Edward Kwok

Philosophy is a discipline that knows its own knowing, and Kant’s Critique is precisely such an attempt of self-knowledge. However, is such self-knowledge possible within the domains of Kant’s own philosophy? In this paper, I problematize the possibility of this philosophical self-knowledge that methodologically grounds Kant’s critical inquiry into the conditions of possibility of objective knowledge, and show that there is no theoretical resource within Kant’s philosophy that sufficiently justifies this methodological self-knowledge. The aim of this paper is to elucidate a productive tension between the content of Kant’s critical philosophy and its method. By thinking through and taking seriously the methodological problem of self-knowledge, this paper shows that Kant’s Critique not only presents us with a difficulty that deepens our understanding of the nature of self-knowledge, but it is also a point of departure that fruitfully motivates the further developments of Kant’s own thinking and subsequent German philosophies.

In this paper, I argue that Nishida Kitarō’s philosophy provides a new perspective on the nature of philosophy and phenomenology by its radical reflection on the phenomenon of self-awareness. As an active philosopher in the early 20th century, Nishida critically commented on Edmund Husserl’s phenomenology. In what follows, I explicate Nishida’s critique of Husserl regarding the pursuit of the “consciousizing consciousness” and its relationship to the phenomenon of self-awareness. Subsequently I respond to Nishida’s critique on behalf of Husserl and phenomenologists by appealing to the general approach of a non-objectified self-awareness. However, I argue that such responses are insufficient, for Nishida is inquiring into the ground of Husserl’s phenomenological method, that is, how is phenomenological reflection possible? Insofar as phenomenological philosophy is a kind of reflective, rational self-awareness that consciousness has of itself, the phenomenological method itself cannot be based on a pre-reflective self-awareness, and Husserl’s phenomenology still remains vulnerable to Nishida’s critique. In this way, Nishida is performing a transcendental (self-)critique of transcendental phenomenology. The aim of this paper is to (1) explicate Nishida’s critique of Husserl’s phenomenological method, (2) evaluate its validity and (3) allude to how Nishida’s positive views on self-consciousness emerge from the problem of reflective self-awareness in Husserl.

In Prajñā and Reason Nishitani presents a powerful vision of philosophy as Absolute knowing. Nishitani’s conclusions are striking: Absolute knowing can only fulill its potential by beginning without any presuppositions and affirming the truth of contradiction. Because Hegel’s philosophy also purports to be a science of Absolute knowing, in Prajñā and Reason Nishitani develops his own account of the Absolute in conversation with Hegel’s philosophy. We reconstruct Nishitani’s reading and various critiques of Hegel, and thereafter evaluate its merits. Our inquiry shows that Hegel too begins without presuppositions and affirms the truth of contradiction. As a result, we argue that Nishitani’s profound reflections on Absolute knowing draw him into close proximity with Hegel’s thinking and call us to re-think the very being of philosophy and philosophical practice today.