Kant, the paradox of knowability, and the meaning of ‘experience’

Abstract

It is often claimed that anti-realism is a form of transcendental idealism or that Kant is an anti-realist. It is also often claimed that anti-realists are committed to some form of knowability principle to the effect that all truths (or at least all truths of a certain class) are knowable and that such principles have problematic consequences. It is therefore natural to ask whether Kant was committed to any such principle, and if he was, whether this leads him into similar difficulties. Both transcendental idealism and anti-realism aim to provide a middle way between realism and idealism. A well known proof appears to show that anti-realism fails in its aim because it collapses into idealism. Can a related proof show that transcendental idealism collapses in the same way? I argue that, initial appearances to the contrary, it cannot.

In §1.1 I argue that a standard reading of Kant does indeed have him committed to the claim that all empirical truths are knowable and that this claim entails that there is no empirical truth that is never known. In §1.2 I extend the result to a priori truths and draw some general philosophical lessons from this extension. However, in §2.1 I then propose a re-examination of Kant’s notion of experience according to which he carefully eschews any commitment to empirical knowability. Finally, in §2.2 I respond to a remaining problem that stems from a weaker, justified believability principle.

More information

Identifiers

ORCID for Andrew Stephenson: orcid.org/0000-0003-4590-1307

Catalogue record

Export record