German Idealism

The Struggle against Subjectivism, 1781–1801

Frederick C. Beiser

• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Year: 2008
• ISBN:
  9780674971219
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Philosophy History & Theory

One of the very few accounts in English of German idealism, this ambitious work advances and revises our understanding of both the history and the thought of the classical period of German philosophy. As he traces the structure and evolution of idealism as a doctrine, Frederick Beiser exposes a strong objective, or realist, strain running from Kant to Hegel and identifies the crucial role of the early romantics—Hölderlin, Schlegel, and Novalis—as the founders of absolute idealism.

PART I

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Kant’s Critique of Idealism

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Introduction: Kant and the Problem of Subjectivism

1. The Clash of Interpretations

In the more than two hundred years since the publication of the Kritik der reinen Vernunft in May 1781 there have been countless interpretations of Kant’s transcendental idealism. These interpretations vary greatly, and they often flatly contradict one another. But, whatever their differences, all have to define themselves in terms of two antithetical extremes. At one extreme there is the subjectivist interpretation, which maintains that Kant’s transcendental idealism is a species of subjective idealism;¹ at the other extreme there is the objectivist interpretation, which states that transcendental idealism is, if only implicitly, a primitive form of objective or absolute idealism.²

According to the subjectivist interpretation, Kant’s transcendental idealism is the epitome of the way of ideas inaugurated by Descartes, and then developed by Locke, Berkeley, and Hume. Supposedly, transcendental idealism is based upon the fundamental principle behind this tradition: that the immediate objects of perception are the ideas of the perceiving subject. But it takes this principle to its ultimate skeptical conclusion: that we have no direct knowledge of reality in itself; rather, all that we know are our own representations, from which we must infer the existence of an independent reality. The fundamental premise behind this interpretation is its account of Kant’s concept of an appearance. On this account, appearances are not aspects or extrinsic properties of things-in-themselves but simply representations. Since Kant often states that appearances are nothing more than representations, and since he also insists that we know nothing more than appearances, it follows that all we know is our own representations. Hence transcendental idealism proves to be a form of subjectivism or skeptical solipsism, a doctrine limiting knowledge to the contents of our individual minds.

Prima facie the subjectivist interpretation seems to be wildly implausible, riding roughshod over the realistic aspects of Kant’s transcendental idealism. More specifically, it appears to ignore not only Kant’s belief in the reality of things-in-themselves but also his empirical realism, his doctrine that the existence of objects in space is given in perception. But the subjectivists are perfectly aware of these realistic aspects of Kant’s system; they argue, however, that they are incompatible with his more fundamental principles. Hence they stress the subjectivist premise behind Kant’s empirical realism: the identification of material objects with representations; and they point out that Kant’s belief in the reality of things-in-themselves is inconsistent with his critical teaching that we cannot know anything beyond experience. If Kant were only consistent, the subjectivists contend, there would be very little difference between his idealism and Berkeley’s. Ultimately, the only difference between their idealisms is Kant’s greater rationalism: transcendental idealism is simply Berkeley’s idealism without its empiricism.

According to the objectivist interpretation, transcendental idealism is not the apotheosis of, but the antidote to, the Cartesian way of ideas. Nowhere is this antidote more apparent than in the Transcendental Deduction of the first Kritik, where Kant shows how the ideas of the knowing subject are determined by the intersubjective order of the a priori concepts of the understanding. There Kant turns subjectivism upside down, for he demonstrates that the intersubjective public world constituted by these concepts is not constructed from the ideas of the individual mind; rather, it is the necessary condition of even having such ideas. The knowing subject therefore loses its primacy, because it is not the first condition of experience but simply another element within experience itself. The fundamental mistake of the subjectivists, the objectivists further contend, is that they construe Kant’s forms of understanding and intuition as psychological faculties, as if they were only the subject’s ways of conceiving and perceiving the world. But this hypostatizes these forms, treating them again as objects within experience when they are instead the conditions for its possibility. These forms cannot be conceived as either subjective or objective because they lay down the conditions under which anything can be identified as either subjective or objective.

