KANT ON LOGICAL FORM by Alexandra Mary Newton MA in Philosophy and German Literature ...

195 Pages·2010·0.78 MB·English

KANT ON LOGICAL FORM

by
Alexandra Mary Newton
M.A. in Philosophy and German Literature, Universität Tübingen, 2003

Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of
Arts and Sciences in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy

University of Pittsburgh
2010
UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH
FACULTY OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

This dissertation was presented

by

Alexandra Mary Newton

It was defended on
September 30th, 2010
and approved by
Robert Brandom, Distinguished Professor of Philosophy, University of Pittsburgh
Nicholas Rescher, University Professor, Philosophy, University of Pittsburgh
Sebastian Rödl, Professor, Philosophy, University of Basel
Karl Schafer, Assistant Professor, Philosophy, University of Pittsburgh
Dissertation Co-Director: Stephen Engstrom, Professor, Philosophy, University of Pittsburgh
Dissertation Co-Director: John McDowell, Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy,
University of Pittsburgh

ii
Copyright © by Alexandra M. Newton
2010
iii
KANT ON LOGICAL FORM

Alexandra M. Newton, PhD

University of Pittsburgh, 2010

Most philosophers today assume what Kant might have called a ‘material’ conception of logic.
According to the material conception, the laws of logic obtain independently of our
consciousness of them, because they are either objective ‘laws of truth’, laws governing
linguistic practices, or laws innate to our cognitive capacities. But it is often overlooked that this
view of logic faces intractable difficulties in providing an adequate explanation of how these
laws govern the mind. (Both rationalist and empiricist attempts to offer an explanation have been
made.) The material conception immunizes logic from these problems, since it assumes that they
do not concern logic, but merely concern epistemological views about what it is to have
knowledge of logic.
In this dissertation I argue that Kant avoids the epistemological difficulties because he
has a ‘formal’ conception of general logic, according to which logical operations and rules
articulate self-consciousness in any exercise of the understanding. That is, they are not rules or
procedures for generating intellectual acts (such as judgments), nor are they products of
intellectual acts. Instead, they bring to (self-) consciousness the necessity (or ‘necessary synthetic
unity’) in the activity of the understanding itself. Logical cognition thus is not material cognition
of that which is distinct from our cognition of it, but instead is formal cognition, or cognition that
iv
any act of cognition has of itself. I argue that we cannot fully appreciate these points if we
assume an ‘analytic approach’ to Kant’s logic, according to which logical operations consist in
mere acts of comparison (or analysis) of representations. General logic must primarily concern
itself with the understanding’s acts of synthesis in cognition, acts that are directed at an inner
telos or purpose (namely, systematic unity in the whole of cognitions). Kant’s conception of
logical form thus invokes an organic notion of ‘form’ that is linked to the teleological structure
of our cognitive capacities.

v
TABLE OF CONTENTS

PREFACE ................................................................................................................................. VIII
NOTES ON SOURCES AND ABBREVIATIONS .................................................................. XI
1.0 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................. 1
1.1 OVERVIEW ................................................................................................................... 1
1.2 WHAT IS LOGIC? ........................................................................................................ 2
1.3 LOGIC AS A SCIENCE .............................................................................................. 11
2.0 CONCEPTS ........................................................................................................................... 17
2.1 WHAT IS A CONCEPT? ............................................................................................ 18
2.2 CONCEPTS AND APPERCEPTION: CONCEPT-FORMATION AND THE
FORM OF A CONCEPT ................................................................................................... 34
2.2.1 Interpretive Difficulties Surrounding the Notion of Logical Reflection ...... 34
2.2.2 Logical Reflection and the Clarity of Concepts .............................................. 42
2.2.3 Objection 1: Reflection in the Brutes .............................................................. 48
2.2.4 Objection 2: Reflection in Concept-Formation .............................................. 51
2.2.5 Generality of the ‘I think’ and the Extension of a Concept .......................... 58
3.0 JUDGMENT .......................................................................................................................... 63
3.1 THE ANALYTIC APPROACH .................................................................................. 65
vi
3.2 REICH’S SYNTHETIC APPROACH ....................................................................... 72
3.3 THE MERE SYNTHETIC APPROACH .................................................................. 78
3.3.1 Analytic and Synthetic Unity of Apperception ............................................... 78
3.3.2 Analytic and Synthetic Unity of Apperception in a Judgment ..................... 81
3.3.3 Two Senses of “Logical Form” ........................................................................ 85
3.3.4 The Organic Unity of Judgment ...................................................................... 96
4.0 INFERENCE ....................................................................................................................... 103
4.1 INFERENCES OF THE UNDERSTANDING ........................................................ 104
4.2 INFERENCES OF REASON .................................................................................... 114
4.2.1 The Analytic Approach................................................................................... 116
4.2.2 The Synthetic Approach ................................................................................. 126
4.3 LOGICAL VALIDITY .............................................................................................. 144
5.0 CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................... 151
5.1 LOGIC AND SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS ................................................................. 151
5.2 AGAINST EMPTY FORMALISM: KANT’S ORGANIC CONCEPTION OF
LOGICAL FORM ............................................................................................................ 159
APPENDIX: PROFILING KANT’S POSITION ON THE FORM OF DISCURSIVE
CONCEPTS IN RELATION TO HIS PREDECESSORS ................................................... 165
BIBLIOGRAPHY ..................................................................................................................... 175

