During the epoch of Enlightenment, philosophical thought went through a series of changes. At first, philosophers celebrated reason and rationalism as the main method of exploring the world. Later, with the development of empiricism, the thinkers focused on the significance of sense experience. Both schools of thought had a different approach to philosophy and the interpretation of the “truth”, as they perceived the world through distinctive perspectives. For instance, rationalists insisted that humans possess certain knowledge though their intuition and innate concepts and knowledge. On the contrary, empiricists denied the existence of innate knowledge or concepts by implying that people derive their knowledge from sense experience.
Two radically different approaches to the “truth” and perception of the world were explored by Immanuel Kant. Later, the ideas of rationalists and empiricists were analyzed by Kant in his Critique of Pure Reason. It was considered that, in general, his work was a synthesis of both schools due to the resemblance of his ideas to the works of well-known empiricists and rationalists. In addition, Kant managed to address the works of both schools directly by presenting his claims in Critique of Pure Reason.
Continental Rationalism is a category developed to unite the works of rationalists operating in continental Europe, for example, Rene Descartes, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, and Baruch Spinoza. In the same manner, British Empiricism has united the philosophers working in Britain, including David Hume and John Locke. Rationalists have developed several major claims that became the basis of their philosophy. First of all, rationalists insisted that some parts of subject areas are known by people through their intuition, while other parts are deduced from the intuited knowledge.
127 our experts are availableright now
Secondly, people know certain truths and specific concepts as a part of their rational nature. Thirdly, rationalists claimed that knowledge available through intuition and rational nature cannot be gained through sense experience, thus, the reason is superior over sense experience. Overall, the rationalists attributed the ability of gaining knowledge and realizing the truths to the people’s innate characteristics and so-called rational nature. Empiricists based their school of thought on the critique of rationalism by denying its ideas. Specifically, they insisted that the source of knowledge and concepts in a specific subject area is sense experience.
However, despite opposing each other, some philosophers from both camps had very similar ideas regarding the experience and the nature of people’s ideas. For instance, Descartes and Locke had somewhat similar perception of the nature of human ideas despite the fact that the first links them to the innate nature of humans, while the latter prefers to attribute these ideas to the experience. Consequently, as the representatives of the opposite schools were able to find certain consensus, it is not surprising that Kant was able to combine both philosophies in his work.
In Critique of Pure Reason, Kant was affected by certain ideas that can be found in empiricism and rationalism. The first sentences of his massive work, Kant dedicates to the support of empiricist thought. Particularly, Kant implies in the Introduction to his book, “experience is, without doubt, the first product to which our understanding gives rise, by working on the raw material of sense impressions”. Here, the philosopher confirms that experience is responsible for people’s understanding of the “truth” when they process the sense impressions.
Moreover, later, Kant states that “no cognition in us precedes experience”, which reinforces the philosopher’s support of empiricism. However, Kant also implies that even though human cognition starts with experience, it does not derives only from experience. In addition, the philosopher develops a concept of universal cognitions that have intrinsic nature and they are independent from experience. In this case, Kant contradicts the empiricism by claiming that humans have certain intrinsic or innate characteristics that provide a possibility for people to retrieve knowledge from experience, yet, it remains independent to the experience. This is a clear indication of a synthesis of both philosophical frameworks, empiricism and rationalism, as Kant combines their beliefs in sense experience and innate characteristics of human nature.
In this case, Kant’s notion of universal cognitions can be compared to rationalists’ perception of an innate nature of humans that allows them to obtain knowledge and concepts in specific areas. The philosopher supports empiricism by referring to experience as a source of knowledge. At the same time, Kant insists that both intrinsic characteristics and experience are responsible for finding out the “truths” and obtaining knowledge. Sense experience cannot serve as a sole source of knowledge since an individual has to be able to synthesize this knowledge from experience. In this way, Kant divides the areas of influence of innate abilities and sense experience on human ability to gain knowledge.
In “Transcendental Aesthetics” (a part of Critique of Pure Reason), Kant defines sensibility as “the capacity to acquire presentations as a result of the way in which we are affected by objects”. Kant continues by claiming that sensibility supplies people with intuition. By understanding the experience, people develop certain concepts. Therefore, the thoughts refer to intuitions as well as to sensibility. Moreover, Kant considered that pure form of sensibility is intuition, which probably triggered the critique of both philosophical frameworks, as Kant managed to unite the concept of intuition, which was considered an innate feature, and sensibility that was used by empiricists to emphasize the impact of experience.
While the resemblance of the ideas of empiricism and rationalism in Critique of Pure Reason is easy to recognize, it is impossible to label Kant’s work as a simple synthesis of these two schools. Critique of Pure Reason is a work of new ideas on human nature and the ability of people to obtain knowledge and develop concepts. This work has developed new dimensions in the debate between the empiricists and rationalists. For example, Kant develops two significant distinctions in knowledge to support his point. The philosopher insisted that there is a priori knowledge and posteriori knowledge, where the first type refers to the knowledge independent from experience, while the second type is derived with the help of experience. By creating these distinctions, Kant managed to develop a new area of discussion in the debate that differentiated between the types of knowledge retrieved with the help of intuition and sense experience. Kant also formulated a distinction between analytic and synthetic judgments by linking them to the a priori and posteriori experience accordingly. These new ideas have enriched the debate by providing a possibility to discuss the differences and similarities of these frameworks.
Rationalism affected Kant’s work and the philosopher was particularly inspired by the legacy of Leibniz and his follower Christian Wolff. In Critique of Pure Reason, Kant addressed several major works of both philosophers. In this case, Kant focused on Leibniz’s doctrine as a failed dogmatic framework in metaphysics and philosophical thought rather than the effective approach to the nature of truth. Kant adopted the dualistic approach developed by Leibniz regarding the availability of reason and eternal (innate) truths, yet, Kant did not support the dogmatic nature of Leibniz’s ideas. Kant referred to Wolff’s strict method by characterizing it as “the regular ascertainment of principles, the clear determination of concepts, the attempt at strictness in proofs, and the prevention of audacious leaps in inferences” Kant used this approach to his work in order to create a strict and transparent definition of concept that would be understandable by the representatives of both philosophies.
Empiricists, who affected Kant, include Hume and Locke. Specifically, Kant referred to Hume’s principle of causality by objecting to it. The philosopher claimed that reference to causality is the main problem of pure reason. Kant continued that as the metaphysics failed to distinguish between the synthetic and analytic judgements, the relevance of causality is questionable. Overall, Kant’s work was based, in most part, on Hume’s philosophical thought and his ideas of causality. Locke has proposed an idea of a blank slate or tabula rasa, as he considered that people are born without any innate knowledge. Kant explored and questioned this idea by objecting to it, at least partially, by claiming that people have certain innate abilities that allows them to synthesize the information from their experience.
Kant’s synthesis is successful since he managed to address the most debatable principles of empiricism and rationalism. The philosopher targeted the concepts of innate cognitive abilities of humans and the impact of sense experience on their ability to retrieve and synthesize the information. Furthermore, Kant managed to expand the debate of these philosophical schools by adding more ideas to this conversation. For instance, the philosopher distinguished between two types of knowledge (a priori and posteriori) and two types of judgements (synthetic and analytic) that contributed to the amplification of the conversation.
