An Answer to the Question: "What is Enlightenment"... and How it Might Relate to Kant's Views on Metaphysics and Religion.

In the present essay, Kant describes the age in which he lives as "an age of enlightenment". It is one in which individuals are learning to use their faculty of reason to make decisions involving religion, morality, ethics and good government... without relying on so-called "experts" to provide them with answers. Kant labels the latter condition as one of "immaturity", and defines it as "the inability to use one's own understanding without the guidance of another" [page 54].

Kant's essay is best viewed as a polemic, directed at his king and others in authority, arguing as he does that while private use of reason can and often should be restricted, public use of reason must always be given free rein... if the goal of those in authority is that society achieve its highest potential [page 55]. By "public use of reason", Kant means that process by which the thoughts and views of learned and informed individuals are promulgated throughout society by means of scholarly writings and public discourse. He terms "private use of reason" that which a person might employ in carrying out his duties within a particular post or office to which he has been entrusted [last line, page 55].

Kant believes that any suppression of public free thinking must, inevitably, have a detrimental and pernicious effect on society by keeping it, at best, in a state of "immaturity" and, at worst, in a state of "barbarism". And Kant adds that "matters of religion" represent the most critical sphere in which public use of reason and individual free thought must be given free rein [page 59].

How do these admonitions of Kant relate to his views on metaphysics, as elaborated in his Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics ?... And, in particular, how can its sub-discipline, religion, have the potential to become a more "enlightened" field of inquiry and endeavor over time? For Kant's present essay on "Enlightenment" to make any sense at all, vis-à-vis the possibility of there being "enlightenment in religion", it is necessary to assume that at least one of the following must be true:

A. That metaphysics, insofar as spiritual and religious matters are concerned, is a science that can make progress and become "more enlightened" over time by adding to its store of "a priori synthetic knowledge", brought about by public use of reason in scholarly discourse.

B. That human happiness and societal contentment will be enhanced through "more enlightened" forms of religious belief and practice, and will be diminished through "less enlightened forms"... and that, over time, through free public discourse based on public use of reason, the better forms of religious belief and practice will become predominant, allowing religious belief to make progress as a "social science".

C. That since "absolute truth" with respect to proper religious belief and practice can never be known, given the limits of metaphysical inquiry, the free exchange of ideas regarding religion by means of public use of reason, nonetheless, represents a desirable "end in itself"... always preferable to the maintenance of a fixed, unquestionable body of religious dogmatism. One might ask, though, whether this last position is inherently obvious... or needs to be supported by means of logically sound arguments.

In conclusion, it is noteworthy that aside from drawing the distinction between public and private uses of reason, Kant notes that, unlike in the case of public use of reason... private use of reason must often be curtailed. He states that, "a lesser degree of civil freedom gives intellectual freedom enough room to expand to its fullest content" [page 59]. In other words, one must often do one's duty as an agent of society and, in so doing, further an idea or enterprise that is in direct opposition to one's own standards of sound logic and reasonableness. For example, the editor of a newspaper or scholarly journal might have an obligation to print a well-framed article, even though he might believe that the contents of the article are false and counter-productive. By curbing his own private use of reason and allowing the article to be published, he allows the general public to see the contents and decide for itself... thereby allowing public use of reason to have its largest audience and its greatest impact.

Responding to critics: Prolegomena, Appendix

          In the appendix of the Prolegomina, Kant takes the chance to respond to some criticism thrown his way by the philosophers of his time. In the introduction, he is quick to make the distinction between two kinds of judgments on The Critique of Pure Reason; those that precede investigation, and those that come after the investigation. The focus of his response then becomes on the critique of one particular author, a Christian Garve, placing him in the category of authors who made the judgment preceding investigation. “He appears not at all to see what really mattered in the investigation with which I have occupied myself (p.124)”. Kant then continues to defend himself against his opponent’s view of him as a “transcendental idealist (p.125)” in a similar condescending manner for the rest of the response, which eventually leads him to the point he was trying to make: What can we do in order to make metaphysics as a science actual?

