Kant's Negative Metaphysics:
Or the Results of Kant’s Philosophizing With an Epistemological Hammer
Or the Results of Kant’s Philosophizing With an Epistemological Hammer
The majority of all metaphysical claims are based solely on speculative reason and are epistemologically impossible. Our fallacious notions that the soul, the universe (world-whole), and God are things-in-themselves, about which we can obtain knowledge, are inevitable consequences of being human. But, with this in mind, there is much we can learn about how human beings fall into these inevitable errors based on universal illusion/delusion, and the consequences and implications of this inevitability for human practices.
Kant believes that the reason is the faculty for organizing and systematizing information in order to draw out universal concepts. The reason attempts to give ultimate explanations for everything that a person experiences. Kant calls these objectives of reason the unconditioned, which are an extrapolation from multiple empirical conditions. Reason cannot help but believe that if the conditioned is given, then the absolutely unconditioned must also be given (because reason functions syllogistically); this is what Kant terms the transcendental illusion. This tendency of reason’s is especially dangerous when it is applied to pure concepts or thoughts, because it results in an entirely non-empirical unconditioned. Kant refers to a non-empirical unconditioned as pseudo-rational. Eventually, all of reasons efforts lead to the three ultimate unconditioneds or principles of pure reason that Kant terms the three transcendental ideas: the soul (psychology), the universe (cosmology), and God (theology). The ideas of the soul and God are both pseudo-rational because their “object” is not considered by reason to be constituted of empirical material. Cosmology, the transcendental idea of the universe or the world-whole, is special because, although it in itself is non-empirical, it is an aggregate of every object of possible experience, and thus is inextricably bound up with the empirical world. For this reason Kant refers to cosmology as pseudo-empirical.
The transcendental ideas of the soul, the universe, and God pose huge problems for the human being that become evident at just a glance at the history of metaphysics. People are all over the place in this field, all claiming to have absolute knowledge or to have proved absolute skepticism, and the debates seem to be irresolvable and never-ending. For Kant, this is all a result of a fundamental human error, which is, namely, that humans treat these fundamentally transcendent ideas as if they were empirical objects even though there cannot be any corresponding object that could be given to humankind in intuition. Kant is very careful to avoid asserting or denying the existence of these things, because he would rather defuse the question by proving the answer to be essentially unknowable. By taking this line of argument, Kant makes the metaphysical arguments of all his predecessors seem overly presumptuous, and asserts his own modesty by throwing his hands up and saying I don’t know and I cannot know. But, since this hypostatization is an inevitable result of reason, we can learn things about humankind that are universal by reason, so long as we use reason regulatively (constantly keeping in mind the transcendental illusions that it can lure us into), rather than constitutively.
Kant writes, “In transcendental philosophy… there are no questions other than the cosmological ones in regard to which one can rightfully demand a sufficient answer concerning the constitution of the object itself”[1]. This is because the cosmological questions are pseudo-empirical, rather than pseudo-rational. This gives cosmology a special place in Kant’s Transcendental Dialectic that Kant treats at length in the sections on the antinomies of pure reason.
The Oxford American-English Dictionary defines an antinomy as a contradiction between two beliefs or conclusions that are in themselves reasonable; a paradox. An antinomy, for Kant, is a set of opposing arguments, which he titles thesis and antithesis, with respect to a specific issue, that claim to be mutually contradictory and are both reasonable (although the product of speculative reason). A transcendental antinomy effects a two-sided illusion/delusion, whose two sides seem to be contradictory, and each side attempts to assert its veracity by apagogic argument (disproving the other by negating it, via reductio ad absurdum). In actuality, the two positions turn out to be contrary, rather than contradictory, and since the whole argument for each side is apagogic (which means the whole argument is hinged on their being mutually contradictory), the argument is defused. In the case that Kant creates, both positions of the antinomies can be false or they can be true, without logical contradiction.
Kant finds four transcendental antinomies in our cosmology, two of which he terms mathematical because they deal with strict quantity, and two of which he terms dynamical because they deal with specific, single concepts and their qualities. Although all of the antinomies, since they fall under cosmology and thus are pseudo-empirical, can rightly demand answers, the mathematical antinomies hold an even higher place because they can be answered more definitively and more simply. This is because the mathematical antinomies are pseudo-empirical and quantitative (for they deal with the infinite and infinitesimal nature of the universe).
