Kant and the Claims of the Empirical World : A Transcendental Reading of the Critique of the Power of Judgment

Kant announces that the Critique of the Power of Judgment will bring his entire critical enterprise to an end. But it is by no means agreed upon that it in fact does so and, if it does, how. In this book, Ido Geiger argues that a principal concern of the third Critique is completing the account of the transcendental conditions of empirical experience and knowledge. This includes both Kant's analysis of natural beauty and his discussion of teleological judgments of organisms and of nature generally. Geiger's original reading of the third Critique shows that it forms a unified whole - and that it does in fact deliver the final part of Kant's transcendental undertaking. His book will be valuable to all who are interested in Kant's theory of the aesthetic and conceptual purposiveness of nature. "Kant's Critique of the Power of Judgment (1790), the third and last of his critical works, has been recognized as a work of great philosophical import from its first reception; and it continues to draw much attention to this day. It is nevertheless a highly puzzling book and its interpretation has produced a virtual maze of exegetical controversies. On the one hand, it claims to bring the "entire critical enterprise to an end" (KU 5:170). On the other hand, it appears to address a great diversity of philosophical topics, many of which do not seem to be part of or even related to Kant's critical project. Its Introduction takes on the task of bridging "the incalculable gulf [unübersehbare Kluft]" (KU 5:175) between nature and freedom as well as the task of completing the account of the transcendental conditions of an empirical experience of nature. The book itself, however, discusses our experiences of the beauty of nature and fine art as well as different experiences of sublimity. It also discusses the teleological manner in which we view organic nature and the natural world more broadly. It ends with a long section devoted to the notion of the highest good"-- Provided by publisher abbreviations 10 acknowledgments 8 charge_of_reflective_judgment_and_the_conceptual_and_aesthetic_purposiveness_of_nature 28 contents 6 copyright_page 5 dedication 4 discursivity_and_the_conceptual_purposiveness_of_nature 111 epigraph 3 index 236 introduction 14 kants_empiricism 213 kant_and_the_claims_of_the_empirical_world -1 organisms_teleological_judgment_and_the_methodology_of_biology 62 references 229 significance_of_form_and_the_aesthetic_purposiveness_of_nature 151 the_antinomy_of_teleological_judgment 96