Introduction to Logic (Barnes & Noble Library of Essential Reading)

By Immanuel Kant and Dennis Sweet

Introduction to Logic might just as well be entitled An Introduction to Kants Thought, for it serves as an excellent introduction to Immanuel Kants entire philosophy, a philosophy that is generally overwhelming when approached from any of his other books. To the student and scholar of Kants thought, the Logic can shed new and interesting light on logic, aesthetics, and moral reasoning.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Barnes & Noble
• Release date: Sep 1, 2009
• ISBN: 9781411428850

Immanuel Kant

Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher and is known as one of the foremost thinkers of Enlightenment. He is widely recognized for his contributions to metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, and aesthetics.

Book preview

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

Introduction

TRANSLATOR’S NOTE

SECTION ONE - CONCEPTION OF LOGIC

SECTION TWO - CHIEF DIVISIONS OF LOGIC—TREATMENT—USE OF THIS SCIENCE—SKETCH ...

SECTION THREE - CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY IN GENERAL—PHILOSOPHY CONSIDERED ...

SECTION FOUR - SHORT SKETCH OF A HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY

SECTION FIVE - KNOWLEDGE IN GENERAL—INTUITIVE AND DISCURSIVE ...

SECTION SIX - SPECIAL LOGICAL PERFECTIONS OF COGNITION A.—LOGICAL PERFECTION ...

SECTION SEVEN - B.—LOGICAL PERFECTION OF KNOWLEDGE AS TO ...

SECTION EIGHT - C.—LOGICAL PERFECTION OF KNOWLEDGE AS TO ...

SECTION NINE - D.—LOGICAL PERFECTION OF KNOWLEDGE AS TO ...

SECTION TEN - PROBABILITY—DEFINITION OF PROBABILITY—DISTINCTION BETWEEN ...

APPENDIX - OF THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL KNOWLEDGE

THE MISTAKEN SUBTILTY OF THE FOUR SYLLOGISTIC FIGURES

ENDNOTES

INDEX

SUGGESTED READING

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Introduction and Suggested Reading Copyright © 2005 by Barnes & Noble Publishing, Inc.

Originally published in 1800 (Introduction to Logic) and 1762 (Essay on the Mistaken Subtilty of the Four Figures)

This edition published by Barnes & Noble Publishing, Inc.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher.

Cover design by Stacey May

2005 Barnes & Noble Publishing

ISBN-13: 978-0-7607-7040-5 ISBN-10: 0-7607-7040-9

eISBN : 978-1-411-42885-0

Printed and bound in the United States of America

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INTRODUCTION

WHILE IMMANUEL KANT IS CERTAINLY ONE OF THE MOST original and influential thinkers of the modern period, he is also among the most opaque. This opacity is grounded, in part, in the profundity of his philosophical ideas and, in part, in his less-than-clear presentation. What makes Kant’s Introduction to Logic truly unique in the context of his other works is both the breadth of the subject matter and the clarity of the discussions. This little book might just as well have been entitled An Introduction to Kant’s Thought, for in it he deals with all of the major issues that had concerned him in his more popular works. Yet his presentation here is far less technical and convoluted and thus far more accessible. For the novice it can serve as an excellent introduction to Kant’s entire philosophy, a philosophy that is generally overwhelming when approached from any of his other books. To the student and scholar of Kant’s thought, the Logic can shed new and interesting light on some enduring problems and issues.

Immanuel Kant was born in Königsberg, East Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia), on April 22, 1724, the fourth of nine children. His father, Johann Georg, a harness maker, provided the family a modest material existence while his mother, Anna Regina Reuter, seems to have been the source of the family’s spiritual sustenance through her commitment to Pietism, i.e., a form of Protestantism that emphasized the inner workings of faith and personal commitment over organized religion and doctrine. She was a devotee and acquaintance of F. A. Schultz (1692-1763), a professor at the University of Halle and the chief representative of the Pietist movement. Schultz was also the director of the Collegium Fridericianum, a quality high school modeled on the University of Halle. Thus, perhaps owing to his mother’s connections and persuasions, young Immanuel was admitted to this prestigious institution in 1732, at the age of eight.

In 1740 Kant entered the University of Königsberg as a theological student, but he soon became enamored of mathematics and physics, especially the work of Sir Isaac Newton. To support himself he served as a private tutor from 1746 to 1755. For the next fifteen years he held the position of Privatdocent (lecturer), during which time his popularity as a teacher increased and his research interests expanded. Although Kant had been raised a Pietist, he, like most writers of the mid-eighteenth century, had been educated and indoctrinated in the philosophy of G. W. Leibniz (1646-1716) and that of his student and expositor, Christian Wolff (1679-1754). During the 1760s, however, he became increasingly critical of the dogmatism that characterized the Leibniz-Wolffian approach then prevalent in German universities.

