Perspectives on Kant’s Opus postumum (Routledge Studies in Eighteenth-Century Philosophy) 9780367545666, 9780367548681, 9781003090946, 0367545667

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Perspectives on Kant’s Opus postumum

This book offers new perspectives on the theoretical elements of the Opus postumum (OP), Kant’s project of a final work which remained unknown until eighty years after his death. The contributors read the OP as a central work in establishing the relation between Kant’s transcendental philosophy, his natural philosophy, practical philosophy, philosophy of religion, metaphysics, and his broader epistemology. Interpreting the OP is an important task because it helps reveal how Kant himself tried to correct and develop his critical philosophy. It also sheds light on the foundational role of the three Critiques for other philosophical inquiries, as well as the unified philosophical system that Kant sought to establish. The chapters in this volume address a range of topics relevant to the epistemological and theoretical problems raised in the OP, including the transition from the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science to physics as an answer to a deficiency in critical thought; the notion of ether and, more specifically, its transcendental deduction; self-affection and the self-positing of the subject; and the idea of God and the system of ideas in the highest standpoint of transcendental philosophy. Perspectives on Kant’s Opus postumum will be of interest to upperlevel students and scholars working on Kant. Giovanni Pietro Basile  is currently associate professor in the Philosophy Department of Boston College. After completing studies in physics, theology, and philosophy, he earned his PhD in philosophy at the LMU Munich, where he also received the German Habilitation. He is a member of the Reviewers Panel of the journals Gregorianum and Kant-­ Studien. Among his main publications are two books—Transcendance et finitude. La synthèse transcendantale dans la Critique de la raison pure de Kant, Paris: L’Harmattan 2005 and Kants Opus postumum und seine Rezeption, Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter 2013—as well as several articles on Kant, Karl Jaspers, and Paul Ricœur. Ansgar Lyssy is currently researcher at the University of Heidelberg, working on a project on causality in Hegel, funded by a grant from

the Thyssen Foundation. In 2020, he finished his Habilitationsschrift at LMU Munich, a yet unpublished monograph titled Humankind and Humanity in Kant. This research was funded by a research grant from the German Research Foundation. Notable publications include Kausalität und Teleologie bei G. W. Leibniz, Stuttgart: Franz-Steiner (Studia Leibnitiana, Special Issue No. 48), 2016, three anthologies on Kant and the philosophy of the eighteenth century, and several papers on Leibniz, Kant, Hegel, and other related thinkers.

Routledge Studies in Eighteenth-Century Philosophy

Kant and the Continental Tradition Sensibility, Nature, and Religion Edited by Sorin Baiasu and Alberto Vanzo Beyond Autonomy in Eighteenth-Century British and German Aesthetics Edited by Karl Axelsson, Camilla Flodin, and Mattias Pirholt Kant’s Critical Epistemology Why Epistemology Must Consider Judgment First Kenneth R. Westphal The Experiential Turn in Eighteenth-Century German Philosophy Edited by Karin de Boer and Tinca Prunea-Brettonet Human Dignity and the Kingdom of Ends Kantian Perspectives and Practical Applications Edited by Jan-Willem van der Rijt and Adam Cureton System and Freedom in Kant and Fichte Edited by Giovanni Pietro Basile and Ansgar Lyssy Perspectives on Kant’s Opus postumum Edited by Giovanni Pietro Basile and Ansgar Lyssy A Guide to Kant’s Psychologism via Locke, Berkeley, Hume, and Wittgenstein Wayne Waxman

For more information about this series, please visit: https://www. routledge.com/Routledge-Studies-in-Eighteenth-Century-Philosophy/ book-series/SE0391

Perspectives on Kant’s Opus postumum

Edited by Giovanni Pietro Basile and Ansgar Lyssy

First published 2023 by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 and by Routledge 4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2023 selection and editorial matter, Giovanni Pietro Basile and Ansgar Lyssy; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Giovanni Pietro Basile and Ansgar Lyssy to be identified the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Basile, Giovanni Pietro, editor. | Lyssy, Ansgar, 1978- editor. Title: Perspectives on Kant’s Opus postumum / [edited by] Giovanni Pietro Basile and Ansgar Lyssy. Identifiers: LCCN 2022025265 (print) | LCCN 2022025266 (ebook) | ISBN 9780367545666 (hardback) | ISBN 9780367548681 (paperback) | ISBN 9781003090946 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Kant, Immanuel, 1724–1804. Opus postumum. Classification: LCC B2794.O63 P47 2023 (print) | LCC B2794. O63 (ebook) | DDC 193—dc23/eng/20220808 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022025265 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022025266 ISBN: 978-0-367-54566-6 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-367-54868-1 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-09094-6 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/9781003090946 Typeset in Sabon by codeMantra

Contents

Notes on the citations and abbreviations List of contributors Preface

ix xi xv

Introduction

1

1 Kant’s paradoxical reception of Lavoisier

9

H E N N Y BLOM M E

2 Filling out space—the ether and the dispositions of matter in Kant’s Opus postumum

27

A N S G A R LY S S Y

3 Physics as system in fascicles X/XI of Kant’s Opus postumum

50

S T E P H E N H OWA R D

4 The analogical use of schematism from the Critique of Pure Reason to the Opus postumum

71

L A R A S C AG L I A

5 The forms of “composition” and the role of mediating concepts in Kant’s Opus postumum

91

G UA LT I E RO L O R I N I

6 Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum and in the Critique of Pure Reason DI NA E M U N DTS

108

viii Contents 7 A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus: Appropriating Kant’s doctrine of self-positing in the Opus postumum

131

B RYA N H A L L

8 Fichte or Baumgarten? On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre

154

LOR ENZO SA L A

9 Kant’s “deification” of reason in the Opus postumum: An attempt at reconciling God and autonomy

179

A N NA TOM A SZ EWSK A

10 François Marty’s interpretation of Kant’s Opus postumum

199

G I OVA N N I P I E T RO B A S I L E

Index

217

Notes on the citations and abbreviations

References to Kant’s works other than the Critique of Pure Reason will be given in the text according to the Akademie edition (AA) cited with volume and page number. English citations are, as far as possible, from The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant (CE). Significant deviations are noted and explained. The Critique of Pure Reason will be cited by the page numbers of the first (A) and second (B) edition. CF Conflict of the Faculties (AA 7; CE 3) CPJ Critique of the Power of Judgment (AA 5; CE 5) CPR Critique of Pure Reason (CE 2) CPracR Critique of Practical Reason (AA 5; CE 4) Dis On a Discovery whereby any new critique of pure reason is to be made superfluous by an older one (AA 8; CE 3) G Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals (AA 4; CE 2) JL Lectures on Logic (Jäsche) (AA 9; CE 9) L Letters (AA 10–13; CE 14) MF Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (AA 5, CE 4) MM Metaphysics of Morals (AA 6; CE 4) ND A new elucidation of the first principles of metaphysical cognition [Nova Dilucidatio] (AA 1; CE 1) OP Opus Postumum (AA 20 & 21; CE 12) OPD The Only Possible argument in support of a Demonstration of the existence of God (AA 2; CE 1) PE What real progress has metaphysics made in Germany since the time of Leibniz and Wolff? [Prize Essay] (AA 20; CE 3) Notes and Fragments (AA 14–19; CE 13) Refl

x  Notes on the citations and abbreviations Rel Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason [Religion] (AA 6; CE 6) Lectures on Metaphysics (Dohna) (AA 28; CE 10) V-Met/Dohna V-Met/Mron Lectures on Metaphysics (Mrongovius) (AA 28; CE 10) V-MP-L 1 /Pölitz Kant Metaphysik L 1 (Pölitz) (AA 28; CE 10) Religionslehre Pölitz (AA 28; CE 10) V-Th/Pölitz

Contributors

Henny Blomme is postdoctoral fellow at KU Leuven and PI of a research project on Lambert, Tetens and Kant. He obtained his PhD from the Universities of Paris-IV Sorbonne and Wuppertal, with a dissertation on Kant’s theory of space from the Critique of Pure Reason over the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science to the Opus postumum. He was a postdoctoral research fellow at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin and at the University of Edinburgh, and a guest researcher at the University of Bochum. He is the author of more than 20 papers on Kant and other philosophers of the eighteenth century. For his work on Kant, in 2015 he was awarded the quinquennual Kant Nachwuchspreis. Some selected papers are as follows: “Israel Gottlieb Canz über die Unsterblichkeit der Seele,” in Aufklärung. Jahrbuch zur Erforschung des 18. Jahrhunderts 29 (2018), 51–72; “On the Mediate Proof of Transcendental Idealism.” In Studia Kantiana 14 (2016), 11–26; and “Kant’s conception of chemistry in the Danziger Physik,” in Robert R. Clewis (ed.): Reading Kant’s Lectures, Berlin: De Gruyter (2015), 484–502. His book Kant et la matière de l’espace is forthcoming. Dina Emundts is professor of philosophy at FU Berlin. She received her PhD and her Habilitation from the HU Berlin and has been a professor of philosophy at the University of Konstanz, before moving to Berlin in 2016. She is member of the advisory board and editor of several journals, including the BJHP and the International Yearbook of German Idealism. She is author of the following books: Erfahren und Erkennen. Hegels Theorie der Wirklichkeit, Frankfurt: Klostermann 2012; Kants Übergangskonzeption im Opus postumum. Berlin: de Gruyter 2004; with R.-P. Horstmann: G.W.F. Hegel. Eine Einführung, Stuttgart: Reclam 2002; as well as numerous papers on Kant and German Idealism. Bryan Hall is dean of the School for Professional Advancement and professor of Liberal Arts at Regis University. He earned his PhD from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and has been a professor of philosophy at St. John’s University, NY. He is the author of several papers

xii Contributors on Kant, including “A Dilemma for Kant’s Theory of Substance,” in the British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 2011. He also authored two books on Kant: The Post-­C ritical Kant: Understanding the Critical Philosophy Through the Opus Postumum, London: Routledge, 2014, and The Arguments of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, Lanham: Lexington Books/­Rowman & ­Littlefield, 2010. Stephen Howard  is a senior postdoctoral fellow at KU Leuven, where he is pursuing a research project on Kant’s critique of cosmology and the theoretical and practical significance of the idea of the worldwhole. He received his PhD from Kingston University, London, and has been a visiting scholar at the University of Bucharest and Ca’ Foscari University of Venice. His first book, Kant’s Late Philosophy of Nature: The Opus postumum is forthcoming with Cambridge University Press. Other publications include: “The Transition within the Transition: the Übergang from the Selbstsetzungslehre to the Ether Proofs in Kant’s Opus postumum” in Kant-Studien (2019); “Dreams of Forces and Pneumatology: Kant’s Critique of Wolff and Crusius in 1766” in Studi Kantiani (2019); “Kant on the Fundamental Forces of Matter: Why Attraction and Repulsion?” in Kantian Review (2021); and “Kant on Limits, Boundaries, and the Positive Function of Ideas” in the European Journal of Philosophy (2022). Gualtiero Lorini is assistant professor of theoretical philosophy at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan. He received his PhD from both the Universities Paris-IV Sorbonne and Salento (Lecce, Italy). In 2016–2018, he was an Alexander von Humboldt postdoctoral fellow at TU Berlin. He is the editor (with Robert Louden) of Knowledge, Morals and Practice in Kant’s Anthropology, Basingstoke: Palgrave 2018, and the author of Fonti e Lessico dell’Ontologia Kantiana. I Corsi di Metafisica (1762–1795), Pisa: ETS 2017. Beyond that, he is the author of more than 20 papers, including “Der Zyklop in der Wissenschaft. Kant und die anthropologia transscendentalis,” in Archiv für Begriffsgeschichte 14 (2018), 113–124; “Kant’s Metaphor by Analogy between Ontology and Transcendental Philosophy”, in Patricia Kauark-Leite, Giorgia Cecchinato, Virginia de Araujo Figueiredo, Margit Ruffing, Alice Serra (eds.), Kant and the Metaphors of Reason, Hildesheim-Zürich-New York: Olms, 2015, 71–85; and “The Contribution of Kant’s Lectures on Metaphysics to a better Comprehension of the Architectonic,” in B. Dörflinger, C. La Rocca, R. Louden, U. Rancan (eds.), Kant’s Lectures, Berlin: de Gruyter, 2015, 233–246. Lorenzo Sala  is currently a researcher at the University of Trier. He received his PhD from the University of Pisa with a thesis on Kant’s theory of consciousness and its role in the Critique of pure Reason.

Contributors  xiii Before joining the university of Trier, he has been junior core fellow at the Central European University, as well as guest scholar at the University of Würzburg and DAAD postdoctoral fellow at the University of Frankfurt. Publications include “A priori philosophy of nature in Hegel and German rationalism”, in British Journal for the History of Philosophy (2022), with Anton Kabeshkin, Systematicity, Purposiveness, Necessity: from the transcendental deduction of the ideas to the transcendental deduction of the principle of purposiveness of nature, in Aisthesis (2021) and Hegel’s Cocktail: from Metaphysics to Logic and Back Again, in Australasian Philosophical Review (2018). Lara Scaglia is currently research assistant (adjunkt) at the University of Warsaw within the project: “The locality of reason. Social, cultural and anthropological contexts of rationality” funded by the National Science Centre in Poland. Between 2019 and 2020, she was DAAD scholar at the Goethe-Universität Frankfurt and research collaborator at the university of Mainz and Bonn. She received her Phd from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) under the supervision of Prof. Thomas Sturm. During her PhD, she has been collaborating with the Centre d’Història de la Ciència (CEHIC), the Universitat Obierta de Catalunya, and the Heinrich-Heine-­ Universität Düsseldorf. Among her recent publications are: Kant´s Notion of a Transcendental Schema: the Constitution of Objective Cognition between Epistemology and Psychology, Peter Lang 2020; “From the Schematism to the Typic. How Can We Be moral?,” in Con-­Textos Kantianos, N.13, June 2021, 323–343; “Bonnet’s and Tetens’s accounts of sensorium commune and Kant’s transcendental schema,” in Rivista di Storia della Filosofia 2/2020, 159–176. Anna Tomaszewska  works as an assistant professor at the Institute of Philosophy of the Jagiellonian University in Kraków, where she also completed her PhD in philosophy in 2011. She is the principal investigator in a project titled Between Secularization and Reform. Religious Rationalism in the Late Seventeenth Century and in the Enlightenment, funded by the National Science Centre in Poland. Her publications include edited and co-edited volumes: Between Secularization and Reform: Religion in the Enlightenment, Leiden/ Boston: Brill 2022, The Sources of Secularism: Enlightenment and Beyond, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan 2017, and monographs: Kant’s Rational Religion and the Radical Enlightenment: From Spinoza to Contemporary Debates, London: Bloomsbury 2022 and The Contents of Perceptual Experience. A Kantian Perspective, Warsaw/ Berlin: De Gruyter 2014. She is also an editor at Diametros.

Preface

In this collective work are published the proceedings of the international workshop The Unfinished System—Kant’s Opus Postumum, held at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich, February 15–16, 2019. The event was organized and chaired by Giovanni Pietro Basile and Ansgar Lyssy, who also are the editors of this volume. The objective of the workshop was to offer a contribution to the debate on a particularly rich and complex text of Kant’s philosophical work, by means of providing a space for intervention and fruitful exchanges between established scholars and selected junior researchers and PhD students. In this volume, two papers by Basile and Lyssy are added to the papers that grew out of the talks presented at the workshop. In this sense, the workshop is part of an established tradition of international conferences on Kant’s Opus postumum, which began with the symposium organized by the Forum für Philosophie in Bad Homburg in 1989 (Blasche et al., 1991), and continued with the conferences organized by Société d’Études Kantiennes de Langue Française at the University of Lausanne in 1999 (Erisman, 2001), by the Società Italiana di Studi Kantiani and the Philosophy Department of the University of Pisa at this same University in 2000 (Marcucci, 2001), and by the Arbeitskreis für Hegels Naturphilosophie at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in 2007 (Onnasch, 2009).1 We would like to express our gratitude to the authors for the high quality of their contributions. We also are grateful to our editor at Routledge, Andrew Weckenmann, and his assistant, Alexandra Simmons, for their support and their patience. Editors’ thanks extend to Dillon Reihill for his assistance in proofreading and to Robert McQueen for his assistance in preparing the index.

Note 1 Cf. Basile 2013, 274f.

xvi Preface

Bibliography Basile, Giovanni Pietro. 2013. Kants Opus postumum und seine Rezeption. De Gruyter: Berlin/Boston. Blasche, Siegfried et al. (ed.). 1991. Übergang: Untersuchungen zum Spätwerk Immanuel Kants. Beiträge der Tagung des Forums für Philosophie Bad Homburg vom 13. bis 15. Oktober 1989 zu Kants Opus postumum. Edited by Forum für Philosophie Bad Homburg (Siegfried Blasche, Wolfgang R. Köhler, Wolfgang Kuhlmann, Peter Rohs). Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann. Erismann, Christophe (ed.). 2001. Années 1796–1803. Kant. Opus postumum. Philosophie, Science, Ethique et Théologie. Proceedings of the 4th International Congress of the Société d’Études Kantiennes de Langue Française. Lausanne: October 21–23, 1999. Under the direction of Ingeborg Schüßler. Paris: Vrin. Marcucci, Silvestro (ed.). 2001. Kant e l’Opus postumum. Conference of the Società Italiana di Studi Kantiani. Pisa: December 2000. Pisa, Rom: Istituti Editoriali e Poligrafici Internazionali. Onnasch, Ernst-Otto (ed.). 2009. Kants Philosophie der Natur. Ihre Entwicklung im Opus postumum und ihre Wirkung. Berlin, New York: De Gruyter.

Introduction

In the last years of his life, Kant worked unceasingly on a final work, which he intended to be the completion of his philosophical system. The main theme of this work is the transition from the Metaphysical Principles of Natural Science to physics. But Kant died before he could complete this last ambitious project. The considerable number of notes left by him are mostly scattered in 12 fascicles or convolutes. They could nevertheless be distributed into 14 drafts, roughly corresponding to as many redactional phases, along with the group of the earliest jottings. In the earlier phases of his work on the so-called Transition Project, Kant deals predominantly with topics belonging to physics and philosophy of nature, showing an increasing interest in the elaboration of a system of all elementary forces of nature to be determined a priori. At this stage, the concept of ether is conceived as a material—the ‘caloric’ (Wärmestoff), or a ‘matter of light’ (Lichtstoff), or also the basic element of physical-chemical processes. But in the draft Elem. System 1–6 (February-May 1799) ether is also considered as a substance that is neither hypothetical nor derivable from experience. The draft Uebergang 1–14 (May–August 1799) marks a major turning point. Here, Kant runs several attempts to prove the existence of ether, being defined on the one hand as an actual material, and on the other hand as a principle a priori that can be demonstrated by means of the principle of identity. In an apparently paradoxical way, the ether is therefore matter as well as form, it is really given and conceived of a priori, and it is both of physical and metaphysical nature. It has become common to refer to this etherproof as a ‘transcendental deduction of ether’. Later on, in the draft Convolut X/XI (August 1799–April 1800) Kant focuses on the notion ‘physics’ and its definition and develops considerably new contributions to the theory of perception and of the self-affection of the subject, along with the concept of ‘phenomenon of a phenomenon’ or ‘indirect phenomenon’. The two latest drafts—Convolut VII (April–December 1800) and Convolut I (December 1800–February 1803)—show a more and more evidently fragmentary character. However, Kant extends here his reflections to several new issues, including the notion of self-positing of

DOI: 10.4324/9781003090946-1

2 Introduction the subject, the idea of God, the demonstration of his existence, and the system of the ideas of transcendental philosophy. Although ‘Opus postumum’ (OP) has become established as the standard designation for this writing, Kant’s notes on his Transition Project do not exhibit the unified character of an accomplished work. Rather, they are the record of an incomplete work in progress. The material or external fragmentary nature of the OP raises the question of whether it is possible to discern at least a formal or substantial systematic unity or whether one cannot rather admit one or more points of radical rupture within the itinerary taken by Kant (cf. Howard, forthcoming). This question about the internal systematic continuity or discontinuity of the OP turns out to be a major crux interpretationis of this text. This question relates to another crucial aspect of the interpretation of the OP, namely, its relation to Kant’s critical philosophy. The dominant topics of the earlier phases show an undeniable correlation between them and the Metaphysical Principles of the Philosophy of Nature, which also is implied by the original title of the work. One may wonder, moreover, whether there is a relation, at least implicit, between the transition from nature to morality, which the Critique of Power of Judgement deals with, and the transition from the metaphysics of nature to physics, which the OP addresses. Starting with the so-called transcendental ether deduction in Uebergang 1–14 and going on with the three last drafts of the OP, Kant returns to confront themes treated in the Critique of Pure Reason. The reflections of the OP revise and expand upon themes taken from Kant’s critical philosophy and cannot be understood without referring to it. In this sense, it is appropriate to speak of the Transition Project as a ‘post-critical’ stage of Kant’s thinking (cf. Hall 2015). Yet, it is still to be understood whether the prefix ‘post’ points to Kant’s overcoming of previous positions, getting progressively closer to a form of speculative idealism, or it expresses a further evolution of Kantian philosophy substantially consistent with the critical perspective. It is hard to say which position in the system of Kant’s philosophy the OP would have taken if he would have accomplished this last work. In its unfinished status, the OP provides instead a collection of final general remarks on the whole critical philosophy, with numerous additions and new developments, connected by the notion of transition. Thereby the OP can be seen as either an unfinished system itself, as an unfinished part of the more comprehensive system of critical philosophy, or both. These late reflections challenge the understanding of the critical philosophy itself and prompt a new interpretation.1 Kant’s notes on the Transition Project were first published, only in an incomplete form, around eighty years after his death. They were first edited in the volumes 21 and 23 of the Academy edition in 1936 and 1938, respectively. This edition turned out to be in many respects unsatisfactory. A new, complete, and scientifically reliable edition of the

Introduction  3 Academy should soon be available. Despite these issues with the publication of the text, the interest and the fascination for the OP within the community of Kant scholars has not slowed in the last decades. Up to this day a considerable number of papers and monographs have been devoted to this writing. Nevertheless, the OP remains a frontier still to be explored and constitutes a promising field for ongoing and future research on Kantian philosophy. The ten papers collected in this volume and covering the different thematic areas of the Transition Project aim to make a helpful contribution to the understanding of the philosophy of the OP and its relationship to the critical system.

Chapter summaries The succession of chapters follows, as far as possible, the chronological-­ systematic order of the drafts of the Opus postumum. First come contributions concerning questions of the philosophy of nature (chapter 1–3). These are followed by papers regarding epistemological issues (chapters 4–6). It concludes with articles dealing with metaphysical topics and the system of transcendental philosophy (chapters 7–10). In the first chapter, “Kant’s paradoxical reception of Lavoisier,” Henny Blomme discusses the claim made by Michael Friedman that it was the scientific paradigm change from Stahlian to anti-phlogistic chemistry that triggered Kant to start working on the manuscript of the OP. According to the author, Friedman had argued that, in the years between the publication of the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science and Kant’s work on the OP, new developments in pneumatic chemistry and the science of heat convinced Kant of the possibility of a physical chemistry. While Friedman is right to stress the importance of those developments for a good understanding of certain passages within the OP, Blomme criticizes this merely historical account and develops an alternative interpretation of the role played by Lavoisier’s new model for chemistry within Kant’s OP. Blomme argues that Kant was struck by what made Lavoisier’s theory similar to the one of Stahl and, therefore, by a central reactionary element it contains. Notwithstanding Kant’s recognition of the scientific revolution caused by the new French and British chemistry, what appears to be philosophically relevant for him in the later fascicles of the OP is the fact that Lavoisier, just like Stahl, refers to a principle of heat that is not a direct object of experience. The notion of the ether is picked up by Ansgar Lyssy in the following chapter “Filling out space – The ether and the dispositions of matter in Kant’s Opus Postumum.” Here, the author starts by asking what it means for a physical body to be located at a certain place. For Kant, a body fills out space by means of its causal efficacy. The essential properties of matter are hence dependent on underlying forces, and it is one task of the OP to reconstruct the system of forces. To avoid an infinite

4 Introduction regress of causal explanations, this system of forces needs to account for a primitive origin of all mechanical moving forces in something that is constitutive of forces, yet radically different. This is the ether that fills all space that constantly moves or vibrates all the parts of the material bodies internally. Lyssy proposes to read Kant’s argument for the existence of the ether through the lens of dispositions: essential properties of matter, such as ponderability, coercibility, cohesibility, and exhaustibility, should be understood as dispositions. These dispositions are ‘physically conditioned,’ as Kant calls it, on the ether. To display their manifest and perceivable properties, the ether acts as the ubiquitous and universal ‘activation stimulus’ of the dispositions that make up material bodies. He causes them to constantly display their manifest properties that make them continuously perceivable and causally efficient. Kant’s struggle to provide a transition from metaphysics to physics leads to the necessity of defining anew what physics is. This is the topic of the third chapter of this book, entitled “Kant’s conception of physics in fascicles X/XI of the Opus postumum,” by Stephen Howard. The author examines the discussions of physics in the fascicles X/XI of August 1799 to April 1800. Here, Howard notes a significant shortcoming of Kant scholarship: while many authors have discussed the departure point of the Transition Project, few have asked where the Transition Project should arrive. Taking various conceptual changes within Kant’s drafts into account, Howard reconstructs how Kant proposes new definitions of physics and he attempts to provide a framework for understanding Kant’s late rethinking of physics within the changing distinctions between an elementary system and a doctrinal system. Here, we find a notable departure from Kant’s earlier positions: the new conceptions of physics in fascicles X/XI weaken or even undermine the distinctions that Kant outlines in the 1780s between physics and psychology and between physics and cosmology, with various consequences for our understanding of the Transition Project. With the next chapter, “The analogical use of schematism from the Critique of Pure Reason to the Opus postumum” by Lara Scaglia, starts a group of three papers dealing with aspects related to the transcendental aesthetic and analytic of the first Critique. Scaglia remarks that Kant’s philosophy is characterized by the notion of limit. Kant builds his system by establishing separations among faculties and domains of knowledge. These analytical distinctions between the intellectual ‘level’ and the sensual are then followed by an attempt to bridge this gap for the sake of the unity of cognition. This requires an element within cognition that serves to establish relations between both levels, namely a schema. Scaglia directs attention to Kant’s analogical use of mediating procedures not only in the Critique of Pure Reason, but also in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science and the Opus postumum. More specifically, the chapter first focuses on the notion of transcendental

Introduction  5 schematism presented in the first Critique, then it considers the metaphysics of corporeal nature developed in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science through a procedure, which is analogous to the schematism. Finally, it discusses the drafts constituting the Opus postumum in which Kant hints at the ether being a ground of schematism. In the following chapter, “The Forms of ‘Composition’ and the Role of Mediating Concepts in Kant’s Opus postumum”, Gualtiero Lorini assesses diverse forms of the concept of coordination or composition within Kant’s consideration of natural science. According to the author, the Opus Postumum provides a rich set of German terms indicating this concept. Such an abundance is due to Kant striving to develop the inexhaustible variety of determinations characterizing the natural phenomena studied by physics, without losing the transcendental root of natural laws. Lorini stresses that the Opus Postumum pursues what in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science was merely envisaged: to structure a priori the system of nature not only in its formal lines, but also according to its material specifics, filling the gap between metaphysics and physics. He concludes that the concept of coordination/composition is particularly suitable to assume a value that goes beyond the formal and normative aspect and encompasses also the material and descriptive domain. In this framework a crucial function is played by the Mittelbegriffe/Zwischenbegriffe, through which Kant seems to finally reach a promising way to explain how the understanding could concretely provide nature with a legislation, whose action can be seen as intrinsic to matter. The sixth chapter, “Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum and in the Critique of Pure Reason” by Dina Emundts, deals with a crucial development of the first Critique in Kant’s Transition Project. The author picks up an argument from the Critique of Pure Reason, where Kant asserts that the conception of ourselves as the enduring subject of our mental life is enough to function as the ground for the possibility of our objective experiences and judgments, even though that is nevertheless insufficient to settle what we as human beings really are. In order to have knowledge about us as human beings and individuals, we need to situate ourselves within the causal order. But, she asks, how is the link between these two kinds of self-conception to be understood? Can they be described as a continuing process of self-determination or are there two different kinds of acts? What role does the practical self play here? To answer these, the author interprets Kant’s doctrine of selfdetermination in the Opus Postumum. The first part of the paper elucidates the context of the doctrine of self-determination in in the Opus Postumum. The second part develops what we exactly do according to Kant in the procedure of self-determination described here. The third part deals with the question of how the practical self comes into play. The notion of self-affection leads to doctrine of the self-positing of the subjects in the later stages of Kant’s OP and to the question of the

6 Introduction relationship between Kant’s post-critical philosophy and the speculative metaphysics. The following two papers deal with the doctrine of self-positing. In his “A Kantian Answer to Aenesidemus: Appropriating Kant’s Doctrine of Self-Positing in the Opus postumum,” Bryan Hall uncovers a yet neglected source for the OP, namely G. E. Schulze’s Aenesidemus. G.E. Schulze’s anonymously published Aenesidemus (1792) has long been recognized as an important document (perhaps even a sine qua non) for the development of early German Idealism. Aenesidemus is directed at two main targets: K.L. Reinhold’s Kantian Elementarphilosophie as well as Kant’s own position as articulated in the Critique of Pure Reason. For scholars, the most important thing about Aenesidemus is the effect it had on J.G. Fichte who published a review of Schulze’s book in 1794. In particular, scholars have focused on how Aenesidemus precipitated Fichte’s break with Kant’s Critical philosophy, though there has been significant disagreement among scholars as to the exact nature and severity of that break. Almost no attention has been paid, however, to Kant’s own response to Aenesidemus. Although Kant never publicly responded to Aenesidemus, he does discuss it briefly in a 1792 letter to J.S. Beck as well as in several suggestive remarks from the unpublished Opus postumum. This chapter uses Kant’s remarks from the Selbstsetzungslehre (doctrine of self-positing) in Convolut 7 of the Opus postumum to reconstruct and ultimately defend a Kantian answer to Aenesidemus, one that is markedly different from the way Fichte’s own answer has been understood. A different account is offered by Lorenzo Sala. In “Fichte or Baumgarten? On Kant’s Use of ‘Positing’ in the Selbstsetzungslehre”, Sala argues that Kant’s Selbstsetzungslehre should not be understood as a Fichtean turn in Kant’s thought. On the contrary, the notion of positing that is central to it was already present in Kant’s previous work and was already used in relation to the self at various stages well before the OP. Kant’s notion of positing is traced back to his reception of Baumgarten’s notion ‘Positio’ in the context of his criticism of Baumgarten’s understanding of existence. By considering its evolution from The Only Possible Argument to the first Critique, Sala first provides an account of Kant’s notion of positing, which he then employs to make sense of the various passages from the first Critique that already use ‘positing’ in relation to the ‘self’. In the same way, Sala then considers various formulations of the Selbstsetzungslehre, showing how Kant’s use of ‘positing’ in them is fully in line with the first Critique. In this way, rather than a Fichtean turn, the notion of self-positing is shown to be a reworking of the rationalist notion ‘Positio’, and the Selbstsetzungslehre can be understood as a more fully developed account of the doctrine of the self from the first Critique. In her “Kant’s ‘Deification’ of Reason in the Opus postumum: An Attempt at Reconciling God and Autonomy,” Anna Tomaszewska argues that in the later fascicles of the Opus postumum, Kant offers

Introduction  7 a conception of the divine that some interpreters have taken to mark a radical departure from the Critical philosophy in that he goes as far as to identify God with practical reason. In this chapter, it is argued, however, that the late Kant builds on the account of rational religion which he advanced in his 1793/94 Religionsschrift, transforming and integrating some of its parts, such as the idea of divine moral legislator, into a new account of transcendental philosophy. The novelty that Kant’s final notes contribute to his rational theology lies, as the author suggests, in an attempt to put together divine legislation and the autonomy of moral-­ practical reason as two constitutive aspects of the ‘self-positing’ of the subject as a person. Finally the last chapter, entitled “François Marty’s Interpretation of Kant’s Opus postumum” by Giovanni Pietro Basile, offers a systematic reconstruction of a lesser-known interpretation of the OP. François Marty is the one scholar who best highlighted the continuity of the Opus postumum with the second Critique. While Gerhard Lehmann had the merit of emphasizing, in Kant’s Nachlasswerk, the structuring function of the reflective judgment, and Vittorio Mathieu pointed out the role of the schematism of the Critique of Pure Reason in it, Marty sees the fulfillment of the critical project of a system of transcendental philosophy in the considerations about the human being as a person, the practical concept of God and the idea of reason, scattered in the form of aphorisms along the last two fascicles—Conv. VII et Conv. I. The unity of reason thus attained cannot be separated from a revision of the ontological argument of the existence of God from an ethical-practical point of view. Marty wrote several papers on the Opus postumum in French, but never published an organic presentation of these issues. This paper provides a systematic reconstruction of Marty’s interpretation of Kant’s Transition Project.

Note 1 On the question of the unity of Kant’s philosophical system, with a special focus on the notion of freedom, cf. Basile and Lyssy, 2022.

Bibliography Basile, Giovanni Pietro. 2013. Kants Opus postumum und seine Rezeption. Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter. Basile, Giovanni Pietro, Ansgar Lyssy (eds.). 2022. System and Freedom in Kant and Fichte. New York/London: Routledge. Blasche, Siegfried et al. (ed.). 1991. Übergang: Untersuchungen zum Spätwerk Immanuel Kants. Beiträge der Tagung des Forums für Philosophie Bad Homburg vom 13. bis 15. Oktober 1989 zu Kants Opus postumum. Edited by Forum für Philosophie Bad Homburg (Siegfried Blasche, Wolfgang R. Köhler, Wolfgang Kuhlmann, Peter Rohs). Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann.

8 Introduction Erismann, Christophe (ed.). 2001. Années 1796–1803. Kant. Opus postumum. Philosophie, Science, Ethique et Théologie. Proceedings of the 4th International Congress of the Société d’Études Kantiennes de Langue Française. Lausanne: October 21–23, 1999. Under the direction of Ingeborg Schüßler. Paris: Vrin. Hall, Bryan. 2015. The Post-Critical Kant. Understanding the Critical Philosophy through the Opus postumum, New York/London: Routledge. Howard, Stephen. Kant’s late philosophy of Nature. Forthcoming. Marcucci, Silvestro (ed.). 2001. Kant e l’Opus postumum. Conference of the Società Italiana di Studi Kantiani. Pisa: December 2000. Pisa, Rom: Istituti Editoriali e Poligrafici Internazionali. Onnasch, Ernst-Otto (ed.). 2009. Kants Philosophie der Natur. Ihre Entwicklung im Opus postumum und ihre Wirkung. Berlin/New York: De Gruyter.

1 Kant’s paradoxical reception of Lavoisier Henny Blomme

Introduction In the preface to the second edition of the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant famously refers to Galilei, Torricelli, and Stahl in order to illustrate how the “revolution in the way of thinking,” which he takes to have been instigated by Francis Bacon,1 led to awe-inspiring scientific results: When Galileo rolled balls of a weight chosen by himself down an inclined plane, or when Torricelli made the air bear a weight that he had previously thought to be equal to that of a known column of water, or when in a later time Stahl changed metals into calxes and then changed the latter back into metal by first removing something and then putting it back again, a light dawned on all those who study nature. (CPR, Bxii–xiii) Regarding the chemist Georg Ernst Stahl, Kant mentions in particular his experiments concerning the reversible transformation of metals in calxes. For Stahl, this reversible transformation was an indirect proof of the existence of the principle of fire that he, in the wake of his teacher Johann Joachim Becher, called phlogiston. Stahl taught that, if a metal is intensely heated and transformed into a metallic calx, the phlogiston that was linked to the metal is expelled. That is why, when one introduces phlogiston to calx by heating the latter with coal, oil, or other matters which Stahl asserts are rich in phlogiston, the metal reappears. During the process of combustion, the air allegedly absorbs the expelled phlogiston, but no fusion of air and phlogiston can occur. Moreover, the air can only absorb a certain quantity of phlogiston and when that limit is reached, combustion is no longer possible. That is why a burning candle that is put under a glass jar will eventually extinguish. Stahl’s explanation of the process of combustion, and especially his claim that corrosion of metals in fact amounts to a slow combustion process, was widely considered a major contribution to the advancement of chemistry as a scientific discipline. In the 1780s, however, French

DOI: 10.4324/9781003090946-2

10  Henny Blomme chemists, in particular Lavoisier, challenged Stahl by developing the so-called anti-phlogistic chemistry, thus causing a scientific revolution that culminated in the system of what is now called organic chemistry. 2 Various scholars have pointed to this transition in chemistry as a possible motivation for the transition project that Kant himself took up during the last decade of his life. As is well known, Kant’s preparatory notes for a projected transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural science to empirical physics take up the major part of the manuscript that is commonly called Kant’s Opus postumum (OP). In his pioneering work on the OP, Erich Adickes (1920) already pointed to the importance of the German reception of the French revolution in chemistry for Kant’s investigations into a transition between metaphysics and physics. But it was Henri Dussort who, in 1956, first connected Kant’s optimism about the possibility of such a transition— and, therefore, the whole enterprise of the OP—to his discovery of and admiration for the work of Lavoisier. In Dussort’s view, Kant realized during the 1790s that Lavoisier’s new chemical system could provide a much-needed bridge between the formal character of mathematical physics and the material character of contemporaneous biology (Dussort 1956, 397). However, Dussort’s contribution to the debate does not seem to have exerted any visible influence on scholarship on the OP. Although Tuschling (1971) also stresses the importance of the chemical revolution for understanding Kant’s final work, his explanation of what drove Kant to engage in the search for a transitional science does not depend on it.3 Arguably, Dussort’s claim about the strong connection between the OP and Lavoisier’s chemistry only gained traction in 1992, when Michael Friedman, in his widely acclaimed monograph Kant and the exact sciences, explicitly related the new developments in chemistry to Kant’s motivation for writing another work. Apparently, without having read Dussort’s short text,4 Friedman claims that it was the paradigmatic change from Stahlian to anti-phlogistic chemistry that triggered Kant’s decision to start working on the project of a transition. More specifically, Friedman argues that, in the years between the publication of the Metaphysical Principles of Natural Science and Kant’s work on the transition, new developments in pneumatic chemistry and the science of heat convinced Kant of the possibility of a physical chemistry (Friedman 1992, 267–316). While Dussort and Friedman are absolutely right to stress the importance of the new French chemistry for a good understanding of certain passages within the OP, I do not agree with their claim that Lavoisier is key to understanding the initial motivation behind Kant’s project of a transition from metaphysics of natural science to empirical physics. But since others (in particular Emundts 2004) have already corrected Friedman (and, thus, also Dussort) on this point, in the following I will specifically challenge the way in which Friedman—whose analysis is much

Kant’s paradoxical reception of Lavoisier  11 more nuanced and refined than Dussort’s—interprets the influence that Lavoisier exerted on the development of Kant’s thoughts within the manuscript of the OP. In a nutshell, I maintain that, notwithstanding the many convincing aspects of his interpretation, Friedman has failed to clearly identify the philosophical result of Kant’s reflections on Lavoisier. Thus, contrary to Friedman and others after him (see, e.g., Vasconi 1999, van den Berg 2014, McNulty 2016), who, in order to understand the novelty of the OP refer to the novelty of Lavoisier’s theory, I will argue that it is first and foremost a certain similarity between Stahl’s and Lavoisier’s theories that Kant took to be philosophically relevant and that may also have led him to present the famous drafts of the ether proof that we find in the OP. In the next section, I will build further on Kant’s remarks on Stahl so as to compare their views on the principles of matter (“Stahl and Kant on the Principles of Matter” section). In “From Stahl to Lavoisier,” section, I will discuss the revolutionary transition from the chemistry of Stahl to the one spearheaded by ­Lavoisier. In “Kant’s Appropriation of Lavoisier” section, then, I will discuss Kant’s appropriation of Lavoisier and the new chemistry. “Lavoisier’s Caloric and Rumford’s Later Rejection” section will be entirely devoted to a short account of Lavoisier’s caloric and its fate. In the concluding section (“Stahl, Lavoisier and Kant’s Ether Proofs” section), I propose that Kant’s insight that Stahl and Lavoisier do have something in common that is philosophically revealing offers an additional explanation for the sudden appearance of an a priori proof of the existence of the ether during the course of the manuscript that constitutes the OP.

Stahl and Kant on the principles of matter In Kant’s interpretation, Stahl’s experiments allowed him not only to clarify the nature of burning processes but also—just as Galilei and Torricelli before him—to discover a more fundamental philosophical truth concerning the relation between reason and nature: [He] comprehended that reason has insight only into what it itself produces according to its own design, that it must take the lead with principles for its judgments according to constant laws and compel nature to answer its questions, rather than letting nature guide its movements by keeping reason, as it were, in leading strings; for otherwise accidental observations, made according to no previously designed plan, can never connect up into a necessary law, which is yet what reason seeks and requires. (CPR, Bxiii) These are some daring theses. Kant here not only claims that (1) Stahl understood that the conception and the construction of scientific

12  Henny Blomme experiments amount to coercing nature to reveal its laws, but also (2) that those laws can only be revealed because it is we who first produced them. Moreover, Kant assures that (3) Stahl already comprehended that we necessarily must produce those laws in accordance with the way in which our own human reason functions. While the first claim may be true, it is difficult to find in Stahl’s work any evidence for the second and the third. At most, Stahl may have agreed that the understanding has an important role in the conception of theories, and thus also in providing guidance when setting up experiments in order to test them.5 So, it seems that Kant projected his own thoughts onto the minds of his scientific predecessors. (2) and (3) are strong philosophical claims that Kant never abandoned, but which seldom are shared by experimental scientists. However, because Stahl also refers to a priori principles, it could seem that Kant is effectively translating one of Stahl’s thoughts when he claims that reason “must take the lead with principles for its judgments.” For Stahl, principles can be considered to be a priori in so far as they express the essences of composed bodies. To the difference of chemical principles, Stahl terms such natural essences physical principles. As an example of such principles, Stahl mentions Aristotle’s four elements. But the ontological status of these principles is paradoxical: in his Chymia Rationalis et experimentalis, Stahl explains that, although composed bodies do “really and most certainly” consist of such physical principles, they are “as yet uncertain and unknown.”6 Although Stahl does not say this explicitly, we can interpret him as stating that, at the time of his writing, these physical principles still pertain to the domain of metaphysical speculation. In any case, Stahl tells his readers that he will limit his account to chemical principles, which are a posteriori demonstrable and actually involved in chemical dissolutions and compositions. Physical and chemical principles are not necessarily unrelated or even distinct. In Stahl’s view, their distinction is a pragmatic one, because the goal of chemistry is to finally arrive, through dissolutions, at essential principles of matter. As long as chemistry is an uncompleted science, though, the chemical principles are not yet equivalent to the physical principles. Hence, Stahl’s twofold definition of a principle: Both that which, in a priori respect, is properly and primarily constitutive of its [sc., a body’s] essence, as that into which, in a posteriori respect, the mixed body is eventually resolved, is called a principle or origin [Anfang]. Both descriptions are true.7 It is on the basis of this passage that Martin Carrier (1990, 198) has claimed that Stahl’s account of principles is “incoherent,” because, in this way, the basic principles of matter would be both (1) a priori and therefore not displayable in experience and (2) a posteriori and therefore experimentally accessible through chemical analysis.8 But what

Kant’s paradoxical reception of Lavoisier  13 Carrier in a later text interprets once more as Stahl’s “confusion” and “inconsistency” (2001, 226) is in reality a justifiable view on the relation between metaphysics and empirical research, once one holds on to a corpuscularian conception of matter, as did Stahl. In line with such a conception, one must assume that there are first, non-dissolvable constituents of matter. What these first elements are, however, is a matter of a priori speculation, as long as chemists are not actually able to dissolve the many kinds of matter into the essential first elements. Thus, for the time being, chemists merely arrive at chemical elements that are secondary with respect to the essential principles of matter and the distinction between empirical chemical principles and metaphysical (“physical”) principles is upheld. This gap between metaphysics of matter and empirical chemistry that Stahl observes in his time must ideally disappear when scientific progress will allow us to empirically bring to light the essential constituents of matter. That this is the context of Stahl’s “double definition of a principle”—as Carrier terms the passage quoted above—is clear when one reads further on: §2. Both descriptions are true, namely when one presupposes a natural and totally pure resolution. But because the resolution hitherto known in chemistry neither corresponds to this nor appears easy [to perform] to anyone, and therefore can hardly be made manifest through the art [Kunst 9]; the most common distinction nowadays is between physical and chemical principles of mixed bodies.10 Kant expresses the same view when he states, in the Critique of Pure Reason, that the ideas of chemical elements “are not taken from nature” and that “we rather investigate nature according to these ideas and take our knowledge to be lacking as long as it does not conform to these ideas” (CPR, A645/B673). One could call this a ‘mild conception’ of the role of reason in empirical research: we presuppose certain elements, and although they are not yet to be found by experiment, we strive to do so in the future. However, Kant also defends a much stronger claim, following which the elements that are thought by reason are some kind of guiding illusions, and the idea that empirical research will ideally succeed in obtaining those elements in their pure form is given up. As a matter of fact, in contrast with Stahl, Kant then does not conceive anymore of the possibility that pure water, pure air, etc. may effectively exist in nature: “One concedes that pure earth, pure water, pure air etc. cannot be found” and that they “as far as concerns their purity, originate only in reason” (CPR, A645/B674). Stahl’s ‘mild conception’ of principles that could perhaps in the future be isolated by means of dissolution is untypical when seen in the light

14  Henny Blomme of the traditional chemistry of principles, according to which the principles of matter had always been non-empirical elements of matter. Thus, Carrier is correct when he states that Kant’s (‘hard’—HB) conception is more in line with this traditional chemistry of principles than Stahl (see also Meer 2019, 234), but I do not share his conclusion, following which Kant understood Stahl better than Stahl understood himself (Carrier 1990, 198). Kant explicitly granted a useful role to the ideas of pure elements as fictions of reason, whereas Stahl does neither explicitly claim that these ideas do have a useful role, nor that they could be mere fabrications of reason.

From Stahl to Lavoisier Stahl stated that the invisible principle of fire (phlogiston) becomes manifestly sensible through the double phenomenon of heat and light that constitutes fire.11 When phlogiston is released under the influence of air, it is separated from the water which takes the form of steam, which in turn projects the fire in such a way in the surrounding space that a flame is produced. Contrary to what is often stated about the difference between Stahl and Lavoisier, it is therefore false to claim that Stahl was not aware that air had to be involved in the process of combustion.12 What is true, though, is that Stahl regarded the role of air in the combustion process as merely mechanical: it communicates such a rapid movement to the phlogiston that the latter can release itself in a state of fire, which will last as long as the particles of the phlogiston remain animated by a sufficiently rapid rotational movement. Phlogiston is thus not the same as fire; it can be compared with air that is at rest or with air of which the vibration is too weak to produce in us the sensation of sound. When the phlogiston is released, it is reduced to extremely tenuous particles that are invisible and insensitive to our senses if they do not produce heat. Stahl held that, although phlogiston is very divisible, it differs from air in that it lacks elasticity. Combustion as such only refers to the swift or slow separation of phlogiston from what is most often constituted as a mixture of elements. The union of the elements of the mixture is not broken by the phlogiston that is released but by mechanical action of the air. Stahl further distinguishes a body that burns by losing its phlogiston from bodies that become incandescent when exposed to a heat source, such as glass, clay, and stone. In the latter case, there is no expulsion of phlogiston, but only a simple rotational movement of the molecules of the incandescent body—a movement that those molecules receive from the phlogiston of the heat source (such as a flame, a blaze, or light condensed by a lens). Usually, the beginning of the revolution in anti-phlogistic chemistry is set on August 1, 1774, because it was on that day that Joseph Priestley discovered what he called “dephlogisticated air” (see Priestley 1774). He

Kant’s paradoxical reception of Lavoisier  15 used this term to refer to the specific element in air that makes the latter breathable and that maintains fire. It was also called aer purissimus or aer vitalis and denotes what we nowadays, thanks to Lavoisier, call oxygen. Priestley obtained it from a portion of dry saltpeter, which he had exposed to heat.13 Independently of Priestley, the Swedish chemist Carl Wilhelm Scheele also discovered dephlogisticated air, which he called fire air or empyreal air (Scheele 1777). But Priestley and Scheele did not abandon the concept of phlogiston. Thus, in the same work in which he revealed that he had been able to isolate the breathable element of air, Scheele writes: The presence of phlogiston, this elementary inflammable base, is proven by each of these processes. They also show us that Air strongly attracts the inflammable principle of the bodies, that it removes it from them, & that through the passage of phlogiston through the Air, a significant quantity of air is lost. It is certain that phlogiston is the only cause of this effect. (Scheele 1777, 59) Antoine-Laurent de Lavoisier was the first to declare that phlogiston was a superfluous scientific hypothesis. He was also the first to present the ideas and explanations on the basis of which the new anti-phlogistic chemistry was to be built (Lavoisier 1777). The main idea of this system of chemistry is to explain the increase in weight during combustion by pointing to the addition of oxygen and thus also the weight of the latter. Lavoisier also came up with the idea to conceive of any kind of oxidation as a process of combustion.14 In this regard, Lavoisier’s new system clearly contradicted the teachings of Stahl, who, as we saw, held that the imperceptible material “phlogiston” is expelled when a body burns. In June 1783, John Blagden undertook a trip to France and reported to French physicists the discoveries made in England by Henry Cavendish and James Watt concerning the composition of water. In 1782, Cavendish had succeeded in transforming water into a gas, and Watt, who had participated in the experiments, concluded that water is composed of dephlogisticated air and combustible air from which the latent heat has been removed. For Watt, dephlogisticated air was nothing more than dephlogisticated water that is linked to elemental fire and light. Blagden’s report marked the beginning of a series of experiments conducted by Lavoisier, de la Place, Meusnier, and Monge that would lead to the discovery of hydrogen.

Kant’s appropriation of Lavoisier Without being himself an experimental scientist, Kant throughout his life was very interested in the scientific developments of his time and kept

16  Henny Blomme himself updated by regularly consulting a number of scientific journals. In various texts, however, Kant has insisted on the non-scientific status of Stahl’s chemistry. Moreover, in the preface to MF, Kant famously asserts that chemistry is unlikely to ever become a proper science. It must instead be called a “systematic art” or an “experimental doctrine” (MF, 4: 470). In my view, this also goes for those developments that led to the systematic chemistry of Lavoisier, which is often considered to mark the birth of chemistry as a real science.15 The earliest evidence that Kant had learnt about Lavoisier’s new system is to be found in a Reflexion that Adickes dates to 1789 or 1790, and in which Kant compares the theories of Stahl and Lavoisier. However, Kant does not yet express a clear preference for Lavoisier, but apparently sees the two theories as interchangeable: Following Lavoisier, when something (following Stahl) is dephlogisticated, then something is added (pure air): if it is phlogisticated, then something (pure air) is taken away, except when it concerns dephlogistication by plants, which is only the removal of combustible air. For him [Lavoisier], the solvents [Auflösungsmittel] are themselves replaced. (Refl, 14: 489; my trans.) In the notes associated with Heinrich zu Dohna-Wundlacken, based on a metaphysics lecture that Kant gave in winter semester 1792/1793, we find the following passage: “An element is a simple part. Is water an element? No, because it can further be dissolved, it consists of vital air and combustible air and we call something that does not contain species elementary” (V-Met/Dohna, 28: 664; my trans.). This passage shows that Kant had definitively rejected Stahl’s conception of water as a simple element, but it does not prove that he had also rejected the phlogiston theory and that he already adopted Lavoisier’s alternative— as we saw in the preceding section, in the early eighties Cavendish and Watt had already succeeded in dissolving water without rejecting therefore the phlogiston theory. In a postscript to a letter that Johann Benjamin Erhard sent to Kant on January 17, 1793, we read: “Girtanner still wants to know if you have read his chemistry, and what you think about it” (L, 11: 408; my trans.). Erhard refers to Girtanner’s Anfangsgründe der antiphlogistischen Chemie, published in 1792. The fact that Erhard writes ‘still’ suggests that Girtanner sent a copy of his book to Kant and told him in the accompanying letter that he would be happy to know what the sage philosopher thought about it. We know that Kant indeed owned a copy of Girtanner’s book (Warda 1922, 34) and, given his interest in chemistry, it is possible that he read some of the passages in which the author presents the decomposition of water as one of the most important results of the anti-phlogistic chemistry. In

Kant’s paradoxical reception of Lavoisier  17 Kant’s reply to Sömmering, published by the latter in 1796 but written in 1795, we find a passage in which Kant invokes the recent developments in chemistry: The pure common water that was until recently considered to be a chemical element is now by means of pneumatic experiments separated in two different kinds of air. Each of these kinds of air contains not only its base, but also the caloric, which perhaps can be in turn decomposed by nature into a light-matter and other matter. (L, 12: 33 f.) The context of this passage is Kant’s argument that chemical division can be done in indefinitum. He clearly refers here to Lavoisier’s antiphlogistic chemistry, which proves that water consists of hydrogen and oxygen, whereby both gases can be decomposed into their base (respectively, hydrogen base and oxygen base) and the heat matter or caloric (see also Friedman 1992, 288sq.). But what exactly is this caloric?

Lavoisier’s caloric and Rumford’s later rejection When reading Kant’s OP against the background of the transition from Stahl to Lavoisier, it is important to keep in mind that the latter still assumes an invisible principle of heat and the supposed effects thereof. It is this invisible principle of heat that Lavoisier calls ‘caloric.’ As Lavoisier claims, due to its extreme elasticity, this caloric is able to divide even the smallest parts of physical bodies. During this process of division, it changes those bodies into liquid matter, or, if elasticity is able to overcome the pressure of the atmosphere, into gas (which Lavoisier appropriately calls an ‘elastic liquid’). Now, atmospheric air consists of a part of breathable gas and another, unbreathable, part in a proportion of 27:73. The base of the breathable part is oxygen. If it is mixed with the caloric, it is called oxygen gas. The base of the unbreathable part is nitrogen. When bound with the caloric, it becomes nitrogen gas. For instance, when phosphorus, sulfide, or coal is exposed to extreme temperatures, these materials will bind with the oxygen in the oxygen gas (that is: the oxygen-caloric bond) that is found in the air around them. On this occasion, the caloric is released, which causes the phenomena of heat and light. That is why one can call the caloric also ‘heat matter’ or ‘light matter.’ The combustion of these materials thus amounts to the process of their binding to oxygen, which makes them acidic (and Lavoisier therefore speaks of phosphoric, sulfuric, and carbonic acid). In his Réflexions sur le phlogistique, written in 1777 but published only in 1786, Lavoisier not only convincingly shows that phlogiston is a superfluous principle, but exposes the basis of his new explanation of chemical processes. Contrasting his methodology with Stahl’s, Lavoisier

18  Henny Blomme claims to have proceeded from a simple principle, which he terms the oxygen principle: In the continuation of the Memoirs that I have just communicated to the Academy, I have reviewed the main phenomena of Chemistry; I have insisted on those that accompany combustion, the calcination of metals, & in general all operations where there is air absorption & fixation. I have deduced all the explanations from a simple principle, namely that clean air, vital air, is composed of a particular principle that is specific to it, that forms its basis, & that I have named the oxygen principle, combined with the matter of fire & heat. Once this principle was accepted, the main difficulties of Chemistry seemed to disappear & dissipate, & all the phenomena were explained with a surprising simplicity. (Lavoisier 1777, 1; my trans. and italics) One can be struck here by the seemingly unproblematic way in which Lavoisier is adding the matter of fire and heat—which Guyton de Morveau later proposed to call ‘calorique’ (de Morveau 1787)—to the principle of oxygen that he just has claimed to be simple. The question at hand is whether this addition was necessary. In the following passage from his later Traité élémentaire de chimie, Lavoisier explains why he thinks it useful to adopt the caloric and reflects on its modal status: It is difficult to conceive of these phenomena [solidity vs liquidity, elasticity, gaseous state of matter – HB] without admitting that they are the effect of a real and material substance, a very subtle fluid, which penetrates through the molecules of all bodies and spreads them out; and, even assuming that the existence of this fluid was a hypothesis, we will see later that it explains in a very happy way the phenomena of nature. Since this substance, whatever it may be, is the cause of heat, or, in other words, the sensation we call heat being the effect of the accumulation of this substance, it cannot, in rigorous language, be referred to by the name heat, because the same name cannot express cause and effect. […] We have therefore referred to the cause of heat, the highly elastic fluid that produces it, as caloric. (Lavoisier 1789, 17–18; my trans.) Is the caloric mere hypothesis or reality? In 1798, the count of Rumford (Benjamin Thompson) published An inquiry concerning the source of the heat which is excited by friction, in which he doubts the existence of a heat matter. Thompson had to supervise the manufacture of cannon barrels by boring solid blocks of metal with large drills, and realized that the heat released in the process was by no means proportional to

Kant’s paradoxical reception of Lavoisier  19 the amount of chip produced, as required by the caloric theory. On the contrary, the heat was continuously released as the drilling went on and stayed on for a long time even after the boring was stopped. Thompson thus realized that the friction due to the mechanical boring procedure gave rise to heat and concluded that heat was itself a form of energy. He then writes: “What is heat?—Is there any such thing as an igneous fluid?—Is there anything that can with propriety be called caloric?” (Thompson 1798, 98). With the benefit of hindsight, we may wonder at Lavoisier’s assumption of still another invisible principle, in the same writing in which he scorns Stahl for having done so. Concerning the latter’s concept of phlogiston, he had written: if everything can be explained in Chemistry in a satisfactory way, without the help of phlogiston, it is therefore infinitely probable that this principle does not exist; that it is a hypothetical being, a free assumption: & indeed, it is in the principles of good logic, not to multiply beings without necessity. Perhaps I could have confined myself to this negative evidence, & content myself with having proved that phenomena without phlogiston are better understood than with phlogiston. (Lavoisier 1777, 1; my trans.) Thompson’s observations concerning the heat that is caused by friction— instead of being transferred from something else, as should be the case if Lavoisier’s caloric exists—contributed to the death of the hypothesis of a heat fluid. To paraphrase Lavoisier: from the moment that heat is considered to be a form of energy, everything about the transition (via friction) of the energy of motion into the energy of heat can be explained in a satisfactory way by the phenomenon of friction, without the help of caloric, and it is therefore infinitely probable that this principle does not exist.

Stahl, Lavoisier, and Kant’s ether proofs Among the many innovative elements to be found in Kant’s manuscript concerning the transition from the metaphysical principles of natural science to empirical physics, the so-called ether proofs are commonly regarded as the most striking. As Eckart Förster has noted, “The sudden appearance of these proofs […] is altogether surprising and […] difficult to understand” (Förster 2000, 82–83). To be sure, the concept of an ether or caloric is present throughout the whole OP, but the period in which Kant wants to provide a priori proofs of it is relatively short: from April to August 1799. In the earlier drafts, Kant had introduced the caloric in several contexts (droplet-forming of fluids, elasticity of matter), but he kept stressing that it was a hypothetical concept that

20  Henny Blomme is merely postulated to explain certain physical phenomena. Kant’s mention of the caloric was thus in line with the way in which also Lavoisier from time to time cautioned against too confident expressions of its reality: Independently of the fact that this expression [caloric—HB] fulfils our purpose in the system we have adopted, it has yet another advantage, which is that it can be adapted to all kinds of opinions; since, strictly speaking, we are not even obliged to assume that caloric is a real matter. (Lavoisier 1789, 18; my trans.) But this conformity with Lavoisier abruptly changes in April 1799, when Kant states: The existence of this material [ether/caloric], and the necessity of its a priori presupposition, I now prove a priori in the following manner. (OP, 21: 216) In the five following months, Kant writes down an impressive amount of ether proofs, at each time slightly varying the formulations.16 The first draft of an ether proof starts from the premise that the proposition: “there are physical bodies,” presupposes the proposition: “there is matter whose moving forces and motion precede the production of a body in time”; for this production is only the formation of matter, and occurs by itself (spontaneous). But this formation, which is to be initiated by matter itself, must have a first beginning whose possibility is certainly incomprehensible, but whose originality, as self-activity [Selbstthätigkeit], is beyond doubt. There must therefore exist a matter which, as penetrating inwardly all the bodies (as a charge, onus) and at the same time moving them permanently (as potentia), which constitutes for itself a whole, and which, as a cosmic whole, subsisting for itself and moving itself internally, serves as a basis for any other moving matter. (OP, 21: 216; my trans.)17 Moreover, in stark contrast with his conception of the ether in the earlier fascicles, Kant now self-confidently assures us that [the] assumption of an ether as a principle of the possibility of experience is an inevitable and necessary assumption, not in order to explain phenomena, but a priori, for the sake of the unity of the

Kant’s paradoxical reception of Lavoisier  21 moving forces in a system, and to bring about the agreement of the principle for the possibility of experience. (OP, 21: 229) If we want to understand why Kant’s reflections on a transition from metaphysics to physics suddenly lead to several drafts of an a priori proof of a transcendental matter (Kant’s ether or caloric), we need to stress that from the beginning of his work on the manuscript until the end, Kant never intended to speak as a physicist. When Kant was confronted with Lavoisier’s criticism of Stahl and his exposition of a new chemistry, he not just transposed Lavoisier’s findings into his own system. Since the initial philosophical task of the OP is to anticipate a priori on empirical physics (whatever the contingent form it may take), it must have been useful for Kant to reflect on what is similar in the two paradigms of Stahl and Lavoisier. It is thus not Lavoisier as such who gave rise to the new development in transcendental philosophy that Kant offers with his ether proofs, but the comparison of Lavoisier’s model with Stahl’s model. And, again, if such comparison is made with the goal of abstracting from contingent factors, in order to arrive at a philosophical science that mediates between metaphysics and physics, then Kant must rather pay attention to what the two models have in common. A relative interchangeability of the two paradigms then strikes the eye. Kant must have seen that Lavoisier had integrated a hypothetical principle (caloric) in the core of his theory, just as Stahl had done before him with the hypothetical principle of phlogiston. Kant knew, of course, that the actual development of the empirical sciences must and will remain out of reach when dealing only with a priori principles—something that Friedman (1992, 338–341) seems to doubt. Although we have no evidence that Kant knew about Thompson’s observations, nothing suggests that Kant could not foresee that Lavoisier’s model, replacing the theory of Stahl, would at a later stage be replaced by yet another model. If the philosopher Kant wants to contribute to the metaphysics of experimental physics, he cannot rely on the contingent form in which chemistry occurs at this or that time. Seen from the perspective of a critical metaphysician of the natural sciences, Lavoisier and Stahl have in common an aspect that must displease any empiricist account of the sciences: their reference to a hypothetical invisible principle. Kant had stated in 1786 (MF, 4: 472) that all those who have dealt with the philosophy of nature, while thinking that they proceeded exclusively with mathematical methods have always used metaphysical principles (albeit unconsciously). Similarly, Kant now sees that those who postulate a hypothetical principle at the core of their theories—theories that aim to explain the specific properties of matter—do so because of an unconscious metaphysical presupposition. This offers a new and additional explanation for the question why Kant, in the OP, allows himself

22  Henny Blomme to think the ether or caloric (“or any name we give to such a principle,” as Kant often puts it) as a necessarily existing transcendental18 matter: Be it called ether, caloric, or whatever, it is no hypothetical material […]; rather, it can be recognized, and postulated a priori, as an element necessarily belonging to the transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural science to physics. (OP, 21: 218) The existence of this matter as unity of an absolute totality, be it called caloric or ether etc., cannot be directly attested by experience but is to be proven a priori […]. (OP, 21: 236) The existence of the caloric is the basis of the possibility of One experience. (OP, 21: 584) The caloric is not a hypothesis subsidiara but originaria, and thus a matter [Stoff] that is not hypothetically conditioned but is categorically given. (OP, 21: 584) It is only in this sense that the revolution in French chemistry must then be seen as an influence on the new philosophical content within the OP. Since Lavoisier, just as Stahl before him, has to resort to the adoption of an invisible material principle (caloric), the question arises whether such a principle is not transcendentally necessary to explain our experience of what is physically external, and thus to make possible not the formal but the material unity of the whole of possible experience. In the end, then, the way in which Lavoisier’s new chemistry was philosophically imported in Kant’s work is highly paradoxical. While the OP is testimony of Kant’s definitive conversion to the new chemical theory of Lavoisier, it also shows that Kant comprehended that, philosophically speaking, Lavoisier’s resort to an invisible material principle did put him on a par with Stahl. More precisely, Kant saw that Lavoisier does not help us much further than did Stahl when we are dealing with material substance in so far as we grant it a role in the investigation of necessary conditions of the unity of experience.

Notes 1 The Kantian concept of a revolution in our manner of thinking [Revolution der Denkungsart] seems indeed directly inspired by a passage from the Novum Organum in which Francis Bacon mentions three doctrinarum revolutiones: “Tres enim tantum doctrinarum reuolutiones & periodi rectè

Kant’s paradoxical reception of Lavoisier  23 numerari possunt: Vna, apud Graecos; Altera, apud Romanos; Vltima, apud nos […]” (“Strictly speaking, one can only count three doctrinal revolutions and periods: the first with the Greek, the second with the Romans and the third with ourselves”). See Bacon (1620, Lib. I, LXXVIII). 2 It is a bitter irony of fate that Antoine-Laurent de Lavoisier, who would be referred to as the father of the French revolution in chemistry, was beheaded in the aftermath of the political perturbations that followed upon the French revolution of 1789. 3 Tuschling (1971) assumes instead that the motivation behind the transition project is to be sought in Kant’s insight that the precedence of phoronomy in his MF could not any longer be upheld, which—still according to Tuschling—led him to prioritize metaphysical dynamical principles of matter above mathematical principles. 4 At least, there is no reference to Dussort (1956) in Friedman (1992). 5 Koch (1926, 36) mentions that Stahl stresses the importance of having a theory, but sees this as the only aspect of the latter’s philosophy that distinguishes him from the empiricists. 6 Stahl (1720, 5): Physicalische oder natürlich wesentliche Anfänge nennet man diejenigen, woraus der vermischte Cörper würcklich und am gewissesten bestehet, welche aber bishero noch ungewiß und unbekannt sind, indem die bekannten vier Elemente der Aristotelicorum, wie man sie insgemein nimmt, diesen Nahmen verdienen. Chymische Anfänge aber nennet man insgemein diejenigen, worinnen die Cörper, durch die bißher bekannten Handgriffe, nach bißheriger Erfahrung können reducirt werden. 7 Stahl (1720, 4; my trans.): §1. Ein principium oder Anfang wird so wohl a priori dasselbe genennet, daß es dasjenige sey, woraus eigentlich und am ersten dessen Wesen bestehet, als auch a posteriori, worinn zuletzt der vermischte Cörper wiederum resolvirt wird. §2. Beyde Beschreibungen sind wahr. 8 Rudolf Meer (2019, 234) follows Carrier in observing “unsteadiness [Schwanken]” in the way Stahl defines a principle. Just as Carrier, he claims that Stahl, on the one hand, conceives of principles as a priori elements, essences, or substances, whereas, on the other hand, he requires that those principles must be a posteriori demonstrable. 9 Kunst here refers to ‘Scheidekunst’ [the art of dissolving], an older German term for chemistry. 10 Stahl (1720, 4; my trans.): §.2. Beyde Beschreibungen sind wahr, wenn nemlich eine natürliche und gantz reine resolution voraus gesetzt wird. Weil aber die bisher bekante resolution in der Chymie hiemit nicht einstimmet, auch nicht leicht jemanden vorkommet, und dahero schwerlich durch die Kunst kan zum Vorschein gebracht werden; so ist heute zu Tage die üblichste distinction, unter physicalische und chymische Anfänge der vermischten Cörper. 11 For further readings on Stahl, Lavoisier and the chemical revolution, I recommend Levere (2001, 28–106) and, especially for philosophers, Vihalemm (2019, 7–179). Metzger (1930) is not based upon the original sources but studies Stahl’s theories through the somewhat modified account of his admirer Johann Juncker in the latter’s Conspectus chemiae theoreticopracticae in forma tabularum repraesentatus …. e dogmatibus Becheri et Stahlii potissimum explicantur (1730). For a historical overview of the chemical doctrines in the eighteenth century, see also Partington (1962).

