant, bem como produção de nomes relevantes do cenário internacional.
Temos a Kant e-prints, primeira revista eletrônica dedicada aos estudos kantianos no Brasil. Ligada à seção de Campinas da SKB, inicialmente dedicou - se à escola semântica de análise de Kant. A partir de 2000, passa a abarcar uma grande produção kantiana nacional e internacional.
Mais recentemente foi criada a Estudos Kantianos, ligada ao Centro de Estudos Kantianos Valério Rodhen da UNESP. Essa revista tem como editor o Prof. Ubirajara Rancan, que promove vários encontros sobre Kant.
Como você vê a questão da internacionalização da pesquisa sobre Kant atualmente? Fale um pouco sobre as iniciativas que existem neste sentido.

A pesquisa sobre Kant no Brasil, principalmente depois do Congresso da SKB de 97, buscou cada vez mais uma maior internacionalização. Hoje temos a iniciativa dos Colóquios Multilaterais, que congregam pesquisadores de vários países e que têm uma periodicidade anual. Os Colóquios Multilaterais foram uma iniciativa do então Presidente da SKB, professor Ubirajara Rancan, que continua muito ativo na busca da internacionalização dos estudos kantianos.
Como você vê o futuro das pesquisas sobre Kant no mundo?

Sem dúvida, Kant é um dos filósofos da tradição mais estudado internacionalmente. Penso que isso se deve ao fato dele ser atual e abrangente. Podemos encontrar em Kant conceitos que ainda são atuais para pensar a ética, a política, a teoria do conhecimento, a estética. Kant não foi superado historicamente, o que nos leva a uma previsão de um estudo cada vez maior de sua filosofia, abarcando não somente o ocidente, mas também o oriente. Vejo que a filosofia kantiana tem-se desenvolvido na China e no Japão, para citar alguns exemplos dessa expansão.
Além de presidente da SBK você é também secretária de cultura da UFSC. Explique as atividades que você exerce neste cargo e até que ponto ser uma pesquisadora e estudiosa de Kant lhe auxilia no exercício desta função.

Eu sou responsável pelas atividades culturais e artísticas da UFSC, é uma Secretaria que tem status de Pro-Reitoria. Foi criada a partir de uma separação da Pro-Reitoria de Extensão, que é onde normalmente se situa a arte e cultura nas universidades. Como kantiana, tento organizar também debates sobre estética, além das atividades de música, teatro e cinema.

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Entrevista com Maria de Lourdes Alves Borges

O que eu levo de Kant para essas atividades culturais é a ideia de que a arte não tem uma finalidade, mas deve valer pelo próprio gozo estético. Penso também que a educação estética pode contribuir para a destinação ou desenvolvimento humano em geral.
Se você tivesse que dar um conselho aos jovens estudantes de filosofia da graduação que estão iniciando nos estudos kantianos aqui no Brasil, que conselho você daria?

Estude com dedicação os textos kantianos, lembrando-se sempre que Kant estava tentando resolver problemas filosóficos. A leitura exegética sem a compreensão dos problemas filosóficos é cega, assim como apenas a compreensão dos problemas filosóficos em questão, sem a devida atenção ao texto é vazia.
Recentemente, como sabemos, uma tragédia se abateu sobre a UFSC e sobre todas as universidades brasileiras, com o suicídio do Reitor da UFSC, o já saudoso professor Luiz Carlos Cancellier. Voce gostaria de prestar uma última homenagem a ele explicando à comunidade acadêmica internacional as circunstâncias que levaram a morte do Cau, como ele era conhecido por todos?

A Universidade brasileira vive hoje sobre uma ferida aberta: a morte de um Reitor. Por quase dois anos, sob a liderança do Reitor Prof. Luiz Carlos Cancellier de Olivo, a UFSC floresceu na arte, na ciência e na tecnologia, apesar das dificuldades econômicas. A convivência tornou-se mais pacífica, pois os adversários não eram considerados inimigos e todos eram convidados a sentar na mesa e na sala do Reitor. Essa harmonia desaparece numa operação denominada Ouvidos Moucos, que prende o Reitor, sob a alegação de obstrução de justiça, relativa a uma suposta irregularidade no programa de Ensino à Distância. Não havia julgamento, nem processo, só um inquérito inicial, onde apenas um lado fora ouvido. Uma operação de 100 homens é montada para invadir a universidade, apreender documentos e prender 5 professores e o Reitor. Sem julgamento prévio, nem direito à defesa. Na prisão, Cancellier é despido, sujeito à revista íntima, algemado e acorrentado. Depois de solto, é impedido de entrar na Universidade, na qual foi um Reitor eleito e aclamado, elogiado até mesmo pelos seus adversários, pelo seu espírito conciliador. Devido ao terrível sofrimento acarretado pela injustiça e humilhação moral, suicida-se em 2 de outubro de 2017.

Hoje assistimos no Brasil a um fanatismo punitivista que, na sua ânsia de “punir os corruptos e passar o país a limpo”, acaba por destruir as bases do Estado de Direito. O que vemos atualmente é o avesso do Direito, que coloca como sua base a pena, a prisão e a utilização indiscriminada de medidas cautelares de restrição de liberdade, sem levar em consideração o princípio fundamental da pressuposição de inocência.

Soma-se à prioridade da pena desse Avesso do Direito, um lado sombrio da natureza humana, que humilha ao mesmo tempo que condena. O relato do Reitor despido e acorrentado na prisão nos faz lembrar as terríveis fotos do campo de concentração de

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Dachau, onde os judeus eram despidos e humilhados antes da solução final. O lado diabólico e monstruoso da natureza humana torna-se ainda menos aceitável quando se transforma naquilo que Hannah Arendt denominou de banalidade do mal. Assim, aqueles que friamente justificam seus atos bárbaros através da lei, cuja vaidade é alimentada pelos holofotes da mídia, sem nenhuma reflexão sobre a moralidade desses, remetem a Eichmann justificando suas atrocidades por que estava seguindo a lei do Terceiro Reich. Segundo Hannah Arendt, em Eichmann em Jerusalem: “Assim era a situação, essa era a nova lei do país, baseada na ordem do Fuhrer. O que ele fizera, ele fizera, tanto quanto podia ver, como cidadão temente a lei. Cumprira seu dever, conforme repetiu diversas vezes à polícia e à Corte; não obedecia apenas ordens, mas também à lei.”1

O exemplo de Eichmann nos leva a questionar a utilização da lei sem nenhum julgamento moral sobre essa. Estaria conforme ao Direito a lei ou a regra que permite a prisão sem defesa prévia? Estaria conforme o Direito o tratamento desumano dado nas prisões?

A partir do Tribunal de Nuremberg, que julgou os crimes da Segunda Guerra Mundial, foi criada uma Carta de Nuremberg, que instituía alguns princípios proibindo, entre outros, o tratamento desumano e alertava, no artigo 8, que “o fato do acusado ter obedecido ordens do seu governo ou de um superior não o exonerará de reponsabilidade”. Em 1948, a ONU promulga a Declaração Universal dos Direitos do Homem, incorporando os princípios de Nuremberg. No artigo 5, pode-se ler: “Ninguém deve ser submetido a tortura, ou submetido à tratamento ou punição cruel, desumana ou degradante”.

Que essa ferida, a morte de um Reitor condenado sem julgamento, sujeito a um tratamento desumano na prisão, tratamento rejeitado até pela Carta de Nuremberg, jamais seja esquecida. Que continue aberta e não cicatrize até que tenhamos um Estado Democrático de Direito no Brasil.

1 Hannah Arendt, Eichmann em Jerusalem, um relato sobre a Banalidade do mal (São Paulo: Diagrama, 1983), p. 148.

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Kant in Current Philosophy of Mind and Epistemology

Kant en la filosofía de la mente y la epistemología actuales

SOFIA MIGUENS 

University of Porto, Portugal

PAULO TUNHAS 

University of Porto, Portugal

Abstract

In this text we present the articles contained in issue 6 of Con-Textos Kantianos, which is dedicated to the relation between Kant’s philosophy and current discussions in philosophy of mind and epistemology. The articles are organized in three sections, dedicated respectively to sensory consciousness and judgement, spontaneity and Kantianism and science.

Keywords

sensory consciousness, perceptual judgement, spontaneity, Kantianism and science.

This present issue of Con-Textos Kantianos is dedicated to the relation between Kant’s philosophy and current discussions in philosophy of mind and epistemology. It contains contributions by Kant scholars and other philosophers on themes such as self- consciousness and self-knowledge, judgement and perception, perception and givenness and conceptualism and nonconceptualism about experience. More generally, Kant’s perspective on nature, perception, experience and science is brought to bear on ongoing research.

Professor at the Institute of Philosophy of the Univ. Of Porto. E-mail for contact: smoraismiguens@gmail.com

 Professor at the Institute of Philosophy of the Univ. Of Porto. E-mail for contact: paulo.tunhas@gmail.com

[Recibido: 4 de noviembre de 2017

Aceptado: 20 de noviembre de 2017]

Sofia Míguens / Paulo Tunhas

The articles are organized the following way. The first section is devoted to consciousness and judgement; the articles included in it explore topics ranging from sensory consciousness, causal-perceptual judgement and perceptual judgement to aesthetic judgement.

In Analytic Kantianism: Sellars and McDowell on Sensory Consciousness Johannes Haag (Potsdam Universität, Germany) focuses on Wilfrid Sellars and John McDowell as proponents of so-called Analytic Kantianism. He analyses how their accounts of sensory consciousness differ in important ways. In particular, he is interested in McDowell’s criticism of Sellars, both as a reading of Kant and on its own merits. The article offers a detailed analysis of such criticism as well as a defense of Sellars’ position. At the background is the attempt to spell out what transcendental philosophy means as methodology.

In Kant, Causal Judgment & Locating the Purloined Letter Kenneth R. Westphal (Univ. Boğaziçi, Turkey) goes after Kant’s subtle and complex account of cognitive judgment, which he believes is far more illuminating (namely for contemporary discussions) than is often appreciated. The analysis of Kant’s account of causal- perceptual judgment leads him to highlight one central philosophical achievement: Kant’s finding that, to understand and investigate empirical knowledge we must distinguish between predication as a grammatical form of sentences, statements or (candidate) judgments, and predication as a (proto-)cognitive act of ascribing some characteristic(s) to some localised particular(s). Kant’s account of perceptual judgment thus accords with – and indeed justifies – a central and sound point regarding language, thought and reference advocated by apparently unlikely philosophical comrades such as Stoic logicians, Kant, Hegel, Frege, Austin, Donnellan, Evans, Kripke, Kaplan, Travis and Wettstein (these are all authors whose approaches stand in contrast to ‘description theories’ of reference, to Quine’s notion of ‘ontological commitment’ and to much of recently regenerated ‘analytic metaphysics’).

In Apperception or Environment: J. McDowell and Ch.Travis on the nature of perceptual judgement Sofia Miguens (University of Porto, Portugal) compares and contrasts John McDowell’s Kantian view of perceptual judgement with Charles Travis Fregean approach to the same topic. By analysing the clash between Travis’ idea of the silence of the senses and McDowell’s idea of intuitional content, the author aims to characterize the core of their divergence regarding the nature of perceptual judgement. The article also aims at presenting their engagement as a reformulated version of the debate around conceptual and nonconceptual content of perception, bringing forth some of its stakes. Such reformulated version of the debate makes it possible to bring out what a Kantian position on representation, consciousness and appearances ultimately amounts to, as well as to identify a particular angle of criticism to it.

Also Matías Oroño (University of Buenos Aires/CONICET, Argentina) in El (no)- conceptualismo de Kant y los juicios de gusto (Kant’s (non)-conceptualism and judgments

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of taste) focuses on judgement, but this time on aesthetic judgement. He believes there is a tendency within the conceptualism–nonconceptualism debate to overlook Kant’s aesthetics. The main goal of the article is to put forward an analysis of D. H. Heidemann’s non-conceptualist interpretation of Kant’s view of judgement of taste. The author begins by considering Heidemann’s analysis of the cognitive character of judgements of taste. Then he assesses the supposed nonconceptualism involved in aesthetic experience. Finally he puts forward an alternative explanation of the connections between Kant’s position on the aesthetics of beauty and the conceptualism–nonconceptualism debate. The author’s thesis is that even if judgements of taste do not possess cognitive value they allow us to understand central aspects of the Kantian theory of knowledge.

In La epistemología kantiana y el contenido no conceptual (Kantian Epistemology and Non-Conceptual Content) Juan Rosales (Universidad Yachay Tech, Ecuador) analyses John McDowell’s contention that the content of experience is fully conceptual; hence anything like nonconceptual content would simply not be possible. The article starts from a direct reading of Kant’s Lessons of Logic and an indirect reading of Concerning the Ultimate Ground of the Differentiation of Directions in Space. The author argues in favor of an interpretation of skills and practices as possible expressions of non-conceptual content in Kant’s epistemology.

We believe a liberal interpretation of the import of Kant on epistemology and philosophy of mind can be illuminating, so we did not restrict the selection of articles to analytic philosophy, or Analytic Kantianism. When a question such as e.g. spontaneity, and what Kant means by it in his approach to subjectivity, is at stake, it may be useful to search beyond analytic philosophy. This the case in the first article of the second section, dedicated to spontaneity.

In Heidegger’s interpretation of the Critique of Pure Reason: the question of imagination (A interpretação heideggeriana da Crítica da Razão Pura: a questão da imaginação) Sílvia Bento (University of Porto, Portugal) focuses on the Heidegger’s controversial interpretation of the Critique of Pure Reason in Kant and problem of metaphysics, searching for a perspective on Kant’s views on subjectivity, spontaneity and imagination. Withholding her critical stance on Heidegger, the author analyses her interpretation of the first edition of the Critique, presented as an ontological interpretation of Kantian transcendental subjectivity, with imagination as its core.

In The Case for Absolute Spontaneity in Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason Addison Ellis (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA) also focuses on the topic of spontaneity. He tries to assess Kant’s claim in the Critique of Pure Reason according to which the understanding is a faculty of spontaneity, while the sensibility is a faculty of receptivity. While the terms ‘spontaneity’ and ‘receptivity’, and their relation, are often taken for granted in Kant scholarship, the author inspects them carefully. He argues for he conclusion that the thesis of relative spontaneity (RS) (according to which thought is self-

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determined according to a conditioned inner principle) is wrong. If RS were the correct way to understand our self-determination in thought, then we would have to understand representational unity as the unity of an aggregate. But we do not have to understand it this way, for reasons the authors spells out. He concludes that this means that we must make sense of how thought can be self-determined in an unconditioned way.

In this collection of articles we took epistemology in a broader sense, so as to include a Kantian conception of science and scientific thinking. Thus the third section if dedicated to Kantianism and science.

In ¿Por qué la psicología empírica no es una ciencia natural? Una lectura del “Prólogo” a los Primeros principios metafísicos de la ciencia de la naturaleza de Kant (Why is Empirical Psychology not a Natural Science? A Reading of the “Preface” to Kant’s Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science) Martín Arias-Albisu analyses the “Preface” to the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science. There Kant holds that empirical psychology, in contrast to mathematical physics and phlogistic chemistry, is not a natural science. The article aims to offer an interpretation of the reasons why Kant assigns such status to empirical psychology. The author purports to show, on the one hand, that empirical psychology does not have a proper scientific character like mathematical physics since inner phenomena cannot be presented a priori like movements in space. On the other hand, psychology does not have an improper scientific character, such as that of phlogistic chemistry, because it is not possible to conduct experiments nor make rigorous observations in the domain of inner sense. The outcome is that empirical psychology is a mere systematic and classificatory natural description of the phenomena of inner sense.

In La fonction épistémologique du jugement réfléchissant chez Kant (The epistemological function of reflective judgement in Kant's theory of knowledge) Eric Beauron (University of Paris I - Sorbonne) analyses the epistemological function of reflective judgement, whose principle is brought out in the two introductions of the Critique of Judgement. The analysis of § 62 of the Critique of Judgement, in conjunction with the § 38 of the Prolegomena and the Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic, reveals the heuristic role of the principle of formal purposiveness and the affinity in scientific procedures, especially in the Newtonian invention of the law of universal gravitation. The aim of the article is to explore how reflective judgement works in epistemological contexts in which the functions of the understanding can no longer operate, since the empirical data escape the transcendental principles of the Analytic of Principles. The functioning of an epistemological ‘as if’ is brought to light to create the architectonical link between the technique of nature and its mechanical necessity.

In Frege sobre Kant: uma motivação filosófica do logicismo (Frege on Kant: a philosophical motivation of logicism) Manuela Teles (University of Porto – Portugal) analyses the way Frege always had Kant in mind when formulating his position in philosophy of logics and mathematics. Frege defends the thesis according to which one can

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only reach knowledge of numbers and of basic arithmetic operations if one accepts that determining what concepts and objects are is not a task for psychology (taken in a broad sense as a research into representations (Vorstellungen), whether they be empirical or a priori). Determining what concepts and objects are is rather a task for logic, to which a non-psychologistic philosophy may be associated. According to the autor, Frege defends the thesis that the agglutinating force of concept largely surpasses the unifying capacity of synthetic apperception.

Finally in Da afinidade à acção (From affinity to action) Paulo Tunhas (University of Porto, Portugal) analyses the work of Portuguese philosopher Fernando Gil, which was much influenced by Kant. From the very beginning of his philosophical work Fernando Gil looked for a harmony between the Kantian project and certain pre-Kantian modes of thinking, such as the Leibnizian. In his later work he also searched for harmony with the post-Kantian philosophy of Fichte. Such is the double origin of his deeply original philosophy of knowledge, which the author analyzes.

We believe we have gathered in the presente issue of Contextos Kantianos very interesting and diverse materials (also geographically diverse, since the authors whose work we present in this issue come from countries such as Germany, Portugal, Spain, the US, Turkey, Argentina and Venezuela); we hope the result presented is of some value for all those involved in philosophical research which owes to Kant its orientation or inspiration.

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Analytic Kantianism:

Sellars and McDowell on Sensory Consciousness

Kantismo analítico: Sellars y McDowell sobre la conciencia sensorial

JOHANNES HAAG 

Universität Potsdam, Germany

Abstract

Wilfrid Sellars and John McDowell can both be read as proponents of Analytic Kantianism. However, their accounts differ in important detail. In particular, McDowell has criticized Sellars’s account of sensory consciousness in a number of papers (most notably in LFI and SC), both as a reading of Kant and on its systematic merits. The present paper offers a detailed analysis of this criticism and a defense of Sellars’s position against the background of a methodology of transcendental philosophy.

Keywords

Kant, Sellars, McDowell, Transcendental Philosophy, perception, intuition, judgment

Analytic Kantianism & Transcendental Philosophy

‘Analytic Kantianism’ is not a well-defined term. It is mostly used very loosely to group philosophers who engage with Kant’s writings in a systematic, philosophical spirit and who themselves have a background in Analytical Philosophy, broadly conceived. If we look back in the history of discussions of Kant in Analytic Philosophy, Peter Strawson and Wilfrid Sellars probably first come to mind. Any list of important contemporary authors would have to include Robert Brandom, Michael Friedman, Hannah Ginsborg, Beatrice Longuenesse, Barry Stroud – and certainly John McDowell.
- Professor at the University of Potsdam. E-mail for contact: jhaag@uni-potsdam .de
[Recibido: 10 de octubre de 2017
Aceptado: 20 de octubre de 2017]
Analytic Kantianism

But can Analytic Kantianism be described in an at least somewhat less loose and superficial way? I think it is possible both with respect to its subjects and the specific form in which they are addressed – at least for the field of theoretical philosophy I will concentrate on in what follows. John McDowell, whom I take to be one of the leading contemporary representatives of Analytic Kantianism, in one place writes:
“If we understood Kant’s theoretical philosophy, we would understand how to think about the limits of intelligibility – the bounds of sense, in one interpretation of P.F. Strawson’s intentionally ambiguous title. That would put us within reach of the insight only glimpsed, I think, by Kant himself that those limits are not well-conceived as a boundary, enclosing a territory by leaving other territory outside it. But we can approach that connection with the theme of boundaries and limits only by dealing with the details of the first Critique, and some of that is all I will be doing here.” (SC1 108).
In this quote, we find a number of features common to what I take to be characteristic for philosophers that could be subsumed under the label ‘Analytic Kantianism’: Most prominently, maybe, there is the vocalization of a deep reverence for Kantian thought, a reverence that Sellars once famously expressed by talking about philosophy being on a “slow climb ‘back to Kant’ which is still underway” (SM 29). Then we find the theme – a philosophical topos one might call it, by no means restricted to Kant – of a great philosopher apparently not being able to understand the depth and dimensions of his or her own thought in the way we today can understand his or her thought: As dwarfs on the shoulders of giants we ca see farther.
But most importantly, there is the emphasis of the subject of ‘limits of intelligibility’, and with it, we might add, the nature of intelligibility itself that we supposedly are in a better position to understand if we engage in the understanding of Kantian philosophy. It is the latter subject, I would like to suggest, that gives us a grip on a more substantial characterization of Analytic Kantianism.
What does this subject of intelligibility and its limits and boundaries consist in? Something’s being intelligible always, it seems, implies that it is intelligible as something of one kind or another for some kind of intelligent or rational being. Consequently, something is intelligible if and only if a rational being can intentionally refer to it as something.
The topic of ‘limits and boundaries’ of intelligibility is thus closely connected to, and indeed: turns out to be only another perspective on, the subject of the possibility of intentional reference and the limits and boundaries of such a reference for rational beings. ‘To be intelligible’ just means ‘to be the potential object of intentional reference by beings of a certain kind’. Thinking about intelligibility and its limits and boundaries, consequently, means thinking about intentional reference and its limits and boundaries. I

1 For a list of the abbreviations used for the works of Immanuel Kant, John McDowell and Wilfrid Sellars cf. the end of this paper.
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would like to suggest that this topic of intentional reference and its limits is indeed characteristic for the thought of the authors that can be classified as exponents of Analytic Kantianism.
However, it should be obvious that not any arbitrary way of asking (and answering) this question should make a philosopher an exponent of this philosophical family. More, certainly, is required to distinguish a way of analytic engagement with questions of intentional reference (even if they include its limits and boundaries) as a specific Kantian way of engagement. Let me, in a first step, try to specify the kind of questions which do make the inquiry a specific Kantian inquiry.
It seems clear that in this connection the limits and boundaries of an intelligibility for beings that are like us in the relevant way is of special (if not of the only) interest for us. Ultimately, what we want to understand first and foremost is what is intelligible for us – and how that can be the case. But this question can be asked in very different ways, as Kant reminds us when he distinguishes questions of fact from questions of justification (cf. CPR A84/B116).
What Kant understood was that a pure, even true description of an epistemic process could never amount to a justification of the epistemic ends of the process in question. While questions of fact are concerned with the description of epistemic processes, questions of justification are concerned with the normative nature of the epistemic purport of our representative acts: Justification is, as Sellars often points out, “a higher- order thinking” (Sellars, SK 325/6). In turning from the question “What is intelligible?” to the question “Why are we justified in believing something to be intelligible?” we thus leave the object- level of matter-of-factual truth and ascend to the meta-level where we reflect upon the question what makes a truth the truth it is – what accounts for its epistemic purport. Analytic Kantianism, in first approximation, is concerned with questions of the later kind.
But, again, not any question about the epistemic purport of intentional reference makes the questioner an exponent of Analytic Kantianism. More, still, is needed to justify this classification. Fortunately this difference is not the only difference in a possible understanding of the question of what the boundaries of intelligibility consist in for beings who are like us in the relevant way. At least two further specifications are possible: One concerning the claim of exclusiveness of any satisfying answer to the question, the other concerning the level of generality or abstraction of the question itself.
Let me first turn to the claim of exclusiveness: Questions concerning the objective purport of intentional reference can be (and often are) answered by indicating how we factually justify the claim to successful intentional reference. And these factual claims are often amenable to interesting philosophical answers as well – answers that certainly can shed some light on the issues in question. Those answers, however, will be restricted to the (albeit highly abstract) description of the facts in question or rather the factual causes and

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reasons for it. But this kind of pure description is not that what a question in truly Kantian spirit is aiming at. They are asked as questions after the conditions that need to be fulfilled in general so that we could possibly justify the claim to successful reference. The modality that is involved proves to be decisive: This way of putting the question indicates a lack of conceptually possible alternatives that is characteristic of the philosophical level of abstraction at which it is properly located. A satisfying answer to questions of that kind has to explain, why something has to be the case and cannot be otherwise. Philosophically substantial claims that are this demanding are characteristic for what we following Kant we call Transcendental Philosophy. The proper methodological framework for questions of this kind – indeed the proper methodological framework for Analytic Kantianism in general – therefore has to be the framework of Transcendental Philosophy.
What amounts to Transcendental Philosophy, of course, is a matter of dispute. It has often been connected to the question of the possibility of transcendental arguments. I would instead suggest to sidestep this hotly contested issue and give an alternative characterization of the issues involved.2 In order to do this in a first step it has to be specified what is meant by the answer lacking alternatives. It certainly cannot mean that the answer is somehow logically necessary. That this is not the case is shown by the fact that we ordinarily can think alternative answers without committing ourselves to any inconsistencies. However, those merely logical alternatives are no alternatives for us, i.e. they aren’t alternatives that can be given a determined content by us.
This determination of content always has to be a determination of thought with respect to its object: as soon as the possibility of this kind of determination is missing, the theory in question only gives us a purely formal analysis of thought. But this is not the kind of answer we expect where we are concerned with the properties of our intentional reference to intelligible objects. For, questions aiming at these properties are questions after the intentional reference to a world of which we conceive ourselves to be a part, i.e. the intentional reference to a certain reality and ourselves as a part of this very reality. The analysis of this reference necessarily has to be neglected in a purely formal analysis of the sort envisaged.
What the alternatives are that can be thought with a determined content is dependent on the factual limits and boundaries that constrain the space of possibilities of our intentional reference to the world. The starting point of the requested thinking of intentional reference therefore has to be the reflexive reference to our own intentionality: There simply is no alternative starting point for the investigation of the conditions of possibility of intentional reference. In this sense our actual presuppositions with respect to this reference are a necessary element of the analysis of its conditions of possibility. They are the starting point

2 Parts of the following characterization of Transcendental Philosophy are taken from my “Personhood, Bodily Self-Ascription, and Resurrection: A Kantian Approach” (Haag 2010, p. 130/1). More detailed discussions of the subject can be found in Haag, J. 2007, ch. 1 and Haag 2012.
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of a reflection on which of these actual presuppositions really are necessary in the sense elucidated.
However, unlike the analysis of our actual or factual employment of concepts, i.e. classical analysis of concepts, the analysis of the conditions of possibility implies the impossibility of alternatives to those conditions under the so descriptively specified presuppositions.
The question of intentional reference and its limits and boundaries, understood as a question of Analytic Kantianism, consequently needs to be concerned with necessities that result from the analysis of concepts we have to use, if we can use concepts at all – i.e. if we can intentionally refer to anything at all. Accordingly the answering of those questions is to be conceived of as an analysis of the conditions of possibility of our way of ascription in the transcendental-philosophic sense: It is concerned with the most general conditions of the intentional relation to a world of which we conceive ourselves to be a part. The results of such a transcendental analysis are only justified if they are – under the preconditions thus specified – without an alternative that can be thought with a determined content. I would suggest it to be a defining feature of Analytic Kantianism proper that it shapes the question of intentional reference to intelligible objects as a question that aims at the conditions of the possibility of this kind of reference.
Levels of Abstraction

I already hinted at yet a further differentiation that is necessary to fully understand the question of intentional reference as a question of Analytic Kantianism – this time not to distinguish Analytic Kantianism from alternative positions, but to differentiate questions within Analytic Kantianism and thereby putting into perspective the scope of the question Analytic Kantians are asking.
In order to further differentiate our understanding of the question for the intentional reference to intelligible objects, we have to pay attention to the fact that the phrase ‚beings like us in the relevant way‘ is a placeholder that is far from philosophically innocent. It requires (and allows for) distinctions with respect to the ways relevant to certain features of intelligibility and intentional reference: Features that can and should be ordered according to the degree of abstraction from our own human ways of understanding – an abstraction that starts with the limits of intelligibility for human beings and reaches its own boundary only when it tries to abstract even from those features that are part of what is needed for every possible epistemic subject in order to generate knowledge of a world to which itself belongs. In Sellars’s words: it is thus as „to rule out the possibility that there could be empirical knowledge not implicitly of the form ‘such and such a state of affairs belongs to a coherent system of states of affairs of which my perceptual experience is a part’…” (KTE 635).

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An epistemic subject of this kind needs to be finite – otherwise it could not be a (proper) part of the world it wants to generate knowledge of. Furthermore, it needs to be rational – otherwise it could not be interested in intelligibility of something in the first place. Furthermore, for Kant any finite rational being, not being able to spontaneously generating the objects of its knowledge, needs to be receptively given some material in order to subsume it under concepts. In other words, beings like us in the relevant way cannot cognize intuitively, but only discursively.3
We consequently could describe the most abstract level of philosophical reflection on the limits of intelligibility as the level where we reflect on the limits of intelligibility for every possible finite rational, and hence discursive being that conceives of itself as part of the world (broadly conceived) it tries to understand. The most concrete level would be a level at which we were concerned with the limit of intelligibility for specifically human ways of intentionally referring to objects – a level that, for instance, clearly involves the specifically human forms of intuitive knowledge, i.e. space and time.
In fact, Kant himself ties what I referred to as different levels of abstraction to the philosophical problem of intentionality as it occurs in transcendental philosophy. The differentiation in question is focussed by Kant as the question of what we do and of what we do not justifiedly presuppose with respect to the objects our intentional representations appear to be referring to. The close connection of this question to the famous question of a letter to Marcus Herz in 1772 concerning the relation between representations and their objects is obvious:
“What is the ground of the relation of that in us which we call ‘representation’ to the object?” (Kant AA 10:130)
In order to answer this question, Kant insists that transcendental philosophy is “not concerned with objects at all” (Kant Metaphysik Mongrovius AA 29:756). Its subject- matter, instead, is the possibility of epistemic or, more general, intentional reference to intelligible objects about whose existence nothing may be presupposed in advance. This is the only way, Kant insists, we can work out the conditions of the possibility of epistemic or intentional reference to objects. One could, therefore, describe the ideal aim of transcendental philosophy as making explicit the presuppositions of our thinking or our discourse about objects.
There are questions on the possibility of reference even at the highest level of abstraction. Transcendental logic, being concerned with intentional reference to intelligible objects begins its reflection on a level of abstraction at which nothing whatsoever is presupposed about those putative objects of reference.

3 For the important difference between discursive and intuitive understanding cf. Förster 2012, ch. 6 und Haag 2014.
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Kant marks this unprecedented level of abstraction in thinking about reference to objects by introducing a specific technical term, the concept of a ‘Gegenstand überhaupt’. (The natural English translation ‘object in general’ has the serious drawback that it invites confusion with the (equally technical) Kantian term ‘Objekt überhaupt’.) The term ‘Gegenstand überhaupt’ serves, as Eckart Förster writes, as an “accusative of this relation (of a thought) ... without already presupposing a specific object as actual or even as merely possible.” (Förster 2012, 4/5.)
But transcendental philosophy must not stop its investigation at this most abstract level: it can only succeed by lifting this abstraction step by step and thus progressing to the insights that can properly labelled to be transcendental philosophical – given that insights of this kind can be achieved at all. It can treat everything which has been shown to be a condition of the possibility of reference to objects at this level as explicitly presupposed at the next (lower) level of abstraction. Thus, after discerning the conditions of possibility of reference to ‘Gegenstände überhaupt’ it has to descend to the next level of abstraction internal to the transcendental hierarchy of these levels: that is, to the level at which the transcendental philosopher discusses the conditions of possibility of ‘Objekte überhaupt’. And from there he finally descends to thinking about the conditions of possibility of objects of experience (Gegenstände der Erfahrung), that is, spatio-temporally located objects.
Incidentally, these lower levels of abstraction turn out to coincide with the differentiation between the relevant classes of ‘beings like us’ adumbrated above. Thus, if it is possible to substantiate the above distinction with respect to the distinction of Objekte überhaupt and objects of experience just introduced, we will have made considerable progress.
A very helpful description of the means we have at our hands at each level of abstraction that helps us along these lines can be found in Wilfrid Sellars’s writings on Kant: He discerns the different steps of abstraction by showing that each of these steps involves a different use of the Kantian categories broadly conceived. (I say ‘broadly conceived’ because, at the highest level, categories are, strictly speaking, not yet in the play as categories.) Here is the quote from Sellars:
“The categories are in first instance simply identical with the forms of judgment ... . These forms of thought would be involved in thinking about any subject-matter from perceptual objects to metaphysics and mathematics.The so-called pure categories are these forms of thought specialized to thought about objects (matter-of-factual systems) in general. Such objects need not be spatio-temporal, as are the objects of human experience. The full- blooded categories ... are the pure categories specialized in their turn to thought about spatio-temporal objects.” (Sellars IKTE §44/5)
The full-blooded categories are, as Sellars makes clear, the schematized categories which are the result of the Schematism of the pure concepts of the understanding. He therefore closes by adding:

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“The relation of the forms of thought to the pure categories is that of genera to species, as is the relation of the pure categories to schematized categories.” (Sellars IKTE §45.)
Sellars is very clear about how the categories, at whichever level, are spared the fate of traditional ontological thinking – whose possibility, remember, it is, among other things, what is at stake. Categories are not treated as names for obscure abstract entities.
“Medieval logicians began the process of reinterpreting the categories that culminated in Kant’s Critique, by recognizing that certain statements (thus ‘Man is a species’) which seem to be about queer entities in the world are actually statements that classify constituents of conceptual acts.” (Sellars KTE 641)
This development culminated in a treatment of the categories as “grammatical classifications”:
“And, of course, Kant’s categories are grammatical classifications. They classify the grammatical structures and functions of Mentalese. Thus the category of substance- attribute is the structure ‘S is P’, the form of subject-attribute judgment. The category of causality is the form ‘X implies Y’. The category of actuality is the form ‘that-p is true’. More accurately, the categories are these forms or functions specialized to thought about spatio-temporal object.” (Sellars IKTE §§ 39/40)
What these distinctions, together with the distinctions concerning the respective accusative of the referential relation in question, give us is an outline of the internal structure of the justificatory or transcendental levels of abstraction: The internal structure is threefold, starting, at the highest level of abstraction, with theorizing about the conditions of possibility of thinking about ‚Gegenstände überhaupt‘ – objects in general writ large – in terms of the most general forms of judgement; turning at the next level to the possibility of our reference to objects in general, i.e. objects thought under the condition of an ‘intuition in general’ which does not have to be an intuition subject to our specific human forms of sensibility; and adding, at its last level, spatio-temporal structure, that is, the categories adapted to our specific human forms of intuition and thus scrutinizing the conditions of possibility of reference to spatio-temporal objects.
This internal structure is characterizing the higher level in a just two-leveled hierarchy of levels of abstraction whose defining feature is whether it does or whether it does not presuppose the possibility of reference to objects.
But we have yet to add an essential ingredient to our picture of levels of abstraction. We have to be more perspicuous about what we do when we think about the conditions of possibility of our reference to objects. Kant (according to the lecture-transcript Metaphysik Mongrovius) puts it in the following way:
“In transcendental philosophy we consider not objects, but reason itself ... One could therefore also call transcendental philosophy transcendental logic ... Transcendental logic

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abstracts from all this, it is a kind of self-knowledge (Selbst Erkenntniß).” (Kant AA 29:752, 756; quote Förster 2012, 4.)
We already heard Sellars referring to the categories – at every of the aforementioned internal levels of abstraction – as classifying the structures and constituents of conceptual acts. What we therefore have to add is a distinction between grammatical classifications which do and classifications which do not add to the kind of self-knowledge Kant refers to in this remark. Otherwise we would have to include any old quality and every relation, since every quality and every relation may serve as characterizing a concept or object. And every concept is, on Kant’s and Sellars’s view, a rule for the classification of ideas.
Which kinds of classification of conceptual acts, then, are the proper subject-matter of transcendental philosophy? It is exactly those kinds that are necessary for an understanding of the ‘ground of the relation of that in us which we call ‘representation’ to the object’. In other words, it is exactly those kinds that are the conditions of possibility of an intentional relation between us as thinkers and the world of intelligible objects, i.e. the conditions of the possibility of intentionality.
Givenness, Guidance, and Sensory Consciousness

With these methodological observations in place, let me turn to some of the central topics in connection with the question of intentionality as it is addressed in Analytic Kantianism. The common denominator of these topics is their connection with an account of the role of sensory consciousness in a Kantian conception of intentionality. I will unfold these topics by discussing the respective takes of Wilfrid Sellars and John McDowell, two of the foremost representatives of Analytic Kantianism, and relating them to each other. Kant’s original account of these topics will serve as the backdrop for this discussion.
In Science and Metaphysics (1968) Sellars observes:
The [manifold of intuitions; J.H.] has the interesting feature that its existence is postulated on general epistemological or, as Kant would say, transcendental grounds, after reflection on the concept of human knowledge as based on, though not constituted by, the impact of independent reality. (Sellars SM 9; my emphasis)
This impact of an independent reality corresponds to the ‘guidedness’ of our perceptual content Sellars shows himself so impressed by in the opening pages of Science and Metaphysics. 4 This guidedness, for Sellars, is an ultimately phenomenological fact grounded in the passivity of our experience. Kant, throughout his critical writings, emphasizes this passivity with respect to the content of our experience.5 There has to be

4 Cf. Sellars, SM 16. Robert Pippin discusses these remarks in his Kant’s Theory of Form (1982, 46-51).
5 Cf. e.g. Kant, CPR A 50 / B 74; Kant, GMS 4:452; Kant, Anthropologie, 7:141.

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something that explains the basic phenomenological fact that we are passive with respect to the actual content of our experience.6
This guidance is the joint effect of independent reality and the sense-impressions brought about by its impact – Sellars’s ‘sheer receptivity’7. The independent reality is the Kantian thing in itself, guiding us from without via the impressions of sheer receptivity. Only the latter are immediately accessible for the working of our spontaneity.
Even this immediate contact with sense-impressions is, however, guidance from without the conceptual order in the sense that these impressions are not given as what they are in themselves, but for both Kant and Sellars are always synthesized by the synthesis of the imagination. (It is in this context that Sellars in his later writings introduces the concept of an image-model. Cf. below sec. 5.)
This fact, in turn, connects the subject of guidance to another important philosophical subject in connection with our intentional reference to a world that exists independently of us: the repudiation of the Myth of the Given. This Myth in its “most basic form” (Sellars, FMPP, I § 44) consists in the following principle:
„If a person is directly aware of an item which has categorical status C, then the person is aware of it as having categorical status C.“ (ibd.)
And he adds:
„To reject the Myth of the Given is to reject the idea that the categorial structure of the world – if it has such a structure – imposes itself on the mind as a seal imposes an image on melted wax.“ (ibd.)
The rejection of the Myth therefore involves a rejection of every form of direct or immediate awareness of something with a certain categorial structure as having this very categorial structure unless one already developed a conceptual framework, which forms the background of this direct awareness.8
The connection to the subject of guidance via the synthesis of the receptively given sense- impressions should be obvious. It can be summarized in the following question: In sensory consciousness, are we immediately aware of the receptively given sense-impressions guiding us as what they are in themselves? In answering this question, everything depends on how the imagination in its synthesizing activity transforms what is receptively given.
McDowell chooses a completely different approach to sensory consciousness and declares himself an intentionalist in the treatment of sensation.9 Intentionalism concerning sensation

6 Although Sellars thought himself in disagreement with Kant in this respect, I tried to show on another occasion that for both authors this guidance has to be strictly ‘from without’ the conceptual order. Cf. Haag 2014.
7 Cf. for example Sellars, ibd.
8 Cf. Rosenberg 2007, 285-289.
9 Cf. McDowell, SC 119 n. 22.

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is the position that sensations themselves are or can become intentional states. 10 For a Sellarsian, this is something like a philosophical fall from grace: In countless places Sellars criticizes this position which he considers to be one of the paradigmatic forms of the Myth of the Given.11
I will not take issue with McDowell’s systematic position directly, but with his understanding of Kant as an intentionalist about sensation. What McDowell suggests as a reading of Kant, is a sophisticated attempt to bring together the two stems of knowledge in a way that does not picture their respective outputs as two “components” (McDowell, SC
124) of experiences, but as the sensory output of a sensibility already “informed” (ibd.) by the understanding.
“[T]he intentionality of intuitions is accounted for by the fact that in intuitions sensory consciousness itself is informed by the higher faculty. The thinkings that provide for the intentionality of perceptual cognitions are not guided by sensory consciousness, as it were from without. They are sensory consciousness, suitably informed.” (ibd. 119)
This technical concept of informed sensory consciousness is important, but at the same time difficult to elucidate. As it is introduced it clearly is brought into play to provide an alternative to Sellars’s concept of guidance from without through sheer receptivity; but it seems that the two conceptions of informed sensory consciousness and guidance from without are not mutually exclusive. To show that will be part of the burden of my argument.
What is meant by the concept of informed (or conceptually shaped 12 ) sensory consciousness? In a first approximation, sensory consciousness being informed must include not being neatly separable in an intentional and a sensory (or conceptual and sensible, or spontaneous and receptive) component, as McDowell insists.13
It seems further safe to maintain that informing in this technical sense has to amount to more than simply the (new) arrangement of given sensory input by the understanding. Otherwise there would hardly be any difference in this respect between McDowell’s and Sellars’s reading of Kant: Sellars acknowledges that the sensory material is (re)structured by the synthetic activity of productive imagination. The latter is guided itself not only from without, but also from within by concepts which provide the recipes for this activity.14 In order to count as informed the sensory consciousness itself has to somehow become spontaneous through this interaction with the higher-faculty – otherwise we would be

10 The cautious amendment “or can become” is meant to incorporate positions, which are prepared to admit that “sensibility alone does not yield cognition” (McDowell, SC 119), but insist that sensory states “informed by the higher faculty” (ibd.) can. McDowell subscribes to such a view.
11 Cf.. e.g. Sellars, BBK, 46; Sellars, SRLG 335/6; Sellars, EPM 132-4, 154-6.
12 Cf. McDowell, LFI 34.
13 Cf. ibd., 124.
14 Cf. Sellars, IKTE § 28. McDowell explicitly seems to grant as much in a reversal of his earlier criticism in the Woodbridge-Lectures. Cf. ibd. 114 f. I will discuss some of the details of this process and the concepts involved below.

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restricted to merely associatively connected representations, that do not amount to cognition.
Informed sensory consciousness should not only be merely a formal (re)arrangement of the receptive input. Moreover, it seems necessary that there should not be an unformed sensory element that can be identified as present in the more sophisticated products of mental activity, be they image-model or the even intuition. Otherwise this element would not have been sufficiently transformed by the higher-faculty in the way just adumbrated.
I would like to point out, though, that the concept of informed sensory consciousness does not seem to imply that a conceptual representation which directly refers to informed sensory consciousness, cannot be distinguished from the representations so informed. There seems to be some philosophical wriggling room here, that will prove important in what follows.
Nevertheless, some of McDowell’s remarks indicate that he seems to take this implication largely for granted, for instance by writing that in his picture “what provides for an intuition, say, to belong to sensory consciousness is not apportioned to an item other than one whose characteristics provide for the intuition to be of an object, as in Sellars’s picture” (McDowell, SC 118/9).
But intentionalism in the treatment of sensations does not need to amount to making intuitions themselves sensory items – although it seems McDowell has exactly this in mind. In the dimension of our thinking that concerns intuitive content it could still make sense to separate a concept of an item that is a conceptual tool for direct, demonstrative reference from an item that supplies intuitive thinking with informed sensory consciousness.
Even if one (like McDowell) rules out an account along these lines, this leaves the possibility that there could still be a purely sensory component that feeds into our mental activity that cannot in any meaningful way be identified in synthesized experience, and yet might prove indispensable for different reasons. In his critical remarks on Sellars, McDowell seems to allow for at least the conceptual possibility of this sort of sensory component, notwithstanding his own rejection of any such sensory items as superfluous.
According to the picture to be developed, Sellarsian sheer receptivity would operate ‘below the line’, thereby guiding the informing of sensory consciousness above the line from without in Sellars’s use of this term; while in a second step the results of this operation would be sufficiently transformed by spontaneity to justify the classification of the resulting sensory consciousness as informed.
Notice that in this case, there ultimately will exist not one, but two different kinds of sensation in a complete account of sensory consciousness: The first kind of sensibility would belong completely to receptivity (‘below the line’), while the second would be permeated with spontaneity from the very beginning (‘above the line’).

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This possibility of a concept of informed sensory consciousness compatible with a conception of a sensory level ‘below the line’15 that separates the receptivity of sense from the spontaneity of understanding, will prove of vital importance for assessing the true extent of disagreement between Sellars’s and McDowell’s Analytic Kantianism with respect to the role of sensory consciousness in intentionality.
The very same function of unity?

McDowell, in discussing Sellars’s conception of sensory consciousness in connection with his reading of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason frequently comes back to a key-statement of the first chapter of Kant’s Transcendental Analytics of the Critique of Pure Reason, called “On the Clue to the Discovery of all Pure Concepts of the Understanding”:
“The very same function that gives unity to the different representations in a judgment also gives unity to the mere synthesis of different representations in an intuition which, expressed generally, is called the pure concept of understanding.” (Kant CPR A 79 / B 104/5)
This statement is the central sentence of the so-called ‘Metaphysical Deduction’ whose purpose it is to give us the pure concepts of the understanding. It is at the same time the first whole-hearted expression of the intimate connection of the logic of judgment with the logic of intuition – but, unfortunately, it is not one of Kant’s clearest expressions of this relationship. McDowell interprets this statement as follows.
„We can recast the remark from the ‘Clue’ to say: the function that gives unity to the various representations in an ostensible seeing is the same as the function that gives unity to the mere synthesis of various representations in an intuition.” (LFI 31)
In order to assess this interpretation it is important to first explain the usage of the technical term ‘ostensible seeing (OS)’. McDowell in this usage follows Sellars who uses it as a term for representations that purport to be instances of visual perceptions which, in the veridical case (unlike in the subjectively indistinguishable case of illusion or hallucination) they indeed are. OS are not the result of a spontaneous commitment of the subject but are involuntary reactions to external stimuli. That these reactions are involuntary does, however, not preclude them from being thoroughly conceptual:
„Sellars shows us how to understand visual experiences as ostensible seeings, occurrences in a subject's life that ‘contain’ claims about an ostensibly visible region of objective

15 To borrow an illuminating metaphor from McDowell’s Woodbridge-Lectures. Cf. McDowell, SPE 5. (I consequently do not share Jay Rosenberg’s criticism of this metaphor: Rosenberg thinks that „McDowell’s reification of Sellars’s references to ‚sheer receptivity’ [is] unfortunate“ (Rosenberg 2007, 279). The reason for this criticism seems to that sense-impressions below the line are the material for the conceptually guided synthetic construction of image-models above the line. My analysis of the role of sense-impressions in this construction will implicitly address this point. Cf. section 5.

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reality. That they ‘contain’ claims is the same fact as that they are conceptual occurrences, actualizations of conceptual capacities with a suitable ‘logical’ togetherness. In that respect they are like judgments. But they are unlike judgments in the way in which they ‘contain’ their claims. Judgments are free exercises of conceptual capacities [...]. But in an ostensible seeing whose content includes that of a given judgment, the same conceptual capacities are actualized [...] in a way that is ostensibly necessitated by the objective reality that is ostensibly seen. A visual experience is a case of being under the visual impression that things are thus-and-so in the ostensibly visible environment.” (McDowell, IR 44)
OS have or contain the same content as the corresponding judgments that are not the result of an involuntary reaction to stimuli. Consequently, they truly are conceptual shapings of sensory consciousness (cf. LFI 33). That these shapings have to be of the same ‘logical togetherness’ is a nod to the fact that we have to exercise a number of different conceptual abilities in order to see something as e.g. a pink ice-cube: ascribing a color, a form, a material etc. (cf. SPE 1 f.). But the connection to the corresponding judgment, according to McDowell, is even closer: OS do have the same content in the same (i.e. propositional) structure. An OS is an (ostensible) seeing-that with direct object-reference (cf. LFI 32). Hence, OS are mental states with propositional content that – unlike judgements – are not the result of a decision. In an OS we see that something is the case without judging, i.e. committing ourselves, that it is. They are distinguished from the corresponding judgment only in that they are not affirmations. McDowell later (in AMG 269) admits that it is indeed hard to deny them the status of judgments. His official doctrine, however, from the Woodbridge-Lectures onwards is that OS are ceteris paribus authorizing the corresponding judgment without being identical to it.
This makes plausible the replacement of ‚judgment’ with OS in his paraphrase of the statement from the ‘Clue’. After all, the connection Kant is after has to be particularly salient in the relation between intuitions and the corresponding judgments of perception. And since commitment seems to be irrelevant with respect to the logical unity Kant is interested in, it makes perfect sense to switch to OS, thus focusing on the question of conceptual structure.
Intuiton, unlike OS, does have the task of presenting the object of experience ore perception itself. Intuitions qua immediate representations of an object are themselves not mere products of sensibility but require the involvement of the understanding that is able to guarantee in their synthesis the same kind of logical structure that characterizes judgments. McDowell affirmatively quotes Sellars’s calling intuitions ‘this-suches’. If an OS has the content that there is a pink ice-cube, the corresponding intuition is an intuition of this pink ice-cube over there, thanks to the involvement of the very same conceptual abilities in both cases:
“If an ostensible seeing is a seeing, then the conceptual shaping of visual consciousness that constitutes it, those very conceptual capacities actualized in visual consciousness with

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that very »logical« togetherness, constitute – looked at, as it were, from a different angle – an intuition: an immediate presentness of an object to sense. [...] This seeing that..., in describing which we explicitly place an expression for the concept in question in a predicative position, is the very same conceptual occurrence – an actualization of the same conceptual capacities with the same »logical« togetherness – as the intuition.” (LFI 33f.)
This should not be misunderstood as implying that intuitions somehow ‚give’ us an object that the OS then refers to in a second step. McDowell’s view is the more radical one that intuitions and OS are, indeed, two sides of the same coin: “Visual intuitions of objects simply are seeings that..., looked at as it were from a different angle.” (LFI 34) It is in order to facilitate this that both need to have the same judgeable content (cf. LFI 35). “In fact, visual intuitions just are the actualizations of conceptual capacities, with the requisite togetherness, that constitute those ostensible seeings that are seeings.” (IR 45f.) This, for McDowell, in the Woodbridge-Lectures constitutes the core of the insight that Kant voiced in the key-passage from the ‘Clue’ about the ‘very same function that gives unity’ to an judgment and an intuition.
It seems clear that McDowell’s interpretation of Kant offers a reading that is compatible with this statement. How, on the other hand, is a Sellarsian reading of this pivotal statement even possible given his conception of sensory consciousness sketched above? In order to make this plausible, we have to take a deeper look at Sellars’s theory of conceptually shaped sensory consciousness as it is developed in his concept of an image- model, in particular. I will introduce this important Sellarsian concept as it were through the lens of McDowell’s discussion of this concept. This will allow me in what follows to develop the opposing views of Sellars and McDowell in the form of a critical investigation of McDowell’s interpretation of Sellars’s Kantian conception of sensory consciousness.
Image-Models and Intuition

The concept of an image-model (IM) does not appear in Science and Metaphysiscs (based on his 1964/5 Locke-Lectures). It is officially introduced no earlier than in the late paper “The Role of Imagination in Kant’s Theory of Experience” (IKTE, 1978), though there is a number of remarks, starting from “Kant’s Theory if Experience” (KTE, 1967) 16 that foreshadow this decisive twist in Sellars’s conception of sensory consciousness.

16 “This difficult doctrine requires that the logical powers of the concept cube involve not only the inferential powers characteristic of its role as predicate of full-fledged judgment, but also the powers involved in “constructing” or “drawing” determinate “this-cube”-representings in accordance with a rule, and knowing that this is what one is doing.” (KTE 643) Though some of the important elements of the IM-conception are already in place, it not yet the IM-terminology, of course, that Sellars is using here and, in particular, the relation of these ‚drawings’ to intuitions is not clarified in this context.
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Concluding from some of McDowell’s remarks in the Preface to Having the World in View (2009) IKTE seems to have contributed to a correction of his Sellars-interpretation that then is developed for the first time in his paper on “Sensory Consciousness in Kant and Sellars” (SC, 2008; reprinted in 2009; all references are to the later edition):
“When I wrote [the Woodbridge-Lectures; JH], I thought Sellars’s picture included this informing of sensory consciousness by capacities that belong to the understanding, and that he added external constraint, by what he calls “sheer receptivity”, as a distinct further role of sensibility. I retract that reading in [SC; JH].“ (HWV vii)
A reading along these lines would have made Sellars’s account of what happens ‚above the line’ that separates the intentional realm from the non-intentional very similar to McDowell’s own conception of sensory consciousness (and, of course, his interpretation of Kant’s theory), while it would mark the difference between the two accounts as a difference concerning mostly what happens ‘below the line’. Instead he now opts for an interpretation that, in fact, distances Sellars from his own conception in a crucial detail:
“[M]y question had a false presupposition. Sellars comes close to Kant in saying experiences contain claims. [1] But all he can make of the idea is that experiences are composites, with claim-containing items accounting for their intentionality and sensations accounting for their sensory character. And this reflects his not arriving at what I take to be the authentically Kantian view. [2] Sellars does not envisage claim-containing occurrences that are themselves shapings of sensory consciousness.“ (SC 122; emphasis and numbering JH)
The discussion in SC makes clear that responsible for this change was McDowell’s integration of the Sellarsian IMs in his picture of Sellars.17
In the remaining parts of this paper I will be mainly concerned with showing that McDowell is correct in high-lighting the introduction of this concept and the importance of the conception of synthesis of imagination that Sellars develops in this context. However, I will argue that, nevertheless, McDowell misunderstands the function of this concept when he ascribes to Sellars (cf. remark [1] of the quote above) an understanding of experience as a composite of non-conceptual and conceptual elements. This precludes him from seeing the real affinity of Sellars’ position to his own.
On the other hand, it will be seen that McDowell is, in fact, correct with respect to his claim that “Sellars does not envisage claim-containing occurrences that are themselves shapings of sensory consciousness” (SC 122; remark [2] above). This claim, however, if true, will turn out to point to a less dramatic difference between the two accounts – especially given the modification that McDowell’s own conception seems to undergo in his

17 There is a brief footnote in the Woodbridge-Lectures where McDowell mentions IMs in passing. Vgl. LFI 26/7 n. 7.
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later AMG where he himself seems to commit to the view that experiences do not contain claims.18
The upshot of McDowell’s criticism of Sellars’s concept of IMs is this: “What the productive imagination generates is a unity involving both sensibility and understanding – not an amalgam, however intimately bound together, of components that belong severally to sensibility and understanding.“ (SC 124) What McDowell is describing as an ‚amalgam’ here is the result of Sellars’s division of the activity of the productive power of imagination in (a) the production of the OS’s this-suches and (b) the IMs as the descriptive core of perception.
While McDowell acknowledges that IMs cannot be produced without the cooperation of the understanding that provides the ‘recipes’ necessary for their construction, he emphasizes that it is still a construction in sensibility: a construction according to conceptual recipes out of sensible material which, consequently, should indeed be seen as an ‘amalgam’ from sensory and conceptual components (cf. SC 117). This clearly is not conceptually informed sensory consciousness in McDowell’s sense.
But is it an adequate representation of what Sellars’s IMs are? This clearly depends on the exact role of the sensory material in this process. Given that we must distinguish between the construction of IMs and the taking up of the items so construed into perceptual consciousness in an intuition, and given, furthermore, that the productive imagination is somehow responsible for both, there are indeed two distinguishable acts of this capacity in play in experience. However, it does certainly not go without saying that in the construction of IMs the imagination simply arranges the receptively given sense- impressions into structured aggregates of impressions which would belong to the conceptual order simply because they are thus ordered.
Yet this seems to be what McDowell has in mind: He insists that according to Sellars it is solely due to the participation of the understanding that provides the ‘recipes’ for the construction in question, that the receptivity of sense-impressions gets conceptually enriched (cf. SC 114/5). The IMs, consequently, now are the elements in our perceptual engagement with the world that provide the guidance that proved so important for Sellars’s epistemology – a guidance that cannot be a guidance ‘from without’ anymore as McDowell notices, implicitly retracting his criticism of Sellars’s insistence on a guidance ‘from without’ (cf. SC 115 n. 14).
This change in Sellars’s position, given the importance he gives to the conception of a guidedness ‘from without’, would indicate a dramatic change. But it strikes me as premature to ascribe it to him on the basis of the introduction of the concept of the IMs. It seems to rest on a wrong understanding on McDowell’s side of what IMs are and what is their task in Sellars’s account of sensory consciousness.

18 Cf. below sec. 7

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IMs, for Sellars, are not simply structured aggregates of sensory material. Sense impressions are modifications or states of a perceiving subject. In IMs they are now represented as properties of imagined three-dimensional models of objects, imagined from any given perspective of a perceiving subject (and, hence, essentially perspectival).19
In being so represented they are already essentially modified. The pinkness of a pink sense-impression (i.e. of a mental state) must be very different from the pinkness of an imagined pink three-dimensional object. In the very act of arranging sense-impressions according to recipes the productive imagination is transforming the sense-impressions themselves and not just ordering them into patterns, as McDowell implies in remark [1].
What is at stake here is what Sellars in another place calls “in a sense most difficult to analyze, a thinking in color about colored objects” (SK 305). The emphasis here is on ‘thinking’ – and the ‘thinking in ccolor’, of course, has to be supplemented by a ‘thinking in shape’ (and a ‘thinking in’ every other kind of sensibly given properties).20 Another way to make essentially the same point is that, unlike the sense-impressions of ‘sheer receptivity’, IMs are already subjected to a structuring synthesis guided by the (mathematical) categories of quantity and quality.
The dynamical categories of relation and modality on the other hand come into the picture only when the essentially perspectival IMs are conceived of as objects of experience with causal and dispositional properties that we refer to in intuitions and the corresponding OS and judgments. It is, in other words, not the (essentially perspectival) IM itself that is the sensibly given object we refer to in perception, as McDowell seems to think (cf. SC 224). Instead, we refer to objects of experience whose sensible properties we conceptualize on the basis of IMs. IMs qua arrangements of categorially transposed sense-impressions contribute the aspect of sensible presence that is necessary for the demonstrative reference being truly perceptual or intuitive. But the reference to object of experience in addition to these sensible properties has to ascribe to them at least some causal and dispositional properties that make them objects of experience in the first place, i.e. empirical objects existing independently of their being perceived by us.
In as much as McDowell’s criticism depends on their being two distinct elements in perceptual reference – a sensibly represented object and an intuitive reference to that very object – McDowell is correct. But this distinct sensible element, although it accounts for the sensible presence of an object in experience, is itself not an element that incorporates sense-impressions from ‘below the line’. In being subjected to the activity of productive imagination it is transformed into an element that clearly belongs ‘above the line’: Sense- impressions are conceptualized through and through as perceptible properties of these objects of experience.

19 For an extensive discussion of IMs in Sellars’s theory cf. Haag 2007 ch. 7 and Haag 2013, 67-71.
20 McDowell, though quoting this remark, largely ignores it and goes on to discuss IMs, “Sellars’s most sophisticated treatment of the relation” (SC 114), thereby missing the opportunity to do justice to the relevance of this remark for the proper understanding of IMs.
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McDowell, for his part, thinks that the resulting conception introduces guidance ‘from without’ through the backdoor. And this cannot be right since the “thinkings that provide for the intentionality of perceptual cognitions are not guided by sensory consciousness, as it were from without”, but are “sensory consciousness, suitably informed” (SC 119).
Somewhat ironically, Sellars could subscribe to this statement without submitting to McDowell’s position: First, he would insist that it is not sensory consciousness that guides us from without. This task would fall to the sense-impressions of ‘sheer receptivity’ that are never apperceived (cf. Sellars, SM 10). This has been his position for a long time and Sellars does not change it in IKTE. Second, the objects of experience we refer to in perception indeed are conceptually informed sensory representations. In a sense that certainly differs from what McDowell has in mind, these objects of experience supply our perceptual representations with the required intentionality by serving as objects of reference that are thought and experienced at the same time.
Guidance and Phenomenalism

Consequently, it is at least possible to read Sellars as subscribing to a conception of “sensibility ... that is informed by conceptual capacities in the experience of rational subjects“ (HWV, Preface vii). At the same time, sense-impressions and the concept of guidance ‘from without’ remains firmly in place. If this is right, McDowell’s critical question from the Woodbridge-Lectures – i.e. why does Sellars even need a level of ‘sheer receptivity’ and a guidance from without? – contrary to what McDowell thinks (cf. SC 122), would still be left unanswered. For McDowell, this additional layer is just superfluous.
It might be helpful to address this deep point of disagreement in connection with the criticism expressed in McDowell’s second remark above: Sellars, he correctly insists,
„does not envisage claim-containing occurrences that are themselves shapings of sensory consciousness“ (SC 114). For neither do this-suches contain sensible elements nor do IMs or objects of experience contain claims. And this is a very serious point for McDowell, since it not only makes Sellars’s account ultimately incompatible with his own conception that insists that “thinkings of a pink cube can include items that are sensory consciousness informed by the higher faculty” (SC 123); it furthermore is a consequence of a feature of the account of sensory consciousness in question that allows Sellars, but not himself to make sense of a critical point in Kant’s philosophy: a ‘brute fact about the shape of our subjectivity’ (cf. SC 102) that Kant introduces into his account through the specifically human forms of intuition, space and time. This-suches as such cannot do justice to this ‘brute fact’. Hence, as we will see, McDowell with respect to this aspect of a theory of sensory consciousness realizes that he has to give up not only Sellars but Kant as well and

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ultimately side with Hegel. This point is closely connected with McDowell’s criticism of Sellars’s (and Kant’s) phenomenalism.
McDowell’s own position concerning sensory consciousness (which he believes to be at least compatible with Kant’s own approach until HIRK) as developed in the Woodbridge- Lectures and SC is indeed ontologically sparse and philosophically less demanding than Sellars’s conception. Through a methodology of indirect characterization and abstraction he is able to develop a detailed account of sensory consciousness, 21 which – though closer to Sellars’s account than he believes it to be – yet consistently abstains from all attempts to characterize the sensible elements of perception more directly or substantially.
For Sellars’s phenomenalist account of perception this direct characterization is not only possible, but unavoidable. 22 (Sellars to this end develops a methodology of analogical concept formation. Cf. SM ch. 1.) There is no explanation on the basis of the conceptual framework provided by the categories alone of the spatio-temporal constitution of the objects of our experience. This is solely dependent on our specific forms of qualitative- sensory access to the world. In his sense-impression inference he concludes from this fact to the phenomenality of the empirical reality or manifest image of the world.
While McDowell in “Self-Determining Subjectivity and External Constraint” (SDS; originally 2005) still sounds somewhat optimistic about his own common-sense realistic reading of Kant, in “Hegel’s Idealism as a Radicalization of Kant” (HI; originally 2007) he acknowledges the element of radical subjectivity in Kant’s theory of experience – notwithstanding some moves in the right direction that could be found in the B-Deduction in particular:
“A Kantian conception of empirical intuitions – intelligibility of objects by virtue of exemplifying unities of the kind characteristic of judgment – almost succeeds in showing how the very idea of objective purport can be understood in terms of free intellectual activity. … What spoils things is that when we widen the picture to take in transcendental idealism, it turns out that the “objects” that we have contrived to see empirical intuitions as immediately of … are after all, in respect of their spatiality and temporality, mere reflections of another aspect of our subjectivity, one that is independent of apperceptive spontaneity.” (HI 81)
McDowell now understands Hegel’s position as the result of a critical examination of Kant’s account. Following Hegel, he endorses all-encompassing objectivity of apperceptive spontaneity as opposed to the phenomenalist subjectivity of sensory consciousness of the Kant/Sellars kind. This is why, for him, the perceived objects themselves can guide us as what they are in themselves – without guiding us ‘from without’ in any but the most innocent sense.

21 Cf. SC 119-122 and 124.
22 I have argued in some detail for this claim in Haag 2016.
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A revision in McDowell’s theory of intuition

This important and deep difference between their respective accounts concerning the role of sensory consciousness in intentionality that underlies McDowell’s remark [2] about Sellars not “envisaging claim-containing occurrences that are themselves shapings of sensory conscioussness“ (SC 122) does remain in place even if we take into account one of McDowell’s most recent developments of his own conception of sensory consciousness.

In AMG McDowell surprisingly seems to revise his position that intuitions contain claims: “What we need is an idea of content that is not propositional but intuitional, in what I take to be the Kantian sense.” (AMG 260) Since conceptual content is always oriented towards judgment as the paradigmatic product of discursive activity, an elaboration of this idea cannot be easy. Since intuitions do not have discursive content we must ask ourselves whether they have conceptual content nevertheless. Charles Travis denies just that, but for McDowell this amounts to a lapse back into the Myth of the Given: Intuitions would be completely alien to the conceptual order and would provide reasons from without this order. For this reason, intuitive content has to be another form of conceptual content. “The conceptual conent that allows us to avoid the myth is intuitional.” (AMG 269) Intuitional content, unlike discursive content, is not “articulated” (AMG 262), but nevertheless can serve as a foundation for the ‘carving out’ (cf. AMG 263) of the articulation of our discursive capacities: “The unity of intuitional content is given, not a result of our putting significances together.” (AMG 263) It is conceptual in its own right precisely because discursive content can thus be ‘carved out’: „The content of an intuition is such that its subject can analyze it into significances of discursive practices.” (AMG 264) Its content is “in the intuition in a form in which one could make it, that very content, figure in discursive activity” (AMG 265). However, this content is constrained to general categorial classification on the one hand and the sensibilia on the other, including their location in space and time, which can be supplemented in a judgment on the basis of our knowledge about causal and dispositional properties of the intuited objects (cf. AMG 265/6).

As indicated, the resulting view is closer to Sellars’s own account of sensory consciousness concerning some of the details of the process, though not concerning the overarching repudiation of his phenomenalism. Now the function of intuitions in McDowell is mainly “to bring particular objects before the mind for its consideration” (Sellars, IKTE §48). But McDowellian intuitions now they have lost their propositional content are much leaner than Sellarsian intuitions: For Sellars the this-suches (linguistically represented as complex demonstrative phrases) that are the intuitions have the same complete, though merely implicit content as the potential judgments that make this content explicit – including the causal and dispositional properties we ascribe to the objects of our experience we refer to in intuition. That these properties should be included, in large part constituted the difference between the (perspectival) IMs and their conception as independently existing in objects of experience.

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Even very complex demonstrative phrases (or, for that matter, their corresponding intuitions) will not be able to encompass the rich content that intuitive representations of objects as a matter of phenomenological fact have (cf. AMG 263). It is this richness that motivated the change in McDowell’s position in the first place in his discussion of Travis. Sellarsian intuitions, McDowell claims, rather than having truly intuitive content, seem to have merely fragmentary discursive content (cf. AMG 270).

But on closer looks, this does not pose a serious problem for Sellars. The demonstrative phrase gets its content from its reference to the intuitively present object of experience. Its content, consequently, is as rich as the involved sensory-cum-conceptual representation of this object. Sellars’s conception of intuition can only be understood in its relation to the object of experience. That is why in intuition the activity of the understanding (in its guise as the productive imagination) the is not the same as in judgment: “If we think of a taking as a special case of believing, it is best to think of it as ‘believing in’ rather than ‘believing that’.” (SM 18/9)

Once again, it is Sellars’s conception of IMs that underlies this account of the richness of intuitive content. Whatever one ultimately might want to say about the question of a guidance from without and the connected subject of phenomenalism with respect to Sellars’s view of intentionality, his conception of sensory consciousness seems to be remarkably resilient to McDowell’s criticism.

Literature

Kant’s works are quoted in the usual manner as after Kants gesammelte Schriften, vols. I- XXII ed. Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Berlin 1902 ff., vol. XXIII ed. Deutschen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Berlin, 1956, vols. XXIV-XXIX ed. Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen, Berlin 1966 ff. The translation mostly follows the Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant, eds. P. Guyer and Allen

W. Wood.

Works by Wilfrid Sellars:

BBK“Being and Being Known,” in: Sellars, W. Science, Perception and Reality. London (1963), 41-59.

EPM “Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind”, in Sellars, W. Science, Perception and Reality. London (1963), 127-196.

FMPP “Foundations for a Metaphysics of Pure Process” (The Carus Lectures) The Monist

64 (1981) 3-90.

KTE “Some Remarks on Kant's Theory of Experience” Journal of Philosophy 64 (1967) 633-647.

KTI “Kant’s Transcendental Idealism” Collections of Philosophy 6 (1976) 165-181.

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IKTE “The Role of Imagination in Kant’s Theory of Experience” (The Dotterer Lecture) in: Johnstone, H. (Hrsg.) Categories: A Colloquium. Pennsylvania State University Press (1978) 231-245.

SK “The Structure of Knowledge” (The Matchette Foundation Lectures for 1971 at the University of Texas) in: Castañeda, H.-N. (Hrsg.) Action, Knowledge, and Reality: Studies in Honor of Wilfrid Sellars. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill (1975) 295-347.

SM Science and Metaphysics. Variations on Kantian Themes. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul (1968)

SRLG “Some Reflections on Language Games”, in Sellars, W. Science, Perception and Reality. London (1963), 321-358.

Works by John McDowell:

AMG “Avoiding the Myth of the Given” in HWV 256-272.

HI “Hegel’s Idealism as a Radicalization of Kant” in HWV 69-89.

HWV Having the World in View. Essays in Kant, Hegel, and Sellars. Cambridge, Ma.: Harvard University Press (2009)

IR “Intentionality as a Relation” in HWV 44-65.

LFI “The Logical Form of an Intuition” in HWV 23-43.

SC “Sensory Consciousness in Kant and Sellars” in HWV 108-126.

SDS “Self-Determining Subjectivity and External Constraint” in HWV 90-107. SPE “Sellars on Perceptual Experience” in HWV 3-22.

Förster, E. 2012 The Twenty-Five Years of Philosophy, Cambridge, Ma.: Harvard University Press.

Haag, J. 2007 Erfahrung und Gegenstand. Das Verhältnis von Sinnlichkeit und Verstand.

Frankfurt a.M.: Klostermann.

Haag, J. 2010 “Personhood, Bodily Self-Ascription, and Resurrection: A Kantian Approach“ in: G. Gasser (ed.) Personal Identity and Resurrection. How Do We Survive Our Death?, Farnham: Ashgate, 127-143.

Haag, J. 2012 “Philosophische Abstraktionsebenen” in: Barth, C. & Sturm, H. (eds.) Robert Brandoms Expressive Vernunft. Historische und Systematische Untersuchungen, Paderborn: mentis, 261-285.

Haag, J. 2013 „Kant on Imagination and the Natural Sources of the Conceptual“ in: Lenz,

M. & Waldow, A. (Hrsg.) Contemporary Perspectives on Early Modern Philosophy: Nature and Norms in Thought. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 29. Dordrecht: Springer, 65-85.

Haag, J. 2014 “Faculties in Kant and German Idealism” in: Perler, D. (ed.) Faculties.

Oxford Philosophical Concepts. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 198-246.

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Haag, J, 2016 “A Kantian Critique of Sellars’s Transcendental Realism” in: Reider, P. (ed.) Wilfrid Sellars, Idealism and Realism: Understanding Psychological Nominalism. London: Bloomsbury, 149-171.

Pippin, R. Kant’s Theory of Form. An Essay on the Critique of Pure Reason, New Haven: Yale University Press 1982, 46-51.

Rosenberg, J. “Divergent Intuitions: McDowell’s Kant and Sellars’s Kant” in: Rosenberg,

Wilfrid Sellars. Fusing the Images. Oxford: Oxford University Press 2007, 266- 290.

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Kant, Causal Judgment & Locating the Purloined Letter
Kant, el juicio causal y la localización de la carta robada

Kenneth R. WESTPHAL 
Boğaziçi Üniversitesi, Turkey

Abstract

Kant’s account of cognitive judgment is sophisticated, sound and philosophically far more illuminating than is often appreciated. Key features of Kant’s account of cognitive judgment are widely dispersed amongst various sections of the Critique of Pure Reason, whilst common philosophical proclivities have confounded these interpretive difficulties. This paper characterises Kant’s account of causal-perceptual judgment concisely to highlight one central philosophical achievement: Kant’s finding that, to understand and investigate empirical knowledge we must distinguish between predication as a grammatical form of sentences, statements or (candidate) judgments, and predication as a (proto-
)cognitive act of ascribing some characteristic(s) to some localised particular(s). With Kant’s finding in view, I then elucidate how we have occluded his achievement. My results are not merely interpretive, but philosophical, because they show that Kant’s account of perceptual judgment accords with – and indeed justifies – a central and sound point regarding language, thought and reference advocated by apparently unlikely philosophical comrades. These finding highlight some methodological cautions which require re- emphasis today.

Keywords

Kant; causal judgment, perceptual judgment, cognitive judgment
- Professor at the Department of Philosophy of the University Bogaziçi. E-mail for contact:
ken.westphal@boun.edu.tr

[Recibido: 20 de octubre 2017
Aceptado: 30 de octubre 2017]
Kant, Causal Judgment & Locating the Purloined Letter

For Paul Guyer, in admiration and gratitude
1. INTRODUCTION.
  Kant’s account of cognitive judgment is sophisticated, sound and philosophically far more illuminating than is often appreciated. Key features of Kant’s account of cognitive judgment are widely dispersed amongst various sections of the Critique of Pure Reason, whilst common philosophical proclivities have confounded these interpretive difficulties. This paper aims to characterise Kant’s account of causal-perceptual judgment concisely and accurately, to highlight one of his central philosophical achievements: Kant’s demonstration that, to understand and to investigate empirical knowledge we must distinguish between predication as a grammatical form of sentences, statements or (candidate) judgments, and predication as a (proto-)cognitive act of ascribing some characteristic(s) or feature(s) to some localised particular(s). With Kant’s result in hand, I then elucidate how we have occluded his insight. My results are not merely interpretive, but philosophical, because they show that Kant’s account of perceptual judgment accords with – and indeed justifies – a central and sound point regarding language, thought and reference advocated by apparently unlikely philosophical comrades: Stoic logicians, Kant, Hegel, Frege, Austin, Donnellan, Evans, Kripke, Kaplan, Travis and Wettstein – in contrast to ‘descriptions theories’ of reference, to Quine’s notion of ‘ontological commitment’ and to much of recently regenerated ‘analytic metaphysics’. These finding underscore some methodological precautions which require re-emphasis today.
  One obstacle to appreciating Kant’s achievement regarding cognitive judgment is his claim to justify some synthetic propositions a priori, by some sort of ‘transcendental’ analysis or proof, which itself requires, Kant argued, transcendental idealism (KdrV Bxvi–xix, A369–70). About this requirement, I have argued elsewhere, Kant was mistaken.1 Here we may also set aside Kant’s aim to justify some synthetic principles a priori. Instead, we may focus on Kant’s recognition that Hume’s scepticism about causality and about substance (‘body’ or physical objects) only addressed two central cases of a host of related conceptual, cognitive and judgmental issues (KdrV B19–20, 127–9, A745–6, 760/B773–4, 788; Prol 4:260; Caird 1889, 1:202). Prompted
  in part by empiricist scepticism, Kant adopted Tetens’ (1775) use of the term ‘realisieren’ (KdrV A146–7/B185–7) to underscore how demonstrating that we can use any concept (especially any a priori concept) legitimately in any cognitive judgment requires demonstrating that we can locate actual particulars to which we can correctly
  
  1Westphal (2004). I stake my case on a strictly internal critique of Kant’s transcendental idealism, and argue en detail that it is refuted by some of Kant’s most important and successful analyses in the Transcendental Analytic. It is disappointing to find critics and reviewers repeatedly rejecting my account by merely assuming as a premiss Kant’s quadruple distinction between empirical and transcendental senses of ‘real’ and ‘ideal’. To the contrary, Kant clearly recognised that he is entitled to that set of distinctions only by his positive arguments for his transcendental idealism. What my critics assume as a premiss, Kant recognised could only be justified as a result. My critique of Kant’s transcendental idealism directly address Kant’s attempt to justify that result.
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  apply that concept, or which properly instantiate that concept. 2 Kant also calls this demonstrating the ‘objective reality’ of a concept or principle (KdrV B288, 300–3, 314), or likewise its ‘real possibility’ (Bxxvi n., B302–3). Kant advocates the converse as well: showing that some concept is such that we cannot provide it any objective reality, or that we cannot ‘realise’ it by localising and designating any of its specific instances, shows that the concept in question is cognitively transcendent: we are incapable of using that concept in any legitimate, justifiable cognitive judgment. Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason develops a profoundly simple, specifically cognitive semantics of singular reference, which achieves one central aim of verification empiricism, yet without invoking verification empiricism, meaning empiricism or concept empiricism.3
2. FIVE LESSONS FROM HUME.
  Developing Kant’s specifically cognitive semantics requires learning five central points from Hume’s empiricism.
  1. First, Hume recognised that we have and use a range of what may be called merely determinable concepts, as well as linguistic tags for various concepts. Hume’s official ‘copy theory’ of sensory impressions and ideas, together with his three official principles of psychological association (resemblance, contiguity and 1:1 correlation, presumed to be causal) can account only for determinate, specific classificatory concepts of sensed qualities, as fine-grained as one can regularly discriminate. All such concepts are empirical concepts. According to concept empiricism, any genuine or legitimate concept is either a logical term, a name for a simple sensed quality, or can be exhaustively defined by conjunctions (perhaps also disjunctions) of these two types of term. Hume’s official mechanisms of the mind may suffice, e.g., for various colour concepts, such as ‘blue’, ‘royal blue’ or ‘dusty Periwinkle blue’. Those mechanisms cannot account for merely determinable concepts. The scope and significance of merely determinable concepts must be specified – determined – in context; these concepts include those of ‘space’, ‘region of space’, ‘time’, ‘period of time’, ‘cause’, ‘substance’, ‘number’, ‘colour’ or ‘word’, and also linguistic tags (names), in contrast to flatus vocii (insignificant – meaningless – vocables). For these merely determinable concepts and for words, only Hume’s ever-capacious ‘imagination’ can account. However, for the imagination and its manifold, prodigious activities and results Hume can provide altogether no specifically empiricist account. Hume’s specifically empiricist principles are exhausted by his official copy theory of impressions and ideas, and his three principles of psychological association (Westphal 2013a).
  2. Second, in explaining our ineradicable though unjustifiable belief in the existence of physical objects in our surroundings (‘body’), Hume rightly found that his official
    
    2Tetens (1775), 38, 44–6, 48–9/(1913), 29, 34, 36, 37–8.
    3Kant’s semantics is much more sophisticated than Coffa (1991) recognised; see Melnick (1989), Westphal (2004), Bird (2006) and Haag (2007). Melnick’s unjustly neglected (1989) first made Kant’s semantics evident to me, including Kant’s understanding of the pitfalls of both causal and descriptions theories of reference.
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    empiricist mechanisms required three additional ‘propensities’ of the mind to form various beliefs in response to various repeated kinds of sequences of sensory impressions. Hume’s focus on the (purported) occasioning causes of these beliefs occludes how these beliefs each require concepts which cannot be defined in accord with concept empiricism; if they could be so defined, no further mental propensities would be required. These propensities are (1): to believe that any unchanging impression, which occurs during any other sequence of impressions, is a physical object;
    (2) to believe that any series of qualitatively closely resembling impressions is an experience of some one physical object; and (3) to believe that any closely resembling series of impressions which occur in different, non-continuous periods of time, are experiences of some one physical object which continues to exist during the (apparent) interruption(s) in our experience(s) of it. The conceptual content of each of these beliefs defies concept empiricism, and can only result (on Hume’s view) from our febrile imaginations. (One way to put this point is that Hume provides, so to speak, an ‘error theory’ of our belief in perceptible bodies, but we can only make that error – or rather, that set of errors – if we posses and use concepts which cannot be defined or learned in accord with concept empiricism, and hence count as a priori concepts, however officially illicit may be our use of them.)
  3. Third, the concept ‘cause’, even as mere 1:1 contiguity, can be neither learned nor defined on the basis of our typically human experiences, because – as Hume recognised
    – we so very often experience either a purported cause or a purported effect without its purported (causal) partner. Consequently, by the official empiricist mechanisms of the copy theory and the three principles of psychological association, we should only form very few, very weak beliefs (if any) in particular causal relations, which cannot suffice to define, to learn, or even to prompt the thought of (much less, any belief in) the general concept of cause invoked in the general causal principle, ‘every event has a cause’ (KdrV A195–6/B240–1; Beck 1975, 121–9). Any sorting of our experiences to select only those favourable cases in which we happen to observe both the purported cause and its purported effect presupposes the concept of cause as 1:1 contiguity, which is required to form even the merest expectation that we should meet with such patterns of contiguity in whatever series of impressions happen upon us, or likewise that we should sort our impression-experiences to select only the relevant paired instances. Hence the concept of ‘cause’ as 1:1 correlation is a priori.
  4. Fourth, when sitting before the fire in his study, Hume received a letter hand- delivered by porter (T 1.4.2.20–25). This delivery requires the continued existence of the stairs Hume no longer perceives, so that the porter can reach the door of Hume’s apartment. Hume’s recognising the knock at the door requires his believing in the continued existence of that door, and in the very likely existence of some person outside knocking upon the door. Neither the content nor the justification of any of these beliefs can be accounted for by Hume’s official empiricist principles: the copy theory and the three forms of association. Yet without the belief in the continuing, mind-independent existence of physical objects, our commonsense beliefs lose all coherence, as Hume
    
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    acknowledged.
  5. Fifth, Hume also recognised a key problem regarding the synchronic identity of perceptible objects at any one time: Any physical object has a variety of characteristics or properties, although it is one single object. This identity, however, is not simply quantitative: Neither ‘unity’ nor ‘plurality’, as numerical concepts, suffice to define the singularity of any one physical object with its manifold characteristics (T 1.4.3). By rigorously developing the implications of his official concept empiricism and verification empiricism, together with the sensory atomism apparently endorsed by his predecessors, Hume verged upon recognising a core problem running through the Modern ‘new way of ideas’ and the sense data tradition, which analytic epistemologists only recognised ca. 2000 (cf. Cleremanns 2003): the host of problems now known as ‘the binding problem’.
    Kant recognised these problems about how any plurality of sensations becomes integrated into some one percept of some single object; and likewise, how any plurality of sensory information about the characteristics of any one sensed object become integrated into their identification as characteristics or features of some one perceived, recognised object. These problems arise both synchronically and diachronically, and they arise both within and across each of our sensory modalities. Kant recognised that none of these problems can be solved simply by adding further sensations to any such series or concurrent plurality of sensations: sensations do not, as it were, bind themselves together into percepts, nor do percepts bind themselves together into perceptual episodes. The integration of sensations into percepts at any time, and the integration of a series of percepts over time into the continuing perception of any object or event requires non-sensory functions guided by relevant principles. This point holds generally; it requires neither sensory atomism, nor that sensations themselves be objects of our self-conscious (apperceptive) awareness.
    Insofar as we perceive our surroundings via our sensory channels, it is obvious that we can sense and perceive physical objects and events. However, we can sense neither space nor time as such (KdrV A172–3, 188, 214, 487/B214, 231, 261, 515). Consequently, we cannot localise physical objects or events simply by sensing the region each occupies. Our sensory experiences are always successive, yet no mere succession of sensations, nor of sensory percepts, nor of perceptions – qua successive sequence(s) – suffices to determine (discriminate) whether the features of objects or events so sensed are themselves sequential, or instead exist concurrently (though they be sensed sequentially). This Hume failed to note, except to the (insufficient) extent that the porter temporarily imposed upon his studied repose in his empiricist habits of mind.
3. DESCRIPTION, ASCRIPTION & LOCALISATION.
One important, elementary point Kant makes is that the use of concepts, principles or classifications in knowledge requires judgment to ascribe relevant characteristics to particular objects or events, by subsuming that (or those) particular(s) under the

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conceptual classifications used in our judgments to identify their features. This remains the case no matter how specific our rules, principles or classifications may be, so far as concerns knowledge in non-formal domains (KdrV A133–5/B172–4). Conversely, Kant points out that our mere possession or use of a priori concepts or principles does not suffice for knowledge using those concepts or principles. Knowledge requires applying those concepts or principles to particulars which purportedly instantiate them. In our human case, localising such particulars and subsuming them under our classifications or principles (be they a priori or empirical; both are involved in any empirical judgment, according to Kant) are localisable only via sensation, whether directly by sensory perception or by using observational instruments. This marks Kant’s decisive semantic and epistemological critique of pre-Critical metaphysics: The mere fact that we possess a priori concepts shows not at all that we are able to use them legitimately in justifiable cognitive judgments. The lingering worry that Kant’s ‘synthetic a priori ’ would open the door to transcendent metaphysics is mistaken. That lesson Kant learned from Tetens. Kant’s critics in this particular have yet to learn this lesson.
Avant la lettre, Kant’s semantics of singular cognitive reference incorporates Gareth Evans’ thesis about predication, which Kant embeds within a much richer epistemological analysis. Against Quine, Evans argued for this conclusion:
… the line tracing the area of [ascriptive] relevance delimits that area in relation to which one or the other, but not both, of a pair of contradictory predicates may be chosen. And that is what it is for a line to be a boundary, marking something off from other things. (Evans 1975, rpt.: 1985, 36, cf. 34–7)
Evans’ point is that specifying the relevant boundary for the use of either member of a pair (or set) of contrary (mutually exclusive, though not necessarily ‘contradictory’) predicates (KdrV A73–4/B98–9) is only possible by specifying the region relevant to the manifest characteristic in question, and vice versa, and (for reasons Evans provides, concerning the mastery of the relevant predicates of a language) this region will be either co-extensive with or included within the spatio-temporal region occupied by some particular object, event, structure or natural phenomenon. More generally, predication requires conjointly specifying the relevant spatio-temporal region and some manifest characteristics of any particular we self-consciously experience or identify. These conjoint specifications may be approximate; the key point is that spatio-temporal localisation and ascription of manifest characteristics are conjoint, mutually interdependent cognitive achievements (KdrV B162).
This conjoint designation of the region occupied by a particular and at least some of its manifest characteristics requires thorough integration of sensibility and understanding: Sensibility is required (though not sufficient) for sensing various manifest characteristics of the sensed particular, and in directing us to its location; Understanding is required (though not sufficient) for explicitly delineating its region and identifying its manifest characteristics as its characteristics, thus enabling Someone to

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be self-consciously aware of this particular.
1. SINGULAR, SPECIFICALLY COGNITIVE REFERENCE.
  The previous point about predication as a proto-cognitive achievement (not merely a grammatical or judgmental form; §3) is justified by Kant’s semantics of singular, specifically cognitive reference. 4 ‘Cognitive’ reference concerns our reference to (putatively) known individuals, as instances of our (putatively cognitive) judgments or assertions. Kant’s point is that knowledge, justified belief, error or indeed experience (whether veridical or not) of or about particulars require satisfying further conditions of reference (further ‘constraints’, if one will) than those implicit or explicit within conceptual content or linguistic meaning (intension) alone. According to Kant, concepts have ‘meaning’ or content as predicates of possible judgments (intension, classificatory content), though no concept has specifically cognitive significance unless and until it is incorporated into a candidate cognitive judgment which Someone refers to some actual particular(s) S/he has localised within space and time (at least presumptively). The relevant particulars are located within space and time; I use the term ‘localised’ to stress that S identifies (at least approximately) where and when (putatively) known or experienced particulars are located. Kant analyses the first stage of conceptual meaning (intension) in the derivation of the Table of Categories from the Table of Judgments and in the Schematism of the Categories; he analyses the second stage of cognitive significance in the Transcendental Aesthetic, the Amphiboly of the Concepts of Reflection and in the Analytic of Principles. To have any possible significance for theoretical cognition (i.e., for empirical knowledge), the categories – and likewise for all of our concepts – require applicability to particulars we can experience. (This is the task of Kant’s Schematism, augmented in the Analytic of Principles.) However, to have actual cognitive significance, the categories and our other concepts must be ‘applied to objects’ which we experience. (In making such discriminatory judgments, Kant expressly notes, we cannot possibly refer in any specific, determinate way whatever to any transcendent (‘foreign’) cause of the sorts alleged by occasionalists; KdrV A206/B251–2.)
  Through his critique of Leibniz (in the Amphiboly of the Concepts of Reflection, in his Appendix to the Analytic of Principles), Kant identified the cognitive and epistemological insufficiency of descriptions theories of reference. According to descriptions theories of reference, our statements refer to whatever is described when we analyse the meanings of our concepts, terms or statements into explicit descriptions. The problem with this approach within epistemology is that, no matter how specific or extensive a description may be, no description by itself determines whether it is (logically) empty, determinate or ambiguous because it describes no, only one or instead several individuals. Which may be the case is not simply a function of the description: it is equally a function of what there is. The inclusion of definite pronouns (such as ‘the’
  
  4Westphal (2004), esp. §§7–9, 33, 62–63.2.
  
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  or ‘the one and only’) within an attributive phrase does not, because it cannot, settle this issue because no definite article insures that the phrase in which it occurs is neither empty nor ambiguous; this was Russell’s problem (ca. 1905) about ‘the present King of France’. As for Quine’s typical example of a definite referring expression, ‘the shortest spy’, it too may fail to pick out any one particular person, because the shortest spies may be twins or triplets, identical in stature and in profession, though distinct (secret) agents nonetheless. Alternatively, ‘that than which none greater can be conceived’ may not secure monotheism, perhaps not even reference at all; likewise, e.g., for Leibniz’s metaphysical principle of plentitude or David Lewis’s merely possible worlds.
  To know any one spatio-temporal particular (even putatively) requires both correctly ascribing characteristics to it and localising it within space and time. Integrating both of these is required for predicative ascription, and also for knowledge of (or even error about) that individual: predication (even putative predication), as the ascription of characteristics to some individual(s), is a cognitive achievement; it is not merely a grammatical or judgmental form. Only through singular sensory presentation and competent use of conceptions of ‘time’, ‘times’, ‘space’, ‘spaces’, ‘individual’ and ‘individuation’, Kant argues, can we localise any object, event, structure or natural phenomenon (of whatever scale) in space and time (even putatively). Only through ostensive designation can we ascribe the predicates used in our judgment or (perhaps implicit) description to any one (or more) putatively known particular(s). Therefore, predicative ascription is required for singular, specifically cognitive reference to any spatio-temporal particular(s). Only through predication as this kind of cognitive achievement can anyone specify (even approximately) the relevant spatio-temporal region (putatively) containing the particular(s) one purports to designate ostensively – by specifying its occupant(s), the (putatively) known particular(s). Only in this way can one note, specify or determine precisely which spatio-temporal region to designate, in order to grasp this (intended, ostended, presented) particular, and to ascribe to it any manifest characteristics, all of which is required to achieve any knowledge (whether presumptive or actual) of that particular (KdrV B162). (The case is parallel for designating any plurality of particulars or structures of whatever scale.)
  Kant argues for these points directly, against Leibniz’s doctrine of complete individual concepts, which (allegedly) by divine providence of maximal diversity amongst individuals, affords de facto individuation of any and every actual individual solely by each individual’s complete and unique concept – an intension, explicable in principle, if in actu only by the divinity, as a complete and unique description. Against Leibniz, Kant illustrates the spatio-temporal requirements for individuating any (putatively) known particulars using a homely example of two drops of rain, identical in size, shape and in all their qualities, though they are nevertheless two distinct individuals insofar as they occupy distinct regions of space (KdrV A263–4/B319–20), or time, we may add.
  
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  Thus, in brief, does Kant show that determinate cognitive judgments are possible for us only through conjoint spatio-temporal designation of, and predicative ascription of characteristics to, any experienced particular(s).5 As important as predication is to philosophy of language, analysing the meanings of our terms or the contents of our concepts, descriptive phrases or psychological ‘attitudes’ does not because it cannot suffice for epistemology (KdrV A727–30/ B755–8). Kant’s semantic thesis can be formulated in terms of claims, beliefs, statements, assertions or judgments. Put in terms of judgments, this is
  KANT’S THESIS OF SINGULAR COGNITIVE REFERENCE: Terms or phrases have ‘meaning’, and concepts have (classificatory) content, as predicates of possible judgments (intension), though (in non-formal, substantive domains) none of these has specifically cognitive significance unless and until it is incorporated into a candidate cognitive judgment which is referred to some actual particular(s) localised (at least putatively) by the presumptive judge, S, within space and time. Cognitive reference, so defined, is required for cognitive status (even as merely putative knowledge) in any non-formal, substantive domain.
  (The restriction to non-formal domains is discussed below, §§6, 7.)
  
  Kant’s cognitive semantics secures the key aim of meaning verificationism, without invoking meaning verificationism! Kant’s point holds regardless of whether the concepts we use in cognitive judgments (in non-formal, substantive domains) are a priori, a posteriori or mixed. His cognitive-semantic point is that, whatever may be the conceptual content or linguistic meaning (intension) of our claims, judgments, statements or propositions, they have no cognitive status unless and until they are referred to particulars we have (presumptively) localised within space and time. This requirement is a necessary condition for the truth-evaluability of our claims (etc.), and it is a necessary condition for us to know enough about our claims and whatever about which we make those claims to discover and thereby to determine their truth value, their accuracy or their adequate approximation. This requirement is also necessary (though not sufficient) for our assessing the cognitive justification of our claims about those particulars. This is the nerve of Kant’s critique of prior, cognitively transcendent metaphysics.6 Kant’s a priori justification of some central synthetic claims provides no solace for transcendent, rationalist metaphysics – nor for its contemporary echos within analytical metaphysics.
2. LOCALISING PARTICULARS BY CAUSAL-PERCEPTUAL DISCRIMINATION.
Having reached these central points of Kant’s cognitive semantics, we must consider

5Kant’s semantics of singular cognitive reference provides for scientific reference to indirectly observed entities or forces, e.g., the magnetism of the loadstone responsible for the stone’s observed effects upon iron filings (KdrV B273). The details of this provision cannot, and need not, be summarised here.
6Kant’s epistemology is (in these regards) sound; see Westphal (2004), cf. Hanna (2001), Rosenberg (2005), Bird (2006), Haag (2007).
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core features of his account of differentiating and identifying spatio-temporal individuals. Any ascription of characteristics to any individual(s) sufficiently accurate and warranted to count as reasonable belief (and all the more so for such ascription to count as knowledge), we must achieve sufficient presumption to have identified an individual as an object, process, structure or event which occupies some specifiable region of space and time and which manifests some plurality of characteristics within that region. Any of these identifications requires distinguishing that individual (or those individuals) from our perceptions of them. As Kant repeatedly stressed, our experiential, sensory intake is always successive, but whether any succession apparent in our perceptions tracks an objective succession within some event or process, or instead successively reveals concurrently existing features of any one (relatively) stable, persisting object in principle cannot be determined (specified) merely by our experiential, perceptual, sensory sequences (KdrV A194/B239–40). This crucial point Hume neglected almost entirely, except when the porter delivered his letter to his upper storey apartment; it has been altogether neglected by the sense-data tradition.
In both the Second and in the Third Analogies of Experience, Kant highlights – briefly, though incisively – the contrast between our own perceptual activity and whatever objects or events we may happen to perceive. Our perceptual activity is not merely mental, and no mere matter of attention, but also includes our bodily comportment (Melnick 1989), including how we direct our gaze: whether first to the roof or to the foundation of a building, or to its ‘left’ or its ‘right’ facing side (KdrV B162); or towards the river when the ship is upstream, then glance away, then glance again at the river, wherein the ship is now further downstream (KdrV A192/ B237); or instead first to the moon, then to the earth’s horizon and then back to the moon; or first to the earth’s horizon and then to the moon and back to the earth (KdrV B257).
Kant’s semantics of singular cognitive reference underscores that empirical knowledge is discriminatory, insofar as it involves discriminating particulars both spatio-temporally and by their manifest or measurable characteristics. The discriminatory character of our empirical knowledge is greatly augmented and underscored by Kant’s analysis of the basic principles of causal judgment in the ‘Analogies of Experience’.
For too long, discussion of Kant’s Analogies focussed almost exclusively upon the Second, where Kant was supposed to have answered Hume’s causal scepticism. Kant’s reply to Hume cannot lie there, for as Beck (1975, 149n.) noted, in the Second Analogy Kant’s model of causality is Leibnizian. That is correct only to this extent: Kant’s Second Analogy only concerns rule-governed causal changes of state within any one substance, whereas Hume’s scepticism concerns causal relations between two or more particulars.7 Kant’s First Analogy concerns the persistence of any one substance through

7Melnick (1973, 96) neglected Beck’s observation and its significance, and so wrongly regarded ‘the separation of the argument into two sections, the Second Analogy and the Third Analogy’ as ‘artificial
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causal changes of its states. Only in the Third Analogy does Kant defend a principle of causal judgment regarding causal interactions between any two or more substances. Recent literature has paid more attention to Kant’s Third Analogy, yet even leading research on Kant’s Analogies of Experience neglects how Kant’s principles of causal judgment in the Analogies form an integrated set, because no one of these principles can be used without conjoint use of the other two.
Indeed, Kant’s three principles of causal judgment provide an integrated, incremental justification of judgments about transeunt causal interactions. A cause is ‘transeunt’ if it extends beyond any one substance in order to effect a change in another (O.E.D.). Kant’s main examples in the Third Analogy are astronomical, but his analysis is general and holds of all forms of causal interaction between physical particulars, of whatever kinds, at whatever scale. As Caird and Paton noted, Kant’s defence of causal interaction counters Leibniz as well as Hume.8
The three Analogies present and defend a tightly integrated set of mutually supporting principles regulating our discriminatory causal-perceptual judgments. The empirical criterion of succession is lack of reversibility of the type of sequence of appearances produced by one or more objects; the empirical criterion of co-existence is the reversibility of the type of sequence of appearances produced by one or more objects. Determining whether either co-existence or succession occurs requires determining that the other does not, where both determinations require that we identify objects which persist through both the real and the apparent changes involved in the relevant sequence of appearances. We directly perceive neither time nor space as such, whilst the mere order in which we apprehend (take in) appearances determines (specifies, indicates) no objective order of objects or events: our ever-successive perceptions may be perceptions of concurrently co-existing particulars or features of some one particular. Consequently, the only condition under which we can determine which states of affairs precede, and which coexist with, which others is if there are enduring perceptible substances which interact causally, thereby producing changes of state in one another, including changes in location or motion (including orientation). Perceiving and discriminating enduring substances are necessary for us to determine any variety of spatial locations, to determine changes of place, and to determine non-spatial changes of state objects may undergo. To ascertain whether a change of appearances is a function of one object, previously in view, moving out of view when displaced by another; or instead is a function of one object rotating to reveal a different aspect; or

and forced’. Melnick (2004, 114) corrects this oversight, though Melnick (2006) altogether omits the Third Analogy.
8Watkins (2005) claims that Kant does not seek to answer Hume’s causal scepticism. However, his responses to Manfred Kuehn’s comments at an ‘Author meets Critics’ at the Pacific Division meeting of the American Philosophical Association (2005), and to questions from the floor, clearly demonstrated insufficient command of Hume’s texts and issues to substantiate his denial that Kant sought to respond to Hume’s causal scepticism.
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instead is a function of one spatially stable object undergoing a non-spatial change of state, requires that we are able to – and do – identify places, changes of state, and objects which change place or state, and that we are able to – and do – discriminate amongst these different kinds of causal scenario. To identify any one such scenario requires conjoint, discriminatory use of all three principles of causal judgment defended in the Analogies of Experience (KdrV B223, 231, 256). The principles of causal judgment defended in the Analogies all stand together, or not at all. Defending transeunt causality is thus central to Kant’s Analogies as a whole, and not only to the Third Analogy. The valid use of Kant’s Analogies of Experience requires that changes in material substances we identify are produced, directly or indirectly (via their ‘relatively inner’ determinations), by external transeunt causes.
We human beings can only discriminate and identify causally interacting, perceptible spatio-temporal substances, events or structures. Identifying any one such particular requires discriminating it from its – and from our own – surroundings within space and time, by identifying some of its manifest characteristics, including some of its causal characteristics, whether those responsible for the relative stability of its concurrent – including its concurrently perceptible – characteristics, or those responsible for some of its changes in spatial location or orientation, or for some of its causal transformations (exchange of characteristics or states) (cf. Harper 1984).
In connection with his example of perceiving successively the concurrently existing features of a building – a house – Kant expressly notes, ‘I draw, as it were, its form’ (KdrV B162),9 thus noting – drawing, identifying, discriminating – its (approximate) spatial boundary. These points about causal-perceptual discrimination of particulars hold generally, not merely in the case of a porter climbing the stairs of the staircase to our flat, which we – now comfortably at home, seated before the fire – do not perceive out in the stairwell. These points, too, belong to Kant’s incisive generalisation of Hume’s sceptical problems. These points also mark Kant’s incorporation of Evans’ analysis of predicative ascription within a richer epistemological analysis. We can only distinguish appearances of particulars by discriminating particulars, and thereby discriminate which features of our perceptual experiences are due to those particulars and their characteristics from other features of our perceptual experiences which are due to our own bodily comportment.
This capacity to discriminate features of sensory appearances due to the environment from those due to a creature’s own bodily motions involves ‘sensory reafference’. This very basic sensory-perceptual function is required to perceive any objective environment; it is found even in very simple invertebrates, including, e.g., drosophila (Brembs 2011). It is very much to Kant’s credit that he noted this perceptual phenomenon, and its fundamental importance to perceiving one’s surroundings. It is also to Kant’s credit that he used this point as part of his subtle and cogent justification

9Kant states: „ich zeichne gleichsam seine Gestalt …“; all translations are the author’s.
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of mental content externalism (Westphal 2006, 2007).

Kant’s cognitive semantics does not rule out second-hand ‘knowledge by description’ based upon reliable testimony or written reports; instead it establishes basic cognitive conditions upon the acquisition of empirical knowledge, by identifying basic conditions under which alone synthetic statements have specifically cognitive status within any non-formal domain. Kant’s cognitive semantics founds an important quadruple distinction between description (intension, classification), ascription – i.e., attribution of the predicates contained in S’s description to some particular(s) localised by S (predication), sufficiently accurate or true ascription, and sufficiently (cognitively) justified accurate or true description. Only the latter can count as empirical knowledge. Consequently, Kant’s analysis of specifically cognitive reference shows why philosophy of language or philosophy of mind may augment epistemology, but cannot supplant it, insofar as neither cognitive justification nor singular cognitive reference can be reduced to, nor substituted by, analysis of linguistic meaning nor of mental content.10
6 THE IRRELEVANCE OF INFALLIBILISM TO NON-FORMAL DOMAINS.
Kant’s cognitive semantics also shows that justificatory infallibilism is in principle irrelevant to the non-formal domain of empirical knowledge. Strictly speaking, formal domains are those which involve no existence postulates. Strictly speaking, the one purely formal domain is a careful reconstruction of Aristotle’s Square of Opposition (Wolff 1995, 2000, 2009, 2012). All further logical or mathematical domains involve various existence postulates, including semantic postulates. We may define ‘formal domains’ more broadly to include all formally defined logistic systems (Lewis 1930; rpt.: 1970, 10). Whether we construe formal domains narrowly or broadly, deduction suffices for justification within any formal domain because deduction constitutes justification within any formal domain. Indeed, a domain is a formal domain only insofar as deduction constitutes justification within it. Only within formal domains is justification constituted by provability.
The relevance of any such logistic system to any non-formal, substantive domain rests, however, not upon formal considerations alone, but also upon substantive considerations of how useful a specific logistic system may be within a non-formal, substantive domain (Lewis 1929, 298; cf. Carnap 1950a). The use of any specified logistic system within any non-formal domain does not suffice for justification within that domain; justification within that domain also requires assessment of the adequacy, accuracy and specific use of, inter alia, the semantic and existence postulates which partially constitute and delimit that domain. Consequently, within any substantive domain, fallibilism is no sceptical capitulation, not because infallibilist standards of justification are too stringent, but because in principle they are inappropriate – i.e., they

10These important features of Kant’s semantics of singular cognitive reference, and indeed of Evans’ analysis of predication, are neglected by McDowell; see Westphal (2008b). On McDowell’s recent re- assertion of perceptual infallibilism, see Westphal (2017a), §107.
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are irrelevant – to any and all substantive domains. Conversely, within any substantive domain, a mere logical possibility as such has no cognitive status and so cannot serve to ‘defeat’ or to undermine (refute) an otherwise well-grounded line of justificatory reasoning within that domain. The domain of (putative) empirical knowledge includes spatio-temporal objects and events; accordingly, empirical knowledge is a non-formal domain. Consequently, Kant’s analysis of singular cognitive reference rules out the ideal of infallible justification (post-1277 scientia) within the entire non-formal domain of empirical knowledge. Recognising that only fallibilist accounts of justification are tenable within the non-formal domain of empirical knowledge concedes nothing to scepticism (Westphal 2013b, 2016b).
In view of Kant’s critique of cognitive judgment, including his cognitive semantics of singular reference, we must distinguish between the literal and full meaning of his causal principles as formulated (their intension), and the legitimate, justifiable cognitive significance of any judgments we can make using those principles. This accords with Kant’s calling his analyses and justification of these principles ‘Analogies’, insofar as these causal principles regulate our causal judgments by guiding our identifying efficient causes of observed spatio-temporal events. How fully or precisely we may identify causes and effects is a matter for empirical inquiry, whether commonsense, diagnostic, forensic or natural-scientific (cf. Harper 1984). Because our causal judgments are discriminatory (in the ways indicated above), we are only able to discriminate apparent from real changes of objects’ states, locations or motions insofar as we identify – sufficiently to recognise them at all – other physical events which cause those changes, so as to distinguish those objective, physical changes from merely apparent changes which result from our contingent observations, including our bodily comportment.
Making such discriminatory, perceptual-causal judgments to identify particulars in our surroundings requires anticipation and imagination to consider, not any and all logically possible alternatives to an apparently perceived causal scenario, but to consider relevant causally possible alternatives to an apparently perceived causal scenario. Yes, already in 1787 Kant developed a very sophisticated, profoundly anti- Cartesian, ‘relevant alternatives’ epistemology (cp. Milmed 1969; Strawson 1974, 1979; Sellars 1978; Westphal 2004, 2007).
1. CRITICAL PHILOSOPHY & PHILOSOPHICAL SELF-CRITICISM.
  The points made above about the necessarily conjoint, discriminatory use of all three of Kant’s causal principles, expounded and justified in the Analogies of Experience, are not new findings: They were established by Guyer (1987),11 and have been restated, augmented and highlighted in my own subsequent research several times. Yet Kant’s
  
  11Guyer (1987), 168, 212–14, 224–25, 228, 239, 246, 274–75.
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  commentators continue to disregard the integrity of Kant’s Analogies of Experience.12 I surmise this results from several habits of thought, all over-due for Critical reconsideration.
  1. Kant’s Analytic Commentators. The infallibilist presumption that nothing short of provability suffices for justification has two fatal consequences: conceptual analysis is the sole legitimate method of philosophy, and mere conceivability of an alternative suffices for refutation. This infallibilist orthodoxy is demonstrably Mediaeval, proclaimed by Étienne Tempier, Bishop of Paris, in condemning 220 neo-Aristotelian heresies in 1277 (Piché 1999, Boulter 2011).
    Frege was highly critical of ‘psychologism’ – of mistaking psychological considerations of how we think or judge for philosophically central, indeed for much more fundamental issues of how we ought to think or judge. Recently I had occasion to read widely in latter 19th-century theory of knowledge, including neo-Kantianism, and found myself confronted with the target of Frege’s critique across the range of European and North American philosophical writings. Carnap and the logical empiricists radicalised Frege’s rejection of psychologism, eschewing even logical analysis of judgment in favour of focussing upon propositions, their proper formulation and use, and their evidence bases (cf. Carnap 1950b, §11). Only that which we can state explicitly, clearly and accurately can we rationally assess and, when warranted, accept – and only that which we can state explicitly, clearly and accurately can we analyse using the resources of modern logical techniques. This focus upon the use of logical techniques, so far as possible, within philosophy was further promoted by Quine, Davidson and Fodor, very much at the expense of ordinary language philosophy (cf. Tanney 2013) – and at the expense of neglecting Carnap’s (1932–33, 1932–33, 177–80;
    1942, §5; 1963, 923, 925–7) repeated insistence that his formalised syntax and semantics are not self-sufficient, but require for their actual use their proper complement: a ‘descriptive semantics’ which identifies observation statements made by natural scientists ‘of our cultural circle’.
    In accord with analytical focus upon propositions, and in view of Hume’s formulation of issues about causality, Kant’s commentators strongly tend to focus on Kant’s three principles of causal judgment in the Analogies of Experience as nothing more than three (mutually independent) propositions, and on ‘causality’ only as ‘event causation’, where ‘event causation’ is conceived only as a sequence of one happening and then another happening; these may be of repeatedly paired instances of kinds, but no consideration is given to how they come about, nor to how we can localise and identify either the (purported) cause or the (purported) event. By focussing too much upon mere principles and not enough upon their use in (putative) cognitive judgments,
    
    12Allison’s (2004, 260–274) second edition includes a new discussion of Kant’s Third Analogy, and considers Guyer’s views of the Third Analogy, yet Allison neglects Guyer’s finding about the integrity of the Three Analogies, as does Melnick (2004, 2006).
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    Kant’s commentators thus neglect the importance of Kant’s point – prefigured by Hume’s encounter with the porter – that the always successive order in which we merely take in appearances in principle cannot distinguish between objective succession and objective co-existence (successively perceived). As a result, these commentators continue to mis-read Kant’s Second Analogy as concerning Humean, merely statistical correlations of distinct events; whereas (Beck noted) Kant’s Second Analogy only concerns successive states of any one substance. Nevertheless, Beck neglected three important consequences of this fact: (1) Kant only defends transeunt causality between distinct substances in connection with the Third Analogy; (2) therefore, competent, cognizant use of all three causal principles is required to identify any one causal sequence or process we identify, by distinguishing it from its causally possible alternatives (which would instantiate either of the other two principles of causal judgment); (3) we can only make such discriminatory causal judgments in regard to spatio-temporal, causally interacting perceptible substances. In Kant’s view, this is not a general truth about knowledge as such, nor about causal concepts or principles as such, nor about causality as such; instead it is general truth about human knowledge using our actual cognitive capacities within our actual environment. As Kant noted, ‘that something occurs, i.e., that something or a state begins to exist, which was not heretofore, cannot be empirically perceived where there is no prior appearance which does not contain this state’ (KdrV A291–2/B236–7). The initial event beloved of Humean causal theorists must itself first be identified as occurring, which requires us to have identified prior circumstances, which requires that we have already differentiated those concurrent and persisting circumstances from our always-successive experiences of them. Kant’s key point about causal judgment turns on the causal discriminations involved in distinguishing those sequences in our experiences which are produced by events surrounding us, from those sequences which instead only reflect our changing perceptual activity as we experience perduring, perceptible circumstances surrounding us (KdrV A292/B237). We don’t first perceive an event, and then – knowing nothing other than that – inquire into the cause of its occurrence; identifying any new appearance as an event in the world, and not merely an apparent change induced by our changing our viewpoint already involves – if implicitly, sub-personally – discriminating that new event within our surroundings, which involves causal discrimination and localisation (however approximate) of relevant particulars and some of their apparent features. Humean causal scepticism is a direct consequence of Cartesian internalism.
    These oversights by recent analytic commentators are highlighted by the general neglect of P.F. Strawson’s later, highly Kantian essays and his later essays on Kant. Strawson recognised deficiencies in The Bounds of Sense (1966) regarding both Kant’s Critique and the core philosophical issues, upon which he improved significantly in ‘Kant’s New Foundations of Metaphysics’ (1997a), ‘The Problem of Realism and the A Priori ’ (1997b), ‘Imagination and Perception’ (1974) and ‘Perception and its Objects’ (1979). These latter two concern central issues of perceptual judgment; their Kantian
    
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    credentials are apparent when compared to Milmed (1969) and Sellars (1978).13
    Long-standing rejection of issues about cognitive judgment within analytic epistemology resulted in part from the aim to avoid ‘psychologism’ (of whatever varieties), though also in part by the implicit though fundamentally Cartesian aspiration to refute the epistemological nightmare of global perceptual scepticism. It is significant that all of Gettier’s (1963) infamous counter-examples centrally involve what soon became known as ‘externalist’ factors bearing upon the justificatory status of Someone’s beliefs, factors such that S/he neither was, nor could easily become, aware by simple reflection. These may be environmental, or they may concern features of S’s neurophysiology of perception, or S’s inference patterns. Sceptics remain impressed by the fact that all of our experiences and beliefs could be as they are, even though as a simple matter of logic they could all be false (Stroud 1994, 241–2, 245). What this fact demonstrates is rather that cognitive justification is not reducible to logical deduction. Kant recognised this in his distinction between general logic and a specifically ‘transcendental logic’ (KdrV A131/B170), which considers the various possible and necessary roles of a priori concepts and principles within human experience and knowledge, their respective domains, and the conditions under which their use can be legitimate (or not). Kant understood that understanding human knowledge requires understanding how knowledge is possible for beings constited as we are. So doing requires a basic inventory of our characteristically human cognitive capacities; Kant deserves credit for having provided the necessary minimum inventory.
    To inventory our most basic cognitive capacities Kant pursued this insight:
    
    Now it is indeed very illuminating: that whatever I must presuppose in order at all to know an object, cannot itself be known as [an] object …. (KdrV A402)
    
    Pace Nietzsche,14 Kant did not neglect the question, ‘How is Immanuel Kant possible?’
    – i.e., how can any philosopher investigate, assay, assess and compose a credible, cogent Critique of Pure Reason? Kant recognised that no critique of pure reason can be conducted by Cartesian reflection, nor within the constraints of Hume’s fork (only logically necessary truths or falsehoods can be known a priori as mere relations of ideas, whilst any synthetic proposition can be known, if at all, only on the basis of empirical evidence regarding matters of fact), nor by mere conceptual analysis. Against Leibniz, Kant noted, e.g., that no causal relation can be established by mere conceptual analysis, nor can any other synthetic propositions be justified a priori merely by conceptual analysis (KdrV B13, A216–8/B263–5, cf. A716, 717–8/B744, 745–6). The entire effort to identify in (or through) Kant’s texts a purely analytical refutation of scepticism by valid ‘analytic transcendental argument’ (cf. Strawson 1966, Bieri et al
    
    13Also worth studying in this connection is R.P. Wolff (1960).
    14Cf. Morgenröte, Vorrede §3.
    
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    1979, Stern 1999) was ill-conceived and ill-fated from the start; nor is weakening the aspirations of (allegedly) transcendental analysis to mere belief (Stern 2000) any avail. The key shortcomings with that approach was its focus upon concept possession and its reliance upon conceptual analysis, whereas Kant had learnt from Tetens that the key issues concern justifiable use of concepts, the necessary a priori conditions of which use require conceptual explication informed by transcendental reflection upon what is possible for beings with our logically contingent cognitive capacities (12 basic forms of judgment; 2 forms of sensory intake). Neither doxography nor doxology can serve as – nor substitute for – sound epistemology.
    Kant is right that we need a fundamentally ‘altered method of thinking’ (KdrV Bxviii, cf. A270, 676/B326, 704). Kant’s method of transcendental reflection is subtle, sophisticated and cannot be summarised here.15 Some of its key features may, however, be indicated. The first point is anti-Cartesian and anti-empiricist: Only due to the structure and proper functioning of sub-personal cognitive processes can we be at all conscious of our surroundings (perception), or be self-aware in and through our consciousness of our surroundings (apperception). Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason is still one of the most incisive and profoundly anti-Cartesian works in all philosophy; his methods as well as his substantive analyses invoke important and pervasive aspects of what is now called ‘externalism’. Consider in this regard that Gettier (1963) made the case against infallibilism – a preconception central to the issue of global perceptual scepticism, including Stroud’s – and for both fallibilism and externalism in epistemology. In so doing, however, Gettier’s analysis echoed Carnap’s distinction, made explicit in 1950, though central to his philosophy from at least 1928, between the methods of conceptual analysis and conceptual explication. Less familiar still is that Carnap’s (1950b, 1–18) distinction between these two methods marks the same distinction, in the same terms, and for very much the same reasons as did Kant (KdrV A727–30/B755–8).
    Devotés of empiricism, internalism or infallibilism generally concurred with Strawson’s (1966, 32) castigation of Kant’s account of sub-personal cognitive functions and processes as an entirely ‘imaginary subject’ of ‘transcendental psychology’. Guyer (1989) showed that Kant’s analysis of the sub-personal cognitive processing effected by transcendental power of imagination is necessary for any cognisant being who synthesises sensory information over time (in response to stimulation by spatio-temporal objects and events; cf. KdrV A139/B178, B298). In reply, Strawson (1989, 77) retracted his ‘somewhat rude’ castigation of Kant’s transcendental psychology. As noted above, in subsequent articles Strawson had greatly improved both the philosophical and the exegetical calibre of his Kantian account of perception. Andrew Brook (1994, 2016) has shown how very prescient Kant’s cognitive psychology is, by showing how very well it serves functionalist cognitive psychology and allied efforts in artificial intelligence.
    
    15See Wolff (1995, 2017), Longuenesse (1998), Westphal (2004), (2016b).
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    None of these epistemological advances or insights can result from conceptual analysis pure and simple. Instead, as both Kant and Carnap recognized, within non- formal domains we can at best aspire to cogent conceptual explication, where our conceptual explications (explicanda) must not only clarify their explicata; they must also improve upon their explicata within their original contexts of use. Ineluctably this invokes important elements of semantic as well as justificatory externalism. Because explicanda cannot be provided necessary and sufficient conditions for their correct use, they are in principle incomplete (or at least not known to be complete), and they are corrigible and revisable. Consequently, explicanda must be assessed in possible contexts of their actual use, not within merely imaginary contexts of their logically possible use! This, too, is part of realising our concepts and principles, to demonstrate that they have a legitimate use and meaning. Talk is cheap; cogent philosophical explication and justification must be earned.
    The ever-ready question from audiences or readers today, ‘But couldn’t s/he say
    …?’, in principle cannot count as a cogent critical question, unless and until so saying is shown to have a significant role within a cogent philosophical account of whatever topic is at issue. Yes, careful attention to what is stated, and what is not, is crucial, as is attention to valid and sound inference. However, these skills and strategies cannot suffice for cogent philosophising, which also requires probing and thinking through philosophical issues and problems systematically and in detail. Logical inferences alone do not constitute justificatory relations; we must also know which statements are to serve as premises for which others, and why. It should not be necessary to state so basic a point, but for the fact that it is ever more commonly ignored by ‘scholars’, ‘commentators’ and their ‘students’.
  2. Kant’s Phenomenological Commentators. Kant’s phenomenological commentators recognise much more readily Kant’s points about how our experiences and cognitive judgments are context- and occasion-specific. However, they tend to loose the specificity and the justificatory achievements of Kant’s analysis by engaging in purely descriptive – hence non-explanatory, non-justificatory – phenomenology; or by uncovering further (allegedly) necessary structures and conditions of our capacity to judge. Buchdahl (1992) realised that Kant meant something significant by using the term ‘realisieren’ (to realise), but mistakenly assimilated it to a broadly Husserlian framework of ontological reduction and realisation (Westphal 1998).
Though Husserl comments at length both on Hume’s and on Kant’s theories of perceptual knowledge, he is antecedently so convinced that he has gained profound new insights into human knowledge and its a priori transcendental principles and basis, that his purported „Phänomenologische Studie über Hume’s Abstractionstheorie“ – as he titles chapter 5 of his second logical investigation (Husserl 1901, §§32–39, + Anhang: 205–13) – is no phenomenological study of Hume’s views at all, but rather recites Husserl’s disagreements based upon his presumed greater insight into the relevant

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cognitive-experiential phenomena and their structure and character. Rather than phenomenological examination, the reader is offered a lengthy rejection by petitio principii. The same approach is taken in Husserl’s Formale und transzendentale Logik (1929), which concludes its sixth chapter (§§62, 99–100) by returning ‘from this historical-critical excursus to our main theme’ (1929, 235). His approach and attitude towards Hume, Kant and other predecessors is typified by his article ‘Phenomenology’ for the Encyclopaedia Britannica (14th ed.; Husserl 1927–28); and also by the same approach and attitude of his doctoral student, C.V. Salmon (1929), who wrote his dissertation on Book I of Hume’s Treatise, purporting to disclose The Central Problem of David Hume’s Philosophy.16
Husserl’s expositors continue to cite Husserl’s discussions of, e.g., Hume or Kant, referring to the master’s extended „Auseinandersetzungen“ with them in countless volumes of Husserliana, but take as little note as he of the cardinal distinction between a philosophical Auseinandersetzung and mere petitio principii. Husserl’s so-called ‘criticism’ of Kant’s or Hume’s views document Husserl’s dissatisfactions with them, his rejection of them and his differences with them. Nonetheless, all of his ‘critical’ remarks remain entirely external and as supremely self-confident as anything Quine wrote from his lofty extensionalist point of view (Westphal 2015). This is evident throughout the most detailed examination of Husserl’s relations to Kant, Kern’s (1964) Husserl und Kant (see esp. §§10–11). Even so sensitive and sensible a commentator as Dan Zahavi (2003, 108) neglects Kant’s rooting our discriminatory causal judgments (in part) in our bodily comportment, as does Smith (2003), though Smith’s Husserl and the Cartesian Meditations is exoteric and critical as well as expository, and pays rather better attention to Hume.
In sharp contrast to such discussions stand Meinong’s (1878, 1882) studies of Hume’s nominalism and theory of relations in Book I of the Treatise. Meinong’s massive articles – together, they are tantamount to a detailed monograph – belong to the very best scholarship on Hume’s theories of ideas and of relations. Regrettably, he neglects Hume’s porter, and devoted no comparable study to Kant’s theory of perceptual experience and knowledge.17
Gurwitsch (2009–10, 1:107–30; 2:140–7, 175–7) devotes significant attention to Hume’s theory of perception and of the identity of perceptible things, and notes some genuine difficulties with Hume’s account. Gurwitsch focusses on Hume’s model of the mind as a bundle of continually successive perceptions, but is more concerned with how those perceptions model the human mind and our experience of temporality, and neglects the problems they raise for Hume’s official empiricism (the Copy Theory,

16The much briefer doctoral dissertation by Sauer (1926) is no different in this regard, but merits no further attention here. Husserl’s (1902–03) lectures on epistemology do not improve on the situation documented here from his published writings.
17I have found none, and none is mentioned or suggested by Chrudzimski (2007).
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Concept Empiricism and the three ‘laws’ of psychological association). Consequently, Gurwitsch’s criticisms are less penetrating than Meinong’s, and likewise fail to capitalise upon Hume’s perplexing porter, and upon Kant’s reanalysis of those problems. Gurwitsch (2009–10, 2:172, 315–6) mistakenly ascribes to Kant a Humean view of sensory data, thus disregarding Kant’s sensationist account of sensations.18 He also neglects Kant’s discriminatory analysis of perceptual-causal judgments. These points are not improved in Gurwitsch (1957) or (1959), although in both he discusses the example of a house, his own study within it, and its location within its surrounding neighbourhood, yet he neglects Hume’s discoveries within his own study about his surroundings and the porter’s arrival, and also neglects Kant’s example of perceiving a house, in contrast to a ship sailing in a river.19 Gurwitsch (1990, 128–32) focuses solely upon Kant’s Second Analogy, and contends that Kant’s analysis fails to address the problems involved in any plurality of persons identifying one and the same spatio- temporal causal sequence or process, because Kant lacks an account of intentionality.
It must be said instead that Gurwitsch, too, failed to identify the integrity of the sole use of Kant’s three causal principles in the Analogies of Experience (per Guyer), and that only in connection with the Third Analogy do Kant’s principles of causal judgment refer – solely – to spatio-temporal objects, events, processes and phenomena. (On Kant’s account of intentionality, see Haag 2007.) In part this appears to result from Gurwitsch’s focus upon the Leibnizian backdrop to Kant’s account of transcendental unity of apperception, and a consequent, if perhaps inadvertent, emphasis upon Kant’s transcendental idealism to the neglect of Kant’s empirical realism. Perhaps Kant identified necessary, though insufficient a priori transcendental conditions of perceptual experience, judgment and knowledge (in particular, by not examining their transcendental, formal though material conditions), yet it is remarkable how Husserl, Gurwitsch and other phenomenological expositors fail to appreciate Hume’s and Kant’s insights and achievements, however incomplete they may have been.20
Heidegger’s engagement with Hume is early and indirect, mostly cast in terms of Hume’s later-day philosophical representatives (characteristic is Heidegger 1912). His interests are already differently focussed, towards what becomes his observation that the scandal of philosophy consists, not in the lack of proof of the external world (KdrV Bxxxix note), but in the continuing search for one (S&Z, §43a./205). In these years prior to Sein und Zeit (1927), Heidegger’s central concern is with standard philosophical

18According to sensationism (about sensations), sensations typically are components of acts of perceptual awareness of something in one’s surroundings, and only rarely are themselves objects of one’s self- conscious awareness. (Chisholm’s adverbial account of appearing is similar.)
19Gurwitsch’s example of perceiving a house: (1957 [2009–10, v. 3]), 495, 499; (1959), 421, 423–4, 431,
435. His editors, too, neglect Kant’s and Hume’s perceptive precedents.
20Sherover (1971) is centrally concerned with Kant’s central concern with temporality, but mentions Kant’s Analogies of Experience and Refutation of Idealism only in passing, and so neglects Kant’s detailed account of the causal judgments by which alone we are able to be aware of our own existence as determined in time.
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language, and its tendency to lull us into assuming that once we have the right concepts and theories, and the methods for using and justifying them, we can disregard the experiential circumstances out of which these philosophical resources grow and on which they continue tacitly to depend. Husserl’s constant concern with properly posing ‘the’ fundamental question of philosophy by discovering and devising ‘the’ best concepts, principles and domain of (allegedly transcendental) phenomena surely prompted Heidegger to ponder and probe the underpinnings of whatever problematic philosophers explicitly formulate and address. Early on, Heidegger characterised philosophical hermeneutics as not itself a philosophy, but rather as solely concerned with this question: „In welche führende Hinsicht ist das Gegenstandsfeld der Philosophie gestellt?“ (1923, 40)21; ‘In what leading regard is the domain and objective of philosophy posed and characterised?’. In this regard, Hume’s psychological treatment of ‘cause’ is more interesting to Heidegger for how Hume struggles to do justice to how this idea is used – as if relations between strictly (1:1) correlated impressions really were connections – within the dictates of Cartesian preconceptions about our human form of mindedness, our experience and the world we inhabit.22 Hume’s struggles are reiterated though not remedied by the turn-of-the-century Humeans Heidegger (1912) lists. Heidegger’s lectures on Kant’s Kritik der reinen Vernunft don’t examine Kant’s Principles of causal judgment closely (e.g.: 1935–36, §27), and so neglect what Guyer noted.
Analytical, phenomenological and historical-scholarly commentators chronically miss, and continue to miss, what Kant takes over from Tetens about ‘realising’ our concepts or principles by demonstrating that we can and do locate relevant instantiations of them; nor do they understand why Kant took over this concern.23 Consequently, they also typically err about what Kant means by the ‘real possibility’ of a concept, which is not that there might be such a thing as (e.g.) a purple guitar, though there was none when F.L. Will (1969, rpt.: 1997, 12–13) used this example; so far as this writer knows, only when the performer known as Prince ordered and purchased a flamboyantly purple guitar did the concept ‘purple guitar’ come to have ‘real possibility’ in Kant’s sense of this designation. Kant’s sense of ‘real possibility’ accords entirely with his use of Teten’s sense of realisiren and with his own sense of ‘objective validity’; each requires that we can in fact localise at least one relevant instance of the concept or principle in question (Bxxvi n., A137–8/B176–7, B301–2, B302–3, A581–2/B609–10). Kant
expressly warns against inferring from the logical possibility of a concept (its logical consistency) that this concept is also really possible (A596/B624n., A602/B630, cf. A720/B748).

21Cf. Heidegger (1923), 19–20, 49, 58–60; (1998), 15–16, 39, 46–8.
22These remarks on Heidegger result from correspondence with Bob Scharff, and some formulations come directly from his. Thanks again, Bob!
23My sole point here concerns an important oversight; I do not dismiss these authors’ positive
contributions (cf., e.g., Zahavi 2009).
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8 PHILOSOPHICAL SPECIALISATION & PHILOSOPHICAL OVERSIGHT.
This pervasive neglect (§7) of core issues and features of Kant’s account of discriminatory causal-perceptual judgment, and of Guyer’s (1987) landmark examination and defence of Kant’s account in those regards, apparently results from scholars thinking about what is said or written, without thinking through the problems addressed by those writings, in part by attending only to one formulation of them. In this important methodological and substantive regard, Nietzsche was right both about perception and about philosophical thinking:
There is only a perspective seeing, only a perspective ‘knowing’; and the more affects we allow to speak about one thing, the more eyes, various eyes, we know how to use observe the same thing, the more complete will our ‘concept’ of this thing, our ‘objectivity,’ be. (GM 3:12; cf. FW §295; EH 1:9)
Accordingly Nietzsche recommends training oneself to adopt a variety of perspectives:

… to see differently in the [vedantic or Kantian] way for once, to want to see differently, is no small training and preparation of the intellect for its eventual ‘objectivity’ – the latter understood not as ‘disinterested contemplation’ (which is absurd nonsense), but as the capacity to control one’s pro and contra and to shift them in and out, so that one knows how to make the diversity of perspectives and affective interpretations useful for knowing. (GM 3:12; cf. EH 1:1)24
No one philosopher, no one period, no one style or tradition of philosophy has a monopoly on any core philosophical issue. Serious study of contrasting or opposing analyses, approaches, methods or formulations is invaluable – as invaluable as it is ever more rare in a field that has fragmented itself into a myriad of (supposedly) mutually independent sub-specialties, schools, movements, problem-domains, their ever more specialised journals and their increasing mutual irrelevance. The consequences of these developments are ever more apparent in the growing cleft, in both quality and quantity, between the best philosophical research and that which is most topical – i.e., most discussed. For example, J.L. Austin, now widely regarded as a narrow philosopher of language, thought and wrote so cogently about philosophy of language because he advocated and himself pursued comprehensive study of philosophy and allied fields. (This I have learnt recently from one of his tutees, Graham Bird.)
The slogan that ‘sense determines reference’ has echoed down analytical folklore with undue consequences. Once detached from Frege’s own view of Sinne, and having rescinded aconceptual ‘knowledge by acquaintance’, the notion that ‘sense determines reference’ has lived on, explicitly or (much more often) implicitly as a descriptions theory of reference: a crucial enthymeme in Kuhn’s (1996, 101–2) strongest argument for paradigm incommensurability, and the target of Kripke’s (1980) withering criticism.

24Nietzsche’s perspectivist cognitivism is examined in Westphal (1984a, b).
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It is fine to use an explicit, fully articulated description to explicate the content of a sentence, statement, proposition or perhaps even an attitude. However, no such fully articulated description alone is either sufficient, nor necessary, to specify what any specific person said or thought on any particular occasion. Specifying his or her statement or thought requires specifying the particulars about which S/he thought or spoke on that occasion in those circumstances. As Donnellan (1966) noted, an inaccurate – hence a false – definite description can nevertheless be used successfully to refer to one or another particular, such as the teatotaller standing in the corner drinking water from a martini glass, whom the speaker successfully though incorrectly designates as ‘the man in the corner drinking a martini’. Frege (1892a, b) distinguished not only between ‘concept’ and ‘object’, but also between them both and any Sinn as a ‘mode of presentation’ (Art des Gegebenseins). His famous example of ‘the morning star’ and ‘the evening star’, by their linguistic designations, indicate perceptual circumstances in which Earthlings can regularly and reliably see one and the same heavenly body: Venus. Throughout his career, Quine remained committed to naïve set theory, neglecting its paradoxes, in order to maintain his naïve confidence that intension and extension – as the classificatory content of predicates and their possible instances (respectively) – suffice for any referential purposes required by his extensionalist point of view (delimited to purported ‘ontological comittement’). To the contrary, careful scrutiny of Quine’s semantics demonstrates that the one sentence the truth-value of which he refused to reconsider – the thesis of extensionalism itself – is false (Westphal 2015). Kant’s point against Leibniz’s ‘individual concepts’ also holds against Quine: whatever particular instances our predicates may possibly classify – and in this sense alone, which they may possibly designate – does not suffice for any actual reference to any actual individuals, much less does it suffice for our localising any individuals which happen to instantiate the predicate(s) used in our claims, propositions or attitudes so as to be able to judge or to know anything about them. Localising particulars requires specifying in context the determinable concepts ‘space’, ‘time’ and ‘individual’, so as to delimit (sufficiently, if approximately) the region(s) occupied by those particulars (or by that particular). Exactly in this regard Kaplan argued that it belongs to the ‘character’ of our use of demonstrative expressions to map a designated region or individual into the context and content of what S/omeone says or thinks. In just these semantic and cognitive regards Kant’s Thesis of Singular Cognitive Reference joins philosophical forces with Austin (1950), Donnellan, Evans, Kripke, Travis (2000, 2006, 2008, 2013), Wettstein (2004) – and Hegel (1807), who argued for Kant’s Thesis of Singular Cognitive Reference by strictly internal reductio ad absurdum of both aconceptual ‘knowledge by acquaintance’ and of reference to particulars merely by description in the first chapter of his Phenomenology of Spirit – with no appeal to Kant’s transcendental idealism, nor to any comparable view (Westphal 2010b). By working out the cognitive-semantic conditions we must satisfy in order to ‘realise’ any of our concepts (in Tetens’ sense), Kant established that mere conceivability – i.e., mere logical consistency – establishes no more than a conceptual possibility, though not even

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a candidate cognition. In this way, Kant achieved the key aim of verificationism, on cognitive-semantic (referential) grounds, without invoking meaning- or concept- verificationism. (This decisive, incisive way of determining (specifying) which of our thoughts or ideas are candidate cognitions, or instead are cognitive empty, is neglected both by Unger 2014 and by Williamson 2015.)
In re-thinking Hume’s problem about understanding his own beliefs about the porter who delivered him a letter in his upper-storey apartment (T 1.2.4.2), Kant recognised the transcendental significance – the transcendental presuppositions – of making the kinds of causal discriminations Hume obviously made in situ, in fact, and in truth – which he reported accurately, but could not understand on the basis of his own empiricist principles (cf. R.P. Wolff 1960). 25 Understanding Kant’s Kritik der reinen Vernuft requires carefully distinguishing what we can experience, think, judge and say within our ordinary self-conscious experience of the world, from what we can think, judge and determine in transcendental reflection about the a priori necessary conceptual and intuitive (sensory) conditions which alone enable us to experience any of the world apperceptively (self-consciously). Nevertheless, Kant’s guides to transcendental reflection are the structures of our worldly experience; he expressly links the empirical and the transcendental levels of analysis in the Second Analogy (B253–6).26 We can understand, appreciate and assess Kant’s analysis, and especially his analysis and arguments in the Analogies of Experience, by taking very seriously Beck’s (1975, 24) observation that ‘the necessary conditions for what Hume knows are the sufficient conditions for what Kant knows’ – centrally: what Hume knows about sorting out sequences within his experiences from the sequences of the events and objects he experienced, and his de facto capacity to identify the later when prompted by the former, as when the porter delivered his letter, is sufficient to show that Hume’s official empiricist principles are insufficient to account for our commonsense capacity to judge what we experience accurately and justifiedly, and to show that Kant’s analysis of our discriminatory causal judgments is correct (at least to this extent). To understand and to assess Kant’s analysis requires integrating both his principled analysis and his realisation of his analysis in concreto in our typical and typically reliable capacities to distinguish and to identify – that is, to discriminate – various kinds of causal sequences

25I do not claim Kant read this section of Hume’s Treatise; rather, Kant recognised that in principle any strictly empiricist account of sense impressions can provide no basis for distinguishing between the
always-successive order of sensory, experiential intake and any (putatively) objective order of (relatively) stable states of affairs and changes in locations or features of (relatively) stable perceptible objects.
26In this passage, he also links the transcendental level of his analysis to transcendental idealism; this, I have argued in detail in my (2004), he did not need to do. Husserl contends that Kant was mired in psychologism. I submit that Husserl failed to understand Kant’s very sophisticated, parallel analyses of our transcendental power of judgment and the a priori transcendental conditions which must be satisfied for us to use our fundamental concepts and principles in actual (if putative) cognitive judgments about spatio-temporal particulars. (Yes, I submit that my (2004) understands Kant’s Kritik der reinen Vernunft better than Husserl did.)
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and processes amongst the perceptible, causally interacting particulars surrounding us. This is central to understanding the dual status of Kant’s integrated principles of causal judgment in the Analogies of Experience, that they regulate our causal judgments, and were it so to happen that we could make no such causal discriminations and identifications accurately and justifiedly, we would altogether lack apperception of our own existence ‘as determined in time’, i.e., as it merely appearing to us that some events appear to occur before, during or after others. That is the constitutive point in Kant’s Analogies of Experience. 27 These cognitive-semantic points have far-reaching implications, not only for philosophy of language and epistemology, but also for philosophy of mind and for theory of action (Westphal 2016c, 2017b, 2017c). Outside pure axiomatics, conceptual clarity is necessary, though not at all sufficient for any real cognitive use, nor for substantive philosophical results. In precisely this regard, much of contemporary analytic metaphysics rejoins pre-Critical rationalist metaphysics, as no more than ‘mere groping, and worst of all, amongst mere concepts’ (KdrV Bxv).
Needless controversy about whether Kant aimed to respond to Hume’s problem of induction persists today (cf. De Pierris and Friedman, 2013, §2). Yes, Kant argues (soundly, I argue in my 2004) that any world in which we can be so much as aware that some appearances to us seem to occur before, during or after others, is a world exhibiting a sufficient minimum of perceptibly identifiable causal interaction amongst individuals so that we can identify some of them and distinguish them from ourselves. Kant further argues that causal relations hold amongst individuals belonging to types. Those demonstrations, however, by design entail nothing about whether, how often nor for how long any type of causal relation recurs within nature, nor within our experience(s). They also entail nothing about our knowledge, justified belief or surmise about any specific types of causal relations or causal laws. As for ‘knowledge of the future’, this is a misnomer: expectations we have aplenty, but there is nothing to be known – neither is there anything about which to err – unless and until it occurs. This basic constraint on any empirical knowledge is justified by Kant’s semantics of cognitive reference. That Kant claims to have solved ‘the Humean problem’ regarding our ‘entire capacity of of pure reason’ (Prol., GS 4:260) neither states nor requires that this domain includes the problem of induction; indeed, in principle it cannot be so included because it is no issue of pure reason. The following three principles concern causality and causal relations:
‘Each event has a (sufficient, total) cause’.
‘Each specific kind of event has its specific kind of (sufficient, total) cause’. ‘Some specific kinds of (sufficient) causal relations are instantiated repeatedly’.
None of those causal principles, individually or conjointly, can or does address the following epistemological or empirical claims:
‘We can (or do) know that each event has a (sufficient, total) cause’.