        

        Kant uses the criticism from Garve to point out its fallacy and incompetence in the sense that, unlike The Critique of Pure Reason, it does not even attempt to make a better case for metaphysics as a science. “The endeavors of all speculative philosophy now stand at the point of total dissolution, although human reason clings to them with undying (and betrayed) affection (p.131)”. His hope is that the Critique will at least be in some way helpful to the masses, that may come together in order analyze his work and re-examine the foundation upon which metaphysics stands at the time, “a system would thereby come into being that could become a legacy to posterity for which it would have reason to be thankful”. It seems as though Kant thinks he came up with the ultimate introduction tool, at the very least, to any system for metaphysics. On the one hand, he does pose some necessary questions for reason as being a priori, and the specific way one can approach the unfilled space of metaphysics in science, but is this a good defense for metaphysics or just an attempt to salvage his taken approach to it and the extensive arguments in the Critique? Are protection against “judgment(s) of dogmatic speculation (p.134)” and the search for the elementary concepts of the pure understanding strong enough rhetoric on his part to sway the criticisms from others in his favor?

      

       Kant takes on an arrogant tone in response to his criticisms from others, but is this tone justified by his work? Did the Prolegomina withstand the test of time as a system for metaphysics as Kant would have hoped?

Difference between Subjective Validity and Objective Validity

What is the difference between Subjective Validity and Objective Validity?

Subjective Validity is bias opinion, which a person will consider them as a statement to believe in if the opinion is significant or meaningful to them. It is based on their experiences that a person had gone through. Subjective Validity is more of a posteriori judgment where they are dependent on experience and empirical evidence. An example would be a dream that only happens in a person's brain, but never existed or happened in real life.

Objective Validity is a priori judgment according to Kant, which they are independent of experience. The way Kant uses the term experience differs from existing usage in the degree experience, understanding in its modern use, must be objective validity in order to classify as experience in Kant's sense. This means that he is making the experience possible (real); they must have a truth value, which do not have to be 100% true. He talks about something is only a judgment if it is objective validity, otherwise it might have a well formed of judgment.

According to Kant, appearance is pure concepts on understand. "Now reason clearly sees: that the sensible world could not contain this completion, any more than could therefore all of the concepts that serve solely for understanding the world: space and time, and everything that we have put forward under the name of the pure concepts of the understanding. The sensible world is nothing but a chain of appearances connected in accordance with universal laws, which therefore has no existence for itself; it truly is not the thing in itself, and therefore it necessarily refers to that which contains the ground of those appearances, to beings that can be cognized not merely as appearances, but as things in themselves." (105) This shows that the world that we see in our eyes are nature where everything are chained together. All actions of rational beings in that degree are appearances, which are subjected to natural necessity, but with the respect to the rational subject and faculty of acting with reasons are free. (97) For some causes, appearance might not even exists, in this case, it would be taken as a thing in itself, and for the effects would have taken as appearances, which is understanding of nature. Thing in itself would be entitled to freedom as Kant mentioned and therefore nature and freedom will be attributable without contradiction to the same thing, which means the case as appearance and the case as thing in itself will be different.

What we experienced and observed in life lead us to an understanding of phenomenon. What we human do in the world and experience that we have come to bring us to the level of nature. This brings us to a question of what is nature. What is Nature? Nature in terms of phenomenon are all the objects that conformity to law. "It states that the more people attempt not to conform to certain stereotypes and shared identities, the more they actually do conform to those stereotypes and identities." Nature is equivalent to the natural world, physical world, or material world. Nature refers to the phenomena of the physical world and to life as well.

Ideas Conceived

Kant gives his critic about how can metaphysics as a science be possible. Through transcendental philosophy Kant suggests that science must have laws of necessity and universally that conceive ideas that are subjective and objective judgments.

Kant makes a distinction between ideas in the mind (ideas in the inner world) such as God, Soul and Freedom as opposed to ideas in the outer world such as Math and Physics or Nature. Ideas that are perceived as real, that is senses of experience that, we can be certain of, are contrasted from ideas of subjective perception. Ideas of math and physics are objective and are conceived from experience.  Ideas conceived in the inner world he calls subjective and are intuitive. Subjective ideas are not known from experience as they go beyond every possible experience.

To avoid error between these two ideas and remove the illusions that can occur when a subjective judgment is confused and is perceived as objective, (there must not be contradictions of ideas) transcendental dialectic is applied. However, it is a difficult task to do because “reason by nature becomes dialectical through its ideas.” (p. 81§42) Transcendental dialectic is compare and distinguish ideas from experience by way of seeing opposing ideas. Kant states, “the only prevention against the errors into which reason falls if it misconstrues its vocation and, in transcendent fashion, refers to the object in itself that which concerns only its own subject and the guidance of that subject in every use that is immanent. (P. 80 §40) Kant furthers states that “all illusion consists in taking the subjective basis for a judgment to be objective.” P. 80 §40 

Objective judgments are pure cognitions of the understanding and are attributed to rules (or laws) which are confirmed through experience. The difference from ideas of subjective judgments is that these are transcendent and they go beyond experience.  Unlike math and physics we can not know them, with certainty, from experience.

