Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics/Letters to Marcus Herz, 2/1772

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Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics/Letters to Marcus Herz, 2/1772

by Immanuel Kant, James W. Ellington (Translator), Paul Carus (Translator)

3.74 · rating details · 725 ratings · 36 reviews

Prolegomena zu einer jeden künftigen Metaphysic, die als Wissenschaft wird auftreten können (Riga: F. J. Hartknoch, 1783), 222 pp. [Ak. 4:255-383] “Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics that will be able to present itself as a Science.” Translated by Lewis White Beck (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1950). Translated by James Ellington (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1977). Transla...more

Hardcover, 140 pages

Published December 1st 2002 by Hackett (first published November 20th 1950)

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Sep 11, 2007

David rated it

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Kant necessitated a paradigm shift in philosophy with the Prolegomena. Prior to Kant, philosophy sought to discover and ask questions about an objective world. Kant showed that it made no sense to talk about the world without also talking about a subject through whom it filtered. The forms of human intuition, and our own conceptual framework, rightfully entered philosophy. For anyone interested in the history of the discipline, this little text (as unnecessarily difficult as it can sometimes be)...more

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Sep 15, 2008

Chris rated it

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Shelves: philosophy

Kant was a pretty smart guy and maybe I'm not so smart, but I can't understand what he thought he accomplished with the Prolegomena. Kant's stated purpose was to refute Hume, who had cast doubt on the concept of causation by pointing out that we only observe one event following another and have no reason to conclude that the first caused the second. Kant's solution is posit that all sensory information is subjective. Even so basic information as the spatial and temporal orientation of objects...more

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Jul 06, 2010

Venus added it · review of another edition

Shelves: philosophy

I am pointing to the need for an entirely new field of investigation to be opened up. You might think that ·there is nothing new about it because· it is already present in the famous Wolff’s ‘introduction’ to his moral philosophy (i.e. in what he called ‘universal practical philosophy’); but it isn’t. Precisely because his work aimed to be universal practical philosophy, it didn’t deal with any particular kind of will, and attended only to will in general and with such actions and conditions as ...more

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Sep 28, 2009

Damien rated it

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Kant is difficult. While the goal of Kant's philosophizing, to establish the requirements of scientific metaphysics, may or may not appeal to you, the way that he constructs the argument and his suppositions about subjects, objects, nature, and how we come to knowledge are central to a huge amount of modern thought. As painful as it was, I'm glad someone made me read this book.

Dismayed that no one was reading his Critique of Pure Reason, Kant wrote the Prolegomena as a concise vers...moreKant is difficult. While the goal of Kant's philosophizing, to establish the requirements of scientific metaphysics, may or may not appeal to you, the way that he constructs the argument and his suppositions about subjects, objects, nature, and how we come to knowledge are central to a huge amount of modern thought. As painful as it was, I'm glad someone made me read this book.

Dismayed that no one was reading his Critique of Pure Reason, Kant wrote the Prolegomena as a concise version of the same argument for us neophytes. Rather than propose a metaphysical system, Kant asks whether metaphysics, inquiry into topics like the soul, God, and the world, is even possible. In order for metaphysics to be actual, there must be synthetic cognition a priori, that is cognition that adds new material rather than analyze that which already exists, and that does so "before the fact" or without the need of experience.

Kant finds that this must be possible, because this type of cognition exists in mathematics and natural philosophy. These disciplines add new knowledge but do so without relying on experience. Rather, Kant believes that they explore the very possibility of experience, which he calls the "forms" or "categories" of sensibility and understanding. These forms, which include space, time, and causality, all belong to the subject, not the object of experience. Therefore, the world that we know is the word of appearances, which are intuitions of objects "out there," experienced by us as existing in time and space in causal relationships. I'm pretty sure I had the exact same thought once when I was really high.

