KANT’S TRANSCENDENTAL DOCTRINE OF METHOD

KANT’S TRANSCENDENTAL DOCTRINE OF METHOD
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By Marsigit, Yogyakarta State University, Indonesia
Email: marsigitina@yahoo.com

Mellway, J., 2004, elaborated that Kant rejects the division of logic into theoretical logic and practical logic, as a practical logic would assume that we have acquaintance with the matter of the associated theoretical logic and, hence, would not really be merely a type of logic. Instead, Kant  divided pure philosophy into a doctrine of elements and a doctrine of method. According to Kant,  the doctrine of elements is concerned with teaching the propaedeutic components of the logic, and the doctrine of method is concerned with teaching the canon aspects of the associated science. Further, Kant  noted that a canon uses the necessary conditions for the science that allows us to assess and correct our theories based on them satisfying these negative conditions, or in other words, a canon contains the rules for thinking correctly about the matter of the science; while an organon goes beyond a canon in that is can legitimately extend our knowledge beyond the scope of a canon. Another way of stating this division is that the ends of these sciences are different; the end of a canon is to elucidate our knowledge, while the end of an organon is to extend our knowledge

Kant, 1787, elaborated that logic is "of understanding and of reason", and a priori presentations constituting the condition under which objects are given to us and it is in this sense that the sensations given partly constitute the form of our concepts and thoughts. Intuition is the effect of an object on us and is a type of representation that intentional refers to a single object of sensation; while Appearance concerns the referred undetermined intentional thing, where the form of appearance is the ordered relationship of the manifold of sensation and the matter of appearance is whatever it is that corresponds to a sensation. Kant  divides our higher cognitive powers into three different faculties with each faculty having its own essential principle function of thought that are: the faculties of understanding, judgment, and reason; whose respective functions deal with the doctrines of concepts, of judgments, and of inferences. Kant  stated that Concepts are representations that refer indirectly to many, that is, to a universal; Judgments are the representation of a unity of several representations; and Inferences are the functions of thought that derive a judgment from other judgments.

Mellway, J., 2004, elaborated that doctrines of method are concerned with teaching the canonic aspects of the associated science; that is, they are concerned with presenting how we can elucidate our knowledge by assessing what we say by using the analytical elements that were learned from the doctrine of elements. Doctrines of method present a canon for assessing how we do the science that doctrine of method is associated with; it provides the rules or principles in which it gives how those rules are to be used for the associated science.  He noted that the elements of the doctrine of elements are the matter of that doctrine and these same elements are part of the form of the associated doctrine of method. Further he insisted that there are several conditions of the perfection of cognitions, which are the form of the form for the doctrine of method, that consist in the distinctness, thoroughness, and systematic ordering of the science.

Mellway, J., 2004, also elaborated that since the doctrine of elements spelled out the elemental parts of the form, the doctrine of method should spend its bulk elucidating the conditions of the form; three conditions consist of completely spelling out our concepts that are  describing or defining,  dividing, and  structuring. He noted that  Kant has universal rules of logical division such that the division of concepts is exclusive and exhaustive, and that the codivisions; Kant’s methodology involves him organizing his concepts in a genus-species fashion, as this should force him to arrange his technical concepts in a clear way. The primitive type of division  is into two components that are in contradictory opposition that called a dichotomy, opposed to polytomy; accordingly, all analytic division is dichotomous and normally all a priori division is also dichotomous; lthough mathematical a priori intuitions can be polytomous and a division that is based on
the principle of synthetic a priori has three components : form, matter, and form applied to matter. Mellway stated that we can find this  trichotomous divisions in the separation of the higher cognitive powers into judgment, understanding, and reason; therefore, the Transcendental Doctrine of Method is the determination of the formal conditions of a complete system of pure reason..
Johnes, R.B., 2004, noted that if we regard the sum of the cognition of pure speculative reason as an edifice, the idea of which, at least, exists in the human mind, it may be said that we have in the Transcendental Doctrine of Elements examined the materials and determined to what edifice these belong, and what its height and stability. He insisted that we are able to understand, by the transcendental doctrine of method, the determination of the formal conditions of a complete system of pure reason. Johnes stated that shall accordingly have to treat of the discipline, the canon, the architectonic, and, finally, the history of pure reason. The part of the Critique will accomplish, from the transcendental point of view, what has been usually attempted, but miserably executed, under the name of practical logic. He claimed that due to the general logic is not being limited to any particular kind of cognition nor to any particular objects, it cannot, without borrowing from other sciences, do more than present merely the titles or signs of possible methods and the technical expressions, which are employed in the systematic parts of all sciences; and thus the pupil is made acquainted with names, the meaning and application of which he is to learn only at some future time.

