Dear All,
* Wednesday 5 March, 3.30-5.30, Muniment Room, Philosophy Seminar, Katherine Dunlop (Univ Texas, SCFS visitor): 'Kant on "Transcendental" and Ordinary Logic'. The Critique of Pure Reason is structured as an (eighteenth-century) treatise on logic. In particular, the Categories are identified through their supposed correspondence with logically basic forms of judgment. But while Kant claims logic abstracts from thought's content, i.e. its relation to an object, his own theory of cognition-which he designates "transcendental logic"-is supposed to concern "pure thinking of objects". To solve the puzzle of how Kant can regard his theory as a logic, I argue that the content thematized in transcendental logic is already presupposed in ordinary logic. Like many other eighteenth-century thinkers, Kant conceives logic as rules for the use of mental faculties, and on his view the proper use of our understanding is to relate to objects (through intuition). On this interpretation, Kant's view is undeniably psychologistic. As such it faces the classic objection that it wrongly narrows logic's scope, to things we can think about. In particular, on this interpretation logic is inapplicable to things in themselves. I argue that this consequence should be accepted: logical knowledge, as Kant conceives it, exceeds what we can claim about things in themselves. Following on from Katherine Dunlop's presentation please join us for drinks in the Philosophy Common Room at 5.30pm. Administrator Sydney Centre for the Foundations of Science e: [email protected]<mailto:[email protected]> w:: sydney.edu.au/foundations_of_science University of Sydney NSW 2006
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