27For concise discussion, see Westphal (2016a, b).
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‘We can (or do) know that some specific kinds of event each has its specific kind of (sufficient, total) cause’.
‘Some specific kinds of (sufficient) causal relations are instantiated repeatedly within human experience’.
‘We can (or do) know that some specific kinds of causal relations are instantiated repeatedly’.
‘We can (or do) know that some specific kinds of causal relations which evidently have been instantiated repeatedly shall continue to be so instantiated indefinitely into the future’. Hume’s ‘problem of induction’ is epistemological, not causal; ‘causal’ relations may be (causally) necessary, exceptionless causal laws – but their existence, instantiation or occurrence does not underwrite our beliefs about them in any way which justifies our claiming to know, demonstratively or justifiedly, that they are exceptionless causal necessities or causal laws in whatever (im)precise form they are formulated by us. For sound Critical reasons Kant was a fallibilist about cognitive justification across the empirical domain, regarding instances, classifications (kinds) and natural laws. More directly: causal and classificatory principles are used to formulate (candidate) cognitive claims, but the cognitive significance of such principles so used pertains to those instances or classes of individuals so judged. The intension of the principles we use may be unrestrictedly universal, but their intension alone cannot and does not determine (specify) the scope of any knowledge we may acquire by using those principles in cognitive judgments. These are direct corollaries to Kant’s semantics of singular cognitive reference (above, §4). Perhaps the nature of nature – or the natures of chemicals – may not change over time; nothing we can know suffices to justify the judgment (nor the surmise) that the nature of nature, or the natures of chemicals, cannot change over time. This no sceptical conclusion; it is merely sceptical about mistaking the scope of mere conceptual intension for the scope of cognitive reference, and so of empirical knowledge. Understanding empirical knowledge requires distinguishing the unrestricted scope of mere conceptual intension (classificatory content) from the actual scope of knowledge of those particulars or kinds (including processes and causal relations) known to humankind. In principle, epistemology requires richer resources than are provided by the analysis of propositions, mental content or philosophy of language. These latter studies may augment epistemology, but cannot substitute for it
(cf. Westphal 2016c, 2017c).

9 CONCLUSION.
When I met Sir Peter Strawson in 1999, well after his further development of Kant’s epistemological insights noted above, he emphatically re-affirmed his original assessment of Kant’s contributions to epistemology:
… the Transcendental Deduction, the Analogies, and the Refutation [of Idealism] together establish important general conclusions. … the fulfilment of the fundamental conditions of the possibility of self-consciousness, of self-ascription of experiences, seems to be necessary to any concept of experience which can be of interest to us, …

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Kant’s genius nowhere shows itself more clearly than in his identification of the most fundamental of these conditions in its most general form: viz., the possibility of distinguishing between a temporal order of subjective perceptions and an order and arrangement which objects of those perceptions independently possess – a unified and enduring framework of relations between constituents of an objective world. … These are very great and novel gains in epistemology, so great and so novel that, nearly two hundred years after they were made, they still have not been fully absorbed into the philosophical consciousness. (Strawson 1966, 28–9).

To achieve his insights Kant developed ‘a changed method of thinking’ (KdrV Bxviii, cf. A270, 676/B326, 704; cf. Rosenberg 2005, Bird 2006). Kant is right that our typical Cartesian-empiricist presumptions require fundamental overhaul and replacement; to this Watson (1881) remains germane. By design I have cited almost no recent literature; Kant’s texts and insights, and those of his most able commentators – none of their letters purloined – have been open to public view and review, occluded only by the misleading habits and expectations of his readers. Innovations and insights can only be identified, and can only be assessed, by comprehending what our predecessors and contemporaries have achieved. As Kant noted regarding romantic genius (KdU §50), the problem with ‘originality’ is that it may be original nonsense. The dearth of methodological care and critical self-assessment now accepted in the field does us no credit.28
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Apperception or Environment.

J. McDowell and Ch.Travis on the nature of perceptual judgement

Apercepción o ambiente.

cDowell y Ch. Travis sobre la naturaleza del juicio perceptivo

SOFIA MIGUENS 

University of Porto, Portugal

Abstract

Within current philosophy of perception John McDowell has for quite some time been defending a view inspired by Kant (McDowell 1994, McDowell 2009, McDowell 2013). Charles Travis opposes such view and counters it with his own, Frege-inspired, approach (Travis 2013, Travis 2014, Travis forthcoming). By analysing the clash between Travis’ idea of the silence of the senses and McDowell’s idea of intuitional content, the present article aims to characterize the core of their divergence regarding the nature of perceptual judgement. It also aims at presenting their engagement as a reformulated version of the debate around conceptual and nonconceptual content of perception, bringing forth some of its stakes. Such reformulated version of the debate makes it possible to bring out what a Kantian position on representation, consciousness and appearances ultimately amounts to, as well as to identify a particular angle of criticism to it.

Keywords
McDowell, Travis, Kant, Frege, judgement, perception.
1. Triangulating the McDowell-Travis debate
  - Professor at the Department of Philosophy of the University of Porto. Principal Investigator of the Mind, Language and Action Group (MLAG) and Director of the Gabinete de Filosofia Moderna e Contemporânea (GFMC) at the Institute of Philosophy of the University of Porto. Email: smiguens@letras.up.p t .
  [Recibido: 14 de octubre 2017
  Aceptado: 28 de octubre de 2017]
  
  Sofia Míguens
  
  Much in current analytic philosophy of perception turns on the question whether perceptual experience has representational content (see e.g. Brogaaard 2014 for an overview). In such circumstances one might expect explicit discussions of the nature of representation to be always on the table. Yet the fact is the discussion within the philosophy of perception leaves the question relatively untouched. More often than not philosophers of perception exercize arguments on the ‘good’ and the ‘bad’ cases, i.e. veridical perceptions on the one hand and illusions and hallucinations on the other, simply leaving assumptions about representation implicit. Discussions then tend towards a certain rigidity. Such rigidity is, I believe, absent from the debate that I analyse in what follows, the McDowell-Travis debate on perception and representation. One crucial point of interest of the debate is that it does concern the nature of representation directly. Another is that it brings forth what being a Kantian might arguably amount to, in such context – namely that it amounts to attributing a specific a role to consciousness in judgement –, as well as the form that a general opposition to such position might take.
  Although in what follows I contrast John McDowell’s and Charles Travis’ respective positions on perception, and stress their disagreement, I want to begin by calling attention to how much they have in common in the way they regard the job of philosophy of perception, and the nature of philosophy in general. In this they both contrast with much work in current philosophy of perception, which may be very close to – in fact almost conflated with – cognitive science of perception. Even in the case of philosophers one would not tend to immediately associate with cognitive science one very often comes across a lack of distinction between cognitive science of perception and philosophy, which might, of course, be supported by argument (see e.g. Burge 2010). This is, anyway, a conception of the job of philosophy of perception which neither McDowell nor Travis accept. For neither of them are the problems of philosophy of perception and the problems of cognitive science of perception to be conflated. Such stance bears on the discussion of the nature of representation, and translates e.g. in the fact that for neither of them is it legitimate (although this is quite widerspread in both cognitive science and philosophy) to speak of perceivers’ sub-personal states (such as brain states) as being representations proper. For both of them while the scientific work on perception is underway, the philosophical work on the nature of perception and representation is still to be done.
  Because the McDowell-Travis debate takes place over a background of wide philosophical agreement it is hard to clearly identify the source of their divergences. This is why a triangulation is called for. In this article I will use Kant and Frege in order to pursue such triangulation – more specifically, I will refer to their respective views of judgement as I compare and contrast McDowell’s and Travis’ proposals on perception and representation. This is almost too obvious a choice since a reading of Kant pervades McDowell’s representationalism regarding perceptual experience, whereas Frege is the (current) central reference for Travis’ claim that perceptual experiences do not have
  
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  representational content1. What might add some interest to this triangulation is the fact that McDowell is not Kant, as Travis is not Frege: their readings of Kant and Frege are in fact quite controversial. They highlight and hide aspects of Kant and Frege, and this in itself is revealing of McDowell and Travis’ own positions and of the differences between them.
  Another cautionary note is called for before starting the triangulation. If we were to set out to simply compare Kant and Frege on judgement (i.e. not having McDowell and Travis in view) there clearly would be a lot at stake from the viewpoint of the history of philosophy and the history of logic. Questions regarding the nature and structure of judgements and propositions would be at stake, as well as the key notion of analyticity (a notion which completely changes shape from the hands of Kant to the hands of Frege2). But there is also something else, and in what follows I am going after that something else – this is what in my title appears as ‘apperception or environment’. As I will be presenting things, apperception is McDowell’s Kantian touchstone for judgement whereas environment is Travis’ Fregean touchstone. That is what I am mostly interested in in this article.
2. Representation and ‘shared form’
  
  We know one thing from the start: in spite of background agreement, namely on the (negative) idea that a perceiver’s sub-personal cognitive states can not yet being thought of as representations proper, McDowell’s representationalist conception of perceptual experiencings (i.e. the idea that perceptual experiences themselves represent things as being a certain way) is simply at odds with Travis silence of the senses view of perception. But how can this disagreement be spelled out and better understood?
  Both McDowell and Travis address the question of perception as part of the general question of conceptual capacities of agents, i.e. the question of what being a thinker amounts to. Here is an example of McDowell doing it in his article “Conceptual capacities in perception”:
  
  «A zebra can be described, but that is no reason to suppose that the zebra itself has a form it shares with a description, or with the thought a description expresses.» (McDowell 2009b : 142)
  
  In order to understand this excerpt one has to have in mind the fact that some critics accuse McDowell of idealism precisely because they attribute to him the idea of a sharing of a form (the same form in world and thought); they see this as a ‘projection of subjectivity’. In this particular passage McDowell is denying such reading, by refusing that his view implies that a wordly object (a zebra) partakes of the form (in the quoted passage he is, by the way, discussing criticisms of his view by Michael Ayers). But if it is not a
  
  1 J.L.Austin was the main reference at the time of Travis’ 2004 Mind article The Silence of the Senses (Travis 2004/2013). This is the article most often cited as the locus of Travis’ position on perception (the position I will refer to as the ‘silence of the senses view of perception’).
  2 See Boyle forthcoming.
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  sharing of a form that he proposes, what is it then? Here is McDowell on perceptual experiencing. My visually experiencing this:
  
  or this…
  
  … is a taking-to-be, which then is (or not) endorsed by judgement. According to McDowell, perceivings (seemings) are claim-like, i.e they are claims-which-are-not yet- judgements. Now ‘claim’ is a term of Wilfrid Sellars, a term which McDowell thinks is ‘wrong in the letter but right in spirit’ – this is how he puts it in his article Avoiding the Myth of the Given (McDowell 2009a: 267). He uses the term to speak of experiences as intuitions. Here it is important to keep in mind that McDowell’s approach to perception is generally considered to have a dominating epistemological purpose. In the words of French philosopher Jocelyn Benoist, McDowell’s approach to perception has in fact an all too dominating epistemological purpose. Benoist speaks of ‘La misère du theoreticisme’, and describes it as ‘confondre perception et connaissance perceptive’ (Benoist 2013: 9) – conflating perception and perceptual knowledge. For McDowell, anyway, an account of perceptual experiencing is key in an account of knowledge in that we cannot understand the relations in virtue of which any judgement is warranted except as relations within the space of concepts (this is a core thesis of his 1994 book Mind & World). Only representations enter such relations, so the fact that perceptual experiences are representational is crucial for knowledge. But it is also the case that McDowell has reformulated his Mind and World position, the position according to which such representational content was propositional content. He is no longer commited to the idea of propositional content of experience; his article Avoiding the Myth of the Given is a particularly clear expression of the shift in his position (McDowell 2009a). He does not claim anymore that perceptual seemings have propositional content; he thinks that only judgements and assertions have propositional content. Yet he still claims that perceptual experiences have content: they have what he calls intuitional content. Now McDowell’s intuitional content is as an interpretation of Kant’s Anschauung. It is in fact the German word Anschauung that McDowell translates as a ‘having in view’ (McDowell 2009: 260). His current claim is that perceptual experiences have intuitional content; that is why they are representational.
  
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  Before the more recent exchanges and reformulations, McDowell representationalism had been a target for Travis, namely in his 2004 Mind article The silence of the senses (Travis 2004/2013). What Travis targeted then was the representationalists’ commitment to the determinateness of seemings. According to him such commitment necessarily came with representationalism concerning perceptual experience (McDowell was not the sole target of such criticism: so were e.g. Christopher Peacocke, Gilbert Harman, John Searle, Michael Tye or Colin McGinn). Yet for Travis (as McDowell himself put it once(and he is very good at formulating the opponent’s theses), if a rock might look like a crouching animal and also look like a rock this better not all be the content of the same perceptual experience (McDowell 2013b). In The silence of the senses what supported the objection to the representationalist’s commitment to the determinatness of seemings was, in a very Austinian vein, a linguistic analysis, i.e. an analysis of our ways of speaking of looks, seemings and appearances. The conclusion of the analysis was that there simply is not one single sense of looks available which would serve the purpose of the representationalist regarding perceptual experiences3. There are many senses of looks, or seemings, i.e. we speak of looks or appearances in many senses. In particular, there are (in Travis’ most recent 2013 terminology 4 ) perceptual (e.g. visual) appearances and conceptual appearances. Imagine that we say ‘The upper line looks longer’ as we look at the Müller-Lyer lines above. And then contrast it with the case where we say, watching TV on the night of the last French presidential election, and before knowing the full results: ‘It looks like Macron is going to win the election’. Travis point is that these are totally different phenomena, which should not be conflated. Yet a conflation of the many senses of looks and seemings is what Travis thinks is bound to happen when we speak of a perceptual experience as a particular seeming. We do as if there was one thing which is the one and one only way thinks look in a particular perceptual experience.
  Of course one might counter: but isn’t there really such a thing, at least sometimes? Let us consider again the Muller-Lyer illusion I introduced above. Should we not think that there is a look here (one and one only)? (A look which is not a conceptual look, but one objective visual look). Here is Benoist, quoting Merleau-Ponty, saying why we need not think that way:
  
  «dans l’illusion de Muller-Lyer les segments ne sont ni égaux ni non-égaux, c’est dans le monde objectif que cette alternative s’impose» (La Phenomenologie de la perception, in Le bruit du sensible, 92)
  
  According to Benoist, Merleau-Ponty means that in the objective world only (and thus with judgement) is there such an alternative. This is a position Benoist attributes to Travis (and agrees with). Anyway one point of Travis in The silence of the senses is that the variety of senses of looks and seemings precludes what the representationalist needs to get his case off the ground. Sticking to the non-determinateness of what one is presented
  
  3 Aimed against many representationalists, not just McDowell, who is special being a disjunctivist.
  4 Travis 2013 includes a rewritten version of the 2004 Mind article.
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  with, and thus to the idea that perception basically puts things in view is his suggestion; this is (part of what) the ‘silence of the senses’ view proposes. In other words, according to Travis, seeing is essentially unarticulated. But of course for McDowell this is The Myth of the Given. The interesting question for me here is how much does McDowell’s contrasting conviction (the conviction that seeing is essentially articulated) owe to Kant.
3. McDowell’s Kant
  So I want to look at McDowell’s Kant, a reading which was very much influenced by Willfrid Sellars. Let us consider the Kant-inspired formulation of what constitutes the Myth of the Given: we succumb to the Myth of the Given by not acknowledging that the understanding is at play in sensibility itself. But what is it in Kant that interests McDowell, and what does it have to do with judgement?
  Although McDowell may care about transcendental arguments (see e.g. his “The disjunctive conception of experience as material for a transcendental argument”, in Engaged Intellect) (McDowell 2009d), and one might trace transcendental arguments to Kant, he does not care about Kant’s global transcendental framework, or his view of subjectivity as it includes, say, the difference between understanding and reason, or the topic of synthesis, or the Critique of Pure Reason inventory of the forms of propositional unity (i.e. the categories)). What he cares about is unity, the unity of judgement as it relates to intuition, hence the recurrent quote from the Critique of Pure Reason is
  
  «The same function which gives unity to the various representations in a judgement also gives unity to the mere synthesis of various representations in an intuition; and this unity in its most general expression, we entitle the pure concept of the understanding» (I. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason A 79/B104-105, § 10 Transcendental Analytics).
  
  We fall prey to the Myth of the Given by not acknowledging that only the unity of (content) of judgement could make for unity of content of intuitions.
  Notice that for Kant himself, judgement is in a very strong sense synthesis: a judgement is a mental act of synthesis, under a logical form, i.e. a form of discoursive synthesis (a category), which relates to the synthesis of Mannigfaltigkeit in intuition (Anschauung). It is because this mental act of judging is so crucial that we may e.g. defend (this is e.g. the thesis of Béatrice Longuenesse in her 1995 book on Kant and the capacity to judge5) that the capacity to judge (Vermögen zu urteilen) takes precedence over the categories as a fixed ‘table’ of forms (deduced from that of judgements). This (synthetic function of unity) is in fact decisive in Kant’s own framework not least because it is the link to the relation between judgement and consciousness. In §19 of the Transcendental Analytics we have Kant saying that a judgement is the way given Erkenntnisse, cognitions, are brought to the subjective unity of apperception, so to consciousness (die Art gegeben Erkentnisse zur objective Einheit der Apperzeption zu bringen, in his own words).
  
  5 Longuenesse 1995.
  
  84
  
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  Now McDowell’s own (officially, Kantian) story about experiencing and judging goes the following way. Experience reveals that things are thus and so; he calls this seemings. As we experience, capacities that belong to reason (he speaks of conceptual capacities) are actualized. They are actualized in the experiencing itself – but this does not mean we should think of perceptual experience as ’putting significances together’. All we need to acknowledge is that perceptual experiences are actualizations – not exercizes – of conceptual capacities.
  But this means there is a potential for discoursive activity already there in intuition having its content – and for that to be so not all concepts need be at play, but some concepts have to. Yet content whose figuring in (such) knowledge is owed to the (further) recognitional capacity need not be part of the experience itself. Experiencing puts me in a position to know non-inferentially that e.g. what I saw (and then I did not have the concept of cardinal) was a cardinal:
  
  Although according to the view above experience has (conceptual) content, it does not have propositional content, nor need it include everything that the experience enables a subject to know non-inferentially. What McDowell means by saying that experiencings have intuitional content is that the unity of intuitional content is given; it is not a result of our putting significances together, as discoursive unity is. But it is not provided by sensibility alone either. This is what matters for McDowell. Seeing capacities of reason as actualized even in our unreflective perceptual awareness is, for McDowell, the best antidote to an intellectualistic conception of human rationality (2009: 271).
  Of course if in this anti-intellectualist view, seeings are seemings and thus (proto) judgings, one might wonder whether this is actually the best antidote to an intellectualist conception of human rationality (Hubert Dreyfus, himself a paladin of anti-intellectualism in philosophy and cognitive science, criticized McDowell, in the debate between them which took place a few years before his death6, for seeing us as ‘24hour rational animals’). But my point here is simply that in Kant himself what holds sensible and discursive unity together is the ‘I think’ of apperception. This in turn leads him to explore the originally synthetic unity of apperception – and such idea of originally synthetic unity of apperception is in we are already dealing with a view of consciousness, an idea of consciousness as synthesis. Notice that synthesis as in ‘consciousness as synthesis’, i.e. the synthetic unity of consciousness, is synthesis in a different sense than synthesis of concepts in a judgemen (namely it involves time). Be it as it may, it is unity that McDowell is
  
  6 Jonathan Shear 2013.
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  interested in in his use of Kant. He believes there is a task for unity, as Kant himself believed there was: the task of the unity of judgement. Need he go further, from judgement into the more obscure waters of the discussion of Kant’s position on consciousness and self-consciousness, a notably controversial topic? Maybe not. That is not what he is interested in primarily (and his own view on self-consciousness takes a clearly different route – let us not forget, e.g. that McDowell is an animalist concerning personal identity, which seems to be a position not easy to acomodate into any form of Kantianism). But just to finish sketching McDowell’s current view of judgement, what exactly is judgement, ‘the paradigmatic exercise of theoretical rationality’, as he calls it, in this picture of experience and intuition? Judging is, according to McDowell, making it explicit to oneself. Judgements are inner analogues to assertions. The capacity to judge is a capacity for spontaneity, for self-determination in the light of reasons recognized as such. This, for McDowell, is the most important trait of judgement. A knowledgeable perceptual judgement has its epistemic entitlement in the light of the subject’s experience (McDowell 2009: 257). This is what McDowell is most interested in: how experience represents things is not under one’s control (McDowell 2004: 11) but minimally it must be possible – in view of a particular seeming – to decide whether or not to judge that things are a certain way.
4. Travis’ Frege

One key to understand the McDowell- Travis debate on perception is that whereas the problem of unity is a problem for McDowell, as he considers perception and judgement and Anshauung, it is a non-existing problem for Travis. Why is it so? In Travis’ Fregean (or, better, Frege-inspired) conception of judgement, a judgement is not an accomplishment, the accomplishment of a unity – there is no unity to be accomplished in judgement because there is no doing. A judgment takes place where there is room for being exposed to error, and that happens when being presented with (what there is) in an environment. ‘Environment’ in Travis terminology means ‘what there is to be met with’. A judgement is nothing like given Erkenntnisse (cognitions) being brought to the subjective unity of apperception. What a judgement is is rather a stance of an agent in an environment. In Frege Father of Disjunctivism Travis put it like this (Travis 2013: 89):

«Frege saw that we needed an environment, and thus perception, and not merely sensation, if there is something for logic to be about. Not that logic applies only to environmental thoughts but rather that only given an environment for thinkers can the notion of judgement gain a foothold»

Jerry Fodor once put his conception of mind in a nutshell by saying: no representations, no computations, no computations no mind. Here we have a starting motto for Travis’ conception of mind and thought: no environment, no judgement, no judgement, no logic (and if no logic then no thought). The reason for environment being so crucial is the fact that, for Travis, judgment involves a particular kind of correctness: truth. According to Frege, Truth is the very business of logic:

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«Der Logik kommt es zu, die Gesetze des Wahrseins zu erkennen» (Frege 1918/1993: ).

No truth, no logic. And Travis’ claim is that there is no such thing as this kind of correctness, i.e. truth, for the non-environmental:

«To be a judgement just is to be subject to a kind of correctness (i.e. truth), which is a particular kind of correctness (contrasting, for example, with being justified). Explaining what kind of correctness truth is and explaining what sort of attitude judgement is are one and the same enterprise» (Travis 2013: 71).

But Travis’ story is until now a story about logic, judgement and truth – how does it become a story about perception? And how is it possible that in this story Frege ends up not being a conceptualist regarding perception? Frege is usually, e.g. by Michael Dummett7, taken to have been, inasfar as he was concerned with perception, namely in The Thought, a conceptualist regarding perception. Admittedly Travis’ reading of Frege is very unorthodox. That is how the relevant passage of Der Gedanke that brings in the role of the non-sensible element nicht sinnliches, is usually read:

«Having impressions is not seeing things….It is necessary but not sufficient. Something nicht sinnliches has to be added. This is what unlocks the outer world. Without it each of us would be locked in an inner world. Besides the inner world we must distinguish the external world of sensible perceptible things. (but) To recognize any of these domains we need something not sensible» (Frege 1918/1997: 343) [In the original German: «Das Haben von Gesichtseindrücken ist zwar nötig zum Sehen der Dinge, aber nicht hinreichend. Was noch hinzukommen muß, ist nichts Sinnliches. Und dieses ist es doch gerade, was uns die Außenwelt aufschließt; denn ohne dieses Nichtsinnliche bliebe jeder in seiner Innenwelt eingeschlossen»]

This something nicht sinnliches is a what Frege calls a thought. In Travis’ terms, a thought always contains something reaching beyond the particular case, by means of which the particular case is presented as falling under a generality (etwas Allgemein). And nothing less than this, i.e. nothing less than something nicht sinnliches, a thought. makes for something truth-evaluable. Because it is precisely because something nicht sinnliches is for Frege involved in perception that Dummett sees Frege as a conceptualist regarding perception. How come Travis does not?

A further step in needed here. For Travis such step is a (Frege inspired) distinction between what the conceptual and the non-conceptual. The conceptual he identifies as ‘ways for things to be’. The non-conceptual are the particular ways things are. The conceptual is the domain of logic. And his point here is that logic is not sufficient for accounting for what he calls reason’s reach, i.e. for rationality. The idea is that such reach is reach to the non-conceptual, and such reach is to be done by judgement, and judgement

7 Dummett 1993.

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only. And so judgements are judgements done by agents, - which means that for Travis, Fregean thoughts properly considered will turn out to be abtractions form judgements).

Only through this further step are we then entiled to the following reading of

‘seeing’:

«But don’t we see that this flower has five petals? One can say that, but then one uses the word ‘see’ not in the sense of a bare experience involving light, but one means by this a connected thought and judgement.» [«Aber sehe ich denn nicht, dass diese Blume fünf Blumenblätter hat? Man kann das sagen, gebraucht aber das Wort ‘sehen’ dann nicht in dem Sinne des blossen Lichtempfindens, sondern man meint damit verbunden ein Denken und Urteilen»] (Frege 1897: 149)

Such reading of seeing is what Travis proposes as an alternative to McDowell’s Kantian reading of seeing as involving understanding in sensibility. One main point there is the role of judgement: judgment is involved in ‘reasons’s reach’, which is a reach from the conceptual to the non-conceptual. Of course form McDowell’s Kantian view point there is no such thing as the Travisian non-conceptual (the ways things are). Yet Travis’ account of representation as representing-as done by a thinker, or agent, is tied to this reaching from the conceptual to the non-conceptual as it is done by judgement. Representing-as is then, for Travis, a three party affair, or three-place relation: there is the representer, a thinker representing as a stretch of the non-conceptual (what is represented- as) as a way for something to be (so involving the conceptual, i.e. ‘ways for things to be’). There is no such thing as representation proper short of this third party affair (hence there are e.g. no sub-personal ‘representations’).

I will not get deeper into this view; its clearly ontological implications have to be substantiated. I just want to point out that in the McDowell-Travis debate Travis recruits Frege above all for thinking of how we even get something truth-evaluable into a picture of thinking and representing. And the idea is that what he terms ‘environment’ is needed for there to be accuracy conditions; this will do away with the ideia that experiencings themselves have anything like accuracy conditions. Experiencings do not have accuracy conditions, experiencings (just) bring our surroundings into view. Sight affords awareness of what is before the eyes, it puts opportunities on offer. Thought is a response to this; only thencan there be representing, as well as truth and falsity.

6. An ambiguity regarding appearances

I would like to finish by testing how McDowell’s Kant-inspired conception of judgement and Travis Frege-inspired conception of judgement position us, respectively, towards an ambiguity regarding the notion of appearances. This is an ambiguity which does matter for metaphysical discussions, i.e. when being a realist or an idealist concerning thought-world relations is at stake. I think there is a difference here, which comes out in McDowell’s and Travis’ respective (and apparently innocuous) linguistic preferences for ‘seemings’ and for ‘looks’.

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Apperception or Environment

This is the ambiguity. When we speak of ‘appearances’ we might mean (1) an object as mere appearance, i.e. a seeming to me; (2) an object as the object of appearance as a phenomenon, my being appeared to.

Let us imagine Travis in his Austinian mode speaking of looks. Let us evoke Austin’s example of the soap lemon – let us say that there is a wax lemon in fornt of my eyes; it looks like a lemon, it looks like a real lemon; I think it is a lemon. So what? Are my senses misleading me? There is nothing wrong with my experience. There is a lemon in front of me, it is neither a hallucination, nor a real lemon: it is a wax imitation. The only mistake is in the thinking, the judging, there is nothing wrong in reality, or in my experiencing. Looks are of looks things, for anyone. This is sense 2 of appearances.

Now let us consider McDowell’s seemings, as claims (remember this is Sellars word, wrong in letter, right in spirit, McDowell says). He does speak of seemings as ‘acts of capacities of a subject in an environment’. But (think of the example of the Müller-Lyer illusion) there is the seeming and there is the deciding, the judging: the subject does not believe things are as they look.

Insofar as seemings are claims McDowell is being tempted to see them as seemings to a subject and there he is at risk of inherit a problem from Kant. The problem is the following. Considering senses 1 and 2 above, Kant would officialy, clearly chose the second sense of appearance: an object as the object of appearance is a phenomenon, one’s being appeared to. It is only with the idea that judging involves the unity of apperception that the first sense of appearance (an object as mere appearance is a seeming to me) sneaks in. But it is thus that Kant risks internalizing the object of representation in representation (I borrow the expression from Béatrice Longuenesse).

If a seeming is a judging and what judging is, is a bringing of representations under the unity of self-consciousness, then a seeming will be involved with self- consciousness. This is what I mean by internalizing the object of representation in representation.

Internalizing the object of representation in representation is obviously not the goal of McDowell (the opposite should be the case, if we think of his disjunctivism). But it is the shape of his appeal to Kantian unity, in the exercise of rational capacities, that makes him run that risk. And so their respective Kantian and Fregean allegiances when it comes to account for the nature of judgement makes a difference for what should be their common de-subjectivizing view of appearances, as fellow disjuntivists.

As for Travis Frege-inspired view of judgement, it is a deeply anti-Kantian view, and this is not because of any direct discussions about structure and analyticity, the kind of discussions logicians and historians of logic might be interested in when comparing Kant and Frege on judgement. The view is is deeply anti-Kantian because of the ‘environment- constraint for logic’ (to be) that it proposes, given the environment-constraint for judgement. Of course, in spite of the environment-constraint (which is a constraint for logic to be, i.e. for there to be logic), there is, in Travis, an idea about reason’s reach (to the non-conceptual) which contrasts with logic’s reach (which is reach within the conceptual). I am not claiming here that all this stands as it is. All I intend to stress is that in Travis view, in contrast to McDowell’s Kantian view, there is no role here for the ‘I think’ (as

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consciousness). There is no role for consciousness because there is no role for combination or synthesis, synthesis into a unity of concepts which are, as it were previously possessed. Neither McDowell’s nor Travis’ view of judgement is a descrition of psychological machinery at work. Still there is place for a difference between them as to what concepts are, which I will not go into here8. Suffice it to point out that for Frege as Travis reads him, in the ontology arising from his view of logic and language, concepts are at the level of Bedeutung, reference, not of Sinn, sense. In contrast McDowell’s Kantian way of seeing seemings as ‘representing’, as rational capacities operative in experiencing, inevitably involving apperception, things should be different.

Conclusion

I have been trying to get at the following. A view of perception is key for a picture of thought-world relations; having a clear picture of how perception and representation relate is particularly important there. Different conceptions of representation are very often simply invisible in current philosophy of perception when one starts off by discussing representational content and whether perception has it or not. One crucial aspect of the debate I analysed is that it concerns the nature of representation directly. In Kant and Frege there are explicit views of judgement, quite different ones, which go a long way in spelling out what one might mean by ‘representation’. Endorsing such views McDowell and Travis arrive at contrasting conceptions of perception, appearings and appearances, which I tried to analyse. Even if their debate on perception and representation goes on against a background of largely shared assumptions on how to do philosophy of perception, their respective Kantian and Fregean allegiances thus make a large difference. The contrast between a Kantian and a Fregean take on judgement, which I tried to express with the alternative ‘apperception and environment’, helps us come to terms with what the crucial questions concerning perception and representation are. That is an important step, not only for the philosophy of perception but also for assessing how a Kantian position fares within contemporary discussions in philosophy of mind and epistemology, and what kind of criticism it may be subject to.

References

8 Although I will not pursue the contrast between McDowell and Travis where it comes to ontology, I think there are illuminating differences there too. Travis thinks in terms of objects and concepts ‘after Frege’. The key point to take from Frege is the distinction between the conceptual and non-conceptual [or: between the conceptual and the historical] The conceptual: things being such and such; ways for things to be; ‘generalities’ The non-conceptual: things being as they are; not the sort of thing to which logic applies. McDowell has moved from his early focus on facts to more recent appeal to common sensibles (2009: 261) to grasp how some concpets have to be at play.

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Boyle, Matthew, forthcoming. “Kant on Logic and the Laws of Understanding” in Miguens & Travis, The Logical Alian At 20, Cambridge MA, Harvard UP.

Brogaard, Berit, 2014. Does Perception Have Content? Oxford, OUP.

Burge, Tyler, 2010. The Origins of Objectivity, Oxford, Oxford University Press. Dummett, Michael, 1993. Origins of Analytic Philosophy. Cambridge MA, Harvard UP. Frege, Gottlob, 1918/1993. “Der Gedanke”, Beiträge zur Philosophie des deutschen Idealismus, 2, pp. 58-77. In Logische Untersuchungen, hrsg. Günther Patzig, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1993. English translation: Beaney, Michael ed. 1997, The Frege Reader, London, Blackwell.

Frege, Gottlob, 1983. Logik 1897. In Nachgelassene Schriften, H. Hermes, F. Kambartel and F. Kaulbach eds, Hamburg, Felix Meiner, 1983, pp. 137-163.

Kant, Immanuel, 1929. Critique of Pure Reason. Trans. Norman Kemp Smith. London, Macmillan [edition quoted by J. McDowell]

McDowell, John, 1994. Mind and World. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. McDowell, John, 2009a. “Avoiding the Myth of the Given”, in Having the World in View, Cambridge MA, Harvard UP.

McDowell, John, 2009b. “Conceptual Capacities in Perception”, in Having the World in View, Cambridge MA, Harvard UP.

McDowell, John, 2009c. “Sensory Consciousness in Kant and Sellars”, in Having the World in View Cambridge MA, Harvard UP.

McDowell, John, 2009d. “The disjunctive conception of experience as material for a transcendental argument”, in The Engaged Intellect Cambridge MA, Harvard UP. McDowell, John, 2009e. “Experiencing the World”, in The Engaged Intellect, Cambridge MA, Harvard UP.

McDowell, John, 2013 b. Are the Senses Silent? (Response to Charles Travis), http://www.youtube. com/watch?v=fBQHEGg5JSo (Agnes Cuming Lecture II)

McDowell, John 2013, Perceptual experience: both relational and contentful, European Journal of Philosophy 21, 144-157 (Mark Sacks Lecture)

Miguens, Sofia, forthcoming 2017. “Les problèmes philosophiques de la perception”. In R. Moati & D. Cohen-Lévinas eds. Lire Le Bruit du sensible de Jocelyn Benoist.

Narboux, Jean-Philippe, “Voir, dire, et dire voir : McDowell, Travis, Clarke”, in Lire L’esprit et le monde de McDowell, C. Alsaleh & A. Le Goff (éds.), Paris, Vrin, 2012, p.13-35. Suivi d’une réponse par John McDowell, p.249-255.

Shear, Jonathan ed., 2013 Mind, Reason and Being in the World – the McDowell-Dreyfus debate. London, Routledge.

Travis, Charles, (2013 / 2004). “The Silence of the Senses”, in Travis 2013, Perception – Essays After Frege, Oxford, OUP, pp. 23-58. Initially published in Mind, 113 (449), pp.59-

94. Extensively revised.

Travis, Charles, 2012. “While Under the Influence”, in Miguens and Preyer 2012,

Consciousness and Subjectivity, Frankfurt, Ontos Verlag.

Travis, Charles, 2013. “Frege, Father of Disjunctivism”, in Travis, Perception – Essays After Frege, Oxford, OUP, pp. 59-89

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Travis, Charles, 2013. “Unlocking the Outer World”, in Travis, Perception – Essays After Frege, Oxford, OUP, pp. 59-89

Travis, Charles, 2014. “The Preserve of Thinkers”, in Berit Brogaard (ed) Does Perception Have Content?, Oxford, Oxford University Press.

Travis, Charles, forthcoming. “The Move: the Divide, the Myth and Its Dogma”, in Johan Gersel, Rasmus Thybo Jensen, Morten S. Thaning and Soren Overgaard, (eds), In the Light of Experience: Essays on Reasons and Perception, Oxford, Oxford University Press.

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El (no)-conceptualismo de Kant y los juicios de gusto Kant’s (Non)-conceptualism and judgments of taste MATÍAS OROÑO 

Universidad de Buenos Aires /CONICET, Argentina

Resumen

Hay una tendencia dentro del debate sobre el conceptualismo y el no-conceptualismo kantiano a pasar por alto la estética de Kant. El objetivo central de este artículo es ofrecer un análisis sobre la interpretación no-conceptualista de Heidemann en torno a la teoría kantiana de los juicios de gusto. En primer lugar, se discuten los argumentos que Heidemann ofrece acerca del carácter cognitivo de los juicios de gusto. En segundo lugar, se analiza el supuesto no-conceptualismo implicado en la experiencia estética de lo bello. En tercer lugar, se ofrece una interpretación alternativa sobre el vínculo entre la teoría de Kant sobre los juicios de gusto y el debate en torno al (no)- conceptualismo. Se defiende la tesis según la cual los juicios de gusto no poseen valor cognitivo, pero permiten comprender aspectos centrales de la teoría kantiana del conocimiento.

Palabras clave

Kant; conceptualismo; no-conceptualismo; juicios de gusto

Abstract

There is a tendency within the debate on Kantian conceptualism and nonconceptualism to overlook the importance of Kant’s aesthetics. The main goal of this paper is to offer an analysis of Heidemann’s nonconceptualist interpretation of the Kantian theory about judgments of taste. First, I discuss Heidemann’s arguments about the cognitive character of judgments of taste. Secondly, I analyse the supposed nonconceptual character involved in the aesthetic experience of beauty. Third, I offer an alternative interpretation of the link between Kant’s theory of judgments of taste and the debate about (non)-conceptualism. I defend the thesis that judgments of taste lack cognitive value, but they allow us to understand central aspects of the Kantian theory of knowledge.

Key Words

Kant; conceptualism; nonconceptualism; judgments of taste

Profesor de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras de la Universidad de Buenos Aires. E-mail de contacto:

matiasoro@gmail.com

[Recibido: 15 de octubre 2017

Aceptado: 30 de octubre 2017]

Matías Oroño

1. Introducción

En las últimas décadas ha cobrado gran relevancia en el ámbito de la filosofía de la mente y la teoría del conocimiento de raigambre anglo-americana un debate que gira en torno a la naturaleza del conocimiento y su vínculo con los conceptos. Se trata de una disputa que presenta muchísimos matices y temas de discusión. No obstante, es posible indicar dos posiciones extremas entre sus participantes, a saber: el conceptualismo y el no- conceptualismo. A grandes rasgos, el conceptualismo puede ser definido como la posición según la cual un sujeto cognoscente puede tener representaciones de objetos sólo si posee los conceptos adecuados mediante los cuales puede especificar el contenido de sus representaciones. Por su parte, en el marco del no-conceptualismo se sostiene que las representaciones de objetos no presuponen necesariamente conceptos por medio de los cuales pueda ser especificado el contenido de lo que es representado.1 En otros términos, lo que se discute en el marco de este debate es si los conceptos cumplen un rol imprescindible en nuestro acceso cognitivo al mundo o si es posible explicar el conocimiento sin apelar a actividades de tipo conceptual. Este debate se ha trasladado a la discusión sobre la teoría kantiana del conocimiento. Algunos intérpretes pretenden encontrar en la filosofía crítica kantiana las raíces del conceptualismo contemporáneo.2 En contraste con esta línea de interpretación, otros autores pretenden hallar en Kant argumentos a favor del no- conceptualismo.3 Naturalmente, existen posiciones moderadas del conceptualismo o del no-conceptualismo en la filosofía teórica de Kant.4

Ahora bien, la gran mayoría de los participantes de este debate en torno al pensamiento de Kant se ha centrado en el análisis de textos donde se desarrollan explícitamente cuestiones vinculadas al problema del conocimiento (e.g. KrV, Prol.). Por su parte, la KU tiende a ser ignorada en el marco del debate sobre el (no)-conceptualismo. Si bien han surgido diversos estudios que analizan, por ejemplo, la relación entre la teoría del conocimiento y los juicios estéticos reflexionantes, en ellos no se ha considerado el problema referido al (no)- conceptualismo.5

El presente trabajo tiene como objetivo central efectuar un análisis de la reciente interpretación que D. Heidemann ha ofrecido sobre los juicios de gusto en la KU. En su trabajo titulado “Kant’s Aesthetic Nonconceptualism” el autor sostiene que los juicios sobre lo bello tal como son presentados en la KU proveen herramientas que permiten atribuirle a Kant una posición no-conceptualista sobre la naturaleza del conocimiento. En

1 Sigo en este punto la caracterización ofrecida por Heidemann (2016, p. 121).

2 Algunos intérpretes que ofrecen una lectura de corte conceptualista sobre la teoría kantiana del conocimiento y de la mente son: Bauer (2012); Bowman (2011); Falkenstein (1995); Geiger (2003); Ginsborg (2008); Gomes (2014); Gunther (2003); McDowell (1994), (2009); Schlicht (2011); Wenzel (2005).

3 Notables defensores del no-conceptualismo kantiano son: Allais (2009); Birrer (2016); De Sá Pereira (2013); Grüne (2009), (2011); Hanna (2005), (2006), (2008), (2016); Peláez Cedrés (2013); van Mazijk (2014); Williamson (2007).

4 Un ejemplo de este tipo de posiciones moderadas se halla en: Matherne (2015).

5 Algunos trabajos que han analizado diversos vínculos entre la teoría del conocimiento y la estética kantiana tal como aparece en la KU son: Ginsborg (2006), (1990); Hughes (2007); Kalar (2006); Kirwan (2004);

Makkreel (2006); Oroño (2011); Kukla (2006).

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El (no)-conceptualismo de Kant y los juicios de gusto

un primer momento, analizaré y evaluaré los distintos argumentos de Heidemann. En segundo lugar, postularé mi propia interpretación sobre los juicios de gusto en el marco del debate sobre el no-conceptualismo.

2.1 La interpretación de D. Heidemann sobre los juicios de gusto

Heidemann intenta demostrar que la KU contiene desarrollos teóricos que permitirían decidir si la teoría del conocimiento de Kant representa un modo de no-conceptualismo. El autor centra su atención en el análisis de la teoría sobre los juicios de gusto y señala que en ellos se revela un particular modo de conocimiento (cognition) que no reposa sobre actividades conceptuales.6 El intérprete añade que la “apreciación cognitiva de lo bello” (the cognitive appreciation of the beautiful) no se deriva de un procedimiento de la mente gobernado por reglas conceptuales, sino que se expresa a través de juicios de gusto (Cfr. Heidemann 2016, p. 118). Ciertamente, resulta llamativa la expresión “apreciación cognitiva” (cognitive appreciation) que el autor utiliza para referirse al enjuiciamiento de algo como bello. Recordemos que ya en las primeras líneas de la “Analítica de lo bello” Kant indica que:

Para discernir si algo es bello o no lo es, no referimos la representación por medio del entendimiento al objeto, con fines de conocimiento […]. El juicio de gusto no es, entonces, un juicio de conocimiento y, por consiguiente, tampoco lógico, sino estético; se entiende por éste aquel cuyo fundamento de determinación no puede ser de otro modo sino subjetivo. (AA V: 203)7

Es decir, la caracterización kantiana del juicio de gusto implica una clara delimitación entre los juicios estéticos y los juicios de conocimiento. Por este motivo, resulta algo confusa la expresión “the cognitive appreciation of the beautiful” (Heidemann 2016, p.118). Considero que hubiese sido preferible la expresión “apreciación estética de lo bello”. Con el fin de avanzar en el análisis de la propuesta interpretativa de Heidemann, voy a asumir que el autor tenía en mente el significado de esta última expresión. A continuación, el intérprete explicita que la “cualidad cognitiva” (cognitive quality) de los juicios es una precondición necesaria de la no-conceptualidad (Cfr. Heidemann 2016, p. 120). Es decir, un juicio de gusto puede ser no-conceptual sólo bajo el requisito de poseer un carácter cognitivo (si brinda algún tipo de conocimiento). El autor admite que en el marco de la KrV nada puede contar como conocimiento objetivo si no es a través del juicio y de la cooperación entre conceptos e intuiciones, pero considera que dentro de una estructura judicativa es posible hallar elementos que “[…] conservan su naturaleza no-

6 Heidemann (2016, pp. 139-143) también analiza la doctrina sobre la creación artística implicada en la doctrina kantiana sobre el “genio” (AA 5: 307 ss.). Por motivos de extensión, aquí sólo me ocuparé de su análisis referido a los juicios de gusto.

7 Cito la KU siguiendo la traducción de Pablo Oyarzún (véanse los datos completos en las referencias bibliográficas). En relación con el término Gemüt he modificado la traducción, ya que Oyarzún traduce “ánimo” y yo he adoptado el término “mente”. Sobre las dificultades inherentes a la traducción del término Gemüt puede consultase el trabajo de Valério Rohden (1993, pp. 61-75).

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conceptual en términos de una representación singular […]” (Heidemann 2016, p. 123). En otros términos, Heidemann sostiene que incluso aceptando la necesaria cooperación entre intuiciones y conceptos a través del juicio, sería posible conservar una referencia intuitiva (en términos de una representación singular) que brinda algún tipo de conocimiento sobre los objetos. Esta necesidad de ubicar las pretensiones cognitivas en el nivel de una estructura judicativa sería igualmente válida en el análisis del supuesto carácter cognitivo de los juicios de gusto. En suma, la necesaria actividad judicativa presente en todo conocimiento (dentro del enfoque kantiano) no parece ser un impedimento para que Heidemann identifique contenidos no-conceptuales –es decir, representaciones que conlleven una referencia a los objetos, sin presuponer la actividad conceptual—.

Contra este modo de argumentar quisiera señalar que efectivamente la intuición jamás se reduce al concepto en el marco del idealismo kantiano. Es cierto que sólo las intuiciones se refieren a los objetos de manera inmediata y lo hacen de manera singular, mientras que los conceptos sólo pueden pensar sus objetos de manera mediata y universal. Pero esto no significa que la referencia inmediata y singular que opera al nivel de la intuición sensible pueda prescindir de la actividad conceptual (i.e. el operar de las categorías y los conceptos empíricos). 8 Considero que una de las tesis centrales de la filosofía crítica kantiana consiste precisamente en subrayar la necesaria cooperación entre conceptos e intuiciones para dar cuenta del conocimiento. Ello no significa que la intuición pierda su carácter no- conceptual, sino que señala que ella sola, sin la cooperación de los conceptos, es insuficiente para referirse cognitivamente a un objeto.9 Ahora bien, pese a este desacuerdo inicial entre la posición no-conceptualista de Heidemann y mi manera de comprender la teoría sobre el conocimiento desarrollada por Kant, creo que puede ser fructífero analizar en detalle los argumentos que ofrece este intérprete. Considero que el análisis del trabajo de Heidemann puede enriquecer nuestra comprensión sobre la potencialidad de los juicios de gusto en el marco del debate sobre el (no)-conceptualismo kantiano.

La estrategia de este intérprete consta de dos pasos. En un primer momento, se ocupa de fundamentar la idea de que los juicios de gusto poseen carácter cognitivo, pues sólo bajo esa condición podríamos incluirlos en el debate sobre el (no)-conceptualismo. Es decir, si se pretende identificar en los juicios de gusto un modo de conocimiento no-conceptual, debemos hallarnos ante juicios que poseen algún tipo de carácter cognitivo. En un segundo momento, el autor señala que los juicios de gusto poseen un carácter no-conceptual –i.e. constituyen un modo de conocimiento que no se encuentra mediado por conceptos—. A continuación, reconstruiré críticamente cada uno de estos pasos argumentativos.

8 No analizo aquí en que sentido los conceptos empíricos constituyen condiciones que posibilitan la referencia a los objetos. Sobre esta cuestión puede consultarse el trabajo de Jáuregui (2014), quien señala que si bien los conceptos empíricos no constituyen condiciones de posibilidad de la experiencia, son no obstante, condiciones de inteligibilidad de los rasgos empíricos particulares que la actividad categorial deja sin determinar.

9 Aquí sólo me limito a mencionar esta cuestión, pues una defensa de la posición que indico exigiría un análisis de textos kantianos pertenecientes a su filosofía teórica, lo cual excede los límites de este trabajo.

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Sobre el pretendido carácter cognitivo de los juicios de gusto
Heidemann ofrece tres argumentos mediante los cuales intenta poner de relieve la cualidad cognitiva de los juicios sobre lo bello. Con el primer argumento, señala que las categorías se encuentran operando en dos sentidos en los juicios de gusto, a saber: a) en el juicio “esta flor es bella” (KU, AA 05: 281) podríamos concentrarnos en la flor en tanto objeto físico ordinario y determinarla según las categorías. Esto implicaría hacer abstracción de la evaluación estética y depositar el énfasis en el objeto dado de manera intuitiva y en sus propiedades. (Cfr. Heidemann 2016, p. 124); b) el predicado de una cosa como “bella” reposa únicamente sobre el “sentimiento de placer y displacer” (KU, AA 05: 209). Y este sentimiento sólo puede ser concebido de acuerdo con un ordenamiento categorial, aunque “sin un concepto del objeto” (KU, AA 05: 217), (Cfr. Heidemann 2016, p. 125). Aquí el autor parece referirse al libre juego entre la imaginación y el entendimiento que desempeña un rol crucial en la teoría kantiana sobre los juicios de gusto, pero por el momento no explica en qué sentido la evaluación estética implica una determinación categorial (aunque diferente a la que presentan los juicios lógicos de conocimiento).
En relación con el primer sentido de este operar categorial en los juicios de gusto, podemos indicar que se trata de una indicación carente de relevancia, pues al hacer abstracción de la evaluación estética ya no estamos considerando el juicio de gusto, sino que en ese caso nos encontraríamos pensando el objeto desde la perspectiva de los juicios lógicos de conocimiento. Por tanto, considero que este primer sentido del supuesto operar categorial no ofrece ningún argumento a favor del carácter cognitivo del juicio de gusto, ya que simplemente se señala que a partir del juicio estético “la flor es bella” es posible colocar entre paréntesis la evaluación estética. Gracias a esta puesta en suspenso del enjuiciamiento estético es posible considerar la flor desde el punto de vista del conocimiento y formular juicios como “la flor posee cuatro pétalos” o “la flor posee sustancias tóxicas para el organismo humano”. Con respecto al segundo sentido del operar categorial en los juicios de gusto, el autor lamentablemente no explica en este punto de su trabajo en qué sentido debemos entender tal determinación categorial.
El segundo argumento que encontramos en el trabajo de Heidemann a favor del carácter cognitivo de los juicios de gusto indica que la comunicabilidad universal de nuestro conocimiento debe ser supuesta en toda lógica y en todo principio de conocimiento que no sea escéptico (Cfr. KU, AA 05: 239). En este sentido, el autor retoma la idea kantiana según la cual si los conocimientos y los juicios no fuesen universalmente comunicables, no podrían elevarse por encima de los meros juegos subjetivos pertenecientes a nuestras facultades de representación, lo cual conduciría al escepticismo (Cfr. KU, AA 05: 238). Heidemann concluye que los juicios de gusto y los juicios de conocimiento comparten la característica de la universal comunicabilidad, pues ambos se refieren a los objetos sobre los cuales se expresan (Cfr. Heidemann 2016, p. 125).
Según mi evaluación, este segundo argumento también adolece de un serio defecto, pues ciertamente los juicios de gusto y los juicios de conocimiento comparten la característica de la universal comunicabilidad. En caso contrario, Kant caería en una posición escéptica. Por un lado, si negáramos la universal comunicabilidad en el plano de los juicios de

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conocimiento, nos hallaríamos ante una suerte de escepticismo sobre las posibilidades de conocer objetos externos a nuestra mente. Por su parte, si renunciáramos a la universal comunicabilidad de aquello que expresan los juicios estéticos, no podríamos fundamentar el gusto sobre principios transcendentales y el gusto se reduciría al ámbito meramente privado. Ahora bien, esto no significa que la universal comunicabilidad implique en ambos casos una referencia a los objetos sobre los cuales se expresan respectivamente los juicios. Veamos esto con un ejemplo. En el juicio lógico de conocimiento “esta flor tiene cuatro pétalos” se comunica de manera universal una propiedad sobre la flor. En contraste con ello, mediante el juicio “esta flor es bella” no se comunica ninguna propiedad sobre el objeto flor, sino sobre un estado de la propia mente que Kant denomina “sentimiento estético” y es ocasionado por el libre juego entre la imaginación y el entendimiento, frente a la contemplación de la flor. Por tanto, en el caso de un juicio de gusto la universal comunicabilidad no implica una referencia al objeto sobre el cual se expresa tal juicio, sino sobre el estado mental del sujeto.
El tercer argumento de Heidemann a favor del carácter cognitivo de los juicios de gusto subraya que la universal comunicabilidad de los juicios de gusto implica la validez universal (tal como sucede como en los juicios lógicos de conocimiento) (Cfr. Heidemann 2016, p. 125-26). Considero que en este argumento Heidemann parece confundir “validez universal” con “pretensión de validez universal”. Es decir, una lectura detenida de la teoría kantiana sobre los juicios de gusto permite concluir que tenemos razones para esperar que otros sujetos estén de acuerdo con nuestro juicio sobre algo como bello, pues el fundamento de nuestro juicio de gusto reposa sobre facultades cognitivas que son universalmente válidas. Pero esta pretensión de validez universal bajo ningún punto de vista se identifica con la validez universal que posee un juicio de conocimiento.
A partir de estos tres argumentos, Heidemann concluye que si bien los juicios de gusto no constituyen juicios lógicos de conocimiento, son cognitivos en varios aspectos y por tanto, son capaces, en principio, de exhibir contenido no-conceptual (Cfr. Heidemann 2016, p. 126). Por los motivos que ya he señalado los tres argumentos que ofrece el autor presentan serias dificultades para establecer de manera exitosa el carácter cognitivo de los juicios de gusto.
Suponiendo que los juicios de gusto aportan algo al conocimiento (lo cual no ha sido demostrado por Heidemann), veamos en el siguiente apartado en qué sentido poseerían un carácter no-conceptual.
Sobre el pretendido carácter no-conceptual de los juicios de gusto

Tras haber presentado argumentos a favor de la supuesta cualidad cognitiva de los juicios de gusto, el siguiente paso de Heidemann consiste en demostrar que ellos constituyen un lugar apropiado para identificar una posición no-conceptualista en la teoría kantiana del conocimiento.

En primer lugar, Heidemann cita dos pasajes de la “Analítica de lo bello”. El primero de ellos corresponde al segundo momento de los juicios de gusto, donde Kant afirma: “Lo

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bello es aquello que, sin conceptos, es representado como objeto de una complacencia universal” (KU, AA 05: 211). El segundo pasaje es la definición deducida del cuarto momento: “Bello es lo que es conocido [erkannt] sin conceptos como objetos de una complacencia necesaria” (KU, AA 05: 240). Según Heidemannn, ambos pasajes estarían indicando mediante la expresión adverbial “sin conceptos” el carácter no-conceptual de los juicios de gusto. Con el fin de profundizar en el sentido del uso de la expresión “sin conceptos”, el intérprete desarrolla diferentes líneas argumentales presentes en la teoría kantiana sobre los juicios estéticos sobre lo bello.

En una primera línea argumentativa, Heidemann sostiene que la clave del no- conceptualismo en la estética de Kant se encuentra en la noción de sentimiento (Gefühl). En los juicios lógicos de conocimiento el sujeto refiere las representaciones a un objeto. En contraste con ello, en los juicios estéticos las representaciones son referidas al sentimiento de placer y displacer. De este modo, a través de un juicio de gusto no se designa nada en el objeto, sino que el sujeto se siente a sí mismo tal como es afectado por la representación. Por ello, el fundamento determinante subjetivo del juicio de gusto es el sentimiento de placer (Gefühl der Lust) (Cfr. KU, AA 05:204 ss.). Heidemann considera que el sentimiento de placer y displacer es el contenido no-conceptual de la “cognición estética” (Cfr. Heidemann 2016, p. 129). Según este intérprete, un contenido mental es no- conceptual sólo si es “fenomenal, intencional y representacional”. Según él, el sentimiento de placer implicado en los juicios sobre lo bello cumple con las tres características: es fenomenal en la medida en que consiste en un estado mental que se le presenta al sujeto de una determinada manera; es intencional, puesto que posee una referencia gracias a la cual el sujeto se siente a sí mismo, y por último, es representacional, ya que en tal estado el sujeto representa la relación armónica entre imaginación y entendimiento (Cfr. Heidemann 2016, p. 129)

Por mi parte, considero que el aspecto más cuestionable de esta interpretación radica en la atribución de carácter representacional al juicio de gusto. En el juicio de gusto no hay una representación de la armonía entre la imaginación y el entendimiento, tal como lo expresa Heidemann. La armonía de las facultades se halla a la base del sentimiento estético, pero esto no significa que el sentimiento represente la armonía de las facultades. Quizás sea conveniente precisar el significado preciso del término sentimiento (Gefühl) en la filosofía crítica kantiana. En el Diccionario de la filosofía crítica kantiana podemos leer que el sentimiento:

Es aquella capacidad del sujeto de ser receptivo para los efectos meramente subjetivos de las representaciones. Esos efectos no contienen nada que pueda servir para el conocimiento del objeto. Este sentimiento pertenece a la sensibilidad. (Caimi et. al. 2017, p. 436).

En el mismo Diccionario, la entrada “Sentimiento de placer y displacer” nos indica que este último es:

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La receptividad del sujeto, que hace posible que este sea determinado por ciertas representaciones a la conservación o al rechazo del estado en el que tiene esas representaciones. […] (Caimi et. al. 2017, p. 436)

Es decir, el sentimiento es una capacidad, una receptividad que supone ciertas representaciones, pero él mismo no es una representación de un objeto, ni de las facultades de conocimiento que posibilitan el estado mental. En suma, el sentimiento no posee un carácter representacional, tal como es defendido por Heidemann. Por este motivo, considero que si bien el juicio de gusto expresa un sentimiento (y este no se encuentra determinado conceptualmente), ello no implica que el sentimiento adquiera un carácter no- conceptual.

En una segunda línea argumentativa, Heidemann subraya que el juicio estético de gusto se basa en una experiencia en primera persona y no puede reposar sobre fuentes heterónomas. En la “Deducción de los juicios estéticos puros” Kant sostiene lo siguiente: “El gusto tiene simplemente pretensión de autonomía. Hacer de juicios ajenos el fundamento de determinación del propio sería heteronomía” (KU, AA 05: 282). Según Heidemann esto implica que la cognición estética presupone esencialmente la experiencia en primera persona del objeto de la evaluación estética. Según este intérprete, esto significa que no hay conceptos mediante los cuales pueda acceder al sentimiento de otra persona, lo cual es una prueba a favor del no-conceptualismo (Cfr. Heidemann 2016, pp. 134-35).

A mi modo de ver, que el juicio de gusto sea fundamento de una estética autónoma y remita a una suerte de experiencia que se sólo se puede llevar a cabo en primera persona es un motivo insuficiente para inferir el pretendido carácter no-conceptual. Efectivamente, el enjuiciamiento “esta flor es bella” supone una experiencia en primera persona, pues a partir del relato de una tercera persona no surge necesariamente mi propio juicio acerca de la belleza de la flor. Pero esta necesidad de acceder al “objeto estético” (en nuestro ejemplo, la flor) en primera persona y no mediante una descripción conceptual, no significa que el enjuiciamiento de algo como bello cuente como un argumento a favor del no-conceptualismo, pues como he indicado anteriormente, en este tipo de enjuiciamiento no hay referencia a ningún objeto. El juicio de gusto tan solo expresa un sentimiento subjetivo, pero no es una representación de un objeto (ya sea que este se encuentre en el sentido externo o en el mero sentido interno).

En suma, el sentimiento estético (en tanto producto del libre juego de las facultades) es el fundamento subjetivo determinante del juicio de gusto. Según la interpretación de Heidemann, se trata de un sentimiento que es fenomenal, intencional y representacional de un estado de la mente, pero él no es conceptual (Cfr. Heidemann 2016, p. 138). Como ya he señalado, en este punto el argumento de Heidemann fracasa en su intento por caracterizar al juicio de gusto como no-conceptual, pues no logra demostrar que el sentimiento en tanto “contenido no-conceptual” del juicio de gusto sea poseedor del carácter representacional, que según él mismo, es un requisito de la no-conceptualidad.

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3. Una propuesta alternativa sobre los juicios de gusto y el (no)-conceptualismo

Hasta aquí he señalado los motivos por los cuales no estoy de acuerdo con la interpretación no-conceptualista de Heidemann sobre los juicios de gusto. Sin embargo, creo que la teoría kantiana sobre lo bello puede arrojar cierta luz sobre el debate en torno al (no)- conceptualismo. En este sentido, considero crucial la explicación kantiana del libre juego y su vínculo con lo que se denomina conocimiento en general.

En el §9 de la KU Kant se pregunta “[…] si en el juicio de gusto el sentimiento de placer antecede al enjuiciamiento del objeto o éste a aquél” (KU, AA 05: 216). Inmediatamente, añade que “[…] la solución de este problema es la clave de la crítica del gusto y, por eso, merecedora de toda atención” (KU, AA 05: 216). En primer término, Kant señala que el fundamento del juicio de gusto no puede ser el placer, pues si este fuese el caso, entonces nos hallaríamos ante el mero sentimiento de agrado, cuya validez es privada. Dado que el juicio de gusto posee una pretensión de validez universal no puede basarse sobre un sentimiento cuya validez es relativa a cada sujeto. Por este motivo, Kant sostiene que el fundamento de los juicios de gusto es la universal aptitud para comunicar el estado de la propia mente (Cfr. KU, AA 05: 217). Así pues, el primer paso de la argumentación del §9 nos indica que el fundamento del juicio de gusto es la universal comunicabilidad.

En un segundo paso, Kant investiga sobre qué reposa esta universal comunicabilidad. Aquello que fundamenta esta universal comunicabilidad no puede basarse en conceptos, pues en tal caso el juicio no sería estético. En el siguiente pasaje se expresa esta cuestión:

Si el fundamento de determinación del juicio acerca de esta universal comunicabilidad de la representación ha de ser pensado como meramente subjetivo, a saber, sin un concepto del objeto, no puede ser él, entonces, otro que el estado de la mente que se encuentra en la relación de las fuerzas representacionales entre sí, en cuanto que ellas refieren una representación dada al conocimiento en general [Erkenntnis überhaupt]. (KU, AA 05: 217)

Es decir, el fundamento de la universal comunicabilidad es el estado de la mente que se encuentra en la relación de las fuerzas representacionales, en la medida en que ellas refieren una representación al conocimiento en general. Kant aclara a continuación que este estado de la mente es el de un libre juego, pues “ningún concepto determinado” (kein bestimmter Begriff) (KU, AA 05: 217) limita la relación de las potencias cognoscitivas “a una regla particular de conocimiento” (auf eine besondere Erkenntnisregel) (KU, AA 05: 217). Aquí se observa el contraste entre el conocimiento en general (Erkenntnis überhaupt) y el conocimiento particular. Mientras que el primero no supone ningún concepto determinado, el segundo se basa en reglas particulares de conocimiento. Para entender con mayor detalle esta concepción de conocimiento en general debemos observar la propia formulación de Kant:

[…] a una representación por la cual es dado un objeto, para que de ella resulte, en general un conocimiento, pertenecen la imaginación, para la composición de lo múltiple de la intuición, y el entendimiento, para la unidad del concepto que unifica las

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representaciones. Este estado del libre juego de las facultades de conocimiento […] debe poder comunicarse universalmente […]

La universal comunicabilidad subjetiva del modo de representación en un juicio de gusto, dado que debe tener lugar sin suponer un concepto determinado, no puede ser otra cosa que el estado de la mente en el libre juego de la imaginación y el entendimiento (en la medida que estos concuerdan entre sí como es requerible para un conocimiento en general) […] (KU, AA 05: 217-18).

En estos pasajes observamos que aquello que es universalmente comunicable en el juicio de gusto es el estado de la mente en el libre juego de la imaginación y el entendimiento. Esta armonía entre las facultades es lo que se requiere para un conocimiento en general. Estas facultades que están supuestas en todo conocimiento son la imaginación (para componer el múltiple intuitivo) y el entendimiento (el cual brinda unidad mediante conceptos). Así pues, el conocimiento en general no supone un concepto determinado, pues si lo hiciera el conocimiento no sería general sino particular y el libre juego se vería impedido. Me interesa subrayar un aspecto: el conocimiento en general supone dos facultades que se vinculan entre sí: la imaginación y el entendimiento. Así pues, es cierto que lo bello place sin concepto, en la medida en que no supone un concepto determinado del objeto, sino que se fundamenta sobre la universal comunicabilidad de un estado de la mente (el del libre juego de las facultades que es requerible para un conocimiento en general). Pero esto no implica la ausencia absoluta del entendimiento y de los conceptos, pues el conocimiento en general supone una concordancia entre intuiciones y conceptos (aunque no un concepto determinado).

En suma, la noción kantiana de conocimiento en general que encontramos a la base de la crítica de gusto constituye un momento crucial para responder a la pregunta sobre el (no)- conceptualismo en la teoría kantiana del conocimiento. Dado que todo conocimiento en general supone la armonía entre una facultad de los conceptos (el entendimiento) y una facultad que compone lo múltiple intuitivo (la imaginación), podemos concluir que todo conocimiento supone la colaboración entre una facultad conceptual y un material intuitivo dado. De esta manera, el libre juego entre la imaginación y el entendimiento que es requerible para todo conocimiento en general revela que Kant está lejos de ser no- conceptualista. Es cierto que lo bello no reposa sobre conceptos determinados. No obstante, un análisis detenido nos muestra que su teoría sobre los juicios de gusto no nos conduce a una posición no-conceptualista. Por el contrario, los fundamentos del juicio de gusto revelan que todo conocimiento supone la participación y colaboración necesaria de intuiciones y conceptos.

4. Conclusiones

En este trabajo he analizado y evaluado la interpretación no-conceptualista que Heidemann ofrece sobre la teoría kantiana de los juicios de gusto. He señalado que la estrategia de este intérprete fracasa en los dos momentos de su argumentación. Esto me permite concluir que

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los juicios de gusto no poseen carácter cognitivo y tampoco constituyen una prueba a favor del no-conceptualismo.

Asimismo, he indicado que la solución a la clave de la crítica del gusto revela aspectos de la teoría kantiana del conocimiento que se sitúan lejos del no-conceptualismo, pues todo conocimiento en general supone la colaboración entre entendimiento e imaginación, es decir, entre conceptos e intuiciones. Es cierto que el placer estético implicado en los juicios sobre lo bello no reposa sobre conceptos determinados. Sin embargo, se trata de un modo de enjuiciamiento estético que se fundamenta sobre una concepción de la mente en la cual todo conocimiento en general supone la colaboración necesaria de conceptos e intuiciones sensibles.

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La epistemología kantiana y el contenido no conceptual

Kantian Epistemology and Non-Conceptual Content

JUAN JOSÉ ROSALES SÁNCHEZ 

Universidad Yachay Tech, Ecuador

Resumen
John McDowell sostiene que el contenido de la experiencia es completamente conceptual y que, por tanto, no hay nada que pueda denominarse contenido no conceptual. Alega este filósofo que las bases de su defensa de este único contenido de la experiencia se encuentran en la obra de Kant, específicamente en la Crítica de la razón pura. Pues bien, a partir de las lecturas directas de esa misma obra de Kant y de las Lecciones de lógica, mejor conocidas como Lógica Jäsche, y de la lectura indirecta de Sobre el fundamento último de la diferenciación de las direcciones en el espacio, argumentamos a favor de una interpretación de las habilidades y de las prácticas como posibles expresiones del contenido no conceptual en la epistemología de Kant.
Palabras-clave
Epistemología kantiana, contenido de la experiencia, contenido conceptual, contenido no conceptual, Kant, John McDowell.

Abstract
John McDowell holds that the content of experience is completely conceptual; hence anything as non-conceptual content could ever exist. This Philosopher argues that the basis which backs this unique content up could be found in Kant works, specifically in Critique of Pure Reason. Thus, this paper begins at the direct readings of this Kantian work, Lessons of Logic well-known as Jäsche, and the indirect reading of Concerning the Ultimate Ground of the Differentiation of Directions in Space as well, so we argue in favor of an interpretation of skills and practices as possible expressions of non-conceptual content in Kant Epistemology.
Key-words
Kantian Epistemology; content of experience; conceptual content; non-conceptual content; Kant; John McDowell.
- Profesor de Historia y filosofía de la ciencia y de la tecnología, adscrito a la Escuela de Ciencias Matemáticas y Tecnología Informática de la Universidad Yachay Tech, Ecuador. E-mail de contacto:

jrosales@yachaytech.edu.ec

[Recibido: 16 de octubre 2017

Aceptado: 2 de noviembre 2017]

La epistemología kantiana y el contenido no conceptual

0. Preliminares

Dentro del espectro de la epistemología que debate sobre los contenidos de la experiencia, McDowell (2003) sostiene que la experiencia posee única y exclusivamente contenido conceptual. Este conocido filósofo declara que su principal base de apoyo es la epistemología kantiana, en especial la Crítica de la razón pura (KrV). En este mismo orden de ideas, el dictum kantiano: “Los pensamientos sin contenidos son vacíos, las intuiciones sin conceptos son ciegas” (KrV A51/ B75) sirve a McDowell para afirmar que “el pensamiento original de Kant era que el conocimiento empírico es el resultado de la colaboración entre la receptividad y la espontaneidad” (McDowell 2003, p. 459). A este respecto, sostiene McDowell (2003) que en la receptividad están implicados los conceptos. Planteado de otra forma, significaría que la sensibilidad, por sí sola, no puede dar lugar a la experiencia sin el auxilio de los conceptos. En consecuencia, el contenido de la experiencia está determinado por los conceptos, y en especial por su poder de producir sentido (Sinn). Para McDowell, la experiencia acontece en el ámbito del sentido más que en el de la referencia: “el pensamiento y la realidad se encuentran el uno con el otro en el ámbito del sentido” (2003, p. 277).

Como respuesta a este enfoque conceptualista este artículo presenta una perspectiva interpretativa de los contenidos de la experiencia en la que algunos elementos típicos de la acción, tales como “destrezas”, “capacidades” y “prácticas” se consideran próximas al dominio de la intuición y, por ello, ilustrativas de un tipo de experiencia con contenido no conceptual. Para sustentar esta tesis tomamos como base la Lógica de Kant (Log AA, 09) y algunos juicios presentes en el ensayo de 1768 del mismo Kant, Sobre el fundamento último de la diferenciación de las direcciones en el espacio (citado en Mc Mannus 2002). Desde estas lecturas sobre la obra de Kant argumentamos a favor de la tesis según la cual algunos elementos de la acción, como el despliegue de capacidades y de destrezas no dependen necesariamente del dominio de los conceptos que pudieran estar relacionados con ellas. De igual modo, la obra de Hanna (2008) es otro punto de apoyo, pues este filósofo encuentra en la Crítica de la razón pura (KrV) elementos doctrinarios que, según su juicio, sirven para sostener la presencia de contenidos no conceptuales en la experiencia. El artículo está organizado en cuatro partes. La primera sección adelanta dos definiciones diferentes de “contenido”; ninguna de estas definiciones procede de los autores que examinamos sino que resultan de un esfuerzo interpretativo nuestro. La segunda parte expone qué se entiende por “contenido conceptual”, y apelamos a las consideraciones de Cussins (2003); aquí la noción de condiciones de verdad y su relación con lo conceptual resulta capital para los propósitos de distinguir el enfoque conceptualista de la experiencia. El tercer segmento es el núcleo de este trabajo porque discurre en torno a los contenidos no conceptuales de la experiencia; en esta parte nos apoyamos en la clasificación kantiana del conocimiento descrita en la Lógica (Log AA: 09) y en ejemplos, expuestos por Kant, que se refieren al ejercicio de capacidades sin que necesariamente medie conocimiento de las reglas que las gobiernan, ni de los conceptos que se referirían a dichas reglas. Por último, y

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS

International Journal of Philosophy

N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 106-120 ISSN: 2386-7655

Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095155

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Juan José Rosales Sánchez

para concluir, se presenta una sección de “consideraciones finales” dedicada a la discusión y síntesis de los argumentos presentados a lo largo del artículo.

Dos significados de “contenido”
El significado de los conceptos y de las proposiciones que empleamos parece estar íntimamente ligado a prácticas que no necesariamente están conceptualizadas, habilidades que se hallan algo así como en el umbral de lo conceptual. Prácticas imprescindibles en cuanto depende de ellas la posibilidad misma del lenguaje y, por tanto, de una buena parte del conocimiento comunicable y cooperativo. Respecto de estas ideas, Kant dice: “Hablamos, sin embargo, sin conocer la gramática. El que habla sin conocer las reglas posee en efecto una gramática y habla conforme a reglas de las cuales, empero no es consciente” (Log AA, 09, 2). Todo está determinado por reglas aunque las ignoremos, afirma el mismo Kant, así que se trata de que el entendimiento someta a reglas las representaciones de los sentidos (Log; AA, 09, 2). Pero resulta que el mismísimo entendimiento, en general, está sometido a reglas, y no obstante lo usamos sin conocer las necesarias reglas que lo determinan (Log AA, 09, 3). Kant destaca un nivel de experiencia en el que la familiaridad con las cosas, la regularidad de las acciones y los resultados, son suficientes para una vida cotidiana libre del empeño por entender. En las prácticas cotidianas y en las que no lo son están escondidas unas reglas que pueden ser extraídas por la investigación, halladas por el intelecto. El deseo de dar y comprender las reglas que gobiernan los fenómenos y las prácticas es una aspiración, un ideal que, según Kant, contribuye al progreso del conocimiento. Así, que no haya un inventario completo de reglas no es un problema sino un acicate; y en cuanto a las prácticas lingüísticas, desde una perspectiva kantiana, sigue siendo un reto la formulación de una Grammatica universalis.
El problema de la experiencia no tiene que tratarse necesariamente atendiendo al asunto de los tipos de estados y contenidos mentales, aunque, desde luego, es válido hacerlo en esos términos. Dicho tratamiento de la experiencia tendría que estar referido, más bien, a la vinculación entre lo que hacemos, lo que pensamos y los resultados que obtenemos del hacer y del pensar. El significado de la experiencia depende de tal vinculación y cuando la sometemos a análisis encontramos que el significado es incompleto y necesita someterse al crisol de la vida. Entonces, en relación con la experiencia, los significados no son completos aunque estén impregnados de cierto grado de intersubjetividad y hasta parezcan totalmente impersonales, por lo que el conocimiento común ordinario, la ciencia y las demás disciplinas se ven afectadas, modificadas y hasta desmentidas, en parte, por el curso de la experiencia. Hasta hace algunos años aprendíamos en la escuela que el Sistema Solar estaba compuesto de nueve planetas, con los estudios más recientes, el reajuste teórico y ciertas evidencias empíricas, los criterios para decidir qué es y qué no es un planeta se modificaron.
Tenemos, entonces, dos tipos de significado, o dos usos del término “contenido”: Primero, el contenido se entiende como el conjunto de elementos variables que facilitan la comprensión y la acción, pero que ellos mismos no son objeto del entendimiento, no caen

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS
108 International Journal of Philosophy
N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 106-120
ISSN: 2386-7655
Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095155
La epistemología kantiana y el contenido no conceptual

bajo una definición o incluso no se pueden tratar ni siquiera metafóricamente: el alfarero que exige a los aprendices que se le preste atención cuando usa el torno, y exige que se toque la pieza para que se aprecie la textura adecuada y los contornos correctos de la pieza que está torneando. En este ejemplo, el aprendizaje vicario está por encima de las palabras y hasta de las definiciones, la verdad se revela a los sentidos y no al intelecto. El conocimiento no es independiente del artífice, es algo muy suyo y no puede ser objetivado en palabras y definiciones, el logro de la obra misma es la objetivación. En este primer sentido, las reglas de construcción no están disponibles para su exposición discursiva y por tanto pública. De esta manera, saber y sentir resultan inseparables.
En un segundo sentido, el contenido está disponible para ser extraído lingüísticamente, para que se señale con la ayuda de una red de conceptos cuáles son sus límites gnoseológicos y prácticos. Contenido es aquello que el entendimiento saca en limpio y un ser con competencias lingüísticas es firme candidato a apropiarse de ese conocimiento. La independencia de los individuos, por el uso de sus facultades intelectuales, estaría garantizada. De todos modos, estas divisiones, aunque necesarias para la explicación, son engañosas. El dominio de las artes y las ciencias, o cualquier otro saber, no está disponible para todos los que estudian y asimilan intelectualmente sus principios, métodos y procesos, aun cuando ellos se encuentren muy claramente expuestos. Siempre hay algo de habilidad personal y de situaciones que influyen en dicho dominio. Al respecto, señala Kant que, “se puede aprender filosofía en un cierto respecto sin ser capaz de filosofar” (Log; AA, 09, 21). Entonces, aun en una disciplina cuyo material de trabajo es el concepto, no se puede ignorar lo decisivo que resulta la posesión de específicas capacidades y la ejercitación de habilidades para elaborar el conocimiento filosófico; y por cierto, cabría preguntarse respecto de esas capacidades y habilidades, de dónde proceden o cuál es su fundamento.
Es evidente que sólo el segundo de los contenidos es relevante para desarrollar un camino de exposición interpretativa de la experiencia, y con ello lograr su objetivación. Pero el primero, orientado hacia la habilidad y las disposiciones, nos hace apreciar de manera distinta ciertos logros que no parecen estar al alcance de los cánones del lenguaje.
Ahora bien, ¿qué debe caracterizar el contenido de una experiencia? ¿Qué tipo de realidad debe poseer el contenido para ser al mismo tiempo objetivo y accesible a las diferentes mentes individuales? El término “contenido” alude a aquello que está en un continente, a lo que tiene límites más o menos definidos. “Contenido” también hace pensar en aquello que puede ser extraído, por lo que se llega a ponderar como una información disponible.
Contenido conceptual
El contenido conceptual es una información que puede extraerse y exponerse en términos lingüísticos puesto que responde a qué es, cómo es, o dónde está, etc., aun cuando originalmente tal contenido no esté dado en una modalidad conceptual. Así, en general, nos entendemos al hablar de objetos disponibles en la experiencia externa (un árbol, una mesa, un perro), de algunas de sus propiedades accesibles a nuestros sentidos (sus colores y figuras), y con ayuda de artefactos, de otras propiedades como sus medidas (peso,

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS
International Journal of Philosophy
N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 106-120 ISSN: 2386-7655
Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095155

109

Juan José Rosales Sánchez

temperatura, dimensiones, duración). Al poner en conceptos una cosa o sus propiedades, especificamos un contenido o significado de la experiencia común, decimos común en el entendido de que puede ser captado por individuos capaces de realizar la misma conceptualización.
Por otra parte, es importante considerar que, en presencia del objeto, la percepción da lugar a la captación de matices, a la apreciación y discriminación de caracteres que se escapan al concepto, porque la capacidad de diferenciación sensorial es diferente en cada individuo, no se encuentra en la uniformidad o rasero propio de la conceptualización. Es difícil negar que las diferencias en la agudeza de visión permiten captar irregularidades de superficie o decoloraciones, por ejemplo; dependiendo de la potencia en la visión y también del entrenamiento en su empleo, se pueden capturar detalles que un concepto deja fuera y que sin embargo son significativos. El entrenamiento táctil es un factor a considerar en torno a la especificación del contenido; a falta de luz ultra violeta o de reactivos químicos, un hombre acostumbrado a manipular papel moneda puede decir, por medio de una inspección táctil, si un billete es de curso legal o no; en todo caso, cierta discrepancia con el continuo de su experiencia en la manipulación de billetes le hará pedir que le cambien ese billete.
La experiencia es la escuela de la percepción y ésta (la percepción) es a su vez un alumno fiel que no la abandona y colabora en asuntos de alta importancia para su escuela. Por eso es que disposiciones perceptivas y un ambiente adecuado para el entrenamiento de tales cualidades son esenciales para el logro de las diferencias en las capacidades de discriminación o de las aptitudes no conceptualizadas: un mecánico escucha el ruido del motor y diagnostica el lugar del problema; un experto en telas toca la superficie y puede determinar si es puro algodón o si contiene fibras sintéticas; un experto en preparación de fragancias, una “nariz”, es capaz de examinar diferentes fragancias y discriminar con absoluta seguridad la original de las imitaciones; un pintor aprecia matices de color o de perspectiva que otros no ven; un buen cocinero prueba la comida y con bastante aproximación puede decir cuáles han sido las especias o ingredientes empleados en su elaboración; en general, los expertos hacen estas distinciones sin poder decir cómo las hacen. Esta apreciación de los detalles, cualidad esencial de la percepción, está muy ligada al hábito y al entrenamiento, y, quizá, a una especial fortaleza y desarrollo de uno de los cinco sentidos en el individuo. Por tanto, el acceso a la información ligado a lo sensorial es esencialmente personal y su cualificación es igualmente variable individualmente. Y a despecho del conceptualismo y su esperanza del continuo refinamiento de los conceptos, hay un mundo de detalles presentes en la percepción de las cuales los conceptos no pueden dar cuenta. Al espectro de detalles percibidos, que sirven al sujeto para actuar con acierto, le llamamos información no conceptualizada.
Mientras los contenidos, cualesquiera sean sus tipos, den lugar a pautas de clasificación y relación de cosas o eventos, no resulta necesario delimitar lo conceptual y lo no conceptual. Pero cuando en nuestros procesos reflexivos nos preguntamos qué pasa con ciertos tratos con el mundo que no son transparentes para el examen conceptual,

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS
110 International Journal of Philosophy
N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 106-120
ISSN: 2386-7655
Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095155
La epistemología kantiana y el contenido no conceptual

entonces notamos que tales pautas varían y buscamos las características determinantes o que nos parecen tales para fijar nuestro contacto con el mundo. En este mismo orden de ideas, Cussins apunta que “el contenido conceptual es el contenido que presenta el mundo a un sujeto como lo objetivo, un mundo humano desde el cual uno se puede formar juicios verdaderos o falsos” (2003, p.134). “Mundo humano”, significa, en el contexto de las reflexiones de Cussins, un mundo moldeado por distinciones compartidas. El carácter representativo de la experiencia, el representarnos el mundo de cierta manera, depende del uso de los conceptos. Pero, ¿qué ocurre con los eventos o cosas que se nos presentan y que no calzan en el repertorio de conceptos que poseemos?, ¿sería conceptual el contenido si la experiencia se especifica con un “esto es…x” en donde “x” es lo más cercano a una definición, o por lo menos a una descripción? Si se tiene la experiencia y nuestro repertorio conceptual no bastara para describirla, si no pudiéramos dar cuenta de las situaciones en las que estamos inmersos con la ayuda de nuestros conceptos, pero pudiéramos movemos en ellas y hasta resolver o tomar cursos de acción sin saber qué ocurría exactamente y cómo lo hicimos, ¿no cabe pensar en un acceso al mundo de forma no conceptual?
Sostiene también Cussins (2003), con respecto a los contenidos conceptuales en general, que este tipo de contenidos presenta el mundo al sujeto como dividido en objetos, propiedades y situaciones, que son los componentes de las condiciones de verdad. Por ejemplo, veo sobre una mesa un libro; entonces, es necesario verificar que el objeto que sostiene al otro cumpla con ciertos caracteres o propiedades, una tabla apoyada en una, dos, tres o cuatro patas, que el objeto sostenido consista en un conjunto de páginas, que al mirarlo contenga palabras y/o imágenes, y que éstas se hilvanen en un orden relativamente coherente de exposición. Verificadas esas condiciones digo, por ejemplo, que estoy ante un libro sobre una mesa. Esta es una manera frecuente de aproximarnos al mundo, manera que se perfecciona paulatinamente según el entrenamiento lingüístico y cognitivo. Sostiene Cussins (2003, p.134) que:
La posesión de cualquier contenido implica contornear el mundo de una manera u otra. Habrá una noción de contenido no conceptual si la experiencia proporciona una manera de esculpir el mundo, que no consista en esculpirlo en objetos, propiedades o situaciones (es decir, los componentes de las condiciones de verdad).
Lo que podemos inferir de todo esto es que, en ciertos contextos, los contenidos están definidos por los conceptos de los que depende la especificación de la experiencia. Pero podría resultar que haya otros contextos y otros modos de captar o esculpir la experiencia. Esta posibilidad nos remite al logógrafo y al zoógrafo que vive en cada uno de nosotros según nos lo plantea Platón (Filebo VI, 39b).
Entonces, está en juego conocer si la determinación del contenido de la experiencia, o su significado, es identificable con independencia de las específicas capacidades perceptivas y de las variadas capacidades de conceptualizar que caracterizan a los seres humanos. Además, puede que tengamos experiencia ordinaria del mundo unas veces con predominio de lo conceptual y otras veces con predominio de lo figurativo. Pero este es un planteamiento que no tiene aceptación o que jamás se planteará el defensor a ultranza del contenido conceptual de la experiencia, ya que el conceptualista piensa que la percepción

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS
International Journal of Philosophy
N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 106-120 ISSN: 2386-7655
Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095155

111

Juan José Rosales Sánchez

sería una clase específica de actitud proposicional. La razón para argumentar de este modo es que, según su punto de vista, sólo podemos percibir una cosa con tales o cuales características si en el acto de percepción se actualizan los mismos conceptos que están involucrados en los juicios y creencias. En resumen, no se puede tener experiencia perceptiva sin poseer los conceptos necesarios para especificar el contenido representacional correspondiente.
Detrás de los argumentos conceptualistas está un ideal epistemológico que atiende a la justificación racional de los juicios de experiencia y de las creencias. Esto es evidentísimo en McDowell, pues sostiene con vehemencia que el espacio de los conceptos y el espacio de las razones coinciden; dicho de otra manera, que no hay justificación fuera del espectro de lo conceptual, y hace hincapié en el argumento, de suyo convincente, de que la percepción es una instancia justificadora de creencias. Igualmente, el contenido de la experiencia es conceptual para McDowell (2003, p. 94) porque lo incorporado en el contacto con el mundo debe estar disponible para la reflexión, para que quede evidenciada su acreditación como racional. Lo conceptual implica autoconciencia, de manera que tener experiencia es poder volver sobre ella en el pensamiento e insertarla en un proceso de reflexión y de enjuiciamiento. Por eso, mundo, experiencia y concepto conforman la trinidad epistemológica de McDowell. La experiencia es un asunto de sujetos que dominan conceptos, por lo que no hay contenido sin concepto. El mundo es el conjunto de los hechos que son conceptuales y enjuiciables, el mundo está disponible para los sujetos de experiencia. Ante una estrategia de este tipo, la posibilidad de que haya contenidos que se sitúen fuera del dominio de lo conceptual es nula. Para precisar estos señalamientos, tomemos un revelador texto de McDowell (2003, p. 92):
Si hacemos abstracción del papel de lo suprasensible en el pensamiento de Kant, nos quedaremos con una imagen en la cual la realidad no se localiza más allá de un límite que circunde y encierre lo conceptual […] Al Idealismo Absoluto le resulta primordial el negar la idea de que el reino de lo conceptual cuente con un límite externo; y nosotros hemos llegado a un punto desde el cual cabría comenzar a domesticar la retórica propia de tal filosofía. Consideremos esta observación de Hegel: ‘En el pensamiento soy libre, ya que no estoy en otro’. Ella expresa exactamente la imagen que he estado empleando, según la cual lo conceptual carece de límites: no hay nada más allá de ello.
Si esta aserción que pudiéramos resumir como, “todo es logos”, no es una posición idealista, entonces no sabemos cómo pueda catalogarse. El contenido de la experiencia es conceptual porque al mismo tiempo lo conceptual es el continente. Así, en el proceso de la experiencia, lo sensorial estará sujeto a los dictámenes del concepto; y, aunque involucrado, lo sensorio como tal no es lo relevante a efectos cognitivos. Los criterios de acuerdo con los cuales decimos que nos hacemos cargo de nuestra experiencia ordinaria, al hablar de objetos, propiedades y situaciones, no tienen que ver con posibles contenidos inmediatos provistos por los sentidos, sino únicamente con las conexiones conceptuales que median cualquier contacto sensorial con la realidad circundante.
Tal y como lo hemos señalado, una normatividad de tipo conceptualista o bien deja fuera lo que se resiste al concepto o bien confía que con el tiempo se alcanzará un

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS
112 International Journal of Philosophy
N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 106-120
ISSN: 2386-7655
Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095155
La epistemología kantiana y el contenido no conceptual

refinamiento tal de los conceptos que podrá llegar a detalles más y más sutiles, o asume la posición de McDowell que decreta la ausencia de límites para lo conceptual en el campo de la experiencia. Pero mediante el examen de algunos argumentos que defienden la plausibilidad de contenidos o significados no conceptuales en la experiencia hay margen para la conclusión de que es posible una normatividad distinta a la definida por lo conceptual. Entre estos argumentos sobresale no sólo la mayor riqueza de detalle de la experiencia perceptiva, sino ante todo, el papel cognoscitivo que tiene esta finura de grano. Se sostiene, además, que la gama de detalles que se captan o se hacen presentes en las percepciones supera con creces el espectro que pueda capturarse y especificarse conceptualmente y que esta captación es muy útil para orientarse en el mundo.
Tomemos el caso en que presenciamos un evento junto con otras personas, la contemplación de un paisaje, el juego de unos niños, un jardín. Al “compartir” por medio de la conversación las experiencias individuales del evento en cuestión estaríamos de acuerdo en que hemos visto un paisaje, o a niños jugando, o que admiramos el jardín. No obstante, el empleo de los términos “jardín”, “paisaje”, “atardecer”, “niño”, “juguete”, “rosa amarilla”, y el estar todos de acuerdo, o la comprensión compartida de los términos, no implica que la calidad de nuestra experiencia sea la misma. Un componente personal hará la diferencia, pues una serie de detalles que están en conexión con ciertos rasgos percibidos por cada observador se hacen presentes en las descripciones y producen una significación diferente. Por ejemplo, el matiz de verdor del paisaje le indica a un observador el comienzo de la sequía, pero no al otro que no reconoce tales señales.
La articulación de significados aprendidos mediante el entrenamiento lingüístico- conceptual hará posible la constitución de un contenido o significado objetivo. Se producirá una experiencia parcialmente conceptualizada porque hemos aprendido un lenguaje en el que los conceptos se usan para referirse a esas situaciones, pero la perspectiva, la luz viva o mortecina, los olores que llegan con el viento, la sensación del viento en la piel, etc., son detalles que no quedan atrapados necesariamente por la red conceptual disponible. McDowell (2003, p.199) defiende una Bildung que sería la responsable de nuestra adquisición del lenguaje, de nuestra capacitación en la conceptualización, que habilita al usuario del lenguaje para emplear el término en las ocasiones correctas y de manera adecuada. Se tendría así la confirmación de que los significados han sido realmente aprendidos. Sin embargo, no sólo hay un aprendizaje en este ámbito, pues no podemos ignorar que existe una Bildung del artesano, del artista, y aun del científico, que es adquirida en el curso de su trabajo y ejerce su influencia aunque ninguno de ellos lo sepa verbalizar y ni se preocupe por ello. Consideremos la siguiente observación de Kant:
En todo conocimiento habrá que distinguir entre materia, es decir, el objeto, y forma, el modo como conocemos el objeto. Un salvaje, por ejemplo, vislumbra en la lejanía una casa cuya utilidad desconoce, de ese modo tiene presente en la representación ciertamente el mismo objeto que otro que lo conoce de un modo determinado como una vivienda dispuesta para el hombre. Por lo que respecta a la forma, sin embargo, este conocimiento de uno y el mismo objeto es en ambos diferente. En un caso es mera intuición, en otro caso intuición y concepto a la vez. (Log AA, 09, 41).
CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS
International Journal of Philosophy
N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 106-120 ISSN: 2386-7655
Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095155
113

Juan José Rosales Sánchez

Kant señala un elemento común en la percepción del salvaje y la del civilizado, y un elemento diferente. De acuerdo con una tradición filosófica, Kant llama aquí materia a lo común e indiferenciado, y forma al elemento especificado. La especificación de algo como casa se agrega en el civilizado a la mera percepción de una cierta extensión y un cierto colorido espacial. Pero, nos preguntamos si lo decisivo en la diferencia es la adquisición de la palabra casa o más bien el uso efectivo de una casa que puede tener el hijo pequeño de nuestro civilizado sin haber adquirido la palabra casa. Nos podemos preguntar si ésta es una diferenciación que vale sólo para el ser humano. Tomemos el caso de un perro salvaje y un perro domesticado. Ante una casita para perros tanto el salvaje como el domesticado captarán la misma estructura. No obstante, para el primero no significará nada, mientras que para el perro domesticado será el sitio para guarecerse. Por tanto, no es lo lingüístico lo decisivo, sino la familiaridad con las cosas y el uso que se haga de ellas.
Los criterios aprendidos para la aplicación del significado de los conceptos son públicos y comunitarios, y ellos expresan todo lo que hay de objetivable en el lenguaje. De esta manera, la práctica a la que denominamos “conocimiento empírico” consiste, pero sólo en parte, en la capacidad adquirida o entrenada de conformar mediante la red de conceptos aprendidos, lo dado en nuestra experiencia. Un encomiable trabajo, sin duda, que consiste en conceptualizar ese elemento dado de acuerdo con pautas comunes y comunicables. En esto consiste la relevancia de lo conceptual a la hora de especificar los contenidos.
Kant y el contenido no conceptual
De acuerdo con el no conceptualista, hay componentes captados en la percepción que no son irrelevantes para la conformación del contenido de la experiencia. Los conceptos aprendidos y empleados en nuestro lenguaje pueden tener un significado estable, pero esa estabilidad, que es experiencia sedimentada en el lenguaje, difícilmente dé cuenta de la totalidad de la experiencia que un sujeto tenga de un objeto en un determinado momento. No hay contenido de experiencia sin un sujeto que experimente un objeto y, en este sentido, el empleo de los conceptos tiene tanta utilidad y valor de experiencia en cuanto más pueda especificar, de manera más o menos acertada, alguna cualidad identificable de su experiencia.
El contenido, como señala Cussins, implica dividir el mundo en algún sentido, pero también implica articulación, pues el contenido sería meramente episódico y estático si se tratara de imágenes o conceptos aislados. Los contenidos individualizados sólo existen separados en nuestras abstracciones. En términos de la experiencia real, ningún concepto es una estructura separada de otros conceptos1. Sólo en el análisis reflexivo de algunas teorías de los conceptos o del significado lingüístico llegamos a abstraer al concepto de las redes en que se inserta.
Esta relativa independencia del concepto respecto de un amplio entramado productor de significados, y la tendencia a pensar en la lexicografía como la verdadera

1 Pensamos aquí en las tesis del inferencialismo brandomiano. Al respecto véase, Brandom (2002).
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fuente del significado, es una trampa. En el tratamiento del contenido no conceptual puede suceder algo similar. Una representación por sí misma, para decirlo con Kant, no será un conocimiento, pero debe haber una articulación en ella, y no sólo división, para que podamos contar con una representación del objeto de tipo no conceptual, en otras palabras, que no se queda meramente en la esfera de los conceptos, aunque tal articulación no se pueda explicar en forma directa porque “qué sea una representación tendría que explicarse siempre mediante otra representación” (Log; AA, 09, 42), es decir, por medio de otras representaciones provenientes del ámbito de la percepción.
Kant expone en la Lógica la “distinción” e “indistinción” en las “representaciones claras” (Log AA, 09, 42)2, cuando señala que una representación es indistinta si no se tiene conciencia de la diversidad en ella, y que una representación es distinta si se tiene conciencia de la diversidad que contiene. Utilicemos un ejemplo de Kant:
Avistamos en la lejanía una casa de campo. Somos conscientes de que el objeto intuido es una casa, de modo que hemos de poseer también necesariamente una representación de las diferentes partes de esta casa: de las ventanas, de las puertas, etc.; puesto que si no viésemos las partes, tampoco veríamos la casa. No somos conscientes, sin embargo, de esta representación de la diversidad de sus partes y nuestra representación del mismo objeto mencionado es, entonces, indistinta. (Log AA, 09, 42).
Una representación indistinta de un objeto lo capta como una totalidad, sin dar cuenta de los componentes que lo caracterizan. Pero también puede dar cuenta del objeto atendiendo a sus partes constitutivas. Entonces, una representación distinta, dice Kant, puede ser de dos tipos:
En primer lugar, sensible. Ésta consiste en la conciencia de la diversidad en la intuición. Vislumbro, por ejemplo, la vía láctea como una banda blanquecina; los rayos de luz de las estrellas singulares que se encuentran en la misma tienen que haber llegado a mi ojo. Pero su representación era meramente clara y únicamente a través del telescopio se vuelve distinta, vislumbrando ahora las estrellas singulares contenidas en aquella banda lechosa. (Log AA, 09, 44).
La agudeza de la vista es potenciada por el telescopio; en condiciones normales ésta no permite percibir los componentes de la vía láctea. Ahora bien, en este ejemplo las distancias reclaman la intervención de una prótesis visual, pero en contextos más ordinarios la diferencia en la agudeza del sentido y el entrenamiento de la percepción permiten ver detalles, u oír frecuencias que no se captan sólo con la posesión de un repertorio de conceptos que se refieran al objeto. A pesar de lo razonable que resulta decir que la persona o las personas involucradas en la observación poseen los conceptos de galaxia, de estrella, etc., y que se puede hablar significativamente de ellos, agregaríamos que a pesar de poder hablar de galaxia y de estrella, los observadores perceptivamente entrenados se diferencian de los que no lo están porque pueden distinguir dentro de las galaxias algunos cuerpos por sus contornos, figuras, destellos, que los llevan posteriormente a hacer conjeturas.

2 A estas representaciones claras las caracteriza la conciencia que se tiene de ellas.
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El segundo tipo de distinción, a saber, la intelectual, consiste en descomponer en notas un concepto. Esas notas son otros conceptos y por tanto otros significados que están vinculados con el significado del concepto analizado. Quedaría este concepto aclarado y mejorado en su forma (Log AA, 09, 44-45).
Los conceptos son el componente primordial de la comunidad de significado, el trabajo con ellos es una tarea muy importante en la formación de la subjetividad. En la cultura se pretende que las pautas de conceptualización sean más o menos las mismas, aunque no funcione así. Al relacionar los términos mediante las mismas definiciones, y al aplicarlos en las mismas ocasiones, cabe afirmar que el trabajo está hecho y que compartimos un conocimiento objetivo de un mundo común. Este mundo común induce a McDowell a mirarlo en esencia como conceptual.
En este punto notamos ahora que, en la discusión sobre distintos tipos de contenido de la experiencia, se pone en juego la posibilidad de que haya situaciones o ámbitos en los que la experiencia pueda aparecer separada en una vía eminentemente personal, bajo el dominio de la intuición. Casos excepcionales, sin duda, porque en Kant no hay preeminencia de uno u otro componente cuando se trata de la objetividad. El conocimiento no se puede producir prescindiendo de ninguno de ellos. Pero cuanto más se lee a Kant tanto más se encuentran oportunidades para interpretaciones que salen de la ortodoxia. Y a este respecto, hallamos en la Lógica las siguientes consideraciones que invitan a pensar en una oportunidad para los contenidos no conceptuales de la experiencia: “Si fuésemos conscientes de todo lo que sabemos tendríamos que maravillarnos ante la gran abundancia de nuestro conocimiento” (Log AA, 09, 44-45). He aquí lo sabido no pensado, aquello que puede aflorar en una situación y sorprendernos. Agrega luego:
En cuanto al contenido objetivo de nuestro conocimiento en general se pueden estipular los siguientes grados, conforme a los cuales es posible, en este respecto, incrementar el conocimiento. El primer grado del conocimiento es representarse algo. El segundo: representarse algo con conciencia o percibir (percipere). El tercero: conocer algo (noscere) o representarse algo en la comparación con otras cosas tanto según la unidad como según la diferencia. El cuarto: conocer algo con conciencia, es decir, reconocer (cognoscere). Los animales también conocen objetos, pero no los reconocen. El quinto: entender algo (intelligere), es decir, conocer mediante el entendimiento en virtud de los conceptos o concebir. Esto es muy diferente de comprender. Se pueden concebir muchas cosas, aunque no se comprendan; por ejemplo, un perpetuum mobile, cuya imposibilidad se demuestra en la mecánica. El sexto: conocer algo a través de la razón o penetrar (perspicere). Llegamos hasta aquí en pocas cosas […] El séptimo finalmente: comprender algo (comprehendere), es decir, comprender algo mediante la razón o a priori en el grado que resulte suficiente para nuestro propósito. (Log AA, 09, 96-97).
En esta extensa cita encontramos el punto de partida y el avance o desarrollo complejo por grados del conocimiento. Una escala que va desde tener una simple representación y luego tenerla con conciencia, que pasa por la discriminación a partir de la dupla unidad- diferencia, hasta un séptimo grado en el que la razón comprende algo a priori. Sin embargo, en el cuarto grado admite que los animales no humanos conocen objetos, pero, en los términos de Kant, no los reconocen. Esta diferencia está en el reconocimiento bajo
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ISSN: 2386-7655
Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095155
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el concepto3, porque muchos animales no humanos reconocen los objetos por la pura discriminación intuitiva. El perro conoce el lugar donde suele dormir y va hasta tal lugar cada vez que tiene necesidad de ello. Otros animales diferencian las crías propias de las ajenas. Otras, como los elefantes, memorizan los caminos que conducen a los abrevaderos y hay filmaciones en los que cooperan para salvar a algún miembro de la manada que está en dificultades. El conocimiento avanza por grados y se hace cada vez más complejo.
Al Kant destacar cada uno de los grados por los que transita el “contenido objetivo de nuestro conocimiento” pone el acento en los recursos y modos con que enfrentamos el mundo; del mismo modo destaca que la objetividad alcanza su punto de mayor esplendor4 cuando la actividad del entendimiento logra la conceptualización precisa de objetos y eventos en el mundo. No desconoce, sin embargo, la primitiva y limitada referencialidad de la representación intuitiva de objetos en el mundo. Es decir, Kant da lugar a la ponderación significativa de las prácticas no reflexivas y no discursivas como elementos de la experiencia concreta del sujeto y admite su referencia a objetos del mundo circundante. Sin objeto conocido no habría objeto re-conocido. Y si esto es así, ¿por qué no ha de haber contextos y momentos en los que conozcamos pero no reconozcamos conceptualmente?
Consideraciones finales

Para concluir con esta aproximación de inspiración kantiana a la posibilidad de existencia de contenido no conceptual en la experiencia, comentaremos algunas reflexiones adelantadas por Kant en torno a las intuiciones del espacio y el tiempo. La legalidad independiente o la autonomía de la “facultad inferior” con respecto a la “facultad superior” para producir o “recibir” representaciones proporciona material para la defensa de las tesis que propone una experiencia con contenido no conceptual. Nuestras representaciones primarias del espacio y el tiempo no son ni conceptuales ni empíricas (KrV A23/B38; A30/B46) y son “fuentes de conocimiento de las que pueden surgir a priori diferentes conocimientos sintéticos, como lo muestra de modo particularmente brillante la matemática pura en lo referente al conocimiento del espacio y sus relaciones” (KrV A39/B56). Entonces, a pesar de la interpretación de McDowell según la cual la sensibilidad no puede hacer contribuciones al conocimiento de manera separable de la espontaneidad, encontramos que en la matemática las intuiciones dan lugar a la construcción de conceptos y no es la espontaneidad (o entendimiento) lo que constituye la base primordial del conocimiento matemático. De hecho, es la imaginación la facultad que sirve de bisagra entre la sensibilidad y el entendimiento. Además, es interesante resaltar que Kant dice que “la síntesis es un mero efecto de la imaginación, una función anímica ciega, pero indispensable, sin la cual no tendríamos conocimiento alguno y de la cual, sin embargo, raras veces somos conscientes. Reducir tal síntesis a conceptos es una función

3 Respecto al concepto, dice Kant: “El conocimiento es, o bien intuición, o bien concepto (intuitus vel conceptus). La primera se refiere inmediatamente al objeto y es singular; el segundo lo hace de modo mediato, a través de una característica que puede ser común a muchas cosas”. (KrV A 320 / B377).

4 “El campo del entender o del entendimiento es por consiguiente mucho mayor que el campo del comprender o de la razón”. (Log AA, 09, 98).

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que corresponde al entendimiento” (KrV A39/B56). Se entiende, entonces, que la síntesis no se produce en el entendimiento, aunque alcance su completa delimitación en el concepto. De allí que, los conceptos implican síntesis, pero no al revés. La síntesis es presupuesta por el concepto que la articula. Síntesis no equivale a conceptualización (Allais 2009, p.396). El trazado de una recta en la imaginación, o el trazado de un círculo, no requiere habilidades conceptuales, a no ser que se entienda por conceptual la legalidad inherente a esos trazados. Nosotros decimos que en el concepto, o en el ámbito de lo conceptual, se hace explícita la regla que gobierna los trazados, una vez que los ejemplos (o particulares) han mostrado de forma no discursiva cómo opera la regla. Es desconocido para nosotros cómo se opera la transición de una representación intuitiva hacia el concepto y McDowell se propone disolver este misterio asumiendo que todo debe ser conceptual.

¿Pero cómo resolver las cuestiones prácticas de la orientación en el espacio con conceptos?, en realidad, ¿existen auténticos “conceptos” de derecha e izquierda? Muchas cuestiones relativas al espacio y a su determinación han sido un quebradero de cabeza en las investigaciones científicas y filosóficas, y fuente de curiosidad para otros desde hace siglos. En el caso de la epistemología, y las pretensiones de objetividad en el conocimiento, hallamos dificultades con respecto, por ejemplo, a la definición de izquierda y derecha. Veamos:

El problema de definir la izquierda y la derecha está implícito en muchas áreas de la ciencia y de la vida cotidiana, y en última instancia todas ellas tienen la misma solución, que se encuentra, por así decir, en nuestras propias manos. Incluso unos términos de navegación tan aparentemente independientes de la mano como ‘babor’ y ‘estribor’, tienen su origen en la mano derecha. (McManus 2002, p.69).

Los “conceptos” de derecha e izquierda están atados a puntos de referencia que son egocéntricos; no se puede prescindir de la referencia al sujeto. La orientación espacial no es conceptual. Si estamos frente a otra persona, por ejemplo, el lado izquierdo de la otra persona es mi lado derecho y viceversa. Entonces, ¿usamos un punto de vista centrado en el sujeto o en el objeto? Expone McManus (2002, p.72) la situación siguiente con la determinación de derecha o izquierda:

La situación con las conchas [marinas] es algo más simple y más compleja. Los científicos que estudian las conchas se imaginan el camino que seguiría un pequeño insecto que entrase arrastrándose por la parte de debajo de una concha y que subiese hasta la parte de arriba, y se preguntan si, para hacerlo, giraría a la derecha o a la izquierda; si el insecto gira a la derecha, la concha se llama dexiotrópica; y si gira a la izquierda, leiotrópica. Lo que complica las cosas es que una concha dexiotrópica tiene una espiral levógira, y una concha leiotrópica la tiene dextrógira.5

5 Levógiro (zurdo): que gira en el sentido contrario de las agujas del reloj. Dextrógiro (diestro): que gira en el sentido de las agujas del reloj. Términos que se emplean para describir procesos en disciplinas como la química, la bioquímica, la matemática, la biología.

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En este experimento imaginario, la determinación depende del recorrido del insecto sin que el sujeto pueda decidir “objetivamente” si la concha marina estudiada6 es “dexiotrópica” o “leiotrópica”. Pero los problemas de orientación de izquierda y derecha están por todas partes, en donde quiera que sea menester decidir con respecto a la ubicación de los objetos y de las vías de recorrido.

Hanna (2008) ha encontrado en la Crítica de la razón pura, en la “Estética Trascendental”, juicios y argumentos que sirven al propósito de la defensa de la existencia del contenido no conceptual. Estamos de acuerdo, y únicamente agregaremos que no sólo en la primera Crítica, sino en la Lógica Jäsche, como ya se ha mostrado. Otros apoyos pueden encontrarse en un ensayo de 1768, Sobre el fundamento último de la diferenciación de las direcciones en el espacio, en el cual Kant examina el problema de la condición absoluta o relativa del espacio. Del contenido de ese trabajo, es propicio señalar que un tema central es la naturaleza de la diferencia entre derecha e izquierda. Así, en nuestro propio cuerpo encuentra Kant el mejor ejemplo para analizar el problema, nuestras manos. Éstas son similares en casi todo y diferentes en un aspecto primordial: el guante de una mano no puede usarse en la otra. Entonces, nuestras dos manos son homólogos incongruentes.7 Y es que, en efecto, hay ciertas diferencias entre cosas, como nuestras manos o también nuestros pies, que no pueden determinarse, estrictamente, desde una perspectiva conceptual. Entonces, distinguir la mano izquierda de la derecha y resolver cuál es el guante que va en una mano u otra es una cuestión de intuición espacial y no de dominio de los conceptos mano y guante. En este mismo orden de ideas, dice Kant que “Nuestras consideraciones [...] dejan muy claro que pueden encontrarse diferencias, auténticas diferencias por cierto, en la constitución de los cuerpos; estas diferencias se relacionan exclusivamente con el espacio absoluto y original” (Kant citado en McManus 2002, p.81).

Para finalizar, a partir de la noción de regla empleada por Kant y su clasificación por grados del conocimiento, que incluye la simple representación sin conciencia dentro del contenido objetivo, podríamos definir el contenido conceptual como el despliegue progresivo de la conciencia. Ese despliegue de la conciencia puede notarse en la escala propuesta por Kant que va desde el primer grado, referido a la representación sin conciencia, hasta el quinto, relativo al entendimiento de algo mediante la asistencia de las herramientas conceptuales. Entonces, inferimos de esta información proporcionada por Kant que el contenido no conceptual estaría vinculado con las habilidades y prácticas de las que no tenemos completa conciencia, o con aquellas actividades y destrezas que aun ejecutadas con maestría no son objeto de dominio intelectual y cuyas reglas constitutivas nos son de consciente dominio. Así, lo no conceptual sería aquello que es en realidad pre- conceptual, pero que es susceptible de ser expresado en términos de conceptos.

6 La concha marina a la que se hace referencia en el ejemplo es la llamada por los científicos Voluta vespertilio (en español, voluta variable). Es un molusco cuya concha mide entre 4,5 y 16 cm.

7 Homólogos se usa en este caso por tratarse de estructuras morfológicamente semejantes.

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Bibliografía

Allais, L. (2009), “Kant, Non-Conceptual Content and the Representation of Space”,

Journal of the History of Philosophy, Vol. 47, N° 3, July, pp.383-413.

Brandom, R. (2002), La articulación de las razones. Una introducción al inferencialismo, (traducción de Eduardo De Bustos y Eulalia Pérez Sedeño), Siglo XXI de España Editores, Madrid.

Cussins, A. (2003), “Content, Conceptual Content, and Nonconceptual Content” in Essays on Nonconceptual Content, A Bradford Book, London, The MIT Press, pp.133-164.

Hanna, R. (2008), “Kantian Non-Conceptualism”, Philosophical Studies: An International Journal for Philosophy in the Analytic Tradition, Springer, Vol. 137, N°1, pp. 41-64.

Kant, I., Kritik der reinen Vernunft, en Gesammelte Schriften, Bd. III-IV, Preussische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Berlin, 1900ff. Traducción: Kant, Immanuel (2009), Crítica de la razón pura, edición bilingüe trad. Mario Caimi, Fondo de Cultura Económica, México DF.

Kant, I., Inmanuel Kants Logik. Ein Handbuch zur Vorlesungen, en Gesammelte Schriften, Bd. IX, Preussische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Berlin, 1900ff. Traducción al español: Kant, I. (2000), Lógica. Un manual de lecciones, (edición de María Jesús Vásquez Lobeiras), Akal, Madrid. Kant, I. (1992). Traducción al portugués: Lógica, (traducción de Guido Antonio de Almeida), Tempo Brasileiro, Rio de Janeiro.

McDowell, J. (2003), Mente y mundo, (traducción de Miguel Ángel Quintana), Sígueme, Salamanca.

McManus, C. (2002), Mano derecha, mano izquierda. Los orígenes de la asimetría en cerebros, cuerpos, átomos y culturas, Ediciones de Intervención Cultural/Biblioteca Buridán, Madrid.

Platón (1992), “Filebo”. En Diálogos VI. Traducción, introducción y notas por Mª Ángeles Durán. Editorial Gredos, Madrid.

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A interpretação heideggeriana da Crítica da Razão Pura: a questão da imaginação

A Heideggerian Interpretation of the “Critique of Pure Reason”: the Question of the Imagination

SÍLVIA BENTO 

Universidad do Porto, Portugal

Resumo

A análise de Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik [Kant e o Problema da Metafísica] de Heidegger constitui o propósito do nosso artigo. Publicado em 1929, o ano do “debate Heidegger- Cassirer” em Davos, Kant e o Problema da Metafísica fornece uma interpretação controversa e peculiar da Crítica da Razão Pura de Kant. Debruçando-se sobre a primeira edição (1781) da Crítica de Kant, Heidegger apresenta uma interpretação ontológica da subjetividade transcendental kantiana. Contra a atenção neo-kantiana dedicada à lógica e à espontaneidade subjetiva, Heidegger procura lançar luz sobre as determinações finitas e recetivas da subjetividade kantiana, salientando a preponderância da imaginação enquanto faculdade fundamental e possibilidade da subjetividade humana. A elucidação cuidadosa de tais posições heideggerianas relativas à Crítica da Razão Pura constitui o objeto do nosso trabalho.

Palavras-chave

Immanuel Kant; Martin Heidegger; Crítica da Razão Pura; subjetividade; imaginação.

Abstract

The analysis of Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik [Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics] by Heidegger constitutes the aim of our paper. Published in 1929, the year of the “Heidegger-Cassirer debate” in Davos, Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics offers a controversial and peculiar

Doutoranda da Faculdade de Letras da Universidad do Porto. Email de contato: up200400784 letras.up.pt

[Recibido: 23 de septiembre 2017

Aceptado: 15 de octubre 2017]

Sílvia Bento

interpretation of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. By dwelling upon the first edition (1781) of Kant’s Critique, Heidegger presents an ontological interpretation of the Kantian transcendental subjectivity. Against the neo-Kantian focus on logics and subjective spontaneity, Heidegger aims to throw light on the finite and receptive determinations of the Kantian subjectivity by emphasizing the preponderance of the imagination as fundamental faculty and possibility of human subjectivity. The close elucidation of these Heideggerian positions on Critique of Pure Reason constitute the object of our paper.

Keywords

Immanuel Kant; Martin Heidegger; Critique of Pure Reason; subjectivity; imagination.

Introdução.

A interpretação da Crítica da Razão Pura de Kant desenvolvida por Heidegger sob o título Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik [Kant e o Problema da Metafísica] fora publicada em 1929 – o mesmo ano do debate com Ernst Cassirer em Davos1 –, conquanto elaborada a par da escrita de Sein und Zeit [Ser e Tempo], de 19272. A título de consideração prévia, importaria ter presente que, no decurso da sua leitura da Crítica da Razão Pura, Heidegger não se dedica a perspetivar o pensamento kantiano no seu todo, propondo-se a analisar exclusivamente a primeira Crítica, e, no que a esta concerne, somente as partes “Estética Transcendental” e “Analítica Transcendental”. As duas Críticas posteriores não são tratadas por Heidegger.

1 Uma obra que acompanha o presente artigo é Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos (2010) de Peter E. Gordon, na qual se expõe os argumentos de Ernst Cassirer e de Martin Heidegger no célebre debate de Davos em 1929. Assim apresenta Gordon os dois interlocutores, Cassirer e Heidegger, bem como as suas posturas filosóficas: “At the core of the debate between Cassirer and Heidegger was a fundamental contest between two normative images of humanity. For Cassirer, the human being is endowed with a special capacity for spontaneous self-expression: to be human is to create in complete freedom whole worlds of meaning, and these self-created worlds become in turn the objective spheres we experience as beautiful, moral and true. Cassirer derived this insight into our constructivist or formative capacity from Kant, whose theory of transcendental conditions served as the initial pattern and inspiration for Cassirer’s philosophy of symbolic forms. [...] For Heidegger, human beings are understood to be defined first and foremost by our finitude, which is to say we discover ourselves in the midst of conditions we had no share in creating and cannot hope to control. To be human in Heidegger’s view is to be gifted with a special sort of receptivity, or openness to the world. This phenomenon of disclosedness lies at the very core of human existence, deeper than our rationality and before any and all practical action. [...] Heidegger called this groundless condition by various names, but most typically he referred to it as a finitude or «thrownness». The disagreement between Cassirer and Heidegger’s turns upon this fundamental distinction between spontaneity and receptivity, between the human capacity for worldmaking as against our openness to the world. Cassirer forges his philosophical system with an eye toward the unconditioned, the inexhaustible, and even the «infinite» spontaneity of human expression. Heidegger works out his own philosophical ideas from the basic premise that the human being is creature of essential finitude, limited by time and history, which finds itself thrown into conditions it did not create.”. (Gordon 2010: 6-7)

2 Tal como esclarece Heidegger no prefácio da primeira edição de Kant e o Problema da Metafísica, a interpretação da Crítica da Razão Pura fora dada a conhecer, pela primeira vez, num curso lecionado pelo filósofo durante o Inverno de 1925/26, e repetido, posteriormente, em conferências no Instituto Herder de Riga, em setembro de 1928, e nos cursos universitários de Davos, em março de 1929. A coincidência temporal entre a elaboração da leitura da primeira Crítica kantiana e a escrita de Ser e Tempo é, igualmente, assinalada por parte de Heidegger.

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A interpretação heideggeriana da Crítica da Razão Pura: a questão da imaginação

Uma das peculiaridades da leitura heideggeriana da Crítica da Razão Pura consiste na reiterada postura de ênfase concedida à primeira edição da obra, a de 1781: Heidegger privilegia a primeira versão do texto de Kant – a principal matéria do seu estudo –, sustentando que aí se apresenta delineada a questão da finitude humana [menschliche Endlichkeit] enquanto problema-chave da fundamentação da metafísica [Grundlegung der Metaphysik]. Com efeito, a interpretação heideggeriana proclama a temática da finitude humana como problemática nuclear da primeira versão da Crítica – um projeto filosófico que, assevera Heidegger, Kant abandonara na segunda edição, procurando, então, e num outro sentido, sustentar a centralidade da lógica e a preponderância da espontaneidade do entendimento. Há, pois, um propósito filosófico que envolve a leitura de Heidegger da Crítica da Razão Pura: avaliar o sujeito transcendental kantiano como um ser eminentemente recetivo, mediante a assunção da perspetivação da imaginação [Einbildungskraft] enquanto faculdade por excelência da recetividade [Rezeptivität] e, como tal, da constituição do conhecimento objetivo. A preponderância filosófica e subjetiva concedida ao papel e às funções da imaginação apresenta-se, sob o olhar de Heidegger, como o cerne do pensamento kantiano.

Não nos parece teoricamente controverso perspetivar a leitura da Crítica da Razão Pura avançada por Heidegger como uma tentativa filosófica de procura de uma fundamentação para a sua “ontologia fundamental” [Fundamentalontologie] no âmbito da filosofia kantiana – trata-se, poder-se-ia afirmar, de um intento de reivindicação de uma justificação ou de uma legitimação kantianas (ou a partir de Kant) para o projeto ontológico heideggeriano3.

Assim escreve Heidegger na “Introdução” de Kant e o Problema da Metafísica:

A seguinte investigação apresenta como tarefa interpretar a Crítica da Razão Pura de Kant como uma fundamentação da metafísica. O problema da metafísica assume-se, pois, como problema de uma ontologia fundamental. Ontologia

3 A título de curiosidade, leia-se Gordon sobre a condenação de Husserl da leitura heideggeriana da Crítica da Razão Pura: “Husserl’s marginal notations in Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics are even more revealing. In them we find a teacher’s frank exasperation at what he saw his student’s decisions to stray from the path of a rigorously scientific phenomenology. Husserl registered explicit doubts about Heidegger’s recourse throughout the book to an essentially theological contrast, between divine (creative) and human (receptive) intuition. As we will see further on, Heidegger had borrowed this contrast from Kant and his idea of an intuitus originarus (a creative or «infinite» intuition that brings into being its objects in the very act of intuiting them), and it had played a critical role in Heidegger’s own attempt to underscore the essential finitude of human understanding. But Husserl seems to have regarded such reliance on theological categories as an illicit and foreign import: “What is infinity over against finitude?” he wrote. “Why talk at all of finitude rather than receptivity?... On the other hand, absolutely adequate intuition, etc...is an absurdity.” From Husserl’s perspective, such language signalled his student’s wilful retreat from philosophy into the arms of crypto-theology (a charge Cassirer would echo the following year). In the Kant-book, Heidegger had tried to justify his unusual reading of Kant by appealing to the principle that “every interpretation, if it wants to wring from what the words say what they want to say, must use violence”. But in response, Husserl underlined the phrase, «every interpretation must use violence», and followed this in the margin with no less than three exclamation marks and three question marks. More than once Husserl expressed doubts as to the accuracy of his student’s interpretation, writing his query in the margins of Heidegger’s book, “Is this Kant?””. (Gordon 2010: 81)

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fundamental significa a analítica ontológica da essência finita do homem, a qual deve preparar o fundamento de uma metafísica “conforme à natureza do homem”. A ontologia fundamental é a metafísica do ser-aí humano, exigência necessária que torna possível a metafísica. Ela difere, fundamentalmente, de toda a antropologia, mesmo da filosófica. Explicitar a ideia de uma ontologia fundamental significa: mostrar que a analítica ontológica do ser-aí, tal como caracterizada, constitui um requisito necessário e esclarecer de que modo e em que circunstâncias se coloca a pergunta concreta: o que é o homem? No entanto, se uma ideia se afirma, à partida, através do seu poder de clarificação, também a ideia da ontologia fundamental afirmar-se-á e desenvolver-se-á mediante uma interpretação da “crítica da razão pura” enquanto fundamentação da metafísica. (Heidegger 2010: 1)4

Finitude e recetividade como problemáticas-chave. A desconsideração do papel da faculdade do entendimento.
A interpretação heideggeriana da primeira Crítica de Kant concebe, declarada e abertamente, o projeto transcendental kantiano como uma investigação da natureza finita do homem, pretendendo propor um eixo de ligação entre a definição de uma fundamentação da metafísica (a investigação das possibilidades de conhecimento do sujeito transcendental) e a constituição de uma ontologia fundamental (o desenvolvimento de uma analítica do ser-aí finito). Assim, segundo Heidegger, a revolução coperniciana kantiana consiste na “revelação da possibilidade interna da ontologia” (Heidegger 2010:
§2)5, i.e., “a possibilidade do conhecimento ontológico” (Heidegger 2010: §2)6, partindo do sujeito enquanto finitude [Endlichkeit] e recetividade [Rezeptivität].

[O] conhecimento transcendental não investiga o ente mesmo, mas a possibilidade de compreensão prévia do ser, isto é, ao mesmo tempo, a constituição do ser do ente. E tal refere-se ao ultrapassar (transcendência) que conduz a razão pura ao

4 “Die folgende Untersuchung stellt sich die Aufgabe, Kants Kritik der reinen Vernunft als eine Grundlegung der Metaphysik auszulegen, um so das Problem der Metaphysik als das einer Fundamentalontologie vor Augen zu stellen. Fundamentalontologie heiβt diejenige ontologische Analytik des endlichen Menschenwesens, die das Fundament für die zur “Natur des Menschen gehörige” Metaphysik bereiten soll. Die Fundamentalontologie ist die zur Ermöglichung der Metaphysik notwendig gefordete Metaphysik des menschlichen Daseins. Sie bleibt von aller Anthropologie, auch der philosophischen, grundsätzlich unterschieden. Die Idee einer Fundamentalontologie auseinanderlegen bedeutet: die gekennzeichnete ontologie Analytik des Daseins als notwendiges Erfordernis darlegen und dadurch deutlich machen, in welchen Voraussetzungen sie die konkrete Frage stellt: was ist der Mensch? Sofern aber eine Idee sich zunächst durch ihre Kraft zur Durchleuchtung bedunket, soll die Idee der Fundamentalontologie sich in einer Auslegung der “Kritik der reinen Vernunft” als einer Grundlegung der Metaphysik bewähren und darstellen.” (Heidegger 2010: 1)
Tendo presente a inexistência de tradução portuguesa de Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik, decidimos avançar com uma tradução da nossa responsabilidade a partir do texto original em alemão, com o auxílio da consulta das traduções em castelhano (de Gred Ibscher Roth, publicada em 1954 pelo Fondo de Cultura Económica), em francês (de Alphonse de Waelhens e Walter Biemel, publicada em 1981 pela Gallimard) e em inglês (de Richard Taft, publicada em 1990 pela Indiana University Press).
5 “Enthüllung der inneren Möglichkeit der Ontologie” (Heidegger 2010: §2)
6 “[die] Möglichkeit der ontischen Erkenntnis” (Heidegger 2010: §2)
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ente, de tal modo que, assim, a experiência poderá adequar-se ao ente como a um objeto possível (Heidegger 2010: §3)7.

Importaria elucidar o modo como Heidegger – segundo uma postura de interpretação oposta ao neokantismo de Marburg – sustenta que a filosofia transcendental kantiana não deve ser perspetivada como teoria do conhecimento ou epistemologia8, mas como interrogação acerca da possibilidade interna da ontologia – a revolução coperniciana coloca no centro o problema da ontologia. Em Kant e o Problema da Metafísica, Heidegger pretende avaliar a filosofia transcendental kantiana como investigação acerca da finitude do sujeito: a possibilidade da determinação da objetividade do conhecimento assume-se concebida por Heidegger como possibilidade de determinação do conhecimento intuitivo, recetivo – efetivada, pois, por um ser definido segundo a finitude e a recetividade. Não se trata da questão epistemológica, mas da questão ontológica: a teoria do conhecimento kantiana deverá ser lida como uma ontologia. A filosofia transcendental, tal como avaliada por Heidegger, inicia, pois, a tarefa de determinar a essência do conhecimento ontológico através da explicitação da sua origem, e tal investigação da origem deve consistir numa investigação da razão pura humana. Neste momento inicial da sua interpretação, Heidegger manifesta a principal perspetiva acerca da problemática definidora da Crítica da Razão Pura: a finitude da razão humana.