The Discipline Of Pure Reason

Kant, 1787, insisted that it needs the compulsion by which the tendency to disobey certain rules is restrained; and therefore, discipline distinguished from culture which is intended to give a certain kind of skill and contribute in a negative fashion to the development of a talent, culture in a positive. Kant stated that when reason is being considered in its transcendental employment it stands greatly in need of a discipline to restrain its tendency towards extension beyond the narrow limits of possible experience.

In respect to the content of our knowledge in general, the task of negative judgments is that of rejecting error; however where the limits of our possible knowledge are very narrow, negative instructions guard us from error. Further Kant stated that the field of philosophy in which we endeavor to obtain the same certainty we reach in mathematics that is apodeictic certainty; philosophical knowledge is the knowledge gained by reason from concepts, while Mathematical knowledge is the knowledge gained by reason from the construction of concepts.
Kant, 1787, claimed that to construct a concept means to exhibit a priori the intuition which corresponds to the concept and for the construction of a concept we need a non-empirical intuition. He then insisted that non-empirical intuition must be a single object and must has universal validity for all possible intuition which fall under the concept. Kant  added that philosophical knowledge considers the particular only in the universal while mathematical knowledge the universal in the particular a priori by means of reason; and thus this is the essential difference between these two kinds of knowledge and not the difference of their material or objects. According to Kant,  the concept of quantities with which mathematics deals, is the only one that allows of being constructed, that is, exhibited a priori in intuition; whereas qualities cannot be presented in any intuition that is not empirical. Kant  then concluded that the concepts constructed by the mathematical method are universal synthetic propositions.

Kant, 1787,  insisted that there is a twofold employment of reason; and while the two modes of employment resemble each other in the universality and a priori origin of their knowledge, in outcome they are very different. Kant  claimed that a twofold employment of reason, in appearance, there are two elements: first, the form of intuition that are space and time, which can be known and determined a priori and can determine our concepts in a priori intuition, inasmuch as we create for ourselves the objects themselves through a homogeneous synthesis of space and time as the employment of reason through the construction of concepts and be the mathematical use of knowledge. Second, matter or content, which is met with in space and time and therefore contains an existent corresponding to sensation. Kant  insisted that this can only be determined empirically and we can have nothing a priori except indeterminate concepts of the synthesis of possible sensations; and this is the employment of reason is accordance with concepts in which the questions of possibility of existence, its actuality and necessity of these objects is the philosophical use of reason. Kant  claimed that transcendental propositions can never be given through construction of concepts, but only in accordance with concepts that are a priori; while synthetic propositions in regard to things in general are transcendental, however these synthetic principles cannot exhibit a priori any one of their concepts in a specific instance.

Kant, 1787, indicated that the exactness of mathematics rests upon definitions, axioms and demonstrations; none of these, in the sense understood by the mathematician, can be achieved or imitated by the philosopher. Definition  is to define means to present the complete, original concept of a thing within the limits of its concept; complete means  clearness and sufficiency of characteristics, limit means the precision shown in there not being more of these characteristics than belong to the complete concept, original means  the determination of the limits is not derived from anything else and therefore does not require proof. Kant  then summed up that an empirical concept, therefore, can not be defined, it can only be made explicit and never certain that we are not using the word, in denoting one and same object, sometimes so as to stand for more, sometimes to stand for fewer characteristics; no concept given a priori can be defined that is concepts such as cause, right, equity, etc. Kant  added that the completeness of the concept is always in doubt and instead of definition, the term 'exposition' applies. Accordingly, the only kind of concept that allows of definition are arbitrarily invented concepts; therefore, mathematics is the only science that has definitions while philosophical definitions are never more that expositions. Kant  concluded that since mathematical definitions make their concepts and in philosophical definitions the concepts are only explained, it follows that: first, in philosophy we must not imitate mathematics by beginning with definitions, since the definitions are analyses of given concepts, they presuppose the prior presence of the concepts; the definition ought to come at the end of our enquiries; in mathematics we have no concept prior to the definition; second, mathematical definitions can never be in error.

