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Andrew Chignell

Princeton University
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 More details
  • Princeton University
    University Center for Human Values
    Department of Philosophy
    Professor
Yale University
Department of Philosophy
PhD, 2004
APA Eastern Division
Homepage
Princeton, New Jersey, United States of America
0000-0002-3303-6195
Areas of Specialization
Immanuel Kant
17th/18th Century Philosophy
Philosophy of Religion
Food Ethics
Hope
Areas of Interest
Epistemology
Aesthetics
19th Century Philosophy
European Philosophy
Immanuel Kant
PhilPapers Editorships
Hope
Immanuel Kant
Kant: Metaphysics and Epistemology
Kant: Skepticism
Kant: Aesthetic Judgment
Neo-Kantianism
1 more
  • All publications (68)
  •  113
    Kant's Panentheism: The Possibility Proof of 1763 and Its Fate in the Critical Period
    In Ina Goy (ed.), Kant's Religious Arguments, De Gruyter. forthcoming.
    This chapter discusses Kant's 1763 "possibility proof" for the existence of God. I first provide a reconstruction of the proof in its two stages, and then revisit my earlier argument according to which the being the proof delivers threatens to be a Spinozistic-panentheistic God—a being whose properties include the entire spatio-temporal universe—rather than the traditional, ontologically distinct God of biblical monotheism. I go on to evaluate some recent alternative readings that have sought …Read more
    This chapter discusses Kant's 1763 "possibility proof" for the existence of God. I first provide a reconstruction of the proof in its two stages, and then revisit my earlier argument according to which the being the proof delivers threatens to be a Spinozistic-panentheistic God—a being whose properties include the entire spatio-temporal universe—rather than the traditional, ontologically distinct God of biblical monotheism. I go on to evaluate some recent alternative readings that have sought to avoid this result by arguing that the relevant facts about real modality can be ultimately grounded in God’s powers or thoughts – or that Kant just leaves the grounding relations mysterious. I argue that the textual and philosophical costs of each of these alternative readings are formidable. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the fate of the proof in the critical period. Some commentators think that it disappears altogether, or that it is downgraded such that it produces a mere regulative idea of God as the most real being. I suggest that the proof survives but that the mode of assent it licenses towards its conclusion changes from knowledge to a certain kind of Belief (Glaube).
    Kant: Philosophy of Religion, MiscKant: OntologyKant: GodKant: Rational TheologyKant: SpaceKant's Wo…Read more
    Kant: Philosophy of Religion, MiscKant: OntologyKant: GodKant: Rational TheologyKant: SpaceKant's Works in Pre-Critical Philosophy
  • Hope but not Optimism: The Kantian Mind at the End of All Things
    In Anna Ezekiel & Katerina Mihaylova (eds.), Hope and the Kantian Legacy: New Contributions to the History of Philosophy, Bloomsbury. forthcoming.
    Kant: Philosophy of HistoryHopeKant: Applied EthicsKant: Moral MotivationKant: Teleology in History …Read more
    Kant: Philosophy of HistoryHopeKant: Applied EthicsKant: Moral MotivationKant: Teleology in History and PoliticsKant: Moral Psychology, Misc
  •  333
    Focus Theory of Hope
    Philosophical Quarterly 73 (1): 44-63. 2022.
    Most elpistologists now agree that hope for a specific outcome involves more than just desire plus the presupposition that the outcome is possible. This paper argues that the additional element of hope is a disposition to focus on the desired outcome in a certain way. I first survey the debate about the nature of hope in the recent literature, offer objections to some important competing accounts, and describe and defend the view that hope involves a kind of focus or attention. I then suggest th…Read more
    Most elpistologists now agree that hope for a specific outcome involves more than just desire plus the presupposition that the outcome is possible. This paper argues that the additional element of hope is a disposition to focus on the desired outcome in a certain way. I first survey the debate about the nature of hope in the recent literature, offer objections to some important competing accounts, and describe and defend the view that hope involves a kind of focus or attention. I then suggest that this account makes sense of the intuitive thought that there are moral and pragmatic norms on hope that go beyond the norms on desires and modal presuppositions. I conclude by considering some key questions.