24  Henny Blomme 12 Both Jean Rey and John Mayow had already claimed this (see the two immediately following footnotes below). 13 But, as Priestley also notes, as early as 1674, John Mayow (1641–1679) had already spread the idea of a breathable component of the atmosphere. See Mayow (1674). 14 A century and a half before Lavoisier, Jean Rey (1583–1645) had already explained the surplus in weight in metallic substances that calcinate by pointing to an absorption of air (Rey 1630), but, as Richard Kirwan would write, he did so “on such weak grounds, that he is as little entitled to the honor of a discoverer, as a successful dreamer to that of a prophet” (Kirwan 1787, 3). Lavoisier himself though was in plain admiration of Rey’s claims. A pharmacist from the French Army had rediscovered Rey’s Essais and succeeded in putting them in the hands of Lavoisier. Lavoisier would write the following about him: Descartes ni Pascal n’avaient encore paru; on ne connaissait ni le vide de Boyle, ni celui de Torricelli, ni la cause de l’ascension des liqueurs dans les tubes vides d’air; la physique expérimentale n’existait pas; l’obscurité la plus profonde régnait dans la chimie. Cependant Jean Rey, dans un ouvrage publié en 1630 sur la recherche de la cause pour laquelle le plomb et l’étain augmentent de poids quand on les oxyde, développa des vues si profondes, si analogues à tout ce que l’expérience a confirmé depuis, si conformes à la doctrine de la saturation et des affinités, que je n’ai pu me défendre de soupçonner longtemps que les Essais de Jean Rey avaient été composés à une date très postérieure à celle que porte le frontispice de l’ouvrage. (Lavoisier 1805, 79–80) 15 As I argue elsewhere (against Dussort), I do not hold that Kant therefore considered Lavoisier’s chemistry to be a proper science (see Blomme [2015]). See also McNulty (2016), who offers a more substantial rejection of Dussort’s claim. 16 See, e.g., Förster (2000, 82–101) for an account of the ether proofs. For a critical assessment of the way in which recent commentators (including Förster) have placed the ether proofs and the Selbstsetzungslehre at the center of scholarly attention for the OP, see Howard (2019). 17 OP, 21: 216: Der Satz es giebt physische Körper setzt den Satz voraus: es giebt Materie deren bewegende Kräfte und Bewegung der Erzeugung eines Körpers in der Zeit vorhergeht: denn diese ist nur die Bildung derselben und geschieht von ihr selbst (spontaneo). – Diese Bildung aber die von der Materie selbst geschehen soll muß einen ersten Anfang haben davon zwar die Möglichkeit unbegreiflich die Ursprünglichkeit aber als Selbstthätigkeit nicht zu bezweifeln ist. Es muß also eine Materie seyn die als innerlich alle Körper (als Last onus) durchdringende und sie zugleich beharrlich bewegend ist (als potentia) die für sich selbst ein Ganzes ausmacht welches als ein Weltganzes für sich bestehend und sich innerlich sich selbst//bewegend allen Anderen zur Basis aller anderen beweglichen Materie dient […]. 18 Although the adjective ‘transcendental’ in Kant is best understood in its minimal sense, where it just means ‘most general,’ in the Opus postumum, when specifying the ether, it can also be understood as designating a ‘condition of the possibility’ of the unity of experience, as the third quote shows.

Kant’s paradoxical reception of Lavoisier  25

References Adickes, Erich. 1920. Kants Opus postumum dargestellt und beurteilt. Berlin: Reuther & Reichard. Bacon, Francis. 1620. Novum Organum. Londini: Apud Joannem Biblium Typographum Regium. Blomme, Henny. 2015. “Kant’s Conception of Chemistry in the Danziger Physik.” In Reading Kant’s Lectures, edited by Clewis, R., 484–501. Berlin: De Gruyter. Carrier, Martin. 1990. “Kants Theorie der Materie und ihre Wirkung auf die zeitgenössische Chemie.” Kant-Studien 82 (2): 170–210. DOI: 10.1515/ kant.1990.81.2.170 Carrier, Martin. 2001. “Kant’s Theory of Matter and His Views on Chemistry.” In Kant and the Sciences, edited by Watkins, E., 205–227. Oxford: Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/0195133056.003.0011 Dussort, Henri. 1956. “Kant et la chimie.” Revue Philosophique de la France et de l’Étranger 146: 392–397. Emundts, Dina. 2004. Kants Übergangskonzeption im Opus postumum. Zur Rolle des Nachlaßwerkes für die Grundlegung der empirischen Physik. Berlin: De Gruyter. DOI: 10.1515/9783110913279 Förster, Eckart. 2000. Kant’s Final Synthesis. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Friedman, Michael. 1992. Kant and the Exact Sciences. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Guyton de Morveau, Louis-Bernard. 1787. “Mémoire sur le développement des principes de la nomenclature méthodique.” In Méthode de nomenclature chimique, edited by Guyton de Morveau, L.-B., Lavoisier, A.-L., Bertholet, C.-L., Fourcroy, A.-F., 26–74. Paris: Cuchet. Howard, Stephen. 2019. “The Transition within the Transition: The Übergang from the Selbstsetzungslehre to the Ether Proofs in Kant’s Opus postumum.” Kant-Studien 110 (4): 595–617. DOI: 10.1515/kant-2019–3002 Kirwan, Richard. 1787. An Essay on Phlogiston, and the Constitution of Acids. London: Printed by J. Davis, for P. Elmsly, in the strand. Koch, Richard. 1926. “War Georg Ernst Stahl ein selbstständiger Denker?” Archiv für Geschichte der Medizin 18 (1): 20–50. Lavoisier, Antoine-Laurent de. 1777. (actually published in 1786). Réflexions sur le phlogistique, pour servir de développement à la théorie de la Combustion & de la Calcination, publiée en 1777. Paris: Académie des Sciences. Lavoisier, Antoine Laurent de. 1789. Traité élémentaire de chimie, présenté dans un ordre nouveau et d’après les découvertes modernes. Paris: Chez Cuchet. Lavoisier, Antoine-Laurent de. 1805. Mémoires de Physique et de Chimie. Vol. II. Paris: Dupont. Levere, Trevor H. 2001. Transforming Matter: A History of Chemistry from Alchemy to the Buckyball. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press. Mayow, Johannis. 1674. Tractatus quinque medico-physici, quorum primis agit de salnitro et spiritu nitro-aereo, secundus de respiratione, tertius de respiratione foetus in utero et ovo, quartus de motu musculari et spiritibus animalibus, ultimus de rhachitide. Oxonii: e theatro Sheldoniano.

26  Henny Blomme McNulty, Michael Bennett. 2016. “Chemistry in Kant’s Opus postumum.” HOPOS, 6 (1): 64–95. Meer, Rudolf. 2019. Der transzendentale Grundsatz der Vernunft. Funktion und Struktur des Anhangs zur Transzendentalen Dialektik der Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Berlin: De Gruyter. DOI: 10.1515/9783110623611 Metzger, Hélène. 1930. Newton, Stahl, Boerhaave et la doctrine chimique. Paris: Albert Blanchard. Partington, James Riddick. 1962. A History of Chemistry. Vol. 3. London: Macmillan. Priestley, Joseph. 1774. Experiment and Observations on Different Kinds of Air. London: J. Johnson. Rey, Jean. 1630. Essais sur la recherche de la cause pour laquelle l’étain et le plomb augmentent de poids quand on les calcine. Bazas: par Guillaume Millanges. Scheele, Carl Wilhelm. 1777. Chemische Abhandlung von der Luft und dem Feuer. Upsala: Magn. Swederus. zu finden bey S.L. Crusius. Stahl, Georg Ernst. 1720. Chymia rationalis und experimentalis; oder Gründliche der Natur und Vernunfft gemässe und mit Experimenten erwiesene Einleitung zur Chymie. Leipzig: bey Caspar Jacob Eysseln. Thompson, Benjamin (Count of Rumfort). 1798. “An Inquiry Concerning the Source of the Heat Which Is Excited by Friction.” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, 88: 80–102. Tuschling, Burkhard. 1971. Metaphysische und transzendentale Dynamik in Kants opus postumum. Berlin: De Gruyter. Van den Berg, Hein. 2014. Kant on Proper Science: Biology in the Critical Philosophy and the Opus postumum. Dordrecht: Springer. Vasconi, Paola. 1999. Sistema delle scienze naturali e unità della conoscenza nell’ultimo Kant. Firenze: Olschki. Vihalemm, Rein. 2019. “A Story of a Science: On the Evolution of Chemistry.” Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum 7 (2): 7–179. Warda, Arthur. 1922. Immanuel Kants Bücher. Berlin: M. Breslauer.

2 Filling out space—the ether and the dispositions of matter in Kant’s Opus postumum Ansgar Lyssy Introduction What does it mean that a physical body fills out the space it is in? Descartes famously suggested that matter fills out space simply by means of inherent properties, namely, through extension and impenetrability. Leibniz then claimed that impenetrability needs to be understood as a force, as the causal ground for the resistance to movement, and hence needs to be of the same type as the causal ground of movement. He also argued that extension is a derivative concept, as it requires the simultaneous existence of similar things in different locations, and hence, it could not be a primordial property of matter. For the constitution of matter at a particular region in space, Leibniz argued, not only the notion of impenetrability (i.e., the resistance to motion) is necessary, but also the notion of inertia (resistance to acceleration). The spatial existence of a physical body is thus tied to its causal effectiveness and its extension arises from a concerted interaction of the forces inherent in the body with external moving forces. A merely geometrical object can be extended, but cannot fill out space, since it lacks the causal efficacy inherent in both impenetrability and inertia—two geometric bodies can be located at the same place, something that is impossible for material bodies.1 But if matter is constituted from forces, where do these forces reside? According to Leibniz, they need to be grounded in simple immaterial substances, in monads. These debates reverberate throughout Kant’s philosophy of nature. While initially drawn to a form of Leibnizian or Wolffian monadology, Kant argues in his critical philosophy that there cannot be any simple substances in space, as no parts of space are simple and as space cannot be understood as the condition of external appearances (CPR, A441/ B469). In Kant’s natural philosophy of the critical period, space is filled by attractive and repulsive forces and the material bodies that are constituted thereof (e.g., MF, 4: 518). In the Opus postumum (OP), the question of the filling out of space is picked up, especially in a series of fourteen drafts concerning the proofs of the ether, most likely all written between May and August 1799. The OP and its conception of a transition

DOI: 10.4324/9781003090946-3

28  Ansgar Lyssy are designed to fill a systematic gap between a priori metaphysics and empirical science, as Kant strives to develop here an “a priori cognizable system of empirically given moving forces of matter” that serves “as filling of a gap by means of the regulative principle of synthetical cognition”2 (OP, 22: 182; my translation). What is needed are “mediating concepts” (Mittelbegriffe, OP, 21: 475) that can be conceived entirely a priori, but have an empirical application as well. Herein, as I will discuss at length, the concept of force takes center stage, particularly the ether, which serves as both epistemic principle and actual object. In the OP, Kant picks up the questions concerning the filling of space, which he discusses in conjunction with the proofs or ‘deduction’ of the ether. In these often rather fragmentary arguments, in which he departs from his earlier take on the ether as a merely hypothetical entity, 3 Kant wants to show that the ether is not merely a hypothetical entity, but something whose existence we necessarily need to presuppose. To make a complicated matter short, we can distinguish several different, but entangled strands of arguments. In the first, Kant argues that without the ether as a unifying ground for experience, experience would be impossible (e.g., OP, 21: 217, 551). Since this is not the case, we must assume the existence of the ether. For this, there needs to be a singular subject of forces and a singular, ubiquitous medium for all forces. Hence, as a condition of the possibility of experience, the concept of the ether is a hybrid notion that can be deduced a priori, but, unlike the ideas or postulates of pure reason, denotes an actual object. It is both an “intermediary object of perception” that provides ground for the unity of experience without being an object of experience itself; it is also “a real material” (OP, 21: 229), as it fills out space and allows for the constitution of matter and motion. Hence, the notion of the ether has a transcendental role to play as a condition for the possibility of experience, and it also has objectivity, as it denotes an actual entity. This is necessary to connect the metaphysical foundations of natural science to the experiential dimension of empirical science, even though the ether cannot be experienced or proven a posteriori. Without such a notion, our experience could not be ordered and understood through a system of a priori notions—and this, in turn, means that there could not be a conceptually unifying ground for experience. Second, it is impossible that there is completely empty space in the world, hence something needs to fill out the space where we cannot locate material objects (e.g., OP, 21: 216, 582). The ether also needs to be the medium for all forces, so that the transmission of forces between bodies is possible without resorting to action at a distance. As physical matter is constituted by an attractive and repulsive force that connects its particles, it presupposes a medium in which these forces are carried. If this medium would also consist of such forces, an infinite regress could loom, as another medium would be required, and so on.4

The ether and the dispositions of matter  29 Third, the ether is needed to explain the constitution of bodies by explaining the transmission and effects of the forces that are constitutive for material bodies. Attractive and repulsive forces are not enough to explain the constitution of the essential properties of matter, such as ponderability, coercibility, cohesibility, and exhaustibility. 5 Science requires a system of forces, but as these forces are constitutive of material bodies, they cannot be grounded in these same material bodies. Instead, they must be grounded in something that is not in the same sense constituted by forces, namely, the ether (e.g., OP, 21: 289, 600). Kant is very explicit here: it is the ether that serves as “basis (first cause) of all the moving forces of matter, for it is thought as the immediately moving primary material (materia primaria)” (OP, 21: 605; see also 21: 217, 183; 22: 550). The ether is to be conceived as ontologically different from moving forces, yet it is constitutive of them. As forces also constitute the essential properties of matter, the ether is indirectly constitutive of matter as well, but also needs to be conceived as ontologically different from all matter that can be experienced. This severely limits our explanation and understanding of the ether in terms of anything that can be experienced. But we know that there must be something that underlies all forces: any comprehensive explanation of moving forces needs to entail not only the forces themselves, but also their first cause, as otherwise, it ends up in an endless regress of forces as secondary causes that presuppose other forces as secondary causes for their explanation. As a first reason, the conception of the ether will be used not only for scientific explanations, but also for the metaphysical foundation of secondary causes and the system of forces. It serves for both first- and second-order explanations, that is, it not only explains certain physical phenomena, such as heat or electricity, but also how other explanations by means of moving forces are possible. This foundational nature of the ether is what I will focus on in this paper. These three strands of argument6 are connected and sometimes Kant seamlessly switches from the possibility of experience to the filling of space. The ether ties together the transcendental project of determining the a priori grounds of all knowledge, and the metaphysical foundations of science. Herein, the ether plays a crucial role in Kant’s OP and fulfills multiple roles at the same time, as it is supposed to bridge the gap between metaphysics and science. As the continuous and ubiquitous grounding of forces, the ether fills out space in a homogeneous way, as it allows for the transmission of moving forces within and between bodies, as well as between bodies and the subject. Kant worked through the ether proofs multiple times, with an occasional shift in terminology or focus, but he never completed a detailed and stringent argument. Consequently, these proofs and their complicated relation to Kant’s transcendental philosophy have led to a comprehensive debate about the ontological or epistemic nature of these proofs,

30  Ansgar Lyssy about the nature of the idea of the ether, as well as about the nature of the ‘transition’ from transcendental philosophy to science. Finally, it is also a particular topic of debate how the material and/or formal role of the concept of the ether can be both a priori and related to experience. As this paper does not have the space to engage with all these debates, I will simply refer to Basile (2013) for a comprehensive overview of different interpretations. Here, I want to provide a slightly different and hopefully new perspective on the role of the ether and give a new answer to the question of why Kant has deemed it necessary. To do so, I want to look at Kant’s philosophy from an angle that is partially motivated and informed by some recent debates in analytic philosophy. I want to point out that Kant’s ether proofs deal with a problem that has also become a topic of discussion in contemporary metaphysics for about the last 40 years, which allows us to read Kant’s ether proofs as an old solution to a contemporary problem. My angle here is this. The ether serves as the ‘basis’ or grounding of material bodies and their essential properties in general. However, the particular nature of this grounding remains obscure in the OP and I reframe and reconstruct Kant’s argument in terms of dispositions, for which I will provide a definition below. In very few words, my argument goes as follows: the mechanical forces and the essential properties of bodies are dispositions and contingent on their activation stimulus; the ether provides an enduring and ubiquitous stimulus and hence leads to a constant phenomenal manifestation of the essential material properties of bodies. While the debates about what we now call dispositional properties in natural things and their role in science go back to antiquity,7 Kant wrote surprisingly little on this topic. This might be the reason why, despite its importance in contemporary debates, this notion has received very little attention from modern Kant researchers.8 He uses the term mostly when he is discussing biological dispositions in the context of germs and predispositions (Keime und Anlagen) and occasionally when discussing mental habits and character traits. Herein, Kant is following the general usage of this term in the biological and psychological context of his time. In this paper, however, it is used in a more general way as a means for the analysis of both causal relations and grounding relations, and with this caveat in mind, we should distinguish Kant’s own use of the term from the way it is used here. Nonetheless, I argue that the essential properties of matter in Kant are, in fact, conceived as dispositions, that means that they can be understood as properties that manifest their perceivable ‘response’ only after a specific stimulus has occurred. The ether will provide these activation stimuli for the dispositions of matter constantly and ubiquitously. Thereby, it turns the dispositional properties of matter into stable properties that are manifest throughout time. The ether serves as the objective side that is necessary for matter to be a ‘manifest reality,’ to borrow a term developed by Allais (2015).

The ether and the dispositions of matter  31 In the following sections, I will first sketch Kant’s post-critical theory of forces and material bodies and then discuss the ether as a foundation for mechanical forces that are nothing but dispositions. In the conclusion, I will argue that Kant has developed an argument that is surprisingly modern and that builds on the strengths of transcendental analysis to offer a solution for a problem in the face of which some contemporary authors have pessimistically resigned.

Forces and material bodies In the OP, matter is conceived within a framework of forces for which he establishes a variety of distinctions, such as internal and external, dynamical and mechanical, and primitive and derivative forces. These forces are located in and ascribed to material bodies, but they do not originate from it; rather, the bodies are constituted by these forces which are prior to matter.9 Those types of forces form a system of forces that plays an important role in the transition from metaphysics to science, as the notions at stake here have both a metaphysical and an empirical side to them—they can be known a priori, as without these forces experience would not be possible, which we know it is; and these notions can be applied for our understanding of the material world. Forces are constitutive of experiences by affecting the subject, albeit they are only mediately represented in our experiences, mediated through our cognition of those objects they are constitutive of. Without forces, there would not be any affectation of the subject and hence experience would be impossible; therefore, forces precede experience. Because we cognize nature as a functionally arranged system, these forces need to fit into a system.10 Reason demands that the system conforms to the table of the categories, because outer experience is shaped by the categories and these forces are constitutive of the material things that are given in outer experience—the objects of experience conform to the conditions of the possibility of experience. Kant has sketched this system of forces multiple times in slightly different versions, so the details remain a bit vague, with Kant being apparently hesitant to commit himself to a single outline. In the MF, he has argued that there can only be two types of moving forces, namely attraction and repulsion (see MF, 4: 498), which are called fundamental or elementary forces.11 We can experience those moving forces through their effects, as they become manifest as a quantity of motion, friction, weight, inertia, etc., and they must be conceivable a priori, as they precede any actual motion. They must also be cognizable a posteriori, as we can have an (indirect) experience of them (see OP, 22: 152). With this dual characteristic of being both cognizable a priori and a posteriori, they serve as mediating concepts between the a priori notions of metaphysics and physics (which Kant struggles to define, but which

32  Ansgar Lyssy can roughly be understood as the experiential and systematic science of matter). It is the task of the OP to conceive of the system of forces in correspondence to the categories, so that they are not a mere aggregate, merely collected from experience, but systematized in correspondence to pure reason. However, the nature of the system of forces taken as a whole is epistemically “problematic” (OP, 22: 240), as it can be discovered neither by reason nor by experience alone. Some forces originate from ‘within’ the bodies, others are exerted through external events; as Kant calls it, they are “implanted” and thus originally located within physical matter (“ingenitae”, OP, 21: 171; or “congenitae”, OP, 21: 173) or they are “impressed” through external events (“impreßae”, OP, 21: 171; cf. 21: 173). This distinction is already found in Kant’s early text Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces (1747) and is used to express the idea that no motion can originate from matter alone (cf. 1: 26 ff.; Mathieu 1989, 88–89). We can know of these forces by means of their different manifestations for which they serve as causes that can be observed only mediately: impressed forces are manifest in the collision of bodies, for example; implanted forces are manifest in cohesion and stability, and so on. This two-fold distinction between repulsive and attractive forces and impressed and implanted forces is also mirrored in the additional division of forces into superficial and penetrative forces (e.g., 21: 308). A superficial force does not scale in relation to motion, as, for example, greater cohesive forces do not result in a change of motion. It also only shows on surface contact, i.e., in the repulsive collision of bodies. Penetrative force, such as gravity, scales with motion. Throughout the OP, the ether is associated with the effects of superficial forces. External or impressed forces must somehow originate from immanent or implanted forces, so that we can avoid a regress of an infinite chain of external forces. Kant also rejects a motive force as an original cause or beginning of motion (a “primus motor”, see OP, 21: 218, 518; 22: 552), as one would have to ascribe spontaneity or will to it to give the initial motion a determinate direction, which contradicts matter. In other words, Kant rejects an infinite chain of external, mechanical causes, as this would make definite physical explanations (causes of causes of causes …) impossible; and he also rejects the notion that the chain of external, mechanical causes might be originated by means of a final cause, as this would lead to an emergence of matter from the mind. But implanted forces are not easy to explain either, as they cannot be a result of matter as well. They are the results of a more primordial motion of the ether. Consequently, Kant also distinguishes between a dynamical force that serves as the original cause of motion (albeit not as a chronologically preceding initiation of motion), and a mechanical force that presupposes moving bodies to act upon and that would be contained in (Newtonian) physics (e.g., OP, 21: 356, 239). This is one

The ether and the dispositions of matter  33 of the major tasks that the OP needs to accomplish to bridge the gap between metaphysics and physics: it needs to explain the origination of motion from ‘within’ bodies, without referring to moving forces that are ‘impressed’ in bodies by means of external causes. What Kant is looking for here is the all-encompassing internal cause that initiates and enables motion, but without temporally preceding the chain of successive external causes: “The problem is: What is it that first sets the moving forces of matter – taken as a whole – in motion?” (OP, 22: 200; my emphasis.). The solution to this needs to be neither a body nor a particular movement, nor a motive force, but rather something that entails its own type of constitutive causality. Here, Kant often conflates moving forces with their manifestations in terms of properties of physical bodies—cohesibility, for example, is often both conceived as force and as an essential property; impenetrability as a property can hardly be described without accounting for some kind of repulsive force. These essential properties are usually defined as ponderability, coercibility, cohesion, and exhaustibility (e.g., OP, 21: 531, 483; 22: 196) that are conceived of along the lines of the table of categories (quantity, quality, relation, and modality). They are manifest as observable properties that come in degrees: one object may be more or less brittle, another may be more or less sturdy, another one may be more or less soft and malleable, etc. These phenomenal qualities of material bodies are the result of different interplays of attractive and repulsive forces within bodies and they are conceived as manifestations of the more basic properties named above. However, these properties do not exist just by themselves, but they require an opposing force of the same type (e.g., OP, 22: 610)—for example, saying that a body is cohesive means that, if the body is subjected to a certain tearing motion, then it will resist it by means of its internal forces. As such, these properties are conditioned on an interplay of secondary causes and can thus not sufficiently be explained by secondary causes alone. For example, if I use a lever, I presuppose the stability of the material involved, and thereby its cohesion; and I also presuppose that I can interact with it through appropriate materials (for example, the hands with which I pull the lever), and thereby its coercibility. I observe coercibility by observing the lever move in a specific way, but coercibility is not phenomenally given, but conceptually implied in my observations. As they denote the essential concepts of materials, essential properties are “anticipations of natural science in accordance to the categories” (OP, 21: 531).12 The actual moving forces can be known through experience (OP, 21: 475), but only indirectly by means of observing the interaction of bodies, and hence they are called “problematic” (e.g., OP, 21: 184, 21: 599).13 This means that they require a distinct grounding. Kant strives to conceive of these forces in terms of attractive and repulsive forces as well as superficial and penetrative forces, but herein

34  Ansgar Lyssy he remains entirely within the realm of secondary causes. As indicated above, this system of forces must be supplemented with a primary cause that can be neither a movement nor inert matter, albeit it must contain both in nuce. This problem is solved by conceiving of the primordial vibration of the ether, which is characterized in opposition to the essential properties, namely, as imponderable, incoercible, incohesive, and inexhaustible (e.g., OP, 21: 231–232). That is, the ether is a ‘non-physical’ matter–matter that is not a causally effective material and neither a distinct body with phenomenal properties. The reason for this juxtaposition between the ether and material objects is clear. If the forces that are constitutive of bodies require other forces or secondary causes that reside in other bodies, no definite grounding can be achieved. What is required therefore is a matter that takes up a constitutive role to all the essential properties of bodies, while having none of these itself (OP, 22: 607),14 such as it acts as a primary cause and stands ‘orthogonally’ to all secondary causes. This ubiquitous, elusive, ephemeral matter pervading all bodies entails its own type of non-mechanical causality and serves as the medium by means of which the moving forces that are inherent in or impressed in bodies are communicated to other bodies. Hereby, the ether serves as ubiquitous, simultaneous, and incessant initiation of motion (OP, 22: 608), even though this initiation may be infinitesimally small, and hence, not always result in actual, perceivable motion.15 The essential properties are observable and also constitutive of our experience: without the possibility of conceiving any natural object under them, these objects could not be conceived of in categorical terms at all. For example, ponderability means that a body (within a gravitational field or under influence of a gravitational force) can be weighed and thus measured in quantity. But to do so, one needs a scale that resists the weight of a body to a certain degree and a lever that is rigid enough not to immediately bend under any weight however little, which means that the scale and lever need to be coercible (cf., for example OP, 22: 138, 275). Without coercibility, the experience of ponderability would be impossible, and vice versa: an imponderable body poses no resistance to being touched by a lever and moves away at the slightest touch like a weightless balloon. Cohesibility means that the inner parts of a matter resist displacement to a certain degree (which is also called “cohesion”, cf. OP, 22: 146) and thereby constitute the state of matter as either fluid or solid. Here, the surfaces of the different parts of matter—the size of these parts may well be infinitesimally small—assert a force to each so that these parts can either be moved against each other or separated from each other more or less easily, leading the body to be either breakable, malleable, or entirely liquid. The notion of exhaustibility is tied to that of a causal origin of motion. To say that a force is exhaustible means that it diminishes because of a specific cause; and to say that a force is inexhaustible means that no potential cause that might diminish it is to

The ether and the dispositions of matter  35 be found (cf. OP, 21: 519). This makes it questionable if it could affect anything to a measurable (!) degree, as usually conceptions of efficient forces entail the idea that by bringing forth the effect, something needs to be diminished in the cause. Elasticity, for example, is conceived as an implanted force that can be exhausted, as elastic bodies can turn brittle or break. The explanation of these essential properties in terms of possibility and in conditional expressions indicates that they are all conceived as dispositions. This will be explored next. But first a quick caveat: the epistemic duality of the ether as both a priori and real matter has often been considered ‘strange’ or ‘quirky’ by some researchers.16 It is ‘strange’ that crucial, apparently juxtaposed properties of matter, such as solidity and liquidity, do not originate from physical matter itself, but from the implanted or immanent forces and hence the underlying ether (on the ether as a ground for solidity, see OP, 21: 276, 320; 22: 232, 261–262, 275; on the ether as the ground for liquidity, see OP, 21: 276, 364; 22: 261). The same holds for some other phenomena related to motion that are derived from the ether, such as friction (cf. OP, 21: 329), the ‘molecular’ texture or composition of bodies (e.g., OP, 21: 181, 374), heat (OP, 21: 523), or even colors and light (CPJ, 5: 224; OP, 21: 387, 469; 22: 111). Given the fragmentary structure of Kant’s text, a definite reading may be out of reach, but we can try to reconstruct Kant’s position with regard to textual coherence and argumentative fit within Kant’s overall philosophy.

The ether and the dispositions of matter While the contemporary discussion of dispositions is rather nuanced, here a somewhat simplified notion will suffice. A disposition is a property that is manifest only17 under specific conditions. Or to put this in more precise terms: an entity x is at a specific time t disposed to manifest a response r to the stimulus s if and only if, if x were to undergo stimulus s at time t, then x would manifest the response r, ceteris paribus.18 These activation conditions at the specific time t will here be called ‘activation stimuli’ because they ‘activate’ the conditioned, hence ‘dormant’ properties or responses. It is important to emphasize that without the activation stimulus the corresponding property or response would be absent. A fragile glass can break, but it can still be considered fragile even if it never actually breaks. Hence, dispositions are expressed in conditional propositions—a dispositional property does not depend on the actuality of its manifestation, it rather describes a conditioned relation between possible events or states. This can be used as a criterion to distinguish dispositions from stable or so-called categorical properties. Those are often illustrated by means of shape or extension,19 because the shape or extension of a body (physical or mathematical) does not depend on any other conditions, albeit one can of course always

36  Ansgar Lyssy introduce subjunctive or counterfactual descriptions of our perception of these properties. Fragility, in contrast, is a disposition, as it describes that if a certain force is asserted to a physical body, then it will break; and without such force, the body would ceteris paribus still be intact. Dispositions describe possible relations and have surprisingly little to do with the actual relations and behavior of an object. 20 Dispositions do not need to be manifested to be real, but one should not mistake dispositions that have not (yet) manifested themselves for mere non-manifest possibilia, as they do have an actual, material basis. 21 As I have already indicated that the essential properties of physical bodies are conditioned, it seems clear that they can be conceived as dispositions: they interact with other forces and maintain a manifest reality that is both relational to external events as it is causally dependent on other forces, such as other impressed or implanted forces. For example, this is apparent in Kant’s descriptions of cohesibility as a disposition that becomes apparent in the lever: by asserting a certain force on the lever, the lever manifests its solidity and thereby the response to the stimulus in the form of material integrity and stability. If such a force were absent, we would ceteris paribus have no experience (!) of the material integrity and stability of the lever—as Kant repeatedly asserts, the system of forces precedes our experiences. The manifest properties of cohesibility become manifest (ceteris paribus) if and only if subjected to forces. The same holds for the other properties of ponderability, coercibility, and exhaustibility that are also manifest (ceteris paribus) if and only if the corresponding material object is subjected to the corresponding forces. Hence, material bodies are constituted by and through dispositions. As pointed out above, Kant never uses the notion of a disposition in this context. But he calls the essential properties of materials “physically conditioned” (OP, 22: 138): they are not merely conceived a priori, but our experience of them is conditioned by “the presupposition of an internally moving matter which [in the exemplary case of ponderability] results in the immobility of the parts in contact with one another [in the lever-arm], by itself being mobile inside this matter” (OP, 22: 138; my emphasis). Herein, the primary cause of the ether serves as the necessary general condition of the possibility of experience, while the actual moving forces are the sufficient particular conditions of our actual experience. Hence, the ubiquitous vibrations of the ether act as the activation stimulus by means of which the response of immobility becomes manifest. This holds for all essential properties and their corresponding forces: “All these moving forces of different kinds and degrees are based on the principle of concussion that prevails through all space” (OP, 22: 275), namely the ether. For example, the ether produces cohesion by initiating infinitesimally small motions in all parts of the world matter by continuously attracting and repulsing all parts of a body against each

The ether and the dispositions of matter  37 other to a certain degree, by “ceaselessly agitating other bodies” (OP, 22: 610; my emphasis, see also OP, 21: 464; 22: 21). The ether is not defined in terms of dispositions, but in terms of intrinsic or stable properties. It is described as imponderable, incoercible, incohesible, and inexhaustible (e.g., OP, 21: 231–232). These properties confirm the table of categories (quantity, quality, relation, and modality) mentioned above, but by virtue of their negation; they are only logically, but not ontologically related to any moving forces. They do not display any immediate effect that can be experienced. It seems hard to conceive of these properties as dispositions. What could the activation stimulus for imponderability be? No matter what forces are asserted, the ether remains imponderable under all circumstances. Here, imponderability designates the inapplicability of the notion of weighing. The same seems to hold for incoercibility, incohesibility, and inexhaustibility. There is no counterfactual description under which the ether would display a different set of manifest properties. But Kant does not rely on the use of negation to indicate the unconditioned nature of the ether. It is also described as an “ubiquitous, all-penetrating, inwardly all-moving (agitating) and in this agitation uniformly persisting (perennial) elementary substance” (OP, 21: 600; my translation). 22 Here, Kant makes it clear again that the ether does not serve as an external and observable cause of change, not as a secondary cause, as it is only “inwardly” moving; and its agitation is “uniformly persisting” and hence does not change its properties in a response to any stimulus whatsoever. Its essential properties are stable throughout time and independent of all causal relations, they are not scalable and, as they are not relational, they do not come in degrees (see OP, 21: 228). However, they are not manifest properties that can be experienced directly. Kant rather suggests that these properties are always and everywhere manifest, no matter the circumstances. The ceteris paribus clause that is crucial for describing dispositions in counterfactual propositions falls flat here. The ether is fully characterized by means of stable properties that cannot be conceived through possible behavior, but only as actuality; albeit they are not manifest properties, as they cannot be perceived directly. This puts the ether at odds with both the properties essential to bodies and with the phenomenal qualities that are given in our perceptions. While this may not hold for all of the rather multifaceted descriptions of the ether that Kant employs throughout the OP, many (if not all) of those that use a more traditional vocabulary can be read in agreement with this interpretation. For example, the ether is described as a ‘caloricum’ (Wärmestoff, literally ‘heat matter,’ e.g., OP, 21: 224). 23 But it is clear that this is to be distinguished from the heat that is inherent within a body, as this particular heat is rather the effect for which the vibrations of the ether are the ultimate cause. The ether’s heat cannot be perceived directly, the concept of a ‘caloricum’ rather serves the purpose to express

38  Ansgar Lyssy the internal agitation of the ether that is manifest in certain agitations in physical bodies and perceivable only therein. Herein, ‘caloricum’ is to be distinguished from its phenomenal manifestation as particular, scalable heat. It rather designates a boundary of minimal rigidity and maximized internal excitation that makes the ether unlike all other materials. On the first glance, this lack of responses under certain conditions seems to deprive the ether of causal powers as well. But the fact that material bodies cannot establish any causal relation with the ether does not mean that the ether cannot establish a causal relation with material bodies—it is rather an asymmetric and hence constitutive relation. It constitutes the forces inherent in physical matter through different types of unsolicited (!) motion, for example through a pulling drive to motion (conatus), a pushing drive to motion (percußio), or through a vibration that consists of a series of different, juxtaposed initiations to motions (oßcillationes, vibrations, and undulations (OP, 21: 532–533, cf. OP, 22: 275, where he also calls this concußio—henceforth, I will subsume these different types of rapid and presumably infinitesimally small initiations of motion under the term ‘vibrations’). It should be noted that these vibrations should not be conceived as an actual motion of something but as a structural modification of the parts of a body. Through all this, by virtue of being an all-pervasive initiation to motion and an ubiquitous, multi-directional vibration, the ether serves both as ground for impressed and implanted forces (see e.g., OP, 21: 310; 22: 275). Through both types of forces, it also constitutes the essential properties and states of matter. If the ether acts on bodies, i.e., as the activation condition is fulfilled, the dispositions become actual, perceivable, and temporarily stable modifications of bodies. However, if the activation condition was not fulfilled, the materiality of bodies would dissipate. An ontology of matter that is based on conditions alone, in which there’s nothing in the material or physical world but conditions ‘all the way down,’ is incomplete, since reason will inevitably look for the unconditioned that grounds any chain of conditions. Through these vibrations, the ether creates the tension within bodies that we can experience as solidity; and it produces varying degrees of solidity either by “the pressure of the ether through gravity” (OP, 21: 374) or “by expansion (as heat) and the simultaneous escape (binding) thereof” (OP, 22: 148). Both fluidity and solidity as states of matter are established through the ether (e.g., OP, 21: 260–261, 374). The vibrations are unsolicited and incessant, as the ether bears no exhaustion or reduction of itself. As a continuously active matter, the ether “maintains” all types of movement by these vibrations, which consist of infinitesimally small repulsions and attractions (OP, 22: 194). Kant leaves out the details of how this is supposed to work, but he clearly seems to think that by such oscillations and vibrations, the ether serves as the medium for all bodies and their movements, and it also acts as the

The ether and the dispositions of matter  39 initiation of motion and hence of all forces. Without such a principle of continuous ‘excitations’ (Erregungen) of the ether, all mechanical and elastic forces could be depleted through ‘exhaustion’ (Abspannung) and thus lead to a “complete standstill of moving forces of matter” (OP, 21: 310)—thereby the ether serves as the immanent cause of implanted forces and impressed forces alike. It is everything but ordinary matter and it explains all that cannot be explained by moving forces. As others have already noted, Kant seems to make the ether responsible for the constitution of all appearances (see Mathieu 1989, 92). It is by means of these vibrations that the ether fills out space: by being causally effective only in the constitution of moving forces and material bodies of different types, e.g., liquid or solid, and hence by expanding bodies through space (cf. OP, 22: 145, 212). Herein, it allows bodies to be located in a particular place in space and as such it serves as the condition of outer experience (OP, 21: 228). Furthermore, it serves as an (unscalable) boundary notion for ‘empty’ space, as it allows us to apply the notion of the filling of space to a certain degree (OP, 22: 206). While the ether that fills out space cannot be experienced, due to the impossibility of interacting with the subject in a determinate way, we do not experience space as entirely void of all matter. As explained above, the notion of a body filling out space relies on its causal efficacy and some bodies have stronger reactions in terms of impenetrability, solidity, cohesion, etc., as they are more or less determined by stronger or weaker forces. The ether serves as the boundary notion for minimal causal efficacy, at least as long as there are objects placed within or particles moving through it. What seems to be empty space may rather turn out to be filled with occasional particles of dust, or by a very light and transmissive liquid. Hence, Kant argues that the moving forces of the ether indirectly “fill a space [both] extensively and intensively” (OP, 22: 211). The ether fills all of space, but its intensity can be understood as the strength of its dynamic power present at every point in space, in so far as it is interacting (or could interact) with a body in a specific way or to a certain degree. For example, the gravitational force is transmitted through the ether, and it is stronger close to a massive body and weaker in the distance. 24 As it is defined by dispositions, the ether is an “imperceptible matter” and can only be an object of experience by mediation, i.e., by affecting other, immediately perceptible bodies (OP, 21: 229, cf. 21: 610). As an all-permeating matter, it connects all that is perceived as determinate bodies, it is situated “in-between” them (ibid.). What we perceive as empty is not empty in an absolute sense, as a mere nothing, but it is empty as it does not contain any perceivable bodies that are made out of distinct materials. The ether fills out space, but does not occupy it, as it does not resist other bodies taking up space; it becomes perceptible only by means of allowing us to relate bodies to each other and to ourselves.

40  Ansgar Lyssy Instead of the ether, it is matter that is “what makes space into an object of the senses” (OP, 22: 508). Thereby, we must presume the ether as the quasi-substantial, incessantly productive whole that continuously and simultaneously brings forth those material properties that we can experience, rendering experience possible. To summarize—it seems that in all these characterizations of the ether, the main line of argument is—the ether is nothing like material bodies, as it cannot be interacted with and as all interactions depend on the continuous vibrations of the ether. Hence, Kant’s theory of forces can be separated into dynamical and mechanical forces that can be characterized in terms of their potential causal effects25 on the one hand, and the ‘proto’-forces that have an actual and constitutive effect on moving forces and matter on the other. It seems that the vibrations of the ether serve as constant activation stimuli for the dispositions of matter, as they initiate motion within the bodies and from outside of bodies as well, acting on them in incessant, infinitesimally small ways. The vibrations of the ether, for example, put the parts of a material body in constant (albeit infinitesimally small) motions against each other, so that solidity and cohesion are actuated throughout (e.g., OP, 21: 374). A body can never be at rest, it is constantly acted upon by forces (e.g., OP, 21: 310). As the activation stimulus is constantly given, the dispositional nature of the essential properties of matter is always actuated and the response is constantly manifest. Thereby the dispositional properties can be both considered potential manifestations, cognizable a priori, and understandable through counterfactual descriptions, and they can also be considered actuated and stable properties that can be experienced throughout time. The ether could thus be called a causally operative necessary condition for the manifestation of phenomenal qualities, while the bodies themselves act as sufficient, but not necessary conditions. Needless to say, this is a rather original take on the nature of physical dispositions and the filling of space.

Conclusion—filling out space Beyond this foundational role, the notion of the ether has to lift a heavy weight in Kant’s philosophy, as the ether serves to explain many different phenomena and entities that are difficult to reconcile within an otherwise mechanistic worldview. For example, the ether is conceived as the matter of light and fire (OP, 21: 515) and, perhaps in tacit reference to the cartesian ‘animal spirits’ that are circulating through an animal’s veins, as ‘nerve matter’ (Nervenstoff, OP, 21: 564). Above, I have pointed out that the ether is seen as heat as well, but rather as the ubiquitous ‘borderline’ heat of the universe, not as the sensual heat that we can experience. Hence, my interpretation of a non-experiential and foundational role of the ether sits somewhat uneasy next to all these

The ether and the dispositions of matter  41 features that may not all be conceived as intrinsic or stable properties. But this might be seen as symptomatic of a more general problem, as physics that had not yet come to terms with its own multi-faceted nature. Kant, like other philosophers of his time, was still trying to establish a reductionist and axiomatic physics, in which all laws could be based on a few principles that could be justified through metaphysics, and where, once the foundations were set, the rest were just conceived as details. Herein, the ether was seen as a ‘one size fits all’-solution for everything that cannot be described by means of mechanical forces alone. Above, I have tried to reconstruct several major claims of Kant: 1 Material bodies are constituted by and through dispositions; 2 Our experience of the material world is limited to dispositions; 3 Dispositions require a grounding for metaphysical reasons; 4 Consequently, such a grounding is metaphysically necessary but impossible to experience. To summarize: A body can fill out space and time only when it is causally active, but within the material world, all moving forces are physically conditioned. Hence, the essential qualities of material bodies can be understood as dispositions—and it goes without saying that all the inessential qualities depend on and result from different iterations of moving forces and essential qualities. As material bodies need to causally affect the subject, we can experience stable properties such as extension and shape only by means of other, causally active forces, which turn out to be of dispositional nature. Science and experience of the material world are thus limited to dispositions, which are effectively reducible to an interplay of attractive and repulsive forces. But these forces require a metaphysical grounding, as otherwise the initiation of motion for the system of forces as a whole could not be conceived and the system of forces would remain incomplete. Consequently, the grounding of the material world is metaphysically necessary but impossible to reach by means of science and experience. 26 While these arguments are situated within the context of eighteenthcentury science and philosophy of science, there is something surprisingly modern about them. To point this out, I will sketch a quick comparison with an argument proposed in an influential paper by Simon Blackburn, “Filling in Space” (Blackburn 1990). Herein, Blackburn makes the same four claims that I have derived from Kant above. He begins his paper by noting that most people believe that dispositional properties need to be grounded in non-dispositional or categorical properties (which I have called ‘stable properties’ here, to avoid any confusion with Kant’s own notion of categories). However, science fails to account for stable properties: resistance, hardness, mass, electric charges, fields, and so on—all scientifically-known properties constitutive of the physical world turn

42  Ansgar Lyssy out to be dispositions, precisely because they are known to us only by means of their causal efficacy on other things, given the appropriate circumstances. Science develops a functional understanding of things; thus, it is consistently inclined to conceive of the properties of these things in terms of dispositions. But if we conceive of this actual world only in terms of dispositions, then our notion of reality becomes problematic. By using a possible worlds analysis of counterfactuals, Blackburn argues that there would be ‘neighboring’ possible worlds that are extremely similar to ours and in which the same counterfactuals apply, hence, the same truths would hold, despite a possibly fundamentally different substantial (or stable) grounding. Truth and reality would hence be disjointed from each other. The only non-dispositional properties available to our knowledge, so Blackburn tells us, are subjective phenomenal properties that play no role in science, such as the appearance of color that is not contingent on any activation stimulus. Hence, we either end up with an endless regress of dispositions ‘all the way down’ or we just accept that there will never be a scientific description of any actuality, any grounding of dispositions. Rae Langton puts it concisely when discussing Blackburn’s analysis: “Properties which adequately ‘fill in space’ are necessary, and impossible: metaphysically necessary, but impossible to reach” (Langton 2015, 106). But quite in contrast to Kant, Blackburn’s argument ends here. He closes his brief discussions of this modern predicament with philosophical resignation, namely, the acceptance of Humean skepticism 27: “carelessness and inattention alone afford a remedy” (Blackburn 1990, 65). While Blackburn (and Langton) resign themselves to epistemic humility of Humean or allegedly Kantian provenience, the interpretation developed above shows that the same does not apply to Kant’s postcritical position. Here, two major differences between Kant’s take on the filling of space and Blackburn’s stand out. First, for Blackburn, the infinite regress of dispositions threatens our notion of reality, while for Kant an infinite regress of dispositions threatens the completion of the system of forces and hence the possibility of science and experience. This difference can be reconciled if we focus on our scientific knowledge of the material world only and ignore all aspects of reality that might, at least for Kant, never be an object of natural science, such as the human mind. Both authors would then likely agree that an infinite regress of dispositions building on dispositions building on dispositions… would endanger the possibility of scientifically accurate knowledge of the material world. The second difference is more crucial. For Kant, a resignation in the face of an unsolvable dilemma between epistemic ignorance and metaphysical necessity would be deeply undesirable and impose profound problems for our epistemological justification of the possibility of experience. While for Blackburn, the grounding of dispositions can never be known, it takes up a rather peculiar epistemic status for Kant:

The ether and the dispositions of matter  43 we must conceive of the ether, as without it, the system of forces had no grounding and would hence be incomplete; but the ether itself cannot be an object of experience. The system of forces is a presupposition of the possibility of experience, and as we know that experience is, in fact, possible, we know that the system of forces must be complete. While Blackburn offers epistemic nihilism, Kant argues that this gap between metaphysical necessity and experiential ignorance concerning the foundations is not that bad. Transcendental philosophy can step up to help us out here. Blackburn seems to think it would be the task of natural science to discover the foundations of all dispositions. But as I have argued above, the ether is precisely this mysterious entity with intrinsic properties that eludes our scientific knowledge—albeit Kant offers us a way out by proposing to understand the ether as a transcendental postulate with objectivity. The system of forces can entail transcendental notions with objectivity, as we can postulate the ether and assert its objective existence too. We may not know anything about the ether in the same sense as we have knowledge of the material world, namely, as knowledge of objects identified in space and time and by means of the categories, but for transcendental reasons, we can still conceive of the belief in the existence of the ether as a justified true belief. What we know of the ether is by means of negating the essential properties of matter, it is defined as their opposite. Therein, it is uniquely characterized. Neighboring possible worlds in which the essential properties of the ether (imponderability, incoercibility, incohesibility, and inexhaustibility) are changed will also maintain different counterfactuals and truths because of this fundamentally different reality. But beyond that, no more knowledge is to be gained and no inquiry into further details is possible. While we can know that the ether exists, we cannot know how, at least not more than these few details developed here. 28 This is a very modest epistemic position, but still more optimistic than Blackburn. But Kant’s position is not free from problems either. In the CPR, Kant had argued that intuition is necessary for the individuation of objects and without it, concepts remain empty (A51/B75). 29 Intuition is a necessary condition for experience and objective knowledge, as concepts can only provide general features and only intuition allows us to individuate an object—but there is no intuition of the ether, and hence it cannot be an object of knowledge. This is one of the reasons why this approach of developing a ‘hybrid’ concept that is both a postulate and a concept with objective validity is so ‘strange’ and why the question how it fits into Kant’s system of philosophy is a rather controversial subject of debate. Unlike empirical concepts, the notion of the ether denotes a singular object that is not in need of individuation. The concept of the ether does not contain universal features that might apply to a variety of singular objects, and herein it rather resembles the ideas of reason, such as the soul, the world, and God. But, quite in contrast to the ideas

44  Ansgar Lyssy and postulates of the CpR, it also entails the theoretical assumption that the ether must be causally active within the world: the ether is not a hypothetical material, but “one whose forces give it reality” (OP, 21: 218). This is a crucial difference from the other postulates and ideas of Kant’s transcendental philosophy and the reason behind Kant’s claims concerning the objectivity of the ether concept. 30 The reach of transcendental philosophy into the realm of the objective can be justified here because it is derived from the claim that objective experience is possible, something that Blackburn would not deny either. As objective experience is possible, its conditions of possibility must be assumed as a given. This includes causality as a material possibility, which is reflected in the formal nature of our grasp of material objects that can be conceived only through their causality (otherwise they could not be distinguished from dreams, mere appearances, or mathematical objects). However, such an interpretation moves the ‘strangeness’ of the concept of the ether to the notion of constitutive causality that is at stake here as well: the ether must be able to causally interact with materials and moving forces, and it must be radically different from them. The plausibility of Kant’s ether solution hinges on whether this apparently paradoxical claim is a plausible or defensible position. But that is a question that needs to be answered elsewhere.31

Notes 1 For the sake of simplicity, I use ‘material bodies’ for extended, physical bodies located at a particular region in space and time. Strictly speaking, Kant also conceives of the ether as a type of fluid matter, hence it is not a body. 2 “Die Idee des a priori erkennbaren Systems der empirisch gegebenen bewegenden Kräfte der Materie als Ausfüllung einer Lücke durch das regulative Princip der synthet. erkentnis.” 3 It has long been noted that the epistemic status of the concept of the ether has changed throughout Kant’s later writings. In the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, Kant emphasizes the hypothetical status of ether and writes that “this refutation of empty space proceeds entirely hypothetically, for the assertion of empty space fares no better” (MF, 4: 564; cf. also the so-called Jäsche-Logik: “[…] the ether of modern physicists is a mere matter of opinion. For with this as with every opinion in general, whatever it may be, I see that the opposite could perhaps yet be proved.” JL, 9: 68) In the later drafts of the OP, he however, insists on the necessity of the concept of the ether without which no experience of material objects would be possible. 4 This is a problem that can be found in Newton’s philosophy as well, see Toulmin and Goodfield (1982, 196) for a discussion. 5 As Eckhard Förster puts it: “The formation of material bodies is not possible by the fundamental forces of attraction and repulsion alone; it requires furthermore the agitations of the ether” Förster (1989, 297–298). For a contrasting take, see Guyer (2005). 6 Other interpretations discuss four arguments, such as Guyer (2005), or only two, such as Emundts (2004), but as I want to focus on the way the ether

The ether and the dispositions of matter  45 serves as the ‘basis’ for the moving forces and essential properties of matter, the other arguments concerning the ether as a ground for the unity of experience, etc. will have to be left out here. The role of the notion of the ether in the OP has been subject to many debates. One controversial question is whether the ether is relevant for the subjective side of experience, for the objective side, or both. Also controversial is whether it provides material or formal unity to experience. As I am here not dealing with the ether as a precondition of experience, I will gloss over these debates. To give just a very brief overview over selected positions: Tuschling (1971, 177) calls it “an idea of a new type” and finds no conflict with the types of ideas developed in the CPR. Friedman (1992) argues that the ether must be considered a regulative idea, because it has us assuming that not so much the totality, but every experientially represented aspect of space is conceived as a unity. The ether, however, should not be considered a proper object of experience. Guyer (2005) argues that the ether is too empirical to be transcendentally deduced. Howard (2019), building on Hoppe (1969), argues that the ether proofs and the Selbstsetzungslehre explore both the objective and subjective poles of Kant’s attempts at effecting the transition between transcendental philosophy and science, constituting the material and formal side of the notion of force. 7 See Schmid and Vetter (2013). 8 For example, the almost 3000-pages long and comprehensive Kant-Lexikon has neither an entry for disposition, nor do dispositions play a major role in any of its entries. See Willaschek et al. (2015). Notable exceptions in secondary literature are Langton (2004) and Allais (2015), who herein follows Langton. 9 Herein, Kant follows Leibnizian ideas ever since the Physical Monadology. 10 On physics as a system, see the contribution by Stephen Howard in this volume. 11 The ether plays a role in the MF as well, but besides having the same name, this concept bears significant differences from the ether in the OP. For a helpful comparison between both notions in the MF and the OP, see Hall (2014: 72sq); for an overview of the development of the notion of the ether before the OP, see Edwards (2000, Chap. 7). 12 However, the ether cannot be considered problematic, because it is necessary: This material [i.e. the ether], therefore, which underlies this generally possible experience a priori, cannot be regarded as a merely hypothetical, but as a given, originally moving, world-material; it cannot be assumed merely problematically, for it first signifies intuition (which would otherwise be empty and without perception). (OP, 21: 217) As it is the necessary foundation of the total system of all matter, the ether proof is not only necessary, but also “apodictic” (OP, 21: 237). 13 The differences within of forces or essential properties between bodies require an explanation (see, e.g., OP, 21: 374). Cohesion, for example, leads to differences in density throughout the universe, and this difference cannot be explained by attractive and repulsive forces alone. Förster (2000, Chapter 3) has argued that this is one of the major reasons why the metaphysical foundations of science require a transition to science, because they fail to provide all of the concepts necessary to explain some of the very basic facts of the universe as a whole—differences in density, but also aspects like light, heat, others.

46  Ansgar Lyssy 14 This is made clear in this passage, wherein the repetitive and paratactical structure of the argument is expressed in grammatically abbreviated and jumbled sentences: Es muß eine Materie seyn durch welche die practische Wägbarkeit möglich ist ohne für sich ein Gewicht zu haben die Sperrbarkeit ohne äußerlich coërcibel zu seyn die Cohäsion ohne innerlich zusammenzuhängen endlich die Erfüllung aller Räume der Körper ohne Erschöpfung oder Verminderung dieses all-durchdringenden Stoffs und zwar darim [sic] weil alle mechanisch- d.i. äußerlich bewegende Kräfte als Erscheinungen nur durch die dynamische möglich sind und dieser ihre Wirkung die Erfahrung möglich macht. (OP, 22: 607) Filling in some of the missing words, here is a rather free translation: There must be a matter by means of which ponderability in practical weighability is possible without having weight for itself, and coercibility must be possible without being externally coercible, and cohesion must be made possible by a matter that is not internally coherent itself. This all-penetrating matter will finally be filling all spaces of the bodies without exhaustion or diminution and that is because all mechanical i.e. externally moving forces as phenomena are possible only through the dynamical forces of this matter and because this matter makes experience possible by means of the effects of these forces. 15 This initiation of motion goes along with Kant’s notion of a first cause or basis: we should not read this as an initiation that temporally precedes any actual motion, but rather as picking up on the Leibnizian idea that every movement of a body through space (actio) is at any given point composed of one or multiple moving forces with a vectorial direction (impetus) that are each initiated by an infinitesimally small force in which the original source of activity lies (conatus). For more details, see Leibniz’s Specimen Dynamicum or Lyssy (2016), part IV. 16 Mathieu (1989, 90) speaks of “Merkwürdigkeiten” and “Schrullen” that Kant displays here. “Weird” would be a more modern translation that captures the spirit that is expressed here. Adickes is even harsher and calls it “senile acquiescence” of personal pet opinions, Adickes (1920, 394). 17 In most cases, this “only” needs to be qualified in temporal or causal terms, as one can think of countless convoluted counterexamples that complicate this comfortable conception. For example, the activation stimulus can be conceived as such that it ‘de-activates’ the disposition; or we can think of external causes happening so that they regularly manifest the effect instead of or simultaneous to the dispositional property. But for the general gist of my argument, these debates are not relevant here. We can try to avoid what one could call the ‘death by a thousand qualifications.’ 18 This definition is inspired by Molnar (1999). 19 See, for example, Prior (1982). This is not uncontested, as others have argued that shape and extension are, in fact, dispositions, by virtue of being describable through subjunctive clauses. Some go so far to argue that all properties are dispositions, see Mumford and Anjum (2011). This however does not fit well with Kant, who insists that physically conditioned bodies need to be conceived in opposition to an unconditioned matter, namely, the ether. As the ether is not conceived through conditions but rather their negation, the same must hold for dispositions. So there must be properties that

The ether and the dispositions of matter  47 are not dispositions; and, by virtue of being a ‘real material,’ the ether is not sufficiently captured by conditional propositions of subjective experience. 20 Dispositions are not identical to the underlying material structures either and cannot be reduced to them. A certain molecular structure will determine the fragility of a body, but it is not identical with it, because the molecular property is given no matter what, while fragility is described in terms of conditional behavior. We can easily conceive of a neighboring possible world in which the same counterfactual descriptions hold, even though the material structure of the glass is different (assuming that its phenomenal properties remain unchanged). It will also be difficult, if not impossible, to describe the material structures in question without using the dispositional predicates they are supposed to replace. 21 See Martin (1994). 22 “[…] allverbreiteter, alldurchdringender, innerlich allbewegender (agitirender) und in dieser Agitation gleichformig beharrender (perennirender) Elementarstoff […].” 23 This ‘heat’ cannot be felt, but the term rather refers to the incessant motion that must be ascribed to all parts of space. 24 On this, see also Wong (1995, 408). He also argues that the ether serves as a “replacement of the category of substance by the concept of a single world-material” (Wong 2001, 681), including a conceptual shift from a substance ontology to a field ontology. In his reading, the ether is Kant’s version of the modern notion of a physical field. This is an attractive interpretation, as it allows us to grasp the causal efficacy of the ether, but the relationship between fields and physical bodies within modern physics is complicated and does not correspond to the way Kant relates bodies to the ether. For Kant, the ether precedes the existence of bodies, it is defined in opposition to them, and it is constitutive of bodies. Whether the same can be said of the modern physical conception of fields seems doubtful to me. 25 Kant even calls the moving forces “powers” (Potenzen, OP, 21: 182). 26 Rae Langton has fleshed out this latter argument in more detail. “Kant thinks that intrinsic properties do not have a role to play in science: that was the point of his argument against Lambert and Newton” (Langton 2004, 184). 27 Langton calls this ‘Kantian Humility’: the acceptance that there are intrinsic properties that are presumably foundational that we cannot know, see Langton (2004, 180). Here, I argue that the ether is precisely this mysterious entity with intrinsic properties that eludes our scientific knowledge—albeit Kant offers us a way out by proposing to understand the ether as a transcendental postulate with objectivity. We may not know anything about the ether in the same sense as we have knowledge of the material world, as objects identified in space and time and by means of the categories, but for transcendental reasons, we can still conceive of our belief in the existence of the ether as a justified true belief. This kind of knowledge is equivalent to the knowledge gained from transcendental arguments. (I’d like to thank Bryan Hall for pointing this out). 28 Langton calls this an ‘inscrutable’ knowledge that makes intrinsic or stable properties “ominously similar to a Kantian thing in itself” (Langton 2004, 176). 29 For a comprehensive debate of the connection between the ether proofs and Kant’s critical philosophy, see Emundts (2004). 30 As per the antinomies, the causal activity of free will is a postulate by practical reason and thus not part of our knowledge of the natural world, hence

48  Ansgar Lyssy we do not need to assume any corresponding object. God is not active within the world, but is the reason or cause for the existence of the entire world. 31 I thank Giovanni Pietro Basile, Bryan Hall, and Stephen Howard for helpful comments on this paper. Further thanks go out to Dillon Reihill for helping me out with the subtleties of the English language.

References Adickes, Erich. 1920. Kants Opus postumum. Berlin: Reuther & Reichard. Allais, Lucy. 2015. Manifest Reality: Kant’s Idealism and His Realism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Basile, Giovanni Pietro. 2013. Kants Opus postumum und seine Rezeption. Berlin: De Gruyter. Blackburn, Simon.1990. “Filling in space.” Analysis 250: 62–65. Edwards, Jeffrey. 2000. Substance, Force, and the Possibility of Knowledge: On Kant’s Philosophy of Material Nature. Berkeley: University of California Press. Emundts, Dina. 2004. Kants Übergangskonzeption im Opus postumum: Zur Rolle des Nachlasswerkes für die Grundlegung der empirischen Physik. Berlin: De Gruyter. Förster, Eckart. 1989. “Kant’s Notion of Philosophy.” The Monist 272: 285–304. Förster, Eckart. 2000. Kant’s Final Synthesis: An Essay on the Opus postumum. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Friedman, Michael. 1992. Kant and the Exact Sciences. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Guyer, Paul. 2005. “Kant’s Ether Deduction and the Possibility of Experience.” In Kant’s System of Nature and Freedom: Selected Essays. Edited by Paul Guyer, 74–85. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hall, Bryan. 2014. The Post-Critical Kant: Understanding the Critical Philosophy through the Opus postumum. New York: Routledge. Hoppe, Hansgeorg. 1969. Kants Theorie der Physik: Eine Untersuchung über das Opus postumum. Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann. Howard, Stephen. 2019. “The Transition within the Transition: The Übergang from the Selbstsetzungslehre to the Ether Proofs in Kant’s Opus postumum.” Kant-Studien 110 (4): 595–617. Langton, Rae. 2004. Kantian Humility: Our Ignorance of Things in Themselves, Reprint. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Langton, Rae. 2015. “The Impossible Necessity of ‘Filling in Space.’” In Passions and Projections. Edited by Robert N Johnson and Michael Smith, 106– 115. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Lyssy, Ansgar. 2016. “Kausalität und Teleologie bei G. W. Leibniz.” Stuttgart: Franz Steiner. Martin, Charles B. 1994. “Dispositions and Conditionals.” The Philosophical Quarterly 44 (174): 1–8. Mathieu, Vittorio. 1989. Kants Opus postumum. Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann. Molnar, George. 1999. “Are Dispositions Reducible?” The Philosophical Quarterly 49 (194): 1–17.

The ether and the dispositions of matter  49 Mumford, Stephen and Rani Lill Anjum. 2011. Getting Causes from Powers. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Prior, Elizabeth W. 1982. “The Dispositional/Categorical Distinction.” Analysis 42 (2): 93–96. Schmid, Stephan and Barbara Vetter. 2013. “Einleitung.” In Dispositionen. Texte aus der zeitgenössischen Debatte. Edited by Stephan Schmid and Barbara Vetter, 7–57. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp. Toulmin, Stephen and June Goodfield. 1982. The Architecture of Matter. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Tuschling, Burkhard. 1971. Metaphysische und transzendentale Dynamik in Kants Opus postumum. Berlin: de Gruyter. Willaschek, Marcus et al. (eds.). 2015. Kant-Lexikon. Berlin: De Gruyter. Wong, Wing-Chun. 1995. “Kant’s Conception of Ether as a Field in the Opus postumum.” In Proceedings of the Eighth International Kant Congress. Edited by Hoke Robinson, 405–411. Milwaukee, WI: Marquette University Press. Wong, Wing-Chun. 2001. “On the Idea of an Ether-Deduction in the Opus postumum.” In Kant und die Berliner Aufklärung. Edited by Volker Gerhardt, Rolf-Peter Horstmann, and Ralph Schumacher, 676–684. Berlin: De Gruyter.

3 Physics as system in fascicles X/XI of Kant’s Opus postumum Stephen Howard

This chapter examines Kant’s discussions of physics in one phase of the Opus postumum (OP) drafts: fascicles X/XI of August 1799 to April 1800. Chronologically, these drafts fall between the so-called ‘ether proofs’ of May to August 1799 and the Selbstsetzungslehre of April to December 1800. They have received relatively little attention in post-war scholarship on the OP, which has tended not to focus on fascicles X/XI but instead on the early drafts, the ether proofs, and the Selbstsetzungs­ lehre.1 By contrast, fascicles X/XI are central to the early twentiethcentury interpretations of Adickes, de Vleeschauwer, and Lehmann. These scholars are however overly concerned with Adickes’ contention that in these fascicles Kant attempts a “new deduction,” which should justify the existence of the moving forces underpinning perception and thereby explain the process of “double affection” by which the cognitive subject is said to be affected by both things in themselves and appearances. 2 In my view, fascicles X/XI deserve renewed attention, free from the external issues imposed onto the text by Adickes.3 To this end, this chapter will examine the question that Kant repeatedly poses in the drafts of 1799–1800: what is physics? Kant consistently formulates his final project as the attempt to make a transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural science to physics. Given that the question of the nature of physics pertains to the point at which the transition project should arrive, it is striking that no study has yet examined in detail the varying conceptions of physics that appear in the drafts. The question of the departure point of the transition project has been much more significant to post-war scholarship.4 Some major post-war studies, including those by Tuschling and Emundts, focus only on the drafts prior to August 1799. Emundts provides a convincing account of the impetus for the transition project: Kant was continuing the task, begun in the General Remark to the Dynamics chapter of the Metaphysical Foundations, of moving beyond the determination of the mere concept of matter in general, which is the primary aim of the 1786 work, to attempt to ground the specific claims of empirical physics.5 Whilst noting that in fascicles X/XI Kant extends his conception of physics beyond that of the empirical doctrine of body, DOI: 10.4324/9781003090946-4

Physics as system in fascicles X/XI of Kant’s Opus postumum  51 Emundts leaves these drafts aside “on pragmatic grounds” (Emundts 2004, 18). The present examination of Kant’s definitions of physics in 1799–1800 does not challenge Emundts’ account of Kant’s initial motivation to embark on the transition project, but I will argue that the conceptions of physics in fascicles X/XI differ considerably from those in the earlier drafts. My focus will be on the various kinds of systems that Kant brings into his considerations of the notion of physics in 1799–1800. This is not to suggest that Emundts overlooks the importance of the systematicity of physics for Kant’s transition project: this is central to her study. However, we can consider the question of this systematicity in terms of the three-fold distinction implied in Kant’s conception of the transition: is the systematicity of physics located in the metaphysical foundations of natural science, in physics, or in the transition between them? In her reading of the drafts dating prior to August 1799, Emundts locates the systematicity that Kant seeks in the transition itself.6 The system, on Emundts’ reading, is for physics; the latter remains the strictly empirical doctrine of nature. By contrast, my contribution aims to demonstrate that in fascicles X/XI, Kant explores reconceiving physics as itself systematic. I consider this to show one way in which Kant’s conception of his transition project changes over the course of his work on it.7 Kant begins to propose new definitions of physics in the “Elementary System” drafts of late 1798, but this greatly intensifies in fascicles X/XI. It is well known that in the final phase of the drafts, Kant provides over 150 definitions of “transcendental philosophy,” but it is not often noted that fascicles X/XI contain a comparable number of definitions of physics.8 Unlike some commentators, I see no reason to think that Kant considered his various definitions to essentially express the same conception of physics.9 Instead, they provide an example of Kant thinking, as Adickes put it, “with his pen in his hand,” attempting to make progress with the problem of the transition by interrogating the very notion of physics (Adickes 1897, 53). This chapter will attempt to provide a framework for understanding Kant’s many definitions of physics by clarifying the distinction between an elementary system and a doctrinal system, and then by considering whether the distinctions between physics, psychology, and cosmology, as outlined by Kant in works of the 1780s, still hold in fascicles X/XI. I will argue that, in 1799–1800, Kant rethinks the status and role of the elementary system as set out in earlier drafts of the OP. I then claim that the new conceptions of physics in fascicles X/XI weaken or even undermine the distinctions between physics and psychology and between physics and cosmology, with various consequences for our understanding of Kant’s transition project. First, though, I will present the background to Kant’s late explorations of physics: his conception of the discipline in major works of the 1780s and in the earlier phases of the OP.