vii
PREFACE
In working on this dissertation, I have spent almost as much time trying to understand Kant as I
have spent trying to understand my advisors, Stephen Engstrom and John McDowell. If I have
succeeded in understanding any one of them, it has only been in virtue of understanding the
others. And if I have understood anything in philosophy at all, I think it has been because I have
understood at least one of these philosophers. I am immensely grateful to them for giving me a
sense of what it is important to understand.
The initial project was inspired by John McDowell’s non-hybrid account of knowledge in
“Knowledge and the Internal”, a paper to which I have returned on several occasions while
writing this dissertation. I am very grateful to John for listening to my fumbling attempts to
articulate a thought in the beginning phases of writing my dissertation, and for sometimes
formulating the thought for me. I never left his office without something new and important to
think about.
My greatest intellectual debt is to Stephen Engstrom, whose seminar on judgment and
papers on Kant’s theoretical philosophy (especially “Understanding and Sensibility”) set me on
my present course of research. Steve has helped me over the past few years in more ways that I
can hope to express here. My debt to him is blatant on every page of this dissertation. I am
grateful to him for his kind support and encouragement, his patience, and for the countless hours
he spent discussing my work. Steve’s refusal to skip any steps in the progress of a thought, even
viii
under duress, has taught me a great deal about intellectual integrity. Most of all, I am grateful to
Steve for getting me to appreciate the fundamental principles of his philosophical system, since I
believe that these principles will have a lasting influence on my pursuits in philosophy.
Sebastian Rödl’s seminar on self-consciousness was one of those events in Pittsburgh that
changed my entire way of thinking about philosophy. His written works have had a huge
influence on what I think. I thank Robert Brandom for his comments on my project, which have
always been encouraging, even when critical. I hope that, at some later stage of this project, I
will be able to meet his challenges. I am thankful also to Nicholas Rescher and Karl Schafer for
their comments in the final stages of my dissertation.
I will always have fond memories of the incredible community of graduate students in
Pittsburgh. Markos Valaris never grew tired of getting me to think more clearly by refusing to
accept anything I said until I could provide an argument that he would have given himself. He
graciously read drafts of the chapters in this dissertation and offered insightful comments on all
of them. I am also grateful to Lissa Merritt, who got me to think more about various issues
through our written dialogue. I have learned a great deal from sessions of Steve- and Kant-
exegesis with Ian Blecher, and I look forward to many years of exchange with him about all
things philosophical. Numerous conversations with Evgenia Mylonaki have helped me to see
that all of us are really working on the same project. Her wit and love of life made the dreary
winter months in Pittsburgh bearable, and I don’t know how I would have survived without her
moral support. I have also been helped over the years by conversations with Alp Aker, Greg
Strom, Dan Addison, Kohei Kishida, Susanna Schellenberg, Matthew Boyle, Jeremy Heis, Hille
Paakkunainen, Jennifer Frey, Chris Frey, Vaheh Shirvanian, Tyke Nunes, and many others in
Pittsburgh.
ix
The summers of 2007 and 2008 were spent in Germany, where I had the opportunity to
present the first stages of my work in the colloquiums at Heidelberg and Tübingen. I am thankful
to the audiences there for their comments, especially to Andreas Schmidt, Markus Gabriel, Mike
Stange, and Anton-Friedrich Koch.
I would also like to thank Eric Watkins, Lanier Anderson, Markus Willaschek, and the
other members of the audience at the Pacific Study Group of the North American Kant Society in
October 2009 for their very helpful comments on a draft of a chapter for this dissertation. In
particular I would like to express my gratitude to Clinton Tolley, with whom I have had several
productive conversations about Kant’s logic.
I spent the last few months completing the dissertation in the excellent philosophy library
at the University of Heidelberg, Germany. I am extremely grateful to Anton Koch for his help in
making those months in Heidelberg possible and for the many discussions we had about my
project, in which we agreed to disagree.
By far my greatest personal debt is to Jochen Bojanowski, whose support throughout my
turbulent years in graduate school has surpassed the ‘mean’ of generosity. He has urged me to
think more clearly, to be more precise in my use of language (both English and German), and to
stand on my own two feet. It would not be an exaggeration (or ‘croc’) to say that this
dissertation, and my completion of graduate school, were things we accomplished together.

x