Prima facie the objectivist interpretation seems to be as implausible as the subjectivist one. Most conspicuously, it appears to ignore or eliminate the Kantian version of the Cartesian cogito, the ‘I’ of the unity of apperception, which is the source of all the categories. But it is precisely with regard to the unity of apperception that the objectivist interpretation shows its true colors. The objectivists insist that ‘I’ does not designate any subject at all, whether pure and universal or empirical and individual. Following Kant’s suggestion in the Paralogisms, they note that ‘I’ designates nothing more than an impersonal ‘it.’ This ‘it’ is either the activity of pure thinking—the mere exercise of a cognitive function—or it is the unifying principle behind the totality of experience, that which makes the forms of understanding and sensibility into a systematic whole.³

Whether implicitly or explicitly, unwittingly or intentionally, the objectivist interpretation brings Kant’s transcendental idealism very close to the absolute idealism of Schelling and Hegel.⁴ The central thesis of absolute idealism is that everything is an appearance of the idea, where the idea is not something in the individual conscious mind but the form, archetype, or structure of reality in general. Since it is a normative order that makes possible both subjectivity and objectivity, this idea is neither subjective nor objective itself; rather, it transcends both the subject and object and yet manifests itself in both. Because they provide the conditions under which the subject and object, the appearances of inner and outer sense, become objects of experience, Kant’s a priori forms are the prototypes for such a normative order.

2. Method and Results

Prima facie it seems absurd that Kant’s transcendental idealism can be interpreted in such antithetical ways. Yet Kant’s texts are so rich and dense that advocates of both interpretations have been able to find evidence for them. Both parties concede that there are some passages that count against their interpretation; but they insist that these do not represent the spirit, intention, or ultimate direction behind Kant’s thought. For them, it is not so much a question of what Kant did say but of what he ought to have said according to his fundamental principles.

How is it possible for the Kant scholar to determine the strengths and weaknesses of these interpretations? How can he find his way through the textual labyrinth, which seems to support both readings? The most simple and straightforward approach is historical: to investigate Kant’s philosophical development, and more specifically Kant’s own reaction to subjective and objective idealism. It is still an underappreciated fact that, for decades, Kant himself had been a sharp critic of all forms of idealism. From his 1755 Nova dilucidatio to his 1797–1800 Opus postumum, he had opposed both extremes of the idealist tradition. He had criticized Descartes’ subjective idealism because it doubted the reality of the external world; and he had attacked Leibniz’s objective idealism because it affirmed only the reality of the noumenal world. After the formulation of his own idealist doctrine in the 1770 Inaugural Dissertation, Kant struggled to distinguish his idealism from other variants, especially Leibniz’s Platonic idealism. This concern only intensified after the publication of the first Kritik, when Kant became especially troubled by the charge of Berkeleyianism. Finally, in both the first and second editions of the Kritik, and in the Reflexionen of the 1790s, Kant devoted much energy to the refutation of Descartes’ skeptical idealism. It is safe to conclude that, throughout his development, Kant conceived his transcendental idealism as the middle path between the extremes of subjective and objective idealism. It is as if he already foresaw—and forcefully rejected—both the subjective and objective interpretations of his transcendental idealism.

Since the historical approach promises to shed the most light on the difficult interpretative issues, Part I provides a close study of Kant’s reaction toward idealism. I focus especially on the development of Kant’s views, begining with the 1755 Nova dilucidatio and closing with the Opus postumum. The first chapter considers Kant’s attitude toward idealism in the precritical years; the second, third, and fourth chapters examine his refutation of dogmatic and skeptical idealism in the first edition of the Kritik. Chapters 5 and 6 are devoted to Kant’s critique of idealism in the Prolegomena and the second edition of the Kritik, while chapters 7–9 evaluate the objectivist interpretation of Kant’s idealism. The final chapter examines the development of Kant’s transcendental idealism in the Opus postumum. The main result of my investigation is that Kant’s transcendental idealism is not entirely or exclusively either subjective or objective idealism; rather, it is a relatively coherent synthesis of both forms, which preserves and negates elements from each.

If transcendental idealism is such a synthesis, the business of Kant scholarship is to determine exactly its place between the extremes of subjectivism and objectivism. Its task is to specify the respects in which this synthesis is both subjectivist and objectivist. In attempting to fulfill this task, I have come to the following conclusions:

1. Kant’s transcendental idealism is objectivist insofar as (1) the intersubjective forms of experience are not ideas but the necessary conditions of having ideas, and (2) these forms are the necessary conditions of subjectivity and objectivity, the representations of both inner and outer sense (7.2, 7.3).