7 “Transzendentale Erkenntnis untersucht nicht das Seiende selbst, sondern die Möglichkeit des vorgängigen Seinsverständnisses, d.h. zugleich: die Seinsverfassung des Seienden. Sie betrifft das Überschreiten (Transzendenz) der reinen Vernunft zum Seienden, so daβ sich diesem jetzt allererst als möglichem Gegenstand Erfahrung anmessen kann.” (Heidegger 2010: §3)
8 A propósito, cite-se novamente Gordon: “It is distinctively Marburgian interpretation of Kant’s philosophy
- as an epistemological propaedeutic to natural science anchored in the thesis of mental spontaneity – that Heidegger most wished to combat. In his Kant-lectures at Davos, Heidegger indicated that his argument was meant “in opposition to the traditional interpretation of neo-Kantianism”, and he insisted further that, Marburg doctrine notwithstanding, the Critique of Pure Reason was “no theory of mathematical, natural- scientific knowledge”. Given the preeminent status of neo-Kantian interpretation in German philosophy at the time, Heidegger’s dissent from its most basic premises no doubt appeared controversial. But Heidegger clearly wished to emphasize the unprecedented character of his own argument. The traditional interpretations notwithstanding, the first Critique in his view was “not a theory of knowledge at all”, but instead a “grounding for metaphysics”. The essential difference lay in the fact that the neo-Kantians saw the first Critique as an epistemological investigation (that is, a study of the formal conditions for empirical knowledge), whereas Heidegger now claimed the Critique must to be understood as a preparatory investigation into the conditions for ontological understanding. [...] On Heidegger’s view, such an ontological inquiry was bound from the very outset by the stricture that the investigation must concern solely human or finite reason. Human thought is in its essential character finite. [...] Yet even in Kant’s own philosophy Heidegger could find support for the premise that “knowing is primarily intuiting”. Human knowledge must consist in both intuition as well as thought; indeed, intuition is primary, because for an object to be thought, it must first to be given. [...] yet Heidegger’s most explicit complaint was that in their zealous efforts to extol the generative independence of the mind the Marburg neo-Kantians had erased from their portrait of human knowledge its most crucial feature: receptivity. Knowledge is always born of an orientation toward the world and a dependency upon its world by means of intuitions. A proper assessment of the first Critique was therefore possible only if one first acknowledge the essence of finite knowledge in general and the basic character of finitude as such. For Heidegger this meant that one must attend primarily to Kant’s theory of sensibility. Against the neo-Kantian absorption of intuition into the understanding, Heidegger claimed instead that sensibility should be granted its foundational role not as a merely “sensual” or “psychological” faculty but as truly “metaphysical” foundation for experience. It followed that the first Critique was an inquiry into finitude itself as the birthplace of ontology.”. (Gordon 2010: 127-129)
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  A origem da fundamentação da metafísica é a razão pura humana, pois, no centro da problemática da fundamentação encontra-se, como o mais essencial, o carácter humano da razão, i.e., a sua finitude. Por conseguinte, de modo a caracterizar o campo de origem, há que concentrar esforços no esclarecimento da essência da finitude do conhecimento humano. (Heidegger 2010: §4)9
  No mesmo tom:
  
  A fundamentação da metafísica baseia-se na pergunta pela finitude do homem – constituindo-se, tal questão, a partir de agora, como problema. […] A presente interpretação da Crítica da Razão Pura assumiu como objetivo lançar luz sobre a necessidade, no que respeita a uma fundamentação da metafísica, da pergunta acerca da finitude do homem. Como tal, a questão da finitude foi constantemente tratada, tanto no início, como também no desenrolar desta interpretação. (Heidegger 2010: §38)10
  
  Por conseguinte, no decorrer da sua interpretação da obra de Kant, Heidegger poderá continuamente reiterar: “assim como a essência do conhecimento se encontra, primariamente, na intuição […], a essência finita do homem é o tema principal de toda a fundamentação da metafísica (Heidegger 2010: §5) 11 . Eis o ponto de partida da interpretação heideggeriana: todo o pensamento dirige-se à intuição [Anschauung] e a esta se encontra submetido; tal sustentação culmina na asseveração de que o pensamento é irremediavelmente recetivo e na conclusão de que o entendimento é uma faculdade menor relativamente à sensibilidade e à imaginação12. Segundo Heidegger, é a intuição sensível o
  
  9 “Der Quellgrund für die Grundlegung der Metaphysik ist die menschliche reine Vernunft, so zwar, daβ für den Kern dieser Grundlegungsproblematik gerade die Menschlichkeit der Vernunft, d.h. ihre Endlichkeit wesentlich wird. Es gilt daher, die Charakteristik des Ursprungsfeldes auf die Klärung des Wesens der Endlichkeit menschlicher Erkenntnis zu konzentrieren.” (Heidegger 2010: §4)
  10 “Die Grundlegung der Metaphysik gründet in der Frage nach der Endlichkeit im Menschen, so zwar, daβ diese Endlichkeit jetzt erst Problem warden kann.[…] Um dieses fundamentale Problem der Notwendigkeit der Frage nach der Endlichkeit im Menschen in Absicht auf eine Grundlegung der Metaphysik ans Licht zu bringen, wurde die vorstehende Auslegung der Kritik der reinen Vernunft unternommen. Demgemäβ war auch die Endlichkeit dasjenige, was im vorhinein beim Ansatz der Interpretation und dann ständig während ihrer Durchführung in Erinnerung gebracht warden muβte. (Heidegger 2010: §38)
  11 “Weil nun das Wesen der Erkenntnis primar in der Anschauung liegt […] für die ganze Grundlegung der Metaphysik das endliche Wesen des Menschen im Thema steht […].” (Heidegger 2010: §5)
  12 Tal afirmação constitui a marca mais incisiva da interpretação heideggeriana da Crítica da Razão Pura, a
  qual continuará presente, alguns anos depois, no âmbito de uma obra de Heidegger igualmente dedicada à primeira Crítica de Kant, Was ist ein Ding? (1962). Leia-se Heidegger em Was ist ein Ding?: “A primazia dada ao tratamento da lógica, a sua extensão desproporcionada na totalidade da obra, salta à vista. Podemos também comprovar, constantemente, em capítulos isolados, que a questão acerca do juízo e do conceito, portanto, acerca do pensamento, ocupa o primeiro plano. Podemos ainda reconhecer, sem dificuldades, este facto, a partir do capítulo que pusemos na base da nossa interpretação e que designámos como o centro íntimo da obra. Os títulos falam de modo suficientemente claro: trata-se dos juízos. É do logos, razão, que verdadeiramente se trata, no título de conjunto da obra. Tendo por base esta evidente primazia da lógica, conclui-se, quase sem excepção, que Kant via no pensar, no julgar, a essência autêntica do conhecimento. A lógica antiga e tradicional, segundo a qual o lugar do verdadeiro e do falso é o juízo e o enunciado, vinha ao encontro desta opinião. A verdade é a característica fundamental do conhecimento. A questão acerca do
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  elemento que possui maior relevância na constituição do conhecimento, e não o conceito do entendimento: “a intuição constitui a essência própria do conhecimento e, em todas as relações mútuas entre intuição e pensar, a intuição possui verdadeiro peso” (Heidegger 2010: §4)13. Consequentemente, o conhecimento, enquanto tal, possui uma essência que lhe é própria – a intuição. E a intuição possui um carácter finito, uma vez que assenta na recetividade. A intuição é sempre finita e dependente daquilo que recebe – “[a] intuição finita está destinada ao elemento intuído como a um ente que existe já por si mesmo” (Heidegger 2010: §5) 14. Neste sentido, “a intuição finita não pode receber sem que o
  
  conhecimento é, portanto, apenas a questão acerca do juízo e a interpretação de Kant deve fixar-se neste ponto, na medida em que ele é o ponto importante. Até que ponto estes preconceitos impediram que se penetrasse no centro da obra não pode, nem precisa, ser aqui tratado com mais pormenor. Mas, para uma correcta apreciação da obra, deve ter-se esta situação, permanentemente, diante dos olhos. Em geral, a interpretação neokantiana da Crítica da Razão Pura conduzia a um menosprezo do elemento constituinte fundamental do conhecimento humano: a intuição. A interpretação de Kant, feita pela escola de Marburgo, ia mesmo tão longe que apagava a intuição, como um corpo totalmente estranho à Crítica da Razão Pura. Tal eliminação da intuição teve também como consequência que a questão acerca da unidade de ambos os elementos constituintes, intuição e pensamento, mais precisamente, a questão acerca do fundamento da possibilidade da sua unificação, tomou uma direcção errada, no caso de, em geral, ter sido posta com seriedade. Todas estas interpretações incorrectas da Crítica da Razão Pura, que ainda hoje circulam com diversas modificações, tiveram como resultado que o significado desta obra, quanto à única questão que verdadeiramente lhe está ligada, a questão acerca da possibilidade de uma metafísica, nem foi correctamente avaliada nem, sobretudo, tornada criadoramente fecunda. Mas como se deve explicar que até o próprio Kant, apesar do significado fundante e determinante da intuição no conhecimento humano, transfira para a discussão sobre o pensamento o trabalho principal da análise do conhecimento? A razão para isto é tão simples como evidente. Justamente porque Kant – por oposição à metafísica racional, que colocava a essência do conhecimento na razão pura, no puro pensar por conceitos – destaca a intuição como o momento fundamental que suporta o conhecimento humano, deveria agora, por isso, o pensamento ser destituído da primazia que até então lhe fora atribuída e do seu valor exclusivo. Mas a crítica não se deverá contentar com a tarefa negativa de contestar essa primazia ao pensamento conceptual; antes de mais e acima de tudo, devia determinar e fundamentar, de modo novo, a essência do pensamento. A extensa discussão do pensamento e do conceito, na Crítica da Razão Pura, fala tão pouco a favor de uma depreciação da intuição que, pelo contrário, a discussão do conceito e do juízo é a prova mais evidente de que, agora em diante, a intuição permanece determinante e que sem ela o pensamento não é nada. O tratamento pormenorizado de um dos elementos constituintes do conhecimento agravou-se mesmo mais na 2ª edição, de modo que, de facto, parece muitas vezes que a questão acerca da essência do conhecimento é exclusivamente uma questão acerca do juízo e das suas condições. Mas a primazia da questão acerca do juízo não tem o seu fundamento no facto de a essência do conhecimento ser verdadeiramente julgar, mas no facto de a essência do julgar dever ser determinada de modo novo, porque ele é agora concebido como um representar que, antecipadamente, se relaciona com a intuição, quer dizer, com o objecto. A primazia da lógica, o tratamento mais pormenorizado do pensar, é necessário, precisamente porque o pensar, de acordo com a sua essência, não tem a primazia sobre a intuição, mas está fundado nela e está sempre relacionado com ela. A primazia da lógica, na Crítica da Razão Pura, tem unicamente a sua base na não-primazia do objecto da lógica e na posição auxiliar do pensar face à intuição. Se o pensamento, como pensamento justo, está sempre relacionado com a intuição, então a lógica que pertence a este pensamento trata necessária e directamente desta relação essencial com a intuição e, portanto, da própria intuição. A pequena extensão da “Estética” – como primeira doutrina autónoma da intuição – é apenas uma aparência exterior. Porque a “Estética” é agora o decisivo, quer dizer, porque ela desempenha em todo o lado o papel determinante, é que ela dá tanto que fazer a lógica. Por isso, a “Lógica” deve ter uma tal extensão.”. (Heidegger 2002: 144-146)
  13 “[…] muβ aber festgehalten werden, daβ die Anschauung das eigentliche Wesen der Erkenntnis ausmacht und bei aller Wechselseitigkeit des Bezuges zwischen Anschauen und Denken das eigentliche Gewicht bezitzt.” (Heidegger 2010: §4)
  14 “Endliche Anschauung sieht sich auf das Anschaubare als ein von sich her schon Seiendes angewiesen.” (Heidegger 2010: §5)
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  recebido se lhe anuncie. A intuição finita necessita, tal como a sua natureza o confirma, de ser tocada e afetada pelo elemento intuído” (Heideger 2010: §5)15.
  No seguimento de tais considerações, importaria atentar que, de acordo com Heidegger, o entendimento constitui-se como uma faculdade mais finita do que a sensibilidade: conquanto a intuição necessite da intervenção do entendimento sobre si mesma para ser determinada, o entendimento, dependente da intuição, afigura-se mais finito do que esta – precisamente por não possuir uma relação imediata sobre o elemento intuído; o entendimento não pode representar senão por desvios, indiretamente, o que significa que a subsunção das intuições em conceitos ocorre apenas de modo diferido. A interpretação heideggeriana manifesta uma postura de contínua desconsideração relativamente à atividade de produção de conceitos e juízos do entendimento: o entendimento é tão pouco criador quanto a sensibilidade, uma vez que, tal como esta, aquele não é capaz de criar o ente (de outra forma seria um entendimento intuitivo). No que concerne a possibilidade de produção de conceitos que unificam intuições, o entendimento não possui um pendor propriamente produtivo em si mesmo – de facto, o conceito geral do entendimento não é produzido, mas extraído do elemento intuído. Haveria que sublinhar que, recorrentemente, a leitura heideggeriana como que parece afirmar a existência anterior do objeto face ao sujeito, como se aquele não fosse constituído pela atividade da subjetividade através da produção de conceitos enquanto função do entendimento. Heidegger rejeita confirmar a leitura epistemológica da Crítica, designadamente no que respeita a conceção de que o objeto, no interior do pensamento kantiano, apenas se constitui quando o dado da intuição é determinado por um conceito do entendimento.
  Atente-se, pois, na postura interpretativa de Heidegger, pautada pela insistência na recusa da leitura preponderantemente epistemológica da Crítica da Razão Pura: a maneira de pensar discursiva, própria do entendimento que, mediante a sua atividade, determina objetivamente os conhecimentos segundo juízos universais e necessários, possibilitando a comunicação dos mesmos entre os homens, não constitui, com efeito, objeto de consideração filosófica por parte de Heidegger. A leitura heideggeriana não concede atenção à posição kantiana acerca da matemática e da física enquanto ciências sintéticas a priori; a tarefa kantiana de sustentação da necessidade e da universalidade de tais ciências não é, de facto, tratada em Kant e o Problema da Metafísica16.
  
  15 “Endliche Anschauung kann aber nich hinnehmen, ohne daβdas Hinzunehmende sich meldet. Endliche Anschauung muβ ihrem Wesen nach von dem in ihr Anschaubaren angeganzen, affiziert werden.” (Heidegger 2010: §5)
  16 Leia-se Gordon: “Heidegger continued to insist that the compulsion to establish a species of “objective knowledge” (modelled on mathematical natural sciences) was little more than a neo-Kantian dogma and had nothing to do with Kant’s genuine aims. How one resolves this perplexity depends entirely, of course, on whether one regards Heidegger’s Kant-interpretation as a faithful exposition or as a wilful imposition to exotic claims. But reaching a settlement on this issue was by no means a simple matter of textual evidence. In fact, for those at Davos who had listened closely to Heidegger’s exposition on the first Critique as a “groundlaying for metaphysics”, it was by now obvious that he considered the very ideal of a faithful exposition as deeply naive. After all, an effort at brute reconstruction would miss the fact that Kant himself was at war with his own intentions and that he had been led “to the brink of a position from which he had to
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A centralidade da imaginação e a sua relação com o tempo. A imaginação como faculdade fundamental.
A interpretação heideggeriana da Crítica da Razão Pura desenvolve-se em torno da afirmação de existência de uma suposta “unidade originária” (Heidegger 2010: §6)17 entre as duas fontes fundamentais do conhecimento, a sensibilidade e o entendimento. De acordo com Heidegger, a união entre essas duas fontes fundamentais deve constituir-se mediante uma “síntese ontológica” (Heidegger 2010: §7)18 que, ao unir intuição e pensamento, seria o fundamento que possibilitaria todo o conhecimento objetivo. Neste sentido, a fundamentação da metafísica deve encaminhar-se para esse “desconhecido” (Heidegger 2010: §6) 19 e procurar tal síntese ontológica, fundamento originário da possibilidade interna de todas as sínteses e fonte de todo o conhecimento finito e da sua possível unidade. Tenha-se presente que, neste ponto, Heidegger procurar autonomizar uma faculdade enquanto fonte de possibilidade do conhecer humano, ao invés de avaliar a concordância formal entre faculdades no ato de determinação do conhecimento – Ernst Cassirer perspetivará depreciativamente tal monismo da imaginação 20 que subjaz à

shrink back”. To remain at the level of mere reconstruction was thus to assure that the deeper historical significance of Kant’s philosophy remained hidden. What was required was not a mere reconstruction but a genuine destruction, because ostensibly only the latter could reveal the true significance of Kant’s philosophy within the larger history of Western metaphysics. It thus seems fair to say that the ultimate effect of Cassirer’s challenge was to insist on the sharp distinction between reconstructive and destructive modes of interpretation. At stake in this distinction, Cassirer believed, was Kant’s own investment in the objective status of mathematical and ethical knowledge, an objectivity Heidegger seemed ready to abandon so as to overcome reason’s historical-metaphysical supremacy.”. (Gordon 2010: 158).
17 “ursprüngliche Einheit” (Heidegger 2010: §6)
18 “ontologische Synthesis” (Heidegger 2010: §7)
19 “Unbekannte” (Heidegger 2010: §6)
20 O termo monismo da imaginação surge na resposta de Cassirer ao livro de Heidegger Kant e o Problema da Metafísica. Parece-nos relevante expor aqui algumas orientações críticas que Cassirer dirige à interpretação heideggeriana da filosofia de Kant, seguindo Peter Gordon. Leia-se, pois, Gordon: “The key to Heidegger’s interpretation, Cassirer observed, was its attempt to characterize the first Critique as a disquisition on the finitude of human understanding. This interpretation had apparently solid textual foundations: Kant himself had distinguished between the divine intellect (intuits originarius), which enjoys an unconditioned spontaneity and relates immediately to the being of objects in the very act of thought, and the human intellect, which is fundamentally receptive in virtue of its dependence on what is given through intuition. On Heidegger’s view this insight into the essential dependency of the human mind remained in place throughout the first Critique. But, as Cassirer noted, this view highly controversial in light of Kant’s discovery that the mind makes its own “spontaneous” contribution to human knowledge in the form of the pure concepts of the understanding. Indeed, Kant himself had wished to safeguard this spontaneity by distinguishing between three faculties of mind: understanding, reason, and sensibility. Thus even while Kant granted that sensibility was a faculty dependent upon what is given, Kant could sustain this dependency together with his theory of rational spontaneity. But, on Heidegger’s reading, the apparent spontaneity of the understanding was an illusion, for Kant himself ultimately reaffirmed the finitude of human knowledge insofar as he traced the three faculties to a single source in the transcendental imagination. [...] As Cassirer explained, the suggestion that Kant’s philosophy was anchored in a theory of human finitude could be justified only if one construed the notion of finitude according to the signature distinctions of transcendental philosophy, between the sensible and the intelligible world, experience and idea, phenomena and noumena. Heidegger was certainly correct to observe that human knowledge exhibits a certain finitude in relation to the objects of knowledge insofar as the human mind does not create its objects but instead must receive them. But in attempting to make this a linchpin of Kantian doctrine, Heidegger missed the fact that transcendental philosophy, in Cassirer’s words, “has nothing to do with the absolute existence of objects and the absolute
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interpretação heideggeriana da Crítica da Razão Pura. Com efeito, a argumentação de Heidegger em Kant e o Problema da Metafísica conduz à afirmação de que a imaginação, enquanto imaginação transcendental, se constitui como a faculdade que promove a união a priori, ou a unidade originária, entre sensibilidade e entendimento: a imaginação é, pois, a faculdade por excelência do conhecimento objetivo – é a faculdade que possibilita o conhecimento objetivo. Heidegger insiste na importância metafísica do carácter intermediário da imaginação (que estabelecerá tal síntese ontológica, fonte de todas as outras sínteses, entre sensibilidade e entendimento), proclamando-a como a principal faculdade do sujeito: a imaginação funda o próprio tempo enquanto sentido interno e afeção de si e condiciona a atividade do entendimento. É deste modo que Heidegger elege a imaginação transcendental enquanto faculdade que permite a determinação, objetivação e unidade do conhecimento, enquanto faculdade que produz a síntese pura entre intuição pura e pensamento puro, i.e., a síntese transcendental que sustenta todas as sínteses dela derivadas – “tudo aquilo que revele uma estrutura sintética na estrutura essencial do conhecimento é devido à imaginação” (Heidegger 2010: §14) 21 . A síntese pura ou ontológica da imaginação apresenta como tarefa que lhe é própria “a fundamentação do conhecimento ontológico” (Heidegger 2010: §14) 22, formando “a unidade da estrutura essencial do conhecimento finito” (Heidegger 2010: §14)23.

ground of their Being”. Kant’s inquiry was not fixed directly on the objects and their origins but only on the modes by which those objects were understood. [...] Cassirer’s conclusion was that throughout the Kant-book Heidegger tried illicitly to collapse the essential dualism in Kant doctrine concerning reason’s twofold application to the intelligible (noumenal) and the sensible (phenomena) worlds. Heidegger’s evident purpose in collapsing this dualism, Cassirer surmised, was to demonstrate and allegedly dramatic if rarely acknowledged truth, that Kant’s critical philosophy bought reason back from its illusory transcendence and restored it to the “plane of temporal Dasein”. But Heidegger’s attempt to unify these two distinctive domains of reason (by grounding them both fully and decisively in the transcendental imagination) found no real warrant in Kant’s text. In place of Kant’s characteristic dualism, Heidegger had simply substituted what Cassirer termed as a “monism of imagination”. [...] The ultimate goal of the Kantian system, Cassirer declared, was not human Dasein in its incorrigible finitude and temporal isolation, but instead the “intelligible substrate of humanity”. [...] Cassirer was well aware of Heidegger’s explanation as to why his reading appeared so exotic: Heidegger wished to bring to light not what Kant actually said but what remained unsaid as the hidden and metaphysical doctrine that had been suppressed by Kant and his neo-Kantian followers. And this meant resisting the apparent meaning of Kant’s texts even to the point of contradicting its manifest content. In Heidegger’s own words (as quoted by Cassirer), “any such interpretation must necessarily use violence”. From Cassirer’s perspective, however, this apologia for violence simply opened the door to wilful distortion. To claim with Heidegger that the first Critique contained a theory of “purely receptive spontaneity” was to import into Kant’s lexicon a wholly foreign terminology that would have seemed, from Kant’s own perspective, no less paradoxical than the concept of wooden iron. “Here”, Cassirer wrote, “Heidegger speaks no longer as commentator but as a usurper, who intrudes as it were on the Kantian system with force of arms to subject it an make it serve his [own] problematic.[...] Kant’s theory concerning an intelligible order of pure ideas did not stand in contradiction to this empiricism because it was not a theory of intelligible substance (and, moreover, because they cannot be schematized in priori spatiotemporal intuition, such ideas were not actually “metaphysical” in the dogmatic sense). Kant neither imagined nor had any reason to fear anything like the “abyss” Heidegger discerned in his philosophy. Cassirer could therefore see little warrant for Heidegger’s image of an “anxious Kant”.”. (Gordon 2010: 273-279)
21 “[…] daβ offenbar alles, was überhaupt an Synthesisstrukturen sich im Wesensbau der Erkenntnis zeigt, durch die Einbildungskraft erwikt ist.” (Heidegger 2010: §14)
22 “die Grundlegung der ontologischen Erkenntnis” (Heidegger 2010: §14)
23 “die Einheit des Wesensbaues endlicher Erkenntnis” (Heidegger 2010: §14)
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Segundo Heidegger, é justamente esta relevância metafísica da imaginação transcendental e da sua síntese pura ou ontológica que constitui o momento fulcral de determinação do conhecimento que Kant sustenta em “Dedução Transcendental dos Conceitos Puros do Entendimento” da primeira edição de Crítica. Haverá que esclarecer que, de acordo com Kant e o Problema da Metafísica, a clarificação da estrutura da síntese pura enquanto produto da imaginação transcendental permite a revelação da “essência mais íntima da finitude da razão” (Heidegger 2010: §16)24 – e o percurso elaborado por uma crítica da razão culmina, por seu turno, na revelação da imaginação transcendental enquanto faculdade que possibilita e determina o conhecimento através da sua intermediação entre sensibilidade e entendimento, apresentando-se como o núcleo definidor da razão humana finita. Segundo a postura heideggeriana, a autêntica crítica da razão revela o núcleo desconhecido da razão: a imaginação transcendental. Heidegger não prolonga a sua interpretação até à “Dialética Transcendental” da Crítica da Razão Pura e, por conseguinte, não considera a razão enquanto tal nem as suas Ideias – de acordo com Heidegger, o cerne da razão pura finita revela-se enquanto imaginação transcendental, o que o levará a concluir que a razão humana é, para além de finita, irremediavelmente “sensível” (Heidegger 2010: §31)25.
A aperceção transcendental, enquanto ato do entendimento, pressupõe a síntese pura: a imaginação configura-se como produtora da aperceção transcendental. É a imaginação a faculdade que permite, em última instância, a objetivação do conhecimento, é a faculdade que condiciona e funda todas as outras: a expressão “realidade objetiva” (Heidegger 2010: §18)26, sustenta Heidegger, deve ser interpretada “desde a essência da síntese pura da imaginação transcendental, que constitui a essência do conhecimento ontológico” (Heidegger 2010: §18)27. Segundo Heidegger, a objetivação do conhecimento desenvolve-se a partir da concordância entre intuição pura (tempo), síntese pura (imaginação) e, por fim, aperceção pura (entendimento), a qual é presidida pela síntese pura da imaginação enquanto “possibilidade interna da unidade essencial do conhecimento puro” (Heidegger 2010: §17)28. É a síntese pura que promove e constitui a objetivação do conhecimento, possibilitando algo como um “horizonte de objetividade” (Heidegger 2010:
§17)29 – primeiramente, através da sua intervenção sobre a intuição pura, o tempo, pois a imaginação transcendental tem sempre que se referir ao tempo enquanto mediadora entre este e o entendimento e, em segundo lugar, através das suas operações de condicionamento do próprio pensamento que, enquanto tal, tem de fundar a sua atividade na síntese pura da imaginação e na relação desta com o tempo. De modo mais claro: a síntese pura da imaginação transcendental funda o tempo (através das suas sínteses sobre ele) e condiciona o entendimento. A imaginação é a faculdade-chave do sujeito transcendental.

24 “das innerste Wesen der Endlichkeit der Vernunft” (Heidegger 2010: §16)
25 “sinnlich” (Heidegger 2010: §31)
26 “objektive Realität” (Heidegger 2010: §18)
27 “[…] aus dem Wesen der reinen Synthesis der transzendentalen Einbildungskraft, als welche sie die Wesenheit der ontologischen Erkenntnis bildet […] (Heidegger 2010: §18)
28 “die innere Möglichkeit der Wesenseinheit der reinen Erkenntnis” (Heidegger 2010: §17)
29 “[ein] Horizont von Gegenständlichkeit” (Heidegger 2010: §17)
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De acordo com a leitura heideggeriana, a imaginação funda o tempo mediante a intervenção das suas sínteses sobre este, identificando-se, simultaneamente, com o próprio tempo. Seguindo uma argumentação não totalmente esclarecedora, Heidegger conclui que imaginação e tempo são o mesmo e que toda a fundamentação da metafísica deve constituir-se enquanto uma investigação sobre o (ser e o) tempo. Tal como a imaginação, o tempo é um dos elementos que revela a finitude do sujeito, bem como a determinação intuitiva do seu modo de conhecer, adquirindo um papel central na Crítica da Razão Pura, tal como se pode ler no capítulo “Do Esquematismo dos Conceitos Puros do Entendimento” – um capítulo que, sob o olhar de Heidegger, apresenta a importante articulação entre tempo e imaginação. Neste sentido, de acordo com a interpretação heideggeriana, é, pois, no capítulo do “Esquematismo” que Kant delineia de modo mais rigoroso a união essencial entre os dois elementos definidores do sujeito: o tempo, enquanto afeção de si, e a imaginação transcendental. É esta relação entre tempo e imaginação que Heidegger privilegia na filosofia kantiana e não aqueloutra relação entre imaginação e entendimento que Kant estabeleceu na segunda edição da “Dedução Transcendental dos Conceitos Puros do Entendimento”. É, justamente, a relação ou a união entre imaginação transcendental e tempo que constitui, para Heidegger, o núcleo da crítica da razão.
A fundamentação da metafísica, ou a crítica da razão pura, deve desenvolver-se em torno da problemática do ser humano e, por conseguinte, encaminhar-se para a revelação de que o aspeto fundamental a considerar é a finitude do modo de conhecer humano. Assim dito, Heidegger proclama a exigência da valorização metafísica da imaginação e da sua articulação com o tempo enquanto afeção dos entes exteriores e, a partir destes, de si.

A fundamentação kantiana da metafísica conduz à imaginação transcendental. Esta é a raiz de ambos os ramos, sensibilidade e entendimento. Como tal, a imaginação transcendental possibilita a unidade originária da síntese ontológica. Esta raiz está inscrita no tempo originário. O fundamento originário que se revela na fundamentação é o tempo. A fundamentação kantiana da metafísica parte da metaphysica generalis, configurando-se como a pergunta acerca da possibilidade da ontologia em geral. Esta coloca o problema da essência da constituição ontológica, ou seja, o problema do ser em geral. A fundamentação da metafísica funda-se no tempo. A pergunta pelo ser, pergunta fundamental da fundamentação da metafísica, é o problema do “ser e tempo”. (Heidegger 2010: §35)30

30 “Kants Grundlegung der Metaphysik führt auf die transzendentale Einbildungskraft. Diese ist die Wurzel der beiden Stämme Sinnlichkeit und Verstand. Als solche ermöglicht sie die ursprüngliche Einheit der ontologischen Synthesis. Diese Wurzel aber ist in der ursprünglichen Zeit verwurzelt. Der in der Grundlegung offenbar werdende ursprüngliche Grund ist die Zeit. Kants Grundlegung der Metaphysik setzt bei der Metaphysica generalis ein und wird so zur Frage nach der Möglichkeit einer Ontologie überhaupt. Diese stellt die Frage nach dem Wesen der Seinsverfassung des Seienden, d.h. nach dem Sein überhaupt. Auf dem Grunde der Zeit erwächst die Grundlegung der Metaphysik. Die Frage nach dem Sein, die Grundfrage einer Grundlegung der Metaphysik, ist das Problem von “Sein und Zeit””. (Heidegger 2010: §35)
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Por conseguinte, de acordo com Heidegger, há que rejeitar filosoficamente a consideração de que a lógica é o núcleo da metafísica kantiana. Segundo a interpretação heideggeriana, a Crítica da Razão Pura revela que
1. “lógica” foi destituída do seu lugar tradicional no interior da metafísica. A sua ideia tornou-se questionável. Se a essência da transcendência se baseia na imaginação pura, ou seja, na temporalidade num sentido mais originário, a ideia de uma “lógica transcendental” constitui-se, em particular, como algo sem sentido, especialmente se, contra a intenção original de Kant, se apresenta considerada como disciplina autónoma e absoluta. (Heidegger 2010: §45)31
Analisemos, de modo pormenorizado, as principais posições sustentadas por Heidegger relativamente ao papel da imaginação no âmbito da Crítica da Razão Pura:
1. A imaginação como unidade originária entre sensibilidade e entendimento. A interpretação de Heidegger da Crítica da Razão Pura de Kant privilegia a primeira edição da obra. Segundo Heidegger, é nesta primeira edição que Kant desenvolve a questão da finitude humana através da relevância atribuída à imaginação na tarefa de determinação dos conhecimentos objetivos. Assim, segundo Heidegger, na primeira edição da Crítica da Razão Pura, designadamente no que concerne a “Dedução Transcendental dos Conceitos Puros do Entendimento”, Kant avalia a imaginação enquanto faculdade fundamental e autónoma da alma, que possibilita a “unidade originária” (Heidegger 2010: §27)32 entre sensibilidade e entendimento e, como tal, a “unidade essencial da transcendência” (Heidegger 2010: §27)33. A imaginação transcendental não é somente um laço exterior que une dois extremos (sensibilidade e entendimento) – a imaginação transcendental é “originariamente unitiva” (Heidegger 2010: §27)34, é o “centro originariamente formativo” (Heidegger 2010: §27)35, o que significa que se trata da faculdade que promove a unidade das duas faculdades referidas, que, por sua vez, possuem uma relação estrutural e essencial com a imaginação. A imaginação transcendental é a raiz comum da sensibilidade e do entendimento; a estrutura da sensibilidade e do entendimento encontra-se enraizada na estrutura da imaginação. Por conseguinte, a imaginação transcendental constitui-se, igualmente, como núcleo da razão pura.
2. A imaginação como a faculdade que possibilita o conhecimento objetivo. Na primeira edição da “Dedução Transcendental”, a imaginação define-se como a “raiz da transcendência” (Heidegger 2010: §27) 36. É a imaginação transcendental que produz a
31 “Die “Logik” ist ihr von alters her ausgebildeter Vorrang in der Metaphysik genommen. Ihre Idee wird fraglich. Wenn das Wesen der Transzendenz in der reinen Einbildungskraft bzw. ursprünglicher in der Zeitlichkeit gründet, dann ist gerade die Idee der “transzendentalen Logik” ein Unbegriff, zumal dann, wenn sie noch, entgegen der ursprünglichen Absicht Kants, auf sich gestellt und absolut genommen wird.” (Heidegger 2010: §45)
32 ursprüngliche Einheit” (Heidegger 2010: §27)
33 “Wesenseinheit der Transzendenz” (Heidegger 2010: §27)
34 “ursprünglich einigend” (Heidegger 2010: §27)
35 “ursprünglich bildende Mitte” (Heidegger 2010: §27)
36 “Wurzel der Transzendenz” (Heidegger 2010: §27)
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37 “die innere Möglichkeit der ontologischen Erkenntnis und damit die der Metaphysica generalis.” (Heidegger 2010: §26)
38 “bildende Mitte der reinen Erkenntnis” (Heidegger 2010: §31)
39 “Horizont von Gegenständlichkeit” (Heidegger 2010: §26)
40 “Einbildungscharakter” (Heidegger 2010: §29)
41 “ist das reine Denken in sich, nicht nachträglich, hinnehmend, d.h. reine Anschauung” (Heidegger 2010:
§29)
42 “rezeptive Spontaneität” (Heidegger 2010: §29)
43 “der Wesengrund der ontologischen Erkenntnis” (Heidegger 2010: §31)
44 “endliche Transzendenz” (Heidegger 2010: §31)
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transcendental e fundam, constituindo, o próprio tempo. A a imaginação, enquanto “elemento originariamente unitivo” (Heidegger 2010: §35)45, apenas em aparência é uma faculdade intermédia, pois, na verdade, ela é o próprio tempo. Imaginação transcendental e tempo são uma e a mesma coisa: “a raiz da transcendência” (Heidegger 2010: §27)46. Deparamo-nos, assim, com o tempo enquanto “fundamento originário” (Heidegger 2010:
§35)47 da metafísica. A fundamentação da metafísica funda-se no tempo – “o fundamento originário que se revela na fundamentação é o tempo” (Heidegger 2010: §35)48. Da mesma forma, o conhecimento objetivo constitui-se como “determinações transcendentais do tempo” (Heidegger 2010: §35)49.
A segunda edição da Crítica da Razão Pura. A alteração da postura kantiana. Heidegger conclui a sua interpretação da Crítica da Razão Pura perspetivando e sustentando uma alteração da postura kantiana relativamente à imaginação ocorrida entre a primeira e a segunda edições da obra. Segundo a leitura heideggeriana, na segunda edição da Crítica da Razão Pura, “Kant retrocedeu perante esta raiz desconhecida” (Heidegger 2010: §31)50, a imaginação – submetendo-a à espontaneidade do entendimento. Em vez de “função da alma” (primeira edição), Kant passa a definir a imaginação como “função do entendimento” (segunda edição): a imaginação não é mais uma faculdade autónoma, mas um produto da faculdade do entendimento. A tarefa da síntese pura já não pertence à imaginação, enquanto faculdade irredutível à sensibilidade e ao entendimento, mas sim à espontaneidade do entendimento, o que se traduz na recusa da possibilidade de que seja a imaginação “o fundamento essencial do conhecimento ontológico” (Heidegger 2010:

§31)51; na segunda edição, é o entendimento que desempenha “o papel de origem de toda a síntese” (Heidegger 2010: §31)52. Todo o ato transcendental da imaginação apresenta-se, assim, concebido – diferentemente do que fora sustentado na primeira edição – como um efeito do entendimento sobre a sensibilidade através da imaginação. Na segunda edição, a imaginação transcendental existe somente enquanto mera designação – imaginação é o nome dado à síntese empírica, pois a denominada síntese transcendental da imaginação assume-se realizada espontaneamente pelo entendimento agindo sobre a sensibilidade através da imaginação. A imaginação torna-se como que subsidiária do entendimento e perde a sua independência enquanto faculdade autónoma e fundamento essencial do conhecimento ontológico. Conclui Heidegger que, na segunda versão da Crítica, Kant efetua um recuo na sua inicial “interpretação mais originária da imaginação transcendental” (Heidegger 2010: §31)53.

45 “ursprünglich Einigende” (Heidegger 2010: §35) 46 “Wurzel der Transzendenz” (Heidegger 2010: §27) 47 “ursprüngliche Grund” (Heidegger 2010: §35)‌‌

48 “Der in der Grundlegung offenbar werdende ursprüngliche Grund ist die Zeit” (Heidegger 2010: §35)

49 “transzendentale Zeitbestimmungen” (Heidegger 2010: §35)

50 “Kant ist vor dieser unbekannten Wurzel zurückgewichen.” (Heidegger 2010: §31)

51 “die Grundlegung der ontologischen Erkenntnis” (Heidegger 2010: §31)

52 “die Rolle des Ursprüngs für alle Synthesis” (Heidegger 2010: §31)

53 “ursprüngliche Auslegung der transzendentalen Einbildungskraft” (Heidegger 2010: §31)

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Na segunda edição da Crítica da Razão Pura, Kant decidiu-se, assim assevera Heidegger, a favor do entendimento puro contra a imaginação, a fim de salvaguardar a supremacia da razão, designadamente da razão prática. Pois, “se a razão finita, enquanto espontaneidade, é recetiva, possuindo a sua origem na imaginação transcendental, também a razão prática, por conseguinte, se funda necessariamente na imaginação transcendental” (Heidegger 2010: §30)54. Em última instância, argumenta Heidegger, a crítica da razão pura (teórica ou prática), tal como o estabelecido na primeira versão do texto de Kant, converter-se-ia numa investigação da imaginação transcendental (a razão pura tornar-se-ia recetividade plena), o que conduziria a fundamentação da metafísica a um “abismo” (Heidegger 2010: §31) 55. Por conseguinte, a problemática de uma razão pura terá que desvalorizar a imaginação e “ocultar-lhe a sua essência transcendental” (Heidegger 2010:

§31)56.

Por fim, Heidegger conclui que a exigência kantiana de proceder a uma reescrita da “Dedução Transcendental” se encontra relacionada com a perspetivação de que a afirmação da primazia da imaginação poderia conduzir a filosofia moral ao empirismo ético. Tendo como principais motivos o afastamento relativamente a um antevisto empirismo ético (que o texto da primeira edição da Crítica da Razão Pura poderia sustentar) e a proclamação do carácter racional do conhecimento puro e da ação moral pura, Kant pretendera retirar proeminência à imaginação, reelaborando um segundo texto da “Dedução Transcendental”. Se, na primeira edição, Kant tratara da “finitude da transcendência humana” (Heidegger 2010: §31)57 enquanto problemática central da obra, na segunda edição Kant procurara salientar o carácter racional puro do sujeito que se descobre progressivamente na personalidade moral – só desta forma seria viável a sustentação de uma filosofia prática que afirmaria uma moralidade pura do sujeito assente numa razão pura (i.e., isenta de determinações sensíveis, que poderiam encontrar a sua fundamentação na imaginação enquanto recetividade).

Não é este o lugar nem o tempo apropriados para comentar – ou, eventualmente, refutar – a leitura da Crítica da Razão Pura avançada por Heidegger. A evocação da Crítica da Faculdade do Juízo permitiria a pronta e fácil consideração de variadíssimas possibilidades de contestação das posições sustentadas por Heidegger acerca da preponderância subjetiva da faculdade da imaginação, caracterizada, em termos definitivos, como “o fundamento da possibilidade da subjetividade humana” (Heidegger 2010: §31)58. Ou, do mesmo modo, bastaria empreender uma análise cuidada e rigorosa da filosofia kantiana – inclusivamente da primeira edição da Crítica da Razão Pura – e obter-

54 “Wenn aber die endliche Vernunft als Spontaneität rezeptiv ist und deshalb der transzendentalen Einbildungskraft entspringt, dann gründet auch die praktische Vernunft notwendig in dieser.” (Heidegger 2010: §30)

55 “Abgrund” (Heidegger 2010: §31)

56 “ihr transzendentales Wesen verdecken” (Heidegger 2010: §31)

57 “die Endlichkeit der menschlichen Transzendenz” (Heidegger 2010: §31)

58 “der Grund der Möglichkeit der menschlichen Subjektivität” (Heidegger 2010: §31)

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A interpretação heideggeriana da Crítica da Razão Pura: a questão da imaginação

se-iam amplas e seguras hipóteses de condenação da interpretação heideggeriana. Saliente- se, porém, e em jeito de conclusão, que a contribuição heideggeriana para a perspetivação da imaginação no estrito âmbito da primeira Crítica não aspira nem pretende repetir, esclarecer ou elucidar o pensamento kantiano – o propósito heideggeriano é, pois, de outra ordem. Insistir na sua reprovação traduziria uma postura de incompreensão da nossa parte relativamente ao modo de filosofar (e de filosofar sobre outros filósofos) desenvolvido por Heidegger.

Bibliografia

GORDON, P. E. (2010). Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos. Cambridge, MA

: Harvard University Press.

HEIDEGGER, M. (1954). Kant y el problema de la metafísica. Trad. Gred Ibscher Roth. Rev. Elsa Cecilia Frost. México : Fondo de Cultura Económica [Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik (1929)].

HEIDEGGER, M. (1981). Kant et le problème de la métaphysique. Trad. Alphonse de Waelhens e Walter Biemel. Paris : Gallimard [Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik (1929)].

HEIDEGGER, M. (1990). Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics. Trad. Richard Taft. Bloomington: Indiana University Press [Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik (1929)].

HEIDEGGER, M. (2010). Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik. Frankfurt am Main : Klostermann GmbH [1929].

HEIDEGGER, M. (2002). Que é uma coisa?. Trad. Carlos Morujão. Lisboa : Edições 70. [Was ist ein Ding? (1962)].

HUSSERL, E. (2008). A Crise das Ciências Europeias e a Fenomelogia Transcendental. Uma Introdução à Filosofia Fenomenológica, trad. Diogo Falcão Ferrer, Lisboa : Universidade de Lisboa. Centro de Filosofia [Die Krisis der europäischen Wissenchaften und die Transzendentale Phänomenologie. Eine Einleitung in die phänomenologische Philosophie (1936-1954)].

KANT, I. (2008). Crítica da Razão Pura. Trad. Manuela Pinto dos Santos e Alexandre Fradique Morujão. Lisboa : Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian [Kritik der reinen Vernunft (1781-1787)].

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The Case for Absolute Spontaneity in Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason

La defensa de la espontaneidad absoluta en la Crítica de la razón pura de Kant

ADDISON ELLIS *

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA

Abstract

Kant describes the understanding as a faculty of spontaneity. What this means is that our capacity to judge what is true is responsible for its own exercises, which is to say that we issue our judgments for ourselves. To issue our judgments for ourselves is to be self-conscious – i.e., conscious of the grounds upon which we judge. To grasp the spontaneity of the understanding, then, we must grasp the self-consciousness of the understanding. I argue that what Kant requires for explaining spontaneity is a conception of judgment as an intrinsic self-consciousness of the total unity of possible knowledge. This excludes what have been called ‘relative’ accounts of the spontaneity of the understanding, according to which our judgments are issued through a capacity fixed by external conditions. If so, then Kant conceives of understanding as entirely active. Or, to put it another way, he conceives of this capacity as absolutely spontaneous.

Keywords

Spontaneity; self-consciousness; unity; apperception; idealism

* PhD Candidate in Philosophy at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA. E-mail: acellis2@illinois.edu

[Recibido: 3 de noviembre 2017

Aceptado: 16 de noviembre 2017]

The Case for Absolute Spontaneity in Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason

§1 Introduction

Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason is famous for its many distinctions: pure/empirical, intuition/concept, sensibility/understanding, just for a few examples. But the distinction that is perhaps the most deeply pervasive throughout Kant’s critical philosophy as a whole, and the one underlying all the previous distinctions, is that between spontaneity and receptivity. In the first Critique, the faculty of the understanding (the capacity for theoretical knowledge) is characterized as spontaneous, which is to say that it is a faculty of “bringing forth representations from itself.”1 In the second Critique, our transcendental freedom (“absolute spontaneity”) is taken to follow from the moral law – a “fact of reason”. 2 For Kant, then, acts of both theoretical knowledge (from a Vermögen der Erkenntnisse 3 ) and practical knowledge (from Wille) are acts to be characterized as spontaneous. The understanding is a theoretical capacity, or one whose object is given to it from elsewhere. The will is a practical capacity, or one whose object is brought about from itself.

What it means for these acts to be spontaneous has been the subject of much debate.4 But it is relatively common practice for commentators to refer to spontaneity as a kind of freedom. McDowell writes that spontaneity or “conceptual activity” takes place in the “realm of freedom” (1994, 5). Allison (1996, 57) interprets Kant as holding that the understanding is “absolutely spontaneous”, which (Kitcher 1990) in turn takes to mean “transcendentally free.” And recently, (Kohl 2015) argues that Kant’s notion of the spontaneity of the understanding is a notion of freedom in judgment. It is correct, in some sense, to think of spontaneity as a kind of freedom, if by ‘freedom’ we mean something suitably general. But it is important to distinguish between our theoretical freedom (the freedom of the understanding) and our practical freedom (the freedom of the will). Even though the first Critique concerns itself with what the Dialectic calls “transcendental freedom” or “absolute spontaneity,” I believe that Kant’s primary interest here is in a theoretical conception of spontaneity. To see this, consider that Kant introduces the concept of spontaneity in two basic ways:

Initially, as the spontaneity of the understanding, or the faculty of “bringing forth representations from itself.”
Later, the spontaneity of transcendental freedom, which is the ability to begin new causal chains:

An absolute causal spontaneity beginning from itself a series of appearances that runs according to natural laws, hence transcendental freedom…5

A faculty of absolutely beginning a state, and hence also a series of its consequences.6

1 KrV, A51/B75

2 KpV, AA 5:30

3 KrV, B137

4 In recent decades, this debate has taken place among (Sellars 1970) and (Kitcher 1990), (Allison 1990), (Allison 1996), (Pippin 1987), (Valaris 2013), (Kohl 2015), (Boyle 2016).‌

5 KrV, A446/B474

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He also calls this “freedom in the cosmological sense”:

By freedom in the cosmological sense, on the contrary, I understand the faculty of beginning a state from itself, the causality of which does not in turn stand under another cause determining it in time in accordance with the law of nature.7

The spontaneity of understanding and the spontaneity of transcendental freedom must be related in some deep way (viz., they are both capacities of bringing about something from themselves), but it is not clear from what Kant has said that they are identical. In fact, I believe they are importantly distinct. Transcendental or cosmological freedom is, in a most general way, an ability for a causal series of appearances to begin from itself, to be unconditioned. The idea of transcendental freedom, in the Dialectic, arises from the question “can there be an uncaused cause?” But notice that such a question cannot be directed at the understanding if what we have in mind, as Kant does in the Third Antinomy, is the question whether what is caused is a chain of appearances. The exercises the understanding is responsible for bringing about from itself are exercises of cognition, not appearances or objects to be known. It follows from this consideration that when Kant discusses transcendental or cosmological freedom, he is discussing a specific way in which a capacity could bring about something from itself, though he does not seem to have in mind acts of cognition. From this we can gather two things: first, that transcendental freedom and the spontaneity of the understanding are, in the first Critique, not identical notions; second, that both notions are nevertheless instances of a general concept of an ability to bring something about from itself.

Now we can ask whether it is possible for the capacities of will and understanding to do this, and if so, in what sense they do it. In this paper, I focus on the capacity of understanding. Thus, I am focused on the following two related issues: whether a capacity whose object must be given to it from elsewhere can nevertheless bring about its exercises from itself; and if so, in what sense.

Specifically, at A51/B75, Kant writes that the spontaneity of cognition is “the faculty for bringing forth representations itself” and identifies this with the faculty of the understanding. Call this the spontaneity thesis. But the thought that our understanding can bring forth its own representations is one that needs to be unpacked further, and Kant says very little else in the way of clarification. In this paper, I aim to unpack this in a way that helps us to understand just what the nature and scope of this spontaneity amounts to.

One way to begin to grasp Kant’s thought about the spontaneity of the understanding is to note that it is an expression of a kind of control that subjects have over their representations. Because we exercise some control over our representations, according to Kant, we are in some sense epistemic agents. In fact, this is one Kantian lesson that many

6 KrV, A445/B473

7 KrV, A533/B561

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contemporary philosophers have taken very seriously.8 I will begin from this thought and then develop from it an account of the spontaneity of the understanding.

§1.1 Two Senses of “Mine”

I am the thinker of my thoughts. This is to say that my thoughts belong to me; they are mine. This is in one sense trivial, but in another sense non-trivial. It is non-trivial if we understand the mineness of my thoughts to be a special kind of mineness. Here is one way of seeing this special kind of mineness: to say that my thought is mine is to say that I am the source of my act of thinking. This much seems to be captured in Kant’s spontaneity thesis. His claim, that is, is that the faculty of understanding brings forth its own representations; it brings them about. This is one sense in which my representations are mine, according to Kant.

But Kant’s spontaneity thesis also entails a second sense of mineness: that my representations are mine in the sense that I am responsible or accountable for them. When I judge that P, I take my judgment to be valid. In taking my judgment to be valid, in turn, I am taking myself to have a right to issue the judgment. And I can only take myself to have a right to issue my judgment on the grounds that I am accountable for it. To gloss it in Brandomian-Sellarsian terms, I judge in a space of giving and asking for reasons. When I judge, I make a claim in a way such that I am prepared to answer a challenge of justification, or a question “why?”.

To say that my thought is mine in the first sense, then, is to say that I am accountable for my thought because I issued it. To say that my thought is mine in the second sense is to say that I am accountable for my thought because I am responsible for it. The second sense of mineness also comes with a deeper sense of freedom: because I am prepared to justify my claim, I am free in a way that I am not when I possess, say, a knee-jerk belief. Furthermore, I am responsible for what I judge through my act of judging. This is because when I judge, I do it on the basis of some reason, of which I am necessarily conscious. So, through judging, we might say, I bind myself to what I judge. I am responsible for what I judge because I am self-conscious in my act of judgment.

If it is right to attribute these thoughts to Kant, then the spontaneity of judgment is the self- consciousness of judgment. So, to understand what spontaneity is, we have to understand what self-consciousness is. I will begin by spelling out the two basic interpretations of Kant’s spontaneity thesis: a strong interpretation (absolute spontaneity) and a weak interpretation (relative spontaneity). Then, I will show that Kant gives us reasons to think that self-consciousness belongs to the understanding in a way that excludes the weak interpretation. I will end by considering a way around one type of worry that might accompany this conclusion.

§1.2 The Spontaneity of the Understanding as Self-determination

8 (Boyle 2011, 2); (McDowell 1994); (McDowell 2009); (Brandom 1994)

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By identifying the ‘spontaneity of cognition’ with the faculty of ‘understanding,’ Kant tells us that spontaneity is a capacity to bring forth representations from itself. So, according to Kant, the understanding is a capacity that can be the source of its own representations. The understanding is the birthplace of certain representations (e.g., the categories, and the judgments that make use of them). 9 This birth takes place through “self-activity” (selbsttätigkeit), 10 which is to say that the representations are “self-thought” (selbstgedachte),11 which is a notion left unexplained. Despite the lack of explanation, we can sketch a plausible account of what it is for certain representations, like judgments, to be self-thought.

Kant explains that judgment is an act of determination. So, because the understanding is the source of judgment, it is thereby also the source of acts of determination. We will say that this makes the understanding a self-determining capacity. The notion of self- determination can be understood in two different ways, only one of which I will concern myself with here. First, we can give a negative characterization of the self-determination of judgment: my judgment that the Cubs will win the World Series is not implanted in me or put into my head, so I judge it for myself. Second, we can give a positive characterization of the self-determination of judgment: my judgment that the Cubs will win the World Series is an act from an awareness of that act’s own grounds. To get a more complete sense of this kind of self-determination, we will need to examine the concepts ‘determination’ and ‘capacity.’ First, consider the concept of determination.

According to Kant, to judge that S is P is to determine S as P, which in turn is equivalent to predicating P of S. Kant writes:

Anything one likes can serve as a logical predicate, even the subject can be predicated of itself; for logic abstracts from every content. But the determination is a predicate, which goes beyond the concept of the subject and enlarges it. Thus it must not be included in it already.12

So, to determine something to be the case is to fix to some subject concept a predicate that goes beyond the subject concept (is not already contained in it). Even more clearly, the pre-Critical Kant writes:

To determine is to posit a predicate while excluding its opposite. That which determines a subject in respect of any of its predicates, is called the ground.13

9 KrV, A66/B90

10 KrV, B130

11 KrV, B167

12 KrV, A598/B626

13 PND, AA 01:391

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Thus, the judgment that the table is brown is a determination of the table as something brown, which in turn is to predicate brownness of the table by excluding from it the predicate ‘not brown.’

Now consider the concept of the understanding as a capacity. What the capacity does is judge, or determine something to be the case.14 As such, a particular act of judgment is an act of determination – it says of a thing S that it is a P by fixing to S a predicate P, excluding not-P. And exclusion is non-accidental. To exclude, Kant says, is to determine a subject on the ground of some reason. To say that acts of determination are acts of exclusion is to say that they exclude on some ground. When I judge that the table is brown, I do so from the presumption that what I judge is true – the table is brown, not not-brown. And when I take myself to be judging truly, I take myself to be judging on sufficient grounds.

Accordingly, the determination of a judgment is determination from a principle. Just as we would say that the capacity to hit a baseball is governed by some standard for what counts as hitting a baseball, we would say that the capacity to judge is governed by some standard for what counts as judgment. By ‘standard’ I have in mind an explanatory principle. All capacities are aimed at some telos, which governs the exercises of the capacity in the sense that it explains its exercises. The standard of judgment is the telos of the capacity of judgment, which tells us when we have succeeded or failed at forming a judgment.15 In addition to being a standard for what counts as successful judgment, the principle of the capacity to judge is to be thought of as the source of judgment. Kant writes:

I would therefore call a “cognition from principles” that cognition in which I cognize the particular in the universal through concepts. Thus every syllogism is a form of derivation of a cognition from a principle. For the major premise always gives a concept such that everything subsumed under its condition can be cognized from it according to a principle.16

In every syllogism, we derive cognition – the conclusion – from a principle. To judge correctly, then, is not only for that judgment to be held to some standard, but for that standard to be at the same time the origin of the judgment. It is from a consciousness of the principle that I judge, and thereby come to have knowledge.

In addition to the thought that judgment is governed by a principle that acts as a standard and a source of judgment, we must think of this principle as a principle of unity. Judgment is no arbitrary collection of representations, such as [{cat}, {mat}]. Rather, judgment is a

14 Kant says that all acts of the understanding can be traced back to judgments, KrV, A69/B94. He later says that the first pure cognition of the understanding is the principle of the original synthetic unity of apperception (self-consciousness), KrV, B137. This means that while the understanding is a capacity to determine judgments, so that its determinate acts are acts of judgments, it determines through a pure cognition of self-consciousness, something self-determined.

15 While the analogy helps explain what I mean by ‘principle’, the way in which we are governed by a principle in hitting a baseball is, of course, different from the way in which we are governed by a principle in judging.

16 KrV, A300

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non-accidental (i.e., necessary) unity of representations: {the cat is on the mat}. This tells us that judgments are governed by a rule for bringing representations together as one.

The principle of unity governing acts of judgment, as the principle of a capacity, is internal to the capacity. This is because capacities are given form by their principles. We identify a range of behaviors as falling under one act – say, hitting a baseball – by identifying a principle for distinguishing between successful and unsuccessful instances of hitting a baseball. This means that the capacity for hitting a baseball is constituted by its principle – likewise for the capacity of judgment.

By spelling out the understanding as a capacity for judgment in accordance with an inner principle, we can now see how it is possible to call the understanding a capacity of self- determination. The act of judging, for Kant, is an act of determination governed by a principle belonging to the subject’s own capacity to judge.

§1.3 Kant on Two Kinds of Self-Determination

Now that we understand judgment as an act of a capacity governed by a principle of unity, we can look more closely at Kant’s own understanding of the different ways in which the principle of a capacity can belong to that capacity. From the Metaphysik Pölitz:

But now the transcendental concept of freedom follows; this means absolute spontaneity, and is self-activity from an inner principle according to the power of free choice. Spontaneity is either absolute or without qualification, or qualified in some respect. –Spontaneity in some respect is when something acts spontaneously under a condition. So, e.g., a body which is shot off moves spontaneously, but in some respect. This spontaneity is also called automatic spontaneity, namely when a machine moves itself according to an inner principle, e.g., a watch, a turnspit. But the spontaneity is not without qualification because here the inner principle was determined by an external principle. The internal principle with the watch is the spring, with the turnspit the weight, but the external principle is the artist who determines the internal principle. The spontaneity which is without qualification is an absolute spontaneity.17

Here we get two conceptions of spontaneity: (1) self-activity from an inner principle that is determined by an external principle [qualified spontaneity], and (2) self-activity from an inner principle according to the power of free choice [absolute spontaneity]. Clearly, in this particular passage, Kant has in mind a distinction between two kinds of practical spontaneity. But we can just as well apply this distinction to the activity of the understanding. As we have seen, Kant describes the understanding as “self-active” in the Transcendental Deduction. 18 Now we must ask whether the spontaneity of the understanding is absolute or qualified. By ‘qualified spontaneity’ Kant means an activity governed by an inner principle which is itself determined by an external principle. By

17 V-MET-L1/Pölitz, AA 28:267-268

18 KrV, B130

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‘absolute spontaneity’ Kant means an activity governed by an inner principle which is not determined by an external principle. If the understanding is spontaneous in a qualified sense, then we might say that it is self-determined in accordance with a given inner principle. If the understanding is spontaneous absolutely, then it is self-determined in accordance with a self-acquired inner principle.19

Following the qualified/absolute distinction, and a similar distinction drawn in the second Critique,20 interpreters have divided themselves into two camps: those who argue that Kant takes the spontaneity of the understanding to be absolute, and those who argue that Kant takes it to be qualified or “relative.”21

I have introduced the idea of a spontaneous capacity of understanding through the idea of the self-determination of judgment. But, we might now step back and look at the spontaneity of the understanding in an even more general sense. In fact, this well help us to evaluate the contemporary relative/absolute debate, since it is rarely put specifically in terms of judgment, but rather, more broadly, in terms of ‘synthesis.’ Kant holds that the understanding is active not only in issuing judgments, but, more broadly, in acts of the imagination and in intuition itself:

But insofar as its synthesis [imagination] is still an exercise of spontaneity, which is determining and not, like sense, merely determinable, and can thus determine the form of sense a priori in accordance with the unity of apperception, the imagination is to this extent a faculty for determining the sensibility a priori…22

The imagination, as spontaneity, is an act in accordance with the unity of apperception. The unity of apperception, in turn, is the highest act of the understanding.23 This unifying act is also at work in intuition, as evidenced by Kant’s remark that “the supreme principle of all intuition in relation to the understanding is that all the manifold of intuition stand under conditions of the original synthetic unity of apperception.”24

It follows from what Kant says that the understanding, while a capacity for judgment, is even more broadly a capacity that brings objective unity to all our cognitive activity. For our purposes, then, we can define the relevant types of spontaneity as follows:

Relative spontaneity (RS) = cognitive activity that is self-determined according to an externally determined (i.e., given) inner principle.

Absolute spontaneity (AS) = cognitive activity that is self-determined according to an internally determined (i.e., self-acquired) inner principle.

19 I take this to be what Kant calls “original acquisition” in “On a Discovery…”, TP, AA 8:221

20 KpV, AA 5:97, where Kant contrasts transcendental freedom with the freedom of a turnspit.

21 Those in the ‘absolute’ camp include (Pippin 1987) and (Allison 1990); those in the ‘relative’ camp include (Kitcher 1990) and (Sellars 1970).

22 KrV, B151-152; see also B136.

23 KrV, B134n.

24 KrV, B136

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Now that we have spelled out two different interpretations of Kant’s spontaneity thesis, we can ask which one Kant has reason to endorse. This means that we must explain what the nature of the understanding’s principle is. To this I will now turn.

§2 The Principle of the Original Synthetic Unity of Apperception

We have explained the capacity of the understanding as being governed by a principle, which serves as both a standard and a source of the understanding’s activities. We have also explained that the most basic activity of the understanding is the activity of determining the unity of cognition generally. But what is the principle that governs this activity? §17 of the Transcendental Deduction is entitled “The principle of the synthetic unity of apperception is the supreme principle of all use of the understanding.” Here, Kant tells us that the principle of the understanding is the original synthetic unity of apperception:

The supreme principle of all intuition in relation to the understanding is that all the manifold of intuition stand under conditions of the original synthetic unity of apperception.25

Two questions must be answered. First, what is the original synthetic unity of apperception (OSUA)? Second, why is this “the supreme principle” of the understanding, even in its relation to intuition? I’ll answer each in turn.

The understanding is a spontaneous capacity. It is the capacity to bring forth representations from itself. But Kant also writes, as we have just seen, that this is the capacity to bring all intuition under the unity of self-consciousness. That is, the principle of spontaneity is that the subject’s representations are brought under the OSUA.26 Kant has in mind a single capacity of understanding. He must therefore think that the two characteristic functions of this capacity are one and the same. The act of bringing all representations under a unity of apperception is the same as the capacity bringing forth representations from itself. Turning to the relation between these two ideas will shed light on what it means for the principle of the understanding to be the OSUA.

First, we must consider Kant’s complicated thought that the understanding is a capacity for bringing representations under the unity of self-consciousness:

Thus all manifold of intuition has a necessary relation to the I think in the same subject in which this manifold is to be encountered. But this representation is an act of spontaneity, i.e., it cannot be regarded as belonging to sensibility. I call it the pure apperception, in order to distinguish it from the empirical one, or also the original apperception, since it is that self-consciousness which, because it produces the representation I think, which must be able to accompany all others and which

25 KrV, §17 of the Deduction

26 KrV, B136; and at B134n. Kant writes that the faculty of self-consciousness is the understanding itself.

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in all consciousness is one and the same, cannot be accompanied by any further representation.27

The representation ‘I think,’ the absolute subject of every judgment, 28 is an act of spontaneity, and thus of the capacity of the understanding. When I judge that S is P, my judgment has the form “I think S is P”; and the representation ‘I think’ is, because spontaneous, self-thought. The only way ‘I think’ could be self-thought is through a consciousness of what I am thinking – that is, through self-consciousness.

How are we to understand this complicated thought: that it is through self-consciousness that I have the representation ‘I think’? It might seem more natural to say that ‘I think’ precedes self-consciousness, which in turn would be a more complex representation, such as ‘I think of myself thinking.’ Kant gives us a clue to this puzzle by pointing out that the self-consciousness at issue cannot be empirical – that is, it is not a second-order observation of my first-order conscious states. This is because all thought is already accompanied by ‘I think’. 29 Because all thought has the form ‘I think,’ all thought is already self-conscious. It does not become self-conscious through a second act. This is why all empirical self-consciousness presupposes yet a higher kind of self-consciousness: because self-consciousness in its most basic form is already contained in any act of judgment. So, Kant says, the ‘I think’ is a representation that cannot be accompanied by any further representation. This “pure self-consciousness,” then, is no second-order representation of a first-order thought, since first-order thought already contains an act of (pure) self-consciousness.

So far, Kant has established that all thoughts are already purely self-conscious acts, and so all thoughts presuppose an original self-consciousness. Furthermore, this pure self- consciousness is the unity under which all representations must stand:

I also call its unity [the unity of pure apperception] the transcendental unity of self- consciousness in order to designate the possibility of a priori cognition from it. For the manifold representations that are given in a certain intuition would not all together be my representations if they did not all together belong to a self- consciousness; i.e., as my representations (even if I am not conscious of them as such) they must yet necessarily be in accord with the condition under which alone they can stand together in a universal self-consciousness, because otherwise they would not throughout belong to me.30

Pure self-consciousness is a condition of the possibility of all a priori knowledge, because no representation at all could belong to me as a thought without already belonging to self- consciousness. Through intuition we are given a manifold of representations – singular,

27 KrV, B132

28 Kant calls the ‘I’ the “absolute subject of all my possible judgments”, KrV, A348

29 KrV, B131-132

30 KrV, B132, brackets mine

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immediate representations of objects. These representations must belong, together, to a single self-conscious subject (a universal self-consciousness), because nothing at all could be thought by me independently from an awareness of myself thinking it. Thus, Kant takes himself to have established that all knowledge belongs to a self-conscious unity – that is, one self-consciousness.

To bring cognition under the unity of self-consciousness (under one self-consciousness) is, in turn, to recognize that all acts of cognition are acts belonging to me, the ‘I think’, the absolute subject of judgment.31 If this is right, then we can see why Kant says that the understanding is both a capacity to bring forth representations from itself and a capacity to bring cognition under a unity of self-consciousness. For, to bring representations forth from itself is something the understanding does through bringing those representations under the unity of self-consciousness. All my judgments are representations that necessarily belong to a self-conscious unity. And my judgments belong to this unity by themselves being necessarily self-conscious. So, it is through self-consciousness that I form judgments.

The self-consciousness through which I judge contains, moreover, a double-faceted unity. On the one hand, when I am given an intuition I am conscious of the manifold of representations given to me as belonging to one ‘I’ – this is what Kant calls the analytic unity of apperception.32 On the other hand, my consciousness of an identical ‘I’, to which all my representations must attach, presupposes a synthesis of representations – a synthetic unity of apperception:

Therefore it is only because I can combine a manifold of given representations in one consciousness that it is possible for me to represent the identity of the consciousness in these representations itself, i.e., the analytical unity of apperception is only possible under the presupposition of some synthetic one.33

The consciousness of my representations as belonging to one ‘I’, therefore, is at one and the same time a consciousness of the ‘I’ as common to all my representations and a consciousness of a synthesis of representations belonging to one and the same ‘I’. Since in order to be conscious of an ‘I’ common to all my representations I must be conscious of a synthetic unity of representations that has this ‘I’ in common, this synthetic unity “is the highest point to which one must affix all use of the understanding, even the whole of logic and, after it, transcendental philosophy.”34

To say that the principle of all use of the understanding is the OSUA, then, is to say that all acts of the understanding are acts of my synthesizing a manifold of representations through a consciousness of their belonging to me – that is, self-consciously.

31 KrV, B134

32 KrV, B132

33 KrV, B133

34 KrV, B134n.

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So far we have characterized the OSUA as a principle of synthetic unity by saying that I synthesize a manifold of representations self-consciously. But it would be misleading to leave off here, for Kant does not see the representation of a synthetic unity as just a unity of any arbitrary collection of representations. For Kant, the representation of synthetic unity in apperception is a representation of a single body of possible knowledge, or a totality. To grasp this, we can look at two passages – one from the B Deduction, the other from the A Deduction.

First, the B Deduction passage. Kant says of the relation between the act of combining (synthesis) and unity:

Combination is the representation of the synthetic unity of the manifold. The representation of this unity cannot, therefore, arise from the combination; rather, by being added to the representation of the manifold, it first makes the concept of combination possible.35

What we take from this is the idea that in combining representations we already represent a synthetic unity (it “cannot, therefore, arise from the combination”). This is to say that the representation of a synthetic unity precedes any non-arbitrary act of combination. As long as it is no accident that I combine A with B, then the act of combining A with B is done from a consciousness that A and B really do belong together in one representation. To know that A and B really do belong together as one representation is to already represent a unity, prior to actually bringing them together as one.

This passage makes a point that Kant had already made, in a slightly different way, in the A Deduction:

But that empirical rule of association, which one must assume throughout if one says that everything in the series of occurrences stands under rules according to which nothing happens that is not preceded by something upon which it always follows – on what, I ask, does this, as a law of nature, rest, and how is this association even possible? The ground of the possibility of the association of the manifold, insofar as it lies in the object, is called the affinity of the manifold. I ask, therefore, how do you make the thoroughgoing affinity of the appearances (by means of which they stand under constant laws and must belong under them) comprehensible to yourselves?36

Kant calls the ground of the possibility of laws of association – laws that say “when A, represent B” – the “affinity” of the manifold of appearances (objects of possible knowledge). Through their affinity, appearances “must belong” and “stand under constant laws.” Clearly, then, the affinity of appearances at the very least entails that they belong together in a unified way. So, all objects of possible knowledge belong – prior to any act of

35 KrV, B130-131

36 KrV, A112-113

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combination – to a synthetic unity. Kant goes on in the next paragraph to make this point very clearly:

On my principles it is easily comprehensible. All possible appearances belong, as representations, to the whole possible self-consciousness……All appearances therefore stand in a thoroughgoing connection according to necessary laws, and hence in a transcendental affinity, of which the empirical affinity is the mere consequence.37

All appearances stand together under necessary laws, which is to say that they belong together in a unified body of possible knowledge. If they didn’t belong together in this way, then we would only be capable of possessing a “swarm of appearances”, but not experience. Knowledge, as distinct from mere perception, involves an act of determination, of taking something for true.38 And in taking something for true, we must implicitly take our representations to be synthesizable, which in turn requires that we take all appearances to belong together, much like pieces of one large puzzle.

This is a complicated series of thoughts to which full justice can only be done in a much lengthier project, but we can capture Kant’s basic insight with a single thesis. Call it the internality thesis.

The internality thesis: in the act of determining S as P, I am implicitly conscious of S and P as belonging to a total synthetic unity.

From this, Kant’s double-faceted unity of apperception can be reconstructed. In the act of determining S as P, I am already conscious of myself as judging that S is P in the sense of being conscious of the thoroughgoing identity of the ‘I’ to which my representations are attached. I am simultaneously already conscious of myself as judging that S is P in the sense of representing a total synthetic unity of representations, making it possible to determine S as P.

The question we now must consider is whether the OSUA is a given principle or a self- thought principle. That is, we must ask whether RS is true or AS is true. I argue that RS fails to capture Kant’s internality thesis, and thus fails to provide a plausible explanation of the capacity of the understanding. To show this, I will first examine two versions of RS that Kant rejects in the Transcendental Deduction of the Critique of Pure Reason. Then, I will show that the contemporary version of RS put forth most famously by Sellars and Kitcher also fails in the same way.

§2.1 RS and the Internality Thesis

In the Transcendental Deduction, Kant rejects what he calls a ‘preformationist’ account of the understanding, according to which we come equipped with pre-determined (“implanted”) rules for judging.39 The preformationist account of the understanding would

37 KrV, A113-114

38 Prol, AA 04:296

39 KrV, B167

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not be sufficient to account for the necessity and universality of our judgments, because it would make our judgments merely subjectively universal and necessary – that is, I would only be able to say that I must judge that P because I happen to be so constituted as to judge that P. But we are capable of objectively universal and necessary judgments – that is, we are capable of saying that P must be judged by all rational thinkers.

The empiricist’s account of the rules of judgment is also insufficient, since it too must hold that if there are such rules, they are merely habits of association, and thus only subjectively necessary and universal.

According to both preformationism and empiricism, judgment is determined in accordance with a principle that is itself determined externally. By rejecting these views, we are left with the thought that judgment is self-determined – that is, determined by the understanding itself, and thus through a self-determined principle.

Those who support RS could attempt to explain this self-determination of judgment in one of several ways, but will usually hold in any case that RS is not empiricism of the sort that Kant criticizes. Both Sellars and Kitcher, who have famously defended RS, hold that they are being true to Kant’s project of overcoming the limitations of Hume and the classical empiricists.40 They take RS to be a more sophisticated position, according to which the activity of a distinct capacity of understanding is necessary in the determination of judgment. If RS is true, then while the principle of the understanding is not ultimately self- determined, the determination of judgment must be considered a cooperative affair of the internal activity of the understanding alongside an external constraint or guide. According to RS, judgment is in a way self-determined for just this reason. But, as Sellars himself notes, the activity of judging is not pure activity, but an active/passive hybrid of sorts:

…the spontaneity of which we are conscious is, though not sheer passivity, nevertheless a passivity in that the inner development is set in motion by a foreign cause and follows a routine. In the awareness of noumenal activities of synthesis we would encounter simply another example of a cause the causality of which is caused.41

So, in line with Kant’s early definition of spontaneity, RS holds that the spontaneity of the understanding is a spontaneitas automatica, or one whose inner principle of determination is itself externally determined.42

Setting aside the rejected preformationist account, if we wish to understand Kant’s claims about the spontaneity of the understanding, then we must take the more sophisticated version of RS seriously. I will first look at two versions of RS that Kant already hopes to have refuted, both of which may be associated with classical empiricism: reductive causal-

40 (Sellars 1997) famously rejects the “Myth of the Given,” which might be ascribed to classical empiricism, and (Kitcher 1990) takes her account of the understanding to show how Kant improves upon Hume’s psychology.

41 (Sellars 1970, 23-24)

42 V-MET-L1/Pölitz, AA 28:267

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mechanism and natural teleology. We will see that what Kant takes to be the central flaw in both is that they rule out the internality thesis. By seeing how this is the case, we will later be able to see how it is also the case for the more sophisticated version of RS supported by Sellars and Kitcher.

§2.1.1 Habit and Self-Consciousness

One version of RS is the view that judgment is the result of habits of association. According to this view, judgments are formed on the basis of a principle of association: when you represent A, you represent B. This is a possibility that Kant considers and rejects as inadequate for understanding the self-determination of judgment.43 Kant first describes the need for a “subjective ground” or principle of association:

Since, however, if representations reproduced one another without distinction, just as they fell together, there would in turn be no determinate connection but merely unruly heaps of them, and no cognition at all would arise, their reproduction must thus have a rule in accordance with which a representation enters into combination in the imagination with one representation rather than with any others. This subjective and empirical ground of reproduction in accordance with rules is called the association of representations.44

If experience is to be more than “unruly heaps” of representations, those representations must be able to be reproduced in accordance with rules. This much was recognized by Hume, who says that such rules are acquired through habits. In turn, habits are themselves developments in accordance with some principle. Kant’s interpretation of Hume says that through habits of association, we learn to combine certain representations with some necessity.45 Hume’s explication of his own view includes remarks in the Treatise that we learn such habits of association through the relative degrees of enlivenment afforded to us through particular acts of perception. 46 That is, according to Hume, perceptions of constancy, resemblance, and regularity are enlivening perceptions – ones that make us more likely to reproduce them in the future. Now we might ask why it is enlivening to perceive constancy, resemblance, and regularity. It is enlivening either through brute causal-mechanistic force or through agreement with the perceiving subject. First consider the latter view.

Call this account the natural teleological account of judgment (NT):

43 At KrV, B5 and B19-20, he tells us that Hume’s associationism fails to account for the strict universality of judgments like those in mathematics; at B123n.b, he tells us that a subjective or implanted necessity (habit) would not prove the strict necessity of the relation between cause and effect; at B127-28, he similarly suggests the need to see beyond the limited perspective of Hume, i.e., beyond mere subjective necessity derived empirically through habit.

44 KrV, A121

45 KrV, B5

46 (Hume 1978, 1, 86)

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NT: The rational human, a kind of animal, develops habits of association (and thus judgments) through a recognition of what is good for it.47

Thus, the habits that account for the association of representations in a judgment would be developed through a kind of self-consciousness – a consciousness of what it is good for one to do or think. This, in turn, is a consciousness of something given to us – our animal nature. It might seem that this is enough to capture Kant’s internality thesis. That is, NT claims that a kind of self-consciousness is already internal to acts of judgment.

But while Kant agrees with Hume that there is a subjective ground of the principle of association, he explains that the principle of association is incapable of accounting for objective judgments (and it is therefore insufficient for knowledge):

But now if this unity of association did not also have an objective ground, so that it would be impossible for appearances to be apprehended by the imagination otherwise than under the condition of a possible synthetic unity of this apprehension, then it would also be entirely contingent whether appearances fit into a connection of human cognitions...

…For only because I ascribe all perceptions to one consciousness (of original apperception) can I say of all perceptions that I am conscious of them. There must therefore be an objective ground, i.e., one that can be understood a priori to all empirical laws of the imagination, on which rests the possibility, indeed even the necessity of a law extending through all appearances, a law, namely, for regarding them throughout as data of sense that are associable in themselves and subject to universal laws of a thoroughgoing connection in reproduction. I call this objective ground of all association of appearances their affinity.48

Our ability to combine representations into an objectively valid judgment – that is, one capable of predicating something of the object (viz., what is of it) – is necessarily governed by a principle that goes beyond the merely subjective and empirical ground of the principle of association. To be sure, we can associate representations in the Humean manner, and thereby combine them through habit in accordance with how we have learned to bring representations together in the past (thus entirely empirically, subjectively, and with only “comparative universality” 49).

But this would not be judgment, and the reasoning goes something like this. It is no accident that appearances – the undetermined objects of experience – “fit into” or have a place in a single unity of knowledge. If they did not fit into one unity of knowledge, then they could not all belong to one consciousness. To put it another way, if appearances did

47 I do not intend to interpret Hume as rejecting a merely causal-mechanistic account of cognition in favor of some form of natural teleology. I merely understand NT as one manifestation of RS that can be constructed from the materials given to us in Hume’s Treatise together with Kant’s treatment of empiricism in the Transcendental Deduction. Additionally, I regard NT as a charitable reconstruction of a Humean empiricism. For more on a teleological interpretation of Hume, see (Baier 1991).

48 KrV, A122

49 KrV, A92 and B3-4; see also “judgments of perception” vs. “judgments of experience” in the

Prolegomena.

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not necessarily fit into one unity of knowledge, then we would thereby confess that while some appearances may be objects of my knowledge, others are objects of my knowledge*, where ‘*’ indicates a distinct unity. But we would not say that I know that P unless it were in agreement with all my knowledge as one unity. The very fact that we have this ability suggests that all representations that could be thought by me must thereby belong to one unity of consciousness. Indeed, Kant famously states:

The I think must be able to accompany all my representations; for otherwise something would be represented in me that could not be thought at all, which is as much as to say that the representation would either be impossible or else at least would be nothing for me.50

If I consciously represent an object – that is, if I think it – I necessarily represent that object as belonging to a single unity of thought. And indeed, when I think objects, I represent them as agreeing with all the other possible objects of knowledge. I could not hold that some objects that I know fit together or agree with some other objects of my knowledge, while some objects that I know don’t, for this would entail a contradiction. This is why Kant says that in order to explain a priori knowledge – knowledge of what is necessarily and universally true – I must also think that what is known fits together with everything else that can be known, not in a hodgepodge manner, but necessarily. But if this is the case, it fits for some reason. Thus, we need a principle that explains this unity, and that principle is what Kant calls pure apperception.

If all we had at our disposal were a principle of association, then while some representations might belong to one unity of knowledge, others might belong to an entirely distinct unity of knowledge. This would make knowledge subjective, as “I would have as multicolored, diverse a self as I have representations of which I am conscious.”51 It would make knowledge subjective, that is, because it would allow knowledge to be bound to particular subjects (or kinds of subject). I might know that P here and now, and I* might know that Q there and then. But then what is known – what is the case – is carved up into what-is-the-case-for-I, what-is-the-case-for-I*, and so on. This sort of view is not incoherent, but it could not account for objective a priori knowledge.

§2.1.2 Process Accounts of Self-Consciousness, pt. 1: RS as Causal-Mechanism

We have looked at one empiricist account of self-consciousness that Kant rejects. Let us briefly turn to another kind of empiricist account of self-consciousness that Kant has equal reason for rejecting.

Assuming that the world behaves in accordance with causal-mechanistic laws, it is natural to look to causal-mechanism as a possible explanation of self-determination in judgment. The causal-mechanistic account, understood broadly, states that what I judge is causally

50 KrV, B131-132

51 KrV, B134

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necessitated by my antecedent mental states together with the laws of nature (hereafter CM).52 Below I examine a problem for CM.

As some commentators have pointed out, our naïve understanding of judgment poses a problem for CM. 53 In order for CM to provide an account of self-determination in judgment, it must be possible for us to attribute to ourselves a causal explanation of judgment. But, in order to be able to conceive of myself as mechanically caused to think (even if indirectly), I must have the capacity of identifying a mechanical cause and attributing it to my capacity for judgment. That is, I must be able to think “I am caused to judge that P.” But in making such a causal attribution, I am already aware of myself as deciding that the causal attribution is valid. The capacity of self-consciousness is already presupposed by any attempt to provide oneself with a purely causal-mechanical explanation of how one judges. So, a causal explanation will inevitably fail to fully explain the activity of judgment.

This argument may sound suspicious. For, it may sound as though the suggestion is as follows: because we necessarily think of ourselves as judging independently of causal- perceptual impingements on the senses, we cannot be caused to judge in this manner. But this would be akin to arguing that, for example, because I necessarily see the stick in the water as bent, it cannot be the case that the stick is not actually bent. This is clearly a bad argument. I think, however, that the argument can be shown to be convincing once it is more carefully examined.

As Kant has argued, for a representation to be my representation is for it to be available for my use in accordance with my capacity for judging. To judge that P is to judge in accordance with a principle or rule for forming the judgment. But to judge in accordance with a rule, according to CM, is an act that we can understand as external to consciousness. By its own lights, this must be true for CM. For, while consciousness may accompany the causally-related mental states, the causal relations themselves do not have to be understood through any kind of consciousness.

CM may allow us to explain rule-following of a sort – for example, it may be that CM can account for the way in which a ball is governed by a mechanical rule when it breaks the glass. There is perhaps a sense in which the ball accords with, and thus “follows” a rule. But it does not allow for an explanation according to which something consciously acts from a rule. To allow for this possibility, CM would have to build into its account of judging some non-causal condition, a condition of self-consciousness which is not couched in causal terms.

Self-consciousness, according to CM, is therefore something that merely accompanies the power of mechanical causation. Kant’s internality thesis, however, requires that acts of judgment are always already self-conscious acts – that is, internally self-conscious.

§2.1.3 Two Kinds of Internality of Self-Consciousness

52 RS is sometimes taken to be a version of CM. See, e.g., (Allison 1996) interpretation of Sellars and Kitcher.

53 (Pippin 1987, 46-47)

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What we have seen is that a plausible account of judgment rests on a plausible account of self-consciousness in judging. Furthermore, while NT’s account of judgment does make judgment internally self-conscious in some sense, it is not in the way we require for rational subjects.

I think that there are two distinct kinds of internality for self-consciousness, only one of which can capture Kant’s thought. First, consider what appears to be Kant’s view, based on our discussion above:

Cognitions can only be judgments if they are already self-conscious of one unity of knowledge (the understanding).
According to this view, judgment and the single unity of self-consciousness are inseparable, and self-consciousness is thereby intrinsic to judgment as such. Now consider the view of NT:
Cognitions are judgments when they are already self-conscious of a subjective unity of what is good for me.

According to NT, judgment is intrinsically self-conscious, but only relative to subjects or kinds of subjects (viz., particular forms of animal life).

(1) and (2) map onto two kinds of internality:

to Objective Internality: the principle of unity for forming judgments (self- consciousness) is internal to the subject through the concept of what is the case – i.e., internal to valid judgment as such, and thus objectively.54
to Subjective Internality: the principle of unity for forming judgments (self- consciousness) is internal to the subject relative to its given nature.55

Given Kant’s explanation of the internality of self-consciousness, Kant’s internality thesis requires us to think of the rational subject not as one with a given principle of thought – a given nature – but as judging in accordance with a self-determined principle. If it were the

54 Because I say “through the concept of what is the case” it might be asked whether the theory of absolute spontaneity I attribute to Kant is a conceptualist one. The conceptualism vs. non-conceptualism debate is a very difficult and important one, and I won’t be able to say anything convincing here. Tentatively, my reading is somewhere in between conceptualism and non-conceptualism as they are ordinarily conceived. I hold that every act of the understanding involves the “first pure cognition” of the understanding (KrV, B137)

the OSUA – through which all objective representation takes place. So, the OSUA is, in a sense, the representation through which all representation is objective for us. If this makes the OSUA conceptual, then I am a conceptualist. But, I suspect this is not the standard notion of conceptual. If so, then I very well may be considered a strange kind of non-conceptualist about the spontaneity of the understanding.

55 In turn, we can say that objective and subjective internality correspond to different kinds of unity. Objectively internal self-consciousness is a seamless unity – i.e., not unified out of some antecedent elements or parts, but prior to them; subjectively internal self-consciousness is an aggregated unity – i.e., unified out of some antecedent elements or parts. This is not unlike the distinctions drawn recently by (Conant 2017) and (Boyle 2016) between additive and constitutive accounts of rationality. The additive account of rationality is an account of the unity of rationality that takes it to be aggregated out of separate elements, and the constitutive account of rationality is an account of the unity of rationality that takes it to be seamless or prior to its parts.

In a previous version of this paper, I took NT (and all forms of teleological explanation) to account for a merely aggregative unity of cognition. I have since changed my mind. Teleological accounts of cognition can indeed account for seamless unity in judgment, which is why it is so important not to reduce all empiricist models of cognition to CM. In many ways, NT is an enormous improvement on CM. I hope this version of my paper exhibits this change.

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case that we judged in accordance with a given principle, then it would be inexplicable how we judge through a concept of what is rather than a concept of what is for me now, what is for me* then, etc.

§2.1.4 Process Accounts of Self-Consciousness, pt. 2: RS as Functionalism

I have outlined Kant’s arguments against two versions of empiricist explanations of self- determination in judgment. He rejects the view according to which self-consciousness (our self-conscious unity of knowledge) is merely subjectively internal to the subject. Now I will argue that even a contemporary version of RS, a functionalist account of the understanding, falls victim to the same sort of criticism.

Sellars and Kitcher on RS

The version of RS put forth by Sellars and Kitcher can be understood as a form of what contemporary philosophers of mind call ‘functionalism’ – the view according to which the basic elements of cognition can be understood in terms of their functional roles within a system.

In Sellars’s well-known contribution to Kantian scholarship, “…This I or He or It (the thing) which thinks…”, he compares the activity of synthesis to the processes of a computer. That is, we can understand judgment to be the combining of representations in accordance with rules given to the judging subject, triggered into action by an external input. According to this model of judgment, the judgment is produced by combining previous states of the system into a new one.56

Kitcher understands Kant in basically the same way, and dubs him a functionalist: What Kant offers…is an account of judgmental states remarkably like that defended by contemporary functionalists. Functionalism is the theory that the identity conditions for mental states are given in terms of their causal connections to stimuli, responses, and other (internal) states.57

Both Sellars and Kitcher thus support a kind of functionalism about the activity of the understanding (judging), which we can call RSF:

RSF: judgments are mental states produced out of antecedent mental states in accordance with certain rules of production.

This is a version of RS, according to our definition, because the principle of synthesis (here, rules of production) is not a self-thought principle. As noted earlier, the defenders of this view make it clear that they take themselves to be giving a plausible account of Kant’s view of spontaneity, and so one that reaches beyond the forms of empiricism rejected by Kant in the Deduction. In order to accomplish this, RSF must be a better account of self- consciousness in judgment than CM and NT.

Kitcher takes RSF to be superior to the empiricist accounts of judgment because it accounts for the causal connections between our states. Indeed, for Kitcher, judgment cannot be the product of a subject who merely tends to associate representations on the

56 (Sellars 1970, 23)

57 (Kitcher 1982, 66)

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basis of a habit. The empiricist is committed to such a view because the empiricist begins by looking at the impact of various impressions on a subject – i.e., with experience. But Kitcher, through Kant, begins with the conditions of the possibility of experience. Such conditions include among them a principle of causation, according to which the mind must be taken to be capable of causally organizing its perceptions in accordance with rules for forming judgments. Kitcher takes this to be Kant’s way of overcoming the empiricism of Hume.58

Sellars takes RSF to be superior to the empiricist accounts of judgment because it avoids the Myth of the Given. By assigning to the mind a set of dispositions through which perceptual inputs are taken up and informed, we do not have to think of impressions (“experience” for the empiricist) as a kind of basic point of departure for judgment. Rather, experience is always already informed by the dispositions through which perceptual inputs are taken up. This, like Kitcher’s project, helps to highlight a central insight of Kant’s – namely, that it is only through some internal activity of the mind that we can make sense of what is given in experience.59

Despite moving past the empiricism of Hume, RSF is criticized by Henry Allison and Robert Pippin on the grounds that it fails to do justice to the epistemic role of the ‘I think’ in Kant’s doctrine of pure apperception.60 We can break their shared worry down into the following basic point:

If it were the case that synthesis were merely combinations of antecedent mental states in accordance with given principles of cognition, then judgment would not necessarily be an act of what Allison calls “taking as.” As Allison says:

Reducing a long and complex story to its barest essentials, to judge is just to take some intuitively given item or set thereof as a determinate something…the main point is that [in] all cases of taking as, no matter how complex, the mind must not only combine its representations in a single consciousness, it must also be conscious of what it is doing.61

If judgment is “taking as”, then it is explanatorily insufficient to define judgment in purely functionalist terms, because those terms leave out the necessary first-personal component of judgment.

As Pippin has put it, even if we understand judgment as a mere process of combination, it would still be necessary for me to first-personally take my representation to be synthetically connected to others. So, no functionalist account of judgment is complete.

I am sympathetic with these concerns. But, to fully appreciate them, we need to see how they fall into the same category of anxieties that Kant had about the empiricist accounts of

58 (Kitcher 1990, 97)

59 (Sellars 1997)

60 Op. Cit., Pippin & Allison

61 (Allison 1995, 346)

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the understanding. Self-consciousness, according to RSF, remains subjectively internal to the judging subject. Now I will spell out more fully why I take this to be true.

The Subjective Internality of Self-Consciousness in RSF

One thing we have seen in the explication of Kant’s view is that pure self-consciousness is a condition on all a priori knowledge because it grounds necessity and universality. Nothing, that is, could be taken as objectively necessarily or objectively universally known unless it were related to pure self-consciousness, since pure self-consciousness is a consciousness of what I must think that is independent of my particular subjective constitution. And NT failed to capture this thought because it was only capable of explaining a subjective necessity and a subjective universality in judgment.

Likewise, RSF only guarantees a subjective necessity and universality in judgment. This is because it does not conceive of pure self-consciousness as an awareness of a single unity of knowledge. Instead, it conceives of pure self-consciousness as an awareness of the contentual interdependence of my actual states of judging. I will show why these are two different thoughts, and why Kant’s internality thesis relies on the former.

Kitcher takes Kant to be saying that when I judge, I am aware of the fact that my representations are all synthetically connected, for this is exactly how it is possible for me to judge in the first place (i.e., by bringing the content of my representations [e.g., {red} +

{ball}] together in various ways in order to produce judgments). The model Kitcher uses to explain the unity of self-consciousness is, as we have seen, a functionalist model along the following lines:

States M1 and M2 are combined in accordance with a rule to produce state M3, which is the synthetic product (a judgment).

On Kitcher’s view, Kant needs only to be able to say that the unity of self-consciousness – the single awareness of all my judgments as belonging together – is the result of a synthetic process. But a synthetic process such as the one just described does not require an awareness of a totality. Kitcher writes:

Kant’s contention was that subjects accepted representations as the basis for objective judgments just in case they could be fitted into their existing beliefs in a particular way: they were consistent with (or extended or coherently revised) their beliefs about the basic constituents of reality and their causal interrelations. Bringing a representation to the “objective unity of self-consciousness” would be a matter of determining its coherence with existing beliefs along the categorial dimensions of substance and cause, that is, “according to the principle of the objective determination of all representations.”62

62 (Kitcher 1999, 374)

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So, according to Kitcher’s functionalist interpretation of self-consciousness in judgment, the unity of self-consciousness that Kant speaks of is a unity of existing beliefs or judgments. The picture, then, is one according to which self-consciousness emerges with judgment: as I judge, I become aware of my (actual) judgments as cohering with my other (actual) judgments.

Now we can recall the motivation for Kant’s principle of pure self-consciousness: that all objects of knowledge necessarily fit, like pieces of a puzzle, into one body of knowledge. To be purely self-conscious is to be aware, in all acts of judgment, that my representations belong to me and all my other possible acts of knowing. We can also recall the problem faced by NT: that their conception of self-consciousness in judgment is a merely subjective conception, or one that says what we are aware of is how I must judge given my particular constitution as a subject belonging to a particular form of animal life.

But this is not the thought that we have attributed to Kant, which is that all judgments presuppose an awareness of a single unity of knowledge. The reason why Kant takes pure self-consciousness – an awareness of a single unity of knowledge – to be the ground of objectivity in judgment is that it is an awareness of a totality. Or, in other words, the reason why Kant takes pure self-consciousness to be the ground of objectivity in judgment is that it is an awareness of my judgment as valid for any thinker, because it is a judgment of the way things are. But this requires a consciousness of a totality that precedes the combination of my actual judgments.

To see this more clearly, consider another objection to the functionalist. Melnick criticizes functionalist interpretations of Kant by suggesting that Kant could not have held that self- consciousness is the product of anything sub-personal.63 The functionalist interpretation, he thinks, is sub-personal in two senses: first, because it holds that the unity of our various states and functions is not literally the subject itself; and second, because it holds that these states and functions do not consciously belong to the subject. While it does not seem to me that the functionalist necessarily believes the latter, the former does express a worry similar to mine. My worry might be seen as an expansion on Melnick’s. I hold that even if RSF gave up on the view that pure self-consciousness were an emergent product of sub- personal processes – that is, even if it conceded that it is no product at all, but that self- consciousness is always already attached to every act of judgment – the account would still be unacceptably sub-personal in an important sense. While the functionalist might hold that self-consciousness and judgment are inextricably bound to one another, she still holds that it is through acts of synthesis that self-consciousness becomes intelligible. But, if I am right, then for Kant it is the other way around: it is through self-consciousness that acts of synthesis become intelligible.

Finally, I want to suggest that it is no accident that RSF holds the view that pure self- consciousness is merely a consciousness of the unity of my actual judgments. It is no accident because it is a process account of self-consciousness. The product of a process of combination is a unity through its parts. We understand M3 by first understanding M1 and

63 (Melnick 2009, 70)

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M2, the states that produced M3. If self-consciousness is intelligible through synthesis, as it is for functionalists, then the character of self-consciousness is determined by an actual combination of states. So, it makes sense for the functionalist to hold that the self- consciousness internal to judgment is a self-consciousness relative to the actual judgments of an individual subject.64

§3 Conclusion: Avoiding Constructive Idealism

I have attributed to Kant the thought that self-consciousness is absolutely internal to judgment. Based on this thought, we have seen that the various “relative spontaneity” approaches to explaining the understanding will fail. In particular, even though the functionalist version put forth by Sellars and Kitcher is intended to truly account for what Kant is up to in the Transcendental Deduction, it fails for the same basic reason that all empiricist accounts of judgment fail – that is, it fails because it makes self-consciousness only subjectively internal to judgment. If I am right, then Kant holds (for good reason) that the understanding is absolutely spontaneous, so governed by a self-thought internal principle.

Now, some might worry that the absolute spontaneity of the understanding would, contrary to what I have claimed, make the objectivity of knowledge impossible. After all, they will point out, if the understanding is absolutely spontaneous, then its valid exercises – objectively valid judgments – are entirely determined by itself. But, if so, then how could we avoid what Kant already takes to be a philosophically undesirable conclusion – namely, that knowledge is a subjective construction? I will briefly spell out this anxiety and then gesture at a way to relieve it.

I have discussed objectively valid judgment in quite general terms. Thus far we have understood it to consist of a necessary and universal form that excludes judgment from being a haphazard or arbitrary association of representations. This perhaps gives us a first pass at what it means to distinguish between subjective and objective validity, but more needs to be said about what kind of rational norm objective validity is.

Kant interpreters generally take objective validity to be a kind of objective purport in judgment – that is, they take it to refer to the ability of a judgment to be successfully applied to the world. According to this interpretation, objectively valid judgments need not be true judgments. Robert Hanna draws the distinction between subjective and objective validity as follows:

Subjective validity = apparent meaningfulness and apparent truth for an individual rational cognizer

64 I should point out that I do not deny that our cognition can be merely relatively spontaneous. For example, some of our judgments are only subjectively necessary, such as those that Kant in the Prolegomena calls judgments of perception. The mere subjective necessity of my associating the representations [sun], [stone], and [warmth] can have a natural teleological basis or even a causal-mechanistic basis. What I deny, however, is that the paradigm case of judgment – what Kant in the Prolegomena calls a judgment of experience – can be relatively spontaneous. Judgments of experience, since objectively valid, are acts of rational self- determination.

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Objective validity = “empirical meaningfulness” of judgment, intuition, or concept 65

In turn, Hanna argues that objective validity is a “necessary but not sufficient condition of truth…for false judgments are also objectively valid (A58/B83). In this way the objective validity of a judgment is equivalent to its propositional truth-valuedness, but not equivalent to its propositional truth”.

So, according to Hanna, we can understand objectively valid judgment as judgment that could indeed come to be true. This, together with the thought that objective validity is the same as empirical meaningfulness, expresses the idea that objectively valid judgment is objective purport as I have described it. Clinton Tolley also argues that objectively valid judgment is judgment with objective purport. He notes that while “Kant’s use of the term fluctuates to some degree”, nevertheless he takes false judgments to be objectively valid.66 However, it is also possible to read Kant as holding that objectively valid judgment is true judgment. Stephen Engstrom, for instance, has argued for this view.67

If objective validity is, as Tolley believes, a merely possible relation to the object, then it will be important for me to demonstrate that this relation is self-determined. If objective validity is truth, as Engstrom believes, then it will be important for me not only to demonstrate that truth is self-determined, but to show that the self-determination of truth is not the same as a “creation” of truth. Thus, there is a lingering concern about identifying objective validity with truth. To do so would be to hold that all objectively valid judgment is true judgment. But, as a related matter, if all objectively valid judgment is true judgment, and objective validity is a thoroughly internal matter, then how could we avoid the conclusion that objectively valid judgment is an internal creation, or an artifact? If objectively valid judgment is a mere construction, then it entails a constructive idealism. I will conclude this paper by suggesting a possible way out for Kant.

On the one hand, the truth interpretation holds that objective validity in and of a judgment amounts to truth in judgment. Coming to know the truth, or becoming an objectively valid judgment, presupposes the original synthetic unity of apperception. In virtue of its being original, it is a fully self-determined unity. Thus, knowledge is an absolutely spontaneous inner activity.

On the other hand, the objective purport interpretation holds that objective validity in and of a judgment is the judgment’s empirical meaningfulness or counterfactual relation to an object – i.e., a judgment is objectively valid when it could be either true or false or when it is actually applicable to objects in the world. Coming to be truth-valued, or empirically meaningful, or empirically applicable, also presupposes the original synthetic unity of apperception, because any actual judgment is secondary to the unity of judgment. Thus, knowledge is an absolutely spontaneous inner activity.

Thus far what I have argued is that on either interpretation, objectively valid judgment entails absolute spontaneity for Kant. But what about the worry that this also entails a

65 (Hanna 2017)

66 (Tolley 2011, 9-11)

67 (Engstrom 2017, 4, footnote 5); (Engstrom 2016, 19)

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constructive idealism? As I have argued, the principle of self-determination in judgment is for Kant the original synthetic unity of apperception. Furthermore, the original synthetic unity of apperception is absolutely internal to judgment, so self-thought. If this is correct, then the self-determination in judging is not an act external to the judgment itself – that is, to self-determine in judgment is not for the subject to act on judgment, but for the judgment to emerge as an activity of thought. The internality of self-determination in judgment is enough to show that to judge is not to act as a craftsman acts on his creations. Now, in addition to eliminating the craftsman metaphor, it is also important to see that in both cases, while objectively valid judgment is absolutely spontaneous inner activity, it rests on the conditions of sensibility – i.e. of being given objects through the senses. Thus, unlike the spontaneity of transcendental freedom in Kant’s practical philosophy, the spontaneity of the understanding is a spontaneity in relation to something given to the thinking subject.

But I want to suggest that resting on the conditions of sensibility is not the same as being determined by sensibility. A capacity of receptivity is necessary for the absolute spontaneity of knowing through judgment. As (Engstrom 2006) argues, there is a sense in which the spontaneity of human cognition is limited: we do not cognize through intellectual intuition, as God would. So, we are in some sense limited because our cognition requires a capacity of receptivity. But this alone does not entail that it is the reception of objects that determines our acts of cognition.

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Engstrom, Stephen. 2017. "Knowledge and its Object." In Kant's Critique of Pure Reason: A Critical Guide, by James R. O'Shea, 28-45. Cambridge: Cambridge UP.

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Hume, David. 1978. A Treatise of Human Nature. Edited by L. A. Selby-Bigge and P. H. Nidditch. Oxford: Clarendon.

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Sellars, Wilfrid. 1970. "...this I or He or It (The thing) which thinks..." Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical Association 44: 5-31.

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¿Por qué la psicología empírica no es una ciencia natural?

Una lectura del “Prólogo” a los Primeros principios metafísicos de la ciencia de la naturaleza de Kant.

Why is Empirical Psychology not a Natural Science?

A Reading of the “Preface” to Kant’s Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science

MARTÍN ARIAS-ALBISU 

Universidad de Buenos Aires/CONICET, Argentina

Resumen

En el “Prólogo” a sus Primeros principios metafísicos de la ciencia de la naturaleza, Kant sostiene que la psicología empírica, a diferencia de la física matemática y la química flogística, no es una ciencia de la naturaleza. Este artículo se propone ofrecer una interpretación de las razones por las cuales Kant atribuye este estatus a la psicología empírica. Mostraré, por un lado, que la psicología empírica no posee un carácter científico en sentido propio como la física matemática porque los fenómenos internos no pueden presentarse a priori como movimientos en el espacio; y, por el otro, que esta psicología no posee un carácter científico en sentido impropio como la química flogística porque no es posible realizar experimentos ni observaciones rigurosas en el dominio del sentido interno. La psicología empírica es una mera descripción natural, sistemática y clasificatoria, de los fenómenos del sentido interno.

Palabras clave

Psicología empírica, Ciencia natural, Química flogística, Física matemática.

Resumen

In the “Preface” to his Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, Kant holds that empirical psychology, in contrast to mathematical physics and phlogistic chemistry, is not a natural science.

Profesor de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras de la UBA e investigador de CONICET. E-mail de contacto:

arias.martin@gmail.com

[Recibido: 24 de octubre 2017

Aceptado: 14 de noviembre 2017]

Martín Arias-Albisu

This article aims to offer an interpretation of the reasons why Kant assigns this status to empirical psychology. I will show, on the one hand, that empirical psychology does not have a proper scientific character like mathematical physics because inner phenomena cannot be presented a priori like movements in space; and, on the other hand, that this psychology does not have an improper scientific character like phlogistic chemistry because it is not possible to conduct experiments nor rigorous observations in the domain of inner sense. Empirical psychology is a mere systematic and classificatory natural description of the phenomena of inner sense.

Keywords

Empirical psychology, Natural science, Phlogistic chemistry, Mathematical physics.

Introducción

La psicología empírica, para Immanuel Kant, es el conocimiento que el sujeto tiene de sí mismo por medio de su sentido interno. El objetivo de este artículo es brindar una interpretación de los motivos por los cuales Kant, en el “Prólogo” a sus Primeros principios metafísicos de la ciencia de la naturaleza, sostiene que esta psicología no es una ciencia de la naturaleza. 1 En el prólogo mencionado, Kant mantiene que la física matemática es una ciencia de la naturaleza en un sentido “propio” del término, mientras que la química lo es en un sentido “impropio”. A fin de comprender el carácter no científico de la psicología empírica, debe explicarse por qué esta disciplina no es una ciencia en sentido propio como la física matemática, ni una ciencia en sentido impropio como la química. Por tanto, la exposición del estatus no científico de la psicología empírica presupone una exposición de los diferentes estatus científicos de la física matemática y la química. A fin de brindar estas exposiciones, dividiré este artículo en tres secciones. La primera de ellas explicará el status científico en sentido propio de la física matemática. La segunda sección esclarecerá el estatus científico en sentido impropio de la química. Por último, en la tercera sección se expondrá el estatus no científico de la psicología empírica.

1 Emplearé las siguientes abreviaturas de las obras de Kant: Anth = Anthropologie in pragmatischer Hinsicht (Antropología en sentido pragmático), Ko = Anthropologie Dohna-Wundlacken (Antropología Dohna- Wundlacken; apuntes de lecciones de antropología dadas por Kant en el semestre de invierno de 1791-1792), KrV = Kritik der reinen Vernunftt (Crítica de la razón pura), Log = Logik Jäsche (Lógica Jäsche), MAN = Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Naturwissenschaft (Primeros principios metafísicos de la ciencia de la naturaleza), V-Anth/Fried = Vorlesungen Wintersemester 1775/1776 Friedländer (Antropología Friedländer; notas de lecciones de antropología ofrecidas por Kant durante el semestre de invierno de 1775- 1776), V-Anth/Mensch = Vorlesungen Wintersemester 1781/1782 Menschenkunde (Antropología Menschenkunde; apuntes de lecciones de antropología dadas por Kant en el semestre de invierno de 1781- 1782), V-Anth/Pillau = Vorlesungen Wintersemester 1777/1778 Pillau (Antropología Pillau; apuntes de lecciones de antropología dadas por Kant en el semestre de invierno de 1777-1778), y V-Ph/Danziger = Danziger Physik (Física Danzig; notas de lecciones de física dadas por Kant durante el semestre de verano de 1785). Doy las referencias a KrV según la paginación de la primera (1781 = A) y la segunda (1787 = B) ediciones originales. Todas las referencias a otros textos de Kant, con excepción de Ko (Kant, 1924), son dadas de acuerdo con el tomo y la paginación de la edición académica de las obras de Kant (AA = Akademie- Ausgabe; Kant, 1900ss.). Las traducciones al español utilizadas son las siguientes: para KrV, Kant (2009); para MAN, Kant (1989 y 1993. Ambas versiones fueron consideradas para ofrecer una traducción única). Modifiqué ciertos pasajes de estas traducciones para brindar versiones más fieles al original alemán.

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¿Por qué la psicología empírica no es una ciencia natural?

En el período de MAN (1786) y KrV (1781/1787), la química que Kant tiene in mente es la química flogística tradicional elaborada particularmente por Georg E. Stahl (1660-1734).2 A diferencia de la física matemática, la química flogística no es una ciencia de la naturaleza en sentido propio porque la matemática no puede aplicarse adecuadamente dentro de su ámbito. Seguiré la interpretación de H. Blomme (2011 y 2015) acerca de esta diferencia entre la física matemática y la química flogística.3 En pocas palabras, de acuerdo con Blomme, en MAN, Kant expone un conocimiento metafísico a priori acerca de los objetos materiales en general tomando al movimiento como característica fundamental de la materia (MAN, AA 04: 476-477). Este conocimiento metafísico pertenece a la parte pura de la física matemática y fundamenta la aplicación adecuada de la matemática dentro del campo de esta física (MAN, AA 04: 470-472). Pero, como se señala en esa obra, los procesos químicos no pueden, como las interacciones de los cuerpos materiales en general estudiadas por la física matemática, ser presentados a priori como movimientos en el espacio. Por tanto, estos procesos no pueden recibir la aplicación adecuada de la matemática que se fundamenta en el mencionado conocimiento metafísico (MAN, AA 04: 470-471). Sin embargo, para Kant, la química flogística posee un carácter científico, aunque en un sentido impropio del término. Según la lectura original que defenderé, esta química alcanza el estatus de ciencia de la naturaleza porque puede ser sistemática y experimental (Ibid.).

Como adelanté, la psicología que Kant considera en el “Prólogo” a MAN es la psicología empírica. Esta psicología no es una ciencia de la naturaleza, sino una “descripción de la naturaleza” que clasifica de manera sistemática los fenómenos del sentido interno.4 La psicología empírica no es una ciencia de la naturaleza por dos motivos. En primer lugar, los estados y procesos del sentido interno están dados únicamente en el tiempo. Estos estados y procesos no pueden admitir la aplicación adecuada de la matemática que es fundamentada por el conocimiento metafísico presentado en MAN, ya que éste versa sobre los objetos materiales dados en el espacio (MAN, AA 04: 471). Además, Kant afirma, en el “Prólogo” mencionado, que la única ley que podría resultar de la aplicación de la matemática al sentido interno es la que expresa la continuidad del flujo de los fenómenos dados en este sentido (Ibid.). Por consiguiente, la psicología empírica, al igual que la química flogística, no es una ciencia en sentido propio como la física matemática. En segundo lugar, no es posible efectuar experimentos materiales ni en el dominio del sentido interno propio ni en el del ajeno. Más aún, Kant estima que ni siquiera es posible observar rigurosamente nuestros propios estados internos (Ibid.). Por tanto, la psicología empírica no puede ser una ciencia en sentido impropio tal como lo es la química flogística.

2 Cf. Friedman (1992, p. 265), Carrier (2001) y Blomme (2011 y 2015). De acuerdo con Friedman (1992, p. 289), Kant habría adoptado la química antiflogística de Lavoisier a más tardar en 1795.

3 Acerca de la física matemática como ciencia en sentido propio y la química flogística como ciencia en sentido impropio, véase MAN (AA 04: 468-471) y las dos primeras secciones del presente artículo.

4 En KrV, Kant ofrece una crítica de la pretendida ciencia denominada “psicología racional”. Por otro lado,

P. Kitcher defendió la tesis según el “método trascendental” introducido por Kant en KrV debe entenderse como una “psicología trascendental”. Acerca de estos dos puntos, véase infra, n. 23.

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Mi exposición incluirá una explicación de la tesis kantiana según la cual, mientras que la química flogística podría convertirse en ciencia en sentido propio en algún momento futuro, la psicología empírica nunca podrá ser más que una descripción de la naturaleza.5

La física matemática: ciencia en sentido propio

La química flogística y la psicología empírica no son ciencias en un sentido propio del término porque la matemática no puede aplicarse adecuadamente en sus dominios. Debe señalarse que la aplicación adecuada de la matemática en el campo de una disciplina no significa meramente que el objeto de esta disciplina sea mensurable.6 De hecho, aunque Kant consideraba que la química flogística no era una ciencia en sentido propio, estaba familiarizado con desarrollos contemporáneos en el marco de esa disciplina que entrañaban la mensurabilidad de ciertos fenómenos químicos. 7 Y, aunque fuese posible adscribir a Kant una concepción de la psicología según la cual esta disciplina admitiese cierta

5 El único trabajo que conozco que estudie los estatus de la química y la psicología mediante un contraste con la física es el de Nayak y Sotnak (1995). La tesis central de estos autores es que la aplicación de la matemática que garantiza el estatus de ciencia en sentido estricto consiste en la posibilidad de formular a priori leyes matemáticas acerca de fuerzas fundamentales atractivas y repulsivas de los objetos externos (pp. 147-150. Cf. MAN, AA 04: 496ss.). En las dos primeras secciones de este trabajo intentaré mostrar, siguiendo a Blomme (2011 y 2015), que esa aplicación de la matemática, más bien, consiste en la posibilidad de construir como movimientos en la intuición pura del espacio conceptos fundamentales del objeto de una disciplina que estén vinculados con la materia en general. Véase infra, n. 14.
6 S. Körner parece sostener la concepción contraria. Körner señala que el principio de las “Anticipaciones de la percepción” de KrV establece que las sensaciones tienen que poseer un grado de intensidad. Según A, tal principio dice: “En todos los fenómenos, tiene la sensación, y lo real que a ella le corresponde en el objeto (realitas phaenomenon) una cantidad intensiva, es decir, un grado” (A166). De acuerdo con B, este principio reza: “En todos los fenómenos, lo real, que es un objeto de la sensación, tiene una cantidad intensiva, es decir, un grado” (B207). Según Körner, el mencionado principio muestra que la matemática puede ser aplicada para medir sensaciones. La formulación de A parecería ofrecer más sustento para la interpretación de Körner que la de B, porque en esta última no se menciona la sensación misma, sino “lo real, que es un objeto de la sensación”. Sin embargo, Körner cita sólo la formulación de B. (Un ejemplo dado por Kant de medición de sensaciones, el cual no es citado por Körner, es el siguiente: “podré componer el grado de las sensaciones de la luz solar con unas 200.000 iluminaciones de la luna”. A179/B221). Körner concluye que tal vez pueda afirmarse que “al formular el principio de las anticipaciones Kant previó la necesidad de una justificación filosófica de toda la así llamada psicometría y de parte de la así llamada econometría, y proporcionó una justificación de esa clase” (Körner 1955, p. 81). Por tanto, en este contexto, Körner parece equiparar la mensurabilidad del objeto de dos disciplinas con la justificación del carácter científico de las mismas. De modo similar, A. Wolf mantiene que Kant “no consideraba la psicología como una ciencia […] [p]ues identificaba la ciencia con el tratamiento cuantitativo y exacto de los fenómenos […] y no pensaba que los procesos mentales pudiesen alguna vez ser medidos” (Wolf 1952, p. 692). Debo la referencia a estos pasajes a Nayak y Sotnak (1995, pp. 144-145). Finalmente, P. Kitcher sostiene que, para Kant, la psicología nunca podrá ser una ciencia “porque una ciencia debe ser cuantitativa pero las cualidades que encontramos en la sensación no pueden ser cuantificadas” (Kitcher 1991, p. 209, n. 21. Cf. Kitcher 1990, p. 11). Kitcher parece no tener en cuenta que, como destacó Körner, en las “Anticipaciones de la percepción” de KrV Kant, aparentemente, intenta mostrar que las cualidades dadas en la sensación deben poseer grados de intensidad.
7 Acerca de este tema, véase Nayak y Sotnak (1995, p. 145) y McNulty (2014, p. 395).
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¿Por qué la psicología empírica no es una ciencia natural?

medición, esta circunstancia no implicaría que la mencionada psicología fuese una ciencia en sentido propio.8
A fin de mostrar en qué sentido la química flogística y la psicología empírica no son ciencias en sentido propio, es preciso explicar anteriormente en qué sentido la física matemática es una ciencia de esa clase. Esta explicación debe consistir, fundamentalmente, en una presentación del motivo por el cual la matemática puede aplicarse adecuadamente en el dominio de la física matemática. En esta sección, en primer lugar, presentaré sucintamente esta última disciplina y, en segundo lugar, mostraré por qué ella admite la aplicación mencionada.
La física matemática es la ciencia de la materia o de los objetos de los sentidos externos. Esta ciencia posee una parte pura y una parte empírica. La primera es el fundamento de la segunda. La parte pura contiene a su vez una parte trascendental y otra metafísica. La parte trascendental de la física matemática no es presentada en MAN, sino en KrV. Efectivamente, el conocimiento a priori contenido en la mencionada parte trascendental está compuesto por los principios del entendimiento puro presentados y justificados en la primera Crítica (véase A148/B187ss.). Estos principios trascendentales expresan la aplicación de las diferentes categorías a distintos aspectos de la multiplicidad empírica dada en la sensibilidad. En virtud de esta aplicación, la multiplicidad empírica se constituye como objeto empírico en general. Así, los mencionados principios determinan y posibilitan la forma de la naturaleza en general, sin hacer referencia a la naturaleza particular de un objeto empírico o una clase de ellos (MAN, AA 04: 469-470). Por ejemplo, el principio del entendimiento correspondiente a la categoría de causalidad y dependencia establece: “[t]odas las alteraciones suceden según la ley de la conexión de la causa y el efecto” (B232).
La parte metafísica de la física matemática es expuesta en MAN. Esta parte metafísica contiene la totalidad de los conocimientos a priori acerca de los objetos materiales que pueden obtenerse aplicando los principios trascendentales del entendimiento y, por tanto, las categorías, a un concepto empírico muy general de materia (MAN, AA 04: 469-477). Por tanto, la mencionada parte metafísica, a diferencia de la parte trascendental, se refiere a los objetos empíricos de una clase particular, a saber, los objetos materiales dados a los sentidos externos (MAN, AA 04: 469-470). Debe notarse que la determinación esencial de la materia es el movimiento, dado que sólo mediante el movimiento pueden ser afectados los sentidos mencionados (MAN, AA 04: 476. Véase infra). En cada capítulo de MAN, Kant presenta una determinación diferente de la materia móvil e intenta mostrar que ella corresponde a una categoría diferente (MAN, AA 04: 476- 477). Al principio del entendimiento correspondiente a la categoría de causalidad y dependencia, el cual mencioné anteriormente, le corresponde en MAN la segunda ley de la mecánica: “toda alteración de la materia tiene una causa externa” (MAN, AA 04: 543).

8 Véase en supra, n. 6 la tesis de Körner acerca de que las “Anticipaciones de la percepción” hacen posible la medición de sensaciones. Esta mensurabilidad, según Körner, justificaría el carácter científico de la psicometría. Para una crítica de las tesis de Körner, véase Nayak y Sotnak (1995, pp. 148-149).
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Martín Arias-Albisu

Ambas clases de proposiciones fundamentales son a priori y, por tanto, universales y necesarias.
Como adelanté, la parte metafísica de la física matemática que acabo de exponer es la que garantiza la aplicabilidad adecuada de la matemática en el campo de esta ciencia. Siguiendo a H. Blomme, intentaré mostrar ahora detalladamente en qué consiste esa aplicabilidad adecuada. Para este comentarista, la mencionada aplicabilidad entraña la posibilidad de construir matemáticamente las propiedades fundamentales del objeto de la física, esto es, la materia. Según Kant, “[c]onstruir un concepto significa: exhibir a priori la intuición que le corresponde” (A713/B741).9 Blomme cita la siguiente afirmación hecha por Kant en el “Prólogo” a MAN: “[a]hora bien, con el fin de hacer posible la aplicación de la matemática a la doctrina de los cuerpos, que sólo mediante ella puede llegar a ser ciencia de la naturaleza, tienen que presentarse previamente principios de la construcción de los conceptos que pertenecen a la posibilidad de la materia en general” (MAN, AA 04: 472; Blomme, 2015, 484-485). Blomme interpreta que la parte metafísica de la física matemática tiene que suministrar los conceptos fundamentales a priori que determinan, de una manera general, el objeto de esta ciencia. A diferencia de la geometría, la física no se ocupa de la esencia de conceptos que dependen de su construcción en la intuición pura del espacio, sino de la existencia del objeto de los sentidos externos. Por tanto, los mencionados conceptos fundamentales no tienen que depender de la construcción matemática. “Sin embargo, estos conceptos tendrán que ser tales que puedan, en principio, ser construidos, al mostrar cómo pueden ser presentados como casos del concepto general de movimiento que Kant afirma que es la determinación fundamental de la materia” (Blomme 2015, p. 493. Véase infra).
Como el conocimiento empírico de la materia queda fuera del alcance de la metafísica de la naturaleza corpórea, “Kant tiene que encontrar una expresión de la naturaleza empírica de la materia que sea sin embargo construible en la intuición a priori” (Blomme 2015, p. 496). De esta manera, “la naturaleza empírica de la materia” será “integrada en la presentación completa de determinaciones sintéticas a priori que especifican el concepto de materia” (Ibid.). Blomme intenta mostrar por qué, para Kant, esa característica fundamental de la materia es el movimiento. En primer lugar, este comentarista observa que todo nuestro conocimiento de objetos materiales depende de la percepción. La percepción sería un efecto de un objeto empírico externo sobre nuestra sensibilidad. Este influjo sobre los sentidos externos se denominaría “afección empírica” (Blomme 2015, pp. 496-497). A continuación, Blomme arguye que Kant llega a la concepción del movimiento como determinación fundamental de la materia mediante un análisis del sentido y las condiciones de la afección empírica (Blomme 2015, p. 497).10

9 Por ejemplo, consideramos los predicados contenidos en el concepto de triangulo (“figura”, “tres” y “segmento de recta”) y producimos, en la intuición pura del espacio, intuiciones formales de triángulos particulares.
10 “No sería posible obtener conocimiento de objetos externos diferentes si el efecto que tuvieran sobre nuestros sentidos fuese siempre el mismo, del mismo modo que una cualidad que pertenezca a todo objeto no podría ser percibida empíricamente. El hecho de que el concepto de materia haya de ser conectado con la
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N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 165-185
ISSN: 2386-7655
Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095671
¿Por qué la psicología empírica no es una ciencia natural?

Según Blomme, el predicable del movimiento se obtiene al conectar el predicable de la alteración, considerado como realizado en el tiempo, con el espacio como forma pura de la intuición externa. Además, el predicable del movimiento puede ser realizado objetivamente de modo a priori o empírico. Puede realizarse el movimiento de manera a priori como descripción geométrica (por ejemplo, moviendo un punto en la intuición pura del espacio a fin de trazar una línea). El movimiento puede también realizarse empíricamente como movimiento físico, cuando es dado en la experiencia. Sin embargo, el contenido lógico del predicable del movimiento como característica fundamental de la materia es en ambos casos el mismo: “alteración real de relaciones externas” (Blomme 2015, p. 498).
Por otro lado, en la “Foronomía” de MAN, “la materia es […] determinada ulteriormente como lo movible en el espacio, y Kant mostrará cómo la determinación fundamental es especificada por la construcción a priori de las propiedades que le pertenecen como magnitud extensiva: velocidad y dirección” (Blomme 2015, pp. 498- 499). Lo móvil se presenta así, en lo que hace a sus propiedades cuantitativas, de modo a priori en la intuición del espacio mediante el trazado de segmentos de recta que pueden ser combinados o compuestos.
En los capítulos siguientes de MAN, Kant muestra cómo la cualidad, la relación y la modalidad de los objetos materiales pueden vincularse con presentaciones de movimientos. Por motivos de brevedad, no haré mención de la modalidad de estos objetos. Mientras que la cualidad de los objetos materiales consiste en el llenado del espacio, su relación viene dada por la comunicación del movimiento. Ambas determinaciones son definidas en términos de sus efectos sobre el movimiento. Por ejemplo, la cualidad de la materia puede entenderse como la resistencia que una materia ofrece a la penetración, por parte de otra materia, del espacio que ella llena (MAN, AA 04: 496-498).11
El expuesto conocimiento metafísico hace posible la aplicación de la matemática para la explicación de la interacción mecánica de los cuerpos en general.

afección empírica, esto es, con la materia o los cuerpos materiales que afectan nuestros sentidos externos, significa que el cambio de estados receptivos en el sujeto es un cambio de relaciones externas. Para Kant, todo cambio real tiene que ocurrir en el tiempo y cada relación externa es per definitionem una relación en el espacio. La afección empírica, por tanto, significa fundamentalmente: cambio (en el tiempo) de relaciones externas (en el espacio). Ahora bien, el único concepto que puede expresar a priori un cambio de relaciones externas y es al mismo tiempo construible en la intuición a priori es el concepto de movimiento. Este es el contexto oculto detrás de la observación aparentemente inocente de Kant en el prefacio a Fundamentos metafísicos, de que la determinación fundamental de algo que es el objeto de los sentidos externos tiene que ser el movimiento, porque es sólo por el movimiento que estos sentidos pueden ser afectados (MAN 4: 476). El ‘movimiento’ es por tanto el único concepto que puede a la vez ‘esquematizar’ a priori la afección empírica (y por tanto también la naturaleza empírica del concepto de materia) y ser construido matemáticamente (a saber, como descripción en la intuición a priori del espacio).” (Blomme 2015, p. 497).
11 Las líneas generales de las tesis presentadas en este párrafo fueron expuestas por McNulty (2014, p. 402). Véase MAN (AA 04: 476ss.).
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La química flogística: ciencia en sentido impropio

Se ha mostrado que, en MAN, Kant presenta principios metafísicos acerca de los objetos materiales en general tomando al movimiento como característica fundamental de la materia. Como las reacciones químicas de las diferentes materias no pueden ser presentadas a priori como movimientos en la intuición pura del espacio, ellas no pueden fundamentarse en los mencionados principios. Por tanto, la química flogística es una ciencia en sentido impropio del término y contiene solamente leyes causales empíricas.12 Sin embargo, Kant estima que en un futuro esas reacciones podrían coordinarse de alguna manera con los mencionados principios y ser así fundamentadas por ellos. En este caso, los conceptos centrales de la química se tornarían construibles, porque podrían reducirse a ciertos movimientos susceptibles de exhibirse a priori en la intuición externa. La química sería entonces una ciencia en sentido propio. Efectivamente, la aplicabilidad adecuada de la matemática dentro de su campo quedaría justificada en la medida en que se expusiesen principios que determinen la construcción de conceptos centrales de la química que serían inherentes a la materia en general (Blomme 2015, p. 499).13
Cito a continuación uno de los pasajes más relevantes del “Prólogo” de MAN para el problema del estatus de la química flogística:

Mientras no se encuentre entonces, todavía, un concepto que pueda construirse para las acciones químicas de las materias unas sobre otras, es decir, hasta tanto no se dé una ley de aproximación o alejamiento de las partes, de acuerdo con la cual, por ejemplo, en proporción a sus densidades o propiedades análogas, sus movimientos y las consecuencias de éstos puedan hacerse intuibles y presentarse a priori en el espacio (una exigencia que difícilmente podrá ser alguna vez realizada), entonces la química no puede llegar a ser nada más que arte sistemático o doctrina experimental, pero nunca una ciencia propiamente dicha, porque sus principios son meramente empíricos y no admiten ninguna presentación a priori en la intuición. Consiguientemente, ellos no hacen comprensibles en lo más mínimo los principios de los fenómenos químicos según su posibilidad, porque ellos son incapaces para la aplicación de la matemática. (MAN, AA 04: 470-471).

12 En el “Prólogo” a MAN se afirma: “[l]a ciencia de la naturaleza […] sería llamada o propia [eigentlich] o impropiamente [uneigentlich] ciencia de la naturaleza; la primera trata su objeto completamente de acuerdo con principios a priori; la segunda de acuerdo con leyes de la experiencia” (AA 04: 468). A continuación, se aclara que los principios de explicación de la química son meramente empíricos (Ibid.). Estos pasajes podrían dar la impresión de que, mientras que la química es puramente empírica, la física es enteramente a priori. El que la química sea exclusivamente empírica es correcto, pero debe recordarse que en la sección anterior se señaló que la física no es exclusivamente a priori. Esta última tesis es presentada más adelante en el “Prólogo” de MAN: “Toda ciencia de la naturaleza propiamente dicha requiere […] una parte pura sobre la que pueda fundarse la certeza apodíctica que la razón busca en esta ciencia” (AA 04: 469). La ciencia propiamente dicha no es exclusivamente pura, sino que tiene una parte pura como su fundamento. Esta parte pura contiene “los principios a priori de todas las restantes explicaciones de naturaleza” (Ibid.). Más adelante en el texto considerado se presentan las dos partes contenidas en la parte pura de la física, a saber, la metafísica y la trascendental (AA 04: 469-470. Véase la sección primera de este artículo).
13 El autor presentó anteriormente las líneas principales de la interpretación que se ha expuesto en Blomme (2011). Una lectura similar fue propuesta por McNulty (2014). No dispongo aquí de espacio para comparar ambas lecturas. Cf. Sturm (2001, p. 179) and Mischel (1967, pp. 601-602, 604).
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ISSN: 2386-7655
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Kant intenta explicar aquí la razón por la cual la química flogística no es una ciencia propiamente dicha. Puede afirmarse que esta razón consiste en que no disponemos de leyes ni de conceptos referidos a las fuerzas que originan las operaciones de alejamiento y aproximación que serían inherentes a las distintas partes internas de las diferentes materias. Estas diferentes operaciones serían las responsables de las “acciones químicas de las materias unas sobre otras” y estarían relacionadas con propiedades de la materia en general que son fácilmente observables, tal como su densidad. Estas operaciones podrían presentarse a priori como movimientos en el espacio y, entonces, las leyes y los conceptos referidos a ellas serían construibles. Las afirmaciones contenidas en el pasaje citado concuerdan entonces con la explicación, ofrecida al comienzo de esta sección, del motivo por el que la química no es una ciencia en sentido propio. Hasta que un concepto íntimamente vinculado con las acciones químicas de las materias entre sí que pertenezca a la materia en general no pueda ser construido, con lo cual estas acciones podrían ser presentadas a priori como movimientos en el espacio, la química será una ciencia en sentido impropio.14
Aquí me interesa destacar que, en virtud de esa razón por la cual la química no es una ciencia en sentido propio, esta disciplina “no puede llegar a ser nada más que arte sistemático o doctrina experimental”. Considero que esta afirmación de Kant no ha sido aún suficientemente analizada por los comentaristas. En ese pasaje, Kant efectúa un contraste entre lo que la química no puede llegar a ser (ciencia propiamente dicha) y lo que esta disciplina puede llegar a ser (arte sistemático y doctrina experimental). Debe recordarse que la química, aunque en sentido impropio, es una ciencia de la naturaleza (véase supra, n. 12). Como esta disciplina, por un lado, no puede alcanzar un estatus científico propio, sino únicamente impropio y, por el otro, no puede convertirse en “nada más que arte sistemático o doctrina experimental”, cabe suponer que ese estatus científico está de alguna manera en relación con el carácter sistemático y experimental de esa disciplina. De hecho, como intentaré mostrar, esa relación consiste en que el carácter científico (impropio) de la química flogística depende de su naturaleza sistemática y experimental.
Algunos pasajes de obras de Kant proveen sustento textual para la interpretación esbozada del carácter científico de la química. En primer lugar, en al menos dos pasajes Kant vincula la sistematicidad con la cientificidad. Al comienzo de la “Arquitectónica de la razón pura” de KrV se afirma: “la unidad sistemática es aquella que primeramente convierte al conocimiento común en ciencia, es decir, que de un mero agregado de ellos

14 El pasaje citado parecería estar de acuerdo con la interpretación de Nayak y Sotnak (1995) mencionada en supra, n. 5. La química no sería una ciencia en sentido estricto porque no pueden formularse a priori leyes matemáticas sobre las fuerzas fundamentales atractivas (“acercamiento”) y repulsivas (“alejamiento”) que son específicas de los diferentes corpúsculos químicos (p. 148). Aquí quisiera subrayar que la imposibilidad de formular esas leyes puede entenderse como un caso particular de la imposibilidad de construir a priori como movimientos en la intuición pura del espacio conceptos de reacciones químicas vinculados con la materia en general. El desarrollo del presente artículo hasta este punto ha intentado mostrar que esta segunda concepción es la que sostiene Kant.
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N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 165-185 ISSN: 2386-7655
Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095671
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hace un sistema” (A832/B860). De manera similar, al inicio del “Prólogo” a MAN se asevera: “[t]oda doctrina, si ha de ser un sistema, es decir, un todo del conocimiento ordenado según principios, se llama ciencia” (MAN, AA 04: 467). En segundo lugar, en el “Prólogo a la segunda edición” de KrV se encuentra una conexión entra la cientificidad de la ciencia de la naturaleza y su carácter experimental (Bxii-xiv). En ese pasaje Kant menciona sucintamente tres famosos experimentos. Uno de ellos fue realizado por Georg
E. Stahl en el marco de investigaciones correspondientes a su química flogística (Bxii- xiii).15 Esos experimentos, según Kant, son expresión de una “revolución del modo de pensar” que permitió a la ciencia de la naturaleza alcanzar “la marcha segura de una ciencia” (Ibid.). Kant señala que, en ese contexto, tiene en cuenta la ciencia de la naturaleza solamente en tanto que se basa en principios empíricos (Bxii). Interpreto esta afirmación en el sentido de que las tesis sobre la ciencia de la naturaleza presentadas por Kant en ese pasaje no se refieren a la parte metafísica de la física matemática, sino a la parte empírica de esta disciplina y a la química flogística. Según el nuevo modo de pensar, la razón debe aproximarse a la naturaleza con sus principios y con experimentos diseñados de acuerdo con estos últimos (Bxiii). De esta manera, la razón extrae de la naturaleza un conocimiento posibilitado por lo que la primera introduce en la segunda (Bxiii-xiv). Kant opone este modo de proceder a la realización de “observaciones contingentes, hechas sin ningún plan previamente trazado” (Bxiii).
En conclusión, la química flogística no es una ciencia en sentido propio porque, en pocas palabras, no pueden construirse a priori como movimientos en el espacio conceptos que estén vinculados con reacciones químicas y que se refieran a propiedades de la materia en general. Por otro lado, esta disciplina es una ciencia, aunque en sentido impropio, porque puede poseer un carácter sistemático y experimental. El carácter sistemático de la química flogística está vinculado, en primer lugar, con el hecho de que haya una estructuración jerárquica de géneros y especies entre los conceptos de dicha disciplina y, en segundo lugar, con que sus leyes causales empíricas menos generales puedan deducirse de las más generales. Por ejemplo, en este último caso, a partir de la ley según la cual el flogisto es el principio de la inflamabilidad y de la tesis de que los metales contienen flogisto puede deducirse la ley según la cual los metales son calcinables (véase supra, n. 15). Los mencionados sistemas de conceptos y de leyes son interdependientes. En primer lugar, para formular leyes causales empíricas químicas se deben poseer conceptos de los fenómenos químicos a los que ellas se refieren. En segundo lugar, las propiedades causales que estas leyes atribuyen a los fenómenos químicos se incluyen en los contenidos lógicos

15 Puede afirmarse que el experimento de Stahl tenía por objetivo sustentar la tesis según la cual el flogisto es el principio de la inflamabilidad, esto es, de la calcinabilidad y la combustibilidad de las diferentes substancias. Tanto un metal como el plomo cuanto el carbón vegetal contienen flogisto. De hecho, la calcinación del plomo y la combustión del carbón vegetal se explican por la liberación del flogisto contenido en ellos. Acerca de este experimento, véase Stahl (1718, pp. 119-120), Partington (1961, pp. 669-671), Carrier (2001, pp. 217-218) y McNulty (2015, pp. 5-6). Uno de los otros dos experimentos a los que se refiere Kant en ese pasaje fue efectuado por Galileo, y el otro fue llevado a cabo por Torricelli.
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de los conceptos de esos objetos.16 Por otro lado, el carácter experimental de la química flogística está relacionado con el hecho de que sus leyes causales empíricas tienen que ponerse a prueba mediante experimentos.17
La psicología empírica: descripción de la naturaleza

Puede afirmarse que, para Kant, la psicología empírica o doctrina empírica del alma es la disciplina que se ocupa de estudiar los fenómenos del sentido interno mediante introspección. Inmediatamente después del párrafo en el que expone el estatus de la química flogística, que se ha citado al comienzo de la segunda sección de este trabajo, Kant introduce el pasaje del “Prólogo” de MAN más importante para el examen del problema del estatus de la mencionada psicología.

Pero la doctrina empírica del alma tiene que permanecer siempre más alejada todavía del rango de una así llamada ciencia de la naturaleza en sentido propio que la química misma; primeramente, porque la matemática no es aplicable a los fenómenos del sentido interno ni a sus leyes, a menos que se que quiera tomar en cuenta, solamente, la ley de continuidad en el flujo de las alteraciones internas del mismo sentido; pero esto sería una extensión del conocimiento que se comportaría, respecto de aquella que la matemática proporciona a la doctrina del cuerpo, más o menos como la doctrina de las propiedades de la línea recta respecto de toda la geometría. Pues la intuición interna pura en la cual los fenómenos del alma deben construirse es el tiempo, que tiene solamente una dimensión.

16 En la primera parte del “Apéndice a la dialéctica trascendental” de KrV (A642-668/B670-696), Kant introduce tres principios de la razón teórica para la sistematización del conocimiento empírico, a saber, los de homogeneidad, especificación y continuidad. La aplicación de estos principios, como señalaré, es la que concede una forma sistemática a disciplinas empíricas como la química flogística. La mayoría de los ejemplos de aplicación de esos principios que son dados en ese texto concierne a la sistematización de conceptos. De todas maneras, se ha visto que los sistemas de leyes y de conceptos de la química flogística son interdependientes. Presentaré a continuación los mencionados principios. El principio de homogeneidad prescribe buscar géneros comunes para especies diferentes (A651-654/B679-682). El principio de especificación hace necesario intentar dividir géneros comunes en distintas especies (A654-657/B682-685). Por último, el principio de continuidad establece la necesidad de procurar introducir, entre dos especies de un mismo género consideradas inicialmente como colindantes, cada vez más especies intermedias (A657- 661/B685-689). En la primera parte del “Apéndice” se presentan cuatro ejemplos de sistematización pertenecientes a la química flogística: homogeneización de sales, tierras, y sales y tierras tomadas conjuntamente (A652-653/B680-681), y especificación de tierras absorbentes (A657/B685). Por otro lado, cabe destacar que la parte pura de la física matemática también es sistemática. No obstante, este carácter sistemático no depende de la aplicación de los mencionados principios, sino del carácter sistemático de la tabla de las categorías de KrV. Por este motivo, la mencionada parte pura puede alcanzar una forma completa y cerrada (MAN, AA 04: 473-479). En cambio, en el ámbito de la química flogística tiene lugar un progreso constante basado en la consideración de lo dado en la experiencia y una aproximación asintótica a una forma sistemática completa mediante la aplicación de los mencionados principios. Presumiblemente, la parte empírica de la física matemática es sistemática en el mismo sentido en el que lo es la química flogística. No dispongo aquí de espacio para presentar la doctrina de las ideas regulativas de la razón teórica expuesta en la segunda parte del “Apéndice”. Acerca del estatus de las leyes empíricas pertenecientes a la psicología empírica y la aplicación del principio de homogeneidad en el campo de esta psicología, véase la tercera sección de este trabajo.

17 No hay aquí espacio suficiente para explicar exhaustivamente el problema de los fundamentos y las consecuencias del carácter sistemático y experimental de la química flogística.

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Pero la doctrina empírica del alma tampoco puede acercarse jamás a la química como arte sistemático de análisis o doctrina experimental, porque en ella lo múltiple de la observación interna sólo se puede separar mediante una mera división en el pensamiento, pero no puede mantenerse separada y conectarse de nuevo a voluntad; pero menos aún puede someterse a otro sujeto pensante a experimentos convenientes a nuestro propósito, e incluso la observación en sí ya altera y desplaza el estado del objeto observado. Por eso, la doctrina empírica del alma nunca puede llegar a ser algo más que una doctrina histórica natural del sentido interno y, como tal, tan sistemática como sea posible, es decir, una descripción natural del alma, pero no una ciencia del alma, ni siquiera una doctrina psicológica experimental (MAN, AA 04: 471).

En primer lugar, Kant afirma que la doctrina empírica del alma está siempre más alejada de la condición de ciencia en sentido propio que la química. Considero que esta tesis hace referencia al hecho de que la psicología empírica, a diferencia de la química flogística, nunca podrá convertirse en una ciencia en sentido propio. Esta piscología examina los estados y procesos del sentido interno, y estos estados y procesos, a diferencia de las reacciones químicas, están dados solamente en el tiempo y nunca podrán ser presentados a priori como movimientos en el espacio. Efectivamente, puede interpretarse que, al menos en el pasaje citado, Kant sostiene que la “ley de continuidad en el flujo de las alteraciones internas” es la única ley que puede resultar de la aplicación de la matemática al ámbito de los fenómenos internos.18

En segundo lugar, Kant asevera que la doctrina empírica del alma tampoco podrá ser nunca, como la química, una “doctrina experimental”. Nuestro filósofo ofrece tres razones para esta afirmación. Las resumo a continuación: 1) no es posible manipular materialmente, a fin de efectuar experimentos, los fenómenos de nuestro sentido interno, porque ellos pueden dividirse únicamente en el pensamiento;19 2) no es posible someter a experimentos, en lo que hace a su sentido interno, a un sujeto pensante diferente de nosotros, y 3) la observación de los fenómenos de nuestro sentido interno modifica el estado de lo observado. 20 Por tales razones, la psicología empírica no puede ser una

18 Anteriormente se ha considerado la posible cuantificación de la intensidad de las sensaciones (véase supra,

n. 6, y también infra, n. 29).

