Phenomenological Interpretation of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason

by Martin Heidegger, Parvis Emad (Translator), Kenneth Maly (Translator)

The eminent philosopher delivers an illuminating interpretation of Kant’s magnum opus in what is itself a significant work of Western philosophy.The text of Martin Heidegger’s 1927–28 university lecture course on Emmanuel Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason presents a close interpretive reading of the first two parts of this masterpiece of modern philosophy. In this course, Heidegger continues the task he enunciated in Being and Time as the problem of dismantling the history of ontology, using temporality as a clue.Heidegger demonstrates that the relation between philosophy, ontology, and fundamental ontology is rooted in the genesis of the modern mathematical sciences. He also shows that objectification of beings as beings is inseparable from knowledge a priori, the central problem of Kant’s Critique. He concludes that objectification rests on the productive power of imagination, a process that involves temporality, which is the basic constitution of humans as beings.

Genres: Philosophy, 20th Century

316 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1928

About the author

Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) was a German philosopher whose work is perhaps most readily associated with phenomenology and existentialism, although his thinking should be identified as part of such philosophical movements only with extreme care and qualification. His ideas have exerted a seminal influence on the development of contemporary European philosophy. They have also had an impact far beyond philosophy, for example in architectural theory (see e.g., Sharr 2007), literary criticism (see e.g., Ziarek 1989), theology (see e.g., Caputo 1993), psychotherapy (see e.g., Binswanger 1943/1964, Guignon 1993) and cognitive science (see e.g., Dreyfus 1992, 2008; Wheeler 2005; Kiverstein and Wheeler forthcoming).

Reviews

[Nathan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent lecture course by Heidegger. It was the lecture course that eventually became the famous "Kantbuch" (Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics ". Heidegger does two critical things: first he attempts to demonstrate that Kant's first Critique is a work which focuses on the transcendental grounds for the possibility of Ontological knowledge, rather than being a work of epistemology - in contrast to popular conception. Secondly, he shows that the categories are inextricably tied up with the pure a priori forms of sensibility (namely, time) through the transcendental synthesis, and that it is time and imagination which are integral to ontological knowledge. He turns apprehension, imagination, and apperception into present, past, and future - and are all cohesive and unified and are the grounds for the 'now' and our temporal horizon.

It is an incredible work, and very underrated. I spent the Summer of '14 carefully navigating through this text, underlining almost every line and putting a sticky on almost every page. It was the first major Heidegger work that I read cover to cover; and it had a tremendous impact on my philosophical development.

Almost all commentaries on Heidegger's work around this period (and after) say something like "The ideas presented here crucial to understanding BT" or "This is a major work which preceded BT" - while BT is obviously a crucial work of Heidegger, I think the heart of his thinking, and the key to understanding his project, are found in his lecture courses. This is one of them. Try not to associate every single Heidegger work with BT, but see them on their own terms and really try to see what Heidegger is actually trying to do: philosophy.

[Edward Moran · Rating 5 out of 5]

Discusses times priority over space as a formal intuition, and the priority of intuition over the understanding and the categories. Also, the common root of intuition and understanding in imagination.

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book points out - like no other book - that “Being and Time” is in fact Heidegger's encounter and response to Kant's “Critique of Pure Reason”.

First, Marburg where Heidegger wrote “Being and Time” and later delivered this course was a Kantian and neo-Kantian stronghold. Heidegger objected to their epistemological and superficial interpretation of Kant, and proposed instead a phenomenological and mainly an ontological one.

Kant's main project in the Critique was to lay the foundation of the special metaphysics (understood as the science of super-sensible beings) and that of the general metaphysics (understood as the science of beings in general). For the first time in the philosophical tradition, Kant suggested that knowledge/understanding is not an analytic principle, but a synthetic one. The core question is where and how this synthetic knowledge a prior happens. Kant, under the sway of German Idealism and modernity, moved this synthesis from imagination in the first edition, to understanding/reason in the second edition of the Critique. Heidegger praised Kant for being truthful to the phenomena, for grasping the main pieces of the problem, and for being completely honest with the difficulties; but objected to Kant for not going deep enough and for being too much under the influence of the natural sciences and the traditional ontology/logic. Accordingly, a much more radical understanding reveals Kant's power of imagination to be fundamentally temporality; and as such the synthetic knowledge a prior happens in time. Time however, is not the objective/scientific time or Kant's subjective time understood as a pure form of sensuous intuition; but the original unity of the ecstatic constitution of Dasein as defined in “Being and Time”. On the other hand, natural sciences and traditional ontology implicit definition of Being as nature's extant was way too restrictive for Kant's project. “Universality of Being and radicality of Time are the two titles which together denote the task which a further thinking of the possibility of metaphysics calls for”; hence Heidegger's “Being and Time”.

Finally, part two of “Being and Time” was supposed to continue with “Kant's doctrine of schematism and time”; that is to approach Kant with all that was developed by Heidegger in the first part of "Being and Time". A shorter version of this course was published by Heidegger as the “Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics” book. Eventually, Heidegger moved in a different direction in his pursuit of Being, lost most of his interest in Kant and Time, and never wrote the second part of "Being and Time".

[Enrique · Rating 5 out of 5]

The reading method that uses Heidegger to interpret Kant’s critique its the most instructive part of this book and the most rewarding.

One feels that the text it’s easy to understand but it is not, only that Heidegger method help us to see where are the connections in the concepts that Kant used, and how to understand the position of Kant and what he is trying to answer.

Heidegger also showed how Kant thinking changed in minimum details later, and why is important to observe this changes, because Kant wasn’t at all sure if his inquiry had any sense at all.

The questions that Heidegger ask along the text are extremely instructive and totally missed in their actual commentators. Profesional philosophers resume the book as “an ontological interpretation of Kant”. It is not the point, Heidegger try to show the tradition behind Kant writings, and obviously this tradition is ontological, but it doesn’t matter in the end, Heidegger knows that this interpretation is also a problem to ask, what ontological tradition? How the ground of philosophical problems is still rooted in this tradition? What are the concepts and experiences that allow this tradition to stay alive?

[Andrew Noselli · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read in conjunction with Bax's biography of Kant, Kant's "Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science", Adorno's book on Kant's Critique of Reason and, finally, Kant's "Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics that will be able to come forward as a Science." I'm really getting into Kant (not sure how much I understand...)