Immanuel Kant's
Critique of Pure Reason
Critique of Pure Reason
Immanuel Kant's
In Commemoration of the Centenary of its First Publication
1873 Press
First Published 1896
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ISBN 0-594-04083-3
Table of Contents
Dedication
Table of Contents to First Edition
Preface to First Edition
Translator's Preface
Translator's Preface to Second Edition
Introduction
I. The Idea of Transcendental Philosophy
II. Division of Transcendental Philosophy
I. The Elements of Transcendentalism
I. The Elements of Transcendentalism
First Part. Transcendental Æsthetic
First Part. Transcendental Æsthetic
First Section. Of Space
Second Section. Of Time
General Observations on Transcendental Æsthetic
Second Part. Transcendental Logic
Introduction. The Idea of a Transcendental Logic
I. Of Logic in General
II. Of Transcendental Logic
III. Of the Division of General Logic into Analytic and Dialectic
IV. Of the Division of Transcendental Logic into Transcendental Analytic and Dialectic
First Division. Transcendental Analytic
First Division. Transcendental Analytic Book I. Analytic of Concepts
Chapter I. Method of Discovering all Pure Concepts of the Understanding
Section 1. Of the Logical Use of the Understanding in General
Section 2. Of the Logical Function of the Understanding in Judgments
Section 3. Of the Pure Concepts of the Understanding, or of the Categories
Chapter II. Of the Deduction of the Pure Concepts of the Understanding
Section 1. Of the Principles of a Transcendental Deduction in General
Section 2. Of the a priori Grounds for the Possibility of Experience
1. Of the Synthesis of Apprehension in Intuition
2. Of the Synthesis of Reproduction in Imagination
3. Of the Synthesis of Recognition in Concepts
4. Preliminary Explanation of the Possibility of the Categories as Knowledge a priori
Section 3. Of the Relation of the Understanding to Objects in General, and the Possibility of Knowing them a priori
Summary Representation of the Correctness, and of the Only Possibility of this Deduction of the Pure Concepts of the Understanding
Book II. Analytic of Principles
Introduction. Of the Transcendental Faculty of Judgment in General
Chapter I. Of the Schematism of the Pure Concepts of the Understanding
Chapter II. System of all Principles of the Pure Understanding
Section 1. Of the Highest Principle of all Analytical Judgments
Section 2. Of the Highest Principle of all Synthetical Judgments
Section 3. Systematical Representation of all Synthetical Principles of the Pure Understanding
1. Axioms of Intuition
2. Anticipations of Perception.
3. Analogies of Experience
First Analogy. Principle of Permanence
Second Analogy. Principle of Production
Third Analogy. Principle of Community
4. The Postulates of Empirical Thought in General
Chapter III. On the Ground of Distinction of all Subjects into Phenomena and Noumena
Appendix. Of the Amphiboly of Reflective Concepts, owing to the Confusion of the Empirical with the Transcendental Use of the Understanding
Second Division. Transcendental Dialectic
Second Division. Transcendental Dialectic
Introduction
1. Of transcendental Appearance (Illusion)
2. Of Pure Reason as the seat of Transcendental Illusion
A. Of Reason in General
B. Of the Logical Use of Reason
C. Of the Pure Use of Reason
Book I. Of the Concepts of Pure Reason
Section 1. Of Ideas in General
Section 2. Of Transcendental Ideas
Section 3. System of Transcendental Ideas
Book II. Of the Dialectical Conclusions of Pure Reason
Chapter I. Of the Paralogisms of Pure Reason
First Paralogism. Of Substantiality
Second Paralogism. Of Simplicity
Third Paralogism. Of Personality
Fourth Paralogism. Of Ideality
Consideration on the Whole of Pure Psychology, as affected by these Paralogisms
Chapter II. The Antinomy of Pure Reason
Section 1. System of Cosmological Ideas
Section 2. Antithetic of Pure Reason
First Conflict of the Transcendental Ideas
Second Conflict
Third Conflict
Fourth Conflict
Section 3. Of the Interest of Reason in these Conflicts
Section 4. Of the Transcendental Problems of Pure Reason, and the Absolute Necessity of their Solution
Section 5. Sceptical Representation of the Cosmological Questions in the Four Transcendental Ideas
Section 6. Transcendental Idealism as the Key to the Solution of Cosmological Dialectic
Section 7. Critical Decision of the Cosmological Conflict of Reason with itself
Section 8. The Regulative Principle of Pure Reason with Regard to the Cosmological Ideas
Section 9. Of the Empirical Use of the Regulative Principle of Reason with Regard to all Cosmological Ideas
I. Solution of the Cosmological Idea of the Totality of the Composition of Phenomena in an Universe
II. Solution of the Cosmological Idea of the Totality of the Division of a Whole given in Intuition
Concluding Remarks on the Solution of the Transcendental-mathematical Ideas, and Preliminary Remark for the Solution of the Transcendental-dynamical Ideas
III. Solution of the Cosmological Ideas with Regard to the Totality of the Derivation of Cosmical Events from their Causes
Possibility of a Causality through Freedom, in Harmony with the Universal Law of Necessity
