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The demand for systematicity and the authority of theoretical reason in Kant

The demand for systematicity and the authority of theoretical reason in Kant
The demand for systematicity and the authority of theoretical reason in Kant
Kant’s notoriously unclear attempt to defend the regulative principle of systematic unity as the supreme principle of theoretical reason in the Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic has left its status a source of controversy. According to the dominant interpretation, the principle ought to be understood as a methodologically necessary device for extending our understanding of nature. I argue that this reading is flawed. While it may correctly affirm that the principle is normative in character, it wrongly implies that it binds with mere hypothetical necessity. I offer novel grounds for thinking that if reason’s principle is normative, then it binds agents categorically instead.
1369-4154
81-106
Mudd, Sasha
104e14da-7e8c-49b0-a7fe-9853bddbb8c5
Mudd, Sasha
104e14da-7e8c-49b0-a7fe-9853bddbb8c5

Mudd, Sasha (2017) The demand for systematicity and the authority of theoretical reason in Kant. Kantian Review, 22 (1), 81-106. (doi:10.1017/S1369415416000388).

Record type: Article

Abstract

Kant’s notoriously unclear attempt to defend the regulative principle of systematic unity as the supreme principle of theoretical reason in the Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic has left its status a source of controversy. According to the dominant interpretation, the principle ought to be understood as a methodologically necessary device for extending our understanding of nature. I argue that this reading is flawed. While it may correctly affirm that the principle is normative in character, it wrongly implies that it binds with mere hypothetical necessity. I offer novel grounds for thinking that if reason’s principle is normative, then it binds agents categorically instead.

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Accepted/In Press date: 31 December 2015
e-pub ahead of print date: 31 January 2017
Published date: March 2017
Organisations: Philosophy

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 382878
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/382878
ISSN: 1369-4154
PURE UUID: 13bb7cca-6d4b-4575-8aea-4913779b75d6

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Date deposited: 22 Oct 2015 16:05
Last modified: 14 Mar 2024 21:34

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Author: Sasha Mudd

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