    Attention and Value TheoryMoral Psychology, MiscSalienceHopeAttention and ActionDesire, MiscMoral Re…Read more
    Attention and Value TheoryMoral Psychology, MiscSalienceHopeAttention and ActionDesire, MiscMoral Reasoning and Motivation, MiscVirtues and Vices
  •  174
    Kant, Wood and Moral Arguments
    Kantian Review 27 (1): 61-70. 2022.
    In this article I discuss the moral-coherence reading of Kant’s moral argument offered by Allen Wood in his recent book _Kant and Religion_, display some of the challenges that it faces and suggest that a moral-psychological formulation is preferable.
    Moral Reasoning and Motivation, MiscArguments from Moral OrderKant: GodKant: FaithKant: Moral Religi…Read more
    Moral Reasoning and Motivation, MiscArguments from Moral OrderKant: GodKant: FaithKant: Moral Religious Arguments
  •  206
    Knowledge, Anxiety, Hope: How Kant’s First and Third Questions Relate (Keynote address)
    In Beatrix Himmelmann & Camilla Serck-Hanssen (eds.), The Court of Reason: Proceedings of the 13th annual International Kant Congress, De Gruyter. pp. 127-149. 2021.
    Kant: Critique of the Power of JudgmentKant: Cognition and KnowledgeKant: Social, Political and Reli…Read more
    Kant: Critique of the Power of JudgmentKant: Cognition and KnowledgeKant: Social, Political and Religious Thought, Misc
  •  116
    Philosophy of Religion in Modern European Thought 1600-1800
    with Brendan Kolb
    The Encyclopedia of the Philosophy of Religion. 2021.
    The early modern period (roughly, 1600–1800 ce) in Europe brought tremendous changes in intellectual, political, and cultural life. It was a period in which philosophical debates were inevitably bound up with questions about the nature and sources of religious truth. A chronological examination of some of the period’s major thinkers highlights two issues that were central to the development of philosophy of religion in the period. The first concerns the relations between God, the soul, and the b…Read more
    The early modern period (roughly, 1600–1800 ce) in Europe brought tremendous changes in intellectual, political, and cultural life. It was a period in which philosophical debates were inevitably bound up with questions about the nature and sources of religious truth. A chronological examination of some of the period’s major thinkers highlights two issues that were central to the development of philosophy of religion in the period. The first concerns the relations between God, the soul, and the body; the other concerns the relationship between human reason and divine revelation.
    17th/18th Century British Philosophy17th/18th Century French Philosophy17th/18th Century Philosophy,…Read more
    17th/18th Century British Philosophy17th/18th Century French Philosophy17th/18th Century Philosophy, MiscellaneousPhilosophy of Religion, MiscellaneousEuropean Philosophy, Misc17th/18th Century German Philosophy
  •  196
    Kantian Fallibilism: Knowledge, Certainty, Doubt
    Midwest Studies in Philosophy 45 99-128. 2021.
    For Kant, knowledge involves certainty. If “certainty” requires that the grounds for a given propositional attitude guarantee its truth, then this is an infallibilist view of epistemic justification. Such a view says you can’t have epistemic justification for an attitude unless the attitude is also true. Here I want to defend an alternative fallibilist interpretation. Even if a subject has grounds that would be sufficient for knowledge if the proposition were true, the proposition might not be t…Read more
    For Kant, knowledge involves certainty. If “certainty” requires that the grounds for a given propositional attitude guarantee its truth, then this is an infallibilist view of epistemic justification. Such a view says you can’t have epistemic justification for an attitude unless the attitude is also true. Here I want to defend an alternative fallibilist interpretation. Even if a subject has grounds that would be sufficient for knowledge if the proposition were true, the proposition might not be true. And so there is sometimes still rational room for doubt. The goal of this paper is to present four different models of what “certainty” amounts to, for Kant, each of which is compatible with fallibilism.
    InfallibilityKant: JustificationKant: Cognition and KnowledgeJustification, MiscKant: Epistemology, …Read more
    InfallibilityKant: JustificationKant: Cognition and KnowledgeJustification, MiscKant: Epistemology, Misc
  •  201
    Hope and Despair at the Kantian Chicken Factory: Moral Arguments about Making a Difference
    In Lucy Allais & John J. Callanan (eds.), Kant and Animals, Oxford University Press. pp. 213-238. 2020.
