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Kant's Philosophy of Science: The Transition From Metaphysics to Science

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2022

Robert E Butts
Robert E Butts*
Affiliation:
The University of Western Ontario
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Extract

For many of us nurtured in idealist ways inclining us to unwavering acceptance of Kantian principles, 1951 was a bad year. We read in Reichenbach's The Rise of Saientifio Philosophy of the “disintegration of the synthetic a priori”. Kant had taught us that there are very general principles—each one connected to a primal category of thought—that are necessary in the formation of mathematics and physics and are expressible in nonanalytic propositions. However, since Kant's death in 1804 both mathematics and physics have developed revolutionary traits: non-euclidian geometries, new developments in symbolic logic, relativity physics, and finally, quantum mechanics, sealed the negative fate of Kant's high principles. Henceforth we must accept that there are no non-empty claims about reality that can be counted as necessary or indispensable to mathematics and science.

Type
Part XVII. Kant's Philosophy of Science
Information
PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association , Volume 1984 , Issue 2: Volume Two: Symposia and Invited Papers 1984 , 1984 , pp. 684 - 705
Copyright
Copyright © 1985 by the Philosophy of Science Association

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