Kant's prognosis for the future of metaphysics is pretty grim, though, as unlike mathematics or natural philosophy, metaphysics doesn't even have a possible object of experience. The only possibility he can think of is reasoning by analogy, so that we can think "at the boundary" between the field of experience and that which lies beyond it. Heavy stuff.(less)

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Jan 30, 2010

CJ Bowen added it · review of another edition

"If it [metaphysics:] is a science, how does it happen that it cannot, like other sciences, obtain universal and permanent recognition?" pg. 1, pgh 256.

"Human reason so delights in construction that it has several times built up a tower and then razed it to examine the nature of the foundation. It is never too late to become reasonable and wise; but if the insight comes late, there is always more difficulty in starting the change." pg. 2, pgh 256.

"...more

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May 05, 2011

Jesse Lopes rated it

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As Kant modestly put it, no one had ever thought that the conditions for our experience could be ascertained a priori (what an exciting premise!). And so comes this book, ostensibly for the layman but in reality intended for lazy academics in the backwoods of Konigsberg (now Kaliningrad) who couldn't plough through the Critique without misunderstanding it, which is mostly a polemic answering four questions that are supposed to get us riled up for a first-hand encounter with modern philosophy's m...moreAs Kant modestly put it, no one had ever thought that the conditions for our experience could be ascertained a priori (what an exciting premise!). And so comes this book, ostensibly for the layman but in reality intended for lazy academics in the backwoods of Konigsberg (now Kaliningrad) who couldn't plough through the Critique without misunderstanding it, which is mostly a polemic answering four questions that are supposed to get us riled up for a first-hand encounter with modern philosophy's most earth, though more properly heaven shattering text. These questions are 1. How is pure mathematics possible? Kant answers that it is experience. 2. How is physics possible? Kant answers that it is rationality. 3. What is the domain of metaphysics? To combine the two former under the unity of consciousness. 4. How is metaphysics possible as a science? By limiting the scope of its fanciful flights to what is a priori, and therefore what is most absolutely certain and necessary. What this amounts to is the denial of whether or not we may know the immortality of the soul or the existence of god. Kant brilliantly points out that, with the soul, we have an a priori knowledge of the continuity of ourselves through all of our experience but we accidentally think that, since it has always continued, it will indefinitely do so; this is, in Kant's phraseology, mistaking something regulative (something that helps us experience) for something constitutive (something that exists separately). Same with God - we have a priori knowledge of the ground of all possible experience in our rational faculty (which is why we can make analogies and imagine), but we have incorrectly thought that rational ground to be actually constitutive of a separate subject, God. Amusingly, Kant himself continued to believe in an immortal soul and a God, which he came to defend in the Critique of Practical (or as Russell called it, "Prejudicial") Reason, but for those who do not like cowardly emendations, this Prolegomena, along with the Critique, continues to demand your full modernist attention. (less)

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Aug 03, 2011

Matthew rated it

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Kant is one of the smartest philosophers that we've got. He took everything that came before him and completely turned it on its head. But he also writes like he's the smartest philosopher. That is to say that I don't think that I'd be able to read and understand him on my own ... it was only through the help of two separate professors that I was able to grasp the scope of what Kant was trying to do.

The Prolegomena is a great one-stop source for Kant's major philosophy. It is short, and once...more

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Dec 15, 2010

Andrew added it · review of another edition

Shelves: philosophy

Reading Kant is pretty interesting. The Prolegomena is doubtless a masterful work... Kant found a totally novel way of reconciling empirical, scientific concepts with an idealistic worldview. Granted, my own perspectives are pretty far from the transcendental idealist system that he proposes, but I have massive appreciation for his insights... recognizing the lens quality of space and time, for instance.

I should note that I don't, for a minute, buy transcendental idealism. He's wi...more

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Dec 26, 2007

Greg rated it

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Shelves: philosophy-theory-and-other-their-i

I don't get Kant, and I've never derived any pleasure from reading him.

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Aug 21, 2008

Curtis rated it

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WHAT?!?!?!

