Immanuel Kant (1724 - 1804) was a German philosopher and one of the central figures of the Enlightenment, widely regarded as among the most influential thinkers in the history of Western philosophy. [1] Working almost entirely within his native city of Königsberg in the Kingdom of Prussia, he developed a systematic account of knowledge, morality, and experience known as critical philosophy, which sought to reconcile rationalism and empiricism and set enduring terms for modern thought. [2]
Early life and education
Kant was born on 22 April 1724 in Königsberg, then the capital of the Prussian province of East Prussia. He was raised in a family of modest means shaped by Pietist Lutheranism, an influence he encountered early at the Collegium Fridericianum. [3] In 1740 he entered the University of Königsberg, where he studied philosophy, mathematics, and natural science and became acquainted with the rationalist tradition of Leibniz and Wolff as well as the physics of Newton.
Academic career
After his father's death, Kant supported himself for several years as a private tutor to families in the region around Königsberg. He returned to the university as an unsalaried lecturer, or Privatdozent, in 1755, teaching a wide range of subjects including logic, metaphysics, mathematics, and physical geography. [2] In 1770 he was appointed professor of logic and metaphysics at Königsberg, a post he held for the rest of his career. His early, so-called pre-critical writings included work in natural philosophy, among them an account of the formation of the solar system from a rotating cloud of matter.
The critical philosophy
Kant's mature thought is set out in a series of major works beginning with the Critique of Pure Reason (1781, revised 1787). [1] There he argued that the mind actively structures experience through forms of intuition, such as space and time, and categories of the understanding, so that human knowledge is limited to objects as they appear rather than as they may be in themselves. He described this reorientation, in which objects conform to our cognition rather than the reverse, as a revolution in philosophy comparable to that of Copernicus. Kant termed his position transcendental idealism.
Ethics and later works
In moral philosophy Kant grounded ethics in reason and the idea of duty. In the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (1785) and the Critique of Practical Reason (1788) he formulated the categorical imperative, a supreme principle of morality binding on all rational agents. [4]
The Critique of the Power of Judgment (1790) extended his system to aesthetics and teleology, while later essays addressed religion, history, and politics, including his proposal for a lasting international peace among republican states.
Legacy
Kant died in Königsberg on 12 February 1804. His critical philosophy became the point of departure for German idealism and continues to inform debates in metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, and political theory. [2] Concepts such as the distinction between appearances and things in themselves, the emphasis on human autonomy, and the categorical imperative remain central reference points in modern philosophy.
