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Karl Schafer, Kant’s Reason: The Unity of Reason and the Limits of Comprehension in Kant, Oxford University Press, 2023, 288pp., $95.00 (hbk), ISBN 9780192868534.
Reviewed by John Callanan, King’s College London
When Kant wrote the Critique of Pure Reason in 1781, he addressed the question of the status of metaphysics itself. It had fallen into low regard in the previous century or so, struggling to keep up with advances in mathematics and the sciences and easily co-opted for dogmatic or oppressive projects. Kant’s own view was that one had to work harder than one would have liked to distinguish metaphysics from pseudo-science or occultism. As he pointed out, this hadn’t always been the case. Not only had metaphysics previously been regarded as a genuine science but in fact it had been the preeminent one, the ‘queen of the sciences’ (Aviii). Part of Kant’s project in the Critique was a glorious revolution whereby metaphysics was returned to the…
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