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Jun 03, 2010

Rowland Bismark rated it

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Kant's philosophy has been called a synthesis of rationalism and empiricism. From rationalism he takes the idea that we can have a priori knowledge of significant truths, but rejects the idea that we can have a priori metaphysical knowledge about the nature of things in themselves, God, or the soul. From empiricism he takes the idea that knowledge is essentially knowledge of experience, but rejects the idea that we cannot learn any necessary truths about experience, and in doing so he rejects Hu...moreKant's philosophy has been called a synthesis of rationalism and empiricism. From rationalism he takes the idea that we can have a priori knowledge of significant truths, but rejects the idea that we can have a priori metaphysical knowledge about the nature of things in themselves, God, or the soul. From empiricism he takes the idea that knowledge is essentially knowledge of experience, but rejects the idea that we cannot learn any necessary truths about experience, and in doing so he rejects Hume's skepticism.

He is able to create this synthesis largely thanks to a radical reconception of the nature of knowledge that comes from from experience. Though empiricists and rationalists may have disagreed about the value or certainty of knowledge from experience, they both generally thought of the mind as a neutral receptor: knowledge from experience was simply the report of the senses. Kant points out that our knowledge of experience extends far beyond what the senses can report. Our senses can report sensations, but they cannot give these sensations a structure in space and time, or organize them according to cause and effect. According to Kant, our faculties or sensibility and understanding are largely responsible for what we think of as "knowledge from experience."

By giving our mind this complex internal structure, Kant makes room for a great deal of a priori knowledge. Though the sensations that are the basis for all our experience come from things in themselves, any regularity or structure we find in these sensations comes from our mental concepts. Thus, while Kant does not slip into the idealist position of saying that reality is all a matter of perception, he does claim that the laws of nature are the laws of our mental faculties. For something to be an objective law, it must be synthetic and it must be a priori, and Kant identifies the possibility of synthetic a priori knowledge within the structure of our mental faculties.

If our sense of order and regularity is not something we find in experience, but something we impose upon experience, the study of this order and regularity is a study of our own faculties rather than a study of experience. Kant reconceives the purpose of metaphysics as being one of critique: we must seek to understand how knowledge is structured, and consequently how the various concepts of our mental faculties are organized. This is an important step for philosophy: after Kant published his work, there was been less interest in making extravagant claims about the nature of the universe, and greater emphasis on determining what we can know and on what grounds we can claim to know it.

This kind of scrutiny, which Kant advocates, has led to some serious attacks on his work. The German Idealists—notably Hegel—were the first to call into question Kant's concept of the thing in itself. Kant insists that while all we can perceive are appearances, these appearances are caused by things in themselves that are outside the realm of experience. Because they are outside the realm of experience, they are also outside the realm of space and time and any of the regularities we perceive in nature. A number of questions can be raised about what kind of relation things in themselves can have with appearances if categories such as time, causation, and even existence do not apply to them. The response of the German Idealists was to abandon the concept of things in themselves and assert that only appearances exist.

Analytic philosophy also got its start by criticizing Kant. This movement criticized in particular his category of the synthetic a priori. Frege was the first to point out that geometry is not synthetic a priori. Pure geometry—which consists only of deductive inferences—is analytic, and empirical geometry—which deals with what space is like in the real world—is knowna posteriori. This position was given a boost by Einstein's relativity, which shows that space is very different from what we had assumed and our understanding of it is certainly not a priori.

Frege also complains that Kant's definition of analytic and synthetic judgments rests on the subject-predicate form of grammar, which is not a necessary part of the logical structure of language. Efforts to define and classify analytic and synthetic judgments have been a major pre-occupation of analytic philosophy, especially in the first half of the twentieth century.

Though many of Kant's doctrines have fallen into question, his exhortation toward critical philosophy remains with us. Perhaps his most lasting contribution is the setting up of a new standard for rigor and circumspection in philosophical investigations.(less)

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Nov 27, 2010

Erik Kershner rated it

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Shelves: my-library

So many philosophers have written against Pure Reason and the Categorical Imperative, even in his own lifetime, that I hope Old Kant will someday be forgotten. He stands today as a Great Thinker because his brilliantly composed, but inherently faulty, arguments gave the Right some stronghold on surface level application of christian ethic. If you want to enter an adult conversation of the Self Superstition vs. The God Superstition pick up Nietzsche and never look back.--Erik

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Dec 27, 2008

Sergio rated it

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Shelves: philosophy, non-fiction

This was the book I was referred too when I decided to learn more about Transcendentalism. It is a book written to help understand a book previously written by Kant on Metaphysics.