    Kant: Moral Religious ArgumentsMoral Status of AnimalsVegetarianismHope
  •  242
    Liturgical Philosophy of Religion: An Untimely Manifesto on Sincerity, Acceptance, and Hope
    In M. David Eckel, Allen Speight & Troy DuJardin (eds.), The Future of the Philosophy of Religion, Springer. pp. 73-94. 2021.
    This loosely-argued manifesto contains some suggestions regarding what the philosophy of religion might become in the 21st century. It was written for a brainstorming workshop over a decade ago, and some of the recommendations and predictions it contains have already been partly actualized (that’s why it is now a bit "untimely"). The goal is to sketch three aspects of a salutary “liturgical turn” in philosophy of religion. (Note: “liturgy” here refers very broadly to communal religious service…Read more
    This loosely-argued manifesto contains some suggestions regarding what the philosophy of religion might become in the 21st century. It was written for a brainstorming workshop over a decade ago, and some of the recommendations and predictions it contains have already been partly actualized (that’s why it is now a bit "untimely"). The goal is to sketch three aspects of a salutary “liturgical turn” in philosophy of religion. (Note: “liturgy” here refers very broadly to communal religious service and experience generally, not anything specifically “high church.”) The first involves the attitudes that characterize what I call the “liturgical stance" towards various doctrines. The second focuses on the “vested” propositional objects of those attitudes. The third looks at how those doctrines are represented, evoked, and embodied in liturgical contexts. My untimely rallying-cry is that younger philosophers of religion might do well to set aside debates regarding knowledge and justified belief, just as their elders set aside debates regarding religious language. When we set aside knowledge in this way, we make room for discussions of faith that in turn shed light on neglected but philosophically-interesting aspects of lived religious practice.
    Atheism and Agnosticism, MiscReligious SkepticismEthics of BeliefFaithAuthenticityHope
  •  17
    Kant's Theory of Knowledge: An Analytical Introduction (review)
    Philosophical Review 116 (2): 307-309. 2007.
    Kant: Cognition and Knowledge
  •  39
    The Many Faces of Transcendental Realism: Willaschek on Kant’s Dialectic
    Kantian Review 25 (2): 279-293. 2020.
    After providing a brief overview of Marcus Willaschek's Kant on the Sources of Metaphysics, I critically reconstruct his account of ‘transcendental realism’ and the role that it plays in the dramatic narrative of the Critique of Pure Reason. I then lay out in detail how Willaschek generates and evaluates various versions of transcendental realism and raise some concerns about each. Next, I look at precisely how Willaschek's Kant thinks we can avoid applying the ‘supreme’ dialectical principle to…Read more
    After providing a brief overview of Marcus Willaschek's Kant on the Sources of Metaphysics, I critically reconstruct his account of ‘transcendental realism’ and the role that it plays in the dramatic narrative of the Critique of Pure Reason. I then lay out in detail how Willaschek generates and evaluates various versions of transcendental realism and raise some concerns about each. Next, I look at precisely how Willaschek's Kant thinks we can avoid applying the ‘supreme’ dialectical principle to the domain of appearances. Finally, I call into question Willaschek's efforts to appropriate the lessons of the Transcendental Dialectic without following Kant into transcendental idealism.
    Kant: MetaphysicsKant: Epistemology
  •  8
    Noble in Reason, Infinite in Faculty: Themes and Variations in Kant's Moral and Religious Philosophy
    Philosophical Review 115 (1): 118-121. 2006.
  •  481
    Fellow Creatures: Our Obligations to the Other Animals, by Christine M. Korsgaard (review)
    Mind 130 (517): 363-373. 2020.
    A review of "Fellow Creatures: Our Obligations to the Other Animals," by Christine M. Korsgaard. New York: Oxford, 2018. Pp. 271.
    Kant: Ethics, MiscAnimal RightsMoral Status of AnimalsKant: Formula of HumanityAnimal Well-Being
  •  223
    Can't Kant Cognize His Empirical Self? Or, a Problem for (almost) Every Interpretation of the Refutation of Idealism
    In Anil Gomes & Andrew Stephenson (eds.), Kant and the Philosophy of Mind: Perception, Reason, and the Self, Oxford University Press. pp. 138-158. 2017.
