Kant's anthropology and its method
the epistemic uses of teleology in the natural world and beyond
pp. 186-202
in: Matthew C. Altman (ed), The Palgrave handbook of German idealism, Berlin, Springer, 2014Abstract
Although it is a little known fact beyond the world of Kant scholars, the last book Kant published in his lifetime was titled Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View.1 Moreover, the lecture course that he gave most frequently, from 1772–73 to 1795–96, was dedicated to anthropology. This subject was thus very prominent in his work as a practicing philosopher. And yet until recently, the anthropological part of his corpus has been for the most part overlooked both within and outside Kantian circles. Kant is, of course, better known for his three Critiques, and his Anthropology, together with his more empirical works more generally, has often been thought of as outside of, if not irrelevant to, the Kantian system as such — starting from Schleiermacher's 1799 review that describes it as a "collection of trivialities."2 In the last few years however, this has started to change. A number of commentators have begun to take it into account, first in order to understand or flesh out his critical philosophy, and then for its own sake.3 In this chapter, I will build on these advances and defend the claim that Kant's anthropology inaugurates a new methodological paradigm for the discipline.4 After spelling out some of its specific features, I will explore their implications for its method.