52  Stephen Howard

Kant’s conception of physics in the 1780s The Architectonic chapter in the Critique’s Transcendental Doctrine of Method sketches a speculative system of pure reason that, Kant claims, can be developed in the wake of the critical propaedeutic (CPR, A841/ B869). This is a metaphysics of nature (not of morals), which broadly follows the traditional Wolffian classification. Alongside transcendental philosophy or ontology, which abstracts from whether objects are given or not, Kant groups the disciplines that treat the soul, world, and God, the sum total (Inbegriff) of objects given to pure reason, under the title “physiology of pure reason” (CPR, A845/B873). This rational physiology is divided according to whether nature is considered through the immanent or transcendent use of reason. This distinction is important to our considerations because it produces the distinction between rational physics and rational cosmology. The object of a transcendent reflection on nature is, by definition, beyond any possible experience. Such a transcendent or “hyperphysical” use of reason generates the disciplines of rational cosmology and rational theology. Rational cosmology is “the physiology of the whole of nature [der gesamten Natur]” or “transcendental world-cognition” (CPR, A846/B874). Its object is therefore the world-whole, just as in the cosmology criticized by the Antinomy chapter. As Kant indicates in the Appendix to the Dialectic, any legitimate rational cosmology in the wake of the critical propaedeutic must, in order to avoid the antinomies, treat the world-whole merely as a regulative idea, not as a whole given in experience, and should not claim to infer determinate knowledge of appearances from this idea.10 By contrast with this transcendent use, reason in its immanent use considers nature insofar as it is the sum total (Inbegriff) of objects given to us in sensibility. Immanent physiology is therefore subdivided, according to the division of sensibility, into the metaphysics of corporeal nature and the metaphysics of thinking nature, which treat the objects of the outer and inner senses, respectively. These branches of immanent physiology are designated by Kant as rational physics and rational psychology (CPR, A846/B874). The use of ‘physiology’ in the Architectonic as the umbrella term for the sciences of the objects of the inner and outer senses follows standard eighteenth-century usage.11 Because Kant here calls rational physics the metaphysics of corporeal nature, which proceeds by taking from experience “the mere concept of matter,” the task of rational physics sketched in the Architectonic seems to be precisely that which is taken up by the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (1786).12 In a footnote to this discussion in the Architectonic, Kant distinguishes rational physics (physica rationalis) from general physics (physica generalis): the latter is “more mathematics than philosophy of nature” and

Physics as system in fascicles X/XI of Kant’s Opus postumum  53 appears to correspond to Newton’s mathematical philosophy of nature (CPR, A847/B875n). Kant makes the same point in the Preface to the Metaphysical Foundations when distinguishing that work’s project from physica generalis.13 These passages anticipate the regular criticisms in the OP of the title of Newton’s Principia: the notion of mathematical principles of natural philosophy is self-contradictory, Kant claims, because philosophy and mathematics are in separate domains and proceed according to different methods; there can only be mathematical foundations of natural science (Naturwissenschaft), the investigation of nature in the most general sense, not of natural philosophy.14 The Architectonic chapter of the Critique thus distinguishes rational physics from rational cosmology, as disciplines of immanent and transcendent physiology, respectively, and distinguishes rational physics, the task of the Metaphysical Foundations, from general or mathematical physics. Furthermore, because Kant’s sketch in the Architectonic treats only the philosophy of pure reason, it does not mention the empirical disciplines that correspond to these branches of metaphysics: empirical physics and cosmology are the a posteriori sciences of nature and of the world. Kant had already dabbled in empirical cosmology in parts of the Universal Natural History (1755), in contrast to the abstract rational cosmology pointed to in the first section of the Inaugural Dissertation (1770). And as noted above, the task of making a transition from the rational physics of the Metaphysical Foundations to empirical physics is the primary initial impetus for Kant’s work in the OP. Many of these distinctions—between rational physics and rational cosmology as immanent and transcendent branches of physiology; between the disciplines of rational physiology and their empirical counterparts; and even between rational physics and rational psychology as the metaphysics of objects of the outer and inner senses—are brought into question in Kant’s reflections on the nature of physics in fascicles X/XI.

Physics in the early OP drafts Kant’s definitions of physics in the early OP drafts are often relatively straightforward. A draft of a “Preface” in the Oktaventwurf of 1796, for example, divides natural science into its metaphysical foundations, which form an a priori system, and physics: the latter contains “empirical principles” of the application of the metaphysical foundations “to objects of outer sense” (OP, 21: 407).15 Physics thus draws its principles from experience and is concerned with moving bodies as the objects of outer sense. Another draft of a preface from the same period makes the same distinction within natural science, this time stating that the metaphysical foundations are “wholly grounded on concepts of the relations of the motion and rest of outer objects,” whereas physics “systematically orders the content

54  Stephen Howard of the empirical knowledge [Erfahrungserkenntnis]” of these relations (OP, 21: 402). Kant adds here that physics has the task of moving toward systematic completeness, but it cannot count on this with certainty. Physics merely systematizes our empirical cognition of outer objects, and this systematizing should be, but is not necessarily, complete. This straightforward conception of physics soon begins to shift. A draft from fascicle III that Adickes dates 1797–1798 begins, “Physics is the science of nature [Naturwissenschaft] founded on experience; its object is matter in general insofar as it has moving force according to empirical laws” (OP, 21: 307). Physics is still an empirical science of the laws governing matter in general. But in this period, Kant starts to insist more strongly on systematicity as an essential element of physics. Again under the title “Preface,” Kant states that “Philosophical treatments do not deserve the name of philosophy as science unless they are presented as combined in a system” (OP, 21: 524; cf. MF, 4: 467). Kant now adopts a pejorative tone when describing “merely empirical science of nature” as a fragmentary aggregate (OP, 21: 474). He characterizes this aggregate as a “farrago” (OP, 21: 478, 484). On other loose leaves in fascicle IV, Kant defines physics as “a system of the moving forces of matter” (OP, 21: 478) or “the empirical doctrine of material nature in a system” (OP, 21: 482). Now, insofar as empirical knowledge of nature forms only a “chance aggregate,” it “forms no part of the philosophical study of nature” (ibid.). Systematicity has therefore become central to Kant’s definitions of physics. Within a few months, Kant begins the series of drafts titled “Elementary System” (October 1798–May 1799), which attempt to systematically classify the moving forces of matter. As in the Metaphysical Foundations, Kant contends that this can be exhaustively done by following the “clue” of the division of the table of categories, and so the “Elementary System” drafts repeatedly try to classify the properties of matter according to quantity, quality, relation, and modality.16 Consistently in these drafts, Kant defines physics as the system of the empirical science of nature or of the empirical moving forces of nature (e.g., OP, 22: 189, 240–241). Indeed, in a draft from early 1799, he suggests that physics is an “empirical system” (OP, 22: 240). This is less a definition than the statement of a problem to be addressed in the transition project. Kant acknowledges this when he continues the sentence to claim that physics is a “problematic whole” of the moving forces of nature (ibid.). The notion of an empirical system has a problematic status for Kant because it contradicts his conception of a system as outlined in the Architectonic of the Critique. There, Kant states that by ‘system,’ he understands the unity of the manifold cognitions under one idea. This is the rational concept [Vernunftbegriff ] of the form of a whole, insofar as

Physics as system in fascicles X/XI of Kant’s Opus postumum  55 through this the domain of the manifold as well as the position of the parts with respect to each other is determined a priori. (CPR, A832/B860, cf. ib., A645/B673) A system is characterized by the priority of the whole over the parts: the idea of the whole determines the parts that are included and the relations through which they are coordinated.17 The problem of systematic empirical physics is that empirical knowledge is not a priori and so cannot be coordinated in advance on the basis of an idea of the whole. As Kant writes in a marginal note in the “Elementary System” drafts, “[t]he empirical is a fragmentary aggregate” (OP, 21: 183). In fascicles X/XI, in direct opposition to his claim in early 1799, Kant repeats with mantra-like regularity that the notion of an empirical system is contradictory.18 He insists nevertheless that there can be a system of empirical knowledge or representations. The difficulty stems from Kant’s new insistence in 1798–1799 that physics is not simply related to the systematic metaphysical foundations or a striving toward a system, but should itself be conceived of as a system. This problem is key to Kant’s most sustained reflections on the notion of physics in fascicles X/XI. We will now turn to these, passing over the Übergang 1–14 drafts, which make a much-discussed attempt to prove the existence of an all-penetrating world-material or ether, but which do not primarily address the character of physics.19

Physics in fascicles X/XI and the elementary, world, natural, and doctrinal systems This section will first show that defining physics is a central concern of fascicles X/XI, before turning to various types of systems that are relevant to Kant’s definitions. To elucidate the key notion of a doctrinal system, I compare Kant’s accounts of the elementary, world, and natural systems. I will propose that fascicles X/XI reveal a shift in where Kant locates the elementary system in the transition project; at the same time, the notion of a doctrinal system allows him to introduce a properly systematic conception of physics. The fact that the meaning of ‘physics’ is a key issue with which Kant inconclusively struggles in fascicles X/XI can be clearly seen in draft ‘U.’ In this period, Kant titles each four-page folio with a sequential letter (A to Z, then AA and BB). Draft ‘U’ therefore appears toward the end of the series of drafts in fascicles X/XI. On the first page of the folio, under the ‘U,’ Kant begins with the title, “What is physics?”20 He sketches a definition and adds two “Notes” on the conception of physics in the main body of the text; the definition and the notes are heavily amended with marginal additions. At the bottom of page one, Kant adds a second header, “How is physics possible?” This follows

56  Stephen Howard a common structure in the period, according to which Kant poses the questions, “What is physics?,” “How is physics possible?,” “What is the transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural science to physics?,” and “How is the transition possible?”: these questions move from attempts to delineate the nature of physics and the transition, to a transcendental consideration of their conditions of possibility. 21 The section “How is physics possible?” on page 1 of draft ‘U’ is just a single sentence, however. As can be seen more clearly in the facsimile, the marginal notes around it continue to examine the initial question of the nature of physics. On page 2 of the folio, Kant takes a step that is unusual in fascicles X/XI by writing the title, “What is natural science in general ­[überhaupt]?” Kant here effectively continues his reflections on physics by turning to the natural science of which it is a part. Page 3 returns to the opening question, once more placing the header “What is physics?” at the top of the page. Much of the densely written and annotated text on this page treats the problem, regularly discussed in the drafts, of whether, following Newton, we can legitimately refer to the mathematical principles of natural philosophy. The fourth page of the folio finally reaches the question of “How does the transition from the metaphysical foundations to natural science take place,” but in the middle of the page, Kant writes his opening question, “What is physics?” as an underlined header for the third time. Draft ‘U’ therefore vividly shows that adequately characterizing physics was a pressing problem for Kant in the 1799–1800 drafts. Many of the drafts in this period begin with the title, “What is physics?,” or with a definition of physics. There are many variations, but Kant consistently calls physics a doctrinal system (Lehrsystem or Doctrinalsystem), often with the Latin systema doctrinale in parentheses. A recurrent theme in the OP is that the transition project is presented as a progression between different systems. In the “Elementary System” drafts of late 1798, Kant begins to make a distinction that some commentators, most notably Vittorio Mathieu, consider decisive: between the elementary system and the world system. We can first consider these two systems before addressing their relation to the doctrinal system that is central to Kant’s definitions of physics in fascicles X/XI. As discussed above, the “Elementary System” drafts (October 1798– May 1799) attempt to exhaustively classify the properties of matter under the four classes of the categories of the understanding. As its title suggests, the elementary system should analyze the concept of matter into its elements: the properties of matter and, particularly, its moving forces as the basic units of physics. This analysis should be complete and so allow the elements to be systematized a priori into a whole (see OP, 22: 240). By contrast, the world system begins with the whole of the moving forces of matter and derives the various properties of matter

Physics as system in fascicles X/XI of Kant’s Opus postumum  57 from this whole. As Emundts notes, the elementary and the world systems are different presentations of the same content, this content being the totality of the moving forces of matter (Emundts 2004, 146). The “Element. System 7” draft accordingly states that “[t]he elementary system is that which proceeds from the parts to the entire complex [Inbegriff] of matter (without hiatus); the world system is that which proceeds from the idea of the whole to the parts” (OP, 22: 200; cf. OP, 22: 197). 22 To borrow a distinction from the Inaugural Dissertation, the elementary system follows the synthetic procedure, the world system the analytic procedure (2: 387–388). Kant adds on the same page of this 1798 draft that the elementary system is prior to the world system (OP, 22: 201). 23 In the drafts of mid-1798 to mid-1799, Kant regularly designates these two systems as forming the main divisions of his projected work (e.g., OP, 21: 245; see Mathieu (1989, 73) for related passages). Mathieu follows this hint when attempting to reconstruct the whole transition-work: he divides it into two parts: the elementary system and the world system. 24 Mathieu’s reconstruction, which privileges statements in the “Elementary System” drafts, is however brought into question by Kant’s reflections in fascicles X/XI. Key to the way that Kant’s plan for his work seems to shift is the definition of physics as a doctrinal system. The term already appears on a loose leaf in fascicle IV: in what seems to be a compressed sketch of the whole work, Kant names the first part “Of the doctrinal system of the a priori investigation of nature,” and the second part “Of the world system” (OP, 21: 483). 25 The fact that the doctrinal system here takes the place elsewhere occupied by the elementary system might suggest that these systems are equivalent or interchangeable, and Kant seems to have thought along these lines in late 1798 (see OP, 22: 197). Fascicles X/XI, however, distinguish between the elementary and doctrinal systems. Draft ‘G’ states that “the moving forces of matter […] form an elementary system, which is, indeed, the object of physics. The latter is the doctrinal system of the moving forces” (OP, 22: 342). Physics is thus a doctrinal system and its object is the elementary system. Draft ‘K’ adds more detail: the moving forces can and must [be enumerated] in an elementary system, which belongs to physics; and these forces, when thought together with the form of their combination into the system, according to principles, constitute the doctrinal system of physics itself. (OP, 22: 358)26 The elementary system classifies the moving forces; the doctrinal system then has the same subject matter but supplements this with the form through which the moving forces are classified and the principles of this form. 27 Physics as a doctrinal system thus apparently includes further

58  Stephen Howard philosophical reflection on the grounds of the particular classification of the elementary system that belongs to it. In the “Elementary System” drafts of 1798, the classificatory endeavors were unquestionably part of the transition project: Kant envisaged that part one of his work would set out the elementary system, exhaustively summarizing the parts of the doctrine of nature so as to form a whole, while part two, the world system, would begin from the idea of the whole and derive the parts. Now, in fascicles X/XI, it is less clear that the elementary system forms part of the transition. If it is produced by physics, and the latter is the point at which the transition should arrive, then the elementary system seems unlikely to be part of the transition, and certainly not its first part. This point can be sharpened by comparing the elementary system with the natural system (Natursystem), another type of system to which Kant makes regular reference in his reflections on physics in fascicles X/XI. Kant generally identifies the natural system with Carl Linnaeus’ system of botanical and zoological classification. The natural system, Kant writes in draft ‘S,’ is “a whole of the coordination of natural things, according to the principles of the division of objects of experience into classes, genera, species etc.” (OP, 22: 460). It is therefore precisely the type of classificatory system that Linnaeus most famously presented in his Systema Naturae, which first appeared in 1735 and went through 13 editions by 1793. Kant’s attitude toward a Linnaean natural system varies in the OP, as it does in his earlier published writings and lecture notes. 28 In fascicles X/XI, the natural system is regularly contrasted with the doctrinal system. Kant sometimes presents a Linnaean natural system as the material part of physics, in contrast to the doctrinal system that constitutes the formal part. 29 The finite, formal part of the system, Kant writes, “can (and should) be presented completely” whereas the objective-material classificatory endeavors of physics “can never be wholly completed” (‘X,’ OP, 22: 496). Both the natural and doctrinal systems are in this case depicted as organized according to principles, so they are distinguished from an “artificial system” that is the mere aggregate or farrago consistently criticized in the drafts (‘G,’ 22: OP, 342). At other points, however, Kant claims that a Linnaean natural system constitutes “merely methodically aggregated objects of experience”; he names it a systema physices artificiali (‘X,’ OP, 22: 498). Here, Kant follows Buffon’s critique of Linnaeus’ classifications as arbitrary and lacking a principle. 30 Kant’s vacillating evaluations of Linnaeus are relevant because he characterizes the Linnaean natural system and his own earlier elementary system in very similar terms. Draft ‘I,’ for example, states that “objects of sense” should be “specified and divided by genus and species”, not by “fragmentary groping around, but according to an objective principle of combination in a system of empirically given natural forces”. This would

Physics as system in fascicles X/XI of Kant’s Opus postumum  59 yield a “natural system out of the elements [Elementen] of the forces” (OP, 22: 354). Kant’s use of “elements” suggests that the natural system has the same subject matter as the elementary system. Further down the same page, he defines the elementary system in almost precisely the terms he has just used to describe the natural system: “ever-progressing physics is led to classify and specify, according to a single principle, the objects of experience … not by random groping among perceptions as an aggregate, but [in] an elementary system” (OP, 22: 355). Both systems specify and classify objects of sense or experience according to a principle, in order to avoid fragmentary groping around (herumtappen, the word used in the B Preface to the Critique).31 Draft ‘S’ makes this implied identity of the natural and elementary systems explicit, in the continuation of a passage partially quoted above: To the doctrinal system there corresponds, as regards the aggregate of objects given to the senses, the natural system —as a whole of the coordination of natural things, according to the principles of the division of objects of experience into classes, genera, species etc., in an elementary system of objects. (OP, 22: 460; cf. OP, 22: 335) Here, Kant identifies the elementary system with the Linnaean natural system. It is debatable whether, according to Kant’s conception of a system discussed above, the elementary/natural system is a system at all. As we have seen, Kant conceives of a system as the unification of disparate cognitions under the idea of the “form of a whole”, the a priori structure of the totality of the parts that determines their relations in advance. We have also seen that an “Elementary System” draft differentiates the elementary system and the world system on the basis that the former proceeds from the parts to the whole, the latter from the whole to the parts. In terms of the criteria of Kant’s system-concept, the elementary system is at best a weak form of a system and at worst no system at all. This may explain why, in fascicles X/XI, the elementary/natural system is conceived of as a mere task belonging to the doctrinal system of physics. The doctrinal system would then be a system proper, according to Kant’s criteria: it should contain the a priori form of the elementary system and the principles that order its elements (the moving forces of matter). These passages suggest that, by 1799–1800, the development of Kant’s thinking would lead him to organize his projected work in a way that significantly differs from the reconstruction speculatively proposed by Mathieu. From the perspective of fascicles X/XI, the elementary system is no longer the first step of the transition project, but rather becomes the classificatory task pursued by physics itself, similar if not identical to a Linnaean natural system. This task is the never-ending compilation

60  Stephen Howard of a system of infinitely varied empirical findings, which Kant sometimes presents positively as a necessary, objective-material part of physics, guided by an organizing principle, and sometimes negatively, as an unprincipled aggregate. In both cases, however, the elementary system plays a reduced role in Kant’s conception of the transition in 1799–1800: it is the task of the properly systematic doctrinal system of physics at which the transition should arrive.32

Physics, psychology, and cosmology We can now return in more detail to Kant’s conception of physics as a doctrinal system, which is the consistent element in the various definitions of physics in fascicles X/XI. As the drafts progress, they more heavily emphasize the notion that the doctrinal system is the subjective part of physics. Drafts ‘S,’ ‘T,’ and ‘X’ arguably represent the high-water mark of Kant’s reflections on this topic. Physics is depicted as concerned with the Inbegriff (sum total or complex) of not just moving forces but also perceptions, that is, representations accompanied by consciousness. Kant often links the existence of a single experience with the existence of a single matter, and he suggests that this common unified character “indicates that both concepts [i.e., experience and matter] stem from a single principle” (OP, ‘X,’ 22: 509). Developing this train of thought, Kant proposes that there are “moving forces that the subject exercises on itself in apprehension for the sake of sensation,” subjective moving forces that are nevertheless “empirically affecting” (‘S,’ OP, 22: 453). He explores the idea that the subject’s perceptions are moving forces that stimulate the reciprocal moving forces of the object (‘X,’ OP, 22: 502, 503). This leads to his intriguing claim that the transition can and should anticipate the material, not just the formal element of experience (‘X,’ OP, 22: 502; cf. OP, 22: 345, 453–456, 459). Adickes, Lehmann, and Mathieu make this suggestion central to their interpretations. 33 Hoppe insists by contrast that Kant cannot have meant to depart so drastically from his critical views: Hoppe is correct that the scholastic phrase forma dat esse rei (form gives being to a thing) more often appears in the drafts, implying that the transition should only formally anticipate experience. However, Hoppe fails to sufficiently acknowledge that Kant at least explores the possibility of anticipating the material of experience, and his arguments that this simply could not have been Kant’s view are unconvincing: Hoppe is led to claim that even the third Analogy transgresses Kant’s true position.34 Without going further into this debate or into the speculative proposals Kant entertains in these drafts, we should note that an important consequence of the inclusion of subjective perception within physics is that Kant starts to regularly define physics as the doctrine of objects of outer and inner sense. For example, “Physics (study of nature) is a

Physics as system in fascicles X/XI of Kant’s Opus postumum  61 complex of outer as well as inner representations of sense in a system” (‘X,’ OP, 22: 500; cf. OP, 22: 407, 458, 472, 482, 493, 523). Here, fascicles X/XI clearly diverge from the earlier “Elementary System” drafts in which physics is the science of objects of the outer sense. 35 Kant vacillates on this point even within fascicles X/XI: draft ‘B’ returns to the definition of physics as “the doctrinal system of the whole [All] of moving forces of matter as outer sense-objects” (OP, 22: 306). But when he includes the objects of inner sense within the purview of physics, Kant undermines his own distinction, in the Critique’s Architectonic and the Preface to the Metaphysical Foundations, between physics and psychology. He implicitly indicates this when defining physics as a “systematic physiology” (OP, 22: 307; cf. 485): as we have seen, physiology is the umbrella term for physics and psychology in the Architectonic. It is in draft ‘S’ that Kant’s definitions of physics may be furthest from that of an empirical doctrine of objects of the outer senses and closest to psychology. Kant offers a remarkable series of definitions, which revolve around the activity of the cognizing subject in ordering perceptions.36 The division that the Architectonic chapter makes within immanent physiology, between rational physics and rational psychology, is therefore weakened or even dissolved in the conception of physics in fascicles X/XI because this conception has broadened to the point of encompassing objects of inner sense.37 I would like to suggest that we can also find a comparable weakening of the Architectonic’s distinction between immanent and transcendent rational physiology, specifically between rational physics and rational cosmology. While Kant often differentiates the elementary system and the doctrinal system in 1799–1800, he rarely distinguishes between the doctrinal system and the world system. As we have seen, earlier drafts distinguished between these two systems (e.g., OP, 21: 483), but this is another point on which Kant explores a different position in fascicles X/XI. Draft ‘U’ states that the world system is contained alongside the elementary system within the doctrinal system of natural science; the latter is equated with physics (OP, 22: 487). The world system, “if it should represent an absolute whole, is a mere idea to which no object can therefore be adequately given, but which is nevertheless not a nonthing (nonens) but a thought-thing (ens rationis)” (OP, 22: 485). Draft ‘B’ explicitly depicts the transition project in cosmological terms: the whole of perceptions are combined and connected under a principle into a world-whole (Weltganze) (OP, 22: 308).38 Kant here defines the doctrinal system of physics as “only an idea of a science understood as never fully attainable but continually progressing, for which we have principles to research the elementary knowledge [Elementarkentnissen] but which we can never encapsulate in a completed system” (OP, 22: 309–310, my emphasis). These passages present the doctrinal system of

62  Stephen Howard physics as either containing or itself the world system, and the latter as grounded on the mere idea of an absolute whole. Even when Kant does not refer to the world system in fascicles X/XI, he consistently defines the doctrinal system of physics as concerned with the whole of perceptions or moving forces, i.e. with experience or matter in the singular. In this sense, as we have seen, the subjective doctrinal system can be complete even if its object, the objective elementary system, has a never-ending classificatory task. The doctrinal system should be able to be completed because it does not treat the objective empirical whole of appearances, the infinite variety of matter and its forces, but rather the subjective whole of empirical appearances.39 In this respect it corresponds to the world system, which progresses from the whole to the parts. However, the prevailing conception of the doctrinal system in fascicles X/XI differs fundamentally from the world system, particularly insofar as the latter anticipates the place of the world in the “system of ideas” in the final fascicle I. This is because the cognitive faculty to which Kant generally refers in fascicles X/XI is not reason but the understanding. The doctrinal system of physics at the center of fascicles X/XI is therefore directed not toward the idea of a unified experience or a unified matter, but toward their concept. Draft ‘X’ states, for example, It is not by compilation, but according to a principle of connection of the moving forces of matter in a system (that is, in relation to the possibility of the object for the sake of experience) that the moving forces of matter—empirical intuitions (perceptions)—can yield an a priori cognition of the object. The understanding is thus, subjectively, the principle of the possibility of making sense-objects into one experience, as an aggregate of empirical representations. The axioms of pure intuition, as the principle [Princip] of form, are followed by the anticipations of experience. (OP, 22: 509) Here, there is no need for an idea of reason to unify the system of perceptions and of moving forces; the understanding performs this function, through its system of principles. In fascicles, X/XI Kant regularly refers to the principles of the understanding, and particularly the Axioms and Anticipations, as key to the task of physics in its newly expanded, physiological sense.40 Kant here explores grounding the systematicity of physics not on the mere idea of the whole, as will be the case in fascicle I, but on the principles of the understanding insofar as they subjectively unify experience. In this respect, it is notable that, like the elementary system, the doctrinal system does not meet the criteria for systematicity outlined in the Critique. They fail to do so in different ways, however: whereas

Physics as system in fascicles X/XI of Kant’s Opus postumum  63 the elementary system proceeds from the parts to the whole, leaving open the possibility that it is a mere aggregate of empirical elements and not a system in Kant’s strict sense, the doctrinal system properly moves from the whole to the parts but remains immanent to the understanding and is generally not presented as grounded on ideas of reason. Rather than marking a fault in Kant’s reflections on the possibility of systematic physics in 1799–1800, however, this might be considered a strength of this phase of the OP. Kant is exploring the possibility of what might be called an immanent cosmology, grounded on the conceptualization of the unified whole of experience and of matter, rather than the transcendent cosmology, based on an idea of reason, that appears in the Architectonic and, arguably, fascicle I. In fascicles X/XI, Kant’s unceasing interrogation of the notion of physics, which diverges ever further from the conception in the earlier drafts of a merely empirical science of objects of outer sense, remains on the terrain of the Analytic of the Critique. The attempts to rethink physics reveal the continuity of a problem from 1781 to Kant’s final drafts: how the understanding can be said to prescribe the law to nature when nature is considered as a dynamic whole of appearances.

Conclusion This chapter has sought to show the developments in Kant’s conception of physics: from the 1780s, to the 1798 “Elementary System” drafts, to the intensive reflections on physics in fascicles X/XI of 1799–1800. In the Architectonic of the Critique, rational physics and rational psychology are differentiated as the metaphysics of objects of outer and inner sense, respectively, and both are distinguished, as branches of immanent physiology, from transcendent physiology, wherein Kant locates rational cosmology. The 1798 “Elementary System” drafts depict physics as a system of the empirical science of nature: this has led commentators to characterize the transition project as Kant’s attempt to expand the General Remark to the Dynamics chapter of the Metaphysical Foundations in order to account for the specific properties of matter within a systematized, but still straightforwardly empirical physics. My account shows, by contrast with this interpretation, how far Kant’s reflections on physics in fascicles X/XI diverge from his conceptions of the science in the 1780s and in the earlier phases of the OP. First, Kant rethinks the nature of the elementary system and its role in the transition project. Whereas the 1798 drafts suggest that the elementary system is the first step of the transition (with the second step being the world system), fascicles X/XI generally present the elementary system as the objective part of the doctrinal system of physics at which the transition should arrive. Kant conceives of the elementary system anew as a mere classificatory endeavor, akin to a Linnaean system that can never

64  Stephen Howard be completed. Second, in line with his shift of focus away from the objective part of physics, Kant emphasizes its subjective part. He accordingly depicts physics as concerned with the Inbegriff of perceptions as well as moving forces, i.e. with inner as well as outer sense objects. This development weakens or undermines the distinction between rational physics and rational psychology within the immanent physiology sketched in the Architectonic. Third, Kant presents the doctrinal system of physics as similar or even equivalent to the world system, which begins with the whole (of perceptions or moving forces) and proceeds to the parts. With this change to his conception of physics, Kant blurs his earlier distinction between rational physics and rational cosmology. It may well be the case that the problem of the transition to strictly empirical physics spurred Kant’s initial work on his final project, and so, as Emundts shows, the project first sets out from the inadequacies or circularity of the General Remark to the Dynamics of the Metaphysical Foundations. In fascicles X/XI, however, we can see how Kant’s conception of physics, and therefore of his transition project, changes over the course of his investigation. In line with his long-running concern with systematicity as the hallmark of a science, Kant rethinks physics by way of the relationships between different systems: the classificatory elementary system, which comes to be equated with the Linnaean natural system; the doctrinal system of physics, which comes to encompass the objects of inner as well as outer sense; and the world system, which becomes almost indistinguishable from the doctrinal system. I suggest that the movement from the Metaphysical Foundations, to the “Elementary System” drafts, to fascicles X/XI, can be understood in terms of where Kant locates the grounds of the systematicity of physics with regard to the three elements of his transition problem. The General Remark to the Dynamics locates this systematicity in the metaphysical foundations; the “Elementary System” drafts locate it in the science of transition; and fascicles X/XI, I have argued, newly locate it in physics. Kant makes this move by redefining physics as a doctrinal system, which is expanded to encompass physiology and what I have called immanent cosmology. As I read the OP, Kant is drawing on all his philosophical resources— the many distinctions and concepts he forged or repurposed in his earlier works—to grapple with a genuine, and perhaps genuinely intractable problem: how can we connect metaphysics, however, understood, and physics, the notion of which is just as fluid; what bridges system and aggregate, or unity and diversity? The importance of the drafts can be found in Kant’s varied and creative attacks on the problem, not by trying to identify a definitive solution that he did not reach. The reflections on physics throughout the drafts, which reach their peak in fascicles X/XI, provide a striking example of Kant’s exacting but incomplete explorations.41

Physics as system in fascicles X/XI of Kant’s Opus postumum  65

Notes 1 See, for example, the interpretations of Tuschling, Friedman, Förster, Edwards, Emundts and Hall. A notable exception is Hoppe (1969). It will be apparent in what follows that I do not share Hoppe’s narrow understanding of physics as “experimentelle Naturerkenntnis” (my emphasis) or his view that fascicles X/XI seek to show “wie durch das Experiment eine objektive empirische Naturerkenntnis möglich ist” (Hoppe 1969: 137). Mathieu (1989, 133) criticizes Hoppe’s reductive conception of physics. 2 Adickes (1920, 235–362, particularly 238–244), Vleeschauwer (1937, 599– 611), Lehmann ([1937] 1969, 278–288). Adickes (1929) sets out the broader claim that ‘double affection’ is the key to understanding Kant’s theoretical philosophy. 3 I argue elsewhere that fascicles X/XI can be viewed as containing Kant’s attempts to mediate between the primarily ‘objective’ approach of the ether proofs, which explore a conception of the ether as a material transcendental condition, and the primarily ‘subjective’ orientation of the Selbstsetzungslehre, which treats the way the subject posits itself and its a priori forms. See Howard (2019). 4 Namely, whether the transition project emerges primarily from the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, the Critique of Judgement, the Critique of Pure Reason or from Kant’s intentions to provide a systematic metaphysics in the wake of the critical philosophy, and the related issue of whether and where there is a ‘gap’ in Kant’s critical philosophy that the transition project seeks to fill. 5 Thorndike (2018, 31–111) broadly echoes Emundts’ account of the relationship of the Opus postumum to the General Remark to the Dynamics, albeit in less detail and with a heavier assumption that the essence of Kant’s transition project can be found in passages in the Oktaventwurf and the “Elementary System” drafts; my proposed modification of Emundts’ position thus applies equally to Thorndike. 6 “Die Aufgabe eines für die empirische Physik aufzustellenden Systems besteht darin, die spezifische Verschiedenheit von Materie systematisch zu analysieren, so daß sich ein Plan aller möglichen bewegenden Kräfte aufstellen läßt.” (Emundts 2004, 119; see also 142). 7 It is by ignoring the changing meanings of ‘physics’ in the drafts that Tuschling can close his study with an outright dismissal of the basic transition-­ problem with which Kant was concerned: Die Versuche, die Kant unter dem Titel eines Übergangs unternommen hat, enden also paradoxerweise mit der Erkenntnis, daß ein kontinuierlicher Übergang von der Metaphysik der Natur zur Physik unmöglich ist: Gebiet, Gegenstand und Methode der metaphysischen Dynamik einerseits und der Physik anderseits sind durch eine prinzipielle Grenze von einander geschieden. Es ist die Grenze zwischen Erkenntnis a priori and a posteriori. […] Die Physik ist und bleibt empirische Wissenschaft, ihre Gegenstände sind in der empirischen Anschauung gegeben, ihre Methode ist die Entwicklung von Hypothesen und ihre Überprüfung durch empirische Beobachtung und Experiment. – Über diese ‚Kluft‘ führt keine Brücke, kein Übergang. (Tuschling 1971, 178) I intend to show that Tuschling’s view (here similar to Hoppe’s) that such a description exhaustively captures Kant’s conception of physics in the Opus postumum is indefensible in the light of fascicles X/XI.

66  Stephen Howard 8 On the 150 definitions of transcendental philosophy in fascicle I, see Adickes (1920, 149) and Hall (2015, 5). In future work I will reflect on Kant’s practice of seeking to define his terms in the Opus postumum in the light of his theory of definition in the Critique (CPR, A727–732/B755–760) and the logic notes (e. g. JL, 9: 140–145). 9 Hall (2015, 130–132) states this explicitly; it is assumed by other commentators, notably Hoppe (1969). 10 See Kant’s discussion of the regulative use of the cosmological idea, A672/ B700, A684–685/B712–713. 11 See Naragon’s entry, “Physiologie,” in Willaschek et al. (2015, 1792). 12 CPR, A846/B874, A848/B876. This view is widely held by commentators: see Plaass (1994, 208–209), Pollok (1997, xxix–xxxviii), Falkenburg (2000, 276–277) and Emundts (2004, 4–5n2). Förster (2000: 53–61) has a different interpretation. 13 In physica generalis, “metaphysical and mathematical constructions are wont to be thrown together” (MF, 4: 473). 14 Kant regularly claims in the drafts that the title of Newton’s Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica is self-contradictory, because “one can as little imagine mathematical foundations of philosophy, as philosophical foundations of mathematics.” Instead, one can legitimately speak of “Scientia naturalis (not philosophiae) principia mathematica” or “Scientia naturalis (not philosophiae) principia philosophica” (OP, 21: 207–208). 15 In cases of passages that are translated in Kant (1993), I have been guided by Förster and Rosen’s translations but have occasionally modified them. Translations of other passages are mine. In the present section I have been aided by Förster’s valuable editorial work, which chronologically orders disparate pages from the Akademieausgabe. 16 OP, 22: 135; cf. MF, 4: 473–474. This ambition also motivated earlier drafts: see, for example, OP, 21: 311. Kant’s optimism about the possibility of “complete enumerat[ing] the properties of matter prior to experience” is evident before he embarks on the “Elementary System” drafts (OP, 21: 477). On Kant’s ultimately fruitless endeavors in this period, see Förster (2000: 12–18); Förster points to Kant’s particular difficulties with the class of modality. 17 See Zöller (2001, 63): “Das Hauptmerkmal von Kants kritischem Systembegriff ist die Vorgängigkeit der Idee des Ganzen gegenüber den Teilen.” In what follows, I set aside the question of how the various systems of physics that Kant discusses relate to the particular conception of systematicity he outlines in the Critique of Judgment. I agree with Förster (2000, 5–11) and Emundts (2004, 59–65) when they argue that the Opus postumum’s transition project differs significantly from the issue of the “general [… and] indeterminate principle of a purposive arrangement of nature in a system, as it were for the benefit of our power of judgment” that is at stake in the third Critique (20: 214). 18 E.g. OP, 22: 310, 328, 336, 345, 381, 384, 391, 395, 398, 448. 19 Whilst it is not their primary concern, the ether proofs do offer definitions of physics, and, given that the phases of Kant’s drafts are not separate but bleed into one another, it is unsurprising that Kant anticipates his redefinitions of physics in fascicles X/XI. Übergang 12 states, “physics is the science of the coordination of all empirical representations (all perceptions) into a system of the whole, for which nothing further is given a priori, through the understanding, than the form of this thoroughgoing connection”

Physics as system in fascicles X/XI of Kant’s Opus postumum  67 (OP, 21: 582). Kant here moves from his earlier definition of physics as the system of empirical forces to a conception of physics as the system of all perceptions. Correlatively, the new conception of matter that Kant develops in the ether proofs—an all-penetrating material condition of all moving forces; a single matter that corresponds to the unity of experience—is presupposed in Kant’s reflections on physics in fascicles X/XI. For an analysis of a passage in fascicle XI in which Kant alludes to the ether, see Howard (2019, 608–614). 20 See the facsimiles of draft ‘U’ at https://korpora.zim.uni-duisburg-essen. de/kant/aa22/481.html (accessed 3/21/2022) and the website’s subsequent pages. The text discussed in this paragraph and the next is OP, 22: 481–495 in the Academy edition. 21 See, for example, draft ‘X,’ OP, 22: 496. 22 Inbegriff tends to be rendered by translators as ‘sum total,’ but Kant commonly glosses it in fascicles X/XI with the Latin complexus. 23 Emundts (2004, 145–147) argues that in the “Elementary System” drafts of 1798, the elementary system is logically prior to the world system, but the world system contains the real grounds of the elementary system. Key to the world system’s grounding function for the elementary system is the notion of the ether, as the absolute whole of matter. We will consider whether, in the later drafts in fascicles X/XI, Kant explores different relationships between the elementary and world systems. 24 Mathieu (1989, 72–75); for his reconstruction of Kant’s “work,” see Mathieu (1989, 79–83). Mathieu’s sketch of the whole work contains much more detail on the elementary system and the ether proofs, which he considers relatively finished, than on the world system, which in his view remains fragmentary and covers topics treated in fascicles X, XI, VII and I. Caygill (2005, 34) points out that this structure of Kant’s transition-work recalls the division of Newton’s Principia, book 3 of which is titled “On the System of the World.” 25 For later appearances that are still prior to August 1799, see OP, 21: 619, 622, 627, 22: 174. 26 I follow Förster’s insertion of “be enumerated.” 27 Kant’s terminology here recalls the title of his 1770 Dissertation. 28 See Marcucci 2001. Emundts (2004, 54–55, 59–65) discusses Kant’s critical view of the Linnaean natural system evident in the drafts prior to August 1799. She proposes a distinction between strong and weak senses of ‘system’ to make these earlier drafts consistent with Kant’s claims in the third Critique about systems in the Linnaean mould. 29 See ‘T,’ OP, 22: 485: “die Physik quoad formale ist complexus coniunctorum empiricus: quoad materiale systema naturae wie Linnaeus”; cf. OP, 22: 496, 498. The formal and material parts of physics are also respectively designated subjective and objective; we will return to this in the next section. 30 Marcucci (2001, 118n30); see also Adickes’ comments on Kant’s allegiance to Buffon over Linnaeus, quoted in Marcucci (2001, 121n37). 31 CPR, Bxv; see also Förster (2000, 5). 32 We will see that Kant nevertheless considers entirely equating physics with the infinite task of the elementary or natural system, which entails placing an idea of reason within his conception of physics. This is rare in the definitions of physics in fascicles X/XI but it becomes a central part of Kant’s reflections on systematicity in fascicle I. 33 See Adickes (1920, 261–265), Lehmann ([1937] 1969, 280–284) and Mathieu (1989, 141–144, cf. 128–131).

68  Stephen Howard 34 See Hoppe (1969, 1–2) and (1991, 61); for the claim about the third Analogy, see Hoppe (1991, 56). 35 Of course, in the Critique Kant claims that all representations, including those of outer objects, belong to inner sense and its formal condition of time (CPR, A34/B50). However, the shift that I consider to be at stake in the drafts here is whether Kant’s definitions of physics refer only to objects of outer sense, or also to objects of inner sense. 36 See: “Physics is a system of perceptions from the forces of matter that affect the senses, insofar as they modify the subject according to a principle of the possibility of experience (outer as well as inner)” (OP, 22: 458); “Physics is a doctrinal system (systema doctrinale) of sensible representations, insofar as they are combined through the subject’s understanding to a principle of experience … [It is] a system of perceptions in the concept of the subject, according to a principle of their combination to the synthetic unity (in experience) of the manifold that is given in intuition” (OP, 22: 459–460); “Physics is a doctrinal system of the connection of perception of sense-objects to the formal unity of experience in the subject” (OP, 22: 460); “Physics is the principle for representing what is subjective in perceptions (as appearances) as objective—by means of the understanding” (OP, 22: 464). 37 Giovanni Pietro Basile has brought to my attention that Drivet (2002) argues for a similar interpretation on this point. 38 Kant adds that “the whole [All] (το παν) of outer sense objects” constitute the matter of the Weltganze, alongside the form provided by the system. Kant’s use of the Greek harks back to the definitions of the world in German school-philosophy: cf. Baumgarten (2013, §354). 39 See the distinction in draft ‘U’ between the (infinite) objects of experience and our (finite) experience of objects: “Object of experience [Gegenstand der Erfahrung] is the objective [part] of natural science.—Experience of objects [Erfahrung von den Gegenständen] is the subjective [part]” (22: 481–482). The issue at stake here already appears in the 1770 Dissertation: “by taking several things together, you achieve without difficulty a whole of representation but you do not, in virtue of that, arrive at the representation of a whole” (2: 390). 40 See OP, 22: 281, 292–293, 300, 326, 338, 342, 366, 494, 504. Draft ‘T’ states, “The transition consists, namely, in progressing, by means of the understanding, from an aggregate of perceptions of oneself, to a system of perceptions in one experience in general (that is, to physics as a doctrinal system)” (OP, 22: 478; my emphasis). 41 Thanks to Ansgar Lyssy and Giovanni Pietro Basile for organizing the conference at which this chapter was first presented and for their helpful comments on an earlier draft. The research for this chapter was funded by the Research Council—Flanders (FWO).

References Adickes, Erich. 1897. “Die bewegenden Kräfte in Kants philosophischer Entwicklung und die beiden Pole seines Systems.” Kant-Studien 1: 9–59. Adickes, Erich. 1920. Kants Opus postumum dargestellt und beurteilt. Berlin: Reuther und Reichard. Adickes, Erich. 1929. Kants Lehre von der doppelten Affektion unseres Ich als Schlüssel zu seiner Erkenntnistheorie. Tübingen: Mohr.

Physics as system in fascicles X/XI of Kant’s Opus postumum  69 Baumgarten, Alexander. 2013. Metaphysics. Translated and edited by Courtney D. Fugate and John Hymers. London: Bloomsbury. Caygill, Howard. 2005. “The Force of Kant’s Opus postumum: Kepler and Newton in the XIth Fascicle.” Angelaki 10: 33–42. DOI: 10.1080/ 09697250500225123 Drivet, Dario. 2002. “La genesi dell’Opus postumum di Kant. Un dato filologico importante.” Studi Kantiani 15: 127–163. Emundts, Dina. 2004. Kants Übergangskonzeption im Opus postumum. Berlin: De Gruyter. DOI: 10.1515/9783110913279 Falkenburg, Brigitte. 2000. Kants Kosmologie. Die wissenschaftliche Revolution der Naturphilosophie im 18. Jahrhundert. Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann. Förster, Eckhart. 2000. Kant’s Final Synthesis: An Essay on the Opus postumum. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Hall, Bryan Wesley. 2015. The Post-Critical Kant: Understanding the Critical Philosophy through the Opus postumum. New York: Routledge. DOI: 10.4324/9781315754413 Hoppe, Hansgeorg. 1969. Kants Theorie der Physik: eine Untersuchung über das Opus postumum von Kant. Frankfurt: Klostermann. Hoppe, Hansgeorg. 1991. “Forma dat esse rei”. In Übergang. Untersuchungen zum Spätwerk Immanuel Kants. Edited by Forum für Philosophie Bad Homburg, 49–64. Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann. Howard, Stephen. 2019. “The Transition within the Transition: The Übergang from the Selbstsetzungslehre to the Ether Proofs in Kant’s Opus postumum.” Kant-Studien 110 (4): 595–617. DOI: 10.1515/kant-2019–3002 Kant, Immanuel. 1993. Opus postumum. Edited by Eckart Förster, translated by Eckart Förster and Michael Rosen. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lehmann, Gerhard. (1937) 1969. “Das philosophische Grundproblem in Kants Nachlaßwerk.” In Beiträge zur Geschichte und Interpretation der Philosophie Kants, 272–288. Berlin: De Gruyter. Marcucci, Silvio. 2001. “Système scientifique et système philosophique. Kant et Linné.” In Kant, les années 1796–1803: Opus postumum. Edited by Ingeborg Schüssler, 107–126. Paris: Vrin, 2001. Mathieu, Vittorio. 1989. Kants Opus postumum. Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann. Plaass, Peter. 1994. Kant’s Theory of Natural Science. Translated by Alfred E. and Maria G. Miller. Dordrecht: Springer. DOI: 10.1007/978–94-011–1126-3 Pollok, Konstantin. 1997. “Einleitung” to Kant, Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Naturwissenschaft. Hamburg: Meiner. Thorndike, Oliver. 2018. Kant’s Transition Project and Late Philosophy: Connecting the Opus postumum and Metaphysics of Morals. London: Bloomsbury. Tuschling, Burkhard. 1971. Metaphysische und transzendentale Dynamik in Kants Opus postumum. Berlin: De Gruyter. Vleeschauwer, Herman J. de. 1937. La Déduction Transcendantale dans l’œuvre de Kant. Tome III: La Déduction Transcendantale de 1787 Jusqu’à l’Opus postumum. Antwerp: De Sikkel.

70  Stephen Howard Willaschek, Marcus, Jürgen Stolzenberg, Georg Mohr and Stefano Bacin, eds. 2015. Kant-Lexikon. 3 vols. Berlin: De Gruyter. DOI: 10.1515/9783110443998 Zöller, Günter. 2001. “‘Die Seele des Systems’: Systembegriff und Begriffssystem in Kants Transzendentalphilosophie”. In Architektonik und System in der Philosophie Kants: System der Vernunft. Edited by Hans Friedrich Fulda und Jurgen Stolzenberg, 53–72. Hamburg: Meiner.

4 The analogical use of schematism from the Critique of Pure Reason to the Opus postumum Lara Scaglia Kant’s philosophy is characterized by the notion of limit: he builds his system by establishing separations among faculties and domains of knowledge. These analytical distinctions are then followed by a synthetical attempt to merge them. What allows this is a methodology which looks for an accessible element (a schema) to establish relations and transitions from one level to another. Kant uses analogy1 as an ampliative synthetical method, namely, a procedure to relate terms, which are not included under a common class, thus enlarging our thinking. As he puts it in his Lectures on Metaphysics: “Analogy is a proportion of concepts, where from the relation between two members that I know I bring out the relation of a third member, that I know, to a fourth member that I do not know” (V-MP-L 1/Pölitz, 28: 292). The task of my contribution is to direct attention to Kant’s analogical use of mediating procedures not only in the Critique of Pure Reason, but also in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science and the Opus postumum. More specifically, I will focus on the notion of transcendental schematism presented in the first Critique, stressing the role of time as the mediating function between the intellectual and the sensible level. Then I will focus on the metaphysics of corporeal nature developed in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science through a procedure which is analogous to the schematism and finally move to the drafts constituting the Opus postumum in which Kant hints at a schematism through the ether.

The schematism chapter The notion of a schema, although present in the pre-critical works of Kant, 2 finds its most significant use in the Critique of Pure Reason, the main task of which is to determine the criteria that metaphysics must meet in claiming to justify the knowledge of its objects: Yet by this [the Critique of Pure Reason] I do not understand a critique of books and systems, but a critique of the faculty of reason

DOI: 10.4324/9781003090946-5

72  Lara Scaglia in general, in respect of all the cognitions after which reason might strive independently of all experience, and hence the decision about the possibility or impossibility of a metaphysics in general, and the determination of its sources, as well as its extent and boundaries, all, however, from principles. (CPR, Axii) How is it possible to develop such a critique of the faculty of reason and find the criteria to determine whether metaphysics is possible? Given that sciences such as logic, physics, and mathematics are valid (CPR, Bviii–Bix), Kant investigates the characteristics of reason in its scientific use in order to determine its limits so that it can be possible to determine if metaphysical objects lie inside or beyond these boundaries. In the Transcendental Doctrine of Elements, he analyzes the two “stems of human cognition” (CPR, A15/B29), i.e., sensibility and understanding, determining what their a priori principles are, namely, those functions that are at the basis of the possibility of the objects of experience and sciences. More specifically, in the Transcendental Aesthetic (CPR, A19/B33– A50/B74) Kant focuses on sensibility, i.e., the faculty through which we are affected by things without mediation, and develops a science of the a priori principle (space and time) of this receptive faculty. Sensibility, however, can provide a necessary but insufficient condition for the constitution of the unity of objects: it can justify, for instance, the order of succession and coexistence of representation given in time and space but not their unity, nor the necessity of such succession. The latter is required in relation to causality and dependency. To achieve this purpose, the activity of the understanding and its pure concepts—the categories—is required as well. Without the act of thinking, objective cognition is impossible because there would be only a flow of separate impressions in which nothing could be distinguished as permanent or lawfully united, as Kant argues in the transcendental deduction, the aim of which is to demonstrate the objective validity of pure concepts of the understanding. But even after the transcendental deduction, Kant’s project to explain the possibility of objective cognition is not completed. Further functions, apart from the pure intuitions and the categories, are needed because the question concerning how pure categories can be applied to appearances still needs an answer. This is an important and distinctive problem from the question concerning the justification of the validity of categories since it is one thing to possess a concept, or to know a rule; it is quite another thing to apply the concept, that is, to recognize the instances to which the concept refers. As Kant puts it: […] the categories contain the grounds of the possibility of all experience in general from the side of the understanding. But more about

The analogical use of schematism  73 how they make experience possible, and which principles of its possibility they yield in their application to appearances, will be taught in the following chapter on the transcendental use of the power of judgment. (CPR, B167) For instance, the rules of causality and dependency are not derived from experience (CPR, A188/B234) because experience does not guarantee the necessity of the succession and is heterogeneous to appearances. However, these rules must nonetheless be applied to them. How is that possible? Kant answers by introducing transcendental schemata. There are more than 15 definitions of schema or schematism provided in the schematism chapter alone. Here, I shall focus on three of them, which are exemplary toward understanding their main features. Schemata are: 1 mediating functions: “This mediating representation must be pure (without anything empirical) and yet intellectual on the one hand and sensible on the other. Such a representation is the transcendental schema” (CPR, A138/B177); 2 time determinations: “[…] transcendental time-determination […]” (CPR, A139/B178), “The schemata are thus nothing but a priori time-determinations in accordance with rules” (CPR, A145/B184); 3 conditions of the significance of categories: “the true and sole condition for providing them with a relation to objects, thus with significance” (CPR, A146/B185); “the schemata of sensibility first realize the categories, yet they likewise also restrict them” (CPR, A146/ B185). Schemata, then, are functions mediating between the activity of the categories and the passivity of the intuitions, developed by reference to the form of time, which is, in Kant’s view, the only function that is homogeneous to both categories and appearances: time, on the one hand, is as pure as the categories are, while on the other hand, it is related to sensibility insofar as all appearances have to be given—at least—in time.3 These transcendental time-determinations realize—realisieren— (CPR, A146/B186) the categories, i.e., show how their application to objects is possible. This, however, does not imply that categories without schemata are of no use at all: it is possible to think about their meaning for another kind of synthesis—the intellectual one (CPR, B151)—which does not concern the contents of the possible experience, but rather pure thought. Namely, categories have a mere logical significance if we conceive them as formal laws of unity with no content. From this perspective, for instance, the category of substance, formally considered with

74  Lara Scaglia no reference to time, is nothing more than an empty position, valid as a mere logical subject: Without schemata, therefore, the categories are only functions of the understanding for concepts, but do not represent any object. This significance comes to them from sensibility, which realizes the understanding at the same time as it restricts it. (CPR, A147/B187) Within this perspective, schemata prepare the grounds for an explanation of how categories are actually employed in making judgments about the objective experience: Thus the schemata of concepts of pure understanding are the true and sole conditions for providing them with a relation to objects, thus with significance, and hence the categories are in the end of none but a possible empirical use, since they merely serve to subject appearances to general rules of synthesis through grounds of an a priori necessary unity (on account of the necessary unification of all consciousness in an original apperception), and thereby to make them fit for thoroughgoing connection in one experience. (CPR, A146/B185) Consequently, if cognition can be granted only within the conditions of possible experience, then metaphysics cannot become a proper science because it deals with the supersensible, with objects that lie beyond the boundaries of our possible experience and cognition, which are limited by a priori forms. This is the negative result of Kant’s inquiry on the possibility of metaphysics. However, other kinds of metaphysics—of morals and of nature—are still possible, thus determining the positive result of Kant’s critical project. These two domains—the metaphysics of nature and the metaphysics of morals—are based on critical philosophy intended as a system of rational cognition through concepts (CPR, A840–2/B868–70). Here, the notion of a schema is quite central—although it holds a different meaning from the schematism chapter—because the content of the domain has to be connected in an architectonic unity according to pure rules through schemata (CPR, A833/B861).4 The notion of a schema, then, is used in the first Critique to address analogical procedures of unification and mediation between categories and appearances (in the case of the schematism chapter) or between a rule (pure or empirical) and particular, scattered contents of knowledge. This very general meaning of a schema provides hints for understanding one of the main thematic threads of Kant’s philosophical project: the relation between foundational, general and particular, empirical levels.

The analogical use of schematism  75 I shall now move to the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, focusing on another analogous procedure and its role in determining Kant’s account of proper natural science.

The subsumption of the concept of matter in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science In order to understand better the role of the schematism in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, it is important to focus on the task of this work: while the Critique of Pure Reason deals with the a priori conditions of objects in general, the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science focuses more specifically on objects given in the outer sense. Kant aims, namely, to build a genuine metaphysics of corporeal nature, which begins with the analysis of the notion of matter in general: this is a task for pure philosophy—which, for this purpose, makes use of no particular experiences, but only that which it finds in the isolated (although intrinsically empirical) concept itself, in relation to the pure intuitions in space5 and time, and in accordance with laws that already essentially attach to the concept of nature in general, and is therefore a genuine metaphysics of corporeal nature. (MF, 4: 472) This metaphysics of corporeal nature is developed through a procedure that is analogous to schematism: the concept of matter is, namely, brought or subsumed under the categories: while in the Critique of Pure Reason, the middle term in the subsumption was time, here space has to play a fundamental because we deal with more specific objects, i.e., corporeal ones. Since the basic determination of objects of the outer senses—corporeal objects—is motion, they are here defined as movable bodies (MF, 4: 474–477).6 Namely, the task of the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science consists of developing a special metaphysics of corporeal objects, movable in space and time, realized by subsuming the concept of matter through time and space according to the four classes of categories.7 Here I do not see the reference to space as generating a contradiction with the role of time in the determination of the application of categories in the first Critique: the transcendental schematism deals with objects in general and therefore must be realized through time; while the subsumption—which is a schematism only in an analogous sense8 to the schematism of the first Critique—at the basis of the special metaphysics in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, concerns corporeal objects, movable in space and time. In other words, the first concerns the applications of pure concepts to intuitions, so that the conditions of possibility of objects, in general, can be determined; the second, in

76  Lara Scaglia contrast, regards the laws at the basis of the science which concerns corporeal objects. As mentioned above, in the Critique of Pure Reason, science requires not only that its claims are a priori grounded, but also unified in a system through schemata. These necessary characteristics of science are explicitly presented, again, in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science in which Kant distinguishes between proper natural science and doctrine.9 As Kant puts it, proper science is apodeictic—the grounds of its principles are not mere empirical but a priori—and systematic; otherwise—if its laws are empirical, as in chemistry—it is a rational cognition but not a science (MF, 4: 468).10 So far, there is a perfect continuity between the Critique of Pure Reason and the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science because both regard science as being constituted by a systematic and apodeictic connection of cognitions.11 Nevertheless, some difficulties might arise due to the role of mathematics, the method of which was regarded as being separated from the philosophical one in the first Critique. More specifically, in The Discipline of Pure Reason in Dogmatic Use Kant clearly differentiates the philosophical and the mathematical methods: the first being a rational cognition from concepts, the second from the construction of concepts, to which a non-empirical intuition is required (CPR, A713/B741).12 In the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, however, mathematics is required as a constraint for science insofar as proper natural science requires an a priori part—at the base of the empirical one—which rests on a priori cognition, i.e., cognition of the possibility of something. In the case of natural objects, to cognize them from their possibility means to construct their concepts in pure intuition, i.e., mathematically. Therefore, mathematics somehow cooperates with philosophy in grounding proper science: “I assert, however, that in any special doctrine of nature there can be only as much proper science as there is mathematics therein” (MF, 4: 470).13 This is a very restrictive claim, which seems to exclude many disciplines from the status of science: not only psychology and chemistry— before Lavoisier, at least—but also logic and philosophy. According to Watkins, there are three possibilities to interpret this claim: (1) to focus on the distinction in play here between science and science ‘proper’; (2) to note that these remarks have been made in 1786, when Kant, in a significant amount of his work in natural science, seems to refer indiscriminately to both natural science and enquiry into nature (Naturforschung); (3) to regard this claim as an exaggeration and not fully representative of Kant’s broader perspective (Watkins 2012, xvii). I am sympathetic with Friedman in stressing the first point, concerning the importance of the distinction between “science” and “proper science”—or, better said, proper natural science—it is possible to distinguish between sciences being apodictic and a priori grounded—dealing with objects in general or abstract rules, such as logic and philosophy

The analogical use of schematism  77 (regarded as general metaphysics and critique)—and proper natural sciences, such as physics, which concerns material objects and requires a metaphysics of the concept of matter as their grounds, as well as mathematics (Friedman 1992, 217). According to Kant, a doctrine of the body can become proper natural science only if mathematics is brought into it, i.e., only when an apodeictic method of quantifiability to develop science according to apodeictic law can be employed. Mathematics, then, has an important instrumental character for natural science and must cooperate with philosophy: “mathematics and philosophy are two entirely different things, although they offer each other their hand in natural science, thus that the procedure of the one can never be imitated by that of the other” (CPR, A726/B754). Mathematics, however, can be applied only after the metaphysical analysis of the concept it is based on, namely, matter. Pure philosophy, then, and mathematics are both necessary for a doctrine of the objects of the outer sense to become a science and must somehow cooperate. However, this does not imply that mathematical and metaphysical constructions are interchangeable, but rather that one must follow the other.14 Mathematics can be applied only after the metaphysical analysis of the notion of matter in general and its constructions must be separated from the metaphysical ones: Yet it is of the greatest importance to separate heterogeneous principles from one another, for the advantage of the sciences […] For this purpose, I have considered it necessary [to isolate] the former from the pure part of natural science (physica generalis), where metaphysical and mathematical constructions customarily run together, and to present them, together with principles of the construction of these concepts (and thus principles of the possibility of a mathematical doctrine of nature itself), in a system. (MF, 4: 473) But why is Kant referring to metaphysical constructions, given that construction is the proper method of mathematics? It might help to recall that in philosophy there is a transcendental function that shares similarities with the mathematical method of construction, namely, the schema. If mathematics deals by definition with construction, then philosophy, intended as applied metaphysics—thus concerning the application of concepts—involves a constructive method, a schematism, analogous to mathematical construction. This analogy between schematism and mathematical construction can be found in pre-critical works, too. More specifically, in the Inquiry concerning the Distinctness of the Principles of Natural Theology and Morality from 1764, the mathematical method is regarded as a way of developing and using rules of construction, in a way similar to the

78  Lara Scaglia drawing of geometrical figures (2: 276). While in philosophy the given concepts have to be, first of all, analyzed, in order to clarify them, concepts in mathematics are not given, but are rather synthetic results of definitions. Nevertheless, besides analysis, in philosophy, there is another method similar to a mathematical one, insofar as it shows how apodeictic claims can refer to experience. Through this method, which is similar to the mathematical one, objects are constructed following the rules of the understanding (Jiménez Rodríguez 2016, 440). As Kant puts it, in a footnote contained in the late On a Discovery Whereby Any New Critique of Pure Reason Is to be Made Superfluous by an Older One: In a general sense one may call construction all exhibition of a concept through the (spontaneous) production of a corresponding intuition. If it occurs through mere imagination in accordance with an a priori concept, it is called pure construction (such as must underlie all the demonstrations of the mathematician; hence he can demonstrate by means of a circle which he draws with his stick in the sand, no matter how irregular it may turn out to be, the properties of a circle in general, as perfectly as if it had been etched in copperplate by the greatest artist). If it is carried out on some kind of material, however, it could be called empirical construction. The first can also be called schematic, the second technical construction. (8: 192) Young Ahn Kang too remarks on the connection between mathematical construction and schematism, stressing that constructability has a semantic value in mathematics insofar as it makes possible to present a concept in intuition, providing it with a meaningful use (Kang 1985, 51).15 The principles of pure understanding and their specification in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Sciences, then, can be regarded as rules to construct16 and exhibit the concepts on the basis of objective experience. More specifically, as determination of the dynamical principles, they are regulative principles, but, nonetheless, “constitutive with respect to experience” (CPR, A664/B692). They do not construct their objects as the mathematical principles do—exposing the category of quantity through a geometrical construction—but indicate the rules for the synthesis of given perceptions: Accordingly, transcendental propositions can never be given through construction of concepts, but only in accordance with a priori concepts. They contain merely the rule according to which a certain synthetic unity of that which cannot be intuitively represented a priori, namely perception, is to be sought empirically. (CPR, A721/B749)

The analogical use of schematism  79 Consequently, the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science provides a further specification of the object of inquiry of the first Critique: it concerns not objects in general, but rather movable objects and the result of this metaphysics of corporeal nature concerns a priori constitutive principles according to which the tangle from empirical intuitions can be connected (MF, 4: 469). The differences between the Critique of Pure Reason and the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science—which concern: the role of space and mathematics, and the kinds of objects that need metaphysical grounds—are consequences of the levels of their inquiry: upon having identified the most general grounds to limit and ground the possibility of experience in the first Critique, Kant moves on to another level of inquiry, focusing on the conditions of possibility of natural proper science, which concerns not objects in general, but rather objects movable in space and time. A further step toward a more specific level of investigation is taken in the Opus postumum in which Kant confirms the importance of the cooperation of mathematics and philosophy17: The transition from the metaphysical foundation to the science of nature in general, represented a priori, according to the formal principles of mathematics and philosophy, is a transition in which mathematics supplies [enthält] only the application of concepts to intuitions a priori, by anticipations etc., not fragmentarily, as a mere aggregate, but systematically, according to one principle. Without these premises there can be no science of nature. This transition is not merely propaedeutic; for such a concept is ambiguous and concerns only the subjective aspect of knowledge. There is a not merely regulative, but also constitutive formal principle, existing a priori, of the science of nature, for the purpose of a system. (OP, 22: 240) After having stressed both the continuity as well as the differences between the role of the schematism in the Critique of Pure Reason and a procedure, analogous to the schematism, present in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, we can now move on to consider the Opus postumum and its relation to the schematism’s problematic, which consists in finding a mediating function between heterogeneous terms and domains.