While it was interesting, it seemed like Kant purposely decided to make it as wordy as possible. Which I think is humorous because the point of this book is to explain a book previously written in which only one other person in the world understood at the time.

As I have yet to t...more

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Mar 17, 2011

Lindsey Doolan rated it

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Shelves: philosophy, old-western-civ-stuff

Kant's Copernican Revolution of the Mind: the world is shaped by the mind, not the mind by the world. So the "center of the universe" is the mind of man. Important book, but I understood little.

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Jan 30, 2011

Ryan West rated it

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This was hard to read. I had to re-read a few times to really get the meaning. To much work for little epiphanies.

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Dec 02, 2011

Tye Patchana rated it

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An absolute requirement before delving into The Critique of Pure Reason.

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Oct 07, 2008

Mr. rated it

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This text is essentially a concise summary of the work accomplished by Kant in his Critique of Pure Reason, in which the great thinker answers the following: 1)How is pure mathematics possible? 2) How is pure natural science possible? 3)How is metaphysics in general possible? 4) How is metaphysics as a science possible? These are of course the most crucial topics in all transcendental thought, and this volume is possibly the most successful microcosm of Kant's thought. However, for all real stud...more

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Apr 29, 2009

Kate rated it

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This is a tough cookie - but it is under 100 pages so it travels easy.

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Dec 26, 2008

Rafael Sanchez rated it

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Shelves: non-fiction

this is the better of the two translations I read.

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Jan 06, 2010

Iamapremo rated it

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Great read for any debate of God vs. Effluvium.

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Jun 28, 2011

Erik Graff rated it

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Recommends it for: readers of the Critiques

Recommended to Erik by: Cornel West

Shelves: philosophy

I'd started but not finished this supplementary polemic to the Critique of Pure Reason while working on my seminary thesis at the Hungarian Pastry Shop on 110th and Cathedral in New York. Although some had recommended it as an easy approach to the critical project, time was short and I wanted to get through the three Critiques and all the Kant texts either cited by C.G. Jung or contained in his library at the time of his death first. I did so, then got back to this after graduation. It served...more

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Apr 29, 2010

Victoria rated it

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Reading for my grad tutorial

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Feb 01, 2010

Gwen Burrow rated it

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Shelves: philosophy

Read the first two sections.

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Jul 06, 2010

Andrew rated it

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How do you rate books like these? They aren't really "right" or "wrong" but are important historical documents. I dock it a star because some of the categories Kant outlines are unexplained in this text; the location of their definitions is the "Critique of Pure Reason," of which this book is a summary. I love Kant's preface to this text, he comes across as a witty, arrogant ass, and you have to love him for it.

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Oct 20, 2008

Mike rated it

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If you want to read this you should sit down with a bottle of vodka and every time you fall off Kant's train of thought have a shot. Then when you wake up the next morning on the floor and realize you have only made it fifteen pages, go out and buy a good secondary source that can explain all of Kant to you. The book gets five stars because its a primary source and because its Kant.

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Jan 11, 2010

Matt rated it

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Shelves: metaphysics, philosophy

The Prolegomena is a discussion of the proper place for metaphysics--that is, if there is any place at all for metaphysics. This short book covers some of the same topics that are discussed at length in the Critique of Pure Reason, so reading this book is a great way to familiarize oneself with Kant without undertaking the Critique.

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Jul 10, 2011

Adrian rated it

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Shelves: germany, nonfiction, philosophy

This is what I read on lazy Sunday afternoons.