19 De acuerdo con R. McDonough, la tesis según la cual los “estados mentales […] ‘pueden separarse sólo en el pensamiento’” significa que estos estados son interdependientes en lo que respecta a su identidad (“they are identity-dependent on each other”) (McDonough 1995, p. 211. Véase también pp. 212-214).

20 T. Sturm ofrece una interpretación de esta tercera razón. Este comentarista señala que observar introspectivamente no equivale simplemente a tener consciencia de los estados y procesos internos. Más bien, esa observación consiste en dirigir la atención hacia ciertos fenómenos internos. “Kant indica aquí que se torna cuestionable si los estados o procesos psicológicos así observados funcionan de la manera en que usualmente lo hacen; si, digamos, mi introspección de un cierto estado de pasión, placer, o dolor no podría cambiar fácilmente ese estado de modo que no lleve a sus consecuencias causales usuales en mi reacción o en mis creencias acerca de las causas de ese estado.” En este caso, concluye Sturm, no sería posible conocer por introspección cómo funcionan esos estados internos en nuestra vida cotidiana. (Sturm 2001, p. 178). Cf. Anth (AA 07: 132-134).

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“ciencia del alma”, sino solamente una “descripción natural” o “descripción de la naturaleza” (Naturbeschreibung) del alma.21

Aquí me interesa subrayar que Kant hace referencia a la imposibilidad de hacer experimentos materiales en nuestro sentido interno y en los ajenos cuando afirma que la psicología empírica no puede ser una ciencia. El hecho de que Kant mencione esa imposibilidad al intentar mostrar el carácter no científico de esa psicología provee sustento a mi hipótesis original según la cual la circunstancia de que la química flogística tenga un carácter experimental es una de las razones por las cuales esta disciplina es una ciencia, si bien en sentido impropio. Debe notarse que el potencial cognitivo de la psicología empírica presenta incluso más limitaciones. En efecto, según Kant, en el ámbito del sentido interno no es posible ni siquiera la observación rigurosa, porque el hecho de prestar atención a un fenómeno del sentido interno puede modificar a este último (véase supra, n. 20).

Para Kant, la psicología empírica no es una ciencia, sino una descripción natural del alma. Presentaré sucintamente a continuación las características generales de esa descripción. El género supremo del conocimiento sobre la naturaleza es la “doctrina de la naturaleza” (Naturlehre). Ella se divide en “ciencia de la naturaleza” (Naturwissenschaft) y “doctrina histórica de la naturaleza” (historische Naturlehre). La ciencia de la naturaleza, como se ha visto, puede ser ciencia en un sentido propio (física matemática) o en un sentido impropio (química flogística). La doctrina histórica de la naturaleza contiene “hechos sistemáticamente ordenados de las cosas de la naturaleza” (MAN, AA 04: 468). Esta doctrina tiene dos partes. En primer lugar, la “descripción de la naturaleza” (Naturbeschreibung) es “un sistema de clases de cosas de la naturaleza según semejanzas”. En segundo lugar, la “historia de la naturaleza” (Naturgeschichte) es “una presentación sistemática de cosas de la naturaleza en diferentes tiempos y lugares” (Ibid.).22 Por tanto, la psicología empírica, en una primera aproximación, consiste en una descripción y clasificación sistemáticas de los fenómenos del sentido interno de acuerdo con sus semejanzas.23

21 N. Kemp Smith (1923, 2003, p. 312, n. 2) ofrece una exposición concisa de las tesis en virtud de las cuales Kant mantiene que la psicología nunca podrá llegar a ser una ciencia. Interpretaciones de estas razones pueden encontrase en Mischel (1967, pp. 599-610), Gouaux (1972, pp. 239-241), Hatfield (1992, pp. 217-

224), Nayak y Sotnak (1995, pp. 148-149), McDonough (1995, pp. 208-211) y Sturm (2001, p. 178).

22 Una clasificación similar de las distintas clases de doctrina de la naturaleza, de acuerdo con el “Prólogo” a MAN y V-Ph/Danziger (AA 29: 97-100), es presentada por H. Blomme (2015, p. 491). Acerca de la descripción de la naturaleza y la historia de la naturaleza, puede verse P. R. Sloan (2006).

23 En el capítulo “De los paralogismos de la razón pura” de KrV, Kant efectúa una crítica de la psicología racional o doctrina racional del alma. Esta presunta ciencia, según Kant, intenta alcanzar todo el conocimiento del sujeto pensante que podría obtenerse, de un modo independiente de la experiencia, mediante inferencias a partir de la mera proposición “yo pienso”. Este principio de la apercepción (B136-

139) no es tomado por la psicología racional como la condición suprema del conocimiento objetivo. Más bien, lo que esta disciplina procura es obtener un conocimiento del mencionado “yo” que no incluya ningún contenido empírico (si la disciplina mencionada incluyese contenidos empíricos, se convertiría en psicología empírica). Los conocimientos principales que podrían alcanzarse predicando las categorías del sujeto pensante son los siguientes: “1. El alma es substancia. 2. Según su cualidad, simple. 3. Según los diferentes tiempos en que existe, numéricamente idéntica, es decir, unidad (no pluralidad). 4. [Está] en relación con posibles objetos en el espacio” (A344/B402). Kant intenta mostrar que los razonamientos que conducen a estas afirmaciones son formalmente inválidos, esto es, que ellos son paralogismos. Acerca de esta

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Tanto la psicología empírica como la química flogística son sistemáticas. Sin embargo, mientras que la primera es puramente clasificatoria y descriptiva, la segunda es explicativa, porque está compuesta por leyes causales empíricas cuyo objetivo es explicar los fenómenos químicos. Cabe destacar que en la primera parte del “Apéndice a la dialéctica trascendental” de KrV se presenta un ejemplo de sistematización del conocimiento en el ámbito de los fenómenos del sentido interno. El sistema considerado es el de las fuerzas de la mente humana. “Los diversos fenómenos de una misma substancia muestran, a primera vista, tanta heterogeneidad, que al comienzo uno debe suponer casi tantas y tan variadas fuerzas de ella, como efectos se presentan; tal como en la mente humana la sensación, la consciencia, la imaginación, la memoria, el ingenio, el discernimiento, el placer, el apetito, etc.” (A648-649/B676-677). El investigador debe intentar reducir esa aparente multiplicidad de fuerzas al buscar “por comparación, la identidad oculta” y, por ejemplo, “comprobar si la imaginación, enlazada con la conciencia, no será memoria, ingenio, discernimiento, quizá incluso entendimiento y razón” (A649/B677). 24 Posiblemente pueda afirmarse que esta unificación de los distintos efectos producidos por la mente humana presupone una clasificación de los mismos, y que la mencionada clasificación, a su vez, presupone la descripción de ellos. Así, la descripción de los efectos de la mente puede conducir al descubrimiento de que una clase de ellos son similares. La labor de clasificación reuniría los efectos mencionados en un grupo único y los diferenciaría de los efectos restantes. De este modo, los efectos reunidos en ese grupo serían explicados en tanto que se derivan de una fuerza de la mente única. Este modo de proceder ejemplifica entonces el carácter sistemático, descriptivo y clasificatorio de la psicología empírica. No obstante, debe señalarse que, como mostraré más adelante, en el ámbito del sentido interno puede hablarse de “efectos” solamente en un sentido muy amplio del término.

presentación del capítulo de los paralogismos, véase A341-348/B399-406. Por otro lado, P. Kitcher ha argumentado que la psicología es relevante para la filosofía trascendental kantiana. Kitcher distingue entre psicología empírica y psicología trascendental. La psicología empírica sería la que, según Kant, procura descubrir, mediante introspección, las leyes que gobiernan las percepciones (Kitcher 1990, p. 12). En cambio, la psicología trascendental presentada por Kitcher efectuaría análisis abstractos de tareas cognitivas a fin de establecer las características más generales de una mente que es capaz de llevar a cabo las tareas mencionadas. Se intentaría mostrar que algunos aspectos determinados de nuestro conocimiento están basados en nuestras facultades cognitivas “al mostrar que cualquier facultad que pueda desempeñar la tarea tiene que satisfacer ciertas especificaciones y que el conocimiento producido por una facultad con esas especificaciones tendrá siempre que incluir ciertos elementos” (Kitcher 1990, pp. 13-14). La psicología trascendental, a diferencia de la empírica, sería parte integrante de la filosofía trascendental kantiana. Me interesa destacar que la psicología trascendental que Kitcher considera parte de la filosofía trascendental kantiana no es la psicología empírica cuyo estatus se examina en este trabajo. Para una presentación más detallada del proceder de la psicología trascendental y de las relaciones de esta disciplina con la psicología empírica, cf. Kitcher (1990, pp. 14-29).

24 Este ejemplo ilustra la aplicación del principio sistematizador de homogeneidad a las fuerzas de la mente humana. Para una exposición sucinta de los tres principios sistematizadores de la razón teórica y su aplicación en el ámbito de la química flogística, véase supra, n. 16. Por otro lado, considero que la psicología empírica, al igual que la química flogística y a diferencia de la parte pura de la física matemática, no puede alcanzar una forma sistemática completa y cerrada (véase supra, n. 16).

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En el pasaje del “Prólogo” de MAN citado al comienzo de esta sección se hace mención de “los fenómenos del sentido interno y sus leyes” (MAN, AA 04: 471). Se plantea el problema de determinar cuáles son las leyes mencionadas. Una respuesta a este interrogante puede encontrarse en el § 24 de la segunda edición de KrV. Allí se distingue entre imaginación productiva e imaginación reproductiva. Ambas imaginaciones establecen enlaces entre representaciones. Cuando la efectuación de enlaces por parte de la imaginación productiva tiene como principio rector las categorías y toma por objeto el sentido interno en lo que hace a la forma de éste, a saber, el tiempo, se denomina síntesis trascendental de la imaginación. Como esa síntesis no sólo es a priori, sino que también es una condición de un conocimiento a priori de los objetos empíricos en general, ella es estudiada por la filosofía trascendental. En cambio, la síntesis de la imaginación reproductiva “está sometida solamente a leyes empíricas, saber, a las de la asociación; la cual [síntesis], por eso, no contribuye en nada a la explicación de la posibilidad del conocimiento a priori, y por eso no tiene su lugar en la filosofía trascendental, sino en la psicología” (B152).

Las leyes empíricas que conciernen a la psicología empírica serían entonces las leyes de asociación de representaciones. En A100 se expone el concepto de ley de asociación: “[e]s, por cierto, una ley meramente empírica [aquella] según la cual las representaciones que con frecuencia se han sucedido o acompañado, terminan por asociarse unas con otras, y con ello se ponen en una conexión según la cual, aun sin la presencia del objeto, una de esas representaciones produce un tránsito de la mente a la otra, según una regla constante”.25

Por otro lado, en V-Anth/Fried se afirma que la ley de asociación se funda en el acompañamiento (Begleitung), la vecindad (Nachbarschaft) y el parentesco (Verwandtschaft) de las representaciones. Según el acompañamiento, se asocian representaciones de fenómenos sucesivos o simultáneos en el tiempo. De acuerdo con la vecindad, se asocian las representaciones cuyos objetos son cercanos en el espacio. Según el parentesco, se asocian representaciones de fenómenos en virtud de la constitución de los mismos. Este parentesco puede consistir en una relación entre representaciones según la semejanza (Ähnlichkeit) de los fenómenos a los que se refieren o según la procedencia (Abstammung) de los mismos. El primer parentesco reside en una semejanza de los fenómenos representados que está basada en un sistema de clases de los mismos. El segundo parentesco radica en la identidad del fundamento de los fenómenos representados. La explicación de este parentesco ofrecida en el texto no es especialmente precisa. Sin embargo, parece claro que esta clase de parentesco está vinculada con la asociación de efectos similares procedentes de causas similares, y que esta asociación presupone el

25 En el pasaje citado del § 24 de KrV B, Kant opone el enlace objetivo de la imaginación productiva regido por las categorías (objeto de la filosofía trascendental) al enlace subjetivo de la imaginación reproductiva regido por las leyes empíricas de asociación de representaciones (objeto de la psicología). En KrV A, en cambio, el acento está puesto en que las leyes subjetivas de asociación de representaciones presuponen la afinidad objetiva de estas últimas. Esta afinidad, a su vez, está fundada en la unidad trascendental de la apercepción (A112-114 y A121-123). Por otro lado, una definición del concepto de ley de asociación similar a la dada en A100, aunque más breve, puede verse en Anth (AA 07: 176).

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parentesco entre causas similares y sus similares efectos. Por ejemplo, cuando llueve y el sol está brillando uno espera un efecto semejante a los acontecidos anteriormente como consecuencia de estados de cosas semejantes, esto es, uno mira en derredor buscando un arco iris. (V-Anth/Fried, AA 25: 512-514).26 Posiblemente a estos diferentes fundamentos de la asociación de representaciones, u a otros similares, se haya referido implícitamente Kant con la expresión “leyes empíricas, a saber, […] las de la asociación” incluida en el pasaje de B152 citado más arriba.

Los comentaristas no están de acuerdo acerca del estatus de las leyes de asociación. La interpretación que concede más importancia a estas leyes es la de G. Hatfield. Hatfield sostiene que las leyes de asociación son leyes causales naturales como las que pertenecen a la parte empírica de la física (1992, pp. 201, 208, 218-219).27 La lectura que, en cambio, otorga menos importancia a esas leyes es la de T. Mischel. Mischel mantiene que la categoría de causalidad y dependencia no puede aplicarse objetivamente a los fenómenos del sentido interno28 y que, por esta razón, las leyes de asociación no pueden ser leyes causales. Estas leyes tendrían un valor exclusivamente clasificatorio y descriptivo (1967, pp. 607-609).

La tesis de Mischel acerca de que la categoría de causalidad no puede aplicarse a fenómenos dados en el sentido interno parece correcta. En la segunda edición de KrV, Kant da a entender que la aplicación de las categorías requiere no sólo intuiciones empíricas, sino también intuiciones empíricas espaciales. Kant ofrece ejemplos únicamente de las tres categorías de la relación, consideradas separadamente, y menciona las categorías de la cantidad tomadas en su conjunto (B291-293).29 Acerca de la categoría de causalidad y dependencia, se afirma que la intuición correspondiente a la misma es la de la alteración. “Alteración es enlace de determinaciones opuestas entre sí de manera contradictoria, en la existencia de una y la misma cosa” (B291). Para hacerla comprensible, precisamos “el movimiento de un punto en el espacio, cuya existencia en diferentes lugares (como consecuencia de determinaciones contrapuestas) es lo que, primeramente, nos hace intuitiva la alteración” (B292). A continuación se dice:

[p]ara hacernos pensables luego las alteraciones internas mismas, debemos hacernos concebible figurativamente el tiempo, como forma del sentido interno, mediante una

26 Una clasificación hasta cierto punto semejante y expuesta más concisamente se encuentra en V-Anth/Pillau (AA 25: 752). También en cierta medida similar y más concisa es la clasificación de V-Anth/Mensch (AA 25: 946-948). Una presentación demasiado sucinta es la de Anthropologie Dohna-Wundlacken (Ko, 107). Véase también AA 25: 1272-1273. No consideraré lecciones anteriores a V-Anth/Fried (1775-1776), porque están más alejadas del período crítico del pensamiento de Kant. Parecería que, en Anth, Kant no distingue entre diferentes modos de asociación (AA 07: 176). Por último, es evidente que la relación de parentesco de las representaciones según la procedencia de las mismas no debe confundirse con la relación causal objetiva hecha posible por la categoría del entendimiento de causalidad y dependencia expuesta en KrV.

27 Cf. Sturm (2001, pp. 169-174).

28 Cf. Gouaux (1972, pp. 239-241) y Nayak y Sotnak (1995, pp. 148-149).

29 Más arriba me referí a la diferencia entre las formulaciones de A y B (KrV) del principio del entendimiento correspondiente a las categorías de la cualidad. Indiqué que la formulación de A es la que más apoyo provee a la tesis según la cual las categorías de la cualidad pueden aplicarse a las sensaciones dadas en el sentido interno (n. 5).

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línea, y la alteración interna, mediante el trazado de esa línea (movimiento); y por tanto [debemos hacernos concebible] la existencia sucesiva de nosotros mismos en diferentes estados, mediante la intuición externa; el fundamento propio de todo ello es éste: que toda alteración presupone algo permanente en la intuición, aun ya sólo para ser percibida como alteración; pero en el sentido interno no se encuentra ninguna intuición permanente (Ibid.).30

Me interesa subrayar que, aunque Kant indique que podemos hacernos concebibles las alteraciones internas mediante la acción de dibujar una línea en la intuición externa, esto no implica que la categoría de causalidad y dependencia sea aplicable en sentido estricto a la experiencia interna. Más bien, el empleo de esta categoría en el ámbito de los fenómenos internos tiene lugar mediante la realización de una analogía con su aplicación a los fenómenos externos.31 La categoría de causalidad no puede aplicarse estrictamente a los estados y procesos internos porque, como afirma Kant, la mera representación objetiva de una alteración presupone la referencia de esta última a algo permanente en el espacio (cf. B224-225). Además, el hecho de que la alteración interna pueda representarse mediante el trazado de una línea en el espacio no implica que los estados y procesos internos puedan presentarse a priori como movimientos en el espacio. Si estos estados y procesos pudiesen presentarse de esta manera, como se ha indicado más arriba, la psicología empírica podría convertirse en una ciencia natural en un sentido propio del término. No obstante, lo que ese trazado continuo de una línea parece hacer posible es, en cambio, la formulación de la “ley de continuidad en el flujo de las alteraciones internas”, que en el pasaje de MAN citado al comienzo de esta sección se menciona como consecuencia posible de la aplicación de la matemática a los fenómenos del sentido interno (MAN, AA 04: 471).32

La consideración de la imposibilidad de aplicar en sentido estricto las categorías a los fenómenos internos es de capital importancia para la comprensión del carácter de las leyes empíricas de asociación de representaciones. Efectivamente, como la categoría de causalidad y dependencia no puede, estrictamente hablando, ser aplicada a los estados y procesos del sentido interno, las leyes de asociación de representaciones no pueden ser leyes causales como las de la química. Tan sólo podemos, en general, representar las relaciones internas de asociación mediante una analogía con las relaciones externas de causación.

A continuación seguiré examinando el problema de la imposibilidad de aplicar las categorías en el dominio del sentido interno mediante la presentación del concepto de

30 Cf. MAN (AA 04: 478).

31 T. Mischel (1967, pp. 607-609) y R. McDonough (1995, pp. 207-208) señalan que las categorías pueden aplicarse a los fenómenos internos sólo en un “sentido analógico”.

32 T. Mischel señala que, como la continuidad mencionada es “puramente temporal y el tiempo ‘no puede ser

una determinación de fenómenos externos’” (A33/B49), la sucesión de nuestros estados internos no puede ser en sentido estricto un movimiento (Mischel 1967, p. 604). Además, Mischel subraya que debemos representar el tiempo en términos de espacio y que la mera afirmación de que el tiempo tiene una única dimensión presupone ya la efectuación de una analogía entre el tiempo y el espacio (Mischel 1967, 602. Véase A33/B50, B154-155, B156 y supra el pasaje de B292).

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asociación particular de representaciones. Estas asociaciones particulares establecen relaciones entre diferentes clases de representaciones. Una clase de representaciones podría referirse a las series de campanadas dadas por un reloj a la hora en la que se suele almorzar, y la otra a las comidas servidas en los almuerzos (cf. V-Anth/Fried, AA 25: 512). Estas comidas siguen habitualmente en el tiempo a estas series de campanadas. Por tal motivo, ambas clases de representaciones quedan asociadas. De esta manera, las representaciones de las series de campanadas hacen surgir en la mente a las representaciones de las comidas. Esta asociación sería un caso particular del tipo de asociación que más arriba, siguiendo a Kant, denominé “acompañamiento”, esto es, una asociación entre representaciones de fenómenos temporalmente sucesivos o simultáneos. Estimo que estas asociaciones particulares de representaciones, si se toma en cuenta lo dicho en pasajes como el de B291-292 comentado anteriormente, deben comprenderse mediante una analogía con las relaciones causales entre dos tipos de fenómenos externos hechas posibles por la aplicación de la categoría de causalidad y dependencia.33

Debe notarse, sin embargo, que en el pasaje del “Prólogo” de MAN citado al inicio de la presente sección Kant no se refiere al hecho de que la aplicación de las categorías requiera intuiciones externas. Más bien, en este pasaje, entre otras cosas, Kant intenta mostrar que en la psicología empírica, a diferencia de la química flogística, no es posible la realización de experimentos. Un análisis del estatus de la psicología empírica según el “Prólogo” de MAN como el llevado a cabo en este artículo tiene que incluir una explicación de las implicancias del carácter no experimental de esta psicología. La realización de esta explicación exige retomar y desarrollar el concepto de asociación particular de representaciones introducido en el párrafo anterior.

Las leyes empíricas de asociación de representaciones presentadas más arriba pueden justificarse y considerarse como probablemente verdaderas solamente en la medida en que varias de las asociaciones particulares que las ejemplifican puedan entenderse como válidas. Sin embargo, como se ha afirmado, dado que no es posible manipular voluntariamente los fenómenos internos, no es posible realizar experimentos repetibles en el ámbito del sentido interno. Esta circunstancia tiene por consecuencia que las asociaciones particulares de representaciones no puedan, como las hipótesis de relaciones causales entre diferentes tipos de materias examinadas por la química, tornarse cada vez más probables gracias a la puesta a prueba empírica exitosa de las mismas.34 Estimo que, en virtud de este motivo, la psicología empírica no es, como la química flogística, una ciencia natural en sentido impropio del término.

No obstante, podría objetarse que, en cierto sentido, el carácter no experimental de la psicología empírica no implica que no sea posible poner a prueba empíricamente

33 La tesis según la cual las relaciones entre causas similares y efectos similares presuponen la aplicación de la categoría de causalidad y dependencia no implica la afirmación diferente según la cual el objetivo de la “Segunda analogía” de KrV es mostrar que causas similares tienen que ser seguidas por efectos similares. Diferentes evaluaciones del objetivo de la “Segunda analogía” pueden encontrarse en Longuenesse (2000, pp. 345-375) y Allison (2004, pp. 246-260).

34 Sobre la probabilidad de las hipótesis, cf. A646-647/B674-675, A790-791/B818-819 y Log (AA 09: 84- 86).

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asociaciones particulares de representaciones. Esta experimentación podría realizarse en los dos pasos siguientes. Retomando el ejemplo dado más arriba, podríamos, en primer lugar, escuchar deliberadamente las campanadas dadas por un reloj a la hora del almuerzo y almorzar inmediatamente después, y repetir estas dos acciones al mismo tiempo del día durante una semana. Al día siguiente, en segundo lugar, podríamos escuchar las campanadas del reloj a la hora del almuerzo a fin de comprobar si no surge en nuestra mente, cuando menos como expectativa, la representación de la comida.35

Posiblemente este experimento, al no proceder sólo mediante introspección, no pertenezca exclusivamente a la psicología empírica. De todas maneras, un cuestionamiento de Kant a la validez del mismo podría consistir en que en el dominio del sentido interno no es posible ni siquiera la observación rigurosa, porque la atención prestada a ciertos fenómenos internos puede modificar a estos últimos (MAN, AA 04: 471). Más precisamente, la atención prestada a la escucha de las campanadas realizada en el segundo paso del experimento esbozado podría ocasionar que a la representación de estas campanadas le siga en el sentido interno una representación diferente a la que le seguiría si no realizásemos el mencionado esfuerzo de atención (véase supra, n. 20). Además, el hecho de que los estados internos dados en el flujo continuo de los mismos no puedan separarse nítidamente como los fenómenos externos, sino sólo mediante el pensamiento (MAN, AA 04: 471), torna difícil la tarea de identificar qué representación sigue en el flujo mencionado a esa representación de las campanadas. En el sentido interno no hay nada permanente que pueda ser sometido a observación duradera.36

Conclusiones

La exposición llevada a cabo tuvo el objetivo de mostrar que la psicología empírica no es una ciencia por dos motivos. En primer lugar, la psicología empírica no es una ciencia en sentido propio como la física matemática porque la matemática no puede aplicarse adecuadamente a los fenómenos del sentido interno. En segundo lugar, la psicología empírica no es una ciencia en sentido impropio como la química flogística porque no pueden realizarse experimentos ni observaciones rigurosas en el ámbito del sentido interno. Esta psicología puede únicamente describir y clasificar los fenómenos internos y, al mismo tiempo, procurar disponerlos de la forma más sistemática posible.

35 Este experimento fue ideado teniendo en cuenta las consideraciones generales sobre la posibilidad de realizar experimentos en el ámbito de la psicología empírica efectuadas por Hatfield (1992, pp. 222-224).

36 Podría objetarse que la efectuación de este experimento sobre un sujeto diferente del experimentador tendría un resultado más provechoso. Se le pediría a este sujeto efectuar los dos pasos del experimento y, tras su finalización, se le preguntaría en qué pensó tras escuchar la última serie de campanadas del reloj a la hora del almuerzo. A esta objeción se podría, tal vez, responder de la siguiente manera: 1) el hecho de saberse parte de un experimento podría afectar la serie de fenómenos internos del mencionado sujeto (cf. Anth, AA 07: 121); 2) el hecho de que los fenómenos internos no posean permanencia y puedan dividirse sólo en el pensamiento también es relevante para esta versión modificada del experimento.

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Referencias

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Blomme, H. (2011), “Pourquoi la chimie ne peut-elle aspirer au titre de science proprement dite ?”, en S. Grapotte, M. Lequan, y M. Ruffing (coords.), Kant et les sciences, Vrin, Paris, pp. 159-168.

Blomme, H. (2015), “Kant’s Conception of Chemistry in the Danziger Physik”, en R. R. Clewis (coord.), Reading Kant’s Lectures, De Gruyter, Berlin, pp. 484-502.

Carrier, M. (2001), “Kant’s Theory of Matter and His Views on Chemistry”, en E. Watkins (coord.), Kant and the Sciences, Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp. 205-230.

Friedman, M. (1992), Kant and the Exact Sciences, Harvard University Press, Cambridge. Gouaux, C. (1972), “Kant’s View on the Nature of Empirical Psychology”, Journal of the

History of the Behavioral Sciences, vol. 8, no. 2, pp. 237-242.

Hatfield, G. (1992), “Empirical, Rational, and Transcendental Psychology: Psychology as a Science and as Philosophy”, en P. Guyer (coord.), The Cambridge Companion to Kant, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 200-227.

Kant, I. (1900ss.), Kant’s gesammelte Schriften, Deutsche (anteriormente Königlich Preußische) Akademie der Wissenschaften (ed.), Walter de Gruyter y predecesores, Berlin y otros (Akademie-Ausgabe=AA).

Kant, I. (1924), Anthropologie Dohna-Wundlacken, en A. Kowalewski (coord.): Die philosophischen Hauptvorlesungen Immanuel Kants. Nach den aufgefundenen Kollegheften des Grafen Heinrich zu Dohna-Wundlacken, Rösl & Cie, München y Leipzig, pp. 71-373 (Ko).

Kant, I. (1989), Primeros principios metafísicos de la ciencia de la naturaleza, trad. C. Másmela, Alianza, Madrid. (MAN).

Kant, I. (1993), Primeros principios metafísicos de la ciencia de la naturaleza, trad. S. Nemirovsky, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, México D. F. (MAN).

Kant, I. (2009), Crítica de la razón pura, trad. M. Caimi, Fondo de Cultura Económica, México, D.F. (KrV, A/B).

Kemp Smith, N. (1923, 2003), A Commentary to Kant’s “Critique of Pure Reason”, Palgrave Macmillan, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire (Reino Unido) y New York.

Kitcher, P. (1990), Kant’s Transcendental Psychology, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Kitcher, P. (1991), “Kant’s Dedicated Cognitivist System”, en J.-C. Smith (coord.),

Historical Foundations of Cognitive Science, Kluwer, Dordrecht, pp. 189-209.

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Longuenesse, B. (2000), Kant and the Capacity to Judge, trad. C. T. Wolfe, Princeton University Press, Princeton.

McDonough, R. (1995), “Kant’s ‘Historicist’ Alternative to Cognitive Science”, The Southern Journal of Philosophy, vol. 33, no. 2, pp. 203-219.

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McNulty, M. B. (2014), “Kant on Chemistry and the Application of Mathematics in Natural Science”, Kantian Review, vol. 19, no. 3, pp. 393-418.

McNulty, Michael B. (2015), “Rehabilitating the Regulative Use of Reason: Kant on Empirical and Chemical Laws”, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, vol. 54, pp. 1-10.

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51, no. 4, pp. 599-622.

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Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, vol. 55, no. 1, pp. 133-151.

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La fonction épistémologique du jugement réfléchissant chez Kant

The epistemological Function of the reflective Judgement in Kant's Theory of Knowledge

ERIC BEAURON 

Université de Paris-Sorbonne, France

Résumé

Cet article analyse la fonction épistémologique du jugement réfléchissant dont le principe est dégagé dans les introductions de la Critique de la faculté de juger (CFJ). L'analyse du § 62 de la CFJ, en lien avec le § 38 des Prolégomènes et l'Appendice à la Dialectique transcendantale, permet de mettre au jour le rôle heuristique du principe de finalité formelle et de l'affinité dans les procédures scientifiques, notamment dans l'invention newtonienne de la loi de gravitation universelle à partir des lois de Kepler. Le but est d'exposer le fonctionnement du jugement réfléchissant dans un contexte épistémologique où les fonctions de l'entendement ne peuvent plus opérer, dès lors que le donné empirique échappe aux principes transcendantaux de l'Analytique des principes. Le fonctionnement d'un « comme si » épistémologique est mis en lumière et permet d'assurer le lien architectonique entre la nature au sens technique et la nature mécanique, du point de vue de l'invention scientifique.

Mots clefs

Jugement réfléchissant, finalité formelle, affinité, invention scientifique, gravitation universelle.

Abstract

This paper analyzes the epistemological function of the reflective judgement, which principle is brought out in the two introductions of the Critique of Judgement. The analysis of § 62 of the
- Docteur pour l’Universitè de Paris I-Sorbonne. E-mail de contact : eric.beauron@gmail.com
[Recibido: 26 de octubre 2017
Aceptado: 17 de noviembre 2017]
La fonction épistémologique du jugement réfléchissant chez Kant

Critique of Judgement, in conjunction with the § 38 of the Prolegomena and the Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic, reveals the heuristic role of the principle of formal purposiveness and the affinity in the scientific procedures, especially in the Newtonian invention of the law of universal gravitation. The aim is to expose the functioning of the reflective judgement in an epistemological context in which the functions of the understanding can no longer operate, since the empirical data escape the transcendental principles of the Analytic of Principles. The functioning of an epistemological "as if" is brought to light to create the architectonical link between the technique of nature and its mechanical necessity.

Keywords

Reflective judgement, formal purposiveness, affinity, scientific invention, universal gravitation.

Cet article vise à analyser la fonction épistémologique du jugement réfléchissant dont le principe est dégagé dans les introductions de la Critique de la faculté de juger (CFJ par la suite). L'analyse du § 62 de la CFJ, en lien avec le § 38 des Prolégomènes et l'Appendice à la Dialectique transcendantale, permet de mettre au jour le rôle heuristique du principe de finalité formelle et de l'affinité dans les procédures scientifiques, notamment dans l'invention newtonienne de la loi de gravitation universelle à partir des lois de Kepler. Le but est d'exposer le fonctionnement du jugement réfléchissant dans un contexte épistémologique où les fonctions de l'entendement ne peuvent plus opérer, dès lors que le donné empirique échappe aux principes transcendantaux de l'Analytique des principes. Le fonctionnement d'un « comme si » épistémologique est mis en lumière et permet d'assurer le lien architectonique entre la nature au sens technique et la nature mécanique, du point de vue de l'invention scientifique.
1. L'existence : de la régulation à la réflexion et à la finalité
  
  Afin de justifier la nécessite de donner au jugement réfléchissant une fonction cognitive et épistémologique, il faut partir des deux séquences conceptuelles déterminées par la partition de l'Analytique des principes. Les principes mathématiques sont apodictiques car ils relèvent de l'intuition pure et ils sont constitutifs car ils produisent intégralement le contenu de leur synthèse. Ils instituent le jugement déterminant au sens fort et strict du terme. Dans la synthèse mathématique en effet, « quelque chose est appréhendé a priori de telle façon que la règle de la synthèse du phénomène puisse fournir en même temps cette intuition a priori dans chaque exemple empirique donné, c'est-à-dire la réaliser (zu Stande bringen) à partir de là » (Critique de la raison pure, CRP par la suite, A 178/B 221) – ce qui revient à construire a priori le concept. Dans cette procédure, l'entendement guide l'intuition grâce à ses concepts mais celle-ci lui donne en retour à voir exactement ce qu'il attend, conformément à ses concepts, si bien que la construction révèle une saturation réciproque de la pensée et de l'intuition qui engendre la certitude intuitive apodictique. On peut ainsi déterminer a priori le phénomène quant à sa forme, du point de vue des grandeurs extensives, aussi bien que quant à son contenu du point de vue des
  
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  grandeurs intensives. Toutefois, la synthèse mathématique ne peut jamais connaître que ce qu’elle aura mis dans l’objet, ce qui fait que son coefficient d’apodicticité se paye d’une perte heuristique majeure. La synthèse mathématique est entièrement déterminante mais le revers de cette efficacité est qu’elle est très pauvre en découverte puisque le contenu objectif de la synthèse se résorbe tout entier dans ses formes pures et ne laisse place à aucune expectative. Apodicticité veut dire remplissement total du jugement mais la satisfaction cognitive ainsi produite n'amène pas la conscience à rechercher autre chose que ce qu'elle obtient, car ce qu'elle obtient dans la construction n'est rien d’autre que ce qu’elle y a mis a priori conformément à la détermination des formes pures de l'intuition. Le donné se résorbe tout entier dans l'intuition et la synthèse épuise a priori la donation.
  Tout autres sont les principes dynamiques de l'existence qui ne sont pas déterminants au même titre que les premiers puisque leur valeur constitutive et cognitive se trouve foncièrement diminuée. Les principes de la relation n'offrent aucune prise à l'intuition pure et ne peuvent être construits. Cela tient à ce qu'ils assurent le passage à l’existence. Or « l’existence des phénomènes ne peut être connue a priori, et quand nous pourrions parvenir par cette voie à conclure à quelque existence, nous ne la connaitrions pas cependant de manière déterminée » (CRP, A 178/B 221 ; nous soulignons). Les synthèses dynamiques de l'existence sont donc constitutive de l'expérience mais pas de l'intuition (CRP, A 664/B 691), raison pour laquelle elles ne peuvent être déterminantes au même titre que les synthèses mathématiques. Leur certitude est sans commune mesure avec la certitude intuitive puisque la synthèse dynamique régulatrice ne produit pas le contenu de son objet et ne sait pas ce qu’elle va trouver dans le phénomène, son objet restent indéterminé. Elle peut ainsi être déçue et demeure en attente d’un remplissement dont elle n’est pas a priori assurée. Le rapport entre apodicticité et heuristique est là encore inversement proportionnel mais il joue cette fois-ci en faveur de la seconde. Les synthèses de l'existence seront des analogies de la découverte.
  C'est alors qu'intervient la réflexion, dans sa fonction réfléchissante 1 . Ainsi,
  lorsque Kant oppose jugement déterminant et jugement réfléchissant dans les Introductions de la CFJ, il ne faut pas oublier que la notion de jugement déterminant regroupe des principes hétérogènes dont seuls les premiers, mathématiques et constitutifs, sont à proprement parler déterminants puisqu'ils constituent a priori leur objet en produisant de façon déterminée le résultat de leur synthèse. Inversement, parce qu'ils affrontent l'indétermination de l'existence, les principes dynamiques régulateurs doivent prendre en compte une part de réflexion, au sens réfléchissant du terme, parce qu'établir une « connexion nécessaire des perceptions » revient toujours à établir une loi empirique de la perception. Or, ainsi que le montre les introductions de la CFJ, l'établissement des lois empiriques et leur systématicité supposent le principe de la finalité (Zweckmässigkeit). La finalité formelle vient compenser du point de vue de la régulation le déficit d’intuition pure et d’apodicticité afin d'apporter aux principes dynamiques une ressource cognitive nouvelle
  
  1 On distinguera la réflexion réfléchissante reposant sur le principe de finalité, dans la CFJ, de la réflexion transcendantale déterminante de l’Amphibologie des concepts dans la CRP.
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  capable de prendre en charge l’indétermination de l'existence puisque la donation matérielle des phénomènes n’est jamais justiciable des synthèses mathématiques. Parce que l’existence est en soi indéterminée, régulation et orientation, elle doit se munir d’un principe transcendantal dont la valeur est exclusivement subjective, comme c’est le cas avec le jugement réfléchissant. Le concept de finalité doit être utilisé afin de « réfléchir sur la nature, en considérant la liaison des phénomènes en elle, liaison qui est donnée selon des lois empiriques » (CFJ, V, 181 ; nous soulignons). C’est pourquoi la région de la régulation s'articule avec le jugement réfléchissant et le principe de finalité.
  L’articulation du principe de finalité avec les principes régulateurs de l’Analytique est alors la suivante. Le principe transcendantal de la causalité est toujours valable à titre de loi originaire (ursprüngliches Gesetz) de l'expérience, quelles que soient les circonstances et le type de nature envisagé, mécanique ou technique, puisque la causalité mécanique s'articule avec le jugement téléologique (la finalité ne gomme pas le mécanisme mais est une façon de l'interpréter et de le comprendre, puisque lui-même ne fait pas sens). Il n'est pas possible de concevoir en effet un moment de l'expérience et de l'institution de la nature où les principes de l'entendement ne seraient pas à l'œuvre. Le bon critère du partage entre le déterminant et le réfléchissant n'est pas de savoir si le principe transcendantal universel est ou non déjà donné – puisqu'il l'est toujours – mais de savoir comment, une fois que l’on se retrouve confronté à l’existence, on peut adjoindre aux lois régulatrices de l'entendement, qui sont déjà données, une autre ressource cognitive que celles des catégories, afin de constituer la liaison nécessaire des perceptions, lorsqu'on part de ces mêmes perceptions afin de les unifier, ainsi que les Analogies de l'expérience invitent à le faire. La véritable question qui se pose concernant le partage entre jugement déterminant et jugement réfléchissant est donc de savoir comment, sur fond de constitution catégoriale de la nature, le sujet doit a priori se munir de principes qui lui permettront de procéder à ce minimum d'induction requis afin de s’orienter dans l’existence et de constituer la liaison nécessaire des phénomènes non plus de façon générale mais locale, en présence de telles ou telles perceptions, afin de constituer le systématique de l'expérience au niveau empirique. Tel est le défi que sert à relever le principe de finalité formelle. Parce que l'existence recouvre la perception et qu'établir une liaison nécessaire des phénomènes revient à établir des lois empiriques, l'application des principes régulateurs des Analogies suppose nécessairement l'exercice du jugement réfléchissant qui, grâce à son principe de finalité formelle, vient en renfort des principes dynamiques, dont il est le complément architectonique. Comment fonctionne alors cette alliance du régulateur dynamique et du réfléchissant ?
2. Le recours à la finalité objective en science
  
  Le principe de finalité formelle décrit dans la première Introduction de la CFJ doit être spécifié. C'est le recours à la finalité formelle objective décrite au § 62 de la CFJ qui va permettre de montrer comment la réflexion s'exerce lorsqu'elle prend le relai des principes régulateurs de l'entendement afin de systématiser des perceptions qui n'offrent
  
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  par elles-mêmes aucun élément de cohésion mais dont la raison, poussée par sa fonction de totalisation, cherche à fournir un principe d'unité systématique. L'analyse du concept de finalité objective va nous permettre de montrer que le jugement réfléchissant actualise le pouvoir cognitif de la raison en mettant en œuvre les lois transcendantales de continuité et d'affinité dont le caractère régulateur complète dans l'Appendice à la Dialectique transcendantale celui des Analogies de l'expérience.
  Le § 62 de la CFJ prolonge les analyses de l'Appendice à la Dialectique mais aussi du § 38 des Prolégomènes. Dans ces trois textes, qui s'éclairent mutuellement, Kant analyse la façon dont les observations astronomiques ont été unifiées grâce à l'utilisation des sections coniques2. Il montre comment cette unification a conduit à chercher un seul et même principe d'unité cosmologique qui a débouché sur la découverte – faudra-t-il dire l’invention ? – de la force de gravitation universelle par Newton (CRP, III, 438-9 ; A 662- 3/B 690-1). Kant écrira d'ailleurs dans l’Opus postumum que « la question est de savoir si on peut conclure des analogies de Kepler à l'attraction universelle de toute matière, ou si seulement il a fallu élaborer encore une hypothèse »3. Nous allons suivre ce parcours qui va de Galilée à Newton en passant par Kepler afin de voir comment il a permis à Kant d’élaborer une théorie transcendantale de l’invention scientifique. On a là un cas exemplaire, dans l'épistémologie transcendantale, d'articulation entre entendement, raison et réflexion, qui permet de décrire avec précision le rôle joué par les principe de finalité et d'affinité dans la connaissance.
  Le principe de finalité formelle s'applique d'abord à la Naturforschung. Ainsi que le souligne le § V de la seconde introduction de la CFJ, la catégorie de la causalité laisse entièrement indéterminée la façon dont les « objets de la connaissance empirique » (CFJ, V, 183) peuvent être déterminés suivant des « espèces de causes » dont le principe de la deuxième Analogie ne dit rien. La légalité du contingent pensée en vue de la possibilité de l'unité systématique de l'expérience selon des lois empiriques concerne ainsi au premier chef astronomie et physique. D'après le § II de la première introduction de la CFJ, le principe de finalité formelle permet de rassembler expériences et lois particulières sous des
  1. Kant écrit que les géomètres de l'Antiquité « étudiaient les propriétés de l'ellipse, sans soupçonner que l'on pouvait également trouver une pesanteur dans les corps célestes et sans connaître la loi de leurs différentes distances par rapport au centre de gravitation, loi qui permet à ce corps de décrire cette ligne dans un mouvement libre » (CFJ, V, 363). Cela tient à ce que, nous allons le voir, il y a finalité objective lorsque les propriétés d'un objet, d'une procédure ou d'un schème de construction sont investies dans un domaine d'application qui ne leur était pas initialement destiné, en vue de répondre à une demande d'intégration et de systématisation de données encore non unifiées. Suivant l'indication de Kant, c'est ce qu'illustre l'utilisation par Galilée des propriétés de la parabole démontrées par Apollonius, afin de construire le mouvement des projectiles. Dans la quatrième journée des Discours et démonstrations concernant deux sciences nouvelles (1638), le physicien italien utilise deux propositions des théorèmes des sections coniques afin de « prouver que la trajectoire décrite par un mobile pesant, alors qu'il descend d'un mouvement composé d'un mouvement horizontal uniforme et du mouvement naturel de chute, est une demi-parabole ». C'est dans le but de résoudre le problème de cette composition, inédite, de deux mouvements d'abord conçus comme hétérogènes – puisque le mouvement inertiel et le mouvement naturellement accéléré semblent de prime abord sans commune mesure – que Galilée se sert des propriétés de la parabole. Dans les mots de Kant, le physicien procède à « l'application de cette parabole à la trajectoire des corps lourds » (CFJ, V, 363).
  2. Opus postumum (XXII, 523), trad. F. Marty, Paris, PUF, 1986, p. 118.
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  lois plus générales afin de produire la connexion systématique indispensable à l'unité de la nature en tant que produit de « l'expérience particulière » (besondere Erfahrung). On interprète généralement cette finalité en lien avec le règne du vivant (les formes de vie classées en genres et espèces), les formes organisées et leurs forces formatrices (cf. la constitution d'un oiseau dans le § 61), mais le § 62 déjoue cette articulation trop vite consommée entre vie et finalité objective, et il indique de façon décisive que ce principe de finalité est d'abord à l'œuvre en mathématique et en physique, au niveau de l'articulation entre figures géométriques et phénomènes célestes. Comme dans l'Appendice à la Dialectique et le § 38 des Prolégomènes, le rôle joué par les sections coniques dans la découverte de la gravitation universelle apparaît alors comme une composante essentielle du procès de la science. Toutefois, au lieu de se présenter comme une pure et simple application des lois de l'entendement (notamment celles de la Mécanique des Premiers principes métaphysiques de la science de la nature, ainsi que le soutient M. Friedman4), l'unification des lois de Kepler dans la synthèse newtonienne révèle la fécondité de ressources cognitives de la raison et du jugement réfléchissant puisque, d'après Kant, ce sont d'abord l'affinité et le principe de finalité qui sont ici à l'œuvre5.
  La distinction entre jugement déterminant et jugement réfléchissant pourrait laisser croire que le principe de finalité (Zweckmäßigkeit) n'a aucune fonction épistémologique dans le domaine des forces motrices mais le § 62 de la CFJ indique rigoureusement l'inverse6. Lorsqu'il s'agit d'unifier phénomènes et lois empiriques (ainsi les lois Kepler dans la théorie newtonienne de la gravitation), finalité, continuité et affinité jouent un rôle central car elles fondent et assurent la possibilité d'extrapoler un principe valable dans une situation cognitive dans une autre situation qui ne lui ressemble pas. Au début du § 62, Kant commence par expliquer que « toutes les figures géométriques qui sont tracées selon un principe témoignent d'une finalité objective variée et souvent admirée », qui permet de résoudre de nombreux problèmes selon un unique principe. Cette finalité, qualifiée d'objective et d'intellectuelle par opposition à la finalité seulement subjective et esthétique,
  « exprime la propriété qu'a la figure d'engendrer de nombreuses formes que l'on se propose comme fins » (CFJ, V, 362). Il y a finalité dans une figure dès lors qu'elle sert d'opérateur pour la construction d'autres figures, afin de résoudre des problèmes avec lesquels elle n'a de prime abord aucun lien. Cette procédure relève de la faculté de juger réfléchissante parce qu'elle ne découle pas « de l'appréciation de l'objet d'après ses propriétés » (CFJ, V, 365), ni même du concept de l'objet, et parce qu'elle fournit immédiatement une solution universelle, valable pour toutes les constructions possibles. Elle permet ainsi de remonter du particulier, donné sous les traits d'une construction singulière, à l'universalité de la loi
  1. C'est la thèse des chapitres 3 et 4 de Kant and the Exact Sciences,. Nous allons préciser les raisons pour lesquelles nous ne suivons pas son interprétation du § 38 des Prolégomènes et de la construction kantienne de la gravitation. Le premier point à souligner est que Friedman interprète le § 38 en lien avec les Premiers principes, en projetant rétrospectivement les lois de la Mécanique, qui datent de 1786, sur le texte des Prolégomènes, qui date de 1783, mais sans jamais relever le lien, pourtant évident, avec l'Appendice à la Dialectique et le § 62 de la CFJ.
  2. Friedman passe complètement ce point sous silence.
  3. On doit à Pierre Kerszberg d’attirer l'attention sur ce paragraphe important mais souvent méconnu de la troisième Critique, cf. Kant et la nature, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1999, chap. 5, p. 276-280.
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    ou du principe qui permet de fournir la solution du problème que l'on cherche à résoudre et de l’appliquer à d’autres figures.
    Dans l'exemple de Kant, il s'agit de construire deux lignes qui « doivent se couper l'une l'autre, de sorte que le rectangle formé par les deux segments de l'une soit égal au rectangle formé par les deux segments de l'autre » (ibid.7). Relativement à ce problème, le cercle révèle sa finalité objective dans la mesure où « toutes les lignes qui se coupent à l'intérieur d'un cercle, dont la circonférence limite chacune d'elles, se divisent d'elles- mêmes suivant cette proportion » (CFJ, V, 362-363). Le fait d'inscrire, de façon tout à fait arbitraire, les deux segments de droite dans un cercle, est ce qui permet d'apporter une solution au problème (et même un nombre infini de solutions qui conservent toutes la même proportion). Il y a alors finalité dans la mesure où le cercle semble jouir d'une propriété qui n'est pas seulement géométrique puisque c'est son usage, en vue de la solution, qui révèle cette finalité que l’on fait entrer soi-même dans la figure (CFJ, V, 365). Or cet usage est une extrapolation vis-à-vis du cercle et de son concept. Le fait d'utiliser la figure comme moyen en vue d'une fin ne relève pas d'une considération géométrique ni même d'une découverte d'une propriété du cercle. On détourne ainsi la figure de son sens initial et de son concept, afin d'utiliser sa structure en vue de résoudre le problème de la construction indéterminée de deux segments de droites ou d'une base et d'un sommet. On découvre et exploite ainsi une virtualité heuristique de l'inscription de la figure dans l'espace, qui ne permet en aucun cas de lui assigner une nouvelle propriété objective mais seulement de s'en servir comme d'un instrument dans un autre contexte. Le cercle n'a en lui-même aucune fonction, aucune utilité, mais il peut s'avérer utile dans bien des contextes où il apparaît comme une pièce maîtresse des constructions.
    Cette analyse de la finalité objective anticipe d'une certaine façon la thèse de Claude Lévi-Strauss sur le bricolage dans la Pensée sauvage. Le géomètre utilisant le cercle apparaît comme un bricoleur qui détourne un objet de sa fonction afin de l'inscrire dans un montage inédit où son insertion est gouvernée par le jugement réfléchissant, en vue de l'efficacité recherchée. Dans cette situation, un signifié inédit émerge du jeu des signifiants – qui sont toujours plus ou moins flottants – et le bricolage apparaît comme l'image de l'activité symbolique ou se révèle l'excès de sens vis-à-vis des ressources limitées du système de signes dont on dispose pour penser. Il en va de même pour la finalité objective en géométrie. Il est admirable de voir que c'est « dans une figure aussi simple que le cercle [que] réside le fondement de la solution d'une foule de problèmes, dont chacun exigerait pour soi maints préparatifs, alors que cette solution résulte quasiment d'elle-même, en tant que l'une des propriétés remarquables et infiniment nombreuses du cercle » (CFJ, V, 362). Le cercle est comme la pièce centrale d'un jeu de formes où il s'insère de façon arbitraire et fortuite – puisqu'il revient à la seule décision du géomètre de l'employer comme méthode de résolution d'un problème – mais tout à fait probante, si bien
  4. Le même exemple est mobilisé dans le § 38 des Prolégomènes où le propos de Kant exprime déjà en grande partie ce qui sera repris dans le § 62 de la CFJ, le développement sur la finalité objective en moins, bien entendu, ce qui n'est pas négligeable.
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  que la finalité n'est pas seulement considérée comme subjective mais aussi comme objective et même inscrite « dans l'essence des choses (dans la mesure où leurs concepts peuvent être construits) » (CFJ, V, 364).
  Tout se passe donc comme si la circonférence du cercle était destinée à résoudre le problème des segments de droites en fournissant d'un seul coup toutes les solutions possibles. La règle de production du cercle apparaît comme contenant en elle-même un tel usage, extrinsèque à la figure, mais qui semble comme pré-adapté à la construction d'autres figures ainsi qu'à la résolution d'une « foule de problèmes ». Or, une telle puissance heuristique du cercle dans son usage finalisé n'est ni pensée dans son concept ni requise en tant que condition de sa construction, si bien que les « solutions finales appropriées » qu'il fournit et qui « n'étaient pas pensées dans la règle de leur construction » (CFJ, V, 363) – exactement comme la bonne pièce dans un montage bricolé – ne peuvent apparaître que dans l'acte de construction.
  C'est ainsi que le travail de construction se ramène au plus près du jugement réfléchissant. C'est en partant du cas singulier construit dans l'intuition que l'on est en mesure de remonter à la règle universelle : le cercle est le « lieu géométrique » qui contient
  « toutes les solutions » (V, 362) mais cela ne peut se manifester que lorsque je construis la figure puisque rien, dans son concept, ni dans l'énoncé du problème, ne me permet de le présumer. Il faut donc « bricoler » avec la figure, la manipuler afin d’en découvrir la finalité objective virtuelle. La finalité s'observe et se découvre dans la construction de la figure comme une propriété fortuite de l'existence, elle ne se déduit pas de l'essence. Pas plus que l'être, elle n'est un prédicat réel. Le paragraphe s'ouvre ainsi sur cette considération d'existence tout à fait essentielle : « toutes les figures qui sont tracées [gezeichnet] selon un principe témoignent [zeigen] d'une finalité objective... ». Ce n'est pas l'essence du cercle, la considération de la possibilité d'une telle figure (son existence logique), qui font voir (zeigen) sa finalité, mais son existence en tant que figure tracée, donnée dans l'intuition (pure ou empirique). C'est pourquoi « la conformité de l'objet au besoin des règles, qui est propre à l'entendement, apparaît comme contingent en soi, et n'est donc possible que par une fin expressément dirigée dans ce sens » (CFJ, V, 364, nous soulignons). L'usage de la figure et sa finalité objective demeurent contingents par rapport à son concept, comme l'existence par rapport à l'essence. Là encore, comme dans le bricolage, l'existence révèle une propriété inattendue et par là même source d'admiration : la figure apparaît comme moyen en vue d'une fin, « expressément dirigée dans ce sens », et que seul l'esprit projette. La finalité objective représente une sorte de bricolage transcendantal qui n'est autre que l'expression de l'ingéniosité à l'œuvre dans l'exercice de la faculté de juger, laquelle n'est jamais une science mais toujours un art qui relève du don naturel (Naturgabe) et ne peut être appris8.
  Seule la réflexion sur la figure singulière permet de conquérir l'universalité du principe de construction. Le choix qui consiste à inscrire les droites qui se croisent dans un
  
  8 L'ingéniosité de l'exercice du jugement, étymologiquement liée à l'ingenium et à ce que l'art de juger révèle d’inné, apparaît ainsi comme l'exact contraire de la bêtise (Dummheit) évoquée dans l'introduction de la faculté de juger de la Critique (CRP, III, 132, note).
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  cercle afin de voir les segments ainsi délimités comme des cordes, n'appartient pas au concept et ne peut être pensé par l'entendement comme si la propriété ainsi découverte était donnée avant la construction. Voir les segments de droites comme des cordes, voir le cercle comme une section conique, c'est avoir recours à un mode d'intelligibilité qui procède par affinité et non plus par concepts, c'est extrapoler les propriétés de certaines figures afin de résoudre un problème dans une autre figure, c'est inventer des opérateurs de solutions grâce à une démarche où la faculté de penser par concepts n'a plus rien à faire. Car c'est introduire de la finalité là où il n'y en pas. Cet acte correspond à une liberté épistémique qui ne relève que de l'appréciation (Beurteilung) subjective de l'état de chose représenté sous le point de vue de la finalité. La faculté de juger réfléchissante est une maxime subjective qui ne détermine pas les objets mais seulement le rapport de la représentation à ses objets.
3. Finalité et unité systématique
  
  Le travail de la réflexion réfléchissante se poursuit ensuite à deux autres niveaux. D'abord on réintègre le cercle dans les sections coniques et on unifie celles-ci du point de vue de la finalité objective. Ensuite, on effectue le passage de la représentation géométrique à la représentation des phénomènes astronomiques, procédé qui va finalement conduire à la postulation d'une loi de gravitation universelle. Il est important d'indiquer le rôle essentiel joué, dans tout ce processus, par les principes d'unité systématique de la raison, les lois de continuité et d'affinité structurant l'exercice du jugement réfléchissant.
  Le rôle du focus imaginarius dans l'Appendice à la Dialectique transcendantale montre que la difficulté inhérente au projet d'unité systématique de l'expérience se ramène au fait qu’on ne peut jamais unifier l'expérience qu'en ayant recours à ce qui la dépasse. L'unité systématique du donné réside toujours au-delà du donné. Mais cela se comprend si l'on précise que les phénomènes sont toujours reçus comme des agrégats et des rhapsodies de perceptions alors que leur unité, elle, ne l'est jamais, et c'est pourquoi la solution est de sortir du donné afin d’en trouver l’unité. Le jugement réfléchissant et le principe de la finalité formelle n'ont pas d'autre raison d'être. Il y a une tension essentielle entre l'idée de nature, que nous nous représentons comme étant nécessairement liée en un système, et l'expérience qui se présente d'abord sous la forme d'une « inquiétante disparité sans bornes des lois empiriques » (CFJ, XX, 209) ainsi qu'y insiste le § IV de la première Introduction de la CFJ. Il revient au principe de l'affinité de résoudre une telle tension afin de prendre en charge l'unification des lois empiriques sous des lois plus élevées et plus générales. Ce principe contribue à réaliser l'unité systématique de l'expérience dont la dynamique interne et inépuisable se situe précisément dans cette tension entre le donné, qui est toujours en attente d'unité, et cette même unité que l'on doit trouver par réflexion si l'on veut parvenir à connaître la nature en tant que système. Et l'on ne trouve pas de plus bel exemple de ce travail de l'affinité que dans l'analyse de l'invention newtonienne de la gravitation universelle à partir des lois de Kepler. La question qui se pose alors est de savoir quel
  
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  statut épistémologique Kant accorde à la découverte de la gravitation et quel est le rôle joué par les sections coniques dans cette découverte qui a permis d'unifier l'ensemble des mouvements du système solaire et de produire l'unité « d'un système du monde pour nous sans bornes, qui est lié par une seule et même force motrice » (CRP, A 663/B 691)9.
4. L'interprétation de Friedman
  
  L'interprétation de Friedman dans son analyse du § 38 des Prolégomènes est que, bien qu'issue de données empiriques de l'observation et des lois de Kepler, la loi de la gravitation est susceptible d'être fondée a priori sur les principes de l'entendement pur, notamment ceux de la Mécanique qui sont une instanciation des Analogies de l'expérience dans la métaphysique spéciale de la nature corporelle10. Le statut a priori de l'attraction gravitationnelle tient à ce qu'elle est requise en tant que propriété immédiate et universelle de la matière afin de pouvoir déterminer les mouvements vrais des corps célestes dans le système solaire. Dans la Dynamique des Premiers principes, les propositions 7 et 8 indiquent à quel titre on doit accepter, contre Newton, de tenir la force d'attraction comme une force essentielle inhérente à la matière. Muni de cette aprioricité de la force d'attraction, Friedman procède alors à une reconstruction de l'argument kantien en indiquant que l'on ne peut procéder à la détermination du mouvement vrai dans le système solaire que si l'on détermine d'abord le centre de la masse de ce système, opération qui dépend à son tour de la proportionnalité entre la masse du corps attractif et l'attraction gravitationnelle, ce qui suppose de tenir la force d'attraction, responsable de la gravitation, pour une détermination a priori de la matière. Le point important est alors que, selon Friedman, l'interprétation kantienne de la loi de Newton éliminerait tout recours à l'induction11.
  L'interprétation est admirable mais s'avère peu fidèle au texte. Il est pour le moins évident que Kant ne mobilise jamais la problématique « phénoménologique » de la détermination du mouvement vrai ni le recours aux lois de la Mécanique dans le § 38 des Prolégomènes – et pour cause : les Prolégomènes datent de 1783 alors que les Premiers principes datent de 1786. C'est seulement par projection rétrospective que l'on peut
  1. Pour une interprétation de la loi de gravitation et son inscription dans le contexte philosophique et scientifique de l'époque, on lira avec profit les analyses de Gerd Buchdahl dans « Gravity and Intelligibility : Newton to Kant », Kant and the Dynamics of Reason, Oxford/Cambridge (Mass.), Blackwell, 1992, p. 245-
    1. Buchdahl montre bien comment, en dépit du scepticisme de ses prédécesseurs (notamment Leibniz et Berkeley, qui tenaient l'action à distance pour une qualité occulte ; et Locke, pour qui elle était proprement inintelligible) ou de l'agnosticisme de Newton (sic, p. 249), Kant a voulu donné un statut de rationalité non seulement à la loi mais aussi à la force de gravitation, notamment dans le théorème 7 la Dynamique des Premiers principe.
  2. Friedman écrit notamment ceci : « Kant goes on to suggest a purely a priori derivation of the law of gravitation », Kant and the Exact Sciences, op. cit., p. 180 ; « this a priori determination of the law of gravitation is grounded (and thereby given a more than merely hypothetical or inductive status) by laws originating a priori in the understanding : above all, by the third law of motion, which is to realize or instantiate the third analogy of experience », ibid., p. 183. Buchdahl discute également cette question du rapport entre induction et dérivation a priori dans « Gravity and Intelligibility : Newton to Kant », op. cit., p. 157 sq.
  11 Ibid., p. 174-175.
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  analyser le lien entre les deux textes en supposant que l'écrit en 1783 s'éclaire à la lumière de celui 1786, ce qui est méthodologiquement discutable. Il ne semble pas non plus que Kant ait évacué le caractère inductif de sa reconstruction. C'est plutôt Friedman qui évacue l'induction afin de montrer comment la loi de gravitation peut être reconstruite à partit d'un fondement a priori ayant ses assises dans les lois de l'entendement12. Kant écrit certes que la nature « repose sur des lois que l'entendement peut connaître a priori » (IV, 321) mais, ainsi que le précise le § 36 des Prolégomènes, la nature dont il est ici question est « la nature en général » qui est « tout à fait identique à la simple légalité universelle de la nature » (IV, 319) en tant que corrélat de l'unité originairement synthétique de l'aperception. Or la nature en général n'est pas la nature particulière où l'on observe la chute des corps et où agissent les forces d'attraction et de gravitation, et dont de l'unité systématique résulte du travail du jugement réfléchissant.
  À s'en tenir à la lettre du texte du § 38 des Prolégomènes, il est au contraire manifeste que Kant retrace un processus inductif au cours duquel nous étendons tout d'abord aux représentations spatiales des diverses sections coniques ce qui vaut initialement pour le cercle, puis à l'espace physique ce qui vaut initialement de l'espace géométrique. À aucun moment il n'est question de mobiliser les lois de la Mécanique ni les principes de la Phénoménologie, si bien que l'on peut proposer une interprétation exactement inverse de celle de Friedman : telle que la conçoit Kant, la découverte de la loi de gravitation n'est pas le fruit d'une reconstruction qui prend l'allure d'un jugement déterminant où l'on appliquerait les principes purs de l'entendement au divers des connaissances empiriques mais le résultat d'un processus inductif qui correspond exactement à la démarche du jugement réfléchissant, au cours de laquelle la détermination du principe universel de l'unité systématique est obtenu par affinité et continuité grâce à la finalité formelle objective des figures. L'analyse de la démarche de Newton va d'ailleurs le confirmer13.
  Certains aspects de la démarche de Newton permettent de fournir un contenu épistémologique précis au concept d'affinité qui sert à régler l'unité systématique des données hétérogènes de l'expérience (CFJ, XX, 209 sq.). On peut ainsi voir fonctionner l'affinité et décrire la façon dont elle opère dans le contexte des lois physiques.
  
  19 Ibid., p. 157.
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  Définie comme communauté du dissemblable dans l'Anthropologie (§ 31, C), l'affinité se conjugue avec la finalité objective que Kant inscrit dans l'usage des figures géométriques. C'est en vue de se représenter la force centripète du point de vue de sa construction que Newton surcharge la représentation géométrique du mouvement de significations physiques. En nous reportant au schéma de la déflexion reproduit ci-dessous et fourni par F. De Gandt (op. cit. p. 99), le coup de génie de Newton réside dans l'interprétation qu'il propose de la déflexion (RQ) en tant que mouvement de chute. Le mouvement curviligne du corps (PQ) est interprété comme une déviation par rapport à sa trajectoire inertielle (PR) et cette même déviation est ensuite interprétée comme si le corps
  
  tombait depuis ce trajet inertiel20.
  
  C'est dans cette interprétation physique d'un schéma géométrique, qu'aucune connaissance de l'époque ne permet de formuler ni de légitimer, que réside le sens prodigieux de l'invention de Newton et l'usage de la finalité objective. Sa trouvaille réside dans le fait de faire comme si la parabole était une déflexion et comme si cette déflexion était un mouvement de chute – le comme si exprimant tout le travail de l'affinité.
  L'idée de mesurer la force centripète par la déflexion implique un usage implicite de ce qui deviendra dans les Principia les deux premières lois du mouvement et que Newton n'a pas encore formulées en 1684. D'une part, en effet, il faut tenir l'inertie pour une propriété universelle et nécessaire du mouvement des corps – ce sera la première loi des Principia – et il faut pouvoir (se) la représenter. Dans le schéma ci-dessus, le trajet inertiel est figuré par la tangente à la courbe qui représente la ligne droite que décrirait le mouvement s'il ne subissait pas l'attraction de la force centripète que l'on cherche à mesurer. D’autre part, il faut tenir compte du fait que tout mouvement non inertiel exprime l'action d'une force et que de ce fait « le changement de mouvement est proportionnel à la force motrice imprimée » (ce sera la seconde loi des Principia). Dans le schéma, c'est l'arc de cercle qui décrit ce changement dont il faut présupposer qu'il exprime l'action de la force motrice. Cela revient à dire que l'écart entre la tangente et la courbe est interprété comme un mouvement physique que Newton va mesurer grâce à la loi galiléenne de la chute des corps, comme si la déflexion était un mouvement de chute, dans un contexte où rien n'autorise cependant à l'appliquer puisque la chute des graves est un phénomène
  
  20 F. De Gandt écrit d'ailleurs que la longueur QR « représente une sorte de trajet de chute », op. cit., p.
  99. (nous soulignons).
  
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  terrestre mais que les lois de Kepler valent des mouvements célestes. En 1687, Newton ne pourra donc affirmer dans les Principia la valeur universelle de ces deux premières lois en tant qu'axiomes du mouvement que dans la mesure où il sait qu'elles sont opératoires parce qu’il en a déjà reconnu la valeur épistémologique dans ses démonstrations du De motu.
  La première étape de sa construction consiste à supposer qu'on doit pouvoir mesurer la proportionnalité entre mouvement curviligne et action de la force centripète à condition de pouvoir mesurer la déflexion, c'est-à-dire l'écart entre le mouvement curviligne et la trajectoire inertielle. Le trajet inertiel doit être tenu pour un trajet virtuel afin que la déflexion puisse être mesurée en tant qu'elle exprime l'action de la force centripète. Car cette dernière action est réelle et la force centripète s'imprime sur le corps en le déviant de ce que serait sans cela sa trajectoire inertielle. La déflexion que l'on cherche à mesurer est donc un mouvement et un segment virtuel : il n'a aucune réalité physique et n'est nulle part observable puisque le seul mouvement donné est celui de la courbe. On va donc mesurer la force par rapport à un segment qui n'a aucune réalité et qui n'existe que pour les besoins de la construction. On interprète ainsi l'écart entre la tangente et la courbe comme si il représentait un mouvement physique qui est celui de la chute d'un corps du point R au point Q. Le segment QR est un trajet virtuel que l'on décide de voir comme une déflexion afin de pouvoir mesurer l'action de la force centripète qui en est la cause et dont on cherche à exprimer le lien avec la forme elliptique de la trajectoire (connue par ailleurs grâce à la seconde loi de Kepler).
  Cette déflexion virtuelle est interprétée comme un mouvement de chute afin de pouvoir introduire le temps dans l'opération, étape clef de la démarche. En effet, afin de mesurer la déflexion, il faut pouvoir mesurer le temps parcouru par le mobile. C'est pour effectuer ce calcul que Newton a besoin de démontrer la seconde loi de Kepler (loi des aires), car seule cette loi permet de tenir une aire pour l'expression d'un temps. En substituant au temps la mesure de l'aire du triangle formé par le balayage du rayon de l'ellipse (entre le point de départ du mobile, le point-source de la force centripète et le point d'arrivée du mobile), on obtient la variable en fonction de laquelle peut alors être mesurée la déflexion. Newton est alors en mesure de calculer la déflexion – localement, pour des espaces toujours très proches du point de déflexion – comme étant proportionnelle au carré du temps (loi de Galilée), qui n'est autre que le carré de l'aire formée par le triangle représentant le balayage du rayon de l'ellipse (loi de Kepler). Et c'est cette méthode de calcul qui lui offre la possibilité de résoudre le problème initial du lien entre la proportion inverse au carré de la distance et le mouvement elliptique des planètes. En effet, lorsque le trajet décrit par le corps céleste est une ellipse, ainsi que le veut la première loi de Kepler, la variation du rapport entre la déflexion et le temps écoulé, qui exprime l'action de la force centripète selon la distance du corps au centre de la force, est inversement proportionnelle au carré de la distance entre le foyer de l'ellipse et le point où se trouve le corps sur cette ellipse. Pour la première fois, Newton parvient ainsi à démontrer que si la première loi de Kepler est vraie et que les planètes se meuvent en ellipse autour du Soleil, alors la force d'attraction que celui-ci exerce sur chacune d’entre elles varie en proportion inverse du carré de la distance qui les en sépare. Il n'est pas encore en possession de la loi universelle
  
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  de gravitation mais le chemin parcouru à partir des données initiales du problème est considérable et il fournit déjà la plupart des éléments de la future loi de gravitation. Newton a d'abord présupposé l'universalité d'une loi qu’il ne connaissait pas afin de prouver la seconde loi de Kepler.
  Revenons alors au schéma. Le segment QR, représentant graphique de la déflexion virtuelle, est une longueur proportionnelle au carré du temps écoulé. Dans une reprise et une généralisation des lois de Galilée sur le mouvement naturellement accéléré et sur le mouvement des projectiles exposées dans les Discours et démonstrations21, Newton traite la description d'un mouvement céleste comme s'il s'agissait d'un mouvement terrestre. On voit ainsi comment l'artifice de la démonstration recourt à la finalité objective et à l'affinité. D'une part, la loi galiléenne de la pesanteur terrestre est prise pour modèle épistémologique de la mesure d'une force centripète céleste. Leur affinité est donc le corrélat d'un artifice méthodologique. D'autre part, l'introduction du schème galiléen (la mesure de l'espace parcouru est proportionnelle au carré des temps) relève d'une lecture finalisée du schéma que l'on interprète de façon ad hoc en vue du problème à résoudre. L'extension universelle de la loi de la gravitation qui unifie les lois de Galilée et de Kepler ne sera donc pas le résultat d'une preuve de cette loi, dans les Principia, mais son principal présupposé. Car c'est à la condition de présupposer que l'on peut considérer la déflexion comme s'il s'agissait d'une chute (phénomène nulle part observé ni observable, répétons-le, puisque le segment QR ne décrit aucun mouvement réel mais un trajet virtuel qui n'existe que sur le schéma) que l'on est capable d'en établir la règle de sa mesure. Du reste, comme l'écrit F. de Gandt, « la parenté entre pesanteur et force centripète est si essentielle aux yeux de Newton qu'il a remplacé l'une par l'autre dans certaines versions du De motu »22 : cette parenté est bien une affinité (Verwandtschaft dit les deux en allemand) puisqu'elle suppose une communauté de nature par-delà l'hétérogénéité des phénomènes terrestres et célestes. Et elle a des répercussions épistémologiques immédiates en termes de techniques de calcul, puisqu'on peut étendre aux lois de Kepler celles de Galilée et ainsi montrer que la forme elliptique de la trajectoire est fonction d'une variation de la force centripète.
  L'universalisation de la procédure est déjà à ce stade entièrement opératoire. La parenté, ou mieux l'affinité entre pesanteur terrestre et force centripète indique déjà le sens de l'universalisation de la future loi de gravitation. D'où est venue la thèse de l'universalité de la force gravitationnelle ? D'une méthode de calcul – la seule dont pouvait disposer Newton mais qu'il a eu l'audace d'aller chercher du côté de la physique des graves alors que rien ne l'y autorisait ni même ne l'y invitait –, méthode qui consiste à supposer que la déflexion virtuellement exprimée par la courbe d'un mouvement céleste par rapport à sa trajectoire inertielle ne peut être mesurée par le temps écoulé que si l'on suppose « que la force qui attire les planètes vers le Soleil est analogue à la pesanteur terrestre »23 et que, ce
  1. La première dit que l'espace croît selon le rapport temporel le plus simple, qui s'ajoute de façon uniforme à lui-même, et donc comme le carré des temps ; la seconde que la composition du mouvement uniforme rectiligne et du mouvement de chute décrit une semi-parabole.
  2. F. De Gandt, op. cit., p. 205 (nous soulignons). 23 Ibid., p. 99.‌
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  faisant, les lois de Galilée deviennent l'opérateur de résolution d'un problème d'astronomie mettant en jeu la loi képlérienne des ellipses et la variation de la force suivant la proportion inverse du carré des distances. Utilisant les lois de Galilée comme artifice technique afin de trouver le moyen de mesurer la déflexion d'un corps céleste, Newton voit la déflexion comme une chute et il transforme un mouvement réel curviligne elliptique en un trajet virtuel (QR) puisque, de chute, il n'y a jamais eu. La déflexion QR n'est ni une chute ni un mouvement réel, mais Newton fait comme si c’était le cas afin de tenir sa mesure pour l'expression de la force centripète.
  
  Conclusion
  
  On peut ainsi éclairer le propos de l'Appendice à la Dialectique transcendantale relatif à la gravitation qui va à rebours de l'interprétation de Friedman selon laquelle la loi de la gravitation universelle correspondrait à une application des lois transcendantales des Analogies de l'expérience et de la Mécanique au divers empirique. L'usage des sections coniques en astronomie et en physique relève des principes d'affinité et de finalité objective propres au jugement réfléchissant. L'introduction de la finalité dans les figures (notamment, comme on vient de le voir, lorsqu'on interprète une ellipse comme une déflexion exprimant la chute d'un corps depuis sa trajectoire inertielle) n'a de sens qu'envisagé du point de vue heuristique. Lorsque la raison formule une demande d'unité dont elle pressent la nécessité sans savoir comment l'obtenir sur la base des principes de l'entendement et de son unité distributive (CRP, III, 428), le jugement réfléchissant vient la seconder. La finalité objective permet en effet de détourner une propriété de son objet et de son contexte initial, afin de l'appliquer à d'autres objets de prime abord hétérogènes et dont rien n'indique s'ils sont commensurables avec les premiers mais dont on postule qu'ils peuvent l'être moyennant démonstration puisque seule la démonstration parviendra à montrer que le processus de construction a force de loi.
  Première étape avec Galilée. L'usage d'une section conique, la parabole, et de certaines de ses propriétés, permet d'unifier le mouvement rectiligne uniforme et le mouvement naturellement accéléré de la chute des corps, d'abord tenus pour hétérogènes. Dans les termes de Kant, cela permet de procéder à « l'application de cette parabole à la trajectoire des corps lourds » (V, 363). Galilée voit donc le mouvement des projectiles comme une parabole, c'est-à-dire qu'il interprète géométriquement ce mouvement comme étant la composition de deux mouvements initialement hétérogènes et pour cela il va chercher chez Apollonius les théorèmes qui lui permettent d'en construire les propriétés. La parabole fournit ainsi les différents ratios requis pour la composition de ces deux mouvements hétérogènes que sont le trajet rectiligne uniforme et le mouvement accéléré. Premier détournement de la parabole, mais aussi première affinité entre mouvement rectiligne et mouvement de chute (on pourrait dire aussi entre inertie et gravité).
  Newton emboîte ensuite le pas à Galilée. Il utilise la loi de la chute des corps afin de mesurer l'action de toute force centripète et l'applique à tous les mouvements curvilignes. Il utilise cette loi à l'intérieur d'un contexte céleste où elle n'a de prime abord
  
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  rien à faire puisque rien n'indique ni ne permet de suggérer que la chute des corps sur Terre exprime la même force de gravité que celle qui est en vigueur dans le système solaire. Second détournement – cette fois-ci de l'ellipse – et seconde affinité – cette fois-ci entre la chute des corps terrestres et le mouvement elliptique des planètes. Ces unifications successives conduisent de proche en proche à l'unité des lois et des causes du mouvement. Le sens inductif du procédé, qui correspond à la démarche du jugement réfléchissant, est formulé l'Appendice à la Dialectique : « c'est ainsi que nous arrivons, sous la direction de ces principes [diversité, affinité, unité] à l'unité générique de ces orbites quant à leur forme, et par là, plus loin, à l'unité des causes de toutes les lois de leur mouvement (la gravitation) » (CRP, A 663/691).
  La formulation d'une cause universelle des mouvements, célestes et terrestres, aussi hétérogènes soient-ils, se fait suivant les « règles de l'affinité » (Regeln der Verwandtschaft) qui sont aussi mentionnées dans la première introduction de la CFJ. Ces règles ne se donnent pas au hasard mais sous réserve de l'établissement d'une démonstration, afin de rendre compte de la connexion légale des phénomènes, ce qui garantit la légalisation du processus d'extension de la loi de la chute des graves hors de son domaine initialement terrestre d'application. C'est aussi le sens du § 38 des Prolégomènes. On généralise la propriété du cercle à toutes les sections coniques en présupposant leur affinité et, en considérant « le cercle comme une section conique, qui se trouve par conséquent soumise aux mêmes conditions fondamentales de construction que les autres sections coniques, alors nous trouvons que toutes les cordes qui se coupent à l'intérieur de celles-ci : ellipse, parabole et hyperbole, se coupent toujours en telle façon que, sans être égaux, les rectangles issus de leurs segments n'en sont pas moins entre eux toujours en des rapports égaux » (CFJ, IV, 321). Kant ajoute que, « à partir de là, nous allons plus loin encore [Gehen wir von da noch weiter], jusqu'aux lois fondamentales de l'astronomie physique : nous trouvons une loi physique de l'attraction réciproque qui s'étend à toute la nature matérielle » (ibid., nous soulignons). L'expression « nous allons plus loin encore » indique le sens du processus d'induction que nous avons retracé dans le De motu. Newton n'a pu conclure à l'universalité de la force gravitationnelle que parce qu'il avait déjà réussi à prouver que la loi qui s'applique à la chute des corps sur Terre peut être transférée avec succès au mouvement elliptique des orbites célestes et ainsi rendre compte, d'un seul et même geste, de l'unité – introuvable par ailleurs – des lois de Kepler, ainsi que de leur lien avec la proportion inverse au carré de la distance. Et c'est parce qu'il a établi l'induction de façon apodictique grâce à une construction dans l'intuition pure qu'il a pu se prévaloir d'une telle postulation d'universalité. L'affinité qui permet d'unifier les lois de Kepler et la proportion inverse du carré de la distance réside donc dans des artifices de calcul où l'usage de la finalité objective est épistémologiquement aussi efficace que les propriétés géométriques effectivement manipulées. Dans les termes de Kant, ainsi s'obtient la connexion systématique de l'expérience, par unification progressive d’un ensemble de données hétérogènes et sans commune mesure apparente mais dont la reconstruction géométrique permet de prouver qu'elles sont coordonnées par une seule et même loi et
  
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  qu'elles sont donc toutes en affinité. Ainsi fonctionne le « principe de l'affinité des lois particulières de la nature » (CFJ, XX, 210) qui permet de ramener le divers des phénomènes sous l'unité d'une seule cause universelle et qui donne ainsi à voir la nature dans sa cohérence systématique la plus étendue. Le principe de finalité formelle prouve la valeur épistémologique du jugement réfléchissant dans le contexte de l'invention scientifique, là où les principes transcendantaux de l'Analytique ne sont pas assez puissants et souples pour rendre possible la connaissance empirique de la nature.
  
  Bibliographie
  
  Œuvres de Kant :
  Kant’s gesammelte Schriften, herausgegeben von der Königlich Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 29 vol., Berlin, Walter de Gruyter & Co, 1902-1983 (Ak. suivi du numéro du volume dans la bibliographie).
  https://korpora.zim.uni-duisburg-essen.de/Kant/verzeichnisse-gesamt.html Kant, Œuvres philosophiques, 3 vol., Paris, Gallimard, coll. « La Pleiade », 1980-1986.
  Prolégomènes à toute métaphysique future qui pourra se présenter comme science [Prolegomena zu einer jeden künftigen Metaphysik, die als Wissenschaft wird auftreten können, 1783, Ak. IV, 253-383], trad. J. Rivelaygue, Œuvres philosophiques, t. II, Paris, Gallimard, 1985, p. 17-172. Prolégomènes à toute métaphysique future qui pourra se présenter comme science, trad. Guillermit, Paris, Vrin, 1996.
  Premiers principes métaphysiques de la science de la nature [Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Naturwissenschaft, 1786, Ak. IV, 467-565], trad. F. de Gandt, Œuvres philosophiques, t. II, Paris, Gallimard,1985, p. 363-493. Principes métaphysiques de la science de la nature, trad. A. Pelletier, Paris, Vrin, 2017.
  Critique de la raison pure [Kritik der reinen Vernunft, éd. 1781, Ak., IV, 1-252 ; éd. 1787, Ak., III, 1-552], trad. A J.-L. Delamarre et F. Marty, Œuvres philosophiques, t. I, Paris, Gallimard, 1980, p. 719-1470.
  Critique de la faculté de juger [Kritik der Urtheilskraft, 1790, Ak. V, 165-485], trad. J.-R. Ladmiral, M. B. de Launay et J.-M. Vaysse, Œuvres philosophiques, t. II, Paris, Gallimard, 1985, p. 845-1299.
  Opus postumum [Opus postumum, 1796-1803, Ak. XXI-XXII], trad. F. Marty, Paris, PUF, 1986.
  
  Autres :
  Buchdahl, G., « Gravity and Intelligibility : Newton to Kant », in Kant and the Dynamics of Reason, Oxford/Cambridge (Mass.), Blackwell, 1992, p. 245-270.
  Friedman, M., Kant and the Exact Sciences, Harvard, Harvard University Press, 1992. Galilée, Discours concernant deux sciences nouvelles, trad. M. Clavelin, Paris, PUF, 1995 (Armand Colin, 1970).
  Kerszberg, P., Kant et la nature, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1999. Lévi-Strauss, C., La pensée sauvage, Paris, Plon, 1960.
  
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  Newton, I., De la gravitation, suivi de Du mouvement des corps, trad. M.-F. Biarnais et F. De Gandt, Gallimard, 1995 (Belles Lettres, 1985).
  
  Articles :
  Tanona, S. : « The Anticipation of Necessity : Kant on Kepler's Laws and Universal Gravitation », Philosophy of Science, 2000, vol. 67, n°3, The University of Chicago Press, p. 421-443.
  
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  Frege sobre Kant:
  uma motivação filosófica do logicismo
  
  Frege on Kant: A Philosophical Grounding of Logicism
  
  MANUELA TELES 
  
  Universidade do Porto, Portugal
  
  Abstract
  
  In 1882, Frege wrote to Anton Marty that his project was to prove that the fundamental laws of arithmetic are analytical in Kant's sense. The answer to this letter was signed by Carl Stumpf, who advised Frege to write about his motivations for the creation of the formal language he had introduced in his Begriffsschrift, written three years before. The Grundlagen der Arithmetik, that Frege published two years after, may be seen as his result for following Stumpf's advice. In it, Frege mentions Kant again, both as a motivation for his logicist program and as an opposer to it. In this paper, I aim to understand this two-sided influence of Kant in Frege's purposes. To do that, I present and discuss excerpts of the Grundlagen where Frege talks about Kant. I show that, after rejecting Kant's proposal that numerical judgements (like 7+5=12) are synthetic a priori, Frege has an insight on Kant's definition of analytical according to which it is possible through reason alone to achieve knowledge about objects that are neither perceived by the senses nor intuitions. It is this insight that rests on Frege's motivation for his logicist program. According to Frege's logicist program, numbers are objects known exclusively by their properties, with no connection to any representation (either sensorial or intuitional). Frege's insight allow us to think that Kant could have come to this result with his notion of analytical were he not compromised with a notion of concepts as representations that are the building blocks of thoughts. Instead, Frege proposes that new concepts can be discovered in the decomposition of thoughts, and this discovery is a task for logic alone. Being a task for logic alone is precisely Kant's sense of analytical. What Frege's insight adds to Kant's notion of analytical is, thus, that it may be a source of knowledge.
  Keywords
  - Doutoranda MLAG Instituto de Filosofia da Universidade do Porto. E-mail de contato: manelateles@gmail.com Agradeço as propostas e discussões da Prof. Sofia Miguens e do Prof. João Alberto Pinto que determinaram a versão final deste texto.
  [Recibido: 30 de septiembre 2017
  Aceptado: 15 de octubre 2017]
  
  Manuela Teles
  
  Frege, Kant, analytical, logicism, foundations of arithmetic, concept, judgement
  
  Resumo
  
  Em 1882, Frege escreveu a Anton Marty que o seu projeto era provar que as leis fundamentais da aritmética são analíticas no sentido de Kant. A resposta a esta carta foi assinada por Carl Stumpf, que aconselhou Frege a escrever sobre as suas motivações para a criação da linguagem formal que apresentou na sua Begriffsschrift, escrita três anos antes. Os Grundlagen der Arithmetik, que Frege publicou dois anos depois, podem ser vistos como o seu resultado por seguir o conselho de Stumpf. Aí, Frege menciona Kant novamente, tanto enquanto motivação para o seu programa logicista como enquanto um seu opositor. Neste artigo, pretendo compreender esta influência de dois lados de Kant nos propósitos de Frege. Para isso, apresento e discuto excertos dos Grundlagen onde Frege fala sobre Kant. Mostro que, depois de rejeitar a proposta de Kant de que juízos numéricos (como 7+5) são sintéticos a priori, Frege tem uma visão da definição de Kant de analítico de acordo com a qual é possível conhecer objetos que não são percetíveis pelos sentidos ou pela intuição apenas pela razão. É esta visão que está na base da motivação de Frege para o seu programa logicista. De acordo com o programa logicista de Frege, os números são objetos conhecidos exclusivamente pelas suas propriedades, sem ligação com qualquer representação (sensorial ou intuitiva). A visão de Frege permite-nos pensar que Kant poderia ter chegado a este resultado com a sua noção de analítico não fosse o seu compromisso com a noção de conceitos enquanto representações que são os blocos de construção dos pensamentos. Em vez disso, Frege propõe que novos conceitos podem ser descobertos na decomposição de pensamentos e que esta descoberta é uma tarefa para a lógica em exclusivo. Sendo uma tarefa da lógica em exclusivo é precisamente o sentido de analítico de Kant. O que a visão de Frege acrescenta ao analítico de Kant é, então, que pode ser uma fonte de conhecimento.
  Palavras-chave
  
  Frege, Kant, analítico, logicismo, fundamentos da aritmética, conceito, juízo.
  
  Diz Michael Beaney que Carl Stumpf terá tido alguma influência na redação dos Grundlagen der Arithmetik (GLA) 1 por parte de Frege. Como se sabe, a primeira publicação de Frege, a Begriffsschrift (BS) 2 foi mal recebida pela crítica. Stumpf terá escrito a Frege que poderia ser vantajoso motivar o seu projeto, apresentando de forma informal o que aparece formalmente tratado na BS. Nos GLA, Frege não usa a sua notação conceptual mas apresenta cuidadosamente as motivações para a usar. É a estas motivações que estamos a chamar o enquadramento teórico da criação da notação conceptual.
  Uma parte do que terá enquadrado teoricamente a criação da notação conceptual por parte de Frege é o contexto técnico do trabalho na matemática da sua época. Como Weiner, Mark Wilson descreve o contexto científico em que Frege começou a trabalhar como um período
  
  1 Grundlagen der Arithmetik. Eine logisch mathematische Untersuchung über den Begriff der Zahl. Breslau, Verlag von Wilhelm Koeber, 1884.
  2 Begriffsschrift, eine der Arithmetischen nachgebildete formelsprache des reinen denkens. Halle,
  Verlag von Louis Nebert, 1879.
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  de mudança do paradigma para resolver problemas trazidos por noções como as que Frege enuncia nos GLA:
  
  “Os conceitos de função, continuidade, de limite, de infinito, revelaram-se carentes de definições mais precisas. Os números negativos, bem assim como os irracionais, de há muito integrados na Ciência, tiveram de ser submetidos a um exame mais rigoroso” (FREGE 1992:37).
  
  Segundo Wilson, a notação conceptual e as motivações filosóficas que subjazem o logicismo de Frege têm raízes no que chama a tradição do logicismo relativo. Wilson caracteriza o logicismo relativo como uma adaptação da geometria projetiva, enquanto método para resolver problemas da aritmética. Sem entrar nos sofisticados pormenores e debates da teoria dos números, podemos definir um elemento de extensão como um número ou conjunto de números que não estão contidos no enunciado ou estão fora do domínio em causa mas que têm de ser trazidos para o cálculo matemático a fim de resolver um problema. Os números imaginários são exemplos de elementos de extensão. De acordo com Edward Zalta, Frege terá dito sobre a sua tese de doutoramento, publicada com o título: ‘Sobre Uma Representação Geométrica das Formas Imaginárias no Plano [Über eine geometrische Darstellung der imaginären Gebilde in der Ebene]’, que nela explicava como, por meio de uma representação geométrica das formas imaginárias no plano (pontos ou linhas), se podia compreender uma correlação entre essas formas imaginárias e um elemento “real” e “intuitivo” correspondentes a elas3. A caracterização de Zalta sugere que Frege poderá ter começado por se aproximar dos projetivistas. Mas o seu trabalho seguinte, que começa com a BS e os GLA, é claramente uma defesa do logicismo. Wilson chama logicismo absoluto à posição de Frege, uma vez que propõe que o logicismo deve estender- se a todas as áreas da matemática, por oposição a ser apenas um instrumento local para resolver problemas de fundamentação. Na Introdução dos GLA, Frege dá razão a Wilson:
  
  “senti-me obrigado a ir um pouco mais atrás até às fundações lógicas gerais do que a maioria dos matemáticos, talvez, veria como necessário” (BEANEY 1997:89).
  
  As questões e os assuntos específicos da matemática terão aqui de ser deixados de lado. O que há a salientar é o modo como Wilson apresenta o logicismo a partir dos problemas com que os matemáticos se deparavam na altura em que Frege começou a trabalhar. Wilson apresenta o logicismo como
  
  “a reivindicação de que os elementos de extensão podem ser justificados usando apenas recursos puramente lógicos” (WILSON 2010:382).
  
  A partir desta definição, Wilson desenvolve o logicismo relativo como a tese de que a lógica pode fornecer as entidades que preencham os hiatos de uma prova matemática.
  
  3 Cf. ZALTA 2014.
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  “Assim, construções lógicas passam a ser vistas como a metodologia crucial para que o matemático explore com liberdade criativa domínios mais alargados de objetos inalcançáveis por consideração ‘intuitiva’” (WILSON 2010:391).
  
  Depois, Wilson considera que o programa de Frege corresponde a um logicismo absoluto que se sobrepõe ao logicismo relativo.
  
  “O logicismo absoluto, tal como preconizado por Frege (…), reivindica que vários domínios da matemática tradicionais podem ser vistos, eles próprios, como tão compostos quanto ‘objetos lógicos’ engendrados pela necessidade de compreender a estrutura de domínios não-matemáticos” (WILSON 2010:406).
  
  Propomos aqui que o programa de Frege vai além do logicismo absoluto. No final do Prefácio da BS4, Frege lista as várias ciências que considera poderem ser beneficiadas com
  o uso da sua notação conceptual, sugerindo que considera que o logicismo tem aplicação não apenas para todos domínios da matemática mas para todos os domínios da ciência. Por isso, chamamos logicismo universal ao logicismo de Frege.
  A outra parte do enquadramento teórico da notação conceptual é a insatisfação confessada por Frege relativamente à fundamentação da matemática. Nos GLA, Frege afirma que o trabalho na matemática tem de ser precedido de uma investigação cuidada acerca da questão primordial da aritmética, que é a de saber o que é um número. De acordo com Frege,
  
  “… ninguém consegue dizer o que o número é. Se um conceito que é fundamental a uma grande ciência levanta dificuldades, então é certamente uma tarefa imperativa investigá-lo com maior detalhe e superar estas dificuldades” (BEANEY 1997:85).
  
  Segundo Frege, a investigação a levar a cabo tem de começar por esclarecer o que são realmente aquelas fórmulas matemáticas como ‘7+5=12’. Sem uma resposta a esta questão, continua Frege, é impossível compreender a natureza do cálculo que está envolvido nos vários ramos da matemática e, usando esse cálculo, estabelecer com certeza os princípios e resultados que caracterizam cada um deles. Começar por uma definição geral de número— a que Frege frequentemente chama nos GLA ‘o conceito de número cardinal’—e partir daí para uma definição de cada um dos números particulares e das operações da aritmética, na qual assenta toda a matemática, é o plano de trabalho traçado por Frege nos GLA.
  Frege acusa as teorias aritméticas até então disponíveis de não terem os instrumentos teóricos para apresentar uma definição de número e, por isso, de serem incapazes de garantir que os juízos matemáticos são verdadeiros. Como resultado, propõe-se ele próprio fazer essa investigação, atribuindo-se a tarefa de definir o que é um número, para, a partir dessa definição, estabelecer os princípios nos quais assentam todas as verdades aritméticas.
  
  4 Cf. BEANEY 1997:50.
  
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  Uma investigação acerca do que é um número, propõe também, tem de ser feita por meio de um processo que parta do que é aceite como verdadeiro na aritmética e chegue até às definições e leis primordiais. Esse processo, a que chama uma demonstração, tem de ser tal que garanta a preservação de verdade em cada passo. Por isso, Frege caracteriza uma demonstração como um processo inverso ao de uma dedução. Se, numa dedução, se “constrói” um argumento para, a partir de premissas, se chegar a uma conclusão, numa demonstração, parte-se da conclusão para “descobrir” as premissas. Mais especificamente, àquelas premissas que já não podem mais ser demonstradas, a que Frege chama verdades primitivas.
  Nos GLA, Frege preocupa-se em apresentar o seu projeto logicista como alternativa à tradição matemática e filosófica vigente, discutindo noções e teorias para, por exclusão de partes, chegar à prova de como, a partir do conceito geral de número se pode chegar à definição dos números naturais primitivos, o 0 e o 1, e à operação primitiva da aritmética, a adição. Frege começa por desmontar as perspetivas que podem ser agrupadas em teorias formalistas e teorias psicologistas. Encontramos uma descrição de Frege das primeiras teorias num dos seus últimos escritos (‘Zahlen und Arithmetik’5), onde diz:
  
  “Quando comecei a procurar responder por mim próprio à questão sobre o que deve ser entendido por um número e pela aritmética, encontrei (…) o que era chamado aritmética formalista. A marca da aritmética formalista era a tese ‘números são numerais’” (BEANEY 1997:371).
  
  Depois, Frege acusa os defensores desta tese de tomarem os numerais como as coisas, elas próprias, e não as suas designações, que estão em estudo na aritmética. Frege entende que as teorias formalistas esvaziam a aritmética de significado, impedindo as suas fórmulas e axiomas de poderem ser afirmados ou negados, e com essa possibilidade, de constituírem conhecimento. Por isso defende o oposto: que numerais são apenas partes de enunciados numéricos e, por isso, que as fórmulas da aritmética são algum tipo de asserção. Enquanto asserção, um enunciado numérico diz algo que é verdadeiro ou falso. Como se verá, e como continua a afirmar em ‘Zahlen und Arithmetik’, Frege entende que “num enunciado numérico algo é asserido sobre um conceito”6.
  O segundo grupo de teorias que Frege rejeita são aquelas que fundamentam a aritmética na experiência sensorial ou intuitiva. Estas teorias psicologistas dividem-se naquelas que defendem que juízos numéricos se fundam na experiência sensorial e naquelas que fundam os juízos numéricos na intuição. Notavelmente, entre os proponentes das primeiras está John Stuart Mill e entre os proponentes das segundas está Immanuel Kant. As propostas de Kant sobre a natureza dos juízos numéricos são uma resposta às propostas dos empiristas clássicos. Por isso, para considerar as teorias psicologistas contra as quais Frege monta o seu programa logicista, basta-nos ter em conta as propostas de Kant. Nelas encontraremos os mesmos motivos de Frege para rejeitar as teorias empíricas da fundamentação da
  
  5 Cf. BEANEY 1997:371-3.
  6 BEANEY 1997:372.
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  aritmética. Tendo em conta as propostas de Kant, saber o que é a intuição ou uma intuição torna-se um assunto relevante para compreender os motivos de Frege.
  O programa logicista de Frege é simultaneamente modesto e ambicioso em relação a Kant. É modesto no que diz respeito à geometria:
  
  “Encaro como um dos grandes méritos de Kant ter reconhecido as proposições da geometria como juízos sintéticos, …”,
  
  diz Frege a Marty, na carta de 1882. Contudo, e aqui começa a ambição, acrescenta:
  
  “… não posso permitir-lhe o mesmo no caso da aritmética” (BEANEY 1997:80).
  
  A ambição de Frege levá-lo-á a considerar que os axiomas básicos da aritmética não são sintéticos a priori, como Kant propõe. Como se verá, todo o seu programa se sustenta na tese de que juízos numéricos são analíticos.
  Entende-se, por isso, ser necessário aqui abordar algumas propostas de Kant, presentes na sua Crítica da Razão Pura, a seguir ‘CRP’. Olhar-se-á apenas para os lugares de que Frege fala diretamente ou que é preciso ler para compreender o que Frege diz nesses excertos. Antes de dar início à nossa apresentação do que Frege diz sobre Kant, tendo em conta a CRP, precisamos de introduzir uma observação terminológica. Na literatura anglo- saxónica, as palavras ‘Vorstellung’ e ‘Vorstellungen’, utilizadas por Frege nos seus vários escritos, são traduzidas, respetivamente, por ‘idea’ e ‘ideas’7. Em português, a tradução resultaria em ‘ideia’ e ‘ideias’, também respetivamente. Ora, na história da filosofia, a noção de ideia é indissociável das propostas dos empiristas clássicos, nas quais ideias são entidades de natureza mental com origem na experiência sensorial. No entanto, a noção de ‘Vorstellung’ que Kant usa tem uma aplicação mais abrangente e sistemática, que precisamente se estende para lá da experiência sensorial e vai até à experiência intuitiva. Como é a noção de Kant, que corrige a dos empiristas, que Frege vai criticar, consideramos que a tradução mais adequada de ‘Vorstellung’, tal como é usada por Kant, primeiro, e por Frege, depois, é ‘representação’, como traduzem Manuela Pinto dos Santos e Alexandre Fradique Morujão 8. A tradução de António Zilhão parece-nos também adequada pois considera que a tradução correta de ‘Vorstellung’ seria ‘representação mental’. À primeira vista, esta seria a tradução mais adequada porque expressa particularmente bem a distinção que Frege está interessado em fazer entre as representações de Kant e os seus ‘conceitos’ (Begriffe). Mas a tradução de Zilhão aparece como redundante, como aliás o próprio faz questão de notar9, se se notar que, para Frege, uma representação é sempre de natureza psicológica e jamais de natureza lógica, como bem expressa na Introdução dos GLA:
  
  “Usei [nos GLA] sempre a palavra ‘representação’ [Vorstellung] na aceção psicológica, e
  
  7 Cf. e.g. DUMMETT 1993, BEANEY 1997.
  8 Cf. KANT 2001.
  9 FREGE 1992:19.
  
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  distingui representações tanto de conceitos como de objetos” (BEANEY 1997:90).
  
  Vamos, portanto, preterir a sugestão de Zilhão e usar a tradução mais curta de Pinto dos Santos e Fradique Morujão, ‘representações’, como aliás acaba por fazer o próprio Zilhão. Assim, ao longo deste capítulo, onde se lê ‘representações’, estamos a traduzir a palavra ‘Vorstellungen’ usada por Kant e Frege. O mesmo para o singular. Onde se lê ‘representação’ é a palavra “Vorstellung” que estamos a traduzir.
  O primeiro lugar onde encontramos Frege a questionar propostas apresentadas por Kant na CRP é na Carta a Marty, onde diz o seguinte acerca de um livro que terá em mãos para publicar em breve:
  
  “Neste momento, estou quase a terminar um livro no qual trato o conceito de número e demonstro que os primeiros princípios do contar, que até agora têm sido encarados como axiomas sem prova, podem ser provados a partir de definições apenas por intermédio de leis lógicas, de tal modo que podem ter de ser encarados como juízos analíticos, no sentido de Kant” (BEANEY 1997:79).
  
  O mais certo é que o livro em causa seja os GLA, publicados dois anos mais tarde, em 1884. Isto mesmo pode ser verificado logo no §3, onde Frege escreve:
  
  “[n]a origem destas investigações estiveram também, no meu caso, motivos filosóficos. As questões acerca da natureza apriorística ou aposteriorística, sintética ou analítica, das verdades aritméticas esperam aqui pela sua resposta” (FREGE 1992:38).
  
  Apesar de não ser explícita, a referência a Kant é aqui óbvia. Mas voltando à Carta a Marty: o que quer dizer Frege com um juízo ser analítico no sentido de Kant? Nesta secção procuramos responder a esta questão olhando para o que Kant, ele próprio, diz acerca do que é analítico.
  Kant usa a expressão ‘analítico’ na CRP para caracterizar um certo tipo de juízos por oposição aos que chama sintéticos. A oposição entre juízos sintéticos e juízos analíticos é introduzida por Kant na Introdução (B) da CRP para esclarecer uma possível confusão que pode resultar de uma outra distinção entre juízos: aquela entre juízos a posteriori e juízos a priori. Esta primeira distinção serve a Kant para se demarcar, precisamente, das propostas empiristas. Considere-se o que Kant diz ainda na Introdução (A):
  
  “Até hoje, admitia-se que o nosso conhecimento se devia regular pelos objetos” (KANT 2001:19-20; BXVI).
  
  Isso mesmo é que está implícito na teoria das ideias de Locke, por exemplo, que propõe que ideias são entidades mentais que resultam do impacto dos objetos exteriores nos nossos órgãos sensoriais. Segundo Kant, é neste sentido que os empiristas defendem que todo o conhecimento tem origem na experiência sensorial. A distinção entre a priori e a posteriori aparece inicialmente, na Introdução (B) para diferenciar dois tipos de
  
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  conhecimento. O primeiro tipo é precisamente aquele que se pode considerar ter origem na experiência sensorial. O segundo, o que não tem essa origem. É a este conhecimento que Kant chama a priori.
  
  “Denomina-se a priori esse conhecimento e distingue-se do empírico, cuja origem é a posteriori, ou seja, na experiência (KANT 2001:37; B2).
  
  No caso dos juízos, a distinção faz-se com base no mesmo critério:
  
  “(…) designaremos, doravante, por juízos a priori, não aqueles que não dependem desta ou daquela experiência, mas aqueles em que se verifica absoluta independência de toda e qualquer experiência” (KANT 2001:37; B3).
  
  Kant apresenta os juízos numéricos como um exemplo do conhecimento a priori. Os juízos numéricos, diz, são por definição necessários e universais, quando juízos que derivam da experiência são contingentes e particulares. Outro argumento de Kant contra a tese empirista é que, sendo contingentes e particulares, os juízos de experiência não podem fundamentar qualquer conhecimento, nem mesmo aquele que deriva da experiência. “Nenhuma experiência particular”, diz Kant, “pode dar a um juízo a necessidade e a universalidade necessárias para fundamentar o conhecimento em geral”. É preciso, então, aceitar que nem todo o conhecimento deriva da experiência sensorial e é esta aceitação que levanta a questão que conduz a investigação de Kant na CRP. Voltando à questão inicial sobre a origem de todo o conhecimento, Kant propõe a famosa inversão da investigação filosófica.
  
  “(…) todas as tentativas para descobrir a priori, mediante conceitos, algo que ampliasse o nosso conhecimento malogravam-se com este pressuposto [de que o conhecimento se deve regular pelos objetos]. Tentemos pois, uma vez, experimentar se não se resolverão melhor as tarefas da metafísica, admitindo-se que os objetos se deveriam regular pelo nosso conhecimento, o que assim já concorda melhor com o que desejamos, a saber, a possibilidade de um conhecimento a priori desses objetos, que estabeleça algo sobre eles antes de nos serem dados” (KANT 2001:19-20; BXVI).
  
  Ao aceitar o pressuposto empirista de que as ideias a partir das quais se forma todo o conhecimento têm origem na experiência sensorial de objetos, a metafísica encontra-se numa situação em que não pode apresentar-se enquanto ciência: ao procurar aplicar os princípios da razão ao que não pode ser universal ou necessário não tem como evitar elevar o que é apenas fonte de conhecimento formal a fonte de conhecimento material. Kant sugere que a sua crítica seja vista como uma revolução copernicana. Onde Copérnico propôs que se movesse o espectador e não os astros, para os observar (no sentido de os conhecer), Kant propõe que se inverta a ordem de investigação metafísica, do sujeito para o objeto. A proposta revolucionária de Kant é então que
  
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  “a nossa representação das coisas, tais como nos são dadas, não se regula por estas, consideradas como coisas em si, mas que são esses objetos, como fenómenos, que se regulam pelo nosso modo de representação” (KANT 2001:22; BXX).
  
  É então que Kant precisa de introduzir a distinção entre juízos sintéticos e juízos analíticos. Kant entende que é a negligência da diferença entre juízos analíticos e juízos a priori que gera a identificação do conhecimento formal com conhecimento material, o que resulta no recurso a entidades incognoscíveis (deus e a alma, por exemplo) para fundamentar o conhecimento.
  A famosa distinção entre juízos analíticos e juízos sintéticos é apresentada por Kant na parte IV da Introdução (B) da CRP, onde se lê:
  
  “Em todos os juízos, nos quais se pensa a relação entre um sujeito e um predicado, esta relação é possível de dois modos. Ou o predicado B pertence ao sujeito A como algo que está contido (implicitamente) nesse conceito A, ou B está totalmente fora do conceito A, embora em ligação com ele. No primeiro caso, chamo analítico ao juízo, no segundo, sintético” (KANT 2001:42-3; B10).
  
  Como vemos, a distinção entre os juízos que são analíticos e os que são sintéticos é feita com base nas noções de sujeito e predicado, que são, para Kant, conceitos. Para termos uma noção do que são conceitos para Kant, considere-se o que escreve na passagem A320/B376-7 da CRP:
  
  “O termo genérico é a representação em geral [Vorstellung überhaupt] (representatio). Subordinado a este, situa-se a representação com consciência [Vorstellung mit Bewußtsein] (perceptio). Uma perceção que se refere simplesmente ao sujeito, como modificação do seu estado, é a sensação [Empfindung] (sensatio); uma perceção objetiva é conhecimento [Erkenntnis] (cognitio). O conhecimento, por sua vez, é intuição [Anshauung] ou conceito [Begriff] (intuitius vel conceptus). A primeira refere-se imediatamente ao objeto e é singular, o segundo refere-se mediatamente, por meio de um sinal [Merkmals] que pode ser comum a várias coisas. O conceito é empírico ou puro, e ao conceito puro, na medida em que tem origem no simples entendimento (não numa imagem pura da sensibilidade), chama-se noção (notio). Um conceito extraído de noções e que transcende a possibilidade da experiência é a ideia [Idee] ou conceito da razão [Vernunftbegriff ]” (KANT 2001:312-3; B377).
  
  Portanto, para Kant, conceitos são, em primeira instância, representações. Mais especificamente, e considerando o excerto supra, são representações comuns, objetivas e conscientes. No excerto supra, salientamos as palavras ‘intuição’ e ‘conceito’ porque serão relevantes para esclarecer o que está em causa nos juízos analíticos. Segundo Kant, a confusão entre juízos a priori e juízos analíticos resulta de uma confusão entre conceitos e
  
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  intuições10.
  Os juízos numéricos surgem na exposição de Kant como exemplos notáveis de juízos a priori.
  
  “É fácil mostrar que há realmente no conhecimento humano juízos necessários e universais (…). Se quisermos um exemplo, extraído das ciências, basta volver os olhos para todos os juízos da matemática” (KANT 2001:38; B5).
  Ou ainda:
  “A matemática oferece-nos um exemplo brilhante do quanto se pode ir longe no conhecimento a priori, independente da experiência” (KANT 2001:41; A4/B8).
  
  Até aqui, Frege poderia concordar com Kant num ponto: juízos numéricos são a priori no sentido em que neles não há qualquer interferência da experiência sensorial. A discordância de Frege teria início no que Kant diz imediatamente antes:
  
  “É certo que [a matemática] se ocupa de objetos e de conhecimentos, apenas na medida em que se podem representar na intuição” (KANT 2001:41; A4/B8).
  
  Kant continua:
  “Mas facilmente se deixa de reparar nesta circunstância [de os objetos e os conhecimentos da matemática poderem ser representados na intuição], porque essa intuição mesma pode ser dada a priori e, portanto, mal se distingue de um simples conceito puro” (KANT 2001:41; A4/B8).
  
  Rejeitada a experiência sensorial como fundamento dos juízos universais ou necessários e, por isso, a priori, o próximo passo de Kant é rejeitar que essa fundamentação seja fornecida pela razão. Para isso, diz Kant, é preciso ter em conta que
  
  “uma grande parte, talvez a maior (…)[,] da atividade da nossa razão consiste em análises
  dos conceitos que já possuímos de objetos” (KANT 2001:42; A5/B9, ênfase nossa).
  
  Uma explicação do que são essas análises dos conceitos que já possuímos de objetos vem imediatamente a seguir:
  
  “[A análise de conceitos] fornece-nos uma porção de conhecimentos que, não sendo embora mais do que esclarecimentos ou explicações do que já foi pensado nos nossos conceitos (embora ainda confusamente), são apreciados, pelo menos no tocante à forma, como novas inteleções, embora, no tocante à matéria ou ao conteúdo, não ampliem os conceitos já adquiridos, apenas os decomponham” (KANT 2001:42; A5/B9).
  
  Fica assim esclarecida a especificidade dos juízos analíticos: decompõem conceitos introduzindo eventualmente novas formas para o que era já conhecido mas não novas
  
  10 Cf. KANT 2001:40-2; A3-5/B7-10.
  
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  matérias, novos conhecimentos. Estes não são, portanto, os juízos a priori que Kant tem em mente quando procura o fundamento de todo o conhecimento. A especificidade dos juízos a priori tem de ser tal que permitem ampliar o conhecimento. É precisamente esta ideia de ampliação de conhecimento que Kant pretende captar com a noção de sintético.
  A diferença entre juízos analíticos e juízos sintéticos é estabelecida pelo tipo de ligação entre conceitos que cada um deles envolve. Diz Kant:
  
  “os juízos (os afirmativos) são analíticos, quando a ligação do sujeito com o predicado é pensada por identidade; aqueles, porém, em que essa ligação é pensada sem identidade, deverão chamar-se juízos sintéticos” (KANT 2001:43; A7).
  
  Logo a seguir:
  
  “Os primeiros poderiam igualmente denominar-se juízos explicativos; os segundos, juízos extensivos; porque naqueles o predicado nada acrescenta ao conceito do sujeito e apenas pela análise o decompõe nos conceitos parciais, que já nele estavam pensados (embora confusamente); ao passo que os outros juízos pelo contrário, acrescentam ao conceito de sujeito um predicado que nele não estava pensado e dele não podia ser extraído por qualquer decomposição” (KANT 2001:43; B11).
  
  O resto da CRP é uma defesa e desenvolvimento da tese de acordo com a qual no fundamento de todo o conhecimento estão juízos sintéticos a priori. Frege vai rejeitar esta tese.
  Podemos agora apresentar como analíticos para Kant juízos cuja verdade depende exclusivamente da análise dos conceitos envolvidos. Por análise de conceitos, Kant entende a sua decomposição em conceitos mais simples e é nesse sentido que afirma que o predicado de um juízo analítico explica o seu sujeito. Esta conceção de análise revela como Kant está prisioneiro do esquema linguístico de sujeito e predicado11. O mesmo esquema linguístico pode expressar uma subordinação ou uma subsunção. Veremos adiante a especificidade de cada uma destas relações. Por enquanto, é relevante salientar que Frege alerta para o facto de Kant considerar apenas subordinações.
  Apresentamos acima o que encontramos Kant a dizer sobre o que é, para um juízo, ser analítico. Notamos também que, na Carta a Marty, Frege apresenta a sua proposta como partindo da tese de que juízos numéricos são analíticos “no sentido de Kant”. Por isso, se é “no sentido de Kant” que Frege atribui uma natureza analítica aos juízos numéricos, a sua ambição consiste em mostrar que juízos numéricos são demonstráveis sem o envolvimento de qualquer experiência sensorial ou intuitiva mas apenas por análise dos conceitos que os compõem. Mas esta noção de análise revela-se insatisfatória para Frege. Tal como Kant, Frege pretende defender que juízos numéricos, como todos os juízos da matemática, são parte do conhecimento que não se funda na experiência sensorial.
  Para Kant, o que torna um juízo analítico é que determinar a sua verdade depende apenas
  
  11 Cf. BEANEY 1997:79-83.
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  da decomposição dos conceitos que o constituem. Esta conceção de analiticididade assenta em duas teses de Kant. Uma sobre conceitos e outra sobre juízos. A primeira é que conceitos são representações que referem objetos por meio de sinais (Merkmalle) que são comuns a várias coisas. A outra tese, é que juízos são relações entre conceitos. Portanto, para Kant, um juízo analítico é aquele onde a decomposição dos seus conceitos é suficiente para determinar a sua verdade. Por isso, juízos analíticos não constituem conhecimento material mas apenas formal. Para Frege, determinar a verdade de um juízo apenas por aplicação dos princípios da razão é mais do que meramente decompor conceitos nas suas características. Um sinal (Merkmal) de um conceito é uma propriedade das coisas que caem sob ele12. Assim, a análise de um conceito, tal como é pensada por Kant, chega apenas a outros conceitos e não às coisas que têm aquelas propriedades. Talvez essa seja a razão pela qual Kant alerta para que juízos analíticos não constituam conhecimento material. Mas, como se verá, Frege entende que decompor o conteúdo de um juízo permite chegar, para lá dos conceitos, até aos próprios objetos. A reformulação da noção de analítico de Kant permite a Frege mostrar que, por decomposição de conceitos e aplicação exclusiva dos princípios da razão, podemos conhecer números, nomeadamente, os números inteiros 0 e 1, que estão na base de toda a fundamentação da aritmética.
  Na BS, publicada dois anos antes da Carta a Marty, sem mencionar Kant, Frege sugere que há dois tipos de verdade, cuja distinção assenta no tipo de justificação:
  
  “[D]ividimos todas as verdades que requerem justificação em dois tipos, aquelas cuja prova pode ser dada de modo puramente lógico [analíticas, dir-se-ia] e aquelas cuja prova tem de ser baseada em factos empíricos [sintéticas, dir-se-ia]” (BEANEY 1997:48).
  
  Para avançar com o seu programa, Frege precisa então de justificar esta alteração de perspetiva acerca dos poderes da análise, entendida como Kant. Para alcançar este fim, Frege precisa também de afastar a noção de intuição de Kant da fundamentação da aritmética.
  O segundo lugar onde encontramos Frege a falar de Kant são os GLA. Aí, encontramos referências a Kant em vários lugares, mas é essencialmente no Capítulo I, intitulado “Posições de alguns autores sobre a natureza das proposições numéricas” que Frege desenvolve as suas razões para rejeitar as propostas de Kant acerca da natureza dos juízos analíticos. O outro lugar dos GLA onde Frege fala em Kant é a conclusão.
  A primeira menção de Frege a Kant nos GLA surge para discutir a demontrabilidade de proposições numéricas. No §5 dos GLA, Frege começa por esclarecer que há dois tipos de proposições a que pode chamar-se numéricas: aquelas que dizem respeito a números inteiros particulares e aquelas que dizem respeito às leis da aritmética. Para simplificar, chamamos fórmulas numéricas às primeiras e leis numéricas às segundas. Depois, Frege alerta para a caracterização de Kant das fórmulas numéricas, segundo a qual são indemonstráveis mas não são axiomas. Se não são axiomas, sendo que pelo menos algumas
  
  12 Cf. GLA§53/FREGE 1992:78.
  
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  fórmulas numéricas decerto não são imediatamente evidentes, como podem ser indemonstráveis? Frege questiona:
  
  “de que outra forma poderiam estas proposições [fórmulas numéricas] ser inteligidas senão através de uma demonstração, já que não são imediatamente evidentes?” (FREGE 1992:41, ênfase nossa).
  
  Em nota, Frege remete a caracterização de Kant para a terceira secção do Capítulo II do Livro Segundo da CRP. De facto, nessa secção, encontramos Kant a dizer o seguinte:
  
  “no que refere à quantidade (quantitas), ou seja, à resposta à pergunta acerca de quanto uma coisa é grande, não há, na verdade, a esse respeito, axiomas propriamente ditos, embora muitas dessas proposições sejam sintéticas e imediatamente certas (indemonstrabilia)” (KANT 2001:199; A164).
  
  A resposta à pergunta sobre quanto uma coisa é grande resulta numa proposição sobre um número inteiro particular, uma fórmula numérica. Ao propor que não há axiomas para fórmulas numéricas, Kant admite que são indemosntráveis. Mas propõe também que são sintéticas. De que modo é isto problemático para Frege?
  O excerto da CRP citado segue-se de um conjunto de considerações acerca do que Kant chama os princípios do entendimento puro. Investigar os princípios do entendimento puro é o objeto da parte da lógica transcendental a que Kant chama analítica dos princípios. De acordo com Kant, os princípios do entendimento puro são válidos a priori, ou seja, a sua validade é anterior a toda a experiência13. Os princípios do entendimento puro são também o que regula todos os juízos. Por isso, a analítica dos princípios funciona como cânone da faculdade de julgar.
  Na parte da CRP em que discute os princípios do entendimento puro, Kant começa por considerar o princípio da não-contradição.
  
  “a proposição: a coisa alguma convém um predicado que a contradiga, denomina-se princípio de contradição e é um critério universal, embora apenas negativo, de toda a verdade” (KANT 2001:190; A151).
  
  O princípio da não-contradição é universal porque
  
  “[q]ualquer que seja o conteúdo do nosso conhecimento e seja como for que se relacione com o objeto, a condição universal, embora apenas negativa, de todos os nossos juízos em geral, é que se não contradigam a si mesmos” (KANT 2001:190; A150).
  
  A universalidade do princípio da não-contradição tem dois resultados imediatos nas propostas de Kant. O primeiro é que não é um princípio do entendimento puro mas um princípio da razão. Por isso, não compete à analítica dos princípios investigá-lo. O segundo
  
  13 Cf. Kant 2001:195.
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  resultado imediato é que, se é universal, rege tanto os juízos analíticos como os juízos sintéticos a priori. Mas Kant nota que há uma diferença relevante entre a relação do princípio da não-contradição com os juízos analíticos e com os juízos sintéticos: apesar ser suficiente para determinar a verdade de um juízo analítico, é insuficiente para determinar a verdade de um juízo sintético. A diferente reside no que Kant expõe a seguir:
  
  “No juízo analítico atenho-me ao conceito dado para estabelecer qualquer coisa a seu respeito. Se o juízo for afirmativo, só acrescento a este conceito o que nele está pensado; se for negativo, excluo apenas do conceito o seu contrário. (…) Nos juízos sintéticos, porém, tenho de sair do conceito dado para considerar, em relação com ele, algo completamente diferente do que nele já estava pensado; relação que nunca é, por conseguinte, nem uma relação de identidade, nem de contradição, e pela qual, portanto, não se pode conhecer, no juízo em si mesmo, nem a verdade nem o erro” (KANT 2001:193; B194).
  
  Deste modo, mesmo que o conceito que ocupa o lugar de predicado não contradiga o conceito que ocupa o lugar de sujeito, o juízo sintético ainda pode ser falso. O princípio da não-contradição torna juízos analíticos verdadeiros. Mas o que torna os juízos sintéticos verdadeiros?
  Serão os princípios do entendimento puro que fornecerão a resposta. Mas Kant formula já uma resposta possível na secção anterior à Analítica dos Princípios. No Capítulo I do Livro Segundo, a que chama Analítica dos Elementos, Kant apresenta aquilo a que chama o esquematismo dos conceitos puros do entendimento. O capítulo começa assim:
  
  “Em todas as subsunções de um objeto num conceito, a representação do primeiro tem de ser homogénea à representação do segundo” (KANT 2001:181; A137/B176).
  
  Kant explica logo a seguir que duas representações são homogéneas quando a que é o conceito inclui a que representa o objeto. Assim, por exemplo, diz-se do objeto a que se chama prato que é um círculo. Diz Kant:
  
  “possui homogeneidade com o conceito geométrico puro de um círculo, o conceito empírico de um prato, na medida em que o redondo, que no primeiro é pensado se pode intuir neste último” (KANT 2001:181; A137/B176).
  
  Veremos adiante como esta noção de subsunção é desafiada por Frege, ainda nos GLA. Por enquanto, interessa-nos apenas perceber que a noção de homogeneidade é o que permite a Kant explicar a relação especial entre um objeto e um conceito. Nesta explicação, tanto o objeto como o conceito são representações. O que os distingue é que há algo que é intuído no primeiro mas pensado no segundo.
  A noção de homogeneidade é crucial para o projeto da filosofia transcendental. Deduzidos os conceitos puros do entendimento—as categorias—a questão que tem de ser respondida por Kant é como se aplicam aos fenómenos. Só assim pode a filosofia transcendental afirmar-se como anterior a todo o conhecimento material. Como não se cansa de salientar
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  Kant, o objetivo da filosofia transcendental é “mostrar a possibilidade de aplicar aos fenómenos em geral os conceitos puros do entendimento” (KANT 2001:181; A138). Diz, então, Kant:
  
  “É claro que tem de haver um terceiro termo, que deva ser por um lado, homogéneo à categoria e, por outro, ao fenómeno e que permita a aplicação da primeira ao segundo. Esta representação mediadora deve ser pura (sem nada de empírico) e, todavia, por um lado, intelectual e, por outro, sensível” (KANT 2001:182).
  
  Essa representação mediadora é intelectual na medida em que é pensada e é sensível na medida em que é intuível, como dizia Kant no excerto anterior. A essa representação mediadora, simultaneamente intelectual e sensível, Kant chama um esquema.
  
  “Daremos o nome de esquema a esta condição formal e pura da sensibilidade a que o conceito do entendimento puro está restringido no seu uso e de esquematismo do entendimento puro ao processo pelo qual o entendimento opera com esses esquemas” (KANT 2001:183; A140).
  
  Mas o que é para uma representação ser simultaneamente intelectual (pensada) e sensível (intuída). A explicação de Kant é que um esquema é um produto especial da imaginação. Sendo a imaginação a faculdade de produzir imagens—encaradas como representações sensíveis—, um esquema é produzido pela mesma faculdade sem envolver a sensibilidade. Kant apresenta um esquema como a representação do processo geral envolvido na imaginação para dar uma imagem a um conceito, ou seja, do método para representar um conjunto enquanto unidade. O exemplo de Kant nesta parte da CRP é depois mencionado por Frege. Considere-se cinco pontos. Os cinco pontos podem ser imaginados numa imagem (por exemplo, como os vértices de um pentágono) ou pensados num esquema (por exemplo, enquanto o número 5).
  
  “O esquema puro da quantidade (quantorum), (…) como conceito do entendimento, é o número, que é uma representação que engloba a adição sucessiva da unidade à unidade (do homogéneo). Portanto, o número não é mais do que a unidade da síntese que eu opero entre o diverso de uma intuição homogénea em geral, pelo facto de eu produzir o próprio tempo na apreensão da intuição” (KANT 2001:184; B182).
  
  Não nos interessa aqui ter em conta os diferentes esquemas que Kant apresenta. O que é relevante para nós é que Kant considera que um número particular, como o 5, é um esquema—uma representação que é simultaneamente intuível e pensável—e o número em geral é um esquema transcendental—uma representação mediadora entre um fenómeno em geral e uma categoria.
  Até aqui, no Capítulo I do Livro Segundo, Kant fala na referência das categorias aos fenómenos ou ao fenómeno em geral. No início do Capítulo II do Livro Segundo, os fenómenos ou fenómeno em geral é substituído pela experiência possível. A substituição é
  
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  justificada pelo projeto maior da filosofia transcendental:
  
  “(…) é precisamente a referência das categorias à experiência possível que deve constituir todo o conhecimento puro a priori do entendimento, e é a relação das categorias à sensibilidade em geral que terá, por isso mesmo, de expor integral e sistematicamente todos os princípios transcendentais do uso do entendimento” (KANT 2001:189; A148).
  
  A noção de um terceiro termo para ligar os dois conceitos de um juízo aparece também adiante, na Analítica dos Princípios. Depois de considerar a insuficiência do princípio da não-contradição para determinar a verdade dos juízos sintéticos, Kant afirma:
  
  “Admitamos, pois, que se tem de partir de um conceito dado para o comparar sinteticamente com um outro; é então necessário um terceiro termo, no qual somente se pode produzir a síntese dos dois conceitos. Qual é, pois, este terceiro termo, senão o medium de todos os juízos sintéticos? (KANT 2001:193; A155).
  
  Tendo em conta o que ficou dito antes sobre o esquematismo, as palavras agora relevantes são ‘no qual’ e ‘medium’. Estes termos são relevantes aqui porque aparecem como surpreendentes. De acordo com o que Kant diz antes, como vimos, o terceiro termo de um juízo sintético é um esquema. Vimos também que um esquema é uma representação simultaneamente intuível e pensável que é produzida pela imaginação. Como pode uma representação ser um local onde se produz a síntese dos dois conceitos? Como pode ser um meio no qual essa síntese ocorre?
  O mistério fica dissolvido considerando a unidade sintética da aperceção. Kant propõe que a ligação dos dois conceitos de um juízo sintético a priori tem origem na autoconsciência de uma representação muito particular, a que chama a unidade sintética da aperceção. A particularidade da aperceção é que é uma representação que acompanha todas as outras, unificando-as. A consciência da aperceção pode ser inicialmente analítica: ao considerar que todas as minhas representações me aparecem como minhas, concluo que há nelas um “eu penso” que represento como uno. Em nota, Kant explica que todos os conceitos pressupõem a unidade analítica da aperceção mas esta depende, afinal, da unidade sintética da aperceção. O exemplo de Kant é o conceito de vermelho. Para que a unidade analítica da consciência, diz, eleve vermelho a um conceito, tem de pensar previamente a unidade sintética das representações das várias coisas diferentes que têm em comum ser vermelhas. Por isso, diz:
  
  “a unidade sintética da aperceção é o ponto mais elevado a que se tem de suspender todo o uso do entendimento, toda a própria lógica e, de acordo com esta, a filosofia transcendental (…).” (KANT 2001:133; B134).
  
  Em secções anteriores, nomeadamente na segunda secção do Capítulo II do Livro Primeiro da Analítica dos Conceitos, Kant informa que usará o termo ‘síntese’ para falar no ato do
  
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  entendimento que liga representações numa unidade. Em contrapartida, a ‘análise’ consiste no ato de decompor o que a síntese liga. Por isso, Kant afirma a síntese como anterior à análise. A síntese, continua, é um ato “originário” cuja unidade não se segue da ligação das representações num conceito mas é antes a sua condição.
  
  “A representação dessa unidade não pode, pois, surgir da ligação, foi antes juntando-se à representação do diverso que possibilitou o conceito de ligação” (KANT 2001:131; B131).
  
  Por isso, a unidade sintética das representações não pode ser confundida com um conceito puro do entendimento—uma categoria—, não é a unidade em causa na tábua das categorias. Antes é o que é a priori e anterior às categorias elas próprias.
  
  “A categoria pressupõe, portanto, já a ligação” (KANT 2001:131; B131).
  
  Se não é um conceito puro do entendimento, o que é essa unidade a priori? A resposta de Kant é que é a condição de todo o pensamento. Essa condição do pensamento, a unidade sintética das representações, tem de ser para Kant uma intuição.
  
  “A representação que pode dar-se antes de todo pensamento chama-se intuição” (KANT 2001:131; B132).
  
  Portanto, temos aqui uma definição de intuição enquanto representação que pode ser dada antes do pensamento. Esta definição interessa-nos para perceber como Kant considera que a síntese que é preciso acrescentar ao princípio da não-contradição para determinar a verdade de um juízo sintético é uma representação deste tipo: uma intuição. O que é uma intuição para Kant tem de ser visto por oposição a o que é um conceito. Vimos antes como Kant trata ambos como representações. Mais especificamente, como perceções objetivas (representações com consciência que não se referem simplesmente ao sujeito). O que os distingue no sistema de representações que apresentamos acima é que intuições são se referem imediatamente a um objeto e são singulares, enquanto conceitos se referem a objetos por meio de sinais e podem ser comuns. Ora, na lógica transcendental, não há objetos sensíveis envolvidos. O objeto de estudo da lógica transcendental são os elementos e os princípios do conhecimento a priori—anterior à experiência. Por isso, nos juízos sintéticos a priori, a intuição envolvida não pode ser definida como uma representação consciente que se refere imediatamente a um objeto.
  Kant conclui nesta parte da CRP que a unidade do diverso nas intuições—voltando ao exemplo, o vermelho comum às diferentes coisas—é o que antecede todo o pensamento e, por isso, é o primeiro conhecimento a priori. Kant chama-lhe também aperceção pura ou aperceção originária e considera que é o que produz a síntese de todas as representações, na qual estão incluídos quaisquer conceitos de um juízo sintético. O estudo do entendimento a priori que a filosofia transcendental leva a cabo pela lógica transcendental revela, então, que a unidade sintética da aperceção é a condição de todo o conhecimento:
  
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  nenhum objeto pode ser dado sem uma unidade sintética.
  
  “A unidade sintética da consciência é, pois, uma condição objetiva de todo o conhecimento, que me não é necessária simplesmente para conhecer um objeto mas também porque a ela tem de estar submetida toda a intuição, para se tornar objeto para mim, porque de outra maneira e sem esta síntese do diverso não se uniria numa consciência” (KANT 2001:137; B138).
  
  Podemos começar por apresentar a unidade da aperceção como a condição do que Kant chama a validade objetiva e que caracteriza como a realidade ou possibilidade de um objeto ser dado. A unidade sintética da aperceção está para o entendimento como o espaço e o tempo estão para a sensibilidade: é a sua condição.
  Assim, também o tempo, enquanto forma pura da intuição, está submetido à aperceção sintética, enquanto unidade original da consciência:
  
  “a forma pura da intuição no tempo (…) está submetida à unidade original da consciência, apenas através da relação necessária do diverso da intuição a um: eu penso” (KANT 2001:139; B140).
  
  Na Segunda Secção do Capítulo II, encontramos Kant a dizer sobre o sentido interno e o tempo que o conjunto onde todas as nossas representações estão contidas, apesar de envolver a imaginação, é a unidade da aperceção. É pois na unidade da aperceção, continua Kant, que deve ser procurada a possibilidade dos juízos sintéticos a priori. Mas a possibilidade ainda não é a verdade que procuramos para os juízos sintéticos a priori. A resposta à nossa questão vem apenas a seguir:
  
  “Para que um conhecimento possua realidade objetiva, isto é, se refira a um objeto e ele encontre sentido e significado, deverá o objeto poder, de qualquer maneira, ser dado” (KANT 2001:193; A155).
  
  Um objeto é dado quando a sua representação se refere à experiência possível, antes ainda de se referir a uma experiência real14. Juízos sintéticos a priori são possíveis quando referem experiência possível em geral. Mas quando são verdadeiros? O que é a experiência possível? Uma experiência é, para Kant, uma síntese empírica. Vimos como uma síntese é, para Kant, uma ligação de várias representações. Uma tal ligação é empírica quando envolve representações sensíveis. Mas, apesar de empírica, a síntese envolvida numa experiência é ainda fundamentada em princípios a priori. São estes princípios que consubstanciam a possibilidade da experiência: são eles o que dão realidade objetiva a todo o conhecimento a priori.
  
  “O princípio supremo de todos os juízos sintéticos é pois este: todo o objeto está submetido
  
  14 KANT 2001:193.
  
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  às condições necessárias da unidade sintética do diverso da intuição numa experiência possível” (KANT 2001:195; A158).
  
  Na Terceira Secção do Capítulo I do Livro Segundo, Kant define a tábua dos princípios do entendimento puro com base na tábua das categorias. Aqui, Kant trata os princípios do entendimento puro como regras para o uso objetivo das categorias. Como tal, propõe, todos os princípios do entendimento puro são axiomas da intuição, antecipações da perceção, analogias da experiência ou postulados do pensamento empírico em geral. A distinção entre os quatro tipos de princípio é fornecida pela sua evidência e aplicação. Considerando os axiomas da intuição, segundo Kant, o seu princípio é que todas as intuições são grandezas extensivas. De acordo com Kant, toda a apreensão de fenómenos tem de ter como condição a sua intuição a priori no espaço e no tempo. Como tal, nenhum fenómeno pode ser apreendido se não enquanto síntese.
  
  “Ora, a consciência do diverso homogéneo na intuição em geral (…) é o conceito de uma grandeza (de um quantum)” (KANT 2001:198; B203).
  
  Por isso, é no conceito de grandeza que é pensada a unidade sintética da intuição que é condição da perceção dos objetos enquanto fenómenos. Kant conclui que:
  
  “os fenómenos são todos eles grandezas e grandezas extensivas, porque enquanto intuições no espaço ou no tempo, têm de ser representados pela mesma síntese que determina o espaço e o tempo em geral” (KANT 2001:198-9; B203).
  
  E eis que chegamos à secção A163 mencionada por Frege no §5 e que começa assim:
  
  “Chamo grandeza extensiva aquela em que a representação das partes torna possível a representação do todo (e, portanto, necessariamente a precede). Não posso ter a representação de uma linha (…) se não a traçar em pensamento, ou seja, sem produzir as suas partes, sucessivamente, a partir de um ponto e desse modo retraçar esta intuição” (KANT 2001:199; A163).
  
  A seguir, Kant explica uma grandeza extensiva como a que é apreendida intuitivamente por síntese sucessiva. Por isso:
  
  “Todos os fenómenos são, por conseguinte, já intuídos como agregados (…), o que não é o caso em todas as espécies de grandezas, mas apenas naquelas que por nós são representadas e apreendidas (…) como extensivas” (KANT 2001:199, B204).
  
  É então que Kant afirma que a geometria, “a matemática da extensão” se funda nessa síntese sucessiva e tem como axiomas as condições da intuição sensível a priori. Mas o mesmo não afirma sobre o que seria “a matemática da quantidade”. Como vimos acima, de acordo com Kant, não há axiomas a respeito de saber quão grande é uma coisa, mas as
  
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  proposições que se referem a quantidades são “sintéticas e imediatamente certas”—são indemonstráveis.
  Kant acrescenta:
  
  “as proposições evidentes da relação entre números, embora sintéticas, não são gerais como as da geometria e, por isso mesmo, não se podem denominar axiomas, antes fórmulas numéricas” (KANT 2001:200; B205).
  
  Depois, explica que fórmulas numéricas, como ‘7+5=12’, não são analíticas porque o predicado (12) não é pensado na representação do sujeito (7+5), mas a síntese envolvida na determinação de fórmulas numéricas é diferente da que está envolvida na geometria. Se nesta última é possível usar a imaginação de várias maneiras—por exemplo, pode-se considerar um triângulo isósceles com linhas de diferentes tamanhos, desde que duas sejam do mesmo tamanho entre si e maiores do que uma—na síntese envolvida em fórmulas numéricas há apenas uma possibilidade—o 7 só pode ser considerado enquanto 7, e o mesmo para cada um dos números. Portanto, Kant conclui que:
  
  “Muito embora sintética, [7+5=12] é simplesmente uma proposição individual” (KANT 2001:200; B205).
  
