The panion - Ch The Critique Of Metaphysics - Kant And Traditional Ontology.pdf

KARL AMERIKS
8 The critique of metaphysics:
Kant and traditional ontology
Kant's attitude toward metaphysics and ontology is ambiguous in
his Critical work. On the standard view of the Critique of Pure
Reason, the positive and negative aspects of this attitude map neatly
onto the two major sections of that work. After that first section
presents a "Transcendental Analytic" of the understanding, or a
"metaphysics of experience," which legitimates the use of certain
pure concepts necessary for structuring our spatiotemporal knowl-
edge, a Transcendental Dialectic is provided to expose fallacies that
theoretical reason entangles itself in when it extends itself beyond
experience. Just prior to that Dialectic, Kant also inserts an "Appen-
dix" on "concepts of reflection" that sketches how the restriction of
our use of pure concepts to the domain of experience limits the
general claims of the traditional ontology of the Leibnizian system.
These attacks would appear plement each other. Whereas the
specific errors of rational psychology, rational cosmology, and ra-
tional theology are exposed in the core of the Dialectic, the critique
of ontology and the general discussions of the operations of "reflec-
tion" and "reason" suggest a principle of closure for dismissing all
claims of our theoretical reason that would stray beyond a merely
immanent spatiotemporal field.
On this view, there is little positive theoretical doctrine in the
latter half of the Critique; at the most it is noted that Kant's discus-
sion of the antinomies in cosmology can be seen as offering support
for the doctrine of transcendental idealism. And even this discussion
can be seen as making a negative point about a negative doctrine -
that is, as showing merely that we run into contradictions if we take
Special thanks for assistance on this essay are due to Steven Naragon, Paul Guyer,
Alison Lay wine, and Eric Watkins.
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