A very concise (and almost readable!) work by Kant, summarizing and clarifying some of the monstrous and intricately detailed trails of thinking from his masterwork, The Critique of Pure Reason. Lays out the groundwork for the philosophy of science, logic, and metaphysics.

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Jul 28, 2008

Patrick Leyshock rated it

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How do mathematics, science, and philosophy, as disciplines, relate to one another? If you're not kept up at night wondering how synthetic a priori propositions are possible, this isn't the book for you.

Challenging to read, I'm nibbling away, one section a day.

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Oct 28, 2007

Tom rated it

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Shelves: school-related

Yeah, it's kind of ridiculous to give the best philosopher ever a 3, but it just wasn't all that enthralling, even though he wrote it to be an improvement in readability to the Critique.

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Aug 04, 2010

k.merlin Wizard rated it

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Shelves: books-read-at-st-john-s-college

I actually quite enjoyed this little guy. Whereas the CPR made me want to jump out of window, the Prolegomena is short, sweet and to the point; unlike most of Kant's "master pieces".

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About Immanuel Kant

Immanuel Kant was an 18th-century German philosopher from the Prussian city of Königsberg (now Kaliningrad, Russia). He is regarded as one of the most influential thinkers of modern Europe and of the late Enlightenment.

His most important work is The Critique of Pure Reason, a critical investigation of reason itself. It encompasses an attack on traditional metaphysics and epistemology, ...moreImmanuel Kant was an 18th-century German philosopher from the Prussian city of Königsberg (now Kaliningrad, Russia). He is regarded as one of the most influential thinkers of modern Europe and of the late Enlightenment.

His most important work is The Critique of Pure Reason, a critical investigation of reason itself. It encompasses an attack on traditional metaphysics and epistemology, and highlights Kant's own contribution to these areas. The other main works of his maturity are The Critique of Practical Reason, which concentrates on ethics, and The Critique of Judgement, which investigates aesthetics and teleology.

Pursuing metaphysics involves asking questions about the ultimate nature of reality. Kant suggested that metaphysics can be reformed through epistemology. He suggested that by understanding the sources and limits of human knowledge we can ask fruitful metaphysical questions. He asked if an object can be known to have certain properties prior to the experience of that object. He concluded that all objects that the mind can think about must conform to its manner of thought. Therefore if the mind can think only in terms of causality – which he concluded that it does – then we can know prior to experiencing them that all objects we experience must either be a cause or an effect. However, it follows from this that it is possible that there are objects of such a nature that the mind cannot think of them, and so the principle of causality, for instance, cannot be applied outside of experience: hence we cannot know, for example, whether the world always existed or if it had a cause. And so the grand questions of speculative metaphysics are off limits, but the sciences are firmly grounded in laws of the mind.

Kant believed himself to be creating a compromise between the empiricists and the rationalists. The empiricists believed that knowledge is acquired through experience alone, but the rationalists maintained that such knowledge is open to Cartesian doubt and that reason alone provides us with knowledge. Kant argues, however, that using reason without applying it to experience will only lead to illusions, while experience will be purely subjective without first being subsumed under pure reason.

Kant’s thought was very influential in Germany during his lifetime, moving philosophy beyond the debate between the rationalists and empiricists. The philosophers Fichte, Schelling, Hegel and Schopenhauer saw themselves as correcting and expanding the Kantian system, thus bringing about various forms of German Idealism. Kant continues to be a major influence on philosophy to this day, influencing both Analytic and Continental philosophy.(less)

More about Immanuel Kant...

Books by Immanuel Kant

Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (Texts in the History of Philosophy)

Critique of Practical Reason (Texts in the History of Philosophy)

The Critique of Aesthetic Judgement (Critique of Judgement 1)

The Metaphysics of Morals (Texts in the History of Philosophy)

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“High towers, and metaphysically-great men resembling them, round both of which there is commonly much wind, are not for me. My place is the fruitful bathos, the bottom-land, of experience; and the word transcendental, does not signify something passing beyond all experience, but something that indeed precedes it a priori, but that is intended simply to make cognition of experience possible.” — 1 person liked it

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