    Kant seems to think of our own mental states or representations as the primary objects of inner sense. But does he think that these states also inhere in something? And, if so, is that something an empirical substance that is also cognized in inner sense? This chapter provides textual and philosophical grounds for thinking that, although Kant may agree with Hume that the self is not ‘given’ in inner sense exactly, he does think of the self as cognized through inner sense. It is also argued that …Read more
    Kant seems to think of our own mental states or representations as the primary objects of inner sense. But does he think that these states also inhere in something? And, if so, is that something an empirical substance that is also cognized in inner sense? This chapter provides textual and philosophical grounds for thinking that, although Kant may agree with Hume that the self is not ‘given’ in inner sense exactly, he does think of the self as cognized through inner sense. It is also argued that he both does and ought to regard this self as an empirical substance in which our changing representations inhere. In the second part of the chapter it is suggested that this poses a significant problem for most of the leading interpretations of Kant’s anti-sceptical argument in the Refutation of Idealism.
    Kant: The SelfKant: SkepticismKant: Cognition and KnowledgeKant: Apperception and Self-ConsciousnessRead more
    Kant: The SelfKant: SkepticismKant: Cognition and KnowledgeKant: Apperception and Self-ConsciousnessKant: Metaphysics, Misc
  •  582
    Noumenal Ignorance: Why, For Kant, Can't We Know Things in Themselves?
    with Alejandro Naranjo Sandoval
    In Matthew Altman (ed.), The Palgrave Companion to Kant, Palgrave Macmillan Uk. pp. 91-116. 2017.
    In this paper we look at a few of the most prominent ways of articulating Kant’s critical argument for Noumenal Ignorance — i.e., the claim that we cannot cognize or have knowledge of any substantive, synthetic truths about things-in-themselves — and then provide two different accounts of our own.
    Kant: Cognition and KnowledgeKant: The Critique of Traditional MetaphysicsKant: Transcendental Ideal…Read more
    Kant: Cognition and KnowledgeKant: The Critique of Traditional MetaphysicsKant: Transcendental IdealismKant: The Synthetic A Priori
  •  203
    On Bitcoin Kings and Public Philosophers (in honor of Onora O'Neill)
    This is a talk given in honor of O'Neill at the Pacific APA when she won the Berggruen Prize in 2018.
    Business Ethics and Public PolicyKant: Ethics, MiscDeontological Moral Theories, Misc
  •  496
    Religious Dietary Practices and Secular Food Ethics; or, How to Hope that Your Food Choices Make a Difference Even When You Reasonably Believe That They Don't
    In Mark Budolfson, Anne Barnhill & Tyler Doggett (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Food Ethics, Oxford University Press. 2018.
    Religious dietary practices foster a sense of communal identity, certainly, but traditionally they are also regarded as pleasing to God (or the gods, or the ancestors) and spiritually beneficial. In other words, for many religious people, the effects of fasting go well beyond what is immediately observed or empirically measurable, and that is a large part of what motivates participation in the practice. The goal of this chapter is to develop that religious way of thinking into a response to a mo…Read more
    Religious dietary practices foster a sense of communal identity, certainly, but traditionally they are also regarded as pleasing to God (or the gods, or the ancestors) and spiritually beneficial. In other words, for many religious people, the effects of fasting go well beyond what is immediately observed or empirically measurable, and that is a large part of what motivates participation in the practice. The goal of this chapter is to develop that religious way of thinking into a response to a motivational problem that arises from our awareness of the insensitivity of contemporary food supply chains. If someone can have faith, or at least tenacious hope, that the significance of her food choices goes well beyond what is immediately observed or empirically measurable, then she may be less demoralized by the apparent inefficacy of those choices. The chapter concludes by considering a way in which this broadly religious way of thinking might be available to secular people as well.
    Philosophy of Religion, MiscFood LawFood Ethics, MiscReligious Topics, MiscVegetarianism
  •  237
    Can We Really Vote with our Forks? Opportunism and the Threshold Chicken
    In Andrew Chignell, Matthew C. Halteman & Terence Cuneo (eds.), Philosophy Comes to Dinner, Routledge. pp. 182-202. 2016.
