The unity of reason rereading Kant - Neiman, Susan 1955- (Oxford University Press, 1997)
Includes bibliographical references (pages 207-211) and index
The first major study of Kant's account of reason, The Unity of Reason argues that Kant's wide-ranging interests and goals can only be understood by redirecting attention from the epistemological questions in his work to those concerning the nature of reason. Rather than accepting a notion of reason given by his predecessors, a fundamental aim of Kant's philosophy is to reconceive the nature of reason. This enables us to understand Kant's insistence on the unity of theoretical and practical reason as well as his claim that his metaphysics was driven by practical and political ends. Susan Neiman begins by discussing the historical roots of Kant's conception of reason and by showing Kant's solution to problems which earlier conceptions left unresolved. Kant's notion of reason itself is examined through a discussion of all the activities Kant attributes to reason. In separate chapters discussing the role of reason in science, morality, religion, and philosophy, Neiman explores Kant's distinctions between reason and knowledge, and his difficult account of the regulative principles of reason. Through examination of these principles in Kant's major and minor writings, The Unity of Reason provides a fundamentally new perspective on Kant's entire work
Historical sources -- Leibniz and the principle of sufficient reason -- Against skepticism -- Against Spinoza -- Intelligibility -- The process of reasoning -- The heteronomy of rationalism -- Hume's challenge -- Reason in science -- The denial of knowledge -- The inadequacy of understanding -- The ends of science -- Systematic unity -- The means to science -- The teleological account -- The impossibility of knowledge -- Justification -- The primacy of the practical -- The role of moral theory -- The politics of autonomy -- The objects of practical reason -- Moral certainty -- Facts of reason -- The structure of faith -- The pantheism controversy -- Faith and knowledge -- Faith and fanaticism -- The highest good -- What may I hope? -- The task of philosophy -- The urge to metaphysics -- The sure path of a science -- Newton of the mind -- Self-knowledge -- Coming of age