[SydPhil] Katherine Dunlop tomorrow, Wednesday 5 March, 3.30pm, followed by reception

[Dalia Nassar]

*Wednesday 5 March, 3.30pm, Muniment Room, Main Quad, University of Sydney*

*Katherine Dunlop, Univ of Texas and Sydney Centre for the Foundations of
Science*


*Kant on "Transcendental" and Ordinary Logic*
The Critique of Pure Reason is structured as an (eighteenth-century)
treatise on logic.  In particular, the Categories are identified through
their supposed correspondence with logically basic forms of judgment.  But
while Kant claims logic abstracts from thought's content, i.e. its relation
to an object, his own theory of cognition--which he designates
"transcendental logic"--is supposed to concern "pure thinking of objects".
To solve the puzzle of how Kant can regard his theory as a logic, I argue
that the content thematized in transcendental logic is already presupposed
in ordinary logic.  Like many other eighteenth-century thinkers, Kant
conceives logic as rules for the use of mental faculties, and on his view
the proper use of our understanding is to relate to objects (through
intuition). On this interpretation, Kant's view is undeniably
psychologistic.  As such it faces the classic objection that it wrongly
narrows logic's scope, to things we can think about.  In particular, on
this interpretation logic is inapplicable to things in themselves.  I argue
that this consequence should be accepted: logical knowledge, as Kant
conceives it, exceeds what we can claim about things in themselves.

Followed by a *welcome* *reception* at 5.30pm for Katherine hosted by
the *Sydney
Centre for the Foudnations of Science, Philosophy Common Room, Main Quad*
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