Next, Kant, 1787, stated that axiom is in so far as they are immediately certain, are synthetic a priori principles; mathematics can have axioms since by means of the construction of concepts in the intuition of the object it can combine predicates of the object both a priori and immediately. On the other hand, philosophy  has no axioms since it is simply what reason knows by means of concepts; and the axioms of intuition in the Table of Principles are not axioms in the mathematical sense, they are the principles that specify the possibility of axioms in general. Kant  further noted that demonstration is an apodeictic proof only in so far as it is intuitive; no empirical grounds of proof can ever amount to apodeictic proof. He claimed that mathematics alone contains demonstrations since it derives its knowledge not from concepts but from the construction of them, that is, from intuition, which can be given a priori in accordance with the concepts. Otherwise, philosophy does not have demonstrations because it has always to consider the universal by means of concepts, while mathematics can consider the universal in the single intuition. Kant called the philosophical proofs as discursive that is it divides all apodeictic propositions into synthetic propositions directly derived from concepts. and synthetic propositions when directly obtained through the construction of concepts. Kant  then concluded that analytic judgment tells us nothing new about the object so they cannot be called dogmas; in other word, there are no dogmas in philosophy because there are no synthetic judgment derived directly from concepts. In conclusion, for Kant, in philosophy all dogmatic methods are inappropriate and the only method is systematic.

Kant, 1787, named the sum total of the a priori principles of the correct employment of certain faculties of knowledge, as a canon; so the transcendental analytic is the canon of the pure understanding; therefore, in the speculative employment there is no canon of pure reason due it cannot produce synthetic knowledge. According to Kant,  the greatest and perhaps sole use of pure reason in its speculative employment is only negative; since it serves not as an organon for the extension, but as a discipline for the limitation of pure reason, and, instead of discovering truth, it has only the modest merit of guarding against error. Kant  claimed that if there be any correct employment of pure reason, in which case there must be a canon of its employment, the canon will deal with the practical employment of reason.

Kant, 1787, noted that the ultimate end to which the speculative reason in its transcendental employment is directed concerns three objects: the freedom of the will, the immortality of the soul, and the existence of God. Kant  explained that in respect of all three the merely speculative interest of reason is very small because they would not be of any use in the study of nature; these three propositions are for speculative reason always transcendent and allow of no immanent employment that is employment in reference to objects of experience. He then concluded that if these propositions are not necessary for knowledge, their importance must concern only the practical. Further, Kant  stated that the practical is everything that is possible through freedom. Accordingly, when the conditions of the exercise of our free will are empirical, reason can supply none but pragmatic laws of free action for the attainment of those ends which are commended to us by the senses.

For Kant, 1787, the moral law can be pure practical law that its end is given through reason completely a priori and which are not prescribed to us in an empirically conditioned but in an absolute manner. According to Kant,  the moral law belong to the practical employment of reason and refer to something further, namely, to the problem of what we ought to do, if the will is free, if there is a God and a future world. While freewill is a will which can be determined independently of sensuous impulses and opposed to animal will which can be determined only through sensuous impulses.  He the noted that everything which is bound up with freewill, whether as a ground or a consequence, is entitled practical and all practical concepts relate the objects of satisfaction and dissatisfaction and therefore, at least indirectly to the object of our feelings. However, according to Kant,  feeling is not a faculty whereby we represent things, so our judgments so far as they relate to pleasure or pain do not belong to transcendental philosophy.

Ultimately, Kant, 1787, indicated that practical freedom can be proved through experience; we have the power to overcome impressions of our faculty of sensuous desire, by calling up representations of what, in a more indirect manner, is useful or injurious and these considerations are based on reason in which the laws are imperatives that is objective laws of freedom, which tell us what ought to happen. Kant claimed that these laws are therefore entitled practical laws. Kant  admitted that when we know practical freedom to be one of the causes in nature, namely to be a causality of reason in the determination of the will, transcendental freedom demands the independence of this reason from all determining causes of the sensible world. Therefore, transcendental freedom is thus, it would seem, contrary to the law of nature, and therefore to all possible experience, and so remains a problem and this problem does not come within the province of reason in its practical employment so we can leave it aside. In conclusion, the canon of pure reason only deals with two questions, which relate to the practical interest of pure reason that is to ask whether there is a God or there is a future life. 


Note:

  Mellway, J., 2004, The Form of Experience: The Transcendental Analogy, University Course Essay
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Kant, I., 1787, Critic of Pure Reason: The Elements Of Transcendentalism
First Part, Transcendental Aesthetic, translated by by F. Max Muller
  Ibid.
  Mellway, J., 2004, The Form of Experience: The Transcendental Analogy, University Course Essay
  Bid.
  Kant, I., 1787, Critic of Pure Reason: The Elements Of Transcendentalism
First Part, Transcendental Aesthetic, translated by by F. Max Muller
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.
  Ibid.