Explanation of the Cosmological Idea of Freedom in Connection with the General Necessity of Nature
IV. Solution of the Cosmological Idea of the Totality of the Dependence of Phenomena, with Regard to their Existence in General
Chapter III. The Ideal of Pure Reason
Section 1. Of the Ideal in General
Section 2. Of the Transcendental Ideal
Section 3. Of the Arguments of Speculative Reason in Proof of the Existence of a Supreme Being
Section 4. Of the Impossibility of an Ontological Proof of the Existence of God
Section 5. Of the Impossibility of a Cosmological Proof of the Existence of God
Discovery and Explanation of the Dialectical Illusion in all Transcendental Proofs of the Existence of a Necessary Being
Section 6. Of the Impossibility of the Physico-theological Proof
Section 7. Criticism of all Theology based on Speculative Principles of Reason
Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic. Of the Regulative Use of the Ideas of Pure Reason
Of the Ultimate Aim of the Natural Dialectic of Human Reason
II. Method of Transcendentalism
II. Method of Transcen
dentalism Chapter 1. The Discipline of Pure Reason
Section 1. The Discipline of Pure Reason in its Dogmatical Use
Section 2. The Discipline of Pure Reason in its Polemical Use
The Impossibility of a Sceptical Satisfaction of Pure Reason in Conflict with itself
Section 3. The Discipline of Pure Reason with Regard to Hypotheses
Section 4. The Discipline of Pure Reason with Regard to its Proofs
Chapter II. The Canon of Pure Reason
Section 1. Of the Ultimate Aim of the Pure Use of our Reason
Section 2. Of the Ideal of the Summum Bonum as determining the Ultimate Aim of Pure Reason
Section 3. Of Trowing, Knowing, and Believing
Chapter III. The Architectonic of Pure Reason
Chapter IV. The History of Pure Reason
Supplements
To His Excellency
The Royal Minister of State
Baron Von Zedlitz
Dedication
Sir,
To further, so far as in us lies, the growth of the sciences is to work in your Excellency's own interest; your own interest being intimately connected with them, not only through the exalted position of a patron of science, but through the far more intimate relation of a lover and enlightened judge. For that reason I avail myself of the only means within my power of proving my gratitude for the gracious confidence with which your Excellency honours me, as if I too could help toward your noble work.
[Whoever delights in a speculative life finds with moderate wishes the approval of an enlightened and kind judge a powerful incentive to studies the results of which are great, but remote, and therefore entirely ignored by vulgar eyes.]
To you, as such a judge, and to your kind attention I now submit this book, placing all other concerns of my literary future under your special protection, and remaining with profound respect1
Your Excellency's
Most obedient Servant,
IMMANUEL KANT .
KÖNIGSBERG, March 29, 1781.
1 The second paragraph is left out and the last sentence slightly altered in the Second Edition.
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Table Of Contents To The First Edition 1
Introduction
I. Elements of Transcendentalism.
Part I. Transcendental Æsthetic
Section I. Of Space
Section II. Of Time
Part II. Transcendental Logic
Division I. Transcendental Analytic in two books, with their chapters and sections
Division II. Transcendental Dialectic in two books, with their chapters and sections
II. Method of Transcendentalism.
Chapter I. The Discipline of Pure Reason
Chapter II. The Canon of Pure Reason
Chapter III. The Architectonic of Pure Reason
Chapter IV. The History of Pure Reason
1 Instead of this simple Table of Contents, later editions have a much fuller one (Supplement III), which, as Rosenkranz observes, obscures rather than illustrates the articulation of the book.
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Preface1
OUR reason (Vernunft) has this peculiar fate that, with reference to one class of its knowledge, it is always troubled with questions which cannot be ignored, because they spring from the very nature of reason, and which cannot be answered, because they transcend the powers of human reason.
Nor is human reason to be blamed for this. It begins with principles which, in the course of experience, it must follow, and which are sufficiently confirmed by experience. With these again, according to the necessities of its nature, it rises higher and higher to more remote conditions. But when it perceives that in this way its work remains for ever incomplete, because the questions never cease, it finds itself constrained to take refuge in principles which exceed every possible experimental application, and nevertheless seem so unobjectionable that even ordinary common sense agrees with them. Thus, however, reason becomes involved in darkness and contradictions, from which, no doubt, it may conclude that errors must be lurking somewhere, but without being able to discover them, because the principles which it follows transcend all the limits of experience and therefore withdraw themselves from all experimental tests. It is the battle-field of these endless controversies which is called Metaphysic.
