Kant and the Science of Logic

Abstract

This book is both a history of philosophy of logic told from the Kantian viewpoint and a reconstruction of Kant’s theory of logic from a historical perspective. Kant’s theory represents a turning point in a history of philosophical debates over the following questions: (1) Is logic a science, instrument, standard of assessment, or mixture of these? (2) If logic is a science, what is the subject matter that differentiates it from other sciences, particularly metaphysics? (3) If logic is a necessary instrument to all philosophical inquiries, how is it so entitled? (4) If logic is both a science and an instrument, how are these two roles related? Kant’s answer to these questions centers on three distinctions: general versus particular logic, pure versus applied logic, pure general logic versus transcendental logic. The true meaning and significance of each distinction becomes clear, this book argues, only if we consider two factors. First, Kant was mindful of various historical views on how logic relates to other branches of philosophy (viz. metaphysics and physics) and to the workings of common human understanding. Second, he first coined “transcendental logic” while struggling to secure metaphysics as a proper “science,” and this conceptual innovation would in turn have profound implications for his mature theory of logic. Against this backdrop, the book reassesses the place of Kant’s theory in the history of philosophy of logic and highlights certain issues that are still debated today, such as normativity of logic and the challenges posed by logical pluralism.

Epistemic normativity in Kant's “Second Analogy”

“…It follows that there is no reason to think that Kant denies that the rules for valid hypothetical syllogisms can be violated by thinkers. 25 We can reject Tolley's argument against the normativity of this logical rule and uphold the suggestion that the causal presuppositions X and Xs cause ABs make it normatively necessary for the subject to judge that AB occurs. Tolley (2006) backs up his claim that it is impossible for thinkers to deviate from the rules of logic by contrasting the activity of thinking with the activities governed by moral laws (p. 374).…”

Kant, race, and racism: Views from somewhere. By HuapingLu‐Adler, Oxford University Press. 2023

“…In Part I, Lu‐Adler (2023: 76) rejects the prevailing “individualistic” approach in the scholarship on Kant's theory of race, which “prioritizes allegedly racist individuals as the sole or primary subjects of blame.” This includes scholars who defend Kant's egalitarian claims in the hope of saving the supposed core of his philosophy (Louden, 2000; Wolff, 2020) and those who claim that Kant, while holding racist views, was simply a “child of his times” (Willaschek, 2020). It also includes Kleingeld's (2007: 5) “second thoughts” account, according to which “Kant eventually lived up to the promise of his practical philosophy by becoming a sort of racial egalitarian.”…”

“…Alternatively, Lu‐Adler (2023: 77) builds on the work of Tommie Shelby (2003) and Sally Haslanger (2017) to situate Kant's theory of race within a collective account of “knowledge production” and “ideology formation.” Thus framed, the pressing question for Kant scholars is not simply what Kant said but what Kant as an educator and public intellectual “contributed to the system of information sharing, knowledge production, and meaning making in which modern racist ideology came to take shape” (Lu‐Adler, 2023: 7). This approach shifts our attention from trying to figure out what Kant thought to critically examining “the racist sentiments and worldviews he might have helped to cultivate in the hearts and minds of other people through his numerous publications, decades of letters, and countless copies of student notes of those lectures that circulated beyond his classroom” (Lu‐Adler, 2023: 5–6).…”

“…And to come to terms with Kant's theory of race, we must radically rethink Kant's standing in philosophy. Lu‐Adler's (2023: 6) goal is to shift the scholarship on Kant's raciology from an individualistic focus on what Kant said to a collective account of knowledge creation that situates him within the “nexus of power relations” that enabled his thinking to have purchase on the social actors and meaning makers of his time. This shift would not only alter the most pressing questions of Kant scholarship but also how Kant's philosophy is taught to future generations of philosophy students.…”

Introduction: Logic and Methodology in the Early Modern Period

“…In a nutshell, in such traditional interpretations of the genesis and the development of early modern philosophy, as those provided by d'Alembert in his Discours Préliminaire de l'Encyclopédie (1751) or by Hegel in his Vorlesungen über die Geschichte der Philosophie, the frequent stress put on the figures of Bacon, Descartes, Locke or Kant, is accompanied by an insistance on the respective merits of Novum Organum, Discours de la méthode, Méditations Métaphysiques, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding and the Kritik der Reinen Vernunft. But the entrenchment of these major books in the field of logic is generally disregarded, while it is acknowledged by their authors and by their contemporary readers, either directly or indirectly (see Rossi 1957;Jardine 1974;Buickerood 1985;Gaukroger 1989;Serjeantson 2006;Ariew 2006Ariew , 2014Serjeantson 2008;Savini 2011;Cassan 2015a;Petrescu 2018;Schuurman 2001Schuurman , 2003Pécharman 2016b;Sgarbi 2013Sgarbi , 2016Lu-Adler 2018). As a result, the significance of the role taken by logic towards philosophical modernity is still commonly downplayed, while being crucial to its building.…”