The Philosophy of Kant Explained

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1908 edition. Excerpt: ... TRANSCENDENTAL ANALYTIC. BOOK I.--ANALYTIC OF CONCEPTIONS. Chapter I.--Guiding-thsead For The Discovery Of The Categories. Imj 46 a The object of Analytic, as the first part of Transcendental Logic, must be to show that there are pure a priori conceptions, and that there are pure a priori judgments based upon them, which determine the conditions under which all sensible experience is possible. Naturally, therefore, the first problem of Transcendental Analytic will be to discover the pure conceptions of understanding, to show that they are pure forms of thought, and to exhibit them as the -necessary and universal conditions of certain a priori synthetic judgments. 466 Now, if we are to give a true account of the a priori forms of understanding, we must be able to put our hands on all the pure conceptions, and this again implies that we must seek for them on some definite plan or principle. After Kant had convinced himself that space and time are a priori forms of perception, the problem pressed itself upon him to explain such universal and necessary judgments as that "all events must have a cause." This problem he * was compelled to face, because Hume had shown that the principle of causality cannot possibly be universal and necessary, on the assumption that it is a generalization from experience. Kant, as he tells us himself, proceeded to ask, whether there are not other principles besides causality, which have the same character of universality and necessity. Thus he was led to generalize the problem of Hume, and in the first instance to enquire how many a priori principles there are. In this difficulty he remembered that Aristotle had given a list of categories, ii.e., of certain universal ways in which the mind judges, and he...