Schematism and transition in the Opus postumum It is important to stress the difficulties to interpret the text, which is not a published work—rather a collection of fascicles—and therefore neither systematic nor concluded.18 Nevertheless, through the reading of the topics sketched in these drafts, it is possible to gain a more critical

80  Lara Scaglia attitude when reading the critical and pre-critical works, by reflecting, for instance, on the problems left open by the critical works. In order to reflect on these problematics and on how they are related to schematism, I will focus on the so-called “transition problem”. As Kant declares, the Opus postumum deals with the transition from metaphysics to physics. In 1798 (eight years after the publication of the Critique of the Power of Judgement), Kant writes to Christian Garve on September 21 that he felt a “pain like that of Tantalus,” “the unpaid bill of my uncompleted philosophy.” “The project on which I am now working […] must be completed,” he writes, “or else a gap will remain in the critical philosophy” (L, 12: 257). A month later, Kant writes to his pupil Kiesewetter on October 19, 1798: The transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural science to physics must not be left out of the system…. [W]ith that work the task of the critical philosophy will be completed and a gap that now stands open will be filled. (L, 12: 258) What does this gap consist of? Why are the three Critiques and Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science not sufficient in explaining the transition Kant is referring to? There are many interpretations and I will focus on four main trends. 1 Dario Drivet and Michael Friedman stress that, after the critical period, some disciplines have developed into proper sciences, thus requiring a metaphysical foundation: for instance, physiology of the human body and chemistry. These disciplines, which were banned from the domain of proper science (MF, 4: 471), need to be metaphysically grounded. More specifically, Drivet stresses that Kant had knowledge of the work On the Organ of the Soul (1796) written by Samuel Thomas (1755–1830), a physician in Frankfurt, and this might have given him further impulse to develop rational anthropology, namely, a metaphysical pendant to the anthropology from a pragmatic point of view (Drivet 2002, 158).19 Besides, Kant shows a more optimistic attitude—probably as a consequence of the developments in the theory of heat and chemistry—toward the possibility of providing empirical sciences with a philosophical foundation (Friedman 1992, 265). 2 It is possible that Kant becomes aware of an inconsistency concerning the third analogy that requires a new conception of spacematter to be solved (Westphal 1995a; Edwards 2000; Hall 2006). In the first and second analogies, namely, there is no need for multiple

The analogical use of schematism  81 substances. More specifically, the first requires one persistent substance solely (CPR, A182 ff./B225 ff.)20; the second necessitates that all alterations in a substance are rule-governed through the “principle of temporal sequence according to the law of causality” (CPR, A188/B232); in contrast, the third analogy (community) involves multiple substances as well as external causation, i.e., simultaneous causation between distinct substances: “All substances, insofar as they can be perceived in space as simultaneous, are in thoroughgoing interaction” (CPR, B256). If this is so, then the substances require a material continuum in which they can interact simultaneously, i.e., an omnipresent matter: “a continuum of material forces present throughout empirically cognizable space” (Edwards 2000, 155). 3 Some critics state that The Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science does not fully explain the application of categories to external objects. A common criticism concerns the lack of an account for density (Adickes 1924; Tuschling 1971; Westphal 1995b). In Kant’s text, namely, it is not clear as to how the mere relation between attractive and repulsive forces can explain the differences in density among the several objects. Kant himself was aware of this problem, as he wrote in a letter to Jacob Sigismund Beck on October 16, 1792: For very few people seem even to have understood the question properly. I think the solution to this problem lies in this: the attraction (the universal, Newtonian attraction) is originally equal in all matter; it is only the repulsive force that varies in different kinds of matter, and this is what determines differences in density. But this solution seems to lead to a kind of circularity. I cannot see how to escape from this circularity and I must give it more thought. (L, 11: 376–377) Furthermore, Mathieu (1989) and van den Berg (2014) claim that the laws of attraction and repulsion, 21 exposed in The Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, are not sufficient to provide a guideline for the specific forces present in nature. Kant himself states that he cannot explain the possibility of the specificity of the variety of matter (MF, 4: 525) and writes: The transition to physics cannot lie in the Metaphysical Foundations (attraction and repulsion, etc.). For these furnish no specifically determined, empirical properties, and one can imagine no specific [forces], of which one could know whether they exist in nature, or whether their existence be demonstrable. (OP, 22: 282) That is to say, in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science only a partial explanation of the application of categories to

82  Lara Scaglia external objects is provided: this elucidation does not provide apodictic certainty and systematicity—both necessary features of proper natural science—to all kinds of scientific laws. 4 A further possible reason to develop the transition concerns the introduction of a principle that functions as a common middle term between the domain of metaphysics and that of physics (OP, 21: 177). In a draft of an introduction, contained in fascicle 4 (from September to October 1798), Kant introduces his transition project by distinguishing the metaphysical foundations of natural science and physics in terms of their distinct territories. The territory of the metaphysical foundations is determined by a priori principles, whereas physics, constituted as the whole of empirical cognition pertaining to natural science, is assigned a different territory (OP, 21: 3, 60). Nevertheless, both are concerned with the very same set of corporeal objects and their main difference does not regard the kinds of their sets of objects but the status of their principles, a priori versus empirical (OP, 21: 177–178). How can they be related to each other? One possibility is to find an intersection between the reflective judgment, which proceeds from the bottom up (the empirical level) and the principles of the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (from the top down). As Friedman interprets it, the transition aims to find: “an intersection between the constitutive domain (of the Metaphysical Foundations) and the regulative domain (of reflective judgment), for only so can there be a continuous connection between the two, formerly entirely independent domains” (Friedman 1992, 265). In contrast, according to Mathieu, the transition project should offer not only a point of intersection between the domains, but also a categorical foundation of the systematicity of the laws of nature. In line with Lehmann (Lehmann 1939), Mathieu sees the transition as Kant’s lack of satisfaction with the result of the Critique of the Power of Judgment in which he relies on the subjective principle of purposiveness to consider nature as if it were objectively systematic. According to this interpretation, Kant came to believe that the unity of the laws of nature cannot be merely grounded on subjective principles and need objective grounds (Mathieu 1989, 42–45). More specifically, in the third Critique the organism—and all other particular laws—could be understood under the formula “as if,” with the help of the regulative use of the power of judgment, which anticipates the forms of nature (5: 185–186). In the transition project, this regulative power is extended through a second schematism, which anticipates not only the general forms of the unity of the experience of nature, but also the possibility to be given, i.e., of the particular material as “dabile”. This schematism is still not constitutive, that is, produced through the determinant use of the judgment as the one

The analogical use of schematism  83 of the first Critique, nor it is subjective like the principle of purposiveness of the Critique of the Power of Judgement. Its status can be regarded as “problematic” (Mathieu 1958, 164): while transcendental schematism concerns the forms of the possible experience, the schematism of the ether regards the particular forms of nature, i.e., the characteristics of nature as material dabile. As Mathieu interprets it, in the Opus postumum Kant introduces a sort of artistic procedure to schematize not the mere form, as in the Critiques, but the dabile, the matter that can be given (Mathieu 1958, 161). Kant does not provide a clear account of this schematism and one might wonder whether he is referring to the transcendental schematism of the first Critique or not. Several passages might be interpreted as being referred to as the transcendental ones (OP, 22: 20, 25, 331, 339, 495). In contrast, in other lines, the schema or the schematism is regarded as: a condition to provide physics with systematicity (OP, 21: 3, 485; 22: 189, 491, 496); a mediating function between the metaphysical principles of physics (OP, 21: 168, 169, 174; 22: 263, 326, 487, 490, 584); a procedure in accordance with the categories concerning the forces of matter (OP, 21: 291; 22: 155, 265, 377, 532, 536, 556); a process to give unity to an aggregate according to concepts, similar to the transcendental schematism in the first Critique (OP, 21: 162, 90; 22: 330, 343, 484, 487, 494, 510); a process concerning the organization of organic bodies (OP, 22: 505). Considering the aforementioned problems left open by the critical works and the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, it seems reasonable to interpret most of the uses of the notion of a schema in a different sense, namely, Kant’s answer to the questions the transition project aims to solve. Kant himself defines the transition as a schematism (OP, 22: 263). However, this schematism is situated at a different level of inquiry of the transcendental schematism: it regards a more specific application, which works not as a transcendental time determination of the first Critique, but through the reference to the ether (OP, 22: 346–347). Besides, it concerns the forces of matter (not the pure forms of the understanding) and the objects of experience as given in space and time (not as objects in general). This schematism might be interpreted as a method to provide the aggregate of experience with unity and systematicity, i.e., to present an object of the outer sense in such a way to be understood as a composed unity (OP, 22: 343).22 Such a schematic-presentation can be regarded as analogous to scientific models elaborated by theoretical scientists, i.e., as representations used to explain and predict the behavior of objects of the experience. According to Procuranti (Procuranti 2004, 225–231), Kant aims to ground specific sciences through a schematism in which the understanding goes beyond the generality of the categories—although in accordance with them— by means of constructing a priori specific functions that can give the

84  Lara Scaglia aggregate of perception a specific rule of unification. The result is a sort of indirect appearance (OP, 22: 343), constituted not in the mere pure intuition of space, but rather in the ether23 (OP, 22: 332), intended as being the material of intuition required for the possible experience: Intuitions in space and time are mere forms, and, lacking something which renders them knowable for the senses, furnish no real objects whatsoever to make possible an existence in general (and, above all, that of magnitude). Consequently, space and time would be left completely empty for experience. This material, therefore, which underlies this generally possible experience a priori, cannot be regarded as a merely hypothetical, but as a given, originally moving, worldmaterial; it cannot be assumed merely problematically, for it first signifies [bezeichnet] intuition (which would otherwise be empty and without perception). (OP, 21: 217) The resulting appearance of an appearance (OP, 22: 326) consists of the ensemble of the physical forces, i.e., non-empirical concepts that are, nonetheless, necessary to empirical cognition and must be confirmed by it. It is, in other words, the construction of physical concepts analogous to the construction of mathematical concepts. As Daval interprets it, the doctrine of the ether is essential to the transition because it constitutes the schematism of physics by, for instance, turning the category of quantity into ponderability and quality into cohesion (Daval 1951, 362). In this sense, schemata and their analogs (such as the “appearance of an appearance”) are functions that we need to organize in the most accurate and adequate way our systems (not only of experience, as the transcendental schematism teaches, but also of knowledge, giving us a tool to think the transition between different domains). After these considerations based on the secondary literature’s main interpretation of the transition problem and my use of the method of analogy to interpret some passages of the Opus postumum as being related to the function of mediation proper of schemata, I will briefly provide some conclusions.

Conclusion In my contribution, I aimed to show that the importance of schematism as a tool for subsuming and mediating among different functions is not limited to the first Critique of Pure Reason, but concerns Kant’s later works too. More specifically, in the Critique of Pure Reason, which aims to identify and justify the conditions of possibility of experience in general, the schematism solves the problem of the way in which categories can

The analogical use of schematism  85 be applied, namely, through their time determination. Whilst the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science concerns the subsumption of the concept of matter under the categories in a procedure which involves space and shares similarities with the schematism of the first Critique. Finally, in the Opus postumum Kant sketches a schematism through the ether that helps to bridge the gap between the metaphysics of nature and of physics: through the principle of the ether, physical models of entities or forces are constituted and directed toward the organization of the particular objects of experience. We could regard this attempt as a sort of conceptual engineering’s project antes litteram: schemata (and their cognates) are specific kinds of functions to establish relations between domains and heterogeneous terms that need to be related. These functions might be regarded as being provisory (such as the appearance of appearance, which needs to be confirmed from experience) or necessary (the transcendental schemata in the first Critique), still, they are characterized by their role of mediation. Besides, the changes in Kant’s work concerning his account of schematism and the conditions of science are interesting with respect to questions concerning the value of philosophy of science for the history of science and vice versa. On the one hand, Kant’s account of philosophy as a propaedeutic implies topics of epistemological and scientific interest: such as the determination of the constraints for science, and the validity and ontological status of scientific laws and constructions. On the other hand, Kant provides a great example of how philosophy might be influenced by the scientific method and discoveries: not only are Kant’s method and philosophical terminology strictly related to the scientific one, but also its theoretical contents change as a consequence of the novelties introduced in the scientific research (e.g., the scientific status of chemistry). In this sense, the use of schematism holds not only a specific philosophical value—as a function of mediation and subsumption—but it provides, in the first Critique, a task to the scientists—the explanation of how this procedure of mediation empirically works—whilst in the Opus postumum, it bears a resemblance to functions and models used in the scientific research.

Notes 1 This contribution is a result of research project No. 2019/33/B/HS1/03003 financed by the National Science Center, Poland. Citations to Kant will be to the Akademie Ausgabe by volume and page, except for the Critique of Pure Reason where citations will use the standard A/B edition pagination. English quotations will be from the Cambridge edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant. Kant distinguishes between mathematical and dynamical synthesis—the first concerning homogeneous, quantifiable terms of relation, the second inhomogeneous ones (see CPR, A160/B199). More specifically, in the mathematical

86  Lara Scaglia relation, we can characterize a term a priori (saying, for instance, which or how great it is), while in the dynamical one on the basis of the given validity of a relation (a:b) and given something of the same type (c), it can be asserted that some unknown thing (x) exists and it is related to c. The formula of such a philosophical analogy is a:b::c:x (Callanan 2008, 761). 2 In the Nova Dilucidatio and the Dissertation De mundi sensibilis atque intelligibilis forma et principiis. Cf. Scaglia (2020, 41–56). 3 The role of time in schematism has been criticized by several scholars (e.g., Zschocke 1907; Walsh 1957/58; Guyer 2006). For instance, Guyer claims that there are categories that, once schematized, through time-­ determinations, seem to require space as well: such as the causal relation (cause and effect are often not only temporally related but also contiguous); the schema of a number is given by the addition of one (homogeneous) unity to another. However, these examples do not deny the necessary development of schemata through time; they only stress that space can be involved in representations, although it is not always involved. The primacy of time in the schematism chapter of the first Critique does not mean that space has no role at all: Kant himself admits that it is necessary to avoid idealistic and solipsistic positions (CPR, Bxl–xli; B275; B291). Moreover, the system of categories receives its only real instantiation in material objects, as Kant argues in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science from 1786. 4 As Kant puts it: A schema that is not outlined in accordance with an idea, i. e. from the chief end of reason, but empirically, in accordance with aims occurring contingently (whose number one cannot know in advance) yields technical unity, but that which arises only in consequence of an idea (where reason provides the ends a priori and does not await them empirically) grounds architectonic unity. What we call science, whose schema contains the outline (monogramma) and the division of the whole into members in conformity with the idea, i. e. a priori, cannot arise technically, from the similarity of the manifold or the contingent use of cognition in concreto for all sorts of arbitrary external ends, but arises architectonically, for the sake of its affinity and its derivation from a single supreme and inner end, which first makes possible the whole; such science must be distinguished from all others with certainty and in accordance with principles. (CPR, A833/B861) 5 The stress on the role of space reveals not only a change in the topic (corporeal objects) but also that this work (together with the Introduction of the second Edition of the Critique of Pure Reason, the “Refutation of Idealism,” and the Note to the Preface), could be read as a response to the accusation of idealism presented in the Feder-Garve review from 1782. 6 “The concept of matter had therefore to be carried through all four of the indicated functions of the concepts of the understanding (in four chapters), wherein each a new determination of this concept was added. The basic determination of something that is to be an object of the outer senses had to be motion, because only thereby can these senses be affected. The understanding traces back all other predicates of matter belonging to its nature to this, and so natural science, therefore, is either a pure or applied doctrine of motion. The metaphysical foundations of natural science are therefore to be brought under four chapters. The first considers any quality of the movable, and may be called phoronomy. The second takes into consideration motion

The analogical use of schematism  87 as belonging to the quality of matter, under the name of an original moving force, and is therefore called dynamics. The third considers matter with this quality as in relation to another through its own inherent motion, and therefore appears under the name of mechanics. The fourth chapter, however, determines matter’s motion or rest merely in relation to the mode of representation or modality, and thus as the appearance of the outer senses, and is called phenomenology” (MF, 4: 474–477). 7 The accuracy of Kant’s analysis of the notion of matter according to the four classes is probably a sign that he had decided to write this work during the elaboration of the first Critique (cf. Geymonat 1959; Procuranti 2004, 175). Besides, the work contains doctrines—not present in the Critique of Pure Reason—that are needed to complete Kant’s “answer” to Hume concerning the problem of causality, which requires: the introduction of the concept of matter as moveable in space; the metaphysical principle that every physical event has an external cause; and a principle concerning the individuation of objects in space and time (cf. Westphal 1995a). These three doctrines are not defended in the first Critique but only in the Metaphysical Foundation of Natural Science. Kant’s transcendental analysis of the conditions of experience thus requires special metaphysics. 8 The use of the notion of schema and correlated terms (subsumption, application) and the general problem of the work (to develop a metaphysic of the corporeal nature by subsuming the concept of matter under the categories) support the legitimacy of putting the work in relation to the schematism of the Critique of Pure Reason (cf. Geymonat 1959; Procuranti 2004). 9 In the critical period, Kant distinguishes between doctrine and science: the first is a mere aggregate of cognitions, while the second is systematic (CPR, A832/B860; JL, 9: 72, 139). 10 “What can be called proper science is only that whose certainty is apodictic; cognition that can contain mere empirical certainty is only knowledge improperly so-called. Any whole of cognition that is systematic can, for this reason, already be called science, and, if the connection of cognition in this system is an interconnection of grounds and consequences, even rational science. If, however, the grounds or principles themselves are still in the end merely empirical, as in chemistry, for example, and the laws from which the given facts are explained through reason are mere laws of experience, then they carry with them no consciousness of their necessity (they are not apodictically certain), and thus the whole of cognition does not deserve the name of a science in the strict sense; chemistry should therefore be called a systematic art rather than a science. A rational doctrine of nature thus deserves the name of a natural science, only in case the fundamental natural laws therein are cognized a priori, and are not mere laws of experience. One calls a cognition of nature of the first kind pure, but that of the second kind is called applied rational cognition” (MF, 4: 468). 11 To be systematically connected, cognitions must be related as conditioned and unconditioned. To be apodeictic, they must be grounded on a priori principles (cf. van den Berg 2014, 15–37). 12 “Philosophical cognition is rational cognition from concepts, mathematical cognition that from the construction of concepts. But to construct a concept means to exhibit a priori the intuition corresponding to it. For the construction of a concept, therefore, a non-empirical intuition is required, which consequently, as intuition, is an individual object, but that must nevertheless, as the construction of a concept (of a general representation), express in the representation universal validity for all possible intuitions that belong

88  Lara Scaglia under the same concept. Thus I construct a triangle by exhibiting an object corresponding to this concept, either through mere imagination, in pure intuition, or on paper, in empirical intuition, but in both cases completely a priori, without having had to borrow the pattern for it from any experience” (CPR, A713 ff./ B741 ff.). 13 And further in the text: For, according to the preceding, proper science, and above all proper natural science, requires a pure part lying at the basis of the empirical part, and resting on a priori cognition of natural things. Now to cognize something a priori means to cognize it from its mere possibility. But the possibility of determinate natural things cannot be cognized from their mere concepts; for from these the possibility of the thought (that it does not contradict itself) can certainly be cognized, but not the possibility of the object, as a natural thing that can be given outside the thought (as existing). Hence, in order to cognize the possibility of determinate natural things, and thus to cognize them a priori, it is still required that the intuition corresponding to the concept be given a priori, that is, that the concept be constructed. Now rational cognition through construction of concepts is mathematical. (MF, 4: 470) 14 On the notion of metaphysical and mathematical constructions, see Plaass (1965), Gloy (1976), Büchel (1987), Menzel (1911), Micheli (1998). 15 “[…] the construction of a concept is an act of providing a concept with objective reality (cf. Entdeckung BA 10–11; Fortschritte A183). In other words, constructability is a semantic rule of mathematical cognition. It makes possible a meaningful use of mathematical concepts on the one hand, and it restricts the valid sphere of mathematical knowledge to the sensible world on the other (Prolegomena § 13 note). The presentation of a concept in intuition (mathematical schematism) provides the concept with ‘sense and meaning’ (Sinn und Bedeutung) (Prolegomena § 8). Thus, construction has the same function as the transcendental schema both in its realizing and restricting of the pure concepts at the same time (A147/B187)” (Kang 1985, 51). 16 Cf. Friedman 1992, 161–164. 17 See also: OP, 21: 114, 242, and 482. 18 The fascicles were not preserved in chronological order and, even if an edition was started in 1882 (by Reicke), it took until 1936–1938 before the first edition was published. 19 In a draft from July 26, 1795, Kant declares that he is tempted to take the risk of moving from the doctrine of the soul to physiology (13: 398). 20 “We can therefore never determine from this alone whether this manifold, as object of experience, is simultaneous or successive, if something does not ground it which always exists, i.e., something lasting and persisting, of which all change and simultaneity are nothing but so many ways (modi of time) in which that which persists exists. Only in that which persists, therefore, are temporal relations possible (for simultaneity and succession are the only relations in time), i.e., that which persists is the substratum of the empirical representation of time itself, by which alone all time-determination is possible. Persistence gives general expression to time as the constant correlate of all existence of appearances, all change and all accompaniment” (CPR, A182 f./B225 f.). 21 Mathieu stresses that the Opus postumum should solve not only the problems left open by the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, but

The analogical use of schematism  89 also by the third Critique in which the limitations of Kant’s system emerge: namely, the need to provide an account for the systematicity of specific laws of nature on which the capacity of judgment could only reflect (OP, 20: 213). 2 As Kant puts it: 2 We can extract nothing other from our sense-representations than that which we have inserted (with consciousness of its presentation) for the empirical representation of ourselves – that is, by the understanding (intellectus exhibit phaenomena sensuum). This presentation produces a system out of an aggregate of perceptions, according to the formal conditions of intuition and the coexistence of these perceptions in the subject. It produces a cognition of the outer sense–object, as appearance, by composition of manifold of the moving forces of matter in appearance, for the sake of the possibility of experience – that is, for the investigation of nature. The presentation is the schema of a concept which, as mere appearance, makes a priori possible the form of the composite in the object and the ground of experience for knowledge of it. For only appearance permits a priori knowledge. (OP, 22: 343) 23 Here I will not delve into the deduction of the ether and the debate concerning its status, which has been regarded as an ideal principle (Lehmann, Hoppe, Friedman), a material substance (Tuschling, Edwards), or something between the two, namely, a principle provided with empirical reality but not an idea or an absolute substance (Mathieu, Emundts, Hall).

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90  Lara Scaglia Gloy, Karen. 1976. Die Kantische Theorie der Naturwissenschaft: Eine Strukturanalyse ihrer Möglichkeit, ihres Umfangs und ihrer Grenzen. Berlin: De Gruyter. Guyer, Paul. 2006. Kant. New York: Routledge. Hall, Bryan. 2006. “A Reconstruction of Kant’s Ether Deduction in Übergang 11.” British Journal for the History of Philosophy 14: 719–746. Jiménez Rodríguez, Alba. 2016. “Die Projektion des Schematismus in den vorkritischen Schriften Kants: Das Problem der mathematischen Konstruktion.” Kant-Studien 107: 429–450. Kang, Young Ahn. 1985. Schema and Symbol: A Study in Kant’s Doctrine of Schematism. Amsterdam: Free University Press. Lehmann, Gerhard. 1939. Kants Nachlaßwerk und die Kritik der Urteilskraft. Berlin: Junker und Dünnhaupt. Mathieu, Vittorio. 1958. La filosofia trascendentale e l’ ‘Opus postumum’ di Kant. Turin: Edizioni di Filosofia. Mathieu, Vittorio. 1989. Kants “Opus postumum.” Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann. Menzel, Alfred. 1911. “Die Stellung der Mathematik in Kants vorkritischer Philosophie.” Kant-Studien 16: 139–213. Micheli, Giuseppe. 1998. Matematica e metafisica in Kant. Padua: Cleup Ed. Plaass, Peter. 1965. Kants Theorie der Naturwissenschaft: Eine Untersuchung zur Vorrede von Kants ‘Metaphysischen Anfangsgründen der Naturwissenschaft’. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Pollok, Konstantin. 2001. Kants Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Naturwissenschaft: Ein kritischer Kommentar. Hamburg: Meiner. Procuranti, Lucia. 2004. Il Problema della Costituzione della Materia nella Filosofia di Immanuel Kant. Verifiche: Trento. Scaglia, Lara. 2020. Kant´s Notion of a Transcendental Schema: The Constitution of Objective Cognition between Epistemology and Psychology. Berlin: Peter Lang. Tuschling, Burkhard. 1971. Metaphysische und transzendentale Dynamik in Kants Opus postumum. Berlin: De Gruyter. Walsh, William Henry. 1957–1958. “Schematism.” Kant-Studien 49: 95–106. Watkins, Eric. 2001. Kant and the Sciences. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Watkins, Eric. 2012. “General Introduction.” In Kant, I.: Natural Science. Edited by Eric Watkins, XIII–XVIII. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Westphal, Kenneth R. 1995a. “Kant’s Proof of the Law of Inertia.” In Proceedings of the Eighth International Kant Congress, Vol. 2,1, 413–421. Milwaukee, WI: Marquette University Press. Westphal, Kenneth R. 1995b. “Kant’s Dynamical Constructions.” Journal of Philosophical Research 20: 381–429. Zschocke, Walter. 1907. “Über Kants Lehre vom Schematismus der reinen Vernunft.” Kant-Studien 12: 157–212.

5 The forms of “composition” and the role of mediating concepts in Kant’s Opus postumum1 Gualtiero Lorini Introduction: natural science and its metaphysical principles On December 11, 1797, Kant wrote to Johann Heinrich Tieftrunk: The concept of the composed in general is not itself a particular category. Rather, it is included in every category (as synthetic unity of apperception). For that which is composed cannot as such be intuited; rather, the concept or consciousness of composing (a function that, as synthetic unity of apperception, is the foundation of all categories) must be presupposed in order to think the manifold of intuition (that is, of what is given) as unified in one consciousness. In other words, in order to think the object as something that has been composed, I must presuppose the concept or the consciousness of composing. (L, 12: 222) Kant is even clearer on this point in the contemporary manuscript titled the Progress of Metaphysics. In this manuscript he claims that, in the context of categorical synthesis, the concept of a ‘composite’ [Zusammengesetztes] “requires the concept of a composition [Zusammensetzung], so far as it is applied to the intuition in space and time” (PE, 20: 271). 2 Kant adds that the ‘composite’ that requires the composition should not be understood as a concept “abstracted from intuitions, as a part-representation contained in them,” but rather as “a basic concept, and a priori at that—in the end the sole basic concept a priori, which is the original foundation in the understanding for all concepts of sensible objects” (ibid.). Precisely during these years, when Kant pursues an exposition of transcendental philosophy that is as compact and systematic as possible, he ascribes to ‘composition’ a fundamental role in relation to all categories, and thus to the definition of the concept of an object in general. It is therefore particularly interesting to study the forms and roles that the concept of ‘composition’ assumes in the context of a project—such as

DOI: 10.4324/9781003090946-6

92  Gualtiero Lorini the Übergangsprojekt—that explicitly aims to complete the critical path toward an in-depth understanding of nature, namely, physics. In this regard, however, it would be methodologically inappropriate to search for a clear and conclusive common thread that runs through the many occurrences, lexical forms, and above all meanings of technical terms that belong to the semantic field of ‘composition’ and ‘coordination,’ which characterize a fragmented and articulated corpus such as the Opus postumum. It would rather be more conclusive for our goal to study the pages of the Opus postumum on the basis of a fundamental question that guides our research. This is a question that concerns the senses and ways in which the concept of ‘composition’—often indicated as Anordnung (Uebergang 1–14, Mai-Aug. 1799, OP, 21: 589), Zusammenfügung (Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 316), Beyordnung (Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 333), Zusammenstellung (Redactio 1–3, Aug.–Sept. 1799, OP, 22: 584; Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 333, 335, 471), Zusammenordnen (Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 448)—contributes to Kant’s more general purpose to determine the transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural science to physics. As can be noticed, in some of these cases the terms employed by Kant refer to a specific ‘order’ [Ordnung] in which certain material elements should be ‘placed.’ Not by chance, the other terms mentioned here and employed in the same sense are compounds of the verb setzen and the noun Setzung, which could be rendered precisely as ‘to put’ and ‘settlement.’ As we shall point out, this semantic framework plays a relevant role in the Opus postumum, since the principles and conditions according to which such a settlement takes place determine at the same time the way in which material elements are ‘settled-together,’ that is, ‘com-posed.’ Furthermore, such principles play a crucial role in the transition project. By illustrating the modalities of composition, this transition aims therefore to find out in matter the a priori norms of its constitution. Accordingly, such a project could be seen as a development of the goal stated by Kant in the Preface to the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science: “to make possible the application of mathematics to the doctrine of body,” which requires the preliminary introduction of the “principles for the construction of the concepts that belong to the possibility of matter in general” (MF, 4: 472). A few lines later, Kant declares that his aim in this framework is to present in a system the metaphysical concepts taken from “the pure part of natural science (physica generalis)” and the “principles of the construction of these concepts” in view of a “mathematical doctrine of nature [mathematische Naturlehre]” (MF, 4: 473). The possibility, or the necessity to put at stake the relationship between the Metaphysical Foundations and the transition project pursued in the Opus postumum, and even more the terms of such a ­comparison—either as a possible continuity or an actual development—is

“Composition” and mediating concepts  93 a matter of wide discussion among scholars. However, as we will try to elucidate, the forms of composition may be regarded as the concrete instruments through which the metaphysical principles of natural science come to synthetically shape matter, and in this sense, such forms represent one of the topics that call for a comparison between the text of 1786 and the Opus postumum. Moreover, the analysis of the most perspicuous expressions of this composing synthesis in the Opus postumum will highlight the relevance of the ‘mediating concepts’ (Mittelbegriffe) in the economy of the transition project. In order to step into our analysis, we need to observe that in the Opus postumum, Kant often refers to a ‘natural tendency’ of the metaphysical principles of natural science toward physics. This tendency is due to the fact that “philosophy desires [begehrt] the transition from that to this,” and it must be possible to construct (aufstellen) such a transition “as a science defined in its extension and limited in its content” (Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 279). The transition Kant seeks is thus not yet physics itself, but a science where the main goal is to delimit the extent and content of nature. The task here consists in deepening the essence of nature materialiter spectata as “the sum total of all appearances [Inbegriffe aller Erscheinungen],” whose presupposed fundamental regularity in the form of nature formaliter spectata was already established in the Transcendental Deduction of the first Critique (see B163–165; see also Thorndike [2018, 85]). This difference between nature as formaliter and materialiter spectata corresponds to the distinction between transcendental and metaphysical principles that Kant will make explicit in the Critique of the Power of Judgment. While the former represents the only a priori universal condition under which things can become objects of our knowledge, the latter are the only conditions for the further a priori determination of objects whose concept is empirically given (CPJ, 5: 181; see Lorini [2017]). In accordance with the sequence of this argument, the following question arises: how has the transition to physics not taken place already in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science—especially considering that the German title for this text specifically refers to the “metaphysical principles” of the natural sciences? In light of the methodological developments that shape the turn of the transition—such as the doctrine of ether—Kant’s answer in the Opus postumum seems to rest—according to the thesis that we will propose—on the concept of composition and the way in which this composition is made possible by the mediating concepts. Yet, the premises of this answer can already be detected in the epistemology at the heart of the critical project. In fact, the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science aims to clarify the distinction outlined in the first Critique between physica generalis, “which is more mathematics than philosophy of nature,” and rational physics, which contains

94  Gualtiero Lorini the a priori metaphysical principles of the science of nature (CPR, A846–847/B874–875; MF, 4: 472–473). Accordingly, the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science provides transcendental philosophy with an “excellent and indispensable service” (MF, 4: 478), insofar as it represents the “basic determination [Grundbestimmung] of something that is to be an object of the outer senses” (MF, 4: 476). As Kant claims in the preface to this work, the Metaphysical Foundations pursues an ideal of scientific inquiry based on the apodictic certainty of knowledge and the systematic unity of the whole of this knowledge (MF, 4: 468). What is at stake is thus a matter of finding out the “further determination a priori” of an object in general, the conditions of possibility and accountability of which are outlined in the first (and third) Critique. This further determination corresponds to the tasks of the metaphysical principles, which presuppose and specify the transcendental ones. Hence, the “further determination” can only occur according to the four groups of categories considered in the study of the a priori forms of nature’s regularity—that is, in phoronomy, dynamics, mechanics, and phenomenology. From this point of view, Kant is consistent when, in the preface to the Metaphysical Foundations he warns not to go “beyond that which makes possible the general concept of a matter as such” (MF, 4: 524). Although the critical project sometimes advances in parallel branches, its systematic value can only be grasped through a unitary progressive presentation. Therefore, the steps taken in the Critique of the Power of Judgment can be recognized as having the vision of developing the perspective of the Metaphysical Foundations. According to the epistemological pattern of the third Critique, the classification of the empirical multiplicity of nature requires one step more than the mere a priori principles mentioned in the Metaphysical Foundations. As Kant states in the First Introduction: Now it is clear that the reflecting power of judgment, given its nature, could not undertake to classify the whole of nature according to its empirical differences if it did not presuppose that nature itself specifies its transcendental laws in accordance with some sort of principle. (FI, 20: 215) This brings us back to the distinction between metaphysical and transcendental principles. The former, though valid a priori, always presupposes the latter. And an analysis of transcendental principles in the Metaphysical Foundations is not undertaken, nor is it part of Kant’s agenda; rather, what it aims for is the “further determination” of objects whose possibility has already been transcendentally determined. At the same time, still in the First Introduction, a few lines before, Kant claims that the self-determination of nature takes place “in accordance with a certain principle (or the idea of a system)” (FI, 20: 215), and this

“Composition” and mediating concepts  95 statement once again stresses that the possibility of looking at nature as a system ultimately relies on the recognition of the action of a transcendental law within it. These theoretical steps allow us to understand the sense of Kant’s emphasis in the Opus postumum regarding the insufficiency (but not the inappropriateness) of the metaphysical principles (at least with respect to one of the two criteria that in 1786 were seen as indispensable for the definition of a science as such, that is, the systematically complete unity of the matter of knowledge). In Conv. X/XI (Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800), Kant writes: The transition to physics cannot lie in the metaphysical foundations (attraction and repulsion, etc.). For these furnish no specifically determined, empirical properties, and one can imagine no specific [forces] of which one could know whether they exist in nature, or whether their existence be demonstrable; rather, they can only be feigned to explain phenomena [Phänomene] empirically or hypothetically, in a certain respect. (OP, 22: 282) The same “further determination” that Kant aimed to reach through the metaphysical principles cannot legitimately continue its determining activity without guaranteeing that what it ascribes to the matter of natural phenomena3 conforms with the transcendental condition under which those phenomena can become an object of knowledge. Thus, the failure of the Metaphysical Foundations to achieve the transition is effectively summarized by Förster in two essential points: first, although systematically carried out, the investigation of the Metaphysical Foundations was limited to the concept of “matter in general” in accordance with the table of categories; yet, since “it dealt only with attraction and repulsion in general” it was not able to “supply physics with a guideline for a systematic investigation of the specific forces of nature” (Förster 1993: xxxiv). Second, when classifying the forces of nature, philosophy cannot confine itself to providing models a priori. After having recognized an a priori normativity within nature, philosophy has the crucial task to explain how this normativity is embedded within nature in such a way that it can be considered to be a constitutive part of nature itself. Thus in the passages of the Opus postumum, Kant aims for the continuum formarum (mentioned a few lines later), but does so in accordance with the epistemological paradigm of the third Critique—namely, according to both a vertical and horizontal continuity. The former refers to the relationship between the forms of conceptual thought and appearance (Erscheinung); yet this is no longer to be understood as an external legalization of appearance, but rather as the so-called ‘appearance of appearance’ (Erscheinung der Erscheinung), that is, the representation of

96  Gualtiero Lorini the emergence of the appearance as deriving from a principle (for example, Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 329). The horizontal continuity looks at the plurality of the appearances, but it is linked with vertical continuity insofar as the conceptual ground of the appearances can be detected within each of them and their mutual relationship can be formalized on the basis of this common conceptual root. It is clear that the decisive difference that makes the adoption of this perspective possible in the third Critique is represented by the introduction of the principle of the formal purposiveness of nature: Judgment first makes it possible, indeed necessary, for us to think of nature as having not only a mechanical necessity but also a purposiveness; if we did not presuppose this purposiveness, there could not be systematic unity in the thoroughgoing classification of particular forms in terms of empirical laws. (FI, 20: 219) In order to clarify this new framework, where the systematic element is no longer merely descriptive but also needs a transcendental foundation, to assume a constitutive value, Kant refers to those concepts in the eleventh draft (tenth fascicle) “which, although invented, still belong to physics.” One of the examples Kant uses for these concepts is the “Caloric [Ether]—the divisibility of the decomposition of a matter into different species” (Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 282). These are the “mediating concepts” (Mittelbegriffe),4 and their systematic role is crucial in this context.

Mediating concepts and forms of composition In the transition from the study of motion in general (in the Metaphysical Foundations) to the system of the fundamental original moving forces, which are internal to matter (in the Opus postumum), Kant searches for certain coordinates that will help to understand and define the essential characteristics of matter. Kant claims that, in order to represent and measure some properties of matter, they must be first of all assumed as actual. Furthermore, since such properties cannot be observed directly, but can only be achieved by conceptual analysis, philosophy has the systematic task of collecting those mediating concepts that are fundamental to a theory of matter into a conceptual system. Only through this systematic collection can the rational classifying of these principles be possible (Emundts 2004, 202; De Bianchi 2010, 244; van den Berg 2014, 175): In a system of natural science, it is therefore unavoidable that a leap (saltus) takes place if a mediating concept [Mittelbegriff ] (not the logical one in a syllogism, which merely concerns the form of

“Composition” and mediating concepts  97 reasoning, but the real one, which presents an object to reason) is not taken into account, which, on the one hand, is linked to a concept of the object a priori, and, on the other, is connected with the condition of possibility of experience, under which this concept can be achieved. For then alone such a concept serves as the transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural science to physics, which then is not a leap. (a–c, Aug.–Sept. 1798, OP, 21: 285) This passage is particularly interesting because it stresses the construction of mediating concepts as the main task of the whole transition. The relevance of such auxiliary terms appears in the draft a–c (Aug.–Sept. 1798) as a guarantee of continuity between the natural genera. Here Kant highlights that if one progresses “from the concept of a genus to a species contained within it, for example, from the concept of a metal to that of iron,” in this case we are only dealing with “a progression (progreßus),” because “I think only [of] the special under the general and define the latter concept.” Quite differently, if one moves “from one genus to another, for instance from the concept of metals to that of stones,” this case has to labeled as a transition (transitus) which, if it has not been carried out systematically by the logical incorporation of a higher term into the lower ones contained below it, is blamed by the logicians as a faulty transition from one genus to another (μεταβασις εἰς αλλο γενος). (a–c, Aug.–Sept. 1798, OP, 21: 284–285) The main function of the Mittelbegriffe consists therefore in the mediation between an understanding of nature in terms of natural science (that is, as a matter to be translated into mathematical terms and consequently expressed by a system of logical-formal laws), and an understanding of nature in its dynamic variety (which allows appreciating nature as a qualitatively multifaceted and irreducible whole). Thus, the mediation-function of the Mittelbegriffe requires them to be at the same time a priori—as both transcendentally deduced and metaphysically determining—and empirical, as they are epistemologically suitable to embed the principles they postulate into the structure of matter (Waibel 2001; Emundts 2004, 138; Pickhan 2019, 121). Such a mediating function requires a pervasive notion of composition, which is not limited to the definition of the domain of what can be thought and thereby known among the externally given appearances. What appears to be needed is an extension of Kant’s theory of experience from the point of view of the Erscheinung der Erscheinung—that is, we need an idea of composition, which includes all possible forms of composition of that matter, and where the material substrate is explained by ether.

98  Gualtiero Lorini In this context, it is not a priority to determine whether the composition is realized in the form of coordination or subordination; in fact, in these passages, Kant limits himself to placing the two terms next to each other as equivalents for the purposes of the composition that is realized through them. What should be emphasized is that the pure intuition of space and time—intended as an a priori representation—is “merely the Formal [das Formale] of composition [Zusammenstellung] (coordinatio et subordinatio)” (Conv. VII, Apr.–Dez. 1800, OP, 22: 42).5 The formal element represented by space and time, which by means of composition is instantiated on the “aggregate of sensible objects [Aggregat der Sinnengegenstände],” supports “the tendency toward a system of manifold” that unfolds “according to a principle of thoroughgoing determination [durchgängige Bestimmung].” Kant adds that this systematic tendency—which closely resembles the “natural tendency” of the metaphysical principles—determines the possibility of experience, the sense of which can only be one (die nur Eine seyn kann). Furthermore, this systematic determination of the possibility of experience makes it possible to univocally represent its object as an appearance of the affected subject and not as a thing in itself (ibid.). In order to understand how this considerable depth of Kant’s account of experience works, it is necessary to focus on the transition from the subjective to the objective in the composition of the empirical manifold. This is achieved through the principle of objective composition, which is understood here as the coordinatio of the parts in a systematic whole of experience: The Formal of such a connection [Verknüpfung] of the empirical manifold under the principle of this composition [Zusammensetzung] (coordinatio) turns its Subjective into objective and a priori with respect to a whole of this connection (forma dat eße rei) in experience, because the Empirical of it is connected to a system of perceptions [Wahrnehmungen] in an unconditioned (absolute) and therefore necessary way; and [this Formal] makes it possible that, through observation and experiment in the composition of the Empirical, the synthetic unity can be encountered, which is necessary because what is a priori given as an appearance [Erscheinung] is at the same time recognized in the consciousness of the existence of the object itself. (Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 368–369) The synthetic unity of the subjective composition of the empirical becomes objective and necessary in so far as it expresses an a priori order of the appearance—that is, in so far as what is given in perception is recognized in consciousness as belonging to the existence of the object. This decisive shift from the subjective to the objective, which makes it

“Composition” and mediating concepts  99 possible to consider the material element within the connection between empirical representations—what Kant calls dabile—as shaped by the formal principle (cogitabile) of this same representative articulation is expressed by the core-formula forma dat esse rei.6 As De Bianchi (2010, 239–240) has perspicuously indicated, this state of affairs significantly differs from the first Critique. It is clear that, even in the first Critique, Kant considers transcendental forms in a double light: they are at the same time objects of possible knowledge that are necessarily a priori, and sources of the possibility of experience in general. Yet in the Opus postumum, Kant seems to look at the unity of the experience from an even broader point of view. In fact, he does not seek the principles of experience in general as the principles of the distributive unity of experience. Instead, Kant puts them into a research framework that aims to identify the whole of possible experience. As a result, by bringing together the principles of the distributive unity of experience, the whole of possible experience can be configured as a systematically ordered totality—that is, as a matter systematically shaped by the a priori laws of reason. This makes it possible to account for the moving forces of matter and, through them, the system of empirical knowledge: The moving forces 1) in the appearance [Erscheinung] subjectively 2) in perception [Wahrnehmung] objectively 3) in the composition [Zusammensetzung] of the manifold of perceptions into the concept within my consciousness 4) a principle of possibility of experience (of empirical thought in general) within the system of moving forces objectively, in general, turning the cogitabile into dabile as the transition to physics. (Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 385–386) Even here we can grasp the work of the principle forma dat esse rei. This is namely through the individuation of a principle of the possibility of experience, which is always mediated by the possibility of shifting from the cogitabile to the dabile—that is, from the subjective in appearance to the objective in perception. This step owes itself to a way of composing the manifold of this perception, which depends on the conceptual synthesis. The objectivity that characterizes the system of moving forces holds in this context as the crowning achievement of that “empirical thought in general” (and it is not by chance that this echoes the first Critique). It has been rightly observed that, in the Critique of Pure Reason, the position of the Postulates of empirical thought in general within the Analytic and with respect to the Dialectic is in fact aimed at clarifying the empirical use of the pure concepts of understanding; this thus distinguishes the “weak” subjective necessity (proper to reason’s dialectical inferences) from the stronger subjective necessity (proper to pure intuitions and pure concepts), which is the foundation of objectivity (Motta

100  Gualtiero Lorini 2012, 196). From this point of view, in the system of moving forces, the subjective necessity of the cogitabile, by virtue of pure concepts and pure intuitions, fulfills the transition to physics as it achieves transcendental objectivity. Kant effectively describes this crucial transition as he claims that while the reality (Realität) of an object is given by the accordance of the appearances in it, the proof of its actuality (Wirklichkeit) comes from the mere form of this accordance, which lies in the synthetic representation: Everything that we shall know a priori, namely, synthetically, can only be judged as an object within appearance [in der Erscheinung], not as the object in itself [der Gegenstand an sich selbst]; hence, as far as the object of experience is concerned, only the accordance [Zusammenstimmung] of appearances in the same object can constitute the reality [Realität] of it, and the mere form of the accordance of the manifold in it, within the synthetic representation, can provide the proof of its actuality [Wirklichkeit] (forma dat eße rei). (Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 375)

Broadening the subject’s horizon This extension of the concept of experience presupposes and at the same time implies, or simply coincides with, an extension of the subject’s horizon. Following Kant’s description, the proper knowledge of the characteristics of matter depends “on the synthetic activity which, through mathematical physics, configures the nature of matter according to the principle forma dat esse rei” (De Bianchi 2010, 244). In order to understand the way in which this form configures the thing, we shall go back to the previously mentioned passages, where coordination and subordination are taken together as bringing the “Formal [das Formale]” into a concrete expression in the composition of the manifold within space and time. It is well known that Kant, in the first Critique, treats space and time as belonging to the transcendental sphere of the subject insofar as they are a priori conditions of the givenness of the manifold. The unity of the appearance that originates from this manifold is achieved through the synthesis operated by the pure concepts of understanding; and the way in which these concepts are applied to the spatio-temporal manifold leads to the so-called “quid iuris-problem” (CPR, A84–85/B116–117). On the one hand, the critical connotation of space and time is kept in the Opus postumum—as shown, for example, in passages like: “space and time are not objects of intuition but pure intuition itself; and the formal element in the synthetic unity of the manifold of them as appearances [Erscheinungen], under the principle of their composition, is spontaneity, not receptivity” (OP, 22: 439). On the other hand, however,

“Composition” and mediating concepts  101 it seems possible to attenuate the heterogeneity of the purely receptive function (space and time) and the spontaneous/active function (concepts of the understanding) of the synthesis. In the twelfth draft (Conv. VII, Apr.–Dez. 1800), Kant states that space “is no perceivable [warnehmbarer] (apprehensible) object, but rather a product of the faculty of representing [Vorstellungsvermögens] the aspectabile as cogitabile, namely, as a self-activity (Spontaneitas not Receptivitas)” (OP, 22: 42). And he is even more explicit a few lines later: Space and time are, on the one hand, acts of the subject’s spontaneity within intuition and, on the other, affections of reception [affectionen der Receptivität]: [the former meaning refers] to the composition of the manifold [Zusammensetzung des Manigfaltigen], whereas [the second to] the presentation [Darstellung] of the composite [Zusammengesetzten] in the unity of the concept. (Conv. VII, Apr.–Dez.-1800, OP, 22: 42–43) Furthermore, the fact that space and time can be conceived of also within the framework of the understanding’s spontaneous activity means that, by representing to itself a spatio-temporalized manifold, the subject is not simply setting the manifold as a dabile; rather, it is unifying this manifold according to a principle a priori. By doing so, the subject shapes this manifold dabile, thereby acknowledging its inner structure as a cogitabile. This once again reveals the systematic need for a broader concept of ‘composition.’ With respect to the terms, Kant uses to address this topic in the first Critique, where he aims to explain in more detail how the presentation of the manifold as an appearance ipso facto places the transcendental laws at the heart of the matter. This succeeds by virtue of the Mittelbegriffe, which translates within matter the conceptual structure of the understanding’s law, thereby bringing the Formal into the Material. And—as we have tried to highlight so far—the activity of the Mittelbegriffe can only be adequately recognized through the multifaceted spectrum of the concept of composition. Insofar as such a concept must always refer to an a priori principle, it is crucial to rediscover the form of the transcendental (categorical) unity already at the level of that spatio-temporal presentation (Darstellung). This presentation is maintained as the precondition of the conceptual representation (Vorstellung) (see, e.g., CPR, A155–156/B195; CPJ, 5: 192–193; JL, 9: 100). Upon closer examination, this can be seen mutatis mutandis as a development of what Kant states in the Anticipations of the Perception of the first Critique, when he describes the sensation [Empfindung] as “matter of perception [Materie der Wahrnehmung]” (CPR, A167/B209). With this comment, he means that what is “found” at the level of sensibility constitutes the matter of what can be “taken as true [wahr-nehmen]”

102  Gualtiero Lorini through conceptual recognition. Even in the third Critique we find a meaningful resonance with this decisive transition-dynamic from givenness to consciousness, as Kant at §39 (On the Communicability of a Sensation [Von der Mittheilbarkeit einer Empfindung]) defines sensation (Empfindung) as “the real in perception” (das Reale der Wahrnehmung) (CPJ, 5: 291). The standpoint of the Erscheinung der Erscheinung, which Kant pursues in the Opus postumum, precisely aims at understanding and expressing the grounds for this transition within matter, and accordingly can only do so through the composition of this matter: thus forma dat esse rei. We can find here, once again, the connection mentioned above between vertical and horizontal continuity. At present they prove to be two sides of the same coin: Kant actually claims that the formal aspect of the manifold as an unconditioned whole is “the representation of space and time (to be next to and after each other)” (Conv. VII, Apr.–Dez. 1800, OP, 22: 25). Space and time constitute here a pure representation given a priori, through which the subject posits itself, thereby turning itself into an object of the senses, but […] not merely analytically according to concepts, rather synthetically, that is, through construction of concepts within the whole manifold of intuition, namely, as a true object [als wahres Object]. (ibid.) The latest passage closely alludes to the theory of the subject’s selfpositioning [Selbstsetzung]. Kant’s rethinking of subjectivity in the Opus postumum through the theory of self-positing [Selbstsetzungslehre] (especially in the drafts contained in the seventh and eleventh fascicle), as well as the debate on the possibility of taking such selfpositing as the most mature expression of the synthetic unity of apperception, are frequently discussed topics that we cannot deal with in the present text (see, e.g., Förster 1989, 2000, 75–116; Howard 2019; Thomson 2019). Rather, we would like to point out that the transitional project of expanding the concept of experience inevitably corresponds to an expansion of the subjective sphere of activity. Kant assigns space and time, moreover, not only the role of forms of the possible sensible data, but also an active function in the concrete composition of the manifold according to principles (Choi 1996, 7–11; Dörflinger 2000, 91–101). This allows the process to be clarified, whereby the formal regularity of the concept is recognized in a matter constituted by internal moving forces. These forces express in concreto and systematically the regularity of the concept, and thus explain the step from the cogitabile to the dabile. In this extension of the subject’s action-framework, we can detect the influence of Salomon Maimon’s critical remarks concerning Kant’s solution to the quid iuris-issue. Kant did in fact appreciate Maimon’s

“Composition” and mediating concepts  103 remarks in his Essay on Transcendental Philosophy (Versuch über die Transzendentalphilosophie, 1790), which he had known since 1789 (even before its publication) via M. Herz (L, 11: 49). The solution proposed by Maimon in the Essay considers space and time as part of a proto-phenomenological analysis of the process by which consciousness determines the meaning of knowledge (Lorini 2019). Accordingly, space and time “are as much concepts as intuitions, and the latter presupposes the former” (Maimon 2010, 14). Maimon develops a conception of space and time where these are forms of the relationship between the elements of sensation (Empfindung), and this allows for these elements to be taken-as-true—that is, to be perceived as the morphology of the German verb wahrnehmen (to perceive) suggests. Space and time thus no longer hold as mere forms of the empirical presentation of a manifold, on which the conceptual representative activity can then be exerted. Rather, they are functions through which consciousness concretely activates certain conceptual relations between the elements of intuition; thus by “matter” Maimon does not mean “an object, but merely the ideas that perceptions must ultimately be resolved into” (Maimon 2010, 109). Maimon’s results are, nevertheless, idealistic. For this reason, a systematic test of his supposed influence in the pages of the Opus postumum under discussion would require a careful assessment of these issues to avoid the risk of superficially branding them as Kant’s slippage into the subjectivist instances of the emerging German idealism.7

Final remarks: an infinite goal of reason Beyond this historical suggestion, which would deserve further elaboration, we would like to conclude in the same way as we began—namely, with a methodological remark. It is clear that a broad concept such as composition, if examined in its systematic validity within a complex and problematic corpus like the Opus postumum, runs the risk of getting dispersed into something that is everywhere and therefore nowhere. It is therefore necessary to explain the use and functions of this term, which we have tried to do by concentrating on the function of the Mittelbegriffe and the related role of space and time in the synthesis of the manifold. At the same time, the broad diffusion of this concept within the Übergangsprojekt means that the term cannot be bound to the strict dating of the drafts, as should be the case when we deal with tracing a concept through a wide spectrum of notes. Nevertheless, it cannot be entirely neglected that the consideration of space and time as “the Formal of composition of the manifold,” which points to the subjective synthetic activity, emerges with particular emphasis in one of the most mature drafts—that is, the twelfth (Conv. VII, Apr.-Dez. 1800).8 As far as the systematic consideration of the composition with regard to the fulfillment of the transition is concerned, we can maintain that

104  Gualtiero Lorini the transition is achieved when the various forms of composition are both found in matter and can be traced back to the synthetic unity of apperception from the point of view of things, namely, without imposing on things the point of view of the transcendental subject. Thus, Kant is not looking at things as he does in the objective part of Transcendental Deduction (especially in the A version)—namely, in the form of the ‘object in general [Gegenstand überhaupt].’ In the context at stake, Kant intends instead the objective point of view as a perspective “quoad materiale.” And he suggests this when he claims that “the possibility of establishing a priori a system of empirical representations illuminates what otherwise would appear impossible,” that is, the possibility “of anticipating experience quoad materiale” (Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 502, trans. amended). The challenge consists precisely in “establishing something a priori about that which is a posteriori” (Giovanelli 2011, 7). Facing the difficulty raised by this kind of anticipation, in the first Critique—and mentioned on the same page of the Anticipation of Perception (A167/B209)9 described above—Kant speaks of something “strange” [befremdlich], an expression that returns in a significant way in the Opus postumum: It is strange [befremdlich] – it even appears to be impossible, to wish to present a priori that which depends on perceptions (empirical representations with consciousness of them): e.g. sound, light, heat, etc., which, all together, amount to the subjective element in perception (empirical representation with consciousness) and, hence, carries with it no knowledge of an object. (Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 493) In the framework of Opus postumum, however, Kant shows greater determination when taking up this challenge. This is perhaps because he is aware that the Mittelbegriffe have a greater capacity to penetrate matter: Yet this act of the faculty of representation is necessary. For, were a counteract of the object not to correspond to this act, the subject would receive no perception of the object by means of the latter’s moving force (which is here presupposed). (ibid.) The possibility of finding the mark of rational regularity in the various forms of composition that underlies each synthesis is the essence of the principle forma dat esse rei. It is particularly about the possibility of referring the matter of the world to an inner law, which also expresses the structure of understanding.

“Composition” and mediating concepts  105 By supporting the natural tendency of the Metaphysical Foundations toward physics, Kant does not cease pursuing his ultimate goal. This aim should be better understood as a task, because it does not seem to be satisfied when it finally hits a target. In fact, it does not consist in the presumed filling of the gap between metaphysical foundations and physics once and for all, but it is better expressed in the almost asymptotic trend of the Übergang (and thus intended as a transition to a further higher level of accomplishment). The Opus postumum often leads us to think that, ideally, Kant could have conceived of a further passage, which would have gone even beyond that pursued in the Übergangsprojekt. Moderating the Newtonian claims of a purely mathematico-mechanical physics, Kant seeks in the Übergangsprojekt “the link that can bind the metaphysics of nature (and ultimately transcendental philosophy) to physics as a system of empirics—and not as a mere aggregate of heterogeneous appearances linked only formally by mathematics” (Duque 2001, 187). Such an ambitious goal, nevertheless, does not exhaust the breadth of the critical-transcendental project as a whole, which in this context consists in finding the unity of reason as mirrored in the unity of nature. This operation cannot succeed without criteria that allow these two units to recognize each other in their structural identity; and this can only happen through ‘bridge-concepts’ that, from time to time, make this recognition possible by acting according to similar forms of composition.

Notes 1 The author thanks Dina Emundts, Giovanni Pietro Basile, and Ansgar Lyssy for their remarks on a previous version of this paper. 2 Translation slightly amended. 3 I employ here the term “phenomenon,” since this is the term Kant uses in the quoted passage. In the rest of the paper, however, I will employ the term “appearance” for two reasons: first, in the majority of the passages cited here, Kant uses the term Erscheinung; second, the context of my analysis refers to the notion of Erscheinung der Erscheinung, which, in the English translation of Kant’s works as well as in the English-language secondary literature, is commonly rendered as “appearance of appearance.” 4 Kant also refers to these concepts as Zwischenbegriffe (see, for example, No 1–No 3η, Sept.–Oct. 1798, OP, 21: 165, 172; a–c, Aug.–Sept. 1798, OP, 21: 486). 5 See also: Conv. VII, Apr.–Dez. 1800, OP, 22: 44–45, 413. 6 In this sense, see also: Conv. X/XI, Aug. 1799–Apr. 1800, OP, 22: 313: Physics is the systematic doctrine of the empirical nature-research: as a tendency of metaphysical foundations of natural science. The principles a priori underlying the nature-research are the metaphysical foundations of natural science. Physics is the science of the principles that connect the moving forces of nature into a system of experience. To this science belong: 1) the Material of empirical representations [Vorstellungen] (dabile) 2) the Formal of composition [Zusammenstellung] of its manifold

106  Gualtiero Lorini into a system (cogitabile), which contains the law of connection between those [representations] for the sake of the possibility of experience as a unity, and which must be laid a priori as the idea of connection (forma dat eße rei). 7 On the influence of Maimon’s remarks on Kant’s philosophy for German idealism, see Beiser (1987, 286), Smith (2012, 286). 8 With respect to some of the technical meanings of “composition,” it is interesting to focus on the dates of Lavoisier’s influence on Kant, in particular as regards the epistemological status of chemistry. On this theme, see the significant contributions by Tuschling (1971, 43–45, 129–159), Vasconi (2001), Basile (2013, 232–235, 279), Blomme (2015). 9 Later Kant writes: nevertheless there must always be something striking [etwas Auffallendes] about this anticipation of perception for a researcher who has become accustomed to transcendental consideration and thereby become cautious, and some reservation is aroused about the fact that the understanding can anticipate a synthetic proposition of the sort which that concerning the degree of everything real in appearance is, and thus about the possibility of the inner variation of the sensation itself if one abstracts from its empirical quality, and it is therefore a question not unworthy of solution, how the understanding can assert something synthetic a priori about appearances, and indeed anticipate them in that which is really merely empirical, namely what pertains to sensation. (CPR, A175/B217)

References Basile, Giovanni Pietro. 2013. Kants Opus postumum und seine Rezeption. Berlin: De Gruyter. Beiser, Frederick C. 1987. The Fate of Reason: German Philosophy from Kant to Fichte. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Blomme, Henny. 2015. “Kant’s Conception of Chemistry in the Danziger Physik.” In Reading Kant’s Lectures. Edited by Robert Clewis, 484–502. Berlin: De Gruyter. Choi, Di So-In. 1996. Selbstbewußtsein und Selbstanschauung: Eine Reflexion über Einheit und Entzweiung des Subjekts in Kants Opus postumum. Berlin: De Gruyter. De Bianchi, Silvia. 2010. Questioni epistemologiche nella scienza della natura dell’ultimo Kant. Dissertation, Roma: Sapienza University. Dörflinger, Bernd. 2000. Das Leben theoretischer Vernunft: Teleologische und praktische Aspekte der Erfahrungstheorie Kants. Berlin: De Gruyter. Duque, Félix. 2001. “Le rapport de Kant, dans son œuvre tardive, à Fichte et à Schelling.” In Années 1796–1803. Kant: Opus postumum. Edited by Ingeborg Schüssler, 185–216. Paris: Vrin. Emundts, Dina. 2004. Kants Übergangskonzeption im Opus postumum. Zur Rolle des Nachlaßwerkes für die Grundlegung der empirischen Physik. Berlin: De Gruyter. Förster, Eckart. 1989. “Kant’s Selbstsetzungslehre.” In Kant’s Transcedental Deduction: The Three Critiques and the Opus postumum. Edited by Eckart Förster, 217–238. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

“Composition” and mediating concepts  107 Förster, Eckart. 1993. Introduction. In Immanuel Kant, Opus postumum. Edited by Eckart Förster. Translated by Eckart Förster and Michael Rosen, xv–lvi. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Förster, Eckart. 2000. Kant’s Final Synthesis: An Essay on the Opus postumum. Harvard: Harvard University Press. Giovanelli, Marco. 2011. Reality and Negation – Kant’s Principle of Anticipations of Perception: An Investigation of Its Impact on the Post-Kantian Debate. Dordrecht: Springer. Howard, Stephen. 2019. “The Transition within the Transition: The Übergang from the Selbstsetzungslehre to the Ether Proofs in Kant’s Opus postumum.” Kant-Studien, 110 (4), 595–617. Lorini, Gualtiero. 2017. “The Practical Purposiveness in the Determination of a Free Will: The Paradoxical Character of Kant’s A Priori.” In Kant e o A Priori. Edited by Leonel Ribeiro dos Santos, Robert B. Louden, Ubirajara R. de Azevedo Marques, 267–778. São Paulo: Cultura Acadêmica. Lorini, Gualtiero. 2019. “Verità, linguaggio e coscienza in Salomon Maimon.” Discipline Filosofiche, 29 (1): 125–150. Maimon, Salomon. (1790) 2010. Essay on Transcendental Philosophy. Translated and Edited by Nick Midgley, Henry Somers-Hall, Alistair Welchman and Merten Reglitz. London: Continuum. Motta, Giuseppe. 2012. Die Postulate des empirischen Denkens überhaupt: KrV A 218–235-B 265–287. Ein kritischer Kommentar. Berlin: De Gruyter. Pickhan, Anna. 2019. “Der Körper im Opus postumum. Ein neues Fundament für Kants Teleologie.” In Teleologische Reflexion in Kants Philosophie. Edited by Paula Órdenes and Anna Pickhan, 111–122. Wiesbaden: Springer. Smith, Daniel W. 2012. Essays on Deleuze. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Thomson, Terrence. 2019. “The Understanding in Transition: Fascicles X, XI and VII of Opus postumum.” Con-Textos Kantianos, 9: 23–48. Thorndike, Oliver. 2018. Kant’s Transition Project and Late Philosophy. Connecting the Opus postumum and Metaphysics of Morals. London: Bloomsbury. Tuschling, Burkhard. 1971. Metaphysische und transzendentale Dynamik in Kants Opus postumum. Berlin: De Gruyter. Van den Berg, Hein. 2014. Kant on Proper Science: Biology in the Critical Philosophy and the Opus postumum. Dordrecht: Springer. Vasconi, Paola. 2001. “Fragen der Datierung des Opus postumum im Verhältnis zur chemischen Revolution Lavoisiers.” In Kant und die Berliner Aufklärung: Akten des IX. Internationalen Kant-Kongresses. Edited by Ralph Schumacher, Rolf-Peter Horstmann, Volker Gerhardt, 658–666. Berlin: De Gruyter. Waibel, Violetta L. 2001. “Des principes régulateurs qui sont en même temps constitutifs.” In Années 1796–1803. Kant: Opus postumum. Edited by Ingeborg Schussler, 147–157. Paris: Vrin.

6 Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum and in the Critique of Pure Reason Dina Emundts

In Kant’s theory of cognition, the faculties with which humans cognitively relate to themselves require special attention. Thus, selfconsciousness plays a crucial role. Nonetheless, there are also other concepts that are linked to the concept of self-consciousness. One is the concept of self-affection, another one is the concept of self-positing. My aim in this paper is to provide an understanding of the idea of selfaffection in the Opus postumum. Directly devoted to this task is the second part of this essay. It answers the questions as to what self-affection in the Opus postumum is and what function it has. In this context, I will also take a look at the relation of the concept of self-affection to other concepts—especially self-positing. The reference to the first Critique also plays a role in these considerations. It does so in the sense that I repeatedly examine the extent to which the remarks of the late work can be embedded in the framework of critical philosophy. The results of these examinations turn out to be rather rough. For, as it will be shown, this relation is unclear, especially where even the first Critique provides ambiguous answers, and alternatives are still disputed (such as the question whether, for Kant, perceptions are already conceptual and, if so, by which concepts they are structured). Although these examinations have rough results, they help to understand the project of the Opus postumum. In the third part of my essay, I deal with the topic of self-affection in the Critique of Pure Reason itself. This can only be done in a very limited way. I will sketch out an interpretation of the theory of self-affection in the first Critique and try to put forward two theses: (1) In the Critique of Pure Reason, a conception is developed in which self-affection means roughly the same as in the Opus postumum (in Conv. X and XI). (2) In the Critique of Pure Reason, problems arise with regard to the theory of apperception and the I, of which self-affection is a part. It is in virtue of these problems that this theory is taken up again in Kant’s Opus postumum in the latest convolutes (VII, I). I do not really argue in favor of these theses, I rather provide an account of how the considerations concerning self-affection in the critical and late writings may hang together. DOI: 10.4324/9781003090946-7

Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum  109 Since it can be helpful for understanding self-affection in the Opus postumum, I will start by tracking the development of the concept of self-affection chronologically, from the Critique of Pure Reason to the Opus postumum. This is contained in the first brief section of my essay. However, it will only be a sketch and the other parts will flesh out this sketch. The topic of self-affection has been much debated in the secondary literature, especially in recent years. This has been done by asking what self-affection is, as well as in the context of related topics such as empirical self-consciousness and inner sense. Because most of these works have the first Critique at the center of their investigation, I will deal with them in the third part of my essay—and due to brevity only sporadically. At this point, however, I want to say that some interpreters see the development of the Opus postumum in a similar way as I do and suggest an analogous thesis: that in the Opus postumum, the conception of selfaffection, as outlined in the Critique of Pure Reason, is taken up under the perspective of possible empirical cognitions and that more fundamental questions about it arise constantly. I would like to mention here, especially Bondeli (2018, 100 ff.), Klemme (1996, esp. 387 ff.), and Zobrist (2011, esp. 167 ff.).

Self-affection in Kant’s theory of cognition The topic of self-affection appears in the critical writings especially in the context of time as a form of intuition and in the deduction of the categories. In the Opus postumum, the topic of self-affection seems to be relevant to answering questions of specific cognition in the empirical sciences, especially in empirical physics. Obviously, in both cases, the idea is part of a complex idea of cognition. If one wanted to see the first Critique and the passages from the Opus postumum in continuity with one another—i.e., building one complex theory—then, the following option of interpretation would be available: self-affection is an ability we have to relate to ourselves. It is a relation to oneself that is also part of our relation to the world. Whenever I relate to myself as something, I determine myself. This can only be done by determining myself according to the categories and forms of space and time. These two aspects—namely, that (1) relating to something as something means determining and that (2) determining for us is always categorical and spatio-temporal—concern the condition for objectivity in general. These aspects are brought up in the Critique of Pure Reason. They also imply another aspect: it means that self-relation as a relation to something (that we can judge about and understand) is only possible as a relation to us as appearances; whenever I refer to myself as something, I do refer to myself as appearance. This is what Kant wants to stress in the context of his theory of the transcendental I or self-consciousness as the condition

110  Dina Emundts for knowledge in the deduction of the first Critique. But another position can be taken with regard to this self-determining act, in relation to the topic of empirical knowledge. The thesis here seems to be that the act of determining that leads to empirical knowledge always has two sides: determining oneself as an object implies at the same time determining other objects in the outer world—and vice versa. If we spell out the act of determination, we therefore have to look for both sides: self-­determination and the determination of outer objects. We also have to ask how this mediation is possible and this topic of mediation is responsible for the fact that Kant brings the body of human beings into focus. Self-affection is conceived of as the necessary ability for empirical knowledge, which is what Kant seeks to explain in the Opus postumum. The interpretation sketched here, aiming at a systematic understanding of self-affection in Kant’s theory of knowledge in the critical writings as well as in the Opus postumum, cannot be spelled out in more detail in this paper. However, this stands somehow in the background. Concerning the development of the theory of cognition, this interpretation would suggest the following: in the Opus postumum, Kant took over the idea of self-affection from the Critique of Pure Reason in order to carry it out in the context of his project of a foundation of empirical physics. That this theory can be spelled out in this way was already clear at the time of the Critique of Pure Reason. In this sense, there is a continuity. However, problems that already existed and were clear to Kant at the time of the Critique of Pure Reason resurfaced in this other project. These problems are responsible for the way the discussion in the Opus postumum also slips more and more into transcendental philosophical questions and considers more fundamental decisions.