  É aqui que Frege situa a origem do problema. Na sua perspetiva, Kant terá chegado a esta proposta por considerar apenas números pequenos. Fórmulas para números grandes não podem ser tratadas da mesma maneira, ou seja, propondo que se fundamentam em intuições particulares ou no princípio cognitivo a que Kant chama a intuição pura. Segundo Frege,
  
  “Kant pretende recorrer à ajuda da intuição de dedos ou pontos, com o que cai no perigo de, contra a sua própria posição, deixar aparecer estas proposições [fórmulas numéricas] como empíricas” (FREGE 1992:41).
  
  De facto, ainda na Analítica dos Princípios, Kant explica que, tal como podemos intuir um triângulo imaginando linhas a entrecruzar-se de acordo com determinadas regras, podemos intuir um número imaginando pontos que se sucedem de acordo com determinadas regras. As regras em causa serão os princípios a priori. Frege considera que, com esta proposta, Kant se compromete com uma tese contraditória: atribui a fórmulas numéricas uma natureza sintética a priori mas simultaneamente não tem como evitar atribuir-lhes também uma natureza empírica.
  
  “a intuição de 37 863 dedos não é de todo uma intuição pura” (FREGE 1992:41).
  
  Tendo como pano de fundo esta contradição quanto à natureza das fórmulas numéricas, no
  §12 dos GLA, Frege acusa a noção de intuição de Kant de ser ambígua.
  
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  “[Ao decidir-se pela natureza sintética a priori dos juízos da aritmética,] nada mais resta [a Kant] senão invocar uma intuição pura como último fundamento cognitivo, apesar de ser aqui difícil de dizer se se trata de uma intuição espacial ou de uma intuição temporal ou de o que quer que seja que uma intuição ainda possa ser” (GLA§12/FREGE 1992:48).
  
  Encontramos na CRP uma resposta de Kant:
  
  “[O fundamento cognitivo dos juízos da aritmética s]ó pode ser um conjunto em que todas as nossas representações estejam contidas, ou seja, o sentido interno, e a sua forma a priori, o tempo” (KANT 2001:193; A155).
  
  Já antes, de modo mais extenso, Kant tinha dito que:
  
  “uma determinação transcendental do tempo é homogénea à categoria (que constitui a sua unidade) na medida em que é universal e assenta sobre uma regra a priori. É, por outro lado, homogénea ao fenómeno, na medida em que o tempo está contido em toda a representação empírica do diverso. Assim, uma aplicação da categoria ao fenómeno será possível mediante a determinação transcendental do tempo que, como esquema dos conceitos do entendimento, proporciona a subsunção dos fenómenos na categoria” (KANT 2001:182; B178/A139).
  
  Mas Frege consideraria que esta resposta é ainda insatisfatória. Ao propor que fórmulas numéricas são particulares, o que quer que seja a intuição pura que Kant propõe como princípio cognitivo tem de ser tal que possa explicar o que é, por exemplo, a intuição de 37863 dedos.
  
  “Eu nem sequer sou capaz de admitir uma intuição de 100 000, quanto mais de número em geral ou de grandeza em geral. Recorre-se com demasiada facilidade à intuição interior quando não se é capaz de apresentar qualquer outra fundamentação. Mas seria conveniente que não se perdesse completamente de vista o sentido da palavra «intuição»” (FREGE 1992:49).
  
  De acordo com Frege, ‘intuição’ surge nos escritos de Kant de modo ambíguo, ora como aquilo a que chama uma representação singular, que Frege trata como uma noção lógica de intuição, ora como uma faculdade do conhecimento, um “princípio cognitivo”, que Frege trata como uma noção psicológica de intuição. Qual destes sentidos é o que está envolvido na fundamentação da aritmética e, mais especificamente, nas fundamentação de fórmulas numéricas?
  Antes de apresentarmos a resposta de Frege, considere-se novamente Kant. Encontramos Kant a falar na intuição enquanto princípio cognitivo quando, por exemplo, diz no primeiro parágrafo da Estética Transcendental da CRP, que:
  
  “Sejam quais forem o modo e os meios pelos quais um conhecimento se possa referir a
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  objetos, é pela intuição que se relaciona imediatamente com estes e ela é o fim para o qual tende, como meio, todo o pensamento” (KANT 2001:61; A17/B31).
  
  A intuição surge aqui como o que relaciona conhecimento com objetos de modo imediato. Mas antes da intuição efetivar essa relação (entre conhecimento e objetos) tem de operar a “capacidade de receber representações”, a que Kant chama sensibilidade (Sinnlichkeit). Na Lógica Transcendental, também no primeiro parágrafo, Kant acrescenta a esta capacidade uma outra, o entendimento (Verstand), como:
  
  “[a capacidade de] conhecer um objeto mediante estas representações (espontaneidade dos conceitos)” (KANT 2001:88; A50/B74).
  
  acrescentando que:
  
  “(…) pela primeira é-nos dado um objeto; pela segunda é pensado em relação com aquela representação” (KANT 2001:88; A50/B74).
  Os objetos, diz Kant, afetam “o nosso espírito” apenas quando sensibilidade e entendimento concorrem no fornecimento de representações. Sem esta contribuição conjunta, não há conhecimento material. Voltando à Estética Transcendental, Kant explica:
  
  “Por intermédio, pois, da sensibilidade, são-nos dados objetos, e só ela nos fornece intuições, mas é o entendimento que pensa esses objetos e é dele que provêm os conceitos” (KANT 2001:61; A17/B31).
  
  Sensibilidade e entendimento aparecem então como as faculdades que fornecem “ao espírito”, intuições e conceitos, respetivamente.
  
  “Intuições e conceitos constituem pois os elementos de todo o nosso conhecimento, de tal modo que nem conceitos sem intuição que de qualquer modo lhe corresponda, nem uma intuição sem conceitos podem dar um conhecimento” (KANT 2001:88; A50/B74).
  
  Como resultado, o trabalho conjunto da sensibilidade e do entendimento é a condição necessária de todo o conhecimento. Sem sensibilidade, o entendimento pode apenas produzir representações de representações, que nada dizem acerca de objetos—são abstrações. Sem entendimento, a sensibilidade apenas recebe representações sensoriais, que também nada dizem acerca de objectos—são sensações. Por isso, Kant afirma que:
  
  “Pensamentos sem conteúdos são vazios; intuições sem conceitos são cegas” (KANT 2001:89; B75/A51).
  
  Ora, Frege não concorda com esta afirmação de Kant. Veja-se, por exemplo, o que diz no
  §89, remetendo em nota para a secção da CRP anterior:
  
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  “Vejo-me também na obrigação de contradizer a validade geral da afirmação de Kant segundo a qual nenhum objeto nos seria dado sem o concurso da sensibilidade” (FREGE 1992:101).
  
  De acordo com Frege, nem todos os objetos nos são dados com o concurso da sensibilidade. Mais especialmente os números, entre os quais o zero e o um aparecem como notáveis:
  
  “O zero e o um são objetos que nos podem ser dados de modo não sensível” (FREGE 1992:101).
  
  O logicismo de Frege começa aqui. A sua proposta é que números são objetos descobertos em asserções sobre conceitos e, por isso, não podem ser conhecidos na sensação ou na intuição, mas antes no pensamento. Por isso, fórmulas numéricas são analíticas “no sentido de Kant”, para Frege.
  Pode-se tentar resistir ao logicismo de Frege procurando preservar as propostas de Kant que consideram que são intuições, enquanto representações singulares, o que fundamenta fórmulas numéricas. Mas Frege tem uma razão para o rejeitar. Considerando que números são objetos, pode-se compará-los com os objetos da geometria. Frege entende que estes são, de facto, objetos dos quais se tem representações singulares específicas. O que não entende é que se estenda a natureza específica dos objetos geométricos aos objetos aritméticos. No §13 dos GLA, Frege concorda com Kant: enquanto representações singulares, intuições podem fundamentar leis geométricas. Contudo, o mesmo não pode ser dito das leis numéricas. Se intuições fundamentam leis da geometria é porque os objetos geométricos têm uma natureza muito particular. Diz Frege:
  
  “Se na Geometria se obtêm proposições de caráter geral a partir da intuição, isso esclarece- se facilmente pelo facto de os pontos, retas ou planos intuídos não terem um caráter individual e, portanto, poderem funcionar como representantes de toda a sua espécie.” (FREGE 1992:50).
  
  No entanto, com os números, a situação é diversa:
  
  “No caso dos números, o problema é diferente: cada um tem a sua especificidade. Até que ponto um dado número pode representar todos os outros e a partir de que altura é que a sua individualidade entra em cena, eis algo que não pode ser dito à partida” (FREGE 1992:50).
  
  Por isso, intuições particulares podem fundamentar juízos geométricos mas não fundamentam juízos numéricos. A desambiguação da noção de intuição de Kant, enquanto princípio cognitivo ou representação singular, não fornece em nenhum dos casos uma razão para defender que fórmulas numéricas são sintéticas.
  Resolvida a desambiguação e mostrada a ineficácia do recurso à intuição por parte de
  
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  Kant, Frege apresenta um argumento contra a tese de que fórmulas numéricas são sintéticas no §14 dos GLA. O argumento que Frege aqui apresenta é usado depois por Dummett como o primeiro passo da instituição de um ‘terceiro domínio’ de entidades, distintas daquelas a que Frege chama reais e daquelas a que chama imagéticas, e que podem ser chamadas entidades abstratas. No §14 dos GLA, Frege estabelece uma comparação entre diferentes tipo de verdade para rejeitar que fórmulas numéricas são sintéticas. Frege estabelece como critério de classificação dos diferentes tipos de verdades o tipo de coisas sobre as quais são. Assim, as “proposições da experiência” são verdades sobre a realidade física e psicológica, a que chamaremos domínio das coisas reais. As “verdades geométricas”, a que chamaremos proposições da intuição, são sobre o domínio do que é “espacialmente intuível”, a que chamaremos o domínio das coisas imagéticas.
  
  “Mesmo os mais fantásticos delírios e as mais arrojadas invenções das lendas e dos poetas, que põem animais a falar e param os corpos celestes, que das pedras fazem pessoas e das pessoas árvores e que nos ensinam a puxarmo-nos a nós mesmos pelos cabelos para fora de um pântano, continuam, na medida em que permanecem intuíveis, sujeitos aos axiomas da geometria” (FREGE 1992:50).
  
  Segundo Frege, o que é físico e real pode não apenas ser experienciado como intuído. Por isso, o domínio das coisas reais estende-se ao domínio das coisas imagéticas. Assim, se Kant está certo, então proposições da intuição—verdades geométricas—são o fundamento último de todo o conhecimento. Mas se proposições da intuição são o fundamento último de todo o conhecimento, nada mais há para além do domínio das coisas imagéticas: é o mais vasto de todos. Ora, Frege considera haver coisas que não se encontram nem no domínio das coisas imagéticas nem no domínio das coisas reais. Os exemplos de Frege são o espaço quadridimensional e o espaço de curvatura positiva. Frege afirma que há “pesquisas que se afastam do solo da intuição” 15. Nomeadamente, aquelas que dizem respeito à negação do espaço euclidiano. Para Frege, embora o espaço euclidiano seja intuível, nem o espaço quadridimensional, nem o espaço de curvatura positiva o são. Mais, tanto um como o outro contradizem os axiomas geométricos nos quais se funda o espaço euclidiano sem entrar em contradição. Note-se como Frege parece estar a responder a Kant, apelando ao princípio da não-contradição, que Kant considera ser o princípio universal, que rege todos os juízos. Voltando ao argumento do terceiro domínio, se, continua Frege, seguindo as propostas de Kant, afirmar o contrário de axiomas geométricos (proposições da intuição) não envolve qualquer contradição, então as proposições que afirmam essa contrariedade podem ser verdadeiras de alguma coisa. Se os axiomas da geometria podem ser negados sem que envolvam qualquer contradição, então tem de haver proposições verdadeiras para lá dos axiomas da geometria. Por isso, conclui Frege, se é possível pensar em coisas como o espaço de curvatura positiva ou o espaço quadridimensional sem contradição, tem de haver um domínio de coisas que não são reais
  
  15 GLA §14/ FREGE 1992:50.
  
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  nem imagéticas. O espaço quadridimensional e o espaço de curvatura positiva pertencem a este terceiro domínio a que Frege chama o domínio da ‘reflexão conceptual’ (begrifflicher Denken)16. Considerando que
  
  “[dos axiomas da geometria] só o pensamento conceptual se pode, de certo modo, libertar” (FREGE 1992:50),
  
  Frege afirma:
  
  “Para o pensamento conceptual é sempre possível pressupor como verdadeiro o contrário deste ou daquele axioma geométrico sem cair em contradição consigo próprio ao extrair conclusões a partir de tais pressupostos contrários à intuição” (FREGE 1992:50).
  
  Frege propõe a possibilidade de algumas proposições serem verdadeiras sem que sejam proposições da experiência ou proposições da intuição. Chamamos-lhes proposições da reflexão. O poder destas proposições está precisamente na possibilidade de ir além da experiência e da intuição negando o que nelas tem de ser afirmado.
  Sobre o que são as proposições que negam proposições da intuição? Podemos já nomear duas coisas: o espaço quadridimensional e o espaço de curvatura positiva. Mas a resposta de Frege é muito mais abrangente. As coisas sobre as quais são as proposições que negam as proposições da geometria não são reais nem imagéticas, mas abstratas. Temos então três domínios de coisas sobre as quais é possível afirmar proposições verdadeiras: o domínio das coisas reais, o domínio das coisas imagéticas e o domínio das coisas abstratas.
  O passo seguinte de Frege é questionar a que domínio pertencem as coisas que são contáveis. Se, como propõe Kant, a intuição—enquanto princípio cognitivo ou representação singular—é o fundamento último das fórmulas numéricas, então o domínio das coisas contáveis tem o seu limite coincidente com o domínio das coisas imagéticas. Mas Frege entende que esta solução é indefensável. Se o limite do domínio das coisas contáveis é coincidente com o limite do domínio das coisas imagéticas, então só é contável o que é real e o que é imagético. Contudo, podemos contar coisas que não ocupam lugar espacial ou temporal e não são intuíveis. Podemos, por exemplo, contar conceitos e pensamentos, como contamos sonhos, nuvens ou carneiros. Entre as coisas contáveis, diz Frege, está
  
  “o que é real, (…) o que é intuível, mas também o tudo o que é pensável” (FREGE 1992:50).
  
  Por isso, as coisas contáveis estão também no domínio das coisas abstratas. Frege reivindica que tudo é numerável, incluindo o que não é temporal ou espacial.
  
  16 Novamente, traduzimos “Denken” por “reflexão” e não por “pensamento”, como faz Zilhão. O objetivo, mais uma vez, é reservar a expressão “pensamento” para o uso mais técnico que Frege vem a fazer mais tarde.
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  “… não apenas o que é justaposto no espaço, não apenas o que é sucessivo no tempo, não apenas os fenómenos externos, mas também processos e eventos mentais internos e mesmo conceitos, que não estão em relações (…) temporais ou espaciais mas apenas lógicas” (FREGE 1992:80).
  
  Portanto, o âmbito da aritmética estende-se para lá do âmbito da geometria até ao âmbito da lógica. Depois de introduzir os diferentes domínios de coisas sobre as quais são os diferentes tipos de proposição, Frege nota como, ao contrário do que acontece com os axiomas geométricos, não é possível negar os princípios da aritmética sem contradição. Pergunta Frege:
  
  “Não se instalaria a confusão total se quiséssemos negar algum deles? Seria, nesse caso, o pensamento ainda possível?” (FREGE 1992:50).
  
  Deste modo, o domínio das coisas abstratas, sobre as quais são as proposições da reflexão, é o mais vasto de todos.
  Perante este resultado, considera Frege, Kant ou rejeita que o que está para lá do domínio das coisas imagéticas pode ser contado ou aceita que as coisas abstratas são contáveis e, por isso, nega que a intuição seja o fundamento último das fórmulas e leis numéricas. A única solução de Kant seria então a de abandonar a sua proposta de que a intuição é o fundamento último de todo o conhecimento e, a partir daí, também a proposta de que juízos numéricos são sintéticos a priori. Frege pode então perguntar o seguinte.
  
  “Não será assim de esperar que as leis dos números estejam na mais íntima das ligações com as do pensamento [a lógica, dir-se-ia]?” (FREGE 1992:50).
  
  No §15 dos GLA, Frege considera que o assunto fica encerrado com o que foi exposto acima e declara que juízos numéricos são analíticos. A seu favor, Frege recorda como Leibniz propôs que o domínio do a priori e o domínio do analítico são coincidentes e que todas as verdades são demonstráveis e recondutíveis a identidades. Note-se que, aqui, Frege está a afirmar não apenas que as leis numéricas são analíticas mas também que fórmulas numéricas o são.
  No §16, Frege questiona: se leis numéricas são analíticas, radicará toda a aritmética—“a ciência dos números”—em “simples identidades”?17. A resposta de Frege é afirmativa. Toda a aritmética radica em simples identidades. Mas para o afirmar é preciso considerar o que não são as simples identidades a que se refere. Não são o resultado do mero “manuseamento habilidoso da linguagem” de que fala Mill. As simples identidades em causa para Frege não são apenas os sinais que compõem as fórmulas numéricas. Para que possa ser afirmado de toda a aritmética que radica em simples identidades, é preciso admitir que é daquilo a que se referem os sinais que compõem as fórmulas numéricas que se fala.
  
  17 FREGE 1992:51
  
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  “Todo aquele que usa palavras ou sinais matemáticos exige que estes denotem alguma coisa e ninguém esperará que se diga alguma coisa com sentido por meio de sinais vazios” (FREGE 1992:51).
  
  Por isso, as simples identidades a que apela Frege, partindo de Leibniz, para radicar toda a aritmética não são um mero manuseamento da linguagem, no sentido de Mill, mas um manuseamento da linguagem enquanto expressão de pensamentos. Manusear a linguagem habilmente, termina Frege, torna-se uma necessidade para, precisamente, chegar aos pensamentos nela envolvidos. Nomeadamente, as simples identidades nas quais radica toda a aritmética.
  Na conclusão dos GLA, Frege afirma:
  
  “Espero ter tornado verosímil neste escrito que as leis aritméticas são juízos analíticos e, por conseguinte, que são a priori” (FREGE 1992:99).
  
  No §88, Frege diz:
  
  “…é manifesto que Kant subestimou o valor dos juízos analíticos. Se se tomarem as suas definições como pontos de partida, poderá verificar-se que a divisão em juízos analíticos e sintéticos não é exaustiva” (FREGE 1992:100).
  
  Segundo Frege, a classificação dos juízos de Kant diz respeito apenas aos juízos universais. Mas, pergunta Frege, “e se o sujeito [do juízo] for um objeto individual? E se se tratar de um juízo singular?” 18 19 . Relevantemente para o seu projeto logicista, Frege considera que juízos deste tipo contêm a relação mais primordial da lógica: aquela que fica estabelecida entre um objeto individual, ou “um indivíduo”, e um conceito. Para Frege, de uma tal relação não se pode dizer que o predicado está contido no sujeito, como diz Kant sobre os juízos analíticos. Ao falar de juízos analíticos, diz Frege,
  
  “Kant parece pensar o conceito como sendo determinado por características justapostas; este é porém um dos modos menos frutíferos de formar conceitos” (FREGE 1992:100).
  
  Frege irá reivindicar um modo mais frutífero de considerar a formação de conceitos. Na Carta a Marty, Frege salienta que um conceito fica determinado apenas onde é possível saber quais os indivíduos que caem nele. Nos GLA defende:
  
  “As determinações conceptuais mais fecundas são aquelas que traçam linhas de demarcação que ainda não estavam de todo dadas” (FREGE 1992:100).
  
  18 Cf. FREGE 1992:100.
  19 Frege usa a expressão “existencial” mas vamos preferir usar “singular”, uma vez que aqui não está a ser aplicado qualquer quantificador.
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  Enquanto relação entre um indivíduo e um conceito, é num juízo singular que conceitos são determinados. Se o projeto logicista de Frege depende de saber quais os indivíduos que caem sob certos conceitos (notavelmente, o conceito de número cardinal), então os juízos singulares tornam-se nele fulcrais. Mas há outra razão para que juízos singulares tenham um papel fulcral no projeto logicista de Frege. Voltando à Carta a Marty, Frege diz:
  
  “Neste caso [de um juízo singular], a relação do sujeito ao predicado não é uma terceira coisa acrescentada aos dois mas pertence ao conteúdo do predicado” (BEANEY 1997:81).
  
  Chegamos então à noção de conceito que Frege considera ser a “mais frutuosa”20. Frege propõe que a característica mais importante de um conceito é que é insaturado (ungesättigt). Para um conceito, ser insaturado, é precisar de ser completado e, neste contexto, ser completado é ter algo que cai sob ele. Deste modo, um conceito é vazio se nada cai sob ele. A partir desta caracterização da natureza insaturada dos conceitos, Frege traça uma distinção que é também fulcral para o seu programa: a própria distinção entre um conceito e o que chama, primeiro, um indivíduo e, mais tarde, um objeto (Objekt). Ao contrário de conceitos, objetos são saturados e isto significa que nada pode cair sob eles. Para um objeto, cair sob um conceito é preenchê-lo. É precisamente esta relação de preenchimento que Frege toma como primordial para a lógica.
  Com a nova noção de conceito, Frege pode agora responder a Kant que encontrar ou descobrir conceitos é um processo inverso àquele que este tinha proposto. A negligência de Kant dos juízos singulares, alerta Frege, impede-o de considerar:
  
  “[q]ue um indivíduo cair sob um conceito é um conteúdo julgável” (BEANEY 1997:81).
  
  Um conteúdo julgável (beurteilbarer Inhalt) é para Frege um ‘pensamento’ (Gedanke). Por isso, se um conteúdo singular é julgável, pode ser asserido como verdadeiro ou falso. Assim, a decomposição de um juízo singular verdadeiro nas suas partes mais simples separa o que nele é insaturado—um conceito—para chegar ao que nele é saturado—um objeto. Diz Frege:
  
  “Penso num conceito como tendo sido alcançado por decomposição de um conteúdo julgável” (BEANEY 1997:81).
  
  Num juízo singular, um objeto preenche o lugar vazio de um conceito, saturando-o. Esta noção de conceito é o que permite a Frege afirmar a natureza ampliativa dos juízos analíticos. A tese é que por mera análise do conteúdo de um juízo, e, mais uma vez, sem qualquer apelo à sensação ou à intuição, é possível descobrir como funcionam os conceitos e, ao mesmo tempo, encontrar os objetos que neles caem. De facto, para Frege, um conceito fica determinado quando é possível saber com exatidão quais os objetos que nele
  
  20 Cf. BEANEY 1997:79.
  
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  caem. Ora, é precisamente esta determinação que permite contar. Saber com exatidão quais os objetos que caem num conceito é a condição para se chegar a um número.
  Esta ideia encontra-se também explicada no §17 dos GLA, onde Frege afirma que considerar que juízos numéricos são analíticos permite pensar que as fórmulas numéricas introduzidas na matemática, cuja verdade se pretende provar, estão contidas nas leis numéricas, de tal modo que cada verdade aritmética condensa e expressa uma cadeia inferencial.
  
  “Em virtude do que ficou dito, abre-se a seguinte possibilidade: em vez de ligar de forma imediata uma cadeia inferencial a um facto, pode, deixando-o ficar onde está, introduzir-se nela o seu conteúdo como condição” (FREGE 1992:52).
  
  Deste modo, uma fórmula numérica revela-se como uma conclusão de uma sucessão de condições independentemente de qualquer facto.
  
  “Esta verdade [a conclusão] seria estabelecida apenas por meio de pensamento” (FREGE 1992:52).
  
  A determinação da verdade de um juízo numérico não termina, portanto, em axiomas indemonstráveis e cujo conhecimento depende da intuição, ou de intuições. Como Frege irá mostrar nos GLA, a demonstração de juízos numéricos termina em pensamentos de caráter geral: leis lógicas e definições.
  Assim, no §48 dos GLA, Frege parece responder diretamente a Kant:
  
  “A força aglutinadora do conceito ultrapassa largamente a capacidade unificadora da aperceção sintética” (FREGE 1992:76).
  
  E acrescenta:
  
  “Por intermédio desta última nunca seria possível ligar num único todo os habitantes do império alemão; todavia, estes podem ser colocados sob o conceito «habitante do império alemão» e podem, enquanto tal, ser contados” (FREGE 1992:76).

percurso aqui traçado mostra como Frege propõe que só se pode chegar ao conhecimento dos números e das operações aritméticas mais básicas aceitando que determinar o que são conceitos e objetos não é uma tarefa da psicologia, entendida num sentido amplo, enquanto investigação de representações (empíricas ou a priori) mas exclusivamente da lógica, a que pode ser associada a filosofia, apenas se garantido que não se trata de uma filosofia psicologista, ou que se baseia de algum modo na psicologia. A “nova lógica” fornece os meios para identificar as cadeias de inferência condensadas no conteúdo de juízos numéricos.

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REFERÊNCIAS BIBLIOGRÁFICAS

BEANEY 1997 / Michael Beaney (ed.), The Frege Reader, Blackwell Publishers, Oxford, 1997.

DUMMETT 1993 / Michael Dummett, Origins of Analytical Philosophy, Harvard University Press, Cambridge Massachusetts, 1993.

KANT 2001 / Immanuel Kant, Crítica da Razão Pura (Trad.: Manuela Pinto dos Santos e António Fradique Morujão), Serviço de Educação e Bolsas, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 2001.

FREGE 1992 / Gottlob Frege, Os Fundamentos da Aritmética, uma investigação lógico- matemática acerca do conceito de número (Trad.: António Zilhão), Imprensa Nacional – Casa da Moeda, Estudos Gerais Série Universitária • Clássicos da Filosofia, 1992.

WILSON 2008 / Mark Wilson, “Frege's mathematical setting” in Michael Potter e Tom Ricketts (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Frege, Cambridge University Press, 2010.

ZALTA 2014 / Edward N. Zalta, "Gottlob Frege", The Stanford Encyclopedia of

Philosophy (Spring 2014 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL

=<http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2014/entries/frege/>.

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Da afinidade à acção

From Affinity to Action

PAULO TUNHAS*

Universidade do Porto, Portugal

Abstract

From the very beginning of his philosophical work Fernando Gil looked for a harmony between the Kantian project and certain pre-Kantian modes of thinking, such as the Leibnizian. In his later work he also searched for harmony with the post-Kantian philosophy of Fichte. Such is the double origin of his deeply original philosophy of knowledge, which I analyze in this article.

Key words

Affinity. Intelligibility. Action.

Resumo

A filosofia de Fernando Gil busca, desde o início, um acordo do projecto kantiano com certos modos pré-kantianos de pensar, nomeadamente o de Leibniz. E igualmente, a partir de certa altura, com um certo pós-kantismo, o de Fichte. Estes dois acordos são fundamentais na constituição de uma filosofia do conhecimento profundamente original, que analiso neste artigo.

Palavras-chave

Afinidade. Inteligibilidade. Acção.

Dizer que há, no pensamento de Fernando Gil (1937-2006)1, uma evolução que o conduz de Kant a Fichte não é estritamente verdadeiro, e isso pelo menos por duas razões. A primeira é que Fichte sempre foi, e isso desde o início da sua carreira filosófica, um

* Instituto de Filosofia, Departamento de Filosofia da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade do Porto. E-mail de contacto: paulo.tunhasgmail.com

1 Para uma introdução geral à filosofia de Fernando Gil, permito-me reenviar a P. Tunhas, O essencial sobre

Fernando Gil, Imprensa Nacional / Casa da Moeda, Lisboa, 2007.

[Recibido: 3 de noviembre 2017

Aceptado: 13 de noviembre 2017]

Paulo Tunhas

pensador que lhe foi caro. A segunda é que o termo “evolução” sugere o abandono de algo que fica para trás, tal como as “cascas de ovo” de que falava Wittgenstein. Ora, tal não aconteceu sem dúvida a Kant no pensamento de Fernando Gil. Mas se limitarmos a ideia de “evolução” à ideia de “aprofundamento”, há, de facto, uma evolução de Kant para Fichte em Fernando Gil, e ela testemunha da sua busca cada vez mais acentuada dos estratos mais arcaicos do pensamento.

“Em todas as artes o problema seria aparentemente escrever como Balzac depois de ter passado por Beckett”, escreveu Fernando Gil na abertura de um estudo sobre a pintura de Eduardo Luíz2. De uma certa forma, poder-se-ia igualmente dizer que, para Fernando Gil, do ponto de vista que nos interessa agora, o problema consiste em saber como pensar com Leibniz – e, já agora, Aristóteles - depois de ter passado por Kant. E a sua filosofia é, em grande parte, um ensaio para mostrar como assim, no meio de aporias várias, pode ser. Fichte ocupa, desse ponto de vista, um lugar importante. No sentido em que, partindo do próprio transcendental, enceta um movimento que lhe permite uma recuperação coerente de certos modos de pensar, por assim dizer, “pré-transcendentais”. O gesto da recusa da coisa-em-si (mantida às vezes, é verdade, para depois ser negada) é fundamental para essa possibilidade.

Tratarei, por esta ordem – e muito telegraficamente, como é fácil supor -, as questões da afinidade; da inteligibilidade; da aplicabilidade das matemáticas ao sensível; do recobrimento das categorias kantianas e das categorias gramaticais; da prova e da controvérsia; dos conceitos epistémicos de opinião, crença e saber; do exemplo e da pedra- de-toque; da evidência; da moralidade; e, finalmente, da acção. Para pôr as cartas na mesa, direi já que a minha tese é que a evolução do pensamento de Fernando Gil vai no sentido de uma afirmação cada vez mais insistente do carácter activo/formador da mente, e que, da afinidade à acção, há menos mutação de temática do que acentuação de um núcleo de pensamento original.

Afinidade e imaginação

Procuremos dar alguns exemplos, começando por Mimésis e negação. Entre as muitas referências a Kant em Mimésis e Negação, uma é, de facto, fundamental, tanto no que respeita à sua importância para as ideias centrais defendidas no livro quanto no que concerne à sua colocação estratégica no final de Mimésis. Trata-se de um estudo aprofundado da ideia de afinidade em Kant e da sua articulação com o conceito de imaginação produtora, sobretudo a partir do Apêndice à Dialéctica Transcendental e da primeira edição da Dedução Transcendental da KrV.

2 Gil, 1998: 519.

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A afinidade – termo mais forte do que “semelhança”, que conota o associacionismo empirista3, e que acentua poderosamente a principal doutrina de Mimésis - é dupla: ela refere-se à relação dos fenómenos entre si – melhor dizendo: às “leis internas de organização” dos fenómenos 4, a uma “unidade sistemática (…) inerente aos próprios objectos”, nas palavras de Kant, que Fernando Gil cita5 -, mas também à relação entre estes e o sujeito cognoscente: “a solicitação recíproca e simultânea do sujeito e do mundo”6. A afinidade é uma “força” que se encontra tanto nos fenómenos como na alma humana7. Dadas as condições próprias ao kantismo, o princípio da afinidade apresentar-se-á como principalmente regulador8, mas, ao mesmo tempo, “objectivo”, se bem que de um modo “indeterminado”9. Ela é tanto subjectiva como objectiva10, “intrínseca ao dado”11: “Cada coisa é uma concentração expressiva de afinidades com outras coisas” 12 . Como nota Fernando Gil, “em toda a doutrina da afinidade, a letra do criticismo acha-se infectada por uma «harmonia», inscrita na «própria natureza das coisas» (A 652 / B 680), cujo espírito é leibniziano”13. Fernando Gil retomará esta ambiguidade (entre o regulador e o constitutivo, o subjectivo e o objectivo) numa análise das duas introduções à KU, a propósito da distinção entre uma inteligibilidade expressiva e uma inteligibilidade finalista. Falarei deste problema mais tarde.

A afinidade é revelada pela imaginação produtora, que, como se sabe, participa em Kant simultaneamente da sensibilidade e do entendimento, sendo imanente tanto a uma como ao outro 14. A imaginação produtora, descobrindo a afinidade entre os fenómenos 15, é “a função intelectual que primacialmente (…) diz respeito” a esta16. Trata-se de “um acto”17, um acto mais do que uma faculdade18 – voltarei ao “acto” quando falar de Fichte, porque a insistência na acção é emblemática da “evolução” de que, no início, falei. E um acto que, de acordo com Fernando Gil, é “o primeiro nome da actividade cognitiva”19, “um outro

3 Gil, 1984: 496. Cf. tb. Gil, 1984: 499, sobre a crítica de Kant a Hume no que diz respeito à redução da associação a ligações contingentes e não objectivas. Para uma análise geral de Mimésis e Negação, cf. P. Tunhas, “Verdade e imaginação em Mimésis e Negação”, in AAVV, A razão apaixonada. Homenagem a Fernando Gil, Lisboa, Imprensa Nacional / Casa da Moeda, 2008, pp. 43-74. (Agora em P. Tunhas, O pensamento e os seus objectos. Maneiras de pensar e sistemas filosóficos, MLAG Discussion Papers, Instituto de Filosofia, Edições da Universidade do Porto, Porto, 2012, Cap. 14.)

4 Gil, 1984: 496.

5 Gil, 1984: 497.

6 Gil, 1984: 496.

7 Gil, 1984: 496-497.

8 Gil, 1984: 497.

9 Gil, 1984: 498.

10 Gil, 1984: 500.

11 Gil, 1984: 500.

12 Gil, 1984: 502.

13 Gil, 1984: 498.

14 Gil, 1984: 502.

15 Gil, 1984: 501.

16 Gil, 1984: 500.

17 Gil, 1984: 501.

18 Gil, 1984: 502.

19 Gil, 1984: 503.

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nome da actividade cognitiva, inventiva por essência” (sem que isso implique arbitrariedade) e que fornece um fundamento à objectividade (tal como a afinidade “é o solo natal da objectividade a que é lícito esperar”20) 21. A imaginação – apesar de ser “por essência plural”, isto é, conjectural22 - “não é uma liberdade sem peias, alimenta-se da textura das coisas, desvelando as afinidades que são a própria condição de possibilidade do seu exercício”23. O sujeito “mima”, por meio da imaginação, a afinidade que se encontra nas coisas24.

Estabelecido isto, Fernando Gil pode passar às questões da adequação e do valor adaptativo do conhecimento, temas nucleares de Mimésis e Negação. Sendo o conhecimento “produto de uma imaginação com raízes materiais” (isto é, fundada na afinidade natural dos fenómenos), ele é - independentemente da existência de uma “margem irredutível de desajustamento” (que exprime a negação que traça o limite da mimésis) – “intrinsecamente adequado”, e a imaginação revela-se “o principal dispositivo adaptativo do homem: tão forte que se desprende do acaso, inventa e antecipa”25. No que diz respeito à “adequação entre representação e representado”, a imaginação aparece como o elemento principal de uma possível solução das suas aporias, já que “espelha e prolonga um sensível esposando o mundo e inteiramente informado por ele”, revelando a “articulação originária do pensamento com a verdade”, à maneira de Peirce26. É o jogo entre a imaginação e a afinidade – a possibilitação da primeira pela segunda, e a revelação concomitante desta última pela primeira – que, como se disse já, instaura a “objectividade da experiência”, fundada na “coadaptação do sujeito e do mundo”27, na “cumplicidade da cognição com o mundo”28.

Inteligibilidade

Não é difícil passar daqui para a questão da inteligibilidade, onde a interpretação de Kant guiou também muitos dos passos de Fernando Gil. Em primeiro lugar, Fernando Gil reconhece que Kant, na KrV, “quis lançar os alicerces de um conhecimento científico não apenas eficaz mas plenamente inteligível na medida em que é restituído ao sujeito, graças (entre outras coisas) à definição do espaço e do tempo como formas da sensibilidade e à posição central da apercepção transcendental na aplicação das categorias e dos princípios ao mundo fenomenal” 29. Permito-me sublinhar que a associação do projecto crítico à

20 Gil, 1984: 504.

21 Gil, 1984: 501. Sobre a relação entre imaginação e objectividade, cf. igualmente, Gil, 2001: 24-25.

22 Gil, 1984: 506.

23 Gil, 1984: 501.

24 Gil, 1984: 502.

25 Gil, 1984: 503.

26 Gil, 1984: 504.

27 Gil, 1984: 504.

28 Gil, 1984: 505.

29 Gil, 1998: 181.

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problemática da inteligibilidade e do sujeito não é trivial. Perfeitamente legítima, mas em nada trivial.

Há, no entanto, problemas. O modelo de inteligibilidade kantiano é, na terminologia de Gilles-Gaston Granger que Fernando Gil adopta (e adapta), um modelo de inteligibilidade objectal (quer dizer: que privilegia a determinação de objectos) – por oposição a uma inteligibilidade operatória (quer dizer: que acentua o papel dos princípios que nos guiam na busca do conhecimento), que seria a leibniziana. (Note-se que o par operatório/objectal ecoará no par fundação/fundamento de A Convicção.) Apesar da “dialéctica cerrada entre operações e objectos” que a KrV exibe, “a operação acaba por se rebater sempre sobre o objecto”: “o modelo da operação permanece sempre a constatação, a sondagem que descobre uma objectividade”30. Fernando Gil nota que o lugar onde o operatório melhor se manifesta na KrV é na discussão da acção da imaginação transcendental - mas a fundação da síntese da imaginação cabe à apercepção, à representação «Eu penso» (momento do objectal)31. Em idêntico sentido, a desproporção entre a Teoria dos Elementos (objectal) e Teoria do Método (operatório) é significativa. (Fernando Gil sublinha ainda que, no interior da Teoria Transcendental do Método, apenas a secção sobre a Hipótese respeita verdadeiramente ao operatório)32. É evidente que toda a simpatia de Fernando Gil vai para o modelo da inteligibilidade operatória que detecta em Leibniz. Um Leibniz, é verdade, pensado depois de se pensar Kant.

Claro que o modelo kantiano de inteligibilidade não se reduz ao aspecto sobretudo objectal que se encontra na KrV (com a excepção muito notória da imaginação transcendental que acima já sublinhei). Os desenvolvimentos da KU são, obviamente fundamentais. Fernando Gil referiu-se a eles várias vezes. Mas também aqui há objecções à doutrina kantiana. A crítica incide sobre o modo como Kant, na sua análise da organização natural, passa de uma inteligibilidade estrutural (“em termos de partes e de todos”) a uma inteligibilidade teleológica (concebida à maneira de uma relação meios/fins), com a concomitante adjunção de uma finalidade supra-sensível à finalidade interna 33 . (Encontra-se uma antecipação deste conceito de inteligibilidade na análise crucial do “paradigma uno- estrutura” em Mimésis e negação. Creio que Fernando Gil nunca abandonou esse enfoque, que encapsula muitas das suas posições filosóficas.34) A crítica é retomada e desenvolvida num texto a que já aludi, “Inteligibilidade finalista, Inteligibilidade expressiva” 35: “Há finalidade a mais na CFJ”36. A tese de Fernando Gil é que o recurso a uma inteligibilidade estrutural que se desdobrasse numa inteligibilidade expressiva dispensaria o recurso

30 Gil, 1998: 109.

31 Gil, 1998: 109.

32 Gil, 1998: 109.

33 Gil, 2001: 319.

34 Gil, 1984: 214 sgts.

35 Gil, 2005 a: 157-164 (a partir daqui, as citações são feitas a partir do texto mais completo, que aparece como separata do livro, sob a designação Gil, 2005 b).

36 Gil, 2005 b: 3.

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abundante à finalidade, “sempre que o «mecânico» se revela insatisfatório”37. Ao excesso de finalidade na KU, Fernando Gil opõe um programa de recorte mais leibniziano, que é consonante com a interpretação já avançada do papel da afinidade no Apêndice à Dialéctica Transcendental: “A minha hipótese é que a via afinitária inspirada em Leibniz – ou simplesmente afim de Leibniz – difere da via apriorística”38. A “via afinitária” – que é a da inteligibilidade estrutural e expressiva, e que evitaria os escolhos do finalismo e do imenso “como se” kantiano – seria a do programa morfológico: “uma inteligibilidade em que a finalidade é preterida em benefício da estrutura, ou seja, da «causa formal» a que Kant é insensível”39.

A aplicabilidade

Passemos agora a um aspecto da filosofia kantiana que ocupou longamente Fernando Gil, e que se articula em profundidade com a temática da inteligibilidade. Refiro-me à questão da aplicabilidade da matemática ao sensível. É uma questão que entronca na problemática da descontextualização do saber “pós-galileiano”, que é o objecto central do Capítulo IV de Mimésis e negação40. Qual a natureza da relação entre os “modelos matemáticos” e a “realidade fenomenal”? Como são os primeiros aplicáveis à segunda? Ou, na terminologia de Fernando Gil, como dar conta da “inerência (…) da matemática ao sensível”? 41 A solução kantiana ortodoxa consiste na tese, exposta na conhecida nota ao # 26 da KrV “que assinala uma antecipação do entendimento na estética transcendental, sob o modo da conversão das formas da intuição em «intuições formais»”42. Não creio incorrer em erro ao dizer que a solução kantiana – desenvolvida, entre outros, por Jean Petitot – apareceu sempre cada vez mais a Fernando Gil como problemática, na exacta medida em que a homogeneização pretendida entre o dado e o abstracto não se encontrava aí estabelecida de direito, mas antes dogmaticamente postulada. Dito por outras palavras, a “cisão pós- galileiana”43 permanece aberta. A célebre “desrazoável eficácia” da matemática permanece surpreendente. Verificamos uma cisão entre a verdade e o sentido – o que Fernando Gil sublinhou várias vezes44 -, e essa cisão exprime um défice de inteligibilidade.

O pensamento da língua

Não quer isto dizer que o pensamento categorial kantiano não ofereça múltiplos contributos para uma teoria da inteligibilidade. Apenas um exemplo, que Fernando Gil trabalhou em algum detalhe: a relação entre categorias da gramática e categorias kantianas.

37 Gil, 2005 b: 3.

38 Gil, 2005 b: 8.

39 Gil, 2005 b: 12.

40 Cf. Gil, 1984: 345 sgts.

41 Gil, 2001: 340.

42 Gil, 2001: 340.

43 Cf. tb. Gil, 1986 b: 40 ss.

44 Gil, 2001: 287 ss.

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Aquilo que o linguista diz do espaço e do tempo corrobora os propósitos kantianos sobre esses dois princípios da sensibilidade a priori, espaço e tempo “constituem um a priori cognitivo da língua” 45 . O mesmo vale para a noção de “identidade” 46 . Ou para as categorias da “Analítica dos conceitos” e para a “Analítica dos princípios” 47 . Como escreve Fernando Gil, depois de uma análise aturada: “É notável que a tipologia linguística e a Estética e a Analítica transcendentais se recubram exacta e exaustivamente”48.

Prova e controvérsia

Da inteligibilidade à prova. Qual a posição de Fernando Gil face à teoria kantiana da prova? Ela deve ser lida tendo em conta o valor da ostensão, figura central do Tratado da evidência. Como nota Kant, a prova apagógica é “sempre mais fraca do que a ostensiva”49. “Só a prova ostensiva ou directa alia «conjuntamente a convicção da verdade e a inteligência das fontes (Quellen) dessa verdade»; a prova apagógica «pode de certo produzir a certeza mas não a compreensão da verdade considerada do ponto de vista do encadeamento que a liga aos fundamentos da sua possibilidade» (A 789 / B 817). É este o sentido kantiano de «ostensão»: uma indubitabilidade incontestável, proveniente do recobrimento perfeito do subjectivo (a certeza, a convicção) pelo objectivo (a inteligibilidade plena da situação)”50.

Fernando Gil resume do seguinte modo os resultados da “Disciplina da razão pura” da KrV em matéria de prova. Primeiro: “É necessário remontar aos princípios que fundamentam as demonstrações. Eles têm a sua sede ou no entendimento ou na razão. Todavia, se pertencem ao entendimento, não se poderão aplicar à razão, e se pertencem à razão, não serão «objectivos», mas dialécticos e, portanto, exclusivamente reguladores. Noutros termos, a argumentação metafísica terá inevitavelmente falta de um fundamento da prova”51. Segundo: “Diferentemente do que se passa nas ciências, «para cada proposição transcendental pode encontrar-se apenas uma prova», «o argumento só pode então ser único» (A 787 / B 815)” 52. Terceiro: “Os argumentos transcendentais estabelecem-se segundo o modelo da prova ostensiva ou directa. Só ela «alia simultaneamente a convicção da verdade e a compreensão das fontes dessa verdade»; a prova apagógica «pode muito bem produzir a certeza, mas não a compreensão da verdade considerada do ponto de vista do encadeamento que a liga aos fundamentos da sua possibilidade» (A 789 / B 817)”53. Resumindo: “a prova não deixará nenhum resíduo: a ostensão representa o recobrimento perfeito do subjectivo (a convicção) pelo objectivo (a compreensão perfeita da razão

45 Gil, 1998: 185. Cf., em geral, Gil, 1998: 185-188.

46 Gil, 1998: 189.

47 Gil, 1998: 190-193.

48 Gil, 1998: 190-191.

49 Gil, 1986 a: 182.

50 Gil, 1986 a: 27.

51 Gil, 2001: 304.

52 Gil, 2001: 304.

53 Gil, 2001: 304-305.

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suficiente, dos «fundamentos da possibilidade» de um estado de coisas)”54. (Voltarei já ao que Fernando Gil diz sobre os problemas que a exigência da prova ostensiva coloca ao criticismo.)

A teoria kantiana da controvérsia é consonante com a teoria da prova 55. “Existe um

«interesse» no «conflito» da razão consigo mesma, pois este conflito revela os limites internos do pensamento, que é por essência aporético56”. E, para Kant, “as controvérsias significativas referem-se a uma aporia que deve ser crucial”57. Igualmente para Kant, deve- se poder determinar as causas das aporias (no caso de Kant, das antinomias), para que uma saída, uma via, um caminho, uma euporia, se tornem possíveis e nos conduzam eventualmente à certeza 58 .A busca de uma solução para as aporias passa por uma reconstrução – a “operação crítica”, que conduz ao desvelamento do “equívoco dogmático”59, é essa reconstrução - dos seus objectos e da argumentação da controvérsia60. Por exemplo, a reconstrução do debate sobre a composição do contínuo 61 . Essa reconstrução funciona como uma redução: “Kant começa por reduzir implicitamente a multiplicidade das controvérsias metafísicas (e também físicas) a uma tipologia finita – para depois apurar, para aquém das diferenças de superfície, o seu comum equívoco. É sobre esta base, e só sobre ela, que se poderá estabelecer um diagnóstico do discurso filosófico”62. Assim se desvanecerá o motivo da controvérsia – mas, como nota Fernando Gil, “no termo da controvérsia”, como resultado dela63. “Nestes termos, a controvérsia

«crítica» revela-se um verdadeiro método, que Kant chama céptico, mas cujo único contexto apropriado é o criticismo”64. A “originalidade” do projecto kantiano “consiste em utilizar a controvérsia enquanto método para eliminar a controvérsia enquanto errância metafísica. Como as proposições do Tractatus de Wittgenstein, as controvérsias serão como andaimes que se deitam fora depois de terem servido para construir o edifício”65. A necessidade de uma passagem pela controvérsia foi sublinhada em várias filosofias. Aristóteles, no De Caelo, via-a “quase como um tributo obrigatório para se atingir a verdade”66. Aquele que busca a verdade deve procurar ser um árbitro das posições em conflito, se bem que de uma forma diferente da kantiana: “O árbitro de Aristóteles (ou de Leibniz ou de Hegel) não instrui o processo dos excessos da razão relativamente aos

54 Gil, 2001: 305.

55 Sobre a teoria da controvérsia de Fernando Gil, cf. P. Tunhas, “Fernando Gil e a Controvérsia”, Revista Portuguesa da História do Livro, 19, 2007, 285-310.

56 Gil, 2001: 58.

57 Gil, 1986 a: 161.

58 Gil, 1986 a: 162.

59 Gil, 1986 a: 168.

60 Gil, 1986 a: 164-165.

61 Gil, 1986 a: 168.

62 Gil, 1986 a: 165.

63 Gil, 1986 a: 166.

64 Gil, 1986 a: 166.

65 Gil, 1986 a: 161.

66 Gil, 1986 a: 167

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limites da experiência, mas procura uma integração de verdades unilaterais ou, melhor dito, de resultados parciais. Em vez de declarar a nulidade de descaminhos simétricos, regista o desdobramento de uma estrutura complexa”67. Mas, no fundo, a posição kantiana reencontra, à sua maneira, as atrás citadas: “Embora não à maneira de Leibniz (ou de Aristóteles ou Hegel), Kant «integra» também os interesses parciais, ao mostrar que, em última análise, cada doutrina tende a acertar naquilo que diz a partir do vantage point que é propriamente seu, e a errar naquilo que diz para além dele (o «epicurismo» e o

«platonismo» enganam-se só porque «dizem mais do que sabem» (A 471-72 / B 499- 500))”68.

Opinião, crença e saber

Relacionadas com as questões da prova e da controvérsia – e também, é claro, com as investigações de Fernando Gil sobre a inteligibilidade, a evidência e a convicção – encontram-se “as três noções epistémicas” de Kant: opinião, crença (ou fé) e saber, reunidas sob a designação comum de “ter-por-verdadeiro” <das Fürwahrhalten>”, estudadas na Nota II de Provas 69. Opinião, crença (ou fé) e saber são três etapas da convicção (algo que apresenta um valor tanto subjectivo como objectivo, por distinção com a persuasão, enganadora porque meramente subjectiva). Elas variam em suficiência, e, como nota Fernando Gil, apenas o saber apresenta simultaneamente uma suficiência subjectiva e uma suficiência objectiva, sem que isso signifique que opinião e crença sejam, como a persuasão, meras aparências). A questão que Fernando Gil coloca é a da possibilidade da distinção perfeita e inequívoca da persuasão e da convicção. Não se encontra em Kant “nenhuma indicação positiva do que pode fundar a «convicção», mesmo parcial [isto é, a opinião]”70. A objecção consiste no apontar a inexistência em Kant – contrariamente ao que se verifica em Leibniz ou Peirce, por exemplo - não só de uma continuidade entre persuasão e convicção, como também entre opinião, crença (ou fé) e saber71. Voltarei a esta questão quando falar de Fichte.

Exemplo e pedra de toque

Indiscutivelmente, o Kant que mais interessa a Fernando Gil é aquele que escapa às compartimentações mais rígidas do sistema. Tal é patente no magnífico estudo que consagrou às noções de exemplo e de pedra-de-toque72. Fernando Gil constata – e retomo aquilo que antes anunciei - que o conceito de prova no criticismo – a prova ostensiva, por

67 Gil, 1986 a: 167.

68 Gil, 1986 a: 169.

69 Gil, 1986 a: 108-110. Sobre a crença (ou fé), cf. tb. Gil, 1986 a: 126-127.

70 Gil, 1986 a: 109.

71 Gil, 1986 a: 110.

72 Gil, 1998: 263-302. Cf. tb. Gil, 1996: 237-238, e Gil, 1998: 207-209.

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oposição à prova apagógica da matemática 73 – é um modelo demasiado forte, que a filosofia não pode honrar: “A prova transcendental é uma prova forte. Mas revela-se de imediato demasiado forte, pois não é susceptível de satisfazer as suas próprias exigências” 74. Por isso mesmo ser assim, o estilo das provas kantianas acaba por ser apagógico (“negativo e não directo”, cultivando “um estilo apagógico de demonstração”)75. E Fernando Gil procura, em dois conceitos aparentemente marginais da teoria kantiana da prova – os conceitos de exemplo e pedra-de-toque, exactamente – os elementos de uma teoria da prova filosófica que faça justiça à natureza em parte ficcional da filosofia e à apetência desta por experiências imaginárias (cruciais ou não)76. Muito rapidamente, o exemplo – Fernando Gil distingue Beispiel de Exempel, e é o primeiro termo que designa efectivamente o exemplo na sua singularidade máxima, como coisa distinta de uma pura instanciação de uma regra geral 77 – participa da constelação de conceitos parentes da evidência. Encontramos na linguagem do exemplo, a linguagem e os conceitos da evidência – “uma evidência virtualmente alucinatória” - , que, entre outras, a tradição retórica desenvolveu: brilho, mostração, ostensão, hipotipose78.

O parentesco com a evidência não fica por aqui. A própria temporalidade do exemplo é a temporalidade da evidência: “O exemplo dá-se no modo indicativo, no tempo presente e aspectualmente no imperfectivo progressivo (ou «cursivo»): o exemplo é algo que está a acontecer, a ostensão é a ocorrência de um processo”79.

O exemplo deve ser distinguido do esquema, de que é um analogon80. Contrariamente a este, “é pregnante na própria medida em que se afigura problemático e não-trivial”, “recorre-se ao exemplo em situações de incerteza cognitiva” 81 . Ele resolve o duplo problema da identificação (a relação universal/singular) e da referência (relação inteligível/sensível) de um modo distinto do esquema: “O exemplo realiza uma espécie de sobrecompensação da presença – uma evidência -, capaz de legitimar uma identificação por essência duvidosa”82. O exemplo, no sentido forte, o Beispiel83, não é, repita-se, uma “simples instanciação de uma regra geral”84: “Requer-se um Beispiel quando há um défice de compreensão, ele não representa a instanciação de uma regra, é antes a invenção de um

73 Sobre a prova apagógica, indirecta e intuitiva, por contradistinção com a prova transcendental, ostensiva e directa, cf. Gil, 1998: 286-287.

74 Gil, 1998: 288-289.

75 Gil, 1998: 289.

76 Gil, 1998: 268, 301-302.

77 Gil, 1998: 266. Cf. tb. Gil, 1998: 207-208.

78 Gil, 1998: 282-283. Cf. tb. Gil, 1996: 238.

79 Gil, 1998: 283. Cf. tb., sobre os aspectos linguísticos comuns ao exemplo e à evidência, Gil, 1998: 284- 285.

80 Gil, 1998: 285.

81 Gil, 1998: 266.

82 Gil, 1998: 266.

83 Sobre a distinção entre Exempel e Beispiel, cf. Gil, 1998: 266 ss.

84 Gil, 1998: 266.

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modelo”85. E essa invenção pode, naturalmente, ser boa ou má, acertar ou não, ser forte ou fraca. Como se chega a um bom exemplo? Chega-se “comparando soluções, procurando analogias, pela tensão de um entendimento plenamente em acto” 86. O que nos remete directamente para a doutrina do Apêndice à Dialéctica Transcendental da KrV que referi no princípio. O exemplo “é como que o protótipo da actividade construtora do espírito”87.

Assim, haverá exemplos da “pura virtude”, tal como o relatado na “Metodologia da razão pura prática” da KpV (a criança que, passo a passo, se identifica com o homem probo e descobre que uma acção particular manifesta a pura virtude) 88 . O exemplo funciona, precisamente, porque é subjectivamente apropriável – a criança quer ser ela própria o agente moral -, o sujeito descobre-o como obra sua89. O exemplo comunica com a lei moral através da evidência: “A evidência própria ao exemplo enquanto tal enxertar-se-á na evidência originária da lei”90. Com efeito, a linguagem que Kant utiliza neste contexto, como nota Fernando Gil, é a já referida linguagem da evidência: força e brilho91. E possui uma “eficácia mobilizadora”: “a interiorização do exemplo é motivo de acção” 92 . O exemplo engendra a convicção – o processo de interiorização é um processo de convicção -

, e esta conduz à acção: “É porque estou convencido que sou levado a agir”93.

Mas o exemplo não é apenas patente no domínio da educação moral. Há igualmente uma exemplaridade do gosto e do génio, quer dizer, no domínio estético94. O génio, como se sabe, é exemplar, mas não é susceptível de imitação. O gosto necessita de exemplos95, e “é a originalidade dos sucessores que o exemplo do génio solicita, ou seja, a sua capacidade produtora”96. Tal como no caso do exemplo moral, brilho e força convivem no exemplo estético97.

A história é um outro lugar da acção do exemplo. Fernando Gil cita as referências kantianas ao “exemplo brilhante”, o “exemplo que reluz” de Frederico 98 , ou aos “ensinamentos e actos” de Cristo “que serão tornados «visíveis» (sichtbar), «como exemplo (Beispiel) para os outros»”99.

85 Gil, 1998: 267.

86 Gil, 1998: 268. Cf. tb. Gil, 1988: 281, que refere explicitamente as « forças fundamentais comparativas » do Apêndice à Dialéctica Transcendental.

87 Gil, 1998: 268.

88 Gil, 1998: 268 sgts.

89 Gil, 1998: 271.

90 Gil, 1998: 271.

91 Gil, 1998: 272.

92 Gil, 1998: 272.

93 Gil, 1998: 285.

94 Gil, 1998: 272-277.

95 Gil, 1998: 274-275.

96 Gil, 1998: 275.

97 Gil, 1998: 276-277.

98 Gil, 1998: 278.

99 Gil, 1998: 280.

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O núcleo da interpretação de Fernando Gil consiste – já o disse há pouco - na tese segundo a qual “o esquema não pode ser um exemplo”, por este último não exprimir uma “regra de construção”; no caso do exemplo, trata-se antes de uma intuição, “mas uma intuição sui generis porquanto é sua função identificar princípios e universais”100. Mas, não sendo um esquema, o exemplo “pertence de pleno direito ao esquematismo”: ele “manifesta um suplemento de realidade relativamente ao esquema em sentido estrito (um molde de imagens)”101. “É no brilho que reside o suplemento de realidade do exemplo relativamente ao esquema; a sobrecarga alucinatória [estamos em plena linguagem do Tratado da evidência] compensa a impossibilidade de esquematizar”102. Tal suplemento advém-lhe de a imaginação não possuir no exemplo uma função homogeneizadora (entre o inteligível e o sensível), mas antes o de ter por objectivo a encarnação do primeiro no segundo: “O exemplo não homogeneíza, encarna”103.

E encarna de forma singular, como uma experiência imaginária – “imaginação tornada experiência”104 - “que se apresenta como uma realidade”105, uma “presentificação” que “induz uma convicção”106. E que “diz o sentido melhor que todo e qualquer conceito”107.

O exemplo não é uma prova (as provas dirigem-se às proposições)108, mas prolonga-se na prova 109 . E o trânsito do exemplo à prova faz-se através da evidência: “O exemplo funciona como meio de prova graças à ostensão alucinatória – uma sobrecompensação de presença relativamente ao esquema (regra, imagem abstracta) – que o acompanha. Nisso reside a sua evidência, que tem em si a sua comprovação”110. O exemplo “é como que um esquema evidente”111.

Dadas as aporias relevadas por Fernando Gil e acima apontadas na teoria kantiana da prova, não é de estranhar que Kant acabe por “recorrer a meios de justificação mais modestos” 112 que a prova transcendental ostensiva e directa. A pedra-de-toque é exactamente um desses meios. Fernando Gil nota: “Como o exemplo, é em situações de insuficiência que a pedra-de-toque intervém e, como aquele, constitui em geral uma experiência imaginária”113. Trata-se de uma “prova fraca: o seu fundamento é por via de

100 Gil, 1998: 280.

101 Gil, 1998: 280.

102 Gil, 1998: 283.

103 Gil, 1998: 281.

104 Gil, 1998: 283.

105 Gil, 1998: 281.

106 Gil, 1998: 282.

107 Gil, 1998: 285.

108 Gil, 1998: 285.

109 Gil, 1998: 285.

110 Gil, 1998: 286.

111 Gil, 1998: 286.

112 Gil, 1998: 290.

113 Gil, 1998: 290. Sobre as situações de insuficiência cognitiva, cf. tb. Gil, 1998: 293.

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regra insuficiente ou desconhecido e os seus domínios de aplicação são precisamente aqueles em que a prova, racional ou experimental, se afigura árdua ou inviável”114. Tal como o exemplo, a pedra-de-toque articula-se com a experiência crucial: “A experimentação é o modelo de toda a pedra-de-toque”115, e o “ideal da pedra-de-toque é a experiência crucial”116.

Não se trata aqui de uma “convicção em sentido próprio”, de algo que “proporcione a inteligência das fontes de uma verdade”117 (cf. o que antes foi dito a propósito da distinção persuasão/convicção). A “pedra-de-toque” não desfruta de uma inteligibilidade própria imediata”118. Como aponta Fernando Gil: “Dentro da classificação de «Opinar, saber e crer» a pedra de toque configuraria uma quarta posição, assaz paradoxal: uma suficiência objectiva, limitada mas com consequências poderosas, que no entanto se acompanha por uma insuficiência subjectiva”119.

Tal como o exemplo, a pedra-de-toque é operativa na moralidade120. Por exemplo: “Um sentimento que se alimenta da lei será (…) a pedra-de-toque do princípio de aperfeiçoamento moral do homem”; e “o exemplo da Metodologia [referido atrás] é apresentado como construindo ele próprio a aplicação de uma pedra-de-toque” 121. No plano da razão teórica122, pensar por si próprio – uma das máximas do sensus communis – não significa senão procurar em si mesmo a pedra-de-toque da verdade123. Num outro plano, a “Analítica” da KrV é uma “pedra-de-toque negativa da verdade”124, e a KrV apresenta-se como “a pedra-de-toque de toda a filosofia”125. E por aí adiante.

Como conclui Fernando Gil nas últimas palavras deste escrito: “A pedra-de-toque e o exemplo kantianos conformam-se com os requisitos das experiências imaginárias. No quadro da estranha ficção que é a filosofia, geram por isso verdade, inclusive para além da antecipação e da expectativa”126.

Kant e a evidência

114 Gil, 1998: 300.

115 Gil, 1998: 292.

116 Gil, 1998: 293.

117 Gil, 1998: 290. Cf. tb. Gil, 1998: 292.

118 Gil, 1998: 292.

119 Gil, 1998: 290.

120 Gil, 1998: 294-298.

121 Gil, 1998: 295.

122 Gil, 1998: 298-300.

123 Gil, 1998: 298, 300.

124 Gil, 1998: 298.

125 Gil, 1998: 299.

126 Gil, 1998: 302.

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Chegamos à evidência, em torno da qual até aqui andamos. No Tratado da evidência, o recurso a Kant é fundamental. Apenas alguns exemplos do modo como a filosofia kantiana inspirou alguns desenvolvimentos do Tratado127.

Primeiro exemplo. Na preparação da introdução de um dos quatro conceitos da evidência, a atenção, Fernando Gil dedica várias páginas ao conceito de orientação, e, isso, em grande medida, a partir de Kant (bem como da crítica deste por Heidegger)128. Do mesmo modo, ao lidar com outro conceito fundamental – talvez o mais fundamental – da evidência, a intuição, Fernando Gil retoma a tematização kantiana do «Eu penso» concebido como ponto de vista 129. Terceiro exemplo. Os “Paralogismos” da KrV são instrumentais na tematização da “posição de si como res”, que “constitui como que uma alucinação do «eu penso» e do ponto de vista”130; tal alucinação constitui uma hipóstase que se associa a uma “felicidade imaginária” 131. Quarto exemplo. Procurando determinar a solidariedade do pensar e do sentir na satisfação do espírito própria à evidência, são convocados os pares conceptuais da Anfibologia da Reflexão da KrV132. Por último, nesta listagem rapsódica e sem dúvida muito incompleta, a ideia de uma existência pré-categorial – discutida através de uma passagem dos “Paralogismos” da KrV (B 422) - é fundamental para se perceber como é impossível não acreditarmos na nossa própria existência, apesar da concepção do

«Eu penso» como ponto de vista des-substancializado133.

A moralidade

Tal como referi apenas a estética muito de passagem, a propósito do exemplo – e haveria muitíssimo a dizer -, não falei – ou quase não falei – da interpretação que Fernando Gil fez da ética kantiana – mormente em “Operadores de comunidade” 134 e no último texto publicado em vida, “O hospital e a lei moral”. O primeiro consiste numa reflexão, a partir do par operações/objectos, em que a ética racionalista de Kant é considerada como a boa solução face às posições alternativas daquilo que Kant chama “misticismo” – e que Fernando Gil identifica certeiramente com o intuicionismo – e “empirismo” – e que Fernando Gil refere como o domínio das várias éticas consequencialistas, tal como o utilitarismo. O intuicionismo privilegiaria o objectal, o utilitarismo o operatório. Acontece que, nesses dois tipos de éticas, objectal e operatório se encontrariam divorciados: “O misticismo está para além das operações – o empirismo, para aquém dos objectos da

127 Sobre o Tratado da evidência, cf. P. Tunhas, “Prendre l’évidence au sérieux”, in Critique, nº 559, Paris, 1993, 847-859 (trad. portuguesa, “Tomar a evidência a sério”, em Gil, 1998: 341-354).

128 Gil, 1996: 87-93.

129 Gil, 1996: 165-168.

130 Gil, 1996: 254.

131 Gil, 1996: 256.

132 Gil, 1996: 165-168.

133 Gil, 1996: 257-258. Cf. tb. Gil, 1998: 5.

134 Gil, 1998: 323-337.

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moralidade”135. Mas a solução kantiana, que, em princípio, lhe aparece como boa, sofre de uma deficiência: apesar da terceira fórmula do imperativo categórico – aquela que se refere à necessidade de, através das nossas máximas, concorrermos para um “reino possível dos fins como para um reino da natureza” -, a solução que Kant oferece ao problema da acção permanece “exclusivamente privada”136. Dito de outra maneira, falta à ética kantiana o bom “operador de comunidade”. Fernando Gil sugere que o busquemos na posição original e no véu da ignorância rawlsianos e na concomitante transformação do Razoável em Racional: “Tal posição do problema remediará, parece, às aporias kantianas – e se infringe os pressupostos da moral kantiana, conserva no entanto os seus conteúdos”137.

Fernando Gil voltará à ética kantiana no último texto publicado em vida, “O hospital e a lei moral”. Trata-se aí de sugerir que o hospital público realiza – no sentido de encarnar, dar corpo: é, de facto, como que um exemplo - o imperativo kantiano de considerar cada pessoa como um fim em si mesmo. E também aqui Rawls é convocado, já que o anonimato do indivíduo que entra no hospital público aparece como uma actualização do “véu da ignorância”138.

Fui muito curto na referência a estes dois textos – o segundo, em particular, mereceria desenvolvimentos muito mais longos -, mas o seu pleno tratamento exigiria que se convocassem outros textos de Fernando Gil relativos à ética, que, por serem razoavelmente independentes das teses kantianas escapam ao objecto de que me propus falar.

Passagem para Fichte

Passemos agora a Fichte.

É no contexto da sua investigação sobre a crença e a convicção em A convicção que a presença de Fichte é decisiva em Fernando Gil139. Fichte importa a Fernando Gil como pensador da acção, da actividade do espírito, que permite, na terminologia do livro, os gestos de fundação, que engendram a convicção, como coisa distinta da crença, que releva do fundamento, onde tal actividade é rasurada. Encontramos aqui um recuo para o mais arcaico, encetado já no Tratado da evidência, um percurso que se dirige a montante da evidência perceptiva que em Mimésis e negação ainda era talvez dominante: “Fichte não tem que se colocar o problema empirista (com que se defronta também o Husserl da Krisis) da construção da objectividade a partir da evidência perceptiva. O pensamento é por natureza objectivante, exercendo-se por ocasião do encontro com um objecto exterior que

135 Gil, 1998: 325.

136 Gil, 1998: 332.

137 Gil, 1998: 336. Sobre Rawls, cf. tb. Gil, 1986 b: 63-70.

138 Gil, 2005 c: 31.

139 Sobre A convicção, cf. P. Tunhas, “O sujeito no conhecimento. Sobre Fernando Gil”, Phainomenon, 22/23, 2014, 275-302.

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representa abstractamente” 140 . Disse “talvez”, porque, entre outras coisas, as páginas inicialmente citadas sobre a imaginação e a afinidade kantianas apontavam já nesta direcção. Como escreve Fernando Gil: “Sob o nome de afinidade, o Apêndice da Dialéctica Transcendental transpõe para os próprios fenómenos a lex continuitatis da imaginação, e a primeira versão da Dedução Transcendental reúne as duas coisas, virtude vinculadora da imaginação e ligação aos fenómenos”141.

O espírito possui uma agilidade própria, “a actividade cognitiva no estado puro”142, que é sem dúvida afim da imaginação tal como Fichte a pensa: “agente último” da “faculdade de produção” 143, “poder criador” que “conduz a actividade do sujeito” 144 e que afirma o “objecto exterior”145 , uma radicalização da imaginação produtora kantiana analisada em Mimésis e negação. E é a actividade do espírito – imanente146, “um dado primitivo e incompreensível”147, cujo conceito é imediato e não pode ser explicado nem deduzido148 - que produz as objectidades, o Não-Eu, uma determinação da agilidade: “A agilidade intuitiva indeterminada determina-se pela efectuação da acção” 149 . E é essa acção – melhor: o “sistema das acções do espírito humano”150 – que importa compreender.

Trata-se, efectivamente, na actividade do espírito, de uma criação: a “autoposição do eu e a oposição ao não-eu produzem-se uma pela outra e realizam-se a partir de nada” 151 . Sublinho: a partir do nada; daí a criação. Actividade e ser, Não-Eu, opor-se-iam de forma indeclinável se o Não-Eu – que Fernando Gil aproxima do prático-inerte sartreano da Crítica da razão dialéctica152 – não fosse ele mesmo um produto da actividade do Eu, consequência última da auto-posição deste. A “actividade real consiste num movimento de objectivação”153.

Essa produção de objectidades – “o movimento de objectivação cristaliza-se em objectidades”154 - é o processo mesmo da construção da inteligibilidade. Na linguagem anteriormente referida, os objectos são o produto das operações. Com o detalhe de, em Fichte, as operações serem o produto do Eu que, reconhecendo o exterior, o Não-Eu,

140 Gil, 2003: 221.

141 Gil, 2003: 40.

142 Gil, 2003: 223.

143 Gil, 2003: 222.

144 Gil, 2003: 45.

145 Gil, 2003: 46.

146 Gil, 2003: 223.

147 Gil, 2003: 215.

148 Gil, 2003: 224.

149 Gil, 2003: 224.

150 Gil, 2003: 213.

151 Gil, 2003: 216.

152 Gil, 2003: 223.

153 Gil, 2003: 220.

154 Gil, 2003: 220.

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através do choque provocado pelo obstáculo155, o fixa e determina. A liberdade originária

– “Ajo porque decidi agir” 156 -, plenamente desenvolvida, conduz ao domínio sobre a resistência do mundo: “O agir actualiza uma liberdade cuja vocação é estender progressivamente o seu domínio sobre um mundo que lhe resiste”157. Ainda: “O eu tende naturalmente a lançar-se para o exterior, para um objecto que faz seu”158. (Notar-se-á aqui a proximidade com a teoria da imaginação-afinidade de Mimésis e negação; e, sobretudo, a sua radicalização: a imaginação produziria a afinidade; que, em retorno, condicionaria a imaginação.)

E a esse domínio chama-se crença: “a crença não se refere unicamente ao ser do mundo mas também às construções do espírito em geral”159. Ela afirma “uma existência real”160. O conhecimento teórico assenta na crença161 – o que, em termos kantianos, significa uma indistinção tendencial entre Analítica e Dialéctica. A questão da relação entre Analítica e Dialéctica havia sido já abordada, de passagem, em Mimésis e Negação162 e, no estudo sobre o exemplo e a pedra-de-toque, através da distinção paralela entre conhecer e pensar163. Em A convicção, Fernando Gil vai mais longe, e cita aprovadoramente Hermann Weyl – alguém de quem se sentia filosoficamente próximo: “Que a crença, i. e. a tese transcendental da razão, sem a qual todo o saber é morto e indiferente, não comece unicamente a propósito de «Deus, liberdade, imortalidade», foi uma das primeiras e mais importantes descobertas que Fichte realizou para além de Kant”164.

A questão da inteligibilidade – voltamos sempre a ela - é aqui fundamental. Como Fernando Gil sublinha, a ideia mesma de sistema em Fichte encontra-se associada à inteligibilidade. Só podemos compreender aquilo que fazemos – Fichte antecipa Valéry -, e compreender o sistema não é uma pura actividade escolar de memorização: exige uma re- actualização do sistema em nós mesmos, uma reprodução activa – sublinhe-se sempre a actividade - do seu movimento e dos seus conteúdos, de “uma série de evidências que cada um pode gerar em si próprio”165. Possuímos a Doutrina da ciência “produzindo-a a partir de nós, a compreensão é apenas esta reconstrução pessoal de um conteúdo de conhecimento”166.

155 Gil, 2003: 221.

156 Gil, 2003: 217.

157 Gil, 2003: 224.

158 Gil, 2003: 41.

159 Gil, 2003: 220.

160 Gil, 2003: 44.

161 Gil, 2003: 45.

162 Gil, 1984: 498.

163 Gil, 1998: 291, 302.

164 Gil, 2003: 45, nota 17.

165 Gil, 2003: 220.

166 Gil, 2003: 214-215.

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Mas – e isso é decisivo – as raízes da inteligibilidade começam no pré-intencional167. A crença é uma “actividade pré-intencional”168. Quer isto dizer que, ao nível mais profundo – e à maneira da “energia livre” freudiana –, ela não se fixa em objectos determinados. É algo de difuso susceptível de tudo abarcar sem nada determinar inteiramente. Tal como, em parte, no verso de Camões que Fernando Gil um dia comentou: O mundo todo abarco e nada aperto169. A acção não é dirigida a nada em particular: é pura acção, actividade ininterrupta consubstancial ao Eu. A crença exprime-se através do sentimento e da tendência (conceitos fichteanos), que não são intencionais170. “No plano fenomenológico, o sentimento exprime a positividade irredutível da sensação ou do sentimento do agir e do querer. Do ponto de vista do objecto, é um índice do Não-Eu. 171” Em qualquer dos aspectos (fenomenológico e ontológico) o sentimento designa o percurso para um mundo aberto e indeterminado (se bem que determinável), prévio a qualquer actividade dirigida (intencional) de fixação. A tendência, por sua vez, paralelamente ao sentimento, significa o movimento “para fora de si mesmo” do Eu, um movimento que se dirige “para algo de desconhecido” 172 . (Poder-se-iam, neste contexto, revisitar algumas páginas de Aproximação antropológica, o primeiro livro de Fernando Gil, onde se esboça uma tal temática – mas ainda, é verdade, no interior do contexto fenomenológico de uma “intencionalidade genérica. 173 ) “Pré-intencional” quer igualmente dizer: anterior à reflexão174. A reflexão supõe que os obstáculos exteriores (o “mundo”) se encontrem já determinados, ou, pelo menos, o exercício avançado da sua determinação. Ora, sentimento e tendência – os principais movimentos pré-intencionais do Eu, representando o estrato mais profundo da crença – são prévios à determinação do Não-Eu (embora sejam operatórios nela). A “pré-intencionalidade” releva de uma “actividade originária e sem objecto do espírito”175, uma “energia psíquica”176, que é, bem entendido, “inconsciente”177. A crença começa com o inconsciente.

Estamos, de facto, no domínio da fundação e não do fundamento: “A autoposição da intuição intelectual é algo bem distinto da alucinação do fundamento” 178 . Não é o conhecimento, fixo e balizado – o puro objectal -, que o sistema fichteano explora, é o próprio acto de conhecer: “A Doutrina da ciência pretende compreender o acto de conhecer através das implicações da intuição intelectual”179. E estamos no domínio da

167 Sobre a “esfera pré-intencional”, cf. Gil, 2003: 82 sgts.

168 Gil, 2003: 82 sgts.

169 Gil, 2005 a: 255.

170 Gil, 2003: 83.

171 Gil, 2003: 83.

172 Gil, 2003: 82.

173 Gil, 1961: 51.

174 Gil, 2003: 83.

175 Gil, 2003: 88.

176 Gil, 2003: 84.

177 Gil, 2003: 82, 84.

178 Gil, 2003: 216.

179 Gil, 2003: 214.

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acção, pedra basilar da inteligibilidade. Uma acção que se entrecruza – tanto na leitura de Fichte quanto na da Dedução Transcendental da KrV que Fernando Gil propõe – com a imaginação. A inteligibilidade máxima é suposta dela resultar. O objectal deduz-se do operatório. A convicção prolonga a persuasão, na medida em que o operatório se expõe na sua actualidade (quer dizer: em que a fundação resiste à sua ocultação pelo fundamento), a Dialéctica trabalha a Analítica, o pensamento o conhecimento. Vê-se aqui o brilho da evidência, que o exemplo tão bem exprime, a experiência daquilo que talvez se pudesse chamar a “acção afinitária”.

Bibliografia

Gil, Fernando – (1961) Aproximação Antropológica, Guimarães Editores, Lisboa.

(1984) Mimésis e Negação, Imprensa Nacional / Casa da Moeda, Lisboa.
(1986a) Provas, Imprensa Nacional / Casa da Moeda, Lisboa.
(1986b) Cruzamentos da Enciclopédia, Prelo, Lisboa, nº especial.
(1996) Tratado da Evidência, Imprensa Nacional / Casa da Moeda, Lisboa (Traité de l’évidence, Millon, Grenoble, 1993).
(1998) Modos da Evidência, Imprensa Nacional / Casa da Moeda, Lisboa.
(2001) Mediações, Imprensa Nacional / Casa da Moeda, Lisboa, 2001.
(2003) A Convicção, Campo das Letras, Porto, 2003 (La Conviction, Flammarion, Paris, 2000).
(2005a) Acentos, Imprensa Nacional / Casa da Moeda, Lisboa.
(2005b) « Inteligibilidade finalista, inteligibilidade expressiva », separata de 2005a.
– (2005c) “O Hospital e a Lei Moral”, Atlântico, nº 7, 2005, pp. 29-31.

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A Guide to Kant’s Treatment of Grace Una guía del tratamiento kantiano de la gracia PABLO MUCHNIK1 & LAWRENCE PASTERNACK 2 ‌‌
Emerson College, USA & Oklahoma State University, USA

Abstract

This Guide is designed to restore the theological background that informs Kant’s treatment of grace in Religion to its rightful place. This background is essential not only to understand the nature of Kant’s overall project in this book, namely, to determine the “association” or “union” between Christianity (as a historical faith) and rational religion, but also to dispel the impression of “internal contradictions” and “conundrums” that contemporary interpreters associate with Kant’s treatment of grace and moral regeneration. That impression, we argue, is the result of entrenched interpretative habits that can be traced back to Karl Barth’s reading of the text. Once we realize that such a reading rests on a mistake, much of the anxiety and confusion that plague current discussions on these issues can be put to rest.

Key Words

Grace, sanctifying, justification, original sin, total depravity, conundrum, Augustine, Calvin, Luther, Pietism

Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason is among Kant’s most misunderstood and maligned texts. Both his critics and defenders alike raise worries about its alleged employment of an “Augustinian” conception of moral evil—a conception which in turn shapes Kant’s views on grace and moral regeneration and is supposed to be responsible for the “wobbles,” “conundrums,” and “internal contradictions” associated with them.
In April 2017, the North American Kant Society, as part of the Central Division meeting of the American Philosophical Association, hosted a symposium to shed light on

1 Associate Professor of Philosophy at Emerson College, USA. Email contact: pablo_muchnik@emerson.edu.
2 Professor of Philosophy at Oklahoma State University, USA. Email contact: l.pasternack@okstate.edu .

[Recibido: 9 de octubre 2017
Aceptado: 14 de octubre 2017]
A Guide to Kant’s Treatment of Grace

these issues. The papers by Jacqueline Mariña, Robert Gressis, and Dennis Vanden Auweelle included in this dossier were part of that event.
Our goal in this introduction is to provide some helpful background to the contemporary debate, a reader’s guide so-to-speak to this particularly baffling topic. We begin with a brief discussion of the overall project of the Religion, necessary to place the question of grace within its proper context (§1). We then proceed to analyze some of the key theological notions informing Kant’s treatment of grace (§2). These notions play an important role in the “conundrum” criticism and will help us show that this criticism rests on a mistake (§3). We conclude by examining how the papers in the symposium may serve as harbingers of a post-conundrum era (§4).

§1. How to read ‘Religion’: The Hermeneutics of Kant’s Religious Hermeneutics

Although Kant originally planned to write a series of separate essays on religion for the Berlinische Monatsschrift, political circumstances led him to combine them into a single volume. Even though we do not know how much of the remaining three pieces Kant had already planned when writing the first, we do know from his correspondence in the year preceding the publication of Religion that his intention, from the start, was to write a series of essays exploring the scope of overlap between rational religion and Christianity (e.g. AA 11:358, 11:429). Hence, despite the fact that Kant originally planned to publish a series of self-standing essays, they were nonetheless all part of an ongoing program to explore the relationship between rational religion and Christianity as a historical faith.1 Indeed, the project articulated in the correspondence is not only reflected throughout Religion’s four parts, but is also explicitly stated in its two prefaces.
In the First Preface, after a discussion of the Highest Good as the principle by which “morality inevitably leads to religion” (AA 6:6, 6:8n), Kant turns to the respective roles of philosophical and biblical theology. That discussion then leads to a description of Religion as an “experiment” [Versuch] (6:10) whose purpose is to determine the “association” or “union” [Vereinigung] which may exist between biblical theology and the “pure philosophical doctrine of religion” (AA 6:10). The Second Preface builds on this idea and presents it as key to understanding the title of the work itself.3
In response to concerns raised about the meaning and “intention hidden behind” (AA 6:12) its title, Kant explains that Religion within [Innerhalb] the Boundaries [Grenzen] of Mere Reason is meant to express an embedding relationship between the wider sphere of “historical faith” and a narrower sphere of natural or rational religion.

1 The initial essay on evil was submitted to the Berlinische Monatsschrift in February 1792 and published in the April issue. The second essay was then submitted in the weeks following the publication of the first (AA 11:343). However, as Kant learned in June that it was denied an official imprimatur, he completed the remaining essays as one single volume, which was then submitted roughly two months later (AA 11:358). All four essays were thus completed within about a six-month period.
3 While many interpreters have held that the Religion is guided by two experiments, there are good textual grounds to think otherwise. For reasons discussed in Pasternack 2014 and 2017, we use “experiment” in the singular.
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Hence, just as the First Preface more tersely presents the Religion as an “experiment” [Versuch] (AA 6:10, 6:12) whose purpose is to determine the “association” or “union” [Vereinigung] between traditional and rational religion, so Kant now, after clarifying the title’s meaning, uses the imagery of two embedded domains to describe the nature of his “experiment.”
Kant’s method can be divided into three steps: identify a particular ‘fragment’ of historical faith which is to be evaluated, hold that fragment “up to moral concepts,” and, finally, determine whether or not the fragment can “lead back” to the “pure rational system of religion” (AA 6:12). In other words, Kant’s experiment consists in identifying a particular Christian doctrine for consideration, examining it in light of various moral concepts, and if these concepts are aptly reflected in the doctrine, determining its “unity” or “compatibility” with the “pure rational system of religion” (AA 6:12).
We will illustrate Kant’s procedure with various examples as we move forward, but first, we would like to note that the experiment of the Religion does not merely compare historical faith and rational religion in order to catalog their points of “unity”—it is also testing or evaluating Christian doctrine by way of this comparison. Although a few years later Kant responded to a royal rescript by claiming that Religion “make[s] no appraisal of Christianity” (AA 7:8), it is undeniable that the text is replete with evaluative language. For example, both in the Second Preface and throughout the book, Kant presents the religion of reason as “genuine [eigentliche] religion” (AA 6:12, see also: 6:112, 6:123n, 6:153) and contrasts it with mere “cult.” The suggestion is clear: to the extent that a historical doctrine coheres with rational religion, it is part of “genuine religion”; to the extent it falls outside those boundaries, it is either superfluous or dangerous, since it belongs to a “religion of rogation” (empty ritual) whose aim is to curry favor with God as substitute for our moral labor. In fact, Kant compares the two religious spheres with “oil and water” and expects that through his experiment the “purely moral religion (the religion of reason) [will] float to the top” (AA 6:13).
This evaluative dimension, however, does not entail that Kant “reduces” religion to morality, biblical to philosophical theology, or faith to reason—what it means is that for Kant the primary value of religious doctrines lies in their contribution to our moral edification (AA 6:48). When divorced from our moral improvement, the historical cognition of the Bible “belongs among the adiaphora” (AA 6:44n.) and can be treated as one sees fit.4
A few preliminary examples will make Kant’s comparative/evaluative procedure clear. Consider, for instance, the investigation of Original Sin throughout Part One. Kant assesses the broadly Augustinian tenets which comprise this doctrine, including that our moral status “comes to us by way of inheritance from our first parents” (AA 6:40). Even if, to our secular ears, this may sound preposterous, it was nonetheless part of the dominant

4 Kant thus recognizes that there is much more to religion as historical faith than what of it overlaps with rational religion. Moreover, he even allows not only that there may be revelation and miracles, but also that they may have meaning beyond their moral significance (6:84, 6:105).
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theological worldview at the time. What, then, does Kant conclude on this matter? Much as one would expect: he finds it “most inappropriate,” primarily on the ground that our moral status must be a “determination of the power of choice” (AA 6:39), not something acquired through the deed of another.
“Radical evil,” i.e., the idea that behind our particular misdeeds there is a singular root source of moral corruption, undergoes a similar examination. Many interpreters suppose that this notion is of Kant’s own coinage, and so treat it as a philosophical (perhaps even a transcendental) thesis. Yet “radical evil” [radikal böse] comes from the Vulgate’s radix malorum (1 Timothy 6:10), and is a central issue of Christian theology. Hence, as with other particular tenets bound up with the Augustinian conception of Original Sin, Kant explores the relationship of this theological notion to moral principles in order to determine what ‘compatibility’ or ‘unity’ it may have with rational religion.
Unlike inheritance, however, radical evil is a theological tenet that receives a more favorable assessment. Although Kant rejects its association with cupidity (AA 6:34) along with the Augustinian thesis of a “corruption” of our faculties (AA 6:35), he finds that this notion, when compared against moral concepts, can cohere with rational religion provided it is understood in kind, i.e., as “the presence in the subject of a common ground, itself a maxim, of all particular morally evil maxims” (AA 6:20).
What these examples show is that Religion should not be read as a linear philosophical argument. It is, instead, the result of a comparative analysis, one which considers a series of traditional religious doctrines, holds them (and their constituting tenets) up to moral principles, and determines, on that basis, their compatibility (or lack thereof) with rational religion. It would be a mistake, accordingly, to read Part One as an attempt to prove that humanity is universally evil. It should be read, rather, as an inquiry into how this item of historical faith fares when examined in light of the moral core of rational religion.5 The same applies to matters of redemption in Part II, the role of the Church (Part III), and “ecclesiastical service” and “statutory ordinances” of Christianity (Part IV).
Unfortunately, readers of the Religion nowadays are often unfamiliar with its underlying theological concerns, and hence tend to confuse a candidate for evaluation with a straightforward philosophical assertion. This confusion leads one to misconstrue the text’s inner dialectic, to overlook the fact that Kant is navigating through various Christian doctrines—some specific to Lutheran Pietism, some concerning debates between Lutheran Pietism and orthodox Lutheranism, some part of the broader Augustinian tradition. Our intent here is to make these theological underpinnings more explicit, not with an eye to present Kant as a hero of Christian Apologetics (Firestone/Jacobs 2008), but rather to appreciate his own interests in theology and his efforts as a “religious reformer” (Hare 2017, p. 72).

5 Read this way, much of the contemporary scholarly anxiety about the missing “formal proof” of the universal propensity for evil can dissipate. Such anxiety is more an expression of old philosophical habits of reading than a real lacuna in Kant’s own argument.
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Furthermore, we wish to emphasize the importance of reading all four parts of Religion as stages in a single overarching project. Most contemporary readers are drawn exclusively to Part One and pay little heed to the rest. Such an approach, however, cannot be justified in light of the text’s history: although Kant first planned to publish each essay as a separate unit, they were conceived as a four-part series meant to be read as a unitary project. To drop Religion after reading Part One is like dropping the first Critique after the Transcendental Aesthetic: the picture we will get is drastically distorted. Kant’s grim pessimistic anthropology (Muchnik 2009, p. xxiii; Frierson 2010, p. 48-55; Velkeley 2014,
p. 244) is only the starting-point of a lengthy inquiry into our moral regeneration, not its final word.
What we are suggesting, in sum, is to break loose from entrenched interpretative habits: we are inviting readers to see Religion as a coherent whole, a project shaped by a comparative and evaluative agenda that requires familiarity with the various Christian doctrines Kant examines. We propose that, to properly interpret the Religion, one must be able to recognize the particular doctrinal tenets with which Kant is engaging (in each Part and passage), recognize the philosophical principles by which they are assessed, ascertain what elements of historical faith meet Kant’s evaluative standards, and (in light of the parerga with which each Part concludes) determine the limits of what rational religion can and cannot settle. To assist those interested in thinking of Religion in this fashion, we now offer a brief overview of the Christian conceptions of Original Sin and grace.

§2. What is Grace?

Christian theology contains an array of different conceptions of (and roles for) grace, denominational disagreements, orthodoxies and heresies, and a number of famous historical debates (Augustine-Pelagius, Luther-Erasmus, Calvin-Arminius, etc.). However, ‘grace’ (gracia, Gnade) can be most generally understood as something God does on our behalf. This may be a specific act of divine aid, the endowment of some capacity, or a “forensic” judgment whereby we are relieved of some burden or forgiven for some transgression. Needless to say, we cannot possibly survey here the entire gambit of views existing on these matters. Our goal is more modest: to explain the specific conceptions of grace Kant actually considers.
First, Kant occasionally appeals to the Leibnizian distinction between the Kingdoms of Nature and Grace when discussing the Highest Good. For example, in the First Critique’s Canon of Pure Reason, he associates the postulate of immortality with the Kingdom of Grace, a realm in which happiness will be “distributed precisely in accordance with morality” (KrV A811/B839). While ‘grace’ in this context refers to God’s agency (i.e., the distribution of happiness in our “future life”), insofar as happiness is allocated “precisely in accordance with morality” there is no overt forgiveness or mercy involved in the process. What matters is our “worthiness to be happy” (KrV A813/B841), and happiness is to be exactly apportioned according to that distributive criterion (KrV

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A814/B842). Yet, Kant calls the “moral world” of our “future life” wherein the Highest Good is to obtain a regnum gratiae (A815/B843).
Second, in the Second Critique’s discussion of the postulate of immortality, Kant qualifies the Highest Good’s principle of an “exact” correlation between morality and happiness, noting that we will never be “adequate to God’s will” (AA 5:123) and hence are in need of “indulgence or dispensation, which do not harmonize with justice” (AA 5:123). Such accommodation looks different in the Religion, but the two texts share the idea that while we may always continue to strive for greater virtue, a commitment to this end “holds for God as possession” (AA 5:123n, cf. AA 6:67). ‘Grace’, in this sense, may either be understood as “perspectival” (Palmquist 2010), i.e., based upon God’s judging us as “a perfected whole” (6:67), or entailing a judgment “which do[es] not harmonize with justice” (AA 5:123) since God takes the lesser condition of endless progress as tantamount to our having reached the goal (AA 5:123n).
Third, unlike the Second Critique where Kant is not as diligent about distinguishing the particular doctrinal issues with which the Highest Good is intertwined, in Religion he explicitly attends to the Christian distinction between Sanctifying and Justifying Grace. Both have to do with our ‘fallen’ condition and with what God does for us in light of that condition. Justifying grace pertains to the “debt of sin,” which, according to the Augustinian tradition, we have inherited from Adam as the result of his “primal” act of disobedience. The Crucifixion then repays this debt such that, through the doctrine of Vicarious Atonement, one can partake of a “foreign satisfying merit.” Justifying Grace, in short, consists in the repayment of our original debt.
In the Second Critique, we can see traces of this doctrinal issue: even with our endless effort, we still cannot become fully worthy of happiness, a shortcoming that leads God to grant us an “indulgence.” This matter is then treated with more precision in Religion, where Kant proposes that the debt of sin is neither forgiven (since this would violate divine justice – AA 6:73, 6:76) nor repaid (since the debt is infinite – AA 6:72), but is rather “removed” or unstruck [entschlagen] (AA 6:76). Thus, in agreement with the Augustinian tradition, Kant believes that there is no “justification through works.”6 But he parts ways with Augustinians on the doctrine of vicarious atonement: for Kant, moral liabilities are not “transmissible” (AA 6:72) and radical evil is the most personal of debts. Hence, as Mariña (1997) has previously argued, Kant diverges at this juncture from the Calvinist and orthodox Lutheran notion of “forensic” justification, according to which justification is no more than an edict by God. Moreover, he also rejects the economic tropes of Reformed theology (Clem 2018), opposing the idea that sin is to be modeled as a

6 It is important to note that Kant does not follow the Augustinian tradition on an essential point, namely, that we cannot earn any moral merit through our efforts. Rather, it is essential to Kant’s moral religion that we become “well-pleasing to God” through “good life conduct” (AA 6:171). The logic of the doctrine of Justification is distinct from this and is rather based upon the antecedent claim that we are born with an infinite debt to God. Kant thus divides up in Part II the question of sanctification (the “first difficulty”) from the question of justification (the “third difficulty”). In fact, the analysis Kant is developing in the three “difficulties” particularly concerns the debate between the Lutheran Pietist treatment of Justification/Sanctification and the orthodox Lutheran position. Space does not allow us to work through the details here. See Clem 2018.
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“financial debt” (AA 6:72). Hence, while Kant engages with the doctrine of Justifying Grace and advances a view on Justification which conforms to rational religion, that view is developed through a critique of the standard theological positions of his day.
Sanctifying Grace, much more so than Justification, is the focus of this dossier, and to it we now turn. This kind of grace concerns the role assigned to God in our transition from evil to good. But before we discuss this point directly, one first needs to understand the underlying theological and moral problematics.
Calvinists and orthodox Lutherans describe our fallen condition as one of “Total Depravity.” They hold that Adam’s ‘primal sin’ changed human nature such that we are now “slaves to sin,” consumed by self-interest, confused about the proper order of “lesser” and “greater” goods, and in our “fallen” state, incapable of any moral improvement. While there are some nuances which distinguish Calvin and Luther from Augustine’s own views, all these thinkers share a privation account of moral evil, according to which our “fallen” condition is understood in terms of cognitive and volitional incapacities that prevent us from making correct moral judgments and willing the good.
The broad strokes of the Augustinian tradition are explored by Kant through the main body of Part One. That is, as we mentioned earlier, throughout the Religion Kant forges a path through a series of Christian doctrines, introducing and then testing their various tenets. Part One tenders for review the Augustinian doctrine that humanity is evil, considers the various claims bound up with this doctrine (innateness, inheritance, corruption of our powers, etc.), and examines these doctrinal claims in light of the moral principles of “genuine” religion.
For example, Kant recognizes that if humanity is universally evil, then there must be something about us “qua human” that makes this so—and hence evil must be innate. However, the notion of an innate moral condition is for Kant inadmissible if it suggests that this condition is not a product of our wills. Hence, he rejects various conventional positions (biological inheritance, determining inclination, and other “natural causes” (AA 6:21)), because the only way to reconcile innateness with the “predicates morally good and morally evil” (AA 6:21) is by taking it “only in the sense that [such character] is posited as the ground antecedent to every use of freedom given in experience” (AA 6:22).
Similar considerations lead Kant to reject common doctrinal views on moral evil according to which, in our “fallen” condition, our volitional powers are so deeply compromised that we are enslaved to our “sensuous nature” (AA 6:35) and/or that there is a total “corruption of [our] morally legislative reason” (AA 6:35). Hence, Kant rejects the dominant privation model of evil (corruption of our faculties) and kindred views, and opts instead for explaining “the difference, whether the human being is good or evil,” in terms of the order of incentives in one’s “supreme maxim.”
As for how Sanctifying Grace relates to the above, let us begin with the Pauline distinction between the “old man” and the “new man,” a distinction Kant often uses both in the Religion and the Conflict of the Faculties. Given the privation model of the Augustinian tradition, the “old man” is a “slave to sin” and lacks the capacities needed to

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become a “new man,” i.e., one who is able to know and will the good. Accordingly, this tradition holds that our moral transformation is only possible through divine aid. For Augustine and his Reformation followers, there are a select few, the “elect,” who have been restored, but such restoration is completely independent of anything they have done to help bring it about. As we can neither know the good nor will it, in our fallen condition we cannot even ask for help. Instead, every human being moves forward in life governed solely by self-interest and confused about what the good really is. The “elect,” on the other hand, have their capacities spontaneously restored to them, and, once restored, they enjoy an ongoing concursus or cooperation by which they continue to persevere in the good, exercising and strengthening their newly acquired powers of moral judgment, resisting self-interest, and choosing the good.
We may thus distinguish between three traditional theological positions regarding our moral transformation. First, there are those who believe that we are ‘slaves to sin’, utterly unable, unwilling to embrace, and ignorant of, the moral alternative. The more stringent brands of Augustinianism, including Calvinists and orthodox Lutherans, subscribe to this view. They hold that the “elect” are “passive” recipients of sanctifying grace and can do nothing to usher it in. They also hold that while the “old man” could in theory resist divine aid, grace is nonetheless “efficacious” and resistance is futile. Second, there are qualified versions of this stringent view, which hold that we cannot positively act towards the good but can nonetheless resist sin and thus move towards “quiescence.” Aquinas, for example, is taken by some to hold this position (Stump 2001). Finally, and this is the main Kantian target, there are those who hold that while we can do nothing to merit aid, God has already granted us a “prevenient” power which, despite our fallen condition, preserves within us the ability to ask for help. This view holds that prevenient grace provides enough of a flicker of freedom to allow us then to request divine assistance. While this third view of Sanctifying Grace has gained in popularity over the centuries, it was harshly attacked by Calvinists and orthodox Lutherans up through Kant’s time. It is usually associated with Jacobus Arminius, who, though condemned by the Calvinist Synod of Dort, was received with more favor among Catholics that found him compatible with the Council of Trent (Session 6, Chapter 5). Arminius contributed to the resurgence of Moravianism, laid the foundations for Methodism, and paved the way for
numerous further Protestant movements, including Lutheran Pietism.7
As we will discuss in the next section, a number of contemporary interpretative disputes regarding Religion arose because various Reformed philosophers of religion wanted to read the text through a Calvinist lens. That is, just as secular readers of the

7 In his introduction to the Cambridge paperback edition of Kant’s Religion, Robert Adams distinguishes between prevenient, sanctifying and justifying grace. Our presentation of these three types of grace roughly track with Adams’, though it is far from clear that he is correct that there is “no place in the Kantian scheme of things for prevenient grace” (Adams 1998, p. xxi). Its role would be different from its use in Arminianism and Pietism, but we regard this as a minor quibble. We do, however, want to indicate that Adams may give the wrong impression about the historical place of prevenient grace. While it was recognized by Augustine as well, it gains a particular importance through and after Arminius as a response to the doctrine of election and as a qualification to the Reformation doctrine of Total Depravity.
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Religion do not usually attend to its theological background, theologians of various orthodoxies fail to recognize that Lutheran Pietism is the principal tradition that Kant has in mind when discussing Sanctifying Grace, both in the Religion and the Conflict of the Faculties.
Given Kant’s comparative/evaluative procedure, it should be apparent why he could not possibly endorse the more stringent Augustinian view: its doctrines of “Total Depravity” and the utter impotence of the passive recipients of a transformative grace do not square with the demands of moral agency. But Kant also opposes the more moderate version that grants Sanctifying Grace to those who merely “ask for it” (AA 6:51), for they still share a fundamental Augustinian assumption, namely, that our moral transformation does not lie within our own powers. We may (due to Prevenient Grace) remain capable of asking for it, but a transformation through a mere request falls well short of the moral significance Kant places on our own efforts.
Kant launches an outright invective against this position at the end of Part One, where he proposes that the doctrinal spectrum, from total passivity to merely “asking” for help, is an expression of our moral corruption, a symptom of rather than a cure for the propensity to evil. As he complains, those who find “moral labor vexing” have conjured up “under the pretext of natural impotence” doctrines through which they can be relieved from the “expectation of self-improvement” (AA 6:51). Thus, what Kant is indicating is that the broader Augustinian tradition, from the more stringent Calvinists and orthodox Lutherans to the gentler Pietists and Moravians, yields to the temptation arising from the first of the three propensities to evil, frailty, i.e., the self-imposed delusion that we are incapable of willing the good.
In light of this diagnosis, Kant concludes that all theological variants of this conception promote a “religion of rogation (of mere cult)” (AA 6:51). Instead of encouraging us to engage in the hard work of moral improvement, they tell us that we need merely “ask” for grace—a plea that “amount[s] in fact to doing nothing” (AA 6:51). In contrast to this ‘lazy’ attitude, moral religion demands that we be responsible for our own moral standing, the authors of our own character.
The problem Kant still faces, however, is that, having given priority to self-interest over morality, the logic of radical evil makes any attempt to reverse the current volitional order seem impossible. For, once the inversion has taken place, self-interest could only perpetuate itself. Hence, even if the moral predisposition has not lost any of its influence on our will, there is still the question of how, once we have given priority to self-interest, could we ever choose to subsequently subordinate our self-interest to morality.
Yet, the Kantian thesis of ‘ought implies can’ tells us that the release from evil must be possible. Furthermore, Kant’s commitment to transcendental freedom entails that our supreme maxim is not chosen once and for all, but must instead be constantly reaffirmed through an ongoing choice, counted at each moment as if it were always “an original exercise” of the will (AA 6:41). No matter how self-reinforcing and self-

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perpetuating the logic of radical evil might be, the demand to undergo a Change of Heart remains unabated.
The question of Sanctifying Grace arises in response to this problem. Kant does not tell us that divine aid is necessary, nor does he tell us that it is not. For even if we must exercise our powers to become a ‘new man’, this does not mean that the moral transformation occurs through our powers alone. Instead, and in keeping with the point of the parerga (which mark the limits of what rational religion can determine), ‘ought implies can’ commits us to the belief that the transformation is possible, but leaves open the question of how the change might happen. All a religion that remains within the boundaries of reason can acknowledge is that “[E]veryone must do as much as it is in his power to do,” and only then “can he hope that what does not lie in his power will be made good by cooperation from above” (AA 6:52).

§3. Genealogy of an Interpretative Impasse

The history of interpretation of Religion has, unfortunately, failed to understand the precise status of this hope. We believe that this is due, in large measure, to Karl Barth’s 1947 Protestant Theology in the Nineteenth Century. In this book, Barth is skeptical about Kant’s grasp of Reformation theology (Barth 1947, p. 285) and believes that his own philosophical biases stood in the way of a proper understanding of the Christian Story (Barth 1947, p. 293). Barth further describes Kant’s philosophical theology as vitiated by an internal contradiction: while Part One of Religion follows an Augustinian account of moral evil, Kant then slides into a “vulgar Pelagian” account of grace (Barth 1947, p. 289). With few changes, this picture still dominates the current state of the debate: interpreters like Philip Quinn, Nicholas Wolterstorff, John Hare and Gordon Michalson have suggested that, despite Kant’s considerable philosophical genius, he was out of his depth in the Religion and failed to manage the complexities of Christian theology. Wolterstorff, for example, describes the Religion as being “riddled with irrationalities,” torn by an “internal contradiction” between an Augustinian conception of Original Sin and a so-called “Stoic maxim,” which holds that “a person’s moral worth is determined entirely by that person himself” (Wolterstorff 1991, p. 48). Similarly, Michalson claims that the Religion’s elaborate “explanatory apparatus” is engendered by conflicting Christian and Enlightenment “habits of mind,” and, far from reconciling the two, Kant instead “cannot
fully understand his own position” (Michalson 1990, p. 9).
Numerous Kant specialists have (perhaps without realizing it) accepted the Barthian interpretation. They find an unstable compromise at the heart of Religion: while the main body of Part One expresses Kant’s Augustinian commitments, after the “General Remark” Kant retreats to the model of moral agency we find in his other writings, according to which “only that can be morally good which can be attributed to us as performed by ourselves” (Barth 1947, p. 284). Hence, instead of coming to Kant’s defense, many influential Kantians have granted the premises of the Barthian critique: Wood, for example, seeks to explain away the Augustinianism of Part One as residual

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“nostalgia towards” pre-modern inquiries into the nature of morality (Wood 2005), and Allison accepts that Kant’s account of evil is “closer to that of the later Augustine” than either “the standard views of the Enlightenment” or the “intuitions of present day philosophers” (Allison 2002, p. 338).
The interpretative consensus is thus that Kant is at war with himself and presents various Christian theses that undermine his core moral principles. The more militant approaches give up all pretense of reconciliation and embrace one extreme or another: some see Kant as a champion of Christian orthodoxy (Firestone/Jacobs 2008), and others see him as refusing to engage any kind of “theological speculation” whatsoever (DiCenso 2012, p. 117). In one way or another, the majority of scholarship grants that there are “conundrums” and “internal contradictions,” allowing the Barthian objections to the Religion to continue to reign.
We propose, however that these views are neither accurate to the text nor needed: the legacy of “conundrums” and “wobbles” owes more to our failing to grasp the basic theology than to Kant’s not “fully understand[ing] his own position.”
This is so, first and foremost, because the majority of contemporary interpreters (from Barth through Quinn, Wolterstorff, Hare, all the way to Firestone/Jacobs) read the Religion through a Calvinist lens. Hence, passages where Kant considers an economy of salvation which diverges from the doctrines of election and the passive reception of grace are either seen as indicative of his own lack of theological competence or, with Firestone/Jacobs, made to fit Calvinist orthodoxies. But this interpretation is both misleading and misguided. As we have seen, the primary focus of Religion is Pietism, which resembled not the theology of Calvinism but much more that of its arch-rival, Arminianism. Like the Arminians, and unlike the Calvinists (and other orthodox Lutherans), Pietists denied total depravity and accepted that we were still able to at least “ask” for grace. Once we recognize this fact, we begin to see that Kant was not out of his theological depth—he was navigating other waters altogether.
Moreover, the Calvinist bias of the Barthian framework is also to blame for the impression of a “conundrum” or “wobble” at the heart of Kant’s position. As explained in the preceding sections, Kant’s aim is to compare rational religion and historical faith in order to determine how much “unity” or “compatibility” there is between them. What seems to be at best meandering, and at worst a litany of “wobbles,” is instead an invitation to identify and assess particular doctrinal tenets in terms of their moral implications. Seen this way, Kant does not stumble through a maze of Christian doctrines, but hovers above them, comparing and evaluating each against the principles of rational religion.
Consider, once again, the widespread claim that Part One reflects an Augustinian conception of evil. If one examines Part One in relation to the particulars of this conception, a very different picture emerges. For, quite in contrast with the Augustinian tradition, Kant maintains that our moral condition is not acquired in time (by Adam’s Primal Sin – AA 6:43), nor is it inherited from parent to child (AA 6:40) but must be “freely chosen” (AA 6:21). Furthermore, evil does not involve a “corruption of the morally

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legislative reason” (AA 6:35), nor does it entail a loss of freedom (AA 6:41). Hence, while the Augustinian advances a privation account of evil, Kant explicitly denies this view: evil is not a matter of corrupt faculties, but of an ethical inversion of the order of incentives, a reversal that bespeaks the presence of an “active and opposing cause” (AA 6:57), a “positive principle” (AA 6:59) within us.
Accordingly, Part One is not “firmly ensconced within the Augustinian tradition” (Quinn 1988, p. 91). Nor is Kant “accommodating” it in any fashion (Wood 1970, p. 246), nor is he building it around tenets “fundamental to Augustine” (Beiser 2006, p. 594), nor resting upon an “Augustinian metaphysic” (Firestone and Jacobs 2008, p. 136). Kant’s account of evil is not at all “closer to that of the later Augustine” than “the standard views of the Enlightenment” (Allison 2002, p. 338). Rather, the “Augustinian echoes” (Mariña 1997, p. 379) of Part One are not “wobbles,” but doctrinal tenets tendered for evaluation which often fail to pass the moral test Kant applies to them.
In short, if we read Religion according to Kant’s own comparative/evaluative intent, the wobbles and failures are revealed for what they are: a byproduct of a misguided interpretative legacy, an external imposition that prevents us from reading the text in its own terms. Kant can be said to have misunderstood Reformation theology—but only if one expects to find pure Calvin in it. Once we abandon this old prejudice, the whole conundrumist apparatus (the dichotomy between Augustinianism and Pelagianism) collapses with it. There is really no “wobbling” between Enlightenment values and Christian orthodoxy, for Kant is not oscillating between two worlds, but engaged in the project of assessing the “unity” or “compatibility” of Christianity and moral/rational religion.

§4. New Voices

The APA symposium was motivated by the will to overcome the unfortunate legacy of the Barthian paradigm. In “Why Is Kant Noncommittal about Grace?”, Robert Gressis questions the fundamental assumption of the conundrumist reading, namely, that there is an outright contradiction between our duty to make ourselves who we are (from the moral point of view) and the need of God’s help in becoming good. This dichotomy presupposes that dependence on another and personal responsibility are contradictory notions—and hence ignores the many instances in which our agency goes hand-in-hand with our receptivity to help. This is the case, for instance, in student/teacher relationships, where responsiveness to the teacher’s guidance does not preclude, but rather bolsters, our agency in learning. Once the appearance of contradiction disappears, Gressis believes, one can appreciate what is truly puzzling in the Kantian account, namely, that Kant neither asserts nor denies the need for divine aid—he leaves the question open, and there are good reasons for that. For, to the extent that settling the issue of grace theoretically is for Kant impossible, any dogmatic position (affirming or denying it) is equally untenable. The question, thus, must be decided on strictly practical grounds.

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At this level, Gressis argues, it makes sense for Kant to be noncommittal about grace, since such position avoids all sorts of vices. While certainty about the availability of divine aid would promote either laziness or arrogance, tempting the recipient to abdicate all responsibility for her moral situation or to fancy herself to be divinely chosen, certainty about its absence would convince her of the futility of any effort, or, if she were to undertake the task of moral regeneration against all odds, generate an inflated sense of her own powers. Although the dangers of passivity, smugness, and self-conceit, Gressis contends, are all connected to the radicalism of evil, Gressis is careful to avoid what he calls the “logical interpretation” of the Gesinnung, according to which it is as impossible for an evil person to act against her self-love as it is for a good person to act immorally. Both extremes contradict our moral experience, and overlook the role that fortuity and exemplary moral action can have in restoring our moral predisposition to its rightful place.
Dennis Vanden Auweele engages in a similar project of redescription of the conundrum problematic. In “Kantian Grace as Ethical Gymnastics,” he sidesteps the Barthian framework and proposes a different genealogy, one that traces the source of the scholarly confusion to a contemporary of Kant, the theologian Gottlob Christian Storr. Storr, in Vanden Auweele story, is the father of a long string of reductionistic readings of Religion, according to which the Kantian project of reconciling faith and reason threatens both what is distinctively religious in Christianity and what is genuinely philosophical in rationalism. This perception underlies much of the 19th century reception of Kant’s philosophy of religion (Schopenhauer and Hegel are cases in point) and prevents us from reading Religion in Kant’ own terms. If we do so, Vanden Auweele argues, we will realize that the “overall project in Religion is twofold, namely to provide a transcendental deduction of the elements of pure rational religion and to test whether or not Christian religion is in tune with these elements” (288). So construed, the relation between faith and reason is not so much one of tension; it is, instead, one of mutual reinforcement and complementarity. The appeals to the “irrational or hyperrational” aspects of Christianity are not a failure, but corollary of an “unavoidable limitation of human reason” (AA 6:115).
Although at times Kant laments this limitation and hopes that human beings will kick away the ladder of historical faith, he also realizes that the allegories and narrative structures of Christianity play an essential role in our moral education. For, in so far as the moral law presents itself in the form of the categorical imperative, pure practical reason presupposes a whole aesthetic dimension that allows it to gain “access to the human mind and [have] influence on its maxims” (AA 5:151). Historical faith, therefore, is instrumental in making “objectively practical reason subjectively practical as well” (ibid.)—it belongs, therefore, to the ‘second part of ethics’, the impure underbelly of morality without which purity would never take a hold. To make his case, Vanden Auweele analyzes the “antinomy of faith” in Religion III, where Kant dissolves the conflict between historical faith and moral religion by reminding us that the son of God is a moral archetype that resides within pure practical reason itself, and hence is “all the same whether I start out from it (as rational faith) or from the principle of good life conduct” (AA 6:119).

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In “Kant’s Robust Theory of Grace,” Jaqueline Mariña presents a different argumentative strategy: instead of redescribing the conundrumist dilemma (as the other panelists do), Mariña redescribes the different meanings of grace in Kant’s Religion. The inconsistencies surrounding the overcoming of the problem of evil disappear, she argues, “once it is recognized that Kant works with three understandings of grace. These are: a) grace and the God within, b) grace and the transformation of the fundamental orientation, and c) grace that can be laid hold of” (303). This redescription is meant to elude many of the problems associated with the standard understanding of grace in the Lutheran tradition (which plague the second of the three meanings she proposes), and direct our attention instead to the possibility of divine aid in the historical arena (c) and the sacred character of the moral law (a). The latter leads Kant to overhaul the Leibnizian distinction between nature and grace, for the divinity of the moral law is no longer seen as an alien force, but is internalized and gives rise to what Mariña calls our “graced nature”, a ‘nature’ that is epitomized by the prototype (Urbild) of moral perfection. This conception, she argues, allows Kant to bypass the problems associated with the ‘Total Depravity’ tradition. Seen this way, grace is not a response the doctrine of radical evil—“the problem of radical evil”, instead, “must itself be understood in terms of an outright refusal to allow the [moral] predisposition and the archetype of the Son of God (the Christ within) to be effective in us” (306). Such an interpretation upends common wisdom: the relation to God is not a consequence of—but rather precedes—our fall into evil.
Similarly, the kind of divine aid that “must be laid hold of” avoids the problems that lead conundrumist writers to attribute to Kant a heteronomous conception of grace. Mariña traces back this type of faith to the “hope that what lies outside [our] power will be supplemented by the supreme wisdom in some way or another” (AA 6:171), for such hope is only available to those who have already undergone a fundamental change of disposition and helps them carry on their moral struggle. This help, Kant tells us, presupposes acceptance from the agent, i.e., “he must incorporate this positive increase of force into his maxim” (AA 6:44) and is hence fully active in receiving it. The complex relation between natural religion and revelation, Mariña argues, is also a case in point: in order for the latter to speed up and increase our awareness of the moral core of religion, human beings must properly receive it, allowing the revelation to “spark the moral imagination” and make the moral demands a “point of focus for […] reflection and engagement” (314). A further example is the founding of the ethical community: even if God is needed, we must act as if everything depended on us if we are to “hope that a higher wisdom will provide the fulfillment of [our] well-intentioned effort” (6:101). Thus, Mariña concludes, even though Kant is skeptical about the second type of grace, for in the process of moral transformation it leads us to abdicate our responsibility for the change, there is enough substance in the two other conceptions of grace to yield a “remarkably positive” (i.e., “robust”) understanding of [divine aid] in Kantian philosophy (304).

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Conclusion

A guiding assumption of this guide has been that the maligned and misunderstood character of Kant’s Religion is not so much a reflection of its forbidding nature, but rather of our own prejudices and limitations in understanding its theological underpinnings. We contemporary philosophers live in a world in which the religious debates that occupied Kant seem alien or quaint, remnants of a pre-modern past. They are not, as William James would put it, live options for us. The goal of our introduction has not been to restore them to life, but to return the reader to the concerns of Kant’s own day and to understand the Religion as a work quite purposefully and consciously written for his own contemporaries, people who lived amidst two clashing worldviews and were in search of a path forward.

Bibliography

Allison, Henry E. 2002. “On the Very Idea of a Propensity to Evil.” Journal of Value Inquiry 36: 337-348.
Barth, Karl. 1947. Die protestantische Theologie im 19. Jahrhundert. Zürich: Theologischer Verlag translated as Protestant Theology in the Nineteenth Century. Eerdmans 2002.
Beiser, Frederick. 2006. "Moral Faith and the Highest Good." In The Cambridge Companion to Kant and Modern Philosophy. Paul Guyer, (ed). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 588-629.
Clem, Stewart. 2018. “Dropping the Debt: a new Conundrum in Kant’s Rational Religion.” Religious Studies, in press.
DiCenso, James. 2012. Kant's Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason: A Commentary. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Firestone, Chris L., and Nathan Jacobs. 2008. In Defense of Kant's Religion. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Frierson, Patrick R. (2010) “Kantian Moral Pessimism.” In S. Anderson-Gold and P. Muchnik (eds.), Kant’s Anatomy of Evil, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 33–56.
Hare, John. E. 1996. The Moral Gap: Kantian Ethics, Human Limits, and God's Assistance. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
——( 2017). “Kant and Theology.” Toronto Journal of Theology 33:1, 69-73.
Mariña, Jacqueline. 1997. "Kant on Grace: A Reply to His Critics." Religious Studies 33:4, 379-400.
Michalson, Gordon E. 1990. Fallen Freedom: Kant on Radical Evil and Moral Regeneration. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Palmquist, Stephen. 2000. Kant’s Critical Religion. London: Ashgate.
——(2010) “Kant’s Ethics of Grace: Perspectival Solutions to the Moral Difficulties with Divine Assistance.” Journal of Religion 90(4): 530–53.

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Pasternack, Lawrence. 2014. Kant on Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason: an Interpretation and Defense. London: Routledge.
Pasternack, Lawrence. 2017. “The ‘Two Experiments’ of Kant’s Religion: Dismantling the Conundrum.” Kantian Review, 22:1, 107-131.
Quinn, Philip L. 1988. "In Adam's Fall, We Sinned All." Philosophical Topics 16:2, 89- 118.
Stump. 2001. “Augustine on Free Will.” The Cambridge Companion to Augustine.
Cambridge University Press, 124-147.
Velkley, Richard. 2014. “Culture and the Limits of Practical Reason.” Kant’s Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason: A Critical Guide. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 233-249.
Wolterstorff, Nicholas. 1991. "Conundrums in Kant's Rational Religion.” Kant's Philosophy of Religion Reconsidered, Rossi, Philip and Wreen, Michael (eds). Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Wood, Allen W. 1970. Kant's Moral Religion. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Wood, Allen W. 2005. “Kant’s History of Ethics.” Studies in the History of Ethics vol. 1.

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Aceptado: 26 de octubre 2017]
Why Is Kant Noncommittal About Grace?

What the human being is or is to become in the moral sense, good or evil, into that he must turn or have turned himself. Either must be an effect of his free power of choice; for otherwise it could not be imputed to him, and consequently he could not morally be either good or evil. When it is said, He is created good, then this can mean nothing more than this: He is created for the good, and the original predisposition in the human being is good. The human being himself is not yet good on that account; rather, according as he does or does not admit into his maxim the incentives contained in that predisposition (this must be left entirely to his free selection), he brings it about that he becomes good or evil. Supposing that, for him to become good or better, a supranatural cooperation were also needed, whether this cooperation were to consist only in the diminution of obstacles or also in positive assistance, the human being must yet make himself worthy beforehand to receive it, and must (which is no trifling matter) accept this aid, i.e., admit this positive increase of power into his maxim; through this alone does it become possible to impute the good to him and to cognize him as a good human being. (Rel, 6:44)1

This paragraph contains two important claims: first, people are responsible for their own overall moral goodness or evil. Second, it’s possible that we need “supranatural cooperation” to become morally good.
At first glance, the two claims seem to be at odds: if it’s true that you must have turned yourself into what you are to become in the moral sense, then how can it also be true that you might need God’s help in becoming good?2
This worry is not particularly troubling. As Lawrence Pasternack has pointed out, there are cases in everyday life where we recognize both that people are responsible for what they become and that they need help.3 Take, for example, students and learning: there are some subjects that a student cannot learn without a teacher instructing her, but even if the student has an excellent teacher, she may need to work very hard and be properly responsive to the teacher’s guidance. In such cases, the teacher may say “I can’t make you learn – at best, I can only put you in the right position for you to take your education into your own hands. Whether you learn or not is up to you.” Kant could say something similar about God’s grace: even if God offers it, it’s up to the individual to take it; if the individual does take it, though, then we can say that the individual made herself good.

1 I use the following abbreviations to refer to Kant’s works:
CF = “The Conflict of the Faculties”, Mary Gregor and Robert Anchor’s translation, in Religion and Rational Theology.
Collins = “Moral philosophy: Collins’s lecture notes”, Peter Heath’s translation, in Lectures on Ethics CPrR = Critique of Practical Reason, Mary Gregor’s translation, in Practical Philosophy
EAT = “The End of All Things”, Allen Woods’s translation, in Religion and Rational Theology. G = Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, Mary Gregor and Jens Timmermann’s translation MM = The Metaphysics of Morals, Mary Gregor’s translation, in Practical Philosophy
Rel = Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason, Werner Pluhar’s translation
2 I equate “supranatural cooperation” with divine aid or God’s grace.
3 Pasternack, unpublished manuscript, pp. 21-22.
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Given that the two claims are not at odds, I want to focus on the second claim, that we may need supranatural cooperation to become good. Kant writes, “Supposing that, for him to become good or better, a supranatural cooperation also be needed.”
What puzzling is that Kant does not assert that divine aid is needed for someone to become good; instead, he leaves it open: possibly, grace is needed for someone to become good, but possibly it’s not. Why does Kant leave this matter open? In other words, why is Kant noncommittal about grace?4
In this paper, I explain why. In brief, Kant’s position is this: theoretical reason cannot know whether God grants grace; that means that we should guide our thinking about grace by practical considerations. However, there can be negative moral consequences both for asserting that God does or that God doesn’t offer grace. Consequently, while we must admit that grace is possible, we should be noncommittal about whether God actually aids anyone.
Before discussing grace, though, one might wonder why Kant thinks that it might be needed at all. After all, there are, in theory, an infinite number of supersensible claims that reason cannot rule out that Kant nonetheless does not think it helpful to posit.
The answer is that Kant thinks we’re obligated to change from evil to good: “the command that we ought to become better human beings […] resounds undiminished in our soul; consequently we must also be capable of this” (Rel, 6:45), but he also seems to think that, prima facie, it’s beyond our capabilities: “how it is possible for a human being who is evil by nature to turn himself into a good human being, this surpasses all our concepts; for how can an evil tree bear good fruit?” (Rel, 6:44-45) Thus, we need to allow for the possibility of grace because it may be the only way to explain how evil people can discharge their obligation to become good.
The structure of this paper is as follows: first, I sketch Kant’s understanding of morally evil and morally good people; second, I explain why Kant thinks that going from good to evil is so difficult that it leads one to conclude that we must allow for grace; third, I articulate Kant’s reasons for being noncommittal about grace.

Evil and Good People

Kant thinks that, fundamentally, what makes someone good or evil is her Gesinnung or, as it has been translated, her “disposition”,5 “attitude”,6 or “conviction”7 (I follow Pasternack’s decision to leave “Gesinnung” untranslated). 8 Just how Kant understands the Gesinnung is a matter of controversy; as I read him, an agent’s Gesinnung

4 Kant talks about different kinds of grace throughout his corpus. The kind of grace I discuss in this paper is aid God grants people in their efforts to go from morally evil to morally good.
5 This is George DiGiovanni’s translation (Kant, 1996, p. 65). 6 This is Werner Pluhar’s translation (Kant, 2009, pp. 13-14). 7 This is Stephen Palmquist’s translation (Palmquist, 2015).‌‌
8 Pasternack, 2014, p. 125.
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is the noumenal ground of her phenomenal character.9 Moreover, Kant often equates a person’s Gesinnung to her “supreme maxim” (see e.g., Rel, 6:31-32, 36, 39, 47). This suggests that, ultimately, the reason why people have the maxims and (at least some of) the reactive attitudes they have is that they have a Gesinnung of a particular sort. And Kant thinks that Gesinnungen are of only two sorts: good and evil. If an agent has a good Gesinnung, then she subordinates the “law of self-love” to the moral law, but if she has an evil Gesinnung, then she “makes the incentive of self-love and its inclinations the condition of compliance with the moral law” (Rel, 6:36).
Now, one way to understand the relationship between an agent’s Gesinnung and the rest of her maxims is as follows: if you have an evil Gesinnung, then this means that you always subordinate morality to self-love when the two conflict, and if you have a good Gesinnung, then you always subordinate self-love to morality when the two conflict. This would mean (1) an evil person would be capable of acting from duty only if doing so didn’t conflict with self-love;10 and (2) a good person would be capable of acting from self-love only if doing so didn’t conflict with duty. (1) would entail the impossibility of an evil person doing something she thought would hinder her self-love, and (2) would entail the impossibility of a good person’s acting immorally. I call this interpretation the “logical interpretation”, for it understands the Gesinnung as a ground that entails each action an agent takes.11
In the present context, the logical interpretation has an advantage and a disadvantage. Its advantage is that it makes sense of why Kant thought that the transformation of an evil person into a good person was incomprehensible. After all, if it’s completely impossible for an evil person to act from duty when it conflicts with self-love, then an evil person could become good only if she thought doing so were in her self- interest. But if that’s why she tried to become good, then she wouldn’t have become good after all, because someone who made morality paramount only because she thought doing so advanced her self-interest would not in fact have made morality paramount. All she would have accomplished is convincing herself that acting morally is the best means of advancing her self-interest. She would always act consistently with duty, but never from duty, so she could not count as a good person.
But this brings us to the disadvantage: the logical interpretation makes the transformation from evil to good incomprehensible because it makes it out-and-out impossible. Not only would the evil person not have the moral psychological resources to

9 Just how Kant understands noumena, phenomena, and their relationship is enormously complicated, and beyond the scope of this paper.
10 Arguably, on this interpretation a person with an evil Gesinnung could never even act from duty, because when he does his duty and thinks that he’s doing something because it’s right, he’s really doing it because it’s right and because it doesn’t set back his self-interest. If that’s the proper description of the evil person’s moral psychology, then at best he can only act impurely: “the impurity of the human heart consists in this: that although in terms of its object (the intended compliance with the law) the maxim is indeed good, and perhaps even powerful enough for performance, it is not purely moral, i.e., it has not, as should be the case, admitted the law alone into itself as sufficient incentive” (Rel, 6:30).
11 I am not sure that anyone has ever endorsed the logical interpretation as a reading of Kant, but some of what Daniel O’Connor (O’Connor, 1985, p. 293) and John Silber (Silber, 1960, cxvi) write comes close.
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become good, he wouldn’t even have the resources to make himself “worthy beforehand to receive” God’s grace.
Fortunately, the logical interpretation is probably wrong, for three reasons.
First, there is strong textual reason to think that a good person can act against duty out of self-love. For instance, Kant writes that a good person can sometimes act against her adopted moral maxims: “the human being who admits this purity into his maxim, although not yet himself holy on that account (for between the maxim and the deed there is still a large gap), is yet on the way of approaching holiness in infinite progress” (Rel, 6:46-47, emphasis mine). The reason a good person can do this is that, even if she has a good disposition, she still has a propensity to evil,12 which makes her frail, i.e., someone who “admit[s] the good (the law) into the maxim of my power of choice” but for whom “this good, which objectively, in the idea […] is an insurmountable incentive, is subjectively […] the weaker (by comparison with inclination) when the maxim ought to be complied with” (Rel, 6:29). Thus, contrary to what the logical interpretation implies, a good person is capable of acting from self-love even if it conflicts with duty.
If a good person can act immorally, then, by parity of reasoning, perhaps an evil person could act from duty, even when doing so competed against his self-interest. After all, recall how Kant defines a good person: a good person is someone who makes “the incentive of self-love and its inclinations the condition of compliance with the moral law”; this suggests that a good person’s supreme maxim is: “whenever duty and self-love conflict, do your duty.” And yet, despite the fact that this is her supreme maxim, she is capable of following self-love. Thus, even if the proper formulation of the evil supreme maxim were, “whenever duty and self-love conflict, pursue self-love”, it might still be possible for an evil person to forgo self-love and act from duty.13
But, and this is the second reason to think that evil people can sometimes act from duty, it’s likely that the proper formulation of the evil supreme maxim is not so all-or- nothing, for elsewhere in the Religion Kant defines an evil human being as someone who is “conscious of the moral law and yet has admitted the (occasional) deviation from it into his maxim” (Rel, 6:32, emphasis mine). This indicates that the evil person’s supreme maxim is not “whenever duty and self-love conflict, pursue self-love”, but rather, “sometimes, when duty and self-love conflict, pursue self-love.” But if that’s the evil person’s supreme maxim, then presumably it would also allow for sometimes following duty when duty and self-love conflict.14

12 Kant writes that the propensity to evil “cannot be extirpated through human powers” (Rel, 6:37).
13 This must mean that, whatever a supreme maxim is, you can have it without it literally entailing certain kinds of actions. Because of this, I understand a supreme maxim to be something that expresses itself phenomenally through your reactive attitudes, deliberative processes, and judgments without it literally causing particular maxim-adoptions or actions. Another way of putting it is: each agent has an outlook on or orientation to morality; she either thinks she should always abide by the real moral law, or she doesn’t. If she doesn’t, then she has an evil Gesinnung; if she does, then she has a good Gesinnung. Going into greater detail would take one beyond the scope of this paper.
14 If I am right that a person’s Gesinnung manifests itself in an outlook that only influences the maxims she adopts and actions she undertakes, then, even if the evil Gesinnung did say to always subordinate morality to
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A third reason for thinking that an evil person can act morally is that each of us has a predisposition to personality that is “the subjective basis” for our ability to “admit this respect into our maxims” (Rel, 6:28). Kant is clear that this predisposition cannot be exterminated (Rel, 6:28) or corrupted (Rel, 6:35). Moreover, Kant writes that, in regards to any immoral action, that a person “should have refrained from the action, whatever the circumstances of time and the connections in which he may have been; for through no cause in the world can he cease to be a freely acting being” (Rel, 6:41). In other words, no matter how evil you are, you are still capable of acting out of respect for the moral law.
I conclude that an evil person can act from duty. Given that, couldn’t an evil person turn into a good person out of respect for the moral law? If so, why does Kant think the transformation from evil to good surpasses all our concepts to the point that we might need to invoke God’s grace to explain it?
The answers to these two questions are: yes, an evil person can turn into a good person out of respect for the moral law; what it takes is fortuity—she needs to find herself in the right kind of situation. That said, though we know that certain kinds of events allow us to do things that seem beyond our powers, we cannot understand how those events pull it off. That’s the sense in which transformation surpasses our concepts. However, the invocation of God’s grace is one model that allows us to make sense of these fortuitous situations.
In the next section, I explore these answers in greater detail.

The Moral Revolution

To understand why fortuity is needed for moral revolution, it helps to know more about evil people. If you are evil, then this means that there is at least some set of non- moral concerns that you think override moral ones, all things considered. Call these concerns “core projects.” When it comes to core projects, not only do you pursue them when they conflict with your duty, but you also think you have more reason, ultima facie, to follow them than you do your duty.
If this is how you think, then it is very difficult to figure out how you could ever decide that you should prioritize morality over core projects, for not only does it advance your interests or flatter your self-conception to pursue core projects, but it also seems to you like the right thing to do, all things considered.
If you’re like this, then when it comes to a conflict between tending to your core projects and doing your duty, you will not only want to pursue your core projects, you will think you should. You may recognize that it is immoral to do so, but think that practical reasons based in your core projects override or outweigh moral ones;15 or you may think

self-love, it would still allow her to act from duty; it’s just that such dutiful actions would always feel imprudent, illicit, or somehow not on the up-and-up. Given that one’s Gesinnung only says to subordinate morality to self-love on some occasions, though, then it’s possible for even an evil person to wholeheartedly act from duty.
15 Bernard Williams thought that Gauguin should have abandoned his family to paint native Tahitians, even though doing so was immoral (Williams, 1981, p. 23). I don’t think that Williams would have described the
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that pursuing your core projects is immoral but, given the kind of person you are, you can’t help but to do the immoral thing;16 or you may think, on some level, that pursuing your core projects is itself the moral thing to do. 17 In each case, it seems psychologically impossible for you to subordinate your core projects to morality.
However, having a predisposition to personality means that you can grasp what morality requires of you, see that its dictates outweigh non-moral ones, and realize that you can carry them out. But to achieve such illumination, you need to be in the right situation; more precisely, you either must find yourself in a situation stark enough to cause you to question your fundamental priorities, or you must observe an inspiring example of moral worth.
Call the first kind of situation a revelatory situation. In a revelatory situation, commitment to your central projects requires a deep breach of morality. This is revelatory because before this situation, you didn’t realize that your central projects could be so misaligned with morality. Once you see that they are, though, your predisposition to personality forces you to reconsider whether you really want to pursue your central projects at such a high moral price,18 and at this point, you can decide to slough them off and commit yourself to the moral law in a revolutionary act.
Call the second kind of situation an inspiring situation. In an inspiring situation, you observe someone doing her duty at great personal cost. When you see that, you not only get a good sense of what morality demands, but you also realize both that people can do what it demands, and that what it asks of us overrides non-moral reasons.19
In the foregoing situations, being in the right place at the right time allows even an evil person to appreciate what he is supposed to do, and motivate him to do it. So a question naturally presents itself: why think that moral revolution surpasses our concepts?

