KANT'S CRITIQUE OF TELEOLOGY IN BIOLOGICAL EXPLANATION

More documents

Recommendations

Info

162 Resolution of the Antinomy the title of §77) or to a "peculiar constitution of our understanding." Both the necessity of explaining everything mechanistically as well as the impossibility of doing just this in the explanation of the organism are not objective but rather subjective in nature. Our understanding has, according to Kant, the peculiarity that it can only explain mechanistically, that it can genuinely understand only that which it can itself produce out of its parts. Due to this peculiarity, we must judge all natural things to be possible according to merely mechanical laws, because it is only such natural objects that we can explain at all. However, apparently due to the same peculiarity, we cannot explain some objects in this manner and have to introduce final (actually formal) causes. We must explain everything mechanistically, but nature need not always let itself be explained in this way. The incompatibility between the two maxims (R1, R2) is based on the presupposition that the necessity and impossibility are objective. Our subjective inability to explain things otherwise than in a mechanistic manner and our incapacity to explain certain things mechanistically contradict one another only under the presupposition that we must be able to explain everything. If there is a difference between causality and reductionist mechanism, such that causality is constitutive of the objects of experience and mechanism is merely regulative since it is based on a subjective peculiarity of our understanding, then it is at least possible that there may be objects of experience that are not explainable for us. If the presupposition that everything (all objects of experience) must be explainable for our mechanistic-reductionistic understanding is dispensed with, then the antinomy dissolves and both maxims can be true. Kant's solution to the antinomy consists essentially in ascertaining a reductionistic peculiarity of our human understanding, that is not constitutive for the objects of experience: these need not let themselves be reduced. Kant's deliberations in §§77 and 78 on the resolution of the antinomy are often very difficult to understand and have given occasion to many misinterpretations and much merely associative reasoning. In this section I shall a) comment extensively and in detail upon Kant's central presentation and justification of the peculiar constitution of our understanding, b) analyze his comparison of our understanding to an imagined "intuitive understanding" taking up the relation to similar figures of argument used in the Critique of
Mechanistic Explanation 163 Pure Reason, and c) present the reconciliation of mechanism and teleology developed by Kant in §78. Mechanistic Explanation As early as the announcement of the antinomy of judgment in the first section of the Dialectic Kant pointed out that the necessity of the two regulative maxims (i.e. that which makes their possible conflict a "natural dialectic") has its basis in the nature of our cognitive powers (B312; CJ, 266). At the end of §73 Kant gives the first indication of his solution to the antinomy; there he mentions "the character and limits of our cognitive powers" (B328; CJ, 277). In contrast to the discussion of the regulative use of the ideas of reason in the Critique of Pure Reason, where he argues that the limited or finite character of our understanding forces us to use regulative principles in empirical research, the discussion here centers not only on the quantitative limits but also on the quality (constitution) of our faculty of knowledge. "Faculty of knowledge" is used here in the broadest sense, and in the "Comment" (§76) Kant deals with the peculiar relations within the mind among reason, understanding, and sensibility. Section 77, however, deals with the peculiarity of a particular faculty, namely, the understanding, indeed of specifically human understanding. The problem dealt with is thus not the potentially universal difficulties based on the fact that reason must rely on understanding and understanding on sensibility; it is the understanding alone that makes us mechanists. In his presentation Kant seems at first to be alluding to the difference between understanding and judgment in a manner similar to that of the arguments in the Critique of Pure Reason which made use of the distinction between understanding and sensible intuition. Understanding must rely on judgment since the objects of experience (the particular) are underdetermined by the concepts of the understanding (the general), at least as far as finite understandings are concerned. With regard to a certain universal, particular objects always have something accidental about them which can provide the occasion for teleological judgments, in as much as purposiveness is taken to be the necessity of the contingent: If an object of experience is underdetermined by (contingent in light of) the