2. Kant’s transcendental idealism is subjectivist insofar as (1) it attaches all appearances to a transcendental subject, which is their source, and insofar as (2) this subject is ineliminable, that is, it is not only consistent with but necessary to the transcendental conditions of experience (8.2–8.5). This subject cannot be simply an impersonal ‘it’ because Kant is justified in attributing to it two of the necessary conditions of subjectivity: self-awareness and spontaneity.

3. Kant has an ambivalent position vis-à-vis the way of ideas. On the one hand, he denies some of the fundamental tenets of this tradition: that ideas are given, self-evident, and resemble their objects (7.2–7.5). On the other hand, he sometimes reaffirms its basic principle: that the immediate objects of awareness are ideas. For Kant, no less than Berkeley, an idea resembles nothing but an idea.

4. Kant’s ambivalence vis-à-vis the way of ideas is also apparent from the new meaning he gives to this principle. Kant both radicalizes and neutralizes it. He radicalizes it insofar as he extends it to outer as well as inner experience; outer experience, the perception of objects in space, consists in the immediate awareness of my own ideas no less than inner experience, self-awareness in time. Hence the existence of objects in space is not the result of mere inference (3.1–3.2; 8.1). Nevertheless, by radicalizing this principle Kant also neutralizes it, because it is no longer the basis for a doctrine of privileged access, as if I knew only myself with certainty and had to infer the existence of the external world. Kant’s extension of this principle means that I know myself not only as much as, but also as little as, objects in space. If I know both myself and outer objects directly and immediately, I also know them only as appearances and never as they are in themselves (7.6).

5. Kant’s transcendental idealism is irresolvably ambiguous, its meaning varying according to how Kant uses the term “appearance.” Kant both attaches appearances to, and detaches them from, things-in-themselves. He attaches them insofar as appearances are aspects or extrinsic properties of things-in-themselves; and he detaches them insofar as they are only representations within the consciousness of the perceiving subject. The source of this ambiguity lay not in equivocation, and still less in the systematically misleading “language of appearance.” Rather, it rested in Kant’s complex polemical context. Kant detached appearances from things-in-themselves when arguing against transcendental realism and Descartes’ skeptical idealism; but he attached appearances to things-in-themselves when distinguishing his idealism from Berkeley’s more metaphysical idealism (3.4–3.5).

6. Although Kant gives appearances a double sense, this does not mean that his transcendental idealism is incoherent or contradictory, since from a transcendental perspective it is possible, and indeed necessary, to regard appearances as both representations and properties of things-in-themselves (3.4–3.5).

7. The dispute between two-worlds and two-aspect theories concerning the status of appearances–whether they are only representations or aspects of things-in-themselves–is sterile and irresolvable, insofar as the texts give evidence for both readings and insofar as Kant used “appearance” in different senses depending on his polemical context.

8. Kant’s transcendental idealism is both epistemological and psychological. Its psychological dimension is irreducible and necessary insofar as Kant connects the questions of what we know with how we know. To discount its psychological dimension is also to undermine its response to skeptical problems.

9. Kant’s most important idealist opponents were Descartes and Leibniz, not Berkeley or Hume. While Kant did not regard Hume as an idealist at all (1.6), he interpreted Berkeley’s idealism in essentially Leibnizian or Platonic terms (5.5). Throughout his career Kant was especially troubled by Leibniz’s idealism, which he criticized to an extent that has still not been fully appreciated. There are criticisms of Leibniz’s idealism in the Transcendental Aesthetic and Second Antinomy of the first Kritik (4.1–4.4), in the Nova dilucidatio (1.2), in the metaphysics lectures, in the Inaugural Dissertation (1.4), and in the 1766 Träume eines Geistersehers (1.3). Some of the essential do...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Preface
• Contents
• Introduction
• I Kant’s Critique of Idealism
• II Fichte’s Critique of Subjectivism
• III Absolute Idealism
• IV Schelling and Absolute Idealism
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index