Gauguin case as one where the action was right but immoral; rather, he would have seen it as a case where a non-moral concern overrode a moral one. For Kant, though, thinking in Williams’s way is one kind of way of being evil.
16 See Collins, 27:350. Admittedly, Collins compiled his notes on Kant’s lectures on ethics between 1774 and 1777, so it’s possible that Kant came to reject the possibility of moral despair. However, there is no reason to think he did.
17 In The Metaphysics of Morals Kant writes, “I can indeed be mistaken at times in my objective judgment as to whether something is a duty or not” (MM, 6:401).
18 In the Collins lecture notes Kant allegedly says, “[n]o man will readily be wicked on his own, and more than he will gladly do a duty on his own; he always appeals to others” (Collins, 27:334). He later writes that “[c]onscience […] has a driving force, to summon us against our will before the judgment-seat, in regard to the lawfulness of our actions” (Collins, 27:351). I take these two passages together to suggest the possibility that if an evildoer becomes aware that his action is unusual in its immorality, this realization will summon his conscience up to judge him.
19 In the Groundwork Kant asserts, “[t]here is no one, not even the most hardened scoundrel, if only he is otherwise in the habit of using reason, who – when one presents him with examples of probity of purpose, of steadfastness in following good maxims, of compassion and of general benevolence (involving in addition great sacrifices of advantages and comfort) – does not wish that he too might be so disposed.” (G, 4:454). Similarly, in the second Critique he writes that “before a humble common man in whom I perceive uprightness of character in a higher degree than I am aware of in myself my spirit bows, whether I want it or whether I do not” (CPrR, 5:76-77).
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After all, in both the revelatory and inspiring situations, it seems clear enough how you can undertake a revolution: you see what you are supposed to do, and so you do it.
The problem with that answer, though, is that if you have an evil supreme maxim that says that your central projects override moral concerns, then why would either a revelatory or inspiring situation make you question this? Along similar lines: if you’re committed to the moral law, then why should having to make a great personal sacrifice or seeing others having to make great personal sacrifices move you to question that? In other words: if someone really does think that her central projects override the moral law, then nothing that happens should move her to question this; similarly, if someone really does think that the moral law overrides all non-moral concerns, then nothing that happens should provoke her into questioning this belief either.
But of course, great personal sacrifice does make people question the moral law; indeed, as I noted before, good people can act akratically, or even fall back into evil.20 Similarly, revelatory and inspirational situations do make people question their central projects; by parity of reasoning, evil people can act enkratically. Just how this is possible is unclear. It is in this sense that the fall from light into darkness and the ascent from darkness to light surpass all our concepts: given how we conceive good and evil people, they should never waver; and yet experience suggests they can.21
Why Kant Is Noncommittal about Grace

Here grace could play a role. Kant writes that divine aid, should it happen, would consist “in the diminution of obstacles or also in positive assistance.” In a revelatory situation, the strength of the reasons your central projects give you could weaken, thereby allowing you to see your moral reasons as being stronger, which in turn could allow you to incite a moral revolution; or, in an inspirational situation, the reasons given to you by moral considerations could strengthen, thereby allowing you to overcome your evil supreme maxim in a moral revolution. If God helped us in this way, then going from evil

20 Kant mentions moral recidivism at Rel, 6:77 and 6:94.
21 One might simply wonder, why does Kant not revise his concept of good and evil people to accommodate the explicability of the fact that they can change? The reason Kant does not do this has to do with his commitments about morality: morality is overriding; we know what morality asks of us; we are morally responsible for our wrongdoing; and we have a character of some sort that persists through and helps to explain our actions. If you know what morality asks of you, and you also know that you are supposed to do what it asks, how can we explain why you choose to disobey it? Moreover, how can we explain how you choose to disobey it over time? The best way, Kant thinks, is to posit a commitment to a principle of self-love that you can know is wrong, but that you also do think is right. But this is just Kant’s view, and forces him to take the position he takes.
A parallel in contemporary philosophy is in the work of Peter van Inwagen. Van Inwagen thinks that the arguments for the incompatibility of determinism and free will and for the incompatibility of indeterminism and free will are both compelling, but he is even more confident that we have moral responsibility, and that moral responsibility entails free will. So he concludes that he have free zwill, but also claims that it is mysterious how we can have it (van Inwagen, 2000, pp. 1-2).
Kant himself takes a similar position with regard to self-deceit in The Metaphysics of Morals: “It is easy to show that the human being is actually guilty of many inner lies, but it seems more difficult to explain how they are possible; for a lie requires a second person whom one intends to deceive, whereas to deceive oneself on purpose seems to contain a contradiction” (MM, 6:430).
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to good would no longer surpass our concepts – we would be able to make definite sense of it. Without God, we could say only, “sometimes people just find themselves able to change, despite our not knowing how this is possible”, while with God we could say, “people can find themselves able to change because God allows them to appreciate what they already, on some level, accept.”
This possibility raises a new question: even if it is true that invoking divine aid allows us to make sense of the change from evil to good, why invoke it at all? In other words, why do we need any explanation of how people can change – why not instead say, “people should make themselves good, therefore they can?”
Kant’s discussion of the afterlife in his 1794 essay, “The End of All Things” helps. There, he tries to determine whether we should believe that everyone after death enjoys endless paradise (he calls believers in this view “unitists” (EAT, 8:328)) or whether instead we should think that some people enjoy paradise, but the rest suffer eternal damnation (he calls adherents of this view “dualists” (EAT, 8:329)). He thinks that we cannot decide the matter using theoretical cognition, so he concludes that we must settle it on the basis of practical considerations.22 And practical considerations show the salvific dualist’s system to be superior to the salvific unitist’s, for the assumption that everyone will enjoy paradise “appears to lull us too much into an indifferent sense of security” (EAT, 8:330).
Though Kant sides with the salvific dualist over the salvific unitist, a footnote in the Religion complicates his position.
When discussing people who have led bad lives, are on their deathbeds, and now wonder whether they have any chance of avoiding eternal perdition, Kant writes that there are difficulties with any answer a confessor gives. If you tell them that damnation lasts only a finite time, “then one must worry that many people […] would say, ‘Then I hope I will be able to endure it’” (Rel, 6:69n). But if you tell them that hell is eternal, then you will create a situation in which confessors will feel pressed to tell their subjects that they can transform through the use of “repentant confessions, formulas of faith, and perhaps also vows to lead a new life” (Rel, 6:69n). Kant concludes that both results are bad, and this dilemma is “the unavoidable consequence if the eternity of the future destiny conforming to the way of life one has led here is set forth as dogma, and the human being is not rather instructed to frame a concept of his future moral state from his moral state as it has been hitherto and to infer this future state himself as the naturally foreseeable consequences thereof” (Rel, 6:69n).23
This makes Kant’s view of the afterlife nuanced: on the one hand, he says that practical considerations favor believing salvific dualism over salvific unitism. On the other

22 “Hence the unitist’s system, as much as the dualist’s, considered as dogma, seems to transcend completely the speculative faculty of human reason; and everything brings us back to limiting those ideas of reason absolutely to the conditions of their practical use only.” (EAT, 8:330)
23 In “The Conflict of the Faculties”, Kant defines dogmas as follows: “Dogma is not what we ought to believe (for faith admits of no imperative), but what we find it possible and useful to admit for practical (moral) purposes, although we cannot demonstrate it and so can only believe it” (CF, 7:42). (Note that the Cambridge translation of Conflict contains a misprint; instead of writing “Dogma is not what we ought to believe”, Gregor and Anchor have Kant writing that “Dogma is now what we ought to believe”.)
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hand, he clearly thinks we shouldn’t respond to evil people who are about to die with an answer to their questions about what will become of them. Instead, we should tell them only to look into their own hearts and answer the questions themselves. So, even though practical reason favors one view of the matter, we shouldn’t tell people that it commits us to a particular view, but should instead tell them to figure out what they believe themselves.
Kant’s thinking on the afterlife provides an example where Kant thinks both that practical considerations should settle a religious question about which theoretical reason must be agnostic, and that we should not communicate what practical reason says, even though it has a position. If we apply Kant’s views on the afterlife to his views on grace, we can make sense of why he is noncommittal about grace. First, theoretical reason cannot tell us whether grace is real, but practical reason may have a need for it, so practical reason should address the issue. Second, even if it is true that practical considerations favor the view that God grants us divine aid, we should not assert that practical reason forces our hand, one way or the other.
That said, Kant comes to his somewhat noncommittal view about the afterlife on the grounds that taking a more dogmatic stand has negative consequences. So what negative consequences might there be to taking a strong stand on grace?
To see this, let’s look at what negative consequences there might be to propounding as dogma the idea that we achieve our moral revolutions completely on our own. There are (at least) two.
First, if you have tried and failed many times to become good, you might conclude, despite what practical reason tells you, that you are not up to the task. Kant suggests this possibility in “The Conflict of the Faculties.” There, he mentions that practical reason commands you to become perfectly good, but you might think that, so long as you are still blameworthy for your past life of evil deeds, you cannot become perfectly morally good. And if you think you cannot become perfectly morally good, then you might not even try to incite a moral revolution at all; why bother revolting if you won’t succeed in your aims? Thus Kant writes that the hope that God will justify you is itself “sanctifying, for only by it can man cease to doubt that he can reach his final aim (to become pleasing to God) and so lay hold of the courage and firmness of attitude he needs to lead a life pleasing to God” (CF, 7:44). In other words, the belief that God can help you become perfect may itself be needed in order for you to try to become good in the first place. While that is not direct evidence for the claim that you need to believe God helps you undergo a moral revolution, it supports the idea that moral timorousness is real possibility, so it is indirect evidence for the view that if grace were ruled out, then some might stop trying to be good, out of moral timorousness.
Second, if you try to become good and succeed, and you think that your success was due wholly to your own efforts, then you may become conceited about yourself or judgmental of those who fail. Doing that, though, may cause (or perhaps just constitute) your becoming evil. This might seem strange: if you truly are morally good, then how could you entertain either of those attitudes? Remember, though: Kant is clear both that the

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good person can be frail, and that she can revert to evil (see Rel, 6:77 and 93). Thus, to forestall moral recidivism, we should not claim that God definitely does not help us to become good.
To sum up: we should not claim that grace does not happen, because such an assertion will rob the morally weak of hope, and will convince the morally strong that they are stronger than they in fact are. As Kant puts it in the Collins Lecture Notes, “[o]n the one hand a man must not despair, but believe he has the strength to follow the moral law, even if he fails to comply with it. On the other, however, he can fall into self-conceit, and build far too much on his own powers” (Collins, 27:350).24
Are there any downsides to propounding as dogma that God helps us become good? Again, there seem to be two.
First, if you are convinced that God dispenses divine aid, then this could diminish the effort you put forth in trying to be good. You might not try as hard as you could if you think that God will carry you over the finish line.
Second, thinking that God dispenses divine aid may lead you into thinking that God plays favorites. If you are certain that God has helped you become good, you might conclude that you are one of God’s chosen, which could lead to moral superciliousness.
Kant enunciates the negative consequences of positively asserting grace near the end of Religion:

This idea [i.e., divine aid] is entirely extravagant, and keeping at a reverential distance from it as something sacred is moreover salutary for us, lest, under the delusion of performing miracles ourselves or perceiving miracles within us, we render ourselves unfit for any use of reason, or allow ourselves to be enticed to the inertia of awaiting from above, in a passive idleness, what we should seek within ourselves. (Rel, 6:191)25

24 It is worth noting that the sentence immediately following reads, “Yet this self-conceit can be averted through the purity of the law; for if the law is presented in its full purity, nobody will be such a fool as to think he can fulfill it quite purely by his own efforts” (Collins, 27:350). This suggests that someone who accurately grasps the demands the moral law will think that he needs divine grace, and so it suggests that, at least in the 1770s, Kant thought that practical reason spoke in favor of grace.
25 Kant’s claim that we who believe we have received divine grace will suffer “the delusion of performing miracles ourselves or perceiving miracles within us”, and “render ourselves unfit for any use of reason”, deserves some explanation; why think such people are especially likely to render themselves unfit for any use of reason? I imagine Kant probably reasons as follows: if you think that God does not offer divine grace, this is likely because you are a philosophical theist, or a deist, or a religious skeptic. Each of these types is unlikely to believe of herself that she has knowledge of the supersensible realm (although atheists claim to know more than they can know, they usually don’t claim to have mystical insights). The person who claims to know that God does grant divine aid but who thinks that he can’t receive it is also unlikely to claim to have mystical insights – not because he denies God’s existence, but rather because he believes that God has no interest in him. It is only the person who thinks that God grants divine aid and thinks that God has granted it to him in particular who is likely to think he has special insight into God’s actions – after all, God has chosen him, so there must be something special about him.

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There are moral downsides to committing yourself to either position about the role of divine aid in moral conversion. This is why Kant takes the position he does: it may be that we are capable of becoming good by our own unaided efforts, but it may be that we are capable of becoming good only by grace. Reason has no theoretical grounds to assert either position, and it has practical grounds to keep both positions open. Consequently, we should be noncommittal about grace.

Conclusion

Kant’s position allows us to avert the negative consequences of taking a stand on how conversion works. If someone despairs of becoming good on the grounds that God will not help him and it is too difficult for him to do it on his own, you must point out to him that he knows no such thing, and that if it really is too difficult for him to become good on his own, then God will help him. Similarly, if someone assumes that God will help her, and so doesn’t try as hard as she can, you should tell her she does not know that God will help her, so she must try harder.
On the other side, if someone seems to have become good but starts showing self- conceit or judgmental attitudes about those who have failed to become good, you must point out that for all he knows, he did not become good on his own, and that God helped him cross the divide. Similarly, if someone is good and thinks himself a member of the religious elect, you should respond that he does not in fact know that God helped him at all. Perhaps the effort was all his own.
This, then, is why Kant is noncommittal about grace: it is the way to prevent damaging attitudes from taking hold, and so the way to enable moral conversion to occur and hold fast.

Bibliography

Kant, I. (1996), Practical Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Kant, I. (1996), Religion and Rational Theology, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Kant, I. (1997), Lectures on Ethics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Kant, I. (2009), Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason, Hackett, Indianapolis.
Kant, I. (2011), Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals: A German-English Edition, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
O’Connor, D. (1985), “Good and Evil Disposition”, Kant-Studien, no. 76, pp. 288-302. Palmquist, S. R. (2015), “What Is Kantian Gesinnung? On the Priority of Volition over Metaphysics and Psychology in Kant’s Religion”, Kantian Review, no. 20, pp. 235-64.
Pasternack, L. R. (2014). Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Kant on Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason, Routledge
Pasternack, L. R. (unpublished manuscript), “Hume’s Principle and Kant’s Pure Rational System of Religion: Grace, Providence, and the Highest Good”.

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Silber, J. (1960), “The Ethical Significance of Kant’s Religion”, in Immanuel Kant, Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone, 2nd Edition, Harper and Brothers, New York, pp. lxxi-cxxviv.
van Inwagen, P. (2000), “Free Will Remains a Mystery”, Philosophical Perspectives, no. 14, pp. 1-19.
Williams, B. (1981), “Moral Luck”, in Moral Luck: Philosophical Papers 1973-1980, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

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Kantian Grace as Ethical Gymnastics

La gracia de Kant como gimnasia ética

DENNIS VANDEN AUWEELE 

RU Groningen (Netherlands) and KU Leuven (Belgium)

Abstract
Kant’s concept of grace in Religion within the Bounds of Mere Reason is a difficult topic, exegetically speaking. Obviously enough, Kant subscribes positively to a notion of divine assistance. This appears awkward given his rationalist ethics rooted in personal autonomy. This has given cause to interpreters of Kant’s philosophy of religion – both early commentators and today – to read Kant’s account of grace is uniquely rationalist. This would make grace a rational expectation given personal commitment to good works. The argument of this paper is that grace is a hyperrationalist element in Kant’s practical philosophy because of the potentially problematic consequences of Kant’s views of human nature. Human nature is namely not particularly prone to be responsive to the rational moral law and therefore requires a number of pedagogical tools that facilitate moral agency.

Key words
Grace, Irrationalism, Pedagogy, Pessimism.

Shortly after the publication of Kant’s Religion within the Bounds of Mere Reason in 1793, Gottlob Christian Storr (1746-1805) published his notes in Tübingen on Kant’s work as
- Dennis Vanden Auweele is assistant professor in philosophy of religion at RU Groningen (University of Groningen) and postdoctoral researcher, sponsored by the Research Foundation Flandres (FWO), at KU Leuven (University of Leuven). He received his doctoral degree from KU Leuven in 2014 with a dissertation entitled: ‘Pessimism in Kant and Schopenhauer: On the Horror of Existence’. He has recently published The Kantian Foundation of Schopenhauer’s Pessimism (New York: Routledge, 2017) and edited (with Jonathan Head) Schopenhauer’s Fourfold Root (New York: Routledge, 2016). He is currently writing a monograph on philosophy of religion in the later Schelling and Nietzsche. E-mail for contact: dennis.vandenauweele@kuleuven.be
[Recibido: 14 de octubre 2017
Aceptado: 30 de octubre 2017]

Dennis Vanden Auweele

Annotationes quaedam theologicae ad philosophicam Kantii de religione doctrinam1. Kant planned a reply to Storr but never explicitly delivered on this (6:13). Storr was a conservative theologian that taught at the universities of Tübingen and Stuttgart. He was highly influential at the Tübinger Stift, which was a prominent Evangelical college of residence and study which housed many important thinkers of the 19th century such as Friedrich Hölderlin (1770–1843), Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831), Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling (1775–1854), Ferdinand Christian Baur (1792–1860) and David Friedrich Strauß (1808–1874). It is no overstatement to say that these individuals were among the most influential of the early 19th century, and all of these were, directly or indirectly, educated by Storr with regard to Kant’s philosophy of religion. Storr was an opponent of rationalism and the Enlightenment, which makes it little surprise that he was highly critical of Kant’s views of rational religion. Storr read Kant’s Religion as an attempt to interpret (Christian) religion rationally in order to expose a rational truth at the bottom of Scripture. This way of reading Kant’s Religion will be engaged in this essay, specifically on the subject of Kant’s philosophical view of grace (Gnade). In short, I will argue that Kant comes upon a notion of grace in relationship to his moral philosophy, but that this concept of grace is a response to certain pedagogical difficulties relating to a level of irrationalism in human beings. Consequently, Kant upholds a level of irrationalism in grace in order to respond to a certain irrationalism in human beings. Certain aspects of Kant’s philosophy of religion can then rightly be read as the progenitor of more Romantic views of religion (e.g. later Schelling, Schopenhauer and Schleiermacher).
But this argument equally implies that a reductively rationalist reading of Kant’s philosophy of religion is mistaken because it misses the pedagogical purposes behind rational religion. As any educator will tell you, educating people is about working with some of the more messy aspects of human beings and not really about determinatively overcoming those aspects. This pedagogical function of religion for Kant has been missed because a certain reading, influenced by Storr, which was common in the first half of the 19th century and remains influential today, especially since Allen Wood’s Kant’s Moral Religion (1970)2. Its dominance in the early 19th century can be illustrated by means of a similar reading of Kant’s philosophy of religion in the work of both Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) and his personal arch-nemesis Hegel. Schopenhauer distinguishes between two types of metaphysics, namely philosophy and religion. The former is a rational system of thought that has its justification in itself and can be true literally; the latter is a doctrine based upon a revealed truth that can, at best, be true allegorically. The two of these ought not go over into one another: one should not make a religion rational and neither should

1 References to Kant’s works follow the Akademie Ausgabe. I provide the number of the volume followed by the page. Translations are taken from Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant. For full references, see bibliography.
2 After Wood, questions were raised whether or not Kant’s position in Religion is consistent with regard to critical philosophy as detailed in the three Critiques and even whether Religion is self-consistent. Gordon Michalson famously locates a number of ‘wobbly’ aspects of Kant’s views of religion that are self- contradictory and at times self-defeating (Michalson 1990 and 1999). For a defense of the consistency of Kant’s Religion: Palmquist 2000; Firestone and Jacobs 2008).
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one make philosophy religious. Kant’s rational religion is then a potentially dangerous mixing of philosophy and religion: “So-called philosophy of religion, which, as a kind of Gnostic wisdom, attempts to interpret given religions and to explain what is true sensu allegorico through something that is true sensu proprio” (Schopenhauer 2011, p. 191 [185]). This is dangerous because “the attempt to found a religion on reason displaces it into the other class of metaphysics, into that which has its validation in itself, thus onto foreign soil” (ibid.). One should not lay a new foundation for a house that is already erected. This is the first part of a twofold objection Schopenhauer voices against rational religion. The second part of this objection is that when one nevertheless lays a rational foundation for religion one is at risk of mitigating or even removing those elements of (Christian) doctrine that are the most compelling. Christianity has an appeal just because it is irrational or hyperrational. Specifically, Schopenhauer is considering the doctrines of original sin and justification through grace – which obviously are two fairly enigmatic, perhaps even irrational, elements in Christian religion. This is likely the real reason why Schopenhauer opposes rationalism in religion: “The [rationalists] seek to interpret away [hinauszuexegesieren] everything specifically Christian; thereby they retain something that is not true either sensu proprio or sensu allegorico, but rather a mere platitude, virtually Judaism, or at most shallow pelagianism, and, worst of all, base optimism that is entirely foreign to Christianity proper” (ibid., p. 191 [184]).
The second part of Schopenhauer’s objection closely approximates Hegel’s objection to rational religion. In his Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion of 1827, Hegel is worried that certain processes in natural and historical science, even in philosophy proper, could impede a proper, dialectical approach to religion. This is a twofold process: on the one hand, philosophy only allows religion the content “that the natural light of reason could supply regarding God” and, on the other hand, philosophy interprets religious doctrine with regard to their immanent, rational usefulness (Hegel 2007, p. 156 [66]). Hegel finds especially this latter aspect highly problematic since, through this process, “Christ is dragged down to the level of human affairs, not to the level of the commonplace but still to that of the human, into the sphere of a mode of action of which pagans such as Socrates have also been capable” (ibid., p. 156 [67]). Hegel is particularly worried that the dialectical essence of the Christian notions of revelation and incarnation would be relegated to mere triviality through rationalizing religion – a worry that anticipates Kierkegaard’s Existentialism.
Neither Schopenhauer nor Hegel mention Kant explicitly when they criticize a rationalized version of religion. In both cases, this likely stems from the honest respect they felt was due to the Königsberg philosopher. What should nevertheless be surmised from this is that Kant’s very project of a rational religion was criticized by both Hegel and Schopenhauer for removing the heart and blood out of (Christian) religion. This complaint continues on after Kant and remains the standard objection to Kant’s Religionsphilosophie. While there certainly is a distance between Kant’s rational religion and Christianity, the view that Kant provides a wholly rationalized version of religion is an overstatement in need of nuance. Kant retained the honesty to see the gaps in rationality and a such

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uncovered the need for something of an irrationalism, even though he sought to address this darkness ultimately by means of the architectonics of reason. This is generally true for many central topics in Kant’s philosophy of religion such as radical evil, Christology and Ecclesiology. All of these are at danger of being read as uniquely rationalistic but their function within a broader architectonic system of practical morality notwithstanding, they remain at root responses to an irrational need for something beyond rationality. In providing a response to these deeper layers, Kant recognized that rationality by itself does not suffice for human agents.
The present contribution will explore how this general strategy is developed with regard to Kant’s notion of grace. The general point will be that there is an irrationalist element to Kantian grace because of a threefold consideration: grace is a pedagogical tool that responds to an underlying layer of moral pessimism; in order to fulfill this function, grace must necessarily consist of certain irrational elements; the pedagogical merit of grace is that it regulates and assuages moral pessimism without dismantling the ground of pessimism. As such, Kant’s grace is not totally and reductively rationalist but – not because of any Christian inspiration, as some would say – in certain interesting parts hyperrationalist. If Kant would have provided a purely rationalized concept of grace, he would likely arrive at some sort of a Pelegian concept of grace that connects human effort directly to justification through grace. Through a reading of the three difficulties with respect to the moral ideal in Religion II, I have previously argued that Kant does not totally subscribe to a Pelegian point of view when it comes to grace (Vanden Auweele 2014)3. Presently, the focus will be on the so-called antinomy of faith (6:116-124), which will be interpreted by means of relevant sections of the ‘Doctrine of Method’ in the Critique of Practical Reason and certain of Kant’s historical/anthropological writings.

The Project of Rational Religion

Kant’s overall project in Religion is twofold, namely to provide a transcendental deduction of the elements of pure rational religion and to test whether or not Christian religion is in tune with these elements. Traditionally, this twofold project was illustrated by drawing a distinction between ‘two experiments’ in Kant’s Religion, a reading guide which Kant clarifies in the second preface (added in 1794 in order to clarify the purpose of his work). The first experiment must necessarily “abstract from all experience” (6:12) and reflect on how “morality thus inevitably leads to religion” (6:6). The second experiment then takes

3 Here, I argued that scholars have generally suggested that Kant either gave a Humanist reinterpretation of Christianity or that Kant was really a closeted atheist. More recently, a new wave of so-called affirmative Kantians aimed to show that there is no fundamental split between Kant’s views of religion and Christianity (e.g. Stephen Palmquist, Chris Firestone, Nathan Jacobs). My view is that while Kant might have been influenced by a Lutheran-Pietist view of Christian religion, his views on religion in Religion do not interpret Christianity in any way. Instead, Kant aims to provide a transcendental ground for religion (which is then ‘rational religion’) which can be clothed in historical garments (which is then ‘historical religion’) in order to countenance the possible despair that can ensue from the ready recognition of the fallibility of human capacities and the strenuous demands of the moral law.
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this one step further and proceeds by holding “fragments of [some alleged] revelation, as a historical system, up to moral concepts, and see whether it does not lead back to the same pure rational system of religion” (6:12).
Whether or not Kant actually intended two experiments has recently received some controversy. Lawrence Pasternack offered a new perspective on this by pointing out that Kant never explicitly intended such a twofold experiment. His mentioning of a ‘second experiment’ (Versuch) merely signals that he will make a second attempt (Versuch translates naturally as attempt) at testing whether Christian religion is rational (Pasternack 2017). Most of the time when Kant mentions Versuch, Kant is merely alluding to ‘attempts’, but, at some times, it gets a more technical meaning closely associated with ‘experiment’. For instance: “Now yet another experiment [Versuch] remains open to us: namely, whether pure reason is also to be found in practical use […]” (A804/B832). At any rate, while one could quibble endlessly about the proper translation and terminology, this point does not touch the hermeneutical strategy in Religion which clearly has the twofold project of delineating rational religion and testing whether Christianity is a rational religion.
Without clearly distinguishing between this twofold project, a number of misunderstandings might arise. In their discussion of the second preface, for instance, two seminal studies of Religion miss the difference between Kant’s two projects: Jean-Louis Bruch discusses only Kant’s insistence that one should not be familiar with his ethical writings and Josef Bohatec focuses solely on Kant’s suggested unity between Christianity and rational religion (Bruch 1968, pp. 21-22; Bohatec 1966, pp. 34-35). More recently, some commentators believe that Kant’s chief concern in Religion is to translate Christian concepts into concepts that may be beneficial for morality and Kant has, therefore, little to no interest in traditional and historical Christianity (Ward 1972, pp. 150-170; Reardon 1988; Hare 1996). Alternatively, some scholars read Kant as providing a revisionary reading of Christian religion: Giovanni Sala argues that Kant’s religion is “a critical revision of one positive, historical religion: Christianity” (Sala 2000, p. 9 – my translation) and Stephen Crites believes that Religion’s “four parts offer strictly moral interpretations of original sin, Christology, the coming Kingdom of God […], and a doctrine of the church” (Crites 2012, p. 550). Stephen Palmquist, Gordon Michalson and Lawrence Pasternack (at one time) offer, however, interesting discussions of both experiments and show what exactly the effect is of that classical Kant scholarship missed this twofold project (Palmquist 2000, pp. 128-135; Michalson 1979, pp. 56-57; Pasternack 2014, pp. 6- 9). While originally it was thought that Kant achieved the first experiment in his writings on ethics in the 1780s, the consensus now seems to be that the experiments appear throughout Religion – even though there is some discussion where exactly. In my view, if Kant wants to be successful in showing that Christianity is a rational religion, he first has to establish the a priori necessary essence of a rational religion. This is what Kant calls the ‘inner circle’ of religion, namely the bare essence of religion as such. Only after having done so, Kant can indeed investigate whether or not Christianity as a historical aligns well with the pure essence of religion.

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This twofold purpose of Religion provides a vital reading guide into Kant’s purposes throughout this book. His aim is not to interpret Christianity (or any other faith) but to deduce the rational necessity of religion transcendentally and only after having established such a universal, merely formal essence of religion, he will explore whether Christianity in fact accords to pure rational religion. In a manner of speaking, after conceptualizing the naked (blos) body of religion, he investigates whether the historical garments of Christianity best flatter its essential, inner essence. While Kant clearly believes that there is essential unity between rational religion and Christianity, he does warn that certain historical evolutions in Christianity have not been true to its essential message. This means that Christianity is essentially a rational religion, but that certain interpretations of Christianity have broken away from this essence. Kant’s aim is then to propose certain reforms in historical Christianity that would purify Christianity of any elements that conflict with the essence of rational religion. Religion I is concerned mainly with the appropriate view of human nature and its natural disposition towards the moral law. Here, Kant argues that humanity is predisposed originally to be good in terms of giving priority to the moral law over its inclinations towards self-love, but humanity has inexplicably fallen from this original goodness and now has incurred a propensity towards evil. In Religion II, Kant is concerned with the individual’s way of recovering from this evil nature. An individual can do so by adopting the good Gesinnung, namely the strong decision, conviction or disposition to persevere in progressing towards moral goodness. A Christian can be strengthened in doing so by the moral example of the Son of God, which “enables him to believe and self-assuredly trust that he, under similar temptations and afflictions (so far as these are made the touchstone of that idea), would steadfastly cling to the prototype of humanity and follow this prototype’s example in loyal emulation” (6:62). Religion III is then concerned with how a society as a whole can progress morally. Here, Kant clearly believes that a merely political community cannot promote moral progress because such a community, on the one hand, aims at promoting legality, not morality and, on the other hand, does not have a legislator that can scrutinize the human heart. Instead, an ethical community, or a church, is best equipped to promote moral progress in humanity.
As illustrated above, there are two aspects to any authentic religion, namely its rational essence and its historical form. For Kant, it is a lamentable but “unavoidable limitation of human reason” that a “historical faith attaches itself to pure religion” (6:115). Human beings do not live merely in the abstract but they formulate, in accordance with certain historically-contingent beliefs and superstitions, certain concrete aspects of being religious. This means that certain not-necessarily-rational elements naturally latch unto to religion as such. To illustrate, a rational religion promotes the idea of a moral ideal, which is a ‘son of God’ that sets a moral example to follow. While Kant never mentions Jesus Christ by name, the Christian Messiah is a good example of the rational ideal of moral perfection. The possible reason why Kant foregoes from naming Jesus Christ likely is related to his general objective to undo religion of its unnecessary elements. Whether or

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not this ‘son of God’ has any specific characteristics such as a name, a place of birth, a heritage, certain bodily features or has any of the specifics of any life, is ultimately of very little concern. In a letter to Jacobi at one point, Kant clarifies that what is most important in the idea of a ‘son of God’ is the universal, ahistorical idea of Christ, while the Evangelical or historical account – or even the historical origin of that idea – is a side-issue (Nebensache) of little relevance (11:76). Indeed, the specifics of the moral example only serve to distract or even impede its moral function for Kant. For instance, the adulation of Jesus Christ could lead towards the idea that Christ is operative in the human agent’s salvation, thereby downplaying the extend of humanity’s autonomous moral duty4.
This is why Kant suggests a twofold strategy of dealing with the historical garments of religion: on the one hand, (Christian) faith is to be reformed so that the historical aspects are in tune with rational religion and, on the other hand, (Christian) faith is to progress on the path of becoming “pure religious faith until finally we can dispense of that vehicle” (6:115). This means that Christianity is to be aligned with rational religion for the time that the historical garments remain a necessary commodity for believers who need historical mediation for rational religion. It is doubtful whether Kant actually believed that such a state could in fact be reached. At one point, Kant expresses the hope that

historical faith, which, as ecclesiastical, needs a holy book to guide human beings but, precisely for this reason, hinders the church’s unity and universality, will itself cease and pass over into a pure religious faith which illumines whole world equally; and we should diligently work for it even now, through the continuous development of the pure religion of reason out of its present still indispensable shell (6:135n).

Kant added to this, in the second edition of Religion, that his hope is that historical faith “can cease” and not that it “will cease” (Ibid.). As such, he clearly believes that human nature might be too fragile ever completely to dispense of historical faith, but that historical faith itself should be of such a nature that it naturally relegates itself to the pure religion of reason.
This general strategy might incline a reading of Kant’s philosophy of religion wherein any elements of historical faith that are not purely rational are to be dismissed. This does not seem to be the case, however. The idea that historical religion has to be aligned with the rational essence of religion, does not imply that such a historical religion has to be entirely rational. In fact, certain functions of rational religion require a reference to something irrational, and certain irrationalist elements of religion cannot be abandoned. This topic is most explicitly addressed when Kant discusses topics that border on pure rational religion, but do not entirely belong to the inner circle of religion. In other words, these are elements of historical religion that are necessary elements of rational religion. These are indeed rather awkward and are prone to give rise to charges of inconsistency in Kant’s Religion. What is to be made of religion’s irrational aspects that necessarily belong to rational religion? The ambivalence of this topic explains Kant’s own hesitations when

4 For further discussion of this topic: Pasternack 2012, pp. 30-52; Palmquist 2012, pp. 421-437.
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discussing the parerga to rational faith, namely effects of grace, miracles, mysteries and means of grace. Kant’s introduction of these is telling:
These are, as it were, parerga to religion within the boundaries of pure [reinen] reason; they do not belong within it yet border on it [stoßen doch an sie an]. Reason, conscious of its impotence [Unvermögens] to satisfy its moral needs, extends itself to extravagant ideas [überschwenglichen Ideen] which might make up for this lack, though it is not suited to this enlarged domain. Reason does not contest the possibility or actuality of the objects of these ideas; it just cannot incorporate them into its maxims of thought and action (6:52).

Two of the terms in this quote are of particular importance, namely ‘impotence’ and ‘extravagant ideas’. The original German terms have been provided because translation is key. Especially the adjective in the latter term is subject to controversy. It is variously translated as ‘extravagant’ (Di Giovanni), ‘high-flown’ (Greene and Hudson) or ‘boundless’ (Palmquist). The connotation in the German original suggests that the ideas are excessive and therefore unnerving at the same time. While one would expect this to carry a negative connotation in Kant’s rational religion, these ‘extravagant’ ideas are introduced by Kant as necessary bordering concepts of rational religion that do not wholly belong to the inner sphere of religion, but without which rational religion cannot function. This already signals that there is a necessary addendum to rational religion which leads to some more high-flown, extravagant or boundless ideas. Grace is one of these.

Moral Service and Grace

The specifics of a rational religion of reason ought to be specified further in order to better understand the irrationalist elements in a proper understanding of grace. While one could make this argument from the difficulties relating to Kant’s Christology in Religion II, we will focus on the ‘antinomy of faith’ in Religion III. Kant sets the stage by making a distinction between a ‘saving faith’ (seligmachende Glaube) and a ‘slavish faith’ (gottesdienstliche Glaube). The former is based upon morality, the latter is based on cultic service to God (6:115-116). This means that the former aims to instill a disposition of dutiful morality while the latter promotes the idea that one can be saved through certain amoral (or even immoral!) services to a deity:

The one faith fancies to please God through actions (of cultus) which (though laborious) yet possess no moral worth in themselves, hence are actions extracted only though fear or hope, the kind which also an evil human being can perform, whereas for that the other faith presupposes as necessary a morally good disposition (6:115-116).

Any reader familiar with Kant’s writings on morality would naturally assume that a ‘saving faith’ is occupied solely with good life conduct. According to Groundwork and the second Critique, a moral agent acts out of respect (Achtung) for a self-prescribed, autonomous moral duty. While these duties derive from the self-legislation of noumenal

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rationality, the human agent is allowed to perceive “all moral duties as divine commands” in order to add to the psychological appeal of these duties (5:129; 6:230). But Kant’s point in Religion goes beyond his point in second Critique (and third Critique), namely in pointing out how a saving faith necessarily has another component next to autonomy, namely grace. A saving faith promotes, on the one hand, good life conduct in order to be well-pleasing to God and, on the other hand, a faith in satisfaction or justification insofar as one exhausts one’s capacities. The two belong together necessarily, which means that a saving faith cannot dispense of either autonomy or grace.
This sudden and somewhat unexpected point appears paradoxical and Kant does not lack the honesty to recognize that this is a “remarkable antinomy of human reason” (6:116). This antinomy wonders whether or not historical faith is “an essential portion of saving faith” (Ibid.). While at first seemingly unrelated to the question of the relationship between grace and autonomy, this antinomy goes to the heart of a troubling paradox in Kantian philosophy. The paradox reads as follows. On the one hand, Kant allies to a strong interpretation of human depravity. When Kant describes his moral anthropology and the reach of human depravity in Religion I, he seems more of the mindset of Luther than Erasmus in their famous debate on the freedom of the will5. Depravity does not touch the autonomy of the human power of choice, but it does deprive human beings of a natural incentive towards the moral law. Luther would say that the human being is nothing but Flesh, while Erasmus argued that human nature remains in some ways redolent of original goodness. This means that morality is superimposed upon human nature and does not emerge from human nature. In Kantian language, there is no sensible hospitality to the moral law: “There is no antecedent feeling in the subject that would be attuned to morality: that is impossible, since all feeling is sensible whereas the incentive of the moral disposition must be free from any sensible condition” (5:75). The moral law and our incentive to respond to that law (respect) is superimposed through noumenal rationality and is not born from human nature. This way of thinking about the relationship between human nature and the moral law does, in turn, explain why morality remains always a duty, rather than an inclination. Through lacking a natural incentive towards morality, the interest in morality is generated in the confrontation with the moral law. Luther would similarly point out that human beings are only informed and interested in God and morality through revelation, not through their nature.
This radical interpretation of human, natural depravity is one side of the coin. On the other hand, Kant emphasizes that moral duties are duties of autonomy for which any individual is uniquely responsible. Human beings are the first and only protagonists in their justification and salvation. As such, Kant seems to be leaning in the direction of a Pelagian concept of soteriology wherein good works by themselves suffice for justification. Fleshing out the purpose of grace in this soteriology is key to understanding properly Kant’s rational religion.

5 For an extensive discussion of this claim: Vanden Auweele 2013, pp. 117-134.
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The tension between both sides of the coin was signaled powerfully by Gordon Michalson, who notes how Kant’s account of depravity “appears to force him in an Augustinian direction, while his conception of grace or divine aid reintroduces an obviously Pelagian element based on human effort and merit. The resulting position […] is not so much incoherent as it is unstable” (Michalson 1990, p. 97). While Michalson’s observation is astute, there is a more charitable reading possible of the interplay between grace and good works in Kant’s philosophy. This reading suggests that one must necessarily model Kant’s language of grace within the strictures of his pessimistic view of human nature. Many commentators fall in either of the following pitfalls. Either one stresses the decisive role of moral works and then relegates Kant to a Pelagian6 or one stresses the profound challenge radical evil poses to Kant’s ethics and one is consequently is forced to read his account as more or less Christian, i.e. not (entirely) based on merit7.
Kant addresses this tension explicitly in the remarkable antinomy of reason – sometimes called the ‘antinomy of faith’ – in Religion III (6:116-123). An antinomy is a conflict of reason with itself because of two propositions that appear equally plausible but mutually exclude one another. On the one hand, Kant argues that “the pure moral faith must take precedence over the ecclesiastical” (6:117). This means that the necessary condition under which ecclesiastical faith might take positive effect is good life conduct. Kant’s argument for this position is a contrario, namely that no rational human being could consent to the view that he merely has “to believe the news of a satisfaction having been rendered to him, and (as the jurists say) accept it utiliter, in order to regard his guilt as done away with” (6:116). To Kant, it appears genuinely absurd that a human being that has not made moral progress by himself could believe that good life conduct would be “the unavoidable consequence of his faith and his acceptance of the proffered belief” (6:117). To put it bluntly, this would be a grace without merit. On the other hand, Kant argues that “faith in a merit which is not [the believer’s] own, but through which he is reconciled with God, would therefore have to precede any striving for good works” (6:117). This is so because insofar as man is conscious of the fact of his bondage to the evil principle (the Hang zum Böse), he is without “capacity in him sufficient to improve things in the future” (6:117). If a human being would have any hope of being justified before God and for the first time capable of good life conduct, then something must happen that is necessarily outside of the capacity of the depraved human being.
This is the antinomy of faith: does good life conduct necessarily precede faith or does faith necessarily precede good life conduct? With the exception of the mathematical antinomy in the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant’s default solution when faced with an antinomy consists in validating both sides of the equation from different points of view. These points of view are the phenomenal and noumenal perspective. The ultimate

6 Numerous authors have made this claim in some way, including Barth 1969, p. 187; Wood 1970, p. 197n. Bohatec 1966, p. 337; Michalson 1990, p. 76. Others have emphasized that Kant’s soteriology is a ‘light’ version of Pelegianism: Byrne 2007, pp. 139–52; Bruch 1968, p. 105n.
7 This point is made, in very different ways, by these authors: Pasternack 2012; Palmquist 2010; Firestone and Jacobs 2008; Mariña 1997; Hare 1996.
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argument is then that good life conduct and faith basically boil down to the same thing. The effect of faith in the Son of God is good life conduct:

The living faith in the [archetype] of a humanity well-pleasing to God (the Son of God) refers, in itself, to a moral idea of reason, insofar as the latter serves for us not only as a guideline but as incentive as well; it is, therefore, all the same whether I start out form it (as rational faith) or from the principle of good life conduct (6:119).

Insofar as the archetype of moral perfection appears in empirical form, what Kant calls the ‘God-man’ but most Christians naturally think of Jesus Christ, there can be somewhat of a distance between faith in the example (Vorbild) of the archetype (Urbild). This is due to a tendency in human beings to elevate the clothing of religion over its rational message. Therefore, human beings come up with various amoral ways of paying homage to the God- man by which they become so-called true followers. Indeed, Kant recognizes that “it is arduous to be a good servant (here one always hears only talk of duties); hence the human being would rather be a favorite” (6:200). In turn, this also explains Kant’s sincere hesitations with regard to historical faith since this is the ground and cause of significant moral waywardness. Therefore, Kant expresses the hope that in the end religion “will gradually be freed of all empirical grounds of determination” (6:121). Authentic religion, however, emphasizes good life conduct as the only means of becoming pleasing to God. On this, Kant is categorical:

There is no other means (nor can there be any) by which to become worthy of heavenly assistance, except the earnest endeavor to improve his moral nature in all possible ways, thereby making himself capable of receiving a nature fully fit – as is not in his power – for divine approval, since the expected divine assistance itself has only his morality for its aim (6:192).

As such, for a rational religion the idea of the God-man (the example of a ‘Son of God’), simply serves to reinforce moral motivation. This means that faith in grace is ultimately equal to a tool that empowers moral courage, nothing more.

Grace and Moral Pedagogy

In order to unpack and clarify Kant’s very dense argument with regard to faith in grace in Religion III, it is vital to address the overarching purpose of his philosophy of religion. Up to this point, Kant has recognized that (1) morality necessarily extends towards a pure rational religion, (2) human beings require rational religion to be clothed into a historical faith, (3) authentic historical faith in attuned to pure rational religion, (4) the cause of moral waywardness can often be attributed to elevating historical faith over rational religion and (5) faith in the Son of God is a companion to good life conduct.
From the above, it should be clear – especially from point (2) and (5) – that rational religion necessarily extends to certain not purely rational notions, mostly because of

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human finitude. This means that it is concern for some of the unique characteristics of human beings that forces Kant to supplement pure practical morality with, what Robert Louden calls, an ‘impure ethics’ (Louden 2000). These are then concerns for, broadly speaking, human education – or, as it would be called in the 19th century, Bildung (cultivation). The primary figures of inspiration of this new view of education (closely associated with Romanticism) were Kant and Rousseau. Through some of their innovations, children were no longer perceived as ‘savages in need of culture’ (against which Rousseau could be taken to argue) or ‘blank slates’ (against which Kant could be taken to argue). Instead, educational institutions progressively realized that students had a remarkable level of autonomy that ought to be nourished appropriately. The task of education was not to use the same standard for every individual but to cultivate their inner potential. Indeed, while the traditional way of thinking about education as Erziehung implicated the student only as the receptacle of instruction, the new idea of Bildung could only be achieved through the participation of the student. While Herder, Schiller and Goethe were among the major figures who propagated this new ideal approach to education, the figure most readily associated with this new innovation is Wilhelm von Humboldt (even though Humboldt’s writings on education were only published some time after his death). Gradually, education was less concerned with imparting knowledge as such, but rather with edifying and cultivating character.
This new approach to education that will become increasingly influential throughout the 19th century was foreshadowed by some of Kant’s insights into education. In the ‘Doctrine of Method of Pure Practical Reason’ of the second Critique, Kant addresses an issue he had without success addressed in Groundwork III, namely “the way in which one can provide the laws of pure practical reason with access to the human mind and influence on its maxims, that is, the way in which one can make objectively practical reason subjectively practical as well” (5:151). By this issue, Kant does not mean to take back any of his rigor in arguing for rational respect as the only genuinely moral incentive. Instead, Kant ponders how “pure virtue can have more power over the human mind […] than all the deceptive allurements of enjoyment” (5:151). Human beings are imperfect and embodied rational agents that require assistance in building up to pure morality. Kant even goes so far as to suggest that “a mind that is still uncultivated or one that is degraded onto the track of the morally good” might need “some preparatory guidance” (5:152). This initial guidance can even consist of immoral practices – such as the treat of harm as motivators for proper legal agency – as long as these practices lead human beings to a legally proper course of action. When human beings are accustomed, however, to the legal proper course of action, then the pure moral incentive must be brought forward. As such, Kant recognizes that the human agent that is averse to pure morality will never be convinced by an appeal to rationality alone. These amoral and immoral practices that would promote legality can enlighten human beings about their own dignity, and so provide the resources to “tear himself away from all sensible attachments so far as they want to rule over him and to find a rich compensation for the sacrifice he makes in the

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independence of his rational nature and the greatness of soul to which he sees that he is called” (5:152). In an Aristotelian spirit, Kant would even recommend habituation to moral virtue (5:154).
This point of view is confirmed by the Lectures on Pedagogy (9:486-499), but Kant draws up a slightly more nuanced view of moral education in the ‘Doctrine of the Methods of Ethics’ in the Metaphysics of Morals. Here, Kant distinguishes between a moral catechism and a moral ascetics/gymnatiscs. The former is a Socratic conversation wherein the educator awakens the student to the proper propositions and content of practical reason; the latter is the whole of practices, symbols and ideas that aim to promote a mindset wherein one is capable of “combatting natural impulses sufficiently to be able to master them when a situation comes up in which they threaten morality; hence it makes one valiant and cheerful in the consciousness of one’s restored freedom” (6:487). In slightly less Kantian terminology, one aspect of moral education aims at instilling moral courage wherein one is trained to remain upright when faced with adversity.
Kant signals clearly that his concern with rational religion and especially the concept of grace is one of education, specifically moral gymnastics. Nearing the close of Religion I, Kant has built up to a remarkable tension between human capacities and the extent of human duties. Slightly bombastically, Kant suggest that how “a naturally evil human being should make himself into a good human being surpasses every concept of ours. For how can an evil tree bear good fruit?” (6:44-45). Since the propensity to evil reaches into the roots (radix) of human volition, one cannot expect this tree to bear good fruits. Therefore, Kant notes that a certain germ of goodness must remain in the human being that would lead him to moral betterment, which is the predisposition to goodness. But this moral betterment cannot happen through gradual improvement! Instead, this must be a “revolution in the disposition of the human being” (6:47). Elsewhere, Kant similarly emphasizes that “the end of religious instruction must be to make us other human beings and not merely better human beings” (7:54). Whether or not this revolution has taken place necessarily remains inscrutable since we lack introspection 8. Therefore, human beings must be jolted into exhausting their own capacities in order to reform their propensity to evil.
At this critical juncture of Kant’s argument, Kant divulges that the essence of rational religion and the concept of grace is moral education (Bildung): “From this it follows that a human being’s moral education [Bildung] must begin, not with an improvement of mores, but with the transformation of his attitude of mind and the

8 E.g.: “The depths of the human heart are unfathomable [unergründlich]. Who knows himself well enough to say, when he feels the incentive to fulfill his duty, whether it proceeds entirely from the representation of the law or whether there are not many other sensible impulses contributing to it that look to one’s advantage (or to avoiding what is detrimental) and that, in other circumstances, could just as well serve vice?“ (6:447) or in Religion as: “Assurance of this [making moral progress] cannot of course be attained by the human being naturally, neither via immediate consciousness nor via the evidence of the life he has hitherto led, for the depths of his own heart (the subjective first ground of his maxims) are to him inscrutable” (6:51); “Indeed, even a human being’s inner experience of himself does not allow him so to fathom the depths of his heart as to be able to attain, through self-observation, an entirely reliable cognition of the basis of the maxims which he professes, and of their purity and stability“ (6:63).
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establishment of a character” (6:48; see also 8:116). This means that moral education does not attack individual vices, but provides a character that remains upright in the face of temptation, not by ousting temptation, but rather by cultivating a character that is valiant in the face of temptation. In a nutshell, this is what has been described above a moral gymnastics, which is a process that necessarily extends to impure, irrational (sometimes even immoral) practices in order to appropriately facilitate moral courage.
The downside of this argument is that these practices – some religious, some secular – are not embraced for their truthfulness, rather for their beneficial effect. As Allen Wood has shown, Kantian moral faith is a lot like Pascal’s wager since it does not “try to show that Christianity is true, but that Christian belief would be advantageous to have” (Wood 1970, pp. 160-161). Pascal, however, recognized the limits of such a prudential embrace of Christian faith. In fact, Pascal knew that prudential considerations do not sway the unbeliever’s heart. When one has recognized the intellectual merit of Christian faith, one must debase (abêtir) oneself through ritual practice in order to render the mind porous to Christian faith. As did the Jesuits of Pascal’s day believe, the practice of ritual repetition can incite one to forget the prudential reason for turning to Christian faith and make one a true believer. Kant does not assign such redemptive qualities to ritual repetition. Instead, Kant merely points out the benefits of an embrace of Christian religion without providing any overriding reasons to convince the unbeliever – with the possible exception that atheism might remove certain incentives to progress morally (5:453).
A related downside to Kant’s argument is that religious notions and practices, such as grace but others can be included as well, lose their uniqueness and become replaceable9. This means that there might be other, non-religious practices that can equally serve the purpose of encouraging moral courage, through which religion would become a replaceable assistant to morality. Two examples can be helpful. First, Kant points out in a number of places that a proper civil constitution can induce moral behavior: “The good moral education (Bildung) is to be expected from a good state constitution” (ZeF 8:366). While a good constitution cannot provide the motivation for moral agency (which can only be rational respect), such a constitution can assist in making moral behavior easier. A civil society in which all sorts of vices are permitted or even encouraged would indeed make morality far more difficult. Second, the beautiful in art can be a symbol for morality (5:351-354). Moral goodness and beauty are similar since, like the moral law, the beautiful legislates for itself: the beautiful is what announces itself spontaneously, rather than conforming to a prior concept of the beautiful. Through exposure to the beautiful, the moral fiber of human beings can be strengthened. Indeed, when one inhabits a world that is beautiful, that beauty can make one more like to act morally. In criminological theory, this is confirmed by the so-called ‘Broken windows-theory’, which suggests that criminal and antisocial behavior is reinforced by an urban situation full of disorder and vandalism10.

9 This was one of the main reasons why theologians objected to Kant’s philosophy of religion in the 19th century. For an overview: : Zachhuber 2013.
10 The theory is based upon the following article: Wilson and Kelling 1982.
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This theory was put to the test in, among others, New York in the late 80s and proved effective: crime declined after a serious investment in public works fixed broken windows, removed graffiti, etc. Kant’s aesthetics suggests something similar: legal and moral behavior is facilitated by the experience of the beautiful.11 These points show that an authentically moral religion, a proper civil constitution and a beautiful environment are not strictly speaking moral, but can facilitate moral behavior.

Conclusion

Kant’s philosophy of religion tries to deal with the mess that is humanity. Human beings are naturally ill-disposed towards morality, which makes its necessary that they receive some sort of pedagogical, preparatory guidance in becoming moral agents. The ready recognition of the fallibility of moral pursuits – not in the least because of the demanding nature of the moral law – can incline moral despair. In order to counteract such moral despair, Kant recognized that human beings require certain practices that can appeal and cultivate moral courage in the face of potential despair. Kantian hope counteracts despair.
This means that religion has its ground in something that is not purely rational. In fact, religion emerges in response to those elements in humanity that would object to rationality. There is an extralogical component to human beings, conceptualized by Kant in his Hang zum Böse, that necessitates the appeal to something beyond rationality. While this is not the place to make such sweeping claims, such a reading of Kant’s philosophy of religion could clarify how certain aspects of Romantic philosophy have decisive Kantian pedigree. For instance, Schopenhauer’s pessimism might then be an enlarging mirror for Kant’s great discovery that human being intimately rebel against rationality.12

Bibliography

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Bohatec, J. (1966), Religionsphilosophie Kants in der ‘Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der blossen Vernunft‘, Georg Olms Verlagsbuchhandlung, Hildesheim.
Bruch, J. (1968), La philosophie religieuse de Kant, Éditions Montaigne, Aubier. Byrne, P. (2007), Kant on God, Ashgate, Aldershot.
Clewis, R. (2009), The Kantian Sublime and the Revelation of Freedom, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
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Firestone, C. and Nathan Jacobs (2008), In Defense of Kant’s Religion, Indiana University Press, Indianapolis.

11 For more on the relationship of the aesthetic sublime to the moral good: Clewis 2009, pp. 126-135.
12 I have discussed this point extensively in Vanden Auweele, 2017.
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Hare, J. (1996), The Moral Gap: Kantian Ethics, Human Limits, and Divine Assistance, Oxford University Press, New York.
Hegel, G.W.F. (2007), Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion: Introduction and The Concept of Religion, edited by Peter Hodgson and Translated by R.F. Brown, P.C. Hodgson and J.M. Stewart, Clarendon Press, Oxford.
Kant, I. (2011), Anthropology, History, and Education. Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant, edited by Robert Louden and Gunter Zöller, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Kant, I. (1996), Practical Philosophy. The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant, edited by Paul Guyer and Allen Wood, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Kant, I. (1996), Religion and Rational Theology. The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant, edited by Allen Wood and George di Giovanni, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Kant, I. (1900 ff.), Gesammelte Schriften, edited by Bd. 1-22 Preussische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Bd. 23 Deutsche Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin, ab Bd. 24 Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen, Verlag Walter de Gruyter, Berlin.
Louden, R. (2000), Kant’s Impure Ethics, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Mariña, J. (1997), “Kant on Grace: A Reply to His Critics”, Religious Studies, no. 33, pp. 379–400.
Michalson, G. (1999), Kant and the Problem of God, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford. Michalson, G. (1990), Fallen Freedom. Kant on Radical Evil and Moral Regeneration, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Michalson, G. (1979), The Historical Dimensions of a Rational Faith. The Role of History in Kant’s Religious Thought, University Press of America, Washington.
Palmquist, S. (2012), “Could Kant’s Jesus be God?”, International Philosophical Quarterly, no. 52, pp. 421-437.
Palmquist, S. (2010), “Kant’s Ethics of Grace: Perspectival Solutions to the Moral Difficulties with Divine Assistance”, The Journal of Religion, no. 90, pp. 530–553.
Palmquist, S. (2000), Kant’s Critical Religion. Volume Two of Kant’s System of Perspectives, Ashgate, Aldershot.
Pasternack, L. (2017), “The ‘Two Experiments’ of Kant’s Religion: Dismantling the Conundrum”, Kantian Review, no. 22, pp. 107-131.
Pasternack, L. (2014), Kant's Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason: An Interpretation and Defense, Routledge, London.
Pasternack, L. (2012), “Kant on the Debt of Sin”, Faith and Philosophy, no. 29, pp. 30-52. Stephen Palmquist, ‘Could Kant’s Jesus be God?”. In: International Philosophical Quarterly 52 (2012) 421-437.
Reardon, B. (1988), Kant as Philosophical Theologian, Macmillan Press, London.
Sala, G. (2000), Die Christologie in Kants ‘Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der blossen Vernunft’, Gustav-Siewerth-Akademie, Weilheim-Bierbronnen.

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Schopenhauer, A. (2011), The World as Will and Representation. Volume 2, translated by David Carus and Richard Aquila, Pearson Publishing, Upper Saddle River, NJ.
Vanden Auweele, D. (2017), The Kantian Foundation of Schopenhauer’s Pessimism, Routledge, New York..
Vanden Auweele, D. (2014), “For the Love of God: Kant on Grace”, International Philosophical Quarterly, no. 54, pp. 175-190.
Vanden Auweele, D. (2013), “The Lutheran Influence on Kant’s Depraved Will”,
International Journal for Philosophy of Religion, no. 73, pp. 117-134.
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Wilson, J. and George Kelling (1982), “Broken Windows: The Police and Neighborhood Safety”, The Atlantic march 1982:
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/03/broken-windows/304465/. Retrieved on March 7th, 2017.
Wood, A. (1970), Kant’s Moral Religion, Cornell University Press, Ithaca.
Zachhuber, J. (2013), Theology as Science in Nineteenth-Century Germany: From F C Baur to Ernst Troeltsch, Oxford University Press, Oxford.

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Kant’s Robust Theory of Grace

Commentators on Kant’s Religion have charged that the work is a failed synthesis of Enlightenment rationality and Christianity, and that, moreover, his understanding of both human evil and the means to overcome it is riddled with inconsistencies.1 In this paper I argue that his view of grace is remarkably robust,2 and that these alleged inconsistencies disappear once it is recognized that Kant works with three understandings of grace. These are: a) grace and the God within, b) grace and the transformation of the fundamental orientation, and c) grace that can be laid hold of.3 While Kant is strongly critical of the

1 For instance, in his book Fallen Freedom, Gordon Michalson comments that Kant “wobbles” between Enlightenment views and those of Christianity (Michalson 1990, p. 8); in his later work he emphasizes Kant’s “conception of autonomous rationality that undermines the integrity of theological statements” (1999,
p. 20). Nicholas Wolterstorff finds that Kant’s attempt to make sense of grace from the standpoint of autonomy yields a series of “conundrums;” he reads Kant as a Pelagian who has little room for making sense of God’s forgiveness and grace (Wolterstorff 1991); Phil Quinn has also criticized Kant’s view of grace as impossibly circular (Quinn 1990); cf. (Hare 1996, pp. 62ff.). I have discussed some of these views, in particular the charge that Kant is Pelagian, in my article “Kant on Grace,” (Mariña 1997) and while my thinking on the matter remains largely the same, the enormous amount of literature that has since appeared on the topic has led me to further develop and qualify the arguments I made there. Firestone and Jacobs (2008) provide an excellent review of the secondary literature on the coherence of Kant’s views in their book In Defense of Kant’s Religion.
2 The views put forward by commentators such as James DiCenso (2011) who argue that for Kant, God (and therefore whatever aid might come from such a Being) is a useful fiction is certainly mistaken. DiCenso too often glosses over Kant’s stress on the difference between the limits of theoretical reason in establishing the existence of the objects of metaphysics and theology, and the demands of practical reason. While theoretical reason cannot legitimately prove God’s existence, Kant nevertheless insists on the primacy of practical reason, and here, Kant maintains, the moral agent must hope and act as if God exists. It cannot be stressed enough that this hope is not directed to a mere imaginary object; one hopes that God really does exist. While one cannot know that God exists, moral commitments demand that we make a decision and act as if God exists. This is rational faith and the true meaning of moral hope. The practical need to postulate God’s existence concerns the moral hope that the Highest Good is genuinely possible, and the conditions that must be assumed for its possibility given both the limitations of our embodied finitude as well as the threat of radical evil. I discuss this in Mariña 2000; recently Lawrence Pasternack has done a marvelous job detailing just about all of the secondary literature on the Highest Good, arguing convincingly that Kant has no secular conception of it. He shows that right down to his latest writings Kant maintained a theological conception of the Highest Good in which the postulates of both God and the immortality of the soul are preserved (Pasternack 2017). On the question of hope see Chignell 2013 and Chignell 2014.
3 In his paper “Kant on Grace” (2014) Leslie Stevenson analyzes several different kinds of grace in the Christian tradition and relates these to Kant’s views. These are: cooperative grace, sanctifying grace, forensic grace, providential grace and electing grace. He discusses my paper on grace (Mariña 1997) and refers to what I call the grace that “can be laid hold” of as “providential grace. Insofar as cooperative and sanctifying grace have to do with the mysterious effect of God’s power on our soul helping us to transform the fundamental moral orientation, these two kinds of grace belong to b) above. It is of course also true that God’s power might both cooperate with us and sanctify us after the fundamental change in orientation, helping us to become completely good. However, insofar as this cooperation cannot be distinguished from natural effects we cannot lay hold of it, since we cannot identify it, and for this reason it may not be practically useful.
Interestingly enough, Stevenson notes that Kant also makes use of the idea of forensic grace, where a righteousness not one’s own is imputed to one. This was at the heart of Luther’s rift with Rome. It is certainly true that Kant believes that the individual that has already made the fundamental commitment to a moral orientation can rationally hope that the righteousness of the Christ within, to which she commits through the moral disposition, will be imputed to her. Nevertheless, Kant differs significantly from Luther, who claimed that it was faith in what God has done for us that produces the change of heart: gratitude for what God has done for us is the impetus for the change of heart. Stevenson, along with others, have wondered why in my earlier paper on grace (Mariña 1997) I claimed that Kant was closer to Rome than the Reformation. The reason for my claim had merely to do with the fact that for Kant justification is not
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views of grace in the Lutheran pietism of his day, specifically in regard to grace and the transformation of the fundamental orientation, he has a remarkably positive understanding of grace with respect to a) grace and the god within and b) the grace that can be laid hold of, that is, grace and the real possibility of divine providential aid within the historical arena. Because certain kinds of divine aid can be understood as really possible in relation to the interests of practical reason, a rational believer may not only hope in them, she may, in fact make use of them in her struggle in virtue. Two things are particularly significant in this regard: first, the real possibility of a religion that is both natural and revealed, and second, the role of the ethical community founded by God. I first briefly lay out these three understandings of grace. My principal focus, however, is on Kant’s exposition in Religion of the grace that can be laid hold of, which I develop in terms of Kant’s discussion of the possibility of providential aid within the historical arena. The way these ideas are worked through in Religion is strongly tied to what I have previously identified as Kant’s developmental view of the human being,4 advanced by him in both the Lectures in the Philosophy of Religion as well as in his Conjectural Beginnings of Human History.

Grace and the God within
In the Conflict of Faculties Kant identifies grace with the “incomprehensible moral disposition in us–that is, the principle of pure morality.” He notes that there are two ways of thinking of nature: if we take nature to refer to those drives connected with the inclinations clamoring for satisfaction and the desire for a merely sensuously conditioned happiness, then nature and grace can be represented as at war with one another. If, on the other hand, we understand by nature our “ability to achieve certain ends by our own powers in general, then grace is none other than the nature of the human being insofar as he is determined to actions by a principle which is intrinsic to his own being, but supersensible (the thought of his duty)” (7:43). Here we are speaking of a graced nature. Moreover, this feature of our nature cannot be lost; Kant notes that we are “never able to lose the incentive that consists in the respect for the moral law, and were we ever to lose it, we would also never be able to regain it.” Hence the restoration of the human being “is not therefore the acquisition of a lost incentive for the good” (6:46). Such an idea of a graced nature certainly conflicts with certain Reformation views, (e.g. those of Calvin and

forensic; the individual is justified before God through and in light of her moral commitment, which is the first crucial step in a complete transformation. When I spoke of Kant’s “Augustinianism” it was only this narrow point that I had in mind: for both Augustine and the Catholic tradition in general moral transformation is a condition of justification. Given Stevenson’s point that for Kant we may hope that the “perfected whole” of a moral life will be imputed to us by God, perhaps it would be more accurate to say that on this point Kant splits the difference between Luther and Rome.
4 See “What Perfection Demands: an Irenaean Account of Kant on Radical Evil” in Kant and the Question of Theology, edited by Chris Firestone, Nathan Jacobs, and James Joiner. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, forthcoming.
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Luther), which stressed that the fall was so severe that it had destroyed the very image of God in human nature.5
Kant finds the moral predisposition in us so remarkable that he notes that it “point[s] to a divine source that reason can never reach (in its theoretical search for causes), so that our possession of it is not meritorious, but rather the work of grace” (7:43). Two things are worthy of attention here. First is Kant’s claim that the moral predisposition points to a divine source (Cf. 6:50). If the moral law is to be worthy of producing respect in us and capable of calling us to the moral life over against a life of the sensuous inclinations, it must be represented as having its origin in Mind. This mind cannot be thought of as the result of blind causal processes, but instead must be thought of as the ground of reason in us, as well as the ground of nature. Only in representing the moral law as having a divine origin does the law gain the requisite metaphysical status over the inclinations. In the Opus Postumum Kant notes that “There must also, however, be–or at least be thought– a legislative force (potestas legislatoria) which gives these laws emphasis (effect) although only in idea; and this is none other than that of the highest being, morally and physically superior to all and omnipotent, and his holy will–which justifies the statement: There is a God” (22:126). Furthermore, the individual committed to morality must certainly hope that an absolute and benevolent Mind (God) stands at the ground and origin not only of the moral law in us, but of all of nature as well: only in such a way can we hope that all that exists is ultimately directed to the ends of morality, even if in a way yet obscure and unknown to us. Second, that the creature has been ennobled through the predisposition to morality, that she has the capacity to hear the Call and is as such capable of entrance into the Kingdom of God, this is not the creature’s own work. Hence, the predisposition which we did not establish in ourselves must be represented “as a stimulus to good produced in us by God….and so as grace” (7:43).
Central to Kant’s understanding of grace in Religion is the “deus in nobis” (22:130), that is, the God in us. This is especially notable in Kant’s idea of the prototype. The predisposition to morality also produces the idea of a divine archetype in us. This is the idea of humanity “in its full moral perfection.” In the second book of Religion Kant provides us with a rational/moral interpretation of the prologue to the Gospel of John: “This human being, alone pleasing to God, ‘is in him from all eternity,’ the idea of him proceeds from God’s being; he is not, therefore, a created thing but God’s only begotten Son, ‘the Word’ (the Fiat!) through which all other things are, and without whom nothing that is made would exist” (6:60). Everything that is, is for the sake of this Son. This is the Christ in us, the “prototype” which we project onto the teacher of the Gospel, and which must be “sought in us as well.” Kant notes that its presence in the human soul is itself “incomprehensible enough” (6:63). We are not its authors; rather “the idea has rather established itself in the human being without our comprehending how human nature could have even been receptive of it;” hence “it is better to say that that prototype has come down to us from heaven, that it has taken up humanity….” (6:61). Kant uses the idea of the Son

5 It does not, however, conflict with a Catholic view of grace, which holds that grace is operative in nature, and that the image of God was not utterly defaced in the fall.
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of God in us for numerous purposes: because it can be found in us, through it we can discern the true from the false in religious matters (6:169n); it is that through which we are enabled to make moral progress, that is, it is the Christ in us that guides us our endless progress, This prototype is the human being in its full moral perfection. We are not identical with it, and yet, in some important sense, we are. It is within us as a destiny that we have not yet achieved. Insofar as this destiny is not yet, it is distinct from us in our earthly iteration. Yet as our destiny it is already within the soul, and only its embrace confers upon us any genuine worth. Hence, the goal of the human being is to become what in some sense he or she already is, that is, to develop out of herself that which is in some sense already within. Moreover, because this archetype proceeds from God’s very being and “is not, therefore, a created thing,” we can infer that the individual is divinized to the degree to which she approximates it, and in such a way becomes God with God.
Kant understands the continuous influence of the moral predisposition and the prototype, recognized in the “example of humanity pleasing to God in his son” as grace. This influence draws out the best in us, and in fact, if we do not oppose it, and allow it to work in us, this “grace can and should become more powerful than sin in us” (7:43). God is well pleased and well disposed to humanity in its full moral perfection and wills its happiness; punishment is merely the limitation of God’s loving kindness when the individual has opposed grace. This idea can be found both in some of the Lectures6 and in Religion, where Kant notes that God’s justice must be represented “only as restricting his generosity to the condition that human beings abide by the holy law” (6:141). Given that the moral law within us is itself the principal locus of grace, and that God is always well disposed to the Son of God in us, we must not understand grace merely in terms of divine aid in the face of the problem of radical evil. Rather, the problem of radical evil must itself be understood in terms of an outright refusal to allow the predisposition and archetype of the Son of God (the Christ within) to be effective in us.

Grace and the Transformation of the Fundamental Orientation
Besides Kant’s fundamental understanding of a graced nature, a nature in which the moral predisposition is always operative even when it is resisted, Kant presents two other understandings of grace. The first, while theoretically possible, is just about practically useless, since it has to do with how God may affect the will itself such that its very desires and motives will become different. The second understanding has to do with the kind of divine aid that must be laid hold of. Recognizing the differences between these two understandings is key to a proper grasp of Kant’s project in Religion. Commentators such

6 For example, in the Danziger Rationaltheologie Kant notes that “what good we receive from God is all unmerited grace…. Justice is the limitation of loving kindness…. Therefore justice does not reward, but alone punishes” (28: 1292-1294). For further discussion of this point see Mariña 1997, 382-385.

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as Michalson and Phil Quinn conflate these two understandings of grace in Kant, and as a result have accused him of setting forth circular conditions for transformation leaving the fallen agent mired in evil, with no real possibilities for regeneration. Quinn notes that according to Kant “we can become morally better persons only if we receive divine assistance, and will receive divine assistance only if we make ourselves worthy of it” (Quinn 1990, 421). Michalson reads Kant as allowing that the problem of radical evil is so severe that only through grace can it be overcome, yet as affirming, in contradictory fashion, that the moral agent must nonetheless “will its way upwards again” (Michalson 1990, 102). Claiming Kant holds that only after the change of heart is the agent worthy of divine aid, Michalson quips that “the element of grace here is thus not only beside the point–it is, as it were, after the fact” (Michalson 1989, 269). These problems rightly disappear if we understand that besides understanding grace in terms of the god within, Kant also makes use of two other views of grace: a) grace as conditioning the possibility of the change in the fundamental orientation (the change of heart) and b) grace as divine aid that might be laid hold of by the individual who is committed to morality, but who is still weakened by results of the propensity to evil.
In the Religion, Kant offers us a definition of grace different from the one in Conflict of the Faculties. Whereas in Conflict Kant identifies grace with the moral predisposition, in part four of Religion Kant defines grace in terms of a “faculty available to [the individual] only through supernatural help;” this is contrasted with nature, defined in terms of what “the human being can do on his own,” (6:190). At the beginning of book one, Kant discusses the problem of the possibility of a radical change in the fundamental disposition: “But if a human being is corrupt in the very ground of his maxims, how can he possibly bring about this revolution by his own forces and become a good human being on his own?” (6:48). The question alludes to one posed by the Reformers, who stressed the complete depravity of the human being and the bondage of the will. They stressed that because nothing good can come from human beings, salvation is only possible through grace, that is, if God himself transforms the individual at his very root, killing the “old man” and bringing the new one to life. Now, were we to think of God’s action in this way, grace would be an alien force transforming the fundamental moral orientation itself. As such, it would completely bypass the agency of the agent, and therefore would be practically useless. Because this orientation–the supreme ground of maxims–is the root of all desires, its transformation through grace would amount to a complete change of the individual through a foreign source. As such, no prior act or desire of the agent would have occasioned the change of heart. This is particularly true of the first moment in the change of orientation. Call this the zero point of transformation, where the agent first turns away from evil and directs herself to the good. All subsequent genuine desires to become a better person must have their ground in this zero point of the change in orientation. This first change does not imply the person has been fully transformed; far from it. But it does mean she has begun the struggle in virtue, that she has begun to understand and value a different way of life, one in which she strives to treat others as ends in themselves. If this fundamental change originates from outside the agent, we have no way of understanding

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the identity between the old self and the new, for there would be no lines of continuity between them. Instead of continuity, we would have complete rupture. And if the change of heart were something simply effected in the person from without, this would mean, further, that it would be hard to grasp how the change of heart was something really characteristic of her, or how it had to do with how she had interiorized certain values because she began now to see how they were worthwhile, when previously she did not understand them. This is a magical solution to the problem of human evil.
For these reasons, Kant insists that the idea of a supernatural assistance that completely bypasses the agency of the agent, while theoretically possible, is practically useless. This kind of grace cannot be incorporated into the maxims of reason:
For it is impossible to make these effects theoretically cognizable (that they are effects of grace and not of immanent nature), because our use of the concept of cause and effect cannot be extended beyond the objects of experience, and hence beyond nature; moreover, the presupposition of a practical employment of this idea is wholly self-contradictory. For the employment would presuppose a rule concerning what good we ourselves must do (with a particular aim [in mind]) in order to achieve something; to expect an effect of grace means, however, the very contrary, namely that the good (the morally good) is not of our doing, but that of another being - that we, therefore, can only come by it by doing nothing, and this contradicts itself. Hence we can admit an effect of grace as something incomprehensible, but cannot incorporate it into our maxims for either theoretical or practical use. 6:53

There are two fundamental issues here: first, there is no possible way for us to distinguish between the natural and the supernatural, between our own activity and that of God’s, which would be necessary for us to cognize the effects of grace (Cf. 6:88). Second, and more importantly, since this grace is not our own work, it would be impossible for us to incorporate it into our maxims of action; the very idea that we should come by a moral good by doing nothing contradicts itself. Moreover, the idea can be a pernicious one, insofar as it might tempt persons to indolence, and to therefore not do what is in their power because they are expecting a work of grace.
Now it is important to keep in mind that Kant does not deny the possibility of God’s cooperation with our will, both throughout the change of heart itself and through the struggle in virtue (cf. 6:191).7 And he allows that as long as we do all that is in our power,

7 On this point I am in disagreement with Lawrence Pasternack, who claims “Kant opposes the view that we need Divine aid in order to undergo a change of heart” (Pasternack 2014, p.146). Even if “ought implies can”, this tells us nothing about how we must obey the command; we would still be obeying it were we to make use of auxiliary means in doing so. This is especially so since there is no contradiction in the idea of a command and the need for help in fulfilling it. To affirm that we are responsible for our moral condition does not exclude the possibility that we may need aid in order to become good; it only means that we must do all that is in our power to achieve it, and make use of whatever aid is provided. For example, if I tell a child “you ought to learn your lessons,” this does not preclude that the lessons need to be taught in an orderly and comprehensible manner if the child is to be able to succeed, or even that a tutor might have to be hired for extra help. It does mean, however, that whoever issues the command must make auxiliary means available if those are required in order for the person commanded to fulfill the request.
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we may “legitimately hope that what lies outside [our] power will be supplemented by the supreme wisdom in some way or another” (6:171). However, since we have no way of separating out natural from supernatural effects, we have no way of understanding how this supplement might work.8 And insofar this supplement has to do with the awaiting of an action that is not one’s own, there is simply nothing that can really be done with it. Nevertheless, Kant admits that the idea of grace can strengthen one’s resolve to do everything in one’s power (6:174). 9 As such, the idea of God’s cooperation with the freedom of the Willkür may have some use. For instance, a good person may be acutely aware of her limits, for instance, of her possible cowardice in the face of a moral demand that might require her sacrifice of life itself, or of the possible depths of her own self- deception that even she cannot fully fathom. Were one to believe that try as one might, the obstacles may just be too great, and failure is inevitable, one might just collapse in despair and give up the fight, for the ultimate goal would seem impossible. Here the hope for divine aid–even when in principle how it works cannot be understood–has a positive function.10 For this hope can actually strengthen resolve and even prevent the collapse of all moral action: one is rationally entitled to believe that despite one’s initial weaknesses and incapacities, so long as one engages all one’s strength in the moral struggle, success will eventually be assured. In Conflict Kant notes that “faith in this supplement for his deficiency is sanctifying, for only by it can man cease to doubt that he can reach his final aim (to become pleasing to God) and so lay hold of the courage and firmness of attitude he needs to lead a life pleasing to God….” (7:44). It is important to note, however, that this kind of moral hope for God’s grace has legitimacy only for the individual that already has a fundamentally good disposition, one who is already oriented in the proper moral direction and has a good sense for what she is aiming at. For the individual who willingly

8 The question of the possible ways in which God might cooperate with the will in both its reorientation and continued progress in the good has recently been the topic of a good bit discussion, for instance, Hogan (forthcoming) and Insole 2013. Insole is particularly interested in the orthodox doctrine of concurrentism, which holds that God is both the creator and preserver of substances and their effects, without, however, vitiating the causality of the created substance itself. For the concurrentist, everything in nature, including all effects and actions of creatures, “directly and constantly depend upon divine action” (198). The position was taken to be an alternative to occasionalism, which held that substances do not interact because they have no genuine power of their own; they only seem to interact. It is God who acts in them, God who “is the sole cause of all the effects in nature, with created natural substances making no causal contribution” (195). The third alternative is mere conservation; here God both creates and preserves substances, but substances, once given their esse by God, can themselves be considered the origin of their effects. Given the no splitting requirement of the orthodox doctrine of concursus, Insole argues that Kant must be a mere conservationist; he later notes that Kant grants the possibility of concursus even in its orthodox form, although we have no insight into how such concursus is possible. While this debate may be of theoretical interest, what is most significant is Kant’s position that for practical purposes the doctrine of concursus is useless. For what can the practical upshot of such metaphysically abstruse doctrines be? What practical use can we make of the idea that God is acting in us, even when, for instance, our hearts are hardened, like that of Pharaoh?
9 “To believe that grace may have its effects, and that perhaps there must be such effects to supplement the imperfection of our striving for virtue, is all that we can say on the subject; for the rest, we are not capable of determining anything concerning their distinguishing marks and even less of doing something toward their production” (6:174).
10 As Chignell notes, all that is required for rational hope is that “for all she is certain of, the state of affairs is not really impossible” (Chignell 2013; cf. Chignell 2016).
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remains mired in evil will not want to become a better person, and hence, the notion of a divine supplementation to the maximal exercise of a moral power would, for such a one, simply be irrelevant.

Grace that can be laid hold of
Even after the individual has turned away from evil, her beginning in evil is a kind of self-wounding with significant consequences for both her imaginative and emotional life; the damaged propensity remains even after the individual has changed over from evil to good, and as such the person is at a significant disadvantage in her struggle to become fully good.11 Hence, contra Michalson, given the vestiges of evil darkening the propensity, there is a kind of divine aid that is most certainly not after the fact, and that can provide significant help to the moral progress of those committed to morality. Towards the beginning of his general remark in book one of Religion, after he has affirmed that the human being must bring it about that she become good or evil (depending on which incentive she chooses to drive her fundamental orientation), Kant notes:

Granted that some supernatural cooperation is also needed to his becoming good or better, whether this cooperation only consist in the diminution of obstacles or be also a positive assistance, the human being must nonetheless make himself antecedently worthy of receiving it; and he must accept this help (which is no small matter), i.e., he must incorporate this positive increase of force into his maxim: in this way alone is it possible that the good be imputed to him, and that he be acknowledged a good human being. (R 6:44)

What kind of divine aid can be accepted such that a positive increase of force is incorporated into a maxim? Above, we had seen Kant object that with respect to the kind of grace involving God’s concurring with our free actions, we cannot distinguish between natural and supernatural effects, that is, we cannot distinguish between what is our own doing, and what amounts to God’s cooperation in the strengthening of the Willkür in its moral striving. This is certainly part of the reason that practically, nothing can be done with this kind of understanding of grace, except perhaps as a hopeful afterthought staving off despair in the face of the enormity of the moral task. If we cannot even identify this kind of divine aid, how can we even accept it, or incorporate it as positive increase of force? But the kind of divine aid that must be laid hold of must be of a different kind. It must be something to which we can react so as to lay hold of it, and in order for this to happen it must be identifiable as something that is distinct from one’s own action. And if it is to be considered as grace or divine aid, it must also be distinguished from mere natural effects in the natural world. We have then several important criteria for this kind of grace:
a) it must be distinguishable from our own action, and b) we must be able to at least take it

11 Kant’s development of this idea dovetails with the Christian notion of concupiscence, and he is very much aware of this.
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as the providential work of the moral author of the world. It must furthermore c) be something that is capable of deepening and broadening our understanding of ourselves, of others, and of what the moral law requires of us. It must strengthen the moral incentive itself by making its ultimate value and its demands upon us more salient.
In the fourth book of Religion Kant echoes Lessing12: religion can be both natural and revealed if a person could and ought to have arrived at it through the use of reason, even though “they would not have come to it as early or as extensively as is required” so that a revelation of it would be “advantageous” to the human race” (6:155-6). He further notes that the rationalist will never “contest either the intrinsic possibility of revelation in general or the necessity of a revelation as divine means for the introduction of religion” (6:155).13 That as an a priori fact of reason the moral law is in some sense innate does not

12 In his Education of the Human Race, Lessing notes that “Education gives man nothing which he could not also get from himself; it gives him that which he could get from within himself, only quicker and more easily. In the same way too, revelation gives nothing to the human race which human reason could not arrive at its own; only it has given, and still gives to it, the most important of these things sooner” (Lessing 1957).
13 Kant’s position on reason and revelation can be found in part four of Religion. There he outlines several positions that can be taken regarding the relation of the true, universal religion to revelation: rationalist, naturalist, pure rationalist, and supernaturalist. What Kant means by these terms, how they are related to one another, and Kant’s own position have been a matter of controversy. Wood, for instance, argues that Kant is a deist, for whom religion based on natural reason is sufficient. Kant certainly affirms that “natural religion is alone morally necessary (6:154).” But this still leaves several questions open. Wood claims that Kant is not a pure rationalist, because he (Wood) understands pure rationalism as taking “the position that God has given us certain commands supernaturally while denying that we are morally bound to carry them out (Wood 1991, p. 11; cf. Wood 2002, p. 98). If this is what Kant had in mind by “pure rationalism” then Wood would have a point. However, a closer look at the text reveals that Wood’s reading of what Kant means by pure rationalism is incorrect. Firestone and Jacobs have an alternative reading that makes more sense of the text: what Kant is arguing is that there are three kinds of positions a rationalist can take regarding revelation: the naturalist, the pure rationalist, and the supernaturalist (Firestone and Jacobs 2008, pp. 211-220). The naturalist denies the reality of any supernatural divine revelation. Kant argues naturalism can be ruled out, since it makes a dogmatic claim that we are not in a position to ascertain regarding the impossibility of revelation. The true rationalist must “hold himself within the limits of human insight” (6:155). Since naturalism is a claim that does not remain within the limits of what we can know, what is left is the choice between pure rationalism and supernaturalism. Both positions allow for the possibility of revelation. What is at stake in the debate between the pure rationalist and the supernaturalist is the question of whether revelation
1. merely gives us the pure moral faith faster and in more detail than we would otherwise have had it, or b) is actually necessary for the human race to acquire true religion. And on the question of whether we should be pure rationalists or supernaturalists, Kant is agnostic. It may very well be the case that human beings, left on their own, would never have arrived at a pure rational faith, the seed of morality laying dormant without an external revelation to quicken it. Or it may be that we would eventually have hit upon the pure moral faith, but revelation got us to it faster. But the question as to which position, pure rationalism or supernaturalism, (or neither), is the correct one, is also one that we are in no position to know. Since it is possible that there is revelation, naturalism is out, but the other two options remain real possibilities, and we have no way of knowing which is correct. Kant notes that the rationalist will never “contest either intrinsic possibility of revelation in general or the necessity of a revelation as divine means for the introduction of true religion; for no human being can determine anything through reason regarding these matters” [italics mine] (6:155). Hence it is clear that the choice between pure rationalism and supernaturalism must remain an open question. Kant however, stresses that what is important is not the origins of a religion, but how it can be communicated. Once the content of rational religion is known, it no longer requires the husk of the revealed religion for it to be grasped or communicated to others, although it may well be the case that without the initial vehicle of an historical event, the true religion would remain in obscurity. There is no question here of an additional revealed command, as suggested by Wood, but rather, the question concerns what it takes for the germ of morality to become explicit.
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imply that we come into the world with a complete understanding of either its entailments or demands. Nor do we arrive with a perfected capacity for moral judgment. In regard to the a priori in general, Kant never affirmed that experience was not necessary for cognition to be activated: in the first Critique he concedes that “all our cognition commences with experience,” although he stresses this does not imply it arises from experience (B1). If we think of the moral law and its entailments analogously to the synthetic a priori of mathematics or geometry, we can see that the first workings through of a geometrical proof or of a mathematical theorem are not something obvious. In fact, the first time through both coming to see and demonstrating these truths can be arduous and ultimately consuming of all one’s energies. Something analogous may very well be true of the moral law and its entailments, as well as of the capacity for moral judgment. In the Lectures, for example, Kant speaks of the “first development of our reason toward the good” (28:1078), and in Conjectural Beginnings Kant mentions “the harder problem of how culture must proceed in order to properly develop the predisposition of humanity as a moral species to their vocation” (8:116). In both cases Kant speaks of the development of moral reason, and in the latter in particular he recognizes that moral reason is developed in social contexts. While the seed of the moral law is innate in our reason, it requires experience for us to understand not only its implications, but also for us to work it through and understand how it must be applied in particular cases. The very nature of the moral law, having to do with our relations with others in the context of the give and take of social expectations, can only be implemented in community, at the very least because it concerns how we are to relate to others. Moreover, that the race is infected with radical evil is yet another factor obscuring our moral understanding and impeding the process of correct moral judgment.
Kant’s affirmation that a moral religion can be both natural and revealed is of great significance on this score, for it shows that even though the moral law is an a priori fact of reason, this does not mean that we immediately fully understand it or its demands–we see rather, “as in a glass, darkly,” and it takes a great deal of commitment, and many trials and tribulations,14 to grasp its concrete requirements more clearly. Its proper understanding and implementation may involve a difficult process of false starts and mistaken assumptions regarding what is really right, even for those whose fundamental moral orientation is a good one. The fact that the moral law is contained as a seed within our reason, and that, indeed, the good principle is implicitly within us, may indicate that eventually we should be able to make its demands explicit.15 This however, may take a

14 In the Lectures Kant notes that the beginning of human cultivation brings with it “false steps and foolishness” (28:1077).
15 Although if my discussion of what supernaturalism amounts to is correct, it may be possible that even if
the good principle is implicitly within us, it may take a certain kind of experience for us to become explicitly aware of it. Given that human beings are inherently social, it could be, for example, that in order for us to recognize the deus in nobis and absolute worth of the moral archetype within us, this worth must be recognized in us by a more morally advanced being. The process through which we are thus recognized is something that must happen; hence the awakening of the race to pure morality may indeed require a
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great deal of time, and so a revelation making explicit that which is already within us would save us from the great deal of suffering resulting from our moral false starts. The idea of a revelation that is both natural and revealed fits well with Kant’s developmental understanding of the progress of the human race.
Throughout Religion, Kant highlights the importance of how the life of Christ may function as a revelation. While Christ simply manifests the good principle present from the very beginning of the human race (6:82), this does not vitiate the moral impact the story of Christ’s suffering and death may have on the moral development of the human race. Because Christ resisted all the temptations of the this world, everything “that could make his earthly life agreeable” was taken from him, and his steadfastness in the good “also provoked against him every persecution by which evil human beings could embitter him,” resulting in “the most ignominious death” (6:81). Christ’s life therefore serves as an example of an individual who upholds the purity of the moral law: because he gives up his very life, and therefore all earthly desires, in order to uphold what is right and good (and this was clarified through his teaching as well), he serves as an example of an individual who acts on the purity of the moral incentive. Hence “by exemplifying this principle (in the moral idea) that human being opened the doors to freedom to all who, like him, choose to die to everything that holds them fettered to earthly life to the detriment of morality; and among these he gathers unto himself ‘a people for his possession, zealous of good works,’ under his dominion, while he abandons to their fate all those who prefer moral servitude” (6:82). Kant’s strong affirmation that Christ “opened the portals of freedom to all,” demonstrates the effect that historical occurrences can have in quickening the moral development of the race. Simply because Christ is a mere example of the moral archetype already present within all of us does not vitiate the impact that such an instance can have in deepening our understanding and strengthening our will. It makes explicit what the purity of the moral law really requires, and demonstrates what the moral call concretely means in action: hearkening to the law, even when requiring the ultimate sacrifice, is really possible. Furthermore, such a life demonstrates what it concretely means to genuinely love the neighbor in the context of actual human relations, exemplifying the difference between genuine care for the other and the ritual commitments that are mere affirmations of those already in power. It may be objected that all of this must be quite obvious, but in reality the pull of our social group and its expectations may clash in fundamental ways with moral demands, and even when the fundamental moral orientation is a good one, our natural desire to fit in may very well obfuscate our capacity to clearly and fully understand moral requirements and their implications. Only in seeing its actual working through in the messy medium of history can the human being really understand what the seed of goodness within her calls her to do. Moreover, this messy medium too often demands “physical sufferings, sacrifices, and mortifications of self-love” for those committed to the moral law (6:83), and these consequences of moral commitment may not be clear without a moral exemplar.

revelatory event or kairos functioning as a Call, for only through it is the essential character of humanity revealed.
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Of course, this process through which a historical occurrence clarifies the meaning of genuine obedience to morality can only occur because the seed of goodness is already present within us. Hence Kant notes that

It is in no way reprehensible to say that every human being makes a God for himself, indeed, he must make one according to moral concepts (attended by the infinitely great properties that belong to the faculty of exhibiting an object in the world commensurate to these concepts) in order to honor in him the one who made him. For in whatever manner a being has been made known to him by somebody else, and described as God, indeed, even if such a being might appear to him in person (if this is possible), a human being must yet confront this representation with his ideal first, in order to judge whether he is authorized to hold and revere this being as Divinity. Hence, on the basis of revelation alone, without that concept being previously laid down in its purity at its foundation as touchstone, there can be no religion, and all reverence for God would be idolatry. (6:169n).

While a revelation may function to clarify and help one to grasp what the purity of the moral law demands concretely, any historical event or narrative part of a revealed religion must be first compared to the moral ideal and interpreted in its light. How then might the content of a revealed religion quicken the moral development of the race? Before a historical event or revelation awakens moral consciousness, it may have remained to a degree implicit and latent, perhaps as a vague call of conscience, one of which persons had only the dimmest awareness. Yet once awoken by the revelation of a moral exemplar, the workings of the pure moral consciousness and the moral imagination might be set into swing in such a way that they themselves become the means through which this revelation is understood and interpreted. This awakening of the moral imagination would not only serve to interpret and understand the life of the moral exemplar. Through the very act of understanding the call as embodied by, for instance, the teacher of the gospel, persons would also come to a better understanding of what is morally salient in human existence, what it is that has ultimate worth and what has less, and what it might mean, in a concrete human life, to chose the better over the worse, in particular when the others among whom one may live are hostile to such values.
Such a historical revelation is an instance of the kind of divine aid that must be laid hold of. It is laid hold of when such a revelation sparks the moral imagination, sharpens what morality demands, and is as such taken as a point of focus for moral reflection and engagement. It thereby spurs the individual in her working through what it means to be worthy of her divine inheritance. This is, however, not the only function of the kind of divine aid found in Religion that is both natural and revealed. God’s establishment of an ethical community in the midst of human social unsociability through an exemplar such as Christ is clearly just as important, and perhaps even necessary, for the possibility of human ethical development.

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Allen Wood has rightly pointed to the importance of Kant’s understanding of unsocial sociability and its role in Kant’s development of the idea of radical evil.16 He emphasizes that for Kant “the human propensity to evil arises in the social condition, and develops along with the process of cultivation and civilization that belongs to it” (Wood 2010, 159).17 Human beings are social beings; this sociality is a key feature of the second of the three human predispositions discussed by Kant in part I of Religion, what he there calls the predisposition to humanity. And while all three predispositions are original predispositions to the good and “demand compliance” with the moral law (6:28), both the predisposition to animality and the predisposition to humanity can be perverted or used “inappropriately.” Insofar as rationality is the highest function essential to the human being, it makes sense to locate the most important possibilities for human perversion at that level. And while it is true that both the predisposition to personality and the predisposition to humanity involve the capacity to reason, the former cannot be perverted, as it is the susceptibility to simple respect for the moral law (6:27). The latter, however, “is rooted in a reason which is indeed practical, but only as subservient to other incentives” (6:28). In other words, the predisposition to humanity involves the use of reason in the service of goals that may or may not themselves have been determined through reason. It can be perverted. As Kant notes earlier, the most significant passion related to this predisposition has to do with our desire for recognition from the other:

The predisposition to humanity can be brought under the general title of a self-love that is physical and yet involves comparison (for which reason is required); that is, only in comparison with others does one judge oneself happy or unhappy. Out of this self-love originates the inclination to gain worth in the opinion of others, originally, of course, merely equal worth: not allowing anyone superiority over oneself, bound up with the constant anxiety that others might be striving for ascendancy; but from this arises gradually an unjust desire to acquire superiority for oneself over others. – Upon this, namely, jealousy and rivalry, can be grafted the greatest vices of secret or open hostility to all whom we consider alien to us. These vices, however, do not really issue from nature as their root but are rather inclinations, in the face of the anxious endeavor of others to attain a hateful superiority over us, to procure it for ourselves over them for the sake of security, as preventive measure; for nature itself wanted to use the idea of such a competitiveness (which in itself does not exclude reciprocal love) as only an incentive to culture. (R 6: 27)

Because we naturally desire to gain worth in the opinion of others, and this desire for recognition is, in fact, a central feature of what it means to be human, we are always already disposed to value what we think others value, for only in being that, or in possessing the things we think they want, do we think that we will find favor in their eyes. Because we are oriented to craving recognition from the other, our default values are

17 The insight was first put forward by Anderson Gold in her essay “God and Community” (Gold 1991). Allen Wood has adopted and developed it in several of his writings such as Wood 1999, Wood 2010 and Wood 2014.‌
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socially constructed; they are values in the public eye, so to speak. Following Kant’s lead on this, Heidegger would comment, famously, that we are always already with the others, that we stand in subjection to the others, and that our being has been taken away by them (Heidegger 1962, 164). Kant continues this theme of the corrupting influence of the others in book three:

If he searches for the causes and the circumstances that draw him into this danger and keep him there, he can easily convince himself that they do not come his way from his own raw nature, so far as he exists in isolation, but rather from the human beings to whom he stands in relation or association. It is not the instigation of nature that arouses what should properly be called the passions, which wreak such great devastation in his originally good predisposition. His needs are but limited, and his state of mind in providing for them moderate and tranquil. He is poor (or considers himself so) only to the extent that he is anxious that other human beings will consider him poor and will despise him for it. Envy, addiction to power, avarice, and the malignant inclinations associated with these, assail his nature, which on its own is undemanding, as soon as he is among human beings. Nor is it necessary to assume that these are sunk into evil and are examples that lead him astray: it suffices that they are there, that they surround him, and that they are human beings, and they will mutually corrupt each other's moral disposition and make one another evil. (6:94)

Our need for recognition, our default understanding of ourselves only in relation to, and in comparison with the others, imprisons us. For here, too often, what is of worth has already been determined beforehand, in the public eye, and often in the most superficial of ways. We seek to acquire what “they” want so that they should not consider us poor and despise us. We desire the kind of knowledge and stuff that can be traded in the clamor for status. The competition with others for public acclaim only makes matters worse. We seek, at all costs, to avoid the “hateful superiority” of the others over us, and in order to do so, we are all too happy to play the game of one up in becoming and having the things we think that “others” value. In this way the self is lost.
Kant’s claim that the malignant inclinations assail us as soon as we are “among human beings” occurs right before his discussion of the ethical community, namely the church. This is important, since it underscores the facts a) that sociality is an essential component of human nature, b) that our default way of being with one another is one in which we mutually corrupt each other, and c) that a new community must be established to upend this default. Kant remarks that the others with whom we are in community do not have to be evil: “it suffices that they are there,” and we will “mutually corrupt” one another. Why this is the case is left unclear; presumably it would have something to do with the propensity to evil which has corrupted every aspect of the human being. At its core this propensity to evil has to do with the desire for an unconstrained freedom, one wherein the other is not recognized as an equal that rightfully makes demands and sets limits on the self. The temptation is, in fact, to make of the other a tool for the self’s aggrandizement of itself: the other is used only for the self’s recognition of itself. And because all are engaged in precisely this project, these rules of engagement are toxic to
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morality. But these, precisely, are the default rules of engagement we are born into. In fact, since the individual always develops in such a social context, and her possibilities for moral understanding and moral judgment are always constrained by it, the universality of radical evil is all but assured. Kant notes that radical infects the race. It does so precisely because the consciousness of the human being is never developed in isolation, but only in terms of the possibilities that are afforded to him or her by the others and the society in which he or she finds herself.It is for these reasons that Kant emphasizes the need for the establishment of an ethical community. This community must be one in which the rules of engagement are completely different than those of fallen sociality, a community which sets up new possibilities for moral self-expression. Kant notes the dilemma, however: if we already begin in the condition of radical evil, with all the fallen socialization attendant upon it, how can such a community be established? He asks, “how could one expect to construct something completely straight from such crooked wood?” Kant concludes: “to found a moral people of God is therefore a work whose execution cannot be hoped for from human beings but only from God himself” (6:100). The fact that such a community must have a divine origin does not excuse anyone from doing everything in his or her power to establish and participate in such a community. But it does mean that absent divine providence in helping to overturn the old ways of relating to each other and the establishment of the ethical community, the prospects for such a community look bleak. Kant notes that on the condition that each one acts “as if everything depended on him,” the person may “hope that a higher wisdom will provide the fulfillment of his well-intentioned effort” (6:101). Interestingly, in the part four, Kant ties the founding of the ethical community to the historical Jesus. There he claims “. . . one will not fail to recognize the person who can be revered. . . as the founder of the first true church. For accreditation of his teachings as of divine mission, we shall adduce some of his teachings. . .” He then goes on to list several passages from the gospel of Matthew. He further notes that we cannot “deny to him the authority due to one who called human beings to union in his church” (6:159). The founding of the ethical community has its basis in the wisdom and actions of an historical individual who is able to disclose true rational religion and to call all persons to a loving union in this community.
Kant’s penetrating analysis of both the propensity to evil and the social condition that perpetuates it, as well as his description of the general characteristics of the ethical community, may provide some insight into the ways in which divine providence might function. He describes the constitution of the ethical community in the following way:

It could best of all be likened to the constitution of a household (a family) under a common though invisible moral father, whose holy son, who knows the father’s will and yet stands in blood relation with all the members of the family, takes his father’s place by making the other members better acquainted with his will; these therefore honor the father in him and thus enter into a free universal and enduring union of hearts. (6:102)

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The church is founded by an individual in his or her capacity as a pure representative of the moral prototype, the son of God. This archetype is, of course, present in each and every one of us, although perhaps only latently or implicitly. The goal of the ethical community is to bring this highest part of the self forward, to nurture it, and to bring it to expression. An individual who is greatly advanced and developed, such as Christ, or the Buddha, could found such a community, establishing a new way of being in the world, one in which persons relate to one another as children of God, rather than as competitors who are always trying to demonstrate that they are “better” and worth more than others. Such an ethical community would be founded on the principle that all persons are Sons and Daughters of God; the Christ or divine archetype resides in each and every one. Insofar as persons are susceptible to the moral call, they are offspring of divinity. And on the basis this call they can, indeed, recognize each other as children of the most high. This mutual recognition is freely given and is the basis of a “free universal and enduring union of hearts,” a union possible through the divine archetype present in every being.
The presence of such a community furthers the moral development of the race, and entrance into it greatly strengthens an individual’s capacity to persevere in his or her struggle in virtue. First, such a community provides a space in which persons can practice recognizing one another as sons and daughters of God instead of possible competitors. When a visible church accords as much as possible with the true ideal of the church invisible, members can freely speak with one another to sharpen their moral judgment and further their understanding of what it is that amounts to a really good life. Second, they can join together in good works, and hearten one another in their daily struggle. Third, they can encourage one another in “the assurance of things hoped for,” that is, in the objects of moral hope, especially given that the world too often does not reward moral choices. The work of the visible church is very much a process, one that makes possible the moral development of its members.
Kant does not have a merely negative view of grace. He understands the moral law as having a divine origin, and human nature as graced because of it. Admittedly he is very skeptical of the kind of grace that is itself to effect transformation of the fundamental orientation; for various reasons this kind of grace cannot be incorporated into our maxims. However, Kant also has more positive expositions of grace, and Religion contains significant resources for understanding how the kind of divine aid that “must be laid hold of” might function in the struggle for moral development.

Bibliography

Anderson Gold, Sharon (1991), “God and Community: An Inquiry into the Religious Implications of the Highest Good”, in P. Rossi and M. Wreen (eds.), Kant’s Philosophy of Religion Reconsidered, Indiana University Press, Bloomington

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Chignell, A. (2013), “Rational Hope, Moral Order, and the Revolution of the Will”, in E. Watkins (ed.), The Divine Order, the Human Order, and the Order of Nature, Oxford University Press, New York, pp. 197-218.
Chignell, A. (2016), “Rational hope, possibility, and divine action”, in G. Michalson (ed.), Kant’s Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason: A Critical Guide, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 98-117.
DiCenso, J. (2011), Kant, Religion, and Politics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Firestone, C. and Nathan Jacobs (2008), In Defense of Kant’s Religion, Indiana University Press, Indianapolis.
Hare, J. (1996), The Moral Gap: Kantian Ethics, Human Limits, and Divine Assistance, Oxford University Press, New York.
Hogan, D. (forthcoming) “Kant’s Theory of Divine and Secondary Causation”, in B. Look,
Leibniz and Kant, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Insole, C. (2013), Kant and the Creation of Freedom, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Lessing, G. E. (1957), The Education of the Human Race, translated by H. Chadwick, Stanford University Press, Stanford.
Mariña, J. (2000), “Making Sense of Kant’s Highest Good”, Kant-Studien 91, pp. 329-355. Mariña, J. (2017), “What Perfection Demands: an Irenaean Account of Kant on Radical Evil”, in C. Firestone, N. Jacobs, and J. Joiner (Eds.), Kant and the Question of Theology, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 183-200.
Martin, H. (1962), Being and Time, translated by John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson, Harper and Row, New York.
Kant, I. (1998), Critique of Pure Reason. The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant, edited by Paul Guyer and Allen Wood, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Kant, I. (1996), Religion and Rational Theology. The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant, edited by Allen Wood and George di Giovanni, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Kant, I. (1900 ff.), Gesammelte Schriften, edited by Bd. 1-22 Preussische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Bd. 23 Deutsche Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin, ab Bd. 24 Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen, Verlag Walter de Gruyter, Berlin.
Michalson, G. E. (1990), Fallen Freedom: Kant on Radical Evil and Moral Regeneration,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Michalson, G. E. (1999), Kant and the Problem of God, Blackwell Publishers, Oxford. Pasternack, L. (2017), “Restoring Kant’s Conception of the Highest Good”, Journal of the History of Philosophy 55, no. 3, pp. 435-467.
Pasternack, L. (2014), Guidebook to Kant on Religion within the Bounds of Reason Alone,
Routledge, New York.
Quinn, P. (1990), “Saving Faith from Kant’s Remarkable Antinomy”, Faith and Philosophy 7, no. 4, pp. 418-433.

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Stevenson, L. (2014), “Kant on Grace”, in G. E. Michalson (ed.), Kant’s Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason: A Critical Guide, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 118-136.
Wolterstorff, N. (1991), “Conundrums in Kant’s Rational Religion”, in P. Rossi and M. Wreen (eds.), Kant’s Philosophy of Religion Reconsidered, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, pp. 56-67.
Wood, A. W. (1991), “Kant’s Deism,” in P. Rossi and M. Wreen (eds.), Kant’s Philosophy of Religion Reconsidered, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, pp.
Wood, A. W. (1999), Kant’s Ethical Thought, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Wood, A. W. (2010), “Kant and the Intelligibility of Evil,” in S. Anderson God and P. Muchnik (eds.), Kant’s Anatomy of Evil, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Wood, A. W. (2014), “The Evil in Human Nature,” in G. E. Michalson (ed.), Kant’s Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason: A Critical Guide, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 31-57.

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Why Even Kantian Angels Need the State:
Comments on Robert Hanna’s “Exiting the State and Debunking the State of Nature”
¿Por qué incluso los ángeles necesitan el Estado?
Comentarios sobre el artículo de Robert Hanna “Saliendo del Estado y deconstruyendo el estado de naturaleza”

ANNE MARGARET BAXLEY 
Washington University in St. Louis, USA

Abstract
Against a widely-held interpretation of Kant’s political philosophy, according to which Kant holds that all finite rational beings have an innate right to freedom as well as a duty to enter into a civil condition governed by a social contract in order to preserve that freedom, Robert Hanna contends that Kant is in fact an anarchist. Hanna’s argument for his novel thesis that Kant ultimately views the State as an unjustifiably coercive institution that should be eliminated depends heavily on the claim there is an outright conflict between Kant’s political theory in The Doctrine of Right and Kant’s ethics. I argue that we should resist Hanna’s provocative claim that Kant’s ethics directly falsifies his official political theory. Further, I suggest that even morally autonomous Kantian angels need the State to guarantee the protection of their external freedom and to promote justice.
- Anne Margaret Baxley (Ph.D. UC-San Diego) is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Washington University in St. Louis, where she teaches courses on Kant, the history of philosophy, and ethics. Her book entitled Kant’s Theory of Virtue: The Value of Autocracy was published by Cambridge University Press (2010). Baxley has been a Fellow at the National Humanities Center and The Center for Ethics and Public Affairs at the Murphy Institute at Tulane. She has received grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Council of Learned Societies, the American Philosophical Society, and the American Association of University Women. Her articles on Kant’s ethics have appeared in the Journal of the History of Philosophy, Kant-Studien, The Review of Metaphysics, Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, Inquiry, and The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism. E-mail: abaxley@wustl.edu
[Recibido: 16 de octubre 2017
Aceptado: 23 de octubre 2017]

Anne Margaret Baxley

Keywords
Kant, political philosophy, freedom, the state
According to what would seem to be an uncontroversial, even uncontestable, view concerning the basic tenets of Kant’s political theory, Kant holds that all finite rational beings have an innate right to freedom as well as a duty to enter into a civil condition governed by a social contract in order to realize and preserve that freedom. Although Kant recognizes that we give up an absolute right to freedom in agreeing to come together in civil society and to abide by coercive juridical laws, we do so for no other reason than to guarantee the protection of our external freedom, defined as “independence from being constrained by another’s choice, insofar as it can coexist with the freedom of every other in accordance with a universal law” (MM 6:237).1 This is to say that, on a conventional reading of Kant’s political philosophy, Kant clearly believes that there is a rational justification for the existence of the State and its coercive political authority, namely, our interest in securing our right to external freedom—freedom of choice and action. Against this orthodox interpretation of Kant, Robert Hanna contends that Kant is in fact an anarchist who ultimately views the State as an unjustifiably coercive institution that should be eliminated (Hanna 2017).
Hanna’s argument for his novel interpretation of Kant’s “true” political philosophy takes three central steps. After distinguishing between two conceptions of enlightenment—“enlightenment lite” and “heavy duty or radical enlightenment” (step 1)— Hanna claims that there is an outright conflict between Kant’s official political theory in The Doctrine of Right and his ethics (step 2), and that Kant’s real political theory—a version of radical enlightenment—can be found in Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason (step 3). According to the Kantian political theory Hanna uncovers from Religion, there is no adequate rational justification for coercive political authority, and we should exit the State in order to create a worldwide ethical community in a world without any States or State-like institutions. In the service of defending his heterodox reading of Kant, Hanna sets out a devastating (and often highly amusing) critique of the pervasive Hobbesian account of human nature that has been a common source of justification for the State’s existence, and concludes with a sort of call to arms, challenging Kantians to embrace an existentialist Kantian cosmopolitan anarchism and to cultivate a political- aesthetic attitude of reverence for humanity.

1 All references to Kant are to Kants gesammelte Schriften edited by the Königlich Preussischen (now Deutschen) Akademie der Wissenschaften (Berlin: G. Reimer [now de Gruyter], 1902-). Citations in this essay include the volume and page number in this standard Academy edition of Kant’s complete works. All English translations are from Gregor, Mary (ed.) Practical Philosophy in The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant (1996). The following abbreviations are used for Kant’s works cited here: Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals – Gr; and The Metaphysics of Morals – MM. The Doctrine of Virtue comprises the first part of The Metaphysics of Morals, and The Doctrine of Virtue comprises its second part.

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“Exiting the State and Debunking the State of Nature” is a rich and stimulating paper, one that raises a number of interesting questions about Kant’s views concerning human nature, the state of nature, the role of the State, the legitimacy of political coercion, and the relation between politics and ethics. My comments focus primarily on Hanna’s provocative claim that there is an “unbridgeable gap” between Kant’s official political theory in The Doctrine of Right and his ethical theory (step 2)—a charge I think we can resist. I will, however, suggest that the aesthetic-political attitude of reverence for humanity that Hanna so eloquently articulates is one that we should readily endorse.

On the alleged gap between Kant’s official political theory and his ethics

In charging that there is an unbridgeable gap between Kant’s political theory in The Doctrine of Right and his ethics, Hanna draws our attention to the axioms or synthetic a priori propositions of right and virtue—these are the fundamental principles of reason that define or govern the two spheres of the moral, as Kant understands it. On the one hand, the axiom of right says that human beings are essentially self-interested and need to be protected from one another by the coercion of the State, which functions to secure external freedom. On the other hand, the axiom of virtue says that human beings are capable of morality and autonomy and of acting non-egoistically. The former axiom is based on the empirical fact of human egoistic self-interested desires, and the latter axiom is based on the idea that rational agents are capable of acting in accordance with the moral law from respect for the law alone (a non-empirical motive), or able to fulfill their duties solely from the motive of duty. As Hanna sees it, there is a straightforward contradiction here between both the axioms of right and of virtue and the different underlying conceptions of human nature on which these axioms are based. That is, Kant’s political philosophy starts from what Hanna terms the “enabling assumption” that we are all essentially egoistic and self- interested, whereas Kant’s moral philosophy depends crucially on the idea that we are autonomous agents capable of acting as morality dictates for no other reason than that it is intrinsically right—that is, from duty, and without any further motive of self-interest. Hanna reasons that, if we accept the assumption about human nature underlying Kant’s official political theory, we might be inclined to accept the idea that the protection of external freedom depends on the State functioning as an executive control mechanism. But why should we accept Kant’s neo-Hobbesian account of human nature in the state of nature, especially when it conflicts with his more optimistic—and, by Hanna’s lights, more realistic—view of our nature as autonomous moral agents?
I suggest that Hanna’s charge that there is a clear conflict or outright contradiction between Kant’s official political theory and his ethics raises two broad interpretive questions that deserve further scrutiny.
Question #1: What exactly does Kant’s ethics imply about our nature as finite rational beings, and does Kant’s thesis that human beings are capable of acting autonomously and acquiring virtue “directly falsify” his political philosophy (Hanna 2017, p. 173)?

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In his foundational works in moral theory, especially the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals and the Critique of Practical Reason, Kant treats autonomy as a property of the rational will, and plainly holds that finite rational agents possess the requisite freedom to abide by the moral law and to act on maxims (or subjective policies of action) that conform to the Categorical Imperative. Moreover, when he sets out his full account of virtue as a character trait in The Doctrine of Virtue, Kant claims that rational agents with autonomy are capable of cultivating virtue—moral self-mastery or strength of will, where strength involves a firm disposition to do one’s duty from the motive of duty and the force to withstand all temptations to transgress the moral law (MM 6:394, 396-397, 405). On Kant’s portrayal, the virtuous agent possesses the power of self-command (Selbstbeherrschung) to control and to rule over her sensible feelings and inclinations and to abide fully by morality’s dictates from respect for the law alone, in spite of any obstacles that might stand in the way. Relying on a long tradition in which ideals of personal or moral self-governance are modeled on notions of political governance, Kant explicitly associates his conception of virtue with what he terms the “autocracy of pure practical reason,” where autocracy stands for a very broad form of rational self-rule or self- governance that goes beyond autonomy (moral self-legislation). 2 Thus, according to Kant’s considered account of moral character, the genuinely virtuous or autocratic agent is one in whom reason has not merely legislative but executive authority—she gives herself moral laws that she takes to be valid solely because of their authority for all rational beings, and she has the power or strength of will to execute those laws in a way that shows full rational self-command.
It is crucial to see, however, that nothing here indicates that autonomous Kantian moral agents who are capable of developing virtue do not need the State to guarantee their right to external freedom. I take the following points to indicate that Kant’s political theory is not undermined by the account of moral agency central to his ethics.
In the first place, it is worth noting that, in spite of holding that all finite rational beings possess the freedom required to conform their actions to the Categorical Imperative from respect for the law (autonomy), and are able to acquire the moral strength of will to overcome all obstacles to duty and to govern themselves fully in accordance with the norms of practical reason (autocracy), Kant maintains that we can never know that anyone has ever genuinely acted from duty. As he writes in the Groundwork:

In fact, it is absolutely impossible by means of experience to make out with complete certainty a single case in which the maxim of an action otherwise in conformity with duty rested simply on moral grounds and on the representation of one’s duty. It is indeed sometimes the case that with the keenest self-examination we find nothing besides the moral ground of duty that could have been powerful enough to move us to this or that good action and to so great a sacrifice; but from this it cannot be inferred with certainty that no covert impulse of self-love, under the mere pretense of that idea, was not actually the real

2 See Baxley 2010.

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determining ground of the will; for we like to flatter ourselves by falsely attributing to ourselves a nobler motive, whereas in fact we can never, even by the most strenuous self- examination, get entirely behind our covert incentives, since, when moral worth is at issue, what counts is not actions, which one sees, but those inner principles of actions that one does not see (Gr 4:407).

As this passage clearly indicates, Kant holds that, for all of which we are capable based on autonomy and autocracy, we cannot know with certainty that any finite rational being has ever acted in a way that displays true or genuine moral worth—that is, non-egoistically.3 Otherwise put, for all that we know based on the conception of moral agency at the heart of Kant’s ethics, it is possible that all finite rational agents capable of morality and virtue demonstrate nothing beyond heteronomy of will, acting only from motives of self-interest and its principle of (personal) happiness.
In the second place, and more importantly, since autonomy and virtue concern self- legislation and self-compulsion, whether or not any moral agent exercises her freedom of choice in conformity with moral principles, and does what duty requires of her, is entirely up to her. Kant takes the realm of right or justice to be concerned with external freedom and external legislation, while virtue or ethics is the sphere of inner freedom and internal self-legislation.4 Ethical duties, such as the duty of beneficence, are distinguished from juridical duties in that they are based entirely on self-constraint and are self-imposed (MM 6:383). Juridical duties, such as the duty to keep a contract, are coercive duties that are externally legislated, that is, imposed on subjects of right by the State and backed by threat of sanction for noncompliance. The main point here is that, even if we attribute autonomy as a property of the will of every finite rational being in the state of nature, and consequently have reasonable grounds for thinking that human beings in the state of nature are fully capable of conforming their actions to universal law (and of acting altruistically), the best that we could hope for under that scenario is that such beings (freely) constrain themselves to act in ways that can be universalized, conforming their actions to laws that they prescribe to themselves based on their own power of inner freedom. But this means that, without the State to enforce the compliance of juridical duties, the protection of our innate right to external freedom depends entirely on the good will of others, and is thus not guaranteed.
Granted, Hanna can reply by insisting that, outside of the State and State-like institutions, Kantian good-willed agents who have autonomy of will and are capable of cultivating virtue will tend to respect each other’s right to external freedom and will not be inclined to trample on the rights of others. This might very well be true, for altruism is at

3 In the discussion following the lengthy passage quoted above, Kant goes on to remark that one need not be an enemy of virtue to doubt “whether any true virtue is to be found in the world” (Gr 4:407). Thus, it looks as if Kant’s point is not just that we can never know for sure that any morally worthy act has ever been performed—an epistemic point—but that it is possible that no one has ever done her duty from duty—a metaphysical point.

4 Indeed, Kant defines the doctrine of virtue as the doctrine that brings inner, rather than outer, freedom under laws (MM 6:380).
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least possible for human beings in a pre-State or post-State condition. We can therefore agree with Hanna’s claim that, from the perspective of Kant’s ethics, the Hobbesian thesis that universal egoism is necessarily true in the state of nature is false—it is false because we know that it is at least possible for human beings in a pre-State or post-State condition to be non-egoistic, non-antagonistic, and mutually respectful. It does not follow, however, that, for Kant, there would no longer be a need for the coercive political authority of the State in a world in which altruism is possible. On the contrary, even in a world in which altruism is common, indeed, even in a realm of Kantian angels—a possible world of perfectly virtuous Kantian agents who always do their duty from duty, reliably compelling themselves to act as morality demands—what is necessary to secure a peaceful condition, by Kant’s standard, is the assurance or guarantee of humanity’s innate right to external freedom, something that can be achieved only when this right is enforceable. In short, even if we could assume that rational agents capable of morality will (freely) abide by moral principles and respect humanity (in themselves and others) in the state of nature, we would still need the State to guarantee the protection of external freedom by coercing universal compliance of this right. This naturally leads to a second key question concerning Hanna’s reading of Kant.
Question #2: Does Kant’s political theory depend on the thesis that human beings in the state of nature necessarily act egoistically in the sense of actually requiring the strong enabling condition that Hanna identifies?
I suggest not, for it seems to me that Kant’s account of the justification for the coercive political authority of the State is somewhat different from the way Hanna characterizes it. For Hanna, it is the nasty view of our empirical nature that is the driving force behind Kant’s political philosophy, but Kant’s primary concern—or at least main emphasis—lies elsewhere, namely in our fundamental interest in securing the rightful exercise of our external freedom.
As Hanna sees it, what motivates Kant’s official account of political coercion is the assumption that we are essentially a devilish race of “biochemical puppets” (Hanna 2017,
p. 172). We therefore need protection from one another for fear that we would fall back into an outright Hobbesian state of nature or “war of all against all.” The State thus functions as a corrective to our egoistic and antagonistic nature: “So State government is nothing but an executive control mechanism, plus a centralized power to coerce (e.g., the police, the army, the NSA, etc.), designed for guaranteeing mutual external freedom in the universal pursuit of egoism/self-interest by all the State’s citizens, a Hobbesian ‘leviathan,’ a decision-theoretic mega-machine State, made out of human beings” (Hanna 2017, p. 172). Yet, despite the fact that Kant undeniably uses Hobbesian language to describe the state of nature and the problem of establishing a peaceful condition among self-interested rational agents, he ultimately conceives of the State as necessary not merely to correct our tendency toward egoism, but to bring about justice, by guaranteeing the protection of our

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innate right to freedom.5 Kant claims that we surrender our freedom in order to regain it (MM 6:315), so what we gain by accepting a system of political coercion is the achievement of a completely rightful condition. My suggestion, then, is that Kant sees the State’s role not as an executive control mechanism to correct our egoistic and antagonist human nature (as Hanna presumes), but instead as a guarantor of right or justice. In short, if we see the State’s function on Kant’s official political theory as that of realizing a greater good—namely, right or justice—then the justification for its existence does not depend on the assumption that human beings in the state of nature are always and only egoistic. Although the difference in Hanna’s and my characterization of Kant’s primary concern in establishing the State might amount to a difference merely of emphasis, the difference (hopefully) serves to underscore my central point that we need not view Kant as wedded to the enabling condition concerning universal egoism that Hanna sees as contradicting Kant’s ethics.
In conclusion, although I have attempted to show that we need not view Kant’s ethics as undermining his official political theory, I suggest that Hanna’s de-biasing strategy in political aesthetics for ridding ourselves of the entrenched Hobbesian account of our egoistic human nature is one that Kantians should happily embrace. In opposition to the pervasive neo-liberal account of human nature as fundamentally egoistic and antagonistic, as it is so powerfully depicted in Dante’s Inferno, Golding’s Lord of the Flies and in post-Apocalyptic movies like Mad Max, Hanna calls us to the better angels of our nature, by appealing to a fundamentally different, genuinely Kantian political-aesthetic attitude of reverence for humanity (“awe, amazement, and wonder directed at the human nature and the human animal”) (Hanna 2017, p. 183). This seems entirely fitting and appropriate as a means for expressing and promoting the very value that Kant places at the centerpiece of his entire philosophical system—humanity as an end in itself, something that has unconditional value and a dignity that goes beyond all price.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Baxley, A.M. (2010), Kant’s Theory of Virtue: The Value of Autocracy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

5 My basic suggestion here is that Kant thinks of justice as doing more than fundamentally remedying or correcting human beings’ tendency not to act sufficiently altruistically. Even if we agree that rational beings in the state of nature do not always act egoistically and are capable of autonomy and virtue, we still need justice, where justice requires, minimally, the assurance that other people will respect the innate right of freedom of others or face punishment for noncompliance. Here, I follow Arthur Ripstein, who has recently argued that, for Kant, “neither justice nor the law is remedial” (Ripstein 2012, p. 44). Ripstein explains that, even if we abstract from all empirical facts about our alleged “crooked timber,” or our human tendencies toward selfishness, egoism, and vice, we still need justice, and to fully establish justice, we need States (the rule of law).

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Hanna, R. (2017), “Exiting the State and Debunking the State of Nature,” Con-Textos Kantianos, no. 5, pp. 167-189.
Ripstein, A. (2012), “Kant and the Circumstances of Justice” in Ellis, Elizabeth (ed.), Kant’s Political Theory: Interpretations and Applications: Interpretations and Applications, University Park, PA: Penn State University Press, pp. 42-73.

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Why The Better Angels of Our Nature1 Must Hate the State

¿Por qué los mejores ángeles de nuestra naturaleza deben odiar al Estado?

ROBERT HANNA 

Independent Philosopher, USA

Abstract
In this brief reply to Anne Margaret Baxley’s comments on my paper, “Exiting the State and Debunking the State of Nature,” I respond to her two critical worries about my thesis that there is an unbridgeable gap between Kant’s political theory, which is classically liberal, and his ethics/theory of enlightenment/moral theology, which is anarchist: (i) that Kant’s strong moral epistemic skepticism in the Groundwork about knowing the true motives of our choices and actions, requires coercive State intervention in order to ensure that we heed mutual relations of external freedom and do our juridical duties, and (ii) that the overall crookedness of the human timber, i.e., our almost inevitable empirical tendency to fall short of autocracy, requires the very same State interventions for the very same moral-political straightening purposes. I argue that (i*) Kant isn’t the moral epistemic skeptic he’s standardly taken to be—on the contrary, we have veridical, direct, occurrent, essentially non-conceptual, non-empirical awareness of autonomous choices and actions, via The Fact of Reason, and (ii*) that coercing people to be morally good

1 The famous phrase, “the better angels of our nature,” is of course borrowed from the final paragraph and sentence of Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address:
I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.
See Lincoln (1861). I use it here not only to allude to AMB’s very nice framing metaphor of “Kantian angels,” but also ironically, since Lincoln was of course trying desperately to preserve the Union, and therefore the State, in the face of civil war.
- Robert Hanna is an independent philosopher, and Director/Editor-in-Chief of Contemporary Studies in Kantian Philosophy. He received his PhD from Yale University USA in 1989, and has held research or teaching positions at the University of Cambridge UK, the University of Colorado at Boulder USA, the University of Luxembourg LU, PUC-PR Brazil, Yale, and York University CA. E-mail:
<bobhannahbob1@gmail.com>

[Recibido: 7 de noviembre 2017
Aceptado: 21 de noviembre 2017]

Robert Hanna

necessarily undermines the moral worth of their choices and actions and turns them into nothing but well-oiled, law-abiding robots of the State—so we must exit the State in order to belong to an ethical community instead, i.e., Kantian anarchism; hence my unbridgeable-gap thesis still stands. I end by self-advertising for existential Kantian cosmopolitan anarchism.

Keywords
Kant, political philosophy, the state, anarchism
I’m extremely grateful to Anne Margaret Baxley (henceforth AMB) for her highly generous and thoughtful comments on my paper.
In this brief reply, there are only two points I want to address.
Both of them concern my (admittedly controversial) claim that there is an outright contradiction, and an unbridgeable gap, between
1. Kant’s official political philosophy as formulated in the Doctrine of Right, on the one hand,
  and (ii) his ethics, his theory of enlightenment, and his moral theology, on the other,
  such that, if we take his ethics, his theory of enlightenment, and his moral theology with all seriousness, then we must reject Kant’s disingenuous official classically liberal political philosophy and wholeheartedly endorse a philosophical and political anarchism of a specifically Kantian kind, that I have dubbed existential Kantian cosmopolitan anarchism. AMB says that she “take[s] the following points to indicate that Kant’s political theory is not undermined by the account of moral agency central to his ethics”:
  1. In the first place, it is worth noting that, in spite of holding that all finite rational beings possess the freedom required to conform their actions to the Categorical Imperative from respect for the law (autonomy), and are able to acquire the moral strength of will to overcome all obstacles to duty and to govern themselves fully in accordance with the norms of practical reason (autocracy), Kant maintains that we can never know that anyone has ever genuinely acted from duty. As he writes in the Groundwork:
    In fact, it is absolutely impossible by means of experience to make out with complete certainty a single case in which the maxim of an action otherwise in conformity with duty rested simply on moral grounds and on the representation of one’s duty…. (Gr 4:407)
    
    As this passage clearly indicates, Kant holds that, for all of which we are capable based on autonomy and autocracy, we cannot know with certainty that any finite rational being has ever acted in a way that displays true or genuine moral worth—that is, non-egoistically. Otherwise put, for all that we know based on the conception of moral agency at the heart of Kant’s ethics, it is possible that all finite rational agents capable of morality and virtue demonstrate nothing beyond heteronomy of will, acting only from motives of self-interest and its principle of (personal) happiness.
  2. In the second place, and more importantly, since autonomy and virtue concern self- legislation and self-compulsion, whether or not any moral agent exercises her freedom of
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choice in conformity with moral principles, and does what duty requires of her, is entirely up to her…. The main point here is that, even if we attribute autonomy as a property of the will of every finite rational being in the state of nature, and consequently have reasonable grounds for thinking that human beings in the state of nature are fully capable of conforming their actions to universal law (and of acting altruistically), the best that we could hope for under that scenario is that such beings (freely) constrain themselves to act in ways that can be universalized, conforming their actions to laws that they prescribe to themselves based on their own power of inner freedom. But this means that, without the State to enforce the compliance of juridical duties, the protection of our innate right to external freedom depends entirely on the good will of others, and is thus not guaranteed.

As to AMB’s first point, I completely agree with her that this famous text from the Groundwork has always—or almost always—been taken to imply a strong and specifically Kantian version of moral epistemic skepticism, by saying that we cannot ever know with certainty whether we are acting or have acted for the sake of the Categorical Imperative, that is, from duty, and not merely in conformity with duty, but actually from egoistic or hedonistic or utilitarian motives.
But my reading of this famous text is sharply different.
I think that the crucial sub-phrase in Kant’s key phrase, “it is absolutely impossible by means of experience to make out with complete certainty a single case…,” is “by means of experience.”
More precisely, I think that it is perfectly consistent with what Kant has actually written at Groundwork 4: 407,2 to claim that, yes, empirical knowledge, in Kant’s technical senses of “empirical” and “knowledge” (Wissen) of whether we are acting or have acted from duty or not, is impossible.
Empirical knowledge for Kant necessarily involves empirical concepts and empirical intuitions, and has its meaning, justification, and truth necessarily determined, at least in part, by sensory, contingent facts about the natural world and ourselves.
Moreover, at most, empirical knowledge can have empirical certainty, which is when a subject “takes something [namely, a judgment or proposition] to be true” (Fürwahrhalten), in such a way that this taking-to-be-true has a kind of indubitability or self-evidence which is both subjectively sufficient, which makes it “conviction” (Überzeugung) and also

2 For convenience, I cite Kant’s works infratextually in parentheses. The citations include both an abbreviation of the English title and the corresponding volume and page numbers in the standard “Akademie” edition of Kant’s works: Kants gesammelte Schriften, edited by the Königlich Preussischen (now Deutschen) Akademie der Wissenschaften (Berlin: G. Reimer [now de Gruyter], 1902-). For references to the first Critique, I follow the common practice of giving page numbers from the A (1781) and B (1787) German editions only. I generally follow the standard English translations of Kant’s works, but have occasionally modified them where appropriate. Here is a list of the abbreviations and English translations. CPR Critique of Pure Reason. Trans. P. Guyer and A. Wood. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1997. CPrR Critique of Practical Reason. Trans. M. Gregor. In Immanuel Kant: Practical Philosophy.
Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1996, pp. 139-272.
Rel Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason. Trans. A. Wood and G. di Giovanni. In Immanuel Kant: Religion and Rational Theology, pp. 57-215.
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intersubjectively or objectively sufficient (CPR A820-822/B848-850), which entails that the judgment or proposition is also actually true.
Examples of empirical certainty would be cases of ordinary perceptual judgments under highly favorable contextual conditions, such as G.E. Moore’s famous anti-skeptical thesis, “This is my right hand and this is my left hand.”
I think that Kant is absolutely correct that we cannot ever have knowledge in this sense of whether we are acting or have acted from duty or not.
Nevertheless, even while conceding that empirical knowledge of the morality of our own actions is impossible, we can also consistently and also justifiably claim on Kantian grounds that we still have the capacity for veridical, direct, occurrent awareness of our choosing and acting from from duty, by means of non-empirical, essentially non- conceptual, moral self-consciousness.
In other words, even though we cannot have empirical knowledge of whether we are acting or have ever acted from duty or not, we can still have non-empirical certainty about this.
Correspondingly, I also think that what Kant calls “the fact of reason” in the Critique of Practical Reason is precisely this veridical, direct, occurrent, non-empirical, essentially non-conceptual, moral self-consciousness of our acting from duty (CPrR 5: 31, 42).
Therefore, given The Fact of Reason, then we can indeed have veridical, direct, occurrent, essentially non-conceptual, moral self-consciousness, with non-empirical certainty, when (and only when) we are acting for the sake of the Categorical Imperative and from duty.
This in turn means that we most emphatically do not need the State to stand in as our default-setting moral compass, by coercing us to heed mutual relations of external freedom, choose and do our juridical duties, and perform justice, for the sake of the Categorical Imperative and from duty: on the contrary, the better angels of our own innately-specified autonomous rational human nature will do this for us, by means of The Fact of Reason.
In other words, autocracy is partially constituted by its own self-validating phenomenology, and the coercive authoritarianism of the State is not only superfluous to this, but also downright inimical to it.
This brings me to AMB’s second point.
I fully agree with AMB and with Kant in the Doctrine of Right that external freedom—i.e., freedom of action, even if it does not involve autonomous, or practically free, transcendental freedom of the will (internal freedom)—juridical duties, and justice are all extremely important for creating and sustaining civil society.
So yes, we ought to heed them and do them: we ought to heed mutual relations of external freedom, choose and do our juridical duties, and perform justice, to the extent that our heeding, choosing, doing, and performing these also flow from the Moral Law.
But our being coerced into heeding, choosing, doing, and performing these necessarily undermines the moral worth of any and all of them, since then we are heeding mutual relations of external freedom, choosing and doing our juridical duties, and performing justice only because we fear communal, administrative, legal, or governmental social

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sanctions, punishment, imprisonment, or other violence against us, and not because they are the right things to choose and do.
In other words, our being coerced into heeding, choosing, doing, and performing these things turns us into nothing but moist robots of the State, and essentially undermines our autonomy.
Hence, as Kant clearly says in the Religion, we must exit the State if we are to live, move, and have our being as autonomous, enlightened, authentic, unalienated rational human animals, and not merely survive as nothing but well-oiled, law-abiding robots:

A juridico-civil (political) state is the relation of human beings to each other inasmuch as they stand jointly under public juridical laws (which are all coercive laws). An ethico-civil state is one in which they are united under laws without being coerced, Le. under laws of virtue alone.
Now, just as the rightful (but not therefore always righteous) state of nature, i.e. the juridical state of nature, is opposed to the first, so is the ethical state of nature distinguished from the second. In these two [states of nature] each individual prescribes the law to himself, and there is no external law to which he, along with the others, acknowledges himself to be subject. In both each individual is his own judge, and there is no effective public authority with power to determine legitimately, according to laws, what is in given cases the duty of each individual, and to bring about the universal execution of those laws.
In an already existing political community all the political citizens are, as such, still in the
ethical state of nature….
[W]oe to the legislator who would want to bring about through coercion a polity directed to ethical ends! For he would thereby not only achieve the very opposite of ethical ends, but also undermine his political ends and render them insecure. – The citizen of the political community therefore remains, so far as the latter’s lawgiving authority is concerned, totally free: he may wish to enter with his fellow citizens into an ethical union over and above the political one….
THE HUMAN BEING OUGHT TO LEAVE THE ETHICAL STATE OF NATURE IN ORDER TO BECOME A MEMBER OF AN ETHICAL COMMUNITY (Rel 6: 95-96)

Now the most common substantive philosophical objection to the Kantian anarchist thesis that I hear or see—apart from the so-called objection that consists in rolling one’s eyes, shaking one’s head vehemently, and saying it’s simply outrageously controversial as Kant- interpretation—is this:
“OK, let’s leave aside Kant-interpretation for the moment. But if you’re correct about Kantian anarchism, then how will we ever force people to be good?”
To which I always reply:

“You’re asking that question under a false presupposition. For Kantian ethical reasons, necessarily, you can’t force people to be good, since their being forced to choose or do X or Y necessarily undermines the moral worth of their choosing or doing X or Y, and turns them into well-oiled, law-abiding machines.

