“Critique of Pure Reason” is one of the most influential works in Western philosophy, written by Immanuel Kant in 1781.
The book seeks to answer two central questions:
What can we know?
How can we know it?
Main Themes:
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Transcendental Idealism
- our experience of things is about how they appear to us (phenomena)
- not about those things as they are in themselves (noumena)
- our experience of things is about how they appear to us (phenomena)
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A Priori and A Posteriori Knowledge
- a priori knowledge - knowledge independent of experience
- mathematics
- a posteriori knowledge - knowledge dependent on experience
- empirical observations
- a priori knowledge - knowledge independent of experience
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Analytic and Synthetic Judgments
- analytic judgments - truth based on definitions / logic
- “All bachelors are unmarried”
- synthetic judgments - new information
- “The cat is on the mat”
- analytic judgments - truth based on definitions / logic
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Categories of Understanding
- the mind has innate structures or categories (such as causality, unity, plurality) that it uses to organize sensory input into coherent experiences.
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The Copernican Revolution in Philosophy
- objects conform to our knowledge rather than our knowledge conforming to objects.
- This shift in perspective is often compared to the Copernican revolution in astronomy.
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Limits of Human Knowledge
- while we can know phenomena, we cannot know the noumena or things-in-themselves.
Limits of human knowledge
Active role of the mind in shaping experience