Kant on Proper Science: Biology in the Critical Philosophy and the Opus postumum (Studies in German Idealism Book 15)

This book provides a novel treatment of Immanuel Kant’s views on proper natural science and biology. The status of biology in Kant’s system of science is often taken to be problematic. By analyzing Kant’s philosophy of biology in relation to his conception of proper science, the present book determines Kant’s views on the scientific status of biology. Combining a broad ideengeschichtlich approach with a detailed historical reconstruction of philosophical and scientific texts, the book establishes important interconnections between Kant’s philosophy of science, his views on biology, and his reception of late 18 th century biological theories. It discusses Kant’s views on science and biology as articulated in his published writings and in the Opus postumum . The book shows that although biology is a non-mathematical science and the relation between biology and other natural sciences is not specified, Kant did allow for the possibility of providing scientific explanations in biology and assigned biology a specific domain of investigation. Acknowledgments 6 Note on Citation and Translation 8 Contents 10 Chapter 1: Introduction: Kant on Science and Biology 14 1.1 Biology, Teleology, and Explanation 16 1.2 Methodology 21 1.3 An Overview of the Work 23 Chapter 2: Kant’s Conception of Proper Science 28 2.1 Systematicity 30 2.1.1 Definitions 32 2.1.2 Logical Division 35 2.1.3 Completeness 36 2.2 Objective Grounding 37 2.2.1 Grounding is not Identical to Derivability 41 2.2.2 Grounding is a Special Case of Derivability 43 2.2.3 Grounding in Natural Science, Natural Description, and Natural History 47 2.3 Apodictic Certainty 48 2.4 Mathematics, A Priori Justification, and Grounding 50 2.4.1 Mathematics and Grounding 54 2.5 Metaphysics, A Priori Justification, and Objective Grounding 58 2.5.1 Metaphysics and Apodictic Certainty 59 2.5.2 Metaphysics and Grounding 61 2.6 Conclusion 63 Chapter 3: Mechanical Explanation and Grounding 65 3.1 Understanding Mechanical Explanation 66 3.2 A Tradition of Part-Whole Conceptualizations 69 3.3 Parts, Wholes, and Definitions 71 3.4 Parts, Wholes, and Explanation 73 3.5 Parts, Wholes, and Forces: Mechanical Explanation 76 3.5.1 Mechanical Explanation in Natural Science 76 3.5.2 Mechanical Method in Biology 78 3.6 Parts, Wholes, and Mechanical Explanation in Kant 81 3.6.1 Parts, Wholes, and Demonstrations in Kant 82 3.6.2 Mechanical Explanations as Explanatory Demonstrations proceeding from Synthetic Principles 84 3.7 Crystallization 88 3.8 The Mechanical Inexplicability of Organisms 91 3.8.1 The Contingent Unity of Organisms 92 3.8.2 Adaptation and Mechanical Explanation 94 3.9 Mechanism as Method 96 3.10 Conclusion 98 Chapter 4: Kant on Teleology 100 4.1 Recent Interpretations of Kant’s Biological Teleology 102 4.2 Baumgarten and Wolff on Efficient Causes, Utility, and Final Causes 103 4.3 Kant on Purpose, Nexus Effectivus, and Nexus Finalis : The Lectures on Metaphysics 109 4.4 Kant on Purpose, Nexus Effectivus, and Nexus Finalis: Über den Gebrauch teleologischer Principien in der Philosophie and the Kritik der Urteilskraft 111 4.5 Purposes and Explanation 114 4.6 Kant’s Critique of the Rationalists 116 4.7 Conclusion 120 Chapter 5: Kant on the Domain and Method of Biology 122 5.1 Constitutive Teleology and Teleomechanism 123 5.2 Kant’s Critique of Leibniz: Parts, Wholes, and Organisms 126 5.2.1 Organisms and their Relative Simple Parts 129 5.3 Blumenbach on the Domain of Natural History 133 5.4 Kant on Propagation, Growth and Nutrition, and 139 5.4.1 Reproduction and Species 141 5.4.2 Growth and Nutrition 144 5.4.3 Self-Preservation and Regeneration 148 5.5 Kant on Purpose and Natural Purpose: Determining the Proper Method of Biology 150 5.6 Construing the Domain of Biology 154 5.7 Conclusion 157 Chapter 6: Kant on the Systematicity of Physics and the Opus postumum 159 6.1 Three Distinguishing Features of a Science 160 6.2 Kant’s Varieties of Physics 163 6.2.1 The Object of Universal Physics 163 6.2.2 Rational and Empirical Physics 166 6.2.3 Physica Rationalis and Physica Generalis 167 6.3 Physics as Presented in Eighteenth-Century Textbooks 169 6.3.1 Eberhard’s Erste Gründe der Naturlehre 170 6.3.2 Karstens’s Anleitung zur gemeinnützlichen Kenntniß der Natur 173 6.3.3 