Kant claims that the only way to get to the truth of reality is “only through a subjective investigation of reason itself, as a source of ideas.” What Kant means by this is to search for reason in the inner world; that is to look within the own mind of the self as opposed to search in the outer world and aside from experience.  The inner subjective ideas Kant refers to such as God, Soul, and Freedom or the World are ideas that go beyond experience. Since subjective ideas, as God, Soul and Freedom cannot be proven or disproved through experience outside of reason Kant states that he must cast out knowledge and make room for belief. 

If it was determined with certainty that God, Soul and Freedom did not exist at all how would that conflict with morality?

General Question of the Prolegomena

General Question of the Prolegomena: Is metaphysics possible at all?

The motivating force behind Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason and of his transcendental philosophy is the question, “Is metaphysics possible at all?” This question can also be understood as, Is metaphysics as a science possible?  That is, a metaphysics that is universal, systematic and generative.

Kant begins the “General Question of the Prolegomena” section by assessing the “problem” of metaphysics thus far. He points to the distinction between analytic and synthetic judgments to explain why metaphysics has not yet reached the level of science. Within metaphysics, the only propositions that are certain and indisputable are analytic--statements in which the predicate asserts what is inherently present in the concept of the subject. But since analytic propositions are merely explicative, they cannot serve to expand knowledge, which is the ultimate goal of metaphysics. On the other hand, although philosophers have used synthetic propositions throughout history, Kant asserts that nobody has yet proven them from reason a priori which results in unfounded assertions and contradictions and “thereby metaphysics has itself destroyed its claim to lasting approbation” (24-25).

In the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant approaches the question (Is metaphysics possible?) synthetically but within pure reason by seeking the elements of pure reason as well as the laws of its “pure use” (25). The Prolegomena, however, serves as preparation for the science of pure reason. Here, Kant uses an analytic procedure in order to show “what needs to be done in order to bring a science into existence if possible” (25). Essentially, he seeks to illuminate and make concrete what is already known in order to form the foundation from which future metaphysics can ascend.

Although we cannot yet assume the existence of metaphysics as a science to be valid, we do have examples of pure synthetic cognition a priori within mathematics and natural science. If we ultimate want to answer the question “Is metaphysics as a science possible?” Kant argues that we must examine synthetic cognition a priori. Since we know that such cognition is possible we must assess how it is possible within mathematics and natural science in order to establish the possibility of synthetic cognition a priori in metaphysics.

Prolegomena General Question: How is cognition from pure reason possible?

The reason for asking how cognition from pure reason is possible is to determine:

 1. The principles of its possibility

  2. The conditions of its use

  3. The boundaries of pure reason

In the preamble, Kant distinguishes between “judgments belonging to metaphysics” and “properly metaphysical judgments” (21) by stating that judgments belonging to metaphysics are mostly analytic while properly metaphysical judgments are always synthetic. In a similar vein, he reserves the phrase “cognition from pure reason” only for synthetic cognition a priori.

Kant admits that cognition from pure reason (or synthetic cognition a priori) seems counter-intuitive. After all, how can one say anything is necessary of something unless it is part of its definition? While Kant credits David Hume for interrupting his “dogmatic slumber” (10), Kant radically disagrees with Hume’s conclusion that only experience can account for causality. He defines “transcendental philosophy” as the “complete solution” to the question: “How is pure reason possible?” (20). Furthermore, he insists that while transcendental philosophy is part of metaphysics, it seeks to establish the possibility of metaphysics and therefore must come before all metaphysics.

Mathematics as a Response to Empricism

Kant’s analysis of pure mathematics in Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics is perhaps the best and most intuitive example of the very counter-intuitive concept of a priori synthetic judgment. In the chapter “The Main Transcendental Question First Part,” Kant demonstrates how the science of mathematics is indeed both a priori and synthetic by arguing that our concept of mathematics is inevitably filtered through, or even wholly shaped by the lens of human experience of space and time—an experience which is inarguably a priori (Prolegomena, 36). In many ways it seems that this analysis is a direct response to empiricist ideas, particularly the problem of induction proposed by Hume. Taken as such, that is, a critique of empiricism, Kant is doubly successful as he proves that not only is knowledge intuited a priori, but that such knowledge is more valuable and valid than empirical knowledge.

