Kant & Post-Kantian German Philosophy Group Talk (Pirachula Chulanon, Toronto Metropolitan)

The Kant & Post-Kantian German Philosophy Research Interest Group welcomes Pirachula Chulanon, an assistant professor of Philosophy at Toronto Metropolitan University. Dr. Chulanon is an expert in early modern philosophy, with a special focus on the work of Immanuel Kant, particularly Kant’s theories of knowledge and mind. A native of Thailand, he received his BA (with distinction) from the Humboldt University of Berlin in 2016 and completed his PhD in Philosophy at the University of Chicago in 2022. A recipient of prestigious research awards from the Mellon Foundation and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), Chulanon’s work concerns the origins and limits of our understanding of our own humanity and rationality. He pairs this with research and teaching interests in ethics and aesthetics, especially theories of art in the German-speaking tradition after Kant.

Talk Title

Kant, Faculties, and Cartesian scientia

Talk Abstract

Where does Critical philosophy belong within Kant’s hierarchy of cognition? Kant’s answer is that it belongs to a higher sort of cognition he calls “rational cognition” or “cognition from principles.” I propose that we can appreciate the significance of Kant’s characterization of critical philosophy as cognition from principles by situating it within the Cartesian tradition which conceives of philosophical knowledge as the basis for perfect knowledge or scientia. I argue that the “principles” of the critique—the faculties of the mind themselves—play a role analogous to that of the Cartesian “foundations of knowledge,” that is, the metaphysical underpinnings of knowledge. The latter explains why something is so if I clearly and distinctly perceive that it is so. Similarly, mental faculties, for Kant as I read him, explain why the object instantiates a certain structural feature if I necessarily represent it as having that feature. This explanation-oriented reading offers a more compelling way to construe the role of faculties in the Kantian critique than the faculties-first or reflectivist interpretation, according to which faculties are the epistemological starting point, that is, that through which we achieve all the cognition in the critique.

For questions or to register, please contact Ethan Millar-Virkutis.

The Kant & Post-Kantian German Idealism Group is a a subgroup of the History of Philosophy Research Group, which focuses on European philosophy in Kant and post-Kantian traditions.