Gehler’s Physikalisches Wörterbuch 175 6.3.4 The Unity and Disunity of Natural Science 178 6.4 Kant’s Transition ( Übergang) to Physics 179 6.4.1 Interpretations of the Opus postumum 180 6.4.2 Kant’s Transition Project and the Systematicity of Physics 183 6.4.3 Physica Generalis and Physica Specialis in Kant’s Transition Project 185 6.4.4 Scientific Topics in the Transition 188 6.4.5 The Transition and Biology 193 6.5 Conclusion 195 Chapter 7: Vital Forces and Organisms in the Opus postumum 197 7.1 The Opus postumum and Kant’s Philosophy of Organic Nature 199 7.2 Theories of Vital Force 201 7.2.1 Blumenbach’s Theory of Vital Force and the Bildungstrieb 202 7.2.2 Brandis and Reil on Vital Force: Some Different Perspectives 208 7.3 Kant, Vital Force, and Regulative Teleology 214 7.3.1 Kant’s Critique of Herder 216 7.3.2 Kant’s Critique of Hylozoism 219 7.3.3 Vital Forces in the Opus postumum 221 7.4 The Concept ‘Organism’ in Kant’s Transition 225 7.5 Conclusion 229 Chapter 8: Materialism, Hylozoism, and Natural History in the Opus postumum 231 8.1 Kant on Sömmering’s Über das Organ der Seele 232 8.2 On Souls and Immaterial Principles in the Opus postumum 238 8.3 Anti-hylozoism in the Opus postumum 241 8.3.1 Maimon’s Theory of the World-Soul 242 8.3.2 The Concept of Life in the Opus postumum 246 8.4 Revisiting Mechanical Explanation in the Opus postumum 249 8.4.1 Construing Biology as a Part of a Unified Physics 249 8.5 Kant on Natural History 254 8.5.1 Natural History: Kant’s Positions Predating the Opus postumum 256 8.5.2 Natural History and External Teleology 263 8.6 Conclusion 268 Chapter 9: Concluding Remarks 270 Bibliography 274 Sources 274 References 277 Index 285 This book provides a novel treatment of Immanuel Kant's views on proper natural science and biology. The status of biology in Kant's system of science is often taken to be problematic. By analyzing Kant's philosophy of biology in relation to his conception of proper science, the present book determines Kant's views on the scientific status of biology. Combining a broad ideengeschichtlich approach with a detailed historical reconstruction of philosophical and scientific texts, the book establishes important interconnections between Kant's philosophy of science, his views on biology, and his reception of late 18th century biological theories. It discusses Kant's views on science and biology as articulated in his published writings and in the Opus postumum. The book shows that although biology is a non-mathematical science and the relation between biology and other natural sciences is not specified, Kant did allow for the possibility of providing scientific explanations in biology and assigned biology a specific domain of investigation--Résumé de l'éditeur This bookprovides a novel treatment of Immanuel Kant’s views on proper natural science and biology. The status of biology in Kant’s system of science is often taken to be problematic. By analyzing Kant’s philosophy of biology in relation to his conception of proper science, the present book determines Kant’s views on the scientific status of biology. Combining a broad __ideengeschichtlich__ approach with a detailed historical reconstruction of philosophical and scientific texts, the book establishes important interconnections between Kant’s philosophy of science, his views on biology, and his reception of late 18th century biological theories. It discusses Kant’s views on science and biology as articulated in his published writings and in the __Opus postumum__. The book shows that although biology is a non-mathematical science and the relation between biology and other natural sciences is not specified, Kant did allow for the possibility of providing scientific explanations in biology and assigned biology a specific domain of investigation. Front Matter....Pages i-xii Introduction: Kant on Science and Biology....Pages 1-14 Kant’s Conception of Proper Science....Pages 15-51 Mechanical Explanation and Grounding....Pages 53-87 Kant on Teleology....Pages 89-110 Kant on the Domain and Method of Biology....Pages 111-147 Kant on the Systematicity of Physics and the Opus postumum ....Pages 149-186 Vital Forces and Organisms in the Opus postumum ....Pages 187-220 Materialism, Hylozoism, and Natural History in the Opus postumum ....Pages 221-259 Concluding Remarks....Pages 261-264 Back Matter....Pages 265-283