Self-affection in the Opus postumum I will first outline the aims of the project in which self-affection plays a role and then develop the idea of self-affection by relating it to some basic ideas of the first Critique. The aims of the project The concept of self-affection plays an important systematic role in the tenth and eleventh convolutes of the Opus postumum, which Kant worked on around 1799–1800. The philosophically leading question here is about the possibility of physics as an empirical science. Kant was already mainly concerned with this question in the years 1795–1799. In the considerations of both these periods (1795–1799 and 1799–1800) Kant assumes that there is a philosophical foundation of physics. There is much to be said about the fact that he still somehow sees his work Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (1786) as having this

Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum  111 function.1 This writing, with recourse to the Critique of Pure Reason, provides fundamental laws as well as concepts that can be regarded as the basis for research in physics. Although there is some evidence that Kant extended the principles of the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science in the first years of the Opus postumum, the basic assumptions of the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science are not only still binding for him but also the starting point of empirical physics. Among these assumptions are Newton’s laws of motion of bodies and, most importantly for the Opus postumum, the assumptions about a theory of matter, according to which everything can be explained by moving forces, as well as the assumption that such a theory must begin with the forces of attraction and repulsion. In the first texts of the Opus postumum (until 1799), Kant considers his project of the foundation of empirical physics with regard to questions concerning the content of the system of physics. This includes, above all, the question as to what further concepts of forces can be derived, such that they may or indeed must be introduced in order to be able to determine matter and different states thereof. 2 Under this aspect fall ‘the ether proof,’ as well as a so-called ‘elementary system of the moving forces,’ in which forces and also possible states of matter are listed according to the categorical classification of quantity, etc. These questions concern the mediation between general concepts— given in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science—and specific concepts that are needed in empirical physics. Around 1799–1800, these questions seem for Kant to be more or less answered. In convolutes 10 and 11, around 1799–1800, in the framework of which the idea of self-­ affection plays an important role, the question of the possibility of mediation, rather than the question of content, is in the foreground. How is it possible to do empirical science and to arrive at empirical knowledge on the basis of a metaphysics of nature? It is baffling that this question is asked here again in this radical form, given that Kant’s critical philosophy should already contain an answer to this. However, I shall put aside for the moment the explanation of the relation of this question to his critical philosophy. Kant’s answer to the question is that empirical science is possible because we ‘put into nature’ what knowledge we gain. This is an answer that repeats at this level, i.e., with regard to empirical knowledge what Kant had asserted in the first Critique about the possibility of knowledge in general; think, for example, of the preface to the second edition. The basic idea then seems to be: when we physically determine matter as liquid, for example, and explain its state of aggregation, we do not react to perceptions and do not derive anything from perception, but we construct physical objects on the basis of our conceptual orders. Thus, it would appear that the question about the possibility of the transition to empirical physics arises after the establishment of an

112  Dina Emundts elementary system of moving forces. Originating in the Metaphysical Foundation of Natural Science, this question reads: how can concepts of specific states of matter developed by us be applied in such a way that they serve to explain empirical phenomena? In this context, the concept of self-affection becomes an issue. 3 Thereby, Kant claims that the transition from a metaphysical foundation to empirical physics is possible in virtue of the fact that the subject affects itself. This can be seen in the following passage: It is not in the fact that the subject is affected empirically by the object (per receptivitatem), but that it affects itself (per spontaneitatem), that the possibility of the transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural science to physics consists.4 (OP, 22: 405)5 Here self-affection means, first of all, that the experiences come about spontaneously and actively, i.e., that the mind is significantly involved in structuring what is our object. This can be taken from the following passage: The perception of the object is consciousness of the moving forces of the subject itself; not in so far as it is affected, but as it affects itself—that is, through the understanding, brings the manifold of appearance under a principle of its own composition.6 (OP, 22: 456) Self-affection names an ability we as human beings have and must have in order to possess a structured world. On the basis of the project description given before, we can initially conclude that, starting from other physical grounding ideas, we develop concepts that are needed for the explanation of specific matters and their states. We then apply them actively to phenomena. That way, we are able to get cognitions of these objects, provided these objects of the external world have received our own structuring in advance. The concept of self-affection—elaborated by relating it to some basic ideas of the first Critique With regard to the reference to the first Critique, the following can be argued at this point: Since we want to obtain necessary and systematic knowledge in the empirical sciences, it is clear that we have to refine the basic idea of critical philosophy with regard to empirical knowledge. Not only do space and time and our fundamental concepts, such as substance and causality, structure our reality, but so do concepts of physical forces. However, with respect to the question of continuity or change,

Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum  113 this assertion remains remarkably indeterminate. It could be said that Kant also held this in the context of his critical philosophy—and simply did not refine it because the empirical was not his task there. Alternatively, one could say that Kant now sees the claim to the scientific character of the empirical clearly strengthened and takes this into account in the execution.7 Whereas during the eighties, he would have said that the empirical sciences only search for regularities, he is now looking for a new grounding for empirical knowledge. At least superficially, the second option appears more convincing, in virtue of the fact that Kant, in his opinion, develops something new and surprising here. At least, he repeats the question of how physics is possible very often, trying to answer it always anew. In order to answer the questions of continuity and change, we have to consider even more aspects of the project in which the concept of self-affection seems to be key, as it comes up in the Opus postumum. Kant discusses perception repeatedly in the context of self-affection— as he does in the last quotation above. It is obvious that the thesis is that our perception is active and determined by a priori concepts of moving forces. However, this raises the following question: are the concepts of moving forces fundamental in every perception or is there a particular form of scientific perception? Kant certainly holds that there is a scientific form of active perception, wherein perception is systematically structured by concepts. However, terminologically, we find the tendency to talk of the concept of perception as structured perception and distinguish this from Erscheinungen (appearances), Phaenomena, or Sinnenvorstellungen (phenomena) (22: 405). Wahrnehmung (perception) seems to consist in an object affecting us, with the caveat that for this affecting to take place, we must already understand the object through our own concepts of moving forces. However, this fact also poses new questions and the situation is further complicated given that just such questions (i.e., to what extent and by which concepts our perceptions are already structured) are extremely controversial, even with respect to Kant’s critical philosophy. But perhaps many readers of the Critique of Pure Reason will find the following proposal acceptable, wherein the first assumption refers to the role of concepts in perceptions and the second to the role of specifically physical concepts: 1 For Kant, perceptions have object reference and this is established by the categories. Perceptions without object reference are perceptions in the broad sense of the term, they must actually be called ‘appearances’ or ‘representations’. Accordingly, the entities that Kant here refers to by the expression ‘perceptions’ are not (yet) objects of experience.8 2 For Kant, each of our perceptions is structured in a way that already contains implicitly the concepts of physics to be worked out. This

114  Dina Emundts seems to be just what we gain with regard to the possibility of empirical laws when we justify fundamental physical laws: because space, time, and the categories fundamentally structure every perception, we can also scientifically investigate these objects of perceptions by using the physical concepts that can somehow be derived from or formed following these fundamental concepts. In this way, we can refer perceptually to wax as an everyday object, as well as to it as a physical object. This is because the latter is the same object determined only with the use of concepts, which are specifically directed to its physical properties, but always remain in accordance with the basic structure of objectivity. As an object of perception, however, the wax is always determined by our concepts. If we perceive some liquid wax (without already paying scientific attention to its state of aggregation), we can go on and determine it as liquid wax. We do this by considering it on the basis of our physical concepts of moving forces and the empirical laws associated with them. We can do this because these concepts and laws are specifications of the principle of substance, causality, etc. Kant need not deny here that it is a question of experience whether or not these specific concepts fit the explanations of properties they are associated with. Indeed, this will only be proved in experience. Yet, such a proof can only be given at all if we consider the object on the basis of these conceptual specifications. As the following quotation from the Opus postumum says, scientific perception is such that the subject consciously carries out its structuring activity and thus cognizes objects as constituted by moving forces, whereby the concepts of moving forces underlie its perception: That the perception of external objects is nothing else than the act of the subject by which this affects itself and perceptions are nothing else than moving forces of the same (sc. subject) connected with consciousness, by which the understanding only gets as much according to principles for the empirical (passive of the representations) as it itself has put into it for the sake of possible experience.9 (OP, 22: 392) Although in the Opus postumum Kant tends to understand the concept of perception as referring to the perception of an object systematically connected with other objects by moving forces, which we determine scientifically, there are also passages that seem to contradict this. For Kant distinguishes in other places an aggregate of perceptions from a system of perceptions (OP, 22: 300), suggesting that we have different kinds of perceptions. However, the following must be considered: this need not mean that we really have two kinds of objects—an assumption

Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum  115 that would be untenable in the broader framework of Kant’s philosophy. Rather, we must understand this to mean that in everyday perception10 we still somehow have an aggregate of perceptions because we do not yet have the systematic connection of objects fully in mind. These connections become obvious to us in science and thus our object of perception becomes determined. It would seem that the following conclusion could follow: although all perception is the perception of objects connected in one system, objects can also be perceived without our having explicitly understood these connections. This seems a good way to understand Kant’s theory of perception for both the Critique of Pure Reason and the Opus postumum. Nevertheless, the situation here is indeed still complex. For it concerns, the fundamental question of the relation between the way a system is conceived, in the form of a continuous system of empirical concepts and laws, and the thought that the categories order objects in a systematic way. This is a contentious, key question already for Kant’s texts from the critical period. Moreover, another question could also be raised at this point: since we fundamentally structure our world and then determine it through more specific terms, shouldn’t Kant distinguish two acts of self-affection, or at least clarify that there must be self-affection both on the a priori level and then also on the empirical level? Again, the answer is by no means simple, since it concerns the much-debated question of whether the categories can be applied at all without empirical terms. With regard to the Opus postumum, the question seems to be best posed such (also with regard to the even later volumes): is self-affection empirical in the context of empirical science (and is it then to be distinguished from an a priori self-affection)?11 I can but offer an emphatic negative answer to this question. This is because the point is to apply a priori concepts in such a way that they constitute the object of reference and this cannot be constituted by empirical self-affection. However, although this is an a priori process, I would say that we determine objects in different acts and, in this sense, one could very well distinguish acts of self-affection. Thus, Kant calls self-affection the spontaneous and conscious acts with which we structure objects on the basis of a priori concepts, regardless of whether these are general and fundamental or specified. In the case of the empirical sciences, self-affection takes place through specific concepts. These are assumptions that determine the basic consideration of the possibility of empirical knowledge in Conv. X and XI. Nonetheless, many would say that Kant would have subscribed to them also at the time of the first Critique. Is there then after all a systematic change in the idea of ‘putting into nature’ in the Opus postumum? One could suggest that the difference between Kant’s thought in the eighties and around 1800 is that in the 80s he assumed that we search for these specific concepts in view of the specificity of the perceived

116  Dina Emundts objects. This would mean that at this point he held that the search itself is not systematic, whereas around 1800, he clearly assumes that we set up these concepts before all scientific perception and then put them into nature as a system.12 Now, Kant also made attempts to present a systematic listing of further moving forces in 1786 in the notes to the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science. It is therefore more likely that there is no fundamental change, but that Kant regarded the attempts to a systematic natural research of the empirical already laid out in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science as more and more urgent over the course of time. With a closer look at the earlier considerations of the Opus postumum something else that changed the founding project of empirical knowledge compared to the Critique of Pure Reason becomes noticeable. The system of moving forces, which Kant established in the early 90s, relies on the assumption of an imponderable substance—ether—as a condition of the explanation for space-filling. Moreover, in setting up a system of moving forces, in 1799–1800 Kant also considers the distinction that must be drawn between organic and inorganic bodies. It is obvious (and becomes clear in the text, see OP, 22: 388–389) that these two considerations must play a role in the view that we consciously put moving forces into nature. Thus, we can say that it is indeed a new project because new considerations with respect to the specific scientific explanations have to be integrated. But independently of this, the grounding idea of a transition to empirical sciences by a process of self-affection with a priori concepts of specific physical forces is in principle in continuity with the critical writings. However, the following also became clear: in order to say that there is a continuity between the first Critique and the Opus postumum, we have to subscribe to an interpretation of the first Critique according to which, for example, perceptions of everyday objects are a kind of aggregate of more specific scientific perceptions. More about self-affection So far, we have been dealing with the aspect of the activity of our perception connected with the concept of self-affection. Self-affection means that perception does not take place passively, in the way that something has an effect on us. It suggests that, in perception, we apply our concepts, and thereby what we regard as affecting us, can also be viewed as our own effect. We as human beings are able to perceive things because of acts of structuring. Thus, self-affection also has the function of embedding the given sensation in the spatio-temporal context and, in virtue of this, it can provide temporally extended perceptions. In this sense, self-affection would be central to every theory of perception as well as to a theory of ‘time-consciousness’.13 However, in the context of the question about the possibility of empirical physics, for Kant, there is more

Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum  117 going for the concept of self-affection. Namely, this concept also suggests that the reference of the cognizing subject to itself is constitutive for empirical science. In comparison with the Critique of Pure Reason, this seems to be a novel idea. However, it is again not obvious whether and to what extent Kant’s earlier philosophy accommodated this idea without developing it or whether this idea in the Opus postumum implies a change in Kant’s philosophy. In order to understand these further aspects of self-affection, I will consider again a passage of the Opus postumum. With it, Kant brings a different formulation of what I explained thus far: In regard to matter and those of its forces which affect the subject externally (hence, are moving forces), perceptions are themselves moving forces combined with reaction (reactio), and the understanding anticipates perception according to the uniquely possible forms of motion: attraction, repulsion, enclosure (surrounding) and penetration. Thus the possibility of establishing a priori a system of empirical representations (which otherwise appeared impossible) and of anticipating experience quoad materiale, is illuminated. (OP, 22: 502)14 First of all, what is important about this passage is that it makes clear (once again) that we are able to establish the concepts for empirical sciences a priori. This is because, if we start from the metaphysical foundation of natural sciences, we arrive at specific concepts and these are the only possible concepts. Moreover, the idea of self-affection seems to imply that the cognizing subject uses these available a priori concepts to generate its perceptions by conceptually processing the effects moving forces have on themselves. Perception is thus an interaction of affections in which something affects me, which is then structured or affected by me as an object and— this is now the new aspect compared to what I have elaborated so far— for this to succeed, the cognizing subject must be embodied. Perceptions are products of an activity and never just caused by external objects. Thus, Kant emphasizes that the forces that affect the subject become determined by the subject and this is done by self-determination: “All matter contains a complex of moving forces; and the subject which is affected by them and makes its experience on itself -itself determines these forces which provide the material for experience” (OP, 22: 474).15 Note that in the German version in the phrase und an ihm die Erfahrung macht, what ihm refers to is unclear.16 I understand it as saying that it makes the experience of these forces on itself—on its body. The cognizing subject of empirical research of nature needs a body that allows it to interact with objects. Even more importantly though, the determination of external objects takes place together with a

118  Dina Emundts self-determination of the cognizing subject. Kant makes this clear in various places by referring to self-affection as a process of self-determining and self-knowledge. Thus, Kant also explains self-affection suggesting that the subject affects itself, i.e., recognizes itself as a phenomenon (as it appears to itself)17 (OP, 22: 390). Furthermore, with regard to physical experience, Kant says: the subject affects itself and becomes itself an object in appearance; the composing subject becomes itself an object but in appearance18 (OP, 22: 364). And about the subject, which affects itself, Kant says: it “recognizes itself as phenomenon, and, likewise, necessarily determines its existence in experience, through apprehension in space and time”19 (OP, 22: 465). 20 To summarize, the following can be said: matter acts on the subject through given forces, and the subject consciously perceives these effects and determines them as forces. In this way, it determines itself as something on which forces act and at the same time it determines that which affected it as the external object. Thus, one’s own corporeality, the consciousness of one’s own location and perspective, is considered as a condition for orientation and for scientific perception. Self-affection in the last stage of the Opus postumum (Conv. VII and I) In spite of the narrow context of self-affection in Kant’s discussion about the possibility of empirical physics, there are further developments in Kant’s later texts that shed new light on this topic. Therefore, I will turn briefly to considering them. In Conv. VII and I (dated 1800–1803), some aspects of what Kant captured with self-affection now stand under the concept of self-positing (Selbstsetzung). 21 One passage reads as follows: The relation of the object to the subject which is determined by this (sc. by space and time) is not perception of coexisting things but their conception as appearance. They are not existing things but actus by which the subject posits itself for the purpose of possible experience a priori and constitutes itself to an object. 22 (OP, 22: 71) Perhaps this does not sound any different from what I have already said. However, the considerations here are, first of all, much more fundamental in that they concern knowledge in general and not any specific empirical sciences. Therefore, the structures that are posited by the acts of the subject that are meant here are (again) the fundamental structures, i.e., those given by space, time, and the categories. This is in any case a difference to what self-affection means earlier in the Opus postumum. However, in the Critique of Pure Reason, there is also a concept

Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum  119 of self-affection which concerns primarily determinations on the basis of fundamental principles (we come to this in the third part of this paper). In comparison to the claims of the Critique of Pure Reason about self-affection and self-consciousness, there also seems to be a difference concerning the basic structure here: the concept of self-positing seems to stand for a different process than that described in the first Critique. The process of self-positing seems to be more intentional than selfconsciousness and self-affection in the first Critique. It comes together with many formulations such that it would seem as if Kant is talking of acts of the transcendental I that are real and progressive—especially because he often uses verbs such as schreiten (walk on) and fortgehen (go on). Such formulations come up repeatedly. For example, shortly after the passage just quoted Kant goes on: “The self-determination according to the order of the categories of quality, quantity, etc. is not the logical consciousness of itself, for that is logical. Only by the subject becoming an object to itself does apperception move to apprehension”23 (OP, 22: 72). This seems to imply a more ontological understanding of the self than that the Critique of Pure Reason provided. 24 One of the reasons Kant discusses these very basic claims of his philosophy in the Opus postumum has to do with his intention to discuss again the relation between theoretical and practical philosophy. This aspect lies far beyond the scope of this paper. 25 Nevertheless, there is a continuity in what Kant says about self-positing with what we have elaborated on self-affection. And for this reason, it is no surprise that Kant also uses formulations that we are already familiar with from the theory of self-affection, such as the understanding affects our sense and represents the object of the sense as appearance26 (OP, 22: 69). Both concepts, the self-positing and the self-affection, refer to the same two issues: (1) The question of how we make sense of the fact that we put something into nature when we come to cognitions. (2) The way the cognition of the subject and the object are related to one another. Kant’s thesis is obviously (always) that in cognition we make ourselves objects. This is not new—it could be found in the theory of self-affection as well as in that of self-positing. Especially worthy of discussion—also in relation to the Critique of Pure Reason—seem to be the questions that are more far reaching than the fact that we determine ourselves as an object, namely: (1) Through which act do we turn ourselves into an object? (2) Does the relation to oneself as an object also always mean that there is cognition as an object? In these late passages, Kant’s view seems to be that we already logically, i.e., by apperception, make ourselves an object. In this way, we also seem to be able to assume that we are aware of our principles. In the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant would not talk about an object in this context. However, also in the Opus postumum, Kant seems to maintain that with this ‘logical’ objectification of ourselves no cognition is yet

120  Dina Emundts connected (OP, 22: 87, see also 79 and 82)—and thus this seems not to fully contradict the thesis of the first Critique. The idea of self-positing seems to be that we make ourselves an object in thinking alone (logically) and then determine ourselves spatiotemporally and categorically. In this way, not only does self-determination take place, but also the determination of the world proceeds. Kant also asserted the reciprocity of the determination of external objects and the self-determination in time more explicitly: What determines their composition (refers to the internal composition of the manifold (in time) on the one hand and the (spatial) intuition on the other hand) reciprocally in one intuition is the understanding in so far as it affects our sense and represents the object of the sense as appearance. 27 (OP, 22: 69) Also, in the case of self-affection, which was necessary for empirical science, it was about the fact that we determine ourselves and the external objects together, as it were, by the same act of determination. Thus, this seems to be something that he wants to stress in both places. Therefore, we can state that Kant develops a theory of self-positing, such that it certainly takes up the idea of self-affection of the earlier Opus postumum, and now reasserts it for the general principles (which are put into nature). What sounds less familiar in the late considerations (Conv. VII and I) is the way Kant talks about the activity. The expression ‘selfpositing’ as well as the talk of ‘progressing’ is different from the first Critique suggesting that Kant associates a clearly ontological status with apperception. Why Kant wanted this is in need of explanation and I will return to this below.

Self-affection in the Critique of Pure Reason There are two main passages in the Critique of Pure Reason in which the conception of self-affection comes up. One passage, §8, is about the ideality of time. The other is the deduction of the categories, §24. Both passages are additions to the second edition of the Critique. In both passages, Kant’s emphasis is on the thesis that we can refer to ourselves only as appearances. Some main passages read as follows: The understanding “under the designation of a transcendental synthesis of the imagination, it therefore exercises that action on the passive subject, whose faculty it is, about which we rightly say that the inner sense is thereby affected.”28 (CPR, B153–154)

Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum  121 The understanding therefore does not find some sort of combination of the manifold already in inner sense, but produces it, by affecting inner sense. 29 (CPR, B155) I think it is important to remember that these passages are additions to the second edition. This suggests, in my view, first the thesis that selfaffection is an aspect that is not equally fundamental for the arguments of transcendental philosophy as others (e.g., apperception and the categories). I admit that this is disputable since the second edition may, after all, provide new essential elements. It also seems to contradict the secondary literature, which has recently tended to place self-affection at the center of the Critique’s interpretation. But the thesis is also supported by the fact that Kant introduces the remarks in the second edition as a kind of excursion.30 I also do not want to suggest with this thesis that selfaffection is not important (in this respect I do not contradict the secondary literature). I only want to point out that self-affection describes the acts of determination of the sensible manifold by means of the categories, whereas the core task of transcendental philosophy, according to Kant, is to state the conditions for cognition, not the process of its coming about. This difference is not identical with that between the transcendental on the one hand and the empirical on the other. Kant himself found the difference between conditions and processes important. However, although he wants to separate things, he often refers to the coming into being, on the one hand, and the processes in the context of the philosophical conditions (like at the beginning of the A-Deduction), on the other, together. In the passage just quoted, he makes the distinction between the understanding “considered in itself alone” (CPR, B153) and the understanding “under the name of imagination” (CPR, B162).31 I think many problems for Kant arise from the fact that he wants to keep the conditions and the coming into being (under these conditions) apart. However, one could also see the problem only in the fact that we have difficulties clarifying their relation to one another. We will deal with this later. Second, the fact that the passages about self-affection are new in the second edition give urgency to the question of what the function of this addition to the first edition is. The full answer would require a great deal of elaboration, but to summarize, I think the supplementation has something to do with the fact that for Kant himself there were problems associated with asserting, on the one hand, that the I is a condition for cognition and, on the other hand, claiming that we are not able to cognize this I as a condition. The fact that he had to maintain this thesis was probably also clearer to him in the second edition than in the first. 32 The problems are manifold and I will later return to the question of what problems really are there. Kant himself formulates the problems as

122  Dina Emundts paradoxes, as, for example, time is ‘in’ the I and the I is in time.33 Kant’s response to these problems in the second edition is to emphasize the difference between the transcendental I and the empirical I, and to claim that we can use this difference to solve the paradoxical challenges.34 For this reason, in the passages where self-affection occurs, it is emphasized that we can only know ourselves as appearances. However, it is also clear to Kant that the problem he wants to react to is such that it is not unproblematic to limit the cognition of the I solely to the I as appearance—which is what he does with this solution. The rationalistic opponents35 have objected to the first edition that there is an after all immediate perception of the sequence of inner states and that time must therefore be real. It is indeed not clear whether the first edition has a good response to this because the first edition seems to presuppose that there is a special inner experience. Additionally, the following question imposes itself: if we have no access at all to the transcendental I, how can we say that we synthesize consciously and how can we be conscious of our forms of intuition and schematism?36 My claim is that Kant introduces the theory of self-affection as part of the determination process to give an answer to these questions or at least to hint at one. Thus, I would assert that self-affection is not to be understood as a condition for knowledge, but it names the process by which we consciously synthesize the manifold. In this process, we act at a very fundamental level, in such a way that our perceptions are not just fluent impressions, rather they are structured—first and foremost temporally. If we accept the theory of self-affection, we have at least part of an answer to the question of how it is that we can consciously synthesize without cognizing the transcendental I.37 Furthermore, according to the idea of self-affection, we synthesize in such a way that it is clear that there is no inner experience that is prior to external objects. This clarifies things with respect to possible rationalistic objections. I am aware that this is not so simple because what I claim implies controversial consequences for the relation between the first and second editions. However, my suggestion is to at least accept that Kant wants, in the second edition, to clarify that there is no purely inner experience because this denial avoids some basic objections roused by the first edition. This fits with the fact that Kant emphasizes the necessity of external objects in many places in the second edition. Among the serious objections to the first edition38 and, consequently, the possible clarifications in the second edition, is the alleged possible denial, in the first edition, of the existence of things in themselves. This objection also plays an important role here because, according to my reading, the theory of self-affection implies external input, and in this way excludes the possibility that experience, as a whole, is a product of self-affection. This is remarkable given that self-affection seems to suggest first precisely this option of a solely inner experience. This really

Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum  123 seems to be suggested by the first edition and many considered it as a serious option.39 I would say that the theory of self-affection in the second edition is also meant to exclude this possibility. What then is self-affection in the first Critique? It is an activity of synthesizing the manifold originally. It is an activity by which we relate to our inner states and order them according to a structure of before and after. Through our activities, perceptions are also temporal (temporally extended). The faculty of imagination orders our inner states according to the categories because only then can we refer to them as following one after the other, as enduring, and as having content that is determined (as a lasting pain in the leg, for example). Interesting but less clear is the relation to the synthesis of the manifold in space. Kant talks of abstraction and this suggests (perhaps together with what I said about the functions) the following: we are describing one process in which imagination synthesizes the outer given manifold. By doing so, the act itself affects us. This is so in every perception, although it is supposed to be clearer in cases where we pay real attention to the act: we see something and we can be very aware that we are seeing something (i.e., aware of the act).40 Thus, any synthesis is a twofold activity and can be seen as affection (by the manifold) and self-affection. The inner sense and the I as an object are the product of the aspect of the activity that is called ‘self-affection.’ This description (the one given here but also Kant’s own) leaves many questions open. In particular, Kant does not elucidate in what relation exactly inner and outer determination is supposed to stand. For this reason, one can find in the secondary literature a dispute about these questions. One question consists in the following: is self-affection identical to the activity of the imagination that leads to our having synthesized spatio-temporal objects? Or is it rather a new act or at least an additional aspect of this activity of the imagination that produces an additional component, namely, the notion of a self that is distinct from external objects? I have already expressed my opposition to the idea that this is a new or separate act.41 According to my reading self-affection is an act in which the I and the outer objects are determined together. I have yet to substantiate this point with arguments but one reason I described self-affection as only one act is that this seems to me to fit better with what Kant spells out in the Opus postumum (and I admit that this is no more than a weak argument). However, I cannot discuss this further here—especially because it concerns many additional aspects, for example, the broader question asking in what sense and to what extent Kant can (still) claim parallelism of inner and outer sense.42 In the last section, I have reconstructed the theory of self-affection in the Opus postumum. In doing so, it became obvious that self-affection deals with the idea of our concepts being put into nature, such that self-affection is also supposed to be relevant in empirical cognitions. In this idea, three aspects were particularly important: (1) the subject is

124  Dina Emundts spontaneous in cognition and structuring with its concepts, (2) the subject determines the world and itself together, respectively, in relation to each other, (3) the determining subject is corporeal and it determines its inner and outer relations mediated by this corporeality. It seems obvious to me that Kant wants to follow closely the first Critique with this conception: In both the first Critique and the Opus postumum, an act is meant in which spontaneity is in the foreground (nothing is already given in order, but it has to be put into order). In both, determinations of the self and its states and those of external objects are closely connected, although in the Opus postumum it becomes clearer that (as well as how) both determinations come about through the same act. That the concept of self-affection remains roughly the same concept, even though it is spelled out in more detail in the Opus postumum, was the first thesis I wanted to present in this third part. As we have seen, Kant takes up self-affection once again within the further development of the Opus postumum and translates the thought into a theory of self-positing. With this theory, I have argued, there is a change because its formulations present apperception more as something that is real and progresses to determination. In the last part of my essay, I would like to develop the thesis that in these late convolutes Kant takes up problems that were already connected with the theory of selfaffection in the Critique of Pure Reason. As I have already indicated, Kant conceded that his philosophy has a paradoxical effect with regard to the I. The paradox can be formulated in different ways: that time is in the subject but the subject is also in time; that the subject has to produce itself by its own act, etc. The solution lies, as already explained, in the difference between transcendental I and the I as appearance and, in addition, in the theory of self-affection. The latter explains how we can speak of conscious acts, even if we have no knowledge of what the subject of these acts is. With this solution, however, various points remain unclear. We know from numerous notes and remarks in writings from the late eighties and early nineties that Kant was still preoccupied with this issue even after the Critique of Pure Reason.43 What remains unclear to him? And to what extent can we say that Kant responds to it with his doctrine of self-positing? One aspect that apparently troubled Kant can be summarized thus: what relation do we have to the transcendental I? We must be able to become aware of our a priori principles and activities. Doesn’t that mean that we must somehow have the ability to look at ourselves as thinking beings?44 One can certainly deny this, but Kant, as was made clear above, conceives of the I, at least in the Opus postumum and at least with regard to the ‘logical’ I (the I of pure thinking), such that it can also make itself an object. Another point concerns the relation between apperception and self-affection.45 I pointed out above that Kant wants to keep the two

Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum  125 apart: apperception is a condition for successful synthesis and cognition; self-affection is the act by which synthesizing takes place. But the question is whether he can really separate them. In the Opus postumum, there are passages where Kant does not make this distinction in this way. If this is true (namely, that Kant wants to identify the apperception with the acts), then it can be understood that Kant speaks in such a way that apperception progresses to apprehension. The third point concerns the question as to whether Kant’s conception has sufficient resources to develop a convincing conception of the I. He distinguishes the I of thought and the I as an empirical object. As an empirical object, the I seems to be subject to the conditions to which all objects are subject. To what extent does this account for the particularity of the I? This is a complicated point but one that is perhaps easier to comprehend if one turns back to tradition: Locke also identified a kind of self-affection, through it we get the ideas about ourselves and our abilities.46 But this is a separate empirical act of the formation of ideas, which is not supposed to be there according to Kant. Descartes admitted the possibility of referring to oneself as a thinking being. But Kant excludes this in virtue of the thesis that we cannot know the transcendental I. Did he really provide a convincing alternative to these conceptions?47 The self-positing I seems at least to be more conscious about its different stages and characters and thus it can be seen as a more promising ground for a theory of an empirical I.48 These points can be seen as motives to pick up again the earlier theory of apperception and self-affection and develop it anew as a theory of self-positing.

Notes 1 He often uses the title from 1786 and he seems to presuppose that this foundation is already written (at least in its main strains). 2 Elsewhere, I have argued for the thesis that, for Kant, a crucial role in these considerations is played by the fact that his foundations provided in 1786 were not sufficient to explain the specific connections of forces in experience. Moreover, I contend that this explains the special importance and the ever-discussed status of ether, because the forces of the ether are necessitated by these explanations (Emundts 2004). 3 The role of self-affection for scientific knowledge is also made clear by Hoppe (2015). 4 “Nicht darin daß das Subject vom Object empirisch (per receptivitatem) afficirt wird sondern daß es sich selbst (per spontaneitatem) afficirt besteht die Möglichkeit des Übergangs von den metaph. A. Gr. der NW zur Physik.” 5 That the project is about the problem of transition is proven by many passages, for example also OP, 22: 292. 6 “Die Wahrnehmung des Objects ist das Bewustseyn der bewegenden Kraft des Subjects selbst, nicht in so fern es afficirt wird sondern sich selbst afficirt d.i. durch den Verstand das Mannigfaltige der Erscheinung unter ein Prinzip ihrer Zusammensetzung bringt.”

126  Dina Emundts 7 The necessity of empirical laws does not really play an explicit role in what follows. However, the concepts (of attraction, etc.) are such that they imply laws of movements (Bewegungsgesetze) and other physical effects (see, for example, OP, 22: 300). 8 For different concepts of perception see Horstmann (2018). 9 Daß die Wahrnehmung äußerer Gegenstände nichts anders ist als der Actus des Subjects durch welchen dieses sich selbst afficirt und Wahrnehmungen nichts anders als mit Bewustseyn verbundene bewegende Kräfte eben desselben sind[,] durch welche der Verstand nur so viel nach Principien für das empirische (passive der Vorstellungen) aushebt als er selbst zum Behuf möglicher Erfahrung hinein gelegt hat. 10 By perception, I mean here a unified time-ordered entity that we consciously perceive in space. 11 This thesis has been put forward by Würker (2008, 60–65, esp. 62). The thesis that self-affection is a posteriori is also contradicted by Bondeli (2018, f.n. 182). I find it also rather problematic how directly Würker (2008) relates on these pages self-affection to self-positing. 12 Of course, the stations of Kant’s development go at least beyond the third Critique—there, too, it is a question to what extent the principle of systematicity represents a renewal. 13 This is an allusion to Edmund Husserl, which I will not pursue here. 14 In Ansehung der Materie und ihrer das Subject äußerlich afficirenden mithin bewegenden Kräfte sind die Wahrnehmungen selbst an sich bewegende Kräfte mit der Rückwirkung (reactio) verbunden und der Verstand anticipirt die Wahrnehmung nach den einzig möglichen Formen der Bewegung—Anziehung, Abstoßung, Einschließung (Umgebung) und Durchdringung.—So erhellet die Möglichkeit ein System empirischer Vorstellungen a priori zu errichten. 15 I changed here the Förster and Rosen translation. “Alle Materie enthält einen Inbegriff bewegender Kräfte und das Subject [-] was durch sie afficirt wird und an ihm die Erfahrung macht [-] bestimmt selbst diese Kräfte welche zur Erfahrung den Stoff hergeben.” Immediately after this comes the remark that basis for all this is the Weltstoff. This means, again, that the way in which Kant developed his system for moving forces 1795–1799 is relevant for the idea here. 16 The translation by Förster and Rosen reads: “[…] and the subject which is affected by them (and his experience of this complex) itself determines these forces which provide the material for experience.” 17 “[…] d. i. sich erkennt als Phänomen (wie es ihm selbst erscheint) […].” 18 “[…] das Subject afficirt sich selbst und wird ihm selbst Gegenstand in der Erscheinung…das zusammensetzende Subject sich selbst zum Object wird aber nur in der Erscheinung […].” 19 “[…] erkennt sich selbst als Phänomen und bestimmt sein Daseyn in der Erfahrung durch Apprehension in Raum und Zeit zugleich als nothwendig […].” 20 For the aspect of bodily awareness see: “Die Wirkung der bewegenden Kräfte des Subjects auf das äußere Sinnenobject in so fern jenes auf sein eigenes Organ wechselseitig bewegend ist, ist zugleich sein innerer und äußerer Gegenstand als Ursache der Erscheinung.” (OP, 22: 345). See, for

Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum  127 example, de Vos (2009). See also Zobrist (2011, 217) who additionally shows a continuity of this topic in Kant and compares Kant’s conception to that of Husserl. 21 This is also claimed by Hoppe (2015) and by Bondeli (2018, 104–107). I want to stress that the first and main framework of the theory of selfaffection in the Opus postumum consists in the discussion about the possibility of empirical science. In Bondeli’s dense presentation of the Opus postumum this tends to slip away. 22 Das Verhältnis des Objects zum Subject was dadurch bestimmt wird[,] ist nicht Wahrnehmung von coexistirenden Dingen sondern ihre Vorstellung als Erscheinung…es sind nicht existirende Dinge sondern Actus wodurch das Subjekt sich selbst zum Behuf möglicher Erfahrung selbstsetzt a priori und sich zu einem Gegenstande constituirt. 23 “Die Selbstbestimmung nach der Ordnung der Categorien der Qualität, Quantität ec. ist nicht das logische Bewustseyn seiner selbst denn das ist logisch[.] Nur dadurch daß das Subject sich selbst Object wird schreitet die Apperception zur Apprehension.” 24 With respect to the Selbstsetzungslehre it has been the main question whether Kant’s conception is getting more idealistic here, for an overview see Basile (2013, 411–420). 25 Nevertheless, this is also interesting for some of our topics. Kant develops the idea of the I as Weltwesen, that is as the sense-object part of the world. This seems to stand in continuity with the idea of the importance of us as bodily beings (OP, 21: 63). For these aspects of the idea of Selbstsetzung see especially Förster (2000). 26 “[…] der Verstand in so fern er den Sinn überhaupt afficirt und das Sinnenobject als Erscheinung darstellt.” 27 “Was ihre [sc. die innere Komposition des Mannigfaltigen (in der Zeit) und die (räumliche) Anschauung—DE] composition wechselseitig in Einer Anschauung bestimmt ist der Verstand in so fern er den Sinn überhaupt afficirt und das Sinnenobjekt als Erscheinung darstellt.” 28 “Er also übt unter der Benennung einer transscendentalen Synthesis der Einbildungskraft diejenige Handlung aufs passive Subject, dessen Vermögen er ist, aus, wovon wir mit Recht sagen, daß der innere Sinn dadurch afficirt werde.” 29 “Der Verstand findet also in diesem nicht etwa schon eine dergleichen Verbindung des Mannigfaltigen, sondern bringt sie hervor, indem er ihn afficirt.” 30 In the deduction, the passage begins with “Hier ist nun der Ort” (CPR, B152). 31 The long and interesting discussion about the relation between understanding and imagination is relevant here but lies beyond my possible focus. See for this relation Horstmann (2018). 32 Here, I follow Ameriks, who argues that there are residual rationalist elements in the first edition that need to be eradicated in the second edition (Ameriks 2000: for example, 226–227). 33 “Hier ist nun der Ort, das Paradoxe, was jedermann bei der Exposition der Form des inneren Sinnes (§6) auffallen mußte, verständlich zu machen.” (CPR, B152). What is the paradox? Kant continues that it seems contradictory that “wir uns gegen uns selbst als leidend verhalten müßten” (CPR, B153).

128  Dina Emundts 34 The solution goes like this: the transcendental I is the condition for all sorts of representation and cognition. It is also the condition of the representation of the I as an empirical self and of self-cognition. If we refer to ourselves as objects, we refer to us as empirical but under transcendental conditions. 35 As we know, Lambert, Mendelsohn and Schultz objected to Kant’s theory of time as purely subjective, that (inner) change is real and therefore time has to be real itself. Kant took this objection quite seriously and reacted to it. This reaction is developed in the “Aesthetic” before the passage about self-affection. 36 I do not think that this can be the philosophical basis for the assurance about space and time and the categories as Glezer (manuscript) suggests. This does not seem to me to fit with the fact that it is (as stated) a kind of excursion after all. 37 Thus, a central motivation for Kant’s theory here (and elsewhere) is the need to find a way to explain our consciousness of the self without reifying the self into some kind of mental object. With respect to the paradox of time, one can also say: the theory of self-affection is also meant to explain a kind of activity that takes place but that gives us the idea of a sequence only as a product (Hessbrüggen-Walter 2004). 38 See the Göttinger Rezension (1782). There it says: “Auf diesen Begriffen, von den Empfindungen als blossen Modificationen unserer selbst, (worauf auch Berkeley seinen Idealismus hauptsächlich baut) vom Raum und von der Zeit beruht der eine Grundpfeiler des Kantschen Systems.” (Feder and Garve [1782] 1991, 11–13). 39 In the A edition, Kant indeed seems to suggest this himself: der Schluß von einer gegebenen Wirkung auf eine bestimmte Ursache [ist] jederzeit unsicher, weil die Wirkung aus mehr als einer Ursache entsprungen sein kann. Demnach bleibt es in der Beziehung der Wahrnehmung auf ihre Ursache jederzeit zweifelhaft, ob diese innerlich oder äußerlich sei, ob also alle sogenannte äußere Wahrnehmungen nicht ein bloßes Spiel unseres innern Sinnes seien, oder ob sie sich auf äußere wirkliche Gegenstände als ihre Ursache beziehen. (CPR, A368) This claim is often discussed in secondary literature (Rosefeldt 2013). According to my interpretation the conception of self-affection excludes this possibility. The concept of self-affection is actually in this respect misleading because it suggests a strict parallel between the thing in itself and the subject (Haag 2015). 40 I take attention to be an example of self-affection because I think that there is also an effect on us if we do not notice it—often we can then reconstruct it for the past situations. Dyck (2006, 41), instead, identifies attention with self-affection. 41 The thesis of only one act is, for example, advocated by Valaris (2008), in another form also by Dyck (2006). In contrast, Allison (2004, 193 and 283– 284) argues that the synthesis of the external manifold and the awareness of states as my states are two acts. 42 Already Vaihinger (1892, 482) thinks that Kant cannot claim the parallel because the manifold in the inner sense is not as indirect as in the case of the outer sense and therefore the manifold in the inner sense is much more thingin-itself-like. This remained a lively discussion until today and is picked up in the recent debates about self-affection. Mohr (1991) and Schmitz (2013) conclude also that every perception is accompanied by self-awareness and Schmitz uses the concept of self-affection to explain this in more detail.

Self-affection in Kant’s Opus postumum  129 43 See, especially, the so-called Kiesewetter Aufsatz (Reflection 5661, 18: 318–320; around 1790). There the idea of ‘putting something into nature’ is again important. There are also passages in the Anthropology and many passages in the Reflections (Reflection 5655, 18: 313–316 and Reflection 6313, 18: 615) that are very interesting in this context. 4 4 This seems to be a consideration that is close to the considerations of Fichte and Schelling. That we need two sorts of self-intuition within Kant’s theory is something Vaihinger (1892, 484) suggested already. 45 The question of how transcendental apperception relates to self-affection is also one of the main points of dispute in the context of the theory of selfaffection in the Critique of Pure Reason. Dyck (2006, 45) argues for the thesis that we cannot separate the transcendental and the acts. Klemme (1996, 221 ff.) claims that this distinction is fundamental for the Critique of Pure Reason. He also thinks—as I claim here—that this is what Kant is obviously prepared to change around 1800. Zobrist (2011, 193 ff) also focuses on the Dasein of the transcendental I. 46 Longuenesse (1998) makes clear that this model is very important for Kant who knows also two sorts of representations, one sort as a product of selfaffection. However, I think we cannot parallel them too strongly because I argued that for Kant this is not a second act. Wunderlich (2017) spelled out the rational background but that’s—as I argued already—also not simply available for Kant. 47 Especially in his first edition, Allison (1983, 260) argued that this is quite unclear. For further discussion see also Serck-Hanssen (2008). I would say that Kant has room for this quite empirical first-person-perspective but that this is more obvious in the Opus postumum. 48 An early version of this paper was presented in 2019 at Munich. I also discussed some of its theses in a reading group of Human Abilities, Centre for Advanced Studies in the Humanities (Kolleg Forschungsgruppe) in Berlin. The paper is part of my project about the cognitive abilities in Kant’s Philosophy in this Kolleg Forschergruppe. I would like to thank the organizers and all participants in both groups. Special thanks are also due to Giovanni Pietro Basile, Mihnea Chiujdea, Sonja Eichstädt, Rolf-Peter Horstmann, and Ansgar Lyssy.

References Allison, Henry E. (1983) 2004. Kant’s Transcendental Idealism: An Interpretation and Defense. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Ameriks, Karl 2000. Kant’s Theory of Mind: An Analysis of the Paralogisms of Pure Reason. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Basile, Giovanni Pietro. 2013. Kants ‘Opus postumum’ und seine Rezeption. Berlin: De Gruyter. Bondeli, Martin. 2018. Kant über Selbstaffektion. Basel: Colmena Verlag. de Vos, Ludovicus. 2009. “Formen der Subjektivität oder die Naturalisierung der Subjektivität im Opus postumum” In Kants Philosophie der Natur. Edited by Ernst-Otto Onnasch, 287–306. Berlin: De Gruyter. Dyck, Corey W. 2006. “Empirical Consciousness Explained: Self-Affection, (Self-) Consciousness and Perception in the B Deduction.” Kantian Review, 11: 29–54. Emundts, Dina. 2004. Kants Übergangskonzeption im Opus postumum. Berlin: De Gruyter.

130  Dina Emundts Feder, Johann G. H. and Christian Garve. (1782) 1991. “Critik der reinen Vernunft. Von Imman. Kant.” In Rezensionen zur Kantischen Philosophie 1781–87. Edited by Albert Landau, 11–17. Bebra: Albert Landau Verlag. Förster, Eckart. 2000. Kant’s Final Synthesis: An Essay on the Opus postumum. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Glezer, Tal. 2020. The Transcendental Deduction on Discovering the Form of Our Understanding. Manuscript. Haag, Johannes. 2015. “Affektion.” In Kant-Lexikon. Edited by Marcus Willaschek, Jürgen Stolzenberg, Georg Mohr, Stefano Bacin, vol. 1, 27–30. Berlin: De Gruyter. Hessbrüggen-Walter, Stefan. 2004. Die Seele und ihre Vermögen: Kants Metaphysik des Mentalen in der Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Paderborn: Mentis. Hoppe, Hansgeorg. 2015. “Selbstaffektion und Selbstsetzung.” In KantLexikon. Edited by M. Willaschek, J. Stolzenberg, G. Mohr, S. Bacin, vol. 3, 2060–2063 Berlin: De Gruyter. Horstmann, Rolf-Peter. 2018. Kant’s Power of Imagination. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Klemme, Heiner F. 1996. Kants Philosophie des Subjekts. Hamburg: Felix Meiner Verlag. Longuenesse, Béatrice. 1998. Kant and the capacity to judge. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Mohr, Georg. 1991. Das sinnliche Ich: innerer Sinn und Bewußtsein bei Kant. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann. Rosefeldt, Tobias. 2013. “Dinge an sich und der Außenweltskeptizismus.” In Self, World, and Art. Edited by Dina Emundts, 221–269. Berlin: De Gruyter. Schmitz, Friederike. 2013. “On Kant’s Conception of Inner Sense: Self-affection by the Understanding.” European Journal of Philosophy, 23 (4): 1044–1063. Serck-Hanssen, Camilla. 2008. “Kant on Consciousness.” In Psychology and Philosophy. Edited by Sara Heinämaa and Martina Reuter, 139–157. Dordrecht: Springer. Vaihinger, Hans. 1892. Commentar zu Kants Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Stuttgart: Union Deutsche Verlagsgesellschaft. Valaris, Markos. 2008. “Inner Sense, Self-Affection, and Temporal Consciousness in Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason.” Philosopher’s Imprint, 8 (4): 1–18. Wunderlich, Falk. 2017. “Kant on Consciousness of Objects and Consciousness of the Self.” In Immanuel Kant: Die Einheit des Bewusstseins. Edited by Giuseppe Motta and Udo Thiel, 164–180. Berlin: De Gruyter. Würker, Katarina. 2008. “Selbstsetzung, Selbstaffektion und Schematismus in Kants Opus postumum.” PhD dissertation, Köln. Zobrist, Marc. 2011. Subjekt und Subjektivität in Kants theoretischer Philosophie. Eine Untersuchung zu den transzendentalphilosophischen Problemen des Selbstbewusstseins und Daseinsbewusstseins. Berlin: De Gruyter.

7 A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus Appropriating Kant’s doctrine of self-positing in the Opus postumum Bryan Hall G.E. Schulze’s anonymously published Aenesidemus (1792) has long been recognized as an important document (perhaps even a sine qua non) for the development of early German Idealism. Aenesidemus is directed at two main targets: K.L. Reinhold’s Kantian Elementarphilosophie as well as Kant’s own position as articulated in CPR. For scholars, the most important thing about Aenesidemus, however, is the effect it had on J.G. Fichte who published a review of Schulze’s book in 1794. In particular, scholars have focused on how Aenesidemus precipitated Fichte’s break with Kant’s Critical philosophy, though there has been significant disagreement among scholars as to the exact nature and severity of that break.1 Almost no attention has been paid, however, to Kant’s own response to Aenesidemus. Although Kant never publicly responded to Aenesidemus, he does discuss it briefly in a 1792 letter to J.S. Beck as well as in several suggestive remarks from the unpublished Opus postumum (OP). This paper will use Kant’s remarks from OP to reconstruct and ultimately defend a Kantian answer to Aenesidemus, one that is markedly different from the way Fichte’s own answer has been understood. The first section of this paper examines a particular line of criticism that Schulze pursues against Kant in Aenesidemus, one that Fichte responds to in his review of Aenesidemus, and that Kant also discusses in OP. In addition to examining Schulze’s line of criticism, this section will discuss Fichte’s response. The second section reconstructs a Kantian answer to this same line of criticism by locating Kant’s explicit remarks on Aenesidemus within the wider context of his doctrine of self-­positing developed in Convolut 7 of OP but presaged by things Kant says in CPR. This section also anticipates a likely objection that Schulze would pose to the doctrine. The final section offers a Kantian rejoinder to this objection, a rejoinder that allows us to finally distinguish the different ways that Kant and Fichte answer Aenesidemus with regard to the line of criticism introduced in the first section of this paper. The upshot of Schulze’s line of criticism is that Kant’s conception of ‘mind’ is self-stultifying within the context of his Critical theory of cognition. According to Schulze’s interpretation of Kant, the mind must be DOI: 10.4324/9781003090946-8

132  Bryan Hall the real ground for what is necessary in our cognition, but there is no way of understanding how the mind could serve this function without violating the Critical philosophy’s constraints on cognition. Whereas Fichte’s answer to Aenesidemus requires adopting a form of absolute idealism that avoids Schulze’s criticisms only by abandoning the Critical philosophy’s constraints on cognition, Kant’s answer to Aenesidemus avoids Schulze’s criticisms while remaining largely consistent with the Critical philosophy.

Schulze’s criticism of Kant and Fichte’s response Unlike some of his contemporaries, Schulze recognizes that there is a difference (at least in approach) between Kant’s view and Reinhold’s Kantian view which leads him to deal with their approaches in different sections of Aenesidemus (Schulze 1911, 96–97). Although Schulze’s criticisms of Kant are wide-ranging, they are all posed from a broadly Humean perspective. Fichte responds, on behalf of Kant, to many of these objections within the context of his review of Aenesidemus (Fichte 1845, 3–25). 2 Kant himself, however, only explicitly responds to a subset of these objections within the context of OP.3 I will focus on a particular line of criticism, one that challenges Kant’s answer to perhaps the most important question the Critical philosophy asks, viz. how are synthetic a priori judgments possible? Since both Fichte and Kant respond to this line of criticism, focusing on it will help us to see where their views overlap, but also where they ultimately differ. Insofar as Kant is supposed to be responding to Hume in CPR, Schulze worries that Kant begs the question in two ways: (1) He assumes that for anything present in our cognition there is a “real ground and cause differing from it realiter” and (2) He assumes that we can infer the constitution of what our representations represent from the constitution of the representations themselves (Schulze 1911, 132–133).4 Notwithstanding that Hume would grant neither of these assumptions, what appears to be even more troubling from Schulze’s perspective is that these assumptions lead Kant to violate his own constraints on cognition in CPR.5 When discussing the first assumption, Schulze focuses his ire on Kant’s answer to the question “How are necessary synthetic propositions possible in us?” (Schulze 1911, 137). For Kant, this is “the real problem of pure reason” (CPR, B19) and is arguably the central question that the Critical philosophy is designed to answer.6 Following what he takes to be Kant’s principle of causality, Schulze claims that if these propositions are present in our cognition, they must be the effect of something that is distinct from them (Schulze 1911, 137).7 At this point, the second assumption comes into play to explain exactly what this ‘something’ is. According to Schulze, Kant “infers the objective and real constitution of what is to be found outside our representations, from the constitution

A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus  133 of the representations and thoughts present in us” (Schulze 1911, 140). Since it is inconceivable that there could be any other cause of necessary synthetic propositions other than the mind, it must be the metaphysically real and effective cause of these propositions. The necessity of Kant’s conclusion is purportedly entailed by the inconceivability of any other option. Although there are a number of Humean objections that Schulze deploys against this line of reasoning, I will focus on the way in which this line of reasoning leads Kant to violate his own critical principles according to Schulze.8 Schulze holds that there are only three options for understanding what ‘mind’ might be for Kant when it is viewed as independent of representation. The mind is either a self-in-itself, a noumenon, or a transcendental idea (Schulze 1911, 154).9 None of these options could serve as a real ground or cause, however, from the Kantian standpoint. To infer the existence of a self-in-itself as the real ground for what is necessary in our cognition, involves a misapplication of the relevant categories (e.g., causality and actuality) to what cannot be given in sensibility. When it comes to inner sense, all that is given to us is the alteration of representations but not the “alleged subject of representations” (Schulze 1911, 155). In this connection, Schulze notes that the Paralogisms chapter of CPR is dedicated to criticizing the arguments of rational psychology that attempt to establish the existence and properties of a self-in-itself (Schulze 1911, 159; CPR, A644/B672). Although the self-in-itself can be thought as a logical subject of thinking, according to Kant, it cannot be cognized as a real subject of inherence (CPR, A351). The next option would be to view the mind as a noumenon where this is understood as different from the concept of a self-in-itself. Whereas the self-in-itself would be something metaphysically real, for Schulze, the mind as noumenon would be a “merely intelligible object” and “empty product of thought” (Schulze 1911, 159). Since the categories can only determine objects given in sensibility, they “have no sense at all when applied to merely thought objects” (Schulze 1911, 160).10 Consequently, it does not make sense to talk about causality, actuality, or the other categorical determinations as applied to noumena. The final option would be to view the mind as a transcendental idea. The problem, according to Schulze, is that ideas do not have a constitutive role to play in theoretical cognition (e.g., grounding necessary synthetic propositions), but rather serve only the regulative function of bringing our cognitions into complete unity with one another (a task which is itself unending) (Schulze 1911, 162–164).11 Because of their function, the transcendental ideas cannot “provide us with the knowledge of a transcendental object understood in the sense of something that exists outside our representations” (Schulze 1911, 164). Since all three options for understanding the “mind” fail to provide, by Kant’s own lights, a real ground for necessary synthetic propositions, Schulze

134  Bryan Hall concludes that Kant’s answer to the central question of the first Critique is self-stultifying. In response to Schulze, Fichte insists that the mind is the ground for what is necessary in our cognition. Understanding “mind” as the activity of thought itself, Fichte claims that “logical ground, however, becomes real ground inasmuch as the mind is simply intelligence” (Fichte 1845, 16).12 A few years after his review of Aenesidemus, in the 1797 First Introduction to the Wissenschaftslehre (abbreviated IWL), Fichte expands on this idea. The activity of thought alone determines not only what is necessary in our cognition but also everything we cognize: As already stated above, idealism explains the determinations of consciousness on the basis of the activity of the intellect […]. Now out of the activity of this intellect we must deduce specific representations: of a world, of a material, spatially located world existing without our aid, etc. […]. [T]his primordial action of the intellect must needs be a determinate one, and, since the intellect is itself the highest ground of explanation, an action determined by the intellect and its nature, and not by something outside it. The presupposition of idealism will, therefore, be as follows: the intellect acts, but owing to its nature it can act only in a certain fashion […]. —This, then, also renders immediately intelligible the feeling of necessity that accompanies specific representations. (Fichte 1982, 440–441)13 What is necessary in our cognition reflects the ways in which the intellect is compelled to act by its own nature. This intellectual activity is unconditioned by anything outside of itself, but nonetheless determines everything that is conditioned in cognition. As the real ground for objects of experience, this activity determines what we experience. As the logical ground for the same, these objects can be deduced (analytic) from this activity. Insofar as what must be thought (logical) determines (real) the world we cognize, logical and real grounds are identical. This absolute idealism is not simply a later development of Fichte’s thought. The seeds are already there in his review of Aenesidemus: “all that arises in our mind is to be completely explained and comprehended by the mind itself” (Fichte 1845, 15). Here and elsewhere, Fichte resists characterizing the mind as a thingin-itself. The I exists only in relation to the activity of thinking, not as a thing independent of this activity. Even so, according to Fichte, considered in terms of this activity, the I is “self-positing, absolutely self-subsistent and independent” (Fichte 1845, 22).14 Although there are important respects in which Kant’s response to Schulze overlaps with the response that Fichte makes on Kant’s behalf, as we will see, there are nonetheless

A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus  135 fundamental differences that ultimately expose the fissure between Fichte’s view and Kant’s own.

A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus Kant first mentions Schulze’s work in a December 4, 1792 letter to J.S. Beck. In his letter, Kant accuses Aenesidemus of advancing a “wider skepticism” than Berkeley insofar as the former claims that “we really cannot know whether anything at all corresponds to our representation (as its object), which is about as much as to say: whether a representation really is a representation (i.e., represents something)” (L, 11, 395). Whereas our sensible ideas imperfectly represent God’s ideas according to Berkeley, Schulze entertains the possibility that they may represent nothing at all. The letter suggests that Kant is primarily interested in defending our cognition of the object of representation from Schulze’s criticisms. The next time “Aenesidemus” is mentioned is in a note from June/July 1797 (Refl 6349) by which point Kant seems to have shifted his focus to defending our cognition of the subject of representation from Schulze’s criticisms: “On Aenesidemus and the diallel—To answer Tieftrunk—How can a subject intuited by itself cognize itself merely as appearance?” (Refl, 18: 653)15 Kant maintains this focus on the subject in Convolut 7 of OP which was written in the second half of 1800. OP is Kant’s final, unpublished manuscript and contains, inter alia, drafts of a new project entitled the Transition from the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science to Physics. The main body of OP is broken up into 13 Convoluts or fascicles.16 The fascicles were numbered by someone other than Kant, and although the numbers imply nothing about Kant’s intended ordering of the manuscript, they are used by scholars for reference. The fascicles that immediately precede Convolut 7 focus on articulating and arguing for a transcendental material condition of experience (a dynamic force plenum or what Kant calls ‘ether’). Convolut 7, however, focuses on the transcendental formal conditions of experience and how the subject constitutes itself within experience through its own activity.17 In this one section of OP, Kant mentions “Aenesidemus” seven times. Before examining the passages where Kant mentions Schulze’s work, it is important to first understand the doctrine of self-positing (Selbstsetzungslehre) within which they appear. One can find the roots of this doctrine in the Transcendental Deduction of CPR. In the B-edition Transcendental Deduction, Kant notes that “we intuit ourselves only as we are internally affected” (CPR, B153). He explicitly identifies this self-affection with the activity of apperception: “That which determines the inner sense is the understanding and its original faculty of combining the manifold of intuition, of bringing it under an apperception (as that on which its very possibility rests)” (CPR,

136  Bryan Hall B153). The transcendental synthesis of the imagination is the means by which apperception acts upon the passive subject in inner sense. Apperception not only determines (through imagination) the intuition of ourselves in inner sense but of all sensible objects. As Kant says: Apperception and its synthetic unity is so far from being the same as the inner sense that the former, rather, as the source of all combination applies to all sensible intuition of objects in general, to the manifold of intuitions in general, under the name of the categories. (CPR, B154) It is here that Kant seems to draw a distinction, however, between the causal mechanism by which we appear to ourselves and the causal mechanism by which external objects appear to us: We must order the determinations of inner sense as appearances in time in just the same way as we order those of outer sense in space; hence if we admit about the latter that we cognize objects by their means only insofar as we are externally affected, then we must also concede that through inner sense we intuit ourselves only as we are internally affected by ourselves. (CPR, B156) Whereas external objects appear to us insofar as we are affected by them, we appear to ourselves only insofar as we affect ourselves through apperception. Not only is the combination of the manifold in inner sense due to the subject’s own activity, but this passage suggests that the content of inner sense, at least with respect to the sensible intuition of ourselves, is also due to this activity (if the parallel with external objects is to be granted). Kant’s explicit use of “posit” [setzen] in the B-edition Transcendental Deduction suggests, furthermore, that he already views the subject as positing itself in CPR: The I think expresses the act of determining my existence. The existence is thereby already given, but the way in which I am to determine it, i.e., the manifold I am to posit in myself as belonging to it, is not yet thereby given. For that self-intuition is required. (B 157n)18 Although this passage might seem to suggest that the “I think” (apperception) only determines a manifold of intuition that is given independently of its activity, once one recognizes that self-intuition depends upon self-affection, the manifold cannot be passively given from without (as it is with external objects), but is actively given from within.

A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus  137 Kant expands upon these themes in the Selbstsetzungslehre. In Convolut 7 of OP, Kant characterizes the subject’s self-positing activity in two stages: (1) an analytic act via concepts by which apperception thinks itself as an object and (2) a synthetic act via intuition by which the subject cognizes itself as an object of sense (OP, 22: 58). As Kant says: I am conscious of myself (apperceptio). I think, i. e. I am to myself an object of the understanding. However, I am also to myself an object of the senses and of empirical intuition (apprehensio). The thinkable I (cogitabile) posits itself as the sensible (dabile) and this a priori in space and time which are given a priori in intuition and are merely forms of appearance. (OP, 22: 119).19 In this passage, Kant seems to be going a step further than he did in the B-edition Transcendental Deduction. In the latter, Kant draws a distinction between cognition of ourselves in inner sense and cognition of objects in outer sense. Whereas we posit ourselves in inner sense, our cognition of objects in outer sense requires being passively affected from without. The embodied cognitive subject (sensible I), however, is an object in outer sense. The above passage suggests that the embodied cognitive subject in outer sense is just as much a product of self-positing as the subject in inner sense. This might indicate, furthermore, that Kant is moving closer to a form of absolute idealism where the I produces itself wholly from its own activity, e.g., in the manner of Fichte’s “deed-act” (Tathandlung). 20 Eckart Förster, in his reconstruction of the Selbstsetzungslehre, resists this turn toward absolute idealism. According to Förster, the Selbstsetzungslehre consists of five steps and aims to show “how the I as mere object of thought (cogitable) can become an empirical object given in space and time (dabile)” (Förster 2000, 103). In CPR, Kant holds that the synthetic unity of apperception makes possible the analytic unity of apperception (CPR, B133). 21 In other words, there must be some unity of representational content that the ‘I think’ can think about. In the B-edition Transcendental Deduction, Kant gives the example of drawing a line in thought (CPR, B154). The act of drawing the line in inner sense allows one to cognize oneself as a thinking subject. Förster believes that Kant continues to hold in OP that the analytic unity of consciousness or ‘I think’ is only possible on the assumption of some synthetic unity. Although the first step of the Selbstsetzungslehre is an act of logical self-consciousness, the ‘I think’ is nothing more than an indeterminate intentional object. As Kant says, “The consciousness of myself (apperceptio) is the act of the subject to make itself into an object. It is merely logical (sum) without determination of the object (apprehensio simplex)” (OP, 22: 89). This act of logical self-consciousness implies

138  Bryan Hall a second step, however, whereby the subject first determines itself as an object by positing itself in the pure intuition of space and time (OP, 22: 420). This synthetic unity of consciousness consequently amplifies the analytic unity of consciousness beyond the mere concept of a subject. As I will argue below, the ‘I think’ considered independently of its acts of synthesis in intuition is an empty concept from Kant’s perspective. Even if we cognize ourselves a priori by positing ourselves in the pure intuition of space and time, according to the B-edition Transcendental Deduction, we still cognize external objects a posteriori (including ourselves as embodied subjects) only insofar as we are affected from without. Similarly, the third step of the Selbstsetzungslehre requires that the subject assumes that space is filled with dynamic forces (what Kant elsewhere calls ‘ether’) since it is represented empirically as an object of sense or “totality of empirically identifiable locations” (Förster 2000, 105). It is not merely the bare assumption of the ether that makes the whole of experience possible, however, but the assumption of this plenum with certain attributes. These attributes are captured by the categories, and the fourth step of the Selbstsetzungslehre holds that these categorically determined concepts of the plenum must be inserted into the undetermined empirical manifold so as to determine to what extent the categories are exemplified in experience (Förster 2000, 111). The subject can represent itself as affected from without, however, only insofar as it exercises its own moving forces in reaction to the moving forces which affect it. In this way, the subject posits itself as empirical object (embodied cognitive subject) and cognizes other empirical objects to which it is related in space and time. This is the fifth and final step of the Selbstsetzungslehre (Förster 2000, 112). 22 Förster claims that the Selbstsetzungslehre deviates from the Transcendental Aesthetic of CPR insofar as sensibility is no longer wholly passive but must exert its own activity in order to be affected (receptive) (Förster 2000, 109). Even so, the subject still is affected by moving forces from without and this is where the ether must play a pivotal role (Förster 2000, 105). One should note, however, that Förster views the ether as a transcendental ideal. Within the present context, this means: (1) it is the idea of an individual thing that is thoroughly determinable through the idea alone and (2) that the object of an ideal cannot be given in experience though the ideal can serve an important regulative function, e.g., as the logical ground for the thoroughgoing determination of everything that exists (Förster 2000, 92). 23 Although Förster admits that “Kant may have wavered” on the ontological status of the ether, he favors the interpretation according to which the ether “is said to exist only ‘in idea’ (OP 21: 553), and to be merely ‘a thought-object (ens rationis)’ (OP 21: 231)” (Förster 2000, 92). Within the context of transcendental theology, the

A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus  139 transcendental ideal becomes the concept of God (CPR, A580/B608). Förster offers some contextual evidence that suggests Kant was simultaneously reconsidering one of his earlier arguments for God’s existence when working on the ether proofs which provides an additional reason to think that Kant viewed the ether as a transcendental ideal. 24 I will return to the ontological status of the ether below when considering how Schulze might respond to the Selbstsetzungslehre. It is in the second step of the Selbstsetzungslehre that Kant first draws a contrast between his view and Schulze’s position. Like most passages from OP, however, Kant’s remarks are as cryptic as they are desultory: “Theaetetus and Aenesidemus. Principles of the position of one’s subject in space and time— primitive intuition in space and time. Derivative, sense intuition” (OP, 22: 4). 25 When Kant mentions “Theaetetus” in this passage, he is referring to Dietrich Tiedemann’s book Theätet. Tiedemann criticizes, inter alia, Kant’s view in the Transcendental Aesthetic, arguing, contra Kant, that our representations of space and time arise a posteriori from our experience of objects. He argues, furthermore, that space and time are transcendentally real, i.e., they possess a reality independent of the subject and its form of representation (Tiedemann 1794). 26 Whereas Tiedemann is a naïve realist about space and time, however, Schulze is a Pyrrhonian (Humean) skeptic about the source of our representations of space and time. Consequently, it might seem strange that Kant would lump the two of them together. Things become clearer, however, once one understands that although the context of disagreement is similar (the metaphysical and epistemological status of space and time) the specific points of disagreements are different. In response to Tiedemann, Kant reiterates that space and time are a priori intuitions and are not given a posteriori in sensibility (OP, 22: 445 and 19). In response to Schulze, however, Kant argues that the subject posits itself as an object within this manifold of pure intuition a priori. As he says, “the principle of the ideality of all representations as pure intuition a priori: I make myself into the sensible object outside me (Aenesidemus)” (OP, 22: 99). This self-positing activity is numerically identical throughout representations much like transcendental apperception in CPR: “The thinking subject posits itself as appearance and neither Aenesidemus nor Theaetetus can object: for the proposition stands fast according to the principle of identity against which nothing can be mustered” (OP, 22: 19). 27 Even if one grants Kant’s account of how the subject posits itself in pure intuition (a significant concession in itself), how does the subject constitute itself as an embodied cognitive subject in empirical intuition? Embodiment is something that Kant has long required for empirical cognition. At the outset of the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (MF) from 1786, Kant claims that “the basic determination of something that is to be an object of the outer senses had to be motion,

140  Bryan Hall because only thereby can these senses be affected” (MF, 4: 476). This is what leads him to define ‘matter,’ within the context of MF, as the movable in space. Kant believes that the senses can be immediately affected only by pressure or impact, both of which require “the approach [motion] of one matter to another” (MF, 4: 510). Michael Friedman argues that embodiment, for Kant, is not based merely on a contingent physiological claim about how we happen to be affected, but follows rather from the transcendental conditions for empirical cognition (Friedman 2013, 40–44). To understand how fundamental embodiment is, Friedman suggests examining two of Kant’s other works: Concerning the Ultimate Ground of the Differentiation of Directions in Space (1768) and What is Orientation in Thinking (1786). In the former, Kant says, “Concerning the things that exist outside ourselves: it is only in so far as they stand in relation to ourselves that we have any cognition of them by means of the senses at all” (2: 378). 28 Kant goes on to say that the subject must be embodied so that it can occupy a relative space that serves as the center of a three-dimensional framework. Keeping in mind that the concepts of relative space and relative motion are intertwined, the subject is affected only by objects that can be precisely located within this framework, i.e., objects that occupy discrete regions of space that move relative to the space that the subject occupies. It is important to note that although the subject qua embodied is itself an object in space and time, the subject is not merely an object in space and time. Even so, embodiment is required for the kind of subjectivity (empirical cognition) that we possess. Without taking a position on the soundness of the Selbstsetzungslehre, how exactly is it providing a response to Aenesidemus? Given Kant’s focus in this section (self-constituting activity), I would suggest that the Selbstsetzungslehre is offering a neglected alternative to Schulze’s trilemma for explaining ‘mind.’29 If we accept Kant’s account, the mind is not a self-in-itself, a noumenon, or a transcendental idea. Rather, the mind is fundamentally embodied in a spatiotemporal (phenomenal) subject. This embodied cognitive subject, however, is self-constituting: It is a self constituted as object, not merely thinkable (cogitable) rather also existing, a given (dabile) nature outside my representations which makes itself a priori into an object (Aenesidemus) and its representation as subject is likewise immediately its own object, i.e., intuition. (OP, 22: 107)30 Although there is much I agree with in Förster’s reconstruction of the Selbstsetzungslehre, there are also some important points of difference from my own reading. These points of difference also indicate areas still susceptible to Schulze’s attack. By my estimation, Förster does an excellent job of explaining the activity on the side of the subject required both

A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus  141 for the self-positing of the subject as an empirical object or embodied cognitive subject (determined phenomenal subject) as well as for cognition of empirical objects (determined phenomenal objects) outside of us. At the same time, however, his conception of the ether as a transcendental ideal is insufficient to underwrite the empirical affection (moving forces affecting sensibility) that his own account requires. For Förster, what affects us in the fifth step of the Selbstsetzungslehre is ostensibly the result of the subject positing the ether as a transcendental ideal in the third step. Förster’s interpretation leaves Kant too close, I would submit, to an absolute idealism that does not avoid the criticisms that Aenesidemus poses. Even though Fichte obliquely suggests, in his review of Aenesidemus, that Schulze’s criticisms can be avoided as long as the absolute subject is understood as an activity and not a thing (viz., the Tathandlung mentioned above), insofar as this activity is unconditioned it would still be noumenal by Kant’s light (Fichte 1845, 11, 15, and 22).31 If the ether, as the source of empirical affection, is a transcendental ideal posited by the subject, then both the form and matter of experience would be rooted in the subject. These considerations lead Norman Kemp Smith to accuse Kant of a “subjectivism of the most extreme type” in OP (Smith 2003, 618). Fichte himself certainly seems guilty of such a charge. In IWL, Fichte claims that “form and matter are not separate items, the totality of form is the matter” (Fichte 1845, 443). As I will argue below, however, Fichte is far closer to Kemp Smith’s characterization of Kant than Kant himself.