In each position the thesis will be the position of the dreaded continental rationalist, and will be an example of a human using reason constitutively, rather than regulatively, and asserting speculations as absolutes. The rationalist positions support morals and religion and are much more common beliefs. This may be because they satisfy the human need for what Kant terms architectonic knowledge, which is really just a structured and complete knowledge that makes the world intelligible. The antithesis will be the position of the empiricist, which, although more humble, is drenched in skepticism and never meets the nagging demand of reason for metaphysics. Even when convinced that nothing else can be so, most men and women cannot persist long in extreme skeptical convictions.
The first mathematical antinomy deals with the extension of the universe in space and time. The thesis states that “[t]he world has a beginning in time, and in space it is also enclosed in boundaries”[2]. The thesis draws its proof for a beginning of time from the idea that if time were infinite, there would be an infinite amount of time that would have to have already elapsed before the present moment (which defies the nature of infinity). If time were actually infinite we would never even get to the present moment because the infinite series of moments leading up to it would never finish elapsing. The thesis proves that the universe has boundaries by insisting that if were infinite a human being could never even conceive of the concept, because the successive synthesis of all its parts could never be finished (since they would be infinite in amount).
The antithesis asserts that “[t]he world has no beginning and no bounds in space, but is infinite with regard to both time and space”[3]. The antithesis draws its proofs for the universe’s infinite extension into both space and time from the idea that nothingness cannot exist. If the universe had a beginning, then that posits an empty time where there was nothing, and something cannot come from nothing. If the universe is bounded in space, then it must be bound by an infinite amount of empty space, which is inconceivable.
Kant resolves the first antinomy by showing that both answers presuppose that the universe is an object-in-itself, or a transcendental object, about which we can obtain information, and which also has either a finite or infinite extension. But, the universe is strictly an extrapolation by reason from the empirical world. We never directly experience or intuit the universe, only pieces of it. The universe itself, as a whole, is really just a thought-concept (although inextricably bound up with the empirical world), existing nowhere outside of the mind, and thus does not exist in itself as either an infinite or finite whole. For Kant the universe is indeterminately extended, which means that however far back in time or out in space experience reaches it will never find a boundary or an infinity, but will instead be able to continually extend to an indeterminate amount. As this regress of experiences occurs, reason will want to extrapolate the idea of infinity, but this infinity can never be reached or experienced, and thus is pure thought corresponding to no object that can be given. If reason is used regulatively, one realizes that this unconditioned can never be reached or proved, because it is outside experience, and thus is pure speculation.
The second mathematical antinomy deals with the existence of absolutely simple substances. The thesis states that “[e]very composite substance in the world consists of simple parts, and nothing exists anywhere except the simple or what is composed of simples”[4]. The thesis argument is that without these simple parts, every composite could eventually be reduced down to nothing, which isn’t logically possible. It argues that there must be something that subsists and forms the substantial composite, otherwise it would follow that it is made up of nothingness.
The antithesis states that “[n]o composite thing in the world consists of simple parts, and nowhere in it does there exist anything simple”[5]. The antithesis argument rests largely on the non-empirical nature of the simple substance. Nothing is ever given to the human in experience that cannot be further broken down or divided. This is because everything object that is given to the human through experience is necessarily given in terms of space, which is by nature infinitely divisible. These simple substances would, if they composed the objects of experience, also have to exist in experience, and would thus exist in space and be divisible, which contradicts the whole idea of a simple substance. Since a simple substance cannot be perceived, and would become a non-simple substance just by being experienced, the antithesis asserts that the thesis is null.
Kant resolves the second antinomy by again showing that it is the result of a presupposition that we have access to knowledge of things-in-themselves, which are either composed of simples or infinitely divisible. The problem is that the idea of simple substance is strictly a thought-concept that can never be supported by empirical evidence. Kant says that the first key is to recognize that the object is conforming to the knower and that we are working strictly with appearances. Since the mind imposes space upon the appearance, and since space is infinitely divisible, it follows as an analytical truth that the appearance must be infinitely divisible – although one must be careful to note that Kant is not saying either that thing-in-itself is infinitely divisible or that the human can infinitely divide the appearance. Though we can know that the appearance itself can be infinitely divided in space, we cannot know whether it is composed solely of complex parts or simple parts a priori. One would have to divide the appearance up and ascertain this a posteriori. Since it is both true that a person could continue to divide it up for an eternity without reaching either a simple substance or an infinite amount of divisions, the object of experience actually has an indeterminate amount of parts (or an indeterminate intensive regress). Thus an object of experience can be infinitely divided (because it exists in space) and, at the same time, has an indeterminate amount of complex substances.
