Kant and the Double Government Methodology


Book Description

This is a book about dreaming and knowing, and about thinking that one can ascertain the difference. It is a book about the Bernards of the world who would have us believe that there is a humanly uncreated world existing en Boi that freely dis closes its forever fixed ontology, even though they too must accept that -many of the worlds we make as we try to under stand ourselves are counterfeit. It is a book about the real estate of the human mind. The book is about Leibniz and Kant, and about methods of science. It is also about what is now called pseudo-science. It tries to show how Kant struggled to mark the limits of the humanly knowable, and how thi s strug gle involved him in trying to answer questions of importance then and now. Some are philosophers' questions: the epistemo logical status of mathematics, the role of space and time in knowing, the nature of the conceptual constraints on our ef forts to hypothesize the possible. Some are questions of per ennial human interest: Can spirits exist? How is the soul re lated to the body? How can we legitimately talk about God, if at all? Finally, Kant teaches that these are all questions bearing on our entitlements in claiming to know. Leibniz fashioned a way of talking about nature and super nature that I call the Double Government Methodology.




Kant’s Political Theory


Book Description

Past interpreters of Kant’s thought seldom viewed his writings on politics as having much importance, especially in comparison with his writings on ethics, which (along with his major works, such as the Critique of Pure Reason) received the lion’s share of attention. But in recent years a new generation of scholars has revived interest in what Kant had to say about politics. From a position of engagement with today’s most pressing questions, this volume of essays offers a comprehensive introduction to Kant’s often misunderstood political thought. Covering the full range of sources of Kant’s political theory—including not only the Doctrine of Right, the Critiques, and the political essays but also Kant’s lectures and minor writings—the volume’s distinguished contributors demonstrate that Kant’s philosophy offers compelling positions that continue to inspire the best thinking on politics today. Aside from the editor, the contributors are Michaele Ferguson, Louis-Philippe Hodgson, Ian Hunter, John Christian Laursen, Mika LaVaque-Manty, Onora O’Neill, Thomas W. Pogge, Arthur Ripstein, and Robert S. Taylor.




Pragmatism, Kant, and Transcendental Philosophy


Book Description

Philosophers working within the pragmatist tradition have pictured their relation to Kant and Kantianism in very diverse terms: some have presented their work as an appropriation and development of Kantian ideas, some have argued that pragmatism is an approach in complete opposition to Kant. This collection investigates the relationship between pragmatism, Kant, and current Kantian approaches to transcendental arguments in a detailed and original way. Chapters highlight pragmatist aspects of Kant’s thought and trace the influence of Kant on the work of pragmatists and neo-pragmatists, engaging with the work of Peirce, James, Lewis, Sellars, Rorty, and Brandom, among others. They also consider to what extent contemporary approaches to transcendental arguments are compatible with a pragmatist standpoint. The book includes contributions from renowned authors working on Kant, pragmatism and contemporary Kantian approaches to philosophy, and provides an authoritative and original perspective on the relationship between pragmatism and Kantianism.




A Companion to Metaphysics


Book Description

Fully extended and revised, A Companion to Metaphysics 2nd Edition includes a section of detailed review essays from renowned metaphysicians, and the addition of more than 30 new encyclopedic entries, taking the number of entries to over 300. Includes revisions to existing encyclopedic entries Features more than 30 all-new "A to Z" entries Offers a section of in-depth, essays from renowned metaphysicians Provides the most complete and up-to-date reference guide for students and professionals alike




Kant and the Ends of Aesthetics


Book Description

This work presents a rethinking of Critical Philosophy through the recovery of a larger sense of 'aesthetics' in Kant. It provides an original unitary reading of the Critique of Judgement . This is situated in relation to Kant's attempt to think ends in general. The question of how to think ends is argued to guide Kant both in his treatment of aesthetics and teleology and to provide the rationale for critique itself. This challenging work will set a new standard for engagements with Kant.




Kant and the Naturalistic Turn of 18th Century Philosophy


Book Description

Kant's philosophy is usually treated according to 'internalist' textual methodology rather than contextually according to 'externalist' methodology. Kant and the Naturalistic Turn of 18th Century Philosophy presents transcendental idealism, the metaphysics of morals, and other Kantian innovations in philosophy as a reaction to 18th century developments in the life and human sciences. It interprets Kant's metaphysics as motivated by, on one hand, anxiety over the moral dangers he perceived in the empiricism of Buffon, Hume, Smith, and certain German materialists; and, on the other, his theological scepticism. Topics treated include cosmology and the fate of the earth, the mechanical philosophy and the problems of life, mind, and matter, historical pessimism, warfare and class consciousness, and the role of women in 18th century society. This book sheds new light on all major aspects of Kant's philosophy and opens avenues for further research.




Kant’s Philosophy of Physical Science


Book Description

The papers in this volume are offered in celebration of the 200th anni versary of the pub 1 i cat i on of Inmanue 1 Kant's The MetaphysicaL Foundations of NatupaL Science. All of the es says (including the Introduction) save two were written espe ci ally for thi s volume. Gernot Bohme' s paper is an amended and enlarged version of one originally read in the series of lectures and colloquia in philosophy of science offered by Boston University. My own paper is a revised and enlarged version (with an appendix containing completely new material) of one read at the biennial meeting of the Philosophy of Sci ence Association held in Chicago in 1984. Why is it important to devote this attention to Kant's last published work in the philosophy of physics? The excellent essays in the volume will answer the question. I will provide some schematic com ments designed to provide an image leading from the general question to its very specific answers. Kant is best known for hi s monumental Croitique of Pure Reason and for his writings in ethical theory. His "critical" philosophy requires an initial sharp division of knowledge into its theoretical and practical parts. Moral perfection of attempts to act out of duty is the aim of practical reason. The aim of theoretical reason is to know the truth about ma terial and spiritual nature.




Polyphonic Anthropology


Book Description

This book connects anthropology and polyphony: a composition that multiplies the researcher's glance, the style of representation, the narrative presence of subjectivities. Polyphonic anthropology is presenting a complex of bio-physical and psycho-cultural case studies. Digital culture and communication has been transforming traditional way of life, styles of writing, forms of knowledge, the way of working and connecting. Ubiquities, identities, syncretisms are key-words if a researcher wish to interpret and transform a cultural contexts. It is urgent favoring trans-disciplinarity for students, scholars, researchers, professors; any reader of this polyphonic book has to cross philosophy, anatomy, psychology, psychoanalysis, sociology, architecture, archeology, biology. I believe in an anthropological mutation inside any discipline. And I hope this book may face such a challenge.







Scientific Theology: Nature


Book Description

New in paperback of the first volume of McGrath's groundbreaking three volume work of Systematic Theology, "A Scientific Theology". Written by one of world's best-known theologians, these volumes together represent the most extended and systematic exploration of the relation beween Christian theology and the natural sciences yet produced. Thoroughly ecumenical, this will be a significant work for Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant and evangelical readers. The work is marked throughout by a sustained and critical engagment with the history and philosophy of the natural sciences, and a passionate commitment to the legitimacy of theology as an academic discipline. "Nature" sets out a vision for a "scientific theology", in which the working assumptions of the natural sciences are critically appropriated as a theological resource. It then moves on to deal at considerable length with the crucially important question of the status of nature, which ahs rearely been given the serious considertion that it deserves. Responding sympathetically to the growing consensus that "nature" is a socially mediated concept, McGrath sets out an approach to nature that establishes it as a theologically legitamate notion, and explores its positive and constructive role within a scientific theology.