Resisting absolute idealism Within OP, the ether serves as a transcendental material condition for embodied cognition. Its dynamic activity is the ultimate source of perceptual affection and the material ground for physical bodies that subjects experience in space and time (OP, 22: 194 and 378). Mechanical motion which is the proximate cause of affection depends upon the dynamic forces of the ether which are the distal cause of affection (OP, 22: 239– 242). Dynamic forces constitute the ether. Put differently, matter consists fundamentally not of compositional stuff, but rather dynamic force for Kant (OP, 21: 218). This dynamic force plenum ensures the unity of the three-dimensional space the embodied subject occupies (OP, 21: 219–220).32 In fact, this is the starting point for a draft of Kant’s Ether Deduction from the earlier Übergang (1799) section of OP: If it can be proven that the unity of the whole of possible experience is founded upon the existence of such a material [ether] (with its stated properties) so its actuality is also proven, not by experience, but rather a priori for experience […]. Now the concept of the whole

142  Bryan Hall of outer experience presupposes all possible moving forces of matter combined in collective unity, specifically in full space (because empty space either inside or outside a physical body is no object of possible experience). (OP, 21: 572–573)33 The argument begins not with the transcendental activity of the subject, but rather the unity of the subject’s experience. Kant’s conclusion, furthermore, does not insist on the transcendental reality of the ether. It is rather a “necessary phenomenon” (OP, 21: 584) whose actuality is proven only relative to the conditions of experience for creatures like us. Nonetheless, the ether is actual, something that Kant insists upon at several points in various drafts of the Ether Deduction. In addition to the passage quoted above, another draft concludes “caloric is actual; it is not a material feigned for the sake of the explanation of certain phenomena, but rather, a material demonstrable from a universal principle of experience” (OP, 22: 551).34 The ether is, inter alia, a transcendental material condition for the unity of the subject’s experience. As he says in the Selbstsetzungslehre: On this, and on the principle of the possibility of experience, is founded the idea of the existence of a universally distributed, all-penetrating etc. material which forms the basis of the possibility of there being one single experience, and whose existence can thus be comprehended a priori. (OP, 22: 89) A transcendental ideal simply cannot fulfill the role that Kant needs the ether to play in the Ether Deduction and later in the Selbstsetzungslehre.35 As a regulative assumption (however necessary that assumption might be), the ether cannot guarantee the actuality of anything. Although I must act as if God exists from the practical perspective, the ether must actually exist to ensure the unity of experience (one single experience) from the theoretical perspective. Insofar as our experience really is unified, the ether is presupposed constitutively not merely regulatively. It is important to note, however, that although the ether is actual, it is not given a posteriori in experience, but is rather proven a priori as a condition for the experience. The objects we encounter in experience are discrete in space and time, but the fact that we encounter all of them as unified in a single space and time requires, for Kant, the actuality of the ether. In addition to defending a transcendental material condition of experience, Kant further distinguishes his position from absolute idealism by denying any positive ontological commitment to the activity of apperception considered in itself. Kant makes clear that the “I think” stripped

A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus  143 of any content of thought is simply an empty concept. It would be equivalent to the concept of the transcendental subject from the Paralogisms chapter of CPR, i.e., the “concept of a mere something […] wholly empty of content” (A355). The activity of apperception is expressed through acts of synthesis, according to concepts, whereby the subject unifies the manifold of intuition and posits phenomenal objects including itself as an object. The ‘I think’ is governed by certain a priori laws (viz. transcendental logic) which safeguard the necessity of its synthetic a priori judgments, but need not be anything in itself, considered independently from what is given in intuition. It is only through the unification of the given manifold of intuition that the subject can posit itself as an object. Insofar as the subject is spontaneous, Kant believes the subject is a thing-in-itself understood as an “act of the understanding = X” (OP, 22: 94).36 This formulation, however, should remind the reader, familiar with CPR, of the transcendental object = X. The latter is “the concept of something in general” (A251) which denotes nothing in particular, but when the synthesized manifold of appearances is related to this concept, the relation yields cognition of a phenomenal object. 37 Just as the transcendental object is a placeholder for the object of representation, so too is the subject prior to self-positing a mere transcendental placeholder for the activity of apperception. Whether we are talking about the activity of apperception or the activity of the ether, internal or external affection, considered on their own “the affecting object is = X” (OP, 22: 36).38 We can only cognize ourselves as subjects insofar as we appear to ourselves through the combination of internal (self-positing) and external (dynamic force plenum) affection. Kant has no commitment to the activity of apperception considered in itself, but rather views it only as a conceptual placeholder. As Kant says in Convolut 7: [The subject’s] consciousness of itself (apperceptio), insofar as it is affected, is the representation of the object in appearance. However, insofar as it is the subject which affects itself, it is equally to be regarded as the object in itself = x. (OP, 22: 78) This view of the “I think” can be usefully contrasted with at least one view of Fichte’s Tathandlung whereby it is transcendentally real and generates the whole of experience through its unconditioned activity. In fact, in his review of Aenesidemus, Fichte refers to this activity as “supranatural” (Fichte 1845, 23) and holds that it is wholly self-determining. 39 Although both Kant and Fichte characterize the I fundamentally in terms of its activity, Kant would flatly reject Fichte’s claim that this activity has the “characteristic of absolute self-subsistence” (Fichte 1845, 22). Although apperception and the ether are transcendental conditions for the possibility of the phenomenal world, this does not entail that

144  Bryan Hall they exist in themselves as positive noumena since, in themselves, neither one is a determinate thing. Both Kant and Fichte could agree that any inference from this activity to the transcendental reality of a thing that is active would be fallacious. As an extension of his argument in the Paralogisms, Kant could go one step further by saying that any inference from the activity of the ether or of apperception to the transcendental reality of these forms of activity is fallacious. Whereas Fichte infers the transcendental reality of mental activity from experience, Kant would resist such an inference. Even though Kant’s ontology in the Selbstsetzungslehre is ultimately one of activity whether physical (the moving forces of the ether) or mental (the spontaneity of apperception); considered in themselves and apart from their relationship to one another they are empty concepts. While Fichte identifies real and logical grounds with one another, Kant maintains they are distinct concepts. Understanding how Kant distinguishes these two forms of “ground” from one another, furthermore, can help us to see how Kant could maintain that apperception and the ether serve as different kinds of grounds depending on whether or not they are considered in relation to one another. In On a Discovery According to which any Critique of Pure Reason has been made Superfluous by an Earlier One (1790), Kant holds that the relationship between a real ground and what it grounds is synthetic and cannot be derived through the principle of contradiction. The relationship has to do with objects and he offers causation as a paradigmatic example (8: 193–195, 231).40 In a May 12, 1789 letter to Reinhold, Kant further distinguishes between two types of real ground: formal and material (L, 11: 36). Whereas the contributions of the subject to its experience of objects could be considered real formal grounds (e.g., in the form of synthetic a priori judgment), the contributions of the object to the subject’s experience of objects (as well as itself as an embodied subject) could be considered real material grounds. I believe that one can also connect Kant’s conception of a real ground to his conception of determination. “X really grounding Y” can be usefully compared with “X determining Y.” For example, appearances have their lawful order (Y) by virtue of the unity of apperception in the synthesis of the manifold (X).41 In his letter to Reinhold, Kant goes so far as to define “ground” in general as “that whereby something else (distinct from it) is made determinate” though he immediately qualifies this for logical grounds by saying that they are not valid for objects but only for the “manner of representation” (L, 11: 35). Although Schulze thinks that he is simply applying Kant’s principle of causality when he claims that the mind, as the real ground for what is necessary in our cognition, would need to be metaphysically distinct from what it grounds, it is unclear whether this interpretation of Kant’s principle is accurate. For example, the principle, as stated in the Second

A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus  145 Analogy, requires only that the succession of representations be subject to a rule (schematized category of cause and effect), but does not require that this rule be delivered by something actual that is metaphysically distinct from representation (CPR, A190–211/B233–256). According to the view I am presenting, Kant can maintain that the mind (apperception, or the ‘I think’) is distinct from what it represents—as real formal ground—without being something metaphysically real considered in itself. When it comes to a logical ground, the relationship between it and what it grounds is analytic and can be derived through the principle of contradiction (Disc, 8: 193–195, 230). The relationship obtains within a certain class of assertoric propositions. For example, I would suggest that the relationship between the concept of a thing-in-itself and an appearance in the B-edition Preface of CPR is that of logical ground (thing-in-itself) to what it grounds (appearance). The reason we must think that “the thing-in-itself grounds appearance” is that the denial of this proposition is contradictory since it would entail affirming that there is an appearance without anything that appears (CPR, Bxxvi–xxvii).42 The concept of a thing-in-itself and the concept of an appearance are connected analytically, such that the former serves as the logical ground of the latter. At the same time, Kant makes clear, in the B-edition Preface of CPR, that even though the thing-in-itself must be thought of in this context, this does not entail that anything answers to the concept: But I can think whatever I like, as long as I do not contradict myself, i.e., as long as my concept is a possible thought, even if I cannot give any assurance whether or not there is a corresponding object somewhere within the sum total of all possibilities. (CPR, Bxxvi)43 Applying this framework to Kant’s discussion in OP, considered on their own and independently of the relationship to one another, both the ether and apperception are logical (conceptual) grounds (= X). They become real grounds only through this relationship, i.e., insofar as they mutually determine one another and so jointly produce the phenomenal world through their activity. Although this relationship of mutual determination is synthetic, we must nonetheless be able to think of the relata (apperception and ether) independently of this relationship. What we think of, however, is only an empty concept analytically connected to the relata in question. Kant compares the activity of apperception, considered on its own, to the transcendental object, saying it is an “act of the understanding = X” (OP, 22: 94).44 What is true of the subject of representation is likewise true of the object of representation. The ether considered on its own is “the affecting object = X” (OP, 22: 36).45

146  Bryan Hall Considered in relationship to one another, however, they are reciprocally determining: Positing and perception, spontaneity and receptivity, the objective and subjective relation, are simultaneous; because they are identical as to time, as appearances of how the subject is affected —thus are given in the same actus and are in progression toward experience (as a system of perceptions). (OP, 22: 466) They are intrinsically related as real grounds since Kant is not committed to the actuality of either one outside the relationship they have with one another. Just because two things are intrinsically related, however, does not entail that there is only a rational and not a real distinction between them. For example, Robert Boyle talks about the first lock and key being intrinsically related such that if Tubal Cain (apparently the first locksmith), had made one without the other, both would be deprived of the essential powers that make them the kinds of things they are (Boyle 1991, 23). In the absence of the first lock, the first key lacks the power essential to a key, i.e., to unlock something. Rather, it is just a piece of metal organized in a particular way. To take things a step further, it seems that we can talk about two things being intrinsically related such that we have no positive ontological commitment to either relatum absent the relationship they bear to one another. Even so, we can talk about the two things as being really distinct from one another even though they are intrinsically related (just as we can talk about the first lock and the first key as really distinct). This is how I understand the relationship between apperception and the ether. Although Kant and Fichte differ in their conception of real and logical grounds, one might wonder whether this dispute is even relevant to Schulze’s concerns since the latter only makes explicit use of real grounds in his criticisms of Kant and Fichte. Even though Schulze never uses the term ‘logical ground,’ he rejects inferring the actuality of a ground from the necessity of thinking of the ground. He criticizes Kant for “inferring from the fact that we can only think of the faculty of representation as the ground of these judgments, that the mind must be their ground in actual fact too” (Schulze 1911, 132). According to Schulze, such an inference simply begs the question against Hume’s skepticism. Later, he makes clear that there is a difference between a ground “qua transcendental idea” and a real (causal) ground (Schulze 1911, 161). As I mentioned in section “Schulze’s Criticism of Kant and Fichte’s Response”, according to Schulze, a transcendental idea can only serve a regulative function in unifying our cognitions, but it cannot serve as a constitutive real ground for cognition itself. Whereas Fichte explicitly identifies real and logical grounds with one another, both Kant and Schulze

A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus  147 maintain that the two types of ground are distinct. Although Schulze criticizes Kant for ostensibly conflating them, this criticism is better directed at Fichte since it is a criticism that Kant himself can avoid. Ultimately, both Kant and Schulze would agree that the necessity of thinking a ground entails only that it is a logical ground but not that it is a real ground. Notwithstanding the differences between Kant and Fichte on the relationship between logical and real grounds, there does seem to be strong prima facie similarities between them when it comes to their conceptions of the relationship between apperception and ether (Kant) and the relationship between I and not-I (Fichte). In his review of Aenesidemus, Fichte says that “the not-I is only for the I; that this not-I derives all the determinations of this a priori being only through its connection with an I” (Fichte 1845, 20). Does Fichte tie the reality of the not-I back to the activity of the I in the same way as Kant ties the actuality of the ether back to the activity of apperception? Although there is a surface similarity between Kant and Fichte, this similarity reveals a more fundamental difference. Whereas the relationship between not-I and I is fundamentally asymmetrical for Fichte (activity of I thoroughly determines not-I), the relationship between ether and apperception is fundamentally symmetrical for Kant (activity of apperception and ether mutually determine one another).46 Although the trajectory of German Idealism after Kant is toward a monism where all of the experience is grounded in the activity of an absolute I (as variously understood by Fichte and Schelling) or part of a dialectical progression toward absolute knowing (Hegel), Kant maintains a dualism (experience as the joint product of ether and apperception) in OP that is consistent with the dualisms he espoused throughout the Critical period. Although I have argued that some aspects of Kant’s mature theory of self-positing are presaged by things he says in the Critical era (e.g., his discussion of self-affection in the B-edition Transcendental Deduction), there are aspects of his view that are very surprising from the Critical perspective (e.g., the ether as a transcendental material condition of experience).47 Even so, I would argue that these later developments in Kant’s theory of self-positing are what make it possible for him to avoid the objections that Schulze levels at his Critical era view. Kant simply does not make the fallacious inference from logical ground (thought) to real ground (cause) as Schulze charges. The ‘mind’ (apperception) considered in itself is only a logical ground. The mind is a real ground only insofar as it stands in a mutually determining relationship with the ether. Only through this relationship can it be the real (formal) ground of what is necessary in our cognition (synthetic a priori propositions). Although Kant would maintain that the ‘I think’ is distinct from what it thinks (including synthetic a priori propositions), he has no positive ontological commitment to apperception independently of the activity of ether

148  Bryan Hall which provides the empirical content for thought and through which the self is posited as an embodied subject. The Selbstsetzungslehre answers Aenesidemus insofar as it explains how the mind, qua real ground for what is necessary in our cognition, is not a self-in-itself, a noumenon, or a transcendental idea. As a real ground, the mind is fundamentally embodied in a cognitive subject. This empirical subject, however, is posited through the joint activity of apperception and the ether. Although apperception is a transcendental formal condition of experience, Kant has no commitment to it as a self-initself independently of the activity of the ether. Considered independently of this relationship, Kant would only concede that apperception is an empty concept (Schulze’s ‘noumenon’), but one that serves as a logical ground. Finally, apperception is not a transcendental idea insofar as it is partially constitutive of experience. It is not simply a regulative principle for the organization of experiential cognition. Likewise, although Kant is committed to the ether as a transcendental material condition of experience, he has no commitment to its transcendental reality, considered on its own, independently of the embodied cognitive subject it jointly constitutes with apperception.

Notes 1 Commentators like Daniel Breazeale hold that Fichte’s review indicates a break with Reinhold and general agreement with Schulze (Breazeale 2013, 23–41). In an influential paper, James Messina takes just the opposite view on Fichte’s review (Messina 2011). The title of his paper serves as inspiration for my own. For more on the debate between Reinhold, Schulze, and Fichte, see Neuhouser (1990, 68–76 and 102–109) and Martin (1997, 81–99). 2 With the exception of correspondence, citations to Fichte’s work follow the Sämmtliche Werke (Vol. 1) pagination which is standard in the translations used. 3 Some of Schulze’s objections that Fichte responds to but that Kant does not include: (1) Instead of a priori concepts being conditions for the possibility of objects, there could instead be a pre-established harmony between these concepts and the objects as they exist in themselves (Schulze 1911, 151). (2) The Refutation of Idealism fails in its task since it does not refute Berkeley (Schulze 1911, 268–269). (3) Kant’s moral theology illegitimately infers practical claims from indemonstrable theoretical assumptions (Schulze 1911, 427). In his review of Aenesidemus, Fichte responds to (1) by saying that our faculty of representation is simply incapable of representing the relationship of pre-established harmony that Schulze claims to countenance (Fichte 1845, 16). Fichte repeats Kant’s own response to (2), viz. that Kant’s target in the Refutation is not Berkeley but rather Descartes (Fichte 1845, 21). Finally, when it comes to (3), Fichte argues that Schulze misunderstands the distinction between practical and theoretical reason (Fichte 1845, 22). Since I limit myself to the objections Kant responds to in Convolut 7 of OP, the focus of this paper will be on theoretical self-positing, but I do discuss Kant’s theory of practical self-positing and its relationship to his mature moral theology elsewhere (Hall 2021).

A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus  149 4 Translations from Aenesidemus come from Schulze (2000, 104–135) which uses the Schulze (1911) pagination. 5 When it comes to the first assumption, Hume would question why one is entitled to assume that “the presence of synthetic necessary propositions in us is the effect of cause different from them—be this cause what you will” (Schulze 1911,138). When it comes to the second assumption, Hume would claim that “we know of no principle by which we can determine to what extent our representations and their characteristics agree with what is objective and its characteristics” (Schulze 1911, 140–141). 6 Unless otherwise noted, quotes from Kant’s work come from the Cambridge University Press series of translations. 7 In the final section of this paper, I will argue that Schulze’s claim is based on a misinterpretation of Kant’s principle of causality. 8 For example, Schulze argues that inconceivability does not entail impossibility (Schulze 1911, 142, 151). He also offers other (conceivable) alternatives to the mind as the cause of necessary synthetic propositions. For example, he suggests at one point that things-in-themselves could “generate cognitions such as would carry necessity” even if (pace Kant) how they do so is unknowable to us (Schulze 1911, 145). Finally, he deploys Hume’s argument that it is conceivable that the effect could obtain without the cause to undermine the (ostensibly logically) necessary connection between them (Schulze 1911, 147). 9 Although Schulze lists these as three separate options, he deals with the first two options in the same way. Fichte also treats these options as identical in his review of Aenesidemus (Fichte 1845, 16). 10 From Kant’s perspective, it would be more accurate to say that the categories, as applied to merely thought objects, would need to be deployed in their unschematized rather than their schematized forms (CPR, A147/B186–187). 11 Kant states clearly that the “transcendental ideas are never of constitutive use” (CPR, A644/B672) within the context of theoretical cognition. Although these ideas take on a different role within practical cognition, since Schulze’s focus is here on theoretical cognition this other role is irrelevant. 12 Translations of Fichte’s review of Aenesidemus come from Fichte (2000, 136–157). I will expand upon the distinction between real and logical ground in the section “Resisting Absolute Idealism”. 13 Translations from IWL as well as the 1794 Foundations of the Entire Wissenschaftslehre (abbreviated FWL) are taken, with minor changes, from Fichte (1982). 14 In IWL, Fichte claims that the intellect is “an act, and absolutely nothing more, we should not even call it an active something, for this expression refers to something subsistent in which activity inheres.” (Fichte 1845, 440) 15 Tieftrunk followed Schulze in criticizing Kant for retaining an assertoric commitment to things-in-themselves. 16 It should be noted, however, that not all of the fascicles concern the transition project and some pages having to do with the transition project have been discovered after the Akademie printing while others have been lost to history. 17 I also discuss Convolut 7 and its relationship to the Critical philosophy in Hall (2015, 184–196). 18 Italics added. 19 Translation is mine. 20 Fichte refers to this concept in his review of Aenesidemus when examining what the highest (and so unconditioned) principle of consciousness might reflect. See Fichte (1845, 18).

150  Bryan Hall 21 The Refutation of Idealism from the B-edition of CPR makes a similar point (B276). 22 Each of these steps should be considered as moments in a single process of self-positing. The relationship between these moments is logical not temporal, i.e., it is not as if the subject first has an existence in pure intuition and then only at some later point an empirical existence. 23 See also CPR, A571–583/B599–661. 24 The argument in question was from The One Possible Basis for a Demonstration of God’s Existence (1763). See Förster (2000, 93–97). 25 Translation is mine. 26 Erich Adickes summarizes Tiedmann’s work in Adickes (1896, 219–221). 27 Translation is mine. Compare this with A107 where Kant talks about transcendental apperception ensuring the representation of the subject as numerically identical. 28 See also What is Orientation in Thinking? (8: 134–135). 29 Jeffrey Edwards mentions Kant’s response to Aenesidemus in a footnote, though he focuses on Kant’s discussion in Convolut 1 (the section of OP Kant was working on when he died). By this point, Kant had moved beyond the Selbstsetzunglehre and may even be starting an entirely new work unrelated to his Transition project. In Convolut 1, according to Edwards, Kant is responding to two of Schulze’s objections: (1) that everything, according to Kant, is an aggregate of forms and effects of the mind, and (2) that Kant does not refute Berkeleyan idealism. Edwards argues that contra (1) the mind’s transcendental ideas form a system and not an aggregate, and contra (2) that Kant adopts a form of realism similar to Spinoza’s substance monism (Edwards 2000, 252n65). I agree with Edwards’ general approach, but I would modify his solution to some extent. At least in Convolut 7, I don’t think Kant is trying to take on one of the horns of Schulze’s trilemma concerning the mind (e.g., the one that understands “mind” as a transcendental idea), but is rather offering a neglected alternative to Schulze’s trilemma. When it comes to (2), I disagree with Edwards that the ether is something transcendentally real (like Spinozistic substance). 30 Translation is mine. The remaining mentions of “Aenesidemus” in Convolut 7 largely repeat what has already been quoted. 31 At one point, however, Fichte seems to grant Schulze’s point admitting that “inasmuch as the mind is the ultimate ground of certain thought-forms, it is noumenon” (Fichte 1845, 16). For Kant’s conception of noumena as unconditioned, see Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics (4: 332–333). 32 For a thorough examination of the various roles the ether plays as a transcendental material condition for experience, see Hall (2015, 71–92). 33 Translation is mine. 34 Kant uses the terms ‘caloric’ and ‘ether’ interchangeably (e.g., OP, 22: 218). Insofar as the ether serves as the dynamical source of mechanical motion, where the latter is the proximate cause of empirical affection, the actuality of the ether is consistent with Kant’s criterion in the Second Postulate of Empirical Thought, viz. that the actual be connected with perception in accordance with natural law. Here, one should also note the similarities between Kant’s discussion of the ether in OP and his discussion of ‘magnetic matter’ in CPR. Neither is immediately perceived but they are nonetheless actual in accordance with the Second Postulate (A226/B273). 35 Elsewhere I argue that Kant needs the ‘totality of empirical reality’ to serve a constitutive function even within the Transcendental Ideal of CPR (Hall 2015, 53–56).

A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus  151 6 Translation is mine. 3 37 Gerd Buchdahl also recognizes the merely conceptual nature of the transcendental object. See Buchdahl (1992, 161). 38 This underscores an important point of contrast between Kant and one of his late contemporaries, Salomon Maimon. The latter views the I in itself as fully determined in thought through a pure a priori intuition (Maimon 2010, 194–196 and 208–209) and resists Kant’s claim that the transcendental object is an indeterminate X. In contrast, Maimon argues that for different appearances one must think of distinct and determined transcendental objects (Maimon 2010, 201). 39 This realist interpretation of the absolute I has long been the received view. One of Fichte’s contemporaries, F.H. Jacobi, accuses him of turning the world into a mere figment of the mind (Fichte 1978, 245). Several commentators suggest that whatever not-I exists for Fichte is wholly due to the absolute I limiting its own activity. See Royce (1892, 157–158), Seidel (1993, 98), and Hickey (2004, 65–80). Finally, Günter Zöller claims that Fichte eliminates any remnants of transcendental realism (the thing-in-itself) and attributes both the form and content of experience to the activity of the absolute I (Zöller 1998, 83). This realist interpretation, however, has more recently been challenged by a fictionalist interpretation which holds that the absolute I is only fictional but must be thought of as the logical ground of experience. Claims invoking the absolute I are not literally true, though they must be made within a certain domain of discourse, viz. a theoretical one concerning the ground of experience. Breazeale and Benjamin Crowe represent this more recent line of interpretation. See Breazeale (2002, 175–208; 2013, 88–92) and Crowe (2008, 268–287). If one accepts a fictionalist interpretation of the absolute I, Fichte’s view ends up being quite close to the view I ascribe to Kant in this paper. For a deeper examination of this possibility, see Hall (2016, 22–43). 40 In order to identify logical and real grounds, it would seem that Fichte needs to reject Kant’s idea that the relationship between determining (real) ground and what is grounded must be synthetic. Unlike Kant, Fichte seems to believe that mental activity is the determining ground of our representations of objects (real) as well as the manner of representation (logical), viz. that some representations are accompanied by the feeling of necessity. This is another way of understanding how real and logical grounds are identical for Fichte. 41 In this context, Kant calls the unity of apperception a “transcendental ground” (CPR, A127). 42 See also CPR, A190/B235, A280/B336, and A283/B339. 43 For more on the relationship between appearance and thing-in-itself, both in the Critical era and in OP, see Hall (2015, 154–197). 4 4 Translation is mine. See also OP, 22: 78. 45 Kant often refers to the ether as the “thing itself” (e.g., OP, 22: 390 and 471), but he also repeatedly compares the concept of a thing in itself to the transcendental object using the locution “thing-in-itself = X” (e.g., OP, 22: 33, 42, and 71). 46 Although the relationship between I and not-I appears to be asymmetrical within the context of Fichte’s review of Aenesidemus, in this same year (1794) he also published FWL which seems to make the relationship symmetrical (like Kant). The third fundamental principle in FWL holds that the I and not-I mutually limit one another’s reality. This leads Fichte to claim “no subject, no object; no object no subject” (Fichte 1845, 183). Although

152  Bryan Hall this may seem to reflect Kant’s view, it is important to note that this relationship is only reciprocal at the empirical level (finite I and not-I) for Fichte. At the transcendental level, both are “products of original acts of the self” (Fichte 1845, 107). For Kant, however, the relationship is symmetrical at the transcendental level (ether and apperception). Consequently, it is not right to compare Kant’s conception of the ether with something like Fichte’s absolute not-I. In fact, Fichte himself makes clear in the second fundamental principle that the absolute not-I depends wholly on the absolute I positing limitations to its own activity (Fichte 1845, 104). 47 Elsewhere, I argue that even Kant’s mature conception of the ether is presaged in the Critical era (e.g., his conception of ‘substance’ in the Analogies of Experience). See Hall (2015, 36–61).

References Adickes, Erich. 1896. German Kantian Bibliography. Boston, MA: Ginn & Company. Boyle, Robert. 1991. “Origin of Forms and Qualities.” In The Selected Philosophical Papers of Robert Boyle. Edited by M.A. Stewart, 1–96. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett. Breazeale, Daniel. 2002. “Fichte’s Philosophical Fictions.” In New Essays on Fichte’s Later Jena Wissenschaftslehre. Edited by Daniel Breazeale and Tom Rockmore, 177–208. Evanston, IL: Northwestern. Breazeale, Daniel. 2013. Thinking through the Wissenschaftslehre. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Buchdahl, Gerd. 1992. Kant and the Dynamics of Reason. Oxford: Blackwell. Crowe, Benjamin. 2008. “Fichte’s Fictions Revisted.” Inquiry, 51(3): 268–287. Edwards, Jeffrey. 2000. Substance, Force, and the Possibility of Knowledge. Berkeley: California University Press. Fichte, J.G. 1845. Sämmtliche Werke. Vol. 1. Berlin: Viet und Comp. Fichte, J.G. 1978. Fichte im Gespräch. Edited by Erich Fuchs, Reinhard Lauth, and Walter Schieche. Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: Frommann-Holzboog. Fichte, J.G. 1982. The Science of Knowledge. Translated by Peter Heath and John Lachs. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Fichte, J.G. 2000. “Review of Aenesidemus (Complete).” In Between Kant and Hegel: Texts in the Development of Post-Kantian Idealism. Translated by George di Giovanni and H.S. Harris, 136–157. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing. Förster, Eckart. 2000. Kant’s Final Synthesis: An Essay on the Opus postumum. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Friedman, Michael. 2013. Kant’s Construction of Nature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hall, Bryan. 2015. The Post-Critical Kant. London: Routledge. Hall, Bryan. 2016. “Fichte and Kant on the Ground of Experience.” Contemporary Studies in Kantian Philosophy, 1: 22–43. Hall, Bryan. 2021. “Kant’s Post-Critical Theology.” In The Court of Reason: Proceedings of the 13th International Kant Congress. Edited by Camilla ­Serck-Hanssen and Beatrix Himmelmann, 1977–1984. Berlin: De Gruyter.

A Kantian answer to Aenesidemus  153 Hickey, Lance. 2004. “Fichte’s Critique of Dogmatism: The Modern Parallel.” The Philosophical Forum, 35(1): 65–80. Maimon, Salomon. (1790) 2010. Essay on Transcendental Philosophy. Translated and edited by Nick Midgley, Henry Somers-Hall, Alistair Welchman, and Merten Reg. London: Continuum. Martin, Wayne. 1997. Idealism and Objectivity: Understanding Fichte’s Jena Project. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Messina, James. 2011. “Answering Aenesidemus: Schulze’s attack on Reinholdian representationalism and its importance for Fichte.” Journal of the History of Philosophy, 49(3): 339–369. Neuhouser, Frederick. 1990. Fichte’s Theory of Subjectivity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Royce, Josiah. 1892. The Spirit of Modern Philosophy. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin. Schulze, G.E. 1911. Aenesidemus, oder über die Fundamente der von Herrn Prof. Reinhold in Jena gelieferten Elementarphilosophie. Berlin: Reuther & Reichard. Schulze, G.E. 2000. “Aenesidemus (excerpt).” In Between Kant and Hegel: Texts in the Development of Post-Kantian Idealism. Translated by George di Giovanni and H.S. Harris, 104–135. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing. Seidel, George. 1993. Fichte’s Wissenschaftslehre of 1794. West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press. Smith, Norman Kemp. 2003. A Commentary to Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Tiedemann, Dietrich. 1794. Theätet oder über das menschliche Wissen, ein Beitrag zur Vernunftkritik. Frankfurt: Varrentrapp and Wenner. Zöller, Günter. 1998. Fichte’s Transcendental Philosophy: The Original Duplicity of Intelligence and Will. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

8 Fichte or Baumgarten? On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre1 Lorenzo Sala

Introduction Ever since Kant’s Opus postumum (OP) first became publicly available, scholars have been struggling to contextualize its so-called ‘Selbstsetzungslehre’ (doctrine of self-positing) within the larger Kantian corpus. The extent to which it has posed a problem is arguably visible in how the secondary literature on the topic can be classified according to the degree to which any given author takes this theoretical segment to be a straight-up deviation from Kant’s previous work or not. On one extreme of the spectrum, we have Adickes’ or Vaihinger’s interpretations. They, each in their own manner, maintain that Kant’s Selbstsetzungslehre is a mere concession to the fashion of the times, one ascribable to Fichte’s influence. 2 On the other end we have Hall’s interpretation, where the Selbstsetzungslehre, just like the OP in general, is construed as a natural, and even consistent, outcome of Kant’s mature position. 3 In the middle, one could situate the multitude of works that claim either that the Selbstsetzungslehre depends on Fichte’s influence or nonetheless that it departs to some degree from Kant’s critical philosophy.4 A particularly significant element in this debate is the fact that Kant uses the language of positing to describe the subject years before the OP. As Förster points out, Kant was already talking of the subject as positing itself in reflections dating back to the early 90s. This precedes not only other theories we find in the OP but also the very first appearance of Fichte’s own theory of the subject. In this paper, I will further develop this line of interpretation by showing how, already in the CPR, Kant uses the language of positing in relation to the self—and, to be more precise, in relation to the judgment ‘I think’5 —in a way that is fundamentally in tune with the later use of this notion in the OP (at least in terms of the first steps of the Selbstsetzungslehre). In both cases, I will argue that Kant’s reflections on the self as self-positing are the result of the coherent and systematic synthesis of various aspects of his critical theory of the subject and his understanding of existence as a particular form of positing, an understanding that he first elaborated in his 1763

DOI: 10.4324/9781003090946-9

On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre  155 The only possible argument. Central to my argument is the thesis that, in both the CPR and the OP, Kant uses the language of positing in relation to the self in order to spell out what, for him, is minimally implied in self-knowledge and the judgment ‘I think.’ In this respect, I will show that the OP’s Selbstsetzungslehre does not involve any radical break with Kant’s previous work. I will proceed as follows. In the first section, I will give an account of Kant’s understanding of positing. To this end, Kant’s critique of Baumgarten’s proof of God’s existence in his just-mentioned 1763 The only possible argument will be considered alongside Kant’s reworking of this critique in the CPR. Kant’s critique will be set against Baumgarten’s ontology and analyzed in light of the fact that the notion of positing was widely used by Kant’s contemporaries. As a result of this, we will see how Kant’s alternative to Baumgarten’s theory of existence will turn out to be, more generally, an alternative to the pre-Kantian understanding of positing. In the second section, I will then sketch several key aspects of Kant’s understanding of self-­ consciousness and self-knowledge, which will help set up the third and fourth sections. In the third section, the first two sections will provide a basis for me to analyze two pivotal passages in the CPR where Kant uses the language of positing in relation to the self. Of special interest is how Kant’s language here mirrors the 1763 distinction between ‘absolute’ and ‘relative’ positing in two ways: first, with regards to the category of existence in order to explain the peculiar way we gain knowledge of our existence; and, second, with regards to our cognition of ourselves, and specifically in relation to the thoughts through which we determine the I. Last, in the fourth section, I will analyze various passages from the OP where Kant also uses the language of positing in relation to the self to ascertain the specific role that the notion of positing plays in them. As we shall see, even in those passages where Kant gives the impression of deviating from the CPR—in particular, when he speaks of the positing of ourselves as a thing in itself—he is actually still following his understanding of the self as laid out in the CPR.

Kant’s understanding of positing The most famous occurrences of ‘positing’ in the Kantian corpus are probably from his 1763 text The only possible argument, where Kant introduces the distinction between ‘relative’ and ‘absolute’ positing in the context of his critique of Baumgarten’s proof of God’s existence. As is well known, this critique is based on the idea that existence is not to be taken as a determination of a thing, namely, one of its properties. As Kant will later write in the CPR, “a hundred actual dollars do not contain the least bit more than a hundred possible ones” (A599/

156  Lorenzo Sala B627), meaning that the difference between them does not consist in their properties. This shift in how one should conceive existence clearly undermines the very possibility of any kind of proof of God’s existence like the one provided by Baumgarten. Inasmuch as existence is, when so conceived, completely independent of what a thing is, the existence of God will not be, in any way whatsoever, deducible from God’s essence nor, as a result, by considering what predicates are entailed by the concept of God. What is important for the present discussion, however, is not so much the details of Baumgarten’s proof or of Kant’s critique of it as Kant’s alternative proposal to Baumgarten’s theory of existence and, in particular, the fact that this alternative proposal is formulated in terms of positing: The concept of positing or setting is perfectly simple: it is identical with the concept of being in general. Now, something can be thought as posited merely relatively, or, to express the matter better, it can be thought merely as the relation (respectus logicus) of something as a characteristic mark of a thing. In this case, being, that is to say, the positing of this relation, is nothing other than the copula in a judgment. If what is considered is not, merely this relation but the thing posited in and for itself, then this being is the same as existence. (OPD, 2: 73) With this distinction, Kant might appear to be merely introducing some new terminology to help solidify the intuition from which his critique of Baumgarten stems. Admittedly, if one were to take ‘positing’ as synonymous with ‘being’ and then distinguish between what we would nowadays call the existential and predicative meaning of ‘being,’ one would then be forced to introduce a corresponding distinction in the notion of positing. Furthermore, the choice of the terms ‘absolute’ and ‘relative’ positing seems to follow the same logic: if one were to understand predication as a relation between a subject and a predicate and deny that affirming that something exists involves predication, it would be natural to define this second kind of positing as ‘non-relative,’ i.e., ‘absolute.’ Nonetheless, the reason why Kant opts for the term “positing” instead of another is not entirely clear on the face of it. It is natural to wonder why, if positing really were synonymous with ‘being,’ why Kant did not simply use this word and, accordingly, distinguish between ‘absolute’ and ‘relative’ being. The way Kant uses ‘positing’ in the rest of the text gives us a clue for how one should understand this terminological choice: ‘to posit’ indicates an activity of the subject, something which is not conveyed by the verb ‘to be,’ at least with regard to how it is commonly used. At the same time, however, the wider use of the language of positing throughout the text, therefore, puts into question Kant’s initial

On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre  157 claim that ‘being’ and ‘positing’ really are synonymous: ‘being’ is (and was) not generally used to indicate any kind of representing activity on the part of the subject. How is one, then, to make sense of this conceptual predicament? To grasp the notion of positing that is here at work, it is best to set it against the broader background of Kant’s predecessors and specifically that of Baumgarten, whom Kant explicitly has in mind in this text. In fact, this makes it apparent how Kant himself did not invent the terminology of positing. Quite to the contrary, the language of positing was quite common among Kant’s contemporaries, so much so that some fundamental ontological principles and concepts were defined in terms of ‘positing.’ For example, both Baumgarten and Wolff defined the principle of sufficient reason in terms of ‘positing,’ with Baumgarten going so far as to list a “principle of position” (principium positionis) among the fundamental ontological principles.6 This last principle states: Every possible A is A, or, anything that is, is that, or, every subject is its own predicate. If you deny this, then some possible A is not-A, (§10), and hence A and not-A, or nothing (§7), which is impossible (§9). This proposition is called the principle of position, or, of identity.7 This principle is interesting for a number of reasons. For our purposes, three in particular need to be mentioned. First, it shows us how the oscillation between cognitive and ontological vocabulary that we just witnessed in Kant’s text is not limited to Kant alone. For Baumgarten also takes the idea that something is what it is (i.e., its ontological identity) to be equivalent to the idea of predication (specifically, to the idea of predicating ‘A’ of ‘A’), related as predication is to cognition. 8 Second, Baumgarten’s principle of position allows us to understand why Kant opted for the terminology of positing for talking about predication in the first place. The equation ‘identity = predication’ is, in fact, reflected in the very name of the principle, where, however, ‘positing’ takes the place of ‘predication.’ In other words, ‘positing’ and ‘predicating’ are treated as equivalent terms. This should not come as a surprise. “To posit” is a locution that Baumgarten also uses in his logic (Acroasis Logica) as a synonym for ‘to affirm’: what is posited is explicitly contrasted with what is negated (“to negate”), and “to posit” was used indifferently in relation to propositions (like in modus ponens 9) and in relation to predicates.10 As a result, it would have come instinctively to Kant to talk of predication as a kind of positing in that this was a common practice among his contemporaries. In virtue of this practice, it is thus easy to wrap one’s head around Kant’s equation of

158  Lorenzo Sala ‘positing’ with ‘being’: if the ‘positing A of B’ was, in effect, used as equivalent to ‘A is B,’ the synonymity between ‘positing’ and ‘being’ becomes understandable. Nonetheless, this equation still seems to be the consequence of an oscillation between an epistemological and an ontological interpretation of these terms: in the first case, the terminology of a conscious act (i.e., positing) is used to indicate what is actually grasped through this act. But there is an additional third aspect of this principle that must be highlighted. I am speaking of Baumgarten’s equation of “A est A” with “quicquid est, illud est.” This equation is crucial for understanding how Kant’s distinction between absolute and relative positing provides us not only with an alternative theory of existence but also with a substantial modification of the understanding of positing we find in his predecessors, and a paradigm shift in ontology to boot. For sure, the grammatical structure of the sentence does leave it open as to whether “quicquid est, illud est” should be translated as “anything that is, is that” or instead as “anything that is, is.” In the first rendering, it would seem that this sentence refers to something like Scotus’ haecceitas and consequently entails the claim that any given thing is precisely that thing which it is; in the second, it would seem that it refers to its “being,” and consequently entails the claim that any being is a being (and not nothing) or that everything existing exists. At any rate, it is here incidental which translation is the correct one. What is of import is that, through this principle, Baumgarten is treating the reference of the sentence (whether be it the haecceitas, existence, or something else entirely) as equivalent to the fact of having a certain property (and as such to predication). That is to say, the reason why “quicquid est, illud est” is the case is precisely the same reason why one has to predicate A of any A: were it not so, the thing in question would be the subject of contradictory predicates.11 This makes it clear that, no matter how it is conceived, “quicquid est, illud est” is understood as something concerning what the thing is, whereby it is a property like any other. To this extent, it is something usually expressed through predicates and is no different in principle than, say, ‘being red’ or ‘not being red.’ This is just one example of the conception of being at the core of Baumgarten’s ontology. From the very start, the fundamental, minimal form of being is defined in terms of predication: ‘to be A’ or ‘non-A’ (i.e., not involving contradiction) is the minimal form of being and the basic criterion for being ‘possible.’ Whereas non-contradiction is the negative criterion, to be is, on the positive flip side, a matter of predication: to be is always something’s being A (or non-A), and any question about it will always ultimately boil down to what it is.12 Given these conditions, it is evident that, in this context, positing will likewise ultimately boil down to predication and hence always include the positing of some predicate. We can better appreciate the meaning and the significance of Kant’s introduction of the distinction between relative and absolute positing

On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre  159 when we set it against this historical background. By denying that existence can be reduced to the determinations of a thing, Kant is going against a basic tenet of his predecessors’ ontology, thereby breaking with a whole ontological tradition.13 In performing this feat, however, he is not introducing any radically new terminology. It’s really just the opposite. The notion of positing employed in the 1763 The only possible argument is a modification and a broadening of the notion of ‘positing’ that was already common currency among his predecessors: positing is no longer construed as equivalent to predication, which now becomes a specific kind of positing, but is also construed as including the activity of representing aspects of things that cannot be reduced to their determinations. In order to more fully flesh out Kant’s understanding of positing insofar as it would have informed his use of such language in the CPR and eventually play a role in the OP, some mention is required of how exactly he reworks this critique of the ontological proof in the CPR. As it turns out, we also see Kant frequently using the notion of positing in the CPR, both in the context of its critique of the ontological proofs as well as in other pivotal passages. Here, I will focus exclusively on the first context, which is in fact the most useful for completing our picture of the Kantian notion of positing. Although the core of Kant’s critique remains the same, this formulation has the advantage of framing the critique within the theoretical framework of Kant’s mature philosophy and specifically in terms of the distinctions between (1) synthetic and analytic judgments and (2) intuitions and concepts, which he had not yet developed in 1763. In view of this new framework, Kant’s account is enhanced in at least four noteworthy ways. First, he specifies absolute positing as the act of “posit[ing] the object in relation to my concept” (CPR, A599/B627). As such, this act is not a modification of a concept, but a relation of the concept with something extra-conceptual (i.e., its object). Second, and this is along the same lines, on the grounds that existence cannot be known through the mere concept of a thing, Kant also claims that “every existential proposition is synthetic” (CPR, A598/B626). Third, due to the need for an extra-conceptual element to be in play for us to know the existence of a thing, Kant then argues that it is possible to know that something exists either “immediately through perception or through inferences connecting something with perception” (CPR, A601/B629). Last, precisely because of the necessity for perception, Kant limits our cognition of existence to phenomena.14 In this way, Kant’s use of the language of positing proves to be—at least up until 1787—a modification of the language used by his contemporaries. From what we have seen, this terminology has nothing whatsoever to do with the idea of positing as a sort of the creative or productive activity that is so often associated with Fichte’s notion of positing (an association, incidentally, probably attributable to

160  Lorenzo Sala the latter’s references to intellectual intuition15). As a matter of fact, relative positing simply consists in articulating a relation among the predicates of certain concepts, making it a merely logical activity completely independent of the existence of anything corresponding to said concepts. On the other hand, absolute positing, the form of positing which is instead concerned with things and not just with concepts, turns out to depend on empirical intuition. And as such, it turns out to be passive in a way that is precisely the opposite of the aforementioned idea of intellectual intuition in that it depends on things given to us, over which we have no control.16

Kant’s understanding of the self and self-knowledge In both the OP and in the CPR, a recurring theme of the passages where Kant uses the notion of positing in relation to the self is the idea that we know ourselves only as phenomena. Prior to looking at these passages in detail, it is useful to give a brief overview of some of the key features of Kant’s understanding of consciousness and self-knowledge. Admittedly, this is a topic worthy of a discussion in itself and, as such, the scope of the present paper means that I cannot fully elaborate upon it nor enter into the minutia of the debates surrounding it. In the CPR, Kant explains the idea that we only know ourselves as we appear by appealing to the distinction he draws between inner sense and apperception as two ways of relating to ourselves. In a nutshell, Kant’s thesis is that, although we are indeed conscious of the activity of thinking through apperception (which does not belong to sensibility), this is by no means sufficient for us to have a knowledge of ourselves. By means of apperception, so goes Kant’s argument, “I am conscious […] only that I am” (CPR, B157, emphasis added), but for such a cognition to be possible, “I also need in addition to the consciousness, or aside that I think myself, an intuition of the manifold in me”17 (CPR, B158). The idea that, in order to have actual knowledge of a given object, one needs an intuition of it, is a well-known tenet of Kant’s critical philosophy. All the same, what is crucial here is how this idea relates specifically to the I, an object that, for Kant, enjoys a unique status. In this respect, there are two pivotal passages from the Paralogisms which are particularly relevant to drive this point home. In these passages, Kant maintains that rational psychology is based on: the simple and in content for itself wholly empty representation I, of which one cannot even say that it is a concept, but a mere consciousness that accompanies every concept. Through this I, or He, or It (the thing), which thinks, nothing further is represented than a transcendental subject of thoughts = x, which is cognized only through the

On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre  161 thoughts that are its predicates, and about which, in abstraction, we can never have even the least concept; […] the consciousness in itself is not even a representation distinguishing a particular object, but rather a form of representation in general, insofar as it is to be called a cognition; for of it alone can I say that through it I think anything. (CPR, A345–346/B404) In a similar vein, in the first edition version of the Paralogisms (which is incidentally longer), we find Kant contending that: this I is no more an intuition than it is a concept of any object; rather, it is the mere form of consciousness, which accompanies both sorts of representations and which can elevate them to cognitions only insofar as something else is given in intuition, which provides the material for the representation of an object. (CPR, A382) These passages provide us with some indispensable clues for how to interpret Kant’s use of the language of positing in relation to the self. There are six in total, and they build off one another. (1) The I is explicitly equated with consciousness itself (which is, in turn, often equated with apperception18). This is pertinent for understanding what exactly Kant is referring to when he talks about the I. (2) The I (i.e., consciousness) is said to be neither an intuition nor a concept and, in general, it is not a representation of an object. Put differently, the I is not one of consciousness’ objects, a particular object we can find in it. This is to be taken in the radical sense that the I (or consciousness) is not one of the objects that consciousness is about, which is to say that it is not one of its contents. To phrase it in a way that would be foreign to Kant, the consciousness of a representation is not one of the intentional objects of the conscious representation in question. Comparable to what Hume had already observed, for Kant, too, the I is not a determinate content that we can simply pinpoint or discover within ourselves. (3) As made clear by Kant’s reference to thoughts as predicates of the I, we only cognize the I through the representations that belong to it. This is, in effect, the flip side of the previous claim concerning the absence of the I as a particular content of our mental life. For what we encounter in ourselves whenever we reflect upon ourselves (i.e., upon our mental life) is not an I as such but only the particular representations that we happen to have, and it is through them that we gain self-knowledge. By way of illustration, in our experience of ourselves we never, in fact, meet an I, but only ever come across things like the sensation of cold, the thought that ‘the sky is blue,’ the perception of the computer screen, and so on, and it is only by means of these contents that one determines (i.e., knows) oneself.

162  Lorenzo Sala When taken in combination with Kant’s claims about the role of the inner sense in self-knowledge, two additional and interlocked key features of Kant’s understanding of consciousness and the I (points 4 and 5 below) become apparent. As just mentioned, Kant maintains that, in order to gain knowledge of ourselves, being conscious (i.e., having conscious representations, that is, consciously representing something) is not enough. We also need “an intuition of the manifold in me” (CPR, B158). The reason why this is all-important is two-fold. (4) In the first place, it tells us, positively, that the aforementioned determination of the I through its representations is something that takes place through inner sense, meaning through an intuition that has the representations in question as their object (e.g., having the previously cited example of the sensation of cold as its object). For instance, in thinking “I think ‘the sky is blue’” the representation ‘the sky is blue’ is an object of an inner intuition, and it is through it that I determine (i.e., know) myself. (5) In the second place, this tells us, negatively, that to apperceive a representation, which is to say to be conscious of it in the first sense (the sense of the passages from the Paralogisms quoted above), is not to have the representation in question as an object. To be more precise, this indicates that it does not consist in having a representation that itself has the representation in question as its intentional object: this is in fact the role of inner intuition.19 Being conscious in the first sense, i.e., being apperceived, simply is a feature of a certain representation, its quality of being a conscious one (as opposed to an unconscious one). This can be easily illustrated through the same example: in the act of consciously thinking ‘the sky is blue,’ the object one is representing is the sky, not the thought ‘the sky is blue’; and the fact that one is aware of thinking ‘the sky is blue’ does not amount to having a representation that itself has the thought in question (‘the sky is blue’) as its object. Conversely, in the act of thinking “I think ‘the sky is blue,’” the thought ‘the sky is blue’ is what is attributed to the I and the represented (intuited) object, but one is not apperceiving it (the thought ‘the sky is blue’): what is apperceived is the thought “I think ‘the sky is blue.’”20 This brings us to the last point. (6) These features of apperception, in turn, shed light on why Kant often talks of apperception as ‘pure,’ ‘a priori,’ or ‘original.’ Inasmuch as being conscious of a representation (i.e., for it to be one we are aware of) does not in any way depend on the intuition of the representations in question, consciousness is something that does not arise in or through experience, but is instead an original feature of the conscious representations themselves. Either I am originally conscious of a representation (i.e., I apperceive it) or I cannot come to be conscious of it in experience. As we have seen, the opposite is true for self-knowledge through these representations: this is in fact something that requires inner intuition and is therefore always a posteriori. 21 With reference to my previous example, when I think “I think

On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre  163 ‘I think the sky is blue’” I am not apperceiving or thinking the thought ‘the sky is blue’: the representation ‘the sky is blue’ is intuited and known empirically (a posteriori).

Self-positing in the CPR All the passages from the CPR where Kant uses the notion of positing in relation to the subject (like most from the OP) are concerned with the role sensibility plays in the subject’s relation to itself. We find these passages in the Transcendental Aesthetic, the Transcendental Deduction, and the Paralogisms. In this section, I will focus solely on the passages from the Transcendental Deduction and Paralogisms, which illustrate the two different albeit complementary ways that the language of positing is used to talk about the self, thereby making them the most pertinent to consider when trying to come to an adequate understanding of the Selbstsetzungslehre in the OP. The first of these passages, which occurs in a footnote to §25 of the Transcendental Deduction, reads: The I think expresses the act of determining my existence. The existence is thereby already given, but the way in which I am to determine it, i.e., the manifold that I am to posit in myself as belonging to it, is not yet thereby given. For that self-intuition is required, which is grounded in an a priori given form, i.e., time, which is sensible and belongs to the receptivity of the determinable. There are a few things to note in this citation. Kant’s claim that the ‘I think’ expresses the act of determining my existence is quite straightforward. For as we have seen in the previous section, we determine our I only through our representations, and specifically through judgments like “I think ‘the sky is blue.’” Further, as is also evident from the fact that Kant uses it as equivalent to ‘determining,’ the ‘positing’ of a certain manifold in me is a form of what Kant in 1763 called “relative positing.” In other words, it is the act of determining ourselves through certain attributes and, more precisely, through the attribution of certain representations to ourselves (to the I) such as, to have recourse again to the same example, the representation ‘the sky is blue’ in the thought “I think ‘the sky is blue.’” Why this would require a self-­ intuition becomes clear from the previous section. In thinking, once again, “I think ‘the sky is blue,’” I am not conscious of thinking ‘the sky is blue’ because, put bluntly, this is just not what I am doing. Accordingly, as in thinking “I think ‘the sky is blue’” I am not thinking ‘the sky is blue,’ ‘the sky is blue’ is not an activity that I am aware of entertaining in thinking “I think ‘the sky is blue.’” Quite to the contrary, it is, for me, simply an inner, given object that I need to observe in myself, which is

164  Lorenzo Sala exactly why I need intuition in order to access it and to ‘posit’ it in myself (i.e., to determine my I through it). Now, let’s turn to Kant’s claim in the above passage that, in the judgment “I think,” existence is “already given.” To get to the bottom of it, it is helpful to consider the other passage where Kant uses the language of positing in relation to the I from the Paralogisms. This latter passage, which is worth quoting in full, runs: The “I think” is, as has already been said, an empirical proposition, and contains within itself the proposition “I exist”. But I cannot say “Everything that thinks, exists”; for then the property of thinking would make all beings possessing it into necessary beings. Hence my existence also cannot be regarded as inferred from the proposition “I think”, as Descartes held (for otherwise the major premise, “Everything that thinks, exists” would have to precede it), but rather it is identical with it. It expresses an indeterminate empirical intuition, i.e., a perception (hence it proves that sensation, which consequently belongs to sensibility, grounds this existential proposition), but it precedes the experience that is to determine the object’ of perception through the category in regard to time; and here existence is not yet a category, which is not related to an indeterminately given object, but rather to an object of which one has a concept, and about which one wants to know whether or not it is posited outside this concept. An indeterminate perception here signifies only something real, which was given, and indeed only to thinking in general, thus not as appearance, and also not as a thing in itself (a noumenon), but rather as something that in fact exists and is indicated as an existing thing in the proposition “I think”. For it is to be noted that if I have called the proposition “I think” an empirical proposition, I would not say by this that the I in this proposition is an empirical representation; for it is rather purely intellectual, because it belongs to thinking in general. Only without any empirical representation, which provides the material for thinking, the act I think would not take place, and the empirical is only the condition of the application, or use, of the pure intellectual faculty. (CPR, B422–423) Why “I exist” cannot be inferred from (i.e., derived through a syllogism centered on) “I think” is clear. This would require “existence” to be derivable from the concept “thinking being,” something which, as we have seen, goes against Kant’s general understanding of existence. The fact that “I think” expresses an “indeterminate empirical intuition” can be understood by referring to how we know ourselves, meaning how we determine our existence. As seen above, we know ourselves through judgments like “I think ‘the sky is blue,’” judgements where we attribute

On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre  165 to ourselves certain representations of which we have an inner intuition. Now, although we do need the intuition of a certain specific content in order to attribute it to ourselves (e.g., the inner intuition of ‘the sky is blue’), the ‘I think’ part of the thought “I think ‘the sky is blue’” does not depend on the particular content of inner intuition “the sky is blue” (or, for that matter, on any particular content): it just needs some sort of content, whatever that might be. Accordingly, although ‘I think’ requires an inner intuition, it does not require (nor depend on) any specific content, such that it expresses an “indeterminate empirical intuition.” It is precisely because of this that Kant calls it an empirical proposition: like all empirical propositions, this proposition is likewise grounded in experience, and especially inner experience. Nevertheless, it is different from all other types of empirical propositions in that it is not grounded in any specific experience, but rather in inner experience in general. 22 It is likely that Kant inserted the remark about the nature of the representation ‘I’ being ‘not empirical’ in order not to mislead the reader into thinking that the consciousness of thinking, like the judgment ‘I think,’ is grounded in experience. Quite to the contrary, the previous section has shown that the I (i.e., consciousness) is not something that arises in and through experience. Instead, it is something original and a priori, which is to say that we are either originally conscious of a representation or we are not, whereby we do not discover it in experience. When set against this background, it is possible to also shed light on the specific remark where Kant uses the notion of positing. The category of existence is normally applied when, in intuition, we have content that corresponds to a certain concept that we have. For example, I can say that my laptop exists because there is specific content in my intuition that I take to correspond to my concept of it. 23 However, it is evident that this can never be the case for the I. If it is true, as Kant argues, that we never have any intuition of the I—that we never any specific content ‘I’ given in our intuition—then the knowledge of our existence cannot be conceived as if a particular content ‘I’ was found in intuition (or, to use Kant’s image, ‘outside’ of the concept ‘I’). As a consequence, when we affirm ‘I am,’ we are not positing a thing (or, to be precise, an I) like we typically do when applying the category of existence: there is not in general any specific content through which an object ‘I’ is posited, either in inner intuition (and therefore as a phenomenon) or in some other non-sensible way (and therefore as a noumenon, and specifically as the soul of rational psychology). 24 Accordingly, although Kant also does not use the notion of positing for positively delineating our cognition of the existence of the I, it is apparent that, if the ‘being’ in ‘I am’ were accounted for in these terms, this would be a unique kind of absolute positing, which is not based on a specific content corresponding to the concept ‘I’ but on the availability of an inner experience in general.

166  Lorenzo Sala

Opus postumum We can now turn our attention to the passages in the OP that contain the theoretical part of Kant’s Selbstsetzungslehre and in particular those dealing with the nature and cognition of the self. As mentioned in the introduction, here the focus will be on the first two steps of this doctrine, which are usually spelled out in terms of ‘positing.’ These concern the very basic structure of the self and that of self-knowledge and generally revolve around Kant’s remarks on the judgments ‘I am’ and ‘I think.’ In particular, I will examine several key passages, beginning with the simplest ones, and then address those which add further layers of complexity to the overall picture. Let’s start with one of the simplest passages. It occurs at OP, 22: 85, where Kant writes: The logical consciousness of myself (sum) contains no determination but the real consciousness of intuition (apperceptio). “I am” is the logical act which precedes all representation of the object; it is a verbum by which I posit myself. I exist in space and time and thoroughly determine my existence in space and time (omnimoda determinatio est existentia) as appearance according to the formal conditions for the connection of the manifold of intuition; I am both an outer and inner object for myself. (OP, 22: 85) Apart from the last sentence, this passage overlaps with those from the CPR considered in the previous section. The meaning of the claim that “I am” is a “verbum” (i.e., a word) through which we posit ourselves should by now be clear: through “I am,” we affirm that we exist, which is something that we do through the “positing” of what we take to exist—here, specifically, ourselves. The fact that this positing precedes “all representation of the object” seems to go together with the first sentence, where the consciousness of ourselves is said to contain no determination “but the real consciousness of intuition.” As we have seen in the previous section, the existence of the I is known in a way that is peculiar to it alone: the judgment “I am” (sum) does not depend on any specific determination of the object ‘I’—that is, it does not depend on any specific representation of which we have an inner intuition and which we can ascribe to ourselves. Nonetheless, again as we have already seen, it requires some kind of determination of inner sense in general and, accordingly, “the real consciousness of intuition.”25 The rest of the passage simply states that we know ourselves like we know any other phenomena, namely through the formal principles that guide the synthesis of appearances. 26

On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre  167 There are also good grounds to take OP, 22: 119 to be in line with what I have presented above: I am conscious of myself (apperceptio). I think, that is, I am an object of understanding to myself. But I am also an object of the senses to myself and of empirical intuition (apprehensio); the thinkable I (cogitabile) posits itself as the sensible (dabile), and this a priori in space and time—which are given a priori in intuition and are mere forms of appearance. (OP, 22: 119) The first half of this passage is a concise, side-by-side discussion of the two ways of being conscious of ourselves, which were tackled in the second section. There, it was shown how, for Kant, we can either be simply aware of certain representative acts (i.e., of our activity of representing) without having the acts in question as an object, or we can take the representations in question as our objects in a passive relation to the representation in question. For example, I am aware of thinking ‘the sky is blue’ while thinking this particular thought, but without ‘the sky is blue’ being one of the represented objects. On the other hand, in thinking “I think ‘the sky is blue,’” we are not thinking ‘the sky is blue’ and, further, the representation ‘the sky is blue’ is, for us, a given object. In the first example, the consciousness of ‘the sky is blue’ is its pure consciousness (or pure apperception), while in the second it is its empirical consciousness (through inner sense). The I, i.e., consciousness, is never given as an object and is therefore only “an object of the understanding”: it is something which, to the extent that we do not have any intuition of it, we can have only a concept of. According to the second way of being conscious of ourselves, we are an “object of the senses” and specifically of “empirical intuition”: although no I is given as a particular content, we in fact have an empirical intuition of our representations themselves. 27 The second half of this passage puts these two ways of being conscious of ourselves in relation to the positing of ourselves. More precisely, the positing of ourselves is said to be: (1) an activity of the “thinkable” I; (2) to take place a priori; and (3) to be a positing as an object of the senses. Again, these three features are in line with what we have already observed above. Of course, the activity of positing ourselves is, as an activity, something that we are first of all conscious of according to the first kind of consciousness (i.e., apperception). Even when we ascribe it to ourselves (and, accordingly, relate to it also through inner sense), we take it to be an activity of the I, which, once more, is never empirically given. This positing is a priori because it is not based on any particular content of our inner sense, but only on inner experience in general. However, precisely for this reason (i.e., precisely due to this relation to experience), it is a positing of ourselves as sensible, and therefore as phenomena.

168  Lorenzo Sala Nevertheless, not all the passages from the OP where Kant deals with the self in terms of positing simply repeat what previous claims advanced in the CPR. Indeed, the inverse is true: some of them seem to definitely go beyond it in that they talk of the positing of the self as a thing in itself. For instance: at OP, 22: 413 one reads: The first act of knowledge is the verb: I am, self-consciousness, for I, [as] subject, am an object to myself. In this, however, there lies a relation which precedes all determination of the subject, namely, the relation of intuition to the concept, in which the I is taken doubly (that is, in a double meaning) insofar as I posit myself: that is, on the one hand, as thing in itself (ens per se), and, secondly, as object of intuition; to be precise, either objectively as appearance, or as constituting myself a priori into a thing (that is, as thing [Sache] in itself). (OP, 22: 413) For the most part, this passage repeats points we have already gone over: our consciousness of ourselves is twofold; we are conscious of ourselves both as the subject of our thoughts and as objects of our intuition (through the inner intuition of our representations themselves); and the cognition of our own existence precedes its determination through the particular contents of inner sense. However, it also goes one step further by affirming that in ‘I am’ we also posit ourselves as a thing in itself. Admittedly, this claim is rather puzzling. Luckily, however, the OP does contain additional passages that go into more details regarding this kind of positing. In this respect, the most useful passage comes from OP, 22: 20, where Kant writes: There lie two ways of representing in the knowledge of an object. 1. Of the object in itself. 2. Of the object in the appearance. The first is that through which the subject posits itself originally in intuition (cognitio primaria), the second, as it mediately makes itself an object according to the form it is affected (cognitio secondaria), this latter is the intuition of itself in the appearance [.] The intuition through which the object of the senses is given to the subject is the representation of the composition of the manifold according to spatio-temporal conditions. However, the object in itself = X is not a particular object, but the simple principle of synthetic cognition a priori which contains in itself the formal of the unity of this manifold of the intuition (not a particular object). (OP, 22: 20; my translation)28 In this passage, Kant explains what the positing of the self as a thing in itself amounts to, contrasting it with the positing of the self as

On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre  169 appearance. However, while what is said about the positing of the self as appearance is consistent with what we have seen above, the way Kant introduces the positing of the self as a thing in itself is rather puzzling. Indeed, it is not easy to say what it means to posit ourselves through the representation of ourselves as a thing in itself, and moreover in intuition. This clashes with the previously discussed passages wherein the positing of ourselves always depended on sensation and intuition (albeit not on any specific content thereof), making it, by definition, limited to the realm of appearances. This obscurity can be dispelled with the help of the last clause of this passage. In it, Kant specifies how the representation of the object in itself through which the subject posits itself is that of “the object in itself = X,” which “is not a particular object” but works instead as a “principle” concerning the “formal of the unity” of the manifold of the intuition of ourselves. This characterization of the representation of the object in itself presents a striking similarity with some of Kant’s claims about the ‘I’ and ‘consciousness’ we looked at in “Kant’s Understanding of the Self and Self-Knowledge” section. There, we saw how Kant, in the Paralogisms, affirms (1) that, through the representation ‘I,’ “nothing further is represented than a transcendental subject of thoughts = x,” and (2) that the I “is not even a representation distinguishing a particular object” (CPR, A345–346/B404). In combination with the fact that Kant is here talking about the positing of the self, we should take it to imply that, when he writes that we posit ourselves through the representation of ourselves as a thing in itself, Kant is, in point of fact, referring to the same representation of the I as a “transcendental subject = x” he was referring to in the Paralogisms. This hypothesis proves to be particularly fruitful in relation to what we have seen in “Kant’s Understanding of the Self and Self-Knowledge” section, and more precisely in relation to the difference between selfconsciousness and self-knowledge. Indeed, it not only helps to shed light on what self-positing means in relation to the notion of an ‘object in itself’ but it also helps clarify another aspect of self-knowledge that Kant’s account in the CPR did not manage to render explicit. Now, if we think back to “Kant’s Understanding of the Self and Self-Knowledge” section, we will recall how, for Kant, to be conscious of a representation does not amount to having a representation that itself has the representation in question as its object (specifically, an inner intuition of such a representation): to be conscious of representing ‘the sky is blue’ is not to have a representation that itself has ‘the sky is blue’ as its object. This, however, is exactly what does happen when we cognize ourselves: in formulating a judgment like “I think ‘the sky is blue,’” ‘the sky is blue’ is an object that is represented, and specifically the object of an inner intuition (as well as, of course, the object of the judgment). That being said, this is not the only way self-knowledge differs from

170  Lorenzo Sala consciousness. To be sure, something similar is true also about the representation ‘I.’ “Kant’s Understanding of the Self and Self-Knowledge” section makes clear that, for Kant, we are not conscious of representing because we have a particular content ‘consciousness’ or ‘I’ as a content of the conscious representation: a certain representation is not conscious because it has the representation ‘I’ among its objects. As such, we do not apprehend that we are conscious on the grounds of some represented contents: consciousness is a formal and original feature of our representations; and the I is never given as a particular content of consciousness either through inner sense or some other way. However, whereas in the simple consciousness of representing we do not have the I as a particular content—the I is not a given object—in self-knowledge we are in fact taking the internally intuited representations as properties of a thing: in formulating the judgment “I think ‘the sky is blue’” we are indeed attributing the inner object ‘the sky is blue’ to a being, and specifically to the I. It is in this sense that the relation between the positing of the self and its representation as a thing in itself is to be understood. We posit ourselves as a thing in itself in that we posit ourselves as the unknown substrate of any internally intuited representation, which we take to be its properties; we posit ourselves through this representation, in intuition, in that it is through the representation ‘I’ (as ‘transcendental subject’) that we take the internally intuited representation to be the experience of an I, which is accordingly known through intuition. Kant’s description of this positing as original is best explained in relation to the function that Kant ascribes to the representation of the I as an object = x, meaning the function it serves as a “principle of synthetic unity” containing “in itself the formal of the unity of this manifold of the intuition.” In fact, when ascribing a representation to ourselves, we are not doing this on the grounds of some of its contents: whatever such contents might be, we attribute to ourselves any representation that is given to us in the inner sense. Consequently, although we need an inner intuition to posit ourselves, it is only thanks to the representation of the I as an “object in itself” that we attribute the internally intuited content to an I. And it is in this sense that this representation works as a principle of the synthetic, formal unity of the manifold in inner intuition: it is through this representation of the self that we attribute to ourselves all the representations that we intuit internally, independently from their contents. 29 In a nutshell, even in this case where Kant appears, at first glance, to be drastically departing from, and perhaps transgressing the limits of, his critical philosophy, his doctrine of self-positing is fundamentally in line with the CPR. Although such a claim was not present in it, Kant’s talk of positing of ourselves as a thing in itself does not need to be interpreted

On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre  171 as involving any cognition of things as they are in themselves or any kind of intellectual intuition. On the contrary, it simply renders explicit an aspect of Kant’s understanding of self-knowledge that had not been fully spelled out in the CPR.