It is easy to default to empiricism when one examines the nature of the natural sciences, and even the nature of pure mathematics. This tendency seems to come from our concern with causality in science, which leads to the assumption that the very nature of scientific discovery is caused by empirical observation (e.g. Newton saw the apple falling before he intuited gravity). Kant’s response to this tendency is to attack the very nature of empirical observation by arguing that perception of space and time underlies our observations, that we inevitably know,a priori, the nature of space. He critiques empirical observation based on the limitedness of our senses: “everything which our senses may be given…is only intuited to us as it appears to us, not as it is in itself,” and argues that it is in fact our deeper, innate understanding of the same senses that allows us to understand that, for example, “a line should be drawn to infinity” in mathematics (36). Mathematics, in this way, becomes the perfect example in which to explore not only Kant’s idea of synthetic a priori reasoning, but also to solve Hume’s problem of induction. Hume argues that since we can only know that which we observe, we can never really know anything, as at any time, we might observe something to the contrary (e.g we know the sun will rise each day, but one day it may not). Kant, however, in his examination of mathematics, demonstrates that not only can we know something and synthesize new knowledge about it, but we can also see it demonstrated empirically. Importantly, it is that we can know itfirst and with a certainty that empiricism cannot provide. Looking back at Kant’s example of 5+7=12 in the previous section, it becomes clear that the synthesis of 12 from 5 and 7 not only follows with necessity but with more certainty than say, the counting of stones, could empirically provide. If this process of a priori synthetic reasoning is actually more reliable than observation, perhaps even closer to the thing-in-itself, then Kant has truly discovered “sure path” that metaphysics can tread (139).

The A and B Prefaces to the first Critique

In the A and B Prefaces to the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant lights on different emphases in explaining the mission of the Critique. These different emphases demonstrate how Kant has changed his conception of the purpose of the Critique, in the years between the first edition of 1781 and the second of 1787.

In the 1781 A Preface, Kant focuses on the promise of possibility of metaphysics. As he writes, the critique sets out to determine the possibility of “cognitions after which reason might strive independently of all experience, and hence the decision about the possibility or impossibility of metaphysics in general” (Critique of Pure Reason, 101). Here metaphysics denotes knowledge of the traditional metaphysical objects, such as God, freedom and soul, none of which are manifest within experience. What is more, the question of the possibility of metaphysics is open, undetermined. Although we presume Kant composed the Preface after he had completed the Critique, he holds out for its possibility. Yet in the Critique, he will sharply restricts the speculative function of reason, and he indicates as much later in the Preface when he says of those objects transcending experience that he must “admit that this wholly surpasses my capacity” (102). So what then does he think that metaphysics is?  We ask this question because it seems that he is saying that metaphysics is something other than the knowledge of these objects beyond experience. The answer seems to be suggested in the beginning of the A Preface, in which he describes the dialectical destiny of reason—its “peculiar fate.”

The 1787 B Preface, by contrast, seems oriented towards different matters, particularly, in the question of the positive and negative consequences of the Critique (Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics, 148). The question is, is the Critique merely negative in its restriction of speculative reason? Kant thinks resolutely not. Conversely, this is a positive effect, as he famously explains: “I therefore had to cast out knowledge in order to make room for belief” (150). In this respect, something completely new enters the orbit of the problem of reason’s critique (relative to the description of the A Preface), namely, that the critique and limitation of the speculative or theoretical function of reason complements, nay, makes possible, the extension of practical philosophy. In brief, only if reason is limited in its knowledge of God, soul or freedom—in which matters it always otherwise remains in contradiction—can it hold out for the possibility of a moral belief in the existence of these unknowable objects. Belief is only possible if knowledge is limited.

Thus, between these Prefaces something dramatic has occurred. The conclusions of the Critique remain largely the same. But the meaning of those conclusions has been transformed. In the A Preface, Kant metaphysics concerns the contradictions reason inevitably finds itself in.  In the B Preface, metaphysics or speculative reason is to be limited for the sake of practical philosophy. What is the connection between these internal rational contradictions and the aspirations of practical philosophy?