In 1770 Kant was appointed to the chair of logic and metaphysics at the University of Königsberg, and so began the most productive period of his career. His chief works of this period were the Kritik der reinen Vernunft (Critique of Pure Reason, 1781), a treatise that revolutionized metaphysics; Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten (Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals, 1785), one the most important contributions to moral philosophy ever written; the Kritik der praktischen Vernunft (Critique of Practical Reason, 1788), another important source of his ethical views; and the Kritik der Urtheilskraft (Critique of Judgment, 1790), a book on teleological and aesthetic judgments. Kant died on February 12, 1804. According to the accounts of those present at his deathbed, his last words were, Es ist gut—It is good.

The present book comprises two of Kant’s works. The first is the Introduction to Logic. The second is a short essay published in 1762, entitled, Die falsche Spitzfindigkeit der vier syllogistischen Figuren erwiesen (Essay on the Mistaken Subtilty of the Four Figures), in which Kant takes on the long and revered tradition of Aristotelian logic.

Kant’s Introduction to Logic might well be described as the best book in his corpus that he didn’t write, and the most readable book that most Kant students almost never read. That Kant didn’t write the book per se is not to deny him either authorship or ownership of the ideas contained therein. From 1755 through 1796, Kant taught logic at least once a year using Georg Friedrich Meier’s textbook, Auszug aus der Vernunftlehre (Extract from the Theory of Reason, Halle, 1752). Kant presented his textbook to his friend and student, Gottlob Benjamin Jäsche, along with its marginalia and loose-leaf notes, to forge into the present work, which was published in 1800. That the book goes largely unread by students of Kant’s philosophy is truly unfortunate. For it is in fact a treasure trove of ideas and information presented in a much less formal fashion than that of his published works.

The stylistic simplicity of Kant’s Logic has led many scholars to treat the essay with some skepticism with respect to authorship. However, since the work was put together from the lecture notes on Kant’s logic course, it really shouldn’t come as any surprise that it lacks the tedious argumentation and tortuous syntax that typify some of his published works, and that it reflects the straightforward presentation and accessible technique that were said to be characteristics of his lectures. He did, after all, have more than forty years of teaching the material to hone and polish his presentation.

Among the many topics dealt with in this cornucopia of ideas, there are six areas of discussion that are of particular interest. These are: (1) logic; (2) metaphysics and epistemology; (3) (the nature and history of) philosophy; (4) aesthetics; (5) moral reasoning; and what we might call (6) commonsense advice.

1. Logic. Since his essay of 1762, Kant had entertained some peculiar ideas with regard to logic, which were ultimately developed and expressed in the doctrine of elements presentation in the Critique of Pure Reason (and, in fact, in each of the other two Critiques). Since the present volume was largely composed during the development of Kant’s Critical philosophy, it is not surprising to find it reflecting those positions. Logic is understood to be "a canon of the understanding and of reason . . . [containing] nothing but a priori laws, which are necessary, and apply to the understanding universally" (p. 4). He then goes on to distinguish various misapplications of logic: e.g., dialectical (or sophistical), popular and scientific, applied, commonsense and speculative uses, which in each case add contents and thus, distort and destroy its purely formal character. The primary role of logic is to teach the correct use of reason, that is, the use which is consistent with itself. Its purpose is to show us how the understanding ought to proceed in thinking (p. 4).

2. Metaphysic and Epistemology. Besides general logic, Kant’s Logic also provides some interesting insights into his metaphysical and epistemic doctrines. "Transcendental Logic, he tells us, is that in which the object itself is conceived as an object of the understanding alone; whereas general Logic applies to all objects universally" (p. 6). In other words, general logic expresses the necessary laws in terms of which any rational being whatsoever must rationally function. Transcendental logic, on the other hand, expresses the necessary laws in terms of which human beings must experience and rationally function within the world. Section V (pp. 29-36) contains the most straightforward account of the origin of our (human) cognition to be found anywhere in Kant’s writings. What it lacks in depth it makes up for in clarity. Finally in this context is Kant’s interesting account of the seven degrees of knowledge we have of things (pp. 64-65), which moves from the lowest stage, of merely having an idea of a thing, to the highest stage, whereby we "comprehend a thing, that is, to cognize it by the reason, or a priori, in such a degree as is adequate to our purpose" (p. 65).

3. Philosophy. For Kant, philosophy is both a rational knowledge and a skill. Yet, a philosopher is much more than a conceptual technician. To become a philosopher one must exercise himself in making a free use of his reason, not a mere imitative and, so to speak, mechanical use (p. 15). To improve one’s rational skills through, for example, the study of logic, is the scholastic conception of philosophy. To consider the so-called higher questions, such as the purpose of human existence, the nature of reality, etc., is the cosmic conception of philosophy, the one that gives the discipline its dignity. It is only through the unity of these two conceptions that true wisdom is to be obtained. To the question, Can philosophy be learned? Kant, interestingly, gives an emphatic no. The reason it cannot be learned is that "it does not yet exist (p. 19). The history of philosophy is simply the history of the use of reason, and the doctrines and views contained therein are nothing more than objects for the exercise of [one’s] philosophical ability (Ibid.). The true philosopher (i.e., one who knows and teaches Wisdom) must, as an independent thinker, make a free and independent, not a slavishly imitative, use