KANT'S CRITIQUE OF TELEOLOGY IN BIOLOGICAL EXPLANATION

116 Antinomy of Freedom
If Kant meant this example seriously, then we should expect
to find in the resolution of the subcontrary antinomies an asymmetry
between the seemingly contradictory propositions, such that
one is simply true and the other merely possibly true. Let us return
to the thesis and antithesis of the Third Antinomy in a "corrected"
version:
Thesis: Some things (intelligible entities) act spontaneously.
Or: Some things (intelligible entities) have themselves no
causes.
Antithesis. No thing (object of experience) acts spontaneously.
Or: All things (objects of experience) have a cause.
Kant can interpret such propositions as subcontrary opposites
because both can be true but both cannot be false. The reason for this
lies, however, not in the logical form of the propositions but in their
transcendental content. The antithesis is a synthetic judgment a
priori; it is a priori true. The propositions cannot both be false
because one of them is always true. On the other hand both can be
true, since the thesis is a descriptive statement about the supersensible
and thus can at least not be refuted.
To resolve the antinomy of freedom, Kant must show that
human freedom is a thing in itself and that it can in some intelligible
sense 'act' in the phenomenal world.
The Freedom of the Turnspit
To understand Kant's proof of freedom, it will be useful first to
examine his remarks at the end of the resolution of the Third
Antinomy. There he explains what he originally wanted to demonstrate
and what he claims to have shown. He emphasizes that, "our
intention has not been to establish the reality of freedom as one of the
faculties which contain the cause of the appearances of our sensible
world" (B585-6). The objective reality of freedom cannot be proved
of coordinates)' and 'The moon does not revolve on its axis for us (considered in
reference to the surface of the earth)'. Between these judgments, too, the originally
given contradiction would be resolved as far as the logical form is concerned."
(emphasis P.M.) But this is precisely what Kant in fact means. It is certainly no
accident that he chose a ("true") rotational motion as his illustration.