    VegetarianismThe Scope of ConsequentialismApplied Ethics, Misc
  •  240
    Kant's theory of causation and its eighteenth-century German background
    with Derk Pereboom
    Philosophical Review 119 (4): 565-591. 2010.
    This critical notice highlights the important contributions that Eric Watkins's writings have made to our understanding of theories about causation developed in eighteenth-century German philosophy and by Kant in particular. Watkins provides a convincing argument that central to Kant's theory of causation is the notion of a real ground or causal power that is non-Humean (since it doesn't reduce to regularities or counterfactual dependencies among events or states) and non-Leibnizean because it d…Read more
    This critical notice highlights the important contributions that Eric Watkins's writings have made to our understanding of theories about causation developed in eighteenth-century German philosophy and by Kant in particular. Watkins provides a convincing argument that central to Kant's theory of causation is the notion of a real ground or causal power that is non-Humean (since it doesn't reduce to regularities or counterfactual dependencies among events or states) and non-Leibnizean because it doesn't reduce to logical or conceptual relations. However, we raise questions about Watkins's more specific claims that Kant completely rejects a model on which the first relatum of a phenomenal causal relation is an event and that he maintains that real grounds are metaphysically and not just epistemically indeterminate.
    Kant: CausationTheories of CausationKant: Metaphysics and Epistemology, Misc
  •  3228
    Religion and the Sublime
    with Matthew C. Halteman
    In Timothy M. Costelloe (ed.), The Sublime: From Antiquity to the Present, Cambridge University Press. pp. 183-202. 2012.
    Warning: includes two somewhat graphic images. This paper is an effort to lay out a taxomony of conceptual relations between the domains of the sublime and the religious.
    Edmund BurkeKant: The SublimeThe SublimeKant: Philosophy of Religion, MiscPhilosophy of Religion
  •  14
    Evil: A History (Oxford Philosophical Concepts) (edited book)
    Oxford University Press. 2019.
    Thirteen original essays examine the conceptual history of evil in the west: from ancient Hebrew literature and Greek drama to Darwinism and Holocaust theory. Thirteen reflections contextualize the philosophical developments by looking at evil through the eyes of animals, poets, mystics, witches, librettists, film directors, and tech executives.
  •  90
    Philosophy Comes to Dinner: Arguments on the Ethics of Eating (edited book)
    with Terence Cuneo and Matthew C. Halteman
    Routledge. 2016.
    Everyone is talking about food. Chefs are celebrities. "Locavore" and "freegan" have earned spots in the dictionary. Popular books and films about food production and consumption are exposing the unintended consequences of the standard American diet. Questions about the principles and values that ought to guide decisions about dinner have become urgent for moral, ecological, and health-related reasons. In _Philosophy Comes to Dinner_, twelve philosophers—some leading voices, some inspiring new o…Read more
    Everyone is talking about food. Chefs are celebrities. "Locavore" and "freegan" have earned spots in the dictionary. Popular books and films about food production and consumption are exposing the unintended consequences of the standard American diet. Questions about the principles and values that ought to guide decisions about dinner have become urgent for moral, ecological, and health-related reasons. In _Philosophy Comes to Dinner_, twelve philosophers—some leading voices, some inspiring new ones—join the conversation, and consider issues ranging from the sustainability of modern agriculture, to consumer complicity in animal exploitation, to the pros and cons of alternative diets.
    VegetarianismSustainabilityPhilosophy of Gender, MiscAnimal RightsEnvironmental Ethics, MiscNormativ…Read more
    VegetarianismSustainabilityPhilosophy of Gender, MiscAnimal RightsEnvironmental Ethics, MiscNormative Ethics, MiscMoral Status of Animals
  •  368
    Ulrich Lehner, Kants Vorsehungskonzept auf dem Hintergrund der deutschen Schulphilosophie und -theologie , pp. 532 + ix, $139 (review)
    Journal of the Philosophy of History 6 (1): 143-147. 2012.
    A review of Ulrich Lehner's recent book on Kant's philosophy of history.
