Kant, Hume, and the Interruption of Dogmatic Slumber

Abraham Anderson (Autor)

Buch | Hardcover

204 Seiten

2020
Oxford University Press Inc (Verlag)
978-0-19-009674-8 (ISBN)

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Kant once famously declared in the Prolegomena that "it was the objection of David Hume that first, many years ago, interrupted my dogmatic slumber." Abraham Anderson here offers an interpretation of this utterance, arguing that Hume roused Kant not (as has often been thought) by challenging the principle that "every event has a cause" which governs experience, but rather by attacking the principle of sufficient reason, the basis of both rationalist metaphysics and the cosmological proof of the existence of God. This suggestion, Anderson proposes, allows us to reconcile Kant's declaration with his later assertion that it was the Antinomy of pure reason - the clash of opposing theses - that first woke him from dogmatic slumber. For the Antinomy suspends the dogmatic principle of sufficient reason; in doing so, Anderson proposes, it is extending Hume's attack on that principle.

This reading of Kant also explains why Kant speaks of "the objection of David Hume" after mentioning Hume's attack on metaphysics. The "objection" that Kant has in mind, Anderson argues, is a challenge to metaphysics, rather than to the foundations of empirical knowledge. Consequently, Anderson's analysis issues a new view of Hume himself-as primarily interested, not in the foundations of experience, but in the problem of metaphysics and theology. It thereby positions Kant and Hume as champions of the Enlightenment in its struggle with superstition. Shedding new light on the connection between two of the most influential figures in the history of philosophy, this volume will appeal not only to scholars of Kant, Hume, and early modern philosophy, but to philosophers and students interested in the history of philosophy and metaphysics generally.

Abraham Anderson is Professor of Philosophy at Sarah Lawrence College. He was born in New York, and studied at Harvard and Columbia. He held postgraduate fellowships at the École normale supérieure (rue d'Ulm) and the University of Munich. He has also taught at the University of New Mexico, the Universidad Autónoma de México, St. John's College (Santa Fe), and the American University in Cairo. He is the author of The Treatise of the Three Impostors and the Problem of Enlightenment, as well as numerous articles on Kant, Descartes, and other topics.

Chapter One: The Objection of David Hume and the Project of Enlightenment
Chapter Two: Defining "The Objection of David Hume"
Chapter Three: Hume's Attack on the Rationalist Principle of Sufficient Reason in the Enquiry
Chapter Four: Interpreting Hume on the Causal Principle: Treatise 1.3.3, "A letter from a gentleman," and Kant's German Contemporaries
Chapter Five: Hume's Attack on the "Impious Maxim" as the Hidden Spine of the Critique

Erscheinungsdatum	18.03.2020
Verlagsort	New York
Sprache	englisch
Maße	239 x 163 mm
Gewicht	437 g
Themenwelt	Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Erkenntnistheorie / Wissenschaftstheorie
	Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Geschichte der Philosophie
	Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Metaphysik / Ontologie
	Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Philosophie der Neuzeit
	Sozialwissenschaften
ISBN-10	0-19-009674-8 / 0190096748
ISBN-13	978-0-19-009674-8 / 9780190096748
Zustand	Neuware