Conclusion Against the background of the previous sections, it seems possible to exclude that Kant’s Selbstsetzungslehre is the result of some Fichtean influence, at least in any way which is conceptually significant. On closer examination of the historical record, one should conclude that the concept of positing used by Kant is deeply rooted in the philosophical tradition of his time, where the concept of ‘positing’ played a central role in logic and metaphysics. More precisely, Kant’s concept of positing proves, on the one hand, to be a modification of the concept of positing deployed by the Wolffians, and, on the other, to originate in his critique of Baumgarten’s proof of God’s existence. Although Kant first elaborated it in the pre-critical period, this concept of positing did not undergo, as has been shown, any substantial modification with the critical turn. Indeed, its meaning was instead retained in the CPR. In the CPR, however, Kant’s use of this notion was no longer limited to his critique of the ontological argument. On the contrary, we see Kant already using the language of positing in relation to the self. He did so to flesh out some aspects of his understanding of self-knowledge and, in particular, to account for the difference between our cognition of our existence and our determination of it. As I have tried to show, as a consequence, the OP’s use of the terminology of positing in relation to the self should be read as being fundamentally in line with that from the CPR. And this goes both for what concerns the notion of positing and the theory of self-knowledge expressed in terms of it. In the end, Kant’s Selbsetzungslehre turns out to be not so much a modification of Kant’s previous doctrines, the result of some new conceptual turn, but simply a more detailed and systematic explanation of his understanding of the implications of the judgment ‘I think.’

Notes 1 This work was finished with the support of the Core Junior Fellowship at the Institute for Advanced Study at Central European University in Budapest. I wish to thank the whole staff for their precious support during my fellowship. 2 See Adickes (1920, 668–669). While Adickes argues that Kant’s theory is “Fichtean” in its terminology, Vaihinger goes a step further than this,

172  Lorenzo Sala arguing that the Selbstsetzungslehre is, in fact, the result of a more substantial “Fichtean” turn in Kant’s œuvre (see Vaihinger 1884, 169). Among more recent prominent interpretations, Tuschling’s is probably the one that comes closest to the claim of radical discontinuity attributed to the Selbstsetzungslehre by Adickes and Vaihinger. However, it is worth noting that he compares Kant’s understanding of positing not so much to Fichte’s, but rather to Hegel’s and Schelling’s (see Tuschling 1991, 117–133). 3 See Hall (2015, Chapter 5, esp. 5.5). The most well-known interpretation of the Selbstsetzungslehre as being fundamentally continuous with Kant’s prior writings is probably that of Mathieu (see Mathieu 1989: esp. Chapter 6). In this context, an excellent article by Onnasch deserves mention (Onnasch 2009). It has the merit of convincingly explaining how Kant’s reference to Fichte and Schelling as transcendental idealists should not be read as implying that Kant had somehow strayed from his critical path. 4 Examples of this interpretative “middle way” are numerous and diverse. By way of illustration, Beiser advances the thesis that the OP and the Selbstsetzungslehre are influenced by Fichte’s and Schelling’s language, but that they regardless remain true to the fundamental tenets of Kant’s critical philosophy (see Beiser [2002, 180–214]). Another notable example of this “middle way” is Förster’s interpretation of the Selbstsetzungslehre (see Förster [2000, 101–116]). Although he upholds that this doctrine develops naturally from Kant’s earlier position, he does, that being said, contend that Kant’s various references to God’s existence do transgress the boundaries delineated by critical philosophy. The two facets of Förster’s interpretation entail that, as far as the limited scope of this paper is concerned at any rate (i.e., its focus being exclusively on the ‘theoretical dimension’ of the Selbstsetzungslehre and in particular its use of the language of positing), Förster could be taken to interpret this doctrine as fundamentally continuous with Kant’s previous work, and so be listed in the previous group of interpretations. 5 For reasons of space, as indicated in the previous footnote, in this article I will focus solely on the ‘theoretical’ dimension of the Selbstsetzungslehre and in particular Kant’s use of the language of positing in it. Kant’s treatment of the practical and the theoretical dimensions are, as it happens, easily distinguishable in the text. In a similar vein, I will leave out Kant’s analysis of the act of positing of ourselves in space and concentrate on the relation between apperception and inner sense. This will in no way hinder my case. For although the act of positing of ourselves in space, together with that of positing ourselves in time, is part of the so-called ‘second step’ of the Selbstsetzungslehre, it is, from a logical perspective, ‘less fundamental’. This is because its necessity is due to the fact that, as already shown in the B edition’s account of the determination of time (and thus, by implication, the act of positing of ourselves in space) is not possible without the representation of space. For more on this very point, see Förster (2000, 76–77). 6 In this respect, it is rather surprising that the majority of the literature on Kant’s critique of the ontological argument does not take into account the widespread presence of the language of positing in the work of Kant’s contemporaries (e.g., Henrich [1960, 62–67], Proops [2015], Kannisto [2016]). Moreover, when scholars do focus specifically on Kant’s notion of positing and put it in relation to that of his predecessors, even then they do not take into account Baumgarten’s principle of proposition (e.g., Longuenesse [1998, 346–358], Franks [2016, 378–380]). For an analysis of Kant’s notion of positing that does go against this trend and discusses this principle, see Sala (2020).

On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre  173 7 Metaphysica §11. Here, I have departed significantly from the otherwise excellent translation by Fugate and Hymers. One could object that, while more faithful from a grammatical point of view, my translation implies that Baumgarten considers two propositions that are not equivalent to be two equivalent formulations of the same principle. But this is precisely the point I am arguing. As I will show, it is rather telling that Baumgarten takes these two propositions to be equivalent in that it clearly shows what understanding of being underlies his thought. For more on this translation, see Sala (2020: esp. 272n8). 8 This oscillation should not surprise us. It is, when push comes to shove, a direct consequence of the isomorphism that, for the Wolffians, holds between thought and being. They upheld that thinking and its structures (e.g., predicates) fundamentally mirror the things they are about. This can easily be illustrated by Wolff’s treatment of the ‘principle of contradiction’. On the one hand, Wolff takes this principle, which we would nowadays understand as logical, to be first and foremost an ontological principle. As such, it governs our thinking precisely due to the fact that it also governs the things our thinking is about. On the other hand, this principle is revealed to us through the nature of our mind: we know that it is ontologically impossible for something to be and not to be because it is, for us, impossible to conceive it in this way (see DM §10 and ON §27). On this point, see Cataldi Madonna (2007: 189–192). Note how this isomorphism is likewise mirrored by Baumgarten’s (Wolffian) definition of metaphysics as the “science of the first principles of human cognition [Scientia primorum principiorum cognitionis humanae]” (Metaphysica §1; see also DM 6), which is based on the idea that the laws governing things also govern our thinking about them. For a more detailed discussion of this issue, see Sala (2021). 9 See, for instance, Acroasis §§237–238. 10 See Metaphysica §§34–35, Acroasis §54. 11 In the following, I will use the term ‘being’ to talk about what is at stake in ‘quicquid est, illud est,’ so that, for example, I will talk about ‘quicquid est’ in terms of ‘a thing that is.’ I have made this choice in order to keep the meaning of the sentence as indeterminate as possible. This is useful not only because this indeterminateness highlights my previous observation about the translation (see note 6 above), but also because this indeterminateness plays perfectly into my hands. For what is important for my thesis is not the precise meaning of ‘quicquid est, illud est’ but, as we will see in a bit, that, no matter how ‘to be’ is interpreted here (i.e., meaning that ‘anything that is, is the very one thing it is’ or anything else), it is something that concerns what the thing in question is. 12 The most famous example of this is probably the so-called “principle of the indiscernibles” (see Metaphysica §269). Given how he takes any question about the being of something to ultimately be about its determination (i.e., about what it is), Baumgarten must conclude that the total coincidence of the determinations of two things implies their numerical identity. 13 In relation to this, one could point out that, although he does not reference Leibniz explicitly, Kant’s remark that God’s creation of the world does not add any predicate to the concept of such a world (see OPD, 2: 72; 118) almost perfectly mirrors an analogous claim from Leibniz’s Theodicy (see Theodicy §52). According to the latter, God’s creation does not add anything to the “nature” or to the “essence” of the world. While, from this

174  Lorenzo Sala point of view, Kant’s ruminations on existence appear, on the surface anyway, similar to Leibniz’s, there are still two vital differences to be kept in mind. The first is that the main aim of Leibniz’s argument is to preserve the contingency of some aspects of the world. Given how God’s choice of creating one specific world among others is, for Leibniz, based on an evaluation of the goodness of the world in question, existence still depends on the constitution of said world. As for the second difference, Leibniz does not fully sever existence from possibility. On the contrary, in his New Essays, Leibniz presented a proof of God’s existence in which existence is taken to follow from God’s bare possibility (see NE, book IV, Chapter X). A complete discussion of how these two aspects of Leibniz’s understanding of existence fit together falls beyond the scope of this paper. I would like to thank Ansgar Lyssy for pressing me on this point. 14 See CPR, A601/B629: whatever and however much our concept of an object may contain, we have to go out beyond it in order to provide it with existence. With objects of sense this happens through the connection with some perception of mine in accordance with empirical laws; but for objects of pure thinking there is no means whatever for cognising their existence. 15 For an illuminating account of this commonplace reading of Fichte, see Franks (2016). As interpreters of Kant’s Selbstsetzungslehre almost universally refer to this commonplace reading of Fichte—whether it is the correct reading or not—when attempting to ascertain whether this doctrine somehow is ‘Fichtean’, this question, in the end, boils down to whether the late Kant ascribes intellectual intuition to the subject. When I take issue with this question in the following I will therefore be interpreting it through this lens. 16 For more on the concept of ‘intellectual intuition’ in Kant, see Förster (2012, 145–152). Note how the passive nature of absolute positing is already suggested by Kant’s frequent use of ‘to give’ (geben) and cognates in The only possible argument, which can be found, for instance, even in the title of the 4th subsection of section “Kant’s Understanding of the Self and Self-Knowledge”, which reads “all possibility is given in something actual” (OPD, 2: 79, 124). I would like to thank Giovanni Pietro Basile for bringing this to my attention. 17 Translation modified. 18 E.g., CPR, B68, A124, MF, 4: 542, PE, 20: 270. 19 This could be clarified by showing how, in this respect, the interpretation I am proposing is the exact opposite of the one proposed by Henrich in one of his most famous articles. According to Henrich, for Kant (as well as for many other modern philosophers), self-consciousness is the “result of the subject’s making itself into its own object; in other words, [selfconsciousness would arise when] the activity of representing, which is originally related to objects, is turned back upon itself” (Henrich 1960; 1966, 21). As is evident from the passages from Kant that have been quoted, however, self-consciousness does not amount to a representation being the object of consciousness. The self-conscious nature of a representation, its being apperceived, does not consist in it being the object of a representation (whether of itself or of another representation). Instead, it is a characteristic of the representation in question. This is most evident from Refl, 5661 (18: 318–319). This passage not only confirms that to apperceive a representation is not to have it as an object, but also shows how, pace Henrich, Kant was deeply aware of the kind of circularity involved in the kind of understanding of consciousness that Henrich ascribes to him. Concerning this issue, see also V-Met/Mron, 29: 882.

On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre  175 20 In this respect, my interpretation departs from one of the most common tendencies in contemporary Kant scholarship. On the grounds that we usually use ‘I think’ in sentences like ‘I think that the sky is blue’ and not as frequently in sentences like “I think ‘the sky is blue’”, scholars interpret Kant’s references to ‘I think’ as if Kant had in mind sentences of the first kind (namely, ‘I think’ followed by a that-clause) and not those of the second (see, for instance, Depperman [2001], Ameriks [2000, 238–244], Longuenesse [2017, 26–32]). Accordingly, Kant’s references to the judgment ‘I think’ are read as being about being about the representations that make up the content of the judgments in question (and, in particular, of what it follows from the fact that they figure in a clause introduced by ‘that’), rather than being about self-consciousness and self-knowledge. While it is impossible for me to present an exhaustive case against this way of interpreting Kant’s references to the judgment ‘I think,’ let me present in its place some reasons why I believe it is highly implausible. First of all, Kant never supports his arguments through linguistic considerations. Although this may be a familiar procedure for us post-twentieth-century philosophers, it was not a common style of doing philosophy at the time. Moreover, ‘I think’ is not a historically neutral sentence. Kant’s contemporaries discussed ‘I think’ along the lines of Descartes’ cogito, and hence with self-knowledge and self-consciousness as their main focus. Given how Kant is usually extremely careful to alert us to when he is deviating from his contemporaries, he must have seen his references to ‘I think’ as something that his readers would be well acquainted with, which implies that these references are, at the very least in their broad strokes, in agreement with tradition. 21 Again, note how the interpretation I am proposing is also in this instance precisely the opposite of Henrich’s (see above, note 15). It is self-knowledge, not self-consciousness, that is a result of consciousness turning back upon itself. 22 In this respect, I disagree with interpreters like Allison (2004, 354–355), Klemme (1996, 384–389), or Förster (2000, 102–103), who take Kant’s reference to an “indeterminate empirical intuition” to be about intuition and experience in general (i.e., whether be it inner or outer) on the grounds that the synthetic unity of apperception is only possible in presence of a given manifold. My disagreement is based on three major considerations. (1) As I have already argued above, although our consciousness of thinking differs from inner perception, the judgment ‘I think’ specifically requires an inner intuition in order to be possible. (2) This line of interpretation seems to imply that any conscious representation whatsoever requires an intuitively given manifold. This, however, seems to overlook the case of the spontaneity of thinking. For example, in thinking ‘God is omnipotent’ I certainly am not synthesizing any given manifold. Nevertheless, there is indeed a unity of the consciousness of a manifold, albeit a merely logical one. (3) The interpretation I am proposing is strongly supported by what Kant writes when introducing Paralogisms: The rational doctrine of the soul […] is built on the single proposition ‘I think’; and we can, in accordance with the nature of a transcendental philosophy, quite appropriately investigate its ground or groundlessness. One should not be brought up short by the fact that I have an inner experience of this proposition, which expresses the perception of oneself, and hence that the rational doctrine of the soul that is built on it is never pure but is grounded in part on an empirical principle. […] For inner experience in general and its possibility, or perception in general and

176  Lorenzo Sala its relation to another perception, without any particular distinction or empirical determination being given in it, cannot be regarded as empirical cognition, but must be regarded as cognition of the empirical in general, and belongs to the investigation of the possibility of every experience, which is of course transcendental. (CPR, A343/B401) For interpretations in a similar vein to the one being proposed here, see Dyck (2014, 183–190) and Longuenesse (2017, 87–91). 23 On the cognition of the existence of empirically given objects, see Motta (2012, 114–116). 24 On this, see also MF, 4: 542–543. 25 The reading I am here proposing is diametrically opposed to Choi’s, who affirms that “the logical positing of myself is analytic, but it collapses into an apprehension in the sense that, in doing this, the subject becomes an object for itself in the appearance” (Choi 1996, 110). Although I agree with him in taking the sensible and intellectual aspects of consciousness to be inseparable, my view of why this is the case is, as it were, the inverse of his. It is not that the positing of ourselves results in an inner experience. On the contrary, although it is independent of any specific content of inner sense, it nonetheless requires a content of inner sense in general and, as such, presupposes it. In other words, ‘I am’ is not possible but as part of the judgment ‘I think,’ which is, in turn, always part of something like “I think ‘the sky is blue’”. In spite of the fact that both the judgment ‘I am’ and ‘I think’ are independent of any specific content of inner sense, and ‘I think’ explains the fact that we apperceive a certain representation—and not that we have an inner experience of it—they are nonetheless not possible without inner sense. For this same reason, the positing of ourselves is not analytic (which entails, of course, that the judgment ‘I am’ is a synthetic judgment). ‘I am’ is indeed contained in ‘I think’, but it is not grounded in the sole concept ‘I’: as I have shown, it requires some content of inner sense in general and, accordingly, rests on sensation. 26 As mentioned above, I will not consider Kant’s claims about the positing of ourselves in space, nor those about our existence in space. In the present context, let it suffice to say that I agree with Förster’s idea that they are due to the results of the Refutation of Idealism, which shows how time determination (and, consequently, self-knowledge) is not possible without space determination (see Förster 2000, 76–77 and 101–116). 27 Hall (2015, 187) interprets this passage as if here Kant were reversing the relationship of dependence between synthetic and analytic unity of apperception introduced in the CPR— “the analytical unity of apperception is only possible under the presupposition of some synthetic one” (B133). This inversion would be extremely problematic, for it is precisely as a consequence of such a relationship between the two unities where one presupposes the other that, in the CPR, Kant can affirm the necessity of synthesis for the possibility of the ‘I think’-accompaniment, and, which follows from this, affirm the necessity of the categories for the possibility of experience (on this, see Allison 2015, 339–345). However, it is not necessary to take Kant to be reversing this relation. Indeed, there is no reason for identifying the “cogitabile” and the “dabile” with the analytic and synthetic unity of apperception: they correspond, in fact, to the consciousness of ourselves in apperception and inner sense, which are something different from the synthetic and analytic unity of apperception. Moreover, what Kant says does

On Kant’s use of “positing” in the Selbstsetzungslehre  177 not imply a recasting of the relationship between analytic and synthetic unity of apperception. Here, which is also in line with the CPR, the I is not a given content that can be found in different mental states, which would then, on that account, be called “mine” on the ground of some content that we experience in all of them. 28 See also OP, 22: 31–32. 29 Note that this is only a description of how self-positing works (and, specifically, of the role the representation ‘I’ plays as the substrate of our thoughts). It should not be taken to imply a denial of the existence of things in themselves, and accordingly, as if Kant were abandoning a basic tenet of transcendental idealism (as Choi seems to maintain; see Choi 1996, 87). For an account of the relation between the various concepts of the thing in itself, transcendental object, etc. see Allison 2004, 57–64. On the concept of the thing in itself in the OP, see Beiser 2002, 210–214 and Hall 2015, 184–196.

References Adickes, Erich. 1920. Kants Opus postumum dargestellt und beurteilt. Berlin: Reuther & Reichard. Allison, Henry E. 2004. Kant’s Transcendental Idealism. New Haven: Yale University Press. Allison, Henry E. 2015. Kant’s Transcendental Deduction. An AnalyticalHistorical Commentary. New York: Oxford University Press. Ameriks, Karl. 2000. Kant and the Fate of Autonomy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Baumgarten, Alexander Gottlieb. 1761. Acroasis logica in Christianum L. B. de Wolff. Halle. [Acroasis] Baumgarten, Alexander Gottlieb. 2013. Metaphysics. Edited by Courtney D. Fugate and John Hymers. London: Bloomsbury. [Metaphysica] Beiser, Frederick C. 2002. German Idealism: The Struggle against Subjectivism 1781‒1801. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Cataldi Madonna, Luigi. 2007. “Erfahrung und Intuition in der Philosophie von Christian Wolff.” In Christian Wolff und die europäische Aufklärung: Akten des 1. Internationalen Christian Wolff–Kongresses. Edited by Jürgen Stolzenberg and Oliver-Pierre Rudolph, 173–193. Hildesheim: Olms. Choi, So-In. 1996. Selbstbewußtsein und Selbstanschauung: eine Reflexion über Einheit und Entzweiung des Subjekts in Kants Opus postumum. Berlin: De Gruyter. Depperman, Arnulf. 2000. “Eine analytische Interpretation von Kants ‘Ich denke’.” Kant-Studien 92: 129–152. Dyck, Corey. 2014. Kant and Rational Psychology. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Förster, Eckart. 2000. Kant’s Final Synthesis: An Essay on the Opus postumum. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Förster, Eckart. 2012. The Twenty-Five Years of Philosophy. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Franks, Paul. 2016. “Fichte’s Position: Anti-Subjectivism, Self-Awareness and Self-Location in the Space of Reasons.” In The Cambridge Companion to Fichte. Edited by David James and Günter Zöller, 374–404. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

178  Lorenzo Sala Hall, Bryan Wesley. 2015. The Post-Critical Kant: Understanding the Critical Philosophy through the Opus postumum. New York: Routledge. Henrich, Dieter. 1960. Der ontologische Gottesbeweis. Sein Problem und seine Geschichte in der Neuzeit. Tübingen: Mohr. Henrich, Dieter. 1966. “Fichtes ursprüngliche Einsicht.” In Subjektivität und Metaphysik: Festschrift für Wolfgang Cramer. Edited by Dieter Henrich and Hans Wagner, 188–232. Frankfurt: Klostermann. Kannisto, Toni. 2016. “Positio contra complementum possibilitatis: Kant and Baumgarten on Existence.” Kant-Studien, 107 (2): 291–313. Klemme, Heiner. 1996. Kants Philosophie des Subjekts. Hamburg: Meiner. Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm. 1981. New Essays on Human Understanding. Edited by Peter Remnant and Jonathan Bennett. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press [NE]. Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm. 1985. Theodicy: Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man, and the Origin of Evil. Edited by Austin Farrer, translated by E. M. Huggard. Chicago-La Salle: Open Court. Longuenesse, Béatrice. 1998. Kant and the Capacity to Judge: Sensibility and Discursivity in the Transcendental Analytic of the “Critique of Pure Reason”. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Longuenesse, Béatrice. 2017. I, Me, Mine: Back to Kant, and Back Again. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Mathieu, Vittorio. 1989. Kants Opus postumum. Frankfurt: Klostermann. Motta, Giuseppe. 2012. Die Postulate des empirischen Denkens überhaupt. Berlin: De Gruyter. Onnasch, Ernst-Otto. 2009. “Kants Transzendentalphilosophie des Opus postumum gegen den transzendentalen Idealismus Schellings und Spinozas.” In Kants Philosophie der Natur Ihre Entwicklung im Opus postumum und ihre Wirkung. Edited by Ernst-Otto Onnasch, 307–356. Berlin: De Gruyter. Proops, Ian. 2015. “Kant on the ontological argument.” Nous, 49 (1): 1–27. Sala, Lorenzo. 2020. “Kant and Baumgarten on Positing Kant’s Notion of Positing as a Response to that of Baumgarten.” Revista de Estudios Kantianos, 5 (2): 269–288. Sala, Lorenzo. 2021. “Un wolffiano dopo Kant? Sulla nozione Hegeliana di pensiero e il rapporto tra logica e metafisica che ne consegue.” Giornale di Metafisica, (1): 1–15. Tuschling, Burkhard. 1991. “Die Idee des transzendentalen Idealismus im späten Opus postumum.” In Übergang: Untersuchungen zum Spätwerk Immanuel Kants. Beiträge der Tagung des Forums für Philosophie Bad Homburg vom 13. bis 15. Oktober 1989 zu Kants Opus postumum. Edited by Siegfried Blasche, Wolfgang R. Köhler, Wolfgang Kuhlmann and Peter Rohs, 105–145. Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann. Vaihinger, Hans. 1884. “Zu Kants Wiederlegung des Idealismus.” Straßburger Abhandlungen zur Philosophie, 85–164. Wolff, Christian. 1720. Vernünftige Gedancken von Gott, der Welt und der Seele des Menschen, auch allen Dingen überhaupt. Halle: Renger. [DM] Wolff, Christian. 1730. Philosophia prima, sive Ontologia, methodo scientifica pertractata, qua omnis cognitiones humanae principia continentur. Halle: Renger. [ON]

9 Kant’s “deification” of reason in the Opus postumum An attempt at reconciling God and autonomy Anna Tomaszewska Introduction One of the difficulties one faces when reading the Opus postumum (OP) concerns the relation of this late unfinished work of Kant to his earlier Critical doctrines. What kind of relation it is has been particularly puzzling in the case of the theological content of fascicles 7 and 1 whose interpretations stray in opposite directions. On the one hand, the late Kant would be attributed a tendency to a mystical insight into the divine transcending human reason1; on the other hand, he would be featured as a forerunner of Feuerbach and Nietzsche, reducing God to a mere idea of human reason. 2 Also, it has been suggested that in the OP Kant abandons his “moral theism” (V-Th/Pölitz, 28: 1011)—the view that faith in God is to be based on moral grounds—by extinguishing the doctrine of postulates3 and even by ‘dissolution’ of the theistic notion of God, a corollary of identifying God with practical reason (Cortina 1984). Thus, on this reading, by the end of his philosophical career, Kant would significantly depart from his Critical tenets and overstep the limits set for knowledge in the Critique of Pure Reason, indulging in illegitimate theological speculation. While I recognize the novelty of Kant’s final work, I am not entirely convinced that we should read it as a radical departure from his Critical philosophy. Therefore, I shall argue that despite Kant’s radicalism— manifest in those passages in which he apparently identifies God with practical reason—attributing to him the view that the idea of God is redundant, since God can be reduced to or replaced by reason, comes close to a misreading. Far from reading Kant as a closet atheist urging that reason take over the role of God,4 but also without claiming that he veers toward illegitimate metaphysics or indulges in Schwärmerei, I would rather think of his late theological views as building on the account of rational religion advanced in Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason and transforming some parts of this account into constitutive elements of a new project of transcendental philosophy—“the science of a system of synthetic a priori knowledge from concepts” (OP, 22: 80) and “the absolute whole (system) of ideas” (OP, 21: 80).

DOI: 10.4324/9781003090946-10

180  Anna Tomaszewska This development would enable Kant to address a problem resulting from a tension between the idea of God as a moral legislator, introduced in Religion, and the autonomy of practical reason which he claims, in the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals and the Critique of Practical Reason, to be a necessary condition of the morality of our actions. For Christopher Insole, this problem culminates in the OP in “a far more significant rupture with the Christian tradition than any supposed crisis in belief in the existence of God. Kant believes in God. It is our freedom in relation to such a God that he cannot believe in, at least in a traditional sense” (Insole 2016, 151). On my reading, though, the OP hints at a possible way of overcoming the problem of how to reconcile God and autonomy. The structure of my paper is as follows: I begin by analyzing textual evidence for the claim that Kant identifies God with practical reason. Then, I discuss possible objections against the attempt to identify God with reason, pointing out that such an attempt is likely to be incompatible with both Kant’s theological doctrines elaborated in the OP and the Critical theology. Yet, I contend, there is a sense of the identification which I would call innocuous and which not only does not conflict with the mature doctrines of Kant, but in fact originates from them. To explain how it is possible for Kant not to relegate God from his philosophical system despite his “deifying” (practical) reason, I turn to the doctrine of practical self-positing (Selbstsetzungslehre) according to which the idea of God is indispensable for the constitution of moral agency. In my view, Kant employs the idea of God to warrant the kind of perspective on autonomy that allows recognizing in it the foundation of a moral community.

Establishing the identity claim In a “forest of contradictions,” as Vittorio Mathieu (1991, 268) has described the theological passages of the OP, 5 one can find a thread which leads to the ‘deification’ of practical reason. Accordingly, Kant writes that “the idea of the relation of man to right and duty” gives rise to “a God in moral practical reason,” who is not however to be construed as “a being outside man” (OP, 22: 60). One discovers the idea of God in moral-practical reason by reflecting on one’s relation to the moral law. This idea is constitutive of the idea of reason and hence the subject matter of transcendental philosophy as a science that deals “merely with the human spirit, which [is] its own thinking subject” (OP, 21: 78). Kant says: The concept of such a being is … the idea (one’s own creation, thought-object, ens rationis) of a reason which constitutes itself into

An attempt at reconciling God and autonomy  181 a thought object, and establishes synthetic a priori propositions, according to principles of transcendental philosophy. (OP, 21: 27) Since the idea of God forms part of the idea of reason, reason cannot reflect on itself without thinking of God. Moreover, the idea of God belongs to moral-practical reason and emerges when reason exercises its capacity to judge and issue universally valid commands (OP, 22: 118), i.e., moral laws. Since the laws “must be obeyed as divine commands,” Kant contends, “the characteristic of a moral being which can command categorically over the nature of man is its divinity” (OP, 22: 130). Thus, insofar as it is practical reason that legislates universally and necessarily binding laws, practical reason should be attributed a divine status. The following passages apparently prove that Kant identifies God with practical reason: A being who has only rights and no duties (moral-practical reason according to its laws and principles). God (OP, 22: 50) The concept of God is the idea of a moral being, which, as such, is judging [and] universally commanding. The latter is not a hypothetical thing but pure practical reason itself in its personality, with reason’s moving forces in respect to world-beings and their forces. (OP, 22: 118) However, to establish that Kant ‘deifies’ practical reason, it still needs to be shown that practical reason legislates the moral law and that it is the unique source of such legislation. To begin with, reason as such is the faculty that sets up laws with regard to two domains of objects: nature and freedom, its legislation yielding laws for nature and the moral law, respectively (A840/B868). In its practical function, reason “gives (to the human being) a universal law which we call the moral law” (CPracR, 5: 31). The lawgiving of pure practical reason is equivalent to “freedom in the positive sense,” i.e., autonomy. The latter manifests itself in this that the will, which is “nothing other than practical reason” (G, 4: 412), gives itself the law that it should abide by and ultimately accounts for what makes up duty for the moral agent. Should it seek its law “in a property of any of its objects,” the will would fall into heteronomy (G, 4: 440–441), i.e., one would have to justify what one takes to be one’s duty in relation to features of external objects, such as God, nature, or laws of the state. Since autonomy is “the sole principle of all moral laws and of duties in keeping with them” (CPracR, 5: 33), insofar as practical reason exercises its legislative function, the moral law can derive exclusively

182  Anna Tomaszewska from practical reason. It is noteworthy though that, according to Kant, the moral law applies to all rational beings including “the infinite being as the supreme intelligence” (CPracR, 5: 32), thus even to a being whose will, as invulnerable to non-moral incentives, such as originate in human sensibility, does not require imperatives. Thereby, autonomy as selflegislation proves to be an intrinsic feature of rational nature as such, rather than just of human nature.6 Norbert Fischer (2017, 373) has suggested that considering the law legislated by practical reason to be authored and given by God to every rational being aligns with Kant’s account of autonomy. This cannot be entirely correct: the moral law binds all rational beings including God, rather than being a law by means of which God binds other rational beings. If the moral law were God-given, practical reason would not legislate to itself its own law alone but also the divine law, falling thereby into heteronomy. Therefore, unless divinity is recognized as an intrinsic property of practical reason—or indeed unless God and reason are equated with one another—the autonomy of moral legislation precludes a different source of the moral law than practical reason. Hence, Kant’s succinct phrase in Latin, “Est deus in nobis” (OP, 22: 130), suggests that practical reason performs the role of God in that it legislates the moral law: there being “God in us” equals precisely the fact that we legislate the moral law to ourselves. As Insole has put it, commenting on the late Kant’s shift away from his earlier position in philosophy of religion, closer to a ‘Christianized Platonism,’ “we are divine, insofar as we give the moral law to ourselves” (Insole 2016, 133). An additional argument against the claim that exercising autonomy can be construed as a joint effort of the human and the divine will can be found in Kant’s denial of a view on divine concurrence which he discusses in reflections from the 1780s. Namely, Kant denies that God’s will can provide “an immediate cause” of an action of a finite being (Insole 2013, 200), although he accepts the idea of the divine concursus according to which “God can supplement the action of the creature by removing impediments to the creature’s free action” (Insole 2013, 215), for example, by creating conditions requisite to act. Metaphorically speaking, the divine assistance can be limited to ensuring the stagesetting of an action, but God cannot affect the springs of the action itself (cf. V-Th/Pölitz, 28: 1106–1107). Kant maintains his views on the divine concurrence in the OP, where he says: Animals can be made by God, because there is, indeed, in them a spiritus and even anima (immateriale), but not mens, as free will. Whether God could also give man a good will? No, rather, that requires freedom. (OP, 21: 34)

An attempt at reconciling God and autonomy  183 The good will—such that it subordinates itself to the self-legislated moral law, driving out non-moral incentives—can be solely of one’s own making. Kant’s God could not ‘incline my heart’ (to draw on a Biblical psalm) without thereby infringing on and actually nullifying my freedom. Hence, unless we are ready to resign either from autonomy or from the idea that divinity pertains to the being that “can command categorically over the nature of man” (OP, 22: 130), God and practical reason have to be considered one and the same thing.7

Some objections Should Kant indeed identify God with practical reason, the theological doctrines of the OP would shatter his Critical philosophy of religion as they would push him toward eighteenth-century Spinozists and freethinkers who used the word ‘God’ to label a natural property. To illustrate the point: Johann Christian Edelmann would identify God with reason (Vernunft), which is how he renders, in Die Göttlichkeit der Vernunft (1742), the Λόγος of John’s Prologue. For Theodor Ludwig Lau, ‘God’ would designate an “infinitely extended body” (corpus infinite extensum) (Bäck 1895, 61). Likewise, Kant’s ‘deification’ of practical reason would imply reducing God to a natural property. Clearly, adopting a position he earlier invested much effort to present as the opposite of Critical philosophy—and “the true conclusion of dogmatic metaphysics” originating from Plato’s theory of ideas (Refl, 18: 434–436)—would provide a rare example of inconsistency, one that many a commentator would qualify as a mark of withering intellectual powers of the old philosopher Kant was at the time of drafting his unfinished work. It would therefore be better not to draw too hasty conclusions from the evidence adduced in “Establishing the Identity Claim” section and instead read “one passage taking into account its relation to other passages and to the whole background of thought,” a method recommended by Erich Adickes (1978, 772; my translation).8 I will thus offer a few reasons to resist the conclusion of the argument appealing to the notion of autonomy. First of all, textual evidence which apparently corroborates the identification thesis can be set against passages that do not support the thesis. For example, Kant repeatedly describes God as “ens summum, summa intelligentia, summum bonum” (OP 22: 116–117; cf. OP, 21: 11, 13–14, 19, 33, 50, 79–80, 91; 22: 53–54, 58, 123) and refers to God as a being who exercises “unrestricted power over nature and freedom under laws of reason” (OP, 22: 117). But he would not predicate perfections of human reason, whether theoretical or practical, given his view of the human mind as finite and dependent on external ‘input’, especially as regards cognition (cf. Mathieu 1958, 400–401).

184  Anna Tomaszewska Second, attributing divine-like properties to reason does not necessarily turn reason into a deity. Many thinkers throughout the history of philosophy would emphasize salient affinities between the human and the divine mind without the kind of ‘deification’ of human reason that seems to follow from the analysis of some of the theological passages of the OP. Notably, Aristotle, in Book X of the Nicomachean Ethics, refers to the intellect as “something divine” in the human being and compares the life of a truth-seeker dedicated to contemplation to a divine life (Aristotle 1995). For Thomas Aquinas, human beings resemble God since they are endowed with an “intellectual nature” (Aquinas 2007, 471). Leibniz holds that there is no essential difference between the human and the divine intellect, human finitude restricting the scope of cognitions but not their kind (Strickland 2014, 23, §48). For the eighteenth-century deists, as well as the religious rationalists of the early modern period, reason sparks the divine light—lux divina—in the human being, which makes it eligible for cognizing the nature of God and evaluating the revealed sources of religious faith (Schröder 2012, 308–309). For example, according to Herman Alexander Roëll, the author of Dissertatio de religione rationali, reason is “the most supreme gift of God,” potentially capable of cognizing all things (Krop 2017, 108–109). Thus, there is a sense in which reason can be divine without being identical with God. Be that as it may, given that Kant clearly distinguishes between the human and the divine mind, the ‘deification’ of human reason may not be a likely move on his part—neither in the above sense nor in the sense explicated in the previous section. Thus, whatever can be said about the divine mind, it is not legitimate to attribute to it the kind of reason that can be attributed to human beings. Kant makes this point already in a pre-Critical essay, A New Elucidation of the First Principles of Metaphysical Cognition; arguing against the rationalist metaphysicians, he contends that “the winding course of reasoning is scarcely becoming to the measurelessness of the divine understanding” and denies the use of abstract concepts to God (ND, 1: 405). In the first Critique, he contrasts the human with the divine understanding: whereas God’s intellect has the power of intuiting objects, whereby the objects are “given, or produced” (B154), the human understanding lacks a corresponding capacity. In Lectures on the Philosophical Doctrine of Religion, he claims that the divine understanding cannot be discursive and “the expression ‘reason’ is beneath the dignity of the divine nature” (V-Th/Pölitz, 28: 1052). It is worthy to note that when in the OP Kant attributes divinity to “a moral being which can command categorically over the nature of man” and says that “his laws must be obeyed as divine commands” (OP, 22: 130), he uses some of the terms which appear in his earlier definition of religion. Kant defines religion “subjectively considered”—i.e., with regard to the capacities of the subject, rather than the contents of a doctrine or its object—as “the recognition of all our duties as divine

An attempt at reconciling God and autonomy  185 commands” (Rel, 6: 154). In the Metaphysics of Morals, he emphasizes the modal aspect of considering our duties as God’s commands, defining religion as “the sum of all duties as (instar) divine commands” (MM, 6: 487). The definition can also be found throughout other texts from the Critical period, for example: Rel, 6: 84, 110, 192; CF, 7: 36, 74; MM, 6: 440, 443; CPracR, 5: 129. Now, in Religion, the key problem Kant undertakes to deal with is that human beings are plagued by “radical evil” (Rel, 6: 32f.) which prevents them from attaining moral perfection they are bound by the moral law to strive for. What exacerbates the problem is that living in society humans corrupt one another (Rel, 6: 93–94), perpetuating the vices of ‘unsociable sociability’ (cf. Pasternack 2014, 7–8). To counteract mutual corruption, humans ought to join an ethical community where they will be able to reinforce their striving for moral improvement (Rel, 6: 97). Kant holds that the laws of such a community cannot be laid down and executed by a human legislator because of the cognitive and moral limitations of human nature—in particular, what Reza Mosayebi (2011, 257–259) calls “ethical motivational agnosia (ethische Motivagnosie).” The ethical community requires a divine legislator who knows human hearts (Herzenskündiger) (Rel, 6: 99) and can judge our moral characters (Gesinnungen). Accordingly, God should be conceived: (1) as the almighty creator of heaven and earth, i.e. morally as holy lawgiver; (2) as the preserver of the human race, as its benevolent ruler and moral guardian; (3) as the administrator of his own holy laws, i.e. as just judge. (Rel, 6: 139) These “moral perfections of holiness, benevolence and justice … constitute the entire moral concept of God” (V-Th/Pölitz, 28: 1073). Thus, when we recognize divine commands in our duties, we appeal to the moral concept of God and consider ourselves members of a moral world, an ethical community. Far from ‘deifying’ reason, when we regard our duties as divine commands, we conceive of ourselves as belonging to a realm that transcends each individual moral agent and requires God, rather than the finite human reason, to be established.

A Reply to the objections and transition to the moral Selbstsetzungslehre In the previous section, I voiced some objections against attributing to Kant the identification thesis emerging from the theological fascicles of the OP. The last objection, based on an exegesis of Kant’s Critical definition of religion, takes us back to the question of the relation between God and autonomy. For how does the picture of God as legislating the

186  Anna Tomaszewska moral law to us fit in with the picture of the autonomy of practical reason as the basic feature of moral legislation? In “Positing Oneself as a Person” section, I will suggest that the doctrine of practical self-positing developed in the OP can help in addressing this question. Yet the above objections may draw upon misconstruing the purport of Kant’s associating practical reason with God. For one could distinguish two senses of the ‘deification’ of practical reason: a contentious and an innocuous one. In the sense I call contentious, one would postulate the relation of sameness between God and practical reason, which would lead to the absurdities pointed out in “Some Objections” section, such as attributing omnipotence to human reason or the discursive mode of cognition to the divine intellect. But in the innocuous sense, one could say of practical reason no more than that there is something divine about it, whereby one would not be committed to substantial ontological claims concerning the nature of God. It is not an extravagant invention of a demented philosopher unable to contain his thoughts at the end of his life, but Kant’s established doctrine that there is something divine about practical reason, the moral law, and morality in general. Indeed, the ‘deification’ of morality in the above signaled innocuous sense underlies Kant’s project of rational religion, i.e., “the religion of reason” which he calls “the purely moral religion” (Rel, 6: 13) and “the true end” of which consists in “the moral improvement of human beings” (Rel, 6: 112). In this sense, also, Kant says of God that “he is, as it were, the moral law itself personified” (V-Th/Pölitz, 28: 1091; italics added) and equates a will that “of itself necessarily” accords with the moral law with a divine and holy will (G, 4: 414). In the second Critique, Kant repeats many times that the moral law itself is holy (e.g., CPracR, 5: 33, 87). Also, the definition of religion as a set of duties regarded as divine commands encourages the idea that religion is an attitude of conscientiousness (Gewissenhaftigkeit) toward the moral law ‘in us,’ implying a kind of ‘sacralization’ of morality. An account along these lines comes to the fore in the OP, too, where one can read that9: Religion is conscientiousness (mihi hoc religioni). The holiness of the acceptance [Zusage] and the truthfulness of what man must confess to himself. Confess to yourself. To have religion, the concept of God is not required (still less the postulate: ‘There is a God’). (OP, 21: 81) The above textual evidence shows that throughout his writings Kant promotes the view that religion and morality create a common space, even if the former contains an irreducible ‘addendum.’10 However, the OP diverges from the Critical writings in its account of the relation between God and the moral law. While according to the standard Critical doctrine the existence of God is postulated to warrant the possibility

An attempt at reconciling God and autonomy  187 of the synthesis of morality and happiness in the highest good,11 in the OP Kant seems to ‘infer’ the divine existence directly from “a concept of duty”—the awareness of the moral law ‘in us’ through the categorical imperative. This new argument can be found, for example, in the following passages: The idea of such a being, before whom all knees bow, etc., emerges from this imperative and not the reverse, and a God is thought necessarily, subjectively, in human practical reason …. (OP, 22: 122) There is in practical reason a concept of duty … A command, to which everyone must absolutely give obedience, is to be regarded by everyone as from a being which rules and governs over all. Such a being, as moral, however, is called God. So there is a God. (OP, 22: 127) Kant ‘infers’ the existence of God from our awareness of the moral command given in the form of the categorical imperative. If there is a command, there must also be the author of the command, someone who issues it. Since the command demands absolute, unconditional obedience, it must proceed from a being who has unrestricted power, and Kant equates such a being with God. But, as has already been established, Kant locates the origin of the moral law in practical reason and insists that all rational beings are bound by the law, God included. Since God, as exercising a “holy will,” does not need to follow imperatives, he can play the role of the ‘commander,’ though not the source or author of the moral law. Yet does Kant’s argument really prove the existence of God, or does it rather highlight the commanding function of practical reason, which it then raises to the status of God? I would distinguish three ways of reading the argument: 1 According to Reiner Wimmer (1990: §30), Kant offers a version of the ontological proof attributed to Anselm of Canterbury. The affinity of Kant’s statements with the Anselmian argument, avers Wimmer, consists not in the … transition from the representation of God as the most perfect being to the assertion of his existence … but in this that God’s presence, his ‘being’ [‘Dasein’] reveals itself to and is attested by practical reason in its thinking. (Wimmer 1990, 259; my translation) Yet Mathieu thinks that in the OP, as much as in the Critical writings, Kant consistently distances himself from the Anselmian tradition. Mathieu attributes to Kant the view that “God exists certainly

188  Anna Tomaszewska and necessarily as a principle in accordance with which I should act, as my thought or idea” (Mathieu 1958, 419; my translation). Indeed, since Kant clearly states that “to wish to prove the existence of such a being [i.e. God] directly … contains a contradiction, for a posse ad esse non valet consequentia” (OP, 22: 121), it seems that the existence of God cannot be deduced from any thinkable contents, the moral awareness included. 2 The above-cited fragments could be read as supporting the account of God as personification of the moral law, commanding to finite subjects through practical reason, or as personification of practical reason in its commanding function. The problem with this reading is that it motivates a reductionist approach to the theology of the OP: since God is in principle identical with the moral law, theology eventually dissolves into ethics, as Cortina (1984) and Insole (2016) have proposed, and this would make the notion of God ultimately redundant. It is not clear, besides, what use there would then be for Kant to be made of the idea of God in his new system of transcendental philosophy. 3 Instead of these two accounts, I suggest that we read Kant’s ‘inference’ from the moral awareness to God as an argument drawing upon the moral concept of God which he introduces in Religion and which I referred to in “Some Objections” section. Kant’s turning back to the moral concept of God in the OP would not generate tensions between autonomy and the idea that our duties are commanded by God, though, because now he would regard the idea of God as requisite for moral agency to constitute itself. In the next section, I will try to substantiate my point more comprehensively.

Positing oneself as a person To see in what way the idea of God could be constitutive of moral awareness, we should examine Kant’s doctrine of practical self-positing. Though the name of the doctrine of self-positing (Selbstsetzungslehre) has been invented by scholars of the OP (cf. Howard 2019), throughout fascicles 7 and 1, one can find such expressions as “the subject posits itself” (OP, 22: 11, 96), “the subject constitutes itself” (OP, 22: 12), “I posit myself as…” (OP, 22: 32), “the subject makes itself into an object” (OP, 22: 77, 88), and “the subject constitutes itself a priori into an object” (OP, 21:14). Later the notion would come to be associated with Fichte, but we can find it also earlier in Kant’s works, for example, in The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God, where it forms part of an analysis of the notion of existence.12 Kant argues in this pre-Critical essay for the claim on which he will premise his critique of the ontological argument, namely, that existence is not “a predicate or a determination of a thing” (OPD, 2: 72;

An attempt at reconciling God and autonomy  189 cf. CPR, A598/B627) and elucidates the notion of existence in terms of ‘positing.’ “The concept of positing or setting [Position oder Setzung],” says Kant, “is perfectly simple: it is identical with the concept of being in general” (OPD, 2: 73). Thus, positing cannot be defined, i.e., analyzed into simpler concepts. Kant goes on to distinguish two senses of positing: relative and absolute. In the relative sense, positing reflects the predicative function of the verb ‘to be.’ For example, in the judgment “God is omnipotent,” ‘omnipotence’ is posited relative to ‘God’ and the judgment expresses a relation between two concepts. In the absolute sense, positing means existence: when God utters “Let there be,” Kant avers, “He posits the series of things absolutely and unconditionally, and posits it all with all its predicates” (OPD, 2: 74). In light of the foregoing, self-positing could be construed as the subject’s ‘constructing’ the consciousness of—or reference to—herself as an object. There are two kinds of self-positing to be distinguished in this context: theoretical and practical. In theoretical self-positing, the subject ‘constructs’ the consciousness of herself as an “object of perception” (OP, 22: 96)—this requires spelling out the conditions under which an ‘I’ can become an object of experience to herself. Practical self-positing consists in the subject’s ‘constructing’ her moral agency, whereby she becomes aware of—or refers to—herself as a person, that is, “a being who has rights and is conscious of them” (OP, 22: 49). The idea of God enters the stage as a condition of the subject’s constituting herself as a person. To be a person—“a substance which is conscious of its freedom”— means to be a subject of rights (OP, 22: 121; cf. OP, 21: 9–10, 12, 14, 17, 36; 22: 48–49, 51–53, 55–57). One has rights in virtue of subordinating oneself to a law obligating a rational will, such as the moral law. The moral law binds every rational agent in analogy with the law of gravity valid for all physical objects: “The Newtonian attraction through empty space and freedom of the human being are concepts analogous to one another they are categorical imperatives ideas” (OP, 21: 35). The moral law issues from practical reason which prescribes the law to itself, a feature Kant identifies as autonomy. Since the moral law is to bind every rational agent, autonomy means legislation for every rational being: my legislating the moral law for myself is thus equivalent to legislating the law for every other rational legislator and equivalent to every other rational legislator legislating the law for me. Consequently, exercising autonomy is tantamount to the subject’s participating in the community of rational beings, bound by a law which obligates every member of the community. Yet in Religion Kant has argued that a moral community needs a divine sovereign because human beings, plagued by an inescapable propensity for evil, cannot act as universal moral legislators and judges toward one another. In the OP, radical evil falls outside the scope of

190  Anna Tomaszewska Kant’s argument, though he sticks to the idiom in which he defined religion in Religion as a system of duties which “must be obeyed as divine commands” (OP, 22: 130). However, as I have already pointed out, claiming that the moral law must be legislated by God seems to conflict with the claim that it is practical reason alone that acts as the moral lawgiver. To resolve the conflict, we can think of the divine legislation and the legislation of moral-practical reason as two modes or perspectives on the process of positing or constituting oneself as a person, a subject of rights (and, in the case of finite beings, also duties, cf. OP, 22: 50). In such an account, God—or, more precisely, the idea of God—would play the role of a warrant of the universality and objective validity of self-legislation and would endow reason with authority which it could not confer upon itself otherwise. The following passages corroborate the claim that the idea of God authorizes reason to issue laws which obligate each rational being: There must also … 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. (OP, 22: 126) The categorical imperative does not presuppose a supremely commanding substance which would be outside me, but is, rather, a command or prohibition of my own reason. Notwithstanding this, it is nevertheless to be regarded as proceeding from a being which has irresistible power over all. (OP, 22: 51) In “Establishing the Identity Claim” section we have seen that, according to Kant, it is the activity of moral legislation that accounts for the ‘construction’ of the idea of God. Yet from the passages adduced above, we can see that the idea of God is also constitutive of moral-practical reason because it, as it were, authorizes reason’s legislation. The generating of the idea of God and the authorization of reason’s legislative capacity emerge as two inextricably linked aspects of the process of the self-constitution of moral personality. This account may engender some problems, though, of which I will mention two. First, the ‘deification’ of the lawgiving activity of practical reason seems to widen the gap between “homo noumenon”—“the humanity in [one’s] own person”—and “homo phaenomenon”—the human being as a natural being (MM, 6: 418). Given the propensity for evil and the natural limitations of our finite nature, how can we as natural beings live up to the ideal of humanity in us? Do we really

An attempt at reconciling God and autonomy  191 understand the idea that the same subject that is marred by evil elevates herself to the rank of the moral lawgiver and ‘creator’ of (the idea of) God? Kant seems not only to fall prey to the paradoxes of the anthropology of “homo duplex” (Hunter 2003, 51), but he also fails to afford a cogent explanation of the source of the divine in us (unlike, for instance, Descartes in Meditation III). Second, why would the idea of God be requisite to authorize the moral legislation of practical reason? Cannot reason itself ensure its own authority without taking recourse to God? To say that reason exercises a divine prerogative in that it legislates the moral law to itself is to boost the authority of reason and reduce ‘God’ to a placeholder in a metaphor describing the rational activity. To address the first concern: Kant’s new conception of transcendental philosophy as a system of ideas, adumbrated in fascicle 1, reflects his dualistic anthropology. But it also provides an attempt at overcoming the dualism of homo phaenomenon and homo noumenon in that it puts forward the idea of the subject as a junction between two realms: the empirical realm of nature and the intelligible realm of freedom, with the world and God as corresponding ideas—“God, the world … and the rational subject which combines both through freedom” (OP, 21: 22), “God, the world, and man as a person: that is, as a being who unites these concepts” (OP, 21: 29). As an intermediary between the empirical world and the divine, the human being constitutes herself in relation to these opposites and integrates them in her own nature. Moving on to the second concern: to see why God cannot be replaced by practical reason and the idea of God dispensed with as redundant, we should turn to Kant’s doctrine of practical self-positing. In this context, an analogy can be drawn between God and ether (cf. Basile 2013, 171– 172). The analogy would consist in this: ether, as a category of physics and an a priori concept of the mind, plays a part in the constitution of the consciousness of the subject as an object in space and time (“the subject posits itself as object (dabile),” OP, 22: 28); analogously, the idea of God plays a part in the process whereby the thinking subject “makes itself into a person” (OP, 22: 54). For, Kant thinks, with the concept of ether, space can be construed as a dynamic field of “moving forces” affecting the subject, and the subject can then be thought of as an object representable in space (cf. Förster 2000, 102–113). Likewise, the idea of God would enable the subject to think of herself as an object in a ‘moral space’—what Kant calls ethical community in Religion (cf. Rel, 6: 94f.) and the kingdom of ends in the Groundwork (cf. G, 4: 433f.). Thus, what I think the analogy suggests is that both God and ether account for the objective side of self-positing. The idea of God furnishes the ‘space’ of the ‘moving forces’ of morality. Kant illustrates this point by paraphrasing a Biblical verse: “In it, that is, the idea of God as a moral being, we live, move and have our being, motivated through the knowledge of our duties as divine commands” (OP, 22: 118).

192  Anna Tomaszewska Since the idea of God endows us with a perspective from which the moral law ‘in us’ can be viewed as a ‘force’ binding all rational beings, one could say that Kant employs this idea in projecting reason’s capacity for self-transcendence. Thus, with the idea of God in her lawgiving reason, the moral agent can think of herself as a citizen of the ethical community. Accordingly, the idea cannot be dispensed with since it legitimates recognizing in moral self-legislation an act foundational to the community in which the agent participates. Exercising moral autonomy means acting, as it were, from the divine perspective, or as part of the divine reality, as Kant seems to hint in his references to Spinoza in those passages in which he writes on “intuiting ourselves in God”: According to Spinoza’s transcendental idealism, we intuit ourselves in God. The categorical imperative does not presuppose a highest commanding substance as outside me, but lies within my own reason. (OP, 22: 56) The transcendental idealism of that of which our understanding is itself the originator. Spinoza. To intuit everything in God. The categorical imperative. The knowledge of my duties as divine commands (expressed according to the categorical imperative). (OP, 21: 15)13 Though Kant’s depiction of Spinoza, in the OP as in other works, matches Spinoza’s real views but to a limited extent, being a construction devised largely for polemical purposes (De Flaviis 1986, 15), the name itself evokes the idea of the mode of cognition sub specie aeternitatis.14 According to Giuseppe De Flaviis, the affinity between Kant and Spinoza remains however merely formal. As the “author of God, the world and itself,” Kant’s subject can be likened to Spinoza’s God, the cause of itself and all there is, only insofar as she constructs a comprehensive system of the ideas of reason, rather than objects corresponding to them. The constitutive activity of the human mind would thus account for the formal aspects of the objective reality, while its “matter has to be presupposed as given” (De Flaviis 1986, 261; my translation). Yet, as per my suggestion, Kant’s references to Spinoza can also be read in light of the conception of practical self-positing. For the idea of God is not just a mere construction of reason, but the warrant of reason’s authority as the lawgiver of the moral world. Thus, as much as for Spinoza the causal activity of an object cannot be explained in abstraction from the comprehensive framework provided by the unique substance—Deus sive Natura—so for Kant moral action plays out against the background which transcends a particular context of each agent and which is epitomized in the idea of God. In other words, the idea of God enables the

An attempt at reconciling God and autonomy  193 subject to place herself in the ‘moral space’ implicated in the exercise of autonomy and warrants an objective perspective on moral subjectivity and the lawgiving activity of practical reason. The account of God in the theological fascicles of the OP can thus be seen as radicalization of Kant’s Critical philosophy of religion. But the sense of this radicalization does not amount to Kant’s drifting toward the denial of the existence of God or reducing theology to ethics. Rather, from the sketchy notes preparatory for his final work, there emerges a new account of rational religion. The moral concept of God, advocated in Religion, would now form part of “the idea … of a reason which constitutes itself into a thought object” (OP, 21: 27) and become constitutive of practical rationality brought by “man” into the empirical world.15 Thus, the radical purport of the OP would not just be manifest in this that, metaphorically speaking, man makes God. Rather, the idea of God, originating in the self-legislative act of moral-practical reason, would empower the subject to envisage herself as a participant in the community of rational beings bound by the moral law, whereby she can make herself into a moral being, i.e., a person.

Conclusion I have argued that although in the theological fascicles of the OP, there is a strand of thought which leads to identifying God with practical reason, this identification does not have to make the notion of God redundant, as some interpreters of the late Kant would suggest. This is because the idea of God—which is no longer a regulative idea of the first Critique or an element of the doctrine of postulates of the second Critique—forms part of Kant’s novel system of transcendental philosophy as a science of reason which constitutes itself into a ‘thought-object.’ Since the idea of God is constitutive of the idea of reason, it accounts for the possibility of rational beings to think of themselves as rational: “hence everything that thinks has a God” (OP, 21: 83). More specifically, the subject employs the idea of God in that she posits herself as a moral being, that is, a member of the community of rational agents under the universal moral law. Thus, the idea of God allows such a perspective on the autonomy of the subject which warrants the universality of self-legislation. In this way, autonomy becomes the foundation of a moral community. Finally, the conflict between autonomy and God’s sovereignty in the moral world dissolves: for God turns out to constitute autonomous agency—and vice versa.

Acknowledgments The work on this contribution has been funded by a grant from the Polish National Science Centre subsidizing the research project Between

194  Anna Tomaszewska Secularization and Reform: Religious Rationalism in the Late Seventeenth Century and in the Enlightenment (grant no. UMO-2018/31/B/ HS1/02050). I would like to thank the organizers and participants of the workshop on Kant’s OP, held in Munich on February 15–16, 2019, and in particular the editors of this volume, for their helpful comments on earlier drafts of this paper.

Notes 1 Such an account has been proposed by authors belonging to different traditions of Kant scholarship, in particular: Stephen Palmquist, who reads Kant’s rational theology as an attempt at “Critical mysticism” (Palmquist 2015); Norbert Fischer, who has discovered aspects shared by Kant with Meister Eckhart (Fischer 2017); and Eckart Förster, who claims that with his account of the ideas of reason constitutive of the understanding as a faculty of cognition, and more specifically the idea of “Deus in nobis,” the late Kant “seems to assume that something precedes even my own reason” (Förster 2000, 173). 2 Reiner Wimmer describes this tendency in terms of “anthropologization of the religious and theological heritage of Christianity” and contrasts it with an approach that aims to establish “a transcendental-theological foundation of anthropology,” represented by Hegel (Wimmer 1990, 224; my translation). 3 “In the Opus postumum the classical doctrine of the postulates of pure practical reason is finally laid to rest” (Förster 2000, 147). 4 By way of an anecdote, some of Kant’s late friends indeed saw in him an atheist of a kind. For example, Friedrich Abegg summarized Kant’s views on religion thus: “Believe nothing, hope for nothing! Do your duty here.” (Insole 2016, 130). 5 To see what motivates this description, let us compare the following passages: (1) “God, the world (both outside me) and the rational subject which connects both through freedom” (OP, 21: 22; here and in the remaining quotations italics added); (2) “There is a God in moral-practical reason, that is, in the idea of the relation of man to right and duty. But not as a being outside man” (OP, 22: 60); (3) “A universal, morally law-giving being, which, thus, has all power, is God. There exists a God, that is, one principle which, as substance, is morally law-giving” (OP, 22: 122); (4) “The concept of such a being is not that of substance—that is, of a being which exists independent of my thought—but the idea (one’s own creation, thought-object, ens rationis) …” (OP, 21: 27). Read literally, there is a contradiction between claims made in quotes (1) and (2), and claims made in quotes (3) and (4), as if they formed two parts of an antinomy. Wimmer (1990, 258–259) has distinguished seven different chains of theses about God in the Opus postumum: (A) God as an idea of reason; (B1) The concept of God as identical with that of the moral subject and (B2) the object of pure practical reason; (C1) God as lawgiver and (C2) judge; (D) God as a postulate of pure practical reason; and (E) God as a being the existence of which is implied by its very concept. Clearly, these theses, when compared with one another, manifest ambiguities in Kant’s conception of God and occasionally prove to be mutually incompatible (cf., e.g., [D] vs. [E]). 6 For more details on the distinction between the human and the divine will, as well as an explanation of Kant’s claim about humanity in us being holy, see Lyssy (2021).

An attempt at reconciling God and autonomy  195 7 Reconstructing this line of thought, Giovanni Pietro Basile writes: “In order to ensure the autonomy of reason, one would have to interpret God as personification of reason. God would be merely an idea in the human being, generated by the human being: the self-positing of reason into an object of thought” (Basile 2013, 427; my translation). 8 Though I agree with Adickes’ claim that the theological views outlined in the Opus postumum do not annul the main tenets of Kant’s philosophy of religion presented in the Critical writings, I tend to see these views as a result of the evolution and radicalization of the earlier ones in which, pace Adickes, it is not belief in the existence of a personal God that plays the key role, but rather a rationalist account of religion as a kind of attitude to the moral law. However, my position, according to which Kant offers a reconsideration of religion along rationalist lines, does not allow endorsing the view against which Adickes was arguing and which was represented by Hans Vaihinger, namely, that the idea of God is a (necessary) fiction of reason. As I see it, Kant’s “deification” of practical reason and, more generally, a kind of “sacralization” of the moral domain, does not lead to depriving the idea of God of objective validity but to reconceiving the meaning of the divine. On the opposition between Adickes and Vaihinger, and some alternative positions, see Basile (2013, 122). 9 It is perfectly legitimate to read Kant as stressing the aspect of religion that manifests itself in an attitude to the moral law in us. The word ‘religion’ itself betrays an ambiguity as to its origin, namely, there are two competing accounts of its etymology: one that comes from Cicero, in which ‘religion’ derives from the Latin relegere meaning ‘to re-collect/reflect on again,’ and one that originates from Lactantius, in which ‘religion’ derives from the Latin religare meaning ‘to bind back.’ Whereas the Ciceronian account emphasizes this aspect of religion which reflects the attitude of conscientiousness, involving self-scrutiny in light of the moral law inscribed ‘in one’s heart,’ the account that comes from Lactantius brings out the relational aspect of religion (one who is ‘bound’ responds to the authority whose commands are binding for her as if she entered a covenant). For more on the etymology of ‘religion,’ see Tomasi (1999, 158ff.). 10 Over the past 30 years or so, Stephen Palmquist has consistently argued against Kant’s reducing religion to morality (Palmquist 1992, 2000, 2015). As I understand this anti-reductionist outlook, the point is that religion, according to Kant, contains more than precepts of moral conduct, for example, historically-mediated revelation and ecclesiastical institutions, and therefore cannot be reduced to ethics. Given the foregoing considerations in this essay, the question may arise whether the claim that the divine and the moral extend over one and the same domain does not imply reductionism with regard to religion. For Kant indeed holds that the core of religion is morality. What we commonly think of as belonging to the relation between human beings and God, such as participation in services, prayer, celebrating feasts etc., including belief in dogmas like the Holy Trinity and the vicarious atonement of Christ, construed literally, does not have, for Kant, a properly religious purport. It provides an external “shell,” for the time being “still indispensable,” yet to be abandoned once “transition to the new order of things” has been effected (Rel, 6: 136). That said, I do not claim that Kant ascribes no significant role to “church” and its matters, but just that, perhaps unlike many believers, he regards the components of the “shell” to be man-made rather than established by God, hence lacking any authentic religious significance. The Opus postumum only reinforces Kant’s development toward the ‘sacralization’ of ethics.

196  Anna Tomaszewska 11 For a nuanced discussion of Kant’s conception of God as a postulate of pure practical reason, see Förster (1998, 341–362). According to Förster, Kant develops four different practical arguments for the divine existence: (1) for God as an incentive (Triebfeder); (2) as one who proportions happiness to each individual in accordance with her virtue; (3) as the guarantor of conformity between nature and morality; (4) as one who establishes an ethical community (das ethische Gemeinwesen) (Förster 1998, 353). See also Förster (2000, 134–135). 12 In fact, as is evident from Kant’s reflections, the notion of positing appears throughout his philosophy, including its mature period. For example, in a note dated the late 1770s or early 1780s, positing appears in an explication of existence as “the condition for positing a thing in general” (Refl, 18: 236). 13 The notion of intuiting or seeing things and oneself in God appears also in other passages: OP, 21: 12–13, 17, 19, 50–51; 22: 54–55, 59. 14 In Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect, Spinoza features intellectual cognition as perception of things “under some form of eternity.” This mode of cognition is juxtaposed with the perception of objects “under duration” (Spinoza 2002a, 29). In Part IV of Ethics, he says that “whatsoever the mind conceives under the guidance of reason, it conceives under the same form of eternity or necessity…” (Spinoza 2002b, 352), and equates cognition sub specie aeternitatis with rational cognition. In Part V, Spinoza explains that “to conceive things under a form of eternity is to conceive things insofar as they are conceived through God’s essence as real entities,” hence as they necessarily follow from the nature of God and as God knows them (Spinoza 2002b, 376). 15 Kant’s triad of God, the world and subject as a moral being connecting the former two illustrates the idea that inserting morality into the empirical world is the task of the subject. Hence, in Kant’s new account of transcendental philosophy, bringing about the unity of nature and freedom would not rest on the postulate of the existence of God. For the idea of the subject connecting God and the world, see: OP, 21: 27, 29, 31–32, 34, 36–37, 59, 61, 80–81, 83–84, 86. Also, the following fragment of fascicle 7 seems to support the idea of the subject introducing morality in the domain of possible experience: “Not that we intuit in the deity, as Spinoza imagines, but the reverse: that we carry our concept of God into the objects of pure intuition in our concepts of transcendental philosophy” (OP, 22: 59).

References Adickes, Erich. 1978. Kants Opus postumum: Dargestellt und beurteilt. Vaduz: Topos Verlag. Aristotle. (1861) 1995. “Nicomachean Ethics.” In The Complete Works of Aristotle. Edited by Jonathan Barnes, 1729–1867. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Basile, Giovanni P. 2013. Kants Opus postumum und seine Rezeption. Berlin: De Gruyter. Bäck, Leo. 1895. Spinozas erste Einwirkungen auf Deutschland. Berlin: Meyer & Müller. Cortina, Adela. 1984. “Die Auflösung des religiösen Gottesbegriffs im Opus postumum Kants.” Kant-Studien, 75 (3): 380–393. De Flaviis, Giuseppe. 1986. Kant e Spinoza. Firenze: Sansoni Editore.

An attempt at reconciling God and autonomy  197 Edelmann, Johann Ch. 1742 (?). Die Göttlichkeit der Vernunft in einer kurtzen Anweisung zu weiterer Untersuchung der ältesten und vornehmsten Bedeutung des Wortes λόγος. Berleburg (?): publisher unknown. Fischer, Norbert. 2017. “Kants Idee est Deus in nobis und ihr Verhältnis zu Meister Eckhart. Zur Beziehung von Gott und Mensch in Kants kritischer Philosophie und bei Eckhart.” In Meister Eckhart als Denker. Edited by Wolfgang Erb and Norbert Fischer, 367–406. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Förster, Eckart. 1998. “Die Wandlungen in Kants Gotteslehre.” Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung 52 (3): 341–362. Förster, Eckart. 2000. Kant’s Final Synthesis: An Essay on the Opus postumum. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Howard, Stephen. 2019. “The Transition within the Transition: The Übergang from the Selbstsetzungslehre to the Ether Proofs in Kant’s Opus postumum.” Kant-Studien 110 (4): 595–617. Hunter, Ian. 2003. Rival Enlightenments: Civil and Metaphysical Philosophy in Early Modern Germany. New York: Cambridge University Press. Insole, Christopher J. 2013. Kant and the Creation of Freedom. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Insole, Christopher J. 2016. The Intolerable God: Kant’s Theological Journey. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing Co. Krop, Henri. 2017. “The Philosophia S. Scripturae Interpres between Humanist Scholarship and Cartesian Science: Lodewijk Meijer and the Emancipatory Power of Philology.” In The Dutch Legacy: Radical Thinkers of the 17th Century and the Enlightenment. Edited by Sonja Lavaert and Winfried Schröder, 90–120. Leiden: Brill. Lyssy, Ansgar. 2021. “Beyond Our Given Nature: Kant on the Inviolable Holiness of Humanity.” In Kant on Morality, Humanity, and Legality. Practical Dimensions of Normativity. Edited by Ansgar Lyssy and Christopher Yeomans, 149–165. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Mathieu, Vittorio. 1958. La filosofia trascendentale e l’Opus postumum di Kant. Torino: Edizioni di ‘Filosofia’. Mathieu, Vittorio. 1991. L’Opus postumum di Kant. Napoli: Bibliopolis. Mosayebi, Reza. 2011. “Die ‘Definition’ der Vernunftreligion.” In Immanuel Kant: Die Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der bloßen Vernunft. Edited by Otfried Höffe, 249–270. Berlin: Akademie Verlag. Palmquist, Stephen R. 1992. “Does Kant Reduce Religion to Morality?” Kant-Studien 83 (2): 129–148. Palmquist, Stephen R. 2000. Kant’s Critical Religion. Volume Two of Kant’s System of Perspectives. Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing Ltd. Palmquist, Stephen R. 2015. Comprehensive Commentary on Kant’s Religion within the Boundaries of Bare Reason. Oxford and Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. Pasternack, Lawrence R. 2014. Kant on Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason. London: Routledge. Schröder, Winfried. 2012. Ursprünge des Atheismus. Untersuchungen zur Metaphysik- und Religionskritik des 17. und 18. Jahrhunderts. Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: Frommann-Holzboog Verlag.

