KANT'S CRITIQUE OF TELEOLOGY IN BIOLOGICAL EXPLANATION

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40 Analytic of Teleological Judgment Schopenhauer, who can here be taken to represent the dominant tradition of interpretation: 28 In the 'Critique of Teleological Judgment' due to the simplicity of the material, one can perhaps better than anywhere else recognize Kant's peculiar talent for turning an idea this way and that, expressing it in various manners until it has become a book. The entire book wants to say only this: although organized bodies necessarily appear to us as if they were constructed according to an antecedent concept of purpose, this does not justify us in assuming that they are objectively so. This judgment of Schopenhauer's cannot be denied a certain justification, at least if restricted to the Analytic; but even with respect to the Analytic, Schopenhauer oversimplifies considerably. While it is true that Kant continually repeats himself collecting ever more 'as if' formulations, nonetheless such psychologizing explanations distract from the obvious and substantial difficulties Kant is having with the philosophical material, which force him again and again to make a new attempt at defining the problem. In the Analytic Kant attempts to draw the methodological consequences of the introduction into biology of a general concept of the reproduction of an organic system by introducing the concept of objective purposiveness. The constant repetitions become more understandable, once one realizes that Kant is groping here at the edges of the explanatory capacities of his philosophical categories. He is more or less compelled to write a fourth 'Critique' and must attempt, so to speak at the special request of a particular phenomenon, to determine the boundaries of mechanistic explanation from the inside. Although the impulse to a discussion of objective purposiveness, as Kant makes clear in the course of the "Critique of Teleological Judgment," comes from actual difficulties in concept formation in the sciences of his time, Kant structures the discussion as if he were dealing with a purely abstract question of the various possible determinations of a concept — in this case, the concept of purposiveness. This is done presumably to preclude the mistaken inference that the concept of natural purpose is an empirical concept derived from experience with a particular kind of phenomenon. The first section of the "Critique of Teleological Judgment" (§61) must explicate what is empirical and what is a priori in the concept of objective purposiveness. Kant begins with the distinction between objective and subjective purpose. 28 Schopenhauer, Will und Vorstellung, p. 630
Analysis of Purpose 41 Although we have good reason, Kant tells us, to assume a subjective purposiveness of nature for our cognitive activities, there is no reason a priori, why an objective purposiveness should have to be attributed to nature in order to explain particular things. We would not prima facie expect that there should be natural things whose complete explanation demands that we make the same sort of reference to purposes that we make as a matter of course in explaining artifacts. But the universal idea of nature as the sum total of sense objects gives us no basis whatever [for assuming] that things of nature serve one another as means to purposes, and that even their possibility cannot adequately be understood except [as arising] through a causality in terms of purposes. (§61, B267; CJ, 237) We have no reason to presume that there is in nature a special causality of purposes that are not our purposes (like the products of art) nor those of nature itself ("since we do not assume nature to be an intelligent being"). Not only could such purposes (without a real purposeful agent) not be foreseen, but "even experience cannot prove that there actually are such purposes." Thus we have neither reason a priori to believe that the concept of objective purposiveness has an empirical correlate, nor can we derive such a concept from experience. We can however project or "slip" it into nature by "some subtle reasonings." 29 That is, through an analysis of the concept of purposiveness we can acquire such a concept and arbitrarily apply this concept to nature. The question of course is, why we should want to do such a thing? At this point Kant simply states an empirical fact: the science of his time in fact used the concept of purpose where mechanism seemed insufficient; later on he argues that the use of teleology is unavoidable. Objective purpose is not derived from experience, rather a particular contingent experience moves us to project this analytically derivable concept into nature in analogy with our own causality according to purposes. Far from being necessarily connected with the concept of a causally determined nature, the concept of objective purposiveness is only brought into play when a natural product appears quite accidental. Kant illustrates this contingent 29 §61, B267; CJ 236. See also "Progress of Metaphysics" (Ak 20,293-4; W 3,631): "for one cannot perceive this [purpose], but can only introduce it by subtle reasoning [nur durch vernünfteln hineintragen], in order to recognize a purposiveness in such objects."
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 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
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90 The Unconditioned and the Infini
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98 Antinomy of Division Antithesis
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100 Antinomy of Division justificat
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102 Antinomy of Division and thus p
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104 Antinomy of Division why it is
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106 Antinomy of Division B552-53) g
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108 Antinomy of Division "machine"
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110 Antinomy of Freedom How far the
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112 Antinomy of Freedom of momentum
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114 Antinomy of Freedom the Third a
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116 Antinomy of Freedom If Kant mea
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118 Antinomy of Freedom phenomena i
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120 Antinomy of Freedom In the Crit
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122 Antinomy of Freedom must appear
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124 Systematics of Antinomy I do no
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126 Summary position proves to be n
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128 Antinomy of Judgment An antinom
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130 Antinomy of Judgment §74 The r
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132 Antinomy of Judgment must have
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134 Antinomy of Judgment dialectic.
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136 Antinomy of Judgment we cannot
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138 Interpretations of the Antinomy
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152 Heuristic but Necessary Princip
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162 Resolution of the Antinomy the
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164 Resolution of the Antinomy know
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166 Resolution of the Antinomy a wh
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168 Resolution of the Antinomy able
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170 Resolution of the Antinomy ous
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172 Resolution of the Antinomy intr
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174 Resolution of the Antinomy tion
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176 Resolution of the Antinomy meth
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178 Resolution of the Antinomy anyt
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180 Summary acquainted with" a caus
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184 Bibliography Bommersheim, Paul,
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186 Bibliography Fraisse, Jean Clau
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188 Bibliography Kraemer, Eric Russ
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190 Bibliography & E. Mendelsohn) B
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192 Bibliography Roretz, Karl, "Zur
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194 Bibliography American and Conti
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196 Index 144; 154; 167; 169; final
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198 Index mere understanding 47; 13
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KANT'S CRITIQUE OF TELEOLOGY IN BIOLOGICAL EXPLANATION

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