Kant’s move here is a culmination of the entire Critique of Pure Reason. It is a beautiful example of the usefulness of his Transcendental Philosophy and also is highly instructive because it is also an example of how to utilize Transcendental Idealism to mitigate the inevitable questions of reason. The student of Kant quickly learns to sort out what he or she can and cannot know before considering metaphysical questions. It is an exhortation to a completed epistemology before any metaphysical enquiries. Kant originally tends to epistemology with the scalpel, slowly, methodically refining it to perfection, and then Kant wields this epistemology like a hammer with which he smashes soaring and glimmering towers of metaphysics in order to examine the rubble, question the foundation, and finally zone the whole area with very strict epistemological boundaries.
It is here that one finally comes to understand what Kant meant when he wrote that “[he] had to deny reason in order to make room for faith”[6]. Kant’s epistemology is very strict and requires that nothing be admitted as knowledge without absolute certitude. This leaves many things to pure speculation, or, faith. I cannot know whether the universe is finite or infinite, and even phrasing the question that way, for Kant, is falling prey to a transcendental illusion of reason (that the universe is either finite or infinite). All I know is that the realm of experience extends indefinitely, because as I regress in time or extend into space I never find a boundary, but, because of the nature of the infinite, I never reach that either (which would be a requirement for absolute certitude). Therefore all I can ever know is that the universe extends indefinitely. And, similarly, even though I can reasonably assume that an object of experience, since space is imposed upon the representation along with time, can be infinitely divided, I can never know if there is a simple substance at its base or not because a human being cannot divide something infinitely. Since a human being can do nothing infinitely, even given an eternity, a human being can actually never posit the infinite or the infinitesimal nature of an object of experience with absolute certitude. And because of this, questions about the boundaries of the universe in space and time and the amount of times substance can be divided before reaching a simple substance are outside of the human purview…we cannot know. We can continually expand our conception of the universe in space without finding a boundary, regress our conception of time without finding a beginning, and divide a substance without finding the simple, but, we also can never ascertain that space is infinite, that time is infinite, or that objects of experience are made up of an infinite amount of complex substances because we can’t count to infinity.
The only critique of Kant’s epistemology that I could raise would be that it has a singular level of truth, or that it solely admits knowledge on an absolute certainty basis. Although I do agree with Kant’s method and all of his findings with regards to metaphysics, I disagree that epistemology should stop with absolute certainty. Rather, I would argue that there ought to be a hierarchy of probability. Although this may be outside the realm of pure epistemology, and might rightly require a different title, it seems that the validity of claims is not quite so black and white as to be either absolutely true or absolutely false. In actuality, much in the same way that Kant proceeds with his arguments against the theses and antitheses of the antinomies, I would argue that the opposite of absolutely true = not absolute true, rather than that the opposite of absolutely true = absolutely false. This is merely a dialectical opposition. There can be different levels of certitude, and thus different levels of truth, or, more aptly, different levels of probability. I would extend epistemology to function in accordance with these levels of probability, much in the same way that quantum mechanics was an adjustment of Newtonian physics in order to allow it to deal with similar probabilities. Although a probability is never absolutely true, and thus is dangerous and less useful in the realm of pure or transcendent philosophy, it is useful in the practical realm. In fact, human beings cannot help but use these probabilities in their everyday life, and it is only when they extend them to the unconditioned (suppose them to be absolute rather than merely probable) that they run into severe metaphysical error. It seems that the world has shown itself to be much more protean and multivalent than the people of the 18th century could have imagined, and epistemology ought to be adapted to this a bit. Although epistemology rightly should retain a hierarchy whose upper echelon requires nothing less than absolute certitude, it should also rightly extend throughout the whole spectrum of veracity, from absolutely true to absolutely false, which is not a simple dichotomy, but instead a sort of grayscale with an infinite amount of points between black and white.
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