Timeline for How would Kant have responded to Darwin's conception of human evolution?
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| Feb 9, 2019 at 7:52 | comment | added | Conifold | I do not think "epigenesis" is similar to Darwinian evolution. He praises Blumenbach, who "rightly declares it to be contrary to reason that raw matter should originally have formed itself in accordance with mechanical laws, that life should have arisen from the nature of the lifeless, and that matter should have been able to assemble itself into the form of a self-preserving purposiveness by itself", and introduces "formative drive" to guide it. That would be Lamarckian evolution, later termed "orthogenesis". | |
| Dec 15, 2015 at 9:29 | comment | added | fileunderwater | Thanks for finding/posting that quote. Didn't know that Kant had such well-developed proto-evolutionary ideas, but nice to add another name to the list of people that probably influenced Darwin. | |
| Jan 4, 2014 at 23:11 | comment | added | Geoffrey | But this doesn't mean that humans aren't special. In fact, at the very end of the Critique, Kant says that there are only three things that are so obviously and absolutely true and yet hidden from scientific observation: the existence of God, the immortality of the soul, and the Freedom of mankind. I'm not sure this has addressed your questions, but I hope it helps you get a better understanding of Kant's writings. (3 of 3) | |
| Jan 4, 2014 at 23:08 | comment | added | Geoffrey | His response to Newton included (very prominently) what it means to be a part of this seemingly mechanical universe as an apparently physical human being. The quote I give is from his section on the teleology of nature (i.e. the "ends" of nature), and what he says is that from human beings (who seem to so clearly be the final ends of nature) all the way down to moss, nature strongly hints at the notion that all life is deeply connected (probably to a common ancestor or "proto-mother"). "And why not?" he says, "Why should humans be any less mechanical than crystals? We obey the same laws." 2/3 | |
| Jan 4, 2014 at 22:56 | comment | added | Geoffrey | Perhaps I am having trouble understanding exactly what your concerns are, but based on what Kant writes in Sec. 63, 80, and 81, I think it is a safe bet that Kant would not only have no trouble buying into Darwinian evolution he would probably also be totally unsurprised by its success. Kant did a lot, but one of his most important contributions was addressing the philosophical ramifications of the apparently mechanistic universe which we were apparently left with in the wake of the tremendous success of Newton's laws of motion and theory of gravitation. (1 of 2) | |
| Jan 4, 2014 at 20:38 | comment | added | patrick | Unless you read into the "analogy of forms" I am not sure if this addresses my concerns. I think his recognition of humans as a special creature squares his thinking on the moral plain, but what are we to say about the human, which is a nexus or unity of experience, when the 'human' has not been able to perceive and intuit as we can now. This quote is certainly on the appropriate subject matter, but I am not sure if its responsive. Admittedly, I have had to read it a dozen times. | |
| Dec 22, 2013 at 0:45 | history | edited | Geoffrey | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Dec 21, 2013 at 8:32 | history | edited | Geoffrey | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Dec 21, 2013 at 6:52 | history | edited | Geoffrey | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Dec 21, 2013 at 5:15 | comment | added | Geoffrey | Thanks! To be fair, though, that link isn't nearly as sketchy as the Chinese website I found that has the entire book available to read in-browser. | |
| Dec 21, 2013 at 5:05 | comment | added | obelia | +1 Nice answer. No harm in posting links. isnature.org/Events/2009/Summer/r/… | |
| Dec 21, 2013 at 2:21 | history | edited | Geoffrey | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Dec 21, 2013 at 2:03 | history | edited | Geoffrey | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Dec 21, 2013 at 1:53 | history | edited | Geoffrey | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Dec 21, 2013 at 1:46 | history | answered | Geoffrey | CC BY-SA 3.0 |