Page 1:
KANT’S CRITIQUE OF TELEOLOGY IN B
Page 5 and 6:
Contents Acknowledgments...........
Page 7 and 8:
Acknowledgements vii This book pres
Page 9:
To My Parents M.M.M. and P.O.M.
Page 12 and 13:
2 Introduction fact the rejection o
Page 14 and 15:
4 Introduction almost exclusively c
Page 16 and 17:
6 Introduction reductionism as the
Page 18 and 19:
8 Theory of the Organism will be se
Page 20 and 21:
10 Theory of the Organism when he f
Page 22 and 23:
12 Theory of the Organism that this
Page 24 and 25:
14 Theory of the Organism not in an
Page 26 and 27:
16 Theory of the Organism formation
Page 28 and 29:
18 Theory of the Organism common sp
Page 30 and 31:
20 Theory of the Organism cated to
Page 32 and 33:
22 Theory of the Organism by these
Page 34 and 35:
24 Kant's Reading of Biology of the
Page 36 and 37:
26 Kant's Reading of Biology for in
Page 38 and 39:
28 Kant's Reading of Biology monly
Page 40 and 41:
30 Kant's Reading of Biology not be
Page 42 and 43:
32 Kant's Reading of Biology to ada
Page 44 and 45:
34 Analytic of Teleological Judgmen
Page 46 and 47:
Page 48 and 49:
Page 50 and 51:
Page 52 and 53:
Page 54 and 55:
Page 56 and 57:
Page 58 and 59:
Page 60 and 61:
Page 62 and 63:
Page 64 and 65:
54 Antinomies of Reason tent is par
Page 66 and 67:
56 Antinomies of Reason antinomies
Page 68 and 69:
58 Antinomies of Reason shows that
Page 70 and 71:
60 Antinomies of Reason categories
Page 72 and 73:
62 Antinomies of Reason "only condi
Page 74 and 75:
64 Antinomies of Reason described;
Page 76 and 77:
66 Kant's Logic For the true opposi
Page 78 and 79:
68 Kant's Logic outside the sphere
Page 80 and 81:
70 Kant's Logic In contrast to Lamb
Page 82 and 83:
72 Kant's Logic predicate under con
Page 84 and 85:
74 Kant's Logic other. We can thus
Page 86 and 87:
76 Kant's Logic then both conflicti
Page 88 and 89:
78 Kant's Logic Both conflicting pr
Page 90 and 91:
80 The Unconditioned and the Infini
Page 92 and 93:
Page 94 and 95:
Page 96 and 97:
Page 98 and 99:
Page 100 and 101:
Page 102 and 103:
Page 104 and 105:
Page 106 and 107:
Page 108 and 109:
98 Antinomy of Division Antithesis
Page 110 and 111:
100 Antinomy of Division justificat
Page 112 and 113:
102 Antinomy of Division and thus p
Page 114 and 115:
104 Antinomy of Division why it is
Page 116 and 117:
106 Antinomy of Division B552-53) g
Page 118 and 119:
108 Antinomy of Division "machine"
Page 120 and 121:
110 Antinomy of Freedom How far the
Page 122 and 123: 112 Antinomy of Freedom of momentum
Page 124 and 125: 114 Antinomy of Freedom the Third a
Page 126 and 127: 116 Antinomy of Freedom If Kant mea
Page 128 and 129: 118 Antinomy of Freedom phenomena i
Page 130 and 131: 120 Antinomy of Freedom In the Crit
Page 132 and 133: 122 Antinomy of Freedom must appear
Page 134 and 135: 124 Systematics of Antinomy I do no
Page 136 and 137: 126 Summary position proves to be n
Page 138 and 139: 128 Antinomy of Judgment An antinom
Page 140 and 141: 130 Antinomy of Judgment §74 The r
Page 142 and 143: 132 Antinomy of Judgment must have
Page 144 and 145: 134 Antinomy of Judgment dialectic.
Page 146 and 147: 136 Antinomy of Judgment we cannot
Page 148 and 149: 138 Interpretations of the Antinomy
Page 162 and 163: 152 Heuristic but Necessary Princip
Page 174 and 175: 164 Resolution of the Antinomy know
Page 176 and 177: 166 Resolution of the Antinomy a wh
Page 178 and 179: 168 Resolution of the Antinomy able
Page 180 and 181: 170 Resolution of the Antinomy ous
Page 182 and 183: 172 Resolution of the Antinomy intr
Page 184 and 185: 174 Resolution of the Antinomy tion
Page 186 and 187: 176 Resolution of the Antinomy meth
Page 188 and 189: 178 Resolution of the Antinomy anyt
Page 190: 180 Summary acquainted with" a caus
Page 194 and 195: 184 Bibliography Bommersheim, Paul,
Page 196 and 197: 186 Bibliography Fraisse, Jean Clau
Page 198 and 199: 188 Bibliography Kraemer, Eric Russ
Page 200 and 201: 190 Bibliography & E. Mendelsohn) B
Page 202 and 203: 192 Bibliography Roretz, Karl, "Zur
Page 204 and 205: 194 Bibliography American and Conti
Page 206 and 207: 196 Index 144; 154; 167; 169; final
Page 208 and 209: 198 Index mere understanding 47; 13
show all

KANT'S CRITIQUE OF TELEOLOGY IN BIOLOGICAL EXPLANATION

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?