    Philosophy of HistoryKant: Philosophy of HistoryKant: AnthropologyKant: Philosophy of Religion, MiscRead more
    Philosophy of HistoryKant: Philosophy of HistoryKant: AnthropologyKant: Philosophy of Religion, MiscKant: Teleology, MiscKant: Rational Theology
  •  33
    Kant's Modal Metaphysics, by Nicholas Stang (review)
    Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 16. 2016.
    A review of Nicholas Stang's 2016 book, Kant's Modal Metaphysics
    Kant's Works in Pre-Critical PhilosophyKant: ModalityKant: Transcendental Idealism
  •  114
    God and the Ethics of Belief: New Essays in Philosophy of Religion (Festschrift for Nicholas Wolterstorff) (edited book)
    with Andrew Dole
    Cambridge University Press. 2005.
    Philosophy of religion in the Anglo-American tradition experienced a 'rebirth' following the 1955 publication of New Essays in Philosophical Theology (eds. Antony Flew and Alisdair MacIntyre). Fifty years later, this volume of New Essays offers a sampling of the best work in what is now a very active field, written by some of its most prominent members. A substantial introduction sketches the developments of the last half-century, while also describing the 'ethics of belief' debate in epistemolo…Read more
    Philosophy of religion in the Anglo-American tradition experienced a 'rebirth' following the 1955 publication of New Essays in Philosophical Theology (eds. Antony Flew and Alisdair MacIntyre). Fifty years later, this volume of New Essays offers a sampling of the best work in what is now a very active field, written by some of its most prominent members. A substantial introduction sketches the developments of the last half-century, while also describing the 'ethics of belief' debate in epistemology and showing how it connects to explicitly religious concerns and to the topics of the individual contributions. The book is a Festschrift for Nicholas P. Wolterstorff, edited by two of his former students.
    Ethics and ReligionPhilosophy of Religion, MiscEthics of BeliefEpistemology of Religion
  •  723
    Review: Saving God from Saving God (review)
    with Dean Zimmerman
    Books and Culture 15 (3). 2012.
    Mark Johnston’s book, Saving God (Princeton University Press, 2010) has two main goals, one negative and the other positive: (1) to eliminate the gods of the major Western monotheisms (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) as candidates for the role of “the Highest One”; (2) to introduce the real Highest One, a panentheistic deity worthy of devotion and capable of extending to us the grace needed to transform us from inwardly-turned sinners to practitioners of agape. In this review, we argue that Jo…Read more
    Mark Johnston’s book, Saving God (Princeton University Press, 2010) has two main goals, one negative and the other positive: (1) to eliminate the gods of the major Western monotheisms (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) as candidates for the role of “the Highest One”; (2) to introduce the real Highest One, a panentheistic deity worthy of devotion and capable of extending to us the grace needed to transform us from inwardly-turned sinners to practitioners of agape. In this review, we argue that Johnston’s attack on traditional forms of monotheism has less force than his criticism of the “undergraduate atheists” (e.g., Hitchens, Harris, Dawkins); and that his candidate for Highest One is not the greatest possible being, and so could not play the role Johnston casts for it.
    PantheismDivine Attributes, MiscPhilosophy of Religion, MiscPanentheism
  •  371
    The Devil, The Virgin, and the Envoy: Symbols of Moral Struggle in Religion II.2
    In Otfried Hoeffe (ed.), Klassiker Auslegen: Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der blossen, Akademie Verlag. 2010.
    Part of a group commentary on Kant's Religion book.
    Philosophy of ReligionKant: Philosophy of ReligionKant: Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reaso…Read more
    Philosophy of ReligionKant: Philosophy of ReligionKant: Religion within the Boundaries of Mere ReasonKant: Ethics, Misc
  •  765
    Modal Motivations for Noumenal Ignorance: Knowledge, Cognition, and Coherence
    Kant Studien 105 (4): 573-597. 2014.
