Kant's Organicism

Epigenesis and the Development of Critical Philosophy

Mensch Jennifer

Because it laid the foundation for nearly all subsequent epistemologies, Immanuel Kant's "Critique of Pure Reason" has overshadowed his other interests in natural history and the life sciences, which scholars have long considered as separate from his rigorous theoretical philosophy – until now. In "Kant's Organicism", Jennifer Mensch draws a crucial link between these spheres by showing how the concept of epigenesis – a radical theory of biological formation – lies at the heart of Kant's conception of reason. As Mensch argues, epigenesis was not simply a metaphor for Kant but centrally guided his critical philosophy, especially the relationship between reason and the categories of the understanding. Offsetting a study of Kant's highly technical theory of cognition with a mixture of intellectual history and biography, she situates the epigenesis of reason within broader investigations into theories of generation, genealogy, and classification, and against later writers and thinkers such as Goethe and Darwin. Distilling vast amounts of research on the scientific literature of the time into a concise and readable book, Mensch offers one of the most refreshing looks not only at Kant's famous first "Critique" but at the history of philosophy and the life sciences as well.

About the Author

Jennifer Mensch teaches philosophy and the history of science and medicine at Pennsylvania State University.

Reviews

"Jennifer Mensch's account of how Kant came to understand the thinking of the naturalists over the course of the eighteenth century and relate it to his own quest for a transcendental ground of reason in self-generation is very well wrought. She has made sense of a number of elements that I knew separately but had not seen in this compelling conspectus" – John H. Zammito, Rice University

"In recent years a host of editions, translations, monographs, and articles have introduced Anglo-American readers to a Kant different from the anti-metaphysical epistemologist and rigorous ethicist of earlier scholarship. Kant has emerged as a pragmatic anthropologist, a physical geographer, and a natural historian. Jennifer Mensch's book seeks to unify the two pictures of Kant by tracking the formative background of the 'Critique of Pure Reason' in Kant's own original account of the biological development of individuals and species. Her provocative epigenesist reading challenges the distinction between matters of fact (quid facti) and grounds of validity (quid iuris) in Kant's account of a priori knowledge" – Gunter Zoller, University of Munich and University of Bologna

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