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS
International Journal of Philosophy
[Recibido: 10 de febrero 2017
Aceptado: 20 de marzo 2017]

Óscar Cubo Ugarte

Ebbinghaus of the cases of "extreme injustice" and establishes a relationship between the Formula of Radbruch and Kant’s philosophy of law. Finally, and against legal positivism, J. Ebbinghaus places the boundaries of political domination in the law of humanity. The normative consequences of this law are evident in cases of extreme injustice, National Socialist Germany is a paradigmatic example. Based on the law of humanity, Julius Ebbinghaus offers a Kantian justification of the concept of crimes against humanity.
Keywords

Law of Humanity; Extreme Injustice; Formula of Radbruch; Legal Positivism
1. Una nota biográfica sobre Julius Ebbinghaus
  
  Julius Ebbinghaus nació el 9 de noviembre de 1885 en Berlín. Su padre fue el famoso psicólogo Hermann Ebbinghaus. Tras sus estudios universitarios en filosofía, Julius Ebbinghaus obtuvo el grado de doctor de filosofía en el verano de 1909 con un trabajo titulado: Investigación histórico-sistemática del camino de Kant a Hegel. Un primer proyecto de habilitarse en la Universidad de Halle con un trabajo sobre Platón fracasa en 1913. Tras participar en la Primera Guerra Mundial Ebbinghaus se traslada a Friburgo donde finalmente, bajo la tutela de Edmund Husserl se habilita en 1921 con un trabajo acerca de los Fundamentos de la filosofía de Hegel 1793-1803. Durante la elaboración de su habilitación Ebbinghaus se hace consciente de la necesidad de revisar su valoración de la filosofía de Kant. En palabras del propio Ebbinghaus, este cambio de perspectiva supuso el final de su escrito de habilitación y el comienzo de su reelaboración de la filosofía crítica de Kant2.
  A partir de 1921 Ebbinghaus trabaja como docente privado en la Universidad de Friburgo y comienza su amistad con Martin Heidegger. En 1926 es nombrado profesor de filosofía en Friburgo y en 1930 obtiene una cátedra en la Universidad de Rostock. Finalmente, y siendo recomendado por H.-G. Gadamer, obtiene en 1940 un puesto de catedrático en la Universidad de Marburgo. En septiembre de 1945 Ebbinghaus fue normbrado por las fuerzas de ocupación norteamericanas rector de la Universidad de Marburgo. Su intento de desnazificación de la universidad le acarreó muchas enemistades entre juristas e historiadores, En 1954 Ebbinghaus se jubiló, aunque siguió impartiendo seminarios en la universidad hasta 1966. Fallece el 16 de junio de 1981 en Marburgo siendo reconocido en Alemania y en el mundo anglosajón como uno de los intérpretes más agudos de la filosofía de Immanuel Kant.
  Sus trabajos se ocupan intensamente con cuestiones de filosofía del derecho contemporánea y con preguntas acerca de la naturaleza del Estado. En este contexto cabe destacar sus trabajos sobre el concepto de tolerancia, de pluralismo, así como su discusión
  
  2 Cf. Ebbinghaus 2013 (1977), pp. 475-520.
  
  336
  
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  con el positivismo jurídico, y el neokantismo, en especial sus controversias con Rudolf Stammler y Hans Kelsen. Contra las tendencias positivistas de los juristas neokantianos Ebbinghaus se propone recuperar el contenido normativo de la filosofía del derecho de Kant como instancia crítica para enjuiciar todo ordenamiento jurídico positivo. Con ello Ebbinghaus pretende no sólo rehabilitar la filosofía del derecho de Kant, sino proporcionar una interpretación de la misma que muestre su actualidad tras las experiencias históricas del nacionalsocialismo y la Segunda Guerra Mundial.
2. Los trabajos de Julius Ebbinghaus sobre la filosofía práctica de Kant
Son numerosos los aportes interpretativos que Ebbinghaus sobre la filosofía práctica de Kant. En el ámbito de su filosofía moral destacan especialmente su detenido estudio de las distintas formulaciones que Kant ofrece del imperativo categórico en la Fundamentación de la metafísica de las costumbres, titulado “Las fórmulas del imperativo categórico y la deducción del contenido de deberes concretos“ 3 “ así como la correspondencia que mantiene en los años cincuenta con el estudioso kantiano H. J. Paton autor de Categorical Imperative: A Study in Kant's Moral Philosophy. Destaca también su análisis del tratamiento kantiano de la mentira en Sobre un presunto derecho a mentir por filantropía en “La deducción de Kant de la prohibición de mentir a partir del derecho de la humanidad”4, así como su estudio de la doctrina de los deberes en la Metafísica de las Costumbres en sus lecciones de Rostock, publicada recientemente, y titulada: “Las leyes del mundo moral”5. En el ámbito de la filosofía del derecho de Kant son especialmente significativos los siguientes trabajos: “Positivismo-Derecho de la humanidad-Derecho de los ciudadanos” 6, “El derecho de la humanidad y los límites del poder estatal” 7, “La doctrina del derecho de Kant y la filosofía del derecho del neokantismo”8, “El sistema kantiano de los derechos humanos en su significado histórico actual” 9 o “Humanidad, derecho de la humanidad y derecho de Estado” 10 . También conviene mencionar sus trabajos acerca de la tolerancia: “Sobre la idea de la tolerancia. Una investigación jurídico- estatal y filosófico religiosa”11, y la pena de muerte, donde Ebbinghaus recupera el debate sobre la misma de Kant y Beccaria en “El problema de la pena de muerte12.
En numerosas ocasiones la recepción e interpretación que lleva a cabo Ebbinghaus de la filosofía del derecho de Kant está marcada por la actualidad jurídico-política de ciertas situaciones concretas, sobre todo, referidas a la “culpabilidad” de la nación alemana respecto a lo acontecimientos bélicos del siglo XX: “La Doctrina de la paz perpetua de

3 Ebbinghaus 1988 (1959), pp. 209-229; También el trabajo de Georg Geismann 2002, pp. 374-384
4 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1954), pp. 407-421. Véase a este respecto, Georg Geismann y Hariolf Oberer 1986.
5 Ebbinghaus 2013 (Sommersemester 1933), pp. 275-326
6 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1952), pp. 349-367
7 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1953), pp. 367-376
8 Ebbinghaus 1988 (1960), pp. 231-249
9 Ebbinghaus 1988 (1964), pp. 249-283
10 Ebbinghaus 1988 (1968), pp. 407-415
11 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1950), pp. 299-332.
12 Ebbinghaus 1988 (1955), pp. 1-10
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Kant y la pregunta por la culpa de guerra”13, “Cuestiones fundamentales acerca de la cuestión de la culpa de la guerra”14 o “Acerca del cambio de destino de Alemania”15. No obstante, y a pesar de toda esta diversidad de temas, se pueden señalar como mínimo dos importantes “tesis” de Ebbinghaus por lo que respecta a su interpretación de la filosofía del derecho de Kant, la primera tesis es conocida dentro de los estudios kantianos, como la “tesis de la independencia” (Unabhängigkeitsthese), que tiene como centro de su investigación la relación que guarda la filosofía trascendental de Kant con su filosofía del derecho, y la segunda, a la que podemos denominar la “tesis de la injusticia extrema”, que rearticula en términos kantianos la “fórmula de Radbruch” así como la defensa de la misma realizada en nuestros días por Robert Alexy.
1. La “Doctrina del derecho” de Kant y la “tesis de la independencia”
  
  En el centro de los trabajos de Ebbinghaus acerca de la filosofía del derecho de Kant está la relación que guardan el derecho y la moral. Este es el punto de partida para determinar la naturaleza específica del derecho en cuanto tal. Numerosos son los aspectos que vinculan a ambas disciplinas: en primer lugar, el derecho y la moral, como ya señalara H. L. A. Hart, comparten en ocasiones un mismo vocabulario, y de hecho Kant habla de deberes morales y deberes jurídicos, derechos morales y derechos jurídicos, así como de libertad moral y libertad civil. A esto se une, que hay numerosos y conocidos ejemplos donde los mandatos del derecho y de la moral coinciden como, por ejemplo, la prohibición del homicidio, de la mentira y del robo16. Para Ebbinghaus estas semejanzas impiden en numerosas ocasiones ver con claridad las diferencias que, no obstante, existen entre ambas disciplinas, y que son centrales para comprender en todo su alcance la filosofía del derecho de Kant. Según Ebbinghaus, la diferencia central reside en que en los “Principios metafísicos de la Doctrina del derecho” Kant se sirve de un concepto negativo de libertad exento de cualquier presupuesto metafísico que le confiere una gran funcionalidad en términos políticos y jurídicos. La “tesis de la independencia” enfatiza que el concepto de derecho que maneja Kant en los “Principios metafísicos de la doctrina del derecho” descansa sobre “el concepto negativo de la libertad práctica”17.
  Este concepto de libertad supone únicamente que los seres humanos tienen la capacidad de obrar con arreglo a otras causas distintas que la mera mecánica natural. La “Doctrina del derecho” de Kant no requiere, según Ebbinghaus, otra noción de libertad que esta acepción mínima de la misma, de modo que se puede fundamentar a partir de un concepto empírico- negativo de la libertad que cada uno es capaz de reconocer en su propio obrar. La remisión de la “Doctrina del derecho”
  
  13 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1929), pp. 1-35
  14 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1930), pp. 35-46
  15 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1946), pp. 117-278
  16 Cf. Hart 2012, p. 19
  17 Cf. Ebbinghaus 1988 (1968), p. 296 y ss. Véase también Ebbinghaus 1990 (1954), p.164 y ss.
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  “a este concepto negativo de la libertad del arbitrio humano [implica] al mismo tiempo la independencia de dicha Doctrina del derecho respecto de la filosofía crítica en general y de su idealismo trascendental”18.
  Especialmente relevante para la comprensión de esta tesis es la definición de arbitrio que Kant ofrece en la Metafísica de las Costumbres:
  “el arbitrio que puede ser determinado por la razón pura se llama libre arbitrio. El que sólo es determinable por la inclinación (impulso sensible, stimulus) sería arbitrio animal (arbitrium brutum). El arbitrio humano, por el contrario, es de tal modo que es afectado ciertamente por los impulsos, pero no determinado; y, por tanto no es puro por sí […], pero puede ser determinado a las acciones por la voluntad pura. La libertad del arbitrio es la independencia de su determinación por impulsos sensibles: éste es el concepto negativo de la misma. El positivo es: la facultad de la razón pura de ser por sí misma práctica”19
  Ebbinghaus considera que la “Doctrina del derecho” de Kant se puede sostener sobre este concepto negativo de libertad, esto es, con independencia de los presupuestos metafísicos de su doctrina moral, porque únicamente requiere para su fundamentación la independencia de la libertad del arbitrio para su determinación a la acción. Es este sentido, afirma Ebbinghaus, que
  “el concepto de libertad práctica, puesto aquí como fundamento, es un concepto conocido por cada uno en la experiencia diaria interior y exterior, indispensable en la vida social humana, un concepto usado y confirmado sin cesar. Porque a través de él sólo se piensa en la capacidad trivial del hombre [...] de actuar tomando en consideración la representación de fines y, por consiguiente, bajo las condiciones de la razón. De este modo, la afirmación de esta libertad es equivalente a la afirmación de que la razón en el hombre es práctica y que él, por consiguiente, es capaz de actuaciones de la voluntad (en contraposición con meras actuaciones impulsivas). Esto significa negativamente, que él, en cuanto está sano espiritualmente, no está arrastrado a actuar ciegamente por estímulos sensibles.”20
  Este es el concepto de libertad que, según Ebbinghaus, maneja Kant en el § B de la “Doctrina del derecho”. En este parágrafo Kant ofrece tres formulaciones distintas del principio universal del derecho:
  “primero en indicativo, como concepto general del derecho (§ B), después, también en indicativo, como principio general del derecho (§ C; cf. “Apéndice”: VI 371, 20 y ss.), y finalmente en forma imperativa como ley general del derecho (§ C)”21 .
  Tras la versión imperativa del mismo, así como tras sus formulaciones en indicativo, lo único que presupone la “Doctrina del derecho” es el concepto de la independencia de la libertad del arbitrio como condición suficiente para dar realidad a la idea de una limitación
  
  18 Ebbinghaus 1988 (1968), p. 298
  19 MS AA 06: 213 (Trad. Adela Cortina / Jesús Conill)
  20 Ebbinghaus 1988 (1970), p. 408
  21 Höffe 2013, p. 11
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  universal del uso externo de la libertad por parte de los seres humanos como condición necesaria para su convivencia con arreglo a leyes universales.
  La idea del derecho en Kant sólo expresa éste necesario constreñimiento como condición para un mismo uso de la libertad externa por medio de leyes jurídicas. La legislación jurídica tiene como fin hacer posible la compatibilidad del uso externo de la libertad de cada cual con arreglo a leyes universales. Con arreglo a ello, el derecho busca que
  “la libertad de cada uno esté en una posible concordancia legal con la libertad de los demás. La libertad que se pretende con ello es aquella libertad, que cada ser humano presupone en él mismo, cuando él se determina a la acción u omisión de algún acto respecto de un cierto fin que él mismo se propone”22.
  En este sentido, la Doctrina del derecho de Kant presupone, en primer lugar, una pluralidad de sujetos libres capaces de obstruir el ejercicio externo de la libertad de los demás, pero también, y al mismo tiempo, seres capaces de constreñir el uso de su libertad para que todos ellos puedan hacer el mismo uso de ella.
  El centro normativo de la filosofía del derecho de Kant se encuentra para Ebbinghaus en el
  § B de la “Doctrina del derecho” y en su análisis del “derecho de la humanidad”. Respecto a la idea tradicional de la humanidad y sus derechos, Kant lleva a cabo una modificación fundamental.
  “Esta modificación consiste en que Kant emancipa la exigencia contenida en su concepto de derecho de todo fin natural del hombre, esto es, de todos los intereses posibles condicionados empíricamente. [...] La ley del derecho se convierte para él en una ley de la unión de todos por lo que respecta a aquella libertad (externa), que es necesaria para poder realizar cualquier fin sea del tipo que sea. La limitación de la libertad a aquellas condiciones bajo las cuales ella está en una posible concordancia legal con la libertad de todos los demás, significa tanto como la limitación de tu libertad (natural) a aquellas condiciones bajo las cuales tu mismo y todos los demás sólo podéis ser libres con una validez universal y necesidad”23.
  La filosofía del derecho de Kant descansa así en un concepto negativo libertad, definido a través de la independencia de las actuaciones del arbitrio humano de los estímulos sensibles en su relación con los demás hombres, en la idea de la limitación de dicho arbitrio por el derecho de la humanidad y en la unión de todos los seres humanos bajo leyes jurídicas de libertad e igualdad. El derecho de la humanidad constituye la condición necesaria para la posible concordancia legal de la libertad externa de todos los seres humanos entre sí. Dicho en términos negativos, el derecho de la humanidad expresa
  
  22 Ebbinghaus 1988 (1968), p. 296
  23 Ebbinghaus 1990 (1954), p. 167
  
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  “que no puede haber ningún uso de la violencia conforme al derecho contra los seres humanos, que, en las condiciones de su posibilidad, esté en contradicción con su posible libertad sin más”24.
  Dentro de los estudios kantianos las réplicas contra esta interpretación de Ebbinghaus se han centrado precisamente en la lectura reduccionista que Ebbinghaus lleva a cabo de las reflexiones jurídico morales de Kant al acotar su filosofía del derecho a la libertad negativa del arbitrio, desatendiendo con ello el concepto positivo de libertad que Kant atribuye a la facultad de la razón pura en virtud de su capacidad para ser por sí misma práctica. Esta reducción tiene consecuencias importantes, ya que a su vez no permite fundamentar el carácter vinculante e incondicional del principio del derecho, ni tampoco la doctrina de los deberes jurídicos expresados en las tres fórmulas ulpianas: honestas iuridica, neminen laede y suum cuique tribue25. Wolfgang Kersting, el más destacado crítico de la “tesis de la independencia”, ha formulado esta objeción del siguiente modo:
  “los defensores de Ebbinghaus derivan falsamente de la independencia de la realización práctica del derecho respecto de la filosofía moral [de Kant] la independencia teorética de la obligatoriedad de su filosofía moral. No obstante, los momentos consustanciales del derecho como [son] la exterioridad, la independencia respecto a la intención moral y la coercibilidad del mismo no pueden entenderse como elementos de la independencia de la validez del derecho respecto de su filosofía moral”26.
  En este sentido, los defensores de la “tesis de la dependencia” como, por ejemplo, W. Kersting, R. Brandt, B. Ludwig, O. Höffe o P. Guyer, sostienen, con distintos acentos y matices, que la validez de la “Doctrina del derecho” no se puede desligar cabalmente de las premisas normativas de la filosofía moral de Kant; mientras que los defensores de la “tesis de la independencia”, entre los que destacan G. Geismann, M. Baum, T. Pogge, A.W. Wood o M. Willaschek defienden lo contrario, aunque empleando para ello diferentes estrategias argumentativas, a saber, afirmando que la validez del principio universal del derecho es independiente del imperativo categórico o enfatizando la no derivabilidad (non- derivability) del principio universal del derecho del imperativo categórico27.
2. La fórmula de Radbruch y el no-positivismo jurídico de Kant
  
  La segunda aportación relevante de Julius Ebbinghaus dentro de los estudios kantianos reside en sus reflexiones acerca de las consecuencias normativas que se deben extraer del carácter defectuoso del derecho positivo a partir de las premisas de la filosofía del derecho de Kant. Para poder hacernos cargo de las consecuencias más importantes de dichas reflexiones es conveniente detenernos brevemente en la “fórmula de Radbruch” y en el modo como el defensor actual más destacado de la misma, Robert Alexy, sitúa a Kant y a su filosofía del derecho dentro de la problemática del derecho extremadamente injusto.
  
  24 Ebbinghaus 1988 (1970), p. 410
  25 Vgl. MS AA 06: 236-237
  26 Kersting 1997, p. 38
  27 Véase: Mosayebi 2013, pp. 3-7
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  Ambos momentos resultan iluminadores para comprender la posición de Ebbinghaus respecto a la cuestión de la “injusticia extrema” y al modo como afronta este problema a través de los principios normativos de la filosofía del derecho de Kant.
  En el caso de la injusticia extrema Ebbinghaus desarrolla un argumento con premisas kantianas para justificar la famosa fórmula de Radbruch, que en su expresión más corta, establece que la injusticia extrema no es derecho. Esta fórmula, apareció en 1946, como respuesta
  “a los excesos del régimen nacionalsocialista, en un célebre artículo titulado Injusticia legal y Derecho supralegal (Gesetzliches Unrecht und übergesetzliches Recht)” 28.
  Esta fórmula representa, primero y ante todo, un rechazo a la “tesis (positivista) de la separación”, según la cual cualquier contenido puede convertirse en derecho 29 y, en segundo lugar, la afirmación de que la violación del “derecho supralegal” resta a las normas de un sistema jurídico su validez jurídica.
  En el mencionado artículo Radbruch afirma que él defiende y comparte, y podemos adelantar aquí que también Ebbinghaus, los valores internos que la positivación del derecho lleva consigo, esto es, su capacidad para coordinar y orientar las acciones entre los hombres estableciendo una cierta seguridad jurídica. Sin embargo, a estos dos valores añade un tercero, que para los positivistas es un sinsentido jurídico, a saber, la juridificación del derecho supralegal o justicia política. Para el Radbruch de posguerra los valores inmanentes a la positivación del derecho tienen que orientarse en última instancia por un valor justicia. Ciertamente, la seguridad jurídica es un ingrediente indispensable de justicia, pero puede entrar en contradicción con ella, de modo que
  “donde surge un conflicto entre la seguridad jurídica y la justicia, entre una ley discutible en su contenido pero positiva, y un derecho justo pero no vertido en forma de ley, existe en realidad un conflicto de la justicia consigo misma, un conflicto entre la justicia aparente y la real"30
  Pues bien, es cuando se da esta contradicción, continúa diciendo Radbruch, o este conflicto de la justicia consigo misma, cuando su posición se separa del positivismo jurídico, ya que
  
  28 Seoane 2002, p. 766
  29 Cf. Kelsen, 2011b, pp. 230 y ss. Esta es la versión kelseniana de la tesis de la separación, y que se encuentra no sólo en la segunda y última edición de la Teoría pura del derecho de 1960, sino también en la primera edición de la misma de 1934, donde afirma que “[las normas jurídicas] no valen en razón de su propio contenido. Un contenido cualquiera puede ser derecho. No hay conducta humana que, a causa de su valor intrínseco, quede excluida de su posibilidad de formar parte del contenido de una norma de derecho. No es posible poner en cuestión la validez de una norma jurídica alegando que su contenido no se adecua a un supuesto valor material, por ejemplo, la moral. Una norma es válida como norma jurídica únicamente porque se ha originado de una determinada manera, porque ha sido creada en conformidad con cierta regla, porque ha sido establecida siguiendo un método específico. El derecho vale sólo como derecho positivo, esto es, como derecho impuesto” (Kelsen 2011a (1934), p. 83)
  30 Radbruch 2003, p. 216
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  “el conflicto entre la justicia y la seguridad jurídica tendría que poder solucionarse en el sentido de que el derecho positivo asegurado por el estatuto y el poder tenga también preferencia cuando sea injusto e inadecuado en cuanto al contenido, a no ser que la contradicción entre la ley positiva y la justicia alcance una medida tan insoportable que la ley deba ceder como 'derecho injusto' (unrichtiges Recht) ante la justicia. Es imposible trazar una línea más nítida entre los casos de la injusticia legal (gesetzlichen Unrechts) y las leyes válidas a pesar de su contenido injusto; pero puede establecerse otra línea divisoria con total precisión: donde ni siquiera se pretende la justicia, donde la igualdad, que constituye el núcleo de la justicia, es negada conscientemente en el establecimiento del derecho positivo, ahí la ley no es sólo 'derecho injusto', sino que más bien carece totalmente de naturaleza jurídica"31.
  Desde este punto de vista, buena parte del derecho nacionalsocialista nunca llegó a alcanzar la dignidad de ser derecho válido. En 1948 Radbruch vuelve a retomar esta idea y tematizando de nuevo la línea gradual que separa el derecho injusto de la injusticia legal:
  “el conflicto decisivo es el que media entre la justicia y la seguridad jurídica. [...] Siendo, por tanto, la seguridad jurídica una forma de la justicia, la contradicción de la justicia con la seguridad jurídica es un conflicto de la justicia consigo misma. Por eso, este conflicto no puede ser resuelto de manera unívoca. Se trata de una cuestión de grado: donde la injusticia del derecho positivo alcance un grado tal que la seguridad jurídica garantizada por el derecho positivo no tenga ya ninguna importancia frente a tal injusticia: en ese caso el derecho positivo injusto ha de (retro)ceder ante la justicia. Sin embargo, por regla general, la seguridad jurídica que confiere el derecho positivo justificará también, precisamente en cuanto forma menor de la justicia, la validez del derecho positivo injusto” 32. En efecto, “aunque no satisfaga las exigencias de la justicia o de la adecuación a fin, la ley positiva siempre realiza un valor: la seguridad jurídica. Ahora bien, la seguridad jurídica es sólo un valor entre otros. La seguridad jurídica garantizada mediante el derecho positivo pierde este valor en el caso de una ley injusta cuya injusticia alcance tal nivel que la seguridad jurídica garantizada por el derecho positivo pierda toda su importancia. Por ello, así como en la mayoría de los casos la validez del derecho positivo puede justificarse mediante la seguridad jurídica, en ciertos casos excepcionales de leyes enormemente injustas subsiste la posibilidad de denegar la validez de tales leyes a causa de su injusticia”33
  La “tesis de la injusticia extrema” es a su vez un elemento clave, según Robert Alexy, para diferenciar los distintos tipos de filosofías del derecho no positivistas como, por ejemplo, la de Kant. Alexy enumera tres formas fundamentales de no positivismo jurídico, y esta enumeración resulta muy útil para situar la lectura que realiza Julius Ebbinghaus de la filosofía del derecho de Kant. Estas tres formas fundamentales de no-positivismo jurídico implican a su vez tres modos distintos de valorar
  “el efecto que los defectos o deméritos morales tienen sobre la validez jurídica. Puede suceder que se pierda la validez jurídica en todos los casos, o que ella se pierda en algunos casos y no
  
  31 Ibidem.
  32 Radbruch 1959, pp. 32-33 (Trad. Seoane 2002, p. 770)
  33 Seoane 2002, p. 771
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  se pierda en otros y, finalmente, puede suceder que la validez jurídica no se afecte de ninguna manera”34.
  La primera posición defiende que todo defecto normativo del derecho positivo implica su invalidez jurídica. Esta es la versión más radical del no-positivismo jurídico, a la que Alexy caracteriza como “no-positivismo excluyente” con el fin de expresar la idea de que todos y cada uno de los defectos normativos del derecho positivo excluyen la validez jurídica del mismo. A pesar de que Kelsen se refiere a esta posición iusnaturalista como paradigma del no-positivismo jurídico35, en realidad, esta posición no constituye más que “la versión más radical del no-positivismo, versión que sólo raramente se encuentra en la literatura”36. Esta posición no puede atribuirse de ningún modo a la filosofía del derecho de Kant.
  La segunda posición, que Alexy, a diferencia de Ebbinghaus, no atribuye a la filosofía del derecho de Kant, es el “no positivismo incluyente”; se trata, por así decirlo de una posición intermedia en virtud de la cual los defectos normativos del derecho casi nunca socavan la validez jurídica del derecho positivo, salvo en situaciones de extrema injusticia. Como acabamos de ver en el caso de la “fórmula de Radbruch”, bajo este punto de vista,
  “los defectos morales socavan la validez jurídica si y sólo si se traspasa el umbral de la injusticia extrema. Por debajo de este umbral, los efectos de los defectos morales se confinan a atribuir al derecho una carácter [meramente] defectuoso”37.
  El no-positivismo incluyente es un modo de iusnaturalismo que afirma, por tanto, que la injusticia extrema no es derecho. De acuerdo con esta posición, los defectos morales de las leyes positivas socavan su validez jurídica si y sólo si el umbral de la extrema injusticia se transgrede. “La injusticia por debajo de este umbral se considera parte del concepto de derecho, y se acepta como derecho válido pero defectuoso”38. Como veremos tras este apartado, Ebbinghaus establece dicho umbral en la violación del derecho de la humanidad (Recht der Menschheit) que constituye un límite último para el poder estatal39.
  
  34 Alexy 2008, p. 81
  35 En efecto, en el „Apéndice“ de la segunda edición de la Teoría pura del derecho de 1960, Kelsen recurre en numerosas ocasiones a la siguiente idea: “desde el punto de vista de la teoría del derecho natural se enjuicia al derecho positivo como justo o injusto, y con arreglo a ella el derecho positivo sólo tiene validez cuando él se corresponde al derecho natural que constituye un valor absoluto de justicia. Supongamos, que una norma contraria al derecho natural no puede ser considerada como una norma válida. Si la norma del derecho positivo sólo tiene validez en la medida en que se corresponde al derecho natural, entonces lo que tiene validez en la norma del derecho positivo sólo es el derecho natural. De hecho, esta es la consecuencia de una teoría del derecho natural que afirma la validez del derecho natural junto al derecho positivo o sobre él y que por tanto pone el fundamento de validez del derecho positivo en ese derecho natural. Esto significa en realidad, que según esta teoría solamente puede considerarse como válido al derecho natural y no al derecho positivo como tal” (Kelsen 1960, p. 359)
  36 Alexy 2008, p. 81
  37 Alexy 2008, p. 83
  38 Alexy 2013b, p. 18
  39 Véase: Ebbinghaus 1986 (1953), pp. 367-376
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  Según Alexy, la tercera y última posición dentro de la tradición iusnaturalista es el “no- positivismo súper-incluyente” como contrapartida del positivismo excluyente. En este sentido,
  “el no-positivismo súper-incluyente va hacia el otro extremo, es decir, esta corriente teórica sostiene que la validez jurídica no se ve afectada de ninguna manera por cualquier defecto moral”40.
  A primera vista, y como ha sugerido Jeremy Waldron, esta posición super-incluyente permitiría interpretar la filosofía del derecho de Kant bajo la óptica del positivismo normativo41. El no-positivismo súper-incluyente representa, sin lugar a dudas, “el más alto grado concebible de inclusión que puede ostentar un no-positivismo”42. La cuestión central a dirimir es, por tanto, el modo como Kant justifica el derecho positivo y el tratamiento que hace de sus presuntos defectos morales.
  El lugar sistemático donde Kant aborda el valor interno del derecho positivo es precisamente en su análisis del “estado de naturaleza jurídico”43. El estado de naturaleza es un estado donde los conflictos se solucionan a partir de la fuerza privada de cada individuo, o lo que es lo mismo, sin la intervención de la “fuerza pública” del Estado. Si se da un conflicto en el mencionado escenario “cada uno es su propio juez”44, ya que en él no hay ninguna instancia pública que permita dirimir los conflictos. La instauración de un ordenamiento jurídico deja atrás el mencionado estado de naturaleza y permite solucionar los conflictos de una manera jurídicamente reglada. No obstante, Alexy clasifica el iusnaturalismo de Kant como un “no-positivismo súper-incluyente” no sólo en virtud del deber jurídico de abandonar el estado de naturaleza, sino también por el deber igualmente incondicional de no abandonar el estado civil una vez que se ha superado el mencionado estado de naturaleza jurídico con la instauración de un orden jurídico-positivo. En este sentido, y por este motivo, recusar la validez del derecho positivo en virtud de sus presuntos defectos normativo no sería sino retroceder a un estado de naturaleza, cuyo abandono es presentado por Kant como un deber jurídico incondicional.
3. La “tesis de la injusticia extrema” y la filosofía del derecho de Kant
El rechazo kantiano de la “fórmula de Radbruch” a partir de lo dicho, puede formularse del siguiente modo: poner en duda la validez del derecho positivo a partir de su presunta incorrección moral no sería sino volver a un estado prejurídico que precisamente se debe superar por medio de la instauración del derecho positivo. Ebbinghaus, siguiendo la fórmula de Radbruch, intenta, sin embargo, hacer plausible con las premisas de la Doctrina del derecho de Kant y en particular a partir del contenido normativo del derecho de la humanidad (Recht der Menschheit) la tesis del “no positivismo incluyente” en virtud de la

40 Alexy 2013b, p. 17
41 Cf. Waldron 1996, pp. 1535-1566.
42 Alexy 2008, p. 85
43 RGV AA 06: 95
44 Ibidem.
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cual la “injusticia extrema” no puede ser considerada derecho. Una ley sólo pierde su carácter jurídico cuando a través de ella la contradicción entre el derecho y la moral alcanza una medida “intolerable” o “extrema”45. En este sentido,
“lo característico de la fórmula de Radbruch es que no exige una coincidencia completa entre el derecho y la moral. Permite que el derecho promulgado y eficaz - Radbruch habla del Derecho "asegurado por el estatuto y el poder"- sea también válido cuando es injusto, y en absoluto exige una orientación de la totalidad del derecho hacia la moral. Más bien, incorpora al derecho un límite extremo”46.
Lo que está en juego en la “fórmula de Radbruch” es básicamente la idea de que en los casos de conflicto entre justicia y seguridad jurídica se debe conferir
“prioridad a la seguridad jurídica y sólo en casos extremos invertir esta jerarquía. A esto puede oponerse sólo quien considere que la seguridad jurídica es un principio absoluto algo que, como toda adhesión a un principio absoluto, contiene una dosis de fanatismo.”47.
Pues bien, Ebbinghaus recurre en sus escritos (tras la Segunda Guerra Mundial) al argumento de la “injusticia extrema” para defender con argumentos kantianos la necesidad de rechazar una tal prioridad ilimitada del derecho positivo, cuando las leyes puestas en vigor por la autoridad pública se revelen extremadamente injustas.
El camino argumental que recorre Ebbinghaus para defender esta tesis parte de un minucioso análisis del derecho de la humanidad como clave normativa para diferenciar la injusticia legal de los casos de extrema injusticia o las “injusticias legales” de los crímenes contra la humanidad o delitos de “lesa humanidad”. Esta distinción tiene, por supuesto, consecuencias jurídicas intraestatales dentro del “derecho estatal” (Staatsrecht) de la “Doctrina del derecho” de Kant, y también dentro del “derecho de gentes” (Völkerrecht), en éste último caso con vistas a discernir distintos grados de crímenes de guerra. A partir de ello, Ebbinghaus describe el nacionalsocialismo y sus leyes no como la simple violación de la justicia, “sino como una violación de la propia humanidad en la persona de las víctimas”48. ¿Qué quiere decir con ello esto? y ¿qué constituye una lesión de la humanidad en la persona de las víctimas?49
La reformulación de Ebbinghaus de la “fórmula de Radbruch” descansa en la siguiente distinción: las leyes injustas o los actos injustos del poder legislativo no pueden ser justificados a la luz del derecho de la humanidad, esto es, como procedimientos jurídicos para asegurar universalmente el derecho originario a la libertad de todos los seres humanos. Al no poder ser justificados desde este punto de vista, se muestran como una decisión arbitraria del legislador que, empero, no priva a sus destinatarios de su

45 Cf. Alexy 2013a, p. 53
46 Alexy 2001, p. 76
47 Alexy 2013a, p. 58
48 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1953), p. 373
49 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1953), p. 20

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humanidad. Dicho de otro modo, por muy arbitrarias que puedan ser las “leyes injustas”, su promulgación no sobrepasa la competencia del poder estatal como autoridad jurídica última dentro de una determinado territorio, porque no privan a sus destinatarios de su humanidad. En este sentido, las leyes injustas a pesar de ser deficitarias moralmente no dejan por ello de ser derecho válido. Sólo a partir de un determinado umbral, es decir, sólo cuando privan a sus destinatarios de su humanidad, pierden su carácter jurídico.
Una dificultad de la fórmula de Radbruch reside en que determinar

“dónde [y cuándo] comienza el umbral de la injusticia insoportable [...]. El propio Radbruch admite que resulta complicado establecer la frontera entre las normas injustas, pero todavía jurídicas, y las insoportablemente injustas”50.
La respuesta de Ebbinghaus a esta cuestión es la siguiente: hay leyes y actos del legislativo

“que carecen de legalidad alguna, porque su legalidad implicaría que era legalmente imposible para las personas afectadas actuar legalmente. Quizá esto suene algo misterioso, así que me apresuro a explicarlo. No puede haber ninguna ley positiva, por ejemplo, que niegue a determinadas personas todo derecho a adquirir propiedad. Una ley de este tipo imposibilitaría que estas personas usaran las cosas legalmente. Ahora bien, si todo uso que hagan de las cosas es ilegal, todo el mundo tendrá derecho a impedir que usen las cosas. Esto implica, evidentemente, que su libertad para usar las cosas ha perdido todo su poder legal para restringir la libertad de los demás con respecto al mismo uso. Y por lo tanto, en este sentido, han perdido su condición de seres humanos y han sido reducidos a la condición de meros objetos”51.
Esta respuesta representa el rechazo de la “tesis de la separación” del positivismo jurídico, cuyo más claro exponente es H. Kelsen y su defensa de que cualquier contenido puede llegar a convertirse en derecho válido. Kelsen ilustra y amplía esta idea en un conocido y polémico pasaje de la Teoría pura del derecho de 1960 donde realiza la siguiente afirmación:
“según el derecho de los estados totalitarios, el gobierno está facultado para encerrar en campos de concentración a las personas de convicciones, religión o raza indeseadas y puede obligarlas a hacer cualquier clase de trabajo, el que sea, incluso puede matarlas. Por más que moralmente tales medidas se juzguen en extremo repudiables, no se las puede considerar como externas al orden jurídico de dichos estados”52.
Pero, precisamente, matar personas en campos de concentración por razones tales como el rechazo a sus convicciones, la religión o la raza es un claro caso de injusticia extrema en el que se supera el umbral de la injusticia soportable. Con estas medidas se lesiona el derecho a la humanidad de dichas personas, de modo que “las normas que permiten a las autoridades legales hacer tales cosas, no pueden ser derecho válido” 53. A través de la

50 Cabra 2005, p. 146
51 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1953), p. 374
52 Kelsen 2011b, p. 92
53 Alexy 2013b, p. 21
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defensa de la “tesis de la separación” el positivismo jurídico consiguió, según Ebbinghaus, hacer “jurídicamente indefensa a la humanidad frente al uso coactivo arbitrario [del poder del Estado]”54
6. Injusticia jurídica versus delitos de lesa humanidad

Para Ebbinghaus,

“el derecho es aquella ley bajo la cual sólo la voluntad de todos los hombres puede concordar en la unidad de una voluntad única [...]. La humanidad misma, pensada como sujeto de esta voluntad universal, es la que hace necesaria para cada uno la limitación de su libertad a las condiciones de su concordancia legal con la de todos los otros. Pero precisamente en esta capacidad puramente ideal, o en la capacidad de la humanidad, de limitar por medio de su voluntad (en la idea) la libertad de cada hombre a las condiciones de su concordancia con la de todos los otros según leyes - en ella hemos encontrado [...] el derecho como derecho de la humanidad”55.
A partir del derecho de la humanidad se sigue, según Ebbinghaus, un derecho subjetivo de cada ser humano a la libertad y “este derecho de la humanidad en su persona es su derecho originario, innato, inalienable e irrenunciable”56.
La violación de este derecho es el criterio, según Ebbinghaus, para diferenciar una injusticia legal de una injusticia extrema, umbral a partir del cual las normas de un sistema jurídico pierden su carácter jurídico. Las leyes positivas que violan el derecho de la humanidad
“son las leyes que reducen a los hombres a la condición de objetos materiales [...]. Se comete el mismo tipo de violación en una ley que anula el derecho de determinadas personas a entablar contratos legalmente vinculantes para los demás; y también en cualquier ley que condene a los hombres a muerte por su credo religioso o su origen racial. Por tanto, resulta también evidente que tales leyes niegan a las personas implicadas toda posibilidad de acciones legales. Y en el último ejemplo, la negación es particularmente monstruosa, puesto que lo que se niega es la posibilidad legal de la vida misma. Su misma vida se ilegaliza porque los actos por los que podría legalizarse está fuera de su alcance. Es tan imposible para la voluntad de un hombre convencerse de aquello en lo que no cree, como lo es cambiar su origen racial. Por tanto, dichas personas están condenadas a muerte incondicionalmente; puesto que están privadas, por

54 Ebbinghaus 1988 (1960), p. 245. Respecto a las objeciones, tanto históricas como normativas, de atribuir dicha indefensión al positivismo jurídico, véase: García Amado, Juan Antonio (1991): "Nazismo, Derecho y Filosofía del Derecho", en: Anuario de Filosofía del Derecho n° 8, pp. 341-364; Dreier, Horst (2007):
„Naturrecht und Rechtspositivismus. Pauschalurteile, Vorurteile, Fehlurteile“, en: „Vom Rechte, das mit uns geboren ist“ (Eds.) Wilfried Härle y Bernhard Vogel, Freiburg-Basel-Wien, Herder; Sandkühler, Hans Jörg (2015): Nach dem Unrecht. Plädoyer für einen neuen Rechtspositivismus, Freiburg / München, Verlag Karl Alber.
55 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1952), p. 353-354
56 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1952), p. 354
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principio, de todo poder para restringir la libertad de los demás de una manera que les permita vivir entre ellos”57
Estas leyes positivas, a diferencia de lo que defiende el positivismo jurídico, han de considerarse como pseudo-leyes, ya que están en directa contradicción con el derecho de la humanidad, que constituye “la fuente de todos los derechos posibles de los hombres”58. El derecho a la humanidad es el único derecho que toda persona dispone de manera originaria, intransferible e irrenunciable y que, por tanto, antecede a todo derecho estatal posible. Se trata del derecho de las personas a ser tratadas como personas jurídicas. La cosificación jurídica de las mismas se realiza, cuando seres humanos son penalizados jurídicamente por sus rasgos empíricos o por sus convicciones internas. En tanto que fuente de todos los derechos posibles, el derecho de la humanidad puede entenderse bajo el dictum de H. Arendt, con arreglo al cual sólo hay “un único derecho humano: a saber, el derecho a tener derecho”59.
En tanto que fuente de todos los derechos posibles, el derecho de la humanidad legitima pero también restringe el poder del Estado, ya que exige la salida del estado de naturaleza jurídico, pero también convierte en una “nada jurídica” todos los actos y leyes que le contradigan. En este último caso, tanto en el ámbito jurisdiccional, como en el ámbito conductual, desaparece el deber de obedecer tales leyes, porque en el fondo no son más que pseudo-leyes. Leyendo la filosofía del derecho de Kant desde el derecho de la humanidad, Ebbinghaus afirma que el deber de obedecer leyes injustas no es puesto con ello en tela de juicio, sino únicamente el deber de obedecer pseudo-leyes que violen dicho derecho.
Este decaimiento del deber de obediencia descansa, pues, en la profunda diferencia, que hay
“entre un acto de injusticia y un acto de inhumanidad. Sólo en el último caso, los que detentan el poder del Estado rebasan sus competencias como tales. Esto no significa que el Estado tenga la competencia legal de actuar injustamente, sólo significa que tiene la competencia legal de exigir obediencia a una orden incluso cuando ésta se considere injusta. Aquí debemos recordar los argumentos por los que probamos que esta competencia no depende de la justicia. En el caso de un acto de inhumanidad, en cambio, no puede exigir legítimamente la obediencia”60.
El derecho de la humanidad es el elemento normativo que permite distinguir, algo que el positivismo jurídico desconoce, a saber, la injusticia jurídica de los delitos contra la humanidad o de lesa humanidad. Según Ebbinghaus. el positivismo jurídico no dispone

57 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1953), p. 374
58 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1952), p. 354
59 Arendt 1986, p. 614. Véase Horn 2014, pp. 113-114 y Sánchez Madrid 2013, pp. 496 y ss.
60 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1953), pp. 374-375
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de medio alguno para la fundamentación de un derecho del hombre contra el poder estatal. Es una simple conclusión lógica del concepto de aquel positivismo mismo. Porque lo único que este dice es [...], que los hombres, en sus derechos posibles unos frente a otros, dependen del presupuesto de un poder soberano, a cuya coacción están sometidos todos en común, sin resistencia posible”61.
Si el positivismo jurídico tuviera razón, esto es,

“si pudiese haber leyes estatales que estén en contradicción con el derecho de la humanidad, y no obstante sean vinculantes, entonces esto significaría que no habría de ninguna manera un derecho de la humanidad.”62
Por último, Ebbinghaus coincide con Radbruch, en que el

“nacionalsocialismo [...] lesionó absolutamente todos los principios del derecho y puso de manifiesto todos los modos posibles de injusticia jurídica (Unrecht). El nacionalsocialismo hizo de un estado de derecho, tal y como él lo encontró, un estado de derecho injusto (Unrechtsstaat) en el pleno sentido del término. La forma más peligrosa de injusticia (Unrecht) es la injusticia que adopta la forma de la ley, esto es: la injusticia jurídica (das gesetzliche Unrecht)”63.
Para ambos autores el nacionalsocialismo produjo una perversión completa del derecho a través de la violación sistemática del derecho de la humanidad suprimiendo a través de pseudo-leyes la personalidad jurídica de numerosos ciudadanos alemanes y extranjeros.
En tanto que violaciones masivas del derecho de la humanidad, los dispositivos legales del nacionalsocialismo que violaron dicho derecho no tuvieron ni pudieron tener el carácter de ley, ya que contenían una imposibilidad jurídica (eine gesetzliche Unmöglichkeit) para sus destinatarios64, de modo que frente a ellos no existía el más mínimo deber de obediencia. Por medio de sus medidas criminales el régimen nacionalsocialista reinstauró un estado de naturaleza político incondicionalmente prohibido en la filosofía del derecho de Kant. La barbarie nacionalsocialista supuso a nivel histórico un restablecimiento del estado de naturaleza jurídico, tanto por lo que respecta al “derecho estatal”, como por lo que respecta al “derecho de gentes” 65. De hecho, la Alemania nacionalsocialista ofrece uno de los escasos ejemplos históricos de lo que Kant denomina en el famoso § 60 de la “Doctrina del derecho” “enemigo injusto” por querer perpetuar y negarse a abandonar el estado de naturaleza interestatal66. En virtud de este acontecimiento histórico, Ebbinghaus afirma que

61 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1952), p. 349
62 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1952), p. 363
63 Radbruch 2003, p. 194
64 Vgl. Ebbinghaus 1986 (1952), p. 362
65 Cubo 2017, pp. 281-291
66 A este respecto Kant afirma lo siguiente: „qué es un enemigo injusto según los conceptos del derecho de gentes, en el que cada Estado es juez en su propia causa, como ocurre en general en el estado de naturaleza? Es aquél cuya voluntad públicamente expresada (sea de palabra o de obra) denota una máxima según la cual, si se convirtiera en regla universal, sería imposible un estado de paz entre los pueblos y tendría que perpetuarse el estado de naturaleza” MS AA 006: 349
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“desde 1933 nosotros, los alemanes, hemos tenido muchos motivos para reflexionar acerca del derecho de la humanidad y los límites del poder del Estado”67, ya que lo que los alemanes violaron durante el nacionalsocialismo fue precisamente el derecho de la humanidad.68
1. Referencias bibliográficas sobre Julius Ebbinghaus
  1. Escritos de Julius Ebbinghaus (resumen)
    - Ebbinghaus, Julius (1986): Sittlichkeit und Recht. Praktische Philosophie 1929- 1954. Bd. 1. Bonn, Bouvier Verlag.
    - Ebbinghaus, Julius (1988): Philosophie der Freiheit. Praktische Philosophie 1955 – 1972. Bd.2. Bonn, Bouvier Verlag.
    - Ebbinghaus, Julius (1990): Interpretation und Kritik. Schriften zur Theoretischen Philosophie und zur Philosophiegeschichte 1924 - 1972. Bd. 3. Bonn, Bouvier Verlag.
    - Ebbinghaus, Julius (1994): Studien zum Deutschen Idealismus. Schriften 1909 – 1924. Bd. 4. Bonn, Bouvier Verlag.
    - Ebbinghaus, Julius (2013): Philosophische Studien aus dem Nachlaß. Würzburg, Verlag Königshausen & Neumann.
  2. Literatura secundaria
- Alexy, R. (2001): “Una defensa de la fórmula de Radbruch”, Anuario da Facultade de Dereito da Universidade da Coruña n° 12, pp. 75-95.
- Alexy, R. (2008): El concepto y la naturaleza del derecho. Marcial Pons, Madrid.
- Alexy, R. (2013a): El concepto y la validez del derecho. Gedisa, Barcelona.
- Alexy, R. (2013b): “El no positivismo incluyente”, DOXA, Cuadernos de Filosofía del derecho n° 36, pp. 15-23
- Alexy, R. (2016): La institucionalización de la justicia. Comares, Granada.
- Arendt, H. (1986): Elemente und Ursprünge totaler Herrschaft, München.
- Baum, M. (2007): “Recht und Ethik in Kants praktischer Philosophie”, en: Jürgen Stolzenberg (Ed.): Kant in der Gegenwart. Berlin, De Gruyter.
- Brandt, R. (1974): Eigentumstheorien von Grotius bis Kant. Friedrich Frommann Verlag, Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt.
67 Ebbinghaus 1986 (1953), p. 367
68 Cf. Ebbinghaus 1986 (1953), p. 375
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Cabra Apalategui, J. M. (2005): “La concepción no positivista del Derecho de Robert Alexy”, en: Anuario de Filosofía del Derecho, pp. 131- 153
Cubo, O. (2017): “Ebbinghaus´ Auseinandersetzung mit dem Begriff des Unrechtsstaats. Überlegungen im Anschluss an Kant und Kelsen”, en: D. Hüning/B. Dörflinger/B. Kruck (Hrsg.), Das Verhältnis von Recht und Ethik in Kants praktischer Philosophie, Hildesheim, Olms, 2017, pp. 287-306.
-Cubo, O. (2013): “Kants normatives Modell der Demokratie”, en: Dieter Hüning / Stefan Klingner / Carsten Olk (Eds.): Das Leben der Vernunft. Beiträge zur Philosophie Kants, De Gruyter, pp. 416-435.
Dreier, H. (2007): “Naturrecht und Rechtspositivismus. Pauschalurteile, Vorurteile, Fehlurteile“, en: Wilfried Härle y Bernhard Vogel (Eds.): „Vom Rechte, das mit uns geboren ist“, Herder, Freiburg-Basel-Wien.
Dreier, R. (1986): Rechtsbegriff und Rechtsidee. Kants Rechtsbegriff und seine Bedeutung für die gegenwärtige Situation. Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main.
García Amado, J. A. (1991): "Nazismo, Derecho y Filosofia del Derecho", Anuario de Filosofia del Derecho n° 8, pp. 341-364
Geismann, G. (1974): Ethik und Herrschaftsordnung, J.C.B.Mohr (Paul Siebeck), Tübingen.
Georg G. / Hariolf O. (Eds.) (1986): Kant und das Recht der Lüge, Königshausen & Neumann
Georg G. (2002): “Die Formeln des kategorischen Imperativs nach H. J. Paton, Klaus Reich und Julius Ebbinghaus”, Kant-Studien n° 93, pp. 374-384
Geismann, G. (2009): Kant und kein Ende. Bd. 1. Studien zur Moral-, Religions-, und Geschichtsphilosophie. Verlag Königshausen-Neumann, Würzburg.
Geismann, G. (2010): Kant und kein Ende. Bd. 2. Studien zur Rechtsphilosophie. Verlag Königshausen-Neumann, Würzburg.
Hart, H.L.A. (1962): Derecho y moral. Depalma, Buenos Aires.
Hart, H.L.A. (2012): El concepto de derecho. Abeledo-Perrot, Buenos Aires.
Herb, K. (1989): “Das Julius-Ebbinghaus-Archiv: Forschungsbericht über ein Projekt der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft”, Kant-Studien 80, pp. 345-353.
Höffe, O. (1990): Kategorische Rechtsprinzipien. Ein Kontrapunkt der Moderne. Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main.
Höffe, O. (2013): “Antropología y metafísica en el concepto categórico del derecho de Kant: una interpretación de los parágrafos B y C de la Teoría del derecho”, Eunomía. Revista en Cultura de la Legalidad n°5, pp. 3-16

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- Horn, Ch. (2014): Nichtideale Normativität. Ein neuer Blick auf Kants politische Philosophie. Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main.
- Hüning, D. / Michel, K. / Thomas, A. (2004): Aufklärung durch Kritik. Festschrift für Manfred Baum zum 65. Geburtstag. Berlin, Duncker & Humblot.
- Joerden, J. C. (2008): Staatswesen und rechtsstaatlicher Anspruch. Ethische Fragestellungen zwischen Recht und Politik, Duncker & Humblot, Berlín.
- Kant, I. (1902 ff: Gesammelte Schriften. Hrsg. von der preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, der deutschen Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin; ab Bd. XXIV Hrsg. von der Akademie der Wissenschaften der DDR u. d. Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen, Berlin.
- Kaufmann, A. (1972): Widerstandsrecht. Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt.
- Kelsen, H. (1960): Reine Rechtslehre. Mit einem Anhang: Das Problem der Gerechtigkeit. Verlag Franz Deuticke, Viena.
- Kelsen, H. (2011a): Teoría pura del derecho (1934), Trotta, Madrid.
- Kelsen, H. (2011b): Teoría pura del derecho (1960), Colihue, Argentina.
- Kersting, W. (1997): Recht, Gerechtigkeit und demokratische Tugend. Abhandlungen zur praktischen Philosophie der Gegenwart. Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main.
- Kersting, W. (2004): Kant über Recht. Mentis, Paderborn.
- Kersting, W. (2007): Wohlgeordnete Freiheit. Immanuel Kants Rechts- und Staatsphilosophie. Mentis, Paderborn.
- Langer, C. (1986): Reform nach Prinzipien. Untersuchungen zur politischen Theorie Immanuel Kants. Klett-Kotta, Stuttgart.
- Martínez Bretones, V. (1994): La filosofía del Derecho de Gustav Radbruch, Fragua, Madrid.
- Oncina, F. (2008): “Derecho político y derecho a la política en el Fichte de Jena”, en: Jean Ch. Goddard y J. Rivera de Rosales (Eds.): Fichte et la politique, pp. 177-193
- Mosayebi, R. (2013): Das Minimum der reinen praktischen Vernunft. Vom kategorischen Imperativ zum allgemeinen Rechtsprinzip bei Kant. De Gruyter, Berlin/Boston.
- Paton, H. J. (1971): Categorical Imperative: A Study in Kant's Moral Philosophy, University of Pennsylvania Press.
- Pogge, T. (2011): “Es la Rechtslehre de Kant un “liberalismo comprehensivo”?, en D. M. Granja Castro / T. Santiago Oropeza (Eds.): Moral y Derecho, pp. 229-268.
- Radbruch, G. (1959): Vorschule der Rechtsphilosophie, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen.
- Radbruch, G. (2003): Rechtsphilosophie. Müller, Heidelberg.
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Ripstein, A. (2009): Force and Freedom: Kant's Legal and Political Philosophy. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mss. / London.
Sánchez Madrid, N. (2013): “Crisis del Estado-nación y dialéctica de los derechos humanos en Hannah Arendt. El totalitarismo como colapso de las formas políticas”, Isegoría 47, pp. 481-507.
Sandkühler, H. J. (2015): Nach dem Unrecht. Plädoyer für einen neuen Rechtspositivismus, Verlag Karl Alber, Freiburg / München.
Seoane, J. A.(2002): “La doctrina clásica de la lex iniusta y la fórmula de Radbruch. Un ensayo de comparación”, Anuario da Facultade de Dereito n° 6, pp. 761-790.
Strauss, L. (1997): “Besprechung von Julius Ebbinghaus. Über die Fortschritte der Metaphysik (1931) ”, en: Gesammelte Schriften, Metzler, Stuttgart.
Tretter, F. (1997): “Willkürfreiheit, Freiheit, Recht und Rechtsgültigkeit bei Kant”. En:
H. Oberer (Ed.): Kant. Analysen-Probleme-Kritik. Bd. III, pp. 201-292.
Tilitzki, Ch. (2002): Die Universitätsphilosophie in der Weimarer Republik und im Nationalsozialismus, Akademie-Verlag, Berlín.
Unruh, P. (1993): Die Herrschaft der Vernunft. Zur Staatsphilosophie Immanuel Kant. Nomos, Baden-Baden.
Waldron, J. (1996): “Kant’s Legal Positivism”, Harvard Law Review 109, pp. 1535-1566.
Wawrzinek, C. (2011): Die „wahre Republik“ und das „Bündel von Kompromissen“: Die Staatsphilosophie Immanuel Kants im Vergleich mit der Theorie des amerikanischen Federalist. Duncker & Humblot, Berlín.
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La ley de la humanidad y los límites del poder estatal 1

The Law of Humanity and the Limits of State Power

JULIUS EBBINGHAUS

Universidad de Marburgo, Alemania

CRISTINA GÓMEZ BAGGETHUN / ÓSCAR CUBO UGARTE 

Universidad de Oslo, Noruega / Universitat de València, España

Resumen

El presente texto traduce por primera vez al castellano «La ley de la humanidad y los límites del poder estatal», a partir de la edición de la editorial Bouvier: Julius Ebbinghaus, Sittlichkeit und Recht. Praktische Philosophie 1929-1954 (pp. 367 – 376). La traducción está antecedida por un estudio sobre Julius Ebbinghaus y su interpretación de la filosofía del derecho de Kant. En este ensayo clásico de 1953, Julius Ebbinghaus ofrece una clara articulación de las líneas fundamentales de la doctrina del derecho de Kant. Por un lado, hace patente que el sistema de la libertad política en Kant sólo puede garantizarse con un sistema legal positivo; por otro lado, y frente al positivismo jurídico, sitúa los límites de la dominación política en la ley de la humanidad. Las consecuencias normativas de dicho derecho se ponen de manifiesto en caso de injustica extrema, cuyo ejemplo paradigmático lo ofrece la Alemania Nacionalsocialista. A partir la ley de la humanidad, Julius Ebbinghaus ofrece una justificación kantiana del concepto de delitos de lesa humanidad.

Palabras clave

Ley de la humanidad; Libertad; Ética; Coacción; Positivismo jurídico

1 Fuente: “The Law of Humanity and the Limits of State Power”: en Julius Ebbinghaus Sittlichkeit und Recht. Praktische Philosophie 1929-1954. Bouvier Verlag Herbert Grundmann, pp. 367 – 376

Cristina Gómez Baggethun, University of Oslo. E-mail de contacto: c.g.baggethun@ilos.uio.no; Óscar Cubo Ugarte, Universitat de València. E-mail de contacto: oscar.cubo@uv.es

[Recibido: 10 de febrero 2017

Aceptado: 20 de marzo 2017]

Julius Ebbinghaus

Abstract

This paper offers the first Spanish version of “The Law of Humanity and the Limits of State Power” and is translated from the edition of the publishing house Bouvier: Julius Ebbinghaus, Sittlichkeit und Recht. Praktische Philosophie 1929-1954 (367 – 376). Our translation is preceded by a study of Ebbinghaus´s interpretation of Kant´s Philosophy of Law. This classical essay published by Ebbinghaus in 1953 provides a clear articulation of the outlines of Kant´s Doctrine of Right. He articulates the idea of political freedom and Kant´s argument that it can only be guaranteed by a legal system. He then contrasts this view with a version of legal positivism and places the limits of political domination in the law of humanity. The normative consequences of this law are evident in cases of extreme injustice, that have their paradigmatic example in National Socialist Germany. Based on the law of humanity, Julius Ebbinghaus offers a Kantian justification of the concept of crimes against humanity.

Keywords

Law of Humanity; Freedom; Ethics; Coercion; Legal Positivism

* * *

Desde 1933, los alemanes hemos tenido muchos motivos para reflexionar acerca de la ley humanidad2 y los límites del poder del Estado. Pero esta reflexión conduce a veces a una conclusión con la que nos hemos familiarizado en Alemania durante los últimos diez años, a saber, que nuestra obligación real no era tanto la de reflexionar sobre la humanidad y el poder del Estado como la de mantener el poder de nuestro líder dentro de sus justos límites, y que fracasamos a la hora de cumplir con esta obligación. A esta acusación cabe añadir la de que los pensadores alemanes cometen tradicionalmente el error de olvidar que las instituciones políticas no viven conforme a la teoría, sino conforme las acciones de sus miembros. Podríamos decir que ni siquiera un catedrático puede contentarse con las sutilezas de la teoría y, por lo demás, aceptar el mundo tal como vaya. No es la teoría la que realmente puede limitar el poder del Estado. Si pudiera, sólo cabría lamentarse de lo inefectiva que ésta resultó cuando tanto necesitamos su eficacia.

2 La expresión usada por Ebbinghaus en inglés es the law of humanity. Como se sabe, el inglés tiene una sola palabra, law, para referirse a lo que en castellano expresamos con dos. Por un lado, la palabra «derecho», como en «derecho internacional» y, por el otro, la palabra «ley», como en «ley de la memoria histórica». El alemán, por su parte, distingue como el castellano entre Recht y Gesetz [derecho y ley] y, en sus escritos en esa lengua, Ebbinghaus emplea la expresión Recht der Menschheit [derecho de la humanidad]. A pesar de ello, hemos decidido traducir the law of humanity por «la ley de la humanidad», porque consideramos que esta opción es la que proporciona mayor coherencia interna al texto, sobre todo en los pasajes en los que Ebbinghaus contrapone the law of humanity [la ley de la humanidad] y the law of justice [la ley de la justicia]. Sin embargo, el lector deberá tener en cuenta esta ambigüedad y recordar que, en ocasiones, usamos la palabra «ley» para referirnos a lo que en realidad es un «conjunto de preceptos y normas», a saber, lo que normalmente llamamos en castellano «derecho» [N. de los T.].

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS

356 International Journal of Philosophy

N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 355-365

ISSN: 2386-7655

Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095840

La ley de la humanidad y los límites del poder estatal

Permítaseme responder a esta cuestión no en tanto que alemán, sino en tanto que un catedrático que, al igual que el resto de los catedráticos del mundo, ha dedicado su vida a la teoría. No se puede domar a los tiranos con teorías; pero, evidentemente, tampoco se les doma sin ellas. Si una buena teoría no es capaz de liberar a nadie de las cadenas impuestas por un poder ilimitado, ¿no será que una mala teoría ha ayudado a este poder a deshacerse de sus limitaciones? En los siglos XVII y XVIII, no podría haberse derrocado la autoridad despótica de los monarcas absolutos sin la ayuda de ciertas teorías y, de hecho, fue una teoría de la responsabilidad personal la que guió a los vencedores cuando, en 1945, emprendieron la desnazificación de Alemania. El hecho de que, no sólo en Alemania, sino, al parecer, también en el resto del mundo, haya un cierto descontento con los resultados de este proceso, ¿no podría sugerir ciertas dudas acerca de si la teoría subyacente a la desnazificación era buena, o por lo menos, lo suficientemente rigurosa?

Siempre me ha impresionado que, en los supuestos del denominado positivismo jurídico, no pueda imponerse ninguna restricción legal al poder supremo, ni siquiera en teoría. Esta ausencia de restricciones es una consecuencia lógica de la idea de que no hay más derecho que el derecho civil. Por derecho civil se entiende el derecho establecido por una persona soberana, ya sea individual o colectiva, que posee el poder físico de imponérselo a sus súbditos. El derecho, tal como la concibe el positivismo jurídico, no es un derecho para toda la humanidad, ya que por definición no puede aplicarse a todos los seres humanos. Su universalidad se ve limitada por su propia naturaleza, ya que ha de haber personas, o al menos una persona, exentas de él, personas para las cuales no es válido.

Ahora bien, cabe preguntarse si el principio de la legalidad jurídica, así concebido, es un verdadero principio. A esta pregunta me gustaría responder (14) formulando otra:

¿qué se entiende por un «verdadero principio»? Innegablemente se trata de un principio que se deja pensar, puesto que en la afirmación del positivismo jurídico no hay contradicción alguna. Y tampoco contradice la experiencia. Al contrario, lo que lo caracteriza es que sólo reconoce una base empírica para los derechos humanos. Si una persona tiene un derecho, evidentemente tiene también la potestad de restringir la libertad externa de los demás por la suya. Viajando por el mundo, sólo se encontrará un poder así allá donde las fuerzas del individuo se ven complementadas por la desbordante fuerza de un gobernante supremo. Sin embargo, la experiencia nos enseña también que, en materia moral, los seres humanos no son empiristas por naturaleza. Por ello, en lugar de cuestionar la corrección del principio del positivismo jurídico, prefiero preguntar si no sería posible diseñar un orden verdaderamente universal para la libertad externa entre los hombres. Tal orden es evidentemente concebible. Se trataría de un régimen de libertad externa limitada en la que, en contradicción con el positivismo, la reciprocidad de la limitación sería universal. En virtud de la ley de un sistema de este tipo, nadie tendría la potestad de limitar la libertad del otro sin estar él mismo igualmente limitado por la libertad de los demás. El verdadero significado de una ley de este tipo es que las limitaciones impuestas a la libertad de la humanidad son absolutamente independientes del poder ilimitado, y por ende arbitrario, de cualquiera. Se trata, por tanto, de una ley que por su propia naturaleza

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requiere una determinación legal y no una determinación arbitraria de lo que los hombres son libres de hacer.

Me aventuro a afirmar que cuando alguien habla en general de «su derecho» [his right], es ésta la ley que tiene en mente. Al hablar de esta forma, le da igual si hay o no un poder físico capaz de imponer su reivindicación sobre los demás por medio de su propia libertad ilimitada de acción. Aquello que alguien reivindica como sencillamente su derecho, lo reivindica en referencia a un sistema ideal en el que no se le puede denegar ninguna libertad que no contradiga la determinación universal de la libertad por ley.

Si ahora consideramos más detenidamente la ley de un sistema de este tipo, se percibe fácilmente que, por su propia naturaleza, se trata de la ley de una sociedad común a todos los hombres. El positivismo está muy equivocado al pensar que la idea puramente racional de una ley que hace posible la libertad personal de cada individuo ha de referirse necesariamente a una ley que protege los intereses del individuo frente a la comunidad. Esta ley no protege ningún interés, ni de las personas ni de las comunidades. Ni siquiera protege la libertad, sino que la crea. Y lo hace condicionando la libertad natural no regulada y precaria de los individuos a la posibilidad de unirla legalmente con la libertad de los demás. Al hacer esto, se revela como la única ley en virtud de la cual es posible una sociedad universal y estable común a todos los hombres. La violación de esta ley hace que sea imposible unir las voluntades de los hombres, en relación a su libertad externa, en una voluntad general de la humanidad. Cualquier libertad concedida o asumida contraria a dicha ley sería una libertad para someter la libertad de los otros a mi propio placer. Por consiguiente, cualquier violación de la misma equivale a la posibilidad de la discordia entre los hombres. Porque resulta evidente que la voluntad de un hombre no puede concordar con la voluntad de otro que se proponga mantener la libertad de interferir arbitrariamente en que (15) haga lo que le plazca. Si esto está claro, parece igualmente claro que la ley de una posible armonía entre los hombres por medio de leyes que determinen su libertad externa es, al mismo tiempo, la ley de una comunidad que abarca a todos los hombres. En este sentido, puede denominarse a esta ley la ley de la humanidad.

Por tanto, una persona que se considera a sí misma sujeto de posibles derechos [rights] no habla en tanto que individuo, ni como miembro de un determinado grupo de seres humanos. Habla de sí mismo en tanto que miembro de la comunidad puramente ideal de toda la humanidad.

Se podría decir que todas estas consideraciones son muy abstractas. Ciertamente lo son y pienso que deben serlo. No es culpa del filósofo que los hombres conciban una idea tan abstracta como el acuerdo de las limitaciones recíprocas de su libertad con su posible determinación por leyes. La culpa es de la razón humana. La razón requiere la determinación de lo particular por lo general. Una acción libre entre los hombres ha de ser determinable por leyes generales. Esta idea tan abstracta y, al mismo tiempo, en mi opinión tan simple, es la idea en virtud de la cual la razón ha creado en cada ser humano la convicción indestructible de que él es una persona con derechos frente a las demás personas.

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS

358 International Journal of Philosophy

N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 355-365

ISSN: 2386-7655

Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095840

La ley de la humanidad y los límites del poder estatal

Con esto hemos establecido las bases para una consideración del poder del Estado. Ahora comenzaremos por preguntarnos qué relación podría haber entre la ley de la humanidad, tal como la hemos concebido, y dicho poder. ¿Implica la ley de la humanidad, por sí misma alguna necesidad de poder? Consideremos qué deberes pueden deducirse inmediatamente de nuestra ley. En primer lugar, sería una violación palpable de dicha ley que un hombre sometiera libremente su propia libertad a las órdenes arbitrarias de otro. Si lo hiciera, imposibilitaría la armonía legal entre su propia libertad y la de la persona a la que a que se ha sometido. De modo que, como es obvio, su acción violaría la ley.

En segundo lugar, la ley nos impone el deber de limitar nuestra propia libertad para que concuerde con la libertad legítima de los demás. El hombre que viola los derechos de los demás, repito, es aquél que no ciñe su propia libertad a los límites requeridos para su posible armonía legal con la libertad de los demás. Si ignora por principios estos límites, toma su propio poder material como medida para su trato con los demás, como si estos fueran meras cosas. Y por tanto viola la humanidad en ellos, como en el primer caso violó la humanidad en sí mismo.

Podemos resumir estos dos principios en un doble precepto: no te reduzcas a ti mismo a objeto del poder arbitrario de los demás, ni reduzcas a los demás a objetos del tuyo. Sin embargo, la unión de estos dos principios genera una dificultad real que nos lleva más allá de los límites de la trivialidad analítica. A pesar de que estos dos principios parecen encajar muy bien entre sí, es imposible cumplir ambos incondicionalmente. Esto resulta evidente cuando consideramos el hecho indiscutible de que el hombre que trata legalmente a los demás no tiene ninguna garantía de que los demás vayan a tratarlo a él de la misma manera. En consecuencia, la propia ley lo obliga a asumir una situación contradictoria. Si no está seguro de la norma de conducta de los demás, es perfectamente posible (16) que se reduzca a sí mismo a objeto del placer de los otros, precisamente, al someter la suya a dicha ley. Esto no sólo puede ser así, sino que seguramente será así. Cualquiera que, en conformidad con la ley, se abstenga de someter la libertad de otras personas a su propio poder arbitrario, por este mismo acto hará que su propia libertad dependa del placer de los demás. Y por tanto violará la ley. ¿Qué puede significar esto? Significa, evidentemente, que un estado de cosas en el que el comportamiento legal de un hombre hacia otro no implique necesariamente una legalidad recíproca del comportamiento del otro hacia él, es en sí mismo contrario a derecho. Y lo es porque imposibilita el cumplimiento de la ley. De este modo, hemos sacado a la luz un tercer principio: la propia ley nos obliga a crear un estado de cosas en el que todo aquél que respete la libertad legal de los otros tenga toda la garantía posible de que los demás respetarán la suya. Si ahora nos imaginamos este precepto dado a hombres que no viven en un estado así y nos preguntamos qué pueden hacer para producirlo, la respuesta es clara. Han de someterse a una autoridad común que tenga el poder de imponer las leyes, y cuyo único objetivo sea la garantía universal de sus derechos. La ley requiere el sometimiento a un poder de este tipo. En consecuencia, tenemos que admitir que la ley crea para cada hombre un derecho

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originario a exigir a los demás que se unan con él para someterse a un poder de este tipo. De esta manera se demuestra que no es posible otra soberanía legítima entre los hombres que la de aquella voluntad cuya ley es la garantía universal de los derechos; esto es, la ley de la justicia pública. Todo sometimiento de los hombres que no esté diseñado para garantizar los derechos de todos es injusto, despótico y contrario a la ley de la humanidad.

Quiero insistir, sobre todo en Gran Bretaña, en que esto no es una proclamación del anticuado liberalismo económico. La total libertad de acción económica bien podría ser un instrumento para reducir a los pobres a depender del poder arbitrario de los ricos. En la medida en que tiene este efecto, vulnera el derecho constitucional del poder del Estado y, en esa misma medida, ha de ser limitada por el derecho positivo. Pero el fundamento de dicha limitación no debe buscarse en la benevolencia, y su objetivo no debe ser la felicidad general. La felicidad no es algo que pueda obtenerse a través de leyes generales y, por tanto, no puede ser la finalidad de la legislación del Estado. El único objeto legítimo de la legislación estatal es proteger a todos, por medio de leyes generales, contra el poder arbitrario de cualquiera; y es en virtud de esto, y únicamente por esto, por lo que la legislación pública no tiene sólo el derecho sino también el deber de interferir en la libertad económica.

III

Ya hemos expuesto la ley de la humanidad y hemos derivado de ella la legitimación del poder del Estado. Recordando la célebre Déclaration des droits de l'homme et du citoyen de la Revolución Francesa, podemos decir que hemos derivado el droit du citoyen del droit de l'homme. Si ahora aplicamos esta derivación a la cuestión de los límites del poder del Estado, la conclusión es sencilla. Tendremos que afirmar que la autoridad del Estado está limitada por la ley de la humanidad. De acuerdo con nuestras premisas, esto significa (17) que el derecho [right] de cualquier poder restrictivo ha de limitarse a elaborar y hacer cumplir las leyes que sean necesarias para garantizar los derechos de todos. Pero aquí surge una nueva dificultad, una dificultad que, por decirlo así, pone de manifiesto toda la miseria de la humanidad, si consideramos a la humanidad no como una comunidad ideal que debería existir, sino como aquélla que realmente existe en nuestra experiencia. En el orden ideal, sin duda, la competencia del soberano para imponer su voluntad sobre sus súbditos depende de la conformidad de su voluntad con la ley universal de la justicia. Sin embargo, bajo las condiciones de la experiencia, nadie puede poseer esta competencia, a menos que posea primero el poder material para hacer cumplir su voluntad. Por un lado, la legalidad de la voluntad es la condición de su poder; por el otro, el poder de la voluntad es la condición de su legalidad.

Repito, es la condición de su legalidad. Esto no significa, simplemente, que en el orden natural de las cosas la soberanía siempre está condicionada por el poder material. Eso sería una afirmación trivial. Significa más bien que nadie que no posea un poder irresistible sobre los hombres tiene el derecho de imponer su voluntad sobre ellos. Esto

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N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 355-365

ISSN: 2386-7655

Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095840

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puede parecer una conclusión desesperada. Pero si se sigue necesariamente de nuestras premisas, tiene que estar contenida en la propia ley de la humanidad. ¿Puede esto probarse? No sólo pienso que sí, sino que, además, suministrar la prueba requiere muy poca reflexión. Sólo hay una voluntad que es necesariamente conforme con la ley de la justicia y ésta es la voluntad universal de la humanidad, considerada como la unión de todos los hombres bajo las leyes generales de su libertad. Para unir a los hombres tal como son bajo dichas leyes es necesario el poder. No podemos suponer que los hombres se unen por sí mismos bajo tales leyes, ya que nadie está obligado a renunciar a su libertad natural sin la garantía de que los demás hagan lo mismo. Para proporcionar una garantía de este tipo se requiere poder. Así pues, si consideramos la conformidad con la ley de la justicia como condición a priori de la autoridad legítima de una voluntad, ninguna voluntad humana real puede tener jamás autoridad legal alguna. Nuestro principio ideal frustra toda posibilidad de justicia entre los hombres. En consecuencia, estamos en contradicción con la ley que exige justicia, y ésta es la ley de la humanidad.

Parece que hemos descubierto la raíz del problema del derecho y del poder [right and might]. No debemos hacer de la justicia real de una voluntad la condición de su legítima soberanía, ya que al hacerlo destruimos la posibilidad de la justicia entre los hombres. En otras palabras, la autoridad del soberano, si está limitada, no puede estar limitada por el principio de la justicia, ya que sin el poder del Estado la justicia no es posible. Un argumento escolástico de muy corto alcance, que han adoptado algunos filósofos modernos, reza como sigue: es la justicia la que necesita el poder de una voluntad soberana; por lo tanto, si esta voluntad viola la justicia, pierde su autoridad. Sin embargo, el argumento adecuado es el siguiente: es la justicia la que necesita el poder de una voluntad soberana; por lo tanto, si la justicia ha de ser posible entre los hombres, no puede ser la condición legal de la autoridad de esa voluntad.

Se podría decir que ésta no es absoluto una conclusión edificante. Y en efecto no lo es. Es simplemente una consecuencia del epigrama, aparentemente cínico, con arreglo al cual el hombre es un animal que necesita de un amo. Esto expresa más claramente la advertencia que he mencionado al principio: que el poder supremo no ha de estar limitado

(18) por la teoría. No puede estar restringido por ningún reconocimiento, por válido que sea, de que debería actuar en conformidad con la justicia. Quien declare que sólo obedecerá lo justo, expresa, en realidad, su renuencia a obedecer en absoluto. Establece así un estado de naturaleza permanente, y renuncia a la soberanía en favor de la libertad sin ley.

Aquellos pensadores que hicieron depender el derecho del gobernante de la condición de que sus actos fueran justos, han sentido sin duda el peso de esta dificultad. Vieron claramente que no se podía permitir que toda injusticia privara al soberano de su autoridad. Este principio sería, muy evidentemente, incompatible con cualquier autoridad estable. ¿Qué ley, qué acto de gobierno, puede decirse que no contiene ningún elemento de injusticia de ningún tipo? No es de extrañar que Locke y sus seguidores se esforzaran por determinar la cantidad exacta de injusticia necesaria para abolir la autoridad de un soberano. Si tuvieron éxito o no, puede juzgarse a partir de una famosa consecuencia

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histórica de su filosofía: la Declaración de Independencia de los Estados Unidos. He aquí una legislación que declara que la enorme injusticia cometida por la Corona Británica contra los ciudadanos de la Federación había destruido el fundamento de su necesaria lealtad. La lista de acusaciones por medio de la cual Jefferson intentó demostrar este veredicto es bien conocida. Pero si la justicia hizo posible tal veredicto, ¿no requería ésta igualmente que el acusado tuviera la oportunidad de defenderse a sí mismo? Si lo requería,

¿era justo permitir que los acusadores presentaran el veredicto? Evidentemente no; y, sin embargo, alguien podría decir que tampoco habría sido justo dejar el veredicto en manos de la Corona Británica. ¡Ah! He aquí el problema. Porque si, en este caso, fuera erróneo dejar el veredicto en manos de la Corona, es también erróneo suponer que la Corona tenía autoridad soberana alguna sobre los colonos. Tenía que haber habido una tercera parte a la que correspondía, propiamente, este poder. Si se permiten veredictos contra el poder supremo, entonces ningún poder es supremo. Es absurdo imaginar que la opinión de un súbdito de que un acto de su soberano ha sido injusto pueda tener validez jurídica alguna contra el soberano. Esta opinión debe conservar siempre el carácter de una queja. Nunca puede alcanzar el carácter de un veredicto, ni siquiera el de una acusación. Porque aunque no sea cierto, como enseña el positivismo, que el poder del soberano sea el que crea los derechos de los hombres, sí que es cierto que estos derechos no pueden hacerse efectivos públicamente a no ser que dependan de ese poder. Por lo tanto, aquél que se declare independiente de su soberano nunca podrá afirmar que está llevando a cabo un acto de justicia.

¿Es esto todo lo que se puede decir acerca de los límites del poder del Estado? Si ningún acto que contradiga su supremacía puede ser acorde con la justicia, ¿no significa esto que el poder del Estado es realmente ilimitado y que tiene el derecho de hacer lo que le dé la gana con sus súbditos? No, no significa eso; pero mostrar que no es así requiere una nueva explicación, que afortunadamente es también final.

Me parece evidente que cualquier persona (física o moral) que detente el poder supremo puede cometer actos contra sus súbditos que sobrepasan con creces (19) los límites de la mera injusticia. Cuando el rey Herodes ordenó la matanza de los niños en Belén, ¿perpetró una mera injusticia contra ellos? Y cuando Hitler aniquiló a los judíos,

¿fue esto ilegal sólo en el sentido en que es ilegal condenar a un acusado sin concederle un juicio justo? Cuando, después de la última guerra, los juristas alemanes trataron de proporcionar una definición satisfactoria de aquellos actos del hitlerismo a los cuales no podía exigirse legítimamente obediencia, siguieron limitándose al principio de la justicia y no tardaron en verse inmersos en las mismas dificultades que Locke y otros como él. Lo único que consiguieron demostrar fue que la ciencia de los derechos naturales —que es lo que estamos tratando aquí— había hecho pocos progresos efectivos desde comienzos del siglo XVIII. La ilegalidad de tales actos no puede describirse adecuadamente como la

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N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 355-365

ISSN: 2386-7655

Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095840

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violación de una ley de la justicia, sino sólo como la violación de la propia humanidad en la persona de las víctimas. ¿Qué significa esto? ¿Cómo podemos determinar con precisión la diferencia entre dichos actos y meros actos de la injusticia? ¿Y cómo se puede demostrar que nadie está obligado a acatar el poder de un Estado que ordene tales actos de inhumanidad?

Por fin podemos cosechar los frutos de la paciente resistencia a las sutilezas y trivialidades aparentes de nuestro análisis introductorio. La pregunta es: ¿a qué nos referimos, en principio, cuando hablamos de una ley injusta o un acto injusto del poder gubernamental o jurídico? Y nuestra respuesta es que nos referimos a un acto que restringe la libertad externa del individuo de una manera que no puede justificarse por las exigencias de una garantía universal de los derechos; es decir, que no puede justificarse por la necesidad de asegurar a todo el mundo contra el poder arbitrario de sus conciudadanos. Si un acto carece de esta justificación, surge de una decisión arbitraria del legislador o del juez. Pero esta decisión, por arbitraria que sea, no priva a los súbditos de su humanidad mientras la restricción impuesta posea el carácter de una universalidad posible. Incluso si les obliga a saludar al sombrero del gobernante, o les prohíbe oler el perfume de violetas, no anula la capacidad de nadie para limitar la libertad de los otros conforme a la suya. En otras palabras, no le priva de todos los derechos posibles. Es cierto que pierden el derecho a pasar por delante del sombrero del gobernante sin levantar el brazo o su propio sombrero. Y sin embargo esto es mejor que vivir en el estado de naturaleza, donde no estás sometido a las órdenes de ningún superior, pero nunca sabes si la libertad sin ley de los demás te dejará alguna libertad a ti. La restricción de la libertad natural es la consecuencia inevitable de toda regulación general de la libertad. Por lo tanto, mientras las restricciones arbitrarias impuestas por el poder del Estado no sobrepasen los límites de una posible armonía de la libertad por medio de la ley, no sobrepasan tampoco, por muy arbitrarias que parezcan, la competencia del poder estatal como tal, es decir, su competencia para restringir la libertad personal por ley. Tampoco hay ninguna restricción determinada de la libertad personal — siempre que permita la universalidad— que no pueda, en circunstancias especiales, asumir el carácter de una restricción justa. En circunstancias especiales, los requisitos de la garantía general pueden prohibirnos incluso oler el perfume de violetas. (20)

Ésta es una de las caras de la moneda. ¿Qué encontramos en la otra? Encontramos que hay actos de los poderosos que carecen de legalidad alguna, porque su legalidad implicaría que era legalmente imposible para las personas afectadas actuar legalmente. Quizá esto suene algo misterioso, así que me apresuro a explicarlo. No puede haber ninguna ley positiva, por ejemplo, que niegue a determinadas personas todo derecho a adquirir propiedad. Una ley de este tipo imposibilitaría que estas personas usaran las cosas legalmente. Ahora bien, si cualquier uso que hagan de las cosas es ilegal, todo el mundo tendrá derecho a impedir que usen las cosas. Esto implica, evidentemente, que su libertad para usar las cosas ha perdido todo su poder legal para restringir la libertad de los demás con respecto al mismo uso. Y por lo tanto, en este sentido, han perdido su condición de seres humanos y han sido reducidos a la condición de meros objetos. Con respecto al uso de las cosas, se han convertido en meros objetos del poder arbitrario de los demás

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N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 355-365 ISSN: 2386-7655

Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095840

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hombres, dado que por ley han perdido toda su capacidad para restringir este poder en favor de su propia libertad de acción. ¿Puede alguien dejar de reconocer que el haber sido privado de esto es una violación de un tipo muy diferente a la de cualquier acto de mera injusticia? La ley les informa, por así decirlo, de que, al no poseer derechos, ni siquiera pueden ser tratados injustamente; y esto es precisamente lo que el poder del Estado nunca puede decirle a ninguno de sus súbditos sin sobrepasar las competencias que le otorga la ley de la humanidad.

Se observará que el término «humanidad», en el sentido en que lo estamos utilizando, no tiene ninguna relación con lo que puede llamarse caridad o benevolencia, ni con ninguna otra virtud privada similar. Lo que hemos dicho no es que la ley no deba privar a un hombre de la posibilidad de adquirir propiedades porque necesita comida, refugio y vestimenta. No es necesario negar que el Estado tenga el deber de proteger a los hombres contra el peligro de depender de un poder arbitrario para su libertad de adquirir estas cosas. Pero aquí, como anteriormente, la cuestión decisiva es la libertad legal de los hombres. Las leyes positivas a las que hemos acusado de violar la ley de la humanidad son las leyes que reducen a los hombres a la condición de objetos materiales. Y esta violación es mucho más grave de lo que podrá ser jamás cualquier denegación de caridad. Se comete el mismo tipo de violación en una ley que anula el derecho de determinadas personas a entablar contratos legalmente vinculantes para los demás, y también en cualquier ley que condene a los hombres a muerte por su credo religioso o su origen racial. Por tanto resulta también evidente que tales leyes niegan a las personas implicadas toda posibilidad de acciones legales. Y en el último ejemplo, la negación es particularmente monstruosa, puesto que lo que se niega es la posibilidad legal de la vida misma. Su misma vida se ilegaliza porque los actos por los que podría legalizarse están fuera de su alcance. Es tan imposible para la voluntad de un hombre convencerse de aquello en lo que no cree, como lo es cambiar su origen racial. Por tanto, dichas personas están condenadas a muerte incondicionalmente; puesto que están privadas, por principio, de todo poder para restringir la libertad de los demás de una manera que les permita vivir entre ellos.

De este modo hemos establecido la diferencia profunda entre un acto de injusticia y un acto de inhumanidad. Sólo en el último caso, los que detentan el poder del Estado rebasan sus competencias como tales. (21) Esto no significa que el Estado tenga la competencia legal de actuar injustamente, sólo significa que tiene la competencia legal de exigir obediencia a una orden incluso cuando ésta se considere injusta. Aquí debemos recordar los argumentos por los que probamos que esta competencia no depende de la justicia. En el caso de un acto de inhumanidad, en cambio, no puede exigir legítimamente la obediencia. Ésta puede parecer una conclusión inútil, ya que si uno es forzado a ejecutar, no hay cabida ni para la obediencia ni para la desobediencia. Pero al decir esto olvidamos que queda un espacio para las órdenes del tirano a sus oficiales, y que estas órdenes no tienen derecho a la obediencia. Y no sólo eso, sino que además el subordinado que se da cuenta de que una orden no puede tener ninguna legalidad, tiene la obligación de negarse a ejecutarla. Esto, sin embargo, no implica que tenga derecho a rechazar la obediencia a la

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autoridad del Estado, dado que una orden que no pueda poseer legalidad no puede ser reconocida como emanada de la autoridad legal del Estado. La persona que emite una orden de este tipo estará actuando siempre en su capacidad privada, incluso cuando utilice el poder irresistible que detenta para imponer su voluntad sobre su subordinado. Pero ¿qué sucede si el subordinado obedece? ¿Puede ser castigado legítimamente? Si existen, en tal Estado, leyes positivas que castiguen dicha obediencia, puede y debe ser castigado, siempre que haya consentido libremente a ejecutar la orden. Pero si su consentimiento fue obtenido por la fuerza y bajo la amenaza de una o varias personas que detentaban un poder supremo e irresistible, ¿qué pasaría? Ciertamente, su acción sería ilegal. Pero ¿sería también punible? La ley penal alemana establece que una acción no es punible cuando el autor se vio forzado a llevarla a cabo por un poder irresistible. ¿No requiere la justicia de una ley de este tipo?

Dejo esta cuestión a su propio juicio. Mi tarea, creo, está terminada; y espero que estén de acuerdo conmigo en que las consideraciones teóricas que he expuesto no carecen de importancia práctica. A menudo digo a mis estudiantes: «Si quieres enfrentarte a los verdaderos problemas morales de la vida humana, debes ahondar tanto como puedas en las abstracciones». Estoy profundamente convencido de que, en la base de la confusión moral en la que se encuentra el mundo contemporáneo, se esconde la falta de una teoría lo suficientemente abstracta. Lo que violaron los alemanes fue la ley de la humanidad. La inevitable reacción a esta violación se ha convertido, a su vez, en fuente de dificultades aparentemente insuperables acerca de la justicia. Este intento, que someto ahora a su juicio, de distinguir y relacionar estas dos nociones pretende contribuir a aliviar tales dificultades. (22)

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Conversación con Roberto R. Aramayo1 con motivo de su 60 cumpleaños 2

Talking about Kant with… Roberto R. Aramayo

ILEANA P. BEADE 

CONICET / Universidad Nacional de Rosario, Argentina

Roberto R. Aramayo, historiador de las ideas morales y políticas adscrito como Profesor de Investigación al Instituto de Filosofía del CSIC, es conocido por sus numerosas ediciones españolas de textos kantianos, entre las que se cuentan entre otras dos versiones distintas de la tercera Crítica kantiana, la segunda Crítica, la Fundamentación, El conflicto de las Facultades, las Lecciones de Ética, una parte de la Antropología práctica, una selección del Nachlass y otra de algunos opúsculos kantianos. Estudioso de la Ilustración europea, ha editado también textos de Diderot (El paseo del escéptico y Pensamientos filosóficos), Federico el Grande (Anti-Maquiavelo), Rousseau (Cartas morales y Ensoñaciones) o Ernst Cassirer (Rousseau, Kant, Goethe: Filosofía y cultura en la Europa del Siglo de las Luces, La Conferencia de Weimar y el debate de Davos con Heidegger y Filosofía moral, Derecho y Metafísica), y algunas obras debidas a Schopenhauer (El mundo como voluntad y representación, Manuscritos berlineses o Los designios del Destino). Entre sus libros no dedicados a Kant pueden citarse Cassirer y su Neo-Ilustración (2009), Rousseau: Y la política hizo al hombre –tal como es- (2015), Voltaire: La ironía contra el fanatismo (2015) y Schopenhauer: La lucidez del pesimismo (2018), teniendo en preparación otro sobre Diderot y el significado de la Ilustración.

1 http://ifs.csic.es/es/personal/robertor.aramayo / https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_R._Aramayo
2 28 de febrero de 2018.
- Profesora de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras de la Universidad Nacional de Rosario (Argentina). E-mail de contacto: ileanabeade@yahoo.com.ar

Conversación con Roberto R. Aramayo con motivo de su 60 cumpleaños

Tras haber presidido desde 2001 -y hasta 2014- la Asociación Española de Ética y Filosofía Política (AEEFP), como primer Secretario de la Sociedad de Estudios Kantianos en Lengua Española (SEKLE) puso en marcha su aparato administrativo y organizó junto a Lisímaco Parra el primer encuentro internacional de dicha sociedad celebrado en Bogotá (Colombia) a finales de 2012. Rentabilizando su experiencia como Director de Isegoría junto a Javier Muguerza, fundó en 2014 con Nuria Sánchez Madrid como secretaría ejecutiva y otros editores asociados (María Julia Bertomeu, Catalina González, Efraín Lazos y Luis Eduardo Molina) la revista internacional Con-Textos Kantianos, la cual generó ulteriormente la Biblioteca Digital de Estudios Kantianos CTK E-Books.

A Kant le ha dedicado sus libros Crítica de la razón ucrónica: Estudios en torno a las aporías morales de Kant (1992), La Quimera del Rey Filósofo: Los dilemas del poder o el frustrado idilio entre la ética y lo político (1997), Immanuel Kant: La utopía moral como emancipación del azar (2001) y Kant: Entre la moral y la política (2018), además de los volúmenes colectivos titulados Kant después de Kant: En el bicentenario de la Crítica de la razón práctica (1989), En la cumbre del criticismo: Simposio sobre la Crítica del Juicio de Kant (1992), La paz y el ideal cosmopolita de la Ilustración: A propósito del bicentenario de Hacia la paz perpetua de Kant (1996), Ética y Antropología, un dilema kantiano: En los bicentenarios de la Antropología en sentido pragmático y La Metafísica de las costumbres (1999) y La filosofía práctica de Kant (2018)3.

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3 Entre sus publicaciones más recientes en torno a Kant se cuentan estos artículos y capítulos de libros colectivos publicados en español, francés, inglés y alemán: "La plausible impronta (política) de Diderot en Kant”, Ideas y Valores 66/163 (2017), pp. 9-33; “La perspective juridico-politique de l’usage pratique de la raison dans les opuscules Kantiens de 1784”, in Kant. L’année 1784. Droit et philosophie de l’histoire, J. Vrin, Paris, 2017, pp. 295-303; “Ideales platónicos y ensoñaciones rousseaunianas en el pensamiento político de Kant”, Con-Textos Kantianos. International Journal of Philosophy, CTK 5 (Junio 2017), pp. 236-260; “Right as a Sign of a Philosophical Chiliasm: Freedom and its Evolution in Kant’s Opuscules”, in Critical Paths outside the Critiques. Kant’s Shorter Writings, Cambridge Scholar, Newcastle, 2017, pp. 398-409; “Spuren Rousseaus in Werk Kants. Erziehung, Gesellschaft, Kosmopolitismus”, in Harmonie, Toleranz, kulturelle Vielfalt, Könighausen & Neumann, Würzbug, 2017, pp. 123-135; “Kant, lecteur et interprète de Leibniz: à propos de l’harmonie préétablie, la téléologie, Dieu et le destin”, in Für unser Glück oder das Glück anderer”, Georg Olms, Hildesheim, 2016, vol. II, pp. 15-25; “Le souverain bien à la lumière de l’impératif de l’espoir chez Kant”, in Kant : La raison pratique. Concepts et héritages, Vrin, Paris, 2015, pp. 375-386; “Una ficción heurística para explorar nuevas configuraciones políticas. El primado jurídico-político de Kant en los opúsculos de 1784”, Conceptos. Revista de Filosofía 8 (2015) pp. 13-25; “Crises and Revolutions: Philosophical Aproches to their Interdependence in the Classic Works of Rousseau, Kant, Tocqueville, Cassirer and Arendt”, ethic@, 13.2 (jul./dez., 2014), pp. 303-314; “La recherche du bonheur et le rôle de l’espérance chez Kant, en dialogue avec Spinoza et Rousseau”, Revista Filosofica de Coimbra 46 (2014) pp. 428-448; “La política y su devenir histórico en el pensamiento de Kant”, Ideas y Valores. Revista colombiana de Filosofía, vol. LXII Suplemento 1 (2013), pp. 15-36; “Politik und Gechichtsphilosophie bei Kant”, Kant e-prints 8 (2013), pp. 1-23; “Immanuel Kant: La Revolución Francesa desde una perspectiva cosmopolita”, en Historia del Análisis Político, Tecnos, Madrid, 2011, pp. 427-438.

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IB1: Conociendo su amplia y reconocida trayectoria como autor, traductor y editor, resulta casi inevitable comenzar preguntando en qué momento o circunstancias decidió dedicarse profesionalmente a la filosofía.

RRA1: A decir verdad no fue una decisión muy vocacional y se debió a un cúmulo de circunstancias harto contingentes. Los estudios de mi padre quedaron truncados por la Guerra Civil española cuando mi abuelo partió al exilio republicano y como consecuencia de todo ello mi hermano mayor también tuvo que incorporarse desde muy temprano al mundo laboral. Ambos decidieron que yo debía ir a la universidad como ellos hubieran querido hacer, mientras que mis inclinaciones me dictaban más bien incorporarme a Iberia, la compañía de aviación donde trabajaba mi citado hermano, para poder volar gratis a diestro y siniestro. La filosofía fue una elección fortuita. Me sentía más cómodo con las matemáticas, pero un mal profesor de tal asignatura me hizo decantarme por un bloque de optativas donde la filosofía iba con latín y griego en el Instituto Cardenal Cisneros de Madrid. Allí quedé cautivado por el talante de quien impartía filosofía (Manuel García Marcos) y al entender que su actitud vital se había forjado al estudiar esa disciplina decidí seguir sus pasos.

Fue por tanto algo tan azaroso como lo es el propio nacimiento, cuyas coordenadas espacio temporales no las elige nadie, aunque luego quepa recrearlas, permitiéndole a uno definirse por ejemplo como un vasco nacido en el madrileño barrio de Chamberí, haciendo así los honores a mis apellidos maternos, ya que todos los de mi madre -Lorea Aramayo Urresti- provenían del País Vasco al ser oriunda de Ondárroa, lo que quizá explique mi devoción por los paisajes y las gentes de la comarca del Bidasoa.

IB2: ¿Qué personas tuvieron mayor incidencia en su formación filosófica? ¿Hay algún libro en particular –o algún autor– que haya incidido de manera decisiva en dicha formación?

RRA2: En primer lugar debo referirme a quienes coincidieron conmigo en las aulas de la madrileña Universidad Complutense mientras estudiamos filosofía entre 1975 y 1980, algunos de los cuales devendrían excelentes amigos entre los que no dejaron de anudarse lazos afectivos e incluso sentimentales: Concha Roldán, Juan Antonio Rivera, Jesús Carlos Gómez Muñoz y Rosa García Montealegre. Mediada la carrera también trabé relación con un profesor excepcional que me animaría más tarde a hacer mi tesis doctoral y que al día de hoy sigue contagiándome su pasión por el estudio. Sin el acicate de mi querido mentor Antonio Pérez Quintana nunca hubiese redactado mi tesis doctoral sobre La filosofía práctica de Kant como elpidología eudemonista (1984)4

4 Cuyo prolijo título resulta sobradamente descriptivo: “Un estudio de las relaciones que guardan entre sí dentro del pensamiento kantiano el Derecho transcendental, la Ética formal, la Religión moral y la Filosofía crítica de la historia, que utiliza como hilo conductor del análisis sus concepciones sobre la felicidad y la esperanza”.

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En 1985 tuve ocasión de conocer personalmente a Javier Muguerza, sin cuyo decisivo e inopinado sostén académico no habría podido dedicarme a este quehacer profesional. Juntos organizamos un seminario con ocasión del bicentenario de la segunda Crítica kantiana que dio lugar al volumen titulado Kant después de Kant (1989), publicando algo después otro colectivo, La paz y el ideal cosmopolita de la Ilustración (1996), a propósito del bicentenario de Hacia la paz perpetua y en el que Concha Roldán se sumó como tercer editor literario.

La razón sin esperanza de Javier Muguerza fue un libro que me influyó mucho y por lo demás nunca olvidaré cuán gozoso resultaba escuchar sus conferencias, tras la decepción que supusieron unas calamitosas clases impartidas por un indolente profesorado cuyo mayor mérito consistió en adherirse al régimen franquista y no se interesaba en absoluto por su alumnado. Aquella no era ni mucho menos la mítica Facultad en que habían enseñado Gaos y Ortega. La reincorporación a su cátedra en 1978 de José Luis L. Aranguren, quien volvía desde California, supuso una bocanada de aire fresco en ese ambiente que sólo se vería renovado poco después. Antonio Pérez suponía una clamorosa excepción a esa indolencia. Su dedicación a la docencia devino legendaria en aquella Facultad, como luego pudieron comprobar sus alumnos de La Laguna. La verdad es que me siento muy orgullo de haber propiciado sendos homenajes a mis queridos maestros, Antonio Pérez Quintana (Mundos posibles) y Javier Muguerza (Disenso e incertidumbre y Diálogos con Javier Muguerza), pues en ambos casos mediaba una inmensa deuda de gratitud tanto personal como académica.

También fue Javier Muguerza quien me animó a recopilar una serie de trabajos para componer el que sería mi primer libro sobre Kant y que cuenta con un prologo del propio Muguerza. En mi Crítica de la razón ucrónica (1991) hablo de un imperativo elpidológico para dar cuenta del papel jugado por la esperanza en Kant, la cual sirve para generar una imprescindible autoconfianza que nos permite actuar autónomamente como propugnó Rousseau, sin depender de instancia trascendente alguna y con arreglo a la divisa kantiana del “debo luego puedo”, porque a fin de cuentas el agente moral kantiano debe creer que sus actos pueden cambiar las cosas al evitar cometer injusticias, conforme a ese imperativo de la disidencia que acuña Javier Muguerza en su esfuerzo por actualizar las formulaciones kantianas. En esta constelación de problemas inciden mis otros ensayos dedicados íntegra o parcialmente a Kant: Immanuel Kant: La utopía moral como emancipación del azar (2001), La Quimera del Rey Filósofo (1997) y Kant: Entre la moral y la política (2018).

Por otra parte, mi trayectoria humana e intelectual se ha visto jalonada por el trato con algunos que me han acompañado en uno u otro tramo de mis itinerarios académico, en ocasiones trabando diferentes grados de amistad. Pienso en colegas y/o compañeros de trabajo como José Francisco Álvarez, José Luis Aranguren, Txetxu Ausín, María Luisa Balenciaga, Reinhard Brandt, Antonio Casado, Victoria Camps, Adela Cortina, Manuel Cruz, Jaime De Salas, Elías Díaz, Toni Doménech, Javier Echeverría, Eusebio Fernández, Manuel Fraijó, Rosa García Montealegre, Victoria Garrido, Ernesto Garzón Valdés,

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Thomas Gil, Jesús Carlos Gómez, Miguel Giusti, José Gómez Caffarena, Catalina González, Ricardo Gutiérrez Aguilar, Efraín Lazos, Emilio Lledó, Fernando Madariaga, Salvador Mas, Francisco Maseda, Rosa Muñoz, Javier Muguerza, Faustino Oncina, Pablo Oyarzun, Lisímaco Parra, Pedro Pastur, Carlos Pereda, Manuel Francisco Pérez López, Antonio Pérez Quintana, Quintín Racionero, Juan Antonio Rivera, Nuria Roca, Concha Roldán, Nuria Sánchez Madrid, Julián Sauquillo, Fernando Savater, Amelia Valcárcel, Fernando Vallespín, José Luis Villacañas o Astrid Wagner.

IB3: ¿Considera que las tareas de investigación filosófica, traducción y enseñanza resultan complementarias? Dado que a lo largo de su intensa trayectoria ha incursionado en estas tareas diversas, ¿tiene predilección por alguna de ellas?

RRA3: Un golpe de fortuna me hizo incorporarme al Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas como becario predoctoral en 1982 y eso posibilitó que cuando Javier Muguerza puso en marcha el Instituto de Filosofía del CSIC pudiese adscribirme al mismo desde un primer momento, propiciando seguidamente que mi vinculación laboral como investigador se consolidara en 1989, lo cual se debió a un decisivo respaldo por su parte que nunca he creído merecer. Esta circunstancia hizo que no tuviese carga docente alguna. Con el transcurso de los años echaría de menos haber tenido una docencia obligatoria, pero desde un principio decidí dedicarme a preparar ediciones de textos, porque me parecía una labor que podía resultar útil. Javier Echeverría ha comentado alguna vez que mis estudios introductorios pueden homologarse con lecciones magistrales intemporales que llegan a un público amplio y me complace pensar que pueda llevar algo de razón en tal parecer. Fue Manuel Francisco Pérez López quien me inició en el arte de la traducción y con él publiqué mi primera edición, Teoría y práctica (1986), a la que le siguieron Ideas para una historia universal en clave cosmopolita (1987) y las Lecciones de Ética (1989), traducidas en tándem con Concha Roldán.

Me tentaba mucho verter al castellano textos de Kant que no estuvieran disponibles en español y por eso acaricié la idea de traducir La metafísica de las costumbres, pero al saber que Adela Cortina quería emprender ese mismo trabajo y no lograr ponernos de acuerdo para hacerlo conjuntamente, me ceñí a las Lecciones de Ética, combinando el manuscrito de Collins con la edición preparada en 1924 por Paul Menzer. Al completar la Moralphilosophie Collins con los tres manuscritos manejados por Menzer, detecté algunas inexactitudes en el trabajo de Gerard Lehmann en su edición académica y esto me sirvió como carta de presentación durante mi primera estancia financiada por la DFG en Marburgo, donde Reinhard Brandt y Werner Stark habían fundado poco antes un Archivo Kantiano. Aquel verano del 89 me familiarizó con los trabajos en curso para la edición académica de las Lecciones de Antropología y eso me permitió publicar mucho antes que saliera la versión original parte del manuscrito Mrongovius con el título de Antropología practica (1990), gracias a un permiso tácito del Profesor Brandt, quien por cierto acaba de cumplir 80 años y con ese motivo le rindió recientemente homenaje la Universidad Católica del Perú durante un congreso que organizó Miguel Giusti con el título de El

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conflicto de las Facultades, al que no pude acudir personalmente, pero en el que acabé participando por medio de una videoconferencia donde diserté acerca del pensar por cuenta propia y la misión de las humanidades.

Si no estoy equivocado, mi atención a las lecciones de Kant sobre filosofía moral y sobre antropología fue pionera en español, contando después con los recientes trabajos de Manuel Sánchez Rodríguez (Lecciones de antropología; 2015), Alba Jímenez (Lecciones sobre filosofía moral; 2017) o Nuria Sánchez Madrid y Macarena Marey, quienes han publicado en CTK 4 un anticipo de sus Lecciones sobre derecho natural (Naturrecht Feyerabend). Paralelamente, un inesperado encargo me animó a hacer una selección temática de algunos textos del Legado inédito kantiano, en donde incluí muchas Reflexiones y ciertos trabajos preparatorios bajo el criterio de su relación con la vertiente práctica del pensamiento kantiano, lo que dio lugar al compendio de fragmentos publicado bajo el título de Antología de Kant (1991).

Tras un paréntesis dedicado a Schopenhauer, en que traduje cosas tales como Los designios del destino (1994), Metafísica de las costumbres (1993), Manuscritos Berlineses (1996), Escritos de juventud (1999) y, antes de traducir El mundo como voluntad y representación (2003), mis estancias en Marburgo me permitieron retomar mis ediciones de textos kantianos durante la primera década del nuevo milenio. A ese periodo corresponden mis ediciones de la Crítica de la razón práctica (2000), la Fundamentación para una metafísica de las costumbres (2002), ¿Qué es la Ilustración? (2003) o El conflicto de las Facultades (2004), publicadas todas ellas en Alianza Editorial con sucesivas reimpresiones, mientras que sendas estancias en Berlín con los profesores Hans Poser y Thomas Gil me sirvieron para preparar, junto a mi buen amigo Salvador Mas, dos versiones distintas de la tercera Crítica kantiana, que dimos en denominar Crítica del discernimiento, o de la facultad de juzgar (2003 y 2012), argumentando las razones de índole funcional que nos inducían a ello. La segunda enriqueció también el fondo kantiano de Alianza Editorial, que junto a mis cinco aportaciones a esa biblioteca kantiana (Fundamentación, segunda y tercera Críticas, ¿Qué es la Ilustración y Conflicto de las Facultades) cuenta con otros tantos títulos cuya traducción se debe a plumas como las de Joaquín Abellán (Paz perpetua), José Gaos (Antropología) o Felipe Martínez Marzoa (Religión).

IB4: ¿Podría decirse que la traducción de fuentes filosóficas conlleva una tarea que es, en sí, filosófica? ¿Considera necesario ejercitarse en la reflexión filosófica para lograr buenas traducciones de obras de filosofía? ¿Cómo podría medirse la calidad de una traducción? ¿Cuáles son los criterios que permitirían evaluar el carácter acertado de las decisiones que debe tomar, inevitablemente, quien traduce textos filosóficos?

RRA4: Traducir es en general un ejercicio sumamente recomendable, porque supone una lectura que no puede homologarse a ninguna otra y que nos hace apropiarnos de un texto ajeno, para interpretar el texto cual si se tratase de una partitura musical, intentando

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encontrar las palabras adecuadas para los mismos conceptos e ideas utilizados por el autor traducido. Es una labor muy gratificante, aunque no siempre goce del reconocimiento que merece, según revelan algunas críticas apresuradas cuyos artífices deberían más bien tender a predicar con el ejemplo aportando versiones alternativas. Ciertamente hay que familiarizarse mucho con un autor para comprenderlo y poder traducirlo. Llevar a cabo traducciones de pensadores consagrados me parece algo tan formativo en términos filosóficos como la docencia, pues en definitiva de trata de transmitir a un tercero lo aprendido por uno mismo gracias a una lectura cuya intensidad no tiene parangón. El transferir ideas de un acervo cultural a otro mediante una traducción es una labor apasionante y siempre supone un enorme desafío, al no haber protocolo precisos para dirimir ciertos dilemas o decantarse por una u otra opción. Revisar las propias traducciones de textos particularmente complicados constituye una curiosa experiencia, máxime cuando se pueden discutir las distintas opciones en el caso de ser una traducción conjunta.

El mejor criterio para juzgar una traducción es que resulte útil a sus destinatarios. La propia índole de las traducciones les hace perecederas, pues la continua evolución de las lenguas exige actualizar el vocabulario y las estructuras gramaticales5. Manuel García Morente hizo una gran labor, pero ninguna traducción es inmortal e inmejorable, al margen del valor histórico que puedan tener en un momento dado. Personalmente soy un firme partidario de que proliferen las traducciones y quepa escoger entre las mismas, lo cual no es incompatible con hacer corpus de autores, tal como franceses, ingleses e italianos han hecho con el propio Kant, a condición de que las traducciones incluidas en una determinada coyuntura puedan verse relevadas por otras al comprobar su mayor plausibilidad. Sin embargo, entre los usuarios de la lengua española esta empresa no parece resultar muy viable merced a ciertos personalismos académicos que buscan un reconocimiento ficticio e impostado por intereses marginales y a sectarismos dignos de mejor causa. Cualquier intento en esa dirección parece previamente condenado al fracaso, por lo que quizá resulte preferible hacer proliferar las traducciones, para que busquen por su cuenta el aire y el sol con arreglo a esa hermosa metáfora kantiana que ilustra su célebre insociable sociabilidad.

IB5: ¿Qué actividades considera más significativas de aquellas desarrolladas en su carácter de Profesor de Investigación en el marco del Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas?

RR5: Me identifico bastante con el perfil del Grupo de Investigación del que soy responsable y que se denomina Theoria cum praxi, por la divisa leibniziana que Kant hiciera suya en su escrito sobre Teoría y práctica, el primero que di en traducir. Los miembros del grupo entendemos, al igual que según Ernst Cassirer hicieron los ilustrados, que la teoría debe servir en todo momento para orientar nuestra praxis. Bajo esa premisa decidí cultivar la historia de las ideas morales y políticas, ciñéndome sobre todo a la época

5 Cf. https://www.academia.edu/34174981/Theoria_cum_praxi_en_la_traducción_de_textos_filosóficos.pdf

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ilustrada, como muestran mis recientes libros dedicados a Rousseau y Voltaire, así como el que quisiera escribir alguna vez sobre Diderot, recreando el ambiente filosófico de la Ilustración europea y desgranando los problemas planteados entonces que nos continúan interesando hoy en día.

La falta de un horizonte laboral dentro del CSIC hace que sean pocos quienes deciden realizar sus tesis doctorales entre nosotros y confieso que lamento no haber podido tener más doctorandos a mi cargo, como sí ha sido el caso de Ricardo Gutiérrez Aguilar, quien tras escogerme como Doktorvater se doctoró con una tesis titulada Posibilidad y facticidad: Los juicios históricos desde la Ilustración y el Idealismo alemán frente a la Revolución francesa (2014), cuya parte metodológica recoge su libro El historiador en su gabinete: El juicio histórico y la Filosofía de la Historia (2013). Juntos hemos hecho una larga travesía que comenzó en el Instituto de Filosofía del CSIC y continuó en Berlín, gracias a un proyecto europeo Marie Curie que permitió una cotutela de su tesis, posibilitando que se doctorase simultáneamente por la UNED y la TU-Berlin. Resulta frustrante que haya tanta gente como él, con una clara vocación y una enorme dedicación, que pese a cosechar todo tipo de reconocimientos (premio nacional de licenciatura y premio extraordinario de doctorado), concatenar becas y contratos (beca de formación, colaborador científico en Alemania e investigador interino en España en el CSIC y la UCM) o realizar estancias de varios años por doquier (Berlín, Buenos Aires, Valdivia, Canada, Chicago, La Plata o Nueva York) no logren consolidar su vinculación laboral con una u otra institución. Es una lástima que jóvenes con semejante formación no tengan unas expectativas más acordes con su capacidad y empeño. Pero como dijo Kant estas dos cosas no sirven de mucho si no les acompaña la suerte.

Por otra parte, ahora mismo soy el único miembro en activo del primigenio Consejo de Redacción de la revista Isegoría, fundada por Javier Muguerza en 1990,, en la que a lo largo de casi tres décadas he oficiado sucesivamente como cosecretario, secretario, vicedirector, codirector y director, haciendo tándem con el propio Javier Muguerza en la Dirección, Victoria Garrido y Francisco Maseda en la Secretaría Técnica, e igualmente con Concha Roldán y Nuria Sánchez Madrid en el equipo ejecutivo. Fue un privilegio participar en este proyecto desde sus inicios, aun cuando reconozca que la creciente burocratización de los procesos hace muy penosa esta labor. El posicionamiento en los rankings va comercializándose y finalmente acaban primando cuestiones formales y cuantitativas que difuminan los contenidos de las publicaciones. Las revistas pueden quedar convertidas en simples expendedurías de certificados con los que alimentar aplicaciones informáticas cuando uno somete a una u otra evaluación, perdiéndose de vista su genuino cometido, que no debería ser sino el de participar la propia reflexión a los colegas y al público en general.

Sin embargo, acaso justamente por lo que acabo de constatar, no me resistí a impulsar una nueva revista que pudiera tender puentes entre todos los torna-kantianos bajo un prisma cosmopolita e hiciera conocer las aportaciones en español a los estudios

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kantianos mediante la convivencia de nuestra lengua con otras como inglés, francés, alemán, portugués e italiano, compartiendo páginas y secciones de una misma revista. Es lamentable que un idioma con tantos usuarios como el español no sea lengua oficial en los congresos internacionales o no pueda ser aceptado por algunas revistas como Kant-Studien precisamente por lo apuntado hace un momento, ya que a los grandes consorcios editoriales les resulta mucho más cómodo y económico ceñirse a la gestión del inglés, tolerando como mucho la presencia testimonial del alemán y del francés. Esto es algo que quedó muy claro en las conversaciones mantenidas a este respecto con los responsables de Kant-Studien durante la celebración del primer congreso de la SEKLE en Bogotá, encuentro que hicieron posible los buenos oficios de Lisímaco Parra y cuya preparación se gestó casualmente mientras charlábamos degustando botellas de Chardonnay en Berlín, donde también me animó a franquear las puertas del paradisiaco Vabali.

Nada más finalizar ese mismo encuentro, propuse a Concha Roldán y Pedro Stepanenko, como directores de los Institutos homólogos del CSIC y de la UNAM, alentar una serie de publicaciones en español que cumplieran la función desempeñada por los Companions editados por Cambridge, aglutinando volúmenes colectivos que versaran sobre una obra de Kant o alguna faceta de su pensamiento. De aquella iniciativa contamos por el momento con dos volúmenes, uno de los cuales está dedicado a la primera Crítica y el otro a la Filosofía práctica de Kant, viéndose coeditado este último por la Universidad Nacional de Colombia, la UNAM y CTK E-Books.

Tampoco he dejado de propiciar distintas colecciones, entre las que quisiera destacar Diálogos con clásicos europeos (Plaza y Valdés), aunque no reniegue para nada de Theoria cum praxi (PyV/CSIC), EidÉtica (Herder), Moral, Ciencia y Sociedad (PyV) o Clásicos del pensamiento (CSIC). Esta experiencia se pone al servicio de CTK-E Books, la Biblioteca Digital de Estudios Kantianos, que también pretende mostrar con los hechos cómo cabe hacer las cosas de otra manera rehuyendo imperativos netamente comerciales como los recién señalados y que cultivará la fórmula de coedición con cualesquiera editoriales e instituciones dispuestas a colaborar en ese proyecto, como sería el caso del volumen ya mencionado sobre la Filosofía práctica de Kant y en donde junto a una contribución mía hay colaboraciones de Ileana Beade, María Julia Bertomeu, Adela Cortina, Luis Eduardo Hoyos, Efraín Lazos, Lisímaco Parra, Faviola Rivera y Nuria Sánchez Madrid,

IB6 ¿Qué experiencias relevantes le ha aportado su actividad como editor de publicaciones científicas?

RRA6: Como ya he apuntado me resultó muy enriquecedor colaborar desde un principio con Javier Muguerza en la revista Isegoría. Gestionarla me permitía estar al día de lo que la comunidad hispanoamericana producía sobre filosofía moral y política. Quizá eso propició que fuese designado como presidente de la Asociación Española de Ética y Filosofía Política desde 2001 a 2014, una sociedad que ahora preside Concha Roldán,

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Directora del Instituto de Filosofía del CSIC. Y esa experiencia me llevó a fundar CTK con Nuria Sánchez Madrid como Secretaria ejecutiva y otros editores asociados como María Julia Bertomeu, Catalina González, Efraín Lazos y Eduardo Molina. Esta iniciativa ha generado también los encuentros internacionales CTK que ya cuentan en su haber con dos primeras ediciones (Bogotá, mayo de 2016) y Madrid (mayo, 2017), habiendo quedado citados en Chile para 2018. En el encuentro madrileño, cuyo elocuente título era Parerga kantiana, tuve la enorme satisfacción de reunirme una vez más con colegas tan estimados como Rodolfo Arango, Catalina González, Alba Jímenez, Efraín Lazos, Luis Eduardo Molina, Pablo Muchnik, Lisímaco Parra, Luis Placencia, Pablo Oyarzun, Concha Roldán, Nuria Sánchez Madrid o José Luis Villacañas.

Junto a la gestión de revistas y la dirección de diversas colecciones, también fui acreditando distintos volúmenes colectivos, fruto de seminarios, proyectos de investigación o cursos tenidos a lo largo de los años. Así por ejemplo, seminarios dedicados específicamente a Kant y con ocasión de sendos bicentenarios generaron volúmenes tales como Kant después de Kant (1989), En la cumbre del criticismo (1992), La paz y el ideal cosmopolita de la Ilustración (1996) o Ética y antropología: Un dilema kantiano (1999). De otro lado, El individuo y la historia. Antinomias de la herencia moderna (1995) y El reparto de la acción. Ensayos en torno a la responsabilidad (1999) se deben a proyectos de investigación, mientras que diferentes cursos de la UIMP, actividades celebradas en el donostiarra Palacio de Miramar y otras cosas por el estilo propiciaron La herencia de Maquiavelo: Modernidad y voluntad de poder (1999), Valores e historia en la Europa del Siglo XXI (2006), Los laberintos de la responsabilidad (2007), Inter-Dependencia: Del bienestar a la dignidad (2008) o Tocqueville y las revoluciones democráticas (2011).

IB7 ¿A qué atribuye su interés particular por los autores modernos?

RRA7: Imagino que también se debe al azar en buena medida. Desde luego fue Antonio Pérez Quintana el responsable de mi acercamiento a Kant y eso me hizo después interesarme por la Ilustración, cuyo programa me parece digno de ser estudiado, puesto que aún está pendiente de ser puesto en práctica. Autores como Rousseau y Diderot son interlocutores muy validos para encarar ciertos problemas morales y políticos de nuestra sociedad contemporánea. Por eso me parece muy importante traducirlos y poner sus ideas a disposición de un público amplio, tal como he intentado hacer con mis libros de 2015 titulados Rousseau: Y la política hizo al hombre (tal como es) y Voltaire: La ironía contra el fanatismo, que se han distribuido en quioscos de prensa en diferentes países latinoamericanos y europeos, habiéndose traducido por lo demás al flamenco, portugués e italiano.

Nuestra obligación en tanto que humanistas es hacer accesibles las ideas del patrimonio filosófico a un amplio universo de lectores, trasmitiendo sus planteamientos e inquietudes, su actitud ante unos problemas que siguen siendo los nuestros, para pensar luego por cuenta propia, en la estela del artífice principal de la Enciclopedia y el autor de

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¿Qué es la Ilustración? En este orden de cosas, la posible influencia de Diderot en la filosofía política del último Kant me interesa sobremanera, máxime al verse cordialmente ignorada por los estudiosos de uno y otro autor. Tengo para mí que tal como Rousseau imprimió un giró ético al pensamiento kantiano, los razonamientos que Diderot puso en circulación anónimamente con sus contribuciones a la Historia de las dos Indias del abate de Reynal calaron en el último Kant y que cabe rastrear esa influencia en sus escritos de los años noventa.

Optar por una u otra interpretación de un autor como Kant puede tener grandes consecuencias e incluso reflejar un determinado clima social y político. Pensemos por ejemplo en el debate sobre Kant que mantuvieron Cassirer y Heidegger en 1929, conocido en los círculos filosóficos como conferencias de Davos, aunque ahora se relacione a esta localidad suiza con el foro por antonomasia de la gran economía mundial. Dos estudiosos del kantismo, formados ambos en la escuela de Marburgo, confrontaron sus antagónicas cosmovisiones a través de sus respectivas lecturas del kantismo, tal como Thomas Mann había enfrentado en La montaña mágica las visiones adjudicadas a un humanista liberal e ilustrado y a un jesuita devoto de las tradiciones, tal como se apunta en mi Cassirer y su Neo-Ilustración (2009). La riqueza de los planteamientos kantianos continúa dando lugar a estas dicotomías y, mientras que algunos apostamos por ver en su obra un hito irreversible del proceso de secularización o un defensor de los valores encarnados por la Revolución francesa, hay otros que utilizan sus textos para buscar pilares filosóficos a un catolicismo reaccionario e integrista. Por eso me gusta recordar que, según señala Kant en El conflicto de las Facultades, la filosofía debe ocupar el ala izquierda del parlamento universitario, al ejercer esa crítica que Kant encomendó al tribunal de la razón y al propio quehacer filosófico, cuyo principal cometido es auspiciar que uno sea capaz de pensar por cuenta propia sin encomendarse a ninguna tutela heterónoma.

IB8: ¿Por qué dedicarse al estudio de Kant en particular? ¿Qué aspectos le han resultado particularmente atractivo del pensamiento filosófico kantiano? ¿Coincide con aquellos que sostienen la vigencia de las ideas filosóficas kantianas para el tratamiento de problemáticas filosóficas (y no filosóficas) actuales?

RR8: Ya he responsabilizado de tal elección a quien orientó mi tesis doctoral, pero lo cierto es que desde siempre me resultó muy sugerente la lectura de los textos kantianos. No recuerdo cuántas veces pude releer la Fundamentación y la segunda Crítica para familiarizarme con sus planteamientos éticos mientras preparaba mi tesis de licenciatura. Y al día de hoy sigo encontrando perspectivas nuevas cada vez que lo releo, como me ha sucedido al realizar una segunda versión de la tercera Crítica o al volver a sus textos pertrechado con otras lecturas. Cuando cursé mis estudios en la Universidad Complutense se solía frecuentar bastante más al Kant de la primera Crítica y se descuidaba un poco al que a mí me interesaba, el de la indiscutible primacía de lo práctico. Enseguida simpaticé con las lecturas de Lucien Goldmann y Yirmiahu Yovel, proclives a subrayar el papel jugado por Kant dentro del proceso de secularización alumbrado por la Ilustración. Al día

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de hoy creo que los principales interlocutores de Kant son Epicuro, Rousseau, Diderot y Spinoza. Este último sería por añadidura su auténtico héroe moral por observar un comportamiento virtuoso al margen de cualquier expectativa interesada, tal como propuso paralelamente Diderot, para quien al fin y a la postre únicamente los ateos podrían ser genuinamente virtuosos. Respeto desde luego que puedan hacerse otras interpretaciones de Kant, aunque no sepa compartirlas y afortunadamente ahí están unos textos que sólo pueden ser comprendidos teniendo en cuenta su contexto, pese a que su vigencia sea imperecedera, como demuestra el hecho de que las discusiones contemporáneas respecto a los más diversos temas continúen considerándolo un interlocutor ineludible. Como dijo Ortega, Kant se las ingenió para compendiar lo que habían decantado diversas tradiciones filosóficas a partir del Renacimiento, convirtiéndose así en un hito imprescindible para los itinerarios trazados en la modernidad y que llegan a nuestros días.

IB9: ¿Contribuyeron los viajes –y en particular, sus estancias en Alemania – al análisis e interpretación de las fuentes kantianas?

RRA9: La respuesta sólo puede ser positiva. El estudio introductorio de Teoría y práctica se fraguó paseando por la Selva Negra durante una grata estancia en Friburgo que data del verano de 1985 y la Idea de una historia universal fue traducida en aquel singular Berlín que aún conservaba su tristemente célebre muro. Obviamente mis estancias en Marburgo y en el Berlín posterior a la caída del Muro fueron vitales para preparar o culminar mis distintas ediciones, gracias a lo acogedoras que me resultan ambas ciudades, así como por el fácil acceso que se tiene a los fondos bibliográficos de sus excelentes y numerosas bibliotecas. Mis rousseaunianos paseos por los hayedos de Marburgo o las orillas de los boscosos lagos berlineses me sirven para meditar sobre las publicaciones que tengo entre manos en uno u otro momento. Al igual que a Rousseau, siempre se me han ocurrido más cosas paseando y disfrutando de un bello paraje que amarrado a mi mesa de trabajo, aunque ahí disponía de mi pipa, compañera inseparable de mis traducciones hasta cumplir los cincuenta y en contadas ocasiones al día de hoy para rematar algún texto que se me resiste, porque un amigo médico me hizo ver que la nicotina intensifica las conexiones neuronales y temo que así sea.

IB10: ¿Se ha modificado su interpretación de la filosofía kantiana con el transcurso de los años? ¿O bien las impresiones iniciales se han mantenido?

RRA10: Más bien diría que se fueron refinando y documentando las impresiones iniciales. El abordaje que hace Kant de las cuestiones morales y políticas me resultó siempre muy sugestivo, independientemente de que por supuesto no se le pueda tomar al pie de la letra y sólo sirva -lo que no es poco- para pensar a partir de sus muy sugestivas problematizaciones lo que ahora pueda preocuparnos. Kant tuvo que suprimir el saber para dejar sitio a la fe, porque quiso emprender una batalla sin cuartel contra los dogmatismos para someterlo todo al cedazo de la crítica y por desgracia sigue siendo muy necesario librar esa contienda todos los días. También quiso prevenirnos de los peligros inherentes a

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toda servidumbre voluntaria y abogó por emanciparnos de cualquier tutela por muy cómodo que resulte tenerla, siendo esto algo que conviene recordar cuando las nuevas tecnologías nos tutelan más cada día y exigen para ello una cooperación imprescindible por nuestra parte, toda vez que confesamos nuestros gustos y actitudes al navegar por internet haciendo consultas o compras. La fórmula de no instrumentalizar a nuestros congéneres conserva toda su vigencia y su modo de responder a sus tres célebres preguntas continúan inspirando innumerables debates en torno a los más diversos temas relacionados con ellas.

IB11: ¿Considera que la comunidad kantiana hispanoparlante ha tenido un mayor desarrollo durante las últimas décadas? ¿Podría decirse que dicha comunidad se halla en condiciones de aportar una mirada original sobre el pensamiento de Kant y de otros clásicos de la Modernidad, o bien carece de sentido referirse a una mirada específicamente hispanoamericana?

RRA11: Estoy convencido de que dicha comunidad puede homologarse sin problemas con cualquier otra y, por otra parte, cuenta con una ventaja que al mismo tiempo supone un grave inconveniente. Mientras que, sir ir más lejos, las comunidades anglosajona y francesa tienden a cerrarse sobre sí mismas en un juego autorreferencial permanente, los usuarios del español suelen estar muy atentos a lo que se publica en otros idiomas y ese tipo de apertura representa un factor muy positivo. Sin embargo, nuestra comunidad lingüística ha solido pecar del defecto contrario. En sus bibliografías raramente aparecen las publicaciones de los colegas hispanoparlantes y se ven trufadas por publicaciones en cualesquiera otras lenguas. Un conato cainita reposa bajo esa tendencia, que tanto preocupó a filósofos como Javier Muguerza y Fernando Salmerón, impulsores de los encuentros iberoamericanos o de la Enciclopedia Iberoamericana de Filosofía. Me gustaría estar equivocado, pero temo que los afanes de protagonismo y las banderías ocasionales puedan escorar la fecunda colaboración entre los estudiosos de Kant en lengua española. Espero que se trate de una percepción errónea y que no quepa generalizarla, pero con esa impresión me he topado por desgracia más de una vez y con esto podría suceder como pasa con las meigas gallegas, que a lo peor, aunque no se crea en ellas, “haberlas, haylas”.

IB12: Atendiendo a su interés por el arte cinematográfico, ¿en qué sentido específico se aproximan el cine y la filosofía? ¿Contribuye la formación filosófica para la formación del gusto estético?

RRA12: En mi caso particular el cine ha prefigurado mis acercamientos a las cuestiones filosóficas. Tengo para mi que las películas memorables resultan tan formativas como los libros y que nuestro imaginario colectivo está poblado de secuencias cinematográficas con las cuales configuramos nuestras opciones morales. Estoy muy contento de haber ideado un ciclo titulado Ideas de cine y cine con ideas, que tenía lugar justo antes de comenzar el Zinemaldia donostiarra y cuyos vídeos están accesibles en la web del Museo de San Telmo. Una cuestión muy distinta es que haya mucho cine aburrido

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y prescindible de baja calidad. Pero hay otro que contribuye a forjar nuestros arquetipos jungianos. Títulos como El planeta de los simios -me refiero por supuesto a la primera entrega-, 2001, una odisea en el espacio del fabuloso Stanley Kubrick, Blade runner, Sonrisas y lágrimas o Tous les matins du monde, siguen dando mucho que pensar o sentir al visionarlas en diferentes momentos del periplo vital y demuestran que la reflexión o la educación sentimental para nada está reñida con pasárselo bien.

IB13: ¿Considera que el estudio de la historia de la filosofía nos torna más aptos para la reflexión filosófica?

RRA13: Creo que resulta muy útil para no descubrir nuevos Mediterráneos a cada paso y que se trata de algo extraordinariamente formativo, no sólo para quienes cultivan profesionalmente la filosofía, sino para cualquier persona que quiera enriquecer con fundamento su formación cultural. Leer a los clásicos del pensamiento supone adelantar mucho camino y ese bagaje sólo puede abrirnos nuevos horizontes. Al igual que nunca se cansa uno de volver a escuchar piezas de Bach, Beethoven o Mozart, releer a Diderot, Rousseau o Kant siempre trae cuenta.

IB14: ¿Que experiencias no académicas destacaría como un resultado valioso de su recorrido académico?

RRA14: Caramba. Pues quizá el haberme dado la ocasión para conocer algunas personas que seguramente no hubiese tratado de otra forma y que me han acompañado luego durante largos años de una u otra forma. En cualquier caso, si decidiéramos invertir el orden causal de la pregunta, podría referirme a lo que me sirvió para fecundar mi recorrido académico y aquí, aparte de a los maravillosos amigos que me han acompañado en uno u otro tramo del camino, abriría un apartado para los viajes. De joven descubrí Europa gracias a uno billete de tren que resultaba muy accesible llamado inter-rail. La ruta de mi primer viaje tuvo como hilo conductor los lugares donde Wittgenstein había estado en algún momento de su vida: la localidad noruega de Skjiolden en el Sognefjord, Viena, Trattenbach o Cambridge. Ver la capilla Sixtina o visitar los museos de Florencia recreándome con el Perseo de Cellini, contemplar un atardecer en la costa de Amalfi con Capri al fondo, explorar los aledaños de Interlaken o admirar el Circo de Gavarnie, son experiencias que no se pueden obtener leyendo libros y que nos dan otra forma de ver las cosas. Ya me referí antes a mi afición por pasear disfrutando de la naturaleza como hizo Rousseau. A esos paseos y paisajes (también humanos por supuesto) debo las pocas ideas que haya podido transcribir en mis publicaciones.

IB15: ¿A qué otra profesión u oficio quisiera haberse dedicado si no hubiese optado por la filosofía?

RRA15 : Pues muchas veces he pensado que me hubiera gustado dedicarme a la fotografía, que junto al ajedrez y los viajes fue una de mis grandes pasiones juveniles. Captar paisajes e inmortalizar gestos y actitudes me resulta muy sugerente. Lo malo es que

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también aquí he cedido a la comodidad, por lo que, tras arrinconar mis viejas cámaras réflex no digitales para servirme de las compactas con sus versátiles objetivos, estas últimas han quedado arrinconadas a su vez por el móvil, cuyas prestaciones no permiten hacer algo que merezca cabalmente ser llamado fotografía, sobre todo si a uno le gusta prescindir siempre del flash para plasmar la luz ambiental. Ciñéndome a mis aficiones, imagino que también me hubiera encantado tener aptitudes para ser cineasta, lo que afortunadamente no ha sido el caso, porque también me gusta mucho el buen vino y esa inclinación dista mucho de convertirle a uno en vinicultor.

Acaso por no tener una docencia obligatoria, he solido echar de menos que mi actividad no tuviera una incidencia más inmediata. Sé muy bien que mi quehacer puede llegar a tener algún impacto a medio y largo plazo, pero no hubiera desdeñado desempeñar encomiendas donde los resultados fueran tangibles de manera más directa. Las tareas de gestión podrían haberme tentado en mi juventud, si se hubiera presentado alguna oportunidad para ello. Pero ya no es el caso, al haber alcanzado lo que ahora se ha dado en llamar madurescencia y contar en décadas el tiempo transcurrido, mientras que sólo cabe vislumbrar algunos años por delante. Tampoco cambiaría nada de lo que hice. De todo se aprende y las malas experiencias nos ayudan a valorar mejor lo que realmente nos importa. Sin tristezas no podría haber alegrías. Lo que cuenta es poder compartir unas y otras con quienes uno elige hacerlo.

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Kant y la política

Kant and Politics

LUCIANA MARTÍNEZ 

Universidad de Buenos Aires/CONICET, Argentina

Reseña de: Faggion, A., Pinzani, A., Sánchez Madrid, N. (eds.), Kant and Social Policies,

Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016, 177 pp. ISBN: 978-3-319-42657-0.

El libro Kant and Social Policies reúne siete trabajos referidos a la filosofía política y jurídica de Immanuel Kant. De acuerdo con la Introducción del libro, algunos de esos textos fueron discutidos en una reunión académica que tuvo lugar en la Universidad Federal de Santa Catarina, en Florianópolis, Brasil. En esa Introducción, además, los editores señalan un consenso de los autores acerca de la vigencia del pensamiento kantiano y su provecho para pensar los problemas políticos actuales.

El primer artículo se titula “Kant on Citizenship, Society, and Redistributive Justice”, y fue escrito por Susan Meld Shell. El punto de partida de este texto es el reconocimiento de dos tendencias en la interpretación de la teoría de la justicia de Kant, y la propuesta de una tercera opción, basada en el concepto de ciudadano. Por un lado, Shell indica una interpretación liberal, según la cual la función principal del Estado consiste en mantener y defender las consecuencias del mercado. Por el otro lado, Shell encuentra una lectura “social democrática”. La autora considera que ninguna de las dos corrientes interpretativas contempla los verdaderos motivos por los que el Estado puede legítimamente tomar el dinero de los ricos en beneficio de los pobres. En la primera parte del texto, la autora reconstruye las dos tendencias exegéticas en la literatura kantiana. En segundo término, analiza las fuentes. En tercer término, exhibe su propia propuesta interpretativa, que se basa en la elucidación de dos conceptos de ciudadano, que son el concepto de ciudadano activo y el de ciudadano pasivo. Shell vincula esta distinción con la explicación de la justicia redistributiva en la cuarta parte de su capítulo.

En el capítulo de Alessandro Pinzani y Nuria Sánchez Madrid, titulado “The State Looks Down: Some Reassessments of Kant's Appraisal of Citizenship” se retoma el

Luciana Martínez. UBA, CONICET. Correo electrónico: luciana.mtnz@gmail.com.

[Recibido: 2 de noviembre 2017

Aceptado: 7 de noviembre 2017]

Luciana Martínez

concepto de ciudadano, con el fin de elucidar cuál es la naturaleza de la protección que recibe el ciudadano pasivo. También en este texto se sostiene una interpretación de la filosofía política de Kant que no la identifica con el liberalismo ni con el republicanismo. Para estos autores, en cambio, el pensamiento kantiano se encuentra en una posición intermedia entre ambos. La argumentación del texto se dirige especialmente contra las interpretaciones liberales de la filosofía política de Kant. El Estado y el derecho, señalan, no se basan en una agregación de voluntades individuales por medio del contrato social, sino, antes bien, en la idea, original y a priori, de una voluntad unificada. Por medio de la interpretación de este rasgo del pensamiento de Kant, los autores pretenden exhibir algunos elementos del sistema político y jurídico de Kant que no encajan con su noción de Ilustración ni con el consecuente destino cosmopolita de la especie humana.

El capítulo de Aguinaldo Pavão y Andrea Faggion se titula “Kant For and Against Human Rights”. Como su título lo anuncia, el texto trata sobre la relación de Kant con los derechos humanos. Por una parte, se suele considerar que la filosofía kantiana constituye un pilar para la tradición que sustenta los derechos de los hombres en su autonomía. Sin embargo, para los autores de este capítulo esa legislación incurre en una confusión de dos planos: el plano moral y el plano jurídico, en la perspectiva kantiana. Para justificar esta tesis, los autores exponen una explicación detallada de las diferencias entre la ética y el derecho.

El capítulo siguiente fue escrito por Alberto Pirni y tiene como título “The Place of Sociality: Models of Intersubjectivity According to Kant”. El autor comienza su investigación reseñando las dificultades del concepto de derecho social en la Modernidad. Luego analiza la contribución de Kant en su desenvolvimiento, en particular por medio del comentario de algunos pasajes de la Metafísica de las costumbres. A partir de ello, alcanza la primera conclusión parcial del capítulo, según la cual Kant alcanza un equilibrio inestable acerca del derecho social en ese texto. Sin embargo, continúa Pirni, puede encontrarse un tratamiento más preciso del tema en la Fundamentación de la metafísica de las costumbres y en el proyecto de una Metafísica. En particular, el autor se demora en la noción del reino de los fines. La referencia a esta noción, que involucra una dimensión ideal regulativa pero también una dimensión constitutiva estructural, proporciona instrucciones concretas para la vida moral.

El texto “Rawls Vs. Nozick Vs. Kant on Domestic Economic Justice”, escrito por Helga Varden, tiene como punto de partida las objeciones de Nozick a la filosofía de la justicia distributiva de Rawls. El objetivo propuesto en él consiste en exhibir, por medio de una relectura de Kant, una revisión de esas objeciones. La autora reseña algunas interpretaciones de la teoría kantiana de la justicia que se habían desarrollado en la época de la discusión de Rawls y Nozick. Luego, propone una interpretación de ese aspecto de la filosofía de Kant que, a su juicio, exhibe que esta filosofía contiene elementos provechosos para esa discusión. El texto se centra en la justicia económica. En él se alcanza una interpretación de Kant según la cual su filosofía no necesita ser actualizada para contribuir en las discusiones contemporáneas. Esa interpretación, además, permite advertir aciertos y errores de Rawls y de Nozick en la discusión reseñada.

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Faviola Rivera Castro ofrece una contribución titulada: “Rawls and Kant on Compliance with International Laws of Justice”. La autora analiza las causas y las soluciones de los conflictos bélicos internacionales, de acuerdo con las perspectivas de Rawls y de Kant. Para ella, la filosofía de Rawls rompe con el contractualismo en el tratamiento de los dos temas. Rawls halla las causas de la guerra en la imperfecta organización de algunos Estados y no, como el contractualismo kantiano, en las relaciones que se establecen entre ellos. Éste es el eje de la diferencia entre ambos filósofos que interesa a Rivera Castro. Para ella, Rawls se distancia del contractualismo kantiano, que motiva la necesidad de mecanismos no morales, externos a la estructura de los Estados, para la resolución de los conflictos internacionales. Estos mecanismos deben asegurar la independencia y la igualdad de poder entre los Estados, de modo tal que las relaciones entre ellos no resulten conflictivas. Según Rawls, en cambio, la paz depende de que algunas sociedades se transformen ellas mismas internamente, i.e., se vuelvan decentes.

El último capítulo, de Joel Thiago Klein, se titula “Kant and Public Education for Enhancing Moral Virtue: The Necessary Conditions for Ensuring Enlightened Patriotism”. En este texto se estudia un aspecto político de la visión kantiana de la educación pública. En ella, según Kant, tiene su lugar la enseñanza del pensamiento patriótico y republicano. Esta enseñanza contiene, indica Klein, los principios de la doctrina del derecho y los deberes de la virtud, y constituye una educación para la libertad. Ella no se orienta según las consecuencias de nuestras acciones, sino de acuerdo con sus principios, y proporciona a los individuos el derecho de actuar en exclusiva conformidad con el deber.

