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The Fundamental Ambiguity of Kant’s Teleology of Reason

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Book cover Teleologische Reflexion in Kants Philosophie

Zusammenfassung

In a previous study, I argued that Kant was guided throughout his intellectual career by a few fundamental insights regarding what, broadly, has been called “teleology.” In particular, I argued that Kant’s Critical and utterly original conception of the structure and unity of reason as teleological evolved out of his pre-Critical attempts to perfect the theocentric teleology typical of – to take just two relevant examples – Christian Wolff and Alexander Pope. In this process, Kant came to the general view that the previous picture of the cosmos as unified into an inexhaustibly productive and infinitely dense nexus of ends has its source in the intrinsic “needs” of finite human reason.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. America University of Beirut, Beirut, Libanon

    Courtney D. Fugate

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  1. Courtney D. Fugate
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Correspondence to Courtney D. Fugate .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Universität Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg, Germany

    Paula Órdenes

  2. Universität Jena, Jena, Thüringen, Germany

    Anna Pickhan

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Fugate, C.D. (2019). The Fundamental Ambiguity of Kant’s Teleology of Reason. In: Órdenes, P., Pickhan, A. (eds) Teleologische Reflexion in Kants Philosophie. Springer VS, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-23694-6_2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-23694-6_2

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