§16 from B-Deduction of Critique of Pure Reason is a debatable passage among commentators where Kant introduces the notion of ‘apperception’ and its transcendental unity. Although original text is short it is highly compact and... more
§16 from B-Deduction of Critique of Pure Reason is a debatable passage among commentators where Kant introduces the notion of ‘apperception’ and its transcendental unity. Although original text is short it is highly compact and impenetrable to the extent that it gives way to dissimilar interpretations of respected scholars, i.e., P. Strawson, D. Henrich, P. Guyer, K. Ameriks, P. Kitcher and H. Allison.
I argue the role and importance of presumption approach in the proof structure of the account with an analysis including observation of the language in the original text. I try to supply extra textual supports from §16 for Allison’s accounts against ‘Cartesian certainty’ interpretation by giving attention to Kant’s employment of modal clauses and the verb ‘presuppose’ in his literal expressions. I also find that Kant is making use of the “Postulates of the Empirical Doctrine” which enable transition from the actuality of a possibility to the status of necessity. And finally, I discuss the contributions of side components in the main argument of §16 which are generally neglected or misunderstood. These are;
i. unconscious representations, ii. apperception’s qualitative sense of unity, iii. transcendental unity of apperception’s being both analytic and synthetic.
The paper reconstructs the connections between (1) Hegel's theory of consciousness, (2) his meta-philosophical method (Dialectics) and his (3) metaphysical telos (Absolute Knowing). It gives an account of various controversies among... more
The paper reconstructs the connections between (1) Hegel's theory of consciousness, (2) his meta-philosophical method (Dialectics) and his (3) metaphysical telos (Absolute Knowing). It gives an account of various controversies among interpreters relating to the true meaning of the three aforementioned parts of Hegel's system. Regarding to methodology, the paper is an exemplification of a more general idea that theory of consciousness is a set of proto-ontological propositions which become explicated into a full metaphysical system using a certain meta-philosophical method (assuming of course that a philosopher constructs a large-scale coherent system - that is the case in German Idealists).
