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i.e. The Critique of Pure Reason. (Kant wrote 3 Critiques) It's known as one of the most difficult-to-read philosophy books in history, though, so don't expect

i.e. The Critique of Pure Reason. (Kant wrote 3 Critiques) It's known as one of the most difficult-to-read philosophy books in history, though, so don't expect to pick it up and understand what he's saying. I did an entire university course on the book—I mostly studied philosophy at university—which was gruelling, and sometime later when a girlfriend saw the fat book on my shelf and asked what it's about, looked horrified when I couldn't tell her. Never heard anyone say he was 100% right, though. Particularly his own successors (Neo-Kantians) who, I believe, thought important parts of his system should be dropped—mainly, Kant's reality/the noumenon/thing-in-itself that we can never know or say anything about. (The most helpful link I can think of is James Franklin's article on Stove's Gem, the "Worst Argument in the World"—Very lucid writing, and not a bad introduction to talk of things-in-themselves. https://web.maths.unsw.edu.au/~jim/worst.html https://web.maths.unsw.edu.au/~jim/worst.html )

ineedasername 5y ago
Yes, so difficult to read that he wrote the much more accessible Prolegomena a few years later to summarize his ideas. Critique if Pure Reason is a classic, but what bootstrapped his ideas into the public academic society if the time was Prolegomena.
ethn 5y ago
Neo-Kantian generally refers to the application of the style and epistemology provided by transcendental idealism in treatment of other subjects, rather than as a departure from Kant. The Thing-in-Itself was once controversial but undeservedly. It's necessary to prevent the subject knowing the object fully, so thus it is treated in the sense of Cassirer/Cohen's Infinitesimal. No one has trouble with Noumenon maybe only in the disappointment with the intractability of metaphysics to answers some of the most pressing questions.

ineedasername 5y ago

Yes, so difficult to read that he wrote the much more accessible Prolegomena a few years later to summarize his ideas. Critique if Pure Reason is a classic, but what bootstrapped his ideas into the public academic society if the time was Prolegomena.

ethn 5y ago

Neo-Kantian generally refers to the application of the style and epistemology provided by transcendental idealism in treatment of other subjects, rather than as a departure from Kant. The Thing-in-Itself was once controversial but undeservedly. It's necessary to prevent the subject knowing the object fully, so thus it is treated in the sense of Cassirer/Cohen's Infinitesimal. No one has trouble with Noumenon maybe only in the disappointment with the intractability of metaphysics to answers some of the most pressing questions.