    My goal in this paper is to show that Kant’s prohibition on certain kinds of knowledge of things-in-themselves is motivated less by his anti-soporific encounter with Hume than by his new view of the distinction between “real” and “logical” modality, a view that developed out of his reflection on the rationalist tradition in which he was trained. In brief: at some point in the 1770’s, Kant came to hold that a necessary condition on knowing a proposition is that one be able to prove that all the i…Read more
    My goal in this paper is to show that Kant’s prohibition on certain kinds of knowledge of things-in-themselves is motivated less by his anti-soporific encounter with Hume than by his new view of the distinction between “real” and “logical” modality, a view that developed out of his reflection on the rationalist tradition in which he was trained. In brief: at some point in the 1770’s, Kant came to hold that a necessary condition on knowing a proposition is that one be able to prove that all the items it refers to are either really possible or really impossible. Most propositions about things-in-themselves, in turns out, cannot meet this condition. I conclude by suggesting that the best interpretation of this modal condition is as a kind of coherentist constraint.
    Kant: IntuitionKant: ModalityKant: Cognition and Knowledge
  •  1
    Kant's Ethics of Assent: Knowledge and Belief in the Critical Philosophy
    Dissertation, Yale University. 2004.
    Most accounts of Kant's epistemology focus narrowly on cognition and knowledge . Kant himself, however, thought that there are many other important species of assent : opinion, persuasion, conviction, belief, acceptance, and assent to the deliverances of common sense. ;My goal in this dissertation is to isolate and motivate the principles of rational acceptability which, for Kant, govern each of these kinds of assent, instead of focusing merely on cognition and knowledge. Some of the principles …Read more
    Most accounts of Kant's epistemology focus narrowly on cognition and knowledge . Kant himself, however, thought that there are many other important species of assent : opinion, persuasion, conviction, belief, acceptance, and assent to the deliverances of common sense. ;My goal in this dissertation is to isolate and motivate the principles of rational acceptability which, for Kant, govern each of these kinds of assent, instead of focusing merely on cognition and knowledge. Some of the principles apply in the context of everyday assent-formation; others apply in more specific contexts . ;The project is worthwhile for at least two reasons. First, it highlights issues that are both neglected in the literature and yet crucial for understanding Kant's famous claims about the nature and limits of our epistemic access to appearances and things-in-themselves. ;Second, it lays out Kant's sophisticated and largely plausible account of our intellectual obligations and of the various roles that "subjective" considerations play in our practices of assent-formation. Kant charts a viable middle course between the epistemic abstemiousness of Cliffordian evidentialists and the epistemic excess of Jamesian pragmatists. ;I begin with an overview of Kant's pre-critical epistemology, and then provide a broad survey of the ethics of assent in the critical period, noting in particular the way Kant allows for exceptions to his First Principle---the principle that it is rational to assent to proposition only on the basis of sufficient objective grounds. Having sketched the whole picture, I turn to the principles governing knowledge and use a new account of Kant's concepts of objective and subjective justification to solve a perennial interpretive problem regarding the nature of our epistemic access to material objects. I go on to examine Kant's theory of belief ; my central claim there is that Kant is much more liberal regarding belief about things-in-themselves that is based on theoretical grounds than most commentators think. Finally, I consider a number of objections to my "Liberal" interpretation of Kant's ethics of assent, and conclude with a meditation on Kant's view of enlightenment
    Kant: JustificationKant: Cognition and Knowledge
  •  152
    Descartes on Sensation: A Defense of the Semantic-Causation Model
    Philosophers' Imprint 9 1-22. 2009.
    Descartes's lack of clarity about the causal connections between brain states and mental states has led many commentators to conclude that he has no coherent account of body-mind relations in sensation, or that he was simply confused about the issue. In this paper I develop what I take to be a coherent account that was available to Descartes, and argue that there are both textual and systematic reasons to think that it was his considered view. The account has brain states serving as occasions fo…Read more
    Descartes's lack of clarity about the causal connections between brain states and mental states has led many commentators to conclude that he has no coherent account of body-mind relations in sensation, or that he was simply confused about the issue. In this paper I develop what I take to be a coherent account that was available to Descartes, and argue that there are both textual and systematic reasons to think that it was his considered view. The account has brain states serving as occasions for the mind to produce in itself the sensations that it takes these brain states to signify. The relation between body and mind on this model is thus neither a standard efficient-causal relation, nor an occasionalist one, but rather a semantic-causal relation (i.e. a non-standard efficient causal relation that goes by way of natural signification). At the end of the paper I argue that the model does not undermine Descartes' commitment to the self-transparency of the mind.
    René DescartesSensation and Perception
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