By Jason Rheins
No thinker has had a greater influence on philosophy in the last two centuries than Immanuel Kant, and no work has had a greater impact on philosophy than his Critique of Pure Reason. Therefore, to understand philosophy today, how it arrived at its present position and how it may yet be changed, one must understand Kant's theoretical philosophy.
This course presents the historical context in which Kant developed his metaphysics and epistemology, and explains his most important ideas. Through the analysis of both the content and the methodology of his mature philosophical system, students will become acquainted with the essential elements and spirit of Kant's "critical" philosophy of Transcendental Idealism and will gain a richer appreciation of his profound influence.
Titles of topics include: Hume's Skeptical Influence; The "Copernican Revolution"; Transcendental Idealism; Transcendental Arguments: The Method of the Primacy of Consciousness; The Analytic/Synthetic Dichotomy; A Priori Knowledge; Space and Time; The Categories; Kant v. Rand on the Axioms; Philosophical Trichotomies; and Kant as the "black mirror" to Objectivism.
This course was recorded at the 2007 Objectivist Summer Conference in Telluride, CO.
(MP3 download; 4 hrs., 27 min., with Q & A, 192.85 MB)