There was a time when Metaphysic held a royal place among all the sciences, and, if the will were taken for the deed, the exceeding importance of her subject might well have secured to her that place of honour. At present it is the fashion to despise Metaphysic, and the poor matron, forlorn and forsaken, complains like Hecuba, Modo maxima rerum, tot generis natisque potens—nunc trahor exul, inops
At first the rule of Metaphysic, under the dominion of the dogmatists, was despotic. But as the laws still bore the traces of an old barbarism, intestine wars and complete anarchy broke out, and the sceptics, a kind of nomads, despising all settled culture of the land, broke up from time to time all civil society. Fortunately their number was small, and they could not prevent the old settlers from returning to cultivate the ground afresh, though without any fixed plan or agreement. Not long ago one might have thought, indeed, that all these quarrels were to have been settled and the legitimacy of her claims decided once for all through a certain physiology of the human understanding, the work of the celebrated Locke. But, though the descent of that royal pretender, traced back as it had been to the lowest mob of common experience, ought to have rendered her claims very suspicious, yet, as that genealogy turned out to be in reality a false invention, the old queen (Metaphysic) continued to maintain her claims, everything fell back into the old rotten dogmatism, and the contempt from which metaphysical science was to have been rescued, remained the same as ever. At present, after everything has been tried, so they say, and tried in vain, there reign in philosophy weariness and complete indifferentism, the mother of chaos and night in all sciences but, at the same time, the spring or, at least, the prelude of their near reform and of a new light, after an ill-applied study has rendered them dark, confused, and useless.
It is in vain to assume a kind of artificial indifferentism in respect to enquiries the object of which cannot be indifferent to human nature. Nay, those pretended indifferentists (however they may try to disguise themselves by changing scholastic terminology into popular language), if they think at all, fall back inevitably into those very metaphysical dogmas which they profess to despise. Nevertheless this indifferentism, showing itself in the very midst of the most flourishing state of all sciences, and affecting those very sciences the teachings of which, if they could be had, would be the last to be surrendered, is a phenomenon well worthy of our attention and consideration. It is clearly the result, not of the carelessness, but of the matured judgment2 of our age, which will no longer rest satisfied with the mere appearance of know- ledge. It is, at the same time, a powerful appeal to reason to undertake anew the most difficult of its duties, namely, self-knowledge, and to institute a court of appeal which should protect the just rights of reason, but dismiss all groundless claims, and should do this not by means of irresponsible decrees, but according to the eternal and unalterable laws of reason. This court of appeal is no other than the Critique of Pure Reason.
I do not mean by this a criticism of books and systems, but of the faculty of reason in general, touching that whole class of knowledge which it may strive after, unassisted by experience. This must decide the question of the possibility or impossibility of metaphysic in general, and the determination of its sources, its extent, and its limits—and all this according to fixed principles.
This, the only way that was left, I have followed, and I flatter myself that I have thus removed all those errors which have hitherto brought reason, whenever it was unassisted by experience, into conflict with itself. I have not evaded its questions by pleading the insufficiency of human reason, but I have classified them according to principles, and, after showing the poi
nt where reason begins to misunderstand itself, solved them satisfactorily. It is true that the answer of those questions is not such as a dogma-enamoured curiosity might wish for, for such curiosity could not have been satisfied except by juggling tricks in which I am no adept. But this was not the intention of the natural destiny of our reason, and it became the duty of philosophy to remove the deception which arose from a false interpretation, even though many a vaunted and cherished dream should vanish at the same time. In this work I have chiefly aimed at completeness, and I venture to maintain that there ought not to be one single metaphysical problem that has not been solved here, or to the solution of which the key at least has not been supplied. In fact Pure Reason is so perfect a unity that, if its principle should prove insufficient to answer any one of the many questions started by its very nature, one might throw it away altogether, as insufficient to answer the other questions with perfect certainty.
While I am saying this I fancy I observe in the face of my readers an expression of indignation, mixed with contempt, at pretensions apparently so self-glorious and extravagant; and yet they are in reality far more moderate than those made by the writer of the commonest essay professing to prove the simple nature of the soul or the necessity of a first beginning of the world. For, while he pretends to extend human knowledge beyond the limits of all possible experience, I confess most humbly that this is entirely beyond my power. I mean only to treat of reason and its pure thinking, a knowledge of which is not very far to seek, considering that it is to be found within myself. Common logic gives an instance how all the simple acts of reason can be enumerated completely and systematically. Only between the common logic and my work there is this difference, that my question is,—what can we hope to achieve with reason, when all the material and assistance of experience is taken away?
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