198  Anna Tomaszewska Spinoza, Benedictus de. 2002a. “Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect.” In Complete Works. Translated by Samuel Shirley. Edited by Michael L. Morgan, 1–30. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Co. Spinoza, Benedictus de. 2002b. “Ethics.” In Complete Works. Translated by Samuel Shirley. Edited by Michael L. Morgan, 213–382. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Co. Strickland, Lloyd. 2014. Leibniz’s Monadology. A New Translation and Guide. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Thomas Aquinas, St. 2007. Summa Theologica. Volume I–Part I. New York: Cosimo Classics. Tomasi, Gabriele. 1999. La voce e lo sguardo: metafore e funzioni della coscienza nella dottrina kantiana della virtù. Pisa: Edizioni ETS. Wimmer, Reiner. 1990. Kants kritische Religionsphilosophie. Berlin: De Gruyter.

10 François Marty’s interpretation of Kant’s Opus postumum1 Giovanni Pietro Basile

François Marty (1926–2016)2 worked on Kant’s Opus postumum for more than three decades. He was the author of the benchmark translation in French, published in 1986,3 he devoted numerous studies to Kant’s unfinished project, and one must not forget the important place of the Kantian Nachlasswerk in Marty’s last work of 2004: L’homme, habitant du monde. À l’horizon de la pensée critique de Kant (The human being, inhabitant of the world. At the horizon of Kant’s critical thought).4 However, he neither collected any of his contributions together into a single volume nor wrote a systematic presentation of his interpretation. The purpose of this paper is to attempt a reconstruction of Marty’s contribution to the understanding of the Opus postumum. He has, more than any other scholar, made practical reason the key to the interpretation of Kant’s transition-project. To this end, I will first deal with the premises of Marty’s interpretation, then I will present his reconstruction of the general structure of the Opus postumum. This will allow me to move on to the exposition of what Marty calls the ‘revised ontological argument,’ and finally to conclude with the unity of reason in the system of ideas of transcendental philosophy.

The premises of the Opus postumum according to Marty In L’homme, habitant du monde, reference to Kant’s late work is readily discernible right from its title—the definition of man as ‘inhabitant of the world’ (Weltbewohner, incola mundi) being taken straight from this work.5 Marty’s thesis is very clear: to situate oneself “at the horizon of Kant’s critical thought,”6 is to interpret this thought from the perspective of the Opus postumum, because: it is possible to consider the ‘Transition [from the Metaphysical Principles of the Science of Nature to Physics]’ as a resumption of the very core of critical thought, such as it is outlined in the works that announce themselves in their title as Critiques.7

DOI: 10.4324/9781003090946-11

200  Giovanni Pietro Basile The singular nature of the Opus postumum is therefore to capture the hermeneutical gesture by which Kant interprets himself,8 what Marty calls “the courage of interpretation (le courage de l’interprétation).”9 The implications of this thesis are essential in order to understand the starting point of Marty’s interpretation of Kantian thought. They can be made explicit in four propositions, which constitute the presuppositions of his interpretation. The first is that Marty assumes the systematic cohesion and essential logical unity of the three Kantian Critiques, thus rejecting any aporetic reading of the critical philosophy. The second presupposition is that the Opus postumum is to be inscribed within critical thought.10 It even constitutes its horizon, the extreme point reached by this thought, and the measure of its extent. Marty is ready to concede that one can speak of the Opus postumum as a ‘fourth Critique,’ but on the condition that one does not understand by this “that it would break with what the three Critiques of the Kantian corpus sought to think.”11 The Opus postumum cannot be considered, from Marty’s point of view, as a new beginning following a turning point, that is to say, a radical revision, nor is it even the disavowal of critical philosophy in favor of an absolute idealism. In other words, if the Opus postumum constitutes—in Marty’s sense—a ‘fourth Critique,’ it certainly does not do so in the sense that Hermann de Vleeschauwer said of the Nachlasswerk, i.e., that it would have been the third edition of the Critique of Pure Reason. The Opus postumum can be considered as a ‘fourth Critique,’ “if we mean by this that the consideration of the Opus postumum is now indispensable not so much to decide the content of the critical thought as to learn from Kant himself how to read the Critiques.”12 One should not hesitate to see in this remark of Marty, which makes the Opus postumum the rule, i.e., the canon, of the interpretation of the three Critiques, an analogy with the function of the Doctrine of Method in relation to the Doctrine of Elements in the Critique of Pure Reason. The third presupposition of Marty’s interpretation is that the main themes of the Opus postumum correspond to the main problematics of the critical philosophy, and the core of the critical philosophy revolves around the fundamental question of freedom as an ethical question. This question, as is already well known, is at the center of the second Critique, whereas, at least at its starting point, the Critique of Pure Reason aims at the philosophical foundation of Newtonian physics. But, according to Marty, one would be mistaken about what is really at stake in the first Critique, if one did not recognize that “the Critique of Pure Reason has the ethical question at its center,”13 or that “the question that one must keep in mind when reading the first Critique is thus that of a metaphysics that has ‘morality’ as its focus.”14 The second part of the Critique of Pure Reason, the Methodology, in particular the Canon of Pure Reason, is quite enlightening in this respect. Similarly, it is the antinomies of pure

François Marty’s interpretation of Kant’s Opus postumum  201 reason that highlight the metaphysical idea of freedom in its practical interest. It is the task of the Critique of Judgment as the third Critique to realize the passage from the first to the second Critique with the help of reflective judgment: “[...] the three Critiques are not in linear succession, but the third one comes to be situated between the first two, in a position of transition [...].”15 Now, the problematic of the Opus postumum is indeed that of the transition. It is first announced, according to the original title of the project, as the realization of the ‘Transition from the Metaphysical Principles of the Science of Nature to Physics.’ But, as Marty rightly observes, “the transition to physics as a system will take such a form that a passage will be made towards a ‘transcendental philosophy’, explaining the questions of God, of the world, of freedom.”16 The confrontation with the problem of the transition to physics leads Kant progressively first to a resumption of the fundamental notions of the Transcendental Aesthetic and Analytic, then to return to the idea of freedom in its relation to the two other metaphysical ideas—that of the world and that of God—in a system of the ‘transcendental philosophy.’ The original questioning of the transition from metaphysics to physics leads in the Opus postumum to a resumption of the problem of the transition from the first to the second Critique, in continuity with the task of the third Critique. The Opus postumum then shows that the notion of ‘transcendental’ constitutes the horizon where any question of transition in Kantian philosophy is always to be situated. And the idea of freedom, aimed at by the transcendental philosophy, is to be recognized as the driving force of Kant’s late thought. This leads to the fourth presupposition of Marty’s Kantian interpretation, which specifically concerns the Opus postumum, namely, the affirmation of its systematic unity. Obviously, the Opus postumum lacks the external unity that can be found in a finished work: Marty says it unequivocally.17 But it nevertheless possesses the logical unity of a single thought that runs through it entirely. In arguing this, Marty takes a stand in relation to a debate that has characterized the reception of Kant’s unfinished work from the very beginning, distancing himself from a whole series of interpreters, from Hans Vaihinger and Gerhard Lehmann to Hans–Georg Hoppe, Burkhard Tuschling, Michael Friedman, and Eckhart Förster, all of whom argue that, after the failure of the initial project of the Passage, in the sketches of the last period of the Opus postumum, Kant was turning toward a form of subjective, even absolute idealism, bringing him closer to the philosophies of Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel.

Systematic structure of the Opus postumum According to Marty, there is therefore no caesura. Rather, one must recognize two major moments that structure the reflections of the Opus postumum: the first corresponds to the reflections on the philosophy

202  Giovanni Pietro Basile of nature, the second, to those on the transcendental philosophy. Each of these two major sets is articulated in its turn in two sections, which correspond to the overall division according to which Marty recapitulates the course followed in his edition of the Opus postumum: (1) Doctrine of the elements: the elementary system of the forces of matter; (2) Toward a system of the world; (3) The thinking subject that is in charge of itself; (4) The system of the transcendental philosophy.18 The starting point of the Transition from the Metaphysical Principles of the Philosophy of Nature to Physics is the reflection on the systematic character of physics. Marty notes that it is a reprise of the Critique of Pure Reason, to the extent that Kant will approach the question from both ends: from the side of the experience and from the side of the subject. It is a question for Kant of thinking once again about the junction between experience and the a priori, between physics and metaphysics without confusion or separation, of “tightening, in their irreducibility, the a priori and the a posteriori.”19 Moreover, the emphasis on the systematic character of science shows that the Transition-project is on a par with the Methodology of the first Critique, notably the Architectonic. 20 On the side of the experience, Kant’s reflection is organized around the notion of matter and leads to considerations of the system of driving forces, organic bodies, and the ether. 21 While the theme of organisms refers to the third Critique, the system of driving forces and the deduction of the ether are part of the thought process of the first. The table of driving forces of matter, “counterpart of the ‘table of categories’ of the first Critique,”22 must be exhaustive, and therefore a priori. And yet, it must be suitable for the experience. The ether, as matter, is a physical reality, but its existence is established a priori (from the impossibility of the vacuum for an empirical science). These two examples show that, in the transition-project, as in the Critique of Pure Reason, “the a priori [...] has meaning only in relation to a given.”23 On the side of the subject, the reflection continues with the notions of ‘phenomenon of the phenomenon,’ of self-affection and a considerable displacement in the notions of space and time. 24 Marty emphasizes a similar movement, this time with reference to the Transcendental Aesthetic. The direct, physical phenomenon, i.e., the empirical given as understood by the Critique of Pure Reason, is implied in the very name of ‘phenomenon of the phenomenon’ (or ‘indirect phenomenon’), considered as a metaphysical notion. The notion of indirect phenomenon refers, in turn, to the concept of self-affection of the Subject, which is already to be found in the second edition of the Transcendental Aesthetic25: “Because the empirical intuition is received only according to a ‘composition’, the subject, in the empirical phenomenon that it grasps, ‘appears to itself’, indirectly therefore, in those sensations which are the direct ‘appearance’.”26 There is no reception of the sensible object, without the subject becoming an object for itself. The self-affection of

François Marty’s interpretation of Kant’s Opus postumum  203 the subject is then the position of oneself as determinable in space and time, that is to say as a sensible subject, endowed with a body, 27 or again, according to Marty’s remarkable formulation: “spontaneity [...] entirely occupied with exhibiting itself in a passivity.”28 This tightening of the object and the subject involves a reconsideration of the status of the space and the time. They remain the forms of any sensible intuition; but, from now on, they constitute an absolute unity. Marty speaks, referring to the draft Convolut VII (fascicle VII)—the penultimate sketch in chronological order—of a ‘turning point’ with respect to the themes of the philosophy of nature that had been dominant until then, that is to say, when the cogito, the ‘I think’, appears. 29 This turning point should not be confused with a break in the movement of resumption of the critical philosophy, because Kant, adhering to the basic theme of the paralogisms of the Critique of Pure Reason, denies the possibility of a deduction of existence from the concept of a thinking subject. It is rather a transition to the transcendental philosophy30 that is announced, and which entails the emergence of the categorical imperative accompanied by the theological problem that it implies. In this double passage to the, ‘I think’ and to the domain of practical reason through the appeal to the categorical imperative, we can easily recognize the third and fourth sections of the division of the Opus postumum reconstructed by Marty. It is the fourth section that will retain our attention in the following section. Let us make one final observation: the four sections identified by Marty correspond in fact to the three metaphysical ideas. The first section deals with matter and the possibility of a system of the totality of its properties, which is related to nature materialiter spectata or the sensible world. In the fourth section, there is the emergence of the idea of God, i.e. of an absolutely intelligible being. Between the world and God, the third metaphysical idea comes to be in a position of mediation or transition: the idea of the knowing, sensible and intelligible subject. It is remarkable that, although it is one and the same subject, it cannot be seized with a single glance, but must be contemplated in two stages. The sensible element and the intelligible element, which constitute subjectivity, remain irreducible, and yet neither element can exist without the other. According to Marty, this irreducibility is an indication of a particular unity: the unity of the inscrutable freedom which is at the very heart of the transcendental philosophy of the late Kant. Therefore, Marty concludes, it would be erroneous not to recognize that this freedom is what truly is at stake in the Opus postumum.

The ‘revised ontological argument’ The ‘transition’ to physics makes possible the appearance of the notion of the self-determination of the subject of knowledge through its positing of

204  Giovanni Pietro Basile itself in self-affection. However, the reflection on the self-determination of the subject would remain incomplete from the critical point of view if it did not take into account this other form of self-determination “which is the autonomy of the subject submitting to the moral imperative.”31 With this transition to the categorical imperative, “the whole reflection of the Critique of Practical Reason is retained: bringing to light the unique character of the law of causality by freedom, the moral law, ‘fact of reason.’”32 It is indeed here that we have to see the ultimate aim that spans the Opus postumum from one end to the other: “When the critical eye looks at the subject engaged in physics, it sees the subject of moral action. The transcendental philosophy of the Opus postumum is resolutely ethical […].”33 One passes from the designation of the subject as ‘I’, implying an ‘I think’, to that of ‘man’ and ‘person.’ The same subject referred to by the transition to physics as a subject of knowledge affected by the driving forces, is referred to now as a subject of ‘ethic-practical’ action, “affected by the law of duty,”34 i.e., as a “person.”35 Now, in the Opus postumum, it is the question of the foundation of moral obligation which leads to the idea of a being ‘who can oblige, but never be obliged’ and thus to appeal to the theological question. One might be astonished that the foundation of morality is related to God. But, according to Marty, this is not in contradiction to the achievements of the second Critique, whose main occupation is the autonomy of reason, as the following passage shows: The categorical imperative does not presuppose a commanding substance in a supreme position which would be outside me, but it is a commandment or a prohibition of my own reason. In spite of this, it is to be considered as coming from a being, which has an irresistible power over everything. 36 With respect to this passage, Marty observes: “It is an absolute commandment of reason that makes man, according to freedom, where he is no longer a simple link of nature, the authority of such a law does not have to wait for an external authority.”37 And yet, as Marty again points out, the second part of this text shows that the theological question, far from being eliminated, arises with respect to the ‘provenance’ of the moral imperative. In fact, the affirmation of the divine origin of moral laws is simply a reiteration of what is said in the Dialectic of the second Critique. It is indeed the fact of understanding moral commandments as divine commandments, which authorizes Kant to speak of ‘religion.’38 Man’s autonomy does not exclude, from a practical perspective, the determination of the existence of God. In a marginal note, Kant remarks that “there are two ways for man to postulate the existence of God.”39

François Marty’s interpretation of Kant’s Opus postumum  205 The first is to represent him as a judge. The second is related to the fact that: reason thinks a merit of which man is capable, that of being able to place himself in a superior class, namely that of self-legislating being (by the moral-practical reason), […] and a call to do that. As such it is not a merely hypothetical call, but a determination to move in this way: to be himself author of his rank, that is to say obliged, and however, at the same time, obliging himself.40 Marty observes that the ‘merit’ of that which is in question here, is to be put in connection with the ‘dignity’ of a reward, that is the reward of reaching the class “of self-legislating beings.” The supreme legislator creates this class and calls man, but it is up to man to take his place in it, by obeying the appeal of the legislator. God cannot do it for him. Marty remarks: “Such legislation can therefore only take the form of an ‘appeal’, which, when it is heard, becomes a ‘determination’ that man makes of his own will to follow this path.”41 Man’s freedom and autonomy arise from the horizon of an appeal, that is to say, from the relation to God, which Kant specifies cannot be “a merely hypothetical thing.”42 A second aspect of the theological question of the Opus postumum that ties in with the Critique of Practical Reason is, according to Marty, the evocation of the sentiment of respect: It is as an ‘act’ that the Kantian imperative is formulated, attesting that the principle of this acting is a freedom. The ‘sublimity of the ideas of pure practical reason’ is then manifested, a feeling of suffering, because there is ‘humility,’ in the face of an inordinate call, but at the same time ‘elevation.’ In the feelings thus evoked, it is respect that we encounter.43 In other words, what we find here is the reference to respect which, as Kant says in the Analytic of the second Critique, “is always directed only to persons, never to things.”44 The recognition of the other as a person implied in the feeling of respect has a decisive consequence in the theology of Opus Postumum, namely, the affirmation of God as a person: If it is true that only a person can hear the imperative of the moral law, this can in turn only be enunciated by a person. And if it is true that this law is ‘holy,’ its dignity will not be enunciated sufficiently as long as the person who enunciates it has not attained to holiness.45 God is a person like any moral subject, except that for a holy will like God’s, the moral law has no dimension of constraint. God alone can be

206  Giovanni Pietro Basile thought of as “a person, therefore as a being, who has rights, over whom no other has rights.”46 The affirmation of a personal God is decisive for the theology of the Opus postumum because it makes it possible to give validity to the ontological argument, which represents one of the most controversial subjects in the history of the reception of Kant’s late work. The expression ‘ontological argument’ does not appear explicitly in the drafts of the Opus postumum, but according to Marty it is presented there not by its name, but by its approach, recognizable in some formulations of the divine origin of the categorical imperative: “There is a God, because there is a categorical imperative,”47 and again: “his mere idea is at the same time the proof of his existence.”48 Under the concept of God, transcendental philosophy even goes so far as to think of classical predicates, by defining God for example as: “a substance of the greatest existence,” a “supreme Being” endowed with all its properties (“ens summum, summa intelligentia, summum Bonum”),49 possessing “the highest perfection.”50 Once again, one could be tempted to see in this revival of the ontological argument the disavowal of the critical positions, especially of the first Critique. According to Marty, however, this is only an apparent dogmatism, because the idea of God for Kant: is not that of a substance different from man, it is not something outside man. It is an idea created by us, from which we proceed analytically. The whole ‘transcendental philosophy’ is a ‘self-creation,’ where the autonomy of the man is manifested. 51 Having said this, Marty immediately warns not to be too quickly satisfied with simple immanence of the idea of God in the later Kant, since we must also take into account the ‘transcendental idealism’ present in the Opus postumum, where it is said, for example: “I am in the supreme being. I see myself (according to Spinoza) in God, who is law-giving in me.”52 Marty remarks: “Being in the supreme being is not a formula of immanence.”53 According to Marty, it is necessary to recognize that in the Opus postumum there is a revival of the “ontological argument.” But it is what he calls a “revised ontological argument (argument ontologique révisé).”54 The expression, which as such does not appear in Kant’s writings, is justified by the fact that the proofs and demonstrations of God’s existence in the Opus postumum have the form of the ‘ontological argument.’ This form is according to Marty that of an argument: “which aims to make the one who recognizes that he/she thinks the concept of God also understand that he/she affirms at the same time God’s existence.”55 However, and this is essential, the ‘ontological argument’ is never applied according to a speculative and theoretical use of reason. It is always formulated within the framework of practical reason, as

François Marty’s interpretation of Kant’s Opus postumum  207 Kant says with reference to God: “the existence of such a being can only be postulated in a practical perspective.”56 Two examples, discussed by Marty himself, stand out. A particularly relevant formulation of the ‘ontological argument’ in the Opus postumum is the following: An a priori synthetic judgment from concepts which thus postulates the existence of a being, and precisely of the unique being (which grasps in itself the One and the whole) is certainly only an idea, but one which must subjectively be thought of as the rule of the supreme perfection of a being (as Ens a priori omnimodo determinatum) [cujus Eßentia per ipsum sui conceptum involvit existentiam]. 57 Marty notes that the problematic of the Critique of Practical Reason is evoked here by the existence of a being that is postulated. The expression ‘synthetic a priori judgment’ recalls the Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, where “categorical imperatives” represent a “synthetic proposition a priori.”58 A second example is the following passage: Now as Wisdom, in a strict sense, can only be attributed to God and such a being must at the same time be endowed with omnipotence— because without this the ultimate end (the supreme good) would be an idea without reality—then the proposition: ‘there is a God,’ becomes an existential proposition.59 Here too there is an affirmation of the existence of God from his concept, but according to a practical interest, which, Marty sees, is signaled by the reference to the highest good.60 In the resumption of the ‘ontological argument’ of the later Kant, there is undoubtedly a shift with respect to the exposition of the Critique of Pure Reason.61 The critical reserve toward dogmatism is not however abandoned: “All of Kant’s theological statements are to be understood ‘from a practical point of view,’ which is not to say that they are hollow thoughts, but rather that they carry the weight of reality.”62 Marty notes that this evolution of Kantian thought was moreover prepared by the third Critique, notably by a reflection in a kind of appendix to the exposition “On the moral proof of the existence of God.”63 Here is considered the case of an “honest man” who is an atheist, and who, while believing neither in God nor in the future life, obeys the categorical imperative. His effort is limited, however, and, faced with the absurdity of the world in which he acts, if he wants to remain faithful to the appeal of his moral inner vocation and not weaken the respect, by which the moral law immediately influences him to obedience,

208  Giovanni Pietro Basile […] then he must assume the existence of a moral author of the world, i.e., of God, from a practical point of view, […] which he very well can do, since it is at least not self-contradictory.64 This reflection shows that, with the ‘revised ontological argument’ that is applied, so to speak, ‘with a practical intention,’ a displacement with respect to the first Critique has taken place in the Opus postumum, but the horizon of the critical philosophy itself has not been left.65

The system of ideas of the transcendental philosophy The shift in the Opus postumum from the first Critique with respect to the theological question also concerns another essential chapter of transcendental philosophy: the unity of the system of the three ideas of reason. Marty notes that, in the Opus postumum, two ideas are very often linked, ‘God and the world,’ with the ‘self’ occupying a third position that provides a unifying function.66 This leads to two considerations. The first is that there is heterogeneity between the ideas of God/ world and the third idea: “[Man] does not add to the couple ‘God and the world,’ but links them.”67 In place of the ‘I’ we find ‘man’: “Man counts among the ideas of reason.”68 Marty notes that this tightening of the two ideas ‘God and the world’ is not without connection with the replacement of the ‘I’ by ‘man’ and the function of junction that this one exerts with regard to the two other ideas.69 The couple “God and the world” concerns “the totality of the beings” and realizes “a synthetic system of the transcendental philosophy.”70 Each of the two ideas is ‘a maximum,’ presenting itself as ‘infinite.’ But one is opposed to the other like the ‘thing in itself’ to the ‘phenomenon,’ the ‘technical-practical’ reason to the ‘ethical-practical’ one.71 Now, man is able to be the connection between these two ideas, by realizing the passage from one to the other, because he is a citizen of these two worlds. He is himself both a sensible and intelligible subject, ‘thing in itself’ and ‘phenomenon’, subject of the ‘technical-practical’ reason (the self-affection) and subject of the ‘ethical-practical’ reason (person). He is not the abstract ‘I,’ that is the subject of an ontologically hollow knowledge. Man is essentially thought of as a free subject, thanks to the freedom of the moral subject which was given to him in the categorical imperative and became constitutive of his being-person. He has attained his dignity as a free man by determining himself for this by his action in this world. It is indeed a question here of the man as “inhabitant of the world”, because it is “the free man who exists in the spatio-temporal world.”72 The “system of the ideas of reason” proposed by the transcendental philosophy “unites God and the world, by means of the free man”73: “God, the world, universum, and myself man as moral being. God, the world and the inhabitant of the world, man in the world.”74

François Marty’s interpretation of Kant’s Opus postumum  209 With the idea of ‘man, inhabitant of the world’ the transcendental philosophy of Kant has reached its highest point. By the end of the reconstruction of Marty’s interpretation, one appreciates the extent to which the system of the three ideas of reason plays an architectonic role throughout all the Opus postumum drafts.75 The starting point of this system is nature materialiter spectata and its point of arrival is the idea of God, passing by a sensible and intelligible subject, which reason arrives finally to posit as absolute freedom and free action in this world. In the idea of absolute freedom, this unfathomable abyss, Marty recognizes the aim of all critical thought. Hence, he can write, “The key to the ‘transcendental philosophy’ of the Opus postumum is thus given by the Critique of Practical Reason.”76 If the system of the three ideas constitutes the architectonics of the Opus postumum, the Opus postumum itself is in a position of canon with respect to the system of the three Critiques, for it indicates in the idea of absolute freedom, generated by the categorical imperative as a divine command, the ‘key’ and touchstone of critical thought. The Opus postumum, for Marty, has thus completed its task, by the very fact that it has remained an unfinished work: “Kant’s philosophy is summed up in a reason that goes to the end, since it constitutes knowledge in a system, but without ever claiming to take in itself, as human reason, the criterion of reality.”77 This is the central thesis of Marty’s Kantian interpretation: “Kantian mediation differs from Hegelian mediation, insofar as it works towards what can only remain hidden. Unity is obscure, and yet it is this kind of absence that spurs the thought of it.”78 In the Opus postumum, critical thought has accomplished its task, because it has not avoided the challenge to think “the enigma of the man, mysterious weld between God and the world,”79 without taking away the unfathomable mystery of it.

Notes 1 The present contribution is the translated, revised, and extended version of the following publication in French: (2015) ‘‘Argument ontologique révisé’ et unité de la raison dans le dernier Kant. La raison pratique dans l’Opus postumum kantien d’après François Marty (‘Revised Ontological Argument’ and Unity of Reason in the late Kant. Practical Reason in the Opus postumum according to François Marty)’. In Kant. La raison pratique. Concepts et héritages. Edited by Sophie Grapotte, Martig Ruffing and Ricardo Terra, 123–134 (Paris: Vrin). © Librairie Philosophique J. Vrin, Paris, 2015. http://www.vrin.fr. I thank the publisher Vrin for authorizing the present publication. 2 François Marty, a French Jesuit and philosopher, was a consistently insightful scholar of Kantian thought. Among his numerous studies, published mainly in French, in addition to those devoted to the Opus postumum (cf. the list at the end of this paper), are to be remembered his main work of 1997, La naissance de la métaphysique chez Kant. Une étude sur la notion kantienne d’analogie (Paris: Beauchesne); the translation of the Critique

210  Giovanni Pietro Basile of Pure Reason for the Pléiade edition–Emmanuel Kant. 1980. Œuvres philosophiques. Vol. 1: Des premiers écrits à la Critique de la raison pure (1747–1781). Edited by Ferdinand Alquié et al. Paris: Gallimard, 719–1470– and his last book L’homme, habitant du monde (2004). 3 Cf. Kant 1986. The first French translation of Kant’s last project, published in 1950 under the title: Emmanuel Kant, Opus postumum. Textes choisis et traduits par J. Gibelin (Paris: Vrin), presented only an anthology of extracts, which was of almost no use for the understanding of Kantian thought. In an appendix to his own translation of the Opus postumum, Marty devotes a section to the critical analysis of Gibelin’s translation (‘La première traduction française de l’Opus postumum’, in Kant 1986, 265–267). 4 See below the list of Marty’s writings on the Opus postumum. 5 Cf. OP, 21: 27, 31, and 47. 6 Translations of passages quoted from Marty’s texts are my own. 7 […] il est possible de considérer le ‘Passage [des Principes métaphysiques de la science de la nature à la physique]’ comme une reprise du noyau même de la pensée critique, telle que l’exposent les œuvres qui s’annoncent, dans leur titre, comme des Critiques. (Marty 2004b, 31) 8 “Nous avons suffisamment montré quelle place y [= in the Opus postumum] tient la confrontation avec les Critiques, et d’abord la première, si bien que Kant s’y fait, en quelque sorte, leur interprète.” (Marty 1986b, 1311). Likewise Marty says: L’Opus postumum me semble être une relecture de tout le parcours critique, une fois que la troisième a été écrite. […] Les esquisses de philosophie transcendantale de la dernière période de l’Opus postumum aboutissent à une remarquable réélaboration du système des idées de la Critique de la raison pure. (Marty 2004b, 104) 9 Marty (2004b, 331). 10 “L’Opus postumum s’inscrit […] dans le champ tracé par les trois Critiques […].” (Marty 1988, 126). 11 “[…] qu’il romprait avec ce que cherchaient à penser les trois Critiques du corpus kantien” (Marty 1988, 140). 12 “[…] si on voulait dire par là que la prise en compte de l’Opus postumum est désormais indispensable non pas tellement pour décider du contenu de la pensée critique que pour apprendre de Kant lui-même comment lire les Critiques” (Marty 1992, 51). Still on the subject of the Opus Postumum Marty adds elsewhere: Faut-il parler d’une ‘quatrième Critique’? Non, au sens d’un titre ajouté à une série indéfiniment extensible, ou d’une nouvelle et définitive expression de la pensée de Kant, rejoignant tel ou tel courant qui alors prenait naissance. Oui, s’il s’agit de la continuation du travail de pensée qui, ayant suscité la Critique de la raison pure, découvre des horizons qui, sans rendre caduque la première, en a suscité deux autres. (Marty 1988, 121) Further on Marty adds: “[L’Opus postumum] est si intérieur à la triple unité des Critiques qu’il n’a pas besoin d’en reprendre le titre.” (Marty 1988, 127). The title of the third chapter of L’homme habitant du monde, dealing with aesthetic judgment, as the raison d’être “de la troisième (et dernière)

François Marty’s interpretation of Kant’s Opus postumum  211 Critique” also answers, albeit indirectly, the question, if and under what conditions can one speak of the Opus postumum as a ‘fourth Critique’? 13 “La Critique de la raison pure a pour centre la question éthique” (Marty 2004b, 35). 14 “La question qu’il faut garder présente à l’esprit quand on lit la première Critique est donc celle d’une métaphysique qui a la ‘morale’ pour foyer.” (Marty 2004b, 57). 15 “[…] les trois Critiques ne sont pas en succession linéaire, mais la troisième vient se situer entre les deux premières, en position de passage […].” (Marty 2004b, 91). 16 “[…] le passage à la physique comme système va prendre une telle forme, qu’un passage se fera vers une ‘philosophie transcendantale’, explicitant les questions de Dieu, du monde, de la liberté.” (Marty 1986b, 1304. 17 L’Opus postumum est à la fois en deçà et au-delà de l’œuvre de Kant. Il est en deçà, son caractère inachevé […] fait qu’il lui manque à tout jamais ce lien qui, de matériaux assemblés, fait une œuvre. Mais il est aussi au-delà. En lui, l’œuvre de Kant commence sa vie. (Marty 1986b, 1311) Elsewhere Marty says that the Opus Postumum is nothing more than a “project” (Marty 1988, 125), “[une] œuvre […] demeurée, irrémédiablement, en chantier” (Marty 1988, 148). Cf. Marty (2001, 31 and 2008, 347–348). 18 Cf. Marty (1986a, 371–389). The articulation proposed by Marty is essentially based on two classification guidelines, which can be found in the Kantian manuscript (cf. Marty [1986b, 1304 and 2001, 28–29). Both are marginal notations separated by a long period of work. The first classification is binary: “1st part: On the Elementary System of Matter (through analysis). 2nd part: on the System of the World.” (OP, 21: 359; all translations from the Opus postumum are my own). The second classification follows a four-part division: 1. Transition from the Metaphysical First Principles of the Natural Sciences to Physics. 2. Transition from Physics to Transcendental Philosophy. 3. Transition from Transcendental Philosophy to the system between Nature and Freedom. 4. Conclusion on the universal connection of the living forces of all things in the mutual relationship of God and the World. (OP, 21: 17) However, Marty specifies that the division proposed by him is an interpretation; even if it is based on two texts by Kant, it is not by Kant (cf. Marty [2001, 29]). 19 “[…] resserrer, en leur irréductibilité, l’a priori et l’a posteriori” (Marty 2008, 362). 20 About the embedding of the Opus postumum in the Methodology of the Critique of Pure Reason, Marty writes: “L’ancrage est donc dans la Méthodologie, précisément dans l’Architectonique. Ce qui la recommande est d’abord son propos systématique, affiché d’emblée: elle est ‘l’art des systèmes’ [A 832/B 860].” (Marty 2001, 31). 21 Cf. Marty (1986a, 372–377; 1986b, 1305–1306; 1988, 122, and 127–131; 2001, 31–32; 2008, 352–355. 22 “[…] pendant de la ‘table des catégories’ de la première Critique” (Marty 2004a, 30).

212  Giovanni Pietro Basile 23 “[…] l’a priori […] n’a de sens que par rapport à un donné” (Marty 1986, 1306). 24 Cf. Marty (1986a, 377–382; 1986b, 1306–1308; 1988: 122, 131–134; 2001, 32; 2008, 355–361, 362–364. 25 CPR, B 66–69. 26 “Parce que l’intuition empirique n’est reçue que selon une ‘composition’, le sujet, dans le phénomène empirique, qu’il saisit, ‘s’apparaît à lui-même’, indirectement donc, dans ces sensations qui sont ‘l’apparaître’ direct.” (Marty 1986b, 1307). 27 Il faut prendre garde de ne pas réduire le sujet reconnu ainsi comme ‘phénomène du phénomène’ au ‘moi phénoménal’, qui relève du ‘phénomène direct’, et qui n’a rien de ‘métaphysique’. La réflexion reste au niveau transcendantal, celui de l’intelligence de la possibilité de connaître. Mais celle-ci est désormais comprise à partir du corps, soumis aux jeux des forces motrices et les rapportant à lui-même, comme sujet qui peut les unifier et les organiser. Corps parmi les corps, il est bien ‘phénomène’, mais, parce que le point de sa passivité est aussi celui de son activité unificatrice, il est ‘phénomène du phénomène’. (Marty 1988, 132) 28 “[…] spontanéité […] toute occupée à s’exposer dans une passivité” (Marty 2001, 32). 29 Cf. Marty (1986b, 1308–1309). 30 ‘Transcendantal’ est […] à entendre en continuité avec le sens qui est le sien dans toute l’Analytique. Il s’agit de parcourir le champ que la raison se découvre, quand elle se met à l’épreuve, et mesure son pouvoir, dans la fondation de la science physique. Il n’y a donc pas tellement de nouveauté, lorsque Kant demande de prolonger le passage des principes métaphysiques de la science de la nature à la physique par un passage à la philosophie transcendantale. (Marty 1988, 135). 31 “[…] qu’est l’autonomie du sujet se soumettant à l’impératif moral” (Marty 1988, 135). 32 “[…] toute la réflexion de la Critique de la raison pratique est retenue, mettant en lumière le caractère unique de la loi de causalité par liberté, la loi morale, ‘fait de la raison’” (Marty 1988, 136). 33 “Le regard critique sur le sujet engagé dans la physique voit le sujet de l’action morale. La philosophie transcendantale de l’Opus postumum est résolument éthique.” (Marty 1988, 136). 34 OP, 21: 86. 35 Marty 1988, 136–137. In Marty’s words one can say that: “[…] c’est une exigence de l’impératif catégorique qui, dans l’Übergang appelle une philosophie transcendantale.” (Marty 1995, 866). 36 OP, 22: 51. 37 “C’est un commandement absolu de la raison qui fait l’homme, selon la liberté, où il n’est plus un simple chainon de la nature. L’autorité d’une telle loi n’a pas à attendre une autorité extérieure.” (Marty 1995, 867). 38 The Opus postumum specifies that religion in the Kantian sense is not to be confused with a historical revelation (cf. OP, 22: 51). 39 OP, 22: 117–118. 40 OP, 22: 117–118.

François Marty’s interpretation of Kant’s Opus postumum  213 41 “Une telle législation ne peut prendre dès lors que la forme d’un ‘appel’, qui, lorsqu’il est entendu, devient une ‘détermination’, celle que l’homme fait de sa volonté pour suivre cette voie.” (Marty 2004a, 32–33). 42 “[…] ein bloß hypothetisches Ding” (OP, 22: 118). Cf. Marty (2004a, 32–33), Marty (2006, 222–223). 43 C’est comme un ‘agis’ que se formule l’impératif kantien, attestant au principe de cet agir une liberté. Se manifeste alors ‘la sublimité des idées de la raison pratique pure’, sentiment de souffrance, car il y a ‘humilité’, face à un appel démesuré, mais du même coup ‘élévation’. Dans les sentiments ainsi évoqués, c’est le respect que l’on retrouve. (Marty 1995, 868) 4 4 CPracR, 5: 76. On the analysis of respect in the Critique of Practical Reason, see the rest of the quote (CPracR, 5: 76.24–77). 45 S’il est vrai que seule une personne peut entendre l’impératif de la loi morale, il ne peut être énoncé que par une personne. Et s’il est vrai que cette loi est ‘sainte’, on ne dira pas assez sa dignité tant que la personne qui l’énonce n’est pas sainteté accomplie. (Marty 1988, 137) It is also worth quoting another happy formulation by Marty: “On peut voir là le souci de penser le spécifique de l’impératif, l’obligation, en la plaçant dans l’appel qu’une personne adresse à une autre.” (Marty 1988, 138). 46 OP, 21: 9. 47 OP, 22: 106. 48 OP, 21: 14. 49 OP, 21: 13. 50 OP, 21: 32. 51 […] n’est pas celle d’une substance différente de l’homme, il ne s’agit pas de quelque chose hors de l’homme. Il s’agit d’une idée créée par nous, à partir de quoi on procède de façon analytique. Toute la ‘philosophie transcendantale’ est une ‘autocréation’, où se manifeste l’autonomie de l’homme. (Marty 1995, 870–871) 52 OP, 22: 54. 53 “Etre dans l’être suprême n’est pas une formule d’immanence.” (Marty 1995, 871). 54 Marty (1992, 58). 55 “[…] qui veut faire entendre à ce qui reconnaît penser le concept de Dieu, qu’il en affirme du même coup l’existence.” (Marty 1992, 51). 56 OP, 22: 116. 57 OP, 21: 140. It is also worth noting the interpretation given by Marty (Marty 1992, 52–53). 58 G, 4: 454. 59 OP, 21: 149. 60 Marty (1992, 55). 61 Marty notes that this resumption of the ‘ontological argument’ in the Opus postumum refers to the ‘transcendental’ proofs of the Critique of Pure Reason. The ontological argument and the cosmological argument constituted a ‘deism’, distinct from a ‘theism’, because the former could not posit a

214  Giovanni Pietro Basile personal God, which only the latter did. With the introduction of a personal God, there is a change in transcendental theology. There is a move from the ontological argument to the cosmological one. But there is also a return to the physical-theological argument: the order and harmony of our universe need God’s support, rather than supporting the theological argument (Marty 1988, 138, cf. Marty [2006, 221]). 62 “Toute affirmation théologique de Kant est à entendre ‘d’un point de vue pratique’, ce qui n’est pas en faire quelque pensée creuse, mais dire plutôt son poids de réalité.” (Marty 1988, 140). 63 CPJ, 5: 451–453. 64 CPJ, 5: 452–453. 65 Cf. Marty (1992, 56–57, and 2004a, 43). 66 Marty (1988, 136). 67 “[L’homme] ne s’ajoute pas au couple ‘Dieu et le monde’, mais il en fait le lien.” (Marty 1995, 873). 68 “L’homme compte parmi les idées de la raison.” (Marty 1995, 874). 69 “Cependant que l’idée de Dieu et celle de monde se joignent, au point de constituer un seul syntagme, l’idée d’homme, habitant du monde, monte à la place de l’idée psychologique, comme ce qui fait l’unité des deux autres idées.” (Marty 2004, 104–105). 70 OP, 21: 9. Cf. Marty (1995, 872–873, 877), Marty (2004a, 40–42). 71 Marty (1995, 869–870). 72 “[…] l’homme libre qui existe dans le monde spatio-temporel.” (Marty 2004a, 36). 73 “[…] réunit Dieu et le monde, par le moyen de l’homme libre” (Marty 1995, 874). 74 OP, 21: 27. 75 “L’Opus postumum […] prend acte du primat de la raison pratique, qui est ainsi à la clé de la systématicité même de l’œuvre à laquelle Kant consacrait ses dernières années.” (Marty 2004a, 31). 76 Marty (1995, 878). 77 “La philosophie de Kant se résume en une raison qui va jusqu’au bout, puisqu’elle constitue le savoir en système, mais sans jamais prétendre prendre en elle, comme raison humaine, le critère de réalité.” (Marty 1988, 128). 78 “[…] la médiation kantienne diffère de la médiation hégélienne, dans la mesure où elle travaille vers ce qui ne peut rester que caché. L’unité est obscure, et cependant, c’est cette sorte d’absence qui en aiguillonne la pensée.” (Marty 1988, 154). 79 “[…] l’énigme de l’homme, mystérieuse soudure entre Dieu et le monde” (Marty 1995, 878).

François Marty’s works on Kant’s Opus postumum Kant Immanuel. 1986. Opus postumum. Passage des principes métaphysiques de la science de la nature à la physique. Edited and translated into French by François Marty. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France. 1986a. “Note sur l’Opus postumum.” In Kant 1986, 371–389. 1986b. “Note sur l’Opus postumum.” In Immanuel Kant, Œuvres philosophiques, vol. 3: Les derniers écrits. Edited by Ferdinand Alquié, 1301– 1311. Paris: Gallimard. 1988. “L’Opus postumum kantien, une quatrième critique?.” Bulletin de la Société Française de Philosophie, 82 (4): 121–157.

François Marty’s interpretation of Kant’s Opus postumum  215 1992. “L’argument ontologique dans l’Opus postumum et l’influence de la Critique de la faculté de juger dans l’Opus postumum.” Kant-Studien, 83: 50–59. 1995. “La philosophie transcendantale dans la dernière période de l’Opus postumum.” In Proceedings of the Eighth International Kant Congress. Edited by Hoke Robinson, vol. 1, 865–880. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press. 2001. “La pensée tardive de Kant.” In Années 1796–1803. Kant. Opus postumum. Philosophie, Science, Éthique et Théologie.:Actes du IV e Congrès international de la Société d’Études Kantiennes de Langue Française. Lausanne, 21–23 octobre 1999. Edited by Ingeborg Schüßler and Christophe Erismann, 23–34. Paris: Vrin. 2004a. “La loi morale comme commandement divin dans l’Opus postumum.” In Criticisme et religion. Edited by Monique Castillo, 29–48. Paris: L’Harmattan. 2004b. L’homme, habitant du monde. À l’horizon de la pensée critique de Kant. Paris: Champion. 2006. “La philosophie transcendantale, une question des dernières années de Kant.” In Immanuel Kant nos 200 anos da sua morte. Edited by Carlos Morujão, Miguel Santos Silva and Miguel Cândido Pimentel, 215–228. Lisbon: Universidade Catolica Editora. 2008. “Une lacune à combler. Une vérification du projet de l’Opus postumum: La question des forces motrices en physique.” In Kant. Edited by Jean-Marie Vaysse, 347–367. Paris: Cerf. 2013. “Dieu, le monde et l’homme dans l’Opus postumum. Kant lecteur de Newton. Le nouvel ordre des Idées de la raison. Le concept cosmique de la philosophie.” In Kant: Théologie et religion. Edited by Robert Theis, 117– 123. Paris: Vrin.

Index

Note: Page numbers followed by “n” denote endnotes. a posteriori 12, 23n7–8, 28, 53, 65n7, 126n11, 138–139, 142, 163, 202 a priori 1, 12–13, 21–22, 28–31, 44n2, 45n12, 53, 55–59, 62, 65n3, 72, 76, 78–79, 85n1, 86n4, 88n13, 91–94, 98–102, 105n6, 106n9, 115, 117, 124, 132, 137–144, 147, 148n3, 151n38, 162, 165, 167–168, 188, 202, 207, 212n23 activity 46n15, 61, 114, 120, 123, 128n37, 141–145, 149n14, 151n39, 151n40, 156–161, 190–193; of apperception 143–148, 167; causal 47; conceptual representative 103; intellectual 134–137; of perception 116–117; of representing 167, 174n19; spontaneous 101, 137; synthetic 100, 103, 143; Tathandlung 137, 141, 143; of understanding 72 actuality 35, 37, 42, 100, 133, 141–142, 146–147 Aenesidemus 6, 131–135, 139–141, 147, 148n3, 149n9, 149n20, 150n29, 151n46 affectation 31 affection 117, 123; empirical 141, 143, 150n34; see also double affection; self-affection agent: moral 181, 185, 189, 192–193 aggregate 32, 54–55, 58–60, 62–64, 68n40, 79, 83–84, 87n9, 89n22, 98, 105, 114–116, 150n29 air 9, 14–18, 24n14 analogy 72, 77, 84, 85n1, 189, 191, 200; Second 145; Third 60, 68n34, 80–81 Anselm of Canterbury 187

apodeictic 76–78, 87n11 appearance 27, 39, 42, 44, 52, 62–63, 68n36, 72–74, 86n6, 88n20, 89n22, 93, 97–101, 105n3, 106n9, 109, 112–113, 136–137, 143–146, 151n38, 151n43, 164, 166–169; appearance of an 84–85, 95–96, 105n3; indirect 84, 202; of selfaffection 118–124, 135, 139, 176n25 apperception 74, 108, 119–121, 124–125, 127n23, 129n45, 135– 137, 147–148, 150n27, 160–162, 167, 172n5; activity of 143–147; analytic unity of 137; synthetic unity of 91, 104, 137, 144, 151n41, 175n22, 176n27 apprehensio simplex 137 apprehension 60, 118–119, 125, 126n19, 127n23, 167, 170, 176n25 Architectonic 52–54, 61–64, 74, 86n4, 202, 209 Aristotle 12, 184 attraction and repulsion see forces, attractive and repulsive autonomy 7, 180–183, 185, 188–189, 193, 195n7, 204–206 Bacon, Francis 9, 22n1 Baumgarten, Alexander Gottlieb 6, 68n38, 154–158, 171, 172n6, 173n7, 173n8, 173n12 Beck, Jacob Sigismund 6, 81, 132, 135 Berkeley, George 128n38, 135, 148n3, 150n29 biology 10 Blackburn, Simon 41–44

218 Index bodies 14–15, 53, 75, 111; composed 12; geometric 27; material 4, 17–20, 27–41, 44n1, 44n5, 45n13, 46n19, 27n24, 141; organic 83, 116, 202 caloric 1, 11, 17–22, 96, 142, 150n34 categorical imperative 187, 189, 192, 203–209 categories 31–33, 37, 47n27, 54–56, 72–75, 81, 83–84, 86n3, 91, 109, 115, 133, 176n27, 202; as a priori forms of nature 94–95; deduction of 120; and imagination 123; and perception 113–114 causality 33–34, 44, 72–73, 81, 87n7, 112, 114, 132–133, 144, 149n7, 204 cause 18, 86–87, 132–133, 145, 149n5, 149n8, 182; first 29, 46n15; of affection 141, 150n34; of ether 36–37, 39; of itself 192; of motion 32–35 Cavendish, Henry 15–16 chemical revolution 10–11, 23n2, 23n11 chemistry 3, 9–22, 24n15, 76, 80, 85, 87n10, 106n8 coercibility 4, 29, 33–37 cogitabile 99–102, 105n6, 137, 176n27 cognition 4, 72, 74, 86n4, 87n10, 119, 121–125, 132–137, 155, 160–161, 165–168, 171; a priori 62; condition for 121, 128n34; empirical 54, 82, 84, 139–148, 175n22, 176n23; objective 72; of eternity 196n14; rational 76, 87n12; theoretical 149n11; theory of 108–110; transcendentalworld 52 cohesibility 4, 29, 33–37, 43 community 81; ethical 180, 185, 189–193 composition (Zusammensetzung) 5, 12, 89n22, 91–93, 96–105, 106n8, 112, 120, 125n6, 141, 168, 202, 212n26; of bodies 35; of water 15–16 Concerning the Ultimate Ground of the Differentiation of Directions in Space 140 consciousness 60, 74, 89n22, 91, 98–99, 102–105, 112, 134, 138, 149n20, 160–171, 175n21, 175n22,

175n25, 189; time 116; see also self-consciousness construction 77–78, 84–85, 192; mathematical 77–78; metaphysical 77; of concepts 76–77, 87n12, 88n15, 92, 102; of scientific experiments 11; of the idea of God 190 contradiction 158, 187n1, 204; principle of 144–145, 173n8 corporeality 118, 124 cosmology 4, 51–53, 60–64 Critique of Practical Reason 181–182, 185–186, 205, 207, 209 Critique of Power of Judgement 2, 80–83, 93 dabile 82–83, 99–102, 105n6, 137, 140, 167, 176n27, 191 deduction 109–110, 120–121, 203; of the ether 89n23, 142; new 50 density 45n13, 81 Descartes, René 24n14, 125, 148n3, 164, 175n20, 191 determination 75, 78, 83, 85, 86n6, 93–95, 98, 110, 120–124, 139, 144–145, 166–168, 188, 205; time 73, 83, 85, 88n20, 172n5, 173n12, 176n26 dispositions 3–4, 27, 30–31, 35–44, 45n8, 46n19, 47n20; see also matter double affection 50, 65n2 Edelmann, Johann Christian 183 elasticity 14, 17–19, 35 Elementary System 4, 51, 54–64, 67n23, 67n24, 202, 211n18 elements 15–17, 56–59, 103; chemical 13–14; material 92; mixture of 14, 63; thought by reason of matter 14 embodiment 139–140 Erhard, Johann Benjamin 16 ether 1–5, 11, 19–22, 24n18, 27–44, 44n1, 44n3, 44n6, 44n11, 47n24, 47n27, 55, 83–85, 97, 135, 138, 191, 202; and apperception 144–148, 151n46; ether proof 11, 19–22, 25n16, 29–30, 44n6, 45n12, 50, 65n3, 66n19, 67n24, 139; and God 191; as hypothetical entity 28; schematism of 72, 83; as transcendental ideal 141–143, 150n32, 151n45; see also caloric ethics 188, 193, 195n10 evil 185, 189–191

Index  219 exhaustibility 4, 29, 33–37, 43 existence 6, 27–28, 47n30, 60, 98, 118, 150n22, 154–160, 163–166, 171, 173n13, 174n14, 188–189, 203; of ether 4, 11, 18, 20, 22, 28, 47n24, 47n27, 55, 141–142, 202; of God 7, 139, 155–156, 171, 172n4, 180, 186–189, 193, 194n5, 195n8, 196n11, 196n12, 192n15, 204–208; of moving forces underpinning perception 50; of a self-in-itself 133, 136; of principle of fire 9; of things in themselves 122, 177n29 experience 28–44, 52–54, 60, 72, 97–102, 114, 134–135, 141–148, 151n39, 202; inner 122, 165–167, 175n22, 176n25; objects of 58–60, 68n39, 72, 83, 85, 134, 139; possible 21–22, 45n12, 73–74, 84, 99, 114, 141–142; unity of 22, 24n18, 44n6, 62, 66n19, 82 extension 27, 35, 46n19, 93, 97, 100, 102, 144 Feuerbach, Ludwig 179 Fichte, Johann Gottlieb 6, 131–135, 141–148, 148n1, 148n3, 149n9, 149n14, 149n20, 151n39, 151n40, 151n46, 154, 171n2, 174n15, 188, 201 fire 9, 14–15, 18, 40 forces, attractive and repulsive 27–29, 31–33, 36, 38, 41, 44n5, 45n13, 81, 95, 111, 117; driving 201–202; dynamical and mechanical 30–32, 39–40, 46n14, 138; Formal [das Formale] 98, 100–101, 103, 105n6; fundamental or elementary 31; gravitational 34, 39; implanted 32, 35–36, 38–39; impressed 32–34, 38–39; moving 4, 20–21, 27–41, 44n6, 46n15, 51, 54–64, 66n19, 89n22, 96, 99, 102, 111–116, 126n15, 138, 141–142, 191; physical 112, 116; primitive and derivative 31; superficial and penetrative 32–33; system of 3–4, 29, 31–36, 42–43 freedom 7n1, 180–183, 189, 191, 194n5, 196n15, 200–205, 208; absolute 209 Galilei, Galileo 9, 11 gap (between metaphysics and science) 5, 13, 28–29, 33, 85, 105

Garve, Christian 80, 86n5, 126n38 Girtanner, Christoph 16 God 7, 43, 47n30, 52, 135, 142, 155–156, 171, 173n13, 179–194, 194n5, 195n8, 196n15, 201, 204–209, 213n61; idea of 2, 180, 195n7, 203 ground 27–30, 34–35, 41–43, 62–64, 74–79, 82–83, 96, 102, 141, 150n31, 163–165; of movement 27 moral 180; logical 134, 138, 145–148, 151n39, 151n40; real 67n23, 132–134, 144–148 Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals 58, 180–181, 191, 207 haecceitas 158 happiness 187, 196n11 heat 3, 9–10, 14–19, 35–38, 40, 45n13, 47n23, 80, 104 highest good 187, 207 human 180–186, 191–193, 194n5, 199, 204–209; see also human being human being 5, 7, 112, 116, 184, 191, 195n7, 195n10; body of 110 Hume, David 42, 87n7, 132–133, 139, 146, 149n5, 149n8, 161 I 165–166, 169–170, 177n29, 189, 208 I think 136–137, 142–143, 154–155, 162–167, 171, 175n20, 175n22, 176n25, 203–204 idealism 2, 86n5, 134; absolute 132–134, 137, 141–142, 200–201; German 6, 103, 106n7, 131, 147; transcendental 177n29, 192, 206 ideas 2, 13–15, 43–44, 112, 125, 135, 189, 203, 205; of pure reason 28; Plato’s theory 183; system of 62–63, 179, 191–192, 199, 208–209; transcendental 133, 149n11, 150n29 identity 59, 105, 173n12, 180; principle of 1, 139, 157 imagination 78, 87n12, 120–123, 127n31, 136 impenetrability 27, 33, 39 Inaugural Dissertation (De mundi sensibilis atque intelligibilis forma et principiis) 53, 57 inertia 27, 31

220 Index Inquiry concerning the Distinctness of the Principles of Natural Theology and Morality 77 intellect 134, 149n14; divine 184–186 intuition 43, 45n12, 73, 76, 84, 87n12, 89n22, 91, 103, 109, 120, 135–140, 143, 159–171; empirical 62, 79, 175n22, 202–203; intellectual 160, 171, 174n15, 174n16; pure 62, 76, 84, 98, 100, 138–139, 150n22, 196n15 Johann Heinrich Tieftrunk 91, 135, 149n15 Johann Joachim Becher 9, 23n11 Kiesewetter, Johann Gottfried Karl Christian 80, 129n43 Lactantius, Lucius Caecilius Firmianus 195n9 Lambert, Johann Heinrich 47n26, 128n35 Lau, Theodor Ludwig 183 Lavoisier, Antoine-Laurent de 3, 10–11, 14–22, 23n2, 23n11, 24n14, 76, 106n8 Lectures on the Philosophical Doctrine of Religion 184 Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm 27, 45n9, 46n15, 173n13, 184 lever 33–34, 36, 79 light 1, 14–17, 35, 40, 46n13, 104; divine 184 limit 4, 41, 71–74, 88n21, 93, 98, 122, 151n39, 151n46, 159, 170, 185, 190 Locke, John 125 Maimon, Salomon 102–103, 106n7, 151n38 man see human being mathematics 52–53, 66n14, 72, 76–79, 92, 105 matter 1–3, 13–14, 20, 27–44, 46n14, 54, 56–57, 62–63, 68n38, 81–83, 92–105, 111–112, 118, 140–141; concept of 50–52, 75–78, 85, 86n6, 87n7, 87n8, 202–203; light and heat 17–18; metaphysics of 13; transcendental 21–22; see also elements; principles mediating concepts (Mittelbegriffe) 5, 28, 93, 96–97, 101, 103–104

Mendelssohn, Moses 128n35 Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science 5, 22, 28, 51–52, 56, 72, 75–83, 86n3, 86n6, 93, 105n6, 111, 116 Metaphysics of Morals 185, 190 metaphysics 13, 21, 28, 41, 63–64, 65n4, 71–85, 87n7, 171, 173n8, 179, 183, 202; contemporary 30; of nature 52–53, 105, 111 mind 32, 42, 112, 115, 131–134, 140, 144–148, 149n8, 150n29, 151n39, 173n8, 183–184, 191–192, 196n14 monadology 27, 45n9 monads 27 moral community 180 moral law, moral legislation 7, 180– 183, 186–193, 195n8, 204–205 morality 2, 180, 186–187, 191, 195n10, 196n15, 200, 204 Morveau, Guyton de 18 Natural System 55, 58–59, 67n32 nature 11–13, 31, 51, 54, 63, 74–76, 81, 93–97, 111, 116; corporeal 75, 79, 87n8; formaliter spectata 93; laws of 12, 82, 88n21; materialiter spectata 93, 203, 209; metaphysics of 52–53; of physics 56, 60; philosophy of 21, 27, 203; purposiveness of 96; putting into 115–119, 129n43 Newton, Isaac 32, 44n4, 53, 56, 66n14, 67n24, 81, 105, 111, 189, 200 Nietzsche, Friedrich 179 not-I 147, 151n39, 151n46 noumenon 133, 140, 148, 150n31, 164–165, 190–191 Nova dilucidatio [A New Elucidation of the First Principles of Metaphysical Cognition] 184 object 27–28, 33–36, 52, 60–62, 83, 86n6, 94–95, 98–104, 112–120, 135–145, 159–171, 174n19, 188–193; corporeal 75–76, 82; empirical 125; of experience 3, 28, 43, 44n6, 189; geometrical 27; in general (Gegenstand überhaupt) 94, 104; intelligible 133; material 28, 36, 44n3, 86n3; physical 111, 114, 189; thought 133, 149n10;

Index  221 transcendental 143, 145, 151n38, 151n45, 177n29 On a Discovery whereby any New Critique of Pure Reason is to be made Superfluous by an Older One 78 The Only Possible argument in support of a Demonstration of the existence of God 155–119, 173n13, 174n16, 188–189 ontology 38, 47n24, 52, 144, 155, 158–159 perceptions 37, 59–62, 64, 66n19, 68n36, 103–104, 111, 113–117; aggregate of 68n40, 84, 89, 115; system of 62, 68n36, 68n40, 98–99, 114, 146 phenomenon 14, 105n3, 118, 142, 202, 208; indirect 1, 202; physical 20, 29, 202; of the phenomenon 1, 202 phlogiston see caloric physics 1–5, 32, 41, 51–64, 65n7, 67n19, 67n32, 68n35, 68n36, 72, 82–85, 92–97, 100, 105, 105n6, 109–113, 200–204; empirical 10, 21, 50, 53, 55, 63, 110–112; experimental physics 21; mathematical physics 10, 53, 100; modern 47n24 ponderability 4, 33–37, 43, 46n14, 84 positing 6, 146, 154–171, 171n2, 172n5, 174n16, 176n25, 189–190, 196n12; ‘absolute’ and ‘relative’ 155–158; principle of 157 postulates 28, 43–44, 47n30, 99, 150n34, 179, 186, 193, 196n11; of existence of God 204, 207 Priestly, Joseph 14–15, 24n13 principles 21, 23n3, 23n8, 53–59, 62, 72, 77–79, 82, 87n10, 91–99, 105n6, 111, 119–120, 124, 139, 157, 166; chemical 12–13; constitutive 79; metaphysical 83, 87n7, 91–95; physical 12; principles of matter 11–14; regulative 28, 78, 148 Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics 88n15, 150n31 psychology 4, 51, 60–61, 64, 76, 147; rational 133, 160, 165

reality 18, 20, 42–44, 100, 150n35, 202, 207, 209; divine 192; manifest 30, 36; objective 192; transcendental 142–144, 148 reason 11–14, 31, 38, 71–72, 183, 204; and nature 11; ‘deification’ of practical reason 6, 179–190, 195n8; human 179, 183–187; ideas of 43, 62–63, 67n32, 86n4, 181, 192, 194n1, 208–209; infinite goal of 103–105; practical 7, 180–183, 186–193, 194n5, 199, 205; pure 32, 52–53, 132 Reinhold, Karl Leonhard 6, 131–132, 144, 148n1 Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason 179, 185–186, 191, 195n10 religion 182–186, 193, 194n4, 195n8, 195n9, 195n10, 204, 212n38; rational 7, 179, 186, 193 representation 55, 60–62, 68n35, 72–73, 68n39, 87n12, 95, 101, 105n6, 113, 128, 129n46, 132–135, 139–146, 151n40, 160–171, 174n19; a priori 98, 102; empirical 66n19, 68n36, 88n20, 89n22, 99, 104, 105n6, 117; faculty of 148n3; synthetic 100; Vorstellung 101, 105, 113 revised ontological argument 199, 203–208 Roëll, Herman Alexander 184 Samuel, Thomas 80 Scheele, Carl Wilhelm 15 Schelling, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph 129n44, 147, 172n2, 172n3, 172n4, 201 schema 4, 71–74, 77, 83, 86n3, 86n4, 87n8 schematism 4–7, 71–85, 86n3, 87n8, 122 Schultz, Johann 128n35 Schulze, Gottlob Ernst 6, 131–135, 139–148; 148n1, 148n3, 149n7, 149n8, 149n9, 150n29 science 29–33, 41–42, 45n13, 47n26, 72, 85, 86n4, 87n9, 179–180, 202; natural 5, 10, 19, 21–22, 28, 50–56, 61–64, 75–84, 86n6, 91–97, 105n6, 109–118, 127n21; philosophical 21; proper 16, 24n15, 74, 87n10, 88n13

222 Index Selbstsetzungslehre 6, 24n16, 44n6, 50, 127n24, 135–142, 148, 154–155, 163, 166, 171, 171n2, 171n3, 171n4, 171n5, 174n15, 180, 185, 188 self 5–6, 124, 128n37, 140, 154–155, 160–163, 166–170, 208; empirical 128n34 self-affection 5, 108–125, 125n3, 126n11, 128n37, 128n39, 128n40, 135, 147, 202–204, 208 self-consciousness 108–109, 119, 137, 155, 168, 174n19, 175n20, 175n21 self-knowledge 118, 155, 160–162, 166, 169–171, 174n16, 175n20, 175n21 self-in itself 133, 140, 148 self-positing [Selbstsetzungslehre] 6, 24n16, 44n6, 50, 127n24, 135–142, 148, 154–171, 171n2, 172n3, 180, 188; practical 149n3, 180, 186, 188–189, 191 sensation (Empfindung) 14, 18, 60, 101–103, 106n9, 116, 162–164, 169 sense 58–59, 62, 68n36, 89n22, 119– 120, 139; inner 63, 68n35, 109, 120–121, 123, 128n42, 133, 136– 137, 160–162, 166–167, 176n25; outer 53, 61, 63–64, 68n35, 68n38, 75, 77, 123, 128n42, 137 sensibility 52, 72–74, 101, 133, 138–141, 163–164, 182 Sömmering, Samuel Thomas von 17 space 3–4, 27–30, 39–44, 44n1, 44n3, 46n15, 47n27, 72, 75, 79–81, 84–85, 86n3, 86n5, 87n7, 98–103, 114, 118, 128n36, 136–143, 166–167, 172n5, 176n26, 191–193, 202–203 Spinoza, Baruch de 150n29, 192, 196n14, 196n15, 206 spontaneity 32, 124, 146, 175n22, 203; of apperception 144 Stahl, Georg Ernst 3, 9–22, 23n5, 23n6, 23n7, 23n8, 23n10, 23n11 subject 28, 60, 100–102, 114, 118–120, 124–125, 133–148, 150n22n 151n46, 154; affection of 31, 41, 68n36, 98, 112, 118, 163, 168–170, 188–193, 196n15, 202– 205, 208–209; cognizing 50, 61, 117–118; logical 74, 133; sensible and intelligible 203, 208–209;

thinking 202; transcendental 104, 160, 169–170 substance 37, 47n24, 73, 81, 89n23, 114, 189–190, 192, 194n5, 206; material 18, 22; simple 27 sufficient reason, principle of 157 synthesis 57, 71–74, 78, 91–93, 99–105, 122–125, 128n41, 137, 143, 151n40, 159, 166, 181, 187, 208; a priori judgements 132, 143–147, 207; mathematical and dynamic 85n1; necessary propositions 132–133, 149n5, 149n8; principle of cognition 28; unity 68n36, 91, 98, 104, 136–138, 170, 175n22, 176n27 system 1–7, 31–32, 52–64, 67n28, 76, 79–84, 87n10, 87n11, 94–105, 110–117, 179–180, 191–193, 199–203, 208–209; chemical 10, 15–16; doctrinal 55–60; of ideas of reason 192, 208–209; of ideas of transcendental philosophy 2, 199; of philosophy 43; of physics 50–64, 66n17, 66n19, 66n32, 68n36, 105n6; system of ideas of transcendental philosophy 199, 208–209; see also forces Theaetetus 139 theology 180, 188, 193, 205–206; moral 148n3; rational 7, 52, 194; transcendental 138, 213n61 things in themselves 51, 122, 144 Thomas Aquinas 184 Thompson, Benjamin (count of Rumford) 18–19, 21 Tiedemann, Dietrich 139 Tieftrunk, Johann Heinrich 91, 135, 149n15 time 20–21, 35, 41, 43, 44n1, 47n27, 68n35, 71–75, 79, 83–85, 87n7, 88n20, 91, 98, 100–103, 109, 112, 114, 118–122, 124, 128n35, 128n35, 137–142, 166, 176n26, 202–203; consciousness 116; in schematism 86n3 Torricelli, Evaristo 9, 24n14 Transcendental Deduction 72, 93, 135–136, 147 transcendental ideal 138–139, 141–142, 150n35 transcendental object = X 52, 143, 145, 151n38, 151n45, 177n29

Index  223 transcendental philosophy 2–3, 7, 21, 29–30, 43–44, 51–52, 66n8, 94, 121, 175n22, 180–181, 191–193, 196n15, 199–209 transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural science to empirical physics 10, 22, 28, 92, 112; transition between metaphysics and physics 1–2, 22, 56, 80, 92, 96, 201–202; see also transition project transition project (Kant’s) (Übergangsprojekt) 2–5, 10, 51, 54–56, 63–64, 65n4, 82, 92–93, 105, 149n16, 150n29; see also transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural science to empirical physics transition 2, 10–11, 19, 30, 50–64, 68n40, 79–84, 97–105, 111–112, 185–188, 201–204, 211n18; concept of 27

unconditioned 37–38, 46n19, 87n11, 98, 102, 134, 141, 143, 149n20, 187, 189 understanding 5, 12, 62–63, 68n36, 68n40, 72–74, 78, 83, 89n22, 91–92, 121, 137, 167; act of 143, 145; categories of 56; divine 184; functional 42; pure concepts of 99–100; structure of 104 Universal Natural History and Theory of Heavens 53 Watt, James 15–16 What is Orientation in Thinking 140, 150n28 world 36, 47n30, 52–64, 112, 134, 173n13, 191–194, 196n15, 199–203, 207–209; determination of 120, 124; material 31, 38, 41–44, 45n12, 47n24, 84; moral 185; phenomenal 143–145 World System 56–64, 67n23, 67n24