Seminar: Kant
Kant: Theoretical Reason and Practical Reason
Prof. Shai Frogel
shaif@post.tau.ac.il
Course no. 1662-3403
2018-9 fall semester
4 credits
Tuesday, Thursday, 12:00-14:00
Office hours: by appointment
Course Description
Kant's critical philosophy is essential for understanding modern philosophy. It suggests a critique of human reason which brings to new view concerning knowledge (theoretical reason), ethics (practical reason) and the relation between them. The goal of the seminar is examining Kant's thesis that theoretical reason (knowledge) is subordinated to practical reason (ethics). For this purpose, we will discuss certain main issues of Kant's philosophy: the "Copernican revolution" and its theoretical implications, the metaphysical ideas of ethics (freedom, the immorality of the soul, God existence) and the teleology of nature.
Assessment
Minor assignments: 2 Oral presentations (each 10min.) – 10%
Mid Term: Short paper (400 words) – 10%
Final requirement: Seminar paper (6000words) or Referat-paper (3000words) – 80%
Schedule
16.10.18 Introduction: Kant's Critiques
18.10.18 Kant's "Copernican revolution"
Required reading: Immanuel Kant, 1929 [1781], Critique of Pure Reason [CPR], Translated by Norman Kemp smith. London: Macmillan.
Section: "Preface to second edition", pp.17-21
23.10.18 Kant's "Copernican revolution"2
Required reading: CPR
Section: "Preface to second edition", pp.22-25
25.10.18 Kant's "Copernican revolution"3
Required reading: CPR
Section: "Preface to second edition", pp.25-29
1.11.18 Reason and understanding – regulative principle and constitutive principle
Required reading: CPR
Section: ""Appendix to the transcendental dialectic", pp. 557-561
6.11.18 Reason and understanding – regulative principle and constitutive principle2
Section: ""Appendix to the transcendental dialectic", pp. 557-561
8.11.18 Mathematical knowledge vs. Philosophical knowledge
Required reading: CPR
Section: "The discipline of pure reason in its dogmatic employment", pp. 585-593
13.11.18 Mathematical knowledge vs. Philosophical knowledge2
Required reading: CPR
Section: "The discipline of pure reason in its dogmatic employment", pp. 585-593
15.11.18 Freedom of the will, Immortality of the soul, God existence
Required reading: CPR
Section: "The ultimate end of the pure employment of our reason", pp. 630-634
20.11.18 Freedom of the will, Immortality of the soul, God existence2
Required reading: CPR
Section: "The ultimate end of the pure employment of our reason", pp. 630-634
22.11.18 What can I know? What ought I to do? What may I hope?
Required reading: CPR
Section: "The ideal of the highest good, as a determining ground of the ultimate end of pure reason", pp. 635-644
27.11.18 What can I know? What ought I to do? What may I hope?2
Required reading: CPR
Section: "The ideal of the highest good, as a determining ground of the ultimate end of pure reason", pp. 635-644
29.11.18 Conclusion of CPR & introduction to Critique of practical reason
4.12.18 Practical reason and Pure reason
Required reading: Immanuel Kant, 2002 [1788], Critique of Practical Reason [COP], Translated by Werner S. Pluhar. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company.
Section: "Preface", pp. 3-22
6.12.18 Practical reason and Pure reason2
Required reading: COP
Section: "Of a dialectics of pure reason in defining the conception of the summum bonum" [Sec. I-V], pp. 141-155
11.12.18 Understanding, Reason and Judgment
Required reading: Immanuel Kant, 1987 [1790], Critique of Judgment [COJ], Translated by Werner S. Pluhar. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company.
Section: "Introduction" (I-V), pp. 9-26
13.12.18 Understanding, Reason and Judgment2
Required reading: COJ
Section: "Introduction" (VI-IX), pp. 26-38
18.12.18 Organism
Required reading: COJ
Section: "§66 On the Principle for Judging Intrinsic Purposiveness in Organized Beings", pp. 255-257
20.12.18 The teleological principal as a critical principle
Required reading: COJ
Section: "§75 The Concept of an Objective Purposiveness of Nature Is a Critical Principle of Reason for our Reflective Judgment", 280-283
25.12.18 Subjective principle as objective principle
Required reading: COJ
Section: "§76 Comment", 283-288
27.12.2018 Subjective principle as objective principle2
Required reading: COJ
Section: "§76 Comment", 283-288
1.1.19 Ethico-Theology
Required reading: COJ
Section: "§86 On Ethicotheology", 331-336
3.1.19 The validity of moral proof
Required reading: COJ
Section: "§88 Restriction of the Validity of the Moral Proof", 343-350
8.1.19 The validity of moral proof2
Required reading: COJ
Section: "§88 Restriction of the Validity of the Moral Proof", 343-350
10.1.18 Conclusion
This schedule is tentative and may change as the course progresses.
Attendance
Attendance is mandatory. Students are permitted a maximum of three unexcused absences without penalty. Any additional absences will affect the final grade and may result in failure of the course.
Academic conduct
Plagiarism is taken extremely seriously. Any instance of academic misconduct which includes: submitting someone else’s work as your own; failure to accurately cite sources; taking words from another source without using quotation marks; submission of work for which you have previously received credit; working in a group for individual assignments; using unauthorized materials in an exam and sharing your work with other students, will result in failure of the assignment and will likely lead to further disciplinary measures.
Bibliography
Primary sources
Kant, Immanuel, 1929 [1781], Critique of Pure Reason, Translated by Norman Kemp smith. London: Macmillan.
Kant, Immanuel, 2002 [1788], Critique of Practical Reason, Translated by Werner S. Pluhar. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company.
Kant, Immanuel, 1987 [1790], Critique of Judgment, Translated by Werner S. Pluhar. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company.
Secondary sources
Abela, Paul, 2006, "The demand of systematicity: rational judgment and the structure of nature" in A companion to Kant, Oxford: Blackwell Pub, pp. 408-422.
Allison. Henry E., 2012, "Reflective judgment and the application of logic to nature: Kant's deduction of the principle of purposiveness as an answer to Hume" in Essay on Kant, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 177-188.
Frogel, Shai, 2017, Understanding Kant's Ethics: from the Antinomy OF Practical Reason to a Comparison with Kierkegaard's Spheres of Existence", Essays in the philosophy of humanism, 25.1, pp. 25-42
Guyer, Paul, 2005, "The unity of nature and freedom: Kant's conception of the system of philosophy" in Kant's system of nature and freedom, Oxford: Clarendon press, pp. 277-313.
O'neill, Onora, 1992, "Vindicating reason" in The Cambridge companion to Kant, ed. Paul Guyer, Cambridge: Cambridge University press, pp. 280-308.
Wood, Allen W., 1999, Kant's Ethical Thought, Cambridge: Cambridge University press.