Este libro contiene, en pocas palabras, intervenciones centrales para la discusión política contemporánea. Esas contribuciones exhiben, como lo pretenden los editores del libro, la vigencia de la filosofía kantiana. La noción de ciudadano, los fundamentos de la justicia distributiva, el significado del derecho social, los motivos y las soluciones de los conflictos bélicos, y la educación ciudadana son algunos temas estudiados a lo largo de textos que analizan de manera rigurosa los argumentos de Kant. Quizás convenga señalar que las contribuciones se inscriben, de manera deliberada, en un espacio de discusión abierto en el ámbito académico angloparlante- pero no restringido a él. Considerando la diversa proveniencia de los autores, creo que hubiera sido interesante que también se consideraran, en los diferentes capítulos, otras intervenciones en esos debates. Esto es lo único que pienso que puede reclamarse de un libro que, por lo demás, renueva y estimula discusiones filosóficas urgentes en el mundo actual.

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A propósito del dualismo cognitivo de Kant. Un análisis no- conceptualista de la heterogeneidad entre sensibilidad y entendimiento en la Crítica de la razón pura

Concerning Kantian Cognitive Dualism. A non-conceptualist Analysis of the Heterogeneity between Sensibility and Understanding in the Critique of Pure Reason

MARCOS THISTED 1

Universidad de Buenos Aires/CONICET, Argentina

Reseña de: Mathias Birrer, Kant und die Heterogeneität der Erkenntnisquellen, en: Manfred Baum, Bernd Dörflinger und Heiner F. Klemme (comps.), Kantstudien-Ergänzungshefte, Band 195, Berlín, de Gruyter, 2017, 327 pp. ISBN 978-3-11-054121-2.

Es sabido que uno de los pilares de la teoría gnoseológica kantiana se encuentra en su doctrina de la heterogeneidad de las facultades de conocimiento. En efecto, en uno de los pasajes más conocidos de la Crítica de la razón pura puede leerse que las facultades de la sensibilidad y del entendimiento, nacidas de una desconocida fuente común, tienen funciones absolutamente diferentes entre sí: mientras la receptividad de las intuiciones es la tarea propia de la sensibilidad, al entendimiento —facultad de la espontaneidad— corresponde pensar los objetos que le son dados mediante aquella (KrV, B29/A15). Una metáfora biológica expresa emblemáticamente esta doctrina: sensibilidad y entendimiento deben ser considerados “dos troncos del conocimiento humano, que quizás broten de una raíz común”, raíz que sin embargo permanece “desconocida para nosotros” (ibid.). Ahora bien, tanto la distinción y aislamiento de ambas facultades de conocimiento como su cooperación resultan imprescindibles tanto para analizar correctamente los elementos que

1 Universidad de Buenos Aires – Instituto de Filosofía “Dr. Alejandro Korn”. E-mail de contacto : marcosthisted@gmail.com

[Recibido: 15 de noviembre 2017

Aceptado: 20 de noviembre 2017]

A propósito del dualismo cognitivo de Kant

intervienen en el conocimiento de la experiencia como para explicar su posibilidad. No obstante, dada la heterogeneidad que media entre ambas facultades, la explicación no ya de la necesidad de la cooperación conjunta, sino del modo en que puede efectuarse esta cooperación —la aplicación de una (el entendimiento) a la otra (la sensibilidad)— requiere dar cuenta de un tercer elemento mediador entre sensibilidad y entendimiento: el esquema transcendental, producto de la imaginación transcendental. Es así que la postulación del denominado “dualismo cognitivo kantiano” entre sensibilidad y entendimiento exige recorrer el arco que va de doctrina de la heterogeneidad de ambas facultades, el reconocimiento de su aislamiento, la legitimación de su necesaria cooperación, hasta la explicación del modo en que esta cooperación puede realizarse. Este marco temático, y los problemas que le son característicos, constituyen el contexto en el que se desarrolla Kant und die Heterogeneität der Erkenntnisquellen, investigación efectuada por Mathias Birrer para su tesis de habilitación bajo la dirección de Dieter Heidemann (Universidad de Luxemburgo), cuyo material aquí se publica en una “versión revisada en varias direcciones”. Y, si bien el foco del análisis de Birrer está puesto en “la mediación entre los elementos intelectuales y sensibles de las facultades de representación y de conocimiento humanas” (Birrer 2017, p. 308), que se trata específicamente en el Schematismuskapitel, la obra lleva a cabo un enjundioso análisis de aquellos capítulos de la Crítica de la razón pura que preludian su tratamiento (particularmente, en el análisis de la temporalidad en la Estética Transcendental y de la síntesis de la imaginación transcendental en la Deducción Transcendental “B”).

Si bien hay consenso entre los estudiosos de la filosofía de Kant respecto de la relevancia que tiene la doctrina de la heterogeneidad de las facultades de conocimiento para el idealismo crítico, ese acuerdo culmina cuando se trata de determinar el significado y delimitación de las principales tesis involucradas por esta doctrina. Esto vale en especial para el problema, particularmente controversial, del sentido y alcance que debe darse a la distinción tanto de la sensibilidad y el entendimiento, como de sus representaciones características, las intuiciones y los conceptos puros. Es precisamente esta la cuestión que aborda M. Birrer en su investigación. En efecto, el autor parte de la siguiente crítica, válida tanto para los estudios contemporáneos como también tradicionales: a saber, que en la evaluación de la función de la sensibilidad –y de sus representaciones sensibles, las intuiciones- ha sido menoscabada en su autonomía e independencia, colocándola frecuentemente bajo la sujeción del entendimiento (Birrer 2017, p. 309).

A contrapelo de esta concepción dominante de la Kantforschung, y mediante el tratamiento de diversos temas característicos de la teoría del conocimiento kantiana (el problema del status del tiempo en la Estética Transcendental, del sentido interno, de la autoafección, etc.), extraídos de los distintos capítulos de la Crítica de la razón pura y analizados al detalle, y a partir de discusiones sostenidas con otros intérpretes (en cada uno de los tópicos estudiados dedica Birrer un apartado o más a la discusión y polémica con otros estudiosos de la Kantforschung), el autor pretende fundamentar la siguiente hipótesis: que el contenido intuitivo que aportan las representaciones originadas en la sensibilidad es ínsitamente autónomo e independiente de todo aporte que ulteriormente pueda provenir del

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entendimiento. Como defensa y explicitación de esta interpretación, Birrer encuentra un inestimable apoyo –y también, sin lugar a duda, una clave hermenéutica- en el no- conceptualismo contemporáneo.

Kant und die Heterogeneität der Erkenntnisquellen se divide en nueve capítulos. El primero de ellos (“Einleitung: Das Schematismuskapitel und das Heterogenitätsproblem”) trae una introducción general a la problemática tratada en la obra; los restantes ocho capítulos se distribuyen en tres partes. Las dos primeras tienen como propósito introducir, desde diferentes puntos de vista, la problemática central de la investigación, que es abordado en la última parte: el problema de la mediación entre las representaciones sensibles e intelectuales.

En la Parte Primera (“Ein kognitiv dualistischer Non-Konzeptualismus?”) se define el problema de la heterogeneidad de las facultades como clave para la comprensión del “dualismo cognitivo” kantiano y se establece una significativa analogía entre la concepción crítica de la autonomía de la sensibilidad con la tesis del no-conceptualismo contemporáneo. Establecido el problema de la heterogeneidad de las facultades, la Parte Segunda (“Die transzendentale Synthesis der Einbildungskraft als Selbstaffektion”) se ocupa, por un lado, de su aislamiento y, por otro, de su necesaria cooperación, recurriendo para ello al análisis textual de los principales tópicos de la Estética Transcendental y de la Deducción (B) de las Categorías, a la luz del concepto de autoafección. Por último, en la Parte Tercera (“Die Heterogenität im Schematismuskapitel”) se encara el problema de la mediación entre ambas facultades, a partir de un análisis minucioso del capítulo del Esquematismo, teniendo siempre como guía la función de la sensibilidad y la tesis de la autonomía e independencia del aporte sensible para el conocimiento.

Veamos con un poco más de detalle cada una de las partes que integran Kant und die Heterogeneität der Erkenntnisquellen.

Del análisis de determinados pasajes de la Crítica de la razón pura en los que Kant explícitamente se refiere a la “doctrina de las dos ramas del conocimiento” pueden extraerse —se sostiene en “Kants Lehre des kognitiven Dualismus”, el segundo capítulo de la obra de M. Birrer— los lineamientos generales del “dualismo cognitivo” kantiano. Birrer los organiza y sistematiza en cinco tesis, tres de las cuales se refieren a la relación que sensibilidad y entendimiento mantienen entre sí (irreductibilidad; cooperación; aislamiento), mientras que las otras dos definen características propias de cada facultad (originariedad del contenido representacional; incognoscibilidad de su raíz común). En efecto, la Irreduzibilitätsthese sostiene que “las funciones de la sensibilidad y del entendimiento no pueden ser adoptadas mediante la otra facultad, ni es posible mediante la facultad del entendimiento una intuición inmediata del objeto, ni tampoco es posible mediante la facultad sensible el pensamiento del objeto” (Birrer 2017, p. 43). Según la Kooperationsthese, por su parte, “el conocimiento humano en sentido propio descansa esencialmente en un trabajo conjunto de las funciones de la sensibilidad y el entendimiento, el cual depende de la función del conocimiento de intuición y concepto” (ibid.). De la Isolierbarkeitsthese se desprende que debe clasificarse cuidadosamente el rol

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que la sensibilidad y el entendimiento desempeñan en el conocimiento. Según la tesis de la Ursprünglichkeit der Vorstellungsinhalte “sensibilidad y entendimiento cada una de ellas portan a priori (originariamente) su propio contenido representacional” (ibid.). Por último, la Unerkennbarkeitsthese sostiene que “el origen del dualismo de las dos ramas no es completamente alcanzable para el conocimiento humano” (ibid.).

De esta manera, queda delineada en sus contornos esenciales la concepción kantiana del dualismo de las facultades de conocimiento. Ahora bien, según Birrer existe una estrecha relación entre esta doctrina kantiana y el debate contemporáneo respecto de “la existencia y modo de interpretación del contenido no conceptual de las representaciones en la teoría del conocimiento contemporánea, en la filosofía de la percepción y del espíritu” (Birrer 2017, p. 44). En “Konzeptualismus und Non- Konzeptualismus”, el tercer capítulo de la obra, se reconstruyen y sistematizan las dos principales corrientes de este debate, poniendo especial acento en el modo en que cada una de ellas interpreta el dualismo cognitivo kantiano, para luego clasificar distintas variantes de la vertiente no-conceptualista, cuya matriz común es la tesis del carácter autónomo e independiente de las representaciones sensibles (Birrer 2017, p. 67). Esta clasificación, que incluye varias opciones posibles, permite al autor identificar a la doctrina kantiana con una versión “dura” del no-conceptualismo, en la medida en que —siempre según Birrer— puede adscribirse a Kant “una diferencia esencial entre el contenido conceptual y el no- conceptual” (p. 96).

La Segunda parte (“Teil II: Die transzendentale Synthesis der Einbildungskraft als Selbstaffektion”) considera el resultado alcanzado en los capítulos previos —a saber, el reconocimiento del carácter no-conceptual de las intuiciones puras de la sensibilidad— como un punto de partida para el análisis de la Estética Transcendental y la Deducción Transcendental de las categorías (más específicamente: el segundo tramo de la versión de 1787, la denominada “Deducción B”). Ahora bien, un aspecto peculiar del recorrido que propone Birrer en esta Segunda Parte consiste en considerar al concepto de auto-afección como el hilo conductor de su análisis. El fundamento de esta elección es tanto polémico (se trata de mostrar aquí la inadecuación de la concepción de la heterogeneidad de las facultades según la corriente conceptualista, como explicación de la doctrina de la auto- afección) como sistemático (en este segundo sentido, la principal tarea es explicar, paso a paso, cómo la tesis de la autonomía de la sensibilidad y de sus representaciones respecto del entendimiento es consistente con la doctrina de la auto-afección). M. Birrer sigue meticulosamente este camino: primero, mediante un análisis focalizado en la noción de tiempo en la Estética Transcendental y su relación con el sentido interno (Capítulo 4: “Die Anschauungshaftigkeit der Zeit und der innere Sinn”), como presupuesto necesario para el tratamiento del problema de la auto-afección en la Deducción transcendental; luego, a partir de la indagación respecto de su “lugar sistemático […] dentro de la estructura de la argumentación de la Deducción B” (Capítulo 5: “Der zweite Schritt der B Deduktion als locus der Selbstaffektion”). Una vez delimitado el lugar y la función de la doctrina de la doble afección, se trata de establecer cómo ella adquiere una “función fundacional”, por un lado, para la “doctrina del ‘doble yo’ (Capítulo 6: “Die Lehre des doppelten Ich”), y, por

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otro, para la distinción entre forma de la intuición e intuición formal (Capítulo 7: “Selbstaffektion und die formale Anschauung der Zeit”).

El objeto de estudio de la Tercera —y última— parte de la obra es el capítulo sobre el esquematismo transcendental (“Teil III: Die Heterogenität im Schematismuskapitel”). Son bien conocidas para el asiduo lector de la filosofía de Kant las dificultades que depara al intérprete este “arte escondida en las profundidades del alma humana” mediante el cual debe explicarse cómo el esquematismo transcendental hace posible la aplicación de los conceptos puros del entendimiento a los fenómenos. La importancia que Birrer asigna a esta última etapa de su investigación depende de la valoración positiva bajo la cual considera al Schematismuskapitel: lejos de ser una mera repetición de los temas tratados en la Deducción transcendental, en él se alcanzaría una nueva comprensión del significado de la relación entre sensibilidad y entendimiento. Tal novedad descansa en la perspectiva que inaugura la facultad de juzgar. El foco del análisis de Kant und die Heterogeneität der Erkenntnisquellen se mantiene también en esta última etapa: una vez más la clave interpretativa consiste en la confirmación de la tesis de la autonomía e independencia del contenido sensible. En efecto, aquí, en el caso del esquematismo transcendental, se trata de establecer que la mediación entre las representaciones sensibles y las intelectuales, posibilitada por los esquemas transcendentales, no implica menoscabo alguno para la autonomía de la sensibilidad. En palabras del autor: “[u]na solución [Lösung] al problema de la heterogeneidad no supone una disolución [Auflösung] de la heterogeneidad, sino una disolución del problema fundamental (…) mediante una mediación de los elementos heterogéneos” (Birrer 2017, p. 288).

El análisis dedicado al Schematismuskapitel abarca los dos últimos capítulos. En el primero de ellos, “Architektonische Bedeutung des Schematismuskapitel”, Birrer analiza cuál es el contexto en el que se presenta el esquematismo transcendental (a saber, la relación que esta pieza argumental guarda con la Deducción transcendental —A y B—, y fundamentalmente la función que desempeña en el marco de la Analítica de los Principios), y cuáles son los principales temas que en él se tratan; para luego proceder a una evaluación general del capítulo en su conjunto. Por su parte, el último capítulo de la obra (“Das Schema als transzendentale Zeitbestimmung) está dedicado al “análisis de la determinación transcendental del tiempo dentro del problema de la heterogeneidad entre la sensibilidad y el entendimiento” (p. 269). Birrer divide la cuestión en dos tópicos: por un lado, se investiga el significado mismo de la heterogeneidad dentro del Schematismuskapitel y, luego, por otro, se dedica al análisis de la determinación transcendental del tiempo.

Diversas son las razones que hacen de Kant und die Heterogeneität der Erkenntnisquellen una obra valiosa para el estudio de la filosofía teórica de Kant. Por un lado, la elección del tema sobre el que gira la investigación: en efecto, si bien es cierto que el problema de la heterogeneidad ha sido tratado en los principales estudios sobre la filosofía de Kant, no menos cierto es que rara vez ha sido objeto de una investigación específica sobre sus supuestos, las tesis subyacentes y las distintas concepciones que sobre

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ella se tienen. Por otra parte, se trata de un estudio sumamente actualizado, ya que su autor se ha encargado de sistematizar las distintas posiciones (clásicas y contemporáneas) que sobre cada uno de los tópicos tratados, mediante una clara presentación, no exenta de puntos de vista controversiales, y ocasionalmente polémicos. Last but not least, la novedosa perspectiva exegética elegida por el autor (el no-conceptualismo como clave de interpretación del dualismo cognitivo kantiano) ofrece una mirada renovada sobre los clásicos temas de la filosofía de Kant, destacando su vigencia.

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El fin último aristotélico y el sumo bien kantiano: Una visión comparada

The Aristotelian and Kantian ethics from the Highest Good perspective

CÉSAR CASIMIRO ELENA

Universidad Cardenal Herrera-CEU, España

Reseña de: Aufderheide, J. & Bader R.B. (ed.): The Highest Good in Aristotle &Kant, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2015 pp. 245. ISBN: 978-0-19-871401-9.

La obra que nos ocupa es una compilación de artículos en torno al bien supremo en Aristóteles y Kant. Buena parte proceden de la conferencia que tuvo lugar en la universidad de St. Andrew en el año 2010 con el título: “Kant and Aristote and the Highest Good”. Dicha recopilación, según sus editores Aufderheide y Bader, permite al lector especializado acercarse a un campo temático de la filosofía moral, que no había sido especial objeto de atención al comparar la ética kantiana y la aristotélica. Los estudiosos contemporáneos de la ética aristotélica habrían estado sobre todo preocupados por la teoría de la acción y de la virtud y los de la ética kantiana por la cuestión de la universalidad y la dignidad. Opinión cuestionable, ya que ignora el interés permanente de la exégesis aristotélica por el fin último, de Ackrill, Monan, Nussbaum o Ursula Wolff; y de la kantiana por el Sumo Bien, Friedman o Düsing. Incluso la comparación de ambas visiones ha sido profundamente tratada por Engstrom, Höffe o Korsgaard.

Declaran los compiladores, que la comparación de ambas éticas desde esta perspectiva permite afrontar sus relaciones más allá de la mera confrontación entre deontologismo y eudemonismo. El lector encontrará, no obstante, profundas diferencias entre los diez artículos. No solo, evidentemente, por sus diferentes perspectivas analíticas, sino por su propio objeto de estudio. Reúne además a un elenco de estudiosos de la ética aristotélica y kantiana del ámbito anglosajón en su mayoría, a los que debemos estudios de referencia en el campo de la teoría de la acción como los del profesor Charles o la profesora Frede, de las relaciones entre felicidad y razonamiento práctico como Engstrom,

[Recibido: 4 de octubre 2017

Aceptado: 10 de octubre 2017]

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de los criterios de conmensurabilidad de los bienes como Shields o de la condicionalidad como Barney, por poner algunos ejemplos. Poder disponer del fruto de su trabajo en una perspectiva de conjunto es por sí mismo un acontecimiento para cualquier estudioso de la ética.

Sólo dos de ellos, el de Louden1 y el de Engstrom2, se ocupan estrictamente de la comparación entre ambas concepciones del sumo bien, el de Barney3 lo hace parcialmente y el resto se divide entre los que afrontan la cuestión en la ética aristotélica, Aufderheide4, Charles5, Shields6 y Frede7, y los que lo hacen en la ética kantiana, Bader8, Sussman9 y Timmermann10. Pero todos, de una manera u otra, conectan ambas visiones y el eje en torno al cual giran son las relaciones entre virtud ética y felicidad, salvo posiblemente el artículo de Sussman, que no obstante tiene un gran interés para el estudio del Sumo Bien en la ética kantiana y el de Frede que lo tiene en el ámbito de los estudios aristotélicos, especialmente iluminador su análisis del papel del deseo y del razonamiento práctico en la teoría de la acción.

La declaración de intenciones de la introducción, la de plantear las relaciones entre Kant y Aristóteles desde la perspectiva del sumo bien, del fin último, se ve ampliamente cumplida. Engstrom es el que destaca de manera más clara los puntos de conexión. Partiendo de su preocupación por la recuperación del pensamiento práctico, considera que tanto la propuesta kantiana como la aristotélica tienen un claro perfil cognitivista. Afirma que la oposición entre deontologismo y teleologismo se ha exagerado injustificadamente, ya que la crítica kantiana al teleologismo no afecta a Aristóteles. La ética aristotélica no plantea que el fin de la acción se establezca teóricamente, como los estoicos, ni

1Louden, R.B. (2015), “The end of all human action/The final object of all my conduct: Aristotle and Kant on the Highest Good”, en J. Aufderheide & R.M. Bader, (coord.), The Highest Good in Aristotle & Kant, Oxford University Press, United Kingdom, pp. 112-128.

2 Engstrom, S. (2015), “The Complete Object of Practical Knowledge”, en J. Aufderheide & R.M. Bader, (coord.), The Highest Good in Aristotle & Kant, Oxford University Press, United Kingdom, pp. 129-157.

3 Barney, R. (2015), “The Inner Voice. Kant on Conditionality and God as Cause”, en J. Aufderheide & R.M.

Bader, (coord.), The Highest Good in Aristotle & Kant, Oxford University Press, United Kingdom, pp. 158- 182.

4 Aufderheide, J. (2015), “The Content of Happiness: A New Case for Theôria”, en J. Aufderheide & R.M. Bader, (coord.), The Highest Good in Aristotle & Kant, Oxford University Press, United Kingdom, pp. 36-59. 5Charles, D. (2015), “Aristotle on the Highest Good: A New Approach”, en J. Aufderheide & R.M. Bader, (coord.), The Highest Good in Aristotle & Kant, Oxford University Press, United Kingdom, pp. 60-82.‌

6Shields, Ch. (2015), “The Summum Bonum in Aristotle’s Thics: Fractured Goodness”, en J. Aufderheide &

R.M. Bader, (coord.), The Highest Good in Aristotle & Kant, Oxford University Press, United Kingdom, pp. 83-111.

7Frede, D. (2015), “Determinig the Good in Action: Wish, Deliberation, and Choice”, en J. Aufderheide &

R.M. Bader, (coord.), The Highest Good in Aristotle & Kant, Oxford University Press, United Kingdom, pp. 15-35.

8 Bader, R.M. (2015), “Kant’s Theorie of the Highest Good”, en J. Aufderheide & R.M. Bader, (coord.), The Highest Good in Aristotle & Kant, Oxford University Press, United Kingdom, pp. 183-213.

9 Sussman, D. (2015), “The Highest Good: Who Needs It?”, en J. Aufderheide & R.M. Bader, (coord.), The

Highest Good in Aristotle & Kant, Oxford University Press, United Kingdom, pp. 214-228.

10 Timmermann, J. (2015), “Why Some Things Must Remain Unknown: Kant on Faith, Moral Motivation, and the Highest Good”, en J. Aufderheide & R.M. Bader, (coord.), The Highest Good in Aristotle & Kant, Oxford University Press, United Kingdom, pp. 229-242.

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empíricamente, como los epicúreos, verdaderos destinatarios de la crítica. Aunque Aristóteles, según Engstrom, considera el deseo del fin como causa de la acción, no es menos cierto que su determinación proviene del razonamiento práctico y no del propio objeto del deseo o de la razón teórica. Ni el argumento del ergon de la Ética Nicomáquea (1098 a 14-16) supone una apuesta por el razonamiento teórico sino por el práctico, ya que está en conexión con la dimensión desiderativa que escucha la razón, ni tampoco su doctrina de la felicidad, aunque señale que la felicidad sea en sentido propio la actividad contemplativa. Engstrom articula brevemente una explicación de las relaciones entre moralidad y contemplación, que posibilita la prevalencia del razonamiento práctico. La contemplación sería una condición formal del razonamiento práctico y no una actividad externa de rango superior. La virtud ética sería el eje de la doctrina de la felicidad y condición del resto de bienes, lo que estaría en sintonía con la concepción kantiana de las relaciones de condicionalidad entre virtud y felicidad.

Louden se aleja de esta visión conciliadora entre ambas concepciones. Aun reconociendo ciertas conexiones, resalta con claridad las profundas diferencias. Compartirían una visión racional de la estructuración de la vida práctica. El Sumo Bien da coherencia y orden, estructura el resto de los bienes en un plan de vida racional. Ni para Aristóteles ni para Kant debe existir una fuente heterónoma de determinación de los bienes. No obstante, las diferencias son más profundas que las similitudes. De su pormenorizado análisis cabe destacar al menos tres: 1-Mientras que Aristóteles establece una pluralidad de virtudes éticas; Kant la niega. 2- Mientras que los bienes exteriores juegan un papel en el ejercicio de la virtud ética aristotélica; en Kant no lo hacen. 3- Mientras que en Kant Dios juega un papel crucial, ya que garantiza la conexión entre virtud y felicidad, por eso la necesidad de postularlo; en Aristóteles, aun siendo la ejemplificación de la actividad perfecta, no tiene ningún papel en la determinación de la vida feliz, que se mueve en el límite de la inmanencia de la polis.

Aunque los artículos de Aufderheide y Charles no establecen una conexión directa con la visión kantiana, sí que lo hacen indirectamente. Aufderheide articula una renovada defensa de la denominada interpretación dominante11. La felicidad consistiría solo en la actividad contemplativa y, por lo tanto, critica la visión inclusivista dominante, que considera que es un conjunto heterogéneo de bienes. Centra su análisis en el capítulo 12 del libro I de la Ética a Nicómaco, donde se establecen las diferencias entre los fines o tipos de vida que merecen elogio y los que merecen honor. Solo la actividad perfecta merece honor, por lo que es un indicativo de que la virtud ética, digna de ser elogiada, no es un tipo de actividad perfecta. Tal título le corresponde solo a la contemplación. Aufderheide cuestiona el planteamiento de Engstrom, al negar a la virtud ética el papel de condicionante, de criterio respecto de los otros bienes. La conexión planteada por Engstrom con la visión kantiana queda radicalmente cuestionada. No solo eso, sino que

11 Tanto Aufderheide como Charles utilizan la denominación para estas dos posiciones que Hardie estableció (Hardie, W.F.R. (1967), “The Final Good in Aristotle´s Ethics”, en: J.M.E. Moravcsik, (coord.), Aristotle, London Pallgrave Macmillan, pp. 297-322.)

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además tiene una gran importancia para la propia doctrina aristotélica de la virtud ética, ya que Aristóteles no podría justificar su carácter absoluto, al estar en función de la actividad contemplativa.

No obstante, Engstrom al reducir la contemplación a un factor formal interno de la virtud ética, traspasa sin duda los límites del planteamiento aristotélico, pero presenta una opción interpretativa 12 , que es la que Charles 13 desarrolla en su artículo. Presenta, partiendo de esta perspectiva analítica, una tercera vía interpretativa, que se aleja tanto del planteamiento inclusivista, la mera colección acumulativa de bienes, como del dominante, un único bien. La felicidad consistiría en un conjunto de bienes, presididos por la contemplación, preeminente jerárquicamente, con la que tienen una relación de dependencia. Se trataría de una pluralidad organizada y no acumulativa. La clave reside en la especificación del tipo de relación que mantiene esa pluralidad con la contemplación. Todos los “componentes” de la felicidad serían instancias de la contemplación y, precisamente por tener ese tipo de relación, formarían parte de la misma. Comparten una forma de deseabilidad. No se trataría de un tipo de relación unívoca, sino analógica o focal. Así, la virtud ética es una instancia de la contemplación, ya que consiste en la búsqueda de la verdad en el ámbito práctico; pero no es la misma relación que la que tiene la amistad con la contemplación. Evidentemente, el problema es especificar el carácter de esta geometría variable. No se trata solo de un problema interno del análisis de Charles, sino que es propio de la reflexión aristotélica, presente en su crítica a la teoría de las ideas platónicas. Plantear una relación unívoca sería reproducir los errores del platonismo, pero también niega que se trate de una relación homónima. Aristóteles parece que se decanta por la analogía, pero deja la cuestión abierta (1096 b 27-30). Eso sí, los componentes de la felicidad están conectados entre sí en tanto que casos de excelente actividad. La lectura de Charles no permite, sin embargo, establecer como hace Engstrom el carácter preeminente y central de la virtud ética de una manera clara. El criterio unificador está en la contemplación. Solo indirectamente podría plantearse que el tipo de instancia o relación focal de virtud ética y contemplación permite establecer entre ellas un tipo de relación preferencial, el tipo de racionalidad que muestran, lo que permitiría también a su vez, presentar a la virtud ética como fundante del resto de bienes. Pero Charles no articula esta posibilidad y, por lo tanto, la relación con el Sumo Bien kantiano resulta problemática de nuevo.

El problema de la relación entre los componentes de la felicidad vuelve a ser el eje en torno al cual gira la reflexión de Shields: la cuestión de los criterios de conmensurabilidad, o lo que es lo mismo, cómo la virtud ética puede convertirse en criterio fundante del resto de los bienes, que forman parte de la felicidad. Considera que la crítica aristotélica a la doctrina de las formas, priva a Aristóteles de poder articular una propuesta

12 Anteriormente ya se habían avanzado interpretaciones de este tipo, siendo especialmente valiosa la de Weidemann ( Weidemann, H. (2001), Kants Kritik am Eudaimonismus und die platonische Ethik, en: Kant- Studien 92 (1)).

13La lectura de Charles en torno de los cinco primeros capítulos del libro I son realmente esclarecedores y

permite dar cuenta de muchos de los problemas que se han planteado en la exégesis aristotélica, al considerar que se trata de una investigación hipotética abierta.

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razonable sobre la conmensurabilidad de los distintos bienes. El fin último no podría por lo tanto convertirse en canon o criterio del resto. Partiendo del problema, que el propio Aristóteles muestra en 1096 b 27-30, la relación entre virtud y contemplación queda sin aclarar. La homonimia podría ser una solución, si la perspectiva aristotélica fuera exclusivamente funcional o teleológica, ejemplos del flautista o del zapatero en el argumento del ergon. Pero es que precisamente la crítica a Platón no se mueve en un contexto funcional o teleológico. Así, por ejemplo, la analogía entre la virtud y el placer como instancias de la contemplación no sería funcional, una es un caso de un tipo de razonamiento, mientras que el placer es la culminación afectiva de la perfección de la actividad. Aristóteles maneja, por lo tanto, diferentes perspectivas en su crítica a la teoría platónica, la categorial, la de los distintos tipos de ciencias, la del bien intrínseco. La crítica a la univocidad trae como consecuencia la eliminación de cualquier criterio de conmensurabilidad. Para Shields significa no haber fundamentado la analogía, que se plantea, pero que no se justifica. Si desde la perspectiva de Charles, la conexión con el planteamiento kantiano del Sumo Bien parece difícil, la reflexión de Shields la excluye totalmente, ya que no habría ningún criterio de medida entre la virtud ética y el resto de componente de la felicidad.

Si Shields cierra, indirectamente, la posibilidad de conectar ambas visiones, el primero que lo hace de una manera explícita, desde la óptica kantiana, es Barney. Destaca tres diferencias fundamentales entre el planteamiento kantiano y el aristotélico: 1- Mientras que en toda la filosofía antigua la felicidad es un estado objetivo, en Kant es un estado subjetivo. 2- Mientras que para la filosofía antigua la condicionalidad de la felicidad es interna, ya que la virtud es psicológicamente constitutiva de la felicidad, sea razón teórica o práctica; Kant habla de una condicionalidad interna solo en sentido normativo, ya que mantiene claramente que su relación es sintética. 3- Mientras que la ética aristotélica establece la posibilidad de realización de la felicidad en los márgenes de la inmanencia de la polis, Kant critica este optimismo “ingenuo”. Precisamente esta última diferencia, esta crítica de Kant al optimismo aristotélico, es la que culmina la reflexión de Frede en el primer artículo de esta compilación. Señala la autora alemana que Kant no la considera solo imposible sino que sobre todo la califica como no deseable.

Las diferencias expuestas por Barney marcan la difícil conciliación entre ambas concepciones. Sin embargo, su análisis pasa por alto que, aunque es cierto que la virtud ética es un componente interno de la felicidad, también es el canon externo del resto de componentes de la felicidad. Y lo es en un sentido muy próximo al kantiano. El problema es interno a la ética aristotélica y es, de nuevo, la difícil armonización del carácter absoluto de la virtud y su relación con la contemplación.

Más allá del análisis de las diferencias entre ambas visiones de la felicidad, Barney desarrolla un estudio sistemático de la concepción kantiana del Sumo Bien en la Crítica de la Razón Práctica. Se ocupa de la condicionalidad entre los dos componentes del Sumo Bien, virtud y felicidad, exponiendo y desmontando algunas de las explicaciones habituales de la misma. Se trata de una relación sintética conocida a priori, en la que la

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felicidad no solo está condicionada por la virtud, sino que está fundada por la misma. Una clara muestra de una lógica interna del querer moral.

Concluye su artículo con una última e interesante conexión con el pensamiento antiguo, no con el platónico o con el aristotélico, sino con el de Hesíodo. Contemplando la argumentación kantiana del Sumo Bien más como una narrativa de ascenso que como una exposición lógica, señala que el propio Kant encuentra un paralelo entre su concepción del Sumo Bien y la exposición del papel de Zeus como juez en los Trabajos y los Días. Concepción criticada precisamente por Aristóteles.

Los tres artículos que cierran esta compilación no establecen ninguna conexión directa con la doctrina de la felicidad aristotélica, pero el artículo de Bader profundiza indirectamente en la heterogeneidad del planteamiento aristotélico y kantiano. Según la Crítica de la razón práctica, virtud y felicidad tienen fuentes propias, su relación es sintética y la condicionalidad de la segunda por la primera es en realidad una relación fundante y no arbitraria o casual. Precisa que la completa conformidad de las disposiciones con la ley moral no puede ser entendida de un modo intensivo sino de un modo extensivo. La santidad no podría ser situada en un punto de la serie de elecciones sino en el conjunto de la serie, en el conjunto de las elecciones como un todo. Esta perfecta conformidad no es exigida directamente por el imperativo categórico. La ley moral como principium diiudicationis y executionis no presupone el Sumo Bien; pero si éste no fuera posible la ley moral sería fantástica y dirigida a fines imaginarios. Es necesaria la posibilidad de esa incondicionada libertad, del reino de los fines, de la razón como un todo. La ley moral es ley de la razón, requiere coherencia, y sin la posibilidad de ese sistema universal de fines la coherencia se perdería. Concepción diametralmente opuesta a la aristotélica, ya que Aristóteles plantea una concepción intensiva de la virtud, que convertida en hábito garantiza la invulnerabilidad del carácter virtuoso, que se muestra en los límites de la vida en común de la polis.

El artículo de Sussman es el que menos permite establecer un diálogo con el planteamiento aristotélico, pero en cambio lo hace de manera muy profunda con el kantiano, especialmente con Bader y Barney. Rechaza los argumentos kantianos de la Crítica de la Razón Práctica y se centra en el análisis del Sumo Bien en la Religión dentro de los límites de la Razón. Criticando la interpretación normativa de las relaciones entre virtud y felicidad, única posible por otra parte, reivindica el rol motivacional, psicológico, del Sumo Bien. Sussman cree que su papel se evidencia cuando el individuo pasa del estado de naturaleza ético a la comunidad ética, de la realización moral individual a su realización colectiva. Si la comunidad moral no fuera posible, el individuo estaría amenazado constantemente por la presión del mal. La mera presencia de la virtud individual puede suponer una humillación al otro, por la superioridad del carácter moral del virtuoso. Solo en una comunidad ética y no política estos peligros pueden ser conjurados.

Timmermann vuelve a la Dialéctica de la segunda Crítica, centrándose especialmente en 146 y 147. Kant argumenta que la naturaleza nos ha dotado sabiamente al negarnos la posibilidad de conocer a Dios. El ocultamiento de Dios es precisamente lo que

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abre la posibilidad de la moralidad. Si existiera dicho conocimiento teórico, el individuo movido por sus impulsos patológicos los conformaría a los mandatos divinos por mero interés. No se actuaría por deber, no tendría que fortalecerse la voluntad frente a las inclinaciones patológicas. Se reconocería la ley, pero ésta no se convertiría en motivo. Se cumpliría la norma por interés, cayendo en la heteronomía. Sin mencionar a Aristóteles esta posibilidad es absolutamente antitética con su concepción de la felicidad como contemplación, como ideal de conocimiento absoluto y perfecto, divino.

Esta compilación permite afrontar el problema del fin último aristotélico, del Sumo Bien kantiano, desde una pluralidad de enfoques bastante amplia. Permite entender los posibles puntos de conexión, sus limitaciones y el origen de sus profundas diferencias. Una lectura trasversal de los distintos artículos recogidos en este volumen resulta iluminadora, ya que conectan las posibles similitudes y las profundas diferencias desde ópticas analíticas diversas. No obstante, se echa en falta un análisis más profundo de diferencias estructurales, que no tienen cabida en los artículos recogidos. No hay, por ejemplo, un análisis comparado entre la noción de virtud aristotélica y la presencia de esa noción en Kant, que desde luego no tiene nada que ver con la concepción de la misma como segunda naturaleza. No hay tampoco una apertura a posibles planteamientos del teleologismo práctico aristotélico desde una visión no esencialista, como ratio cognoscendi, lo que posibilitaría un cambio de perspectiva en la conexión con el papel de la virtud en la doctrina de la felicidad. A pesar de todo ello, tanto la selección temática de los artículos como la profundidad analítica de los mismos, representan no solo una aportación en la exégesis contemporánea de ambas propuestas éticas, sino sobre todo una perspectiva poco frecuente desde la que plantear sus posibles conexiones.

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ISSN: 2386-7655

Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095730

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS.

International Journal of Philosophy

N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 397-400

ISSN: 2386-7655

Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095734

Una nueva colección de ensayos sobre la Doctrina del derecho A new collection of Essays on the Doctrine of Right

FIORELLA TOMASSINI*

Universidad de Buenos Aires – CONICET, Argentina

Reseña de: Ormeño Karzulovic, J., Vatter, M., (eds.), Forzados a ser libres. Kant y la teoría republicana del derecho, Santiago de Chile, Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2017, 246 pp. ISBN: 9789562891493.

Forzados a ser libres reúne una serie de ensayos sobre la Doctrina del derecho de Kant, aunados por el propósito de indagar las preguntas y tópicos filosófico-políticos que aparecen en la “Introducción” del mencionado texto. En la introducción a esos ensayos, los editores del volumen, Juan Ormeño Karzulovic y Miguel Vatter, presentan la tesis de que Kant, ya en la “Introducción a la doctrina del derecho”, “parece revolucionar los postulados de gran parte de la tradición iusfilosófica occidental antecedente y sienta una nueva y radical doctrina del derecho para un mundo político sacudido por los eventos de las revoluciones republicanas norteamericana y francesa”. 1 De todos modos, esta compilación de trabajos no se limita a hacer un trabajo de exégesis de la “Introducción…”, sino que, con ese disparador, aborda diferentes temas y problemas de la filosofía jurídico- política kantiana, muchas veces con distintas perspectivas y estrategias argumentativas.

El libro se estructura en cuatro secciones. La primera sección se centra en la relación entre naturaleza y moral e incluye los trabajos de Ernesto Garzón Valdés y Juan Manuel Garrido. En su trabajo “Siete pecados capitales kantianos”, Garzón Valdés presenta lo que, a su juicio, constituirían “pecados políticos-morales” respecto del orden democrático nacional e internacional. Estos pecados son: la creencia en la naturaleza

*Profesora de la UBA e investigadora del CONICET. E-mail de contacto: fiorellatomassini@gmail.com

1 Forzados a ser libres. Kant y la teoría republicana del derecho, Santiago de Chile, Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2017, p. 13.

[Recibido: 14 de octubre 2017

Aceptado: 21 de octubre 2017]

Fiorella Tomassini

angélica del hombre, la imposición de una concepción determinada de la felicidad, la violación del principio de publicidad de las leyes, la intervención en los asuntos internos de los Estados, el colonialismo, la imposición de una autoridad mundial suprema y la guerra. El autor discute cada una de estas tesis de Kant desde una perspectiva sistemática, más que histórica, y poniéndolas en relación con cuestiones políticas del mundo contemporáneo. En el siguiente capítulo, “¿Y si la vida no fuera un derecho? Ser vivo e ius necessitatis”, Garrido tematiza el derecho de necesidad y sostiene que la posición kantiana respecto de este concepto jurídico implica una ruptura con la concepción tradicional de vida como autoapropiación. A diferencia de la tradición, para Kant el estado de necesidad queda por fuera del orden jurídico, porque la preservación del cuerpo propio no constituye una exigencia de la razón. Más bien, la noción de vida, tal como aparece en el apartado de la Doctrina del derecho dedicado al derecho de necesidad, supone una interrupción o suspensión de la realidad jurídica. Según Garrido, por detrás de esta tesis está la idea de que la vida no es sujeto de propiedad ni de derechos y, en definitiva, nada podría justificar la necesidad o urgencia de ella.

La segunda sección reúne trabajos dedicados al vínculo entre derecho y moral. En el capítulo titulado “¿Qué es erróneo en una interpretación moral de la filosofía política de Kant?”, Christoph Horn sostiene que la filosofía política de Kant es ciertamente confusa y mezcla elementos de la tradición del derecho natural, del liberalismo de raigrambre lockeano, de la teoría del contrato hobbesiano, de la teoría de la soberanía popular y de una teoría “peculiar” de la propiedad. De acuerdo con el autor, no hay continuidad entre la filosofía moral y la filosofía política, y en particular, la legitimidad del Estado en Kant no descansa en fundamentos morales. Las “interpretaciones morales” de la filosofía política kantiana no tienen suficiente apoyo textual. Para Kant el establecimiento del Estado es un problema prudencial, o al menos, el problema de su legitimación no se resuelve estrictamente desde un punto de vista moral. Además, el experimento mental de la institución de un Estado demoníaco prueba que el exeundum no puede ser de tipo moral. Según Horn, la esfera política es incluso incompatible con la esfera moral y presupone un concepto de libertad distinto de aquel constitutivo de la filosofía moral kantiana. En su trabajo “Derecho y coacción. ¿Puede derivarse la concepción del derecho de Kant de su teoría moral?”, Markus Willaschek, en la misma línea interpretativa que Horn, sostiene que el carácter coactivo del derecho vuelve imposible su deducción desde los principios de la moralidad. Pero a diferencia de la posición de Horn, el principal argumento que encuentra Willaschek contra la interpretación moral del derecho no tiene que ver con la falta de apoyo textual sino con la autorización para coaccionar. La independencia del derecho respecto de la moral se funda en que la coacción (que es un elemento analítico del derecho) no se puede derivar de los dos pilares de la moralidad kantiana, a saber, la noción de autonomía y el imperativo categórico. Negar que la concepción kantiana del derecho sea dependiente de la teoría moral de Kant no implica negar su normatividad. Willaschek no sostiene que el derecho en Kant descanse sobre fundamentos de tipo prudenciales. Los principios del derecho son, en efecto, normativos, porque pueden ser considerados como

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autolegislados, como expresión de nuestra autonomía racional. El siguiente capítulo, a cargo de Nicolás Vargas Carlier, estudia la “finalidad y formalidad en la formulación del imperativo categórico kantiano”. Allí el autor proponer leer las distintas formulaciones del imperativo categórico en Fundamentación a la luz (retrospectiva) de la Metafísica de las costumbres y de la Crítica del juicio. Cada una de esas formulaciones implica “un compromiso más íntimo de nuestra voluntad” y contiene un “saber no conceptual”, un “saber sin finalidad”, que debe determinar toda praxis moral.

La tercera sección tiene como tema “la libertad del derecho” e incluye los trabajos de Eduardo Molina Cantó, Juan Ormeño y Miguel Vatter. En “Libertad y exterioridad”, Molina Cantó examina las distintas nociones de libertad en la filosofía crítica para finalmente detenerse en la noción de libertad externa de la Doctrina del derecho. El autor propone analizar la distinción entre la noción de libertad externa y libertad interna tomando en consideración las nociones de “hecho” y “experiencia” de la libertad. El capítulo de Juan Ormeño, “Violencia y autorrespeto: las bases kantianas de la libertad exterior”, también está dedicado a la noción de libertad jurídica, aunque en relación con la interpretación kantiana de las fórmulas de Ulpiano. Según el autor, el primer deber jurídico no solo es condición de posibilidad de la agencia jurídica sino que además ese deber solo se puede cumplir bajo una constitución civil. En su trabajo “El derecho a tener derechos y las reglas de Ulpiano en la Doctrina del derecho kantiana”, Vatter sostiene que la distinción entre voluntad y juicio es útil para entender la diferencia entre la soberanía constituida de un Estado y el poder constituyente del pueblo. Dependiendo de si entendemos la autorización de las leyes en términos de voluntad o juicio, se pueden distinguir dos modos de autorización: el modo “electoral” y el modo “político” de autorización. A la luz de esta diferenciación, Vatter interpreta los elementos fundamentales de la “Introducción a la doctrina del derecho”, el derecho innato, las reglas de Ulpiano y la idea de constitución. El derecho a tener derechos es el derecho del ciudadano y su estatus como tal está dado por las reglas de Ulpiano. De todos modos, sostiene el autor, ser ciudadano no implica ser autor de las leyes positivas sino juzgar si las leyes del Estado corresponden a la idea de constitución civil.

Por último, la cuarta sección está dedicada a la moral, la historia y el cosmopolitismo. En “Justificación normativa y justificación funcional de la necesidad del Estado en Kant”, Alessandro Pinzani se propone mostrar que el exeundum kantiano está fundado a partir de una perspectiva normativa, pero no moral en sentido estricto, sino en el sentido de ese término en La metafísica de las costumbres, i.e. como concepto que incluye el derecho y la moral en sentido estricto. La fundamentación del Estado no es una cuestión que atañe estrictamente a la moralización del género humano ni tampoco a la necesidad de garantizar la paz y la propiedad. El exeundum e statu naturali es la conditio sine qua non para la realización concreta de nuestra libertad externa, o sea, para poseer derechos, ser autónomos y regular nuestra convivencia en base a obligaciones autoimpuestas. Por último, en su trabajo “Libertad y propiedad en la fundamentación del Estado y el cosmopolitismo kantiano”, Daniel Loewe investiga la necesidad del Estado como condición de posibilidad de la libertad, su relación con la paz perpetua y los diversos

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Fiorella Tomassini

estratos del derecho público. Según sostiene, los principios del derecho y sostiene nos conducen a la necesidad de una “república mundial de Estados”. La institucionalización del derecho de gentes como una Federación de Estados no basta para garantizar el derecho, la libertad exterior y “lo mío y tuyo externo” de cada Estado. La filosofía política kantiana permite fundamentar la idea de una república de repúblicas, a pesar de que Kant mismo rechace esa idea sobre la base del comportamiento de los Estados efectivamente existentes. En los últimos años, La metafísica de las costumbres en general, y la Doctrina del derecho en particular, han despertado un renovado interés en el ámbito de los estudios kantianos. Cada vez menos los trabajos acerca de la filosofía política kantiana omiten cualquier mención o investigación sobre lo que Kant dijo sobre el derecho en este texto de 1797. Los ensayos reunidos en Forzados a ser libres estudian cuidadosamente cuestiones nodales de la Doctrina del derecho, como es el concepto de libertad externa o jurídica, la noción de obligación jurídica, la interpretación de los deberes jurídicos de Ulpiano, la justificación de la propiedad y su relación con la necesidad del Estado, la relación entre ética y derecho, entre otras. Con ello, este libro contribuye a la investigación de la filosofía política de Kant, especialmente a la producción de literatura académica en lengua

castellana.

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International Journal of Philosophy

N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 401-403

ISSN: 2386-7655

Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095740

The functions of cognition and the unity of the Kantian system

Funciones del conocimiento y unidad del sistema kantiano

LARA SCAGLIA ●

Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, España

Review of: Martin Bunte, Erkenntnis und Funktion. Zur Vollstandigkeit der Urteilstafel und Einheit des Kantischen Systems, Berlin, De Gruyter, 2016, 359 pp. ISBN-13: 9783110488029.

The work of Martin Bunte “Erkenntnis und Funktion. Zur Vollstandigkeit der Urteilstafel und Einheit des Kantischen Systems” focuses on two of the most important questions addressed to the Kantian philosophy: is the table of categories complete? Is it possible to defend Kant from the accusation of an irreparable dualism between things in themselves and appearances and think about the possibility of an affection through the thing in itself inside the Kantian perspective?

Bunte aims to solve these two important problematic points of the interpretation of the Critique of pure reason through the reconstruction of the value of the functions implied in the process of knowledge. He focuses on the metaphysical and the transcendental deduction and on the roles played by categories, schemata, ideas and apperception.

The author divides his works into three chapters: the functions of knowledge, the transcendental subjectivity and the transcendental objectivity.

In the first chapter the author focuses on the origin of categories as subjective functions of the judgements. Considering several critics of Kant (for instance Paton, Priel, Wolff and Schulthess), Bunte stresses the different kinds of functions of cognition (logical, real and ideal) and their possible interpretations as rule, form or activity. More in detail, one of the most relevant epistemic topic of his research concerns the origin of the functions of objective cognition, namely categories. The author shows how categories can be defined as subjective forms of the thinking, responsible for the determination of objectivity insofar they are applied to experience as functions of the imagination through the inner sense (schemata).

Doctoranda en la UAB. E-mail de contacto: lara.scaglia@gmail.com

[Recibido: 22 de octubre 2017

Aceptado: 29 de octubre 2017]

Lara Scaglia

Another important theme of the first chapter concerns the correct interpretation of Kant’s notion of criteria of truth: as the Kantian philosophy suggests, the aim of epistemologists is not to ask if knowledge is possible, rather how knowledge is possible, what the criteria to identify the truth is and what its object is. Following the passages of the Critique of pure reason, Bunte distinguishes formal and material criteria of truth, and question in which sense they can be necessary or sufficient criteria.

In the second chapter, the author aims at demonstrating that the table of judgement is based on the apperception and how the completeness of the table can be demonstrated. He provides a reconstruction of the Kantian notion of transcendental subjectivity, distinguishing intellect, reason (as faculty of the principles, logical faculty or transcendental faculty) and apperception as principle of unity of the rules of the concepts at the base of the possibility of experience.

In the third chapter Bunte shifts his focus on the object, questioning its possibility to affect the subject through senses. The Kantian philosophy is not only a transcendental idealism but also an empirical realism: the condition of possibility of the unity of our knowledge is based on the subject and at the same time no knowledge is possible without experience.

The author then clarifies the Kantian conception of experience text through the distinctions of its different levels of complexity: from the simple impressions and organized structures of perceptions to the actual empirical knowledge, namely, experience, seen as the unification (nexus) of perception in a judgement.

Finally, he focuses on the representation of the things in themselves and the relation between objects of experience and things in themselves, which he considers both transcendental and transcendent More in detail, he aims at solving the problem of the affection through the things in themselves, referring to the symbols, namely, through a particular function to apply the category of causality (in its aspect of free causality).

The structure of the book reflects Bunte’s interpretation of the Kantian philosophy. According to the author Kant proposes an epistemology based on the duality between subject and object, the relation of which can be described in terms of activity and passivity: the object, indeed, must have an effect (affection) on the subject in order to start the process of knowledge.

Besides, subject and object are considered from two point of view: formal and material, namely, transcendental and empirical. According to Bunte, subject and object are called transcendental because not only because they are at the base of the possibility of experience, but also because they are beyond experience. To defend Kant from the accusation of a redundant multiplication of subject and object and to explain how the something beyond experience can be regarded as object of knowledge, Bunte clarifies the notion of knowledge in his interpretation of Kant. Knowledge is the unification of concept and intuition in a judgement, or in other words, the synthesis of the intuitions given in experience in accordance to the objective laws of the thinking. The activity of the intellect provides unity to the representation of a object given in intuition through space and time, which are conditions of the possibility of the experience of it.

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The functions of cognition and the unity of the Kantian system

But how can subjective rules of the thinking be objective functions of the determination of the object? To answer this question, the author reconstruct Kant’s transcendental deduction of the categories, clarifying that categories have a subjective origin (and for this reason Kant’s perspective is a transcendental one) and that these concepts, based on the subjective transcendental activity, have an effect on the empiric level, to which they provide order and unity.

Moreover, interpreting the notions of objectivity and subjectivity in Kant, Bunte aims at clarify the relation between activity and receptivity in the process of knowledge. In particular, he questions: 1) how can the relation between transcendental object and transcendental subject be regarded in terms of affection?; 2) how can the relation between transcendental and empirical subject be defined as self-affection?; 3) how can the necessary correlation of affection and self-affection plausibly work?; 4) how can the relation between transcendental and empirical object be intended?

The author provides a solution to these questions, reconstructing the Kantian system of cognition, following the thesis that there is a correspondence between the epistemic structures of cognition and the functions of the thinking.

To conclude, the work of Martin Bunte is a new interesting attempt to question the problem of the completeness of the table of judgements. The author gives a clear contribute in solving this question by elaborating an inquiry on the Kantian transcendental philosophy, which involves central topics such as: the different functions of the pure intellect (ideal, real, discursive and logical), the apperception and the thing in itself. Moreover, the book is systematically organised and the schemes presented in the last part are helpful to give an effective contribute to synthesize and visualise the manifold functions of cognition and help in understanding the value of the topics on which Kant focused. For instance, the clarification of the ontological value of the functions of the intellect as well as of the things in themselves still originates debates nowadays. Bunte underlines in many passages that the Kantian philosophy is not only an idealism but also a realism and he refers to things in themselves as transcendent base and transcendental condition of phenomena. But in which sense are things in themselves transcendent objects? Is this the only possible interpretation of the text? Does it lead to a multiplication of types of objects and realities?

As we can see from these and other questions, the book of Bunte opens a debate which originates in the problem of the completeness of categories and leads to the current topics inquired by logic, ontology and metaphysics.

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ISSN: 2386-7655

Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095744

La posibilidad de la unidad de la razón o el abismo infranqueable a través de las categorías de la libertad

The Possibility of the Unity of Reason or Its Unbridgeable Abyss from the Point of View of the Categories of Freedom

LAURA HERRERO OLIVERA 

Universidad Complutense, España

Reseña: Zimmermann, Stepham (Hrsg.), Die “Kategorien der Freiheit” in kants praktischer Philosophie, Kantstudien-Ergänzungshefte, 193, Berlin/Boston, Walter de Gruyter, 2016, 344

pp. ISBN: 978-3-11-048929-3.

La insistencia con la que Kant busca en sus escritos la unidad de la razón en sus usos posibles, corre paralela a las variaciones que a lo largo de sus obras podrían contribuir a profundizar ese abismo entre ambos usos de la razón. Así nos encontramos entre la publicación de la primera y la segunda edición de la Crítica de la razón pura la acentuación de una distinción que se dice precisamente del uso de las categorías, es decir, del corazón teórico de esta obra (KrV, B 166, Anm.). Esta distinción se refiere a la diferencia establecida entre el conocer y el pensar, en tanto que las categorías son, como se indicaba en la primera edición de la Crítica de la razón pura, las condiciones del conocimiento de toda intuición sensible que es traída así a la unidad de la conciencia; pero, además de conocer, las categorías se dicen en la segunda edición también de los objetos que pueden ser meramente pensados y que tendrán la posibilidad de adquirir cierta forma de realidad en el uso práctico de la razón. Bien podríamos pensar, que de esta forma se cierra precisamente esa cesura entre los usos de la razón, pues hallaríamos las mismas categorías garantizando la unidad de la sensibilidad (percepciones o deseos), pero en realidad se abre el abismo de lo suprasensible. De esta forma se encuentra en el ‘Prefacio’ de la Crítica de la razón práctica expuesto: “Aquí se esclarece también el enigma de la crítica de cómo en la especulación se puede negar la realidad objetiva al uso suprasensible de las categorías y, sin embargo, se puede concederles esta realidad respecto de los objetos de la razón pura práctica” (KpV, V, 5).

Profesora asociada de la Facultad de Filosofía de la Universidad Complutense de Madrid, lauraher@ucm.es.

[Recibido: 15 de noviembre 2017

Aceptado: 22 de noviembre 2017]

La posibilidad de la unidad de la razón o el abismo infranqueable…

Esta confrontación de los usos posibles de las categorías, y esta misma cita, son el motivo del segundo de los ensayos que nos encontramos en el volumen editado por Stephan Zimmermann, un minucioso capítulo redactado por Heiko Puls de la Universidad de Hamburgo. Antes de adentrarnos más detenidamente en este capítulo, me gustaría indicar que el hilo conductor de la obra en su conjunto, además de las interpretaciones de la tabla de las categorías de la libertad ofrecidas por cada una de los doce autores, apunta a la unidad de la razón y a la función que lo suprasensible juega en este sentido en las variaciones de la razón kantiana. Es por ello que no parece casual que el volumen se cierre con una propuesta acerca de la unidad de la misma de la mano del profesor Christian Kijnen (Kants ‘Kategorien der Freiheit’ und das Problema der Einheit der Vernunft”). Encontramos en estas páginas un arco de investigación que recorre desde las consideraciones de lo múltiple sensible, a los postulados de la existencia de Dios y de la inmortalidad del alma; desde la sensibilidad a las formas variadas del juicio y sus funciones y por último, aunque en ocasiones de forma muy rápida, nos encontramos ante un abanico histórico de líneas de influencia que nos lleva desde la propuesta general aristotélica, la filosofía escolástica del siglo XIII o la propuesta de Suárez hasta la condena a ser libre de la reflexión sartreana.

El capítulo que de una forma más clara se distancia de este modo de exposición es el primero, “Die praktische Elementarbegriffe als Modi der Willensbestimmung. Zu Kants Lehre con den ‘Kategorien der Freiheit’”; lo que tras este título se esconde es un muy original recorrido por las influencias que desde la escolástica se han ido introduciendo en las propuestas filosóficas del siglo XVIII, incluyendo por supuesto la obra de Kant. Así se reta al lector a desprenderse de la originalidad que el propio Kant se encarga de anunciar en su obra. Las influencias de Suárez, Pufendorf y la escuela de Wolff son el caldo de cultivo en el que el pensamiento kantiano madura, y cuyas huellas Theo Kobusch va entresacando. A la ingente tarea que supone establecer las líneas de continuidad dentro del propio opus kantiano, se le añade la propuesta de hacer una lectura desde el horizonte histórico y trazar esas mismas líneas que enlazarían textos y conceptos de diversos siglos y procedencias. Una tarea tan atractiva que nos anima a descubrir esas influencias, más allá de las idas y venidas respecto de la escuela de Wolff en la primera de las críticas, tema que sobrepasaría la finalidad de este primer capítulo y que se encuentra ya más documentado, pero que seguro ayudaría a entender mejor la razón histórica de algunas de las propuestas que se señalan en la Crítica de la razón práctica y la Metafísica de las costumbres. El cuerpo doctrinal histórico propuesto por Kobusch como escenario en el que surge el pensamiento kantiano se aúna bajo el título de una metafísica del ser moral (Metaphysik des moralischen Seins), en tanto que se descubre la función directriz que adquiere el ens morale (Cf, p. 18-19). Especialmente relevante a este respecto aparece la obra de Pufendorf de 1672 De jure naturae et gentium, obra en la que se propone la doctrina de los entia moralia como fundamento ontológico de la primera ética universal. La universalidad referida a la ética debía ser, de la mano de este autor del siglo XVII ampliamente estudiado y traducido en la época, una propuesta bien conocida en los círculos universitarios germanos del siglo XVIII y así Kobusch afirma rotundamente: “No es una causalidad sino

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más bien un hecho, que la expresión ‘ética universal’ con la que se señala la distancia respecto de la ética particular aristotélica aparece por primera vez con Pufendorf” (p. 21) y más concretamente en una carta a Thomasius fechada el 19 de junio de 1688. En esta capítulo nos sorprende igualmente que, frente a la mirada puesta en la modernidad desde la obra kantiana, se ahonde más en su “anclaje en la época medieval” (p. 22) especialmente por lo que se refiere a la Crítica de la razón práctica y a la Metafísica de las costumbres.

En relación con el tema de estudio propuesto, a saber, la tabla de las categorías de la libertad como formas de una autodeterminación de la voluntad, se apunta a una tradición medieval que se remonta a Heinrich von Gent (s. XIII) que habría propuesto por vez primera el concepto de autodeterminación de la voluntad mientras que, también en el s. XIII de la mano de P.J. Olivi, encontremos que “la mirada detenida a nuestra propia conciencia nos deja descubrir la existencia de nuestra libertad” (p.23). Estas propuestas son sin duda originales y apuntan a la necesidad de realizar una exégesis histórica más detenida, un trabajo que puede encaminarnos a posiciones polémicas, pues el mismo Kobusch apunta un error que los profesores R. Bittner y O. Höffe habrían cometido en 1989 y reeditado en 2010 en su clásico comentario a la Fundamentación de la metafísica de las costumbres, al considerar que el término ‘metafísica de las costumbres’ era de original porte kantiano cuando en realidad se encuentra ya en la escuela wolffiana bajo el título philosophia practica universalis y que se remontaría a la propuesta de Tomás de Aquino en la forma de una ontología de la acción. La polémica se avivaría al afirmar incluso que el único comentario a la Fundamentación que responde a una interpretación apropiada de los textos es el propuesto por H. E. Allison, Kant’s Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals.

Kobusch señala varias notas originales en la obra kantiana que no deberíamos desatender, pues en realidad a lo que apunta su análisis no es a un desmontaje de la razón pura práctica sino a la necesidad de realizar un análisis más fino y detallado de los textos pues su originalidad, no siendo tan evidente, habría de ser más profunda. En general será el espíritu sintetizador kantiano y la propuesta de su método propio lo que ha de establecerse como impronta kantiana y no la selección de una terminología y una problemática que ya habían sido establecidas minuciosamente en los siglos precedentes.

Como decía al comienzo, el segundo de los capítulos escrito por Heiko Puls, nos propone un recorrido por uno de los párrafos más relevantes del ‘Prefacio’ de la segunda de las Críticas. El método de exposición de estas páginas es muy diferente al largo capítulo con que se obra la obra, pues nos encontramos ahora con un estudio pormenorizado de tres textos seleccionados por el autor que se refieren de forma diversa al uso sensible de las categorías. La diferencia que señalaba al comienzo entre la posibilidad de conocer un objeto y la posibilidad de pensarlo, acciones ambas para las que necesitamos el uso de las categorías, apunta en realidad a un problema que parece más complejo, un problema terminológico y de contenido que diferencia la realidad objetiva desde un punto de vista teórico y desde un punto de vista práctico. Si bien estas dos formas de realidad se dicen de diversas maneras, ambas requieren el uso de las categorías. Ambas se refieren a formas de

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determinación, pero esa determinación se desplaza del ámbito de los objetos sensibles a la necesidad de la determinación del propio sujeto. En este capítulo se menciona casi de pasada la confrontación entre Kant y Pistorius, pero los comentarios de este último en su recensión a la Fundamentación de la metafísica de las costumbres, pudieron ser realmente el detonante para llevar a cabo la ampliación del campo de validez de las categorías (Cf. p. 81).

Esta recensión de H.A. Pistorius publicada en 1786 es el punto de partida del tercero de los capítulos escrito por el profesor Manfred Baum. De hecho esta recensión pudo haber dado pie al desarrollo de algunas de las partes más relevantes de la segunda de las Críticas, sino lo fue además de la segunda edición de la primera de ellas. Pistorius reclama de Kant una definición de qué sea bueno, pues el inicio del cuerpo argumentativo de la Fundamentación: “En ningún lugar del mundo, pero tampoco siquiera fuera del mismo, es posible pensar nada que pudiese ser tenido sin restricción por bueno” (GMS, IV, 393), le parece que necesita una explicación previa. Kant ahonda en esta cuestión y señala que establecer una definición de qué sea bueno antes de haber investigado acerca del principio de determinación de la voluntad sería de nuevo caer en el empirismo. De esta forma nos encontramos uno de esos momentos de orgullo del propio Kant cuando en la Crítica de la razón práctica se encarga de señalar que esta cuestión atañe al método y que su propuesta es la explicación de todos los extravíos que han tenido lugar en la historia de la filosofía (Cf. KpV, V, 64).

Gracias a las propuestas de estos dos capítulos se define de forma detallada cuál es el objeto de la razón pura práctica, un objeto muy particular que se refiere a la relación entre la voluntad y la acción, una relación determinada por el querer. No olvidemos que este querer es la nota distintiva, y en ocasiones desatendida, en la comprensión del imperativo categórico, que es aquel que no sólo no es contradictorio en sus términos, sino que además hemos de poder querer como ley universal. De esta forma, lo que es bueno o malo no se encuentra referido a un objeto sino a la forma en que se determina la máxima de una acción, lo cual concuerda además con el entendimiento más cotidiano del término que según Kant no se refiere en ningún caso a los deseos (Cf. p. 97). Este tercer capítulo concluye con una de las explicaciones más claras acerca de qué sean las categorías de la libertad: “Predicados de las acciones libres en tanto que sean posibles bajo un principio de la razón” (p. 104). Este principio de la razón es el que permite unir todas las acciones posibles bajo un ‘yo quiero’ o ‘yo debo’ determinados procurando así una unidad análoga al ‘yo conozco’ que proporciona la tabla de las categorías en el uso teórico de la razón.

Los capítulos escritos por Jochen Bojanowski e Ina Goy se desarrollan como comentarios ordenados según el propio transcurrir del texto kantiano y abordan, especialmente en el caso de la profesora de la Universidad de Tübingen, Ina Goy, bajo el título de “Momente der Freiheit”, discusiones muy interesantes y presentes en la exégesis clásica de los textos. Recurriendo de una forma detallada a cada uno de los momentos de la tabla de las categorías de la libertad, argumenta que éstas son fundamentos determinantes de las acciones humanas respecto a los conceptos de lo bueno y lo malo, es decir, que las propias categorías tienen un contenido moral y además, una discusión presente también en

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el texto de Jens Rometsch, que todas las ellas se dicen de aspectos empíricos que determinan nuestra acción. Un análisis también pormenorizado de esta tabla aparece en el texto del editor de la obra, el profesor Stephan Zimmermann. En buena medida los textos aquí recopilados hacen referencia a su texto del año 2011 Kants “Kategorien der Freiheit”, que él mismo se encarga de anunciar como la primera obra que se dedica íntegramente al estudio de esta tabla de las categorías de la libertad. En el texto que en este volumen presenta propone una reflexión crítica a sus propuestas en relación especialmente a las categorías de cantidad, cualidad y relación.

El capítulo escrito por el profesor Torralba se ocupa de la facultad de juzgar presente en todo uso de la razón, no sólo en la tercera de las Críticas, y destaca el papel que esta facultad de juzgar asume en la ‘Analítica de la razón pura práctica’. El paralelismo respecto a la facultad de juzgar en el uso teórico de la razón acaba allí donde respecto del uso práctico el objeto se refiere a lo suprasensible. El esquema de la sensibilidad se sustituye respecto de lo práctico por el concepto de la forma de la finalidad universal (Cf.

p. 272). Antes del cierre del volumen con el capítulo del profesor Krijnen al que ya me he referido, nos presenta Bartuschat el puente que nos llevaría de esta tabla de las categorías a la Metafísica de las costumbres, pues es en esta obra donde considera que las categorías tienen su lugar apropiado en tanto que se han de aplicar a los objetos sensibles del deseo y no sólo ser percibida como el resultado de una determinación perfecta de la razón por parte de la ley pura a priori de la moralidad.

Me gustaría concluir este comentario con el interrogante que hacia la mitad del volumen Jens Rometsch presenta en el desarrollo del capítulo “Kants ‘Kategorien der Freiheit’”. Parte en su reflexión de la consideración de la ubicuidad en la historia del pensamiento occidental del término libertad y considera que se debería establecer una consideración mínima en torno a qué se declara sujeto de un proceder libre. Un proceso se dice libre cuando el paso de un determinado estado de cosas a otro no parece poder deducirse por medio de ninguna ley, como, usando la terminología kantiana, podemos apreciar en el mundo empírico a través de las leyes de la naturaleza. Desde luego, podremos preguntarnos a partir de qué presupuestos establece Rometsch tal definición, pero parece inevitable que al menos haciendo uso del entendimiento común ordinario de nuestra época la definición no estaría tan desencaminada, teniendo además en consideración la concepción de la libertad heredada de la filosofía existencialista como aparece expuesta en este texto. Pero si asumimos la propuesta de Rometsch acerca de la equiparación de ser libre con estar inmersos en procesos de indeterminación de los resultados, no podemos inmediatamente asumir que este sea el significado presente en Kant. La ley moral que muestra la presencia de la libertad en nuestra voluntad no deja espacio para ninguna forma de la indeterminación en el curso de la acción del sujeto moral. De nuevo nos vemos remitidos a la primera de las preguntas que hacen del estudio de este volumen la pregunta siempre actual de la filosofía, ¿cómo pensarnos como libres sujetos a las limitaciones de una conciencia finita, no sólo referida al conocimiento sino también a su posibilidad práctica? Los fantasmas de la razón presentes en la Fundamentación de la

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metafísica de las costumbres y que nos anuncian las limitaciones a la hora de esclarecer los verdaderos motivos de nuestra acción, no se diluyen por la pormenorizada revisión de una tabla de las categorías que se dice siempre de una forma de conciencia de la obligación moral.

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LO GENÉTICO Y LO TRASCENDENTAL A PROPÓSITO DEL PROBLEMA DEL LENGUAJE EN LA FILOSOFÍA KANTIANA

THE GENETIC AND THE TRASCENDENTAL RELATED TO THE PROBLEM OF LANGUAGE IN KANT’S PHILOSOPHY

ALBA JIMÉNEZ 

Universidad Complutense de Madrid, España

Reseña de: Raphaël Ehrsam: Le problème du Langage chez Kant, Vrin, 2016, 288 pp. ISBN: 978-2-7116-2721-9.

Ya Kuno Fischer, al explicar la distinción entre la vieja y la nueva escuela kantiana de Jena, había trazado una línea divisoria fundamental entre dos modos comprehensivos antagónicos de evaluar el programa crítico. Dichos modelos tienen sin duda un claro paralelo con las interpretaciones contemporáneas representadas respectivamente por las lecturas fenomenológicas antipsicologistas y las derivas naturalizantes desarrolladas bajo el paraguas de las recientes investigaciones de las ciencias cognitivas. Kuno Fischer había subrayado la distancia entre la filosofía de la identidad representada por Fichte, Schelling, Hegel o Reinhold y una crítica de la razón o doctrina de la experiencia interna del alma de corte antropológico o psicologista como la de J. F. Fries.

En Le Problème du Langage chez Kant se hace de esta distinción el hilo conductor desde el que abordar la cuestión del lenguaje en la filosofía kantiana, presente ya en los debates contemporáneos a Kant, como muestra la publicación de la pregunta de 1772 de la Real Academia de las Ciencias de Berlin cuyos frutos se hicieron rápidamente visibles en investigaciones como el Abhandlung über den Ursprung der Sprache de Herder, la disertación de J. D. Michaelis, o el libro de Tetens Über den Ursprung der Sprachen und der Schrift. En 1756 Maupertuis había pronunciado una conferencia sobre el origen del lenguaje que fue respondida por J. P. Süssmilch, cuyo libro Versuch eines Beweises, dass,

Profesora de la Facultad de Filosofía de la UCM. E-mail de contacto: albajimenez47@gmail.com

[Recibido: 22 de octubre 2017

Aceptado: 24 de octubre 2017]

Lo genético y lo transcendental a propósito del problema del lenguaje…

die erste Sprache ihren Ursprung nicht vom Menschen, sondern allein vom Schöpfer erhalten habe impulsó un debate desde el cual Kant pudo elevar su perspectiva trascendental. La historia de la Real Academia de las Ciencias de Berlin muestra una vez más el curso fecundo de las preocupaciones de los autores franceses, en esta ocasión, sobre el problema del origen del lenguaje, hacia el campo conceptual de los filósofos alemanes. En el caso de Kant, su relación con el problema del lenguaje parece haber estado marcada casi ininterrumpidamente por una doble ambigüedad. De un lado las escasas menciones de Kant al respecto en las obras del canon publicadas por él y la exigua labor de investigación

―si lo comparamos con otros aspectos clásicos de la filosofía kantiana― que ha hecho de este tema su objeto de estudio. Por otro lado, la enorme centralidad del problema del significado o del lenguaje, si atendemos al lugar sistemático que Kant le atribuye explícitamente y a las funciones que parece conferirle en el marco de la Analítica trascendental, así como la enorme influencia que sus posiciones han ejercido en la filosofía del lenguaje y de la semántica contemporánea, con referencias directas por ejemplo en el marco de los planteamientos del indio K. K. Bagchi sobre metalenguaje, la reflexión sobre semántica trascendental de Z. Loparic, la distinción subrayada por J. P. Nolan entre Sinn y Bedeutung o los trabajos de Béatrice Longuenesse, de los que este libro es deudor en muchos aspectos.

El autor de Le Problème du Langage chez Kant adopta una posición decidida sobre la importancia de la reflexión kantiana desde un punto de partida según el cual el lenguaje es un objeto de reflexión explícito en Kant, que ostenta una posición arquitectónica relevante y claramente definida la cual, aunque no permea la totalidad de la filosofía kantiana como su hilo conductor, sí ocupa un lugar estratégico de notable prioridad en su teoría del conocimiento. De esta manera, Raphaël Ehrsam se distancia tanto de lecturas críticas como las de Hamann o Herder que habían sostenido que el problema del lenguaje carecía sintomáticamente de un articulación suficiente en la filosofía kantiana, bien ocasionada por el privilegio atribuido por Kant a la matemática, bien como consecuencia del carácter trascendental a priori otorgado a los principios del conocimiento, como de lecturas que, aunque reconocen que la cuestión del lenguaje está presente de modo subterráneo en la filosofía kantiana, consideran que el tratamiento queda siempre limitado a una perspectiva local, fragmentaria e implícita. La posición de Ehrsam diverge asimismo de aquellas interpretaciones que, como la lectura semántica de W. Hogrebe, consideran que el problema del lenguaje constituye en realidad la clave de bóveda de todo el proyecto crítico. El libro permite por lo demás revisitar cuestiones apasionantes, como el papel de la cópula en los enunciados (en el fondo lo que permite comprender la relaciones de las representaciones con la apercepción trascendental, a nivel de la lógica trascendental) o si la filosofía trascendental misma puede entenderse como filosofía del lenguaje y si es compatible con el enfoque genético. El autor trata así de conciliar las declaraciones claramente antipsicologistas de Kant diseminadas a lo largo de su obra con su descripción de la génesis del lenguaje en el individuo y en la especie. De este modo, trata de demostrar que la teoría kantiana de la adquisición de conceptos excluye toda posibilidad teórica de dar cabida a un reduccionismo empirista. Distingue así con precisión entre el momento de

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adquisición de las categorías ―pues, como sabemos, Kant es un perspicaz crítico del innatismo― de las condiciones de posibilidad de su validez objetiva. En esta línea, la tesis del autor es que el problema de la relación entre lo genético y lo trascendental contiene en su seno la cuestión más fundamental del lenguaje.

R. Ehrsam sostendrá a lo largo del libro que el lenguaje desempeña al menos cuatro funciones esenciales vinculadas respectivamente a la formación de conceptos, la estructura de las reglas gramaticales, la construcción de la identidad o la personalidad en el plano práctico y la educación moral, articulados a partir de varios loci claves del pensamiento kantiano: el concepto de epigénesis de la razón pura y la idea de la adquisición originaria. En efecto, la teoría de la epigénesis se inscribe abiertamente en la línea que el autor pretende hacer valer bajo esa peculiar aleación de los planos genético y trascendental. Así, de igual modo que Kant no acepta el innatismo en el plano de la teoría del conocimiento, no admite que la forma de un ser vivo se encuentre por completo preformada en el germen, sino más bien que la actualización de dichas características depende de la demanda empírica de la emergencia de determinadas disposiciones. La validez universal de las categorías posibilita su aplicación a la experiencia sin depender ni de la falibilidad de lo empírico, como en la generatio aequivoca, ni de una arbitraria coincidencia con disposiciones innatas y separadas de las condiciones sensibles de la experiencia. La afirmación de N. Sánchez Madrid sobre el estatuto de la noción de epigénesis bien podría entenderse en todos los respectos sustituyendo el término “razón” por el término “lenguaje”: “Así, pues, el alcance de la noción kantiana de epigénesis no se reduce a una mera valoración metodológica, sino que apunta al fondo de la pregunta por el hombre, al arrojar luz sobre el modo en que nos hallamos ya siempre precedidos por la Razón y, al mismo tiempo, proyectados hacia ella”1. La adquisición de las categorías es perfectamente compatible con el carácter universal y necesario de los conceptos puesto que se obtiene por reflexión sobre la forma o la estructura de las representaciones, no sobre sus contenidos. Respecto de la segunda figura, el autor lleva a cabo un recorrido muy iluminador sobre el concepto de la “adquisición originaria” en el corpus jurídico frecuentado por Kant, tomando pie fundamentalmente en los textos de S. Pufendorf, G. Hufeland y H. Jakob. El denominador común de las distintas definiciones vertidas es la idea de que el término se empleaba para designar aquello que, no siendo de nadie, comienza a pertenecer a otra persona sin mediación alguna en forma de tradición o intervención divina. Cuando Kant distingue la adquisición originaria de la derivada en continuidad con esta línea de pensamiento, subraya precisamente el carácter no innato de lo originario. Los derechos adquiridos no corresponden al hombre en virtud de su mera humanidad, sino que se requiere la mediación de un acto jurídico como condición de posibilidad de su validez. La adquisición originaria tiene por tanto un momento genético puesto que en definitiva se trata de una Er-werbung, de un acto empírico por el cual se posee lo que antes no pertenecía a nadie, pero a su vez, debe ser compatible con el principio universal del

1 Sánchez Madrid, N.: “La función de la epigénesis en la Antropología kantiana: las condiciones de ejecución de una historia natural del hombre” en Thémata. Revista de Filosofía, nº 39, 2007, p. 327.

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derecho y gozar de una validez a priori sin la intervención de un fundamento divino. Del mismo modo, a través de un razonamiento apagógico, Kant demostrará que el lenguaje no es innato sino que hace su aparición en la especie y en el individuo en un momento determinado, aunque dicha adquisición no sea sino originaria.

Desde esta perspectiva, el autor estructura el libro conforme al desarrollo de las diversas funciones genéticas atribuidas al lenguaje, abordando en primer lugar su papel en el desarrollo de la normatividad conceptual analizado al hilo del estudio sobre las capacidades de los sordos que surge a su vez como consecuencia de la emergencia del modelo correlacional. En segundo lugar, el autor trata del aprendizaje del lenguaje ligado a la estructura de los discursos partiendo del concepto de gramática definido por Kant en Prol como gramática particular, en V-Lo/Jäsche como gramática general y en V-Lo/ Wiener como doctrina del entendimiento. La tesis fuerte es que la matriz de las reglas gramaticales permite desplegar la forma de los principios trascendentales del entendimiento.

Probablemente uno de los aspectos más sugestivos del libro es la puerta que abre hacia el debate sobre la gramática ―ya con Kant por primera vez desprovista de toda connotación ontológica― en diálogo con los desarrollos de Leibniz, Wolff o Lambert que, como se recordará, dedica una de las cuatro partes del Neues Organon a la semiótica. Kant se ocupa de explicar cómo pueden conciliarse la gramática con las gramáticas, lo universal y necesario con la especificidad de las reglas del lenguaje surgidas en contextos históricos concretos para acabar describiendo las lenguas, en consonancia con el paradigma correlacional, como la ratio cognoscendi de las leyes del entendimiento y a las leyes del entendimiento como la ratio essendi de la gramática general o del fundamento de univocidad de la diversidad de las lenguas. El papel genético de la gramática consistiría en definitiva en la capacidad que proporciona para reflexionar sobre las reglas de gramática implícitas.

El uso de la primera persona tiene también a juicio del autor un valor insoslayable en tanto que posibilita la autorreflexión en el ámbito teorético y la imputación o causa libre por la cual atribuimos responsabilidad moral o jurídica a la persona. En el ámbito práctico existe una relación intrínseca entre el espacio de la enunciación y el ámbito de la formación de leyes; hecho que de nuevo hace del lenguaje una instancia de peso tanto en el ámbito de justificación de la moral como en el ámbito de la educación, pues es el lenguaje ―y nunca las conductas ejemplares de individuos concretos― lo que propicia la formación adecuada de la conducta moral. Los exempla, a juicio de Kant, pueden tener ―como los sentimientos o la religión en otros contextos― una función de Triebfedern o motivo impulsor, pero no son un legítimo fundamento de la acción como los principios trascendentales condensados en enunciados.

El recorrido por estas cuatro raíces del lenguaje permite trazar un mapa muy útil de las distintas posiciones que pueden adoptarse a propósito de la relación kantiana con el problema del lenguaje, revelando asimismo un conocimiento muy amplio por parte del autor de las fuentes kantianas. Una indudable virtud de esta obra consiste en el uso que hace de los manuscritos no publicados directamente por Kant entre los que se encuentran

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algunos elementos de la correspondencia, las reflexiones, el Nachlass o, especialmente, las anotaciones o apuntes de las lecciones impartidas por Kant, de importancia capital para desarrollar adecuadamente el problema del lenguaje, ya que en las obras canónicas no aborda esta cuestión por extenso al menos hasta 1790. Asimismo este estudio exhaustivo de las fuentes permite apreciar el salto producido a partir del semestre de invierno de 1775 cuando Kant empieza a sustituir el modelo ampliativo-extensional por el modelo correlacional en la explicación de las relaciones entre el pensamiento y el lenguaje desde el cual comienza a definir a las palabras como condición de posibilidad de la estructura lógica.

Quizá las ausencias más difíciles de pasar por alto en la obra podrían cercarse en torno a la relativa exigüidad de los argumentos en favor de la tesis que sostiene el punto de partida global de interpretación desde el cual se articula el libro a partir de la división de las cuatro funciones del lenguaje, a saber, la posible conciliación de la perspectiva genética con la perspectiva trascendental. Probablemente, tampoco hubiera sido superflua una reflexión atenta al capítulo del esquematismo trascendental el cual, como han señalado por extenso diversos autores como A. Mumbrú Mora, Daniel Leserre o M. Arias Albisú es de suma importancia para abordar la cuestión del lenguaje en Kant. Por lo demás, la prosa clara, ordenada y elegante de Ehrsam representa una magnífica ocasión para deshacer ciertos prejuicios sobre la filosofía del lenguaje kantiana y conocer las diferentes perspectivas posibles en su filosofía teórica y práctica sobre el lenguaje que, en sus propias palabras: “contiene ya todo lo que la filosofía trascendental extrae con esfuerzos”2.

22 V-Met/Mrongovius: “Unsre gemeine Sprache enthält schon alles das, was die transcendentale Philosophie mit Mühe herauszieht”. AA, 29, 804.

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El fenómeno y el reenvío. Sobre el fundamento kantiano de la finitud de la razón humana

Il fenomeno e il rimando. Sul fondamento kantiano della finitezza della ragione umana

LEONARDO MATTANA EREÑO 

Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, España

Reseña de: Giulio Goria, Il fenomeno e il rimando. Sul fondamento kantiano della finitezza della ragione umana, ETS, Pisa, 2014, 214 pp. ISBN: 978-884673870-7.

El libro de Giulio Goria afronta uno de los problemas más interesantes en torno a la Crítica de la Razón Pura; uno de los más interesantes y también más debatidos y trabajados en la historia de la interpretación de la obra kantiana, manteniendo de hecho un vigor indiscutible hasta nuestros días. La actualidad y, al mismo tiempo, la tradición de estudios sobre este núcleo teorético tan profundo exige a Goria una seriedad y un rigor ejemplares; y ciertamente al autor de nuestro libro no le faltan. Por un lado, el esfuerzo hermenéutico de trabajar en los intersticios de una obra tan conocida como la primera Crítica y, por el otro, el sólido aparato crítico con el que se sostiene todo el discurso argumentativo que es capaz, no solamente de tratar del tema de la finitud de la razón en Kant, sino de incluir en su travesía a otros indispensables referentes como Platón ( que es de donde surge el problema, como dice Vincenzo Vitiello en el prefacio), Aristóteles, Leibniz, Hegel o Heidegger, por citar los más importantes. Ciertamente, los últimos, Hegel y Heidegger son, por así decirlo, los transmisores de este problema: Hegel con su oposición al enfoque kantiano (aunque veremos, más allá del objetivo polémico, que el tema da mucho de sí también para y en la filosofía del propio Hegel) y Heidegger con su atrevida reinterpretación de algunos de los hitos que Goria recorre sin adherir nunca acríticamente a

Investigador de la UAM. E-mail de contacto: mattanaleonardo@gmail.com

[Recibido: 17 de octubre 2017

Aceptado: 26 de octubre 2017]

Leonardo Mattana

ninguna posición ya establecida, o, por lo menos, sin antes haberla examinado con detalle y en todo caso manteniendo la justa distancia que toda buena praxis filosófica exige.

El libro se articula en dos secciones, respectivamente tituladas “Espontaneidad y reflexión” y “Juicio y espacio”. Antes de entrar propiamente en el contenido y en la articulación más precisa, es necesario, sin embargo, considerar las dos parejas de conceptos: con la enunciación de sólo cuatro palabras, Goria ya nos expone un campo de acción vasto, pero claramente orientado. Se trata de comprender, en relación al tema de la razón y de los conocimientos humanos, cuestiones capitales como la libertad y la responsabilidad que atañen al ejercicio de la filosofía. La transversalidad de la mirada de nuestro autor destaca la sistematicidad del problema mismo y ahonda en las preocupaciones kantianas de las que surgen inéditas soluciones; es más, la habilidad de Goria está justamente en proponer esa doble dimensión de profunda exigencia ética del pensar kantiano junto a la solidez lógica de las propuestas, sin perder la complejidad y la interconexión entre ambas dimensiones.

El punto de partida es claro: la lógica trascendental de Kant, pero al mismo tiempo se exige que se abandone una lectura y partición horizontales y que, por tanto, se llegue a comprender que «el método trascendental nos lleva a entender la experiencia según un movimiento vertical, que se profundiza y se adentra no sólo superando distinciones empíricas y no trascendentales, sino también permitiendo que el saber se constituya como un saber capaz de expresar en manera conforme a sí, su fundamento y su límite» 1. Condición preliminar para comprender la complejidad y la trascendencia del problema es no tomar la división de los varios momentos de la Crítica como una serie de cuestiones que están dispuestas en una sucesión temporal, sino según un movimiento vertical, y transversal, que permita hacer emerger el problema del fundamento y del límite. El primer punto es mostrar como la cuestión de la finitud surge de la experiencia misma, y podríamos incluso decir, que es su condición de posibilidad.

Cuando Kant presenta la imagen del tribunal de la razón y se pregunta por la legitimidad de la metafísica de ser una ciencia, está tomando una decisión en torno al camino de la filosofía. Y no se trata de decidir del objeto de la filosofía, sino de sí misma, y con ella de la razón. Para Kant, la razón es humana porque se fundamenta a través de su hacer experiencia: éste es el presupuesto para comprender que la articulación y la elaboración de la arquitectura de la Crítica no son elementos artificiales, impuestos simplemente a partir de un resultado ya obtenido, así como tampoco son distinciones de carácter psicológico. Por lo contrario, ahondan en la experiencia y del carácter estructural de la misma quieren ser expresión. En tal sentido, es fundamental la reflexión que Goria hace con respecto a la división entre lo empírico y lo racional, que lejos de excluirse recíprocamente, han de pensarse a partir de una raíz a nosotros desconocida, según la célebre expresión del mismo Kant. Pero esto justamente «significa que el carácter peculiar de las dos cepas del conocimiento no se deja tomar sino en cuanto que constituye la posibilidad de aquello que al hombre se revela manifiesto en la experiencia, el ente intuido»2. Podemos comprender

1 G. Goria, Il fenomeno e il rimando, ETS, Pisa 2014, p. 18.

2 G. Goria, Ibidem, p. 31.

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N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 415-420

ISSN: 2386-7655

Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095800

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la división y al mismo tiempo la inseparabilidad de las dos ramas del conocimiento sólo si partimos del hecho constitutivo de la finitud de la cual, como destaca Goria, surge todo thâuma. Por ello, cobra tanta importancia el pasaje en el que Kant afirma «el simple surgir es ya en sí mismo, sin importancia de lo que surja, un objeto de investigación» (KrV A 206 B 251). Este momento es el que permite comprender lo que significa fenómeno para Kant: lo que surge es algo que está más allá (o más acá) de aquello que se coloca bajo los juicios o las categorías, es un surgir anterior a todo tema (y aquí claramente Goria no puede tener escondido al Heidegger de Kant y el problema de la metafísica) y que se hace objeto (Gegenstand) de nuestra investigación. Éste es el pasaje fundacional para comprender, según la interpretación de Goria, la arquitectura kantiana y la centralidad del fenómeno: amplio espacio es dado a la cuestión de la receptividad y de la espontaneidad ligadas a la imaginación productiva, pero todo ello es importante para poder ser reconducido a un único punto, a saber, demostrar que «los fenómenos sean al mismo tiempo conformes a las condiciones del entendimiento»3. Goria subraya al mismo tiempo justamente para recordarnos la advertencia de no leer la Crítica horizontalmente ya que «la unidad subjetiva del entendimiento no se constituye ni antes ni a parte del horizonte objetivo del fenómeno»4. La prioridad, por el momento, es la de evitar una interpretación subjetiva (o intersubjetiva) del fenómeno kantiano: no, el horizonte de aparición ha de ser objetivo y el fenómeno como fenómeno está enraizado en él. No son las famosas cuanto mal atribuidas lentes azules las que constituyen el fenómeno: éste, ante todo, es.

La orientación está dada, pero aún no es suficiente, ni para Goria en su libro, ni para el mismo Kant: el paso del puro surgir al fenómeno no es tan inmediato ni puede ser dejado sin más, pensando en una milagrosa autoconstitución del fenómeno mismo, a menos de conformarse con una evidente indeterminación ontológica. Es necesario explicar los detallados pasajes de Kant, en particular, sobre la triple síntesis, para detenerse sobre uno de los grandes problemas de la filosofía kantiana: la cuestión del Yo pienso.

Este punto sirve de apoyo a Goria para abrir una muy interesante confrontación entre Kant y Hegel: es indudable que, sobre la cuestión del yo, Hegel juega importantes ataques a la filosofía kantiana en su conjunto. Ahora bien, como sabemos, en cierta medida las críticas de Hegel a Kant, cuando se encuentran explicitas como en los escritos públicos de Jena, son más bien injustas e incluso superficiales. Sin embargo, la atención que Hegel le dedicó al autor de Königsberg incluso en obras maduras como la Ciencia de la Lógica denota la plena consciencia que Hegel tenía de la importancia de los problemas puestos por Kant. Hegel en la introducción a la Ciencia de la Lógica critica la abstracción del Yo pienso, condenándolo a una vacía tautología, mientras que Goria insiste justamente en la imposibilidad de cerrarse como si fuera Yo=Yo: la fenomenicidad del Yo «no puede ser predicado»5, porque el Yo no es un sujeto determinante. El Yo es ya mundo, parece decir Goria, en un cierto eco heideggeriano. Y es justamente a partir de Heidegger que Goria introduce la cuestión del reenvío, a partir del texto kantiano concerniente al esquematismo

3 G. Goria, Ibidem, p. 53.

4 G. Goria, Ibidem, p. 54.

5 G. Goria, Ibidem, p. 73.

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trascendental. Pero sobre todo la cuestión se hace más interesante, cuando Goria añade su aportación en torno al valor simbólico de la imagen y su conexión con la cosa: «no sólo la palabra-imagen indica a la imagen que viene de nosotros, sino que ésta reenvía a la cosa»6. El esquema no puede actuar solamente al nivel de los simbólico o del significante, sino que ha de mantener una conexión con el nivel más propio de la fenomenicidad del fenómeno y, por ende, con sus condiciones de aparición. La pregunta que nos guía es entonces: «¿en qué sentido, decimos que el gesto del esquema puro es en primera estancia espacio-temporal?»7; y bien la respuesta se orienta nuevamente hacia el elemento más originario del surgir de algo: el esquema es un signo originario que se sustrae a la posibilidad de la pregunta ‘¿qué es?’. El esquema ha de considerarse según una dimensión modal, nunca un momento junto a otros, de la Crítica, sobre el que justamente se permite la articulación de ese puro surgir. Ahí se comienza a entrever la solución kantiana que Goria saca a luz sapientemente. Desde el puro surgir a la articulación de los juicios hay un recorrido en el que incumbe, según la crítica hegeliana, la sombra del Yo, como sujeto determinante, y al mismo tiempo, el riesgo de una indeterminación ontológica, causada por la separación de las facultades del entendimiento y, por ende, por la incomunicación entre los varios ámbitos del saber. Para salir de esta insidia es necesario responder a la pregunta:

¿cómo dar lugar a la circulación coherente e inmanente en ese recorrido, sin que el Yo sea una figura demasiado invasiva, sino al contrario sea el medio que permite dicha circulación? Pregunta y exigencia de orientación claramente hegeliana, como es evidente. Pero, ¿Kant puede contestar a ella, desde su punto de vista y con sus propios instrumentos? La apuesta de Goria es que sí y ahora intentaremos ver brevemente cómo: la circulación debe garantizarse entre el puro surgir, el objeto, la fenomenicidad, el signo y finalmente la expresión categorial del fenómeno. Y ello, evitando que el noúmeno comparta las mismas características ontológicas del fenómeno: el noúmeno no puede tomar la consistencia de esa circulación, si justamente se quiere evitar que sea pensado con un más allá, como un terreno solamente dedicado a la fe, según la nota crítica del joven Hegel. Decíamos que la circulación se garantiza a través del esquema, que toma la forma de la reflexión como doble reenvío; reflexión que, a pesar de las críticas, no puede ser simplemente unilateral, sino ya en cierta medida especulativa, «movimiento en acto del pensamiento»8. Parece que, al fin y al cabo, Kant y Hegel comparten el mismo horizonte, reconociendo ambos la acción de una reflexión que obraría en el entendimiento, pero a partir de la razón, y que podría ser el movimiento de la misma. Sin embargo, «es este estar consigo mismo del pensamiento en lo puesto, en el saber dicho y puesto, aquello frente a lo cual Kant vaciló»9. El tema del temor y temblor de Kant frente a la posibilidad del “gran paso negativo”, según la expresión de Hegel en las primeras páginas de la Ciencia de la Lógica, requiere una cierta atención que implica también la consideración de la dimensión ética de la filosofía. Pero no de una ética al uso, sino del interrogante más alto para un filósofo, a

6 G. Goria, Ibidem, p. 87.

7 G. Goria, Ibidem, p. 89.

8 G. Goria, Ibidem, p. 107.

9 G. Goria, Ibidem, p. 134.

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N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 415-420

ISSN: 2386-7655

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saber, ¿qué debe ser y hacer la filosofía? Claro está que no puede ser, como demasiado a menudo se suele leer y escuchar, que las soluciones de Hegel y Kant difieren porque cada uno pertenece a una época distinta, con exigencias morales diversas o ¡incluso que tienen puntos de vista distintos! Cómo escribe Eugen Fink en un pasaje de las Interpretaciones fenomenológicas de la Fenomenología del espíritu, decidirse por la solución hegeliana o la kantiana en base a una simple opinión y de una reducción a una exigencia irracional, es una imbecilidad completa. Cómo si después de tanto esfuerzo teórico de dos de los mayores exponentes de la historia del pensamiento, fuese razón suficiente una trivial práctica de la peor historiografía filosófica con a la base un mero criterio empático. También hay razones históricas y culturales, pero siempre son más profundas que las de una banal reconstrucción por etapas: evidentemente la decisión por una perspectiva o la otra es algo sumamente más serio, similarmente a cuando en una partida de ajedrez entre grandes maestros se trata de hacer el movimiento decisivo, y Giulio Goria es plenamente consciente de ello. En tal sentido, la segunda sección “Juicio y espacio”, es una respuesta teorética, o al menos, una seria fundamentación para comprender la perspectiva kantiana del problema de la finitud, pero también para traer la problematicidad de esa cuestión hasta nuestra reflexión filosófica más actual. Goria retoma la cuestión de los juicios y la fundamental exigencia de cómo pueden darse juicios sintéticos a priori: pero, más allá de los pliegues técnicos del texto kantiano, de los cuales Goria se ha ocupado sobre todo en la primera parte de su libro, la gran pregunta que mueve toda esta parte, vierte sobre el conocimiento mismo. Aclarada la forma en la que surge el fenómeno, ahora cabe interrogarse si el conocimiento del mismo y, por ende, del mundo, comparten el mismo modo de ser de su objeto. Si la reflexión permite la circulación y la relación del objeto con el entendimiento, dando lugar a la expresión fenoménica, ahora es necesario poner a tema el límite del conocimiento. Pero, no el límite entre fenómeno y noumeno que sería sólo un hecho derivado del más fundamental límite de la razón frente a sí misma. Se pregunta Goria en la última página de su libro: «llegado frente al límite, Kant se pone la pregunta que concierne no al fenómeno, sino a la razón de las condiciones del fenómeno: “¿por qué la razón no se determina diversamente?”»10. Bueno, pues su (no) respuesta está contenida en unos versos de Rilke (que no desvelamos para aumentar mayormente la curiosidad del lector), pero que seguramente dicen mucho sobre el Denkweg kantiano, como mucho dice también una palabra del título (más exactamente del subtítulo): “humana”; sobre el fundamento kantiano de la finitud de la razón humana. Tal vez sea justamente la consecuencia más coherente después del recorrido afrontado: la razón, si quiere estar a la altura de ese puro surgir inicial, si quiere respetar el estatuto de la cosa y no quiere hacer del noúmeno un monstruo productor de presupuestos, debe ser humana, profundamente humana, esto es, finita. No cabe el gran paso negativo, no cabe un espíritu que sustraiga a la razón de su enraizamiento en la existencia.

Por todo ello, decía al comienzo que hay un profunda exigencia ética tanto en el libro de Goria como obviamente en la propuesta kantiana: el ejercicio crítico consiste en salvar a la

10 G. Goria, ibidem, p. 201.

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razón que, creyéndose como Ícaro, intenta volar hacia un límite donde no habría nada más que ella, donde no le quedaría que reflejarse a sí misma, complaciente y mostrenca a la vez, para volver a precipitar, inútil y resignada, en un mundo que se habría empeñado en negar.

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International Journal of Philosophy

N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 421-426

ISSN: 2386-7655

Doi: 10.5281/zenodo.1095814

Sobre la teoría de la biología de Kant

On Kant’s Theory of Biology

MATÍAS OROÑO 1

Universidad de Buenos Aires, CONICET, Argentina

Reseña de: Goy, Ina, Kants Theorie der Biologie. Ein Kommentar. Eine Lesart. Eine historische Einordnung, Berlin/Boston, Walter de Gruyter, 2017, 420 pp. ISBN: 978-3-11-047110-6.

El libro de Ina Goy, intitulado Kants Theorie der Biologie, constituye un importante punto de referencia para comprender la teoría kantiana del ser organizado (organisiertes Wesen). La autora reconoce que en los tiempos de Kant la biología aún no se encontraba constituida como disciplina científica. Hacia fines del siglo XVIII la investigación sobre los organismos vivientes involucraba un amplio rango de disciplinas, entre las cuales podemos mencionar: la medicina, la física, la fisiología, la historia natural, la descripción de la naturaleza y la teleología. Sin embargo, al referirse a la teoría kantiana de los seres organizados como una teoría de la biología, Goy nos permite formular el interrogante acerca del vínculo que puede entablar la teoría kantiana del ser organizado con el desarrollo científico posterior a los tiempos de Kant.

La obra se encuentra dividida en tres partes. La primera de ellas, bajo el título “Kants Theorie der Biologie. Ein Kommentar”, ofrece una sinopsis histórica de la teoría kantiana sobre el ser organizado hasta el año 1790. Las fuentes analizadas por Goy abarcan: Historia general de la naturaleza y teoría del cielo, o ensayo acerca de la constitución y del origen mecánico de todo el universo expuesto según principios newtonianos (1755); El único argumento posible para una demostración de la existencia de Dios (1763); Acerca de las diversas razas humanas (1775); la reseña de la obra de Herder: Ideas para la filosofía de la historia de la humanidad (1785); Primeros principios

1 Becario Postdoctoral del CONICET con lugar de trabajo de el “Instituto de Filosofía Dr. Alejandro Korn” (Facultad de Filosofía y Letras - Universidad de Buenos Aires). E-mail de contacto: matiasoro@gmail.com

[Recibido: 3 de noviembre 2017

Aceptado: 10 de noviembre 2017]

Matías Oroño

metafísicos de la ciencia de la naturaleza (1786); distintos pasajes sobre teleología presentes en la Crítica de la razón pura (1781/87) y en la Crítica de la razón práctica (1788) y Sobre el uso de principios teleológicos en la filosofía (1788). Finalmente, encontramos un detallado y extenso comentario sobre el discernimiento teleológico tal como es presentado en la segunda parte de la tercera Crítica (1790).

Gracias al análisis de estas fuentes, Goy concluye que Kant encontró tempranamente características específicas que permiten describir al ser organizado y que no pueden ser explicadas como características meramente mecánicas. Las fuerzas y leyes que se hallan a la base de los seres organizados son fuerzas formadoras (bildende Kräfte) y leyes físico-teleológicas. Asimismo, el desarrollo y la fundamentación del proyecto crítico conduce a la formulación de un interrogante central en el estudio de la teleología: ¿De qué manera las fuerzas y leyes morales (segunda Crítica) pueden ser realizadas en una naturaleza que obedece a leyes y fuerzas mecánicas (primera Crítica)? La solución al problema planteado por esta pregunta es posible mediante el descubrimiento de objetos conformes a fin. Dentro del conjunto de estos objetos se encuentran los seres organizados, los cuales en la medida en que pueden ser enjuiciados de manera teleológica pertenecen a un orden racional puro; y en tanto objetos del mundo de la experiencia son parte de un orden natural.

En su comentario sobre la “Crítica del discernimiento teleológico”, la autora comenta la “Analítica del discernimiento teleológico” (§§ 61-68), la “Dialéctica del discernimiento teleológico” (§§ 69-78) y la “Metodología del discernimiento teleológico” (§§ 79-91). En la “Analítica” Kant describe los rasgos fundamentales de la naturaleza organizada, que según Goy, es caracterizada mediante dos formas de la ley, a saber: la mecánica y la físico-teleológica. En la “Dialéctica” Kant presenta la naturaleza organizada de modo tal que la multiplicidad empírica es explicada mediante ambos tipos de leyes de la naturaleza sin caer en contradicción. En la “Metodología” Goy encuentra un momento crucial –no sólo de la Crítica del discernimiento, sino del proyecto crítico en tanto tal—. Contra aquellas interpretaciones que pretenden naturalizar la teoría kantiana de la biología, Goy subraya que sólo unificando en la representación de un intelecto divino las diferentes maneras de enjuiciar la naturaleza que aparecen en la “Analítica” y en la “Dialéctica” es posible alcanzar una visión coherente de los seres organizados.

En la segunda parte del libro, intitulada “Kants Theorie der Biologie. Eine Lesart”, Goy propone una interpretación sistemática mediante la cual intenta destacar la arquitectura de la teoría kantiana del ser organizado. Esta interpretación puede ser resumida en seis tesis que a continuación serán reconstruidas en sus rasgos esenciales.

Tesis 1: desde la perspectiva del discernimiento humano los seres organizados son máquinas mecánicas, pues se hallan sujetos a movimientos mecánicos y a cambios que se explican mediante leyes mecánicas. Si bien un ser organizado no es una mera máquina, hay aspectos esenciales de él que pueden y deben ser caracterizados mediante leyes mecánicas.

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Goy señala que el significado del concepto kantiano de mecanismo es altamente controversial, pues Kant no define tal concepto en la Crítica del discernimiento, pero lo utiliza frecuentemente y presupone su significado, aunque sin explicitarlo. Según la autora, Kant trabajó con tres sentidos del concepto de mecanismo. Un primer sentido de la noción kantiana de mecanismo describe un orden de características de los objetos de la naturaleza, en la medida en que ellos se subsumen bajo leyes mecánicas universales y a priori. Estas leyes a priori se identifican con los “Principios del entendimiento puro” de la Crítica de la razón pura (KrV, A148/B188 y ss.). Estos principios constituyen la metafísica general o la ontología de la primera Crítica. Mediante ellos se describen aquellas fuerzas y leyes de la naturaleza (universales y necesarias a priori).

El segundo sentido del concepto kantiano de mecanismo se encuentra, según Goy, en los Primeros principios metafísicos de la ciencia de la naturaleza. Allí se describen las leyes de la física racional y los cuerpos son caracterizados en la medida en que se hallan sujetos al movimiento. Este segundo sentido de leyes mecánicas supone el primer sentido de leyes mecánicas que se presentan en la primera Crítica. Es decir, la física racional y el movimiento de los cuerpos supone la constitución general de la objetividad en tanto tal.

El tercer sentido del concepto de mecanismo se refiere a las leyes mecánicas empíricas, particulares y contingentes a las que se hace referencia en la Crítica del discernimiento. Se trata de leyes que sólo tienen validez para un dominio particular de objetos y son contingentes en la medida en que no se derivan de la aplicación de las categorías, sino que remiten a un modo de comportamiento de la naturaleza que es contingente para la perspectiva del entendimiento humano puro.

Tesis 2: desde el punto de vista del discernimiento humano los seres organizados son seres físico-teleológicos, pues sus cambios y movimientos mecánicos se orientan a la realización de fines naturales. Las fuerzas y leyes mecánicas del movimiento y del cambio se pueden subordinar bajo leyes físico-teleológicas. La diversidad de leyes mecánicas encuentra una unidad superior en los fines naturales.

Las fuerzas mecánicas y las leyes del movimiento y del cambio son medios para los fines naturales. Los seres organizados no son meras máquinas que poseen fuerza motriz (bewegende Kraft), sino que además tienen fuerza formadora (bildende Kraft). Esta última no puede ser explicada únicamente a través de la capacidad para el movimiento.

Goy subraya que, según Kant, el discernimiento reflexionante humano utiliza leyes y fuerzas físico-teleológicas para explicar la organización unitaria de la multiplicidad empírica de fuerzas y leyes mecánicas. Las leyes teleológicas son interpretadas como hipótesis regulativas que exigen comprender la multiplicidad empírica de leyes naturales en relación con la idea de finalidad. Si bien los fines naturales son conceptos empíricos, contienen una idea que no puede ser empíricamente condicionada, pues la unidad que es pensada mediante los fines naturales es concebida a priori como necesaria.

Tesis 3: desde la perspectiva del discernimiento humano los seres organizados no sólo son fines naturales (y en tanto tales, relativos a ellos mismos), sino que sirven en relaciones externas como medios para la realización de fines morales absolutos. Los distintos fines naturales encuentran una unidad superior en los fines morales.

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La autora señala que esta tercera tesis sobre el ser organizado ha sido escasamente analizada por quienes investigan este aspecto del pensamiento de Kant. Goy considera que en este punto es importante revisar la literatura sobre la filosofía moral kantiana. El ser humano es el fin final (Endzweck) de la creación y debe ser pensado como un fin en sí (Zweck an sich) que posee un valor objetivo indeclinable (con independencia de los intereses subjetivos y de la lógica subyacente a las relaciones entre medios y fines). La autonomía, la libertad y la auto-legislación de la voluntad le conceden al ser humano su dignidad. Así pues, con la introducción de esta tercera tesis los seres organizados son referidos a un fin final (Endzweck).

Estas tres primeras tesis presentan tres perspectivas sobre el ser organizado, a saber: la mecánica, la físico-teleológica y la moral-teleológica. Esta triple perspectiva sobre el ser organizado introduce el interrogante acerca de la unidad de estos diversos modos de enjuiciamiento. La búsqueda de esta unidad abre una nueva dimensión en la reflexión kantiana, la cual es resumida en las siguientes tres tesis.

Tesis 4: desde la perspectiva del discernimiento humano los seres organizados son caracterizados mediante fuerzas y leyes de la naturaleza físico-teleológicas y mecánicas. Ambos tipos de leyes y fuerzas de la naturaleza no se encuentran en conflicto recíproco, sino que el ser humano las considera unificadas en la conciencia de un Dios que las utiliza como fundamento de su creación. A partir del enjuiciamiento de los seres organizados se arriba a la idea de un Dios que ha creado la unidad del orden físico-teleológico y moral- teleológico.

Tesis 5: desde la perspectiva del discernimiento humano los seres organizados son caracterizados a través de fuerzas y leyes físico-teleológicas y moral-teleológicas. El ser humano considera que estas leyes se encuentran unificadas en la conciencia de Dios, de modo tal que se resuelve el posible conflicto entre ambos tipos de leyes. A partir del enjuiciamiento de los seres organizados se arriba a la idea de un Dios que ha creado la unidad de fuerzas y leyes de la naturaleza y de la moral.

Tesis 6: La existencia de seres organizados conformes a fines conduce a la creencia en un único Dios que crea la unidad de las fuerzas y leyes de la naturaleza y de la moral.

Las primeras tres tesis caracterizan el ser organizado desde el punto de vista del discernimiento humano. Las últimas tres tesis consideran al ser organizado desde la perspectiva de Dios, considerado en el marco del proyecto crítico como una hipótesis regulativa del discernimiento reflexionante. Las primeras tres tesis describen un orden creado y secundario de fuerzas y leyes de la naturaleza y la moral. Estas dependen de un orden primario que reposa en la conciencia de Dios (últimas tres tesis). Según Goy, el supuesto de una unidad conforme a fines indica el fundamento último de la filosofía crítica y en tanto tal no es objeto de indagación posterior. Es decir, el holismo teleológico, en la medida en que es el fundamento de la filosofía crítica, no puede ser explicado a partir de otras cosas.

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Sobre la teoría de la biología de Kant

La tercera parte del libro, intitulada “Kants Theorie der Biologie. Eine historische Einordnung”, presenta una investigación sobre las relaciones sistemáticas entre la teoría kantiana del ser organizado y las diversas corrientes teóricas sobre la naturaleza viviente desarrolladas durante los siglos XVII y XVIII. En primer lugar, encontramos una sistematización de las características más relevantes de las teorías preformacionistas (ovistas y animalculistas) y de las teorías epigenéticas (mecanicistas y vitalistas). Señalemos brevemente que el preformacionismo reúne un conjunto de doctrinas que subrayan que el desarrollo de un embrión consiste en el crecimiento de un organismo que ya se encontraba preformado en las células sexuales que lo originaron. En su versión ovística, el organismo se encuentra preformado en el óvulo sin fecundar. Por su parte, los animalculistas consideraban que el organismo preformado residía en el espermatozoide. En contraste con estas vertientes, las teorías de la epigénesis defienden que los rasgos de un ser organizado se configuran en el transcurso del desarrollo y no se encuentran preformados en los gametos. Las teorías epigenéticas admitían dos vertientes. La primera de ellas señalaba que los órganos se configuraban a partir del influjo de leyes meramente mecánicas. La segunda vertiente de la epigénesis destacaba que las leyes que rigen la formación de los seres organizados no pueden reducirse a las mismas leyes que explican el comportamiento la materia inanimada.

Tras admitir que Kant no adhirió de manera explícita a ninguna de estas corrientes, Goy investiga en qué medida la explicación de Kant sobre el ser organizado puede ser leída a la luz de alguna de estas teorías. La autora sostiene que en Acerca de las diversas razas humanas (1775) Kant desarrolla una teoría preformista –aunque sin adherir a una posición animalculista ni ovística— de las disposiciones y de los embriones. Goy indica que en este texto Kant asume de manera dogmática el supuesto de la creación divina. En la Crítica del discernimiento Kant atenúa el preformacionismo, ya que tras el giro crítico no es posible admitir un concepto dogmático de Dios. En la tercera Crítica Kant ya no habla de gérmenes ni de embriones, pero menciona las disposiciones (Anlagen). Goy sostiene que en la Crítica del discernimiento Kant abandona la teoría preformacionista fundamentada en el supuesto dogmático de la creación y se orienta hacia una teoría del télos, señalando con ello la unidad conforme a fines de los seres organizados en la conciencia divina. Asimismo, la autora señala que el debilitamiento del preformacionismo no conduce a una versión fuerte de la epigénesis, pues las fuerzas y leyes de la naturaleza son autónomas, pero al mismo tiempo creadas, con lo cual suponen la creencia crítica en un Dios creador. De este modo, la autora encuentra en Kant a un representante tanto del preformacionismo como de la epigénesis. A su vez, Goy subraya que el aspecto epigenético de la teoría kantiana se halla más cercano al vitalismo que al mecanicismo. Este aspecto vitalista sería el que permite explicar la adaptación de los seres organizados a su entorno.

Cabe destacar que Kants Theorie der Biologie no se limita a presentar un análisis preciso de los textos de Kant, sino que además incorpora numerosas referencias al estado actual de la interpretación sobre la teoría kantiana del ser organizado. De ese modo, la lectura del libro de Goy permite obtener una visión panorámica de las diversas

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controversias actuales en torno a la filosofía kantiana. Si bien la autora ofrece una sólida investigación sobre la teoría kantiana del ser organizado y su vínculo con las teorías de la epigénesis y del preformacionismo, deja sin explorar en qué sentido la explicación de Kant puede arrojar luz sobre los debates actuales en la filosofía de la biología. Considero que el trabajo de Goy constituye un punto de partida de gran valor para el desarrollo de nuevos trabajos que puedan incorporar elementos de la teoría kantiana en los debates filosóficos contemporáneos sobre la biología.

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Contextualizando el pensamiento jurídico-político de Kant

Giving a Context to Kant’s jurídico-political thought

NURIA SÁNCHEZ MADRID 

Universidad Complutense de Madrid, España

Reseña de: R. Malik, Kant’s Politics in Context, Oxford: Oxford U.P., 2014, 195 pp.. ISBN: 978-0-19-964515-2

La monografía que el profesor de la Universidad de Oslo, Reidar Maliks, dedicó en 2014 a la genealogía del disputado destino contemporáneo del pensamiento jurídico y político de

Kant, merece toda la atención de la comunidad internacional de especialistas. No es habitual encontrar trabajos que pretendan evaluar los ejes del republicanismo kantiano sin caer en la tendencia a salvar al pensador de las limitaciones de su propio contexto, sencillamente movidos por el desinterés por la preciosa contribución que la historiografía podría suministrar a la evaluación de sus misma tesis, al enriquecerlas y volverlas más densas de sentido. Frente a una hermenéutica abstracta y desencarnada de los escritos de Kant sobre teoría del derecho y sentido de la actividad política, la investigación de Maliks se ocupa de señalar los puntos de inflexión que permiten comprender mejor la formación de escritos como Teoría y práctica (1793) y la tan anunciada como esperada Metafísica de las costumbres (1797), situando en todo momento la Revolución francesa —sus presupuestos teóricos y sus consecuencias prácticas— como el telón fondo sobre el que Kant dialoga en todo momento, huyendo de alardes tradicionalistas tanto como de veleidades radicales. En efecto, se aprecia en la propia construcción de la obra la voluntad de subrayar los esfuerzos kantianos por contradecir el diagnóstico de las condiciones de una vida civil legítima difundido por antiguos discípulos como Rehberg y Gentz, «hombres de negocios y de acción» guiados por la figura de Möser, representantes de la

Profesora Contratada Doctor (acreditada a Titular) de la Facultad de Filosofía de la UCM. E-mail de contacto: nuriasma@ucm.es

Nuria Sánchez Madrid

interpretación conservadora del Estado y el derecho y precedentes de la posterior Escuela histórica del derecho capitaneada por Savigny, pero tampoco con las lecturas radicales de Fichte o Bergk, adalides de la acción revolucionaria, en la que Kant reconocerá siempre un fenómeno intolerable frente a la constitución misma del poder estatal público y una apología del retorno al estado de naturaleza.

Maliks nos recuerda desde el comienzo del ensayo la cercanía de Kant a los problemas más acuciantes de su presente y su atención al curso de los acontecimientos, un rasgo con cierta frecuencia descuidado por lecturas excesivamente platonizantes del profesor de Königsberg. Este último gesto bien podría servir de indicio de las distorsiones que lecturas unilateralmente guiadas por el proceder textual e inmanente pueden introducir en los textos, apagando las zonas más luminosas y eclipsando las suturas que hasta el pensamiento más sistemático tiene en su haber. Hay quien se precia de que la naturaleza sistemática de este pensamiento —la promesa de clausura estructura de la propia arquitectónica de la razón— lo salvó precisamente de los cantos de sirena de su propia actualidad, lo que a mi juicio —y a juicio de Maliks— nos arrebata al Kant más titubeante y, por ello quizás, el más capacitado para interpelarnos. Por de pronto, el capítulo primero de la obra nos instala en el impacto que la experiencia revolucionaria de 1789 pudo tener en la progresiva ganancia de claridad kantiana sobre la necesidad de proceder a una ampliación de la autonomía moral de la mano del despliegue de una teoría racional de la libertad externa, clave para construir la figura de la autoridad estatal. Los debates que el Kant docente mantiene con juristas como Hufeland y Achenwall, cuyas obras asume como manuales de comentario en sus propias clases de derecho natural, encarnan el punto de referencia con el que el primero se mide constantemente, intentando superar la deuda de los especialistas en derecho con el paradigma perfeccionista de Wolff y con la teleología organicista de raíces aristotélicas. Este es el punto desde el que tomará forma el programa de explicitación de las consecuencias jurídicas inherentes a la propia dinámica de la razón.

El segundo capítulo —Freedom and Equality— se centra en desentrañar los motivos que condujeron a Kant a desmarcarse con fuerza de la displicencia que los autores tradicionalistas citados mostraban frente a los principios del liberalismo, apostando claramente por una concepción de la libertad en términos de independencia material y civil. Frente a las voces que pretendían denunciar que el discurso volcado en la defensa de los derechos de los sujetos individuales conducía sin reservas al desorden social y al desmoronamiento de arraigadas costumbres, Kant se encargará de plantear que una teoría de la libertad debe desembocar en un análisis de la libertad externa basada en la protección y reconocimiento estatal de los derechos de propiedad. El capítulo tercero —Political Rights— continúa avanzando en la dirección de la emergencia de los presupuestos que animan la elaboración conceptual kantiana, poniendo de manifiesto que la tríada de principios —libertad, igualdad, independencia— que anima el modelo republicano elogiado no conduce en ningún caso a una asunción de la democracia participativa como una encomiable forma de gobierno ni tampoco conduce a una ampliación universal del sufragio, toda vez que Kant reconoce como un hecho que aquellas profesiones que no

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garantizan la independencia material, de la misma manera que la existencia de las mujeres, no han de contar con el derecho al voto, sin que por ello el estatus de ciudadanía pasiva se calibre en ningún momento como causa de desprotección estatal. Por el contrario, aunque la situación de un individuo en la sociedad no le permita experimentar lo que signifique actuar como colegislador de su Estado, sin embargo sí es menester que cuente en todo momento con la protección de su integridad física y de amenazas externas. Nos encontramos aquí con una tesis kantiana frecuentemente malinterpretada, fundamentalmente bajo la expectativa de obviar los anteojos de un pensador clásico debido a una desenfocada noción de lo que debería ser pensar, a saber, acertar en todo sin fracturas y prever el futuro sin necesidad de la historia. No se trata únicamente de una invitación a la ignava ratio, sino de un presupuesto que condena la historia de la filosofía al tedio más aterrador. Maliks se atreve a formular y a desentrañar las causas por las que Kant no encuentra necesario que un Estado republicano deba intervenir en las propias dinámicas competitivas de la sociedad, liberales y no fundadas ya en la lógica del legado patrimonial de una decadente aristocracia, para remediar la pobreza de unos o la injusticia estructural de otros, sencillamente porque nos encontramos ante un pensamiento que confía en el mercado, esto es, en el horizonte de beneficios comunitarios esperable de la libre confrontación de energías, facultades y azares.

Forma parte de la delimitación de la posición mantenida por Kant acerca del poder estatal el rechazo decidido de todo reconocimiento de un derecho a la revolución, un proceder faccioso dentro del cuerpo del propio derecho político, lo cual no impide, como se señala repetidamente en el cap. 4 —Resistance and Revolution—, denunciar determinados regímenes políticos como potencias coactivas intolerables, toda vez que no están sostenidas sobre el respeto de las leyes y de la libertad. Aquellos gobiernos que, por poner un ejemplo procedente de la teoría racional del derecho, se convierten en la mejor expresión de lo que Kant llamará un “enemigo justo”, debido a la amenaza que representan para la paz general y para la seguridad de su propia población, no pueden elevar ninguna queja en caso de que un movimiento revolucionario devuelva a la nación al temible estado de naturaleza, del que a su vez habrá que proceder a salir y consiguientemente ingresar en una regenerada unión civil. Como señala acertadamente Maliks, Kant compartiría con Arendt el diagnóstico de que una revolución liberal debe estar comprometida con el mantenimiento de la libertad en el marco de una nueva constitución. Sin la debida constitutio libertatis, la transformación buscada por quienes pretenden reducir la vida civil a la lucha contra la indigencia y la solidaridad con los desharrapados no encontrará bases sólidas desde las que operar. Finalmente, el cap. V de la monografía —War and Peace— se ocupa de exponer la especificidad jurídica del derecho cosmopolita kantiano y sus consecuencias para el establecimiento de una paz duradera entre los Estados y los pueblos, poniendo de manifiesto la falta de autoridad coercitiva que caracteriza a la tercera parte del derecho racional kantiano. De todo ello cabe extraer como conclusión que el pensamiento jurídico-político de Kant se forma en la discusión y confrontación directa con un crecientemente hegemónico sector conservador, responsable del olvido generalizado que en el siglo XIX padece la Metafísica de las costumbres, que no reconoce ninguna de las

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contribuciones realizadas por la Revolución en Francia, ante el que reivindicará la libertad e igualdad entre todos los ciudadanos como el único derecho innato. Por otra parte, frente a los anhelos de ampliación democrática de la soberanía, Kant fijará notables restricciones en el ejercicio de la libertad republicana, levantando sobre ambos pilares una respuesta enérgica frente a las amenazas de la anarquía y del despotismo. Identificar si nosotros podemos seguir manejando estas piezas de la historia de la filosofía sin ajustes ni preventivos debe formar parte del ejercicio de reflexión de cada cual, pero con especial responsabilidad de quienes están llamados por su profesión a legar a las generaciones venideras interpretaciones maduras de los textos de las figuras señeras del pensamiento. Los cuerpos doctrinales excesivamente compactos no suelen ayudar a incrementar la capacidad crítica de ningún tiempo, más allá de otorgar a quienes pontifican desde esos constructos imaginarios una seguridad impropia de quien es consciente de su propia finitud y contingencia. El trabajo de Maliks es merecedor de toda la atención por la valentía y sobriedad con que se ha atrevido a considerar a Kant como un hijo adelantado de su tiempo, no infalible, pero provechoso hasta en sus desaciertos, desde el momento en que estos nos permiten dibujar la silueta de una concepción de lo público y lo estatal en la que ya no nos sentimos reconocidos. A eso debería llamársele conciencia histórica, de la que en tantas ocasiones ha adolecido la interpretación del pensamiento político de Kant, no solo en nuestra lengua.

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Política Editorial

Este proyecto editorial sólo podrá salir adelante propiciando una nutrida participación presidida por la más absoluta pluralidad y obviando exclusiones de ningún tipo.

Se trata de una revista electrónica en torno a los estudios kantianos que tendría una periodicidad bianual y alternará los números monográficos (al cuidado de uno o dos editores invitados) con otros donde se publicarán los trabajos que obtengan informes favorables por el sistema de par ciego El español será el idioma principal, pero también se podrán publicar trabajos en inglés, alemán, francés, italiano y portugués.

Los manuscritos deberán ser originales inéditos en cualquier idioma, que no estén bajo consideración en ningún otro lugar. Deberán remitirse por correo electrónico en Word a: contextoskantianos@gmail.com

Preparación del Manuscrito

La extensión de los artículos no deberá exceder las 12.000 palabras, la de las discusiones 8.000 palabras las críticas de libros 4.000 palabras. En caso de que el interés y calidad del manuscrito lo aconseje, el equipo editorial podrá tomar en consideración la publicación manuscritos de una longitud mayor o menor.

Tanto los artículos como las discusiones deberán incluir un resumen en la lengua en que estén redactados y en inglés de unas 150 palabras. Igualmente deberán incluir tres o cinco palabras clave en ambas lenguas, adjuntando además el título del trabajo en inglés. El título del artículo, en la lengua en que esté redactado y en inglés, y el nombre y apellidos del autor, que estará en VERSALES, constarán en letra Times New Roman, tamaño 16, apareciendo únicamente el título en negrita. La vinculación institucional aparecerá en letra Times New Roman, tamaño 14. El resumen y palabras clave, en la lengua del artículo y en inglés, aparecerán en Times New Roman, tamaño 11. Si la lengua del trabajo es el inglés, título, resumen y palabras clave aparecerán también en traducción al español.

Las recensiones llevarán un título, en la lengua en que estén redactadas y en inglés, relativo a su contenido y describirán la obra reseñada del siguiente modo: Autor, título, lugar, editorial, año, número de páginas.

En todos los casos los autores deberán adjuntar unas breves líneas curriculares (250 palabras) donde, aparte de consignar su adscripción institucional, den cuenta de sus principales publicaciones y reflejen igualmente los ámbitos temáticos cultivados, sin dejar de proporcionar una dirección de contacto electrónica. Por favor prepare el manuscrito para un referato ciego quitando toda auto-referencia.

Estilo

Todas las contribuciones han de emplear tipo de letra Times New Roman, tamaño 12 y espaciado 1,5 (texto y notas). Las notas deben estar numeradas consecutivamente (números volados, no entre

[Recibido: 2017

Aceptado: 2017]

paréntesis) y aparecer como notas a pie, usando la fuente Times New Roman, tamaño 10 y espaciado simple. El número de nota que remite a la información contenida en la nota a pie aparecerá directamente después del signo de puntuación que cierra la cita en el cuerpo del texto.

Las palabras y sintagmas que el autor considere necesario recalcar, irán en cursiva, nunca en

negrita.

Citas y referencias

Las referencias a autores y publicaciones en el cuerpo del texto aparecerán entre paréntesis, incluyendo el apellido del autor, el año de publicación de la obra y las páginas citadas. Ejemplo: (Jáuregui 2008, p. 25)

Los pasajes de obras citados a lo largo de los artículos aparecerán, con justificación a la izquierda de 1,5, en Times New Roman, tamaño 11, sin dobles comillas. Las reseñas no extractarán pasajes con justificación: en caso de que el autor desee citar extractos de la obra reseñada lo hará entre dobles comillas en el cuerpo del texto y respetando su tamaño, empleando la modalidad indicada de referencia entre paréntesis al autor, año de la publicación y página.

Las partes omitidas en citas se señalarán con tres puntos entre paréntesis cuadrados — […]—, separados por un espacio simple de la palabra anterior y siguiente.

Las referencias de las obras de Kant deberán hacerse según las pautas fijadas por la Edición de la Academia: http://www.degruyter.com/view/supplement/s16131134_Instructions_for_Authors_en.pdf
La bibliografía se debe organizar alfabética y cronológicamente al final del texto. Si se citan varias obras del mismo autor, éstas deben ordenarse de manera cronológica, de la más reciente a la más antigua.

Ejemplos:

Libro:

Stepanenko Gutiérrez, P. (2008), Unidad de la conciencia y objetividad: ensayos sobre autoconciencia, subjetividad y escepticismo en Kant, Instituto de Investigaciones Filosóficas UNAM, México.

Artículo:

Parra París, L. (1987), “Naturaleza e imperativo categórico en Kant”, Ideas y valores, no. 74-75, pp. 35-60.

Capítulo en una obra colectiva:

Gómez Caffarena, J. (1994), “Kant y la filosofía de la religión”, en D. M. Granja Castro (coord.), Kant, de la "Crítica" a la filosofía de la religión: en el bicentenario de "La religión en los límites de la mera razón, Anthropos, España,

pp. 185-212.

Trabajos disponibles en la web:

Waldron, J. “The Principle of Proximity”, New York University Public Law and Legal Theory Working Papers 255 (2011), p. 19

http://lsr.nellco.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1256&context=nyu_plltwp, acceso mes, día y año).

Editorial Policy

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We would like to acquaint you with a journal project that can only go forward with the greatest possible participation of Kant scholars, without exclusions of any kind.

This periodical will be a biannual electronic journal in Kantian studies, which will alternate between open-submission issues and single-topic issues coordinated by one or two editors. All submitted manuscripts would undergo peer review.

Though Spanish is the Journal’s primary language, manuscripts in English, German, French, Italian, and Portuguese are also welcome.

Submissions must not have been previously published, nor should they be under consideration anywhere else in any language. Please send your manuscript as a Word attachment to the following e-mail address:

contextoskantianos@gmail.com

Manuscript Preparation

Articles must not exceed 12.000 words, discussions 8.000 words, and book reviews 4.000

words (including footnotes and bibliography in all cases). Longer manuscripts could also be considered by the editorial team, if the interest and quality of the contribution justifies its acceptance.

Articles and discussions should include an abstract both in the language of the submitted paper and in English that should not exceed 150 words as well as three to five keywords, with the title also in English. The title of articles, in the language of the submitted text and in English, and the author (in SMALL CAPS) will appear in Times New Roman 16 and in bold type. The institutional affiliation will have font Times New Roman 14. The abstract and key words, also in the language of the submitted and in English, will have font Times New Roman 11. If the language of the article or discussion is English, the title, abstract and key words will be also translated into Spanish.

Book reviews should have a title both in the language of the submitted paper and in English. They should also refer to the work under review as follows: Author, title, place, publishing house, year, and number of pages.

Please include a brief biographical note (250 words) that includes institutional affiliation, the titles of some publications, areas of specialization, and an e-mail address. Please prepare the manuscript for blind review deleting all self-references.

Style

For any contribution, the author should use letter type Time New Roman 12 and lines should be spaced 1.5 (text and notes). Notes should be numbered consecutively (superscript, no brackets) and appear as footnotes, using Times New Roman 10. The number of the annotation which points to the bibliographic information contained in the footnote has to appear directly after the quotation mark closing the citation.

Stress required in the text should be done through the use of italics, never in bold type.

Citations and references

References without excerpting throughout the manuscript must appear in parenthesis in the main text with the following information: author’s last name, year of publication, and quoted pages.

Example:

(Jáuregui 2008, p. 25)

Excerpts cited throughout articles will use Times New Roman 11, without quotation marks and 1,5 left indented. Reviews shall not include indented excerpts, only brief citations, if necessary, with

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS

International Journal of Philosophy

N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 432-435 ISSN: 2386-7655

433

quotation marks and the reference in parenthesis of author’s last name, year of publication, and quoted pages.

Omissions in citations are marked by three dots placed in square brackets which are separated from the preceding and the following word by a single space.

When citing Kant’s Complete Works the usage within the Akademie Edition is mandatory http://www.degruyter.com/view/supplement/s16131134_Instructions_for_Authors_en.pdf

*Bibliography must be included at the end and organized alphabetically. Several works by the same author must be ordered chronologically beginning with the most recent one.

Examples:

Book:

Stepanenko Gutiérrez, P. (2008), Unidad de la conciencia y objetividad: ensayos sobre autoconciencia, subjetividad y escepticismo en Kant, Instituto de Investigaciones Filosóficas UNAM, México.

Article:

Parra París, L. (1987), “Naturaleza e imperativo categórico en Kant”, Ideas y valores, no. 74-75, pp. 35-60.

Chapter in a collective work:

Paper available in websites:

Waldron, J. “The Principle of Proximity”, New York University Public Law and Legal Theory Working Papers 255 (2011), p. 19

http://lsr.nellco.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1256&context=nyu_plltwp, accessed

month, day year).

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS

434 International Journal of Philosophy

N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, pp. 431-434

ISSN: 2386-7655

CON-TEXTOS KANTIANOS.

International Journal of Philosophy

N.o 6, Diciembre 2017, p. 431

ISSN: 2386-7655

Listado de evaluadores / Reviewers List

María Julia Bertomeu (CONICET / Univ. Nacional de La Plata, Argentina) Maria de Lourdes Borges Duarte (UFSC, Brazil)

Giorgia Cecchinato (UFMG, Brasil) Julio Esteves (UFFRJ, Brasil)

Jesús González Fisac (Univ. de Cádiz, Spain)

Catalina González Quintero (Univ. de los Andes, Colombia) Ricardo Gutiérrez Aguilar (UCM, Spain)

Robert Hanna (Independent Researcher, USA) Silvia del Luján (UNSAM, Argentina)

Sofia Míguens (Univ. Porto, Portugal)

Luciana Martínez (UBA/CONICET, Argentina) Eduardo Molina (Univ. A. Hurtado, Chile) Pablo Muchnik (Emerson College, USA)

Cinara Nahra (Federal Univ. of Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil) Antonio Pérez Quintana (Univ. of La Laguna, Spain)

Luis Placencia (Univ. of Chile, Chile) Roberto R. Aramayo (IFS/CSIC, Spain) Nuria Sánchez Madrid (UCM, Spain) Paulo Tunhas (Univ. Porto, Portugal) Milla Vaha (Univ. of Helsinki, Finland)

435

CTK

CTK

Editorial de CTK6

CTK6 Editorial Note

Interview with Maria de Lourdes Alves Borges

Kantismo analítico: Sellars y McDowell sobre la conciencia sensorial

Kant, el juicio causal y la localización de la carta robada

Apercepción o ambiente.

cDowell y Ch. Travis sobre la naturaleza del juicio perceptivo

Kantian Epistemology and Non-Conceptual Content

A Heideggerian Interpretation of the “Critique of Pure Reason”: the Question of the Imagination

La defensa de la espontaneidad absoluta en la Crítica de la razón pura de Kant

Why is Empirical Psychology not a Natural Science?

A Reading of the “Preface” to Kant’s Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science

The epistemological Function of the reflective Judgement in Kant's Theory of Knowledge

Frege on Kant: A Philosophical Grounding of Logicism

From Affinity to Action

¿Por qué es Kant evasivo con respecto a la gracia?

La gracia de Kant como gimnasia ética

La teoría robusta kantiana de la gracia

¿Por qué incluso los ángeles necesitan el Estado?

Comentarios sobre el artículo de Robert Hanna “Saliendo del Estado y deconstruyendo el estado de naturaleza”

¿Por qué los mejores ángeles de nuestra naturaleza deben odiar al Estado?

Julius Ebbinghaus´s interpretation of Kant´s philosophy of law

The Law of Humanity and the Limits of State Power

Kant and Politics

Concerning Kantian Cognitive Dualism. A non-conceptualist Analysis of the Heterogeneity between Sensibility and Understanding in the Critique of Pure Reason

The Aristotelian and Kantian ethics from the Highest Good perspective

Funciones del conocimiento y unidad del sistema kantiano

The Possibility of the Unity of Reason or Its Unbridgeable Abyss from the Point of View of the Categories of Freedom

THE GENETIC AND THE TRASCENDENTAL RELATED TO THE PROBLEM OF LANGUAGE IN KANT’S PHILOSOPHY

On Kant’s Theory of Biology

Giving a Context to Kant’s jurídico-political thought